Like most states, California's school budgets are under extreme pressure. Teachers are bearing the brunt of rising healthcare and retirement costs, while infrastructure is failing without sufficient funds to make necessary repairs. Putting a dent in what schools are paying to settle liability claims would help keep dollars focused where they should be – in providing quality education for our children.  But what is the true impact of those claims?

The purpose of most actuarial methods is to estimate ultimate losses, or total losses, for a particular accident period. Once an estimate of the ultimate losses is determined, outstanding losses or required reserves are easily calculated by subtracting the paid losses from these total losses.