I grew up in Sudbury, Massachusetts, zip code 01776, home of the very first town meeting on this continent in 1649. My mother, a Daughter of the American Revolution, and my father, an immigrant from India, attended this town meeting monthly and instilled in me a deep sense of civic responsibility and civic engagement. These...

Ask most adults when their U.S. history textbook stopped. Was it World War II? Maybe Korea? Perhaps it was the Vietnam War, but the last few chapters were rushed as you hurtled towards summer vacation. Then ask most adults what they know about the defining social and political movement of the modern era, the civil...

Mike Antonucci’s Union Report appears weekly at LA School Report. Long before the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Janus v. AFSCME, public employee unions in California anticipated the loss of agency fees. Last year they persuaded the state legislature to pass Assembly Bill 119, which gave unions mandatory access to new employee orientations and required public employers...

Last month, the San Fernando Valley scored two big victories. The Los Angeles Unified School District board approved a petition by Granada Hills Charter (GHC) High School for its charter renewal and the establishment of a K-8 grade school. These developments are important steps toward creating opportunity for parents and their students while establishing a...

Mike Antonucci’s Union Report appears weekly at LA School Report. As expected, three mediation sessions between the Los Angeles Unified School District and United Teachers Los Angeles failed to result in a settlement — or even any movement, apparently — so the state-appointed mediator agreed to move the process forward to its final phase, fact-finding. Each side...

While a strike looms within our nation’s second-largest school district, the business community of Los Angeles urges the Los Angeles Unified School District and United Teachers Los Angeles to resolve their differences in a way that doesn’t put students at risk. As the organized, grassroots voice of the business community in Greater Los Angeles, BizFed works to...

Mike Antonucci’s Union Report appears weekly at LA School Report. If you lost your ranch, I apologize. Back on July 31, I predicted with confidence that United Teachers Los Angeles would strike in October — more specifically, the week of Oct. 8, this week. And while there are still a few days left in the week, and...

Mike Antonucci’s Union Report appears weekly at LA School Report. Representatives from the Los Angeles Unified School District and United Teachers Los Angeles will meet with mediators on Thursday to see if some settlement can be reached in contract negotiations. That’s the textbook description of what will take place. In this instance, mediation is nothing more than...

Mike Antonucci’s Union Report appears weekly at LA School Report. The Los Angeles Unified School District and United Teachers Los Angeles remain far from a settlement of a new collective bargaining agreement. Mediation is set for Sept. 27, but no one seems optimistic that it will have a positive outcome. UTLA members have authorized their leaders to...

Christopher Lund, assistant superintendent of the Long Beach Unified School District, says all school districts have the same questions: How do we close achievement gaps? How do we improve graduation rates? How do we get more students into college and prepare them to graduate from college? The answers are hard work and education policy that...