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...

Mike Antonucci’s Union Report appears weekly at LA School Report. Leaders of United Teachers Los Angeles continued their preparations for a strike by approving the transfer of up to $3 million from the union’s strike fund to its general fund in order to be ready for immediate use. The first mediation session is scheduled for Sept. 27,...

With talks between United Teachers Los Angeles and LAUSD at a tense impasse and teachers voting overwhelmingly to authorize a strike, there’s one group caught in the middle that’s largely been left out of the discussion: L.A.’s kids. A strike would have a dramatic impact on the kids and families of Los Angeles, where 84...

Mike Antonucci’s Union Report appears weekly at LA School Report. Employees who work for the California Teachers Association claim union managers are trying to renege on an agreement in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s Janus ruling, which ended the practice of unions charging agency fees to represent non-members. With teachers now free to withhold payments,...

An open letter from Katie Braude, executive director of Speak UP, to President Mónica García, Vice President Nick Melvoin, and members of the board: I am writing to share the collective dismay of parents and community members who attended the board meeting on Tuesday, Aug. 21. In particular, I am writing on behalf of the...

Mike Antonucci’s Union Report appears weekly at LA School Report. I’m on the record as predicting United Teachers Los Angeles will go on strike the week of October 8th. Two things have since become clear: 1) Los Angeles Unified School District Superintendent Austin Beutner is actively trying to delay the inevitable. 2) UTLA is irate about Beutner messing...

Mike Antonucci’s Union Report appears weekly at LA School Report. I have covered California’s teacher unions for about 25 years, so my archive is filled with many tales of humor and woe regarding their doings. As I dug through the files I came across seven sagas that have faded over time and deserve one more revival. Do...