Mónica García carried a little green alien with her as she took her seat after being inaugurated for a fourth term on the LA Unified school board. “It’s a little alien named ‘Z’ from my niece Maya, and it’s supposed to spread love and harmony and peace and calm,” Garcia said. (And it’s a social-emotional...

The new members of the LA Unified school board were inducted Thursday, and the board’s first votes — on who would be their leader — broke along expected lines. The pro-reform majority exercised its muscle, voting 4-3 to elect as their president Ref Rodriguez, the co-founder one of LA’s largest charter school organizations. But immediately...

* UPDATED When the new board is inducted on Thursday, it will kick off the longest period of time that all seven board members will be working together — a full three and a half years — in the entire 164-year history of the largest school district in the country that has an elected board. But...

LA Unified’s charter school oversight division has confirmed it will look into complaints about three independent charter high schools made by a parent whose daughter attends one of the schools and who ran for school board this spring. The charter division confirmed Tuesday that staff is looking into the complaints and will report back to...

A realignment of Title I money being proposed at LA Unified could end up hurting some of the district’s most successful schools, many in low-income areas. The school board is discussing funneling more of the federal funding to schools with the highest poverty rates. The plan to reshuffle the federal money was proposed by two...

In an effort to stave off a pending budget deficit, the LA Unified school board agreed Tuesday to reassign 943 classified employees, laying off 114 of them. These reduction-in-force notices are in addition to 115 administrative layoffs that are expected to be finalized by the end of the month. The latest RIF notices include accounting, financial...

Only eight people showed up at one of the last chances for parents and educators to give input on the state’s overall school plan that they need to submit in order to get about $80 billion from the federal government. Their top concerns for the state as it formulates its Every Student Succeeds Act plan were...

* UPDATED LA Unified is going to get its first phase of a unified enrollment system, but board members held up authorizing the cash for it until they added a stipulation that specifically excludes independent charter schools for at least two years. After a long and animated discussion at Tuesday’s meeting, the board — which...

In a surprise move during Tuesday’s closed session, LA Unified Superintendent Michelle King had her contract extended through June 30, 2020, even though her contract wasn’t up for renewal until next year. The lone dissent came from board member Mónica García who objected because it didn’t give the new pro-reform majority a chance to review...

State education officials have solicited meetings all month to work out a plan to let the federal education department know how they will help low-achieving students. Some community education leaders said they think the state still has a long way to go. Two meetings will be held this week in Los Angeles, and two more will...