Responding to a barrage of requests from district superintendents around the state, including a recent appeal from LA Unified Superintendent Ramon Cortines, state education officials will consider a delay in using the results of the 2014-15 Smarter Balanced computerized test as means of measuring academic growth next year. “This will be a public discussion beginning...

The teachers union, UTLA, and LA Unified officials will be back at it today, for the last contract negotiations of the year. The final bargaining session has no set agenda, but Vivian Ekchian, the district’s Chief Labor Negotiator, told LA School Report salary discussions are likely to be front and center. To that end, the...

In a sudden reversal for LA Unified, Superintendent Ramon Cortines is asking the state to ignore the district’s Smarter Balanced testing results as a measure of academic growth or improvement next year. In a letter to the State Schools Chief, Tom Torlakson on Friday, Cortines wrote, “I have determined that it would be untimely to have...

The LA Unified school board got a first look at the district’s financial future, and what members saw wasn’t pretty. Yet, it wasn’t ugly enough to stop the board from approving millions of dollars in new expenditures. Like a town crier, Superintendent Ramon Cortines has been warning anyone willing to listen that the district is...

* UPDATED There’s another LA Unified School Board meeting tomorrow, which means there’s another round of requests for boat loads of money. The board will consider a a $12.1 million MiSiS bailout to pay for overtime costs, additional training and staffing, third party oversight and general customer support. The money will be siphoned from bond construction...

If the LA Unified School Board tomorrow approves another $13 million in bond money for digital devices for Smarter Balanced exams next spring, school principals are likely to get a choice of Apple iPads or Google Chromebooks. Chromebooks are about $100 cheaper, and some principals may prefer them. But there’s one problem: Even as Superintendent Ramon...

* UPDATED Now that the list of eligible candidates for the LA Unified School Board’s four open seats in 2015 is finalizing, the district’s powerful unions are starting to choose which ones they’ll back and throw their considerable resources behind. The first endorsement came today: The union representing school cafeteria workers, custodians, special education assistants, and...

The deadline for would-be LA Unfied school board candidates to submit nominating petitions passed yesterday, and so far, the City Clerk’s office has qualified nine for the four open seats in 2015. As of today, all of the incumbents are officially in the running — Board President Richard Vladovic, George McKenna, Bennett Kayser, and Tamar Galatzan....

While LA Unified officials yesterday dealt with the FBI probe into the district’s controversial iPad program, the school board approved a wave of new instructional hires and promotions despite an on-going hiring freeze. The personnel changes continue a shake-up at the highest levels of the organizational chart that began when Superintendent Ramon Cortines arrived just over...