The LA Unified’s Office of Inspector General told a school board committee this week that it needs an additional $570,000 to audit charter schools, according to a recent report. The OIG once had a staff of 83 and is now down to 57, according to Inspector General Ken Bramlett, whose office oversees a $7.6 million budget....

After 90 minutes of contentious debate, the LAUSD school board agreed on a list of desired characteristics for the superintendent candidates they will begin interviewing. The discussion ran the gamut from the definition of the word “bold” to whether the members wanted someone with experience in an “urban environment.” Ultimately, the one-page list of desired...

An LAUSD budget committee discussing the unlikely possibility of establishing an all-charter school district today found merit nonetheless in seeking waivers from state rules that grant charters a greater degree of autonomy than traditional schools have. Mónica Ratliff, chair of the Budget, Facilities and Audit Committee, said that it didn’t seem fair that the charter...

The LAUSD school board plans a meeting tomorrow afternoon to set the guidelines for a Leadership Profile that the board will us in picking the next school superintendent. The meeting was called last week after the search firm of Hazard, Young, Attea & Associates presented its compilation of input from community forums, private interviews and surveys....

Spending cuts. Layoffs. Early retirement packages. Reductions in benefits. These needs, which were among recommendations made by LA Unified’s independent Financial Review Panel on Tuesday, are the kind that would make any union leader lose sleep. But three full days since the doom and gloom report was presented at the LA Unified school board meeting, with recommendations that...

The LA Unified School Board convened at 10 a.m. and didn’t adjourn until more than 12 hours later yesterday, in a series of meetings that ran the gamut from moving forward on finding a new superintendent, to confronting ugly budget realities to diving into the minutiae of charter school applications. For background information, each member...

An independent Financial Review Panel yesterday detailed drastic measures that LA Unified must take to remain afloat in what school board President Steve Zimmer calls a “perfect storm” of financial trouble for the district. “There’s a fiscal cliff that is immediate if different decisions are not made,” warned Bill Lockyer, the former California attorney general and...

The LA Unified school board is scheduled to meet today at 1 p.m. Among the items up for discussion is an analysis of a district finances conducted by non-district analysts and a number of proposals involving charter schools. Before a closed session scheduled to start at 10 a.m., the board will receive a detailed report on community input for the superintendent search. Click...

LA Unified school board member Scott Schmerelson is bringing a resolution before the board today, asking it to go on record opposing a plan by the Broad Foundation to add 260 new charter schools to the district over the next eight years. The plan has drawn rebuke from other board members and the LA teachers union,...

The Los Angeles Times today listed former LA Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa as having a “medium chance” of becoming a finalist for the job of next superintendent of LA Unified. As the district’s search moves into a phase for identifying potential finalists, the story features a list of 43 possible candidates, based on what it called “interviews...