*Updated June 5 Los Angeles voters decisively defeated a parcel tax that would have sent $500 million a year to schools, according to unofficial results by the county registrar. Measure EE, which would have charged residents within L.A. Unified boundaries 16 cents per square foot of developed property for 12 years, fell more than 20...

This article is from The 74’s ongoing ‘Big Picture’ series, bringing American education into sharper focus through new research and data. Go Deeper: See the full series. Over the past few years, education researchers have coalesced around a striking, if somewhat unpalatable, observation: Kids learn more from teachers of their own race. A decade of studies from...

What started as a package of four bills tamping down on charter schools in California quickly became two this week, as legislation in the Assembly and the Senate that looked to cap the schools in one chamber and place a moratorium on their future growth in the other were both withdrawn. The demise of Assembly...

*Updated June 3 If L.A. Unified’s proposed $500 million annual parcel tax passes Tuesday, it would be uncharted territory for the country’s second-largest school district. L.A. Unified has never had a parcel tax. They aren’t commonplace, with about 9 percent of school districts — most clustered in the Bay Area — passing or renewing parcel...

L.A. Unified’s schools chief has a new plan to simplify the sprawling urban district’s complex system. A little more than a year into his tenure, Superintendent Austin Beutner is betting that by empowering principals he can turn “the organization upside down in a certain way” that puts students at the center. Under the new plan,...

L.A. Unified’s proposed $500 million annual parcel tax is unlikely to pass next week if low voter turnout trends continue, a new independent poll finds. The poll, conducted by Probolsky Research, shows that if June 4’s special election sees “high” turnout, or 17 percent of the district’s 2.5 million eligible voters, the parcel tax could be on the...

The biggest statewide battle over charter schools in the country is coming to a head in California. Amid competing protests in Sacramento on Wednesday, the California Assembly narrowly passed legislation that would give local school districts sole authority to approve new charter schools. The bill, titled AB 1505, is one of several new measures the...

Brown v. Board of Education has been called the Supreme Court’s finest hour, and it is perhaps the most critical single event in the history of American education. In a unanimous ruling, the Supreme Court swept aside more than a half-century of legal segregation, paved the way for the groundbreaking civil rights legislation of the 1960s...

Following his proposal Friday to limit charter schools, Sen. Bernie Sanders over the weekend released perhaps the most substantive K-12 platform of any of the major presidential candidates. It touches nearly every area of K-12 policy, from protections for LGBT students to teacher pay to special education, but perhaps what sticks out most of all...

Heated political debates that center on marginalized communities can lead to negative consequences for students, according to a new study that found an uptick in anti-LGBTQ bullying at California schools during a statewide push to ban same-sex marriage. The study, published in the journal Pediatrics, suggests that high-profile debates involving marginalized groups can lead bullies to...