Editorial: California should restore the trigger allowing parents to force change at low-performing schools An editorial challenges the arguments that LA Unified has had against the parent takeover of the failing 20th Street Elementary School. The editorial muses: “Had the parents been hard-nosed from the start, they’d have transformed the school by now.” Los Angeles...

Rising concussion numbers have spurred LA Unified to examine how to better monitor head injuries and ensure the safety of student athletes. “I love football,” said board member Richard Vladovic, who noted that this week the NFL for the first time recognized a link between football and brain disorders. “But I’m very concerned about long-term effects on...

By Nick Melvoin Last week’s Los Angeles Unified School Board meeting was a political circus. Scores of parents, students and advocates in a packed boardroom vied for a chance to speak as the board debated their futures in real time. And while the politics may interest an arm-chair social scientist—“everyone is in such a bunkered...

Are charter schools suspending too many students? In the 2011-12 school year, charter schools nationwide had an average out-of-school suspension rate of 7.8 percent, as opposed to 6.7 percent in traditional public schools, meaning the rate in charter schools was 16 percent higher. However, the data is a few years old, and much has changed...

The California Charter Schools Association handed out nine Hart Vision Awards Tuesday at the 23rd Annual California Charter Schools Conference, and five of them were given to schools or leaders from the Los Angeles area. Among the winners at the event, which is taking place Monday through Thursday at the Long Beach Convention Center, was The CHIME Institute for Charter...

About 100 parents from 20th Street Elementary School met Tuesday night in the auditorium with more than a dozen school administrators after the district denied a “parent trigger” that would allow them to make sweeping changes to the school. Some of the parents were still unhappy, however. “It was like a big cheerleading session,” said parent...

Monica Ratliff files to run for Fuentes’ City Council seat in the Valley Ratliff, a grade school teacher who scored a significant upset in the 2013 election, filed initial paperwork Monday to run for the San Fernando Valley seat being vacated by Los Angeles City Councilman Felipe Fuentes. Los Angeles Times, by David Zahniser and...

The two schools with 1,850 students that were relocated due to a methane gas leak in Porter Ranch probably won’t be moved back to their locations before the end of the school year. Although the district continues to weigh options about returning the students back to their schools, there are no plans to move the...

LA Unified has so many different kinds of schools, it’s hard to keep them all straight. With such varied terms as affiliated charter, independent charter, magnet school, pilot school, continuation school, option school and others, it can be a challenge to understand what they are, what they offer and how they differ.  This is the first part...

Last week officials shut off water taps at 30 schools in Newark, N.J., after lead levels were found to exceed federal standards. Lead from aging pipes created a water crisis in Flint, Mich., in January and may do so next in cities in Ohio and Mississippi. So what about LA? “Yes, our water is safe,...