As the LA Unified school board today prepares to debate fixes to its implementation of college prep graduation requirements, hundreds of people are expected to rally outside the district’s downtown headquarters in favor of the proposal. The rally is scheduled for 4 p.m. to 5:30 p.m., roughly the same time the board is expected to...

Just as LA Unified is planning big cuts to a preschool program, a new report that says California is lagging behind other states in the quality of its early education programs. The annual report, The State of Preschool 2014, was prepared by the National Institute for Early Education Research and focuses on 10 quality preschool standards...

By Chris Megerian  As California staggered through years of budget crises, the state law intended to safeguard funds for public education was no defense against a flood of recessionary red ink. School budgets were cut by billions of dollars, and thousands of teachers were laid off. So it’s an incredible reversal of fortune that the...

How low voter turnout impacts LAUSD schools Over the last 50 years, local election turnout plummeted from a about 50 percent to less than 10 percent of eligible voters. KPCC LAUSD board seat election could determine the fate of charter schools The spending on both sides has turned the tussle in District 5 into a...

Big Picture High School, a charter school attended by mostly troubled teens, will likely be shut down in June after a review by the LA Unified Charter Schools Division reported that it is dissatisfied with the school’s, um, big picture. The school board tomorrow is considering turning down its request to stay in operation. The...

The non-profit group behind the Vergara lawsuit, Students Matter, said its website was hacked over the weekend to display “vulgar and disgusting language.” The website as of this afternoon displayed the message, “We are temporarily Under Construction.” Students Matter sent out information about the hack in its regular newsletter Monday. The statement read: Over the weekend,...

As if winning the City Section wrestling championship at 195 pounds wasn’t enough, an El Camino Real Charter High School senior will have his short film about the emotional and physical stress of the sport screened at no less than the prestigious Cannes Film Festival. Rory McClellan’s film “Pride,” shot during this past wrestling season,...

Tomorrow’s LA Unified School Board meeting is shaping up to be loud and crowded as the seven members take the final step in approving a new contract with the teachers union and consider several plans to fix impending drop in graduation rates. After years of working under an expired contract, UTLA members last week overwhelmingly...

An open letter from four members of the Community Coalition Youth Leaders to the LA Unified school board, which is considering a resolution tomorrow from Mónica García and Steve Zimmer to enhance support for improving the district’s college-ready graduation rate.  Dear Board Members: On behalf of the thousands of students in South Los Angeles, we...

By The Editorial Board It’s much easier for members of the L.A. Unified school board sitting on the dais to pass stringent and unrealistic new standards than it is for teachers on the ground to carry them out. Case in point: the district’s requirement that all students take the full schedule of college-prep courses —...