Students teaching students in new world of Common Core math Four years into teaching Common Core-based math in elementary schools, Downey Unified is betting that its collaborative approach will serve its students. KPCC Toxic turf? Movement grows against synthetic turf Artificial turf fields, cushioned with recycled crushed tires and increasingly in demand for US athletic...

* UPDATED UTLA  members overwhelmingly approved a tentative contract with LA Unified that will lead to 10.4 percent raise for teachers over two years. The school board is expected to rubber stamp the new deal at its next board meeting, on Tuesday. Eighty three percent of union members — 25,300 people — participated in the...

Millennials may be the first generation born and raised in the digital age, but the state of California has a long way to go in catching up to modern times in providing the state’s minority students with a proper education in computer science, according to a new report. “Path Not Found: Disparities in Computer Science...

By Jenna Chandler Moms who turned out last week to hear vaccine critic Andrew Wakefield speak in Dana Point said the debate over whether to inoculate their children has become so divisive it’s severing friendships. “The ‘V’ word, man, it’s a hot topic,” said Dotty “Sunshine” Hagmier, founder of local moms group Moms In Charge....

What schools must learn from LA’s iPad debacle When LA schools began handing out iPads in the fall of 2013, it looked like one of the country’s most ambitious rollouts of technology in the classroom. Wired LA rents are so high the school district is building apartments for teachers The LAUSD notes that annual median...

A state audit of Magnolia Public Schools, a charter network operating in LA Unified, has found that the group’s financial controls need improvement but that the district acted too hastily in its attempts to close three of the chain’s eight campuses. The report, issued today, brings to a close a long running episode involving Magnolia’s parent...

Continuing a stream of major academic wins for LA Unified schools, El Camino Real Charter High School this week won the 2015 national U.S. Academic Decathlon Online competition. The news follows last month’s victory by Granada Hills Charter High students in the 2015 U.S. Academic Decathlon championship. It’s the fifth year in a row that LA...

As LA Unified awaits millions more dollars from Governor Jerry Brown‘s revised budget, district officials are beginning to cobble together a spending plan for the next academic year. It’s a task that involves reinvesting in programs that were gutted in the aftermath of the Great Recession. But as advocates for many worthy causes are calling...

By Jill Stewart One of Emilio Pack’s most vivid childhood memories is that of his Cuban immigrant single mom, desperate to hold together her extended family amid the poverty and street violence that gripped their chosen new city, performing illegal dentistry in the bathroom of their crowded Elysian Park home. To young Emilio, it was...

UTLA contract fails to guarantee a single additional teacher in LAUSD LA Unified is not obligated to hire a single teacher to help ease crowded classrooms under the terms of its tentative agreement with UTLA. Los Angeles Daily News LA teacher says wi-fi makes her sick — so she wants it out of every classroom...