UPDATED at 10:55 pm With mail-in ballots and more than three-quarters of the precincts counted, George McKenna had expanded his lead over Alex Johnson — 13,041 votes to 11,827 — for the open LA Unified District 1 board seat. The early totals included 17,483 mail-in ballots as well as results from 247 of the district’s 324 precincts...

Eight months after being yanked off campus, long-time choir director Iris Stevenson returned to Crenshaw High School today. Stevenson, who’s led an award-winning music program at the school for nearly three decades, was pulled from teaching last December and reassigned to report to work at district offices — a sort of purgatory for educators under...

The vacuum is ending today, as polls remain open until 8 p.m. for District 1 voters to select a school board member. It’s been vacant since the death of Marguerite LaMotte in December, and now, either George McKenna or Alex Johnson is going to succeed her. McKenna won the June primary by 20 percentage points,...

School starts again today. Another year of hoped for higher graduation rates, lower dropout rates, higher academic achievement, lower temperatures between district and teacher union officials negotiating a new bargaining agreement. So what’s really new this year in LA Unified? 1. More digital devices are coming. They’re not going to be all iPads. Thanks to...

* UPDATED As LA Unified students begin their first day of school tomorrow, district officials will be out in force, welcoming them. Superintendent John Deasy has a full schedule over two days, with plans to greet principals and to tour schools that are under construction. Planning to visit nearly a dozen campuses tomorrow and Wednesday,...

George McKenna and Alex Johnson appeared yesterday in the KNBC Sunday talk show, “News Conference,” and it was as close to a debate as the candidates for LA Unified’s District 1 board seat have had since the June 3 primary propelled them into tomorrow’s runoff. McKenna had the advantage in time, appearing for 8 minutes, 45...

In a deal with UTLA, the teachers union, LA Unified said late today it will provide $10,000 stipends that pay for mentor teachers to help instructors at 37 highly-challenged schools. The mentors qualify for funding over the next three school years at campuses included in the Reed case court settlement. The goal is to reduce high...