Alex Caputo-Pearl, the presumptive next president of UTLA,  said today that current president Warren Fletcher made the right decision by expressing a willingness to step aside in the race to lead the second largest teachers union in the nation. “We look forward to the opportunity to expand the base of support behind an approach where...

SEIU Local 99, the service employees union, which represents more than 30,000 cafeteria workers, custodians, bus drivers, special education assistants and other school support staff at LAUSD, has decided not to endorse a candidate for the district’s vacant District 1 Board seat. The local is the largest labor unit within LA Unified that chose not...

Winning endorsement is one thing. Winning financial support is quite another. UTLA, the teachers union, has endorsed three candidates in the June 3 special election to fill LA Unified’s District 1 board seat, all three with ties to the union: Rachel Johnson and Sherlett Hendy-Newbill are teachers, and Hattie McFrazier is a former teacher. The...

Via the Los Angeles Times |  By Howard Blume Los Angeles teachers’ union president Warren Fletcher said he will no longer actively campaign for reelection, clearing the path for challenger Alex Caputo-Pearl to become the next leader of United Teachers Los Angeles. In the first round of voting in March, Caputo-Pearl received 48% of the...

LA Unified officials had no additional information by mid-day on the fate of 19 students from 16 LAUSD high schools who were on the bus involved in a fatal crash yesterday, heading to Humboldt State University. Superintendent John Deasy met with reporters at a noon press conference but couldn’t offer much beyond reports of earlier in...

In his first State of the City speech, Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti laid out a plan to boost job creation, safety and the city’s ability to compete in a global economy. Noticeably absent, however, was any mention of the vast education challenges facing the city. The Mayor’s vision of Los Angeles was notable for...

Just in case Judge Rolf Treu might have missed anything during the two months of Vergara v. California, a battle over teacher employment protections that concluded last month, the parties filed their post-trial briefs yesterday, each making one last effort to influence Judge Treu’s decision. At issue are five state laws that govern tenure, dismissal...

Via EdSource | By John Fensterwald Faced with intense opposition from teachers, Sacramento City Unified announced Wednesday it would not join other California districts in reapplying for a waiver from the federal No Child Left Behind law. Its defection leaves seven of eight districts seeking to extend a waiver from the federal accountability law through...

After less than two months on her temporary position as liaison for LA Unified’s District 1, Sylvia Rousseau says she’s figured out how to improve the academic performance of the most troubled schools: zero in on what’s called Standard English Learners. Rousseau, a USC professor and former local superintendent in the district who was appointed...

Community groups big and small, have responded collectively to the extra $332 million coming into the district via the Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF), Governor Jerry Brown‘s signature K-through-12 education initiative. For now, only a few schools have complete autonomy in deciding how the money should be used although more will gain the freedom over the next...