The staging is classic for a campaign ad in late-September: a close-up of a disappointed-looking woman sitting at a kitchen table. The speaker is a mother of five in Wichita, and the target of her reproach is Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly. A Democrat, Kelly was America’s first governor to order K-12 buildings closed in the spring of...

National testing data released this morning reveals severe damage inflicted on student math and reading performance, reaffirming COVID-19’s ongoing educational toll. Even as some states have shown evidence of academic recovery this year, federal officials cautioned that learning lost to the pandemic will not be easily restored. Eighth-grade math scores on the National Assessment of...

To compensate for the painfully slow internet in their Pomona home, Yesenia Miranda Meza’s sons kept their cameras off during pandemic remote learning – causing tension with their teachers. Because Miranda Meza couldn’t afford a faster connection, the family was constantly at odds balancing the demands of online work and schooling.  “I can’t be here...

As the nation witnesses unprecedented declines in academic achievement, one of the largest education philanthropies has announced it will fund $1.1 billion in K-12 math initiatives over the next four years. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s investment marks the beginning of a decade-long strategy to prioritize math gains, particularly for Black, Latino and low-income...

On the day she made a decision leading to suspension from her “dream” journalism teaching job at an L.A. Unified high school named for slain reporter Daniel Pearl, Adriana Chavira had no second thoughts and taught her classes as usual. But the chain of events stemming from publication of a November, 2021 student newspaper article...

In yet another data point on missed learning during the pandemic, ACT scores from this year’s high school graduates dropped to their lowest level in three decades, according to a report released Wednesday. Exam-takers averaged 19.8 out of a possible 36 total points on the college admissions test, the first time since 1991 that nationwide results dipped...

After the police in more than a dozen South Carolina communities fielded calls last week alerting them to active school shootings, officers rushed to campuses where students and educators hid in fear for their lives. Ever since the mass school shooting in May at a Uvalde, Texas elementary school, families nationwide have been on high...

Determined to provide herself with a quality education in the 1980s when opportunities for Latino students were limited, a young Frances Baez endured more than two hour bus rides from her Boyle Heights neighborhood to a LAUSD affiliated charter school in Pacific Palisades.  “I had to take a bus and go across the city to...

It is a desperate plea from a father seeking information about his missing son. Morris Jenis Jr.’s father knew only his son, a Native American student at the Genoa Indian School in Nebraska 100 years ago, had not been seen in a year. Morris ran away from the school in 1921 — “deserted,” according to...

For Christie Pesicka, the Los Angeles Unified School District cyberattack hits home. During “The Interview” hack in 2014, Pesicka was one of thousands of Sony Pictures employees that had their private information exposed in the midst of aggressive attacks by a North Korean hacker group. Now, as a mom, Pesicka worries about protecting her son...