As we raised our margarita glasses and dipped into guacamole on Cinco de Mayo, most of us weren’t thinking about why this celebration even matters. Cinco de Mayo commemorates a Mexican victory over French invaders, but May 5, 1862, is also an important day for the United States.  On that day, our country was in...

This story was originally published by CalMatters. Sign up for their newsletters. A bill that could reshape literacy education in California elementary schools cleared a major hurdle in the Legislature this week after dueling sides reached a compromise that provides funding for phonics-based instruction but stops short of requiring it. The compromise between English learner...

An LAUSD principal recently named a top school leader uses social media to build enthusiasm for her high school — and a strong spirit is spilling over into excellent academic outcomes, as well as strong enrollment. Rebecca McMurrin, principal of venerable Ulysses S. Grant High School in L.A.’s San Fernando Valley, takes a creative approach...

In 1984, I was part of the first responder team sent to 49th Street Elementary School in the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) after one of the country’s first school shootings happened there. Two children were killed, and a dozen children and staff were wounded.  Following that heartbreaking tragedy, I saw the outline of...

When she was laid off from her job as a Los Angeles Unified middle school teacher in the Great Recession, LAUSD school board member Tanya Ortiz Franklin couldn’t have imagined she’d be back one day as the boss.  But such is life. Ortiz Franklin took her layoff and went to law school for a second...

This story was originally published on LAist. The city of Los Angeles says it will no longer have the money to run most childcare centers launched during the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2021, the city allocated federal relief dollars to renovate and reopen 10 licensed childcare centers for young kids in economically disadvantaged areas. Eight of those centers...

Sharp and independent, Brentwood native Nick Melvoin has served on the LAUSD school board since 2017.  But the attorney and former teacher said he’s never seen anything like this year, where he’s currently helping to guide the nation’s second-largest school system through some rough situations.  That includes federal agents turning up at schools, looking for...

This story was originally published by CalMatters. Sign up for their newsletters. Want to know how students at your child’s school district are performing five or even 10 years down the line?  Today, California released a new tool that aims to make that question — and many others — much easier to answer. Known as...

L.A. Unified’s famed ‘Last Repair Shop’ for students’ musical instruments just got tuned up, with a $1 million donation and a visit from the world’s most famous cellist.   The beloved shop, which was featured in an Oscar-winning short documentary last year, repairs students’ school instruments across the district: taking in, fixing up and and sending...

After more than 20 years, 10,000 students, and countless lives changed, Liza Bercovici stepped down last year as executive director of Gabriella Charter Schools — a network she built from heartbreak.  In 1999, Bercovici lost her daughter Gabriella, 13, in a tragic bike accident while the family was on vacation in Grand Teton National Park....