LA School Report

In the context of the search for its next superintendent, LA Unified’s school board is asking existential questions about how hard it should be pushing to disrupt the status quo in a system that serves more than 700,000 students. While none of the conversations came particularly full-circle in a special meeting of the board on...

A lobbyist for the California Teachers Association took to Twitter recently beating the drum for transparency and accountability in advocating for a bill related to charter schools. Having private and secret meetings to discuss how tax dollars will be spent is not acceptable. Too much is at risk when our students are counting on sound...

Every week, we sit down with Los Angeles parents to talk about their students, their schools, and what questions or suggestions they have for their school district. “Having more data available is good, but who is going to explain it to me?” Sandra Sánchez, mother of a first-grader at LA Unified’s Bryson Avenue Elementary in...

The new year started off with a bang for education watchers in Los Angeles: a new leader will be chosen this year for the nation’s second-largest school district. The first month of 2018 had plenty more news to keep up with, as the state thumbed its nose at new federal accountability rules, the governor sought...

*Updated Jan. 30 Two young DACA recipients from Los Angeles will be guests at Tuesday’s State of the Union address, sitting with House Democrats and hoping to hear President Trump announce a permanent solution for them and their families to remain together in this country. The two young women are part of a delegation of...

*Updated Feb. 7 Jesús González Saucedo’s parents knew that even though he was born with a cleft palate that made it hard for him to speak, he could develop his potential and rise above the life they could offer him as street vendors. They just had to find the right school. “They had to sell...

  * Updated Jan. 25 The California governor’s new budget proposes giving more to schools than ever before — $78.3 billion — but it’s not going to keep LA Unified from driving off its fiscal cliff in three years, according to the district’s chief financial officer. With steady enrollment declines and crushing pension debt, the...

A tentative agreement on health benefits marks the first time an LA Unified labor contract has directly taken on the district’s soaring healthcare costs. But watchdogs say the deal doesn’t go far enough in tackling the district’s standing debt — and some school board members warn it may actually make the next round of negotiations...

*Updated Jan. 22 Marshall Tuck’s student-focused campaign for state superintendent of public instruction has earned him the endorsement of the Association of California School Administrators, which hasn’t endorsed in the race for eight years. In 2014, the organization, which represents more than 17,000 California school principals and superintendents, chose not to endorse because they wanted...