LA School Report

*UPDATED Palms Middle School Principal Derek Moriuchi jokes with fellow administrators that one must be “kind of special” to want to teach middle schoolers. “They do do weird things and their hormones are all over the place,” he said. “But we get that.” Palms Middle School, on the westside of Los Angeles, is among the...

When Principals Maria Ozaeta and Anita Maxon interviewed prospective teachers this summer for the Dr. Julian Nava Learning Academy, the one question they repeatedly asked themselves was: Does this teacher have a heart? The pilot school campus has had challenges in the last couple of years, teacher turnover being one. They hired 11 brand new...

(Click on the red dot on the map for the school name and its rankings.) *UPDATED LA Unified middle schools rank far behind their elementary and high school counterparts and trail middle schools throughout the state, an LA School Report analysis of statewide school ranking data from California Charter Schools Association has found. And in...

LA Unified officials say the district has bent over backward to give schools as much local control as possible over discretionary positions and funds. But has it backfired? Are schools filthier, counselors scarce and financial bookkeeping in disarray because principals can juggle staff resources and choose which positions to fill? That’s what school board members are now...

A Los Angeles charter school organization that sends 95 percent of its graduates to college wanted to make sure its students made it not just to but through college. So it developed a list of colleges that would give students the best chance at graduating. Alliance College-Ready Public Schools’ college ranking system identifies the top 150 colleges...

*UPDATED School board members gave a tentative but tepid thumbs up to a strategic plan for the LA Unified School District after more than four hours of discussion Tuesday, but they also called for more urgency. The biggest change since an August draft of the 2016-2019 Strategic Plan was a simplified singular goal: 100 percent graduation....

By Nathania Johnson Every year, Maycie Vorreiter bought her high school’s yearbook and asked her friends to sign it. She could never read it herself, though, having been born blind, so her assistant or her twin brother had to read it to her. “I’ve ordered a yearbook every year, basically just to be included in...

While students in Los Angeles face growing anxiety over the Donald Trump presidency, there’s increasing pressure to end the school district’s random searches that go on every day at middle and high schools. Momentum is greater than ever to end the mandatory practice at LA Unified after the election of an administration that threatens to deport undocumented students, punish sanctuary...

Francisco Bravo is proud to be an educator and serve students with special needs in Lincoln Heights. Obtaining his college degree and then a master’s degree in education as an undocumented student was hard, but not as difficult as now facing possible deportation and losing everything he has achieved if the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals...

By Tim Newcomb Alarm over the ease with which Americans are duped by fake news continues to grow. With propaganda-filled stories and hoax articles crowding social media feeds — where more than 60 percent of people in the United States now get their news — during the recent election cycle, lack of media literacy among...