LA School Report

While the latest academic reports from the LA Unified school district were positive overall, school board President Steve Zimmer expressed frustration at some of the data presented at Tuesday’s board meeting and said he foresees potential problems ahead. Zimmer asked for a breakdown of how many students are graduating with D grades and in what subjects. “How many...

LA Unified Superintendent Michelle King, State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson, LA Unified school board President Steve Zimmer and other leaders called a press conference this morning at Eagle Rock Elementary School to tout the results of the newly released standardized test scores. Scores in the California Assessment of Student Performance and Progress (CAASPP) went...

LA Unified students increased their scores this year in the statewide standardized tests, but significant achievement gaps remain for African-American and Latino students, as well as for English learners and students from economically challenged backgrounds. The improvements came along with increases statewide in the second year of the new assessments, which are aligned with the Common Core...

In the long struggle to make the United States more just and perfect, court majorities have made some horrific mistakes. When that happens, the burden falls on dissents to provide hope for the future arc of the moral universe. Such dissents often come from the most distinguished jurists. Benjamin Curtis, for instance, was the first...

More L.A. Unified students reach goals on statewide exams, district says More students in the Los Angeles Unified School District met statewide goals on standardized tests in 2016 than they did last year, district officials said at a meeting Tuesday. Scores on the California Assessment of Student Performance and Progress increased in both English and math, they reported....

The attorneys involved in Vergara v. California, a landmark case that challenged teacher tenure laws, announced Tuesday they have filed a federal lawsuit in Connecticut challenging that state’s laws that they say restrict school choice options. The lawsuit comes on the heels of the California Supreme Court’s decision Monday to decline to review an appellate court...

In the wake of a crushing defeat for a landmark challenge to California’s teacher tenure laws, the battle for change has shifted from the courts to the state Legislature. While most parties agree that the inequities brought to light during the Vergara v. California trial must be righted, there’s a difference of opinion from those...

The LA Unified school board is scheduled to hold an open session meeting today starting at 2 p.m. Key items on the agenda include hiring more teachers, adjusting the school calendar, training workers to fix air conditioners and offering health benefits for teachers assistants and playground aides. Click here to watch the livestream of the meeting.

By Samuel Gilstrap Visiting her namesake school never gets old for Dr. Ellen Ochoa. The former shuttle astronaut, who now heads NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, recently paid a visit to the Ellen Ochoa Learning Center in Cudahy, the fourth time she has returned since the 800-student school was named in her honor a decade...

By Caroline Bermudez Nearly two years ago, Los Angeles Times columnist Steve Lopez posed a question in an op-ed worth revisiting. “Is the L.A. teachers union tone deaf?” Based on a recent speech given by Alex Caputo-Pearl, the head of United Teachers Los Angeles, the answer is a definitive yes. The juvenile world of heroes...