LA School Report

LA Unified officials said tonight that all district schools have been declared safe and will reopen tomorrow. The decision was made after law enforcement officials determined that an email foretelling violent acts across the district was judged to be “not a credible threat” by investigators, in the words of Mayor Eric Garretti, who joined city...

Walter Reed Middle School in Studio City, has “zero periods,” when students with electives go to classes before school begins. When teachers arrived at the school early today to prepare for their regular class time, they were greeted by their colleagues saying, “Leave the school, we’re on Level 1 alert. This is serious!” Minutes before...

Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti made it very clear: He didn’t close the schools. Neither did the police chief, nor the county sheriff. That decision was made by LA Unified Superintendent Ramon Cortines, who was supposed to be on his way to retirement this week. “I made the decision to close the schools,” Cortines said...

Rep. Adam Schiff, a Democrat and ranking member of the House intelligence committee whose district includes many LA Unified schools, said today a “preliminary assessment” of the emailed threat prompting the closure of all district schools today was a hoax. In a statement, he said, “While we continue to gather information about the threat made against the...

*UPDATE Officials with LA Unified will be holding a press conference today regarding the terror threat that closed all district schools today, and district officials said it is scheduled to be at 5:30 p.m. The district closed its 1,000-plus schools, including all charter schools, today as a result of the emailed threat. Speaking at a...

It wasn’t by accident that all seven LA Unified school board members happened to be at this morning’s press conference with the mayor, the sheriff, the police chief and superintendent as they announced closing the schools today. The school board had already plan to continue closed-door deliberations to select a superintendent to succeed Ramon Cortines....

A 17-year old male student at Los Angeles International Charter High School in Highland Park was struck and killed by a truck this morning as he was crossing a street near the school. The death occurred after the LA Unified school district decided to close all its campuses this morning due to a threat of violence,...

The LA Unified school district made the rare move today of closing all of its campuses after receiving a terror threat. Superintendent Ramon Cortines has asked for police to search every building — a major operation considering the district has over 1,100 campuses. The move also comes as New York officials said they received a...

An email that threatened violence with “explosive devices, assault rifles and machine pistols” provided LA Unified officials today with the rationale for closing all schools across the district. Those details and others, which began emerging today, convinced city and school officials that closing schools was the more prudent action, especially in the aftermath of the...