LA School Report

Now that LA Unified and UTLA have agreed that they can’t agree, they’re headed for mediation later this month. The state Public Employment Relations Board has assigned a mediator to accomplish in three sessions what the two sides were unable to do in 18 meetings over seven months: negotiate a long-overdue contact for the 35,000-member...

With less than 24 hours to go before the polls open, LA Unified school board candidate Carl Petersen said today that he filed several ethics complaints against Tamar Galatzan, the District 3 incumbent he is challenging in tomorrow’s elections. Petersen levied the same complaints that were filed last week with the City Ethics Commission by candidate Filiberto Gonzalez,...

The fate of three LA Unified board incumbents — and the influence of charter schools and teachers — is on the line tomorrow when voters cast ballots to decide how satisfied they are with the seven-member board that runs the nation’s second-largest school district. Any candidate winning a majority is in. Without a majority winner,...

The Los Angeles Times| By Eric Sondheimer  Here’s a statistic from the Los Angeles Unified School District that should set off alarm bells: 58 percent of its coaches from 83 high schools were walk-ons or non-certificated employees during the 2013-14 school year. Only 42 percent were teachers, according to Trenton Cornelius, the district’s coordinator of...

Moving beyond a single measure of a school The State Board of Education is seizing the chance to redefine student achievement and reframe how schools are held accountable for performance. Ed Source Editorial: Mayor Eric Garcetti’s silence on L.A. issues helps no one Averse to controversy and hesitant to take sides, Garcetti has often avoided...

Together for the final time before Tuesday’s elections, the three candidates for LA Unified’s Board District 5 seat were determined last night to set themselves apart from each other. In a small church in a residential neighborhood in South Gate, incumbent Bennett Kayser, and his opponents, Andrew Thomas and Ref Rodriguez, spoke only to the...

The Los Angeles Times | By Teresa Watanabe California may be a blue state, but a Republican-led effort to scale back federal intervention in educational reform is drawing support here. As the House of Representatives moves to vote this week on reauthorizing a 50-year-old education reform law, Republicans are pushing to sharply curtail what they...

It was dubbed the “Stand at Grand,” and while it may not have drawn as many as the “Thrilla in Manilla,” it was an impressive turnout of thousands of Los Angeles Unified teachers at Grand Park last night as they rallied to demand a new contract. With City Hall behind him and a massive crowd...

In LAUSD board election, it’s charter schools vs. labor unions  Direct campaign donations from individual contributors make up 18 percent of the money spent in the LAUSD’s District 5 school board race. KPCC Report: New Teacher Prep Rules ‘Too Stringent’ Proposed federal changes to teacher preparation requirements have generated numerous comments from education leaders and...

The Los Angeles Unified School District has reached agreement with the union on a new labor agreement. No, not that union The district and Unit E, Los Angeles/Orange County Building and Trades Council, which represents 1,300 electricians, plumbers, carpenters, roofers and other skilled workers, have agreed to terms on a three-year deal that includes a...