LA School Report

A middle-school teacher at LA Unified has been named one of five recipients of the 2015 California Teachers of the Year Award from the California Department of Education. Lovelyn Marquez-Prueher is an eighth-grade English teacher at Dodson Middle School in Rancho Palos Verdes. She has been teaching for 11 years, the last six at Dodson. Marquez-Prueher...

As part of National School Bus Safety Week, LA Unified’s Transportation Services Division is recognizing its top drivers this week by handing out 811 safe driving pins and certificates. Some drivers will be receiving pins for multiple years of safe driving, with one reaching as high as 37 years of safe driving, according to Transportation Services...

In the first contract talks under LA Unified’s new superintendent, Ray Cortines, negotiators for the district and the teachers union, UTLA, hit another snag yesterday as the district reasserted claims that unions demands are unsustainable and would lead to severe cutbacks to key programs, resources, and personnel that would detrimentally impact students. The union is...

Bonds should not pay for iPad curriculum, new L.A. Unified head says Newly installed Supt. Ramon Cortines said he opposes using construction bond money to pay for curriculum on student computers. Los Angeles Times California moving rapidly toward post-NCLB accountability In one sentence, the president of the California State School board signaled the end of...

KIPP LA Schools today announced plans to open nine additional campuses, nearly doubling its presence in south and east LA by 2020. The high performing charter schools are part of the Knowledge Is Power Program,which runs 162 campuses, educating 58,000 students nationally. In LA, the organization currently operates 11 schools serving 4,000 elementary and middle school...

In a speech today  in Buena Park, Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, cited former LA Unified superintendent John Deasy as a failed example of school district management and argued for collaboration over fiat as the pathway to success in public education. “Collaboration is the vehicle that creates trust. It’s the vehicle that...

*UPDATED Several LA Unified workers have filed a federal class-action lawsuit against the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Local 99 over what they say is an improper collection of their full dues. In the complaint, which was prepared with free legal assistance by the National Right to Work Foundation (NRWF), the employes claim SEIU Local 99 union...

Via Los Angeles Times | By Steve Lopez It was back-to-school night in August. A time for new beginnings and high hopes at Thomas Starr King Middle School on the Silver Lake/Los Feliz border. Then came an awkward moment. With new parents and students in the room, a teachers union rep got up on a...

Education Secretary Duncan talks tech with L.A. Unified’s Cortines U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, in a brief visit to Los Angeles on Tuesday, met with newly installed L.A. Unified Supt. Ramon C. Cortines. Los Angeles Times Education secretary says time to debate preschool is over U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan told a conference of...