LA School Report

The Coalition for School Reform will support Monica Garcia, Kate Anderson and Antonio Sanchez in their respective bids for LAUSD school board, according to paperwork filed with the Los Angeles Ethics Commission yesterday (you can see the form here). The endorsements of Garcia and Anderson were expected. There was something of a question mark over what...

State Schools Chief Urges Cut in Number of Tests Next Year Supt. of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson says second-graders would not be tested in math and English, and most high school tests would be dropped. L.A. Unified chief expresses reservations. LA Times See also: KPCC, LA Daily News Student Test Scores Can Identify Effective Teachers,...

This Thursday is the 4th quarterly filing deadline for municipal candidates (as well as independent expenditure committees), including those running for LAUSD school board, which will tell us how much money everyone raised during the last three months of 2012. It’s a sort of awkward period, since much of it occurred before candidates officially declared...

Coming in March, Oprah Winfrey’s OWN network is going to start airing Blackboard Wars, the six-part story of the attempt to turn around New Orleans’ McDonogh High School. Produced by Discovery and originally titled “Treme High,” the series features a challenging turnaround attempt undertaken through an organization called Future Is Now Schools, which was created by...

The Los Angeles City Ethics Commission has a handy, one-page document that gives an overview of the rules covering independent expenditures (IE) made to support or oppose LAUSD Board candidates. The rules are straightforward, at least in theory. But as LA School Report has shown in previous reporting, finding out exactly who’s giving to IEs can be tricky if...

Classroom teachers will vote next week on whether or not to approve the new teacher evaluation system agreed to by UTLA leadership and John Deasy late last year. The tentative agreement, signed by UTLA President Warren Fletcher and Superintendent John Deasy on November 30, calls for a complex evaluation that would use a number of...

On 11th Anniversary, No Child Left Behind Law in Tatters As the federal No Child Left Behind law’s eleventh birthday arrives Tuesday, California is one of the few states that still must meet its requirements. KPCC California Schools Flunk Education Group’s Ratings California is sorely lacking when it comes to school reform, failing to adopt...

In a letter to the California Board of Education, US Secretary of Education Arne Duncan rejected California’s request to be exempted from certain No Child Left Behind requirements because he didn’t feel California was willing to take on rigorous enough reforms. Read the full letter below: Arne Duncan’s Letter Rejecting California’s NCLB Waiver Request

LAUSD Superintendent John Deasy sat down with ABC LA to discuss the state of the district’s budget, which he plans to present at the Board meeting next week: “This budget comes to the board with no proposed new reductions and no furloughs. And that will be the first time that’s happened in six years in...

StudentsFirst, an education advocacy group headed by former Washington Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee, released a education policies report Monday that gave 11 states, including California, failing grades. Not many other states fared much better—no states received A’s, and nearly 90 percent of states scored lower than a C grade. Rhee and former NYC superintendent Joel...