LA School Report

Even with all its magnets, charters, and other options, LAUSD ranks 27th out of 107 large urban school districts when it comes to choice and competition, according to a new report by the Washington DC-based Brookings Institute,  What strengths could LAUSD do to promote more options? You can read all the details here.

Former Washington DC schools superintendent Michelle Rhee credits LAUSD and UTLA for making progress with their tentative teacher evaluation deal but describes it as”falling short in many ways” and cites it as an example of the need for a “strong statewide policy governing teachers’ performance evaluations.” Read below for the full statement from Rhee, who is now...

The nonprofit and independent EdSource Today is one of the best education news sources covering statewide education issues, along withe SI&A Cabinet Reports. Now, EdSource Today journalists John Fensterwald and Kathy Barron are being joined by Lillian Mongeau (pictured), a Peninsula-based reporter who’s covered education issues as a freelancer. From the looks of it, she’s going to focus on...

New Policy for Young Immigrants Creates Paperwork Deluge Lydia Ramos, assistant to Superintendent John Deasy, says the system has the largest DACA-eligible population in the country. School officials knew the paperwork demands would take a toll at the individual school level, she says, particularly “in an environment where, in California, our schools have been ravaged...

In this video clip, LAUSD Board Members Tamar Galatzan and Steve Zimmer debate the risks the grant application veto could pose to school funding opportunities during the Tuesday, December 11 meeting: Despite Galatzan’s—and Superintendent John Deasy’s—objections, Zimmer voted yes on the proposal, and the grant application veto passed with a 4-3 vote. (See: Controversial Grant Approval...

Even before the final roster of candidates has been announced by the City Clerk’s office, their official ‘ballot position’ has been determined by random draw.  Here’s the order:

Roughly 300 LAUSD employees – mostly teachers – suspected of misconduct are housed in “rubber rooms,” as you may recall from last week’s LA Weekly article documenting the process and the costs of the lengthy review and dismissal process (127 days, on average). But how many employees ever find their way back to their old jobs? As it turns out,...

Following LA School Report‘s breaking coverage of his surprise withdrawal from the LAUSD School Board race for District 6 (covering the eastern part of the San Fernando Valley), Ernie Cardenas issued an email through a public relations firm describing his reasons for the move and asking friends and colleagues to pass media inquiries along to...

While union president Warren Fletcher has claimed victory on a recent court-ordered tentative agreement on teacher evaluations, a closer look might leave rank-and-file teachers scratching their heads. UTLA has consistently opposed any use of student test scores in teacher evaluations in the past. So it was unexpected when the union leadership signed off on using...

LAUSD Board Debates Raising Salaries or Buying Students Tablet Computers With the groundwork laid for a new digital-learning plan, a request for a strategy to buy computer tablets for all students erupted Tuesday into a shouting match between two Los Angeles Unified board members over setting budget priorities for the district. LA Daily News See...