Some of the names and faces might be not be familiar, but five of the 10 candidates running for president of the teachers union, UTLA, have agreed to participate in a candidate forum next Thursday, Jan. 30th at Thomas Starr King Middle School. Click here for announcement. Wil Page, the school’s chapter chair, said in...

Via The Center for American Progress Five years ago, U.S. teachers were asked in a survey how many years of experience they had; their most common answer was one year. Policymakers feared an impending crisis because, if past trends held, about half of these teachers would leave in their first five years. But the latest...

The California Department of Education is setting aside $250 million for school districts to link high school curricula to careers beyond the classroom, an initiative designed to keep students engaged in classes often consider dull and dry, while preparing them for a high-skilled job market. The 40 one-time grants bundled in the Career Pathways Trust –...

In his State of the State address today, Gov. Jerry Brown spent a few minutes talking about public education in California. Here’s what he had to say: “Last year, I spoke of the principle of subsidiarity, a rather clunky word that nevertheless points to a profoundly important principle, namely that in our federal system there...

Today’s LA Unified school board meeting may have been brief, but it was just as acrimonious and confusing as some of the longer ones. While problems contributing to the appearance of dysfunction usually focus on content or process. This one focused on both. The big issue was over Bennett Kayser’s resolution to expand Title I...

“I don’t have to stress that a billion dollars is an insane amount of money,” Jacques assures me right away. I feel much better. I was starting to think I was the one who was insane. To understand how LAUSD’s billion dollar commitment to Apple iPads makes any sense, I’ve consulted a panel of experts:...

It’s not often that LA Unified board members Tamar Galatzan and Bennett Kayser agree, and Kayser’s abstention on a measure two months ago killed an effort by Galatzan that would have lowered the threshold for schools receiving federal dollars for low-income students. Now, Kayser is returning to the board meeting tomorrow morning with a measure...

Via The LA Times | By Howard Blume The watchdog committee for the Los Angeles school district’s $1-billion iPad program is scheduled to fold, raising questions about oversight of the ongoing effort to provide every student, teacher and administrator with a computer. The decision to disband the panel as of April was announced last week...