*Updated March 25 Former L.A. city official Heather Repenning and teachers union-pick Jackie Goldberg are officially headed to a May runoff for L.A. Unified’s Board District 5 school board seat, as the county registrar certified the March 5 primary results on Friday. Goldberg had been leagues ahead of the race’s nine other candidates since election...

School board members have approved L.A. Unified’s latest budget, even though the district is still far from being financially sustainable. The revised fiscal stabilization plan lays out the district’s response to county concerns about deficit spending, inadequate reserve levels and reliance on non-guaranteed funds to keep itself afloat in coming years. But instead of providing...

If you had the money, would you bribe a college official to get your child admitted? Fifteen percent of all American adults would answer yes, according to a new poll. And that number rises to 25 percent for adults who actually have children ages 18 and under. It’s a hypothetical question, but certainly a revealing...

Meritocracy is a cornerstone of the American ideological edifice. Or at least it was, until the FBI took a sledgehammer to it as it revealed Operation Varsity Blues: a sting that outed a long-running pay-to-play scam at some of the country’s best-known colleges and universities. The details — the bulk of which amount to Mafia-style...

*UPDATE: The county announced Thursday, March 21, that six more ballots have been counted in the race this week, and all went to Jackie Goldberg. There is still a 31-vote difference between Heather Repenning, who is in second place and thus eligible for the runoff election, and the closest competitor, Graciela Ortíz. The county will...

When some teachers in the Long Beach Unified School District hear students say they’re bad at math, they rephrase. You’re not bad, you’re just not understanding it yet. It’s not too difficult, it’s just challenging right now. These educators are helping students develop a growth mindset, a belief that they can improve their skills through...

It was nearly three decades ago when the New Jersey Supreme Court found the state’s school funding formula shortchanged its poorest students, and lawmakers directed more money to districts serving large shares of low-income children. Now, a new report suggests the state didn’t go far enough. Despite the landmark decision, the state has one of the nation’s largest...