The word “historic” has gotten a lot of play during labor negotiations in Los Angeles Unified this year. The district has used it to describe its offers to the teachers and support staff unions. The unions themselves — Local 99 of Service Employees International Union and United Teachers Los Angeles — have used it to describe their...

The early May release of National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) data on student achievement in civics and U.S. history is likely to generate renewed discussion about the urgent need for improved curriculum and instruction in these subjects. Calls for reforms are not new; previous NAEP results that revealed low achievement levels, with disparities across...

Los Angeles teachers have much to cheer about. Less than a month after the district’s school support workers received a contract with 30% salary increases, United Teachers Los Angeles came away with a mammoth deal of its own. On April 13, the district made what it called a “historic offer” of 19% in pay hikes...

A California district attorney announced Monday he will investigate “any and all wrongdoing” in the Stockton Unified School District after state auditors highlighted millions of dollars of possible fraud in board members’ use of pandemic stimulus funds. It’s the next step in a process many in Stockton believe will result in criminal charges against its...

As LAUSD high school English teacher Jason Torres-Rangel finishes his second year at Theodore Roosevelt High School he looks back on a time filled with accomplishments.   In October, he was named one of five 2023 California Teachers of the Year, and nominated as California’s representative for the National Teacher of the Year competition.  Torres-Rangel, who...

The National Commission on Excellence in Education’s release of a report titled “A Nation at Risk” in 1983 was a pivotal point in the history of American education. The report used dire language, lamenting that “the educational foundations of our society are presently being eroded by a rising tide of mediocrity that threatens our very...

In a small conference room off the main office of a large high school near Tulsa, Oklahoma, eight students gathered with a language arts teacher and a youth development specialist to identify a problem that they could tackle in their school. Students immediately talked about the mental health crisis among their peers. “When hard things...

During a heated Senate confirmation hearing in July 2021, civil rights attorney Catherine Lhamon made clear her goal to confront longstanding, dramatic racial disparities in school discipline at a moment when racial inequities — in policing, education and society more broadly — were at the center of the national discourse. She’d done it before, to fanfare...

Every day, adults are tasked with supporting young people showing behavioral changes or experiencing a mental health crisis. The problem? Many are unprepared to do so. It’s a challenge Deborah Offner came up against so often, as a consulting psychologist for schools in and around Boston, she decided to write a guide. Urgency is only...

Since being named a 2023 California Teacher of the Year, Bridgette Donald-Blue said kindergarteners she has never taught have eagerly approached her in the hallways at Coliseum Street Elementary School. They will say, “Hey Ms. Blue, you’re a teacher leader, I have you as a screensaver on my iPad, we watched your video at home,”...