California high school seniors have a better shot at getting through the first year of college than students from most other states, according to ACT’s 2014 Condition of College and Career Readiness report, which was released today. But many of them will still be entering a world of academic pain. While students state-wide performed above...

* UPDATED Barely a week after losing to George McKenna for an LA Unified School District board seat, Alex Johnson is eying another board seat. His former boss, LA County Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas, has nominated him to fill a soon-to-be vacant seat on the LA County Board of Education, a body that hears appeals of...

The City Clerk Elections Division has certified the results of the LA Unified District 1 election, giving George McKenna final tally of 52.81 percent of the vote, to 47.18 percent for Alex Johnson. Overall, turnout for the Aug. 12 runoff was 9.5 percent of the district’s 342,493 voters, a disappointing but not horrible count, given...

Two weeks into the new school year, LA Unified administrators are still working out bugs in a new computer system, a disruption that has made instruction particularly difficult for special education teachers, who need specific information for each of their students.. The new MiSiS — My Integrated Student Information System — is designed to track...

While officials from the teachers union, UTLA, are contemplating salary demands in a new labor contract with the district, they have not lost sight of another key issue, how to deal with teachers housed in what union officials derisively call “teacher jails.” The union’s Committee for Unjustly Housed Teachers was meeting today, for the first...

Via NY Times | by Frank Bruni There are perils to the current tenure talk: that it fails to address the intense strains on many teachers; that it lays too much fault on their doorsteps, distracting people from other necessary reforms. But the discussion is imperative, because there’s no sense in putting something as crucial as...

The LA teachers union today intensified its attack against LA Unified Superintendent John Deasy and the administration over the management of the district’s new student data computer system. For the second time in less than a week, the union put out a press release critical of Deasy and what UTLA says are his attempts to...

A major shift is underway across LA Unified in how schools and administrators approach student disciplinary issues. LAUSD officials and LA School Police Chief Steve Zipperman are planning to announce new district-wide protocols tomorrow that will define and limit the role of police on campus, incorporating new student protections and providing opportunities for students to...

The growing diversity gap between teachers and students of color has been problematic for years, and school districts have struggled to find ways to attract a workforce that more closely resembles changing student demographics. Now, one organization is tackling the issue head on: Half of this year’s Teach for America (TFA) recruits are people of...

Via NY Times | by David Kirp Today’s education reformers believe that schools are broken and that business can supply the remedy. Some place their faith in the idea of competition. Others embrace disruptive innovation, mainly through online learning. Both camps share the belief that the solution resides in the impersonal, whether it’s the invisible...