On the first day of orientation for her all-girls school on Wednesday, Principal Liz Hicks seemed relatively calm. She personally answered her phone at her office as she was in the middle of preparing for the high-profile school celebration coming up Friday morning. “I’m feeling a little pressure, but I’m mostly excited because this dream...

The vote to open LA Unified’s first all-girls high school was swift and the motion was passed with no fanfare; it was one of more than two dozen resolutions lumped together, including one to open a similar all-girls charter middle school, that were approved in a single vote by the Los Angeles Unifed school board earlier...