Ray Cortines appears  to be returning to lead LA Unified for a third time. With John Deasy resigning, Cortines was chosen unanimously by the seven member board, a condition Cortines insisted upon before agreeing to take the helm of the district, according to sources who were made aware of the board’s decision. An official announcement is...

After 12 hours of open and closed meetings, the LA Unified school board still wasn’t through for the day. At 10 pm tonight, the members retreated back into closed session, spurring speculation they were returning to the issue of Superintendent John Deasy‘s employment status. With Deasy in South Korea on a cultural trip and due...

The LA Unified school board today unanimously approved the district’s $1.1 million plan to fix scheduling issues at Jefferson High School and respond to a temporary restraining order issued last week by a judge that ordered the state to step in and fix the problems. Before the vote on the plan — which was presented...

The Office of the Independent Monitor, charged with overseeing the implementation of the MiSiS program, told LA Unified yesterday, in great detail, how the introduction of the student data system was a massive failure from start to (un)finish. The district was forced to develop the computer software program as a result of a 1993 lawsuit...

* UPDATED Officials from LA Unified and Jefferson High School met for several hours today as they began to address the issues that have led to students at the school losing instruction time over scheduling problems. The meeting came in direct response to a ruling yesterday by a state judge that requires state and district...

Community groups supportive of Superintendent John Deasy have sent a second letter requesting a meeting with the LA Unified school board to discuss Deasy’s annual performance review. In a letter sent yesterday to board President Richard Vladovic, the groups chided him for being unresponsive to their concerns about the lack of transparency in the evaluation...

John Deasy is still the LA Unified superintendent. After four hours behind closed doors last night, the district school board emerged with nothing to say. For Deasy, who did not attend the meeting, that was a plus, because it meant that the members might have talked about his performance, but they didn’t take a vote...

Another bargaining session came and went today and still no contract agreement between LA Unified and the teachers union, UTLA. The district said in a press release, “union leaders weren’t ready to talk about raises at the table,”  leaving the sides to focus, instead, on issues with the student-tracking system known as MiSiS, for My...

Monica Ratliff, who was elected to the LA Unified school board last year, became the first member of the board to take sides in the District 1 school board race, endorsing George McKenna over Alex Johnson, McKenna’s campaign announced late in the day. No other board member has expressed public support for either of the contenders in the...

*UPDATE The Los Angeles Unified Board of Education unanimously approved a $6.4 billion budget for the 2014-15 school year, ending a tumultuous year for the district and Superintendent John Deasy. The budget represents the first in seven years that does not include cuts from the previous year. It reflects a $332 million injection of statewide...