Free Republic

LOS ANGELES—The Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) announced it will end its indoor mask mandate for students and staff by March 23 after a week of negotiating an existing contract with its teachers’ union. “Los Angeles Unified is pleased to announce that we have reached agreement with labor groups to align with the guidance from the State of California and Los Angeles County Department of Public Health to make masking strongly recommended,” the district said in a March 18 statement. A March 18 agreement between the school district and the United Teachers of Los Angeles (UTLA) includes a requirement...

LOS ANGELES (CBS) — Planned Parenthood and the Los Angeles Unified School District have teamed up in an unusual collaboration to reduce the number of unplanned teen pregnancies at Roosevelt High School. Students can visit the on-campus health clinic to get free birth control, pregnancy tests, counseling and screening for sexually transmitted diseases – the first program of its kind in the country, according to the Los Angeles Times. Birth rates among teenagers are down throughout California and Los Angeles County, but certain areas within the county, like the heavily Latino and low-income neighborhood around Roosevelt High School, buck that...

The L.A. Unified School District Teachers Union made good on their promise to protest the Los Angeles Times over the papers release of evaluations of over 6,000 teachers in the district. From FishbowlLA The controversy surrounding the LA Times’ decision to publish an online database of teachers’ effectiveness isn’t going away any time soon. Yesterday, hundreds of teachers from the LA Unified School District gathered outside the Times’ downtown headquarters in protest. “I feel, in a way, betrayed,” Lee Bartoletti of Ivanhoe Elementary School in Silver Lake told a Times reporter. “The Times has reneged on its mission of telling...

The Los Angeles Unified School District this week backed down from a controversial proposal to slash the number of students it lets transfer to other districts. Supt. Ramon C. Cortines said Tuesday that most students who attend schools outside of the district can continue to do so next year, a retreat from a recent, more restrictive policy that provoked an outcry from parents, other school districts and some members of his own Board of Education. But this is only a tactical withdrawal. Cortines will be back with a new plan in the fall. The reason is simple: money.

One of the nation’s largest and most troubled school districts finally got desperate enough to try something new to rescue its schools: private-sector competition. The Los Angeles Unified School District approved a plan to turn 250 of its schools to the private sector for management as charter schools, after winning a battle with the teachers union. Union officials threatened to take the school district to court, while Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa practically dared them to try

Gates Foundation Is Giving $1.3 Million to L.A. Schools By Howard Blume, Times Staff Writer September 14, 2006 The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation today will announce a $1.3-million grant to Los Angeles schools to improve the teaching of algebra and other college-prep courses. The investment is modest compared to other Gates grants and even other school district initiatives, but marks a growing partnership between the nation's second-largest school system and perhaps the world's largest private philanthropic fund. The one-year grant will pay for teacher training and curriculum design. The hope is to build on documented achievement gains at the...

LAUSD Schools Win Large State Grant Wednesday June 29, 6:06 pm ET Nearly $6 Million for Technology Awarded to 9 Middle Schools LOS ANGELES--(BUSINESS WIRE)--June 29, 2005--The California Department of Education announced this week that the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) was the top Los Angeles County winner among dozens of local school districts during the latest round of the competitive Enhancing Education Through Technology (EETT) grant program. The winning grant will provide nearly 6 million dollars as well as in-kind donations and partner discounts benefiting 9 LAUSD middle schools and approximately 20,000 students. Glendale Unified was the other...