Former LA Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who once attempted to take over LA Unified and later founded a public school network, criticized the state’s new accountability system Wednesday at a panel discussion with education experts. The event, “A for Accountability: A Report Card on California’s New Public-School Assessments,” was sponsored by CALmatters, Southern California News Group...

By Judy Lin | CALmatters As he eyes a run for governor, former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa is spotlighting the lagging academic performance of Latino and African American students and saying the state should do more to hold schools accountable. The 63-year-old Democrat says parents have a right to know how their schools are...

Two and a half years ago, Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa left his office steering the nation’s second-largest city with a legacy of pushing the kind of changes in the school system that education reformers relish. Trying to make good on a campaign promise to fix the city’s schools, he fought the teachers union in...

While state teacher unions are spending time, energy and money fighting the landmark Vergara v. California ruling through appeal, one group of teachers in Los Angeles is helping shape what a post-Vergara world could look like. In a presentation yesterday at the California Community Foundation, former Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa joined L.A.-based teaching policy fellows with...

Endorsements in the District 1 school board race continued to pile up today as two LA Unified board members jumped on the George McKenna bandwagon, and former Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa weighed in for Alex Johnson. Steve Zimmer and Bennett Kayser appeared at a news conference outside City Hall this morning to offer their strong support for...

Former mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has thrown himself into the District 1 special election race by endorsing Genethia Hudley-Hayes, one of 13 candidates running to join the LA Unified School Board. Hudley-Hayes, who served as school board president until she lost her seat to the late Marguerite LaMotte in 2003, released a list of endorsers this...

Legal battles aren’t only waged in the courtroom; they’re also hard fought in the court of public opinion. As testimony in the landmark case, Vegara vs. California, resumed today inside a state superior court, another star witness took the stand — more accurately, the mic — outside the courtroom. Former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa held...

LA School Report has learned the deal to extend the contract of LA Unified Superintendent John Deasy might not have been possible without the involvement of former LA mayor, Antonio Villaraigosa. According to three people with knowledge of events, none of whom would speak for attribution, Villaraigosa made a flurry of calls to both Deasy and...

Marshall Tuck was 33 when Mayor Antonio VIllaraigosa asked him to leave his position at Green Dot Public Charter Schools to become the first CEO of a new entity called the Partnership for Los Angeles Schools. Six and a half years later — just a few weeks before Eric Garcetti takes over as the new...