The district has 36,322 students, or about 5.5 percent of the school population, designated as English learners, said Hilda Maldonado, executive director of LA Unified’s Multilingual and Multicultural Education Department. About 3,300 of those are also designated as special education students.

In a comprehensive report given to the Curriculum, Instruction and Educational Equity Committee on Tuesday, Maldonado said the district is making progress in lowering the number of students who require six or more years of special English instruction — those designated Long-Term English Language learners.

The district is working toward reclassifying those students so they can join the general population. Dual immersion schools and new courses have lowered the numbers and helped the students with their English, administrators said.

“We have made a lot of gains in long-term and standard English learners, but we still have much work to do,” said Maldonado, who also unveiled a new dashboard for charting EL students’ progress online that will launch in August.

The percentage of students reclassified out of the EL program entirely because of their better understanding of English has increased as well. In the 2011-2012 school year, 11 percent of the EL students were reclassified. In 2014-2015, 24 percent were reclassified, according to the multilingual department.

As examples of how the program is working, the administrators brought in principals from Ellen Ochoa Learning Center and 74th Street Elementary.

Mara Bommarito is principal of Ochoa, a dual language school that is 98 percent Latino and has 42 percent designated as EL. One-third of the EL students are in special education. She said 71 percent of the kindergarten students come in requesting to be part of the dual language program.

“We have focused totally on the development of their literacy skills so they can leave us in the 8th grade and go on to high school,” Bommarito said. She has followed her students’ scores and successes after high school. “We want them to be reclassified and college ready.”

School board member George McKenna asked if the school was losing students to charter schools, and the principal said no, despite attempts at recruiting students out of the school. “There is a big commitment to our students by everyone on the staff, and that is keeping the students with us,” she said. The school has maintained an enrollment of about 1,500 K-8th graders for the 11 years she has been there, she said.

Cherise Roper, principal of 74th Street Elementary, said 75 percent of her students are African-American and 25 percent are Latino. She described a diagnostic tool her school uses that identifies African-American linguistic features, such as whether a student confuses the “th” or “f” sound or if the past tense is incorrect. She also said parents at the school are very much involved in the programs.

Kandice McLurkin, program coordinator for the district’s Academic English Mastery Program, said the California Department of Education provided a $300,000 grant that will reboot in June to help the program. There are 11 English-language coaches set up in all parts of the district and the money also helps support 40 parent representatives and parent centers.

“I am encouraged and hope that this work will inspire and become contagious for everyone because it’s a long frustration of mine that the district has not addressed this with adequate resources,” McKenna said. “You need to get the staffing you need and the quality of materials you need for kids to improve their language skills and show the progress.”

LAUSD report on A through G completion rates.

There is a wide gulf of disparity when it comes to the performance of races and subgroups in LA Unified’s A through G completion and graduation rates, but these groups have come a long way and are doing better than ever before.

Recent district reports breaking down the graduation rate as it heads into the final six weeks of the school year show 68 percent of seniors are currently on track to complete their A-G courses with all D’s or better. A-G completion is a key component required for graduation and is being implemented for the first time this year. The courses are required for acceptance into California’s public universities, although C’s are needed to qualify.

Due to a $15 million credit recovery program that has signed up thousands of students to retake courses after school, on weekends and over holiday breaks, the district has predicted the graduation rate could rise as high as a record 80 percent. But peeling back the layers of the 68 percent mark reveals other numbers that are troubling yet familiar, as African-Americans, Latinos, English learners, foster students and students with disabilities are far behind their peers on A-G completion.

“The racial disparities in achievement and discipline have been consistently on the front burner. It means we need more support, it means we need to have more personalization and it means that you can’t just do more of the same,” said board member Monica Garcia, who is a strong advocate for the A-G standards. “I think it is about a system learning how to succeed with all populations, and LA Unified has more to do.”

Despite the disparities, the district has made big strides over the years when it comes to race and subgroup performance. According to a UCLA report from 2013, 21 percent of African-American high school students were on track with A-G courses in 2008, compared to 59 percent today. Latino students had a 24 percent on track rate then, compared to 67 percent today. English learners had an overall 9 percent on track status, compared to 29 percent for long-term learners and 24 percent for short-term learners today.

Asian students and white students, who are outpacing their peers today, have also made significant strides. Asians have gone from 58 percent on track in 2008 to 83 percent today, and white students have gone from 45 percent to 74 percent. Overall the district had made progress in all students who are getting C’s or better in all A-G classes, from 18 percent in 2005 to 48 percent as of March 7.

When asked about the low performance of African-American students on A-G, LA Unified Chief Academic Officer Frances Gipson said the district is taking various steps to help those students and new data coming soon will show that more African-American students from LA Unified are getting into college than ever before.

“We are working with UCLA on a really strong collaborative, and we have seen our numbers increase with our connective efforts around culturally proficient teaching and pedagogy. We have also done some partnering with the College Board and our partners at UCLA making sure we are developing that college-going culture,” Gipson said. “This year we have a record number of students getting into UCLA and our historically black colleges. Those numbers should be out soon.”

She added, “We are doing some intentional practice and research and study and learning from what is working best in our field for our learners.”

LA Unified school board President Steve Zimmer at a recent board meeting said the district is focused on bringing more equity to all its students.

“I’ve said this before and want to continue to emphasize that we are striving to bridge the education gap between the haves and the have-nots and give every student a path to quality education and graduation. That remains the civil rights struggle of our day,” he said.

The district’s 141,000-plus English learners remain among the biggest challenge when it comes to A-G because some of the courses essentially require English fluency.

“We have seen a lot of autonomy given to local districts and schools to figure [racial disparities] out. The other groups that are really struggling are English learners, they are not even really eligible to take those A-G courses,” said Sara Mooney, an education program associate at United Way of Greater Los Angeles, which has advocated for the district to keep the A-G standards. “There is a big concern, even though there is differentiated instruction and a lot to of autonomy, we really need to see a greater push for some racial equity and some real supports for African-American students and for English learners.”

LA Unified has the most English learners of any district in the country, at roughly 155,000, and a troubled history of educating them. In 2011 it settled a complaint by the federal Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights, which found that the district had failed to provide adequate services to English learners. As part of the agreement, the school board passed an overhauled English Learner Master Plan in 2012 meant to increase services for ELLs.

In the English language arts part of the new statewide tests, only 3 percent of LA Unified’s ELLs scored in the top categories — exceeding and meeting standards — and only 5 percent did so in math. That compared with 11 percent in both subject areas statewide for ELLs.

Compared with the state’s 11 other large districts, LA Unified’s ELLs finished second-to-last in English language arts, ahead of Frenso and Oakland by a single percentage point in the number of students meeting or exceeding standards. In math, the district’s ELLs tied for second to last with San Jose and Oakland at 5 percent, with Fresno coming last at 3 percent.

San Francisco led the pack with 21 percent of its ELLs scoring in the top categories. The 11 other districts averaged 8.6 percent in the top categories for English and 9.5 percent in math.

Hilda Maldonado, director of LA Unified’s Multilingual and Multicultural Division, said the district is still analyzing its results and trying to determine how many of the ELLs who took the test are at the beginning of English language acquisition and how many are near the end. A difference in those numbers could explain the district’s relatively poor performance.

But LA Unified also doesn’t provide the same level of services as the top performer, San Francisco, which has roughly 30 percent of its ELLs enrolled in bilingual programs, compared with a five percent average around the state. At LA Unified, Maldonado said, bilingual programs are only offered at about 60 of the district’s 1,000-plus campuses.

“The services that San Francisco offers, we don’t offer at that higher rate, but we are looking to expand the duel language and bilingual language programs. That’s one of the charges that is under our office this year,” she said.

To what extent the district is exploring an expansion, Maldonado said, is still under discussion. She also pointed out progress the district has made since the settlement with the feds: One of the major problems the federal investigation found was the district’s high level of long-term English learners who were not progressing after years of instruction.

“I think we’ve been able to cut [long-term English learners] by about 10,000 to 15,000 students. We started off with about 40,000 long-term,” Maldonado said.

The district’s poor ELL performance could also add fuel to a lawsuit brought earlier this year by Community Coalition South Los Angeles and a parent that accuses LA Unified of improperly calculating and distributing money from the Local Control Funding Formula, a 2013 state law intended to direct extra money to high-need students. The result, they assert, deprives low-income, foster youth and English language learners of $2 billion in funds that should be directed to their education.

Maldonado sidestepped the question of whether the district needs to dedicate more LCFF funds to its English learners.

“Rather than say it costs more money to educate these children, our office thinks of it more from the perspective of, look at his wonderful assets these kids bring by having a second language,” she said.

Following the release of the tests results last week, State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson said he is seeking funding from the Legislature and the Department of Finance for three positions within the California Department of Education to help insure that English learners are receiving quality instruction. The move arises out of the settlement of a lawsuit involving English learners,

“Serving English learners, who make up nearly one-quarter of our public school students, is one of my top priorities,” he said. “We are eager to carry out the terms of this settlement, including adding staff and providing additional guidance to districts, so together we can make sure English learners get the support they deserve.”

The new tests will look a lot like the tests they replace, said Hilda Maldonado, director of the LAUSD Multilingual and Multicultural department. The district had initially sought to purchase the old CST tests independently but found the nearly half-million dollar price tag too expensive for the 40,000 tests needed for ELL students this year.

The new assessment will be administered by schools from March 17 to May 23, according to Maldonado, adding that students in grades 3-9 will have the option of “banking” their CST scores from the previous year if they scored a basic or above. The CST tests have been replaced by the Common Core-aligned Smarter Balanced tests, which are slated to be officially administered next school year.

Maria Ruiz, a mother of two ELL students in Boyle Heights, said she’s concerned that the new Common Core-aligned assessments will be far more challenging for ELL students, resulting in fewer reclassifications.

“The first time students take the [Smarter Balanced tests] will likely result in students’ scoring lower,” Maldonado said. “Whether or not we’ll consider these scores next year or we’ll use a completely different reclassification process as we’ve done this year is still to be decided.”

A recent report by the Public Policy Institute of California recommends a single state standard for reclassification, rather than each school district developing its own, the current policy. The report also noted more rigorous reclassification guidelines often resulted in slightly better academic outcomes for recently reclassified students.

Ruiz said she hopes any changes to the reclassification assessment will be supported by new funds for ELL students. “I’ve asked for tutors and even Saturday classes at my sons’ schools to help them along, but I’ve been told there’s no money for these things,” Ruiz said.

Ruiz also said the district must do a better job informing parents of ELL students how they can help with the process. According to Ruiz, only three parents of ELL students attended the most recent meeting of her local school site council, which represents a school with hundreds of ELL students.

“Many parents don’t even know their children are ELL, even though they’re instrumental in guiding them through the process” Ruiz added.

Previous Posts: CA Getting ‘Smarter’ with New Tests to Probe Critical Thinking; Millions of American students need to learn English;

Van Houten has been doing everything she can to comply with the district’s rules, and come tomorrow morning, all Kindergarten through fifth grade EL students at the school will be pulled out of mainstream classes and sorted by their ability to speak English.

“It’s been hard,” said Van Houten’s administrative assistant.

The policy is not new one. It was established in 2000, but it wasn’t until the district settled a suit with the U.S. Office of Civil Rights last year that LA Unified decided to enforce having segregated classrooms for non-English speakers. The lawsuit accused the district of failing to provide adequate services to EL students.

It’s not clear why district officials set Oct. 25, two months after the start of the school year, as the deadline, but it’s caused quite an uproar across the district as well as protests among teachers and parents, who say it’s too late in the year to reshuffle students.

“We don’t really know, exactly, what kind of disciplinary action they might take against anyone who defies the policy,” Judy Perez, president of Associated Administrators of Los Angeles, the union representing school principals, said in an interview.

Perez says she’s heard from dozens of principals from every region of LA Unified who are debating whether or not to meet the deadline.

There is a wide range of disciplinary actions that the district can take. Among the options: a Letter of Reprimand (a strongly worded letter that’s not officially considered disciplinary action), suspension a without pay or demotion. In an extreme case, a principal can be fired.

“If one of our members is called into a disciplinary conference, it is our role to protect them and make sure they are given their due process rights,” Perez said.

Juan Ramirez, Elementary Vice President for the teachers union, UTLA, said it’s too late for the teachers’ union to intercede on behalf of teachers who are caught in the middle of the shift and might be exposed to disciplinary action.

“If teachers had come to us at the end of last year, or before the beginning of the year, maybe we could have approached the district and tried to ask for an extension,” he said. “But now, there isn’t anything we can really do for them.”

Previous Posts: LA Unified town hall meeting; LA Unified Budget Wars Return with the Usual Competing Visions; Common Core Training Session Draws Overflow Crowd

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg Donates $350,000 to LAUSD Reformer’s Campaign
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See also: LA School Report

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See also: LA School Report, SI&A Cabinet Report

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See also: EdSource, Fresno Bee

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See also: LA Times, KPCC

Tom Bartman, Who Helped End LA School Busing, Dies
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L.A. Unified Teacher Arrested for Alleged Child Porn Possession
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See also: LA Daily News, HuffPo

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Five Gates Millennium Scholars Selected From Paramount High School
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Pasadena Unified Plans to Slash 48 Additional Jobs Across District
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Thousands of Los Angeles County Fifth-Graders Enjoy a Day at Music Center
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Panel Moves to Include Grad Rates As Part of the API
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Democratic Senators Offer Alternative to Brown’s Funding Formula
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State Probes Burbank Third Grade Cheating Report
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See also: LA Times

State Toughens Regs for Interns Teaching English Learners
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Democratic Party Schism Over Scandalous Schools: Gloria Romero, Slimed by Teacher Unions, Says Sober Up
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LA Mayor’s Race: How the Candidates Stand on Your Issues
Even though the mayor doesn’t have any direct authority over the Los Angeles Unified School District, many voters said they want the next major to play a role in education. KPCC

As Restorative Justice Spreads, When Do You Suspend?
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Help on the Road to Higher Education
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A Curriculum Crunch for California
While education reformers in Sacramento continue to obsess about how easy it should be to fire teachers and how important tests should be in evaluating their performance, almost no one is talking about the central issue of what students are supposed to be learning in the near future. LA Times Editorial

Hawthorne Middle School Teacher Wins Honor
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Educators Want Concrete Data to Build New API Indicators
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School Boards Join Movement Against Out-of-School Suspensions
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Students Rally to Support Adult Education Programs
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Education Advocate Michelle Rhee Fends Off Accusations
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Study: Charters Get Less Funding Than Traditional Public Schools
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CA Legislature Kills Bill to Shield Identities of Armed Teachers
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L.A. School Reform Effort Draws Diverse Group of Wealthy Donors
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Interest in Teaching Continues to Drop in California
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See also: EdSource

A To-Do List for L.A.’s Next Mayor
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Villaraigosa’s Legacy
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Robot Experiment Coming to Los Angeles Classrooms
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LA County Preschool Teachers Honored at Event
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Civil Rights, School Groups Rally to Protect Spanish-Language Testing
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LA for Youth Holds Concert at City Hall
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CTA Goes Hollywood on Teacher Dismissal Bills
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See also: SD Union-Tribune Editorial

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More Teachers Group Students by Ability
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How to Build a Progressive Education Movement
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Report: Cheating on Standardized Tests in 75 Percent of U.S. States
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SBE Allows Higher Student/Teacher Ratio for Online Charter Schools
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In the course of reporting a story about Michelle Rhee, the controversial former District of Columbia chancellor seeking to take her brand of education reform to statehouses across the country, the Los Angeles Times asked her spokeswoman a simple question: Do Rhee’s children attend public or private school? LA Times

From the Lunch Line to the Stage: LA Cafeteria Worker Featured in New Play
A new play that tackles healthy eating in schools by following the life of a lunch lady opens tonight. Among the performers is a Los Angeles Unified School District cafeteria worker who will take to the stage for the first time at age 58. KPCC

Inland Empire School District Repeats as Finalist for Academic Prize
The Corona-Norco Unified School District was named as a finalist Thursday for the prestigious Broad Prize, which honors academic excellence by minority and low-income students in urban districts across the nation. LA Times

Intern Teachers: Special Ttraining Is Needed to Teach English Learners
magine your family transplanted to a new country. Neither you nor your children speak the local language; the education system functions entirely differently. Who do you want teaching your child: a teacher who knows how to teach both academic subjects and the new language to non-native speakers, or a teacher with little to no training in either?  San Jose Mercury Sun Opinion

California Schools Chief Strikes Tone of Optimism in Annual Address in Lawndale
In a speech addressing the state of education, Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson on Thursday celebrated a recent wave of voter-approved taxes that are expected to stabilize a dire education budget, and touted other initiatives that would bring still more tax dollars to public schools. Long Beach Press-Telegram

California Needs to Fill Teachers’ Pension Gap
Last week the Legislative Analyst’s Office told the Legislature it needs to get serious about closing a $73 billion shortfall in the California State Teachers’ Retirement System over the next 30 years.  What would getting serious about closing that gap mean? Inland Valley Daily Bulletin Editorial

Head Start Programs Across the State Cut Services, Children
As the federal sequestration budget cuts kick in, Head Start providers across California are struggling to decide how to absorb the shortfall without hurting children. EdSource

The Secret to Fixing School Discipline? Change the Behavior of Adults
A sea change is coursing slowly but resolutely through this nation’s K-12 education system. More than 23,000 schools out of 132,000 nationwide have or are discarding a highly punitive approach to school discipline in favor of supportive, compassionate, and solution-oriented methods. New American Media

Poll Finds the Less You Make, the More You Like Brown’s School Finance Reform
An even 50 percent of respondents told pollsters they favored – while 39 percent opposed – the idea of having “some money diverted from middle and upper class children to low income children and English language learners.” EdSource

Lockyer Widens Request for Legal Opinion on School Bond Campaigns
California Treasurer Bill Lockyer on Monday expanded his request for a legal opinion to determine if some local education officials and the financial underwriters they hire are violating state law by campaigning for school bond measures. LA Times

Long Beach Middle Schools to Start Day an Hour Later
The Long Beach school board voted Monday to push start times at the district’s five middle schools from 8 to 9 a.m. — a cost-cutting move officials believe will also boost student success. LA Times

Bill Clinton Endorses Wendy Greuel for Los Angeles Mayor
Former President Bill Clinton weighed in on the Los Angeles mayoral race Monday with an endorsement for City Controller Wendy Greuel. HuffPo

Orville Wright Middle School in Westchester Reinvents Itself in Bid to Improve Enrollment
Trying to reverse a plunge in enrollment and the effects of a high-profile principal kerfuffle, Orville Wright Middle School in Westchester – currently an aerospace magnet where students learn how to use flight simulators – is trying to recast itself as a magnet school with an expanded focus. Daily Breeze

St. Genevieve High’s ‘Cabaret’ Draws Ire of Conservative Catholics
St. Genevieve High in Panorama City, which won accolades as a National School of Character, now finds itself under fire, targeted by a cadre of conservative Catholics hoping to halt the production of its spring musical, “Cabaret.” LA Daily News

Partnership Blends Science and English Proficiency
Pupils at El Verano Elementary School are learning about science as they also improve their English-language skills. Their instruction is part of a federally funded collaborative project between the 4,600-student Sonoma district and the Exploratorium, a science museum in San Francisco. EdWeek

Most State Board members Back Districts’ NCLB Waiver
A majority of State Board of Education members expressed strong support at their meeting Thursday for a consortium of districts’ unconventional request for a waiver from constraints of the federal No Child Left Behind law. EdSource

Aspire Surrenders Benefit Charter Status Under Settlement Terms
Aspire Charter Schools will surrender its statewide benefit charter status under terms of a settlement agreement reached today between the charter operator, the state board of education and the group of education advocates that brought the lawsuit. SI&A Cabinet Report

Teacher Evaluations: We’ve Got to Come up With a Better System
Two years ago we all jumped up and down against the emergence of Academic Growth Over Time (AGT), which is a prediction of student performance on the California Standards Test (CST).  Compared to raw test scores, AGT looks pretty good. TakePart Op-Ed

L.A. Chief John Deasy: Depoliticize Education Research
John Deasy, the superintendent of Los Angeles public schools, opened the annual meeting of the Association of Education Finance and Policy here today with a call for researchers to help school and district administrators making decisions in hot political environments. EdWeek

Have Charter Schools Grown Too Fast?
After two decades of offering educational choice to families, leaders of the charter-school movement in California are touting accomplishments but also calling for higher standards in light of some underperforming and mismanaged schools. San Diego Union Tribune

Stemming the Tide of English-Learner Dropouts
English-language learners are two times more likely to drop out of school than their peers who are either native English speakers or former ELLs who have become fluent in the language—a trend that, if unabated, will have far-reaching negative consequences, says a new report. EdWeek

Thousands in Los Angeles Marathon Will Test the Luck of the Irish on St. Patrick’s Day 
Ortega has been training for six months with Students Run L.A., an organization that challenges 1,300 youth within the Los Angeles Unified School district to finish the marathon. San Bernadino Sun

In Los Angeles, Focusing on Violence Before It Occurs
In the days after the elementary school massacre in Newtown, Conn., Tony Beliz and his staff at the county’s mental health department here made a series of calls. New York Times

Union Wins Right to Represent Valley Charter School
The Los Angeles teachers union announced Wednesday night that it has won the right to negotiate a contract for teachers and counselors at a West San Fernando Valley charter school. LA Times

Open Letter to New York Mayor Bloomberg
Perhaps I haven’t pleased everyone in my pursuit to make our student’s education a priority, and by eschewing politics to pursue education reform I’ve offended the extremes of the education debate. Venice Patch Op-Ed by LAUSD Board Member Steve Zimmer

Slate Mailer Sleaze in L.A.
If you are on record as ever having voted in an L.A. municipal election, this month your mailbox will jam up with photo-filled mailers in advance of the March 5 primary for mayor, City Council, city attorney, controller, Los Angeles Unified School Board and community college trustees. LA Weekly

For First Time, a ‘Parent Trigger’ Without a Hitch
For the first time, a group of parents has succeeded in pulling a “parent trigger” on a struggling school without resistance. On a 7- 0 vote, the Los Angeles Unified School District Board of Education on Tuesday afternoon quickly approved a petition to overhaul 24th Street Elementary. Hechinger Report

California Drops Out of ELL Assessment Consortium
California education officials have dropped out of a group of a dozen states that had organized around the need to develop a new English-language proficiency assessment that will measure the language demands of the Common Core State Standards. EdWeek

Beverly Hills High Wins County Academic Decathlon
Beverly Hills High School has won the Los Angeles County Academic Decathlon, earning a spot in the state competition in Sacramento next month. LA Times

Charter School Petition Is Approved
Plans to bring a charter school to Downtown got the green light from the Los Angeles Unified School District Board of Education this week. LA Downtown News

Changing the Debate on Charter Schools
As charter schools have dominated public discussion on education in the past several years, the debate at times has appeared to be between charter schools for the whole country or no charter schools at all. EdWeek Commentary

Judge May Dismiss Sex Lawsuit Against Former LAUSD Chief Ramon Cortines
A judge said Wednesday he was inclined to grant a motion by lawyers for former Los Angeles Unified Superintendent Ramon Cortines to dismiss a lawsuit alleging the educator made unwanted sexual advances to a male LAUSD employee.  LA Daily News

API Rewrite Getting Fast-Tracked, Graduation Rates Come First
Under pressure to quickly add new indicators for school success into the Academic Performance Index, a state advisory panel recommended Tuesday a point-scoring system that would reflect the number of students who’ve graduated. SI&A Cabinet Report

Report Questions Impact of Brown’s Finance Formula on Career Tech
In proposing to give school districts money with fewer strings attached, Gov. Jerry Brown is confident that local school boards and superintendents are best able to make the right decisions so that all students can graduate ready for college and work. A report released today questions that assumption. EdSource

L.A. Unified’s College-Prep Push Is Based on False Data
San Jose’s school district, which requires all students to pass the classes necessary to apply to California universities, initially reported strong results. But its success was overstated. Those results should raise warning flags for other school systems, including Los Angeles Unified, that based key policy decisions on San Jose’s misreported data. LA Times

LAUSD Plans to Add 1,000 New Campus Aides for Security at Elementary Schools
The Los Angeles Unified School District plans to make more than 1,000 new hires to bolster security at hundreds of campuses in a move some critics have called “security on the cheap.” LA Daily News
See also: KPCC, LA Times

State Legislators Seek Crackdown on Expensive Form of School Finance
Two state lawmakers moved on Friday to crack down on a costly method of finance that hundreds of school districts have been relying on to pay for new construction. LA Times

Teachers Flip for ‘Flipped Learning’ Class Model
When Timmy Nguyen comes to his pre-calculus class, he’s already learned the day’s lesson – he watched it on a short online video prepared by his teacher for homework. AP

Days of Small K-3 Classes Look Done for in California
California embarked on an ambitious experiment in 1996 to improve its public schools by putting its youngest students in smaller classes. Nearly 17 years later, the goal of maintaining classrooms of no more than 20 pupils in the earliest grades has been all but discarded. KPCC

Students Struggling With English Not Getting Help
More than 20,000 California students struggling with English are not receiving legally required services to help them, setting them up for academic failure, says a report by two civil rights groups. LA Times

Arrest of LAUSD Teacher May Bolster Lawmaker’s Case to Speed up Dismissals
In California, school districts can remove a teacher accused of serious misconduct from the classroom, but must put them on paid leave through the dismissal process — and during appeals — if the employee contests the action. KPCC

Attorney: Alleged LAUSD Abusers Mostly at Low-Income Schools
Attorney Martha Escutia said in a statement that the public deserves to “know why LAUSD is unable to protect children and why a majority of alleged sex abusers appear to end up teaching at economically disadvantaged schools.” CBS LA

Calif. Agency Takes Months to Review Misconduct
Months after the California Commission on Teacher Credentialing was notified of a Los Angeles Unified elementary school teacher suspected of molesting at least a dozen students and a principal who failed to report him to authorities, the agency has not taken action on the cases. AP

North Hollywood High’s Cyber Patriot Team Heads to National Finals
North Hollywood High School is one of three Los Angeles Unified campuses that will send teams to the National High School Cyber Defense Competition in Washington, D.C. in March. LA Daily News

Russia Is Topic as LAUSD Academic Decathlon Begins
The topic is Russia for the more than 500 students from 58 high schools gathered at Roybal Learning Center in downtown Los Angeles on Saturday for the Los Angeles Unified School District Academic Decathlon. LA Times

Gov. Jerry Brown

LAUSD Superintendent John Deasy praised the budget proposal California Gov. Jerry Brown released today, saying in a press release, “the changes announced today are quite positive for our students in the Los Angeles Unified School District.”

In his proposal, Governor Brown would fund school districts based on the number of its students and the level of challenges faced by its students, meaning districts like LAUSD with higher enrollments of low-income students and English language learners would be eligible for more state funding. According to Deasy, the Brown proposal would prevent new furloughs or budget cuts.

To see the summary of Gov. Brown’s 2013-2014 budget proposal, click here. To see Superintendent Deasy’s full press release, click here.

Former San Gabriel Student Hosts Bullying Prevention Day
Schools throughout the Los Angeles region Wednesday observed 12 seconds of silence to commemorate the Bullying Prevention Day, created by former San Gabriel Unified School District student Gerry Orz. LA Daily News

Parents Challenge Crenshaw High Shake-Up
Los Angeles school district officials received a frequently skeptical and occasionally hostile reception Tuesday night when they met with parents and others to explain their plans to restructure low-performing Crenshaw High School. LA Times

Last of the School Construction Money Going Out
The board that approves state construction funding for California schools on Wednesday issued the bulk of its remaining cash to 90 districts, effectively ending for now the pool of money set aside to match local contributions. SI&A Cabinet Report

Perfection: Cleveland High Student, Schuyler Ross, One of Five in the World to Ace AP Biology Test
A Van Nuys teen was one of only five students in the world to score a perfect 150 on the college-level exam, which he took as a sophomore in his school’s humanities magnet. LA Daily News

County School Board Hears Einstein Charter Proposal
Los Angeles County Office of Education board members heard about 30 minutes of discussion Tuesday at a public hearing that provided Einstein Academy for the Letters, Arts and Sciences another chance to petition for a kindergarten-through-sixth-grade charter school in Santa Clarita. SCV News

Ed. Department Focus on English-Learners Seen Waning
As the number of English learners continues to grow faster than that of any other group in the nation’s public schools, concerns are mounting that the distinctive needs of those students and the educators who work with them are receiving diminishing attention from the U.S. Department of Education. EdWeek

Ex-Gang Member Says He Survived Shooting to Make a Difference in Kids’ Lives
Shot in the chest and arm by a gang member wielding a .45, Steve Martinez figures he should have died on the street near San Fernando High School. LA Daily News

New CTE Standards Reflect Fast-Moving Tech Changes, Higher Academic Goals
After almost two years of work, state officials have completed proposed revisions of the Career Technical Education curriculum standards encompassing the addition of several new pathways including game design and integration. SI&A Cabinet Report