When Principal James Lee learned that his students at Sylmar Charter High School had among the biggest jumps in state test scores in the local school district, he was thrilled but surprised, because they managed to pull it off despite a well-publicized lunchtime brawl that erupted on campus right in the middle of testing. He credits the...

For the second year in a row, LA Unified’s independent charter schools outperformed the district’s traditional schools on California’s standardized math and English language arts (ELA) tests, according to data released Monday by the California Charter Schools Association. The district’s magnets topped both.  The district’s independent charters saw 46 percent of its students meet or...

LA Unified has so many different kinds of schools it’s hard to keep them all straight. With such varied terms as affiliated charter, independent charter, magnet school, pilot school, continuation school, option school and others, it can be a challenge to understand what they are, what they offer and how they differ.  This is the third...

This is part of an LA School Report series taking an in-depth look at the different categories of schools that exist within the massive LA Unified school district. (Read more on affiliated charters: A successful model on its way out? and The elementary school-turned-affiliated charter that became so popular parents fake their addresses) (Read the series on magnet...

LA Unified has so many different kinds of schools it’s hard to keep them all straight. With such varied terms as affiliated charter, independent charter, magnet school, pilot school, continuation school, option school and others, it can be a challenge to understand what they are, what they offer and how they differ. This is the...

*Oops. In a previous version of this story the chart mistakenly used “district control” instead of “district autonomy,” reversing the meaning of the graphic. Apologies to our readers. The Los Angeles public school landscape is undergoing an unmistakable shift, with schools adopting new models that ultimately will result in students getting more choices. In a...