U.S. Secretary of Education John B. King Jr. takes questions from reporters Wednesday at USC.

U.S. Secretary of Education John B. King Jr. was joined by LA Unified Superintendent Michelle King and a number of education leaders at the USC Rossier School of Education Wednesday to announce the release of his department’s new teacher preparation regulations.

The regulations call for more detailed information to be gathered on how new teachers are performing, aim to provide better tracking of retention rates, offers more flexibility to states in how they measure the performance of preparation programs and require states to report annual ratings on their programs.

“The regulations really try to establish a better feedback between our K-12 schools and our teacher preparation programs, so that teacher preparation programs are getting good information about how their graduates are doing,” Sec. King said to a group of reporters. “What kinds of schools are they going into? Are they staying in those schools? Are they being retained in the teaching profession? What kind of impact are they having on their students that they teach?”

In his opening remarks at USC, Sec. King referred to the information gathered in the old regulations as “surface data,” and Superintendent King offered praise for the new, more detailed data the regulations call for.

“The use of data and really focusing on outcomes I really think is critical. And so whenever we can put that in place I think it helps drive the whole system forward, which is important,” Superintendent King told LA School Report when asked how the new regulations would impact her district. “And we certainly want teachers that are prepared, that are making an impact and a difference for kids. And so we can look at that and go back and have our partnerships with the different universities and say, ‘Look, this is what’s working.'”

The new regulations also:

• Will punish low-performing programs by cutting off federal TEACH grants.
• Require feedback from graduates and their employers on the effectiveness of their program.
• Give guidelines for measuring the student learning outcomes of those under novice teachers, including academic performance.

The new regulations were criticized by American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten.

“It is, quite simply, ludicrous to propose evaluating teacher preparation programs based on the performance of the students taught by a program’s graduates,” Weingarten said in a statement.

The new regulations have been in the works for at least five years and were begun under Sec. King’s predecessor, Arne Duncan, who stepped down in 2015. Earlier this month, in an open letter to college presidents and education school deans, Duncan said, “The system we have for training teachers lacks rigor, is out of step with the times, and is given to extreme grade inflation that leaves teachers unprepared and their future students at risk.”

Sec. King also participated in a roundtable discussion at Rossier, where he was joined by Under Secretary Ted Mitchell, Superintendent King, Rossier School of Education Dean Karen Symms Gallagher and a number of education leaders. Also at the table were some educators and administrators at LA Unified schools, including Norma Spencer, principal of the Alexander Science Center, and Kristen McGregor, principal of Belmont High School.

One issue that was raised several times was the problem of teacher retention and the teacher shortage plaguing the nation. According to a new study from the Learning Policy Institute, enrollment in teacher-preparation programs dropped from 691,000 in 2009 to 451,000 in 2014. And according to a recent commentary on LA School Report by Jane Mayer and Jesse Soza, approximately 11,000 LA teachers are predicted to leave the profession in the next five years.

“What I have learned is that teachers are feeling isolated and when they don’t have other teachers or a support team there, they are more likely not to stay within the profession,” Superintendent King said during the discussion.

Kearstie Hernandez, a chemistry teacher at Huntington Park High School and a 2014 Rossier graduate, listed during the roundtable discussion all the different roles she has taken on at her school, including head of the girls’ basketball program, assistant athletic director, head of the science fair and several others.

“I sleep five hours a day. I commute an hour in the morning and an hour and a half in the evening back home,” she said.

Superintendent King was impressed with the list — and concerned.

“I was listening to all that stuff. That’s a lot for a new person. I’m thinking, ‘Oh my gosh, she is going to hit the wall and burn out,'” King told LA School Report. “So we really have to be very intentional about that and put the supports around them and really hook them up with other people. Because if you don’t, three years out, they just say, ‘It’s too much.'”

During his closing remarks at the end of the panel discussion, Sec. King had praise for Superintendent King and LA Unified.

“Certainly, Michelle, I really admire the things you are doing in LA and your commitment that LAUSD has to continue to get better and close gaps and create better opportunity. And your willingness to have the hard conversations to make that happen, I appreciate,” he said.

Described as the variations in academic performance among children entering kindergarten and first grade who are from low-income and diverse backgrounds compared to their wealthier and white counterparts, Zimmer reiterated in a recent interview with LA School Report that he believes the district can eliminate this gap. California and LA Unified have invested heavily in early childhood education programs like transitional kindergarten and preschool. But ultimately, King and the school board, including Zimmer, coalesced around a singular goal of 100 percent graduation, which King said would trickle down to all grade levels.

Here is the rest of our interview with Zimmer on topics like the school readiness gap, the school calendar and his opinion of King. Read the first part of the interview, which was on credit recovery, here.

Q: Your board office here in East Hollywood seems pretty robust with after-school programs, classes for homeless youth and computer courses for parents through your partnership with Youth Policy Institute. Do other board members run similar operations in their field offices, or is yours unique?

A: I think different board members have different operations. We’re the only one right now. We pay. We invest in this. Most field offices are at school sites. We have an office at Twain and we have an office at Taft. We have a huge district, so it’s important. But they are literally a tiny office or desk. It’s just so when I’m out there I don’t have to ask families to come all the way downtown or to east Hollywood to meet me. Or when we have staff, they can work out of the field. They’re not an office like this. This is the neighborhood I served as a teacher and counselor. This is the neighborhood where I live.

Q: How long have you lived here?

A: I’ve lived here in this area for about nine years. But I worked this area for about 15 years. They actually had me come over for the first week, this was 2007, when they opened Bernstein (high school). This whole area used to be Marshall. It’s hard to imagine now with the building program, what the world was like 10 to 15 years ago. And what the world was like before we built 131 schools. And the whole debate right now over the calendar is a very interesting debate because there’s a whole generation of us who only taught at year-round schools, what were known as Concept 6. 

Q: What is Concept 6?

A: Year-round schools is a misnomer because it implies that there was an academic or instructional reason why we had a year-round calendar. The only reason we had a year-round calendar was we didn’t build adequate facilities for children living in the most economically and racially segregated neighborhoods in the state or in the nation. And so, when we say Concept 6 that was how we designed a calendar so that we could meet, at the bare minimum, the state’s standards, the state’s requirement for days of instruction, while offering less days of instruction.

Q: What were the advantages of a year-round calendar?

A: I think for adults, there were things about that schedule that had advantages. There were even things unintentionally instructionally that had advantages when we had funding. Let’s say you were an immigrant student who came to this country in middle school and you went to a Concept 6 year-round school. You basically could go to school all year round, so you really had a chance actually to not have any gaps in your English language acquisition and your academic acquisition. So there were a few advantages, unintentional. But when you really parsed it out, if you went to a year-round school from kindergarten through 12th grade, you actually missed the equivalent of a year and a half of days of instruction, and that was ultimately what won out in court and I think ultimately what helped folks convince the voters that we should pass these (school construction) bonds.

Q: You are constantly asking Superintendent Michelle King to be bold and to take chances. Do you feel like there needs to be more of that? 

A: I think Superintendent King is genuinely collaborative in her leadership approach, and I think in the long run that’s going to be a good thing for the students of Los Angeles. I think the normative back and forth between a board and the superintendent should have some of that pushing back and forth. And that’s how districts move. It’s a precise nexus between the proper checks and balances in a system, but also the creative tensions in a democratic structure that has separation of powers that actually move an organization. I’m sure that the superintendent and her team will push us a lot on budget issues over the next few months. We may push for some more bold measures in terms of goals or aspirations or things like that. That’s appropriate.

If I didn’t believe that Ms. King has those for our students, I wouldn’t have voted for her to be superintendent. I just think there’s an incredible amount of balancing that takes place. And actually, I couldn’t imagine right now a better relationship between a board and a superintendent. We model in some ways what (former superintendent) Ray Cortines taught us in terms of a true partnership. But that doesn’t mean it’s not without creative tension. That doesn’t mean there is a 100 percent disagreement, nor should there be. We are sleeves rolled up and working on this, both literally and figuratively. 

And I believe it’s within our grasp to eradicate the school readiness gap, and I don’t understand why we would do anything else. If we make this investment on the front end and ensure that we have an equity lens to early childhood education and we invest heavily, all the research indicates that will pay dividends throughout. And so, do I want there to be a more aggressive, faster, bolder initiative around that? Of course. Is the administration really to roll that out tomorrow? Probably not. I think Dr. McKenna feels the same way about zero dropouts, and Dr. Vladovic right now is extremely concerned about re-classification, Ms. Garcia as it relates to graduation and the different things that we need to be doing now to make 100 percent a potential reality. Each board member has urgency about things that are absolutely driven by transforming outcomes for kids.

Q: What is your focus?

A: Today? Today it is eradicating the school readiness gap. Some of this is completely informed by research, some of this is informed by a lot more time spent with 3- and 4-year-olds recently. I’m just convinced that if we could say that for every child living in poverty in Los Angeles County, we are going to make sure they have access to a high-quality early-education program, with high-quality literacy, numeration skills and social emotional learning linked to an early elementary school literacy program. I actually believe it’s within our grasp to eradicate the third-grade reading gap. We saw last spring when we are focused on something, and when we resource it appropriately, and I don’t just mean resource it with funding, there’s the intellectual and emotional heart and mind resources that happens also, otherwise known as focus and mission.

I really believe that our kids can do amazing and remarkable things and I really do have an asset mindset. This has to be personal for each of us, we can’t think of EL as over there, those kids, who don’t know English. For a lot of us, English learners are our grandparents and it has to be that personal. We are very intentional in our office about what we do and how we approach the work to be very conscious and very intentional about making this personal.

And so when I approach the work as a policymaker and people say, ‘Why are you so concerned about labor rights as it relates to the largest public-sector food services contract west of the Mississippi?’ The most important part of it, the folks working in the field picking the vegetables or working in the slaughterhouses that’s someone’s mom or dad, brother or sisters, not mine, but someone’s, and we should approach the work as if it were our own. What labor conditions would we expect for our own parents? We are literally trained to not personalize this. What level of instruction do we expect for our own children? Why would we expect anything less for anyone’s child?

Monica Ratliff places a sticker on a list to identify dysfunctional school board characteristics.

Some school board decisions get ignored, all board meetings are too long and most decisions have nothing to do with what goes on in the classroom.

That’s some of the conversation that came out of an all-day session Tuesday with the LA Unified School Board and superintendent. The meeting, led by a private facilitator, was held to discuss the strategic plan and vision of the nation’s second-largest school district.

They didn’t make any binding commitments, but the discussion could lead to some major changes in the way the school board deals with the public, and how the superintendent deals with the board.

“Everybody knows low-performing schools should not exist, everybody knows this, so why does it still keep happening?” asked board member Monica Ratliff. She noted that the school board doesn’t have much to do with what goes on in the classroom and then answered her own question with: “There’s this giant bureaucracy and layers of bureaucracy and you can get help from one layer and then get stifled by another layer. And sometimes you have to go to a school board member and have that member advocate for them, but it should not have to be that way.”

Ratliff said that even the agreements made at board meetings seem to go nowhere. She said a few members nod in agreement, but sometimes nothing gets done unless she writes a resolution forcing them all to vote on it.

“I see some people (on the board) throw out the same ideas over and over and we all nod our heads and it doesn’t go anywhere,” Ratliff said.

Board member George McKenna agreed and said, “When we throw out an idea, who is supposed to pick up on it? The superintendent? I hope others can pick up on it and will come up with something.”

Superintendent Michelle King admitted that she has to prioritize what the board throws at her. “There are great ideas, but we can’t take the focus off of where we have to go,” King told the board. She noted that if there are five new things for her to do that are suggested by the board, and money is already allocated for other things they must do, she has to “clear the must-haves and stay centered and focused on what is aligned to our mission and where we are trying to go.”

King said she preferred that school board members come to her directly with issues. “I prefer direct contact and we can talk about issues, that works best for me,” she said. “I appreciate clear expectations and where it will go, and that is how I operate. The more the specific the better.” That way, board members can avoid so many resolutions.

Facilitator Jeff Nelsen

McKenna said to King, “I’m concerned what stimulates your office is a private meeting with a board member. You start doing something because a board member is asking.”

The issues brought up were not supposed to lead to direct solutions, said facilitator Jeff Nelsen, of Targeted Leadership Consulting. A coach to more than 2,000 principals and school leadership teams over the past decade, Nelsen said the exercise with the board is to identify dysfunctions, and he said, “some underlying issues naturally surfaced.”

For example, the board members and superintendent were to put dots next to items on a board that had a list of dysfunctional characteristics. Most of them put dots next to: “Disagreement among members on goals and processes,” while others pointed out “Unfocused agenda that wastes time on unimportant, peripheral issues.” A few noted: “Disagreements get personal in public” and “Members represent special interest groups or only certain areas of the district.”

Others suggested problems, including: “Board members play to other district staff, go around superintendent” and “Board plays favorites with press.”

“I think as a board we get in your way,” board member Ref Rodriguez told the superintendent. “You report to seven people rather than one board.”

King suggested that some decisions like business contracts could be handled during the various committee meetings rather than the marathon monthly board meetings that often start at 9 a.m. with closed sessions and then start again at 1 p.m. and often last until 9 p.m.

“It takes me a whole day to recover from those board meetings, I would like a more humane process,” said board President Steve Zimmer, who is in charge of the agenda for the board meetings.

Board members threw out some ideas, such as moving closed sessions to another day, getting board materials earlier than the Friday before the meeting and holding more board meetings.

The strategic plan is discussed at a meeting held at USC.

Rodriguez said some media reports “try to polarize us as a result of expressing our viewpoints and that is a shame.” He admitted, “My 4-year-old self may come out, but there’s so much value that we have different perspectives.”

King said she doesn’t mind the diversity of the board and said, “It is healthy to see the diversity of the board and their districts and how it all fits together as one. It is healthy to be aware of what it looks like in other parts of the district and it’s really not the same. We talk about poverty and there is poverty everywhere, but it does not look same everywhere.”

King suggested field trips or meetings in other parts of the district to see the diversity. Board member Richard Vladovic, who said he has worked in every district, said, “I don’t think that would be helpful for me.”

Vladovic suggested that the district consider decentralizing or even breaking up more to allow more local control.

“We as a district can’t change instruction, we can tinker with it, but the real change works at the school,” Vladovic said. “We need to stop thinking central, we need to divest ourselves of that.”

King agreed, adding, “I don’t believe one size fits all, and each school has a unique DNA. I need to see them get the results and not dictate that this is the way you need to do it. I agree that decentralizing is one of the best ways to serve the kids with the budget.”

Vladovic said he remains frustrated that the same schools continue to fail and said some solutions have become political. He said, “Union leadership doesn’t share our vision. State and federal laws don’t necessarily share our vision. We’re all together in this.”

Board member Scott Schmerelson said that when he asks staff a simple question, he often gets back a detailed five-page report that isn’t necessary. King defended the process and said, “Not every board member is satisfied with the same level of response.”

Another idea that came up is putting high-performing teachers in low-performing schools. Ratliff suggested that teachers would go if there were incentives, but McKenna said the existing teachers may resent the newcomers.

Zimmer suggested increased investments in 3-year-olds not yet into the school system. McKenna replied, “Why should we make investments on 3-year-olds when we are graduating students who cannot read?”

Zimmer said, “I am interested in a revolution of mindset and how it can be a dynamic and synergistic confluence that has to come from the messaging and framing from the district level.”

Zimmer and board member Monica Garcia both said they wanted to learn more from employees who have chosen to educate their children in the schools they work at, even though those schools may not be their neighborhood schools. Their choices show the schools are doing something right. “You want to have people proud of the school they send their children to, and we should look at that. I do not want to see any school tumble.”

Rodriguez quipped, “I have the intestinal fortitude to take on the lowest-performing schools, but I take a lot of Tums.”

Great Public Schools Now Executive Director Myrna Castrejon at a June news conference announcing the first three grants.

Great Public Schools Now announced Thursday it will give up to $3.75 million in grant funds next year to expand up to five academically successful LA Unified school campuses in underserved areas — the nonprofit’s first partnership with the school district.

GPSN launched its program in June, when it gave its first grants, totaling $4.5 million, to Teach for America, an after-school program called Heart of LA and Equitas Academy, which runs three charter schools in LA’s Pico-Union neighborhood.

GPSN Executive Director Myrna Castrejon said replicating high-performing schools has not been attempted in Los Angeles before or anywhere in the nation at the same scale, and the organization is encouraging the “best and brightest” in the district to apply for grants to expand their successful schools’ impact on more children in LA.

“We are excited to begin this collaboration with LA Unified schools where we know high-needs students are finding supportive learning environments that result in high achievement,” Castrejon said. “Our goal is to increase the number of students enrolled in high-quality programs, and to do so quickly.”

 GPSN is encouraging schools that fit certain criteria to apply for the grants. Castrejon said her organization wants to help successful leaders do more, rather than tinker with what’s working.

“We feel strongly that it is actually the leaders and the school that have the will and vision to do more that should apply rather than us deciding to do x, y or z,” she said.

“Frankly, I’m really excited to see who will apply,” she said.

Castrejon said her organization has been working with Superintendent Michelle King and her staff to develop the process, which she described as collaborative and open.

“I am excited about the opportunities to increase the number of high-quality choices for our LA Unified families,” King said in a statement. “We have schools in every corner of the district where students are excelling. Investing in these campuses will allow more of our students to attain the knowledge and skills to be successful in college, careers and in life.”

The grants — that will range from $50,000 to $250,000 annually over three years — will only be given to district-run schools. They must be used to expand successful schools by either adding seats or adding a new campus of a school.

Here are some of the criteria:

• schools must be non-selective, high-performing magnets, pilot or traditional schools;
• at least half of the students must meet or exceed proficiency in math or English on state tests
• no fewer than 25 percent of all students must perform at proficient levels
• schools as a whole must perform significantly better in math and English than surrounding schools with similar demographics
• schools must enroll special education students and English language learners at rates similar to the district as a whole
• administrators should have the autonomy to pick their own teaching staffs
• at least 80 percent of the students qualify for a free or reduced-price lunch

GPSN will also provide up to five planning grants of $20,000 to help schools prepare their applications. The deadline to apply for a planning grant is Oct. 28.

Applications for the grants will be due in February. An advisory committee will vet the applications, and the GPSN board of directors will make a final decision by April.

Castrejon said the grants are not intended to replace traditional funding of schools through ADA but will be used to support school leaders to do effective planning.

King said she has asked local district superintendents to identify the district’s most successful models and to develop competitive proposals.

“These grants can help us bring additional resources to meet our students’ needs,” said Christopher Downing, who oversees 148 schools as superintendent of Local District South. “They deserve every learning opportunity that will create pathways to college and 21st-century careers.”

Map of 10 neighborhoods where Great Public Schools Now will focus its efforts.

GPSN’s areas of focus are in South LA, East LA and the northeast San Fernando Valley because they have “chronically underperforming schools and few high-quality school choices for struggling families,” according to the organization’s plan released in June. In the 10 identified neighborhoods, 160,000 low-income English language learners are enrolled in schools where 80 percent of students are learning below their grade level, according to the plan.

GPSN’s new plan outlines its targeted areas of funding as teacher and leadership pipeline and support, facilities, community engagement and school replication.

GPSN is also holding a town hall meeting Oct. 22 at St. Mark’s Banquet Hall, 14646 Sherman Way, Van Nuys, 91405 from 9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. to hear feedback from parents and the community on its program. Another event will be held on Dec. 10 in LA, the location will be announced.

School board members and facilitator Jeff Nelsen (far right) at USC’s Caruso Catholic Center for a special committee meeting.

LA Unified’s three-year strategic plan lacks a clear mission statement.

That was the consensus of an all-day school board session Tuesday. So the seven board members decided to fix it, landing on the goal of a 100 percent graduation rate. Yet the draft of the strategic plan remains light on exactly how to accomplish it.

Because even with every teacher and principal knowing that 100 percent graduation will be the ultimate goal for the district, the three-year plan presented by Superintendent Michelle King offers targets that expect only 81 percent graduation by 2018-2019, and only 52 percent of students getting a C or better in the A-G classes required for graduation. Board members agreed that while a 10-point increase in the graduation rate to 75 percent from the 2010-2011 school year was significant, it wasn’t enough.

Draft of strategic plan targets.

The strategic plan does not directly address what King has previously acknowledged as two of the most pressing issues facing the district: the decrease in enrollment and a serious financial deficit, which she addressed last spring when she held a series of meetings before the budget was approved to discuss major challenges.

During Tuesday’s discussion at the Committee of the Whole at USC’s Caruso Catholic Center, school board President Steve Zimmer said a number of times, “I would argue that people don’t have a sense of mission” in the district. He insisted, “This discussion today is so important. We’ve got to coalesce about something.”

In a brainstorming session Tuesday that was described in the agenda as discussing “vision elements and core values” rather than specifics of the strategic plan, the school board was led by Jeff Nelsen of Targeted Leadership Consulting who has coached more than 2,000 principals and school leaders over the past decade.

“I will argue today that we should revisit the goals,” Zimmer said. “None of us is OK with 75 percent graduation, and we are being dishonest if we think so.”

Zimmer’s preferred goals are to eradicate the school readiness gap and have every graduate be bilingual and bi-literate. “We can lead the state and the nation with this,” he said.

But Zimmer was willing to let go of his ambitious goals to allow for one singular goal that the board agreed on that could encompass other goals. “We can really make real that we don’t give up on a single kid,”  Zimmer said. “We can lead in that area too.”

Zimmer told his fellow board members, “I don’t think we have a mission sense right now, and I think it’s our role to create it. And it has to be big, and the strategic plan should fall behind it. The strategic plan should be about implementing a broad mission.”

School board members with Superintendent Michelle King and facilitator Jeff Nelsen.

While King’s draft plan sets a goal of 100 percent graduation, she conceded Tuesday it wasn’t the sole clear mandate. “Heretofore, it’s about graduation,” she told the seven board members. “It’s about getting students to graduation and all that entails.”

In the initial draft, dated Aug. 3, the mission statement reads: “Embracing our diversity to educate LA’s youth, ensure academic achievement and empower tomorrow’s leaders. We are LA Unified.”

And the strategic plan does not include the 100 graduation rate in its seven targeted accomplishments with benchmarks to be hit in the next three years.

The seven goals included a 24 percent increase in school pathways such as magnets, dual-language immersion and Linked Learning programs; a 30 percent decrease in chronic absenteeism; and 100 percent access to quality art instruction, a parent computer program and restorative justice practices. Two other goals — of high school students concurrently enrolling in community college and an increase in bilingual, bi-literate graduates — did not have numerical targets yet.

“We can have all the mission statements in the world, but if it doesn’t translate to action, it doesn’t matter,” board member Monica Ratliff said.

Ratliff said that once every teacher is on board with a unified mission, then everything they do, from preschool to third grade to fifth grade, to children with trauma and more, should all lead to a child graduating from high school. “That provides us with a very clear mission that everything feeds into,” she said.

But can the district ever get to 100 percent graduation, asked board member George McKenna? “I have a problem with 100 percent graduation, it’s like a trap,” McKenna said. He pointed out that students get to the next grade simply by their birthdays, not because they are academically equipped to go to the next grade level. “How do you reconcile that we’ll never get to 100 percent graduation?”

King said some pilot schools in the district have reached 100 percent graduation and they are looking at how to replicate those programs. But she also pointed out that the one-size-fits-all approach that the district used in the past doesn’t work for every district school.

King acknowledged, “If there is a common vision and direction that is set forth and folks know where you want to go, it’s better than having competing multiple agendas.” She said, “You can’t go anywhere by spinning around about this one and that one, all that energy dissipates.” She said she plans to outline clear messages that don’t contradict each other and then plans to get the word out to kids, parents, educators and all school stakeholders.

Michelle King at the white board with Jeff Nelsen, facilitator.

Board members Ref Rodriguez and Zimmer both pointed out that statistics prove that early education helps achieve college-ready graduates.

Board member Scott Schmerelson added, “I believe most people think they work for the district, they don’t work for the kids. They forget for whom they are working.”

Board member Richard Vladovic said, “The same schools are still failing and I believe we can do better. It’s about leadership and good teaching and we’re not putting our resources where the greatest need is. I believe we have to do it now, time is running out.”

Board member Monica Garcia said she champions the 100 percent graduation goal and they all need to work out what can be done most immediately.

Zimmer pointed out that King has the respect of the teachers. “You have more trust than any superintendent has had,” Zimmer said. “You inspire trust amongst our ranks, and it’s our job to establish this mission sense once again.”

King acknowledged that the “superintendent represents the image of the district” and that “once we have what we want to do, I will go out again when I can engage (parents and teachers) face-to-face” to explain how they will accomplish their mission.

“We want graduation, bar none, not just college eligible but also getting students to be productive citizens,” King said. “Getting them to get a diploma in hand and being eligible to get to college, if that’s their choice, and everything else that supports that happening” is now the district’s clear mission, she said.

Nelsen, who monitored the discussion, said afterward that the meeting went well, and that often large urban districts don’t have as cohesive a mission as LA Unified does. He said the meeting helped “get some closure around what is the focus” for the district. He added, “I was impressed on how open and honest the board members were with a room full of people.”

The room contained about a dozen onlookers, half staff members and half media. The school board members, King and Nelsen sat around a boardroom table with religious iconography hanging over them and bulletin boards listing characteristics of a successful superintendent and school board. Although the committee meeting wasn’t televised live as meetings at LA Unified headquarters usually are, an audio recording is expected to be available in the next few days, said Board Secretariat Jefferson Crain.

The off-site meetings held outside the regular Beaudry headquarters of the school district are considered “field trips” for the board, and although they are still open to the public, the off-site locations usually discourage the public from making comments. Vladovic said Tuesday that public comments made before the monthly closed sessions end up extending the board meetings much longer than anticipated.

King said she would revamp the strategic plan in two weeks and then discuss the changes at the Oct. 25 meeting of the Committee of the Whole set for 2 p.m., although it is not yet clear where it will be held.

LAUSD Superintendent Michelle King’s strategic plan.

Superintendent Michelle King will present her strategic plan for LA Unified to the school board on Tuesday, a 16-page document outlining three years’ worth of goals and expected improvements but lacking specific details on how to accomplish them.

This is the draft of a long-anticipated plan that is supposed to address academic improvements and budget concerns in a roadmap that King said she has been working on since she was first appointed to the position in January.

The board members may not be happy with the single-digit percentage increase goals if Tuesday is anything like a committee meeting two weeks ago where board members skewered an upbeat report on improvements. That report was made by King’s chief academic officer, Frances Gipson. The elder statesmen of the board, George McKenna, Richard Vladovic and Scott Schmerelson — who had all been LA Unified teachers and principals — expressed dissatisfaction with the district’s test scores and called them “frustrating,” “depressing” and “disappointing,” despite the reported improvements.

For the 2016-17 school year, King is proposing a 5 percentage point increase in math scores, from 28 percent meeting or exceeding standards this year, to 33 percent. In English, she hopes for a 4 percentage point increase to 43 percent from 39 percent meeting or exceeding standards. For each of the following two years, the goal is to increase both math and English scores by 2 percentage points each year.

In a breakdown of the 10 largest school districts in the state, the California Department of Education’s scores of the 2016 California Assessment of Student Performance and Progress (CAASPP) tests show there’s still much improvement needed. LA Unified ranked 4th among the largest 10 school districts for improvement, and most of the other districts have at least a score of 40 percent in one or both of the tests.

While the plan does not address the district’s significant problem of declining enrollment specifically, among the stated highlights of the plan is a 24 percent increase in magnet, Linked Learning, dual-language, STEM and STEAM programs, as well as a 30 percent decrease in chronic absenteeism. Other main goals are 100 percent of schools providing arts education and restorative justice programs. King also wants every parent to have access to a Parent Access Support System Portal (PASSport) by the end of the year so parents can monitor students’ grades.

The district’s impending deep deficits were also not specifically addressed.

King noted in the introduction that the plan had input compiled from 68 meetings attended by 2,655 people including teachers, parents, students, civic leaders, employees, board members and community and labor partners.

The ultimate goal for graduation rates is 100 percent. King’s report said they have yet to set a goal of how many students they want to be concurrently enrolled in at least one community college class. They also have yet to set a goal of the desired percentage of graduates who are bilingual and bi-literate.

In a striking similarity among many of the stated benchmarks in the strategic plan, King is calling for increases of 2 percentage points per year. For example, the percent of English learner students who reclassify as fluent English proficient should increase to 20 percent in 2016-17, to 22 percent in 2017-18 and to 24 percent by the end of the 2018-19 school year.

The plan calls for the percentage of students getting a C grade in their required A-G courses to rise from 42 percent this year to 48 percent in 2016-17, 50 percent in 2017-18 and 52 percent by 2018-19. The percentage of students passing the Advanced Placement exams is to rise to 40 percent next year, 42 percent the following year and 44 percent the third year.

In other areas, benchmarks are decreasing by 2 percentage points per year, such as for English learners who have not been reclassified in five years. In 2016-17 it calls for 19 percent, dropping to 17 percent in 2017-18 and to 15 percent in 2018-19. Chronic absences are to drop to 11 percent in 2016-17, to 9 percent in 2017-18 then to 7 percent in 2018-19. Days lost to suspensions are to decrease from 6,097 to 5,036 by 2018-19.

King’s plan also talks about getting parents and the community more involved in education, providing safer schools and continuing to support the whole child with health centers, mental health clinics and other services.

Other goals include developing “collaborative district partnerships” and “streamlining processes will lead to expanding school-driven partnerships.” School and staff members are to “promote the value of an LA Unified education” by handing out fact sheets, brochures and flyers at schools and training staff to communicate about district accomplishments and success stories.

One item under “tools and resources for success” is “financial incentives for schools,” with no further details. New York City schools experimented with schoolwide performance bonuses, but they were discontinued in 2011 after three years.

The school board members will be able to ask questions at Tuesday’s meeting. There will also be time for public comment.

The plan will be presented Tuesday to the Committee of the Whole, which is made up of all seven board members and is supposed to offer a forum for deep-dive reports that would take too long during the already lengthy monthly board meetings. This meeting is scheduled to be held at the USC Caruso Catholic Center at 844 W. 32nd St. at 9:30 Tuesday and is open to the public.

Student school board member Karen Calderon spoke against the change, then voted for the compromise.

The LA Unified school board decided Tuesday night to start school one week later next year, moving the start date to Aug. 22, then to Aug. 28 the following year.

After passionate debate on both sides, five school board members voted for the change, and two voted against it.

The number of days of instruction remains at 180. But the Thanksgiving break will be reduced next year to three days, instead of the whole week off, as students have had the past four years. Winter break will also be cut, from three weeks to two weeks. Unassigned days, such as for Jewish holidays, will not change.

Overall, it falls short of the initial proposal spearheaded by board member Richard Vladovic to move the start of the school year to after Labor Day, which he has tried four separate times but was out-voted. He seemed satisfied with a compromise of inching toward Labor Day over the next two school years.

But Superintendent Michelle King made it clear that school cannot start after Labor Day because a full semester could not be completed before winter break.

Parents in a previous survey said they wanted a post-Labor Day start.

“The next school year will be August 22 and the subsequent year school will start August 28, which is the week before Labor Day, and the first semester will conclude before winter break,” King said.

Student board member Karen Calderon won some applause from the audience when she explained how her peers didn’t want the calendar to change because it affects their college exams.

“The three-week difference may not seem so large, but to do that before the AP exam will have a negative effect for so many students,” Calderon said. “By changing the start date you are limiting our future and limiting our success, and I am against starting after Labor Day.”

Nevertheless, Calderon voted for the compromise. Her vote is an advisory vote.

The board also voted against concerns and pleas from two labor leaders, Letetsia Fox of the California School Employees Association representing classified employees and Juan Flecha from the Associated Administrators of Los Angeles representing administrators and principals.

“Our simple and clear message on behalf of the vast majority is to tell the board to stick to their initiative and asking to continue the calendar of the last five years,” said Flecha, who represents nearly 3,000 administrators. Their own survey said that 87 percent wanted an August start date and 40 percent wanted no change.

Juan Flecha of AALA spoke against the change.

Fox was concerned that the change in schedule could affect the number of days employees work, as many cannot afford to lose work time.

Daniel Jocz, the 2016 California State Teacher of the Year from Downtown Magnets High School, tweeted out “as someone who has worked hard to build a successful AP program, this is bad news for LAUSD students‬.”

That Twitter note got to board member Monica Garcia, who read it to the other board members and said, “I’m against it and concerned about whatever comes next.” She said that academic gains and increased graduation rates could be due in part to the calendar year starting earlier.

“We have not seen the evidence that we should roll this back,” Garcia said. “We are going to spend money to roll this back and adjust it. I have heard from angry parents to stop changing your mind.”

Garcia pointed out that the calendar was originally changed when many elementary schools in the San Fernando Valley wanted to become charters or affiliated charters to move their start dates earlier in August. Instead, the district changed the calendar.

“Everybody got used to it and it is most aggravating that people are not clear what is happening,” Garcia said. “I am so concerned and I will leave it on the board that they have their families’ interest.”

In past surveys and telephone input from teachers and parents, they said they wanted to start after Labor Day, but they also said they wanted the semester to end before winter break, which can’t both happen because there aren’t enough school days.

Vladovic and board member Scott Schmerelson said parents in their communities and neighborhood councils have asked for the more traditional school start, like they do in Chicago and New York. The board members also said they were concerned about the cost of air-conditioning expenses and energy costs in the hotter earlier start of the school year.

• Read more: Would a later start to the school year really save money?

Board member George McKenna said that he thought children were being robbed of their summers.

“We’re taking away the summer from these kids,” McKenna said. “I’m still in favor of moving it closer to Labor Day. We’re not doing this to the students, but for the students.”

Board President Steve Zimmer was concerned that the compromise does not affect the classified employees and that King address the concerns that the student school board member has about enough counseling and time for AP tests. He appreciated King’s willingness to compromise.

Board member Ref Rodriguez said there needs to be more data if the calendar affects achievement. He voted for the compromise change in the calendar. Monica Ratliff voted against the changes without comment.

By Kyle Stokes

Superintendent Michelle King has asked managers in the Los Angeles Unified School District’s central offices to submit plans outlining how they would slash their departments’ budgets by 30 percent in the coming fiscal year, according to a memo obtained by KPCC.

For now, it’s just a planning exercise. But top district officials say the aggressive cost-cutting target — the reductions would total more than $112 million if fully implemented — falls in line with King’s vision for a slimmed-down headquarters and a district in which school sites are given greater control over their own budgets.

“It’s not just another 5 percent drill,” said L.A. Unified Chief Financial Officer Megan Reilly. (Some central office departments took a 5 percent cut this year, saving a total of $11 million.)

For managers to hit their cost-saving targets of 30 percent, they couldn’t simply close open positions or pick off other similar low-hanging fruit in their budgets. The idea behind the exercise, Reilly said, is to prompt central office managers to completely rethink how they operate as declining enrollment in L.A. Unified kinks the district’s revenue stream.

“You can’t get to 30 percent without really reinventing yourself or basically talking about consolidation in other types of functions,” Reilly said.

“I call it an exercise,” Reilly added later, “but this is, in reality, something we will be going through … to look at how do we work effectively with a smaller, leaner kind of headquarters.”

L.A. Unified’s own projections show an operating shortfall of up to $663 million in the 2017-18 budget year. If that holds true, the long-term fiscal stabilization plan approved in June calls for $60 million in cuts to central office departments next year.

That grim projection, however, does not factor in new revenues the district could see from Proposition 55, a measure on the statewide ballot in November that would extend an income tax increase on the rich to benefit healthcare programs and schools.

The measure, which one poll showed as leading by a wide margin, could net L.A. Unified as much as $120 million in new revenues starting in 2018-19, district projections show.

To read the full article from KPCC, click here. 

The logo for the After School Satan Clubs.

Their logo features a wild-eyed horned character holding out a candy cane. Their promotional video features eerie music, children running backward and lots of spiders. They want to take children on field trips to local cemeteries.

Members of the Satanic Temple of Los Angeles are hoping to host After School Satan Clubs that will be targeted toward 5- to 12-year-olds in Los Angeles Unified schools. They want to start with Chase Street Elementary School in Panorama City and eventually filter into 46 other elementary schools in the district where Good News Clubs teach Bible verses and Christian values in after-school programs.

“We want to provide an alternative to what children may be taught at the Good News Clubs,” said Ali Kellog, the chapter head of the Los Angeles Satanic Temple, one of 16 chapters throughout the world. “I think the general public would be surprised to find out that there are 47 Good News Clubs at their public schools in Los Angeles.”

Good News Clubs have existed for 79 years at 77,811 sites worldwide. In the United States, more than 178,000 children go to Good News Clubs in more than 4,500 public schools.

To be clear, the Satanists do not worship Satan or Lucifer, the fallen angel of the Bible. Their courses are science-based and offer skepticism, rationalism and free inquiry, said Kellog, who created the After School Satan curriculum with Amy Monsky, executive director of Atheist Alliance of America.

But they want the After School Satan Clubs to provide an alternative to the Good News Clubs, and they are waging a battle at the second-largest school district in the country, as well as in eight other school districts across the nation. The LA Unified school district has yet to respond to the request to allow the clubs on campuses, so the Satanists said they may speak out at the next LA Unified School Board meeting, and they may conjure up some legal action to force the district’s hand. The Good News folks don’t see that legal interference is necessary.

The picture used for a petition sponsored by the American Society for the Defense of Tradition, Property and Family.

“We do not have any problem with the After School Satan Clubs being at the same campuses as our Good News Clubs, but we really feel like they are being bullies,” said John Luck, the project manager of Good News Across America and the director of development for the Child Evangelism Fellowship based in Warrenton, Missouri. “If they want to start a club, the After School Satan Club has the right to be at the school. I just doubt that many parents will want to send their children to such a club.”

Without offering specific numbers, Luck said Southern California has one of the largest numbers of Good News Clubs in the country. The organization behind the clubs, Child Evangelism Fellowship, was formally organized in 1937 in Los Angeles. In 2001, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the Good News Clubs were allowed to rent space at public schools.

LA Unified confirmed there are 47 Good News Clubs on school campuses and, after a public records request, provided the letter of request sent to LA Superintendent Michelle King, but otherwise refused to comment about the After School Satan Clubs. The letter dated Aug. 1 came from Kellog and outlined the 90-minute once-a-month club that would provide membership cards and “typically include a healthy snack, literature lesson, creative learning activities, science lesson, puzzle solving and art project.” The Satanic Temple also asked to be able to promote the club at a table during back-to-school night.

The school district said they don’t have any more to say on the matter other than: “We do not have any After School Satan Clubs in our district.” LA School Report is awaiting answers to other records requests involving after-school club procedures and a list of clubs that rent LA Unified classrooms for after-school events.

The After School Satan Club requires a permission slip just like the Good News Club does, and both clubs allow parents to observe at any time.

The Good News organizers and Luck said it’s all smoke and mirrors and that they don’t believe the Satanists actually want to start any After School Satan Clubs, but merely want to get their Good News Clubs thrown out. “They came up with a club so preposterous that people will not like it and get it thrown out and we may get thrown out along with them,” Luck said.

“The reality is that we have been embraced by the principals, teachers, parents and students,” said Luck, who can recount many times when children were comforted by the clubs when local tragedies have occurred. “We encourage good character, to tell the truth, not to cheat, be better citizens and we are not hiding in a dark corner.”

Another symbol for the After School Satan Club.

He says Good News Clubs are about spreading the word of Jesus, but it is non-denominational and the groups pay the going rate for after-school rentals, Luck said.

“We are an after-school club, and a parent has to sign you up to be in it,” Luck said. “We are not forcing anyone to be in the club. And, we are not scary.”

Kellog said the After School Satan Club she helped create could involve some scary elements, including dressing up in spooky costumes and visits to cemeteries as well as science centers. “We may look at iconography on gravestones and have the children imagine how they died,” Kellog said.

For now, she’s concerned about the next step with the LA school district. She said she has been stonewalled by district officials and has made repeated requests to meet with King.

“This involves First Amendment violations and getting the same access to the schools as the Good News Clubs,” said Kellog, who said she may soon attend a school board meeting (the next one is Sept. 20) and speak to the school board members during the public comment section. The group is also considering legal action.

At the moment, only one of the eight districts they targeted has actually approved allowing an After School Satan Club, near Portland, Ore., at the Neah-Kah-Nie School District.

Meanwhile, the Good News organizers said other groups are rallying against the Satan Club idea and insist they are not behind a petition that already has collected more than 10,000 signatures to keep the club from the schools. That’s sponsored by the American Society for the Defense of Tradition, Property and Family, based in Pennsylvania.

Moises Esteves, vice president of USA Ministries, the organization that oversees Good News Clubs, said, “No one in their right mind would send their kids to something like this.”

Luck added, “They are trying to paint us as narrow, but they are saying there is no God, and I say that that’s a pretty exclusive club. It’s a shame, but also a sham, that they are engaging in this fight.”

Satan Temple’s Kellog said she is eager to refute the concerns that parents have and offer her idea of a fun After School Satan Club. “We want to get our message out and see how many people are interested. We just haven’t had the chance to get that far yet.”

Michelle King visits Luther Burbank Middle School.

LA Unified is wasting no time in getting students with poor or failing marks into its online credit recovery program at the start of the new school year.

A district communications representative confirmed that credit recovery began right away for any student who earned a D or F in a course now being offered through the program.

Last school year, the district did not begin offering the courses until October or November, depending on the local district, but this year it is enrolling students right away in the makeup courses. The program has proven successful in boosting the graduation rate, but the value of those diplomas has been questioned by some academic experts and editorial pages.

Last year, the district was facing a huge drop-off in its graduation rate due to the school board raising the bar for what is required. For the first time, seniors had to complete and pass all of their A though G courses, which are required for acceptance into California’s public universities. LA Unified allows students to earn D’s in the courses and still qualify to graduate, although C’s are required by the universities.

The district was ill-prepared for the new requirements and entered the 2015-16 school year with only 49 percent of its seniors on pace to graduate. But it was also the first year the district implemented a wide-scale online credit recovery program, which along with some other traditional programs was part of a $15 million effort to help seniors graduate on time. After enrolling thousands of students in the courses — which took place in classrooms in front of computers after school, during free periods, over summer school or during winter and spring break — LA Unified Superintendent Michelle King announced earlier this month the projected graduation rate for 2015-16 was 75 percent, a new record.

The district has yet to disclose how many seniors graduated due to at least one online credit recovery course, but some are saying the way the record was achieved is questionable. A recent Los Angeles Times editorial criticized the graduation rate as “not quite as remarkable as it appears” due to the apparent ease with which some students are able to complete the online courses.

Academics are also beginning to question the online courses and the high number of graduates they are helping produce. “It looks very fishy,” Michael Petrilli, president of the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, an editor of Education Next and research fellow at Stanford’s Hoover Institution, told LA School Report in February.

Still, LA Unified is marching forward with its online efforts, and another $15 million has been set aside by the school board this fiscal year for credit recovery. At total of $400,000 of that is going to a company called Edgenuity that provides online courses.

Last year, LA Unified’s Chief Academic Officer Frances Gipson said that California’s public universities had approved the online credit recovery courses provided by Edgenuity and others as acceptable for admission. University of California spokeswoman Claire Doan said recently that the university system has reviewed Edgenuity’s online credit recovery courses offered by LA Unified. She declined to say whether any changes have resulted from the review.

She said there will be no change to the admission status of the students who have been accepted to UC schools starting this fall.

For its fall 2015 class of freshmen, UC schools admitted 2,659 students who attended public high schools in Los Angeles. Those numbers do not include LA Unified high schools outside of Los Angeles, like Bell High School. It does include charter schools in Los Angeles.

In the fall of 2015, 1,504 students from Los Angeles public high schools enrolled in UC schools. Data is not available for this fall. You can search for your own school here.

“UC reviews California high school courses — classroom-based and online — according to ‘A-G’ course criteria determined by UC faculty,” Doan said in a statement. “UC only approves courses that meet those criteria. We rely on educators and administrators throughout the state to uphold the standards and rigor of those approved courses.”

Cal State University spokeswoman Toni Molle said CSU is not investigating Edgenuity courses. The university does “routinely monitor the Edgenuity site,” she said.

UC approves A-G course eligibility for both the UC and CSU systems.

Some LA Unified independent charter schools are also using credit recovery. One high school has alerted parents by automated phone calls that credit recovery will start at the campus Sept. 1, and any student who had earned a D or an F in an English, math or history class is eligible to take the online makeup courses. The classes are limited, it stated, and seniors would get first priority.

LA Unified Superintendent Michelle King signed off on new health benefits for teachers assistants and playground aides even though the agreement stated that it will help push district reserves into the red by half a billion dollars within two years.

And the question in the document asking how the district would replenish those reserves was left blank.

The collective bargaining agreement with SEIU Local 99 signed Aug. 10 by King notes that “the district will have to identify additional balancing strategies to address the cost of the agreement,” and that “program adjustments are needed to accommodate the additional costs.”

According to the agreement, the superintendent acknowledges that the impact of the agreement will cut existing unrestricted reserves in half next year, then result in a $506 million deficit in 2018-2019. The unrestricted reserves meet the state minimum reserve requirement for this school year and next year, but then a “NO” box is checked for the 2018-19 school year.

The new health benefits, which will cost the district an additional $16 million a year, was approved unanimously last week without discussion by the school board and helps 4,197 employees who make an average of $28,000 a year pay for their health benefits. The total cost for the certificated and classified salaries is $117 million a year before the agreement.

Some of the costs of the health benefits will be absorbed by the state’s Local Control Funding Formula and soften the blow to about $5.7 million a year, according to the Memorandum of Understanding signed between the union and the district.

Beginning next school year, teachers assistants who work 800 hours or more a year will get their medical, dental and vision benefits paid for, valued at $506 per month per worker. They will be able to enroll in the Kaiser Permanente plan or a comparable plan.

SEIU Local 99 members protest during negotiations over the new health benefits.

Playground aides who work 1,000 hours or more a school year will get half of their medical, dental and vision paid for, a benefit of about $253 a month.

Family members, who are fully covered in teachers benefits, are not insured by this agreement for these employees. This also does not involve retirement benefits.

In the district’s original counter-proposal, the superintendent and school board referred to the findings of the Independent Financial Review Panel, which suggested cutting health benefits and decreasing staff by nearly 10,000. Administrative staff increased this year.

In the document signed by King, “specific impacts” of the agreement were listed as: “This agreement impacts the purchasing power of school sites, especially for limited, restricted funding sources. Positive impacts could be claimed in improved quality staff and organizational climate.”

It adds, “The district will have to identify additional budget balancing strategies to balance the one-year deficit” of $5.7 million.

In the section titled “concerns regarding affordability of agreement in subsequent years,” the agreement states: “The out-year impact of this agreement compounds existing budget imbalances brought about by increases in fixed costs as well as decreased revenues due to enrollment decline.”

Teacher assistant Andrea Weathersby, who was on the bargaining team for Service Employee International Union Local 99, told the school board last Tuesday that the agreement is going to be a big help for her. She is an LA Unified parent, as are many of the other workers getting the new benefits. “Unfortunately, there have been times when my children have had to skip the arts classes they love because I need to pay for their health care instead. How can you tell a child, ‘You can’t’?”

It may not go as far as the union wanted, but the agreement helps, SEIU Local 99 executive director Max Arias said at the board meeting, and added, “These are the mothers and fathers of district students, educators committed to keeping our children safe and learning, LAUSD graduates, future teachers and members of our Latino and African-American communities who have historically suffered from unequal access to quality health care.”

School board President Steve Zimmer heralded the deal, pointing out that these workers have direct interaction with the children on a day-to-day basis, and the decision is making up for past staff and budget cuts. “I am proud to support the action which ensures that our workers, and their families, will have access to expanded health care options,” Zimmer said in a statement. “We need to make sure that the women and men who take care of LAUSD’s children by day can care for their own families by night.”

Michelle King and Steve Zimmer.

Board member Monica Garcia said, “I am proud to stand with every employee – from our bus drivers to our cafeteria workers, from our maintenance professionals to classroom support staff. You help make Los Angeles great, and we look forward to our continued partnership.”

And school board member George McKenna added, “Providing health and welfare benefits to our employees is the right thing to do and will further strengthen the relationship with vital members of our school families.”

King, who is working on a budget plan that she said she hopes will off-set the additional expenses in the upcoming years, said, “We are pleased to be able to extend health and welfare benefits to support more of the hard-working employees of SEIU Local 99.”

SEIU Local 99 represents nearly 30,000 employees throughout Southern California in public and non-public organizations in early education, child care, K-12 and community college levels and includes maintenance workers, gardeners, bus drivers, special education assistants, custodians, playground workers and cafeteria workers. Nearly half of the union members are parents or guardians of school-aged children, the union said.

King added, “We believe it is in the best interest of the district to support the teacher assistants and playground aides who are committed to providing a safe and nurturing learning environment for our students.”

State Superintendent of Instruction Tom Torlakson, left, LA Unified Superintendent Michelle King and LA Unified school board President Steve Zimmer at Eagle Rock Elementary School to discuss new standardized test results.

LA Unified Superintendent Michelle King, State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson, LA Unified school board President Steve Zimmer and other leaders called a press conference this morning at Eagle Rock Elementary School to tout the results of the newly released standardized test scores.

Scores in the California Assessment of Student Performance and Progress (CAASPP) went up both statewide and districtwide in the second year the Common Core-aligned tests were given. King was quick to point out that LA Unified’s gains were among the best of any large district.

“These represent some of the highest gains that were achieved among urban districts in California,” King said.

LA Unified’s score jumped six percentage points in the English test — from 33 percent to 39 percent — and three or four percentage points in the math test, from 25 to 28 or 29 percent. (There is a discrepancy between what the CDE website shows and LA Unified said the score was. Officially, LA Unified said the total was 28.696 percent.)

King also pointed out that nearly every important subgroup like English learners and students from economically challenged households also saw gains.

Statewide, students jumped five percentage points to 49 percent meeting or exceeding the English standard, while jumping four percentage points to 37 percent who met or exceeded the math standard.

Zimmer, who is running for reelection, said he does not put all his faith in test scores but was happy to brag about the results. The board president has received financial support and the endorsement of the LA teachers union, UTLA, which has a policy of downplaying the importance of standardized tests, in particular when they are used to judge the performance of teachers.

“Those of you who know me know that I don’t believe that test scores tell us everything. I don’t even believe that test scores always tell us the most important things. But they are an indicator of progress, and the scores that we are releasing today show that in almost every significant area this district continues to make progress,” Zimmer said.

Zimmer, King and Torlakson stayed away from some of less positive news from the test results, including that the achievement gaps between some minority groups and white students, and between students from economically challenged backgrounds and their wealthier peers, remained close to the same as last year. While minorities and subgroups showed improvements, so did white students and those not from wealthier backgrounds, so the gaps remained at close to the same levels.

“Yes, absolutely, we have a lot of work to do. Yes, unfortunately, we did not see the achievement gap narrow. It’s real and we have to redouble our efforts,” Torlakson said when asked by a reporter about the achievement gap. He then added that he is working to create a team on equity in education to focus on the achievement gap.

Zimmer said the new results should “supercharge our urgency around the achievement gap and take very, very clear steps in terms of our investments.”

When it came to the improvements that have occurred, Torlakson said not all the reasons are known, but he did credit the increased education budgets over the last few years from Gov. Jerry Brown as a key factor.

“Why did this occur? We don’t have all the answers to that question. There is research and further analysis of data to be done, but I believe that it is because we have set new, higher, rigorous standards, relevant standards to our students, and it is because we have had better budgets, so we have had the resources to make a difference,” Torlakson said.

LA Unified is fresh, clean, safe and on the upswing.

That was the message Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti, LA Unified Superintendent Michelle King, school board President Steve Zimmer, U.S. Deputy Secretary of Education James Cole Jr. and board member George McKenna delivered at a news conference from the library of John C. Fremont High School in South LA this morning to help kick off the first official day of classes at the district.

The location of the library was strategically chosen, as it is brand new.

“We are so excited that this district and this city and our voters have given us the resources to do this, to take a school district that just a decade ago was literally falling apart and now has some of the most shining examples of what we should make our campuses feel like and look like,” said Garcetti, referring to the district’s $27 billion bond program to build 131 new schools, the last of which are set to be completed next year.

All of the leaders who took to the podium highlighted various positive aspects of the district, in a coordinated effort to project LA Unified as a place with a bright future — and not one facing serious budget shortfalls, potential labor unrest and continued declining enrollment.

Zimmer started off, setting the tone. “We have an unprecedented and I would say best-in-the-nation partnership with the city of Los Angeles.”

Garcetti took the opportunity to highlight the numerous ways the city and the district partner together and how the city directly aids LA’s youth. The programs he highlighted included the family source centers and other shared facilities, a summer jobs program called Hire LA’s Youth, anti-gang efforts like Summer Night Lights, an initiative to get LA Unified students signed up for library cards and efforts to boost graduation like Student Recovery Day. He also discussed a new program, Los Angeles College Promise, in which the city has partnered with the Los Angeles Community College District and LA Unified to offer a free year of community college to district graduates.

Referring to a group of high school students who were lined up behind the podium, Garcetti said, “So for our seniors here today, this is our promise to you. When you graduate, community college will be free this next year.”

Garcetti also had high praise for King, who took over as superintendent in January. Referring to her recent efforts to cool relations between the district and charter schools at the “Promising Practices” forum, Garcetti said King is “building a bridge” between reformers and teachers.

During her turn at the podium, King also spoke of the library card program, saying the district and the city are working together “for each and every LA Unified student to have a library card. There are applications in each and every enrollment packet.”

Cole, who said he grew up in a rough neighborhood in Chicago, praised LA Unified for its leadership in the nation on issues like LGBTQ student rights and restorative justice. He then remembered a high school teacher who encouraged him to “dream big” and get a college degree. Speaking to the students, he said, “So what I encourage each and every one of you to do is to find a teacher, find a coach, find a mentor who can help you along the way and help you do great things while you are here at Fremont.”

All in all, the message was clear, and perhaps best summed up by Zimmer in his remarks: “Fremont, this library, the enrollment today, and what you can see in the classes here and the amazing young people that stand with us today represent what is possible when dreams come true though public education.”

Summer outing with new GALA students at Will Rogers State Historic Park. (Courtesy: GALA)

On the first day of orientation for her all-girls school on Wednesday, Principal Liz Hicks seemed relatively calm. She personally answered her phone at her office as she was in the middle of preparing for the high-profile school celebration coming up Friday morning.

“I’m feeling a little pressure, but I’m mostly excited because this dream is really coming true,” Hicks said.

The Girls Academic Leadership Academy, known as GALA, is a middle and high school that will be the first traditional single-sex school in LA Unified. It’s also the first to open in all of California in nearly 20 years, according to LA Unified’s communications office.

“I guess I’m not too nervous because I’ve had such tremendous support from the community and the school district,” Hicks reflected.

Among her biggest supporters are those planning to come to the Friday morning grand opening: Superintendent Michelle King, school board President Steve Zimmer and school board Vice President George McKenna, who also encouraged a new district all-boys school to be opened by next year. Those school leaders will attend the launching of the school along with State Sen. Holly Mitchell, State Assemblyman Sebastian Ridley-Thomas and Mount St. Mary’s President Ann McElaney‐Johnson. The keynote speaker addressing the faculty and students will be Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti’s wife, LA’s First Lady Amy Elaine Wakeland, another longtime supporter of the all-girls school.

“We are so honored to have (Wakeland) speak because she will talk about the status of girls in Los Angeles, and she is such an inspiration for the girls,” Hicks said. “And so is Michelle King.”

GALA Principal Liz Hicks. (Courtesy: GALA)

At her State of the District speech on Tuesday, King mentioned GALA and its STEM program that will introduce girls to science, technology, engineering and math and encourage them to pursue degrees and professions where females are underrepresented. King did not mention in her speech that the first all-girls charter middle school, GALS, which stands for the Girls Athletic Leadership School of Los Angeles, is also starting up in the district this year.

Both all-girls schools can use a few more students on their rosters, and they have developed a unique positive coalition of cooperation between charter and traditional schools that seems to be rare at LA Unified.

“We help each other as much as possible, it’s not a typical model in LA where we’re thought to be in competition with charters,” Hicks said. “It’s to our benefit that we both succeed.”

Carrie Wagner, CEO of GALS, said the girls charter school was created in the wake of GALA’s formation. “There’s no doubt that Liz and GALA helped pave the way for us to exist, and she’s always there to take my call,” Wagner said.

GALS needs about 20 more students to hit their maximum of 125. GALA, which is opening with grades 6 through 9, has a waiting list for 6th grade but could use about 15 more girls for their 9th grade class to get to a total of 100 students. Both school leaders are aware their schools are very often confused, and both feel comfortable about hitting their maximum enrollment numbers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yffMQ0pQuy8

“Carrie and I talk and if I get girls who may feel like they will be traveling too far, then we tell them about the other school, and she does the same if the Valley is too far for them and are closer to us,” Hicks said. “We are trying to develop some reciprocal cooperation.”

GALA is co-located on space shared by Los Angeles High School in the Mid-Wilshire district. GALS is located in Panorama City in the northern end of the San Fernando Valley sharing Vista Middle School.

“Maybe the biggest difference that I see with being a district school rather than a charter school is that we have so much support,” Hicks said about GALA. “I know who to go to when I have a question or problem.” GALS has a board of directors locally and is based on a program in Denver.

For the girls of GALA, today is a day of learning about their dress code, getting books and understanding what to expect when the doors open for the entire district next Tuesday. On Friday, after the ceremony that is open to the public, the girls will take a tour of the USC campus.

“We want to establish the idea of higher education and going to college from day one—even before day one—and instill that idea constantly,” said Hicks, who has set a goal of 100 percent acceptance into higher education.

The inaugural class of GALA brings together girls from 69 public and private schools from 49 ZIP codes throughout Los Angeles. The breakdown is fairly diverse at about 30 percent Latina, 30 percent white, 23 percent African American, 10 percent Asian and 7 percent other. While serving only grades 6 though 9 this year, the school will expand one grade a year until it serves grades 6 through 12 by the 2019-2020 school year, when it is expected to reach its capacity of 700 students.

The district points out that research shows that all-girls schools provide a culture of academic achievement and self-confidence that results in 30 percent more females graduating than in co-ed settings, while sending 50 percent more female graduates to college.

“We are offering this all for free, and the district didn’t have that before,” Hicks said. “This was only available before at a private school. I know people are looking at this as a model, and that is an awesome responsibility, but I am sure that it will be a phenomenal education for these girls and it’s real exciting for me.”

GALA will start later in the day than the traditional school it is co-located with, and end later in the day, Hicks said. That allows for a little more sleep.

“Right now, everyone is being so supportive, and when I get a chance, I will take a deep breath and take it all in,” Hicks said.

GALA’s grand opening ceremony will take place Friday from 9 to 10:30 a.m. at the school in the northeast corner of Los Angeles High School at 1067 West Blvd. Local District West Superintendent Cheryl Hildreth and LA Sparks Chief Operating Officer Christine Simmons are also among the special guests expected at the ceremony.

Michelle King announced a record 75 percent graduation rate at her first State of the District address as superintendent of LA Unified, “a district on the move,” she proclaimed Tuesday.

King noted that the 75 percent rate is based on “preliminary data” as she addressed 1,500 principals, assistant principals and district administrators at the annual kick-off to the school year, held at Garfield High School in East Los Angeles.

“We are a district on the move,” King said after her speech, when asked what she wants the general public to know about the second-largest school district in the country. “The movement and trajectory is from the earliest youth, pre-K and not just stopping at high school but through college. Right now our preliminary data shows that the class of 2016 is at 75 percent graduation. It Is supposed to be as high as we can get it. It is better than we’ve done in the past. Last year was 72 percent, and we’ve exceeded that.”

The graduation rate jumped nearly 3 percentage points over last year despite a new requirement that students pass a rigorous college-prep curriculum in order to earn a diploma. The slate of classes known as the “A-G curriculum” qualifies students to attend California’s public universities.

Michelle King at her first State of the District address.

She added, “This is exceeding expectations of those who said our students couldn’t do it. Today we say our students can and will thrive to meet the standards to be college-ready.”

The theme of King’s address was “A District on the Move,” and she introduced a promotional video of the same name showing the district’s successes. She also emphasized that “we’re in it together,” and she peppered her speech with more than a dozen names of principals and administrators in the audience that she congratulated for their successes.

Among those she called out included: California’s National Distinguished Principal Marcia S. Reed of 186th Street Elementary School in Gardena; teachers Anthony Yom and Sam Luu and Principal Jose Torres of Lincoln High School who helped every student pass the demanding Calculus Advanced Placement examinations; and Hesby Oaks Leadership Charter Principal Movses Tarakhchyan who required all of his staff to learn CPR and then saved a cafeteria worker when she collapsed this year.

“Together we are turning the tide in a district on the move,” King said. “We are at our best when we are unified and working together as a team.”

All of the school board members except Ref Rodriguez and Richard Vladovic attended the speech, held one week before the Aug. 16 start of school. School board President Steve Zimmer gave a rousing introduction, calling King “not only the best but most qualified leader in public education in the United States.”

Zimmer thanked his fellow board members, school police and principals for their response to the terrorist threat that closed down the schools on Dec. 15. “We hope that never happens again, but if it does, LA became the model on how we all come together and work together and be strong together in the face of danger.”

Marcia Reed, in white sweater, was one of the principals honored by Michelle King.

King noted safety as a top priority. “As I talk to parents, one topic that continuously emerges is school safety in this time when the headlines are dominated by tragedy and violence. Our students, families and employees want to feel safe, and I am committed to ensuring that they do.”

King also announced:

• Preliminary results of last year’s Smarter Balanced Assessments show that some math and English scores have improved by as much as 7 percent.

• Nearly 200 Title III coaches for English learners have been added.

• 1,000 classrooms in bungalows will be replaced this year with new, modern classrooms.

• Linked Learning will expand to 20,000 students.

• 16 new magnet schools will start this year, including firefighter academies at Wilson and Banning high schools and the very first robotics magnet at Mulholland Middle School.

• There have been 20,000 fewer days lost to suspensions over the last three years thanks to the district’s restorative justice program.

• Nearly 90 programs will offer Arabic, Armenian, Mandarin, Korean and French this year, and multilingualism will be required throughout LA Unified.

• The district is working on a plan to allow more students to earn community college credits while they are still in high school.

• A landmark academy for gifted students and gifted students with autism is coming to the district.

• The district has distributed more than 342,000 instructional technology devices and will expand online gradebook pilots to 54 schools this year, with full districtwide implementation planned for the 2017-2018 school year.

• Students will receive more support. A specialized counselor will be assigned this year to high-needs high schools, helping students stay on track to graduate, while college and career coaches support struggling middle schools. Additional resources will be dedicated to help English-language learners, who make up nearly one-third of LA Unified’s enrollment.

King’s speech brought the principals to their feet for a standing ovation at least three times. Many of the administrators arrived on buses provided by the district, and they divided up afterward into groups such as “new principals” and other groups for professional development training.

Some of the biggest applause and whoops from the crowd came when King discussed “decentralization” and allowing “greater decisions to be made by the school community.”

King touted her “listen and learn” tour, the successful relocation of two schools during the Porter Ranch gas leak and the “Promising Practices” forum with charter and traditional educators which she wants to make a biannual event.

She pointed out that the “district is facing a deficit of hundreds of millions of dollars and we need to prioritize investments in what gives greater results,” and added, “We are spending more money than we are taking in.” She pointed out that the people in the audience could help by making school more attractive, because the district could save $42 million by raising the attendance rate by 1 percent. She pointed out that around Garfield High are banners on Atlantic Boulevard of successful high school graduates, and that keeps students wanting to come back.

She gave props to Kim Bruno, the teacher who created a play about the LA riots at the Ramón C. Cortines School of Visual and Performing Arts, Shelby Sims, who transformed Western Avenue Elementary School into a technology hub with an annual technology fair, and Garry Joseph at Millikan Middle School who won a Fulbright Award  to connect students with those in India to collaborate on a science fair.

She also honored longtime activist Scott Folsom who died last week, calling him “the conscience of the district” and saying he would be truly missed.

The Garfield High JROTC color guard and cadets brought out the flags at the opening of the ceremony, the Verdugo Hills High School choir sang, Danielle Rawles from Westchester Enriched Science Magnet High recited the Pledge of Allegiance and Eileen Garrido from Ramón C. Cortines School of Visual and Performing Arts sang the National Anthem, receiving a standing ovation.

“It is critical that we continue the momentum of all these efforts through the year,” King said. “We have to keep it moving.

“All students can succeed.”

LA Unified Superintendent Michelle King at the “Promising Practices” forum on July 23.

There were plenty of kumbaya moments at the July 23 “Promising Practices” forum, called by LA Unified Superintendent Michelle King, leaving charter leaders cautiously optimistic it can lead to a new era of cooperation.

More than 200 people from the LA Unified world attended the forum, which featured a series of workshops and discussion panels aimed at sharing best practices between the district’s charter schools and traditional schools. Another forum is planned for next spring, and while it is too early to tell, some charter leaders said they hoped the sharing would continue.

“I’m so excited about what Michelle King is doing, because for the first time since I was on the board, we have a superintendent who is saying, ‘Hey, we can learn from each other,'” said Caprice Young, CEO of Magnolia Public Schools and a former LA Unified school board member. “And it’s not like charters have the answer or traditional schools have the answer, it’s that we can all learn from each other. And she is supporting her internal innovators like pilot schools and magnet schools.”

Young said it is too soon to tell if there will be more tangible evidence of increased cooperation beyond the forum, but “good vibes are not to be underestimated, particularly in a place where there has been so much conflict. The fact that there are good vibes matters.”

Jason Mandell, spokesman for the California Charter Schools Association, said the focus on learning as opposed to politics was refreshing.

“I think it was a very healing event because it did provide an opportunity for teachers and the elected officials and the appointed officials to all focus on instruction and learning and say regardless of the issues that sometimes cause conflict, this is what we are here to do. This is why charters are here,” Mandell said. “They are here to innovate and to try and do things and share what’s working with district schools. There is so much time that could be spent on solving those problems that aren’t.”

Parker Hudnut, CEO of Inner City Education Foundation Public Schools, who attended the forum, also said it is not yet clear what will come of it.

“The teachers and I were pleasantly surprised when they got their session surveys back to find out that most of the people in the seminar were district teachers and not other charter teachers,” Hudnut said. “It was amazing that the LA Unified teachers came to us. Now there needs to be a follow-up. I’ve not heard what they are doing with what was heard at the sessions, or what people came away with, but there could have been a goldmine of ideas that were shared.”

Perhaps the crescendo of the good vibes at the forum was a speech by LA Unified school board President Steve Zimmer, who spoke about breaking down barriers and working together. The speech turned heads due to Zimmer’s sometimes incendiary comments about charters schools and their proliferation.

“Steve Zimmer gave a wonderful heartwarming speech. Michelle King was very positive. The vibe in the room seemed very positive,” Hudnut said. “I see the day as positive, but LAUSD and charters still need to work to improve our relationship. It should be more of a partnership, not a compliance culture. How strong can that relationship be when one day we are working together to better educate children and then the next day we get a notice to comply that is pretty silly. There needs to be positive celebration that stands shoulder to shoulder.”

Courtney Everts Mykytyn, parent, anthropologist and education activist.

Parent and anthropologist Courtney Everts Mykytyn surprised some charter and traditional LA Unified educators at her lectures last weekend when showing that schools in Los Angeles and across the country are more segregated than at any other time in the nation’s history.

Mykytyn noted that Latino and African-American students in LA Unified are more segregated than even before the Civil Rights Movement and the Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court decision that helped integrate schools. She was approved by Superintendent Michelle King’s office to give two lectures last Saturday at the Promising Practices forum, and hers was among the most-attended of the day, becoming robust discussions among dozens of educators.

“This is really a hopeful time to be having this conversation,” Mykytyn said. “LA Unified is in a good position to be a leader in dealing with the challenges of integration.”

Among the findings that Mykytyn shared during her seminar was that, when offered choices of various schools, parents will self-segregate into schools of their same racial and socio-economic demographics. And statistics show that white and higher-income students who attend lower-performing integrated schools don’t suffer in their test scores and actually benefit from the experience.

“Children are more likely to go to school with kids just like them than at any other time in our nation’s history,” Mykytyn said. “There is a particular kind of segregation by socio-economic class that has long-lasting negative effects for all children.”

Mykytyn and her husband became active in their children’s education at their local school in Highland Park, and with other parents helped create a dual-language immersion program at Aldama Elementary School.

“I was adamant that I didn’t want to drive my kids all over the city to go to school; I wanted my kids to walk to school and play with neighborhood friends,” Mykytyn explained. “I really, really hate driving and knew that committing to driving to the charter school 10 miles away meant not only driving to and from school every day but also to and from kids’ friends’ houses 20 minutes in the opposite direction. Life is chaotic enough; why go to school in a different ZIP code?”

Now her son, 13, is in eighth grade and her daughter, 11, is in sixth grade, and both speak Spanish. They are now going to the Franklin Dual Language Academy. They are hoping to build a dual language program through high school at Franklin High.

“Middle-class families talk about these issues and really care about diversity,” Mykytyn said. “But too often, it’s simply about racial, ethnic diversity. That’s vitally important, of course. But if everybody is dropping off kids in their Prius, what is the diversity even if it is a different skin color? We need to think broader than that.”

Issues of the lack of socio-economic diversity came up with attendees at Saturday’s lectures including California’s National Distinguished Principal Marcia S. Reed of 186th Street Elementary School in Gardena, and Deb Smith, principal of Daniel Pearl Magnet High School in Van Nuys, and Parker Hudnut, CEO of Inner City Education Foundation (ICEF) Public Schools.

“We all have issues like this, it’s something that the parents at our schools are very concerned about,” Hudnut said.

Mykytyn said LA Unified should consider integration issues when assessing the performance of schools, not just test scores. She said she knows the state and district are looking at broader assessments to gauge a school’s success.

“Research shows there is a lot of value in attending diverse schools,” Mykytyn said.

Discussions in Mykytyn’s sessions were robust and they challenged some people’s assumptions and beliefs. “I was grateful for the responses,” she said. “I think this conversation about integration will continue with LAUSD.”

Mykytyn said she has heard many stories similar to her own where parents are told that their children should go to different schools where they would better fit into the population. Forced busing and white flight added to problems that only exacerbate segregation, she added.

“The key is changing what we’re comfortable with, and that is complicated and can be really difficult,” she said. “There’s so much hope for really doing good integration work, not just by social justice shaming.”

She added, “There is so much potential with what is going on at LAUSD. I’m not sad as much as excited and impatient.”

Sharing Narbonne High’s campus, principals Gregory Fisher and Gerald Kobata.

At the final panel of the “Promising Practices” forum held all day Saturday, participants called for an arbiter at the district level who could step in to help solve disputes at schools sharing campuses.

The panel discussion was titled “Leading the Way with Collaboration and Sharing of Promising Practices: Perspectives from the Field” and included three sets of principals at co-located sites that share the same buildings, gyms and libraries. Sometimes the relationships are strained at first, as in the case of when Narbonne High School found its staff and students separating into a pilot school.

A smoky morning at the Sonia Sotomayor campus because of the Sand fire in the Santa Clarita Valley.

“Call it an amicable divorce, it wasn’t easy,” said Gregory Fisher, the principal of the Humanities and Arts Academy (HArts) pilot school that is co-located at Narbonne. A former teacher at the traditional district school, Fisher saw his pilot school competing for the same students and teachers. “We tried to be as sensitive as possible. Of course we had some common goals, but some of our goals were divergent.”

HArts and the traditional school were going through struggles that were similar to the five stages of death, Fisher said. Narbonne High School Principal Gerald Kobata agreed, saying: “That first year was not easy. It was difficult for me and my staff and why those teachers were leaving Narbonne. We experienced every conceivable problem.”

Now co-located for their third year, the principals agree things are going smoothly based on the mutual respect they have for each other and their regular communication.

“We had to get our staff to see that this is good for the students and we’re not competing with the other school,” Kobata said.

Both Narbonne schools shared professional development training such as active shooter training and a seminar on economics. Narbonne’s schools have common state championship sports teams, which is part of the glue that holds the school together, but they still have problems that the district could step in to help.

Yvette King-Berg of the Youth Policy Institute.

“The students are fine, they don’t see a difference,” Kobata said.

Fisher suggested that district administrators help settle disputes rather than simply letting the principals haggle it out. “Emotions can take over, and that needs to be addressed in a way to show there’s nothing personal,” Fisher said.

Yvette King-Berg, executive director of the Youth Policy Institute that runs the Monseñor Oscar Romero Charter Middle School on the campus of Berendo Middle School, warned that charter programs shouldn’t use Prop. 39 to co-locate at a district school and then come in with a bad attitude.

“Do not be the bratty younger brother or sister that was born second and you come in like you are entitled and have the right of access of resources from mom and dad,” King-Berg said. “You have the right for it all being equitable, but the older sibling was already there. You have to make it easier for the older sibling too.”

King-Berg said, “Prop 39 is not going away, it is what is best for kids. I make sure that me and my staff never engage in negative talk.”

She added, “We hear in LA School Report and the Los Angeles Times the negative stories about co-locations that are not working, but we need to show the partnerships that are working.”

King-Berg said she often has coffee every week with the Berendo principal, and they collaborate on grant proposals for both schools and share best practices.

“The community and parents all come together in the Pico-Union area and we treat them all like they are all our students,” said Berendo Assistant Principal Justin Howard.

The Sonia Sotomayor Learning Academies, where the conference was taking place, is a complex of 1,900 students with four high schools and one middle school, and two of the principals discussed their co-location issues.

“We all meet every week without exception,” said Kristine Puich, principal of the Los Angeles River School that specializes in environmental-related studies. “If we have a disagreement, we hash it out.”

Also on the Sotomayor campus, Alliance Tennenbaum Technology Principal Abigail Nunez said, “We have to accept and embrace that we sink or swim together, or we are going to tumble together. Once a school achieves success, it is success for the whole campus.”

Principal Kristine Puich of the Los Angeles River School.

Despite the mix of independent charter and traditional pilot school programs at the Sotomayor campus, the schools coordinate Advanced Placement and college testings, share costs for the librarian and athletic director and open after-school events to everyone.

But sometimes they are at odds and “some things need to be hammered out that are beyond a conversation between principals,” Puich said.

Nunez added that “over the past five years we have had some very, very heated discussions and some of them got very ugly because that’s how passionate they are.” She was also asking for someone from the district to help them come up with solutions when conflicts arise.

Superintendent Michelle King said she and her staff are gathering suggestions and solutions offered during the nearly three dozen sessions held Saturday. Although more than 350 people signed up for the event, about 200 turned out. Some didn’t show because of the fires in the northern part of Los Angeles, said a district spokeswoman.

King and school board members Monica Ratliff and Ref Rodriguez attended, and board President Steve Zimmer gave a rousing speech before he had to leave for a family issue. The seminars were equally mixed with charter and LA Unified district officials as well as parents and experts in this first-ever forum of sharing best practices.

Michelle King closing the “Promising Practices” forum.

Representatives from the teachers union, UTLA, and administrators union, AALA, attended the free seminars as did representatives from Partnership for Los Angeles Schools, the California Community Foundation and many other groups. Also in attendance was Marcia S. Reed, principal of 186th Street Elementary School in Gardena, who was just selected as California’s 2016 National Distinguished Principal.

King opened and closed the session. “I was impressed with the openness and giving,” King said at the end of the seven-hour summit. “We now have to go back and tell somebody what we learned today and spread it across the district to help change the narrative.”

King said she hopes to double the numbers of the sessions and hold a similar collaboration next spring.

Steve Zimmer at Saturday’s “Promising Practices” summit.

LA Unified School Board President Steve Zimmer offered a rousing speech at Saturday’s “Promising Practices” forum that was praised by charter leaders because of his inclusiveness.

“We understand that a narrative that blames charter schools for all that is wrong in public education may serve short-term organizing goals but is counterproductive and doesn’t help every child,” Zimmer said. “Equally, a narrative that perpetuates the notion that LAUSD schools are failures may increase the short-term goal of increasing charter schools and reinforces deficit mindsets. It’s an immoral narrative. Both of these narratives are not factual, both goals have the effect of dividing us artificially and not really serving the needs of kids and their families and why we got into this work.”

Zimmer, who was on his way to catch a plane across the country, stayed only for the first hour of the forum, but people were talking about his speech all day.

“We haven’t yet figured that out with LAUSD and charter schools how to share promising practices, and this is a beginning,” Zimmer said to the room of about 200 teachers from traditional and charter schools. “We have things that we can learn from each other, we have ways that could get over the barriers … and work together to make those dreams come true.”

The “Promising Practices” forum was held at the Sonia Sotomayor Learning Academies campus.

“Wow, I feel like we charter schools don’t have cooties anymore,” quipped Caprice Young, chief executive officer of Magnolia Public Schools, who was also a panelist at the forum. She joined with Granda Hills Charter School to discuss “Communities of Practice: Special Education Innovation.” “I think Steve Zimmer’s speech was wonderful and this forum is giving all of us a chance to share and discuss. It’s very good energy all around.”

Parker Hudnut, CEO of Inner City Education Foundation (ICEF) Public Schools, said he was also pleased. “Steve did an excellent job setting the stage for collaboration through his vivid imagery. He reminded us that we each got into this work to fortify future generations and to be successful, we must all collaborate across adult divisions.”

Hudnut pointed out that two of his ICEF teachers gave a lecture titled: “Moving Away from Sage on the Stage Teaching: Targeted Group Structure” attended by 15 LA Unified district teachers. He said, “To me, that is the entire point of the gathering. Here were educators focused solely on how to teach students better: two charter teachers sharing their learning with 15 LAUSD teachers. That is beautiful to me!”

Zimmer, who is running for re-election, has tempered his comments about the proliferation of charter schools in the second-largest school district in the country.

“I ask that you be really active listeners today,” Zimmer told the audience before heading to Philadelphia, not for the Democratic National Convention but to accompany a family member to a medical appointment. “Listen with open minds and open hearts. You all have a very, very important role in changing the narrative.”

Zimmer pointed outside to the ash, smoke and dark clouds of the Sand fire in the Santa Clarita Valley and said, “That’s symbolic of what is facing our kids, who need public education the most. We understand the devastating effects of poverty, which affects the kids in LAUSD schools and in charter schools.”

Zimmer spoke of the immigration raids on undocumented families and said, “Those raids upon our families that tear them apart affects charters and LAUSD schools alike.”

He added, “Violence walking home from charter schools affects charter students the same as walking home from LAUSD schools.”

He referenced the fearful scenarios of America brought up by Donald Trump at last week’s Republican National Convention and said, “That was directed at our children on every network, right out front unapologetically. It was directly aimed at our children and our families, at LAUSD and charter schools alike.”

He spoke about his mother being an educator in Flatbush, New York, and LGBT children feeling safe, and about special needs students.

“We know that we must serve every kid that comes to the schoolhouse door, and we know if we are public school educators, there is nothing more important than making those dreams come true,” Zimmer said. “We also know there are a lot of things we have not figured out.”

Superintendent Michelle King at Saturday’s forum.

One of the traditional teachers at a table said, “I thought I was coming here to be inspired by Ms. King, and it ends up being Steve Zimmer, who’d have thought?”

Superintendent Michelle King said she wanted to bring educators from all different models of LA Unified schools to share ideas. “I wanted to create a safe space that colleagues could come around a table and discuss what works and doesn’t work and hopefully seeds will be planted here, fostered and grow.”

King added, “Charter schools and traditional schools have some great developments going on and this is a chance to come together to collaborate. We are looking at breaking down these silos, these walls, to only one type of grouping.”