Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti

Mayor Eric Garcetti, who rarely insinuates himself into Los Angeles public school politics, is endorsing Tamar Galatzan for a third term representing LA Unified’s District 3 board seat.

“Tamar is an innovative problem-solver and a strong and thoughtful advocate for Valley schools and kids,” Garcetti said in a news release from the Galatzan campaign. “She has shown strong leadership on critical issues concerning our students. And she isn’t afraid to make the tough choices about spending taxpayer dollars and fighting for the resources for her schools.”

Garcetti’s endorsement is repayment, of sorts. Galatzan endorsed him for mayor in 2013 when he was running in a close campaign against Wendy Greuel. Greuel, the former city controller, has also endorsed Galatzan, the campaign said.

Of the four board incumbents facing reelection on March 3, Galatzan has drawn the largest number of challengers — five. George McKenna (District 1) is running unopposed. Bennett Kayser (5) and President Richard Vladovic (7) are each facing two challengers.

In any race without a majority winner, the top two candidates will compete in a runoff on May 19.

Galatzan was first elected in 2007,prompted by her concern over the district’s truancy and drop-out problems rates. Re-elected in 2011, she became a strong ally of former superintendent John Deasy, whose management style and battles with other board members led to his resignation in October.

Galatzan, who also serves as a city prosecutor and is the only board member with children in LA Unified schools, often supported Deasy on issues opposed by the district’s teachers union, UTLA.

“The mayor and I each have school-age children, so we both understand what it will take to prepare our kids for college and the workforce,” Galatzan said. “I am honored to have his endorsement, and I pledge to continue the hard work to help our district and our students succeed.”

Garcetti’s endorsement represents his first foray into board politics. A message to his office seeking to learn if he intends to endorse other candidates did not draw an immediate response.

Alex Johnson

In two recent mailings (here and here) to “most likely” voters in LA Unified’s District 1, the Johnson campaign is questioning George McKenna‘s accomplishments as the two candidates seek the open school board seat.

“We always knew that at some point, our campaign has to address to the myth of George McKenna,” Johnson’s campaign manager, Roy Behr, told LA School Report today. “The real George McKenna is nothing like the myth he likes to spread.”

McKenna has responded with a message on his website, calling Johnson’s tactics a “shameful smear campaign” — with the word “SHAMEFUL” in red appearing across a photograph of Johnson — and asking supporters to donate to his campaign.

In an email to voters, McKenna’s campaign manager, Jewett Walker, wrote, “When a candidate loses a primary by 20 points, like our opponent, there is no clear path to victory in the runoff. Well, over the last several days, our opponent has revealed his plan: smear the good name of George McKenna.”

A message seeking further comment from Walker was not returned.

McKenna won 44 percent of the June 3 primary vote to Johnson’s 24 percent, moving them into the runoff because neither surpassed 50 percent in a field of seven candidates. Until late last week, as Johnson built on his substantial financial advantage, both candidates had stayed positive in their campaign materials, each pitching his own assets.

Then last week, Johnson sent out a mailer, spoofing the 1986 TV movie, “The George McKenna Story,” starring Denzel Washington as McKenna, that told the story of his turn-around experiences at Washington Prep High School.

The ersatz movie poster in the Johnson mailer says the “real” story includes “failed school,” “false claims,” “fiscal mismanagement” and “failure to protect kids.” While the Johnson campaign provided citations to the Los Angeles Times, the California Department of Education and other sources that purport to substantiate the assertions, McKenna’s web-based response does not include any specific defense or rebuttal, saying only, “The good news is our opponent has no defense for our greatest weapon: the truth.”

A second mailer from the Johnson campaign takes McKenna to task on some of the same issues, also with citations.

“His story is, ‘I was in a movie, so I must be great because I was played by Denzel Washington; that’s how cool I am,’ ” Behr said. “Our goal is to remind people that Hollywood movies are rarely based in fact, and that’s certainly the case here.”

Going negative is a tried and true campaign tactic, often used by candidates trailing in a race. While public opinion polls often show that voters disdain the strategy, political consultants generally agree that they use them because they are effective.

Behr said the mailers have gone to those the Johnson campaign has identified as “most likely to vote,” but he declined to say whether the negative messages would continue.

 Previous Posts: Johnson’s internal poll shows gains on McKenna in runoff; Labor groups split on support for McKenna and Johnson in runoff; SEIU endorses Alex Johnson for LAUSD school board in runoff

As the week comes to a close, Alex Johnson has expanded his overall lead in financial support over George McKenna in their quest to win election as the new District 1 board member in LA Unified, according to the latest figures from the City Ethics Commission.

At mid-day, he held the same ratio of support, about 8-to-1, in individual contributions that he had as the week started — now, $47,646 to $6,450.

But expenditures on behalf of his campaign have jumped considerably.

Today, the figurees show that money spent by outside Political Action Committees on behalf of Johnson’s campaign has doubled, to a $200,000-plus advantage over McKenna from a $100,000-plus advantage early in the week.

Also, with less than a month before the Aug. 12 election, the figures show Johnson holding a sharp advantage in cash on hand. By the latest numbers, he has more than $46,000 to spend while McKenna has only $2,258.

One caveat for all of Johnson’s money lead continues, however: McKenna remains well-known and popular in the district, and voter participation is expected to be lower than the usual turnout for local elections, especially ones that have the day to themselves. 

Also this week, each candidate picked up an endorsement from a sitting board member. Monica Ratliff endorsed McKenna while Monica Garcia appeared at a fundraiser for Johnson.

Previous Posts: Johnson outpacing McKenna in school board race for money; LA Fed’s PAC recommends Johnson for LAUSD board seat; McKenna, Johnson re-launch campaigns for school board seat

]]> https://www.laschoolreport.com/pac-spending-for-johnson-gives-him-200000-advantage-lausd/feed/ 1 https://www.laschoolreport.com/johnsons-internal-poll-shows-him-gaining-on-mckenna/ https://www.laschoolreport.com/johnsons-internal-poll-shows-him-gaining-on-mckenna/#respond Tue, 01 Jul 2014 16:40:37 +0000 http://laschoolreport.com/?p=25813

Alex Johnson, District 1 candidate

An internal poll conducted by Alex Johnson’s campaign suggests that he is gaining on George McKenna as they compete for the vacant LA Unified school board seat.

The Johnson campaign says that polling conducted in April and June shows that Johnson’s name recognition has grown to 52 percent, from 14 percent percent.

It also said Johnson’s favorable rating climbed to 42 percent from 12 percent while McKenna’s grew to 49 percent from 29 percent. Each candidate’s unfavorable rating also rose — to 10 percent from 2 percent for Johnson and to 8 percent from 7 percent for McKenna.

The two were the leading vote-getters among seven candidates for the vacant District 1 board seat in the June 3 primary. They’re now facing off in an Aug. 12 runoff.

The Johnson poll, included in a campaign staff memo, was sent, unsolicited, to LA School Report, for the apparently obvious reasons that it shows encouraging results for Johnson, a political neophyte who has been working as an education aide to LA County Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas.

The memo said that the campaign has fulfilled the first of two goals, holding McKenna, a former school administrator and the subject of a television movie, under 50 percent in the primary, thus denying him an outright victory. “We knew from the outset that McKenna’s higher initial name ID would virtually guarantee him a first place finish in a multi-candidate race,” it said.

The campaign’s second goal, the memo said, is to turn Johnson’s opportunity into victory by convincing voters he represents “a  new direction for L.A. schools.” The memo said voters are responding favorably to his positions on a series of issues but it offed no polling results showing how they compare with voter sentiments on McKenna’s positions on the same issues.

With the runoff election still six weeks away, it’s hard to assess the true impact of the polling data. McKenna far outdistanced Johnson in the primary, 44.6 percent to 24.7 percent, and as a rule, internal campaign polls usually project good news for the campaign conducting the poll.

Nonetheless, the memo concludes that a third of the voters remain undecided and Johnson “can and will win the runoff.”

LA School report sent a message to the McKenna campaign, sharing some of the numbers in the Johnson memo. The message asked for any similar poll conducted by the McKenna campaign and for reaction to Johnson’s poll.

Jewett Walker, McKenna’s campaign manager, provided an ambiguous, one-word response — “Absurd!.” It was unclear if he were referring to the requests or to the conclusions of the Johnson poll.

He did not respond to another message seeking clarification.

Previous Posts: Labor groups split on support for McKenna and Johnson in runoff, SEIU endorses Alex Johnson for LAUSD school board in runoff, LAUSD candidates McKenna, Johnson set for election runoff

Genethia Hudley-Hayes

This is the final profile of candidates running for LA Unified’s vacant District 1 board seat. The election is scheduled for June 3, with a possible runoff in August. Genethia Hudley-Hayes is the only candidate who declined to be interviewed for the series. Numerous attempts to reach her and her campaign failed to get a response. 

Genethia Hudley-Hayes has one thing none of the other seven candidates running in the special election for LA Unified District 1 seat can claim: she has actually served on the school board, representing the same south LA district.

She won a narrow victory in 1999 against an incumbent, sweeping into office with a reform slate that was backed by then-Mayor Richard Riordan. Her tenure lasted four years, until she was defeated in 2003 by Marguerite LaMotte. But by many accounts, her term in office, including the first two years as board president, Hudley-Hayes won a reputation as a leader with record of success.

“She demonstrated good judgement, independence and leadership during her time on the board. I saw her in action,” said Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa who took office after her tenure. “She didn’t just do a public service, she did it well. She was a change agent focused on accountability and results.”

Caprice Young, who came into office as a school board member the same year as Hudley-Hayes, says she made every decision based on what she knew was right for children, especially students who were under-served. Young had high praise despite launching a successful campaign to replace her as board president after just two years.

“She fought for the rights of foster children, English language learners, gifted kids, special needs students and, especially, African-American students,” Young told LA School Report.

Hudley-Hayes took leadership of the school board at a time it appeared paralyzed in the face of enormous district-wide problems.

Overcrowding was chronic, more than 300,000 students rode polluting diesel buses to far away schools to help alleviate it; test scores were falling; and LAUSD was facing a movement to break up into smaller districts.

One of the biggest crises facing the school board had been a $200 million Belmont high school construction project located on an oil field near downtown which was under investigation for not securing a proper environmental review. A symbol of dysfunction at the school board level, the project had been in perpetual limbo.

Young said Hudley-Hayes led the board in a vote to abandon the Belmont project, at the risk of alienating Latino groups.

Later, in an effort to unite the board majority to start solving problems, Hudley-Hayes helped bring in Colorado’s out-going Governor Roy Romer as superintendent, impressed by his ability to raise money and lead large organizations.

When the state legislature failed to allocate LA Unified’s fair share of construction dollars, Hudley-Hayes leveraged her relationships with the social justice community to sue the state and worked with then Assemblyman Tony Cardenas to get nearly $980 million in state bond money set aside for construction projects.

Over the next decade, the funds helped build 150 new schools and renovate 350 more in the most high-needs neighborhoods, easing overcrowding and extending the school year by more than two weeks.

Despite heavy criticism of back-room politics, Hudley-Hayes not only helped the district restore arts, expand after-school programs and purchase clean-fuel buses, she also helped make sure early childhood and dropout programs were protected and new, more effective reading and math programs were adopted. She helped pass a Healthy Beverage Resolution, the first school board policy in the country to ban sugary drinks from school vending machines.

“She was effective because she didn’t get caught up in district politics,” Young said. “She didn’t just bring people to the table, she made them sit down and do the right thing together.”

Marlene Canter, another former board member who served with Hudley-Hayes, said that her wisdom and experience put her in a position to get things done because she helped bring cohesion to the board.

“She had an ability to work cooperatively with the Superintendent and senior staff to make sure goals were in alignment,” Cantor said.

A decade later, Hudley-Hayes, who is a product of the LA Unified school system, finds herself in a familiar hot seat. One of her opponents, Alex Johnson, has accused her of falsifying her resume and has invited her to drop out of the race.

“I will not be bullied,” she said in response. “My record stands for itself, with 30 years of service in this town.”

LA School Report confirmed the inaccuracies on her resume (see story here), which included claims of several academic degrees, but she has declined interview requests from LA School Report ever since.

Nonetheless, she has maintained a number of high profile endorsements including Villaraigosa, U.S. Congresswoman Karen Bass, California State Senator Holly Mitchell and other civil rights activists and groups.

Candidates at USC forum

When Angela Jauregui arrived Saturday at USC for a debate with five of the seven candidates running for LA Unified’s District 1 board seat, she told her friends she was there to listen.“

Let’s pay attention,” she said in Spanish as she shushed all three, found a seat in the first row of the lecture hall and put on a head set that translated the hour-long event.

What they heard was pretty much the same from each of the five candidates who participated in an event sponsored by Parent Revolution, the Los Angeles Urban League and Students for Education Reform (SFER). The participants: Rachel Johnson, a kindergarten teacher; George McKenna, a former school principal and superintendent; Genethia Hudley-Hayes, a previous board president; Alex Johnson, a deputy to LA County Supervisor Mark Ridley Thomas; and Hattie McFrazier, an educator and health and human services director.

Two other candidates, Omarosa Manigault and Sherlett Hendy-Newbill, had been invited but declined to appear. The special election to replace the late Marguerite LaMotte is June 3.

Between the testimonials from a handful of the Parent Revolutionaries who filled the room, the candidates’ answers differed very little in content, if not style. Often, they began by agreeing with whatever the person before them had just said.

Yes, the district’s neediest schools should get more money under the Local Control Funding Formula.

Yes, if elected, I will work with parents to ensure teacher effectiveness.

Even on touchy subjects they agreed. “Should parents be allowed to weigh in on teacher evaluations?” All five took their allotted 30 seconds to say no.

McKenna, went first on that one. “It’s the responsibility of the supervisor, not the parent. Teachers need to be protected.” Hudley-Hayes, responded with a similar answer, adding, “We have not trained our administrators to properly evaluate a teacher.” McFrazier told the audience, “You do not have that right,” then directed them to LA Unified’s website to verify a teacher’s credentials themselves.

The only answer that was a real departure from the others came from McFrazier when she admitted she does not support the Parent Empowerment Act, the so-called Parent Trigger Law and raison d’etre of Parent Revolution. That drew an actual gasp from audience.

“Let me explain why,” she began. “I was at the board when 24th Street presented their case, and I sat there and I observed both sides, and I came out confused.”

Parents who had signed the petition to take over what would become the first Parent Trigger school in LA Unified didn’t fully know the consequences of what they were doing, McFrazier said, adding, “No one clearly explained to them what was going to happen. And it is important that both sides understand what is happening so everyone will know what they are deciding on.”

By the end, Jauregui and her friends, all of whom were outfitted in Parent Revolution t-shirts, had warmed to Rachel Johnson, who became a crowd favorite, telling the audience that she drives to Staples every week and spends her own money to make copies of work book lessons and reading materials for five new students who joined her class in January. Moms in the room nodded approvingly and clapped loudly.

“That’s the kind of commitment that makes her standout,” Jauregui  said afterward.

She and her friends said they would help spreading the word for Johnson, as they signed up to join a door-to-door get out the vote walk on May 31.

“I can’t vote,” she said, “but if I tell them why it’s so important, maybe they will.”

Rachel Johnson

Beginning today, LA School Report is taking a longer look at each of the seven candidates running for LA Unified’s vacant South LA, District 1 board seat. The series starts today with Rachel Johnson and will continue over the weeks ahead.

After three decades as a LAUSD elementary school teacher and nine years as a member of the Gardena City Council, Rachel Johnson is hoping her extensive teaching and fiscal policy-making background will help her secure a seat on the LA Unified school board.

As one of three teachers among the seven candidates running for the District 1 board seat, left open by the passing of the board’s only African American member, Marguerite LaMotte, Johnson, 54, believes she has the practical and administrative expertise to make a difference.

“Since I put in the time in LAUSD, and I saw how policy that school board members implement and how it directly affects my practice, I said ‘you know, I think I can do better, I think I can contribute, I think I have a voice that would be valuable,’ ” she said in an interview with LA School Report.

Johnson, who teaches kindergarten at Purche Avenue Elementary school, wants to empower educators by raising awareness on several issues impacting District 1, such as why there are so many charter schools in the district.

Johnson believes low-performing traditional schools would greatly benefit if they were allowed to invest in a similar teaching model used by charter schools, giving administrators the flexibility to craft an innovative curriculum that she says would invigorate learning and motivate students to achieve.

“Let’s give those schools more independence, more time and investment and let’s see if these kinds of innovative programs will turn the tide,” she said. “We need to demand excellence from our schools, but in order to get that, we need to give them all the tools that they need.”

Another hot-button issue is seniority-based layoffs. Johnson, who benefitted from the policy, says a more comprehensive structure is needed that facilitates the replacement of ineffective teachers and supports the mentoring of young teachers.

“There is value in experience, but let that just be one variable in how a teacher is evaluated and laid off,” she said, echoing a central theme of the recently-argued Vergara case. “I would challenge UTLA as a board member to come to the table and to have that kind of discourse.”

Even though Johnson has been endorsed by UTLA, she says she will stand her ground and do what she feels is right when it comes to voting on policy issues.

“What’s good for the children is good for me,” she said. “You have to have a more comprehensive view when you’re making policy, but if our children are going to achieve, our teachers have to be supported.”

But, she says, what is best for students may not always complement initiatives that impact learning. Johnson said some of Superintendent John Deasy’s ideas are disconnected from the actual practice and implementation at the ground level because “he doesn’t hear or value teacher input,” she said.

If elected, Johnson says her policy-making decisions would be fair and transparent and would involve all parties concerned. She plans on visiting school sites and talking to instructors who will be directly impacted by the policy.

She believes in standing behind every decision she makes through “transparency, accountability, integrity and being consistent with every decision.”

But while her vision is clear, she says the road to getting elected has been a bumpy one.

So far, Johnson is running a grass-roots campaign, relying on volunteers, family and friends going door to door. Campaign funding has been a major challenge and donations have fallen short of expectations. Many of her past supporters have decided to support another candidate. She raised no money through the first reporting period, leaving her more than $100,000 behind the leader, Alex Johnson, who is no relation.

Despite having no political support, she remains focused and determined to reach as many voters as possible and hopes her background and experience will help her stand out from the rest.

The decision mirrors that of SEIU Local 99, the LA Unified support staff union, which also voted not to endorse anyone in the special election for the South LA seat, left vacant by the death of longtime school board member Marguerite LaMotte.

The vote was a reversal of sorts. Last week, the County Fed’s political action committee, COPE had voted to recommend “no endorsement” in the race, a decision made after interviewing four candidates: Alex Johnson, and the three teacher union-backed candidates, Sherlett Hendy-Newbill, Rachel Johnson and Hattie McFrazier. But a day later, that recommendation was trumped by the Federation executive board, which recommended Alex Johnson’s name be put before the delegates for a vote.

Johnson, an aide to County Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas, and a product of the LAUSD school system and American University Law School, is the top fundraiser in the election but has little name recognition.

The other three candidates, including George McKenna, considered by insiders to be a front-runner, were not involved in any round of the process because they failed to obtain a required letter of recommendation from any one of the 300 labor affiliates in the federation.

McKenna, a retired administrator, was the subject of a made-for-TV movie and has the backing of the prinicipal’s union, AALA.

As officials at the LA Unified school board scramble to work out options with the city and county on how best to fill the school board seat left vacant last week by the sudden death of longtime member Marguerite LaMotte, they are weighing elements of timing, tradition and of course, politics.

The law relating to vacancies on the school board, written into the LA City Charter, clearly lays out two options for the school board: appoint a replacement or call a special election.

And while appointing someone may seem simpler, cheaper and faster, doing so has big liabilities.

Politics
For one, it’s dangerous politically. The seat for school board district 1, which encompasses a wide swath of south LA, extending from Hancock Park to Gardena, has been held continuously by a black woman since 1979. That was the first year board members were no longer elected at-large, a change brought about in part because the black community argued it was under-represented electorally. So having the school board hand-pick an appointee raises red flags in the black community, which is already voicing concerns.

Tradition
For another, there’s a long tradition of vacancies being filled by election, not appointment. City council seats — which are frequently vacated by members seeking higher office — have uniformly been filled by special election. The last long term appointment was in 1966.

Timeline
But calling a special election takes consensus, too. The last time a special election was called by the school board was when Jose Huizer vacated his seat after being elected to city council in 2005.

That year, the school board fast-tracked a special election in late November by giving notice and approving a motion (seconded by LaMotte) to hold a stand-alone primary the following March and consolidating with a statewide election for a run-off in June 2006.

City Council quickly approved, setting the election into motion. Monica Garcia won that seat, which she still holds.

But a March/June timeline in this case would require swift action by a school board already hobbled by divisiveness.  A board meeting scheduled for tomorrow was pushed back a week because of LaMotte’s death, leaving little time for coordinating an election with city council before the new year.

Another scenario would be to call for the primary to take place on June 3, 2014, the same day as a statewide primary, while pushing the runoff to a later, stand-alone election. This would also give prospective candidates notice in case they need to move into the district to meet the City Charter’s residency requirements of 30 days.

Educators 4 Excellence, an organization that advocates for teachers to take a more active role in shaping education policies, plans to host a podcast interview with District 6 (East San Fernando Valley) runoff candidates Monica Ratliff and Antonio Sanchez.

E4E will interview Sanchez and Ratliff, who have both agreed to participate, on May 8. The podcast will available on E4E’s website to stream or download on May 13.

Previous posts: School Board Candidate Praises Deasy’s Efforts to Limit Tenure;  Sanchez Unavailable for Candidate Forum; Daily News Addresses Ratliff Union Role.

Monday, May 6 is the last day you can register to vote for the May 21 runoff. If you still haven’t registered, go here to register to vote online.

Click below for other deadlines for applying to vote by mail and to drop off a vote by mail application.

May 14, 2013 (Tuesday): The last day to apply by mail for a vote-by-mail ballot in the May runoff election.

May 20, 2013 (Monday): The last day to drop off a vote-by-mail ballot at the Los Angeles City Clerk’s election division office. (You can also fill out and mail in the vote-by-mail ballot application on the back of an official sample ballot.)

May 21, 2013 (Tuesday): Runoff election day. It’s also the last day to drop off a vote-by-mail ballot at any polling place by closing time at 8:00 p.m.

LAUSD Supt. John Deasy Faces Performance Evaluation by Teachers Union
Barely two weeks after delivering a stinging no-confidence vote on the leadership of Superintendent John Deasy, the teachers union announced it will do a first-ever “performance evaluation” of the Los Angeles Unified chief. Daily News
See also: LA School Report

Voters Can’t Let LAUSD Seat Be Bought: Elect Monica Ratliff
For a glimpse of what’s wrong with politics in Los Angeles, look no further than the campaign to fill an open seat in the LAUSD’s northeast San Fernando Valley district. LA Daily News Editorial

Lawsuit Targets Union Fees Collected from Nonmember Teachers
A conservative organization has joined with a group of California teachers in an effort to overturn laws that allow teacher unions to collect fees from those who don’t want to be members. Los Angeles Times
See also: Bloomberg, AP

StudentsFirst Rallies Troops for California Teacher Evaluation Bill
StudentsFirst, the Sacramento-based education advocacy group headed by school reform crusader (and wife of Sacramento major Kevin Johnson) Michelle Rhee, has launched a major blitz in advance of a hearing today on Senate Bill 441, a union-opposed teacher evaluation bill that was granted reconsideration after registering a 4-4 committee vote last week, with Democrats and Republicans on both sides. The Tribune

Bill Would Overhaul Student Testing in California
A key hearing is set today for consideration of what may prove to be landmark legislation that would replace the state’s existing statewide student performance testing program with one that is designed to be taken online and is also aligned with the new common core curriculum standards. SI&A Cabinet Report

UCLA Preschool and the California Science Center Museum Help Turn Kids Into ‘Pre-Scientists’
University Village and the other two UCLA preschools are among a few in Southern California to offer science-based learning. The vocabulary and experimentation may give kids a head start in later grades. KPCC

L.A. Ninth-Grader Whips up Winning Breakfast Recipe
Her nephew likes fruit. Her brother likes eggs. And so Guadalupe Gonzales, a ninth-grader at Panorama High School in Los Angeles, put the two ingredients together in a dish that was named the top winner Tuesday in L.A. Unified’s first annual breakfast recipe contest. LA Times

Civil Rights Groups Oppose No Child Left Behind Waiver for LAUSD
A coalition of civil rights groups is opposing efforts by Los Angeles Unified and eight other school districts to get a waiver from a federal law requiring that all students be proficient in English and math by 2014. Daily News

L.A. County Rejects School Districts’ Bid to Avoid Voting Rights Suits
Los Angeles County officials rejected a bid Tuesday from several Santa Clarita Valley school districts and a water district hoping to consolidate elections and avoid the kind of voting rights lawsuits that other local governments have been hit with. LA Times

The Messy Complications of Breakfast in the Classroom
The Los Angeles Unified School District is in a period of tremendous upheaval that, it’s hoped, will result in better education for its students. With so much changing and so much at stake, of course there are more than a few daggers drawn. But when the teachers union and district administration can’t even get together over feeding hungry kids, something sick is going on. LA Times Opinion

Pre-K Funding is Delivered Another Blow
California state funding per child fell by more than than $400 compared with the previous year, and only 41% of 4-year-olds were served by public pre-K programs and Head Start in the 2011-12 school year, the institute reported. LAT

Washington and Sacramento Must End Cold War on Education
It is too late for California to get more than the sliver of Race to the Top funds it has already received. But the administration’s rejection of California’s NCLB waiver request is too important an issue to accept without further urgent efforts on both sides to reach a resolution. EdSource (opinion)

Walton Foundation Gives $8 Million to StudentsFirst
A foundation associated with the Wal-Mart family fortune has expanded its support for the education advocacy group run by former District of Columbia schools chancellor Michelle Rhee. LA Times

Granada Hills Honored for Record Three-Peat As Academic Decathlon Champs
To raucous cheers and the skirl of the school’s bagpipers, the nine-member Academic Decathlon team from Granada Hills Charter High School was celebrated Monday for winning its third consecutive national championship – the first such achievement for a California campus. LA Daily News

New Science Standards Hard Sell at Cash-Strapped Sylmar High School
Ronald Hitchcock has been teaching science at Sylmar High School for more than a decade. He’s seen a lot of changes, but perhaps nothing has hit the school harder than the news last fall that it lost a $3.5 million QEIA grant.  “We’re pretty cash strapped right now,” he said. KPCC

Positive School Climate Boosts Test Scores, Study Says
It’s the million-dollar question or, given the size of the California education budget, the $50-billion-dollar question: What makes extraordinarily successful schools different from other schools? The answer: school climate, according to a new study from WestEd. EdSource

Attack on School Reformers Rings Hollow
This time, the powerful teachers’ unions went too far. At this month’s California Democratic Convention, a resolution attacking education reform movements was approved by delegates. It was sponsored by the California Teachers Association, the California Federation of Teachers and the California Faculty Association. O.C. Register Editorial

Bill Seeks to Limit School Police in Discipline Matters
As the national debate grows louder over deploying police in schools, the largest state in the union ­– California – is considering a bill that would require schools to set “clear guidelines” defining the role of school police and limit their involvement in disciplinary matters. CA Watch

School Discipline Survey Finds Challenges in Making Changes
Many school districts are changing their codes of conduct in a way that limits the use of out-of-school suspension and expulsion and defines the role of law enforcement in school. But the resources—human and financial—needed to make those changes don’t always match what districts can muster. EdWeek

New National Goals Set for Teaching Profession
A blueprint for improving the teaching profession nationally calls for more emphasis on quality preparation programs, higher standards for entry into the profession and better compensation for both classroom educators and school administrators. SI&A Cabinet Report

Monica Ratliff. Via LA Times

Concerned that District 6 (East Valley) School Board candidate Monica Ratliff might oppose the leadership of LAUSD Superintendent John Deasy, the LA Times editorial page secured a commitment from Ratliff to keep Deasy at the helm of the district as part of re-iterating its endorsement:

“Ratliff, who was a public interest lawyer before she became a teacher, advocates smart solutions to vexing issues — such as improving instruction by giving weak teachers time to sit in on the classes of highly effective ones. She is neither a gung-ho member of the school reform movement nor a backer of the union’s anti-reform rhetoric…. [And] if she were in a position to decide on Deasy’s contract today, she would vote to renew it.” [emphasis added]

Previous posts: Board Candidate Changes Position on Deasy (Again);  District 6 Candidate Hardens Position on Deasy; Union Endorsements Unchanged for District 6

District 6 Candidates Monica Ratliff and Antonio Sanchez

The May 21 LAUSD Board runoff for District 6 is less than a month away, and Teach Plus, an urban education advocacy group, is hosting a candidate forum on Thursday, May 2.

Both candidates Monica Ratliff and Antonio Sanchez have been invited, but only Ratliff has confirmed her participation so far. The event is interactive, and audience members will have opportunities to ask the candidates questions and offer input on education issues in LAUSD.

The forum is aimed at LA-area teachers, but Teach Plus said other members of the community won’t be turned away at the door if they show up. See full event details here.

Decrease in Pink Slips Thanks to Prop 30
The sharp decrease in the number of pink slips from 20,000 last year to 3,000 this March can be directly attributed to the historic passage of the CTA-supported Proposition 30 in November. CTA Blog

Senate Counters Governor’s Funding Plan for Disadvantaged Students
Brown wants to make sure disadvantaged students get more of the funding pie, but the Senate disagrees with the formula the governor wants to use. KPCC
See also: LA Times, EdSource, SI&A Cabinet Report

Endorsement: Monica Ratliff in L.A. Unified District 6
She would, she said, terminate Supt. John Deasy’s contract and initiate a new search for a superintendent, in which he would be invited to reapply. That would be a mistake. LA Times Editorial

LAUSD Reassigns Valley Superintendent, 3 Other Administrators
Four senior Los Angeles Unified officials, including the San Fernando Valley’s local superintendent, have been removed from their positions pending an internal investigation into “a confidential personnel matter,” a district spokesman said Thursday. LA Daily News
See also: LA Times, CBS LA

Giving Every Kid in L.A. a Computer Tablet? Pros and Cons
My wife and I have tried, with mixed results, to keep our daughter from becoming too obsessed with digital electronics. And yet her school district, L.A. Unified, has a plan to give every child in every school a digital tablet. LA Times Column (Steve Lopez)

A Dangerous Game for UTLA
Superintendent John Deasy’s popularity and direct approach have been seen by United Teachers Los Angeles as immensely threatening. The union plays an outsized role in Los Angeles, in large part because we are one of the last large cities in which the superintendent reports to an elected school board, not the mayor. LA Times Op-Ed (Jamie Alter Lynton)

Alice Waters, School Officials Talk Teaching With Food
Fast food begets a fast-food culture that has seeped into pretty much everything going on in the world today, the chef Alice Waters told a crowd gathered at UCLA for a presentation about edible education. LA Times

Democrats Are Inviting Trouble Over Education Reform
One of the nation’s biggest teachers’ groups has just attacked Democrats for Education Reform. Is the party itself pushing people who want to improve schools into the Republican camp? Crosscut Op-Ed

Private Groups Balk at Running LAUSD Science Center in San Pedro
It’s back to square one for Los Angeles school officials trying to keep San Pedro’s science center open beyond next year. Daily Breeze

Locke High School Joins List of South LA Schools With On-Campus Health Centers
The Watts Healthcare Corporation opened its second school-based clinic in three weeks on Thursday morning at Locke High School in South Los Angeles. KPCC

Sal Castro Recalled As Inspiring Teacher
More than 1,000 people attend the funeral for the activist, who urged a 1968 student walkout demanding better education for Latinos. LA Times

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg Donates $350,000 to LAUSD Reformer’s Campaign
With the runoff now less than a month away, Bloomberg has given the coalition an additional $350,000 – again at Villaraigosa’s request – to support the election of Antonio Sanchez to the District 6 seat. LA Daily News
See also: LA School Report

Teacher Evaluation Bill Opposed by Unions Dies in Committee
Legislation that would have required more frequent evaluations of educators was killed by a state Senate committee Wednesday under strong opposition from teachers’ unions. LA Times
See also: LA School Report, SI&A Cabinet Report

Jerry Brown Vows Battle With Democratic Critics of Education Plan
Gov. Jerry Brown offered a spirited defense of his plan to overhaul the state’s education system Wednesday and warned Democratic critics of his plan that they were “going to get the battle of their lives” if they attempt to change key parts of his proposal. LA Times
See also: EdSource, Fresno Bee

Law That Holds Parents Accountable for Kids Truancy Applied Differently Across Southern California
Last week, six parents in Orange County who had let their kids miss up to 22 days from school were charged with two misdemeanors: contributing to the delinquency of a minor and failure to reasonably supervise or encourage school attendance. KPCC

Calif. Neglecting Thousands of English-Learners, Lawsuit Claims
More than 20,000 English-learners in California’s public schools are not receiving language instruction and the state department of education is failing in its role to ensure that schools educate such students, alleges a lawsuit filed today by the American Civil Liberties Union. EdWeek
See also: LA Times, KPCC

Tom Bartman, Who Helped End LA School Busing, Dies
Tom Bartman, who helped end forced busing for integration in the Los Angeles Unified School District, has died. He was 67. KPCC

Funeral Today for Sal Castro, Who Led ’68 Chicano Student Walkouts
Funeral services will be held Thursday morning for former teacher Salvador “Sal” Castro, who played a central role in the 1968 Eastside school walkouts to protest inequalities in education for Latinos in the Los Angeles Unified School District. LA Times

Arrests Made in Fatal Stabbing at High School
An 18-year-old man was playing handball at Cleveland High School in Reseda when he was fatally stabbed and three suspects were arrested in connection with the death, police said on Thursday. NBC LA

The election will pick between Monica Ratliff and Antonio Sanchez for the LAUSD Board’s District 6 seat representing the East San Fernando Valley. Voters will also elect LA’s next mayor and a number of other city offices.

Early voting might seem like a sleepy issue, but it plays a big role in election outcomes. In the LA Daily News, Rick Orlov wrote about its “increasingly important role in all elections,” making up 46 percent of the total vote in the primary election. We saw  proof of the impact of vote-by-mail ballots in the March primary, when District 4 (Hollywood/Westside) LA School Board incumbent Steve Zimmer beat his challenger Kate Anderson thanks to a significant early voting advantage. (Read the story here.)

Previous posts: Calendar: Registration & Vote By Mail Schedule; How Steve Zimmer *Really* Won

State Probes Burbank Third Grade Cheating Report
Burbank school officials say a third-grade teacher has been put on leave after a student reported a got help with answers on state standardized tests. KPCC
See also: LA Times

State Toughens Regs for Interns Teaching English Learners
The California Commission on Teacher Credentialing will now require non-credentialed Teach For America teachers and other intern teachers to receive more training in how to teach English learners and to get weekly on-the-job mentoring and supervision. EdSource

Democratic Party Schism Over Scandalous Schools: Gloria Romero, Slimed by Teacher Unions, Says Sober Up
A few days ago, the teachers union wing of the California Democratic Party tarred the growing numbers of breakaway Democrats who, in sync with President Obama, point the finger at teachers unions as a big obstacle to fixing crappy schools. LA Weekly

LA Mayor’s Race: How the Candidates Stand on Your Issues
Even though the mayor doesn’t have any direct authority over the Los Angeles Unified School District, many voters said they want the next major to play a role in education. KPCC

As Restorative Justice Spreads, When Do You Suspend?
Critics of suspensions, and the zero-tolerance policies that fuel them, advocate for restorative practices, which have been making inroads across the country to demonstrated positive effect. But restorative practices take time, in a way that simple punishment does not. EdWeek

Help on the Road to Higher Education
Parent College gives fathers and mothers an introduction to campus life so they can help their teenagers gain admission. LA Times

A Curriculum Crunch for California
While education reformers in Sacramento continue to obsess about how easy it should be to fire teachers and how important tests should be in evaluating their performance, almost no one is talking about the central issue of what students are supposed to be learning in the near future. LA Times Editorial

Hawthorne Middle School Teacher Wins Honor
A teacher at Bud Carson Middle School in Hawthorne is among three to be named California Teachers of the Year by Project Lead the Way, a nationwide nonprofit that partners with schools to offer a hands-on engineering curriculum. Daily Breeze

Educators Want Concrete Data to Build New API Indicators
In the search for a more perfect school accountability system, classroom teachers and district administrators joined school advocates in a call last week for more concrete indicators – like daily attendance, fitness marks and discipline records. SI&A Cabinet Report

Eli Broad

The Coalition for School Reform’s District 6 (East San Fernando Valley) runoff election coffers have been replenished thanks to big donations received from Los Angeles philanthropist Eli Broad and StudentsFirst, Michelle Rhee’s education advocacy group, among others.

According to reports just filed with the LA City Ethics Commission, Broad gave the Coalition $250,000. StudentsFirst contributed another $100,000. A LA-area business consulting group called Aurora Management Partners contributed $30,000 to the Coalition, and Century City 1800 Partners gave $20,000. As LA School Report reported Monday, the Coalition had $230,000 in its war chest at the beginning of April. These new contributions push that amount to $630,000.

Previous posts: Runoff 2013: Slow Fundraising Start for District 6; Runoff: Union & LA Times Might Shift Endorsements