Let the negative campaigning begin! An arm of the California Charter Schools Association‘s political action committee has unleashed the first campaign attack with a full color, glossy flyer aimed at District 5 board incumbent Bennett Kayser. The message targets a very specific demographic: Latinos. It features five sad looking brown-skinned kids with their heads in their...

As part of its contract negotiations, the teachers union, UTLA, is asking LA Unified for a new approach to school oversight, a demand that seeks to move decisions on school management and operations into the collective bargaining process. In effect, the proposal would insinuate UTLA into areas now the sole province of the board and...

The California Charter Schools Association (CCSA) asked students, parents, teachers, leaders and supporters last year to share videos about their charter schools as part of a contest for thousands of dollars in cash prizes. With the deadline now passed, the CCSA has received 47 submissions and is asking the public to view the videos and...

The Los Angeles region has seen the largest increases in the state in new charter schools this academic year, with 33 new charters opening, according to data released today by the California Charter Schools Association (CCSA). With the growth in LA and elsewhere, California remains the state with the most charter schools and students in the nation....

A tiny, rural school district in northern Los Angeles County is under growing scrutiny over its approval of more than 20 new charter schools in the last few years, the majority of them serving students outside of its own district boundaries. At least three are within the Los Angeles Unified School District. The small district,...

LA School Report has learned that ‘fiscal mismanagement’ and a host of other irregularities are the reasons behind the sudden closure last month of two LA Unified charter schools, Magnolia Science Academy 6 and Magnolia Science Academy 7, according to a letter sent from LAUSD’s Charter Division. Both are considered high-performing schools; MSA-6 is a...

The problem for girls is boys. Several years ago Elizabeth Hicks, a counseling coordinator for LA Unified, had an idea, to open the first all-girls traditional public school in California in more than a decade. It would be a rigorous STEM academy, requiring girls to take science, math and computer classes from sixth grade through...

Despite the ongoing debate over whether charter schools are better than traditional public schools and the steady increase annually of new charters, the California Charter Schools Association reports a record number of students are on charter school wait lists statewide. In LA Unified, the largest district in the state, an estimated 36,300 students are hoping...

After the LA Unified board denied renewals last month for two high-performing charter public schools in southeast Los Angeles — Aspire Antonio Maria Lugo Academy and Aspire Ollin University Preparatory Academy — the schools vowed to fight on. They filed an appeal with the LA County Board of Education and now have a public hearing scheduled March...

California launched the largest number of charter schools in the nation last year, according to a report released this week by the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools (NAPCS). The state saw the start of 104 charter schools, bringing its total to 1,130. Almost 520,000 California students of more than 6 million now attend charters in...