Aftershocks could have ramifications; teacher union leaders grouse as they plan next steps. On Tuesday, May 6th, Nick Melvoin and Kelly Gonez, who are more concerned with the needs of parents, kids and taxpayers than stoking the bureaucracy and complying with teacher union diktats, were elected to the Los Angeles Unified School District board. Reformers...
Sacramento — Supporters of charter schools, homeschooling and other forms of school “choice” are so used to fighting in the trenches against the state’s muscular teachers’ unions that they often forget how much progress they’ve made in the last decade or so. Recent events have shown the degree of progress, even if they still face...
Incumbent Steve Zimmer, lost to challenger Nick Melvoin in the District 4 race for the Los Angeles Unified School District Board of Education, while seventh grade teacher Kelly Gonez was leading in early election results Tuesday night to represent District 6 on the LAUSD Board of Education. cityclerk.lacity.org/election/results.html
A new study points fingers at charter schools for malfeasance, but traditional public schools are still by far #1 in wasteful spending.
Unions, which are tax-exempt, see to it that the rest of us pay and pay and…. Tax Freedom Day is the day when our government has taken enough of workers’ income to satisfy its tax lust for the year. TFD, which differs from year to year, is determined by taking all federal, state, and local...
Last week’s report from State Auditor Elaine Howell reveals some disturbing budgeting and compensation practices at the University of California’s Office of the President (UCOP). But the problem isn’t just limited to UCOP; it is a systemwide phenomenon. We have previously reported that Robert Reich makes close to $300,000 annually to teach one class at...
Education establishment is protecting its turf in the Golden State; kids are not on its radar. In late April, U.S. News & World Report released its yearly national rankings of America’s public high schools, and six of the top 10 are charter schools – public schools that don’t have to be in lockstep with their...
Officials fought parents for years to keep children in a failing Anaheim school Parent-trigger warning In 2015 parents at the Palm Lane Elementary School of the Anaheim City School District turned in far more signatures than needed under the Parent Trigger Law (authored by former State Sen. Gloria Romero as Ed. Code sections 53300-53303). The goal...
In early 2015, Santa Ana school officials quietly signed a deal with union leaders that allowed teachers to leave the classroom in order to lobby for higher pay “on a full-time basis with no loss of pay, seniority, sick leave or benefits.” The so-called “release-time” agreement, drafted in November 2014 and signed on January 5, 2015,...
LFor those of us old enough to remember its beginnings, the United Negro College Fund’s iconic “A mind is a terrible thing to waste” campaign is still haunting. It began in 1972 with TV images of black students shut out of classrooms, and ended with an almost undeniable appeal: donate to UNCF so that black...
Our illiteracy rate is alarming, but the ed establishment doesn’t seem to be concerned. The biggest problem in the country today? Some may say that it’s healthcare, while others will insist that it’s the economy. A third group maintains that it’s ISIS. While a good a case can be made for any of the above,...
Betsy DeVos’ ridesharing analogy is spot on, but draws Randi’s wrath. At the Brookings Institution last week, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos gave a talk in which she drew parallels between school choice and the ascendancy of ridesharing companies like Uber and Lyft. “Just as the traditional taxi systems revolted against ridesharing, so too does the...
As we approach Tax Day, when millions of taxpayers deal with our convoluted tax laws, many San Francisco parents have more than taxes on their minds. This is the time of year when the San Francisco Unified School District (SFUSD) mails out the school assignment letters to anxious parents awaiting the results of the government...
Though better than the current law, a new tenure bill doesn’t go nearly far enough. As things stand, k-12 public school teachers in California are essentially guaranteed lifetime employment if they can get through their first two years on the job. This puts a lot of pressure on principals, as they must decide by March...