What Has Betsy DeVos Accomplished? Part II | janresseger

What Has Betsy DeVos Accomplished? Part II | janresseger

What Has Betsy DeVos Accomplished? Part II

THIS BLOG WILL TAKE A SHORT SPRING BREAK.  LOOK FOR A NEW POST ON APRIL 9.

Yesterday’s post covered Betsy DeVos’s record as U.S. Secretary of Education—examining her failed quest to privatize the public schools and Congress’s success in blocking her K-12 agenda. But there are other important departmental responsibilities. DeVos has also turned her attention to deregulation.

DeVos has set out to expunge Obama-era rules and guidance protecting students’ civil rights in public schools. She has also quietly erased protection for college students in predatory for-profit colleges and trade schools whose operating budgets depend for their very survival on their ability to market themselves to students who will bring federal loans, grants, and Veterans’ program dollars.  However, again and again, her Department’s justification for cancelling or delaying Obama rules has been blocked by the courts.

Court challenges have forced DeVos’s staff to continue enforcing civil rights protections in public schools and to continue cracking down on predatory for-profit colleges. Politico‘s Michael Stratford describes a long list of failures by DeVos’s department to rescind Obama-era rules: “Education Secretary Betsy DeVos’s attempts to swiftly roll back major Obama-era policies at her agency are hitting a roadblock: federal courts. Judges have rebuffed DeVos’ attempts to change Obama policies dealing with everything from student loan forgiveness to mandatory arbitration agreements to racial disparities in special education programs.  As a result, the Education Department is being forced to carry out Obama-era policies that the Trump administration had been fighting to stop—stymying DeVos’ efforts to quickly impose a conservative imprint on federal education policy over the past two years.”

In many cases, courts have blocked DeVos’s efforts to deregulate on procedural grounds. DeVos’s staff people are accused of failing to follow the requirements for changing federal rules and guidance.  Stratford summarizes Toby Merrill’s reaction to DeVos’s rule changes.  Merrill is the director of the Harvard Law School’s Project on Predatory Student Lending, an organization that has challenged, along with the attorneys general of several states, several of DeVos’s attempts to rescind or delay Obama-era rules: “Every administration has wins and losses in court, Merrill said, but most have done better at making sure they follow the legal rules of the road for rulemaking.”  Merrill explains: “It speaks to the Department of Education’s unwillingness or inability to follow the basic law around how federal agencies conduct themselves… At the very least, they cross their Ts and dot their Is and therefore are CONTINUE READING: What Has Betsy DeVos Accomplished? Part II | janresseger

Social Justice Humanitas Academy (Part 2) | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

Social Justice Humanitas Academy (Part 2) | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

Social Justice Humanitas Academy (Part 2)

Geological strata reveal historical periods of plant and animal life eons ago. Schools  birthed in reform unveil similar strata.

In Part 1, I recounted teacher-founders’ (Jose Navarro and Jeff Austin) creation story of Social Justice Humanitas Academy, a Los Angeles Unified District school located in the northeast corner of the San Fernando Valley. These founders placed its origin initially at Sylmar High School where they and other teachers established a Humanitas school-within-a school, offspring of an interdisciplinary curricular reform sponsored by the Los Angeles Education Partnership. LAEP’s Humanitas innovation began in the mid-1980s and slowly spread through the 1990s across LAUSD high schools. Aimed at engaging low-income Latino and African American youth to take academic courses that would prepare them for college, the teacher-led Humanitas program at Sylmar High School gained traction with a growing number of students. The teacher founders who had designed and governed the school-within-a-school, however, wanted more autonomy. They wanted their own school.

Second stratum of reform in SJHA

At the district level, the Board of Education at this time sought to expand parental choice in those neighborhoods where predominately low-income minority children and youth attended low-performing local schools. The reform idea of giving parents more choices among LAUSD schools gained speed and political support. In 2009, the Board of Education approved a Public School Choice resolution to establish innovative and rigorous schools designed to turn around low-performing schools across the district. Teams of teachers, parents, community activists, and others drafted plans for new schools in each of four rounds that Public School Choice sponsored. The superintendent’s review team critiqued proposals. In many cases, proposers revised and re-submitted their plans.

At the same time, another LAUSD reform was underway called “Pilot Schools.” The two streams of reform converged as the teachers at Sylmar High School CONTINUE READING: Social Justice Humanitas Academy (Part 2) | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice

After Trying for Three Years, Betsy DeVos Fails to Nix Special Olympics Funding | deutsch29

After Trying for Three Years, Betsy DeVos Fails to Nix Special Olympics Funding | deutsch29

After Trying for Three Years, Betsy DeVos Fails to Nix Special Olympics Funding

US Department of Education (USDOE) secretary of education, Betsy DeVos, has been in the news this week for her unfavorable (insensitive? foolish?) decision to propose– and ardently defend– $17.6M in cuts to Special Olympics in USDOE’s FY2020 proposed budget.

It isn’t the first time DeVos has proposed cutting Special Olympics. She has tried to cut Special Olympics in FY 2018 and FY 2019, as well.

Here is the language from the FY2019 budget summary justifying those cuts under the heading, “Programs Proposed for Elimination”:

Programs Proposed for Elimination

The 2019 request supports the Administration’s commitment to eliminating funding for programs that have achieved their original purpose, duplicate other programs, are narrowly focused, or are unable to demonstrate effectiveness. ….

Special Olympics Education Programs ……………………………………………… $12.6

This program supports a directed grant award to a not-for-profit organization. Funds are used to expand the Special Olympics and the design and implementation of Special Olympics education programs. Such activities are better supported with other Federal, State, local, or private funds.

The language in FY2020 and FY2019 was the same as it was in DeVos’ proposed budget for FY2018, with only the amount differing ($10.1M in FY2018).

Despite her repeated attempts to eliminate federal funding to Special Olympics (FY2018, FY2019, FY2020), the House has instead increased funding to the program.

In hearings before the House Appropriations Committee on March 26, 27, and 28, 2019, DeVos defended cutting Special Olympics, including the reasoning that the CONTINUE READING: After Trying for Three Years, Betsy DeVos Fails to Nix Special Olympics Funding | deutsch29

NEA - U.S. Senate approves bill recognizing education support professionals and classified school employees

NEA - U.S. Senate approves bill recognizing education support professionals and classified school employees

U.S. Senate approves bill recognizing education support professionals and classified school employees
Legislation creates national, annual award program for ESPs

WASHINGTON - March 28, 2019 -

The U.S. Senate today approved the Recognizing Achievement in Classified School Employees Act (H.R. 276), legislation that provides long-overdue recognition for the outstanding contributions of education support professionals and classified school employees to the nation’s public schools and the students they serve. The legislation directs the U.S. Secretary of Education to establish a national award program recognizing the excellence exhibited by public school system employees who provide services to students in pre-kindergarten through grade 12. The National Education Association already annually recognizes such educators with its prestigious Education Support Professionals (ESP) of the Year award.

"Education support professionals are an integral part of the nation’s public education system and the more than 50 million students it serves," said NEA President Lily Eskelsen García. "They often are the first in the building and the last to leave. They promote student achievement, ensure student safety, and contribute to the establishment and promotion of a positive instructional environment every day."

"Our school support staff are fully committed to student success," said Matthew Powell, the 2019 NEA ESP of the Year, and a custodial supervisor, special events bus driver, and night watchman at Central Elementary School in Mayfield, Kentucky. "Although they seldom seek the spotlight, I am pleased this national award will increase the awareness of the important roles they play because our ESPs have a depth of knowledge and experience that, when paired with their hearts for students, can make a tremendous and positive difference."

There are almost 3 million classified education support employees in our nation’s public schools, colleges, and universities and they make up one-third of the public education workforce.

"Whether driving a bus, working a computer lab, assisting a teacher in the classroom, serving lunch to students, or making sure the building is clean and healthy, they work hard every day knowing the important role they play in creating learning environments that help students reach their fullest potential. They are the gears that keep school operations moving," continued Eskelsen García.

"After many years by educators of advocating for such a national award, Congress is right to recognize the unsung and often unseen heroes of the education professions – education support professionals and classified school employees. In particular, we thank Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA) for sponsoring the bill as well as the members from both sides of the political aisle of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions. This long-overdue bill appropriately respects and rightly acknowledges the hard work, dedication, skills, and expertise of our ESPs," concluded Eskelsen García.

Of NEA’s 3 million members, almost 500,000 are Education Support Professionals represented in the following nine career families:

• Clerical services
• Custodial and maintenance services
• Food services
• Health and student services
• Paraeducators
• Security services
• Skilled trade services
• Technical services
• Transportation services

For more information on education support professionals, visit: www.nea.org/ESP.
　
                                 Follow us on twitter @NEAMedia and @NEArESPect

The National Education Association is the nation's largest professional employee organization, representing nearly 3 million elementary and secondary teachers, higher education faculty, education support professionals, school administrators, retired educators, and students preparing to become teachers.

CONTACT: Miguel A. Gonzalez
(202) 822-7823, mgonzalez@nea.org

NEA - U.S. Senate approves bill recognizing education support professionals and classified school employees

How Charter Schools Lost Real Democrats' Support

How Charter Schools Lost Democrats' Support

How Charter Schools Lost Real Democrats' Support

Last December, after two years of negotiation that hadn’t produced a contract, the United Teachers of Los Angeles took to the streets. Thousands of them marched in their red shirts past the glimmering towers of revitalized downtown Los Angeles. They finished their march at The Broad, a contemporary art museum where union leaders held a rally before dismissing the crowd. Their demands were clear: smaller class sizes and a limit to the explosive growth of charter schools. 

The final destination was as deliberate as the demands. The target of their rage was Eli Broad, the billionaire philanthropist who is a modern-day Medici in Los Angeles. He backs the arts. His bid to buy the Los Angeles Times was widely supported by locals. And his museum attracts nearly a million visitors a year. But as labor negotiations slowed and then stalled last year, the teachers turned their anger toward the city’s civic hero. The reason was simple: Broad is a passionate supporter of charter schools.

California is home to 1,306 charters -- more than any other state in the country. And Los Angeles is the state’s most fertile ground for these schools. The Los Angeles Unified School District has 277 of them. Control of the nation’s second-largest school district rests with its school board, where Broad has wielded influence for years. In the last two election cycles he gave more than $2 million to school board candidates. After the 2017 campaign -- the most expensive school board election in the nation’s history -- yielded a 4-3 pro-charter majority, Broad’s influence over the school district grew even stronger. The board picked as its new school superintendent Austin Beutner, an investment banker with no experience running a school district or even a school, but with close connections to Broad, who had helped Beutner land a job as L.A.’s deputy mayor. Beutner, like Broad, is a charter supporter, having served on the boards of several charter operations.

With the labor dispute in its second year, Beutner pushed a plan to reshape the school system. He proposed forming 32 networks across the district, meant to foster a decentralization of power. Autonomy would be returned to the schools and, by extension, to parents. But to the powerful teachers union in Los Angeles, Beutner’s plan was a move toward still more charters and to school privatization. “Decentralization is a common refrain in so-called portfolio districts -- like New Orleans, Newark and Detroit -- cities that are riddled with a patchwork of privatization schemes that do not improve student outcomes,” the union said in a statement released in November. “Clusters of schools compete against each other for resources and support, creating a system of haves and have nots and exacerbating segregation and equity issues.” 

Beutner’s plan galvanized the anti-charter forces. Parents joined teachers on the picket lines, swelling the ranks of those who descended on The Broad museum to roughly 50,000 on the day of the march. “The thing Beutner didn’t see,” says Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, the nation’s second-largest teachers union, “was the overwhelming support of traditional public schools in Los Angeles.” 

Mayor Eric Garcetti broke the labor stalemate in January, forging a deal between the union and Beutner. The union got a commitment to the smaller class sizes it had long demanded. And the mayor, who had once called for the expansion of charter schools in Los Angeles, got the school board to vote up-or-down on a union-backed resolution asking the state to place a cap on charter schools. In short, Garcetti delivered a win for the teachers in a place where the charter movement had won some of its most significant victories. The school board eventually approved the resolution calling for the charter cap in a 5 to 1 vote. In February, state leaders agreed to form a task force to examine the fiscal impact charter schools have on traditional public school funding. The union claims that charters drain resources from regular public schools.  

The concessions by the school district didn’t happen in a vacuum. From coast to coast, the charter movement has seen its political support declining, especially among progressive Democrats. The movement was CONTINUE READING: How Charter Schools Lost Democrats' Support

Big Education Ape: California: Now Is the Time to Reform Charter Schools | Diane Ravitch's blog - http://bigeducationape.blogspot.com/2019/03/california-now-is-time-to-reform.html

California: Now Is the Time to Reform Charter Schools | Diane Ravitch's blog

California: Now Is the Time to Reform Charter Schools | Diane Ravitch's blog

California: Now Is the Time to Reform Charter Schools

California has more charter schools and students than any other state, due to its size and its notoriously weak charter law. Add to that a progressive Governor with a blind spot for charters (Jerry Brown opened two when he was mayor of Oakland) and to a gaggle of billionaires in both parties who favor privatization.

in the new report by the Network for Public Education, Asleep At the Wheel, California was home to a large proportion of phantom charters. An amazing 39% of federally funded charters in California either never opened or closed soon after opening.

A new organization has been founded in California to encourage charter school reform, which can happen only by revising the state charter law.

The organization is “Reform Charter Schools.”

What a difference two California strikes make — Reform Charter Schools started in 2016 when the environment for demanding that charter schools function under the same rules as neighborhood public schools was much more hostile. Some brave activists in Orange County were among the first to call out charter corruption. Now the group has rebooted to spread the message that even ordinary well-run charters defund and depopulate public schools by virtue of their business model.

Reform Charter Schools has developed a place for people to read about and learn what the bills say as they go through the committee process, and a petition calling for strong charter accountability here: http://reformcharterschools.org/.

The site has resources for those who want to launch their own school board resolution to call for a moratorium on charters, and is starting to offer the petition in multiple languages. (The simplified Chinese version to sign is here.) Some pro-public ed grassroots groups have already started meeting with their Assembly representatives.

Californians, go to Reform Charter Schools and get the ball rolling.

=========

Links for all of the above in case they don’t copy over, in the order they appear:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/ReformCharterSchools1505.1508/learning_content/

http://reformcharterschools.org/school-board-charter-moratorium-resolution-templates/

http://reformcharterschools.org/simplified-chinese-strong-charter-school-accountability-with-ab-1505-1508/

http://reformcharterschools.org

California: Now Is the Time to Reform Charter Schools | Diane Ravitch's blog

“A case for why both sides in the ‘reading wars’ debate are wrong — and a proposed solution” Is 50% Wrong | radical eyes for equity

“A case for why both sides in the ‘reading wars’ debate are wrong — and a proposed solution” Is 50% Wrong | radical eyes for equity

“A case for why both sides in the ‘reading wars’ debate are wrong — and a proposed solution” Is 50% Wrong

In her The Answer Sheet, Valerie Strauss offers yet another post about the current Reading War/Crisis: A case for why both sides in the ‘reading wars’ debate are wrong — and a proposed solution.

Strauss explains before offering the long post:

This is an unusual post about the “reading wars,” that seemingly never-ending battle about how to best teach reading to students — systematic phonics or whole language. This argues that both sides have it wrong, and the authors, two brothers who are literacy experts, suggest a new way.

While this is a provocative, often nuanced, and compelling, it makes a fatal flaw common in the seemingly never-ending false war between phonics and whole language by misdefining whole language and then failing to take care when citing research that seems to show neither systematic phonics nor whole language are more effective than the other.

First, let me offer an example of this type of failure in a slightly different context, the powerful and complicated work of Lisa Delpit.

Delpit has made for many years a strong case about the inequity of educational opportunities that cheat black students (as well as many other vulnerable populations). At times, Delpit’s work has been co-opted by traditional advocates for education—notably those calling for intensive phonics and isolated grammar instruction.

Here, Delpit make a very direct refuting of that sort of co-opting:

I do not advocate a simplistic ‘basic skills’ approach for children outside of the culture of power. It would be (and has been) tragic to operate as if these children were incapable of critical and higher-order thinking and reasoning. Rather, I suggest that schools must provide these children the CONTINUE READING: “A case for why both sides in the ‘reading wars’ debate are wrong — and a proposed solution” Is 50% Wrong | radical eyes for equity

Does Homework Work? - The Atlantic

Does Homework Work? - The Atlantic

The Cult of Homework
America’s devotion to the practice stems in part from the fact that it’s what today’s parents and teachers grew up with themselves

America has long had a fickle relationship with homework. A century or so ago, progressive reformers argued that it made kids unduly stressed, which later led in some cases to district-level bans on it for all grades under seventh. This anti-homework sentiment faded, though, amid mid-century fears that the U.S. was falling behind the Soviet Union (which led to more homework), only to resurface in the 1960s and ’70s, when a more open culture came to see homework as stifling play and creativity (which led to less). But this didn’t last either: In the ’80s, government researchers blamed America’s schools for its economic troubles and recommended ramping homework up once more.

The 21st century has so far been a homework-heavy era, with American teenagers now averaging about twice as much time spent on homework each day as their predecessors did in the 1990s. Even little kids are asked to bring school home with them. A 2015 study, for instance, found that kindergarteners, who researchers tend to agree shouldn’t have any take-home work, were spending about 25 minutes a night on it.

But not without pushback. As many children, not to mention their parents and teachers, are drained by their daily workload, some schools and districts are rethinking how homework should work—and some teachers are doing away with it entirely. They’re reviewing the research on homework (which, it should be noted, is contested) and concluding that it’s time to revisit the subject.

Read: My daughter’s homework is killing me

Hillsborough, California, an affluent suburb of San Francisco, is one district that has changed its ways. The district, which includes three elementary schools and a middle school, worked with teachers and convened panels of parents in order to come up with a homework policy that would allow students more unscheduled time to spend with their families or to play. In August 2017, it rolled out an updated policy, which emphasized that homework should be “meaningful” and banned due dates that fell on the day after a weekend or a break.

“The first year was a bit bumpy,” says Louann Carlomagno, the district’s superintendent. She says the adjustment was at times hard for the teachers, some of whom had been doing their job in a similar fashion for a quarter of a century. Parents’ expectations were also an issue. Carlomagno says they took some time to “realize that it was okay not to have an hour of homework for a CONTINUE READING: Does Homework Work? - The Atlantic

SAT and ACT costs: Why college admission testing is so expensive - Vox

SAT and ACT costs: Why college admission testing is so expensive - Vox

The cost of taking the SAT and ACT, explained
The SAT’s baseline price is $47.50 and the ACT’s is $50.50. Where does that money go?

It costs a lot of money to get into college. There’s the cost of high school extracurriculars and test prep, all the things that are supposed to give a student a better shot at getting into the “best” school. There’s trips to visit potential schools to prove that your student is deeply interested in attending. There’s bribery for “side door” acceptance, if you’re into that sort of thing. But even if you don’t spend thousands on upping your potential to get into college, there’s one cost that is basically unavoidable: the cost of taking the SAT or ACT.

The Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) and ACT (originally American College Testing) are standardized tests that are functionally mandatory for admission at many colleges across the country, from elite universities to community college. Currently, it costs $47.50 to take the SAT ($64.50 with the Essay portion), and $22 for each of the SAT subject tests, not including the $26 registration fee. The ACT costs $50.50 ($67 with the Writing portion), and for each test there are extra costs for late registration. Advanced Placement (AP) tests cost $94. Fee waivers are available, but considering most college counselors suggest students take these tests multiple times, odds are many students and their families are paying hundreds of dollars just to be considered, turning college testing into a billion dollar industry.

Recently, these tests made the news again in the college admissions scandal centered around “counselor” William “Rick” Singer. Part of this particular scam involved bribed proctors either allowing professionals to take these tests in place of students, or editing the test results before sending them in. And thus, a decades-old conversation about bias and corruption in college testing — and whether the SAT and ACT should exist at all — was given a shot of adrenaline.

The college testing industry is run by two nonprofits: the College Board, which develops the SAT, PSAT, and AP curriculum, and ACT Inc., which administers the test of the same name. And for decades, the two have been accused of abusing their nonprofit status by holding a monopoly on college testing and, thus, admission. However, in recent years, more colleges and universities have been deeming these entrance tests optional or entirely unnecessary, often in order to promote a more diverse applicant pool — and to weed out unfair advantages. Even without a crime ring, “Well-to-do people buy their kids all kinds of advantages,” Bob Schaeffer, public education director of FairTest, told the San Francisco Chronicle. “These so-called objective numbers are very easily manipulated in a way that creates a tilted playing field.”

Schools going test-optional, or eliminating them altogether, could mean a huge blow to the big business of testing. Or it could just drastically change the way the system is gamed. CONTINUE READING: SAT and ACT costs: Why college admission testing is so expensive - Vox

Struggling districts profit by approving charter schools with little oversight - Los Angeles Times

Struggling districts profit by approving charter schools with little oversight - Los Angeles Times

Struggling districts profit by approving charter schools with little oversight

The superintendent’s plan was born of necessity.

In the aftermath of the Great Recession, as tax revenue plummeted, small school districts across California quickly felt the pain. Many were already lean, where administrators did the work of two or three, and students were counted in tens, not thousands. The economic collapse threatened their very existence.

In Superintendent Brent Woodard’s rural district, which covered the towns of Acton and Agua Dulce about 45 miles north of Los Angeles, enrollment in 2013 had fallen by more than a quarter over five years. The area’s population had aged, the birthrate declined and some students were choosing to attend schools outside the district. Without increasing revenue or making harmful cuts, the district was facing insolvency and the threat of a state takeover.

In California’s charter school law, Woodard saw financial salvation.

In the years to come, some would praise his creativity. Others would accuse him of embarrassing the district. Everyone agreed that his strategy was entrepreneurial, though not everyone meant it as a compliment.

Woodard did not respond to several requests for comment. Court records detail how — methodically and rapidly — the Acton-Agua Dulce Unified School District began approving new charter schools. The first year, there were two. The next: 11. By 2017, the district, which operates only three schools of its own, had authorized 17 charter schools.

How a couple worked charter school regulations to make millions »

Some were located outside the district’s geographical boundaries, in places like L.A., Santa Clarita and Pasadena. Some were based entirely online.

Each charter brought the district something it badly needed: Money.

“It was common knowledge ... just go to [Acton-Agua Dulce], they’ll sponsor anyone,” said Ken Pfalzgraf, who won a seat on the district’s board in 2016.

Across California, other small districts hatched similar plans as word spread that they could fix their financial problems by approving certain types of charters and then charging them for a range of services.

State law allows school districts to charge charters fees that are meant to cover the cost of monitoring the schools, but it does not restrict how districts use the money. As a result, districts have spent charter oversight fees on sports coaches, textbooks and computers for their own schools.

When the California Legislature passed the Charter Schools Act in 1992, it was intended to introduce competition into public education as well as an incentive for districts to experiment. There was supposed to be a marketplace of ideas about new ways of teaching and learning. But what has evolved in some parts of the state resembles an actual marketplace in which charter schools can shop for lenient authorizers and school districts can rake in much-needed cash.

Before he was elected to the school board for Acton-Agua Dulce, Pfalzgraf recalls attending meetings and watching with growing concern as a line of charter operators sought approval to open new schools. He remembers those meetings as breezy, friendly affairs in which the CONTINUE READING: Struggling districts profit by approving charter schools with little oversight - Los Angeles Times

Teachers union lawsuit says layoff call made in closed session | The Sacramento Bee

Teachers union lawsuit says layoff call made in closed session | The Sacramento Bee

Lawsuit says Sacramento school district made teacher layoff decision behind closed doors

The city teachers union filed a lawsuit against the Sacramento City Unified School District on Monday, claiming the district unlawfully engaged in discussions regarding budget cuts in closed session meetings in recent months.

The Sacramento City Teachers Association lawsuit claims the financially-troubled district violated California’s open meeting law, which details the provisions of when and how the public can be excluded from closed session meetings, and what can be discussed during those meetings.

The teachers union said the district had closed session meetings in February and March, and then adopted resolutions for layoffs that relied on discussions around budgetary matters. The district voted to lay off 163 teachers in recent weeks in an effort to identify a $35 million budget gap and prevent a state takeover.

The provisions in the Ralph M. Brown Act allow for closed session meetings, but mandates discussion of “general budgetary matters in open session so that the board’s deliberations are open to the public and available for public scrutiny and input,” according to the lawsuit filed in Sacramento Superior Court.

The district denies the union’s allegations and said the focus should be on saving the district of 48,000 students from a state takeover.

“Although the district does not believe it has violated the Brown Act, we take these allegations seriously and will provide an appropriate response through the legal process,” read a statement from the district. “In the meantime, we will continue encouraging SCTA leaders to come to the table and commence negotiations that are focused on saving our schools.”

The union said the decision to lay off teachers should be “null and void.”

“If the district is to be believed, the school board is making huge decisions that will impact the CONTINUE READING: Teachers union lawsuit says layoff call made in closed session | The Sacramento Bee