Just weeks ago, Brandy Caldwell was finishing up her senior year at Boston’s Brandeis University when she got the notice: The coronavirus was forcing a campus shutdown in two days. For most students, that meant a hasty packing up and a quick car trip home to their parents. But for Caldwell, 22, it wasn’t that...

When she read in late February that the coronavirus could infect as many as 70 percent of Americans, Emily Freitag was “primed” to prepare for its effect on schools. She grew up near New Rochelle, New York, one of the first U.S. hotspots of the virus, and her husband, who analyzes international hotel data, saw...

As the COVID-19 pandemic spreads throughout the United States, the urgent need for health and stability is paramount. In these early weeks of spring, we must work together to minimize transmission and flatten the curve. Yet even as we secure the basic safety of our homes and communities, we must not forget the important, once-a-decade...

Our polarized and tribal politics have suddenly come crashing into a moment where we are now only as strong as our weakest link. The coronavirus knows no party, ideology, ethnicity, or wall. And the virus certainly doesn’t distinguish between those who support differing progressive policy positions on education. A few weeks before our entire city...

With a recession on the way, states and localities could be making severe cuts to public education over the next year — and many leaders don’t seem to realize it yet. That was the message delivered this week by Marguerite Roza, one of America’s foremost experts in school finance, in a public webinar. Her presentation...

Updated April 2 Parents of the nearly 700,000 students attending traditional and charter schools in Los Angeles are facing an unprecedented disruption of their children’s routine and their daily lives with the shutdown of L.A. Unified School District’s more than 1,000 campuses. One of the main concerns for district officials and educators trying to control the...

All 60 Grab and Go Food Centers operated by Los Angeles Unified will be open on Friday, March 20. While the Governor and Mayor have both issued “Stay at Home” orders, they stated that they expect essential services like food centers to remain open. This is an advisory LAUSD sent out Thursday.   On a...

What’s a school for in the 21st century? Start with the bedrock: they’re for helping children develop academic skills and access core content, right? Those famous R’s: reading, writing, ‘rithmetic, you know the deal. We also count on them to grow democratic citizens — informed, aware, civic-minded community members. But that’s just the beginning. Public...