Revised California budget softens blow for schools [Sacramento Bee, 5/18/11]: Largely because of rosier revenue projections for the coming year, budget experts at the Capitol say schools gained a cushion against cuts – even if Brown fails in his effort to extend 2009 increases to income taxes.


Teacher: ‘My employer has become my enemy’ [Washington Post, 5/18/11]: A library media educator in Los Angeles who blogs under the name Mizz Murphy wrote a powerful, first-person account of hearings being held by the Los Angeles Unified School District for teachers and others who who have received a Reduction in Force notice and are trying to keep their jobs.

Fensterwald: Big (invisible) boost in K-12 spending [Educated Guess, 5/17/11]: Gov. Jerry Brown gave K-12 school districts significantly more money, tempered by conflicting messages and sober warnings in the May Revision budget he presented on Monday.

Federal plan would expand school year – as California's shrinks [California Watch, 5/17/11]: Even as school districts around California are shrinking their school year, a bipartisan group of lawmakers in Washington is trying to push states to move in the opposite direction.

Fensterwald: Big (invisible) boost in K-12 spending [Educated Guess, 5/17/11]: Gov. Jerry Brown gave K-12 school districts significantly more money, tempered by conflicting messages and sober warnings in the May Revision budget he presented on Monday.

Baron: It’s not business, it’s personal [Thoughts on Public Education, 5/16/11]: It’s a measure of how worried and angry people are that nearly a hundred parents, students, educators, and policy makers gave up their Saturday to learn just how badly schools will be hit under Gov. Brown’s all-cuts budget, due out today, and to discuss some of the not-so popular solutions.

Oakland Unified becomes a cautionary tale for state takeovers in California [Oakland Tribune, 5/13/11]: Eight years after the Oakland school district's financial meltdown and state takeover, the local school board can't seem to shake past mistakes -- including some made by the state agency tasked with restoring its fiscal health. The story of the Richmond (now West Contra Costa County) school district is here.
Teacher layoffs out of sync with budget impasse [California Watch, 5/13/11]: Thousands of California teachers will receive final layoff notices by a state-imposed deadline of May 15, even though school districts are still in the dark about their financial status in the coming school year.

Opinion: Tobar: The disgraceful interrogation of L.A. school librarians [Los Angeles Times, 5/13/11]: If state education cuts are drastic, the librarians' only chance of keeping a paycheck is to prove they're qualified to be switched to classroom teaching. So LAUSD attorneys grill them. I've seen a lot of strange things in two decades as a reporter, but nothing quite as disgraceful and weird as this inquisition the LAUSD is inflicting upon more than 80 school librarians.

Family Claims H.S. Principal Went Ballistic [Courthouse News, 5/10/11]: A Clovis West High School student says high school officials had police arrest and interrogate him, then suspended him for 15 days for logging onto a Facebook page that parodied the school's principal. He says he didn't create the parody, and never logged onto the Facebook page with school computers, or during school hours or on school property.

Performance-based teacher layoff bill dies in committee [Los Angeles Times, 5/12/11]: California legislation calling for creation of teacher ratings for use in layoff decisions instead of seniority fails to win enough votes to move forward.

Shorter school year? [Inland County Bulletin, 5/10/11]: California's ongoing budget crisis could result in 20 days being cut from public schools' academic year. No legislative proposal exists, but Gov. Jerry Brown and school officials recently warned that shutting down school one month early - 20 instructional days - is a real possibility next year without an extension of higher taxes.

U.S. schools chief backs off on publication of teacher ratings [California Watch, 5/10/11]: U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan has tempered his initial enthusiasm for publishing teacher effectiveness ratings based on test scores.

Times updates and expands value-added ratings for Long Angeles elementary school teachers [Los Angeles Times, 5/8/11]: New data include ratings for about 11,500 teachers, nearly double the number covered last August. School and civic leaders had sought to halt release of the data. The Daily News has a story also.

High bar for firing kept Sacramento teacher on paid leave for 14 months [Sacramento Bee, 5/8/11]: Each letter arrived differently over the course of four years: by mail, by hand and a third by email.

Teachers Union Objects To L.A. School District's New Evaluation Plan [Los Angeles Times, 5/7/11]: The union representing Los Angeles teachers is pursuing a legal challenge to a key early step in creating a new teacher evaluation system that includes the use of student scores on standardized tests, union officials said Friday.

Pension Study: Teachers' Benefits Are Modest [Ventura Star, 5/7/11]: An economic research firm hired to produce data that could justify an expected initiative campaign to scale back public-employee pensions uncovered what its authors called a surprising finding in its report issued this week: Teachers receive relatively modest pensions and contribute a sizable chunk of their earnings to fund their retirement benefits.

Court Upholds Teacher Firing Over Computer Porn [School Law Blog, 5/5/11]: A federal appeals court has upheld the dismissal of a Wisconsin high school teacher for accessing pornographic images on his school computer, rejecting his claims that his school district retaliated against him for teachers' union activism. The case, from the 7th Circuit, is Zellner v. Herrick.
You can read a blurb about the case from Wired.com's "Threat Level" blog (5/5/11).