Author name: Graciela Newman

Credit: Allison Shelley for American Education The battle over parents’ rights in California is moving from packed school board meetings to contentious lawsuits. How these controversies are resolved will profoundly affect the rights of children, the rights of parents, and our obligation to educate our children to be responsible citizens in a democracy. Chino Valley […]

Credit: Noah Lyons / EdSource The Biden administration continues to explore ways to forgive student loan debt for hundreds of thousands of borrowers across the country, even after an unfavorable Supreme Court ruling in June. That’s a good thing. But what’s concerning is how the debate on this issue — and the focus on students

Credit: Allison Shelley for American Education Just when life in post-Covid schools looks the bleakest in California, with growing teacher shortages and political wars disrupting classrooms, innovation and change for students, parents and teachers are emerging. For example, $4.1 billion in funding for community schools, where health care, tutoring and other social supports converge on

Nestor Henrriquez, third from left, poses with students graduating from Merced High School this past June. The students all began attending school in the U.S. during high school. Each of them graduated with various pathways to community colleges or vocational training schools, thanks in to support from Henrriquez’s project for Teach Plus called English Learner

Students study at De Anza College. Credit: Neil Hanshaw / EdSource Like many young people in California, I always aspired to graduate from college. Having spent much of my youth in the foster care system, I was proud to enroll in Pasadena City College in 2018 with plans to transfer to a four-year university. After

A big crowd was on hand when the Murrieta Valley Unified School District board voted last August to mandate that parents be told if their child shows any indication at school of being transgender. Credit: Mallika Seshadri / EdSource Teachers working in California school districts with conservative school boards are increasingly finding themselves with a

Photo: Alison Yin/EdSource As a nation, we are confronting an alarming crisis in K-12 education that goes beyond the effects of a global pandemic. Before the pandemic, roughly 1 in 10 students in Los Angeles County and across our state were chronically absent. Now, in many schools, almost half of our students are missing from

Sixth graders work together on a science project. Credit: Allison Shelley for American Education In the past few weeks, EdSource has reported that the California Department of Education is attempting to silence researchers to prevent them from testifying as expert witnesses in a case against the agency. The department, as a condition of providing nonpublic

Credit: Allison Shelley for American Education Georgina Perez started completing her online coursework to become an assistant preschool teacher last December — around the same time she began treatment for colon cancer. “I really thought once (I started my classes), I wasn’t going to be able to continue,” said the mother of three who had

The Murrieta Valley Unified School District board mandates that parents be told if their child shows any indication of being transgender. Credit: Mallika Seshadri / EdSource The Murrieta Valley Unified School District board voted Thursday night to accept the policy passed by the Chino Valley Unified school board on July 20 “as is” — mandating