The history of LAUSD over the past five decades, reveals an organization pulled up from its early 20th Century Progressive Era roots. Decades of reform efforts have provided a lively audition for what a new institution of public education could look like. In this seminar Charles Kerchner shows how successive reform efforts have outlined the design of a more effective educational system, and identifies some policy levers that can help to create a new institutional structure for public education, in L.A. and for all of California and beyond.

Since 2009, AIR and Pivot Learning have successfully formed partnerships with the Los Angeles, Pasadena, and Twin Rivers Unified School Districts. This team has made a great deal of progress in initiating the activities necessary to implement the basic policy elements of Strategic School Funding for Results at the local level. At this briefing, representatives from each district will discuss the partnership’s progress and the challenges, and offered recommendations for state policy and other districts.

Since 2008, Fresno and Long Beach Unified School Districts have been engaged in a formal district partnership designed to help the districts achieve a common a set of goals. With the generous support of the Hewlett Foundation and Stuart Foundation, the American Institutes for Research, in collaboration with Pivot Learning Partners, has been documenting the districts’ work together. This panel featured the leaders of these two districts who discussed their Partnership and its implications for policy and practice.

Bringing the Common Core to California: A Discussion Morning Presentations. Welcome and Overview by David N. Plank, Executive Director, PACE and Scott Hill, Compliance, Programs and Policy An Introduction to Common Core by Keith Gayler, Program Director, Council of Chief State School Officers The Common Core Standards English/Language Arts by Sue Pimentel, Co-Founder, StandardsWork The Common Core Standards Mathematics by Hung-Hsi Wu, Professor of Mathematics Emeritus, University of California, Berkeley Afternoon Panel Discussion. Implementing the Common Core in CA: Reflections on Standards

This conference cosponsored by PACE and Pivot Learning examines the reform efforts of the Los Angeles Unified School District amidst one of the largest budget crisis known to the district. The panels featured multiple perspectives discussing how resources are allocated to afford greater autonomy for schools, greater budget transparency for the community and greater equity of results for students.

In this seminar, Sean Reardon and Michal Kurlaender will present student-level data from four large California school districts was used to examine the impact of the California High School Exit Examination exam on student achievement and graduation rates. In particular, they focus of the effects of failing vs. passing the CAHSEE in 10th grade on the subsequent achievement and graduation rate of students with relatively low math and ELA skills.

This seminar will feature Isabella Furth, Senior Associate, Viewpoint Learning, and Heidi Gantwerk, Vice President, Viewpoint Learning, discussing a recent project in which they engaged groups of citizens in informed dialogue about the future of California’s K-12 education system and the policy choices that our state faces. Moderated by David N. Plank, Executive Director, PACE.