LAUSD celebrates academic recovery, but without Covid relief funds, a difficult road ahead

This story has been updated to include additional community voices.

The Los Angeles Unified School District celebrated its students’ academic achievements on the 2024 California Smarter Balanced test during a news conference Friday. The district’s results reflect near-fulfillment of Superintendent Alberto Carvalho’s 2022 promise of pandemic-related learning loss within two school years to overcome.

Across all grade levels, most demographic groups, and LAUSD priority schools, the district saw gains in both English Language Arts (ELA) and math.

Between the 2022-23 and 2023-24 academic years, English language arts scores increased from about 41% of students meeting or exceeding standards to just over 43%.

Math scores also increased. In the 2022-23 academic year, 30.5% of LAUSD students met or exceeded state standards. Last year, that number rose to 32.83%.

“I predicted about two years ago that within two years we would see a recovery at a level that would affect some subgroups and reach or exceed pre-pandemic levels,” Carvalho said.

“I find it encouraging that the students who have historically performed at the lowest levels are actually those who have already exceeded pre-pandemic performance levels.”

Carvalho added that LAUSD’s Black and Latino students outperformed their counterparts across the state. Meanwhile, both students with disabilities and English language learners are performing better than before the pandemic.

While district officials say they are prepared to maintain student achievement levels, they are grappling with the end of one-time Covid relief funds that expired last month and are pushing federal and state lawmakers for more support going forward.

“I believe from the bottom of my gut and from the bottom of my heart that we must create the conditions in which every child can learn. And that means smaller class sizes. It means more mental health support. This means that there is a nurse at every school. It means [psychiatric social workers] at every school. It means things we can’t afford right now because the Covid money is gone,” LAUSD School Board President Jackie Goldberg said during the event.

“This is remarkable, but if we want to move forward, the state has to find a way… to do something.”

How did the district’s neediest students fare?

Students with disabilities saw an increase in scores of about 1% compared to the previous year. Still, just over 13% of LAUSD students with disabilities met or exceeded California ELA standards, with nearly 11% meeting or exceeding math standards.

Achievement among homeless students remained about the same as last year, with small increases of less than 1% in both subject areas. Meanwhile, foster youth saw a slight decrease in ELA scores — just over 20% met or exceeded standards — and a slight increase to 13.08% in math.

Immigrant students performed better on the 2023-24 tests, and English language learners saw a significant jump in improvement.

Between the 2022-23 and 2023-24 academic years, the number of English learners who met or exceeded state ELA standards doubled, from 4.44% to 8.88%. Meanwhile, the share of English language learners who met or exceeded math standards rose from 6.80% to 10.65%.

“Los Angeles is not like the rest of the state of California. The challenges in our community are far greater. Poverty is higher. The proportion of students learning English is significantly higher. The proportion of students with disabilities is higher. The proportion of students who are newly arrived international newcomers is significantly higher. “The percentage of students who are homeless is unprecedented,” Carvalho said Friday.

“That’s why we should come together and celebrate every time the unnatural, the almost impossible, becomes the inevitable.”

Not everyone agrees with this. Evelyn Aleman, the organizer of the Facebook group Our Voice/Nuestra Voz, claimed that the district’s results are still not sufficient and that more investment needs to be made to support student achievement.

“We cannot settle for substandard outcomes,” she said, “…particularly for vulnerable, needy student populations. “There is no gain if most of our children do not meet state standards in the core subjects.”

How big was the difference between non-charter schools and charter schools?

LAUSD charter schools outperformed non-charter schools in both English and math.

Approximately 49% of district charter students met or exceeded standards in English language arts and just over 35% met or exceeded standards in mathematics, compared to non-charter students, where just over 40% met standards in the English language arts met or exceeded standards, and just over 30% met or exceeded standards in mathematics.

How did the students do in science?

While LAUSD’s science scores increased, they still lag behind other subject areas.

In the 2023-24 academic year, nearly 24% of LAUSD students met or exceeded state standards in science, compared to 22.17% the previous year.

What strategies have helped at the local level?

While district officials emphasized that much work remains to maintain and improve this year’s numbers, they also said their growth reflects the hard work of LAUSD teachers and staff at all levels.

“We have that [improved our scores] intentionally,” said Elesia Watkins, principal of 54th Street Elementary, “and intentionally ignored the stigma that black and brown children cannot achieve greatness.”

Principals from other LAUSD schools with higher scores agreed, emphasizing the importance of tracking data and making sure students also know where they stand and what they need to work on.

Others emphasized the importance of students attending both lab enrichment courses and elective courses every day, including after school hours if possible.

Student board member Anely Cortez Lopez also praised the hard work and resilience of the student body.

“I think it would be wrong of me not to highlight the tremendous resilience and commitment of our students,” she said. “We have experienced an unprecedented event, many falls … not only academically, but also emotionally, physically and mentally for many of our students. ”

“But [we] were eager to get back on their feet better.”