News & Commentary

“Apartheid was legal. The Holocaust was legal. Slavery was legal. Colonialism was legal. Legality is a matter of power, not justice.” —Jose Antonio Vargas

It's back to school time! You'll have your class schedules soon if you don't already, and we hope that you find a subject this year that really inspires you — whether it's art, math, history, science, P.E., or something else.

If you’re a middle or high school student in the Los Angeles Unified School District, you’ve probably been subjected to a “random” metal detector search – and if not, you’ve probably heard about them. Every day, school staff are required to interrupt class and search students and their belongings, even if they have done nothing wrong and there are no safety concerns at the school. This practice, like on-campus policing, is ineffective, intrusive, and excessive, and is applied in a discriminatory fashion against students of color and low-income students. Students aren’t suspects, and policing them undermines their education and damages school morale.

With a new school year comes new experiences, new choices, and new opportunities. One is the opportunity to make sure you and your friends have the information you need to help navigate the different decisions that may come up in your life. Some of the most important decisions you may face are around your reproductive and sexual health, and if you’re a young person in California, you have the rights and resources to get the health care you need.

There are some things you won't be able to avoid when the new school year starts up. Homework. Pop quizzes. Final exams.

In this time when our federal government has ordered ICE officials to aggressively pursue undocumented folks, it’s important to remind some of our most vulnerable populations about their constitutional rights.

Historian Timothy Snyder got it exactly right in his commentary on the political situation we face today "when the less popular of the two parties controls every lever of power at the federal level, as well as the majority of the statehouses."

Omar Arnoldo Rivera Martinez fled to the United States from his native El Salvador to escape persecution and violence from organized gangs that use their power to extort, kidnap and kill with little consequences. He traveled thousands of miles over unforgiving terrain to seek asylum in the U.S. But what he found here was more violence and depravation – not on the streets, but in a U.S. immigration detention facility.

Last week, Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos confirmed what we have long suspected: she and President Trump are prioritizing private education at the expense of an equitable K-12 public education for all.