Los Angeles District, Ed. Dept., Resolve Civil Rights Probe

U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan and Russlyn Ali, right, assistant secretary for civil rights, were on hand at a meeting of the Los Angeles Unified School District's board. The federal Education Department has resolved a civil rights investigation involving services provided to English-language learners and African-American students.

—Reed Saxon/AP

ELLs, African-Americans promised support, equity

By Katie Ash

English-language learners will be promised adequate school system support, and black students will receive more resources, under an agreement announced last week by Los Angeles school officials and the U.S. Department of Education.

The department’s office for civil rights began an investigation in March 2010 into the services the Los Angeles Unified School District provided to ELLs and, after prompting from civil rights groups such as the Los Angeles NAACP, later expanded it to include resource comparability for African-American students.

“We didn’t understand how you could separate the issues involving African-American students,” said Leon Jenkins, the president of the local NAACP chapter. “The African-American student suffers from the same lack of resources and good teachers...