I know three people who are retiring or have retired from LA Unified School District. Two are teachers and one an administrator. All are happy to get out and all note a change in the ability of students to focus (stay on task in teacher-talk). Some of the blame has to go to the hyperdistraction of “smart” phones. Another common observation was that wealth disparities have increased. The rich don’t attend public schools and poor parents have little participation in school life e.g. PTA. And there is the programming of instruction. In place of Nordic and Netherlands’ emphasis on novel problem-solving, CA K-12 has been increasingly in a programmed curriculum mode since the 1960s. US PISA scores are on par or below the scores of their Russian counterparts.
