GOV. GRAY DAVIS AND LEGISLATIVE leaders agreed earlier this week to provide California schools an additional $1.8 billion that districts could spend for teacher pay raises or other purposes in the 2000-01 school year.

In exchange, the state's most powerful teachers union, the California Teachers Association, immediately announced it would drop a November ballot initiative that would have forced the state to raise school spending to the national average, even if it meant a tax hike.

The $1.8 billion technically will repay schools for cost-of-living increases that were withheld during the recession of the early 1990s and meets a key demand by school leaders for more state funds with no strings attached with it being allocated directly to local school districts on a per-pupil basis. It amounts to $280 per student for elementary schools and $340 per student for high schools.

	LAEP to Honor Outstanding Educators Fifteen teams of teachers, schools and school communities will be selected to receive Excellence Awards from nearly 100 applications from within the Los Angeles Unified School District.

	Do You Measure Up? Among the criteria to be chosen as an Excellence Award recipient, was the applicant's ability to meausure up to teaching, school and school-community standards. [in PDF Format]

	Kindergarten Readiness The California Senate Education Committee on Wednesday approved a bill to require children to be 5 years old when they start kindergarten.

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