Alliance College-Ready Public Schools
Alliance College-Ready Public Schools (LA Alliance) is a not-for-profit organization which operates charter schools in Los Angeles. Based at the Frank E. Baxter Education Complex (next to Gertz-Ressler High School and on the east end of Richard Merkin Middle School), it is governed by a board of 27 directors and represented by president & CEO Dan Katzir. Schools. , Alliance College-Ready Public Schools operates 17 high schools and 10 middle schools. History. LA Alliance was created in 2004 by business and community leaders involved in the Los Angeles Educational Alliance For Restructuring  Now (LEARN) reform effort of the early 1990s in the Los Angeles Unified School District. Following massive budget issues at Inner City Education Foundation (ICEF) Public Schools, another charter school organization in Los Angeles, there were rumors that LA Alliance would take over the ICEF schools in March 2011. Former LA Mayor Richard Riordan was negotiating the merger as a member of both boards of directors. The combined organization would have operated 30 schools with over 12,000 students, however the deal fell through over financial concerns and other complications. Teachers. Since March 2015, teachers at LA Alliance have been engaged  in a union organizing campaign. That month, 70 teachers told LA Alliance that they wanted the United Teachers Los Angeles (UTLA) to represent them and asked the company to refrain from interfering. LA Alliance created a website called Our Alliance Community that opposes the organizing effort. UTLA filed three unfair labor practice (ULP) charges with California’s Public Employment Relations Board (PERB) in August 2015 that accuses LA Alliance of retaliation and refusing to meet with union organizers. In October 2015, PERB asked the court for injunctive relief (at this time there were four ULP’s on file). The Los  Angeles County Superior Court issued a temporary restraining order on October 30 and ordered LA Alliance to not “coerce or ask teachers about their positions on unionization, must allow organizers to come onto school grounds, cannot block emails from the union, and must stay 100 feet away from UTLA organizers.” Leadership. Judy Burton, a long time Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) employee, left the district in 2003 to help found LA Alliance. She served as President/CEO until returning to the district in December 2014. The following month, Dan Katzir took over as President/CEO. Katzir previously worked  as a consultant and as the Managing Director of the Broad Foundation. Former LAUSD principal Howard Lappin was hired for school year 2004-05 to run College-Ready Academy High School. He helped turnaround Foshay Learning Center.