As I serve my community as a school board member, my work is to make sure kids in Arizona, like my daughter, are safe in and outside of school – especially from gun violence.

A teacher and a school district want a judge to decide whether a new law that bans school districts from requiring face masks takes effect now or later.

The Phoenix Union High School District plans to require students, staff and visitors, regardless of vaccination status, to wear masks indoors when school starts on Aug. 2.

The potential for red-clad teachers again descending on the Capitol could motivate legislators to wrap up budget negotiations before school is out for summer.

Emails obtained by the Arizona Center for Investigative Reporting from four school districts show the depth of the relationships construction company executives have cultivated with school district administrators.

At a time when Gov. Doug Ducey boasted more than $100 million in new investments for education in his budget plan, a Senate panel advanced a bill that could put roughly double that amount of school funding in jeopardy.

Backers of a bill that would strip Arizona school districts of millions of dollars in funding allotted for desegregation and student achievement are struggling to find enough votes for approval.

School choice has fostered competition, and with that has come student recruitment, growing marketing budgets and branding for public schools.

About 63 percent of public schools around Arizona earned letter grades of "A'' or "B'' in the latest results of students' academic improvement and performance.

A record 814 Arizona schools, or 42 percent, failed to get students to make adequate yearly progress in the 2010-11 school year, compared with 563 schools, or 29 percent, the previous year.