Annie Gilbertson of public radio KPCC in Los Angeles has another scoop. Officials who were on the committee to choose the winning bid for LAUSD’s huge technology purchase received free iPads and the cost of their trip to a meeting at a resort was underwritten by the Pearson Foundation.

She writes:

“Los Angeles Unified officials who evaluated bids for its massive technology project received iPads from Pearson, met with a Pearson software executive and attended a weekend sales pitch for that software — all ahead of the public bid process, documents show.

“The revelation is important because Superintendent John Deasy has repeatedly said the bid process was not affected by early conversations on the software — which he asserts were limited to a small pilot project.

“According to travel reports received through a public records act request, Susan Tandberg and Gerardo Loera, top administrators in the district’s office of curriculum and instruction, attended a Pearson conference at a Palm Desert resort in July 2012 where all attendees were given iPads loaded with Pearson’s learning software.

“A third office of curriculum and instruction staffer, Carol Askin, also attended the conference and would have received an iPad, records show.”

At the end of the story comes this stunning revelation:

“As for the meetings, Pearson officials on Monday said they agreed with Deasy’s statements to other media that the early communications between the company and L.A. Unified officials related only to planning an eight-classroom pilot program.

“However, emails show L.A. Unified officials discussing training 2,000 teachers on the Pearson software and Pearson offered to hire four, full-time staff members to help train teachers – an extraordinary expense an eight-classroom pilot.”

Howard Blume reports in the LA Times that at least $2 million in computers cannot be accounted for.

“More than $2 million worth of Los Angeles Unified computers, mostly iPads, could not be accounted for during a recent audit by the school system’s inspector general.

“The review also found that the school district lacked an effective tracking system — and that losses could be higher as a result.

“The District did not have a complete, adequate and centralized inventory record of all of its computers,” the report said. “There was an increased potential for fraud, misuse and abuse of District resources.”

“L.A. Unified spent about $67 million from July 2011 through June 2013 to purchase 70,000 computers and mobile devices from Apple and Arey Jones, a vendor.

“The totals in the audit are estimates because, the report said, “we were unable to determine the exact number of computers and mobile devices purchased through the master contracts for the period under review because the information needed was incomplete, inaccurate, or unavailable.”

“The audit found campuses that had a surplus of devices and schools with no effective system to track who had a computer or who was responsible for it.

“In one case, the charter school division said it transferred 30 laptops and three desktops from one closed campus to another school. But the second one said it never received anything.

“And 106 computers from a closed occupational center could not be located, the report said.

“At Dymally Senior High, “current and former administrators refused to take responsibility for missing computer devices,” the report said.

“Eighty-two computers disappeared from a regional district office.

“Where records did exist, they were often incorrect, showing computers assigned to employees who had resigned, retired or transferred, the audit found.

“For the most part, the missing devices covered by the audit did not include iPads that were part of last fall’s rollout of a $1-billion effort to provide a computer to every student, teacher and campus administrator.

“However, 96 devices included in that effort also were lost or stolen, with 36 eventually recovered.”

Annie Gilbertson of public radio station KPCC in Los Angeles somehow managed to get the emails that broke open the Los Angeles iPad fiasco. Once her story broke, Superintendent John Deasy canceled the contract with Apple and Pearson.

Gilbertson reported:

“The emails show the officials detailed aspects of a one-to-one student technology program, down to the specifics of tech support and teacher training. A year later, the requirements for proposals resembled the package Pearson was selling.

“KPCC aired and published stories on those emails Friday. On Monday, Superintendent John Deasy announced he was canceling the contract with Apple and Pearson and issuing a new request for proposals for the one-to-one technology project.

“L.A. Unified’s technology expansion, including upgrading wifi at schools, is poised to be the largest in the country with a price tag of nearly $1.3 billion.”

Now Ken Bramlett, the Inspector General of the schools, has decided to reopen an investigation that had been closed, based on those emails.

Hopefully, any future purchases will not take money from the bond issue that voters approved for school repair and construction. Having a clean, safe, up-to-date, beautiful school to attend should be the civil right of every student in Los Angeles.

Steve Lopez, columnist for the Los Angeles Times, asks all the right questions about John Deasy and the blow-up of his plan to spend $1 billion for iPads loaded with Pearson curriculum.

Can he survive the release of the emails that give the appearance of impropriety?

Can he survive when the new board may have a majority of members not in his corner?

Can he survive in light of the fact that Stuart Magruder, one of the few public critics of Deasy’s decision to use school construction bonds to pay for the iPads, was reinstated to the Bond Oversight Committee?

Can he survive when the LAUSD technology committee criticized the deal with Apple and Pearson before the emails were made public?

How much worse can Deasy’s situation get? Will he tough it out or has he lost the public’s confidence?

Students at Jefferson High School in Los Angeles staged a sit-in to protest a scheduling breakdown now in its third week of school.

“Students gathered in the quad after first period, sitting in a grassy area in a silent protest of what they contend has been weeks of mismanagement by administrators that has wasted their time and severely interrupted their education.

“For the first weeks of school, many students were left without class schedules, others were given courses they did not need and some were without those required for graduation, students and teachers said.

“Several Advanced Placement courses were scheduled at the same time, leaving students unable to enroll in all the college-level courses they desired. Students still learning English were unable to enroll in courses at their level, as they were scheduled during the same periods.

“Problems were apparently intensified by a new computer database, known as the My Integrated Student Information System, which caused a litany of scheduling problems around the district in the first weeks of school.

“Teachers have described over-enrolled classes, missing or inaccurate rosters, students without schedules and an inability to take attendance in the system.”

The students want an education, but their schedules are in chaos due to the district’s hasty adoption of a computer system that wasn’t ready.

Annie Gilbertson of KPCC in Los Angeles reports that internal emails show that district officials met and emailed Apple and Pearson a year before the bidding process for new technology and software began.

“Emails obtained by KPCC show Los Angeles Unified School District Superintendent John Deasy personally began meeting with Pearson and Apple to discuss the eventual purchase of their products starting nearly a year before the contract went out to public bid.

“Detailed in dozens of emails, the early private talks included everything from prices – about $160 million over five years – to tech support.

“On behalf of those involved in Pearson Common Core System of Courses, I want you to know how much we are looking forward to our partnership with LAUSD,” Pearson staffer Sherry King wrote the head of curriculum for L.A. Unified at the time, Jaime Aquino, in November 2013. “We have begun to work closely with your leadership to help make the transition to the common core smooth for everyone.”

“Emails show Deasy met with CEO of Pearson in May 2012 and later told her it led him to have “excited” conversations with his staff upon his return.”

Deasy also met with Apple officials in 2012.

School officials declined to comment.

“Michael Josephson, of the Josephson Institute of Ethics in Los Angeles, said it’s possible Pearson was the best choice and school officials didn’t mean to play to favorites – but it doesn’t look good.

“You absolutely don’t want a situation where contracts are being steered to favorites,” he said. “It invites kickbacks. It invites skimming. It invites bribery. That’s totally unacceptable.”

Howard Blume of the Los Angeles Times reported today the leaked results of an investigation of the district’s plan to purchase $1 billion of iPads loaded with Pearson curriculum.

It begins:

“The groundbreaking effort to provide an iPad to every Los Angeles student, teacher and school administrator was beset by inadequate planning, a lack of transparency and a flawed bidding process, according to the draft of an internal school district report obtained by The Times.

“The bidding process — and events leading up to it — were singled out for particular criticism. The report concludes that the district needlessly limited its options on price and product, and raises questions about whether the process was fair.

“The much-anticipated analysis is drawn from public and closed meetings held over 10 months by a committee chaired by school board member Monica Ratliff. That panel, composed of parents, employee representatives and district officials, heard presentations, posed questions and gathered documents from experts and officials. Ratliff directed that the report remain confidential until committee members could provide input.

“The Times obtained it from sources who requested anonymity because they were not authorized to release it.

“The committee review stops short of accusing anyone of wrongdoing, but offers a carefully worded rebuke of the $1-billion-plus technology effort in the nation’s second-largest school system.

“While the report applauds the goals and potential benefits of the technology push, it details major problems in how the effort was carried out.

“Among the findings:

“•The initial rules for winning the contract appeared to be tailored to the products of the eventual winners — Apple and Pearson — rather than to demonstrated district needs.

“•Key changes to the bidding rules were made after most of the competition had been eliminated under the original specifications.

“•Past comments or associations with vendors, including by L.A. schools Supt. John Deasy, created an appearance of conflict even if no ethics rules were violated.

“Last year’s iPad rollout at 47 schools suffered a series of setbacks. In one, students at three campuses deleted security filters so they could browse the Internet — prompting officials to prohibit the iPads’ use outside of school.

“Still, many students and teachers expressed excitement about using the $768 devices and the opportunities they might offer.

“Both the devices and the curriculum on them have been paid for with voter-approved school construction bonds.

“While the report is wide-ranging, it focuses heavily on the bidding that resulted in a $30-million initial contract for Apple in June 2013. That work was expected to expand districtwide by the end of 2014, but officials changed the plan after the rollout, pushing the timetable back and testing to see if laptops might be better for older students.

“The report suggests that from the beginning district officials, including Deasy, made decisions that created an appearance of impropriety, clouding good intentions.”

“The superintendent recused himself from the bidding process because he owned Apple stock, which he has since sold. But he seemed to signal where his preferences lay in a promotional video filmed for Apple in December 2011, as a school pilot program using only iPads was set to start.”

The story points out that the instructional leader of the district, Jaime Aquino, previously worked for Pearson, and that Pearson’s foundation underwrote the cost of a conference for 50 district employees in Palm Desert, where each received a gift iPad for “district use.”