Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has talked earnestly about school reform for two years. And Los Angeles has listened - hungry for some hope in the face of years of failure….The mayor lost his bid for partial control of the Los Angeles Unified School District in court, but now he has full control of the school board itself within reach…. That's why he must spell out right now what he intends to do if he wins and demonstrate that his school board candidates and board members are 100 percent behind his plan….

The time for abstract concepts about education reform is over…. Everyone knows what we've got with the LAUSD - decades of mediocrity - but we don't know how Villaraigosa intends to change that…. The debate on school governance has gone on for three decades, and little has changed…. Nothing has changed because, for all the debate over governance, it's a policy problem.

So this would be the time for the mayor to lay out his reform plan in detail. He doesn't just need to win this election; he needs a mandate for changing the culture of the LAUSD from top to bottom.

Editorial, Los Angeles Daily News, March 12.