Settlement reached in California suit on learning time in public schools

California state education officials will track student assignments to classes that offer no academic content and cost students learning time under terms of a settlement reached in a class-action lawsuit.

The settlement announced Thursday provides a new mechanism for schools and the state to identify when students are assigned to classes in which they are given chores or allowed to leave early.

The state must also provide extra help to the six schools named in the suit.

The lawsuit filed in 2014 claimed students were being unconstitutionally denied an equitable curriculum. The schools named in the settlement are in Los Angeles, Oakland, and Compton districts.

The settlement follows a new law prohibiting high schools from assigning students to more than one week a semester of classes with no educational content.