The eight high school teams that will advance to the semifinals of the 2019 Ventura County Mock Trial were announced today by the Ventura County Office of Education. The semifinalists received the eight highest scores of the 30 teams participating in this year's Mock Trial. Listed in order of their scores, the final eight teams are:1. Saint Bonaventure2. Trinity Pacific Silver3. Oaks Christian Gold4. Santa Susana Locke5. Westlake6. Oak Park Black7. Adolfo Camarillo Scorpions8. La ReinaThe pu...

Kids today are shockingly ill-equipped to evaluate the information that comes rushing at them on their phones, tablets and computer screens. They may have grown up with the internet, but they lack the skills they need to tell legitimate news from advertising or propaganda. In this edition of Focus on Education, we show you how these skills, known as Media Literacy, are increasingly being taught in Ventura County schools.Read it below on your computer or click here to read on your phone or mobile...

More than two dozen local high schools will field 30 teams in the Ventura County Mock Trial competition, which begins Monday in Ventura. Courtroom drama comes to life as students take on the major roles of a criminal case, including attorneys, witnesses and even bailiffs. The students will present their cases before actual local judges who volunteer for the competition. Local attorneys serve as coaches.WHAT: 2019 Ventura County Mock TrialWHEN: The competition runs Monday, February 25 to Thursday...

The Ventura County Office of Education is pleased to announce that the winner of the 2019 Ventura County Academic Decathlon is Calabasas High School. Coming in second place is La Reina High School, followed by Westlake High School, which came in third. Calabasas High School is also the winner of the “Super Quiz” portion of the competition.Students from twenty local high schools participated in the competition, which was held over the past two Saturdays at Pacifica High School in Oxna...

By Stan Mantooth, Ventura County Superintendent of Schools   Last November, just after Thanksgiving, there was a remarkable gathering in Camarillo. Some 400 members of our community – representing business, education, government and nonprofit organizations – came together for the first-ever Ventura County Education Summit. They were there to forge stronger bonds between education and business to ensure students are learning the human and technical skills they need for caree...

Parents who suspect their child has a disability are advised to contact their local school district or the Ventura County Special Education Local Plan Area (SELPA). Federal and state laws require public schools to provide free and appropriate education for children with special needs. Children and youth from birth through 21 years of age may qualify for special education programs in public schools. Special education staff will help parents identify appropriate programs based upon ...

Dr. Roger Rice, VCOE's Deputy Superintendent of Student Services, has been named the new Superintendent of the Ventura Unified School District. Below is an email that Ventura County Superintendent of Schools Stan Mantooth sent to the VCOE staff about Dr. Rice's appointment.Dear VCOE Family-It is with great pleasure that I inform you of our own Deputy Superintendent Dr. Roger Rice’s selection by the Ventura Unified School District (VUSD) as their next permanent Superintendent. ...

The Ventura County Board of Education welcomed two newly-elected trustees at its meeting tonight in Camarillo. Rob Collins (pictured on the right) and Mike Teasdale were formally sworn in as trustees following their election victories in November. Collins now represents trustee area four, which includes Simi Valley, Moorpark and surrounding areas. Teasdale now represents trustee area two, which includes Thousand Oaks and surrounding areas. Rachel Ulrich, who represents trustee area one, and...

A redesigned and expanded California School Dashboard is now available to the public at www.caschooldashboard.org. The Dashboard, which debuted in 2017, has a new look that makes it easier to see how individual schools and districts are performing in six statewide measures of student success. For the first time, the Dashboard is providing data on chronic absenteeism and college and career readiness along with the four other state measures that were reported previously. The six measures are:...

For the first time, Ventura County’s major educational institutions have combined their resources to create a report that encompasses educational programs and achievements from elementary school to graduate school. The 2018 Ventura County Education Report to the Community is now available to view and download at www.vcp20.org/report.California Lutheran University, CSU Channel Islands, the Ventura Community College District and the Ventura County Office of Education jointly produced the 20-...