The Brief

There are at least 63,000 students with disabilities in the Los Angeles Unified School District. For these students, the district's cellphone ban has implications beyond missing texts from friends or losing the option to scroll social media at lunch.

Families told LAist their child’s phones help them control medical devices, cope with anxiety and regulate their emotions.

While students with disabilities can be exempted from the Los Angeles Unified cellphone ban, that requires families to assert their rights.

Without an exemption, students can lose access to a valuable learning tool and the policy may also put students in the awkward position of sticking out from their phone-less peers.

When Faith returned to her sixth-grade class at Walter Reed Middle School in January, she learned students would soon have to lock their phones in pouches all day to comply with a new district-wide policy.

“I was concerned for students like me,” Faith said.

The North Hollywood student uses her phone to play Roblox, text her friends and to control a small electronic device that helps her hear. Faith’s cochlear implant sits over her left ear and translates sounds into electrical impulses that her brain interprets as sounds and speech.

We wanted to understand how students like Faith and their families are navigating the ban, which went into effect last month.

Pico-Robertson mom Ingrid Levy said she’s heard about the challenges cellphones pose at her daughter’s middle school, from bullying to students recording fights, but is also comforted by being able to reach her child, who experiences anxiety, in real time via her smartwatch.
“How do we find that balance?” Levy said. “It's tricky.”

Here's what we learned:

What rights do students with disabilities have?

The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act guarantees students with disabilities a “free appropriate public education.” Still, many families struggle to access services that would help their children learn, and Congress has never fully funded special education as intended when the law first passed in 1975.

“The goal of all of those laws really is to be sure that students with disabilities are not unfairly segregated, or removed from the classroom, or from the learning that their peers get on the basis of their disability,” said Denise Marshall, chief executive of the Council of Parent Attorneys and Advocates, a national nonprofit that advocates for the legal and civil rights of students with disabilities and their families.

Special education law protects students’ rights to use technology that helps them in the classroom. For example, Los Angeles Unified provides more than 3,000 students with devices, such as iPads that translate text to speech, through its assistive technology program.

Marshall is skeptical of cellphone bans. She said that they may be a barrier, because families have to assert a right and go through the process rather than it being automatic.

Marshall said families of students who want to ensure their child’s access to personal technology can call a meeting of their child’s IEP or 504 Plan team to discuss adding an accommodation that specifies how the device is used to benefit the student.

But she’s also worried that students may feel too uncomfortable being the only ones in their class with access to a phone to use the device to their benefit.

“It's just the overall dampening of an effective, promising technology,” Marshall said.

Faith and her dad, John Perron, outside Walter Reed Middle School in North Hollywood.

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Marshall said while there is validity to the argument that students may use technology in inappropriate and distracting ways during the school day, many use their cellphones in a way “that enhances their learning,” for example, by taking photos of assignments or leaving themselves a voice note during the school day.

And she said a ban does little to prepare young people for the future.

“The goal is supposed to be to graduate students, all students, from school who have the tools and the skills they need to be successful in the workplace in community living and interacting with other people,” Marshall said. “Artificially limiting their access to the number one way that people communicate in our society these days, to us, makes no sense.”

Students navigate a new reality

As Los Angeles Unified developed the cellphone policy last year, Faith’s dad, John Perron, contacted his school board member.

“I wanted to make sure that the parents and the students' voices made it to the top,” Perron said. He’s the former chairman of a committee that advises the district on special education.

“Devices have their place,” Perron said. “And some people have more of a need.”

The resolution that expanded the district’s existing cellphone restrictions included several exceptions, including for students with IEPs or Section 504 Plans.

However, the existence of either document doesn’t grant a student automatic access to their phone. Perron shared a district flier with LAist that read “exceptions can be made if the student’s IEP or Section 504 plan outlines specific needs for the device to support the student’s unique needs related to their disability.”

An LAUSD spokesperson said in a statement that students and families should discuss their child’s needs with their teachers, IEP teams and coordinators. The district could not provide the number of students who have received an accommodation related to their personal devices.

Perron said his request that Faith continue to have access to her phone to control her cochlear implant and apps that translate audio to text were met with “zero resistance.”

Faith holds up her cellphone pouch (bottom) next to her brother's, which is locked for the duration of the school day.

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The school issued Faith a pouch with a Velcro closure that allows her to access her phone if needed. Her peers’ pouches are sealed magnetically and can only be unlocked by a staff member.

The exception doesn’t go unnoticed by Faith’s friends.

“There's a joke where whenever I'm using my phone, they'll be like, ‘This is a rare sighting, a phone in the middle of the school day,’” she said, with a smile.

She recognizes that her exception has limits — “I can't just open YouTube.” Faith said she’s already had to contact her dad several times to bring her a new battery for her implant.

Other families are taking more of a “wait-and-see” approach.

Crissy is a freshman at Venice High School and has attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD.

Her IEP allows for her to take a “breather” from class and listen to music if she needs to calm down, but she says she hasn’t done that since the school’s full-day cellphone ban started in February.

“If I asked for permission, I feel like I'd be OK with it,” Crissy said. “But if I didn't, I feel like I'd be scared to do it.”

At Venice, students are expected to store their phones in locked cases that remain in their sixth period classroom.

The Los Angeles Unified School District budgeted $7 million to purchase pouches and other storage devices, like the lockers seen here at Venice High School, to enforce the all-day cellphone restriction. In February, a district spokesperson said in a statement that about half of schools chose to rely on the “honor system" and purchase no additional equipment.

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“Immediately in my brain, I was like, ‘I'm not gonna put it in the locker,’” Crissy said. “Anything could really happen. So I don't really trust it enough to be in a locker.”

LAist visited Venice classrooms in February and interviewed several students and teachers. At the time, the majority of students opted not to turn over their phones.

Crissy’s mom, Cristal Perez, said she does not encourage phone use during class, but supports her daughter’s decision.

“She's allowed to turn it off and turn it back on after school,” Cristal said. “I think that should be fine. She should not have to hand it over.”

Crissy said since the ban was implemented, her weekday screen time is down to about an hour a day. On the weekends, she spends about 8 hours a day on her phone, often watching make-up tutorials on TikTok and teen romances, including the “To All the Boys” series, on Netflix.

“When I'm on my phone, it just feels like I'm in my own world,” Crissy said. “It's just like a little safe space for me and it's something that can keep me entertained and calm.”

This story first appeared on The LA Local.

On a recent Wednesday evening in March, the auditorium at Roosevelt High School buzzed with old-school Japanese anime anthems.

Songs like Hironobu Kageyama’s “Cha-La Head-Cha-La,” the theme from “Dragon Ball Z,” and selections from Hayao Miyazaki’s cult classic “My Neighbor Totoro” echoed throughout the performing arts center.

The concert was an intentional tribute to a community once central to Boyle Heights, as students used music to honor a history largely erased during World War II, when more than  400 Japanese American students were forcibly removed and incarcerated in camps. 

Guiding the 77-piece ensemble was band director Pedro Ramos, who took over the program last fall and, in collaboration with the school’s Japanese teacher and club, built the concert around themes of culture and solidarity.

“Roosevelt was hit hard during Japanese Internment and continues to be attacked with ongoing ICE raids,” said Ramos, 24. “The purpose of this concert is to bring solidarity and highlight the perpetuity and appreciation of each other’s culture in turbulent times.”

That vision came through in a program that blended cultures and histories. One piece, “Gelato Con Caffé” by Toshio Mashima, fused rock with samba, reflecting both Japanese and Latin influences. The concert also featured a video of students speaking on what Japanese culture means to them.

Band director Pedro Ramos leads his student ensemble on stage on March 25, 2026.

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“We’re a community now, but there was a Japanese community here once before us,” said Frankie Danielle Trujillo, a senior who plays the alto saxophone. “These pieces honor them and show our appreciation of both communities.”

The performance drew students from across campus, including members of Roosevelt’s Japanese Club.

Junior Eric Samaniego, 17, joined the club as a freshman and said it gave him a sense of belonging.

“Middle school was miserable … This was a very refreshing start,” he said, standing next to his mother, who wore a pink cherry blossom T-shirt designed by students and sold to raise funds for the club’s cultural activities.

The club, supported by Japanese teacher Yoriko Hongo, offers a space for students to connect and celebrate their passion for Japanese culture.

“What’s special is that many of our members are not enrolled in Japanese classes and find a strong sense of belonging and identity through the club,” said Hongo. “It shows how culturally-inclusive spaces can impact students beyond the classroom.”

For Ramos, that community building is at the heart of his work in the classroom and on the stage.

“My job as a teacher is to simulate a consistent environment where students can learn and be the best version of themselves,” he said. “Only by recognizing patterns and tools of oppression can students see themselves as powerful forces in a world that needs drastic change. I’m happy I can provide that in an entertaining, musical way.”

A student plays the drums at Roosevelt High School’s Japanese appreciation concert on March 25, 2026.

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The concert ended with a rendition of the chart-topping “Naruto” theme song “Go!!!” by 90s Japanese rock band Flow.

For freshman trombone player Eliah Daniel Gramajo, performing the music made that connection feel personal.

“It’s not every day you get to play a piece from one of your favorite anime that you watched as a little kid,” he said.

In the latest move to rewrite the history of the violent Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, the Department of Justice has filed papers seeking to vacate the seditious conspiracy convictions against members of the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers extremist groups, who previously received commutations rather than full pardons from President Donald Trump.

About a dozen defendants who received lengthy sentences for their roles in planning and executing the riot were released from prison once Trump returned to office, though the felony convictions remained on their records. If approved by the federal courts, the move would wipe out those convictions and, among other things, restore the defendants' right to own guns.

On Tuesday, the Trump administration described the decision in court filings as "in the interests of justice."

Members of the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys celebrated.

"I am beyond thrilled right now," wrote Proud Boy Zachary Rehl, who was previously sentenced to 15 years in prison, on the social media site X.

Ed Martin, who has held multiple roles in the Trump Justice Department and currently serves as the U.S pardon attorney, cast the move as a triumph and called for further action.

"Hearing from J6rs and families tonight. They feel respected even loved. Proud," Martin wrote on X. "But there is more for you to do. Keep grinding. You were directly wronged by Biden prosecutors and you deserve more."

Martin has previously called for former Jan. 6 defendants to receive financial restitution.

The decision illustrates both the dramatic extent of changes at the Department of Justice in Trump's second term, as well as the stunning reversal of fortunes for the Jan. 6 defendants convicted of some of the most serious crimes that day.

During the Biden administration, the indictments and subsequent convictions on the rarely used seditious conspiracy charge underscored how law enforcement viewed the Jan. 6 attack: as a historic threat to democracy and the defendants as key orchestrators. Judges and juries largely agreed.

At the trial of Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes, prosecutors had played a recording discussing additional violence after Jan. 6. "We should have brought rifles," Rhodes said. "We could have fixed it right then and there. I'd hang f***in' Pelosi from the lamppost."

When federal judge Amit Mehta sentenced Rhodes to 18 years in prison, he described him as "an ongoing threat and peril to this country ... and to the very fabric of our democracy."

Now, under the Trump administration, leaders of the Justice Department say they take orders directly from the president, who has called Jan. 6 a "day of love," described the rioters as "great people" and denied — falsely — that his supporters assaulted police.

"I pardoned people that were assaulted themselves. They were assaulted by our government," Trump told reporters last year. "They didn't assault. They were assaulted."

Todd Blanche, the acting attorney general, recently touted the mass pardons of Jan. 6 defendants as one of the administration's greatest achievements.

Greg Rosen, who led the "Capitol Siege" unit that prosecuted more than 1,500 Jan. 6-related cases, castigated the Trump administration for its latest move to vacate the conviction of Rhodes and several others.

"This is a sad and selfish reminder that constitutional due process — jury verdicts, judicial findings, years of hard-fought litigation and mountains of evidence — doesn't appear to matter once again," said Rosen, who is now with the law firm Rogers Joseph O'Donnell. "This isn't about fairness or justice. It's about overriding the considered will and judgments of judges and juries and rewarding individuals solely because of their political alignments with an administration."

An estimated 140 police officers were injured in the Jan. 6 attack, including many who testified to lifelong physical and mental trauma from what they endured.

Meanwhile, since receiving presidential pardons, dozens of former riot defendants have been charged with or convicted of additional crimes. On the same day the Justice Department moved to vacate the seditious conspiracy cases, it also filed documents in the ongoing case against David Daniel, who assaulted police Jan. 6 and was separately accused of child sexual abuse.

Daniel, prosecutors said, agreed to plead guilty to allegations that he sexually abused two young girls, including one who was under 12 years old at the time of the abuse.
Copyright 2026 NPR

Editor's note: This is an update of the profile published in December of the great African musician Fela Kuti. The original post was published when it was announced that Kuti would become the first African musician ever awarded a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. Now this week, he is on the list of Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees and again is a historic "first" — the first African musician to be inducted into the hall.

Fela Kuti, the Afrobeat pioneer and activist who died in 1997, now holds two landmark honors.

On Dec. 19, he became the first African musician ever awarded a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award, joining an elite group of legends like The Beatles, Johnny Cash, Aretha Franklin, Bob Marley and Frank Sinatra — all recognized for making "creative contributions of outstanding artistic significance to the field of recording."

This week it was announced that he is one of the musicians who will be inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2026. He is being honored in the category of "musical influence." The Hall of Fame paid this tribute: "Fela Kuti was a revolutionary voice who spoke out against injustice through his innovative music — provoking political change while infusing jazz, West African and soul music to pioneer the Afrobeat genre."

He has long been acclaimed by his fellow African artists. "Fela Kuti's music was a fearless voice of Africa — its rhythms carried truth, resistance and freedom, inspiring generations of African musicians to speak boldly through sound," says the legendary Senegalese singer Youssou N' Dour.

Nicknamed the "Black President" for his role as a political and cultural leader, Fela is one of the rarified artists who's recognized by a single name. He saw huge success as a pioneer of the Afrobeat genre, with its multilayered and shifting syncopation, psychedelic horns and chants. He was never nominated for a Grammy during his lifetime — although his musician sons, Femi and Seun, and grandson Made, have received eight nominations collectively.

A really big sound

Fela embraced a massive sound. His band often swelled to more than 30 members (including backup singers and dancers) and featured two bass guitars and two baritone saxophones. He himself played saxophone, keyboards, guitar, drums and trumpet (his first instrument as a child). His emphasis on complex polyrhythms and the inclusion of traditional African instruments like the talking drum were revolutionary at the time — a rebellion against the dominance of Western pop and a marked effort to forge a post-colonial African identity.

From the start of his career, Fela aimed to reach a larger and Pan-African audience by singing almost exclusively in Nigerian Pidgin English (rather than his mother tongue, Yoruba, which doesn't translate throughout most of the continent).

He did not play by the rules of the music biz. He expressed disdain for party tunes and love songs. He'd release as many as seven albums in a single year. And he refused to perform songs live once they'd been recorded.

His music broke new ground with songs that could stretch to 45 minutes. One of his most famous albums, Confusion, was composed of a lone tune broken into two sides, Confusion Pt. I and Confusion Pt. II — the first half entirely instrumental.

BCUC (Bantu Continua Uhuru Consciousness) from Soweto, South Africa, the incendiary live band and 2023 winner of the WOMEX Artist Award, sent a statement to NPR: "Fela is our spiritual muse and if he didn't pursue music without boundaries of song length and speaking his truth — even when it was putting his life in danger — we wouldn't have had the guts to be ourselves without fear or favor."

A political awakening — and repercussions

During a 10-month stay in Los Angeles in 1969, Fela befriended members of the Black Panther Party. Afterward, his music grew political. He became an outspoken opponent of Nigeria's military dictatorship and of South African apartheid.

The year following his 1976 album Zombie's scathing indictment of the Nigerian government, The New York Times reported that a force comprising 1,000 Nigerian military members burned Fela's Lagos home and recording compound (including all his instruments and master recording tapes). Fela was beaten unconscious, and his mother, Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti, was thrown from an upstairs window and later died from the resulting injuries.

That album, Zombie, was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame last year, becoming only the fourth record by an African artist among the 1,165 releases.

In 1979, Fela unsuccessfully ran for president of Nigeria. His political activism added to his high profile — and controversial history. He was arrested many times by Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari's military junta, including at Lagos airport while departing for a U.S. tour. He was sentenced to five years in prison and held for over a year. Amnesty International classified him as a "prisoner of conscience." Fela was freed only after the Buhari regime was overthrown in August 1985.

Musical life after death

Fela succumbed to complications from AIDS in 1997. His older brother, Olikoye Ransome-Kuti, a pediatrician and AIDS activist who served as health minister for Nigeria, spread the word that Fela's death was AIDS-related. According to Ransome-Kuti, Fela had believed that "all doctors were fabricating AIDS, including myself."

Following that news, one of the nation's largest daily papers reported that condom sales surged in Nigeria. Fela's passing marked a turning point in bringing greater consciousness about the epidemic across Africa. It is estimated that over one million people attended his funeral.

Since his death, his music has carried on. A tribute album, Red Hot + Riot: The Music and Spirit of Fela Kuti, was released in 2002, featuring such artists as Sade, D'Angelo, Nile Rodgers, Questlove and Taj Mahal. Profits went to organizations working to raise AIDS awareness. And in 2009, Jay-Z and Will Smith produced Fela!, a Broadway musical about Fela's life that earned 11 Tony Award nominations.

For today's African musicians and worldwide, he is both a legend and an inspiration.

Tunde Adebimpe, the Nigerian American actor (Rachel Getting Married, Twisters) and lead singer for Grammy-nominated band TV on the Radio, told NPR: "Fela for me is the chapter heading in my musical education. He is the originator who showed us music as a power move calling out corruption. Music that questions your psyche and health, worries for your ecosystem, gut checks your self-worth and pride, and keeps you lifted. And it moves nyash [ass]."

Four-time Grammy-nominated Malian singer Salif Keita puts it this way: "Brother Fela was a great influence for my music. I loved him very much. He was a brave man. His legacy is undisputed."

Ian Brennan is a Grammy-winning music producer (Tinariwen, Parchman Prison Prayer, The Good Ones, West Virginia Snake Handler Revival) who has recorded over 50 records by international artists across five continents. He is the author of 10 books. His latest is Missing Music: Voices From Where the Dirt Roads End.

Copyright 2026 NPR

The first Earth Day, in April 1970, led to the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency and landmark legislation like the Clean Air Act.

In the years since, it's expanded to Earth Month, with schools, governments and organizations — including museums — using it as a way to spark conversations about protecting the environment.

Here are some sustainability-focused museums, art exhibitions and events to check out in Los Angeles this Earth Month.

Living materials centered at new exhibition

The new Hammer Museum exhibition titled Several Eternities in a Day: Form in the Age of Living Materials includes a collection of works made from organic materials like avocado, cacao, flowers, stone, clay, sand and natural dyes.

It invites visitors to rethink ideas of permanence and humanity's place in nature, through sculptures, paintings and collages made by 22 artists from across the Americas, including some based here in Los Angeles.

A view of Carmen Argote's "an archetype of stillness" and "an archetype of touch" paintings in the Hammer Museum's "Several Eternities in a Day" exhibition.

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L.A.-based Mexican American artist Carmen Argote's paintings — titled "an archetype of stillness" and "an archetype of touch" — are among the works that first catch your attention upon entering the exhibition.

The pair of 16-foot-tall human-like figures that Argote painted — without brushes — by dipping her hands and feet in a mixture of avocado, cochineal dye and lemon juice, will change color throughout the length of the exhibition as the avocado continues to dry, release oil and eventually disintegrates the paper they were painted on.

" This piece has taught me so much about letting go," Argote told LAist. "And really accepting the life of a material and life of an artwork."

"Cuerpos terrestres en fluidez" by Jackie Amézquita in "Several Eternities in a Day: Form in the Age of Living Materials" at the Hammer Museum.

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Another work, titled "Cuerpos terrestres en fluidez" (or "Terrestrial Bodies in Fluidity") by L.A.-based artist Jackie Amézquita consists of a set of sculptures that Amézquita built using the rammed earth technique (which dates back to the Neolithic period) and then split into fragments.

The materials she used included decomposed granite from the Mojave Desert, lava rocks, obsidian, rain and ocean water.

“There's this idea that we have of nature to not be permanent when it's actually older than us,” Amézquita noted.

The questions that her and other artists’ use of organic materials raise about permanence or impermanence, Amézquita told LAist, “is just an echo to what life is.”

“That is part of our human condition,” she explained. “We’re always confronted with the idea of life and death.”

Her artistic practice, Amézquita added, is also about “ reminding us that we are part of the land, that we are soil, that our bodies are made of earth and also earth is made out of us. And so our footprint, or the decisions we make, has a ripple effect.”

What an exhibition on rice cultivation can teach us about sustainable practices

At the nearby Fowler Museum (also affiliated with UCLA), is Mountain Spirits: Rice and Indigeneity in the Northern Luzon Highlands, Philippines, a new immersive exhibition centered around the ecological wisdom of the rice cultivation practices of the indigenous Ifugao people in the Philippines.

 ”We focus on rice because rice became this foundation for the Ifugao resistance against Spanish conquest, and they used rice to be able to consolidate their political and economic resources,” says Stephen Acabado, professor of anthropology and director of the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at UCLA.

The exhibition is split into three galleries. In one gallery, visitors can see a time-lapsed video of the landscape that places into context the Ifugao mountain spirits and the indigenous belief system. Paired with the videos are wooden carvings of the bulul, or rice guardians, and fabrics that represent Ifugao deities.

Wooden carvings of the bulul, or rice guardians, in the Fowler Museum's new "Mountain Spirits" exhibition.

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A second gallery pairs rituals and tools that the Ifugao use for rice cultivation with videos showing them in practice. And the third gallery examines how the higher ranking Ifugao members keep the community alive through sustaining rituals.

 ”What we're seeing now, especially with climate change, looking at how they cared for the land for at least 400 years, [their] sustainable form of agricultural production … will give us at least an idea on how we can adapt their practices for food security and care for the environment,” Acabado says.

Beyond sustainable practices, Acabado hopes the exhibition can dispel the idea the Philippines is a monolith and also strengthen a sense of identity for Filipinos.

“Although we’re focusing on the Ifugao,” Acabado says, “the exhibit wants to highlight the diversity of the Philippines.”

A museum with sustainability at its core

LACMA’s newly opening Geffen Galleries are getting a lot of attention at the moment, but don’t overlook the nearby Craft Contemporary museum, which is also worth checking out (and a fun fact for The Pitt watchers: It was founded by Noah Wyle’s grandmother).

The Craft Contemporary on Wilshire Boulevard in Los Angeles.

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Sustainability is a core tenet for the Craft Contemporary, according to its senior curator Frida Cano. The museum was a case study in the Getty’s 2025 Climate Action Report for sustainable exhibition design.

Its practices include recycling materials from past exhibitions for public workshopping events, having artists sign printed exhibition materials so they become collectibles for guests and utilizing natural dyes in art installations.

Its upcoming May exhibition, tierra, recycles pulp from a past paper-making workshop for artwork labels and creates paint utilizing cacti from Descanso Gardens.

For Cano, it’s especially important to focus on the power of craft and sustainability in an increasingly tech-based era.

“The world is larger than our little micro-universe of craft,” Cano said.  “So we're taking the power of craft to make sure that we contribute to the wellness of humanity, you know, mother Earth at large.”

More exhibitions and Earth Day events to check out

Earth Day Festival at the Natural History Museum: Events include exhibitions, art and science activities and free screenings of the museum’s film series “Green Screen: Our Planet on Film.” The event takes place Sunday. (And a tip: go full Earth Day and take the Metro there. The Los Angeles Times Festival of Books at USC will mean more traffic in the area.)

Clay LA at the Craft Contemporary: A weeklong event that features air-clay activities and a market where artisans will sell their ceramic creations. This event runs from April 24-26.

Material Prophecies: Craft as Divination at the Armory Center for the Arts: A group exhibition (which also features a work by Jackie Amézquita) that reflects on time through artists’ works made from fiber, wood, bronze, terracotta and earth. The exhibition is ongoing until Aug. 1.