Melanie Lundquist of Palos Verdes Estates is optimistic that writing a $5-million check every year for 10 years to help low-performing L.A. schools will result in wider reforms nationally.

By Steve Lopez

Instead, she called Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa in 2007 and told him she wanted to give the money to some of the lowest-performing schools in Los Angeles Unified. She promised to write a $5-million check each of the next 10 years for his Partnership for Los Angeles Schools, which took control of 10 campuses a year ago as part of the mayor's boast that he could do better than the district.