EDITORIAL RESULTS, RESULTS HIGH STANDARDS AND CHARTER SCHOOLS PAY OFF FOR LAUSD.

INITIAL analyses of the latest round of API scores suggest two trends that are good news for Los Angeles Unified School District parents, but are sure to ruffle a few feathers within the education establishment: Rigorous standards work, and so do charter schools.

On the surface, the statistics look grim: The total number of high-poverty LAUSD campuses that failed to meet federal No Child Left Behind standards this year increased from 178 to 221. And while that increase is smaller than last year's, there's little consolation to be taken in the thought that we're running out of schools to lump into the failure category.

Still, there are some silver linings.

The first is that while API scores haven't increased quickly enough to keep up with the new standards, they are increasing. Thus many schools that are failing are nonetheless improving, and that's a cause for hope.

Take, for example, Sun Valley Middle School, which has seen its API score increase by 190 points over five years, to 616. That's still well short of the federal goal, so the school remains classified as failing - much to the chagrin of Superintendent Roy Romer.

``We ought to be measured by the progress we make,'' says Romer. ``But the federal government holds you to an absolute standard for all subgroups and that doesn't reflect the great improvement that takes place at schools like Sun Valley.''

Maybe, but would schools like Sun Valley - which have been mired in mediocrity for decades but have recently made great efforts to change - work so hard if they weren't under pressure to meet an ever-loftier standard? History suggests not.

Meanwhile, a higher percentage of the LAUSD's charter schools (57 percent) met their federal performance targets than did the district's traditional schools (37 percent). LAUSD officials, who have always had a passive-aggressive attitude toward charters, try to use a statistical sleight of hand to dismiss this finding, but the results speak for themselves.

Much as the district may loathe standards and charters, both seem to be yielding real results for Los Angeles families. And that's something the LAUSD ought to embrace.