EDITORIAL WORKING TOGETHER BOARD NEEDS TO ADMIT IT LOST REFORM FIGHT.

THE legislative victory of AB 1381, the LAUSD school reform bill, on Tuesday was the most notable accomplishment yet in Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's struggle for control over the school district.

But it's not the last fight for this reform effort, and maybe not even the toughest. That battle could begin as soon as today, depending on the whim of the Los Angeles Unified School District's Board of Education.

The board, for obvious reasons, has opposed Villaraigosa's plan to reduce its power through a council of mayors, which he would head. Members have fought the plan at every turn, and now that it has prevailed in Sacramento the board could file a lawsuit to challenge its legality.

If board members are so inclined, they could drag the court battle on for months as they debate the constitutionality of various provisions of the bill, maybe longer.

But why stall the inevitable?

With the teachers union and most of the town aboard, Villaraigosa will prevail at the ballot box in the spring and get a school board that wants to see genuine reform. Villaraigosa has the public's confidence, while the school board -- after a generation of bungling -- is perceived as petty and ineffective.

With Superintendent Roy Romer's help, the school board made its last stand in Sacramento. Now it's time for members to come back to Los Angeles and work with the mayor to push the reform agenda forward.

The political momentum favors the mayor, who sparked an intense public debate on the region's schools and their problems. That alone was a great achievement that will yield benefits, whether the mayor wins or loses his political gamble.

There's a lot to quibble about, a lot to worry about in the clumsy governance structure that has evolved as the Legislature worked over the mayoral takeover plan. But that is all the more reason for the school board and its allies to sit down with the mayor's team and find the common ground.

When all is said and done, only one thing matters: the students.

School board members ought to be able to see that the mayor's campaign is already benefitting students. Just a few days after Villaraigosa promised that he would start tracking dropouts -- something the district doesn't do -- school officials suddenly trumpeted a ``diploma project'' that would do exactly the same thing.

It's a good idea in a district where an estimated 50 percent of the students don't graduate. But that it took the threat of a mayoral takeover to make it happen illustrates how important this reform effort is.

In seeking their positions, school board members made a commitment to put the students first. They need to remember that commitment now, and get to work to improve the educational system in cooperation with the mayor -- instead of looking for conflict.