The Los Angeles Unified School District may be facing more accusations of civil rights violations in the two weeks since the announcement of thousands of layoffs. 

The U.S. Department of Education announced that it is beginning to investigate whether or not LAUSD provides adequate service for students learning English. The Civil Rights Office is concerned not only about “meaningful access to core curricular content,” but also whether the District provides English-learner students with an effective program for developing their English-language skills.

“In today’s information age, America has to both raise the bar for student learning and close the achievement gap,” said Russlynn Ali, the Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights at the Department of Education. “Anything less is economically unsustainable and morally unacceptable.”

The investigation will also see if the District communicates well with the parents of English-learner students. The L.A. Times has reported that English-Learner students make up about a third of enrollment in the District.

The American Civil Liberties Union filed a class-action lawsuit on February 24 against the District, on behalf of three South Los Angeles schools. The schools, primarily black and Latino, allege that prior layoffs had “disproportionately affected” them.  The announcement of the ACLU suit came just a day after the District announced school layoffs to close a reported $640 million budget gap.