AB 2310. Proposed Cal. Educ. Code Section 52160.1.

Billingsley, Hispanic Parents Battling to Stop Bilingual Classes, Washington Times (February 18, 1996).

Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U.S. 483 (1954) Brown I

Brown v. Board of Education, 349 U.S. 294 (1955) Brown II

California Department of Education Fact Book, Part II (1993).

Cal. Educ. Code ¤ 47600 et seq.

Cal. Educ. Code ¤ 35730 et seq.

Cal. Educ. Code ¤¤ 62000 et seq.

Caughey, J. W. (1967). Segregation Blights Our Schools, Quail Books, Los Angeles.

Chastang, C. (1995). Common Ground. Los Angeles Times Westside Section p.12.

Chanda Smith v. LAUSD, Case No. CV 93-7044-LEW.

Colvin, Panel Oks Overhaul of Bilingual Ed, Los Angeles Times (April 11, 1996).

Colvin, Hard lessons in Bilingual Ed., L.A. Times, September 15, 1996

Crawford v. Board of Education of the City of Los Angeles, 130 Cal. Rptr. 724 (1976) (Crawford II).

Crawford v. Board of Education of the City of Los Angeles, 246 Cal. Rptr. 806 (1988) (Crawford III).

Devins, N. & Stedman, J.B. (1984), Symposium Civil Rights and Federalism: New Federalism in Education: The meaning of the Chicago school desegregation cases. Notre Dame Law Review Vol. 59 p. 1243-1292.

Edsall, T.B. & Edsall, M.D. (1991). Chain reaction: The impact of race, rights, and taxes on American politics. W.W. Norton & Company: New York.

Former Cal. Educ. Code ¤ 52161.

Former Cal. Educ. Code ¤ 52163.

Former Cal. Educ. Code ¤ 52165.

Freeman v. Pitts, 503 U.S. 467 (1992).

Goldfinger, P.M. (1996). Revenues and Limits: A Guide to School Finance in California. School Services of California Inc.

Governor Buries Bilingual Education Bill and 6 Other Education Proposals, L.A. Daily Journal (July 27, 1987)

Hain, Jr., Elwood B. (1978). Report of Elwood B. Hain, Jr., Crawford v. Board of Education of the City of Los Angeles, Case. No. 822 854, November 14, 1978.

James, B. & Hoffman, J. (1993). Brown in state hands: State policymaking and educational equality after Freeman v. Pitts. Hastings Constitutional Law Quarterly Vol. 20: 3.

Keyes v. School District No. 1, Denver, Colorado, 413 U.S. 189 (1973).

Little Hoover Commission Report (March 1996). The Charter Movement Education Reform School by School.

Little Hoover Commission Report (July 1993). A Chance to succeed: Providing English Learners with Supportive Education.

Lopez-Lee, David (1976). School Desegregation in the Los Angeles Unified School District, prepared for hearing of U.S. Commission on Civil Rights in Los Angeles, California, December 1976.

LEARN (1993). LEARN Documents. Los Angeles: LEARN.

LEARN (1994). LEARN Documents. Los Angeles: LEARN.

Los Angeles Unified School District, Update #5, School Desegregation Funds 6/24/96.

Los Angeles Unified School District, Choices 1994-95 Brochure.

Los Angeles Unified School District, Citizens' Advisory Committee on Student Integration, Integration Plan Submitted to the Los Angeles City Board of Education, March 3, 1977.

Middleton, Lorenzo (1977). Has Desegregation Effort Been Halted in the North? The Ford Fellows In Educational Journalism Report, Diane Brundage, Editor, p. 25.

Moran, R. (1987). Bilingual Education as a Status Conflict, California Law Review, Vol. 75, 321-___.

New York's Bilingual 'Prison,' N.Y. Times (September 21, 1995).

Orfield, Gary (1978). Report of Dr. Gary Orfield, Crawford v. Board of Education of the City of Los Angeles, Case No. 822 854, November 14, 1978.

Pyle, A. (1996) Bilingual Bonus Plan Proposed, Los Angeles Times (April 11, 1996).

Pyle, A. (1995) L.A. Schools Wrestle With Realities of '92 Money Pact, Los Angeles Times, A1, 20 (February 14, 1995).

Rodriguez v. LAUSD, Case No. C611358 (1992)

San Antonio Indep. Sch. Dist.v. Rodriguez, 411 U.S. 1 (1973).

Serrano v. Priest (Serrano I) (1971) 5 Cal. 3d 584, 96 Cal. Rptr. 601, 487 P.2d 1241

Shuster, B. (1995). Coordinator Explains the Attraction of Magnet Schools. Los Angeles Times, Valley Edition, B5.

Wells, A.S., Hirshberg, D., and Datnow, A. (1994). A Comparison of Magnet and Charter Schools: The Trade Off Between Desegregation and Deregulation. AERA paper.

Wycoff, R.E. (1993, March 8, 1993). LEARN -- 'A Plan of Daring Imperfections.' Los Angeles Times, pp. B7, col. 1.

Yudof, M., Kirp, D., and Levin, B. (1992). Educational policy and the law. 3rd Edition. West.

2 347 U.S. 483 (1954).

3 Id. at 495. Although Brown did not directly overturn Plessy this case was the impetus for ending segregation in other public and private places.

4 Prior to Brown the Supreme Court had heard several cases which addressed the “separate but equal" standard in the context of higher education programs but the Court expressly reserved a decision on the question whether Plessy v. Ferguson should be held inapplicable in public education. Brown, 347 U.S. at 492. See, Missouri ex rel. Gaines v. Canada, 305 U.S. 337 (1938)(Black student admitted to state law school), Sweatt v. Painter, 339 U.S. 629 (1950)(Black student admitted to law school), and McLaurin v. Oklahoma State Regents for Higher Education, 339 U.S. 637 (1950) (Black Graduate admitted to previously all-White university).

5 Id. at 493 (emphasis added). Desegregation has taken different forms. It has meant everything from court ordered busing to voluntary desegregation programs including magnet schools and voluntary student transfers. This paper will address the primary desegregation methods employed in LAUSD.

6 San Antonio Indep. Sch. Dist v. Rodriguez, 411 U.S. 1 (1973). Rodriguez left the issue of school funding in state hands by finding that differences in funding did not violate the Federal Constitution. Since the Rodriguez decision, 40 states have faced challenges to their Constitutions. Ponessa, J. Ohio High Court Hears Arguments in Finance Case. Education Week, October 2, 1996. P. 16. In California, challenges to both between district and within district funding have been brought. Serrano v. Priest, 5 Cal. 3d 584 (1971) and its progeny addressed between district spending disparities and Rodriguez v. LAUSD, Case No. C611358 (1992), addressed within district disparities. These cases are discussed in depth in the School Finance Briefing Paper.

7 Lau v. Nichols, 414 U.S. 563 (1974).

8 Chanda Smith v. LAUSD, Case No. CV 93-7044-LEW.

9 James, B. & Hoffman, J. (1993). Brown in state hands: State policymaking and educational equality after Freeman v. Pitts. Hastings Constitutional Law Quarterly Vol. 20:3 521-577.

10 Codified as Cal. Educ. Code ¤ 47600. See infra note 100.

11 Because of the impracticality of doing so, this paper does not address Federal programs implemented to afford access to equal educational opportunities such as Title 1, Free and Reduced Lunch or Head Start. The reader should note that any reorganization might impact already existing programs and might require the creation of new programs to accommodate students previously receiving benefits from LAUSD.

12 LEARN stands for the Los Angeles Educational Alliance for Restructuring Now. LEARN is discussed infra in Section 4(C).

13 Brown addressed de jure segregation. De jure segregation is defined as “segregation directly intended or mandated by law or otherwise issuing from an official racial classification or in other words to segregation which has or had the sanction of law." In later court cases the courts distinguished de jure segregation from de facto segregation. De facto segregation “is limited to that which is inadvertent and without the assistance or collusion of school authorities." Black's Law Dictionary (1990). West Publishing Co. citing State ex rel. Citizens Against Mandatory Bussing v. Brooks, 492 P. 2d 536, 542.

14 Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, 349 U.S. 294 (1955).

15 Brown in State Hands, supra note 9 at 522.

16 Id. at 537.

17 Yudof, M., Kirp, D., & Levin, B. (3d ed. 1992). Educational Policy and the Law. West Publishing:St. Paul.

18 Yet on a local level, resistance grew as federal guidelines mandated more actual desegregation. Devins, N. & Stedman, J.B. (1984), Symposium Civil Rights and Federalism: New Federalism in Education: The meaning of the Chicago school desegregation cases. Notre Dame Law Review Vol. 59 p. 1243-1292.

19 42 U.S.C. ¤ 2000d-1 (1964).

20 Such complaints could be lodged by private citizens. Kirp, supra note 17, at 481.

21 Devins & Stedman, supra note 19, at 1249.

22 Edsall, T.B. & Edsall, M.D. (1991). Chain Reaction: The impact of race, rights, and taxes on American politics. W.W. Norton & Company: New York.

23 413 U.S. 189 (1973).

24 Lopez-Lee, D. (1976). School Desegregation in the Los Angeles Unified School District, prepared for hearing of U.S. Commission on Civil Rights in Los Angeles, California, December.

25 This suit was instituted several weeks after the California Supreme Court held in Jackson v. Pasadena City School District, 31 Cal. Rptr. 606 (1963) that school boards in this state bear a constitutional obligation to undertake reasonably feasible steps to alleviate racial segregation in the public schools, regardless of the cause of such segregation. Crawford v. Board of Education of the City of Los Angeles, 246 Cal. Rptr. 806, 808 (1988).

26 The trial court initially found that the public schools in LAUSD had been substantially segregated prior to the initiation of the lawsuit and between 1966 to 1968 they had become increasingly segregated. In addition, the court found that a substantial portion of District's schools had student populations of either 90 percent or more minority students or 90 percent or more White students.

The court stated that these statistics reflected a racial imbalance that was perpetuated and maintained by "de jure" practices of the School Board: "Since at least May 1963, by and through its actual affirmative policies, customs, usages and practices, doings and omissions, the Board has segregated de jure, its students." (Crawford v. Board of Education of the City of Los Angeles, Minute Order). The court held that the School Board had acted in the following manner:

a. Adopted, mandated and slavishly adhered to its neighborhood school policy without regard to integration or desegregation or the effect of segregated education;
b. Acquired sites and building neighboring schools thereon within racially imbalanced, segregated ghetto areas knowing and intending that the students who live in such areas would be required to attend these schools;
c. Established, mandated and maintained mandatory attendance areas and boundaries around such neighborhood schools, thereby creating or perpetuating segregated schools, knowing that the schools affected thereby would become or be perpetuated as minority segregated schools or White segregated schools or racially imbalanced schools;
d. Established, mandated and maintained transportation policies which, in conjunction with its pupil transfer policies and practices, have compelled its disadvantaged minority pupils to attend segregated neighborhood schools, while permitting White students to escape to predominantly White schools.
e. Failed to adopt or instruct its staff, including those charged with selecting school sites and established and modified school attendance areas and boundaries, as to any definition of "equal educational opportunity," "integration," " desegregation," "segregation," "racial imbalance" or "racial balance;"
f. Failed to make or commence a good faith plan to integrate the schools
g. Failed to evolve any good faith plan to integrate the schools; Expended billions of dollars of public monies received by it to create, maintain, protect, and perpetuate its segregated and racially imbalanced schools;
h. Assigned and compelled pupils to attend schools on the basis of geographic criteria knowing that such system of pupil assignment created and would perpetuate racial imbalance and segregation in the schools; and
i. Asserted, as its educational philosophy, policy and legal position, that integrated education is not a necessary part of equal educational opportunity; that its separate but allegedly equal schools provide equal educational opportunity; that its separate but allegedly equal schools provide equal educational opportunity; that it has no legal duty to desegregate its segregated schools or remedy racial imbalance in its schools; and that, unless compelled by the court to do otherwise, it would continue to pursue its neighborhood school policy and perpetuate its segregated schools until the district, in its arbitrary and uncontrolled discretion, deems it "feasible" to do otherwise. (Crawford, Respondent's brief).

27 As with the United States Supreme Court decision in Brown, the California Supreme Court issued a unanimous decision in the Crawford case.

28 Crawford II (1976) 17 Cal. 3d at 297, 130 Cal. Rptr. at 735, citing Serrano v. Priest I (1971).

29 Crawford II (1976), 17 Cal. 3d 280, 130 Cal. Rptr. 724.

30 In addition, the Court found that the Board had located new schools, closed old ones, and determined the size, grade categories, and feeder patterns for such new schools without considering the desegregative benefits of such decisions. Similarly, the Court noted that the School Board had adopted a transfer policy which had the foreseeable consequence of perpetuating and indeed exacerbating the segregation in its district's schools. Crawford II (1976), 17 Cal. 3d 280 at 308.

31 For definitions of de jure and de fact segregation, see supra note 13. Jackson v. Pasadena City School District, 59 Cal. 2d 876 (1963). In Jackson, a 13 year old African American boy, requested that the Supreme Court compel the Pasadena School District to permit him to transfer from a predominantly African American junior high school (Washington) to a predominantly White junior high school. The Court found that the District had gerrymandered the school and District boundaries for the purpose of "instituting, maintaining, and intensifying racial segregation at Washington, relegating to a single junior high school a substantial proportion of all Negro pupils, and permitting most white pupils to avoid attendance at schools where substantial numbers of Negroes are enrolled." Id. at 878. The Court further found that "Washington is a racially segregated school which is inherently inferior to other junior high schools in the District. Plaintiff, who resides in the Washington zone, is required by the board to attend the Washington school, with the result that he is denied equal opportunity for public school education[ ]" and equal protection and due process of the law. Id. at 880. Finally, the Court stated that although in Jackson the School Board was accused of intentional discriminatory action, "it should be pointed out that even in the absence of gerrymandering or other affirmative discriminatory conduct by a school board, a student under some circumstances would be entitled to relief where, by reason of residential segregation, substantial racial imbalance exists in his school [ ]" and that the school boards have an affirmative duty to reasonably alleviate racial segregation. Id. at 882. In fact, at the time of the case, the California Administrative Code, Title 5, section 2010, provided: 'STATE BOARD POLICY. It is the declared policy of the State Board of Education that persons or agencies responsible for the establishment of school attendance centers or the assignment of pupils thereto shall exert all effort to avoid and eliminate segregation of children on account of race or color.' Id. at 882, fn. 1.

32 Id. at 282.

33 Crawford III (1988), 200 Cal. App. 3d 1397, 1402.

34 Id.

35 Id. at 1403.

36 Id.

37 Id. at 1404.

38 The other voluntary integration measure was the Permits With Transportation program which is discussed briefly below.

39 Shuster, B. (1995). Coordinator Explains the Attraction of Magnet Schools. Los Angeles Times, Valley Edition, B5.

40 Los Angeles Unified School District, Report on LAUSD Integration Programs Executive Summary, 1991-1992, Vol. I, Part A 5-6 (1992).

41 Id.

42 Magnet schools in the inner city have low to non-existent White populations.

43 The School Board has attempted to assure that these specialized magnet programs are spread throughout the District, even when that means actively creating a magnet within a school that did not actively seek one or temporarily denying a magnet program to a school in a more affluent community.

44 Wells, A.S. Hirshberg, D., and Datnow, A. (1994). A Comparison of Magnet and Charter Schools: The Trade Off Between Desegregation and Deregulation. AERA paper.

45 In recent years, about 38,000 students have applied for about 9,500 openings. Shuster, supra note 39.

46 Chastang, C. (1995). Common Ground. Los Angeles Times. Westside Section. pp. 12

47 Cal. Educ. Code ¤ 35730.1(d).

48 Cal. Educ. Code ¤35730.1 (emphasis added).

49 Letter from Jesus E. Quinonez to Marc R. Forgy, July 9, 1996. p. 3. On file with author.

50 Id.

51 Crawford II (1976), 17 Cal. 3d 280, at 296. In the context of segregation, a facially neutral policy is one that when simply read does not appear to require discrimination. A policy may not require segregation by its terms but may discriminate in its application to a given set of circumstances.

52 Id.

53 Cal. Educ. ¤ 35753(a)(4) also provides that any proposal for reorganization may be approved if “[t]he reorganization of the districts will not promote racial or ethnic discrimination or segregation."

54 Letter to Marc R. Forgy, supra note 48 at 5.

55 United States v. Scotland Neck Bd. of Education, 407 U.S. 484, 489 (1972) quoting Wright v. Council of City of Emporia, 407 U.S. 451 (1972).

56 503 U.S. 467 (1992). In Freeman v. Pitts, Black schoolchildren and their parents sued the DeKalb County, Georgia, School System (DCSS) for segregating students on the basis of race. The District Court, in 1969, entered a consent order approving a plan to dismantle the de jure segregation that had existed in the DCSS. The court retained jurisdiction to oversee implementation of the plan. In 1986, DCSS officials filed a motion in District Court for final dismissal of the litigation, seeking a declaration that DCSS had achieved unitary status (Unitary status is more or less defined as satisfaction by the district of its duty to eliminate the dual education system. Id. at 473.). The District Court ruled that DCSS had not achieved unitary status in all respects but had done so in student attendance and three other categories. In its order the District Court relinquished remedial control as to those aspects of the system in which unitary status had been achieved, and retained supervisory authority only for those aspects of the school system in which the district was not in full compliance. The Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit reversed the District Court's decision in 1989, holding that a district court should retain full remedial authority over a school system until it achieves unitary status in six categories at the same time for several years. The Supreme Court reversed the Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit holding: "a district court is permitted to withdraw judicial supervision with respect to discrete categories in which the school district has achieved compliance with a court-ordered desegregation plan." Id. at 471.

57 Freeman decreased the likelihood that a federal court would evaluate a reorganization under federal law because the court would have to find that the reorganization was intentionally designed to segregate students on the basis of race. As Justice Scalia stated in his concurrence, the “rational basis for the extraordinary presumption of causation [by the school district or state] simply must dissipate as the de jure system and the school boards who produced it recede further into the past." Id. at 506. Instead, the Court "must soon revert" to ordinary equal protection principles that require "plaintiffs alleging Equal Protection violations [to] prove intent and causation and not merely the existence of racial disparity." Id. As a new district formation will have a past history of discrimination which is now substantially removed from current events, the "ordinary equal protection principles" will apply. Id.

58 One of the measures used to determine district funding levels is a calculation of the Average Daily Attendance (ADA) of students. ADA is equal to the average number of pupils actually attending classes who are enrolled for at least the minimum school day, or have a valid excuse. Goldfinger, P.M. (1996). Revenues and Limits: A Guide to School Finance in California. School Services of California Inc. p. 215.

59 Los Angeles Unified School District (1996). Choices 1996-97 Brochure. p. 4

60 Id.

61 Id. at 566. Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (42 U.S.C. ¤ 2000d) has been relied upon by plaintiffs in a number of key education cases. It provides: "No person in the United States shall, on the ground of race, color or national origin, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance."

62 See generally 414 U.S. at 564, 569.

63 Id. at 565.

64 Id. at 568.

65 See generally Yudof supra, note 17, 793-809.

66 Despite the central role of Title VI in the Lau case and in the new OCR guidelines that followed, most commentators and jurists believe that this civil rights statute has limited value for LEP and NEP plaintiffs today.

67 The acronym LEP refers to limited English proficient children, while the acronym NEP refers to non English proficient children. While these terms are included because they were used in the Lau guidelines and in much of the literature that followed, it should be recognized that they have gone out of fashion today, and have typically been replaced by the terms "English Language Learners," "Second Language Learners," "English Learners," and/or "Language Minority Students."

Former Cal. Educ. Code ¤ 52163 (d) defines "Limited-English-speaking pupils" as those "who do not have the clearly developed English skills of comprehension, speaking, reading and writing, necessary to receive instruction only in English at a level substantially equivalent to pupils whose primary language is English."

Former Cal. Educ. Code ¤ 52163 (e) defines "Non-English-speaking pupils" as those "who communicate in their primary language only or who communicate in English at a level which does not enable them to participate meaningfully in an educational setting where only English is used."

68 See Yudof, supra note 17, at 793 794.

69 See Moran, R. (1987). Bilingual Education as a Status Conflict, 75 CAL. L. REV. 321, 329.

70 20 U.S.C. 1703 (f).

71 648 F. 2d 989 (5th Cir. 1981).

72 See 648 F. 2d at 991. Plaintiffs brought this suit under the fourteenth amendment, Title VI, and the EEOA. See id.

73 Id. at 1009.

74 Id. at 1009 1010. For a representative example of how this three part analysis has been applied by the federal courts in recent years, see Teresa P. v. Berkeley Unified School District, 724 F. Supp. 698 (N.D. Cal. 1989).

75 For additional analysis regarding the applicability of federal law in this area, see Rebell & Murdaugh, National Values and Community Values: Part II: Equal Educational Opportunity for Limited English Proficient Students, 21 J. L. & EDUC. 335, 356-373 (1992).

76 See Former Cal. Educ. Code ¤ 52161, effective April 29, 1977 (emphasis added).

77 See generally Former Cal. Educ. Code ¤ 52165, effective April 29. 1977 (emphasis added).

78 See Former Cal. Educ. Code ¤ 52165 (a), effective April 29. 1977 School districts with at least 10 K 6 LEP students speaking the same primary language at the same grade level had to offer at least "partial bilingual education." Id.

79 See Former Cal. Educ. Code ¤¤ 52165 (b), 52163 (f), effective April 29. 1977.

80 See Cal. Educ. Code ¤¤ 62000, 62006 regarding the mandatory review prescribed by the legislature before the mandatory bilingual education program could be continued.

81 See Governor Buries Bilingual Education Bill and 6 Other Education Proposals, Los Angeles Daily Journal, July 27, 1987.

82 See Cal. Educ. Code ¤¤ 62000 62002.5.

83 See Cal. Educ. Code ¤ 62003.

84 This overall legal position has been affirmed by the Office of Administrative Law. See 1994 OAL Determination No. 1 (Docket No. 90-021), December 22, 1994.

85 Former Ed Code Selection 52161 specified 8 general purposes of bilingual education programs, as follows:
1. "The primary goal of all programs is, as effectively and efficiently as possible, to develop in each child fluency in English."
2. The program must "provide equal opportunity for academic achievement, including, when necessary, academic instruction through the primary language."
3. The program must "provide positive reinforcement of the self-image of participating pupils."
4. The program must "promote crosscultural understanding."
5. CA school districts are required "to offer bilingual learning opportunities to each pupil of limited English proficiency enrolled in the public schools."
6. CA school districts are required "to provide adequate supplemental financial support" in order to offer such bilingual learning opportunities.
7. "Insofar as the individual pupil is concerned participation in bilingual programs is voluntary on the part of the parent or guardian."
8. School districts must "provide for in-service programs to qualify existing and future personnel in the bilingual and crosscultural skills necessary to serve the pupils of limited English proficiency of this state."

86 A Chance to Succeed: Providing English Learners with Supportive Education, Report of the Little Hoover Commission, July 1993 [hereinafter Little Hoover Commission Report I], at iii-iv.

87 See Billingsley, Hispanic Parents Battling to Stop Bilingual Classes, Washington Times, February 18, 1996.

88 New York's Bilingual 'Prison,' New York Times, September 21, 1995.

89 Little Hoover Commission Report I, supra note 85, at v-viii.

90 A local plan for such incentives was recently set forth by LAUSD. See Pyle, A., Bilingual Bonus Plan Proposed, Los Angeles Times, May 10, 1996.

91 See Little Hoover Commission Report I, supra note 85, vi-ix.

92 See, e.g., Colvin, Panel Oks Overhaul of Bilingual Ed, Los Angeles Times, April 11, 1996 [hereinafter Bilingual Overhaul].

93 AB 2310. Proposed Cal. Educ. Code Section 52160.1. (emphasis added).

94 See Colvin, Hard lessons in Bilingual Ed., L.A. Times, September 15, 1996. Commentators suggest that Senators Alpert and Firestone lost the support of critics when they attempted to woo bilingual education advocates by agreeing to strengthen the role of the State Department of Education.

95 Id.

96 Id.

97 See Bilingual Overhaul, supra note 91.

98 Bilingual education, loosely defined, refers to language remediation programs where at least some of the instruction is in the student's primary language.

99 Letter from Elisa Fernandez, MALDEF staff attorney, to Mr. Marc Forgy, Secretary, Los Angeles County Committee on School District Organization, June 30, 1996. (On file with the author).

100 The Collective Bargaining Agreement gives the District the right to “determine whether and to what extent a given school is to participate" in the District's bilingual master plan, and provides for a committee review of its effectiveness. Most of the section, however, appears to address nothing more than teacher qualifications and salary differentials. See Collective Bargaining Agreement between the United Teachers Los Angeles and the Los Angeles Unified School District, July 1, 1995-June 30, 1998, Article XI-B, at pp. 77-84.

101 The charter legislation states the clear intention of the Legislature to use charter schools in order to increase access to educational opportunities for all students. Section 47601 states, in pertinent part: It is the intent of the Legislature, . . . to establish and maintain schools that operate independently from the existing school district structure, as a method to accomplish all of the following: b) Increase learning opportunities for all pupils, with special emphasis on expanded learning experiences for pupils who are identified as academically low achieving. Additionally, the legislation requires that school districts give preference to schools who wish to serve academically low achieving students. Cal. Educ. Code ¤47605(h). As many "academically low achieving" students are located in poorer urban inner-city schools, the Charter School Act was intended by the Legislature to benefit these students.

102 Case No. C 611358, Los Angeles Superior Court (1992).

103 Rodriguez, Statement of Decision, p. 8 (1992).

104 Teacher experience is considered to be a factor in promoting educational opportunity and educational achievement. Id.

105 Id. at 14.

106 Chanda Smith v. LAUSD, Case No. CV 93-7044-LEW.

107 Id at 3.

108 Wells, A.S., Hirshberg, D., and Datnow, A. (1994). A Comparison of Magnet and Charter Schools: The Trade Off Between Desegregation and Deregulation. AERA Paper. p. 1.

109 Id.

110 Cal. Educ. Code ¤ 47601. The Department of Education has effectively waived the 100 charter school cap and there are now more than 100 charter schools in California. No district has yet to exceed the 10 charter school per district limitation.

111 The Charter Movement Education Reform School by School, Report of the Little Hoover Commission, March 1996 [hereinafter Little Hoover Commission Report II].

112 Cal. Educ. Code ¤ 47601.

113 Cal. Educ. Code ¤ 47610 states: A charter school shall comply with all of the provisions set forth in its charter petition, but is otherwise exempt from the laws governing school districts except as specified in Section 47611. Section 47611 relates to teacher retirement benefits.

114 Recently, the Attorney General issued an official opinion indicating that charter schools are only subject to the building safety requirements of the Field Act if the requirements are set forth in their charter petitions. 96 Op. Att'y Gen. 1206 (1997).

115 Cal. Educ. Code ¤ 47605(d).

116 Cal. Educ. Code ¤ 47602(b).

117 Little Hoover Commission Report II, supra note 110 at 91.

118 EdSource Report (1996). Charter Schools - Works in Progress. EdSource, Inc. Sacramento, California.

119 Cal. Educ. Code ¤ 47605.

120 Cal. Educ. Code ¤ 47606.

121 Accelerated School has only four faculty members. Consequently, obtaining the requisite 50% approval from the faculty was not difficult.

122 The degrees to which each of these schools has actually attained complete independence varies between schools. All of the schools remain dependent on the District for guidance and support in different ways. Interviews with (Cook, the Controller for LAUSD). On file with the author.

123 Cal. Educ. Code ¤35730.1 (emphasis added).

124 The language in Cal. Educ. Code ¤ 47603, concerning the acceptance of a petition by a school district, provides guidelines for the school wishing to submit a charter to a district. The district governing board "may grant a charter for the operation of a school under this part if it determines that the petition contains the number of signatures required by subdivision (a), a statement of each of the conditions described in subdivision (d), and descriptions of . . ." a series of criteria. Nothing in the code section requires that a district grant a charter if the charter meets all of the stated criteria. Therefore, any new district would not be required to automatically accept the charters in effect in LAUSD.

125 Cal. Educ. Code ¤ 46600 states that “[t]he governing boards of two or more school districts may enter into an agreement, for a term not to exceed five school years, for the interdistrict attendance of pupils who are residents of the districts. The agreement may provide for the admission to a district other than the district of residence of a pupil who requests a permit to attend a school district that is a party to the agreement and that maintains schools and classes in kindergarten or any of grades 1 to 12 inclusive, to which the pupil requests admission."

126 Cal. Educ. Code ¤ 47605 (d).

127 For a more complete history and analysis of funding as it relates to LAUSD, please see the Break-up Briefing Paper on School Finance.

128 The attendance of students from other districts at charter schools also has funding implications. Students attending charter schools from other districts bring their ADA with them. For a more complete explanation of school funding please see the School Finance Briefing Paper.

129 LEARN document, on file with the author.

130 Id.

131 LEARN (1992). For All Our Children: Better Educational Results in the Los Angeles Public Schools. Preliminary Draft.

132 Editorial Writers Desk, A Promising Report on LEARN Progress Improvement is needed, however, in language transition. Los Angeles Times. June 24, 1996 pp. B4.

133 Wycoff, R.E. (March 8, 1993). LEARN -- 'A Plan of Daring Imperfections.' Los Angeles Times, pp. B7, col. 1.

134 Id.

135 LEARN (1994). LEARN Documents. Los Angeles: LEARN.

136 Here is a list of Valley schools applying to participate in the fourth year of the LEARN reform program.

Senior high and continuation high schools:
Birmingham, Chatsworth, Cleveland, Grey, Kennedy, Owensmouth, Reseda, Thoreau, Verdugo
Elementary schools and children's centers:
Blythe, Canterbury, Chase, Coldwater Canyon, Dearborn, El Dorado, Encino, Gledhill Child Ctr., Granada, Gridley, Hubbard Child Ctr., Justice, Langdon, Lorne, Mayall, Mountain View, Napa, Parthenia, Pinewood, Pinewood Child Ctr., Plummer, Rio Vista, Stonehurst, Tarzana, Toluca Lake, Vanalden, Vanalden Child Ctr., Winnetka
Middle schools:
Byrd, Maclay, Van Nuys
Special Ed centers:
Lowman, West Valley
Kindergarten through 12-grade school:
Valley Alternative Magnet
Kindy, Kimberly, LEARN Adds 99 Schools. Los Angeles Daily News, March 16, 1996 N1.

137 Pyle, A., New Chief Rallies Teachers, Outlines Goals Education: L.A. union's leader urges weeding out poor instructions through peer review and halting promotions of students who fail to meet specific academic standards. Los Angeles Times, September 8, 1996, B1.

138 Wycoff, supra note 132.

139 Cal. Educ. Code ¤35730.1 (emphasis added).

140 Quinonez, J., et al. Memorandum to UTLA Officers, September 22, 1995. On file with Author. (emphasis added).

141 For a more complete explanation of school funding please see the School Finance Briefing Paper.

142 See generally Biegel, S. (1995) School Choice Policy and Title VI: Maximizing Equal Access for K-12 Students in a Substantially Deregulated Educational Environment, 46 Hastings L.J. 1533, 1540-1555.

143 See, e.g., Yudof, M. (1973). Equal Educational Opportunity and the Courts, 51 Texas L. Rev. 411, 412.

144 See, Biegel, S. (1989) Reassessing the Applicability of Fundamental Rights Analysis: The Fourteenth Amendment and the Shaping of Educational Policy after Kadrmas v. Dicinson Public Schools, 74 Cornell L. Rev. 1078, 1082-1084.

Return to the Table of Contents
Return to the previous section
Return to LAUSD Study Page.
UCLA Graduate School of Education & Information Studies

updated