A potential arts beacon

The spectacular new arts high school in downtown Los Angeles cost an equally spectacular $232 million. Now that the campus is complete, with its state-of-the-art theater, ceramics studios and other eye-popping amenities, the critical next step for school leaders is to avoid wrecking it. Our prescription: Don’t rush the school into a September curtain-raising, and don’t diminish what could become a national beacon of arts education by turning it into a neighborhood school.

This is the wrong time for Los Angeles Unified School District leaders to practice their quick-action skills, and this is the wrong school to do it on. After a nationwide search for a principal led nowhere, they last week selected someone from within the district who has no particular arts education background. That accomplished, they’re planning to open the school this fall, even though they still lack a faculty and a curriculum. Another misstep: After months of arguments over whether the school should admit students on the basis of talent or residency, the political pressure from neighborhood forces prevailed. Only 500 of the school’s 1,700 seats will go to students drawn from throughout L.A. Unified.

A beautiful campus is just a start toward a showcase arts academy. The school needs outstanding teachers and a critical mass of outstanding students, drawn from the largest possible population. These two things go together -- top teachers in the arts are drawn to work with the most promising students. But by severely limiting the talent pool, the district dooms its venture from the start.

There’s no denying that for too long, students in the district’s urban core have been jammed into overcrowded, rundown campuses. They’re overdue for a little academic stardust. But the district has recently completed other attractive new schools in that area and doesn’t need the arts school to relieve overcrowding. A fair compromise would be to turn the numbers around: 1,200 students to be admitted on the basis of talent, with 500 spots reserved for students within the neighborhood, to give kids who haven’t had years of lessons a chance to shine. Waiting a year would allow the district to cancel the admissions process it has already nearly completed and start over.

L.A. Unified needs to prove it can run a marquee school without the usual top-down, politically shaped agenda. That means taking the time to hire the best faculty and giving them the time and authority to plan a curriculum and play a role in selecting the students.

“I don’t know what we’d gain by waiting,” local district Supt. Richard Alonzo recently told The Times when asked about the new school. We’ll elucidate: Time would allow the district to get the right student mix, the right faculty and an appropriate curriculum, none of which it has now. There’s too much promise and money in this school to see it become another big L.A. Unified initiative gone bad.