Agreement Reprieves Fernald for 1 Year

Parents who have conducted a seven-month campaign to save UCLA’s Fernald School are celebrating an “agreement in principle” by which the university will reopen the school for the learning-handicapped for one year.

Spokesmen for the university and for parents have said that they expect Fernald to reopen Friday.

Parent spokesman Michael Cornwell said the agreement is “quite a victory” for Friends of Fernald, a group organized in February to fight UCLA Chancellor Charles E. Young’s decision to close the 65-year-old school for youngsters with learning disabilities.

Parents were notified in a Feb. 19 letter from John D. O’Connor, UCLA dean of life sciences, that the university planned to close the school June 30.

Parents Treasure School

O’Connor said that Fernald was being closed because other schools offer similar programs. The closure would allow Fernald’s funds to be diverted to the university for research on childhood disabilities, he said.

But parents, outraged that they had been given only 4 1/2 months notice to look for new schools, said Fernald’s teaching and research have provided an irreplaceable opportunity for their children, some so severely handicapped that they cannot attend public school.

Fernald parents first took their case to the University of California Board of Regents, which declined to overrule Young’s decision. Then they filed suit in Santa Monica Superior Court claiming that the closure violated the students’ rights to equal educational opportunity.

On Aug. 28 Judge Richard G. Harris ruled that the school should reopen until the lawsuit was resolved, but a week later the university appealed the decision, leaving the school’s fate in limbo while legal questions were debated by opposing attorneys.

Will Close Next June

Attorneys for both sides reached an “agreement in principle” by which UCLA will continue to offer programs this year for students who attended Fernald last spring, said university spokesman Harlan Lebo.

The agreement provides that the school will close in June, 1987, he said.

The one-year reprieve will give parents time to find another location for Fernald off the UCLA campus, said James R. Lahana, an attorney representing Fernald parents.

Under the agreement, if UCLA keeps Fernald open this year, parents will withdraw the lawsuit and claims for damages, Lebo said.