Classrooms in Compton Cited as ‘Horrible’ by NEA Chief

The president of the nation’s largest teachers’ union on Wednesday accused California of shortchanging its schools and singled out Compton Unified School District for what she said were “horrible” conditions there for students and teachers.

National Education Assn. President Mary Hatwood Futrell, speaking as the NEA released its annual report on national school funding, enrollment and teachers’ salaries, described a visit she had made early this month to three Compton schools. She said she was “absolutely appalled” to find leaking ceilings, broken windows, “filthy” bathrooms, bird droppings on classroom floors and no fire extinguishers.

“I’m surprised that the Fire Department or the Health Department had not gone in and closed down those schools for being unsafe and unhealthy,” she said.

The NEA annual report showed that California slipped from 9th place to 31st place nationwide over the last decade in spending per pupil. Once a “bellwether state,” she said, “California is now lagging far behind many of our poorer states, as far as funding and quality of education are concerned.”

Futrell also attacked the Reagan Administration for allowing a steady drop in federal support of public schools. The federal share of education spending, which peaked at 9.2% in 1979-80, is now 6.2%, the lowest in 22 years.

Nationally, she said, public school revenues, adjusted for inflation, have increased by 13.8% since 1977. NEA officials contend that increases from 20% to 25% are needed to adequately finance education reforms nationwide.

Futrell offered the Compton schools as an example of the effect dwindling financial support can have on the quality of education. She gave a vivid account of a visit she made May 7 to the financially strapped school system, which has been locked in a bitter labor dispute with its teachers all year.

“When I visited Compton, I was absolutely appalled at the physical conditions in the schools. I was appalled at the class size. I was very surprised with the uncleanliness in the schools . . . and I saw physical facilities that had been in disrepair for a very long period of time,” Futrell said.

On cold days, Futrell said, gas burners used for science experiments heated a laboratory classroom. At one school, she added, teachers also served as janitors. “They have their own mops and their own brooms and they are cleaning their own buildings,” she said.

After the visit, Futrell said she wrote California schools Supt. Bill Honig, U.S. Education Secretary William J. Bennett and Rep. Mervyn M. Dymally (D-Compton) to complain about the conditions.

Compton teachers, whose average pay is the lowest of Los Angeles County’s 43 school districts, have been working without a contract for a year. They staged 16 one-day strikes to protest their salary situation and school conditions, but in April a Los Angeles judge enjoined them from staging further walkouts.

Compton School Supt. Ted D. Kimbrough would not comment Wednesday on Futrell’s statements, citing legal reasons connected with the labor dispute.

The NEA report said California spends $3,751 per pupil, and the figure has increased substantially in recent years. The state with the highest per-pupil figure was Alaska, with $8,842, and the lowest was Utah with $2,455. Neither Futrell nor the report made any direct reference to the running fight between Honig and Gov. George Deukmejian over the California education budget for the fiscal year that begins July 1.

Deukmejian’s press secretary, Kevin Brett, responded to Futrell’s criticism of state education financing by saying: “Since Gov. Deukmejian took office, education is and has been his No. 1 spending priority. More than $6 billion in new general fund dollars has been provided for education.” Brett declined to comment on the situation in Compton, noting that neither he nor the governor had visited the schools there.

Honig, meanwhile, welcomed Futrell’s comments about Compton. “I’m glad she brought it up,” he said. “I think we need more reality in this discussion in California. These are real children, real buildings and real teachers. . . . Compton is probably the most visual evidence of financial neglect, but it’s certainly not the only district suffering.”

Futrell attacked the federal Department of Education for not following through on its controversial 1983 report, “A Nation at Risk,” which found a “rising tide of mediocrity” in the nation’s public schools.

“Administration education policy makers are attempting to subject education to a ‘talk’ cure,” she said. “They believe there’s no problem in education that cannot be solved by a quick quip or trite adage.”

To those charges, Education Secretary Bennett responded in a statement: “Give me a break! And give the American people a break. Once again the NEA reveals its cash-register mentality. While continuing to resist every promising and significant education reform in the states, the NEA returns to its favorite obsession: money.”