Opening of New Newhall School Stirs Furor Over Boundary Shift

The opening of an elementary school should be a happy occasion for a community, but that is not the case in the Newhall School District.

In September, Valencia Valley Elementary School is scheduled to open its doors to about 700 youngsters. The new school will provide needed classroom space in the overcrowded district that serves about one-third of the fast-growing Santa Clarita Valley.

But controversy over how to redistribute students among the district’s six campuses has dampened enthusiasm about the opening. Proposals to redraw school attendance boundary lines have unleashed waves of protest from parents who do not want their children moved.

Muddying the debate even further is the possible shifting of up to 200 Latino students from Newhall Elementary School. Newhall has the highest concentration of minority students in the small district and the area’s most extensive bilingual education program.

Many of the students moved from Newhall will need bilingual instruction at their new school. This has upset some Anglo parents, who are wary of having their children taught in a bilingual setting.

Racist Acts Feared

Some Latino parents are equally unhappy about reassignment plans. They would rather have their children stay at Newhall, where Latinos make up about 42% of the 896-student enrollment. The parents said they are afraid that their children will become targets for racist acts if they are assigned to schools where there might be a climate of fear and anxiety.

Emotions over reassignment proposals peaked in late March at a public hearing. There, neighbor was pitted against neighbor as parents railed at a 12-member committee appointed by the district to design new school attendance boundaries.

Several parents denounced plans to reassign Latino students to other schools. They claimed that a school with a bilingual program in a predominantly Anglo neighborhood could lower the property values of homes in the area.

“It seems as if everyone is out for themselves,” lamented Patty Martin, a member of the Study Committee on Attendance Boundaries.

The committee will make its recommendations on the reassignment of students to the Newhall Board of Education tonight. Because of the community interest, district officials decided to move the meeting from their cramped headquarters to the auditorium of Meadows Elementary School.

Attendance Area Goals

The committee’s stated goals in establishing new attendance areas are to maximize the use of each campus, limit the need for cross-district busing, preserve neighborhood schools and avoid creation of segregated schools.

Parents involved in the controversy admit that it is difficult for them to accept change. Many readily admit they moved away from Los Angeles, the San Fernando Valley and other areas to isolate themselves from desegregation orders, bilingual programs and what they viewed as deteriorating educational programs.

They said they made a conscious decision to live in an area where their children could walk to a neighborhood public school that provides a quality education to a homogeneous group of youngsters.

For the most part, they found this in the 3,700-student Newhall School District.

Standardized test scores at all of the district’s schools are among the top in the state. There are only a few minority children sprinkled throughout the district, and most of them come from the same middle-class backgrounds as their white schoolmates. Whites make up 81% of the district’s students.

Latino Barrio

The area’s only concentration of minorities is in a small Latino barrio of about 1,500 people. The neighborhood, bounded by Market, Race and Park streets and San Fernando Road, is on the southeastern edge of Newhall.

“Most people don’t even know it’s there because it’s this isolated pocket behind the railroad tracks that no one ever goes to,” said a Valencia homemaker.

Even the barrio parents said they have strong reasons for living in the area. They prefer to raise their children in this quiet, close-knit community away from urban ills.

The only problem to disturb the district’s tranquility has been the rapid increase in enrollment. In 1985, there were 2,667 students in the Newhall district. In 1987, enrollment had shot up to 3,130. The most recent data shows that almost 3,700 students attend district schools. Officials expect enrollment to top 4,000 by September.

To handle the growth, the district has placed portable classrooms on every campus. The opening of Valencia Valley is supposed to alleviate many of the crowding problems. However, the region is growing so fast that when Valencia Valley opens in September, the district’s other five schools are expected to have enrollments near capacity.

In the report to be presented tonight, the boundary committee will propose six redistricting plans. The board can adopt one of the plans, combine any of the plans, or discard the committee’s work and draw up its own plan, said Anne Hazlett, the district’s assistant superintendent.

Additionally, the committee will make three general recommendations to the board.

The first would allow open enrollment between Newhall and Valencia Valley schools. This would give families assigned to either campus the chance to choose which one they want their children to attend. The transfer would only be accepted if the minority enrollment at Newhall is not increased by the move.

“This is just an option to help with the ethnic problem at Newhall,” said committee member Robyn Stowell.

The second recommendation calls on the district to construct a new building on the Newhall campus to provide classroom space for 200 to 300 additional students. This would increase the school’s capacity to almost 1,000 children. The new building is needed to provide room for children from housing developments being built in the Newhall attendance zone, the committee said.

Finally, the committee suggests that children from developments on the outskirts of the district be evenly distributed to all six schools instead of being assigned to a single campus. This would prevent one school from becoming “disproportionately overcrowded,” according to the report.

During the week of April 25, a series of public hearings will be held on the committee’s recommendations. Meetings are scheduled for Newhall, Old Orchard, Peachland Avenue and Wiley Canyon, the four elementary campuses involved in the reassignment controversy. The attendance area for Meadows school will be virtually unchanged because no students are bused to the school.

On May 11, the school board is scheduled to vote on a school assignment plan.

But some parents are planning to take matters into their own hands. Some neighborhood organizations have developed their own plans to keep their children at their present schools.

Other parents have discussed suing the school district if their children are bused to a school outside of their area.

Misconceptions Cited

Newhall educators said many white parents hold misconceptions of the district’s bilingual program. No English-speaking student sits idly in a classroom while a teacher or an aide speaks Spanish to a group of students, according to the educators.

As a way to dispel widely held myths, Newhall’s principal and teachers are encouraging parents to come to the school to watch classes.

District officials hope that the controversy will die down once a student assignment plan is adopted and youngsters start school in September.

“The children will adjust in one day,” said Supt. Michael McGrath. “But it will take longer for their parents to adjust. Change is hard for everyone, but it is hardest for adults.”