Parents Oppose Capistrano District Proposal for Transfer of Students

About 150 parents showed up at a meeting of the Capistrano Unified School District trustees Monday night to protest the district’s plan to transfer their children from an elementary school in San Juan Capistrano to a heavily Latino school nearby.

The district staff has recommended that some students from Ambuehl Elementary School be transferred to San Juan Elementary School, which has fewer students, 52% of whom are Latino.

“It’s an unprecedented policy to move established students,” complained Karen Hester, whose 5-year-old daughter attends kindergarten at Ambuehl but would be transferred to San Juan Elementary in the fall under the proposal.

Hester, who helped organize a meeting of about 100 parents, said San Juan Elementary has had a history of poor curriculum and low parent involvement. “The school is 52% Hispanic, and they have the lowest test scores,” she said.

But Jerome R. Thornsley, superintendent of Capistrano Unified, disputed the inference that San Juan Elementary was not as good a school as Ambuehl.

“We have excellent teachers in all of the schools,” Thornsley said after about 14 Ambuehl parents spoke publicly against the planned transfer Monday night. “If someone assumes San Juan is an inferior school, I don’t accept that.”

Jackie Cerra, a spokeswoman for the Capistrano Unified School District, said the planned move is necessary because “Ambuehl has exceeded its capacity and does not have enough room to accommodate its projected enrollment for October, 1988.”

Under the proposal, about 295 Ambuehl students who live in the Spotted Bull, Village of San Juan, and Country Hills neighborhoods would be transferred to San Juan Elementary in the fall.

At least 10 portable classrooms would be needed for San Juan to accommodate the extra students, said William F. Dawson, assistant superintendent of facilities and services for Capistrano Unified.

Dawson said Ambuehl already has 18 portable classrooms on its campus and cannot make room for any more.

Scrambling to Find Room

Dramatic growth in the south county has left district officials scrambling to find enough room for the onslaught of new students, Dawson said.

With 1,008 students currently attending Ambuehl, district officials are projecting that enrollment will grow to 1,093 by October, 1988. Even with the portable classrooms at Ambuehl, the school already far exceeds its capacity of 868 students, he said.

That is why district officials this year have sent 133 sixth-grade students to Marco Forster Junior High School in San Juan Capistrano, Cerra said. Even if the district continued to send sixth-graders to Marco Forster, there would still be too many students in the lower grades, she said.

Cerra said a committee formed to study the issue developed options for the district: Send some students to San Juan Elementary; add four more portable classrooms at Ambuehl, and transfer all sixth-grade students to either Marco Forster or to Del Obispo Elementary.

School district staff recommended sending Ambuehl students to San Juan Elementary as the best option.

But parents who turned out Monday night disagreed.

“We are here for our children; my 7-year-old says he loves Ambuehl,” Robert Bacha told board members.

Trustees, who listened to the parents without comment Monday night, said they would hear additional testimony on the issue at the school board’s May 2 meeting and would schedule a vote for May 16.

Meanwhile, Hester, who expressed concern that enrollment at San Juan Elementary is predominantly Latino, said she has no problem with the school itself, or its principal and teachers.

“They have bilingual teachers and bilingual programs, and they are really trying to upgrade the school (San Juan). I don’t have a problem with my child going to that school. I do have a problem having them plop almost 300 children on that campus,” she said.