CHINA IN TURMOIL : California Schools Tell Students to Leave China

University of California and California State University officials have temporarily canceled foreign exchange programs in China and ordered students and faculty members in troubled Beijing to return home as soon as possible.

“We have concerns for their safety until they are out of there because the situation is unpredictable,” said William Allaway, director of the nine-campus University of California Education Abroad Program, which has 22 students in Beijing.

Students were starting to arrive home Tuesday night even as university officials in California and elsewhere were trying to determine exactly how many students and faculty members were in Beijing, let alone studying or traveling elsewhere in the immense country.

Those students and teachers who have not yet booked seats on flights to the United States have been told to stay inside their hotels, university officials said.

“The situation in China continues to deteriorate, and the safety of the students and faculty requires that they come home as quickly as possible,” said Lee Kerschner, vice chancellor of academic affairs for the California State University system.

U.S. Government Flights Sought

Allaway, among others, criticized U.S. officials for failing to hasten the scheduling of government-chartered flights out of Beijing International Airport.

“We think there is a problem of adequate flights, and we’ve been trying to go through congressional delegations to stimulate action through the State Department,” Allaway said. “The State Department has announced a willingness to possibly set up flights, but so far that decision has not . . . been made.”

Officials at Air China, which flies out of Los Angeles International Airport, said the problem was compounded by the time of year. This is the height of the tourist season in China, and airline seats are scarce.

Karen Coffey, 20, a UC Berkeley Chinese history student from San Diego, was among the first American students to arrive home this week.

“I was concerned about my safety. It’s getting worse and worse over there,” said Coffey. “Also, I had my mother here, who was so worried that she couldn’t even form words on the phone and burst into uncontrollable sobbing.”

Brandi Wolf, 20, of Camarillo, a UC Santa Barbara Asian studies major studying at Beijing University, was among those who managed to book a flight out of Beijing--on a jet chartered by the British government.

Her father, Paige Wolf, said he and his wife, Nancy, lost track of their daughter for a harrowing 24 hours before she called late Monday from a police station in Hong Kong, saying she had managed to find an open seat on the British-chartered jet and hoped to be back in the United States soon.

Cal State Seeking 16 Students

Meanwhile, Cal State Northridge officials said Tuesday that they were trying to locate 16 students who had been spending this semester at a Chinese university in the city of Xian, about 600 miles south of Beijing. Northridge officials also said that 13 faculty members have cut short a separate visit to China and are now in Hong Kong awaiting return flights to the United States.

Nine of the 28 students in the Cal State Northridge exchange program have already left China, university President James Cleary said. But three more remain at Shaanxi Teachers University in Xian. Cleary added that several of the 16 students who are unaccounted for may have traveled to Beijing following the end of the semester May 25.

Nina Ellerman, spokeswoman for Pomona College in Claremont, said the school has nine students in China. Four are stranded in Dalian waiting for transportation out of the country, while three others are on independent study. The school has been unable to locate the other two students, who completed their studies just before the military crackdown began and are thought to be traveling through China on their own.

Similar reports came from schools across the nation. Arizona State University, for example, has recalled 19 students and two faculty members who were studying at Anhui University in the city of Hefei, about 60 miles northwest of Nanjing.

The university is trying to remove its students as quickly as possible, but there is only one flight a week out of Hefei.

Reluctance to Leave Beijing

Michael Lerner, 21, of Pacific Palisades, is one of several students who have expressed a reluctance to leave Beijing, according to his mother, Ruth Lerner.

“These students are hoping in their hearts that what looks like a revolution can be resolved more peacefully,” said Lerner, whose son has been studying Chinese in Beijing since September. “I think he is coming to realize that things will only get worse.”

At the request of Los Angeles City Councilman Michael Woo, Mayor Tom Bradley agreed to lower city flags to half-staff “in honor of those who have died in China.”

In San Francisco, which has the largest concentration of Chinese-Americans in the United States, a Chinatown community leader said residents there had buried their political differences and vowed to unify on behalf of the pro-democracy movement in their homeland.

“Every Chinese is upset about the bloody massacre on the mainland. Every Chinese wants to express their anger,” said Li Ye Woo, a spokesman for the Three People’s Principles Assn.

Times staff writers Ashley Dunn, Sam Enriquez and Valarie Basheda also contributed to this story.