Summer Vacation Ends for 50,000 : Schools: At 64 campuses, year-round schedule goes into effect. Students’ attendance was less than expected.

Two weeks ago, they were kindergartners. But on Friday, the 15 students in Rosa Aguirre’s class at Sierra Vista Elementary School draped their book bags across their chairs and took their seats to begin first grade.

After the scant two-week summer vacation, the youngsters--along with about 50,000 more across the Los Angeles Unified School District--began a new school year Friday at 64 schools that have converted to year-round operation this summer to relieve overcrowding.

They join more than 140,000 others already attending 102 year-round schools in the district. Because there are several different year-round calendars in use in the 610,000-student district, groups of pupils stop and start school throughout the year.

The 63 elementary schools and one junior high are the largest contingent to convert at one time. The transition will provide a testing ground for the district, which plans to put the remainder of its 600 schools on a year-round schedule next summer.

“Things were going very smoothly at the schools today, and we expected that,” said Joyce Peyton, who helps the district coordinate year-round schools. “You’d think the schools had been year-round all their lives.”

The new year-round schools are all “multitrack,” meaning students are divided into four groups, with each group getting two six-week vacations during the year. Schedules are arranged so that one group is always on vacation, generating about 25% more classroom seats throughout the year.

Schools that opted to go year-round this summer get first dibs on state funds for air-conditioning. Only 12 of the 64 schools have more than half of their classrooms air-conditioned, and 17 have no air-conditioning at all.

In the meantime, portable fans have been placed in classrooms and offices, and some schools are considering starting earlier in the day to minimize class time during the afternoon heat.

The earlier dismissals would also allow neighborhood children more use of the school playgrounds--the only supervised play areas in some neighborhoods. District schoolyards are usually open from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. in the summer, but year-round school playgrounds are off-limits for all but students during the school day.

The district did no official attendance tally Friday, but at many schools, up to one-third of the expected students failed to show, in part, because classes started on the last day of a holiday week.

District officials had planned to delay the start until Monday, but the teachers’ union, which must approve school calendars, opted to begin a day earlier and add an extra day off to the winter vacation in December.

“We tried to give as much notice of the schedule as we could, but some families had already made their summer plans,” explained Sierra Vista Principal Seth Sandberg, who has worked at several year-round schools.

“The first year is always a little rough, but we’ll all adjust,” he said. “The students who miss the time now can make it up during the (three-week) intersession (between classes) later this year.”

Those students who did show up seemed sanguine about spending their summer vacation behind their desks.

“It’s OK . . . I just don’t like getting up so early,” said Mario Martinez, who began the fifth grade Friday at Sierra Vista. “When we were off, I was sleeping till 10 o’clock. Now I have to set my alarm clock to wake me up” in time to get to school by 8 a.m., he said.

While the school board debate over year-round schools earlier this year engendered plenty of opposition among parents, many now seem satisfied with their new schedules and the benefits of year-round education, school officials said.

“Our parents realized it’s the only way to go to handle our overcrowding,” said Louis Owens, principal of Nevin Avenue Elementary School, near USC. Last year, 660 students attended Nevin, but another 500 from the neighborhood had to be bused to schools as far away as Chatsworth. Year-round operation will allow enough space for many of those students to return.

Parents and staff at Sierra Vista, near El Sereno, are grateful to get the school’s library back. The library and teachers’ lounge had been converted to classrooms two years ago, when the school ran out of space to put students.

But parents are disappointed that the “year-round incentive” money traditionally doled out by the state might not be forthcoming.

That money has amounted to more than $150 per student at each year-round school in Los Angeles, but Gov. George Deukmejian has warned the district the budget crunch might mean less money this year, meaning schools might get little or nothing to fund the improvements they had planned.