3 Districts Sell Names of Students to Military : High schools: Officials say they have received few complaints about providing lists to recruiters. But opposition is growing statewide.

Three of Ventura County’s biggest school districts furnish students’ names and addresses to military recruiters, while other districts either refuse to release the data or provide it only with parent or student consent.

Officials in the Simi Valley Unified, Oxnard Union High and Ventura Unified school districts, which together have 18,600 high-school students, said they provide names of seniors to military recruiters for a nominal processing fee.

“We do, upon request, give names and addresses of seniors to the armed forces,” said Allan Jacobs, associate superintendent of the Simi Valley district. “The only thing we charge them for is the cost of preparing the list, which is minimal.”

In Ventura Unified, however, officials withhold data on students whose parents have signed a form requesting that their child’s name not be released, Assistant Supt. Joseph Spirito said.

Officials in all three districts said they have received few complaints from parents or students about the practice in recent years.

Across California, however, the lists--usually sold for about three to five cents per name--are facing increasing opposition from parents and educators. Some school officials expect resistance to grow as the war in the Persian Gulf continues.

The practice is legal under the state Education Code.

But the Oakland Board of Education recently stopped giving out names after complaints from parents, and opposition is growing in the Los Angeles Unified School District. Some of the complaints focus on concerns that the military is touted to poor and minority students as the only way out of poverty.

So far, there have been few complaints in Ventura County schools, although one parent raised the issue at a recent Simi Valley Unified school board meeting, officials said.

In Simi Valley, board member Douglas Crosse equated military recruitment with college recruitment and said the district has historically applied the same policy of allowing recruiters access to students in both areas.

“It’s a postgraduate opportunity,” Crosse said. “It offers scholarships that might not be available to students otherwise. I don’t think it’s appropriate to change the policy with a war going on. When you go into the military, you don’t go in there thinking you’re going to day camp.”

Bob Costello, a member of the Ventura County Coalition for Peace in the Persian Gulf, said that the coalition has not taken a stand on the issue, but that he personally did not object to releasing names. The military “is certainly a career option for a lot of people,” Costello said. “The coalition is very supportive of the troops in general. It’s the war we oppose.”

But 16-year-old Mitra Rahnema, a student member of the coalition, said she opposed the practice. “Personally, I think it’s wrong,” the Ventura High junior said. “I have friends who get calls all the time, and they don’t want to have to deal with it. There’s no way I would want my name on a list like that.”

To protect students’ privacy, officials in Fillmore Unified, Conejo Valley Unified, Oak Park Unified and Santa Paula Union High said they do not provide such lists.

“We have a long history of not releasing names to the military,” said Assistant Supt. Richard Simpson of the Conejo Valley district. “That policy was reviewed last year by the board and they stood by it adamantly.”

Fillmore Supt. Marlene Davis said the district does not release students’ names because some recruiters “just bug the heck out of kids.”

The Moorpark Unified School District will provide names of seniors but not addresses or phone numbers, Assistant Supt. Charles Smith said. However, the military has not requested the names in the recent past.

And in the Ojai Unified School District, Nordhoff High School began restricting military access to students’ names two years ago after students complained that they were being harassed, Principal Ron Barney said.

“We had a couple of guys who were really aggressive recruiters, and kids really got hounded at home,” Barney said. Now, the school only releases the names of students who have consented, he said.

Santa Paula Union High Principal Robert Fisher said his son was bombarded by calls and flyers when he graduated from Conejo Valley’s Newbury Park High five years ago, despite the district’s policy of confidentiality. The flyers still come occasionally, Fisher said.

In Ventura, Army Staff Sgt. Richard Bollier said recruiters from his office put brochures in the career counseling offices at Buena, Ventura and St. Bonaventure high schools, but that they rely most heavily on weekly visits to the campuses to recruit students. His office has not used the lists since he arrived in December.

Sgt. Charles Mujica, an Army recruiter in Oxnard, estimated that his office has contacted every high school student in Oxnard, Camarillo and Port Hueneme either by telephone, mail or at campus career day activities.

But Mujica said he has cautioned his recruiters not to pressure students. “I’m trying to teach my recruiters not to do that,” Mujica said. “If students say they’re not interested, that’s it. If you get somebody upset, it’s not going to do anybody any good.”