Students Rush to Beat Schools’ Red Light on Driver Training : Education: The Los Angeles district has said it must discontinue behind-the-wheel classes by June 30 because of budget constraints.

Michelle DePackh is 15 and, like all her friends, wants desperately to get a driver’s license. But first she had to fight for a spot in a driver’s training class at El Camino Real High.

“That class is hard to get into,” DePackh said. “My mom had to call the principal.”

Tony Delgado wasn’t as fortunate. The 17-year-old could not get a seat in any of the cars for student drivers at Reseda High last fall. This semester his school days are filled with required classes.

In the meantime, he had been driving without a license.

“But not since I crashed the car,” he said.

Los Angeles students are accustomed to waiting for behind-the-wheel instruction because cutbacks have forced schools to offer fewer and smaller training classes.

But last week, the waiting game became a mad dash when the Los Angeles Unified School District announced that it had run out of money to pay driving instructors and would drop the program by June 30.

Such drastic action has been threatened before, but the district came up with last-minute funding. Nevertheless, students are panicking at the prospect of the elimination of behind-the-wheel driver’s training.

If the program is cut, students who can’t squeeze into a class by semester’s end will have to pay as much as $300 for private instruction. Or they will have to wait until they are 18, when the Department of Motor Vehicles allows them to apply for a license without training.

“I’d like to go to dances and not have to have my parents drive,” said Scott Hill, a 16-year-old Van Nuys High School sophomore.

Said Courtney Myers, 15, a student at El Camino Real High: “We heard that there may be only a few more sessions left. There are a lot of kids trying to rush in.”

Teachers say driver’s training is more than just a prerequisite for a license. It is a rite of passage.

The journey begins with those first anxious moments behind the wheel, a teacher at one elbow and classmates peering from the back seat.

The novice driver who slows appropriately at intersections and checks before changing lanes is rewarded with a passing grade.

This translates into a learner’s permit, which can be obtained at age 15 1/2 and is a first step toward adulthood and independence.

Jaunts to the mall or the movies aren’t the only reason teen-agers want to drive.

Benito Johnson, a 17-year-old Reseda High student, hopes to work as a chauffeur after graduation. And DePackh needs to drive to get to school.

“Where we live there is no busing, no public transportation,” said her mother, Suzanne Gutsch of West Hills, who persuaded school officials to fit Michelle into an already filled session.

“It’s a necessity for her to have a license.”

But driver’s training is also a fringe program vulnerable to cutbacks as school funds tighten. The district will continue to pay for driver’s education in the classroom, but officials must cut behind-the-wheel training because state money for that program dried up two years ago.

Although Gov. Pete Wilson’s upcoming state budget includes a proposed $21 million for driver’s training, similar proposals were dropped from two previous budgets.

“If we don’t get someone in a very high position to start rejuvenating driver training, I expect it will go down the drain,” said Fred English, the supervisor of driver’s education in Los Angeles schools.

Before 1982, the district could afford to train more than 40,000 students a year. Last year, with a trimmed $4-million budget, the program accommodated 27,000. This year, only 13,000 will be trained. At some schools, the oldest students get priority. On other campuses, it’s first come, first served.

The quality of instruction has suffered as well, English said. Students used to spend as many as 25 hours behind the wheel of driving simulators and actual cars. Now they practice 16 hours over eight days.

Students can enroll if they have a physical education class or free period, the only activities they are allowed to miss for driver’s training sessions. They must also come to school early or stay late to practice on simulators. The schedule can get tricky for those with jobs. And athletes, whose physical education classes are part of team practice, are often left out.

“During our season, nobody would even ask to miss eight days of practice,” said Steve Marden, the baseball coach at San Fernando High.

The cutbacks have also affected private schools in the San Fernando Valley, some of whose students used to get after-school or weekend training in public schools.

Those sessions were cut last September.

English and his instructors worry about a generation of new drivers hitting the streets without formal training.

A 1976 study by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration showed that school-taught drivers are less likely to be involved in accidents or get tickets in their first four years on the road.

“People say, ‘Let the parents teach their kids,’ “said Jim Hiller, a driving instructor. “Well, drive down Van Nuys Boulevard sometime and watch how the parents drive.”

Nor are students anxious for home lessons.

“At least a teacher won’t yell at you like your parents will,” said George Virgen, 15, who attends Van Nuys High School.

One thing about high school driving classes hasn’t changed--the fun that students appear to have.

On a recent afternoon at El Camino Real High, DePackh and her classmates were crowded into a darkened trailer, sitting at rows of simulators and watching a flickering movie screen before them.

Nervous giggles fluttered around the room as the would-be drivers steered along a cinematic roadway.

“I’m so glad I got in this class,” DePackh said.