This Woman Has Big Plans : An Enterprising Nun Is the Backbone of Multifaceted Literacy Program in East L.A.

Against the backdrop of downtown skyscrapers, a caravan of trailers is rolling onto an empty lot in East Los Angeles. Surveying the scene, blueprints in hand, is Sister Jennie Lechtenberg, the enterprising nun who intends to make the flat patch of brown dirt the home of her new learning center.

“You’re given your lot in life, and you have to do something with it,” she quips.

Lechtenberg, who six years ago founded the Puente Learning Center, a multifaceted literacy program for adults and children in Boyle Heights, has been on the move this summer, searching for a place for her students to settle.

The program, which offers classes in English as a second language for the entire family, has been strongly supported by the city’s education and business establishments, attracting assistance from the Richard and Jill Riordan Foundation, IBM, Citibank and Times Mirror Corp.

It is the largest of several such efforts in Los Angeles and the only one on the Eastside, officials say.

Puente “has fostered a real community spirit,” observes Lupe Reyes, administrator of the Los Angeles Unified School District’s operations for adult and occupational education. “Sister Jennie’s enthusiasm is so catching that people are committed to doing anything to make the program work.”

For awhile, however, the program was running in the danger zone.

As of May, Puente was out of a home. The school’s lease was up on space it had been renting in a community center, and at the 11th hour a deal for new quarters fell through.

Bursting at the seams, the school had a waiting list of students, and Lechtenberg had been patrolling the neighborhood for more than a year, poking into the area’s traditional brick buildings to find a larger space.

When she found a former bank building down the street, the students packed up their books and papers, computers were put in storage, and a staffer’s husband brought a beer truck to help move tables and chairs.

Still, on the designated “blue Monday,” when she went to the bank, check in hand for the first three months’ rent, Lechtenberg learned that the owner had changed his mind: The building would be rented as office space to the Los Angeles Police Department for double the amount Puente was supposed to pay.

“I ended up at the bank with the check, blueprints and no place to go,” she recalls.

However, there was never any question that Puente would not continue its programs.

The school has been overcoming obstacles since it began with Lechtenberg, one assistant and 70 students.

With the help of firefighters, police and nearby merchants, Lechtenberg put up drywall, painted and remodeled a warren of offices, transforming them into classrooms and a computer laboratory.

Today Puente has a staff of 22 and 900 students, 700 of them in adult literacy programs.

With similar determination, a solution was found within three days of the bank fiasco.

Puente’s staff and students would camp out on the two-acre lot, bought and donated to the school a year ago by the Richard and Jill Riordan Foundation, which supports child literacy programs.

Puente supporters went to work getting permits to occupy the land, workers cleared dead trees and an architect began to design a trailer “learning park,” connected by a series of ramps and decks.

Meanwhile, the desks and chairs went into temporary storage at the parochial Salesian High School nearby, which also lent space for Puente’s summer school.

Once completed, the modular mobile classrooms will house a full contingent of programs: computer language programs for preschoolers; high school equivalency programs; English as a second language for adults; facilities to develop software for Spanish-speakers learning English, and a new job training program in computer skills.

“It’s a one-stop approach to adult education in the community,” says James Figueroa, assistant superintendent of the Los Angeles Unified School District’s Division of Adult and Occupational Education. “People can get education here morning, afternoon and evening.”

“You’re going to see a hub of activity,” says Lechtenberg, who sees education as the answer to the community problems ranging from drugs to jobs to family harmony.

It also is the answer to the most basic daily needs, providing a safe haven where latchkey children can spend the afternoon, or a quiet place where high school students can study in the evening and where neighborhood volunteers can give them encouragement.

“Many of our students just need someone who’ll talk to them and say, ‘You’ve done a good job,’ ” says Lechtenberg.

The outfitted trailers opened their doors Aug. 19, the beginning of the school year for Puente.

In two years the school hopes to have a permanent building on the lot--one with classrooms emptying out onto a central courtyard “where people can talk to each other (in English),” Lechtenberg says.

Meanwhile, students have volunteered to clear the remaining weeds from the grounds. They also plan a bake sale to help raise money for the new classrooms.

Looking at the still-barren spot, Lechtenberg says, “I love this lot because I see growth here.”

And, at last, the entrepreneur of Eastside education sees a permanent home for her growing grass-roots enterprise.

“The people will know that Puente is here to stay,” she vows. “It’s not another temporary place.”