2 Area Schools to Add Magnet Programs in Math, Science : Education: Van Nuys High students will be offered a medical course, with practical experience gained at nearby Valley Presbyterian Hospital.

Despite deep budget cuts that have left the Los Angeles Unified School District hunting for money, new magnet programs--including one in medical science--are expected to begin next fall at two San Fernando Valley schools, officials announced Wednesday.

Van Nuys High School will add a medical component to its current mathematics and science magnet school program, with students taking classes and gaining practical experience at nearby Valley Presbyterian Hospital, district officials said. James Madison Junior High School in North Hollywood is due to receive a new mathematics and science magnet.

“It will be an incredible boost to the community,” said school board member Roberta Weintraub, who represents the East Valley, where both programs will be located. “I’m a big supporter of magnets.”

The new programs, along with several others at sites yet to be determined, will be financed through a $2-million reallocation of funds initially earmarked for the district’s racial integration program, said Assistant Supt. Theodore T. Alexander, who heads the office in charge of integration and magnet programs.

Class-size increases instituted earlier this semester cut anticipated integration program costs by nearly $8 million, he said.

With the unexpected windfall, the district began investigating the possibility of adding or expanding magnet programs at schools where space for new students was readily available. How many students the program at Madison could handle has yet to be determined, but as many as 250 could be comfortably added to a campus that now has more than 1,400 students, Principal JoAnna Kunes said.

“We’re very pleased,” Kunes said of the decision to locate a magnet program at Madison. “We have been on an old list as a potential magnet site going back three or four years. But then all the budget problems began to get really serious, and it was put on the back-burner.”

A team of administrators, teachers and parents will meet with the district’s magnet school specialists next week to design the new curriculum at Madison, which Kunes said may target Spanish-speaking students, who are traditionally underrepresented in the district’s 103 magnet programs. “Maybe we can make some inroads in that community,” she said.

District officials decided to add a medical component to the math-science magnet at Van Nuys High because of the school’s proximity to Valley Presbyterian Hospital, which has agreed to allow students to work with doctors and in the hospital’s laboratories, Alexander said.

Initially, about 60 students will be admitted to the program and will attend classes at the hospital as well as at the school, which is also home to a performing arts magnet program.

Alexander said the district hopes eventually to build a 700-student school devoted entirely to such a program, much like Francisco Bravo Medical Magnet High School in Southeast Los Angeles. The district owns a five-acre parcel across from Valley Presbyterian Hospital where the school could be built, Alexander said.