LAKE FOREST : Students Walk Out to Support Teachers

Forming a long line through city streets, about 500 students from El Toro High School walked off campus Thursday and marched to another nearby school in support of their teachers, who have been without a union contract for nearly a year.

Don Martin, principal at El Toro High, said that about 40 teachers, about half his staff, began walking off campus at the end of the morning snack break, urging students to join them.

“They walked out the front gate and the students followed them,” Martin said. “But the teachers stopped in the parking lot, realizing they would be guilty of abandonment of position if they walked. The kids kept going.”

With a sheriff’s squad car creeping beside them to ensure order, the students walked a few miles to Trabuco Hills High and gathered peacefully in the stadium, where Martin and a negotiator for the Saddleback Valley Unified School District answered their questions about the status of contract talks. Then they boarded a bus and returned to class, Martin said.

Similar student walkouts were staged at Los Alisos Intermediate School on Thursday and at Trabuco last week. Some students, especially seniors, are worried that teachers might withhold final exams or grades to demonstrate their unhappiness with the standoff in negotiations.

Bonnie Chadd, president of the Saddleback Valley Educators Assn., said the union has suggested that teachers consider withholding grades to seniors. Teachers in the district have been without a contract since last July. They are still negotiating with the district.

“They’re exasperated, pushed to the point of frustration at not being able to sign a contract,” she said. “We’ve been patient. We’re asking for zero.”

Martin said that if teachers withhold grades or exams, they could be disciplined by the district. He said he is optimistic the contract impasse will soon be resolved.