Schools Chief Urges End to 9th-Grade Plan : Education: Officials in Acton and Agua Dulce want to begin a local program this fall. The county may block that move.

The county superintendent of schools on Monday urged elementary school officials from Acton and Agua Dulce to cancel plans to begin a local high school program this fall, an indication that the county may block local parents’ desires to keep children near home.

Los Angeles County Schools Supt. Stuart Gothold made the request in a four-page letter to the Soledad-Agua Dulce Union School District, warning that the expense of ninth-grade classes would bankrupt the small, rural district.

He asked for an answer by April 15. Although his letter is only advisory for now, county officials have the power to force the school district to comply.

“We will expect and require the full cooperation of the board and every member of the district staff as we work together to solve these difficult problems,” Gothold said. The letter also announced that the county plans to monitor the district’s troubled finances.

The school board in the 1,600-student elementary district, where residents voted overwhelmingly last November to add secondary education, decided March 25 to start their own ninth-grade program this fall at the district’s High Desert middle school in Acton.

The district has no high school of its own yet, so this fall’s 10th- through 12th-graders will continue to attend classes in the separate Antelope Valley Union High School District. Under the county’s plan, the ninth-graders would go to the Antelope Valley as well.

In his letter, Gothold cited the increased costs for busing, staff, utilities and supplies the district would incur by running its own ninth-grade program. Gothold’s letter did not mention, however, that the district also will have to pay the Antelope Valley high school district to accept its students.

The Soledad district’s planned ninth grade already was running into trouble before Gothold’s letter--from its own students. As of last week, 43 of this year’s 152 eighth-graders had obtained waivers to attend Antelope Valley high schools this fall.

A ninth-grade program was favored by Acton and Agua Dulce parents who dislike their children’s long bus rides into the Antelope Valley and fear crime and other problems on the campuses there. But the students favor the broader sports, social and academic opportunities of the larger high school district.