Values Lesson : Vandalism Gives Students an Up-Close Look at Bigotry

A recent statewide poll conducted for Policy Analysis for California Education (PACE) found that Californians want schools to take a strong role in teaching values to their children. PACE is a nonpartisan think tank that studies the effects of state policy on schools and citizens. In fact, 80% of those polled consider the values a school teaches very important, ranking it higher than the school’s reputation, discipline, class sizes and test scores on a list of 13 criteria for choosing a campus.

But officials at Mayall Elementary in North Hills did not need a poll to understand that it made sense to turn two ugly incidents into a valuable lesson.

Twice within the past year, the school has been scarred by vandals who have defaced it with all manner of swastikas, satanic symbols and other visages of religious intolerance. Instead of attempting to shield her students, however, Mayall Principal Barbara Fuller instructed her teachers to walk students past the spray paint scrawl before it was removed. Then, Fuller strongly urged her instructors to discuss the meaning of racial and religious hatred with their charges. But that wasn’t the end of it.

This week, the vandalism was the subject of an hourlong assembly at Mayall that brought in the LAPD’s top cop in the San Fernando Valley, Deputy Chief Mark A. Kroeker, Deputy Dist. Atty. B. Kay Schafer and others.

“I want them to realize what an awful thing had happened,” Principal Fuller said. “I want our children to be vigilant, to see that they have an important part in preventing this. . . . I want our kids to respect each other.”

In the Valley, where reported hate crimes have increased by 30% over last year, against a decline for the city as a whole, Fuller’s effort was indeed a value worth teaching.