GLENDALE : Educators See Limits to Open Enrollment

While Glendale educators believe a policy allowing parents greater latitude to choose what school their child attends is overdue, they say it will be difficult to provide space for more students in the district’s most crowded schools.

The Glendale Board of Education will review Tuesday a proposal designed to meet provisions of a state law that requires California school districts to adopt open enrollment policies by July 1. The board is scheduled to vote on a proposed choice plan April 19.

Board President Jane Whitaker said educators have long ignored parents’ requests for greater choice in their children’s education.

The district proposal requires parents to file applications requesting that their children be allowed to attend a school other than their neighborhood school.

The Office of Student Services then will place applications into a pot for each school and randomly draw requests to match the number of slots available. When each school is full, officials will continue to draw names to be placed on a waiting list.

Donald Empey, deputy superintendent of educational services, said some schools may have no vacancies to fill. “It is possible that many schools will have no openings; a lot will depend on the movement of kids from school to school,” he said.

The number of spaces available for additional students at each school will be determined by the school’s recommended capacity minus its projected enrollment.

Officials also must consider spaces filled by a permit system currently in place that allows parents to transfer their child to another school for child-care reasons, or for a specific curriculum. The district issued 500 transfer permits for the 1993-94 school year.

Unlike in the Los Angeles Unified School District, Glendale educators do not expect a clash between the choice system and school integration policy. The district’s student body is racially mixed, eliminating the need to maintain a balance at individual schools, Empey said.

If the board adopts the plan, it will send a letter explaining the choice policy to parents in early May. Applications to transfer schools would then be due by May 27. Administrators are researching how many spots will be available districtwide.