Los Alamitos Trustees May Have to Rethink $10,000 Gift : Schools: Anonymous donor specified that the money benefit male high school students. Legal experts wonder if it meets equal educational opportunity standards.

The donations to the Los Alamitos Unified School District last week were mostly ordinary: a collection of National Geographic magazines, $150 worth of used computer equipment and a few dozen dictionaries.

Then came one that took the five-member school board aback--an anonymous $10,000 donation “to be used for the general welfare of male students.”

Though surprised it was so specific, the board was nonetheless pleased with the anonymous donor’s largess and within minutes voted unanimously to accept it.

Little did they know, their acceptance could prove unconstitutional. Legal experts say public schools that receive federal funds cannot earmark spending solely for members of one sex unless they have substantial justification. Though there are scholarships designated for women and certain racial and ethnic minorities, they can be justified under affirmative action as compensating for historical wrongs or disparate treatment. The terms of the bequest look “like straight gender discrimination, which must be justified by showing there is an important reason for it,” said Julian Eule, a professor of constitutional law at UCLA. “I am at a loss to figure out what that would be for male students.”

In explaining the gift earmarked for male Los Alamitos High School students, School Board President Donna Artukovic said the donor “sounded like a person who might have had some [financial] difficulties in his high school years,” and who wanted to spare other young men from similar problems.

He stipulated that the principal and the athletic director at the high school select one or more students to receive half of the interest earned by the donation for academic or athletic expenses. For the first few years, that would amount to between $200 and $300.

Though it is not a substantial sum, it could cause problems for the school district if challenged.

A U.S. Department of Education spokesman said Wednesday it would take further study to determine if the gift violated Title IX, a law designed to prevent gender discrimination in schools that receive any federal funding. Used to get schools to increase athletic funding for female students nationally, the law says a school can accept donations from wills and trusts for one sex, but they must match them with an equal financial assistance for the other sex.

If the school is unable to provide matching gifts for the opposite sex, “they are not able to accept the [gift],” said Charles Love of the Education Department’s office of civil rights.

Reached for comment Wednesday, two school board members said that, although they thought the donation was very generous, they did not want to break the law.

“If something needs to be changed, we will change it,” board member Matthew Duggan said. “As a school district we certainly don’t want to treat anyone unfairly.”

Board member Virginia Wilson said she, too, would look into it. “I am going to find out right away” whether it is legal, she said, since the district wants to be “fair and equitable and follow the law.”