The New Math: Year-Round School Inevitable

The once-radical idea of replacing traditional summer vacations with year-round schools used to draw hundreds of angry parents to public meetings and threatened to unseat its supporters on the Los Angeles school board.

But what was the hot-button political issue is now simple arithmetic.

An exploding student population has prompted year-round classes at 190 campuses citywide, mostly elementary schools. The school board later this month is expected to approve the conversion of four high schools--the first in the San Fernando Valley--to year-round classes, a change needed to accommodate hundreds of new students expected for the coming school year.

“This is not the district saying you have to be multitrack year-round because it’s the right thing to do for philosophical and political reasons,” said Board of Education President Mark Slavkin.

It’s a decision, he said, based on population rather than politics.

The overwhelming numbers may explain the resignation at North Hollywood, Monroe, Francis Polytechnic and San Fernando high schools, proposed to begin a year-round schedule this summer.

“I think most teachers have acquiesced,” said Dick Crowell, a social studies teacher and union representative at San Fernando High. “We feel that our hands are tied and we don’t have any other options.”

The four schools will be adding hundreds of ninth-grade students to their campuses next year in a districtwide reorganization. Elementary schools are giving up sixth-grade students to middle schools, which in turn will send ninth-graders to the high schools.

The addition of a freshman class--expected to reach 1,200 students at Polytechnic in Sun Valley--has left the schools with little choice but to operate classrooms all year.

Under the proposal, the students are divided among three groups--with one of the groups on vacation while the other two are in session. Each student would complete 163 school days a year, 17 fewer days than the traditional schedule. About 39 minutes are added to each school day to compensate.

“The East Valley is an overcrowded area--period,” said Joyce Peyton, the district administrator in charge of finding classroom seats for students. “We walked every campus with administrators, teacher representatives and, in many cases, parents to make sure that every nook and cranny was being used.”

Polytechnic, for example, is already operating over its capacity.

“We have run out of rooms,” said Beverly Bushner, the assistant principal. “This was an eventuality and we’re there. It hit this year.”

Other Valley schools first sought other solutions to the overcrowding.

North Hollywood High, for example, had asked about adding portable classrooms, as well as changing its attendance boundaries. Administrators had sought permission to relocate its adult school to another campus.

District officials said, however, there is no money to add new portable classrooms. Boundary changes would only increase overcrowding at other schools. The district also denied the request to move the adult school.

School Principal Catherine Lum warned her supervisor in a memo that the school could lose students if the traditional September-June calendar is changed to year-round.

“I anticipate that we may lose 400 students to other schools [on a traditional schedule] as we begin our multitrack schedule,” Lum wrote to her boss, Carmen Schroeder. “The 1996-97 school year will, most likely, leave parents, students and staff asking why did we ever go multitrack.”

Some parents already are asking that question.

“There were alternatives that should have been better explored,” said Susan Branman, whose son attends the magnet program for highly gifted students at North Hollywood. “They’re not looking at other options at all.”

Branman said she is uncertain what she will do if the school converts to a year-round schedule.

District officials say they are more concerned about accommodating growing numbers of new high school students than school transfers.

And even board members who have opposed the year-round school system concede they have little choice. The state has no money for new school construction, the only other solution to the overcrowding.

“When we see these schools growing to 3,000 or 3,500 [students], there’s a limit to how creative we can be,” said board member Julie Korenstein. “It’s an unfortunate decision that any of us has to make. But it gives you a little bit of room for growth.”

To encourage the move to year-round schedules, the district has begun installing air conditioning at the four Valley high schools--where classroom temperatures routinely hover in the 90s during the summer months.

Besides air conditioning, the schools will also receive an additional $70 per student in state funding, as well as $50,000 to cover the costs of switching to a year-round schedule.

Two other high schools--Van Nuys and Grant--are resisting the move to year-round classes, gambling that the district estimates are too high and that they will be able to accommodate all of their new students next year.

Van Nuys, which last year sought--without success--to close its magnet program rather than switch to a year-round schedule, is projected to enroll 3,850 students next year, 400 students over capacity.

District officials predict Grant will enroll 3,750 students next fall, well over its capacity of 3,600.

At Polytechnic, teacher and student representatives plan to visit some of the district’s 14 year-round high schools in other parts of the city to assist in the change.

“Nobody’s looking at it with great joy, but it’s inevitable,” said Hector Colon, a biology teacher and union representative at Polytechnic.

Coaches at the four high schools are nervous about the year-round schedule but believe they can adjust. Student athletes will be expected to show up for team practices, even if they are on vacation.

“Coaches in general don’t like change,” said Kim McEwen, who coaches girls’ basketball and softball at Polytechnic. “The first year is going to be difficult, getting adjusted to new schedules. I’ve talked to other coaches and they don’t see any long-term problems.”

San Fernando football Coach Sean Blunt expressed concern about his students being away from the playing field, but doesn’t see a problem once practice begins.

“If the kids are dedicated to playing football, they will be here,” Blunt said.

Times staff writer Michael Lazarus contributed to this story.