Putting Education to the Test

Opportunities to enroll children in choice public schools outside their neighborhoods, a well-received program that began four years ago during a downturn in enrollment, have dwindled significantly because of surging demographics.

The Los Angeles Unified School District announced last week that only 7,400 seats are available this fall in its open enrollment program, about two-thirds of last year’s number and down from a high of nearly 22,000 when the program began in 1994.

The state’s class-size reduction initiative in kindergarten through third grade, coupled with the so-called baby boom echo, have especially affected elementary schools in West Los Angeles and the western San Fernando Valley--places where for years schools were underused or closed because of aging residents and flight to suburbs and private campuses.

Since the open-enrollment program began, however, shuttered schools are reopening in response to demand. Districtwide enrollment is at an all-time high of 680,000, an encouraging sign for some public school boosters but one that is providing less flexibility for parents seeking alternatives.

The one-month period in which parents may apply to schools outside their immediate neighborhood begins May 4, when the district will release the names of the schools with seats available. Administrators are bracing themselves for widespread disappointment.

“These are real seats and only so many are available,” said Bruce Takeguma, assistant director of school management services. “It’s going to be a real difficult start of the school year if we don’t get the word out now. There is not as much choice.”

The program has worked well for some families, keeping students in the public school system who might otherwise have left the district or turned to private schools.

“It was like winning the Miss America pageant,” said Kijoo Ahn, of learning that his daughter Susan had gotten one of the 250 open positions at Granada Hills’ Frost Middle School two years ago.

The Ahns had considered moving to another neighborhood rather than send their children to their local school, Patrick Henry Junior High School in Granada Hills, which they considered to be academically inferior and physically unappealing.

They felt fortunate to find an opening at Frost, which has slightly higher test scores than Patrick Henry and is a more attractive place but lies in a more expensive neighborhood whose school-age population had declined.

“We have all these houses with four or five bedrooms in the neighborhood, but there aren’t any kids in them,” said Frost Principal Ronald Frydman, adding that his school will have 256 open enrollment seats this fall.

The open enrollment program--which has 25,000 participants-- depends on schools being underpopulated. But the situation at Frost Middle School, which used to be the rule in the more affluent areas of the city, has become the exception.

With 45,000 new students entering the district in the past three years--an unprecedented surge-- most schools are feeling the squeeze.

In addition, the district has seen a shift in population. Part of the impetus behind open enrollment--which was enacted by the Legislature in 1993--was to enable families in less affluent neighborhoods to take advantage of openings at schools with excellent records of academic performance.

Westside and West Valley grade schools had the majority of openings four years ago. Many of those same schools today have no more room, as families have moved within popular school boundaries to ensure spaces for their children, choosing higher housing costs over private school tuition.

For families who cannot afford the choicest neighborhoods, however, the shift is bad news.

Overland Elementary School, near the Westside Pavilion shopping center, gets calls from interested parents every week. The school was only able to offer open enrollment the first year of the program, receiving more than 100 applications for 20 slots. Sue DiJulio, principal at Overland for 11 years, said she understands parents’ anxiety.

“I think parents are frustrated and concerned about getting their child into good schools,” she said.

DiJulio said she has gone from having too few students at her school and recruiting from outside her boundaries to concentrating on serving her local population, including many returning to public school from private institutions.

Competition for seats at schools with high test scores and active parent groups has been fierce all along.

At Dixie Canyon Elementary in Sherman Oaks--where open enrollment slots evaporated after the first two years of the program--the seams are now bursting, with some students being bused to nearby Chandler Elementary so Dixie Canyon can stay under the state-mandated enrollment cap.

The collapse of available seats illustrates open-enrollment’s superficial remedy to the district’s problems, say critics who consider it an elitist anomaly within the public school system. Less than 4% of the district’s students participate in the program, which requires parents to find a desired school and apply to it on their own--and then provide their own transportation.

Open enrollment also has offered the illusion of choice at a time when the district is funding fewer programs, said Amy Stuart Wells, an associate professor of education at UCLA.

“The reality is that Los Angeles Unified is cutting back on other programs like voluntary integration and child care permits with transportation--programs that the district must fund,” said Wells. “That raises all sorts of questions about who has access to choice in this district.”

In many cases, say Wells and other critics, the program has made good schools better while leaving lesser schools in the lurch--not unlike the effect private schools have had on public education. And, just as applying to private schools has created anxiety in many families, so the open-enrollment program has engendered a highly competitive atmosphere.

Robbie Knauer of Studio City wept last year after her daughter Sarah was accepted into the highly coveted Carpenter Avenue Elementary School--three days after school had begun, and after Sarah had started at Colfax Avenue Elementary. The 5-year-old kindergartner did not want to make the switch, oblivious to the waiting list of 400 her mother had conquered.

Carpenter Principal Joan Marks said there will be no open enrollment at her school this year.

“I had nine children move into my boundaries just this week,” she said. Marks and other principals say they understand parents’ frustrations but there is only so much room at the inn.

Rachel Shavik, vice president of the San Fernando Valley chapter of the Parent Teacher Student Assn., said the program is fine but agreed with Wells that it doesn’t address the needs at every school. “Ideally,” Shavik said, “everyone would be able to attend their local school and get a quality education.”

But some parents who chose schools through open enrollment say if they had been forced to send their child to their local school they would have left the district.

“I would be in private school without a doubt,” said Steven Lelles, a Dixie Canyon parent who said he and his wife did not consider their local school an option for their daughter. He considers himself lucky that they applied there at the start of the program and were easily admitted.

“I could never get my daughter into Dixie Canyon today,” Lelles said, “and that’s unfortunate.”