Huntington Beach School Transfer Rule Disputed

Eight white students were granted transfers Monday from Huntington Beach’s Ocean View High School, but the mother of one of them said she still plans to challenge what she sees as a race-based school district policy.

The eight were among 32 white students who had been denied transfers to other schools under a Huntington Beach Union High School District policy designed to regulate the ethnic balance of students in the district’s eight high schools.

“I feel relieved,” said Susan Prescott, whose son, Nicholas, was granted a transfer. “But we’re not dropping it. We’re still going to sue for his civil rights. I have two more children . . . and I don’t want to go through it again. He was discriminated against, and there are still 24 more kids that didn’t get [out].”

The transfers came as a state official warned the district that its policy “could violate the Constitution’s prohibition against discrimination or preferential treatment” on the basis of race.

State Secretary of Child Development and Education Marian Bergeson also said in a letter to the district last week that, contrary to the district’s belief, state education codes do not mandate that students be barred from transfer based on race.

District officials, though, said state laws that supersede the education code require that the district maintain ethnic balance.

Assistant Supt. John Myers said that the district was preparing a response to Bergeson’s letter, and that it would review the policy this fall as part of a regular policy analysis.

No other response was planned, he said.

The transfers were granted after eight new white students enrolled at Ocean View, which means that the departure of eight other white students would not affect the ethnic mix of the student population, Myers said.

The names of the 32 students requesting transfers were placed in a hat Monday morning, and eight names were drawn, Myers said. More students could be granted transfers if additional white students enroll at Ocean View, he said.

Myers said the policy was instituted five years ago at Westminster after district administrators concluded that state law required them to monitor and maintain ethnic diversity in the schools to avoid racially segregated campuses.

The districtwide student population is about 51% white, according to statistics compiled in October 1997. Individual schools range from 72% white at Pacific Coast High School to 18% white at Westminster High School.

The largest minority groups at Westminster are Asian, 42%, and Latino, 33%. At Ocean View, the largest minority groups are Latino, 29%, and Asian, 21%. Districtwide, the largest minority groups are Asian, 23%, and Latino, 18%.

Last year, Myers said, the transfer policy was applied to Ocean View after district officials recognized that enrollment of white students was dropping by 3% a year, a faster decline than the districtwide pace of 1%.

About 20 transfer requests from white students were denied that year, Myers said. Parents and students initially were upset, but at the end of the year only three of those students still wanted to transfer, he said.

Prescott said family considerations led to a transfer request for her son. The family’s youngest child is autistic and requires treatments in locations ranging from San Diego to UCLA.

With the eldest child, Nicholas, entering high school, Prescott said the family feared he would be unable to participate in extracurricular activities because of transportation problems stemming from the care required by his younger brother. By transferring to Huntington Beach High School, she said, Nicholas would be able to carpool with neighbors.