An Early Start for the Police

Students at other Los Angeles high schools cut open frogs. Police magnet school cadets study crime scenes and do DNA testing. Other kids shoot baskets or whack tetherballs. Cadets scramble through challenging obstacle courses in a minute flat.

“We imagine ourselves as real police officers,” said David Muth, an 18-year-old senior at the police magnet program at James Monroe High School in North Hills.

That statement brings smiles to officials of the Los Angeles Police Department. Having experienced trouble recruiting sufficient numbers for the force, they see the five police magnet programs in Los Angeles schools as a way to create future police officers.

And the police magnets are but one element in the LAPD’s vision of developing a natural stream of home-grown recruits and increasing community service among young people.

The first academy opened at Dorsey High School in 1996. Since then, Roberta Weintraub, the former Los Angeles Unified School District board member who is executive director of the police magnet program, has raised $21 million for the schools from high-powered donors.

The program has become a darling of City Council members, the mayor, the school district and the LAPD’s upper command. At present, 481 students are enrolled at police magnet programs at Dorsey, Wilson, Reseda, San Pedro and Monroe high schools.

At the same time, the LAPD continues to operate its Explorer program, begun 37 years ago. After receiving some initial training at the Police Academy, Explorers meet a couple of times a week or as needed at police stations or elsewhere.

After an Explorer graduation last summer, Police Chief Bernard C. Parks issued a directive to expand the program in three years from 400 participants to 2,000.

“I look at these programs not only as invaluable tools for city employment, but as a boon for the criminal justice system,” said Parks. “This is a way to touch more kids than ever before, kids who will not only be performing valuable public services for Los Angeles, but who will also be directed in a noble path.”

Youths Encouraged to Give Back

The magnet and Explorer programs appear alike at first glance but actually are quite distinct.

When the Explorer program was begun by the Boy Scouts in 1962, the idea was to encourage young people ages 14 to 21 to give back to the community while learning about law enforcement careers. The California Highway Patrol, the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department and the LAPD soon had hundreds of young people working at parades, helping small businesses and churches with security and assisting officers with field searches for evidence.

Uniforms and other expenses in the LAPD’s Explorer program are covered through fund-raising or income from various tasks, such as directing traffic at public events.

Explorers--who must pass physical, written and oral exams before undergoing three weekends of training at the academy--do a minimum of 20 hours of community service a month.

Service acts as a balancing agent for youngsters who often think of police work in terms of chasing and shooting.

“If you draw kids who have a cowboy image of policing, who . . . only see themselves as cops, then you’re getting people who are pretty limited,” said William Darrough, a sociology professor at Cal State L.A. who has worked extensively with the Sheriff’s Department. “They need to receive a broad service orientation.”

In contrast, cadets in the police magnets do about 20 hours of community service over a year. They do not have to worry about paying for uniforms or other accessories. And there are no entrance exams, though physical fitness later becomes a key part of their training.

The magnet program gets funding from big-name donors such as the Ahmanson Foundation, the Walt Disney Foundation, Bank of America and the U.S. Department of Education.

With no money for marketing, Explorer recruiters rely on referrals from churches, the Boy Scouts and parents and school organizations.

The Los Angeles Police Academy Magnet Schools program, on the other hand, has money for shiny badge-like pins, promotional videos, full-color brochures and other marketing tools.

LAPD Cmdr. Eric Lillo said the department hasn’t pursued grants for the Explorer program because potential donors don’t consider it “innovative.”

However, Sheriff’s Department Explorer programs have benefited from grants, including $10,000 recently awarded to the Century Station, said Sgt. Karen Smith.

Meantime, Weintraub, who earns $80,000 as executive director, has used her contacts to promote the magnet program.

Grant money for the magnet program has provided fitness trainers and built state-of-the-art gyms with expensive workout machines. It has built computer labs and elaborate obstacle courses. Within the year, half-million-dollar forensic labs, where DNA and other analyses can be done, will be built at four of the high schools, Weintraub said.

Each of the magnet schools will also get a $250,000 communication center, she said.

Other grant money will enable Mulholland Middle School next September to become the first junior high to have a police magnet program.

Differences in Instruction

Explorers benefit from the initial training at the Los Angeles Police Academy, but the magnet cadets’ law enforcement instruction lasts longer, is more consistent and satisfies high school course requirements.

Explorers have regular contact with youth service officers at their police stations, but how much contact they have with other officers and how much police-type work they do varies by station.

As an officer in the LAPD’s Northeast Division said, some police officers don’t feel comfortable around the youths. Past sex scandals involving supervising officers and female Explorers have colored the program’s image at some stations.

“In light of some of the nasty things in the past, yes, there’s been a tendency by police officers to shy away from Explorers,” said Officer Marjan Mobasser.

While Explorers with the Sheriff’s Department and the California Highway Patrol get to go on ride-alongs with patrol officers, the LAPD prohibits that practice. Nor can female Explorers ride in a car with a male supervisor unless a female police officer is present.

Pedro Rayas, 20, said he has gained a rich law enforcement experience as an Explorer by putting in extra hours for six years at the Hollenbeck station in Boyle Heights.

“You have to go beyond the call of duty to make the officers trust you,” Rayas said. “They’re not going to stick their neck out for an Explorer unless you work hard to build a bond with them.”

At the magnet schools, contact with law enforcement officers, whether full-time officers funded by the LAPD, sheriff’s deputies, visiting FBI agents or school police, is integral to the program.

The close contact with officers, including six-week summer internships with school police, has helped students model their own behavior, said Monroe High’s Elena Perez, 17.

“We feel like we’re at a higher level, almost like adults,” said Perez. “Everyone expects teens to be misfits of society, but we want everyone’s respect.”

They’re Proud Despite Razzing

The magnet youths liken the kind of razzing they get from other students to the criticism LAPD officers get. And to hear them tell it, the teasing only strengthens their solidarity.

“Yeah, we hear the ‘wannabe pigs’ and stuff, but we’re proud ‘cause we’re one of a kind no matter what,” said Wilson High School freshman George Cresbo, 15, who wants to be a SWAT sharpshooter.

The first cadets will graduate from the magnet schools this summer. They will be two or three years away from eligibility to apply to be LAPD officers, for which the minimum age is 20 1/2.

A key to keeping the youths on the LAPD track could be a program that backers are trying to revive with this year’s city budget. The Student Worker Program, axed in 1983, paid students to work at police stations while attending college.

“Now more than ever we have an interested pool of very young potential officers, and we don’t want to lose these kids, for their good and for our good,” said Councilwoman Laura Chick, who has endorsed the program since the police magnet schools were established.

Cmdr. Lillo said he wants 80% of magnet school cadets to become police officers, “preferably LAPD.”

The Explorer program is expected to feed into the schools more than ever, infusing them with a strong community service ethic and rewarding Explorers with something they’ve never gotten before: school credit for their work.

But for “Explorer 2000,” Chief Parks’ plan to expand the Explorer program fivefold in three years, daunting challenges lie ahead.

Training at the Police Academy for classes of about 1,000 recruits would cost nearly $400,000 a year, according to LAPD estimates. The Los Angeles Police Foundation denied an LAPD request to fund the first of this year’s four classes.

Hollenbeck Division Officer Alex Ortiz wonders where the funds will be found. “We can’t even hire police officers,” he said.

At a November meeting among two dozen youth service officers and Juvenile Division supervisors, the officers also raised concerns about having sufficient space to accommodate more Explorers and about the costs for transportation and activities.

Lillo and others say the job can be done. “This was important enough to Chief Parks that we doubled the number of youth officers,” Lillo said. “We should have at least twice as many Explorers.”