Sheik Helps School, but There’s a Hitch

First there were the bingo nights and lemonade stands as fund-raisers to preserve smaller class sizes. Then came the jaw-dropper: $15,000 from the leading sheik in the United Arab Emirates.

Now there’s a hitch: Officials in the Capistrano Unified School District are wondering if it’s proper to take the money.

The strange turn of events began earlier this week with word that the president of the United Arab Emirates, Sheik Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan had wired $15,000 to help parents at Las Flores Elementary School save teachers’ jobs and maintain the smaller class sizes. Parents throughout south Orange County have been holding fund-raisers to cushion the blow from state budget cuts in schools, and the Las Flores supporters had come up $13,000 short of their goal.

The sheik bestowed the money after hearing of the school’s struggle from the grandmother of one of the students. The woman, who has chosen to remain anonymous, had recently traveled through the United Arab Emirates, where she had connections and told government officials of the school’s plight. Word reached the sheik, and the gift arrived this week.

Zayed’s penchant for philanthropy is not without controversy, however. He recently gave $2.5 million to Harvard University’s divinity school to establish a professorship in Islamic studies. The contribution triggered protests by students and faculty there because of the sheik’s ties to an organization, the Zayed Center, that sponsors speeches by some who are labeled anti-Semitics, including those who deny the Holocaust.

Harvard President Lawrence H. Summers will decide in the next two weeks, after a background investigation, whether to accept the gift, a Harvard spokeswoman said Wednesday.

The outcome of that investigation will help determine whether Las Flores can accept the sheik’s donation, district Supt. James A. Fleming said Wednesday.

He said he also has asked Rep. Christopher Cox (R-Newport Beach) for help in gathering more information on the sheik’s background before deciding whether the school can keep his money.

“There is always a concern about accepting money that may be somehow tainted,” Fleming said.

If the decision is made to tell Zayed thanks but no thanks, the district will help the parents make up the difference, Fleming said.

Some parents don’t understand the need for such caution.

“The district is putting us in a position where we have to question the affiliations of everyone giving us money,” complained Jennifer Timm, the Las Flores parents’ fund-raising chief. “We don’t have time for that.”

Another parent said a little bit of controversy shouldn’t chill philanthropy. “It makes me sick that because of some negative publicity, the district isn’t willing to have a backbone and take the money,” said Kristen Beals, who will have a first-grader and a third-grader at Las Flores. “It’s from the Middle East, so they should have known there would be a little controversy attached to it.”

Beals said she was not bothered by the sheik’s connection to the Zayed Center because, she concluded, its emphasis was on promoting free speech even if its opinions were unpopular.

“Just because you’re from the Middle East doesn’t mean you’re a bad guy,” Beals said. “I just think it’s very sad that since our politicians won’t do anything [in addressing the schools’ budget crises], somebody thousands of miles away would be paying for my daughter’s reduced-size classroom.”

Officials at the United Arab Emirates’ embassy in Washington, D.C., declined to comment.