Space for charter schools rescinded

The Los Angeles Unified School District on Tuesday withdrew offers of classroom space for charter schools at seven traditional schools.

Charters will no longer be invited to share space at Taft, Fairfax and Crenshaw high schools. Elementary schools off the list are Wadsworth, 49th Street, Miles and Hughes. Teachers, administrators and parents at numerous schools have waged campaigns against the charters.

In a memo, Senior Deputy Supt. Ramon C. Cortines said he based his decision on his experience running schools and on input from an “instructional group” that examined effects on academic programs. More changes to the charter offer list could be forthcoming.

“Several of these [charter] schools have nowhere to go,” said Caprice Young, president of the California Charter Schools Assn. She added that some protests had included “threats made to school leaders. Obviously this [decision] rewards that kind of inexcusable behavior.”

-- Howard Blume