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L.A. Times

June 3, 2010

L.A. Unified to shutter 200 classes, campus for disabled students

The schoolchildren will be transferred to other classes, sometimes meaning longer commutes to other schools. It's part of the beleaguered district's attempts to deal with a $640-million deficit.

By Howard Blume, Los Angeles Times

With its fountains, gardens, playgrounds, murals and spotless walkways, Frances Blend School in Hollywood looks more like an oasis than a battleground over the future of education for the disabled.

The well-ordered campus for young blind students conveys the message that no detail, no extra care, is too trivial or wasted in helping the neediest in the Los Angeles Unified School District.

This level of care, intermittent districtwide, grew out of decades of effort by educators and advocates, who sometimes sued the district to secure rights.

But now officials plan to spend much less on the disabled: 200 classes will be shut down, as well as a specialized campus, the West Valley Special Education Center. Blend also faces cutbacks; but just as alarming as these overt moves, critics say, is a pervasive focus on saving money by limiting services to individual children.

Parents, advocates and attorneys have rallied to complain about the cutbacks, even enlisting the star power of actor Ed Asner, whose grandson is in a special education program.

The cutbacks are part of broader budget reductions across the school system to close a multimillion-dollar deficit. The results will include increased class sizes, decimated art and music programs, closed libraries and an expected 1,000-plus layoffs.

Meanwhile, serving the disabled costs more than the state and federal governments pay for. The overrun for this year is $628 million from the general fund, which is intended for the district's regular program.

Officials assert that they have to reduce expenses, but they also insist that they are helping disabled students as the law requires and have even improved some services.

At Blend, recent enhancements include gardens outside every classroom. One room has been outfitted like an apartment so students can learn skills such as making beds, washing clothes and cooking meals.

The blind often can be accommodated at regular schools, but Blend students have multiple disabilities: Some are emotionally unstable, some are deaf, some don't speak, some don't walk.

But they all do physical education, a few under screening that shields albino students from sunburn. On a recent day, a 9-year-old girl with an unerring sense of direction steered a tricycle around the playground. A group shot baskets, cheering each time a thump announced ball hitting backboard.

The school's curriculum is diluted as little as possible.