Inglewood Board Postpones Controversial Schools Vote

With two members absent, the Inglewood Unified School District board this week postponed a controversial vote on year-round and middle schools because the other three trustees said the entire board should be present for such an important vote.

The trustees were scheduled to vote Wednesday night on a new administration proposal drawn up after last week’s meeting, at which the board rescinded all previous action on middle and year-round schools.

The administration’s original plan, rejected by the board at its Jan. 15 meeting, was to have all sixth-, seventh- and eighth-graders attend four middle schools to open in July. At the same time, the plan called for all students in kindergarten through eighth grade to be converted to a year-round schedule.

But some parents were angry that their children would be moved out of neighborhood kindergarten-through-eighth-grade schools to attend a middle school, and other parents were upset that their youngsters might be left in overcrowded classrooms if the middle school plan was not adopted.

And the conversion to a year-round schedule drew fire from parents and the Inglewood Teachers Assn., which threatened legal action to stop the district from making the conversion. They said the district had not notified the community early enough about the new schedule. District officials said that the community had plenty of notice and that since 1986 the district has been gradually converting to a year-round schedule.

Under the latest proposal, the board is being asked to turn Albert Monroe and George W. Crozier junior high schools, which now serve seventh- and eighth-graders, into middle schools for sixth-, seventh- and eighth-graders. The plan calls for students from Hudnall, Oak Street, Beulah Payne, Clyde Woodworth and Worthington elementary schools to attend the two new middle schools.

The recommendation also asks the board to delay putting more schools on year-round schedules until fall of 1993.

However, five elementary schools currently operating year-round would stay that way.

The board will take up that proposal at its Feb. 26 meeting at which all board members are expected to be present, said Maurice Wiley, director of public information for the Inglewood Unified School District. Trustees Lois Hill Hale and Larry Aubry were absent from this week’s meeting because Hale had an illness in her family and Aubry was undergoing medical tests, Wiley said.

Middle and year-round schools have proven to be politically explosive issues for the board, which has had to face several groups of angry parents.

School district administrators say that middle and year-round schools are the solution to overcrowding that has occurred in several central Inglewood schools as a result of a population surge there in recent years.