Boycott Cost L.A. Schools $1 Million

The cash-strapped Los Angeles Unified School District lost about $1 million in state attendance-based funds during the one-day “Latino boycott” last month, district officials said Thursday.

An estimated 40,000 Los Angeles students participated in the Dec. 12 statewide boycott to protest the repeal of a state law allowing illegal immigrants to apply for driver’s licenses.

Although that number is a small fraction of the district’s 740,000 students in kindergarten through 12th grade, the absences exceeded 50% in some heavily Latino schools, including Roosevelt High on the city’s East Side, some campus administrators reported on the day of the protest.

The district, in which nearly 72% of the students are Latino, expects to finish an official school-by-school accounting of the absenteeism soon.

“I think it’s unfortunate that the district lost approximately $1 million, but even more unfortunate than the economic blow in these hard times is the loss of learning for the students that day,” Board of Education President Jose Huizar said.

Huizar said he supported the driver’s license law but added:

“Putting children’s educations at risk should not be a part of any public policy agenda.”

Nativo Lopez, president of the Mexican American Political Assn. and one of the boycott’s main organizers, said the cause had more than justified the lost of a school day and of district income. He said the lesson for students in exercising their rights was “a much better education than anything they would read in a book.”

If school authorities are “so concerned, they should be in Sacramento wrestling ‘The Terminator’ to sign a new driver’s license bill,” Lopez said. “It’s not enough to be sympathetic.”

District officials arrived at the 40,000 figure by comparing the Dec. 12 absentee rates with those for other Fridays in December. The district receives $26.11 per day for every student at school for the bulk of the school day, but the state withholds the funds whenever a student is absent, even for such legitimate reasons as illness.

“Money aside, it’s important for kids to be in school,” Lorenzo Tyner, the district’s budget director, said Thursday. “Beyond that, every day they don’t show up can have a direct impact on the resources that come to the district and go into their schools.”

Like most districts in California, Los Angeles is facing the prospects of deep cuts in education programs because of the state’s budget crisis. After Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger unveiled his proposed budget earlier this month, school district officials estimated that they would have a gap of $466 million to close in their budget of nearly $6 billion before the new fiscal year begins July 1.

Protest leaders urged Latinos and immigrants to stay home from work and school and to avoid shopping to show their anger at the recently inaugurated governor and the Legislature for repealing the controversial driver’s license law.

The boycott, timed to coincide with the feast of the Virgin of Guadalupe, sought to highlight the economic contributions of Latinos in California.

Many school districts, especially those with large numbers of Latino students, reported record absences during the boycott. The superintendent of the Oxnard Elementary School District, for example, which is about 85% Latino, said that about 30% of his students had stayed away from classes.