YOUTHS WANT MORE MONEY FOR SCHOOLS

The high school students came by the thousands via BART trains
yesterday, taking to the streets of sleepy San Leandro to once again
make their demand: Spend more money on schools, not jails.

About 2,500 students from throughout the Bay Area left class and
converged on the Bayfair train station in San Leandro. From there,
protesters marched to an Alameda County Sheriff's Department
substation, chanting, ``Education, not incarceration.''

Raquel Lavina, 27, a leader of a Latino youth group that helped
organize the protest, said the state spends $60,000 a year to
incarcerate a young person but only $8,000 a year to educate the same
youth.

``The need isn't to build more prisons, it's to build better
schools,'' Lavina said.

``These are the students speaking,'' she said as students marched
behind her, clogging East 14th Street on their way to the sheriff's
substation on Foothill Boulevard. ``They know that the jails look
nicer than the schools.''

The walkout was organized by the same youth groups that coordinated an
April protest in which 2,000 students rallied in Concord to demand
more financing for education and to condemn measures attacking
bilingual education.

Angela Davis, a professor at the University of California at Santa Cruz and
a radical feminist, followed the marchers yesterday in her car. She said
she would have walked with
them if she had not injured her leg in a fall more than a month ago.

``It was absolutely amazing to see so many young people -- it was
really inspiring,'' said Davis, 54, of Oakland. ``If they don't leave
their classrooms for dramatic demonstrations like this, they may not
have classrooms.''

Last weekend at the University of California at Berkeley, Davis helped
organize a conference entitled, ``Beyond the Prison Industrial
Complex.'' According to a report released there by a San Francisco
group, the Justice Policy Institute, the state's higher-education
budget shrank by 3 percent over the past decade while corrections
spending jumped 60 percent.

No one was injured or arrested yesterday, but there were a few tense
moments. One protester was cited near the Bayfair BART station for
parking an equipment truck in an illegal zone, prompting an angry
exchange between students and Alameda County sheriff's deputies.

As a crowd gathered outside the sheriff's substation, someone twice
set off a fire extinguisher, scattering students who thought it was
teargas. At times, members of rival gangs exchanged words, nearly
coming to blows. And tempers flared when students threw plastic water
bottles at each other at the Bayfair BART station, where protesters
were allowed to ride trains to and from the rally free of charge.

During the protest, police advised some storeowners near the Bayfair
Mall to close up for a few hours.

A California Highway Patrol helicopter monitored the crowd from the
air as CHP officers, sheriff's deputies and San Leandro police blocked
streets and an Interstate 580 off-ramp. Protest organizers used
bullhorns to urge the students to keep moving.

``The organizers are trying to keep it peaceful, but with this many
kids, it's tough,'' said San Leandro police Sergeant Ian Willis.

``We're trying to get a better education,'' said Laura Quinonez, a
junior at Oakland's Castlemont High School, who held a sign reading,
``Raza Studies Now.'' ``The schools are losing money when we're not in
there.''

Although school officials said they recognize the students' right to
free speech, they noted that the protest -- which was intended to help
secure more money for schools -- would cost districts state funding
tied to attendance.

``We don't like having students out of class,'' said Karen Sarlo,
Berkeley school district spokeswoman. ``When they are out of class,
they do miss material.''

More than 300 Berkeley high school students participated. But the
protest's effect on San Francisco classrooms was fairly minimal.
McAteer High School reported that 50 students skipped class for the
march, and Balboa High School reported three students leaving.

In an unrelated rally yesterday, about 1,000 students protested
outside the school district office in Fairfield, decrying plans to
switch to a year-round schedule because of financial constraints.
School Board President Mike Helms assured students that programs,
including football and dances, would not be affected.

Some school administrators and police officers were supportive of
yesterday's outpouring of student activism.

``The students are right to be outraged,'' said Dan Kelly, vice
president of the San Francisco Board of Education. ``If we don't give
the kids the service in school, we'll have to give it to them in
prison later.''

1998 San Francisco Chronicle

Checked-by: Rich O'Grady