CA: District clears charter school catering to Mexican students - Academia Semillas del Pueblo

Responding to allegations of discrimination, the school district has concluded that an elementary school catering to students of Mexican descent is following its charter, officials said Monday.

The district sent observers after Sandy Wells, a reporter working for KABC-AM, was allegedly assaulted outside the school Thursday by a man who demanded his audio tape. Station officials said Wells was also followed as he drove away. Police are investigating the incident.

"They have followed the charter that they wrote originally," said Kevin Reed, chief legal counsel for the district. "What we care about is that the curriculum is inclusive and not exclusive."

The school in east Los Angeles is one of about 100 charters in the district, Reed said. The school has until January to apply for renewal, and the district anticipates it will, Reed said.

The alleged assault has brought attention to the small school as immigration tensions rise across the country.

KABC-AM radio host Doug McIntyre has been one particularly vociferous critic. McIntyre has accused Academia Semillas del Pueblo school and its principal, Marcos Aguilar, of having a separatist philosophy that excludes students of non-Mexican origin from applying.

Repeated calls to Aguilar Monday seeking comment were not returned.

A school statement last week said it did not "discriminate against any student on the basis of ethnicity, national origin, gender, gender identity or disability."

Meanwhile Monday, a handful of parents protested at McIntyre's studio, saying the school had received bomb threats because of the show. McIntyre said he had also received death threats due to his criticisms.

The school aimed to provide children of immigrant and native families an education "founded upon their own language, cultural values and global realities," according to the charter application.

"The indigenous heart of our vision is a repossession of an identity denied from our children in standard schools," the application reads.

Students are taught in English, Spanish, Mandarin and Nahuatl, an Aztec language. The school teaches both traditional math curriculum and a separate Aztec math system.

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