CLASSROOM TRASHED VANDALS' ACT LEAVES MARK ON PUPILS, TEACHER.Byline: Luz Villarreal Daily News Staff Writer Cindy Bean is sifting through dust-covered piles of chaos in her classroom Monday looking for Looking for In the context of general equities, this describing a buy interest in which a dealer is asked to offer stock, often involving a capital commitment. Antithesis of in touch with. small treasures. Precious photos of her students. Tiny animals made of foil, paper and painted twigs. Story books colored and written by her kindergarten students. Over the weekend, vandals hit Bean's classroom and several other rooms at Colfax Elementary School elementary school: see school. , breaking windows, discharging fire extinguishers and pouring soap, glue and orange juice over floors, desks and computers. ``(My students) created this,'' Bean said of the makeshift rain forest with hanging vines and an African Serengeti with paper animals. ``It's not anything that would be important to anybody else.'' But it is to Bean. She broke down and cried in the middle of her classroom, a surgical mask A surgical mask is intended to be worn by health professionals during surgery and at other times to catch the bacteria shed in liquid droplets and aerosols from the wearer's mouth and nose. hanging from her neck to keep her from breathing in the white chalky dust from a discharged fire extinguisher. Her students and another kindergarten class were forced to hold their lessons in the school library until work crews finish cleaning the campus. In the 1995-96 school year, vandals and burglars have hit Los Angeles Unified School district The Los Angeles Unified School District (the "LAUSD") is the largest (in terms of number of students) public school system in California and the second-largest in the United States. Only the New York City Department of Education has a larger student population. campuses 4,296 times, costing the district more than $6.3 million, according to according to prep. 1. As stated or indicated by; on the authority of: according to historians. 2. In keeping with: according to instructions. 3. district police officers. ``I would say there is probably more than one (incident) every weekend,'' said Richard Page For the musician, see . Richard Lewis Page (born 22 February 1941, Tredegar) was a Conservative Member of Parliament (MP) in the United Kingdom from 1976 to 1979 and from 1983 to 2005. , an assistant school police chief covering the San Fernando Valley San Fernando Valley Valley, southern California, U.S. Northwest of central Los Angeles, the valley is bounded by the San Gabriel, Santa Susana, and Santa Monica mountains and the Simi Hills. and Westside. ``We have burglaries and vandalism every week. Sometimes arsons. Monday is a big day for us as far as report taking because a lot of time the school officials don't discover any of it till Monday.'' While an inventory of Colfax's losses was not completed Monday afternoon, it does not appear the vandals stole anything - leading school police officers to believe the culprits were older students. ``If they were to go in and take expensive computers, then it is usually done by an adult,'' Page said. Nonetheless, the vandals destroyed the two computers in the kindergarten classes and the total in damages could run as high as $10,000. ``Our society needs to have morals and values,'' said school Principal Shirley Di Rado. ``This is what we teach our students. What is this message if they see everything they work for wantonly wan·ton adj. 1. Immoral or unchaste; lewd. 2. a. Gratuitously cruel; merciless. b. Marked by unprovoked, gratuitous maliciousness; capricious and unjust: wanton destruction. destroyed?'' It was Bean who actually discovered the vandalism Sunday, about 11 a.m., when she stopped by her classroom to pick up a school bulletin. ``I started to cry,'' she said. ``I didn't walk in. I closed it and went over to a volunteer parent's home across the street and called the police.'' Police late Monday had no suspects. Bean said she doesn't believe any Colfax students were involved. Large Nike footprints were left in her classroom - too large for any of the school's elementary school pupils to make. ``What we're teaching (our students) is respect,'' said Bean. ``I'm here because I believe in this school. To have this happen, you feel like it's a violation. This is like my home.'' ``It was just meanness,'' said Vicky Louie, the other kindergarten teacher whose classroom was also vandalized. Jennifer Silverstein, co-president of the school's PTA PTA or parent-teacher association: see parent education. , said parents were stunned stun tr.v. stunned, stun·ning, stuns 1. To daze or render senseless, by or as if by a blow. 2. To overwhelm or daze with a loud noise. 3. . ``I walked into the school and I didn't know whether to scream or to cry. We parents are beside ourselves,'' she said. And the kindergarten students who were kept out of their classrooms Monday did their best to put things into perspective. ``It took us a long time to put (the tree and decorations) up,'' said 6-year-old Nicholas Star. ``That's why we are mad. They wrecked it.'' Zaria Gunn, another 6-year-old, can't wait to get out of her cramped quarters inside the school library. ``I'd rather be in the classroom because it's more exciting,'' Zaria said. ``We have a big tree in there. It's colorful. The classroom is beautiful, until somebody tore it up. Maybe that's why they messed it up, because it's the nicest class.'' CAPTION(S): 2 Photos, map PHOTO (1 -- color) Teacher Cindy Bean inspects her damaged classroom at Colfax Elementary School. (2) Kindergartners at Colfax were forced to spend the day in the library. Hans Gutknecht/Daily News Map: Colfax Avenue Colfax Avenue is the main street that runs east and west through the Denver-Aurora metropolitan area in Colorado. As U.S. Highway 40, it was one of two principal highways serving Denver before the Interstate Highway System was constructed. Elementary School |
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