Who's teaching who

Ector County Youth Center Director Lou Serrano and the county's juvenile board are all about helping troubled kids, but they never planned on being in the education business.

That could be a part of their job description soon if efforts to change a state law aren't successful. If the law stays as is, then the county would be charged with funding education for an estimated 200 youth offenders.

"I don't want to call it an unfunded mandate, I want to call it passing the buck," Commissioner Barbara Graff said. "What the Legislature seems to be doing is passing the buck to counties, cities and schools."

The mandate Graff, Serrano and the juvenile board are taking issue with stems from a state law, passed in 1995, that calls for the creations of juvenile justice alternative education programs.

These JJAEPs are county-funded education programs for dangerous or disruptive students in counties with at least 125,000 people. Serrano said Ector County is projected at about 132,000, but official numbers won't be released until after the 2010 Census.

Currently, the school district pays to educate students who have been ordered out of their traditional campuses to ECISD's Alternative Education Center for various infractions, including fighting, weapons possession and chronic misbehavior. Serrano said students who get expelled for more serious crimes, including felonies, aren't allowed to attend the Alternative Education Center and are basically left at home and uneducated until their punishment is up.

If the county's lobbying efforts to change the JJAEP law aren't successful before the 2010 Census kicks in, responsibility for Ector County's alternative education will essentially be taken away from the school district and put on the county's juvenile board.

Expelled students would be mixed in with lesser offenders, and juvenile board members could be responsible for coming up with curriculum instead of trained educators.

Taxpayer costs are expected to increase, including possibly paying for a new facility to accommodate a JJAEP.

Serrano said when they passed the law, legislators thought it would be a good idea to get troubled kids - especially expelled students who were left at home - under the direct supervision of juvenile justice workers instead of regular teachers.

"What they weren't thinking of was the educational component of it," Serrano said Tuesday. "I'm not from the education field, but I could end up running a school."

And while taxpayers are already shelling out dollars to educate the school district's unruly few, Serrano said state mandates that go along with a JJAEP will push costs up.

"From a juvenile probation standpoint, we don't want to get into the education field," he said.

Serrano said Williamson County, with similar student population numbers, adopted a boot camp-style JJAEP to the tune of about $2.1 million for the 2006-'07 academic year. This included hiring 14 drill instructors and paying for transportation and nutrition needs.

Serrano said the county would probably have to hire more detention officers to help police the kids, plus case workers to oversee their progress.

"You're talking about everything from busing services to special education services and requirements for physical education," he said.

There's a question of whether or not the county would have to pay for a new facility to accommodate a JJAEP. Serrano said it's possible to use the Alternative Education Center, but teachers tend to those students in portable-type buildings that aren't connected to a main hallway or open space.

"With felony kids, for us that wouldn't be safe," Serrano said. "You'd have to hire more staff with the bungalows because you don't have large general areas with hallways."

Alternative Education Center principal Ruby Rodriguez acknowledged some of the challenges behind a JJAEP, but she thinks it's worth it.

She said expelled kids would get off the street and into the classroom, and having detention and probation officers around to supervise them will make teaching troubled kids much easier.

"They act totally different under the supervision of a probation officer and a detention officer," Rodriguez said. "It's muscle that we don't have here. The hardest thing we can do is expel them."

AT A GLANCE:

>> What: Juvenile justice alternative education program. JJAEPs are county-funded education programs for dangerous or disruptive students in counties with at least 125,000 people.

>> When: Ector County might have to implement one of these programs after 2010 Census numbers are released and if efforts to change state law aren't successful.

>> The fuss: Responsibility for Ector County's alternative education will essentially be taken away from the school district and placed with the county's juvenile board. Expelled students would be mixed in with lesser offenders, juvenile board members could be responsible for coming up with curriculum and taxpayer costs are expected to increase.