LOS ANGELES TIMES September 29, 1968

School Board Sit-Ins

Pass Time Musically

The sound of mariachis playing "La Cucaracha" filled the chambers of the Los Angeles Board of Education Saturday.

Everyone was eating chorizo burritos (sausage and egg wrapped in a big tortilla). One of the name plates at the seats had been changed to: "Mr. Raul, Brown Beret." On the blackboard behind the seats someone had chalked:

"The Free and Liberated Board of Chicano Education."

Twenty-five members of the Mexican-American community were occupying the Board of Education.

It began Thursday as a protest over the removal of teacher Sal Castro from classroom work because of his felony indictment as an alleged leader of the East Side school walkouts last March.

Leaders of the protest said Saturday that they intended to continue to occupy the chambers util Monday afternoon, when the board meets to discuss-among other things-Sal Castro.

The school system removed Castro from his assignment as a social studies teacher at Lincoln High School under a long-standing administrative policy under which a teacher charged with a felony is taken from contact with students pending decision of his guilt or innocence.

The Negotiation Council, which represents teachers in the school system, is expect to urge the board Monday to apply only the State Education Code requirements to Castro's case.

Under the code, teachers charged with narcotics or moral violations must be suspended without pay pending trial. Castro is accused of conspiring to disturb a school and the peace-a felony conspiracy to commit misdemeanors. Neither comes under code rules.