Special Students Join With Mainstream in Completing Their School Curriculum

Michelle Hight has done plenty during her high school years: She carried the Olympic torch as it made its way to the 1984 Summer Games, worked as a volunteer at a day-care center and won more than 100 medals and ribbons in athletic competition.

Today, she will celebrate her greatest accomplishment when she receives her “diploma” from Sierra Vista High School.

“This is beyond our wildest dreams,” said Carmen Hight, her mother. “When she was just a child, the doctors told me to keep her in the house because she would be a vegetable.”

Michelle, 22, is retarded. So are the other 11 students graduating from Sierra Vista, a special education high school that strives to make students independent and accepted as a part of society, Principal Myrna Vallely said.

Although these students have taken almost seven years to earn a “certificate of attendance,” they have exemplified the dedication required to be among the students graduating from high schools, said Doug Langdon, a spokesman for the county Office of Education.

For Hight and about 19,168 other students graduating from 54 high schools in San Diego County, this is a special week as they are awarded their diplomas.

“The class of 1987 has shown dedication and a commitment to learn,” said Supt. Tom Payzant of the San Diego Unified School District.

At a time when many youths face drug problems and high dropout rates, Payzant said “nobody should trivialize what it takes to acquire a high school diploma.” His district will graduate an estimated 6,500 students--more than any other district in the county.

“These students were successful because their teachers helped them meet higher standards and their parents supported them,” Payzant said.

These “three ingredients”--the combined effort of teachers, parents and students--make up the formula that has produced this year’s high school success stories, school officials said. It was the formula that worked for Hight, said her father, Bobbie.

‘Didn’t Sit Back’

“My wife and I have been aware of Michelle’s success and problems throughout her education,” he said. “We became a part of her education and took interest in what she was doing. We just didn’t sit back.”

Lon Miller, one of Hight’s teachers said, “She worked very hard and never missed a day of school in two years. She’s going on to take classes at MiraCosta Community College to earn a certificate so she can work as a paid employee at the day care center.”

Like Hight, many of the graduating seniors will continue their commitment to education, said Dr. Peter Bell, a researcher for the San Diego Unified School District.

“We’ve been following the 1984 high school graduates to see how many of them went on to (college),” Bell said. “Our survey shows about 69% are continuing their education.”

He added that 36.7% of the class of 1987 dropped out of school between their freshman year in 1983 and Graduation Day. (These figures do not include the final months of the school year.)

Although these figures account for students only in the San Diego Unified School District, Bell said they are representative of the county as a whole.

As commencement exercises abound this week, students won’t be the only ones with a sense of accomplishment, Langdon said. The Class of ’87 fared better than ever before on the California Assessment Program exams and those results have teachers smiling, he said.

“Not only have these scores been the highest ever recorded by our high school seniors, but the improvement over last year’s scores also marks the biggest one-year gain in test scores,” he said.

Langdon said the countywide 12th-grade scores on the California Assessment Program exams--designed to determine how well students are learning in four categories: reading, spelling, written language and math--were higher than the state average.

Finishing Touches

For three high schools in particular, this commencement adds the finishing touches to a banner year.

Torrey Pines, Orange Glen and Southwest high schools were named as among the top 123 public schools in the nation by the U.S. Education Department, Langdon said.

“We’re very proud of this honor because just four years ago we were identified as one of the 58 “poor performance” schools in the county,” said Elisabeth Cogdill, Southwest’s principal.

She said the school first had to be selected as one of the distinguished schools in the state before it could become eligible for the National Secondary School Recognition program.

Entry into such competition required each of the 650 schools that participated to submit 25-page reports and have “everything analyzed--including a well-rounded curriculum, exemplary teaching skills, achievement of high test scores,” Cogdill said. Finalists were then evaluated by Education Department officials, who conducted on-site inspections.

Cogdill said her school’s achievement was, like other high school success stories this year, attributable to a proper mix of the “three ingredients.”

‘Buckled Down’

“When we were identified as one of the poor-performing schools, the teachers and students alike buckled down,” she said. “We made a decision that we didn’t want to be in the cellar. In order to succeed you have to look for a final outcome, that is make education a No. 1 priority.”

Such goal-setting led Southwest to conduct rigorous evaluation of the curriculum “to make sure that what we were teaching wasn’t wishy-washy,” then hold workshops for teachers and study sessions for students.

Cogdill said it was the responsibility of the faculty and the students’ parents to provide motivation, but said the students have to “want” an education. She said it was that desire that brought students to their commencement seats this week.

“At the beginning of every school year, I go in to talk to the seniors and show them what the previous class did,” she said. “And then I ask them, “Do you want to graduate from a poor-achieving school or from a well-respected one?” I think they made the right choice.”