Dana Point : Students to Set Sail on Learning Experience

About 30 county high school students will set sail on a learning adventure Monday that will teach them about the Constitution.

The students will weigh anchor from Dana Point Harbor aboard the state’s official tall ship, Californian, and on their day-long journey “discover” a mythical island somewhere offshore. Although inhabited, its people will have no formal constitution to govern their way of life.

“The job of the students will be to go back to their various classrooms and frame a constitution for those people,” said Steve Christman, president of the Dana Point Nautical Heritage Society.

The students, all from the Newport- Mesa Unified School District, will be prepared for their work during a one-hour pre-cruise lecture at the Orange County Marine Institute.

Christman, who will give the talk, is an authority on the Constitution. He also was the driving force behind construction of the Californian, a 145-foot re-creation of mid-19th century revenue cutter. The speedy schooner has taken part in tall ship parades and races, but her primary purpose is to serve as a training vessel in the nearly forgotten art of sailing such ships.

Christman said if the program, which the Californian is offering as a public service, is successful, “it could be replicated throughout the state.”

Christman is scheduled to give lectures for a UC Irvine course beginning Sept. 25 in which he will “teach teachers how to teach” the Constitution.