Principal of Year Keeps Students in the Spotlight

As the school day ended Wednesday at U.S. Grant High School, Principal Robert J. Collins took his usual spot on the front sidewalk of the Van Nuys campus, directing buses, questioning visitors and greeting students and parents.

Collins, who earlier this week was named the state’s principal of the year by the National Assn. of Secondary School Principals, paced back and forth, walkie-talkie in hand, as he asked student after student: “Where are your books? How much homework do you have?”

He noted with obvious pride that most of the school’s 3,100 students are in fact leaving the campus with books under their arms.

After most of the buses filled, he moved on to the football field where he threw passes to team members during a drill. Collins, a high jumper at University High School in the 1960s, threw two interceptions and an incomplete pass. But he shrugged it off--”I can hit a baseball a lot better”--and continued his tour past groups of girls practicing cheers.

“The cheerleaders are cheerleading, the football team is footballing, the pep squad is pepping,” Collins said. “High school is the greatest job in the world.”

But Collins, 46, is more than just an athletic booster. Last spring, Grant led the state in the number of students who took and passed advanced placement tests. Such tests enable students to receive college credit in subjects such as calculus, physics and U.S. history.

“We had more than 500 students take AP exams,” Collins said. “There were only three other schools in the state that had more than 400 students take them.”

Nearly 75% of those students passed.

That kind of academic success is often greeted with surprise, Collins said, since his school’s student body is 57% minority, mostly Latino.

About one-third of the students are bused from the downtown Los Angeles area. Nearly one-fourth have been living in the United States for three years or less. And about 40 languages are spoken on campus.

Even more astonishing is that 794 of the 800 graduating seniors last year were accepted to either community colleges or to 4-year universities. Such statistics sparked the nomination of Collins as principal of the year by a committee of the Assn. of California School Administrators. His nomination was confirmed by the national association.

“We expect each youngster to gain a firm, well-developed character with values that will help them in their career, as well as in their personal lives,” said Collins, who lives with his wife and 12-year-old daughter, Kelli, in Chatsworth.

The school has been successful because of teachers, parents and students, Grant said. The percentage of those belonging to the school’s Parent Teacher Student Assn. is the highest in the country, he noted.

“This was a great school when I got here five years ago,” Collins said. “Any success I’ve had is truly the school’s own effort.”

Still, state association committee members noted that Collins routinely spends 18-hour days at the campus, arriving long before the first buses roll in and leaving after the last football team member has been picked up after Friday night’s game.

In the fall, he meets with each class, pointing out to freshman and sophomores the school’s various rules of conduct--”things like you can’t bring your skateboard to school.” He tells seniors that they should set an example for younger students by getting into college.

Talking to Students

“I don’t walk around with a baseball bat,” said Collins, a U.S. history teacher for nine years at Locke High School before taking administrative posts at Fremont and Monroe high schools. “The day I have to do that is the day I’ll quit.”

Instead, Collins said he prefers to talk to students in small groups and individually, exhorting them to good behavior and academic performance. Several times a year, Collins teaches a class. Last year, he taught wood shop, modern dance, U.S. history and economics.

“What’s important is what happens in the classroom,” Collins said.