School Showcase : Santa Margarita High Stirs Pride, Some Criticism

With the fog-shrouded hills of the Cleveland National Forest behind him, Father Michael Harris, founding principal of Santa Margarita Catholic High School, strode through the colonnades and courtyards of the campus, pointing out one reason after another why the school is considered a state-of-the art education showcase.

Harris noted the college-style lecture halls, the 30,000-volume capacity library with electronic news banks, the 2,000-seat gymnasium, the science wing, the separate counseling and performing arts buildings. He described the underground cables and wiring, providing computer links for students’ home access and research, and plans for the school’s own cable television channel.

Unique among the nation’s Catholic high schools--many of which have closed or merged in recent years--the $26-million Santa Margarita Catholic High School opened a year ago to general amazement for its high-tech grandeur.

But because it is located in Rancho Santa Margarita in affluent South Orange County and draws a good percentage of non-Catholics, the school also has prompted some to question whether it is appropriate in a county where an estimated half of the 700,000 Catholics are Latino, many of them poor.

Wide-Ranging Donors

Catholics contributed a total $12.5 million toward the school from general collections taken in the 52 parishes of the Diocese of Orange. The rest came from 295 pledges from the private sector, many non-Catholics among them--including a total of $3 million from two philanthropist couples, John and Donna Crean, who are Lutherans, and William and Willa Dean Lyon, who are Presbyterians.

Some critics say the diocese and philanthropists’ money could have been spent better elsewhere, for the poor, the sick, the homeless and immigrant families.

“The people of Santa Ana are people too,” said Sister Carmen Sarati, parish sister at St. Joseph Church in Santa Ana, who works with Latinos. “Their children are not going to Santa Margarita; they barely go to our schools.”

Sarati said the underlying policy of the church and the pervasive philosophy in Orange County--”if you have the money, you can build”--is “bad for the poor, for people of color, uneducated, undocumented, welfare recipients and homeless.”

Diocese of Orange Bishop Norman F. McFarland acknowledged that the contributions of poor Catholics also helped build the elegant school, but defended the funding system of the Catholic Church as traditional.

“Just like the poor people of Paris built Notre Dame of Paris and Chartres, everybody contributes according to their means. This is a good thing.

“Catholic education helps all of us. . . . You shouldn’t look on our efforts as a quid pro quo , you give so much, get so much.”

Donors Were Unaware

Contributions from the Archdiocese of Los Angeles parishes built Orange County Catholic schools before the local diocese was formed, McFarland noted.

But some donors did not realize that they were helping fund the high school by contributing to the diocese’s annual donation appeal when collections for several projects, including the high school, began in 1984, said Gary Pellegrini, director of development for the diocese.

Pellegrini said they may have missed the explanation that was contained in annual appeal fund brochures, either mailed or handed out to parishioners, and in the Diocese of Orange Bulletin, a free monthly newsletter distributed to each parish.

Also, he said, priests unable to obtain money for their own parish projects may not have explained the high school project fully or enthusiastically. Even those who understood at first did not understand why they needed to support a school so far away.

“They said, ‘Gee, why do we have to build it, it’s way down south in an affluent area and we’re not an affluent area.’ The answer is, we’re a diocese made up of parishes and we help each other. . . . We’re one church, one faith and we have to help each other,” Pellegrini said.”

One Goal Is to Help Poor

Harris said one of the school’s goals is still to help the poor, citing one unusual school graduation requirement: 80 hours of Christian service to the community.

“We are training Christian leaders for tomorrow. And they will address many of these problems of the homeless, the poor and the immigrants,” Harris said.

Unlike early U.S. Catholic schools, which grew out of ethnic, working-class neighborhoods with their own ethnic Catholic teachers, newer schools serve the general population in which they are located, said Sister Celine Leydon, superintendent of schools for the Diocese of Orange.

Nearly all of Santa Margarita High’s current students live south of the Costa Mesa Freeway--Orange County’s so-called Mason-Dixon Line, separating the generally older, poorer communities from the younger, richer ones of the south county. Tuition at Santa Margarita is $2,700 a year; tuition aid is available and admission requirements are strict.

At Santa Margarita, 25% of the 581 freshman and sophomore students are not Catholic. Nationwide, the percentage of non-Catholics in Catholic schools has risen from 2.7% in 1970 to 11.2% in 1987-88, said Sister Catherine McNamee, president of the National Catholic Educational Assn. in Washington.

Outside Donations Sought

Secular and corporate donors have increasingly been sought to keep Catholic schools open across the country, particularly in inner-city areas of New York and Philadelphia, McNamee said. In Orange County, she said, business leaders recognize a good investment in Catholic schools.

“They have hired a lot of (Catholic school) graduates, find they can read well, write well, have a sense of responsibility, and are coming to work on time. Most feel they are making a contribution to the community and to the business community,” McNamee said.

For Catholic and non-Catholic alike, many involved in the private-sector fund-raising campaign for the new high school believe that it makes sense to encourage development of a state-of-the-art secular school.

Lyon, who donated $1.5 million for the school, is chairman of the board and chief executive officer of the William Lyon Co., a Newport Beach real estate development company that is building homes in the rapidly growing community of Rancho Santa Margarita.

In a fund-raising publication, Lyon was quoted as saying: “My motivation was based upon my conviction that this was a superior educational project; a project capable of having a major impact on secondary education in our community. Nothing can supplant a good education.”

‘Wanted . . . Opportunity’

South Orange County developer Tony Moiso, a Roman Catholic and president of Rancho Mission Viejo/The Santa Margarita Co., added, “We wanted to provide the best educational opportunity we could since we were only going to do this once.”

Moiso co-chaired the fund-raising campaign and donated 40 acres owned by his family to the church as part of the 5,000-acre development of Rancho Santa Margarita--a high-density, instant town built on an isolated mesa between Mission Viejo and the Cleveland National Forest.

Some families have moved to the new town, one of the largest planned communities in the West, to be closer to the school, Harris said. But Moiso said the school was intended to serve the whole south county as well as residents of the new town.

Many appreciate the personal attention the parochial school provides.

“We have a rule,” Harris said. “No one is allowed to fail.” Individual counseling is intense, and those who do not make up a failing grade the following summer are dismissed, he said.

$45,000 in Tuition Aid

This year, $45,000 in tuition aid was available to those who qualified for admission, Harris said. “Any qualified student with desire and ability to be here” will be admitted, he said. About 15% of the students are minorities--mostly Latino.

Touring the campus, Harris called out to students by name. Some spontaneously hugged him. When he walked unannounced into a classroom, the teacher looked pleased and the entire uniformed class of sophomores stood enthusiastically.

The best thing about the school, the students offered, is Father Harris. The worst, the uniform dress code.

Many see Santa Margarita as a harbinger of the future for Catholic schools, not just for its advanced technology, but also for its support from non-Catholics. From now on, Harris predicted, “It’s going to require more than the Catholic Church exclusively to fund the building of schools.”