Praises Sung for Money to Keep Teacher

Parents and students have staged a sing-a-thon at a pizza parlor, persuaded a yogurt shop to pitch in part of its profits and solicited donations outside supermarkets in an effort to keep Ted Reid teaching at Fountain Valley High School.

Reid, 34, widely praised for his ability to inspire students to excel and embrace the love of music, has taught at the Orange County school for the last three years but was among 32 teachers who were told that they would not be rehired for the fall semester.

The teachers are the victims of declining enrollment in the Huntington Beach Union High School District, where rising housing prices have kept out many younger families with children. The district will have 2,200 fewer students in its six high schools this fall than two years ago, officials said.

But parents, who rave about Reid’s program and how it has turned their children on to music and the arts, have vowed to raise enough money to retain him as the music teacher and director of the school’s three choirs.

“The kind of teacher who can pass on his enthusiasm and knowledge of music is rare,” said Pat Harney, whose three children have studied under Reid. “But Ted Reid is really good at that. He turns the kids on to music.”

While parent groups in Huntington Beach and other districts have raised money to supplement teacher salaries or augment special programs, directors of education groups say it is rare for a group to take on the task of raising money to save one teacher’s job.

Originally, the group formed to keep Reid on the payroll--the Vocal Music Foundation, with about 100 parent members--was prepared to raise $43,000 to pay Reid’s full-time salary for teaching three periods of music and two English classes.

But after hearing of the parents’ determination and of the difficulties the group was having in raising the money, the district said it would require only $28,000, or enough to pay Reid for the three periods of music. The district said it needs $12,000 by Aug. 15, with the rest due later.

In addition to other fund-raising activities, the group also appealed to real estate agencies in the Huntington Beach area for help, saying that if a school does not have a good music program, home sales could drop.

All this attention, frankly, makes Reid a little uneasy.

“It’s gratifying and a little bit flattering,” he said. “It’s also a little bit uncomfortable to have people spending so much of their free time and free energy on your behalf. But I know ultimately that it’s on behalf of their children.”

Parents say special programs such as Reid’s choirs make the school a special place for students. But they say that in these times of scarce school funds, such programs are fast becoming luxuries that parents are having to pay for.

“Fountain Valley doesn’t have any music in its elementary schools anymore,” said Susan Pike, the mother of two students in the music program. “I feel like a lot of people don’t realize what’s happening.”

Rebecca Einstein, a former Reid student who will become a music major at Ithaca College in New York this fall, praised Reid for his commitment.

“I cannot speak highly enough about this program,” she said. “The best part of my high school experience was the choir.”

Each of the school’s three choirs puts on several performances a year, and the groups also appear in out-of-town concerts.

“It takes hours and hours of rehearsal and planning the tours and planning different performances,” Einstein said. “Mr. Reid happens to be the type of teacher who puts his entire person into it.”

Reid, in turn, said the music program at Fountain Valley has been successful because of parent support.

“Their support is indicative of the quality of students we have,” Reid said. “The support we get from parents makes it possible for us to reach higher and higher and higher goals.”

Married and the father of a 2-month-old child, Reid said the uncertainty over his future had been “a point of tremendous concern for my wife and me.”

Because he did not know his status with the Huntington Beach district, he has found two other part-time jobs: one directing a 100-voice adult choir called the Masterworks Chorale at Orange Coast College and one as music director of a Huntington Beach church.

The district was not going to do away with the music program entirely at Fountain Valley High. But administrators were going to ask a music teacher at another school to take on the programs at both schools.

“That is comparable to asking a football coach to take over at two schools,” Reid said.

“It’s doable, but both programs are going to suffer,” he said.