Junipero Serra High to Admit Girls in Fall

In a major break from tradition, Junipero Serra High School in Gardena is planning to add pink tiles to one of its locker rooms, romance novels to its library and, most important, girls to its all-male student body.

The 40-year-old Roman Catholic school will go coeducational in the fall of 1991, administrators announced.

Principal James Crowell, a 1970 Serra graduate, began pursuing coeducation about two years ago when enrollment began declining significantly as it lost potential students to coeducational parochial schools in Torrance and Playa del Rey. From 1986 to this school year, Serra’s enrollment dropped from 520 to an all-time low of 266.

“An all-boy school is really a holdover from the past,” said Crowell, who spent 14 years at Serra as a teacher and dean before becoming principal last year.

“The guys are in favor of it,” said student body President Kenny Davis.