FILLMORE : $100 Awards Spur School Attendance

Twenty Fillmore Junior High School students are each $100 richer after an area ranch owner set up a private foundation with cash awards to encourage the students to continue their education.

The seventh-, eighth- and ninth-grade students received the money for giving up their summer vacation to attend a special summer school class.

For five weeks, in addition to their regular school subjects, they worked on personal journals, set goals for themselves, tutored elementary school students and did community service projects such as picking up trash along Fillmore’s Central Avenue.

Eighth-grader Guillermo Andrade, 12, said the $100 means “going to school is something special.”

Audrey Glanville, 13, another eighth-grader who wants to become a teacher, said she enjoyed the extra money, but more important, “it gave me a chance to teach other students.”

The summer school class and the money are funded through the Draine Foundation, which was set up by Pat and Robert Draine, who live in Los Angeles and own a ranch in Fillmore.

Junior high Principal Lynn Edmonds said she was contacted by the Draines in March, 1990. “They wanted to do something that would keep students excited about learning.”

Twenty students with grade-point averages of at least 3.14 were selected based on their responses to questions on the scholarship application.

“We wanted to know why they wanted to be a Draine scholar and why they thought the scholarship is good for the school,” Edmonds said.

Edmonds said she has been talking to the Draine family about providing monthly stipends to encourage the students to complete high school and increasing the number of students in the program to 25. She said the details must be worked out with the Draines and formally approved by the Fillmore school board.

The proposed monthly $20 stipend would be dependent upon the students maintaining a high grade-point average and remaining active in school and community activities.

Several of the students said that although they liked the money, their community work was more important.

“Some of the merchants asked . . about us when we were picking up trash,” said Diana Patino, aged 13. She said she believes her class’s community work has changed the merchants’ view of her age group.

Hector Sanchez, 13, agreed. “We were helping the community.”