Schools Turn to Hot Lines to Link Up With Parents : Education: Several O.C. schools offer daily phone recordings listing such things as homework assignments.

“Hi. This is Ms. Haslett,” begins the cheery recorded message. “On Oct. 14 in the science class, we watched a film on the black widow. . . . Our homework tonight is page 46 and 47, but not the reading ideas. . . . The test for Chapter 2 is Wednesday. . . .”

The message, from sixth-grade science teacher Janet Haslett at TeWinkle Intermediate School in Newport Beach, is one of hundreds recorded daily at several Orange County schools so that parents can call, listen to the recording and check on everything from homework assignments to hot lunch menus.

These new phone systems--being introduced this fall in school districts from Newport Beach to Fullerton--provide a high-tech answer to parents’ age-old question: “Do you have any homework tonight?”

Most parents are thrilled with the system.

“My daughter’s 7. Sometimes we’d find out about things weeks later, either the note got lost on the bus or it was crumpled at the bottom of her book bag,” said Bill Stegall, who calls to check on the activities of his daughter’s second-grade class at Golden Hill Elementary School in Fullerton.

Last year, Los Naranjos Elementary School in Irvine was the first in California to introduce a voice-mail message system under a pilot program that involved 40 schools nationwide. This year, the idea is spreading as teachers, parents and students try to find new and better ways to keep in touch.

In the Newport-Mesa Unified School District, where the phone lines have been in place at the district’s two intermediate schools since September, thousands of calls have been received in the system’s first month of operation.

At TeWinkle, where enrollment is about 850, Principal Mary Ann Ehret tallied 13,000 calls in the first month, and at Horace Ensign Intermediate School, the September total was 14,600 calls.

For 24 hours a day, any day of the week, parents and students can call the voice-mail systems, which are accessed through a touch-tone phone. Parents and students are given individual code numbers for each class. Armed with those codes, they can simply push in the digits and wait for the recorded message from the teacher. Teachers are supposed to change their messages every weekday.

“I use it every night,” said TeWinkle sixth-grader Brad Wayman. “I always said, ‘I forgot my homework,’ and the teacher would say, ‘That’s no excuse.’ ”

Eighth-grader Eric Wayman, Brad’s brother, likes the convenience of the system. But he says the trouble is that his mother uses the hot line about as often as he does.

“That’s kind of one of the downfalls,” Eric said. “Every day, she checks.”

To familiarize students with the new device, some teachers told their classes on the first day of school in September that there was a homework assignment, but they would have to call the hot line to get it.

Others, like TeWinkle’s sixth-grade teacher Steven Pinney, recently told his students there would be a secret message on the line. The secret message was in fact an assignment, and the next day 25 of his 28 students came to class with the completed lesson.

“The real bottom line is more homework is getting done,” said TeWinkle Principal Ehret, adding that the system is especially helpful to working and single parents who are not able to frequently talk with their childrens’ teachers and participate in parent groups.

The lines in the Newport-Mesa and Irvine districts are operated through the Nashville-based Advanced Voice Technologies, which set up the system for about $13,000. The Newport schools used student-at-risk funds and school improvement funds to pay the one-time expense.

In Fullerton, the school linked up with Pacific Bell, which offers the lines for $9.95 a month for each class extension. Golden Hill pays about $230 monthly for its 23 lines. The school has not allocated funds for the program, and is soliciting contributions from the community by suggesting that donors adopt an extension. Golden Hill’s hot line also includes some messages in Spanish.

Most of the time, callers are connected to the hot line on the first try. However, some parents say that between 5:30 and 6 p.m. there’s often a busy signal.

While many hot line users are enthusiastic about the system, not all are convinced it is the answer to getting kids to do their homework.

Ensign Intermediate School parent Mary Moyer, whose daughter was having difficulty remembering assignments, knows the codes for her daughter’s science and math teachers by heart. Still, she’s not sure that checking in every night is actually helping her child’s grades.

“I can’t say it’s made a huge difference. It’s made a difference in the quantity if work she’s turning in,” said Moyer. “I don’t know if it’s making a difference in the quality. We’ll have to see about that.”

Dialing for Homework: How It Works

Some schools in Orange County have turned to voice-mail systems so parents and students can obtain daily information about homework assignments, school activities and other messages. Below is a sample of how the system works for TeWinkle Middle School.

Hello. Thank you for calling TeWinkle Intermediate Information Hot Line. Please enter your three-digit class number to receive class information at any time during this message .

Code 101 entered for Janet Haslett’s sixth-grade science class

Today on the 15th of October in science class, we reviewed the work for the science test tomorrow. Tonight the students need to study everything from Chapter 2. The test tomorrow will be matching, true or false, and short answers. Thank you.

Code 201 entered for Liz Meyer’s eighth-grade science class

Today in class, we read Science World about using coral to replace bone matter, and we handed in our lab assignment, which was the spaghetti tower. They do not have any homework tonight, but I suggest that they watch TV about Tropical Storm Fabian. That’s all, and have a nice evening. Thank you.

Code 2 entered for school calendar

The magazine sale begins Oct. 19 through 30.

Code 3 entered for sports calendar

The boys’ volleyball and the girls’ basketball practice begins Oct. 17. There will be a late bus Monday through Friday for students who stay for practice.