Life Without High School

Homecoming, homework and hall passes--the annual ritual called high school is well under way.

For most San Fernando Valley teen-agers, that means another autumn of savoring their fleeting adolescence while slowly advancing toward adulthood. The next stop: Graduation.

But not for everybody. Once again, thousands of students have dropped out of high school. In 1989-90, 5,000 out of 38,000 Valley students--or 14%--quit school. Districtwide, the rate was 16%.

The Valley is no aberration; throughout the Los Angeles Unified School District, the dropout problem is a priority concern.

The district devotes 100 people and $7.5 million annually to combat this problem. But it’s not enough.

“We have to get started earlier,” said Barry Mostovoy, a district administrator who works on dropout prevention programs, of which there are about half a dozen. “We need more counselors in schools to talk to students. We need them in elementary schools.”

According to Mostovoy, the reasons teen-agers quit school haven’t changed much in recent years: poor grades, the lack of family support, pregnancy.

Grover Cleveland High School in Reseda had the highest dropout rate of any Valley school in the 1989-90 academic year, the period of the most recently released official figures. That year, 274 youngsters--22% of the 1,227-member student body--quit school, according to district figures.

Here are the stories of three students who dropped out of Cleveland High:

Dax Patterson, 18

“Everyone says that high school used to be fun. It did look like fun in the

‘50s, but that’s not how it is now.”

Dax Patterson, 18, wasn’t crazy about the concept, either, so he turned in his pens and pencils for paintbrushes.

Dax spends eight hours a day painting apartments, working for his father’s business. He makes about $250 a week and claims the money proves that he doesn’t need high school.

“I just felt like I needed to do more things,” Dax said. “I needed a job. I was wasting my time.”

This would have been Dax’s senior year, a final rendezvous with carefree adolescence and a chance to plan the future.

But, for him, high school had stopped being fun after ninth grade, and he couldn’t hold on past his junior year. He didn’t like the teachers and felt threatened by gang-related activities.

There were other things to do, like play music. After several years in the rock band Wildfire, Dax is busy trying to assemble a new group. Dax plays guitar and dreams of a career in music.

But that is the future--maybe.

The present still has its hardships.

The fumes from the paint often bother him, he doesn’t get home till late in the afternoon, and he doesn’t see his friends as often as he used to.

Would he go back?

No way.

“I’m already out,” he said, “so why backtrack now?”

At first, Dax said, his parents weren’t pleased with his decision. But he said they now sympathize and don’t give him any trouble. In fact, neither his older brother or sister ever graduated from high school.

“Everyone says that high school used to be fun,” he said. “It did look like fun in the ‘50s, but that’s not how it is now.”

Like Jason, Dax is concerned about not having a high school diploma, and he’s not proud of quitting school.

Recently, his grandmother died. When the family got together for the funeral, everyone wanted to know how high school was going.

Dax lied.

“I told them it was fine. I thought they might think I was a loser,” he said. “I’m not a loser. Maybe someday my kids will look down on me for not graduating from high school.”

The only regret is girls.

“It was easier to meet girls when I was in school,” he said. Now he shops the malls.