BUENA PARK : A Club for New Kids on the Block

Four faces stare at counselor Rita Neumann as she ticks off a series of questions. “What time does school start?” she asks, looking back at the children.

After a long pause and a nervous shuffle, one of the students remembers and answers confidently: “8:15.”

Almost every week since September this scene has been repeated at Dysinger School, where like most schools in Centralia School District, the student turnover rate tops 30%. For a variety of reasons, many children leave Dysinger, the biggest school in the district, before completing the year.

To cope with the special problems that result, the school has taken a unique approach and created its own New Kids Club to help the newcomers.

“It is always difficult for kids to come in after the school year has started,” said Principal Linda Radar. “It is frightening. . . . We want to make sure the children are comfortable here.”

The club is really just another name for a one-person Welcoming Committee. As the school’s counselor and founder of the group, Neumann must get the students ready for the ultimate goal of the club--the classroom.

Before the new students even arrive, she has a list of Friendship Ambassadors, or student pals, waiting to be assigned to the newcomers on their first day. Then she formally calls a meeting of the club. Taking the kids under her wing, she spends time touching on many subjects, including why the students left their other schools, anxiety over moving, fears about making friends and also a few more practical matters.

“At one school I worked at a boy didn’t use the restroom for two weeks because he didn’t know where it was and was too afraid to ask,” she said.

Winter break has been over for just three days and already six new students have enrolled. There is traditionally an increase in the population after the holidays, and this year is no different.

Heidi Price and her brother Evan have moved from Escondido. Both have been invited to the portable classrooms, usually reserved for preschool children but now playing host to the New Kids Club. Heidi and Evan have been delivered special invitations for the event, with a picture of the school mascot--the Dysinger Dragon--gracing the cover.

For Heidi, a fourth-grader, it is the third day at her new school and she has already had a few mishaps. “On the first day of school I took the wrong bus,” she said, adding that the bus driver was nice and took her home.

Heidi, 10, is excited about making new friends and proudly announces their names. If she is concerned about moving, she doesn’t show it. Her brother Evan, 8, is equally as confident. “I like it pretty much because we are close to Knott’s Berry Farm and I have some new friends,” he said.

Third-grader Jason Washington is also glad to be at Dysinger and not at his former school in Los Angeles where, he said, gunshots frequently could be heard outside his classroom. “They had gang-bangers in school,” Jason said quietly. “I thought I was going to be shot.”

Some move because of divorce, others because of economic reasons and others to flee urban problems.

With the latest bunch of newcomers, Neumann reviews when school starts, the principal’s name and, yes, where the bathrooms are.

“If nothing else, I am going up to these kids and saying: ‘Welcome.’ I want them to feel important,” she said.