Senator Studies Schools at Source : Education: Gary Hart is teaching two high school history classes. He says the volunteer stint is unrelated to his likely run for superintendent of public instruction.

State Sen. Gary K. Hart, chairman of the Senate Education Committee, temporarily has forsaken the hearing rooms of the Capitol for the classrooms of a local high school for what he calls a lesson in reality.

Under a flickering fluorescent light and next to smudged windows plastered with bumper stickers, the Santa Barbara Democrat is seeking to win over what is likely his toughest constituency: 30 or so high school students who are more interested in passing their drivers’ tests than Hart’s quizzes on the Spanish-American War.

At the Capitol, Hart is an influential mover and shaker on education issues, able to control the tempo of business before his committee. But in his classroom at John F. Kennedy High School a few miles south of the Capitol, he is merely the new U.S. history teacher who must put up with a steady stream of interruptions--from late-arriving students to announcements blaring out of a loudspeaker system--that conspire to derail his lesson plans.

Even sneaking a quick drink of water between classes can prove daunting, Hart said, noting that the water fountain near his classroom was out of order for the first two months of the semester.

“Prisoners might have better access” to water, Hart said.

“I’m like a first-year teacher. I struggle,” said the 49-year-old lawmaker.

Actually, he is not a rookie, having been a teacher before his 1974 election to the Legislature and thereafter returning to school as student and teacher. A few years ago, he attended UC Davis to study American history. In the mid-1980s, Hart, who has a master’s degree in education from Harvard University, spent a week at Los Angeles High School. In the late 1970s, Hart taught college-bound students in his Santa Barbara hometown.

This time, though he disavows any connection, his back-to-school experience may help serve another purpose.

Hart said he expects to enter the 1994 race to succeed Bill Honig as state superintendent of public instruction, the state’s top education post. Honig, scheduled to go on trial next month on felony conflict-of-interest charges, has said that he does not expect to seek reelection.

Whatever his political future, Hart trumpets the benefit of spending time in the classroom.

“Having an experience like this is helpful” in shaping education priorities, he said. “It’s a reality check.”

Without missing a beat last September, Hart shed his sport coat and tie for a pullover sweater and open-collar shirt to teach two periods of history at Kennedy High, an ethnically diverse 2,300-student school in an upscale neighborhood of pools and patios.

Hart said he sought the unpaid assignment to reacquaint himself with the day-to-day challenge of educating high school students. He returns to the Capitol each day, but the Legislature has been in recess most of this fall, which has allowed him to devote his mornings to teaching.

He persuaded Sacramento school officials to place college-bound and non-college-bound students in his courses. And like a regular teacher, he offers instruction, assigns classroom work and tests and grades his students.

He describes Kennedy as a school facing problems but, in his words, not yet a disaster.

In contrast to his days teaching in Santa Barbara, Hart said, his current students are “hurting more emotionally.” He cites free-flow essays in which some students voice fears for their safety, raising concerns about gang activity.

Hart, who has three daughters, sometimes frets that he is failing to motivate his pupils. He complains that some days are disappointing, such as early in the semester when none of his pupils knew that Bill Clinton was governor of Arkansas. Other mornings he is greeted with small triumphs: A would-be rap musician turns out to be the only student in two periods to know the meaning of the word overt.

“It’s been an eye-opener for him,” said Victor Cozzalio, one of two teachers whose class Hart has taken over. “He bumps his nose on reality.”

“He’s a good teacher, but he’s hard and sometimes he talks real fast,” said Charles Sammis, 15, a student in Hart’s first period class. “He gives us a challenge. He wants us to do the best we can.”

Hart said he is trying to turn his classroom into a laboratory for fresh education approaches. Among other things, Hart seeks to cut down the frequency of lectures, team up students to tackle questions together and focus his class on such themes as isolationism in U.S. foreign policy, instead of just important historical dates.

“I’m learning how to do a better job,” Hart said, noting that he has found it productive to establish a more structured classroom environment than when he walked into the classroom in September.

It is too soon to tell whether Hart’s back-to-school experience will lead to legislation. But he wants to explore ways of boosting the support system for teachers and students. He said a counselor might be best suited to assess a student’s needs, but Kennedy High has only one counselor for 2,300 students.

“When you don’t have any counselors,” Hart said, “you pay a heavy price.”

Hart plays down any tie between politics and his teaching stint, saying: “I was committed to doing this irrespective of whether I run for superintendent. Whatever the political benefits that might exist, it’s helpful to me to be a better legislator.”