HIGH LIFE: A Weekly Forum For High School Students : Laguna Hills High to Go to State Academic Decathlon

The Academic Decathlon team from Laguna Hills High School will represent Orange County at the state championship for the fifth consecutive year.

The Laguna Hills team scored 45,148 points in the county competition last month, defeating runner-up Foothill High from Santa Ana by 2,000 points. Los Alamitos finished third, Sunny Hills fourth and Dana Hills fifth.

Fifty-one high schools competed in 10 academic events, including economics, fine arts, language, literature, mathematics, science and social science. Students also delivered a four-minute prepared speech and a two-minute impromptu speech and wrote an essay.

The Super Quiz, a College Bowl-style contest, culminated the one-day event. In the Super Quiz, Laguna Hills finished tied with Foothill for second place behind University High of Irvine.

This year’s state finals will be March 11-13 at the University of the Pacific in Stockton. The winner advances to the national competition later in the spring.

Laguna Hills won state championships in 1989 and 1990 and placed second nationally in those years. Last year, Laguna Hills placed third in the state competition.

Members of the Laguna Hills team, coached by English teachers Kathy Lane and Roger Gunderson, are Aaron Brunstetter, Paul Cary, Jeff Ferrell, Karen Gross, David Huang, Tedd Lehman, David Ochi, Mike Pernat and Chris Shortell.

Sitting on the floor of a crowded high school gym littered with torn wrapping paper and dappled with water from squirt guns, George, 5, opened a box containing a toy motorcycle.

“I wasn’t hoping for something like this, I was hoping for something different, but this (is) better than what I was hoping for,” he said. “This is great!”

George was one of 200 pupils from Clinton Elementary School and Mendenhall Special Education School who were treated last week to a holiday party complete with gifts, cookies, punch and a visit from Santa Claus.

Held annually at Pacifica High School in Garden Grove, the “Adopt-a-Child” party is thrown by the school’s 275 seniors. It is aimed at helping bring some cheer to low-income and disabled children, many of whom would receive few presents during the holidays.

Next to George, senior Dominick Scaccia, 18, said: “This feels great. The best part is the smile on their faces.”

Seniors watched as their wide-eyed “adopted” children unwrapped dolls, coloring books and crayons, walkie-talkies, bubble-blowing toys, bows with foam arrows and slot car sets.

“Being able to help people less fortunate than you makes you feel better,” senior Bridget Haynes said. “This is what Christmas is all about. It makes me feel good.”

“Our progress as a nation can be no swifter than our progress in education.”

--John Fitzgerald Kennedy (1917-1963)