Search for Harmony : Students Attend a Summit on Campus Violence

High above the beach west of Malibu, dozens of teen-agers stop giggling and talking as they are asked, “Are you guys ready?”

With the enthusiasm only teen-agers can muster, 95 students from Los Angeles County high schools scream back in unison, “Yeah!”

The scene may be cheery at the Gindling Hilltop Camp in Ventura, a rustic getaway with a majestic view, but these students have gathered to discuss a grim topic: how to combat growing violence at their schools.

Today, students are subjected to random searches with metal detectors at all 50 high schools in the Los Angeles Unified School District, and policy requires the expulsion of any student found with a gun on campus.

But most of the 15- to 18-year-olds participating, who represent 29 schools, said they felt those measures are no solution for the deeper problems--tension between races, lack of understanding, and low self-esteem.

“They (administrators) are just trying to find a quick solution to the problem,” said Marla Gomez, a junior at Reseda High, where a 17-year-old was shot by a 15-year-old classmate in a crowded hallway last year. “But it won’t work because kids are smart and they can always find a way to bring guns to school.”

Gomez, 16, said it would be more effective to persuade students that guns aren’t necessary to be cool.

“We want kids to take a look at what is going on in their environment,” said John Berndt, who helped organize the “Harmony Summit.” Berndt is project coordinator for the L.A. County chapter of Friday Night Live, a group fighting drug and alcohol use and campus violence. “They may or may not be involved, but what part do they play if they see something and don’t say anything?”

Berndt said students should not only identify the problem, but find a solution.

“I don’t know how to get kids to stop bringing guns to school,” Berndt said. “But these kids might.”

The retreat was funded by the Healthy Kids Center and the Los Angeles Office of Education. “Who would have thought 10 years ago that we would be a part of an anti-violence campaign now?” Berndt said. “But kids kept saying to us that they didn’t feel safe at parties and school.”

For the five participants from Reseda High, the subject hit close to home.

“I was scared when that (shooting) happened,” Gomez said. “I never thought that would happen at my school. I thought my school was safe.”

Students at the two-day gathering suggested that peer counseling and mandatory multicultural classes could help quell violence at their campuses because it would promote more understanding.

But others urged more drastic steps.

“If we all had uniforms, we would have no competition between students,” signed Regina Acoba, a deaf student from Seleco High School in Downey. “Gang members wouldn’t be able to wear their kind of clothes.”

But Twandra Cole, 17, of Manual Arts High School in Los Angeles retorted: “I know a lot of people who wear that kind of clothes just for fashion. You can’t just look at someone and say ‘Oh they are a gang member’ because they dress that way.”

That give and take was part of the process.

“There are a lot of problems going on in different schools,” said Candise Ketcham, a 15-year-old Reseda High student. “We don’t all have the same problems, but we helped each other with different ones.”

“A person is more likely to act if I ask them to because I am their peer,” Cole said. “We should work among ourselves to solve our own problems.”

Students will take back “action plans” to their campuses for programs to fight violence. Reseda students, for instance, plan a “Hands Across Campus” Day. They plan to create a scholarship to recognize one of their peers who works for harmony.

Many said they feel left out of the loop when administrators decide what is best for them, something Gomez won’t accept.

“People don’t listen to us,” Gomez said. “They think we don’t have a grasp on reality and that we are immature. But all of us are not like that. We know the difference between right and wrong, and we have a better chance of solving our problems than they do.”