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Many Questions Linger About Brea Olinda High Grade Changes

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* I retired in 1990 after 23 years as a teacher and administrator at Brea Olinda High School, and I have watched with sadness and outrage as the reputation of a fine school has been attacked with questions about its educational integrity.

The continuing false allegation that the practices currently under investigation there occurred over a 10-year period implies that this is an established part of the school culture, not the recent aberration it is.

This unfairly damages not only honest and dedicated educators, but also students at Brea Olinda who work hard to achieve success and who present authentic academic transcripts to the world.

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The class of 1990 (with whom I “graduated”) left irrefutable evidence of their achievements: state test scores in the top 5% statewide; SAT scores higher than national, state and county averages; completion of advanced math and science well above the norm; and other objective documentation of solid academic performance. Among that class were about a dozen National Merit scholars, as well as students who brought honor to the school and themselves by championship performances in music, dance, drama, speech and athletics.

Student achievements like these and the hard work of a dedicated staff formed the basis for the national recognition of Brea Olinda as a distinguished National Blue Ribbon School.

Who speaks now for these students? Who speaks for the honest, hard-working staff who served them? The respect for themselves and the pride in their school which these students felt are gravely undermined by editorial allegations that they cheated and lied, and educators helped them do it.

Whatever happened to the transcripts of the 1991-94 graduates should not be allowed to harm the self-respect and confidence of students, nor should those responsible for the present problems be allowed to shift blame to others who served before them and are innocent of grade changing and other unethical manipulation of student transcripts.

JEAN SULLIVAN

Placentia

* The recent revelations reported by The Times regarding illegal grade changes and the issuance of duplicate academic credit at Brea Olinda High School are highly distressing.

And yet even more distressing is the rather matter-of-fact response of the Brea superintendent and certain school board members. Rather than treating these acts as violations of state law and serious examples of unethical conduct, the superintendent has been quoted as believing that the grade changes and issuance of duplicate credit are merely instances of poor judgment not deserving additional attention.

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Such a stance is yet another example of the lack of importance some educators ascribe to ethical conduct and their lack of conviction when it comes to taking an unpopular stand based upon ethics. Certainly the involved students and their parents would have been outraged if eligibility for graduation had been impacted. And certainly it was the expeditious and “easy road” that the Brea school board took with its “midnight” decision to temporarily reduce the 1994 graduation requirements in order to allow seniors who were the “beneficiaries” of the duplicate credit to graduate.

But student and parental outrage is not sufficient reason to take the “easy road.” School officials obviously made egregious errors, but two wrongs don’t make a right. The school board’s decision to allow students to graduate who did not fulfill the original graduation requirements was yet another error in the handling of this incident.

This is an important issue and one that goes beyond Brea. It should not be considered “closed.” A number of questions need to be addressed.

Some that come immediately to mind include: Did the grade changes and issuance of non-earned credit give certain Brea students an unfair advantage in college admissions and scholarship competition over other students from Brea and from other high schools? Did such changes provide athletic eligibility to otherwise ineligible students, thus giving Brea athletic teams an unfair advantage over other schools? What was the status of the very first student who received this preferential treatment? How did this practice affect the class rankings of Brea students? Did these changes originate because of parental pressure and/or position?

In light of the fact that the Brea district considers this a closed issue, and since “doctored” grade-point averages can adversely affect students in other school districts, perhaps the Orange County Department of Education should be considered the appropriate agency to conduct a thorough review of the Brea situation.

DENNIS L. EVANS

Irvine

Dennis L. Evans was a high school principal in Orange County for 21 years.

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