Santa Clarita / Antelope Valley : Teachers Wary of Crime-Tip Reward Program : Schools: Some in the Antelope Valley district say offering cash to students who turn in their peers for guns and drugs sends the wrong ethical message.

Two weeks after the Antelope Valley Union High School District began rewarding students with cash for turning in peers who carry guns and drugs, some teachers in the district are expressing discomfort with the program, calling it morally flawed.

Dave Kennedy, president of the Antelope Valley Teachers Assn. and a teacher at Quartz Hill High School, said instructors fear that the program--which rewards students with $25 for their crime tips--may send teen-agers the wrong message.

“We should be teaching students to do this because it is the right thing to do,” said Kennedy, whose union represents 470 teachers in the five-high school district. “By interjecting money into it, we destroy the ethical nature.”

Kennedy also criticized the Antelope Valley school board for instituting the program without consulting teachers. The first time he heard of the program, he said, was when it appeared on the school board’s agenda two days before the panel met.

But school board member Sue Stokka said the program was unanimously approved at “a public board meeting. . . . It should not have been a surprise to anyone.” She added that Kennedy attended the meeting and could have voiced disapproval.

The board’s concern in implementing the reward program was for the children, Stokka said. “Reality is that this money would encourage someone that would not otherwise report it.”

Kathleen Parks, a teacher at Quartz Hill High who is secretary of the teachers union, said: “This whole policy caught us all by surprise. . . . I don’t believe there was any teacher discussion of this before it was done.”

On the first day of the program, she said, she found posters and bumper stickers in her campus mailbox that warned, “Get arrested and get expelled.” Parks said she fears the program is “turning the school into a model that looks like law enforcement rather than education.”

“It’s a trivial amount of money and it’s ineffective,” Kennedy said.

But Thursday, principals at district schools said the program is widely backed on their campuses.

“We have unilateral support for the program. No teacher has come to me and expressed displeasure,” said Jeffrey E. Foster, principal of Littlerock High School, where six student tips have led to five arrests under the new program.

At Palmdale High School, Principal Darrell Havens said, “As far as I know, everyone is very supportive of it.” He added that many students had given campus security crime tips before the cash bonus program. Now the only difference is the money, he said.

But the financial incentive is partly what has bothered district teachers in the brief time the program has been in place. Teachers said their students were comfortable when they informed authorities before, and that should remain the case now.

“My impression over the last few years has been that (campus) security had real good success to get students to tip them off without any rewards program,” said Parks.

Students have expressed opposing views about the cash-for-crime-tips program. Some have supported it, saying guns and drugs are too much of a problem in their schools. But others say $25 is too little to put their lives in jeopardy and face the possible retaliation of their peers and gangs, even though school officials promise confidentiality.