GLENDALE : Miniature Yacht Buoys Spirits of Special-Education Students

A 75-inch yacht--a scale model like those that sail in the America’s Cup--wobbled its way across the Glendale High School swimming pool Friday as a group of special-education students unveiled the product of nine weeks of blood, sweat and accounting.

The boat, christened Rising Star by school secretary Barbara Melone, was a class project designed to give students a hands-on chance to learn physics and math. Along the way, the students also learned simple accounting as they kept track of their time spent on the project--and how much that would mean in wages in the real world.

“Working on this project, they are learning real job skills and life skills,” said special-education director Randy MacLaren. “I’ve had to face that my students don’t go on to college or some academic environment. In the best case, they all get jobs after they leave here.”

At Friday’s christening, Melone poured sparkling cider over Rising Star’s bow. The ceremony, originally religious in nature, now signifies good luck. Bad luck is said to follow a failure to break a bottle on the first try.

So, not taking any chances, Melone just dumped cider from a plastic cup onto the bow. “I have been practicing this move all night,” she said.

This project certainly didn’t need any more bad luck. The night before Rising Star’s original launch date, MacLaren and the students sneaked into the pool to test the boat’s seaworthiness. It sank.

MacLaren, a sailor since he was 8, said that setback dampened spirits only momentarily.

“The students pretty much got right back into a problem-solving mode,” he said. “One of the greatest things that I learned through this project is that, if I give them enough time, these kids will come up with their own plans and solutions.”

MacLaren, who lives with his wife on a sailboat docked in Long Beach, presided over Friday’s ceremony in sailing attire. He said that as the group toiled away on the finer points of yacht-building during January’s heavy rains, staff and students wondered whether they might really be building an ark.

Although he listed hydrodynamics and aerodynamics as important lessons, student Ernesto Velasquez said, “What I learned most--the hardest thing and the best thing--was confidence. Self-confidence.”