Seniors Embrace Future With Degrees of Zeal, Fear

With the end of the school year in sight, Principal Jo-Ann Yoos made a final sweep of the senior class at Thousand Oaks High to offer a warning to the would-be graduates, their heads now spinning with thoughts of diplomas and commencement ceremonies.

Room by room, senior by senior, Yoos told the upperclassmen they should feel good about making it this far. And she said there is still much to look forward to, this year and beyond.

But she urged them to stay focused. Play by the rules. Don’t blow it now.

“We’re heading toward graduation and we want to make sure there’s no confusion as to what our expectations are,” said Yoos, slipping into a senior English class to offer a refresher course on graduation contracts signed at the start of the school year.

With time running out on the Class of ‘97, Yoos reminded the seniors of the promises they had made to stay on their best behavior all year long.

So if you are thinking of taking time off to work on your graduation day tan, Yoos told them, forget about it. And if you are thinking of running off with your friends for some kind of “ditch day,” think again.

Graduation privileges are won and lost in the homestretch of the school year, she warned. And while the end is near, it’s not over yet.

“Your parents have waited a long time to see you walk the line, and they deserve to see you come into the stadium and get your diploma,” the first-year principal told the collection of fourth-year students.

“But there’s a terrible, terrible disease lurking about, and it’s called senioritis. As the days warm up, and the beaches look more inviting, it tends to get very infectious, so please be careful.

“It’s a very full last week of school, you guys, and I want everyone to be able to participate in all of it.”

For the 503 seniors at Thousand Oaks High, the school year has come racing to this point.

From the opening bell, most recognized the magnitude of what was ahead. This has been a pivotal year, one in which they have made key choices about colleges and career paths.

They have finished off the meat of their course work and have experienced such senior year milestones as the Homecoming Dance and the Senior Ball.

Most of those who won’t make it to the end already have been weeded out. And most who will already have been measured for caps and gowns and are busy sending out graduation invitations.

Now, with spring break behind them, only two months remain until the big day.

Two months to hang out with friends and shore up plans for next year. Two months and no more.

For many, the final days are winding down so quickly that all they want to do is shift into cruise control and enjoy what’s left of the ride.

“It’s so hard to stay motivated,” said Kristin Price, the 17-year-old senior class president who is headed to USC next year. “It’s exciting. I’m ready to leave but I’m nervous about next year. It’s not just a new school, it’s a whole new stage of your life.”

Thick and Thin Envelopes

There are some senior year rituals that never change. Take March Madness, for example, when letters of acceptance or rejection from University of California campuses start flooding mailboxes across the state.

By now, most seniors know that the size of the envelope tells the tale: Thick you are in, thin you are out.

Still, when letters started arriving in Thousand Oaks, widespread panic started to set in.

Senior Katie Krim, 18, was among the first to get word. She got a packet from UC Santa Barbara in early March, the first of three responses she would receive from UC schools.

With her mother and a friend looking on, she tore open the envelope and started reading aloud: “Congratulations! You have been accepted for admission to the pre-communication major in the college of letters and science at the University of California, Santa Barbara, for the fall 1997 quarter.

“Your selection recognizes your academic and personal accomplishments and our belief that you will find your experience at UCSB rewarding.”

The onlookers burst into applause. Katie’s mom rushed over and delivered a big hug and kiss. Her friend, senior Kelli Brock, followed right behind.

“I’m really proud of her,” Karen Krim said. “She’s worked so hard for this.”

Katie already had been accepted to the University of Arizona. And last week she received another acceptance letter from USC. Balanced against two paper-thin rejection letters from UCLA and UC San Diego, she now has until the end of the month to make up her mind.

It is not an easy decision. Go away or stay close to home. Taste a small measure of independence locally or sit down for a full meal of it out of state.

“I have no idea where I want to go,” she said. “What if I make the wrong decision?”

Around this sprawling campus, that question is being asked a lot these days.

At a school where eight out of 10 seniors go on to college, there is not a more popular topic of conversation. Some decisions came easy. In February, varsity quarterback Scott McEwan signed a letter of intent to play football at UCLA, his education paid in full by scholarship.

Classmate Jeff Hunter, 18, accepted an offer to attend the University of Arizona, adding his name to a running tally of college-bound seniors posted on the wall of a government class guided by veteran teacher Ellen Droshe.

For 17-year-old Leila Jirari, the big decision remains. She was accepted by UC schools in Davis, Santa Cruz, Santa Barbara and Irvine. She also got into Sonoma State University, the University of San Diego and the University of Arizona.

With so many schools to choose from and so little time, Leila is spending this weekend touring the campuses in Davis and Santa Cruz, her two front-runners.

“It’s scaring me because everyone else already knows where they’re going,” she said. “I’m happy to have a lot of choices. I just want to make a decision so I’ll know where I’m going.”

In the scramble to make the tough choices and find the perfect fit, the campus tour often tips the balance.

Senior Meghan Carroll has visited Pepperdine in Malibu, Westmont in Santa Barbara and Chapman in Orange. Each of the private institutions is small and offers a solid English curriculum, her chosen field of study. And each has a strong religious affiliation, also important to her.

“I’d like to be able to do something for the school and get involved,” said Meghan, a varsity cheerleader, member of the track team and student government commissioner. “I know that will be a lot easier to do at a school where you’re just not a number.”

On a President’s Day exploration of Chapman, Meghan and her parents, Jax and Debbie, got a good look at the Orange County campus, tucked into a residential district just outside of the city’s historic downtown core.

With 2,100 students, the university has a smaller enrollment than Thousand Oaks High. It is quiet and cozy, boasting stately buildings more than a century old.

Within a few hours, the Carrolls got a crash course in College 101. While Meghan went off to learn about Chapman’s liberal studies major, Jax and Debbie joined dozens of other parents at a financial aid seminar.

There was talk of loan caps and annual percentage rates, cost analyses and family contributions.

With the annual price tag of Chapman and the other schools in the mid-$20,000s, the Carrolls said the final decision will come down to who offers the best financial aid package.

At this point in Meghan’s academic career, the rest is out of her hands. She has worked hard to get this far. Now it’s time to see how well it all pays off.

“I don’t think you can just sit back and decide your senior year what you’re going to do,” said Debbie Carroll. “Meghan has been planning since her freshman year, figuring out what it’s going to take to get into a good college.”

Alternative Paths

There is another side of the senior year struggle at Thousand Oaks High, one of close calls and sometimes heartbreak. Not every senior who starts the year makes it to graduation day.

Since September, 19 seniors have checked into continuation school to finish their high school careers.

Most of those were funneled to alternative placement because they would have fallen short of the 230 credits needed to march into the stadium on June 12 and collect a diploma, school officials said.

In addition, there are a handful of seniors who make it all the way to the end of the school year only to lose their senior privileges, including the senior picnic, the graduation ceremony and a graduation night trip to Disneyland. An end-of-the-year fight or ditching school can cause that to happen, although in most cases seniors can win back those privileges by doing community service.

Taking such a hard-line approach is never easy, school officials say. But teachers and counselors say they do everything they can to keep kids in school and moving toward graduation.

Counselors, for example, look early and often for students who are slipping academically and falling short of meeting the requirements for graduation.

The push is to funnel those students as early as possible into continuation school or some other kind of alternative placement, with the hope that they can catch up and return to graduate with their class.

“It’s kind of a crap shoot,” said Steve Myerchin, the school’s welfare and attendance officer. “We want to keep kids here so they can get a high school diploma from Thousand Oaks, and we try to implement all of these alternative methods to make that happen. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t.”

For 18-year-old Ben Cooper, clearly something didn’t work.

Before the end of the first semester, school officials told him he would be several credits shy of the graduation requirement and recommended that he finish off his senior year at Conejo Valley High School, Thousand Oaks’ alternative school.

Because of the way credits are calculated at the continuation school, he would be able to do accelerated course work and come away with a high school diploma.

But it would not be from Thousand Oaks High. And he would not be able to walk in the graduation line or take part in any of the other senior activities.

He knew early on he was in jeopardy, but he hoped to hold on and succeed.

“I was so close,” said Ben, a former varsity football player who has lived apart from his parents the better part of his senior year. “I don’t know, maybe if I had paid more attention I could have done it. Now I can’t even graduate with my class.”

For now, he continues to work toward his high school degree. He also works part time as an automotive parts salesman at a local mall. And he rents a room in a house in Newbury Park, where two large, framed pictures of the varsity football squad dominate the walls.

“I miss TO High a lot, I really do,” he said. “I would go back there if I could, but there’s nothing I can do. My future is just kind of up in the air.”

Glad to Be Alive

Kristin Price knows the feeling. For a dozen years, the senior class president has worked toward this stretch run.

She is an honor student and a member of the dance team. She has an invitation to attend USC, where she plans to major in communications and business.

She stands at the threshold of adulthood, literally glad to be alive.

Kristin was born with cystic fibrosis, a fatal disease that attacks the pancreas and lungs. When she was diagnosed at age 2, the life expectancy was 10 years.

Today, as a result of advances in treatment, the mean survival age is about 30. But for someone who is 17, someone whose life has already been disrupted by doctor visits and hospital stays, the future can sometimes be clouded with darkness and doubt.

“If I think about it too much, yes it is scary,” she said. “It’s one of those things where you never know what can happen. Here I am, making all these plans to go on to college. But sometimes I think, ‘Should I even be making these plans?’ ”

The good thing is she is usually way too busy to give it much thought.

Between monitoring her diet and administering a dizzying array of medications, she carries a full academic load.

At the tail end of her junior year, when she was perhaps the sickest she has ever been, she campaigned for senior class president from her hospital bed and went to the state finals in speech and debate with a moving talk about her illness.

And last month, even as she was battling a lung infection, she was scripting a speech for graduation and studying for three Advanced Placement exams to earn college credit.

Her energy and drive are mind-boggling. But they also are a source of concern for her parents, Jeff and Donna, who worry that she might neglect her health when she leaves home.

“Over the past couple of years, we’ve really worked on turning it over to her, specifically so that when she goes away she can take care of herself,” said Donna Price, accompanying Kristin on a recent doctor’s visit to Childrens Hospital in Los Angeles.

“I’m excited for her, but it’s going to be hard,” she said. “She’ll have to call home a lot.”

Turning the disease over means a lot of work for Kristin. In a collection of tattered notebooks, she keeps a running log on her disease.

The notebooks are full. She has been in and out of the hospital 18 times since 1988, including a series of hospital stays in eighth grade and a long hospitalization at the end of last school year.

And with every infection and every illness, the potential exists for the disease to run out of control.

“Kristin is a wonderful patient, she has a wonderful attitude, but she’s a sick girl,” said Dr. Eithne MacLaughlin, a pediatric pulmonologist at Childrens Hospital. “It may plateau, but this is something she will live with and die with. Our goal is to keep her as stable as possible so that she can have a pretty normal life.”

For now, Kristin wants all the things any other high school senior might want. She wants a college education and a good job. And, somewhere down the road, she wants a husband and children to share her life with.

And, when she dares to dream big, she wants a cure to be found in her lifetime for her disease.

“Nobody knows how long they’re going to live,” she said. “I just try to get the most I can out of everything I do. The rest is in God’s hands. He’s already gotten me this far.”

Future Plans

This far is a long way from where she and the 500 other seniors started. Already, plans are being laid for graduation night celebrations and senior trips abroad.

Denise Sherman and her boyfriend, Bjorn Suckow, both 17, will share a summer trip to Europe before barreling headlong into the reality of next year. They too have made some decisions about their future.

Bjorn is headed for UCLA, Denise for Moorpark College. But he has decided to live at home and she has decided not to go away to school so they can continue seeing each other next year.

Their relationship is serious, but only time will tell if it’s forever. They are Mormons, and Bjorn will leave on a two-year mission for the church at the end of his freshman year.

“We’ll just see what happens,” Denise said. “If he came back and we knew it was right, then maybe it could be something more. But there’s still a lot of time between then and now.”

In the meantime, they are enjoying what is left of their senior year. They went to the Senior Ball together and afterward walked out onto the Santa Barbara pier hand in hand. And there, under the moonlight, they held each other and danced across the splintered wood, no music and no one else around.

They are young and in love, and, on this night at least, nothing else mattered.

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About This Series

“The Final Lessons: The Last Year of High School” is an occasional series chronicling a year in the life of the senior class at Thousand Oaks High. Over the last two years, similar series have highlighted school life in pivotal years for Ventura County students in elementary school and middle school. The third installment of this year’s series focuses on the seniors as they prepare for graduation and make critical choices about what to do with their lives once the school year is over.