Boosters Honor Students Who Make the Grades

Academic booster clubs--the scholarly equivalent of the long-traditional athletic booster groups--are emerging as a strong force to promote and reward good schoolwork.

Increasingly, schools and parents are raising funds to pay for scholarships, help struggling pupils and pay for academic after-school programs.

Brea-Olinda High School, for example, recognizes its top students by awarding scholarships and inscribing their names on bronze plates that gild the sidewalks of a local shopping center. Laguna Niguel’s John Malcom Elementary raised $7,000 last year to bolster its science program. And Saddleback High in Santa Ana helps students get into college by organizing SAT prep courses.

Though their missions can vary dramatically, each school’s academic booster club provides support and services that help students excel, parents and educators say.

“It’s really nice to have that group of people who add that extra touch to our programs,” said Lois Anderson, principal at Malcom Elementary. “It’s really the frosting on the cake that keeps science as a forefront focus at our school.”

Malcom relies on its science booster club to supply equipment for science experiments, help arrange quarterly family science nights and fund transportation for field trips. Also, the school’s outdoor garden lab was created with the help of booster club parents.

Brea-Olinda High’s academic booster club raised $6,000 last year to pay for scholarships and commendations for students with high marks. It also helps fund programs for struggling students and such extracurricular activities as the speech and debate team, said Caryn Phillips, club president.

“We want to draw attention to students who not only perform well in athletics but also academics,” Phillips said.

And as special recognition to the best performing Brea-Olinda seniors each year, the booster club inscribes the students’ names on bronze plaques that line the sidewalks at the Brea Marketplace.

“The whole idea is very affirming for students,” said Nancy Fowkes, a former Brea-Olinda High club president. “It’s special to the kids who have earned [engraved plaques] because they can go over to the Marketplace and there’s their name.”

At Edison High in Huntington Beach, booster club volunteers run the student store, selling gym clothes, candy and school-spirit items such as bumper stickers and Edison teddy bears. Money raised is returned to the school.

Teachers who want books and materials not provided by the school district also turn to the booster club.

“One of the things we do is department requests because sometimes the district doesn’t provide the things teachers need,” said Libby Davis, club president. The club has also helped financially disadvantaged but gifted students pursue special training and instruction outside of the school.

The club gives $200 scholarships to 25 high achievers each year but also rewards students who simply try hard.

“Next month we are having an academic recognition event, and teachers get to recommend students in whom they’ve seen improvement, whether it’s academic or just in effort,” Davis said. “They do not have to be A students.”

All of the academic clubs and committees reserve special recognition for scholastic achievement.

Corona del Mar High’s top students next month will receive letters for their school jackets the same way athletes do. About 75 students who have achieved 3.7 grade-point averages for four terms--not necessarily in a row--will be honored by the academic letter committee of the school’s PTA.

“This is a hard high school and these kids really work hard for this,” said Sandy Jackson, chair of the event.

Corona del Mar High has been awarding letters to top students since 1995, when Johnnie Johnson started the event to show students and their parents that academic achievers are not taken for granted.

“That first year I called the parents to see if they were coming, and they told me their kids said not to bother, no one was going,” Johnson said.

She talked most into checking out the reception that year, and each event since has been well-attended.

“The kids were hesitant at first, she said, “but they got the drift of it. And they know that at our school it’s cool to be smart.”