Triple Threat

On a recent summer day, three newly graduated students returned to their high school haunts for a reunion of sorts--to reminisce about the past and hope for the future.

The three have conquered El Modena High School. And now they’ve begun their conquest of the Ivy League.

While most high school administrators would beam at the thought of one graduate studying at Harvard, the El Modena staff is heady at having three of them treading the Yard of the prestigious university in Cambridge, Mass.

Monica Castillo and Scott Worsley, 18, and Raymond Chen, 17, were among the academic vanguard of the El Modena Vanguards’ graduating class this year.

“I’ve talked to people that have been here for decades,” said Orange Unified School District spokeswoman Judith Frutig. “From what everybody says, this has never happened.”

Harvard admission officials won’t say just how rare it is. But El Modena High Principal Nancy Murray knows.

“To have three! It just reinforces that our school is doing something right,” she said. “This reaffirms something that you already know is true.”

What makes the accomplishment even more noteworthy is that El Modena is constantly trying to overcome the misguided notion that it is somehow less than first-rate because of its location in a low-income, mostly immigrant neighborhood in Orange.

“For other schools, there doesn’t seem to be that much to prove,” Murray said. “The stereotype has given us a chance to show what we have.”

Instead of just a handful of advanced-placement classes, El Modena offers twice as many as most schools in this area. It is this extra push of academics, Murray said, that gave Worsley, Castillo and Chen the extra glow to shine over 18,000 Harvard applicants last year. All three are on Harvard scholarships.

Now they are but three of the university’s freshman class of 1,652 students. This year’s admission rate was a mere 11.3%.

“These students have already demonstrated that they can do college-level course work--not just one course, but full time,” Murray said.

For Castillo, success hasn’t come without sacrifice.

“Ambition has been my main value,” she says. “So far, I’ve been totally immersed in books and studying and cramming before tests. I’ve sacrificed sleep, a social life, my childhood.”

But she believes a higher power--not just brainpower--has been at work too: “I really think this is all part of God’s grace. It’s just one of those paths . . . a course I will walk down.”

Known as the school’s best writer, Castillo dreams of influencing others with her words. She doesn’t hope just to publish: She wants to incite. “I hope to start a literary movement someday,” she says.

Best Pals and Mental Sparring Partners

Worsley and Chen, best friends and intellectual sparring partners since ninth grade, hope to change the world with science.

The two are opposites: Worsley, wearing a button-down shirt and tie, is talkative and outgoing. Chen, in a slightly wrinkled T-shirt and shorts, is reserved, more interested in interviewing a visiting journalist than in being interviewed himself. Proving just why he’s such a brilliant student, he seizes the opportunity to grill the visitor on Newspapering 101.

Asked who has most influenced their education, Worsley and Chen gesture toward each other.

“Scott’s been the best teacher I’ve ever had,” Chen says. “I’ve learned some pretty important things from him.”

The relationship started with a stumper of a biology question--on cell division, they think. Chen was stuck doing his homework one night and telephoned the person he believed was the smartest guy in class--Worsley.

“We’ve been best friends ever since,” Worsley says.

The two talk about the usual things that interest high school boys, but mostly they like to test each other on ideas or concepts.

“We’ll read something in class,” Worsley says, “and then talk about it while we’re walking or just hanging out the next day.”

The three are uncertain about what life will soon resemble: late nights, new friends and snow, they agree. But they vow to hold on to the friendship that binds them and to never forget good old El Modena.

Worsley laughs about the time he wore red and green Christmas lights sewn into his tuxedo for the senior prom.

“I don’t want to change too much,” he says. “I don’t want to look back and say I liked myself better” back in high school.