Student Musicians Sent Home From Sydney

Four El Dorado High School band members who were to have performed in opening ceremonies of the 2000 Olympic Games were back at school this week after having been caught drinking, authorities said Tuesday.

The three boys and one girl, whose names were not released, were sent home from Sydney, Australia, by band director Richard Watson and other school representatives after they broke rules that barred them from consuming alcoholic beverages, officials said.

“The whole thing turned out to be painful for everyone,” said Karen Wilkins, principal of the Placentia school. “But once they violated the rules, there was no other choice” but to send them home. She said she was also troubled by the fact that school representatives in Sydney disclosed the matter to the news media.

The incident happened within 48 hours of the students’ Sept. 2 arrival in Sydney, where they were among 400 Orange County high school musicians to play in the 2,000-member U.S. marching band performing at opening ceremonies Friday. Irvine High and La Palma’s Kennedy High also sent performers. Each student had to raise $3,000 for the trip.

Last summer, the invitation to play in the ceremonies was revoked when Australians realized that the Olympic band would consist of 500 Australians, 200 Japanese and 1,300 Americans. Some U.S. bands were dropped from the list, including the musicians from Orange County.

But after letters from lawyers to Olympic officials and worries over a possible lawsuit from a company organizing the Olympic band, members of the Sydney Organizing Committee of the Olympic Games relented.

At El Dorado on Tuesday, students had varied reactions to the news that four of the young musicians had been flown home.

“They wasted a great opportunity they worked hard to get,” freshman Amber Long said. “But I guess it’s fair because they’re under age, and they’re not supposed to be drinking.”

Others saw it differently.

“They should have given at least a warning,” said Jaimie Guerra, a sophomore who knows one of the students. “This is not fair. They worked their butts off to be there.”