Chatsworth High School

The Chatsworth High School drama program boasts an illustrious list of movie alums: Oscar winner Kevin Spacey, action hero Val Kilmer and Emmy Award-winning actress Mare Winningham. But a look at a recent school newsletter shows just how far the program has fallen since Spacey and Winningham played the leads in "The Sound of Music" in the school auditorium 30 years ago.

More than $73 million was spent making Los Angeles Unified campuses safer this school year. But it's the $300,000 that \o7wasn't \f7spent on Nobel Middle School that makes students and teachers on the Northridge campus feel secure. While other schools lined up for money for guards and gates, Nobel -- unfenced for 44 years -- turned back a plan this spring to surround the school with a security fence. The rejection has some school board members shaking their heads.

Chatsworth has a long and colorful history. An important stagecoach stop in the latter half of the 1800s, it also was the site where John Wayne stepped into stardom in the 1939 film "Stagecoach." Horses are still a presence in the hills and on county roads and trails, but nowadays their riders are packing cellphones instead of six-shooters. Chatsworth lies in the northwest corner of the San Fernando Valley, cradled on two sides by a swath of the craggy Santa Susana Mountains.

After two months and 27 consecutive victories, Chatsworth has finally moved into the No. 1 spot in The Times' high school baseball rankings. Why did it take so long? There was skepticism among coaches, fans, even sportswriters, over Chatsworth's unbeaten record because of a perceived weak schedule. But any team that is still unbeaten at this point in the baseball season deserves respect. No City Section team has gone unbeaten since North Hills Monroe in 1971.

Steady-fielding, power-hitting second basemen are difficult to find at the high school level. Leadoff hitters who reach base 60% of the time and score at nearly the same rate are baseball's equivalent to archeological treasures. But Chatsworth has those qualities wrapped into one player this spring.

Fifty straight victories, two consecutive City Section titles and No. 1 atop its nameplate for at least another year. Those were the numbers the Chatsworth High baseball team was chasing heading into the City Championship Division final Tuesday night against San Pedro at Dodger Stadium. And Jason Dominguez made sure the Chancellors finished there. Dominguez, a senior right-hander, threw a five-hitter to defeat San Pedro, 7-1, before an estimated crowd of 3,500.

In the bleachers Monday at Chatsworth High, the matriarch of the Cassel family was squirming through another one of those nerve-racking moments that routinely come when you're the mother of four athletes. Justin Cassel was on the mound for Chatsworth and starting to struggle despite a nine-run lead against West Valley League rival Woodland Hills El Camino Real. The bases were loaded with one out. Momentum was changing. Then Cassel struck out the next two batters and Mom could exhale again.

Re "District's Freelance Fees Cited in Audit," April 23: For years the L.A. Unified School District has had a racket going on with "outside consultants," paying them hundreds of dollars an hour for performing poorly defined jobs. At the same time, teachers seeking pay raises have been told that the district's coffers are bare. Here's a bold plan that will encourage qualified individuals to enter teaching, while ending the teacher ritual of begging for money for their students and themselves.

Catchers usually have a high pain threshold because their bodies are treated like punching bags. No matter how many chest, face, shin or mouth protectors they wear, the ball usually finds the uncovered spot. That makes Jordan Sisson of Chatsworth High the ideal catcher because he has the toughness of a middle linebacker. "I've gotten banged up pretty good blocking balls, running into people, going through fences," he said. "But I'm just trying to help the team out by sacrificing my body."

David Massey has given his students at Chatsworth High School an unusual weekend homework assignment. Find and tape television footage of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and bring it to school for extra credit. The tapes will form the basis of a lesson Massey is planning for his advanced film and video studies class on Wednesday, the first anniversary of the deadly attack. "We'll look at the imagery of Sept.