Eagle Rock High School

Spurred in part by Eagle Rock High School students and parents, Los Angeles school board member Julie Korenstein has introduced a measure to automatically expel students who carry guns to school or seriously injure others, a milder version of a proposal that the board has rejected.

The difference in grade-point average between the valedictorian and the runner-up salutatorian at Eagle Rock High School this year was small but significant - a full five hundredths of a point, the difference between a 4.5 and a 4.55. Yet the parents of the second-ranked student are outraged, writing to top officials and threatening (what else?) a lawsuit. The mother of Stanford-bound Elisha Marquez complains that her daughter's "sleepless nights" of study were "for nothing," and her father characterizes her second-place finish this way: "You don't want your kid to be a loser.

Last September, Dave Gardetta, Eagle Rock High School class of 1979, returned to his alma mater to teach English. In doing so, he became one of the 5,472 uncredentialed teachers brought in with emergency permits into the Los Angeles Unified School District. Eagle Rock High School, like the small town of Eagle Rock just north of downtown L.A., has changed in the last 20 years. Once predominantly Anglo, Latinos and Asians now compose a majority of the student population.

An Eagle Rock High School football coach allegedly was assaulted by a disgruntled former player who graduated last year, officials said Friday. It was the latest episode in a series of conflicts related to the firing of the previous head coach. Coach Johnny Lopez was bending down to pick up a ball when a young man struck him from behind during practice Thursday afternoon, witnesses told school Principal Salvador Velasco.

The students in Beverly Glassford's fifth- and sixth-grade class gathered in small groups last week to discuss advertising techniques used to hustle products to unwary customers. The students clearly had no trouble spotting the gimmicks. For example, one student suggested to the class that an ad for a carpet "smart enough to pass a school test" made no literal sense. "How can a carpet be smart?" she asked.

The community of Grover's Corners, N.H., celebrated in Thornton Wilder's play "Our Town," will come to life once more on the stage at Eagle Rock High School Auditorium tonight, Friday and Saturday. The ever-popular story, telling of the courtship, marriage and lives of two simple people in small-town America, is one of the plays most often performed on high school stages. But this is not your garden variety high school production--the Eagle Rock community is getting into the act.

Students at Eagle Rock High School were evacuated for 40 minutes Wednesday after bomb squad officers were called to investigate a fake hand grenade brought to school by a 15-year-old student, authorities said. The grenade contained ground-up charcoal. School authorities summoned police to the campus at 1750 Yosemite Drive after a metal shop teacher saw the student and a friend carrying the device, said Eagle Rock Principal John Anderson. The boys told school officials that it was fake.

Re the Associated Press photo of a Marine on Page A11, April 3: This picture is one example of how this war hits close to home; it is of our son, Cpl. Jeffrey Davis. Jeff graduated from Eagle Rock High School in 1999 and joined the Marines shortly thereafter. Last November he married Candice Johnson, also from Eagle Rock. We are very proud of his dedication to the Marines, duty and his love of country. In his e-mails, he states that he is very proud to be a Marine and to be in Iraq.

Like many of his classmates, George Colindres will graduate Friday from Eagle Rock Junior High School with a ninth-grade diploma, euphoric at becoming a high school sophomore. But unlike his classmates--or other ninth-graders in the Los Angeles Unified School District--Colindres has a strong chance of entering high school having already earned credits for five college classes.

I very much enjoyed Doug Smith's article "Behind-Scenes Work Brings a New Sense of Drama to Schools" (June 13 Glendale Section). However, there is another very important aspect to one school performance related in the column. The production of "Fiddler on the Roof" at Eagle Rock High School involved 70 students in the cast and another 30 in the orchestra and stage crew (as well as 2,000 other high school and elementary school students who sat in the audience and loved it!). These kids don't have time for gangs or drugs.

"There's nothing I can do." It's the official mantra of bureaucrats worldwide. It was the wrong thing to say to Elda Martinez. Martinez is standing on the sidewalk outside Eagle Rock High School. She's dressed in a pink T-shirt and sneakers, waiting for the bus to bring her son, Daniel, back from Fairfax High where, through no fault of his own, he just squandered the first week of what could be the most important year in his academic career.

Eagle Rock is a multicultural community centered on a budding main strip complete with upscale restaurants, coffee shops and art galleries. A small town in the big city, it is part of Los Angeles and eight miles from downtown. The basics Founded as a city in 1911, then annexed to Los Angeles in 1923, Eagle Rock takes its name from the sandstone formation shaped like an eagle in flight in the northeast part of town.

Re the Associated Press photo of a Marine on Page A11, April 3: This picture is one example of how this war hits close to home; it is of our son, Cpl. Jeffrey Davis. Jeff graduated from Eagle Rock High School in 1999 and joined the Marines shortly thereafter. Last November he married Candice Johnson, also from Eagle Rock. We are very proud of his dedication to the Marines, duty and his love of country. In his e-mails, he states that he is very proud to be a Marine and to be in Iraq.

A 46-year-old Eagle Rock man has been charged with stealing more than $50,000 worth of property from public schools in his neighborhood, Los Angeles Unified School District police said. Jay Bentley was apprehended Sunday after a stakeout by school police outside Eagle Rock High, where he is accused of taking computer equipment in eight separate burglaries since November, said Officer P.J. Webb.

The physical strength is obvious, evident in Rhuben Williams' rippling physique and the distances he throws the shotput. Then there is the inner strength. It is subtle, sheathed beneath the muscles but as integral to Williams' success as the power and speed he generates once he steps into the circle for competition.

Last September, Dave Gardetta, Eagle Rock High School class of 1979, returned to his alma mater to teach English. In doing so, he became one of the 5,472 uncredentialed teachers brought in with emergency permits into the Los Angeles Unified School District. Eagle Rock High School, like the small town of Eagle Rock just north of downtown L.A., has changed in the last 20 years. Once predominantly Anglo, Latinos and Asians now compose a majority of the student population.

A 46-year-old Eagle Rock man has been charged with stealing more than $50,000 worth of property from public schools in his neighborhood, Los Angeles Unified School District police said. Jay Bentley was apprehended Sunday after a stakeout by school police outside Eagle Rock High, where he is accused of taking computer equipment in eight separate burglaries since November, said Officer P.J. Webb.

An Eagle Rock High School student was stabbed as he stood outside the campus Friday, just hours after more than 150 classmates walked out of their classes to protest what they said was increasing campus violence and a weak school district policy for disciplining students who carry weapons. Students who witnessed the attack, which occurred shortly after classes ended at 3 p.m.

Re "Group Warns of Potential Textbook Loss," Aug. 14: A majority of schools do not rely on two little white cards but rather one white and one blue. The use of the cards is a very effective inventory process. The students fill out those cards which gives them an indication that they will be held responsible for the book. The blue copy is kept by the classroom teacher. Some of us (classroom teachers) hold weekly book checks during quizzes. Textbooks must be covered, clean and with the proper identification.