High School Courses

Armed with nearly $20,000 in grant funds, the Orange County High School of the Arts will launch its first tuition-free opera vocal training this year. The Opera Conservancy program is being organized in partnership with Irvine-based Opera Pacific, the county's only major opera company. It is open to Southland high school students by audition, scheduled for Sept. 14 at the high school in Los Alamitos. Classes begin Sept. 27.

A proposal to place a novel whose teen protagonist is raped and considers suicide on a reading list for high school students is raising concerns among Temecula school district trustees. The school board is expected to decide Tuesday whether to allow the book, "Speak," by Laurie Halse Anderson, to be taught in sophomore English classes. The book first came before the board in August, but trustees delayed action after they heard a summary of the plot, which involves a teenage girl dealing with the aftermath of getting drunk at a party the summer before her freshman year and being sexually assaulted by a senior.

Emily's high school boyfriend likes to play a little game with her. Resting his 180-pound frame on her slight 17-year-old body, he holds her down by her wrists until they bruise, tickling her until she starts to cry and loses her breath. He won't stop until she calls him "Daddy." If she goes out, she must call him as soon as she returns home. Most important, she is allowed to talk to only three girls at school, and he had better not catch her talking to any guys--or else.

High schoolers will have an easier time earning diplomas after the school board decided this week to reduce graduation requirements from 240 to 220 credits. The board of Orange County's largest school district voted 4 to 1 late Tuesday to cut world geography, earth science, health, and college and career planning as required courses as a way to retain more students. Administrators and school counselors said the move will free up jammed student schedules and boost graduation rates. Santa Ana raised its requirements in 2000 to among the state's strictest, saying the higher standards would challenge more students to aim for college.

There seemed to be as many NCAA staffers as media types in the room for the pre-convention luncheon with Executive Director Cedric W. Dempsey. Similarly, turnout by the membership has decreased. The number of preregistered delegates dropped about 20% from 1997, most of the shortfall accounted for by Division I members. So, has the NCAA restructured its convention all the way out of public view? Major changes impacting Division I schools won't be happening in full view.

John Foley figures he has pretty much maxed out on explaining to African American mothers why it's OK to call a black man the N-word -- as long as it's in a novel that is considered a classic. For years, English teachers have been explaining away the obvious racism in Mark Twain's "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn."

Nearly 100,000 California 12th graders -- or about 20% of this year's senior class -- have failed the state's graduation exam, potentially jeopardizing their chances of earning diplomas, according to the most definitive report on the mandatory test, released Friday. Students in the class of 2006, the first group to face the graduation requirement, must pass both the English and math sections of the test by June.

American high school students have an alarming deficiency of economic knowledge, according to a survey that revealed two-thirds didn't understand profits and more than half couldn't supply a definition for demand. Economic education is "not in the kind of shape we want it to be," former Federal Reserve Board Chairman Paul A. Volcker said Wednesday at a news conference sponsored by the Joint Council on Economic Education, a nonprofit coalition that underwrote the survey.

Abel Franco, actor and drama coach extraordinaire , had center stage. All eyes were on him as he peered through the lights at a sea of faces and, strictly unrehearsed, delivered his entry line: "What the hell is this?" A chorus of about 150 voices yelled, "Surprise!"

After years of minor convictions for minor offenses, some jail time and finally a prison sentence, I decided it was time to change. I began to prepare myself for release from prison by polishing up on high school courses and taking a few college correspondence courses. When I was released, I enrolled at San Francisco State. In those years (1950s) there was a very developed rhetoric about rehabilitation and there was some attempt to actualize that rhetoric.

Briana Ramirez and Troy Harrington, both seniors at Santa Monica High School, recently spent an afternoon at a local community center, searching the Internet for college scholarships. Thousands of results appeared on the computer screen, making the confusing process even more daunting. But nearby was a walking, talking college resource, ready to answer their questions.

John Foley figures he has pretty much maxed out on explaining to African American mothers why it's OK to call a black man the N-word -- as long as it's in a novel that is considered a classic. For years, English teachers have been explaining away the obvious racism in Mark Twain's "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn."

It's arrivederci after all for Advanced Placement Italian. Despite a spirited fundraising campaign by Italian Americans in Southern California and across the country, the effort to save the AP exam in Italian has failed, at least for now. The language exam for high school students trying to win college credit will be suspended after this spring's testing because not enough money was pledged to subsidize it, College Board officials in New York said Wednesday.

Three years ago, Roosevelt High School student Jose Orea went to Los Angeles Unified School District headquarters and handed out pamphlets imploring officials to provide more college preparatory courses. It was the first time he'd gotten involved in politics, and he was filled with enthusiasm. When the L.A.

The University of California did not violate students' freedom of expression and religion when it rejected some classes at a Riverside-area Christian school from counting toward UC admission, a Los Angeles federal judge has ruled.

When school begins at Diamond Bar High School, students in the Advanced Placement environmental science class taught by David Hong may find themselves in the field studying the pattern of tracks made by the mule deer, the feeding habits of the horned lizard and the unique trill of the California quail.

Mark Keppel High School in Monterey Park, John Muir High School in Pasadena and San Marino High School each have 16 students enrolled in Caltech's Summer Secondary School Science Project. Caltech has 370 young scholars from 18 states and five foreign countries taking special math and science courses, including molecular biology, physics, trigonometry and calculus. The classes supplement standard high school courses and are taught by Caltech undergraduates.

Ralph Opacic was an 18-year-old with stars in his eyes when he headed to California from his native Virginia in hopes of becoming a pop singer. He never hit it big as a singer, but he did as an educator. As founding director of the tuition-free Orange County High School of the Arts, Opacic started a school that "teaches kids the business of the business." More than 700 students from Orange, Riverside and Los Angeles counties apply each year for 125 coveted spots left by departing seniors.

Today a high school, tomorrow an orchard (with a high school attached). That was sort of the idea when students from the Environmental Charter High School in Lawndale got down and dirty helping to plant some 60 fruit trees and shrubs on their small campus near Hawthorne Boulevard. The school, now in its seventh year, has an environmental focus and a college preparatory curriculum.

Alex Schwertfeger doesn't know what college she wants to attend. But the Notre Dame High School junior is convinced that the key to entry at her dream school is the SAT. To boost her score, she attended a pricey private prep class and spent countless hours at home studying drills and completing practice tests. Before she went to bed many nights, she flipped through flashcards of the 200 most popular vocabulary words to appear on the test.