By Hannah Glasston
HALF OF THE students who come to school don't give a hoot about learning. Most of them are here to mess around and cause trouble," blasts a March 28 editorial from Catalina High School's student newspaper, The Trumpeteer.
Which is just what the school's PTA Safety Committee has been contending in the weekly meetings they've held since November 1994. They've been asking for a few not-so-novel steps to combat increasing violence and vandalism, like having students eat in the lunchroom, as opposed to anywhere they want, and making sure they attend classes.
Failing to receive what she felt was a proper response from the school's principal, Linda Schloss, committee co-chair Luci Messing says she invited Barbara LaWall, chief deputy in the Pima County Attorney's office, to address the group following the assault of the son of a committee member. LaWall, a former Catalina teacher and chair of the 1992 Arizona Criminal Justice Commission's Youth and Crime Task Force, said she had real concerns about the school.
Basically, however, the prosecutor was only able to tell the committee, "We prosecute criminal activity whenever we have sufficient evidence." Meaning, if there's a police report and lots of evidence and people willing to come forward, she can, as she said, "open some doors."
LaWall encouraged Catalina High parents to document every incident in writing and said she would meet with police to determine proper reporting procedure.
What was really criminal, though not from a prosecutor's standpoint, is that Principal Linda Schloss apparently did not want the safety committee to meet this week. She initially sent word in a sealed envelope to Messing stating she was denying the request for the use of the usual library meeting space. Schloss claimed her reason for doing so was that PTA President Jim Dixon had not been properly informed.
Schloss later rescinded her denial. Dixon and his wife Doris were both at the committee meeting.
Parents and faculty attending the meeting said they thought Schloss was running scared. LaWall did, in fact, tell the 13 people present that Schloss had spoken with her and was upset the prosecutor's office was stopping by.
In a related matter, the March 28 school bulletin summoned 150 of the school's 1,200 students to the auditorium first thing in the morning. No teachers were told why, but several people at the safety committee meeting said the requested kids represented a good portion of the school's known "troublemakers." Schloss is reported to have told the kids to clean up their act--no more smoking cigarettes or marijuana, and they had to go to class. Vice Principal Al Watson reportedly chimed in they would no longer tolerate profanity. No students were seen in the often-vandalized parking lot during lunch that day, said Messing.
Amazing what a visit from the county attorney's office can do. This is welcome get-tough stuff at the school nicknamed the "Hug-a-Thug High School" by faculty and staff.
LaWall told the mostly skeptical committee, "I want to help get rid of the things threatening your children. Don't be in resignation or despair. We need to take action. We'll do it one step at a time."
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