Light in California

When Sputnik flashed across California, it lit dark places in the nation's biggest public school system. Heckled by parents, the state legislature named a blue-ribbon jury to examine the quality of California's schooling. Called the Citizens Advisory Commission, it was sparked by former University of California President Robert Sproul. Without pussyfooting, the group soon made clear its stance. It attacked the theory of education for "life adjustment" as non-education: "The school has neither the chief responsibility nor the means for dealing with all aspects of personal development . . . The school should foster in each student the desire to excel, or at least to do his best. The school is under special obligation to develop the talent and skills needed by the Nation."

Last week the commission issued its first recommendations. Some were downright iconoclastic. The commission wants to change an 1872 law requiring instruction in "manners and morals," eliminate time-consuming ceremonies such as Susan B. Anthony Day (Feb. 15) and Conservation, Bird and Arbor Day (March 7). To get down to business, it wants to abolish required physical and driver education along with automatic promotion. And it demands that two-thirds of class time in elementary schools be spent on basic subjects, not just half the time.

Into the state education code, said the commission, should go a stiff three-R curriculum. For the first grade: reading taught by phonics, writing with spelling (now often delayed until third grade), arithmetic emphasizing basic principles. Science and foreign languages should begin no later than sixth grade. From elementary grades on, statewide tests should check on each school's progress. To jolt high schools, state-run colleges should report on freshmen performances--and school boards should publish the results.

Down at Simmons. If the legislature must still approve such audacity, the least likely to disapprove are those most concerned--bright students. In suburban Downey near Los Angeles, for example, the schools have long been touted as topnotch. Last week the big issue in Downey was how to make this notion a reality. Reason: 14 recent graduates showed up at a school board meeting last month and stunned their elders with a bruising charge that their education had involved "too much play and too little work."

At Warren High School, Fran Doroshow, 18, a pediatrician's daughter who started it all, said she got mostly A's and ranked seventh in her class ('59). At Boston's Simmons College this past year, she got a jolt. Simmons festooned her freshman English essays with C-minuses, and she knows why. "In all my years in high school," recalls Fran, "I wrote only two essays and one term paper. They came back with A's and no criticism." French was an equal bust: "I had three years of French in high school, but when I went to Simmons I had to take beginning French." At that, Fran feels lucky to be at Simmons: "It hurts me to see so many of these bright students end up at California junior colleges, just fooling around, when they could be doing big things."

Invited to tell it to the school board, Fran did--and so did bright-eyed Linda Farley, 17, graduate of Downey High School ('60). An A-minus student, Linda was maddest on one key point: "In my three years at Downey, I had only three instructors whom I considered to be real teachers--teachers who challenged me, made me want to learn, increased my intellectual curiosity." Equally biting was Tom Saltzman, 17, another A-minus graduate of Downey: "Of what use is it to have a teacher not prepared for the course--who is one chapter ahead of us in the book? We read two chapters, and we're one ahead of the teacher who is supposed to teach us."

Up to Sacramento. At meeting's end, angry snorto came from school officials. "I'm afraid she has hurt herself," one of them said of Linda Farley. But the kids were unruffled. Linda has since described many of her high school textbooks as "seventh grade level." Fran Doroshow's sister Barbara, 17, joined in to criticize a course called Senior Problems, which deals with dating. "A breeze," scoffed she. "I got an A, and I didn't do a thing." World Geography was worse: "You colored maps for a whole semester, then got graded on your notebooks."

By last week the kids' campaign had produced results. The Downey Unified School District Board announced a plan based on the kids' recommendations.

Among them: a longer school day (seven periods), strengthened English, spelling, civics, a program to challenge bright students. Pledged Board Chairman Reno Sirrene: "We will do everything to give Downey a topnotch educational system." Some grownups thought that the state legislature at Sacramento should also listen to Downey's kids. Then the Citizens Advisory Commission would have no trouble getting its proposals enacted.

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