‘Gramma’ Gets Respect : La Habra High School Security Supervisor, 72, Is Firm but Friendly

At 72, Sylvia Gebhart, a security supervisor at La Habra High School whom students and faculty call “Gramma,” can still keep order.

The great-grandmother does what some describe as one of the toughest jobs on campus.

Gebhart, who is in charge of four other campus supervisors, takes no guff. She breaks up food fights and escorts cigarette-smokers and others who break school rules to the principal’s office for discipline. She doesn’t hesitate to jump between fist-throwing teen-agers to physically separate them and finds it easy to tell strangers who have no business on campus to leave.

“I make sure students get to class,” Gebhart said. “I make sure the ones who get Saturday detentions serve their time, and I make sure no one is doing anything they’re not supposed to be doing.”

Students respect and obey her, according to school officials.

The 12-year veteran said she tries to handle trouble compassionately but firmly.

“These kids know when I mean business,” Gebhart said. “But they know I love them too. I treat them just like I would treat my own.”

On a recent morning, Gebhart walked her beat around campus with walkie-talkie in hand, stopping every few seconds to say hello and chat with students.

About a dozen teen-agers walked by her, each saying, “Hi, Gramma.”

Gil Rivera, 18, greeted her with a hug. “She’s the nice narc,” he said.

“I hope I’m making better people of the students here,” Gebhart said. “I’m really a grandmother to them all and I try to make them care about other people.”

Administrators say Gebhart is doing a great job. “I’m amazed at the respect that (the students) show Gramma,” Principal Patricia Howell said. “They couldn’t survive without her.” Gebhart’s superior, assistant principal Terry Kent, agreed.

“She’s a remarkable lady,” he said. “You would not expect someone would choose to do her job at her age, but she loves the kids and the work, and that’s what keeps her going. The kids respect her because she really cares about them.”

Along with keeping the peace on campus, Gebhart provides counseling for troubled students.

Gebhart listens to students tell of their woes and tries to guide them to solutions. “Kids have to bear a lot of stuff with problems and burdens from home,” she said.

“Gramma knows how to relate to us,” said Roxanne Barba, 16, a 10th-grader. “We look up to her and respect her. I don’t know why, but for some reason she just fits in. If I ever have a problem, I would ask to talk to her about it because she understands us.”

Gebhart has lived in Fullerton for 30 years with her husband, Francis, 73, a retired truck driver. The couple raised two daughters, who both attended the now-closed McComber Junior High School in Buena Park, where Sylvia Gebhart worked as a security officer for eight years before being laid off in 1981. She also has a granddaughter and two great-grandchildren.

Before her job at McComber, Gebhart said she kept busy volunteering her time in her children’s schools as a PTA member. She also worked as a candy striper at Children’s Hospital of Orange County for a few years.

“I’ve worked with kids all my life,” she said. “And I love it.”

One of Gebhart’s daughters, Ellen Young of Hemet, said her mother always had a good rapport with teen-agers. She isn’t surprised at how much La Habra students love her.

“When I was a teen-ager, my mom would never condemn my friends, and my girlfriends would come to her to talk about their problems because they felt they couldn’t talk to their own mothers,” said Young, 36.

So it’s no wonder to Young why her mother receives so much respect at school. “The kids trust her because she doesn’t make judgments on them,” Young said. “She just tries to reason with them and gives examples as to why they shouldn’t be doing bad things.”

Gebhart’s partners say they admire her style and try to emulate it.

“She holds her own and knows how to get in the middle of everything without getting hated,” said Tony Boyant, a campus supervisor.

“My main job is not to get the kids in trouble but to keep them out of trouble,” Gebhart said. “That’s why I do this job.”