Two new principals great for Costa Mesa

Change is hard for most of us because we overestimate the value of

the status quo, and underestimate the value of what could be gained

by change.

At Costa Mesa High School, we have just gone through a major

change. We started this year with a brand new administration with two

new principals: Fred Navarro for the high school, and for the first

time, John Garcia, as a separate principal for the junior high. The

two new principals are working well together as a team, but many of

the students have found it hard to adjust to their new ways of

running the school. I assert that this duo of principals is just what

we need.

Among the controversial new policies they have introduced is one

to deal with a persistent attendance problem at the school.

Apparently, our past is littered with “too many tardies.” The

principals recognized that tardies are very disruptive to the

educational experience of first period, since the late arrivals

interrupt the class for all.

They decided to address the issue of tardiness by locking the

school gates at 7:40 a.m., when classes start. Students who arrive

after the gates are closed are required to report to the office

before going to class. Some argue that this just makes tardy students

even later to class than they already would be. But really, if this

happened to you once, I would bet that you would make every effort

not be tardy again.

Another unfortunate consequence of the new policy is that students

around campus have started calling our school a “prison” because the

gates that were once open during all hours of the school day are now

locked during the school day. But why, we may ask, is this bad? Our

school has always been a “closed campus,” so really, the principals

are not introducing new rules to inconvenience the students; rather,

they are implementing previously existing ones.

Perhaps the students at Mesa who are opposing the new ways are

really objecting to having to change their ingrained habits. Perhaps

they view all change as undesirable because it requires them to give

up the comfort of the familiar. But hindsight usually shows the

opposite: that change is invigorating, and new ways of doing business

can stimulate yet more new ideas for further change.

A sad feature of the current debate is that many of the students

who claim to dislike the new administration cannot really articulate

a reason for their disapproval. It seems that they just assume that

because many students do not support the principals, they should not

be backing them either. If conformity is what is being practiced

here, why not conform behind the new principals, instead of against

them?

Next year’s incoming freshman class will not be affected in the

same way as the current students because they will really only know

the new way and have nothing to compare it to. As a result, they will

appear to be less resistant to change.

Navarro and Garcia are a breath of fresh air at Mesa, and they

have rolled up their sleeves to begin tackling some of the persistent

problems that drag our school down. Surely we all want our school to

be the best that it can be, so that one day we can look back with

pride and say, “I went to Costa Mesa High School!”

* SARA BRYANT is a Costa Mesa High School student whose columns

will appear occasionally in the Forum section.