High school district ends tough year

By STACI HAIGHT
Valley Press Staff Writer

But faced with hard times, the district also met difficulties head on, forming student safety committees, increasing campus security and electing new board members.

On April 8, district officials learned that five present and past high school students had died in a crash along the Antelope Valley Freeway. During spring break, a car driven by Highland High School senior Vanessa Yusi, 17, plunged off a 75-foot embankment while allegedly racing with another vehicle.

Also killed were Highland student Jovannie Solano, 20; Yusi's boyfriend and former Palmdale High star football player Shaun Michael Perez, 20; John David Batas, 18; and John Kenneth Chu, 25.

Tragedy struck again April 20 when two juniors at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colo., embarked on a shooting rampage inside the school, killing 12 students and a teacher. Eric Harris, 18, and Dylan Klebold, 17, then turned the guns on themselves.

In the aftermath of the Columbine shootings, threats of violence erupted on Valley campuses. Those threats and rumors prompted six arrests and 20 suspensions.

Sheriff's deputies arrested two Highland High School students for allegedly making terrorist threats. One reportedly threatened a girl during a bus ride to school; the other threatened an entire class during a first-period discussion about the Colorado tragedy.

Two freshmen at Quartz Hill High School were arrested for investigation of making terrorist threats and a third was cited and released for having a "practice" grenade, Los Angeles County sheriff's investigators said.

School officials also suspended a pair of Lancaster High School ninth-graders who wore backpacks bearing menacing letters and symbols, and who allegedly joked about a rumor that the school would blow up that day.

Two days after the Columbine shootings, Lancaster High School students learned that a classmate had died after fighting for his life for nearly a week.

Jeff Hodge died at Antelope Valley Hospital from injuries he sustained when he fell from a moving Ford Windstar van on Avenue J-13 and 20th Street West.

As April drew to a close, trustees turned their attentions to former Highland High School teacher Craig Fulladosa.

A former district art teacher, Fulladosa was fired in May 1998 after a district investigation revealed he was keeping pornographic materials from the Internet on his school computer.

Despite his firing, trustees voted to give Fulladosa $40,000 in order to avoid litigation. District officials said the 4-1 vote was cast to end the case because they didn't want to go to court, face rising attorney fees or risk losing the case.

Fulladosa still faces 17 misdemeanor and felony charges related to the use of a school computer to store sexually explicit, erotic and pornographic material and for allegedly committing a lewd and lascivious act upon a 15-year-old female student.

The Columbine massacre prompted district officials to implement a massive safety project at all of its campuses.

In September, the district appointed a full-time deputy to monitor gang activity and illegal activity on each of the district's seven campuses.

In the wake of the Columbine shootings and copycat rumors, the district announced the creation of a student safety committee on each campus and a Valleywide student safety council.

In November, district officials failed in their attempt to get a $91 million bond measure approved by voters to repair aging schools.

The bond, known as Measure E, would have paid for the district to build new schools to alleviate overcrowding and modernize existing sites.

Turbulent times continued in November when the district called for the resignation of its director of the Antelope Valley Schools Foundation, a one-time district employee.

The foundation had hired Jill Harris as its grant writer and foundation director earlier in the year, but placed her on leave as it investigated $15,000 in overdue bills. Foundation board members offered Harris the option to resign or be terminated. She chose the former.

As the high school district prepares for the new year, century and millennium, it will do so with new leadership. In November's election, Darrel Brown and Cheryl Lundgren were elected to the board of trustees; incumbent Wilda Andrejcik was re-elected.

Uploaded December 21, 1999