IN THE MIX:Misbehavior requires attention

About eight years ago, Richard Gomez saw a problem on the Costa Mesa High School campus.

The handball courts were being run by students associated with crews — a group of kids not yet technically a gang, but adopting some gang activity.

The courts were plagued by graffiti, drugs and students who weren’t giving their education the attention it deserved.

Gomez, a Costa Mesa High School security staff member, told the students that if they stopped the tagging, got rid of the drugs and started going to class he would organize a handball tournament. The students responded to the call for competitive play and have stuck with it. Two years ago the high school had six nationally-ranked players. The tournament is still going on and the handball courts are cleaned up.

Guess how officials handled a similar problem at Estancia and a few other high schools? They tore down the handball courts.

The forward thinking at Costa Mesa high didn’t stop with handball. The security staff has a habit of seeing a need for improvement and acting on it. Along with Gomez, the staff consists of Albert Marron, Cristina Maaba and School Resource Officer John Gates.

My introduction to the enthusiastic security team came after a talk with Costa Mesa Middle School principal Kirk Bauermeister. He was discussing the middle school campus and his upcoming move to TeWinkle Middle School. He was telling me that you can’t educate if the kids don’t feel safe when he led me into the campus safety office. That’s when I was astounded.

He had shown me the video cameras, but I didn’t know there was software that could track where problems were common and who was in trouble and how often and why.

The technology allows the security team to watch certain areas closely on camera and on foot and to know when a student needs special attention. The security staff is also equipped with palm pilots to carry with them that have every student, their schedule, any gang affiliation and their picture. Quite helpful when combating trespassing issues.

Before this program started about three years ago, the middle school had a problem with gang activities, tagging and theft.

Now, the tagging is virtually gone. Better than that, the students with crew affiliation have become fewer and the children who are still hanging out in these groups, aren’t associated with disruptive activity.

I’d love to say that any school could install some cameras and software and clean up any campus, but I can’t. Without the enthusiasm and attitudes of people like Gomez, Marron and Maaba the system wouldn’t work.

They take the job seriously and personally. They get to know the students and go beyond the typical campus security guard method. They take time to talk to the students.

Gates, the Costa Mesa police officer assigned to the school for the past eight months, said he’s been to many campuses and has never seen a campus like Costa Mesa. He said he’s never seen security staff work like the Costa Mesa High School staff and he’s never seen such an effective program.

You might be wondering why the program isn’t at every middle and high school in the district.

District board of education President Judy Franco said in an e-mail that the program is a pilot program and while the district is impressed, issues like training and supervision necessary to expand it are being evaluated.

She said the district’s Safe Schools Task Force is considering installing a district-wide safe school software program, staff training and updating the mobile phones and mobile command centers.

I hope when they evaluate the program at Costa Mesa high, they listen to the staff there. That’s what Bauermeister did. He said since becoming principal of the middle school nine years ago there have been many changes he is proud of, “and none of them were my idea,” he said. He said he has to listen to the teachers and staff because it is their school and will continue to be their school long after he, or any administrator, is gone.

To help the district implement the program at more schools the security staff has offered to help train employees and install cameras and software to help save the district money.

If Project ASK bought the Costa Mesa system’s computers and Palm Pilots, maybe they could pitch in at the other campuses.

One obstacle is the pay scale for starting security guards. Gomez and Marron said the district may have to consider increasing the starting pay in order to attract applicants who are computer savvy and have the proper attitude to do the job right.

Parents at Estancia and even Newport Harbor should be badgering the district to adopt this program at their schools until it’s a reality. No need to lobby on behalf of TeWinkle. Bauermeister was quick to say the program would be implemented at that campus when he arrives in the next school year.

What else does he have planned for that middle school? Plenty, but that will have to wait for my next column.

is a Costa Mesa resident and journalism instructor at Orange Coast College.