Los Gatos Weekly-Times

Photograph by George Sakkestad

Eve of Construction

New LGHS principal inherits a school with money for building renovation and dramatic digital improvements

By John Pancharian

It's out with the old and in with the new at Los Gatos High School as longtime administrators Ted Simonson, Patti Hughes and Al Simon clean out their desks, do some retirement planning and make way for a largely new administration headed by Trudy McCulloch, who assumed duties as principal on July 1. Only assistant principal Craig Heimbichner remains from the former administration.

This change in leadership comes at an interesting time for the school. Voters in June approved a $79 million bond for the Los Gatos-Saratoga Joint Union High School District, which will mean a renovated campus; larger, more modern science facilities; and probably a challenging time instructionally during the construction. LGHS has been chosen as one of the first California Digital High Schools and will soon receive $438,000 for new computer technology, which presents the daunting task of determining how best to invest those funds in a field that changes with amazing speed.

Additionally, the Western Association of Schools and Colleges accreditation team recently completed its report on LGHS, which will likely serve as a script for its future.

Trudy McCulloch describes herself as a woman who embraces change and new challenges, who listens well and isn't afraid of hard work. She comes from the East Side Union High School District in San Jose, where she has worked since 1968 as a teacher, counselor, associate principal and, for the past five years, as principal of Mount Pleasant High School. She has won East Side's Distinguished Associate Principal and Career Services awards and is described by that district's superintendent, Joe Coto, as "a thoughtful, capable, productive administrator who is not afraid of change."

"I was one of those people who always knew I was going to be a teacher," McCulloch says. "I think part of it was that I had an incredible math teacher when I was in high school. She really loved what she was doing," McCulloch recalls. "Since I loved math and I knew that it was the bane of many people's existence, I guess I had this vision that I was going to make math interesting and fascinating for everybody. Reality set in very quickly once I started teaching, but I really had that dream that I wanted to share knowledge."

A native of Oakland, McCulloch was the daughter of a milkman and a florist. She attended Catholic schools in Oakland before moving away in 1963 to earn her degree and teaching credential at Santa Clara University. There, among the third class of women admitted to SCU, the nascent teacher bartered tutoring in math for haircuts or laundry services from classmates. She also played on the first women's competitive sports teams at SCU, going out for basketball, volleyball and softball--and putting up with restrictions that would bring mobs of angry parents to campus today.

In basketball they could not dribble beyond half court and often were not allowed to use the gym for practice until 10 or 11 p.m.--after the men's teams were done. The season for any given sport would only include eight or 10 games--there weren't many other teams to play--and McCulloch says she would see many of the same faces on teams she played against, as the same women typically participated in several sports.

In spite of the barriers, McCulloch earned a place in the university's hall of fame and was on the first women's basketball team to bring home a trophy for Santa Clara. She coached girls basketball early in her career and said she still makes a habit as principal of going to many of the home games--for both the boys' and girls' teams.

Upon earning her credential in 1968, McCulloch went to work as a math teacher at Piedmont Hills High School and knew very quickly she had found her calling.

"When you start teaching, at least for me, if you really are meant to be in education, you know it right away. It's just an incredible feeling," she says. "When you've been trying and trying to get them to understand something, then you see the light go on and you think, they got it, there's nothing for me that tops that."

McCulloch enjoyed the new sense of freedom the students had when she started teaching, but she also had to deal with the darker side of those turbulent times.

"It was an interesting time in the late '60s when I started. Drugs were starting big time. It was a scary time. Kids were not sophisticated at all, so they were getting drugs out of their mother's medicine cabinet and that type of thing. You would have situations where you would go in to class and kids would just fall out of their desks. It was a very frightening time as far as that was concerned."

After nine years of teaching, McCulloch took a position as counselor, first at Piedmont, then at Independence High School. Why switch after had expressed such enthusiasm for teaching?

"I've asked myself that. When I taught, I would look around and see other people and say, I'm never leaving the classroom; this is what I want to do,' " she says. What won her over was the opportunity to have a more personal impact on the students, rather than confining herself to academics.

"What a wonderful thing to work with a student who's got something in the way of their doing well and being able to help them work through whatever that is," she said about her decision to go into counseling.

She returned to SCU for a counseling degree, then spent the next 12 years as a counselor. "I just loved it. I loved teaching, but if someone asked 'What was your favorite job so far?', I'd have to say counseling. I used to pick up students in freshman year and follow them for four years.

You'd see this munchkin come in at the age of 14, a typical freshman, not having a clue as to what was going on. And then you'd watch them grow up and you'd watch them graduate.

"That's an incredible four-year span. That's why I love high school. I couldn't imagine being at any other grade level, because the development a child goes through in high school is just fascinating to watch," she says.

McCulloch also enjoyed the relationships she developed with the students she counseled.

"It was a special bond that you have with the students. Once you earned their trust, which was the key to the whole thing; they tell you just about everything. And that's a special relationship right there. You become their confidante, someone [with whom] they can share what's happening in their lives. And that's an awesome responsibility, but it's an exciting way to try to help kids."

The issues students face today have not changed much, although there's a perception that they are dealing with bigger problems, McCulloch says. High school students still deal with the same battery of hormones, identity crises and peer pressure they always have. Because things are less hidden today, she says, it's hard to judge if problems are bigger or just more visible.

"When I first started in education, for instance, you didn't talk about teen pregnancy. The kid just disappeared for six or eight months then came back thinner, and nobody talked about it."

When she was a counselor, she recalls, pregnant students would either seek an abortion or be sent home. Today, she says, they more often keep the baby, either dropping out of school or, if they are lucky, leaving the baby in day care while attending school.

"So you see different ways of handling things, but I think the same problems exist," she says.

And how would she handle a pregnant student as principal of Los Gatos?

"It's a real tough one, but I certainly don't want anyone to not have an education, because the days of someone being able to do anything without a high school education are gone. Having come from a Catholic upbringing where all this would have been shocking growing up, I would still rather have the girl on campus."

Even though McCulloch switched to administration in 1987, to be able to impact more students' lives, she said she still wears her counselor's hat as principal.

"I'm out on campus a lot. I really do have an open-door policy, which gets me in a lot of trouble because I don't get my work done. I had kids come in all the time, and I hope at some point when the students of Los Gatos know they can trust me and that it's OK to come into my office that that will start happening there. But it's going to take time, and I know that," she says.

McCulloch believes her role with teachers and staff should be similar, helping them remove blocks to functioning well and acting as a facilitator.

"I believe that the role of administration is to create an environment where everybody else can do their job. And that's very challenging. My view of administration is not that we're at the top of the hierarchy, but we're really here to service everyone else. If we're doing our job right and doing it well, then everybody is doing their job well."

McCulloch acknowledges the differences between Los Gatos and Mount Pleasant, but says she does not put much stock in a school's reputation. She believes Los Gatos has its share of problems to solve, even if it is known as a pampered school. And she also downplays the reputation Mount Pleasant has as a tough school.

"People who say that really don't know. I know they believe the East Side has gangs and murders, but I was there for 30 years and I'm not a stupid woman, so if it were that dangerous I wouldn't have been there."

That's not to say she sees no difference between the schools.

"At Mount Pleasant, one of our struggles was always trying to get more parents involved," she says, explaining Mount Pleasant has a large limited-English population. Many uneducated parents, or those from other countries, she explains have the attitude "that educators have all the answers," so they don't feel comfortable telling school staff how to do things.

Not so in Los Gatos.

"I went to one meeting of the [Los Gatos] PTSA one morning, and at first I couldn't believe how many people were there and everything that they do. They were talking about all their projects, and I was awestruck."

Mount Pleasant's student body is also less homogenous both ethnically and academically. At Mount Pleasant, she saw the entire spectrum from low-functioning special education to honor students, but in numbers less weighted toward the high achievers. Some 20 percent to 25 percent of Mount Pleasant seniors go directly into a four-year college, while the numbers at Los Gatos are in the high-90th percentile. She said because of this change in environment, she will first educate herself about Los Gatos before taking the reins in a real sense.

"I just think it's a different world. I think there will be different challenges, and to be honest, I won't know really what they are until I'm there. I think that's why this is exciting for me."

McCulloch has sent out letters to all Los Gatos teachers, inviting them to meet with her one on one. She says she is not afraid of changing Los Gatos High School, but not without plenty of input from the school community.

"Certain people, I'm sure, are fearful--like what's this lady gonna do?" she acknowledges. "I'm not one who's going to say, 'Well, at Mount Pleasant we did it this way,' because it's two totally different worlds and two totally different communities," she says. "But what I insist on is that all students are successful and are prepared when they graduate from high school, and if there is anything keeping that from happening, we need to do something about it."

McCulloch does not expect to please everyone at her new job, but she points out that often the ability to look at a school--even a successful one--with fresh eyes can be necessary to finding the things that have slipped through the cracks.

"The one thing that I can assure people is that every time I make a decision, I do what I think is best for the kids."

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