Photograph by George Sakkestad
Homestead High ASB President Blake Williams raises the green flag on campus, signifying that students have displayed good behavior throughout the week.
By LESTER CHANG
Before October, several merchants at Loehmann's Plaza complained about a handful of Homestead High School students selling and using drugs, harassing customers and littering at the shopping complex and nearby businesses during lunch.
Most of those problems have been eliminated, students and administrators say, in part because of a new system that flies colored flags on campus to gauge student behavior.
A green flag means student behavior for the week was acceptable. A yellow one indicates some problems. A red flag means serious problems exist, and that action, such as closing the campus at lunch, might be taken. The Homestead Road shopping center was barred to students from Oct. 7-18 because of complaints.
The flag system started Oct. 22 and will continue until June 1997. Should enough red flags be flown, administrators may bar students from Loehmann's Plaza and other businesses more often.
But so far, the flag system has worked well, said Principal David Payne. "We have gotten no complaints from neighbors or from the businesses," he said. "It has been a success."
The system was developed by a committee of parents, merchants, students and staff members, Homestead's Associated Student Body President Blake Williams said.
A panel consisting of two students, a student body officer, a teacher and a parent makes daily visits to the campus to determine whether there are problems.
Only green flags were posted during the first two weeks of November, Williams said.
But some students say the flag system is too punitive.
"I don't think it is fair at all," said junior Regina Hwang as she ate bagels and sipped drinks off campus at Starbucks, with schoolmates Susie Lee and Valerie Shagday. "Not every student is doing those things. Only a small group. So why should the rest of the [1,800] students have to put up with the flag system?"
Danielle Lewis, a sophomore, said the system poses an inconvenience to all students. "When they closed the campus in October, I felt something was taken away," she said.
Students have said the troublemakers number only a few, and some are from other high schools.
Some merchants, including Gary Shoenfeld, assistant manager at Long's Drug Store--one the largest stores at the center--said they worried less about goods being taken or damaged during the closed-campus period in October.
At the same time, neither Shoenfeld nor Wayne Johnson, the owner of a McDonald's restaurant across the street from the plaza, was aware of the existence of the flag system.
"I didn't know one was in place, but we haven't had any problems with the students," Johnson said. "We have a simple policy. We ask that they behave like adults. And if they don't, we ask them to leave. We have been doing it this way for 20 years, and we haven't any problems."
Patti McKinley, manager of Starbucks, said the shop hasn't had any problems with students. She said the good behavior might exist because of the flag system, but she wasn't sure.
Students voiced their frustrations about the problems to the Fremont Union High School District Board of Trustees earlier this year. Board President Franklin Pelkey told school officials, students, merchants and residents that finding answers should be their "top priority."
Principal Payne told the board his school has worked diligently with the public to try to resolve the problems.
Among the actions taken by the school and interested parties so far:
*increasing administrative supervision of students at the plaza;
*holding neighborhood meetings to fashion solutions;
*working with the owner of the plaza and merchants to provide more benches, chairs and garbage cans at the plaza; and
*using undercover police surveillance. Police patrol cars also have been used.
This article appeared in the Sunnyvale Sun, December 11, 1996.
©1996 Metro Publishing, Inc. All rights reserved.