Worth Cheering About

In the past year, Los Angeles has had the Lakers as national basketball champions, the Dodgers as baseball champions and now, Taft High School as academic champions. In weekend competition in Providence, R.I., the Taft team beat schools from 36 states to win the U.S. Academic Decathlon.

High school being what it is, the official homecoming celebration for the team’s nine seniors must wait until Friday. Today is test day. A campus blood drive takes place Thursday. But then they will celebrate as Principal Ronald Berz offers congratulations, the school choir sings a composition written for the decathlon champs and the cheerleaders lead appropriate cheers.

The decathlon, which was originated in 1968 by Orange County Superintendent of Schools Robert Peterson, is an especially valuable competition because it’s not just for A students. So here’s our suggestion for a cheer: “Give us an A”--for Shawn Canter, Lisa Demsky and Marc Sarti, the team members with A grade averages. “Give us a B”--for B average team members Andrew Goodman, Roy Rapoport and Andrew Rosenthal. And, “Give us a C”--for C average team members Rodney Crump, Michael Pocrass and Deborah Sim. Pocrass scored highest among all the C students. Their coach is English teacher Arthur Berchin.

Should we worry that these students won just by cramming their heads with facts? Taft’s assistant principal, Patricia White, thinks not. Acknowledging that we all forget a little bit from our school days, she pointed out that these students had to learn concepts--not just facts--to deal with the math and science tests. “You either have the ability to use these concepts in the tests or you don’t,” she added. These students knew the concepts, knew the facts about American presidents so they could capture the Super Quiz, and now they know the thrill and the honor of academic success.