Mira Costa High Revamps Grad Night : Schools: Problems of drinking and driving have inspired parents at a growing number of campuses to work magic with the decor of gymnasiums.

Many Mira Costa High School seniors customarily celebrate their graduation night by visiting Disneyland or partying with friends.

But this year, parents of seniors at the Manhattan Beach school hope the youths will opt to spend $50 to stay at school all night on Thursday. The 8:30 p.m. to 8 a.m. grad night party promises dancing, live entertainment, food and mock casino gambling in a gym lavishly decorated to look like Mardi Gras in the New Orleans French Quarter.

“Graduation is really a big disappointment at our school,” said Mary Ann Millar, chairman of the Mira Costa Circle PTA grad night committee. “The kids graduate, get their diplomas, and everybody goes their own separate ways. A lot go in ways parents don’t like. There’s a lot of drinking.”

Students and parents say they like the idea of partying as a graduating class without driving and without alcohol. A majority of Mira Costa’s 370 seniors are expected to be there, though some are staying away because the party is only for Mira Costa seniors and that keeps many of them from bringing their steadies or a favorite date, said some students.

The grad night party at the South Bay Union High School District facility follows the success of the area’s first on-campus grad night last year at Palos Verdes High School. Principal Kelly Johnson called that event, which 330 of the 385 graduates attended, “an unbelievable success.”

Palos Verdes will have its second grad night on the same evening Mira Costa has its first.

According to the Grad Nite Foundation, which is based in Costa Mesa and helps parents put on grad nights, San Marino High School pioneered the concept 37 years ago. In Orange County, 72% of the high schools have such events, and nationally, the percentage is 25% to 30%. The closest high schools to the South Bay with grad nights are Cerritos, Downey and Cypress.

“The idea is not new, except in the South Bay,” said Dianne Johnson, who was co-chairman of Palos Verdes grad night last year.

Kate Nelson, senior adviser at Mira Costa, calls grad night “the most dangerous night of the year for teen-agers” because of drinking and driving. Concern over safety has prompted on-campus grad parties to grow in the last two years, according to Elaine Goodman, executive director of the foundation.

The group will put on a how-to workshop about grad night for parents at Palos Verdes High in September.

Although she said everyone she had spoken to “thinks it’s a wonderful thing to do,” Millar concedes that two factors--the on-campus locale and a prohibition against bringing dates--turn off some seniors.

She said some have flatly refused to buy tickets and others have taken a “wait and see” attitude before deciding. However, she said most have reacted positively to the event, and she hopes for an 80% turnout as ticket buying picks up in the final days before graduation. By early last week, 150 tickets had been sold.

In interviews on campus last week, eight seniors said they think most of the class will attend but don’t believe the total will hit 80%. They said being with friends is the biggest attraction of the evening, along with the chance to gamble on a replica of a Mississippi River steamboat.

But not all of the eight who were interviewed plan to be there. Shannon Poore, 18, is not going because she can’t bring her boyfriend. Richard Schwerdtfeger, 17, objected to the cost and said, “I don’t see the excitement.” He likened the adult-chaperoned night to being held prisoner in the gym.

Senior Class President Richard O’Reilly, 17, said, “We’ll be with our classmates. A lot of us won’t see each other after graduation night.”

Parents working voluntarily to put on the event say it is an opportunity for the seniors to spend a final night in high school together. Millar calls it “their first reunion.”

It has taken awhile for the event to catch on with students at Mira Costa, and Johnson said that was true in Palos Verdes last year.

“The kids took some convincing,” she said. “They didn’t believe we could come up with a party that would be as much fun as it turned out to be.”

Kent Olsen, 19, who was senior president at Palos Verdes last year, called grad night an incredible time.

“Our gym was so transformed,” he said, “you couldn’t even tell you were on school grounds.”

Another 1989 Palos Verdes graduate, Lance Haworth, 19, said some seniors “thought it was a dumb thing to do” at first, but it turned out to be a great idea.

Tickets are going faster in Palos Verdes this year. Sue von Nordenflycht, treasurer of the parent committee, said about 260 of the 370 graduates have purchased $30 tickets for grad night, which will have an international theme, complete with a simulated airliner and Orient Express luxury train.

At Mira Costa, parents have been working for weeks to provide their youngsters with an evening that will include two live bands, an array of foods, carnival games and even a car bash in which youths can smash an already-wrecked car with sledgehammers.

J. C. Edwards has been supervising construction of 80 pieces of scenery and the 50-foot river boat that will seem to transport the gym to New Orleans. “It’s a lot of work, but it’ll be worth it if it goes to reinforce the idea that you don’t have to booze to have fun,” he said.