Culver City Observer -

90% Plan for College, Trade School or Military Career

By David W. Myers

Contributing Editor

Nearly 570 teenagers from Culver City High School and Culver Park High marched across a stage at Helms Field Friday night, respectfully accepted their diplomas, then danced away from the podium and into the next great adventure of their young lives.

The students were largely quiet until the end of the two-hour long graduation ceremony, when Culver High Principal Dylan Farris finally instructed them to ceremoniously move the tassel atop their blue caps from the right to the left—the traditional sign of a high-schooler who has just earned a diploma.

Most of the teens immediately erupted into cheers, and some into tears, as they hurled their caps into a balmy summer sky while thousands of proud parents and other loved ones looked on from the football field’s packed bleachers.

“We are the Centaurs,” proclaimed graduating senior Mariah Watson, who was selected to present the Class of 2012’s farewell address several minutes earlier. “And, for your information, we’re just gettin’ started!”

Samuel Cappoli, the school’s Valedictorian, urged each of his fellow students “to help change the world” as they march into their post-high-school life.

“Just make a difference, no matter how small it might seem in the overall scheme of things,” Cappoli implored the crowd during his five-minute speech.

The 17-year-old Cappoli amassed a staggering 4.43 grade-point average—nearly one-half of a percentage point higher than a 4.0 “Straight-A” score—in part because he aced all of his high school classes and took several college-level courses through the school’s vaunted “Advanced Placement” program over the past few years.

Matthew Lin was named Culver High’s Salutatorian, with an impressive 4.35 GPA. Jennifer Kochevar, a current teacher at the school who graduated from Culver High in 1998, was given the student-run Associated Student Body’s “Teacher of the Year” award.

Kochevar thanked her students for the prize, while also acknowledging the professors “who made such a difference” in her life. Some of those teachers, now in their 50s or 60s, are still working for the local school district and were seated on the stage directly behind her.

More than 510 students, or 90 percent of the graduating class, told the district earlier this year that they are planning to attend—or have already been accepted into—four-year universities, two-year junior colleges, trade schools or the military.

By comparison, less than 50 percent of all high-schoolers in the much-larger Los Angeles Unified School District eventually go to college and about 25 percent don’t graduate 12th grade at all.

The most popular destination for Culver’s Class of 2012 will be Santa Monica College, where 131 of the men and women plan to trade their Centaur silver-and-blue colors for the blue-and-white of the SMC Corsairs.

Another 60 students will stay a bit closer to home, attending West Los Angeles College in the fall.

The most popular four-year institution among this year’s grads is California State University, Northridge, which will get at least 16 of Culver’s best and brightest a few months from now.CSU Long Beach will boast 14, while San Francisco State University will host 13.

Three Culver High students from the Class of 2012 will head to USC, while two will attend cross-town rival UCLA. Twelve will go into military school, or directly into the Armed Services.

While dozens of the other newly minted grads will attend out-of-state campuses, some will be travelling much farther than others.

One has been accepted into Universite Catholique de Louvain, the largest French-speaking school in Belgium. Another will go to the University of Mosul in Iraq, one of the Middle East’s largest educational and research centers.