St. Augustine High School in New Orleans has neither a gymnasium nor an athletic field, but its "Purple Knights" are champions in football, basketball and baseball. St. Aug's lacks an auditorium, but its theatrical productions are among the liveliest in Louisiana. St. Aug's academic facilities range from a 7,000-volume library down to a biology lab without running water, but its best graduates get into the most competitive colleges in the U.S., often with full scholarships.
Yet despite St. Aug's well-rounded achievements, says a teacher, "we are aware that our students are not being prepared for the total fabric of life." A Roman Catholic school of 750 boys taught by an interracial faculty of 31 Josephite priests, an order dedicated to Negro mission work, St. Aug's is -to its own distress-segregated. It hopes that some day white boys will be willing to go to school at St. Aug's. In the meantime, says Father Eugene P. McManus, a math teacher: "We are trying to get first-class citizenship in graduate schools, colleges, the Catholic system. We want in."
$100,000 in Prizes. By its excellence, St. Aug's is already getting in. Its graduates have gone on to Tulane, helping to integrate that university, and they rank high at Louisiana State, whose 600 Negro students, among 10,000, make it the most integrated university in the South. Founded only 14 years ago, St. Aug's has also become the Southern supply point of an intellectual underground railroad with branches to all parts of the nation. Last year's seniors won $100,000 in scholarships to schools such as Harvard, Carleton and Caltech (the choice of New Orleans' only Presidential Scholar, St. Aug's Michael Saulny).
"The boys are better trained than most Southern high school students of either race," says Harold Owens of Andover, one of the half-dozen leading prep schools that have accepted St. Aug students for intensive summer courses. Adds Charles McCarthy, director of a cooperative effort by the Ivy League schools to spot bright, underprivileged students: "St. Augustine produces high-quality candidates who don't disappoint the colleges once they're admitted." Peter Briggs, a freshman admissions officer at Harvard, finds St. Aug boys "interesting, constructive guys."
An Oak Paddle. The atmosphere at St. Aug's is warm but strict. Misbehaving students are whacked with an oak paddle; homework averages three hours a day. Entrance is by competitive exam, but the school's principal, the Rev. Robert H. Grant is committed to the idea of a comprehensive high school for youths of different intellectual capacities, and the IQs range from 75 to 130. Every pupil writes a weekly 300-word composition to counter the prevalent weakness in verbal skills. Math and science come easier because in those subjects "we are dealing with a kid's natural ability," explains the Rev. Joseph C. Verrett, vice principal. "When we get into fields loaded with cultural values, we find that our kids are retarded."