RETIRED TEACHER SILL INVOLVED IN SYSTEM.

Byline: Bettie Rencoret Seniors

Frank Wayland is a teacher's teacher.

He retired from classroom teaching back in 1985, but he has not retired from the educational system and is still very much involved in youth programs through the Lancaster Lions Club.

For the past several years, Wayland has supervised student teachers as an adjunct professor for Chapman University, and he thinks that public schools and kids are getting a ``bad rap'' from the public.

Whenever something bad happens anywhere, he said, people assume immediately that kids did it and that it's the fault of poor teachers and inferior school systems.

``I don't subscribe to that kind of thinking,'' he said. ``An objective investigation of each situation on its own merits would undoubtedly prove that they generally produce some pretty good results.''

He is, he said, very conscious of the serious responsibility he has, as well as the joy, of serving as a master teacher, ``teaching the people who have chosen teaching as their life's work.''

At present he supervises four student teachers, two on duty at Challenger Middle School in Wilsona School District, one at Tierra Bonita in Eastside Union School District and one at Sky Blue Mesa in the Saugus School District.

Student teachers, he said, can take over the classroom at any time for the regular teachers, but supervision by a master teacher is required. He loves being a part of that.

``I especially enjoy being around the young students again,'' he said. ``I visit the classrooms about once a week. And when my students introduce me as their supervisor, I find it very gratifying that their students are always on their best behavior.''

He started teaching right after he graduated and received his teaching credential from Western Illinois University in 1957. His studies concentrated on teaching social studies and geography. When he received his master's degree from the same school in 1961, it was in elementary education.

He was born and raised in Colchester, Ill., and graduated from high school just as the Korean conflict was simmering. In 1950, he went into the United States Army and saw overseas duty, mostly as a clerk, in a big ordnance plant operated in Tokyo.

Mustered out in 1952, he returned to Illinois and went to work as a timekeeper for Hemp & Company.

``I don't think that company exists anymore,'' he said. ``But we made Illinois license plates and Little Brown Jugs. . . . I've taken a lot of ribbing about that, but convicts didn't make the Illinois plates back then. I guess they do now.''

In 1954, he decided to go to school on the GI Bill and enrolled at WIU.

Through a friend of a friend, and a complicated set of circumstances, he and Joann Laflin, of Macomb, Ill., met on a blind date that set in motion their steady path to the altar on Aug. 20, 1955.

Joann had received her bachelor's degree from WIU in 1954, with a teaching credential in business education, so while Frank was pursuing his degree she worked in the Macomb school system.

When their first son, Mark, was born in 1957, she quit work and didn't return to teaching until after their second son, Bob, was born.

Immediately after graduating, Frank began his teaching career in the little town of Galesburg, Ill., where the pay scale for teachers was notoriously low. After a year, Frank decided to move his family to California, where he had heard the pay was a lot better.

He and Joann sat down and wrote a lot of query letters to schools here and decided on Madera, in the San Joaquin Valley.

In 1959, they moved again, this time to the Antelope Valley for an even better salary package.

He taught in the Lancaster School District for five years before moving to Wilsona Elementary School for three years.

When he switched to Acton Junior High School, there was a certain happy permanence to the job. He stayed there for 17 years.

Wayland retired with an overall total of 28 classroom instruction years behind him.

Joann went to work as a business education teacher at Antelope Valley High School and at various times during her 32-year tenure taught every aspect of the course. She retired in 1992.

Frank joined the Lancaster Lions Club in 1963 and over the years went through the local chairs. He capped that by ascending to the post of district governor for 1993-1994, which required nationwide and international travel to many conventions.

Youth programs he has overseen as the group's top executive included high school scholarships and achievement awards, the Lancaster High School Leo Club, student speakers contest, Student Speakers Foundation, Wilderness Camp for the Deaf, Youth Exchange and Little League.

``We're really a group of people helping people,'' he said, ``so in our 50 years of existence here in the valley, we have also supported many other projects.''

He listed those as Antelope Valley Hospital, Christmas baskets for the needy, City of Hope, the Mobile Glaucoma Screening Unit, Southern California Lions Eye Institute, White Cane Sight Conservation and others.

``How many people know, for instance, that the Lancaster Lions Club puts out all those flags along Lancaster Boulevard on national holidays?'' he said. ``Not many, I'll bet.''

Wayland is especially proud of the Leos at Lancaster High School.

``These are high school kids who want to do constructive things for the community,'' he said. ``We feel we are making a major contribution ourselves when we can foster a group like this.''

Another special interest he has is the club-sponsored Wilderness Camp for deaf children near Wrightwood.

He said the Lions Club bought the property from the original owners, a religious group, that had let it run down. The club fixed it up with modern recreational equipment and amenities, and now it is opened up in the summer for hearing-impaired children.

Since their retirement, both Frank and Joann have spent a lot of time volunteering at Antelope Valley Hospital. Frank is in chargJe of ordering and stocking the greeting card section of the gift shop, and Joann works in the office of the volunteers.

Still energetic, the Waylands expect to continue their activities for quite some time. Only last Wednesday they hosted a big Lions Club barbecue at their home.

``Sometimes it's a lot of work,'' he said. ``But surprisingly enough, everything we do is fun. We always get a lot of enjoyment out of it.''

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Photo: Frank Wayland, with one of his numerous lion gifts, has held many posts in the Lions Club, including district governor in 1993-1994.

Bettie Rencoret/Special to the Daily News