College

Cal State Fullerton next month will host an interactive conference for high school students interested in leadership positions and volunteer work. The campus will host Take the Lead, an annual teen conference on March 11 for freshman to seniors at any school around the county. Teachers are also invited to attend with their students for free. The event is sponsored by OneOC, an organization that connects volunteers with nonprofits, and the Festival of Children Foundation, a Costa Mesa-based nonprofit that assists local charities that serve children.

It is heartwarming how our 6-year-old thinks she will live with us forever. And while it is moving to hear her devotion to daddy and how she wants to marry him someday, I know the time will come when her pure adoration of us will turn into something that resembles complete and utter animosity. I hope it is a fleeting hour or short phase, if we are lucky, but more than likely, she will want to fly far from the coop. When the time comes for college, I imagine she won't want to live at home with her doting parents (as she is an only child)

While most high school students settle in and delve into their back-to-school routines, senior Torie Immel is thinking about colleges and which one she will attend next fall. But, unlike other students, Immel, a Newport Beach resident, is also preparing for a national championship. If Immel's name doesn't sound familiar, that's because she isn't competing in your classic high school sport. Her locker room is a barn and her teammate is a 12-year-old gelding named Ambassador.

In the 1940s, Jim Carnett’s parents met on the dusty landscape of the Santa Ana Army Air Base, which later became home to OCC. He grew up near the college, putting the biggest playground a boy could want only a short walk away. Carnett remembered he and his brother sneaking into the gym several times to play basketball, only to get caught and sent home. After graduating high school, OCC welcomed Carnett on campus, then as a student. At 26, Carnett got his first big job and, not surprisingly, it was at OCC. He even met his wife there.

Early College High School's Parent Information Night   Where: Early College High School  2990 Mesa Verde Drive East               Costa Mesa, CA 92626   When: Thursday, March 20th, 2008              6:30 - 7:30 p.m. Are you interested in a smaller learning environment with greater academic support? Are you interested in a challenging environment? Are you mature enough to take college level courses? We are now accepting applications from current 9th and 10th grade students for next school year!

The Daily Pilot asked students at the Newport-Mesa Unified School District's new site, "What inspired you to apply for Early College High School?" "The opportunity to get an A.A. degree." Jason Costa Mesa Valdez, 14   "It was a new challenge." Pedro Cervantes, 14 Costa Mesa "To get an opportunity to take two years of college and not pay." Gabriel Urbana, 14 Costa Mesa "To have a chance to be the first in my family to complete four years of college."

I had the recent privilege, frightening though it was, of speaking to high school students about going to college. Talking in front of unfamiliar classrooms is just scary. It doesn’t matter who the kids are and I thought it didn’t matter how old they are. It mattered this time. It turns out ninth graders are much harder to please than elementary-age kids or even juniors. These were high school students at Estancia. I was invited by Tricia Edlund to speak to the Puente students there.

Daily Pilot columnist Steve Smith apparently fancies himself nanny to us all. I’ve just finished reading and re-reading his most recent attempt at the enlightenment of the populace (“Drake lacks faith in students,” Sept. 25). You can chalk it up to my steady march to geezerdom, but I’m having a tough time finding a point in all his verbiage. I’m guessing the point of his piece was to let UC Irvine Chancellor Michael Drake off the hook for the way he botched the hiring of Erwin Chemerinsky as dean of the new UC Irvine law school.

Biology text books and boxes lined walls in a portable while Early College High School science teacher Candace Leuthold unpacked a box containing specimens in glass jars. "It's going to be nice to have my own classroom again," said Leuthold, who was racing to get the classroom ready for Tuesday's classes. After sharing digs with the Back Bay High School campus for the last month, Early College teachers and workers were busy Monday moving into several portables behind Back Bay. "It's my space, so to speak," Leuthold said with a laugh.

When Marisa Miranda entered Newport Harbor High School, she had the desire to ace her classes, win scholarships and get accepted to college. She didn't have much beyond that. But it turned out to be enough. Miranda, the only child of a single mother who emigrated from Mexico, grew up without any family members who had gone to college in the United States. She started the ninth grade knowing almost nothing about Advanced Placement tests, SATs or college applications. All that changed when she enrolled in Advancement Via Individual Determination — better known as AVID — a program that helps struggling students acquire the technical skills for college and life.

MEN'S TRACK & FIELD State championships SAN MATEO - Sophomore Austin Pollok finished fifth in the hammer throw to top Orange Coast College athletes competing on Friday and Saturday at San Mateo College. Pollok's mark was 173 feet, 3 inches. OCC sophomore Cameron Pizzica finished eighth in the decathlon with 6,069 points. He topped the field with a pole vault of 14-5 1/4. The Pirates' five team points ranked 29th among 36 teams who scored at the event. * WOMEN'S TRACK & FIELD State championships SAN MATEO - Freshman Reanna Cortez topped Orange Coast College finishers with a seventh-place showing in the 1,500 meters in the meet contested Friday and Saturday at San Mateo College.

IRVINE - Another UC Irvine baseball loss sent the historians reeling through the years Tuesday night. The Anteaters, on then other hand, are just plain reeling. Visiting USC's 6-4 nonconference triumph was the fifth straight setback for UCI, equaling the program's longest losing streak since 2004. It's the first time UCI has lost five consecutive regular-season games since 2003 and the first time Coach Mike Gillespie has lost at least five straight since the 2007 season at USC, after which he was fired to end a 20-year run at the helm of his alma mater.

FULLERTON - For the third straight game, Cal State Fullerton fifth-year senior Carlos Lopez erased a UC Irvine lead to produce a dramatic baseball victory for the Titans. Turns out, it was Lopez who also got away from the Anteaters. "It's pretty funny, because I was supposed to go to Irvine," Lopez said after he hit his second walk-off home run in two days on Sunday, this time a three-run shot with one out in the ninth off reliever Evan Brock to give the host Titans a 7-5 triumph to sweep the three-game Big West Conference series in front of 2,551 at Goodwin Field.

FULLERTON - Two pitches after he nearly swung out of his shoes, Cal State Fullerton senior Carlos Lopez left visiting UC Irvine on the field, stunned in their tracks. Lopez launched a 1-1 split-finger fastball off a banner about 10 feet over the top of the right-field fence to lift the host Titans to a 3-2 walk-off victory over the Anteaters in front of 2,399 on Saturday at Goodwin Field. The winning homer, which Lopez said was pre-ordered by Titans head man Rick Vanderhook, clinched the Big West Conference series victory for the Titans, who also wrapped up at least a share of the conference regular-season crown.

FULLERTON - This time, UC Irvine pitcher Andrew Thurman lost more than just a strong bid for a no-hitter. For the second time in two seasons, Cal State Fullerton broke up a no-hit bid late against Thurman, who frustrated the Titans through eight no-hit innings last year in a 4-1 home win. But in the opener of a three-game Big West Conference series on Friday, the host Titans washed away Thurman's would-be no-no on a leadoff single in the seventh...

IRVINE - It was a loss about which UC Irvine baseball coach Mike Gillespie wanted to be anything but trivial. But nothing less than a bit of baseball lore that unfolded at Anteater Ballpark on Wednesday may have upstaged the consequences of the Anteaters' 7-3 nonconference loss to visiting San Diego. San Diego junior third baseman Kris Bryant launched his NCAA-leading 30th home run of the season in the second inning to conclude his regular-season with seven homers in his last six games.

The Coast Community College District on Wedensday shot down a request to draft an agreement that would pre-negotiate hiring terms with local unions for almost $700 million in construction projects. The idea has split the Board of Trustees and drawn sometimes-heated debate for months. And that acrimony could continue, according to one trustee. "Our future as a board is going to be intensely divided after this because this is a basic human right in my opinion," Trustee Jerry Patterson said.

MEN'S TENNIS Vanguard 5, Warner 1 MOBILE, Ala. - The No. 3-seeded Lions improved to 23-0 by trouncing the Florida-based school in the second round of the NAIA Tournament on Wednesday at the Mobile Tennis Center. Lions freshman Stefan Kilchhofer remained unbeaten in singles (23-0) by topping Julian Ramirez, 6-1, 6-1, in the No. 1 spot. Freshman Daymon Johnson also earned a singles point with a 6-0, 6-2 win in the No. 5 spot Kilchhofer and sophomore Roger Muri outlasted its No. 1 doubles foe, 9-8 (7-5)

The Newport Mesa Tea Party announced Tuesday that it objects to the possibility of an overarching agreement between the Coast Community College District and local unions that could govern hiring on almost $700 million in construction work. The district's board of trustees on Wednesday will consider drafting a project labor agreement, or PLA, that would pre-negotiate hiring terms with local unions for $698 of infrastructure bonds voters approved under Measure M. "The Tea Party stands for free markets," Tom Pollitt, Newport Mesa Tea Party Patriots founder, said in a prepared statement.

Estancia High junior Rebecca Lewis qualified fifth in the girls' discus throw at the CIF Southern Section Division 3 preliminaries Saturday at Estancia High. Lewis' mark was 114 feet. She won the Orange Coast League title in the discus the previous week with a 106-5. Lewis also won the OCL title in the shotput at 30-11. She was 12th on Saturday with a 34-0 1/2. She will compete in the CIF Southern Section Division 3 finals Saturday at Mt. San Antonio College, joining Estancia teammate Persis Williams-Mensah, a sprinter who qualified in the 100 and 200 meters.