Boards Of Education

Bill Summers He helped build racer that set speed record Bill Summers, 75, who with his brother Bob built a four-engine racer called Goldenrod that in 1965 set a speed record for wheel-driven cars, died May 12 at his home in Ontario of natural causes, said his daughter, Maggie Peace. Goldenrod streaked across the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utahon Nov. 12, 1965, at an average top speed during two runs of 409.277 mph. The record was later broken. Bob Summers, who drove the car, died in 1992.

L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa knew exactly whom to alert last year when he wanted his nonprofit group to win control of a low-performing new elementary school in Watts. After all, a majority of the seven-member Board of Education was elected with the help of his substantial campaign fundraising. FOR THE RECORD: L.A. school board elections: An article in the March 6 LATExtra section about Los Angeles Board of Education elections referred to Florence Griffith Joyner Elementary as a new school.

Douglas County, a swath of subdivisions just south of here that is one of the nation's wealthiest, is something of a public school paradise. The K-12 district, with 60,000 students, boasts high test scores and a strong graduation rate. Surveys show that 90% of its parents are satisfied with their children's schools. That makes the Douglas County School District an unlikely frontier in the latest battle over school vouchers. But a new, conservative school board is exploring a voucher system to give parents ?

The state Board of Education, in its first full meeting with a majority of members appointed by Gov. Jerry Brown, moved Wednesday to put the brakes on a landmark law that gives parents the right to force major reforms at low-performing schools. The board took no action on proposed regulations to implement the law but instead will set up a working group to help determine the procedures. The panel will include those who had complained that the previous board was rushing the process without sufficiently considering their input.

Leaders of the Los Angeles teachers union withdrew their backing of two school board candidates Monday, leaving their political strategy in disarray while boosting the efforts of Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa to maintain an allied majority on the Board of Education. Under the union pressure, one candidate abandoned the race while the other vowed to continue. Jesus Escandon signed a letter dated Saturday saying that he was dropping out effective immediately. John Fernandez has refused to step aside in the only contest without an incumbent, resulting in a union rebuke.

It was billed as a radical transfer of power from the educational establishment to parents. It survived a furious opposition campaign. And after squeaking through the state Legislature by one vote last year, the "parent trigger" law made California history as the first successful effort to empower parents to force sweeping changes at low-performing schools. But now the fight has shifted to implementing the law, making its passage look almost easy. After months of debate and reams of revisions, state education officials were expected to vote last week to finalize details laying out how the law is supposed to work.

Without question, Gov. Jerry Brown has the right to make his own appointments and craft his own policies. But his picks for California's powerful Board of Education could jeopardize one of the most innovative and empowering ? if controversial ? education reforms to come along in years: the so-called parent trigger that gives parents a strong say in the education of their children. After just one day back on the job as governor, Brown named seven new members to the 11-member state school board.

Reporting from Sacramento Less than one week after being named to the state Board of Education, Bill Honig has withdrawn his name from consideration, according to the governor's office. Honig, who served on the state board during Jerry Brown's first tenure as governor and went on to be elected state superintendent of public instruction three times, was among the new governor's most controversial early appointments. Honig resigned as state superintendent in 1993 after being convicted of conflict-of-interest charges involving state education payments received by his wife's nonprofit organization.

In one of Gov. Jerry Brown's first official acts this week, he sacked the majority of the state Board of Education, replacing several vocal proponents of charter schools, parent empowerment and teacher accountability. A broad range of educators, policy makers and others say the move was widely believed to be the handiwork of the California Teachers Assn., which heavily supported Brown in his gubernatorial campaign. The union's support will be vital if he, as expected, places measures on the June ballot to temporarily raise taxes to ease the state's budget deficit.