Tustin Unified School District

Eight candidates are seeking three open seats on the board of the Tustin Unified School District in the Nov. 3 election. Monday is the deadline to register to vote. To register, pick up a form at any post office, library or city hall. For more information, call the county registrar of voters at (714) 567-7600.

A 16-year-old girl died early Thursday after a one-car traffic crash in an unincorporated area of Orange County near Tustin, and the teenage driver was arrested on suspicion of felony drunk driving, authorities said. The 17-year-old driver was speeding about 2:45 a.m. when he lost control of his black 1998 Mercedes-Benz E320 and struck a traffic signal pole at Newport Avenue and La Colina Drive, said California Highway Patrol Officer Jennifer Hink. The passenger, Mackenzie Frazee of Tustin, was pronounced dead at 3:40 a.m. at Western Medical Center in Santa Ana, said Larry Esslinger, a supervising Orange County deputy coroner.

An auto dealer recently contributed $1,125 to the Tustin Unified School District for instructional materials and equipment. Norm Reeves Honda Superstore has established a foundation that contributes to Southland schools.

Richard Bray has been named superintendent of the Tustin Unified School District, officials announced Friday. Bray, superintendent of Hesperia Unified School District in San Bernardino County for the last 12 years, will begin work Monday at the 20,500-student Tustin district. Former Supt. Peter Gorman left in May to become chief of a school district in North Carolina. Deputy Supt.

The Tustin Unified School District needs parents, retirees and other members of the community to work as substitute clerical and instructional aides during the school year. Information: (714) 730-7301, Ext. 331.

Tustin schools are handing out free drug-testing kits to parents who may be worried their children are experimenting with marijuana, cocaine or other illegal substances. The nonprofit Assistance League of Tustin bought 300 of the $25 urine-testing kits, which have a three-year shelf life and are being distributed to parents at the city's four high schools and the league.

Re "Battle Over Reading Texts Erupts in Tustin" (March 15): I live in the Tustin Unified School District and am a retired Tustin Unified classified employee. In 1999, I accepted a job at a small private school in south Orange County. I was thrilled to find the Houghton Mifflin reading series on the classroom shelves. The books were identical to the series Tustin had recently discarded after only six years. The private school kept those books in use for the next two years. Stanford 9 test scores for reading were in the 90th percentile, and I believe the Houghton Mifflin books were instrumental in achieving those scores.

A bus driver for the Tustin Unified School District has been arrested after a 6-year-old girl told her mother he had molested her on the way home from school, police said Wednesday. Marcos Moreno Leon, 42, of Stanton was booked into Orange County Jail on Tuesday night. He faces two counts of child molestation. Police and school district officials interviewed 40 children who ride the same bus from Helen Estock Elementary School, said Tustin Police Lt. Brent Zicarelli.

The Orange County district attorney's office said Thursday it will not file criminal charges against a substitute teacher who allegedly taped a Tustin first-grader's mouth shut with a strip of masking tape and threatened to tie her up for being disruptive in class. The incident at Lambert Elementary School allegedly occurred just before school let out March 16. Police were notified after the girl's mother, Theresa Rodriguez, reported it to Principal Karla Wells. Tustin Police Lt.

A substitute teacher has been told he can never again teach in the Tustin Unified School District after he allegedly taped a first-grade girl's mouth shut with a strip of masking tape and threatened to tie her up because the youngster was disruptive in class. Tustin police are investigating to determine whether any criminal conduct was involved in the alleged incident, which occurred last Friday at Lambert Elementary School.

Trading one Orange County for another, Peter C. Gorman, area superintendent of the Orange County School District in Orlando, Fla., is expected to be appointed superintendent of the Tustin Unified School District at a board meeting today. As one of five area superintendents for the other Orange County, Gorman managed a $103-million budget, 26 schools and more than 30,000 students.

Tustin Unified School District trustees will hold a closed-door session meeting at 9 a.m. today to discuss the district's ongoing search for a new superintendent. James O. Fleming, who retired as superintendent of the Placentia-Yorba Linda Unified School District in June, is serving as interim superintendent of Tustin Unified. George Mannon, Tustin's former superintendent, had earlier left the district to take over as superintendent of the Glendora Unified School District.