SCHOOL NOTES

Compiled by Jessica Garrison

Estancia High School received a new, $10,000 sound system, which was

dedicated in a ceremony at the school Friday. The system came thanks to a

gift from the Newport-Mesa Schools Foundation and C.J. Segerstrom and

Sons. A drama teacher at the school applied for the grant last spring.

Eastbluff Boys and Girls Club center gets donation

The Boys and Girls Club of the Harbor Area received donations from

Pacific Bell and First Security Van Kasper. Tom Fulton of Pacific Bell

donated $2,000 for new computer equipment.

Since 1974, the Eastbluff branch of the Boys & Girls Club has provided

safe, affordable, supervised educational and recreational programs at a

drop-in facility designed to promote positive youth development for all

school-age youngsters in the Newport Beach area.

Governor signs Newport-Mesa bill.

Gov. Gray Davis put his pen to Senate Bill 1039, which Sen. Ross Johnson

(R-Irvine) sponsored to enable the school district to apply for state

school modernization money.

District officials had feared they would not be eligible to apply for the

money because profits from the 1995 sale of the Bear Street School went

into the general fund. The state allowed this usually forbidden practice,

but barred the district from applying for state money for five years.

Because the district badly needs state funds to fix crumbling schools,

last February district officials asked Johnson to submit the bill, which

he did.