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Enrollment, crab feeds, UC Irvine, kindergarten, iGive

Education roundup

The U.S. Dept of Education’s College Navigator is an incredible resource to compare colleges. Most important, perhaps, for college-bound students, would be to check how long it typically takes to graduate from each college on their list. Few colleges are graduating most of their students in four years right now. At  UC Davis, for example, only 50 percent of its fulltime students graduate in four years. Some other local colleges: Sonoma State – 30 percent graduate in four years; Dominican University – 43 percent; University of Oregon – 41 percent; University of Washington – 59 percent; Mount St. Mary’s (L.A.) – 38 percent; Santa Clara University – 77 percent; UC Berkeley – 71 percent; UCLA – 68 percent; Stanford – 79 percent. As you assess college options, not realizing you should be multiplying tuition by six years can make a huge difference (not to mention the loss of two years of income). I spent hours on the site and there is a lot of interesting, easy to navigate data there. Go to nces.ed.gov/collegenavigator for the details.

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According to the L.A. Times, the number of seniors graduating from high school in California peaked two years ago at 430,292 and is expected to be 408,467 in 2012-13 and to drop each year until 2019-20. (This is due to population trends not drop-out rates). The state will then see some modest growth, but the ranks of its new high school graduates will remain well below the peak. The article also states that 45 percent of the nation’s public high school students will be non-white by 2019-20, compared to 38 percent in 2009. In that period, the annual numbers of Latino graduates from public high schools will rise 41 percent and Asian-Pacific Islanders will be up 30 percent, while whites decline 12 percent and blacks 9 percent.

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El Verano Elementary School’s English and Spanish kindergarten registration information night will take place at Sassarini School on Wednesday, Jan. 30. The program is in English at 5 p.m. and in Spanish at 6 p.m. The actual kindergarten registration for English- and Spanish-speaking families will be held on Wednesday, Feb. 6, at El Verano School from 4 to 7 p.m.

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El Verano fourth- and fifth-grade families who plan on attending Altimira for middle school, should come hear Will Deeths, Altimira principal, speak about the programs that Altimira has to offer at 6 p.m. Wednesday, Feb. 13. This meeting will take place in the El Verano multipurpose room. Childcare is provided. The meeting will be conducted in English with simultaneous Spanish translation. This event is made possible by Universidad de padres/Parent University. U de P is a parent leadership group that works to identify vital issues for the EV community.

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There is an important parent forum at Sonoma Charter School from 6 to 8 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 24, regarding the possibility of a change in the lottery enrollment system at SCS. Sonoma Valley Unified School District trustee Helen Marsh will be in attendance and will share with everyone her reasoning for requesting a change to the lottery.

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It is crab feed season. Sonoma Valley High’s Boosters Club is hosting its crab feed Friday, Feb. 1, at the Moose Lodge at 20580 Broadway. Tickets are $45 (svhsboosters.com). The Presentation School is hosting its annual crab feed on Saturday, Feb. 2, at 20872 Broadway. Tickets are $65 (presentationschool.com). Justin-Siena High School is hosting its crab feed on Saturday, Jan. 26. Tickets are $65 (www.justin-siena.org).

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January is National Mentoring Month and the Sonoma Valley Mentoring Alliance has more than 100 children on a waiting list. The nonprofit will host an informational reception on Wednesday, Jan. 30, from 5:30 to 7 p.m. at Macarthur Place. Potential mentors can ask questions and speak with current mentors in the Stand By Me Mentoring Program. To attend, contact 938-1990 or Sonomamentoring.org.

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UC Berkeley and UCLA get most of the attention around here, with a healthy enthusiasm for UC Davis thrown in, but exciting news is coming out of UC Irvine, a college that few students here consider. The inaugural graduating class of UC Irvine’s law school beat every law school in California except Stanford, with a state bar exam pass rate of 90 percent this year, and it is hot on the path toward becoming a top-20 U.S. law school. In addition, UC Irvine was recently ranked number 1 among universities less than 50 years old by the Times Higher Education. The university has 28,000 students enrolled and more than 76,000 students applied this fall to become UC Irvine Anteaters, one of the highest totals among American universities.

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There is a new, free web site that makes escrip-type giving to your favorite cause even easier. iGive.com’s iGive Button is a browser app. It tells stores that you want a percentage of every purchase you make donated to your cause or charity, at no cost to you. You shop normally at over 1,200 stores online, doing nothing differently except entering through a different portal, and 2 percent to 15 percent of your total purchase can be donated to the school (or nonprofit) of your choice. Igive.com.

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Sonoma Valley High Schools AVID program (Advancement Via Individual Determination) will be hosting a Dine and Donate at Mary’s Pizza Shack on Tuesday, Jan. 22. You can eat at either Mary’s in Sonoma (dine-in, take out, or delivery) to support the AVID program. You need to bring a flyer from the high school office or an AVID teacher.

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Congratulations to seventh-grader Anthony Costanzo who won the school geography bee at St. Francis Solano School. The school-level bee, during which students answer oral questions on geography, is the first round in the 25th annual National Geographic Bee, sponsored by Google. Costanzo will now take a written test, and up to 100 of the top scorers on that test in each state will be eligible to compete in the California state bee. Everyone can test their geographic knowledge in the GoBee Challenge, an online geography quiz at nationalgeographic.com/geobee, which poses 10 new questions a day.

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Flowery School fifth-grade students recently hosted a family math night to raise money for scholarships for kids in rural El Salvador. The night was called “Mathematics Saves the World!” Families with students in kindergarten through grade seven enjoyed math games in exchange for a small donation to the scholarship jar. Before the night even began, the fifth-graders gathered enough change from their pockets, under beds and couches and from their allowances to pay for one student to start classes in January.

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I have served on the City of Sonoma’s Cultural and Fine Arts Commission for several years now, so its $2,000 annual student award is near and dear to my heart. The Student Creative Arts Award is open to Sonoma Valley residents, ages 16 to 21, studying the visual, literary, or performing arts. Applications are online at sonomacity.org. The entry deadline is Wednesday, Jan. 23. Past winners include Esmeralda Chavez, Sarah Summers and Michael Starr. There are dozens of other local scholarships accepting applications right now (most for seniors). See Sherry Dean in the high school front office to pick up a list.

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Family Life Magazine is holding its iLearn Fair from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 26, at the Wells Fargo Center in Santa Rosa. More than 1,000 people attend this free, annual educational event, which gathers families who are looking for enrichment activities, products, party ideas, tutors, etc.  

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One of my favorite guides to colleges is, “Colleges that Change Lives” by Loren Pope. The book uncovers incredible colleges that not many people have heard of. Marty O’Connell, executive director of the off-shoot Colleges that Change Lives organization, will be sharing her insights into college admissions and the importance of a student-centered college search process at 6:30 p.m. Wednesday, Jan. 31, at the Mill Valley Community Center (free). Register at compassprep.eventbrite.com.