Irvine Valley College Administrator Gets a Plum Assignment in an Orange Grove

Talk about a juicy tidbit: The associate dean of student development at Irvine Valley College spends a lot of her time on the job in a nearby orange grove.

To tell the truth, it’s not that great a rumor, but it’s true, and being there is part of Carolann Messner’s job, making her perhaps the only college administrator in the world to manage an orange grove.

“At the beginning, I was overwhelmed,” said Messner, who administers the 20-acre orange grove operated by the associated student body but owned by the Saddleback Community College District. “But I’ve acquired a lot of information about Valencia oranges through reading and by clipping newspaper articles. Now I’m even following orange projections and forecasts.”

And besides the time demands on her from her post as associate dean of students, Messner keeps track of the community pick-your-own-oranges project. Run by the student body on weekends, the event allows the public to pick the juicy Valencia oranges for 15 cents a pound.

Associated Students President Steve Danon, 20, credits Messner with much of the success of the public orange pick, which financially benefits the student body. He feels that while there is a strict working agreement between the two, “we have found that even in a learning setting we can have a friendly relationship that benefits us all.”

Messner said that last year the students earned about $5,000 with the orange pick and that “almost as important was bringing students together in an outdoors informal situation to give them a chance to become better acquainted with one another.”

Besides that benefit, “there’s nothing quite like a fresh picked-off-the-tree orange,” maintains Messner, a former forensics teacher who coached the Saddleback debating team to a national title in 1982.

Messner doesn’t plan on quitting her academic post for a job with Sunkist, but she points out: “As an educator, any amount of information you acquire is useful. In management or administration, what you learn is what counts, and it doesn’t matter whether it comes from the grove or from another direction.”

A private contractor tends the orange grove and shares the proceeds with the student body.

The grove is open weekends from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. to anyone who wants to pick oranges. Pickers must bring their own bags and ladders.

Five years ago, Ken C. Parker of Los Alamitos hired on as Los Alamitos High School tennis coach and since then has compiled a regular-season record of 90 wins, 0 losses.

Contacted about the sensational win streak, Parker replied, “We try not to talk about it.”

Sure.

Unlike high schools, elementary schools rarely hold class reunions.

Well, Cherie Beckmeyer, 35, chairman of Gilbert Elementary School’s combination 30-year class reunion-birthday party, knows why. No records are kept of students who attended that long ago.

“We’ve got a sign posted at a local bank, I’m using my phone number ((714) 635-4486) and we’re trying to get newspaper publicity,” said Beckmeyer, who has two children attending the Garden Grove school, one of the reasons she’s working on the project. “I want them to remember their elementary school days,” she said, recalling that “nothing was ever done especially for us when I went to (elementary) school.”

Beckmeyer said that close to 500 students attended Gilbert School when it opened in 1956 “and we know it’s going to be difficult finding those people.” She said her reunion-birthday group is planning food for about 500 people for the celebration, “but if a lot of reunion people unexpectedly show up for the party, we’ll just run out and buy more food.”

El Toro Marine Air Station Lance Cpls. Jack Cravens and Dave Kallweit have been tight buddies for about a year, so it was natural to share the proceeds of the two lottery tickets they bought together.

Kallweit’s ticket paid $2 so he turned it in for two more, each taking one.

This time Cravens’ ticket paid $50,000, which they split.

“We had a deal,” said Cravens, “and besides, you share with your friends.”

Acknowledgments--Kristie Sweeney, 20, named Miss Placentia, the same crown her sister Karen, 22, won in 1983.