IRVINE : Schools Rethinking Computers

An ambitious plan to create a computer link between all public schools in the city, put in mothballs after the county bankruptcy, is being slowly revived.

Irvine Unified School District officials are reworking the $10-million Foundations for the Future campaign, which envisions a community of teachers and students linked by computers.

After a new plan is created, Supt. Dennis Smith and Deputy Supt. Dean Waldfogel plan to contact companies and individuals that had previously pledged nearly $5 million to the campaign.

Smith, who joined Irvine Unified in August, led a similar technology drive at Cajon Valley Union School District. “It was basically the same concept, to create a networking system in the schools, then to tie that system into the outside world and ultimately out to the Internet,” he said.

The Foundations for the Future board, which includes four school board members, will be asked to approve a revised five-year plan in the coming weeks.

The Irvine school district paid about $500,000 to the Russ Reid Co. of Pasadena to raise money for the campaign before it was stalled. But school board President Tom Burnham said the company may not have generated enough donations to cover the cost.

“This approach was not very successful,” Burnham said in predicting that the district will not hire another outside fund-raising organization to restart the campaign.