Pushing years of experience

Jan Vickers is running to be re-elected to the Laguna Beach Unified

School District’s Board of Education.

Vickers has lived in Laguna Beach since the late ‘60s and has an

education background. She now serves as treasurer for the board on

which she has been a member for 14 nonconsecutive terms.

“My first job here [in Laguna] was teaching adult education in the

district in the 70s,” Vickers said. “Then for 11 years I was the

preschool director for Laguna Methodist School.”

Vickers has one child who graduated in ’88 from Laguna Beach High

School and another who is in seventh grade at Thurston.

She became involved in school politics with the closing of Aliso

School.

“My oldest child was a student at Aliso School and it was a very

hot issue in the community,” Vickers said. “The board in place had

not planned well, and I didn’t agree with the board. It was a major

change to the district. We had three elementary schools and that was

my school.”

Vickers said she was elected to the board in 1981 and served

through 1987.

Vickers was elected to the board again in 1992. In the meantime,

she was a substitute teacher at the district. For many years, when

she felt things were tumultuous, she attended every school board

meeting.

“[When re-elected in 1992] everything was going nice at this point

in time, people were very complimentary about the district and

everything was good, solid,” Vickers said.

Things started to get more complicated when the board began to

face problems following the county’s bankruptcy in 1994. Vickers said

her goal then was to re-establish confidence in the community.

“My term came up in ‘96,” Vickers said. “There was long financial

difficulty following the county’s bankruptcy in ’94. The community

was looking for business people [for the board.] It’s not supposed to

be a political office, but a lot of politics were involved.”

After four years off the board, Vickers said she decided to run

again in 2000 because her tenacious nature didn’t let her give up.

“It was important because I have a good sense of what has happened

and could be used as a point of reference,” Vickers said. “I knew

what the board had tried before.”

She said it is that first-hand knowledge of what worked and what

didn’t that made her a valuable asset to the board.

“Our mission is to maximize each child’s potential as a group from

the administration to the board, to the principals and teachers,”

Vickers said.

She is looking forward to working on programs like the Individual

Education Program and Quest for Excellence. She said a healthy board

that works to be proactive will be prepared for any problems that

come along.