EDITORIAL:

Estancia High School’s gain this year will be Newport Harbor High’s loss.

Longtime Harbor High teacher Phil D’Agostino is leaving the campus, where he helped nurture hundreds of students and led the school’s Student Political Action Committee, to become an assistant principal at the Westside high school.

D’Agostino’s efforts at Newport Harbor have been publicized repeatedly, but he would be the first to give the credit elsewhere. Via the political action committee, or SPAC, D’Agostino bred an interest in politics and activism in dozens of students who addressed issues close to them that included discussions of the Newport-Mesa Unified School District’s zero-tolerance policy and a controversial church expansion plan at neighboring St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church. The organization of the meeting on the church expansion was impressive enough that Newport Beach City Council members praised SPAC’s efforts on what was a brusquely debated issue.

But D’Agostino’s influence went beyond the confines of SPAC. Talk to Harbor High students, and his name repeatedly is on the top of their favorite — and more importantly best — teacher list. D’Agostino brings a passion for education, for engaging students and for putting what they learn into the larger context of their world. He is enthusiastic both inside and outside the classroom.

D’Agostino, of course, is not alone in his dedication to his students. There are countless others in Newport-Mesa schools with the same devotion and the same commitment to teaching. They are the ones who even now are getting ready for the classes that begin next week. They perhaps have been out buying the extra supplies their students will need. They possibly have spent the last days of their summer vacations in their classrooms, making sure everything is set for the first day of school.

But D’Agostino, for some reason, is just one of those teachers who captures students’ affection and loyalty more than others. He is the type who can get students started on a path of lifetime learning, of lifetime engagement with their world and of lifetime activism in their communities.

And now, a whole new campus full of students will get a chance to experience what Newport Harbor High has come to know.

Indeed, this is shaping up to a promising year at Estancia High.

ESPAC has a good ring, doesn’t it?