Hopefuls evenly matched

FOR THE RECORD

An article in Monday’s Daily Pilot, “Hopefuls evenly matched,” incorrectly stated that the teachers union had endorsed Michael Collier earlier this week. The union declared its endorsements in September.

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Michael Collier rose before sunrise to teach early-morning seminary classes to Mormon high school students. Kimberly Clark counseled families at California Victory Church in Santa Ana — then ventured up to Canada to teach at one of the church’s partner colleges.

Collier dealt with families and children as the president of the Costa Mesa National Little League. Clark deals with them as a nurse and marriage and family therapist.

Collier has sent three children through the Newport-Mesa Unified School District. Clark has sent two.

At a glance, the candidates for the Newport-Mesa school board’s second trustee area look like two sides of the same coin. Both are Republicans, practicing Christians, experienced in business and education — and both have significant allies behind them. The Newport-Mesa Federation of Teachers, which has never backed a candidate who went on to lose, endorsed Collier this week, while Clark has the support of the California Republican Assembly, Costa Mesa Mayor Allan Mansoor, Huntington Beach Rep. Dana Rohrabacher and Costa Mesa Assemblyman Van Tran.

“I don’t think anybody can say it’s going to come out one way or the other,” said Trustee Linda Sneen, who oversees the second area and will step down when her term expires this year.

The race between Collier and Clark is the only one in Newport-Mesa without an incumbent. Tom Egan, who was elected to the board along with Sneen in 2002, has also declined to run again, but businessman Walt Davenport is running for his post unopposed.

Collier, 51, has a long and varied history in the Costa Mesa community. Currently the PTA president of College Park Elementary School, he also served as president of Orange Coast College’s Alumni and Friends Assn. and held a position on the college’s Foundation Board. Recently, he spent a year at Estancia High School as a band instructor.

As a candidate, Collier favors bringing arts into classrooms — a major goal of Newport-Mesa’s latest strategic plan — and raising teacher salaries. He also advocates secondary school redesign, a concept that the district has pushed with its Orange Coast Middle College and Early College high schools.

“The kids actually get a chance to work within their interest,” said Collier, whose own children graduated from Middle College. “In an ideal setting, it would be nice if they passed all their tests as freshmen and spent the rest of the time preparing for life.”

Clark, 48, works as a nurse and case manager for Bristol Park Medical Group in Santa Ana. An advocate of parent involvement in schools, she also believes in teaching abstinence in sex-education courses and reviewing textbooks for violent and sexual content.

Among her top priorities on the board, Clark said, would be raising test scores at Costa Mesa schools, many of which have lagged under the No Child Left Behind Act. Three schools in Newport-Mesa — Pomona Elementary, Wilson Elementary and TeWinkle Middle School — went on a federal list for academic intervention this year.

“The first thing anybody on the school board’s going to have to do is investigate what’s going on in those schools and what’s going on in the classrooms,” Clark said.