RANCHO SANTA FE — Three of the newly elected board members of the Rancho Santa Fe School District attended the Nov. 7 board meeting.
Tyler Seltzer and Richard Burdge are continuing board members. Newcomer Todd Buchner came to get up to speed before taking his place on the board in January.
Seltzer received 1,000 votes, or 21.59 percent, of the vote. Burdge received 981 votes equaling 21.18 percent of the vote. Buchner garnered 979 votes and 21.14 percent of the vote.
The results of the election showed that the community wanted to stay the course of the school board.
Candidates for change Lorraine Brovick Kent received 883 votes for 19.07 percent of the vote and Heather Slosar earned 788 votes with 17.02 percent of the vote.
“I want to publically thank all the candidates who ran for the board,” said Lindy Delaney, superintendent. “I think we are going to have a fine board. We will have to say goodbye to Jim (Depolo) next month after 10 years.”
Depolo decided not to run again for the board. After competing his upcoming term, Burdge will have served a total of 14 years on the board. Seltzer was appointed last year to take the place of Jim Cimino who was transferred to Texas with his job. Seltzer was successful with his first election bid.
The board is still glowing about the outstanding API test scores, the best in the history of the school.
“We had phenomenal test scores that we celebrated at the last meeting,” said Todd Frank, board member. “Do we have a short list or plan to keep that moving?”
The answer is yes, Delaney said.
“We do it all year long. We look at every single child to see how they are doing,” she said. “We identify the needs of each child. A lot of discussion takes place every day about that. The idea is to catch the student and determine what they need.”
She said a lot of people from other schools are calling to see what Rancho Santa Fe is doing to achieve such high test scores.
In other school board news, Delaney said the Halloween celebration went off without a hitch.
“It was the very best we have ever had,” she said.
The roll out of placing iPads into the hands of middle school students is going fine.
“Things are going along very well,” Delaney said. “We have had not that many issues. We are gong to look at what technology will look like in 2012 and 2014.”
Burdge asked about the new bleachers that have been installed by the sports field.
“We are looking at a canopy because it gets so hot,” Delaney said.
The robotics program is taking off under the tutelage of Dave Warner and even the younger students are taking to it.
“Wow! Learning is fun. Who would have thought?” said Depolo.
The school board usually meets on the first Thursday of the month, but will be on Dec. 13 next month.
For more information, call (858) 759-0912 or visit http://rsfschool.net.
