Jan Vickers, a school board member for 23 years and a former teacher, replaces Bill Landsiedel as president of the Laguna Beach Unified School District. Landsiedel, an attorney, served for one year, as will Vickers, who previously served as the board’s clerk.
The major emphasis in the coming year, said Vickers, will be switching over to a new teaching and testing protocol known as the Common Core standards, being implemented statewide. The new standards emphasize informational writing using cited texts and deeper understanding of fewer subjects. It will also switch all testing to computers.
Next year, said Vickers, will be a sample year where some of the district’s students will use the new testing system. Computer testing where each student is able to use some type of laptop or computer tablet will be fully implemented statewide by 2015, she said.
“It’s so expensive to add technology,” said Vickers. “Other districts that have been suffering much more economically, they’re not there yet. We’ve had an emphasis on adding technology for a number of years but it is expensive and there’s always something new coming and devices that kids want to be able to use.”
Ketta Brown, a school board member for eight years, steps in as clerk of the board, replacing Vickers.
School board members use a set rotation to annually change board officer positions.
