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Marymount officials announced on Thursday that the institution of higher learning that soon will have a campus in Lucerne is changing its name.
Marymount College, Palos Verdes, California will now be known as Marymount California University (MCU).
This new name reflects the recent transformation of the 45-year-old institution of higher education to a future multisite institution with undergraduate and graduate programs.
“The consideration of a name change came as a natural part of a college-wide inquiry in 2012 that included reviews of academic programs, mission, governance and marketing,” said MCU President Michael Brophy.
“Marymount” remains the core name, preserving the formative and personal experience offered to students for more than four decades. “California” allows the University to embrace its multiple communities along the Pacific Rim.
With new sites and the potential of graduate programs, “University” best describes the current and future Marymount.
“Marymount California University – a new name for a school that so many have trusted for so long,” said Marymount Board of Trustees Chair Burt Arnold, class of 1984.
Founded in 1968 by the Religious of the Sacred Heart of Mary (RSHM) as a two-year coeducational college, Marymount has undergone a transformation in the past five years.
Changes include the investment of more than $15 million in facilities development, construction and improvement since 2008; the founding of a comprehensive service learning program in 2009; the addition of four-year degree programs in 2010; the addition of an urban campus in Los Angeles (San Pedro) in 2011; admission into the NAIA Cal Pac Athletic Conference in 2012; and the anticipated addition of graduate degrees in 2013.
Another key aspect of Marymount’s transformation – and the town of Lucerne’s – is the planned opening later this year of the university’s Northern California campus, which will be housed at the historic Lucerne Hotel.
Led by lay leadership since 1975, Marymount remains inspired by the RSHM to “serve others so that all may have life.” Marymount reaffirms that mission in 2013.
Marymount College is a Catholic institution that welcomes students of all faiths and backgrounds into a quality, values-based education. They foster a student-centered approach to learning that promotes the development of the whole person.
Inspired by the Religious of the Sacred Heart of Mary, they challenge students to pursue lives of leadership and service.
Long regarded as an exemplary institution offering a transformative educational experience, Marymount has remained focused on its students during its own transformation.
Marymount’s enrollment has doubled in the past three years, and it is envisioned that the university will continue to grow and diversify its enrollments through 2020.
Marymount’s five central goals in supporting growth are as follows:
- In the tradition of Catholic higher education, affirm and support a mission of access, personal growth, lifelong learning, service, justice and universal connection.
- Continually enhance the support of student learning and success.
- Develop and implement viable, relevant new degree programs in a multiyear rollout.
- Take fuller advantage of Marymount’s location in California and on the Pacific Rim.
- Integrate sustainability into Marymount’s facilities, workforce, operations, curriculum and student experience.
For the latest updates, visit www.marymountpv.edu .
CLEARLAKE OAKS, Calif. – A Thursday night collision has resulted in a fatality.
The fatal crash occurred just after 9:30 p.m. on Highway 20 at Keys Boulevard in front of the Lakepoint Lodge in Clearlake Oaks, according to the California Highway Patrol.
Radio reports indicated that a pedestrian had been struck by a vehicle, while the CHP’s online incident reports said the crash involved a bicyclist.
The CHP’s Ukiah Dispatch Center could not confirm if a bike or pedestrian was involved, but said officers were working a major traffic collision.
A witness stated on Lake County News’ Facebook page that they observed a bicycle at the scene.
The CHP, sheriff’s deputies and Northshore Fire responded to the crash site.
At approximately 9:46 p.m. firefighters confirmed the fatality.
Additional details about the incident will be posted as soon as they become available.
Email Elizabeth Larson at
This story has been updated with additional details.
LUCERNE, Calif. – The fast and determined actions of several passersby, a sheriff’s lieutenant and deputy, and fire personnel saved a Lucerne woman from her pickup after it went off the highway and sank in Clear Lake Thursday afternoon.
Ann Adams, 71, was pulled from the vehicle after it went underwater, according to witnesses at the scene.
The California Highway Patrol’s initial report said the incident occurred shortly before 2:30 p.m. just west of Lucerne.
Lucerne resident Doug Arnold said he had followed Adams’ pickup from Lucerne as it traveled westbound on Highway 20.
He said he saw the pickup weaving before it went across the lanes of traffic and shot off into the lake, not even going down the embankment.
In keeping with Arnold’s account, no tire tracks could be seen on the soft embankment where the CHP said the pickup entered the lake.
Arnold said he swam out to try to help Adams – the pickup was about 50 feet offshore – but the doors were locked and the windows closed. He said he told Adams to unlock the doors.
Unable to get her out, Arnold said he swam back to shore to try to get help and look for something to break out a window.
Frank Haas of the Callayomi County Water District was driving by and saw Arnold waving. Haas pulled over, turned around and came back to the scene, and called 911.
As he was on the phone with 911, Haas said the pickup sank, with Adams still locked inside.
“It went down fast,” Arnold said.
Haas, in his work truck, pulled out a sledgehammer which was used to help extricate Adams.
Sheriff’s Lt. Chris Chwialkowski arrived, and Haas said Chwialkowski pulled off his uniform and swam out to the pickup, using the sledgehammer to bust out the pickup window.
Also going into the water to help was Laura Carr, an emergency medical technician with Northshore Fire who had been dispatched to the scene.
Arnold and Haas said a few young men riding bicycles who had been passing by also swam out to help.
According to a sheriff’s office report later in the day, Deputy Nick La Velle also was at the scene, and went into the water to help with the rescue.
A group of people could be seen clustered around Adams as they brought her to shore, placed her on a gurney and put her into a Northshore Fire ambulance. Traffic was briefly held up as first responders worked at the scene.
CHP Officer Nick Powell said Adams stated that she had been trying to get comfortable in her seat in the pickup when the crash occurred.
He said it appeared that her pickup’s passenger side wheels got caught in the drainage ditch when she slightly went off the highway, and she overcorrected at full speed, causing her to go across the highway and off into Clear Lake.
Powell said Adams had a possible fractured right arm and a laceration to her left leg.
She was flown by REACH air ambulance to Santa Rosa Memorial Hospital, Powell said.
After the rescue, with Adams safe in the ambulance, a battalion chief went up and put an arm around Carr, whose black uniform was soaked from having been in the water.
Chwialkowski, in black shorts and t-shirt, his gunbelt slung over his shoulder, also was wet from head to toe. As he walked from the scene Powell said he anticipated he would recommend Chwialkowski for an honorable mention for his lifesaving efforts.
Northshore Fire Dive Team members arrived at the scene, with divers Keith Hoyt and John Rodriguez swimming out to place a tow line on the pickup, which was out of the lake shortly after 3:30 p.m., at which time the incident was terminated.
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UPPER LAKE, Calif. – A month after it agreed to cut some administrative and teaching positions within the district, the Upper Lake Union Elementary School District Board of Trustees on Wednesday night approved the second phase of an aggressive budget reduction plan that calls for restructuring and cutting classified staff.
District Superintendent Valerie Gardner took the proposal to the board as followup to the first phase, which was approved Feb. 20.
The first phase of cuts included laying off the middle school principal and cutting the special education director position, with Gardner taking over the latter job. On Wednesday the district board also took the second and final vote to make those cuts.
The classified reductions will include a reduction in custodial staff, eliminating a full-time district secretary, half-time special education secretary and part-time cook, and the creation of a full-time administrative assistant to help Gardner with the added jobs she has taken on.
Other restructuring includes changing 11 instructional aid positions to six special education aids and eliminating a media aid, Gardner said.
At the same time as the district makes cuts, it also has to improve student performance at Upper Lake Elementary School, which is in Performance Improvement status, Gardner said.
Efforts to improve the student performance and attendance include implementing all-day kindergarten in the new school year, ability grouping in English language instruction in kindergarten through fifth grades, staff development focused on teaching strategies and Common Core States Standards, and an increase in instructional minutes for kindergarten through fifth grades, according to Gardner.
Classified cuts will total approximately $209,283, plus $34,900 in certificated reductions, for a total of $244,183, Gardner said.
After additional staff members are hired to help bring the teacher to student ratio in kindergarten and first grades to 20 to 1, there will be a net savings of $123,796, she explained.
“I don't know where else we can cut at this point,” said Gardner.
Before voting on the reductions, the board received a report from district business manager Becky Jeffries on the district’s 2012-13 Second Interim Budget Revision Report.
Jeffries gave a thorough report on the district’s finances and reserves, the latter only about 4 percent when she said an elementary district should have a double-digit reserve to be prepared for emergencies.
The district, Jeffries explained, was in deficit spending. Revenues for this year are projected at $2.9 million, with expenses just over $3 million, putting them $132,992 in the red.
In order to meet their reserve obligations they’ve had to tap into lottery money for the short-term, she said.
The projections for the current academic year as well as the two to come included the staffing reductions being proposed, said Jeffries, as well as a $22,000 cut in funding due to federal sequestration.
By implementing the reductions and restructuring, Jeffries estimated that in 2013-14 the district would have a net increase of $55,089 and $11,426 the following year. The 2014-15 increase would be less, she said, because it’s unclear if federal legislation that gives schools money from timber receipts will be renewed.
The district also has $300,000 in early retirement offers, or “golden handshakes,” for certificated staff that it is paying off. Jeffries said the district has to pay interest on those obligations when they’re not paid off immediately.
This month the district has to make a $200,000 loan between its different funds in order to meet its obligations, and will have to loan itself $100,000 in May, Jeffries said.
She said that 37 percent of the district’s apportionment payments will be made in the coming year. Jeffries said the state is holding onto about $800,000 of the money due the district.
Based on the proposed cuts included in the report, Jeffries said they were giving the second interim budget revision a positive certification, meaning the district was meeting its obligations for the current school year and the next two.
Board member Ron Raetz asked how long the district had been in deficit spending. Gardner said the Fiscal Crisis and Management Assistance Team, which helps state schools address fiscal problems, had told the district they had been deficit spending for five years.
Board member Marilyn Pivniska pointed out that the positive certification was better than the qualified certification for its finances the district had been facing in December.
Raetz moved to approve the second interim report, with the motion receiving a 5-0 vote.
He also moved to approve the resolution reducing the classified positions and received unanimous approval.
Raetz said that because the district had been deficit spending for so long, rather than making cuts along the way, it was now having to make many cuts all at once.
“It’s not pleasant but it has to be done,” he said.
Pivniska agreed. “It’s really hard to vote on this resolution, especially because we’ve heard all your concerns, we really have,” she told the group of parents and classified staff present for the meeting.
Because the board hadn’t been on top of things and hadn’t held its previous administrators accountable as they should have, “Right now, we don’t have a choice,” Pivniska said, adding that it’s a decision the board didn’t take lightly.
“It seems with past personnel there should have been some checks and balances and more transparency in place” so the board could have known what was going on before, said Board Chair Joanne Breton.
“There was a lot we didn’t know,” Breton said, adding that the golden handshakes they had previously approved had projected savings.
A woman in the audience said the board hadn’t listened to anyone but the past superintendent – a reference to Kurt Herndon, who retired last year. “Yes, you guys are to blame for a lot of it,” the woman said of the district’s financial condition.
As the district tries to improve its finance, community members are pressing the board to give up health insurance benefits, an issue raised during public comment at the Wednesday board meeting.
Dawn Binns, a district classified employee facing the loss of her job, asked board members to give up the insurance benefits.
“As a community member I ask that you be a role model and take the cut with the rest of us,” she said.
Walt Christensen, a former board member of 10 years, spoke on behalf of the board keeping their benefits, with the exception of the member who ran against him on a platform of not accepting them. That was an apparent reference to Raetz, first elected to the board in November 2011.
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CLEARLAKE, Calif. – A young woman who traveled from her Clearlake home to Nevada earlier this month has not communicated with family and friends since then, and they and police are seeking information on her whereabouts.
Desirae Deweese, 22, left Clearlake with an ex-boyfriend around March 5 for Reno, according to information posted about her by friends on a newly set up Facebook page, https://www.facebook.com/pages/Help-locate-Desirae-Deweese/172807502869064 .
The Clearlake Police Department is investigating Deweese’s case after her father reported her missing, said Sgt. Nick Bennett.
Bennett said Deweese recently had two family members die, including her mother, and was reported to be despondent at the time she left home for the trip to Reno.
Friends reported on the Facebook page set up for Deweese that she and her ex-boyfriend had an argument while in Reno and he returned to California without her.
Reno Police had contact with Deweese on March 6 and again on March 8, and found her to be in good health both times, Bennett said.
“However, we haven’t heard anything further from her,” said Bennett, who spoke with Deweese’s father on Wednesday.
It’s believed that Deweese is still in the Reno area, Bennett said.
She is described as 5 feet 6 inches tall, weighing 120 pounds, with brown hair and blue eyes.
A reward is being offered for information about her whereabouts.
Anyone with information is asked to call her family at 707-295-2238 or 707-245-2525.
Email Elizabeth Larson at
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – Although rain began earlier and lingered longer than forecasters predicted over the last few days, clear skies and warmer weather are on tap for at least the next week.
Showers arrived before noon in Lake County on Tuesday and lingered throughout the day yesterday, but the highest rainfall totals around the county yesterday barely reached one-quarter to one-half inch, according to Western Weather Group Lake County.
Upper Lake reported the highest level at one-half of an inch, with areas of Kelseyville receiving less than one-quarter of an inch of precipitation, Western Weather Group reported.
Still, this small amount of rain as spring was officially ushered in at 4:02 a.m. yesterday is welcome as warmer weather and clear skies return.
Today's high temperatures are forecast to reach into the upper-50s and low-60s, as high pressure builds once again over Lake County and daytime skies are forecast to remain sunny and clear throughout the weekend.
Overnight temperatures tonight are expected to drop near freezing with this trend continuing throughout the weekend, but daytime highs will slowly increase.
As the weekend approaches, each day will be increasingly warmer with a forecast for sunny days in the mid- to upper-60s.
By Sunday, daytime temps will approach 70 with overnight lows will only dipping into the 40s.
There are conflicting extended forecast models according to Western Weather Group for mid- to late next week, when an either fairly wet – or warm and dry – pattern may develop.
Email Terre Logsdon at