By RACHEL FIRESTONE Special to the Palisadian-Post In keeping with the L.A. Unified School District’s ongoing quest for community-supported renovation of local public schools, Marquez Elementary, Palisades Elementary, Canyon School, Kenter Canyon Elementary and Brentwood Science Magnet are all undergoing major transformations. From libraries and computer labs to playgrounds and playing fields, parents, administration, community members and the L.A. Board of Education are focusing on improving the resources and opportunities available to students. P.R.I.D.E., the parent booster club at Paul Revere Charter Middle School, is making sure its 2,200 students are not left behind in this movement to build strong minds and strong bodies. The volunteer group hopes to complete two of the school’s groundbreaking projects’the renovation of the existing library and the building of an innovative agility course’by year’s end. “The budget for these upgrades is $308,000, of which over $200,000 has been raised from parents, school organizations, Palisades service clubs and several businesses,” said T. Scott MacGillivray, a Brentwood resident and architect who has had two children at Revere and is coordinating the projects. MacGillivray noted that Revere has not had any significant upgrades since it was built 50 years ago. “By hooking up the library with modern technology and building a training camp-style agility course, school officials and parents are determined to make Revere a first-class facility on par with the community it belongs to,” he said. Principal Art Copper and Board of Education President Marlene Canter, whose district includes the Palisades Complex schools, believe this Revere renaissance will provide students with new opportunities and will serve to spark other schools to follow suit. “Take ownership and help mold it to make the school a success,” Canter said. Having stated that a proper education is a civil right for every child, she sees parent interaction and community involvement as “change agents” in the system. “It is about pride and ownership,” Canter continued. “It is crucial to have parents become part of the school’s climate and to encourage them that their value is not just as a volunteer in the classroom or to just come when their child gets into trouble, but to become part of the fabric of the school.” Copper, who is beginning his third year as principal, agreed. “You don’t own the school unless you participate in making it a success.” Revere supporters are doing just that. The new library, budgeted at about $220,000, will not only house thousands of new books, it will be buzzing with students using the new audio library and laptop computers. The previously under-utilized facility will soon be a place students can visit, research, write, do schoolwork and recreational reading or pursue independent studies. With 12 new computer terminals at two circular tables, the library will serve as a resource for both students and teachers alike. Additionally, P.R.I.D.E. is seeking funding for a library aide to keep the library open longer hours and help navigate students through the new resources. Integration of computer technology into the core curriculums for elementary, middle and high school students is essential in keeping students up to speed. To ensure that its students excel academically throughout these crucial years, P.R.I.D.E. is emphasizing the acquisition of new laptop computers for the library. With a laptop, every chair becomes a computer station when you want it to and then a study chair when the laptop is returned to the recharging unit behind the librarian’s desk. Another advantage is that laptops operate on wireless technology, which saves thousands of dollars in hardwire costs. The future has arrived and it is cheaper and faster. Revere’s state-of-the-art audio lab, a new feat for LAUSD, will allow students with varying learning styles to acquire knowledge in new ways. Students with learning disabilities, attention problems or visual processing challenges will have the tools necessary to keep up with other students and further narrow the achievement gap. “As a school with an emphasis on math, science and technology, it is imperative that we prepare our students for the ever-advancing world of technological innovations,” Copper said. “With the addition of an audio lab and the flexibility that laptop computers provide, we’re taking a giant step forward in giving our students immediate access to the tools they need to be competitive.” The new agility course, designed to supplement Revere’s rigorous physical education curriculum, will feature various apparatus that challenge and develop students’ agility, fitness, upper- and lower-body muscles, competitiveness and the confidence of meeting the challenge and bettering one’s personal time. Located on the athletic playground, the course will be equipped with a 153-ft. by 27-ft. rubber mat saftey surface and will include balance beams, crawl-under bars, a cargo climbing fence, hurdle walls, a 4-ft.-high vault wall, inline loop climbers, interlocking tires, and a 6-ft.-high vault wall. “The PE staff requested this course as their top priority,” MacGillivray said. “If fundraising goes well in the next month I hope to be ordering the agility course by October 1. I am currently bidding out the work. Equipment and installation will come from Steelcraft, Inc. of Pasadena.” MacGillivray added: “We will be mailing a flyer to all of our Palisades and Brentwood neighbors in two weeks, asking for donations to help make this happen. We really want the community to be proud of Paul Revere and help us bring the facility up to the standard of our great elementary schools.” Public schools used to be community hubs and it is the vision of Revere supporters and the L.A. school board to see every public school become the center of the Palisades community again. Currently, the campus is used for night basketball, non-school affiliated performances, soccer games and more. The agility course will add a novel community resource. To support these projects, send a check made out to P.R.I.D.E. c/o of Paul Revere Middle School, 1450 Allenford Ave., Los Angeles, CA. 90049 or contact MacGillivray by phone (479-1974) or e-mail: TSMAIA@aol.com. (Editor’s note: Rachel Firestone graduated from Palisades High in 2002 and is now a senior at Boston University majoring in public relations. Upon graduating next spring, she hopes to move back to Los Angeles and work in the nonprofit sector on behalf of public schools.)

With fall 2005 fast approaching and Proposition K renovations at Rustic Canyon Park remaining incomplete for the third year, members of the local volunteer neighborhood oversight committee (LVNOC) will meet tonight with the project manager to get things back on track. Although the men’s and women’s bathrooms have been retrofitted to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act, the park’s handicapped ramp, originally scheduled to be completed by the beginning of summer camp’June 29’remains unfinished, owing to a subcontractor’s error. According to Neil Drucker, project manager for recreational and cultural facilities with the Bureau of Engineering, “There is a mistake in one of the concrete landings that has been corrected by the subcontractor at his own cost. It will not be a cost to the City or Prop. K.” The ramp, which descends from the porch on the north side of the main building to the children’s play area, remains off limits to the public pending repairs. According to Nelson Willis, LVNOC chairman, the committee signed off on the overall plan a year ago with the promise from then project manager Alice Gong that they would be presented with a revised list of projects so they would have an opportunity to set priorities. “In addition, Gong promised to supply the committee with a revised list of costs to date and firm numbers on the cost of each of the items approved by the committee.” The list includes an automatic irrigation system, repairs to the entry courtyard, and replacement of inside patio doors with French doors. Inside upgrades include removing all acoustical tiles, resurfacing the basketball/volleyball court and adding fencing where appropriate. The VNOC was formed as a result of the controversy surrounding a previous plan that was developed by the previous VNOC and the Department of Recreation and Parks, but without input from the broader Rustic Canyon community. Opponents of the plan argued that the public had not been notified with sufficient time of VNOC meetings, and had been deprived of an opportunity for input. “We make every effort to accommodate the needs and wishes of the LVNOC when possible,” Drucker said, “but ultimately the City, not the LVNOC, must make the final decision on design’the LVNOC is an advisory body.” The project was previously designed and bids had been awarded by Recreation and Parks prior to being turned over to the Bureau of Engineering, which caused a delay in the construction schedule and reduced the amount of money available for construction. Of the original Prop K allotment $500,00, about $150,000 remains to complete most of the items on the LVNOC list. “The project was delayed due to delays in transferring the funds from Prop. K to the General Services Department (GSD), beyond the control of the Bureau of Engineering, which pushed the construction into a time period where it is competing with a number of other GSD- constructed projects,” Drucker said. In addition, Drucker said the department stopped work during the summer so the work would not interfere with the park’s summer camp activities. He anticipates that the entire project will be completed by February 6, 2006. The LVNOC will meet at 6:30 p.m. at Rustic Canyon Park, 601 Latimer Rd. The public is invited.

By JACK KUHLENSCHMIDT Special to the Palisadian-Post Students and parents at St. Matthew’s Parish School will see a new face on campus this fall. Rev. Frank Sawyer has been hired as the new school minister for grades K-8. So just who is this Frank Sawyer? I was curious to find out, so I sat down with him for a few minutes during lunch. First of all, Frank is a Canadian (he emphasizes that he is an English Canadian and not a French Canadian) and says “aboot” and “oot” instead of “about” and “out.” He says that he is determined to make school chapel more compelling and exciting by relating everything to stuff that we (the students) can understand. He might relate a lesson to a current event or something that we as a congregation can all relate to. Oh, so you want to know more about Frank Sawyer? Okay, here goes. Frank grew up in Ontario, Canada, and at the age of 15 received a sense that he was “called to serve God.” He says that the feeling was “kind of weird” and that he “didn’t tell anybody for two years” because he did not know what to think of this gut feeling. Still, Frank pursued his calling and was soon an ordained minister and teaching at Cathedral School for Boys in San Francisco. But don’t worry, Dodger fans, because Frank never had anything to do with the dreaded San Francisco Cheaters… I mean Giants. He worked at Cathedral from 1999 to 2004, and moved here at the end of June with his wife, Ginnelle, to take the job at St. Matthew’s. Frank has been married for nearly seven years. When he first met Ginnelle, she thought that it was “kind of strange” that he was studying to become a priest, but they overcame that minor setback and now live happily in the Palisades. The couple had a little girl, Maggie, this Monday. Frank would like you to know some of his hobbies. He likes “nature sports” such as kayaking, hiking, swimming and sailing. He also has two dogs (bichons, which are very small white dogs) that he walks with his wife. Frank likes to run and has participated in three marathons. Another interesting fact about his life is that he spent one summer in the Canadian Army as an officer in the artillery. He did it because his grandfather was in the army, his father was in the army, and he wanted to continue this tradition. I hope you know that Frank is not your typical school minister. This gives him an advantage over others, because he is almost a kid himself. He does not teach the standard way; he seeks to teach the way that is most effective. So Frank would like to invite his students to please come to class with an open mind because he wants to be their teacher and friend. (Palisadian Jack Kuhlenschmidt, an eighth grader at St. Matthew’s, also has a story in this week’s sports section.)

A bold concept of teamwork inspired Mike Deasy and George Penner to create their new real estate firm, Deasy/Penner & Partners on Main Street in Venice. They envisioned a company in which the agents would be partners in the firm, actively involved in multiple aspects of the business, and would accrue equity in the company based on their individual productivity. “All agents participate in both profit and equity,” says Palisadian Deasy, formerly of Mossler Deasy & Doe, a trailblazer in the industry of architecturally significant homes. “Most of our agents are as adept at creating ads as doing finance and administration.” Deasy/Penner & Partners was born in June and currently has 15 agents, including Frank Langen, a Santa Monica Canyon resident and co-creator of inthecanyon.com. The firm hopes to have a team of 30 within six months. Penner, an advertising executive who was chief operating officer at MDD, has even created a logo that can be personalized by incorporating the name of each partner. In this way, Penner says, they’re “rewarding and incentivizing each agent” and simultaneously “developing a firm that’s a unified front in the eyes of the consumer. “We’re allowing our new brand to be everybody’s brand,” he says. Penner resigned from MDD May 31 and Deasy followed shortly thereafter. Both are well versed in the specialized market of architectural homes, and Deasy bought his current home’the Entenza house designed by Modernist architect Harwell Hamilton Harris’from Penner in 1998. The two share a passion for the “home as art” and a mission to help clients translate their aesthetic preferences into a living environment that will complement their lifestyles and tastes. “We want to be experts on how people live in the house,” Penner says, explaining that the name of the architect who designed a house and the year it was built are less important than how the house interacts with the emotions of the buyer. “Think of the home as a piece of artwork but not as a museum that you can’t live in.” Deasy adds that their philosophy is “not having the art impose itself on you.” The firm’s reach will extend from Malibu to Palm Springs, and incorporate diverse architectural styles. Currently, their most significant listings in terms of design include three Brentwood homes: the Binstock residence, a bluffside estate on Richwood; a restored Spanish-style home on Medio, with gardens designed by Pamela Burton; and a New England traditional home on Carmelina. They have two listings on Amalfi in Santa Monica Canyon. One is an original concrete house that was renovated and wood-clad in the 1960s by Doug Rucker, and expanded two decades later by architect Sam Tolkin. French doors open to the verdant canyon, which stretches around the home. “We’re very passionate about our vision,” Penner says, emphasizing that their firm’s scope “goes well beyond the focus on mid-century architecture, which MDD did so well. There’s so much more design and ‘home as art’ in Southern California.” Deasy says that currently, one of the most popular designs is the Nantucket beach style’white and open, with hardwood floors. Penner adds that mid-century modern is still “in” but “I think it’s evolving. People are looking at contemporary designs with a mid-century attitude.” Whatever the trend, Penner says there’s “a sense of need to be more diverse and create a market that breaks through the generality.” Deasy and Penner believe they’ve created that market and a new real estate model with their boutique firm. For more information, visit www.deasypenner.com or call 275-1000.

By SUSAN MONAHAN Special to the Palisadian-Post At 6:05 p.m. the ballroom at the Fairmont Hotel was still empty’and chilly. Blue and silver balloons floated above the tables. The reunion committee expected 250, plus walk-ins’the highest attendance this group had seen. Clinks cut the silence as bartenders stocked up on glasses. ”Two collages flanked the entrance. The first was a standard high school reunion bit, with black-and-white snapshots of the seniors’ last football game, and boys with their Chevys in the parking lot. But the other evidenced why the Palisades High Class of 1965 is extraordinary: the nation’s press has kept an eye on this group for 40 years. ””Yes, I remember Time magazine coming,” said Padre Clayton (who went by Greg in high school), the first alumnus to arrive. ”During their senior year, Time devoted a cover story to the newly built high school’s group of affluent students, writing about their social and scholastic habits as 500 models of “Today’s Teenagers.” The article deemed them graduates “on the fringe of a golden era.” ”Beyond the social order at Palisades High was a world in flux. These teens experienced the Cuban Missile Crisis during their first month in high school; then came the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. The number of men drafted into the Vietnam War climbed as the students marched through graduation. ”Ten years later, the Time article left questions in the minds of two Palisades High ’65 alumni: David Wallace (later Wallechinsky) and Michael Medved. From a late-night reminiscing session came the shared idea to write a book about whether or not their classmates, Time’s “leaders of tomorrow,” really “changed the world.” Medved, voted Most Intellectual by his class, and Wallechinsky, son of famous author Irving Wallace, tracked down and interviewed nearly 50 classmates. The compilation book “What Really Happened to the Class of ’65?” was published in 1976. Its chapters had titles like “The Cheerleader” and “The Joiner,” and contrasted the students’ high school images with their candid accounts of moral and sexual experimentation and how they discovered’or avoided’adult responsibilities. Almost all interviewees claimed drugs influenced their lives. ”The press and public were again intrigued. Were these classmates still prototypes of the era? The Daily Californian reviewed the book as “gossip, melodrama and cultural history.” It became a national best-seller. The Los Angeles Times covered the class’s 20-year reunion to follow up. But the classmates’ opinions on the book were as varied as the directions their lives had taken. On this night 30 years later, many of them have watched children of their own graduate into adulthood. What conclusions have they drawn now? The Quarterback’s Record ””You still look just like Paul Newman,” a classmate said as she shuffled out of the ballroom past Mark Holmes. In the book’s first chapter, “The Quarterback,” Medved and Wallechinsky cite other classmates’ memories about the attractive young man, whom they voted Most Likely to Succeed. The authors continue: ””For 10 years we heard nothing of Mark Holmes until we ran into him in the men’s room following a ‘Cosmic Mass Celebration”he was organizing the annual ‘Conference of Grace’ for the Movement of Spiritual Inner Awareness.” ”These days Mark has moved back to Los Angeles after spending time in Panama, where he continued to practice the Asian medicine he’d spoken of in the book. Holmes ran a medical practice in Beverly Hills, has been married, and is now engaged again. Saying he did not want to be negative about the situation, Holmes pointed out he didn’t feel accurately portrayed in the book. ””I was the first chapter. Then there I was in the New York Times, and they misrepresented the religion.” He has a strong presence and conveys opinions largely with his eyes. “It wasn’t the story of the class. You can’t generalize about a group of people, as being from Palisades, or being that age. We all have our own biological individuality. It’s like the dinner they’re serving. Everyone in the room can eat the same thing, but we’re all going to react differently to it.” ”Wallechinsky arrived at the reunion, dressed in an eggshell-colored suit jacket. He flew in from France, but makes his home in Los Angeles. A published author many times since “What Really Happened…,” he hasn’t heard many complaints from the interviewees recently. ””It’s people you know. I haven’t written a bad word about someone I know since. I didn’t like that part of it. I’ve heard what Mark thinks and I’m sorry he feels that way. All the interviews were transcribed from tapes, of course. But I still don’t agree with the religious movement he was involved in.” The Beauty ””Suzanne!” A woman called her name over the noise of the registration table and soon a small group of women circled the champagne blond, sun-tanned and gracious Suzanne Thomas. ”Wallechinsky and Medved entitled her chapter “The Beauty.” They wrote about the girl voted Most Natural: ””We got Suzanne’s number from her parents, but hesitated for several days before making the call. There was no logical basis for our nervousness, but old-time insecurities die hard. In high school, a call to Suzanne Thomas would have been unthinkable; she was too desirable, too mature, too far above us in the rigid social hierarchy.” ”From the interview she gave at the time of the book, she was waitressing in Marina del Rey and enjoying free time at the beach. This surprised her classmate Harvey Bookstein, who was quoted in the book saying he assumed she would be married and a mother. Thomas’s quote in the book explains her indecision: ””In high school, everything was more organized. I knew what I was doing and where I was going. Now it’s kind of helter-skelter. I don’t really like the way things are going’I think people are a little too free.” ”At the reunion Thomas smiled warmly at her classmates and seemed comfortable to talk in groups of just two or three, stationing herself outside the perimeter of the ballroom floor. She spoke in a soft but optimistic voice. ” “I live in San Diego now, and I do landscape design,” she said, adding that she didn’t have children. After reading her personal feelings in the book about hoping to find a Prince Charming and wanting a family, it’s almost too severe to pose the typical reunion inquisition, Well, why aren’t you married? ””I don’t know if she ever was married. She’s pretty quiet about that stuff,” classmate Jeff Stolper said, whose chapter in the book was titled “The Surfer.” “She still looks beautiful,” Stolper said of the woman dressed in a nautical-blue jacket and skirt. ”Wallechinsky said people developed an instant bond to those profiled in the book: “The comment I usually get on the book is people saying, ‘My class (in whatever state) had the same cast of characters.’ Which is what we were trying to accomplish, but had no idea how successful we would be.” ” However, some feel that Medved and Wallechinsky’s book was not the right sampling. ””I wasn’t interviewed for the book. My life was very normal,” said William Kaplan, a classmate who now has a dental practice in the Palisades. ””They basically got their friends involved,” Mark Mathews, a classmate whose band used to play at Sports Night dances at Palisades High. “We would have made an interesting story’the Vietnam War eventually broke up our band.” ”Wallechinsky explained his and Medved’s selection method: “We tried to get a cross-section of the class; to identify ‘classic’ types.” ”Tom Betts, the reunion committee member credited with the giant Internet outreach for this 40-year event, cited Google.com as his tool. “This is a special group of people,” he said. “We have a Nobel Prize winner, Richard Gelinas. It’s a very diverse class politically. That book mentioned only one guy affected by Vietnam, but I’ve found over 30 classmates involved in the military, like myself.” ”Gelinas was a member of a research team awarded the Nobel Prize for Medicine in 1993, recognizing their discovery of split genes. He currently works at the University of Washington’s Department of Pathology. ””This is my first Pali reunion.” he said. “The committee used modern technology to locate us, and old-fashioned emotional persuasion to get us here.” ”Gelinas was not interviewed for the book. “I was too busy studying to be noticed.” But Medved and Wallechinsky did donate a chapter to one bookworm. He was “The Idealist.” Who Didn’t Show? ”Conversation about classmates who weren’t at the 40-year reunion erupted as the DJ lured couples onto the dance floor to the beat of Otis Redding. ””Did you hear about Kelso?”‘ a classmate asked Wallechinsky. ””Tom found out from Google,” Wallechinsky replied. He said Kelso was the reunion no-show who surprised him most. ”Jamie Kelso’s chapter, “The Idealist,” began with Kelso’s declaration: ””I think probably a lot of people remember my lecture on Sartre in Advanced Placement English. Inside my own head, I was in a crisis. Existentialism is, of course, a fraud. Jean-Paul Sartre is an imbecile. I’m quite aware of that now. When I got up in front of the class I was so torn up inside that I couldn’t see.” ”During an Internet search, Betts came across several articles naming Kelso as a member of the National Alliance under former Klu Klux Klan leader David Duke. ”When Kelso was interviewed for the book, he was a member of The Church of Scientology and living south of Kansas City. ””He was always a joiner,” said Betts. “We were friends. But I’ve lost touch with him now. In fact, he’s the reason I called Michael [Medved]. Michael said he was up-in-the-air about coming tonight.” ”Medved did not attend. He lives with his wife and three children in Seattle, where he hosts a conservative talk radio show. “I had the invitation on my desk and couldn’t decide. Eventually the date came and went, so I guess that was the answer,” said Medved, who also skipped the 20- and 30-year reunions. “Saturday at 6 p.m. is the heart of the Sabbath. It just didn’t seem like the right thing to do, and I didn’t want to spend the weekend away from home and my kids.” ”Medved published the book “Right Turns” this year, which he considers a kind follow-up to “What Really Happened to the Class of ’65?” “One of the things that’s very striking is the political prominence of this particular graduating year’Bill and Hillary Clinton, George W. Bush were the high school classes of ’64 and ’65.” Medved attended college at Yale with these same leaders. ”Did Medved find the answer to Time magazine’s expectations of his classmates? “It wasn’t that expectations changed. But [teens] went from general expectations of success to having no idea of the right thing to do. In the ’60s there was a strong prejudice against careerism. We were self-indulgent and self-destructive.” Couples’Did Any Last? ”The book dedicates one chapter each to Anita Champion, who declared her goal was to be “a good wife and mother,” and Ron Conti, entitled “Big Bad Ron.” ”The pair married a few years after college. Ron worked for Douglas Aircraft after high school, then began to attend Santa Monica City College and began “bumming around” with an older, rowdy group. He is further quoted in the book as saying: ””All I remember about Anita [in high school] is her hair piled up on her head and sticking straight up in the air, with about three cans of hairspray to keep it up there.” ”Anita’s memories were recorded in the book as follows: ””I was going out with a guy fairly seriously for awhile, but he got drafted into Vietnam’then I got together with Ron. He was very gentle and he always smelled good.” ”Chris Wolfenden Woods, a classmate and reunion committee member, said the Contis would not be attending. They are no longer together. After coming across so many classmates on their second marriage, were there any sweethearts from the class of ’65 who made it to the 40-year reunion together? ””The Doerners are still married,” said Woods, referring to actor Karl Malden’s daughter Mila and Tom Doerner. “But they didn’t get together until college.” ”Stolper has a Palisades love story that culminated in late July. He married Janice Hayes, a Palisades Elementary classmate who moved to Palo Alto. They hadn’t seen each other in 46 years, but preparations for this reunion brought them in touch again. In his 1975 book interview, Stolper was working as a speech therapist back at Palisades High’where the surfer had nearly been expelled for not cutting his hair. Now his hair is short and combed smoothly to frame his head.” ”Woods, who wasn’t interviewed for the book, called many of the stories in it rebellious. “I didn’t go through my rebellion until about 40, after my divorce. I was 22 when I got married,” she said. “Someone told me I was a ‘goody-two-shoes’ in high school. I think I’ve changed a lot. My parents were wondering when I would settle down and marry again. But I was getting to travel often with my new job. You look at this group tonight, all the different things we’ve done, and you realize it’s never too late to create your dreams.” Retiring the Image ”Possibly the most sensational chapter in Medved and Wallechinsky’s book was “The Bad Girl” about Lisa Menzies: ””In school I was always getting into trouble. I’d smoke in the bathroom. I’d ditch class’I actually counted how many men I went to bed with, and then I stopped counting.” ”The chapter catches up on her 10-year story of experimentation with drugs, travels with different men, the birth of two children, and the loss of her baby’s father to lung cancer. ”Classmate Lany Tyler moved into a house in Venice near Menzies and offered this comment for the book: “We didn’t see each other often, but I remember being struck by the amount of pain she seems to have lived through in the years since high school.” ””I was happy to see [the book] out there,” Lisa Menzies Corletts said at the reunion, with a direct and assured tone. “I think it says a lot about the human outlook on personal development, if only to be able to expose others to our stories.” ”Medved said, “The subjects in the book were the most surprised it became a best-seller. But a few, like Lisa Menzies, really reveled in the attention. She went on a few talk shows.” ”Corletts now has three children and three grandchildren, and recently retired from a career in special education. What does exposing Corletts’ story do for future high school students? ””Some people don’t progress; some are just frozen in time,” Medved said. “But to look at our generation, we hope that from the leaps and bounds we made, in transgressing our differences, future generations will be able to build from how far we’ve come.” ”Medved describes 1965 as “when the bottom fell out. After we graduated, dress codes disappeared. Drugs, other than beer, were totally unknown to us at Palisades. We were the last class of the optimistic and functional period.” ”Holmes said the conditions the class of ’65 graduated in were not as tough as those currently. “Back then it wasn’t as frenetic. Now there’s more of a breakdown’of family, of young people unsure what it means to be American. I am appreciative of the opportunity we got to live in a place like the Palisades.” One Successful Night ””This is my first reunion,” Kevin Goff said over his salmon dinner, admitting he hadn’t kept up with classmates. He sat talking with Holmes. “I feel like now we’re all moving up a notch in life. Now it’s time to tie loose ends.” ”Holmes agreed. “My mother just passed away, and my father died some time ago. I no longer have those roots in L.A. That’s why it’s nice to come back to something like this.” ”Betts hopes that this reunion in particular will reconnect classmates. The Web site (www.palihiclassof65.com) is an instant conduit to catch up on what peers are doing. ”The turnout was about 275, even after a last minute change-of-venue from the Sofitel Hotel to the Fairmont. “It’s nice here, closer to the beach, and our roots,” said Woods, who sent one of her three children to Palisades High.”The school changed a lot. If you look around the room, almost all of these people are Caucasian. The district began to bus kids in from all over L.A. So then unfortunately, many families left the school system because of that.” ”Medved did not send any of his children to public school when he still lived in Los Angeles. “I was very involved in religion when I lived (near Venice).” His oldest daughter recently graduated from a private Jewish high school. “Shana is a stronger and sensible girl, much more committed than I was at that age. She’s very religious-minded,” he said. ”Although Medved considers the current high school graduating classes “more competitive,” he pointed out, “our standards are still the ones to beat. Look at our music’The Rolling Stones are still selling out stadiums. And politicians, we’ll sway many elections to come. Our generation still has the power.” (Susan Monahan is a freelance writer who lives in Brentwood. She has written for the Beverly Hills Weekly and several Kansas City business publications, as she’s a transplant from the Midwest. This summer she has been learning to surf.)

Going on a date in Los Angeles can mean having to make a lot of choices. Thanks to the range of excellent restaurants, you might spend hours trying to decide what kind of ethnic food you’re in the mood for only to conclude that you’d love to just hit the trattoria down the street if only the dining atmosphere were a little more…hip and off-beat. Before you furiously scour the Zagat guide, consider this: an Italian chef at your service, ready to guide you and your date in preparing a savory Tuscan feast. Work for food? You might ask. But don’t be mistaken. Date Night at Chefmakers Cooking Academy in Pacific Palisades is an example of what founder and CEO Richard Klein calls “edutainment”‘part interactive cooking instruction, part entertainment and social interaction. And together, those ingredients make a distinct and enjoyable evening. At this particular Date Night (there are a variety to choose from depending on the type of cuisine you prefer), Chef Valerio Castellano greets guests as they enter the kitchen following a pre-dinner champagne at 6:30 p.m. He wears a pink hankerchief around his neck and sarcastically jokes about everything but cooking. Originally from Rome, Castellano says his family had a beach house on the Tuscan coast, so “I had to spend 30 summers there.” He’s one of Chefmakers’ popular instructors and also a private chef. The menu for this Friday evening event, appropriately called “My Love for Tuscany,” includes two kinds of bruschetta; an original bread salad recipe from Siena; spaghetti with a zucchini sauce; chicken cacciatore, and a Florentine version of panna cotta for dessert. Red and white wine are served throughout the evening, though many of the couples bring their own bottles to enjoy. Most of the people who have turned out for this particular Date Night are married, including newlyweds. One couple recently returned from Tuscany, where they learned to make bruschetta, so they thought they’d pursue their interest in Italian cooking. Another couple was there as part of a birthday gift, and for the sake of doing something “grown up.” And a group of friends decided that this was a great alternative to their usual night out on the town. Castellano tells the group of 24 (the maximum number of people for these events) that his goal is to have them complete the menu, or follow through with the recipes to the end. How much or little each person participates is up to the individual. “We have to make our own salads?” one woman asks as she sets down her glass of wine and joins the group gathered around the kitchen island. Others roll up their sleeves and survey the countertop, which is divided into two work stations, each with bowls of pre-prepared and measured ingredients. Hands-on participation is encouraged, but it’s not mandatory. You might have to pass a ramekin of dark chocolate shavings to someone across the table, but you won’t have to squeeze the vinegar-water out of the bread with your own two hands unless you want to. After all, some like to be in the driver’s seat and others prefer to observe and enjoy the ride, asking a few questions here and there. What kind of bread should we use for the bruschetta? How long should we marinate the cherry tomatoes? Why does the milk need to boil before we add it to the egg-yolk mixture? Castellano is as comfortable answering everybody’s questions as the participants are snacking on the fresh ingredients. While some find comfort in reading out loud the recipes conveniently printed on large notecards, others prefer to take orders’pouring, stirring and mixing under Castellano’s watchful eye. Taking additional notes on the cards might be helpful for those who plan to try out these recipes in their own kitchens. Castellano encourages them to follow the recipes, but adds that the recipes are only a guideline; preparing the ingredients correctly and following the order of putting them in is key. Tips like this, or Castellano’s advice to use chunks of garlic instead of chopped garlic to flavor olive oil, are helpful, especially to the non-cooks. When the participants realize that the spaghetti forte dei Marmi and the pollo alla cacciatora di Montalcino require time to saut’ and cook, some voluntarily see these dishes through while others return to their elegantly dressed tables to chat with friends’new and old. Two participants (one man, one woman) who have assumed control of the cooking appear completely relaxed and even a bit daring as they stir and taste the simmering sauces and continually check the pieces of chicken for doneness. Their spouses seem content watching from a distance. When the food is ready to be served, the rest of the group instantly forms a well-organized assembly line, not unlike kids at camp who know the mess-hall routine. Castellano and his sous chefs are at the end to implement the final gourmet touches, adding a basil leaf to the spaghetti or wiping sauce stains off the gleaming white plates for presentation. “Buon appetito,” says Castellano. The next Date Night is Caribbean Fever, September 16. Contact: 459-9444, www.chefmakers.com or stop in at Chefmakers, 872 Via de la Paz.