After 35 years of educating students, the sun has started to set on El Camino Real School in Irvine, CA. Come June 21, one of the city’s oldest and most respected institutions will close its royal blue doors for good and relocate under a new name a few miles up the street to the community of Woodbury.
I was one of El Camino’s earliest students, starting kindergarten there in 1976 and staying right through sixth grade graduation in 1983. Of all the schools I’ve attended over my scholastic career – preschool through college – my seven years at El Camino are the ones I cherish the most.
Maybe it was just childhood or the year-round schedule (three-week vacations every nine weeks) but El Camino never really felt like school. Sure we had spelling tests and math quizzes practically everyday but the environment was such that we really didn’t seem to care. The teachers and staff at El Camino were like good friends – never judging or impatient – whom you couldn’t wait to hang with everyday.
One such teacher was Walt Turner. You couldn’t have asked for a better guide through 4th grade than Mr. Turner. It was like going to school with your dad or favorite uncle. He was funny (we each got a nickname), attentive and caring. You never felt intimidated when asking him a question or approaching his desk. He was so committed to his students that when my mom couldn’t afford the extra expense of leasing a violin for after-school lessons, he financed one out of his own pocket. I think I only played a few weeks before doing humanity a favor and hanging up my bow but his gesture has always stayed with me. We even made an in-class movie (Robot Restaurant) and screened it for our parents. I remember on vacation wishing I could go back to 4th grade.
And then there was the principal. Gene Bedley ruled El Camino with funny money and a stuffed bear. With a million-dollar smile and looks to rival Burt Reynolds, Mr. Bedley roamed the halls handing out his eponymous Bedley Bucks to students spied excelling in the classroom. Earn enough BBs and you could redeem them for parking lot rides in the back of his stake-bed pick-up truck or more importantly for hugs from the school’s stuffed mascot – HUGGY BEAR – who had his own chair in Mr. Bedley’s office. Even when sent to the office for disciplinary measures, you knew nothing bad could ever happen in the presence of HUGGY.
Upon hearing of the closure a few months ago, my wife and I took a weekend stroll around the school grounds. Memories came pouring back. There were the once-towering handball courts and tetherball poles my friends and I religiously challenged each other to every day after school; there was the lunch bench where I got into an epic chocolate pudding fight with a buddy of mine and had to spend the afternoon in the back of class “thinking about” my behavior; there was the boys’ bathroom where two brothers charged admission to admire their new Mohawk-style haircuts; there was the entrance to the multi-purpose room where I had my first arms-length slow dance with a girl (there’s nothing like your first arms-length slow dance, let me tell you); suffice to say, it was like I had never left. While it’s sad to know that one day there will no longer be a school to stroll, it’s comforting that its memories will never fade.
El Camino Real will hold a closing ceremony on school grounds June 8 at 2:30 pm. Staff from past and present will be on hand to commemorate the event. To those staff members and teachers who have shaped the lives of students like me for the past 35 years, know your commitment, patience and generosity will never be forgotten. Thank you, El Camino, and continued success at your new location in Woodbury.
.
