by Mark McDermott
The list is unlike any you will see elsewhere. It includes surfers, Olympian volleyball players, CEOs, writers, actors, a punk rocker, an asteroid hunter, a U.S. Army brigadier general, an Ivy League linebacker, and an array of influential educators.
The Mira Costa High School Hall of Fame is only a little more than a decade old and already as illustrious as any honorary body of its kind. This year, its organizers are hoping to streamline the nomination process to eventually welcome more alumni into the Hall. The deadline for nominations is March 10. The criteria for nominees is that they graduated from MCHS and went on to accomplish something noteworthy in the world.
“It’s really easy to get a nomination form,” said Bill Fauver, who taught at Mira Costa for 36 years and is part of the committee that has standardized and streamlined the criteria and process for nominations. “It’s on the Mira Costa website. There’s a tab for it, click on it, and you can submit it directly online. The instructions are all on the form.”
The Mira Costa Distinguished Alumni Hall of Fame was founded in 2012 and inductions have occurred each year since, except for the years impacted by the pandemic. The vision for the project originated with former MCHS teacher Bill Cooper who, after he retired from 40 years at Costa, moved to Bend, Oregon where he saw that the local high school had such an honor. Working with former MBUSD teacher and administrator Bev Rohrer and a committee of teachers and community members, Cooper’s vision came to fruition.
“Because the real 10 year anniversary could not be celebrated because of the pandemic, we are treating 2024 as the 10th anniversary of this award,” said Fauver. “The honorees have come from every walk of life, science, tech, publishing, athletics, the arts education, military and human service. Their stories inspire our students and serve to unite the community.”
Forty-five alumni have thus far been inducted into the Hall. Fauver said there are a few goals this year. The first is simply to encourage an increase in nominations, in part through the simplified process.
“The second thing is we’d like to see a more balanced submission of nominations,” Fauver said. “We have about two-to-one men to women, in terms of awardees. That’s a reflection we have received probably significantly more nominees who are male and we know there are women of distinction. Third, we’d like to get nominees from all decades of Mira Costa’s existence. We’ve got the early 50s, and to some degree the 60s and 80s, in larger numbers, but we have relatively few awardees from the 70s and 90s and 2000s.”
“We’re not going to do a quota system, in terms of gender or in terms of decades, but we just want to get a good representation of all the great people that have gone to Costa,” Fauver said.
The Hall of Fame induction ceremony takes place early each fall, starting with a morning reception in the library, followed by a school-wide induction ceremony in the auditorium, a luncheon for the inductees and their guests and the visitation of classrooms. It wraps up with recognition under the lights on the 50-yard line during half-time of a home football game in Waller Stadium.
According to “The History of Mira Costa High School,” compiled by Denise Anderson, Jennifer Wildenburg, and Kayla Keyzer, the Hall of Fame assemblies have become one of the most popular gatherings of the school year.
“The fact that the inductees walked these hallways, learned in the same classrooms (the 22 original classrooms of September 1950 are still in use as of this writing), and in some cases even have children (or grandchildren) at Mira Costa, makes for a very strong sense of connection between inductees and current Mustangs,” the school historians wrote.
There are four ways to obtain a nomination form. One is to a tab on the upper left hand side of the Mira Costa website (miracostahigh.org); another is to email longtime MCHS teacher and HOF organizer Chuck Currier at ccurrier@mbusd.org; or you can pick up a hard copy at the front desk/office at Mira Costa, at 1401 Artesia Blvd.
