DITCHING CLASS: Some Thousand Oaks students skipped...

DITCHING CLASS: Some Thousand Oaks students skipped class Monday to avoid this year’s California Learning Assessment System exam (B5). . . . But the ditch day was organized by parents opposed to the exam’s effort to test how well children think, not just what they know. Concerned Women for America, a conservative Christian group, said it objects “to measures which ultimately seek to control the minds of our children by probing their thoughts, beliefs and feelings through psychotherapy disguised as public education.”

KING JUROR: The dozen Ventura County men and women scorned for their verdicts in the first Rodney G. King beating trial remain cautiously out of the public eye. . . . But juror Kathy Anderson of Atascadero, who sat in on the second King beating trial, will speak at a county bar association luncheon Friday. Anderson will tell what it’s like to be sequestered for 52 days, allowed only a daily 10-minute phone call and a half-hour chaperoned visit on Sundays with her husband.

SALES BOOST: George P. Shultz, the former secretary of state, kicked off the first major conference sponsored by Ronald Reagan’s conservative think tank at his presidential library near Simi Valley (B8). . . . And the library’s gift shop did a brisk business with Shultz’s $30 book, “Turmoil and Triumph,” a dense and serious tome of 1,184 pages about his years in Washington. Meanwhile, Reagan-era fans swarmed the library hoping for a chance to get Shultz’s autograph.

ON THE MEND: The little town of Fillmore, thrust into the spotlight because of its earthquake damage, gets one more shot at fame today. . . . Gov. Pete Wilson’s wife, Gayle, and a clutch of officials will celebrate Fillmore’s rapid recovery. Overall, the attention has been a plus, City Clerk Noreen Withers said. “It has perked up some people’s ears that we are a viable little community.”