Orange County Focus is dedicated on Monday to analysis of community news, a look atwhat’s ahead and the voices of local people. : IN PERSON : Reflections on Life, Learning in Classroom No. 200

The open-air corridors of Rosary High School are empty for the summer, but Claire McKellogg felt that she was not alone last week as she sat in classroom No. 200. The faces of students past seemed to beam at her from the neat rows of desks, and she could almost hear the old nuns who once stood at the blackboard whispering in her ear.

“There are a lot of friendly ghosts in this room, a lot of spirits,” the 70-year-old said while scanning her workplace at the all-girl Catholic school in Fullerton. “This room is haunted by some wonderful people. It’s inspiring, really.”

For the New York native and mother of 11, the classroom has been a treasured platform from which to reach into hundreds of lives. And at the end of this month, she will watch a new group of girls file through the door.

“Teaching is humbling, and you’ve got to love it to make it work,” McKellogg said. “Some students you reach better than others. I feel bad when I can’t help them all, especially the troubled ones. Teaching has given me a lot too. I think I’ve become a better listener.”

McKellogg came to teaching relatively late in life. In 1973, at age 49, when she sent the youngest of her children off to kindergarten, McKellogg became a volunteer at Rosary High, where two of her older daughters attended classes. She already had a teaching certificate, earned when she got her psychology degree years earlier, and the part-time commitment to the school soon grew into a career. She has taught a variety of subjects, most recently religion.

“When I was young, I said I would never teach,” she remembered. “That’s why I tell my students to be careful what they say they will never do. Life surprises you. The main thing is, you just keep growing.”

Rosary High itself has grown and changed since McKellogg’s arrival. The student body has doubled, topping 600 this year. A sleek athletic complex has replaced the crumbly asphalt basketball courts. More telling, the old home economics room has seen its sewing machines and range-top stoves replaced with personal computers.

“These things,” McKellogg said, nodding at the rows of dark monitors, “this is what has really changed things. Computers have changed our concepts of education.”

McKellogg chuckles when asked how she feels about the new arrivals. She is a book-lover and the cabinets in her room are stuffed to capacity with yellowing articles clipped from newspapers and magazines. The thought of staring at a flickering screen holds little appeal for her.

“Here’s where the card catalogue used to be,” she said pointing at an empty tabletop in the school library. “I went to use it one day and it was gone. Just gone. Replaced by a computer. I have to learn the new system, they told me. But the students help me out. They love to teach a teacher. I tell them, ‘We’re all ignorant, just about different things.’ ”

She concedes to a little skittishness around a computer.

“I’m inclined to feel a little threatened by it, because it’s not my thing,” she said, measuring her words. “But I’m also very open to the possibilities, the future of it all. It amazes me to watch little children, the command they have of these computers. It gives you access to a lot of information, but I wonder if they are gaining the maturity to know what to do with it.”

Coping with the whirlwind of changing technology is only part of the picture for today’s youth. A tour of the deserted campus, through the counseling center and past the five plaques bearing names of students who died before graduation, made McKellogg wonder when growing up became such a daunting prospect.

“It was all so much simpler when I was young,” McKellogg said. “It’s so much tougher being a youngster now. So often, both parents are working. That’s a hard way to raise children.”

Still, McKellogg marvels at the promise and potential of each new generation. Born just four years after women won the right to vote, McKellogg says the opportunities awaiting today’s girls take her breath away.

“Prejudices die hard, I suppose,” she said. “I must have some of the same old prejudices myself because I’m startled by what I see some women accomplish. I say to myself, ‘You believe women are the equal to men, so why are you so surprised?’ But I still am.”

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It’s also satisfying to look out at the class each year and see a growing diversity among the girls wearing the familiar Rosary uniform, McKellogg said. The school remains predominantly white and Catholic, but each semester brings students of different races, religions and nationalities into the mix.

McKellogg said she is thrilled that students created a group called United Colors of Rosary, and she said having students of Jewish, Buddhist, Muslim and other beliefs enrolled in her Catholicism class adds new dimensions to the discussion.

“It’s a wonderful resource, a way to help everyone build respect for our differences,” she said. “It’s one more thing to make learning exciting.”

But how does she keep teaching exciting? In addition to the days that feel like drudgery, McKellogg must contend with a difficult time at home--her husband of 49 years is battling the steady march of Parkinson’s disease. In recent months, the battle has not gone well.

“Sometimes I tell my kids I’m ready for life to be over,” she said, not for a moment sounding morbid. “I’m really ready. My husband and I have had a long life, and in some ways I’m looking forward to moving on. It drives the kids crazy when I say it, but that’s just how I feel.”

But the voices of the long-gone teachers and the shimmering smiles of the past students tell McKellogg that her time is not done. There are new students to teach, and old teachers who have more to learn. That’s why, when the girls arrive in classroom No. 200 this month, Claire McKellogg will neatly write the same phrase on the blackboard she wrote last year and the year before that.

“Have patience, God is not done with me yet.”

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Claire McKellogg in Profile

Born: New York City

Resides: Fullerton

Age: 70

Career: Teacher since 1973 at Fullerton’s Rosary High School, a Catholic all-girls school

Education: Bachelor’s degree, psychology, Seton Hill College (Greensburg, Pa.)

Family: Married 49 years to husband, Robert; 11 children, 24 grandchildren

Attitude: “Really, you can’t actually learn a whole lot in four years. But if you can find yourself, who you really are, then you sure have a jump on life.”

Source: Claire McKellogg

Researched by GEOFF BOUCHER / For The Times