TWO HARBORS, Santa Catalina Island – One of California's last one-room public schoolhouses will soon close in this sleepy town, the latest victim of state education cuts.

While residents of the island about 25 miles off the Southern California coast understand the math, life will change dramatically for the town's population of 150. Starting this fall, children as young as 5 will be bused more than three hours round trip over mountainous dirt roads to reach the island's only other school, in Avalon.

"It's a really long day for the kids, and my granddaughter Coral Rose, who just turned 7 today, would need to leave at 6:30 in the morning and not get home till 5 o'clock," said Pam Deinlein, manager of the General Store and the first of three generations living in the remote town.

Known by its full name, the Little Red Schoolhouse is perched on a hill up a dirt road from the waterfront, where the store, a restaurant and a small visitor center and kayak and dive shop make up the town. Its seven students can see grazing bison, large ravens and other wildlife right outside the schoolhouse.

The island falls under Los Angeles County's jurisdiction but feels much farther than two dozen miles away from the mainland. Here, travel is often faster by boat for the residents, who work either for the Catalina Island Co., which runs the town and services, or for the University of Southern California's Wrigley Institute for Environmental Studies.

The schoolhouse is part of Long Beach Unified, the state's third largest school district at 87,000 students. State budget cutbacks have forced the district to slash $100 million in the past five years, and it faces an additional $80 million trim. Last Tuesday, the district – which won the Eli Broad Prize for most-improved urban district in the country – announced possible layoffs of 750 employees, more than half of them elementary school teachers.

Facing such drastic circumstances, the school board voted last month to end funding of the island schoolhouse when class ends in June, saving $120,000. Few questioned the vote.

Yet the blow to town life will be palpable. Last week, the seven students chatted happily about having so much free time and space. They do have soccer – and just enough kids on the whole island to field two teams, which play each other every week. But there's no shuttling to Little League and hours spent in cars.

As the students talked about living so close to nature, bison lumbered around yellow grass in the near distance toward Cat Harbor, the bay on the back side of the island.

"You probably know this: The bison are the stars of the island," explained Zac Nelson, 6, as he did jumping jacks.

His older brother, Daniel, 9, remembers life in suburban Maryland. Of course the kids here have TV and video games. But did he miss having more kids on the block?

"It's a little less complicated," he said, sounding beyond his years. "It's easier to have a friend. You know you will see them every day, so you need to get along and work things out."

Their father, Bill Nelson, an assistant professor of research at the Wrigley Institute, studies molecular evolution at the genome scale. He used to work at a Maryland company with John Heidelberg, who joined the institute three years ago to research microbial genetics. Heidelberg sold Nelson on moving to the remote inlet two years ago.

The institute's directors say it might become a challenge to recruit other faculty members to a place where their kids' education means an 11-hour school day. Nelson said he will likely remain, because son Daniel is only two years away from the lengthy commute to the island's only school for sixth through 12th grades.

The scientists asked that their children be spared questions about their school closing. But the kids offered the news themselves.

"For the past two weeks, they've been crying off and on at lunch and feeling sad about the school maybe closing," said Gracila Platas, who watches the students during teacher Trina Dye's lunch break.

Platas also provides after-school day care. Following dinner, she then returns to the school as janitor. Her husband is a cook in the Wrigley Institute's cafeteria. But a closed school would mean no afternoon work for her.

"I tell the kids, 'Don't worry yet,' and they're doing better," she said.

After 18 years in Two Harbors, Platas has seen the schoolhouse saved before.

So has school board member Jon Meyer. The schoolhouse's first principal when it opened in 1987, Meyer moved from Long Beach, the state's fifth largest city, to Avalon, a town of about 3,000, where people live so tightly together that next-door neighbors can hear each other's alarm clocks. The schoolhouse is overseen by Avalon Schools Principal Joseph Carlson.

Catalina Island's history includes serving as a Prohibition-era playground to Hollywood stars escaping stardom, particularly in remote Two Harbors.

The island's most lasting legacy stems from its purchase in 1919 by Chicago gum magnate William Wrigley. The island was a profitable resort with steamboat service, hotels and the signature art deco-design casino, which still graces Avalon. Wrigley even brought his Chicago Cubs to the island for spring training.

It has been a company town ever since. Most of the island is held in trust by the Catalina Island Conservancy, which fiercely protects native plants and species. Business on the island is primarily operated by the commercial arm, Catalina Island Co., and most Two Harbor residents work for the company or for USC.

Grueling school commutes are not new for Two Harbors residents. A generation ago, the children there rose at sunrise and boarded a motor boat for a 40-minute voyage. Landing at Empire Cove at the rock quarry, they then boarded an old bus for another 40 minutes, then climbed off in Avalon for a hike uphill to the only school.

In 1987, locals and boaters with island weekend homes teamed up to raise $100,000 to open the Little Red Schoolhouse, which – despite the nostalgic symbolism – is a donated mobile home. California has at least one other one-room public schoolhouse, Wooden Valley Elementary in Napa, also slated for closure at the end of the school year.

Four years ago, as budget cuts imperiled the island's school, the Little Red Schoolhouse Foundation formed to rally the $100,000 needed to keep the place open.

The foundation has begun talking about how it might do so again with fundraising. Absent that, come September, the Two Harbors students will board a bus for their three-hour round trip to Avalon, where 636 students attend grades K-12.

Two Harbors' Christopher Heidelberg, 10, and his twin sister, Jessica, tried to see the bright side of a bigger school with more choices.

But, Christopher said wistfully, "I'd miss this place."

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Nancy Wride is a Southern California journalist.

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