About one in six Gunn or Palo Alto high school graduates goes directly to Foothill or De Anza community college, according to the college chancellor.

Linda Thor, chancellor of the Foothill-De Anza Community College District, spoke at a reception Sunday at the Palo Alto home of Elaine Andersen, a member of a Foothill College "friends" group.

Sunday's reception drew several dozen PTA and other community leaders, including Palo Alto school board member Barbara Klausner, Palo Alto Mayor Sid Espinosa, City Council member Pat Burt and State Sen. Joe Simitian.

In the fall of 2009, about 18 percent of Paly and Gunn graduates entered Foothill or De Anza, and the rate over the past decade has ranged between 13 percent and 19 percent, Thor said.

According to Foothill statistics, about 80 percent of Palo Alto students meet their goals of completing preparation for transfer or successfully transferring to a four-year university.

Between 2004 and 2009, Palo Alto students attending Foothill or De Anza transferred to about 95 different four-year institutions, including every University of California campus, Carnegie Mellon, Columbia, Cornell, Mount Holyoke, Northeastern, Occidental, the University of Michigan, the University of Southern California and Yale, Thor said.

Foothill-De Anza students ranked No. 1 among 72 community colleges in California for UC transfers in 2010, Thor said.

The colleges' Transfer Admission Guarantee (TAG) program guarantees Foothill or De Anza students admission as juniors to certain UC or other campuses if they meet agreed-upon grade and course requirements.

Foothill and De Anza have TAG agreements with UC campuses at Davis, Irvine, Merced, Riverside, San Diego, Santa Barbara and Santa Cruz, as well as with some private universities, including Cornell, Thor said.

UCLA and Berkeley do not have TAG agreements with any college. However, Foothill has a "special transfer relationship" with UCLA called the Transfer Alliance Program. It does not guarantee admission, but in 2010 more than 80 percent of the Foothill honors students who used the program were admitted to UCLA, Thor said.

Andersen, the hostess of Sunday's event, is a member of the Foothill Commission, a group dedicated to promoting and raising funds for the school in the community. She received an associate's degree from Foothill in 1969 before earning her bachelor's, master's and doctorate degrees from Stanford University. She is a professor of linguistics and neuroscience at the University of Southern California.

The former Onizuka Air Force Station in Sunnyvale has been chosen as a new campus for Foothill College, Foothill-De Anza Community College District's Board of Trustees voted on Monday. The new site does not replace the school's main campus in Los Altos Hills.

Board members directed the district's administration to take the necessary steps leading to possible acquisition of the land as a public benefit, they said in a statement.

The board cited the opportunity to acquire the 9.6-acre property at no cost; its proximity to highways, public transportation and areas of population growth; and its visibility and location in a growing part of Sunnyvale.

"This is an exciting time," Board President Pearl Cheng said. "This direction comes after an exhaustive search and review of opportunities that would best meet the district's objectives in finding a permanent home for the education center."

The new education center will offer year-round programs and services, including partnerships with other colleges and universities, high schools, regional occupational programs, community-based organizations, local government, business and industry, district officials said.

Foothill has leased an 8-acre site at Cubberley Community Center in Palo Alto for many years and had hoped to purchase the property for the education center. But some residents were opposed, citing the need for future school district expansion as school-age population increases.

The Palo Alto City Council voted in July to draft a letter to the district expressing its interest in the campus, but decided against moving forward after the Palo Alto Unified School District, which owns the land, voted against supporting a sale.

Sunnyvale Mayor Melinda Hamilton and Vice Mayor Jim Griffith told the board they are enthusiastic about possibly having Foothill-De Anza open a center in their community. The City of Sunnyvale serves as the local redevelopment authority overseeing the disposal and reuse of the Air Force property.

"We are thrilled to hear you are interested in coming to Sunnyvale," Hamilton said.

Griffith described the education center as a good match for the base reuse, envisioning it as a place where students could intern at surrounding high-tech companies and area workers and displaced armed forces personnel could gain additional education.

The district must do an environmental impact report of the site before a final transaction could take place, board members said, and the Sunnyvale City Council, as local redevelopment authority, must amend the Onizuka redevelopment and reuse plan to specify that an educational use is preferred for the property.

Foothill-De Anza could then move forward with an application to the U.S. Department of Education for a public-benefit conveyance.

The only cost to the district in obtaining the 9.6 acres would be the expense of clearing and preparing the site for construction, estimated at approximately $5 million, according to a board statement. The education center would be funded through a bond measure approved by district voters in 2006.

The Onizuka property is located in the Moffett Business Park, a center for corporate headquarters and research and development. Park tenants include Juniper Networks, Yahoo and Network Appliance.

The entire Onizuka site is 23 acres, approximately 18.9 of which can be developed. The Air Force has accepted a request by the Veterans Administration to use 4.1 acres and three buildings for research activities.

Foothill-De Anza has been searching for several years for a permanent home for the education center.

In April, the district issued solicited proposals for properties of eight acres or more along the Highway 101 corridor within the district's boundaries. The district needs about 50,000 square feet of building space, with the opportunity for possible future expansion to 100,000 square feet.

This effort took place at the same time companies such as Facebook, Google, Apple and others were rapidly expanding and leasing large blocks of commercial and research and development properties in Silicon Valley.

The district received one offer: a joint venture from development firms Orchard Partners/Lane Partners for a "build to suit" education center on a 10-acre site at 895 Kifer Road, Sunnyvale.

The Onizuka site development would take several years. Even if the education center relocates from Palo Alto, Foothill College President Judy Miner said she hopes the college can retain leased space at Cubberley so Foothill can continue offering courses that are in greatest demand by residents of Palo Alto. Foothill's Middlefield Campus offers serves approximately 4,000 students.

Foothill College's prospects for building a major education center in south Palo Alto suffered a fatal blow Tuesday morning when the City Council decided not to sell a portion of Cubberley Community Center to the college.

For the second straight meeting, the council held a late-night discussion that dragged on past midnight and featured comments from community members urging the council not to sell the Cubberley land. But unlike on June 27, when the council asked staff to consider sending a "letter of interest" to Foothill, on Tuesday members decided that the city's best response to the college district is, "Thanks, but no thanks."

The council decided to send the Foothill-De Anza Community College District a letter stating that it is not interested in selling the Cubberley site, but indicating the city's willingness to work with Foothill on exploring other sites for Foothill's use. The council reached its decision not to sell the land after a wave of protests from city residents and former elected officials, most of whom argued that the Cubberley space would be needed for a future school.

Their arguments proved convincing. Instead of negotiating with Foothill, the city will now work with the Palo Alto Unified School District to come up with a new plan for Cubberley.

Larry Klein, who supported sending a letter of interest to Foothill two weeks ago, quoted Kenny Rogers in explaining why he now proposed sending a letter of non-interest.

"Like the old country song says, 'You got to know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em.'" Klein said. "To put our staff, ourselves and the community through a useless exercise just doesn't make any sense."

The council voted 8-0, with Gail Price absent, to direct staff to work with the school district on creating a plan for the busy and dilapidated community center at Middlefield Road. The city owns an 8-acre parcel of Cubberley; the school district owns the rest.

In recent weeks, school officials took a stronger stance on the Cubberley land, which they see as a potential site for a new school. On June 28, one day after the council voted 6-3 to direct staff to draft a "letter of intent," the school board passed a resolution stating that it believes the district "will need the 35-acre contiguous Cubberley site to provide high quality and comparable K-12 educational services to all students in all neighborhoods."

"We also believe that working together with the City of Palo Alto to define and address our joint Cubberley interests will produce effective and mutually beneficial decisions for the residents we serve," the district's motion stated.

The council's decision Tuesday morning still leaves room for the city to negotiate a land deal with Foothill some time in the future, though given the lack of available land it's unclear what such a deal might look like. Foothill, which already has a campus at Cubberley, is seeking to build a new state-of-the-art Education Center and intends to make a decision on the site of the new center later this summer. The college district is eying a site in Sunnyvale and has issued a request for offers to private parties.