MOVING ON CLASS OF 2000 GRADS FOCUS ON FUTURE.

Byline: Robert Monroe Staff Writer

WOODLAND HILLS - With advice borrowed from the ``Wizard of Oz,'' about 320 Pierce College students received their degrees Thursday, joining about 650 other San Fernando Valley students in a wave of community college graduations.

Assemblywoman and commencement speaker Sheila Kuehl, D-Encino, reminded the Pierce graduates that the associate of arts degrees they received only symbolized the ambition and talent they had all along, just like the characters in the children's story.

``You already have what you need within you to get every dream you have,'' Kuehl said. ``You can have it all, you can do it all, and it's in you.''

Around the Valley, Mission College in Sylmar saw 250 students out of 356 eligible to graduate take part in commencement ceremonies. Commencement speaker and award-winning elementary school Principal Yvonne Chan addressed graduates on the power of education. At Valley College in Van Nuys, 400 of the 926 students who earned degrees took part. The college followed its tradition of letting notable graduates, this year academic standouts Larry Wooldridge and Ianthe Roldan, take speaker honors.

Glendale Community College graduated its Class of 2000 on Saturday, when nearly 600 students participated in the annual graduation ceremony. Occidental College President Ted Mitchell gave the commencement address.

At Pierce, a total of 860 students became eligible to graduate this year.

From the audience in Pierce's Swisher Park, camcorder-wielding family members watched graduates holding cellular phones.

Nana Thomas said that at age 41, she didn't think she'd want to take part in the ceremonies but wanted her 8-year-old son to see it.

``My family forced me to graduate,'' said Thomas, a Calabasas resident receiving her associate's degree in psychology.

Some Pierce graduates purposely waited to finish their coursework so they could graduate at the beginning of a new millennium.

``That's what makes it exciting,'' said Bertha Flores, a Van Nuys resident receiving a degree in business. She said she had enough credits to transfer to California State University, Northridge, last year, but waited to get her associate of arts ``because I wanted to do something special.''

Pedro Cardona had the opposite circumstance. He had enough credits to graduate but will take a few more classes at Pierce so the intended electronics major can transfer to CSUN.

``I loved the experience here,'' he said. ``This is very special for the students because only they know how hard they worked.''

Christopher Segura, president of the Phi Theta Kappa honor society branch at Pierce and an intended transfer to UCLA, wished his classmates well.

``Today is a bittersweet end for our time here at Pierce,'' he said.

But Kuehl also admonished the students not to attach too much importance to graduation, likening it to the millennium change. In the end, it is an advance of time like any other. The goal, she said, is to look at life as a series of additions rather than starts and ends.

``The sense that we're going to lose something as we go along - that it's over and you'll be sad - there's something you feel you're leaving behind here, but you're not,'' she said.

CAPTION(S):

Photo: (1) Jennifer Hinrichs smiles Thursday as she and some 650 oth er San Fernando Valley students took place in community college graduation ceremonies.

Gene Blevins/Special to the Daily News

(2) Pierce College graduates make their way toward their diplomas Thursday during commencement ceremonies.

Eric Grigorian/Special to the Daily News