When Mark Asher started teaching at Los Altos Middle School in Camarillo seven years ago, it seemed a bit like fate.

He had finished his teaching credential program at San Diego State University in the middle of the school year. At the same time, school officials were trying to fill a midyear opening at Los Altos, from which Asher had graduated a decade earlier.

"I was at the right place at the right time," he said.

Now, the world history teacher plans to end this year at Los Altos the last one for his old neighborhood school. Citing declining enrollment, trustees of the Pleasant Valley School District have decided to close the campus at the end of the school year.

But not before all past and present Los Altos Trojans celebrate the school's 45th anniversary Wednesday with memorabilia, a band performance and classroom presentations. Old uniforms, newspaper articles, photos and yearbooks will be on display from 6:30 to 8 p.m. at the school, 700 Temple Ave.

"We've worked very hard this year to have it be a positive year for all of us," Principal Sue Eastman said. It could have been a year of hand-wringing or sour grapes, she said, but that didn't happen.

Instead, everyone approached the year saying, "Why not." New clubs were created, and teachers took students on more field trips than ever.

"We've had a good year," said Eastman, who plans to retire this summer. She expects most Los Altos teachers and staff to be working at other schools in the district come fall.

Los Altos, which had nearly 800 students in 2002-03, has about 350 seventh- and eighth-graders this year.

Administrators had considered closing Los Altos last year. After hearing from concerned parents, officials chose to keep it open and reconsider the issue later.

In May 2006, the board decided to reassign incoming sixth-graders to other middle schools after only 70 of them registered at Los Altos. Then, in March, trustees decided to close the campus after this school year.

Asher said he remembers a more crowded campus when he was a student there. The small school environment sometimes can limit the variety of courses and extracurricular activities offered, but it also can be a benefit. Everybody knows everybody, said some eighth-graders working on assignments in the library last week.

Isaac Alfaro, 14, said the principal knows all the students, including their names and parents' names.

"It's like we're all friends here," said Mabel Contreras, 15.

For information on the celebration, visit http://www1.pvsd.k12.ca.us/losaltos/School.