Jane Kim, Hydra Mendoza and Kim-Shree Maufas won seats on the seven-member school board Tuesday night. Meanwhile, Dan Kelly, a board member since 1991 and the only incumbent to run this election, lost his bid for a fifth term.

The three seats had been contested by 15 candidates – one of the highest challenger counts since the 2000 elections when 13 candidates ran.

"I feel really good," said Kim, while celebrating with many of her supporters in the Mission District. "I'm really happy that all of the hard work paid off."

Kim, a 29-year-old youth education director at the Chinatown Community Development Center who lost her school board race in 2004, will be the youngest board member.

With 100 percent of the precincts reporting, both Kim and Mendoza held a commanding lead with roughly 13 percent of the vote. At 11.06 percent, Maufas had a slight edge over Bob Twomey who had 10.59 percent of the vote.

"I'm excited. This is really great," said Mendoza, between hugs and kisses from her supporters at Slim's, a club/bar in SOMA. "This is what the voters wanted to see."

"It's a great victory for the community," said Maufas during a phone interview that was cut short because she'd lost her voice. "Congratulations to all the candidates," she added.

Earning a stipend of $500 a month, the new members will face pressing district concerns including declining enrollment, increasingly segregated schools and the search for a new superintendent.

"We want to make sure that we change the negative image of our public schools," said Mendoza. Mendoza came into the elections as one of the strongest candidates. She is Mayor Gavin Newsom's education advisor and earned the support of the powerful, 6,000-strong teachers union, the United Educators of San Francisco. The union endorsed Mendoza, Maufas and Twomey.

"I'm looking forward to working with (Jane) Kim and Kim-Shree," she added. "I'm also looking forward to working with the board members who I've had a good relationship with in the past."

Recently, the school board has been marred by infighting. Early this year, former Superintendent Arlene Ackerman resigned because of the constant squabbles between her and many of the board members. Interim Superintendent Gwen Chan took over in February and is expected to stay on through June 2007.

Although Chan has done much to rebuild relations with the school board, the results of the upcoming elections promise change. The responsibility of the new board will be to hire a new superintendent and end the bickering.

Looking at the results, Kim, who was endorsed by current school board members Norman Yee, Eric Mar and Mark Sanchez, said she holds similar views to Maufas.

"Now we have a clear majority on the board," said Kim who supports neighborhood-based schools.

Although he was defeated, Twomey, holding his election night festivities at Medjool, a restaurant lounge in the Mission District, said he was glad to have run.

"I'm honored to finish somewhere in the top four," he said. "There were a lot of really good candidates."

"This was a great experience," he said.