Friday, April 22, 2008
Printed courtesy of Imperial Valley Press, El Centro, CA
The Imperial Valley has some good schools, with top-notch teachers and hardworking, caring students whose success and achievements are many.
Take El Centro’s Margaret Hedrick Elementary, one of three campuses in Imperial County this year to be named a California Distinguished School, and one of only dozens throughout the state.
But sometimes even in such a strong field, the cream rises to the top. That’s what we have in the Imperial Unified School District, which has repeatedly shown its excellence in the test scores of its students and the awards it’s garnered, which seem to come weekly and monthly.
To what was already a fine résumé of accomplishments, the district several days ago found out that not only had one of its schools been named a California Distinguished School for the third time in a row, a distinction no other Valley school can claim, but that now each of the district’s campuses has earned the designation, also a Valley first.
Imperial High, Frank Wright Middle School, Ben Hulse Elementary and Westside School all have been previously named Distinguished Schools. Now, T.L. Waggoner can join that prestigious list, earned through meeting state API standardized test scores and an extensive application process.
What’s more, Westside, a small country school in far western reaches of the district that at one point a few years ago was threatened with closure because of budget issues, can claim three Distinguished School awards.
Some would argue that the Imperial Unified School District does in fact have an advantage over other districts in the Valley in that its socioeconomic base is higher than that of other districts. It’s true that statistically more moneyed communities mean better schools and better teachers. But that misses the point.
When all is said and done, it’s the students taking the tests, and it’s their parents who are involving themselves in their lives. It’s a culture that has been created within the boundaries of the Imperial school district, and we don’t believe high median incomes have all that much to do with a good system.
So again, congratulations to Imperial Unified and its high achievers at Westside and T.L. Waggoner. The same goes to Hedrick in El Centro, a school that’s had a history of elevated test scores.