Godinez High has quickly become one of Santa Ana’s best schools
Ouch. The O.C. Register slammed the Santa Ana Unified School District in their “This year’s “Orange County’s Best Public Schools: High Schools” report,” which was published on Sunday.
In the report, Santa Ana Unified has the bottom four ranked schools, Century High, Valley High, Santa Ana High, and Saddleback High.
But the article didn’t tell the whole story. For one thing, the SAUSD’s newest high school, Godinez Fundamental, is quickly turning into a real gem, on a par, if not better, than Segerstrom High, which received a Bronze Award in the Register’s 2010 report. Bug Godinez isn’t ranked in the report, probably because they are too new.
Two other SAUSD schools also received awards. The Orange County High School for the Arts was one of five gold medal winners. OCSHA is a charter school. Few Santa Ana kids get into the school, but those that do generally excel.
And SAUSD’s Middle College High not only won a silver award, but earlier this month…
Click here to read the rest of this post.
ATM (Above the Mean) Education First! What a joke! Not that tired old Santa Ana Unified speech about the less than 1/2 percent of the students who can read and write or got affirmative action scholarships to Ivy League schools! That’s just marvelous but for nearly all the rest of the students in SAUSD it’s an academic death sentence. It’s also absurd to trumpet the success of the Orange County High School of the Arts which happens to have a Santa Ana campus. Most of the top students are from OUTSIDE Santa Ana. It would make as much sense to include Mater Dei in your braggadocio.
P.S. Why doesn’t Art Pedroza run for school board?
We Try Harder!
My wife will kill me if I run for anything again. I figure the best I can do is keep this blog going and do what I can to keep folks informed.
We do need new leaders to emerge…
I’d like to see Art run for School Board to represent parents are willing to roll the dice with their kids education and send them to Santa Ana schools. I’m love their blind faith and frugalness. I’d also like to see a few parents run for school board who live in the district but feel the schools are a failure and don’t want to put their kids in such rotten schools. I’d like to see some home school parents and parents of kids in private school run. They also represent a group of taxpaying parents who get nothing for their money since there are no vouchers currently available.
Art..Don’t give up the dream of winning an elected office. The extra $1,000/month and full medical might also help you with your current financial situation brought on by Dan and his lawyers.
We Try Harder: Rumor has it you need to pay your electric bill before they shut if off again.
Why have the comments from tmare and Rob been deleted? Art?
Rob,
I think they commented over at my New Santa Ana blog, not here at the OJ. So no, they were not deleted.
I guess it can get confusing going back and forth betwen the two blogs…
Mr. Pedroza said: “My daughter graduated from Santa Ana High School, where she also excelled at water polo. She just finished a two year fashion degree at FIDM, which is a world-renowned art school in Los Angeles. She finished with a GPA higher than 3.0. She is now looking for an internship in her industry.”
Mr. Pedroza,
Like most parents you are proud of your kids. I bet you even have one of those “My kid is an honor student” bumper sticker on your cars..Que lindo! I hate to be the one to burst your prideful bubble Mr. Pedroza but I feel that I owe it to your kids to tell my story.
I was just like your kids, a big fish in a little pond in Santa Ana’s school system. I was in the top of my class at Muir and MacArthur Fundamental schools. My parents were so proud and I had very high self esteem. Even though I played football and basketball and was tall for my age, I had problems walking to and from school. The local gang members gave me a hard time for not joining their gang so my parents made the tough decision to put their kids ahead of their own personal goals and we moved to Irvine. It was the best decision our family ever made. Sure, we had to live in a little one bedroom apartment but I was now in the best school system in Orange County instead of the worst. I thought that since I had done well at MacArthur I would have no problems in Irvine. Boy was I in for a shock! I had to take remedial courses in math and English. You see my teachers in S.A. compared us to Santa Ana kids so I thought I was a genius! In Irvine I was just another below average student. Luckily, since my parents were just paying for rent on the apartment they could afford to pay for tutors and I was able to catch up to my grade level by my senior year at University High school. I went on to study at a U.S. News and World Report top 10 college in the U.S. (I think my Spanish surname may have helped me out there but I don’t mind) but I was one of the lucky. If my parents had not moved I would have been heading for a trade school, just like your daughter. (No offense to her, I’m sure she will love her chosen career field but I wanted more with my life) I’m back living in Santa Ana now in Park Santiago, but when I have kids someday, I’ll be putting them into private schools or looking for a little studio apartment in Turtle Rock.
I wish only the best for you and your ninos.
We Try Harder!
I am myself the product of private schools. And my parents took me out of public schools for similar reasons, while I was growing up in Monterey Park.
I am glad things worked out for you!
My daughter is very stubborn – and she got my creativity. Sure, I would have loved for her to pursue a four year degree – and a graduate degree, but she found her muse. It is not my place to tell her not to pursue her dreams.
And I am not worried about my boys. I see their homework. Joey is doing all AP level course work and his teachers at Godinez are excellent. Jimmy and Jacob are similarly bright.
We are fortunate to have made use of the local fundamental schools.
Art,
I think this post of yours is very bias. Segerstrom is perfroming way way better on all levels! Our sports teams are winning Goldenwest League Championships, making it to CIF. Our CST scores have left Godinez in the dust, and to put the cherry on top of all this, our CAHSEE scores were about 20% Higher than Godinez. Don’t try to make Godinez what it isn’t. Just because your son goes there, and did not make it to Segerstrom.
Anon,
I would love to see a competition develop between Segerstrom and Godinez. Both are great schools. Segerstrom has the benefit of history, while Godinez is new and it shows. Godinez sports will get better. Right now the school is essentially an expansion team.
Rather than bicker about which school is better, we need to focus on improving the rest of our high schools, don’t you think?
I hope this is correct. It could help the performance of Santa Ana schools, as well as the city.
http://www.firstfocus.net/library/polling-and-opinion-research/public-support-for-the-dream-act
SAHS Teacher,
I agree! These kids need something to hope for. I hope that Congress will get behind the Dream Act. It would make a huge difference!
“I think this post of yours is very bias. Segerstrom is perfroming way way better on all levels! Our sports teams are winning Goldenwest League Championships, making it to CIF. Our CST scores have left Godinez in the dust, and to put the cherry on top of all this, our CAHSEE scores were about 20% Higher than Godinez. Don’t try to make Godinez what it isn’t. Just because your son goes there, and did not make it to Segerstrom”
These are the same things they said about Century for about 5 years until it turned into the dump of a high school it is today. .
Here is the first comment I posted on your New Santa Ana blog:
Art,
Great to hear that your kids are doing so well, you should be very proud of them. Unfortunately, your analysis of the problems with SAUSD demonstrate clearly that you simply don’t get it.
Your kids are obviously smart and also benefit from your active involvement in their academic lives. I’m certain that a good percentage of kids currently failing miserably are also smart kids – but the reason they are failing while your kids are thriving is cultural and parental apathy, neglect and ignorance.
That you don’t get this, and refuse to blame the parents, is truly sad. Your personal and political bias, and yes – racial opportunism – has so severly compromised your thought process that you refuse to acknowledge the elephant sitting on your head.
You stated: “I for one won’t criticize their families. They are poor and struggling to survive. We live in a city with only one main library and one small external branch. The libraries are closed on Sunday. Many kids in town don’t have access to the Internet. Many live in cramped surroundings with no desk to do their homework on. And many live in single parent homes.”
You MUST criticize their families. Poor kids all over the US, from every demographic – rural to inner city – have excelled academically when they have parents and support systems (extended families, volunteers, etc.) who hammer into them the importance of education. A single parent who makes education a priority and clears the kitchen table so their kids can study doesn’t need a library or computer at home. I didn’t have a computer and my Mom raised us alone. She worked and went to schiool herself – all the while staying involved, making us do homework, asking about our classes, staying in touch with teachers, etc.
You suggest that we need partnerships with ” local industry leaders.” No, we don’t. All the money in the world won’t help a bit when the kids have NO support at home, their parents cannot read, speak or write English, their culture does not respect – and often scorns – education, and they live in an insular world where the radio, TV, signage, businesses, churches, etc. are all Spanish-language.
If their parents and community do not value English-language proficiency and education, why should they?
It is time to demand accountability from the parents and SAUSD. I know that blaming the cultural hindrances is not an option for the new Latino/Hispanic Champion version of Art Pedroza, but that really is the key. Too bad, because every day you and everyone else who can make a difference in Santa Ana ignores reality the kids get further behind.
Also, thanks for pointing out the positives in SAUSD, it is great to hear about those schools. I bet if you looked at the student body and sat down and asked them about their home lives, you’d find that my comments above about parental involvement and English-language proficiency are 100% accurate.
Also, again, you’re obviously doing a fantastic job raising your kids – demand the same of every other parent, Art – stop blaming those who have no real stake in the success of all these failing kids. They deserve better.
Go Centurians,
Well it was because of mismanagement by the principal.
Rob,
Pedroza is offering a solution to the puzzle as you are. You are missing pedroza’s point of hope and opportunity. Alone your suggestion nor Pedroza’s will succeed. Instead of criticising Pedroza, you should embrace his ideas and suggest they get added to the solution pot along with yours…..” make parents responsible”.
Why do you focuss only on the parents and present your baseless opinion that: Hispanics) “their parents cannot read, speak or write English, their culture does not respect – and often scorns – education, and they live in an insular world where the radio, TV, signage, businesses, churches, etc. are all Spanish-language.”
“If their parents and community do not value English-language proficiency and education, why should they?”
It is not true generally. Why the negative stereotype?? This does not offer anything positive or factual.
We try harder (not smarter),
Have fun in the cubicle!