La Sierra High School

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La Sierra High School
Location
4145 La Sierra Avenue
Riverside
Flag of California California
Flag of the United States United States
Information
Principal Doctor Robert Cunard
Type Public
Motto "Soaring high with pride."
Mascot Eagle
Color(s)      Navy
     White
Established 1969
Homepage La Sierra High

La Sierra High School, located in Riverside, California, is a public high school in the Alvord Unified School District that was founded on August 28, 1969. The school underwent a change in principals when Dr. Don Austin took up the position of principal at Laguna Beach High School for the 2006-2007 school year. Dr. Austin was replaced by Dr. Robert Cunard.

The two main feeder schools for La Sierra High are Arizona Intermediate and Villegas Intermediate schools. La Sierra's rival is Norte Vista High School, the other public high school in Alvord Unified.

Contents

[edit] History

La Sierra High School is opened in 1969 with Dr. William Conlon as the first principal. It was a mainly white middle-class school with only about 1500 students. Arizona Middle School was the only feeder middle school.

After Dr. Conlon left for a position at the district office, Mr. Menzia (who came from Norte Vista)became the second principal, and was strict with the students so that they could succeed later in life. After retiring, Dr. Marc Jackson became principal. After only two years, he left and interim principals were put into place. Dr. Robert Cunard, from the Newport-Mesa Unified School District, became the current principal. He added new security cameras for student safety.

Some other changes include student demographics. Although the majority of La Sierra students are still middle-class, 27% use free/reduced price lunch. 55% of the students are Hispanic, making up the majority of English-Learners. To relieve Arizona's crowding, Villegas middle school was opened, thus Arizona was no longer the only feeder school.

New cement replaced the all-grass walkways. The main office was once the mini-theater that had walls that could be moved for more chairs. The main office was where the cafeteria is now. Finally, the student population of La Sierra is now about 3100, more than double of what it was when it first began.

[edit] Recent events

La Sierra has recently become one of the highest scoring campuses in the Inland Empire as ranked by the annual achievement tests given by the State of California. In 2005, La Sierra High was awarded a 6-year clear accreditation through the Western Association of Schools and Colleges, making La Sierra High the only comprehensive high school in the entire Inland Empire to earn this distinction.

As of the 2007-2008 school year, approximately 3200 students attend La Sierra High. Many of the 2007-2008 valedictorians have joined some of the nation's top universities, e.g. University of California Berkeley,the University of California Los Angeles, the University of Southern California, and Dartmouth College.[citation needed]

[edit] Academics and test scores

[edit] Academics

La Sierra offers 16 AP Courses in Art Portfolio, Biology, Calculus (AB and BC), Chemistry, Economics, Environmental Science, English Language, English Literature, European History, French Language, Government, Physics B, Spanish Language,Spanish Literature, Statistics, and U.S. History. La Sierra hopes to adopt a Computer Science course within the next few years.

[edit] Test scores

[edit] API

As of 2005, La Sierra High School has increased its API to 715 from the 2004 base score of 679. Although it met the schoolwide growth target, it did not meet the state subgroup growth targets. To encourage schools to improve achievement for all students, the state computes APIs and sets improvement targets for the different student subgroups at the school.

2005 API Base by Subgroup
Subgroup API Base
All Students 715
African-American 690
Asian 791
Hispanic 676
White/Caucasian 761
Socioeconomically
disadvantaged		 664
English Learners 648
Special Education 487

[edit] CST results

As of 2005, La Sierra's students met or exceeded the state expectations on the California Standardized Testing and Reporting (STAR) as listed below: [1]

Subject Freshmen Pass rate (%) Sophomore Pass rate (%) Junior Pass rate (%)
Algebra 1 4 2 3
Algebra 2 80 24 6
Biology / Life Sciences 20 14 12
Chemistry -- 22 12
Earth Sciences 5 20 19
English 39 32 30
Geometry 46 10 6
World History -- 29 --
U.S. History -- -- 39

[edit] CAHSEE results

All data below reflect the percentage of sophomore, junior, and senior students who passed the CAHSEE sections.

ELA [2]
Year Percent Passed
2002 65
2003 67
2004 71
2005 65
2006 61
Mathematics[2]
Year Percent Passed
2002 24
2003 40
2004 70
2005 67
2006 91

[edit] Activities and Clubs

Some of the notable clubs on campus include:

  • ASB (Associated Student Body)
  • Academic Decathlon
  • Advancement Via Individual Determination (AVID)
  • Black Student Union
  • California Scholarship Federation(CSF)
  • Cheer Club
  • Chess Club
  • College Club
  • Drama Club
  • Economics Club
  • Friday Night Live
  • Film Club
  • Future Business Leaders of America (FBLA)
  • Future Farmers of America
  • French Club
  • Health Organization Students of America
  • Inkblot (Literary Magazine)
  • Latinos Working Together
  • Marching Band (Which will be undergoing a change in band director in the near future.)
  • Music Industry Club
  • Muslim Student Association (will formed by the end of March, delays due to an absent advisor)
  • Pingpong Club
  • Renaissance Club
  • Spanish Club
  • Mock Trial
  • Screamin' Eagles Marching Band
  • Sunrise (Yearbook)
  • The Eagle's Quill (Student newspaper)
  • The Voices of the Eagles (Choir)
  • The Call (Christian Club)
  • Wind Ensemble
  • Winter Drumline

[edit] Drama

Past productions include:

  • The Musical Comedy Murders of 1940
  • Grease
  • A Christmas Carol
  • Once Upon a Mattress
  • The Nerd
  • A Midsummer Night Dream
  • The Man Who Came to Dinner
  • Strange Bedfellows
  • Brighten Beach Memoirs
  • You Can't Take it With You
  • Gentlemen Prefer Blondes
  • Hello, Dolly!
  • Once in a Lifetime
  • The Crucible
  • Bye-Bye Birdie
  • A Flea in Her Ear
  • The Little Shop of Horrors
  • Fiddler on the Roof
  • Romeo and Juliet

[edit] Athletics

La Sierra High School is a member of the California Interscholastic Federation (CIF) Ivy League, competing with Riverside Polytechnic High School, Riverside John W. North High School, Riverside Martin Luther King High School, Riverside Arlington High School, and Riverside Ramona High School. La Sierra High School is committed to the idea of producing 'student-athletes' manifested by their varsity head coaching staff. La Sierra competes in 20 varsity sports, while maintaining a full junior varsity and freshmen schedule. The 2005-2006 season included several league championships for LSHS. The track team extended the varsity win streak to 37 in a row, while the football team won the first league championship in many years.

However, the 2006-2007 football season ended with a 1-9 record, after which their head coach, Mike "Old Man River" Churchill departed in February 2007, following former Principle Don Austin to Laguna Beach High School to take the Athletic Director (AD) position there. Head football coach Churchill had only been in the position one year, this is the third coaching change for La Sierra football in as many years.

On April 19, 2007, La Sierra announced they had hired former Desert Hot Springs High School head football coach, Craig Cieslik, to replace Churchill after a two month search.

Fall Sports:

Winter Sports:

Spring Sports:

In addition to the varsity sports at LSHS, the Eagles also had several roller hockey teams from the late 1990's-2005 which never gained club status. The players paid for everything themselves including rink time and insurance. The teams competed at the varsity level (gold), junior varsity level (silver) and beginner level (bronze).

In December 2001 the bronze team (the only team that particular season for LSHS) went to the championship game and lost in sudden death overtime to Yucaipa High School. The next season the gold team returned and beat Temescal Canyon High School 4-2 in the championship game to win LSHS's only roller hockey championship. To get to that game the Eagles had to beat rival Poly High School in the semifinals. The Eagles were down one goal with less than a minute to go in regulation when they tied it up, sending the game to overtime. After a five minute OT period the game went to a shootout. LSHS won the shootout 2-1, scoring on their last opportunity, to advance to the championship. The season after the championship the bronze team (again the only team that particular season) won the regular season championship but was beat by Poly in the semifinals. Although Poly had been moved down illegally after the cutoff date from the Silver division they were still allowed to compete in the Bronze playoffs, which they predictably won.

In addition to the in-house schedule, every year in February the State Cup tournament was held the same rink where the Eagles played. The tournament consisted of the best teams from all over California. In 2001 the gold team reached the sweet 16 but lost to Poly. That same year in April the gold team won the USA Hockey Regional tournament which consisted of teams from California, Arizona and Nevada. The team went undefeated in the tournament. In 2002, a combo team consisting of players from LSHS and Arlington High School won the Phasmania Tournament combo division. Phasmania was a pre-State Cup tournament held in October.

LSHS also had an ice hockey team which lasted only a couple of years.

[edit] Teachers

Category Total # of Teachers [3]
La Sierra 120
District 899
County 18,164
State 307,864
Type of Credential Teachers (State) Teachers (LSHS)
Full 307,864 (94.2%) 114 (95.0%)
University Intern 7,668 (2.5%) 3 (2.5%)
District Intern 2,690 (0.9%) 2 (1.7%)
Pre-Intern 1,150 (0.4%) 0 (0.0%)
Emergency 9,922 (3.2%) 1 (0.8%)
Waiver 1,298 (0.4%) 0 (0.0%)

According to the California Department of Education, the teachers at La Sierra have 11.1 average teaching experience and have spent an average of 10 years teaching in the Alvord Unified School District (as of 2005-2006 school year). The average class size is ~ 30.

[edit] Students

Ethnicity LSHS (% of population) State (% of population)
Afro American, not Hispanic 8 8
American Indian or Alaska Native <1 <1
Asian 6 8
Phillipino 3 3
Hispanic or Latino 50 47
Multiple or No Response <1 2
Pacific Islander <1 <1
White, not Hispanic 32 31















Language La Sierra High State
Arabic <1% <1%
Filipino (Pilipino or Tagalog) 2% 1%
Hindi <1% <1%
Khmer (Cambodian) <1% <1%
Lao <1% <1%
Mandarin (Puntonghua) <1% <1%
Persian <1% <1%
Portuguese 1% <1%
Rumanian 1% <1%
Russian <1% <1%
Samoan <1% <1%
Spanish 89% 85%
Thai <1% <1%
Vietnamese 2% 2%
All other non-English
languages		 <1% <1%


























[edit] School colors

La Sierra High School's official school colors are blue and white. Red is the unofficial color recently added.

[edit] Alma Mater

Written by Leroy Jacobs

[edit] Notable alumni

[edit] References

  1. ^ California Standardized Testing and Reporting (STAR) Program [1]. Accessed on 02 November, 2006.
  2. ^ a b California High School Exit Examination Cahsee Results. Accessed on 02 November, 2006.
  3. ^ California Department of Education website. CDE website. Accessed on 02 November, 2006.

[edit] External links