WHAT: Tokay Elementary School will celebrate its 40th anniversary with a schoolwide assembly featuring students performing songs and chants, and former Tokay principals and current student council members sharing stories and history about the school, which opened on Sept. 7, 1982. The event is free and open to the entire Fontana Unified community.

WHEN: Friday, Oct. 14
9:30 a.m.

WHERE: Tokay Elementary School
7846 Tokay Ave., Fontana

DETAILS: Tokay Elementary School opened its doors at the beginning of the 1982-83 school year, becoming the first year-round school in Fontana Unified. The school had nine classrooms, no cafeteria, and nine teachers to educate 250 students. There were picnic tables for the students to use at lunch and the playground was dirt.

As the community grew around it, Tokay installed new portable classrooms, a cafeteria, an administration building and a playground, and equipped the school with state-of-the-art technology and learning tools to serve its students.

In its 40th year of operation, Tokay Elementary is focused on empowering students to succeed by introducing Advancement Via Individual Determination (AVID) strategies into instruction, which teaches skills that prepare students for the rigor of secondary education, college and careers. The school has also partnered with Discovery Education to provide Tokay students with engaging science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) instruction, supported by a dedicated STEM room.