Fontana Unified School District will hire new bilingual aides, develop a strategy for early education literacy and college/career readiness along with a cultural proficiency task force that will support students as part of the updated Local Control and Accountability Plan (LCAP). A special meeting to discuss the LCAP will be held Monday, June 13. The LCAP and 2016-17 budget are expected to be adopted Wednesday, June 15.
The Association of California School Administrators’ (ACSA) Region 12 has honored four Fontana Unified administrators for individual excellence and the Fontana Leadership Intervention Program (FLIP) with its Partners in Educational Excellence Award. Sequoia Middle School Principal George Santiago, Associate Superintendent of Human Resources David Creswell, Director of Teaching and Learning Tonia Causey-Bush and Deputy Chief of Schools Shelley Holt were recognized for outstanding leadership and service to the community. FLIP, which started in 2009, coordinates with the Fontana Police Department to intervene with students exhibiting academic and behavioral issues.
Olga Pacot, a reading teacher at Fontana Unified’s Citrus Elementary School, has been named one of only six recipients of this year’s READ 180 Educator Awards for helping students improve their literacy. Pacot is known for inspiring improvement that far exceeds expectations. READ 180 is a reading intervention program that provides individualized instruction to meet each student’s reading needs and help them overcome any obstacles.
Fontana High School is among 24 schools in California – and 75 in the nation – to earn the Advancement Via Individual Determination (AVID) Schoolwide Site of Distinction award for 2015-16, a new honor given to select AVID schools for their extensive commitment to providing students with college preparation resources. Schoolwide Site of Distinction is the highest rating a school can achieve on the AVID certification rating scale. Only 380 out of 5,000 AVID schools in the U.S. were eligible to apply for the honor. The distinction puts Fontana High’s college and career readiness program in the top 2 percent of all AVID programs in the nation.
Fontana Unified School District’s stellar 2016 graduating class has collected $7 million in college scholarship offers. Among the graduates are three Gates Millennium Scholars, a Southern California Edison Scholar, five Dell Scholars, three QuestBridge and three TheDream.US recipients. Many of these are full-ride scholarships that will allow students to attend prestigious universities, including Stanford, UCLA and Northwestern University.
Follow-up Story: Close to 3,200 students from Fontana Unified School District’s five high schools, two continuation high schools and adult school capped their high school careers with commencement ceremonies held May 23-27 at the Citizens Business Bank Arena. Among the Class of 2016 graduates are two Kaiser High School students headed to Stanford University and several others bound for respected UCs, CSUs and universities across the nation.
Fontana Unified’s five comprehensive high schools will hold senior awards night ceremonies over the next week. Summit High School will hold its senior awards night at 6 p.m. Monday, May 16 in the high school gym, 15551 Summit Ave. Kaiser High School’s event is at 6 p.m. Tuesday, May 17 in its multipurpose room, 11155 Almond Ave. Fontana High School will hold awards night ceremonies at 5:30 p.m. Thursday, May 19 in the school auditorium, 9453 Citrus Ave. Jurupa Hills High School will hold its event at 6 pm. Thursday, May 19 in the gym, 10700 Oleander Ave. A.B. Miller High School will hold its program at 6 p.m. Friday, May 20 in the gym, 6821 Oleander Ave.