Arcadia High School's awesome government class travels to "We the People" finals. Megan Leahy is the teacher of the Advanced Placement (AP) U.S. Government class going to the national competition in Washington DC.
Arcadia Unified School District hires four new principals. They are Tom Bruce (First Avenue Middle School), Teresa Oakdale (Holly Avenue Elementary School), Ben Acker (Foothills Middle School), and Lauren Leahy (Hugo Reid Elementary School). The new hires come soon after David Vannasdall became the district superintendent in May.
Arcadia High School Constitution Team wins state finals. The team will head to Washington DC for the National Finals in April. The team is comprised of 30 students, teacher and leader Megan Leahy, and several volunteer coaches, including Kevin Fox, Miriam Lopez, Mark Hong, Carl Nielsen, Bob Garrett, and City Councilman Gary Kovacic.
Arcadia Unified 'lip-dubs spirit of its middle schools. Some 2,200 Arcadia Unified School District middle school students and adults are featured in a four minute YouTube video featuring Jason Derulo's "Undefeated," to show their school spirit and pride. A lip-dub video is music played over a lip-sync video, filmed in one continuous shot.
The new J Building and Music Building are ready at Arcadia High School, made possible by passage of the $28 million bond issue in April, 1993. The new facilities include the Library Technology Center, the new nurse's office, Associated Student Body Office and the Trading Post student store.
Arcadia firefighters helped raise funds for a muscular dystrophy fundraiser called "Fill the Boot" and were presented with a participation plaque by Megan Berry, Director for MDA, the Muscular Dystrophy Association.
Dootson School of Trucking, an Arcadia trade school, is on a federal list of school that face loss of eligibility for some student loan programs because of a high rate of borrowers in default.
First Avenue Junior High was one of 3 area schools to receive the state Dept. of Education's Distinguished High School and Middle School Awards. Arcadia's Foothill Jr. High received the award in 1988. The other winners included San Marino High School and the L. A. County High School for the Arts at Cal State Los Angeles.
Ten Arcadia High School students have been selected as National Merit finalists, placing them among 14,000 competing for the 6100 available Merit Scholarships. The seniors are Kenneth Branson, Sidney Chung, Enrique Colayco, Bonnie Flinn, Norbert Hsu, Jacqueline Luk, Douglas McCreary, Regina Momblanco, David Park and Henry Tseng.
First Avenue Middle School welcomes new principal Semeen Issa. Dr. Issa had been assistant principal at the school for the past 6 years and this will be her 17th year at First Avenue Middle School.
Arcadia Unified School District's First Avenue Middle School music teacher Michael Danielson is one of only 16 teachers to be recognized as a 2019-2020 Teacher of the Year.
Arcadia Unified School District accepted into national network of innovative school districts, called the League of Innovative Schools, a national coalition of forward-thinking school districts organized by Digital Promise, a nonprofit organization with the mission to accelerate innovation in education and improve the opportunity to learn for all through technology and research.
The Arcadia Unified School District is participating in the Fulbright Teacher exchange Program for the first time. The program is responsible for First Avenue Middle School teacher Michelle Shaw exchanging places with Leena Heinila, a teacher from Helsinki, Finland.
The Arcadia Board of Education will study the environmental impact of new uses and the addition of lights at Dana and First Avenue Middle schools and the Arcadia High School softball field.
The Arcadia Unified School District may turn down nearly $800,000 in state funding to reduce class size because of the difficulty in finding enough teachers and classroom space.
Arcadia’s First Avenue Middle School student-actors are out of this world. The school’s Production class of 2019 has been preparing the entire fall semester for its upcoming play “Out of This World,” to be performed December 6 and 7 in the First Avenue auditorium. The theater teacher is Susi Reck. The theater program at First Avenue has four different levels.