The start of this school year has been by far the busiest in my nine years as principal. It gives me great pleasure to welcome our students, parents, and community members to Maria Carrillo High School’s (MCHS) fourteenth year. The entire staff looks forward to a year where students experience challenging and rewarding academics, exciting extracurricular activities, and engaging social events.
This year, we were pleased, but challenged, by more than the anticipated number of students who choose to attend Maria Carrillo (currently 1580 in the student body). Because of this, we added fifteen additional class sections to our course offerings to alleviate overcrowding and to facilitate the rebalancing of classes as needed. I would like to take this opportunity to thank students and parents for their patience during this process. We certainly understand how unsettling this may be for students, parents and teachers, and we make every effort to minimize the number of changes we make. I appreciate your support during this process. Additionally, I would like to take this opportunity to thank all of the parent volunteers and staff members who insured that the student orientation days went smoothly. Although we always discover a couple of areas to refine for next year, without their hard work the opening of school each year would be a far different experience.
As I am writing this after Back-to-School Night, I would like to thank the 800 parents who came that evening. For those of you unable to attend, I was very happy to report the State’s release of the 2009 STAR data confirmed that Maria Carrillo had again improved its API (Academic Progress Index) by 15 points to 842 (on a statewide 1000 scale with 800 as the state goal). The results are again the highest in the county of all comprehensive high schools. Additionally, I am happy to report that the school’s two significant subgroups both raised their API scores (Latino – up 36 to 751 & Caucasian – up 9 to 852). These ongoing year-over-year gains validate the hard work being done by the students, staff, and parents of Maria Carrillo, and further the school’s goal of insuring that every student at Maria Carrillo receives an excellent educational experience.
Although we open this year with some larger class sizes due to budget reductions, we have been able to limit the impact on students. MCHS begins this year with not only the same programs in place as last year, but I am also pleased to announce that we have also established new support classes for struggling students in 9th & 10th grade English, established Algebra I classes for all 9th graders with 3 algebra support classes for students who need additional time to understand the material, and also revamped the 12th grade English course so that students can now choose between focused areas of literary study.
None of these changes will impact our established and well respected academic program. We will again offer a wider range of Advanced Placement and Honors courses at all grade levels than any other school in the county. One thing that does change, to a greater or lesser extent, on an annual basis is the teaching staff. This year we have 15 teachers/counselors new to Maria Carrillo. These teachers come to us from schools outside the district, outside the state, and for some it is their first teaching assignment. I am very impressed by the staff members we have found and expect them to be great additions to our staff.
This year I will continue my ongoing efforts to improve the communication between the school and families. You can help me in this effort by signing up for e-Notify if you not have already do so. You sign up on the school website www.mariacarrillohighschool.com. The sign up steps are included in this newsletter. It is my intention to have monthly messages for parents, so if you are not part of this system please join soon.
Finally, I look forward to another exciting year at Maria Carrillo. I urge all parents to stay actively involved in their students’ education and become involved in one of the parent organizations on campus. As always, we stand ready to assist however possible. Thank you for your continued support of Maria Carrillo.
Mark W. Klick
Principal