October, 2007

Principal’s Message

by Dr. Craig D. Rocha

I can report to all community stakeholders and parents the fact that Steele Canyon High School, a California Charter High School, opened its first school year as an independent charter school on August 16, 2007.  Besides welcoming all of our students to school that day, we also celebrated a long-awaited ribbon-cutting ceremony with staff, students, parents, Governing Board members, our mascot Scratch, and with Dianne Jacob as a special guest during a commemorative event which preceded the PTO meeting in the gymnasium. Our traditional Term 1 Curriculum Night followed immediately thereafter.  Whew!  What a busy but productive day/afternoon/evening it truly was!

Our school launched its new charter year with somewhat below the anticipated 2,150 students as called for in our approved charter document––but still with one of the largest student populations in our school’s pre-charter history.  A special thanks goes to all community members and young people who remained patiently on our various wait lists and accepted our call to join this new educational family once we had determined which students were leaving us and going elsewhere.  While we needed to wait until we knew exact enrollment counts, we are confident that we still were able to enroll a majority of young people who desired acceptance to our new charter school!  Again, thanks to our community for your patience and belief in us.

As I have written before, we are opening this school year with a solvent first-year budget, with several new staff members on board, and with our hopes high and our dreams already unfolding.  I want to work in conjunction with our school community to continue making Steele Canyon one of the premier schools in the state, rivaling the highest performing schools––not just those close-by in East County––but in all regions of California, and beyond.

For now, we invite all school stakeholders to meet with me or with any of our new grade level team support staff so that we can maximize the involvement of community and family members to support our students.  And of course, I ask that you feel free to work directly with our instructional and support staff as we coalesce this year to perfect the education of your student.

A note about our new website:  We are told by the outside agency with which we have contracted that our sleek, new Steele Canyon website will be up and running by the end of September.  For now, we are currently operating our charter website (www.steelecanyoncharter.net) graciously maintained by Tom Parr, our PTO president.  We are also currently operating our soon-to-be-sunsetting Grossmont website at http://schs.guhsd.net/, making sure that important information is posted for all school community members.  However, toward the end of September, 2008, look for our new domain address which will display a completely refurbished and user-friendly site for all Steele Canyon communications, posted and updated on a regular basis, at www.schscougars.org.  (Our new web site will be well worth the wait!)

In closing, I am confident to state that my former professor in graduate school, the late Dr. Max Lerner, would approve of what we have assembled this year as a powerful team of teachers, support staff, and involved community members who are helping develop a new synergy at Steele Canyon High School for this new charter experience.  I submit to all community stakeholders the following famous quotation from Lerner, which has become a kind of motto for us as we have worked to select new staff members and to open new doors for our community’s investment of time and talent.  I hope you, as I, will always remember Lerner’s words:

"A good teacher––whether at home, at school, or on the job––heightens the energy field around him {or her} and makes the life force in everyone flow more strongly."

––Max Lerner, 1976