Category: Education

San Bernardino City Unified School District’s Middle College High School (MCHS) has been named a California Distinguished School. “What an honor to be selected as a California Distinguished School for 2021,” MCHS Principal James Espinoza said. “We couldn’t have achieved this level of distinction nor been able to sustain and expand successes for our MCHS community scholars without leadership from the top and support for our learning model. We are also so appreciative of the commitment of our scholars, their families, and our selfless and talented teachers and staff, not to mention our amazing partners from San Bernardino Valley College.” MCHS previously earned a Distinguished School Award in 2007. The school is also a National Blue Ribbon School honoree, an AVID Schoolwide Site of Distinction, and a California Coalition of Early and Middle Colleges (CCEMC) Signature Practice School of Distinction. Since opening in 2001, Middle College has offered SBCUSD high school students a chance to take both high school and community college courses at the same time, with the potential to earn an associate’s degree by the time they graduate high school. Unlike most of…

August 2015 to March 2021 was the time duration of my journey at San Bernardino Valley College (SBVC). For most students, community college is a two-year gig, but for me, it went a little differently and I wouldn’t change it for anything. As an 18-year-old attending SBVC full time, I didn’t know what I wanted to do academically or professionally. Instead of attending class, I would work or just do something that was not school-related. I literally only passed one class out of five during my first semester. After taking a year off, I was placed on academic probation due to my grade point average. I eased my way back into college, taking one class in the evening of spring of 2017. At this point, I still didn’t have an idea of what I wanted to do in life, but I knew college was going to be the route I would take. I quit my full-time job and took a class over the summer, I was still easing my way in. In the fall of 2017, I made the baseball team and took three classes…

Rep. Pete Aguilar announced today that Empire KVCR, a public radio and television station operated by the San Bernardino Community College District, has received $377,529 in federal funding from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, a congressionally-chartered nonprofit agency. The funding was made available through the American Rescue Plan, President Biden and Congressional Democrats’ landmark COVID-19 relief package. “I helped pass the American Rescue Plan because every corner of our community has felt the effects of this crisis, and we need real relief. Inland Empire residents deserve to have access to local public news sources like the ones KVCR provides, and I’m proud to have supported this funding to help them maintain their operation and offset lost revenues as a result of the pandemic,” said Aguilar. “Like so many in our community, KVCR has had a very challenging year, and these funds will help us tremendously in getting through it. We are grateful to Congressman Aguilar and our federal policymakers for making these funds possible, so the San Bernardino Community College District’s KVCR station continues providing daily local news, information, and educational radio and TV programming…

Rialto resident Vanessa Mendoza, 26, wanted to study literature, write novels, and possibly even become an English professor, but that all changed after her first cultural anthropology class. At the end of her first year at San Bernardino Valley College, Mendoza began experiencing vertigo spells and migraines. They became chronic, and for almost a year, she was unable to attend classes on campus. During this time, Mendoza says she “began to question and think about the social circumstances that made it difficult for me to obtain a proper diagnosis and treatment.” Mendoza signed up for an online cultural anthropology course, and upon its conclusion, “felt that I had finally found a lens through which I could understand myself and my experiences related to culture and health.” When she was well enough to return to campus, she enrolled in more anthropology classes, and Professor Melissa King introduced her to other branches of study. “Through her classes and mentorship, I came across something called medical anthropology, which further confirmed that this was the major I wished to pursue,” Mendoza said. “This branch of anthropology deals with the…

San Bernardino Valley College (SBVC) students will now have more scholarship support available to help them achieve their career goals, thanks to the generosity of Charles “Chuck” Obershaw (1926-2019) and his wife, Shelby Obershaw, long-time SBVC benefactors and community leaders. The Chuck Obershaw Estate recently gifted more than $370,000 to an existing Obershaw endowment at the San Bernardino Valley College Foundation, expanding it to over $600,000. Proceeds from this endowment will provide 30 $1,000 scholarships annually for students pursuing careers in automotive, business, and entrepreneurship at SBVC. SBVC students can apply for these scholarships during the Foundation’s regular scholarship application period from October 1 to January 31 of every year. There are no citizenship requirements for students to apply for scholarship opportunities. A proud SBVC alumnus, Chuck was a lifelong learner and advocate for higher education throughout the Inland Empire. The Obershaw family has donated generously to numerous local educational institutions, including San Bernardino City Unified School District, Cal State San Bernardino, and SBVC. As the former owner and CEO of Chuck Obershaw Toyota in San Bernardino, Chuck was a successful businessman and investor. He…

The students and staff at Richardson PREP HI Middle School have earned the California Distinguished School Award for the ninth time in the school’s history. “Richardson’s long history of being a Distinguished School is proof that our success is due to more than just the efforts of one staff member or a handful of students,” said Richardson Principal Jenny (Paige) Vetere. “It’s the proof that our high standards for staff, students, and parents, including requirements for good attendance and behavior at all times and fostering a positive and caring school environment, have long-term academic impacts.” The California Distinguished School Award recognizes schools for exceptional student performance for two consecutive years or for closing the achievement gap between two school years. The data used to evaluate schools for the award comes from the California School Dashboard. Richardson’s 2019 Dashboard results show the average math score for all students was 64.4 points above the standard. Additionally, English Learner students, as a group, scored 62.2 points above the standard in English/language arts. Students at this San Bernardino City Unified School District magnet school surpassed the state’s metrics in…