The school district serves students within a 220 square miles (570km2) area of Phoenix, and 27,761 students are enrolled within its 20 schools.[2] Its boundaries are largely coextensive with what was the city of Phoenix prior to the 1960s.
The school is a minority-majority district, with 81.7% of its students being identified as "Hispanics",[3] and 52.4% of its students speaking Spanish at home.[2] In all, 71 languages have been identified as primary home languages.[2]
The district employs 2,777 people, with 1,617 of them being teachers.[2]
The school district has no elementary or middle schools, and as such, it has identified 13 elementary school districts as its Partner Elementary Districts, with students who enroll with those districts being fed into PUHSD's high schools.[4]
History
Phoenix Union High School
The school district's roots lie with the opening of Phoenix Union High School in 1895. In that same year, Arizona's Territorial Legislature[5] passed a law that allowed districts with at least 2,000 residents to form a high school.[6]
Phoenix Union High School first opened with four classrooms and 90 students, on the second floor of an elementary school building, but eventually moved into its final location, near 7th Street and Van Buren. The school campus was a former mansion, and was chosen at the time because it was located in a residential area, bordered in part by two arterial streets.[7] PUHS also affected later developmental patterns in the area.[7]
Phoenix College
In 1920, Phoenix Union High School District opened Phoenix College as Phoenix Junior College,[8] after consultation with University of Arizona and the designing of a two-year curriculum.[9] The school, however, was considered to be extra-legal, as no laws authorized its existence. That changed in 1927, after the Arizona State Legislature authorized and legalized the creation and maintenance of Junior Colleges in Arizona.[9] Phoenix Union High School District would vote to transfer Phoenix College to the Maricopa County Community College District in 1963.[9]
Segregation of African American students
Phoenix Union Colored High School (later George Washington Carver High School)
Beginning in the late 1910s, Phoenix Union High School District began segregating its White and African American students. While segregation of elementary schools in Arizona was mandated, segregation of high schools was never required under Arizona law.[10]
In 1918, a "Department for Colored Students" that was established at a rear room of Phoenix Union High School's Commercial Building, with one teacher.[6] The school's African American students were then housed in two small cottages that was separated from the PUHS campus by an irrigation ditch.,[6] and later placed at a rented house on 9th Street and Jefferson.[6]
A plot of land that would later become the Phoenix Union Colored High School (later George Washington Carver High School) was purchased in 1925.[6] The site, a former four-acre landfill that was surrounded by warehouses,[11] drew protests over safety and sanitary concerns.[6] The school, however, was opened in 1926, and was the only one ever built exclusively to serve African American high school students in Arizona.[12]
The school was closed 1954,[8] a year after a judge at the Maricopa County Superior Court ruled school segregation in Phoenix high schools was unconstitutional, in the case Phillips vs. Phoenix Union High Schools and Junior College District.[13] PUHS, along with Carl Hayden High School and South Mountain High School, took on the bulk of the school district's African American students after desegregation.[6]
To this day, Phoenix Union High School District's website makes few references to the school's segregated past, merely stating that Carver High was built to accommodate the district's African American population, and stating that the school closed, following integration.[8]
Expansions
Until 1926, Phoenix Union High School was the school district's only school. By 1939, PUHS' student population reached 5,219,[14] and North High School, the first school not built for the purpose of segregation, opened its doors.[8]
The racial makeup of Phoenix Union High School District schools began to change during the 1950s and 1960s. PUHS' African American and Hispanic population increased during those two decades,[15] and by 1970, the school's White population fell to 19.3% of the student body. Despite that rise, PUHS' ethnic minorities had little say in determining and conducting education at the school.[15] Meanwhile, violence between the school's Hispanic and African American population eventually played a large role in everyday school life, with each side blaming the other side.[15]
In the 1980s, Phoenix Union High School District's board voted to close North High, PUHS, and East High, and West High, due to declining enrollment.[8]
As a result of the closures, two lawsuits were filed, accusing the Phoenix Union High School District of discriminating against ethnic minorities and low-income students by closing schools in their neighborhoods, in addition to unfair resource allocations.[17]
An Office for Civil Rights investigation also found that the school district had an open enrollment policy that, while designed to alleviate school overcrowding, resulted in racial imbalance.[18] The school district, according to the investigation, was fully aware of the policy's impact, and, despite numerous recommendations, chose not to take action of the matter.[18]
The lawsuits were later consolidated into the Castro v. Phoenix Union High School District lawsuit.[17] Eventually, a federal judge ruled against the school district.[19] A consent decree followed the ruling, which resulted in the reopening of North High, as well as, among other things, the establishment of magnet programs across the district, continued summer school programs, increased transportation options for students, and the building of two more high schools.[17]
Maricopa County is in the south-central part of the U.S. state of Arizona. As of the 2020 census the population was 4,420,568, or about 62% of the state's total, making it the fourth-most populous county in the United States, the most populous county in Arizona, and making Arizona one of the nation's most centralized states. The county seat is Phoenix, the state capital and fifth-most populous city in the United States.
Laveen is a community in Maricopa County, Arizona, United States, situated eight miles (13 km) southwest of Downtown Phoenix, between South Mountain and the confluence of the Gila and Salt rivers. Parts of Laveen constitute an unincorporated community in Maricopa County, while the remainder falls within the city limits of Phoenix, constituting the city's "Laveen Village" an urban village within the city of Phoenix. Laveen Village is split between District 7 and District 8, both notable as minority-majority districts for the city. Although Laveen has been home to "pastoral alfalfa, cotton, and dairy farms" since the 1880s, housing and commercial developments have been increasingly urbanizing the area.
Central High School is a high school in the Phoenix Union High School District, Phoenix, Arizona, United States. The campus is located at 4525 North Central Avenue, just north of downtown. It was established in 1957.
North High School is a high school that forms part of the Phoenix Union High School District in Phoenix, Arizona.
Alhambra High School is a high school that forms part of the Phoenix Union High School District in Phoenix, Arizona. The campus is located at 3839 West Camelback Road, northwest of downtown Phoenix, Arizona, United States.
South Mountain High School (The Academies at South Mountain) is a high school located in Phoenix, Arizona. The school is part of the Phoenix Union High School District.
Betty H. Fairfax is a high school in the Phoenix Union High School District, Laveen, Arizona, United States. The campus is located at 8225 South 59th Ave.
South Mountain Community College is a public community college in Phoenix, Arizona. It is one of the ten colleges in the Maricopa County Community College District.
Cesar Chavez High School is part of the Phoenix Union High School District. The campus is located at 3921 West Baseline Road, south of Phoenix, in Laveen, Arizona. Cesar Chavez's enrollment is approximately 2,499 students, over 65 percent of whom are Hispanic. The school predominantly serves students from partner elementary districts Laveen and Roosevelt; however, students from across the district come to Cesar Chavez for large Advanced Placement and Honors program, Freshmen House, performing arts, and athletic programs.
South Pointe High School is a charter high school in Phoenix, Arizona, United States. Established in 2003, the school is managed by the Arizona branch of The Leona Group. It serves mostly central and south Phoenix; Laveen; and parts of Tempe. The student body is approximately 40% African-American, 20% Caucasian and 40% Hispanic and Latino.
The Agua Fria Union High School District (AFUHSD) is a high school district serving Goodyear, Buckeye, Avondale, Waddell and Litchfield Park, Arizona. It was founded in 1955.
Phoenix Union High School (PUHS) was a high school that was part of the Phoenix Union High School District in downtown Phoenix, Arizona, one of five high school-only school districts in the Phoenix area. Founded in 1895 and closed in 1992, the school consisted of numerous buildings on a campus which by 1928 consisted of 18 acres.
Carver High School was a public high school in Phoenix, Arizona, established to serve African-American students during a time of school segregation.
The Laveen Elementary School District is the K–8 school district for Laveen, an area of southwest Phoenix, Arizona, USA. It operates eight schools, serving about 7,200 students in 2018. Laveen ESD is one of 13 elementary school districts in the Phoenix area that feed into the Phoenix Union High School District. The superintendent of Laveen ESD was Dr. Bill Johnson who retired in 2020 and was succeeded by the former director of human resources for the Laveen School District Dr. Jeffrey Sprout.
The Murphy Elementary School District 21 is an elementary school district in Phoenix, Arizona. It operates three K-8 schools and previously operated a fourth.
Frederick Christian Struckmeyer Jr. was a justice of the Supreme Court of Arizona from January 3, 1955, to January 19, 1982. He served as chief justice of the court on four occasions.
Dunbar School was a segregated middle school in Tucson, Arizona which closed as an integrated school in 1978.
Dunbar Elementary School is an elementary school in Phoenix, Arizona that was once segregated.
↑ Finn, Elizabeth (July 1998). "The Struggle for Civil Rights in Arizona". State Bar of Arizona. Archived from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 3 December 2017. At mid-century, state law mandated segregation in the elementary schools but made it optional in the high schools.
↑ Fitzpatrick, Tom (17 November 1994). "A Process is Due At South Mountain High". Phoenix New Times. Retrieved 27 November 2017. When Roberto Frietz, now 39, was a student at South Mountain High School in the 1970s, a riot brought on by racial tensions broke out at the school.
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