- Piner High School (PHS) is a secondary school located in Santa Rosa, California. It is part of the Santa Rosa High School District, which is itself part of Santa Rosa City Schools.
- History
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Piner High School was built in 1966 in semi-rural Sonoma County on Fulton Road near Piner Road just west of Santa Rosa. Initially it was surrounded by orchards and pastures. By 1975 the City of Santa Rosa expanded to the back fence of the school. In the late 1980s further expansion included more housing on two sides and Youth Community Park (including an award winning skate park) across the street.
- Piner High School was opened with 9th, 10th, and 11th grades in the fall of 1966. The next year it became a four year high school, with the class of 1968 being the first graduating class of the school history. The class of 1975 was the last of the four year classes until 1996, when Piner was reestablished as a four year high school to alleviate overcrowding of local middle schools.
- The central quad was completed for the fall of 1970, and the class of 1974 was the first class to enjoy crossing campus without going through the mud during rainy winters.
- Piner High School was named for a family of squatters who occupied nearby lands for several decades in the late 1800s. Many locations in the area northwest of Santa Rosa took on this name, as the Piner family became quite notorious and certainly the most recognizable name in the area.
- Construction and Modernization
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Piner High School is unusually designed in that there are no indoor hallways and student lockers are located on the outside of buildings, secured during non-school hours with hurricane fencing. Each building was constructed with wide overhangs and interconnecting covered walkways between buildings to shelter students from the weather.
- All original classroom buildings are constructed with all classrooms accessed directly from the outdoors with main entrances on the outside of the square and secondary entrances through an atrium in the center of the building. Each classroom building was designated for a group of related academics, such as the Language Arts building, the science and math building, the social studies and business building, and the arts and shop building.
- During restructuring in the 1990s the use of the buildings was altered so that some of the classroom buildings were designated for the use of one of four specialty schools within the larger school.
- In the past four years, Piner High School has remodeled more than half of the buildings, as well as adding new structures.
- The administration offices were moved to a brand-new two story building along with ten English classes and three language classes, and 5 history classes. Along with the new Administration buildings, other classrooms are located in another two story building that is connected to the Administration building.
- A new culinary arts building was established at the old location of the administration offices.
- A new library, performing arts, and science wing were also built on the campus.
- A new performing arts center, which was finished in the year 2001. It seats 360 students.
- A new football field with artificial turf, snack bar, and bleachers.
- Administration Change
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Starting in the 2007-2008 school year, the new principal is Mary Beth Halsey, formerly Vice Principal at Elsie Allen High School. She will be replacing Janet Olson, who served as principal for over five years. The new vice principal is Paul Gallegos, who was formerly, the vice principal at Comstock Middle School. Mary Ann Ayala is returning as an Assistant Principal, while Gregory Watt was appointed the other new Assistant Principal, who is replacing Craig Wycoff, who moved to Maria Carrillo High School.
- For the School Year 2009-2010, Mary Beth Halsey will continue as Principal for her third year, the vice principal will be Sally Bimrose for the 2nd year, Louise Larro who came mid year in 2008-2009 school year after Mary Ann Ayala transferred will continue on until her retirement in June 2010 and the new assistant principal replacing Gregory Watt who resigned after 2 years will be Steve Mizera, a middle school principal from Placerville, CA
- Safety Planning Committee
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In the 2008-2009 school year Piner has seen some dramatic and much needed changes to its Safety Committee, first starting off with the committee’s decision to split in smaller divisions, with the “Committee Split Proposal”. This would increase the amount of concentration on a certain group of issues. Along with designating certain divisions to certain *Areas of Improvement* that go along with the Safety Committee’s main goals and objectives. One of the divisions introduced from this proposal is the Emergency Preparedness Division, which has turned the old staff dining room on the “E” Wing cafeteria into an On Campus Emergency Operations Center. This ensures Piner’s functionality after an actual emergency, and supplies quick support for city officials when the campus is used as a shelter.
- Emergency Preparedness Division
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Among other things is the addition of the 50’s Cold War Civil Defense Look it’s given to the Emergency Preparedness Division. The Head of the Emergency Preparedness Division, Andrew Esch says “we have taken certain aspects from the Civil Defense to help in the organization post-earthquake or after an emergency”. Every member of the staff is put into a group and given a corresponding symbol that has been taken from the Civil Defense Archives, these symbols then intern match up with allocated job duties. They also have propaganda safety posters posted around campus that stretch the meaning of safety.
- Student Involvement Program
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New to the committee and the first to be introduced in the district, the Student Involvement Program allows students currently attending Piner High School to join the Safety Planning Committee under a program designed to involve the student body. Under command of the Incident Commander, the students will learn how to help there designated divisions during an emergency and train to perform first aid, search and rescue, evacuation and building inspection duties. These duties would be needed after an earthquake or emergency to ensure that all students and staff are taken care of, until help from the governing authorities arrives.
- The Student Involvement Program is a great way to teach students how to react to an earthquake and other emergencies while teaching them how to be prepared and alert. The program hopes to be fully operational in the 2009 - 2010 school year.
- Department Representatives
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Administrative – *To Be Assigned*
History – Correia, Andrea
English – Spearman, Simone
PE – Pepper, Darlene
Science – Converse, Michael
Art – Pedersen, Brian
Math – Weber, Ed
World Language - Belofsky, Mireille
Vocational Arts - Grove, Debbie - Drills
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Earthquake Drill – In Place
Fire Drill – In Place
Lockdown Drill – In Place
Incident Command Drill – In Place
Bioterrorism Drill – *To Be Scheduled*
Disease and Bird Flu Pandemic Drill – *To Be Scheduled* - Early College Magnet Program
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In the 2006-2007 school year, the Early College Magnet Program started. This program prepares students for college and by the time they finish high school, they will have completed a year of college. This is in part with the Santa Rosa Junior College.
- Freshman and sophomore years the students will take accelerated and in depth classes denoted Honors classes at Piner, which will prepare them for rigorous college courses. In their Junior and Senior years, they will take four classes, including Honors and AP classes, at Piner and, at lunch, will be bussed to the Junior College to take two classes, earning up to a year of college credits.
- Piner High School and Santa Rosa Junior College have joined in an educational partnership to offer the Piner High School-SRJC Early College Magnet Program to qualified incoming 9th graders. This exceptional educational opportunity provides Piner students with accelerated learning in the company of other college bound students, while preserving their high school experience in sports, drama, music, student government, and other extra-curricular activities.
- Program Details:
• Freshmen and sophomores enroll in specific classes at PHS geared to prepare them for college success.
• As juniors and seniors, students take four courses at Piner and two courses per semester at Santa Rosa Junior College.
• Free tuition and book expenses are provided for up to 30 college credits.
• Free transportation to and from SRJC is provided for students enrolled in college courses between 1:00 and 3:00 p.m. Monday-Friday.
• Students may choose to transfer approximately one year of college credit to one of the campuses of the California UC or CSU system.
• Students may choose to stay at SRJC an additional year and complete a career certificate in a qualifying field, earn an AA degree, or transfer to a UC or CSU as a junior. - Student Expectations:
• Pursue post secondary education
• Devote minimum of two hours daily to homework
• Participate in Early College Magnet activities
• Attend SRJC support counseling classes.
• Maintain a 2.5 cumulative grade point average at PHS and the SRJC
• Complete all Santa Rosa City Schools high school graduation requirements
• Abide by all SRCS & SRJC rules - Student Support Provided by Piner:
• A dedicated Counselor who works with students to create an Individual Graduation Plan
• An onsite program coordinator
• Rigorous college preparatory courses
• Support classes Junior & Senior year
• Free transportation to and from SRJC between 1 and 3 p.m. Monday-Friday
• Teachers knowledgeable of expected student outcomes in the program- Student Support Provided by SRJC:
• Free college textbooks and class tuition - Up to 30 units
• Access to library & research facilities
• Access to tutoring center
• An SRJC counselor with knowledge of magnet program and college entrance expectations
• Resource room for PHS students on the SRJC campus
• Ongoing collaboration with PHS staff
• SRJC support classes at PHS:
- Counseling 299 (Differences Between High School and College)
Counseling 60 (Effective Study Workshop)
Counseling 370 (College Orientation)
Counseling 61 (Introduction to Career Development)
- Athletics
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Piner High School is a member of the 4-A North Bay League of the North Coast Section of the California Interscholastic FederationSports that Piner High offers are:
- Badminton
- Baseball
- Basketball
- Cheerleading
- Cross Country
- Football
- Golf
- Soccer
- Softball
- Swimming
- Tennis
- Track and Field
- Volleyball
- Wrestling
- Notable alumni
- Dustin "Nuts" Green
- Kasey Olenberger
- Brandon Schrey
- Greg Alexander - University of Hawaii starting QB
- David Terrell
- Vicky Nguyen
- Clubs
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Piner High School has several student-organized and teacher-supervised student groups as of September 2009:
- Academic Spirit Club
- Associated Student Body
- Asian Club
- Badminton Club
- Black Student Union
- California Scholarship Federation
- Chess Club
- Christian Club
- Creative Writing Club
- Dance Club
- Drama Club
- Fashion Club
- GATE Club
- Gay Straight Alliance
- Key Club
- Latino Club
- PHAST (Piner High Astronomy Science&Technolgy Club
- World Awareness Club
- Population
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The school's population for the 2008-09 school year is approximately 1282 students, down from the 2006-07 enrollment of 1530, which reflects a general pattern of declining enrollment in the area.
- Piner is one of the most racially diverse schools in the Santa Rosa School District.
- See also
- List of school districts in Sonoma County, California
- External links
- Piner High School
- Source: Wikipedia; it is used under the GNU Free Documentation License. You may redistribute it, verbatim or modified, providing that you comply with the terms of the GFDL.
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