Helping our schools recover federal funds through Impact Aid is as easy as… 1, 2, 3. Every year the Sunnyside Unified School District applies for funds under Public Law 81-874, “Federal Impact Aid” which supports local school districts with students who have parents/guardians in the uniformed services, parents/guardians who are employed on eligible federal properties or students who live on federal properties or tribal lands. Impact Aid assists districts that have lost property tax revenue due to the presence of tax exempt Federal Property served by the District.  This means that Impact Aid could produce significant revenue for children attending SUSD schools. How can I help? 1. FILL OUT THE IMPACT AID FORM SENT HOME WITH YOUR STUDENT 2. SIGN THE FORM 3. BRING THE FORM WITH YOU TO PARENT TEACHER CONFERENCES     Please return the survey by no later than Friday, October 26, 2018.  If you cannot attend, please return the form with your child ASAP. This information is confidential and strictly for our application for financial aid for schools. If you have any questions, please contact Kevin Fortuin at (520) 545-2020.  

The Sunnyside Unified School District, in collaboration with the UA Hispanic Community Council, hosted UA President Dr. Robert Robbins on Monday, October 8 at a small reception in downtown Tucson. The event was co-sponsored by the UA Office of Community Relations and members from Hispanic-serving organizations including Sunnyside, Chicanos por la Causa, El Rio Health Center, the Tucson Hispanic Chamber of Commerce and Tucson Unified School District.  Victor Mercado (above, right), Sunnyside Director of Public Information discussed the College Academy for Parents and Imagine Your STEM Future, two key partnerships that have resulted in improved educational outcomes for Sunnyside students and their families. In his remarks, Mercado spoke about the impact of the College of Academy for Parents (CAP), which has served more than 2,500 students and 900 families since its inception sixteen years ago. President Robbins (above) echoed his support for the program, which was first introduced to him by SUSD Governing Board member and Arizona State Representative, Mr. Daniel Hernandez. Robbins was present at last year's CAP graduation and vowed to find ways to support the program. The College Academy for Parents works with elementary school parents in the Sunnyside District to develop a college plan for their children. Participants in the program take part in parent workshops, mini lectures with UA professors, and campus tours to understand how to create a better college going culture in their households.  Imagine Your Stem Future, a collaboration with the UA Stem Center, matches women engineers from Raytheon with female students at Desert View High School. The program is in its seventh year and supports girls interested in science and math through classroom activities, mentorship, and leadership opportunities. Research shows that despite an interest in math and science in the early grades, girls are more reluctant to take upper level math and science courses in middle and high school which creates a representation gap as women are less likely than their male counterparts to pursue STEM majors in college. Longtime Sunnyside supporter, Raytheon's Melissa Martinez was present at the event along with Naomi Proaño, President of the Sunnyside Foundation (above, far right) and Dr. Marla Franco (above, second from right) who serves as the UA's Assistant Vice Provost for Hispanic Serving Institution Initiatives and is responsible for spearheading the university's newly bestowed HSI status.   

The Sunnyside Alumni Association will host the 2018 Hall of Fame dinner. This year's event will take place November 17th at Gallego Intermediate Fine Arts Magnet School at 5:00 p.m. The annual dinner is the signature fundraiser for the Alumni Association/Dollars for Scholars, which last year awarded close to $70,000 in college scholarships to graduates from Sunnyside, Desert View and STAR Academic High School.  The Hall of Fame awards were established to honor individuals or groups who have made notable contributions to the Sunnyside educational system, the community, or their chosen profession. The awards also honor those who have exhibited leadership and innovations that have contributed to academic success and the quality of life for the Sunnyside community. Congratulations to the 2018 Sunnyside Alumni Association Hall of Fame Inductees:  Samuel “Sam” Portillo Humberto “Bert” Otero Raúl Esteban Hodgers Sgt. William Corrales  Steven “Steve” Price Andrea León Foster Yolanda Herrera

Our Vision: Every child... College, Career and Community Ready. Our Mission: Our mission is to develop students with a strong sense of identity, purpose and agency, so that they leave our system as effective learners who act with purpose to achieve the conditions they desire in their own and others’ lives. Since the release of the 1983 report “A Nation at Risk” our public school systems have been challenged with the task of improving public perception regarding how we prepare students for the future. This issue of a quality of education was compounded with the accountability requirements under the No Child Left Behind of 2001, which focused primarily on one assessment.  This narrow focus on one metric as the definitive measure of school quality misrepresents the complexity of educating students and diminishes the great work of educators across this nation who make a difference in the lives of students every day, in every classroom. And though aggregate performance is a key variable for measuring success, it simply fails to tell a bigger picture of what our students have and will be able to do in the future.  For this reason we felt it critical to recast our PROFILE OF A GRADUATE within a broader narrative of student success. This new framework provides an unparalleled level of clarity that aligns our mission, vision, and the work.  This new iteration of our graduate profile picks up where our Strategic Plan left off in 2015 and drives the work forward through five competencies, key to each student’s journey towards graduation: 1). Knowledge for Learning, 2). Knowledge for Impact, 3). Creative Confidence, 4). Critical Consciousness, and 5). Self and Systems Awareness.  In addition to college and career readiness, Community Ready was added to this iteration of the work thanks to feedback we received from community members, as well as industry and higher education professionals who expressed certain intangibles that Sunnyside students brought to their organizations. Attributing to our students traits like, “community-minded”, “a sense of social justice”, “respectfulness” we felt strongly that Community Ready also provided us with a framework to bridge the gap between knowledge and agency. This framework allows our District to capture the summative experiences that mark each child’s learning journey so that personalizing the classroom is less about technology, and more about each student’s ecology.  Thank you for being a part of our journey.      COMPETENCY #1: KNOWLEDGE FOR LEARNING Our students are knowledge creators. We look to them to not only master the content, but also to transfer knowledge across disciplines: From science to the humanities, from mathematics to the social sciences—Sunnyside students are deep thinkers and well-rounded learners with a strong sense of academic identity.  We trust our students as knowledge co-creators who share their expertise with peers and teachers as part of an intentional process of collaboration. Sunnyside students understand that learning is a social and shared responsibility. By listening respectfully, students value learning from one another as they begin to develop transferable skills like responding positively and constructively, which are important skills to employers as they are assembling their teams.   COMPETENCY #2: KNOWLEDGE FOR IMPACT When Hurricane Harvey crippled the Texas coast in 2018, Sunnyside students in our JTED Construction program rolled up their sleeves, gave up their spring break, and traveled across the country to rebuild homes. When faced with the opportunity to speak at the state capitol demanding an increase in teacher pay, one Sunnyside student took to the microphone, took a deep breath and pumped up a crowd of tens of thousands.    Our students are engaged participants in their future, not merely bystanders. Equipped with deep knowledge of history and a sense of what is fair, our students are adept at using social media and student organizations to drive change. Sunnyside students are aware of community issues and possess real-world knowledge gained from internships and other experiences that put global issues into a local context.   COMPETENCY #3: CREATIVE CONFIDENCE All students are creative, and it’s our responsibility to nurture that creativity. Borrowing from the work of Tom and David Kelley (IDEO, Stanford d.School) we define creative confidence as the natural human ability to come up with great ideas and the courage to act on those ideas.  Sunnyside students take part in human-centric experiences that use empathy, systems thinking, and design thinking to unlock their creativity. Through building prototypes, using causal loops, challenging assumptions, and acknowledging that all ideas are worthy, our students learn how to take risks. More importantly, creative confidence relies on human collaboration, which is embodied in the performing arts. Sunnyside's tradition of excellence in the fine arts provides a first point of entry for students into a world of creativity that gives them opportunities to gain confidence and succeed.    COMPETENCY #4: CRITICAL CONSCIOUSNESS Workplaces, schools and colleges, and other social environments are defined by internal cultures and norms that are not always visible from the outside. Some environments are built to nurture and empower, while other systems have internal cultures that hinder upward mobility. This is why we give students the tools to identify systems that perpetuate inequality so they’re prepared to take action.  In collaboration with League of Women Voters of Greater Tucson and the YWCA Southern Arizona we host workshops that help high school students learn about running for office while deconstructing issues such as racism, discrimination, and LGBTQ rights. Fostering critical consciousness through debate empowers our students to keep up with important issues and to demand a seat at the table.    COMPETENCY #5: SELF AND SOCIAL AWARENESS Students who are self-aware have strong intrapersonal skills such as self-regulation, which develops in the early years and aids in problem solving and supports volitional behavior. Social awareness (or social intelligence) is part of an important skill set that, later in life, is what sets a transformational leader apart from an everyday boss. This profile of a graduate takes into account our students’ social and emotional development and values traits such as assertiveness, conflict resolution, positive self-talk (to name a few)—as important indicators—of self- and social awareness, which is key to our students’ ability to thrive after high school.   NEXT STEPS 1. Create a graphic representation of the Graduate Profile 2. Introduce the Graduate Profile at the 2018 Administrative Summit 3. Develop indicators for each of the Graduate Profile competency areas 4. Establish a continuum or rubrics by grade band for each indicator that will be used to support internal accountability metrics with the desired outcome of establishing our own school label system