Phoenix Union High School District Classes Start August 2

Betty H. Fairfax High School’s first senior class as well as over 500 incoming freshmen, Bioscience High School’s new McKinley Hall and a new location for Suns-Diamondbacks Education Academy will highlight the opening of the Phoenix Union High School District’s 2010-2011 school year that begins Monday, August 2 for over 25,000 students at 16 campuses.

Franklin Police and Fire High School will house a complete 9-12-grade school for the first time, and specialty programs will kick off at several schools, including Camelback’s School of Sustainability, Engineering and Architectural Design; Central’s School of Global Business and International Studies and Alhambra’s Medical Arts Pathways.

Betty Fairfax in Laveen will grow to over 2,000 students with a full compliment of ninth through twelfth-graders for the first time. The Class of 2011, which opened the school in August of 2007, will be the first graduating class next May.

Bioscience High School’s campus is complete with the restoration of the original McKinley School and construction of an adjacent building on the two-acre downtown campus to house a Medical Sciences school with five classrooms, a lab, conference room, technology center and student services office. The City of Phoenix provided a $2.4 million Small Schools grant to fund the project. The main school complex was completed in 2008.

Suns-Diamondbacks Education Academy moves to a new building at 2920 N. 7th Street to accommodate the alternative school’s growing enrollment. The school, beginning its 10th year, has rescued hundreds of at-risk students from dropping out with a more personalized accelerated credit recovery program. Suns-Diamondbacks began at 1505 N. Central Avenue, and has graduated over 800 students since 2001.

Phoenix Union schools follow a traditional school calendar. There are 180 instructional days, with 90 days in each semester. Students have fall break, October 4-8, a two-week winter break beginning Friday, December 17, and spring break, March 14-18. Graduation Days are May 18-19.

Students not yet pre-registered can enroll at the schools in their attendance zone. Students need a birth certificate, two proofs of address and immunization records. Incoming 9th graders who have not pre-registered will need AIMS test scores and an 8th grade diploma. Those from other high schools outside the district will need unofficial transcripts from their last school.

Students interested in enrolling in magnet programs offered at six campuses or the magnet high school, Metro Tech can contact the school, or magnet office at (602) 764-1309. Magnet programs and small schools Bioscience and Franklin Police and Fire afford open enrollment to anyone residing in the District.

Source: Phoenix Union High School District