Halton Pardee Team Takes A Field Trip

In the past week, we’ve had the privilege of touring two local elementary schools: Short Avenue Elementary in Del Rey and Broadway Elementary in Venice. Both tours were excellent and our team learned so much about the current programs that make these schools special.

At Short Avenue, known for it’s STEAM-oriented curriculum (think STEM with the addition of Art: Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Math)—has won numerous awards related to this curriculum. Principal Reynolds came to the school last summer and excitement about her came through from the teachers and parents who introduced her. In addition, art, Latin, and theater arts are taught to all grades.

The school has approximately 300 students and plans to grow to about 350 over the next few years. If you’re looking to move to Del Rey, then we suggest taking a tour and meeting the teachers and parents to see what a passionate, involved team helps make this a superstar school.

At Broadway Elementary the same passion is there for making this school a success, led by Principal Wang who joined the school nine years ago and had a vision. This school stands out on the Westside by offering language-immersion programming in Mandarin and Spanish. This means that students spend 50% of the day learning in their targeted language and the other 50% in English. We stepped in to observe a Mandarin third-grade class and were stunned at how well the children were speaking in complete sentences.

The school has approximately 600 students and plans to grow to about 640 over the year or two. Because of the specialized programming, this school is a strongly desired option for many parents—including out of district! These immersion programs have been designed to extend to Mark Twain middle school and Venice high school, meaning K-12 students have an opportunity to participate in 13 years of quality, bi-lingual education.

Overall, the Westside has many wonderful schools and for those parents wanting to move to new neighborhoods, we strongly encourage visiting the schools and reaching out to PTA members to get a true feel for what makes each school special.