History
The high school was opened in September 1910 after 10 acres (40,000 m2) of desert brush land was donated. CVHS is the oldest public school in the Coachella Valley. It was incorporated into the Coachella Valley Unified School District in 1966 to include a high school instead of only elementary schools in nearby Coachella. A second high school, Desert Mirage High School opened in 2003 to ease overcrowding (at 2,500 maximum in the early 2000s).
The school's location was decided on because it was the central point of the Coachella Valley. In 2002, social studies teacher Chauncey Veatch was honored as National Teacher of the Year.
Rumor has it the school mascot was named to honor the once large imported Arab colony involved in the date palm growing industry, but the mascot namesake is the local desert foundation. In 2002, CVHS officials had a meeting whether to rename the mascot out of concern it might produce negative stereotypes against Arabs and Middle Eastern people, after the September 11 terrorist attacks. The mascot name remains unchanged and concerns over the sensitivity of "Arabs" continues.
Read more about this topic: Coachella Valley High School
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“The history of the genesis or the old mythology repeats itself in the experience of every child. He too is a demon or god thrown into a particular chaos, where he strives ever to lead things from disorder into order.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“To history therefore I must refer for answer, in which it would be an unhappy passage indeed, which should shew by what fatal indulgence of subordinate views and passions, a contest for an atom had defeated well founded prospects of giving liberty to half the globe.”
—Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)
“It is my conviction that women are the natural orators of the race.”
—Eliza Archard Connor, U.S. suffragist. As quoted in History of Woman Suffrage, vol. 4, ch. 9, by Susan B. Anthony and Ida Husted Harper (1902)