former SVHS alumni. specifically from class of 2006. It might be 20 years late, but I could definitely tell you that when I was a student at Sonoma Valley high school the school itself was far from perfect. For one thing it felt vastly overcrowded. I think on average the student population was about 1200 give or take. But it doesn't change the fact that this meant a lot of the classes could be very very filled with students to the point of absurdity.
Another issue is the fact that unfortunately many other school seems to have a very kind of hands off opinion of operation or whatever you wanna call it when it comes to dealing with bullying. As a young man, I was bullied pretty extensively for being the tall skinny kid with glasses. And every time I would try to get the faculty involved. and then when I would finally hit my breaking point and would basically take things into my own hands all of a sudden I'm the bad guy. Now, unfortunately, this is nothing new in the world of the American school system, but it doesn't change the fact that still absolutely aggravating.
Next, we have the fact that the school at least at the time was not the best when it came to accommodating students with learning difficulties. there were a number of "special education courses" these were and far between. And when they would finally make any kind of meaningful changes nine times out of 10 it was already far too late. Now there were some positives. Several teachers that at the time in attendance there were very very supportive. I don't remember names off the top of my head, but many of them were very good in terms of being kind to certain students and all that stuff. I will say this, though as bad as this is going to sound I think the school needed a requirement for all students to at the very least, no conversational English.
Unfortunately, by the time I was a student I guess you could say ratio of ethnicities and stuff for was skewed beyond measure. I cannot tell you how many times I had classes where aside from the teacher and maybe one or two of the of the students were all of Mexican or at the very least descent and stuff like that. Now I'm not trying to be racist in any way I'm just saying that it would've been nicer if there were a little bit more in terms of a better I guess you could say equilibrium.
All in all at the time when I was a student there if the option of going to a different high school, I definitely would've taken it. But unfortunately, this was literally the only high school in the area and therefore it was the only choice for me or my family. But I can definitely say that had I've been given the option. I would've gone to a completely different school. Now again these are recollections from over 20 years point so things could be very different by now. But even so who knows. So if you have children that are either about to attend or are attending hopefully things have gotten better. read more
