GO COUGARS! Rarrrwwwr!
I cannot speak for the state of this school currently, but I attended as a student from 1990 to 1996, and I must say that it was a fabulous school. What I remember about it :
Father-Daughter Dance night on Valentine's Day: The best night of the year for those of us who were lucky enough to have daddies to dance with, pose for pictures, and drink punch. We're talkin' some serious old-school fun here, folks. It was always themed, either 50's or some equally ridiculous reason to get dressed up. My sister and I used to fight over my dad since we attended at the same time, so he quickly learned how to dance with two girls dangling from his limbs.
The loving teachers: Ms. Margettes, Mrs. Baldwin who put me in my first play and had us sing along while she played piano in class, Ms. Boon, Ms. Johnson who taught us nutrition, Ms. Carlos, who took us on an over-nighter on the SF-docked pirate ship "The C.A. Thayer" - which was the best night of my LIFE up until that point... and possibly still so. Overall, I feel I got a great education, since I developed great writing and communication skills.
They were great about having "cultural" events, such as Chinese New Year parades, info on all religions around the holidays, and offered language classes after school for interested students.
We lived for Thursdays because they were the "COMPUTER DAYS!" - that heralded day of the week where we went to the portable with the computers, put in our (yes...) Floppy Disks, and played Oregon trail, and layer-cake games, puzzles, and the game where you're a fish and you try not ot get eaten by Osprey. Those were the days.
Equally exciting was Choir days with Ms. Steidell, the crazy but amazing woman who taught us the President's Song, the States song, and was able to get a room full of about 100 4th graders (including the special ed kids) to sing like angels, even after lunch. I STILL can name each state in alphabetical order, and the presidents, too. Way to go, Ms. Steidell.
The track team: We were THE BEST in the district, at the time I graduated we were undefeated for 12 years straight. We kicked serious little-kid butt. My sister and I were really supported and inspired by the best track coach in the world - Raul, who taught us discipline, how to pass a baton, and how to keep up running after we commenced. He is the reason my sister continued with cross-country into HS. I think my sister's 200 track record is still on the books there from '91.
I also attended the afterschool program "Adventure Time" which had fun but inconsistent staff, who would charge our parents $25 if they came late to pick us up. It was really easy to ditch school, too, at that time, cause we could just "waltz out of bounds" and doorbell ditch the neighbors... well, maybe that was just us. Hopefully they've secured it more since then, to prevent the opposite - people coming IN.
We also had good principals: Mr. Lyon, (who played chess with those who got sent to detention with him) and Ms. Rothwell, who became the HS principal when I attended (not such a good principal there).
My only issues were with the GATE (Gifted and Talented Education), which was great for me and the firends of mine who were IN it, but really isolated the kids who were not. They would remove us from class since we scored higher on some test, and left the 'other kids' to do 'regular math and science.' I always felt really uncomfortable when we were separate form our classmates in that way.
Also, my DARE Education was brainwashing and problematic, demonizing drug users and spreading misinformation about drugs throughout our class... but that was a state programme, not the schools.
Overall, I'd send my kids there if I were ever delirious enough to have some.
INFO: http://www.vannoy.cv.k12.ca.us/ read more