The Hillsboro School District 1J is a unified school district located in Hillsboro, Oregon, United States. The district operates 26 elementary schools, four middle schools, and four high schools. Founded in 1851, the school district covers Hillsboro, Scholls, Reedville, North Plains, West Union, and other area communities. Total enrollment as of the 2019–2020 school year is 20,269 students, the fourth largest in the state.
The district is labeled 1J, as it absorbed the West Union School District, the first district in the county; the J (for "joint") represents that the district extends into other counties, Yamhill and Multnomah. Hillsboro's elementary schools had been District 7 prior to consolidation in 1996. The high school district was 3J and included students from grades 7 through 12, and received students from the Hillsboro elementary district and five other elementary districts.
The Hillsboro School District Board of Directors (school board) consists of seven elected members serving four-year terms. Members receive no pay for their work on the board. The district is part of the Northwest Regional Education Service District.Hillsboro board rethinks, accepts education service district budget. The Oregonian, February 27, 2003.
The district also runs a special alternative school and the Hare Field athletic complex.
History Hillsboro's first school district was formed in 1851 as School District 7. The Reverend Horace Lyman established the district and was the first commissioner, with that title later becoming school superintendent. The first school in the district was a single-room log cabin built in 1853 after a school levy was passed to raise $600 for construction. In 1875, a new frame constructed school was built, with the smaller log cabin was kept for additional space.
In 1890 a new eight-room schoolhouse was finished at the present site of David Hill Elementary. In September 1908, tenth grade was added to the Hillsboro school district, with the classes held on the top floor of the school. Eleventh and twelfth grades were soon added, and in June 1911 the first students to complete four years of high school graduated. This class totaled five students, four girls and one boy. A stand-alone high school was completed by 1913, and a gymnasium was built beginning in 1915. The district overall employed a total of 19 teachers for the 1913–1914 school year.
All five of the high school teachers in the district resigned in 1914 in a dispute with management. The school board had allowed the students to vote on which teachers to retain, which the teachers resented even though all were retained in the vote. The mass walkout led to classes being canceled for a time.
The district paid high school teachers $133 per month, other teachers $125 per month, and principals $1500 per year for the 1920 to 1921 school year.
In 1929, a new high school building was finished with additional buildings and the wings added later. The neighboring Cornelius school district was dissolved in 1960, and part of their enrollment area was shifted to the Hillsboro districts, while the remainder went to the Forest Grove School District.
Brookwood Elementary was opened in 1953, followed by Poynter Junior High in 1960, then Brown Junior High and Mooberry Elementary in 1963. In May 1961, voters in all the districts feeding the high school voted on a proposal to merge into a single district. Voters decided not to merge, but the next February voters did approve merging the junior high grades into the high school district. The high school district then purchased Poynter from the elementary district for $772,566, and passed a bond measure in March 1962 to pay for that purchase, expand the school, and pay for the new junior high school that became Brown.
The district opened Hare Field in 1965, a multi-sport facility with a track, baseball stadium, and football field.McKinney, Dick. Sparts win first game at Hare. The Hillsboro Argus, October 19, 1976.Gaynair, Gillian. Hillsboro thinks things will go better with Coke. The Oregonian, May 21, 1998. In 1970, a new senior high school opened on on the south side of Hillsboro, with enrollment of the high school district reaching 3,621 students that year. The Union High School District's teachers held a three-day strike in March 1973 over their contracts, the first teacher's strike in Oregon history.
By 1987, enrollment in all the districts feeding into the high school district along with the high school district reached approximately 12,325 students.Ostergren, Jack. Hillsboro hears report on unified school district plan. The Oregonian, September 9, 1987. In 1987, the Union High School District began plans to unify the high school district with the six elementary districts that feed into the district's junior and senior high schools. In 1991, the Oregon Legislature passed a law requiring school districts to unify by 1996, which forced some reluctant elementary districts to unify into the Hillsboro School District.Di Rado, Alicia. Agness stays true to its history. The Oregonian, October 1, 1995. On July 1, 1996, Hillsboro Elementary, North Plains, Farmington View, Groner, Reedville, West Union, and Hillsboro Union High School districts unified into a single district, the fifth largest in Oregon at that time.Franzen, Robin. Leaving nothing to chance. The Oregonian, May 30, 1996.
21st century In 2003, the district made national news when 17 days of classes were cut from the school year, which allowed students to be out in May, due to budget cuts to education in Oregon.Oregon schools cutting class. CNN.com. Retrieved on February 8, 2008. That year enrollment reached 18,951 for the unified district.Most school districts in county see growth. The Oregonian, October 5, 2004.
In 2006, the district implemented a statistical tracking program that keeps track of all student information such as demographics, attendance, and academic achievement.Navas, Melissa. 'Data warehouse' tracks students. The Oregonian, May 17, 2007.
The district faced opposition in 2009 over the demolition of J. B. Thomas Middle School, which preservationists wanted to save for use as a community building. The district planned to tear down the old building after a 2006 bond measure approved construction of several new schools, including a new middle school and expansion at the other existing middle schools. A new elementary school was built with funds from this levy on the eastern part of Thomas' grounds, with the buildings of the old school to be torn down to make way for athletic fields. In July 2009, a court allowed the demolition to go forward.
By November 2009 the district had become the first in Oregon to use an Internet-based crisis management program to allow for easier access to information on schools by the district.
HSD purchased in the South Hillsboro area in April 2014 to house a fifth high school, and, along with prior acquisitions, could add up to four elementary schools and a middle school in that area.
In 2017, a $408 million capital construction bond was passed to facilitate various projects across the district, such as renovations to school buildings, increased security measures, the construction of two new elementary schools, the creation of a fiber optic network connecting all schools, and land acquisition of new school sites.
Boundary The boundary includes most of Hillsboro, all of North Plains, and portions of Aloha, Beaverton, Cornelius, and Rockcreek.
Schools The district operates 34 schools, including four high schools, four middle schools, and 26 elementary schools. HSD also operates an alternative combined middle and high school, an online school, as well as a charter school. As of 2021, one new elementary school is under construction. Staffing includes 1,244 full-time classified employees, 1,130 full-time teachers, and 79 administrator staff members. The average student to teacher ratio is 26:1 with a 3.5% drop-out rate for the 2005 to 2006 school year.Fast Facts. Hillsboro School District. Retrieved on March 28, 2008. In the 2009 school year, the district had 403 students classified as homeless by the Department of Education, or 2.0% of students in the district. The annual budget is $250,935,863
Elementary schools & K–8 school The 26 elementary schools in the district serve students in kindergarten through sixth grade, with the exception of Groner as described below.
Atfalati Ridge Elementary School Named after the Atfalati people who originally inhabited the area, Atfalati Ridge is located on Northwest King Street in the Sunset Ridge subdivision of eastern North Plains. The two-story, , building opened in 2021 at a cost of $37.2 million. The school shares its floor plan with Brookwood Elementary and Tamarack Elementary, all constructed as a part of the District's 2017 bond measure. The students are known as the Blue Jays.
Brookwood
Located in the middle portion of the city on Southeast Cedar Street, Brookwood Elementary originally opened in 1953 and was named after the area. It was the first building in the district to be built using prefabricated forms, and had to be expanded in 1957. In 2020, the original one-story building was replaced with a new two-story building at a cost of $37.6 million, nearly doubling the school's space from of space to . The new building, which can house up to 600 students, features "learning areas" for group learning, a glass-enclosed "think tank", a STEM lab, an outdoor learning area, and a broadcast studio. Brookwood's new floor plan has since been used for Atfalati Ridge and Tamarack Elementary. The school's mascot is the bobcat, and enrollment is 343 students (2019-20 school year).
Butternut Creek
Originally part of the Reedville School District, Butternut Creek is located east of Hillsboro in Reedville. The school opened in 1977 with ten classrooms, with the students known as the Bulldogs. Butternut Creek is a single-story, wood-sided structure with a total of of space. The school served 378 students during the 2019-20 school year and is named after the nearby creek of the same name, a tributary of the Tualatin River. In 2021, the campus went through a major renovation paid for by the 2017 construction bond, adding air conditioning, a new entry plaza, a layout change of the drop-off areas, and the construction of a new modular building with two new classrooms.
Eastwood
Home of the Eagles, the school is located in the central part of the city on Northeast Lincoln Street adjacent to Shadywood Park. The single-story building is faced with red brick and has of space. Eastwood opened in 1978 and has a current enrollment of 435 students as of the 2019-20 school year. Renovations, funded by the 2017 bond measure, were carried out in 2019 and 2020, including a new gym, a new modular building containing 4 classrooms for the preschool housed at Eastwood's campus, a new layout of the parking lot and drop-off areas, and the addition of heating,
Farmington View
Opened in 1950, Farmington View was a part of its own single school district before unification in 1996. Prior to 1950 the schoolhouse for the district was in several other locations, including on Rood Bridge Road at Burkhalter Road east of the current building site. Located south of Hillsboro on Oregon Route 219, the school has an enrollment of 310 as of the 2019-20 school year, and students are known as the Bobcats. The single-story school building, has of space. A 2017 construction bond built a new modular building containing two classrooms and a restroom on the school's campus in 2018, and renovation improvements were carried out in 2021 including to the layout of the drop-off area and the addition of air conditioning.
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