West High School

West High School 's Pioneer pride runs deep for West students. Wichita High School West "Home of the Pioneers," is a four-year comprehensive 5A high school. Opened in 1953, West High offers students opportunities to gain skills in all required areas and a wide variety of elective areas and is a High Schools That Work site.

High Schools That Work (HSTW) is an effort based school improvement initiative founded on the conviction that most students can master rigorous academic and career/technical studies if school leaders and teachers can create an environment that motivates students to make the effort to succeed. Partnering with Southern Regional Educational Board (SREB) as a HSTW site provided an Academy structure to better meet student's classroom to career needs.

The Academy structure includes the following Academies:

• Freshman Success
• Fine Arts and Communication
• Health and Human Services 
• Engineering and Manufacturing
• Business and Hospitality Services.

Our affiliation with the High Schools That Work School Reform initiative along with our academy approach, including a four-year professional development program, enhances the skills of those wanting to enter into many career fields.

West High Academy Programs provide the necessary foundation linking high school to post secondary education, whether it is through an apprenticeship program, technical college, or a four-year institution. Each academy is a school within a school, academics are taught as they relate to careers. Dedicated to quality performance, the focus is on understanding, application and integration of the academic and technical skills necessary in the modern workplace. Community learning experiences are an integral part of the four-year plan to make the student's education come alive.

Exit Kellogg at Seneca. Go south on Seneca to Dayton. Go east on Dayton to West High. See Maps for all USD 259 locations.

The mission of Wichita High School West is to provide each student with a safe learning environment and an equitable opportunity to develop competencies necessary to become a productive member of society.

Vision Statement

The Wichita High School West Academies provide the necessary foundation linking high school to post secondary education, whether it is through an apprenticeship program, technical college, or a four-year institution. Each academy is a school within a school; academies are taught as they relate to careers. Dedicated to quality performance, the focus is on understanding, application and integration of the academic and technical skills necessary in the modern workplace. The academy model provides us the opportunity to customize programs to support student needs through tiered interventions, structured classes and small learning communities.

1. Reading - All students will improve reading comprehension scores across all curricular areas.
   
2. Writing - All students will improve writing skills across the curriculum.
   
3. Math - All students will improve mathematics and problem solving skills.
   

Each school has a site council, which is a group of parents, community members, business representatives, teachers and other school staff. Site councils identify, consider and discuss educational problems and issues at the school. Councils provide advice and counsel for evaluating state, school district and school site performance goals and objectives. Councils may also recommend methods that may be employed at the school site to meet these goals and objectives.

Meeting day: Four times a year; on evenings to be determined
Time: 6:30 p.m.
Location: Room E9/11

• High Schools That Work 
• AVID
• Computer-based Learning Center
• Project Pass-After School Tutoring
• JROTC
• Project "Lead The Way" Pre-engineering classes
• Student Technology Leadership Program
• eXtreme Reading
• EMT, CNA/CMA courses
• Fine Arts

• Business Professionals of America (BPA)
• Distributive Education Club of America (DECA)
• Occupational Family and Consumer Sciences (OFACS)
• JROTC program    
• National Honor Society
• Learning Center
• Student Council
• Pioneer Peer Leaders
• Future Educators of America
• Youth Court
• Pioneers for Peace
• Outdoor Wildlife Learning Sanctuary (OWLS)
• Numerous Clubs and Athletic Teams

The Wichita Public schools offer a comprehensive interscholastic athletic program for high school students. For more information click here to go to the Athletic website.

In September 1953, Wichita High School West opened, the culmination of a drive begun in 1925 when the West Wichita Community Council started campaigning for a high school west of the Arkansas River. Twenty years elapsed before plans for a vocational-technical school started. Development of these plans resulted in an academic school now classified as a comprehensive high school by the North Central Association.

The one-story, intercom equipped, multi-wing building designed by architects Glen H. Thomas and A.B. Harris served as the prototype for the later construction of Wichita High Schools South and Southeast. The building was regarded as adequate for the long-range needs of the community; but by the third year of operation it was necessary to add 25 classrooms, and by 1971 the building was surrounded by 24 portable units. The first year the student body totaled 1,035 students; by 1959 there were 1,907. The rapid growth made it impossible to practice the original concept of having each department housed in its own wing. The faculty doubled and the enrollment more then doubled. A new library media center was added in 1976 and the existing library was renovated. In 1979, Wichita High School Northwest opened which caused the enrollment at West to decrease.

At its inception, only 22 percent of the graduates went on to college. Therefore, the curriculum reflected an emphasis on vocational preparation. In the large homemaking department the students studied food preparation, family budgeting, child care and family relations so they were prepared to enter home and family life. The business education department offered courses in stenography, secretarial training, retail selling and business, and the industrial education department offered printing, mechanical drawing, general metals, woodworking, auto mechanics, electricity and other trades.

The first graduating class erected a memorial to the Pioneers of the West. The class of 1956 planned its own commencement with student speakers, a practice since adopted by other schools in the city. In 1969, a group of art students and their instructor created a sculptured relief mural in fired clay, 20 feet long and 15 feet high, outside the school office. The cast bronze-effect mural illustrates mathematics, art, music, drama, social studies, science, industrial arts, language arts, home economics and business curricular areas.

Lockers were replaced in 1981. In 1988 and 1989, alterations were made to the cafeteria and several classrooms.

In the fall of 1988, all ninth graders were moved to high schools. The enrollment has leveled to an average of 1,500 students.

From A History of Wichita Public School Buildings, c 1997