East Los Angeles Renaissance Academy

East Los Angeles Renaissance Academy (ELARA) (Renaissance; officially East Los Angeles Renaissance Academy at Esteban E. Torres High School No. 2, unofficially East Los Angeles Renaissance Academy, School of Urban Planning and Design, and colloquially the Purple Building), is a small public, coeducational, pilot secondary school of the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) located in East Los Angeles, California. Founded in 2010 as an attempt to relieve student overcrowding at James A. Garfield High School, ELARA is one of five small schools established on the Esteban E. Torres High School campus, alongside East Los Angeles Performing Arts Magnet (ELAPA Magnet), Humanitas Academy of Arts and Technology (HAAT), Social Justice Leadership Academy (SJLA), and Engineering and Technology Academy (ETA).

East Los Angeles Renaissance Academy Academia Renacimiento del Este de Los Ángeles  (Spanish)
Address
4211 Dozier St. East Los Angeles Los Angeles , California 90063 United States
Coordinates	34°2′30.507″N 118°10′30.175″W
Information
School type	Pilot school/ Public
Religious affiliation(s)	Secular
Founded	2010
Status	Active
School district	Los Angeles Unified School District
School code	054450
NCES School ID	12657
Principal	Martin A Buchman
Teaching staff	18 Teachers
Grades	9–12
Gender	Co-Ed
Enrollment	402 (2018-2019)
• Grade 9	129
• Grade 10	107
• Grade 11	72
• Grade 12	94
Student to teacher ratio	23:1
Classrooms	15
Campus	Esteban Torres High School
Campus type	Urban
Color(s)	Purple
Mascot	Toro (Bull)
Newspaper	The Renaissance Newsletter (discontinued)
Information	Office : 323.265.6760 Fax : [phone]
Website	Schoolloop Website

ELARA is a four-year high school with an enrollment of 402 students for the 2018-2019 academy year. The school is distinctive for its curricular emphasis on the field of urban planning and design. Students are offered core academic courses, Advanced Placement (AP) courses, Career Technical Education (CTE), and courses required to prepare students for admission to University of California (UC) and California State University (CSU) systems. ELARA competes in the United States Academic Decathlon.

History

See also: Esteban Torres High School

Pre-Construction

Overcrowding at James A. Garfield High School

By the late 2000s, the Eastside region of the City of Los Angeles and East Los Angeles, an unincorporated area of Los Angeles, had a problem with overcrowded high schools due minimal school choices for new students. However, it was the overcrowded conditions at James A. Garfield High School, the only high school in East Los Angeles, which led to the establishment of Esteban E. Torres High School and its five pilot schools. Garfield was founded in 1925 and was built to withhold 1,500 students; however, by the late 20th century, the student population at the school had increased to a point at which the school had to implement a multi-track/year-round calendar to relieve the overpopulation, though this did not last. The overcrowding problem continued into the 21st century, prompting demands for the construction of a second high school in the area.

Approval of East Los Angeles High School No. 2

In 2004, the Board of the Education of the City of Los Angeles approved the construction of a new high school, then called “East Los Angeles High School No. 2”. On June 22, the Board of Education approved the final location of the future Esteban E. Torres High School.

Prior to the construction of the Torres High School campus, the land on which the ELARA building is now located was an agricultural center administered by the Los Angeles Conservation Corps.

Founding of ELARA

ELARA main entrance in 2013

In 2009, nine James A. Garfield High School teachers, along with students, parents, and representatives from community-based organizations, such as Inner City Struggle, joined together and submitted a proposal to the Los Angeles Unified School District Public School Choice motion in order to found the proposed East Los Angeles Renaissance Academy as a Pilot School at the yet unopened Esteban E. Torres High School campus. The main Design Team was composed of Martin Buchman, Michael Leavy, Zoe Souliotis-Foley, Michael Rocha, Rachel Varty (formerly Rachel Greene), Antonio Marquez, Norm Chen, Monique Ulivi, and Adrianne Harwood (formerly Adrianne Sarabia).[1]

2010-present

After being approved by the motion, the East Los Angeles Renaissance Academy opened, alongside its four other sister schools—East Los Angeles Performing Arts Academy (now Magnet), Engineering and Technology Academy, Humanitas Academy of Art and Technology, and Social Justice Leadership Academy—on September 13, 2010 at Torres campus.

On June 21, 2012, ELARA held its first class graduation. On June 5, 2014, the last of the founding student body graduated from the school.

On September 24, 2018, former biology teacher, Gina Murry, was accused of sexually assaulting a 15-year-old student during the months of May and June. She faces six counts of unlawful sexual intercourse and four counts each of committing a lewd act on a child, oral copulation of a person under 16, and sexual penetration by a foreign object.[2] On November 5, 2019, Murry pleaded no contest to the accusations.[3] On January 14, 2020, she was sentenced to 2 years in state prison.[4]

Education

School of Urban Planning and Design

ELARA main entrance in 2017

ELARA was designed to prepare students in the field of urban planning and design. The mission of the school is for students to see themselves as architects of their own future and of their community.

ELARA offers to its students a full range of college preparatory classes, independent study opportunities, project-based electives in New Media and architecture, and community-based internships—all with an emphasis in urban planning and design.

ELARA college-ready graduates obtain broad-based knowledge, learn collaborative skills, and gain the self-confidence necessary to become innovators and leaders in their communities and professions.

ELARA is "one of only three high schools in the United States with an Urban Planning/Design focus".[5]

Principals of ELARA

Term as Principal		Principal	Prior Position	Term	Assistant Principal
1	September 13, 2010 – June 22, 2012	Maricela Ramirez	Theodore Roosevelt High School Social Studies Teacher	–	–
2	August 14, 2012 – June 10, 2016	Jose Gonzalez	N/A	August 18, 2015 – June 10, 2016	Martin A. Buchman
3	August 16, 2016 – Present	Martin A. Buchman	ELARA English Teacher & Assistant Principal	N/A	Estevan Leyva

Schedule

Block Schedule (2010-2012)

During its first two years, ELARA functioned under a 2x8 block schedule system that allowed for the flexibility to accommodate students who needed to remediate their academic stance, accelerate in their studies, and acquire special needs during the regular school day. Under this schedule, students were granted an advantage in gaining more course credits than they would have gotten on a traditional schedule where a student would go to all their classes in a single day.

Ex. 2x8 Block Schedule of an 11th Grader (2011-2012)
Period	1st Semester		2nd Semester
	Day A	Day B	Day A	Day B
Period 1/5	Draft Architecture 1A	Trigonometry A	Draft Architecture 1B	Trigonometry B
Period 2/6	AP English Lit. A	AP Spanish Lang. A	AP English Lit. B	AP Spanish Lang. B
Advisory
Lunch
Period 3/7	Sociology	U.S. History A	Psychology	U.S. History B
Period 4/8	Drawing A	Filmmaking A	Drawing B	Filmmaking B

6-Course Rotating Schedule (2012-present)

During the 2012-2013 school year, ELARA switched from the 8-course block schedule system to a 6-course rotating schedule system.[6] Under this system, students meet for five of their six classes on any one day. Each day, one class of the six is “dropped” in the first rotation and another is “dropped” in the second rotation, adding the previously missing class to the beginning of the rotation. The rotation takes six days to complete and the process repeats beginning on the 7th school day.

Under this schedule system, ELARA class periods, or "tracks", are not listed in numerical hierarchy (1, 2, 3…) but in a letter-based hierarchy (A, B, C…).

Community Partners[7]

ELARA is in partnership with:

• UCLA
• USC
• Huntington Library
• Los Angeles Education Partnership[8]
• Public Matters LLC[9]
• 826LA[10]
• Cal Poly Pomona
• Inner City Struggle[11]
• Gensler[12]
• Ford Foundation
• Tony Bennett's Exploring the Arts
• Los Angeles Service Academy

Academics

Overall, ELARA had in 2011 a sophomore population that placed it slightly below average in the California High School Exit Exam (CAHSEE).[13]

In 2015, several ELARA 10th grade students took the CAHSEE,[14] with 78 students taking the Mathematics subject exam and 75 taking the English-Language Arts (ELA) subject exam. 78% passed the Math subject, falling 7% below the statewide average of 85%. 87% passed the ELA subject, rising 2% above the statewide average of 85%.

ELARA had also in 2011 a student population that placed it below average in the California Standardized Test (CST) or STAR.[15]

On January 1, 2014, the STAR Program was replaced by the California Assessment of Student Performance and Progress (CAASPP) System "to assist teachers, administrators, students, and parents by promoting high-quality teaching and learning through the use of a variety of assessment approaches and item types".[16] During the 2014-2015 school year, ELARA's 11th grade class taking the CAASPP resulted with 11% exceeding the standard, 26% meeting the standard, 37% nearly meeting the standard, and 26% not meeting the standard in English Language Arts/Literacy. 2% exceeded the standard, 7% met the standard, 24% nearly met the standard, and 67% did not meet the standard in Mathematics.[17] The 2015-2016 11th grade class resulted with 19% exceeding the standard, 49% meeting the standard, 25% nearly meeting the standard, and 7% not meeting the standard in English Language Arts/Literacy. 3% exceeded the standard, 19% met the standard, 39% nearly met the standard, and 39% did not meet the standard in Mathematics.[18]

Academic Decathlon

ELARA is the only school on the Torres campus that provides and maintains an Academic Decathlon program for its students only. The program is provided as an elective class. In this class, students are placed into either one of three competitive team ranks based on their grade-point average and skill level: Varsity, Scholastic, and Honors. Focusing on a selected subject determined by the United States Academic Decathlon Association (USADA), the class divides its curriculum into ten different disciplines: Language & Literature, Economics, Art, Music, Mathematics, Social Science, Science, Essay Writing, Speech, and Interview.

The program was first presented at the school during the Fall of 2011 as a before and after-school program coached by former ELARA math teather Sarah Newton (née Harville). Under her administration the program went on to become an elective class during the 2012-2013 school year.

Demographics

Ethnicity

ELARA is located in East Los Angeles, California, a predominantly Hispanic/Latino community. Based on the 2010 United States Census,[19] 97.1% of the population in East Los Angeles was Hispanic or Latino.

Ethnic composition of student body

Ethnicity	2010-2011[20]	2011-2012[21]	2012-2013[22]	2013-2014[23]	2014-2015[24]	2015-2016[25]	2016-2017[26]	2017-2018[27]	2018-2019[28]
Non-Hispanic White	0%	4.3%	0.5%	1.2%	1%	1%	0.7%	0.5%	0.7%
Hispanic or Latino	98.9%	95.3%	98.6%	98.3%	97.1%	97.8%	98%	98.7%	99.3%
Asian American	0%	0%	0.2%	0.2%	0.2%	0.2%	0.2%	0.5%	0%
African American	0.3%	0.2%	0.2%	0.2%	1%	0.7%	0.5%	0.3%	0%
Native American	0%	0%	0.2%	0%	0.2%	0.2%	0.5%	0%	0%
Other*	0.8%	0.2%	0.2%	0%	0.5%	0%	0%	0%	0%
*including unreported

Enrollment

Total Enrollment by Academic Year

Academic Year	Enrolled
2010-2011[20]	361
2011-2012[21]	471
2012-2013[21]	442
2013-2014[23]	420
2014-2015[24]	418
2015-2016[25]	402
2016-2017[26]	406
2017-2018[27]	392
2018-2019[28]	402

Enrollment by Grade Level

Grade Level	2010-2011[20]	2011-2012*[21]	2012-2013[22]	2013-2014[23]	2014-2015[29][30]	2015-2016[31]	2016-2017[32]	2017-2018[33]	2018-2019[34]
9th	168	215*	186	176	170	123	132	150	129
10th	120	139	113	101	93	136	108	84	107
11th	73	57	89	63	89	69	73	76	72
12th	0	60	54	80	66	74	93	82	94
*2011-2012 enrollment data shows one student enrolled as an 8th grader; outlier figure is added to 2011-2012 9th grade enrollment

During the 2017-2018 school year, 16.6%[35] of the student body were classified as English language learners. 64[35] of these students had Spanish as their primary spoken language. 1 student had Mandarin Chinese as their primary language.

93.6%[36] of the ELARA 2017-2018 student body come from low-income families. This designation is based on data presenting 367 out of the 392 students being eligible for free or reduced-price lunch. This is an increase of 8.9% from the 2016-2017 school year.

References

1. "ELARA (Urban Planning and Design) Application: Appendices" (PDF). LAUSD. Los Angeles Unified School District.
2. "Female East LA Teacher Accused of Sex Assault on 15-Year-Old". NBC Southern California. Retrieved September 26, 2018.
3. "November 5, 2019: Ex-High School Teacher Pleads to Sexually Assaulting Student". Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office. Retrieved March 17, 2020.
4. "January 14, 2020: Ex-High School Teacher Sentenced for Sexually Assaulting Student". Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office. Retrieved March 17, 2020.
5. "About Us". Retrieved August 13, 2012.
6. "Bell Schedule".
7. "School Partnerships". Retrieved October 6, 2013.
8. "LAEP". Retrieved August 30, 2012.
9. "Public Matters LLC". Retrieved August 30, 2012.
10. "826LA". Retrieved October 6, 2013.
11. "Inner City Struggle: Building a Movement in the Eastside". Retrieved October 6, 2013.
12. "Gensler". Archived from the original on October 12, 2013. Retrieved October 6, 2013.
13. "CAHSEE Results". Retrieved August 13, 2012.
14. "California High School Exit Exam (CAHSEE) Results for Mathematics and English-Language Arts (ELA) by Program (Combined 2015) for (Grade 10) East La Renaissance". California Department of Education. Retrieved June 3, 2017.
15. "CST Results". Retrieved August 13, 2012.
16. "California Assessment of Student Performance and Progress(CAASPP) System - CAASPP 101" (PDF). California Department of Education. Retrieved June 3, 2017.
17. "Smarter Balanced Assessment Test Results for East Los Angeles Renaissance Academy (2015)". California Department of Education. Retrieved June 3, 2017.
18. "Smarter Balanced Assessment Test Results for East Los Angeles Renaissance Academy (2016)". California Department of Education. Retrieved June 3, 2017.
19. "2010 Census Interactive Population Search: CA - East Los Angeles CDP". U.S. Census Bureau. Archived from the original on July 15, 2014. Retrieved July 12, 2014.
20. "2010-2011 Enrollment by School". Retrieved June 22, 2018.
21. "2011-2012 Enrollment by School". Retrieved June 22, 2018.
22. "2012-2013 Enrollment by School". Retrieved June 22, 2018.
23. "2013-2014 Enrollment by School". Retrieved June 22, 2018.
24. "2014-15 Enrollment by Ethnicity". Retrieved June 3, 2017.
25. "2015-16 Enrollment by Ethnicity". Retrieved June 3, 2017.
26. "2016-17 Enrollment by Ethnicity". Retrieved June 3, 2017.
27. "2017-18 Enrollment by Ethnicity". Retrieved June 21, 2018.
28. "2018-19 Enrollment by Ethnicity". Retrieved December 5, 2019.
29. "2014-15 Enrollment by Grade". Retrieved June 21, 2018.
30. "2014-2015 Enrollment by School". Retrieved June 22, 2018.
31. "2015-16 Enrollment by Grade". Retrieved June 21, 2018.
32. "2016-17 Enrollment by Grade". Retrieved June 21, 2018.
33. "2017-18 Enrollment by Grade". Retrieved June 21, 2018.
34. "2018-19 Enrollment by Grade". Retrieved December 5, 2019.
35. "English Learner Students by Language by Grade". California Department of Education. Retrieved June 21, 2018.
36. "School Profile: East Los Angeles Renaissance Academy at Esteban E. Torres High No. 2". California Department of Education. Retrieved June 21, 2018.