The Westminster School District (WSD) is an elementary school district in Orange County,

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

, established in 1872 and headquartered in

Westminster Westminster is the main settlement of the City of Westminster in Central London, Central London, England. It extends from the River Thames to Oxford Street and has many famous landmarks, including the Palace of Westminster, Buckingham Palace, ...

. It operates schools in Westminster, Garden Grove,

Huntington Beach Huntington Beach is a seaside city in Orange County, California, United States. The city was originally called Pacific City, but it was changed in 1903 to be named after American businessman Henry E. Huntington. The population was 198,711 as o ...

, and

Midway City Midway City is an unincorporated community and census-designated place (CDP) that forms part of the county land controlled by Orange County, California. The only area in Orange County that incorporates its chamber of commerce and homeowners as ...

. It operates elementary and middle schools. High school students attend schools in the

Huntington Beach Union High School District The Huntington Beach Union High School District (HBUHSD) is a public school district serving portions of the Orange County cities of Huntington Beach, Fountain Valley, Garden Grove and Westminster. It oversees eight sites, offering courses ...

as well as in the Garden Grove Unified School District. Racial segregation and discrimination against Mexican-American students by the school district resulted in a 1947 federal court case, Mendez v. Westminster, which ordered

desegregation Racial integration, or simply integration, includes desegregation (the process of ending systematic racial segregation), leveling barriers to association, creating equal opportunity regardless of race, and the development of a culture that draws ...

of the district's schools, so that Mexican and non-Mexican children attended the same schools. The plaintiffs had argued that Mexican-Americans were white and therefore should be allowed to attend the schools reserved for white children. The courts ruled that even if the students were not white, public schools "must be open to all children by unified school association regardless of lineage", except when segregation was explicitly authorized by state law.

List of schools

Elementary schools

* Anderson Elementary (K–6, Garden Grove) * Clegg Elementary (K–5, Huntington Beach) * DeMille Elementary (K–6, Midway City) * Eastwood Elementary (K–6, Westminster) * Finley Elementary (K–5, Westminster) * Fryberger Elementary (K–5, Westminster) * Hayden Elementary (K–5, Midway City) * Meairs Elementary (K–5, Garden Grove) * Schmitt Elementary (K–5, Westminster) * Schroeder Elementary (K–6, Huntington Beach) * Sequoia Elementary (K–6, Westminster) * Webber Elementary (K–6, Westminster) * Willmore Elementary (K–6, Westminster)

Middle schools

* Stacey Middle (6–8, Huntington Beach) * Johnson Middle (6–8, Westminster) * Warner Middle (6–8, Westminster)

Child development schools

* John F. Land School (Westminster)

Closed schools

* 17th Street (Westminster) * Hoover Elementary (Westminster) * Midway City Elementary (Midway City) * Virginia K. Boos / Barber City Elementary (Barber City) * Cook Elementary 14401 Willow Ln., Westminster, CA 92683 * Gil Elementary 15252 Victoria Ln, Huntington Beach, CA 92647

Historic references

An important precursor to the desegregation of schools across the nation, the Westminster School District was the defendant in the groundbreaking litigation Mendez v. Westminster. Five Mexican-American families sued on behalf of thousands of students who were forced to attend substandard schools within the district. Ultimately, the court ordered the school district to allow students of Mexican descent to attend schools that had been previously reserved for only white students. The case proved to be an important training-ground for ''

Brown v. Board of Education ''Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka'', 347 U.S. 483 (1954), was a landmark decision of the United States Supreme Court that ruled that U.S. state laws establishing racial segregation in public schools are unconstitutional, even if the ...

''. Thurgood Marshall authored an amicus curiae brief on behalf of the NAACP in favor of integration and later argued the merits before the Supreme Court in Brown. After the Mendez case, Governor Earl Warren led the call for full integration of California public schools. Additionally, the untimely death of Chief Justice Vinson during the Court's recess and the ascendancy of Earl Warren to the position of Chief Justice made the favorable ruling in Brown possible. In 2015, Westminster School District became the first school district in the State of California to offer a Vietnamese-English Dual Immersion Program. The program was first proposed in 2014 by Board Member Jamison Power, whose wife is Vietnamese-American. The program was implemented by the district's first minority Superintendent, Dr. Marian Kim-Phelps and the Director of the Office of Language Acquisition, Dr. Renae Bryant, after the board consisting of Jamison Power, Mary Mangold, Amy Walsh, Dave Bridgewaters, and Penny Loomer unanimously approved moving forward with implementing the program. In 2017, the program received the prestigious California School Boards Association Golden Bell award.

References

External links

* {{Authority control School districts in Orange County, California Westminster, California Education in Garden Grove, California School districts established in 1872 1872 establishments in California