Odessa High School

I agree with the previous poster regarding the leadership, however, my kids love going to school here. They have excellent extracurricular programs and alot of parental involvement. I enjoy the school for the most part but would prefer to see more focus on academic achievement.
--Submitted by a parent

Odessa High School is in dire need of new leadership that truely has the students social advancement and academics in mind, Principal and vice principal need to be replaced. They appear to have many zero tolerance dicipline policies in place that do not consider the situation or circumstances involved. Their approach to dicipline does nothing to help the student learn and modify their behavior. Their answer to everything is ISS, OSS, or alternative school and they are unfair and bias in their dicipline according to how well they like the student or their parents. They simply want to rush the students through and deal with no behavioral or social issues common in High School. They have trouble keeping good teachers and are more focused on sports than academics. Good leadership could turn this school around and it needs it badly. I have put 3 children through this school all with 3.0gpa or better and still would not recommend it to anyone at this point. It was a struggle since our family wasn't on their elite preferred list. I wish I could have moved and sent them elsewhere so they would not have had to deal with the misguided leadership in this school.
--Submitted by a parent

The administration at OHS will not work with parents who have children who are ill. They are unyeilding even to the doctors. If your child is bright they leave you on your own to work it out yourself. I fyou are thinking of movinf your children to theis district, please reconsider. A parent.
--Submitted by a parent

Odessa High School is strong in that there is a sense of community and there aren't too many strong 'clicks' (if this is possible in high school). There is also a strong sense of school spirit which one might not find elsewhere. But OHS has one flaw which many of the schools in rural areas have. This is that the school does not focus on gearing their programs towards students who are college bound. I graduated in '06 and felt that the students like myself who were college bound weren't getting very much attention, we were left on our own for the most part. We weren't aided in the search for colleges , nor encouraged to take college prep. courses. For example, the French department was cut and foreign languages aren't required for graduation. Also other departments are lacking such as the fact that there is only one AP course provided!
--Submitted by Deborah, a former student

I graduated in 2003 and now have three children of my own. I barely made it. I graduated with a 3.6GPA and that was more my wanting then the encouragement from the staff. I had my own dreams and not a lot of students do and they need the guidence. I had three siblings in the district and after my sister graduated last may, she moved. One of my brothers dropped out of Odessa High due the bulling that has ABSOLUTLY NO PLACE IN THE HALLS OF A LEARNING FACILITY. If you are planning to move and put your kids here, DON'T. I moved last here so that my children would never have to experiance the pain I saw in so many eyes of my classmates. Growing up is stressfull, troubles at school should not make it that bad.
--Submitted by Brandie Long (Lyons), a former student

I find this school to be severely lacking in leadership from the principal on down. I have personally witnessed a teacher verbally abuse students and when brought to the administrations attention I was told 'oh, sorry to hear about that'. This teacher is still on the payroll today. I have also seen that when it comes to 'no tolerance' policies, it depends on who you are/know as to whether or not it's tolerated. This school does seem to have adopted the policy of 'what you don't know won't hurt you' attitude towards the parents. Instead of being open and honest with the parents, telling them of the problems and asking for their help/support in fixing the problems, this school believes in covering up the problems. With such a high turnover in teachers, there is obviously something wrong on several levels here. Sports/band definitely play a bigger role than academics do here.
--Submitted by a parent

I love Odessa Highschool. It has a great atmosphere and it'a a wonderful place to be raised. Everyone knows everybody. It has a small town atmosphere but with major cities just in a short drive. The school is pushing for higher MAP testing scores and they're doing there best to meet A+ competencies. The teachers are wonderful and very thoughtful of the students needs. Sports are very strong and the band program is outstanding.Odessa is a mostly white populated school but no one is dicriminated against. The only problem i have ever had with the school is the size. The student body is growing and the classrooms aren't meeting the demand. However they're thinking about building a new band room which is needed. In my opinion though football over academics has way too much emphasis,but academics are rewarded and congratulated.
--Submitted by a student

It has been my experience there was a lot of discrimination in those halls. Though they were very good with there zero tolerance rule, they tended to in force it a little late they weren't getting to the root of the problem. The teachers do the best they can but the classes were filled to the maximum amount of students. Which in turn made learning difficult. I've seen many people fall threw the cracks of the 'no child left behind ' act, I myself was one of them. I know many that went to the ACE program to get away from the children that taunted them in those halls. This school needs better supervision half the student body are bullys. No child should have to learn in that kind of environment it makes them scared to go to a place their suposted to be safe in. This horrid trend needs to end.
--Submitted by a student