Welcome to the Altar Valley Elementary School District website. Located twenty miles west of Tucson, Arizona, we are proud of our educational contribution to our community's students. With our outstanding teaching staff, dedicated support staff, and committed administrators, the Altar Valley School District maintains the highest standards for our students.

We hope you will use our website to learn more about our district and the excellent services we provide. Whether you are looking for student registration information, job openings, or our school calendar and events, you'll find it here. If you have questions and you don't find answers here, please contact us directly by phone or email.

Dear Altar Valley Families,

A recent article in the Arizona Daily Star highlighted the shrinking level of pre-kindergarten services available to students nationwide. Families across the country are finding fewer school districts able to provide comprehensive pre-kindergarten programs for their children. I am very pleased to report that Altar Valley avoided this trend. Recently, our district learned that we have been awarded two significant grants that will enable the district to approximately double the size of its pre-kindergarten enrollment. The awards are a result of successful grant proposals submitted to First Things First, identifying the need to expand services for pre-kindergarten aged students within the district. 

The pre-kindergarten scholarship grant will provide resources for the district to staff a second classroom for preschool students. Students in families whose household income is at or below 200 percent of the Federal Poverty Level are eligible for this program tuition-free. Students in families with incomes in excess of this limit will be eligible for services on a sliding scale. Simultaneously, the district also received funding to modernize and expand the inadequate playground that currently serves early childhood students. 

This funding is absolutely vital to us as we continue our pursuit of delivering a world-class education to each of our students. I firmly believe this funding is a game-changer for our district. We have an identified need to increase the level of preparedness of our students entering kindergarten. This funding will enable us to do exactly that.

Anecdotally, our kindergarten teachers frequently commented on the gap in student readiness between students entering kindergarten with and without formal preschool experiences. More specifically, a renowned study from the University of North Carolina that followed students from birth through age 30 found that children from low-income families who receive high-quality educational interventions reap long-lasting benefits, including increased achievement in math and reading and a greater likelihood of enrolling in and graduating from a four-year college (Carolina Abecedarian Project).  

Kim Scott, a veteran kindergarten teacher in the district has been named the new lead teacher for our pre-kindergarten program. Please contact her at 822-9418 to learn more about this wonderful opportunity. You may also e-mail her at kscott@avsd.org. 

Kudos to our Governing Board

The many wonderful gains our district made over the course of the past several years (including the expansion of the preschool) did not occurr by accident. Rather they are the result of the purposeful work of our governing board. 

The hard work and commitment to making decisions in the best interest of our kids garnered our board statewide recognition. At the annual conference of the Arizona School Boards Association (ASBA), our governing board was named the 2011 recipient of the Lou Ella Kleinz Award of Excellence. This is the highest honor ASBA bestows on a governing board as the award recognizes the Arizona school board that demonstrated the most outstanding educational leadership during the year. To provide a little perspective, there are over 240 member districts in ASBA.

Governing board members Robert Ethridge, Patricia King, W. John Williams, Sharon Nicholas, and Chris Isabel were recognized for their efforts and received a standing ovation at the ASBA awards dinner held in Phoenix in front of more than 650 people.

Congratulations to this terrific leadership team!

Sincerely,

Dr. Nathan McCann
Superintendent
(520) 822-1484
E-mail