Tech school's achievement well deserved

WASILLA — Mat-Su Career and Technical High School is known locally as a school of high achieving students and wonderful teachers. Now something amazing has happened to allow Tech to be known this way on the national level as well.

On September 29 it was announced the school has become a Blue Ribbon school! What does a Blue Ribbon School mean? It is an award to recognize “Exemplary high performing schools and exemplary achievement gap closing schools.”

Tech was among 335 schools in the country to receive this award. CTHS was invited to apply for this award last year and it has been a “long, secretive process,” according to Principal Mark Okeson. It is known as a difficult to attain award that involves many statistics and rates from schools.

While students can pick up on this feeling of excitement, the actual award won’t arrive at our school until Mr.Okeson returns from a trip to Washington, D.C. to retrieve it. Since Mr.Okeson rarely misses any school students will notice the lack of a principal in the hallways on November 8, 9 and 10, as he will be retrieving the prestegious award.

This is a big deal in our school district as well. CTHS is only one of three schools in the history of the Mat-Su Borough School District to have received this award; Larson Elementary in 2009, Iditarod Elementary in 2004,and now Career Tech in 2015! Notice that Tech is the only high school to ever win.

Students and teachers alike are excited and honored to receive this award. Assistant principal Mr. Simmons said the honor “is one more thing to show how special this school is and what a great place it is to be. [The award] puts an exclamation on our excellence.” Students are assured that Tech is still striving to be better.

This doesn’t mean that Tech is perfect, it is just “increasing the value of your diplomas,” Okeson said.

Tech was truly honored to be invited to apply let alone receive this award. Students are walking around with their heads held high with the knowledge that they have helped in attaining this prestigious award, especially since Tigers are students from all over the district.

“It was the effort of the whole school district that allowed us to receive this award,” said junior Madeline Larson.

CTHS is a representation of the cooperation of all of the schools in the district, a place where students from all schools can come and learn together to earn their certifications, and that is something Tech students have been proud of since the school’s opening.

This national recognition shows how hard everyone in the school district has worked to achieve this 5 star level learning environment. CTHS is truly honored to receive such an award and would like to thank everyone who helped the school reach this status.

Stormy Powers (her real name) is a Senior at Mat-Su Career & Technical High School. She is a member of student government and is editor of the school newspaper, The Tiger Tribune.