Students from Palisades Charter High School returned to in-person classes today, marking a new chapter in their educational journey post the devastating Southern California fires earlier this year. The high school, having been significantly damaged by the blazes, has found a new temporary home at a repurposed Sears building in Santa Monica. Governor Gavin Newsom, present to witness the school's revival, expressed his contentment with the community's resilience and the collaborative efforts that led to this moment. "I’m happy to welcome the administrators, educators and students of Palisades Charter High School back to in-person learning," Newsom said. "While this home is only temporary until we can get them back to their regular site, the partnership and collaboration between state and local officials to get this new site up and running shows the spirit of our recovery."
The initiative to return to in-person learning could not come soon enough, as the community has been navigating the challenges of remote learning since the fires in January. With a student body numbering over 2,400, the move to hurriedly adapt a former retail space into an educational facility was no small task. Yet, with determination as the watchword, state and local entities managed to quickly convert the space, embodying a tangible sign of the area's capacity to rebuild and heal. This effort has ensured that all eight public schools affected by the disaster have now resumed in-person education.
Following the tragedy of the fires, clearing debris and restoring normality to the educational environments became a top priority for the Newsom administration. Last month saw the completion of debris removal at the original campus of Palisades Charter High School. The return to physical classrooms is also in line with executive initiatives taken by the Governor earlier on, focused on accelerating Californian children's journey back into the classroom and providing necessary aid to schools amidst the crisis.
Furthermore, the steps taken to prioritize school sites for debris removal have enabled rebuilding efforts to quickly commence safely. When the state and federal partners launched the structural debris removal process back in February, they spotlighted a school location that had been cleared already.
