University High School

one of the best high schools in the Southern California area. very competitive setting with great teachers and staff. my little brother has been going here for 2 years now and for the most part likes his experience. even though it’s not a private school they really get you ready for college here. exercise your brain!

This school IS as GOOD as it gets! I live in Irvine just so my children can attend schools like this one. I’m glad my son is attending UNI. I have heard this is a tough school and what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger and growing up in this world isn’t a piece of cake.
Preparation is the key to success!

I went to this high school until 2010 and it was the best high school I ever attended.
The academics here are TOP NOTCH. I went to a high school in Santa Ana before this one. Trust me– Uni is the best. It’s worth it to live in Irvine JUST to send your kids to this school. Even though your kid may not get as high of a GPA as they would in another school, they will come out more prepared and competitive for the real world in college. My college GPA is HIGHER than my high school one. That says something. Little Jimmy may get into UCI instead of UCLA but at UCI he will be the top of his class instead of in the middle of the pile.
The teachers are ALL GOOD here. Yeah some have annoying personalities but they all do their job and will TEACH your kids.
The best teachers I ever had here: Mrs. Natan/​Fox, Mrs. Raitt, Mrs. Ives, the tall blonde kind of heavyset pre calculus teacher who I forgot the name of, Mr. Chinn, and Mrs. Wallenrod.

best publick school in oc

I WILL BE REVIEWING OUR SCHOOL’S CAFETERIA
CONGRATS OUR SCHOOL IS RANKED 8^th IN THE NATION!
HOWEVER, THE FOOD HERE CAN BE RANKED 8^th FROM BEHIND!
Elementary School cafeteria food to middle school cafeteria food was a big step forward. No more do we have to wait until Friday’s to order pizza, middle school had a larger variety of food, beverages, and even ice cream! Not to say that the quality of food improved, it was still somewhat nasty, but it was nevertheless a HUGE LEAP forward.
However, this is not the case for University High School. Although Uni does have more choices for food, the selections they added were inedible, and I feel that the food is less healthy. Fries were soggy and oddly colored, chick fil-​a had an odd scent to it, their combo meals looked hideous, and the pizza was inconsistent.
On the upside, the lunch ladies were moderately friendly and most of them were smiling and did not seem to absolutely loathe their jobs.
BATHROOM REVIEWS: i don’t know why im doing this for my school, but I think it’s a good habit to put bathroom reviews for all my food-​related reviews.
The 200s bathroom is clean, plenty of stalls, automatic pissing stalls with dividers, and adequate amount of mirrors. The soap is very rough on the skin despite being water diluted.
300s bathroom is less clean but acceptable, pissing stalls have no dividers, a pooping stall doesnt have a door, and plenty of vandalism. More sewage issues and inadequate amount of mirrors for the self-​conscious high schooler.
500s bathroom, similar to the 200’s bathroom except more dark.
Heard the administrators are reworking the schedule next year so hopefully we can have more time to walk/​drive to somewhere else to eat

How do I sum-​up 4 years of my life in a single review. Overall, this high school was tough, very tough. Your child doesn’t have to go through Uni to get into a great university. If they get the same gpa at Woodbridge, they’re getting into the same schools. Unfortunately, getting a very high gpa at uni for 4 years is no easy task. In fact, going to Woodbridge, and maintaining a higher gpa means acceptance into better university’s. And yes I took a summer course at Woodbridge, and it was like piece-​of-​cake heaven. Looking back I will make a bold statement and say I think the graduates at Woodbridge overall from my friends didn’t have as good an outcome as myself and my peers; I have no idea why that would be. But if your a good student who will be a good student anywhere. But I really wish Uni would have filtered their professors better. I had a few really bad teachers and some amazing ones. Also, the biology curriculum here is very very weak; this is coming from someone graduating with A’s in their biology department. I went into college not as prepared in biology as I should have been. Despite being a great public school, class sizes were large and learning wasn’t reinforced with anything besides a 1 time test.
Fresh and Soph. year are pretty easy-​going. But when junior year comes around and counselor’s are pressuring you to take 4 AP and honors courses, things start to change.
They had very excellent teachers and some very bad teachers.
Bad teachers:
Ms. Parmalou– She is still teaching. Do not have your child take Ms. Parmalou’s honors chemistry class! That teacher was very condescending. Super nice to other teachers/​parents, and very mean to students. I once accidentally broke a .75 cent graduated cylinder, and the expression on her face made me want to cry. Honey, find a job that brings you peace. Literally I just earned my two bachelors and have been accepted into dental school; taken more units than anyone should, and can confidently say this was the worst teacher I ever had in my life.
Mr. Ives– you are very nice, but people were constantly cheating in your AP European class. I wasn’t one of them, which is prob. why I’m bitter now. But seriously do something about this. And the reason they were cheating was because you did not enforce the readings, thus everyone was very unprepared for your exams. I honestly learned nothing in this class.
Mr. Wilson– they ended-​up firing him the year after I took his Algebra 2 class. Thank you UNI for letting me be your guinea pig. I think every one knows what its like to get a bad math teacher you can’t learn from…
Some fantastic teachers:
Ms. Natan– was the best! I want to add that all the Spanish teachers here were very enthusiastic about their jobs and taught well.
Mr. Jerrako– LOVE! I was president of Girls’ League and he did a fantastic job guiding us to organize winter formal to UNI. He was seriously the best, you could go to him for anything.
Another huge suggestion I would give to students is step outside your box! You know that ceramics class, automobile emergency class, and college units, all of which you don’t have to do. well do it! For a number of reasons I can’t fully list here those out of the box classes will be the one’s most useful and memorable to you. And focus on your career, begin the pathway to your career in high school, trust me you will thank yourself later.
Overall, I saw UNI as taking the harder way in life with the same outcome, but it really depends on the perseverance of the student in subject.