Skyline High School

Yes, I am a product of the Oakland Public Schools! Sky High as we called it, or Skyline High School is the high school in Oakland located all the way up in the hills on Skyline Blvd. My time here I did enjoy with various ups and downs. Oakland schools do not have those yellow school buses like other districts, like the suburban ones over the hill. No we had to take the city public buses AC Transit. Getting to school was a bit of a trek, living in Montclair, I had to walk down to the Village and get a bus to take me all the way back up the hills to school. This taught us real world skills like knowing how to cross the street, with out having some stupid «crossing guard» shepard us across the crosswalk. No yellow school bus to stop traffic with that little pop out stop sigh on the side of the bus … no, we learned to use our brains and cross when there were no cars. So, I am grateful for the real world experiences of Oakland.
Skyline tended to be a bit more academic and arts oriented than the rest of the Oakland high schools. We always got whooped in track and field, but our golf and swimming teams did better than most. I thought for the most part the teachers were decently motivated and I didn’t get stuck with the old crumungen teachers. It’s been some years but I do remember my days there when I drive by there. Red and white… I think those were our colors! If you have to send your kids to high school in Oakland, try to live in the district for Skyline High, second choice would probably be Oakland High on Park Blvd.

Dance Department headed by Ms. Dawn James is the BEST program in all of Oakland’s High School’s hands down. Look at where all her past dancers have ended up. It’s truly amazing.

I’ll go ahead and review this place since I been visiting this place for so many times, not as a student, but as an outsider.
What sucks about this school is that there is a perception of this school being at a higher scholastic level due to the location of the campus being on top of the Oakland Hills, it’s a false reality.
What IS real, is that this school is a perfect example of what happens when money is taken out of the education system and it’s left for the school administration to fill in the role of creating funds for itself.
In the last 5 years, there has been 4 principals, each one trying to stabilize and mobilize the faculty and staff in creating a supportive school environment. Let me give you some examples. Oakland High has rallied around a structured administration, stable VPs, school spirit, and much more acceptance in diversity of cultures than the other public high schools in this district. Oakland Tech has some good administration, but their key personnel is their principal, who seems to be a diamond in the ruff at this school. Oakland Tech has surprised me in the last couple of years, school spirit is becoming very organized, the student body has grown to be alot more pleasant to deal with.
So what’s with Skyline? The students don’t seem to support alot of school functions (is it because the campus is on the top of the hill and the kids just want to leave after school is done?). There’s many staff members that I have seen and worked with that truly believes in this school, but the student body just doesn’t support them back.
Why?
Here’s my pluses and I will leave it at that…
Great theater program, great activities director and class advisors, friendly friendly security staff, positive parents and families.
Come on students! Support Skyline and what this place has to offer.

When I entered its hallowed halls, a 4’11 whisp of a 14-​year-​old, what did I expect in an education? It taught me my biggest life’s lesson: how to skirt the system, which I find useful to this day!
Some helpful hints a) how to slip through that hole in the fence near the 30 end zone and ditch the narcs; b) make friends with short-​day passes and cars; c) make your escape in the trunks of these cars. Oh, and don’t get drunk before your AP French class because Madame DeRill has the nose of a bloodhound and will smell it on your breath. Always wear 3 jackets to Caldecott, and don’t bother doing your hair because it’ll get ruined in pea-​soup fog.
These hijinks and I still graduated with a 3.6 average. I had some crappy teachers, but a few rock stars, such as Mr. Campbell for history a «liberal» in the Regan/​Bush-​dominated political landscape of the late 80s/​early 90s and Mr. Pessick for AP Econ. And Dr. Galton who took us to see «Blue Velvet» as a postmodern treatise of symbolism.

I’m still blown away that Skyline (or Sky-​high as they used to call it) is on Wikipedia and now has vegetarian options! In my day, the only veggie options were Doritos from the vending machine. Kids today!
Famous alumni (aside from yours truly): Tom Hanks and Del the Funkee Homosapien.