Washington School Students Study Great Americans

Washington Primary School continues to celebrate great Americans through literacy. Third graders in teacher Vivian Joseph’s dual language class recently learned all about Dolores Huerta, who migrant workers consider a hero.

“The beauty of books is they take us to faraway places in the past and present,” Washington Principal Dr. Michelle Richards said.

Washington students on every grade level learn about great Americans in every walk of life. The third graders found the book, “Dolores Huerta, A Hero to Migrant Workers” to be fascinating.

“Ms. Huerta believed that ‘every minute is an opportunity to change the world,’” Mrs. Joseph said. “In class, we analyzed and discussed what Dolores Huerta meant when she said this. The students wrote about their future goals and how they plan to help others and change the world.”

More than 15,000 youngsters have “graduated” from Washington School over the past 70 years. The alums have gone on to study at all the top universities in the country and excel in hundreds of career fields. The building opened in September 1954 and for most of its history it served students in grades K-6. Today, about 375 students ranging from pre-kindergarten through third grade are filling classrooms.

Co-founder of the United Farm Workers Association, Dolores Clara Fernandez Huerta is considered to be one of the most influential labor activists of the 20th century and a leader of the Chicano civil rights movement, according to the National Women’s History Museum.

The recipient of many honors, Ms. Huerta received the Eleanor Roosevelt Human Rights Award in 1998 and the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2012.