OLD TOWN — A magnet school in Old Town has further cemented its status as one of the city's top performing elementary schools by winning this year's national blue ribbon award, it was announced Tuesday.
LaSalle Language Academy, 1734 N. Orleans St., was one of 335 schools across the country chosen to receive the honor from the United States Department of Education this year.
It was one of two Chicago schools to win. A Catholic school in Jefferson Park, St. Cornelius Elementary School, 5252 N. Long Ave., was also recognized.
Since 1982, the honor has been awarded to schools that achieve overall academic excellence or progress in closing achievement gaps among student subgroups, according to the award's website.
LaSalle enrolls 560 students in kindergarten through eighth grade. The student body is 32 percent white, 30.8 percent black, 20.9 percent Hispanic, 8.8 percent Asian and 7.5 percent multi-racial, according to Chicago Public Schools. Approximately a quarter of the students, or 37.9 percent, are considered low income.
In the 2013-2014 school year, 82 percent of LaSalle kids met or exceeded state standards on the Illinois Standards Achievement Test, according to a news release.
When LaSalle Principal Beth Bazer announced the news of the national blue ribbon over the intercom Tuesday morning, she said "you could hear the screaming and cheering from the main office."
"It's a feeling of jubilation in this school today. It's awesome," she said.
The elementary school is unique, she said, because of its comprehensive world language program and its "incredible teachers."
Students at LaSalle are assigned a language when they start kindergarten and continue to learn the language through eighth grade, when they both visit the country where the language is spoken and host a student from the foreign country, she said.
"It's a real opportunity to gain a cross-cultural experience," Bazer said.
Though she's been the head of the school for only four months, Bazer said she continues to be impressed by the teachers and how much they care for the students and families.
Before Principal Bazer, Elisabeth Heurtefeu was the head of the school for eight years. Heurtefeu made the difficult decision to leave the top-performing school in part due to new federal testing mandates.
"Rigorous standards were needed," she previously told DNAinfo Chicago. "What was not needed was over-testing."
For a full list of the 2015 national blue ribbon schools, visit the program's website.
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