Desert View High School opened in 1985[3] with 9th, 10th, 11th and 12th grade classes. The new school was designed with the philosophy that it was an educational regime, focussed on itself and set apart from its community. The building was thus designed with no windows, and a single entrance that would present an "impregnable face to the world".[4]
Desert View is one of three high schools in the Sunnyside school district; the other two being Sunnyside High School and Star Academic High School. It is ranked #170 amongst Arizona high schools, and #1 in the Sunnyside Unified School District.[5] About 80% of the school role are hispanic,[6] However, lying close to the Valencia reserve border, the school has the largest population of Native Americans in any off-reservation school in Tucson, about 10% of the school role.[7] In 2007 the school pioneered a Native American Literature class curriculum. This was developed because the school recognised that Native American students were harmed when none of the curriculum reflected their own culture, and that other students were studying American literature absent Native authors. Indigenous cultures and histories were also not being recognised in the metropolitan area.[8]
Ortiz, Flora Ida; Gonzales, Rosa (November 1, 2000). "Latino High School Students' Pursuit of Higher Education". Aztlán: A Journal of Chicano Studies. 25 (1): 67–108. doi:10.1525/azt.2000.25.1.67.
San Pedro, Timothy J. (November 1, 2015). "Silence as Shields: Agency and Resistances among Native American Students in the Urban Southwest". Research in the Teaching of English. 50 (2): 132–153. doi:10.58680/rte201527599. ISSN0034-527X.
Simmons, Lizbet (December 31, 2020). "3. The Docile Body in School Space". Schools Under Surveillance: 55–70. doi:10.36019/9780813548265-004.
