By Mary-Justine Lanyon
There’s a new face in the principal’s office at Mountain High School this school year.
Jeremy Montiel is at the helm of the continuation high school as its alternative education specialist.
The trustees, Montiel said, were looking for someone with a strong three years of leadership in a counseling realm. His master’s degree, from USC, is in education with an emphasis on school counseling. After earning that degree, he served as a school counselor in the Hesperia Unified School District.
Much of Montiel’s time has been spent supporting both academic and social-emotional behavior – collective mental health, as he calls it.
At Mountain High School, he sees his role as “helping students find what it takes for them to graduate. What barriers are there?” That’s what he is determined to discover and then help the students overcome those barriers.
“There is a lack of motivation when students come here,” the administrator said. “I want to help them – to light a fire. We will teach them the skills to be successful in a two-year college and then transfer to a four-year university.”
In an effort to accomplish his own goals, Montiel has set goals for his students. He is very proud that at the school’s second credit check they had earned just under 400 credits. “That is fantastic!” he said. “I want to increase that by 5 percent – I would like to see them earn 424 at the next credit check.”
He has set goals with the help of the students for that third credit check. Above all, he would like to improve the school’s attendance rate by 5 percent. To do that, he would like the students to keep to a consistent sleep schedule, engage in person with their classmates following the “2×10 rule” and limit their use of cell phones during approved times (no cell phones are allowed during instructional time).
“In doing so,” Montiel said, “Mountain High shall promote an inclusive, welcoming environment and surpass the credits earned schoolwide by 5 percent.”
What is the 2×10 rule? “I am challenging them to talk to someone for two minutes for 10 consecutive interactions about anything not to do with school,” Montiel said. He sees this as a way for the students to build relationships.
Once the students achieve the necessary number of credits to graduate, they don their cap and gown and are celebrated by the staff. “It’s amazing when they put on that cap and gown,” Montiel said. “You can see a change in their attitude.”
The best part of the school, he noted, is that “it is a very close-knit community. The district wanted someone to listen to the students nonjudgmentally – see them where they stand, help them set goals – and not focus on where they may have failed.”
Attendance is a big concern of Montiel’s but he’s pleased they have increased the attendance rate by 6 percent since the beginning of the year. “It’s partially due to a change in the environment,” he said. “We welcome the students when they walk in the door, tell them we’re glad they’re here.”
Montiel has also been working on developing a positive relationship with the students’ parents. When one student showed considerable improvement in his behavior, the administrator called the mother to tell her how proud he was of her son.
“Relationship first is my approach,” he said.
He has been learning a mile a minute, Montiel noted. “The Mountain High students have needed someone to believe in them. They are very adaptable to change. They respond well to tough love. I don’t like to sugar-coat things. They need an alternative setting because they haven’t been given the truth. They are resistant at first but then they realize it comes from a place of caring. They know we have their back in a calm, caring environment.”
Montiel is bringing with him a youth mental health first aid program for the staff that talks about burnout and what leads to it. “It comes down to a good life balance,” he said. “You put in your best A game at work and at life. Show up and be present.”
The program, he said, will help staff learn how to help students in crisis scenarios. There are students dealing with ADHD, others who have been issued an IEP. “They think that becomes them rather than them dealing with it. It is not their identity – it’s something they are experiencing.”
Currently there are 47 students in 11th and 12th grade at Mountain High. Ninety percent of the Mountain High students come from Rim High. “Rim sends us 11th-graders who are credit deficient,” Montiel said. There are a number of fifth-year students who are very close but didn’t quite meet the requirements to graduate.
Montiel also is the administrator for Rim Virtual Academy where they have four teachers: one for elementary students, one for middle school and two for high school. All instruction is virtual and mirrors the same standards set for the Rim district as a whole.
“Students can transfer to and from us and still be at the same rigor,” Montiel said.
While he has less traditional interaction with the RVA students, he does pop into their instructional time on the computer.
RVA has a current enrollment of about 108. Montiel is looking to grow that number. “We want to find students who will be with us for years to come. RVA is a budding school.”
To bring the students together, RVA holds periodic mixers. At Halloween they painted pumpkins and had a costume contest. For their holiday mixer they will make gingerbread houses and have a festive sweater contest.
These mixers give the Mountain High students an opportunity to earn service hours. They volunteer at them, helping the RVA students with their projects at the mixers. This, Montiel said, “boosts the morale of the Mountain High students.”
Montiel had moved to Crestline in 2020 and welcomed the opportunity to shorten his commute by working on the mountain. He met his spouse, Jaime, who teaches science in Fontana, here on the mountain. The two enjoy hiking with their dogs. And Montiel loves to travel and hopes to visit all the national parks.
As for other activities Montiel enjoys, his bachelor’s degree is in theater and film. “I still work on some short films with fellow UCR alumni,” he said.
What he had discovered when he took a public speaking class was he enjoys working and talking with people. “I wasn’t sure what that was,” he said. “I wanted to help people realize their stories. That led me to students in the high school realm. There is so much story we need to help them tell, stories they may not even be aware of.”
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