The Mountain View-Los Altos High School District has two high schools: Los Altos High School and Mountain View High School. Children graduating from Graham Middle School in the Mountain View K-8 School District, Crittenden Middle School in the Whisman K-8 School District, Blach Junior High and Egan Junior High in the Los Altos K-8 School District attend either Mountain View High School or Los Altos High School.

Children growing up in Mountain View and Los Altos are part of the same community in more ways than just sharing a high school experience. These children belong to the same churches, temples and mosques. They also participate in sports together, like soccer, tennis, baseball, gymnastics and swim club. These children attend preschool together, share the same pediatricians and participate in a myriad of activities together.

Community among children occurs naturally as a result of shared experience. Los Altos and Mountain View school district children share experiences and community, but they do not share equal educational opportunity through their respective K-8 school districts as reflected by the differences in achievement test percentiles and ninth grade algebra placement.

A significant number of children who live in the City of Mountain View, and who are in kindergarten through eighth grade, attend school in the Los Altos K-8 District. Since school district boundaries do not correspond with city boundaries, the boundaries of the Los Altos K-8 School District extend into the residential sections of the City of Mountain View. One of the Los Altos K-8 District schools, Springer School, is located in the City of Mountain View. This means that some children living in the City of Mountain View rightfully attend school in the Los Altos K-8 School District and benefit from a math program aligned with the state standards. We want all Mountain View children to benefit from high level math programs.

Mountain View children attending school in the Whisman District also benefit from a program differing from the Mountain View K-8 District program. The Whisman District has recently aligned its program with the state standards, piloted a standards based report card, purchased supplementary math materials through Schiff-Bustamonte funds, and will be piloting a state approved textbook series for its low performing children. While their program does not offer acceleration and classes at mastery level like Los Altos, the Whisman District is moving in the direction of Los Altos.