Race is perhaps the biggest difference that separates Los Gatos High from Saratoga High.
According to a U.S. National Center for Education Statistics survey in 2009, Los Gatos High School had 1,382 white students, 56 Hispanic students, four black students, 153 Asian students, five American Indian students and 203 students identifying themselves with two or more races. This is significantly different from Saratoga High’s data set, in which 711 of 1,371 students identified themselves as Asian.
With Los Gatos High having often been refered to as a very “white school,” it was not surprising that the survey had Los Gatos High as the “whitest” high school of the 27 high schools in the Santa Clara County. Behind Los Gatos’ mark of 1,382 white students, Homestead High was second with 1,003 white students and Palo Alto High was third with 991 white students.
Los Gatos sophomore Aaron Walker said that it’s very noticeable that not very many races are represented at the school, but at the same time, race is not much of an issue on campus.
“People don’t tend to use any racial slurs or even make racist comments,” he said.
Walker added that while it’s extremely recognizable that the majority of the students at Los Gatos High are white, racism toward the less-represented races rarely arises.
“The stereotypes are far more present at LG than any type of straight-up racism. These [stereotypes] include comments such as ‘Asians are smart’ and such.”
Walker recalled that in the weeks preceding the 2010 Saratoga vs. Los Gatos football game, there was a Facebook page on which students from both schools were exchanging slurs.
“Some Los Gatos students might really think that Saratoga High students are nerds and study all day,” Walker said. “But I think at the end of the day, most of our students realize that’s not the case.”
Walker said that those comments between the schools could have just been made in the competitive spirit leading up to the game, but they were still uncalled for.
Despite the negative comments, Walker said there really isn’t a significant amount of racism at the school.
“It doesn’t seem to be a very large problem,” he said.
