With nine associate degrees in tow, Middle College High School senior Manny Rodriguez Mejia will attend Yale in the fall thanks to his hard work, dedication and a 4.7 GPA.
Manny recently found out he was accepted to Yale University, earning college credits and boosting his grades while enrolled in the school’s dual-enrollment partnership with Santa Ana College.
CBS News Los Angeles reported that his acceptance follows in the footsteps of his older brother Alexis, a Harvard University graduate and fellow Middle College High alum who was previously recognized for his academic achievements.
Rodriguez Mejia said he hopes to continue serving the Santa Ana Unified School District community through his future studies in politics and data science. Middle College Principal Scott Werner said the future graduate’s achievement reflects the opportunities available to his peers and the strength of the district’s early college programs.
“I want to represent Santa Ana in a positive light and show that students from here can achieve great things too,” Rodriguez Mejia said in an interview with CBS Los Angeles.
Middle College High School allows students to earn college credits while completing high school coursework and has become known for preparing students for higher education success.
Here are the other stories we’ve been following this week:
- Students in Anaheim’s Jefferson Elementary School Korean dual-language immersion academy are learning language and culture as the school prepares to celebrate the program’s first graduating class of eighth-graders.
- Students from Placentia’s Valadez Middle School recently took a field trip to the Frank R. Bowerman Landfill in Irvine — hosted by OCDE’s Inside the Outdoors and OC Waste & Recycling — for real-world lessons about the operations of trash, recycling and composting systems before tours of the active landfill site.
- Four Orange County teams have advanced to the national finals of the United States Academic Pentathlon after standout performances at the regional and state competition.
- The OCMaker Challenge Awards ceremony on May 19 — hosted by the OC Pathways program — will highlight Orange County student innovators who developed creative solutions to real-world challenges through hands-on STEM learning.
- Farm-to-classroom lessons are blended with science and environmental education at Golden View Elementary School, which was recently named one of 12 OC Impact Schools by the Orange County Department of Education.
- In the latest FutureCurrent episode with County Superintendent Dr. Stefan Bean, Big Brothers Big Sisters of OC and the IE CEO Sloane Keane discusses the positive impact of mentorship and the importance of building supportive relationships for young people.
- California’s revised state budget proposal includes a one-time $50 million investment to continue supporting the state’s Multi-Tiered System of Support framework focused on students’ academic, behavioral and mental health needs.
- Students in OCDE’s Access and Connections program reflected on the meaning of Memorial Day through essays and artwork submitted to the annual Jack R. Hammett Memorial Day Essay and Art Contest.
- Students from Anaheim’s Loara Elementary School and Orange Grove Elementary School were named finalists in the 2026 Conga Kids Dance Championship last week, displaying student teamwork and performance through dance education.
- The OC Friday Night Live partnership recently honored two school chapters from El Modena High and McGarvin Intermediate School alongside an advisor from Ralston Intermediate School for their outstanding leadership in youth prevention and community engagement efforts.
- The Newport-Mesa Unified School District’s Ignite Night event brought students together to present projects focused on building, creating and competing through interactive science lessons.
- The Laguna Beach Unified School District Board of Education recently voted to end the contract of its superintendent at its Tuesday meeting, according to the Daily Pilot.
- A statewide bill requiring all California high school students to complete an ethnic studies course by graduation has been halted due to a lack of state funding, according to a Spectrum News report.
This is the part where we encourage you to keep up with local education news stories by bookmarking the OCDE Newsroom, subscribing for emailed updates and following us on Facebook, X (formerly Twitter) and Instagram.