Officials, dignitaries and the Valdez-Yeager family broke ground Thursday morning on the new Ofelia Valdez-Yeager Eastside Elementary School, marking a milestone 60 years after the Lowell School arson that highlighted educational inequities in the neighborhood.
The ceremony at 14th Street and Park Avenue drew community members and dignitaries to the site where construction will close a section of Park Avenue for the new campus.
“This school represents promises kept to the Eastside neighborhood,” said Brent Lee, president of the Riverside Unified School District board of education, during the 9 a.m. groundbreaking.
Principal Dawn Brawley welcomed the crowd, emphasizing the connection between the school’s namesake and the community it will serve. Valdez-Yeager began her career at Longfellow Elementary just blocks away in the same Eastside neighborhood.
Lee credited Valdez-Yeager’s leadership on Measure O, the bond measure that provided funding for the school’s construction. The new campus represents RUSD’s commitment to educational equity across underserved neighborhoods.
Superintendent Dr. Sonia Llamas also addressed attendees during the ceremony, which included both community members and district officials.
The groundbreaking comes as RUSD expands access to modern facilities in historically underserved areas. Casa Blanca Elementary opened earlier this year as part of the same district-wide equity initiative.
The timing carries particular significance for the Eastside community, where the 1965 Lowell School burning became a symbol of educational challenges facing the predominantly Latino neighborhood. The new elementary school represents progress from that difficult period in local educational history.
Measure O bond funding, championed by Valdez-Yeager during her tenure with the district, made the construction possible. The bonds were designed to address facility needs across RUSD while prioritizing communities that had long waited for modern school buildings.
The Ofelia Valdez-Yeager Eastside Elementary School will serve families in the neighborhood surrounding 14th Street and Park Avenue. Construction is expected to continue through the coming months, with the district working to minimize disruption to local traffic patterns during the building process.
Both Casa Blanca Elementary’s recent opening and the Eastside school groundbreaking represent the next step in ensuring all students from all neighborhoods receive quality educational facilities, district officials said.
The new school honors Valdez-Yeager’s legacy of educational leadership while addressing long-standing community needs for neighborhood-based elementary education on Riverside’s Eastside.
