(EL PASO INDEPENDENT SCHOOL DISTRICT – May 31, 2024) - Tippin Elementary School is celebrating a historic milestone.
On Friday, May 31, the campus celebrated its 20th anniversary. The school was built in 2004 and officially opened its doors in August. A special assembly was held at the school’s cafeteria for new and former staff, alumni, and students.
Gina Rodriguez-Nuñez is the principal of Tippin Elementary and has been the principal of the campus for the last 15 years. She explained why Friday’s event was important.
“The greatest take away from being a principal at Tippin is watching our students grow up and succeed later in life,” Rodriguez-Nuñez said. “We invited some of our alumni to this celebration and some of them are current students at Franklin High School who will be graduating in June. It’s great to hear about their successes and how they will be going to prestigious colleges after graduation.”
Michelle Jimenez, a senior at Franklin High School, is a Tippin alumni who was invited to speak at the school’s 20th birthday celebration. She said the special event was a full circle moment for her as she got to meet some of the current students and was able to catch up with some of her old teachers.”
“I think all of the hard work of the Tippin staff and community members like the PTA, helped to make Tippin into an amazing school,” Jimenez said. “We always had a lot of fun events at our school like our Turkey Trout. Those kinds of events are what brought the community and school closer together, and now here we are creating these new memories for this new generation of students.”
Tippin capped off its 20th celebration bash with a parade featuring wonderfully decorated floats. Food trucks and other planned activities were also on site for the community members who came out to join the festivities. After the parade, attendees were invited to check out the campus during an open house-style event.
“Some of these students that I’m going to graduate with at Franklin, started school with me at Tippin Elementary,” Jimenez said. “Now we are going our separate ways after graduation. I’m sure we’ll stay connected with each other after high school, but at least we’ll always have the fun memories we created at Tippin.”