Superintendent Tricia McManus welcomed community members to Reynolds High School on Thursday morning as part of the district’s See for Yourself program.
See for Yourself invites local leaders like business owners, non-profit representatives, Board of Education members, and central office staff into schools to speak with educators and students about how things are going on their campuses. Guests hear updates from school administrators and testimonials from student ambassadors before touring classrooms to observe students during their lessons. This month, See for Yourself has visited Carver High School, Parkland High School, and now Reynolds.
McManus says that See for Yourself is a valuable opportunity for people outside of the schools to get a better sense of what they’re like on a daily basis. Because it’s easy for certain incidents to create sticky narratives about the culture of a school that don’t actually reflect the truth, it’s important for students and educators to be able to voice their own experiences and help complete the public picture.
“We can do a better job of sharing narratives and seeing the amazing things we have in our schools,” McManus said. “There is no ‘let’s put on a show’ today – you’re going to go into classrooms, you’re going to walk around the campus, and you’re going to see the real deal.”
Guests at Reynolds on Thursday got to see students engaging with coursework in every subject, ask them about their recent projects, and learn more about the campus atmosphere. Principal Clavin Freeman had plenty of good news to share about his students and their achievements. In the Fall 2024 semester, the school saw improvements in math testing scores, strong participation rates in over 50 school clubs, more than 30 early admittances to major state universities, and significant increases in enrollment in honors courses.
“In my first year here in 2021… just a third of our students had access to an honors course. In 2024-25, 87% of our students have access to an honors course,” Freeman said. “I lift that up because that’s the kind of thing that doesn’t necessarily show up when we talk about test scores on certain days.”
Freeman also drew attention to his school’s high level of socioeconomic diversity, fueled in part by Reynolds’ status as a Tier I magnet school. Student ambassadors who led tours of the campus cited this diversity as one of the school’s most underrated assets, helping them understand the world outside their homes more thoroughly by meeting more people in classes and clubs who aren’t just like them.
“The diversity of this school allows you to see the world from a lot of different perspectives,” said Reynolds Senior Tyler Cronan. “I think it’s really interesting to be in classes with people who have a lot of different views.”
Visitors found it enlightening to see education in motion at the most grounded level. Richard Daniels, executive director of the YMCA of Northwest North Carolina, said he has 160 students at Reynolds who come to the YMCA every day, and it was special for him to see those students in class and witness them thriving in a different setting than usual. He hopes more people will accept future invitations to See for Yourself and take advantage of the opportunity to learn how Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Schools teaches its students.
“There’s always a perception, and when you share your story, you strengthen that perception,” Daniels said. “I’m amazed by what’s been shared today. People need to know.”
The next See for Yourself Session will be on Thursday, February 6 at Glenn High School.