We are pleased to share that the Jim Boyle Memorial Scholarship has been established. The scholarship has been set up through the Scholarship Foundation of Santa Barbara and is designated solely for graduates of Santa Maria High School.

Jim was in the education field for 40 years. He taught at history at Righetti High School from 1968 – 1992 upon which he became a Vice Principal and Administrator at Santa Maria High School (SMHS). He held this role until his retirement in 2008. He was extremely passionate about everything at SMHS – students, their families, supportive colleagues and an overall environment that truly wanted to see their students success.

Santa Maria has a large population of low income families. There is lots of farm work – if parents didn’t show up to work, food might not get put on the table. So when students got in trouble for things like dress code violations, talking back to a teacher and other non-violent student offenses, Jim found other ways to discipline them rather than sending them home from school. Suspending them just took away from their parents ability to show up to work, put the students in a situation of being home alone that might lead to other troubles for them and overall didn’t help them learn from their mistakes.

He was continuously trying to help his students learn how to “get their act together” so they could make it in life. Jim would want nothing more than to help reward these students that went against the adversities they faced making it to their high school graduation. The scholarship winners can be anyone going anywhere from a vocational school to Harvard – these schools were all equal in the eyes of Jim.