Immaculate Heart High School is a co-ed Catholic school in Oro Valley, Arizona (a suburb of Tucson). It is located in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Tucson. The high school is part of a larger campus that includes an elementary and middle school. However, the high school is governed by a Board of Managers consisting of community leaders and businessmen along with a president and principal. The elementary and middle schools are governed by a different president and principal and are independentof the IHHS Board of Managers. All three campuses are the focus and mission of Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. The school bills itself as a small, close-knit campus with a focus on college preparatory curriculum.BackgroundIn 1870 the Sisters of Saint Joseph from Los Angeles, California arrived in Tucson and opened a school called Saint Joseph's Academy. The academy's first location was next to St. Augustine Cathedral. The Sisters of Saint Joseph moved the academy to this site, on what is now 15th Street, in 1885. They instructed both Catholics and non-Catholics. During the early period most students came from Spanish and Mexican American families. By 1931, the school had outgrown the building, and the diocese purchased another property known as Villa Carondelet in the foothills of the Rincon Mountains, east of downtown Tucson.The religious institute of the Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary was founded in Spain in 1848 by Father Joachim Masmitjá. In 1871 nine sisters journeyed to California to teach in several schools. In 1911, five sisters from Spain and two from California were sent to start a school in Mazatlán, Mexico. Six years later, in 1917, the sisters were forced to leave due to the Mexican Revolution. During a stop in their journey back to California, Bishop Henry Granjon of Tucson, Arizona invited the sisters to stay and they accepted. The IHM sisters taught in various locations before moving to the site of the former Saint Joseph's Academy.
