Everett private school celebrates 100th graduating class

Published 1:30 am Friday, June 5, 2026

EVERETT — A private Christian school in Everett celebrated its 100th graduating class on Wednesday, a milestone for the tiny school with historic roots in the north end of the city.

Families and graduates piled into a north Everett church to celebrate the graduating eigth graders from Everett Christian School, which serves students from pre-kindergarten to eigth grade.

“It’s really special already,” said Melissa Patton, the secretary on the private school’s board, in an interview Tuesday. “To have it be 100 years on top of that, when you have all this history behind you and building up to it, it’s a special feeling.”

Over the years, Everett Christian School has remained small, in the same location on Cedar Street where it first opened a century ago. This year’s graduating class included only seven students.

It’s a school steeped in tradition, Patton said, with events like an annual back-to-school picnic which began in the early 1940’s, as well as activities for kindergartners like a “teddy bear picnic” and a “clown day,” have persisted over the years, Patton said.

“It feels like a family,” she said.

The school first opened to students in 1926, formed by Dutch immigrants who had settled in Everett looking for work and had hoped to give their children religious education, Patton said. Just five students made up the first graduating class.

It has weathered significant difficulties over the years, Patton and Jenkins said. After the Great Depression began in 1929 — four years after the school opened — it was so strapped for cash that it had to take donations of firewood to keep the buildings warm.

“There’s been great years and some lean years,” said Elaine Jenkins, the school’s principal who also taught at the school for nearly three decades. “And people always come through in those tough times.”

The school’s small size means everyone knows everyone else, Jenkins said. Students often take field trips together across the state to the Olympic Peninsula or eastern Washington. When the school holds activities in its one multipurpose room, the entire school can meet in one place together, she said.

“We have a humble little building here in a humble little corner of Everett, but we do some pretty great things,” Jenkins said. “Although we’re not perfect, you know, most people who leave here say they would do the same thing all over again.”

Will Geschke: 425-339-3443; william.geschke@heraldnet.com; X: @willgeschke.