Indio High School was founded in 1958, which makes it the third oldest high school in the Coachella Valley. The school newspaper is called Sandscripts. School graduates continuing their education at college have recently improved to 75 percent in 2006, up from 23 percent in 1995. It was the only high school for DSUSD students in the 9th to 12th grade level, until Palm Desert High School opened its doors in 1985/86 and then La Quinta High School in 1994/95 which have a large share of Indio residents who can attend there by school district policy. A new high school, Shadow Hills in the northern half of Indio will decrease the number of students in the 2009/10 school year. In the 2009/10 school year Desert Sands was deciding whether to close the school at the end of the 2009/10 school year, due to low Standardized Test scores. That year the scores went up dramatically and the board instead voted to renovate the school, which was approved. The School was featured in a video for success 101, a course for freshmen entering high school to help them transition from middle to high school. Freshman students, faculty, and teachers of the 2010/11 school year were followed all school year to see how the class had helped them. For the 2011/12 school year the school moved from a six-period day schedule to an eight-period A/B Block schedule. This was done to give the students more electives and also so they would have opportunities to get more credits. On May 1, 2013 at 8:52, there was a fire at the boy's locker room coaches office. Firefighters took out the fire in about a half an hour.
Renovation
The school has begun renovations in late 2011. Phase I of III which included a new administration building, science/business building, a new gymnasium, and a new Performing Arts Center. The new campus was open to all students at the beginning of the second semester during the 2014/2015 school year. Phase II of III officially began in February 2015, with demolishing the old campus. Phase III was completed in January 2018 and included the baseball, softball, and soccer fields, and basketball hard courts.
Indio High School has been mentioned in the lyrics of songs and has been featured in music videos. The Desert Sessions song "Winners" contains an audio sample of a man reading out the names from Indio High School. The names listed in the song "Winners" were real Indio High School students. The song "Interpretive Reading," on the same album as "Winners", features a choir singing the school's alma mater song in the background. There was a hip-hop single titled "Indio Rydaz" on YouTube released by Lil' Tweety, an Indio High School alumni from the class of 2004. In 2012 it was in the inspiration for the rap song "Rajah City" on YouTube by Ray Ray, an Indio High School Alumni from the class of 2012.
