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Glendale High School (Glendale, California)
Glendale High School is a high school in Glendale, California, United States. The school is part of the Glendale Unified School District. History Glendale High School was founded as Glendale Union High School in 1901 by the residents of the villages of Glendale, La Crescenta, Burbank, Eagle Rock, Ivanhoe, Tropico and West Glendale. The first classes were held at the Glendale Hotel. The first principal was Mr. Llewellyn Evans and the school had two teachers and 29 students. The next year, a new school building was built at the corner of what is today Brand Boulevard and Broadway. George Moyse was appointed principal and continued in his role for 35 years until 1937. The school continued to grow rapidly, and the school moved several times, in 1907 to Harvard Street and in 1914 to Maryland Street. The school continued to grow, as enrollment reached 800 in 1920 and 1,050 in 1921. During the 20's Women Right's activist Ella Lillian Wall Van Leer would help create and manage various Art and Architecture departments.[2] It was decided then to move the Grade 10, 11 and 12 classes to a new campus at the corner of the present-day Broadway and Verdugo Road (Grade 9 students remained at the Maryland Street campus, and were later integrated into area Middle Schools). The school has remained in this location (1440 East Broadway, at the southeast corner of Verdugo) since 1924.[3] The Class of 1960 was Glendale's largest, with 903 graduates. Crescenta Valley High School opened in September 1960, taking a sizable portion of Glendale's students. The school suffered extensive damage during spring break on March 22, 1964, when a student who was concerned about his grades set fire to the room in which he thought the grade information was stored. The fire quickly spread throughout the administration building and to adjacent buildings on the campus. The decision was made to reconstruct the campus, leaving the swimming pool, baseball field, tennis courts, and football stadium as the only remnants of the old campus. In 1966, Captain Max Schumacher, an aerial traffic reporter for a local radio station KMPC, landed his helicopter on the football field during a school assembly and spoke about traffic safety. He was later killed in a crash with a police helicopter near Dodger Stadium. In the early 1990s, the decision was made by the School Board to reintegrate ninth graders into the Glendale Unified School District high schools (with the exception of Crescenta Valley High School, which had already transitioned to a four-year high school in September 1983). As a result, the 'J' building was constructed in 1994–1995, opening in September 1995. In 2001, Glendale High School celebrated its centenary. The student population was then 3,500 and there were over 100 teachers.[4] In 2001, the Glendale High School Visual and Performing Arts Program (VAPA) was awarded the BRAVO Award for excellence in arts education by the Los Angeles County Music Center. In 2003, the program won another award, the Creative Ticket National School of Distinction Award from the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. Glendale High School was the only public high school to be awarded this honor. On July 1, 2005, Katherine Fundukian replaced LeRoy Sherman and Lou Stewart as co-principals, as part of a School District decision to move Glendale High School back to a "traditional" one-principal system from the two-principal system that had been in place. In 2006, eight students from Glendale High School represented the United States at the Junior G8 summit in Saint Petersburg, Russiawhere they discussed world issues and met with the leaders of the G8 nations. Glendale High's mathematics department received the highest average AP scores in the United States in 2012. Dance/Drill TeamSince 1999, the dance/drill team program has won over 50 National Championship titles. The Glendale High School Junior Varsity and Varsity dance/drill team competes annually at the United Spirit Association Nationals competition and starting in the 2018 Season now competes annually at the West Coast Elite Dance Nationals competition. This is held at the Anaheim Convention Center and Long Beach Convention Center, respectively. The Glendale High School dance/drill team consists of more than 80 dancers with ten coaches and a director. List of USA National Championship titles since 1999:
USA Nationals Drill Down Wins: 2001, 2010, 2012, 2014, 2016 Number of Co-Ed Dance National Championships: 18 - 1999–2009, 2011–2018[5] List of WCE National Championship titles since 2018:
SportGlendale High School was among the first schools in Southern California to offer athletic sports, and the school's sport program continues to be a major source of pride. Its two mascots are the Dynamiters for the American football program and the Nitros for all other sports. The large weights and sizes of the players in the 1924-1925 American football team, with all 11 starting players weighing 170 pounds or more, and with almost all of them six or more feet tall, made them, in the words of the authors of Duke: The Life and Times of John Wayne, "a high school phenomenon."[6] That team was directed by coach Normal C. Hayhurst, with University of Southern California student Vic Francy serving as one of the assistants. During that year, the first team to score against them did so in one of the postseason semifinal games.[6] Fall season (September–November)
Winter season (December–February)
Spring season (March–May)
TraditionsOratoricalEvery March, the school holds its annual "Oratorical" event. Students from each class (Grades 9, 10, 11, and 12) are judged on:
The tradition was started in 1910, at a time of heightened interest in public speaking in Southern California. It has continued through the years, demonstrating to the community the pride that students have in the school. The event is judged by a combination of alumni, community members and members of the military. As of 2023, only five classes have ever won all four categories, the classes of 1999, 2010, 2012, 2014, and 2023. Newspaper and yearbookThe school newspaper, the Explosion, was first published in 1917 and has continued to be published semi-quarterly. The school yearbook, the Stylus, was started in 1909 as a monthly publication. In 1910, it became a quarterly publication, being published each quarter by a different grade level. Later, it became an annual publication. Pat Navolanic Memorial AwardThe Pat Navolanic Memorial Award was established in 1966 in honor of Patrick Navolanic, student body president and Valedictorian of the Class of 1963, who is remembered for being extremely active in school activities, and who died of asphyxiation in December 1965 while studying abroad in France. The award is given to the graduating senior who best exemplifies Navolanic's leadership traits, scholarship skills and athletic prowess, as decided by a council of electors representing all student organizations and sports teams on campus. The winner receives a scholarship in the amount of $2,500 and finalists receive $300. The scholarship money is made possible by a financial endowment, as well as generous donations from students, teachers, alumni and the community.[7] DemographicsGHS is noted for its diversity. Hispanic/Latino students comprise 33.6% of the student population. Additionally, total minority enrollment is 47%, and 61% of students are economically disadvantaged. Statistics based on 2022-2023 enrollment [8]
Notable alumni
References
External links
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