Montpelier High School (MHS) is a public secondary school

Secondary school

Secondary school is a term used to describe an educational institution where the final stage of schooling, known as secondary education and usually compulsory up to a specified age, takes place...

, comprising grades 9-12, located in Montpelier, Vermont

Montpelier, Vermont

Montpelier is a city in the U.S. state of Vermont that serves as the state capital and the shire town of Washington County. As the capital of Vermont, Montpelier is the site of the Vermont State House, seat of the legislative branch of Vermont government. The population was 7,855 at the 2010...

. MHS serves the Montpelier School District. Montpelier is located near the center of Vermont in Washington County. The school's sports teams are called the Solon

Solon

Solon was an Athenian statesman, lawmaker, and poet. He is remembered particularly for his efforts to legislate against political, economic and moral decline in archaic Athens...

s and the school's colors are green and white. Enrollment in 2006 was 420. Schools in the district include Union Elementary School, Main Street Middle School, as well as MHS.

Recognition

U.S. News & World Report

U.S. News & World Report

U.S. News & World Report is an American news magazine published from Washington, D.C. Along with Time and Newsweek it was for many years a leading news weekly, focusing more than its counterparts on political, economic, health and education stories...

ranked Montpelier High School in the top 500 out of over 18,000 high schools in the United States in November 2007. They initially and incorrectly reported that the school ranked fifth. The school brought the error to the magazine's attention shortly thereafter, prompting a correction on December 10, 2007. The school's correct ranking still puts it in the top 2.8% of American high schools and best in Vermont (by U.S. News standards).

History

MHS is a successor to the Washington County Grammar School, incorporated in 1813. Montpelier High School first issued diplomas in 1914, the year a new high school building opened on Main Street. That building was replaced by the current building, off Bailey Avenue, which opened in 1956. The old high school building was converted to a middle school, and continues to house grades 6, 7, and 8. The present high school building was enlarged in 1998.

Academics

As of 2006, MHS offers 5 AP classes

Advanced Placement Program

The Advanced Placement program is a curriculum in the United States and Canada sponsored by the College Board which offers standardized courses to high school students that are generally recognized to be equivalent to undergraduate courses in college...

: Biology, US history, English, Calculus, and Spanish. MHS offers several foreign languages, French, Spanish, and Latin, at several levels. Students at Main Street Middle School are offered French I, Spanish I, and Algebra I. Upon successful completion of these courses students may earn high school credit. MHS is also a site for interning student teachers from the University of Vermont

University of Vermont

The University of Vermont comprises seven undergraduate schools, an honors college, a graduate college, and a college of medicine. The Honors College does not offer its own degrees; students in the Honors College concurrently enroll in one of the university's seven undergraduate colleges or...

As of February 2006, 17 students were attending the Barre Technical Center http://vitaschools.learningnetworks.com/brvc/ in the neighboring town. Barre Technical Center is a technical and vocational school. Juniors and Seniors are eligible to attend.

MHS offers courses in the English department including, Journalism, Public Speaking, American Studies, American Literature, British Humanities, Irish Humanities, and Creative Writing. Some of the courses in mathematics include Applied Business Math; Functions, Statistics and Trigonometry; Statistics; and Calculus. Some of the science classes offered are, Astronomy, Geology, Environmental Application. Some of the social studies classes that are offered include World Geography, Economics, Women's Humanities, Psychology, and Sociology.

Scholastic Aptitude Test

In 2010, the school was first in the state with a 1,705 average. The state average was 1,546. The national average was 1,509.

In 2005, 74 seniors, 85% of the senior class, took the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT).

SAT Verbal	Montpelier Average All Students	Vermont Average All Students	National Average All Students
2001	550	511	506
2002	560	512	504
2003	547	513	507
2004	578	516	508
2005	557	521	508

SAT Math	Montpelier Average All students	Vermont Average All students	National Average All students
2001	538	506	514
2002	561	510	516
2003	547	510	519
2004	556	512	518
2005	541	517	520

Clubs & Extra Curricular Activities

MHS has 20 clubs open to all students including:

• AFS/Cultural diversity club- Students who participate in AFS/CDC get the chance to travel to another school in another state. Each student stays with a student from that school for three days and they get to experience what life is like in different communities.

• VTLSP (Vermont Teen Leadership Safety Program)- A club directed towards raising awareness of prevention and wellness issues including alcohol and other drug use, traffic safety and risk taking behaviors, and to provide students with the resources, skills and adult support with which to facilitate positive change among their peers.

• Outing Club- Outing club offers opportunities for students to participate in activities like backpacking, hiking, winter camping, canoeing, hiking, caving, rock climbing, and much more.

• Amnesty International
  Amnesty International
  Amnesty International is an international non-governmental organisation whose stated mission is "to conduct research and generate action to prevent and end grave abuses of human rights, and to demand justice for those whose rights have been violated."Following a publication of Peter Benenson's...
  
  - Its members learn about and take action on such issues as freedom of speech, torture, the death penalty, economic organization, and the rights of refugees.

• Community service club - In this club, students respond to requests from the community for help in any areas.

• French Club - Students engage in French conversation and take part in exchanges and field trips in the French-speaking Canadian province of Quebec
  Quebec
  Quebec or is a province in east-central Canada. It is the only Canadian province with a predominantly French-speaking population and the only one whose sole official language is French at the provincial level....
  
  .

• Solon Spectrum - The Solon Spectrum is the school newspaper. It is published monthly.

• STAND
  Stand
  Stand may refer to:*Stand, Greater Manchester, a residential area in the Metropolitan Borough of Manchester, England*A partnership in cricket*STAND: A Student Anti-Genocide Coalition...
  
   - A Student Anti-Genocide Coalition (Originally Students Taking Action Now: Darfur). This club has three objectives: (1) Create awareness in the community of current ongoing genocides taking place in the world (2) Pressure government officials to take action in stopping genocide (3) Raise aid funds for genocide victims.

Athletics

Most sports have a varsity and a junior varsity team. Basketball

Basketball

Basketball is a team sport in which two teams of five players try to score points by throwing or "shooting" a ball through the top of a basketball hoop while following a set of rules...

 has an additional "Freshman Team" or Junior Varsity. MHS plays in Division II in every sport except for football which is Division III. The most popular sports at MHS are soccer and basketball. The girls soccer team won the 2007 Division II Championship. These sports are offered:

Fall season

• Boys Soccer
• Girls Soccer
• Football
  American football
  American football is a sport played between two teams of eleven with the objective of scoring points by advancing the ball into the opposing team's end zone. Known in the United States simply as football, it may also be referred to informally as gridiron football. The ball can be advanced by...
  
   (Boys)
• Field Hockey
  Field hockey
  Field Hockey, or Hockey, is a team sport in which a team of players attempts to score goals by hitting, pushing or flicking a ball into an opposing team's goal using sticks...
  
   (Girls)

Winter season

• Boys Basketball
• Girls Basketball
• Boys Cross-country skiing
  Cross-country skiing
  Cross-country skiing is a winter sport in which participants propel themselves across snow-covered terrain using skis and poles...
  
  
• Girls Cross-country skiing
• Boys Hockey
• Girls Hockey

Spring season

• Baseball (Boys)
• Softball
  Softball
  Softball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of 10 to 14 players. It is a direct descendant of baseball although there are some key differences: softballs are larger than baseballs, and the pitches are thrown underhand rather than overhand...
  
   (Girls)
• Boys Golf
  Golf
  Golf is a precision club and ball sport, in which competing players use many types of clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a golf course using the fewest number of strokes....
  
  
• Girls Golf
• Boys Lacrosse
  Lacrosse
  Lacrosse is a team sport of Native American origin played using a small rubber ball and a long-handled stick called a crosse or lacrosse stick, mainly played in the United States and Canada. It is a contact sport which requires padding. The head of the lacrosse stick is strung with loose mesh...
  
  
• Girls Lacrosse
• Boys Tennis
• Girls Tennis
• Ultimate Frisbee

In the spring students can participate in track and field

Track and field

Track and field is a sport comprising various competitive athletic contests based around the activities of running, jumping and throwing. The name of the sport derives from the venue for the competitions: a stadium which features an oval running track surrounding a grassy area...

 at neighboring U-32 High School

Union 32 High School

U 32 High School known most officially as Union High School District No. 32 is in East Montpelier, Vermont, United States. It is the regional high school for the towns of Berlin, Calais, Middlesex, East Montpelier, and Worcester, and students from Orange/Washington can choose attend U 32 after...

. There is also an ultimate

Ultimate (sport)

Ultimate is a sport played with a 175 gram flying disc. The object of the game is to score points by passing the disc to a player in the opposing end zone, similar to an end zone in American football or rugby...

 club that competes.

The school also participates in Unified sports, a program of Special Olympics

Special Olympics

Special Olympics is the world's largest sports organization for children and adults with intellectual disabilities, providing year-round training and competitions to more than 3.1 million athletes in 175 countries....

. Unified sports teams consist of all types of students, including differently-abled students. The unified sports that are offered are soccer, bowling

Bowling

Bowling Bowling Bowling (1375–1425; late Middle English bowle, variant of boule Bowling (1375–1425; late Middle English bowle, variant of boule...

, snowshoeing, basketball, and softball. They compete against other schools.

MHS has many sports facilities on campus, including the following:

• Baseball diamond with field hockey/soccer/lacrosse field in outfield and a scoreboard
• Soccer/football field surrounded with a dirt/fine gravel track with grandstand and scoreboard
• Softball diamond with scoreboard
• Field hockey/ lacrosse field
• Two outdoor tennis courts
• Basketball court
  Basketball court
  In basketball, the basketball court is the playing surface, consisting of a rectangular floor with tiles at either end. In professional or organized basketball, especially when played indoors, it is usually made out of a wood, often maple, and highly polished...
  
   in gym
• Weight room, recently renovated with new workout machines and repainted

Hockey is played at the Montpelier Civic Center. The ski team skis at a variety of locations, sometimes at the school but usually at U-32 or at the Morse Farm Touring Center nearby. The golf and tennis teams play scheduled games off-campus.

In some PE (physical education

Physical education

Physical education or gymnastics is a course taken during primary and secondary education that encourages psychomotor learning in a play or movement exploration setting....

) classes, students canoe in the Winooski River

Winooski River

The Winooski River is a tributary of Lake Champlain, approximately long, in northern Vermont in the United States. Although not Vermont's longest river, it is one of the state's most significant, forming a major valley way from Lake Champlain through the Green Mountains towards the Connecticut...

, which passes the school, as a regular part of PE class. Students also participate in outdoor archery

Archery

Archery is the art, practice, or skill of propelling arrows with the use of a bow, from Latin arcus. Archery has historically been used for hunting and combat; in modern times, however, its main use is that of a recreational activity...

.

Greenhouse and composting

MHS is home to a solar greenhouse

Greenhouse

A greenhouse is a building in which plants are grown. These structures range in size from small sheds to very large buildings...

. It was built in 2004 by students of MHS from lumber from fallen trees. The goal of the greenhouse was to reduce the ecological footprint

Ecological footprint

The ecological footprint is a measure of human demand on the Earth's ecosystems. It is a standardized measure of demand for natural capital that may be contrasted with the planet's ecological capacity to regenerate. It represents the amount of biologically productive land and sea area necessary to...

 of the school and to be an example of sustainability

Sustainability

Sustainability is the capacity to endure. For humans, sustainability is the long-term maintenance of well being, which has environmental, economic, and social dimensions, and encompasses the concept of union, an interdependent relationship and mutual responsible position with all living and non...

. The greenhouse also has a web cam that has operated seasonally. Students who take biology are responsible for planting, watering and harvesting their own section of the greenhouse.

Organic greens grown in the greenhouse were used in the school cafeteria. Food waste from the kitchen and cafeteria have been composted and used in the greenhouse's soil.

Notable alumni

• William Charles Fitzgerald
  William Charles Fitzgerald
  William "Bill" C. Fitzgerald was a United States Navy officer who was killed in action during the Vietnam War, while serving as an advisor to the Republic of Vietnam Navy...
  
  , Class of 1956, Vietnam war hero.
• F. Ray Keyser, Jr.
  F. Ray Keyser, Jr.
  Frank Ray Keyser is a former American politician from Vermont, serving as the 72nd Governor of Vermont from 1961 to 1963....
  
  , Class of 1945, Governor of Vermont 1961–1963.
• Garrett Graff
  Garrett Graff
  Garrett Graff is the editor-in-chief for Washingtonian magazine in Washington, D.C. and an instructor at Georgetown University in the Masters in Professional Studies Journalism and Public Relations program...
  
  , editor and writer.

External links

• Montpelier High School
• Montpelier School District
• Montpelier STAND