Washington-Lee High School (often simply called "W-L") is one of three traditional public high schools in the Arlington Public Schools

Arlington Public Schools

Arlington Public Schools is a public school division in Arlington County, Virginia. In 2010, there were 19,903 students, up from 18,715 a year earlier. In 2010, the students had come from more than 120 countries. There were 2,166 teachers....

 district in Arlington, Virginia, covering grades 9-12. As of 2009-2010, the school had over 1,800 students and 120 teachers. In 2010, W-L was listed at # 63 in Newsweek

Newsweek

Newsweek is an American weekly news magazine published in New York City. It is distributed throughout the United States and internationally. It is the second-largest news weekly magazine in the U.S., having trailed Time in circulation and advertising revenue for most of its existence...

's listing of "America's Best High Schools," and # 3 in the state of Virginia

Virginia

The Commonwealth of Virginia , is a U.S. state on the Atlantic Coast of the Southern United States. Virginia is nicknamed the "Old Dominion" and sometimes the "Mother of Presidents" after the eight U.S. presidents born there...

.

From 2006-2009, Washington-Lee underwent a complete reconstruction, costing Arlington County nearly $100 million and making it one of the most expensive high school construction projects in the United States.

History

Construction on Washington-Lee began in 1924, with the school opening its doors in 1925 and graduating its first class in 1927. The architectural firm Upman & Adams designed the building in a simplified version of the Colonial Revival style. The school fronted on 13th St. N, which separated the school from its athletic field, eventually dedicated as Arlington County's War Memorial Stadium. In 1932, 41 classrooms, new offices, and another gym were added to the original building. A new wing and a large library with Palladian windows and two reading rooms were built in 1942 with WPA funds. The rifle range was also constructed in the shop area. In 1951, noted architect Rhees Burkett designed an addition that fronted on N. Quincy Street in the International Style. Along with the new Stratford Junior High School, it helped usher in a wave of contemporary commercial and school architecture that defined much of Arlington until the 1980's.

In 1975, the school board made the controversial decision to demolish the original sections of W-L and construct a new facility with an open space instructional environment. The new school opened in 1977, and a new auditorium was constructed a few years later. In 1984, with the introduction of a new "closed campus" policy for underclassmen, a cafeteria was constructed in the school's commons.

In 2009, the school underwent a complete reconstruction; none of the older buildings remain. The theater and nearby classrooms were demolished to allow for the construction of the new classroom building, which opened in January 2008. An axial orientation to War Memorial Stadium and the primary parking areas is the defining characteristic of the new school. A ten-lane regulation NCAA short course swimming pool (with optional 25 meter lanes), gym and other indoor athletic facilities, and an 800-seat auditorium opened to the public in July 2009. The demolition of the 1951 building and the construction of auxiliary athletic fields and additional landscaping was completed in December 2009.

Campus

The new four story building frames the northern end of War Memorial Stadium, referencing the orientation of the original three story 1924 building. A stepped terrace leads to the field from the school's student commons and outdoor eating areas. The school's primary corridor on the ground floor is the focal point for the more public spaces, which include the performing arts center, student commons, alumni conference room, cyber cafe, and journalism suite. It spans the distance between the commons and a primary entrance with access to a multistory parking structure and bus lanes. A public entrance is located on N Stafford St, and a separate public entrance serves the pool.

The compact massing of the new building allowed for the construction of additional athletic fields on land previously occupied by the former school. The orientation of the new school within the surrounding open space and the abundant pedestrian connections across the site that connect neighborhoods adhere to Arlington County's urban design guidelines, which follow "smart growth" planning principles. The new building was certified LEED

Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design

Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design consists of a suite of rating systems for the design, construction and operation of high performance green buildings, homes and neighborhoods....

 gold by the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC)

United States Green Building Council

The U.S. Green Building Council , co-founded by Mike Italiano, David Gottfried and Rick Fedrizzi in 1993, is a non-profit trade organization that promotes sustainability in how buildings are designed, built, and operated...

 rating system, the second high school in Virginia to achieve that benchmark.

Notable alumni

• Forrest Tucker
  Forrest Tucker
  Forrest Tucker was an American actor in both movies and television from the 1940s to the 1980s. Tucker, who stood 190 cm tall and weighed 93 kg , appeared in nearly 100 action films in the 1940s and 1950s.-Early life:Forrest Meredith Tucker was born in Plainfield, Indiana, a son of...
  
   (actor), 1938
• Gena Rowlands
  Gena Rowlands
  Gena Rowlands is an American actress of film, stage and television. The four-time Emmy and two-time Golden Globe winner is best known for her collaborations with her actor-director husband John Cassavetes in ten films, in two of which, Gloria and A Woman Under the Influence, she gave Academy...
  
   (actress), 1947
• Shirley MacLaine
  Shirley MacLaine
  Shirley MacLaine is an American film and theater actress, singer, dancer, activist and author, well-known for her beliefs in new age spirituality and reincarnation. She has written a large number of autobiographical works, many dealing with her spiritual beliefs as well as her Hollywood career...
  
   (actress), 1952
• Nancy Dussault, 1953, Actress and Broadway musicals singer and dancer, ABC's
  American Broadcasting Company
  The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...
  
   Good Morning America
  Good Morning America
  Good Morning America is an American morning news and talk show that is broadcast on the ABC television network; it debuted on November 3, 1975. The weekday program airs for two hours; a third hour aired between 2007 and 2008 exclusively on ABC News Now...
  
  co-anchor
• Pat Priest, Actress The Munsters
  The Munsters
  The Munsters is a 1960s American family television sitcom depicting the home life of a family of monsters. It starred Fred Gwynne as Herman Munster and Yvonne De Carlo as his wife, Lily Munster. The series was a satire of both traditional monster movies and popular family entertainment of the era,...
  
  , 1954
• Warren Beatty
  Warren Beatty
  Warren Beatty born March 30, 1937) is an American actor, producer, screenwriter and director. He has received a total of fourteen Academy Award nominations, winning one for Best Director in 1982. He has also won four Golden Globe Awards including the Cecil B. DeMille Award.-Early life and...
  
   (actor), 1955
• Robert Richardson
  Robert Coleman Richardson
  Robert Coleman Richardson is an American experimental physicist whose area of research includes sub-millikelvin temperature studies of helium-3...
  
  , Nobel Prize-winning physicist, 1955
• George Lee Butler
  George Lee Butler
  General George Lee Butler was commander in chief, United States Strategic Command, and the last commander of Strategic Air Command.-Education:...
  
  , Commander in Chief, USSC
  United States Strategic Command
  United States Strategic Command is one of nine Unified Combatant Commands of the United States Department of Defense . The Command, including components, employs more than 2,700 people, representing all four services, including DoD civilians and contractors, who oversee the command's operationally...
  
  , 1957
• Jake Scott, (two time Super Bowl
  Super Bowl
  The Super Bowl is the championship game of the National Football League , the highest level of professional American football in the United States, culminating a season that begins in the late summer of the previous calendar year. The Super Bowl uses Roman numerals to identify each game, rather...
  
   champion w/ Miami Dolphins
  Miami Dolphins
  The Miami Dolphins are a Professional football team based in the Miami metropolitan area in Florida. The team is part of the Eastern Division of the American Football Conference in the National Football League...
  
  : Super Bowl VII
  Super Bowl VII
  Super Bowl VII was an American football game played on January 14, 1973, at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum in Los Angeles, California, to decide the National Football League champion following the 1972 regular season...
  
   and VIII
  Super Bowl VIII
  Super Bowl VIII was a professional American football game played on January 13, 1974 at Rice Stadium. in Houston, Texas to decide the National Football League champion following the 1973 regular season. The American Football Conference champion Miami Dolphins defeated the National Football...
  
  ), 1963
• Stan Winston
  Stan Winston
  Stanley Winston was an American visual effects supervisor, makeup artist, and film director. He was best known for his work in the Terminator series, the Jurassic Park series, Aliens, the Predator series, Iron Man, Edward Scissorhands, and Avatar...
  
   (film director, visual effects supervisor), 1964
• Reggie Harrison
  Reggie Harrison
  The former Reggie Harrison was a professional American football running back for four seasons in the National Football League for the Pittsburgh Steelers and St. Louis Cardinals...
  
  , 1969 (two time Super Bowl champion w/ Pittsburgh Steelers
  Pittsburgh Steelers
  The Pittsburgh Steelers are a professional football team based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The team currently belongs to the North Division of the American Football Conference in the National Football League . Founded in , the Steelers are the oldest franchise in the AFC...
  
  : Super Bowls IX
  Super Bowl IX
  Super Bowl IX was an American football game played on January 12, 1975 at Tulane Stadium in New Orleans, Louisiana to decide the National Football League champion following the 1974 regular season. It would be the last pro game at legendary Tulane Stadium...
  
   and X
  Super Bowl X
  Super Bowl X was an American football game played on January 18, 1976 at the Orange Bowl in Miami, Florida to decide the National Football League champion following the 1975 regular season....
  
  )
• Eric Sievers
  Eric Sievers
  Eric Sievers is a former professional American football player. A 6'4", 235-lb. tight end from the University of Maryland, Sievers was selected by the San Diego Chargers in the fourth round of the 1981 NFL Draft. He played for ten NFL seasons from 1981-1990 for the Chargers, the Los Angeles Rams...
  
  , 1976 (10-year NFL player, 1981–90)
• Steve Buckhantz
  Steve Buckhantz
  Steve Buckhantz is a television play-by-play announcer for the Washington Wizards.-Biography:His television announcing career began as Sports Director at WTTG, a Fox affiliate in Washington, D.C. A District native, Buckhantz grew up in Arlington, Virginia, where his father owned a construction...
  
  , Play-by-play voice of the Washington Wizards
• Brian Blados
  Brian Blados
  Brian Blados is a former American football guard and tackle who played nine seasons with the Cincinnati Bengals, Indianapolis Colts and Tampa Bay Buccaneers in the National Football League. He attended Washington-Lee High School with Sandra Bullock, who was two years behind him...
  
  , 1980 (Nine year NFL player, first round draft choice and Pro Bowler for Cincinnati Bengals)
• Carl Tanner
  Carl Tanner
  Carl Tanner is an American operatic tenor.-Biography and career:Born into "very modest means," Carl Tanner's earliest exposure to music was in the form of country icons such as John Denver, Willie Nelson, and Roy Clark...
  
  , (World-class opera tenor), 1980
• Sandra Bullock
  Sandra Bullock
  Sandra Annette Bullock is an Academy Award winning American actress and producer who rose to fame in the 1990s after roles in successful films such as Demolition Man, Speed, The Net, A Time to Kill, and While You Were Sleeping. She continued with films such as Miss Congeniality, The Lake House,...
  
   (Academy-award winning actress), 1982

Academics

Since the 1950s, W-L has received national recognition for its academic programs. W-L was the first high school in the country to exempt qualified seniors from final exams during the '58-'59 academic year. In the 1960s, Time Magazine named W-L the second best public high school in the nation. The Ladies Home Journal also grouped W-L with an elite list that included New Trier in Winnetka, IL, and the Bronx High School of Science. In 1985, W-L was named a National (Blue Ribbon) School of Excellence by the US Department of Education. The school has also received honors from the Virginia Board of Education and the Virginia Department of Education. In 2007, Newsweek Magazine ranked Washington-Lee 33rd among the nation's top high schools.

W-L offers courses required as part of a standard high school curriculum (Math, Social Science, English, Science,Physical Education). Beyond these courses, the school offers elective classes in Computer Science, Business, Art, Music, Foreign Languages, Drama, Psychology, and Tech Education. The school also runs a HILT (high-intensity language training) program for students who are not well-versed in English

English language

English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...

.

Washington-Lee is the only school in Arlington that offers both the Advanced Placement Program

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...

 as well as the International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme. 450 of its students take advantage of these advanced courses or diploma programs.

Fine arts

The school offers fine arts courses and electives. Within the music department, electives include the marching and symphonic bands, madrigals, choir, orchestra, music theory, and guitar. In 2007, the music department received the Blue Ribbon Award, the highest award given by the Virginia Music Educators Association. The school is also a blue ribbon school for 2010-2011.

Technology

There are over 500 computers at Washington-Lee connected to its local area network which provides access to educational software, administrative data bases, and the Internet. Additionally all classrooms have SMART board interactive whiteboards. The school currently has 7 computer labs, with one in its library and an additional cyber café with computers. There are also multiple mobile laptop labs and several mini labs in math, business and publications. All science classrooms are equipped with 6 or more student computer stations. Washington-Lee has a student-operated broadcasting studio which is used to produce the morning announcements to all classrooms on its closed circuit television channel. A technologically advanced distance-learning classroom in the school allows classes conducted in that room to be viewed by students in other schools and by individuals watching from their homes.

The school's CNC/digital fabrication lab has been updated to meet the latest standards in digital fabrication technology. The lab has CAD and 3d modeling software, 3d printers, a laser cutter, vacuum former, 3-axis CNC milling machine, and standard wood shop equipment. The lab provides students with interests in architecture, industrial design, and engineering a complete set of digital and analog design tools for form-making.

Demographics

The school boasts a diverse student population, representing more than 20 countries around the world. The student population is 40.9% White

White American

White Americans are people of the United States who are considered or consider themselves White. The United States Census Bureau defines White people as those "having origins in any of the original peoples of Europe, the Middle East, or North Africa...

, 32.6% Hispanic, 13.3% Black

African American

African Americans are citizens or residents of the United States who have at least partial ancestry from any of the native populations of Sub-Saharan Africa and are the direct descendants of enslaved Africans within the boundaries of the present United States...

, 12.9% Asian

Asian American

Asian Americans are Americans of Asian descent. The U.S. Census Bureau definition of Asians as "Asian” refers to a person having origins in any of the original peoples of the Far East, Southeast Asia, or the Indian subcontinent, including, for example, Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Japan,...

, and 0.1% American Indian

Native Americans in the United States

Native Americans in the United States are the indigenous peoples in North America within the boundaries of the present-day continental United States, parts of Alaska, and the island state of Hawaii. They are composed of numerous, distinct tribes, states, and ethnic groups, many of which survive as...

. 140 of its students receive English as a second language, or ESL.

Sons and daughters of prominent Washington families have attended W-L, and the attendance area includes some of the region's most affluent neighborhoods. W-L also draws students from middle and low-income areas throughout Arlington, and this helps account for the socio-economic diversity of the student body.

The attendance area includes neighborhoods both suburban and urban in character.
North Arlington neighborhoods: Dover Crystal, Riverwood, Woodmont, Maywood, Lyon Village, Lyon Park, Ashton Heights, Cherrydale, Ballston/Virginia Square, Waycroft-Woodlawn, Tara-Leeway Heights, Waverly Hills, Stonewall Jackson, Dominion Hills, Arlington Forest, Buckingham, Fort Myer, Bluemont.
South Arlington neighborhoods: Glencarlyn, Columbia Heights West, Arlington View.

Most current W-L students matriculate from Swanson or Kenmore for grades 6-8 and Taylor, Barrett, Science Focus or McKinley for K-5. However, students in the IB Program may reside in any part of the county and can transfer from their home school.

Test scores

Washington-Lee High School is a fully accredited high school base on its performance on the Standards of Learning

Standards of Learning

Standards of Learning ' is a public school standardized testing program in the Commonwealth of Virginia. It sets forth learning and achievement expectations for core subjects for grades K-12 in Virginia's Public Schools...

 tests in Virginia. W-L's average SAT score in 2007 was a 1,095 (548 in Reading; 548 in Math).

Athletics

The school mascot is the "Generals." The men's crew team was started in 1949 and the women's crew team in 1975. The crew teams have won 31 SRA (Scholastic Rowing Association) National Championships (Men's Varsity 8). W-L boats in other events have also won at both Nationals and Stotesbury. Washington-Lee Crew has competed seven times at Henley, winning it twice. The crew team has also produced four national team members, and three Olympians

Olympic Games

The Olympic Games is a major international event featuring summer and winter sports, in which thousands of athletes participate in a variety of competitions. The Olympic Games have come to be regarded as the world’s foremost sports competition where more than 200 nations participate...

. The crew team rows from the Potomac Boat Club

Potomac Boat Club

The Potomac Boat Club is a rowing club on the Potomac River in Washington, DC. It was established in 1859, originally as the Potomac Barge Club.The boat club hosts a number of private members, as well as the Washington-Lee High School crew team...

 boathouse in Georgetown

Georgetown, Washington, D.C.

Georgetown is a neighborhood located in northwest Washington, D.C., situated along the Potomac River. Founded in 1751, the port of Georgetown predated the establishment of the federal district and the City of Washington by 40 years...

 along the Potomac River

Potomac River

The Potomac River flows into the Chesapeake Bay, located along the mid-Atlantic coast of the United States. The river is approximately long, with a drainage area of about 14,700 square miles...

. The 1960 football team won the Virginia State Championship under the coaching of head coach John Youngblood and assistants Sal DiGeorgi, Roger Coggins and Clarence Dryer. The team, dubbed The Untouchables by the local press because they were unscored upon for the first half of the season, had few stars but a solid and tenacious body of players.

A Washington-Lee senior, Chris Tyson, recently achieved the state championship in the 1000m run in 2007.

All other athletic teams, as well as many scholastic competitions, compete through the Virginia High School League

Virginia High School League

The Virginia High School League is the arbiter of interscholastic competition among public high schools in the Commonwealth of Virginia. Unlike similar organizations in many other states, private or religious schools are prohibited from joining. Non-public schools belong to other organizations,...

.

List of Teams

Boys Athletics: Cross Country Cross country running Cross country running is a sport in which people run a race on open-air courses over natural terrain. The course, typically long, may include surfaces of grass and earth, pass through woodlands and open country, and include hills, flat ground and sometimes gravel road... 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.... 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... Rifle Team Shooting sports A shooting sport is a competitive sport involving tests of proficiency using various types of guns such as firearms and airguns . Hunting is also a shooting sport, and indeed shooting live pigeons was an Olympic event... 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... Wrestling Scholastic wrestling Scholastic wrestling, sometimes known in the United States as Folkstyle wrestling, is a style of amateur wrestling practised at the high school and middle school levels in the United States. This wrestling style is essentially Collegiate wrestling with some slight modifications. It is currently... 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... Ice hockey Ice hockey Ice hockey, often referred to as hockey, is a team sport played on ice, in which skaters use wooden or composite sticks to shoot a hard rubber puck into their opponent's net. The game is played between two teams of six players each. Five members of each team skate up and down the ice trying to take... Swim Swimming (sport) Swimming is a sport governed by the Fédération Internationale de Natation .-History: Competitive swimming in Europe began around 1800 BCE, mostly in the form of the freestyle. In 1873 Steve Bowyer introduced the trudgen to Western swimming competitions, after copying the front crawl used by Native...  & Dive Diving Diving is the sport of jumping or falling into water from a platform or springboard, sometimes while performing acrobatics. Diving is an internationally-recognized sport that is part of the Olympic Games. In addition, unstructured and non-competitive diving is a recreational pastime.Diving is one... Soccer 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... Baseball Baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each. The aim is to score runs by hitting a thrown ball with a bat and touching a series of four bases arranged at the corners of a ninety-foot diamond... Tennis Tennis Tennis is a sport usually played between two players or between two teams of two players each . Each player uses a racket that is strung to strike a hollow rubber ball covered with felt over a net into the opponent's court. Tennis is an Olympic sport and is played at all levels of society at all... Crew Rowing (sport) Rowing is a sport in which athletes race against each other on rivers, on lakes or on the ocean, depending upon the type of race and the discipline. The boats are propelled by the reaction forces on the oar blades as they are pushed against the water...

Girls Athletics: Drill Team Color guard (flag twirling) Modern colorguard has evolved over the years into a form of entertainment that's a form of dance theater. It uses props, along with movement, to express dynamic passages in the music accompanying the show. A colorguard is traditionally the visual representation of the music... Cross Country Cheerleading Cheerleading Cheerleading is a physical activity, sometimes a competitive sport, based on organized routines, usually ranging from one to three minutes, which contain the components of tumbling, dance, jumps, cheers, and stunting to direct spectators of events to cheer on sports teams at games or to participate... Volleyball Volleyball Volleyball is a team sport in which two teams of six players are separated by a net. Each team tries to score points by grounding a ball on the other team's court under organized rules.The complete rules are extensive... 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... Rifle Team Shooting sports A shooting sport is a competitive sport involving tests of proficiency using various types of guns such as firearms and airguns . Hunting is also a shooting sport, and indeed shooting live pigeons was an Olympic event... Gymnastics Gymnastics Gymnastics is a sport involving performance of exercises requiring physical strength, flexibility, agility, coordination, and balance. Internationally, all of the gymnastic sports are governed by the Fédération Internationale de Gymnastique with each country having its own national governing body... Basketball Track and Field Swim & Dive Soccer Lacrosse 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... Tennis Crew