Montgomery Blair High School is a Montgomery County, Maryland, USA, public school named for Montgomery Blair, a lawyer who represented Dred Scott in his United States Supreme Court case, and served as Postmaster General under President Abraham Lincoln. It was originally built at 313 East Wayne Avenue, in Silver Spring, where it overlooked Sligo Creek, a tributary of the Anacostia River. The campus has since moved to a long-vacant tract of land on University Boulevard by the Capital Beltway. Some students and alumni affectionately refer to it as Blair, or less affectionately as Monkey Blair, perhaps to distinguish it from Richard Montgomery High School in Rockville. It is a member of the National Consortium for Specialized Secondary Schools of Mathematics, Science and Technology (NCSSSMST), and appears to be the only member school that is not a specialized secondary school, because the majority of its students are not enrolled in the school's specialized programs.
History
When the school opened in 1925, it was called Takoma-Silver Spring High School. Within ten years, the school was over capacity, and in 1935 it was relocated to 313 Wayne Avenue and named for Montgomery Blair. In 1992, it became the first high school to host sections of the AIDS memorial quilt. In 1998, it relocated once more to a larger space on University Boulevard, eliminating one of the few remaining undeveloped tracts of land in that area of Silver Spring. On February 5, 1998, President Bill Clinton, and UK Prime Minister Tony Blair appeared at Montgomery Blair High School during a state visit.
Notable Alumni
The following famous people have attended Blair: (this list is by no means complete)
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Carl Bernstein, journalist who, along with Bob Woodward, broke open the Watergate scandal for The Washington Post
- Kiran Chetry , journalist
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Connie Chung, television journalist
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Dominique Dawes, Olympic Gymnast (though she later transferred to Gaithersburg High School because of a coaching change).
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Matt Drudge, internet personality
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Steve Francis, National Basketball Association player for the Houston Rockets
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Goldie Hawn, actress
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Sylvester Stallone, actor (though he is known to have transferred out of the school soon after enrollment)
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Ben Stein, actor, professor, game show host, and speechwriter for President Richard Nixon
- David Vanterpool , National Basketball Association player
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Stan Greenberg, pollster for Bill Clinton and others
Academics
Because of its Science, Mathematics, and Computer Science Magnet Program, and its Communication Arts Program, the school attracts students from across the entire county. The school is one of the few US high schools to have a .edu domain name, with its internet connection going live in the late 1980s. The school is also home to the award winning newspaper Silver Chips.
The school attracts over 3400 students from the surrounding residential area, including several hundred brought via bus from throughout Montgomery County. The magnet program, which was initiated as a desegregation program, accounts for about four hundred students within the school.
Science, Mathematics, and Computer Science Magnet Program
In 1985, Montgomery County Public Schools opened its Science, Mathematics, and Computer Science Magnet Program within Montgomery Blair High School. The magnet program offers accelerated, interdisciplinary courses in science, mathematics, and computer science for highly able students particularly interested in these subjects.
Ninth and tenth grade Magnet students take four courses each semester within the Magnet curriculum (science, mathematics, research, and computer science), and four courses each semester in other disciplines (English, fine arts, foreign language, physical education, social studies, etc.) with the rest of the Blair student body. This allows Magnet students to take full advantage of Blair's wide variety of traditional high school offerings, advanced placement, and honors courses. Juniors and seniors have fewer required Magnet courses, and therefore complete their schedules with electives Since Magnet students have a number of extra academic requirements, Magnet students have an eight-period day, instead of the normal seven-period days of most county high school students. (The count of periods does not include a lunch period, which is not counted because it does not have a separate number.)
Magnet students have been finalists in the Westinghouse/Intel Science Talent Search (including taking first place in 1996 and first runner up in 1999), National Merit Semifinalists (more Semifinalists than any other school in the Maryland for nine years running), Montgomery County Science Fair Grand Award Winners, first place winners in the International Science and Engineering Fair , Montgomery County Mathematics League champions nineteen straight years, Super-Quest finalist teams, national winners in the NASA Space Science Student Involvement Project , American Computer Science League National Championship Teams, Grand Winner of the Physics Olympics for the Baltimore/Washington Metropolitan Area, first place winners in the National Junior Science and Humanities Symposium , and much more. The average SAT score for the magnet program consistently falls above 1500.
External links
Last updated: 05-23-2005 10:11:13
