Bloomington High School South (simply referred to as BHSS or South) is a

public In public relations and communication science, publics are groups of individual people, and the public (a.k.a. the general public) is the totality of such groupings. This is a different concept to the sociological concept of the ''Öffentlichk ...

high school A secondary school describes an institution that provides secondary education and also usually includes the building where this takes place. Some secondary schools provide both '' lower secondary education'' (ages 11 to 14) and ''upper seconda ...

Bloomington, Indiana Bloomington is a city in and the county seat of Monroe County in the central region of the U.S. state of Indiana. It is the seventh-largest city in Indiana and the fourth-largest outside the Indianapolis metropolitan area. According to the Mo ...

, United States. It is part of the

Monroe County Community School Corporation The Monroe County Community School Corporation (MCCSC) is a school corporation providing primary, secondary and adult educational services in Monroe County, Indiana. MCCSC constitutes a unified school district and has tax and legislative author ...

Athletics

The Panthers compete in the

Conference Indiana Conference Indiana (CI) is an athletic conference within the Indiana High School Athletic Association. Conference Indiana was initially formed from the union of surviving members of the Central Suburban Athletic Conference (CSAC) and the South Ce ...

, with their main rival being the cross-town

Bloomington High School North Bloomington High School North (often referred to as BHSN or simply North) opened in the fall of 1972, is a comprehensive four-year public high school located in the northern part of Bloomington, Indiana, United States. The school is accredited by ...

Cougars.

History

Bloomington High School South originated as Bloomington High School, or BHS. BHS was a prep school for

Indiana University Indiana University (IU) is a system of public universities in the U.S. state of Indiana. Campuses Indiana University has two core campuses, five regional campuses, and two regional centers under the administration of IUPUI. *Indiana Universi ...

until University High School was built in the 1930s, which allowed BHS to become a general high school. It was housed, for many years, in a three-story brick building at Seminary Square Park, and was considered Bloomington's central high school in 1864. As Bloomington grew, BHS got and slowly evolved. The Gothic year book began in 1909 and The Optimist newspaper in 1911. Both were started at BHS and are still published as of 2021. In 1965, a new high school building was built for BHS on South Walnut Street. When BHS vacated Seminary Square, the old building was turned into a middle school called Central Junior High School. On April 6, 1967, an arsonist burned down the building, completely destroying it, and the present park was created on the site. In 1972, University High School and Unionville High School (the closest county high school outside the city of Bloomington) were closed along with Smithville High School. "South" was added to BHS to create "Bloomington High School South," (BHSS) complete with mascot and school colors (purple and white), similar to that of the former BHS. Later, the fall of that same year, as a result of the 1968 school consolidation plan which formed the

(BHSN) was built with students from the closed University and Unionville High Schools along with some transfer students from BHSS. The zonal boundary that determines which Bloomington high school a student will attend forms a jagged line that intersects the city. The zoning is such that one student who actually lives north of another, may in fact attend "South", while the other attends "North". This geographic divide was contentious given that the MCCSC school board decided to send the most prominent socioeconomic neighborhood (Hyde Park) to North to reduce in economic/academic inequity. The map can be obtained from the Monroe County Community School Corporation. The two schools have remained contentious rivals in most sporting events since the creation of BHSN in 1972.

Extracurricular activities

Music

The Bloomington South and Bloomington North string orchestras together form the Hoosier Youth Philharmonic, which has performed nationally and internationally, including a concert at Carnegie Hall on March 14, 2012.

Notable alumni

David Shuster David Martin Shuster (born July 22, 1967) is an American television journalist and talk radio host. He most recently served as principal anchor and managing editor for i24 News, previously serving as an anchor for MSNBC and worked for Fox News, ...

, journalist and talk radio host *

Rex Grossman Rex Daniel Grossman III (born August 23, 1980) is a former American football quarterback who played in the National Football League (NFL) for 11 seasons, most notably with the Chicago Bears. He played college football at Florida, where he rece ...

, NFL player *

Hoagy Carmichael Hoagland Howard Carmichael (November 22, 1899 – December 27, 1981) was an American musician, composer, songwriter, actor and lawyer. Carmichael was one of the most successful Tin Pan Alley songwriters of the 1930s, and was among the first ...

, singer, songwriter, and actor * Meg Cabot, author * Jordan Hulls, professional basketball player * Liz Watson, attorney and politician * Darwin Davis, professional basketball player *

Steve Kinser Steve "The King" Kinser (born June 2, 1954) is a former professional sprint car racing driver. He has won 20 championships in the World of Outlaws (WoO) series. Kinser left the World of Outlaws in 2006 to compete with the National Sprint Tour s ...

, former professional racecar driver * Anthony Leal, collegiate basketball player * Daniel Larsen, mathematician

References

External links

* {{Authority control Schools in Monroe County, Indiana Public high schools in Indiana Former Southern Indiana Athletic Conference members Buildings and structures in Bloomington, Indiana