Heritage High School was 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 ...

located in the northeast area known as Clifton Park of

Baltimore, Maryland Baltimore ( , locally: or ) is the List of municipalities in Maryland, most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland, fourth most populous city in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic, and List of United States cities by popula ...

, United States. It served Baltimore City high schoolers from 2004 to 2015. Founded in 2004, established as an expansion school and as a result of the breakup of

Lake Clifton Eastern High School Lake Clifton Eastern High School (LCEHS) was a Public school (government funded), public High school#United States, high school closed in 2003, located in the Clifton Park, Baltimore, Clifton Park area of northeast Baltimore, Baltimore, Maryland. ...

. It was categorized within District 6, "neighborhood high schools": a comprehensive high school. It officially specialized in the focus of three career and technology completer preparation programs: Business, Management & Finance; Human Resource Services; and Law. Lake Clifton Eastern High School had existed on the campus since the early 1970s until it was closed down in 2005, after which its building was occupied by the new smaller schools. These schools were still faced with problems common to underfunded urban schools, such as academic performance and discipline. The same problems led to Doris M. Johnson High School being recommend for closure in 2010 and Heritage was identified by the

Maryland State Department of Education Maryland State Department of Education (MSDE) is a division of the state government of Maryland in the United States. The agency oversees public school districts, which are 24 local school systems—one for each of Maryland's 23 counties plus one ...

for school improvement in many years.

History

Founded in 2004 by Karen Lawrence, established as an expansion school originally known as Harford Institute during the time and as a result of the breakup of Lake Clifton Eastern High School. The school began it existence at the old Fairmount-Harford Building of 2555 Harford Road where it shared the building with Harbor City High School for the first two years (2003—2005) with an initial enrollment of up to 310 9th and 10th graders. After the following school year, the school was relocated to the Lake Clifton Campus with an initial enrollment of 550 students of grades 9th through 11th for the 2004–2005 school year, where it was the last year of the graduating class and existence of

. This building already had science labs, a state-of the art library & media center, gymnasiums, full-service health clinic, and established athletic and extracurricular activities. It was also wired for internet. Beginning with the 2005–2006 school year, Heritage High School shared the Lake Clifton Campus with Doris M. Johnson High School. Both schools had their first graduating classes of seniors in the year 2006. From 2008 to 2012, Heritage offered Advanced Placement courses. In 2010, the school system recommended Doris M. Johnson High School for closure due to poor test scores, school climate, and discipline problems. The REACH! Partnership School was relocated to the campus for development and replaced Doris M. Johnson after the closure. REACH! Academy had undergone a renovation of $3.5 million to accommodate lab areas construction and health-care (its themes). Heritage continues career & technology pathways into human resources, business, and leadership, and now also includes law. However, as of 2012–2013, the school no longer offered Advanced Placement. As a cost-cutting measure, Heritage High School was slated for closure at the end of the 2014–2015 school year. The graduation ceremony for the final Class of 2015 was hosted in the Lake Clifton auditorium complex on Saturday May 30, 2015.

Sports

The Lake Clifton Lakers won state championships in 1995, 1999, 2009, 2012.

Organizations

Beginning in 2008, the school offered a pilot course in conjunction with the Baltimore

Algebra Project The Algebra Project is a national U.S. mathematics literacy program aimed at helping low-income students and students of color achieve the mathematical skills in high school that are a prerequisite for a college preparatory mathematics sequence. ...

. Their first class was slated to graduate in 2013. Heritage High School had a

JROTC The Junior Reserve Officers' Training Corps (JROTC -- commonly pronounced "JAY-rotsee") is a Federal government of the United States, federal program sponsored by the United States Armed Forces in high schools and also in some middle schools acr ...

program through the

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the land warfare, land military branch, service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight Uniformed services of the United States, U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army o ...

. Real Food Farm, which cultivates crops on the campus, offered internships to Heritage students."Education Programs for Clifton Area Schools"

Students

In 2010, 97.5% of students at HHS identified as

African-American African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of ensl ...

. The graduation rate was 54.65% (up from 42.15% in 2009 and 47.32% in 2008). The drop-out rate was 5.16% (down from 7.02% in 2009 and 14.01% in 2008). The average total SAT score in 2009 was 936.

References

External links

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Real Food Farm
{{authority control Public schools in Baltimore Public high schools in Maryland Defunct high schools in Maryland Educational institutions established in 2004 2004 establishments in Maryland Educational institutions disestablished in 2015 2015 disestablishments in Maryland