Ellen H. Richards Career Academy (formerly known as Richards Vocational High School) 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 ''Öffentlichkei ...

four-year vocational

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 Back of the Yards neighborhood on the southwest side of

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

Illinois Illinois ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern United States. Its largest metropolitan areas include the Chicago metropolitan area, and the Metro East section, of Greater St. Louis. Other smaller metropolita ...

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

. Opened in 1946, Richards is operated by the

Chicago Public Schools Chicago Public Schools (CPS), officially classified as City of Chicago School District #299 for funding and districting reasons, in Chicago, Illinois, is the third-largest school district in the United States, after New York and Los Angeles. ...

system and is named for environmental chemist Ellen Henrietta Richards.

History

Richards was established by the Chicago Public Schools in September 1946 as an all-girls vocational school. At the time of its opening, enrollment was 230. The school was initially housed in a former elementary school building at 2535 South Green Street which was used as a barracks during

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

. Prior to Richards, the school building served as a branch of the Englewood High School. The early vocational courses offered at Richards consisted of Home Arts, Dressmaking, Basic Business Training, Bookkeeping, Beauty Culture, Art, Commercial Art, English, History, Commercial Geography, Science, and Physical Education. This curriculum remained unchanged until the 1961–1962 school year when a course in office practice was added. By the 1962–1963 school year, the enrollment had more than doubled, reaching 870. Due to the construction of the

Stevenson Expressway Stevenson is an English language patronymic surname meaning "son of Steven". Its first historical record is from pre-10th-century England. Another origin of the name is as a toponymic surname related to the place Stevenstone in Devon, England. Th ...

, the school was moved from its South Green location to 3031 South Wallace, another building that once housed an elementary school in 1955. The school moved once again to its present location, 5009 South Laflin Street, during the 1967–1968 school year. The new location was selected to provide a new and much larger building, specifically designed for a vocational high school with a increasing enrollment, which was about 1,300 at the time.Directory of Federally Aided All-day Trade and Industrial Education Programs, by James Reason Coxen, Lucile Allen
Retrieved December 2, 2019. Richards became co-educational during the 1988–1989 school year.

Athletics

Richards competes in the

Chicago Public League The Chicago Public High School Athletic Association, commonly known as the Chicago Public League (CPL), is the interscholastic competition arm of the Chicago Public Schools. The governance of the CPL is set through the Department of Sports Admini ...

(CPL) and is a member of the

Illinois High School Association The Illinois High School Association (IHSA) is an association that regulates competition of interscholastic sports and some interscholastic activities at the high school level for the state of Illinois. It is a charter member of the National Fed ...

(IHSA). The school sport teams are nicknamed Warriors. The girls' basketball team were regional champions and Class 1A in 2018–2019.IHSA Chicago (Richards)
Retrieved December 2, 2019.

References

{{authority control 1946 establishments in Illinois Public high schools in Chicago Educational institutions established in 1946