Seneca Valley High School (SVHS) is a U.S.

public high school State schools (in England, Wales, Australia and New Zealand) or public schools (Scottish English and North American English) are generally primary or secondary schools that educate all students without charge. They are funded in whole or in pa ...

(grades 9-12) in

Germantown, Maryland Germantown is an urbanized census-designated place in Montgomery County, Maryland, United States. With a population of 91,249 as of 2020 U.S. Decennial Census, Germantown is the third most populous place in Maryland, after the city of Baltimore ...

. It is part of the Montgomery County Public Schools system. Its enrollment for the 2019–2020 school year was 1,226 students. The new building was completed in 2021, which has a capacity of 2,551 students.

History

Seneca Valley High School's parking lot in 1974

Seneca Valley High School sits on land which was once the site of a dairy farm owned by baseball player Walter Perry Johnson, having been purchased by him in 1935. Johnson lived there with his five children and his mother, as his wife died, until his death in 1946.

1970s

Seneca Valley High School opened in 1974 as the first high school in Germantown and remained the only one until 1998, when Northwest High School opened. In its first year of operation, the 1974 to 1975 school year, under Principal Nathan Pearson, Seneca Valley hosted students grades seven through ten. In the following 1975 to 1976 school year, the school operated grades nine through eleven, with 8th graders transferring to the newly opened Ridgeview Junior High School in Gaithersburg, Maryland. During the 1976 to 1977 school year, Seneca Valley transformed into what was then a senior high school, hosting grades ten through twelve, graduating its first class in June 1977.

1980s

Finally in 1988, Seneca Valley changed to the present state of full-fledged high school with grades 9-12.

1990s

The class of 1992, was the first to graduate all upper high school years in one facility.

2010s

The original school building, inaugurated in 1974, was demolished in 2020 and replaced with a new building on-site in 2021. Construction work began in September 2017 and was completed in September 2020. The new building is the largest high school in the State of Maryland, and will draw students from the former Clarksburg High School boundary area.

Sports

The school colors are

kelly green Shades of chartreuse are listed below. Historically, many of these colors have gone under the name of either yellow or green, as the specifics of their color composition was not known until later. Wrapping the spectrum into a color wheel In a c ...

and

gold Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile met ...

, and the mascot is the Screamin'

Eagle Eagle is the common name for many large birds of prey of the family Accipitridae. Eagles belong to several groups of genera, some of which are closely related. Most of the 68 species of eagle are from Eurasia and Africa. Outside this area, just ...

. Seneca Valley's

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

biggest rivalry is with

Damascus High School Damascus High School (DHS) is a public high school in Damascus, Maryland, United States. It is part of the Montgomery County Public Schools district. History Damascus High School was built in 1950 and renovated in 1978. Athletics The Damasc ...

. Seneca Valley's

team is one of the most accomplished public school programs in Maryland history. They have a record 12 state football championships, with the most recent title coming in 2002. Seneca Valley won the state title in 1976, 1977, 1979, 1980, 1987, 1992, 1993, 1994, 1997, 1998, 1999, and 2002.

Notable alumni

Mark Bryan Mark William Bryan (born May 6, 1967) is an American musician. He is a founding member, songwriter, and the lead guitarist for the band Hootie & the Blowfish. In 1986, Bryan and his friend Darius Rucker formed a duo called The Wolf Brothers whi ...

(1985), lead guitarist for

Hootie and the Blowfish Hootie & the Blowfish are an American soft rock band that were formed in Columbia, South Carolina, in 1986. The band's lineup for most of its existence has been the quartet of Darius Rucker, Mark Bryan, Dean Felber, and Jim Sonefeld. The band w ...

Neil Fallon Neil Fallon (born October 25, 1971) is an American musician, best known as the lead singer and occasional rhythm guitarist and keyboardist for the rock band Clutch. He is also the lead singer for The Company Band and Dunsmuir, and joined The Bak ...

(1989), vocalist for

Clutch A clutch is a mechanical device that engages and disengages power transmission, especially from a drive shaft to a driven shaft. In the simplest application, clutches connect and disconnect two rotating shafts (drive shafts or line shafts). ...

Dean Felber Hootie & the Blowfish are an American soft rock band that were formed in Columbia, South Carolina, in 1986. The band's lineup for most of its existence has been the quartet of Darius Rucker, Mark Bryan, Dean Felber, and Jim Sonefeld. The band w ...

(1985), bass guitarist for Hootie and the Blowfish *

Jean-Paul Gaster Jean-Paul Gaster (born June 19, 1971) is the drummer for American rock band Clutch. Style and influences Jean-Paul Gaster learned to play drums by playing along to 1960s and 1970s heavy rock bands like Jimi Hendrix, Cream, ZZ Top and Black ...

(1989), drummer for Clutch *

Dan Maines Clutch is an American rock band from Germantown, Maryland. Since its formation in 1991, the band line-up has included Tim Sult (lead guitar), Dan Maines (bass), Jean-Paul Gaster (drums), and Neil Fallon (vocals, rhythm guitar, keyboards). To ...

(1989), bass guitarist for Clutch * Andre Smith (2006), former football player in the NFL *

Paula White Paula Michelle White-Cain (née Furr; born April 20, 1966) is an American televangelist and a proponent of prosperity theology. White became chair of the evangelical advisory board in Donald Trump's administration. She delivered the invocation a ...

(1984), Televangelist and Pastor, Paula White Ministries

References

External links

*
Seneca Valley Football

Seneca Valley Lacrosse

Seneca Valley Class of 1979 Alumni
* * {{authority control 1974 establishments in Maryland Educational institutions established in 1974 Germantown, Maryland International Baccalaureate schools in Maryland Public high schools in Montgomery County, Maryland