Lourdes High School is a Catholic high school located in

Rochester, Minnesota Rochester is a city in the U.S. state of Minnesota and the county seat of Olmsted County. Located on rolling bluffs on the Zumbro River's south fork in Southeast Minnesota, the city is the home and birthplace of the renowned Mayo Clinic. Acco ...

. It is a part of the Rochester Catholic School system and is located in the

Roman Catholic Diocese of Winona Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *''Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a letter ...

Background

Lourdes High School (LHS) was initially for girls only and went

coeducational Mixed-sex education, also known as mixed-gender education, co-education, or coeducation (abbreviated to co-ed or coed), is a system of education where males and females are educated together. Whereas single-sex education was more common up to t ...

in 1925 when nearby boys-only Heffron High School closed. When the school relocated to a location on Center Street in 1941 it was renamed Lourdes High School. It moved to a site near 19th Street and Valley High in 2013.

Administration

Dennis L. Nigon, Principal of Lourdes High School from 1987 to 2007, became President of Rochester Catholic Schools in 2007. Mr. Nigon has 39 years of experience in Catholic high schools, and is in charge of the Lourdes Building Our Future project, to build a new facility for Lourdes High School.

Academic performance

LHS uses

modular scheduling Modular scheduling (also known as flex scheduling, flexible modular scheduling, or modular flex scheduling) is a system of timetabling in certain high schools in the United States. History Modular scheduling was developed by schools such as the Ke ...

, students usually having classes into 36-minute class periods, with each class meeting about four of five days of the school week. Lourdes High School has additional academic requirements beyond those commonly found at public high schools. Lourdes students averaged a score of 26 on the ACT examination in the 2006–2007 academic year, meaning that the average Lourdes' student scored higher than 80% of national ACT takers.

Extracurricular activities

Math League

The Lourdes High School Math League in 2008 won first place in the Hiawatha Division, as well as attending the State Competition on March 12, 2007, taking second place in the Small Schools Division. LHS student, Patti Geisler, won first place of all high schools in the division for highest individual score. 6 of the top 10 students of all high schools in 2008 were from Lourdes high school. (Post Bulletin, page A4 February 15, 2008)

Science Club

The science club was established around 2005. The club is made up of students dedicated to increasing their knowledge of science. In 2007, the club formed its second team to take to the Envirothon Competition. After taking second place in the regional competition, the team went on to the state tournament. In 2010, the team finished fourth in the regional competition by one point. That team was led by Taylor Nelson and Andrew Lose.

Chess Club

Lourdes also boasts the city's top ranked high school chess team after defeating local rival Century High School in the 2008 city championship while going on to finish 7th in the state competition.

Athletics

Football

In 2006, the Lourdes varsity football team advanced to the semi-finals of the state tournament. The current head coach is Mike Kesler. The first year of Kesler's coaching career was a 2–7 season. But every year since has been a successful winning season making the state tournament three straight years in 06, 07, and 08. In November 2010, Rochester Lourdes won the Minnesota State Class 3A football title with a convincing 42–13 win over Holy Family. Lourdes finished the season undefeated.

Soccer

In 1997, Lourdes had a boys soccer team for the first time. The Lourdes boy soccer team won the Minnesota State Soccer Championship for Class A in 1998 and 1999. In 1995, Tom Kane, the current varsity coach for boys soccer at Lourdes, campaigned heavily for a school-sanctioned team. The 1998 Boys team (the first out-state Minnesota soccer team to win state) beat LaCresent (4–3), Mankato West (2–0) and Caledonia (2–0 section championship game) on their way to state. At state, Lourdes came back from a 2–0 deficit to win 3–2 against Benilde-St. Margaret's in overtime in the state quarterfinals. They then proceeded to beat Duluth Marshall 1–0 to claim the championship. The 2006–2007 season found Lourdes falling to Benilde-St. Margaret's 2–5 in the semi finals and tying Totino-Grace 1–1 for third place.

Ice hockey

In the 1960s,

Gene Campbell Eugene Edward Campbell (August 17, 1932 – April 8, 2013) was an American ice hockey player. He played for the Minnesota Golden Gophers. He won a silver medal with the United States national team at the 1956 Winter Olympics. He was bo ...

and

Ken Johannson Kenneth Johannson (October 6, 1930November 27, 2018) was a Canadian-born American ice hockey player, coach and executive. A native of Edmonton, he attended the University of North Dakota on a football scholarship, then played for the Fighting ...

were the inaugural coaches for the boys' hockey program.

References

External links

* {{authority control Roman Catholic Diocese of Winona-Rochester Catholic secondary schools in Minnesota Schools in Olmsted County, Minnesota Educational institutions established in 1877

Lourdes Lourdes (, also , ; oc, Lorda ) is a market town situated in the Pyrenees. It is part of the Hautes-Pyrénées department in the Occitanie region in southwestern France. Prior to the mid-19th century, the town was best known for the Château ...

1877 establishments in Minnesota