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Hillsdale High School
Address
3115 Del Monte Street San Mateo, California 94403 United States
Coordinates	37°31′57″N 122°18′46″W / 37.532403°N 122.312669°W / 37.532403; -122.312669
Information
Type	Public Secondary
Established	1955
Principal	Jeff Gilbert
Faculty	92.67 (FTE)
Grades	9–12
Number of students	1,629 (2022-2023)
Student to teacher ratio	17.58
Campus	Suburban
Color(s)	Columbia Blue, Scarlet Red
Athletics conference	Peninsula Athletic League
Team name	Fighting Knights
Rival	Aragon High School
Newspaper	Hillsdale Scroll
Yearbook	The Hillsdale Shield
Website	www.smuhsd.org/hillsdalehigh

Hillsdale High School is a public co-educational high school in San Mateo, California, serving grades 9–12 as part of the San Mateo Union High School District. Hillsdale generally serves the residents of San Mateo and Foster City. The main feeder schools to Hillsdale are Abbott, Bayside, Borel, and Bowditch Middle Schools of the San Mateo-Foster City School District.

History

When it opened in 1955, Hillsdale High School was awarded the School Design Award from the American Institute of Architects. It served as the prototype for Bay Area high schools, with indoor/outdoor passages, landscaped courtyards, and skylights in classrooms. The design is credited to John Lyon Reid.

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, teachers Greg Jouriles and Sue Bedford developed and implemented an integrated humanities curriculum, scheduling social studies and English classes back-to-back. The extended periods were first rolled out to first-year honors students in 1989, followed by a parallel program implemented by Christine Del Gaudio and Marty Kongsle for the remaining first-year students in 1992. 1994 marked the start of the annual Battle at Dawn, a re-enactment of the Battle of Neuve Chapelle for first-year students at HHS as part of their studies about World War I.

In 1996, HHS proposed implementing a senior exhibition as a graduation requirement to pass fourth-year English classes. Students would have to defend a fifteen-page thesis before a three-member panel for their senior exhibition, which drew attention from parents concerned their children would not pass. The senior exhibition requirement was implemented in 1997, and the review of multiple drafts added a substantial load to teachers' grading burden, including one-on-one assistance and mentoring. As a result, a tutorial period was added to the teachers' schedules in 1999, and the English, social studies, and math teachers collaborated to create the Reflective, Eager, Aspiring, Learning Masters (REALM) program to help personalize instruction. Jeff Gilbert left HHS in 2001 to join the Stanford Teacher Education Program, introducing the two schools, and Stanford faculty entered into a Professional Development School relationship with HHS in the fall of 2001.

In the early 2000s, HHS won multiple grants to transform school culture into small learning communities (SLC), an approach championed by Linda Darling-Hammond, who had introduced HHS faculty to the concept during a professional development day in January 2002. The planning for SLCs at HHS was funded by a spring 2002 federal grant which culminated in Coyote Point Day, a two-day discussion and planning session held offsite at Coyote Point Park in November 2002.

Under the SLC model, incoming first-year students at HHS are divided into three houses (Florence, Kyoto, and Oaxaca), named for important medieval centers of learning; each house has approximately 100 students, who stay with a common set of teachers covering math, English, social science, and science for two years. Between their second and third years, students are reorganized into three upper-division houses (Cusco, Jakarta, and Timbuktu), where they remain for their final two years. Students take elective and advanced placement courses outside their houses.

Campus

SMUHSD residents approved Measure D in 2000 and Measure M in 2006, which directly funded the repair and modernization of District schools, including Hillsdale.

Statistics

Demographics

2022-2023 1,645 students: 845 male (51%), 800 female (49%)

Athletics

Hillsdale participates in the Peninsula Athletic League (PAL) in the following sports:

• Cross country
• Football
• Golf
• Tennis
• Volleyball
• Water Polo
• Basketball
• Soccer
• Wrestling
• Badminton
• Softball
• Swimming
• Track and Field
• Baseball
• Lacrosse

Awards

Hillsdale High School has received a number of awards and honors:

• 1955 American Institute of Architects School Design award for its Neo-Brutalist style
• 1990 "Best of San Mateo County" by the San Mateo County Times
• 1993 Named a United States Department of Education, National Blue Ribbon School
• 2001 Stanford Graduate School of Education's first Professional Development School
• 2007 Named a California Distinguished School
• 2009–2010 The Mock Trial team won first place in the California State Mock Trial Championship (and ultimately placed 19th at the national competition in Philadelphia, PA)
• 2011 Ranked no. 225 in the Newsweek Top 1,000 Public High Schools
• 2016 Received Gold Recognition from Schools of Opportunity

Notable alumni

• Frankie Corbett, badminton player, multi-time Pan American Badminton Championships medalist.
• Valerie Fleming, Olympic Silver Medalist and World Cup Champion bobsledder.
• Billy Hardwick, Bowling Hall of Fame.
• John Holdren, scientist, director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, co-chair of the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology.
• Karen Kraft, two-time Olympic Medalist in women's rowing.
• Jay Mathews, author and education columnist with The Washington Post.
• J. Michael McGinnis, physician and public health scholar.
• Jed Rose, credited with co-inventing the nicotine patch.
• Thomas Schumacher, theatrical producer.
• Nick Vanos (d. 1987), former NBA player with the Phoenix Suns.
• David Yarnold, former assistant managing editor of the San Jose Mercury News and president and CEO of the National Audubon Society.

See also

• San Mateo County high schools

References

1. ^ "Hillsdale High". National Center for Education Statistics. Retrieved November 16, 2024.
2. Hillsdale Scroll
3. ^ "About Us: Hillsdale High School History". San Mateo Union High School District. Retrieved 18 June 2019.
4. Michelson, Alan. "San Mateo Union High School District (SMUHSD), Hillsdale High School, San Mateo, CA". Pacific Coast Architecture Database. Retrieved 18 June 2019.
5. ^ School Redesign Network (2005). Windows on Conversions: Hillsdale High School, San Mateo, California (PDF) (Report). Stanford Center for Opportunity Policy in Education. Retrieved 18 June 2019.
6. Mathews, Jay (March 25, 2018). "Duck! Ninth-graders learn on the battlefield while squirt guns squirt". The Washington Post. Retrieved 18 June 2019.
7. ^ "A Knight's Tale: 2016-2017" (PDF). Hillsdale High School. Retrieved 18 June 2019.
8. Swartz, Angela (August 28, 2013). "A decade of small learning community success: Hillsdale continues to share its redesign with other U.S. high schools". San Mateo Daily Journal. Retrieved 18 June 2019.
9. Mathews, Jay (November 6, 2011). "My high school's surprise transformation, and what it says about education reform". The Washington Post. Retrieved 18 June 2019.
10. "About Smaller Learning Communities". Retrieved 16 January 2024.
11. "Smaller Learning Communities Model". Retrieved 16 January 2024.
12. "Measure D: San Mateo Union High School District Bonds For Repair and Renovation". Smart Voter. November 7, 2000. Retrieved 18 June 2019.
13. "Measure M: Bond Measure — San Mateo Union High School District". Smart Voter. November 7, 2006. Retrieved 18 June 2019.
14. "Measure M" (PDF). San Mateo Union High School District. Retrieved 18 June 2019.
15. "Peninsula Athletic League". Archived from the original on January 14, 2010. Retrieved December 30, 2009.
16. "Blue Ribbon Schools Program, p.11" (PDF). U.S. Department of Education. Archived from the original (PDF) on June 30, 2014.
17. "2007 Distinguished Middle and High Schools – California Distinguished Schools Program (CA Dept of Education)". Archived from the original on 2014-03-04. Retrieved 2012-11-17.
18. "Hillsdale wins state Mock Trial". The Daily Journal. March 23, 2010.
19. "America's Best High Schools 2011 – Newsweek and The Daily Beast". The Daily Beast. Archived from the original on 2011-10-16. Retrieved 2012-11-10.
20. "2016 Recipients - Schools of Opportunity". April 4, 2017.
21. Staff, Nathan Mollat Daily Journal (2019-07-31). "Corbett: A badminton gold standard". San Mateo Daily Journal. Retrieved 2023-07-05.
22. ^ "Hillsdale High School Hall of Fame: 2018 Inductees" (PDF). Hillsdale High School Alumni. Retrieved 18 June 2019.
23. Sue Lempert (28 July 2014). "Famous local high school graduates". San Mateo Daily Journal.
24. Mathews, Jay (February 5, 2000). "What Coach Vermeil Taught Me". The Washington Post. Retrieved 18 June 2019.
25. "Hillsdale High School Hall of Fame: 2019 Inductees" (PDF). Hillsdale High School Alumni. Retrieved 18 June 2019.

External links

• San Mateo Union High School District official website
• Great Schools profile
• California Department of Education - DataQuest reports

• Educational institutions established in 1955
• High schools in San Mateo County, California
• Public high schools in California
• 1955 establishments in California