East Chapel Hill High School

East Chapel Hill High School
Established	August 20, 1996
Type	Public
Coeducational
Principal	Eileen Tully
Asst. Principal	Dr. Kylon Jerome Middleton Beverly Rudolph Tomeka Ward-Satterfield
Faculty	195
Grades	9–12
Location	500 Weaver Dairy Road, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, United States
District	CHCCS
Accreditation	SACS
Colors	Black and silver
Mascot	Wildcats
Yearbook	Eurus
Newspaper	The ECHO
National ranking	126th (Newsweek)
Website	http://www2.chccs.k12.nc.us/education/school/school.php?sectionid=5
All data from school website/handbook.

East Chapel Hill High School is a public high school in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. It is the second high school of the Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools district which contains two other high schools, Chapel Hill High School and Carrboro High School. The school's principal is Eileen Tully, and the mascot is the Wildcat. East holds multiple 3A and 4A championships and is home to many award-winning extracurricular groups, particularly the two student-run a cappella groups, the Alley Cats and the Chiefs of Staff , and the East Chapel Hill Speech and Debate team. Many of its students take Advanced Placement (AP) courses.

Although East previously ranked within the top 100 of American public high schools, it has not appeared on the list since the 2009–2010 school year due to achievement gaps. The school does, however, place in the rankings of best high schools for math and science in the nation, where it is at #23.

Academics

This is a highly competitive school in which the students typically score above the national average on standardized tests. In the 2002 school year the median weighted GPA was 3.56, and the median SAT score was 1181 compared to the state average of 1001. Also, 313 students participated in Advanced Placement (AP) examinations with 53% of all scores above a 3. There are typically 15–25 National Merit Scholar Semi-Finalists in a graduating class at East. Negative effects of the intense academic atmosphere include considerable student stress.

Demographics

According to 2002–2004 school statistics, 63% of the school's student body is white, 18% is African American, 5% is Hispanic, and 14% is Asian. 52% of the student body is male and 48％ is female. For this time period, out of a total of 1706 students 30% (513 students) were in the 9th grade, 24.6% (421 students) were in the 10th grade, 25% (426) were in the 11th grade and 20.3% (346 students) were in the 12th grade. There were a total of 69 teachers making for a 1:25 ratio of teachers to students.

Athletics

Athletic programs make up a large part of student life at East, and East's teams have been highly competitive and successful every year since the school's inception in 1996. East fields teams in sports across the board. Fall sports include: football, men's soccer, women's tennis, field hockey, volleyball, cheerleading, women's golf, and men's and women's cross country. Winter sports include: men's and women's swimming and diving, men's and women's basketball, wrestling, cheerleading, and Men's and Women's Indoor Track and Field. Spring sports include men's tennis, baseball, softball, men's and women's track & field, men's golf, women's soccer, and men's and women's lacrosse. Since 1996, East teams have won many NC state, regional, conference, and individual championships. As of Fall 2004, East's women's tennis team had won 7 3A State Championships in a row. In the spring of 2008 the men's tennis team won the 4A state championships. In 2005, Sports Illustrated named East Chapel Hill the best sports high school in North Carolina. In the fall of 2010 the field hockey team won the State Championship for the third year in a row. The East men's lacrosse program has also won 2 state championships and was runner up three times in the past ten years.

For the first 13 years of East Chapel Hill High School's existence, Dave Thaden was the principal; he retired on June 30, 2009. He was replaced by Eileen Tully.

Also notable is the school's rivalry to nearby Chapel Hill High School.

Alumni Association

Proposals for the creation of an alumni association for East began in Fall of 2007. These efforts took off in 2009 with the drafting of organizational bylaws, the creation of a Board of Directors, and the launching of a new website. [2]

Notable events

• On April 24, 2006, eighteen-year-old student W.B. Foster held both teacher Lisa Kukla, and a student hostage with a shotgun, a hunting knife, and a pistol. After more than an hour, Lisa Kukla was able to talk Foster out of harming her or the student. Instead, Foster fired a shot through the window and fled, but was later turned in to the police. It's unknown why Foster held those two hostage, since he was never taught by Kukla, and didn't seem to know the student. In June 2007, Foster was sentenced to five years of probation, because his attorneys claimed he had schizophrenia.

• In July 2006, a junior at East Chapel Hill High School, Arnav Tripathy, won a gold medal at the International Mathematical Olympiad in Slovenia. He was one of the two members on the U.S. squad that won gold medals. Competing in a field of 498 students from 90 countries, Tripathy helped the U.S. team finish fifth overall. Tripathy also has been enrolled in undergraduate level math courses at UNC since 9th grade, and has been enrolled in graduate level math courses at UNC since 11th grade. During the qualification for the IMO, Arnav Tripathy scored 150/150 on the AMC 12. He then scored a 14/15 on the AIME examination. He then won the USAMO, qualifying for the IMO. He then returned to the IMO in 2007, where he won a silver medal, one of three Americans to do so.

• In February 2009, assistant principal, Gloria Woods-Weeks was named the 2009 North Carolina Assistant Principal of the Year by the N.C. Principals and Assistant Principals Association. Ms. Woods-Weeks left at the end of the 2008–2009 school year to become the principal of the Holton Career Center in Durham Public Schools.

Notable alumni

• Anoop Desai – American Idol top 6 finalist. (Class of 2004)
• Arnav Tripathy – Three Time William Lowell Putnam Fellow (2007, 2008, 2009)
• Tony Mendes – Two time Lacrosse All-American, U-19 All Star, former player for DI University of Maryland and Syracuse. Now plays for DIII Sailsbury.
• Ryan Watts - Actor - Tyler Perry Studios "Georgia Sky" (contracted through 2015) - ECHHS Class of 2008

External links

• School website
• Athletics
• East Chapel Hill High on "Public School Review"
• Alumni Association webpage
• Alley Cats
• [3]
• The ECHO – The School Newspaper