Sleepy Hollow High School

Sleepy Hollow High School serves an ethnically and socio-economically diverse student body from the villages of Sleepy Hollow and Tarrytown. Recently renovated and expanded, the school stands above the east bank of the Hudson River in southern Westchester County, approximately 20 miles north of New York City. We have become a community of choice for middle and upper middle class families who value our "snapshot" of the real world. Our population is a blend of families who have lived in town for generation and newly-arrived immigrants from the Caribbean and Latin America. Many of our families can afford to send their children to a host of private schools in the area, but we are proud to say that they choose instead to have their children attend the public school. Side by side, the children of professionals and tradesmen, study our full curricula. In October 1957, Sleepy Hollow High School was the focus of an article "New Buildings Won't Educate Your Children" in Woman's Day magazine. Although the 1957 physical plant was deemed "as handsome a high school as any in America," the curriculum, based on "best-practices" was recognized as enabling our graduates to have "a better chance today than ever before to become all that they are capable of. However, the two-year major renovation and expansion to our sprawling building on its scenic campus completed in 2008, now matches our 21 st century curriculum: The addition of one hundred thousand square feet of teaching space, state-of-the-art science labs, art studios, a gymnasium that boasts a fitness center and dedicated wrestling room, an auditorium that seats 750 and provides professional quality sound and light engineering, a renovated and expanded Library Media Center, a cafeteria with a food court, wireless capability throughout the building, and all classrooms-not just the twenty newly-built ones-outfitted with Smartboards enhances and augments the best-practices curriculum offered at Sleepy Hollow. What hasn't changed since 1957 is the public and academic communities' shared belief that there is "no substitute for a solid foundation" in education. In 2012, we hosted representatives of the Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools who, in addition to enthusiastically recommending SHHS for re-accreditation, commended our teaching faculty on its "demonstrated dedication to meeting the needs of all students" and to teaching "outstanding educational programs that include an extensive array of rigorous courses based on best research-based instruction practices and technology application available." In 2009, the United States Department of Education first featured us on their website "Doing What Works" as one of five schools nationally identified as putting best-practices in action to achieve graduation. In 2008, Sleepy Hollow was selected by the Magellan foundation as one of three exemplary New York State high schools to have programs and practices that lead to high graduation and low drop-out rates. Sleepy Hollow was among the top 40 from over 640 schools to reach benchmark graduation rate standards and was one of five exemplary high schools chosen for in-depth, research, study, and visitation by the Magellan foundation. Our comprehensive high school programs are designed to meet the needs of each adolescent we serve. We build relationships with our students and their families that guide everyone through the stress and strife of adolescence. Thriving athletic and performing arts programs are complemented by an extensive extra curricular program. A new source of pride is our award winning student-produced Multimedia Production Team, recipient of Honorable Mention in the Adobe Max competition for professional international media developers; Sleepy Hollow's team came in second to Homeland Security and NASA Space Center. The team has produced programming for our local educational channel 77; along with our presence on the web, check it out at www.sleepyhollowhits.com . In our quest to get our students college and career ready, we have established extensive partnerships with local colleges, corporations, and the community at large. Support from local historical and business resources has made our community an extension of our campus; students conduct research and participate in internships as an integral part of our academic program. Our creativity and commitment has been acknowledged through consistently passed local school budgets, and the award of state, federal, and private foundation grants. Locally, smaller grants have provided funding for cultural trips for students, added instruments to our band and orchestra, equipment for our multimedia students, robotic kits for AP Physics students, a gardening component to our Life Skills curriculum for our most handicapped students, and provided a weather station for our Earth Science students. We are proud of our students' records of accomplishment. An impressive percentage of students from the Class of 2012 - 93% continued their studies in higher education. In the recent past, our top students have matriculated at Emory, Cornell, Middlebury, Northwestern, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Smith College, Stanford, Tufts, University of Pennsylvania, University of Virginia, Vassar and Wesleyan. We are equally proud of the many first generation graduates we send to local and community colleges. Annually, our students earn an impressive number of scholarship dollars, averaging in excess of $275,000 in each of the last five years. A key factor to our success is the involvement of our parents in their children's education; parents feel welcome at our school. Our PTSA sponsors Parent-to-Parent Nights. These events, offered in English and Spanish, enable parents to share strategies for raising a teenager. The PTSA, the Foundation for the Public Schools of the Tarrytowns, and our Sports and Performing Arts Boosters raise funds for our curricular and extra curricular programs. Sleepy Hollow is an exciting place for students and staff to work and learn together. If any school community can demonstrate that public education is alive and well, it is ours. Our school slogan, "Sleepy Hollow: Say it Proudly" sums up the collective commitment to our school.