CENTENNIAL HIGH SCHOOL (MARYLAND)

'Centennial High School' is a secondary school located in Ellicott City, Maryland which was established in 1977. The school is based in Howard County and is part of the Howard County Public Schools system. As of 2006, the school principal is R. Scott Pfeifer. In 1984-85, the school was recognized as one of the top 100 high schools in the country through the USDE Secondary School Recognition Program. In 1996, Centennial High School was the first high school within the state of Maryland to achieve the excellence standard in all categories of the MSPAP's report card. It attained these standards again in 2000 and 2001.
The school has a maximum capacity of 1,332 students, but through the addition of four portable classrooms currently (as of 2005) enrolls over 1,469 students. Of those in attendance, 65.1% are White, 26.1% are Asian, 6.2% are African American, 2.3% are Hispanic, 0.1% are Native American and 0.1% are unidentified. The high school dropout rate is 0.79%.

Contents

Credentials

Accomplishments

Notable alumni

Spirit Week and Color Day

Color Day Controversy

External links

Credentials

Ranked 147th best high school in the United States in 2007 by Newsweek Magazine.^[2]

Accomplishments

'Staff:'

★ Milken Outstanding Educator Award

★ Washington Post Educator Leadership Award

★ Intel Award for Excellence in Teaching in the Sciences

★ Instructional Assistant of the Year

★ Presidential Scholars (2)

★ Tandy Scholars (2)

★ Christa McAuliffe Award

★ Maryland Earth Science Teacher of the Year

★ Howard County Chamber of Commerce Educator of the Year

★ National Board for Professional Teaching Standards Certification
'Athletics:'

★ 14 People Tree Awards

★ 120 County Championships

★ 101 Regional Championships

★ 39 State Championships
'Academics:'
'2006'

★ First Place HC Math League

★ Intel Talent Search Semi-finalist
'2005'

★ Howard County Math League Champions

★ It’s Academic Baltimore Champions
'2004'

★ Lemenson-MIT InvenTeam Grant

★ AP State Scholar Award
'2003'

★ It’s Academic Finalists

Notable alumni

★ Suzanne Malveaux

Spirit Week and Color Day

"Spirit Week" is an annual tradition set to occur a week before homecoming, near the end of October. Each day during the week has a theme pre-determined by the Student Government; past themes have included Costume Day, Pajama Day, and Wacky Tacky Day. The fifth day of the week was traditionally reserved for Color Day, in which each class would dress up in their class colors, which correspond to the school's official colors. Freshman wore black as they technically have no color and were given that color as an insult to neighboring rival Mount Hebron High School, whose seniors wear black as their class color; sophomores are blue, juniors are white, and seniors are red. It was tradition for members of one class to "tag" a student of another class with paint that corresponded to their class color. While most students enjoyed the fun, there were some who complained of un-washable color on their clothes or vandalized cars. As of 2002, this practice was made against the rules to avoid possible clothing damage if staining substances were used as well as property damage to the school.

Color Day Controversy

During the 2006 Color Day, tagging reached critical mass when the brand new Centennial Track was tagged with house paint during the outdoors Pep Rally. Not only did the students do damage to the bleachers (for instance, students were witnessed lobbing tennis balls of paint over the crowd), but certain Centennial sports teams also dirtied up the track and field. All Centennial sports teams were required to stay after school to help clean up the mess. There was no permanent damage. As a direct result of this incident, Principal Scott Pfeifer canceled Color Day for all future Spirit Weeks and also did away with other spirit-related activities for the next year. These activities include the Pep Rally and the Battle of the Classes, an event centered around class competition which has traditionally been plagued with the same problems common to Color Day, including an incident in 2005 when the freshman class was hit with hundreds of pies thrown by the senior class. There was no ensuing reaction from the student body. Rumored student-run Battle of the Classes and Color Day have been scheduled by way of the popular social networking website Facebook.

External links

★ Centennial High School website

★ Centennial High School profile (PDF)

★ CHS Class of 2001 Alumni FaceBook Group to connect and plan future reunions!