Lee High School (Houston, Texas)

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Lee High School

Lee High School (formerly named Robert E. Lee High School) is a secondary school located at 6529 Beverly Hill in Houston, Texas in zip code 77057. Lee High School serves grades 9 through 12 and is a part of the Houston Independent School District.

YES Prep Lee, a charter middle school, is located inside the Lee High School campus; the school plans to expand to a six through twelve campus with thirty classrooms [1].

Contents

[edit] History

Lee High School was named after Robert E. Lee, and was opened in 1962 to relieve high attendance at Lamar High School. At that time, Lee High School had an all white and mostly affluent and suburban student body [2].

The United Daughters of the Confederacy's Robert E. Lee chapter number 186 supported the school in its early years; it donated portraits of Lee, gave American Civil War-related books to the library, and gave the school a rebel flag. The school's symbol was the general's family coat of arms, which has a squirrel on the top holding a nut. The school was desegregated in 1970. In 1999 the school's name was changed to simply Lee High School, and its logo became that of a four-point, star bodied-person. [3].

As times changed, the demographic of Lee's student body shifted. It is currently made up predominantly of Hispanic immigrants and sons and daughters of Hispanic immigrants. Lee's student body was relieved of about 1,000 students when Westside High School opened in 2000.

In 2003 the school dropped American football from its sports program; Westside drained most of the American football players from the school and the school did not have enough children who were interested in playing American football. This is likely because American football is not a popular sport in the home countries of its largely Hispanic student body.

According to an October 2004 report given by whatkidscando.org called "Students as Allies in Improving Their Schools," Lee students did not cite many academic concerns when filling out surveys about their school experiences; 80 percent of students favored replacing the tennis courts with basketball courts, 96 percent of students favored cleaning the bathrooms and 52 percent expressed a desire to help clean the bathrooms. The school had a split opinion about the idea of giving guided tours of the students' neighborhoods to the teachers [1].

Newcomer Charter High School (as of 2007, it is known as Liberty High School), which opened in January 2005, was housed in Lee High School until summer 2007, when the new campus at 6400 Southwest Freeway (U.S. Route 59) opened [2].

According to the Houston Independent School District October 2006 "For Your Information" newsletter, Lee was one of four high schools that took the most Hurricane Katrina evacuees.

Charles Rotramel, the owner of the nonprofit program Youth Advocates, stated in a 2006 Houston Chronicle article that Lee High School, Westbury High School, and Sharpstown High School have suffered from the actions of youth criminal gangs [4].

In 2007 Johns Hopkins University referred to Lee as a "dropout factory" [5].

[edit] Student body

During the 2005-2006 school year Lee had 2,179 students. [6]

Lee's student body is overwhelmingly Hispanic, with 74% of the students identified as Hispanic. 17% were African-American, 5% were Asian, and 4% were White. In a 2003 article by the Houston Press, principal Steve Amstutz stated, referring to the "Hispanic" designation, "But that covers from Nuevo Laredo to Tierra del Fuego. We're from the top of Mexico to the south of Argentina. And I've got kids from everywhere in between" [3].

Of the students who were not born in the United States, the pupils were first generation immigrants from 72 countries, including [2]:

92% of the student body qualifies for free or reduced lunch and the federal aid associated with those programs.

[edit] Neighborhoods served by Lee

Despite their lack of proximity, many areas of Houston outside of the 610 Loop, have zoning regulations which funnel students to Lee High School, such as Uptown Houston, St. George Place (Lamar Terrace), Larchmont, Briargrove, Shenandoah, Tanglewood, Tanglewilde, Briar Meadow, Briarcroft, Woodlake, Jeanetta, the Houston ISD portions of Piney Point Village and Hunters Creek Village, Sharpstown Country Club Estates, Gulfton, and small portions of Westchase east of Gessner Road.

Anyone living in an area with zoning to Lee High School has the option to go instead to Lamar High School or Westside High School.

Students that attend Lee tend to come from low income backgrounds, so Lee "serves" the low income communities within its attendance zone. For instance, most residents of Gulfton, a low-income immigrant neighborhood, attend Lee High School [3] [4]. A general trend is that students from wealthier families and students living in wealthier neighborhoods choose the alternative high schools rather than Lee High School.

[edit] Feeder patterns

Elementary schools that feed into Lee [5] include:

(portions)

Middle schools that feed into Lee include:

K-8 schools that feed into Lee include:

All pupils zoned to Long and Pershing Middle Schools may attend Pin Oak Middle School. Accordingly, Pin Oak also feeds into Lee High School.

[edit] Notable alumni

[24]

[edit] References

  1. ^ "Sixth-graders get to know new home at Lee High," Houston Chronicle, July 12, 2007
  2. ^ a b "Lee High School Where the World Comes To Learn," Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory
  3. ^ a b "Tee Time," Houston Press
  4. ^ "Troublesome spike in teen violent crime," Houston Chronicle, December 10, 2006
  5. ^ "Report points to 'dropout factories'," Houston Chronicle, October 31, 2007
  6. ^ "Lee High School" Profile, Houston Independent School District

[edit] External links

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Houston Independent School District
Alternative and magnet K-12 schools T. H. Rogers
Alternative 7-12 schools C.L.C.
High schools Austin | Bellaire | Chávez | Davis | Furr | Sam Houston | Jones | Kashmere | Lamar | Lee | Madison | Milby
Reagan | Scarborough | Sharpstown | Sterling | Waltrip | Washington | Westbury | Westside | Wheatley | Worthing | Yates
Alternative and magnet high schools Carnegie Vanguard | Challenge Early College | DeBakey | East Early College
Eastwood Academy | H.S.P.V.A. | Barbara Jordan | H.S.L.E.C.J. | Liberty (Newcomer)
Alternative 9-11 schools Houston Academy for International Studies
K-8 schools Gregory-Lincoln | Woodson
Alternative and magnet K-8 schools Briarmeadow | Kandy Stripe | Rice
1-8 schools E.O. Smith
Middle schools Attucks | Black | Burbank MS | Clifton | Cullen | Deady | Dowling | Edison | Fleming | Fondren MS | Fonville | Grady
Hamilton | Hartman | Henry | Hogg | Holland | Jackson | Johnston | Key | Long | Lanier | Marshall | McReynolds
Ortíz | Pershing | Pin Oak | Revere | Ryan | Sharpstown | Stevenson | Thomas | Welch | West Briar
Elementary schools Briargrove | Longfellow | Neff | Poe | River Oaks | Roberts | Twain | Walnut Bend | West University | Others
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