Lake Brantley High School

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Lake Brantley High School
Image:LBHS2.jpg
Motto Where the Patriots Meet the Challenge!
Established 1972
Type Public
Head Mary Williams
Location Altamonte Springs, Florida, United States
Campus Location using Google Map
Enrollment 3,325
Colors Red, White and Blue
Homepage http://www.lakebrantley.com/

Lake Brantley High School (LBHS) is located in Altamonte Springs, Florida, an urban community approximately 13 miles (20km) north of Orlando, Florida, USA. It is a public high school in Seminole County, FL. The school, which opened in 1972, ranked 79th on Newsweek magazine's 2005 list of the top 100 high schools in the United States[1].


Contents

[edit] History

In 1969 the School Board of Seminole County, Florida determined that because of projected population growth, three new schools would need to be built in the southern part of the county. School Board Chairman John G. Angel proposed a $10 million bond issue to fund these schools, and the issue was handily approved by the voters. The plan was that an elementary school, a middle school and a high school all be built adjacent to each other in an "educational plaza" on Sand Lake Road, just west of Forest City Road. All three schools (and several others in the next few years) were designed by architect Eoghan Kelley, a somewhat controversial figure in Central Florida in his day.

Kelley's designs were based in part on a trend of the early 1970s called the Open School Concept. The outer school building was composed of large, simple geometric shapes with no windows, and the interior of each module was so laid out that it had few permanent walls; instead, movable walls abounded and very few of the classrooms had any doors. This was supposedly done to facilitate free movement between the rooms and other resources (such as the libraries) in each module. As the first few years were to make clear, the "no-doors" concept proved a failure, with teachers complaining constantly about noise from other rooms and halls. Eventually all the gaps were boarded up and each classroom got a door.

Kelley also stated that he had designed each school to be a fallout shelter if ever needed. (There was controversy as to whether these buildings were stout enough to play such a role, no exterior windows notwithstanding. They contained no steel reinforcement in the outer cinder-block walls, and engineers doubt that they could stand up to a hurricane stronger than Category 2 or even a tornado, let alone a nuclear weapon.) Kelley was awarded the contract to design the Educational Plaza schools and several others in Seminole County, as well as other schools in Florida, primarily in Pasco County.

The first school, Forest City Elementary, was completed in 1971 and its first principal was Mr. John Otto. (This area was originally part of the incorporated (in 1972) municipality of Forest City, however, within the decade it was absorbed into the city of Altamonte Springs. Brantley's early yearbooks refer to the school being in "Forest City, Florida," a ghost of former times.) Teague Middle School was completed in 1972 and John Angel, by then retired from the school board, became its first principal. Lake Brantley High School was actually opened in 1973 and its first principal was Mr. William ("Bill") Daugherty.

Bill Daugherty first proposed the plans for Lake Brantley to the school board in 1971, and, because construction of the new building was not complete, classes were first started in September 1972 on the old Lyman High School campus. (This old campus is now the site of R. T. Milwee Middle School; the new (1970) and present site of Lyman High is a mile to the north.) The new building was finally completed in February 1973, and Lake Brantley's 900 students moved across town and started classes on February 15. The new building was officially dedicated on Monday, May 13, 1973.

LBHS' first official year in the new building began on September 4, 1973 with 1,100 students in two grades, 9 and 10. One grade was added in each of the next two years and LBHS' first graduating class matriculated on June 8, 1975. Because enrollment was growing so quickly, a New Addition to the original building was completed in the summer of 1975, at a cost of $3,500,000 - which was the entire cost of the original building, some five times larger than the addition. (Rampant inflation overtook John Angel's original budget, and the original school was built for only $17 a square foot. This was to come back to haunt the school board in later years.) The stadium, Tom Storey Field, was finished and dedicated in November 1975, and its final improved cost (including the concrete bleachers structure and a scoreboard) was $70,000. The open-air commons was roofed over during this time as well, and the final size of LBHS was 220,000 square feet (about 20,500 square meters) or approximately 5 acres (2.05 hectares) of enclosed building.

Within just six years, serious flaws in construction and material quality began to appear, and massive roof leaks appeared in many different places. Two major repair and refurbishing projects were undertaken in 1980 and 1985, but eventually, the school board had had enough, and plans were unveiled in 1996 to demolish the school and rebuild it from the ground up. By 1979, Seminole County had given up on Eoghan Kelley and by 1996 all but two of his Seminole County schools - all designed and built in the same way - were torn down, and only a couple fragments remain of the others: the gymnasium of Lake Howell High School, and a partial addition to the original Teague Middle School. His Pasco County schools are still standing.

The new school design was thoroughly traditional, consisting of many different buildings instead of the old monolithic structure. The projected cost was $39 million, which wound up being $41 million even after some proposed items were omitted - quite a lot more than the $7.1 million cost of the first school. Construction of the present LBHS began in 1998, and demolition of the original building began the day after classes ended in May 1999. Demolition was complete by August, and the new school buildings opened for business the same month - not totally finished. Of all the structures on campus today, only the stadium is original. All of the east wall and about a third of the north wall of the original 700-module (which held Band, Chorus, Dance and part of the gymnasium concessionary) were left intact and re-used as the outer walls adjacent to the auditorium and the cafeteria. They are now the only remaining fragments of the original school.

The first motto of LBHS was School of the Future, the first line of the original Alma Mater:

School of the Future Lake Brantley High

We are proud to sing your praise

We gather knowledge through the years

In all of the modern ways

Lake Brantley High School leads the way

Lake Brantley High School here we'll stay

To try our best to learn the most

and be the finest from coast to coast

It is now unclear who actually wrote it, but it may have been Kay Lanier, the first sponsor of the LBHS Civinettes. For reasons unclear, this Alma Mater fell from favor and it ceased to be used. The original Alma Mater plaque, made in 1973 and hung from the east wall of the gymnasium, was not salvaged and it was destroyed in July 1999 when the gymnasium was demolished. That no effort was made to preserve the plaque is a stark indication of how badly the original Alma Mater came to be despised.

[edit] Principals

The first principal of LBHS was Bill W. Daugherty, who took the helm in March of 1972. This was, for him, the fulfillment of a lifelong dream. His assistant principals were Mr. Don T. Reynolds and Mr. A. Darvin Boothe, and his dean was Mr. James Mc Manus. In the spring of 1975, Mr. Daugherty was offered the position of Dean of Men of his old college in Tennessee, and he resigned at the end of the 1974-75 school year.

His replacement, LBHS' second principal, was Mr. Richard Barnett, who served for almost two school years, but he was forced to resign in January 1977 amid rumors of severe misconduct. The school board appointed Assistant Principal Boothe to serve in his stead, and this temporary appointment was made permanent on April 1, 1977, and Darvin Boothe became Lake Brantley's third principal, a job he was to hold for the next 29 years.

Mr. Boothe worked tirelessly to improve the school, and his efforts finally raised LBHS' academic standing into one of the Nation's Top 100 schools. He resigned as principal in March 2006 at the age of 58, after more than 34 years of service to Seminole County. (Mr. Boothe still serves the county as a liaison between the public schools and the state government in Tallahassee.) Mr. Boothe first started his Seminole County years as a teacher and a coach at Seminole High School in Sanford (where he worked for Don Reynolds,) and came to LBHS as an assistant principal.

Of all the people that ever worked at Lake Brantley, no one served as long as Mr. Boothe, and with his departure, there is no one else left from Brantley's beginning. Up until 2005, there was one person who had served as long - Regina Klaers, who started as a mathematics teacher and left as curriculum director after serving 33 years. There are still two faculty members who came in Brantley's second year (1973) - Wes Salley (a vocational teacher) and Dannie Roberts (a guidance counselor.) As of this writing, they have served 33 1/2 years. There are two faculty members remaining from Brantley's third year - Bill Dempsey (a social studies teacher) and Sally McCall (a guidance counselor,) both of whom came in 1974 and have now served 32 1/2 years. One second-year person (1973) has actually returned - Darla Lanier, a business teacher who moved to Seminole High School in Sanford, Florida for a number of years. There are no other faculty members remaining from Brantley's early days.

Mr. Boothe's replacement is Mrs. Mary Williams, who along with her husband and her sons are all alumni of LBHS. She joined the faculty in 1983 as a teacher and later became an assistant principal. She now serves as the fourth principal of Lake Brantley High School.

[edit] Athletics

Lake Brantley has excelled in most athletics throughout the county, often winning district and state level competitions.

[edit] Football

The Lake Brantley Patriot football team has graduated many players that have gone on to play Division I-A football. The Patriots also have traditionally won their district each year.

While the Patriots were only runner-up state champions during the '06-'07 season, they had an exceptional season overall, having been the greatest Patriot football team to ever play at Lake Brantley. The Patriots went on to play the state finals for the '06-'07 season, at Dolphin Stadium in Miami, on December 9th, 2006, which has never been done by a team in Seminole County, FL before. They lost to Miami Northwestern, their opposing team, 14-34.

Due to recent funding, the high school decided to install artificial turf on Tom Storey Field in partnership with ProGrass following the conclusion of the 2006-07 football season.

[edit] The Arts

The school excels in the arts and owes a great debt to former principal Darvin Boothe and his fervent support of these programs.

[edit] Music

Lake Brantley is notable for its large band, which contains over 300 students and is under the direction of Cynthia Berry and assistant band director Nancy Micklos. The Marching Patriots are often present at football games in the stands and at halftime and hold concerts throughout the year. The Marching Patriots have received straight Superior ratings at Florida Bandmaster's Association Music Performance Assessments on the field for 23 consecutive years. In 1975, the Lake Brantley marching band appeared in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York then being under the direction of Mr. Donald Schmaus.

[edit] Drama

The drama department has two performances each year, with a play in Fall and a musical in the Spring.

2004-2005 Rumors and Lucky Stiff

2005-2006 The Nerd and Chicago (musical)

2006-2007 A Christmas Carol and Damn Yankees

[edit] Facts

  • Highest ACT and SAT scores within the district for 2002 and significantly higher than the state average [2]
  • Over 1600 Advanced Placement tests administered in 2003
  • 821 students scored 3 or higher on the 2003 AP tests
  • In the class of 2005, there were 4 National Merit Finalists
  • Lake Brantley's auditorium is home to the Don Baker Memorial Wurlitzer Theatre organ

[edit] Notable students

[edit] Notes and references

  1. ^ The Complete List of the 1,000 Top U.S. Schools. Newsweek (May 8, 2005). Retrieved on September 15, 2006.
  2. ^ "Lake Brantley High School Website" Patriot Fast Facts

Lake Brantley High School Alumni - http://www.thinkcybis.com/lbhs

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