Winnacunnet High School

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Winnacunnet High School is an American public high school located in Hampton, New Hampshire. It serves students in grades 9 through 12 who reside in the communities of Hampton, Seabrook, North Hampton, and Hampton Falls. Students from South Hampton have the option of attending either Winnacunnet or Amesbury High School. The name Winnacunnet is a Native American word that means "beautiful place in the pines".

1 History
- 1.1 The Pamela Smart murder case
2 Past principals
3 Trivia
4 See also
5 References
6 External links

[edit] History

Ground was broken for Winnacunnet High School on October 30, 1957, and it first opened in the fall of 1958 with an attendance of 474 students. Prior to 1958, area students attended the Hampton Academy and High School, a junior-senior high school which today still exists as the junior high school for Hampton. The official Winnacunnet High dedication ceremony took place on October 26, 1958. The school has recently finished major construction and renovations.

[edit] The Pamela Smart murder case

The school was in the national news in 1990, when Pamela Smart, a media services coordinator at Winnacunnet and an adult volunteer with "Project Self-Esteem" at the high school, seduced 15-year old sophomore student William "Billy" Flynn and convinced him to murder her husband on May 1, 1990. [1] Smart was convicted of first degree murder in March, 1991, and was sentenced to life imprisonment without possibility of parole.

[edit] Past principals

Roberta Neuman
Steve Collins
Judy Langlois
Ruth Leveille (September, 2002–June 30, 2005)
Randall P. Zito (July 1, 2005–present)

[edit] Trivia

The school's sports teams are called the Winnacunnet Warriors. The choice of Warriors was made by a vote of the student body in 1958 as a tribute to local Native Americans.
The school's colors are blue and white.
The school's logo is an Indian head.
Winnacunnet's rival team is the Exeter Blue Hawks, located at Exeter High School in Exeter, New Hampshire.
Winnacunnet's math team, led by coach Stephen Latvis, has won its division in the Tri-State Math League for the past eight consecutive years.
Winnacunnet has made it to the finals of Granite State Challenge twice, once in 2003 and again in 2006 airing on New Hampshire Public Television, in 2003 defeated by Hanover High School and in 2006 where they were defeated by Manchester High School West. The 2006 team was captained by Marie Cushing and included Victoria Mason, Meagan Munch and Zack Coburn. The 2003 team featured captain Allison McManus, Kathryn Schoenberger, Jeremy Shaw, and Stephen Healey.
James Thomson '62 is CEO of the Rand Corporation, a highly regarded research institution in Santa Monica, Ca.

[edit] See also

List of high schools in New Hampshire
Phillips Exeter Academy - a presigious private school loacted in the neighboring town which serves the same grades