Louisville Male High School

Louisville Male Traditional High School is a public secondary school serving students in grades 9 through 12 in the southside of Louisville, Kentucky, USA. It is part of the Jefferson County Public School District.

School history

Mascot and school letter

The school's mascot is a Bulldog and it is common to refer to the school as the Male Bulldogs.

The school letter is actually an H, standing for High school while the longstanding rival duPont Manual has the M as its letter. The reason behind this is as follows: Male was known originally as, "The High School." Others have suggested, that when Manual was founded, the schools had a football game to determine who would use the "M" as their school's letter. Manual then won the game, which led to a rivalry that continues to the present day. This latter explanation has little historical evidence to substantiate it.

School locations

Third site Fourth site

Corner of Brook Street and Breckinridge Street (1915–1991)

This location is now owned by Salvation Army and is a historic landmark in Louisville.

4409 Preston Highway (1991–present)

In August 1991, Male moved to its current campus at 4409 Preston Highway, an educational facility that doubled the instructional, laboratory, library and campus space. Since it has moved to this location, the school has won two U.S. Department of Education Blue Ribbon awards. The site was previously Sallie P. Durrett High School, which became the Durrett Education Center in the early 1980s and was used by Jefferson County Public Schools Library Media Services until 1991. The adjoining Gheens Academy, which opened in 1983, was previously Prestonia Elementary School.

Present day

Programs

The school, like its rival du Pont Manual, runs a unique curriculum that is different from the other public high schools in the city. All students participate in the College Preparatory Program so as to guarantee the transition to higher education is as smooth as possible.

Students have an opportunity to graduate with a Commonwealth Diploma,^[3] which demands more than the required units for graduating high school in JCPS. One of the stipulations is the successful completion (i.e., receiving a grade of "C" or its equivalent) in 4 AP courses in the areas of English, Science/Mathematics, Foreign Language, and Elective.

Uniforms

Louisville Male adheres to a strict dress code, stipulating (amongst other requirements) that students wear neatly tucked-in shirts, belts, few piercings (two for girls' ears, none for boys'), hair of even color and length (boys' sideburns and bangs may not be more than two inches—51 millimeters—long), and without visible tattoos or markings. Students may wear solid purple, gold, white, or black emblemless polo shirts, and plain black, navy, or khaki pants; exceptionally, on Fridays ("Spirit Day"), students may choose from a variety of school "Spirit" shirts with blue jeans.

The guidelines and strict rules are designed to give students a clean and professional appearance, and to level the appearance of all; for, as a magnet school, students come from the entire city and from different social and economic backgrounds.

Lottery

Getting into the high school is virtually impossible unless previous enrolled in one of the three traditional program magnet middle schools, Johnson Middle (Southwest), Jefferson County Traditional Middle (Middle East) and Barret Traditional Middle (Northeast and East). The traditional program works on a lottery system where you are given an equal chance as everyone else to get your student into the school. Only students from the feeder schools are automatically accepted. However, if they give up their spot freshmen year they cannot retain it on special status.

Athletics

On Saturday, November 18, 1893, the annual Male-Manual football rivalry, the longest running, continuously played, high school football series in Kentucky, began. Their football team is a perennial state power, and in addition to its long-running rivalry with Manual, Male is also a close rival with St. Xavier High School, with the annual contest usually determining the fate of the district champion; however, due to the state's realignment of high school football into a six-class system starting in 2007–08, Male is the third winningest football program in the United States and the winningest program in Kentucky.^[4] Male also has a rivalry with Trinity High School in football. The school offers football (State Championships: 6)(State Runners-up:3),^[5] basketball (State Championships: 4)(State Runners-up: 5),^[6] baseball (State Championship: 1944), softball (State Runner-up: 2015), bowling, tennis, soccer, field hockey, wrestling, swimming, track and field (5-Peat State Championship Winners: 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011) and lacrosse

Sports championships

Clubs and organizations

Students participate in many clubs and organizations: Art Club, Band (Marching, Concert, Symphonic), Beta Club, Brook 'n' Breck Newspaper, Chorus (Boys, Girls), Drama Club, FBLA, FCA, FCA, Governor's Scholars, French Honor Society, JROTC (Drill Team, Color Guard, Rifle Team, Raider Team), Lacrosse, Latin Club, Latin Honor Society, Literary Magazine, Marine Biology, Math Team, Men of Quality, MTRP, Mu Alpha Theta, National Honor Society, Orchestra, Peer Mediation, Quick Recall (Varsity, JV), Recycling Squad, Red Cross, SAM (serving at male), Show Choir (Boys, Girls), Spanish Honor Society, Speech & Debate, Student Senate, Student Technology Leadership Program, Women of Quality, Writing Team, Yearbook, and YMCA Club.^[16]

Notable alumni

See also

• Public schools in Louisville, Kentucky

References