Columbus High School - Columbus, Mississippi/MS

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Columbus High School

215 Hemlock Street, Columbus, MS, 39702-3142 -

tel: (662)241-7200
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Definition of Terms

Columbus High School

School Level

High school

Grades Offered

Grades 9 - 12

County

Lowndes County, MS

Students & Faculty

Total Students

1418 students

% Male / % Female

49% / 51%

Total Classroom Teachers

72 teachers

Students by Grade

Grade 9 - 484 students

Grade 10 - 337 students

Grade 11 - 287 students

Grade 12 - 299 students

Grade Not Listed - 11 students

This School

(MS) School Average

Teacher : Student Ratio

1:20

1:17

Students by Ethnicity

This School

(MS) School Average

% American Indian	n/a	n/a
% Asian	1%	n/a
% Hispanic	1%	1%
% Black	82%	53%
% White	16%	43%

Additional Student Information

This School

(MS) School Average

% Eligible for Free Lunch

63%

65%

% Eligible for Reduced Lunch

% Migrant Students Enrolled

n/a

n/a

(MS) Statewide Testing Performance

School Statewide Performance

View Education Department Test Scores

School District Name

Columbus Municipal School District

This School's Agency

(MS) District Average

Number of Schools Managed	12	5
Number of Students Managed	5,065 students	2,328 students
District Total Revenue	$39,012,000	$16,989,000
District Expenditure	$42,517,000	$17,079,000
District Revenue / Student	$7,702	$6,879
District Expenditure / Student	$8,394	$6,138
District Graduation Rates	85%	78%

Columbus is a city in Lowndes County, Mississippi, on the Tombigbee River. It is approximately 175 miles (282 km) northeast of Jackson, 120 miles (193 km) north of Meridian, 63 miles (102 km) south of Tupelo, and 123 miles (198 km) west of Birmingham, AL. The population was 25,944 at the 2000 census. It is the county seat of Lowndes County.
History: The first record of the site of Columbus in Western history is found in the annals of the explorer Hernando de Soto, who is reputed to have crossed the Tombigbee nearby on his search for El Dorado.
The first trading post here was created in 1783, but there are recorded European settlements predating that by a few decades.
Columbus was founded in 1821. Before its incorporation, the town site was referred to informally as Opossum Town, which remains its nickname even today. Columbus's existence owed to the failure of a flooded settlement across the river, Plymouth, which was established in 1817. The Plymouth Bluff (above the ruined settlement) is today an environmental center for Mississippi University for Women.
One of the first actions taken by the city's founders was to establish a public school, Franklin Academy. As the territory had achieved statehood only a year previously, Franklin thus became Mississippi's first public school. However, this fact was not immediately recognized; early in its history, Columbus was referred to as "Columbus, Alabama" due to a mistaken estimate of the territorial boundary.
Civil War and aftermath: During the American Civil War, Columbus was a hospital town. As a result, it largely avoided Union attack. Many of the casualties from the Battle of Shiloh were brought there, and thousands were buried in the town's Friendship Cemetery. The decision of a group of ladies to decorate the Union and Confederate graves with flowers together on May 29, 1866 is credited as part of the founding of Memorial Day. (Similar ideas occurred to other groups in several other towns on the same weekend.) A poet, Francis Miles Finch, happened to be in town that day and commemorated the occasion with the poem The Blue and the Grey.
Another result of Columbus's history as a hospital town was the sparing of its antebellum homes, making its collection second only to Natchez as the most extensive in Mississippi.
20th Century: Columbus has hosted the Columbus Air Force Base (CAFB) since World War II. CAFB was founded as a flight training school. After a stint in the 1950s and 1960s as a Strategic Air Command (SAC) base (earning Columbus a spot in Soviet Union target lists), CAFB returned to its original role. Today, it is one of only three basic flight training bases in the United States, and prized as the only one where regular flight conditions may be experienced. (The other two are in the arid conditions of the desert Southwestern United States). Despite this, CAFB has repeatedly hung in the balance during Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) hearings.
Columbus boasted a number of industries during the mid-twentieth century, including the world's largest toilet seat manufacturer and major mattress, furniture, and textile plants. Most of these had closed by 2000. A series of new plants, capped by the proposed SteelCorr minimill, have been planned to revitalize the local economy. American Eurocopter has constructed a facility at the Golden Triangle Regional Airport. Aurora Flight Sciences is planning on locating at the Golden Triangle Regional Airport.
Columbus is the birthplace of famous playwright Tennessee Williams, author of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and A Streetcar Named Desire. His birthplace, formerly the rectory of nearby St. Paul's Episcopal Church, is now the welcome center for Columbus (300 Main St., Columbus). Columbus is also the birthplace of baseball announcer Red Barber and boxing's first three-time world heavyweight champion, Henry Armstrong.
Recent history: Columbus has made the national news at least three times in the past two decades. On June 12, 1990, a fireworks factory exploded, detonating a blast felt as far as thirty miles away from Columbus. Two workers were killed in the blast. On June 26, 2000, the television show 48 Hours did an investigative report of five murders of senior citizens occurring in an eighteen month period between late 1997 and early 1999. And on February 16, 2001, straight winds measured at 74 miles per hour destroyed many homes and trees but fortunately resulted in no fatalities. The city was declared a federal disaster area the next day by President George W. Bush.
Media: Columbus' city newspapers are the daily Commercial Dispatch and the weekly Columbus Packet. Two television stations, WCBI-TV and UPN-MS, are located in the city's historic downtown area.
Education: Columbus is home to a state university, the Mississippi University for Women. MUW, a liberal arts college, has received numerous distinctions by U.S. News and World Report. The MUW campus is also home to the Mississippi School for Mathematics and Science, a state-funded school for academically gifted high school juniors and seniors.
The city's public high school (under the Columbus Municipal School District) is Columbus High School, located in the eastern part of town. It is the largest high school in the city and fifth largest in the state, enrolling approximately 1370 students. Columbus High was formed by the merger of the city's two previous high schools, Stephen D. Lee High School and Caldwell High School; the schools were merged in 1993 and the campuses in 1997.
Columbus also includes several private schools, the most prominent being: Heritage Academy (Christian, K-12): the headmaster is Tommy Gunn, the nickname is the Patriots. It is accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools and the Mississippi Private School Association.
Annunciation Catholic School (Catholic, K-6).
Palmer Home for Children (orphanage).
Source: Wikipedia; it is used under the GNU Free Documentation License. You may redistribute it, verbatim or modified, providing that you comply with the terms of the GFDL
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About This Zip Code (39702)

School Zip (39702)

(MS) State Average

Population (Approximate)	22,115 people	2,619,126 people
% (age 25+) w/College Degree	20%	18%
Population Average Age	34 years old	33 years old
Average Household size	2.7 persons	2.4 persons
Median Household Income	$33,668	$31,745
Avg. # of Rooms in Household	5.4 rooms	5.3 rooms
Median Age of Housing Structure	28 years old	33 years old
	View current housing listings in this area
% Owning / % Renting	77% / 23%	69% / 31%

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Nearby Schools:


1. Mckellar Vocational Center - n/a - view location
2. New Hope High School - 885 students - view location
3. M.S. School For Math And Science - 255 students - view location
4. West Lowndes High School - 191 students - view location
View all schools in: Columbus Town, Lowndes County, Zip 39702

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Note: Data has been gathered from several government and commercial data sources. School data reflects years 2002-04 statistics (most recent years available). Area and demographic data reflects year 2000 statistics. Public School Review does not ensure the timeliness or accuracy of the information on this site.

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