- McLean High School is a public secondary school located in McLean, Virginia. It is located on 1633 Davidson Road and is part of Fairfax County Public Schools.
- According to Newsweek magazine's 2008 list of the top US high schools, McLean was ranked 97, down 24 positions from 2007. According to the 2008 U.S. News & World Report Rankings, McLean High School is the #1 open-enrollment school in the state of Virginia, and the #55 high school in the country overall.
- Demographics
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In the 2007-2008 school year, McLean High School's student body was 63.89% White, 19.35% Asian, 8.38% Hispanic, 5.04% other, and 3.34% Black.
- Test scores
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McLean High School is a fully accredited high school based on the Standards of Learning tests in Virginia. The average SAT score in 2008 for McLean was 1,759 (579 in Critical Reading, 601 in Math, and 579 in Writing).
- Athletics
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The school plays in the AAA Liberty District and the Northern Region. Their mascot is the Highlander, and their primary rival school is Langley High School, also in McLean. McLean's football team finished the 1980 season 10-1, played Virginia powerhouse Hampton High in the State semifinals in 1995 when they finished 12-1, and went to the playoffs in 1996 and 1997. Recently, in 2007, the McLean Women's volleyball team won their district game against Thomas Jefferson High School, and advanced to the regional playoffs.
- State championships and runner-up finishes
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McLean has won one state championship in AAA girls field hockey in 1986.
- McLean has made four runner up finishes, which are:
- two in wrestling (one in the now defunct IA Division in 1970, and one in AAA in 1971).
- one in AAA boys soccer in 1995
- one in AAA girls field hockey in 1982
- McLean placed second in the region and went to the state tournament in AAA girls field hockey in 2001
- McLean has also finished 1st place in the AAA Wachovia Cup for Academics in the 1999-2000 year.In the Winter of 2007, Senior Keeven Kuate Konga was All-State in the 55 meter hurdles.
- Music programs
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McLean's band program is currently conducted by Chris Weise, who took over direction of the band at the beginning of the 2008-2009 school year. Jim Kirchenbauer, who had been the conductor since 1982, was forced to step down from his position early because of serious health concerns. Under Mr. Kirchenbauer, the McLean band was awarded many honors, such as the Sudler Flag of Honor, an award granted by the John Phillip Sousa Foundation for consistent superior musical performance, in 2000. The band also traveled to the Midwest Clinic in 2006, one of the most prestigious performances a high school band can achieve. McLean High School also has a marching band, complete with four Bagpipers and a Color Guard. There is also a McLean Pep Band that plays at away games.
- McLean's Choral program is currently conducted by Linda Martin. Under Martin, the McLean chorus is ranked 11th in the nation as of 2007, the only non-performing arts school in the top 15. Chorus has also received many high-level awards and honors at local and national competitions. The chorus program consists of four separate choruses: Women's, Men's, Armonia, and the Madrigals.
- The McLean Orchestra program consists of three separate groups of string musicians: Concert, Symphonic, and Chamber. McLean belongs to District XII of the Virginia Band & Orchestra Directors Association. In 2007, Gretta Sandberg, the orchestra conductor, was recipient of the Orchestra Director of the Year Award from the Virginia Chapter of the American String Teachers Association. McLean participates in a musical exchange program with a sister school located in Detmold, Germany. In alternating years, musicians from the Grabbe Gymnasium travel to McLean; McLean Chamber musicians travel to Detmold for a similar experience with their German counterparts.
- Mascot
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The school considered itself "The Eagles" before becoming "The Highlanders". Girls' sport teams were known as "The Bald Eagles". The mascot was changed to its current form today in 1958 after a school-wide vote to instead reference the Scottish heritage of McLean, Virginia.
- Newspaper
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McLean also has an award winning newspaper, Highlander. In 2006, Highlander was inducted into the high school newspaper Hall of Fame after ten consecutive years of being an "All American".
- Two writers from the paper won "National Story of the Year" awards while attending the school. The first was a feature story about the underage drinking that occurs at Friday parties in student homes. The other was a sports story that revealed that tobacco was being chewed on school grounds by some coaches and their players.
- Highlander has existed since the school opened. In 1956, it was named the Hilltop Highlights, but was changed in 1958 to The Highlander. Since the paper's first publication, it has gone from being a newspaper to a news magazine and back to its current state, a newspaper. 2007 is the year of volume 52 of the Highlander.
- Yearbook
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The Clan has been McLean's award-winning yearbook since the school's first year. In 2004, The Clan was inducted into the National Scholastic Press Association Hall of Fame after ten years of consecutively being "All American"
- Committee For Students' Rights
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In 2006, seven members of the senior class, calling themselves the Committee For Students' Rights, staged a protest against the plagiarism detection service Turnitin. The Committee argued that the use of Turnitin was a violation of their intellectual property rights, put them in a situation where guilt of all parties was assumed, and also violated student privacy as specified in FERPA. The students were interviewed for three articles in the Washington Post, received the services of an intellectual property attorney, and one of them, Ben Donovan, was featured on NBC's The Today Show. On March 27, 2007 four high school students, two from McLean, filed legal action against iParadigms LLC, the parent company of Turnitin.com. The lawsuit was filed in United States District Court, Eastern District of Virginia, the jurisdiction where McLean lies.
- Notable alumni
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Notable McLean High School alumni include:
- Sharyn Alfonsi (1990), Correspondent for ABC News. Reports and appears on World News with Charles Gibson, Good Morning America and Nightline.
- Aldrich Ames (1959), CIA agent. He was convicted in 1994 for spying for the Soviet Union. Ames' story is widely told in novels and movies, and was also featured on the March 7, 1994 cover of Time
- Elizabeth Cheney (1984), former Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs. She is also the daughter of Vice President Dick Cheney.
- Mary Cheney (1987), daughter of Vice President Dick Cheney.
- Eric Dorsey, (1982), led McLean to a 10-1 season in 1981. Went to Notre Dame on a football scholarship and then got drafted 19th in the NFL draft by the New York Giants. Dorsey went on to start in Super Bowl XXV for the Giants
- Don Drakulich (1979) Sculptor, videographer, and artistic talent behind the stage design for the alternative rock group GWAR. Don plays the character of Sleazy P. Martini as well as others. Don also designed the fish for the Richmond Virginia's 2001 Go Fish project.
[http://www.slavepitinc.com/roster/drakulich/index.html] - Duff Goldman, who attended McLean during his sophomore year. He opened a bakery in Baltimore, Maryland and became the star of his own Food Network show, Ace of Cakes. He considers his McLean art teacher, Jeffery Meizlik, his biggest inspiration.
- Seth Greisinger (1993), baseball player, played in 1996 Olympics (bronze medal), with Yomiuri Giants in 2009
- Mary Hager, CBS Evening News producer
- Rusty Payne (1991), Drug Enforcement Administration Senior Public Affairs official
- Luke Kruytbosch, race track announcer at Churchill Downs.
- William F. Readdy (1970), astronaut. He has flown three missions during his career.
- Vern Yip (1986), interior designer who has appeared on design show Trading Spaces. He currently hosts the HGTV show Deserving Design.
- Sam Stitt (2000), member of the US Olympic rowing team at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, China. Stitt sat 2 seat of the Men's Quadruple Sculls.
[ USRowing - USRowing Athlete Profiles - USRowing.com] - Giuseppe Lanzone (2001), member of the US Olympic rowing team at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, China. Lanzone sat 3 seat of the Men's Four w/o.
[ USRowing - USRowing Athlete Profiles - USRowing.com] - Rose Arce (1982), CNN producer
- S John Massoud Politician, civic activist, anti tax advocate, columnist, business executive.
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- External links
- Band website
- Choral website
- Orchestra website
- Newspaper website
- 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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