Type Public Grades 9 - 12 Phone +1 718-944-3400 Color silver and blue | Principal Lisa Maffei-Fuentes Enrollment 2000 Number of students 2,000 Lowest grade Ninth grade | |
Address 925 Astor Ave, Bronx, NY 10469, USA District New York City Public Schools Oversight New York City Department of Education Similar DeWitt Clinton High Sch, The Bronx High School of, Bronx Little School, Walton High School, Morris Academy For Colla | ||
Christopher Columbus High School is a public secondary school located in the Pelham Parkway, northeast section of the Bronx, New York. It is within walking distance from the Bronx Zoo and the New York Botanical Garden.
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It currently enrolls over 2000 students in grades 9 through 12. The student body is diverse, with students whose families come from 66 countries. Seventy-four percent of its faculty have Masters degrees. The current principal is Lisa Maffei-Fuentes.
Partnerships and Special Programs
Columbus High School has been a member of the Foundation for Excellent Schools since 1997. It has a partnership with the University of Vermont, which offers special courses at Columbus. JetBlue Airlines provides free transportation to faculty and students travelling between Vermont and the Bronx.
As of June 2004, Columbus High School was broken down into the Christopher Columbus Educational Campus and shared its premises with four, smaller, specialized schools:
As of 2016, Columbus High School is composed of five, smaller, specialized schools:
The Bronx High School for the Visual Arts, originally the first small school to move into the campus, moved out at the end of the 2004 school year. It currently resides in the old Mercy College Bronx campus which it shares with one other small school.
Notable alumni
Teams
Main sport in the school is the Football Team: Columbus Blue Steel, which won the Bronx Championships on November 3, 2006. In 2006, Blue Steel had two All-City Players, a Linebacker and a Defensive End. The Blue Steel have gone to the PSAL playoffs four times in the last six years. The Columbus Explorers Varsity Tennis Team has acclaimed more importance in the last few years reaching the playoff 3 out of 4 years while The Girls' A-Division Varsity team reached the finals in the School year of 05'-06'. Also the track team won second place in 2007 in cross country, and that same year they won the Bronx indoor championship beating Clinton. The boys' lacrosse team in 2010 won the PSAL championship, the first PSAL title Columbus had won.
In men's Bowling, Columbus won the division championship 3 years in a row 95-97 led by team captain Derrick "Casanova" Williams.
The girls' volleyball team was dominant in their division in the late 80s, early 90s under the coaching of Annette Leder.
Other Columbus teams include:
Soccer team also has been successful winning divions 2 straight years 2008,2009 and in the process producing young players such as Martin Dadaj, Armand Dadaj, Alhousein Bah, Mamoudou Diallo, Malal Diallo, Mamadou Barry, Endri Berisha,Frank Osei and Michael Asante.
Threatened closure
In December 2009, the New York City Department of Education announced plans to close Christopher Columbus High School, citing poor performance and low graduation rates. The department's plan called for phasing out the school and not enrolling new students in the ninth grade starting in the fall of 2010. Students, parents, and community activists criticized the Department and fought to keep the school open. The Supreme Court in New York county later rejected the Department of Education's proposal on the grounds that there were procedural errors made.