The high school is attached to
Dakota Hills Middle School, and the two schools each have access to a common auditorium, a series of athletic fields, and a municipal park. Although they share a common building, the two schools are completely separated and there is almost no incidental interaction between the middle school and high school students.
Expansion and renovation When the high school opened, it was built to accommodate 1200 students but was designed to be expanded to handle an additional 800 students. This expansion was necessary almost immediately and was completed within a few years of the opening. That expansion, completed in March 1993, included additional classrooms, teacher offices, and science labs. Another expansion was completed in 2005; this most recent expansion added yet more classrooms but also included additional locker bays, circulation improvements to prevent hallway congestion, and an improved entryway for students and visitors.
Technology Eagan High School stresses technology in education, a commitment set down by former principal Wilson and shown in the school's motto: "Technology-enhanced education with a human touch." When the school opened, it became the first fully networked high school in the nation. Six hundred computers were sold at a discount by
Apple Computer, which publicized EHS worldwide as a "demonstration school". Every room was equipped with a television, which received satellite broadcasts as well as programs from the school's television studio. Now, EHS has replaced those televisions with LAN projectors that any teacher can connect to wirelessly while connected to the school's network. Departmental fundraising allowed for the construction of a fully operational television studio within the school. The main purpose of the studio was the ability to loan out the equipment for student or community projects, but the construction of the studio also allowed the school to create a weekly television series called
Eagan AM. It is aired every Thursday morning during PAWS, a
homeroom-like activity that takes place each morning, and can be viewed online at CatCast, the school's video-sharing platform. In 1999, the school helped test the use of fingerprint scans for checking out books in the library—making it one of the first schools in the nation to use biometric data for school services. They have since discontinued this method of checkout and now use student and faculty ID cards instead. In 2002, EHS became one of the first high schools in the nation to require students to register for classes online. The school uses Infinite Campus, a student-teacher communication and grading service, to do this. The building has
wireless Internet access throughout the school for student, faculty, and guest use. Teachers use
MacBook Pros to wirelessly transmit attendance and grades to Infinite Campus, an online student/teacher communication platform. This information can be accessed through individual Infinite Campus accounts made available for students and parents. The school has ten iMac computer labs, all running on
Mac OS X. Every school Mac is also equipped with the full
Adobe Publishing and
Creative suites, the
Microsoft Office 2008 or
2011 suite, and the
Apple iWork suite. There are two different kinds of labs the school utilizes: stationary and mobile computer labs. The stationary labs consist of 40
iMacs each, allowing students to get online and collaborate on projects. The mobile labs consist of 30-40
MacBooks each and can be wheeled around from classroom to classroom on carts. In 2011, district 196 rolled out a new tool to its schools:
Google Apps. This Google Apps platform gave students and faculty access to collaborative educational tools such as
Google Drive,
Google Docs, and
Google Slides. Most teachers at EHS currently use this platform to grade student assignments and monitor student collaboration activities. Many students there now prefer using Google Docs as an alternative to
Microsoft Word or
Pages, as they can work with other students more easily online. Because of the positive feedback District 196 has received from its students about Google Apps, it plans to keep using it as an educational tool. In 2012, EHS's health department began using
iPad 2s in the classroom. In each health classroom, there are 40 iPads available for student use; students use them to read articles selected by their teachers, take tests and quizzes using Infinite Campus, also an online testing platform, and watch videos pertaining to the subject matter they are currently studying. Eagan is the first high school in District 196 to implement the iPad in the classroom. In 2013, EHS began participating in a beta-test program of different electronic devices for potential use throughout ISD 196. In the 2013–14 school year, freshman history classes tested the use of
Chromebooks in the classroom. This program was being expanded in the 2014–15 school year district-wide, as several classrooms beta-tested the use of
iPad Minis for each student. In 2015, voters in district 196 approved a
bond referendum that designated $5 million per year for ten years to improve technology in the school; one part of this plan was to provide an iPad mini to every student in fourth through 12th grade. In the first phase of the district-wide one-to-one initiative in 2016, every EHS 9th grader was given an iPad mini. The iPad minis were used to allow students to work together, take online notes, turn in assignments online, and even take online quizzes and tests. In 2017, EHS seniors, and juniors were given full-sized iPads, while all the other students were given iPad minis. This completed the district-wide one-to-one initiative so that every student in the building would have access to the internet from their own personal iPads. ==Academics==