Hunterdon Central Regional High School

The Hunterdon Central Regional High School School District was created by referendum on April 4, 1954, and the high school opened in the former Route 69 Elementary School in September 1956. There were a few impetuses that led to the creation of the district. Before 1956, public school students of the school districts of Delaware, East Amwell and Readington Townships were sent to Flemington High School as tuition students, but these districts had no voice on the Flemington-Raritan Board of Education, which administered the school. Additionally, Flemington High's facilities could no longer support the growing student population, nor could its plant support the offering of a more broad-based curriculum that was becoming standard among American high schools in the post-WWII era. A statute passed by the New Jersey Legislature in 1931 permitted two or more municipalities to create regionalized school districts so that all member municipalities had representation and authority as members of a regional board of education, as well as the benefit of being able to pool tax resources and share the cost of running a school district. When the new HCRHS Board of Education purchased the Route 69 elementary school, its facilities were expanded to accommodate 1,000 students with the passage of a bond act in December 1954. The Board selected Robert Shoff to be the district's first superintendent. When the school opened in 1956 most of the program and faculty from the former Flemington High School was transported to the new school and district. Additionally, the physical plant was expanded in 1962 and then again in a massive expansion begun in 1969. By 1970 the campus consisted of the 9/10 building, the 11/12 building, a separate Instructional Media Center (library), a fieldhouse and separate fine arts building. Connecting all of these buildings to one another was a covered walkway to shield students from the elements when passing from class to class. Since 1987, Hunterdon Central has had the word "Regional" as an official part of its name. Prior to that it was known as Hunterdon Central High School. Other plant renovations occurred in the 1980s, and in 1984 lights were installed on the football field. In the 1990s Hunterdon Central embarked upon massive upgrades to the facility and infrastructure. Former superintendent Raymond Farley committed the district to embracing educational technology, and to this day the high school is known for embracing the use of technology as a tool of learning and education. In the late 1990s, the 11/12 building was expanded with the addition of 34 classrooms and the Commons. Elevators were also added to the 9/10 campus as the result of a lawsuit filed against the district by student who used a wheelchair and was unable to navigate all parts of that campus. HCRHS also began random drug testing of students participating in athletics, co-curricular activities, extra-curricular activities and parking on campus. This was in response to indications that there was a dangerous level of drug use among students at HCRHS, including more than 30% who had indicated in surveys that they had used drugs in the previous year and 27 students who had tested positive after undergoing drug tests that had been performed based on reasonable suspicion that the students had been using drugs. Technology plays an important role in instruction at Hunterdon Central and its use in the classroom continues to grow. Teachers are required to use services such as Moodle, Wikispaces or Google Sites to maintain resources and materials for the courses that they teach. In March 2012 the district fully opened its bring your own device (BYOD) program to students, faculty and staff. In Spring 2013, work was completed on a second pedestrian bridge over the creek that separates the 11/12 campus from the rest of the buildings at Hunterdon Central, which alleviated congestion on the existing pedestrian bridge during passing times. In December 2015, Sireen Hashem, a former history teacher at Hunterdon Central, made international news when she filed a lawsuit against her former employer alleging that the school discriminated against her as a Muslim American and American of Palestinian descent. In part, the suit alleges that Hashen was fired in April 2015 after the school received complaints from a "local rabbi and several parents" that Hashen had shown her class a video on the subject of Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai, a video a non-Muslim colleague had allegedly shown a different class without incident. The district had been classified by the New Jersey Department of Education as being in District Factor Group "I", the second-highest of eight groupings. District Factor Groups organize districts statewide to allow comparison by common socioeconomic characteristics of the local districts. From lowest socioeconomic status to highest, the categories are A, B, CD, DE, FG, GH, I and J. ==Awards, recognition and rankings==