Crofton High School
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Crofton High School is a high school located in the suburban community of
Gambrills, Maryland Gambrills refers to two neighboring places in Anne Arundel County, Maryland, United States, located in the Annapolis metro area: the unincorporated community of Gambrills, and the Gambrills census-designated place (CDP). The area was named after ...
,
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, a suburb of
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and
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located within
Anne Arundel County Anne Arundel County (; ), also notated as AA or A.A. County, is located in the U.S. state of Maryland. As of the 2020 United States census, its population was 588,261, an increase of just under 10% since 2010. Its county seat is Annapolis, wh ...
. It serves students from the greater Crofton area, and it is part of the
Anne Arundel County Public Schools Anne Arundel County Public Schools is the public school district serving all of Anne Arundel County, Maryland. With over 85,000 students and 126 schools, the AACPS school system is the 4th largest in Maryland and the List of the largest schoo ...
district. The school opened its doors (virtually) on September 8, 2020, to students in grades 9 and 10 only. The school began serving grades 9-11 in September, 2021, and added its first senior class in the fall of 2022 (comprising the school's first graduating class, the Class of 2023).


History

Historically, all high school students in Crofton were served by
Arundel High School Arundel High School is a public high school located in Gambrills, Maryland, a suburb of Anne Arundel County. The school is part of the Anne Arundel County Public School system, and is the primary high school for Gambrills and portions of the ...
in Gambrills. However, in the 1990s, Arundel High School began experiencing extreme overcrowding issues to the point where the school held split sessions to alleviate the overcrowding. Eventually, community members started pushing for county officials to build a new high school in Crofton. In 1998, instead of building a new high school in Crofton, Anne Arundel County Public Schools officials decided to split Crofton Middle School students between two high schools in the county. The plan redistricted students zoned to Crofton Meadows and Crofton Woods Elementary Schools from Arundel High School to South River High School in Edgewater beginning in the fall of 1998. Crofton residents were told by school district officials that the redistricting of students from Arundel to South River was only a temporary measure until a high school in Crofton would be built in the near future. However, the "temporary" solution became permanent as Crofton Middle School graduates were continuously split between Arundel and South River High Schools for 17 years with no plans of a new Crofton High School. During those 17 years, Crofton residents (as well as residents of nearby towns such as Odenton and other areas in
Anne Arundel County Anne Arundel County (; ), also notated as AA or A.A. County, is located in the U.S. state of Maryland. As of the 2020 United States census, its population was 588,261, an increase of just under 10% since 2010. Its county seat is Annapolis, wh ...
) were advocating for a new high school to be built, but many of the attempts were met with no success. The most recent was an activist group called "Build Crofton High School", formed in 2012 by Crofton residents. In 2015, AACPS hired MGT of America, a
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-based consultant, to do a professional study on their facilities. The consultants strongly suggested building a new high school in Crofton. As a result, Anne Arundel County Public Schools later adopted a plan to build a new high school in Crofton. It was decided that the new high school would be built on a portion of the land that belongs to Crofton Park, behind Crofton Middle School. Construction for the new school building began in November 2017. Attendance boundaries for the school were finalized in April 2019. On August 26, 2019, a community meeting was held at Crofton Middle School with attendance by parents, students, and area residents; the meeting included a ballot on an unofficial name for the new high school, in which voters favored the name "Crofton High School" with 323 out of 402 votes. The name "Crofton High School" was officially approved by the county's Board of Education on September 11, 2019.


Students

Crofton High School educates all students with Crofton addresses as well as a portion of students with Gambrills addresses, a small area of addresses in Davidsonville, and one Odenton townhome complex. Crofton High School only has one feeder middle school, which is Crofton Middle School. Crofton Middle School has four feeder elementary schools: Crofton E.S., Crofton Meadows E.S., Crofton Woods E.S., and Nantucket E.S. The Crofton cluster is bordered by the Arundel cluster to the north, the South River cluster to the south, the Bowie cluster to the west ( Prince George’s County Public Schools), and the
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cluster to the east. Crofton High School's grand-opening was not held in person, as Crofton High opened during the midst of the
COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...
. Like most other Maryland school districts, Anne Arundel County Public Schools decided to start the first half of the 2020–2021 school year virtually due to the second rise in cases of COVID-19 in July 2020. Thus, Crofton High opened its doors to its first students online.


Academics and Rankings

Because Crofton High School is still new, it has not yet appeared in some lists of high school rankings--such as
US News and World Report ''U.S. News & World Report'' (''USNWR'', ''US NEWS'') is an American media company publishing news, consumer advice, rankings, and analysis. The company was launched in 1948 as the merger of domestic-focused weekly newspaper ''U.S. News'' and ...
's list of best high schools. However, Crofton High School is currently ranked #19 in the entire state of Maryland by SchoolDigger.https://www.schooldigger.com/go/MD/schools/0006001761/school.aspx In addition, Crofton High is rated an 8/10 by
GreatSchools GreatSchools is an American national nonprofit organization that provides information about PK-12 schools and education. The website provides ratings and comparison tools based on student growth, college readiness, equity, and test scores for ...
and has a 4 out of 5 star rating from the Maryland State Department of Education.


References

{{authority control Public high schools in Maryland Schools in Anne Arundel County, Maryland Educational institutions established in 2020