Bridgewater Raritan High School Campus Map

Bridgewater-Raritan High School (commonly abbreviated as BRHS) is a four-year comprehensive public high school. It is the lone secondary school of the Bridgewater-Raritan Regional School District serving students in ninth through twelfth grades from Bridgewater Township and Raritan in Somerset County, New Jersey, United States. The school has been recognized by the National Blue Ribbon Schools Program,[4] the highest award an American school can receive.[5][6]

Until the 1950s, high school students from the Bridgewater-Raritan Regional School District attended Somerville High School[7] and Bound Brook High School.[citation needed] With the opening of the high school, the Somerville district saw the loss of 370 Bridgewater students that had attended the district's high school.[8]

Bridgewater-Raritan High School was opened in September 1959, with students in ninth and tenth grades; those students moving into eleventh and twelfth grades remained at Somerville High School, with the final set of Bridgewater and Raritan students graduating with the Class of 1961.[7] Norman A. Gathany serving as the school's first principal. Increasing enrollments in the early 1960s led to the construction of a second high school in 1966, which was named Bridgewater-Raritan High School East (the Minutemen), while the original high school was renamed Bridgewater-Raritan High School West (the Golden Falcons).[9] Declining enrollments led to their consolidation into a single high school during the 1990s. The former High School West was expanded and updated over a period of several years, during which all of the district's high school students attended what had been High School East. In 1992, the former High School West reopened as the new consolidated Bridgewater-Raritan High School, and High School East became the district's middle school.[10]

The high school's football field is "Basilone Field", named for John Basilone, a World War II recipient of the Medal of Honor who grew up in Raritan. On the wall of the field house next to the field is a mural honoring Basilone.[11]

In the 2011 "Ranking America's High Schools" issue by The Washington Post, the school was ranked 36th in New Jersey and 1,190th nationwide.[15] In Newsweek's May 22, 2007 issue, ranking the country's top high schools, Bridgewater-Raritan High School was listed in 983rd place, the 29th-highest ranked school in New Jersey.[16]

The school was the 76th-ranked public high school in New Jersey out of 339 schools statewide in New Jersey Monthly magazine's September 2014 cover story on the state's "Top Public High Schools", using a new ranking methodology.[17] The school had been ranked 113th in the state of 328 schools in 2012, after being ranked 67th in 2010 out of 322 schools listed.[18] The magazine ranked the school 91st in 2008 out of 316 schools.[19] The school was also ranked 83rd in the magazine's September 2006 issue, which surveyed 316 schools across the state.[20] In previous years, the school had been ranked in the 20s in the same ranking. Following publication of the 2006 New Jersey Monthly article, the school's principal issued a public statement explaining changes in the magazine's ranking methods that altered the school's standing, and generally criticizing the ranking methodology.[21] Schooldigger.com ranked the school tied for 83d out of 381 public high schools statewide in its 2011 rankings (a decrease of 20 positions from the 2010 ranking) which were based on the combined percentage of students classified as proficient or above proficient on the mathematics (89.0%) and language arts literacy (96.1%) components of the High School Proficiency Assessment (HSPA).[22]

In its listing of "America's Best High Schools 2016", the school was ranked 108th out of 500 best high schools in the country; it was ranked 20th among all high schools in New Jersey and seventh among the state's non-magnet schools.[24]

The school's wind ensemble has performed in the State Gala concert numerous times within the past decade. The symphonic band and wind ensemble have performed at Carnegie Hall for the Eastern Wind Symphony Symphonic Gala in March 2013. Since 2002 BRHS has won three NJAJE state jazz band titles, eight NJ state marching band championships, four BOA regional class championships. In fall 2012, the BRHS marching band finished 18th in the nation as BOA semi-finalist and was awarded the national The Albert J Castronovo Esprit de Corp Award, the highest placement of a NJ band in the history of Bands of America.[26]

The high school currently has many ongoing clubs and activities, such as the Forensics Speech and Debate Team. In the past, the Forensics team has had National Championship qualifiers, as well as numerous state champions and one national champion. In 2019, the Forensics team qualified two teams to the Tournament of Champions, the school's first qualifications to the tournament in over half a decade. The school also has an Academic Team and Math League. The Forensics team has been ranked third in the state of New Jersey.[27]

In the past decade, the high school has expanded its Peer Mediation program, training approximately 20 new mediators a year and student conflicts have followed a consistent downward trend since the program's inception.

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In support of its mission to make higher education as accessible as possible to the residents of the communities it serves, the College also offers selected courses and programs at a growing number of off-campus locations. Current off-campus sites are the following:

In partnership with area high school, the College also offers dual enrollment opportunities for concurrently enrolled high school students. Through this program, high school students meeting appropriate academic requirements take courses on their local high school campus and earn academic credit that simultaneously fulfills high school graduation requirements and RVCC Associate degree requirements. Concurrent enrollment opportunities are currently available for students attending the following high schools:

Bridgewater-Raritan Regional High School (commonly abbreviated as BRHS) is a four-year comprehensive public high school. It is the lone secondary school of the Bridgewater-Raritan Regional School District serving students in ninth through twelfth grades from Bridgewater Township and Raritan in Somerset County, New Jersey, United States.

Before Fairfield: A two-sport athlete, Giordano comes to Fairfield after spending time with the varsity field hockey and lacrosse teams at Bridgewater-Raritan High School. She collected All-State first team honors in Group 4 and All-State second team accolades across all Groups following the 2014 campaign. She led her high school team to four conference (Skyland), county (Somerset), and state (Group 4) championships. She was named the Somerset County tournament most valuable player in 2013 and received All-County first team and Skyland Conference first team honors. She also spent time with the Total Dutch Field Hockey Club which was ranked sixth in the nation (USFHA) for U-16 in 2011 and 2012. The team captured the 2011 U-16 USFHA Festival championship and was a Festival finalist one year later. In 2013, the club team was a U-19 USFHA Disney quarterfinalist. She also played Futures in 2013 and 2014 with the 2014 U-19 squad advancing to the National Futures Championships.

After finishing the curriculum at Bridgewater-Raritan Middle School, students will graduate to this high school. In 2019, the school performed better than 82.1% of local high schools in New Jersey. Teachers are always available after hours to help students who are struggling in certain areas. 2b1af7f3a8