Belmont High School

Belmont High School is a four-year public high school in Belmont, Massachusetts. It was built in 1970 at a cost of $9 million. The school had 1,183 students enrolled and a student/teacher ratio of 17:1 in the 2013-14 school year.The school is built on an old landfill and is situated next to Clay Pit Pond. The town's high school used to be located on Orchard Street, but was badly damaged by fire in the late 1960s. A new school was eventually built at the current location on Concord Ave. The address of the school is 221 Concord Ave. Belmont, MA. The previous high school re-opened as the Roger Wellington elementary school in 1972, and was entirely demolished in February–March 2010 for reconstruction.In 2009, US News gave Belmont High School a gold medal and named it the 100th best non-private high school in the United States and the second best in the state of Massachusetts.Administration and facultyThe school administration consists of the principal, Mr. Daniel Richards, and two assistant principals, Sherri Turner and John Muldoon. In recent years, the school administration has experienced frequent changes.In June 2004, the school's long-time principal, Foster Wright, decided to retire. Jonathan Landman was hired to replace him, but the school department did not renew Landman's contract for the 2006-2007 school year. Michael Harvey, who had been among the candidates for principal in 2004, was selected as an "interim principal" for the 2006-07 school year, and, on 10 January 2007, was approved by the town as principal. He had been the Director of Social Studies during the previous school-year. In addition, one of the school's two assistant principals has left the system in June 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2010, and 2011. In 2012, when Principal Michael Harvey left to become a Superintendent, ex-assistant-principal Daniel Richards took his place. Richards had spent his last year as the Principal of Melrose High, and had been replaced by David Smokler. When Richards returned, Smokler kept his position temporarily before being permanently replaced by the Head of Guidance, Jim Brown.