Thomas FitzSimons High School

Thomas Fitzsimons Junior High School, later The Young Men's Leadership School at Thomas E. FitzSimons High School, is a former public secondary school that, in its final years, was a secondary school for boys. It was located at 2601 Cumberland Street in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States and was a part of the School District of Philadelphia. The school was named after Thomas FitzSimons, who was a signer of the Constitution of the United States.HistoryThe building was designed by noted architect Irwin T. Catharine and built in 1926. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1988 as the Thomas Fitzsimons Junior High School.In September 2005, the School District of Philadelphia converted FitzSimons Middle School, a coeducational middle school managed by Victory Schools Inc. since 2002, into an all-male middle and high school. During that year the district established The Young Women’s Leadership School at E. Washington Rhodes High School for females. The males zoned to the former FitzSimons and Rhodes zones were assigned to FitzSimons, while the females in the zones were assigned to Rhodes. After the redesign FitzSimons reported increases on assaults targeting students and teachers. Margaret Harrington, the chief operating officer of Victory, described FitzSimons as having a "transition problem." Martha Woodall of the Philadelphia Inquirer stated in a 2006 article that the boys assigned to FitzSimons had tension with the boys assigned to Rhodes, and that tensions increased when they were combined into the same school. Richard H. Jenkins Sr., the principal of FitzSimons, said in that Philadelphia Inquirer article that he began establishing order with the students as the 2005-2006 school year progressed.