Boston Latin School

History

17th and 18th centuries

Boston Latin School was founded on April 23, 1635, by the Town of Boston. Under the auspices of Reverend John Cotton, the school was modeled after the Free Grammar School of Boston founded 80 years earlier in Boston, England. The first classes were held in the home of the Master, Philemon Pormort. John Hull was the first student to graduate (1637). It was intended to educate young men of all social classes in the classics. The school was initially funded by donations and land rentals rather than by taxes. A school established in nearby Dedham was the first tax-supported public school.

Latin is the mother of modern Romance languages and was an educational priority in the 17th century. The ability to read at least Cicero and Virgil was a requirement of all colonial colleges, and to write and speak Latin in verse and prose was the first of the “Harvard College Laws” of 1642. Boston Latin prepared many students for admission to Harvard, with a total of seven years devoted to the classics. However, most graduates of Boston Latin did not go on to college, since business and professions did not require college training.

Until the 19th century, the Latin School admitted only male students and hired only male teachers. Helen Magill White was the school's first female graduate and the first American woman to earn a doctorate. Magill White was the only female pupil at the school when she attended.

19th century

Until the middle of the 19th century, BLS was popular among the Boston upper class. Under the headmastership of Epes Sargent Dixwell (1836–1851), the school moved into a new facility on Bedford Street. In 1844, Dixwell organized the Boston Latin School Association to support the school.

At mid-century, the City of Boston banned BLS from employing or teaching individuals who lived outside city limits. In response, Dixwell (who lived in Cambridge) broke away and started the Dixwell School, an exclusive private school that drew away affluent families from BLS.

In 1877, the Girls' Latin School was founded. A cadet corps was founded during the American Civil War but was later disbanded in the early 1960s.

20th century

In 1967, the school appointed Marie Frisardi Cleary and Juanita Ponte as the first two women in its academic faculty. Cornelia Kelley was the school's first female headmaster, serving from 1998 until her retirement in 2007, after which Lynne Mooney Teta became headmaster. Boston Latin admitted its first co-educational class in 1972.

21st century

In 2016, Mooney Teta resigned amid a federal probe into racially charged incidents at the school. In 2017, Rachel Skerritt became the first person of color to serve as headmaster. Skerritt resigned at the conclusion of the 2021–22 school year and was succeeded in the retitled position of Head of School by elementary principal and fellow Latin School alumnus Jason Gallagher.

Academics

Boston Latin's motto is Sumus Primi, Latin for we are first. This has a double meaning, referring both to the school's date of founding and to its academic stature. Boston Latin has a history of pursuing the same standards as elite New England prep schools while adopting the egalitarian attitude of a public school. Academically, the school regularly outperforms public schools in affluent Boston suburbs, particularly as measured by the yearly MCAS assessment required of all Massachusetts public schools. In 2006, Brooklyn Latin School was founded in New York City, explicitly modeled on Boston Latin, borrowing much from its traditions and curriculum. In 2006, Washington Latin School was founded in Washington, D.C., also modeled on Boston Latin.

Admissions

Admission to Boston Latin School is limited to residents of the city of Boston. Until 2020, admission was determined by a combination of a student's score on the Independent School Entrance Examination (ISEE) and recent grades. As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, however, the entrance exam was suspended, and admission was based on grades and Boston residency. In 2021, a new exam, the MAP Growth test, was designated for students applying for entrance to the 2023–24 school year and beyond. Students must have a grade point average from their current and previous school years of at least a B to be eligible to apply. In addition to GPA and test scores, students may be eligible to receive additional points if they meet specific criteria, such as living in housing owned by the Boston Housing Authority, in the care of the Department of Children and Families, or experiencing homelessness. They also receive additional points if they attended a school in the year prior to application that has, on average over the past five years, an enrollment of 40% or more economically disadvantaged students.

Although Boston Latin runs from the 7th through the 12th grade, it admits students only into the 7th and 9th grades.

The school has been the subject of controversy concerning its admissions process. Before the 1997 school year, Boston Latin set aside a 35% quota of places in the incoming class for under-represented minorities. The school was forced to drop this policy after a series of lawsuits were brought by white females who were not admitted despite ranking higher (based on test scores and GPA) than admitted minorities.

After the lawsuits, the percentage of under-represented minorities at Boston Latin fell from 35% in 1997 to under 19% in 2005, despite efforts by Boston Latin, the Boston Public Schools, and the Boston Latin School Association to recruit more minority applicants and retain more minority students.

Boston Latin later defeated a legal effort to end its admissions process entirely in favor of admissions by blind lottery.

In recent years, the admissions exam has continued to cause controversy due to the lack of diversity among admitted students. In 2017, Lawyers for Civil Rights published the demographics of the incoming class, highlighting that Black students are invited to attend Boston Latin at a rate that is more than two and a half times lower than their enrollment rates in Boston Public Schools overall.

Curriculum

Declamation is one of the school's time-honored traditions. Students in the 7th through 10th grades are required to give an oration, known as declamation, in their English class three times during the year. The school also holds Public Declamation, in which students from all grades are welcomed to try out for the chance to declaim a memorized piece in front of an assembly. During Public Declamation, declaimers are scored on categories including "Memorization," "Presentation," and "Voice and Delivery," and those who score well in three of the first four public declamations are given the chance to declaim in front of alumni judges for awards in "Prize Declamation.”

In addition to declamation in English classes, the Modern Languages department holds an annual "World Language Declamation" competition. Once a year, during National Foreign Language Week (usually the first week of March), students in grades 8 through 12 perform orations in languages other than English. Entrants are categorized by level, rather than language. So all students declaiming at the first-year level of various languages are competing against each other, all students declaiming at the second-year level compete against each other, and so on.

In 2001, the school decided to decrease the Latin requirement by one year, starting with the class of 2006. For students admitted for 7th grade, the minimum number of years of Latin required decreased from five years to four years, and for students admitted for 9th grade, from four years to three years. Students, however, can still take Latin (and Greek) electives after their fourth year.

Publications

There are currently three main publications of the Boston Latin School: The Register is the school's literary magazine, The Argo the school newspaper, and Catapulta is the science magazine. George Santayana founded The Register in 1881 to serve as the school newspaper. Over the years, however, it evolved into a purely literary magazine, publishing prose and poetry written by members of the student body, as well as artwork. There are generally three editors-in-chief, and it is published twice per year. The Argo, the school's newspaper, is far younger, having been founded in 1970 after it was clear that the Register had become a purely literary magazine. As of the 2006–2007 school year, it is published seven times a year. Catapulta, the science magazine, highlights popular and recent science and technology and is generally published four times a year. The Register, the Argo, and Catapulta are entirely student-produced, and the "Argo" and the "Register" have won awards from the New England Scholastic Press Association, while Catapulta has won awards from the American Scholastic Press Association.

Another Boston Latin publication is "G Mello", published by the Boston Latin School Association, whose president is Peter G. Kelly, '83.

Athletics

Boston Latin's teams are known as the Boston Latin Wolfpack; their colors are purple and white. Boston Latin has played rival Boston English in football every Thanksgiving since 1887, one of the oldest continuous high school rivalries in the United States.

In 2024, the Boys' Ice Hockey Team entered the state playoffs as the 11th seed and completed a magical Cinderella run by defeating the 10th, 6th, 3rd, and 1st ranked teams in the MIAA Division 2 on the way to winning the State Championship.

In popular culture

April 5, 2000: In "Six Meetings Before Lunch", a first-season episode of The West Wing, Rob Lowe's character Sam Seaborn mentioned Boston Latin School in a discussion of public school reform and school vouchers in American public education. He said, “Boston Latin, the oldest public school in America, is still the best secondary school in New England.” Mallory O'Brien replies "They all can't be Boston Latin and Bronx Science."

January 8, 2002: President George W. Bush visited the Boston Latin School after signing the No Child Left Behind Act earlier that day.

January 22, 2007: In Season 1, Episode 12 of Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, Matthew Perry's character Matt Albie mentioned that his nephew had a 3.8 GPA at Boston Latin.

Rankings and awards

In 2008, the school was named number 28 of public high schools in the United States by U.S. News & World Report magazine. It was named a 2011 "Blue Ribbon School of Excellence", the Department of Education's highest award. As of 2018, it is listed under the "gold medal" list, ranking 48 out of the top 100 high schools in the United States by U.S. News & World Report.

In 2024, the school was rated as the top public high school in Massachusetts by U.S. News & World Report and number 27 in national rankings.

Alumni

Boston Latin has produced four Harvard University presidents, four Massachusetts governors, and five signers of the United States Declaration of Independence. Benjamin Franklin and Louis Farrakhan are among its well-known dropouts.

Boston Latin has graduated notable Americans in the fields of politics (both local and national), religion, science, journalism, philosophy, and music. Of the 56 men who signed the Declaration of Independence, five were educated at Latin: Adams, Franklin, Hancock, Hooper, and Paine. Graduates and students fought in the Revolutionary War, American Civil War, World War I, World War II, Korean War, and the Vietnam War, and plaques and statues in the school building honor those who died.

Hall of Fame

The Hall of Fame, known casually as "The Wall," refers to the upper frieze in the school's auditorium, where the last names of famous alumni are painted. These names include Adams, Bernstein, Fitzgerald, Franklin, Hancock, Hooper, John Hull, Kennedy, Mather, Paine, Quincy, Santayana, Winthrop and others. The most recent name, Wade McCree Jr., was added to the frieze in 1999, and the selection of the name involved a conscious effort to choose a graduate of color. There are no names of female graduates, mostly because women have attended the school for just 46 years and the honor is only bestowed posthumously. There is also a lower frieze with the names of many other distinguished graduates, and a place on the lower frieze can be awarded while the person is still alive.