Newburgh Free Academy

History

Early school

The school traces its history back to the early days of the United States. The Rev. George H. Spierin proposed to open an "Academy" in Newburgh. Work began in 1796 under the direction of the trustees of the glebe. (A glebe was land originally set aside in the early 18th century for a pastor and his church. The glebe for the Newburgh area was issued in 1719.) A portion of the first Academy was occupied in 1797. The building was 60 feet (18 m) by 40 feet (18.5 × 12.3m), two stories high, built of wood, and lined with brick. It was located on Liberty Street and cost around $2,500. The building was not finished until some years later when a court room was included. The building itself saw use as not only a school and court, but was also site for town meetings and political organizations.

The first record of a teacher employed was in 1799 when Samuel Nicholson was hired. The academy had only one teacher during its first eight years of existence. In 1807 management of the school passed from the hands of the trustees of the Glebe to a regularly incorporated Board of Trustees. At that time rates for tuition were adopted. The charge per quarter was $2.50. This was for the study of writing and arithmetic. A scholar studying Greek, Latin or French was charged $5.00 per quarter.

In 1807 Richard A. Thompson was employed as principal. He lived in the school rent free and was paid $100 at the end of the year. He also received all money arising from the tuition of scholars attending the academy. A Female Department was established at the academy in 1809. Reading, writing, sewing, and drawing were taught. On April 6, 1852, the New York State Legislature authorized the establishment and organization of free schools in Newburgh. Within a month free education was introduced into what was then the village of Newburgh. The academy then came under the control of Board of Education as the senior department of the Newburgh Public Schools. In 1871 a three-year course of study was arranged, at the completion of which students were required to take a written examination. Those who passed the examination were granted diplomas as graduates. The first Commencement Exercises were held on April 28, 1871, and included the participation of a Salutatorian and Valedictorian.

Second Montgomery Street Academy

Ten years after the first official Commencement Exercises the academy had outgrown itself. A "new" Academy was built on the grounds of the formal school on Montgomery Street in 1886 for around $70,000. Designed by Ehrick Rossiter and partner Frank A. Wright, a former student, the school had three stories and a basement. The three floors contained twelve school rooms, a large assembly room that could fit six to seven hundred people, a drawing room, a laboratory, an annex, and janitor's quarters. Each school room contained desks for 45 students, and was equipped with countersunk ink wells, black boards, closets, and electric bells. It had a brick frontage of 112 feet and a depth of 68 feet, each classroom 33 1/2 x 23 feet. Light was designed to enter over the student's left shoulders to help them when writing. The stairwells were also noted as being broad.

September 2, 1886, 201 students registered for classes at the "new" Academy, which now housed grammar and academic classes. Actual classes began on September 20. It was also during 1886 that "the free book system" was adopted by the Board. Three years later on July 7, 1889, the Board received a certificate of admission of the academy to the University of the State of New York. Soon afterwards a definite standard was set up for graduation, and the high school course was extended to four years. In September of that year the department plan of teaching, that is assigning teachers to subjects rather than to grades, was adopted. Three courses of study were established: English, Scientific, Latin-Scientific, and Classical. It was also in 1886 that corporal punishment was abolished. A superintendent's report says that "the unlimited use of the rod is certainly not desirable." Six years after moving into its "new" Montgomery Street building the academy adopted its school colors: navy blue and gold.

Fullerton Avenue

Compulsory education laws such as those of 1894, and increasing population in the city resulted in an enlarged high school enrollment. The need for a larger and more modern building was becoming increasingly evident as our school and country entered the 20th century. In 1926 construction began on a 7-acre (28,000 m2) lot at the corner of Fullerton Avenue and South Street for a million dollar building, which was to accommodate 1,500 students. (Note: All three previous Academy buildings were built within the original glebe boundaries.) On January 23, 1928, the first classes were held in the present Newburgh Free Academy building, but it was not until March 1928 that the construction work was finally completed. In the fall of 1931, an annex was added to the building, adding dressing rooms, a music room, and an additional place for gym work.

In 1936, WPA muralist Lee Woodward Zeigler was hired by the Board of Education to paint murals in either the auditorium or vestibule. A part-time New Windsor resident, Zeigler was a popular muralist at the height of his career. He favored the idea of possibly painting the Muses, but the Board of Education supported the depiction of a local historical scene or something more academic. Boston architect Ralph Adams Cram wrote to Zeigler and recommended that he create a set of murals to depict the progress of education in Western world, from the School of Athens to the College of William & Mary. Zeigler thought this subject matter was too arresting, and that visitors would not grasp the images. He decided to paint two vertical murals, flanking the stage, featuring Renaissance figures meant to represent the dramatic arts and music.

In the first ten years of its occupancy pupil enrollment grew from about 1,100 to more than 2,200. The teaching staff increased from 39 to more than 75. To relieve the overcrowding Columbia University Teachers College recommended that two new junior high schools should be built in order to keep Newburgh up with the times. In spite of the Great Depression, two schools, North Junior High School which still stands and operates on Route 9W and South Junior High School which also still stands and operates on Monument Street, were built with the aid of a 45% grant from the Public Works Administration. In 1937 both buildings were dedicated, and the academy began to see its enrollment drop back to around 1,500 pupils.

In the early 1960s, as the baby boomer generation reached high school age, a major addition was built on the north side of the building along Roe Street. The wing was designed to meet Space Age sensibilities, incentivizing students to enter STEM careers. Among the new features were a planetarium, laboratories for chemistry and physics, a greenhouse, mobile animal cabinets, a climatorium for weather measurements, courtyard and a 250-seat lecture room with a dividing wall. A dark room for photography and a TV studio were also added. The planetarium was built with a 30-foot dome visible to passersby, fitted with 90 adjustable seats and used a Model A3P Prime machine. Students in the elementary and junior high schools would be brought there on field trips for their science curriculum. It is no longer in full use. The new addition opened for classes in September 1965.

First attendance scandal

Beginning in 2011, the high school was involved in a scandal concerning widespread class cutting and poor graduation rates among Newburgh Free Academy basketball players during their state championship in 2008–09 and the 2009–10 season.

Star players on the 2008–09 and 2009–10 teams told the Times Herald-Record they skipped classes as their coach and administrators looked the other way or actively covered for them. Attendance records later obtained by the paper showed the top six players skipped more than 1,000 classes. E-mails showed NFA teachers had notified top administrators only to see their concerns brushed away. It was only after the allegations became public that the district took any corrective actions.

NFA's Principal Peter Copeletti and Athletic Director Chris Townsend both retired during the investigation. Coach Frank Dinnocenzio was replaced. Assistant Principal Karriem Bunce was suspended.

Student activism in 2018

After the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting, 11th grade students immediately organized to rally against gun violence. A group of about 20 students participated in a nation-wide school walkout on March 14 to end gun violence. Wearing orange in solidarity, the students left their classrooms and gathered in front of the school. This quickly garnered safety concerns from the district. Other smaller demonstrations were held indoors, and students sat or laid down in the hallways as protest. While many students were focused on school shootings, others expressed concern for gun violence in Newburgh and those that had been lost to it.

An 11th grader approached school administrators to organize a Week of Awareness on topics including bullying, suicide prevention and gun violence. On March 23, two grade assemblies on gun violence and mass shootings were held, allowing students to speak. Some controversy emerged as an anti-gun control student prepared to speak in opposition to the students. The morning of the assembly, they withdrew their name from the lineup. 11th graders made speeches on issues related to the shooting, including the role of mental health statistics. This was in response to President Donald Trump's tweets blaming mass shootings solely on poor mental health. A representative from Moms Demand Action, Tom Campbell of the Newtown Action Alliance and James Skoufis were present.

During the month of March, a school shooting scare occurred when a YouTube video surfaced of an 11th grader referring to himself as a school shooter. In the video, the student poked fun at comments people had made about him, a recurrent one being that his appearance and behavior likened that of a school shooter. Without this context, students brought the video to administration and many did not return to school for the rest of the week.

Second attendance scandal

After the 2011 scandal, the school set new policies to prevent one from happening again, setting stricter guidelines and requiring more reporting from faculty and staff. Administration changed in 2015 and Raul Rodriguez became principal. In 2016, a former girls varsity basketball coach noticed that the school's attendance system, Infinite Campus, seemed to alter a student athlete's attendance record. Days earlier, the coach had notified administration that the student was ineligible to attend a state track competition due to exceeding excused absences. After notifying them, he checked Infinite Campus to find the student's attendance in excellent standing, contrary to its initial appearance. He wrote to the New York State Education Department on May 18, 2017, notifying them attendance policies may have been changed illegally. After following up on June 23 and July 28, the department neglected to respond as to whether they had investigated the school. In September, they opened an investigation on their own.

On the morning of October 23, 2018, officers from the Orange County District Attorney arrived at the Board of Education and Newburgh Free Academy. They served administration with a search warrant, seeking the district's attendance policies regarding academics and athletic participation. Later in the day, the district released a statement agreeing to comply.

In January 2019, a grand jury began looking into attendance findings, as the FBI began looking for witnesses and the Orange County DA began to seize information from the Board of Education. Many employees of the district pointed to the credit recovery program APEX as a continuing problem. The program had been enforced and misused. Failing students could stay after school to recover credits. According to the investigation, dozens of APEX students completed coursework for a 45-day quarter in under two hours, including six who did so in 20 minutes or less. Teachers alleged they were told they could provide unlimited chances for quizzes and assignments.

Many of the student athletes had been chronically absent with "illness" but had managed to get the excessive absences cleared. The investigation also found that 65 of the 110 students whose records were examined averaged 100 or more class absences per year. One student had 2,276 class absences, plus 1,272 latenesses, in four years.

As the investigation went on, ineligible students were found to be actively participating in football, boys soccer, wrestling, baseball and track.

Athletics

The NFA basketball team won the 2009 New York State Class AA Championship, as mentioned above. The NFA soccer team also won the 2009 New York State Class AA Championship. The NFA crew team's men's 4+ won the state regatta in 2008, and went on to compete in the national regatta winning 6th place, beating out all public schools in their category. The NFA football team has made the State Championship game three times, in 2011, 2014, and 2022. Losing games to Orchard Park, Jamestown, and Buffalo-Bennett respectively. The NFA baseball team has not been to the state tournament since winning section 9 in 2005, however, they lost in extra innings to the eventual state champions, Kingston, in the section 9 semifinals in 2012. In track & field, the NFA boys 4x400 meter relay were 2021 national champions and received All-American honors.

Newburgh is rivals with Monroe-Woodbury, Kingston, Middletown, and Pine Bush.

Alumni

Rob Cohen, film and television director and producer

Pardison Fontaine, rapper

Willie Fraser, professional baseball player

Michael H. Hirschberg, District Attorney of Orange County and New York Supreme Court Justice.

Hubertus Hoyt, Class of 1974, professional tennis player

Bud Kerr, professional football player and college football coach

Lexi Lawson, class of 2002, theater actress and singer who made her Broadway debut as Eliza Hamilton in Hamilton on Broadway

Ksenia Makarova, Russian-American figure skater

John Palermo, college football coach and player

Justin Rutty, professional basketball player

Mickey Scott, professional baseball player

Bill Short, professional baseball player

Saul Williams, poet, rapper and author

Erica Mena, actress, model, socialite