Paramus High School


Paramus High School is an American four-year comprehensive public high school, located in Paramus, in Bergen County, New Jersey, United States, serving students in ninth through twelfth grades as the lone secondary school of the Paramus Public Schools. The school has been accredited by the Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Secondary Schools since 2006.
As of the 2018–19 school year, the school had an enrollment of 1,265 students and 106.3 classroom teachers, for a student–teacher ratio of 11.9:1. There were 57 students eligible for free lunch and 24 eligible for reduced-cost lunch.
Paramus High School offers a wide range of course offerings to its students, including Advanced Placement courses available in 26 subjects.

History

Historically, Paramus shared many municipal services with the township of Rochelle Park, including schooling. In 1922, the school situation was the hot topic of discussion. Residents felt that the schools were too far away and wanted to make sure that their children were safe when they went to school. It was because of this that Paramus decided to become a borough of its own, and it built the high school on Spring Valley Road in 1957. The school's 50th anniversary was celebrated in 2007.

Awards, recognition and rankings

For the 1988-89 school year, Paramus High School was awarded the National Blue Ribbon School Award of Excellence by the United States Department of Education, the highest award an American school can receive.
The school was the 57th-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. The school had been ranked 111th in the state of 328 schools in 2012, after being ranked 98th in 2010 out of 322 schools listed. The magazine ranked the school 77th in 2008 out of 316 schools. The school was ranked 45th in the magazine's September 2006 issue, which included 316 schools across the state.
Schooldigger.com ranked the school tied for 124th out of 381 public high schools statewide in its 2011 rankings which were based on the combined percentage of students classified as proficient or above proficient on the mathematics and language arts literacy components of the High School Proficiency Assessment.
In the 2011 "Ranking America's High Schools" issue by The Washington Post, the school was ranked 50th in New Jersey and 1,527th nationwide.
In its 2013 report on "America's Best High Schools", The Daily Beast ranked the school 705th in the nation among participating public high schools and 54th among schools in New Jersey.

Athletics

The Paramus High School Spartans compete in the Big North Conference, following a reorganization of sports leagues in Northern New Jersey by the New Jersey State Interscholastic Athletic Association. With 961 students in grades 10-12, the school was classified by the NJSIAA for the 2015-16 school year as North I, Group III for most athletic competition purposes, which included schools with an enrollment of 786 to 1,074 students in that grade range. The school had participated in the North Jersey Tri-County Conference in 2009-10. Until the NJSIAA's 2009 realignment, the school had participated in Division A of the Northern New Jersey Interscholastic League, which was made up of high schools located in Bergen County, Essex County and Passaic County, and was separated into three divisions based on NJSIAA size classification. The Paramus High School sports program has had much success over the years, most notably in baseball, volleyball, and wrestling. The ice hockey team ended a 12-year drought with a league title, league championship, and also a holiday tournament championship in the 2011-12 season.
The baseball program has won over 800 games since its inception in 1960, which includes four state championships, a county championship, and 13 league championships. Many players have gone on to graduate and continue to play baseball at the collegiate level, several of which played at the NCAA Division 1 level or professionally. Former head coach Joe Cervino, who managed the team for 30 seasons from 1982-2011, was one of the most successful coaches in Bergen County history, one of only four coaches to win more than 500 games.
The girls' volleyball team has won seven state championships, winning the Division A title in 1981 against Northern Valley Regional High School at Old Tappan, taking the Group IV title in 1982 against Hackensack High School, and earning Group III titles in 1988, 1999, 1994, 1995 and 2005. The team won the Tournament of Champions in 2005, defeating Secaucus High School in the tournament finals with a two-game sweep by scores of 25-22 and 25-23. The 1994 girls' volleyball team finished the season with a record of 22-2, winning the league and Group III state title, but lost to Paramus Catholic High School in the Bergen County tournament. The 1995 team won the Group III title for a second consecutive year, and took the Bergen County title with a win over Paramus Catholic.
The wrestling team won the North I Group IV state sectional championship in 1982, 1985, 1998 and 1999, and won the North I Group III title in 1993 and 2012.

Administration

The school's principal is Raymond Kiem. His core administration team includes two assistant principals

Notable alumni

Notable Paramus High school alumni include: