Southeast High's New Building and Reputation: A Socio-Historical Study of an Urban High School

Abstract

Southeast High is a large high school in a mid-sized midwestern city. After decades of racial and socioeconomic shifts, the school’s reputation has also declined dramatically. This study sought to better understand how this story fits into the national historical narrative and how these historical and social factors contributed to the decline in reputation of Rightown Southeast High since its opening in 1957. Archival data analysis, oral history interviews, and student focus groups point to policy changes during the 1980s and 1990s as distinguishing factors that lead to a decline in levels of academic achievement and social status within the school. Negative media coverage of Southeast High during the 2010s also played a large role in informing the community’s perception of the school; interview and district data conflict with this media coverage, suggesting that the popular storyline surrounding Southeast High does not align with the realities within its four walls.