San Carlos High School was a high school operated by the Sequoia Union High School District in San Carlos, California, United States, from 1960 until 1982. Originally founded due to increasing enrollment across Belmont, San Carlos, and Redwood City, by 1982, the high school suffered from low enrollment due to racial protests between local students and students bused in from East Palo Alto, which led the district to close the site. The campus was demolished in 1988, and is today the site of Highlands Park and a subdivision of luxury homes in the San Carlos hills.
History
In the late 1950s, Carlmont High School and Sequoia High School were nearing capacity, even with the recent construction of Woodside High School and Ravenswood High School. To accommodate increasing student numbers in San Carlos and Redwood City, the Sequoia Union High School District developed plans to build a 41-acre campus in the western hills of San Carlos, on lands that formerly belonged to the John Brittan Estate. Geographically, the school drew students from subdivisions in western Redwood City, along with neighborhoods in San Carlos east of Devonshire Boulevard and south of San Carlos Avenue in San Carlos. It was the fourth high school built by the Sequoia Union High School District within a decade.
The acreage for the site cost the district $353,629 and the preparation of the land, mainly grading, cost $699,825. Construction of the first phase of the school was $1,754,000 for a total of $2,483,000. Buildings were designed by San Carlos resident and architect Delp Johnson, who pioneered a radial design of the school, with wings spreading out from a central assembly court that was capable of hosting up to 3,500 people. Johnson also designed several pod-like buildings at Central Middle School, also in San Carlos, with a similar design by the end of the decade. The general contractor for the San Carlos High School project were Williams & Burrows, of Belmont. The school featured a baseball diamond, football field, hockey field, five tennis courts located at the end of Heather Drive, basketball courts, a 40' x 75' swimming pool open to the public during the summer, and a gymnasium. Mr. Philip Maslin was the first principal.
As more and more students grew up with a separation between Carlmont High School, which had formerly enrolled nearly all San Carlos students, and San Carlos High School, a sports rivalry developed between the schools, especially in basketball and track and field. Within the first semester, the student body was tasked with voting for a team name. Among the choices accepted by the faculty, including the Hurricanes, Comets, Falcons, Cardinals, and Dons, the Dons won by eight votes. A Don is a Spanish landowner from the 19th century.
Student Tension
Particularly due to San Carlos' proximity to San Francisco, which had prompted social activism stemming from the Summer of Love, San Carlos High School experienced changes in the early 1970s. In the 1969–1970 school year, students participated in moratoriums, electing to stay home from school every 15th of the month, allegedly in protest of the Vietnam War. Several years later, the Supreme Court ruled on the use of busing to achieve racial integration at schools, bringing change to the student makeup at San Carlos High School, which, due to the composition of San Carlos residents, had been significantly white. Beginning in 1970, 125 African-American students from East Palo Alto were bused into San Carlos, a number that increased each year.