Pius XI High School is a private Catholic high school located in
MilwaukeeMilwaukee is the largest city in Wisconsin and 23rd largest in the United States. It is the county seat of Milwaukee County and is located on the southwestern shore of Lake Michigan. Its estimated 2008 population was 604,477. Milwaukee is the main cultural and economic center of the...
,
WisconsinWisconsin is one of the fifty U.S. states. Located in the north-central United States, Wisconsin is considered part of the Midwest. It is bordered by Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake Michigan to the east, Michigan to the northeast, and Lake Superior to the...
. It is in the
Roman Catholic Archdiocese of MilwaukeeThe Archdiocese of Milwaukee is a Roman Catholic archdiocese headquartered in Milwaukee, Wisconsin in the United States. It encompasses theCity of Milwaukee, as well asDodge, Fond du Lac, Kenosha,Milwaukee, Ozaukee, Racine,Sheboygan, Walworth, Washington...
. Its enrollment is approximately 1,200.
Pius XI High School, named in honor of
Pope Pius XIPope Pius XI , born Ambrogio Damiano Achille Ratti, was Pope from 6 February 1922, and sovereign of Vatican City from its creation as an independent state on 11 February 1929 until his death on 10 February 1939...
, was founded in 1929. Originally it offered only the first three years of high school. Thus, the first graduation occurred in 1937, when the first senior class was added to the school. Enrollment grew from a class of eight in 1937 to over 2,000 students throughout the 1960s and 1970s.
Pius XI High School is a private Catholic high school located in
MilwaukeeMilwaukee is the largest city in Wisconsin and 23rd largest in the United States. It is the county seat of Milwaukee County and is located on the southwestern shore of Lake Michigan. Its estimated 2008 population was 604,477. Milwaukee is the main cultural and economic center of the...
,
WisconsinWisconsin is one of the fifty U.S. states. Located in the north-central United States, Wisconsin is considered part of the Midwest. It is bordered by Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake Michigan to the east, Michigan to the northeast, and Lake Superior to the...
. It is in the
Roman Catholic Archdiocese of MilwaukeeThe Archdiocese of Milwaukee is a Roman Catholic archdiocese headquartered in Milwaukee, Wisconsin in the United States. It encompasses theCity of Milwaukee, as well asDodge, Fond du Lac, Kenosha,Milwaukee, Ozaukee, Racine,Sheboygan, Walworth, Washington...
. Its enrollment is approximately 1,200.
History
Pius XI High School, named in honor of
Pope Pius XIPope Pius XI , born Ambrogio Damiano Achille Ratti, was Pope from 6 February 1922, and sovereign of Vatican City from its creation as an independent state on 11 February 1929 until his death on 10 February 1939...
, was founded in 1929. Originally it offered only the first three years of high school. Thus, the first graduation occurred in 1937, when the first senior class was added to the school. Enrollment grew from a class of eight in 1937 to over 2,000 students throughout the 1960s and 1970s. Current enrollment is approximately 1,200 students, making it the largest private school in Wisconsin.
The original four-story school building was constructed in 1930, with a two-story addition, for six stories total, completed in 1957. Additional classroom space, library space, science laboratories and general renovations were completed in 1998, and a field house was annexed in 2004. The original gymnasium is being remodeled into an auditorium, which will be completed in the next three to four years.
Academics
Pius offers almost 200 courses, more than any other school in the state, including almost 20 advanced placement, honors and accelerated courses. In recent years, Pius XI High School has twice been named a National Blue Ribbon School. Pius has more national board-certified teachers than any other private school in Wisconsin.
In 2007, several fine arts and English students were awarded 24 Gold and 16 Silver Key awards, some for portfolios from the
National Scholastic Art & Writing Competition. In addition, several students have recently won awards and scholarships from the
National Foundation for Advancement in the Arts, and the Wisconsin Regional ARTS Competition. The Theater and English departments co-produced the Metro Milwaukee Young Playwrights Competition in 2005 and 2006 before the project was tabled.
The social sciences department's mock trial team has recently begun hosting annual workshops for other schools with students interested in learning about the activity. This year, Pius will begin competition in the Academic Decathlon.
The newest academic department is engineering, which offers a certified program called "Project Lead the Way" that prepares students for college engineering programs and allows them to earn college credit while in high school.
Schedules
Pius has a modular scheduling system; courses meet two, three or four times per week and last from 30 minutes to 1.5 hours. This system provides flexibility in the frequency and duration of individual courses, and approximates the scheduling systems used by colleges and universities.
Student government
The Pius XI High School Student Forum is responsible for bringing student concerns to the administrative level, bringing administrative opinions, decisions, views and ideas to the student body, to solve or assist in the solving of school-wide problems and to act in the interest of the Pius XI community. The Forum is guided by a constitution that is renewed with each new set of representatives, board representatives and officers. The president of the Forum is elected to the position by the representatives at-large and the vice-president is nominated by the president and moderator, subject to approval of the Student Forum. The moderator of the Forum is Mary Talsky, a social science instructor.
Athletics
Milwaukee Pius is a member of the
Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic AssociationThe Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association is the regulatory body for all high school sports in Wisconsin. Its history dates to 1895, making it the first high school athletic organization in the country...
and participates in the
Classic 8 Athletic ConferenceThe Classic 8 Conference, also known as the C8C, is a high school athletic conference made up of 8 teams in southeastern Wisconsin. The Classic 8 Conference is a member of the WIAA. The conference is one of the newer conferences in the WIAA, having been formed in 1997...
. The male athletic teams play under the name "Popes", while the females are referred to as the "Lady Popes". For one season the Pius XI football team was renamed the "Storm", after which the name "Popes" was brought back permanently. Despite the papal nickname, no visual imagery that alludes to the Pope is used at sporting events. The team had an unofficial mascot of the "Sugar Bear," alluding to an advertisement from the 1960s. The "Sugar Bear" lasted from the 1960s to 2004 because the bear suit was taken.
The Popes and the Lady Popes Basketball teams were the last two teams to win the Wisconsin Independent Schools Athletic Association (WISAA) boys' and girls' state basketball championships. The boys' basketball team finished with a school record of 24-1 and #1 in the
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel's state and area polls. The girls were coached by Hall of Famer Joel Classen, who lead them to 18 conference championships in as many years and 12 state titles. The boys were coached by recently inducted Pius XI Hall of Fame member, Gary Pieske.
Notable alumni
- Mike Kelley, sports analyst on CBS
- Alan Kulwicki
Alan Dennis Kulwicki , nicknamed "Special K" and the "Polish Prince", was an American NASCAR Winston Cup Series racecar driver. He started racing at local short tracks in Wisconsin before moving up to regional stock car touring series...
, 1992 NASCAR Winston Cup Champion
- Andrew Mozina
Andrew Mozina is a short story writer whose books include the collection, The Women Were Leaving the Men , which was a finalist in the Mary McCarthy Prize in Short Fiction...
, professor of English at Kalamazoo CollegeKalamazoo College, also known as K College or simply K, is a private liberal arts college located in Kalamazoo, Michigan, United States. Founded in 1833, the institution was American Baptist in origin, and acknowledges its historical relationship with that denomination, but today maintains no...
, and author of The Women Were Leaving the Men.
- Pat White, former professional soccer player
- Suzanne Schlict, contestant on the sixth season
Season 6 of the American competitive reality television series Hell's Kitchen began airing on the Fox Network on July 21, 2009. Gordon Ramsay returned as the host and head chef. Scott Leibfried returned as a sous chef for the blue team, for his sixth season. This season, Heather West, the winner of...
of Hell's Kitchen (U.S.)Hell's Kitchen is an American reality-television cooking competition broadcast on FOX. It is hosted by celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay....