Wheatley High School (Houston)

The Carter Career Center/DeVry Advantage Academy building, which formerly served as the Wheatley High School building

Wheatley first opened at 3415 Lyons Avenue in the former McGowan Elementary School building on January 31, 1927.[3]

In 1927 Wheatley High School was one of the largest Black high schools in the United States with 2,600 students and 60 teachers,[4] and it was such throughout the Jim Crow era, when schools were segregated on the basis of race.[5] By 1949 Wheatley's first facility on Lyons Avenue became so overcrowded that students attended in shifts. During that year the 14-acre (5.7 ha), $2.5 million 4900 Market Street campus opened. The most expensive high school built in Houston at the time, the campus was designed by the firm MacKie & Kamrath in a Frank Lloyd Wright-influenced modernist style. The campus, described by the Houston Chronicle as "the finest Negro high school in the South," had a 1,500-seat auditorium, a gymnasium, an industrial arts facility, and a swimming pool. The school district spent attention on Wheatley in order to promote the argument that segregated minority schools can be equal to segregated White schools. The former Wheatley campus became E.O. Smith Middle School,[6][7] and later the Carter Career Center.[6]

In May 1965, William Lawson, a youth minister, asked some Wheatley students to discuss a proposed school boycott. While the school district was integrating, African American leaders believed that it was being integrated too slowly. During the boycott, which occurred five days later, 10% of Wheatley students attended classes.[8]

Fine Arts Complex and John F. Codwell Auditorium

In the 1970s Houston ISD had been desegregated. As the Fifth Ward as a neighborhood experienced a surge in crime, Houston ISD rezoned the Denver Harbor neighborhood, which had many White residents, to Wheatley. At that time the neighborhood was quickly becoming Hispanic. Many area Hispanic students preferred to attend Austin High School and Furr High School as they became the majority population at those schools. John Nova Lomax of the Houston Press stated that pride and discipline at Wheatley began to disintegrate in the 1970s, as counselors complained about a low level of morale among the students. The school abolished corporal punishment around that time, since White parents did not want Black teachers to physically punish white students, and Black parents did not want White teachers to physically punish black students. In addition, many of Wheatley's new White teachers, many of whom did not live in the Fifth Ward, had a lack of experience in teaching inner city Black students. Wylie Henry, a former HISD board member, said that many of the new White teachers "came in and tried to be kids' friends instead of their teachers."[8] In 1979 Principal Herald stated that integration caused the best students and teachers to leave the school.[2]

In 1976 the school was in the bottom twelfth percentile for reading; this meant that 88% of U.S. high school students had better reading scores than Wheatley students. In 1977 it declined to the bottom 11th. In 1978 HISD proposed using smaller classes, higher teaching salary, and a redesigned educational program to ameliorate Wheatley's academic problems. In 1979 Herald stated that test scores had declined.[2]

That year Herald also stated that the situation at the school was more peaceful in the 1970s than during the Civil Rights Movement; he added that 50% of Wheatley students were attempting to gain admission in to university and that some gifted individuals still remained at the school.[2]

In the mid-1980s, as crack cocaine became an epidemic in many inner-city neighborhoods, Wheatley students and teachers complained about security issues regarding some area apartments. In 1985 three youngsters walked onto the campus and shot an English teacher who had been conducting drill team rehearsals in the cafeteria. In 1986 a Hispanic student who had transferred from Dallas shot another Hispanic student in the face. After Joan Raymond became superintendent in 1986, she considered closing Wheatley because of difficulties in making the school have acceptable academic achievement and safety. Michael Berryhill of the Houston Press said that it was not politically possible to have the school closed since there were too many Wheatley alumni who did not want their school to be closed.[9]

In the 1990s Wheatley had low test scores and high dropout rates. In 1995 Wheatley had the highest dropout rate and lowest mathematics score of the high schools in Houston ISD.[10] In 1997 none of the teachers at Wheatley High School lived in the Wheatley attendance zone.[6] During the same year, of the 1,800 high-school-age children zoned to Wheatley, less than 1,000 attended the school.[8]

In 2007 a Johns Hopkins University study cited Wheatley as a "dropout factory" where at least 40% of the entering freshman class does not make it to their senior year.[11]

A new campus for Wheatley High School, designed by Willie Jordan, a Wheatley alum, was under construction in the same plot of land as the first 4900 Market Street campus, although the address changed to 4801 Providence Street.[12] The construction ended in fall 2006 and the new campus opened.[13] The old 4900 Market Street campus was demolished. The new campus's original budget was $35,000,000. Construction began in summer 2004 and ended during summer 2006. The lead architect was ESPA Architecture, with the lead manager as Gilbane.

The population of the school increased when Middle College for Technology Careers merged into Wheatley.[14]

Schools that received students zoned to Wheatley included Davis High School, Furr High School, Barbara Jordan High School, and Reagan High School.[15] During that year 58% of children zoned to Kashmere chose to attend a different Houston ISD school.[14]

The former Carter building later became DeVry Advantage Academy.[16] HISD plans to build the permanent Mickey Leland College Preparatory Academy for Young Men on the site of the former Carter Career Center. The new building will look similar to the original one.[17]

In 2019 the school received a failing ranking from the Texas Education Agency (TEA), the only HISD high school to receive that ranking that year. Around that period the TEA was attempting to replace the HISD school board, and it could possibly use Wheatley's failing grade as evidence that it should take this action. This was the seventh year in a row that the school had a failing grade.[18] According to the TEA, any school which does not receive a passing grade in any of the four accountability categories, as Wheatley did, fails its overall accountability grade; this requirement came into effect in 2018. Wheatley officials stated that if the rule did not exist, Wheatley would have been ranked a "D".[19] In November of that year, TEA Commissioner Mike Morath announced that the appeal for Wheatley was rejected; the basis of the appeal submitted was that student scores should be waived due to Hurricane Harvey, but other schools did not get the waiver for that reason for that year.[20]

In 2023 the Wheatley school community was not certain whether, in the wake of the TEA taking control of HISD, the TEA would keep the school open.[21]

The school won many trophies from the state basketball tournament, which was held at Prairie View A&M University.[6]

In a 25-year period ending in 1974, 15 of its teams made the state championships. Originally Wheatley played in the Negro leagues, but around 1968 the University Interscholastic League (UIL) opened its membership to black schools.[30] In 1968 the State of Texas held the first high school basketball playoffs. Then, the Wheatley team defeated the Thomas Jefferson High School team of Dallas, Texas by 85–80 in overtime. Through the win, Wheatley had achieved a 36–0 record.[6] In from 1968 to 1974, Wheatley received four state championship crowns, won 219 games, and lost 11 games.[30]

Historically many star basketball players moved on to Prairie View A&M University and Texas Southern University. By 1974 other, more prominent universities were considering recruiting Wheatley players.[34]

Berryhill said that basketball wins continued "periodically" after desegregation.[8]

In the segregation era schools for blacks played their games on weekdays while schools for whites played their games on Fridays.[35]

Historically the American football game between Wheatley and Yates High School was among the most prominent ones in the United States. In the segregation era Wheatley did not play games against white high schools.[35] Beginning in 1927,[36] each Thanksgiving Day the school's American football team played Yates High School's football team at the Jeppeson Stadium.[6] The Yates-Wheatley Thanksgiving football match, described by On American Soil: How Justice Became a Casualty of World War II author Jack Hamann as "the most important noncollege football game in the country", often had crowds that had over 30,000 people.[37] The rivalry declined after Yates joined the UIL, and after the football leagues integrated the Thanksgiving Day Yates-Wheatley game ended.[38]