Baldwin Middle School - School System

School System

Baldwin has its own school district, officially named the Baldwin Union Free School District (formerly Union Free School District No. 10, Town of Hempstead). The boundaries of the Baldwin School District are not identical with those of Baldwin itself, also containing a significant portion of Freeport, up to Knollwood Road in Rockville Centre and a few blocks from other neighboring villages. On the other hand, a small portion of Baldwin, located to the West of Silver Lake, is included in the Oceanside Union Free School District.

As of September 2012, the Baldwin Public Schools consist of seven schools with a total enrollment of approximately 5500 students. There is one high school, Baldwin Senior High School, and one middle school, Baldwin Middle School. There are five elementary schools spaced throughout the town: Brookside, Lenox, Meadow, Plaza, and Steele.

Baldwin Senior High School is a Nationally Recognized School of Excellence, and as of 2011, is the eighth-largest high school in Nassau County, New York. Baldwin Senior High School was ranked by Newsweek in its annual list of America's Best High Schools. In 2010, it was ranked #837 in the entire United States, #804 in 2008, #971 in 2007, and #602 in 2006. The high school offers a multitude of extracurricular clubs, varsity sports, and a robotics team. Baldwin Senior High School offers Advanced Placement courses that may enable students to earn college credit, and the school produced two National Merit Commended Students, who achieved scores in the top 5% of the more than 1.5 million students who took the PSAT in 2009.

The high school is located near the north-central part of town, and the middle school near the south end. Buses are run to both of these schools. Most students are able to walk to their elementary schools. The elementary schools contain kindergarten to fifth grade. The middle school contains grades six through eight—but the sixth graders spend most of their time in a separate wing except for music, gym, lunch, arts, computers, technology, and language. The high school contains grades nine through twelve.

Three former elementary schools were closed in June 1980: Prospect School was torn down, along with the former Baldwin Junior High School and former Baldwin Senior High School which were combined in one building in the 1980s to make way for a housing complex; Coolidge School on Grand Avenue has been converted to condominiums; Harbor Elementary School on Hastings Street is now the school district office building. Two additional elementary schools, Milburn and Shubert, were closed in June 2012 as the result of enrollment changes and cuts in state funding.

The district is governed by a five-member elected board of education. Dr. James D. Mapes is the superintendent of schools.

Baldwin also has one Catholic school, St. Christopher's. This school was established in 1925 as part of St. Christopher's parish. The school serves students from Baldwin, Freeport, and surrounding areas, and it ranges from kindergarten to eighth grade. Although originally staffed by nuns, most of the school's faculty consists of lay people. Originally the school was one building that housed all classes, however it has been expanded twice. The school now consists of the "original building" (now housing classrooms, a gym, stage, computer lab, and music room), the "middle building" (housing the school and religious education offices, classrooms and an art room), and the "new building" (housing a cafeteria, library, and classrooms). Over the years the school has gained a highly regarded reputation in the Baldwin community. Students from the school participate in a wide variety of both Catholic and community events. For example, students take religion classes from kindergarten to the eighth grade, as well as march in the Baldwin Memorial Day Parade and help out at Baldwin's Big Sweep (a community event in which volunteers clean up Grand Avenue).