Stuyvesant High School

Students from all over New York City attend the school, many with commutes longer than an hour (my own commute was 90 minutes, each way).

The most respected students are not the quarterback nor the cheerleaders, but rather those with academic prowess.

Famous alums include Lucy Liu, James Cagney, Paul Reiser, Tim Robbins, Thelonious Monk, and Dick Morris. Author Frank McCourt taught at Stuy for a while (in the '80s?) and often mentions it during interviews.

The football team is named the "Peglegs" (after Peter Stuyvesant's peg leg). Traditionally, Stuyvesant is very strong at fencing and boys and girls swimming.

Stuy has a fierce academic rivalry with Bronx Science (think of the '80s TV show Head of the Class.)

Fans of the technophile cult classic Hackers (with Angelina Jolie and Jonny Lee Miller) will recognize Stuyvesant as the high school Dade Murphy transfers to after moving to New York. The movie was filmed there two years after the opening of the new and impressive downtown building. The extras used in the school shots (and even other places around the city) were mostly Stuyvesant students.

The choice of filming location was quite appropriate to the subject matter of the film. Stuyvesant, being a specialized math and science high school, has always had an advanced computer science program. Unofficially, it has also been known to breed 31337 h4x0rs as well as script kiddies, as exemplified by Joey's character in the movie. However, none of them have been nearly as gorgeous and cool as the main characters of the film.

In 1995, a couple of students were involved in breaking into the computer systems of several top universities, including Columbia, Princeton, and Bucknell. One news article dubbed Stuyvesant "Hacker High."

Stuyvesant hacker activity was previously associated with IRC channel #stuy95.

While Stuyvesant is commonly held to be the top public high school in New York City, that isn't exactly the case.

For one, there is no teacher screening process. New teachers are accepted on a simple seniority system, which means a young, enthusiastic teacher with a degree from M.I.T and an actual lesson plan based on pedagogical research will probably be rejected in favor of a demented and burnt-out veteran. I have the deepest respect for those who have braved the classroom for decades, but I am all too familiar with dementia and a disconnection from reality in those (oftentimes previously brilliant) individuals. Then there is the problem of teachers who are just plain incompetent and are accepted through the seniority system. Mentioning specific names would probably result in swift retaliation unto me, but the general consensus amongst the students is that a number of teachers have no business teaching The Supposedly Best and Brightest. The other two specialized high schools of the city, Bronx Science and Brooklyn Tech employ a screening process. Why not Stuyvesant? A proposed screening process was put up for voting earlier this year. It was rejected, by a landslide. The primary reason cited by most voters was "job security".

A number of other problems exist, although none as glaring as the former. The Technology and CS departments are waging war, the Student Union is meaningless, the class schedule allots equal time to Multivariable Calculus and Health class, et cetera.

Most of the above information is based on word-of-mouth and observing indirect effects of the newly adopted policies, as the administration doesn't bother to inform the students of decisions directly affecting their education and their future. Perhaps it's due to technical difficulties of doing so, although we are provided with completely meaningless handouts about non-events on a regular basis. If you happen to notice an error, feel free to correct me.