Eastside High School (Paterson, New Jersey)

Eastside High School (or EHS) is a four–year public high school located in Paterson section of Passaic County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey, that serves the eastern section of Paterson. EHS, which serves ninth through twelfth grade students, operates as part of the Paterson Public Schools. The school has been accredited by the Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Elementary and Secondary Schools since 1928. Eastside High School opened on February 1, 1926. As of the 2024–25 school year, the school had an enrollment of 2,073 students and 130.0 classroom teachers (on an FTE basis), for a student–teacher ratio of 16.0:1. There were 1,183 students (57.1% of enrollment) eligible for free lunch and 26 (1.3% of students) eligible for reduced-cost lunch. The school mascot—the Ghosts—derives from the location of Eastside's football field, where a nineteenth-century cemetery once stood. A May 1927 article in The Paterson Evening News refers to the Eastside team as the "Galloping Ghosts". History The school building, completed at a cost of $1.5 million (equivalent to $27.3 million in 2025), was dedicated in formal ceremonies in January 1926. The school opened to students the next month, with students moving over from Central High School (since renamed as John F. Kennedy High School) to the new school facility. Schools The Eastside campus hosted three separate academy programs that operate independently but this is no longer the case: School of Culinary Arts, Hospitality and Tourism Andre S. McCollum, Principal School of Government and Public Administration Andre S. McCollum, Principal of Instruction Edgard Nieves, Principal of Operations School of Information Technology Andre S. McCollum, Principal of Instruction Awards, recognition and rankings The school was the 311th-ranked public high school in New Jersey out of 316 schools statewide, in New Jersey Monthly magazine's September 2008 cover story on the state's Top Public High Schools. The school was ranked 309th in the magazine's September 2006 issue, which surveyed 316 schools across the state. Schooldigger.com ranked the school 370th out of 376 public high schools statewide in its 2009-10 rankings which were based on the combined percentage of students classified as proficient or above proficient on the language arts literacy and mathematics components of the High School Proficiency Assessment (HSPA). Demographics and achievement EHS is 55% Hispanic of various Latin American nationalities, 43% Black, 2% White. 37% of the school speaks Spanish in their homes while another 32% speaks another language other than English. There are also limited English proficiency students or LEPs who compose 12% of the school. Limited English Proficient students cannot speak, read, or write in English and are placed in "bilingual" classes. 45% of the students participate in the free or reduced price lunch program. The average class size is 39 students, excluding special education. The school's ratio of students to computers is 9 to 1, with the state average being 4 to 1. On the Language Arts section of the High School Proficiency Assessment (HSPA), 51% scored proficient and 46% scored partial. On the Math section of the test, 39% scored proficient and 57% scored partial. The average SAT score is 736 out of 1600. The Advanced Placement Program (AP) participation is 2%. The average attendance rate is 87%. As of the 2004–05 school year, EHS had a suspension rate of 10%. 60% of Eastside High School seniors graduated. 71% of the school graduated via the SRA process and 10% graduated through the LEP SRA process. Roughly 38% of the graduating seniors go on to four-year colleges and another 34% of the graduating seniors go on to two-year college. The faculty gets paid $46,500 a year while the state average is $52,563. The administrators get paid $105,000; the state average is $102,755. Since the school is in a "special needs" or one of the Abbott Districts, the district receives almost 85% of its budget from the state. Athletics The Eastside High School Ghosts compete in the Big North Conference, a super conference composed of public and private high schools in Bergen and Passaic counties that operates under the supervision of the New Jersey State Interscholastic Athletic Association (NJSIAA) and was established following a reorganization of sports leagues in Northern New Jersey. For the 2009–10 season, the school competed in the North Jersey Tri-County Conference, an interim conference established to facilitate the forthcoming realignment. Until the NJSIAA's 2009 realignment, the school had participated in Division B of the Northern New Jersey Interscholastic League, which included high schools located in Bergen, Essex and Passaic counties, and was separated into three divisions based on NJSIAA size classification. With 2,304 students in grades 10–12, the school was classified by the NJSIAA for the 2019–20 school year as Group IV for most athletic competition purposes, which included schools with an enrollment of 1,060 to 5,049 students in that grade range. The football team competes in the Liberty Blue division of the North Jersey Super Football Conference, which includes 112 schools competing in 20 divisions, making it the nation's biggest football-only high school sports league. The school was classified by the NJSIAA as Group V North for football for 2024–2026, which included schools with 1,317 to 5,409 students. Eastside plays an annual Thanksgiving Day football game against Kennedy High School. In 2011, Eastside won the 87th annual match-up between the two schools by a score of 17–12 At the 93rd annual game in 2017, Kennedy defeated Eastside by a score of 16–6 to win their fourth game in a row in the annual rivalry. NJ.com listed the rivalry at 21st on its 2017 list "Ranking the 31 fiercest rivalries in N.J. HS football", with Kennedy leading the series by a 43–42–7 margin. The boys' bowling team won the overall state championship in 1960. The Paterson Eastside softball team won the program's first North I Group IV state sectional title in 1981 with a 6-5 win in the championship game against Passaic Valley Regional High School. The team won the Group IV semifinal by a score of 2-1 over Roxbury High School before falling to Lenape High School by a score of 5-4 in the title game played at Mercer County Park. The boys track team won the spring / outdoor track state championship in Group IV in 1987. The girls basketball team won the Group IV state championship in 2004 (defeating runner-up Marlboro High School) and 2014 (vs. Shawnee High School). The team won the finals of the Group IV tournament in 2004 with a 43–36 win against Marlboro High School. The team won in Group IV in 2014 with a 60–41 win against Shawnee in the playoff finals. The boys basketball team won the Group IV state championship in 2011 (against Rancocas Valley Regional High School in the tournament final), 2015 (vs. Cherry Hill High School East) and 2023 (vs. Egg Harbor Township High School). The team won the Group IV title in 2011 with a 56-52 win against Rancocas Valley in the championship game and came into the Tournament of Champions as the fourth seed, and failed to hold an 11-point fourth-quarter lead in the quarterfinals before losing to fifth-seeded Newark Central by a score of 73–67 in overtime to finish the season with a record of 21–9. The team won its second Group IV title in 2015 with a 50–34 win against Cherry Hill East in the tournament final and lost as the third seed in the ToC to number-six Newark Tech High School in the quarterfinals 66–56. The team finished the 2023 season with a 29-2 record after winning the Group IV title with a 52-45 win against Egg Harbor Township High School in the finals. On May 17, 2023, the Eastside baseball team played Don Bosco Prep in the first baseball game played since 1997 at the renovated Hinchliffe Stadium. In popular culture Paterson Eastside High is known for its renaissance in the mid-1980s under the leadership of Joe Clark as principal. The school was depicted in the 1989 film Lean on Me, starring Morgan Freeman as Clark. Former student, Fetty Wap, filmed the music video for his song "Wake Up" in the school in 2016. Notable alumni References External links Eastside High School Paterson School District School Performance Report for Eastside High School, New Jersey Department of Education School Data for the Paterson Public Schools, National Center for Education Statistics