Bishop Kelley High School

Bishop Kelley High School is an American Lasallian Catholic high school with 905 students, grades 9 to 12, located at 41st and Hudson Avenue, in the center of the Tulsa metropolitan area (in the Midtown area), on a campus spanning just over 47 acres (150,000 m2). The school is formerly a function of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Tulsa, but is now incorporated separately, and operates in the Lasallian tradition of the Brothers of the Christian Schools (Christian Brothers or the French Christian Brothers). Bishop Kelley is a comprehensive secondary school with a college-preparatory style curriculum consisting of tracks designed to fit a variety of learning abilities and interests. Bishop Kelley students come from 53 different zip codes, with incoming freshmen and transfer students matriculating from more than 30 middle schools across Northeast Oklahoma. Students come from a variety of faith and educational backgrounds. They are traditionally welcomed with extensive freshman orientation activities. Though Bishop Kelley is the flagship diocesan Catholic high school for the Diocese of Tulsa, it serves both Catholic and non-Catholic students. The school consistently ranks as one of the best private high schools in Oklahoma. History Bishop Kelley was established in 1960 to serve as Tulsa's citywide Catholic high school. At the time of its founding, its forerunners, Holy Family High School (founded 1899) and Marquette High School (founded in 1926), closed and consolidated their student bodies into the newly formed Bishop Kelley High School. While the initial plans for the school were developed under Bishop Eugene J. McGuinness' leadership, it was the pioneering Bishop Victor Joseph Reed who oversaw its founding. Bishop Reed was a famous Catholic reformer who attended all four sessions of the Second Vatican Council, where he was associated with the more progressive bishops, lending his support to the use of vernacular in the Mass and to an emphasis of pastoral over administrative skills in bishops. Bishop Reed is in part responsible for the high school's legacy of lay leadership. In 1960, the year Bishop Kelley High School was founded, Bishop Reed established the first mixed (clerical and lay) diocesan board of education in the United States.