Albany Senior High School (known as ASHS) is situated in North Harbour

North Harbour, New Zealand

North Harbour is the name of a suburb of Auckland, New Zealand. It is located 12 kilometres north of the city centre, to the south of the suburb of Albany, close to the northern edge of the city....

, Auckland

Auckland

The Auckland metropolitan area , in the North Island of New Zealand, is the largest and most populous urban area in the country with residents, percent of the country's population. Auckland also has the largest Polynesian population of any city in the world...

, New Zealand

New Zealand

New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...

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Opened in February 2009, it is New Zealand

New Zealand

New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...

's first state senior high school

Secondary education in New Zealand

Secondary education in New Zealand takes up to five years, covering the ages 13 to 18, corresponding to the school years 9 to 13.- Types of school :...

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Location

The school is located at 536, Albany Highway, North Shore City, New Zealand. Before its construction, there were protracted disputes about the siting of the school which delayed the process, so that the school initially ran from the site of Albany Junior High School

Albany Junior High School

Albany Junior High School is situated in North Harbour, Auckland, New Zealand. Opened in 2005, it was the first purpose built Junior High in New Zealand. The concept of a junior high school, although common in the United States, is controversial in New Zealand...

, Appleby Road, Albany

Albany, New Zealand

Albany is a northern suburb of Auckland, one of the several cities in northern New Zealand. The name derives from Alba and its Latinisation. It is located to the north of the Waitemata Harbour, 15 kilometres northwest of the Auckland city centre. The suburb is in the Albany ward, one of the...

, North Shore City, New Zealand

New Zealand

New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...

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Uniform

Albany Senior High has variety in its uniform, allowing a level of student choice. Students can choose from: a green polo; white t-shirt; red t-shirt and a white shirt. They also have the option of pants or a skirt for girls and shorts and pants for the boys.

Classes

All classes except those which require other resources take place in large open plan areas called 'Learning Commons'. These spaces enable flexibility when planning and delivering classes, including the ability to combine two classes into one for some activities, combining similar curriculum areas, such as physics and mathematics and easy access to technology. Technology is thoroughly embraced by this school. Examples include: Students can utilize any mobile device like laptops and cellphones to edit Google Docs in real-time together. Students can utilize Gchat in class to ask and answer questions, and students and can perform a search on Google to answer teachers' questions - Ref. The teaching periods are 100 minutes long, twice the length of typical periods in New Zealand.

Every Wednesday, students engage in a 'community based' Impact project. This involves performing an act for the community. Impact projects completed include forming a business, organising and performing a 'School of Rock' concert, building a video server and digital signage solution for the school, restoring local waterways, designing, building and programming a robot for the Robocup competition and creating original artworks for the school.

Open source

The school uses open source

Open source

The term open source describes practices in production and development that promote access to the end product's source materials. Some consider open source a philosophy, others consider it a pragmatic methodology...

 software. and won an award for the 'Best Open Source Project in Education' at the New Zealand Open Source Awards 2010.