Unley High School

Unley High School, located in Netherby, is one of the largest public high schools in South Australia. In recent years the number of students enrolled typically ranges from 1,100 to 1,300, but in the early 1960s the school had a peak enrolment of 2,000 students.The school currently has 30 international students enrolled, and has a history of enrolling such students from the 1960s. Unley has a long history of teaching foreign languages; in the beginning Latin, then French, German and for a period Indonesian. Today, Chinese is strong; Unley has sister schools in China. The school has a lot of multicultural students, the majority of which come from China, Greece, Italy and Lebanon.HistoryUnley High School was founded in 1910 as one of the first group of public high schools to be established following Adelaide High School in 1908. Initially it was under the control of the Headmaster of the Unley Primary School, and had its first home as part of that school in the suburb of Unley.In 1915 the school was granted independence from Unley Primary and its first headmaster was appointed. This was Ben Gates who remained at the school until 1940. It was during his headmastership that the school became renowned for its discipline and high academic standards. An early link was forged with the Australian rules football club, Sturt. The colours of the school, light and dark blue, were also the colours of the football club.