On a weekday morning in Burbank, Illinois, drive down 77th Street and you’ll see the typical school start rhythm: buses idling, a few stragglers jogging toward the doors, a parent double-parked near the flagpole. The scene doesn’t shout history. However, more of it can be found in the hallways of Reavis High School than most visitors would realize.
The narrative nearly didn’t take place. Voters established Cook County School District 220 in 1940, but the resources and labor needed for construction were consumed by World War II. When a Cook County Superior Court injunction halted construction in 1945, a utility building connected to the project was almost completed. Dr. William Claude Reavis, a professor at the University of Chicago, had to resolve the conflict and get shovels back in the ground. His name would be associated with the school that eventually rose to prominence, welcoming 330 freshmen, sophomores, and juniors on September 11, 1950.
That origin story has an almost archaic quality: the school was named for the man who merely ensured its construction rather than for a politician or donor. In today’s school marketing, where everything is polished and branded, this kind of detail is often overlooked. It still appears at Reavis in conversations, in the framed portrait by the door, and in the way longtime employees refer to “Dr. Reavis” as though he might arrive at any moment.
Reavis doesn’t pretend to be someone it’s not in the classroom. According to state data, about 21% of students read at grade level, and math performance is even worse. U.S. News ranks it 191st in Illinois. Approximately two-thirds of graduates pursue post-secondary education within a year or so, and the graduation rate is approximately 86%. The school doesn’t appear to be pursuing the kind of prestige that motivates glossy brochures, and these aren’t numbers that make headlines. With over 1,000 students enrolled in CTE courses, it does frequently highlight critical thinking, social-emotional learning, and career and technical education in its own materials. That is a significant portion of a school with fewer than 1,900 pupils.
It’s difficult to ignore the trend that Reavis appears to focus its true energy on the campus. A swimming pool, a tech wing with auto and electronics stores, a commercial kitchen, turfed sports fields, and, most recently, an expansive field house with an indoor track and a cheer and dance area that will open in the fall of 2024 have all been added to the district since 2010. For the families who actually walk those halls, it’s the kind of consistent, unglamorous reinvestment that doesn’t make national news but usually has a huge impact.
A state football championship in 1982–83, wrestling titles in the early 1960s, and hosting wrestling matches during the 1959 Pan American Games are just a few examples of the school’s athletic heyday, which may be decades behind it. With six state titles since 2006, the drama program has quietly grown into something of a powerhouse. It serves as a reminder that a school’s identity isn’t always found where you might think.
Reavis is not and most likely never will be the most well-known high school in Chicago. Building infrastructure, focusing on trade and technical skills, and believing that “Once a Ram, Always a Ram” still has resonance with the actual residents of Burbank and Stickney are what it appears to be doing year after year, renovation after renovation. It’s still unclear if that will be sufficient to improve academic performance over the next ten years; the district appears to be struggling with this issue just as much as anyone observing from the outside.
