Austin High School is a public 4–year high school located at 231 North Pine Avenue in the Austin neighborhood on the west side of Chicago, Illinois, United States. Operated by the Chicago Public Schools, Austin opened in 1876 and was named in honor of Henry W. Austin, a Chicago real estate developer In 2004, the online newsletter Chicago-Catalyst.org called it the yellow brick fortress. Austin Polytech shared its campus with two smaller schools; Austin Business & Entrepreneurship Academy High and V.O.I.S.E. Academy High School. After the 2015–2016 school year, the small schools converted into one school and was renamed Austin College and Career Academy High School.HistoryAustin was opened by the Chicago Public Schools district in 1876. During the mid-twentieth century, Austin High was considered one of the best high schools in the Chicago area. In later years, however, Austin suffered from low test scores, low attendance, and student violence. The Chicago Public Schools began phasing it out in 2004, ordering the school to stop admitting new freshmen students. The last graduations were held in June 2007 and the phase-out was completed by the end of summer, 2007. Many of the old school records from 1890 to 1970 are now preserved at the Chicago Public Library in the Special Collections for Community History.Renaissance 2010As part of the Renaissance 2010 program, the school's campus was then converted into three smaller high schools: Austin Polytechnical Academy, which opened in 2007, Austin Business and Entrepreneurship Academy, which opened in 2006, V.O.I.S.E. Academy High School, which opened in 2008. (VOISE stands for "Virtual Opportunities Inside a School Environment"; the school combines an online curriculum with classroom instruction.) The schools on the Austin campus share an athletics program. The sports teams are nicknamed the Tigers.
