Cedar Ridge High School is a school in Hillsborough, North Carolina. It was officially opened in 2002, and at the time only served students in grades nine through eleven. The original student body was primarily made up of students in the southern portion of Orange High School's attendance area (in general, areas south of I-85, exclusive of the attendance areas of Chapel Hill High School and East Chapel Hill High School). The first senior class graduated in 2004. As of the 2006-2007 school year, Cedar Ridge is running on the block schedule, with two different sets of four classes every semester.Alisa R. McLean served as the school's principal from 2002 through 2005. She was assisted during the school's inaugural year by assistant principals Rodney Trice, and interns John Heath and Daniel Davis. Upon McLean's resignation in 2005 to pursue doctoral studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and to serve as assistant director of the North Carolina Principal's Executive Program, she was succeeded by Gary Thornburg, who had previously served as principal of Walter M. Williams High School.On April 19, 2010, John Wheeler, was announced as Thornburg's successor, effective July 1, 2010, who retired. Dr. Wheeler had served as CRHS assistant principal for six years. Dr. Wheeler remained at CRHS until June 30, 2014. Heather Blackmon is now principal.Authorized to offer the IB Diploma Program since July 2004, Cedar Ridge currently has approximately 60 juniors and seniors enrolled in the two-year IB program. IB students must complete an extended essay and a Theory of Knowledge course to graduate with an IB diploma, and also must obtain 150 CAS (creativity, action, service) hours.
