SeattleChange
Broad Run (BRHS) has experienced the most change in both its physical and demographic environments during its nearly four decades of existence. Originally a rural school serving all of eastern Loudoun County, the explosive growth of the county's population beginning in the mid-1990s has resulted in systematic reduction of Broad Run's attendance area as it spun off six of the district's high schools from within its original boundaries. Initial surroundings of farm fields have been replaced by housing tracts and the school now possesses one of the most culturally diverse student populations in the region. Broad Run High School is also located in one of the most affluent city and county in the country with recorded average income of more than $100,000 per household.
Nicknamed “Cornfield High” when it opened, Broad Run’s facilities, academic and extracurricular environments have always been challenged by its location in one of the fastest growing counties in the United States. In 1969 Loudoun County opened its third public high school amidst corn fields in Ashburn to accommodate the growing student populations resulting from new housing developments in the unincorporated communities in the eastern half of the county. Since then the county population has increased nearly sevenfold (most of it in the east), straining education budgets, infrastructure and local politics. For Ashburn, this has resulted in constantly shifting attendance boundaries as new school after new school is opened every year, at all levels, elementary, middle and high. The area’s student demographics have significantly changed as well: Loudoun County’s residents are now the country’s most affluent and its ethnic composition continues to diversify as foreign immigration into Northern Virginia increases.
No longer able to justify the sobriquet “Cornfield High”, Broad Run High School today is surrounded by tens of square miles of high density housing developments. However, in this dynamic environment the school continues to achieve academic and extracurricular excellence and recognition, leading regional and state schools in Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) and No Child Left Behind AYB performance, as well as in such activities as forensics and sports.
Before the 2011-2012 school year additional lockers were installed due to increases in the school's population.