Kubasaki High School 4.54

Kubasaki High School is a United States Department of Defense Dependents School on Okinawa. Kubasaki is the second oldest operating high school in the Department of Defense Dependents Schools system. Only W.T. Sampson High School (1931) at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base in Cuba is older.HistoryThe first classes started sometime in November 1946 at a site named Okinawa University Study Center in Camp Hayward with Dr. Theodora J. Koob as its founder and first principal. Classes were held on the site of Okinawa University Study Center in a large quonset hut under the name "Okinawa University School". The first classes consisted of 30 students and faculty; the initial schedule consisting of a half day, six days per week and was inclusive of only six grades. Middle and high school grade children were included sometime between November 1946 and March 1947. The school newspaper was The Quonsetter. There was no yearbook printed in 1947.In the fall of 1947 classes opened the school year in a group of 15 Butler-type prefabricated buildings in the Awase housing area with 177 students and 11 teachers serving grades 1 through 12. 1947-1948 was the first year that high school seniors attended Okinawa University School. A problem with graduating seniors was the lack of accreditation of the school; however, on March 11, 1948 through the efforts of Dr. Theodora Koob, Okinawa University School received accreditation from The Northwest Association of Secondary and Higher Schools.The first school yearbook was printed in 1948 and was called the Torii. The school newspaper was called the Typhoon. In July 1949, Typhoon Gloria destroyed the school and delayed the opening of the school year. When school did begin, teachers and students were forced to conduct their classes in two temporary family residences in the "New Sukiran Housing Area" (Zukeran, now known as Camp Foster). In November of that year, the school name was changed to "Okinawa-American Dependent High School" and moved back to the Awase Housing Area in quonset huts. Later, communist aggression on the Korean Peninsula necessitated a ban on dependent travel in East Asia, resulting in few new students enrolled until 1951. At some point before 1952, the school name was changed to Okinawa-American Dependent School. In 1952 during the publication of the fifth Torii, the Dragon was chosen as the mascot.