Montgomery Blair High School (MBHS) is a public high school in the Four Corners neighborhood of Silver Spring, Maryland, United States. It is operated by Montgomery County Public Schools. With more than 3,200 students, it has the largest enrollment of any high school in the state of Maryland.
The school is named for Montgomery Blair, a lawyer who represented Dred Scott in his Supreme Court case and later served as Postmaster General under President Abraham Lincoln. Opened in 1925 as Takoma Park–Silver Spring High School, the school changed its name in 1935 when it moved to 313 Wayne Avenue overlooking Sligo Creek in Silver Spring. In 1998, the school moved two miles (3 km) north to the Kay Tract, a long-vacant site just north of the Capital Beltway.
About 20% of the student body is part of one of two magnet programs: the Science, Math, and Computer Science Magnet; and the Communication Arts Program (CAP), which draw students from the Silver Spring area and across Montgomery County. The school is a member of the National Consortium for Specialized Secondary Schools of Mathematics, Science and Technology.
History
Philadelphia–Chicago campus era (1925–1935)
The school opened in 1925 as Takoma–Silver Spring High School with 86 students. The campus sat at the corner of Philadelphia Avenue and Chicago Avenue in suburban Takoma Park, Maryland.
By the end of the 1920s, the school had added a junior high school (8th and 9th grades) to its senior high school (10th through 12th grades). Growing along with the communities of Silver Spring and Takoma Park, it eventually encompassed kindergarten to 12th grade. By 1934, the school was over-capacity with 450 students, and so, in 1935, the 10th, 11th, and 12 grades moved to a new high school named Montgomery Blair Senior High School. For a time, students, teachers, and administrators commuted between the two campuses. The annual yearbook, ‘’Silverlogue’’, was established around this time.
Wayne Avenue campus era (1935–1998) When Montgomery Blair High School's Wayne Avenue campus opened in March 1935, it was the sixth high school in Montgomery County, and the first in the lower county. One of several Montgomery County schools designed during that period by Howard Wright Cutler, the facility then consisted only of the C building, overlooking Sligo Creek.
In 1936, the Auxiliary Gymnasium was added, followed by the B building in 1940, and the D building in 1942. MBHS's first football team was founded in 1944, and the War Memorial Stadium opened in 1947. In 1950, the A building was constructed, containing the Blair Library/Media Center. With the addition of the Main Gymnasium/Fieldhouse in 1954, MBHS possessed one of the finest basketball and football facilities in the county. The E building was added in 1959 as an administrative section, followed by the 1969 opening of the 1200-seat auditorium, named for long-time teacher and librarian Elizabeth Stickley. The most recent addition was the automotive shop building in 1973.
During World War II, students from the University of Maryland taught several classes, and in some cases, able senior students taught sophomore classes. The Blair Library created the "Senior Corner" to honor those who died in war. Life magazine featured the school's Victory Corps close order drill team. Before to the Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board of Education, Blair was an all-white school. In 1955, the school began to integrate along with the rest of Montgomery County.
With Silver Spring's growth, Blair's enrollment jumped from 600 students in 1946, to 1900 by 1956, peaking at 2900 in 1965 before being reduced from 1700 to 1400 after rezoning in 1982. Enrollment was around 1,800 when the Science, Mathematics, and Computer Science Magnet program brought 80 new students in the fall of 1985. The Communication Arts Program (CAP) followed in 1987, founded by Alicia Coleman, brought 75 new students. Overcrowding became an issue for Montgomery Blair High School, as portable buildings covered what was once open land and enrollment exceeded the building's capacity of 2,000.
Blair is one of the few U.S. high schools with a .edu domain name, with its internet connection having gone live in the late 1980s.
Four Corners campus era (1998–present)
In 1994, construction began on a new campus on an empty tract of land north of the Wayne Avenue campus, at the intersection of University Boulevard, Colesville Road, and the Capital Beltway.
In fall 1998, Blair opened on the Four Corners campus, the largest high-school campus in the county and nearly twice as large as the old Wayne Avenue site. It was designed for 2,830 students.
Blair's Wayne Avenue campus was converted into an elementary and middle school; currently, Sligo Creek Elementary School and Silver Spring International Middle School. The Elizabeth Stickley Auditorium was not included in the conversion plans, and has remained closed and deteriorating since 1997. Several local politicians and leaders, including former Maryland state senator Ida Ruben, current U.S. representative Jamie Raskin and former U.S. Senator Barbara Mikulski, have endorsed projects to restore the auditorium to its former condition.
During the early to mid-2000s, the school population spiked to 3,400 students, with the overflow handled by up to eight portable classrooms. Enrollment decreased slightly due to the opening of other schools and the creation of the Downcounty Consortium. Two portables were removed at the beginning of the 2006–2007 school year, and all were gone by April 2010, when enrollment was 2,788. Enrollment has rebounded to about 3,200 students, making Blair the largest public school in Maryland.
In 2008, digital Promethean provided boards to many classrooms.
In 2011, Renay Johnson was appointed as the first woman to lead the school. She decided to retire at the end of the 2023-24 school year having completed 33 years of teaching. The school appointed Damon Monteleone as the new principal. Adrianna Burgos, the current assistant principal, served as acting principal from July 1, 2024, until August 14, 2024. Kevin Yates, the principal at Damascus High School, took over as acting principal at Blair for the 2024-2025 school year. Damon Monteleone currently serves as principal.
Notable events
In April 1992, Montgomery Blair High School was the first high school in the United States to sponsor a display of the NAMES Project AIDS Memorial Quilt. More than 5,000 children, their families, teachers and friends came to see the Quilt.Hayward, Fran. "Blair High Sponsors AIDS Memorial Quilt", Takoma Voice, 1992-03.Liz Spayd. "Stitched with Sorrow, Awareness", The Washington Post, March 22, 1992.Matt Neufeld. "Memorial to AIDS Victims blankets high school grounds", Washington Times, April 10, 1992.Danahy, Anne. "Panel for Melvin Lindsey added to Quilt display", The Washington Blade, April 17, 1992. Retrieved November 2, 2017Deborah Linzer. "Letter to the Editor: AIDS Quilt was received warmly at Blair", The Montgomery Journal, May 5, 1992.
The school has been a stop for politicians because of the school's diversity, strong academic programs, and proximity to the nation's capital. Some notable visits include:
February 5, 1998: President Bill Clinton and UK Prime Minister Tony Blair March 7, 2003: United States Secretary of Homeland Security Tom Ridge and Secretary of Education Rod Paige June 1, 2016: Secretary of State John Kerry discussed ocean conservation
On June 23, 2005, President George W. Bush held a town-hall-style event at the school on short notice to promote his plan to partially privatize Social Security. Students and the general public were barred from attending. About 400 community members, students, and union members protested Bush's proposals on the public sidewalk outside the school, rebuffing police attempts to persuade them to move to a park more than a block away.
During the 2010–2011 school year, NBA Hall of Famer Kareem Abdul-Jabbar spoke to a packed auditorium of students about his upcoming film and his life, then privately with the varsity and junior varsity basketball teams.
On February 26, 2018, U.S. Congressmen Jamie Raskin and Ted Deutch brought survivors of the Parkland high school shooting to meet with Blair students.
In November 2021, one student stabbed another in the staff parking lot during a school day. The victim was taken to the hospital and recovered from his wounds; the perpetrator was charged with attempted second-degree murder, first-degree assault, and reckless endangerment.
In October 2023, three school days were delayed or disrupted by phoned-in bomb threats that were discovered to be hoaxes by a 12-year-old child.On October 13, a bomb threat prevented students and staff from entering the school for two hours. Three days later, a second threat arrived as students were leaving for the day; police later deemed the threat "not valid". Another bomb threat on October 23 led to a "shelter-in-place" around 10:51 a.m., then evacuation from the building a half-hour later; by 1 p.m., police had cleared the school and students returned to class. A similar swatting call was made on February 4, 2026.
On January 23, 2026, Ian MacKaye visited the school to speak to Blair Album Club, the school's student-led music forum club, about his experiences as a pioneer in the Washington, D.C., hardcore scene.
Campus
The school's campus covers 42 acres between the Capital Beltway, U.S. Route 29, and Maryland Route 193 in Silver Spring's Four Corners neighborhood. The school was completed in 1998 and contains of space, originally designed for 2,800 students.
Eight portable classrooms were erected and then removed in the 2010s as student population grew and then receded. Four new portables were added in the 2017–2018 school year to handle another enrollment spike. The population has continued to grow, and as of June 2026, there are 19 portables.
The school has baseball and softball fields to the east of the main building as well as Blazer Stadium which serves as the home of the school's football, soccer, field hockey, and lacrosse teams.
The main building has three courtyards and a 750-seat auditorium. A greenhouse and accompanying patio is on the second floor on the west side for horticulture classes. The main hallway of the school, "Blair Boulevard," displays flags from many countries, representing its diverse student body.
Academics
In 2025, MBHS was ranked 42nd in Maryland and 2,430 nationally by U.S. News & World Report. The school has an Honors Program and an Advanced Placement Program.
Science, Mathematics, and Computer Science Magnet program In 1985, Montgomery County Public Schools opened its first Science, Mathematics, and Computer Science Magnet program at Blair. At the time, Blair had the highest minority population among the high schools in the county and the lowest standardized test scores. The school board conducted a survey to decide that a specialized science magnet program would attract high-achieving white and Asian students to Blair. Although there was criticism of the program from some parents and students, the leaders of the PTA and the principal supported the program, noting that by 1989 more families were staying in the neighborhood to attend Blair and fewer students were seeking to transfer out. In 1993, Montgomery County Public Schools superintendent Paul Vance told The New York Times, "I have never seen a high school's image turn around so quickly."