Sacred Heart Academy (Hamden, Connecticut)

Sacred Heart Academy was founded on September 9, 1946, by Sr. M. Antonine Signorelli of the Missionary Zelatrices of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, who later became the Apostles of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Initially located in New Haven, Connecticut, the school was established to provide a Catholic college preparatory education to local young women. The first class contained 17 students, but enrollment numbers rapidly grew. To accommodate increasing popularity, the school was expanded in 1948 with the building of Clelian Hall and in 1957, the school relocated to its current location on Benham Street in Hamden, Connecticut. The school has continued to expand throughout the years, adding classrooms, computer labs, and recreational facilities as needed.[2] Currently, the school sits on the same 127-acre (0.51 km²) campus on Benham Street in Hamden and has a student body of about 500 girls, representing 55 different schools from 36 towns across Connecticut.[3]

Sacred Heart Academy has received a great deal of media attention for the scientific accomplishments of its students. Each year since 1998, students enrolled in biotechnology classes have worked on advanced research projects and have presented their findings at a national conference. Early projects caught the attention of Applied Biosystems, which led to their donation of an automated DNA sequencer (an ABI Prism 310 Genetic Analyzer) to the school, making Sacred Heart the first high school in the country to have such technology.[5][6] In 2005, using funding from a three-year grant from the Vernal W. and Florence H. Bates Foundation, a group of students identified genes implicated in osteoporosis and sequenced the calcitonin and collagen 1 alpha1 receptor genes in Bos taurus. Their findings were presented at a conference in Hilton Head Island, South Carolina, and their sequences were published in GenBank.[5] Following their successes, another group of students continued their project, submitting additional sequences for the calcitonin and vitamin D receptors in Bos taurus and presenting their findings at the Annual Conference sponsored by American Society of Human Genetics in New Orleans, Louisiana.[7] Additional groups of students have presented in Washington, D.C. These accomplishments helped make Sacred Heart the recipient of a grant from the John G. Martin Foundation of Farmington for a molecular science research laboratory.[6]

• Official website
• Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Hartford