Maple Lane High School
Rochester School District

20311 Old Highway 9 SW  |   Centralia, WA 98531  | Phone 360.273.3156  |  Fax 360.273.5012   

 

History of Maple Lane High School 

Maple Lane School; Looking Back

Located in southern Thurston County on Violet Prairie, the facility is situated 17 miles south of Olympia and 5 miles north of Centralia along the Interstate 5 corridor. Nestled among dairy farms and residences of this rural area, Maple Lane School has functioned continuously for the past eighty-eight years.

Maple Lane School, originally known as the State Training School for Girls, was established by the Session Laws of 1913. This legislative action provided a separate school for the care of delinquent girls and was officially opened December 22, 1914. Prior to this date the girls were housed in a wing of the State Correctional Facility for Boys (Green Hill School, founded in 1889) in Chehalis, Washington. The proximity of the two schools was not coincidence. The act stated “the location site to be within a radius of not less than one mile and not more than ten miles of the State Training School (Green Hill School).” The Grand Mound site was selected and upon completion of construction in 1914 the facility was officially opened and has continued to operate without a break in service.

The original name for the institution was “State Training School for Girls” and was generally known as “Grand Mound” (Grand Mound is a regional name associated with the geological feature of the Mima Mounds located in the nearby Capital Forest). An actual mound (a small hill) much larger than the Mima Mounds is approximately a quarter mile from the location of the school, hence the name of the area. In 1951 the school, in its growth, began to change purpose and scope and gradually moved from a restrictive, punitive program towards a more open and in some ways a normal residential high school. Because of these changes, the student body requested the school be called “Maple Lane School.” The name gradually became custom for all residents and residential staff and in the RCW’s of 1959, the institution was officially named “Maple Lane School.” Although the school was originally created for the sole purpose of housing, counseling and educating young women, which it did exclusively for 47 years, there were gradual changes. These changes were the inclusion of young men into the educational program. This began in 1961 when the school officially became co- educational; young men were bussed from Cedar Creek Youth Camp located coincidentally in the Capital Forest near the Mima Mounds. The young men were bussed to the Grand Mound location for their daily education and socialization with the young women making it a more normalized school situation.

The school was run co-educationally with the young men being bussed to school daily and gradually over time the young men were being housed on the Maple Lane campus to the point where young men outnumbered the young women. Then during the 1981-82 school year the decision was made to have all female students moved and housed at Echo Glen Children’s Center in Issaquah, Washington. Since the 1982 school year Maple Lane has been operated as an all male institution.

Through the many years and many changes, thousands of young people have called Maple Lane School home. The general philosophy has been to aid children and young adults, through education and counseling to achieve their full potential, recognized their individual worth and grow with pride and dignity into responsible adults.

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