The Ginn Academy, founded in 2007 by Ted Ginn, Sr., is the only all-male, public high school in Ohio. It's at 655 E. 162nd Street in the Collinwood neighborhood of Cleveland.
It's also the focal point today (Jan. 15) as third-string Ohio State QB Cardale Jones -- who led the Buckeyes to a win in the National College Football Championship on Monday -- will announce his future plans on whether or not he will enter the NFL draft.
Jones is a Ginn Academy graduate.
The school's motto? "Having the Courage to Be Different."
WKYC anchor Russ Mitchell sat down with Coach Ted Ginn Sr. in October for his recurring segment "7 Minutes with Russ Mitchell."
Here's what the Ginn Academy website has to say (see all the information on the website):
Ginn's football players have gone on to play in the NFL, most notably his son Ted Ginn, Jr., who at 29 is a wide receiver for the Arizona Cardinals. (He started with the Miami Dolphins, and played for the 49ers and the Panthers before coming to Cardinals.)
Ginn Sr. reflects on his successes, his students that continue to inspire him and the greatest compliment he's ever received,
Scholarship, leadership, and service are the primary core values "...upon which a Ginn Man's education is based."
Ginn Academy students come from the entire Cleveland area and surrounding suburbs because of the district's open admission policy. The boys wear uniforms consisting of black dress pants, a white shirt, red blazer, and a grade-level designated necktie or bow-tie.
The Academy believes that education is not confined to the classroom and that it is important to educate the whole child through experience and exposure, which leads to empowerment.
Each day starts with a morning session, led by Coach Ginn, Principal Nick Petty, or a student leader. The curriculum includes history, math, science, social studies, and electives of business technology, foreign language, art, and physical education. Internships and shadowing opportunities are also sought and provided for students.
"Mr. Ginn," "Coach Ginn," or sometimes just plain "Ginn" has been following his simple formula of giving kids love, passion, and understanding since he started volunteering on the football coaching staff of nearby Glenville High School in the 1970's.
Coach Ginn played for the Tarblooders himself. After graduating, the coaching staff saw a need to keep him close by after his mother passed away and he was left on his own at age 19. Eventually he left his factory job to work as a security guard at Glenville.
During each school day, he got to know the histories and personalities of the hundreds of kids flowing through the halls as well as the athletes that he worked with after school.
As Coach Ginn's reputation for stepping in when he saw a kid in trouble grew in the Glenville neighborhood, more and more parents asked him to keep an eye on their child. Kids knew they could go to him for help. People started noticing that he was making much more significant differences in kids' lives than how they ran down a football field or jumped over hurdles.
In 1997, he became the head football coach for Glenville High School and was raising money on his own to take his football players and kids from other schools on college tours when recruiters wouldn't bother stopping there.
It became more and more widely known that Coach Ginn was all about showing kids a path to leading a successful life. He realized that he wanted to be able to present these same lessons in a school environment where he could reach many more kids than just the athletes on his football and track teams.
This man, who never attended college himself, who worked as the school security guard and football and track coach, convinced the CEO of the Cleveland Metropolitan School District that what he had to give was so powerful that they should start an all-male high school.
The Ginn Academy is now the only single gender, public high school in the state of Ohio. Many people swear that the world would be a better place if each and every kid could have a Coach Ginn in his or her life.
