Rock Bridge High School is a public high school located in southern Columbia, Missouri, United States. The school serves grades 9 through 12 and is one of four High Schools in Columbia Public Schools. It is located next to the Columbia Area Career Center. The mascot is the Bruin Bear. History Due to the crowding of David H. Hickman High School towards the end of the 1960s and the increasing population of Columbia in the 1970s, the Columbia Board of Education decided to form a new high school. The board bought of land in the southern portion of the city and started the construction of the new high school. The name "Rock Bridge" was chosen because of the school's proximity to the natural rock bridge at Rock Bridge Memorial State Park. Construction started in 1969 on the original portion of the building, which consisted of 18 classrooms and one office area in the present-day east wing of the building. The school was planned to open in 1971, but funding issues pushed back construction of the second phase of the building. As such, this original portion sat unused for a year or two while the second portion was not yet complete. Construction started on the second portion in early 1972, which added the "Main Commons", another office area, the library, the gymnasium, and a few specialty classrooms underneath that area. In September 1973, with the completion of the second portion, Rock Bridge was considered "complete enough" to open and had a class of 583 students, mostly sophomores and juniors. This high school was the second centrally air-conditioned school built in Columbia after Oakland Junior High School north of town. However, the air-conditioning system was prone to failure and the school was difficult to keep cool in warm weather due to the fact that the windows were not designed to be opened. Later additions to the building included some windows that were able to be opened. The school had a Sonitrol security system which enabled remote 24x7 security monitoring. In 1974, the planetarium was completed with a capacity of nearly 90 people, which features a state-of-the-art star ball. A full-dome projection system was later added with the advent of newer technology. In 1979, the west wing opened, which adopts the same basic design of the original 1971 building but with a finished basement. This added about ten general-purpose classrooms, as well as