Established in 1971 as Griffith’s second high school, prior to its closure, Wade High School had an enrolment of approximately 720 students and 63 staff. Half of its students came from the East Griffith / Driver / Collina area, with the main feeder school being Griffith East Public School. The remainder of the students came from farming areas and smaller places including Yenda, Yoogali, Rankins Springs, Beelbangera, Bilbul and Binya. Many of the students spent a great deal of time travelling to and from school each day, especially those in the Rankins Springs area. Years Seven and Eight were part of the Middle School years, Years Nine and Ten the School Certificate years and Years Eleven and Twelve the Senior School when Preliminary and NSW Higher School Certificate Courses were completed. Students with satisfactory attendance and progress received their School Certificate at the end of Year Ten and their HSC at the end of Year Twelve.
Facilities
The school featured two fully renovated kitchens for food technology and hospitality, a large enclosed hall used for indoor sports and gatherings and two computer rooms, one with approximately 30 IBM computers, with 1GB of RAM and Pentium 4 3.2 GHz Processors, and another with the more recent iMacs and a further small computer room conjoined with the music rooms for multimedia fitted with four eMacs. The school library, which was to be used for school related work on Tuesdays and Wednesday, also contained IBM computers with each named after an author. Recently, after a fire, the school's B Block was renovated. 15 new class rooms were built - each with new equipment and refrigerated air conditioning. The F Block contained seven class rooms were also fitted with refrigerated air conditioning. The school's outdoor sporting facilities included two soccer fields, six netball courts, two basketball courts and two cricket pitches.
Sporting
Wade High School hosted annual swimming and athletics carnivals. The swimming carnival was held early in term one at the Griffith Aquatic Centre and the athletics carnival was held in term three at the West End Oval. The school's students were divided into four houses for these carnivals and points were given to each house based on student participation and placement in each event. The four sporting houses of Bradman, Fraser, Laver and McKay were named after Australian sportspeople. High performing students could progress to regional, zone and state carnivals after the school carnivals. Wade High and Griffith High School hosted the Nugan Shield every year, which consisted of a series of sporting events. Wade High was very successful in the sporting area, including:
The Bill Turner Soccer Cup - won the Riverina area of the competition in 2007,2008 and 2013 before losing to the South Coast winner in the next round in the first two years and the Victorian winner in 2013.
The Bill Turner Soccer Trophy - the girls won the Riverina area in 2012 and progressed to the quarter finals where they lost to the eventual competition finalists. They have twice been area runners up as well.
