Bishop O'Dowd High School is a Catholic, co-educational, college preparatory school in Oakland, California, administered by the Roman Catholic Diocese of Oakland and named for the late auxiliary Bishop of the Archdiocese of San Francisco, James T. O'Dowd (1907–1950). About 44% of students are non-Catholic. The school requires all students to attend school liturgies (Catholic Mass and prayer services), to enroll in religious studies courses each semester, and to complete its 4-year service learning program.

Bishop O’Dowd High School is named in memory of the former Superintendent of Schools of the Archdiocese of San Francisco, Bishop James T. O’Dowd, who died of an automobile accident at the age of 43. At the time of O'Dowd's sudden death, having just helped to establish Marin Catholic and Riordan high schools, he was in the process of drawing up plans for a new Catholic high school in the East Bay.

O’Dowd is a Catholic high school community of 1,120 students. Its students show good academic performance and high test scores, engage in award-winning fine and performing arts, strong athletics, and campus ministry offered to the student body. The school has a faculty and staff of 120, as well as over 75 coaches and moderators.

High school is a term used in parts of the English-speaking world to describe institutions which provide all or part of secondary education, but not always the highest years of basic education, which can be called a "secondary school" or "secondary college" or other terms, depending on the nation or region (see below: Usage by country). The phrase "high school" is often incorporated into the name of the related institutions.

The term (as "high school") originated in Scotland, with the world's oldest being Edinburgh's Royal High School from 1505. The Royal High School was used as a model for the first public high school in the United States, the English High School founded in Boston, Massachusetts in 1821. The precise stage of schooling provided by a high school differs from country to country, and may vary within the same jurisdiction. In all of New Zealand and Malaysia along with parts of Australia, Bangladesh and Canada, high school is synonymous with secondary school, and encompasses the entire secondary stage of education.

Mario Brown (abt 1951 - Oct 5, 2002), known as "Bro' Rap", was the first African-American men's basketball player at Texas A&M University.

Mario Brown attended Parker High School in Chicago, Illinois. As a senior, Brown was named the most valuable player of the school's basketball team and earned all-district honors. He was also president of the school's student council and played on the baseball team.

After graduating from high school, Brown played basketball for two years for Kennedy-King Junior College in Chicago.

Brown was recruited by Texas A&M coach Shelby Metcalf, who travelled to Chicago, Illinois to personally ask Brown to attend the school. Brown played for two seasons at A&M, starting in 51 games and averaging 14 points and 4.3 assists per game. In his first season, 1971–1972, Brown earned second team All-Southwest Conference honors, leading A&M with a 16.9 scoring average in conference play and helping the team to a 16-10 record. The following year, his senior year, Brown was selected as team co-captain, and averaged 13.4 points and 4 assists per game as the Aggies ranked second in the Southwest Conference and finished with a 17-9 record.

Eugene Green Hamilton (1910-2005) was a pioneering American OB/GYN obstetrician, writer, and medical researcher. He did some of the key writing in the effort to develop a vaccine which fought against Rh disease, a condition which would cause pregnant women's immune system to attack the fetus she is carrying as not being identical to the mother. Hamilton did some of the earliest and best writing about the search for the vaccine, long before diagnostic techniques such as ultrasound had been developed.

Hamilton was born on June 27, 1910 in White Hall, Illinois. His father was Ray Hamilton, an Illinois physician. In the early 1940s, he married Mary Jo Hickey of Minnesota. They had three children: Barbara, Eugene Jr., and John, who also became an OB/GYN.

He studied medicine at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, receiving his degree in 1941, and then worked as an OB/GYN doctor in several different hospitals, including St. Mary's Health Center. He had a private practice in St. Charles, Missouri which he eventually passed on to his son John. He was also a Professor at Saint Louis University.