The Spring Valley Academy Assoc. was founded in 1866. The board of education was formed on January 30, 1871. The board recommended the establishment of a Union Free School, and, at a meeting of the taxpayers on February 24, 1871, the plans. were adopted. Charles Smith was the first principal. 

     The success of the Union Free School obliged the Spring Valley Academy to close. 
A new school building which housed the kindergarten, grade school and high school under one roof was erected on South Main Street in 1896. 

     The Grade School on North Main st. was built in 1916. 
     In October, 1920, the Board of Education was notified that the village schools were now entitled to have a superintendent. This meant a change in status. Spring Valley now would deal directly with the State Education Department instead of through Supt. Miller of Nanuet. Principal Harry Langworthy was appointed first superintendent. In 1921 Guy P. Rigaud took over as superintendent. 

     On July 1, 1922 the voters approved a new high school large enough to accommodate 750 pupils which was built in 1924. 

     With the coming of Guy P. Rigaud to Spring Valley, a new spiritual and intellectual force entered the village. Mr. Rigaud was an authority on international affairs and on the history of the development of political organization. He visited Europe in 1938 to gain first hand knowledge of the European situation and predicted a war would break out in Europe in a year, and the U.S. would be fighting on the side of Russia, for which he was accused of being a communist and war-monger. 

     In 1927 the Spring Valley schools received more State money than any other school in Rockland County which showed that Spring Valley led all other schools. 
On March 7,1927 the Spring Valley Board of Education appointed Leland Rickard Meyer principal of the high school. 

     Mr. Meyer is a descendent of Peter Richard who emigrated to America from Holland in 1708, and from Joseph Loomis who came to America from England in 1639. He was a very dedicated man and remembered to this day by many of his students still living in the area and for his devotion to preserving local history with the Historical Society of Rockland County.