NCHS serves parts of Normal, Bloomington, and Towanda and is home to over 2,000 students (grades 9–12) with 150 faculty and staff.

A new campus opened for NCHS on an entirely new site on Raab Road, northeast of Normal, in August 2003.

NCHS became the scene of a widely publicized school shooting on September 7, 2012, when a student fired gunshots into the ceiling of a classroom and was tackled by a teacher.

According to the Illinois State Board of Education's online Report Card,[7] 86% of NCHS students in the class of 2012, the most recent class for which the Report Card has information, graduated within four years, down from a peak of 95% in 2010, and 60% were ready for college coursework compared to a 46% average for Illinois high schools.

The school did not make Adequate Yearly Progress according to the terms of the No Child Left Behind Act.

[8] NCHS teams played for many years in the Corn Belt Conference but eventually departed due to school-size issues.

According to the Illinois State Board of Education's online Report Card,[7] the student body as of the 2015-2016 school year was composed of the following ethnicities: 66.1% White, 11.9% Black, 7.7% Hispanic, 8.6% Asian, 0.5% American Indian, 4.9% Multi Racial/Ethnicity, and 0.5% Pacific Islander.