A look at the 2024 Best High Schools rankings released today – which ranked nearly 17,660 out of more than 24,000 reviewed public high schools in all 50 states and the District of Columbia – shows notable movement among schools, especially at the top.
BASIS Peoria in Arizona jumped from No. 12 to claim the top spot. There were four other new entrants to the top 10 this year: Julia R. Masterman Secondary School in Pennsylvania, International Academy in Michigan, Gwinnett School of Mathematics, Science and Technology in Georgia and Riverside Stem Academy in California, three of which rose at least 29 spots in the rankings.
Previously ranked as the No. 1 school, The Early College at Guilford in North Carolina dropped to No. 16 this year. All of the top-20 schools this year have either selective enrollment – with requirements often including a minimum GPA, teacher recommendations and an entrance exam – or a lottery system.
A Look at the Methodology
While these shifts seem significant, there were only slight changes to the top schools' overall scores, which are based on the following six factors:
- College readiness, based on the proportion of 12th-grade students who took and earned a qualifying score on at least one Advanced Placement or International Baccalaureate exam (30% of ranking).
- State assessment proficiency, based on aggregated scores on state assessments that students may be required to pass for graduation (20%).
- State assessment performance, based on whether performance on state assessments exceeded expectations given the school's proportion of underserved students (20%).
- Underserved student performance, based on how Black, Hispanic and low-income students performed on state assessments compared with those who are not underserved in the state (10%).
- College curriculum breadth, based on proportions of 12th-grade students who took and earned a qualifying score on AP and/or IB exams in multiple content areas (10%).
- Graduation rate, based on the proportion of students who entered ninth grade in 2018-2019 and graduated four years later (10%).
Using this methodology, schools earned an overall percentile score between 0 and 100 at two decimal places. Scores below the 25th percentile are listed with a ranking range rather than a numerical rank. Each percentile includes 177 schools, so small changes due to any factor can result in big moves within the rankings, according to the U.S. News data team.
Additionally, Oregon, Rhode Island and Wyoming allowed U.S. News to use their schools' AP data in the rankings this year, which could have attributed to rank increases within those states. Once again, Maine and Oklahoma did not allow use of their schools' AP data.
All of the data is collected from third-party sources. U.S. News receives AP and IB data directly from the College Board and International Baccalaureate, when applicable.
The state assessment data and graduation rates are from each state, and other data comes from the U.S. Department of Education Common Core of Data. For three states – Montana, Tennessee and Utah – state assessment data from 2021-2022 was unavailable, so 2020-2021 data was used.
U.S. News works with RTI International, a global nonprofit social science research firm, to assess and rank all eligible public high schools nationally, and also produces distinct high schools rankings of charter schools and magnet schools.
Magnets, Charters Overrepresented Among Top Schools
Looking at all ranked public schools, 11.5% of high schools were charters and 4.4% were magnets. The classifications for magnet and charter were based on the Common Core of Data, which may underreport for some schools.
However, magnets and charters show up in disproportionately high rates among the top-ranked schools.
Thirteen of the top 20 ranked high schools are classified as charter or magnet. Two of those are part of BASIS Charter Schools Inc., a network of charter schools in Arizona. In the top 5% of the rankings, 31.5% of schools were charter or magnet.
Charter schools are independently operated public schools, meaning they are exempt from some state and local regulations. They may have an application process or lottery system for enrollment. The charter school environment varies regionally, as some states have no charter schools.
Magnet schools, on the other hand, are subject to the same regulations as traditional public schools. They offer specialized curricula tied to fields such as performing arts; science, technology, engineering and math; or career and technical education. They also often use a lottery system, and some require applications that look at students' GPAs or standardized test scores.
Another category is Best High Schools for STEM, in which rankings were based on student participation in college-level math and science courses and scores on AP exams in STEM subjects for 2022 graduates. To be eligible for this category, schools must be in the top 2,000 of the overall national rankings, versus 1,000 last year.
High Technology High School in New Jersey once again claimed the No. 1 spot this year. Two schools – BASIS Peoria and Tesla STEM High School in Washington – made the overall top 10 and the top 10 in the STEM rankings.
Demographic Breakdown of Ranked High Schools
The number of high-ranking schools varies per state. Twelve high schools in both Arizona and Florida are in the top 100, the most of all states. California is next with 11 schools in the top 100.
Massachusetts once again took the lead for the state with the largest proportion of schools in the top 25% of the Best High School rankings. About 44% of its eligible schools are in the top quarter of the national rankings, followed by Connecticut with nearly 43%. Eleven other states had at least 30% of their high schools in the top 25%, while eight states had less than 10% of their schools in the top quarter.
As for metropolitan areas, San Jose, California, once again tops the list with the largest proportion of schools in the top quarter of overall rankings. This metro area, which also includes Santa Clara and Sunnyvale, had 66%, or 41 out of its 62 high schools, ranked in the top 25%. Lynbrook High School was the highest-ranked school, No. 82 nationally, within the metro area.
The New York City metro area – which includes schools in the city itself, Newark and Jersey City in New Jersey, and part of Pennsylvania – had the most ranked schools of all metro areas: 981. Slightly over 41% of this metro area's schools are in the top 25% of the national rankings.
In terms of student demographics, 32.5% of all ranked schools had student populations that were at least 50% Black and Hispanic, while 22.6% of schools in the top quarter of overall rankings had similar demographics. Research indicates that Black and Hispanic students tend to score lower on state assessments – which are ranking indicators – compared to their white and Asian peers for various reasons, including gaps in educational opportunity.
Schools serving large proportions of low-income children were also underrepresented in the top quarter. "Mid-high poverty" schools, defined as schools where 50-74% of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, made up about 19.9% of total ranked schools and 10.9% of schools in the top quarter of the rankings. High-poverty schools – where 75% or more of students qualify for free or reduced-price lunch – were about 15.2% of ranked schools and 10.3% of schools in the top quarter.
See the complete rankings of the Best High Schools.
