Prestigious High Schools?

<p>How do you find out how your high school is ranked?
and i think that my high school is ranked pretty low, so how important is the prestige of your high school in getting into college?</p>

<p>How your HS is ranked is not an issue you need to concern yourself with if you know it is lowly. What you do need to understand is have you taken advantage of the most that HS had to offer? Recognizing that it is lowly and knowing that you are looking for higher level academics and competition is important. Better to know from whence you came than to presume that it was better than it was. Also......students coming from a top ranked HS will have to demonstrate great achievement.....too whom much is given much is expected.</p>

<p>You will be just fine......apply to the schools that interest you.</p>

<p>Alrighty. thank you very much. I've been on here and everyone is posting in their stats how their high school is and i'm like...eep!</p>

<p>so thank you.</p>

<p>Remember one thing.....colleges and adcoms are putting together a "class" of folks from all over the world.....with varying interests and skills. You have something to contribute and they want to know what that is.......so, you didn't have the kind of HS you may have dreamed of......maybe you can get that experience in college. Let the colleges know that you are a participant, you will take advantage of what they have to offer.....classes/clubs/activities. What college wants a class of kids who are all the same? You are an individual you have lots to offer.....don't be intimidated by those who come from high powered schools.</p>

<p>Your highschool rank is of almost no importance.</p>

<p>You find the USnews or something list and find your school.</p>

<p>my school is #310.</p>

<p>Firstly perhaps you are not aware that thousands of HS are not listed on the ranking........the fact that yours was 310 is interesting but the OP is in a very different circumstance. As you may recall it will be of significance if your school has a high ranking.....more will be expected.</p>

<p>I don't think you can trust the rankings. I think what they use to rank high schools is divide the number of AP/IB tests taken by the number of students in the school...not a very accurate measure. My high school (Myers Park) is ranked near the top, but we don't send many students to top colleges.</p>

<p>Exactly for the USNWR.....I was speaking more to ranking schools ie Exeter, Andover, St Paul.....Stuyvesant,Boston Latin.....well known high power academic institutions with long records of IVY admits.</p>

<p>This is a bit OT, but nobody is answering me in any of the other posts i make... Hazmat, you said that a college will look more at what you've done, etc....
What, around, do you need to get into NYU. I've read the admissions stats and all of that, but if my GPA sn't amazing(around 3.9?) do i still have a chance is i score well and have a lot of E.Cs?</p>

<p>Here is the link to the list of the top 1000 schools that Newsweek published:
<a href="http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7723397/site/newsweek/%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7723397/site/newsweek/&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>I go to Richard Montgomery High School, #11, and since I only have a 3.0 on a 4.0 scale, I have less of a chance of getting into my top schools.</p>

<p>if you're a good student the ranking will most likely help you.</p>

<p>if you're an average the and the rank is high, it will probably damage your chances of getting into a more selective school.</p>

<p>if your high school isn't on the list than don't worry, it probably won't even be a factor in your application</p>

<p>hope this helps.</p>

<p>Ranking on schools meaning absolutely NOTHING.</p>

<p>I go to a public high school in suburban Boston and we have a large number of Ivy admits every year. Although we have a crazy numbers of kids taking APs, our score will never be that great because we are both a normal and a tech voc high school. Ironically, this integration that holds us back in the rankings actually makes for a more diverese, interesting, and stimulating environment than other schools.</p>

<p>Weston, a neighboring town, is always ranked ridiculously high. However, they have extremely little diversity and don't offer nearly as many programs as mine does.</p>

<p>Those rankings are BS. The only thing they factor in is number of APs taken by the students. It doesn't even matter if everyone takes 7 APs and fails them all. The ranking would be number 1 on this list. My school restricts us to 3 APs in junior and senior year only, and most of our APs classes are very hard. That fact alone makes my hs have no chance in hell of making this so called "ranking."</p>

<p>14 from Tj went to Princeton...</p>

<p>A year ago 26 kids from my school got into Harvard. Any school can have a lot of kids taking AP exams. It doesn't really correlate to the actual quality of the school. Maybe it would have slightly more merit if the calculations for the ranking included AP scores rather than mere number of tests taken.</p>

<p>This ranking must be funded by College Board......the cash cow that we are all feeding. Who cares how many APs and who cares the ranking......many schools who have giant reputations as academic powerhouses......feeder schools to IVY.....don't teach APs because they offer more difficult curriculum on a regular basis. Suburban HS who cannot compete w/ this have resorted to selling APs as the high standard which they are not.</p>

<p>You know what's HILARIOUS?
People are saying "Oh those HS rankings don't matter, they're judging stuff that doesn't necessarily mean a great school" but isn't that what US News does with colleges, which a lot of people take as basically God's word?</p>

<p>I am not saying HS rankings in general don't matter at all. I am just saying that these specific rankings have nearly zero merit. I also don't take US News' college rankings too seriously, but they certainly involve at least a few more valid criteria than this specific HS ranking.</p>