<p>hey guys,
can anyone tell me anything about palo alto's two high schools, paly/palo alto and gunn?</p>
<p>there is a chance we might move there, and not to sound superficial but I'd rather go to the one with better matriculation, though I know both are extremely great schools. basically ivy league, and wonderful LAC/non-ivy-but-we-belong-there schools</p>
<p>i heard gunn sends like 3% of their kids to just stanford, which is amazing i think, and i'd assume paly would be close to that as well. can anybody confirm this? </p>
<p>Sorry to bump this up but I didn’t really feel like making a new thread (especially after receiving advice that i should recycle posts)</p>
<p>if anyone has info on paly/gunn matriculation, academics and extracurriculars in detail (i know both are superior to a lot of other schools in many fields, but things you’ve heard by word of mouth? or anything really) and the overall student body in general… please post or pm me. If you’re a student from there (unlikely seeing as cc has so many people who, by reasoning, would not be from there) please pm me or post or whatever :)</p>
<p>There is a high chance that I will be moving there between now and 2010 so I would really like some information on them The internet isn’t quite as helpful as I thought it would be.</p>
<p>Everyone in the Bay Area knows that Gunn and Monta Vista are the “smartest” schools. Monta Vista sent over 50 kids to Berkeley this year and a bunch more to Ivies. </p>
<p>I don’t know about Gunn’s stats, but they have around a 900 API score out of 1000 while my school (Los Altos) is in the 790 range (API score is based on state standardized testing). Their campus makeup is around 30% Asian and 50% White. I would go to Gunn if you are looking for a school with a better Ivy matriculation. By word of mouth, everybody knows that Gunn is a top school. I also like it’s campus a little better than Paly’s. But this is reasonable since Paly is a much much older school than Gunn.
So yea…Gunn is the way to go :] Their academics are amazing.
But we own them in sports haha Just saying…</p>
<p>They’re both good schools. Honestly, the exact matriculation numbers doesn’t matter. Just because Gunn sends a few more to some really prestigious schools doesn’t mean that your chances of getting in will significantly higher just because you go there. And in the end you might not have much of a choice since you normally get assigned to your high school based on where you live (although sometimes people that technically live in the Gunn area get sent to PALY since Gunn is often full).
In terms of extracurriculars, they’re both good, but Gunn has a reputation of better arts programs while PALY is typically better at sports, but there are definitely exceptions (like Gunn is better at badminton than PALY). At either school you’ll probably find whichever ECs you’re looking for.
As a PALY student, I don’t really know how the Gunn student body is as a whole, but the people that I know that go to Gunn are all pretty nice, and I’ve heard from others that Gunn has a slightly better sense of community among students. Personally, I didn’t really like many people at PALY. Most people are the preppy type that are pretty shallow and get really drunk on weekends, or the type that are obcessed with college and don’t talk about much besides where everyone is applying and why they don’t deserve to get in to where they’re applying. The competitive atmosphere can get a little overwhelming at times. That said, there definitely are some cool people, and I’ve made some really great friends through ECs. Good luck on making a decision if you get your choice of high schools! And feel free to PM me if you have any other questions about PALY</p>
<p>What are you interested in? Both schools are awesome in almost everything, but there are some distinct strengths that each school has. Both have great ivy matriculation rates. Not quite 15-30 as databox said, more like 10-15 to stanford, and 5-10 to HYP. It’s way more competitive at Gunn than at Paly, though.</p>
<p>^he said 15-30 to stanford… anyways, I don’t think that’s the point of this thread…
Also keep in mind that many students have parents who are professors at Stanford, or are recruited athletes. That may skew the data a bit.</p>
<p>Since everyone posted about academic, I’ll say that the Gunn campus is great looking, while Paly is right next to Stanford, which is pretty neat. As a justified generalization, the students are all snobs.</p>
<p>fairy_dreams: i have a friend that goes to los altos (: the campus (or at least the main building) is beauuuutiful.</p>
<p>I actually did live in the bay area for a while, so I was aware that Monta Vista was one of the “smart schools” but I was thinking of Palo Alto as well since they have good public schools. And the person who mentioned matriculation, kudos (: I was curious though, because I know of the roughly 500 people in every grade, there were about 200 that were really really serious about college, etc. Or am I wrong? haha. Either way, I wanted to know how many of those “competitive” students got into colleges of their choice (assuming one of the ivy league, mit,stanford,ucb,and ucla were colleges of choice, which I think they would be for a lot of students.) </p>
<p>i completely agree with the athlete recruit/parents part, I’ve asked friends in the bay area about paly and gunn and they all mentioned tons of legacies live there, since it’s their university after all. </p>
<p>i know paly has a good reputation for debate and journalism? that’s why I might seem a little bias towards paly, because those two ecs are what I’m interested in and I wasn’t really sure about gunn</p>
<p>Woot paly debate is awesome! Our coaches (all from Stanford) are all TOCers and NFLers and they’re really awesome. We’re first in the state in LD and have a great up-and-coming Policy Team!
Come to paly, you’ll love it. Yeah, right around sophomore year, the top 20% ish gets extremely serious about college, then the next 30% starts getting pretty serious. Beyond that, they don’t really care.</p>
The internet isn’t quite as helpful as I thought it would be.</p>