Newsweek Ranks WHS 159th in U.S.

Westfield High School has been ranked 159th on Newsweek’s list of the 500 best high schools in the country.

The ranking, announced on the magazine’s website represents a rise on the list, including the change in rankings by Newsweek. In 2010, WHS ranked 978th on Newsweek’s list, which then encompassed over 1,600 high schools nationwide. A comparison of the placement on both total lists, shows an upward movement for WHS.

In 2009, Newsweek ranked WHS as in the country.

Newsweek based the ranking on statistics regarding the Class of 2010. The magazine used self reported data from the school system, including an 11 to 1 student teacher ratio at the high school, a graduation rate of 98-percent, a 1.9 average score on AP and IB tests, 92-percent of the class attending college and an average SAT score of 1746. The magazine said the high school’s ranking was 0.569 on their scale.

According to the Newsweek website, the magazine weighted each of the components based on advice from a panel of education experts. The website said that the graduation rate, college matriculation rate and AP tests taken by graduates were each weighted at 25-percent, with average SAT/ACT scores and average AP and IB scores being weighted at 10-percent and AP courses offered at five-percent.

Thirty six high schools across New Jersey placed on the Newsweek list, with High Technology High School in Lincroft ranking 18th on the list to be the top Garden State school on the list. The top Union County high school on the list was the Academy of Allied Health Sciences in Scotch Plains, which placed 70th. The Union County Magnet High School in Scotch Plains finished 74th on the list. The Academy for Information Technology in Scotch Plains placed 271st. The two academies and the magnet school are all operated by the Union County Vo-Tech Board of Education.

The top Union County town based high school on the list was Governor Livingston High School in Berkeley Heights, which placed 155th. Cranford High School ranked 352nd on the list, with Jonathan Dayton High School ranking 394th on the list.

The Newsweek rankings come 10 months after New Jersey Monthly Westfield High School’s ranking on their biannual list of the top high schools in the state. New Jersey Monthly’s ranking of WHS dropped from 27 in 2008 to 41 in 2010. At the time, Schools Superintendent Margaret Dolan said the drop was based on the magazine’s ranking system and a change in how high school class size is calculated, along with how the student to teacher ratio was calculated in Westfield versus other districts. At the time she said her staff filled out the reports based on what she described as a literal definition of the teacher/student ratio and not how other districts put the calculation together.

Board of Education members have discussed ways to address the New Jersey Monthly ranking prior to the magazine’s next high school ranking issue in 2012.

Last month, the Middle States Association announced the of the high school. The decision followed an intensive self-study by high school staffers and an evaluation by a team of outside educators.

Members of the Board of Education were casually discussing the ranking system prior to the start of Tuesday evening’s board meeting. Board members noted that the Newsweek rankings did not include traditional New Jersey Monthly powerhouses including Millburn and Princeton, which have scored near top of the biannual state rankings.

Dolan used the ranking to praise the work of the high school’s students.

“We’re pleased at how well our students continue to do and we’re proud of their accomplishments,” she said in as brief interview Tuesday night.

Newsweek Top High Schools (New Jersey Only)

25 Top High Schools on Newsweek List

Addendum - June 24, 2011

The Westfield Board of Education has noted that the AP score listed in the Newsweek story is lower than the 4.22 on file in their records. Board officials said they are not sure the exact calculation used by Newsweek in determining the final number used in the ranking.