Cary High School. Staff photo by Hal Goodtree.

Cary, NC – US News just released their third annual survey of American high schools. Both Cary High and Green Hope made the list.

In America’s Best High Schools, US News used Standard & Poor’s education research to determine school rankings. Here’s some info about their methodology:

“We analyzed 21,786 public high schools in 48 states plus the District of Columbia. This is the total number of public high schools that had 12th-grade enrollment and sufficient data, primarily from the 2007-2008 school year, to analyze.

A three-step process determined the best high schools. The first two steps ensured that the schools serve all their students well, using state proficiency standards as the benchmarks. For those schools that made it past the first two steps, a third step assessed the degree to which schools prepare students for college-level work.”

More about how the survey was conducted.

Of the 21,786 schools surveyed, 1,750 were recognized for considerably outperforming their state’s education standards. Of that group, 561 schools, including Cary High and GHHS,  were honored for doing an excellent job of preparing students for college-level coursework. Neither school cracked into the Top 100.

The top high school in the nation, according to the report, is Thomas Jefferson in Alexandria, VA. Their coursework includes DNA science, neurobiology, and quantum physics. In North Carolina, only two schools ranked in the top 100: The Early College at Guilford (#18) in Greensboro and the Raleigh Charter High School (#24).