The 25 Most Competitive High Schools of 2017
Over the past five years, Test Innovators has helped more than 60,000 students prepare for the SSAT and the ISEE, the high school admissions tests required for applications to the most competitive independent schools in the country. Every year we review our data from thousands of test-takers to find out the most popular schools students are applying to.
Our long-awaited 2017 results are here! Below is a list of the top 25 most sought-after high schools, based on the number of students who stated their intention to apply in 2017.
For our 2019 list, click here.
Keep in mind that there are many lovely schools which may be perfect for you that we haven’t included on this list!
(Looking for middle schools? You can view our list of the Top 25 Most Competitive Middle Schools of 2017 here.
1. Phillips Exeter Academy, Exeter, NH
Phillips Exeter Academy, founded by John Phillips in 1781, is one of the oldest secondary schools in America. The school is proud to use the Harkness method of teaching, which places twelve students and one teacher at a table to discuss subjects and explore ideas as a group, creating “a collaborative approach to problem solving and learning”. Eighty percent of students live on campus, and there are opportunities to participate in over 150 student clubs, over 4,600 performances per year, athletics, and global engagement trips traveling across the world. It is the most competitive high school in the country.
2. Phillips Andover Academy, Andover, MA
Phillips Academy Andover was founded by the founder of Phillips Exeter Academy’s nephew, Samuel Phillips Jr., three years prior in 1778. Andover is a liberal arts boarding school that has two museums on campus – the Addison Gallery of American Art, and the Robert S. Peabody Museum of Archaeology. In 2009, the school implemented a full need-blind admission policy, and will meet 100% of a family’s demonstrated financial need.
3. Choate Rosemary Hall, Wallingford, CT
Choate Rosemary Hall is a private boarding school founded in the 1890s in Wallingford, Connecticut. In 2015 the school spent $17 million to open the new Lanphier Center for Mathematics and Computer Science. You could call it a presidential school: Choate Rosemary has at least two notable alumni – former U.S. president John F. Kennedy, and current U.S. president Donald Drumpf’s daughter, Ivanka Drumpf.
4. Harvard-Westlake, Los Angeles, CA
Harvard-Westlake is an independent, co-educational college preparatory day school for grades 7-12, located on two campuses: a Middle School at the original Westlake campus in Holmby Hills, and an Upper School located at the former Harvard campus in Studio City. It is the most competitive school on the west coast. The school motto is “Possunt Quia Posse Videntur”; translation: “They can because they think they can.”
5. Deerfield Academy, Deerfield, MA
Deerfield Academy was founded in 1797 by a charter granted by U.S. Founding Father Samuel Adams. The athletic facilities are extensive, offering over 90 acres of fields, 21 tennis courts, a hockey rink, a fully functional boathouse on the Connecticut River, two gymnasiums, several squash courts, and a downhill ski slope. A quick glance at the academic catalog reveals unique classes including a computer science class called “Data Structures & Algorithms,” an English class called “Jazz Age and Lost Generation”, and an Art class called “Design for Human Impact”.
6. Lawrenceville, Lawrenceville, NJ
The Lawrenceville School is a boarding school founded in 1810. It has a residential House System similar to traditional British boarding schools, and immortalized by the Harry Potter series. Similar to Phillips Exeter, the school also uses the Harkness method of teaching, which focuses “not on teaching what to know but on learning how to think.” The school also has a Harkness Travel Program for students on school breaks and over the summer to places like Bolivia, Nepal, and Tanzania.
7. Milton Academy, Milton, MA
The charter to found Milton Academy was passed in 1798, making the school now over 200 years old. The school’s motto, “Dare to be true,” is over 100 years old. The school is split half and half between boarding and day students. There are over 10 different student publications on campus, along with 12 athletic fields. One of the most interesting buildings on campus is the Ayer Observatory, where astronomy students can observe and study celestial objects.
8. Menlo, Atherton, CA
Menlo School, established in 1915, is dedicated to providing a challenging academic curriculum complemented by outstanding creative arts and athletic programs. In addition to rigorous academics, Menlo offers an “M-Term”, which are immersive mini courses that take place in May after finals and AP tests have finished. It is the most competitive school in the Bay Area.
9. Lick-Wilmerding, San Francisco, CA
The second most competitive school in the Bay Area, Lick-Wilmerding High School, was founded in 1895 by James Lick and offered free education of boys and girls. The original goal of the school was to combine general education with technical and vocational training to create the “educated craftsman”. Today, the school’s urban campus includes “Technical Arts shops”, a full-court gymnasium with a rock climbing wall, a dance studio, photography studio, music studio, three computer labs, and a 30,000 volume library.
10. Noble and Greenough, Dedham, MA
Noble and Greenough School is a coed day and five-day boarding school for students in 7 through 12 grades. The school was founded in 1866 and just celebrated its 150th birthday last year. The campus architecture was designed by legendary American landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted. The athletic program is particularly developed, and the school has 26 varsity athletic teams.
11. Westminster, Simsbury, CT
The Westminster School is a private boarding and day school for students in grades 9 through 12. The school offers numerous AP classes, an excellent college counseling program, and has recently opened a new dining hall, a new student and faculty residence, and two new carriage houses. Students may choose to study abroad during their junior year in places like China, Spain, France, Italy, or the UK. Westminster’s school motto is “grit and grace”.
12. Horace Mann, Bronx, NY
Horace Mann School was founded in 1887 as a “coeducational experimental and developmental unit” of the Teachers College at Columbia University. The school was named after Horace Mann, a lawyer who served in the Massachusetts State Legislature who proclaimed that every person should receive a public education based on the principles and practices of a free society – a revolutionary idea at the time. The school now offers a coeducational, nondenominational independent day school education for students of age 3 through 18.
13. Hotchkiss, Lakeville, CT
The Hotchkiss School, founded in 1891, provides an independent boarding school education for students in grades 9 through 12. A 287-acre farm is located one mile south of the main campus, and allows students the opportunity to gain hands-on experience in sustainable agriculture, while supplying a quarter of the produce used in the dining hall. The campus sits directly on Lake Wononscopomuc, Connecticut’s deepest freshwater lake, and there are miles of hiking trails on campus.
14. Riverdale Country School, Bronx, NY
Riverdale Country School, for students in grades Pre-K through 12, has three signature programs: Character Education, which is designed to strengthen “character skills” such as optimism, honesty, grit, and social intelligence; Design Thinking, which is a problem-solving methodology that emphasizes creativity, collaboration, and an understanding of human experience; and Living Mindfully, which is defined as “paying attention in a particular way; on purpose, in the preset moment, and non-judgmentally.” The school recently opened a new 23,000 square foot Upper Learning Building in 2016.
15. Woodward, College Park, Georgia
Woodward Academy is Atlanta’s oldest college preparatory school, founded in 1900 by Colonel John Charles Woodward. It is the largest independent school in the continental U.S. with 2700 students attending. The school has a robotics program, 86 student clubs, 75 yearly art performances and 18 varsity sports. Woodward Academy prides itself on its commitment to community service, with students devoting more than 5000 hours to service projects every year.
16. Loomis Chaffee, Windsor, CT
Loomis Chaffee is a boarding school for students in grades 9 through 12 located on a 300-acre campus. The school offers over 250 courses per year, including a four-year Arabic language program. The school was founded in 1874 by five siblings who had lost all of their children and “selflessly determined to found a school as a gift to the children of others”.
17. Urban, San Francisco, CA
The Urban School of San Francisco was founded in 1966 and was one of the first schools to use block scheduling and the first school to use a 1:1 student laptop program. The school has a program called UrbanX Labs, which offers classes like electronics and robotics, engineering, advanced coding, industrial design, and more.
18. Boston Latin School, Boston, MA
Boston Latin School is one of three Boston exam schools, some of the oldest (for context, BLS was founded in 1635) and most competitive public schools in the country. Residents of Boston are the only students who can apply. The school is requires very high ISEE scores of its applicants, though it offers a high quality education tuition-free to all students who get in.
19. Sidwell Friends, Washington, DC
Sidwell Friends School is a Quaker day school founded in 1883. Its location in D.C. means that the children of many U.S. presidents and politicians have attended the school, most recently Sasha and Malia Obama. The school is also home to the Quaker Rare Book Collection, which is housed in the School Archives and includes more than 1000 items dating from 1655 to the early 20th century.
20. Dalton, New York, NY
The Dalton School is an independent, co-educational day school in Manhattan, offering education for 1,300 students in grades K-12. It was founded in 1919 by progressive educator Helen Parkhurst. In addition to a rigorous academic program, the school also offers a Service Learning Program for high school students, which expects students to complete four projects during High School with each project representing a “sustained, meaningful commitment to one agency or cause.”
21. Taft, Watertown, CT
Taft School was originally founded by Horace Taft in 1890 as a boarding school for boys. Today, the student body is students of all genders, from all across the U.S. and 44 different countries. The school is home to the Hulbert Taft, Jr. library, a library with more than 55,000 print volumes, over 70 digital databases, rivaling the resources of many college campuses’ libraries.
22. Peddie, Hightstown, NJ
The Peddie School is a private boarding and day school with a student to faculty ratio of 1 to 6. The school has a program called the Signature Experience for juniors and seniors, where students can enroll in specialized programs in the subject of their choice, ending in a performance, presentation, or a panel with the Peddie community. One unique tradition is the Sophomore Bike Trip, where 10th graders travel almost 200 miles under the supervision of experienced faculty.
23. San Francisco University High School, San Francisco, CA
San Francisco University High School is a college preparatory high school established in 1975. The school has a mentoring program which helps support ninth-grade students as they navigate their first year of high school. The school’s main building was built in 1917 and originally housed Katherine Delmar Burke School, a school for girls. SFUHS is also home to the Summerbridge program, an award-winning tuition-free academic enrichment and advocacy program for ambitious middle school students from under-resourced circumstances.
24. Lakeside, Seattle, WA
Lakeside School is an independent school for students in grades 5-12. In Fall of 2018, Lakeside School will open a new sister school called The Downtown School, located blocks from the Seattle Center. Microsoft founders Bill Gates and Paul Allen are both alumni of Lakeside, from the class of 1973 and 1971 respectively.
25. Poly Prep Country Day, Brooklyn, NY
Poly Prep, founded in 1854, is an independent school for students in preschool through 12th grades with a progressive liberal arts curriculum. The campus for the Upper School covers 24 acres, an “urban oasis” in the heart of Brooklyn. The school offers more than 18 Advanced Placement courses per year.
You can view the ISEE and SSAT score data we have on these and other schools here for the ISEE, and here for the SSAT.
Find out your chances of getting into these and other schools with a full length ISEE practice test or a full-length SSAT practice test from Test Innovators.
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