US World 2013 High School Rankings LI list (Babylon, Huntington: neighborhood, school districts)
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
US World & News Report just came out with their 2013 rankings, I thought I'd list the ranked LI districts together in a single list:
Obvious disclaimer that these ranks don't tell everything about a district. US World ranks strictly off of test scores and weights AP/IB participation and pass rate VERY heavily in their ranks.
I listed the state rank in parenthesis for each district:
1 (14) Jericho
2 (17) Great Neck
3 (19) East Williston
4 (20) Rockville Centre
5 (21) Cold Spring Harbor
6 (24) Garden City
7 (26) Manhasset
8 (27) Herricks
9 (32) Syosset
10 (37) Port Washington
11 (43) Plainview-Old Bethpage
12 (46) Harborfields
13 (48) Bellmore-Merrick
14 (59) Valley Stream South High School (there are 3 high schools in this district/only one ranked)
15 (60) Commack
16 (61) Half Hollows West
17 (62) Half Hollows East
18 (79) Babylon
19 (85) South Huntington
20 (145) Bayshore
21 (172) Greenport
US World & News Report just came out with their 2013 rankings, I thought I'd list the ranked LI districts together in a single list:
Obvious disclaimer that these ranks don't tell everything about a district. US World ranks strictly off of test scores and weights AP/IB participation and pass rate VERY heavily in their ranks.
I listed the state rank in parenthesis for each district:
1 (14) Jericho
2 (17) Great Neck
3 (19) East Williston
4 (20) Rockville Centre
5 (21) Cold Spring Harbor
6 (24) Garden City
7 (26) Manhasset
8 (27) Herricks
9 (32) Syosset
10 (37) Port Washington
11 (43) Plainview-Old Bethpage
12 (46) Harborfields
13 (48) Bellmore-Merrick 14 (59) Valley Stream South High School (there are 3 high schools in this district/only one ranked)
15 (60) Commack
16 (61) Half Hollows West
17 (62) Half Hollows East
18 (79) Babylon
19 (85) South Huntington
20 (145) Bayshore
21 (172) Greenport
Rest did not have rankings in their system.
Nice to see Valley Stream South nationally rank! especially after all the treads on here on how bad Valley Stream is. Kudos.
I'm surprised Massapequa wasn't ranked in the top 2,500 High Schools in the country.
If your nationally recognized and your school is in the top 1,000... your children are going to a great school regardless of where you call home!
Last edited by BigMike50; 04-23-2013 at 10:35 PM..
These lists by US World & News are a joke, IMO. First, they are using 2010-2011 results for a 2013 list. That would be fine by itself, but the methodology is actually biased to favor certain schools.
Have you looked at the methodology they use? Schools have to go through 2 steps showing that their share of "economically disadvantaged" and minority students are performing better than state average. So that right there knocks out a ton of 'majority-white' LI School districts. Race and economically disadvantaged students has very little to do with school quality.
Then they look at AP/IB participation rate weighted 25% in the CRI. All that does is encourage school admin to plop as many kids as possible into them so they could make it onto these lists. I saw one school in NC with a 62% participation rate but only an 8% pass rate, 60% proficient in Math/Eng, ranked near the top 1000 . How ridiculous is that?
Also, it's difficult to compare schools at the national level. Only way to really do that is grad rates maybe, or SATs. Even the SATs are not a great measure because of how that data can be skewed (ie- lower participation rate, "cherry picking" could lead to higher school averages).
If you want a good measure of LI School district quality and how we compare to NYS, you will not find a more objective and comprehensive list than this:
These lists by US World & News are a joke, IMO. First, they are using 2010-2011 results for a 2013 list. That would be fine by itself, but the methodology is actually biased to favor certain schools.
Have you looked at the methodology they use? Schools have to go through 2 steps showing that their share of "economically disadvantaged" and minority students are performing better than state average. So that right there knocks out a ton of 'majority-white' LI School districts. Race and economically disadvantaged students has very little to do with school quality.
Then they look at AP/IB participation rate weighted 25% in the CRI. All that does is encourage school admin to plop as many kids as possible into them so they could make it onto these lists. I saw one school in NC with a 62% participation rate but only an 8% pass rate, 60% proficient in Math/Eng, ranked near the top 1000 . How ridiculous is that?
Also, it's difficult to compare schools at the national level. Only way to really do that is grad rates maybe, or SATs. Even the SATs are not a great measure because of how that data can be skewed (ie- lower participation rate, "cherry picking" could lead to higher school averages).
If you want a good measure of LI School district quality and how we compare to NYS, you will not find a more objective and comprehensive list than this:
I found it a bit weird a school (Manhattan Bridges if I recall) was listed 40 something'th in the state and was below state average in english AND math and was 50+% in college readiness. Far below others with similar rankings. Made no sense at all. How can they rank higher for college readiness and yet be below average in Math and English?!
Obviously if they only pick high schools from wealthy, white areas there's going to be trouble. I did LOL at some of the high schools in NC that are on the list. I mean But I guess it's nice that they give everyone a chance otherwise rural high schools anywhere wouldn't get on the list, and they'd have the PC police after them.
As Pequa said, it's pretty hard to compare schools across the country, so I guess they must use the methodology that they do. Perhaps once common core has take hold everywhere it will be easier to compare.
Nice to see Valley Stream South nationally rank! especially after all the treads on here on how bad Valley Stream is. Kudos.
I'm surprised Massapequa wasn't ranked in the top 2,500 High Schools in the country.
If your nationally recognized and your school is in the top 1,000... your children are going to a great school regardless of where you call home!
I'm in VS South myself - it's a wonderful neighborhood. My brother graduated from VS South and went on to go to an Ivy League school - along with many of his peers, so I think it's a fine school.
Perhaps, some folks don't quite understand how large Valley Stream actually is - there's the North part that's closer to Elmont which kind of gets a bad rep. I've never been there much, so I can't comment. However, I've had tons of friends who've gone to Central and the school is perfectly fine. Other than that, the areas right by the mall + unincorporated village can get busy, but I've never felt unsafe in any of those areas.
There is certainly some strange outliers to be sure based on their methodology. They basically have to judge schools with large minority populations by different metrics and compare them to how well they are performing versus other large minority pop schools. And they also lump in charter schools and magnet schools which eat up a ton of rank places which LIers know we don't have those kind of schools here.
But you can look at any school (even the unranked ones) and see what the participation and pass rates are for AP and IB tests which I feel gives a good idea about the quality of college prep curriculum. Even if your school is not ranked, it's a nice compilation of test scores to pore over. I'm sure if someone had the time they could build a more complete LI list that better represents all districts.
And no one can deny that the LI schools at the top of that list are generally considered some of the best districts on LI.
Good list. Thanks for compiling it. Missed Carle Place at 79th in the state which puts it just ahead of Babylon on this list.
Thanks! I'll add it! Actually looks like I can't, guess the time to do so expired. =(
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
. How ridiculous is that?
