The area¡¯s best public and private high schools, ranked head-to-head for the first time. Plus: A sneak peek at the Microsoft-designed ¡°School of the Future,¡± and three local learning innovations your child¡¯s school should adopt
By Timothy Haas
The Elite 40
When we compiled our first-ever school rankings last year, we considered private and public schools separately. Almost as soon as we were finished, we began to wonder whether it was possible to identify the best schools in the area by comparing all of them together. To answer the question, we again turned to statisticians I. Elaine Allen and Christopher A. Seaman.
Looking at the available data, they found that by concentrating on academic variables (such as SAT scores and number of AP classes offered) and classroom environment data (such as class size and student-faculty ratio) ¡ª and leaving cost out of the equation (due to the difficulty of making private tuition and public-school spending comparable) ¡ª they could produce a statistically valid snapshot of our most elite schools regardless of their type.
It¡¯s important to bear in mind, however, that within the list itself, the differences measured are often quite small ¡ª any school could fairly exchange places with schools 10 positions higher or lower. Accordingly, we offer these rankings not as the final word on school quality, but as a starting point for parents searching for educational options for their children. Of course, if the reaction to last year¡¯s rankings is any guide, they will be the starting point for any number of arguments, too. (You can find an explanation of our methodology on page 99.)
On the following pages, we¡¯ve highlighted some useful ¡°top five¡± lists from the main chart and broken out the area¡¯s top public schools by county. We¡¯ve also done a second round of calculations on our data, this time keeping money in the mix, to recognize schools that give the best academic value for every dollar spent.
1. The Haverford School, Haverford 2. The Shipley School 3. The Hill School 4. The Episcopal Academy 5. The Baldwin School 6. The Agnes Irwin School 7. William Penn Charter School 8. Holy Ghost Preparatory School 9. Springside School 10. Germantown Friends School 11. Chestnut Hill Academy 12. Devon Preparatory School 13. Friends¡¯ Central School 14. Akiba Hebrew Academy 15. Academy of Notre Dame de Namur 16. Malvern Preparatory School 17. Germantown Academy 18. Abington Friends School 19. Moorestown Friends School 20. Masterman High School 21. Mount Saint Joseph Academy 22. Conestoga High School 23. La Salle College High School 24. St. Joseph¡¯s Preparatory School 25. Cherry Hill High School East 26. Friends Select School 27. Villa Maria Academy 28. Westtown School 29. George School 30. Merion Mercy Academy 31. Lower Merion High School 32. Strath Haven High School 33. Harriton (Lower Merion) High School 34. Haddonfield Memorial High School 35. Radnor High School 36. Bishop Eustace Preparatory School 37. Upper Dublin High School 38. Unionville High School 39. Country Day School of the Sacred Heart 40. Moorestown High School
How We Prepared the Rankings
Philadelphia magazine researchers first looked at SAT data for all private and regular public high schools in the eight-county Philadelphia region. (We didn¡¯t include technical or charter schools.) Schools whose combined average SATs fell below 1028, the national average for the class of 2005, were removed from consideration. For the remaining 106 schools, we compiled the latest available information for 16 variables for private schools and 11 for public. (Not all variables were used in the final analysis.)
Our primary source for private-school data was school websites; when a number couldn¡¯t be found online, we supplemented with information from Peterson¡¯s Private Secondary Schools 2007. We then called each school at least twice to offer an opportunity to confirm or amend the data; some schools declined to talk to us. Data for Pennsylvania public schools, mainly from the 2004-¡¯05 school year, was obtained from the state Department of Education website, from Standard & Poor¡¯s SchoolMatters.com website, and from the Philadelphia Inquirer¡¯s 2006 Report Card on the Schools database (inquirer.philly.com/specials/2006/report_card). Data for New Jersey, also from 2004-¡¯05, was obtained from the state Department of Education website.
We then sent our data to I. Elaine Allen, associate professor of statistics and entrepreneurship at Babson College in Wellesley, Massachusetts, and Christopher A. Seaman, a doctoral student in mathematics at City University of New York. The rankings were calculated using a combined database of private and public schools and validated doing separate analyses for private and for public schools. If a school had no data for a particular variable, the mean of the variable was substituted so as not to bias the analyses. Two factors were identified and combined for ranking: an academic achievement factor that included SAT scores, percentage of students attending post-secondary education, and number of AP courses offered (split between academic achievement and environment), and a school environment factor that included student-faculty ratio, average class size, and number of AP courses (split between academic achievement and environment). To combine these into an overall rank, the achievement factor was weighted 75 percent and the school environment factor was weighted 25 percent. To ensure comparability between variables, all the combined variables were standardized to create the same metric for comparisons. An additional analysis included a third factor, educational costs (day tuition and percentage of students receiving financial aid for private schools, and operational spending per student for public schools), to identify public and private schools that provide both high achievement and many opportunities for students at a reasonable cost. When combined with the other two factors, the weighting was 50 percent for academic achievement, 25 percent for educational environment, and 25 percent for costs.
Top of the Class Most Expensive Day Tuition 1. The Hill School $25,250 2. George School $24,700 3. The Haverford School $23,200 4. The Episcopal Academy $22,375 5. The Agnes Irwin School $22,350
Top Five Boys¡¯ Schools School/Affiliation/Overall Rank 1. The Haverford School, nonsectarian, 1 2. Holy Ghost Preparatory School, Catholic, 8 3. Chestnut Hill Academy, nonsectarian, 11 4. Devon Preparatory School, Catholic, 12 5. Malvern Preparatory School, Catholic, 16
Top Five Girls¡¯ Schools 1. The Baldwin School, nonsectarian, 5 2. The Agnes Irwin School, nonsectarian, 6 3. Springside School, nonsectarian, 9 4. Academy of Notre Dame de Namur, Catholic, 15 5. Mount Saint Joseph Academy, Catholic, 21
Top Five Coed Schools 1. The Shipley School, nonsectarian, 2 2. The Hill School, nonsectarian, 3 3. The Episcopal Academy, Episcopalian, 4 4. William Penn Charter School, Quaker, 7 5. Germantown Friends School, Quaker, 10
Highest Combined SATs 1. The Baldwin School, 1343 2. The Shipley School, 1316 3. Germantown Friends School, 1312 4. (tie) The Episcopal Academy, 1310 The Haverford School, 1310
Most Extracurricular Activities, Private 1. Westtown School, 68 2. St. Joseph¡¯s Preparatory School, 51 3. The Hill School, 47 4. Germantown Friends School, 43 5. The Haverford School, 40
Most Varsity Sports, Private 1. (tie) The Episcopal Academy, 30 The Hill School, 30 2. (tie) Bishop Eustace Preparatory School, 28 Friends¡¯ Central School, 28 3. William Penn Charter School, 27
Top Public High Schools by County PENNSYLVANIA
Bucks 1. New Hope-Solebury 2. Central Bucks East 3. Council Rock North
Chester 1. Conestoga 2. Unionville 3. Great Valley
Delaware 1. Strath Haven 2. Radnor 3. Garnet Valley
Montgomery 1. Lower Merion 2. Harriton (Lower Merion) 3. Upper Dublin
Philadelphia 1. Masterman 2. Central
NEW JERSEY
Burlington 1. Moorestown 2. Shawnee 3. Cherokee
Camden 1. Cherry Hill East 2. Haddonfield 3. Eastern
Gloucester 1. Woodbury Junior-Senior 2. Gateway Regional 3. Clearview Regional
Bang for Your Buck Fifteen high-value schools that offer ¡ª based on tuition dollar or tax dollar spent ¡ª the best overall mix of high SATs, AP classes, and number of teachers. (• indicates a public school.)
1. •Masterman High School 2. St. Joseph¡¯s Preparatory School 3. •Conestoga High School 4. Holy Ghost Preparatory School 5. •Central High School 6. The Baldwin School 7. The Haverford School 8. The Shipley School 9. The Episcopal Academy 10. Germantown Friends School 11. William Penn Charter School 12. Germantown Academy 13. Devon Preparatory School 14. • Cherry Hill High School East 15. Academy of Notre Dame de Namur
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