The 35 Best High Schools in DC, Maryland, and Virginia (2019)

Last updated

May 14, 2019

Background on the top 35

What are the top high schools in the DC metro area? We spent hundreds of hours looking at academic data to find out who has the smartest students.

The top 3

The magnet public high school Thomas Jefferson, known for its STEM emphasis, outranked every school in the DC metro area. Sidwell Friends, known for its scions of famous families, ranked #2. The all-girls National Cathedral School rounded out the top 3.

Ranking methods and references

Click here to learn more about our methods and references.

Rank	High School	Average SAT	National Merit Semi-Finalists	Presidential Scholars	Tuition and fees	Type	Gender	City	State
1	Thomas Jefferson Magnet	1503 Official	37.41%	7.29%	$0	Magnet	Co-ed	Alexandria	VA
2	Sidwell Friends School	1400	10.94%	6.25%	$44,672	Private	Co-ed	Washington	DC
3	National Cathedral School (NCS)	1400 Official	5.63%	11.27%	$48,290	Parochial	Girls-only	Washington	DC
4	St. Albans School	1350	8.43%	9.64%	$48,682	Parochial	Boys-only	Washington	DC
5	Maret School	1365 Official	2.78%	4.17%	$37,470	Private	Co-ed	Washington	DC
6	Georgetown Day School	1343	8.66%	8.66%	$43,370	Private	Co-ed	Washington	DC
7	St. Anselm's School	1354 Official	2.38%	Not reported	$31,050	Parochial	Boys-only	Washington	DC
8	Holton-Arms School	1440 Official	3.75%	1.25%	$42,975	Private	Girls-only	Bethesda	MD
9	The Potomac School	1440 Official	Not reported	0.88%	$45,985	Private	Co-ed	McLean	VA
10	Charles E. Smith Jewish Day School	1370 Official	6.12%	2.04%	$37,275	Private	Co-ed	Rockville	MD
11	Washington International School (WIS)	1310 Official	1.82%	7.27%	$42,830	Private	Co-ed	Washington	DC
12	Stone Ridge School	1295 Official	Not reported	Not reported	$40,525	Private	Girls-only	Bethesda	MD
13	Landon School	1250 Official	2.74%	2.74%	$43,560	Private	Boys-only	Bethesda	MD
14	Georgetown Preparatory School	1386 Official	1.63%	Not reported	$71,515	Private	Boys-only	Bethesda	MD
15	Walt Whitman High School	1322 Official	2.24%	1.22%	$0	Public	Co-ed	Bethesda	MD
16	Richard Montgomery High School	1201 Official	6.34%	2.29%	$0	Magnet	Co-ed	Rockville	MD
17	Georgetown Visitation Preparatory School (Visi)	1317 Official	0.83%	Not reported	$30,100	Private	Girls-only	Washington	DC
18	St. Stephen's and St. Agnes School	1250 Official	Not reported	Not reported	$39,770	Parochial	Co-ed	Alexandria	VA
19	Winston Churchill High School	1252 Official	2.12%	0.88%	$0	Public	Co-ed	Potomac	MD
20	Madeira School	1319 Official	0.00%	Not reported	$62,000	Private	Girls-only	McLean	VA
21	School Without Walls	1272 Official	4.73%	4.73%	$0	Magnet	Co-ed	Washington	DC
22	Gonzaga College High School	1285 Official	1.73%	0.00%	$25,085	Private	Boys-only	Washington	DC
23	Edmund Burke School	1320 Official	Not reported	Not reported	$42,390	Private	Co-ed	Washington	DC
24	Sandy Spring Friends School	1288 Official	Not reported	Not reported	$53,195	Private	Co-ed	Sandy Spring	MD
25	Emerson Preparatory School	1213 Official	Not reported	Not reported	$29,425	Private	Co-ed	Washington	DC
26	Walter Johnson High School	1213 Official	0.51%	0.17%	$0	Public	Co-ed	Bethesda	MD
27	Bethesda-Chevy Chase (BCC) High School	1249 Official	1.72%	0.38%	$0	Public	Co-ed	Bethesda	MD
28	Thomas Wootton High School	1230 Official	2.06%	0.00%	$0	Public	Co-ed	Rockville	MD
29	McLean School	1110 Official	Not reported	Not reported	$50,295	Private	Co-ed	Potomac	MD
30	Montgomery Blair*	1142 Official	5.93%	1.84%	$0	Magnet / Public	Co-ed	Silver Spring	MD
31	Bullis School	1320 Official	0.90%	Not reported	$44,850	Private	Co-ed	Potomac	MD
32	Field School	1300 Official	Not reported	Not reported	$48,260	Private	Co-ed	Washington	DC
33	British School	1230 Official	Not reported	Not reported	$35,038	Private	Co-ed	Washington	DC
34	St. John's College High School	1230 Official	Not reported	Not reported	$23,975	Private	Co-ed	Washington	DC
35	Episcopal High School	1330 Official	Not reported	Not reported	$58,500	Parochial	Co-ed	Alexandria	VA

Methodology: ranking the best high schools

Factors

3 factors were weighted equally:

Average SAT (math and critical reading)
Average number of Presidential Scholar candidates
Average number of National Merit Scholarship semi-finalists

For many high schools, we also reported the average number of students who went on to attend 15 top colleges. This number was not included for ranking purposes. The schools included were Harvard, Yale, Princeton, MIT, Williams, Pomona, Swarthmore, Chicago, Johns Hopkins, Brown, Cornell, Dartmouth, Duke, the University of Chicago, and the University of Pennsylvania.

Each criterion was normalized by the min-max method to create raw scores:

x^t – min_c(x^t0) / (max_c(x^t0 – min_c(x^t0)).

High schools were ranked by raw score.

References

¹ SAT Average. Calculated by adding average Math Test and average Reading Test scores. Scores for all public high schools, all magnet high schools, National Cathedral School (NCS), Stone Ridge School, Gonzaga, St. Anselm’s, Washington International School, Holton-Arms, and Charles E. Smith Jewish Day School were obtained from the schools’ websites. Maret School scores were obtained from their 2015-16 Curriculum Guide. Scores for Sidwell, Emerson, Georgetown Day, and Georgetown Visitation were obtained from the Washington Examiner. Scores for other private high schools were obtained via private communication with school staff.

² National Merit Scholarship Semi-finalists. Calculated by dividing the number of 2018 class year National Merit Semi-finalists by the number of students in the 2018 class year.

³ Presidential Scholar Candidates. Calculated by dividing the number of 2018 class year presidential scholar candidates by the number of students in the 2018 class year.

⁴ Number attending 14 Top Colleges. This is an average of the percentage of students from each high school who went on to attend 14 top colleges from 2004 to 2014. The schools included were Harvard, Yale, Princeton, MIT, Williams, Pomona, Swarthmore, Johns Hopkins, Brown, Cornell, Dartmouth, Duke, the University of Chicago, and the University of Pennsylvania. The methods of obtaining this information were inspired by three different studies and included collecting the high schools’ self-reports and viewbooks from the 15 colleges. Education researcher Sam Tuo collected these data from 2004 to 2014.

*Note: Montgomery Blair was scored on the basis of its entire student body, rather than its magnet program alone, because magnet students at that school are mainstreamed in many classes.