HISD’s Carnegie, Bellaire, Lamar high schools place well in US News rankings

Eleven schools in the Houston Independent School District were ranked in U.S. News and World Reports prestigious list of Best High Schools in the United States.  The rankings include more than 4,700 of the top high schools in the country.

Carnegie Vanguard, the district’s flagship high school for gifted and talented students cracked the top 25 nationally, ranking 23^rd on the list. IT was also ranked third in Texas.

Locally on the southwest side, Bellaire High School ranked 54^th best in Texas and 494^th nationally, while Lamar High School was 65^th in the state and 564^th nationally.

Vanguard, which was also ranked as the third-best magnet school in the country, is an application only school, while both Bellaire and Lamar are locally zone schools with magnet programs that attract applications from across the district.

Other HISD schools in the rankings were DeBakey High School for Health Professions, Eastwood Academy, The High School for the Performing and Visual Arts, Challenge Early High School, High School for Law Enforcement and Criminal Justice, Lamar, East Early College High School and the Houston Academy for International Studies.

U.S. News and World Report compiles the annual rankings based on a three-step process. The first two steps take into account proficiency scores on reading and math exams for both the general student population and specifically disadvantaged students. The final step incorporates data on participation and scores on Advanced Placement and International Baccalaureate Exams to measure college preparedness. The detailed methodology can be found here.