Monmouth County High School Named Nation's Best STEM School

LINCROFT, NJ — Incredibly, for the fourth year in a row, and for the seventh time in the past eight years, High Technology High School in Lincroft was named the #1 best STEM school not only in New Jersey, but all of America.

The ranking was determined by U.S. News & World Report, and just released Wednesday. High Tech is a magnet high school for grades 9th through 12th grade that pulls kids from all over Monmouth County. You must apply to get in. High Tech has a graduation rate of 98 percent and a college readiness score of 100 percent out of 100. 100 percent of High Tech's students tested in AP subjects, with 99 percent of them passing. 97 percent passed in AP mathematics proficiency, and 94 percent passed in reading proficiency. You can read their bio on U.S. News & World Report here: https://www.usnews.com/educati...

High Tech was also named the 22nd best high school in the nation, overall (not just looking at STEM programs).

High Technology High School’s curriculum is engineering-centric, with courses in civil engineering and architecture, computer-integrated manufacturing and digital electronics. Students at High Technology High School can earn college credit for core coursework through partnerships with Rochester Institute of Technology, Georgian Court University and Brookdale Community College.

U.S. News’s STEM high school rankings looked at the the top 500 public schools from the overall rankings and then evaluated for the schools for student participation — and success — in Advanced Placement (AP) science and math tests.

AP is a College Board program that offers college-level courses at high schools. Students at these schools “must participate in and pass a robust curriculum of college-level math and science courses,” U.S. News says on its website.

For mathematics, AP courses include Calculus AB, Calculus BC, Computer Science A and Statistics. For science, AP courses include Biology, Chemistry, Environmental Science, Physics 1, Physics 2, Physics B, Physics C: Electricity and Magnetism and Physics C: Mechanics.

The rankings come as the U.S. finds itself lagging behind many other advanced industrial nations when it comes to math and science. In 2015, the Program for International Student Assessment, or PISA, ranked the U.S. 38th out of 71 countries for math literacy and 24th for science literacy. Among the 35 members of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, which sponsors the PISA initiative, America ranked 30th in math and 19th in science.

New Jersey, Texas and California each had at least two schools crack the top 10 overall for best STEM schools. New Jersey actually had three in the top ten:

1. High Technology High School (NJ)
2. BASIS Scottsdale (AZ)
3. Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology (VA)
4. Bergen County Academies (NJ)
5. The Early College at Guilford (NC)
6. Science and Engineering Magnet School (TX)
7. Monta Vista High (CA)
8. Union County Magnet High School (NJ)
9. Saratoga High (CA)
10. DeBakey High School for Health Professions (TX)

Click here to read more about the methodology.

Patch reporters Dan Hampton and Feroze Dhanoa contributed to this report. Shutterstock image