Northwest region rules ranking of state's high schools

Haas Hall Academy remained the top high school in Arkansas for the fifth straight year and rocketed up the list of the nation's best in the latest rankings of high schools by U.S. News & World Report.

Six of the state's top nine high schools are in Benton and Washington counties. The state's top three remained unchanged from last year, with Bentonville High School ranking second and Rogers High School ranking third.

Haas Hall, a charter school with campuses in Fayetteville and Bentonville, moved up the national list from No. 175 last year to No. 116 this year. Its rank as the 41st best charter school in the nation also was an improvement from No. 51 last year.

"We strive to be the best," said Martin Schoppmeyer, Haas Hall's founder and superintendent. "Our goal is to be first in the nation."

Schoppmeyer attributed the rapid rise in the national ranking to the increased number of Advanced Placement tests the school gave and its improved performance on those tests.

Bentonville High School also saw a modest improvement nationally, rising from No. 886 to No. 837 this year.

Greenbrier High School, located about 45 minutes north of Little Rock, ranked fourth in the state this year. It didn't finish in the top 10 last year but placed seventh on the 2014 state list.

Lakeside High School in Hot Springs ranked fifth on the state list this year, dropping one place from last year.

U.S. News recognizes high schools with gold, silver and bronze medals, with gold medals indicating the greatest level of college readiness. Maryland had this year's highest percentage of schools that received gold or silver medals at 28.9 percent. Arkansas ranked 35th at 10.3 percent, up from 8.5 percent last year.

There are 95 Arkansas schools honored in the 2016 U.S. News Best High Schools rankings, including one gold medal school, 28 silver medal schools and 66 bronze medal schools.

The online publication used a four-step process to determine the nation's best high schools, according to U.S. News website.

The first step was assessing whether each school's students were performing better than statistically expected for students in that state. The second step determined whether disadvantaged students -- black, Hispanic and low-income -- were outperforming disadvantaged students in the rest of the state.

In step three, schools had to meet a certain benchmark for graduation rate. Schools that made it through the first three steps became eligible to be judged on college-readiness performance using Advanced Placement or International Baccalaureate test data.

U.S. News determined the School for the Talented and Gifted in Dallas to be the No. 1 high school in the country.

Three of Arkansas' top eight high schools are in Rogers. They included Rogers High School, Heritage High School and Arkansas Arts Academy's high school.

Robert Moore, the Rogers district's assistant superintendent for secondary instruction, said the district's charter school, New Technology High School, also fared well, earning a bronze medal.

"They're still in their infancy," Moore said. "(Principal Lance Arbuckle) doesn't have a lot of AP scores because his school is growing, so when he starts having more AP scores he should climb that ranking as well."

Moore likes the U.S. News rankings because of how many different things they take into account.

"To see Rogers High and Heritage High in the top 10 and basically the top five, it reaffirms for us that we're doing the right things," Moore said. "It's a testament to the hard work of the principals, the teachers, the parents and everyone else involved in those schools."

Springdale High School finished ninth in the state rankings this year, the first time a Springdale school has cracked the top 10 in the five years U.S. News has published high school rankings.

NW News on 04/21/2016