14. The Bronx High School of Science
The Bronx High School of Science, located on West 205th Street, Bedford Park, Bronx, is on the top of most lists in New York’s who’s-who of the best high schools. Also one of New York City’s eight specialized schools, the 3,000-plus students have a nearly perfect graduation rate and post-secondary enrollment rate, according to statistics compiled in a list of the best high schools in New York compiled by the New York Post.
Bronx High School of Science notes that eight Nobel laureates, more than any other secondary school in the world, have graduated from the school, according to the school’s website, with seven prizes awarded in physics, and one awarded in chemistry as recently as 2012 to Robert J. Lefkowitz.
From 1947 through 1978, Bronx High School of Science graduates have been awarded six Pulitzer Prizes. Eight alumni have also won the National Medal of Science, bestowed by the President of the United States, from the years 1991 through 2011.
Graduation requirements for Bronx High School of Science include passing the New York State Regents exams in the fields of English, Global History, U.S. History, Biology, Chemistry, Physics, Integrated Algebra, Geometry, and Algebra 2 and Trigonometry, and any Foreign Language; 99.7% of Bronx High School of Science students graduate. SAT scores average 1969.
The school opened in 1938, serving an all-male alumni from largely Eastern European Jewish families then living in the Bronx, reports the NY Times. Today, the demographics of the school favor Asian male and female students, many of whom commute from nearby Queens and other parts of New York City.
The school is home to a $1 million Holocaust Museum and Studies Center, initially opened in 1978 as a one room display; it was reopened on April 19, 2013 after 12 years of preparation, and features 900 artifacts from the Holocaust.
