Avalon on U.S. News and World Report List of America’s Best High Schools for 4th Year!

Avalon School has been listed once again by the U.S. News and World Report magazine as one of the best high schools in the United States. Avalon is listed as receiving the Bronze Award in the April 23, 2014 on-line edition of the national publication. The school was also listed as a Bronze Award Recipient in 2008, 2010, and 2012.

According to the article, the rankings were produced as U. S. News teamed up with the Washington D.C. based American Institutes for Research (AIR), one of the largest behavioral and social science research organizations in the world.

“AIR implemented U. S. News’s comprehensive rankings methodology, which is based on the key principles that a great high school must serve all of its students well, not just those who are college-bound, and that it must be able to produce measurable academic outcomes to show the school is successfully educating its student body across a range of performance indicators.”, the website states.

The methodology used in the 2013 Best High Schools rankings was unchanged from the 2012 edition. Criteria used were the school’s reading and math testing statistics as compared to overall state statistics. The next step evaluated how economically disadvantaged and minority populations performed as compared to the state average. The final step evaluated performance on Advanced Placement and IB exams. Of 1,870 high schools in Texas, only 410 schools in Texas were awarded either a Bronze, Silver or Gold award.

AIR analyzed more than 21,000 public high schools in 49 states and the District of Columbia. This is the total number of public high schools that had 12th grade enrollment and sufficient data from the 2011-2012 school year to analyze.

Superintendent Dr. David Del Bosque gives credit for these accomplishments to the teachers, staff, students and administrators of the district. Avalon ISD has been rated as a “Recognized” school district by the Texas Education Agency for the past seven years. :Awards such as these affirm that as a district we teach all students , regardless of whom that child is or what background they may come from. We believe that every child comes to us with their own educational and personal experiences and that we build on that. We believe strongly in the potentiality of the individual child as well as the collective strength of the whole student body.”

For more information about the list of the best high schools in the country, go to http://www.usnews.com/education/best-high-schools. The online edition includes a complete list of schools and a search by state.

“We are excited and honored by this national listing.” “We are very proud of our school district and all that its students have accomplished throughout the year.”