Six comprehensive high schools in the William S. Hart Union High School District offering grades 9-12 (Canyon, Golden Valley, Hart, Saugus, Valencia and West Ranch) have been ranked in the top 13 percent of public high schools in the country by U.S. News & World Report.

The publication’s Best High Schools Rankings, released Tuesday, compared the Hart District’s high schools against nearly 18,000 public high schools in all 50 states and the District of Columbia using six factors: college readiness; math and reading proficiency; math and reading performance; underserved student performance; college curriculum breadth; graduation rate.

“We are so proud that our school sites are once again being recognized as outstanding places for students to prepare for their next step in life,” said Mike Kuhlman, superintendent of the Hart School District. “The US News and World Report honor acknowledges the outstanding efforts of students staff and parents working together to achieve great things.”

The rankings of the Hart District schools are:

• West Ranch High School (#840 nationally {top 5%}, #113 in California)
• Saugus (1,126 nationally, 163 in California)
• Canyon (1,959/279)
• Valencia (2,014/286)
• Hart (2,316/335)
• Golden Valley (2,359/343).

The rankings noted AP participation rate, graduation rate and college readiness. By virtue of being a middle college high school, Academy of the Canyons does not offer AP classes (which goes against them on the magazine’s ranking system), but instead their students take college classes concurrently with their high school coursework. Every student in the Hart School District has the opportunity to take concurrent classes at College of the Canyons.

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