By Patricia Bogumil
Editor
Waterford High School leaders credit the efforts of local educators; the Waterford-area community in general; and students and their families in particular for the high school again being named by Newsweek magazine as one of the top high schools in the country.
“It’s nice to make the list again, for the second year in a row,” said Superintendent Keith Brandstetter.
For 2013, Newsweek ranked what it considers to be the best 2,000 public high schools in the nation – those that have proven to be the most effective in turning out college-ready graduates.
The list is based on six components: graduation rate (25 percent of total score), college acceptance rate (25 percent), Advanced Placement (AP) and other high-level tests taken per student (25 percent), average SAT/ACT national test scores (10 percent), average AP scores (10 percent), and percent of students enrolled in at least one advanced course (5 percent).
This year, Waterford is ranked 1,033 out of Newsweek’s best 2,000 selected schools in the country, a ranking which is 18th in the state.
Last year, when the Newsweek list ranked 1,000 schools nationally, Waterford came in at 996.
Brandstetter described the high school’s achievement as “a whole effort, with everybody working together.”
He explained that not only does the high school offer excellent programs, but staff work to motivate students to strive and excel, and students react to that encouragement by reaching and achieving higher personal goals.
Also, it doesn’t hurt that Waterford’s feeder schools – and the community in general – send students to the high school prepared to learn, as confirmed on state standardized tests (see state tests graph, below).
And, not surprisingly, the high school’s four-year graduation rate tops that of all high schools in the Southern Lakes Conference (see graduation rate graph, below).
Waterford earned its 2013 ranking in the Newsweek America’s Best High Schools list for:
• Graduation rate: 99 percent;
• AP tests taken per student: 0.3;
• College-bound: 87 percent;
• Average ACT score: 22.6;
• Average AP test score: 3.1.
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Why can’t BASD do as well? BASD has a $6926.90 higher wage & benefit package than Waterford Union High including the feeder schools based on FULTIME TEACHING EQUIVALENT (FTE ) per the 2011-2012 DPI report from the 3rd Saturday in September 2012
That is an excellent question Mr. Ketterhagen asks. I think the way to approach such a question would be to analyze what Waterford is doing right that would lead to such positive results and attempt to implement them. The comment on benefits is not irrelevant. You have to address staff benefits as a matter of course. It is just not very relevant to this question. Maybe that is a partial answer.
Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that the Burlington Area Schools has a 27% higher incidence of free and reduced lunch within our student population. But being the well researched school board member you are, you already knew that, otherwise your previous comment would make you look foolishly narrow minded. The only other district with a higher incidence of free and reduced lunch is Delavan. It is time you broaden your scope and take into account other factors that affect student achievement.