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Polk IB High School Ranks No. 7 On U.S. News' Top 100 List

Tribune photo by JIM REED

Tampa Bay Tech students have something to cheer about. Their school earned a silver medal in U.S. News and World Report's ranking of the top 100 high schools in the country.

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TBO.com

Published: December 5, 2008

Updated: 12/05/2008 09:19 am

TAMPA - Tampa's Plant High School has much to brag about, but it's a school in Polk County that made U.S. News & World Report's list of the top 100 high schools in the United States.

The International Baccalaureate School at Bartow High School is rated No. 7 in the nation. The top high school in the country is Thomas Jefferson High School for Sciences and Technology in Alexandria, Va., according to the report.

U.S. News used data on 21,069 public schools from the 2006-07 school year, looking first at performance on each state's high school exams (such as the FCAT) vs. the percentage of low-income students, then at the performance of minorities and low-income students on tests and finally, how well they prepared students for college, looking at Advanced Placement and IB test data.

Bartow High's IB school gained its ranking based on both AP and IB tests. Last year, the IB program ranked No. 3.

The top 100 high schools were awarded gold medals. The next 504 top-performing schools earned silver medals. An additional 1,321 were awarded bronze medals.

Looking only at Florida schools, silver medals went to:

Hillsborough's Tampa Bay Tech High School

Lois Cowles Harrison Center for the Visual and Performing Arts in Polk County

Palm Harbor University High in Pinellas County

A bronze medal went to Hillsborough's Robinson High School.

Plant High School, which has been named a Newsweek top 100 high school for the past four years, is not on the U.S. News list. Nor are Hillsborough High or the Center for Advanced Technologies in St. Petersburg, which were also on Newsweek's list this year.

For information on the U.S. News rankings, go to www.usnews.com/sections/education/high-schools/ind....

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