According to U.S. News, Madison’s ranking for 2023 has dropped to 12th in the state and 718th in the nation. This significant drop in the school ranking has raised some questions about how the ranks are determined and how much they matter.
Many students at Madison over stress about things at school, whether that be tests, grades or college admissions. Many juniors and seniors, even some sophomores, are worried about getting into a good college. While some Madison students may worry that the drop in ranking could affect their eligibility, some Madison officials suggest that there’s no reason for concern.
“School ratings are an arbitrary way of attempting to compare schools based on a variety of data points,” Madison Director of Student Services Timothy Buckley said.
There are many different organizations that rank schools, and each one uses different data points to develop the rankings. US News is a trusted source for ranking, and they use factors like total enrollment to determine Madison’s ranking. Madison has a total of 2,212 students enrolled, the largest class being the class of 2025 with 594 students and the smallest class being the class of 2026 with 514 students. Another way that Madison’s ranking is decided is by student diversity and gender distribution. 60% of students are white and there is a 50-50 split between females and males.
Test scores are also looked at when deciding a school ranking. Madison’s AP and SOL test scores are important tests that compare to other schools. On average, Madison performs best in science with an average percent of 86% in comparison to math which has 80% and reading with only 72%. Madison’s AP participation rates may be what caused the ranking to drop.
“Madison seems to have quite a few students who choose to opt out of their exams thus lowering our participation rate,” Buckley said.
In the past, students would not receive the GPA bump given through AP courses if they opted out of their exams. Now that students can get the bump regardless of their participation in the test, many students are not taking it, which may be causing the ranking to drop.
According to US News, Madison’s ranking has been dropping in both the state and national levels since 2019. In Virginia, Madison was ranked seventh in the state, and now it is ranked 12th. While this may not seem like a huge difference, it is still significant to drop out of the top ten high schools in the state. The drop in national rankings was more severe: 261st in 2019, 361st in 2022, and now 718th as of 2023 rankings.
Many students who are applying to college worry that Madison’s ranking will affect their acceptance. While seniors and juniors have many things to worry about, Madison’s ranking should be the least of their worries. The rankings are there to bring attention to good qualities a school has in comparison to others. Some schools have amazing academics like Thomas Jefferson High school, some have great arts programs such as Coogan High School, other schools are exceptional in sports like Madison.
“I cannot stress this enough that no college admissions officers are looking at the many various ratings that exist.” Buckley said.
Dozens of admission representatives have shared what they look at in an applicant, yet none of them mentioned a school national ranking. Colleges are more interested in looking into school specifics. Admission officers like to see what extracurriculars are offered, as well as how students perform on the AP, SATs and other nationally scored tests. Despite Colleges not caring about your schools ranking, students participation in activities is the main factor for Madison’s ranking. Students don’t need to
“I personally and professionally do not think this is an issue or concern that the students should be worried about. However, if they are so inclined, they can participate in all the AP Exams for the courses that they are taking,” says Timothy Buckley.
Madison has a lot of students who opt out of the AP exams. This has caused Madison’s ranking to progressively drop over time. While students don’t need to worry about Madison’s ranking the best thing they can do is take their AP exams.
Despite many people believing that Madison’s ranking is an important part of college admission, many colleges do not actually care about the ranking of a high school. Many students go to a school they are zoned in, they don’t usually have a choice in where they go.Therefore, colleges don’t care and neither should you.