It’s not a traditional powerhouse like Stuyvesant High School (#31) or Bronx Science (#58).

It has a specific theme, but it’s not the High School for Dual Language and Asian Studies (#52), New Explorations Science, Technology, and Math School (#64), or the High School for Law and Public Service (#75).

To enroll, you don’t have to take the Specialized High School Admissions Test (SHSAT), so it’s not Staten Island Tech (#34) or Brooklyn Tech (#63).

It’s not tied to a post-secondary institution, so it’s not Queens High School for the Sciences at York College (#81), or the High School of American Studies at Lehman College (#19).

It is in Queens but it’s not Townsend Harris (#33), or the Baccalaureate School for Global Education (#35),

Stumped?

The answer, coming in at #6 with a whopping College Readiness Index of 100, is Newcomers High School in Long Island City, Queens.  Known as something of an academic Ellis Island and located not far across the East River from the United Nations, Newcomers High School aims to fulfill on the mission created at its founding: to greet recent immigrants to the U.S. of one year or less with high expectations and rigorous support.

To be fair, the criteria for the numerical ranking is based on a scale called the College Readiness Index, which is limited in its scope.   Described as the measure of the degree to which students master college level material, the index only considers total participation and percentage of passing scores on AP exams (or IB exams, where applicable) in its determination of college readiness.  Not quite a complete picture.

Data was included from 21,786 public high schools in 48 states (NE and OK did not submit) and DC, mainly from the 2007-2008 school year.

View the rankings:

http://www.usnews.com/articles/education/high-schools/2009/12/09/americas-best-high-schools-gold-medal-list.html