As the recent college-admissions scandal shows, some parents will do just about anything to get their children into an elite university. And while most don’t fake their child’s athletic records, it is why some lay out $40,000 or more a year for private high school. Or why they live in Montgomery or Fairfax County.
But which local high schools send the most students to elite colleges? Research done by PolarisList provides a bit of an answer.
PolarisList looked at which secondary schools across the country had the most alumni graduate, between 2015 and 2017, from Princeton, Harvard, and MIT—numbers 1, 2, and 3 in the most recent U.S. News & World Report national university rankings. (MIT is tied for 3 with Yale, Columbia, and the University of Chicago.)
The PolarisList is based on sheer numbers—how many total students, versus percentage of the student body, went to one of those three institutions—which may be one reason why larger schools top the list.
These are the 15 local high schools with the highest matriculation to Harvard, Princeton, and MIT.
Thomas Jefferson High School
Alexandria
Class size: 423
Harvard, 11; Princeton, 33; MIT, 35
Montgomery Blair
Silver Spring
Class size: 619
Harvard, 2; Princeton, 9; MIT, 10
Richard Montgomery
Rockville
Class size: 482
Harvard, 3; Princeton, 6; MIT, 11
Sidwell Friends (private)
DC
Class size: 121
Harvard, 10; Princeton, 6; MIT, 2
St. Albans (private)
DC
Class size: 77
Harvard, 10; Princeton, 3; MIT, 1
Winston Churchill
Potomac
Class size: 454
Harvard, 6; Princeton, 5; MIT, 2
National Cathedral School (private)
DC
Class size: 71
Harvard, 4; Princeton, 5; MIT, 3
Thomas S. Wootton
Rockville
Class size: 554
Harvard, 1; Princeton, 5; MIT, 6
Walt Whitman
Bethesda
Class size: 441
Harvard, 6; Princeton, 1; MIT, 4
Georgetown Day School (private)
DC
Class size: 125
Harvard, 7; Princeton, 1; MIT, 2
Maret (private)
DC
Class size: 80
Harvard, 7; Princeton, 3; MIT, 0
Walter Johnson
Bethesda
Class size: 543
Harvard, 3; Princeton, 4; MIT, 1
Landon (private)
Bethesda
Class size: 78
Harvard, 1; Princeton, 4; MIT, 2
Potomac School (private)
McLean
Class size: 97
Harvard, 2; Princeton, 4; MIT, 1
Eleanor Roosevelt
Greenbelt
Class size: 584
Harvard, 0; Princeton, 5; MIT, 1
This article appears in the October 2019 issue of Washingtonian.
Sherri Dalphonse joined Washingtonian in 1986 as an editorial intern, and worked her way to the top of the masthead when she was named editor-in-chief in 2022. She oversees the magazine’s editorial staff, and guides the magazine’s stories and direction. She lives in DC.
