Both high schools in North Kitsap have earned national recognition on the U.S. News & World Report Best High Schools List.

For the third consecutive year, Kingston High School has received the highly coveted national ranking. Kingston ranked in the top 6 percent of high schools nationally, earning a silver medal and a place on the National 2015 Best High Schools List. North Kitsap High School earned bronze medal recognition for the first time, placing it among the top 20 percent of high schools nationwide.

Top-performing schools are selected using a comprehensive rankings methodology, which is based on the key principles that a great high school must serve all of its students well, and that it must be able to produce measurable academic outcomes to show the school is successfully educating its student body.

A three-step process determines the best high schools. The first two steps ensure that the schools serve all of their students well, using their performance on the math and reading parts of their state proficiency tests as the benchmarks. For those schools that make it past the first two steps, a third step assesses the degree to which schools prepare students for college-level work.

Kingston High School ranked 36 out of 458 high schools in Washington, and 1,297 out of 19,753 high schools in the nation.

Principal Christy Cole said, “This is an extraordinary accomplishment, and is a direct reflection of the hard work of our students, the dedication of our teachers and the support and guidance of our parents. Thank you to our entire Kingston community.”

For more information, visit nkschools.org.