Academics
PVPHS has been designated within the state a California Distinguished School, and nationally a New American High School. It has a blue ribbon from the United States Department of Education.
PVPHS students matriculate to top colleges, including (in 2010), 1 student to Harvey Mudd College, 5 to MIT, 3 to Harvard, 2 to Yale, and 8 to Stanford.
Awards: • Ranked 89 by U.S. News & World Report out of (18,500) • Distinguished California School (four times) • National Blue Ribbon School (35 schools named of 18,500) • New American High School (one of ten named out of 18,500 schools) • Siemens Foundation Science Winner (one of four schools of over 27,000) • Newsweek recognition (#15 of 18,500 schools) • Wall Street Journal (top ten of 27,000 schools) • California Junior Classical League (several times)
PVPHS offers foreign language courses in Chinese (1,2,3, 3H, AP), French (1, 2, 3, 3H, 4AP, 5AP Literature, Projects), Japanese (1, 2, 3, 3H, 4, 4AP), Spanish (1, 2, 3, 3H, 4, 4AP, 5H), and Latin (1, 2, 3, 3H, 4, 4AP).
Courses at PVPHS go beyond the basics; the school offers classes such as Comparative Religions, Robotics, Aerospace Engineering, Sociology, Philosophy, Ethics, International Relations, Womens' Studies, Advanced Philosophy and Religion, Comparative Literature, Forensics (Debate), Mythology, Shakespeare, Advanced Calculus (H), Graphic Design, Foundations of Scientific Thought, Geology, Marine Biology (H), Art History, and more.
PVPHS is known for its strong test scores. For example, in SAT II Tests (out of 800), the average score at PVPHS is 706 in Chemistry, 754 in Chinese, 669 in Math Level II, and 768 in Japanese. The average SAT scores are 578 reading, 634 math, and 605 writing. The average composite ACT score at PVPHS is 27.2, significantly higher than in the state overall (22.2) or the country (21.0).
In May 2010 a total of 907 PVPHS students took 2076 Advanced Placement examinations in 30 different subjects. 83% of the scores were 3 or above. 39% of the student body was enrolled in Advanced Placement classes.
For the class of 2011, approximately 40 students have a GPA of 4.75–5.00, and 65 more have a GPA of 4.5–4.74.
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Famous quotes containing the word academics:
“Almost all scholarly research carries practical and political implications. Better that we should spell these out ourselves than leave that task to people with a vested interest in stressing only some of the implications and falsifying others. The idea that academics should remain “above the fray” only gives ideologues license to misuse our work.”
—Stephanie Coontz (b. 1944)
“Our first line of defense in raising children with values is modeling good behavior ourselves. This is critical. How will our kids learn tolerance for others if our hearts are filled with hate? Learn compassion if we are indifferent? Perceive academics as important if soccer practice is a higher priority than homework?”
—Fred G. Gosman (20th century)