Most challenging school in CMS? Think artistic ...

Washington Post education writer Jay Mathews has posted his 2013 rankings of the nation's most challenging high schools, and you might be surprised at the highest-ranking school in Charlotte-Mecklenburg.

High-performing neighborhood schools like Myers Park and Ardrey Kell made the list,  as did Harding, Cato and Berry,  schools with academic admission requirements. But topping them all was Northwest School of the Arts,  a magnet in West Charlotte that auditions students for their passion for music, theater, dance or visual art.

Mathews

For 15 years, Mathews has been ranking schools based on participation in Advanced Placement and International Baccalaureate exams.  He creates a ratio by dividing the number of exams given that year by the number of seniors who graduated.  About 1,900 schools with a ratio of at least 1.0  --  that is, as many exams as graduates  --  made the list.  He explains that he doesn't take scores on those exams into account because he found that schools were inflating performance by limiting participation to top students. "The Challenge Index is designed to identify schools that have done the best job in persuading average students to take college-level courses and tests," he writes.

Thomas Jefferson Classical Academy, a Cleveland County charter school,  got the best ranking in the Charlotte region,  landing  at No. 125 with 4.8 exams per graduate.  Northwest was at No. 593 with a 2.6 ratio,  immediately followed by Gray Stone Day School, a Stanly County charter.  Myers Park High was the next CMS school on the list, at 739.

The ratings aren't all that impressive for a district that used to routinely land a handful in Mathews'  Top 100.  That was when the district paid fees for all students to take the AP and IB exams.  That subsidy was scaled back during the recession;  Superintendent Heath Morrison is seeking $1.2 million from Mecklenburg County to revive that payment  and start paying for career-tech exams.

Here are the other Charlotte-area high schools that made the list.  They're in CMS unless otherwise noted:
809. Ardrey Kell.
956. South Meck.
1035. Providence.
1188. Butler.
1211. East Meck.
1287. North Meck.
1295. Lake Norman (Iredell-Statesville Schools).
1299. Harding.
1455. Cato Middle College.
1600. Hough.
1615. Berry.
1865. Mallard Creek.
1881. Olympic Biotech.