Newsweek Ranking: Fairfax County Public School No. 1 in the Nation

FAIRFAX COUNTY, VA — Newsweek is out Thursday with its top high schools in the country list, and a local public school ranks No. 1 in the nation.

Fairfax County Public Schools’ Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology in Fairfax County took home this year's honors. The magazine ranks the school at 100 percent for college readiness and high school graduation rate and 99.8 percent for "college bound."

The school, located at 6560 Braddock Road in Fairfax County (see map below), was established in 1985 and is a STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) school. Students have high-tech equipment at their fingertips, including 3-D printers (14), plasma cutters, refractrometers and ultrasonic probes, according to their student-run Web site, Jefferson Insiders. Evan M. Glazer, former director of Roanoke Valley Governor's School for Science and Technology, is principal of the school.

Also read: Newsweek's Top Public High Schools 2016: 4 Virginia Schools Rank Among the Best

The school had 164 semifinalists and 34 winners in this year's National Merit Corporation Scholarships. Last year, Pooja Chandrashekar, 17, a student at the school with a 4.57 GPA and 2390 score (out of 2400) on her SAT, looked over offers from Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Cornell, Dartmouth, Columbia, Brown and the University of Pennsylvania. (She went with Harvard.)

As the Governor's School for Science and Technology in Northern Virginia, the school is also supported by the Virginia Department of Education. Unlike other magnet schools, TJHSST has a four-year, full day program.

In recent years, local business leaders and Jefferson parents have formed the Jefferson Partnership Fund to help raise money to maintain and equip labs and classrooms in the school.

In addition to providing a specialized education for selected students in Fairfax County, Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology also serves other school districts, including Arlington, Loudoun and Prince William counties, as well as the cities of Fairfax and Falls Church.

The TJHSST Admissions Office is located at FCPS Gatehouse Administration Center and operates independently from the school. You can visit the TJHSST Admissions Office website for information on applying. Applications for the Class of 2021 will become available Sept. 19. An open house is held each spring.

In April, a competing national high school survey by U.S. News & World Report ranked "T.J." fifth best in the nation, down two notches from third best in the country in 2015.

The school has been undergoing renovations for the past few years, and they are expected to be completed by December. Watch this virtual walk-through of the school's new building, expected to be completed at the end of this year; the video was created by Fairfax County Public Schools:

PHOTO: Thomas Jefferson High School photo from Patch archive