As the birthplace of eight U.S. presidents and carrying a long history of its sons and daughters leaving school to serve in the federal government, Virginia’s public school systems are held to a high standard of academic excellence. Luckily, the state boasts some of the finest public school divisions (the term used to denote subsections of schools in Virginia, rather than “school district”) in the country.

Virginia’s top school division is Falls Church City Public Schools, administering five schools serving the Washington, D.C. suburb. FCCPS has an excellent, well earned reputation for academic excellence, recently boasting an on-time graduation rate of 100% and SAT scores over 200 points higher than the state average.

At #2 we have Arlington Public Schools, a large school division of over 30 schools and an enrollment topping 25K serving Arlington County, VA, which sits across the Potomac River from Washington, D.C. Students of this affluent county are known for their diversity, hailing from 122 nations and able to speak over 100 languages.

Ranking third is Loudoun Public Schools, a massive school division with enrollment topping 80K headquartered in Ashburn, VA. 2017 witnessed 40 LCPS students becoming National Merit Semifinalists.

Fairfax County Public Schools, the largest school division in the country, boasting an enrollment of over 180,000, ranks #4.

York County School Division, a modestly sized (for Virginia), yet high-performing school division, is #5. At 95.4%, YCSD’s 2017 graduation rate was over 4 points above Virginia’s already excellent statewide average.

Methodology

The following contributed to the ranking: student performance (math and reading test scores), dropout rates, school funding, and area poverty rates. Data was collected from a total of 9,577 school districts.

Did your district make the list?