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The entrance exam scores have arrived for the incoming class of students at the city’s specialized high schools, and it seems that Brooklyn Tech has fallen from 5th to 7th in popularity with the city’s young brainiacs. Once part of the New York City high school triumvirate along with the likes of Stuyvesant and Bronx Science, Brooklyn Tech’s popularity with high-scoring students has been chipped away by smaller, newly formed schools like Staten Island Tech and the High School for Math, Science and Engineering at City College.
As long as the 8th and 9th grade students who take the city’s Specialized High Schools Admissions Test reach a school’s cut-off score and space remains, they can choose which school they would like to attend (LaGuardia High School for the arts does not participate in the written exam). Over the past few years, Brooklyn Tech has seen the test scores of its incoming students drop as they select one of the other six schools instead of Tech. Stuyvesant continues to lead in average test scores, and is 61 points over runner-up Bronx Science.
Brooklyn Tech’s principal defended the school, asserting that the lower ranking in test scores is due to the large size of the school, which reflects a larger pool of students. The school’s enrollment of almost 4,500 students is 1,400 to 4,000 more than the other specialized high schools. Below is a list of the city’s specialized high schools, along with their years of formation:
High School of American Studies at Lehman College (2002)
Bronx High School of Science (1938)
Brooklyn Latin School (2006)
Brooklyn Technical High School (1922)
Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts (consolidated 1984)
High School for Math, Science and Engineering at City College (2002)
Queens High School for the Sciences at York College (2002)
Staten Island Technical High School (1988)
Stuyvesant High School (1904)
