U.S. News & World Report has selected the Harmony School of Innovation Katy as the top high school in the greater Katy area, in last week's highly prestigious annual ranking of Top High Schools in America, Harmony Public Schools announced on August 19.

The campus at 21650 Bellaire Blvd. in Richmond ranked as the number one high school in the Katy area as well as the number one high school in Harmony Houston’s west high school division; the school ranked number nine among the Houston metro area high schools, 45th in Texas, 72nd in charter high schools and 335th in the nation according to the publication’s website. Schools are ranked on their performance on state0required test, graduation rate and how well they prepare students for college, according to the website.

In determining its top schools, U.S. News & World Report looks at a variety of factors, including college readiness (30 per cent), math and reading proficiency (20 per cent), math and reading performance (20 per cent), underserved student performance (10 per cent), and college curriculum breadth (10 per cent), Harmony Public Schools said in their press release.

Harmony School of Innovation Katy’s senior class size is 111 students with 47 per cent of all students being economically disadvantaged.

Seven Harmony Public High Schools were ranked the Top High School in their city. In total, 13 Harmony campuses were ranked within the Top 10 in their communities, including Harmony School of Innovation-Sugar Land. All eligible Harmony high schools statewide made the U.S. News rankings, the charter school system said.

Harmony also had five campuses place among the Top 100 high schools in Texas:

· Harmony School of Innovation-Katy (45)

· Harmony School of Discovery-Houston (54)

· Harmony Science Academy-El Paso (57)

· Harmony School of Innovation-Sugar Land (80)

· Harmony Science Academy-Euless (99)

Harmony was also the top-ranked charter school in Austin, Pflugerville, Euless, Dallas, Garland, El Paso, Houston and Sugar Land, in addition to Katy.

Harmony's curriculum places a heavy focus on STEM skills, Character Education, project-based learning and college readiness. The system has a 98 percent graduation rate for its high school seniors, and 100 percent college acceptance rate among its graduating seniors.