Both Portage high schools make Newsweek list of nation’s best

Newsweek says Portage Central and Portage Northern high schools are in the top 6 percent of all high schools in the nation.The Challenge Index is designed to honor schools that have done the best job in persuading average students to take college-level courses and tests, Newsweek reports. There were 33 schools in Michigan to make the list.The ranking is based on the total number of Advanced Placement and International Baccalaureate or Cambrdige tests give at a school each year divided by the number of seniors graduating in June. Schools also are ranked on what the listmakers call Equity and Excellence — a percentage of all graduating seniors, including those who have never taken an AP course, who passed at least one AP test. The average Equity and Excellence rate in 2009 was 15.9 percent. At Central 45 percent passed  at least one AP test and Northern 39 percent did so.Excerpt:Each year, Newsweek picks the best high schools in the country based on how hard school staffs work to challenge students with advanced-placement college-level courses and tests. Just over 1,600 schools — only 6 percent of all the public schools in the U.S. — made the list. Check out the profiles by clicking on the name of any school in the list.Source: Newsweek