Thursday, Oct. 19, 2017
AUGUSTA, Ga (WRDW/WAGT) -- Two local high schools are ranked among the best in Georgia and the Country according to a US News and World Report.
Davdison Fine Arts is ranked fourth in Georgia and number 118 nationally.
It's the Fine Arts part and a 100 percent Graduation Rate that separates them from the rest, but Greenbrier High School in Columbia County is also ranked pretty high at number 30 in the state.
With an orchestra, a band, and drama classes, Davidson Fine Arts is making its mark.
Prinicpal of Davidson Fine Arts said, "Students learn through the fine arts that they have to practice something over and over again, they're not going to get on stage without practicing and they're not going to go into the classroom and take a math test without practicing that."
Students at Davidson are hand-picked by a board, then they have to audition.
"Students try out in five different areas visual art, music, dance, creative writing and drama and then we drop the lowest score and those highest scores on a fine arts audition that's who gets in," said Kelly.
Giving Davidson the chance to pick from some of the best students in town, which not all schools get to do.
One county over, Greenbrier High School is also highly ranked.
Associate Superintendent for the Columbia County Board of Education Jeff Carney said, "They have a very strong student body there, I think it's the culture of the school the kids that go there and their parents are expecting to be prepared for college."
Greenbrier stands out from the other five high schools in Columbia County right now, but the board of education is working to improve them all.
"The NMSI grant that we just got for 2.7 million (dollars) is going to greatly expand the AP program at all the schools," said Carney.
Greenbrier's graduation rate is 98 percent which is high.
Carney said they are working on improving the other high schools' graduation rates, but right now the county's rate is 90 percent, which is still impressive.
