Haven earned a spot in the top 20 public high schools in Pennsylvania, ranking 17th in the latest Niche rankings.
According to Patch.com, Haven ranked 10th in 2023. In 2024, Haven fell to 18th. This year, Haven managed to take one place back.
Niche is an online platform that seeks to help parents and students find schools and areas to live in that best fit their wants and needs.
“No other platform gives more time and attention to collecting and cleaning data than Niche. Our data analysts are dedicated to constantly reevaluating the data we collect to make certain our stats are up-to-date, accurate, and complete,” a Niche representative stated in an email.
Niche uses many factors to determine its rankings, including academics, culture and diversity, parent and student surveys, teachers, clubs and activities, resources and facilities, and sports. The most influential factor in the ranking is academics, weighing 60 percent.
Haven received an overall Niche grade of an A. While the highest grade was an A+ for Haven’s teachers, the lowest grades were a C for resources and facilities and a C+ for Haven’s food.
“Our teachers, academics, clubs and activities, these are all high scores, which makes a lot of sense to me. [It] resonates with me,” Principal Mr. Andrew Benzing said. “The food, that’s kind of funny, but [I’ve heard] it’s been amazing. The chef is trying a bunch of new things here recently, so that was kind of intriguing to me.”
These scores are based on information from the U.S. Department of Education and other available data. Surveys from students and parents play a role in each category, according to Niche’s methodology page.
“The Best Public High Schools ranking is based on rigorous analysis of academic and student life data from the U.S. Department of Education, along with test scores, college data, and ratings collected from millions of Niche users,” a Niche representative stated.
While Benzing acknowledged the importance of the survey data, he also expressed concern that it could skew the rankings.
“You get a certain element of response bias,” he said. “The people who are going to respond to any survey are people who feel really strongly about something one way or the other. So, is this a true measure of what we’re doing well and not?”
Niche claims there is “no direct pathway to improving a school’s ranking.” According to Niche, if schools want to increase their ranking, they have to score better in Niche’s scoring categories.
“It is based on a compilation of individual grades, which are then used to determine the ranking relative to other schools,” a Niche representative stated. “Without any changes in other schools’ performance, the way to increase a school’s ranking is to outperform surrounding schools in our scoring categories.”
Benzing is satisfied with the ranking but believes there are more important things than Niche rankings, like graduation rates and student growth.
“I would like to have 100 percent of the senior class graduate,” Benzing said. That seems like a reasonable expectation, and if we’re not reaching that, what more can we do as an education staff? We really value kids and getting them to grow from A to B, and sometimes this stuff runs against that.”
