La Cañada High grads head for elite colleges
Members of the La Cañada High School Class of 2012 — who received their diplomas Wednesday — are poised to carry on the school tradition of enrolling at top-flight colleges and universities across the country.
District officials are compiling an online survey of admissions offers, with the results to be released in the fall. But early, self-reported numbers show 2012 shaping up as another strong year for local grads, officials said.
As in past years, 99% of this year’s 326 graduates will pursue higher education, said La Cañada High School college counselor Sally Spangler. About 78% will attend four-year institutions, with the balance enrolling at community colleges.
Perhaps the most distinguishing attribute of this year’s graduating class is the variety of schools they plan to attend, Spangler said. Students are lined up to study at prestigious institutions near and far, from Caltech in Pasadena to Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore.
“The class did extremely well in the most competitive year in the college admissions process ever,” Spangler said. “They are attending schools across the country.”
Members of the Class of 2012 were “bold” in their choice of schools, she noted.
“They really seemed to have chosen schools based on a fit for them,” Spangler said.
La Cañada High School does not recognize a valedictorian or salutatorian, instead honoring the students in the top 5% of the class in terms of cumulative grade-point average, La Cañada Unified School District Board President Scott Tracy said.
Among this year’s 16 top scholars, four are headed to UCLA, two to Harvard, and one each to Caltech, Georgetown, Princeton, UC Berkeley, Brigham Young University, Carleton College, Claremont McKenna College, UC San Diego, the University of Pennsylvania and USC.
Other students among the Class of 2012 have reported plans to enroll at institutions including Dartmouth, Cornell, the University of Chicago, Tufts and Arizona State.
A substantial contingent of graduating seniors will attend USC and the nine University of California campuses, Tracy said.
“The success of our students is a reflection of the community’s support for our public schools,” Tracy said. “Recruiters of highly selective colleges view La Cañada High as an elite public school based on the qualifications of our students and their contributions to the colleges, once enrolled.”