Iowa City High, Washington, Linn-Mar make Newsweek ‘Beating the Odds’ list

Washington High School in Cedar Rapids, City High School in Iowa City and Linn-Mar High School are among the best high schools in the country for low-income students, according to a Newsweek ranking released this week.

The list - called 'Beating the Odds” - identifies schools based on a 'college readiness index,” a combination of students' college enrollment rate, graduation rate, enrollment in college level courses and SAT and ACT scores and retention rates, as well as the school's counselor-to-student ratio. Newsweek used data from the 2013-14 school year, it said.

The magazine then ranked 500 schools based on how they performed compared to the average for schools with the same percentage of students who qualified for free and reduced-price lunch, a common measure of poverty in schools.

City High ranked 210th on the list. Linn-Mar High ranked 388th, and Washington High ranked 427th.

Linn-Mar also was recognized because students who qualified for free or reduced-price lunch there performed at least at an average level on state tests.

At City High, 32 percent of students qualified for free or reduced-price lunch, according to the list. That number was 41 percent at Washington High and 15 percent at Linn-Mar High.

Other Eastern Iowa schools included on the list were Cascade Junior-Senior High School (198th), North Fayette High School (252nd) and Oelwein High School (437th).