Scarsdale Senior High School, Scarsdale NY

Original Research by School Decision on Scarsdale Senior High School

Scarsdale Senior High School sits on Post Road in one of the most consistently affluent residential villages in the New York metropolitan area, serving grades nine through twelve for the Scarsdale Union Free School District. Its enrollment places it in a comfortable range for a four-year suburban comprehensive high school, with a roughly even distribution across grade levels.

The student body is predominantly white, with a substantial Asian population, a smaller Hispanic share, and very small Black and other minority enrollments. Free and reduced-price lunch data was not reported, which is common in very low-poverty districts where participation is minimal. English learner and special education rates were also not available in the data provided.

On the academic side, state assessment proficiency data and graduation rate figures were not available in the dataset, so a direct comparison relative to other districts in Westchester County cannot be made from these numbers. That absence is worth naming plainly rather than leaving a reader to guess. What is publicly reported about Scarsdale High School speaks to a school with a long-standing reputation for rigorous college-preparatory academics, and the district's grading practices are themselves a live topic: beginning in the 2023-24 school year, the high school moved to a cumulative rolling gradebook that eliminates per-marking-period percentages, meaning a student's grade at any point reflects cumulative performance across the year rather than discrete quarterly snapshots. A common online gradebook giving students real-time access was added for the 2025-26 year. Parents evaluating the school should understand this is a genuine shift in grading philosophy, and community reception has been mixed.

The district recently passed a substantial capital bond to renovate aging facilities across all seven schools, publicly reported as the district's largest such investment and a departure from its traditional tax-neutral approach to debt. Expiring debt is being replaced at a significantly higher level, and estimates suggest the median homeowner will see a meaningful annual tax increase. For families considering a move to Scarsdale specifically because of the schools, this is a real carrying-cost factor alongside the already very high housing market.

That housing market is striking on its own terms. Home values in the Scarsdale zip code sit dramatically above both the state and national benchmarks, and the gap is wide rather than marginal. Monthly rental costs, where rentals exist, run at levels that make the rent-to-income ratio essentially impractical relative to national norms. The county inventory has tightened over the past year, with new listings down, and homes are selling faster than a year ago. This is not a market a buyer enters casually.

Scarsdale itself is a compact, architecturally controlled village with a Tudor-style commercial center near the Metro-North Harlem Line station, which connects to Midtown in a relatively short ride and is publicly reported as among the busiest stations in the county. Civic life runs through the library, a farmers market, the Music Festival, and roughly ten neighborhood parks with pools, tennis, and sports facilities. Walkability is genuinely good only near the downtown core; most of the residential neighborhoods require a car. The village is essentially built out, with new residential construction mostly teardown-and-rebuild single-family homes at very high price points. There is one new affordable multifamily development, a 45-unit project in the Edgemont section that opened in 2025. Downtown retail has faced pressure, with publicly reported closures prompting a formal revitalization committee.

The five residential neighborhoods feeding the school, Heathcote, Quaker Ridge, Greenacres, Fox Meadow, and Edgewood, each feed one of the district's five elementary schools, so the community structure and the school structure are tightly intertwined. That neighborhood-to-school pipeline shapes the social environment students arrive with at the high school level.

Discipline data, attendance figures, course access details, and staffing ratios were not available in the data, leaving meaningful gaps in the picture of day-to-day school environment. A parent wanting specifics on AP breadth, counseling ratios, or extracurricular depth would need to go directly to the school or district.

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Academic performance

How students graduate and prepare for what comes next.

Graduation rate (ACGR)

>=99%Cohort of 374 students · Class of 2021

The federal source publishes a banded range instead of an exact rate when the graduating cohort is small enough that an exact number could risk identifying individual students.

How this school compares to all schools in this state

Each dot is one school’s SY 2020-21 graduation rate, binned by integer rate. Taller columns mean more schools at that rate. This school is highlighted.

1,253 schools plotted. 14 additional schools' rates are federally suppressed and not shown. Data: EDFacts SY 2020-21.

Advanced Placement & IB

32 subjects offered · 2023-24

Each card is one AP or IB subject. The headline number is the share of students scoring 3 or higher on the exam — the threshold for college credit at most universities. The bar below each rate shows the underlying distribution across performance levels.

Score:12· no credit345· extremely well qualified

Math and Computer Science

Calculus AB

91 tested

95.6%

scored 3 or higher

Calculus BC

46 tested

100.0%

scored 3 or higher

Computer Science A

33 tested

100.0%

scored 3 or higher

Computer Science Principles

3 tested

0.0%

scored 3 or higher

Statistics

116 tested

94.0%

scored 3 or higher

Sciences

Biology

19 tested

78.9%

scored 3 or higher

Chemistry

17 tested

94.1%

scored 3 or higher

Environmental Science

3 tested

0.0%

scored 3 or higher

Physics 1

28 tested

71.4%

scored 3 or higher

Physics 2

2 tested

0.0%

scored 3 or higher

Physics C: Electricity and Magnetism

6 tested

0.0%

scored 3 or higher

Physics C: Mechanics

56 tested

83.9%

scored 3 or higher

History and Social Sciences

European History

1 tested

0.0%

scored 3 or higher

Human Geography

1 tested

0.0%

scored 3 or higher

Macroeconomics

71 tested

93.0%

scored 3 or higher

Microeconomics

10 tested

70.0%

scored 3 or higher

Psychology

58 tested

87.9%

scored 3 or higher

U.S. History

81 tested

97.5%

scored 3 or higher

World Languages and Cultures

Chinese Language and Culture

13 tested

69.2%

scored 3 or higher

French Language and Culture

16 tested

100.0%

scored 3 or higher

Italian Language and Culture

2 tested

0.0%

scored 3 or higher

Latin: Vergil (archived)

1 tested

0.0%

scored 3 or higher

Spanish Language and Culture

54 tested

94.4%

scored 3 or higher

Spanish Literature and Culture

1 tested

0.0%

scored 3 or higher

Arts

Art History

10 tested

60.0%

scored 3 or higher

Music Theory

6 tested

50.0%

scored 3 or higher

Studio Art Drawing

2 tested

0.0%

scored 3 or higher

Other

Language and Comp

13 tested

76.9%

scored 3 or higher

Literature and Comp

48 tested

100.0%

scored 3 or higher

Studio Art 2d Design

3 tested

0.0%

scored 3 or higher

U S Government and Politics

12 tested

83.3%

scored 3 or higher

World History

1 tested

0.0%

scored 3 or higher

New York Regents Exams

4 courses reported · 2024-25

End-of-course exams required for a New York Regents diploma. Each row shows the cohort size and the share of students scoring at the proficient level or higher.

Course	Students tested	% proficient
Ela	375	99.0%
Social Studies	370	99.0%
Science	366	99.0%
Math	104	94.0%

Graduation rate (ACGR) reflects the federally published Adjusted Cohort Graduation Rate for the most recent year available. We refresh this data annually at the close of each academic year in June. The federal source publishes a banded rate (for example, "90-94%") instead of an exact number for cohorts small enough to risk identifying individual students. The state distribution chart, where shown, plots every school in the state with a published rate or band; schools whose rate is federally suppressed are excluded. Where the federal source publishes a band rather than an exact rate, the school is placed within its band using a stable, ID-derived offset, so its position is consistent across visits.