The Hunter School

[Barbra Lidder]

Medical office administrative staffers perform many tasks, including interacting with patients and scheduling appointments. Our school graduates are able to update electronic medical records, code and file insurance claims, and maintain patient accounts.

Computer and network technicians repair and maintain computers and servers, install and update software, and create and maintain computer networks. Our school graduates can do their work at a single location or go out into the technical field.

Web app designers and developers are responsible for creating a website that is functional, user-friendly, and aesthetically pleasing. Our school graduates write original code for both the front end and back end of software applications.

LPNs provide basic nursing care while being supervised by an RN or doctor. Their functions include the monitoring of vital signs, changing and dressing wounds, maintaining patient histories, and assisting with various tests and procedures.

X-ray technologists use radiation to produce images that detect injury and disease. Our school graduates have a thorough understanding of anatomy and physiology, patient positioning, patient care, radiation protection, and image analysis.

Diagnostic medical sonographers (ultrasound technicians) use sound waves to create images of organs and internal structures. Our school graduates create these images or scans to diagnose and monitor various diseases, signs, disorders, and conditions.

Medical billers play a vital role in the connection between health care providers, patients, and insurance companies. Our school graduates not only bill for medical services, but also code and post electronic medical records. (The Medical Billing Specialist program is only three months long.)

Hunter College High School is a public academic magnet secondary school located in the Carnegie Hill section of the Upper East Side of Manhattan. It is administered and funded by Hunter College of the City University of New York (CUNY) and no tuition is charged. According to Hunter, its 1,200 students represent the top one-quarter of 1% of students in New York City, based on test scores."[1]

Hunter was established in 1869 as "The Female Normal and High School", a private school to prepare young women to become teachers. The original school was composed of an elementary and a high school. A kindergarten was added in 1887, and in 1888, the school was incorporated into a college. The high school was separated from what would become Hunter College in 1903. In 1914, both schools were named after the Female Normal School's first president, Thomas Hunter.[2] The school was almost closed by Hunter College President Jacqueline Wexler in the early 1970s.[citation needed]

Hunter was an all-girls school for its first 105 years, with the official name "Hunter College High School for Intellectually Gifted Young Ladies". The prototypical Hunter girl was the subject of the song Sarah Maria Jones, who, the lyrics told, had "Hunter in her bones." In 1878, Harper's Magazine published an approving article about the then-new school:

Girls all the way from fourteen to twenty years of age, from the farther edge of childhood to the farther limit of maidenhood; girls with every shade of complexion and degree of beauty; girls in such variety that it was amazing to contemplate the reduction of their individuality to the simple uniformity of their well-drilled movements.The catholicity and toleration crystallized in the country's Constitution prevail in the college: about two hundred of the students are Jewesses, and a black face, framed in curly African hair, may occasionally be seen.

The aim of the entire course through which the Normal students pass is not so much to burden the mind with facts as it is to develop intellectual power, cultivate judgment, and enable the graduates to take trained ability into the world with them.

The school began admitting boys in 1974 as a result of a lawsuit by Hunter College Elementary School parents, a development which was described in the New York Daily News with the headline "Girlie High Gets 1st Freshboys." In January 1982, the school was featured in a New York Magazine article entitled "The Joyful Elite."[3] Hunter was the subject of the 1992 book Hunter College Campus Schools for the Gifted: The Challenge of Equity and Excellence published by Teachers' College Press.[4]

In total, an entering 7th grade class contains approximately 225 students, known as "Hunterites," about 200 of whom will graduate from the school. Those who leave go to other magnet schools, private schools, local public schools or leave the city. The total enrollment from grades 7 through 12 is approximately 1,200 students.[1]

Author and alumnus Chris Hayes stated in Twilight of the Elites: America After Meritocracy that the school's sole reliance on the one test for admissions reproduces societal inequalities; that students whose families cannot afford intensive test prep courses are less likely to earn competitive scores on the entrance exam. In recent years underrepresentation of African-Americans among students admitted to the school, compared to their numbers in the public school system, has increased. Hayes quotes Hunter College High School's 2010 graduate Justin Hudson's commencement speech:

If you truly believe that the demographics of Hunter represent the distribution of intelligence in this city then you must believe that the Upper West Side, Bayside and Flushing are intrinsically more intelligent than the South Bronx, Bedford-Stuyvesant and Washington Heights, and I refuse to accept that.[11]

Because of its relatively small size, and because the school is run by Hunter College rather than by the city's education department, Hunter has largely avoided being caught up in the debate over diversity at the specialized high schools in New York City. However, some alumni, students, and alumni expressed concern about the lack of diversity at the school where only 6.3 percent of the student body is Hispanic and 2.2 percent African-American (67% of NYC public school children are black or Hispanic).[12] On the other hand, while Asians make up 16.2% of NYC public-school children, they make up 49.4% of the student body at the school, based on NYC department of education data.[13][14]

The Wall Street Journal ranked Hunter as the top public school in the United States and noted that it is a feeder to Ivy League and other elite colleges.[15][16] Worth likewise ranked Hunter as the top public school in the country.[17] The New York Times called Hunter "the prestigious Upper East Side school known for its Ivy League-bound students" and "the fast track to law, medicine and academia."[18] Publicly available data indicate that Hunter has both the highest average SAT score and the highest average ACT score of any school in the United States, public or private, though complete data is needed to be conclusive.[1][19]

All Hunter students pursue a six-year program of study. Hunter is a college preparatory high school that provides a liberal arts education. The majority of subjects are accelerated such that high school study begins in the 8th grade and state educational requirements are completed in the 11th. During the 12th grade, students take electives, have the option to attend courses at Hunter College (for transferable credit), undertake independent academic studies, and participate in internships around the city.

Hunter's English Department incorporates reading novels and writing analytical papers beginning in the 7th grade. Students have historically graduated with strong writing and reading comprehension skills, reflected by the school's high average SAT scores in critical reading and writing, and by the number of students who have earned recognition by the scholastic writing awards.[citation needed]

There were 87 faculty members in 2013. 89% had advanced degrees. Many teachers are scientists, writers, artists, and musicians. Many come to Hunter with university-level teaching experience. The student/faculty ratio is 13:1,[1] much lower than the city's other selective public schools (e.g. Stuyvesant = 22:1;[21] Bronx Science = 21:1;[22] Brooklyn Tech = 21:1[23][24]).

Nearly 99% of Hunter's classes of 2002 through 2005 went directly to college, and about 25% of these students accepted admission into an Ivy League school.[15] Worth reported that 9.4% of Hunter's classes of 1998 through 2001 attended Harvard, Yale or Princeton (the highest rate of any public school in the United States).[17]

Hunter students win many honors and awards during their high school careers,[26] including numerous scholastic writing awards. Hunter wins approximately 23% of all New York State Scholastic Art and Writing Awards. 74 members of the Class of 2013 (38%) were National Merit or National Achievement Scholarship Semifinalists.[1] Of particular fame are the winners of the Regeneron Science Talent Search (formerly Intel and Westinghouse STS), of which Hunter has had four: Amy Reichel in 1981, Adam Cohen ('97, now a professor in the Chemistry and Physics Departments at Harvard) in 1997, David L.V. Bauer ('05) in 2005, and Benjy Firester ('18) in 2018.[27]

Publicly available data indicate that Hunter has both the highest average SAT score and the highest average ACT score of any school in the United States, public or private, though complete data is needed to be conclusive. For the graduating class of 2012, the average SAT score was a 2207.[19] The class of 2013 averaged 2200[1] on the test and the class of 2016 averaged 2208. The class of 2013 scored an average of 32.6 on the ACT.[1]

Clubs are diverse in their topics, and include politics, film, music, and knitting. Clubs and organizations at Hunter are all student-run, with faculty members as advisers. During club open house, members of the student body have the opportunity to spend their lunch time meeting representatives of clubs.[1] The school publishes a list of clubs available in this footnote's link.[28]

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