Early College High School
Costa Mesa · Orange County · Newport-Mesa Unified · Public
Shareable scorecard →Compare with peers
Most similar nearby schools
College And Career Preparatory Academy → Coast High School → Hillview High (continuation) → Richland Continuation High → Back Bay High → Compare all similar →A parent's read
- The UC pipeline here is real. 19 admissions to the top six UC campuses for a class of 52 seniors puts this school in roughly the top 21% of California high schools.
- Almost all students read and write at grade level. On the state's own 11th-grade test, 95% met or exceeded the college-readiness bar — the top 10% of California high schools (statewide: 54%).
- Families don't leave. 96% of students who start the year here finish it here — top-tier retention statewide. Kids stay; that tells you something no test score does.
- 8 in 10 graduates leave eligible for UC and CSU. 82% finish the A-G courses California's universities require before a student can even apply — most California schools manage about 6 in 10.
- Worth asking about: the recent trend. UC admissions per senior have slipped for three straight years. Ask the school what changed — counseling, course access, or just class-size shifts.
Composed from this page's data — every claim is backed by a number in the sections below.
At a glance
- Dual-enrollment program (college credit while in HS)
- 1 calculus classes · 3 physics · 2 chemistry
- AP rigor: Bottom 40% of US high schools
- SAT/ACT participation: Bottom 7% by test-taker volume
- 4-yr grad rate: 95% in 2019 (75th percentile nationally)
Composed from federal CRDC offerings, EDFacts graduation data, and other public data. Full breakdowns below.
Where grads go — and what it costs & pays
UC admits by campus · Class of 2025
Getting in is step one. The cost above is the average aid-receiving family's net price — yours depends on whether you qualify for aid — and your child's odds depend on their GPA + scores. See your family's real numbers at these campuses:
Get my child's odds + our real costs →Sources: UC Office of the President (admits); IPEDS net price + College Scorecard 10-yr earnings (cost & payoff). Full campus-by-campus breakdown below.
California College-Going Rate
86.5% of the 2022-23 graduating class enrolled in college within a year.
The share of 2022-23 graduates who enrolled at a college anywhere in the U.S. within 12 months, per the National Student Clearinghouse match the California Department of Education publishes.
Give the same class four more months and 88.5% had enrolled — CDE publishes a 16-month window alongside the 12-month one, 46 students.
Up 11.5 points from the 2021-22 class (75%).
Where the 2022-23 class enrolled
In California — 41 students (78.8%)
Out of state — 4 students (7.7%)
CDE puts each graduate in one bucket only — whichever kind of college they were enrolled in longest — so these add up to the rate above. That is a different count from the UC Reach Score on this page, which counts a student at every UC campus that admitted them.
Source: California Department of Education, College-Going Rate (DataQuest) ↗, cohort 2022-23, posted 17-Sep-2025. Data file: cgr12mo23.txt ↗ (and the 16-month file ↗). CDE builds the rate by matching California high school completers to National Student Clearinghouse enrollment records; we publish CDE’s aggregates and hold no student-level data.
How Early College High School compares for families
Above-average college outcomes statewide.
- ▸ StatewideUC Reach Score of 37 — 18 points above the California median of 19. Ahead of 79% of California high schools.
- ▸ Locally📘 Top 1% in California on ELA proficiency — plus 5 more top-ranks.
- ▸ vs Similar SchoolsThe closest comparables nearby: College And Career Preparatory Academy, Coast High School, Hillview High (continuation) and 2 more. See the sidebar to compare side-by-side.
For Parents
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Objective, government-grade data — no school pays us for placement.
Academic rigor
AP + advanced-course offerings
Moderate — some AP / advanced course access
Bottom 40% of US high schools
Source: federal Civil Rights Data Collection (CRDC 2020-21). CRDC reports what's offered + enrolled — it doesn't collect AP exam pass rates (College Board owns that data and doesn't release it school-level).
SAT / ACT participation
CRDC federal data · 2020-21Bottom 7% by test-taker volume
Source: federal Civil Rights Data Collection (CRDC 2020-21). Volume — not score — is what's reported here. A higher count means more students at this school are entering the college admissions pipeline. Note: 2020-21 was COVID-disrupted; some districts (especially those that stayed remote longer) report unusually low or zero takers.
4-year graduation rate · federal EDFacts
What % of students graduate on time?
75th percentile nationally
Source: federal EDFacts ACGR (Adjusted Cohort Graduation Rate), 2019 vintage via Urban Institute. EDFacts publishes a range (low-high) to preserve privacy on small cohorts; we display the midpoint.
Federal Title I context
Title I Schoolwide eligible
≥40% FRPL — qualifies for Title I Schoolwide program
40-74% of students qualify for free/reduced lunch. The district can use Title I funds across the whole school under federal Schoolwide Program rules.
Source: NCES Common Core of Data, free/reduced-price lunch eligibility. The actual Title I designation is a district decision and may differ from eligibility — but the federal eligibility math is what we show here. We don't claim to assert whether the district formally chose to enroll this school in Title I.
SBAC academic outcomes — grade 11, 2025
Share of grade-11 students meeting or exceeding the California standard on Smarter Balanced ELA and Math. This is the academic-readiness signal that pairs with UC Reach (post-grad outcomes), stability (retention), and absenteeism (engagement). Note: statewide median Math is only ~20% — a school at 20% isn't an outlier; one at 45%+ genuinely is.
Source: California Assessment of Student Performance and Progress (CAASPP) Smarter Balanced research files. Benchmarks limited to non-virtual public & charter HS with ≥30 tested students.
Student composition — 2025-26
HS grades 9–12 racial/ethnic composition and program subgroups, from CDE Census Day Enrollment. Two-year shift shown when ≥1 pt — surfaces how the community served has changed since 2023-24.
Race / ethnicity
Program subgroups
Source: California Department of Education, Census Day Enrollment 2025-26 (HS grades 9–12). Δ shown when shift is ≥1 pt since 2023-24. Categories below 0.5% omitted.
Chronic absenteeism — 2024-25
Share of students missing 10% or more of expected attendance — the leading indicator that often precedes the demand decline shown above. Families disengaging tend to raise absenteeism first, then formally leave. Basis: grades 9–12.
Absenteeism is up 3.5 pp since 2016-17. A rising absenteeism trend often precedes formal departure — worth investigating which subgroups are driving it.
Source: California Department of Education, Chronic Absenteeism 2024-25. Benchmarks limited to non-virtual public & charter HS with ≥100 eligible students. CDE didn't publish a usable 2019-20 file (COVID).
Enrollment trend & projection
If this trend holds (-2.4%/yr, Total enrollment)
At per-pupil funding of $ / student:
| Horizon | Projected Total enrollment | Change | Funding impact / yr |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 yr (2027) | ~144 | -4 | $0 |
| 3 yr (2029) | ~138 | -10 | $0 |
| 5 yr (2031) | ~131 | -17 | $0 |
Straight-line extrapolation of the recent annual rate — a what-if, not a forecast of intent. Default = California's LCFF base grant for grades 9–12 ($12,423/ADA). Edit the figure to match your school.
How does Early College High School really compare on getting kids to college?
Unlock a head-to-head snapshot of Early College High School against its 10 most similar nearby schools — matched on size, location, type. See exactly where it stands on the college pipeline.
Your similar-school group includes
College And Career Preparatory Academy · Coast High School · Hillview High (continuation) · Richland Continuation High · Back Bay High · Valley Vista High · +4 more
Enrollment stability & demand — 2024-25
Two complementary signals: retention (do students stay once enrolled?) and demand (are families choosing the school?). Read against the Orange County baseline — the demographic tide is moving every CA HS, so a school's gap vs. county is the actionable signal.
Early College High School's enrollment is shrinking 4.9× the county rate (school -29.1% vs. county -6.0%). Stability of 96.1% means every family you keep is one fewer; the leverage is at recruitment, not retention. This is the case the high stability number alone would hide.
7 of 180 students who enrolled at Early College High School this year didn't maintain continuous enrollment (3.9% non-stability). Mid-year transfers, dropouts, and other exits are all counted.
Stability by student group
Nearest peer high schools
Source: California Department of Education, Stability Rate 2024-25. Benchmarks limited to non-virtual public & charter HS with ≥100 cumulative enrollees so by-design-high-churn continuation schools don't dominate the bottom of the distribution. Cumulative enrollment counts every student on the rolls during the year, so it can exceed peak-day enrollment.
District financial profile — Newport-Mesa Unified (FY2020)
From 4 years of NCES F-33 filings (the federally-mandated district finance survey). Public schools don't have their own books — the district does. These figures show the financial scale, revenue dependence, instruction-vs-overhead mix, and long-term debt that shape what a school can sustain.
Local: 78.6%
Federal: 7.2%
Source: NCES F-33 Annual Survey of School System Finances (Urban Institute Education Data API). Latest year currently published: FY2020. F-33 is a district-level federal filing — it reflects the Newport-Mesa Unified as a whole, not this individual school's books. Revenue mix shows where the district's dollars come from (state aid dominates in CA via LCFF). Instruction share is current expenditure on instruction ÷ total current expenditure (national benchmark ~60%). Long-term debt is end-of-year outstanding (mostly facilities bonds).
Early College High School sent 99 applications to the six most selective University of California campuses and 19.2% were admitted, producing a UC Reach Score of 36 (top-6 UC admits per 100 seniors, counting a student at each campus that admitted them) — 18 points above the California median of 19, higher than 79% of California high schools..
19
53
36
Higher than 79% of California high schools (1107 ranked, ≥50 seniors)
Early College High School's UC Reach Score of 36 is in the top quartile statewide (median 19; top 25% bar 33) — but it's still below the top-10% bar of 53.
For context, the elite tier (top 1%) clears 95 — a gap of 58 pp from where this school sits.
Overall, Early College High School's UC Reach is higher than 79% of California high schools (1107 ranked).
UC funnel — which kids are getting in at what GPA
Combining the school's applicant pool GPA, admit pool GPA, actual admit rate, and statewide CA admit rates by individual GPA band, we can read which GPA tiers tend to get in — and which don't.
| Campus | 4.00+ GPA | 3.70–3.99 GPA | 3.30–3.69 GPA | < 3.30 GPA |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| UCLA | Real shot | Long odds | Filtered out | Filtered out |
| UC San Diego | Strong shot | Moderate | Long odds | Filtered out |
| UC Santa Barbara | Strong shot | Real shot | Long odds | Filtered out |
| UC Irvine | Strong shot | Real shot | Long odds | Filtered out |
| UC Davis | Strong shot | Strong shot | Real shot | Filtered out |
The numbers behind it
| Campus | Applicant GPA | Admit GPA | Lift ⓘ | Admit rate | vs peer schools @ same GPA ⓘ |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| UCLA (2023) | 4.01 | 4.19 | +0.18 | 35.3% | Peers +0.25 · wider |
| UC San Diego (2023) | 3.94 | 4.19 | +0.25 | 42.1% | Peers +0.28 · matches |
| UC Santa Barbara (2024) | 3.98 | 4.25 | +0.27 | 43.8% | Peers +0.27 · matches |
| UC Irvine | 3.74 | 4.16 | +0.42 | 22.2% | Peers +0.37 · steeper |
| UC Davis | 3.83 | 4.05 | +0.22 | 53.8% | Peers +0.29 · wider |
Statewide CA admit rates by individual GPA band, 2025 (for reference)
| GPA band | UCB | UCLA | UCSD | UCSB | UCI | UCD |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 4.00+ | 17.0% | 15.1% | 45.2% | 62.3% | 46.3% | 65.9% |
| 3.70–3.99 | 3.1% | 1.6% | 9.3% | 17.6% | 17.0% | 31.1% |
| 3.30–3.69 | 0.8% | 0.5% | 1.5% | 2.8% | 2.4% | 10.3% |
| 3.00–3.29 | 0.4% | 0.3% | 0.2% | 0.4% | 0.3% | 1.9% |
| < 3.00 | 0.7% | 0.4% | 0.3% | 0.2% | 0.1% | 0.7% |
Where Early College High School sits vs. all California schools ⓘ
Overall, this school admits its UC applicants in line with what their GPAs predict (27.5% actual vs. 24.3% expected).
UC Outcomes Trend — 2018–2025
Class size from CDE grade 12 enrollment. Campus-level data: applicant and admit totals count a student once at EACH campus. A senior admitted to UCLA and UC San Diego adds 2 to the admit total, so the total can exceed the senior class — that is the metric working as defined, not an error. The admit RATE is unaffected: both its numerator and denominator are campus-level.
Campus Breakdown — 2025
| Campus | Applicants | Admits | Enrollees | Admit Rate | UC Reach Score | Yield | Avg GPA (App) | Avg GPA (Adm) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| UC Berkeley → Elite | 11 | —† | —† | —† | —† | — | 3.66 | —† |
| UCLA → Elite | 19 | —† | —† | —† | —† | — | 3.78 | —† |
| UC San Diego → Selective | 15 | 3 | —† | 20.0% | 6 | — | 3.80 | —† |
| UC Santa Barbara → Selective | 14 | 3 | —† | 21.4% | 6 | — | 3.85 | —† |
| UC Irvine → Selective | 27 | 6 | 3 | 22.2% | 12 | 50.0% | 3.74 | 4.16 |
| UC Davis → | 13 | 7 | —† | 53.8% | 13 | — | 3.83 | 4.05 |
What This Means
For School Admins
The full Reach Report for Early College High School
A board- and LCAP-ready intelligence brief: your enrollment retention and college outcomes, benchmarked against your closest competitors, with a 5-year forecast, concrete steps to act on, and the rigor + outcomes story you can share with your families. Built from primary public data — prepared for you, not auto-generated.
- ✓Your UC Reach Score (37) ranked head-to-head against your closest competitor schools
- ✓Your 5-year enrollment forecast (currently -2.4%/yr) with the revenue at stake
- ✓Student-retention benchmarking vs your county median — and the LCAP evidence to back your goals
Related reading
Behind the data · August 24, 2026
Orange County · League table · August 18, 2026