High Tech High International
San Diego · San Diego County · San Diego Unified · Public
📄 Shareable scorecard →Compare with peers
Most similar nearby schools
High Tech High Media Arts → High Tech High School → E3 Civic High → Kearny Digital Media & Design → Urban Discovery Academy Charter → Compare all similar →🧭 A parent's read
- Almost all graduates leave eligible for UC and CSU. 96% finish the A-G courses California's universities require before a student can even apply — most California schools manage about 6 in 10.
- 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.
- About 3 in 4 students read and write at grade level. On the state's own 11th-grade test, 75% met or exceeded the college-readiness bar — the top quarter of California high schools (statewide: 54%).
- One question for any counselor: who should still test? Plenty of strong students skip the SAT/ACT now — but merit scholarships at dozens of colleges still key off scores. Ask how the school decides who should still sit for one.
Composed from this page's data — every claim is backed by a number in the sections 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 family's net price — yours depends on your income — 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 net price →Sources: UC Office of the President (admits); IPEDS net price + College Scorecard 10-yr earnings (cost & payoff). Full campus-by-campus breakdown below.
How High Tech High International compares for families
Mid-pack college outcomes within California.
- ▸ StatewideUC Reach Score of 19 — right around the California median of 18.
- ▸ Locally📘 Top 10% in California on ELA proficiency.
- ▸ vs Similar SchoolsRight at the peer median (UC Reach Score 19) across the 5 most similar nearby schools.
For Parents
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Objective, government-grade data — no school pays us for placement.
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 10.3 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 (-1.4%/yr, Total enrollment)
At per-pupil funding of $ / student:
| Horizon | Projected Total enrollment | Change | Funding impact / yr |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 yr (2027) | ~343 | -5 | $0 |
| 3 yr (2029) | ~334 | -14 | $0 |
| 5 yr (2031) | ~325 | -23 | $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 High Tech High International really compare on getting kids to college?
We've ranked it #4 of 8 most similar nearby schools on UC Reach. Unlock the full snapshot to see the head-to-head — who's ahead, by how much, and where it's heading.
Your similar-school group includes
High Tech High Media Arts · High Tech High School · E3 Civic High · Kearny Digital Media & Design · Urban Discovery Academy Charter · Kearny College Connections · +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 San Diego County baseline — the demographic tide is moving every CA HS, so a school's gap vs. county is the actionable signal.
Families who enroll at High Tech High International stay (95.9% stability — elite). But enrollment is dropping 1.7× the county rate (school -13.1% vs. county -7.8%). The audit question isn't why students leave — it's why fewer families are choosing to enroll in the first place.
15 of 364 students who enrolled at High Tech High International this year didn't maintain continuous enrollment (4.1% 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 — San Diego 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: 65.2%
Federal: 10.6%
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 San Diego 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).
High Tech High International sent 116 applications to the six most selective University of California campuses and 13.8% were admitted, producing a UC Reach Score of 19 — 1 points above the California median of 18, higher than 53% of California high schools. The school produces 4.8 UCLA + UC Berkeley admits per 100 seniors.
On the peer median (19) · Ranked #4 of 8 similar schools
18
51
19
Higher than 53% of California high schools (980 ranked, ≥50 seniors)
High Tech High International's UC Reach Score of 19 is above the California median (18). The top 10% of CA schools achieve 51 or higher.
For context, the elite tier (top 1%) clears 97 — a gap of 78 pp from where this school sits.
Overall, High Tech High International's UC Reach is higher than 53% of California high schools (980 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| UC Berkeley | Real shot | Long odds | Filtered out | Filtered out |
| 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 ⓘ |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| UC Berkeley (2022) | 4.18 | 4.30 | +0.12 | 21.9% | Peers +0.15 · matches |
| UCLA (2020) | 4.09 | 4.35 | +0.26 | 18.5% | Peers +0.22 · steeper |
| UC San Diego (2024) | 4.09 | 4.33 | +0.24 | 30.8% | Peers +0.21 · matches |
| UC Santa Barbara (2024) | 4.15 | 4.34 | +0.19 | 45.5% | Peers +0.15 · steeper |
| UC Irvine (2024) | 4.17 | 4.26 | +0.10 | 35.3% | Peers +0.09 · matches |
| UC Davis | 4.13 | 4.21 | +0.08 | 62.5% | Peers +0.14 · 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 High Tech High International sits vs. all California schools ⓘ
Overall, this school admits its UC applicants in line with what their GPAs predict (20.8% actual vs. 22.0% expected).
UC Outcomes Trend — 2018–2025
Class size from CDE grade 12 enrollment. Campus-level data — applicant/admit totals may count a student at multiple campuses more than once.
Campus Breakdown — 2025
| Campus | Applicants | Admits | Enrollees | Admit Rate | UC Reach Score | Yield | Avg GPA (App) | Avg GPA (Adm) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| UC Berkeley → Elite | 18 | 4 | 3 | 22.2% | 5 | 75.0% | 4.00 | —† |
| UCLA → Elite | 22 | —† | —† | —† | —† | — | 3.92 | —† |
| UC San Diego → Selective | 32 | 4 | —† | 12.5% | 5 | — | 3.93 | —† |
| UC Santa Barbara → Selective | 19 | 3 | —† | 15.8% | 4 | — | 3.81 | —† |
| UC Irvine → Selective | 17 | —† | —† | —† | —† | — | 3.92 | —† |
| UC Davis → | 8 | 5 | —† | 62.5% | 6 | — | 4.13 | 4.21 |
What This Means
For School Admins
The full Reach Report for High Tech High International
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 (19) ranked head-to-head against your closest competitor schools
- ✓Your 5-year enrollment forecast (currently -1.4%/yr) with the revenue at stake
- ✓Student-retention benchmarking vs your county median — and the LCAP evidence to back your goals