Blue ribbon schools are the schools that have been selected and honored by government for school's academic achievement or significant improvement. For academic success, the schools are selected based on academic assessment on students and other criteria (mainly the results from math and reading test results). For academic improvement, schools are evaluated based on the location of schools, 40%minority students, income level of families and on how these disadvantaged students performed on these reading and math test. This is a good indication of how schools seriously think about their academic improvement.
学校的主要指标性的信息都包括在SCHOOL PROFILE 里。如学生人数及族裔比例，SAT/ACT分数，AP 课程，毕业生去向等。 南加这里很多优秀的公立高中,包括好学区的名校，并无蓝带标签， 却是California Distinguished High School，Nationally Recognized School, United States Department of Education。 在查看学校信息时不妨留意一下是否有Distinguished及Exemplary等词。
