August 18, 2026
The 2026 rankings release of Best High Schools by the US News & World Report gave us spectacular news!
HORIZON SCIENCE ACADEMY MCKINLEY PARK IS RANKED THE TOP CHARTER PUBLIC HIGH SCHOOL IN ILLINOIS!!
This remarkable feat deserves utmost praise, admiration, and appreciation to the dedicated team at HSA McKinley Park. To be ranked #1 is the result of continued efforts by teams of educators and staff, along with parents and members of the greater community, who work tirelessly to bring forth the best in their students. HSA McKinley Park High School truly is a family, and this recognition only proves that their investment provides dividends that will live far beyond the walls on the campus.
How This Came to Be
For the 2025-2026 school year, HSA McKinley Park opened a new campus in the Bridgeport neighborhood of Chicago (which had not opened a high school in nearly 10 years). It marked the opportunity to not only provide the “Big-Mac” students a campus of their own, away from the “Little-Mac” elementary and middle school students, but also a chance to expand on the offerings that enable students to thrive.
Perhaps the most prominent addition to the lineup of offerings for HSA McKinley High Schoolers was the addition of the Career and Technical Education (CTE) program, which is the tip of the iceberg for academic and student life resources that differentiate the HSA educational experience. The new campus enabled a sense of freedom and provided opportunities for leadership with peers within their own age group, which fueled the passion of the educators who continuously explore more creative ways in which to approach key subjects.
Students are treated as important members of a greater family. They are appreciated, valued, respected, and encouraged to go boldly into territory that is yet to be discovered, personally and academically. They are prepared for the next phase of life, not in terms of fear of the seemingly unattainable, but rather grounded in the pursuit towards a more prosperous future. HSA Hawks compete as a whole and not against one another, linking their success to that of their fellow peers and celebrating their accomplishments as a collective community.
Today we celebrate an accomplishment of magnificent proportions, though the end result of our efforts is yet to fully shine. We uplift students to astounding new heights, whereby knowledge and wisdom are shared from one class of graduates to another, as the garden of educational seeds planted by the community yields an abundance of opportunities for its most treasured learners. The quest to ensure that the path of lifelong achievement lives beyond the walls and hallways of the campus may not be most traveled, though the incentive of having an entire community behind our efforts is a priceless feature which we have aspired to attain since our inception.
Horizon Science Academy and Concept Schools stay true to our mission, now and always, as the legacy we wish for tomorrow begins with brave steps we take today. You chose wisely, and we could not be more grateful to be a part of your continued journey of success.
