Where are the Ridgewood Grads Going?

Trying to keep cool, 393 of the 398 seniors will be marching down to the football field to receive their diplomas on the 117th annual graduation on Thursday.

According to a survey sent out by the guidance department, the vast majority of students have keyed in on where they'll be going next.

The survey was completed by 387 of the 398 students and according to the data, 87.6 percent of students (339) will be going to a four-year university, (90.6 percent). Another 7.7 percent of students will be attending a two-year college (up from 4.6 percent last year) and a few are making different plans – one student will head to trade school, two will join the armed forces, and eight will take a gap year.

Though 81 percent of last year's students said goodbye to the Garden State, more of this year's students are sticking around. Seventy-three percent of village kids will be going out of state, with the remaining 21.6 percent staying in Jersey. Bergen Community College (18 students) accounts for the most RHS grads, with Rutgers following close behind (16 students).

NYU and Montclair State attracted the next highest amount of grads, each with eight students matriculating in the fall. Seven students will be attending Pennsylvania's Muhlenberg College. TCNJ, University of Richmond, William Paterson University and SUNY Binghamton each have six students joining their respective campuses.

Of the Ivy League schools, two students are Providence-bound to attend Brown. A pair of grads are heading to Morningside Heights at Columbia, and one RHS senior will be attending Dartmouth. Among the Ivy schools, Cornell courted the most grads with six.

Harvard University in late May announced Joshua Blecher-Cohen, a student at Bergen Academies, would be matriculating at the school. No RHS students are attending Harvard or Yale, according to the guidance department's list.

Students are, however, attending schools like Carnegie Melon, Johns Hopkins, Stanford, Duke, Georgetown, RISD, SCAD, SVA, Parsons, Berklee, Juliard and many more top institutions of higher learning. It's an impressive list, for sure.

Check out the PDF at the right of this article for a complete list of schools.

Congratulations to the Ridgewood High School Class of 2012!

[Correction: Joshua Blecher-Cohen was not on the list because he attends Bergen Academies in Hackensack.]

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