Early College of Forsyth County

Early College of Forsyth County is a small public high school in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, serving 306 students in grades 9–12 within the Winston Salem / Forsyth County Schools district. The school ranks 73rd of 662 North Carolina high schools — the 89th percentile with a 4-star rating — a standout within a district that overall ranks near the middle-lower end of the state. This strength is not new: the school ranked in the 99th percentile statewide in the mid-2010s before easing slightly, yet it still performs far above nearly every other high school in the region.

Test scores tell the story: 98.5% of students were proficient in Biology and 97.4% in English II in the most recent year, far above district and state rates of roughly 49–65%. Math III proficiency reached 88.9%, and even Math I — the school's most challenging subject — hit 66.7%, more than double the district rate. Subgroup rankings are also strong, including a 92nd-percentile standing for African American students and 88th for Hispanic students. Among nearby schools, only Atkins Academic & Technical High competes at the 76th percentile; Mount Tabor High School and R J Reynolds High sit in the mid-20s, while Parkland High and Winston-Salem Preparatory Academy rank near the bottom. Early College achieves all this while spending just $6,298 per student — the lowest among nearby high schools — with about a third of students qualifying for free or reduced-price lunch, versus over 99% at most surrounding traditional high schools.

The school's challenges deserve attention. Math I proficiency has fluctuated between 52% and 67% in recent years, though students rebound strongly by Math III. More concerning, chronic absenteeism has climbed from 5.3% in 2021–22 to 40.5% in 2024–25, now above the district rate. This has not yet dented test scores, but it bears watching. Early College shares its campus with Middle College of Forsyth County, which posts far weaker results on the same Math III exam (54.2% vs. 88.9%). Overall, this is a high-performing, cost-efficient school delivering near-elite results across all student groups — and with attendance back on track, it has the capacity to return to the very top of the state.