Specialized high school · Audition
Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts: average SAT score, 2017-2024
#19 of 548 citywide · 1195/1600 in 2024 · Manhattan · DBN 03M485
- SAT total, 2024
- 1195
- Math
- 588
- Reading & writing
- 607
- Students counted
- 398
In 2024, students at Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts who sat the SAT averaged 1195 out of 1600 — 588 on Math and 607 on Reading and Writing. That is 216 points above the 979 averaged across the 461 New York City high schools that reported a score that year. Within Manhattan, where the average is 1034, it is 161 points higher. Citywide it ranks 19 of 548, inside the top fifty. In Manhattan it is 10 of 140.
Across 8 measured years, the school's average went from 1288 in 2017 to 1195 in 2024, down 93 points. The peak was 1293 in 2019 and the floor 1188 in 2022, a spread of 105 points. Citywide the average moved down 37 points over the same span, so relative to the rest of New York this school is behind by 56 points.
The sharpest single move came between 2021 and 2022, when the average dropped 93 points in one year. Its place in the citywide order has hardly changed: 15 of 453 in 2017, 19 of 461 in 2024.
The 2024 figure is the average of 398 students at this school who actually sat the exam — not of the whole graduating class. That number has fallen sharply since 2017, when 543 students were counted, so year-to-year moves here reflect a changing group of test takers as much as anything else. Of those test takers, 63% on Math and 77% on Reading and Writing cleared the College Board's college-readiness benchmark.
The highest average in Manhattan that year belonged to Stuyvesant High School, at 1497, 302 points ahead of Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts. A gap that size is a different admissions pool, not a different amount of preparation.
Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts is one of New York's nine specialized high schools, and the only one that admits by audition rather than by the SHSAT. An SAT average at this level is in large part a selection effect — these students were already at the top of the city's eighth-grade distribution before they arrived.
Eight years against the city
SAT total out of 1600. The dashed line is the citywide average for the same years, weighted by the number of students counted at each school.
Year by year
| Year | SAT total | Math | Reading & writing | Tested | College ready, math | College ready, R&W |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2017 | 1288 | 643 | 645 | 543 | 86% | 89% |
| 2018 | 1279 | 642 | 637 | 678 | 88% | 94% |
| 2019 | 1293 | 649 | 644 | 604 | 90% | 95% |
| 2020 | 1222 | 613 | 609 | 708 | 79% | 87% |
| 2021 | 1281 | 639 | 642 | 461 | 67% | 74% |
| 2022 | 1188 | 586 | 602 | 772 | 68% | 83% |
| 2023 | 1216 | 600 | 616 | 397 | 69% | 84% |
| 2024 | 1195 | 588 | 607 | 398 | 63% | 77% |
| City, 2024 | 979 | 487 | 492 | 53,619 | — | — |
| Manhattan, 2024 | 1034 | 511 | 523 | 11,026 | — | — |
“Tested” is the number of students the DOE counted in that year’s average, not the size of the class. “College ready” is the share of those students who met the College Board benchmark on that section. A dash means the DOE published no figure for that year; nothing here is estimated.
Next
- Compare all 549 New York City high schools on the same figures, sortable by borough and by score.
- SAT preparation — what actually moves a score, and how far it moves in the time you have.
- LaGuardia admits by audition, not by the SHSAT — the SAT here is a graduation-year number, not an admissions one.
- Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts on schools.nyc.gov — the DOE’s own page for this school.
Figures from NYC Open Data — School Quality Reports, Multi-Year Metrics, New York City Department of Education. Rebuilt 2026-09-15. Method and caveats are set out on the index page.
Take the next step
Tell us the score you have and the one you need.
Write the target school or the number you are aiming at in the box below. We start with a diagnostic, so the plan is built on the distance you actually have to cover, not on a package.