Best Private High Schools in Tacoma / Pierce County
Pierce County's private high-school field has three schools with selective-college placements and a deep bench of Christian K-12 systems behind them. Bellarmine Preparatory School in Tacoma is the anchor: about 890 students in grades 9-12 on a 42-acre hilltop campus, founded in 1928 as a Jesuit boys' school and in 1974 the first Jesuit secondary school in the country to go co-educational. It placed two students at Harvard, Princeton, or MIT in the 2022-25 window, more than any other school in the county. Annie Wright Schools, founded in 1884 under the Episcopal Diocese of Olympia, runs a co-ed PreK-8 and single-sex upper schools with day and boarding programs for about 750 students, and Charles Wright Academy, Tacoma's secular independent K-12 on 107 wooded acres in University Place, founded in 1957, enrolls about 490. Each placed one.
Behind those three sit the church-affiliated systems. Life Christian Academy on Tacoma's South End, founded in 1973 out of Life Center Church, enrolls about 660 students PreK-12. Cascade Christian Junior High / High School in Puyallup, grades 7-12 with about 620 students, is the secondary campus of the Cascade Christian Schools system of roughly 1,700 students across Pierce County. Concordia Christian Academy, Tacoma's Lutheran PreK-12 with roots back to 1899, enrolls about 225 on its 7.5-acre South End campus. Bethel Baptist Christian School in Spanaway (about 150) and Evergreen Lutheran High School in Tacoma (about 100, Wisconsin Synod) complete the Pierce County entries.
The shape differs from Seattle's. Tacoma's private secondary market has one Jesuit school at the top rather than a cluster of secular independents, and Annie Wright and Charles Wright together enroll fewer high-schoolers than Bellarmine alone. Below them, Pierce County's Christian systems are larger and more numerous than their King County counterparts relative to population, with Life Christian and Cascade Christian each enrolling more students than most Eastside independents.
Ranked schools
- 001BELLARMINE PREPARATORY SCHOOL(PRIVATE SCHOOL — INDEPENDENT) · PIERCE2 HPM
- 002ANNIE WRIGHT SCHOOLS(PRIVATE SCHOOL — INDEPENDENT) · PIERCE1 HPM
- 003CHARLES WRIGHT ACADEMY(PRIVATE SCHOOL — INDEPENDENT) · PIERCE1 HPM
- 004LIFE CHRISTIAN ACADEMY(PRIVATE SCHOOL — INDEPENDENT) · PIERCE—
- 005CASCADE CHRISTIAN JUNIOR HIGH / HIGH SCHOOL(PRIVATE SCHOOL — INDEPENDENT) · PIERCE—
- 006RAINIER CHRISTIAN SCHOOLS(PRIVATE SCHOOL — INDEPENDENT) · KING—
- 007CONCORDIA CHRISTIAN ACADEMY(PRIVATE SCHOOL — INDEPENDENT) · PIERCE—
- 008BETHEL BAPTIST CHRISTIAN SCHOOL(PRIVATE SCHOOL — INDEPENDENT) · PIERCE—
- 009EVERGREEN LUTHERAN HIGH SCHOOL(PRIVATE SCHOOL — INDEPENDENT) · PIERCE—
- 010K-SCHOOL(PRIVATE SCHOOL — INDEPENDENT) · KING—
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