Catholic high schools in Chicago, IL

Catholic high schools in Chicago

This is the NCES directory listing for Chicago, not a ranking. The schools below are the ones Chicago families most often research: the flagship Jesuit college prep, the city's single-sex schools, the corporate work-study model, and the neighborhood schools that anchor each side of the city. Compare on fit — commute, single-gender versus coed, size, identity, programs, and aid.

What families compare

• Location and commute — Chicago families choose by side of the city first: the North Side schools (St. Ignatius, DePaul Prep, Holy Trinity, Resurrection, Trinity), the South Side schools (Brother Rice, Mount Carmel, Leo, De La Salle, St. Rita, Mother McAuley), and the West and Southwest sides (Cristo Rey Jesuit, Our Lady of Tepeyac, Josephinum, St. Francis de Sales).
• Single-gender versus coed — Chicago has a real single-sex set: all-boys Brother Rice, Mount Carmel, St. Rita, and Leo; all-girls Mother McAuley, Resurrection, Trinity, and Josephinum.
• School size — from Josephinum at about 90 students to St. Ignatius at about 1,492; smaller schools usually mean smaller classes and fewer course and athletic offerings.
• Identity and religious order — Jesuit (St. Ignatius, Christ the King, Cristo Rey), Lasallian (De La Salle), Vincentian (DePaul Prep), Augustinian (St. Rita, Mount Carmel), Christian Brothers (Brother Rice), Mercy (Mother McAuley), and Sacred Heart (Josephinum) schools each carry a different formation and community culture.
• Tuition and aid — tuition varies by school, most run financial aid, and programs like the Big Shoulders Fund help Chicago families; HSPT scores sometimes factor into merit scholarship consideration.
• College outcomes — college-going rates and published matriculation lists, where available; ask each school for its own profile.

Schools Chicago families often compare

These ten cover the city's most-researched Catholic high schools across the North, South, and West Sides — the flagship Jesuit school, the city's largest coed and single-sex options, the work-study model, and the neighborhood anchors.

Also serving Chicago families

Six more Chicago Catholic high schools round out the city's 16-school set, each serving a distinct part of the city.

Two well-known Chicago schools — Marist and St. Patrick — are not yet in this NCES-based directory; the Archdiocese of Chicago's Catholic high schools page and High School Search list the complete archdiocesan set. Looking for elementary or middle school? The Archdiocese's school pages (schools.archchicago.org) cover the full PK-8 landscape. For the statewide picture, see Catholic high schools in Illinois.

HSPT & admissions at Chicago Catholic high schools

Chicago Catholic high schools are heavily HSPT: 9 of the 16 schools in this directory have source-reviewed HSPT records, and the Archdiocese of Chicago coordinates admissions across its high schools — families can often work from one shared application and a common testing picture. But each school sets its own policy and dates, so confirm the current test, the date, and whether one sitting can be shared across your list with each admissions office before registering.

Chicago-area schools typically give the HSPT between November and January of 8th grade, during the fall admission cycle, and each school posts its own date — usually by early fall. Plan prep around the earliest date on your list rather than assuming one shared sitting.

How to prepare for the HSPT in Chicago

Start with the free diagnostic to establish a baseline, then build a study plan around the date your schools post. These guides cover the practical questions Chicago families ask:

Chicago families researching aid should know about the Big Shoulders Fund, which provides tuition support to students at archdiocesan and private Catholic schools in Chicago — and most schools run their own financial aid on top of that. HSPT scores sometimes factor into merit scholarship consideration, so it is worth asking each admissions office how scores are weighed in aid decisions.

Plan on 8th grade: open houses and applications open in the fall, entrance testing runs from November to January, and decisions arrive in the winter and spring. Financial-aid and scholarship applications run on separate deadlines — collect every date for every school in one place early.