Newsweek magazine this week released its rankings of U.S. high schools that can provide the best chances for post-graduation success for students living below the poverty line. Athens High School was only one of two Alabama schools included on the list.

Coming in at No. 361, Athens High School boasted a 100 percent graduation rate, the highest graduation rate in recent years. In an earlier interview with The News Courier, Athens City Schools Superintendent Trey Holladay attributed that increase to the availability of alternatives to traditional education, giving all students a personalized path to graduation.

The Renaissance Center, the crown jewel in the Athens City Schools alternative education plan, gives students who might not perform their best in a traditional classroom a way to finish school. Renaissance students meet with their teachers two days a week for one-on-one instruction and spend the other three days completing coursework online.

Holladay said the Renaissance Center is catered toward a select number of students, such as those with extreme social anxiety or those that misbehave in a typical class because they are bored or under-stimulated by the material.

“It cut our discipline rate in middle and high school by 40 percent,” Holladay said, adding that not many children in the system go down the path of attending Renaissance. “We’re talking about five percent of the kids and that’s where we want to keep it.”

The Renaissance Center enabled 25 students that were in danger of failing school to graduate with the rest of the Class of 2015, raising the high school’s graduation rate to 100 percent.

Graduation rate was only one of many factors considered by Newsweek. The list Athens is featured in, titled “Beating the Odds 2015,” considers schools “based on performance while also controlling for student poverty rates,” the magazine wrote in an accompanying article.

“For the relative list, the index was used to identify high schools that perform 0.5 standard deviations or more than their state’s average when accounting for students’ socioeconomic status as reflected by the percentage of students eligible for free or reduced-price lunch,” Newsweek staff wrote.

In Athens, 42 percent of city high school students fall into the “free and reduced-price lunch” category, according to figures obtained for the study through the National Center for Education Statistics. Student retention clocks in at 78.9 percent while 5.1 percent of students are registered for Advanced Placement/Dual Enrollment courses.

The average Athens High student scores 1662 on their SAT and 23 on their ACT, according to the study. These figures add up to about 77 percent of students committing to college as their post-graduation plans.

Athens High also earned a Gold Star Equity rating in the Newsweek rankings, meaning that out of the other schools listed, Athens students classified as “disadvantaged” by socioeconomic standards performed at or above state averages in standardized reading and math tests.