1
St. Joseph Hill Academy
Staten Island·Richmond County·Grades PK-12·~650 students
CatholicAffordable
Tuition$12K/yr
TypeCatholic
Students~650
NYC
Best Catholic Private Middle Schools in NYC under $20K
Independent rankings of Catholic Private Middle schools in NYC, built from director interviews and verified data — never from school payments.
13 schools indexed0 director-verifiedUpdated this week
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Grade level
Affordability
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AdmitCompass tracks 13 private middle-level schools in NYC. Annual tuition ranges from $6.2K/yr to $12.5K/yr, with a median of $7.8K/yr across schools that publish a number. Staten Island has the highest concentration with 7 schools, followed by Brooklyn (3).
Private schools on this page set their own admissions criteria. Most ask for a school visit, prior records, and a family interview; competitive K and 6th-grade entry points often fill 6-9 months before the start of school. Every school is re-verified through direct outreach to admissions teams; data is refreshed on a 180-day cadence and timestamped on each profile.
See also: Scholarship-friendly, Tuition-Free.
Showing 10 of 13 NYC schools
- 2Notre Dame Academy
Staten Island·Richmond County·Grades PK-12·~400 students
CatholicAffordableTuition$12.5K/yrTypeCatholicStudents~400 - 3Visitation Academy
Brooklyn·Kings County·Grades N-8·~175 students
CatholicAffordableTuition$11.5K/yrTypeCatholicStudents~175 - 4St. Clare Catholic Academy
Staten Island·Richmond County·Grades PK-8·~500 students
CatholicCo-edAffordableTuition$6.5K/yrTypeCatholicStudents~500 - 5Our Lady Star of the Sea Catholic Academy
Staten Island·Richmond County·Grades PK-8·~400 students
CatholicCo-edAffordableTuition$6.5K/yrTypeCatholicStudents~400 - 6Our Lady Queen of Martyrs Catholic Academy
Forest Hills·Queens County·Grades PK-8·~380 students
CatholicCo-edAffordableTuition$7.8K/yrTypeCatholicStudents~380 - 7Saint Mark Catholic Academy
Brooklyn·Kings County·Grades PK-8·~365 students
CatholicCo-edAffordableTuition$6.5K/yrTypeCatholicStudents~365 - 8St. Charles School
Staten Island·Richmond County·Grades PK-8·~300 students
CatholicCo-edAffordableTuition$6.5K/yrTypeCatholicStudents~300 - 9Holy Rosary School
Staten Island·Richmond County·Grades PK-8·~250 students
CatholicCo-edAffordableTuition$6.8K/yrTypeCatholicStudents~250 - 10Saint Mary Star of the Sea Catholic Academy
Brooklyn·Kings County·Grades PK-8·~240 students
CatholicCo-edAffordableTuition$7.8K/yrTypeCatholicStudents~240
How we rank these schools
Built relationships, not scrapers. AdmitCompass ranks schools using a composite score that blends four signals: enrollment size (a proxy for stability and program breadth), tuition reasonableness within the local market, freshness of our most recent verification, and a small bonus for schools with full admissions detail published on their profile.
Public data comes from the Florida Department of Education (FLDOE), the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), and each school's own admissions pages. The information that actually matters to most families — acceptance rates, deadlines, what a director cares about — comes from direct interviews with school directors and admissions coaches across our active markets.
We do not publish scoring weights or per-axis thresholds. That keeps the moat intact: the rankings reflect actual conversations with people inside schools, not a formula anyone with a crawler could clone. Every profile is re-verified on a 180-day cadence, and the "last updated" date is timestamped on every school page.
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Frequently asked questions
What's the average tuition for middle schools in NYC?
Across the 13 schools on this list, annual tuition ranges from $6.2K/yr to $12.5K/yr, with a median of $7.8K/yr. Many schools offer financial aid, sibling discounts, or accept Florida Step Up / FES scholarships — check each school's detail page for current aid policy.
How competitive is admission to private schools in NYC?
Selective private schools review transcripts, teacher recommendations, an admissions test (ISEE or SSAT for grades 5-12), and an in-person visit. Acceptance rates vary widely — some schools accept nearly every qualified applicant, while top-tier programs admit fewer than 25%. Apply 9-12 months ahead of the start date.
What's the smallest and largest school on this list?
Visitation Academy is the smallest with 175 students; St. Joseph Hill Academy is the largest at 650. Smaller schools tend to offer more direct teacher contact and tighter community; larger schools usually have more elective and extracurricular breadth.
Is this list updated?
Yes. We re-verify school data on a 180-day cadence through direct contact with admissions teams, plus cross-checks against FLDOE, NCES, and published school sources. Each school profile shows the date of its most recent verification.
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