Tenafly High School is a four-year comprehensive community public high school in Tenafly in Bergen County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey, serving students in ninth through twelfth grades as the lone secondary school of the Tenafly Public Schools. Students from the neighboring community of Alpine attend the school as part of a sending/receiving relationship with the Alpine Public School.
As of the 2023–24 school year, the school had an enrollment of 1,166 students and 107.3 classroom teachers (on an FTE basis), for a student–teacher ratio of 10.9:1. There were 32 students (2.7% of enrollment) eligible for free lunch and 11 (0.9% of students) eligible for reduced-cost lunch.
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History
Until October 1962, when the initial wing of Cresskill High School opened, Cresskil's students in grades seven to twelve had attended Tenafly High School. Students already in the Tenafly district for grades 11 and 12 when the Cresskill school opened remained at Tenafly High School until graduation.
Awards, recognition and rankings
Tenafly High School was recognized by the National Blue Ribbon School Award by the United States Department of Education at a special assembly to the Tenafly High School community on September 20, 2005. Tenafly was the only high school in New Jersey and one of 38 public high schools in the U.S. to receive the 2005 Blue Ribbon School Award.
The school was the 17th-ranked public high school in New Jersey out of 339 schools statewide in New Jersey Monthly magazine's September 2014 cover story on the state's "Top Public High Schools", using a new ranking methodology. The school had been ranked 3rd in the state of 328 schools in 2012, after being ranked 3rd in 2010 out of 322 schools listed. The magazine ranked the school third in 2008 out of 316 schools. The school was ranked 2nd in the magazine's 2006 rankings out of 316 schools included across the state. Schooldigger.com ranked the school 68th out of 381 public high schools statewide in its 2011 rankings (a decrease of 42 positions from the 2010 ranking) which were based on the combined percentage of students classified as proficient or above proficient on the mathematics (89.2%) and language arts literacy (97.3%) components of the High School Proficiency Assessment (HSPA).
In the 2011 "Ranking America's High Schools" issue by The Washington Post, the school was ranked 19th in New Jersey and 720th nationwide. Tenafly High School was the 2nd-highest ranked school in New Jersey in a 2007 listing by Newsweek magazine of the top 1,200 U.S. high schools .
In its 2013 report on "America's Best High Schools", The Daily Beast ranked the school 253rd in the nation among participating public high schools and 20th among schools in New Jersey. The school was ranked 198th in the nation and 16th in New Jersey on the list of "America's Best High Schools 2012" prepared by The Daily Beast / Newsweek, with rankings based primarily on graduation rate, matriculation rate for college and number of Advanced Placement / International Baccalaureate courses taken per student, with lesser factors based on average scores on the SAT / ACT, average AP/IB scores and the number of AP/IB courses available to students.
Extracurricular activities
A clip of journalism students at the school was featured on a December 2025 episode of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert introducing Colbert's "Meanwhile" segment.
Marching band
In 2012, the Tenafly High School Marching Band came in first place for group 3A in the USBands Marching Band Competition in Fair Lawn, New Jersey. In 2022 and 2023, the Band came in first place for group 4A in the USBands New Jersey State Championships. In 2023, the band competed in the USBands National Championships for the first time and placed first in group 4A.
In October 2024, the marching band won at the USBands annual competition at Bergenfield High School in October 2024, scoring 81.700 in Group Open IV. In November 2025, the band competed in the USBands New Jersey State Championships and placed second place in group 4O.
Athletics
The Tenafly High School Tigers compete in the Big North Conference, which is comprised of public and private high schools in Bergen and Passaic counties, and was established following a reorganization of sports leagues in Northern New Jersey by the New Jersey State Interscholastic Athletic Association (NJSIAA). Before the 2010 realignment, Tenafly competed in the Bergen County Scholastic League (BCSL) American Conference, which included public and private high schools located in Bergen and Hudson counties. With 910 students in grades 10–12, the school was classified by the NJSIAA for the 2019–20 school year as Group III for most athletic competition purposes, which included schools with an enrollment of 761 to 1,058 students in that grade range. The football team competed in the Ivy White division of the North Jersey Super Football Conference, which includes 112 schools competing in 20 divisions, making it the nation's biggest football-only high school sports league. The football team was one of the 12 programs assigned to the two Ivy divisions starting in 2020, which are intended to allow weaker programs ineligible for playoff participation to compete primarily against each other. The team was promoted to the American Red division after an 8–0 record in 2020, and a 6–4 run in 2021. The school was classified by the NJSIAA as Group III North for football for 2024–2026, which included schools with 700 to 884 students. The name for the school's athletic teams is the Tigers, and its school colors are black and orange, adopted in the 1920s as a nod to those of Princeton University.
The school participates as the host school / lead agency in a joint ice hockey team with Cresskill High School. The co-op program operates under agreements scheduled to expire at the end of the 2023–24 school year.
In the annual "Turkey Bowl" game, played on Thanksgiving Day in 2025, Dumont High School beat Tenafly by a score of 28-20 to win its 11th consecutive game in the series. The game between the two teams, played 95 times, is the oldest and most-played high school football rivalry in Bergen County, and one of only two remaining Thanksgiving Day games in the county, with Tenafly leading the all-time series against Dumont 56–36–3.
The boys' cross country team won the Group III state championship three consecutive years, from 1955 to 1957.
The boys track team won the indoor relay Group III state championship in 1966, won the Group I-II title in 1967, 1968 and 1977, and won the Group II title in 1975. The program's five state group titles are tied for eighth-most in the state.
Administration
The school's principal is James O. Morrison. His administration team includes the vice principal and athletic director.
Notable alumni
Edie Adams (1927-2008), actress
Josette Andrews (born 1995 née Norris, class of 2014), middle to long-distance runner
Mark Attanasio (born 1957), businessman who is principal owner of the Milwaukee Brewers and majority shareholder of English football club Norwich City
Paul Attanasio (born 1959), screenwriter and producer who was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay for Quiz Show and Donnie Brasco
Ann Blackman (born 1946, class of 1964), author and journalist
Neil M. Bressler, ophthalmologist who is a professor at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and editor-in-chief of JAMA Ophthalmology
Matt Brown (born 1999), professional ice hockey left winger who plays for the Bakersfield Condors
Jonathan Carney, appointed concertmaster of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra in 2002
Hope Davis (born 1964, class of 1982), actress
Pierce H. Deamer Jr. (1907-1986), politician who served in the New Jersey General Assembly from 1952 to 1962 and then in the New Jersey Senate until 1966
Tate Donovan (born 1963, class of 1981), actor
Emin (born 1979, class of 1997), stage name of Azerbaijani-Russian singer and businessman Emin Agalarov
Eran Ganot (born 1981, class of 1999), head coach of the Hawaii Rainbow Warriors basketball team