North Canyon High School is a nationally recognized public high school located in north central Phoenix, Arizona and features an International Baccalaureate program. The school has approximately 2500 students. It is the largest high school by student body in its district. The school is part of the Paradise Valley Unified School District. The school athletics teams are known as the Rattlers. North Canyon's school colors are purple and black. The campus opened in the 1991-1992 school year as Paradise Valley High School before PVHS moved into their remodeled school. It became North Canyon starting in the 1993-1994 school year. The first graduating class was the class of 1997.AcademicsNorth Canyon features special programs in academics. In addition to its IB Diploma Programme, NCHS offers a variety of Advanced Placement classes, and many of its highest-ranking students have grade point averages above 4.0. Students have won a vast array of awards spanning from the sciences to literary honors, from a football state-championship to a sophomore tennis state-champion. Also, in the class of 2009, there were ten National Merit Semi-finalists.North Canyon's Academic Decathlon team won the State Championship in 1995 and 1999, placing fourth and fifth, respectively, at Nationals.In 2007, North Canyon was on Newsweek's list of top schools in the country, placing 837 in the nation out of thousands of schools.