Walter Payton College Preparatory High School (commonly known as Payton College Prep, WPCP, or simply Payton) is an American public 4-year magnet high school located in the Old Town neighborhood on the north side of Chicago, Illinois, United States. It is currently ranked the No. 1 public high school in the State of Illinois, and No. 4 in the United States, by U.S. News & World Report. History Walter Payton College Prep, founded in 2000, is part of the Chicago Public Schools system. The school, which is located on Chicago's near north side, is one of the city's nine selective enrollment high schools. It was named after football legend Walter Payton, a former star halfback for the Chicago Bears and humanitarian who died at age 45 of a rare liver disease shortly before the school opened. The Walter Payton NFL Man of the Year Award is also named after Payton, and the Payton school colors are blue and orange, the colors of the Chicago Bears. The school is known for its advanced academic programs provided within an international model for teaching and learning. In May 2006 the Confucius Institute in Chicago was opened at Payton, as a partnership between Chicago Public Schools, the Office of Chinese Language Council International and Shanghai's East China Normal University. It is the only Confucius Institute in the world housed in a high school. On January 21, 2011, President Hu Jintao of China visited the school, where he saw the KAM and AP Chinese classes, and invited 20 faculty and students to China for the upcoming summer. The Payton Choir was one of eight US choirs to travel to the 2008 Olympics in Beijing. In September 2013, Mayor Rahm Emanuel announced plans to build a new annex behind the original building to house more students. The annex was completed and opened by the beginning of the 2016 school year. The annex features a new gym and a black box theater. It cost $17 million to build. Academics Payton has been ranked the No. 1 public high school in the State of Illinois by U.S. News & World Report since 2019. In 2015, Newsweek ranked it the top public high school in the state and No. 10 in the nation. In recent years it also has been the most difficult in which to gain admission among Chicago's elite selective enrollment schools, with freshman applicants needing a