[8][9][10] Briarcliff is noted for outstanding student achievement, testing scores and accomplishments, including a highly regarded science research program, world language and performing arts programs, University in the High School and Advanced Placement courses, and graduation and college attendance rates.

[7] The student body primarily consists of graduates from Briarcliff Middle School.

[12] Students from Pocantico Hills as well as other districts pay a tuition fee to attend.

The enlarged school accepted students from Croton, Hawthorne, North White Plains, Valhalla, and as far as Granite Springs.

Efforts were delayed until the 1960s, when the village government made plans to purchase 55 acres (22 ha) of the Choate estate.

[16] In 2013, the school's cardiovascular and weight lifting center was improved with more machines and equipment, increased space, new flat screen televisions, and other additions.

The school also reaches out to professionals who volunteer their time; the assistant director at the Studio Theater (also the son of Frances G. Wills) ran a workshop on proper casting and auditions for the students and arranged for Children of Eden creator Stephen Schwartz to visit the school during its 2002 production of his musical.

Their 2002 performance of Children of Eden earned ten nominations and three awards, for overall production, actor in a lead role, and director.

The school spent $23,000 on the production to pay for royalties, stipends for teachers acting as choreographers, musical directors and rehearsal accompanists, and for external workers to help students improve the production's lighting, sets and sound.

For their 2003 production of Footloose, the school's musical director Kathleen Donovan-Warren rented multicolored stage lighting and hired an electric guitarist as one of three professional musicians who played along with the student orchestra.

In 2010 they made it back to the section finals, led by seniors James Lombardi and Danny Collins.

[29] As of recently, the girls varsity soccer team has won the title of class B section 1 champions, as the boys had made it as the finalists.

(2023) Along with classrooms, a writing lab,[30] and a library, the school has an open room called the Maresca, where students study surrounded by teacher's offices.

[31] The school offers courses in five languages: Spanish, Latin, French, Conversational Italian, and Mandarin Chinese.

[40] Notable alumni of Briarcliff High School include Michael Azerrad, an author; Clifford Carter, a musician;[41] John Hersey, a Pulitzer Prize-winning writer and journalist who grew up in Briarcliff and attended the public schools;[4][42][43] Brice Marden, a minimalist painter who grew up in the village and is a 1965 graduate of Briarcliff High School;[44][45] Tom Ortenberg, the CEO of Open Road Films and the former president of Lionsgate Films; Jen Sincero, New York Times bestselling author, graduated in 1983; Ali Vitali, a journalist and author; and minor league baseball player Bobby Blevins, who grew up in the village and graduated from Briarcliff High School in 2003.

[46][47] Susan Bassett, a 1975 graduate, was a competitive swimmer in High School and a swim coach and Assistant Director of Athletics at Union College, where her teams won 3 New York State Championships.