Located sixty miles from Manhattan in the Three Village area, Ward Melville High School is situated in East Setauket, New York.

In the 2010–2011 school year, an additional wing was built to house the science department while the auditorium and the library was refurbished.

[5] It was named, among three other Long Island high schools, a National Blue Ribbon winner for academic excellence by the U.S. Department of Education in 2022.

The proximity of Ward Melville to Stony Brook University has encouraged the school to house a very strong science research program.

Over the past nine years, 2002–2010, Ward Melville has produced a total of 85 Intel semi-finalists and 11 finalists, the third-most of any secondary school in the United States.

[citation needed] Ward Melville high school offers a wide range of extracurricular activities for its students.

After being faced with legal action by the Liberty Institute, the school superintendent investigated and reversed the decision, stating that the initial reason for rejection was "inaccurately conveyed".