Stuyvesant High School in Manhattan is polishing its reputation for top academics today, earning more finalists spots in a prestigious national science competition than any high school in the country.

New York also beat out every state in the country, capturing 15 out of 40 finalist spots.

Five of the finalists named yesterday in the Intel Science Talent Search attend New York City public schools, and four go to Stuyvesant, the selective downtown school that focuses on math and science. The school last had a finalist in 2004, and has not sent so many finalists since 1992.

The fifth finalist is a senior at the Bronx High School of Science, another selective-admission high school.

“I could not be happier,” Stuvyesant’s principal, Stanley Teitel, said. “I’m very proud of all our finalists, and our semi-finalists as well.” Eleven semi-finalists were named at the school.

The finalists at Stuyvesant are Katherine Banks, Timothy Chang, Olivia Hu, and Xiaoyun Yin. The Bronx Science finalist is Artem Serganov.

The students will join 10 other New York high school seniors in Washington, D.C., in March, where the winner will receive a $100,000 scholarship. Finalists receive at least $5,000 and a new laptop.

The city schools chancellor, Joel Klein, personally congratulated the New York City finalists this afternoon in a visit to Stuyvesant. Mr. Teitel said the contest honor could boost the students’ odds of admission at colleges to which they’ve applied. “I can’t imagine every one of them will not notify their colleges immediately if they haven’t been accepted already,” Mr. Teitel said. “It could make a difference.”

The contest was formerly sponsored by Westinghouse.