Report on Ontario high schools rebuffs claim they can't improve student performance

Ontario high schools can improve student performance regardless of challenges, theFraser Institute said in its annual ranking of secondary schools released on Sunday.

The right-leaning think-tank'sReport Card on Ontario's Secondary Schools 2019 ranks 738 anglophone and francophone public and Catholic schools and a small number of independent schoolsbased on nine academic indicators derived from standardizedprovincialreading, writing and math tests.

Angela MacLeod, a senior policy analyst at the Fraser Institute, said contrary to common misconceptions, the data suggest every school is capable of improvement regardless of type, location and student characteristics.

"We often hear excuses in Ontario that schools can't improve student performance because of the communities and students they serve, but the evidence suggests otherwise," said MacLeod.

As an example, the report shows Stamford Collegiate Secondary School in Niagara Falls is the second-fastest improving school in the province rising from a score of 3.2 out of 10 in 2014 to 5.3 in 2018 despite 55 per cent of students having special needs.

Over the same period, St. Patrick's High School in Ottawa with a 61 per cent English-as-a-second-language (ESL) population and 17 per cent of students having special needsimproved its score from 4.6 to 6.4, the report said.

"The Report Card offers parents information they can't easily get anywhere else, about how their child's school performs over time and compares to other schools in Ontario," MacLeod said.

Key academic indicators of school performance

The Report Card is an overall rating of each school's academic performance. Fraser Institute says its overall rating is based out of 10 on the school's performance on seven indicators, all of which are derived from province-wide tests of literacy and mathematics skills that are administered by the province's Education Quality and Accountability Office (EQAO). They are:

• The average level of achievement on the Grade 9 EQAO assessment in academic mathematics.

• The average level of achievement on the Grade 9 EQAO assessment in applied mathematics.

• The percentage of Ontario Secondary School Literacy Tests (OSSLT) written by first-time eligible students that were successfully completed.

• The percentage of Ontario Secondary School Literacy Tests written by previously eligible students that were successfully completed.

• The percentage of all the completed tests written by students at the school that were assessed either as unsuccessful (OSSLT) or below the provincial standard (Grade 9 math tests).

• The difference between male and female students in their average levels of achievement on the most commonly written Grade 9 EQAO assessment in mathematics.

• The difference between male and female students attempting the OSSLT for the first time in their rate of successful completion of the test.

Toronto school only one with perfect score

Havergal College an independent boarding and day school for girls from Junior Kindergarten to Grade 12 in Toronto was the only school in the province to achieve a 10 out of 10 score.

"It's great to see them doing very well but there are quite a few other Toronto schools who are doing well,"MacLeodtold CBC Toronto.

"There's certainly a lot of Toronto schools in the top 10 this year, that's not super surprising based on population. But there are schools all across the province with all types of different student bodies who are getting great results for their students and that's always great to see."

Don't become complacent

But MacLeodwarns against complacency, noting that there is always room for improvement.

"Every school can always improve; every school can always do better for their students. Just because you are at the top of the list doesn't mean you can kind of sit back on your laurels. There is always something to be done for the betterment of students."

"We want all students to be successful so this is one more measure to take a look and say, 'are we actually meeting the needs of all of our students?"'

The Fraser Institute senior policy analyst says they are taking a "wait and see" approach to theprovince's proposal to increase class sizes.

The Doug Ford government has announced significant changes to Ontario's education system, including increased intermediate and high school class size averages. The average class size requirement for Grades 9 to 12 will be adjusted to 28, up from the current average of 22.

"If there are going to be some changes in scores based on these policies it's something we won't see for a few years yet,"MacLeodsaid.

"Whether or not [you have] a few more kids in the classroom or 10 more kids, how that will look is kind of something we're just going to have to wait and see what the data tells us. It's certainly something that will be really interesting to study to see if it does have an effect if all of these changes do go through."