Wellington Point chalks up highest NAPLAN rises with sharp declines at elite colleges
Redland City’s secondary schools have recorded some of their most significant shifts in academic performance with the 2025 NAPLAN data showing declines across several private colleges.
Redland City’s secondary schools have recorded a striking mix of academic outcomes in the latest NAPLAN results, with the city’s most elite private colleges showing some of the sharpest declines — and one state high school emerging as a rare improver.
Across Redland, the results revealed dramatic falls in achievement at some private colleges compared to schools of similar socio-economic status across the country.
There were steady or minor declines recorded at most state high schools, and isolated gains where targeted teaching appears effective.
Ormiston College, long regarded as the benchmark for academic excellence in Redland, posted the most dramatic negative shift compared to the performance of students at other similar colleges across the country.
This year, the college recorded six dark green standard deviation bands, signifying achievement “well above” students from similar schools, which is a fall from nine dark green standard deviation bands in 2023.
Overall, it recorded 17 positive “above average” bands this year compared to 23 above average in 2023, a loss of six bands.
The results showed over the past decade a narrowing of Ormiston’s relative advantage, raising questions about staffing, curriculum priorities, and strategic focus.
The decline signals the college is no longer outperforming comparable schools to the same extent.
Principal Michael Hornby emphasised the school’s achievements.
However, looking at the just the college’s raw data, Ormiston’s Year 9 students, who sat Year 7 in 2023, achieved 629 in reading, 661 in writing, 619 in spelling, 641 in grammar, and 660 in numeracy, gains of between 28 to 77 points compared with 2023.
Using just the raw data alone, Year 5 students (2023 Year 3 cohort) also excelled, improving reading from 476 to 549, writing 484 to 537, spelling 465 to 540, grammar 499 to 583, and numeracy 474 to 554.
Mr Hornby said the school was still analysing the detailed data.
“Ormiston College is proud to once again be recognised among Queensland’s top-performing schools,” he said.
“Data released highlights outstanding literacy and numeracy outcomes in the 2025 testing program for Ormiston College students.
“Year 5 ranked within the top 10 and Year 9 placed fourth overall across the whole of Queensland.
“For our Year 9 cohort in particular, the 2025 outcomes are the strongest ever reported,” he said.
Sheldon College remained stable with no change to the number of bands it recorded above the national average, while Faith Lutheran College fell below ACARA’s participation threshold, preventing a reliable SD band comparison.
Its raw data, which is not a comparison to other schools, showed its Year 9 reading increased from 578 to 609, writing 577 to 611, spelling 566 to 598, grammar 576 to 617, and numeracy 590 to 630.
Carmel College lost three standard deviation bands, when compared to similar schools across the rest of the country.
However, its raw data showed Year 9 students progressing from the 2023 Year 7 cohort, improved across all domains, with reading up 49 points, writing up 50, spelling up 43, grammar up 40, and numeracy up 43 points.
Redlands College dropped two “above average” standard deviation bands over the two years, and Capalaba State High School lost one.
Among other state schools, Alexandra Hills State High School fell two SD bands, Cleveland District State High lost one, Victoria Point State High remained steady, and Wellington Point State High school gained two, showing the greatest improvement.
Cleveland District State High saw solid growth in its own raw data from 2023 to 2025, with Year 9 students boosting reading by 41 points, writing by 37, spelling by 32, grammar by 23, and numeracy by 33 points.
Parents are advised to look beyond raw scores to understand how schools perform relative to comparable peers.
Standard deviation bands — are used to measure how a school performs compared with students from similar socio-economic backgrounds.
A higher SD band means the school is performing better than most peers, while a lower SD band shows performance is below expectations.
Unlike raw test scores, SD bands reveal a school’s relative performance, showing whether it is keeping pace with similar schools.
Each Redland school showed improvements in its own raw data.
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