NAPLAN results 2023: NSW high school performance revealed

We’ve crunched the numbers and ranked every NSW high school based on their 2023 NAPLAN results. SEE WHERE YOUR SCHOOL RANKS.

Girls-only secondary schools have markedly lifted their rankings and outperformed several elite boys’ schools in the latest Year 9 NAPLAN data released today, exclusive Daily Telegraph analysis shows.

While coeducational selective public school James Ruse Agricultural High came first — with a NAPLAN average score of 747.2 — three selective public girls’ only schools took out the next three spots — Sydney Girls High, Hornsby Girls and North Sydney Girls.

The snapshot of student performance is based on tests in Year 9 in reading, writing, spelling, grammar and maths, giving an insight into how students are faring in the middle years of secondary school.

Sydney Girls rose from third place to second place, Hornsby Girls jumped from number six to number 3 and North Sydney Girls also rose a spot to fourth.

Retaining single-sex schools in NSW has been hotly debated in recent years, with the NSW government moving to phase out a number of single sex schools and a growing number of private boys’ schools are also going co-ed amid questions over whether girls are better off academically in single sex environments.

The entire top 10 schools in the NAPLAN Year 9 test results were dominated by selective high schools, with the first non-government school Sydney Grammar, a private, selective school, coming in twelfth.

The selective St George Girls High in Sydney’s south was placed ahead of other nearby selective high schools, with a NAPLAN average score of 685.4, coming 16th, managing to edge out the public selective schools Caringbah (a co-ed school), Sydney Tech (a boy’s school), and the regional Gosford and Smiths Hill High Schools (both co-ed).

And a number of girls’ private schools also outperformed boy’s private schools, including Presbyterian Ladies’ College, Tangara School for Girls, Pymble Ladies’ College, Kambala, Ascham, SCEGGS and Tara Anglican all placing ahead of the boys schools of Knox, Newington, Kings and Cranbrook.

In Sydney’s west, Blacktown Girls was ranked 131, while Blacktown Boys was ranked lower on 146, and Strathfield Girls was 114, while nearby Homebush Boys came in at 314.