The top performing NAPLAN schools in suburban areas delivering best bang for buck

Low-fee private schools and suburban state schools are offering a top-quality schooling for a fraction of the price of prestigious private schools, new NAPLAN data shows. See where your school ranks.

Low-fee private schools and suburban state schools are offering a top-quality schooling for a fraction of the price.

Low-fee private schools and suburban state schools are offering a top-quality education for a fraction of the price of expensive private schools, new NAPLAN data shows.

Analysis of the top 100 secondary and primary schools shows some superstar providers beating, or performing just as well as, elite colleges.

Top of the secondary list are the four selective state schools, Melbourne High, MacRobertson Girls’ High, Nossal High and Suzanne Cory High. Each has a combined year nine average NAPLAN score of 670 or more.

Meanwhile Lighthouse Christian College Cranbourne posted a year nine average score across all five domains – reading, writing, spelling, grammar and numeracy – of 666.

Other lower-cost private schools beating big-name elite colleges such as Scotch College, Methodist Ladies’ College and Melbourne Grammar, include Harkaway Hills College in Narre Warren North and St Andrews Christian College in Wantirna South.

Apart from the four selective schools, there are 23 government schools in the secondary top 100 list, led by Glen Waverley Secondary College, which posted an impressive average year nine score of 626.4.

Other top state secondary performers include Victorian College of the Arts, McKinnon Secondary College, Highvale Secondary College and Balwyn High School.

Exclusive independent schools Haileybury College and Presbyterian Ladies’ College were the two highest-performing schools in primary education, achieving year five averages of 592.8 and 589.4 respectively.

Haileybury College principal Derek Scott said he was proud of not only students’ efforts, but also the teachers’ “extraordinary” work.

“It’s a dedicated team of teachers who really work on explicit teaching, evidence-based practice, phonics and literacy and all of them deserve a lot of credit for the great results the students achieve,” he said.

Some public schools performed just as well as their private counterparts in NAPLAN.

But it wasn’t just the prestigious private schools achieving great results, with students at a number of more affordable Christian and government schools also obtaining top marks.

Lighthouse Christian College Cranbourne, where school fees start from $2800 for a grade five student, scored the third-highest average NAPLAN rank out of the primary school cohort.

Mentone Girls’ Grammar and Scotch College were outdone by multiple public primary schools with fees a fraction of the cost of the wealthy private providers.

These schools were led by the state’s best primary government school provider, Oakleigh South Primary, which achieved a NAPLAN year five average of 584.

The top-performing state primary school requires parents to only contribute a fee of $475 per year, with 1048 students enrolled at the school.

Serpell Primary School, where fees are as low as $180 a year, was another government school that performed well.

Government schools Beverley Hills Primary, Vermont Primary and Canterbury Primary also outperformed high-fee grammar schools Trinity Grammar, Christ Church Grammar and Westbourne Grammar.

Meanwhile independent schools Lighthouse Christian College Keysborough, Oxley Christian College, Erasmus Primary School and Waverley Christian College – where fees range between $6900 and $11,410 a year – achieved year five NAPLAN averages between 560 and 568.

Lighthouse Christian College Keysborough principal Wing Hoe Leong attributed the school’s success to its established learning program that equips students with “good penmanship and writing skills” from prep.

“We are very proud of our students for performing well in the NAPLAN while also learning important values that build good character,” he said.

“Our fees are lower than many similar independent schools as we want to continue focusing on delivering high academic standards at an affordable level to our community.”