If an HSC student gets 88 for everything, why shouldn’t they be recognised?

As more than 70,000 Higher School Certificate students finish their trial exams this week and private school fees rise to eye-watering levels, the Herald’s analysis of HSC subject averages at each public school has become increasingly important.

The analysis, led by our data journalist Nigel Gladstone, education editor Lucy Carroll and senior developer Richard Lama, is a good start at peeling back the curtain on some of the information hidden from parents, who are increasingly making decisions on where or how to live around their choice of schools.

Ashfield Boys High has been a big improver on HSC average scores.Credit: Louise Kennerley

For almost three decades, the state’s education authorities have restricted publicly released HSC information each December to band six results only – that is, students who have achieved a mark of 90 or more in any subject, and their schools. ATARs stopped being released after another newspaper inadvertently ridiculed a single school in 1997.

Restrictions exclude proper recognition for excellent comprehensive public schools in which students are getting averages in the 80s, as well as schools which have lifted their averages from the 60s to mid-70s.

Leading the list of big improvers since 2019 are Quirindi High and Ashfield Boys High, both of which have improved their average subject scores from the 60s to above 75. Quirindi – a town of fewer than 4000 people south of Tamworth – has a remarkable average advanced English mark of 82.8.

For the large cohort of good, hard-working, university-ready students who receive marks in the 80s, the lack of recognition each December when results come out is insulting.

Indeed, it is possible to get an ATAR north of 95 without a single band six.

Consider a student who gets 88 in five difficult subjects: their ATAR, according to the Universities Admission Centre estimate, would be 96.9.

HSC and ATAR.

Our analysis of the HSC subject data, which averages the average of all subjects to form a fairer picture of success, is not perfect: some comprehensive schools are missing; and Catholic and independent schools mostly do not report their subject averages.

Until last year, individual ATARs were supplied by the University Admissions Centre to only individual students. Now, schools also receive them, enabling them to calculate their median ATAR.

The Herald has long wished for better data than just band sixes. Median ATAR is the fairest measure of a school’s performance – and band five and sixes combined is a close second.

It is now time for education authorities to move past one incident last century and release median ATARs.

Any parent making life decisions around schools should be asking a school’s median ATAR now they have this information. If they won’t tell, ask why not.

Expensive private schools that want to stay in the game might consider releasing their average marks or median ATARs, too.

The reality is, no matter how we rank HSC success, North Sydney Boys, Conservatorium High, Baulkham Hills High and similarly popular selective schools would still be at or near the top.

But for many parents, knowing their local school has a strategy for improvement that is working, or consistently scores average marks in 80s, or has a strong median ATAR, is priceless information.

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