Achievement tests show how a student is doing in comparison to other students of his or her grade level in schools across the United States:  public, parochial, private, inner city, suburban, rural, etc.  If a student scores on the 65^th percentile, this means they are scoring better that 65% of the students of their grade, and under 35% of the students in their grade.  The 50^th percentile is the exact middle, exactly on grade level.  The higher a student scores above the 50^th percentile the more significant the score is above grade level, and the lower a student scores below the 50^th percentile the more significant the score is below grade level.

A school that averages above the 50^th percentile has an academic program that is progressing most of its students above grade level, and once again the higher the average is above the 50^th percentile the more significant the average is.  Bear in mind that school averages mean that ½ of the students are not scoring as high as the school average, and, of course, ½ of the students are scoring even higher than the school average.

Listed below are Good Shepherd’s achievement test percentile averages for all students for the past ten years.  Not all tests are administered to all grades, so the number of students each test represents varies.

In 2004, a new test was administered; when this happens, scores typically fall for a year or two and then start rising again.