Ontario high schools can improve student performance regardless of challenges

TORONTO—The Fraser Institute today released its annual rankings of Ontario secondary schools, the most accessible tool for parents to compare the academic performance of the province’s schools. The Report Card on Ontario’s Secondary Schools 2019 ranks 738 anglophone and francophone public and Catholic schools (and a small number of independent schools) based on nine academic indicators derived from annual provincewide reading, writing and math tests.

“The Report Card offers parents information they can’t easily get anywhere else, about how their child’s school performs over time and compares to other schools in Ontario,” said Angela MacLeod, a senior policy analyst at the Fraser Institute. Contrary to common misconceptions, the data suggest every school is capable of improvement regardless of type, location and student characteristics. For example, Stamford Collegiate Secondary School in Niagara Falls is the second-fastest improving school in the province (rising from a score of 3.2 out of 10 in 2014 to 5.3 in 2018) despite 55 per cent of students having special needs. Over the same period, St. Patrick’s High School in Ottawa, with a 61 per cent English-as-a-second-language (ESL) population and 17 per cent of students having special needs, improved its score from 4.6 to 6.4. “We often hear excuses in Ontario that schools can’t improve student performance because of the communities and students they serve, but the evidence suggests otherwise,” MacLeod said. For the complete results on all ranked schools and to compare the performance of different schools, visit CompareSchoolRankings.org. Media Contact: Angela Macleod, Senior Policy Analyst, Fraser Institute To arrange media interviews or for more information, please contact: Mark Hasiuk, Fraser Institute