THE TOP ACADEMIC
OHIO HIGH SCHOOLS - 2019
AUGUST 12, 2020 (v1)
PREPARED BY SCOTT GERBER
GERBER ANALYTICS, LLC | OHIOTENNISZONE.COM

 

Many education enthusiasts may remember the Gerber Analytics' 2007-2014 high school academic reports that were generated from the Ohio Graduation Test (OGT) results. Unfortunately, the OGT was discontinued. Now that the OGT has been replaced with the ACT and SAT tests, it is once again time to offer this report and the detailed school reports.

This information is already interesting to many, but it will be especially worthwhile as post-COVID-19 results arrive. It will also be very fascinating to compare schools that offered in-person classes versus those that only offered remote classes.

What Was Included?

Unlike the Ohio Graduation Tests, which all schools were required to take, schools now choose between the ACT or SAT.

There were 825 schools included in this analysis. The number of schools that took the ACT totaled 725 (88%), while 100 (12%) schools took the SAT. The Ohio Department of Education (ODE) provided the data.

While the OGT tests measured school performance using five subject tests -- Reading, Mathematics, Writing, Science, and Social Studies. The ACT measures Reading, Mathematics, English, and Science. The SAT only measures Mathematics and Evidenced-Based Reading and Writing, which comprises the Reading and English components.

Methodology Used

All schools were ranked based on their performance. This was straight-forward for the four ACT subject matter tests. It was not as clear cut for the schools which took the SAT tests.

For the rankings, the SAT results were converted to ACT values by using the Guide to the 2018 ACT/SAT Concordance which is published by the CollegeBoard. There were three steps. The SAT Composite was converted to the ACT Composite; the SAT Math was converted to the ACT Math; and the SAT Evidenced-Based Reading and Writing was equally split between the ACT Reading and ACT English values.

As an example, Indian Hill scored a 1221.74 on the SAT Composite. That converted to an ACT Composite score of 25.33. Their SAT Math score of 612.25 converted to an ACT 26, and the Indian Hill Evidenced Based Reading and Writing (EBR) score converted from 609.49 to 52. The 52 EBR was equally split between ACT Reading (26) and English. Is this a perfect way to split the value? Maybe not, but it still provides readers with a reasonable estimate of a school's performance. As a result of this, Indian Hill was ranked ninth in the ACT Composite and tenth, fifth, and seventh in the Reading, Math, and English subjects, respectively. They had no ranking for Science.

The absence of an SAT Science score caused another problem. It made the rankings for the ACT Science scores higher than they should be since 100 SAT Science scores did not exist. For schools with the lowest ACT Science scores, their ACT Science rankings were 100 places better than they should be. To remedy this and for ranking purposes only, SAT Composite scores were used as placeholder SAT Science scores. These rankings will not be shown for SAT schools. Note that only five of the 50 schools on the list took the SAT test so this has limited impact for this report.

Championship Schools

While there was Ohio Graduation Test data available for all of Ohio's schools, that is not the case for this analysis. This report does include many of Ohio's best schools, but not all. There was no data provided for several schools that had previously been Gerber Analytics' Championship Schools. Those omitted include: Hathaway Brown, Seven Hills, Columbus School for Girls, and Columbus Academy.

While the list below is worthwhile, it is not complete. It is probably fine for schools to declare that they were listed 15th on this Gerber Analytics report, but not 15th in the state of Ohio in education.

For the above reason, Gerber Analytics will not be using the Championship School designation as has been done in previous years.

Reading the Table

The table should be self-explanatory. It is sorted by the ACT or the SAT conversion score. It includes the number of students, the ACT | SAT score, the OhioTennisZone.com link (see below), the school's rankings in Reading, Math, English, and Science, and the number of Top 10 rankings which the school received. The SAT score is in italics and it is a much larger number. Subjects in which a school received a Top 10 score is highlighted in a darker shade of blue.

The subject rankings provide an additional dimension by helping to identify the strengths and weaknesses within each school. To view detailed performance on each school, click on the school name.

HIGH SCHOOL /
DISTRICT
# STU.
HS TENNIS
STATEWIDE RANKINGS
# TOP 10
READING
MATH
ENGLISH
SCIENCE
Ursuline Academy
Cincinnati Archdiocese
Hamilton
163
27.85
1
3
1
3
4
St Charles Preparatory
Columbus Diocese
Franklin
151
27.44
3
1
2
1
4
St Xavier
Cincinnati Archdiocese
Hamilton
351
27.08
4
4
3
2
4
Ottawa Hills
Ottawa Hills Local
Lucas
62
26.79
7
2
5
4
4
Wyoming
Wyoming City
Hamilton
164
26.60
2
8
6
6
4
St Ursula Academy
Cincinnati Archdiocese
Hamilton
159
26.28
5
18
4
7
3
Walnut Hills
Cincinnati City
Hamilton
488
25.84
6
12
9
8
3
Oakwood
Oakwood City
Montgomery
173
25.64
13
7
16
5
2
Indian Hill
Indian Hill Exempted Village
Hamilton
138
1221.74
10
5
7
3
Maumee Valley Country Day
OAIS - Maumee Valley Country Day
Lucas
61
25.02
9
14
10
34
2
Grandview Heights
Grandview Heights City
Franklin
81
25.02
14
19
13
11
0
St Ignatius
Cleveland Catholic Diocese
Cuyahoga
331
1209.82
10
10
7
3
Madeira
Madeira City
Hamilton
96
24.93
15
13
14
17
0
Upper Arlington
Upper Arlington City
Franklin
402
24.74
25
9
23
16
1
HIGH SCHOOL /
DISTRICT
# STU.
ACT | SAT
HS TENNIS
STATEWIDE RANKINGS
# TOP 10
READING
MATH
ENGLISH
SCIENCE
Dublin Jerome
Dublin City
Franklin
443
1200.27
19
5
11
1
Fenwick
Cincinnati Archdiocese
Warren
122
24.48
8
51
18
20
1
Notre Dame-Cathedral Latin
Cleveland Catholic Diocese
Geauga
181
24.35
22
24
19
28
0
Chagrin Falls
Chagrin Falls Exempted Village
Cuyahoga
174
1188.97
19
10
11
1
Mason
Mason City
Warren
821
24.25
27
20
33
14
0
Hudson
Hudson City
Summit
345
24.21
18
28
36
19
0
Solon
Solon City
Cuyahoga
392
24.20
29
15
32
22
0
Walsh Jesuit
Cleveland Catholic Diocese
Summit
257
24.18
17
57
17
23
0
McNicholas
Cincinnati Archdiocese
Hamilton
122
24.17
28
54
14
20
0
Revere
Revere Local
Summit
168
24.17
38
22
27
18
0
Olentangy Liberty
Olentangy Local
Delaware
513
24.16
40
15
34
13
0
Granville
Granville Exempted Village
Licking
221
24.12
16
20
48
31
0
Archbishop Alter
Cincinnati Archdiocese
Montgomery
162
24.00
24
47
20
25
0
Sycamore
Sycamore Community City
Hamilton
342
23.99
31
26
30
26
0
Mariemont
Mariemont City
Hamilton
116
23.83
21
49
28
32
0
HIGH SCHOOL /
DISTRICT
# STU.
ACT | SAT
HS TENNIS
STATEWIDE RANKINGS
# TOP 10
READING
MATH
ENGLISH
SCIENCE
Bexley
Bexley City
Franklin
174
23.81
22
34
45
26
0
Mount Notre Dame
Cincinnati Archdiocese
Hamilton
159
23.70
12
83
22
50
0
Turpin
Forest Hills Local
Hamilton
225
23.66
32
29
50
28
0
Olentangy Berlin
Olentangy Local SD
Delaware
255
23.59
50
23
57
24
0
Bishop Watterson
Columbus Diocese
Franklin
163
23.59
30
60
26
36
0
Olentangy
Olentangy Local
Delaware
236
23.41
55
25
64
33
0
New Albany
New Albany-Plain Local
Franklin
375
23.33
43
40
43
38
0
Tree Of Life-Northridge Branch
Tree of Life
Franklin
36
23.31
35
63
31
49
0
Bay
Bay Village City
Cuyahoga
211
23.27
54
38
55
30
0
Cuyahoga Valley Christian Academy
Cuyahoga Valley Christian Acad
Summit
145
1150.28
35
30
21
0
Avon
Avon Local
Lorain
331
23.16
57
57
34
40
0
St John's Jesuit
Toledo Diocese
Lucas
136
23.12
34
41
79
37
0
Beachwood
Beachwood City
Cuyahoga
127
23.11
46
37
55
46
0
St Joseph Academy
Cleveland Catholic Diocese
Cuyahoga
180
23.08
26
100
25
81
0
Aurora
Aurora City
Portage
221
22.99
39
55
69
44
0
HIGH SCHOOL /
DISTRICT
# STU.
ACT | SAT
HS TENNIS
STATEWIDE RANKINGS
# TOP 10
READING
MATH
ENGLISH
SCIENCE
Independence
Independence Local
Cuyahoga
83
22.93
41
74
45
58
0
Springboro
Springboro Community City
Warren
502
22.91
64
39
66
42
0
Olentangy Orange
Olentangy Local SD
Delaware
488
22.84
66
35
84
41
0
Archbishop Hoban
Cleveland Catholic Diocese
Summit
198
22.80
47
103
24
82
0
Worthington Christian
Worthington Christian
Franklin
81
22.79
35
127
45
52
0
Loveland
Loveland City
Hamilton
367
22.78
47
67
73
60
0

Additional Graphs Provide a New Perspective

Viewing trend charts is the best way to evaluate schools because it makes it possible to see which schools are already outstanding and which schools are trending higher. Three year trend charts are provided within this document for the ACT Mean Scores (or SAT Mean Scores) and the Number of Students Who Took the Test. As more years of data are acquired, they will be listed in future reports. By adding these graphs, this likely makes this report the most valuable and succinct document to compare Ohio's best schools. Note that some schools do not include three years of data because they switched from the ACT to the SAT or vice versa during this three year period.

State Team Tournament
Upper Arlington - Click for Graph View

Click on the following link to view the graphs for all of these schools. Click on the next link to return to normal viewing.

Note that these graphs only reflect those students who took the test as 11th graders.

OhioTennisZone.com

Many schools and parents know "Gerber Analytics" as the provider of the best web site to obtain detailed Ohio high school tennis information. As a bonus to the top schools that support OhioTennisZone.com, a link to that school's tennis report is available via the OTZ link.

Tennis players typically do very well academically so it is worthwhile for middle school parents and students to be aware of the schools that offer both great academics and great tennis programs.

Note that Safari browser users (typically used in Apple products) may experience a "421 Misdirected Request" problem when clicking on the "OTZ" link. It is best to use a different browser or go to OhioTennisZone.com directly to view this information.

Summary

Does this document include any mistakes? Hopefully not. The data was carefully entered and the numbers were double checked, but it is possible. Please send a Feedback message with any significant discrepancies. The revised document will be updated and placed online.

Will this type of ranking put more pressure on schools to do well? It might if the State of Ohio would endorse and publish the results of this type of friendly competition. It would encourage all schools and their students to do better as they strive to be one of the best schools. However, this is not about applying pressure to just the high schools. Excellent performance on this 11th grade test is not possible without the following:

While it would certainly be great to profit from this effort, please record the last decade of Gerber Analytics reports as a pro-bono or volunteer effort. I do this type of analysis because I enjoy doing it. I am also hopeful that it will benefit an extremely large number of Ohioans. If this analysis receives a large distribution, that might happen.

You may forward this report to anyone you wish but please give proper attribution if you use any of this material. To assist with tracking, please provide others with the link to the report..

Please let me know if you have any questions or comments.

Scott Gerber
Gerber Analytics, LLC
GerberAnalytics.com and OhioTennisZone.com

Click to submit a Feedback for any questions and/or to have your email address included so that you may be alerted to additional analysis work.