What School Ratings Actually Measure (and What They Miss)

When you're researching schools for your child, one of the first things you'll encounter is a number. A 1-10 rating from GreatSchools. A letter grade from your state. A color-coded dashboard. These school ratings promise to simplify one of the most consequential decisions you'll make as a parent.

But here's what those numbers don't tell you upfront: they're measuring something narrower than school quality. And if you don't understand what's actually behind the rating, you might overlook a great school — or chase a score that doesn't match what your family needs.

This guide breaks down the common inputs behind school ratings, where the data comes from, and — most importantly — where parents should look past the number.

The Core Ingredients: Test Scores and Proficiency Rates

Nearly every rating system, whether from your state department of education or a third-party platform, leans heavily on standardized test scores. GreatSchools, for example, calculates a Test Score Rating based on state-standardized test performance. States measure student proficiency in reading and math from third through eighth grade, plus once in high school.

Proficiency rates tell you what percentage of students met grade-level standards at a single point in time. A school where 70 percent of students are proficient in math will typically rate higher than one where 40 percent are proficient.

The problem? Test scores reflect more than what happens inside the classroom. Research shows that proficiency rates are heavily correlated with family income and parental education. A 2022 study by MIT economist Josh Angrist found that schools with top scores "aren't necessarily the ones that actually help students learn more." In fact, test score-based ratings can effectively penalize schools serving largely low-income students and students of color.

Take Texas, where elementary and middle school ratings are based solely on how students perform on the State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness. Mississippi follows a similar pattern, weighing student proficiency and growth rates in English and math heavily in district grades. Colorado's system mostly uses standardized test scores to rate schools and school districts.

These inputs are measurable and comparable across schools. That's their appeal. But they capture where students start academically — often a reflection of ZIP code — more than they capture what the school itself contributes.

Growth Measures: A Better but Underweighted Signal

Some rating systems now include student growth — also called progress or value-added — as a separate component. Growth measures ask: how much did students improve over the course of a year, regardless of where they started?

GreatSchools gives more weight to its Student Progress Rating than its Test Score Rating because research shows growth metrics are a more accurate measure of what a school adds for its students. Texas includes a School Progress domain that gives credit to schools where students are improving, even if they haven't yet reached a particular benchmark.

The Angrist study found that growth scores are "much less biased and a strong gauge of how much a school contributes to student learning." A school in a low-income neighborhood might have modest proficiency rates but stellar growth, meaning teachers are helping students make significant academic gains year over year.

Yet growth still plays second fiddle in many systems. In the GreatSchools formula as of 2019, growth counted for only about 25 percent of a school's overall rating, while proficiency rates made up 45 percent. That imbalance means a school making tremendous progress with students can still land a mediocre score.

High School Ratings: Graduation Rates and College Readiness

For high schools, ratings typically add new layers. GreatSchools includes a College Readiness Rating based on graduation rates, SAT/ACT performance, and participation in Advanced Placement, International Baccalaureate, or dual enrollment courses. Texas counts graduation rates and measures of college, career, or military readiness in its overall score. Mississippi looks at performance on the ACT, ACT WorkKeys, high school assessments, and advanced coursework.

These indicators capture important outcomes. But they still miss nuance. A school might have a high graduation rate but provide little support for students who aren't college-bound. Another might excel at career and technical education but not offer enough AP courses to score well on the college readiness measure.

And some metrics can skew unfairly. Schools with International Baccalaureate or Cambridge programs can score lower on the AP participation metric, even though those programs are rigorous college-prep pathways.

What the Ratings Leave Out

Jack Schneider, a professor at the University of Massachusetts Amherst and author of Beyond Test Scores: A Better Way to Measure School Quality, has spent years documenting the gaps. School ratings often miss pieces of the puzzle that aren't captured in numeric form, he told the National Education Association. "They don't measure how safe and welcoming the school climate is, what arts and enrichment programs are available, the teachers' years of experience, or the professional development available to educators."

Here's what typically doesn't show up in a rating:

Teacher quality and stability. Ratings don't reflect whether a school retains experienced teachers or burns through staff every few years. They don't tell you if teachers have strong instructional training or access to high-quality curriculum materials. Yet research increasingly points to the importance of using high-quality, standards-aligned instructional materials, and nearly half of all U.S. teachers reported regularly using a standards-aligned material in Spring 2024, a proportion unthinkable a decade ago.

School culture and climate. Is the school safe? Do students feel supported? Are parents welcome? Many states include chronic student absenteeism in accountability systems as a proxy for whether a school's climate is safe and conducive to learning, but well-designed student and teacher surveys can provide more direct measures. A 2025 study by MIT researchers found that "schools have a greater impact on long-term student outcomes — like college success — when they measure and work to improve not just test scores but also broader dimensions of school life, such as student engagement and school culture."

Specialized programs and enrichment. Does the school offer strong arts programming? Music education? World languages in elementary grades? Robust special education services? These details rarely surface in a 1-10 score.

How the school serves different student groups. Some platforms break out test score data by race, ethnicity, and income, which is valuable. But ratings still tend to obscure whether a school is closing achievement gaps or whether certain students are being left behind.

Long-term outcomes. Few states track what happens after graduation. Metrics such as whether students attend and graduate from college, find gainful employment, and lead healthy lives are better gauges of readiness for adulthood, but most rating systems don't include them. Some progress is being made: a growing number of systems from large urban districts like Chicago to states like California and Tennessee are beginning to use some of these indicators.

The Equity Problem: Ratings Can Reinforce Segregation

Rating systems don't just leave things out — they can actively steer families in troubling directions. A 2019 Chalkbeat investigation found that GreatSchools ratings effectively penalize schools serving largely low-income students and those serving largely Black and Hispanic students, generally giving them significantly lower ratings than schools serving more affluent and more white and Asian students.

The result? "These scores really were on the top of the list of almost all of the parents that I talked to," said Duke researcher Sharique Hasan. "They wanted to be in a school district with schools that were rated a 9 or a 10." A preliminary study found that as GreatSchools rolled out ratings, areas with highly rated schools saw increases in home prices of nearly $7,000 within three years, making it harder for low-income families to buy into those areas.

Michelle Cardenas, a bilingual pre-K teacher at Hillcrest Elementary in South Austin, Texas, put it plainly: "It tears communities apart when families flee to higher-rated schools. And the rankings don't tell the full story of what is really happening inside a school." Her school received a B from the state but a 4 out of 10 on GreatSchools. The site doesn't show that most teachers have been there for two decades or that Cardenas spends hours creating scrapbooks for each student.

Parents in a 2025 study published in *Education Sciences* had little understanding of what inputs were behind their state's A-F grades. When researchers explained the frameworks, parents found them "overly simplistic" — failing to accurately reflect performance or capture the subjective nature of school quality.

Where to Look Beyond the Number

Ratings can be a useful starting point. But if you stop there, you're missing the story. Here's how to dig deeper:

Look for growth, not just proficiency. If your state or rating platform reports student progress separately, prioritize it. A school where students are making strong gains year over year is likely doing something right, even if proficiency rates are still catching up.

Check disaggregated data. Look at how the school serves students from different backgrounds. Are achievement gaps widening or narrowing? Do English learners and students with disabilities have access to strong support?

Visit the school. No dataset can replace walking the hallways, observing how staff interact with students, and asking questions. Talk to teachers, the principal, and other parents. Ask how the school tracks individual student progress and what support systems are in place.

Ask about what matters to your child. Does your child thrive with structure or need more flexibility? Are arts or athletics important? What about mental health resources or counseling? Great schools for one child aren't always great schools for another.

Consider teacher quality and stability. High turnover is a red flag. Ask how long teachers have been at the school on average and what professional development opportunities they receive.

Look at the school's own goals and improvement plans. Many schools publish these on their websites. They can reveal where a school is investing energy and resources, and whether leaders are transparent about challenges.

Colorado's accountability system uses standardized test results, graduation rates, college enrollment, and other factors, and a 2022 audit found the system provides "a reasonable and appropriate basis" for measuring school performance. But the same audit noted that parents need data to be accessible and understandable — and many parents still rely on word-of-mouth, school visits, and community Facebook groups over official ratings.

The Bottom Line

School ratings measure real things: test scores, graduation rates, and in some cases, student growth. Those data points matter. But they don't measure everything that shapes a child's experience or predicts long-term success.

A number can't tell you if teachers care deeply about their students. It can't tell you if the school fosters curiosity, creativity, or resilience. It can't tell you if your child will feel safe, seen, and challenged.

Use ratings as one input among many. Cross-reference multiple sources. Visit schools in person. And remember that the best school for your child is the one that meets their specific needs — not the one with the highest score on a website.

The conversation around school quality is evolving. States like Illinois are proposing to overhaul their accountability systems to better recognize school strengths and support improvement. Chicago suspended its single-number rating system in 2022, acknowledging that it reduced complex schools to overly simple designations. These changes reflect a growing recognition that great schools come in many forms — and a single number will never capture the full picture.

Your job as a parent isn't to find the school with the perfect rating. It's to find the school where your child will thrive.