Dialog Editor
Students at diocesan high schools are getting great marks from the SAT test, widely used in college admission processes.
Test scores for juniors and seniors taking the SAT test at diocesan high schools are the highest they’ve been for the past five years, Louis De Angelo, diocesan superintendent of schools said last week.
The data show results from St. Mark’s High School in Wilmington, St. Thomas More in Magnolia, St. Elizabeth High School and Padua Academy in Wilmington, and St. Peter and Paul High School in Easton, Md.
Composite scores for juniors and seniors who took the test in the 2013-14 school year were above the national average and above other results in Delaware and Maryland schools.
(See the chart below.)
“We’re very proud of what those scores look like this year,” De Angelo said, noting some of the individual schools received higher results.
“It speaks volumes about the good work that happens in our schools,” he added.
The superintendent said the diocesan schools have been using the results of PSAT tests, given to freshman and sophomore students each year, as baseline data to prepare students for the SAT tests.
The SAT, which originally stood for Scholastic Aptitude Test, is administered by Educational Testing Service nationwide. The PSAT exams, preliminary SATs, are also part of College Board preparation exams.
De Angelo said the schools have always “been conscious of the data” resulting from the tests, but “I think we’ve become more data driven in terms of mining that data to improve both instruction and achievement.”
The PSAT results, he said, are returned to the schools with information on how students fared on specific questions. That way principals and faculty can focus on redirecting instruction to increase student scores in needed areas.
Following the highest test results in five years, De Angelo, who is also secretary of Catholic education for the diocese, said, “My hope is that when schools look at these results, our people feel affirmed in the good work they’re doing and they continue to address what needs to be done in each school.”
