Reporting is a process, not simply a format for a report card. It is made up of a number of practices that schools negotiate with their parent communities and apply regularly and routinely in a cyclic manner. Reporting involves a professional judgement made on a body of evidence about a student’s progress and achievement against the standards of the curriculum of each learning area. These indicate standards of typical development aligned with particular year levels. Reporting provides parents with a progress point along this framework as well as a statement of achievement that indicates whether progress is at the expected level, above or below it.

In addition to these formal school reports, students in Years 3, 5, 7 and 9 take part in annual National Assessment Program Literacy And Numeracy (NAPLAN) testing, after which reports are produced. Students receive individual reports that allow parents to identify aspects of achievement and some comparative information with their children’s peers across the nation. To the extent that the tests are based on only a small part of the overall curriculum, they may indicate some individual strengths and weaknesses.  It remains the case that the best indicator of each student’s achievement is the school’s own assessment program, designed to assess the student’s ability in relation to the curriculum taught in our schools. These levels of achievement will continue to form the basis of semester reporting to parents.

By 30 June each year, all schools are required to publish a range of information on their websites, for the benefit of parents and the wider community. This information is very comprehensive and includes: