How to interpret gov stats comparing secondary schools? Attainment, avg point scores, etc

[ParentOfOne]

Can you please help me understand how to interpret the government stats at
https://www.compare-school-performance.service.gov.uk/
to compare secondary schools?

• Progress 8 score: this is a measure of how much kids improve, right? So a fully or partially selective school may well show a lower score than a comp in a deprived area, simply because their kids started from a higher level?
• Entering Ebacc: there is a school with only 20%. What does it mean? That 80% of their students don't do the GCSE at all? That 80% drop out?
• Attainment 8: These are measures of how well kids do at the GCSEs? But what are the differences between "attainment 8", "grade 5 or above" and "Ebacc avg point score"? The last one can probably be skewed by schools promoting 'easier' subjects, but is "grade 5 or above" the % of kids who pass their GCSE in English and maths? I see schools with 30% here, and that sounds worrying.

Is it fair to say that for an academic child attainment scores are more important than progress, and viceversa for a less academic child?

But maybe non-selective schools which use seats or streams can have low overall results while still having sets or streams of highly performing pupils?

For context, we already know which schools are our top priority, but we would probably want to choose a safe option as 6th choice, just in case we can't get into any of the other 5. State schools only. So this is basically about choosing the "least worst" among schools which are either undersubscribed or less oversubscribed than most (which is typically for a reason).

Of course, I understand that metrics can be distorted.
School can push up their results by offrolling disruptive students, by limiting their GCSE options, by being partially selective with specialism tests, etc, so everything has to be taken with a truckload of salt.

Thanks!

If this is just for a last option, I am wondering if you are overthinking. Unless you think there is a reasonable chance you will get none of your top 5 and be assigned it? Although, if all the schools are undersubscribed, you would be able to move to another undersubscribed school without too much difficulty.

If there's not a huge amount to choose between the schools, why not make "ease of getting there" and "likely to have friends reasonably close by" as tie breakers?

Yeh I agree with Redsky, is it actually likely that you will be allocated this school? In other words, are your top 5, the ones you actually like, all total long shots? If one or two of them are pretty probable I would just stick the closest one down in slot 6. Close and bobbins is better than far-flung and bobbins after all. Today’s great thought!

"Much harder to make progress on already high achieving kids"

I'm not sure that is always true. Or at least it doesn't mean that they don't make any progress, perhaps just less than others.

For example, in one school where I used to live, I've just looked at the latest figures.

Overall, the school managed a P8 score of 0.73 which is quite good indeed.

Out of 173 pupils there were only 18 who were low prior attainers. High attainers overall had a P8 score of 0.62, so definitely lower than other pupils (which backs up the point you were making) but a score of 0.62 is nothing to complain about.

Looking separately at how a school manages those who are high, medium and low prior attainers often highlights what is going on.

https://www.compare-school-performance.service.gov.uk/school/136398/the-king-s-(the-cathedral)-school/secondary/results-by-pupil-characteristics?accordionstate=1

Although, having said all of the above, I have just noticed another school in that city. It has an overall P8 score of -0.64. Low prior attainers have a P8 of -0.44 and high attainers a P8 score of -0.99.

High prior attainers do not fare well at all at that school.

For context though, 46% are disadvantaged pupils.

@RedSkyDelights "If this is just for a last option, I am wondering if you are overthinking. Unless you think there is a reasonable chance you will get none of your top 5 and be assigned it?"

Well, in the last 3 years, she would have got in at 4 out of 5 schools, but always by September (never as of March), and always by a tiny margin in terms of admission distance.

This means that all it takes is a few more siblings or a few more applications in a given year, and our chances plummet.

For example, as of March 2025 she would not have been accepted at any of those. We'll see how much waiting lists will move this year. (We are pplying for 2026 entry)

Why overthink it if there are multiple undersubscribed schools? Because the schools which are undersubscribed in August may not be undersubscribed after the term starts. It's already happened in the past.