Understanding the ISEE Score Report

This is the third in our series of Tuesday Testing Tips, prepared by Megan Cohen of La Jolla Learningworks.

You’ve helped your child prepare for the ISEE. Test day has come and gone. Now, the moment you’ve anticipated finally arrives and you receive your child’s score report. You open the envelope and unfold the report. You scan it over for meaningful information, but it all looks like Greek! All you can think is, “What do these scores mean?!”

Rest assured, once you know what to look for, the ISEE score report can be a helpful tool to learn about your child’s academic achievement. Below are some tips to help you make sense of your child’s score report.

1. The score report you receive will present data on the four different multiple choice sections of the ISEE. The essay is not scored; an unscored copy is sent to each score you select to receive score reports on your child. Results for each of the multiple choice sections are presented as comparative and individual scores.
2. On the score report, you will find two categories: 1) Test Profile and 2) Analysis. The Test Profile contains information on how your child’s performance compares to other independent school candidates in the same grade who have taken the ISEE in the past three years. The Analysis gives section-specific information on how your child performed on the test.
3. The Test Profile section of the score report breaks down results in 4 different measures: scaled scores, percentile rank, stanine, and stanine analysis. The scaled score is a statistical measure based on the raw scores for each section of the test and used by the ERB testing company to adjust for differences in the versions of the test administered on different testing days. Your child’s scaled scores for each section are used to determine his/her percentile rank, ranging from 1-99.

   Since small differences in percentile rank are not considered significant, stanine scores are also assigned as comparative measures. Percentile ranks are divided into 9 different segments to identify stanines. The breakdown is as follows:

   Percentile Rank	1-3	4-10	11-22	23-39	40-59	60-76	77-88	89-95	96-99
   Stanine	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9

   It is important to remember that the group of students that takes the ISEE is much more competitive than those who take private or public school annual standardized tests. Due to this difference in the comparison group of students, you may notice that your child’s scores are lower in some areas than they have been on similar types of tests in the past. You should also know that admissions offices do not expect all students to be above average in their performance.

   The stanine analysis presents a student’s scores in a more visual depiction with a band to indicate the percentile range within the assigned stanine. It also allows comparison between the ability measures (Verbal Reasoning and Quantitative Reasoning) and the achievement measures (Reading Comprehension and Mathematics Achievement).

4. The Analysis section of the score report indicates how your child performed on each section of the test. It provides more detailed information on your child’s strengths and weaknesses based on the specific types of questions he or she responded to on the test.

For more information on the specific types of questions on the ISEE, please visit the ERB’s website at http://isee.erblearn.org/guide.aspx and select “View This Book as a PDF” from the left-hand navigation options.

One Response to “Understanding the ISEE Score Report”

1. uberVU - social comments says:

   January 23, 2010 at 4:49 pm

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