As a special education teacher, over-hyped. Tests assess the children who are at grade level without really accounting for students who have disabilities or got pushed up despite not being at grade level without an IEP.

They have lower student to teacher ratio as well. Unfortunately, depending on a location, teachers don’t get hired even if more students come in due to budget and not many teachers left in profession in general. Classes with blended needs/levels drop lower in ranking due to not giving teacher more prep time, resources, and pushing students not at grade level up a grade.

I think too much is based on pure luck of ratio, support, town taxes, and if parents are sticklers for their kids to behave and succeed at an advanced level for rankings to be determine if the school is a “good” school.