Parramatta at a glance
Parramatta contains 11 schools reporting to ACARA — predominantly primary schools across the 8 Government, 2 Independent, 1 Catholic sector mix. ICSEA values across these schools range from 994 to 1144, with a mean of 1088 — that is the socio-educational backdrop you should keep in mind when comparing NAPLAN scores within the suburb.
3 of the 11 schools flag two or more STEM signals in their published curriculum (robotics, coding, IB MYP science, etc.).
How Parramatta reads
Parramatta feels more urban and secondary-driven than several of the suburban pages. The school count is decent, the government footprint is large, and the names near the top are the sort families often search when they are thinking about city access and later-year pathways together.
This page has a more practical, mixed-market feel than the prestige-coded suburbs. A larger government presence means the suburb is not only about private-school comparison.
The long-run Year 5 trend edges upward rather than surging. That suggests a usable, stable market with selective bright spots, not a wholesale suburb transformation.
The top-ranked schools in Parramatta are not all telling the same story. Some are clearly academic destination schools; others matter because of location, stage coverage, or city-adjacent practicality.
11-year NAPLAN trend (Year 5 mean across all suburb schools)
What this page can hide
The suburb average can hide the fact that families are often comparing very different school journeys here: inner-city commute logic, government pathway logic, and named secondary destination logic.
Parramatta is not especially language-rich in the current crawl output, so curriculum nuance may be underrepresented on the page.
Schools in Parramatta
| School | Sector | Type | ICSEA | NAPLAN | Highlights |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Our Lady of Mercy College Parramatta | Independent | Secondary | 1144 | 632.8 (Y9) | — |
| Macarthur Girls High School | Government | Secondary | 1071 | 593.4 (Y9) | STEM |
| Arthur Phillip High School | Government | Secondary | 994 | 560.0 (Y9) | — |
| St Patrick's Primary School | Catholic | Primary | 1094 | 519.8 (Y5) | — |
| Parramatta Public School | Government | Primary | 1134 | 515.0 (Y5) | — |
| Parramatta East Public School | Government | Primary | 1091 | 513.4 (Y5) | STEM |
| Bayanami Public School | Government | Primary | 1108 | 505.8 (Y5) | — |
| Parramatta West Public School | Government | Primary | 1029 | 499.8 (Y5) | — |
| Parramatta High School | Government | Secondary | 1132 | – | STEM |
| Secondary College of Languages | Government | Combined | – | – | — |
| Indie School Parramatta | Independent | Secondary | – | – | — |
NAPLAN column shows the latest-year mean across the 5 subjects for the indicated grade (Y5 for primary, Y9 for secondary). Click a school name to open it in the map view.
Nearby suburbs
What to verify before shortlisting
- Work out whether your real decision is academic ranking, access, or school culture; Parramatta often looks different depending on which of those dominates.
- Compare secondary schools directly if that is the stage you care about, because they carry a lot of the suburb’s headline weight.
- Check catchment and transport trade-offs together rather than reading this as a pure score page.
Frequently asked questions
What's a good NAPLAN score for schools in Parramatta?
There is no suburb-specific official benchmark for “good”. A reasonable first read is to compare each school with the broader national range and then, more importantly, with schools at similar ICSEA. In Parramatta, some schools sit well above the national Year 5 average, but that does not automatically tell you whether they are adding more value than a lower-scoring school with a very different intake profile.
How do I check the school catchment for Parramatta?
Open a school from the table and inspect it in the map view. Where department or ACARA-linked catchment data is available, that is the best starting point. Catchment boundaries can change, though, so the cautious step is to confirm with the relevant education authority or the school before relying on it.
Which is the best primary school in Parramatta?
There is no single factual answer to that. The table is sorted by latest NAPLAN mean, which is useful for orientation, but a family could still reasonably prefer a different school because of sector, fees, language offering, learning support, distance, or culture. This page is best used to narrow the field, not to end the decision.
Suburb schools report generated by Schoogaroo from public data (ACARA / My School and state sources). Latest version: https://www.schoogaroo.com/suburbs/nsw/parramatta - verify enrolment details with the school or the relevant education authority.