As admission professionals, we know that assessments are one tool to support you in identifying students who are the right fit for your school. Developing a well-rounded admission process that includes both objective measures (like assessment data) and subjective measures—like teacher recommendations and interviews—can help you gain a more holistic understanding of applicants and enroll a diverse body of mission-appropriate students.
As the most trusted admission assessment used by more than 1,000 independent schools worldwide, the Independent School Entrance Exam (ISEE) by ERB empowers schools to objectively assess student applicants alongside other admission inputs. It also enables students to show admission teams what they’re capable of in terms of their academic abilities and supports families in finding a school that meets their student’s needs.
At The Pingry School in New Jersey, ISEE is a critical tool to help staff identify the students most likely to thrive from a vast applicant pool, support enrollment, and refine admission processes that promote fairness and equity. An ERB member since 1928, Pingry also uses ERB’s Comprehensive Testing Program (CTP) summative assessment to measure student progress.
Background: The Pingry School
- Was founded in 1861
- Has been a member of ERB since 1928
- Is an independent K-12 day school with campuses in Short Hills, Basking Ridge, and Pottersville, New Jersey
- Currently enrolls over 1,200 students coming from 96 towns across the state
- Has a highly competitive admission process and a 12% admission rate, with 100% of graduates attending a four-year college or university
A Century-Long Partnership: ERB and Pingry
As a member school for nearly a century, The Pingry School has embraced its partnership with ERB in part because of the reliable, actionable data the organization has provided over the years.
“The value in our partnership with ERB is the tremendous credibility that comes with the organization and the ISEE,” says Brad Fadem, Pingry’s Director of Strategy.
While The Pingry School measures students’ potential and progress across many dimensions, ERB assessments offer objective data points that contribute to a holistic understanding of each student, school leaders say. These data serve as essential tools for the school’s admission teams in their decision-making and educators in tailoring their instruction and identifying gaps.
With its ERB membership, Pingry staff also gain access to up-to-date information about the independent school landscape and assessment best practices, says Director of Enrollment Edwin Núñez.
“I read every email and attend the conferences,” Núñez says. “There are so many places where you can gather information, but the amount of credibility ERB has is significant, and we truly trust it.”
“The value in our partnership with ERB is the tremendous credibility that comes with the organization and the ISEE.”
— Brad Fadem, Director of Strategy at Pingry
ISEE and Admission at Pingry
Pingry uses ISEE as part of its application process for students starting in Grade 2. For the enrollment team, ISEE has become a crucial tool for measuring applicants’ academic fit for the school.
An Admission Tool to ‘See Beyond the Transcript’
One reason ISEE results are so important, Núñez says, is that they offer standardized data points that allow admission staff to assess students with different educational and personal backgrounds. Unlike some assessments, ISEE—which includes sections on Reading Comprehension, Verbal Reasoning, Quantitative Reasoning, and Math Achievement—doesn’t just measure students’ specific knowledge; it also measures how they think. It’s a tool the Pingry admission team can use to predict students’ success at the school.
“Grade inflation has made it very difficult for us to really compare apples to apples,” Núñez says. “Every school doesn’t have the same standards in grading or in curriculum, which has made it very difficult for us to rely on transcripts to make any assumptions when we have applicants from all over New Jersey. ISEE has allowed us to see beyond the transcript.”
Since Pingry is an academically demanding school, ISEE scores also help families decide if it’s the right choice for their students. As Núñez explains, parents don’t witness their children’s experience in the classroom. That can make it difficult to understand what they need academically.
“Seeing test results can help parents realize where their kid fits on the academic spectrum and whether or not a school has the support to meet them where they are,” Núñez says.
Ultimately, says Núñez, the goal is not to fill Pingry with top-performing test-takers—the admission team works hard to fill each class with students who bring a wide array of strengths to the school. Using ISEE helps the school ensure it enrolls students who are prepared to thrive in a rigorous academic environment.
“Seeing test results can help parents realize where their kid fits on the academic spectrum and whether or not a school has the support to meet them where they are.”
— Edwin Núñez, Director of Enrollment
Supporting Data-Driven Enrollment Strategies
When schools collect standardized data (like ISEE and CTP results), they can more effectively track the success of their approach to enrollment.
At The Pingry School, enrollment and academic staff analyze student performance across multiple dimensions and compare those outcomes to their application profiles to see how well certain traits predict success.
The school uses this analysis to create an internal “engagement score” that looks at students’ academic performance alongside their involvement in athletics, the arts, extracurriculars, and student leadership. This helps the team ensure they base admission decisions on real trend data rather than perceptions.
“We essentially wanted to build a metric that allows us to look back at our admissions practices and validate or refute our beliefs,” Fadem says. “We also wanted to hone our rubric to uncover any bias that might unintentionally be baked into it.”
According to Núñez and Fadem, Pingry isn’t using these data to exclude students from admission. Rather, if they see that students who share a certain trait aren’t performing as well as predicted or aren’t engaged in the school community, they work to identify any potential gaps in support of those students.
A Personalized Approach to Admission
For The Pingry School, serving as an ISEE test site at the Lower, Middle, and Upper levels has allowed the school to adapt its admission process to fit its mission and goals.
“We were one of the first high schools to create an early-action process,” Núñez says. “The challenge of creating an alternative timeline is that you also have to be flexible with families and have a personalized approach to admission. The flexibility of being a test site and being able to assign test dates has made that possible.”
Image: Courtesy of The Pingry School
Núñez adds that with such a high volume of applications submitted, demands on admission staff are high—and the school’s partnership with ERB significantly lightens the load since ERB offers extensive support and a streamlined ISEE process.
For Núñez, ERB’s research-informed, data-driven approach to test development and validation is another critical differentiator. “There are not many standardized tests that we truly trust,” Núñez explains. “And without a third-party metric that we trust, it would be really, really hard to measure a student’s academic fit for Pingry.”
Prioritizing Equity in Admission
Diversity, equity, and inclusion are core values for The Pingry School—and Núñez says that contrary to popular misconceptions, standardized assessments can help make admission to independent schools like Pingry accessible to more students. The school does its best to remove any financial barriers to application, offering ISEE fee waivers and free test preparation resources to qualifying families applying for financial aid.
ERB and Test Innovators’ Partnership
All students deserve access to quality education resources. Through our continued partnership with Test Innovators, ERB provides free advanced test practice to all students who qualify for an ISEE fee waiver. Test Innovators provides engaging, interactive preparation tools to help ISEE registrants fully demonstrate their academic abilities on the test.
Additionally, Núñez says, the ISEE At Home remote testing option removes one of the biggest obstacles many families face: securing transportation to a test site and potentially waiting several hours for their student to complete the exam before they return home.
“In my experience, the flexibility of where you can take the test and the fee waivers make it really accessible to everybody,” Núñez says.
As Núñez points out, this differentiates ISEE from other admission considerations, like athletic achievements, which are often only possible for students whose families have the disposable income, free time, and transportation available to support high-level participation in sports.
Unfortunately, no admission process is perfectly equitable, and all schools should aspire toward continual improvement. But, as many elite universities have experienced, assessments can help admission officers spot talented students who may not have had access to the resources needed to help them reach their full potential.
How the ISEE Can Help You
More than 1,000 independent schools worldwide accept ISEE scores to provide objective input into their admission processes. Designed to focus on students’ skills and potential in addition to their pre-existing knowledge, ISEE is a powerful tool for predicting future academic success.
Plus, with ERB’s reporting capabilities in the 360 Access data reporting platform, schools can break down individual results and compare cohorts to track applicant trends over time.
ISEE is available for students entering Grades 2-12. ERB offers at-home, at-school, and in-office administration, with paper and online formats—more options than any other admission test provider.
Accepted by over 1,000 independent schools around the world, the ISEE is the most trusted admissions assessment tool available, and an important part of well-rounded admissions processes.
