Year Level vs Benchmark
The Year Level vs Benchmark page compares your year group's scores on three key wellbeing metrics against a national benchmark drawn from a broader population of students. It shows not only whether your school's scores are higher or lower than the benchmark, but whether those differences are statistically significant — meaning they are unlikely to be due to chance. This page is designed for school leaders who want to understand how their cohort sits relative to a wider reference point and identify where targeted action may be needed.
Page Layout
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The page is divided into two sections.
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The summary table at the top lists each metric with its change direction, magnitude, and significance. The comparison chart below visualises the same data, showing your school's score alongside the benchmark score for each metric, with a directional arrow indicating the size and direction of the difference.
A Help link in the top-right corner opens a panel explaining how to read the results, including the colour coding system and significance thresholds.
Summary Table
The summary table provides a quick read of all three metrics at once. Each row contains four columns.
- Title — The name of the metric being compared.
- Change — A directional arrow icon showing whether your school's score is higher or lower than the benchmark:
- ↗ Increase — your school's score is higher than the benchmark
- ↘ Decrease — your school's score is lower than the benchmark
- → No change — no meaningful difference detected
- Magnitude — The size of the difference, shown as both an absolute value and a percentage (e.g., 9.07 (447.2%)).
- Significance — A Yes or No badge indicating whether the difference is statistically significant:
- Yes — the result is statistically significant (p < 0.05) and unlikely to be due to chance
- No — the result may be due to random variation (p ≥ 0.05)
The Significance badge is colour-coded to indicate the nature of the outcome:
| Colour | What it means |
|---|---|
| Red Yes | Significant negative outcome — your school's score is meaningfully worse than the benchmark |
| Green Yes | Significant positive outcome — your school's score is meaningfully better than the benchmark |
| Pink/light Yes | Significant neutral outcome — the difference is significant but the direction is context-dependent |
| Grey No | Non-significant — the difference is not statistically meaningful |
Click the ⓘ icon at the end of any row to see the full statistical detail for that metric, including the t-test type, p-value, t-value, mean difference, sample size, degrees of freedom, and the benchmark and school means.
Comparison Chart
The bar chart below the table visualises all three metrics side by side. For each metric, two bars are shown:
- Grey bar — the benchmark score
- Blue bar — your school's score
A directional arrow line connects the two bars, colour-coded to match the significance and direction of the result:
- Red arrow — significant negative change (your school is meaningfully worse)
- Green arrow — significant positive change (your school is meaningfully better)
- Grey arrow — non-significant change (no meaningful difference)
The percentage difference is labelled directly on each arrow line.
Hover tooltips
Hover over any bar in the chart to see a tooltip showing the exact scores for that metric:
- Benchmark score
- Your School score
- Difference (as a percentage)
- T-test Results — the p-value and whether it is significant
The Three Metrics
The page compares your year group against the benchmark on three measures.
Mental Distress
Measures the average level of psychological distress in your cohort using the K6 scale. A higher score indicates greater distress. An increase relative to the benchmark (red arrow) means your cohort is experiencing more distress than the reference population — a signal that warrants attention in your wellbeing planning.
Masculinity Index
Measures the average level of agreement with traditional masculine stereotypes. A lower score than the benchmark (green arrow showing a decrease) is a positive outcome, indicating your cohort holds less rigid masculine attitudes than the reference population.
Life Satisfaction
Measures the average life satisfaction score across the cohort. A decrease relative to the benchmark (red arrow) means your students are reporting lower life satisfaction than the reference population.
For Mental Distress and Masculinity Index, a lower score is better. For Life Satisfaction, a higher score is better. The colour of the significance badge already accounts for this — a red badge always signals a concern regardless of whether the number went up or down.
Understanding the Help Panel
Clicking Help in the top-right corner opens the Understanding the Results panel. It provides a plain-English explanation of each column in the summary table and the colour coding system used throughout the page.
The colour coding for significant outcomes uses a gradient scale:
- Significant Positive Outcomes — green gradient from low to high intensity
- Significant Negative Outcomes — red gradient from low to high intensity
- Significant Neutral Outcomes — blue gradient from low to high intensity
- Non-significant Outcomes — always grey, regardless of magnitude
How to Use This Page
The Year vs Benchmark page is most useful as a contextual check — placing your cohort's wellbeing data within a broader reference frame before deciding where to focus effort.
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Read the Significance column first. Focus on rows marked Yes before looking at magnitude. A large percentage difference that is not significant (marked No) does not warrant action based on this page alone. Start with what is statistically confirmed.
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Check the colour of each Yes badge. A red badge signals a concern — your school is meaningfully worse than the benchmark on that metric. A green badge signals a strength to acknowledge and build on. Use the colour to prioritise which findings need a response.
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Hover over the bars in the chart to get exact scores. The percentage difference on the arrow gives you the headline, but the tooltip shows you the actual benchmark and school means. This is useful for understanding the practical size of the gap, not just the statistical one.
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Click the ⓘ icon for full statistical detail. If you need to share this data with a leadership team, external partner, or wellbeing researcher, the ⓘ tooltip provides the complete t-test results including sample size, t-value, and degrees of freedom.
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Use a red badge as a prompt to investigate further, not as a conclusion. A significantly higher Mental Distress score or lower Life Satisfaction score tells you that your cohort differs meaningfully from the benchmark — it does not tell you why. Use the Year Level Wellbeing Snapshot and Student Dashboard to understand the distribution and identify which students are driving the result.
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A green badge is still worth noting. A significantly lower Masculinity Index score is a positive finding. Acknowledge it in your planning and consider what practices may be contributing to it — these are worth protecting and reinforcing.
Present the Year vs Benchmark results alongside the Year Level Wellbeing Snapshot in school leadership or wellbeing team meetings. The benchmark comparison sets the external context; the Snapshot shows the internal distribution. Together they give a complete picture of where your year group stands and where effort is most needed.