Forsyth County’s high schools fared well on the End of Course Tests, but officials say there’s always room for improvement.

Superintendent Buster Evans was pleased with the results, which were released last week by the Georgia Department of Education, largely because “all of our schools performed in the top 20 percent in the state.”

“That’s pretty much across the board in all subject areas,” he said.

But Evans noted that the results also signal that it’s time to get to work.

“The results do a number of things for you. In some cases, they tell you how well you performed, and in some cases, they tell you where your opportunities for improvement are,” he said.

“We will take that data and ask the questions — what’s working well … what do we need to do to add support — and that will help us determine how do we do even better.”

End of Course tests are given to all high school students. And for those who entered ninth grade for the first time in the 2011-12 school year, they count 20 percent of their final grade.

The new grading system makes the test that much more essential for students.

This school year, the tests will be used to determine school success under the new accountability system: The College and Career Ready Performance Index.

Cindy Salloum, the school system’s chief accountability officer, said high school teachers would be meeting this week in groups by their departments.

“Their agenda that day is going to be talking about the data and test scores and then they’ll be sharing good practices, asking for suggestions on those areas that didn’t do so well,” Salloum said.

In total, students were tested in eight subjects: U.S. history; economics; American literature; physical science; biology; ninth-grade literature; math I; and math II.

Across the board, Lambert and South Forsyth topped every subject area among the system’s five traditional high schools.

One subject in which the local schools were challenged — in Forsyth and across the state — was math II.

Just 54 percent of the state’s schools met or exceeded the standard.

For Lambert and South, that figure was 83 percent, while it was 78 percent at North and West and 74 percent at Central.

Also worth noting, last year was the first time eighth-graders could take the physical science test for high school credit.

“You can’t tell the difference between the scores for them and high school, which of course was the goal,” Salloum said.

FCN regional staff contributed to this report.