An authoritative ranking of secondary schools based on the results of the 2026 National Multisubject Test (NMT) has been published in Ukraine. The study, prepared by the ThinkGlobal online school using open data from the Ukrainian Center for Educational Quality Assessment (UCEQA), covered 8,217 schools across the country. The main feature of this analysis was the rejection of complex mathematical formulas and additional coefficients that take into account the total number of tests taken, allowing for an objective assessment of graduates' academic preparation.
Ranking Leaders and Calculation Methodology
The first line of the nationwide list was taken by the Lviv Gymnasium "Yevshan", which demonstrated an impressive average score of 174.98. The top ten educational institutions also included schools from Kyiv, Lviv, and Ivano-Frankivsk, sharing positions in proportion to their academic achievements. It is worth noting that traditional educational ratings often use an integral score, where 85% is directly the average NMT indicator, and 15% depends on the scale of the school and the number of test participants. This approach often pushes large educational complexes to the top due to massiveness, while the ThinkGlobal methodology focuses exclusively on the pure quality of knowledge.
Special Ranking of Distance Learning Schools
Since traditional full-time institutions in general lists often stand side-by-side with mixed or hybrid learning formats, researchers formed a separate segment for specialized remote platforms. This list included exclusively private online schools without offline classes, whose students took the NMT from different regions of the country. Each institution underwent rigorous manual verification through official websites to avoid the inclusion of hybrid lyceums. A comparative analysis with NMT-2025 data allows tracking the dynamic and identifying stable leaders in the online education sector who have maintained high positions for several years.
Controversial Data
Despite the high popularity of such lists among parents and applicants, official agencies urge treating them with a certain degree of skepticism. UCEQA traditionally refrains from compiling official school rankings, emphasizing that the NMT is taken only by those who plan to enter Ukrainian universities, which distorts the general picture of the quality of secondary education. UCEQA Director Tetiana Vakulenko has repeatedly stated that external factors—tutoring, individual preparation, and student migration between schools in high school—can affect the final score. In addition, in small schools, even one exceptionally high or low result of an individual student can significantly change the institution's overall statistics.
Expert Recommendations for Parents
Experts remind that NMT statistical indicators should serve only as one of the reference points when choosing an educational institution, rather than an absolute criterion. Priority factors for a child's harmonious development remain psychological comfort in the team, teaching methods, the presence of feedback, and live interaction with teachers. The professionalism of the teaching staff, the depth of understanding of the subject, and the empathy of teachers play a key role in reducing stress levels in teenagers. Ultimately, the optimal choice of a school is always based on the individual characteristics, pace of learning, and personal needs of each specific child.
