Since school quality is often one of the most important issues to homebuyers, getting factual information and objective data can be critical to your marketing and sales efforts.

Fortunately, objective information on schools is just a few mouse clicks away thanks to a joint partnership of the Pennsylvania Association of REALTORS® (PAR) and Standards and Poor’s School Evaluation Services (SES). PAR members can easily access it for free on a Web site provided by Standard & Poor’s School Evaluation Services.

More than 1.3 million people have visited the SES Web site, and 40% of them classified themselves as parents or homebuyers Standard & Poor’s, through a contract with the state of Pennsylvania, provides comprehensive data and independent analyses of public school performance. "As part of its strategic plan, PAR seeks opportunities to partner with outside entities to bring services that help make our members essential to the consumer," James Mentzer, PAR Communications Director, said about the partnership with Standards & Poor’s. "This is a comprehensive tool that delivers objective data to prospective homebuyers, parents, taxpayers and interested individuals."

Using the SES Web site

On the S & P homepage, you will be asked to select your state (Pennsylvania) and role (homebuyer). On the next page, you can choose to view information on a school district, school or charter school. From there, you can easily search for a multitude of information including:

* Performance on state tests
* SAT, ACT, PSAT, and AP scores
* Class size
* Demographics
* School spending
* Property taxes

In addition, Standard & Poor’s "S&P Observations" are posted for each district in a simple question-and-answer format. This will give you a quick overview of a school system’s strengths, challenges and other characteristics.

Click here to go to the Standard and Poor's homepage: http://www.ses.standardandpoors.com/