MISHAWAKA — Scores on Indiana’s fall 2007 statewide test in the Penn-Harris-Madison School Corp. were higher than the state’s average in every subject area — not a surprise here based on past years, officials said Monday night.

But there’s always room for improvement, said Nancy Nimtz, assistant superintendent for instruction. P-H-M’s goal about five years ago was to get scores in the 80 percent proficient range, and the district has done that.

But now the goal is to get scores in the 90 percent proficient range - a feat the district has accomplished in two out of 18 Indiana Statewide Testing for Educational Progress test measures, Nimtz said.

“It’s showing,” Nimtz told the board of school trustees Monday. “Even though we may not be where we want to be in our grading system, we’re certainly seeing some increases in our ISTEP.”

P-H-M’s scores on the latest English/language arts portion of the ISTEP ranged from 82 percent to 86 percent passing in third through 10th grades — higher than the 66 percent to 75 percent of Indiana public school students who passed the English portion, according to 2007 results released Monday.

The degree to which P-H-M students as a whole outperformed students across the state was the greatest for freshmen and sophomores in both English and math, in part likely because P-H-M instituted reading and writing strategies for eighth-graders two years ago, which helped freshmen in English, Nimtz said.

P-H-M also excelled on the math portion, with between 78 percent and 91 percent of students here passing, compared with 66 percent to 80 percent passing across the state. Unlike statewide and national trends, P-H-M math students actually do better as they get older because of the rigorous curricula, Nimtz said.

In addition, the percentage of students passing in science has grown each year districtwide since 2005, Nimtz said. The science portion made its debut about four years ago, starting solely with fifth-graders, Nimtz said.

Writing prompt scores were equally impressive, with the number of passing P-H-M students remaining relatively higher than the state’s percentages. In some cases, district schools/grades tripled their scores, Nimtz said.

Discovery Middle School scored highest of the middle schools in English/language arts, math and science, while several elementary schools — including Madison, Mary Frank, Moran, Northpoint and Prairie Vista — had at least 90 percent of students pass in at least one of the subject areas for 2007.

A few other schools maintained or increased their scores over the past three years.