UPDATED Sept. 27: The Arlington Public Schools’ administration reports positive results for 2024 student MCAS scores.
A Sept. 25 news release said five of 10 town schools earned 75 percent or above on their progress toward improvement targets, meeting or exceeding designations. As a district, Arlington earned 80 percent on its progress toward improvement targets, placing it in the highest tier of districts.
State and federal laws require high student participation in statewide assessments. Each district and school within the district is expected to maintain a participation rate of 95 percent or higher for each subject-area test.
Two elementary schools, Thompson and Peirce, earned an overall classification of requiring assistance or intervention because of low participation in statewide assessments for a focal group. “This is mostly due to families’ voluntary nonparticipation in MCAS,” the release said.
Read the full release, including charts, here >>
Asked why Table 3 9 (chronic absenteeism) omits the category of African American/black, which is listed on the previous two tables, the school representative reported Sept. 27: “It was not a reported category due to the number of students who identified as black/African American at the high school during that reporting year.”
Statewide
Statewide, BostonGlobe.com reported, “Long after schools reopened from the pandemic, Massachusetts students across the board are falling further behind academically, according to the latest state MCAS scores released Tuesday. The results raise worrying questions about whether an entire generation of children will ever fully recover.
“More than 450,000 students in elementary, middle and high school took the math, English, and science exams last spring. In most grades and subjects, fewer students scored at grade level than the year before. And, on every single test, students trailed their prepandemic peers by substantial margins.
“Overall, only 42 percent of students met expectations on the tests; before the pandemic, half did. Nearly 40,000 more students failed English tests than in 2019 — even though there were fewer test-takers.”
Sept. 23, 2024: Arlington schools awarded $39,500 toward genocide education
This news announcement was published Wednesday, Sept. 25, 2024, based on information from Weslie Etienne Pierre, APS director of communication. It was updated Sept. 27, to provide a clarification. It is not known why the two web links in the .pdf are not clickable here.
