An in-depth analysis of the Newton Public District’s MCAS scores found trends that the district aims to use to improve its curriculum.

Although no longer a state-mandated graduation requirement, the  the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System is still being used by Newton Public Schools district as a source of data to inform educational practices.

“Common assessments provide a consistent measure of learning across all classrooms and schools; they move us beyond anecdotal feedback to evidence-based insights into teaching and learning,” said Gina Flanagan, the assistant superintendent, at the last School Committee meeting on Nov. 17.

Flanagan, along with Katy Hogue, chief of data and research for the district, gave the school committee an in-depth presentation detailing how MCAS data can help NPS maintain and improve the quality of its school curriculum.

What did the data say?

Research by the district showed that students with “chronic absenteeism” had markedly lower MCAS scores in all subjects.

The state defines a student with chronic absenteeism as one with at least 18 absences in a 180-day school year.

Hogue used the MCAS assessment given last spring as an example, providing a graph that showed the more absences a student had, the lower they would score on the assessment. Simply put, students missing class were not performing as well as their peers.

Hogue and Flanagan provided graphs for each subject of the MCAS assessment. Each section broke down the number of students who “met or exceeded expectations” in each subject matter based on scores.

Writing continues to be a struggle

In terms of specific subjects, Hogue said that the writing section of the English Language Arts assessment has continued to give students the most trouble. Since 2019, the section has had the lowest average score out of all sections for each subject.

As a whole only 77 percent of students in grade 10 met or exceeded expectation in English Language Arts compared to last year’s 83 percent, while performance for students in grade 3 to 8 increased by 2 percent.

Breaking down the data further, Flanagan said that ELA MCAS scores for elementary students seemed to be remaining stable, suggesting that they were receiving consistent instruction in the subject.

But scores for students in grades 6 through 8 seemed to be showing a variation across school years, which to Flanagan suggested “a need for a more aligned curriculum.”

Although the writing portion continued to be a source of struggle for students overall, there were pockets of improvement. Students in grade 10 showed improved writing scores, despite fewer students overall meeting or exceeding expectations.

In response to these scores, Flanagan said the district has initiated a “self study” of its ELA curriculum for grades 6 through 12.

Math scores show improvement

According to the presentation data, math scores for students across all age groups increased this year.

Students in grades 10, and 3 through 8 had a one percent increases in the number of students meeting or exceeding expectations compared to last year. 

Middle and elementary schoolers performed the best on the functions portion of the assessment with 77 percent of students meeting or exceeding expectations. Only 62 percent of these students met the benchmarks for the expression and equations portion.

Tenth graders had higher scores on the algebra and functions sections but struggled with statistics and probability.

Flanagan said that the lower scores for statistics suggested students could benefit from an earlier exposure to curriculum that develops their data analysis and interpretation skills. She also acknowledged that an increasing rate of employers are asking for candidates to have strong backgrounds in these skills as well.

Science and Technology (STE)

In science and technology, fifth graders and eighth graders saw increases in performance of 5 and 4 percent respectively with 70 and 69 percent of students meeting or exceeding expectations.

Tenth grade saw a seven percent decrease in student scores compared to last year.

“I think it’s important to highlight that grade 5 scores are up seven points from pre-pandemic levels, which was a significant improvement that reflects strong teaching and curriculum implementation,” said Flanagan.

School Committee response

School Committee members had questions about the presentation.

Rajeev Parlikar wanted to know if there has been a noticeable change in how seriously students are taking the assessment, given how it was removed as a high school graduation requirement in November 2024.

Hogue responded saying there are still incentives for students to perform well, mentioning that college scholarships are still given to students for high scores.

Vice Chair Emily Prenner was concerned about the amount of professional development sessions that were presented as a solution to some of the inconsistencies or shortcomings within curriculum and MCAS scores.

“I am concerned about the load on teachers,” said Prenner, referencing the tight schedule teachers have to follow to stay on track with teaching.

Flanagan said that the timing of the professional development sessions will align with the schedule for its Curriculum Review Process, an in-depth review to determine whether each subject is being taught to state standards. Flanagan said that being mindful of this schedule and other factors like early release days has helped the district schedule these sessions more efficiently.

Mayor Ruthanne Fuller was concerned that the presentation didn’t include information about the testing performance of certain groups of students on its “key takeaway” section

“If you look at our students who are low income, our students with disabilities, our English language learners, our students who are boys, our students who are black, the gaps are way too big.” she said.

According to the study, black students from grades 5 to 10 had scored noticeably lower than their white peers on the writing portion of the ELA assessment. Low-income and English Language Learning students also performed much lower than their non-low income and non-English learning peers in this age group.

Fuller acknowledged that Flanagan, Hogue, educators and the rest of the district put a lot of work into the presentation, but emphasized that these points should not be lost within the other findings of the analysis.

“We can’t bury the headline, and it feels like some of the headline got buried here,” she said.