Belmont MCAS Scores Continue to Set High Marks

There is good news arriving for Belmont students and the school district's staff: Belmont continues to score near the top of schools and districts in Massachusetts after the release today, Sept. 19 of the 2012 Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS) test scores.

Students from the six public schools show a much higher level of advance knowledge and proficient skills than the state average in the annual test, which was administered this past spring.

Statewide, just under 20 percent of students are advanced in English while Belmont has double that amount.

In Math, 82 percent are either advanced or proficient compared to the 59 percent of students statewide.

2012/2011

MCAS Comparison

All schools

Needs

Improvement

Failing

The test – which measures student performance based on the Massachusetts Curriculum Framework learning standards – is the first under a new accountability system that replaces the federal No Child Left Behind law after the state was issued a waiver from the requirements earlier this year from the Department of Education. 

Now, instead of all students needing to reach the proficient level in math and English by 2014, schools must strive to reduce proficiency gaps by 50 percent by 2017. That would require Belmont to reduce to seven percent those children deemed to be "needing improvement" in math.

Belmont High 10th graders showed a continued mastery of both subjects, with no student failing and more than 95 students testing in the top two ranking categories.

Belmont High School

10th Grade 

2012/2011

Needs

Improvement

Ranking

statewide

In terms of overall ranking, Belmont High slipped from its perch of being the top open enrollment High School in the state but continues to show a mastery in science with the school ranked sixth statewide.

Belmont's other schools also put up good test numbers with 7th grade English students at the Chenery Middle School recording 97 percent advanced/proficient, the 7th best ranking of the state's nearly 500 middle and junior high schools. 

For a complete list of scores, head to this website.