Wellesley Ranking Decline: Open Letter From Concerned Parents
Dear Members of the School Committee and Dr. Lussier, I trust that you have had access to the recently published rankings of Massachusett…
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Wellesley Concerned ParentsWellesley Concerned Parents
One of the primary concerns of Wellesley Concerned Parents is that we have noticed a continuous decline in academic rigor over the past 10 years at all levels of WPS. We have noticed this in the negative trends in MCAS & SAT. We have seen this in declines in national rankings. Along with a disturbing decline in enrollment and parent satisfaction.
Wellesley Concerned Parents want to work with the school to ensure rigor is restored in our school system.
MCAS Scores for Wellesley High School 2021
Looking only at the grade 10 results for 2021 since these are the results that will matter for national rankings like U.S. News and World Report, the outcomes were unexpectedly good. These data are of the percentage of those “Meeting or Exceeding” (M&E) the standard for English (ELA) and MATH.
Although the state in general saw and improvement in ELA results and some slippage in MATH, Wellesley’s results moved the school from 8th best in 2019 in both ELA and MATH, to 2nd and 4th, respectively.
Trend in Scores in English MCAS
Wellesley has a positive movement with English MCAS scores over the last 10 years, where there has been a trend in increase in Advanced scores, and a decline in proficiency, meaning 10th grade Wellesley Student are more often moving into the advanced measure in English.
Trend in Scores in Math MCAS
However, the situation is quite different in Math. 10th grade scores show a decline in “advanced scores”, a decline in proficiency scores and an increase in needs improvement in math.
Trend in Scores in Science MCAS
The story for science at first glance looks promising, with a shift of less students failing and more students moving into the “advanced scores”.
However, a concerning trend that is happening is in proficiency of core classes such as biology, chemistry, physics and engineering. Wellesley 10th graders are falling behind in these courses.
The trend in all science classes is less students are “advanced” (A) and more students are “failing” (F). The worst being in the technology classes.
A small glimmer of light is physics, which is moving in the right direction.
This decline in rigor in sciences is bad news for our children who will increasingly need these types of classes to succeed in college and in modern careers.
SAT Scores Decline
Another extremely concerning trend is the decline in SAT rankings for Wellesley Students. Since 2010 our students are doing worse and worse on the SAT.
There is much more to this SAT story, please come back and learn more.
We have to ask ourselves, is Wellesley High School preparing our children for college. The trending graph below might have you questioning this.
Wellesley Middle School & Wellesley Elementary Schools Concerning MCAS Scores
Where Wellesley Concerned Parents see the most concerned are the declining MCAS score at WMS and in the elementary schools. These declines are persistent and unacceptable.
As example, in the middle school 8th grade MCAS scores has been a downward trajectory in both ELA and Math in the past 4 years. Students are declining in “Meetings Expectations”. With little advancement in “Exceeding Expectations”. While we see a small uptick in students “Partially Meeting Expectations” we noticed an increase in students “Not Meeting Expectations”.
E = Exceed, M=Meets, PM=Participially Meets, NM=Not meeting
Please come back to read our deeper analysis of the WMS and elementary school MCAS declines.
National Rankings
The other area of concern is the decline in school ranking. Wellesley was once a #4 school in Massachusetts, but over the past 10 year, our ranking has declined to its current #26 ranking.
See Wellesley’s 2021 US News Ranking
Parent Satisfaction
With all this shift in academic rigor parents have begun to ask themselves if Wellesley Schools is providing the best education for our children. A recent survey sent to parents via a WPS Parent’s Coalition Facebook group shows a concerning answer to that question.
Read more about the . Parent’s Satisfaction Survey
Please help us to work with WPS administration to improve Academic Rigor at Wellesley Public Schools.
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We want to make our children’s education the greatest value. We refuse to take the back seat and watch “things happen”. We chose to be part of improvements in rigor and positive change.
Wellesley Concerned Parents