School Committee Members Push District for Measurable Goals to Improve MCAS Scores as Achievement Gaps Widen

As this year’s standardized testing data revealed persistent disparities for underrepresented students, Cambridge School Committee members pressed district administrators on Tuesday to set measurable academic goals and explain how they will support schools with low test scores.

Cambridge Public Schools reported that 59 percent of students in grades three through eight met or exceeded expectations on the English Language Arts section of the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System — putting the district 19 percentage points above the statewide rate.

Some schools saw more progress in meeting grade-level standards than others, with four schools reported as meeting or exceeding targets, and another eight making substantial progress. Four other schools, including Cambridge Rindge and Latin School — the district’s only high school — made moderate progress.

But the district’s overall results mask sharply different outcomes across student groups.

ELA proficiency for Black and low-income students remained nine points below their respective 2019 levels, according to the district’s Tuesday presentation. Over the same period, proficiency rose six points for white students and five points for non-low-income students.

The racial and socioeconomic gaps have persisted across multiple years of MCAS results. When the committee reviewed Science and Civics scores earlier this year, School Committee members also asked district officials to explain how they would close the gaps.

On Tuesday, School Committee member Richard Harding Jr. argued that the district had yet to see sufficiently strong outcomes for all students, despite significant spending intended to improve test scores. He pointed to schools where roughly half of students did not meet the state standard and asked what the district was doing differently for them.

“This is a culture of mediocrity that, unfortunately, is costing our young people the opportunities of a lifetime,” Harding said.

He called for measurable goals that would make substantial progress on achievement gaps and urged the district to use MCAS results to identify the specific skills students struggle with in classrooms.

Superintendent David G. Murphy said the district has changed how it monitors schools and distributes support according to their needs. He agreed that differences among schools and student groups were stark, but said improvement could not come solely from district-level administrators visiting schools.

“At the end of the day, the work happens in schools,” Murphy said. He said principals must support educators who are struggling and, when necessary, make personnel changes to maintain strong instruction.

“I don’t think this is good enough,” Murphy said of the results, while acknowledging that the district had made progress in some areas.

District officials highlighted gains in ELA scores for older students. Eighth-grade proficiency rose nine percentage points since 2023, when CPS began implementing curriculum designed by the nonprofit Fishtank, which the district began using for grades six through eight in 2024.

The district also said students in grades four through eight showed strong ELA growth compared to students statewide who had similar prior scores. Officials described MCAS as one measure among several that educators use, alongside classroom assessments and diagnostic tools, to identify students’ needs.

Though district officials said the results suggested the curriculum may be helping, School Committee Chair David J. Weinstein cautioned against assuming that it caused the improvement without further examination.

Weinstein asked why achievement gaps had widened despite the areas of progress. Murphy said he had posed that question to district leaders as they worked on a strategic plan. He cited the lingering effects of the pandemic as one possible factor, but also said the district must examine why some schools see high performance from white students without producing similarly strong results for students of other identities.

The district plans to more closely connect classroom instruction, assessments, tutoring, and interventions, according to its presentation. Officials said they would direct more support toward students and schools with the greatest needs.

Some parents have questioned whether those changes go far enough. Larry Kim, a parent of two CPS students, wrote that he was “a little more disappointed with the School Committee than the superintendent.”

“After all these years, we still have no published, measurable goals for reading or science, and both are where they were eight years ago,” Kim wrote.

Sebastien Arnold, an MLK School parent who analyzed MCAS results by student subgroup, said Cambridge’s demographics affect its overall scores but do not fully account for the disparities he found. He cautioned against comparing districtwide averages without accounting for differences in student populations.

“I think of each comparison as a bit of a data point in a constellation that allows you to see what’s going on,” Arnold said. He said the district should examine schools that have improved and find out which of their practices might help students elsewhere.

The question of how the School Committee will measure progress grew more contentious near the end of Tuesday’s meeting. School Committee member Elizabeth C. P. Hudson said members still lacked concrete goals against which to evaluate district proposals or explain to families what would change.

“At the very least, we should be able to tell people here is when I will publish a concrete list of goals, and here’s what those goals will look like,” Hudson said.

Murphy said Committee members would receive strategic planning materials this week ahead of individual office hours. A broader public discussion is tentatively scheduled for Dec. 1, and the district will present its Math and Science MCAS results on Oct. 20.

—Staff writer Tess E. Sumner can be reached at [email protected].