Called meeting to order with question "Did you like test taking?"

Called for public comment, no public comment

Meekerley led executive summary about MCAS data. Some highlights: overall achievement remains below target, 26% of students met or exceeded expectations in ELA, however wins in science and civics point to the impacting of adopting strong curricula, aligned instruction and teacher instruction.  Growth tells a promising story, but subgroup gaps persist. SWD and MLL students averaged SGPs of 41 and 39. Underscoring the importance on targeted and accelerated supports. 

To meet 2026 literacy targets, we must balance grade level instruction with structures for targeted intervention without overextending staff. Our next steps are to supplement teacher capacity-- staff is fully engaged in mastering grade level instruction, leaving limited bandwidth for intervention work on unfinished learning. Recalibrate school-level goals-- shift near term targets toward growth and subgroup acceleration as the leading indicators of future achievement. 

Opened up to questions:

Literacy is the root of science and civics-- how does this impact the data? Clarified, that science content really builds on itself throughout the year, civics. Similar.

Question about how we are viewing science

Question: How do we navigate the tension between growth and achievement? Board emphasized that for a kid on grade level should be at a SGP of 60+, and even higher for kids behind grade level.

Discussed how we are going to continue push closing gaps, specifically using the upper grades to close persisting gaps. 

We have done the phase of adopting new curriculum, which took time. But now we have adopted them and we are shifting gear to the phase of accelerating growth in response to the MCAS. The tier 1 was HQIM intervention. Then phase 2 is targeted course support for students who failed a course, they will get weekly office hours, attendance logged with families, quick academic recovery and re-engagement. Then tier 3 comprehensive recovery supports for students who failed 2+ courses-- they are receiving small group instruction every week, re-teaching high leverage standards.

Question asked what other schools have done to accelerate learning? Wondering, about what the timeline is for when we will see the growth from the implementations we have. 

Are our school goals calibrated to drive the right kind of growth? To ensure they are, we discussed what options there are for goals to review ourselves against. Asked the board: why of the goals would demonstrate a balanced approach to focusing on short term growth and achievement over time?

Questions were made about what groups we are focusing on and what the realistic number for goals is. We should really think about what the context. Also, want to think about what this looks like by grade level?

Question: Are we getting better at helping students grow during their time at Boston Prep? Are we setting goals grade by grade? Or whole school? Board suggested that the goals are grade by grade. This is a one year goal. There is a lot going into it including what are the teacher supports, etc. But school team emphasized the usefulness of having a set benchmark for everyone to work towards.

Set goal: Middle School SGP of 50 or higher and/or 5-6% SGP improvement across all school with at least 6-8 growth points for grades under 50%.

For High school: discussed worth it setting a SGP goal given the state wide discussions for graduation requirements.