None of Everett’s ten schools remains in the bottom 10 percent of Massachusetts schools that the state requires to take intervention, the district’s assistant superintendent for teaching and learning told the School Committee on Monday, October 5, in the first full review of the 2026 MCAS and accountability results. Student growth rose across the grades, chronic absenteeism kept falling, and every school’s percentile rank went up. The weak spot is Everett High School, where achievement scores slipped and English learners met none of the state’s proficiency targets.
The numbers
Dr. Margaret Adams said the Parlin and English schools, both of which had been flagged for state intervention, moved out of that category. The English school’s percentile rank rose from 10 to 18. The Whittier went from 11 in 2024 to 17 in 2025 to 26 this year, “the trajectory we want to see for all of our schools.” Districtwide, Everett scored 56 percent on the state’s criterion-referenced measure, placing it in the “substantially making progress toward targets” band, up from 55 percent a year earlier.
The state weights achievement most heavily, 60 percent at the K-8 schools and 40 percent at the high school, and that is where Everett earned the fewest points: two of four in elementary and middle school English, three of four in math, none in science, which Adams attributed partly to changes in the science test. Student growth scored three of four in both subjects. The K-8 schools earned full marks on English language proficiency and chronic absenteeism; the high school earned full marks on absenteeism and zero on English learner progress.
At the high school, English composite scores moved backward even as growth percentiles rose above 60, the state’s threshold for high growth. “Our students grew, but they didn’t make it to proficiency yet,” Adams said. Superintendent William Hart said the current high school classes are “the last of the COVID family of students” and that the district is lining up partnerships and outside resources for the building. Mayor Robert Van Campen pressed on what that looks like in practice; Adams described a Barr Foundation partnership to build a common instructional vision at the high school, with a three-year grant expected to come before the committee, teacher-led departments, and a push to make students “do the cognitive lift.”
Other steps Adams listed: after-school tutoring paid with Title I money, which she credited for gains among the lowest-performing students; common planning time rebranded as professional learning communities focused on data; a districtwide writing push after staff read the actual MCAS writing samples; and a state-funded high-dosage literacy program giving more than 400 first and second graders 15 minutes of one-on-one tutoring a day. Vice Chair Marcony Almeida Barros asked whether participation dropped after voters made the test optional for graduation; it stayed near 100 percent, Adams said, though the state has seen a dip in high school scores that may reflect students taking it less seriously.
A parent’s year at Webster Extension
During public comment, Priya Patel told the committee her child, who has a disability and a 504 plan, was verbally denied transportation to the Webster Extension School last year and again at a second 504 meeting last week, with no written decision explaining why, and that she has been “redirected between staff members” and left voicemails at the central office without an answer. She said she spent a year advocating alone at City Hall for drop-off parking; three spaces were set aside last week for families of children under six, but morning demand exceeds them, and about 20 spaces beside the building that once served the old Malden High School go unenforced while the wellness center there has been closed for a year and a half. Parents double-park on Broadway and walk two blocks with small children, she said. “I did not expect this to go through as a parent.” No committee member responded during the meeting; the chair thanked her and closed public comment.
Governor’s citations for the parkway rescue
The committee suspended its rules to honor the Everett High basketball players who pushed a stranded motorist’s car off Revere Beach Parkway, the same students the City Council recognized on September 28. Almeida Barros said he had shared the video with Governor Maura Healey, who sent citations for each student in her name and the lieutenant governor’s. “They said they were simply doing what they would hope anyone would do for someone in need,” Chair Samantha Hurley said.
Superintendent’s report
- Everett High art teacher Josephine Dugan, who built the school’s fibers program and costumes its theater company, was named a secondary art educator award winner by the Massachusetts Art Education Association. Lafayette School kindergarten paraprofessional Jeffrey Gomez, in his first year, received the 2026 Latino Excellence on the Hill Award at the State House on September 24.
- The city and the schools held a public meeting September 30 at the Parlin School on converting the old Everett High School on Broadway into a school for grades 7 and 8, with architects Perkins Eastman and project manager Leftfield. Hart repeated his view that a junior high is “the ideal way to solve overcrowding.”
- Homecoming was set for Friday, October 9 against Revere at Everett Veterans Memorial Stadium, with a rolling pep rally through every school, a 3 p.m. procession down Elm, Ferry, Chelsea and Spring streets, and the announcement at halftime of the first class of the Everett High School Athletic Hall of Fame, with a banquet to follow in the spring. The Homecoming Hustle walk and pancake breakfast on Saturday benefit the Women’s Breast and Cervical Care Program at Cambridge Health Alliance.
- The district is roughly halfway through a network modernization of all ten buildings, Hart said, with new switches going in on nights and weekends; the Whittier came online the weekend before. He said the work separates systems so an infection cannot jump device to device, and noted that the same day another Massachusetts district had been “crippled” by ransomware.
- Worcester State University’s president visited to meet the first students admitted under the district’s guaranteed-admission agreement, which waives application fees, testing and recommendation letters. A similar agreement with Salem State is to be signed next week.
- Family University runs Wednesday, October 7, 5 to 7:30 p.m. at the Keverian School, with sessions on reading iReady results, substance use, attendance and Everett High basics. Financial aid night for senior families is October 15 at 5:30 in the Crimson Cafe.
- A Webster School fourth grader broke his leg October 1 when his scooter hit a curb; a Keverian student called 911 and a group of Webster and Keverian students tracked down his mother and stayed until the ambulance came.
- The Adams School and Webster Extension preschools each won a $500 Healthy Start award for breakfast participation. A bench for Margaret “Maggie” Shabanir, a former Keverian student who died in 2022 at 24, was dedicated October 6.
Honors and votes
The committee presented Massachusetts Association of School Superintendents certificates of excellence to seniors Mia Allen, class president, ranked fifth with a 4.77 grade point average, and Alexander Angulo, ranked first with a 4.95, STEM club president and a two-time Tide Rises innovation award winner.
All votes were 7-0: the career and technical education admissions policy, which adds the new multimedia and broadcast production and public safety programs; the middle school pathway exploration policy; a Saturday, November 14 History Club trip to the National 9/11 Memorial and Museum in New York for about 40 students with seven chaperones; a city flu clinic at the Lafayette School on Saturday, October 24, 9 a.m. to noon; free use of Everett High on Tuesday and Thursday evenings through May for the Everett Adult Learning Center’s English classes, run by acting youth development director Roberto Velasquez, which could start within days and already has a waiting list; and four federal grants: Title I, $2,647,596; Title II, $273,899; Title III, $424,496; and Title IV, $189,547. Bills and payroll of $4,340,580.16 were approved.
The committee next meets Monday, October 19 at 6:30 p.m. in the Everett High School library. The agenda includes a library and instructional materials reconsideration policy, a $224,000 state reading grant and an executive session on the lawsuit DiCicco v. Everett Public Schools. The meeting video is on the district’s YouTube channel. This account is drawn from the livestream’s captions and the posted agenda; names are checked against the district’s roster.