About & Methodology

Who We Are

Mass School Rankings is an independent project that turns Massachusetts' public education and municipal finance data into rankings that families can compare side by side. We are not affiliated with the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, any school district, or any real estate company, and no school or district pays to be listed or ranked.

Questions, corrections, or data issues: info@massschoolrankings.com. We fix verified errors in the next update.

Data Sources

Every number on this site comes from public Massachusetts state data:

  • Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE): MCAS results (ELA, Math, and Science), SAT scores, AP participation and scores, graduation rates, post-graduation plans, attendance, class sizes, enrollment and demographics, teacher licensure, experience and salaries, staff retention, discipline, and per-pupil expenditures.
  • Massachusetts Department of Revenue, Division of Local Services (DOR): average single-family assessed values and tax bills, income per capita, certified free cash, bond ratings, and new growth for each town.

The current rankings use spring 2026 MCAS results (2025-26 school year),2024-25 data for SAT, AP, attendance, and staffing, and FY2026 town finance data. Historical trends go back as far as 2015, depending on the metric.

How Schools and Districts Are Ranked

High schools

  • SAT (30%): average total score, scaled from the 400–1600 range
  • MCAS (25%): average of grade 10 ELA and Math Meeting + Exceeding Expectations rates
  • AP (20%): share of AP exams scored 3 or higher
  • College plans (25%): share of graduates who report plans to attend a two- or four-year college, from DESE's Plans of High School Graduates report

Only high schools that report SAT results are ranked. If a school is missing another component, the remaining weights are rescaled.

Elementary schools

  • MCAS ELA (25%) and MCAS Math (25%): grade 3 Meeting + Exceeding rates, averaged over 2024–2026 so one small class doesn't swing a school's rank
  • Attendance (20%): average attendance rate
  • Teacher quality (20%): average of licensed, experienced, and in-field teacher rates
  • Discipline (10%): lower suspension rates score higher

Districts

A district's score is the average statewide percentile of all of its ranked high schools and elementary schools, so a district has to perform well across its schools, not just at one. Districts with a single school receive a 10% scoring discount to account for that smaller sample.

Letter grades

Letter grades are based on percentile rank within each category:

A+ Top 3%
A 3–8%
A- 8–15%
B+ 15–25%
B 25–40%
B- 40–55%
C+ 55–70%
C 70–85%
C- Bottom 15%

Reading School and District Pages

  • "State" vs. "MA avg": where DESE publishes a statewide result (MCAS, high school science, and graduates' college plans), a school is compared with that state figure. Where it doesn't (SAT, AP, graduation, attendance, teachers, and student needs), "MA avg" is the average of the schools we rank: high schools for high school pages, elementary schools for elementary pages. On district pages, "MA avg" is the average of Massachusetts districts, spending and salaries are compared with the median district, and MCAS is compared with the state's results in the same grades the district tests.
  • Green and red mark whether a school is better or worse than the comparison. Measures with no better or worse direction, like the share of low-income students, are shown in blue with "higher" or "lower" instead.
  • "Top X%" standings in each category count only the schools ranked in that category; a school with no AP results, for example, isn't ranked on AP.
  • "What stands out" notes are written by fixed rules from the data, not by AI: a school's strongest category, any category that ranks average or below, and its biggest changes over about three years. Statewide 10th-grade MCAS results fell after 2024, when passing the MCAS stopped being a graduation requirement, so high school MCAS changes are described alongside the statewide change.
  • Town data on school pages comes from DOR for the school's town. For a school in a regional district, we show every member town, since our data doesn't say which town the school is in.

Limitations

  • Test scores and college plans are strongly related to family income. Each school and district page shows its low-income and demographic makeup so you can read the scores in context.
  • Home values are DOR assessed values, which usually run below recent sale prices.
  • Short district and school overviews are drafted automatically with an AI model from the data shown on each page. The rankings and figures themselves are calculated directly from state data.
  • Rankings measure what the state reports. They can't capture school culture, specific programs, or fit for an individual child, so visit schools and talk to families.

Update Schedule

Rankings are rebuilt once a year after DESE publishes new school-year results, typically in the fall, and town finance figures are refreshed when DOR releases each fiscal year's data. Each page reflects the most recent release we have processed. See the FAQ for more detail, or browse every town A–Z.