Wachusett
1 high school and 7 elementary schools in our rankings
Students from Holden, Paxton, Princeton, Rutland and Sterling attend Wachusett schools, including Wachusett Regional High School.
Ranks #79 of 328 Massachusetts school districts — top 25%.
MCAS is the share of students meeting or exceeding expectations in 2026, grades 3–10 combined. Spending is total per-pupil expenditure in FY2024.
The Wachusett Regional School District serves five towns in the hills northwest of Worcester: Holden, Paxton, Princeton, Rutland, and Sterling. Its high school, Wachusett Regional High, is located in Holden and draws students from across the district. The district is set around Wachusett Mountain, the state's second-highest peak, and its towns combine rural and suburban character with a mix of residential neighborhoods, farmland, and conservation land. Princeton and Sterling stand out among the five for their notably high per capita income and assessed home values, while Rutland and Paxton are more modest in those measures. Princeton is also home to the Mount Wachusett Community College campus, along with a history tied to the region's early farming and mill-village past.
How it compares
- Strongest area: AP results, in the top 15% of districts. 88% of AP exams at its high schools scored 3 or higher, vs 69% for the average MA district.
- Relative weak spot: Graduation rate ranks in the top 43% of districts, below its other categories.
- Top school: Dawson, #107 of 895 Massachusetts elementary schools.
- Trend: Chronic absence has fallen from 17.1% in 2022 to 11.5% in 2025.
- Trend: ELA MCAS is down 6.9 points since 2023 (57.1562% to 50.2561%); statewide it fell 3.9 points.
A district's overall rank is the average statewide percentile of its ranked schools, with a 10% discount for single-school districts. Category standings compare the average of each district's ranked schools and count only districts with data. How we rank
Schools in Wachusett
We rank high schools that report SAT results and elementary schools with grade 3 MCAS results, so some of the district's schools (middle schools, for example) aren't listed. Elementary ELA and Math are 2024–2026 averages of grade 3 results.
MCAS results
Share of students meeting or exceeding expectations, compared with the state. Statewide 10th-grade results dropped after 2024, when passing the MCAS stopped being a graduation requirement. There was no test in 2020.
High school results
Averages of the district's ranked high schools (Wachusett Regional High). "MA avg" is the average of all Massachusetts districts with high school data.
Students & classrooms
49.5% female · 50.4% male · 0.1% nonbinary
Spending & teachers
Spending is total per-pupil expenditure from all sources. Dollar figures aren't adjusted for inflation. "MA median" is the middle district in each year; small districts can spend far more per student, so the median is a fairer yardstick than the average. Salary is the average across 468 full-time-equivalent teachers.
Attendance
9.9 days absent per student (MA avg 11) · 2.6% missed 20% or more of school days
About the towns
What could you afford here? · All towns A–Z
Town figures are FY2026 averages for single-family homes from the Massachusetts Department of Revenue. Assessed values usually run below recent sale prices. "MA median" is the median of the state's 351 towns.
Compare Wachusett with nearby districts
Side by side: test scores, spending, class size, home values and taxes. Distance is between district centers. Compare with any district