Burlington Public Schools Shares 2021 DESE Report Cards

BURLINGTON, MA — State report cards for the 2020-2021 school year are now available for Burlington Public Schools and the district's schools, the district said Wednesday.

The report card includes multiple measures of a school's performance – more than just MCAS scores. It represents a new way of looking at school performance by providing information on student achievement, teacher qualifications, student learning opportunities, and more.

Like most schools around the country, the 2020-2021 school year looked fairly different in Burlington than in pre-pandemic years. Enrollment fell slightly from 2020 to 2021 in Burlington, and the annual dropout rate rose slightly from .2% to .3%.

However, chronic absenteeism - the percentage of students who miss more than 10 percent of the school year actually fell over 1.5 percent.

According to the district report card, Burlington schools outperformed most of the state on all metrics. In terms of MCAS scores, students in grades 3-8 did as well in English and math as students did in grade 10.

On the 0-99 student progress scale, with higher numbers meaning more progress, Burlington had low numbers in terms of growth in younger years, scoring a 39.2 for English grades 3-8, and 36.1 in math grades 3-8, both of which were still higher than the rest of the state. However, students in grade 10 scored 57.6 for English, higher than the state at 52.5, and 32.0 for math, lower than the state at 36.5.

Still, Burlington scored well on most metrics. In measures including attendance, college attendance, access to the arts, MassCore completion, and more, Burlington outperformed the state. While MCAS progress was low in younger years, absolute results were higher than the state average, with a larger proportion of students meeting or exceeding expectations.

Burlington's district report card and individual school metrics are available here.