S. Greenwood school designated Compass School by State in recognition of improvement on MCAS

BOSTON - The Sarah Greenwood K - 8 School was selected today to serve as a Compass School by the Massachusetts Department of Education. The school was picked as one of 12 statewide to serve as a model for improvement for other schools.

Compass Schools were designed by the Department of Education (DOE) to recognize improvement and student performance on the MCAS exams. The schools serve as models for reform and open their doors to visits from other schools to share their successful strategies. Each school receives $10,000 to prepare materials and ready themselves for the visits.

The S. Greenwood worked its way through several rounds before being selected to serve as a Compass School. It was one of almost 200 schools invited to apply based on the most recent report on Adequate Yearly Progress for improvement on the English Language Arts and Math MCAS exams. Of those 200 schools, 80 applied and 16 were chosen for further review and on-site visits before the final 12 were selected.

The S. Greenwood is the fifth school from the Boston Public Schools to be selected as a Compass School. The Donald McKay K - 8 School was selected as one of seven schools in 2004 while Boston Arts Academy was one of 10 schools in 2003 and both Brighton High School and the Richard Murphy K - 8 School were selected in 2002.

The other Compass Schools this year are Andover High School, Thompson Elementary School in Arlington, Community Day Charter School in Lawrence, South Street Elementary School in Fitchburg, Framingham High School, Lynnfield High School, Turkey Hill Middle School in Lunenburg, H.H. Galligan Elementary School in Taunton, Franklin Avenue School in Westfield, Lawrence W. Pingree School in Weymouth and the Mill Swan Communication Skills Center in Worcester.