As NPS approaches its December break, the district’s fulsome response to Year 2024’s Ballot Question 2, the statewide repeal of passing the MCAS tests as a requirement to graduate from a Massachusetts public high school, is coming into clearer focus. Changes to NPS’ graduation requirements must conform to statewide requirements still being developed, as a recent School Committee vote to change graduation policy reflects. However, based on information issued by the state last week, it’s unclear how, or if, the vast majority of NPS students will experience any meaningful changes in their high school experience due to this change.
On December 1st, the Education Council – established by the Governor’s office in January 2025 following the passage of Ballot Question 2 – issued an “interim report” titled Reimaging High School. The most notable component of this 108-page document, which framed a broad re-envisioning of public education in Massachusetts, was the inclusion of statewide “end of course assessments” as the implied successor to MCAS exams. However, the Governor’s office issued a statement clarifying that such passing assessments will not necessarily be a requirement to graduate, differentiating them from “high-stakes” MCAS exams. The report also stated that “capstone or portfolio” projects could similarly be used to assess mastery in a subject. The interim report was vague regarding what proportions of these assessments and locally devised coursework projects would ultimately be used in the new graduation requirement. The final report of the Governor’s Council is expected in June 2026.
This interim report comes only weeks after the Newton School Committee approved on November 3rd, by a 7 Yes / 0 No / 1 Abstain vote, a revision to the NPS prior year graduation requirements, which mandated only completion of satisfactory coursework. (The prior 2023-2024 academic year was the first one since 2003 without the statewide MCAS requirement.) The November 3rd revision, effective for the NPS Class of 2026 this spring, added a “Competency Determination” requirement in addition to completion of coursework. This addition was in response to DESE guidance issued in July. NPS administrators will now decide, possibly course-by-course, whether a Competency Determination means a test (and if so, whether that test will be the same as existing final exams or an additional, newly-administered one)- or some other subject-specific project.
Superintendent Nolin’s comments at the November 3rd meeting during the discussion of Newton’s policy centered on the present lack of uniformity across the district, making the task of composing district-wide competency determinations by subject align with the NPS 5-year goal of a common curriculum. The NPS policy change was first introduced at the School Committee’s October 20th meeting by Newton North High School Vice Principal Amy Winston and Newton South High School Vice Principal Jason Williams. Ms. Winston stated that students who transfer into NPS for their junior or senior years are generally the most difficult to assess for skills.
The November 3rd meeting replay and vote is on NewTV, and the fulsome discussion of the topic that occurred at the October 20th meeting is also on NewTV, beginning at the 21:00 minute mark. During that October 20th meeting, the majority of questions by School Committee members for the Vice Principals implied the Committee members opposed a return to standardized testing, however Chris Brezski (Chair, Ward 2) noted that capstone projects or similar were “inherently subjective.”
Underlying these debates and policy changes is the startling fact that since passing the MCAS exams became a graduation requirement in 2003, it is believed that not a single NPS student has failed to graduate from Newton’s high school solely because of the now-repealed requirement. (The very small number of NPS students who have not graduated have failed other requirements, such as coursework.) Therefore, the 2024 repeal of a law that appeared to have no direct relevance to Newton has nonetheless set in motion a chain of policy events that NPS continues to grapple with.
