Boston Tutoring Center

A Race to the Bottom?

While the latest MCAS scores are not surprising, what is surprising is how many parents do not realize how ill prepared their children are to do work at a very high level.

I was one of those parents back in 2002. My son did well in school and was a straight A student. He scored at the top on his school's standardized tests, and I felt good that he was doing well in school.

I got the shock of my life when he scored at the bottom stanine (10%) in vocabulary and reading on a practice test for the ISEE. My efforts to help him raise his score were the impetus for starting my test prep business all those years ago.

I did not realize that his skills were really weak, and that the measure his school was using to evaluate student performance were equally weak.

Last year we had a very bright student who was attending one of the top suburban middle schools in the state. She attended a popular extracurricular math enrichment program that many of our students attend (and she was in the advanced/honors classes in this program). She earned a PERFECT score on her 5th grade MCAS math section. Her score on the ISEE math diagnostic was a 50%!

Big difference!

It is hard to know sometimes if your child is really learning the skills they need to be successful at a rigorous private school.

If your child will be applying to private school next year, now is the time to get started on test prep for the entrance exams. Skill building takes time, effort and dedication, and it does not happen overnight.

The work we do with students preparing them for entrance exam like the ISEE and the SSAT carries over for years into middle and high school, and gives them a solid foundation to succeed academically.

Let us know if we can help your child.

Boston ISEE Prep - www.bostoniseeprep.com

Boston Tutoring Center - www.bostontutoringcenter.com

Boston Private School Search - www.bostonprivateschoolsearch.com

https://www.bostonglobe.com/2025/09/29/metro/mcas-2025-pandemic-losses-recovery/