School Statistics
& Other Information
As parents we often have lots of questions about our schools. We know we pay taxes and would like to understand how much is budgeted to our schools and how that funding is spent, including how much of that is on special education. We'd also like to understand how we compare to other schools, and statewide averages.
The good news is that much of this is public information, though it may not always be easy to find. This page provides some helpful links to locate public information made available by the Town of Reading, as well as the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education.
Information Provided by the School
School Budget
The school helpfully publishes its prospective budget on the school website under Departments > Finance and Operations.
READING PUBLIC SCHOOLS The Superintendent’s FY24 Recommended Budget - The prospective 2024 budget contains detailed information on the current 2023 budget as well as actual expenditures going back to 2020, in addition to information on the number of students with IEPs, overall student enrollment and more
The Superintendent’s FY24 Recommended Budget Questions & Responses - Answers questions on changes to the school budget
Meeting Minutes, Reports & Related Documents
The Town of Reading makes public all meeting minutes and related documents.
School Committee Meeting Minutes - Meetings by the school committee are public and published in the town's public directory under Minutes\School Committee
Meeting Packets - Documents presented at committee meetings are published in the Town of Reading Document Center under Packets > School Committee
Town Annual Reports - Annual reports for the town will contain school specific reports and can be found in the public directory under Reports\Annual Town Reports
School Statistics Provided by the State
The Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education Provides a variety of statistics for comparing school districts
District Report Card - Comparative report card for the Reading School District
Reading Highschool Report Card - Comparative report card for the Reading High School
District Profile Summary Comparisons - Provides links to various metrics such as finance, teacher salaries, MCAS, graduation rates etc. across school districts in the state. Spreadsheet versions of much of the same data can be found in Spending Comparisons
School Attending Children Report - This report includes the enrollment of all full-time students whose parents or legal guardians are residents of the city or town
District & School Profiles - District and individual school profiles for Reading include a variety of information such as student achievement, finance, etc. The individual profiles comprise the data in the summary profile comparisons but include additional details not found at the summary level
Tiered Focused Monitoring Reports
The Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education reviews schools compliance with the state and federal laws and regulations for special education and civil rights. The reviews are every 3 years and alternate focus on different standards, termed groups.
The Reading School System's Group A report was in 2020 and Group B report was just completed in 2023. Student services is justifiably proud that no issues were found in the 2023 report.
Both can be found below:
Parent information on Tiered Focused Monitoring
Reading Student Services Presentation on Tiered Focused Monitoring Process
