South Hadley

South Hadley is a Massachusetts district with four schools serving about 1,620 students: two elementary schools (Mosier for grades 2–4 and Plains Elementary for PK–1), one middle school (Michael E. Smith Middle School, grades 5–8), and one high school (South Hadley High, grades 9–12). The South Hadley district as a whole ranks 243 of 351 districts statewide, in the 31st percentile, with 2 stars.

Among the three tested schools, South Hadley High holds the strongest overall position, with a 93.2% graduation rate, a 3.0% dropout rate, and the lowest student-teacher ratio in the district at 8.5. Michael E. Smith Middle School is the largest school at 505 students, and its standout result is 8th Grade ELA, which is 1.70 points above the state. Its biggest weakness is math: 24.77% proficient, 16.34 points below the state. Mosier is the improvement story, moving from 1 star to 2 stars nationally and posting gains in ELA (+0.43 points) and math (+3.47 points), though its 4th Grade ELA remains 12.77 points below the state.

Both the high school and middle school declined recently, falling from the 63rd to the 49th percentile and the 56th to the 42nd percentile respectively, each dropping from 3 stars to 2 stars. The steepest one-year drop was high school 10th Grade Science, down 17.36 points, followed by 10th Grade Math (down 9.58 points). High school Biology is a bright spot at 5.80 points above the state. Plains Elementary has no test scores or rank history because it serves PK–1, so it cannot be evaluated on achievement here; it does report the highest per-student spending ($18,585) and the highest student-teacher ratio (13.7).