Alexander B Bruce

Alexander B Bruce is a public school in Lawrence, Massachusetts, serving grades 3–8 with 462 students. One thing to know up front: most Lawrence middle schools serve grades 5–8, so Bruce's results include 3rd and 4th graders that neighboring schools do not test. In 2025–2026 the school ranked 412th of 478 Massachusetts middle schools — the 14th percentile, or 1 star — while the Lawrence district ranked 337th of 351 districts statewide. The school's percentile has mostly hovered between 12 and 20 in recent years, with no sustained improvement since a high point of 28 in 2016–2017.

Proficiency rates are low across the board. In 2025–2026, Bruce students scored 15.38% proficient in ELA, 16.75% in math, 19.05% in science, and 11.25% in 8th-grade civics, compared with roughly 40–41% statewide in each subject. Within Lawrence, Bruce is in the lower-middle tier: it clearly outperforms Francis M Leahy Middle and Arlington Middle School, and beats Henry K. Oliver Middle School in math and science, but trails Spark Academy, Parthum Middle School, Frost Middle School, and Guilmette Middle School in most core subjects. A few miles away, Andover West Middle and Wood Hill Middle School in Andover post proficiency rates roughly three times higher, and North Andover Middle runs about 30 points ahead in ELA and math.

The clearest bright spot is the school's English Language Learner program, which ranked in the 88th percentile statewide with 4 stars in 2025–2026, up from the 60th percentile two years earlier — remarkable for a school ranking in the 14th percentile overall. Weak points include 5th-grade ELA (5.97% versus the district's 14.18%), 6th-grade math (10.53% versus 18.22%), and 8th-grade civics (11.25%). Notably, Bruce spends more per student and has a lower (more favorable) student-teacher ratio than several nearby Lawrence schools that outperform it, so resources alone do not explain the results.