Three out of four Lexington students meet grade-level standards in English. But for students with disabilities, it’s one in three. That 44-point gap, detailed in a new report conducted by consulting firm New Solutions K12, highlights persistent academic achievement gaps within the district.
The January review praised Lexington Public Schools for investing in specialized staff and resources but found that students with disabilities, about 14% of the student body, have not rebounded academically from the pandemic.
Mona Roy, a candidate for School Committee and mother of two neurodivergent students, said the report’s findings were “highly predictable.” Her younger son graduated from Lexington High School in 2022.
“The report confirms what many of us feared: while general education students have largely recovered academically, students with disabilities have not,” she said. “As parents, we can support our children and reinforce learning at home, but that is fundamentally different from the work of trained educators.”
Lexington serves 6,524 students across 11 schools and consistently ranks among the highest-performing districts in the state. However, 2025 Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS) results show that at least 14 districts out performed Lexington among students with disabilities.
“Since children start off in different places on their learning journeys, we want to be mindful of not only absolute achievement, but also growth,” Lexington Public Schools Superintendent Julie Hackett said. “If a student’s MCAS scores are very low, but their growth scores show gains each year compared to their cohort of peers, that is an important signal of progress.”
Lexington has a median annual household income more than double the state and national average. Pediatric neuropsychologist Eavan Miles-Mason, who works with Lexington families seeking special education services, said high overall achievement and private tutoring can mask deeper gaps.
“Students whose families can afford private, external support may ‘bump up’ the district’s reading scores, while students who do not receive adequate instruction or services may be left behind,” Miles-Mason said. When students with disabilities or socioeconomic disadvantages have lower achievement in an otherwise high-performing district, she said, it is often an indication that they’re not getting the appropriate instruction.
The report found that while 75% of students in grades 3-8 meet or exceed grade-level expectations in English, just one in three students with disabilities is proficient. Similarly, nearly 80% of all Lexington students meet grade-level expectations for math, compared with just over a third of students with disabilities.
Hackett cited limited access to the core curriculum and insufficient time with subject-matter experts as primary factors contributing to the gaps. “Not only do all students need access, but some students, depending on their abilities, may need more time with people who know the subject matter best,” she said. “Gaps will close with more time on learning and better access to the core curriculum.”
Roy said she was struck by the report’s staff allocation findings. Literacy specialists spend 22% of their time directly with students and math interventionists spend 18%.
“This raises important questions about how we structure educator work and whether we are directing resources to where they have the greatest impact,” Roy said.
The literary specialist and math interventionists split their time among direct student services, coaching, meetings and paperwork, planning and preparation and other activities. Other activities, including communication tasks, professional development, school duties, lunch and travel between buildings, took up the largest share of their time, according to the report. The literary specialist spent 32% of the workday on “other activities” while math interventionists spent 50%.
The report described staff as “hardworking” and “collaborative” and notes that educators care deeply about all students. However, it recommended that Lexington Public Schools adopt a consistent, districtwide reading program, provide extra support for struggling students and put more focus on promoting lifelong independence for students with severe disabilities.
“When we provide intensive one-on-one support throughout a student’s school experience, we may inadvertently create dependence rather than independence,” Hackett said. The district will focus on teaching self-advocacy, problem-solving and independence skills in the future, she said.
The report comes as schools across Massachusetts continue to recover from pandemic-related learning loss. MCAS results remain below pre-pandemic performance statewide, with about 42% of students meeting expectations in 2025 compared with about half before COVID-19. No student group has fully regained its pre-pandemic test scores statewide, according to WBUR.
Lexington schools have recovered at a faster rate than the state overall and many peer districts. But students with disabilities still have not returned to pre-pandemic scores, according to the report.
“The learning loss was real, and our most vulnerable students were disproportionately impacted,” said Roy. “That damage lingers.”
Roy described navigating the pandemic shutdown as a parent as “deeply frustrating.”
“In our household, we pushed our son to keep working through the pandemic, alongside family death and separation. He did not get a semester off,” Roy said. “[Students with disabilities] face an uphill battle where they are either progressing forward or sliding backward. There is no standing still.”
In order to address these gaps, the report called for a redesign of the severe-needs special education program, including stronger reading instruction, extra support for students who struggle, as well as programs that help students with disabilities gain long-term independence.
“Lexington’s special education system has been in place for decades now, and it’s a community-built system,” Hackett said. “Whether and how we make changes to special education delivery models will depend on the community’s willingness to try new things and explore different and perhaps better ways to address our students’ needs.” The district will host community workshops to identify top priorities, she said.
Roy said she worries that under financial pressure the school may cut necessary services that benefit students. Still, Roy sees the report’s findings as an opportunity to make changes that would have been harder to justify before.
“When we receive difficult news about outcomes, we can choose to reframe and reflect—and then recover,” Roy said. “Our students deserve that honest effort, and our educators deserve the support to deliver it.”
This story was written by a journalism student in BU’s Newsroom program, a partnership between the university, The Lexington Observer and other news organizations in the Boston area.