By Brian Prato

Staff Writer

Last year the MCAS scores for sophomores at Westford Academy ranked highly in the state of Massachusetts.

Principal Jim Antonelli is especially excited about this feat.

“It’s incredible, absolutely incredible. It just shows what hard work and determination can do as far as middle school teachers that have really given these students a really solid foundation. Then you come into the high school and we’ve got outstanding English teachers that really push our students to be exemplary in the classroom,” said Antonelli.

He also goes to say how the students in our school every year feel a “good kind of pressure”, which pushes the students to want to do well and succeed on these important assessments.

To show how well we really did, a little over twice as many students tested advanced than the state average. Also, 98.5% of the WA students who took the ELA MCAS in the tenth grade scored proficient or higher.  This also holds true for the Math MCAS, where 97.7% of WA students scored proficient or higher.

Out of all the grades that took the MCAS, the tenth grade English and Math both only had three students in the “needs improvement” category.

“I’ve always believed that we have very strong curriculum leadership in the building. I believe that we have great teachers in the building and again, it’s based on really smart students that really care and take the time,” said Antonelli.

Curriculum Coordinator Anita Goldberg is also satisfied with this accomplishment.

“I’m very proud of them. I’m very proud of the department, proud of all the teachers, and proud of all the students. I think it’s a really terrific achievement,”said Goldberg.