The 2026 MCAS results came out Tuesday and they are down again. Forty percent of third through eighth graders met or exceeded expectations in English language arts, two points below last year. Among tenth graders the drop is sharper: 45 percent met the standard in English, against 51 percent a year ago.
The obvious question is whether the scores fell because the test stopped mattering. Voters removed MCAS as a graduation requirement in 2024. State officials say that is not the explanation. The more useful question, and the one nobody is asking, is what the law now requires in its place, because the answer is written into the statute and it is not what most parents assume.
The numbers
From the spring 2026 administration, as released by the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education:
- Grades 3 through 8, English language arts: 40 percent met or exceeded expectations, down two points from 2025. In 2019 it was 52 percent.
- Grades 3 through 8, math: 41 percent, unchanged from last year. In 2019 it was 49 percent.
- Grade 10, English language arts: 45 percent, down from 51 percent. Pre-pandemic it was 61 percent.
- Grade 10, math: 44 percent, down from 45 percent. Pre-pandemic it was 59 percent.
- Science: elementary 43 percent, middle school 39 percent (up two points), high school 41 percent (down five).
Fourteen districts returned to or exceeded their pre-pandemic performance in both subjects. Commissioner Pedro Martinez said the state is “still not where we want to be in terms of our results.” Deputy Commissioner Rob Curtin pushed back on the idea that lower tenth grade scores reflect a motivation problem now that the stakes are gone.
What actually replaced the graduation requirement
This is where the coverage stops and the law starts.
Massachusetts still has a graduation requirement. It is called the competency determination, it lives in G.L. c. 69, § 1D, and the statute still says that “satisfaction of the requirements of the competency determination shall be a condition for high school graduation.” The 2024 ballot question did not abolish it. It changed what satisfies it.
Here is the operative language as the statute now reads. The competency determination represents a determination that a student “has demonstrated mastery of a common core of skills, competencies and knowledge in these areas by satisfactorily completing coursework that has been certified by the student’s district as showing mastery of the skills, competencies, and knowledge contained in the state academic standards and curriculum frameworks in the areas measured by the MCAS high school tests described in section one I administered in 2023, and in any additional areas determined by the board.”
Read that carefully, because three things are packed into it.
The standard did not change. The proof did. A student must still demonstrate mastery of the same body of skills. What counts as proof is now district-certified coursework rather than a test score.
The benchmark is frozen in 2023. The statute ties the required areas to “the MCAS high school tests described in section one I administered in 2023.” The graduation standard is pinned to the content of a specific past administration of the exam, plus anything the board adds.
The certifier is the district. Each district certifies that its own coursework shows mastery. Every district in the Commonwealth now decides, for its own students, what satisfies a state graduation requirement.
Why this makes the scores more important, not less
The instinct is that a test without consequences is a test that matters less. Legally it runs the other way.
When MCAS was the gate, the score was the accountability mechanism for the student. Now it is one of the only remaining external measures of whether district-certified coursework actually reflects mastery. If a district certifies its students as competent while its tenth graders post 30 percent proficiency on the same content, the statute has no built-in mechanism that notices.
That is not an argument for or against Question 2. It is a description of where the check moved. The state still administers the test, still publishes the results, and now has no direct lever tied to them for an individual student.
The part of section 1D that did not change
Two provisions are still on the books and are worth knowing if you have a student who is struggling.
A student whose tenth grade results “do not demonstrate the required level of competency” has “the right to participate in the assessment program the following year or years.”
Students who fail to satisfy the competency determination “may be eligible to receive an educational assistance plan designed within the confines of the foundation budget to impart the skills, competencies and knowledge required to attain the required level of mastery.” A parent, guardian or person acting as parent “shall have the opportunity to review the remedial plan with the student’s teachers.”
Note the limit the statute attaches immediately after: nothing in the section gives a parent or student “an entitlement to contest the proposed plan.” The right is to review it, not to appeal it. That is a meaningful distinction from the special education framework, where disputes have a hearing process.
What to watch
- Whether the board adds areas. The statute lets the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education define “additional areas” beyond the 2023 MCAS content. That is a quiet lever over what graduation requires statewide.
- District certification practices. Whether districts converge on a common standard or each writes its own is the single biggest open question under the new framework.
- The 2023 anchor. Curriculum frameworks get updated. A graduation standard tied to a 2023 test administration will drift from what schools are teaching, and at some point the Legislature will have to address that.
- Next year’s tenth grade scores. One year of decline after a change is a data point. Two is a trend, and it will be argued as one.
Do Massachusetts students still need to pass the MCAS to graduate?
No. Voters eliminated that requirement in 2024. Students must still satisfy the competency determination under G.L. c. 69, § 1D, but it is now satisfied by coursework certified by the student’s district.
Is there still a state graduation requirement?
Yes. The statute still provides that satisfaction of the competency determination “shall be a condition for high school graduation.” What changed is the evidence that satisfies it.
What content does the requirement cover?
The skills and knowledge in the state academic standards and curriculum frameworks in the areas measured by the MCAS high school tests administered in 2023, plus any additional areas the board determines.
Who decides whether a student has met it?
The student’s district certifies that its coursework shows mastery.
What happens if a student does not meet the standard?
The statute preserves the right to participate in the assessment program in later years and provides that a student may be eligible for an educational assistance plan, which a parent has the opportunity to review but no entitlement to contest.
How far below pre-pandemic are the scores?
Tenth grade English is at 45 percent against 61 percent in 2019, and tenth grade math at 44 percent against 59 percent. Grades 3 through 8 are at 40 percent in English against 52 percent, and 41 percent in math against 49 percent.
Score figures, the district count returning to pre-pandemic performance and the quotations from Commissioner Pedro Martinez and Deputy Commissioner Rob Curtin from WBUR, September 22, 2026, reporting the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education’s release of the spring 2026 MCAS results. Statutory text of G.L. c. 69, § 1D, including the competency determination language, the right to participate in later assessments, the educational assistance plan and the limitation on contesting it, read at malegislature.gov. General information about Massachusetts law, not legal advice.