While Boston children are starting kindergarten with strong literacy skills, some performance gaps for older students remain, according to a recent report.
The 2026 Cradle to Career Report from Opportunity Boston, formerly known as the Boston Opportunity Agenda, found that kindergarten readiness jumped to 74% in the most recent school year from 66% in 2022-2023.
However, third and sixth-grade students have shown reading and math scores below grade level.
Ayesha Cammaerts, executive director of Opportunity Boston, hopes that that as the current kindergarteners move into higher grades, that academic success will continue. But she acknowledged that it will require more work and collaboration.
“There’s a good deal of work that is being done to look at how we can sustain those gains for our young people,” Cammaerts said.
She highlighted the Boston Reads program, launched last September to help improve literacy, as an initiative that will help sustain the success seen among kindergarten students.
At the high school level, graduation rates have improved slightly over the last few years to 82.7%. High school dropout rates have also dropped from 4% in 2023-2024 to 3.2% in 2024-2025. More high schoolers are showing interest in college through career and academic planning and enrollment in early college and career programs.
“The incredible college and career pathways work that BPS is doing and the early college work that’s happening here in Boston and across the state, I think really are setting up students to be more and more prepared coming straight out of high school into a career path,” she said.
Cammaerts said they have also been increased outcomes for low-income students and students with disabilities.
“To look at the trends over those three years and say that actually all of the outcomes are gradually improving is actually a pretty exciting thing to see,” she said. “At the same time, we have to acknowledge that there are still areas where there’s a lot of work to be done.”
However, college enrollment remains low, with about 55% of Boston high schoolers enrolling in college.
Cammaerts said the report doesn’t reflect the full surge in Boston high schoolers enrolling in community college as a result of the MassEducate program, which will provide free tuition for all residents.
“We also are at a moment where students are continuing to work on their enrollment and work on postsecondary plans and are looking at a lot of different diverse options,” she said.
Going forward, partnerships between organizations will be key to further supporting local students. Emma Tobin, co-executive director for advancement at the Family Nurturing Center of Massachusetts, partnered with Opportunity Boston to make screenings available for young kids and their parents. Last year, they provided services to nearly 7,500 children and parents in Boston and Chelsea.
“We are much more powerful and we are more likely to achieve the results we’re seeking together than apart,” said Emma Tobin, co-executive director for advancement at the Family Nurturing Center of Massachusetts.
The report found that Black and Hispanic students, multilingual learners, students with disabilities and students from low-income backgrounds face systemic barriers that limit opportunity. Students in these demographics make up most of Boston’s school-aged population.
Tobin said that if children lack pivotal learning opportunities — from language acquisition to literacy development — they will arrive at kindergarten behind their peers.
“If they’re behind at 5-years-old, they’re probably going to be behind at 8-years-old and 12-years-old and 15-years-old,” Tobin said. “This work that we’re doing in terms of screening kids … is an attempt to reach every child and their parents in the city of Boston.”
Cammaerts said it’s essential to address these inequities to ensure academic success across the city.
“There are bigger inequitable structures, not just within education, but in many of our systems,” she said. “Part of the way to disrupt that is through improvements in education and thinking about how we can invest in support [systems].”
