Mattapan school takes $100G prize
Teachers and staff members at the Mildred Avenue K-8 School in Mattapan were moved to tears yesterday when they received a $100,000 prize from EdVestors — a nonprofit educational improvement organization — for guiding the turnaround of one the city’s most rapidly improving schools.
“Their tireless work and the tireless work of the entire staff is what brings us here today,” Mildred Avenue principal Andrew Rollins said while accepting EdVestor’s annual Thomas W. Payzant School on the Move Prize at the Westin Boston Waterfront hotel.
Mildred Avenue was selected over two other finalists, the Donald McKay K-8 School and the Patrick J. Kennedy Elementary School, both in East Boston, which will receive $10,000 prizes.
School officials praised the hard work of the administrators and teachers at Mildred Avenue who helped turn what was one of the city’s worst performing schools five years ago into a Level 1 school — the state’s highest ranking.
And though all three schools dramatically improved, EdVestors CEO Laura Perille said the Mildred Avenue school stood out for its rapid transformation.
“All three schools had a pretty dramatic improvement in slope over the last five years but Mildred was coming from incredibly far behind,” Perille said. “They used this opportunity to have a teacher-led turnaround that was fully supported by the union and the district . ... This was the comeback prize this year.”