Recent focus in Bordentown has understandably been on the regional school district’s tentative 2025-26 budget calling for massive cuts and significant reduction in staff.
But in addition to questions of how the district will budget for the upcoming school year, there is also the question of how district students have performed in recent years.
The New Jersey Department of Education released its annual reports assessing how students in every school district measure up on key educational metrics, including standardized assessment performance and attendance.
So how are the Bordentown Schools doing overall, according to the Department of Education? Overall, district students are meeting state standards in mathematics, but slightly below state standard in English language arts. And at the elementary school levels, these numbers are slightly, but significantly, better.
This is according to the state’s measurements of both how students performed on statewide assessments (NJSLA and DLM) as well as how the state measures “student growth.”
Another key metric reported by the DOE is attendance. The state classifies students to be “at risk” if they are chronically absent. Students are considered chronically absent if they miss 10% of school days.
In the Bordentown school district, 9.8% of students meet this criterium — below the state median of 14.9%. By this measurement, Bordentown has fewer at-risk students than the median New Jersey district.
Across New Jersey, chronic absenteeism is at 14.9%, a decrease from 16.6% in 2022-2023, but well above the pre-pandemic rate of 10.6% in 2018-2019.
In terms of graduation, Bordentown students are graduating at a 93.3% rate in four years, and 95% in five years. Both figures meet state standards.
In terms of readiness for college or a career, the picture for Bordentown students is more of a mixed bag.
Student performance on Advanced Placement or International Baccalaureate courses is more than 10% below the state median. Bordentown has 25.3% of 11th and 12th graders who are enrolled in one or more AP or IB classes, compared to the state median of 35.9%.
On the other hand, Bordentown students compare very well to the rest of the state when it comes to dual enrollment. The Department of Education measures the percentage of 11th and 12th graders who are enrolled in one or more dual-enrollment courses, which are courses that allow students to earn college credits prior to graduation.
The DOE reports that Bordentown students are almost twice as likely to take part in dual enrollment as students from other districts. Slightly more than 50% of BRHS students are enrolled in such courses, compared to the state’s 26.9% median marker.
Overall, Bordentown Regional School District had 2,228 students in the 2023-24 school year, of whom 24.3% were classified as students with disabilities. Just under 18% of students are considered economically disadvantaged, and 2.3% are multilingual learners, which is a fairly low percentage for a New Jersey district.
Bordentown teachers have an average of 11.5 years of experience teaching, and the average student-to-teacher ratio in the district is 12:1.
At the high school level, the DOE shows Bordentown students with a negative trend in terms of ELA proficiency relative to federal standards, dropping from 40.3% in 2022-23 to 34% in 2023-24.
Proficiency in mathematics, on the other hand, rose sharply in 2023-24, up to 37.6% from 28.6% in 2022-23. Student proficiency relative to federal standards has been suffering across the country since the pandemic, with many districts struggling to recover from the learning time lost when students missed classroom time.
In terms of performance on the SAT test, Bordentown students are above average both relative to the state and also according to college readiness benchmarks set by the state.
Bordentown students averaged a 556 on the reading and writing portion of the SAT, and 564 in math, compared to the state averages of 530 and 519, respectively. The state’s benchmarks for college readiness are set at 480 and 530, respectively.
Bordentown offered 19 AP-level courses in 2023-24, although students enrolled in only 11 of them. Of the students who took AP exams, just 20.5% earned at least one score of 3 or higher on the AP exam or 4 on an IB exam. The state average is 23%.
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Looking just at Bordentown Regional Middle School, the numbers are similar to overall district data for ELA and mathematics. BRMS students are below standards in student growth and assessment test performance in ELA, while meeting standards in mathematics. Attendance rates at BRMS are in line with overall district numbers.
There is some good news at the K-5 level for the district. At Mac Farland Intermediate School, students met state standards in both ELA and mathemetics, measured by both student growth and assessment test performance.
The DOE put Mac Farland student growth in the 42.5 percentile for ELA and the 47.5 percentile for mathematics. For ELA assessments, 52.6% of students met state standards and 50% met the standard for mathematics.
The data is similar for Peter Muschal Elementary School. The DOE put Peter Muschal student growth in the 44 percentile for ELA and the 49 percentile for mathematics. For ELA assessments, 60.1% of students met state standards and 57.3% met the standard for mathematics.
Peter Muschal Elementary School has the fewest students who are chronically absent of any school in the district, at 7.1%.
Clara Barton Elementary, as a K-2 school, was not assessed by the state in terms of academic performance.
The overall trend for student enrollment in the district is down. Bordentown enrolled 2,285 students in 2021-22, 2,268 in 2022-23, and 2,228 in 2023-24. The downward trend is also noticeable on a grade-by-grade basis, with enrollment in K-5 classes consistently lower than overall enrollment in grades 6-12.
The one outlier there is the 3rd-grade class of 2023-24, this year’s fourth grade, which is on par with the overall enrollments in grades 6-8. The tenth grade was the largest class in the district in 2023-24, with 202 students. First grade had the lowest enrollment, with 132 students.
“Through the annual school performance reports, the department provides extensive, meaningful data that conveys information about each public school and school district in the state,” said Kevin Dehmer, education commissioner. “These reports are a valuable tool for family and community engagement. They serve as a starting point, and a resource, for dialogue between the community and local school leaders about the school district’s accomplishments, priorities, and areas of need.”
