The Rhode Island Department of Education gave 28 out of 37 Providence Public School District schools one-or two-star ratings out of five in the department’s 2026 accountability report. Released earlier this month in RIDE’s Report Card portal, the report also identified eight PPSD schools in need of “comprehensive support and improvement,” a status given to the lowest-performing schools across the state.
PPSD achievement in ELA and math each earned only one out of four possible points in RIDE’s Providence 2026 Accountability Summary Report. ELA proficiency fell 1% from last year, while math proficiency rose — but only 0.2%. Since last year, the four-year graduation rate and post-secondary enrollment fell 2% and 2.8%, respectively.
“It is important to understand that the accountability system is designed to provide a comprehensive picture of school performance and identify areas where continued improvement is needed,” RIDE spokesperson Victor Morente wrote in an email to The Herald. “The report cards are intended to guide continuous improvement, not simply serve as a final judgment on schools or districts.”
Morente noted that “student achievement was the most common area identified for improvement” in schools across Rhode Island.
The 2025-26 report card comes just months after Providence schools returned to local control, showing the results of the final year of state control, which began in 2019. Following the enactment of statewide takeover, the Turnaround Action Plan was developed to set benchmarks for improvement.
As a part of the TAP, State Turnaround Superintendent Harrison Peters and Commissioner of Elementary and Secondary Education Angélica Infante-Green set benchmarks for improving “excellence in learning” in the PPSD. These benchmarks included increasing the number of students in schools with at least a two-star rating, increasing the number of students present 90% of the school year and raising standardized test scores.
According to PPSD Chief of Communications Suzanne Ouellette, 6,200 fewer PPSD students attend the state’s “lowest-performing schools” compared to before state takeover.
“That is unrefutable progress,” Ouellette added.
Of the 37 schools in the PPSD, 10 received a one-star rating, 18 received two and eight received three. Only Classical High School received a five-star rating. The report from the 2018-19 academic year — the last before state takeover — listed 41 schools, awarding one star to 17 schools, two stars to 15, three stars to eight and five stars to one.
While COVID-19 served as an “unprecedented disruption” to education, state control helped the PPSD make progress in career and technical education, absenteeism, infrastructure investment and opportunities for advanced learning, according to Morente.
“The expertise provided through RIDE during the intervention was immeasurable,” Ouellette wrote. “They helped us to develop systems and structures that we will use to advance our students forward.”
Chronic absenteeism in Providence schools has been on the decline, but many of the other goals outlined in the TAP remained unfulfilled at the end of state control.
“The key takeaway for district leaders is that while the emergency interventions of the takeover phase worked to stabilize the system, there is much work to be done to increase our star ratings,” Ouellette wrote.
The outcomes of the state takeover are “nuanced,” according to Kate Donohue, director of R.I. Research Partnerships and Analytics at the Annenberg Institute. Donohue wrote to The Herald on behalf of the Evidence in Action - RI team, which partners with R.I. school administration on education research and policy.
“Meaningful change in a system this size takes time, and the results of that work don’t always show up right away,” she wrote, noting that the PPSD has seen improvements in infrastructure and absenteeism.
Donohue added that the TAP was an ambitious plan and that the star ratings are “a hard way to judge that progress because it summarizes an entire school into one number.”
“Our view is that state policy, paired with closely aligned implementation in PPSD, contributed to improvement rather than holding it back,” she wrote.
Still, these scores represent areas for continued improvement. The Evidence in Action - RI team believed that “everyone involved knows there is still work to do to make sure every student in PPSD is getting the education they deserve,” Donohue added.
“With the return to local control, responsibility for the district's future now rests with local leadership, and our hope is that the progress achieved over the past seven years continues to accelerate on behalf of Providence students and families,” Morente wrote.
Amber Marcus-Blank is a metro editor covering youth & education. She is a senior from outside of Boston studying Political Science and Public Health on the pre-law track. She is interested in working in politics and journalism in the future and enjoys playing soccer and making playlists in her free time.
Alejandro Ruiz is a university news editor covering undergraduate student life and student government. He is a senior from Edison, NJ studying biochemistry and philosophy. In his free time, he can be found with his friends or with an AirPod in.
