MATCH School

CONTACT:

1001 Commonwealth Avenue
Boston, MA 02215
(617) 232-0300
www.matchschool.org

Alan Safran, Executive Director

DESCRIPTION:

The MATCH School is a public, tuition-free charter school, dedicated to preparing inner-city Boston students to succeed in college and beyond — including those who have no family history of college attendance. MATCH supplements conventional curricula and teaching tools with innovative programs and relentless academic attention, including a residential tutoring program, the MATCH Corps, which recruits 45-50 recent college graduates to work full time as tutors in exchange for housing and a small stipend.

MATCH opened in 2000, and has shown impressive results in its short history. The average MATCH student enters with 5th and 6th grade reading and math skills, having failed the MCAS tests in middle school. These students, mostly minority (92%) and low-income (70%), consistently out-perform their suburban peers on the 10th grade MCAS tests, ranking MATCH in the top 10 of over 300 schools in the percentage of students scoring proficient or advanced on the math MCAS test for two consecutive years. All of its graduates have gone on college, including prestigious schools such as Brown University, Duke University, Georgetown University, and Smith College. MATCH is: one of 11 charter schools, out of 1,900 applicants, to receive a Vanguard Award from the Mass Insight Education public policy institute; one of 25 selected by Knowledge Works Foundation as an excellent, cost-effective school; and one of two to receive major grants from the USDE Office of Innovation to bolster minority participation in AP courses.

(2001: CULTURE: Education: Formal: Schools)