Magnet schools are the amazing good fortune of the families and children living in Springfield.  In the past seventeen years, the United States Department of Education has awarded the Springfield Public Schools—against stiff competition from many larger and better known American city and metropolitan school districts—over 50 million dollars to launch new and meaningful programs that offer our kids the chance to go to schools they love, to do things that are creative and engaging and in some key ways different from schools as we have come to know them. I like to say I have the best job in Springfield—I get to think about what I would want for my own kids (both of whom attend Springfield magnet schools) and to talk to parents about what you want for your kids to be able to experience in school, and then, when funded, to put those ideas into action. That means honoring our kids’ passions—for hands-on learning, for work with modern technologies, for self-expression through the arts and through meaningful participation in and engagement with high level academic work.

The International Baccalaureate program and 21^st Century Global Communications make it possible for our students to connect to others in our shrinking world’s learning landscape, bridging differences in culture and language through new universal communications tools. With STEM specialties (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics) at the High School of Science and Technology and STEM Middle Academy, SPS is at the cutting edge in a quickly developing area that is receiving much national attention. Central High School’s Arts and Advanced Studies program honors and develops our students’ creative energies while at the same time encouraging all students to take some advanced classes. Our district’s partnership with Expeditionary Learning continues to evolve at STEM Middle Academy, where students’ school lives are organized around the EL model, which attends to social and school climate issues at the same time as it structures the learning day around real STEM issues and problems that students deal with in their everyday lives, such as community health/asthma.

In our Magnet Schools of Choice book ( a link to which is available on  the front page of this website) you will find descriptions of Montessori and other SPS magnet programs. Where magnet programs are implemented as designed, we are showing dramatic results. It’s not rocket science—families have a way of knowing what kids need to be more successful in school. Our job is to make sense of that, to ensure that “doing school differently” is coordinated in a way that attends to all students’ right to learn at an academically meaningful level, to ensure that all of our students have equitable access to great programming and that all of our teachers demonstrate a suitable level of commitment to every student in their charge. In this way the vision of magnet schools echoes the mission of all SPS schools.

Please explore our Magnet web site and feel free to call Magnet staff, our principals or me at any time to learn more. I look forward to our conversations and to meeting your children soon in Springfield’s Magnet schools.

Joshua P. Bogin, Esq.
Magnet Director for Springfield  Public Schools