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History

A circular red logo featuring intertwined white block letters.East Providence School Department | The Home of Townie Pride

 

The East Providence School Department serves approximately 5,300 students across twelve schools in one of Rhode Island's most historic and diverse communities. From pre-kindergarten through grade twelve, we prepare every Townie for college, career, and citizenship.

Our Community

East Providence sits on the eastern bank of the Providence and Seekonk Rivers, looking out across Narragansett Bay. With a population of roughly 47,000, it is Rhode Island's fifth-largest city, and it remains a collection of distinct villages as much as a single municipality: Rumford, Riverside, Watchemoket, Phillipsdale, and Kent Heights each hold onto their own character, their own landmarks, and their own long memories.

Families here have deep and layered roots. East Providence is home to one of New England's most established Portuguese, Azorean, and Cape Verdean communities, a heritage visible in the city's churches, bakeries, festivals, and the Cape Verdean Club, and audible in classrooms where Portuguese is both a heritage language and a course of study. Those communities now sit alongside growing Latino, Brazilian, and multiracial populations, making our schools meaningfully more diverse than the state as a whole.

The city gives its families recreational and cultural opportunities like the East Bay Bike Path, the Crescent Park Looff Carousel, a revitalizing waterfront, and an easy connection to the research institutions, hospitals, and employers of greater Providence.

Our students at a glance

  • Approximately 5,300 students enrolled across 12 schools
  • Roughly 59% White, 16% Hispanic/Latino, 12% Black, 10% two or more races, 2% Asian
  • About one-third of students qualify as economically disadvantaged
  • Students receive world-language instruction in Portuguese, Spanish, and French

Our History

East Providence's story begins with a border dispute. The land was settled as part of Rehoboth and later Seekonk, Massachusetts, and only became Rhode Island soil in 1862, when the U.S. Supreme Court finally resolved a boundary argument that had run for nearly two centuries. That same year, the villages of Rumford, Riverside, Watchemoket, Phillipsdale, and Kent Heights incorporated as the Town of East Providence. The town became a city in 1958.

Public secondary education arrived in 1884, when the first East Providence High School opened on Broadway, a building that later served generations of students as Central Junior High. In 1952 the district opened East Providence Senior High School on Pawtucket Avenue, one of the first genuinely modern high schools in New England, with a thousand-seat auditorium, a swimming pool, and the clock tower that became the city's most recognizable civic landmark.

For nearly seventy years, the clock tower stood over the education of East Providence. In 2021 the district opened its successor, and began a decade of rebuilding that has touched nearly every school in the city.

Notable Alumni

Townies have gone on to shape film, science, sport, and public life:

  • Jennifer Lee — Academy Award–winning filmmaker, writer and director of Frozen, and Chief Creative Officer of Walt Disney Animation Studios
  • Gregg Amore — Rhode Island Secretary of State, and for decades a teacher and coach at East Providence High School
  • Jamie Silva — NFL safety, Indianapolis Colts
  • Claudia Jordan — television personality and broadcaster
  • Kim Schifino — drummer and half of the band Matt & Kim
  • Timothy Army – NHL player and coach
  • Victor Luis – former CEO of Coach fashion house

The East Providence High School Hall of Fame continues to honor graduates whose service to the school and city deserves a permanent place in Townie history.

District Leadership

Robert S. Perry, Ed.D became Superintendent of Schools on July 1, 2026, following a vote of the School Committee in June of that year. He succeeded Dr. Sandra Forand, who led the district through the completion of Edward R. Martin Middle School, and Kathryn Crowley, who spearheaded construction of the new East Providence High School, the first major school building project in Rhode Island in decades.

The district is governed by a five-member elected School Committee, with four members representing the city's wards and one elected at large. The Committee sets policy, adopts the annual school budget, and appoints the Superintendent. Meeting agendas, minutes, and video are posted publicly, and residents are welcome at every regular meeting.

Day-to-day operations are led by the department heads, which includes leadership for curriculum and instruction, student services and special education, finance, human resources, facilities, and technology.

Building for the Next Generation

East Providence voters have twice gone to the polls to rebuild their schools, approving more than $300 million in school construction bonds, an investment unmatched by any comparable city in Rhode Island.

East Providence High School (opened 2021). At $189.5 million, the new EPHS was the largest school construction project in Rhode Island history and the first new public high school built in the state in two decades. The four-story, 304,000-square-foot building holds 1,600 students and includes 45 classrooms, ten science labs, two greenhouses, a 900-seat auditorium, a digital music lab, and a library resource center built for collaborative work. The East Providence Career and Technical Center is fully integrated into the building, with dedicated space for construction, allied health, culinary arts, graphic design, and an audio and video broadcast studio. Outside, a lighted synthetic-turf stadium, track, tennis courts, and fields for baseball, softball, soccer, and lacrosse complete the campus. The state reimbursed approximately 75% of the cost.

Edward R. Martin Middle School (opened 2025). In November 2022, residents approved a $148 million bond with 78.2% support, $128 million for a new Martin Middle School and $20 million for renovations at Waddington Elementary. Ground was broken in April 2024, and students moved into the new 164,443-square-foot building on December 1, 2025. The school is organized by floor, one grade per level, with 34 flexible classrooms, six science labs, three collaborative learning commons, computer science and robotics labs, band and chorus rooms, a media center, art rooms with a kiln, and a fully renovated gymnasium that doubles as a community venue.