The Boston Globe reports that the Newton School department budget has reached a financial crisis point.
Despite falling enrollment (down 1000 in five years), and even though the city has increased school funding this year by $8.9 million, the school department budget is still $5.2 million in the red due to rising costs.
In an email to staff Superintendent Fleishman said that school department expects to have to cut between 50 -60 staff positions to close the budget gap
This news seems to have come out of the blue. It is a significant number of positions that are being cut. and a very large deficit I don’t understand why NPS could not have foreseen this large budget shortfall percolating the last few years. Did they spend all of the Covid relief money already? I have had kids in the system for a combined 22 years and I am sympathetic to providing sufficient funds. However, the fact that we are now hearing about this for the first time (at least from my perspective) seems odd to put it nicely.
Thank goodness for local journalism!
Knowing Fleishman, he probably was trying to plagiarize the Watertown school budget line-for-line. No surprise this resulted in an unforseen deficit.
The whole plagiarism critique always has and always will come off as holier-than-thou sanctimony. I guess this is to be expected given how many Newtonians I have seen walking across Crystal Lake on any given summer’s day. Nonetheless, it may be more convincing to those of us who are not Divinely Perfect to keep the criticisms of Dr. Fleishman to his incontrovertible failures of which there are many.
I wish they would breakdown the $ that caused the increase in costs.
Healthcare costs, pension liabilities? Just asking for simple transparency
They just gave out bonuses from the stimulus, could that not have been used to cover the shortfall instead? All very confusing
The details are here:
https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1vvXw4rcqtzNbta1uQGmhccBLLYYa4kAnoqYLWTX3bCU/edit#slide=id.g1182cdcc1ac_4_0
Existing pension liabilities of teachers are paid from the Massachusetts Teachers Retirement System, not NPS or Newton.
Transportation is a big cost too. One good reason to keep our schools small and local.
Concerns were raised in 2020
https://village14.com/2020/06/23/matt-hills-very-tough-choices-ahead-for-newton-public-schools/
Again, our public school students need MORE help and not MORE cuts. While we need to live within our budgets, I have to ask, did Mayor Fuller, look for other funding????? She doesn’t hesitate to cut, cut, cut. Our teachers SHOWED up online, hybrid and IN person over the last two years. Our teachers have classrooms full of students who need more learning, especially to make up over the last two years. Our students need access to more therapists to help them cope with death and loss. Our students need more access to professionals to help them enter into social situations that haven’t been there for two years. Our current third graders, only had a normal kindergarten. Their first and second grade years were not COMPLETE. There is significant loss of learning time, and Mayor Fuller is going to CUT CUT CUT and not build.
How about the city Audit itself!! That is what legislation is doing. There is no way in hell Newton doesn’t have millions tore up in wasteful spending. They just don’t want to do the work to find it. They would rather bleed a rock. Families cannot afford to pay higher taxes in this economy. Electric bills, gas food staples of life are so expensive that myself and my elderly mother have had to go on food stamps. I am all for the schools having why they need as I have 3 children in the system and so volunteer my time ALL the time. They need more money find it, it’s there being spent on useless projects. There is no doubt.
Again, our public school students need MORE help and not MORE cuts. While we need to live within our budgets, I have to ask, did Mayor Fuller, look for other funding????? She doesn’t hesitate to cut, cut, cut. Our teachers SHOWED up online, hybrid and IN person over the last two years. Our teachers have classrooms full of students who need more learning, especially to make up over the last two years. Our students need access to more therapists to help them cope with death and loss. Our students need more access to professionals to help them enter into social situations that haven’t been there for two years. Our current third graders, only had a normal kindergarten. Their first and second grade years were not COMPLETE. There is significant loss of learning time, and Mayor Fuller is going to CUT CUT CUT and not build.
NewtonMom – the school budget hasn’t been “cut, cut, cut”. The budget this year increased by $8.9 million while enrollments have been dropping. This was a proportionally bigger increase then the rest of city government received.
The issue isn’t that NPS budget is being slashed, it’s that the NPS budget has been growing faster than the rest of city government. That trend has been going on for some time.
I have no idea of how it should be addressed but its important to keep the facts straight if we are going to wrestle with this
The phrase to remember is “while enrolled are dropping”.
Why is that? Increase enrollment and the math changes.
NewtonMom is correctly reacting to the lack of educational priorities of the Mayor which is one of the reasons why enrollment is dropping. She can say it’s her highest priority but it’s not.
This is a stinging indictment on Superintendent Fleishman’s time with NPS, along with the Newton School Board – it’s not like this is a new superintendent or vastly new school board. Both have had long periods of longevity, knew NPS was getting to this point, and only now talk about it before it’s too late to change directions.
The fact that in FY22 – a time everyone knew would be extremely turbulent, the district “relied on surplus and aggressive assumptions to balance” budgets is just poor management.
Our stature in the state has gone down, our teacher-district relations have gone down, and now it looks like our financial advantage is gone. It’s time for someone to step up and make some big moves within the district, we can’t keep at the status quo.
And yet the previous school committee approved a new three year contract for the superintendent last year.
These cuts are completely unacceptable for a multitude of reasons. First among them, our teachers deserve better. Of equal importance, Newton’s school children need more hands-on teaching than ever before, after two years of COVID impacted education.
While the Superintendent clearly waited too long too long with this public announcement, he’s not responsible for the budgetary shortfall. So there’s little point in shooting the messenger.
So far the School Committee deserves some slack too, because they don’t control the city’s finances, and they haven’t yet had the opportunity to address this financial shortfall in earnest. Ultimately, the School Committee should be judged on how they deal with the problem from this point forward. Good leadership on their part and on the part of the Mayor should find a way to close this funding gap. Judge them on the success or failure of that endeavor.
Given Newton’s dynamics, this city should be flush with cash. In the future, the City of Newton needs much stronger leadership on the City Council. Their lack of proper planning, accountability, personal agendas, and insular approach to governance have cost the city countless millions in lost revenue. Should it stand, today’s $5M shortfall for our schools is a result of poor long-term planning and decision making on the part of the City Council.
Does anyone have at least a ballpark estimate about how much of the increase could be due to sharp nationwide inflationary pressures that weren’t anticipated when the budget was first drafted?
Before we excuse leadership, do we know the extent to which our peer districts got in the same mess? Needham, Weston, Wellesley, etc. During COVID, we responded the worst. When you compare deliverables, we do the worst. If we are content being last, we will continue to do so.
Last year the administration wildly over-estimated the number of students returning to the NPS. They assumed that parents were happy with NPS and that every single student who left NPS would return. I told the school committee at the time that this assumption would result in a severe overestimate of this year’s attendance. I told them that they should get statistics on the number of transcripts requested since this is an indication of not only how many students were leaving but how many students wanted to leave (which is important because getting into private school is hard, and these families might try again).
No one on the school committee questioned the administration’s ridiculous forecast. At the end of the day, the truth came out, but I bet the NPS budget was a lot bigger as a result.
NPS needs to address its falling enrollment, since enrollment drives revenues. Here are some reasons why enrollment is falling:
– Poor covid performance (re-opening delays relative to peer districts, etc.).
– Worsening academic performance – test scores dropping both on an absolute and relative basis.
– Decreasing focus on academic excellence.
Net result? Many families who seek a rigorous education for their children, and can afford it, are going to private schools.
If you’re a company whose product is getting worse and you lose market share as a result, you can do two things. First, you can fix the product and regain your lost share. Or second, you can be in denial, continue to lose share and continue to shrink. Same concept applies here.
I hope the SC – particularly the newly elected members – take notice and act decisively.
No surprise.
As a Wellesley resident I follow this site to get a feel for what is going on in Newton. I can tell you that the mass exodus from Wellesley schools over the past couple of years is about the size of one of our elementary schools, approx 300 students. The reasons listed by a different poster are the exact reasons many feel families are leaving Wellesley schools. If you want to see a very lively (that is being nice) meeting regarding the Wellesley school budget, set to be approved in a few weeks, watch the March 3, 2022 Advisory meeting. This can be found on wellesleymedia.org.
In addition to the budget there is a citizen petition discussed at the same meeting which will be presented at the Annual Town Meeting. This citizen petition was created by a group of parents asking for the town to institute an academic excellence oversight board to review Wellesley’s school curriculum. Wellesley has dropped considerably in rankings and the administration thinks we have no issues in Wellesley. A very contentious School Committee race was held last week. The person concerned about academics lost.
As a parent of school children in Wellesley I have witnessed changes being made that I do not think benefit our children. I understand why families are leaving and covid decisions only made matters worse. Families who left were very satisfied after a year of parochial/private school, they did not return.
I’m not sure that any administration should be let off the hook so fast. It is very apparent that Newton North has a principal very focused on his new book. Wellesley’s administration thinks it is ok to allocate approx 900k in salary hours to professional development that is not academically focused. As an outsider it seems like Wellesley is right on track with Newton but probably worse. I hope this provides some insight.
PS: I am not including my name since I have children who could be affected by my criticism.
Hey, I read about that school committee race in the Swellesley Report! I’m not going to waste too much time researching it, but is your aforementioned guy who was “concerned about academics” the same one whose website had a petition to “remove BLM curriculum from WPS”?
Goal: 500
Total Signatures: 12
Deadline: March 1, 2022
Also, is he related to Larry Glick from WBZ-AM? I used to love the Larry Glick show when I was a wee lad.
https://theswellesleyreport.com/2022/03/wellesley-election-aftermath-school-committee-runner-up-calls-out-political-groups-email/
Hi Michael, to start I don’t know if he is related to Larry Glick, I do not know him personally.
Ironically this letter to the editor popped up on the Swellesley report today from the candidate:
https://theswellesleyreport.com/2022/03/wellesley-letter-to-the-editor-politics-and-local-elections/
From all of his candidate interviews he gained the support of many families who felt academic excellence has dropped. He had a strong minority backing too, some of those parents called in to the Advisory meeting after he lost extremely upset that we would continue with the lack of concern.
Unfortunately politics played a role here and from what I can gather from the website of Wellesley Concerned Parents they do not want politics in the schools. That is really all I can tell you about him.
Have a nice weekend.
Can the NN Principal donate his book “change the narrative” proceeds to help save Teacher jobs?
The quality of our schools supports the value of our real estate. We haven’t seen the impact yet, but we will. We’re living on reputation, not results.
Anyone close to the schools can sense the deep gaping wounds our children and staff have experienced these past two years. There are vast gaps in learning, huge unmet needs for psychological support, and more. The private schools have more resources this way and parents are voting with their feet.
While I blame the Superintendent for a lack of vision, I mostly blame this Mayor. The funds should just be found at any cost. She’s about development and infrastructure, not our kids. We need better and different. Sadly, we lost our chance for change last November. Newton is on the wrong path, but we’re likely stuck with more of the same for the foreseeable future. The Pandemic was our war. People need help now. What good is a great bond rating if you can’t leverage it at a time like this?
A few thoughts:
Academically, from my personal experience and the experience of many of my families friends and my kids friends, private school is a better experience. I don’t think the teachers are always better, just to be clear. Some are, some aren’t. But the class size is 15 kids or below. There are more counselors, more mental health folks, more leeway for individual instruction. I know quite a few families who pulled their kids during Covid and then had a moment of realization that the Newton schools, FOR THEIR INDIVIDUAL KIDS, was not as good a fit as the private school. So they swallowed hard and kept their kids in private school.
I always find it frustrating that most of us seem stuck in talking points. I’m the same way I guess, certainly not immune. And I’ve always before now been a big believer in the public school system in general, and with high hopes for Newton. The schools are really why I moved here.
But man, the last 5 years have just beaten that belief out of me. And I’m tired.
In my opinion, I don’t think it is just one cause that is causing the move away from Newton schools. It isn’t just Covid. It is also the value of the real estate. No one in my neighborhood who bought their home for 1.5 million or more (the new buyers) have their kids in Newton public. At some point, private school isn’t cost-prohibitive. If you can afford 2 million for a house, you can afford private school.
But let’s not ignore the Covid response either. The Newton school system proved itself to be ill equipped, both in leadership and in facilities, to deal with this crisis. Parents with means voted with their feet as well, and if your kid could test into the private school system, odds are they are still there.
And let’s also acknowledge that my kids in public schools have heard multiple changes in teachers this year, multiple weeks of missed classes or inadequate subs, multiple teachers aids that have been hired in other districts for full time positions.
I think the teachers and the councilors are working hard and doing the best they can. It isn’t an easy job. But wow, this has been a frustrating year. And I see the lag in my kids education on all levels. Parents talk. All is not well.
Where does that leave us? What are the solutions?
Honestly, nothing popular. I’d fill the budget gap any way I could. I’d call for a property tax increase, too. The reality is that the bond rating has little to do with this, you can’t borrow money for operating costs.
These posts end up being about blame more than solutions. We already know most of the usual posters politically leanings (and certainly their feelings about development). What are the concrete steps needed to help the school system? What are the hard choices we need to make? Let’s talk about that.
“It is also the value of the real estate. No one in my neighborhood who bought their home for 1.5 million or more (the new buyers) have their kids in Newton public. At some point, private school isn’t cost-prohibitive. If you can afford 2 million for a house, you can afford private school.”
I think this is a big part of it. Wealthy white folks who move to Newton can enjoy Newton, a large house, but then afford and send their kids to a private school for wealthy white folks.
If we bring housing into the equation, I’m not convinced that the type of housing we are building in Newton will correct the issue. These bloated condos and these very expensive apartments either won’t bring kids in or are geared toward the demographic that won’t use a public school. And houses like mine (small, old, single family) are a guaranteed teardown.
I’m really crestfallen over all this. I’m a firm believer in public education and have had consistently positive experiences with the teachers here.
don’t understand why the skin color of “wealthy” ppl is relevant here. I understand pointing out poor, middle class, wealthy/affluent….. but skin color???
Because that’s the demographic of private schools. White people of a certain income bracket. And that’s the appeal of private schools to a lot of people.
Sorry if facts dont meet the narrative. But looking at Fessenden demographics, its not that far from Newton public school.
The main factor being 10% less asian students. Perhaps private student just prefer to focus on academics only.
white: 77.3% vs 61%
asian: 9.5% vs 19%
black: 4.2% vs 5%
hispanic: 3.4% vs 8%
fessenden:
https://www.usnews.com/education/k12/massachusetts/the-fessenden-school-308545
newton:
https://www.newton.k12.ma.us/domain/61
That’s literally one private school.
Nice post Fig and sorry for what your family and many others are going through.
Our “financial crisis” has been anticipated for some time. This is just the beginning of it and has been pointed out by some folks repeatedly.
https://www.newtonma.gov/home/showpublisheddocument/40952 – see page 45. We don’t need to just talk about the hard choices – we need to act.
There are two parts of this story, and both deserve ample time and consideration.
1. Schools are a priority for many in Newton, our house value are tied directly to school quality, and so budget cuts don’t make sense in that context.
2. The drop in enrollment in just a few years- roughly 1000 kids- is stunning and should be considered a five alarm fire.
Newton underperformed other cities during COVID, that is true. But we left the public school system several years before that. It’s was clear to us that the school system was in decline, and most people here were more focused with their political arguments than acknowledging this reality and making changes.
Just look at this website. We’ve had 1000 kids leave the system in the last few years, and this blog had never had one post on the topic. Test scores and rankings are on the decline. When was the last post here, not budget related, about the schools? I can’t recall one.
Little change on the school committee, where most candidates come from a sliver of the community focused on status quo. The topic of our underperforming schools were barely a topic until COVID. For Fitzgibbons to have been even close to Levy, when running a status quo is good campaign, says everything.
Its been apparent to us that too few people really cared about the schools here, so we made a change. We felt extra blessed during COVID, and sad for our friends at NPS.
As a city, we get what we deserve. If we want change we need to ask for it. So far, most folks seem fine as is.
Over on FB, there is a parallel post on this topic. In it, a number a couple of folks blamed this issue on, “the housing crisis”, and admitted, as one posted called out, “(I) was triggered” by that comment. Guilty as charged. I commented (ok, admittedly it was a bit of a tirade) about how NOT EVERYTHING can blamed on housing. But after some thought, perhaps I need to walk that back a bit.
For decades NPS has enjoyed a stellar reputation for providing a high (if not enviable) level of quality education. This was the result of a venn diagram, the perfect storm, of optimal conditions. A demograhic base that was able to provide the resources ($$$) required to support a high quality education, but not so much that the choice of private schools is easily in reach. In other words, the middle/working class.
Recent housing/zoning practices have skewed if not broken that balanced venn diagram. Our housing policy favors the top; attempts to fill more of the bottom, and leaves the middle out in the cold. Middle class homes are regularly knocked down for McMansions and McCondos. Large developments providing housing to those who can afford $4k/mo rents with 20% (or often less) of the units made available for affordable. Middle/working class families seek more modest size homes they can afford… and OWN… and left to find those in other communities as Newton has little to offer in that regard.
Look, no shade to those who looks at private school invoice like the receipt at Dunkin for a cup of coffee – mazel tov. If money was no object who would not opt for a nicer cup of coffee; drive a nicer car; or provide a better, more catered education for their kids. But the topic of this post is the budget deficit, so how do we fix this?
Short term, find the money. More than ever, NPS needs to fight to keep families on fringe of jumping ship to private from doing so. To compete, programs need to be enhanced, not cut, with a focused on increasing acadmic excellence, test scores and college prep/counseling services. Perhaps cut back on the Mayor’s consultants budget? How many “experts” do we need to hire to tell us the obvious? #snarkalert
Longer term, we need to adjust our housing policy to support the middle/working class. Support zoning for the type of housing that the middle/working class wants – multi-bedroom homes, but modestly sized so families can afford buy and not just rent. The type of zoning that will return Newton demograpically to the venn diagram that supports a best in class public education, instead of our current trajectory… 80% or more homes for the wealthy to very wealthy and 20% or less housing for those in need.
“Short term, find the money. ” I could not disagree more.
That response is a continuation of a variety of short term thinking that appears to be the normative response among residents of Eastern Massachusetts (particularly, if only to the extent, IMHO).
If we see operating results suggesting a structural problem, oughtn’t we get about the task of fixing the problem post haste? If Newton North of old is deteriorating because of a lack of maintenance, oughtn’t there be a grown-up in the room to ensure that the right thing is done? If children are underserved in their learning, shouldn’t the focus be on diagnosing the diseases at work, proscribing the courses of treatment, and ensuring that the patient stays on its meds?
A little backbone and a little less short-term thinking was called for in the past … but since it got kicked down the road, they are still the appropriate response for these times. To do otherwise is to do no better than harvesting someone else’s crop without replanting the field.
[@Paul Levy: reprise of phrasing put to you — “NPS ought not run exclusively as a cost center, but as a line of business”]
Part of the reason people stay in any school, public or private, is the sense of community. Kids want to stay where their friends are, and adults want to feel connected as well. As of now 50% of elementary families, those with kids in K, 1st, or 2nd grade, have never experienced a normal NPS school year. Same for families of 8th graders. Hundreds, maybe thousands, of NPS families have never set in foot in their kids’ school buildings. While this no-visitor policy was very recently corrected, the broader community issue remains. PTO’s have been frustrated by not having access to parent email lists like they did in the past due to a vague privacy concern issue. A parent wanting to be inclusive and invite their child’s whole class to a birthday party doesn’t have contact info for parents. The frustration of high school families with sudden class structure changes has been discussed here too.
NPS most valuable resource is its hard working, diverse, striving families that prioritize their kids’ education. A turnaround plan for enrollment must be parent-centric to have the community support that will be required to implement it.
Back not too long ago the PTOs used to have better mailing lists than the Schools and we used to have to send out all kinds of messages from the school and Principal. :)
A sense of community is being lost. NPS has reduced parent interaction. This began a bit with security measures physically limiting some of the every day casual interactions that occurred. Now with COVID communication is mostly one way with little interactive communication. Zooms with pre-submitted questions. Personally I’m sick of this BS. Have enough guts to take questions on the fly so we can get honest answers not pre-prepared answers to selected questions. These zooms are just show. The Administration is not truly listening. They are talking. They instead should be listening and allowing people to follow up with questions. Parent engagement is key to student success. What we see and hear is another perspective of what is occurring in our schools . Surveys especially those with poorly worded questions do not provide enough depth of what is going on. Why are things not set up to hear each other out so that collaborative efforts can lead to better end results,
Wasn’t there an election last year that would have prevented all this? If not, there’s one next year.
The buck stops with Mayor Fuller. As long as she keeps asserting (pretending?), that everyone is fine and we have “excellent” public schools, we will not have improvement. Money won’t help us without a vision of how resources should be allocated to solve the problem. We have a crisis. The mayor needs to recognize that many parents have pulled their kids out of NPS for a reason (the reason is not “excellence). For every family who have fled, there is an other unhappy family without the resources to extricate their kids from NPS.
Here is a radical idea. The mayor and the superintendent should ask to parents about how NPS can be improved. Listening goes a long way. This is the first step.
The emphasis on testing scores as an indication of the system being in decline is truly sad to me. Testing has long been considered problematic in terms of metrics to see if a school is doing well. There are known biases. In addition, as Newton gets more diverse there are a good chunk of ELL kids who may not receive high test scores. We also have a higher number of kids receiving special education services than surrounding districts. That in conjunction with the families paying big bucks for tutors are often the ones pulling their kids out to attend private schools.
Testing scores are a very poor indication of whether or not a district is struggling. I’m surprised that in 2022 so many people are still relying on that.
Sorry Jeffrey didn’t mean to reply to you. The threaded comments doesn’t work on my phone.
Jeffrey – as you are aware, some senior NPS administrators and the NTA have adopted a narrative the past few years that concerned parents are an obstacle to the district’s goals rather than part of the solution. Walking back that narrative would be a good first step in moving ahead all together.
I did a little research, and 64% of households in Newton don’t have kids. In other words, 2/3 or more of Newton households have no direct interaction with NPS, when you factor in the households with kids who are too young for school or who go private.
So when the mayor says we have “great schools”, a super-majority of Newtonians either have no first hand experience to contradict that claim, or think back to the 1970s/80s/90s/2000s when their kids were in Newton schools, and when yes indeed Newton did have great schools.
This is probably one of the biggest barriers to significant reform.
Tim,
I’ve seen this often, and back when MassStats had interactive maps on based one the 2010 census, areas with “good” schools has 25-30% households with kids, and areas without could have less than 10%.
I I think a more relevant question (and one I can’t answer, and don’t know of anyone can answer) is what percentage of house sales are to people with pre-schools or school,age kids?
Anecdotally, looking at sales near me in the last decade, I would put that at 80% or more. And that includes developers/flippers who will eventually sell to someone who (probably) has kids. I have a hard time seeing young (single) professionals or elders looking to downsize being interested in my home.
/as always, this is a personal opinion. All numbers are “anecdata”
Not only do 64% have no kids, over 80% have no kids in NPS currently. The NPS budget has grown in the last 20 years from 50% of the total City budget to almost 66%. It is crowding out spending on roads, parks, senior center, library, water and sewer etc.
Solutions? An override? More taxable businesses? 1/3 of Newton’s businesses are tax-free non-profits.
Newton’s proximity to Boston, T connections, low crime rates, etc. also make it a desirable place to live.
You get what you pay for. If we want good schools, we need to pay for them. To pull a quote from the Lincoln Insititute below “school funding and property taxation are so interconnected that those who are concerned about school finance find themselves examining the role of the property tax, and those who are interested in property taxation inevitably find they need to consider school finance questions.” The elephant in the room here is Prop 2.5, which caps the annual increase on the city’s tax levy to 2.5% + new growth. When inflation is more than 2.5% the costs of administering city services are rising faster than the tax levy that pays for them. Inflation has been higher than 2.5% almost every year since prop 2.5 went into effect in 1980, and is particularly acute in the last 12 months for anybody who is paying attention. There are some interesting lessons learned in the CBPP document below, though that document dates to 2010 and I haven’t been able to find a more recent one.
There are 3 options to balance the equation here:
1 – Prop 2.5 override to increase the amount of taxes levied on the existing community
2 – Facilitate new growth to grow the tax base
3 – Do nothing and let NPS deteriorate
Personally, as someone who does not currently have students in the schools but hopes to one day #3 is unacceptable.
In the short term I would vote in support of an override (#1) because we are in a period of high inflation, and we need to own up to that. I think that an overreliance on overrides would be poor form in the long term.
I think #2 is the best option, but it takes time. It sets us up for long term success without continuous overrides. Given that school finance and property taxes are so entwined, and property tax and land use are so entwined, it follows that land use and school finance are also entwined. Our precarious school finances should be a canary in the coal mine amid the largest land use discussion that is going on in Newton right now – zoning redesign. Zoning will determine the long term trajectory of new growth, and we should ensure that we are zoning for long term success for our schools and our city.
Some papers I will be reviewing that have more information on this topic:
https://www.cbpp.org/research/hidden-consequences-lessons-from-massachusetts-for-states-considering-a-property-tax-cap
https://www.lincolninst.edu/sites/default/files/pubfiles/the-property-tax-school-funding-dilemma-full_0.pdf
Option 4 – return to academic excellence at NPS so that families who have left, return, and therefore increase revenues for the system.
I don’t think throwing more money at the system without fixing it is going to help.
Tim – academic excellence at NPS is a goal everyone can get behind but students returning to NPS does nothing to raise revenue.
? Funding is provided to NPS on a per student basis. More students, more funding. Or am I missing something?
No, the school system budget is not allocated on a per student basis.
Occasionally you will see references to how much Newton or other town spend per student. That number is just the total budget /divided by the number of students. It doesn’t indicate that the budget is allocated that way.
Students returning to NPS would be a heartening sign of parental confidence but it wouldn’t save the city money in the school budget or automatically increase the money the city spends on schools.
You are both correct. My understanding is the state provides funding support per student, on a lagging year basis (i.e. this year’s enrollment = next year’s support). However the city’s budget contribution to NPS is not formulaic per student. Whether year-to-year enrollment increases or decreases vs. prior year are better or worse for students’ experience is complicated math and analysis, and it depends a lot on details. Over the long run, however, sustained drops in enrollment equate to less public support and appetite for funding, leading to the downward spiral others on here have discussed.
How much does Newton spend per child? Has that number been declining as Newtom schools has gotten worse academically… or has it been rising? Facts please
Dollars/student is not a useful metric when talking about inflationary pressures on the budget.
Of course the cost per student is increasing over time, the costs per everything is increasing over time. A better question is how has the city revenue per dollar of land value changed over time? My guess would be that it’s down, probably more significantly than we realize. Property values in Newton have skyrocketed since 1980, but taxes have remained capped per prop 2.5. Relatively, we are trying to achieve the same performance with fewer resources ever year. The chickens must come home to roost.
In a year with particularly high inflation, there is going to be a large shortfall. Because costs, which increase relative to inflation, are rising faster than revenues, which are capped. The difference between them needs to be offset somehow. The budget shortfall can only be reconciled by reducing expenditures (=layoffs, service cuts) or increased revenues (=override, new development).
Based on the outrage I’m seeing, I don’t think anyone wants to see a service cut. If we think of newton as a business, we either need to raise new capital from existing investors (override) or issue new shares (development).
I also think there’s room for a restructuring of prop 2.5 that allows cities to increase levies relative to inflation and/or land values and offer progressive tax relief to avoid displacement, but that’s a different conversation with a whole host of externalities to consider.
I would have no problem with tax increase if i thought academic proficiency will increase. Unfortunately i have no confidence it will. Personally dont think NPS is focused on academic excellence (math, science)
I have compared 2nd and 6th grade newton subjects and difficulty with other school districts and frankly am embarrassed to say newton is consideted a good plated district when it comes to academics
We have observed the results of a chronic funding shortfall. Withholding resources from schools influences academic performance in one direction – down. Using declining school performance as a justification to withhold additional resources is a negative feedback loop that will lead to the continued decline of NPS.
As some who works in a “STEM” field, specifically medical device/bio tech/scientific software, the writing task is very large to meet FDA or DoD requirements. We need engineers that can write well, AND get along well with others, not only know linear algebra. I can tell you quite a few stories about engineers who have been fired because of lack of teamwork skills and writing skills in my business. If English is a second language that’s fine. But to define quality education as only math and science is wrong. We need well rounded individuals who do excellent work and can at least run a grammar checker ( common sense).
Most of the lower paying web design jobs are offshored. The good paying engineering jobs are less offshored because they require more supervision because lives are potentially at stake.
On International #SELDay, the excellence in Newton schools has been diminished because of the Mayor/Superintendent’s lack of self awareness and honesty. Telling people what they want to hear solves no problems and eventually, as is the case here, the house if cards collapses.
Just as an example, the Mayor writes in her newest newsletter that “my highest priority continues to be our children” and then places this message behind lengthy explanations of new construction projects, her true priority.
The first comment on this thread says “this news seems to have come out of the blue”. I agree that it was a bit of a shock.
That said, it really didn’t come out of the blue. Back in 2020 Emily Norton hosted a video presentation by Paul Levy and Matt Hills that worked hard to put this exact issue front and center in the public discussion.
Looking back on the discussion that ensued on Village14 and elsewhere, it appears that the biggest part of the reaction to that presentation was ‘shoot the messenger’.
One commenter in that discussion said “no one here has a crystal ball.” Apparently Matt Hills did. Here’s what he said in 2020.
I’m not a finance or budget guy. I don’t pretend to know the details or budget minutia but it is 100% clear that we have a profound funding issue that does need to be addressed to prevent serious cuts to the staffing and quality of instruction of Newton Public Schools.
As a first step I’d like to see a Prop 2 1/2 override proposal on the table, dedicated specifically to school funding. Without additional funding the handwriting is already on the wall of how NPS will be affected if we just keep muddling along.
Actually first step before any override is obviously to confirm any ‘waste’ and unnecessary costs with FULL public transparency
Cant imagine many would object.
Bugek – How would you go about that beyond publishing the department budget?
Bring in a 3rd party accounting firm to inspect finances, interview staff and look at result metrics and make suggestions
Very widely used in private companies
Bugek – Get down to brass tacks. There are finite options here.
No new revenue this year = layoffs this year
Are you saying you’d rather cut services than increase revenue?
Spending money this year auditing for waste, fraud, and abuse (WF&A) = even less budget for payroll = possible additional layoffs this year + no guarantee for recouping the costs looking for such waste
Do you have any evidence that suggests there is annual WF&A in NPS on the scale that we could be funding 50+ teaching positions instead? My gut says that corruption that deep would have a least 1 whistleblower by now.
Are you saying you’ll support an override to maintain service levels but only if it also includes funding an audit for WF&A in NPS? Is that the compromise here?
Yes, instead of throwing more $ at the problem, we need to understand the root issue.
Fiscal alarms were brought up few years ago which were ignored = poor leadership.
Teachers got a new contract few years and school funding was increased last year AND federal stimulus was avail to schools… but we still have an issue = poor leadership.
At the very least, override should come with NPS leadership overhaul
I am thinking about the current third grade class. Their ONLY normal year was kindergarten. First and Second grade build foundational skills that allow students to learn in higher grades. This year third grade class needs more foundational time. I don’t know how you make up first and second grade skills in fourth and fifth grade. I am talking about decoding skills and addition and subtraction. How do you use manipulatives (blocks, marbles, etc) if you were online all last school year (second grade) and the year before you didn’t finish the end of first grade. These skills are needed to build more complex skills. I am concerned about this grouping of elementary school kids. They need smaller class sizes and access to reading specialists and math coaches (in school and not Russian School of Math) to boost their fundamental learning that they missed. Again, if your first and second grade classrooms had 25 students and next year it is 30 kids, that is less one on one teacher time for each student, when they need it most. If you don’t get these skills now, MCAS scores will be even lower in the future.
When there is talk about eliminating positions at NPS, we automatically think teachers and teaching positions. What is the ratio of teachers and aids to administrators and curriculum coordinators? Just a thought from someone who went through NPS from Kindergarten to High School, newton North class of 1973. For transparency, my son went to Belmont Hill and my daughter graduated NNHS 2011. Should 64% of the population spend 80% of their tax dollars on the schools? And I’m ok with a tax over ride to fund the gap.
Q for folks. I keep hearing about Newton schools reducing options for accelerated / honors / AP classes. Heck, I even hear of thoughts to remove it for middle school math which just seems dumbfounding. Lots of talk about not fostering the very brightest. It is a reason why I’ve heard people send their kids to private school.
But I’m not actually versed on the NPS approach here and I don’t really know how serious proposals are to do things like eliminating advanced math class pathways. Nor do I understand why people feel it might be the right thing to do. I obviously feel we need to challenge the brightest to set themselves up for great things. And of course we need to help and motivate the entire student body succeed toward greatness. Holding all the brightest down doesn’t seem to be the right way.
Is there something I can read to get smarter on this?
In the Boston.com article on this, and the discussion that came in over at Universal Hub, it was mentioned that $1.2M of the shortfall is driven by increases special education costs.
*raises hand*
That’s my family. We have a nearly non-verbal autistic 8 year old. The level of regression he went through during the pandemic was stunning, and when we completed his 3 year assessment he was pretty much where he was 3 years ago (there was some minor progress -finally using the potty!-, a lot of no change, and a few severe regressions)
He can’t be the only kid in that boat. And I don’t think (despite the work of Kay Kahn and others) that the prop 70 funding metrics and state reimbursement rates ever got adjusted up for special Ed.
So now special ed kids needs a lot more support, in terms of staff/$/out of dirstrict placements. Lots more than the 2.5% growth. None of us as parents of these kids want this – if I could wave a magic want and have a normal (or even underperforming kid) and give all the money spent honoring his IEP back, I would. But I can’t – and pandemic + special needs kids has been a mess*.
Other have covered why/how insurance/GIC costs ballooned, but this is my tiny view into why special ed costs did too.
/as always this is a personal statement.
//a very personal statement, please be kind.
Easily the most valuable comment in the discussion.
Yep. A thousand times, yep. It is also why the district is fighting so many folks trying to get more special education services. There is not enough money for them all, my kid included.
Costs for all things have gone up. And more need for services, and some of those services are federally mandated, meaning the school system can’t ignore them. For the kids where they can fight against paying for outside services, trust me, they do.
And Newton is known as a “good” city for SPED. I hate to think of the bad ones if that is true.
Out of District SPED costs keep rising, and NPS must pay for it. No choice. State law. And after these last two years, I see the amount of students that need OOD rising, so the cost will rise. We can’t slash that budget. The mayor knows it, and it leaves less at the district level. Our OOD students need to be placed there, but we can’t have an exodus from the public schools.
“Heck, I even hear of thoughts to remove it for middle school math which just seems dumbfounding.”
It is not a thought. It is fact. There are no “honors math” courses in the NPS middle-schools. My understanding is that they were dropped because of concerns of equity. I do not understand this reasoning so maybe someone closer to the decision can explain.
At the HS level, there are more “balanced” classes where honors and standard curriculum are taught in the same class. Honors students have extra work and take different exams. I’ve never seen any details on how this model is more, less or as effective as having honors classes only for honors level coursework. Intuitively it does not present as effective.
Were parents consulted before these advanced classes were dropped? Parents (tax payers) don’t get a say?
We did vote on this recently, so I guess we got what we voted for
A question to add on to Justin’s comment
How equitable will public schools end up being if students who are denied advanced classes are pulled for private schools? Don’t we end up with an another equity issue at that point? Seems to me that we have over corrected in the name of equity and what you are seeing are parents who will do anything and everything to have their child succeed pull their kids for parochial/private. These are not bad people; it is human nature to want your child to succeed in life. If public school are not supplying this opportunity parents will not stay. There needs to be a balance.
I don’t believe there is a lot of waste or excessive spending on administration in the NPS budget. I remember these being assessed not so long ago.
I also don’t think where or not we have honors math in middle school (we don’t) impacts the budget. What it does impact is families attitudes towards NPS and our comparative rankings.
There has been a long, pernicious effort by the administration to both decouple acclaim from academic accomplishment and to obstruct students from benefiting from academic accomplishment. The School Committee, through inattention and neglect, has allowed this to occur.
Over 15 years ago, Gail Spector penned a sad editorial, “More than an Asterix,” about the Newton Public Schools’ elimination of the National Honor Society (unlike our peers). https://gailspector.com/home-page/my-writings/
Similarly, unlike our peers, we no longer have a high school honor roll or even class rank. Why don’t we recognize academic achievement? We have award ceremonies for student athletes. A social justice seal is stamped on students’ diplomas if school officials deem that they “support” marginalized communities. The NPS message is clear, if you want to distinguish yourself in school, don’t do so through academics.
The next shoe to drop is the elimination of differentiated learning including AP classes. Will the school committee vote on this? No. Will parents be asked for feedback? No. The administration will just do it. If history repeats, when the SC finds out they will follow the party line and applaud the decision as promoting equity. No one will care that the science tells us that ALL students learn more under differentiated learning.
NPS sent so many surveys and honestly I think no one was happy with the outcome. Parents of high school students said a 3:45 pm dismissal was too late.
High school students get out at 3:45 and student athletes miss more classes than ever now.
NPS can ask for opinions but that doesn’t mean anything will change.
(Yes, I know if high school kids got out at 3 pm the bus fees would be even more than they are now. But again our high school students and their families lose again.)
I strongly disagree with this last post. I was very happy with the outcome NewtonMom. My high schooler is happier and does sports as well. There was no perfect solution, but the early morning start times really are tough for my kid.
I certainly acknowledge that it completely didn’t work for some families. I’m not saying it was perfect. But saying no one was happy with the outcome…not true. Not at all.
I will note that considering the anger this particular issue seems to have inspired in certain parents, especially the sport Moms and Dads, I think many of us who like the change haven’t been especially eager to engage publicly on it.
But I take my kid’s mental health seriously, and this was a very positive change for my child. Not making it universal at all, but I also know I’m not alone in this.
And this is also why I’m glad this forum doesn’t require names. It sometimes seems folks can have different opinions on some topics, but when it comes to school sports, the conversation becomes a shouting match (with me not doing the shouting) very quickly…
I agree the late start has helped MANY students. However, there were many voices stating that 3:45 PM is too late (I don’t have a sport kids, but I feel for the kids that miss the last block twice a week). I can tell you that a struggling sports student should not have to pick playing a game in Westford over attending the last class of the day (math, English, etc).
We got survey after survey last year. I can’t tell you if my answers actually helped, other than the school committee wanted the survey. Did anyone read and listen?
@NewtonMom Just to correct your parenthetical comment…the 3 PM dismissal time was the CHEAPEST option of the three feasible options identified by the NPS transportation department and transportation consultant in 2019. At that time was about $400-600K LESS expensive than the 3:45 option that was put in place.
A 3pm end time was in line with all the research that NPS conducted during the years and years of the HSST process. 3pm end time is in line with all the other schools in our athletic leagues and in line with EVERY other school in the state (and I believe the region) that put Later State in place. No other district in the state ends as late as Newton.
But the 3 pm end time option vanished from any discussion and decision-making process. Instead 3:45 was misleadingly touted as the “only option” last year presenting the community with no choice.
Loud applause for Gail and her incredibly intelligent, insightful, observations. They were spot on to an eerie degree. But I have to ask, where was Gail – and all other brilliant observers who recognized this was happening for a while – during the last 5 yrs?
Afraid of cancel culture? Probably…
We need to cancel cancel culture. And go with truth, facts and data.
Jeffrey:
I get the frustration, but no one is talking about eliminating AP classes. I think it is counterproductive to use rumors as a why to drive policy. If you know differently, say so and I’ll fight along with you to make sure that doesn’t happen. Lots to focus on with our school system, but let’s focus on what the changes need to be, not what we fear might someday happen with no proof.
AP classes are now mixed-level in one classroom. Kids still have access to AP curriculum but not in a dedicated space nor instructor. The district is still able to say “the number of AP courses being offered hasn’t changed”.
No, they’re not. There are other mixed level classes (e.g. CP/ACP, ACP/Honors) but I’ve taught AP many times…in one room…just me.
If you want to know what’s going on in classrooms, ask your kids’ teachers. Please don’t propagate misinformation.
NNHS Teacher – this is not misinformation, this is directly from students, administrators, and SC meetings. It is pointed to as equitable progress. Your class may be one of the remaining tracked classes. What do you teach?
AP Politics and Govt at NSHS has both AP and ACP students.
Calculus AB also has AP and Hons combined class with separate assignments.
These are just 1 (or 2) classes that I know.
I tend to agree with @Sumukh’s views on differentiated learning. Regardless of whether the AP offerings are diminished, I question our students’ preparedness (to be clear – not at all based on the teachers but on how they are being forced to teach in the new schedule design with reduced classroom time and mixed-level). Performance has dropped over the past two years: % of students earning 3-5 has dropped to low 80’s from low 90’s before. While the pandemic can be blamed for this drop during this 2-year period, it would be worth monitoring future years data.
https://profiles.doe.mass.edu/adv_placement/ap_perf_dist.aspx?orgcode=02070000&fycode=2021
NNHS Teacher – in any case it shouldn’t be for two people to dispute the district’s intentions on a blog. The NPS senior leadership should come forward and make their plans and beliefs clear. I think they already have based on voluminous public record over the past two years, but if you’re saying there’s more to it, great let’s hear it from the decision makers.
There are 38 possible AP tests offered by the College Board. Depending on the test, many high schools offer mixed classes and allow honors students to take them if there is room in the class. The student then can elect to take the AP test on their own (effectively promote themselves to being a test taker). Also, some of the AP tests are somewhat limited in folks actually wanting to take them, so I can certainly see why some amount of classes would be combined. 38 is a LOT of possible APs. But I’ve still heard nothing about an elimination of AP classes in the name of “equity” which is how this conversation began. The idea that a class or two is combined due to a teacher issue or an enrollment issue isn’t that big a deal from my personal experience. And this is pretty easy to spot as not the norm just by looking at any junior or senior honors student’s transcript in our high schools. Let me give you a preview…there are a lot of AP classes for our top students.
@Fignewtonville: There are many who think differentiated learning is best (and fair) for all students. I suggest reading Bob Jampol’s post from Mar 13th OR NNHS student’s comment and Principal Turners non-response (https://vimeo.com/674613826 1:28 marker).
I do not believe NPS will eliminate AP/ Hons classes, but certainly convinced they will dilute it. Ref to the student reps’ comment for content based multilevel classes. It also extends to others – English (Ref: Jampol’s comment) or the fact that Politics and Govt class involves significant class discussion and peer learning from fellow students at similar level and interest.
BTW – I did not believe NPS would eliminate 8th grade Hons math…. but they did.
From the Newton North web site: There are 17 AP classes offered in Newton high schools, not 38.
Advanced Placement / Honors (AP / H)
There are 17 AP and 87 honors courses offered. Advanced placement courses are taught in the following areas:
– American History,
– Art History,
– Italian,
– Biology,
– Calculus AB & BC,
– Chemistry,
– Chinese,
– Comparative Government,
– English,
– European history,
– French,
– Latin,
– Physics,
– Psychology,
– Spanish,
– Statistics.
And an important reminder
“Due to the rigor of AP and honors courses, we strongly recommend that students take no more than three courses at this level in one year. Most AP courses are only open to seniors.
Why is no one focusing on the role of the School Committee members in all this? The criticisms of the superintendent and mayor may be deserved, but we elect a School Committee to be directly involved in all of this. They are the ones who extended Fleischman’s contract for 3 years despite serious concerns about his performance. And while the mayor may have a seat on the School Committee, she’s only one of several members.
It’s time to contact School Committee members about how they plan to correct course. Are any of them holding office hours the way several City Councilors do regularly? Are any of them speaking out about this situation, rather than just sitting by passively? We elect these people to do a job, so why are people not complaining about how they are (or are not) doing it and holding their feet to the fire to effect change?
And folks like Matthew Miller and Tamika O ran on the platform of reform and accountability. Matthew’s obviously gone but I was so very disappointed in him.
I hope that differentiated learning survives because it did meet the needs of students with distinct skill levels. Back in the day I taught classes each year in each level: Honors or AP (about 20% of the population overall), Curriculum 1 (about 60%), and Curriculum 2 (20% or so). Curriculum 2 classes were usually smaller so that teachers could give greater individual attention to those with academic challenges. Special ed teachers met with each student twice a week outside of class to review class material, approach it if possible in another way, and to coordinate with the classroom teachers in general. I very much admired those special ed teachers and appreciated their contribution to the progress of my academically neediest students.
It seemed absurd to me to eliminate homogeneous groupings. How could my junior Honors English class, for example, cover “Crime and Punishment, ” which runs about 500 pages, without assigning about forty pages a night for homework? I could never assign that many pages in a class with readers unable to keep up or grasp the complexities. That novel, by the way, was perhaps the most beloved title we read in that course. Its magic would have eluded those not honors level junior year.
At the same time, I gave my curriculum 2 classes as much work as I thought they could handle in coordination with their support systems. It depended on the year and the constituency. Insofar as was possible, we covered, with adjustments, the same units of grammar, vocabulary, and usage. The approach, however, had to be different because the students were different. It makes no sense to treat all students as if they all learn the same way and at the same pace.
A good school also offers undifferentiated courses in which all sorts of students learn together, usually electives in the arts and Wellness and so forth. At South students were not tracked across the board; a student in Honors Math might be in Curriculum 1 History or Curriculum 2 English. Hence, students could have their own differentiated academic program. Now that is flexibility!
If you have ever taken a course that moves too slowly or too rapidly for your own learning capacity, you know how frustrating that can be. I hope that the Newton Schools resist a faux equality in the form of heterogeneous groupings. Let us instead permit students to work at their own levels and not force them to conform to some bureaucratic vision of academic justice.
@Bob Jampol – I agree completely. Differentiated learning is so important for all kids. It’s torture for a kid to sit through a math class where they’re totally lost and damaging because they can’t learn the material they need; it’s also torture for a kid to sit through a class where they never learn anything new. And the same kid can be at all points of that spectrum – I had one who was lost in foreign language, average in English, and way ahead in math so was miserable almost 100% of the time.
Meredith. I was in the same situation as your son. From elementary through high school, It was a frustrating often losing struggle dealing with math related courses, but I was light years ahead of almost all my classmates in what I was reading. During my last two years at Newton High, I was admitted to college level history and government courses, college bound in English and remedial what I called “basket case” geometry and algebra. Your son and I had radically different strengths and weaknesses. The core challenge is not to let the weak stuff define you. Tell him to celebrate his strengths.
@Bob – we ended up being forced into homeschooling. It turned out to be exactly what he needed, a mix of unstructured and softly structured, child led learning. We started in 4th grade (and yes, he spent plenty of time with other kids). He did one year of brick-and-mortar h.s., and the last two years did some community college classes and then when he ran out of math classes there took some at a 4-year college. He graduated with honors and now has a Ph.D. in math, working outside academia. I feel very fortunate that, although it caused financial hardship, I was able to provide him with that.
“Forced into homeschooling”????
What an odd choice of wording. You weren’t forced. You made a CHOICE due to PRIVILEGE.
Reading above that honors math has been removed from middle school. Wow. I’m sure the Russian Math out of school program is happy. Wealthier families will get the extra help. Poorer ones will not. Equity!
I seriously could see paying for private schooling or moving out of Newton. Many folks want cheaper housing … reducing the ability for kids to excel academically is a good way to make that happen.
@MMQC – I can’t give details due to my child’s privacy, but it was necessary if there was any way to do it at all. I was a single mother at that time with inconsistent child support, and it was a financial hardship. I have already acknowledged in my comment that I was fortunate to be able to find a way to do it, but it was very painful financially and I was only able to make it work for a few years by doing things like refinancing my home; the last two years I was working full-time and thankful to live on the T.
I have known other parents who have homeschooled while in financial straits. There are times when one’s child’s mental and/or physical health require sacrifices and one finds a way to do something previously thought impossible.
NPS has ~2500 employees: ~1000 teachers and ~1500 non-teachers. Cut hundreds of non-teachers and hire more of the people who teach kids literacy, math and critical thinking. NPS wastes too much time, money and energy on things other than teaching.
Surely that 1500 includes teacher aides, councilors. How many are simply admin or management bloat.
This should be public information no?
Absolutely should be. Doesn’t mean it is. Step one in this process needs to be a third-party audit. Where is all this money going?
It is all public, more detail than anyone knows what to do with, on the NPS website (including itemized 80 page budget), as well as DESE databases. The issue isn’t transparency, it’s what decision makers do with the information.
The NPS budget in 180 page detail is here: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1iARDo4cuC7AUDgQi8LWwkW_poudRkRDq
Bill Koss
Great public schools bring and bind a community together. We unfortunately are now in a downward spiral where more families flee to private making the schools worse making more families flee to private and so on. I fear as a result Newton as a community has lost its collective will to support excellence for its schools. Newton has set course to become a collection of $2 million luxury townhouse islands that helicopter their children to private schools. More and more Newtonians will walk by each other as strangers rather than friends.
I can empathize with Newton parents. Given the decrepit state of the schools in Needham with their 30 minutes per week wasted on “kumbaya” curricula, their insistence on paying unionized teachers 4.7% more than Newton’s, and the recent bombshell that high school students will be allowed to take no more than 10 AP classes out of the 20 on offer, my family has been given no option but to choose between Phillips Academy, Harvard-Westlake, Eton, and the Louvre.
Guess you are one of those negotiators that thinks the less you pay a teacher the better job they will do?
Personally i say pay teachers more. Hire more teachers, etc. While some of the problem is the annual increase in their salary, the other problem is declining enrollment.
On that point, the ridiculous and BS woke policies of the district are now biting them in the a$$.
Homework is not racist.
AP classes are not racist.
Mixed level classes are a joke and are great at holding back the advanced students.
Equity is not about suppressing the achievement potential of the advanced students, it is about giving opportunity and extra support to those who need it to increase their chance of being in an AP class.
Henry Turner and the woke revolution is ruining our schools. Let’s get back to priding ourselves on sending kids to Ivys, having more, not less, AP and honors classes, etc.
The real world doesnt give a sh!t what woke idiots in Newton think about education. Businesses hire the best and brightest and we need to make every student in Newton the most successful we can by giving them more rigor and more opportunity to succeed. What we are doing is a sham and it shows in rankings, enrollment, etc. Can we stop the bullsh!t ready?
Leadership matters. The first critical step to turning around NPS is to NOT renew Flesichman’s contract. The abandonment of excellence for fake “equity” happened under his watch. It’s amazing that a chief executive can keep their job when the vast majority of customers (students & parents) and employees (teachers) hate him. His only support comes from the legacy members of the school committee and the three previous school committee chairs. If we want change in NPS, we have to replace the current members of the school committee that voted to renew his contract.
Last year, he received a three year contract renewal.
Exactly. Every school committee member that voted to renew Fleischman’s contract needs to get tossed out. I’d also recommend tossing out the new guy who is part of their clique.
Which new guy do you think is part of their clique?
You can tell by the way he votes.
Can you just say who, in your opinion, the new member is for those of us who don’t tune into every school committee meeting/votes?
…and too be clear, I meant Bruce Wang.
Bruce, based solely on what you have written on V14, you not only have my vote, I will donate $500 to your campaign. Where should I send the check? I am happy to do more if needed.
Well done Bruce. I’ve got to figure out a way to monetize my Village14 posts. ;-)
Bruce, based solely on what you have written on V14, I will secretly donate $1,000 to your competitor using my Dogecoin account. Pre-announced, three-figure, check-based donations are so 1980s. Alex P. Keaton called, your check bounced.
Fast forward 2 years and Lizzy Warren will have banned Dogecoin – so your donation/account is worthless. Sorry.
Like FDR, I ask everybody to judge me by the enemies I have made.
I hope people avoid throwing around the “Woke” adjective, a Trumpist trope that tries to bury complexity by painting anyone who disagrees as a mechanical advocate of political correctness.
I believe, as my comment above suggests, that homogeneous groupings work well as long as students aren’t tracked across the academic spectrum at the same level. I concede, however, that arguments exist for heterogeneous groupings, particularly in the cause of creating a stronger, less stratified school community. Those arguments don’t win me over because schools can create other opportunities outside academic classes for students of all levels and backgrounds to work together and get to know each other. I’d rather see every student appropriately challenged in every class and not pushed too fast or held back in the name of “equality.”
Here’s the problem. I don’t think it’s a matter of ability/oppportunity that creates problem in heterogenous classes. Barring exceptional situations, the intellectual ability of most humans is high. We have classes where 5 kids are engaged and the rest are focused on their TikTok videos. This is not fair to those 5 kids or the aspiring social media influencers.
You are wrong. Even when engaged, some kids catch onto math concepts more quickly or find reading easier than others. You can have two kids with the same upbringing and same intelligence who have differences in what subject matter is harder for them. Different people have different neurological “wiring”. Just as some people have perfect pitch and some have tin ears, some think visually while some think in words, some can play a song after hearing it once while others need to see the music written out.
It’s often the case that kids are disengaged because they are lost and can’t follow what’s going on or because they already know the subject matter and are bored to tears when they can’t learn anything new. One way to have kids more engaged is by presenting the subject matter at the right level for them – something that can best be done with grouping within subject matter.
@Bob, by referencing Trump you are in essence trying to bury the point of the statements. By mentioning Trump in Newton you immediately discredit content.
The point is this, call it woke, PC, uneducated, biased, whatever you want…its wrong. Homework is not racist. Honors/AP are not racist. What is “racist” or classist or whatever is holding back one group so another can be propped up.
Newton’s mantra is Equity and Excellence. This means we strive to give ALL STUDENTS the opportunity to outperform their own status quo. For kids in AP classes, that should mean better AP test scores or more AP classes. For kids in “regular” classes it means giving them the support to get to AP. For kids who dont want to go to college, offer more vocational/job training opportunities. Equal opportunity for all to do better.
To force an equal outcome by holding back one cohort is bullsh!t. To only care about one group is bullsh!t. The point of NPS is to educate our children and make them successful, not for those in charge of NPS to further some political agenda. That is why I mention the NNHS principal. His track record is not one that makes me confident his main goal is to better the education of ALL students.
All that said, I dont think firing teachers is the right move. I want more teachers and higher quality teachers. Pay the best ones as much as we can. Give more money to NPS. My kids are at different levels in the school system and I want them to equally be afforded the best opportunity. I dont want to see random cuts because we cant figure out a budget. That’s just dumb.
Here is an interesting passage from the recent, telling Newton Tab coverage.
‘…Olszewski did not answer whether she learned about the budget gap at the March 7 School Committee meeting and if it came as a surprise to her.
Instead, she said, “It’s clear that NPS finances are facing the same significant challenges affecting school districts across the state and the reality of having to make hard choices due to increasing costs and pandemic related expenses is difficult. We will be working to address the impact of this budget deficit over the next several weeks.’
I don’t want to pick on Tamika specifically, because you could have replaced her name with that of any other recent SC chairperson and it would have been exactly the same. The statement illustrates a broad problem with the SC. The administration does not keep the SC in the loop, the SC is embarrassed to admit that they don’t know what is going on until it is too late, and they don’t want to reveal their impotence. Next, whenever there is total failure the SC and the administration assert that things are just as bad at other districts. Whenever this excuse is used we find out, after the fact, that things are not just as bad at other districts, rather NPS handled things WORSE than our peer districts. Stay tuned and we will see if history repeats.
I am voting “yes” for the two school overrides, but against the general override.
Although I am 65, my two now-grown children attended the Newton public schools and I still consider public education to be the number one priority of any municipal government. This is why I have voted “yes” for every previous override in the 30 years I’ve lived in Newton and will probably vote “yes” for all future overrides. I also think most of the ARPA money should have been spent on helping Newton’s school children recover from the pandemic. During the pandemic, we chose to prioritize the safety of the old over the needs of the young, who endured two years of isolation – even though they were not at much risk from Covid and may experience lifelong effects from this isolation. The old owe the young a lot for this sacrifice.
So why am I voting “no” on the general override? Because I don’t think it will be spent on the schools after the first year. Instead, Mayor Fuller will spend it on more consultants, lawyers, and photogenic vanity projects for when she runs for her next office. Do not give Mayor Fuller any more money to use against the middleclass for the benefit of her rich friends.
You might not like all of the mayor’s spending priorities, but she has been extremely faithful to what she said she would spend money on. She maintained the override priorities from the Warren administration as the voters intended. She funded pensions like she said even though that’s a pretty wonky priority. She committed to NewCAL from day one of her campaign. She followed the general principles for ARPA funding that she laid out. That includes enormous amounts of money to the school, one time and budgeted.
(And I disagree that ARPA funding should have been focused on more on the schools. There were plenty of highly vulnerable populations served by ARPA money and regular government services that needed to be maintained — housing aid, for instance. We also needed to keep our community together.)
The impact of rejecting the override will go well beyond the Mayor (who may or may not be on the ballot soon).
We also have an enormous City Council, including adversaries to the mayor, to alert voters if money isn’t going to schools as promised.
If they can’t do that, why do we have so many of them?
Thank you for popping this on the radar. I wish the people in power read some of these comments as they were planning this override or when they endorsed it. I don’t know how to get these people to listen :(
As an NPS parent, I am predisposed to supporting any override. But I am not. I oppose Q1 and my reasoning is here https://youtu.be/iLrvBZRRgj8 . My humble request to everyone – please vote. For representative government to work, people need to vote (and also run).
PS- Frank D – I just noticed you were crushing it even a year ago. #fanclub
Excellent presentation Sumukh ! The AP Calculus % pass rate declines are shocking. It’s not surprising that parents who value STEM learning and can afford it are removing their children from NPS.
Ditto. Great job, Sumukh. In the “how did we get here?” vein, here is the email correspondence that I had with the North high school math department head about calculus. In her defense, these emails were in the Spring of 2020. In the NPS tradition, I was never afforded transparency into what my son was going to learn and not learn.
Dear Ms xxxx,
My son was scheduled to take AP calculus at Newton North this upcoming year. It looks like some topics will be dropped or the treatment will be compressed. Compared to a normal year, would you mind telling me where the coverage is being shrunk?
Thanks,
Jeffrey Pontiff
Dear Mr. Pontiff,
This will be a work in progress throughout the school year. I want to point out that much of the start of our school year will be about working to build relationships and community virtually and this needs to be the teachers’ focus at the outset.
Teachers will be working collaboratively as part of their teams and with their classes to assess individual student needs for content and skill development. Because of this, I cannot make a call today on exactly what they will/will not cover with students.
As teachers do every year, they will clearly communicate the content and skills covered and students can consult the college board curriculum map (linked here) so that if they desire to take the AP Exam, they can address additional topics and be prepared to do so.
Sincerely,
xxxx
Thank you, Ms. xxxx for your response.
My interest is not in the AP exam per se, rather in the content that my son will miss. When you write ” they will clearly communicate the content and skills covered” do you mean that my son will receive a syllabus the first week of school? If not, will you know the expected content when school starts?
Best,
Jeffrey Pontiff
Mr. Pontiff,
Jeffrey (sic) and his peers will have a deep and rich calculus experience that will provide an excellent foundation for future math classes.
Sincerely,
sxxxx
At this point I gave up. Almost 3 years later, I think we can see why the kids of hyper-educated parents aren’t doing well in the AP calculus exam relative to peer district.
Jeffrey, “In her defense, these emails were in the Spring of 2020.”
Yes, I would say that’s a pretty good defense. Perhaps she should have been more blunt and said, “I have no idea what’s going to happen”, because in the spring no one did, but I guess she was trying to be reassuring.
Extrapolating from the Spring of 2020 – when no one had any idea what the next day, much next the next year was going to look like – seems unfair and likely misleading.
Good scientists and mathematicians try hard to recognize errant data points.
Jeffrey:
I can check, but pretty sure that content has returned to AP Calculus. Maybe your complaint is that post-Covid years were rigorous enough? I think I’d agree with that. I believe your kids have all graduated now, but you should know that this year is much different. For instance, there has been a crackdown on any unexcused absences at North. With Covid, there was a lot of flexibility, now, more exact standards.
I agree with you that mixing the non-honors/honors and AP/non-AP classes is a mistake and one I’d like to change. I don’t know if that is an effort for equality in the classroom or funding.
I personally feel like the high schools (and to some extent the middle schools) should be doing more to help academic high achievers thrive. I also remember how Newton used to be known as a meat grinder in terms of stress. I know folks who went to Newton in the 80s, 90s, and 2000s. They describe a pretty tough and competitive environment, as well as a place where the middle group of kids got lost. It is a balance.
I think the “WIN” Blocks have been great for some kids, and a waste of time for others. Work to be done there.
But I do think in terms of using the testing success as a proxy for how the school is doing, we really need to wait a year or two. Covid made comparing across years difficult. And it does feel like this year Newton North returned much more to normal.
So in terms of Sumukh’s points, I’m glad he is passionate about the school system. Still feel that he has no plan for what happens if the no vote wins. And that means at best he has identified a problem, but not why his suggested action (vote no) is the solution.
And the venn diagram of the people supporting him who also would refuse to vote yes on any override is a close match. In other words, he is being amplified by people who won’t agree with his future plans for the school system. That matters too.
The other obvious NPS mismanagement from two years ago was that the administration projected student enrollment that assumed that all of the students who left NPS for other schools would come back. I emailed the school committee at the time and told them that the projection was absurd and that if they wanted a better projection, they should ask the administration to tell them how many parents requested transcripts (which are necessary for getting into another school). I suspected that the exodus from the NPS would continue since a lot of families were trying to move their children out, but where unsuccessful since private school enrollment was swollen. My email was apparently ignored. Neither the Mayor nor SC questioned the analysis. This resulted in resources being inefficiently allocated.
Boston Public Schools have played this trick year after year. Marcela Garcia has covered it Globe has brought it to light. Google, “Fuzzy math from Boston Public Schools”
In the case on NPS, there is no reason for SC oversight. Oversight takes more effort than asking voters for more money.
On this I agree. A simple survey would have disclosed that.
Hoping for a potential result is not the same as obtaining that result (or checking on it). There is a lesson to be learned there for what Sumukh is proposing, no? Same logical fallacy in both arguments. Both relay on hope vs facts/history.