School Committee continues to step up advocacy efforts to increase state funding for AB schools
The Acton-Boxborough Regional School Committee engaged state Senator Jamie Eldridge and Representatives Simon Cataldo and Danillo Sena in a frank conversation at the Committee’s November 20 business meeting about the inadequacies of the state’s chapter 70 education funding model and its impact on the Acton-Boxborough Regional School District.
School Committee members remarked on components of the funding model that have contributed to four budget cycles of cuts to staff and programs, depletion of reserves, and the need to push for a narrowly approved $6.6M operational override in 2024 to meet the real cost of operations in the context of higher than anticipated inflation rates, soaring energy costs, and double-digit increases in healthcare and special education out-of-district tuition and transportation.
The District is anticipating a budget deficit in the fiscal year 2026-27 of $2-3M, even with cost savings realized through planned school reorganization which includes the closure of the Luther Conant Elementary School building.
School Committee Chair Tori Campbell told the delegation that the state’s perception of the wealth of the Acton-Boxborough communities is overestimated. “We don’t have the commercial wealth or a population that can absorb more tax increases,” Campbell said. “On paper it looks like we have the capacity to pay one hundred percent of the base amount the state requires us to spend to operate our schools (“the foundation budget”), which is too low to begin with, but when you look at the [uneven] wealth distribution across our communities, we don’t have the capacity. We have parents who tell us they are willing to pay more for our schools, and we have [a rising population of] seniors that tell us, ‘Please don’t raise our taxes; we won’t be able to live here.’ When we sit down with our select boards and look at how much revenue is coming in, it barely covers health insurance increases. That makes for some really hard conversations. You see the AB Forward school reorganization discussion; that is where this has brought us. We are controlling the piece we can control, but we really need help from the state because none of this is enough, and it feels like the state is not upholding its constitutional obligation to support education when we are all in this position.”
School Committee Vice Chair Adam Klein reminded the legislative delegation that districts like AB that are experiencing overall declining enrollment but also seeing increases in high needs populations of students requiring specialized instruction, will not meaningfully benefit from the $1.5B in education funding that is being phased in by the state through the 2019 Student Opportunity Act (SOA).
The SOA substantially increased the state’s per pupil allocations for high needs students mostly in school districts located in Gateway cities with larger enrollments of disadvantaged students and limited local revenue. Those districts saw their state aid rise by multiple millions of dollars.
State aid for suburban and rural districts with declining enrollments, on the other hand, is essentially level funded from the prior year with the state providing an additional, required minimum allocation of $30 per pupil (“minimum aid”). Larger minimum aid increases are subject to the discretion of the legislature and driven by stakeholders’ advocacy efforts.
Representative Cataldo praised the School Committee for its strong advocacy that influenced a historically high minimum aid increase this year of $150 per pupil from the state.
Klein told the delegation that “there’s a catch 22 in advocating for increased minimum aid. Every time we get something above $30 per student, we get a few extra hundred thousand dollars, but [with continued declining enrollment], it puts us further away from the day that we will see a return to meaningful state aid. While we appreciate the additional aid, this allocation alone is not enough to offset our budget deficits in the current economic environment.”
Representative Sena agreed that though “the $150 per pupil increase in the state’s current budget was a victory, it was not enough.”
In his opening remarks, Senator Eldridge noted, “We’ve all been very aware of the deliberative process the School Committee is having about possible reorganization of the AB public schools. There’s a clear recognition that healthcare costs have eaten up any increases the state has provided in Chapter 70 funding. We need to find other ways to provide support to the Acton-Boxborough schools.”
The legislators all referred to a forthcoming Chapter 70 Local Contribution Study (due out this summer) which tasks the Department of Education and Department of Local Services with examining components of the Chapter 70 funding formula to ensure the model stays current with educational needs and costs.
The study will, in part, examine the extent to which current wealth and income measures accurately reflect a community’s ability to pay for the continued operation of its schools, re-evaluate the legislated minimum aid allocation and inflation adjustment cap of 4.5 percent, and revisit the underlying assumption in the formula that the total of all local contributions statewide should fund 59 percent of the state’s total foundation budget with the state covering the remaining 41 percent.
Representative Cataldo asked the Committee,“If there are tweaks or variables in the foundation budget that will disproportionately help Acton-Boxborough, we need to know about those. We can’t take for granted that any changes in the formula will be better or neutral. It’s very possible that it gets worse. We really want to hear from you. You have been effective advocates for changing what minimum aid communities get at a minimum, and that is something we need to continue to do no matter what.”
With the repeal of MCAS, it’s still unclear who’s calling the shots when it comes to competency determination for high school graduation
The Regional School Committee unanimously approved a new competency determination policy at their December 4 business meeting that identifies specific high school English language arts, mathematics, science, and, beginning 2027, history courses, that Acton-Boxborough Regional High School students are required to successfully complete in order to graduate. The action fulfills a new state-requirement that calls upon local school districts to certify that students are graduating with comparable skills, competencies, and knowledge in the areas that were assessed by the tenth grade Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS) exams.
Massachusetts voters repealed a 1993 Education Reform mandate last November requiring high school students to pass the MCAS as a prerequisite to earning their high school diploma.
In addition to the competency requirements, Acton-Boxborough students will still have to meet the general graduation requirements identified in the high school’s program of studies.
“By naming specific courses, the new competency determination policy increases the level of rigor and expectations at the high school,” said Assistant Superintendent for Teaching and Learning Gabby Abrams, at a first reading of the policy on November 20. “There is a feeling of a win here in terms of the work the high school is doing with course releveling and ensuring that all Acton-Boxborough students have access to highly rigorous, standards-aligned, college, career and life-readying coursework.”
The deadline for school districts to submit a new competency determination policy to the Department of Education is December 31, 2025.
Meanwhile, on December 1, the Healey-Driscoll administration’s Statewide Graduation Council (Council) released an interim report that lays out seven initial recommendations for a uniform, statewide graduation requirement for all Massachusetts public school districts.
The Council’s initial recommendations specify required coursework that aligns with minimum requirements for four-year state universities and include a limited number of state-designed end-of-course (EOC) assessments and a capstone or portfolio requirement that would showcase students’ best work demonstrating mastery of course content. Students would also be required to demonstrate competency in financial literacy and have opportunities to earn state-designed seals of distinction. The recommendations also require districts to proactively support students in planning post-secondary career pathways through MyCAP and help students keep their post-secondary options open by applying for financial aid through the FAFSA or MAFSA.
The Council’s recommendations are designed to reflect attributes in the state’s Vision of a Massachusetts Graduate framework released in September 2025 which is meant to complement but not replace similar frameworks developed locally.
In preparation for the report, the Council analyzed national- and state-wide trends in local graduation requirements. Acton-Boxborough was among 120 Massachusetts school districts that participated in a survey that looked at variations in local graduation policies and at the ways districts are integrating their locally developed Portrait of a Graduate competencies into their district’s policies and school-based practices.
The Council, which will continue to seek input as they refine the recommendations, is scheduled to release their final report in June 2026.
School Committee Vice Chair Adam Klein expressed frustration at the timing of the Council’s initial report. “There should be an understanding that if guidance from the state is forthcoming, the state should then not issue an interim requirement for school districts that is onerous and takes up an inordinate amount of our time.”
Abrams shared her personal views with the Committee on November 20, that even though any type of state-imposed assessment facilitated by the Department of Education feels counter to the intent of the voters who repealed the MCAS state graduation requirement, she has “grave equity concerns about three hundred fifty-one cities and towns in over four hundred school districts individually delineating competency. Finding a uniform, statewide measure feels like a moral imperative,” Abrams said. “We want all of our students in all our cities and towns to reach a certain level of success.”
Diane Baum is the School Committee beat reporter for the Acton Exchange. She served on the Acton-Boxborough Regional School Committee from 2015 to 2021.
