Days after news of the state taking up a second review of Boston Public Schools in less than three years, Mayor Michelle Wu and other officials Tuesday expressed opposition to potential state seizure of Massachusetts' biggest school district.
BPS is slated to undergo the review next week following one from 2019 that found "major structural challenges" in the district. The audit yielded a memorandum of understanding between BPS and the Department of Early and Secondary Education to improve the district's poorest performing schools. The agreement went into effect on Mar. 10, 2020, the day the COVID-19 pandemic triggered a Massachusetts-wide state of emergency.
Wu, who recently crossed her first 100 days in office, campaigned with a long and detailed education plan to improve BPS.
In her testimony before the state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education Tuesday, Wu pointed to the district's current superintendent search and forthcoming "unprecedented investments" in the city's budget to the goal of transforming BPS facilities and services.
"It is with all this in mind that I firmly oppose receivership with deep gratitude for the progress we've made and with deep appreciation for the scale of the challenges ahead," she said.
"Receivership would be counterproductive in light of our ongoing transition and in light of the progress we're making in collaboration with the state," Wu continued. "No one is better equipped to accelerate the progress Boston has made than our Boston Public Schools communities and I'm confident this review will suggest the same."
In a letter earlier this month, Education Commissioner Jeffrey Riley notified BPS about the upcoming review, which carries the threat of receivership.
In remarks Tuesday, Riley said he decided to conduct the review in light of a forthcoming update he's scheduled to deliver to the state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education on Boston's progress with the goals outlined in the 2020 memorandum of understanding.
"This board has asked me to schedule a meeting later in the spring to update them," Riley said. "In order to provide you guys with a good update, I've decided to conduct a district review."
The review, DESE officials said, will begin next Monday.
Riley said he is particularly concerned with special education services and placement of those students and English Language Learners, as well as high school graduation data and school bus arrival data.
In the report resulting from the 2019 review, special education was noted as an area of concern, describing BPS' special education services as in "systemic disarray."
That upshot was reflected in testimony from Marcela Sliney, a BPS parent who shared how she struggled to get services for her dyslexic son.
"Dyslexia was not recognized in the Boston Public School system. After BPS evaluated my son, I was informed he was on grade-level and even if he had a reading disability, he would only receive services if he was two years behind in the system," she said.
Sliney said she found BPS services "inadequate" and eventually moved her son to private school.
"Other kids and families do not have the ability and resources to send their kids to a private school an hour away from Boston," Sliney said, avoiding comments about Boston's upcoming review or potential receivership.
Boston Teachers Union President Jessica Tang and At-Large Boston City Councilor Julia Mejia, who chairs the council's education committee, pointed to outcomes from the latest school districts in receivership.
"If you want to help the Boston Public Schools, please do not waste your time with top-down interventions [like] school closing and receivership," said Tang, reading testimony from fellow members. "Your time and money would be better spent engaging individual school communities to determine what interventions they already know they need."
"It's the wrong move for Boston for many reasons," said Mejia. "Not the least of which is that DESE doesn't have the best track record for improving schools it has taken into receivership."
Mejia pointed to school districts in Lawrence, Holyoke and Southbridge which were each put into receivership and are among the state's poorest performing school districts according DESE.
Boston outperformed all three districts in that assessment list.
"BPS is not without its problems, but these are problems that can be solved by turning to the community, not by initiating yet another executive leadership retooling. That kind of thinking lacks innovation and intentionality and avoids the core problems facing Boston Public Schools," Mejia said.
