TURNERS FALLS — Citing a state Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) recommendation, the Six Town Regionalization Planning Board is expected to vote on Tuesday, Oct. 14, to recommend that the Special Town Meetings and Montague ballot vote to approve a regional agreement for a new merged school district be delayed.
During a sparsely attended public outreach meeting on Thursday at the Gill-Montague Senior Center, Regionalization Planning Board Chair Alan Genovese and Vice Chair Greg Snedeker shared that in continued conversations with DESE regarding the regional agreement that is needed for regionalization, DESE recommended the board postpone a vote, with Snedeker citing “uncharted waters.”
This issue comes from the logistics of merging the two regional districts, the Pioneer Valley Regional School District and the Gill-Montague Regional School District, while also incorporating the independent Warwick School District that educates elementary-age students — a combination that DESE has no precedent for.
A full meeting of the Regionalization Planning Board will be held next week to vote on recommending the postponement of the planned Special Town Meetings in Bernardston, Northfield, Leyden, Gill and Warwick, as well as the ballot vote in Montague, that have all been tentatively scheduled for November.
Snedeker also said the postponement recommendation is not related to critiques of the Regionalization Planning Board and its research by Pioneer Valley Regional School District Superintendent Patricia Kinsella and others who have been critical of regionalization, and sought to correct the record on the reason for postponing the Special Town Meetings.
“She’s welcome to have her opinions about the regionalization, but that is absolutely not why we’re recommending postponement. It really came down to our meetings with DESE,” Snedeker said on Thursday.
The draft regional agreement, which is under review by DESE, would need to be approved by all six towns for the proposed Great River Regional School District to be formed, which would then commence an 18-month transition period.
Under this plan for regionalization, high school students from these six towns would be educated at the existing Turners Falls High School and Great Falls Middle School. Middle schoolers would occupy Pioneer Valley Regional School and elementary students would remain in their current buildings.
A key element that has inspired an interest in regionalization is declining enrollment that has impacted student learning opportunities. In each of the public outreach sessions so far, the Regionalization Planning Board has emphasized that the decline in enrollment between the districts has been steady since the 1990s, how it impacts student education and social interactions, how regionalization is not centered on finances and that the decision will come down to residents of the six towns.
Thus far, each town that would be impacted by regionalization has had an information session, with differing responses from community members in each session. Gill’s Sept. 15 meeting featured more positive attitudes toward regionalization, whereas other sessions, such as the ones in Leyden on Sept. 30 and Warwick on Oct. 2, leaned more critical.
Despite the postponement recommendation, the goal is to continue outreach sessions for the public to continue engagement, and a vote could come to fruition in the spring as the state and the Regional Planning Board continue to discuss the subject.
“Through these forums, we’re getting feedback that gives us some time to still make adjustments,” Genovese said about the postponement. “That could be a real positive thing. Even though it’s critical, it really helps us to be sure we address each one of these before we go to Town Meeting.”
The next information session is scheduled for Saturday, Oct. 18, at 10 a.m. at Northfield’s Dickinson Memorial Library, followed by Tuesday, Oct. 21, at 6 p.m. in the Turners Falls High School auditorium. More information on the regionalization proposal is available at 6towns.org.
