Pioneer eliminating director of teaching and learning as part of $18.2M budget

NORTHFIELD — The Pioneer Valley Regional School District plans to eliminate the director of teaching and learning position as part of its $18.2 million budget for fiscal year 2027.

Superintendent Patricia Kinsella told members of the School Committee, and member towns’ finance committees and selectboards, on Thursday that school officials have been working to make $800,000 in cuts from the first draft of the budget, which had included a $974,343 increase in town assessments.

“We made some deep cuts,” Kinsella said. “We heard you, and we are seeking your partnership in coming out [to Town Meetings] at the end of the spring with a budget that preserves what we love and appreciate about Pioneer, because we’re providing an excellent program for our students, and is affordable to our taxpayers.”

The proposed budget will be voted on by the Pioneer School Committee on Thursday, Feb. 12. Of the $18.2 million, about $16 million will come from local funds.

Bernardston will see a 14.22% assessment increase in FY27, Leyden will see a 12.34% increase and Northfield will see a 4.48% increase. Bernardston’s assessment will be $4.01 million, Leyden’s will be $1 million and Northfield’s will be $4.94 million.

In addition to the town assessments, the district is anticipating receiving $684,690 in tuition revenues. Other anticipated revenues include $34,000 in charter school assessments and $350,000 in excess and deficiency funds.

Director of Finance and Operations Taffy Bassett-Fox said that cuts made from the original draft of the budget included cutting the existing director of teaching and learning position, eliminating plans to reinstate a certified librarian at Pioneer Valley Regional School and building-specific substitute teachers, and implementing a new literacy curriculum.

“One of our budget priorities is to invest in teaching and learning to support an enhanced educational vision,” Bassett-Fox said. “Ironically, during these budget cuts, we needed to eliminate the position of our director of teaching and learning. It was a very difficult, painful decision to make.”

“Education is our core mission here. It’s ridiculous that [the director of teaching and learning position] is one of the cuts we’re making and we want to get a budget passed,” Kinsella said. “I don’t know how else we can show the towns, if we tighten our belts much more, we’re not going to offer a good program.”

The FY27 budget plan includes $40,000 to cover stipends to compensate remaining staff for the tasks that would have been completed by Director of Teaching and Learning Zevey Steinitz, whose salary is $118,976. At the time that Steinitz was hired, the director of teaching and learning position served as an expansion of the curriculum coordinator role, to be tasked with leading all student learning, staff development and staff evaluations.

School Committee Chair Melissa Gerry said the cuts aim to protect “frontline staff” and student programming.

“I can’t tell you how hard some of these decisions were to drop the budget another $800,000, and to do it so we’re not cutting direct student-facing services,” Gerry said. “But these hurt.”

According to the budget, other cuts include removing a per-diem payroll/human resources assistant role, reducing central office travel expenses for conferences, an 11.57% reduction to Bassett-Fox’s salary and reduced hours for the superintendent’s assistant. Additionally, $10,000 was removed from the field trip budget line and $17,150 for textbooks was cut across the three schools.

Even with these changes, the FY27 budget is $779,712 more than the FY26 budget, as many of the cuts entailed removing staff and programming the district hoped to add in the new budget year.

Kinsella said the largest increases in the budget cover salary increases for district staff as required by their collective bargaining agreements ($301,000), health insurance ($280,623) and special education tuition ($118,940).

Amid fiscal stability concerns with the Hampshire County Group Insurance Trust, the school district recently switched to the state-backed Group Insurance Commission. For FY27, the district has budgeted $2.19 million for health and life insurance for active employees, and $1.22 million for retired employees.

“We want to maintain district stability in these really tough financial times, as well as the health insurance crisis,” Bassett-Fox said. “Stability is the most important thing we can offer our students and our staff.”

Other increases in the budget include an $85,723 increase in transportation costs, a $50,000 increase in charter and School Choice tuition, and a $43,449 increase in administrative staff salaries, including a $6,909, or 4%, increase to Kinsella’s salary.

In addition to the operating budget for FY27, school officials presented a $155,600 capital budget at last week’s hearing. Capital requests include maintenance projects such as $50,000 in parking lot repairs, a $10,000 replacement of a kitchen grease trap and $16,000 for window shades.

Kinsella said many of the cuts made in the FY27 budget are not sustainable long-term and would hurt the administrative team.

“It won’t be sustainable in the long term for us to to operate like this. We’ll do it this year because we have to,” Kinsella said. “It’s not a good long-term plan if Pioneer is to continue on its path to excellence.”

She did not speculate as to how the district could become more fiscally sustainable, but attendees said it would take a lot of teamwork among the towns and school district.

“We know there’s going to be more challenges. When we work collaboratively, and we listen to each other and support one another, and remain grounded in what is best for the children, we can accomplish what we need to do,” said Michele Giarusso, a School Committee member and Leyden’s town coordinator.

The budget book and slideshow presented at last week’s hearing can be found at pvrsdk12.org.