As a state commission investigates the formula that sets state aid allocations for schools, local advocates are working to ensure the voices of rural districts are heard on Beacon Hill, including through a new Rural Schools Storyboard Project.
In the fiscal year 2027 budget signed by Gov. Maura Healey in July, legislators agreed to revive the Foundation Budget Review Commission to examine the K-12 funding formula and look at how the state can address the rising costs of education, particularly in the areas of special education, student transportation, personnel and employee healthcare.
The commission was last active 10 years ago, when its final report in 2015 recommended increasing Chapter 70 funding by $432 million. The FY27 budget includes $7.66 billion in Chapter 70 aid to public school districts, an increase of $297 million over fiscal year 2026.
For FY27, the governor’s approved budget includes $67.4 million for Franklin County towns and regional school districts, an increase of approximately $1.9 million over FY26.
“My stress level around [the Foundation Budget Review Commission] is really high,” said Jessica Corwin, chair of the Sunderland Elementary School Committee, a Frontier Regional School Committee member and co-chair of the Massachusetts Association of School Committees’ (MASC) Rural Schools Committee. “If this doesn’t go well for rural schools, it’s game over. … I hear these stories from these other rural schools — Mohawk Trail, Gateway Regional — that they are truly in their final death spiral. If there is not an infusion of cash, they’re not going to be able to meet the basic needs of their students anymore.”
Across Franklin County’s public schools, the Greenfield Recorder found that there are more than 40 fewer educators, administrators and other staff members in the current school year than there were in the 2025-2026 school year as districts have had to make cuts in the wake of expenses and salaries outpacing revenues and state aid, several administrators said.
According to the Budget Summary, the Foundation Budget Review Commission must file a report with recommendations backed up by the data that it collects by Oct. 31, 2028, and hold at least four public hearings across the state.
“We know that there are going to be lots of competing interests. We are underfunding education everywhere — everybody needs more money,” Corwin said, “but rural schools have been left behind repeatedly in these processes and we are further behind than everybody else.”
To broadcast the challenges rural schools are facing to Beacon Hill, the Rural Schools Committee has organized the Rural Schools Storyboard Project. Committee volunteers reached out to selectboards, school committees and superintendents in 71 school districts across the state that receive rural school aid asking for local and personal stories illustrating the hardships and loss that comes from state funding falling short.
“What really helps make the case for rural schools is when people hear real stories from real people about things that have happened or are happening,” said Martha Thurber, co-chair of the MASC Rural Schools Committee with Corwin and chair of the Mohawk Trail School Committee. “You bring it right down to the level of, ‘This is affecting our students.’ When people hear those kinds of stories, it’s not abstract — it brings it right down to the level that people can emotionally understand.”
After the Dec. 18 deadline for submissions, the volunteers will package the stories online and compile them into a booklet with common themes and statistics to anchor them. Thurber envisions handing copies to the commission members when they host a hearing in western Massachusetts. She called the final product a “hard-copy version of the Rural Schools Action Week” in March.
“In some ways, this is a bit of a study of what are the issues today,” Corwin said. “We’re looking to extract themes, but really show our unity and common concerns.”
So far, Corwin has heard from 30 of the 71 communities stretching from Berkshire County to Barnstable County.
“We will be fighting hard to get stories from all of them,” Corwin said. “It’s a real grassroots effort.”
Residents in rural school districts connected to the issue, like superintendents, school committee members, selectboard and finance committee members, town administrators, teachers, staff, parents, union leaders, students, alumni and taxpayers, can submit stories through the Rural Schools Storyboard Project’s website at ruralschoolsma.org/storyboard.
Rural Schools Summit
Earlier in November, a similar conversation was sparked at the Rural Schools Summit, where superintendents met with state officials, including Department of Elementary and Secondary Education Commissioner Pedro Martinez, to chart steps toward sustaining rural schools in the face of challenges like insufficient funding and declining enrollment.
On Tuesday, Nov. 3, school superintendents from Franklin and Hampshire counties, school committee members and other local education leaders traveled to the Collaborative for Educational Services in Northampton for the summit, which focused on the need for coordinated action.
“This summit builds on important work that began several years ago, including the Rural Schools Commission’s efforts to identify the challenges facing our districts and recommend meaningful solutions,” Sheryl Stanton, superintendent of the Mohawk Trail and Hawlemont regional school districts, said in a statement.
The goal of this summit was connecting local education leaders with state policymakers. Along with Martinez, Massachusetts Secretary of Education Stephen Zrike was in attendance, along with state Sen. Jo Comerford, D-Northampton, and state representatives Lindsay Sabadosa, D-Northampton, Mindy Domb, D-Amherst, and House Chair of the Joint Committee on Education Ken Gordon, D-Bedford.
“I thought it was great. I thought it was a really terrific event,” Thurber said in reflection. “It was important, especially because of the people … in the room. They got the commissioner of DESE, they had the secretary of education, they had a number of high-level DESE people there. … It wasn’t just talking; it was exercises that forced people to talk about and hear about the issues [facing] rural schools.”
According to Thurber, part of the effort behind the summit was to get all rural schools across the state “pulling in the same direction.”
“We have some opportunities now, to really begin to potentially make some changes that will ultimately affect rural schools and remedy the consistent inequitable funding,” she said. “It’s important that we don’t just say, ‘Here are our problems,’ but that we also say … ‘Here are some potential solutions that we, as rural leaders, can agree on and push for.’
“That was as important as getting the right people in the room, making sure that we begin to develop a consistent message,” Thurber continued.
Part of the summit involved rural school leaders sharing with state representatives and each other their hopes for rural schools in the future. Later in the day, attendees discussed the current situation for rural education across Massachusetts.
“Rural school districts are an essential part of the commonwealth’s public education system, but the circumstances in which we operate are often very different from those of larger and more densely populated districts,” Patricia Kinsella, superintendent of the Pioneer Valley Regional School District, said in a statement. “Declining enrollment, rising costs and the challenges of maintaining educational programs across geographically large districts are placing enormous pressure on our schools.”
Thurber added that this was a good start for conversation with state leadership, but that advocacy for rural school aid “is not over by any sense.”
“I thought it was an extremely valuable day,” Thurber said of the summit, “and I hope something comes out of it.”
