School Com talks school choice, districts and Extended Day

The Norwood School Committee met last Wednesday and discussed several topics facing the district.

The most anticipated discussion may have been that of school choice, which has a very different definition in Massachusetts in this context. Norwood Public Schools (NPS) Superintendent Timothy Luff explained that this is a program about allowing public school students in other districts to enroll in NPS (MGL Chapter 76, Section 12B).

Luff explained that the School Committee has to periodically vote on whether to allow this, as it has since the associated law was enacted in 1992 – https://gvimes.link/masschoice

School Choice, at least nationally, refers to charter school offerings and legislation.

Regardless, the Committee voted to continue to not allow school choice in the district, as it has since the law was enacted. Luff said Norwood students are allowed, however, to go to districts that do allow it.

“We know that with redistricting, our enrollments are high and we need to make sure classroom spaces are such that we can serve the students in the Norwood Public Schools in the Town of Norwood,” he said.

In other news, Luff gave an update on the Elementary School Redistricting project, which will be enacted in the 2026-2027 school year.

The redistricting was an effect of the new Coakley Middle School going from grades 6-8 to 5-8, which was designed to take some pressure off the elementary schools, some of which were projected to reach or go over capacity in the coming years.

While that helped, there were still some schools that were becoming overcrowded, and the redistricting was aimed at fixing that. However, no one likes moving in the middle of elementary school, and many parents were not exactly happy about their children changing schools. Luff said he got many requests for students to stay in their old schools.

“All parents have been notified, and we got all requests they have made for non-district placements,” he said. “I have mostly not approved any of those requests unless there was a sibling going to another school for a program and that was so we didn’t break up the families that went to those schools. In those situations, transportation was not provided for the sibling, but those few requests have been made.”

Luff said there were many requests for children to stay in their old schools, and said where enrollment in those schools was high, he “definitely did not approve those requests.”

Luff also said they are working with the staff to get the transitions ready before the big moves start in the summer.

“Most staff at this point have been notified of their new assignments, so thank you to our staff for being very patient for those pieces, especially our English language education and special education teachers, who had to wait until we looked at case loads and how things balanced out that way,” he said.

He said principals have been meeting to discuss the big transition activities, the biggest being the “Willett Shuffle,” referring to the fact that Willett Early Education Center is transitioning from a Kindergarten-only school to a regular K-4 elementary. That will affect all other elementary schools, as they will all have to have their own kindergartens now.

Other move considerations include furniture logistics, curriculum, specialist schedules, orientation scheduling, technology changes, and parent-teacher organization modifications.

Also at the meeting, Norwood Community Media (NCM) Director Jack Tolman and NCM Board President (and Town Moderator) Gerri Slater came by to give an update on the channel’s financial situation.

For a more detailed explanation, go to The Norwood Record’s coverage of the April Board of Selectmen meeting where the pair presented a similar explanation – https://gvimes.link/selectncm

The reader’s digest is that Norwood Light, one of the Town’s three cable broadband providers, is ditching broadband, and NCM, a separate non-profit not affiliated with the Town, gets its funding through public access laws that require broadcasters to pay a portion of their subscription payments to public access channels. So, with Norwood Light leaving that space to go all-in on streaming, NCM is left losing one-third of its budget (Xfinity and Verizon Fios are not expected to go anywhere anytime soon).

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Tolman pointed out that the partnership with NPS has helped to prepare students for modern production better than many of the higher education spaces dedicated to the profession, to the point where some students have reported a bit of a downgrade when they get to college. He said the success of the Norwood High School (NHS) TV studio led to NCM kicking in during the Coakley process for a brand new studio there.

“With the success of the NHS television studio, the NCM Board of Directors voted unanimously to fund a TV studio, and a $100,000 investment of video, audio and lighting equipment was made to fund this studio (at the new Coakley),” Tolman said. “I’ve had multiple conversation with NPS Director of Technology Joe Kid, and we both agree that this has already exceeded everybody’s expectations… I have asked every company I know involved in this process, and they are not aware of any other school that has this capability.”

“Our numbers are tracking what we anticipated for enrollment, so no changes there; however we are tracking enrollments and registrations over the summer,” he said.

The perhaps more unique issue was a piece of correspondence from an “anonymous” parent in the Extended Day program. The program provides after-school activities and care for students and parents, and the writer of the correspondence, read out loud by Luff, expressed frustration at an apparent lack of attention and budget for the summer iteration of the program.

The writer’s main concerns have long been issues at Extended Day, and included the fact that students can sometimes face extreme heat and rain, as the space provided inside is “minimal.”

“Are you aware that after families registered to enroll their children in the summer program, the superintendent has made it clear that the space at the Savage Center will be minimal, just barely?” they wrote. “Use the hallways, stay outside all day, there will be no ‘real’ designated space. Well if you consider restrooms designated space then I guess there will be some. Ninety-plus degree heat, barely any shade, and fend for yourselves. ‘It takes a village’ has taken on a different meaning for some in this administration. Are there really not two-to-three classrooms in this building to house this program during extreme heat, rain, etc? Use of the gym with other programs, contingent on schedules?”

For the full letter, go to https://gvimes.link/extendeday

Both the committee and Luff did not comment on the letter.