Solidify our foundation in education by offering affordable and quality education, from preschool through college.

Our congressional delegation should build on their commitment to early education by increasing their support for the federally funded Head Start program. Over the past 50 years, Head Start has provided comprehensive early education and support services in the areas of health and dental care, nutrition, special education, parent skill workshops and social services for children ages three to five and their families. We recommend an increase in funding not only so more children can benefit, but also to develop and retain a quality workforce. 

Legislation has been filed to help close the achievement gap and ensure that all Massachusetts children have the opportunity to succeed in school and in life. The legislation builds on the Commonwealth’s strong policy foundation for early education, including the ongoing work of the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE). Cost estimates range anywhere from $400 million to $1.4 billion, depending on the type of universal pre-K program the state seeks to implement, and whether it covers 3- and 4-year-olds or only 4-year-olds. The pending proposal would capitalize on existing grant programs and many advocates argue that it would actually help to reduce existing costs for special education and social services, pointing to successful programs in Boston, New Jersey, and Oklahoma.

The school-to-prison pipeline¹ is a concept that describes repeated and escalating interactions of youth with school disciplinarians, the juvenile justice system, and the criminal justice system, ultimately leading to incarceration. Such interactions disproportionately criminalize the behavior of students of color, low-income students, and special education students at higher rates than their White counterparts for the same behaviors. Studies have shown that these students are not necessarily more prone to misbehavior than their peers; but policies and discrimination make them more likely be punished than White students.²

A proposed bill - An Act Decriminalizing Non-Violent and Verbal Student Misconduct - would help to dismantle the school-to-prison pipeline by limiting the use of criminal enforcement activities for nonviolent misconduct in schools, allowing the steps of arrest and prosecution only when other more appropriate school-based approaches have been tried and not succeeded. In addition, the expansion of alternative programs that address root causes of off-track behavior and apply restorative justice practices are essential next steps.

Two out of three K-12 students that qualify for free and reduced lunch aren’t eating it. The stigma of the existing free breakfast programs and the logistical challenges of getting to school early keep students from participating in breakfast-before-the-bell programs. This bill requires that high poverty schools serve breakfast to all students at the beginning of the instructional day, or “after the bell.” Passage of this bill would extend existing benefits to over 260,000 students at approximately 600 Massachusetts schools.

In 2015, the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education changed the methodology used to count the number of low-income students and counted only those students that already participate in existing state benefit programs like Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), Transitional Aid to Families with Dependent Children (TAFDC), foster care, or MassHealth. This change led to lower state funding to schools because it does not accurately capture the actual number of low-income students. This new method misses many students who are economically disadvantaged because it fails to account for those low-income students who are not accessing social services, such as homeless youth and newly arrived immigrants. The current approach to counting low-income students leaves some of our most financially challenged communities with a significant financial gap. Adequate funding is critical to our communities and will ensure they receive the funding necessary to provide all students with education they deserve.

The Metropolitan Council for Educational Opportunity (METCO) program, created in 1966, is the longest continuously running voluntary school desegregation program in the country. The program provides voluntary busing for eligible high school students between Boston or Springfield and their suburbs. It was created to expand educational opportunities, increase diversity, and reduce racial isolation, by permitting students in certain cities to attend public schools in other communities that have agreed to participate. The program should be modernized to serve today’s educational needs and should expand both its funding and reach in order to increase the number of students and suburban municipalities that participate. This would help provide access for more students to many high-quality schools in the suburbs.

Free tuition at community colleges for residents who have graduated high school or have completed their GEDs, would remove a barrier to individuals seeking to advance their career. Educational attainment is a strong indicator of how much money an individual will make and has long-term economic impacts as well. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the median usual weekly earnings for someone with a high school diploma is $692, but for an Associate’s degree and Bachelor’s degree, is $892 and $1,156 respectively.¹ The reverse trend is seen with unemployment rates, with higher unemployment rates correlating with lower educational attainment. In 2017, Boston Mayor Marty Walsh and Governor Charlie Baker rolled out the Boston Bridge, a continuation of Boston’s Tuition-Free Community College Plan. The Plan “pays for the costs of tuition and mandatory fees that are not covered by the Pell Grant”² for low income city residents for up to three years of community college. The Boston Bridge is a pilot program that would allow these same students to then transfer into a four-year program through the state’s Commonwealth Commitment Program.

California, Kentucky, Missouri, Oregon, Rhode Island, Tennessee have all passed legislation or adopted pilot programs to provide some form of tuition free community college, while other states like Arkansas, Louisiana, Minnesota, and South Dakota have free tuition at community colleges for targeted fields of study.

According to the Pew Research Center, there are 210,000 undocumented immigrants in Massachusetts, including over 8,000 DACA recipients.¹ DACA, Deferred Action for Childhood Arrival, was created in June 2012 by President Obama and enabled undocumented individuals brought to the U.S. as children to receive Social Security numbers, temporary work permits, and protection from deportation, as long as they met age requirements, demonstrated physical presence, met educational or military service requirements, and passed a criminal background check. In 2012, Governor Patrick took Executive Action that allowed DACA recipients to be eligible for in-state tuition at the 29 public colleges and universities, as long as they met the Board of Higher Education’s residency requirements. While this is still the current policy in Massachusetts, recent federal actions require that the Commonwealth pass legislation to extend in-state tuition at public higher education institutions to current DACA recipients and allow other undocumented immigrants who are not DACA eligible to enroll in college as in-state students. Full implementation of in-state tuition for undocumented immigrants could result in an additional $7 million of annual revenue to the public university system.²