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After a November ballot measure eliminated the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System as a state graduation requirement, officials on Beacon Hill are developing new guidelines to define graduation readiness. Cambridge and Somerville residents are working to ensure their voices are heard in the process.
Local parents, students, and educators gathered at Cambridge Rindge and Latin School on Wednesday for the first of six people’s forums throughout the state, sharing their opinions on the changing graduation requirements.
Executive Director of Citizens for Public Schools Lisa A. Guisbond, who helped organize the forum, said the event was designed to get “a diverse group of people’s views on what they want to see happen in our schools.”
The forums supplement existing work by Governor Maura T. Healey ’92, who appointed 33 people to the “K-12 Statewide Graduation Council” to recommend new graduation requirements. The council consists of students, educators, teacher union members, and elected officials.
Guisbond said she is concerned that the appointed council might not receive enough input from the public when determining new requirements.
“We don’t want the state to miss this opportunity that we have and rush into something that perhaps won’t be that different from what we already had that the voters rejected,” she said.
The forum — organized by Citizens for Public Schools, the Cambridge Education Association, the Somerville Educators Union, and Cambridge Retired Educators United — consisted of small group discussion about how students should demonstrate the necessary skills to graduate, and how schools can support this effort.
During discussion, participants highlighted financial literacy, critical thinking, and social-emotional learning as necessary skills to instill in students. They also pointed to reducing the stress of test taking as a way for educators to support students’ mental health, and recommended introducing portfolios and capstone projects as a way for students to demonstrate their learning.
Event organizers plan to compile residents’ ideas and share them with state legislators, the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, and the public.
Guisbond said that public opinion is especially important “in this moment of such turmoil for our whole democracy.”
“Public education is a foundation of our democracy, and our democracy is under attack,” she said. “Our public school system is under attack.”
“It just highlights for me the importance of giving people the opportunity to raise their voices, weigh in, have participated in a process about their public schools,” she added.
But Cambridge City Councilor Ayesha M. Wilson, who previously served on the city’s School Committee, said she wished that the group better represented the populations who will be most affected by shifting requirements.
“I’m always going to stress the need for more diversity in these spaces,” she said. “To be one of few people of color in this space is often really challenging.”
Cambridge Mayor E. Denise Simmons and School Committee member David J. Weinstein also attended and actively participated in the forum.
Weinstein said that it is important for the district to constantly be “reevaluating” graduation requirements, to make sure “that we still feel like they meet our ambitions for serving our kids.”
“It’s really helpful to hear different perspectives, and it helps us make sure we’re not missing things and perspectives and experiences,” he said. “Can never have too much of that.”
— Staff writer Ayaan Ahmad can be reached at ayaan.ahmad@thecrimson.com. Follow him on X @AyaanAhmad2024.
— Staff writer Claire A. Michal can be reached at claire.michal@thecrimson.com.
