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A New MHS: Laying the Foundation

Updated: 4 days ago

Soon after my election to the Medford School Committee we learned that Medford had been accepted into the Massachusetts School Building Authority (MSBA) pipeline to support the creation of a new high school to update or replace the current building, which was established in 1970 and opened in 1971. This was at least the third time that Medford had applied for the program, so the district was quite excited to move on from application to planning. You can learn more about that process here. This series of posts is intended as a big picture overview of the decisions I have been asked to make as a sitting school committee member, and why I voted the way I did. I am more than happy to chat offline (or perhaps in a separate blog post) about other aspects of the project. For the full text of the resolutions described below, see meeting agendas and/or resolution trackers. 


January 2024 - Vote to authorize the district’s entry into the Eligibility Phase

Yes. Largely a formality, this resolution authorized district administrators to collect data and fill out the forms required by MSBA. A goal with this resolution was to establish the expectation of doing the work quickly, thoroughly, and efficiently so as to quickly move toward the stages of Feasibility and design. 

Yes. This series of resolutions over the course of the month identified the required membership of the committee, named it, appointed school committee member Jenny Graham as the chair, authorized the district to create a website about the project, and established a process for selecting community members with relevant expertise to join the committee. These votes set the foundation for the project within the MSBA framework. Member Graham’s appointment as chair made sense to me given her longstanding role as a liaison between the district and the community, her professional credentials, and her capacity to take this on as a priority (versus district or city leaders whose top priorities would need to be the broader school and municipal needs). As a member of the strategic & capital planning subcommittee, I helped develop the survey that community members could fill out to be considered for appointment to the committee; in addition to open text fields describing the requested expertise (school design and construction experience, communication, and familiarity with the needs of the school community) we identified some key areas of representation that would be an asset to the project and ensure that multiple priorities and backgrounds were included on the committee.

Yes. The building committee’s leadership received more than 100 applications for membership on the committee and spent several weeks combing through and discussing both the individuals who applied and various combinations thereof to bring forward a recommended slate of 15 voting members and another 7 non-voting members to provide additional perspectives to the discussion. There was some tension around the relative proportion of elected officials, general community members, and educational staff, but ultimately the non-voting membership was expanded by way of compromise. I had a chance to see the applications (having worked on the survey design, I had access to the survey) and while there were a number of applicants whom I believe would have been great who were not selected, I respect the recommendations of the Chair and the Mayor.  This was an essential vote, as the building committee is the group responsible for hiring and design decisions for the project. The school committee has representation on the building committee, but we are not responsible as a body for these on-the-ground decisions. 

Yes. This was also straightforward. Three administrators left the district and their successors were appointed to take their place (two voting, one non-voting) and one non-voting member was given voting status due to the change of positions by one voting member (Assistant Superintendent to Interim Superintendent). There was also a transition of non-voting members, where a retired vocational teacher was replaced with a current teacher. 

Yes. Where an applicant from the original pool had similar expertise as the member stepping down, this was a non-controversial switch. 

Yes. It is up to the district to articulate their vision for what happens in a school, aligned with the school committee’s guiding principles. The educational plan describes what currently happens in the existing building and what the district intends to happen in the new building. Our district administrators, working alongside the educational consultant hired by the architect and the project managers, spent many hours meeting with school staff and community members to refine this vision and the presentation we received in January about it reflected this breadth and depth. We had an opportunity to provide edits before approving; overall, I would say that the plan accurately captured the current activities in the school and presented a reasonable vision for what would be possible in a new building. Although I would have preferred the district to have an official strategic plan in place before approving this, I did not want to delay the process by a year or more. I believe the document presented offered appropriate flexibility for moving the design process forward even as strategic planning is in process. 

Yes. The new educational plan clarified questions from the MSBA about current vs. future use of spaces and existing vs. proposed spaces. These light edits and minor reorganization (mostly headers) did not change the scope of the vision, as MSBA does dictate project scope. While they did request a breakdown of core vs. non-core spaces in their feedback, this was for purposes of defining reimbursability rather than appropriateness for the project. 

Yes. This resolution defined the process of collaboration between City, school community, and building committee around the City’s exploration of non-high-school-located spaces for non-core programs. It defined an order of operations for communication and decision-making to ensure that the final project remains aligned with the educational plan and is not delayed by bureaucracy. Although one hopes such collaboration would occur naturally, I support having formal protocols in place, making the process visible to the community, and providing multiple opportunities for the public to weigh in on these non-core spaces. 

Yes. This updated the timeline for new and expanded vocational programs in the high school based on the latest enrollment numbers and new funding received or allocated since the plan was created. While this perhaps should have been included in the June update, I am guessing (though I don’t know for sure) that it simply fell through the cracks as the educational leadership team focused on responding to MSBA feedback. Or maybe the enrollment numbers, grant letters, and appropriations weren’t quite there yet. Either way, an easy update, and very exciting to see vocational programs supported. 


Conclusion

This takes us from project initiation (eligibility) through the selection of a single design option (conceptual design). Future posts in this series will likely be related to the alternative spaces or changes to the project scope. The school committee has the strongest role to play in approving the overall vision and making recommendations to ensure alignment with district goals, but the details of what gets built, and how, remain in the hands of the building committee and project team (architects, project managers, construction manager, etc.). I am grateful for everyone who has volunteered for this work and appreciate its complexity as we work as a community to define the best path forward.

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