School Committee overturns decision

By Danielle Paine, Reminder Assistant Editor

LONGMEADOW Last week, the School Committee decided to overturn their February decision to not accept any Massachusetts Department of Education's Metropolitan Council for Educational Opportunity (METCO) program students into the district for the 2007-2008 school year with a vote of 4-2.

METCO is a state program in which minority students from major cities are enrolled into suburban school districts for their entire kindergarten through twelfth grade education in order to create diversity and desegregation.

Although budget concerns and an increase in full-day kindergarten class size was a large factor in the committee's initial decision to not allow new METCO pupils into Longmeadow next year, School Committee Chair Mary Vogel explained that the issue was reexamined last week due to an overwhelming public response and two petitions.

"We were afraid that by admitting METCO students into the full day kindergarten next year, we would be displacing Longmeadow students," Vogel explained. "There is also a cost which is not reimbursed by the state."

Of the district's $8,300 per pupil cost last year, Vogel said that the state reimbursed under $5,000 per student, of which a significant portion was used for transportation.

Currently there are 46 METCO students spread through the district, a number that has dropped in the past several years from 52.

Like the teacher, out-of-district student, parents and principal who gave testimony to the School Committee last week, Vogel believes that the METCO program is a vital enrichment experience and has twice voted in favor of keeping it.

"I grew up in Wisconsin and attended a school where there were no children of color before we moved to Connecticut where I went to high school and where there were a number of students that were of color," Vogel explained. "For me, that was an added value to my educational experience. So I see great value in the program in terms of tolerance and understanding the different experiences that people have growing up."

While Vogel believes it was the compelling testimony regarding the METCO program's true value that gave School Committee members a change of heart, a change may be coming to make the program more appealing to "receiving communities." Specifically, a bill that is currently being reviewed by state legislature and is supported by State Senator Gale Candaras will increase state funding for METCO students by $300 per pupil, per year.

The vote in favor of the METCO program during the May 26 School Committee meeting will allow two students from other communities to enroll in full-day kindergarten next year at Wolf Swamp Road Elementary School.

"I am in favor of it for the reason which it was started back in the fifties, to create racial balance in our schools," Vogel said. "Longmeadow is a very homogenous community and whatever racial diversity we get is thought METCO. Our students benefit from it as well as the students that come in through METCO."