Board debates how to put student rep proposal into practice

by Sheldon Ocker

Sept. 8 board of education work session

For the fifth consecutive month, the Revere Board of Education thrashed out proposals to create a formal policy enabling two student representatives to join the board as nonvoting members.

Among the issues are the selection process, responsibilities of students chosen, one senior and one junior, restrictions on what they will be permitted to say and when to begin the initiative.

Timing has been a sticking point for the past two months, with board members Courtney Stein and Natalie Rainey proposing the pilot program begin at the start of the 2027-28 school year and board members Kasha Brackett and Jennifer Burke asking that the student representatives be chosen for the start of the current school year, which is now moot.

Board member Jeff Bowler suggested previously that the program begin with the second semester of the current school year, which now seems the most likely path.

Nevertheless, Stein continued to urge that the board slow down.

“What’s the rush?” she said. “I don’t understand why it has to be done this school year.”

Stein said she has heard from parents asking the same question and wants to ensure that more parents have the opportunity to address the issue.

“Some parents don’t even know that we meet during the summer,” Stein said.

“I think we’ve heard from more parents on this than anything other than RTI [religious training during school hours],” Burke said.

Stein expressed other reservations about the policy.

“I still am questioning what problem we are solving,” she said, adding that students seldom make personal appeals to the board, having seen them speak only three times during her four years on the board.

Burke defended the proposal, saying she had talked to 15 people since the August board meeting who expressed “mostly overwhelming support for the idea.”

Stein questioned the wisdom of a component of the policy entitled “Responsibilities.”

Reading from the policy, she asked how one high school student can “gather feedback” from each of the district’s four buildings.

“Are they going to be the creepy 17-year-old hanging out at the playground talking to a kid?” Stein said.

Brackett suggested that information gleaned from a student representative wouldn’t hamstring anything the board needed to rely on.

“This is an advisory role only,” she said. “They’re not decision-makers. They’re just purely providing a voice.”

How the representatives are chosen is unsettled, but the initial thought was to form a committee, possibly of student leaders, who would pick a junior and a senior.

Stein lobbied for more student participation.

“If we’re going to choose a student who is representing the student body, the student body should have a say in who the representative is,” she said.

Two board members mentioned the possibility of a student election becoming nothing more than a popularity contest.

“As far as whether it’s a popularity contest,” Stein said, “if we want them to learn what democracy is, we could call all of democracy a popularity contest.”

A suggestion to have a student leadership group narrow the list of candidates, then have the student body vote for a winner seemed to gain traction.

No votes were taken on any of these proposals.

Legislature at work

Director of Curriculum and Instruction Marcia Roach outlined changes for struggling students and the brightest students in math.

Every student who scores a 1, the lowest achievement level, on the state test must now be provided with tools for an academic intervention by the next school year.

“It’s not really different than what we’re already doing,” Roach said.

Under the requirements of a different bill, every student who scores a 4 or 5, the highest scores, on the sixth-grade state math test qualifies for accelerated math the succeeding school year.

The goal is to combine sixth- and seventh-grade math into one school year for advanced students, who then would take algebra in eighth grade rather than ninth.