May 2025 - Conversation on the ARPS School Budget

Community Conversation on the ARPS School Budget

On Sunday, April 13th, the League and Support Our Schools (SOS) Amherst held a Community Conversation on School Funding at Crocker Farm Elementary School. This event brought together approximately fifty community members to discuss the challenges with funding in the Amherst and Amherst-Pelham Regional Schools. Childcare and children's activities were provided so that parents of young children could attend. Participants heard a brief presentation on the current status of the schools' budgets as well as how school funding works, the challenges around insufficient state funding and the ways in which municipal funding flows to the schools. Participants then spent the bulk of the meeting in discussion groups, discussing obstacles to more adequately and equitably funding Amherst's schools as well as brainstorming potential solutions and paths forward. Many discussion groups focused on the challenges in understanding and participating in the budget process in Amherst as well as a need for more dialogue between the schools and the Town Council and Town Manager. Groups also identified the Charter Review Process as well as November elections as potential avenues for increasing participation of school funding advocates in Town government. The League of Women Voters' Civic Engagement Grant money was used to rent the space at Crocker Farm for both the Community Conversation and Childcare activities. 

SOS Amherst website: www.arpsparents.com

SOS Email address: [email protected]