We’ve talked about how hard change can be many times over the past few years. Why? Because we as a community have been going through a series of changes designed to improve educational outcomes for all our students.
I know we all agree that change—even when absolutely necessary—is hard. But it is made easier when we know we are being heard, when our suggestions are valued, when our fears and concerns are acknowledged. That’s my job: To hear you, to consider your perspectives and incorporate them as we can, and to truly care that community-wide changes affect each individual and each family differently.
Please know this: I am listening. I do care. It is my job to ensure that HPS meets its mission of helping all Holyoke students develop the skills and access the opportunities they need to graduate high school prepared for life, career, and college. We can only do that through equitable, high-quality education, and trusting relationships.
That’s why rezoning—with all its messy and uncomfortable changes—is a crucial step in helping us better meet students’ academic and social-emotional needs.
Rezoning allows us to:
Design schools tailored to elementary or middle school grades;
Staff each grade with a complete team of teachers who collaborate together;
Expand learning opportunities, including growing dual language and offering varied enrichment opportunities to students; and
Dedicate more resources to instruction, not operations.
Change is hard. And it’s messy. And it’s necessary. But: Juntos podemos, together we can.
Superintendent Anthony Soto