Superintendent Discusses Amherst-Pelham Regional Budget Deficit

The Amherst-Pelham school district has been facing budgetary concerns since December, revealing a deficit of $186,071. On Monday, Superintendent of the Amherst-Pelham Regional School District Dr. Ericilda Ximora Herman commented on the deficit that the district, which includes Amherst Regional High School and Middle School, is facing, as well as a plan to merge local schools in the district to address monetary and staffing deficiencies.

In an interview with The Student, Herman began by sharing what she wants the community to know about the proposed budget. “There’s a lot of nuances to running a school system, things that are seen and things that are unseen, and it’s not often explained or laid out the way it should be,” she said.

She added that these nuances include the “things that go [on] behind the scene, [which] are often in the budget, and it gets hard to break down and explain each and every item, task, and person.”

For Herman, the most important thing to emphasize is “encouraging the community to seek clarity, but also to be open-minded.” According to Herman, this approach is especially important as the elementary school goes through consolidation in the district — a proposal to merge all district middle and high school students into the current Amherst-Pelham Regional High School building to manage the deficit in finding and staffing limitations. Herman said that the Office of the Superintendent has held meetings to solidify the plans for this consolidation. 

Herman emphasized that the consolidation plan was “not an overnight quick fix," but months of planning and conversations all coming together to create the budget. She expressed that “this is something that to my knowledge, no other district in Massachusetts has done,” which she acknowledges “comes with a level of shift in mindset.”

When asked how the budget will continue to offer students in the district a quality education, she explained that it is “a different look at budgeting, operations, but the focus is making sure we give our students what they need.”

Herman also spoke about the broader trends of budgetary struggles in public schools. “The budgetary issue that we’re facing isn't one that's just unique to Amherst,” she said, adding that they are occurring across the school districts of Massachusetts as well as the entire country.

In acknowledging nationwide budget cuts for education, Herman expressed that local, state, and federal actors were contributing to this issue, but that all conversations come back to the same question: "How are we prioritizing the money … the monetary, financial stability of our schools?” 

It was important to her that the programming needs of the school district are taken into consideration, as population numbers for the district change, ensuring that there is equity of workloads for teachers.

During conversations regarding the budget, the Office of the Superintendent had to balance conflicting priorities, including educational and extracurricular interests. “Children come to school for more than to learn,” Herman said. She wants the budget to “make sure that we still are creating that level of quality education," not only in terms of academics, but opportunities for students to engage in orchestra, band, music, art.”

Herman also emphasized listening to community feedback and pushback. “Each of our committees are required to have a budget hearing where the community comes forth and says what they need to know about it. They’ve sent public comments to staff … I’ve had listening sessions with teachers and sent questions to the union,” she said. After this process, the committee has reflected on what was said by community members to shift the plans they have previously put forward.

If there were areas where she felt like student needs weren’t met, Herman said, changes will be made. “As long as we’re able to show that in the areas we were meeting [the] needs of our students, we just stood firm until the school committee told us otherwise,” she said.