WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — The Mount Greylock Regional School District is placing an emphasis on literacy instruction that is reflected in the preliminary budget that the administration put forth last week.

 

Interim Superintendent Joseph Bergeron and Director of Curriculum and Instruction Joelle Brookner laid out the reasons why literacy needs to be a priority for the district and the steps staff plan to take to address that need during the School Committee's Feb. 13 meeting.

 

Bergeron opened by emphasizing that while there are issues that need to be addressed, the district continues to do a good job educating the students of Lanesborough, Williamstown and surrounding towns.

 

He noted that Mount Greylock ranks 25th in the commonwealth and first in the Berkshires in the most recent U.S. News and World Report "Best High Schools Rankings" and pointed out that most of the Massachusetts schools ranking higher on the list are magnet or charter schools like No. 1 Boston Latin and No. 2 Pioneer Valley Chinese Immersion Charter of Hadley.

 

And in the area of literacy itself, 65 percent of Mount Greylock's students are above the national average in literacy benchmarks as assessed by the California-based FastBridge Learning system.

 

"So we're starting from a good place, but we're nowhere near perfect," Bergeron said.

 

To help address the 35 students performing at or below average on literacy assessment metrics, district faculty have been pouring over data and looking at what personalized instruction strategies will work for individual students, the administrators said.

 

"The focus is on the 35 percent to see how we can better serve them," Brookner said. "We're working to understand what tools we have at our disposal to provide them differentiated instruction, whether that's happening in Tier 1 [regular classroom] instruction or if we're utilizing Tier 2 instruction, typically small groups in our elementary schools and, this coming year, in middle/high school or in special education.

 

"To be able to do that for every student is the goal, and we would expect over the next few years that 35 percent number will become smaller."

 

To drive that number down, the administration has put forth a preliminary budget that seeks more investment in professional development for teachers specific to literacy and training in its assessment tools and one full-time equivalent position at the middle-high school.

 

The administration wants to restore a reading specialist position at Mount Greylock that went unfilled due to a retirement, Brookner told the School Committee.

 

"It will be a shared position," she said. "Some will be working with students on [Individualized Education Programs]. Some will be co-teaching in classrooms. Some will be available to do ‘What I Need' periods, so when there are is something that comes up in benchmark assessments, there is someone who can address those concerns."

 

Bergeron said the restored reading specialist would be "heavily dedicated" to the seventh and eighth grade at Mount Greylock.

 

Much of the School Committee's regular February meeting was dedicated to a first look at the budget that will be refined for submission to both the district's member towns in March, and the panel scheduled a special budget workshop for Feb. 27 to continue discussing the spending plan.

 

But there were other business items for the Feb. 13 meeting.

 

At Bergeron's request, the panel voted 6-0 (Christina Conry was absent) to ask both Lanesborough and Williamstown to include items on their annual town meeting warrants to see if the towns will adopt Chapter 399 of the Acts of the Legislature's 2024 session.

 

If adopted, the towns will allow the district and its transportation provider, Dufour Tours, to install cameras on school buses that capture license plate information of vehicles that move past a bus while its "Stop" sign is extended.

 

Bergeron noted that the potential votes at town meeting will enable the installation of the cameras but not require them, so there is no budgetary implication in the measure if adopted by the towns this spring. He also pointed out that the cameras are designed to photograph the offending vehicle, not the driver, and pass that information along to law enforcement.

 

Related to the discussion of the fiscal year 2026 budget and decisions about how best to utilize professional development days during the coming school year, Bergeron said that the 2025-26 school calendar was not quite ready for the School Committee's approval but said he would have a final version ready for the panel's March meeting.

 

He did say the current calendar anticipates a first day of school on the Tuesday after Labor Day (Sept. 2) with a winter break that begins on Dec. 24 with classes resuming on Jan. 5. As usual, the district is planning for a five-day Thanksgiving break with no school on the Wednesday before the holiday.

 

Finally, the School Committee voted 6-0 to endorse a plan Bergeron put forward to determine competency for potential Mount Greylock graduates in the Class of 2025.

 

After the passage of November's statewide referendum to do away with the 10th grade MCAS standardized test as a requirement for graduation, state officials are working to provide guidance to districts for a long-term approach to establishing criteria for a diploma, Bergeron said.

 

In the meantime, the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education has recommended a course that the School Committee reviewed last week: Students who previously have passed the 10th grade MCAS have earned their "competency determination." Students who have not passed the MCAS can graduate if they receive a passing grade in the equivalent of the school's English 10 course; receive a passing grade in the equivalent of the school's algebra I and geometry courses; and receive a passing grade in one or more of the equivalent of the school's biology, physics, chemistry, or technology/engineering courses.