The Newton School Committee (NSC) held a public hearing on Wednesday night to discuss the budget for the 2026 fiscal year after Newton Mayor Ruthanne Fuller rejected Superintendent Anna Nolin’s preliminary proposal.
Parents and teachers in the district urged the NSC to approve the superintendent’s budget, which would allocate an additional $14.9 million to public schools. This comes just over a year after a costly teachers’ strike which shuttered schools for 11 days.
Newton South High School teacher Ryan Normandin believes Fuller has failed to adequately prioritize the school district in the wake of the strike.
“And now we’re in the same spot again this year,” said Normandin. “And I’m forced to conclude that either Mayor Fuller has lied to her constituents over and over, or she is incompetent and unable to deliver to her constituents what she claims is her top priority: a thriving public school system.”
According to Normandin, public school teachers have been forced to shoulder the burden of educating students in an improperly funded district.
“[The NSC’s] job is to get kids what they need,” said Normandin. “And if you don’t think you can do that, you need to get out of those chairs.”
Normandin hopes the school system will be a more salient point for voters in the 2025 Newton municipal elections.
“I am begging the people of this city to pay attention to this year’s annual Fuller-manufactured crisis,” said Normandin. “Nothing is going to change if we continue to elect people who do not understand schools, who do not care about schools. We can do better than this committee, which has overseen disaster after disaster while Fuller steals from the schools to fund her free cash surplus.”
Newton resident Jim Murphy expressed dissatisfaction with the NSC’s lack of action on budgetary matters.
“It is incredibly frustrating to watch the committee kick the can down the road, particularly on special-needs students, particularly on younger special-needs students,” said Murphy. “If we don’t fund this stuff now, it will cost more later. To say we don’t have the money now ignores the real question.”
According to Murphy, the Nolin’s proposed increase may not be enough to satisfy the district’s long-term needs, but it is still more favorable than Fuller’s smaller allocation to the schools.
“I don’t like the budget proposed by the superintendent,” said Murphy. “I don’t think it’s adequate, and I think it’s a demoralizing one as it is. But the city needs the education system, and I’m asking you to vote for that budget.”
The current situation is the result of poor budgetary choices over several years, according to Newton resident Jane Frantz. Frantz believes the district’s credibility has suffered in the process.
“The loss of trust in the school system is a direct result of underfunding the school budget for five years,” said Frantz. “The constant drip, drip, drip of cuts known among the staff as ‘death by a thousand cuts’ has left the system at a tipping point.”
Small changes to the budget have reverberated across the district. Frantz cited the NSC’s decision last year to reduce the number of kindergarten classroom aides as an example.
“Unilaterally breaking the contract for the kindergarten aides has resulted in a loss of trust for the entire NPS [Newton Public Schools] staff, well beyond the kindergarten teachers and those who lost their jobs,” Frantz said.
Frantz targeted Fuller’s plan to pay off Newton’s pension liability by 2032. Fiscal decisions such as that have caused the school system to suffer, Frantz said.
“It’s unprecedented to use [mayoral] power to promote a singular goal, when making minor adjustments would allow the school district and the city to move past austerity budgeting,” said Frantz.
Enrique Rosero, also a Newton resident, expressed a similar sentiment.
“Here we are again in this regime of austerity, back to making cuts to our children’s future,” said Rosero. “I have watched this board tout their managerial and financial skills, failing year after year to secure enough resources to at least maintain base-level services for our kids.”
Newton resident Jenna Stein’s two children are enrolled in NPS. Stein expressed how a poorly-funded school district would harm the entire city.
“Year after year, Mayor Fuller underfunds our schools, only for the city to later reveal a surprise surplus in municipal funds,” said Stein. “Families move to Newton because of its reputation for excellent public education. When our schools decline year after year … our community as a whole suffers.”
Stein urged the committee to assert itself and accept Nolin’s recommendation to increase the district’s budgetary allocation.
“The budget Dr. Nolin has proposed is not extravagant,” Stein said. “It is necessary. Your role is not simply to accept what is given, but to advocate what is right.”
