Podcast: Bob Pura talks School Regionalization

 The topic of the Review's inaugural podcast is school regionalization, the subject that has come to dominate much of the discussion surrounding public education reform in the Commonwealth today. To help provide insight on the matter the Review visited with Bob Pura, the President of Greenfield Community College and Chair of the Franklin County Public Education Study Group, which has set out to identify potential reforms to the public schools in Franklin County. President Pura has helped guide the work of the Study Group over the last two years and as such is ideally placed to help explain what school regionalization may or may not mean for Massachusetts.  The Review's interview with him can be heard below. It should be noted that the interview is quite long, a little over an hour in fact, and thus was broken out into segments regarding the various topics that were discussed. Furthermore, brief highlights are included for those who merely have time to scan the page.



A final word before proceeding to the interview itself. The project would not have been possible without Sam French of Barnside Studio Productions. Without him, the recording, editing and countless other tasks necessary to create a podcast could not have been accomplished.  Thanks are also in order for the Ghost Quartet, a Review favorite, who provided the musical introduction for the interview. Finally, the Review owes a debt of gratitude to President Pura, who lent his voice and an hour of his time to explain what can be a very complex issue.  Thanks to all.

• Full Interview

Pod cast full edit fix 1.mp3

• Franklin County Public Education Study Group

frank.mp3

• On Study Group's intent: " The intention of the Committee and truly the work of the Committee began with 'how do we ensure and work to increase the quality of the experience of our children in the public schools in light of diminishing resources.'" 

• School Regionalization

1 reginionalization.mp3

• On why school regionalization is now an issue:

-"I think the why of why we're talking about it now comes from a few different places. I think it does come from an underfunding of publication education for the last decade."    

• On what regionalization means: 

- "First of all there isn't a model that this committee [Franklin County Public Education Study Group] is talking about. The state when they talk about regionalization really are talking about decreasing the number of districts so that there is an increase on efficiency, and that is the term that is being thrown about now, and the language that is being used is being used is the back door or the back room. Which means the administrative work that has to go on in any system. Transportation, purchasing, curriculum development, human resources work."

• Funding and State Capacity

Funding edit Fix 1.mp3

• On Correlation between Capacity and Performance: 

- "Is there a correlation between performance in the classroom, student success and administrative resources? The answer is yes, is there a connection to that. Is it the one piece, is it a direct correlation. No. Its a variable complex set of variables that impact our children's ability to succeed.  

• On difference between small classrooms and large districts

- "There is a difference between the needs for small classroom, small schools and small system. Often times in our conversation there has been a confusion between larger regions meaning larger classrooms or larger schools. That's not necessarily the case. We could have small classrooms, small schools, but larger regions."

•  The current economic crisis and rising education cost

The Greath REcession.mp3

• On Decreasing education costs:

- " A good example of how a school district went about decreasing its costs by changing its health insurance system. I think Mohawk two years ago, last year... but there is an example of how those kinds of larger shifts can decrease the overall cost. [of education]"