Holyoke advisory panel readies for March 24 meeting as district prepares to exit receivership

City officials and members of a community advisory team for Holyoke Public Schools said they are preparing for a March 24 meeting in which the state-appointed receiver is expected to report "exit reassurances" as the district moves toward returning to local control, and that an interim superintendent will serve from July 1 through June 30, 2026.

Mildred, vice chair of the school committee and chair of the transitional local control subcommittee, said the receiver has moved an expected March 31 meeting up to March 24 and will "hopefully give us some exit reassurances" that the district can return to local governance without quickly reverting to receivership. "We're still looking forward, hopefully, and optimistically for July 1 for the school committee to get back local control," Mildred said.

Why it matters: Holyoke is preparing to be among the first districts to leave receivership in the state. The substance of the receiver's "exit assurances," and any conditions attached to them, will shape how much decision-making authority the locally elected school committee has once local control resumes.

At the advisory-team meeting, officials described several near-term steps the committee and consultants will take. The advisory team will continue compiling community feedback through two planned public meetings and an online survey partner, GreatSchools. Consultants identified as PUC (referred to in the meeting as "Eric at PUC") and GreatSchools will compile the advisory group's four meetings, public input and survey results into a report for the school committee. The mayor and school officials said that report will inform whether the district should run a formal superintendent search or pursue other options.

The meeting also covered the school committee's internal work: a policy subcommittee has posted revisions to district policies for public comment for two weeks, and the finance chair, Mr. Wellahan, is signing warrants and approving some budget transfers while receivership-related oversight continues.

Advisory members raised two recurring tasks the committee assigned them: (1) gather public input on what the community wants in a superintendent and in the district's leadership and (2) help shape a superintendent-evaluation process that, under the committee's timeline, will run from July 1 to June 30. "We want to see how that information was used," said a community advisory team member, describing a desire for a clear feedback loop so participants can track how their input influences school-committee decisions.

Participants also voiced concerns about the limits of local authority after exit. One member asked whether decisions made after July 1 will route through the democratically elected school committee or remain constrained by state-imposed conditions; meeting leaders said state law allows the receiver to place exit assurances or conditions and that the receiver plans to report back on March 24. Officials acknowledged that some details of the exit are unprecedented and said they are "building an airplane as we fly it," but emphasized partnership between the receiver, the school committee and the community.

Logistics and process issues discussed included avoiding large school-committee attendance at the same community forums to prevent quorum violations, caution about "reply all" email exchanges because the committee is a public body subject to open-meeting rules, and a suggestion to add one or two advisory meetings if members need more time to synthesize community input.

The mayor and other officials asked advisory members to attend the March 24 meeting of the receiver and said they would place the advisory team on the agenda for that meeting and for the school committee's local control subcommittee to report progress. Officials said consultants will produce a final report that advisory members can present to the school committee; the school committee will decide which elements to adopt, including whether to launch a formal superintendent search.

The group closed by noting the transition's broader significance: how Holyoke conducts the exit could become a model for other districts leaving receivership in the commonwealth. The advisory team will meet again to finalize the community-outreach plan and to separate workstreams on evaluation and search planning ahead of July 1.