Parents and teachers warn proposed cuts to paraprofessionals and co‑teaching roles will erode inclusion in BPS
Get AI-powered insights, summaries, and transcripts
Subscribe
Summary
At a City Council hearing, parents and teachers described school‑level consequences of proposed FY26 cuts — including eliminated multilingual teacher roles and six inclusion paraprofessionals at some schools — and urged restoring positions to preserve co‑teaching and one‑to‑one supports.
Parents, classroom teachers and students told the Boston City Council on March 10 that proposed FY26 budget changes threaten day‑to‑day inclusion supports in multiple schools.
Dr. Liz Tonogbanwa (Charlestown High School LATF) described the Charlestown co‑teaching model as a successful approach that combines rigorous culturally affirming instruction with multilingual teacher supports. She urged the council to “rescind the cuts” that would remove provisional multilingual staff and weaken co‑teaching capacity, warning that those roles are not easily replaced.
Dr. Jennifer Ward, a parent and School Site Council member, said her school (the Joseph Lee) faces the loss of six inclusion paraprofessionals: “We need more educators and staffing right now, yet they are cutting key student‑facing positions that enable our students to access inclusion,” she testified. Cheryl Buckman, a parent leader, asked the council for an audit to explain why large special‑education expenditures have not eliminated chronic unfilled IEP services.
BPS officials acknowledged challenges and said service mapping is being used to reallocate staff based on student needs; they argued some apparent cuts reflect changes in student enrollment or coding of bilingual staff rather than wholesale loss of services. The district also said it will provide more detailed, school‑level data during April budget hearings.
Councilors asked for immediate follow‑up on (1) whether cuts affect one‑to‑one paraprofessionals, (2) precise counts of paraprofessional and specialized‑service FTE reductions, and (3) how schools with specialized strands (for example, autism ABA strands) will retain capacity during the transition to an inclusion model. BPS committed to supplying further detail for the record and to work with school leaders on implementation plans.