ON Education

Education has been an issue of concern for both the cities of Fall River and New Bedford since 2018, when it was first prioritized at our Issues Assembly. During community listening sessions in early 2021, following a year of Covid’s impact and racial unrest, the community continued to express concern in two areas: racial inequity in our schools and the impact of remote learning on students.

In response, UIA held two online community forums with Fall River Public Schools and New Bedford Public Schools Superintendents: 1) Pandemic Year Response & Rebuild to explore learning loss and the impact of an unexpected year of the challenges of remote learning and social distance and 2) Racial Equity to explore a lack of a curriculum and staff representing diverse cultures and experiences, along with the need for further professional development and training in areas such as anti-bias and anti-racism.

Please click on the following links for resource material from these events:

Newspaper Articles

Video of Forum on Pandemic Year Response and Rebuild with FRPS

Video of Forum on Racial Equity with FRPS

Click here for Video of Forum on Racial Equity with NBPS

Q & A from Superintendent Malone:
Pandemic Year Response and Rebuild

Testimony from Fall River City Councilor Trott Lee: Racial Equity in Education

COMMUNITY WIDE RESPONSE TO COVID RECOVERY FUNDING
As part of the national stimulus/recovery infusion, Fall River is set to receive $61M and New Bedford $74M in funding relief. In order to get feedback from the community (parents, students, educators, community organizations) on where the funds in each district should be spent, UIA created a survey. To date, the UIA’s ESSER funding survey has received over 720 responses from primarily parents and educators in both cities.

To fill out the survey and share what you believe the priorities should be, click below.

If you live in Fall River and speak English, click here.
If you live in Fall River and speak Spanish, click here.
If you live in Fall River and speak Portuguese, click here.

If you live in New Bedford and speak English, click here.
If you live in New Bedford and speak Spanish, click here.
If you live in New Bedford and speak Portuguese, click here.

STUDENT OPPORTUNITY ACT
At the statewide level, UIA has also helped win the Student Opportunity Act totalling $1.5 Billion in education funding and commitments from local school districts to help set spending priorities and focal areas in their 3-year implementation plans for that funding.