Natick 2022 Candidate Profile: Cathi Collins, School Committee

NATICK, MA — Natick voters in 2022 will have a big choice to make in the school committee race.

There are three seats up for election this spring, and the three incumbents holding those seats — Cathi Collins, Henry Haugland and Julie McDonough — are all seeking reelection. There are also two challengers in the mix: Kathleen Flathers and Elise Gorseth.

To help voters get to know each candidate, Natick Patch sent all five a questionnaire to probe their thoughts on school issues. Here's what Collins had to say:

Occupation: Retired internal bank audit manager and marketing instructor
Ties to Natick schools: Natick School Committee (2019-present), Finance Committee member, Chair of the Education & Learning Subcommittee. Moved to Natick in 1999 largely because of the strength of the school district.
Experience as an elected official: Natick School Committee (2019 – present), current Vice Chair Town Meeting (2005 – present).

What's the biggest issue facing Natick Public Schools and what would you do about it?

As a school district, our most important assets are our teachers and staff. They have a direct impact on every child, every day. For this reason, the biggest issue facing the Natick Public Schools (NPS) is the retention of our most experienced faculty and staff. Education as we knew it ceased to exist on March 10, 2020. Our educators reinvented how they taught on an almost weekly basis – moving from enrichment to remote through hybrid and finally returning to full in-person instruction. While challenging for students, families and teachers, Natick served as a model for teaching under pandemic conditions by districts throughout Massachusetts. Yet despite this impressive work, Natick’s most experienced teachers are paid much less than colleagues with equal, and sometimes even less, experience in neighboring and comparative districts. This must change. NPS has invested in these experienced, highly effective teachers and it makes no sense to train these individuals for the benefit of other districts, but this is exactly what is happening. Moreover, these educators serve as mentors to our newer teachers. We simply cannot afford to encourage, inadvertently encourage, or sit by and watch while these individuals seek better pay elsewhere as it will have a negative impact on students and is unlikely to save money in the long-term.

Natick voted to close Johnson Elementary last year. If you voted for that closure, can you explain why?

My vote to close the Johnson Elementary School was a difficult one to take and understandably upsetting to Johnson families. I appreciate this and empathize with them. School Committee members must always think about what is in the best interest of all of our students, across the district, and how we best allocate our limited resources. If I weren’t confident that the quality of each child’s education will continue to be strong, I would not have supported closure. But I am confident that NPS’ ability to provide a high-quality education to all of our students is enhanced by this decision. Student and staff experiences throughout the district, including those from the current Johnson district, will be more equitable, benefiting from targeted academic and social-emotional supports. Staff will have more colleagues with whom to interact and from whom to learn. Further, closing Johnson will permit the district to achieve its strategic goals while simultaneously controlling the rate of growth in our budget. It avoids spending at least $18 million of taxpayer money merely to bring Johnson up to code, and is not anticipated to increase class size or result in any lay-offs. I intend to oversee a smooth and supportive transition of rising and current Johnson students and staff over the next three years.

What do you think of DESE's lifting of the statewide mask mandate? Do you think it was too soon, or maybe too late?

I was in favor of lifting the school mask mandate, but I was not in favor of lifting it on February 28, 2022 for two reasons. First, it was the first day back from February vacation, when many students and families were taking long-awaited trips outside of New England for the first time since March 2020. Second, the Natick School Committee could not have lifted the mask requirement in schools on February 28th because there was an emergency order from the Natick Board of Health in place which superseded the School Committee’s mandate. I made the motion, however, to rescind the school mask mandate on the first day of school after the Board of Health lifted its emergency order. This motion meant that the mask requirement could be lifted without waiting for another School Committee meeting. The metrics which Natick has been considering since the beginning of the pandemic supported NPS’s move to a flex mask culture as of March 7th. We will continue to review the science in partnership with the Natick Board of Health to determine whether NPS must return to a mask mandate in the future should there be a surge in a COVID-19 variant.

If you could snap your fingers and fix or change one thing in the school system, what would it be?

I would erase the effects of the crisis-oriented, on-demand culture which grew out of the pandemic. Since March 2020 most of us have been in “fight or flight” mode. Students from pre-kindergarten to high school seniors exhibit anxiety driven behavior requiring immediate responses multiple times a day. With the shift to remote learning, parents witnessed their child’s learning experience for the first time ever. This immediate in-home access caused some to expect the same immediate access to faculty and staff, expressing frustration if an email is not returned in mere hours. This crisis-oriented, on-demand culture has encouraged, if not demanded, a shallowness of thought born of frequent interruptions instead of the deep, transformative thinking and planning that moves a district forward. Constantly responding to the newest problem and putting out fires is the antithesis of quiet contemplation, elaboration and discovery. If I could snap my fingers, I would ensure that our faculty, staff, administrators, students, families and the larger Natick community each had the time to engage in this important contemplative and rejuvenating process. This is how Natick will move from a really good district to a great district where every student can be the best possible version of themselves.