Natick 2022 Candidate Profile: Julie McDonough, School Committee

NATICK, MA — Natick voters in 2022 will have a major 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 McDonough had to say:

Name: Julie McDonough
Age: 48
Occupation: Director of communications
Ties to Natick schools: Parent of three students in the Natick Public Schools (9th, 8th, and 6th grades), Natick resident since 2006.
Experience as an elected official: School Committee member 2015 to present. School Committee chair 2019 to 2022. Town Meeting member 2012 to 2022.

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

The biggest issue facing the Natick Public Schools is the biggest issue that is facing the Town of Natick and that is the structural budget deficit. Without proper funding, we cannot serve the needs of our students and we cannot improve the services that we provide to students and families. This deficit also prevents us from paying our teachers and staff on par with other districts like our own. For several years, town officials have documented this structural budget deficit. Since the operational override in 2008, we have relied upon new growth, savings from prior years, and revenues that have come in higher than expected. And frankly, we have not invested in the things we should like expanding our parks and trails, paving our roads, and providing adequate staffing to care for all of our town resources. On the school side, we have been unable to add resources and services we have identified as real needs in this district, such as certified librarians to our elementary schools, a K-12 orchestra program, and a robust technical theater, all things that our surrounding districts already have. While we have made some progress, our teacher pay for our most experienced teachers continues to be below our neighboring districts. We must address the structural deficit so that we can improve the programs and services we offer to our students, our families, and the entire Natick community.

Natick voted to close Johnson Elementary last year. If you voted for that closure, can you explain why? If you weren't on the committee, how would you have voted and why?

I was on the committee and did vote to close Johnson. This was an extraordinarily difficult decision as the school is deeply embedded in the fabric of the community and families have a deep connection to the school. The Johnson school, like all of our elementary schools, had been studied at various times over the past 25 years. Last year, the district put together an advisory group to study enrollment and space again. After reviewing these studies and reports dating back to the mid-90s, considering the investment in the facility that was necessary, examining the financial picture of the town, and considering the other current elementary schools in the district, it became clear to me that Johnson should close. It required too much investment, had very little flexibility in its current location, and was a very different size than our other schools, which impacted service allocation. However, it was important to me to hear the concerns of Johnson families as I weighed this decision and I felt strongly that the community forums needed to occur. Feedback from families helped me to ask additional questions and make sure I had those answers before I made any decision. I am confident that the concerns families expressed about the closure will be addressed as we move through this transition and as one of two School Committee members on the transition advisory group, I will continue to listen and address the concerns of families.

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

As I have navigated through this pandemic as the School Committee chair, I have relied upon guidance from local, state, and public health authorities to make decisions about health and safety protocols in our school buildings. We were fortunate as a School Committee that our superintendent had a strong working relationship with the Director of the Public Health Department in Natick so that we were guided in our decision-making by public health experts. I say this because I believe that DESE made the decision to lift the mandate based upon guidance from its public health experts. The timing was difficult as it was the first day back from February vacation and that reasonably caused anxiety for some families. The Natick Board of Health then lifted the mandate after reviewing a week of COVID data. I’m happy that our schools are now mask-optional so that families who would like their students to wear masks may do so and those families who would like their students to take off their masks may do so as well. The district is committed to supporting all choices without judgment and that is how it should be. Based upon guidance from local, state, and federal public health authorities, it does seem like the appropriate time to provide families with options.

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

If I could snap my fingers and fix one thing, it would be teacher pay. In Natick, we run an extraordinarily lean operation. This means that we ask our teachers and our staff to take on responsibilities outside of the classroom all the time. It is these responsibilities outside of the classroom that allow our district to function as one cohesive unit, so that no matter where your student goes to school, they are receiving the same education and services. Yet, we continue to pay our experienced teachers significantly below the average salaries in other districts. We must fix this now. Over the past two years, teachers reinvented the way they did business in ways we could not possibly imagine. Some left because the stress was simply too much. But others stayed and delivered services to our kids in meaningful and incredibly creative ways. Now more than ever, we need to keep our most experienced teachers here in Natick and we need to pay them salaries that are competitive and reflect what they are worth to our students and our families. I know that this community supports our teachers. I think it is imperative that we make Natick an attractive district to come to and to stay so that we have the very best teachers guiding and teaching our kids.