Welcome to SaveTheAcademy.org!

Dear alumni, students, parents, and friends of the Academy,

Thank you for all of your calls, letters and support to date. With your support and the work of Rep. Pedone, funding for Mass Academy was recently reinstated into the House's proposed budget.

Unfortunately, the house budget is one piece of a big puzzle, and thus funding has been cut from the Senate's initially proposed budget. Next week, the Senate Ways and Means Committee will undergo a revision process similar to the House's.

Senator Harriet Chandler has agreed to sponsor an amendment to continue funding for Mass Academy. Once again we must rise to the occasion. WE NEED YOUR HELP LOBBYING SUPPORT FROM LEGISLATORS.

CALL AND E-MAIL YOUR LOCAL SENATOR, TELL THEM YOU SUPPORT AN AMENDMENT TO CONTINUE FUNDING FOR THE MASS ACADEMY OF MATH AND SCIENCE!

Here is a list of legislators by city and town: http://www.mass.gov/legis/city_town.htm

In addition to local senators, here are five key offices we need to reach out to. Please voice your support to as many as you can.

Harriette.Chandler@state.ma.us (617) 722-1544
Steven.Panagiotakos@state.ma.us 617-722-1630
Therese.Murray@state.ma.us (617) 722-1500
Stephen.Brewer@state.ma.us (617) 722-1540
Richard.Moore@state.ma.us (617) 722-1420

The Senate Ways and Means Committee will be meeting next week. This means we are working with a shorter time frame this round, so please act now.

Thank you for your continued support,
SaveTheAcademy.org

The 2010 budget is a combined effort between Governor Deval Patrick, the Mass. House of Representatives, and the Mass. State Senate. Recently Governor Patrick proposed his budget, the first step in the budget process.

In Governor Patrick’s message posted on his 2010 budget website he writes:

“Cuts in aid to cities and towns are unavoidable in today's circumstances, but we have made it a priority to limit the pain. At $3.948 billion, current Chapter 70 funding for public schools is at an all-time high. Though cut during the last economic crisis, we have maintained the current level of spending in both fiscal year 2009 and fiscal year 2010.”

The Mass Academy of Math and Science is a public high school as well as a degree granting program, and it is being entirely cut from the proposed budget. The state contributes $1.2 million to this program, and WPI, a private university, makes up the balance, which actually makes this a unique value for the state.

What the heck happened?

Governor Patrick also writes:

“Some of our budget savings reflect the continuing work of modernizing government - especially in health care, as we shift to new models of payment and care that emphasize outcomes, prevention and alignment with other payers. Moreover, in collapsing almost 850 budget line-items into 480 line-items, we are giving agencies the flexibility to manage within tighter budgets and protect priorities to the maximum extent possible.”

As far as we can tell in the past year funding for Mass Academy was combined into another line item on the budget, which was subsequently cut in the recent budget revisions. We are alarmed by the ease of making an accredited public high school disappear. We, the students, alumni, parents, friends, teachers, and administration are determined to stop the Academy from falling through the cracks in the system.

Thank you for your support,
SaveTheAcademy.org