Jason McCourty — yep, that Jason McCourty — looked at the Tracy Elementary School teachers, parents and elected officials standing in a circle around him Wednesday and summed up his feelings about the old school: “It’s awesome. There is so much positivity.”
Dressed in dark suits, McCourty, his brother, Devin, and their fellow New England Patriot, Duron Harmon, toured the old school for an hour. The players followed Principal Dr. Pattye Griffin through narrow hallways and into classrooms that looked like sets for a movie set in a 19th-century school.
Their low-key manners signaled clearly that the trio were not on a Super Bowl celebratory jaunt through Lynn. They acknowledged cheers and adoring smiles from students but they came to Tracy to listen and learn.
They left the school with a message they have already heard repeated and hammered home in communities across the state: Public schools are underfunded and schools like Tracy are burdened by not one, but two, even three significant challenges.
Local educators and elected officials have talked for years about getting Tracy renovated or, better yet, replaced. School Superintendent Patrick Tutwiler on Wednesday told the McCourtys and Harmon, “You see a building but what you don’t see is the lack of services.” Tutwiler went on to explain how the increase in school funding the players are advocating for translates into more hiring, which translates into more services for Tracy students and students in other schools.
Harmon summed up the tour by observing that his son is one of 18 students in a Walpole classroom while the number of students in Tracy classrooms totals 28. “You see the discrepancies between the two districts,” he stated succinctly.
Increasing the amount of money spent on schools isn’t just a task aimed at leveling the playing field for all students. The 1993 landmark education reform law that almost all state lawmakers agree is outdated sought to do just that with varying success.
New legislative efforts at bolstering school spending acknowledge that education is a complicated challenge that must take into account the variety of needs facing educators at schools like Tracy.
Griffin did a great job underscoring Tracy’s needs on Wednesday. But the McCourtys and Harmon sounded like they came away from their morning in Lynn optimistic and inspired by the people who walk into the school every weekday.
Devin McCourty said the contrast between the aging school and the excited, energetic young people learning in it left him feeling “bittersweet.”
“How the school operates is great. You see the kids love it.”
It’s time for everyone with a voice in public education to get behind the players’ efforts and push increased spending for schools across the goal line.
