In Massachusetts, school funding mostly comes from state and local sources. The state gives every school a budget based on per student cost to operate and then provides aid for that budget. Often schools placed in wealthier towns get less money from the state and are expected to meet budgets through their taxpayers. Triton is in the middle when it comes to wealthy and poor schools. This means it receives less state funding than most other schools so it has to pay more of the budget with property taxes. The lack of state funding for Triton puts the school at a disadvantage.
Triton should receive more state funding to support the school. Triton receives state funding that makes up 19 percent of its total operating expenditures while Lawrence High School receives funding that accounts for 80 percent of the operating expenditures. State funding for Triton has also decreased from 35 percent to 19 percent in just the past 20 years, shifting the responsibility more to the towns to locally fund the school. Because Triton receives significantly less state funding than schools such as Lawrence, it has to heavily rely on local funding through property taxes to fund the school. This can result in the budget for the school declining or staying stagnant if the percentage of state funding goes down like it has with Triton.
In the 1973 landmark case of San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez, a class action lawsuit was filed by Rodriguez arguing that Texas’s education finance system was unconstitutional because it relied on property taxes to fund public schools. In a 5-4 decision, the United States Supreme Court ruled that there was no constitutional right to education, that there was no violation of rights by the Texas school system, and was not a violation of the 14th Amendments equal protection clause. This case established that property taxes could be used to fund public schools without violation. So while it may be out of reach to look for more state funding, state grants are an easier way of getting external funding for a project like a new school building.
A grant is an awarded sum of money given by the government or an organization usually for education or research. The Triton school district was recently accepted by the MSBA (Massachusetts School Building Authority ) to be in its 2025 assessment process for a new school building. It had previously been denied for the past two years. Brian Forget said the school can’t keep funding “Band-Aid repairs and solutions that do not provide a facility that meets the needs of our students and community.” If Triton is given a grant to build a new school building it would significantly reduce the burden on local taxpayers and school budgets. It would mean the school could invest in better facilities without needing to raise taxes.
Others may argue that because of the area’s high median income, the school is sufficiently funded through local taxes so the district doesn’t need as much state funding. While having a higher median income does mean our district can utilize local property taxes to fund the school more than other areas, it also limits the amount the budget can be raised as it could raise taxes in the area. This puts Triton at a unique disadvantage when it comes to renovating facilities and improving or modernizing learning resources. Because no significant changes to the budget can be made in one year, there is never enough money to invest in big projects. This is why Triton needs the grant for a new school building as it would realistically be the only way of starting a huge and costly project like that.
