Equitable Early Childhood Education

At the grade school level, outcomes for students from economically disadvantaged backgrounds - estimated to be around 28% of students in the Cambridge school system, or around 1,800 children - are still failing to match those of students from more privileged backgrounds. While Cambridge has the resources, allocation remains inequitable. COVID has only exacerbated these differences, and we need to take action now before we fail these children any more than we already have. As a Councilor, I pledge to:

• Allocate funding for universal pre-K.

• Partner with local childcare providers to ensure that children are being screened in a timely and consistent way on childhood development milestones, so that meaningful action can be taken before a child has the chance to fall behind.

• Create easy-to-use informational resources to help parents make informed choices about their children’s education and navigate public schools’ school choice and lottery systems.

Investing in Our Future

Several wealthy universities operate within our city as nonprofits that are not held accountable to local government or community needs while wielding huge influence over local policy in other areas. The voluntary PILOT contributions these universities make are consistently lower than they should be. I believe that this cycle of representation-without-taxation needs to change. As a Councilor, I will take action to push private institutions, such as Harvard, MIT, and Cambridge-based corporations to create a start-up fund and competition to advance the initiatives of CRLS’ graduating students, with a focus on students from economically disadvantaged backgrounds. Further, I would push our universities to provide meaningful increases in graduate student and post-doc housing as a condition for zoning increases.