Wayland parents demand reversal of middle school overnight field trip cancellation

WAYLAND — November 29, 2023 — Wayland parents pack School Committee to protest cancellation of middle school overnight trips. Dozens of residents and two eighth-graders spoke Wednesday after administrators announced the night before that the long-standing eighth-grade Washington, D.C., trip and sixth-grade bike ride to Walden Pond would end. Chair Erin told the crowd the decision was administrative, not the committee's, but Acting Superintendent David Fleischman and middle school administrator Betsy Gavron, a 26-year veteran of the trips, agreed to hold a community forum before the next meeting. Gavron cited MetroWest survey data showing 26 percent of eighth-graders reported generalized anxiety and noted 25 percent of last year's sixth-graders opted out of the bike trip; the D.C. trip ran about $1,650 per student. "The presentation was weak," parent Joe Palazzotti told the board, saying presenters "talked in circles." The committee also unanimously appointed Jackie Espirito Santo Vega to the Wayland Housing Partnership and heard a proposal from Athletic Director Heath Rollins to absorb the roughly $60,000 hockey program into the operating budget at $15,000 a year over four years.