Cape Cod's largest school district will welcome a new superintendent in July.
Earlier this month the Barnstable School Committee appointed Dr. Sara Ahern from a field of 19 applicants. She has served as superintendent of Franklin public schools for five years.
Meg Mayo-Brown, Barnstable's superintendent since 2016, decided last year not to seek another contract.
Ahern's family owns a home in Dennis, and will move to the Cape full-time before starting her position this summer.
Morning Edition's Patrick Flanary spoke with Ahern about the challenges ahead, and how her science background has helped steer students and staff through the pandemic.
Patrick Flanary: So, why here? What attracted you to working with the Cape's largest school district? I know you were a finalist several years ago for the same position.
Dr. Sara Ahern: I was. I love the Cape, it's a place that's near and dear to my heart, and has increasingly become my home and part of my community. And so, in order to be the leader that I want to be, I want to be connected with the community. I love the size of Barnstable. Barnstable is very similar to the size of Franklin. So much positive comes from being a little bit bigger. I think you can provide a bigger range of opportunities to students, to meet diverse needs. There's an increasing diversity among the community. I think that living in a community with diversity enriches all of our lives. And so I look forward to working in the largest and most diverse district on the Cape.
PF: You have stressed inclusivity and empathy at Franklin public schools, and helped create a Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion committee there. What should Barnstable schools be doing when it comes to hiring teachers?
SA: I wouldn't want to prescribe any solutions right now about Barnstable without coming into the district and talking with more people and learning more about what's already underway. But I think we all recognize the value of having a diverse educator workforce working with students. The research is pretty clear about the impact of having diverse educators working with children, and children who identify with them. We don't have a tremendous pipeline of diverse educators coming in to apply. And so I'd love to kind of grow that pipeline, and encourage more students to become teachers and counselors in the future.
PF: Barnstable is among the districts in Massachusetts ending Covid-testing at school. Instead, testing will be at home, and it's up to the parents to do it. Is it the right call to shift testing from the school nurses to the parents?
SA: What we have realized with so many Covid cases in our schools through the contact-tracing and test-and-stay program is that the schools are really quite safe. Very few students have been turning up positive through the test-and-stay program. And so that is one reason to move toward rapid-antigen testing [at home]. I think it's kind of a valuable alternative and it's keeping up with what the science is saying.
PF: One of the most fascinating things I find about you is that before you were a superintendent, you were a science researcher and science teacher. How does your science background inform your thinking when it comes to public health in the school system?
SA: I think my science background informs my decision-making in general, even before Covid. Gathering information and not wanting to make a high-stakes decision without having the data in front of me. I think my science background has helped navigate the Covid environment. It's not all driven by science. I think we also need to be taking into consideration the human aspect and the social sciences. I've taken virology classes, I've run some of the tests in my graduate program that they used to detect the virus, so I'm pretty well-informed there. And I've used the information to help the community in Franklin navigate the pandemic.
PF: In the conversations you're having in Franklin and elsewhere, who do you find is having a harder time right now, the teachers or the students?
SA: I think everyone is struggling and I would be very hard-pressed to say who's having a harder time. I think that teachers have done tremendous work in terms of adapting their instruction. They are, like students, craving connection. And I think every time we have to take a step back and go to more virtual meetings rather than meeting in person, it takes its toll on our educators who are inherently collaborative.
Students similarly have really struggled through the pandemic, and we know that this is manifesting in all sorts of ways, with learning loss and mental-health struggles that come from isolation, escalating substance abuse, and really missing those connections.
PF: You'll start as superintendent on July 1, five years to the day you became superintendent of Franklin public schools. What have the last five years taught you?
SA: I've always been a proponent and advocate for public education. But I think after the pandemic -- and I'm certainly not alone -- we've realized that a computer or technology is never going to replace the importance of the interaction between a teacher and the students in class. And that in-person learning is so very important to students' academic, social and emotional growth. I do feel really strongly about the value of in-person learning.
PF: In the context of the pandemic, Governor Baker recently said "the best place for kids is in school." Should remote learning be absolutely off the table as an option, no matter what?
SA: I think there's two elements to consider about students needing to be in school. One is the importance of the connection among students, and the connection between teachers and students. I think another piece to what Governor Baker is saying is the mitigation strategies that we have in place are really pretty effective, in that in-school spread of the virus has been pretty low across the entire state. We've been working really hard to keep the doors open, and have our kids coming on a daily basis.
