Senate Votes 35-3 to Combat Politically Motivated Book Banning

The Senate voted 35-3 to address the rise of politically motivated book bans. The bill — An Act regarding free expression — creates clear guidelines for how schools and libraries decide which books to make available, and how local leaders determine whether a book is appropriate or should be removed from the shelf. 

The bill recognizes that teachers and librarians are trusted experts and should be treated as such and that personal, political, and doctrinal views should not be governing which books are allowed to be on the shelf.

Local school districts and municipal public libraries would have the flexibility to craft their own policies that align with state protocols and the standards of the American Library Association. For school libraries, an appropriate process for considering whether to remove a book would include assurance that a challenged book remains available to library patrons while the process plays out, guarding against frivolous or unfounded complaints. 

The bill also protects librarians and school employees from retaliation over their selection of library books and requires tracking of book challenges statewide to monitor the issue.

Voting NO were Republicans Kelly Dooner (R-Taunton), Peter Durant (R-Spencer), and Ryan Fattman (R-Sutton).

During floor debate, the Senate voted unanimously (37-0) for Sen. Cindy Creem’s amendment to grant authors the right to challenge the removal of their works from schools and libraries

Several Republican amendments rightfully failed:

  • 6-32 on Sen. Bruce Tarr (R-Gloucester)’s typo-ridden amendment to increase bureaucracy for schools and libraries. Note also that this amendment’s requirement of notification of “at least two parents or guardians” for every student is a disappointing demonization of single parents. Democrat Mark Montigny (D-New Bedford) joined the five Republicans in voting for it.
  • 7-30 on Sen. Peter Durant (R-Spencer)’s amendment to increase the administrative burden on school committees facing book challenges. Democrats Barry Finegold (D-Andover) and Michael Moore (D-Millbury) joined Republicans.
  • 5-32 on Sen. Bruce Tarr (R-Gloucester)’s amendment to make it more difficult to challenge book bans and again 5-32 on his amendment to increase the administrative burden on school committees

Testimony: Educating for the Whole Child

Wednesday, November 12, 2025 

Chair Lewis, Chair Gordon, and Members of the Joint Committee on Education: 

My name is Jonathan Cohn, and I’m the policy director of Progressive Massachusetts, a statewide, member-based grassroots advocacy organization fighting for a more equitable, just, sustainable, and democratic Commonwealth. 

We urge you to give a favorable report to S.374: An Act empowering students and schools to thrive and S.409/H.726: An Act to establish a community schools special legislative commission. 

Massachusetts has a bedrock constitutional commitment to public education as well as a legal responsibility to provide a quality education to all students. However, we are still living under misguided policies that work against that commitment and that vision, such as state takeovers. 

State takeovers have not improved outcomes for students; to the contrary, takeovers have made decision-making less democratic; imposed a stigma on districts; disempowered parents, educators, school leaders, and elected school committee members; and increased teacher turnover. They weaken the bonds between schools and communities. Compounding all this harm, they have failed to yield any long-term improvements in student test scores or, more fundamentally and more importantly, learning. 

Cities with higher populations of Black, Brown, and immigrant students have been those targeted with state takeovers, perpetuating existing inequalities between districts. 

Last year’s vote on Question 2 showed that voters don’t support the “test and punish” approach to education that is too often just a tool for privatization. 

At the same time as we abandon the harmful education policies of two decades ago that have led to no lasting gains and instead cemented inequalities, we can also embrace a better vision for education. 

The Community Schools model offers such a vision. It recognizes that schools should be spaces where parents, students, educators, and community members can come together to provide services and support to meet the needs of our students and schools. The model understands that students thrive best in the classroom when they are in strong communities and have access to robust services, that for students to learn, they need to be healthy and supported, and that parents, educators, and students know their needs best. 

Sincerely, 

Jonathan Cohn 

Policy Director 

Progressive Massachusetts 

An Inclusive Education is a Quality Education

Tuesday, September 16, 2025

Chair Lewis, Chair Gordon, and Members of the Joint Committee on Education:

My name is Jonathan Cohn, and I am the Policy Director of Progressive Massachusetts, a statewide grassroots advocacy group committed to fighting for an equitable, just, democratic, and sustainable Commonwealth.

We urge you to give a favorable report to S.371/H.655: An Act to promote comprehensive and inclusive curriculum in schools and S.340/H.656: An Act relative to healthy youth. 

In recent years, we have seen an attack from organized conservative forces on the teaching of US history, fueled by a desire to whitewash history and erase the contributions of women, people of color, and LGBTQ communities. The Trump administration has been doubling down on this with a multi-front attack on public education and civil rights with the Orwellian term of “patriotic education.” 

Students benefit from learning the entirety of history, not sanitized versions of it, and they benefit from seeing themselves represented in the materials taught in the classroom. We should be ensuring that students receive an inclusive, comprehensive, anti-racist curriculum that will set them up for success. 

S.371/H.655 would require that the state’s academic standards include the achievements, contributions, and other works in the humanities, science, math, literature, arts, and other disciplines by people from underrepresented groups; and the accurate heritage, customs, and identities of underrepresented groups, including the histories of slavery, colonial settlement, land appropriation, territorial expansion, tribal reservations, and present-day effects of such pasts. All our students benefit from such a fuller understanding of history and culture. 


S.340/H.656 (“The Healthy Youth Act”) would expand the reach and positive impact of the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education’s Comprehensive Health and Physical Education Framework, which includes updated standards for sex education and was unanimously approved by the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education in 2023. This new Framework is a significant step forward, but the Healthy Youth Act is still needed to ensure that the sex education students receive in school is medically accurate, age appropriate, and LGBTQ-inclusive. It is disappointing and shocking that MA is behind many other states in this regard. We should be leading, not playing catch up, when it comes to basic education.  

Sincerely,

Jonathan Cohn

Policy Director

Progressive Massachusetts

Protecting the Freedom to Read

Chair Garballey, Chair Mark, and Members of the Joint Committee on Tourism, Culture, and the Arts: 

My name is Jonathan Cohn, and I am the policy director at Progressive Massachusetts. We are a statewide, multi-issue, grassroots membership organization focused on fighting for policy that would make our Commonwealth more equitable, just, sustainable, and democratic. 

We urge you to give a favorable report to S.2328 and H.3594: An Act Regarding Free Expression, filed by Senator Julian Cyr and Representative John Moran.

Over the past few years, we have seen attacks on schools and libraries across the country aimed at removing books by and about LGBTQ people, communities of color, and other marginalized groups. Much of this has been driven by well-funded, well-organized national conservative groups, now unfortunately urged on by the White House. 

Many people would like to think that Massachusetts is different, but we are not. According to the American Library Association, in 2022 there were at least 45 attempts to restrict access to books in Massachusetts school and public libraries, with 57 titles challenged. This puts us among the top 5 states with the highest book ban attempts.

Students learn best when they see themselves and the issues that impact them reflected in their education. Education should be about opening up students to the world and to themselves, and that requires a focus on inclusivity and equity. And it means not seeking to exclude parts of history or identity.

Beyond being simply a moral issue, this is a constitutional issue. The First Amendment protects the right to share ideas, including educators’ and students’ right to receive and exchange information and knowledge. These bills would ensure that selection of age-appropriate library materials is based on the professional expertise of librarians and educators, and would establish a process and standards for handling book challenges so that books are not taken off the shelves based on political or personal views.

At a time when education is under attack from a hostile federal administration, and the goals of diversity, equity, and inclusion are under attack, Massachusetts should be clear about our values and join other states like Illinois, New Jersey, and Rhode Island in pushing back against book banning. 

Thank you for all your work on the hearing, and, again, we urge you to swiftly advance these important bills.

Sincerely,

Jonathan Cohn

Policy Director

Progressive Massachusetts

Let’s Stop Short-Changing Our Public Schools

May 12, 2025

Chair Lewis, Chair Gordon, and Members of the Joint Committee on Education: 

My name is Jonathan Cohn, and I am the Policy Director at Progressive Massachusetts, a statewide grassroots advocacy group fighting for a more equitable, just, sustainable, and democratic commonwealth. 

We urge you to give a favorable report to H.678/S.388: An Act to fix the Chapter 70 inflation adjustment and S.345: An Act eliminating education funding inflation gap.

Back in 2019, your chambers took the necessary step of updating our state’s funding formula for aid to public school districts with the passage of the Student Opportunity Act. It was an important and overdue victory.

However, our public schools are losing out on the full benefits of the increased funding promised due to a glitch in how the Chapter 70 formula treats inflation.

The funding formula caps inflation in calculating year-to-year funding increases at 4.5%. However, we have seen several years of high inflation. The costs for our schools are rising, but the state’s support is not keeping pace. Indeed, the gap in funding schools faced in FY 2025 was $465 million. Cuts mean fewer teachers, fewer counselors, and fewer classroom resources, and they mean lost opportunities for our students to learn and grow.

This growing gap is occurring at a time when our public schools are already under attack from the Trump administration, and because of outdated policies like Proposition 2 1/2 , our cities and towns face severe, state-imposed roadblocks in filling the gaps themselves.

Moreover, this wasn’t how the formula was originally designed. When it was first passed in the early 1990s, the state would catch up with funding in low-inflation years to account for this discrepancy in high-inflation years. Our cities and towns could plan better, and our students could get what they need. But a technical change made a decade later eliminated that common-sense arrangement.

H.678 and S.388 would undo that misguided technical change that is costing our public schools resources and our students the present and future they deserve. S.345 would eliminate the arbitrary 4.5% inflation cap and calculate inflation by comparing it to the same period two years prior.

Massachusetts prides ourselves in our commitment to public education, and we must recommit to that with real resources. Our commonwealth has a higher GDP than Sweden: the resources are there; we just need the commitment.

In the budget hearing earlier this spring, students came to testify to talk about the impact of cuts on their schools, highlighting what that meant for them in terms of lost supports and lost opportunities. These students were praised and cheered by legislators. We ask that you accompany that praise with listening and action.

Sincerely,

Jonathan Cohn

Policy Director

Progressive Massachusetts

Send Two Emails to Support Students

The Joint Committee on Education has two upcoming hearings where your voice matters.

TODAY, they are holding a hearing on a wide array of bills, including a trio of hateful bills to discriminate against trans kids in high school sports.

NEXT MONDAY, they will be holding a hearing on bills related to school funding, including one of our priority bills, which would ensure that schools are able to benefit from the full promised funding from the recent update to the state’s education funding formula and don’t lose out because of high inflation.

We’ve created easy tools you can use to submit testimony to these hearings:

SUBMIT TESTIMONY

SUBMIT TESTIMONY

FY 2026 Budget Testimony: Protect Our Essential Services & Invest in Our Future

April 8, 2025 

Chair Michlewitz, Chair Rodrigues, and Members of the Joint Committee on Ways & Means: 

My name is Jonathan Cohn, and I am the Policy Director at Progressive Massachusetts, a statewide grassroots advocacy group fighting for a more equitable, just, sustainable, and democratic commonwealth.

As we contemplate the daunting, anxiety-inducing, catastrophic possibility of steep cuts to the federal budget as Republicans in DC attempt to take an axe to health care, education, infrastructure, and so much more, we need to be prepared in MA to protect our essential services. We need to continue to do what we are doing—and we also need to be doing more. 

To make that possible, I urge you to embrace progressive sources of revenue as well as tap into the rainy day fund as needed. 

First on the rainy day fund. Like many of us, I have had the experience of holding an umbrella while walking in the rain. The rain gets heavier and heavier, but I think, “Oh, it’s not that bad yet” while getting fully soaked. Let’s not be that. When it starts pouring, don’t be afraid to take out an umbrella. 

But beyond that, I want to urge that “the money isn’t there” is a difficult argument to stomach in a state as affluent as Massachusetts. Indeed, our state’s GDP is higher than countries like Sweden or Belgium despite our smaller population. We have great wealth in this state, and that great wealth is why the Fair Share Amendment has been able to deliver so much. 

You have many tools at your disposal to raise necessary funds, such as but not limited to ensuring that billionaire global mega-corporations like Amazon and Apple are paying their fair share and are not able to dodge taxes by offshoring their profits in Bermuda and the Cayman Islands. 

Similarly, as you are going to seek every opportunity to trim our investments, I would urge you to first do the same to the state’s tax corporate tax breaks to evaluate whether or not they deliver upon any goal at all. The sales tax exemption for private jets is but one of many examples. 

It shows a lack of regard for the most vulnerable populations to countenance cuts to mental health case workers and cuts to assistance to needy families, but not countenance cuts to the tax giveaways to large estates and day traders passed two years ago. 

We  know who has the money: the rich and large corporations. What matters is the political will to raise the funds. 

In the FY 2026 budget, we urge you to focus on increasing critical investments that underlie the quality of life in the Commonwealth and make this high quality of life accessible to all: 

  • Delivering on Our Promises to Our K-12 Students: The Student Opportunity Act from 2019 was a major win for students across the Commonwealth. However, the combination of high rates of inflation in FY23 and FY24 and a tight inflation cap under the SOA has led to a $465 million gap in district budgets.  As a result, districts across the state are being forced to cut their budgets, lay off educators and staff, and cancel long-needed investments. We must keep our promises to students.

We further urge you to fix charter school tuition reimbursements so that our public schools are not losing critical funding. Tuition dollars follow students, but if a class size falls from 25 to 23, a school cannot hire 23/25 of a teacher. So many of the costs of education are fixed costs, and siphoning off resources harms the 90% of students who attend local district public schools. 

Our students deserve not only well-funded schools, but also green and healthy schools that focus on the whole student. We urge you to increase funding for capital improvements for school buildings so that students can have the safe and healthy environment conducive to learning, and to provide funding for community schools so that districts can embrace this proven model that empowers students, parents, and educators to collaborate and provide vital wraparound services. 

  • Building on Recent Child Care & Early Ed Investments: Last session, you made historic investments in early education and child care, moving us closer toward a vision of quality and stability for providers, good pay for educators, and affordability and access for families. We join the Common Start Coalition in calling for continued investments:
    • $200 million to increase access to child care financial assistance (line item 3000-4060 in the FY25 budget): A $100 million increase over FY25 is needed just to maintain existing caseloads, and an additional $100 million would be enough to provide financial assistance vouchers to 6,000 additional children who are currently on the waitlist for CCFA.
    • $45 million to increase operational grants to child care providers to a total of $520 million (line item 3000-1045 in the FY25 budget): An increase in total funding to $520 million is needed to keep up with increased utilization of the C3 program by providers. Increased funding for the C3 program is essential to support the growing number of providers who accept families using child care vouchers.
    • $45 million to raise early education and care financial assistance reimbursement rates (line items 3000-1041 & 3000-1042 in the FY25 budget): This will improve access to child care financial assistance by increasing the number of programs that are willing and able to accept vouchers, allow programs to invest in quality, and raise workforce salaries for subsidized child care providers.
    • $20 million for the Head Start Supplemental Grant (line item 3000-5000 in the FY25 budget): Funding needed to increase salaries in Head Start classrooms and help programs that provide high-quality care to some of the state’s lowest-income, highest-need children, especially in anticipation of potential federal cuts.
  • Investing in the Opportunity Engine of Public Higher Ed: Last year, you made community college free, a transformative step that has benefited many residents already. We need to build on that commitment to opportunity by making our four-year public institutions debt-free for all students as well and ensuring that our colleges and universities have the resources needed to give a high-quality education and experience to every student. 

That means ensuring better pay and benefits for adjunct faculty, who often have to juggle high course loads for low pay. That means ensuring that our public higher education employees are paid at or above the national average, especially given the high cost of living in MA.  And that means ensuring that our public colleges and universities have green and healthy buildings and having the Commonwealth assume the capital debt of public higher education institutions and cover the costs of such upgrades. 

  • Increasing Funding for Access to Counsel: We join fellow organizations in the Right to Counsel Coalition in urging for an increase to the Access to Counsel pilot (Line Item 0321-1800) from $2.5 million to $5 million and making the program permanent. While upwards of 90% of landlords are represented, recent Trial Court data shows that over the past two years only 4% of tenants had legal representation. We can change this, prevent homelessness, and stabilize peoples’ housing by incrementally building a strong statewide Access to Counsel program.
  • Protecting Our Right to Shelter by Investing in Emergency Assistance: We believe in listening to the experts connected to communities on the ground about how best to solve the problems facing the Commonwealth. The Massachusetts Coalition for the Homeless are the experts on how to best manage the emergency shelter system in Massachusetts and assume that all families have access to safe housing. We urge you to support their requests, which include:
    • Undoing harmful restrictions to emergency shelter: Removing the length of stay limits, which force families out of shelter before they can access safe housing; eliminating the “dual track” system, which kicks some families out of rapid track shelters in as little as 30 business days; removing the cap on the number of families in EA shelter, currently set at 5,800 families; restoring presumptive eligibility, which gives families temporary access to shelter while they gather documents to prove ongoing eligibility; and strengthening support for families leaving shelter, including by improving housing search, providing ongoing wraparound support, and increasing HomeBASE rehousing resources
    • Increasing funding for RAFT (Line Item 7004-9316): Increase funding for Rental Assistance for Families in Transition RAFT) to $300 million, up from the current FY25 funding level of $204.7 million ($197.4 million in General Appropriations Act funding and $7.3 million in supplemental funding)
    • Increasing HomeBASE (Line Item 7004-1008) Increasing the maximum benefit levels to $50,000 over the first 24 months of the program and up to $25,000 in subsequent years for families needing additional time

Moreover, we urge you to reject harmful proposed cuts in Governor Healey’s budget. 

  • Please reject Governor Healey’s proposed elimination of the 10% increase to cash assistance grants that recently took effect. This assistance is for our families with highest need, and it is unconscionable to think that that is where we would be making cuts in the budget. 
  • Please reject Governor Healey’s proposed cuts to mental health care and the corresponding layoffs of Department of Mental Health case workers. This is critical care, and it is about people’s lives. 

Thank you for your work on the budget and on this marathon of a hearing. 

Sincerely, 

Jonathan Cohn 

Policy Director 

Progressive Massachusetts 

2024 Ballot Initiative Forum: Recording

You can find a copy of the video here.

We’d love to know how you want to get involved this fall, so please also take a moment to fill out this survey.

Question 1: https://www.dianaforma.com/ballot

Question 2: https://www.yesonquestion2ma.com/

Question 3: https://www.voteyeson3mass.com/

Question 4: https://maformentalhealth.org

Question 5: https://www.fairwageplustipsma.com/

Question 6 (a non-binding advisory question in select state rep districts): https://masscare.org/

Testimony in Support of Ending the Use of MCAS as a Graduation Requirement

Monday, March 4, 2024

Chair Friedman, Chair Peisch, and Members of the Committee:  

My name is Jonathan Cohn, and I am the policy director at Progressive Massachusetts. We are a statewide, multi-issue, grassroots membership organization focused on fighting for policy that would make our Commonwealth more equitable, just, sustainable, and democratic. 

I am writing today in support of ending the use of MCAS as a graduation requirement and in favor of NO. 23-36, An Act requiring that districts certify that students have mastered the skills, competencies and knowledge of the state standards as a replacement for the MCAS graduation requirement (House, No. 4252).

Ample education policy research has shown that high-stakes standardized testing, such as the MCAS, does not measure a student’s ability to learn, capacity for effort, creativity, or perseverance, and it is not an accurate predictor of future academic or life success. Instead, test scores are highly correlated with a family’s economic status.

Massachusetts is among only eight states that mandate passage of standardized testing as a requirement to graduate high school. This requirement inaccurately and incompletely assesses students, incentivizes the narrowing of school curricula to focus on test content, and adds undue stress to students’ lives, with impacts especially felt by students with Individualized Education Plans, English Language Learners, and BIPOC students.

Massachusetts’s strong performance in education statistics is not due to a testing graduation requirement, but due to the investments put into our public schools (as well as the comparative affluence of the commonwealth vis-à-vis other states). Indeed, our education out-performance often fades away when data gets disaggregated.

Testing can and should serve a valuable diagnostic purpose—assessing progress, identifying trends, and more. But it should not be a high-stakes phenomenon. We have capable educators and policymakers who can craft a statewide competency-based graduation requirement that would enable students to be properly assessed according to the totality of their work.

Sincerely,

Jonathan Cohn

Policy Director

Progressive Massachusetts

Join MEJA’s We <3 Our Public Schools Day!

In honor of Valentine’s Day, MEJA (Massachusetts Education Justice Alliance) is having a We <3 Our Public Schools Day tomorrow.

Here are actions you can take to show your support for public schools on Valentine’s Day!

Share on social media what you love about public schools!

  • Share a photo of you holding a sign saying what you love about your school
  • Post photos with students, friends, teachers, staff, or anyone else in the school who has made a positive impact on you, students and school community!
  • Use the hashtag #welovepublicschools and tag @massedjustice!

Upload your photos and videos to the MEJA Soapboxx!

Check out MEJA’s folder and toolkit for some more ideas and social media prompts!