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District overview

Peabody Public Schools

Funding structure, how it compares to peers, and where major projects stand.

How is Peabody's school budget funded and decided?

State Chapter 70 aid plus a required city contribution, proposed by the superintendent and set by the School Committee

Like most Massachusetts districts, Peabody's school budget runs on two main sources: state Chapter 70 aid and a required local contribution from the city, known as net school spending. The Mayor sits as ex-officio chair of the School Committee, so the same person who leads city government also chairs the body that adopts the schools' budget request before it goes to the city for funding.

Chapter 70 state aid

The superintendent's FY27 budget presentations explicitly tied spending changes to Chapter 70 aid levels and the state-required net-school-spending minimum.

Mayor chairs the committee

Edward Bettencourt Jr. serves as Chairperson ex-officio of the School Committee while also serving as Mayor, the official who oversees the city's overall budget.

A multi-week budget process

The FY27 budget moved through more than eight separate committee work sessions between January and May 2026, with each school presenting its own numbers before a public hearing.

Cuts and additions happen together

The same May 12, 2026 meeting that cut an ELL teacher position also added 2.0 FTE and $53,320 for special-education support at the Brown School — budget balancing moves money between schools and programs, not just up or down.

Most of the FY27 budget's roughly $2 million in reductions came from insurance, utility, and out-of-district tuition lines rather than classroom staff, and the committee added special-education staffing even while cutting elsewhere.

Where the district stands

FY27 budget (Draft 5, May 12, 2026)verified
102,600,000 dollars
FY27 budget (Draft 2, March 24, 2026)verified
104,773,704 dollars
ELL teacher positions cut in Tier 2 reductionsverified
1 positions
Total enrollmentcontext
5,774 students

Federal NCES Common Core of Data count, not from a document collected for this district.

Schools in the districtcontext
11 schools

Federal NCES Common Core of Data count, not from a document collected for this district.

Major projects

Peabody Veterans Memorial High School (PVMHS) building project

Owner's project manager hired; selecting a design team

Owner's project manager hired; selecting a design team

Next: Select a design team
  1. School Building Committee met to begin work on soliciting an Owner's Project Manager (OPM).
  2. Advertisement for an OPM was published.
  3. The city hired The PMA Company as OPM for the project.
  4. Design-team applications were due; a School Committee member was appointed to the Designer Selection Panel.

Funding

Massachusetts School Building Authority (MSBA) process plus city funding, feasibility/design phase

FY27 district budget

Reductions finalized at the committee level; public hearing held

Reductions finalized at the committee level; public hearing held

Next: Final FY27 budget adoption
  1. Draft 1 of the FY27 budget was presented.
  2. Committee received Draft 2, $104,773,704.
  3. Committee adopted Draft 5, $102.6 million, after $696,442 in combined reductions and $53,320 in new Brown School special-education funding.
  4. Public hearing held on the FY27 budget.

Funding

Chapter 70 state aid plus required city net school spending

Local elections & school board members

Elections & votes

Board electionScheduled

Next School Committee election

Peabody

Peabody elects its School Committee at the city's municipal election held in odd-numbered years in November; the most recent was November 4, 2025, so the next falls in 2027.

Official source · verified Aug 19, 2026

School board members

Every School Committee meeting notice, agenda, and minutes document published to the district's Google Drive records folder (linked from the School Committee webpage) for August 2025 through August 2026 was collected and reviewed, along with FY27 budget meeting notices and minutes.

Get alerts for Peabody Public Schools

We read every agenda, packet, and set of minutes, and write up the decisions that affect families — each one linked to the document it came from.

View alerts for this district