The tracker now covers 65 Massachusetts school districts — 14 acknowledgments, five reroutes, and the project’s first substantive response: a $750 fee estimate from Amesbury, appealed to the Massachusetts Supervisor of Records the same day it arrived.
The last update covered 36 districts and one story about a mailbox. Today the board reads 65 districts and two stories: one about a district that answered a public records request with a price tag, and one about an “acknowledgment” that did not survive the audit. Both belong on a public ledger, and both are on one.
The numbers, first and always:
- 65 districts requested, up from 36 at the last update
- 14 acknowledgments — six new, one reversed (the Lexington correction below)
- 1 appeal to the Supervisor of Records — Amesbury, docket pending
- 0 productions posted yet
- 45 districts still inside their initial response window; 5 requests confirmed moving through clerks, portals, and reroutes without a receipt confirmation yet
- Records window: agreements from September 18, 2021 to the present
- Next expected first-response dates: October 2 through October 7
The First Real Response — and the Appeal
Every district so far has said either nothing or “we got it.” Amesbury Public Schools said something more. On September 23 — inside the statutory window and well ahead of its October 5 milestone — the district responded to the September 21 request with a $750 fee estimate and, in the same letter, challenged portions of the request as insufficiently described.
That is not an acknowledgment, and the tracker does not count it as one. Under G.L. c. 66, § 10, a fee estimate is the district telling you on paper what it believes your own records will cost, itemized in good faith under § 10(b)(viii) — and a requester is entitled to ask for a fee waiver under § 10(d)(v), which this request did.
Parent Data Force answered the same day. An appeal was filed with the Massachusetts Supervisor of Public Records under § 10A challenging the scope objection, the fee estimate and its itemization, the production timeframe, the proposed charges for electronic copies, and the handling of the requested fee waiver. The docket is pending.
The three source documents — the original request, the district’s response, and the appeal as filed — are posted on the project page, self-hosted and dated. They were reviewed before posting per the project’s privacy rule; the request asked for no student information, and none appears in them.
A Correction on Lexington
Tuesday’s update carried a headline that does not survive the audit, and this is where it gets taken off the board: the Lexington “acknowledgment” signal was an artifact of a forwarding chain, not a receipt confirmation. On follow-up, the district’s published school RAO mailbox bounced — and a later individual address bounced too. The request has been re-routed to the current Superintendent’s Office and the Town’s public-records contacts, and Lexington moves from acknowledged to routed on the tracker — five rows now carry that status — until someone there confirms receipt in writing. A ledger that corrects itself in public is the only kind worth keeping.
Six New Acknowledgments
Six districts moved to acknowledged since the last update, by two channels.
Named humans, in writing:
- Andover — RAO Nicole Kieser confirmed receipt on September 22 and promised a response within 10 business days, replacing an auto-reply that had been sitting on the row.
- Freetown-Lakeville — the district confirmed the original September 18 submission and identified Superintendent Barbara Starkie as the school records route after the published Town routing address bounced.
- Wilmington — Superintendent Matthew Poska confirmed receipt on September 23 and identified RAO Lauren Celi.
- Somerset — RAO Robin Vaccaro confirmed receipt on September 23.
- Peabody — the district confirmed receipt on September 23 and forwarded the request to RAO Lily Bettencourt.
Affirmative automated receipt:
- Fairhaven — an automated receipt notice on September 21 confirmed the message was received and reviewed. An affirmative statement of receipt is an acknowledgment under the project’s counting rule; an out-of-office auto-reply is not, and the tracker draws that line in every row note.
Routed, Rerouted, or Waiting on a Form
Five requests are confirmed moving without a receipt confirmation yet:
- Wakefield — Town Clerk/RAO Betsy Sheeran forwarded the request to Superintendent Douglas Lyons.
- Brookline — the Town Clerk directed submission through the district’s online platform; portal receipt confirmation pending.
- Westwood — the published contact was outdated; the request remains delivered through current district contacts.
- North Attleborough — the published guide named an outdated RAO; the request went to Superintendent John Antonucci with instructions to route it to the current school RAO, preserving the September 23 submission date.
- Lexington — as corrected above.
Routing is the system working its way toward a records officer. It is not a violation, and it is not an acknowledgment — the tracker just refuses to call it one before it is.
Twenty-Five New Districts
The board grew from 40 to 65 this week. Three districts were added on September 22 — Peabody, Dover-Sherborn, and Franklin — and twenty-two more on September 23: city districts (New Bedford, Methuen, Weymouth), towns (Bourne, Dartmouth, Milton, Hudson, Saugus, Sharon, Swansea, Somerset, Webster, Holbrook, Wakefield, Westwood, Wilmington), regionals (Tantasqua, Pentucket, Silver Lake), and Public Schools of Brookline. Their expected initial-response dates land October 6 and October 7.
Backfill on the wave-one rows while the mail moved: Braintree’s Superintendent Tim MacDonald confirmed receipt; Hopkinton’s Superintendent Evan Bishop confirmed and forwarded to the public records officer; Berlin-Boylston says its RAO will review within 10 business days; and Whitman-Hanson, on behalf of RAO George Ferro, anticipates producing the requested information by October 2 — the earliest named production date on the board. Watertown’s published school RAO address bounced and the request was rerouted through the City’s public records inbox. Two rows explicitly did not move: New Bedford’s automatic out-of-office reply and Amherst-Pelham’s brief informal reply are logged as exactly that.
So the board reads: 65 requested, 14 acknowledged, 1 appeal filed, 0 productions posted. Acknowledged is not finished. The Amesbury docket, Whitman-Hanson’s October 2 date, and 50 districts still without an acknowledgment are the next measures. The full tracker is here, updated as the mail comes in.
If your district is not on the board, ask for your district to be added. If it is, watch it with me.
What This Means for Parents
- The tracker is live and public: all 65 districts, statuses, and dated notes are on the project page.
- Want your district added to the next wave? Ask for your district to be added.
- The project page includes a DIY template so you can file your own public records request with your district’s RAO.
- Acknowledged is not finished: the Amesbury appeal and any actual production of settlement records are the next measures to watch.
- Delivery failures are disclosed and fixed on the tracker — including the Lexington reroute in this update.
Sources
- Amesbury district response letter with $750 fee estimate, Sept. 23, 2026
- SPR appeal as filed, Sept. 23, 2026 (Massachusetts Supervisor of Public Records)
- Email from Nicole Kieser, RAO, Andover Public Schools, Sept. 22, 2026
- Email from Barbara Starkie, Superintendent, Freetown-Lakeville Regional School District, Sept. 22, 2026
- Automated receipt notice, Fairhaven Public Schools, Sept. 21, 2026
- Receipt confirmations: Peabody Public Schools (RAO Lily Bettencourt), Supt. Matthew Poska, Wilmington Public Schools, RAO Robin Vaccaro, Somerset Public Schools, Sept. 23, 2026
- Delivery status notifications, Sept. 21–23, 2026
- G.L. c. 66, §§ 10, 10A; 950 C.M.R. 32.00
- Champa v. Weston Public Schools, 473 Mass. 86 (2015); SPR17/661 Alexander v. Wellesley (2017)