Two Newton residents on the Massachusetts Board of Elementary and Secondary Education will help review Commissioner Pedro Martinez’s evaluation process and proposed goals Friday, Nov. 6.
Matt Hills and Martin West serve on the four-member Commissioner’s Performance Evaluation Committee. Its posted agenda schedules a virtual meeting from 2:15 to 3 p.m. for discussion and a vote on the evaluation process and draft goals for the 2026–27 school year.
The public can find meeting access information on the committee’s agenda.
Hills chairs the committee
Hills chairs the panel, according to the official committee roster. The other members are West, Kristen Smidy of Westfield and Ericka Fisher of Worcester. Newton residents hold two of its four seats.
Hills also serves as the full board’s vice-chair. He served on the Newton School Committee from 2010 to 2018, including as chair of the committee and its collective bargaining team, according to his state board biography.
He is a managing director at LLM Capital Partners, a private equity firm. His four children attended Newton Public Schools from kindergarten through high school.
West brings education policy experience
West is academic dean and Henry Lee Shattuck Professor of Education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, according to his Harvard faculty profile.
He also serves as editor-in-chief of Education Next and deputy director of Harvard Kennedy School’s Program on Education Policy and Governance. His research examines education policy and its effects on student learning and development.
Newton has a third resident on the full 11-member state board: Farzana Mohamed.
Evaluation follows October board agenda
Friday’s committee meeting follows the full board’s Oct. 27 meeting in Williamsburg, where Martinez’s 2025–26 performance evaluation was scheduled for discussion and a vote, according to the October board documents.
The November committee agenda turns to the evaluation process and proposed goals for the new school year.
