Nearly four years after the Island’s municipal leaders agreed to work together on a new Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School, the Massachusetts School Building Authority (MSBA) has approved a grant of more than $71 million to renovate and expand the aging facility.
“We’re incredibly excited. This was a milestone,” superintendent of schools Richard Smith told the Gazette after the state board’s unanimous vote on Wednesday morning.
The estimated maximum grant of $71,771,642 represents more than 21.5 per cent of the total estimated cost of $333 million for the school renovation and addition.
None of the funding will be guaranteed until a majority of Martha’s Vineyard voters agree to shoulder the remaining costs — currently estimated at nearly $262 million — at an all-Island election June 2.
“The challenge we have now is to get the information out about why it’s needed and what the impact of not doing anything would be,” said Sally Rizzo, a member of the high school building committee that was formed in late 2022 to guide the project.
“The building is in disrepair. The systems are very old and very expensive to maintain. There’s asbestos and mold and a variety of deteriorating factors, and losing state support would cost the Island so much more money,” Ms. Rizzo said.
The plan approved by the MSBA calls for razing the oldest sections of the school, which date from the 1950s to the 1980s, and adding a new, two-story classroom wing.
The part of the school built in the 1990s, including the performing arts center, the gymnasium and the spaces connecting the two, would be renovated and brought up to current building and educational codes.
The $333,490,457 million price tag — more than $1,600 per square foot for the 199,000-square-foot project — is due largely to two factors: the high cost of construction on Martha’s Vineyard and the school’s obligation to prepare students for careers as well as college.
“We have a comprehensive high school, and I don’t think people on the Island realize how unusual this is,” building committee member Nancy Gilfoy told the Gazette.
“On the Cape, there is a technical high school, but our high school has everything: career and technical education, college prep, arts, and athletics … which is part of why this is such a huge project,” she said.
The 25-member building committee has worked intensively with Tappé Architects to trim down the size of the expanded school to the minimum square footage possible, Ms. Gilfoy said.
“As a building committee person, I know people have done their best,” she said.
As a longtime member of the Tisbury finance and advisory committee, however, Ms. Gilfoy is concerned about the impact on her town’s taxpayers, who took on a $55 million obligation for the Tisbury School project in 2021.
“Fifty per cent of Tisbury’s budget is already [going for] education,” she said.
The Massachusetts School Building Authority, which funds school construction with money from the state sales tax, previously authorized a reimbursement rate of nearly 39 per cent for eligible costs of the high school project.
The school also stands to gain additional reimbursement points, including 1.81 for renovating existing property and up to four points if it meets state standards for green schools, bringing the MSBA grant to well above 45 per cent.
The reimbursements are based on mainland construction costs, however, and top out at about $568 a square foot — less than a third of the per-square-foot cost estimate for the Vineyard high school project.
A 2022 agreement, hammered out by representatives from all six town governments and approved at each town meeting, applies a cost-sharing formula for high school construction that’s based 70 per cent on the number of students each town sends to the school and 30 per cent on the town’s equalized property values.
The actual percentages for each town will vary slightly when assessed, because Oak Bluffs — where MVRHS is located — negotiated a 1 per cent discount to compensate for its municipal costs in relation to the tax-exempt school.
Projected assessments for each town are in the process of being calculated, Ms. Gilfoy said.
Islanders will have the opportunity to ask questions about the high school building project and its financing at a series of in-person public information sessions, where school committee members, school and district staff and members of the professional team of architects and project managers will be on hand to explain the plan and answer questions.
Upcoming sessions are scheduled for March 1, from 2 p.m. to 3 p.m. in the West Tisbury library, March 14, from 11 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. at the Oak Bluffs library, and March 26, from 7 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. at Edgartown town hall.
Because the school district is prohibited by law from using public resources to campaign for the $262 million facilities vote in June, former high school committee member Michael Watts has begun the process of establishing a state-authorized ballot question committee, which will operate independently as a citizens group.
He has filed the required statements of organization with the state and all six towns, Mr. Watts said.
The committee now is waiting for a green light from the state office of campaign finance, Mr. Watts told the Gazette Wednesday.
This article appears in February 27, 2026.
MSBA was very clear from the start that the 30% reimbursement was based on their thresholds and that the island was going to exceed it. Many people have been asking about it throughout the process and nobody wanted to talk about it. Well now you have an in black-and-white 21%. Transparency in these situations is crucial. This should be voted down by town to maintain the autonomy of the towns, especially since every town is being charged a different number. What one town can afford might not work for another not all of us have the same budgets.
So let’s say we vote down this project, we’re still left with an unsafe dilapidated building and we’re out the $71 million. Sure we could go back to the drawing board and perhaps downsize the project but with rising construction costs the smaller project will probably cost the same.
This is like saying we don’t have a car and most likely can’t afford one, but Mercedes are 20% off so what choice do we have? We have a regional funding formula problem, we have a regionalization problem that the island can no longer turn its eye from. With the lack of teachers available, and things of that nature a regional middle school is probably worth a look. This is Cart before the horse.
I hope they will at least wait a few years until some of these Tisbury kids that just spent their last few years in trailers, can get through high school without having to spend more of their school years in transitional trailers. Let these kids get through high school in the buildings that are there and have a few normal school years, before they start putting kids in trailers again for the HS renovation.
No trailers in this plan.
Please note that the date for today’s Information Session at the Edgartown Town Hall has been postponed due to weather and parking conditions. It will be rescheduled for another date.
There are no trailers needed in this plan. The new academic wing will be built while students are still in the main building.
Amazing price tag !!!’ Why so much? A serious question…0
$$$$$$$$ how do retired or working people pay the cost of the rising taxes that will be incurred?
We are not an island of filthy rich and now the hole in the bucket has gotten bigger. Just tip it over and see how much is left especially for a dwindling student population
Bulldoze it down and bring all of the schools, K through 12, back to their hometowns.
Whats wrong with the old high school. I went to a high school in southie that was 90 years old and we had plenty of kids who became doctors,professors,teachers,scientits,great soldiers,athletes,etc. Just put new systems in the old one.Myself I quit in the 11th grade.
Building a high school for 700 students typically costs between $40 million and $150 million, though high-cost regions like the Northeast can see project budgets exceeding $220 million for this capacity .AI This looks to ba about 100 mil too much.
+30% to build on the island, There is your additional 100M. How does everyone think materials and workforce to build this thing will get here. Yes, same steamship we all take. All that equipment doesn’t just drive 2 towns over. This is a logistical challenge and that costs $$$$. Even slapping lipstick on a pig comes with code upgrades. There are no easy buttons.