Cummings receives 2.5 percent salary boost as new school contract is approved

Superintendent of Schools James Cummings will be continuing his 10-year term as the leader of the Grafton Public Schools after the School Committee unanimously approved a three-year contract offering a 2.5 percent salary increase.

The contract, the last negotiated in the district, is retroactive to July 1, 2021, the start of the current fiscal year, and ends on June 30, 2024..Cummings’ salary this year is $190,139.49, with potential 2.5 increases over the next two years.

The contract renewal comes after an unprecedented period in the public schools, when the COVID-19 pandemic shut down Grafton schools in March 2020 and forced a pivot to virtual education for the rest of the school year — despite the lack of such a program. Cummings brought students back into the classroom in fall 2020, alternating time in school with virtual learning, and managed to bring all Grafton schools back to full-time by spring 2021, head of a state mandate.

Formerly an assistant superintendent of schools in Shrewsbury, Cummings took on the superintendent’s role in April 2011 after the retirement of Joseph Connors.

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