Panel likely to agree on role in co-op

A committee examining Brookline’s participation in the Hollis/Brookline Cooperative School District looks likely to agree with its cohort in Hollis that the two towns should stay in the school district for many years to come.

The committee appointed by the Brookline Board of Selectmen plans to meet several more times, but is unlikely to break new ground.

“We have a couple of meetings left, no great surprises,” said Jim Murphy, chairman of the town’s co-op study committee. “We’ll be putting a bow on the work we’ve done to this point.”

A Hollis study committee said last month that dissolving the cooperative school district would be prohibitively expensive for both communities, in the short term and long term. The group also concluded that when more space is needed, the cooperative should expand by restructuring the grades and building another campus in Brookline.

“Our committee whole-heartedly agrees with their recommendation to continue forward in the current co-op,” Murphy wrote in a previously released press release. “Not only does this validate the cost effectiveness of the current co-op, but their recommendation to look at expanding the co-op to include the sixth grade emphasizes the value that we find in a cooperative school district.”