Superintendent Bill Lupini and the Brookline School Committee assured the community that the Brookline Metropolitan Council for Educational Opportunity (METCO) program will not experience any cuts, contrary to implications in the Boston.com article that was published on March 11.

The article states that the Brookline School Population and Capital Exploration (B-SPACE) committee is “considering doing away with or scaling back the METCO program as early as next year.”

In a message that he sent to the staff of the entire school system, Lupini said that his support toward the program has not changed.

“I will oppose any effort (and none currently exists) to reduce or eliminate the commitment of Brookline and our school system to METCO and/or the materials fee program,” Lupini said.

Alan Morse, chair of the Brookline School Committee and co-chairman of the B-SPACE committee said that the Boston Globe article “is substantially inaccurate” and that there was misunderstanding created by his quoted comments in the article.

Morse said that the committee still had to consider changes in the METCO program as part of protocol despite its support for the program.

“The B-SPACE committee, as part of its charge, has the obligation to look at every aspect of the schools that affect our enrollments,” Morse said in an e-mail statement. “That is why we were discussing METCO along with other agreements we have for enrolling students who reside outside Brookline.”

In a Brookline Tab article published on March 13, Morse said, “The education advantage to the Brookline students having a more diverse student body is, in our opinion, enormous.”

METCO Coordinator Keith Lezama agreed with Morse about the importance of the program.

“Brookline METCO provides not only wonderful opportunities for kids from Boston, but it also provides kids, resident students, the opportunity to meet and work with kids from different community, and the impact that METCO has on the community is wonderful,” Lezama said. “I don’t think that they will try to get rid of something that is so much great work for both communities.”

Morse stated in the Brookline Tab article that “cutting or limiting the program does not appear to be ‘of interest to the committee.’”

Lupini reaffirmed this statement.

“Simply put,” he said, “the group did not find compelling evidence (either in terms of numbers or philosophy) to continue a conversation about ending the system’s commitment to these important programs.”

Amy Park and Alex Johnson can be contacted at [email protected]