When Boston College takes on Virginia Tech next week in another road test, it will be in front of a sellout crowd at Lane Stadium.

The Hokies have sold out six games already this season, and have now added their conference bout with BC to that list. All 65,000-plus seats will be filled as the Eagles look to rebound from a hard loss at Virginia 12 days prior.

This game will be played in an awkward window for Boston College, as the team is on bye this week, but drew the Thursday night matchup with VT leading up to the October 17 bout. The game will serve as the Eagles’ third ACC matchup and will provide a chance for the team to get back above .500 in conference play.

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The battle over the MCAS ballot question continued to heat up, with a new ad campaign joining the legions flooding televisions and the Boston mayor chiming in with her stance on the issue.

“Massachusetts students attend the best-ranked schools,” argues a new television ad from the opposition group Protect Our Kids’ Future: No on Question 2. “But Question 2 will gut our education system and leave us with lower standards than Mississippi and Alabama.”

The MCAS ballot question would nix the state’s standardized testing graduation requirement for high school students, replacing it with criteria determined by local districts informed by state standards. Students would continue to take the test as an assessment tool.

The No on Question 2 group bought a 30-second and 15-second ad, including a featured parent speaking arguing the effort would “weaken” high standards for her kids.

The latest two ads by supporters of the MCAS graduation requirement follows a similar 30-second ad released in support of the question Tuesday by the Committee for High Standards Not High Stakes, largely led by the Massachusetts Teachers Association.

“We all want to maintain our school’s high standards, and we all agree a single standardized test shouldn’t keep a student from graduating,” state several speakers, including teachers, parents and a pediatrician featured in the ad. “Question 2 replaces the high stakes, high stress MCAS and allows teachers to work with each learner using grades and assessments to measure who’s prepared to succeed after graduation.”

A Suffolk University/Boston Globe poll released Tuesday showed 58% of surveyed Massachusetts voters said they would vote in favor nixing the MCAS graduation requirement, while 37% said they would vote no.

Both sides have highlighted a range of endorsements in recent weeks.

MCAS supporters touted the endorsement of the Black Economic Council of Massachusetts and The Alliance for Business Leadership on Monday. They noted Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey and Secretary of Education Patrick Tutwiler, among other state leaders, favor the MCAS requirement.

Meanwhile, those in favor of Question 2 boasted the endorsement of Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Rep. Ayanna Pressley the week before, along with a group of local business leaders and State Auditor Diana DiZoglio.

Boston Mayor Michelle Wu chimed in on a live WGBH segment Tuesday, saying she is “torn” and will not take a public position on the question.

Wu noted the importance of “high standards and clear standards for our education system” but said “tests should not be used in a high-stakes way, especially in a one-size-fits-all mechanism.” She expressed concern with doing away with the test through this ballot measure, adding that “more nuance or more language” could be worked in through a legislative process.

“There are elements that I think are important around the need to reflect the diversity within our learning communities and the negative consequences that can happen when a one-size-fits-all standard can be applied,” Wu said. “But I’m not comfortable with the alternative that this puts in place in terms of what would replace that to maintain high standards.”

Massachusetts voters will see Question 2 on the ballot for the Nov. 5 general election.

During an emergency hearing Tuesday, members of the Boston City Council heard testimony accusing United States Postal Service leaders of mismanagement that is causing significant delays in service. Adding to frustrations, the USPS declined to send a representative to testify before the councilors. 

Councilors Sharon Durkan, Henry Santana, and Ben Weber filed a hearing order last month to investigate a “lack of adequate postal services” in Boston’s Mission Hill neighborhood. Both businesses and residents alike have been impacted, and complaints have come in from all around the city, Durkan said Tuesday. 

“Let me be clear about what we’re experiencing in our communities. Residents are missing critical communications including legal documents and financial statements. Vulnerable neighbors are experiencing delays in vital medications. Small businesses are struggling with unreliable mail services,” Durkan said. “Most critically, as we approach election season, unreliable postal service threatens to undermine our democratic process.”

USPS spokespeople did not return a request for comment Wednesday morning. 

Councilors were accidentally forwarded internal emails ahead of the hearing in which a USPS official accused the council of having a political agenda and not caring about customers, according to Durkan. Multiple councilors expressed outrage at the accusation. 

“It’s outrageous that someone from the post office has accused us of having a political agenda. Our agenda is to make sure Boston residents get their mail. That they get their checks, that they get their medication, that they get their ballots,” Weber said. “That’s not political, it’s just ensuring that residents of Boston have a basic public service.”

Leaders from three different unions that represent USPS workers in the Boston area testified at the hearing. One of the core issues is “whimsical” operating hours at post offices, according to Scott Hoffman, a national business agent representing USPS clerks in the New England region of the American Postal Workers Union. Early and consistent closures are caused by the reluctance of USPS leadership to properly staff them, even though staff members are frequently available to work. 

“The additional lost time due to improper closings just feeds the formula to staff lower, which in turn degrades service. It’s a built-in system that is designed to spiral downward,” Hoffman said.

The flow of mail through the USPS system can get clogged in multiple ways, he said. Due to staffing shortages, employees will be assigned to work customer service windows at the expense of behind-the-scenes work facilitating the distribution of mail. USPS leaders will force trucks not to leave offices for mail deliveries until they are at full capacity, something Hoffman compared to a bus operator delaying an evening bus until the following morning because all the seats are not full. 

This fell in line with a consistent theme of the complaints about management: that decisions are being made for business reasons with little to no consideration for the service disruptions they cause. On top of that, subpar employee retention is causing the workers who remain to be inundated with massive workloads. 

Multiple residents testified about their experiences. They described instances of not receiving vital health care through the mail, delays of crucial paychecks, and issues with insurance coverage caused by USPS service problems. Mitch Hilton, who worked as a letter carrier for more than 35 before retiring in 2006, said that he has seen a marked change in service since that time. Hilton recorded 44 instances of his mail not being delivered on time so far this year, he said, with September being the worst month for on-time delivery. 

Mail service in the Boston area is “current and within performance standards,” a spokesperson for the USPS Northeast region told The Boston Globe in September. Almost all first class mail in Massachusetts during the last quarter of the fiscal year arrived “within a day of the service standard. On average, mail in the state is delivered in 2.5 days.”

Last month, the USPS recorded an 89% on-time delivery rate for first class mail in a district consisting of Massachusetts and Rhode Island, according to the agency’s online service performance dashboard. Just over 96% of first class mail was delivered with one additional day, according to the dashboard, and it took an average of 2.6 days for mail to be delivered. 

Durkan voiced skepticism about the accuracy of the metrics published by the USPS.

“If I believed their weekly performance standards were correct based on what I’m hearing from constituents, I would not have called for this hearing,” she said. “We’re being gaslit in Boston. We’re being gaslit.”