So So good evening everyone. And like I said before Melissa does the sit presentation tonight. I realize this will probably be probably you have another meeting before June, though the last time I'll speak before the school committee. After 35 years here in Dartmouth, I am retiring at the end of the school year. And if you will just indulge me just a couple of minutes, there's a few people I'd like to thank. My sincere appreciation is to the members of the school committee, past and present. Your unwavering support over the years has meant the world to me. Your dedication to the students and educators here in Dartmouth has always been evident and this community is so fortunate to have all of you as their representatives. I also want to express my sincere gratitude to the many superintendents and there have been many in central office administrators including June and Jim that I've worked with during my time here.
We showed some the black pans, right? So, so does that come from you or that's So, what I'll do is if you guys decide you want to go out for bid, right? So, I'll go and I'll make an extens. I'll look at all of your facilities and see what you have. If we need to bring in uh a fresh fruit and salar, fresh fruit vegetable bar, we will bring those in with all the utensils that go with it. That's part of the bid. That's part of the bid. Now, it depends on if you need them or not. you like I saw some things at the high school that we will use. We may bring in something that's uh for a condiment bar where kids can go get pickles, lettuce, tomatoes for burgers, and if we have tacos, they have sour cream, hot sauce, lettuce, you know, jalapenos, those types of things.
No problem. Because it was a It was a bad We had a problem. Yeah. There was Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. I got left with someone down the road. Yeah. Someone down the road because they did a poor job. Yeah. I'm not sure the concrete slam. Yeah. Well, I believe they shorted this job a little bit when they did it because they had another job that someone got in their ear about a couple miles down the road. So then that's why we hold water. If you ever drive by when it rains, the side by the trees holds water extremely extremely bad. And that's because I think that someone else wasn't sloped the way it needed to be because they shorted this job a little bit because someone in Ellen will go into pickle ball court put it in his backyard. So, I know that's a side story, but but to answer your question, I don't know exactly when it was re I could I could text be or call be here and I you'd probably know off the top of his head here in a little bit.
And we were able to get asphalt companies in some of our projects and we currently have over 500,000 of that anticipated to this year. We're hopeful to have those projects done before school [Music] starting every building access.
Well, I guess there's not that many. That's my Okay. Do you think if it's just a regulation and not the actual policy? that that should be included in the policies still to be reviewed. Seems like kind of lower level stuff, right? Yeah. I'll leave that out. I think it's kind of embedded. I mean, if you eliminated the policy, the regulation would go away, right? So, one's dependent on the other. Yeah. And the policy actually it says pulled. So, I'm guessing that was something that we decided not to pursue. What's RB? JIC A-RB. What's So, um, it's probably means if there was more than one regulation. So, if there's like if there's only one irregulation, it's - R, but you could have a - R A and a - RB if there's multiple regulations. I'm going to delete that, too. She told me Okay. Got chance.
So, it's really been a positive experience and both products were very strong products. So, they were happy to bring this one. Um at the end of it, the teachers kind of voted and this was their favorite product between the two. Okay, that's what I was going to ask the teacher feedback and their personal preference and yeah, when I met with our content leads who did the pilots, they really said that they would be happy with either one and they knew it was going to be a difficult decision. Um, I would say that HMH had a little bit stronger of a phonics program and kind of the systematic approach to that a little bit stronger than Wonders and Wonders had some three four really like the writing components. They were just a little bit more miniedbased I guess. Um, however, both products really had strong responding to reading through writing in embedded in that.
Sorry. Um just a quick snapshot. Uh these are districts that went through master planning process with us over the last four or five years. Um all but one went out to referendum successfully. And uh it shows on the spectrum different uh approaches where some are more internally driven to the right side and some are more communitydriven. So it's a more of an informative approach versus a more collaborative community engagement approach. So we know that there's everything across the spectrum can work just what fits for your district. the screen. Great question. That wasn't It wasn't snapping for would be unusual for me to mess up technology. That's part of the historian mindset. I'm not even still keep it connect. We've got a really we've got a really cute picture of Matt's son I know. We saw that. I thought he should have been here. Good for him to start exploding, right?
Um I think you need to have a fiveyear plan. Um, and I think that needs to show where you prioritize spending your money and and what is you think is the most dire and which is the least necessary at this point in time. The old tennis court a few times. So with a new superintendent, I'd say that's where that start. Yeah. Yeah. So because it changes every time. We've had we've had a five-year plan five times in the last four years. five year plans only get to year one and then start a new fivey year plan. Actually, if you get if you put one together and you get it posted someplace or several places, if you got it on the wall and people can watch and they know what what your plan states what you're looking at, they'll remind you of it. That's okay. I mean, no, that's good.
Um that's our autonomy uh to be able to offer that. We are our own area now as recently approved by the board. So when other schools uh particularly those that are smaller in nature are looking at other partners to send their kids across county boundaries to meet the employment uh bucket. We have that here in our own building and across the street. And finally, as it relates to enrollment, um we are positioned with a number of dual credit and advanced placement offerings um as well as anyone. But again, I don't think any high school has all three of those like we do under uh their own umbrella. We not only have them, but we've built that out and will continue to do so. And so our focus will be to make sure that we meet our students needs and interests. Um, but right now as it sits, it's more a matter of fitting the pieces together instead of trying to create them and build them.
Um, as I mentioned earlier, we ask that you state your name, your address, limit your comments to the proposed project and financing, and keep your comments limited to three minutes. Avoid being repetitive if possible. I'm glad I got this script. It really helps. Uh, I I'm pretty sure we don't have any names on the sign-in sheet, but at this point, if we do, I'd be given the sign-in sheet and begin calling out the names of those interested in speaking. Um, no names. No names. Now, we have one last chance. Would anyone else like to speak? If so, please state your name and address and sign on the signin sheet and uh we'll listen to you speak. No. All right. Thank you for all those participated in the hearing. We appreciate your time and interest in the projects and the future of our community. Please note that is just it is just the first step in the legal process.
Sure. Um it could potentially impact um the development of the second language. Um, I think that would be a student by student conversation that we would want to have and counsel based on the proficiency that students bringing in and whether it's English proficiency that we're really working on or it's Spanish proficiency that we're working on. Thank you for that. Is the assumption that the students who would participate in that course be part of the immersion program or to Miss Pucket's point I think the point that you're making was it could be a native Spanish speaker or yeah it would be an expectation they're in the dual language program. Okay. The dual so not a new um a new student who's coming in. Correct. And I I guess I am I'm con I'm just a question. How logistically do you combine those two into one course?
Okay. Yeah, that's what I was going to ask. Yep. And you already have another pass. All right. Uh for those watching at home, um I don't know how the video is coming across. We did have a problem with the camera earlier today. It apparently broke. Uh it's that camera in particular was 11 years old. Someone said 2014, right? Yeah. So 11 year old camera. So that broke. So fortunately, one of the employees here had a camera. So we're using that tonight. I'm not sure how good it's going compared to the previous, but uh I don't know if that's going to fit into the budget or not for a new camera. We'll have to see. But hopefully we got something going. So yeah, we'll watch something. But it's not the same video quality you're used to. Or maybe it's better because it looks like a newer camera.
Each one has brought their own leadership and vision and I'm thankful for the trust and collaboration we have shared to work together to make Dartmouth a place where students and educators thrive. to the incredible staff at Bush Street and I'm really I'm looking at Kate right now. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Without your dedication and hard work, none of our successes would have been possible. You've all assisted me in so many ways during my years as an assistant principal and principal. You are the district's unsung heroes. So, I would like to thank you all. I also want to thank my colleagues at Potter School and at the Quinn School. Yes, I was at the Quinn School for six years. You have been more than just fellow educators. You have been my support system, my sounding board, and my friends. You have made a lasting impact on the lives of so many students, and I couldn't have asked for a better group of people to work alongside.
So, there'll be bar set up. Okay. Okay. So, I have a couple questions. So, how many So, how many employees do you have per like for our size school? Is it like based on how many students we have? And so you need this many employees and like how many kitchens we have. So we what we will do is you will come in, we'll do an assessment, we'll keep it all your employees, right? That's how we'll bid. If that's how many you want in your kitchens, that's how we will bid the program. But do you So do you have a suggested number like you evaluate and be like, well, you have five and really you could do it with four. Maybe one employee would do something different in our district. Absolutely. Okay. And then um what is the pay comparison like? So you're that we would come.
Well, I say he goes ahead and let's find out what it's going to take and and what we can do. I mean, I'm all for improving and and helping out the students what we need to do. Um, yeah. And I would say probably the um move forward with uh trying to find the funds, but also the resurfacing, seeing what exactly. I mean that that might be something the school board actually you know the upkeep normal upkeep of our maybe we get that done way before the rest of it gets done just because I mean you got to take care of them otherwise they do that's just normal wear and tear up to anything that would be out of the or being outside is even worse than being inside the gym. So well I think there is a consensus that go ahead and move forward. Thank you guys.
Uh any questions with our main fun there with [Music] any questions? Okay. Okay. No, we're good. I'll hold on to just a couple funds I wanted to call out here just for a second. Funding. You can go through your tax fund report. We do have activity there. That's a federally approved in public school fund. We've been trying for the last four years to get that fund going operating and claiming and being reimbured for all the best to deliver services to students with medical. year to date received $16,000 in that fund. We hope to receive significantly more than that. We were able to just complete our Octo December claim. So we'll have two quarters in addition to that this year. We hope to clear at least 45 to 50,000 better perh per year there perhaps significantly better 691 and applications the other day. We still have about 10 applications to get process 3.8 million in the past project.
Who did JBA? You didn't. And who did J I C H me? Who did that to me? It's looking good. James, if you or maybe Adriana, somebody who deals with CPS coming in for peace officers. I know you guys talked about having a systematic form where there's like a because of the policy there'd be like a more uniform way to handle people coming in to interview students, right? Would you put that in that slide? Um well those are more um that's more internal practice. It wouldn't really be policy and that's going to be addressed as on slide 11. Okay. Uh for some of the common forms that we're going to be using. Okay. You know why you're breaking up. You just switched to my car. Can you Well, I assume we can hear you and I assume if we switch to your car it's because you're getting I figured you were here.
Along with that, we've been working with our third through eighth grade teachers on a new kind of structure, MELCON, and they've been able to easily adapt that into the product. So, I think that we'll really see some really great things from our students and our teachers. Another thing HMH kind of headed out with was um vocabulary. The teachers thought that the vocabulary is really intentional, helped build a lot of background. It gives the students a lot of content knowledge as well and helps support social studies and science. So, Any other questions? Great job. Thank you. Can I please have a motion to approve the adoption of HMH into reading as an ELA curriculum resource for students in grades K through five on first reading? Motion. Second. Ash and Doug. Bennett. Yes. Patterson. Yes. Johnson. Yes. Keer. Yes. Lions. Yes. Ventures. Yes.
That's fair. have any questions so far? If you have something you're going to jump to, go ahead. Yeah. So, uh um what percentage of your uh practice uh with the group that would work with us um is focused on K through 12. The group that's here tonight is exclusively. Exclusively. Yeah. Okay. our our management team as we get down through the project uh folks, project manager also exclusively in the K12 and then we would start to see a few people that may be crossing their government sector too just depending on how we ramp up our team but the people at the leadership levels are all focused on K12. Okay. Would you say like 50% of of you all is K not just your team but just the business in general is it is about K through 12 it's it's closer to 2/3 um We've been tracking about 60 to 70% the year all focused on K12 education.
Yeah. Keep you on track. So, all right. That's all I've got for that. There's something for us, Paul. Yes, Paul. Okay. So, to start off with, the door accesses, um, most of them are the panels are 15, 20 years old. Um, so we were able to go with the same company who installed them way back when that we'll have a new integration. Um, it was cheaper to go that way, so we didn't have to worry about pulling cables, changing all hardware because that's very, very expensive. So that's where we were able to cut that cost down really low. But the elementary was obviously the biggest issue. They're having problem with their doors all the time. And and the the panels that's in there currently are outdated. So if something was to happen to them, we were going to have to put new panels in anyway, which with new panels comes new software.