001but I'm exhausted from me too but in conclusion obviously the district improvement plan is not simply a document it's a reflection of where we where we are and where the district needs to go where we need to do this together its strength will come from the shared commitment of our educators family students you as a school committee and our community partners I encourage you to provide feedback what you did your insights are essential to ensuring this plan is both meaningful and actionable By working together, we can ensure that these focus areas guide not only our district-level decisions, but also support the important work happening every day in our schools. Thank you for your time. And then I just want to talk about the next steps. These are the next steps, planned next steps, and I
002welcome your feedback on this as well. Tonight was the presentation. We did get your feedback, which is great. We'll incorporate your feedback, establish shared understanding. Next step after we incorporate your feedback is to send this draft plan out to all staff and to our community for feedback. provide a feedback window, and then provide a collection system. Open communication is clear, but I think a survey. I think if we put the three, if we create a survey with the three focus areas and provide some, ask for feedback on that, I think that could work as well. And then the administrative team will take a look at this, take a look at all the feedback from their staff as well as the community, and process that and decipher all of that and try to ensure that it
003lines up. with their school level improvement efforts as well the step that i think is probably quite somebody may raise a question on is school improvement plans will be coming in in the first meeting in june for school committee for your support based off of the three focus areas not necessarily all of the sub goals or the ways of measuring it or as mrs. Kamranati mentioned as well the budgetary impact as well as timelines I think those are important columns to put in as well but they're going to come in with their school improvement plan presentations looking for support of those and then our goal is by the last meeting in June second meeting in June to have the revised district improvement plan for school committee approval the final approval at that point in time
004so that's that's kind of the plan from this point it's after our very rich discussion tonight it feels a little aggressive but I think we can I think we can meet the timeline You can add six things. You left out my favorite plan, my favorite part of the feedback loop. I did? Yes, students. Oh, yeah, that's right. So my favorite part. We did talk about that, yeah. My plan is to take this show on the road, and we're going to get feedback from fourth grade students at both Heritage and Dudley L. So I'm going to sit with the principals, and they'll curate a little group of. Students for me to explain some of these things obviously in kid friendly language to them but to get their feedback and get some information from them on what
005they would like to see and then I'll go to the middle schools and Have some representative students there and then a representative group from the high school. I'm so excited I'm so excited Using our systems. Okay, I'm just wondering, so you're using your systems where you're emailing it out? Are we going to put it on the website for anyone to be able to? We'll definitely put it on the website, but we're going to communicate out to all the people we have captured within our particular system. Okay, I'm just wondering, because we're going to budget on Monday, and if we are there and we have anything that we could... you know, if we had a small flyer that we could put up and direct people to the website to say, hey, please look at our, you
006know, coming on this date, you're going to see this on our website. Consider going through it. Or maybe we announce it at one of our, like we have our people that are our liaisons to our town selectmen. Maybe we go to a selectmen meeting and announce that. So that people understand it too. Just so that we're transparent. Yeah, my only caution is by Monday to have, again, I feel like this is aggressive now. I think by having this Monday, and it's open now. This could be a little tricky. Come on. What are you doing after this? I do think that we could say it's coming. So once it's completed, then folks can. Well, yeah, they'll have protection. I mean, I think we could give some opportunity for people. We could work with the talents to
007try to use their systems to advertise it as well. Yeah, that's not a bad idea. We could ask them to put a QR and about their agendas. for select points and stuff yeah yeah yeah it puts it back to our website i agree i agree thank you okay thank you so we're moving on from that and we uh next on the agenda is the superintendent's evaluation and I'll just do a kind of a brief overview since everybody's received it and looked at it. We did get seven out of seven members that responded. Anthony will give you a moment at the end if you want to put some input in. Basically, we had four different goals. standards, curriculum planning and assessments, teaching all students, standard three, family and community engagement, and standard four, professional culture. And
008Superintendent LaMarche on these, on our curriculum, planning and assessment was met expectations overall. On the standard two of teaching all students was significant progress. Keep in mind it's exceeding, met expectations, significant progress, some progress, or did not meet. So that's the options there. On standard three, which was family and community engagement, I landed at met expectations again. as well as professional culture was also a significant process. I believe, does this get posted or is this, it is a public, yeah, okay. It's already in the packet on our website. Oh, yeah, okay, it's already posted. So you can see, you know, comments and ratings and things are listed on that. There was also, we... His assessments for performance standards, standard one being instructional leadership. The ratings are exemplary, proficient, needs improvement, or unsatisfactory. And in all
009performance standards, I believe he was proficient in all. So instructional leadership rating proficient, management and operations overall proficient. uh standard three family and community engagement uh was overall proficient and standard four for professional culture was also rated overall proficient so overall proficient and um met expectations significant progress overall this year um based off of these these goals i just have some questions for committee members if that's okay yeah um because i do think that we should have conversations about comments and things um so When we go to standard two with management and operations, what page are you on? I'm on page 14 and 15. Thank you. So when I look at that, and Kelly, I wonder, you had needs improvement. and you put some issues emerged this year that will continue to need to be
010monitored, addressed, and improved upon. I wasn't understanding what you meant by that. I think just a basic overall, I mean, there was some safety concerns at school. Like, that's what some of the standard, I think, was. What safety concerns? Wait a minute, hold on. I just think there's been some discussions, and I think overall that there could be some improvement in that area. Where are we? Without pinpointing I just So promotes learning and growth of all students and the success of all staff by ensuring safe sufficient effective learning environment using resources I just feel like we can always improve to make sure that we're improving on our culture I mean our curriculum our staffing is obviously we have issues with staffing Scheduling our staffing at some of the schools Was mainly what I was referring
011to okay, that's all okay, and then I think For some of them, I think there were a couple people that talked about, I think Kelly and Jamie, you both mentioned something about that you're not seeing Superintendent LaMarche at events. And I think, I just want to understand how many events do we expect him to go to to get to proficient on those things? Because I don't feel like I just want to be fair to someone like and as we you know look forward like What do we you know if we need to give him a number give him a number? But I don't like every time I go to an event I see him So I just I want to make sure we understand like what's the bar? What's our benchmark and so maybe next
012year as we go forward? If we want a benchmark, we should say it. I mean, I've also seen him as the only superintendent I have ever known after this now being my third district to go to anything CPAC related. He's the only one I've ever seen do that. Which is great. I think some of it's great. I think some of mine was more in the actual schools during the school day, visiting the schools and being actually... campus of the schools I do see him at some of the things yes absolutely what I would love to see us is maybe even create or have access to like a district-wide calendar I mean there has been events obviously I'm not expecting him to show up at every single thing and I have seen him at some things
013so for me I think it was more in the actual schools during the school day with that culture and communicating it you know to families or just knowing what's going on but that was more Yeah, I'm not thinking he needs to be president every single thing absolutely And I don't go to every single thing to even know if he would be so And so in my in my eyes I was just thinking in the schools more and that would that's what I was my expectation would be I guess okay. I mean I guess for next year for his knowledge like Should we ask him to give us data on that on how much he's in the schools like the other thing we need to think about is we have such a low staff central office
014that we can't expect him to be in the schools every day when he's trying to handle all the different things he's trying to handle and also have life no I absolutely understand that and I think you know we as a committee and but not all had added put when we were attending things you know we created that form for when we were attending things although I'm sure people are attending things and not putting them on there because I was the only one who's doing it but I mean maybe even creating something like that just so when he comes in with the superintendent's report it's always you know he can report back because if he's only reporting back on those things and there are some other things And I understand there's also conflicts. But if we're
015going to have, you know, I'm out in the community and people are asking something, they don't know who he is. And that's not necessarily his fault either. But it's nice that they can put a face to the name and things for even the students. But I just think all around, as present as you can be, and again, maybe he is, and maybe we just should have an ongoing, some sort of record so that we know. So I would just say, I don't want to put that extra task on him that he has to create a record. I do, you know, I think we can think of ways, like he can think of ways, if that's important to us, but... I think we should have a discussion as a committee as we move forward. Is that
016something that's truly important to us to have him that he has to be in the buildings to see every single person? You know, I think we also have brought in Kelly to go through and be able to do some of that work, too. So I just don't want to set unrealistic expectations, you know, as we. Yep. So are you talking about like. like a data point of having a collaborative relationship with the town administrators, like for community engagement, you know? Like, are you looking for those types of specifics or how we would rubric this to get like all seven people into one mind about it? Yeah. I mean, I guess if I was a professional, I just wouldn't, well, I am a professional, but if I was in this role, I wouldn't want to be.
017I wouldn't want to have something on my report that says I wasn't at events or I wasn't in schools enough when we haven't given him direction on that and we're expecting him to go above and beyond every day because we're so low staffed. that I just want to make sure that what we're asking is manageable and that at some point, Superintendent LaMarche is going to retire and we need to look who would want to come into our district if we have unreasonable expectations of our superintendent. I don't know that it's an unreasonable expectation to ask them to be out into the women. But I see him at things. Visit one school a month, you know, just to check in. How do you know he doesn't do that? I mean, I go into the schools once
018a month. Not that I would expect to see him, no, but I mean. So you're at all seven schools every month? Not all seven every month, but I've gone to all the schools this year and a few multiple times, yeah. But I don't. So are you going in and managing that? No, no. I'm just saying. No, I'm just going in, visiting. I'm asked into the class, like, volunteering. And I just don't, you know, I just thought teachers like to see administration and feel that they, even if it's, I mean, and some teachers don't. Some staff don't, I'm sure. But I just feel like. Sometimes a friendly, you know, it's nice to get out there and be present. I mean, I'm not saying I'm not expecting him to spend every day and like be in there
019all the time, but maybe we do add an expectation of what we are, what we can all come to a consensus and feel that is a good amount. The superintendent? Yes. The evaluation of the superintendent? Oh, no, I know the evaluation, but deciding whether or not he goes out and about enough to be seen. Well, I mean, that's a pretty big umbrella of... What we should be looking at as far as the superintendent we do hire him we want to well I know and I'm sure in the hiring process it was you know We want to make sure you're out at the schools I just I'm not trying to be a jerk. I'm just saying it like you know I know we we also had Superintendents prior that were out in our schools and out
020in our community like you would turn around you wouldn't You would try to find an event where you didn't see them. And I'm not saying that that needs to happen, but maybe there should be an expectation. I guess I think that it would be important to make sure that if we're asking, if you're hearing from faculty, that we're hearing from all faculty at an equal opportunity. Because I don't know, are you hearing just from a certain faculty? Does our whole faculty feel that way? Because that would be important for him to understand. And if that is something our whole faculty feels, I'm sure he will address that. But I think when we're talking about data-informed practices, we want to have data behind it. Okay. I'll do that. I mean, we put a survey out. We
021should maybe survey our teachers anyway as far as what we could be doing better. have questions in there that relate to that or something. Yeah, I don't know that I would survey the student. I think that that's something Superintendent LaMarche could survey his faculty on. Sure. Yeah, I mean, I just, again, it comes back to like a human resource person. If we had them, we would be doing different things. And obviously, yeah, I'm not looking to overload him with responsibilities. I just think it would be, it helps the culture of the school and the community if all parties are. We're all out there. That's why we created that form so everybody could be out there. I just want to make sure that this is going out to the community and I don't want the community
022to feel like it's an issue. And I don't feel like, it's not that I don't feel like it's an issue, I haven't heard from staff, staff haven't reached out to me to tell me it's an issue. And I haven't had families reach out to me and say, I don't even know who that LaMarche man is. Then you're, maybe Dudley's different, I don't know, because I definitely get it, and I don't seek it out, so people definitely come. I want to make sure that it's just data-informed when we get it. That's fair. I'm sure we can discuss and figure out a way to... to make it work, so that's fair. Anybody else? Mr. LaMarche, would you like to add anything? The only thing I wanted to say is I really appreciate the effort and the work
023that was put into my evaluation. I think I say this every year. I know I say it every day. I am an imperfect superintendent. I will always be an imperfect person. But you did give me things to work on. I continue to work on it, and I can continue to improve, not only for myself professionally and personally, but I can improve for Dudley-Charlton, and that's the goal. It's not a hypocrite if we're going to look for continuous improvement for everyone. I have to improve as well. So I really appreciate the opportunity to improve. So thank you. Well, we appreciate your hard work all throughout the year. It's clear that, you know, I feel like things are going in the right direction. A lot of things were accomplished this year. So this is not to deny
024you of any of that recognition for sure. I think just to piggyback on what Kathy is saying and some of the things we've seen, but also Anthony is new and we're going to be starting ramping this all up again shortly, right? Probably too soon, right, Stephen? Where the new goals start to come out and everything and we start this all over again. Maybe it would behoove us to actually have a workshop with MASC just specifically on the evaluation and what the... going over the rubric and how we can actually have those concerns and then have that one voice of the committee instead of kind of like that fragmented feel that we sometimes have. We can put that on. And I should say, I mean, everybody has a different perception of what's going on, too. So
025as we can see, clearly some people are saying, oh, so much or so little or this or that. So everybody's perception is going to be a little bit different. That's why we have so many people have responses. Right, but that's overall collective. They have that one voice kind of shine through instead of, and then ensuring that we set the parameters so we don't end up having the same questions again. Think this is like the second or third time. This is kind of come up in this way Right Kathy like like these questions like some of these specific questions on on the evaluation where I think if we just had a had a workshop maybe in the summer before the goals come out so we can put some parameters around I'm just yeah, you know Okay,
026anybody else Anthony did you want to add anything? Well, being a newcomer, I have an interesting perspective that... I wore a hat in higher education for a decade and a half, so I was always on the receiving end of K-12 plus, receiving students and seeing where they excelled and where they had challenges. Now I have two kids in the district, and since the day we moved into town, which we moved here for the schools and that amazing library, I've been watching the meetings. And then the last three years, I've been attending all the meetings. I had a meeting recently with Mr. LaMarche and I think my expectations were pretty clear. I guess being an engineer by trade and being a 30-year referee, whatever the expectation, we need to follow it and we set a guideline
027of rules and we have to follow those. Sometimes we don't always like the rules. Parenting, we don't always like the rules, but we have to follow those rules and set those expectations and follow through. When I tutor a young official, I always say, hey, did you ever watch baseball? They go, yeah. I go, well, what's the most frustrating thing about baseball? And they say, well, it's the strike zone. I go, you don't really care what the strike zone is as long as from the first pitch to the last pitch, the strike zone doesn't change. And I think what I'm hearing and what I've seen reading these evaluations from both sides is we haven't defined well enough what the strike cell needs to be and we need to, when we define it. make it go from
028the beginning of the year to the end of the year so that our expectations are clear and we can hold accountable to those expectations but also that Mr. LaMarche and Ms. True and everybody else in the administration can also have a fair shot at meeting, exceeding, or working towards those expectations. And so that's my perspective. I know that there's some things that I'm going to be looking for when I turn around. But I think the first thing I need to do is look at my expectations. Are they realistic before I go into those future meetings? Can you please leave the whistle at home next time? consistency yes I know in any professional capacity you have to have consistency so that when you work take on whatever task or job you you have an anticipated outcome
029because that person you put in charge of that project it's no different as a referee because Whatever they call they call it every single game no matter what the game looks like and so the players adjust That's how I would look at these kinds of things. We're a committee of seven and a superintendent of one and We whatever our expectations are They have to hold truth from beginning to end For the betterment of the district because we have to operate as one one wheel with all the spokes Next is a more thing. Sorry. It's a quick one Mr. Lewis school committee I asked for this to be put on the agenda tonight because for our June 11th meeting I would like to recommend, you know, I'm looking for your feedback do a new Tradition. Tradition
030doesn't, first year is never a tradition. It's the following years. But I would like, but for June 11th, I would like to invite in all the retirees from Dudley Cholton to come to school committee so we can recognize them. And also the Quo Vadis recipients for this year. So I just wanted to throw that, that's why I respectfully asked for this to be on the agenda, to throw it out there to see if that's something that's welcoming and good. I haven't seen that happen here before, but we don't. As a full district or school committee, we haven't recognized retirees before. I think we have 11 right now that would be invited to come. They're not all responsible for coming, but we could provide them with a nice token of appreciation and a small gift for
031them to come. So any? Yeah, no? Okay. Okay. So that's why I wanted to put it on, just to run it by you before I... Begin the new program. We'll call it a program, not a tradition yet. Sounds good. All right, Gene. I move to adjourn. Thank you. All those in favor? Okay. Thank you, everyone.