001we'll call the meeting to orders my name is stephen last superintendent this is a reorganization meeting that's why i'm starting off the meeting this evening a couple of quick announcements though one is i want to congratulate caitlyn kanzek for her being voted in as the next school community member from dudley representative from dudley unfortunately she is not here this evening as most of you are aware this is the end of school vacation time for a lot of families and people so miss kanzek couldn't be here this evening but she looks forward to starting at the next meeting in july In addition, Mr. Bob Bergeron will not be here this evening. He is also utilizing vacation time. A lot of school administrators are trying to squeeze days in before donating them back to the district because
002of the past year that we had. But Mr. Bergeron will not be here this evening. And also Principal Dean Packard will not be here this evening as well. But Joe Rogalski, his assistant principal, will be here to represent Charlton Middle School this evening for questions or comments. We'll start with the Pledge of Allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Now if we could take a moment for a moment of silence. Thank you. And my limited role here will conclude after this first order of business, and that's a reorganization, specifically identifying a chair for the school committee for this meeting and beyond. So at this point in time, I will entertain
003motions or nominations for the chair of the Dudley-Chalk Regional School Committee for the upcoming 2022-2023 school year. I'd like to make a nomination. Ms. Kathy Carminiani for chair. I'm sorry, do we have a second? I'm sorry. Okay. For Mrs. Pauline O'Coin. Jean, I'm going to decline this year because Kathy would like to crack at it. So thank you for thinking of me. Are there any other nominations at this time? Mrs. Cameron, do you accept the nomination that's been motioned and seconded? Okay, we'll take a roll call vote for the chair of the next W child racial school committee for the 2022 2023 school year I'm sorry. Oh, I'm sorry any discussion For being chair and and really I will definitely look to you for your guidance and and Advice as the year moves forward. Thank
004you any further discussion okay i think it has to be done by roll call vote so if we take a roll call vote and we'll start with miss ellen yes okay mr cameron yes miss o'coyne yes miss terry yes mr lobo yes miss costello so we have a five uh yes and one abstention so congratulations mrs cameron so i'll bring this you can move over here i'll bring this over to you okay all right so so our Our next order of business is a vice chair. Do I hear any nominations for a vice chair? I nominate Jean Costello. Is there a second to that nomination? I would nominate Jamie Terry. I think we're on the Jean. Is that how that goes? I don't know how it works. I'll second. Okay. Okay. And you? I would
005like to nominate Jamie to step into it again. Is there a second to that? Okay. Second by Jamie. Jamie, Terry, do you accept that nomination? I do. okay is there any discussion on that nomination seeing no discussion do we have to roll call these all of them I thought chair you did from there okay all those in favor of Jamie Terry as vice chair of the school committee okay thank you opposed okay and no such and so that's three to two so oh yeah I voted I'm sorry yep four to two all right moving on to secretary and that is miss Glenn okay okay I would entertain a motion to nominate miss Glenn for secretary second any discussion on that no all those in favor okay motion passes congratulations assistant treasurer okay can I have
006a nomination to appoint superintendent LaMarche as the assistant treasurer second any discussion on that all those in favor great and no and that's me too sorry I'm not used to voting now and you know we're all set that's that passes great congratulations we'll move to the borrowing authorization Second Any discussion on that? Okay all those in favor? Okay that carries and now we move on to the Southern Worcester Educational Collaborative Representative Superintendent LaMarche Any discussion? All those in favor? and motion carries okay then we will move on to the committee so school committee subcommittee appointments and we have budget and finance first is there anyone that would like to be on budget and finance I will do that we would love to have you on that and Jamie So Pauline and Jamie and then Caitlin
007Panczak, I talked to her. I think when she gets here to the next meeting, we'll figure out where she would like to be as well. Jamie DeLobo. Did I say that right, Jamie? DeLobo. DeLobo. Okay. Thank you. Moving on to policy review. Great. We have Jean Costello. And anyone else? Jamie, I can... Yeah, go ahead. How many are we required, or can we serve? I don't think there's a typical requirement. I think sometimes you do two if you can, and maybe more if you can. Okay. You usually try not to have more than three people, because once you have four, it can become a quorum. Quorum, okay. Right. Okay, well, why don't we go back to Policy Sub afterwards and see what everybody's interested in. Capital outlay and safety, typically two to three members for
008that. So we have Jamie Terry. and anyone else for capital safety and outlay no okay curriculum teaching and learning yes go ahead so because we have so many capital improvements coming up that are we are faced with in this district this year we may wish to have representatives from both Charlton and Dudley because we have Clear meetings that we're going to need to be out in front of the public in both communities to Explain all the needs we have coming up. So okay. I think that's important and I think you know, I'm not sure Pauline did you have interest in that no I do with the budget I think when this pancic gets here we'll figure out where that lies and then we'll make sure we get you a Dudley representative curriculum teaching and learning
009we can have two to three I don't mind continuing it all three of us okay that gives both and both downs school year calendar review last year we had two I think that's enough yeah it seemed enough does anyone have a I don't mind doing it okay so Jamie and Kelly thank you and then executive session minutes review I'll do that you'll do that Pauline thank you and I can do that as well okay good that'd be great an executive session minutes review did you get that and me anybody else on that okay moving on to negotiations this year we have the nursing contract and I'll do that I did that the last time thank you that would be great and Jamie you want to do that as well yeah do we need three for
010negotiations No that's a small one This year I want to make sure I know Jean you served as our CPAC advisory committee liaison I didn't know if you want to continue serving as that would you like to do that okay does anyone want to be on the CPAC advisory committee as our liaison from our school committee And this year I was wondering if we wanted to have, seeing as we have the capital outlay and we have a lot of different things coming up, I was hoping we could have liaisons to the Troughton Board of Selectmen and the Dudley Board of Selectmen. So is there someone that could be the liaison to the Troughton Board of Selectmen? I think all I envision and tell is really I'm not envisioning you going to another meeting every week
011I think it's me really just keeping those lines of communications open with the chair of that committee and just kind of seeing you know making sure we're all on the same page that's all for Dudley I don't know did you have any interest in that I think Caitlin might have interest in that I'm not sure if she does it if she doesn't I'll do it okay why don't we wait and see and then we'll figure it out okay that sounds good yeah thank you Jean and then the Dudley Charlton Education Foundation we thought that it might be good to have a liaison to there obviously you're not sitting on their board it's just really a point of contact for them Jamie you'd like that does anybody else wanted that okay so Jamie will put you
012on that Jamie Terry I'll write that in Caitlin's with a C yeah thank you yeah I we did not appoint her to anything just yet I don't we could have appointed her lots of things but you know I think she might want to be here so okay I think we've got yes go ahead Mr. Matthew was just raising that to for the borrowing authorization the motion should probably include authorization to borrow as far as language versus just a motion to put Carol Barron in as that person okay could you read the motion as you want it to be stated and then we'll to grant borrowing authorization to the district treasurer I thought we did that no I think we just had that you didn't put the language in about that you're that you're authorizing authorization
013so Jamie you so moved and do I have a second second second by Pauline okay any discussion on that no all in favor okay motion carries thank you no that's great thank you yep thank you that's great Okay. Moving on to approval of minutes, I will just let people know that we do have Mr. Eisenthal coming from Unibank. When he arrives, we are going to move him up in the order, so just so that you know when we might switch the order around a little bit when he comes. So moving to the approval of minutes. Yes. weren't we also gonna do a subcommittee for the evaluations for the superintendent not yet okay no we're gonna Jean we're gonna go through and when we have our training in July we'll kind of look at that further
014all right so moving on to the approval of minutes for the regular meetings of Wednesday June 8th 2022 do I hear a motion to approve the minutes so move so move do I hear a second Okay, is there any discussion or corrections on those minutes? No, okay all those in favor? Okay motion carries We have approval of the warrants. We have warrants going around. So if you want to sign those that would be great I will sign them at the end and Communications does any members have communications? I'm not sure if anybody here is familiar with the break the silence fundraising efforts I suppose they do a presentation to schools for free so the break the silence and motorcycle run that raises funds for schools to have this National Alliance on mental illness come in
015and they do a presentation to the schools it's for ages really 11 to 18 so middle school high school age this fall they're actually bringing in a presentation for parents as well for students K through 12 so I just kind of want to bring that up the presentations about an hour long it can be shortened to 45 or lengthened to like 90 but with all the mental illness concerns for a free program to come in I think it'd be worth looking into so I don't know this is the place to bring that up And I can share the information electronically as well. OK. Anybody else? No? We'll go to the superintendent's report. I don't have a lengthy report this evening, but my entire report is really addressing some of the things that were raised at
016our last school community meeting during public comment at the June 8, 2022 meeting. The Shepparton Regional High School French Program was not eliminated and studies will continue. We recently posted for a Spanish or French teacher for Shepparton Hill, and we do have staff members at Shepparton Hill that can teach French as well that are still in the department. and we hope to fill the position with a quality, qualified educator for the next school year so we have not eliminated French at Sheppard Hill Regional High School. In addition, there were questions about staffing. Aside from attrition, meaning those that retired, the reductions were well-published and shared during our fiscal year 23 balanced budget presentations over several months. The reductions were 1.0 FTE foreign language teacher at Sheppard Hill Regional High School. 1.0 FTE middle school librarian,
0172.0 Shepparton Regional High School teachers, which turns out to be ELA in history, and 1.0 FTE district office data specialists. Again, those were the positions. There are no further reductions from that for fiscal year 23. I know that there were other items that were brought up as potential reductions. Those are not occurring at this point in time. We did have support from our two communities. for the 3.23% budget, which did reduce the number of reductions within our particular budget and district for next year. The increase in school lunch fees was set at the minimum value we can charge as a public school entity. It wasn't set to overcharge our students. It's the minimum if we're going to be in federal reimbursement programs. We do have to set a minimum charge for those. So we took
018the step of raising it to the minimum value, which would be a requirement for charging lunches, but we still hope that the federal government or the state government will come through with free lunches for all students moving forward. But we did set that as a minimum value that we can charge. Through our fiscal year 2023 budget, work with the town of Dudley, it became obvious to the community that the funding structure for the town of Dudley itself cannot support the services of the town to include us as the schools. Therefore, we must begin our work for fiscal year 2024 now to support the town of Dudley and the schools through an adjustment in their fiscal structure. This is commonly known as a potential or an override. this will have to be this will have to
019be a town of Dudley override or town of Dudley vote so I just want to be clear about that there were also because again in that particular point there was the point was that school committee should do an override it's not it's not the school committees vote it's the communities vote for for that particular thing financial structural change there were also several Shepparton regional high school students who expressed concerns with offerings and opportunities at Shepherd Hill next year I emailed each one of them and thanked them for their courage courage and for being courageous and coming to school committee to speak I also spoke with Shepparton regional high school administration and mr. Michael Reznor assistant principal scheduling extraordinaire for Shepparton Regional High School is here to provide more feedback to the committee in response to
020those points that were made by those students which we need to honor and celebrate. So I invite Mr. Reznor up to provide some more information on scheduling of courses. Thank you Mr. LaVarge and like like yourself I'd like to also recognize the students who stepped forward last week or two weeks ago to advocate for themselves and take an active voice in their education it's always encouraging to see young people do that and so while it is regrettable to make decisions to not offer courses in a given school year It's important to point out that those decisions have to be made every year. And like most decisions in our school, those decisions are based on data. And the process includes... meetings with students between themselves and their guidance counselors and the collection of course selections. So
021students select the courses they would like to take and the data gleaned from that is used to develop a master schedule and decide which courses will be offered and which courses will not be offered. In nearly all or in all but one of the cases mentioned by the students last week, the decision was simply a matter of there not being enough interest in the courses to warrant running those classes. Of course, staffing and other resources are not limitless. In the case of astrophysics, we are able to offer a comparable course entitled General Astronomy. This course along with the other science department electives and courses really compromise a very robust selection of courses. The science department offers five AP science courses, four project lead the way courses in biomedical science. They offer all levels of biology,
022chemistry, physics, and environmental science. This coming year we'll be offering marine science, forensics, and general astronomy as well. So again, we are offering a comparable course. I'm happy to take any questions. Any questions? Thank you. Thank you. Does anybody else have any questions for the superintendent? Yeah, I can close my report. Yeah, no, I do. Okay. We'll move on to public comment. It is 7.23. We'll put for now 30 minutes on public comment. Do we have anyone here for public comment? Stephan Sage, Charleston. As of July 1st, the middle schools will be without a librarian, which we're in one of the libraries right now here. So my question is, a number of questions I have is, how is the library going to be utilized by students? Will materials be available to be checked out? Who
023will be processing and checking out the materials? Will new materials be purchased? Who will be making the decisions on new materials to be purchased? Who will be maintaining an orderly library? In other words, returning materials to the correct locations. And if none of those things are going to be able to be addressed by the current staffs at the buildings, are you going to notify families of middle school students that they're best source? for materials will be the Dudley and Charlton Public Libraries. So those are some of my concerns about the fact that a major room in each of the buildings, in my opinion, are not going to be properly utilized and supported. And also in response to a question that came up... Last week, I did some research and could not find anything that substantiated
024the claim that the Democratic Party at their convention supports critical race theory ideas in the public schools. There was one independent online newspaper. that had a article about it, but otherwise I could not find any other newspapers or sources that covered that particular item. So I don't know whether it's an actual fact or fiction. Thank you. Mr. Sage, do you mind emailing... Your questions on the library to Lamar can I give them just a copy? You want it well, that's the one that's got the written question on it's the big size. Okay Is there anyone else that has public comment Swagner Marsha Wagner Dudley, can you hear me? Okay As you probably are all aware, Telegram and Gazette recently reported on school ratings within the state, and this district scored below the top 25. Is
025this a recent decline in ratings, or have we been misled over the years? Notably, a good school system brings residents to a town and in return helps businesses. A robust residential and commercial town brings tax revenue to support a good school system, which ultimately ensures our children the quality education they all deserve. I'm hoping that a study with this committee will comprise a study to improve the district's ratings and figure out why this has happened. Secondly, the so-called woke movement of Marxist critical theory, critical race theory, social and emotional learning, and now the latest, sexualizing young children, shifts a child's emotional focus from concentrating on their basic needs to become a productive individual. The most recent bills passed by both houses in this state by quite a majority on sexual health education and human sexual
026education goes into gender identity, sexual orientation, some even propose curriculum that includes role playing at the higher levels. All of this is promoted by so-called experts, but not parents of the children. Parents are allowed under these bills to withdraw their children without disciplinary action against their child. To me, this is such a joke. If this kind of curriculum is allowed in a classroom, it'll spread like cancer. There was a time when some of this stuff was considered abuse, but instead they're trying to normalize behavior in which parents have no control. and no say. Putting some of these ideas in the kids' heads, again, without parents' control. In order to teach children to analyze and think for themselves, critical theory, equity, diversity, social justice can be countered by writers of productive citizens of all ethnicities and
027color, like, and you guys know I'm a booker, Ben Carson's new book, The name is Created Equal, and it's the painful past, confusing present, and hopeful future of race in America. I hope this gets in our library. Anti-American curriculum such as New York Times 1619 project can also be countered and should be. And there are endless sources. One notably Robert Woodson's 1776 Unites program. But stealing a child's innocence by sexualizing them at a young age can never be repaired. I hope that and I implore this committee to review every aspect of the proposed curriculum in these bills with a fine-tooth comb and also serve their constituents with full transparency. Thank you. Is there anyone else? Thank you very much. We'll close the public comment. We do have Mr. David Isenthal from Unibank here with us
028today. So we're going to move that up to the front of new business. So that is B, subsection C, number two. We'll give you a minute to settle. Okay, thank you. No problem. Madam Chair. No problem. So. Madam chair I am here at the invitation of Vesta Matthew who I think I don't know Rich if you want to talk a little bit about what you're thinking or do you want me to lead off here well I think what we're looking for tonight from school committee is a vote to authorized the issuance of debt for the phase one of the capital projects that we've been discussing for a period of time now. One of the questions that needs to be decided to be put into said motion or voted upon in some way is the actual
029date of the potential election in both towns. for this special ballot question. Again, based on the regional agreement, the school committee can vote to authorize debt but cannot issue debt until it has been approved by a simple majority of the voters in both towns. That doesn't mean a majority in Dudley and a majority in Charlton, but it means a combined majority. So, again, the options are spelled out in my memo. As we met with the different boards of selectmen and finance committees in both communities, they thought that Tuesday, September. Sixth, the day of the primary, statewide primary, made a lot of sense. And there are some pros to that and some cons to that, as you can see spelled out. Another option discussed with the town clerks in line with our original thinking of the
030last week of September or first week of October was Tuesday, October 4th. Really, it comes down to what the committee wants to, how the committee wants to proceed here. Again, you know, because this is a special election on the day of the primary, voters would be given two distinct ballots. One for the statewide election and one for our special election. That can lead to some level of confusion. the other hand the costs for paying the cost of the election itself will be greatly reduced for the district if we hold it on that primary day simply because the infrastructure is already there we're not paying separate poll workers to come out we're not providing a separate meal for them everything is already built into the cake and we just pay for basically the cost of our
031ballot and for mailing and those sorts of things I don't know that we can make the motion until we know the date well I think I think putting a motion out there of the date okay does anyone have a motion for the date make a motion that the date is October 4th special town meeting does anyone want to second that motion okay we'll move to discussion anyone would like to discuss that right I agree on that. Having the primary and our ballot for the Capitol asked can be confusing. It'll be overshadowed a lot by the primary with a lot of political things moving. And if anything, this is a very apolitical, very town decision that needs its own moment to really... Put the gravity of what is really needed for DCRSD not only for the
032building Stabilities and longevity but also for the safety for everyone that is in those buildings. That's all said my hang-up is that it's an extreme expense to our district and we just needed to move forward and reduce staff in certain buildings and So that's that's where I have a really hard time taking on additional costs Any other comments? Yes, go ahead. I understand it's an extra expense, but it's not an expense equal to anybody's pay at DCRSD, and it's a small expense for a $4.7 million ask of Charlton, right around that, and a $2.8 of Dudley. I mean, we're talking about a very small expense if we're really thinking about the larger picture. I'm gonna make a comment my concern is that I had the perception from our Dudley meeting with the Board of Selectmen
033that they truly wanted it on that September 6 date and felt that we would be wasting money by having it any other day and I think that as we are asking our towns for more and more finances I worry about what we're saying to the town choosing to go with a different date and I completely understand what you're saying it's it's a very it's a toss-up I don't it's very hard to say I would agree because Charlton was pretty much saying the same thing they were hoping the board of selectors was hoping it would be on the same to save funding but I do understand how it should be a separate Because, I mean, there's political ramifications, too. Right. Yeah. On having it on that date. And typically finances tend to be less political and
034more straightforward. So it is a very challenging decision for the committee to make. I honestly don't have a recommendation one way or another. I think if the boards of selectmen and fincoms had differing views, that would lead you in one particular direction. I think the message certainly has relayed to me for the Dudley meeting and what I heard in the Charlton meeting was very clearly pointing to the September 6th date. But again, I understand both perspectives. I'd almost say flip a coin, you know, and I don't mean to be blithe about, you know, a $15,000 difference, but it really is that type of decision-making. Either decision is the right one, and both decisions are the wrong ones. Right. I hope that was political enough. Superintendent Lamarche? I reinforce what Mr. Matthews said, but I do
035want to say at the Dudley meeting, my read on it, and I could be completely off, was I thought they thought they had to bear the cost of the election, so that's why they didn't want that. I think they did think that. They thought it was their expenditure, and they didn't realize it's a regional district expenditure for the additional election. I don't know if that helps or hurts the conversation. To be fair to that, though, it's all taxpayer funds. Right. To be fair, so is the state primary. You know, I mean, we are our own municipality, and we just get our funding from the towns, but we're the ones who decide where that budget goes. Can I ask, have we had any conversations with the town clerks to understand? Because I imagine that this is
036going to put a lot of strain on them as well. Yes, I did have a meeting with two town clerks. Oh, thank you. And that's how we determined the Tuesday, October 4th date. Okay. So they were okay with that? They were okay with that. Again, they pointed out the pluses and minuses of each date. I don't think they would desire to run a separate special election, but they certainly pointed out some of the concerns, especially with the multiple ballots for the day of the primary, because there's the Democratic ballot, there's the Republican ballot. you know so again there can be a level of confusion that would occur on the primary day ask a tactical question that maybe you know the answer to mr. Matthew do they all do all ballots get put into the same
037machine even though they're separate election do we have enough equipment to run two different ballots they indicated that they would be able to handle this yes I believe most district votes that have been special elections have indeed been special elections, not scheduled on the same day as a statewide or a federal election. But that's my understanding. I'm not well-versed in what happened in 1973. And I would say like the Dudley town clerk, we haven't had that situation in Dudley recently at all. Any other conversation? Yes, go ahead. So like the political elections, you can't have people standing in front of the door or whatever. So if we were there on the primary day, would we be able to give out information or would we have to stand at a table away from the door as
038well to say, you know, this is what you're also voting on or how would that work? Just to also get the information out, you know, with people coming in so that they know. Yes, go ahead. As in any election, there are representatives for those that are looking for votes. So whatever parameters we'd have to be in, we could fit in those parameters and certainly do that in every way. Another thing that does occur for elections, too, is they do print a sample of the ballots and try to get that out to the community ahead of time as well. But again, it's as Mr. Matthews said, you have two right answers and two wrong answers. I think that's how you saw it. believe so yes can I ask do we know of any do we know
039of any school districts that have done this previously and and had had it done on the same election day as another one like on a state primary I would defer to Mr. Harrison I'll say that this school district is a little bit unusual in that every borrowing authorization has to go to a ballot vote Most other regional school districts in Massachusetts utilize the procedure where the school committee takes the vote authorizing debt and then notifies boards of selectmen within a week and then those boards of selectmen have 60 days to call a town meeting to veto the authorization. That option... 16D of Chapter 71 is not available under your regional agreement. You must authorize debt at a ballot election. And as Mr. Matthews said, it's a vote that would pass with the simple majority of
040those voting, and it wouldn't matter whether you had 70% of the votes coming from Charlton or 70% of the votes coming from Dudley. It's a simple majority of whoever votes in that election. Does anyone else have any other questions that would help them vote on this matter? One more question. Sure. We vote tonight on a date, and that locks the date in. If we voted, say, on October 4th and heard from both boards of selectmen yet again that they were not comfortable with that date and that they wanted us to reconsider, would we have that opportunity? You do have a meeting in July, and you can certainly call a special meeting to reconsider something along those lines if necessary. Yes, I probably missed it. But how much is would it cost if we? Did our
041election ourselves on a different day? My understanding is the cost would be around $20,000 total for the election if we were to hold it on us on a special date about $5,000 if we were holding on the primary day it was October 4th all those in favor of October 4th okay all those opposed okay motion fails I'll entertain a motion for the date to be Tuesday September 6 2022 September 6th okay okay do I have a second great discussion on that All those in favor of having the election on Tuesday, September 6, 2022? Okay. Opposed? Okay. One opposed. Thank you. So motion carries. We will put the motion in for Tuesday, September 6. Am I okay to read the next motion? Yes. So I think the next step would be to actually take the vote
042on the issuance of debt, unless there are any specific questions. We invited Mr. Eisenthal here today for his expertise and recognizing that we have potentially three new members that would have been here this evening. I don't know if there may be any questions from the new members the previous members of the full school committee as well as the capital and school safety committee and budget and finance subcommittee have heard from Mr. Reisenthal but again we wanted to give the opportunity for the new members to have any questions they may have answered why don't I read read the motion and then we'll go to move to discussion after that okay Make I make a motion or I would entertain a motion that the Dudley Regional School the Dudley Charlton Regional School District Known as the district
043hereby appropriates the amount of seven million five hundred and sixty six thousand eight hundred and thirty eight dollars for the purpose of paying costs of roof repairs to the Charlton and Dudley middle school buildings upgrading fire alarm panels and devices throughout the district's facilities replacing and installing cameras and video infrastructure, upgrading radio communications, conducting an architectural review of all six of the district's buildings, and paying related professional fees associated therewith, and also including the payment of all costs incidental and related thereto. To meet this appropriation, the district is authorized to borrow said amount under and pursuant to Chapter 71, Section 16N of the General Laws and the District Agreement as amended, or pursuant to any other enabling authority. The debt authorized by this vote of the committee shall be submitted to the registered voters of
044the district's member towns for approval at a district-wide election to be held on Tuesday, September 6, in accordance with the provisions of Chapter 71, Section 16N of the General Laws and the District Agreement. The warrant calling the district-wide election to be held on Tuesday September 6 in the form presented to this meeting is hereby approved with such changes as bond council to the district shall approve prior to its boasting is there a second second by Miss Ella and now we have a discussion I'll just simply say that I was asked to come here to discuss any to answer any questions that members of the committee would have. I've been in discussions with Mr. Matthew and others about the plan of finance. I think the tentative thought is that given what is likely to be the
045schedule of work to be done, we might be looking at a temporary financing toward the end of this calendar year with a permanent financing to take place toward the end of calendar year 2023. And I've provided some projected schedules, debt service schedules, both aggregate and split by member town for, you know, based on that assumption. So, and otherwise I'm really here to answer any questions that members of the committee have on this borrowing authorization. I do have a question. If our towns do not vote to borrow, to authorize the borrowing, and then we get into the situation where our roofs will fail eventually, at that point, what does happen? Well, so... Just to be very precise maybe over precise madam chair. It won't be the towns making this decision. It'll be the voters Voting in
046the elections residents of both towns voting in the aggregate in a district election but if the if the ballot question fails I think that the the issue is that unless you find some other unless the district finds some other source of financing the answer would be that the district would need to try again and you know perhaps thinking about the fact that costs of roofs and other construction probably are not going to decrease over time so that might be something to be mentioned in the process of having discussions with the voters and the other stakeholders in the district. But this methodology that you're voting on tonight, that is the methodology that's available to you to borrow through the issuance of general obligation bonds. And unless you get some other source of financing, that's really your
047only path at this point. Okay. Thank you. Our consultant has made mention in the past three meetings that I've been to over the past couple weeks that our roofs are already in failure this is already a failure scenario and so we are already at that point where we have damage that has been done to the roof that is irreparable Madam Chair I need to look up to see an example of such Do we have any further discussion? Thank you for your time and coming tonight. Thank you. I appreciate it. No problem. My pleasure. Okay. I'll entertain a motion. No, I'm sorry. We will go forward with the vote on the motion as read. All those in favor? I think that's unanimous. Motion passes. Thank you very much. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you. Thank you.
048Thank you, David. Great. We will go back to the regular start of the new business, the presentation of school improvement plans with our principals. And I'll leave that to Superintendent LaMarche to take over. Madam Chair, in school committee, I'd love to do an introduction. This will be my, again, it's one of those things, it's my third year here, but it's my first time going through this. The school improvement plans for the district as I mentioned when we talked about the district plan We are looking to try to bring everything together We are in kind of what I would call a gap year in that we do have some adjustments to our school improvement plans But we have some new school improvement plans this year as well We have some plans that are on a two-year
049cycle in the folder There were a number of a couple of plans that were labeled as a two-year plan Those are all actually a one-year plan so that we can all be on the same page by the end of next year And tied into our district plan next year And then my understanding is that typically these are presented to school committee for you to take a look at and ask questions if you have questions. They're not a really big presentation, but I have asked the principals to be here this evening to present at least their three goals. We're trying to narrow it down to three goals and present their three goals to the committee and if there are any questions. They are all here to to try to answer your questions regarding that so you'll
050see some connections to our district plan You'll see some connections to prior planning But we are getting to that point where we're starting to bring things together Which is really great as a whole district as you know two towns one district We are getting there, and I really appreciate the incredible Work of our building principals with their school councils to get to this point, so I think the first principal and to come up will be Mr. Stachewski from Dudley Middle School and then he will name his successive principals after that I won't identify people after that so it'll be great to see who he picks next Thank you members of the committee Superintendent Lamache and members of the admin team for allowing me to break the ice. As you know, the school improvement plan is
051a very important document. It lives more than just on the corner of desks. It drives our decisions and it drives our key areas of focus to help make improvements to our school. In looking at the process this year, The way the district plan has evolved, we really tried to focus in on the three target areas within the district plan. And as you see by the presented plan at DMS, we do have three goals to strengthen the continuum of learning, to provide access and opportunity for all students. Our second goal to continue to improve the multi-tiered system of supports that are already in place to improve academic and social emotional outcomes for all students. And finally, goal three is a continued focus on increasing family and community engagement with our school as it is a... a
052public center in the town, a vibrant area of life. So looking at those three targeted areas at DMS. And you can see through the action steps, there are numerous steps that we will obviously be taking, but these targeted areas and the action steps we feel strongly relate to the goals themselves and can allow us to see significant performance gains. in this one-year plan. My school was one with one of the errors on the front cover, but we'll end that in 2023 instead of 2024. But I'll take any questions regarding DMS. Does anyone have any questions? Thank you to you and your team. Thank you, and apologies on the dress I was coaching tonight. Mr. Reznor, I think, to get the high school going. Hello again. So the three goals identified by the high school this
053year, the first goal pertains to communications, community engagement, and partnership. And this goal is really about, again, strengthening our attachments and connections with folks in the community, agencies, businesses, alumni, and such, and bolstering our use of social media to inform. those folks in the community. The second goal pertains to climate, culture, and civility, and this is largely about running wellness events and connections between faculty and staff and the students, as well as implementing some handbook changes to further define what is appropriate in in pro-social behavior versus behavior that is disruptive and Finally the third goal is really the meat and potatoes of what we do and that pertains to curriculum instruction and assessment and goals or action steps within this relate to bolstering our internship programs providing more opportunities for capstone projects vertical alignment with
054our sending schools and programs and opportunities for students in our ILC programs. Can you just let us know what ILC means? Sure. Intensive Learning Center. Okay. Great. Happy to take any other questions. Do you have any specific areas that will also map to our post-grad students? That's a great question. I just realized before I came up here that I ran out of the building and grabbed only the goal page, not the action steps. So I would love to give you a more thorough answer on that right now. That's fine. I bolted this afternoon without that. Not a problem. Okay. Anyone else have any questions? Thank you for your time. Thank you. And who do you choose next? Oh, great. I think I'll honor the assistant principals in the building. Okay. Mr. Rogalski. I appreciate that.
055Good evening, Mr. LaMarche and committee members. As Mr. LaMarche said, I'm here to represent Mr. Dean Packard, who cannot be present today for a family engagement. As Mr. LaMarche also said, the theme is really two towns in one district. So myself and Mr. Packard and Mr. Starczewski and Mr. Tucker worked collaboratively to develop basically synonymous goals with one another because we feel like that is... another thread to really weave this district together so our goal one is to strengthen the continuum of learning to provide access and opportunity for all students I would like to note that the original draft that we provided the school committee had access equity and opportunity for all students however upon further discussion after it was submitted basically equity and opportunity are synonymous terms so we are just going to focus
056on the term opportunity is to strengthen our current system of MTSS, or Multi-Tiered System of Supports, in place to improve academic and social-emotional outcomes for all students. And then again, goal three, synonymous with DMS, is to increase family and community engagement as well. I'm here to answer any questions if the committee has any. Yes, Ms. Costello. Mr. Chair, I have a question about... Let's see, strengthen the understanding and utilization of our DCAP, the district accommodation plan, in which it looks like the person responsible is the principal and special education coordinator staff. You know, it just, can you explain more on the fact that it's not just for special education, that it's for every student to be able to be utilized on the DCAP? Sure so obviously the DCAP is the district curriculum accommodation plan so
057it's an opportunity for all students to have access to the curriculum if they require it or not this way it's to strengthen the understanding really within our general ed staff a lot of times those accommodations get overlooked so we really want to make sure that the staff knows that they can have Those supports in place for the students to access the curriculum seems to be shunted just a special education, but it's for everybody right It is 100% for everybody. It's part of the tiered intervention plan So obviously we want to provide the decap accommodations as a tier one intervention Do the parents have access to the decap yes, so There's a hyperlink in there, which is actually the hyperlink to the web page. I will it is on the website I will note it is
058under the community tab I believe under student services wonderful mm-hmm yep it's accessible perfect thank you so much and the link is there thank you welcome does anyone have any other questions for mr. Gelski thank you thank you mr. Olson former vice Here's mr. Gowski mr. Resnick group wanted to get rid of all the guys first Thank You school committee for the time I am gonna start by saying a little embarrassment as a sixth grade math teacher I cut and pasted a little bit and the math on the front page is incorrect as far as the number of students Just so you know current number of students as of June 1 is 439 which changes that student-teacher ratio to 21.95 to 1. And then on September 1st, anticipated is 440, which will put that at
05920.9. We started our process actually before the goals were introduced and it's ironic that we kind of came up with three goals that kind of align with the proposed district plan. Our first goal is a teaching and learning goal. It is to implement practices that inform instruction and impact achievement for all students. Our council was very firm that they wanted the first goal to be an academic goal. We are an academic institution. They wanted an academic goal. They mentioned all students, so we are looking at ways during our win blocks, which is something that all schools are going to look to do next year, intervention block, where we're going to not only focus on students who may need some extra supports, but also some enrichment for students who could use a little more challenge. At
060the same time, it's a perfect 40-minute block to do that. Second goal is a social emotional learning resources goal. Students and staff will continue to grow the core competencies of social emotional wellness. This goes from not only what we're teaching and what we're using in the classroom, but also really identifying all the resources we have. Sometimes we don't realize what we already have in place. So this is kind of, you know, one of the goals here is to organize that and to provide that to the families. And finally is the Strengthen Family Communication Engagement and Partnership. Staff and administration will strengthen family, community engagement, partnership, and communication. One of my favorite things at the end of the year was the increase in volunteers in the school towards the end of the year. And it was
061absolutely amazing in the communication with the parents and more of a relaxed environment. I learned a lot through that and it was a great experience and hope to continue to grow that throughout the whole year next year Does anyone have any questions? We'll go over to the sister school Kelly True Thank you So my school improvement plan is a lot like the ones you just heard with many of the same goals the first goal is to strengthen the continuum of learning to provide access and opportunity for all students Goal two is to continue to improve MTSS, to improve academic and social emotional outcomes for all students. And then the third goal is to increase family and community engagement. Prior to COVID, we did a lot of family and community engagement nights, curriculum nights, where families
062could come in, access the school, do some academic things that would be fun. Last year, we did the first one with reading with the Rams, but that was just a small kind of... get our feet wet with having people back in the school type of event, and I'd like to do a lot more of those to get more volunteers into the school and also to provide some parent workshops, which my school council has been helping me work to develop and look at doing some workshops that cross parents and students. So there's a through line for that, and we're thinking about technology and phones, which is so fun. Love that and then the other two goals align with much of what we were hearing already with improved outcomes for all students Does anyone have any questions
063from us true were you able to get your book? Vending machine yes, it's going to be coming this fall. I just put a newsletter together that said we made it We actually were able to do it, and I'm so excited We were able to raise all the funds it is going to be coming this fall I'm trying to think of how to unveil it. Maybe do a little ribbon-cutting ceremony. I don't know we'll see But we're very very excited. I can't wait congratulations. Thank you very much. It's exciting How's everybody doing? So for Mason Road School, I am one also that has the error for the timeline, so we are only a one-year plan. And we are very much in line with a lot of what you've heard tonight, especially supporting the district plan. So
064our goal number one is just to continue to work and implement to support the district plan with partnerships from administration, teachers, and support staff. And that's just going to be to keep building on the continuing of learning to provide access and opportunity for all students. We are going to continue to work on our efforts with social-emotional learning. I know in past years there's been an implementation of the Choose to be Nice program, which is wonderful and lovely, but I think that we really need to look at a school-wide, classroom-wide program that we can all do together. I personally like to tweak kind of what the Choose to be Nice program was with principal awards, so we're going to kind of keep trying to build all those things by catching kids doing the right things. making
065great choices. And then lastly, one of the things, and I will say this is in accordance with the KHB fundraising policy, I'd like to work on... just building fundraising opportunities for Mason Road School whether it to be to replace some playground equipment or anything that the district cannot necessarily have provide money for but we we want it so we'll certainly take take a look at that it's a goal does it mean it's gonna happen maybe some maybe not all but maybe a little bit of effort so Does anyone have any questions? Thank you Mrs. Acosta And Mrs. Lilly I think I do work well going last because I am the lucky one that inherited an existing school improvement plan. My predecessor, Ms. Pacheco, and her school council created a three-year plan, which they started last
066year. And what you have from us this year is updates. The goals focus on... the implementation of literacy curriculum. The first goal is to work collaboratively with the four district elementary schools, the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, and the Director of Curriculum to establish and implement a literacy curriculum that sets our students up for reading success. Obviously, CKLA has been a big part of that this year. The second goal is Charlton Elementary School will develop a schedule for assessments and create a data document to share this information with parents. sharing with parents portion is still to come and um gulfcrete is charlton elementary school provide continuing support for social and emotional development our school council had a lot of new members this year so it was really interesting for us to shepherd the vision
067of our predecessors and have that as a view into the the town and the school that was really nice for me i can't can't lie but i'm also looking forward to creating plans that align with the rest of the district questions Does anyone have any questions? Lovely, thank you. Thank you. And just for the public's knowledge, where would the public find these posted? I haven't looked but they should be on their school web the school pages perfect and I would just make the suggestion I noticed in some of these that it had a lot a lot of acronyms acronyms that we may all understand like IST and things like that that maybe we just need to spell those out for families so that they know all the good things that we're doing Okay. Moving on
068to the report of the Director of Finance and Operations, Budget and Finance Subcommittee, and the Capital Outlay Safety Subcommittee. Director Matthew and Chair Terry. So first, in terms of the memo to school committee, we do have two donations. One was late breaking and did not make the memo. Charlton Middle School received a donation from the Music Parents Association of New Risers for the show choir, valued at $13,200. Did you say Charlton? Yes. Do we need to make a motion to accept that? Yes Any discussion? All those in favor? Motion carries Additionally Heritage School received $1,000 from the ROS charitable fund from the overlook for four scholarships to Camp Foskett for four families Any discussion? All those in favor? motion carries next is the French River education the FREC bids. So posted on the online drive
069for school committee was the full list of the bids and the items and the results. These bids are done once a year and they provide us with a common procurement with a number of other communities. The number of communities may vary depending on the bid. So some people may participate like us in all of them. Some may only participate in a couple of them. But again, you did have the results for school supplies, computer supplies, custodial supplies, athletics, and then specifically for food service, the bread and rolls, the market basket, milk and dairy, and non-food paper goods. There's a historic joke involved here that there are no free samples of ice cream, unfortunately. So I will continue that tradition on this year. maybe one year we'll actually be lucky and have the ice cream truck
070here just for this purpose but that's not this year do we need to make a motion for that yes it's up to the committee as to whether it wants to make a motion for each individual bid separately or just do one one motion for all that would make the most sense so moved I'll make a motion to approve the front bids do I hear a second second second by Miss Terry any discussion Wonderful. All those in favor? Great. Motion carries. Thank you. And obviously we've just concluded a pretty large discussion about the debt. Again, we've been to the boards of selectmen in each community last week. We held a community forum here last evening with some people in attendance. And we have another scheduled for next Tuesday at Dudley Middle School at 6 p.m. to
071review our capital plan and answer any questions from the community that they may have on it. Mrs. Terry, I don't know if there's anything else that you'd like to add to that? Sure. I had been asked personally if this information is on the website, and so I did verify that, yes, the slides from last night are on the website, and the meetings were taped in Dudley and in Charlton. And so you can see the Board of Selectmen meeting and also the Finance Committee in Charlton. which the Board of Selectmen attended last Wednesday, and there is a taped recording of the meeting last night. It is yet to make the website. However, in the next couple of days, it will make the website. So for the members of the public that were unable to attend, it
072may be up there right now. Thank you very much. You have to go into Venmo? Not Venmo. Wait a minute, is this how we're fundraising? Okay, so it is on there now, so any of the members of the public that were unable to attend last night. Please attend or, you know, in your own home and look and listen because there's a lot of information. Our roof consultant was excellent, and I think he answered a lot of questions that I had heard from the public already. So we would encourage everybody to be informed on what we're going to vote on on September 6th. just to follow up so there is a page with all of the capital information the roof report from last year the presentations that we've done at the boards of selectmen in the
073community forums additionally the link to the Vimeo page will will go there as well as a separate link and there will be an email address if the public has questions that they can email us great anything else Please just keep getting the word out. Yeah, and I must say I want to thank Ms. Costello and Ms. Terry for continuously promoting that over Facebook and different media sources. I'm not sure if you two did or not. I'm sorry. But I appreciate it. And the more we can keep promoting it to our towns, the better we're going to be. Wonderful. Is that it for you? Yes, thank you. Okay. Wonderful. We'll move on to the report of the Assistant Superintendent for Teaching and Learning, Dr. Ackerman. Thank you, Madam Chair, members of the committee. I have a
074brief report this evening. To update from a previous item, Dr. Katie Novak, who was previously scheduled to join our Curriculum Subcommittee for Teaching and Learning on June 13th, will now join our subcommittee on Thursday, June 23rd, to offer a presentation on Universal Design for Learning. for the subcommittee and engage in a conversation with members of the subcommittee. This meeting is going to run at 3.30 via Zoom and it will be recorded so that folks that are unable to see it will be able to view it at a time that works for them. Wonderful. Thank you. Does anyone have any questions? I guess just my follow-up to last time was if she was going to be able to put any slides from her presentation. I think she may have slides for tomorrow, but they will be
075in the recording. So any materials that she presents will be up on the website, so people will be able to get the same information that we get at the meeting. Wonderful. Any other questions? No. Moving on to the superintendent's evaluation, I'm going to pass that to Ms. O'Coin. Okay. Now we have the form from DESE, end of cycle summative evaluation report, and this form was given to the superintendent. He did put in his goals and all his evidences, and then each member did receive a form, and they did their evaluation. And I compiled them and got an average. There were six members that evaluated the superintendent and I put them all together, got the averages for each rating. So the first on DESE is the step one, assess performance on superintendent goals and goals for
076the standard one, curriculum, planning and assessment. Mr. Lamache's goal underneath it is the district will continue to systemically move towards the adoption of high quality instructional materials that are aligned with the Massachusetts curriculum framework supported by an academic research base like the nationally established edreports.org. or the Massachusetts Established Gallery. And the ratings were exceeded, met, significant progress, some progress, did not meet. And the average was he did meet the goal. So he got met on that one. The next standard, and it's standard two, is teaching all students. And Mr. Lamache's goal, the district will develop at least five professional development opportunities for staff to meet the needs of all learners to increase student achievement and assess. Standard two, the progress rating, he got met on that. That was the average. So he met that goal.
077Goals for standard three. family and community engagement. The district will engage families in the community in a meaningful and beneficial ways to cultivate an inclusive caring and supported district environment. And the rating, the combined rating is significant progress. Goal of standard four, professional culture. His goal go for the district will use district-wide information to determine if the current policies practices and outcomes are the most essential priorities for students and He did get significant progress on that one. So those were the four standards that he's rated on then Curriculum standard one, curriculum planning assessment. This is now an overall rating on the standards. And his overall rating was proficient. All members gave him proficient, and it came out it's proficient. And the next one is standard two. And that's teaching all students. And there's an overall
078rating there. And it was proficient again. And I didn't tell you the ratings. There are four ratings here. Exemplary, proficient, needs improvement, unsatisfactory. If you do, if any members give needs improvement and unsatisfactory, then they have to write a comment on that. And standard three, family and community engagement, and the overall rating, again, was proficient. We have the last standard. And the last standard was professional culture and commitment to high standards. And Mr. Lamasch got proficient. So if anyone would like to see Mr. Lamasch's evaluation, they have to call the central office. They're welcome to make an appointment to look at it because it is a public record. And then there was the last step is an overall summative performance. That was proficient too. That's the overall of the whole evaluation. And that was it.
079Mr. Lamar. Okay. Any questions or anybody want to make any comments? Does anybody want to read anything that they wrote? Before we go into our executive session we'll go through our next meeting dates school committee meeting is Wednesday July 13th at Shepherd Hill at 7 p.m. that will be a workshop based and we're still working on the format of that I believe right no sorry I emailed Stephen, Stephen LaMarche and Pauline O'Coin because it was finalized then. So it's the MASC representative is Jim Hardy who will be coming out. It'll be done mostly in a roundtable kind of format. So it'll be a little bit more low key, a little bit more conversational. He will of course, he'll bring in the handouts and stuff, but he'll also have a PowerPoint. So if anybody does come
080for the public that wants to be part of it, it'll be up on the screen so that way they can follow along too. Wonderful, I'd just like to get a copy of that so we can, if there's anything additional that you might want to add. Great, okay. My only question because this will be again first time for me is there any traditional items for the developing the agenda for that meeting or is it explicitly just the workshop that's all that's because there is a reason why I'm asking that question Yes and I think I would I need to go over what the workshop has the information about the workshop to be able to answer that question to you Okay. And the reason why I'm asking that question is because administrators are trying to take vacation
081time. So typically stuff goes in on a Friday before. That would be Friday, July 7th, 8th, July 8th. And the meeting is the following Wednesday. So some people may be on vacation and not get, if there are traditional requirements of the agenda and all that kind of stuff. So that's why I'm asking that question. Well, do you think there'll be pressing things that you will have to do? at this at this time there were probably a couple dr. Ackerman is going to ask if we can put on out-of-state field trips you know things like that I would be skipping a regular scheduled meeting I would think that we may have a shortened light meeting but certainly not something that we would need to have every administrator at but the administration could attend if they want
082absolutely yeah Okay. Yeah, I was just out. I just again. I've not done that here. So I don't know right what it looks like I don't know either so Okay, and we'll move to budget. Let's say budget and finance subcommittee. That's too Yes, go ahead. No, go ahead. I'm sorry. Don't wait. No, it's fine The budget and finance subcommittee to be determined video conference policy in review is to be determined the curriculum subcommittee for teaching and learning like we said it's June 23rd which is tomorrow at 3 30 via video conference and capital outlay safety committee is that to be determined as well it is because we wanted to wait to see who was going to have interest in that committee okay and just going back to Jean's workshop. I do remember we had a
083workshop once and this is all we did Jean. We during a school committee meeting and we started it a little bit earlier. We did it. We started like at six o'clock. We did the workshop then we went into the this way. You're not going to be at the other end if it's going to be long. So, I mean, if people agree to it, but I remember that. We did have that. That was the one with Tracy Novak, wasn't it? No, this is a while ago, but we did have one with Tracy Novak, too. I don't know if that was as long. I don't think hers was that long. But we did have a regular workshop once. Does our presenter need any, our MASC representative? Does he wish to start earlier? I originally told him 7.
084He seemed good with that because he is the one coming from the Cape Cod area. So I think 7 o'clock was actually pretty good for him. But I mean, if all we have is for the possible agenda of school committee business, I mean, if it's out-of-state field trips, that really does not take very long to just kind of rubber stamp it and move on. We could stop the regular meeting Do we wish to start the regular meeting at 630 that night? I think because I think that makes sense Okay, I think because that is outside of the policy of starting at 7 we need to have a two-thirds vote on that So I would Make a motion to start the school committee meeting for July 13th at 630 at Shepherd Hill Wonderful A second Okay,
085any discussion? Okay, all those in favor? We've met the two-thirds great so we will start the school committee meeting at 630 wonderful okay yes We are still listing video conference it is set to expire at the very end of July July 19th we're paying very close attention to it to see if there's any changes to it but right now that is something that will expire as we try to schedule some meetings I think there was a July an actual July 31st Yeah, I think July 18th or something like that somewhere in there. Yeah, it's changed so we're or or that's the official one But we're trying to pay attention to see if it will continue. Hopefully there's enough school committee school committees out there that Have written letters to the legislators to ask for it
086to continue. Okay, okay Oh and or public other public boards are not just school committee a board of selectmen finance committees because it's worked extremely well It has it definitely has okay as far as future agenda items we have the school committee summer workshop in July our district plan presentation in August our student handbooks in August are you still okay to do that in August recommendations from there we can still get it in time for the start of school okay wonderful and then our superintendent schools in September so is there any other future agenda items that you would like yes In July, correct? Okay. Wonderful. All right. Moving on to... I will entertain a motion to enter into executive session to discuss strategy with respect to non-union contracts. If an open meeting may have a
087detrimental effect on the bargaining of non-union personnel, the athletic director, assistant principal, director of finance and operations, superintendent, or litigating position of the public body and the chair so declares, only to reconvene into regular session to take votes if necessary and to adjourn. Okay. Do I hear a second? Second. Okay. All those in favor? Oh, roll call? Yeah, roll call. Sure. Yeah. She just said that. Yeah. Jamie? Jean? Yeah. Jamie? Yeah. Pauline? Yeah. I'd say yes. Yes. Yes. Okay. We are adjourned into executive session.