MRSD School Committee Meeting 3/9/2026

001It's very interactive. As soon as live stream is going. We're feeling recording. Say it again. Because it's not in the budget. Hi, good evening. I'll call to order the March 9th uh Nashoba Regional School District School Committee meeting at 7:05 p.m. Um I'm going to save my remarks actually for after comments from the audience. Um but can I first get a show of hands on who is going to provide a public comment tonight? Just keep your hand up. People behind them. Okay. So folks, we we have about 25 people that want to comment in about 30 minutes. Um I will ask people to keep their comments to things that haven't been said yet. Uh I apologize. I want to give everybody as much as a voice as possible tonight. But we do have work to

002do tonight and I suspect that we have quite a bit of deliberation on the topic of the budget. So um I'm going to hold everybody to 60 seconds. I know that's not a lot. Um we've heard a lot about the various topics that I'm guessing we're going to hear a lot about tonight. And so please share uh new perspectives with us. New thoughts with us. Uh please don't be repetitive. Please don't repeat what was said at the last meeting. Um and unfortunately, I don't want to be rude, but I will cut people off at 60 seconds. Including the students tonight. Um I hate doing that. I love hearing from the students. But you we just need time to be able to deliberate tonight. So I hope you guys can respect that. Um if you haven't

003signed in, there's a sign-in sheet on the table when you come up. Hopefully, hopefully, that most people have signed in already. Um one thing we could do is we could put the sign in sheet on the back table. So, everybody else can sign in while you're waiting to speak. And then, one by one, if you want to form a line, uh we can do that. So. Any particular order? We can start with anyone who wants to speak first. I need to like check my name to sign in. All right. You will, yeah. Afterwards, if you can put your name on. I'll do that when I go. When you When you come up to the podium, please just introduce yourself and let us know what town you're from. Um Krista Howie, I have been teaching biology

004and forensics at Masco for 10 years. Um I will skip through some of this, obviously. I worked real hard to keep it to 2 minutes, but now we're down to one. Um so, hopefully, I can just leave this here, so you can maybe read the rest of it. Um So, I'm going to stick to the nitty-gritty here. Um part of my frustration um comes from what I think are just such obvious considerations that are being ignored, essentially. Um so, I propose that the assistant superintendent of finance position is eliminated altogether. Uh we are a district of one building with 1,500 students. We do not need the same amount of administrative positions as districts who oversee several schools. I saw some of the cross a Google Drive, actually, full of Masco School Committee documents. Uh and

005there's one called the DBI budget implementation. And it said the superintendent is responsible for the development of a sound system of business management, ensure effective and efficient use of funds, provide for accounting, yada yada yada. Um so, I believe that our new superintendent would be able to meet those expectations with the support that's currently in the finance position. So, we're at 60 seconds. So, I've just two more things. The The world language department head should not be rehired, period. That's a waste of $140,000. Um and then I have some numbers that I crunched, but I think the most powerful is in the district-wide operating budget uh conferences and seminar line item. In FY25, there was a budget of $37,000. Actual expenditure was 24. So, we had 13,000 extra dollars. The year before that line item

006went up to six $1,000. We're going to ask you to move on. I'm I apologize. I don't mean to be rude. It's taking away from other people's time, too. I'm going to be equitable tonight. Shel Bonner, resident of Topsfield. Um I have a several questions on page 14 and 15 of the FY27 preliminary budget. Why does it say that the business income side and then salaries are going up 55.6% or 15 over $15,000 and the professional salaries are going up by 50.8% or over almost $150,000? This isn't happening in other departments. Why is it happening in this one? Why wasn't it indicated in any of the slides? Um just to finish Chris's point, why are we jumping from $24,000 for professional development to 2 years later $64,000? That's ridiculous when there's teachers being cut. Um

007in terms of combining arts department and music, there is no guarantee since it's a combination and it's a new job that you will hire either of those people, which the fact that we brought in Jared Cassidy and there might not be a job or that Stacy Mann 9 might not have a job is ridiculous. Um and those are the two departments that have the most outside of school time which they presented to you guys in the fall. Yeah. I'm here as a parent of two students. One is a senior and who's applying for colleges and one is a sophomore who would be impacted what we have a Chinese program cut, right? I think the uniqueness of Chinese language is not only helping my kid with college applications but also preparing him for real world scenarios,

008right? I personally in my work life where I I myself know nine languages. And three in high proficiency and six in multiple reading levels of proficiency. Having known multiple languages, I was able in my real world in my work life save some good money for my clients almost worth of quarter million dollars. So not only learning it and using it for college applications but there's real world applications to all of that. I did see some ideas floated for an online program. I feel like having a teacher present and an online program there are many deficits in there. Just no answers of speaking Chinese language. For example, I was trying to speak a certain word in Chinese which actually if you say it in one way it means stupid and the other way if you say

009it the right way it means house. I mean that's clearly a big difference which would be lost if it was an online program. I feel we definitely need a teacher for that. Thank you. Hi, I'm Amy Hsieh. I am the mother of a sophomore student studying Chinese. Um I really want to talk about the the what matters most for kids is who's in front of them. Who are their teachers? Who are the people that are working with students directly? Um, they shape the daily experiences of our kids. And it's important to examine the overall structure of the district when making financial decisions. Um, I don't think many residents realize that we are pretty unique in um Massachusetts with this superintendent who oversees and superintendent offices that oversee Masconomet. And then we have a whole separate

010superintendent with all those administrative positions overseeing the six elementary schools. I'm a teacher in Reading Public Schools. I've been there for 25 years. We have one superintendent. We serve 150 more students than Masconomet combined with the Tri-Town elementary schools. They have half of half the footprint of administration. It's obscene and I don't think that people understand what's happening and we're taking away student-facing positions. Chinese, which makes Masco stand out. We're even talking about this without And I don't think you guys can make that decision unilaterally and I don't know why that decision was made to begin with that we would have these two superintendents with full staff, but that needs to be reexamined. And I think it needs to be made really public. So, please talk it up to anybody because I don't think people

011realize Good evening, School Committee members. My name is Samira Lekic. I'm a junior here at Masco and I've been taking Chinese for the past five years. It is clear that the reason why the Chinese program is at risk of being cut in the first place is due to its low enrollment rate. To address this, too, I created a slideshow about my experience in the Chinese program and the Chinese course at Masco Middle and High School. Along with my classmate Zoe Chan, we plan to speak to sixth graders at Tri-Town elementary schools to encourage enrollment. Um, unfortunately, I couldn't print out the copy of it, but I did email a PDF of the slideshow to all of you this morning, so I hope you will have time to see that. I strongly believe speaking to these

012upcoming seventh graders will positively impact enrollment, eliminating any reason to cut the Chinese program. Thank you. Hi. Um I'm Katie Towns from Topsfield. I don't have anything prepared, but I'm a mother of a ninth grader currently in the Chinese program. Um I was very disappointed to hear that that's being considered to be cut. Um I don't think the alternative of online language learning is at all appropriate. Um I I just don't think it's a good idea, and I think you guys should try to find other ways to save money. Um I'm also not happy to hear about the cuts for middle school. Um I have a fifth grader who's going to be coming, and I think that's going to harm the school big time. So, I hope you reconsider that. Thank you. Good afternoon. My

013name is Herman Lehman Pricky, and I have a daughter uh Ella studying in Chinese class, and I'm here to support that. So, I wrote a little speech. The largest economy in the world is China, and each year that goes by, the USA lags behind in more ways than one. Cutting the Chinese program that gives students an early competitive edge for the future, and the ability to understand a language spoken then by more than 1 billion people is not setting up the US for future business or geopolitical success. By removing the Chinese program from our school, it will leave students from Hamden from being able to further their Chinese studies, and by the time they reach college, it'll be too late for them to continue their expertise in the language. We have basically we've built a

014bridge, and now we're taking it away from people who are leaving middle Hamden coming into our school. A school is not only a place of learning, but also a place that helps shape and define the characteristics of a human being and the ultimate success of a nation. Reducing programs like this undermines all of the above. Thank you. I'm I'm John Meyer. I'm I am on the Boxford School Committee, but I am here in my personal capacity. I will just say I think it's important to note that um regionalization was studied at the elementary school level and I would point people to that uh if they're interested in the reasons uh it's set up this way. Um the things that I wanted to add that probably haven't been talked about before I haven't heard in the

015deliberation. I'd just like to hear a little bit of dialogue about you know what is our vision? Like what is the level of service we want to be? Do we want to be the town that is upset about not having a top-tier education and we're fighting for it or do we want to be the town that that cuts taxes this all a math problem? Sort of without regard of of what the impact is on that education. If the cuts can be done and still provide the level of service that the towns expect, that's great. Just Just discuss it and communicate it. Uh it seems like only the discussion is about hitting a target number. Um the other uh thing I wanted to add is I haven't heard any discussion about the director of teaching and

016learning. If we are um looking for new things that we haven't discussed um a model that is maybe more efficient would be to to look at whether that is the most efficient uh to fit our needs. Thank you. Good evening, School Committee. My name is Mason Carboni and I'm an eighth grader here at Masco. Um I'm here today to urge you not to cut a team from the middle school. Uh I would like to start out by saying that I have really enjoyed my time at Masco. The past few years have been really some of the best for me. One of the things that has affected me the most are my teachers. They've not only educated me, but I've been lucky enough to be have a special bond with them. And through them I've learned

017crucial skills in today's world including how to participate in local government and how to speak to an audience. They've also inspired me to stand up for what I believe in, which is part of why I'm here speaking to you now. I've been incredibly proud to be a student here and I take this pride home with me each day to share with my family. Specifically with my younger brother who will be here in just two short years. I'm here today because I care deeply about his education as a middle schooler. If you cut a team as planned, the class size would skyrocket the class sizes would skyrocket up to 27 students per class, which has been shown to decrease learning for students. According to the Brookings Institution, a decreased classroom size can increase learning by up

018to three in school months. But of course, people are more than just test scores and wages to be paid. By cutting this team, you will also be sacrificing kids deeper connections with teachers. You'll be sacrificing the little moments that can make or break a child's view of education as a whole. I urge you to consider the following. How far do the benefits of Chromebooks and Yonder Pouches really go? And do they outweigh a more individualized and connected education for students? Yep. Hi, good evening all. Jess McDonald's from Boxford. I'm going to cut a lot of this because everyone kind of said a lot of what I was going to say, but I do have an eighth grader who is in Chinese, absolutely adores the program. And just want to say that language education is a

019fundamental part of a well-rounded academic experience that I think we all appreciate. The idea of taking away a language that student has been studying for two plus years is just simply not okay. Smaller class sizes lead to improved test scores, better measured results of students engagement, and higher educational attainment. The consideration of removing a whole team at Masco resulting in larger classroom sizes simply not okay. I I go everything Lisa and Jess said about that. And potential cuts to our social studies program, not okay. And to level set, our Tri-Towns community's biggest asset is the education of our students. I don't just say that as a mom who loves her kids and cares deeply about many of the kids in the well-being in the Tri-Town community. I say that as a homeowner. Deterioration of the

020school the students middle school and high school education will have a profound negative effect on our community. The less ideal of an education that Masco can provide our learners, the more students will be moved to private schools along with the funding. You know how that goes. Then there's more cuts, less funding, more students go, and then what do we end up with? A sub-par education, and who would want to pay the tax that we pay in the community for that? I don't mean to be an extremist, but this is what we can see happening in the years to come if we make a cut. While I won't pretend to have the answers, I would ask that the school committee go back and re-evaluate any budget crisis that we're experiencing. I'd also ask how the school

021school committee and Masco parents committee or any other kind of parent organization coordinate and communicate to fundraise opportunities to supply these Chromebooks and these phone case things that I think are completely unnecessary, but that's irrelevant. Um so that we can raise money um out outside if we need to fund anything that's not directly curriculum-related. I might need to move on to the next speaker, please. Thank you. Hi, my name is Liz Sun. I'm a certified educational counselor and Masco graduate of class of 2008. I have worked in education for nearly a decade as a teacher, then curriculum designer, and now as an independent educational consultant helping high school students across the US find college options both here and abroad. It is unequivocally clear that high quality teachers is a crucial component to having a functional

022and thriving educational system. When examining student academic performance in middle school and high school, it is there is nearly a 10% increase in student academic performance when exposed to high performing well-qualified teachers. There is also a high correlation that links quality teachers to bachelor degree attainment. Reductions in effective teaching capacity would therefore likely weaken Masconomet's college enrollment outcomes. Cutting history will have a direct impact on our students if they choose to pursue higher ed. History and social sciences are not nice to have electives. They are core engines of college, career, and civic readiness. Reading shows Research shows that when history is taught with evidence-enriched content, reading Students' writing, reading, and civic engagement measurably improve. The Chinese language programming that Masconomet Regional School offers allows students to stand out in the college application process. I'd now

023like to take a moment to highlight the importance of the Chinese language in the world we live in. Yeah. Ma'am, we're out of time. I'm sorry. You can leave it with us if you'd like, Phil. My name's Anthony Carboni. I have uh my son Mason, who is an eighth grader now, and my son Julian who will be rising as a middle schooler shortly. Um I You want a different perspective? Here's a different one. Um this is being treated as a business, which I can understand. So, let's talk about it like a business, right? We have an entire level of Let's call them C-suite executives, and we have a pile of individual contributors that are all sitting here. When you get rid of the individual contributors, there's nothing left to contribute. We are the We're the

024taxpayers. We're the customers. Our students are the end users, right? So, let's cut the fat at the top, and let's not cut the individual contributors. There has to be a better way, and as a business, it seems like a really poorly run plan. Good evening. My name is Rose Leon, and for I've been in living in Boxford for the last like about 13 years, and growing up in Boxford, I've loved it. However, growing up, I used to get teased a lot for being Chinese. I've been asked, "Do I speak English? Do you speak chopsticks?" And a lot a lot of other uneducated um responses came from my peers. And obviously as kids, I don't think you're meaning to hurt my feelings, but it all stems from lack of understanding other people's cultures. And this Chinese

025class gives that education to kids. It teaches you about the culture. It teaches you, if you're from that culture, like the love of your culture. Other people who are not Chinese or Asian to appreciate your culture. And just build so much more understanding people. And as we go into the future in our jobs, we want students, we want these people to be understanding of other people's cultures. And be able to appreciate others for their differences. And know there are similarities between and not to bring people down because of things they can't control like their culture. And nobody should feel less because they're different race or culture. Thank you. Good evening, Master School Board. My name is Kaylin Zhao and I am a sophomore here at Masterman. I'm here to talk about the proposal to cut

026the Chinese program. My peers have already shared their voices with you. They have spoken to you about how impactful the Chinese department is. And even presented solutions to help increase enrollment numbers in the program in the future. But I'm here today to speak from the perspective of a Chinese American student raised by two immigrant parents. When I was a kid, I never had anyone to share my culture with outside of my family. I was always one of the only Chinese kids no matter where I went. Other kids made racist comments towards me and whether they meant it or not, it hurt. It hurt because I was always proud of my culture, but it seemed like no one around me wanted to celebrate it with me. They That changed when I got to Masterman and I

027was given the opportunity to sit in a whole class of people who wanted to share my culture with me. I've made such close bonds with my classmates and teachers and I'm forever grateful with for the companionship that the Chinese department has provided me. But I I want to continue the to experience it throughout high school as well as allow incoming students to feel that sense of belonging. The Chinese department is the only representation I have in the entire school, but it also encourages people of other Asian cultures to express themselves. My class, along with the whole program, is filled with persevering, accepting, and kind students, and it would be unfair for any of them to lose the opportunity that they were granted back in seventh grade. Taking away the Chinese department would take away all

028the wonderful things that it offers, and if it seems small to you, it means the world to us. So, I, along with all of my classmates, urge you to think this over once more and preserve this community that we are all so honored to be a part of. Thank you for your time. Good evening everyone. My name is Weston Chapin. I'm currently a sophomore in college and I've continued my Chinese learning in college. When I heard the the proposal alternative to keeping the Chinese teaching position was to move the program entirely online, I was concerned. As someone who experienced online learning during my freshman year of high school during COVID, I saw firsthand how much it limited learning compared to in-person instruction. Even in relatively straightforward subjects, engagement dropped, participation was lower, and it was

029far harder to stay motivated and truly understand the material. Now, consider applying that model to Chinese, which is one of the most difficult languages for English speakers to learn. Chinese relies heavily on pronunciation and constant feedback from a teacher to correct mistakes. Without the real-time guidance, it becomes much harder for students to develop the fundamental needs to actually speak and understand the language. I also have had several friends who have completed entire online Chinese programs and have criticized their effectiveness. Language also depends heavily on interaction between students. In my Chinese classes, some of the most valuable practice came from speaking with my classmates, practicing dialogue, and working through mistakes together. Moving Chinese to an online platform largely eliminates that kind of interaction and turns what should be an active learning environment into something much more

030passive. While online tools can certainly be helpful supplements to learning, they should not replace teachers. If the goal is for Masco students to truly learn Chinese, an in-person teacher is essential. Thank you. Good evening, members of the School Committee. My name is Carl Ferran, and I'm a ninth grader at Masco. Spoke to you here last Monday, and I'm here to speak to you again in favor of the Chinese program at Masconomet. Like my peers, I have studied the language and culture extensively over my six years in the program. That being said, I was very close to not having done so. I distinctly remember at the end of sixth grade, when I was picking my language, that there were three options: Spanish at a quote one-star difficulty, French at a three-star difficulty, and Chinese at a

031five-star difficulty. When my parents When I suggested the idea of taking Chinese to my parents, all they saw was the five-star difficulty. They did not see a potential future for me in the program. They warned me and tried to persuade me to not take to take another language. It was a very rare occurrence. I am extremely glad that I ignored them on this topic. Although I do believe that Chinese is a somewhat difficult class, the five-star difficulty ranking is not representative of what the Chinese program is. It is not a more difficult class than French or Spanish. It is simply different. The Chinese program at Masconomet is, I believe, most hindered by the arbitrary difficulty placed on it. As a community, we at Masco must avoid the decisions that attribute difficulty with difference. Please do

032not take away the program that makes Masconomet school that it has always strived to be. Thank you. Good evening, members of the School Committee. My name is Bella DeCarlo and I'm a senior at Masconomet. Reviewing non-instructional expenses such as conferences and travel, administrative consumables, consulting services, and unused budget surpluses could reveal areas where small adjustments might close the gap. If the Chinese program or any academic program is cut, it can be extremely difficult and expensive to restart. In the long run, rebuilding a program often costs substantially more than maintaining it. The Tri-Town community demands to see the itemized expenses because we don't know what the money has been spent on. As a result, the current proposed cuts are very questionable at best. It's a common It is common sense that the academic programs and teachers

033are what make a school excel and that they need to be preserved and protected. But we are losing the very core and foundation of Masco, a program that offers students with advantages and lasting benefits at multiple levels. The teachers who pour their very heart and soul into their students. Such damage, if and when happens, is irreversible. We demand answers. Why do you prefer a department head over a program? Why are you not looking at non-student facing areas such as Masco's administration team that has grown so top-heavy? Why are we having positions that do duplicate work? Before cutting a program that provides cultural learning global opportunities for students, I hope the committee will consider whether adjustments like these could help address the budget challenges while preserving important academic opportunities for students. Thank you for your time.

034Good evening members of School Committee. My name is Eileen Masco Chinese teacher at a high school. Tonight I'm here again with my students to urge you to vote to conserve the program. At tonight's meeting, I just want to share with some of the many voices from the community. Um for time restriction, I'm just going to just going to summarize and highlight the most most important things. So, first, for the Asian-American families living here, the program means even more. It's a way of feeling seen in their own community. When a school district prioritizes Mandarin, it is sent a clear message to the minority population that their culture isn't just an extra. It's a valuable part of the local fabric. It turns the Chinatown into a place where diversity is actively practiced, not just talked about, helping

035every student to feel like they belong in a much larger world. And here's another one. As the son of Taiwanese immigrants, born and raised in this country, I I understand in deeply personal way the value of what program offers, not just to my family, but to every student so who participates. I also want to express my concern about the budgeting process. A decision of this magnitude, one that affects curriculum, families, and the district's identity, demands transparent deliberation and a meaningful community input, not a line item reduction buried in a budget cycle. I urge the committee to preserve the Chinese language program and to engage families and educators in a genuine conversation about how we want the education we say we believe in. So, members of the school committee, please hear these voices from concerned parents

036and community members, also those from the students. Please do not take this away from our students, and then please vote to retain the program. Thank you. I am I'm Shane Stebbins. I uh live in Topsfield. I have two sons at Masco right now. We have two daughters on the way. I thank you for listening to us all tonight. I work for a global company with 30,000 employees around over 100 different countries around the world. And when I lived in Somerville, I asked one of my colleagues, I needed to move to the North Shore for family reasons. Said, "Where where should I move?" He said, "Any of the three towns that are in Masco's district." And I asked, "Why?" He said, "Because of the most progressive, globally minded school district around." And so when we came

037here, it wasn't a surprise that we were teaching Chinese as a program. And obviously it is the as we've already stated, it's the largest, you know, one of the largest speaking languages in the world. It's three times more than French. Twice twice about versus Spanish. And it also combats things that you've already heard about in terms of nationalism, xenophobia, which I think we all know is really important right now. As an employer, it does help candidates stand out. You do notice when someone has taken a path like Mandarin to focus on. And I would add that on the website today, we still say right under the headline is that the motto is thinking critically in a global environment. So please make sure it's not just the Western Hemisphere that we're thinking that way, but a

038globe that we're taking that into account. Thank you. Good evening. My name is Nicholas Ealy. I'm one of the least tenured members of the guidance department in the district. I'd like to thank you all for your service. I'd like to read a short excerpt from my colleague Lea Campbell, an adjustment counselor, who can't be here tonight. Last Wednesday, there was a suggestion for the removal of a high school guidance counselor almost a year to the day of the decision to eliminate both an adjustment counselor and a nurse. The idea of losing another full-time student support position is not only disheartening and discouraging, but it is also dangerous for the students we care so much about. We keep saying we don't want to take from the high-impact positions that would drastically affect our students, and guidance

039counselors are literally just that. In 11 years of first-hand experience at Masco, I have witnessed a steady increase in all aspects of the youth mental health crisis. Removing a school guidance counselor who works side by side with the already depleted adjustment counselors will only put our kids in more risk of not getting the support that they need. These counselors are not low-hanging fruit. They are vital members of the school fabric that help detect early warning signs of depression, mental well-being, in addition to connecting kids with the resources and programs that help drive their careers and futures. They literally save kids' lives. Would you mind just taking one and passing those around? I'll keep this very brief. In the last meeting, a couple members of your Are you speaking for somebody else for this point or

040Are you speaking for somebody else? >> No, no, I'm speaking for myself now. I I read a statement from my colleague Leah Campbell before. I I'll keep this to myself now. Okay, I I apologize for I don't know if that was confusing. I'll keep this very brief. In the last meeting, a couple members of the committee mentioned cutting a guidance counselor position due to the ASCA ratios of 250 to 1. I think it's instructive to look deeper at the data with respect to how this would affect the ratios, how these ratios would affect student outcomes and well-being. ASCA ratios are outdated and do not reflect the current mental health crisis. I mean, so to take a deeper dive, according to research out of Connecticut, high-performing schools have a counselor-student ratio of 182 to 1 versus

041285 to 1 for lower-performing schools. I think you can all agree that we want to be a high-performing school, correct? A A years ago, the United States General issued an advisory about the youth mental health epidemic saying exponential increases in adolescent diagnoses of depression and anxiety. I began working at Masco a decade ago and my job is substantially more challenging than it used to be. I spend way more time with a fast growing subset of students that are reintegrating from mental health hospitalizations. Our counselor team is currently stretched very thin with respect to supporting these students. If we can't support them at Masco, they end up being outplaced. The average cost of an outplacement in Massachusetts in 2023 according to the Boston Globe was $90,000. Not only will cutting a counselor position provide less support

042for our students during a mental health crisis, but it was not fiscally responsible. In conclusion, I know that if you ask any of your former current students, they would tell you the counselors were always there for them when they needed it. Ask yourselves, do you really want to vote this week to change this? Good evening committee members. My name is Ella Montpeculiar. I'm here in support of the Chinese program. I think an aspect as to why this kind of proposition was brought up is because it's considered a low impact cut, but Chinese program has never really been given its true ability because there's not much advertisement and the Tri-Towns have an amazing library system with incredibly supportive librarians who I'm sure would have no um uh aversion to having like a meet and greet with

043all of the languages provided at Masco and I think that would really strengthen the enrollment numbers and I think what we have to do is kind of give them this opportunity instead of cutting what is essentially a beautiful program and I think we need to retain our members. We don't need to cut members and then introduce new ones because then there's this constant flow of disruption and I think what Masco needs is a clean slate with keeping the members we have and completely wiping the oh changing like have a new world head department and then you know cutting a guidance counselor. I think we need to retain the incredible staff here and I think that's incredibly important. Thank you for your time. Good evening. My name is Gary Baker, Boxford. I'm also here to speak

044in support of the Chinese language program. I think that there is a choice that is in front of you and that is you have a staff which is supportive of not hiring the department head and using those funds to keep the program funded. Nothing should speak louder than the commitment of the staff to want to deliver those services. So, I'd ask you to please consider that. Thank you. Hi, my name is Stana Blos and I'm a resident of Middlebend and supporter of Chinese program. I spoke already last meeting, but during the last meeting it really kind of bothered me. I don't know maybe because I didn't grow up in America and it looked very strange to me that when you guys are talking about the cuts, you were kind of comparing math economic to other

045schools and it just seems like okay, I could see like we comparing us to somebody higher and we strive to that and we're like oh, we can cut counselors, we can cut this program down or middle school teachers and it just I have hard time comprehending that maybe because I don't know. Came from different country. It just seems weird for me that we are kind of striving to mediocrity and just looking how okay, those schools can do it, we can do it too and it's like how are we then different from the other schools. Uh I talked to my husband who who grew up here in the middle of then and went to this school in '80s and he said they had four language classes. So, somebody built Masco back then that it was hot

046name. And it's going down and down and now it's in your hands. What will be the legacy? What is the legacy you going to have for the school? Because it's so easy to break something down that somebody built. Somebody built the Chinese class or some other languages and it's so easy to break it down and build up it's much harder. I think. Anybody else question? Good. And everybody everybody signed in? Okay. Um I I'd first like to thank the students again in particular uh for coming out speaking their minds tonight, speaking on behalf of the programs and teachers that they believe in. Uh thank you guys for doing that. Thank you to the community for coming out and sharing your perspectives. Uh thank you to everybody who has sent emails and text messages and I'll

047go out on a limb and say Facebook posts for a moment, but um These are really hard discussions. This is a hard time. Right? I I agree with a lot of the things that were said tonight. I disagree with some of the things that were said tonight. Um I have spent dozens of dozens of dozens of hours digging into these things. I have met with the executive team, I've met with principals, I've met with teachers, I've met with department heads so that I can get as smart as I can on the impacts of each one of these cuts. I have gone through the budget in much more detail than what we discussed here because we don't have time to discuss every line item here. A lot of the points you guys are bringing up are

048good questions, are good points. I have had a lot of the discussions with the school about the points that you guys are making and if I haven't when you guys ask them, even though I may not respond to your emails I do go back to the team here at the school and I do ask them and I do have those discussions. Okay, so your emails, your thoughts, your recommendations are not going ignored. I promise you. We know this will have an impact. We know. We understand. My job is to our job is to balance the need the broad needs of the community, the broad needs of the students and to strike a balance between those two things, between the needs of the students and what the town can afford. I want to remind everybody that

049in addition to this budget this year, we are asking for um a debt exclusion for the capital project here at the school that we so direly need. We have the prospect of getting into the MSBA program, we have been accepted into the MSBA program. If we continue down that path and we and we approve the debt exclusion, we have the prospect of up to 40% of about $70 million. That is if I'm doing quick public math That is if I'm doing quick public math, $28 million in reimbursement for infrastructure that we need to apply to the to this building that is that that so needs it. Okay, I stood in front of Middleton two years ago and presented the and presented the capital project and watched it fail. Okay, Herman was there speaking on our

050behalf. I'm sure there were others that were there speaking on our behalf. Okay, we are doing this with a broad vision of the school with a deep understanding of the needs of the students having heard from lots of different parties. I again, I want to go back to the first thing that I said. I appreciate everyone's perspective. I hear you. You're not being ignored. Okay. We are looking at this through lots of different lenses and are having to make some difficult decisions. I do want to clear up This gets confusing sometimes. I know somebody mentioned Chromebooks. I just want a point of order. Chromebooks are not part of the operating budget. Chromebooks are part of a capital budget. We can eliminate the Chromebooks completely. It doesn't save a teaching position. I have a question. Is

051there If you guys are the Do you guys control the budget and is that something you can you can transfer that? Can you I That That will We cannot transfer that. We'll move on. Um The other point that came up tonight was transparency. If anybody is concerned about transparency, we do get audited on a regular basis and I'm sure the central office would be happy to share those audit results and uh order online on the website. Thank you, Mike. Um So, school committee, it'll be a difficult decision tonight, a difficult discussion. We have um real lives and real livelihoods at stake. Student-facing positions, administrative positions, uh transportation on the docket tonight, and taxpayers who are tired of overrides as well. Right? So, it is a hard game of tug-of-war we're playing. Um but I ask

052you guys to have the hard decision and and be honest and um and we have to get there. We have to get to a decision. This isn't something that we don't get to not pass. So, um so, with that, I will uh end my my comments and um Dr. Harvey, I don't know if you have uh the budget presentation that you want to open up or if you want to >> to do? Well, you've got one that's linked in the One that's linked has scenario three. Is that worth reviewing or not? Um I can speak to that if we want to pull it up quickly. Um so, last meeting, I was the member who brought suggested that we look into a scenario in which we reduced a high school guidance counselor. Since then, I've asked

053my very specific questions to the appropriate people in the building, as in Brad and Katie, and I feel confident and I appreciate their willingness to respond and provide some color and context for me. And I also did a little more research um looking at surrounding communities and what their ratios were. And I uh would not feel comfortable reducing a high school guidance counselor at this point and would recommend moving forward with our same number. Thanks, Chuck. Okay. The other point of clarification I want to provide is on the transportation. So, um I was under the impression that we were currently at 25 buses looking to go down to 24, the TTU had elected to go to 23, and so that our here our hand was forced to either uh go to 23 or um What's

054that? Or pay to actively Or or pay to go to 25. At 24, it would be net zero. We would be paying So, sorry, it's a little confusing. So, I'll just I'll tell you what the reality is with the buses. Um We budgeted for 25. We In this past year, we had 24 bus routes. Correct. To achieve 24 bus routes this year, we would have to pay We We would We would actually spend the full budget on 25. Next year. Next year. Because the TTU has gone to 23. Okay? So, if we go from 24, which is what we implemented this this school year, down to 23 it would be a $106,000 savings. So, $107,000 savings. Okay? Um we don't have specific data from the bus company. Mike did Mike did do a little homework

055um on current bus routes. And if you applied some simple math going from 20 four down to 23, it's a few percent. Um if you remember what the bus route lengths were It average increase about a minute or two, but it's really not I mean, that's that's about That's really back of the envelope math. It's That's really back of the envelope math. There's no analysis of it. >> But the But the data on the actual bus bus route lengths today? Um I could pull it up, too. We got it. Today Sorry, this wasn't sent to you earlier. It was just literally done today. Yeah. Um while we pull it up Today, the average for this for the 24 routes that we currently have, the average run is about 32 minutes in the morning. I didn't

056get to do the afternoon. It's about average of 19 stops per route. Um if you added four, you know, reducing from 24 to 23 is a 4% reduction in So, if you added the 4% minutes, you're really going to a 34-minute average. As I said, that's a real real rough kind of estimate there. How many of the or the existing 24 routes would be changed? Good question. I don't I can't answer. Don't know. Don't know. We requested a couple weeks ago data from bus company. So, Jeff. Just to clarify cuz it's kind of windy conversations. So, last year the TTU had 24 routes and they're going to Last year I don't know how many of the TTU had last year. What What I do know is this in the current fiscal year we budgeted for

05725 buses. We got to September, 24 rolled up to the front of the school. So, we're only paying for 24. So, budget to budget, we're going from 25 to 23, but it's really only a one one reduction in effect from this year to next. The master contract, that's TTU plus Masco, is it? So, the So, the contract is roughly So, there's it's a combined contract between the two. A bus costs roughly $100,000. We pay 52% of the cost and they you know, they pay 48 rough roughly speaking. So, each bus costs us about $52,000. Is this the The routes you your routes in the the transit routes are they harmonized or has the They're They're separate. Same number of routes, but completely sep- separate. To clear. Thanks. Again, it's imperfect math. Yes. Um we don't

058have good data on it. I Well, I guess we can continue the discussion in a different dimension if you guys would like, but I just wanted to provide you with some accuracy around the the bus situation. So, any other comments on that or thoughts on it? Any feelings about it? What are your feelings? It's just hard to make any kind of decision without any information, right? Should we do that? I think we know what we know we had. Anything outside of that is, I guess, If I could add one thing, the uh Again, this you know it certainly would be better if we had, you know, much better, more thorough analysis of the situation, but you know, we're we're sort of indebted to the bus company for for providing that. Um I think it's reasonable

059to assume that removing one bus route is not going to have a material impact on all the other routes. I mean, that's just I don't see that happening. Um it would not I can see the if it's if things are spread across multiple routes or maybe just a couple of routes are are impacted, there might be some uh additional transportation time, but I think we can probably safely assume that one route reduction is not going to severely impact most of the transportation that kids experience. >> I really don't agree with that. I I suffered from a consolidation of losing a route for for Boxford. Um you know, my routes for my 6-year-old went from 40 minutes to an hour and a half. So, it's not just this isn't an average. What sort of consolidation? So,

060I'm in West Boxford, they had two bus routes, now they have one. And they have 25 stops or something or Well, you didn't Cuz there's a 50% change. Right? Okay, that's not >> it's it's one out of It's one out of 25. Just cuz all they the one they lost was the one that hits West Boxford. So, for that people on that route, that's catastrophic. Everybody in Everybody in West Boxford driving their kids to school now, they would have to stop working. So, it's not to say the average is not necessarily even cuz it's not the average. People are going to be affected drastically if you're on that bus route that's lost. It's not like you necessarily We don't know. We may not know, but not necessarily. I mean, it's just as It's just as

061irresponsible as it may be to say they're definitely going They're not They're definitely not going to be impacted. It could be just as irresponsible to say they definitely are going to be impacted. We don't know. Right. I Yeah. Um how often do we, you know, experience a a drop of a bus through the normal course of business because something's wrong with the bus, somebody calls out, like do they typically consolidate that fairly effectively in the normal course of business? They do it quite frequently, for sure. >> Yeah. I mean, I'm My daughter's in the high school, I get the emails all the time, and it seems seamless in terms of I know it's not seamless. Big shout out to everybody that manages buses in the school. You guys get a gold star cuz That's yeah.

062legitimately >> Alicia Shatzel does that from No, high school assistant principals or does get a stipend to manage transportation as well. Exactly. So, >> so that she feels those calls and if somebody has to miss the >> are already accommodating that on a He's doing it now, too. Sorry. regular occasion, but Okay. Sorry. field trip The students will all know at 2:00, they'll hear bus 25's not here. If you live on this street and this street, get on bus 18. If you live on this street and this street, go to bus 20. And they'll separate it out on the three buses. And same way thing in the morning if somebody a bus driver sick and there's not a sub we all would receive the email saying your bus is coming but it'll be a little

063bit later due to it's picking up multiple routes. And our team sends that information as soon as they have it and we get it out to families as soon as we are able to or the afternoon to the kids as soon as we are able to. I'm not riding the bus so I don't know how much longer it's taking them to get home but they get rides. And you know I I don't want to create a bunch of like cross talk but I am aware that at the elementary school level they are generally taking bus routes and using them to drop off at multiple schools. So drop off I do remember that being significantly longer because they had to go to pick ups and then drop off at one school and then continue on to

064another school with drop offs in between. Home was a little bit easier but I do think that's a factor at the elementary school level that we don't necessarily contend with. So I think we get more economy out of the routes than the elementary schools. Um so I just wanted to make those points. Joe Elementary school schools do not have parking lots full of student cars. So it stands to reason whatever the elementary school can do we should do no more than that period in my opinion. It's the number of routes you need. Let me know. Be natural about this. Come on. I see a lot of empty buses at the at the high school. Yeah, good job everybody one second. I think the other comment right there you made was we don't we don't foresee

065a capacity issue now on the buses. Sorry. No. Robert, I was just going to say I'm supportive of the reduction of two buses as presented in scenario three. Anybody else who hasn't had a chance to share that last on this topic? Mark, can you from the back I know this is the library but schools close and a bit of us few of us are hard of hearing. Possibly maybe a little more of an outdoor voice. I can try. Thank you. I can try. Um I will say I'm supportive of this cut as well. My only question is elementary school they're able to track the bus which I use very frequently. Um Uh was it is that a possibility up here as well? I don't know if that would help us alleviate some of the pain

066um if they're able to track it and know what's coming and how. Because again my daughter and I use it quite frequently. I'll just share my perspective real quick. You know, I think I'm in I I support this reduction. I think it's on us to make sure that we work closely with the bus company to make sure that we don't have a scenario that that Jack describes where you know, the the the pain is all focused in one specific area. Um I mean if there's two buses serving Boxford that means that there's 22 buses serving Topsfield and and Middleton and it feels like we should be able to work with them to find a reasonable solution that doesn't There's double the bus lines. You know what I mean? Yeah, what's that? Please. Can I ask

067a clarifying question maybe of Kate or maybe you could ask Katie is that I believe that when the bus routes come out every year or Mike there's an opportunity for families to look at them and then provide feedback or there used to be at least. Or like She can hear now. or email concerns? No? No, the only concerns that um I'm accepting is if the bus is at a dangerous location or child has to walk around a curve. Um, it's very, very difficult to change any of the bus routes. They have studied them, they send them out a couple times will make tweaks due to the weather if like a sidewalk is not accessible anymore, but to make changes to the buses are very, very difficult. Um, we are a family that we've reached out

068to the school and we were allowed to change bus routes because we needed to get an earlier bus stop. So, if there is a specific concern, the school has been overwhelmingly supportive in accommodating us cuz we go to work cuz school. So, I can say that from personal experience. The kids need a different bus. Yeah, maybe it's the maybe it's switching buses. Yeah, and if you needed a different stop or I knew there was something. Yeah, but I mean in in uh for us, the stops are more centrally located rather than, you know, sort of that door-to-door um, situation just to make it faster. Um, that we feel the kids can walk a little bit at least to get to a bus stop. Okay. I'm going to go to the next topic which is uh

069world language department head position. Um, there were some emails from folks at home and I uh spoke with folks here at the school. The general consensus with uh the people that I did speak with here at the school is given the autonomy that we are talking about giving the uh leadership team here our ground department heads next year and how to restructure the department heads, they feel they could absorb the world language department head. So, my suggestion is that we do not reintroduce a dedicated position for world language department head, that we include that in the bucket of departments that will need to be managed by um the department heads that are here next year. Thoughts? Discussion? Adrian. I would be in favor of that if it meant keeping the Chinese program. Okay. Trevor. I

070I think I disagree with Adrian because if it's not a horse trading practice, it's we're looking at the Chinese program because the numbers are telling us to look at the Chinese program. It's I don't see it as an if or, I think we can do both and do our job and deliver a budget to the towns that is um palatable. Adrian. Maybe I should restate that. Um I've heard the feedback. I I'm confident that our very dedicated and creative team can figure out how to recalibrate the department head roles to absorb that. And I feel very strongly that we should keep the Chinese program. It is a cornerstone of culture and belonging in this district and having recently met with the A students, um I think it undercuts who we are trying to be as

071a school district and it's one of the things that would give a lot of people a reason to look elsewhere. And I don't want to give anyone a reason to not choose Masco at a time when enrollment trends are down and we're seeing this flywheel of issues. I don't want to do anything to perpetuate that and I think there's a lot in here that is going to be really difficult to swallow, but I do think that keeping the Chinese program means we're keeping a differentiator and a sense of culture and belonging for many of our students and an opportunity to expose them to something that they wouldn't otherwise get in their middle school and high school careers. So, it feels very important. I would just say I think we can have that conversation separate to

072the department head. Which is what I just did. We were on department head. All right. I'm not used to this. Back to department head. Any Any other comments, questions about department about the world language department head? Now you Now I'm curious. My My question was about the visual arts department head and I'm it's more of a um just sort of clarification for me because I guess I'm and I I want to hear opinions and feedback from everybody, but we did have this discussion 2 years ago when we were doing the thought on performing arts and visual arts and we heard from many people that they're two very very very different departments. So, I guess I'm just trying to understand why now we are looking at that one again where the person responsible here covers a

073lot of classes and a lot of coverage. So, for me I'm just looking at the the scope, the numbers. And I'm wondering why now we're discussing the same thing just on the other side. We said no to doing it to performing arts 2 years ago and I guess I'm just looking for a point of clarification why now we're doing the same exact thing to the visual arts area if they're so different, which is what we heard 2 years ago over and over again. Very clear that they are not the same and that one can't go over to the other. Why is that now being presented? Share my perspective, I'd invite Katie to come up afterwards if she'd like. Um when we were talking about this a couple of years ago, I think that the view

074was that the music department was very unique. The performing arts department was very unique in the things that they needed. We got a department head for the uh performing arts department. Um today we're looking at a a a visual arts uh department head elimination. And while unique, the feeling is that the person the the prospect of being able to have somebody who can also cover the visual arts department who isn't necessarily from a visual arts background, but maybe a performing arts background or other arts background is more likely than it was a couple of years ago when it was the reverse. So, Katie, I don't know if I got that that completely right, but if you want to share your perspective, I'd welcome you to share. Um yeah, I don't I mean, I don't have

075a lot to say. Losing visual arts, they're both they are very different. Um we're presented with the budget asked you to let allow us to figure it out. Uh Stacy does a ton with outside stuff. Jerry does a ton with outside stuff. Uh I can't pick one. I I honestly like I can't pick one or the other over each other. They're both very important. We were presented saying, "Can you figure this out?" Um so, like I I can't pick, to be honest. I can't pick between the names. I guess my follow-up question is I I was just my other part of my concern was the weight of what she's responsible that person's responsible for, and and amount of kids being serviced that it's multiple classes. I guess that was my only other question and concern

076with not having that. Is that a larger impact than some of the others? Again, with the art teacher, I might be wrong. She teaches four. She's one below a full-time teacher in our department. She teaches four classes. She's one class away from full-time. Normally four. I think graphic design was one. It's just memory. So, do we know that there are other people in the department that would pick up those classes or those If Stacy teaches graphic design, nobody will pick that up. That is her specialty. Wow. She has ceramics right now as the She's the only ceramics teacher. We can navigate somebody picking that up. She also does the APs. Uh this year she's doing AP art. That goes back and forth between some staff uh as well as art studio, but not everybody teaches

077all these Sure. So, graphic design is her specialty and she's doing the ceramics as the only ceramics teacher. Um and then we have her and another teacher studio and then she and another teacher back and forth flip the AP art. Uh but we're also bringing back the art history and AP. That is desirable. So, she does a lot. She's an amazing art teacher. Yep. Thank you. Nice. I think everybody really good point. You You would have been bending over backwards trying to figure out how to justify Yeah, our music department had to hang out specialized it was and today we're saying this saying the opposite for a very specialized role as well. And I I kind of think I know we're trying to hit a number, but the number's it's not a real number. So,

078I don't want to be making decisions that are It feels silly not to bring it up because it would be extremely obvious. If we're going to be honest with ourselves, we have to keep consistent, and I think we haven't done a great job over the last few years. And we're all learning, so I'm not It's not blame. It's my observation. But, it's you know, there's keep it as not keep it as It's not one or the other. We can choose to keep this role and make it work. Just because we're chasing a number that's not our number is fine. We should be doing what's best for the school, not what's best for this number that we're chasing. Yeah, Joe and then Melissa. Joe. So, my take from 2 years ago is I think we missed

079an opportunity to combine these two positions. I um And you can say these are very different things, but I would say Chinese and French are just as different. Um and yet somehow we're completely eliminating the department head there perhaps. Um I don't like the idea of picking the department heads to eliminate. Myself, I had someone throw out an idea of saying we're going to have five department heads. You guys figure out how many you know, how how you're going to do that. To me, that's the efficient way to run a school. It's not let 11 school committee members sit here and argue about whether, you know, we need somebody to, you know, look after instruments in a storage room somewhere, or, you know, keep up on art supplies. I mean, these are not conversations we

080should be having. We should just say, "Here's the budget level. These are the number of positions. Have at it." That That's my opinion. So. Melissa Linda. Mhm. I feel you just need to understand the effect of being to 2 and 1/2% on the towns that aren't Topsfield. Like what are their overrides in every town at this point? Is that what we're fighting for to keep out? Like is that incoming on our final number? Like what is the end goal here? Like cuz we could argue back and forth for 3 weeks about the numbers. Right. So, I guess that's what I'm clarifying. What have the towns asked us to do in order to avoid the in order for the likelihood of the budgets to be passed in all three towns. And the towns asked us to

081get to 2 and 1/2% with the exception of Topsfield that asked us to get to 2 and 1/4. Did I get that right? Yes. Okay. And um Middleton, we met with them last week and they had asked that we adopt scenario three that was in the packet today. Um to um avoid an override in Middleton and Boxford. Boxford, I think would still at that point have an override. Are not at people I thought it was somebody to get to that. What is the threshold in those communities, I guess? Like if we're we're more than 2 and 1/2, is there going to be an override? Are they still deciding that? Like so we could be arguing at this in my opinion. And 2 weeks from now, are the towns saying, "Oh, well, we could we are

082going to put this on override." If we're under 2 and 1/2%? >> No, if we get like like are we certain that if there's not going to be any like there's no certain certainty into that until the towns actually vote. And we've been told above 2 and 1/2% we are Middleton will be seeing an override. Seek for Boxford or Topsfield, but maybe Adrienne can. I don't know if I can comment on that. I'm sorry, did you want to comment on Alyssa's question? Yeah, I know what Topsfield is. So, if if want to answer for the the everyone else, like Boxford, how do you feel? Well, I would say Boxford is going to be logical and fair about this. And if we do the best we can to get to 2.5, and we're a little bit

083over the my guess is that it depends on how much over. Um you know, but if we're looking at something over three, I think they would definitely go for an override. It's my guess. So. I know it's like a broken record, but um it's like Coms I think Coms doesn't dictate our budget. We're an independent regional school. So, you know, we should definitely keep that in consideration. It's a big stakeholder. But we have other stakeholders here as well. So, you know, it's a balancing act, which I know I appreciate you doing a ton of work. But I just want to make sure everybody hears that, you know, we're we're not chasing this because we're told to chase this. We're trying to do an exercise to get the best process best product the most cost effective

084way as possible. Without doing, you know, my my goal is not to damage the school and keep it moving forward. And I'll I'll just reiterate the point that was made last week, right? We we're not answering to the FinCom or the Select Board. We're answering to those that have articulated that they're frustrated with overrides. Um the you know, the taxpayer. The frustrated taxpayer. So, you know, we tend to have a pretty good pulse of those people. The FinCom Select Board tend to have a pretty good pulse of those people, and I think that that's where that guidance, I would call it, comes from. So. Uh Bill, and Adrian. Uh just a couple of quick points. The you know, since the various department heads all make different salaries, and not a single salary, we we're not

085in a position to just say here, you can have five department heads. >> do that. You take the two lowest salaries and say that's the amount that's coming out. But we need to come up with a real number for a budget. Oh, you take the It'll end up You'll end up spending less than the budget. It's easy. That's how you account for that. Simple. Oh, perhaps. I'm not I'm not convinced yet. Um but the other thing is that um you know, our our towns are are certainly made up of of families um who you know, came to our towns so they could enjoy this this school uh but we also have quite a few and a growing number of people on fixed income um who have made it clear that the continuing increases in in

086taxes is is putting them in the uncomfortable position where uh they need to they need to consider leaving. Um so unfortunately, they don't come to this meeting. Um but they do come to other meetings. Um and if you've ever gone to a Council on Aging meeting and tell them you're from Masco, you're going to get an earful about what we're doing to their to their fixed income. Um so we absolutely have a responsibility because those are We represent those people um just as much as people who are sending their kids to our schools. Yeah, I'd say I'd say and we're also representing people who can't make it here cuz they have two parents working and the kids are doing something else. Mhm. Um you know, Massachusetts best schools in the state or best schools in

087the country. And also probably the busiest maybe commute. We have people occupied and we only hear of people who are able to make the time to come. And I'd say we're we don't hear from 65 to 75% of the town all the time. So and I always you know, caution that you know, the feedback we hear is a very small and very particular group and it's it's successful but it's not the town. Adrian. Um So, I I want to put maybe a creative idea on the table that might get us through this maybe easier. The idea that there are things that we could probably all align on is present. And then there are the rest of the things that are all going to be different perspectives. Could we entertain the idea of getting to something

088we can all align on and then knowing what the backup plan is, however ugly that looks and knowing that we don't like it, we don't want to support it and then going forward to the towns and saying this is what the school committee could align on, this is what we feel is responsible. If this fails please know that we have a backup plan ready to go. This is what it looks like, this is the impact. There are lots of districts that do things like this when they present their budget. They kind of give the step thresholds and say, if we're here, we're losing this, if we go further, we're losing that. And they give the taxpayers the authority through the override to say we want that one, whichever one it is. And it gives them

089the opportunity to weigh in in a more direct way. Um so, floating that idea for whatever it's worth. I also want to call out that I hear Bill and I've heard from some of our seniors in Topsfield, but it's it's limited. I haven't had a single email saying don't you dare come with overrides. Not one, not one phone call, not one text, nothing. The FinCom hasn't published anything in Topsfield that's empirical that shows what percentage of our population is struggling with tax payments. I did some back of the envelope math with publicly available data and it represents probably a swing of 3 to 5%. Um, which equates to about 30 to 50 households in Topsfield out of about I don't know, 950. So, their voice is an important voice, but we service a lot more

090of the community than 3 to 5%, so I'm indexing a little more heavily on that. I'm not discounting it and that's why we're doing this work, but I do want to call out that there really isn't anything concrete to back up the premise that because some folks in our town are struggling, we should underfund public education. It's just not a good premise to operate from and so, I did that work because I wanted to be at peace if I made decisions one way or the other. And I have to say it's it's not compelling to me, but it is important and I am taking it as an input, but I'm not going to be driven to something beyond what I'm comfortable with for something that doesn't really exist data-wise. Selectman Maggie. I have a uh

091question about your first proposal. Is it something similar to what I think it was Stoneham did last year? I I think it was it Stoneham that like they were getting regional library, so if you if you budget for this, you give us this much, this is what you will have. If you give us this much, this is what you have. You give us this much, this is what you'll have. And I think they ended up with the middle. And we might be governed by different things under regional >> And but that is that kind of what the where you were No, it'd be like we could go forward with the budget we adopted and say, "This is what we adopted as a school committee. We understand for some those cuts may not be deep enough."

092And it's up to you, voters. So, How was that different from last year? It's not. Just having the the backup plan there to say, "If you say no to this, this is what we move forward." Cuz we didn't do that last year. We had a list of positions that we said, "Yes, we're not specific positions because this committee can't find a future committee." I I think it's way too late in the game to have this discussion right now, but Yeah, I'll I'll only just add real quick that whether I like that or don't like it, my concern is the MSBA project. And they may support an override, and then shoot down the MSBA project. And if they shoot it down in one town, just there goes 28 million. Yep. And 28 million is real money.

093>> of money. Nothing ceases. Well, our kids don't have to sit in the cafeteria and get dripped on anymore. Ew. Sorry. Who? Maggie? Somebody over here. Just two things I want to kind of add. Um I completely agree with Joe about the department heads. I really feel as though it's it's with the lack of I feel kind of concrete data that we should not be making the decision of what department head positions should be consolidated. Because my opinion's going to differ from your opinion, and it might differ from this opinion, and how the numbers impact. Like, I don't quite understand how we've gotten to this point, and I really believe that if we say giving them total autonomy to do that, knowing that the incoming and incoming superintendent is going to have a vision. And

094they're going to have a very structural vision. I think that we need to take into consideration that's going to happen. So, yes, Joe, I agree with you. The other thing is what Going back to your first idea, that we would as a school committee kind of agree to the things that we do align. Like, what That sort of thing. Like, we all kind of say keep this program or do this or do that. I like that. So, I actually thank you for saying that. I'm going to get I'm going to get to that. I'm going to present something in just a few moments after we talk about each of the individual line items for a minute. Um but I like where you're going with that. Thank you. I have a clarifying question. In the current

095scenario C just quickly clarifying question. That would be a total of three social studies positions to be cut, one middle, one high, and social studies department head. So, ultimately three social studies positions. Is that correct? Am I Am I reading that correctly? Yes. Yes. Okay. Thank you. Yep. Yep. Is there another com- Did you have another comment? >> Oh, I was just going to say I I disagree with um and I got a bunch of nods last week or the other day when I said it was letting them decide who to cut as a department head just giving them a budget to figure it out because it's I feel like it's just going to cause so much more chaos in school if every department head is fighting for their job and having to prove their

096worth and who who gets to keep their job. It just I feel like in their in their working lives it's just a bad look. Whereas this way if we choose then we're the bad guys and we accept that we're the bad guys and they can make it work from there, which is what we've always done is we've been the bad guys and they make it work. I'll go first. How about you go first? I just do want to respond to something Adrian had said. I don't believe anything on this scenario shows or speaks to underfunding education here at Masco. And I think if you went back to your member towns, they would be honestly insulted that you made that insinuation. We spend roughly $38 million funding this district. Nowhere near underfunding. So, I'm just wanted

097to make that clear. You get the good spot. Sorry, somebody else had their hand up next. I think I have my hand up. And I guess I should just get this out early. We haven't talked about the Director of Teaching and Learning role. I feel like it's my personal responsibility to bring it up. Again. I know there are reasons to consider not eliminating that role. I also know that it's also a likely a practical consideration given where we are. And I would be in favor of it. And I know it's not in here. But we have the numbers from last year. We could certainly make a back of the envelope addition if we needed to. And it would probably be within my estimations of the actual number. That's all. Um so, I can I can

098share a little bit on the DTL. Um The and I'll be careful. Um but I'll just say that the the DTL is under contract right now, one more year. And he is um committed and passionate about continuing to provide his service to the district. Mhm. Um I think that's probably the best I can say. So. He wasn't having a conflict. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Um I don't doubt that Kevin is dedicated. I've I've observed him. I've connected with him here and there. This is not reflecting on him. I think we have not done what we need to do to set him up for success. Absolutely. And we have 2 years running now of salary dedicated to that role and we're going to do another year of that knowing that there's no funding for him to do

099something innovative or cool or it's just kind of like All right, is your proposal to put the director of teaching learning on the list for reduction? Yes, because the justification here for me, just to be clear and put a finer point on it, is if we are going to be reallocating department head responsibilities and we have a new incoming superintendent, that's a fantastic opportunity to eliminate a role and redistribute those responsibilities. Net some savings, absorb the role. I just don't >> Theoretically. I don't think we have a way of If we want to have that discussion, I don't think we have a way around the contractual obligation that we have for one more year. So, if you eliminate the position, you still owe them the money. So, if you eliminate the position, we are still

100on the hook to pay him for his final year. So, this is probably going to be a So, I just want to make sure that we fully understand this, that are we saying that there's a contract in place that removes a financial lever for the school committee entirely? Yes. Yep. Okay. So, multiple contracts. The contract was written Yeah, it was multiple contracts I think all of the I think all of the one individual contracts do not have uh financial exit clauses. Which is something that we have noticed as we've gone through this process and will consider for future contracts. Okay. Thank you, Adrian. Uh sorry, I'm Trevor. I I just quickly the DTL is mentioned a lot in the strategic plan and it's pretty much centered around that one position, which I raised some red

101flags to back in the day when we were voting on that strategic plan. Um but that's the plan that this committee not this committee, but the past committee adopted. Um so, we would have to reopen that strategic plan, which it's I'm just throwing it out there. Unintended anyway. Unintended consequence. Just got sidetracked. >> And then Lisa. I think Lisa's hand was up first. Should she go first? Then Lisa. I was say my understanding though too is uh that director of teaching and learning is actually taking on some of the responsibility of the department heads right now too. And especially if we're eliminating a bunch, he's probably going to be taking on more of those responsibilities. So, it doesn't feel appropriate to be doing all of those at the same time. So, unless there's anybody that

102wants to pay the DTL uh his salary to not work next year, I I think we should I suggest we focus on things that would pull be impactful for us this year. Uh but Melissa. Yeah, I was just going to say with the new superintendent, the role might allow for it change and we don't really know what's going to happen and I think it's definitely valid that we've brought it up and discussed because it has been brought up multiple times, but we also have to remember that there's going to be a superintendent coming in with a, you know, a 90-day plan and sitting down and looking at all of this, like our like Dr. Harvey did when he started, um just to see where we are, and then I think probably there'll be decisions made

103next year that may be impactful and different. I don't know. Okay. Um the other thing that I wanted to put on the table for tonight is if we go back to the original scenario that Mike and Jeff put on the table for us based on our request to get down uh to get that 4 to 5% range. Um one of the things that they put on the list was a high school English teacher. And we deliberated on this a little bit uh a couple weeks ago. Um I would like to reintroduce that position for consideration. Uh I talked to a couple different folks um within the school. The biggest impact would be the average class size would go from 19 to 21. Um there was one class that would be eliminated. Uh I got to

104go back to my notes to find it. Class or section? A class. Uh American studies would be Thank you. That was That was immediately winning. That was going to go right away. It's with the social studies reduction. They would probably go. Okay. How does that affect the the things that The impact The impact of that would be to go from 19 an average class size of 19 to an average class size of of 21 in the high school. Um So what I did was Mike, I'm going to share. You're okay with that? I shared this with you folks. So going back to Maggie's point earlier around things that we seem to kind of be not discussing passionately or as passionately as a couple of other topics. Uh I put that in column B. Um that

105was my perspective of what was being not discussed as passionately as other topics uh before the meeting. Um and then I put all the other possible reductions in column C. Uh in column D I showed what it would look like if we were to keep the Chinese program. And then in column E I just showed the uh additional to the language department head just for keeps sake. Down the bottom you can see column B we net a savings of 1.5 million which means we're 150k shy of hitting 2 and 1/2% if we wanted to get to 2 and 1/2% column C or column D would get us there. You said column D? Column D would get us there. So we're 150k shy in column B. Column Column A I'm sorry column C and column D

106Column C nets an additional $304,000. Column D nets an additional 100 191,000. What do you mean scenario C? >> Scenario Scenario I think people are confused over the scenario versus you you're using the columns on the top of the sheet. Sorry sorry sorry. Scenario A and scenario B would both get us both get us there. I don't deal with scenarios. Google. I might have said it wrong. I'm sorry. Okay. No, I'm really No, okay. It comes up in I'm just Is that Just do the scenario. Letters, not the Okay. Problems. Can you guys see if it's on the board? Great. That's the one. Two? That's the one that you sent Yeah. last. >> Earlier. Earlier. Wait, isn't the one you sent at a little over a little after 7:00, right? That was which version did

107I send? Yeah, 7:03 you sent. Which is which was this one, though. Isn't it? I think. Oh, sorry. That one didn't have B populated. So, B is the same thing uh scenario B is the same thing as scenario A except I've deleted the three um the three numbers associated with the Chinese program. Oh, okay. And that And that's 191,000. Apologies for the wrong file, folks, I sent you. You can see it up there, though. Like that orange section in scenario B is just deleted. Yeah. Oh, and you Oh, the one that I had, it's not totaled at the bottom in under scenario B. So, but Yeah, so I built I I guess I sent the I sent the wrong file on to you guys. All right, no worries. Can you just say the total at

108the bottom of B? The bottom of B nets 191,286. Yeah. I think all of those totals are there, too. >> We need to work on this. So, that 191286, is that in addition to Do we add that to the baseline of 1.5 million? Correct. So, if you take if you take uh the baseline and you add either a scenario A or scenario B, that will get you to 2 and 1/2%. I just want to put numbers in front of all the things that we were talking about. as we deliberate on this. I will say that English teaching position in the high school that we left off on, I I don't see that class size jump to be too alarming. Yeah, it's getting to a point where I don't think we could go much higher, but

109from 19 to 21, I think it's reasonable, especially given the circumstances that we find ourselves in. Yeah. Um being data driven, I did a lot of homework over the weekend. I'll try and be very succinct with this. Um Class sizes, there's not like one party on it, but there are a number of people that do research in that area. Um there was one very rigorous a that was done in Tennessee, I believe, if I'm remembering that right. All of that points to lower class sizes are better. We know that. Um class sizes in the range of 13 to 17 really support students a lot, but class sizes in the range of 20 to 25 are also still effective and still show measurable growth for the students. Once you get over 25 is when you start

110to see sort of the the impacts more consistently, is what I found. Our policy is 14 to 24. It doesn't say average, though, in there. So, I I just want to make sure that we're looking at the numbers for what they are, because we know the averages are generally not representative of what those upper and lower limits are. I agree, from 19 to 21, we're probably not going to see classes of 35 or even 30 in there. I just want to make sure that I shared that. Um I also spent some time with our accountability data. Has anybody else looked at our 2025 accountability data? Um there's the trends in there that point to keeping student support services in place, and I'm happy that we're doing that. Likely that we're likely doing that. Um and

111I do think that ELA, math, and science MCAS scores are trending down, but not significantly. Just another data point for everybody to chew on, if you haven't had time to do deep digging, but >> I I just want to clarify on the class sizes. I don't I don't want to disrupt the process here, but I felt it's important. And obviously like the principals jump in sometimes. It's impossible to know exactly how each class will be impacted by a reduction. In the middle school, for example, my third period class for the last few years has been small just by the way that it works out with other programs. So, but my fourth and fifth period classes are always big, whether it be because of honors classes that offset that or band or whatever. So, to reduce

112numbers means that there will be classes that I have and that other teachers in the building have that will be above the point where we want them to be. That's a fact. And I'm not saying it will be widespread every period, but every teacher in these buildings will have periods that go beyond a comfort level that we currently have cuz we're very close to that even with the numbers that we currently have. And while I have the floor, to echo Adrian's point, I was in the coffee shops, I was at the FinCom meetings, I was boots on the ground, and I appreciate everyone during the override campaign last year. And I will echo the notion that the read that I got from the community was not that the an anger over the ask for the

113override. It was the lack of transparency from MASCO regarding what could be lost if the override didn't happen. And I would absolutely echo the sentiment that Adrian put out, which is if you offer the townspeople a clear, transparent, this is what could happen should we do this. It may not work, but the adults in the Tri-Town have a right. Thank you. Trevor, just quickly question to Adrian, was there in that Tennessee study, did it say anything about class sizes from 5 to 13? What do you mean from 5 to 13? >> Like you said 13 to 17 was effective and, you know, the optimal class size, I guess you could say. Because of the the district that they were doing these in, that's what they had to work with. So there were no class sizes

1145 to 13? If they If they were, they weren't included in the study. Okay. Thank you. I'll put it back up in just one more folks. So moving forward, is there something of which we all align that we do not feel comfortable eliminating or certain areas that we I mean, how do we move forward with this, too? So I want to make sure everybody gets their perspectives Okay. on the individual line items. I put up um and I'm going to send you guys what's on the screen so you can see it. I'm just sending it. Yeah, just talk, guys. Sorry. Adrian, go. Um I was going to say for me and for the benefit of those watching, I think it would be helpful to just quickly enumerate the impacts that we know exist for each

115of these, just keep it fresh in our head and you know, make sure that we are all hearing that loud and clear. Um cuz there's a lot of material out there and it all gets lost. Like I don't think any of us can say it off the top of our head. And we're You're pretty close. So, is there Melissa, did you have your hand up, too? >> Yeah, so I tried to go back earlier today and look through what the the impact of reduction of a high school social studies teacher plus a department head who also teaches one or two classes um would do to and I couldn't find it or I may have missed it cuz I couldn't I couldn't find it in my notes. So. It's been in the document. From We got

116I didn't know if there was a I didn't quite get an I think I didn't ask the question the other day because there was another topic that came up or something. So. But I'll try to find that sec. It was a There was a reduction in teachings sections that were presented, but It's it's included in that. Okay. I go back to my notes. The the impact of the loss of a social studies teacher in the high school was going to be primarily around electives. I didn't catch it. I didn't hear that. The teacher and the department head? Both combined? As electives. No, if you including the department heads, they're well hit, of course. I'm sorry, say that again? I've It's five. It's not You're never not going to hit the core classes, but we'll offer

117less electives so the core classes can have more sections. Make sense? So, those were that was for the audience. It's five sections from the social studies teacher and then two sections from the department. Seven sections. So, what section? The high school. Five total seven. At the high school. >> Oh, seven. Okay. One at the middle school with the team. And the focus would be on electives first before cutting into core. Yes. Okay. Okay. This slide seven from Wednesday's deck. Questions. If we have to add more core sections, look at balancing like all of that to make sure that everything gets spread out. So, that's why I say when electives might get We might reduce some electives, so we're not overloading the graduation requirements, but we also will make concerted effort that all of our balancing

118of the classes gets balanced out. So, to Trevor's point, to Nico's point, we're not having a class of five and a class of 26. You know, we'll make sure that the balancing and that's after, you know, we know who's signed up for what classes. How we feel about the um kind of the scenario planning around Chinese if we were to make any uh reductions in that department or gradually reduce it. I know we brought up an online option the other day. There's been discussions about keeping in-person staff FTEs and trying to gradually reduce it that day. Although, I will say when I originally was discussing this, it seemed hard to expect a staff member to stay in-person if towards the end of that phasing out if that's the committee's choice to come to teach a

119point two or point four by the end. So, I just didn't know if the committee had a feeling one way or the other. And then we also learned that um some of our recovery courses for Spanish, I think was said, um uses this online model and although it may be serving a different cohort of students, um seems to work. Um and they've already gone through one program that didn't work and found another program that may be more suitable, especially to the needs of uh Chinese students who um are historically well-performing cohort of students that may do well in that type of environment. Just didn't know if there was thoughts. Okay. I mean, for me, it's less than $150,000 to keep the Chinese program. Feels like a no-brainer to keep it. Right. No. Yeah, um I

120will call at the beginning of this process, um I think originally getting rid of the uh wood wood shop guy, um was on the table or was being discussed and and I think we quickly got rid of that because we didn't like the idea of getting rid of that program. He was the only one that could do it. I think it was as well attended. It was well >> Yeah, yeah, right. Right. Um and as I'm looking at the the the the Chinese program, um of course my starting position is um I don't like to get rid of programs that reduce uh things that make the school unique. Um I guess I guess the finally comes down to um is it being used enough? Um and and I guess that's where um frankly undecided at

121at this point. Um it's obvious that um the its current participants and their families are passionate about it. And and former students they're they're they're very passionate about it. I think we you know none of us have missed that point. Um but you know, do we do we think that's enough to keep it? Um and and and tonight right at this moment I'm I'm I'm not sure. So. He's out. I am under I understand from a numbers scenario that of course um again 150 in the balance of things doesn't make sense. Sorry, doesn't make sense. But I think what really resonated with me tonight I've been listening to the public feedback. But I think what really finally hit home for me tonight was talking about minorities and the minority support. And I am a minority.

122I'm Jewish. And if I had something like this in my high school where I could feel supported rather than being that outlier. I would have gravitated toward that and that would have made I really feel like that would have made my high school experience so much stronger. Again, hearing everybody and I appreciate it. I really do. I just I'm having a really hard time. I know we had talked about phasing it out, but it just does not at this point feel right. Again, first of all, cutting them off to me so we're cutting off people from being able to graduate. The online course we know we know the online course Not cutting anybody off from being able to graduate. >> No, I know, but I mean I what I mean was if we go but

123it felt like it at first. It was like, okay, well, we just cut the department. Well, okay, now we're going to offer an online program. We but we've all seen that online programming is not the best. And if we're I really feel like this is not a big ask and if we're all we want to keep a community then this is not a hard lift. Yeah. So, I I'm sorry that, you know, I've been traveling a lot. Um I was curious, did we explore just going to one Chinese teacher and trying to get that one Chinese teacher to teach at both the middle school and the high school level? I know that that's six grades, six classes and they don't teach six classes, they teach five. But ideas like combining seventh and eighth grade into

124one class or something. I mean, you've got such a small number of kids enrolling in this program. I agree that it's a valuable program and there are potentially a way to to keep it and yet make it more in line with typical class sizes is. You know, thinking out of the box on this is where I'm going and it's only $33,000 savings getting rid of that middle school position, but it's something that we ought to keep in mind because if these numbers stay low, we're just going to be discussing this year after year after year. So, I would just say for the future, keep that in mind. The other thing that I just want to comment on is the E&D threshold from 4% to 3%. When was that number calculated and does it comprehend um

125our assistant superintendent leaving early this year? I think they E&D's is based on the FY25 E&D number. I accept. Sorry. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. So, you're it's a fiscal year behind. >> Something we'll be able to save in 2028. Should not have asked. Sorry, first. Shuter may have had her hand up first. Don't forget, so >> Okay, good. I'll take that one. >> Yes. Um I see retaining the Chinese program as an investment in the district. I also think if we retain it, we know there's capacity. We know more students could take it. And I have heard a resounding support from our students and educators to promote it and to create more of a bridge with the elementary schools, which we know that any relationship with TTU is going to help from anywhere. So,

126I think if we had it next year, there's capacity for it to grow. And if it does, that's a good indicator for us that was a sound investment. If it doesn't, like you said, well, it'll probably be looked at again, but I think retaining it is a way to make a smart investment without actually adding dollars to our budget, technically. Mr. I was just going to say that if you take the baseline that's on here, which doesn't include the eliminating Chinese program, and you add back in the bus routes, you're within $42,000 of 2.5%. Mhm. Yep. And we've done really good exercise of talking through all the reductions in the points and everything. So, um I'm not happy with the budget, but that's the exercise. Right. I just wanted to go back to the three

127social studies positions. If we all are aligned with that as an appropriate cut for the Okay. I'm wondering to get everybody's opinion about that. Second on that. We done with No, Chinese program? All right. I thought we were getting back to that next. That. All right, Maggie. Um so, I look at the Chinese program not as a means to get to 2.5%, but looking at the enrollment and saying that, unfortunately, I don't see any other option than to start to scale back the depart- the program within that world language department, because the numbers just tell us the interest, and I'm sorry, but they're low. And if we're going to take that equity approach, it's over $2,600 per student that we're not spending on any other student outside of that program. When that those dollars could

128be spent on students to take other classes. And we're talking about class sizes that we're scared jumping too high. We have to also worry about the low ones. And our policy, like I read like I said before, it says those numbers for a reason. It's supposed to guide us. It doesn't dictate what we do, but it is supposed to guide us and have these conversations. And I think it would be an opportunity missed, because it may only be that number this year, but it was that number similar number last year and the year before that and the year before that and enrollment has not gone up exponentially. We have not seen a boost of growth within that program and I understand I do the culture that's built and I said it before within a world

129language classroom. I was there. I get it. But we we don't have languages like we used to like Italian. We have a lot of students with Italian ancestry that would connect with Italian, I believe. We don't offer that because we don't have the means to offer that. If we did have the means, we would have. So I think all those points considered I would go with the option to um continue the Chinese program for the students um that either need it for graduation requirements or to finish out their years here um and if they want to use that as a means to get their global diploma through um the online program that has proven to be effective for the students that currently take it for a different language. So was it on the Chinese program?

130>> It was. Just to rebut um Trevor's points of the low enrollment. Actually in grade 7 and 8 next year, there's uh nine seventh graders and 10 eighth graders. The only other highest there right now is 10th grade that is 13. So seventh and eighth graders already make up a good chunk of the students that are taking that. But we lose kids in grade eight. Not saying >> we We don't know. We don't know. Exactly. We don't know. We don't know actually. But we're definitely going to lose them if we if we get rid of the program. That's not definite. There is a very good chance that they will. If they're going to have an option to take it somewhere else. Could be true. We don't know. I'm just saying there's 19 students in 7th

131and 8th grade. That makes up a very good big chunk and that replaces That's true. quite a few that are getting ready to graduate. And as we have heard over and over again, they keep taking it. It's not a take it one year, take it two years and I'm done. It's a I take it every single year, all six years. Like every language. No, not No, it's not a lot of I mean it just a point of order. We didn't We didn't We did not get data on how many kids don't continue after two years. That was discussed. Was it discussed? And it was back in January. >> I would share that generally it's all emphasized for all. All languages, most. Yes. That's gotten deleted then. Um Jeff, Melissa, I'm worried about this topic, so

132It's I'm I'm not moving on past this topic, but I'm happy to kind of just um Um personally, I think it's a really strategic to have just there. Um but I think Travis has some really good points. You know, if enrollment does not continue to improve in the next few years, I'll be My personal opinion is it's We're doing the students a on that track at a service right now just to cut it out of nowhere. But at same time, if you know, the Chinese language group cannot boost enrollment and get that a higher participation in the schools, I'd be happy to look at this down the line. I'd give them, you know, two years now. I'd be happy to say, "Hey, you know, you were put on notice that there's not a lot of

133interest. You have two years to try and build that. If that's not there in a year or two, I think it's it's fair game to revisit. Cuz I think we should be looking at classes that are not enrolling to full capacity. But I would definitely like to give it a chance. I You know, I said before, I'd I'd much rather have emerging regions, you know, growing. This is where the world's going. So, give it a chance to build up. And so, I've you know, giving a charge to the the teachers and the students to really start to vocalize this and champion this. If you can get the enrollment up next year or two, I'd be all for growing this group as much as possible. At the same time, if we're still at 10 to 40

134students, it's really hard to justify on this side of things. I don't know if that helps the conversation or not, but it's kind of sort of middle path. >> Sharon, your thoughts on it. So, I'm going to go with Maggie, Bill, and then I'm going to just share my my thought on it, and then we're going to jump topics. So, Good night. Good night. So, you guys might not want me to talk. I've never been called Maggie before. Call me Maggie. I um I sort of what Jeff was saying that I don't know if we gave the Chinese program a chance or even a warning that this might happen. It's not come up, really, from um a vision point of view in the last 7 years that I can recall. It's been mentioned that it's

135a small I've heard it by members of the school committee that it might probably needs to look at, but um I feel like from a teaching and learning perspective, like it was not a program that was targeted as this is not working, this is not producing good students, etc. So, I think it's worth giving it an equitable chance to thrive and grow. And I don't know, maybe 10, 20 years ago, or I don't know how long we've had it. 2014, I think it was. 10 years ago, 2007. I don't know. Um It was before me. Um I just think we have to give it a chance at this point. Because we were we were cutting it without some some out of a warning. Thanks. Uh Bill. Yes, thank you for calling. Um I'd say at

136this point just my my feeling tonight is uh to accept the baseline numbers on this uh as well as scenario B. Let's do a straw poll. What is scenario B? I'm sorry, hold on. What is scenario B? Don't do that. >> Did you say sorry Did you guys have this? I cannot eat that. Hands up. Folks, folks have Oh, sorry. Yeah, I'm sorry. All right, no. All right, hold on. I'm sorry. Scenario B keeps the Chinese program, but removes the bus routes as well as the high school English teaching position. Give me a second. So, based on cost of bus It's in the email. That's just uh Yeah, I just I was using that. I'm saying Yeah. Okay, with the department head. I don't want to cut. Be quiet. Uh I want to go to

137Mag. Well, I want to figure out I'd like to take a straw straw poll real quick just to see where we are. As Bill suggested baseline plus B and I want to get a sense of who's coming close to aligning with base baseline plus B. Maybe just by a show of hands. Sorry. I'd like to get a feel for who's getting close to aligning with baseline plus scenario B. I'm going there. What's that? Close. You guys leave your hands up so I can just see. That actually puts us under the two and a half delta, just so you know. Yeah, which is slightly under, yes. 1 2 3 4 5 6. Okay. All right, so we wouldn't be there yet. Um I'd like to Let's Let's Let's get to Maggie's question. And then let's talk

138a little bit about where we need to go in scenario B. Maggie. >> My question's going back. I don't I'm going to pass. I'm going to hold off asking. Sure. Mhm. Okay. All right. Lisa, did you have something? I do. Do you bring us to the right direction? Um because we really have not talked at all about the cutting the middle school team today. We've kind of danced around it. Um I just want to say and I want to put it out there that there are three of us at this table. Right? 1 2 3 that who has an up-and-coming seventh grader. So, these we know exactly what it is that we're doing. And it is going to be affecting our own children specifically as well. So, we're not making this thinking, "Oh, it's not

139going to affect us." There are at least three of us at this table that it's going to. So, I understand what it is I'm looking at and what I'm doing to my own child. Did you say something? Let's take a straw poll on baseline. Okay. Can I get a straw poll on baseline? Do we Are we at least aligned Are we aligned around the baseline that's up there? Meaning baseline or better? Or baseline or more baseline or less? Depending on your definition of better or worse. Um my point is to vote for it. Would you vote for the baseline? >> it good enough or is it that plus else? Like something else, you know, plus additional I'm fine on baseline and then we can How about what else? Right. Is there anything else in the

140baseline that we need to discuss? Or is there somebody who's walking away from this because of what's on the baseline list. Just have one more just one more just definitive question about the visual arts and then I promise I won't ask again, but my only my only question about it is the weight of what that person does. So when I'm looking at the Chinese program compared to that, that's what I'm trying to balance with the amount of classes and the students that are going to be affected with those specific things. Is are we okay to not have that? I think is what I'm just just doubly asking and just to make sure. It's my only hangup is the amount, the weight of what that person is responsible for. So I mean and the and the

141amount of classes, excuse me. So I just want to make sure and check myself and get opinions on that just to be really sure that I'm not taking a huge gouge out of I mean we are obviously with everything, but with that specifically, it's the only one that I'm just hearing about the weight of what that person does. Are we okay with that? Is that I'm just a little nervous. What what will happen to all of those classes or is that Are we I can share my perspective only having talked to a handful of different folks across teaching, principals, department heads. Uh Mike Jeff You know, it it feels like yes, there'll be an impact. Yes, it will be managed. And that the art department will continue to be successful. Um Stacy provides a great

142service. She's very talented and a very respected leader. Um As is Jared. Um and when we compare that to the the Chinese program um being completely eliminated with zero chance of anybody taking a Chinese class if we do that, I think the thought here is that you keep the programming verse if if you're comparing the two, you keep the programming verse the um I'm not sure what the verb is, but verse the uh discomfort of having a single department head overseeing both of them. Both departments. Actually, not a perfect verb. No, I know. I guess and yeah, I just that was my only my only hang up because we and I get it. We there are people that wanted to do this 2 years ago, but my that's my only just the fairness of it.

143We're talking about equity. We're talking about not wanting to take from each one. So, I guess I'm just doing my due diligence asking out loud, you know, why why it's okay for this one, but it wasn't okay 2 years ago for the other one. And just but that's what I asked the question for to get the answer. So, thank you. All right. Um to build off of what you were saying and to respond to Kendra, I think the impacts for say the students that are currently taking Chinese would be great if we were to go to an online model or start to pair down the program. And it would direct impacts but few students. Eliminating the art department head who teaches four sections, larger impact, no, maybe not larger, large impact, but spread across like

144more of a ripple effect is how I'm imagining it. Wouldn't the digital arts teacher, her position, classes would be cut? So, all of the kids who are taking digital art would be graphic design graphic design. Thank you. graphic design She's correct. >> Is that Is that accurate? Okay. And but and the other point I was going to bring up, if Stacy were to which I mean her years of service here, I don't think she would, but if she were to leave the district or retire, there's no saying whoever was to take that position anyways would be able to teach that class as well. So, it's just a way that as well while you're making the decision. I think. But I was a little less on the scenarios at this point. Um So, right now I

145think sounds like we are yeah, we're not fully aligned but closely aligned to keeping Chinese reducing the the buses, correct? Those seem to pretty strong opinions for um Then you would have to infer the middle school. So, that's um world language head, that's in or out at this point. Replace it back to that. I mean for me the introducing the world language head is is off the table. >> Okay. I have forgiving the school the autonomy to rebalance their departments. For me I I kind of struggle with like every I you know, if we're not placing that role, it's almost a net zero to keep the the visual arts role at this point. Um I'd much rather save that till we have the superintendent on next year to really determine what the what the model

146looks like as we are changing up the leadership here. So, to me it's it's pretty much a I'd keep that in at least for another year and revisit. Um it's less about the person. I think Jeremy makes a good point but I'm I think about it more as just roles. These are all long-term strategic positions. So, we shouldn't be deciding based off a person. That's just kind of the way I see things. So, I think I'm aligned with everything except for that that one line item for the Since we are picking, you know, department heads and that but we're still like much rather get to the point where we're just picking a number. But it sounds like we're not there yet. We could pick a number. I'll just say I'd rather defer to the the

147people who know the business, you know, the superintendents, the principals, the staff on this but you know, we're not there this year. So, I No, you know, if I'd have a hard time approving a budget dropping the the arts at this point. Everybody else I'm okay with. The perspectives on baseline. Okay. I mean just real quickly, I like baseline but I like I like baseline plus scenario B a whole lot more. >> Yeah, yeah. So, I don't think baseline is enough. Yep. I maybe I'm asking is baseline is is baseline what we want to start from? Jeff has concerns about the art but otherwise This baseline what we sent out doesn't include the the busing, correct? In the Is everybody good with the busing? Yeah. I'm just going to move that over then. I can't

148access you know for some reason 37. Well, I'm a lag. So, if you move the busing over, we're $42,000 off from 2 and 1/2%. And but that includes the visual art department head that Jeff has concerns about and maybe others. What's up? Sorry, don't need to call you out. No, that's fine. Yeah. I don't I mean I got to say all the time that 2 and 1/2% doesn't bother me. I'm happy to go over it. I think you can't cut your way to excellence. Um this is going to be a recurring problem if we keep cutting so It's a little bit because you guys can see. What percentage is $100,000? I'm sorry, I didn't get the first What percentage of our budget is $100,000? It's like 2.5. percent 2.5% or 0.25? 0.25 ish Has the

149leadership at the building level, have they have We're going back and forth and this is why we kind of opened with this about the naming of the department heads, right? We're really going to get caught up in this cuz the same logic can apply to the social studies department head. Like why this one versus this one? If there is support from the building leadership that this is what they want and this is what they see best for students. Department heads weren't on our list. Area one did not have department heads, sorry. Scenario one that level service Oh. No, scenario one was just cutting Was getting >> Just cutting everybody. >> Teacher of every meeting department in the high school teacher or last night. If you take a baseline and you remove the So it I

150think there's an overall sense that we can save money by reducing reorganizing the department head structure. Um Sorry. Um If you take out if you only reduce it by one it leaves us at $187,000 to budget which is half percent away from two. So it's about 3% I think. That assumes you're picking the one. Well, it but the don't we have to in their bargaining unit that contract that we have to Like can't we say we're reducing by one? You can, but then you'd have to pick the lowest salary for all of all of the department. >> Isn't it it's not I thought I read that There's no attrition in that. No attrition. No reduction in force language in that contract. So I'm looking at that. But it's not the It's not It's not the

151administrator's contract. So you have to pick the lowest salary only because you have to assume that the school would choose Okay. So that reminds I just lied. Okay. I mean it might not It might not move the needle more than 20 30,000. But it's probably another 20 30,000. Yeah. So we're so If we only reduce it by one uh department head, we get to 87 or 83 that we are away from our 2.5% which is close to 3% Would that include the world language? No, that does not. That include the world language? I'm sorry. So I should have said that differently. It doesn't It It reduces it from the current structure by one. Correct. So it's still We're still down two department heads. Correct. But what I heard is that that might be manageable. Yes.

152Adrian. And just I'm completing We said the department head position for visual arts would impact graphic design which would be lost which theoretically when our amazing department head retired that would likely be a loss to You meant to French not Um she's the one that does French but I did I think I heard someone say we would try and find someone that could maybe pick that up. So like there's a chance that could be preserved. Um AP art would we lose AP art all together? No, we would still retain that. It would just be redistributed. And then art studio is taught by a number of teachers because it's sort of like the Okay. I understand that better now. Thank you. So you're missing all the extracurricular achievements that are going on as well. That's a

153risk. The school is very highly recognized externally. Yeah, I know. My daughter was one of the scholastic award winners. This guts me. I hate it. So folks, I do want to point out if we went with just baseline right now, having added the bus routes to that list, we'd be $42,000 over 2 and 1/2%. It would get Middleton under the override threshold. And if we included B, would it also get Boxford below that threshold? Is English position in there? No, not in the baseline. That's the In B though, right? It would be close. I think that your spreadsheet was to figure that out. I have a lot of area to This is really rough. We're still two percent over override. That's the increase is 909. When they're 2 and 1/2% Increase is 909 at 2

154and 1/2%. What I did is send that out. My spreadsheet don't do that. So, I just want to check in. Baseline keeps Mandarin Chinese, correct? That's right. That's my formula. I mean, if it's going to not be close It won't be close. Baseline plus B? That was close if not eliminates the over the need for an override in two or three towns, which means 50. We leave here Wednesday, pretty certain we have a budget that will be our budget for the next year. There's no more chance of it failing an election um and us not having a budget. I don't have the sheets. 1.6 million dollars That's what we wanted to get Boxford. Maybe Topsfield you don't only have one Topsfield you might only have one operational Right. How many people break down the assessments

155in the department? Maybe I'm not going to talk anymore today. So what these guys put together here from the truck we're just looking at the assessments for each town because it it baseline baseline gets Middleton under the threshold for a override. And then the unbalanced assessments Right. start to figure out what that would be. Okay. It's just baseline. Yeah. It was transportation in there. Baseline plus debt. some days. I'm going on what's on the screen right now. But I've updated this potential for What's the total of the warrant? cheap I'm just one year to see the override. And brought me That's the bottom line. It's 42,631. They gave it to the town meeting. I never see she's a paper. Mhm. So I'm not fine. Good. Yeah. So, I'm not sure. There you go. That's what

156you got to get out. Yeah, I got that for sure. I know. We're just trying to figure out the assessment. We're over it. And let's tell them to You got to You got to plug it all in. I'm not sure what it I need this company name, yes. Mhm. This is cost of something. If you think it's a handful. 7661000, which you need. But from the local service. Yep. Yeah. Matt, what are you figuring out? So, Okay, that's This line by itself is $42,000 off from 2 and 1/2%. Okay. But remember the assessments are under in balance unbalanced across the three towns. And so, at $42,000, at least Middleton would be under the the 2 and 1/2% threshold. Topsfield would probably be at I don't know, I'm guessing 2.7 or something like that. And I'm

157sure we're trying to figure out if Boxford would be at 2.5 or 2.6. It's really close if they're going to be under the 2 and 1/2% threshold. But it's hard to do those assessments in real time. >> Yeah. So, So, just for the sake of analysis, would it be worth to also at the reducing the English position? The what? The English high school English teaching position. That's what they're trying to figure out. We haven't figured that. Well, it's not in in the baseline if the A&B's I think they're still going to be over because I think I You look at the distribution. If you're at 2 and 1/2%, Middleton's going to be below the 2 and 1/2% and Topsfield and Box are always going to be above it to make up for Middleton's belowness. If

158we recessed, would we be able to figure it out better? No. I mean, yeah. I won't I'm going to assume that Box is still in there a little bit. So. And actually, what I was suggesting is basically baseline plus scenario B because you've already added in the buses. Yeah, scenario B just adds in the teacher at this point. Adds in the English teacher. So. We're adding in versus removing. Is that Is it adding in or adding in reduction? Adding the reduction, thank you. Including the reduction, yes. I think we should start with that number. Yeah, Jeff come up with it. That's right. It will go down. What? Baseline minus a Six and then baseline two. Baseline is the six, yeah, with the transportation. All of that. And then it's up. Jeff, hold on. We Got

159it. I think we're talking just one minute. You added in the I just want to make sure that this is her scenario. Yeah, I mean, you're just going to have to figure out that's just around two cents. Sorry? All right. 1.5 All right, can we do another straw poll of baseline? We did. I just lost Melissa. Melissa just walked away. I still don't think we need She's coming back. Baseline. Plus. Baseline with space. Just baseline. Just baseline with transportation. >> All of that. Sorry, I've moved that over now. Baseline plus Baseline plus buses. Sorry. Just start with the legs. Can we do a straw poll of baseline including the transportation? Not Chinese? Chinese is not in the baseline. Okay. Do a straw poll, please. And this is would you vote for it? Would you vote

160for it? Yeah. Would you support baseline plus adding And what's the 1.6? 1.6 18. Okay. Sorry. Is that a reduction of 1.6? >> 1. I want to make sure I have 1.6 1.9. Yeah, 1.6 1.9. Yeah, 1.6 19. Is that Sorry, I couldn't hear you. You said 1.6 19. Is that what you got? 1.6 19. All right. We're 42,000 shy of 2 and 1/2% with baseline. Just Only the buses. Okay, so one last time, guys. I think I only saw two hands and maybe they're going in the wrong direction, but yes. So, Who would support voting for baseline? Jeff, Joe, you guys there? Support for voting for baseline. No. No. Yes. Two, three, four, five. No. Okay. All right, guys. We got to get We got to get here somehow. So, keep talking. All right.

161Can we do another baseline and B? Same things? Uh I can do another baseline with B. Can you raise your hand if baseline with B would change your mind in favor? Okay. Can I do a full straw poll of baseline plus B? That's adding back in Chinese, correct? >> Yes, but it's keeping most of the baseline. >> plus B is baseline plus the English teacher. So, That gets us under 2 and 1/2%. >> English teacher. Keep them up, folks. Keep them up. It's It's what we just voted on. We're just adding adding the English. 25. You need more than that on your phone. Four. Man, not even All right guys, let's get back to work. Keep going. What if we lose votes from when we did it 10 minutes ago? I I That was me.

162Why did you not support baseline plus B? I cuz there's part well, Middleton's already at Or not with I thought we were at base No, we are with baseline. We are We are. Middleton And if we don't have And if we don't have Are you sure we have the transportation? And then we don't have to make that extra cut. Sorry, that's where my brain went was if we were already at baseline. So if we We're not at that place with the other two tabs. At least you can tell. Right. Where does baseline plus B but keeping the visual arts head get us? Baseline >> That's no That's no Chinese. 1.55B 1 cent, I think. Well, I can't lose the rest of the dollar that you have. Sorry, can you just clarify what you're saying? I

163have losing track of the baselines. I got you guys. So hold on. So you're saying keep the keep visual arts and move the English teacher. And Get rid of the English teacher. The difference between the visual arts is $60,000. The visual arts and the English teacher is $60,000. Can I walk through my mind just to see where What does that get us? We're at 2. 5%. Be 100,000 over. I think we are. Is that That doesn't Does that get Middleton there or not? I don't know. It's getting hairy. Can I get my head just over it? Can I just walk through the numbers and see where starts at? So that's I'm My proposal would be to baseline but add back Chinese, drop the English teacher. What do you mean by drop the English teacher? Remove.

164Okay. Remove the role. Remove the So we keep reduce just the English teacher. Reduce English teacher, add back Chinese. Maintain the arts and science. The visual arts. >> Visual arts, sorry. Visual arts, sorry. That's my school. Science. I didn't know. Sorry, that's my issue. I'm having flashbacks to college. Um and incorporating the bus reduction. Like it's me to I I think 1558. Can I ask you to say that again in words again? Pretty much baseline. It's baseline plus B. It's all right. Minus visual arts. Baseline plus B, which is what Joe just asked for, I think. Yes. I'm assuming back to arts. Maintaining the visual arts rule. That's what he asked for. >> It's 15 58. So that's 154 over your 2 and 1/2 target. And that doesn't sound right. I'm Would it be better

165if we gave you say said scenario, we recessed for 5 to 10 minutes and let people crunch numbers and then come back? Yes. We have like four things here to debate over. Let me make sure I understand what you asked for here. You're proposing to keep the art department head. Arts. Reduce the English teacher. Arts. Yep. Yep. The Chinese. And consulting the buses. It's Yeah. You just want That's our core. All this um You have a lengthy executive session. Mhm. 16, 17 hours. That's 1558. Let's get this And this 103,000 over. 130? No. 130. I I get 154. Oh, we recess for 5 minutes. Who wants to use the bathroom? Yeah. I need to get water. Then that Jeff, you and I can compare notes for a second. My definitely be a different baseline than

166yours. I just look at total my numbers delta G or 2 and 1/2%. That's the number I was at. Like double two year scenario. You good there? All right, let's do 5 minutes. Uh Back in 5 minutes, please. 37 38. We're going to We're going to We're going to break, but you can come up here and talk to uh meeting. Very long time. In student enrollment. But what I want to point out to is how to enrollment it really is a lot not a lack of interest. It's a lack of I'll have your something. information. Mhm. Um And there's a lot of things such at a school level beginning like only offering the first choice and the second choice was never considered. >> Yeah. And A quick example I can think of is how to

167wait list. They have a much smaller school. Their Chinese program is very strong. Why? Because the students were taking are taking Mandarin Chinese and having your Spanish. So they know the language. As a result, although they are half size our school our 1 to 12. But they have stronger number. We're talking about 20 plus even 30 students. So Yeah. >> He asked us We're missing one. Do we have everybody? Okay. Which I guess puts us to 100,000. 103,000 off to 2 and 1/2%. Which part of my numbers probably puts Middleton outside of 2 and 1/2%. >> It does. It does. Do you have a way of calculating that now? Um Well, I know that number. Okay. Um and certainly Boxer and Topsfield are You know my number off by about 50 grand. I'm not sure

168why. Um We didn't. >> So That's all. The whole purpose of the three slides. I don't know what your numbers Mhm. 103745. >> Yes. Same. I have the same number. >> You have three of us here 103745. But I'm lost. Any other recommendations? Is East Old Town Is Katie's Uh excuse her. Yes. So is Middleton at target number or not? I don't think we are at 100,000. I think that we are at 40,000. So Do you have a motion? I I move that we consider reducing E&D by that $60,000 just to say we get to that target number. I think the risk is pretty low. Can we move >> million dollars in that budget we'd be reducing it by 60k. Move to reduce E&D so that Middleton falls at 2.49999%. Whatever that number is which

169is probably around $50,000. Yeah. Right. What are you doing? Cuz we're we already have a A&D. Down the three, yeah. Right. >> But what I said earlier today was that Jeff left early. We know we're going to have I know A&D next year is going to be even larger. We've never come close to having to dig into that $2 million ever ever ever ever, right? And sure things can happen, but at the towns would support us over $60,000 if that's what we needed to do some big project, right? So you want to add if that we're we're going to the three floor. I'm saying go lower. We can do it. The policy is at the three. The policy is at the three. Policy is only set at the three, right? Yeah, we just did. Did

170it last week. Is that two meetings. There's no on a duly posted agenda. I don't like any of this. I did. The challenges is probably a little bit of wiggle room in the budget that we just don't, you know. We're at the point now where like fall adjustments make a difference. And I don't think that's 60,000. I don't I just think you know our estimates right now, we're going to come in probably we we tend to be pretty conservative in our estimates. These these are official numbers from Jeff. They may be conservative in in dimension or not, but this is what will get certified at the towns. So he's not going to take the conservativeness out of what goes to the towns. And we're pretty accurate when we close out at the end of the

171year. It's not like we have like we can just plan for $60,000 to be there. They're not overly conservative. No, you can't roll like that. Right. Okay, other suggestions? So we didn't have the votes for baseline plus B. We haven't had the votes of baseline plus B. We haven't had the votes of baseline. I mean I will say I'm compromised to get the baseline B. I think we're way better off reducing, making cuts in the Chinese department, but I'm willing to listen. I listen to all of you. I listen to them. The committee doesn't feel that's the right path forward. I'll compromise. I I think some people need to compromise here as well. I think Trevor is right and I don't think we're leaving here tonight until we do find a middle ground number. I

172didn't bring enough snacks. What's that? I didn't bring enough snacks. You better get talking. Did I make my grapes and stuff there this morning? Probably not. Um So I guess my question is what's what's the hang-up with baseline plus B? Is it the reducing the high school English teaching position? I heard a lot of pushback on that. Why is there more support? Cuz it includes keeping Chinese um buses um yeah. Okay, go ahead. I mean I'll just say for me it's like where I think we're my my thought is we're diving into and maybe I'm wrong. Again, this is where I go back to like Joe's point of not knowing enough to make those decisions specifically with the department heads, but three in the social studies area, a big visual arts. I just it seems

173like a big chunk of that as as opposed to the Chinese program for me. Where I'd would compromised to do it online, but I just seems like we're digging into and maybe I'm wrong. I'm just saying this is my perspective that we're diving into regular curriculum. I know it's electives, but it's a lot of classes or maybe I have that wrong. So, I'm just looking at how many we're taking away in that area versus the Chinese program to maybe move that online for now and compromise. But I maybe I have it wrong. But that's where I'm I'm just a little confused and I don't want to make the wrong choice without having all of my information right. Uh I'd like to Phil, please. I think it's important to remove for the middle school, look thinking

174about social studies as part of the department, you're really looking at the middle school reduction separate from the high school reductions. The middle school you're looking at a team. So, it's really the full team. And you can't take one middle school math, one middle school social studies out. It's either you take out a team or not. Way the setup works. So, I would caution you to not look at it as departments. But look at the middle school separately from high school. It's just I'm just trying to weigh the both high school and Adrian. I'm also I'm still trying to figure out some way to do this that doesn't Just do that. do the wrong thing. Um It all feels terrible. I I agree. None of this feels good. I do Question now. I'm trying to

175think about how we can distribute the FTE reductions, distribute the reductions, distribute the balance of impact um >> Maybe I just need 20 minutes to do it. No. What's the statutory requirement here for having the the budget approved? Wednesday, I believe. Uh I should have put Eight yeah. Eight Eight votes. Is that your timing? Timing. >> need it for Wednesday to print. Yeah, but Topsfield and needs us to vote by Wednesday. I guess in order to have things ready for you to vote on Wednesday, we got to have numbers tonight. So the E&D put together two You said it takes two readings. That's changing the policy, correct? A policy takes two meetings. They can vote at a school committee just to override the policy one time. I would not do No, you can't do that.

176I'm just asking. I don't know. Is that I believe so. What's the point of a policy? Policies are guidelines and I'm not in the policies, but I'm not in favor of reducing Andy and he said he would We had a thoughtful discussion and we landed on that and it's not meant to be used as a one-time get off get out of jail free card. And that's Yeah. what that conversation is starting to sound Yeah, Middleton wouldn't Middleton wouldn't support that. They were pretty clear about that on Topsfield didn't support And we met them. And so is Boxford the folks I've heard from Boxford. Topsfield wouldn't support that either. They're very upset that we did this already. The pen comments. So that's not an option here. Yeah. I Increase athletic fees? Unless it's get Why are

177these couched as eliminate this position and eliminate that position as opposed to combine these two positions into one? I mean, there's We're willing to say what positions we're eliminating, but we're not willing to say what the combining is going to be. Jeff, last week there was a big discussion around um how do we think about department heads within the context of position productions. And I described it as a spectrum um where on one end of the spectrum the school committee decides specifically which positions are going to be reduced and specifically decide which which department heads are going to be combined. On the end of the end of the end of the spectrum, all we do is we specify how many positions are going to exist. The school decides how many who's going to be reduced,

178which positions are going to be reduced, and which positions are going to be merged in which dimensions. Which is what On the middle of the spectrum, we could specify which positions are going to be reduced and then let the school figure out how to manage. So that's my sticking point. So the reason why I see that as a little bit problematic is because Jeff over here is saying we're eliminating the visual arts position. The reality is we're combining that the that role with another role somewhere and that new role you could have the visual arts person could move into that role perhaps. You don't know. So by saying we're eliminating the visual arts position here, we're getting up all up in arms over who we're losing. When it's possible you don't have to lose that

179particular person. Let me ask Let me ask you this. Would there be more support if we did baseline plus B but we did not dictate the specific department heads? You'd lose me. Lose you? To uh They they asked us to >> They asked us to and that's where that's where I'm really conflicted cuz I don't if us to. it. came to a consensus. >> their perspective. I'm just trying to figure out I think we all raised our hand that we supported that model for those of us that were here. But we all weren't facing a a budget that isn't getting agreed to and I wanted to revisit the question of whether or not that would be a game-changer for for the group. Okay, you'd lose me. Okay. Just as a service to just a question,

180if the you know, we're looking at some significant staffing reductions, you know, we haven't talked about support staff at all. That's something that's it you know, on on the table, but the administration, central office, Realistically, I don't see how at the 11th hour we can No, exactly. set of considerations. I I'm I'm still I'm just annoyed with you all that these never came up at all, so it's I I don't disagree at all with what you're saying. Some of this may be a conversation that the the school committee needs to have in our introductory meetings with the new superintendent that's saying we really want to look at reorganization of the school and what's the best way. We're not going to accomplish this in fiscal 27, but you could possibly accomplish it in fiscal 28. That's

181just my two It's not going to help us now, but it may help us in the future to have that in the back of our head. And it's not a given that the school needs reorganization. We've had a number of of suggestions thrown out there and um you know, observations that you know, may may not be you know, technically accurate about the the top-heaviness of the you know, this the school district. Um I mean, that's that's interesting to hear, but it's it's it's not necessarily factual. So, Yeah, and I think it was fun. We we just don't know. We don't know yes or no. It's still of a black hole. No, that's not true. They sent us an organizational chart of a few months ago. Let's Let's have that conversation, you know, I I have

182to rely on who is it who is it that you're talking about? Give us the organizational perspective. We have you on chat. I We did discuss it. I did discuss it with Mike and Jeff at one point. I think it's honestly, with all due respect to Mike and Jeff, I think it's a hard discussion to have because they're the only two that can comment on the central office. I shouldn't say that. They're the only two that They're the ones that report up. They The central office reports up to them. Mhm. Right? They're not going to be here next year. When we talk about department heads, we talk about teachers, even principals to an extent, we can get informed by people who are going to be here next year. I think that, you know, to the

183point Yeah, we are effectively reorganizing the school bit by bit over the last 3 years, right? So, you know, we'd be much better to do it in whole and back, you know, with a strategic view instead of trying to do it. You know, this is more I'm complaining about the process. It's not We did We all inherited this process. Year by year, making cuts and changes is a reorg. It's just a poorly informed one. I I I would disagree with that statement right there. So, Trevor, please. So, um just to Jeff's point and a lot of the comments that we heard that, you know, we weren't looking at administration, they weren't on our table. Department heads, I see as Yes, they may have teaching sections, but I see them as administrators. And principal consolidation, I

184see They may be housed in these two buildings or this one building, two schools, but I see them as administrators. So, I think this is shared. Maybe not as broadly as some may have hoped, but this is pretty spread out and affecting a lot of different areas. Whether that's a good thing or a bad thing, it's just fact that those positions are administrators. Sorry, I just want to say that I was thinking that's halfway. The other half is that you have if we're consulting the principals, do they both have EAs that are really really short dollars now? Is there a need for that? Um they do and that was a discussion that I had with them and I think that the perspective is that the EAs aren't necessarily an assistant to the principals, they're an

185assistant to the school. Okay, thanks. Okay. I hope I got that right. Yes. And in the middle school it's a registrar combined with EA. >> Okay. It could be an argument going that's one principal that their role goes up actually. >> Absolutely. Yes. Yeah. All right, AJ. What is the FTE equivalent for the social studies department head? Do you know? I'm sorry, I didn't catch that. Or I know, sorry. 0.4. >> 0.4. Change of teaching, yeah. Two sections, we did that. I just think All right, folks. Let's keep Let's keep trying to move towards a compromise. >> We have the strawberry proposal. On which one? On my scenario, we Your scenario was >> over your target. Yeah. I'm sorry. It's the one that's 100 over your target, I think. One that's 100 over my target.

186Or not my target, but the 2.5%. That's because it's not my target. So, your yours was keep the art department head, reduce the English teaching position. That gets us to 103 over 2 103,000 over 2%. 2.5%. Change Chinese. Change Chinese. Swapping the buses. It's baseline. Yeah, it's baseline. It's baseline, you're swapping the art department head. Uh and you're introducing the teacher. English teacher. Uh, straw poll for that? Show of hands. Uh, Jeff, one. Okay. All right, we're continuing to move in the wrong direction. Sorry. Who should be crossed off? And somebody Joe, what would you like to see? And you know what? I'm not even going to go necessarily to Joe, but like >> Yeah, throw up. I have a question now. I'm going to go around. >> a I have a question, so if

187we went down to one Chinese full-time Chinese teacher and got rid of the part-time one, could you figure out how to make a program work? Absolutely not. There's no thinking out of the box. >> No, there's no way to do out of the box. No way to do middle school and high school. Teach them. Okay. One teacher's EAL classes middle school >> Yeah, there's there would be no way to have there would no be no way to have six grades of Chinese. What's 0.4? Or 0.8? Sorry. I told you. Thinking out of the box, you have a ninth and tenth grade class, you have an eleventh and twelfth grade class, you have an eighth and seventh and eighth grade class, right? Well, then you're only talking about 0.6, still reducing the position. And scheduling that's

188half the section. It gets tricky. It's different levels. That's only 19 kids at a seventh and eighth grade combined, right? That point online might be more of an effective mode of teaching. But then it's throwing kids that have never seen Chinese in their life with kids that have been there for a year and just continuously. Immersion, baby. Yep. People on different levels. They already immersed here. They they you day one you walk in and they then they speak that language to you. All right, anyway. And it's 30K, that's, you know, hanging there, waiting. So, who wasn't for baseline and B? Have we said anything to get anyone closer? We talked Can we say Can you remind us what's keeping us from that? Again, I I and I feel like an idiot. I just don't I

189don't feel like I know enough. Like go back to Joe's point. I mean, we maybe we're right about field maneuver department heads the way they see fit, but I just don't if we're supposed to be looking at numbers and we're supposed to enrollment numbers, sorry, and the weight of what students are taking in the school. That's I just want to be sure that removing a visual arts department head is going to be just fine when it wasn't okay. I just want to make sure I'm just I'm asking it for seriousness. We've we've always had the Chinese program on the list. I'd be fine with moving it to online, but I'm looking at the weight of removing all of the regular even a full middle school team, which is on the docket here. That's a lot

190a lot a lot a lot of impact versus you know, a smaller amount. So, I'm having a hard time balancing out what Okay. What's what's hurting the the larger amount of students every single day and it's not an easy answer and it's certainly ridiculous thing to even say out loud, but that's where I'm hung up. I just want to be sure if the visual arts department head we're fine without all of those classes and the amount of kids. I don't even know how many students all together rough estimate with all of those. If you remove that person out right now, how many students directly are affected? I That's all. That's me. I'm just trying to make sure I have it right before I I can share how I think about it, which is kind of

191what Trevor I think was trying to articulate earlier. It can either either one is going to have an impact. Every single line on here is going to have an impact. It is close. I think in my discussions the removal of a Chinese program is going to hit 50 kids really hard. There's no more program. It's gone. Right. Right. So, they either stop taking a language if they've met the requirement or they transition to a different language if they haven't. To what? What's that? Or online. Or Or online if that's an option. The art department, again, if we lose Stacy would be a hit. I think it's going to be less of a hit on the average students. Maybe across more students. Right. Um Sorry, I don't mean to keep asking the same question again. I'm

192just I just for just clarification purposes. I just want to make sure because we talk a lot about equity and being fair and you know, just because departments weren't represented here doesn't mean that they don't get a fair discussion on being meaningful to the school as well. So, and I just go back to the two-year prior discussion where we were never okay with doing it on one side. I just want to be sure. That's all. So, I appreciate >> know that we're going to be sure. Right. >> You're not going to know. It was a different school committee, too. Like, it's it was a different committee. Yep. If we're looking for absolutes here, the only absolute is the data that we review next like this time next year. Right. Like >> I know. I wish

193I could reassure everybody more than that. I'm sure Katie and Phil wish they could reassure Mike wish they could I'll do. Right. We're not going to be able to reassure everybody that's going to be perfect. >> No, totally understand. Just real quick. I remember two years ago when that issue was discussed, we have to remember that there were two retirements that year that completely decimated the the long-term leadership of of music here of Masco. So, that was a big part of honestly not wanting to change too many things at once. So, that was wrapped into that discussion as well. Um which is not the case today. That's, you know, the you know, how how those programs have have seemed to have thrived in the interim. So, I don't think um you can apply what happened

1942 years ago to what we're discussing right now. I'm going to Adrian just a second, but the other thing I'll just share real quickly, Kendra, is um in my discussions with some of the leadership here, they've Right, they don't want to see any cuts, but they've assured me that if we eliminate these two positions and allow others to be combined, that they will make it work. Right? So, how you quantify success or failure, again, I think that that's going to be something that we look at next year. But, they've assured me that it's not going to it's not going to be catastrophic, that they'll they're going to make it work. And specifically >> which two reductions are you talking about? Social studies and Visual arts, that's all. Okay. I just >> Adrian. I want to

195say that I'm right there with you. I'm aware of the conversations and I'm aware of the dedication that our team has in making all of this work. It's not going to be easy for them. No one wants this. But, they're going to come here every day and they're going to do what they need to do to make sure that Masco stays Masco and for that I'm so grateful to every single one of you. I also want to say we made a decision last year with the school nurse that we really didn't like. We didn't It didn't sit well with us. We're making that work this year. Next year, maybe we'll have retirements that will allow us to make decisions about things that we couldn't this year. I don't know. We're going to have a new

196a new leadership. Maybe there'll be creative solutions that come that we haven't even contemplated yet. I think there's so much opportunity ahead of us. This is awful. But I'm so hopeful that we're able to make it work and we're going to continue to do the work to make sure that it keeps getting better. We're just between a rock and a hard place right now. I mean, that's really something. For sure. Thanks. Yeah. I guess Thank you. No, I appreciate it. I do I appreciate the repetitive answer for me cuz I just my point was that it was made very clear that they're two separate areas and that you can't just mesh them together. So, that was my just just to say it out loud just to give respect to both sides of it that that

197was my only One nuance too and I don't again, we're leaving it to them to operationalize this so I don't know which way it goes. But take some comfort in knowing that there are certifications that allow someone to do oversight on a visual arts department that um versus not the other >> people have. So, I don't know that that was the case two years ago. I I was not at the table. But that you know, there are people who have experience overseeing a variety of departments. No, I mean that's why I ask. I just I'm just want to hear feedback. That's I appreciate it, so. So. I I'm hearing you and I and I understand. Um I guess I would just kind of look at too, we did look at putting that world language head

198back in the budget again this year. Even though everybody had said we couldn't do that last year, we did look at doing that again this year and if it turns out to be a massive failure, we could look at next year putting another visual arts head back into the budget. I know it's harder, but we did contemplate doing that here this year. So, I would say it's not out of the realm realm of possibilities. Just like we did the nurse. We realized the nurse was a complete utter failure. We're putting her back in. Or him. Or Or him. Or him, sorry. Them. Them. They. I just You're good. Jeff, you're good. I just historically, yeah, we we all promised we agreed we would add back this world language head, so once you remove something, it's

199uh the bar to replace it is very very high. Um it's a big cost in you know, I've never seen I've been here three years, the chance of us ever sitting here taking more money to add something we took out, you know, that trajectory is going down and fighting that is pretty hard. So. That's not what we did. We We we agreed to leave the position vacant after the world language head left in October. That was the agreement last year. We didn't promise to add it back. We didn't eliminate >> make a promise. We left it open for the rest of the year. That was the discussion. >> the discussion we had with the world language head who retired that we would bring back. I never said that for one second. No, no, he said

200That's what I heard. I said Regardless, my point is more that, you know, I'm hearing you know, not catastrophic, we can make it work. These are all unknowns, these are all guesses. I I still I'm anchored on this visual arts. This you know, this role is a specific role where there's a lot of we do a lot of external competitions. We do a lot of work outside of the school. So, someone who does not specialize in that space is service. So, saying we're going to spread the pain a little bit over a bigger group versus doing a lot of pain to a small group, to me that's unacceptable. And for me, we're at the point where the dollar numbers are so small, you know, I I I know people aren't on board with it. I

201think we should be able to make this work. Weren't you not in favor of the Chinese option as well? So, if you're going to just shoot down everything, I would suggest adding a supplement to that and help offset it because you're going to lose everyone. You got zero you got yourself to vote for. I mean, I got to vote my conscience. That's fine. And the other thing on the We have to get to it. We have to get to eat tonight. Right. And the other thing to keep in mind, I know that you you mentioned this this matter earlier that that this isn't happening in a vacuum. This is at the same time that we're going to be presenting this budget to our three towns and and pray that it that it passes at least

202two. Um we're also going to be introducing the the capital request that will initiate the MSBA process. And I think I think many of us believe that the likelihood of us getting the MSBA stuff approved only goes down if we have if we have operating budget overrides in various town votes. So, maybe that's not true, but honestly, I think it is. Um and that's not a risk we can afford to take. Joe, I want to add to that and that's that's this year's challenge. Next year, we're talking about in redoing the track, redoing the girls softball field, potentially uh a new soccer stadium, as well. I mean, at some point you have to just tell people we're being fiscally responsible to keep them on your side cuz we're going to be asking for a lot,

203not just this year, it's next year, too. Probably the year after that. Actually, not the year after. 6 months later, there's going to be a special town meeting to ask for the big ask here, right? The reason we're at that point is cuz the town's worked fiscally responsible for the last 30 years and didn't support all this infrastructure work, and it's Regardless of how much that Regardless Regardless It doesn't matter. Yeah, yeah, because we're cutting and we're cutting the school to pay for things we should have paid for 10 years ago. And that I guess I don't understand how that helps us with our problem this year. I think also you need to keep in mind that capital is not the same as operating budget here, Jeff. So, you know, if they kept everything going,

204you still have the operating budget in place. It's when when when did it go away? All right. Matt, where are we? Should we do another straw poll of baseline and B? We just did a lot of defending of that, I think. Sure it is. Um baseline, which is um art department head back in I'm sorry. Is there >> going to leave it alone. Reduces. The baseline plus the transport transportations in baseline now. Plus B, which is uh the reduction of an English teaching position. Have a straw poll. 2 3 4 5. All right. Let's keep going. Can we go on to easy topic just for a minute? >> Is that No, it's just it's just it's No, it's just It's easy topic. Can we take a break? Can we do that? It's the the capital

205project and talk about the problem while we do this. I'm not leaving this. Is there an option to do baseline and online Chinese program? Option to do anything. Yes. Do you want to ask for a straw poll on that? I mean, I guess. Yeah, I mean, don't love it. >> be with or without the English teacher? Well, like what do you what do you are you substituting something with it? Both. All reductions? Both. But yeah, like baseline then baseline plus B, but doing an online um Chinese program instead of And and with both of those scenarios. So including the reduction of the art department head? Yeah. Want to baseline plus A. Sorry. Delete this. I I yeah. I mean, I don't like it. I don't want to do it, but I mean, I got we

206have to figure something out and I understand I'll admit I'm confused by the logic, but I will take a straw poll. Do you want to Well, only the logic I think you were voting against B because you didn't like the idea of the art department head in there. Right. So, I'm saying So, then we put that back in the the original reduction, but to compromise, can we is it are we going to can we do an option with an online Chinese program? Trade art department head with the Chinese with the online. Online. Um do we want to do a straw poll for that? I mean, keeping Chinese No, I'm sorry. Getting rid of Chinese. Keeping the art department head. Right. Space straw poll. Hands up. Oh, no, I meant I meant like a reduction. Like

207what you originally had, but just in instead of keeping the entire Chinese program, doing an online version. Do you understand? Yeah, that's what they said. If this 2.5 It's roughly the same. Yeah. Okay. I mean, I would be supportive. You get rid of the Chinese program. You keep You get rid of the Chinese program making it online. Yes. You keep the art department. That is what you said. No. Get rid of the art department. Okay, so then I'm confused now. Okay, so that gets us well below. It's going to get us and that is baseline plus A. That gets us 200,000 uh Yeah. Uh that's going to get us to 150,000 What is our policy on languages anyway? Does it have Do we have to have Does Do kids have to take a language? Graduation

208requirement 2 years. 2 years. High school. In high school. What about the junior high? Part of the regular curriculum in junior high. It's just a core class that everybody takes. So, it's a requirement? Well, 2 years. I mean, it's not a There's no requirements in the middle school at all. It's just everybody takes a pretty scripted list of courses. So, we could make Chinese a high school only program, for instance. You could, but then there's no feeder for it. I mean, you start from scratch at ninth >> Well, everybody Everybody would take French and Spanish in middle school and then nobody would want to take it. You just kind of end up killing it. I question whether it would I mean, my daughter decided to take Japanese when she got to college rather than have

209the kids start taking Chinese ninth grade. But then again, we've heard over and over they take them in seventh grade, they take them in eighth grade. So, it it feeds into There's a base in seventh and eighth grades that helps. And then we also hear that after eighth grade a lot of kids drop it. No. I was just saying those kids would transfer. A lot of kids leave. Kids transfer? A lot of kids, You know, average about 45 kids don't go from 8th grade to 9th grade and so a percentage of those kids are in Chinese. But it's not necessary. And so your numbers from 8th to 9th I wouldn't say they would drop. There's nothing stopping the kids from doing that now. >> prefer making it a high school only program over dropping it.

210That's my point. That's That's my point. That's all. I would have to go We saved 0.4. 33 9 Let's try and do it a different way. From earlier. Reduces Reduces budget 33 9. Adrian, where's your head at? Why me? I haven't seen your hand, but I have my thoughts tonight. I share a lot of perspectives. I'm taking my quiet time now to digest. How is it? It's almost time. Quiet time. Would be close. As in one away. >> I think I can hear it as well. Good class. We don't know where Chris is. So You don't know where Chris is. I'm assuming she's going to know no matter what. Just for I have to go in the Wednesday night with the yes. We're playing tickets. We're good. It'd be hard to come to school cold.

211Maggie, where's your head at? I Next. Do not feel comfortable passing judgement on certain positions. I am very comfortable with saying five FTE two departments. I know we I dis- I really differ from that, but without the numbers and the leadership, I feel that that is irresponsible to make unless it is a decision given to us by school leadership and that is what that is what is recommended and I don't feel like that I don't know and I just don't feel like it's responsible to do that. I am fine with the amount of numbers. It's just it's it is for me to pass judgment on saying this position I don't know enough. This position means more than this position. This one that that I just I need guidance from leadership on that. I'm just going

212to say it. Matt did a lot of work. He did a lot of conversations with a lot of these people that are back here. The scenario that he presented to us is after numerous conversations with these people and they're telling us they can make this work. And it feels really ridiculous to keep going round and round as to who we can and can't cut when again, Matt has done a lot of this work and they're telling us they can make this work. So, I mean I mean I appreciate I appreciate that, Lisa. I do. And I mean I'll be frank, right? Um I Um I invested a lot in this process. Um I have the benefit of having had all those conversations with a a wide pool of different people which makes me comfortable with

213baseline plus B. But I appreciate that people didn't have those conversations that I had even though I I did my best to relay um what I learned uh in in most cases. Um But because I've had all those discussions you know, I am comfortable that we are going to be a successful organization next year if we were to do baseline plus B. The leaders in the building tell me so. The leaders in the building have reassured me that we will make it work. We will be successful. Is this great as it is today? No. But I I'm confident that it will be great. All right. Thanks. This is not like last year where just felt like we're making cuts to make cuts. And where are we going to land and who can we This was

214thought out. This was again, a lot of discussions. So I can I I came into this pretty comfortable. But after I just and I had a few things I wanted to fight for. But again, because I've had these conversations with Matt and I've had conversations with people that are in the that are in the chairs. Does that move the needle at all? For either of you? Well, I'll just say for me, like we talk about looking at enrollment numbers. We've talked for months about looking at what what is trending up and what is not and that's how we are basing on what we're making for decisions and then it changes. So for me, that's what I'm looking at. So I'm willing to compromise, but for me it's moving the Chinese program online because we've talked

215for months now about how numbers are dropping and if we have to make compromises and we are cutting from other areas. I'm trying to just look at everything with a broad spectrum. I I I'm fully aware of all the work that Matt has done. He's done far more than than somebody in a volunteer position should be doing and I could never do it. But that's where my head is at. We are looking at enrollment numbers, what's going up, what's going down. We could we could think maybe it will go, maybe it won't, maybe it will. We're deciding right now based on what is happening and we have to make difficult decisions. So, that's for me, that's where I would be. That's my compromise. To to remove major teaching positions and department heads based on what

216can be done in the school, and then like what we've talked about for months now, and now it's changed. So, that for me is my compromise with moving it online, and that's where I would be. With everything else being reduced, which is horrible and awful, and and I think I major got to the school, but that's my personal compromise. This is good. I guess. So, so your proposal is Chinese goes to online. I think Off all that program. And we keep the visual arts, or is that No, I mean I don't I yeah, I don't I mean I'm just trying to budge. I think that number gets us close. I don't want to, but I'm just trying to Here's one. Everyone wants baseline plus A, I think is what you're saying. Baseline plus A is

217all reductions and move which includes moving the Chinese program online. Yeah, I mean it's I want, but you know No, I understand. But you're I yeah. You're with more than what you're targeting, correct? Yeah. Makes more sense. I mean Melissa. I think most of the reductions that we're looking at are going to affect student experience. That's not That's That's a given. However, when we're looking at what would be a programmatic change versus what would um adjust class size, I hate that we're considering cutting its team in the middle school. Like that doesn't sit right with me. However, to remove an entire an entire program, which is Chinese, when everything else seems to me that we've been provided some information that it can be our teachers are going to do it, our staff is going to

218do it, our administrators are going to deal with everything else. That's like the big thing. So, as much as I do not support cutting a middle school team at this point, I'm going to support baseline plus B. Because it doesn't change a program. And our programs are what make Masco Masco. Our teachers are amazing and I hate to lose full FTEs. But at the end of the day, the Masco experience includes a lot of different programs, a lot of different classes, things that differentiate Masco from other school districts. And I at this point, I think that cutting the Chinese program would We're not getting that back. We're probably We may not even get another language back. But I think that at the end of the day, if we have to make hard decisions, we can

219work with the other things. So, I'm looking at it. I'm trying to compartmentalize that between program changes and then Russell. Again, everything affects student experience. So, Awesome. That gets us one away. Right. One away. Not including Chris. That's right. We'll be We'll be here Wednesday night, but we need a we need a a commitment from eight tonight. Baseline plus B. >> Baseline. We do a straw poll again? Baseline plus B. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Okay. So, with Chris if Chris would support that we're there. If we support that we're there. So summarize what is that is reduction of buses, sorry I have to go to my computer is not working right. Reduction of buses, reduction of English teacher, reduction of named two department heads or what else? Um that's it. Those are

220the ones but and keeping the Chinese program. Keeping Chinese program. That's seven. Maggie, did that help you at all? I I know if I'm trying to imagine being in your shoes and I don't envy you because usually we have you're the only one that wasn't here last year where Chris we took kind of a historical budget approach where we went cost category by cost category where Jeff was up here for probably four meetings in a row going through our entire budget packet and and we didn't have that this year. I think because one a lot of us have been here for some years and well, it just didn't happen this year. Um so I feel for you there. I I don't know if what Matt had said and Lisa that this was not recommended, I

221wouldn't say supported, but given the options we have right now, this is what could be made um to work for the school. I don't know if their combination of answers helped you at all. I have been a teacher for 25 years. I can't separate that from this decision. I it's it's so hard for me to vote against core classes in this reduction. It more I just it's so hard and I just knowing all of this, I'm sorry I'm sorry. I just You wouldn't support reducing one FTE from a core subject. Say that again. You said core subjects. You wouldn't support >> a hard time with reducing making these decisions. It's just it's I thought I was approving a budget. I didn't think I was approving positions. That's how they get to the budget. There's just

222no other way to do it. >> That's not how I been I didn't realize that that when I did this that that would be my role to positions. I approved the budget but not who. Yeah. Just Last year was my first year sitting at this table. And I I cried tears one night. It was that hard for me. I want you to know that it is that hard and I'm not a teacher. And that first year, you will never have enough information that makes you feel good about the decision or makes you feel comfortable with it. In year two, I don't feel good. I don't necessarily feel comfortable either. But I am as informed as I can be and I have the assurance of very competent people telling me that they are going to do

223everything they can to make this work for our students and I have to believe them. And I just I I hope that offers you some comfort whatever your decision is, but I want you to know that what you're feeling is totally normal. And it is that hard. I know. I love budget season, too. Yeah. So, scenario C is basically scenario B adding back the world language head? Yes. Scenario C is just a column for me to capture the diversity of a world department head. Okay, so that's on my calculator. >> Which department? That's sorry. To me this is Not ideal compromise but I would I could I still anchored on that arts and science. If we had to pause on China Chinese that scenario. So it's sort of the opposite of what we just talked

224about. This force trading with Chinese for the arts and the visual arts. Getting rid of Chinese very interesting visual arts. I I could feel what's a core function of a core competence of the school. I I wouldn't want to damage it. So that's like a almost a net zero change. But it's not Is it damaged in other districts that have done this? Have you even looked at comparable districts what they do? Cuz it's very common to have them combined. Is it common to have a band teacher? Yes. Yeah. He's actually >> I just well supervises other departments. Or has done it. We made this decision two years ago. Period. Yeah. It's very common. This is not an unusual combination. I I just think it brings a lot of value. I know. I'm getting nods. So

225it's common. And that's true. That's true. I mean I'm willing to I like I didn't want to get rid of the visual arts and I'm willing to compromise and and I don't want to but have everything back on the list but my compromise would be to put Chinese online because we've discussed for multiple months about the enrollment and and it's not getting rid of it. Am I correct if it goes online? I know it's not the same. I hate online learning. Absolutely was against it during COVID. Hate it. But if we have to meet at a compromise, I'm willing to move all the way over and have all of the core things be horribly ripped out to make a compromise to do online. I mean that's that's where I'm at. I mean, that's I personally

226I'm okay going over general. I think we are overly influenced by select committees and finance committees that you know, don't always have teachers, students, and the parents. Right, they're they're balancing things out, but I think it's an underrepresented group is the working parents. I just want to go on record again saying I am influenced by the fact that I stood in front of Milton 2 years ago and saw my capital proposal fail. That was a unique vote, too. I want like that was a dark moment. >> your MBTA 3A No, it was not. That was the capital project that we were I think he's saying. >> the same night. Which it was. Yeah. So, you we brought in a very different crowd that you know, demographics of the vote were very different. >> think so.

227I think that's the demographic of the town that shows up in That is the town. It showed up three times. Yep. I think the town has stepped stepped up mostly, but That's enough for I don't know. Probably you think that the town has to step up. And votes are always tough with small turnouts. So, it's a real too, but the town has shown me differently. Yeah. Yeah. Um just want to make sure we're clear. Also, I have a I have a clarifying question. If we can answer this, I'm going to ask this publicly cuz I just asked it. We received emails, right? From people not supporting this in leadership positions. So, I'm supposed to put my faith into this decision, although we heard otherwise and say yes. That's what I'm being asked to do. From

228who? You can just say what emails at this point. >> Well, it's just we've we've been getting emails. Not every department head is in support of this, and that is just we're hearing. So, I am conflicted with that, but if everybody is saying that this is the best route and everybody's in agreement, I just I hope you can understand that I just am so uncomfortable with that. But I think that other piece of that is no department head is going to say yes, pick me. Please put my position on this list. So they're going to defend and this would be left This is the only way to do it. We can't leave it to the principals to come up and decide because it would be that times 10 behind closed doors. It just would be

229a horrible work environment, I think. What Lisa was saying. The basic I think that you guys have up there is what the LFT I said you can live with. Okay. We're not saying we're comfortable or supportive, but we can live with it. Work with it. That's where the LFT is at. Which is both of me, Brad, Kevin, Katie, Mike, and Jeff. I don't think any of us are comfortable. No, nobody really likes it. I'll put it a different way, Maggie, right? Um and I shared this with you yesterday or earlier today or a couple days ago. It'll all blurry at this point, but at any given moment I think I have 38 people Oh. my ear. I know. Yeah. Figuring out which way is up is the hardest thing and so I rely on um

230and I first rely on those that are going to be the decision makers next year. Not that I don't hear the other perspectives. I weigh them. I ask questions about those perspectives to the leaders. And they share as an unbiased view as possible. Which is I'm sure hard for them. One more point of clarification. If hypothetically, just so I have this right, if the Chinese program were to move online is it the the thought when we were discussing it would the thought be that it would stay there or that it would be phasing out? >> It was to be phased. What would the what would the money number be with the baseline reductions and an online? It would be both It wouldn't so we would not be running it in the middle school at all.

231And then the the high school courses online Yeah, I'm right at all. There would be nothing in the middle school. So at the high school for the kids that wanted to continue on they would be allowed to do that online. So Kenya, am I so it's a $140,000 $132,000 $133,000 program today. So that would go away and I put a placeholder for $20,000 in the budget if we were to introduce online option. The total the total number with everything all the baseline reductions combined with just the added 20,000 we would be both we'd be at the number or close to the number that we were looking for budget-wise. We'd be under 1.5 >> under. >> Baseline plus B you don't need the you don't need the Chinese program to get under the under 2.5%. >>

232Right. That's where I'm a little confused. Why am I illogical? Because for me it's we we talk all the time about enrollment and how we make decisions based on what's happening to to just move forward. So that's if we're not going to do that and that doesn't matter anymore then I'm then that's what and I know it's not that it doesn't matter but we talked for months about it and now all of a sudden it doesn't. So I'm just trying to again have a hard time equating Agreed. You know what I mean? That's my only that's my thought. >> I'll put it really well to me the other day. We like data when the data is convenient for us. When the data is not convenient for us sometimes we look the other way. And I'm

233going to >> I also it also resonated with me if Bill Midas. I forget who said it about you know, we can't commit a future school committee, but we can put them on notice. I'm not sure if it's the right way to say it, but I think that we can place an emphasis on growing the program if that's what we view as value. If we view it valuable enough to fund it this year, then I would suggest that we should view it valuable enough to ensure that there's an emphasis placed on it next year to try to grow it to critical mass. But I understand the data argument, Kendra. It resonates. So I saw somebody had their hand up Lisa was it? So that's That was my only reason for for going back to it.

234It's like it mattered it mattered it mattered and now it doesn't or now we're just saying oh never mind because To be honest with you, I came into the I came into tonight with the perspective that you know, at best we should ramp it down. Yeah. Right? Well, that's where I'm at for a compromise. It's just because of the numbers, but I you know, we do continue the community The student that spoke the other night about trying to grow the program that resonated with me and uh you know, if I look at the options on the table and I'm only trying to if the lens I'm taking for a moment is to get to 2 and 1/2% I can do that and preserve the Chinese program. Again, knowing what I know about the other knobs

235uh that would be my perspective. So, I'm sorry I'm talking a lot, but Lisa and then Joe. So just Joe never said next to me and said Duke I don't No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. No, sorry. Can't do that. She's not here. Sorry. Lisa. Yes. I just said that again, current enrollment for 7th grade is nine students. Current enrollment for eighth grade is 10 students. >> Let's move us forward in the conversation. You did that. The enrollment in that program is Nice. Stop. I'll control it. Now we're all Guys, we're all getting tired, I know. Our discussion. And we have an executive session to go. Executive session. I can make the executive session really fast. I need to get this passed. >> saying, she said enrollment's down.

236Seventh and eighth grade prove that it's actually it's not. So, and and if we're going to invest in it, then it can can continue to grow, and it can be a more robust program. I wouldn't just cut it because it's at the moment we see the numbers as being declining. The amount of people I'm sorry, this is this was band level. But that's my That's my point is we don't we don't ever go to every department and every area and say, "Give them a chance to say, can you grow it?" We don't do that typically. So, that's where I'm just trying to make sure that we're fair in how our assessment is for all of these things. Because we haven't given that treatment to other areas. We just say, "We have to do it. We

237have to do it. The numbers show it." So, that's where I just want to be cautious that we're not only doing it sometimes and not all the time. >> This is the only program that we're talking about completely eliminating. Right. Besides woodshop What I mean is like to grow the grow the program. Like we don't ever Numbers told us not to cut woodshop, so we didn't cut woodshop. Oh, that was a pretty cut and dry Right. It's a one-off. There's two woodshop classes, I believe. Like four or five. >> It was four. Oh, like woodshop one and woodshop two. Yes. There's two. You don't take two without taking them. All right. Just one quick point. I I do think just as a natural course of the school year that the there are plenty of academic

238apartments that are ginning up interest, you know, for people to take their courses in the queue. That's That That happens every year. I I I know I've I've seen the emails. So, you know, the fact that we're that it's being asked of of Chinese isn't unusual. I I I'm guessing it's it's been done, but maybe not. Yes, I think this is the depart- the Chinese is on life support. If we're saying, "Okay, we're going to have students going to the middle school" in that presentation, I I think all the foreign languages should be given an equal chance, which they are. It just so happens that less kids take Chinese. I'm going to say, when you go into the middle school, you pick your primary and secondary. There could be more load balancing down there, potentially.

239It's not my job. That's their job. I'm just saying, there's an opportunity to load balance it more to spread the students more equally across the three. It's just not happening right now. What do you mean? Sorry, I'm not My daughter chose French, and her second choice was Mandarin. If the Mandarin enrollment was low, like below the school committee's policy low, there could be some load balancing done, and people could have gotten their second choice instead of their first choice. If we have to stand >> the first choice. Yeah, first choice is what you would want. Right? What? >> You'd want that. I would have been okay if she got put into Mandarin. She would have been okay with it. Then she should have put it as one. And yet, here we are. All right. All

240right. Listen. Let's make a point that we've only started talking about the Chinese program last week. Like A year. No, last week we talked about it. It was the first time it showed up on the scenario to cut the budget this year. It was on the 2nd of March. Your point is it got a little attention last year. It did. We talked about it a little bit. And DCF But again, it was never a direction from somebody on the ELT saying this is the program we absolutely have to cut. And I think that has weight to it. But I I think we got to get to a decision and that was bad grammar. So if there's any English teachers in the audience, I apologize. Um I want to vote no for the whole darn budget,

241but I have a responsibility as a school committee member. All right. So one last perspective. Nobody's happy with this. There are definitely things that we each want to take off the table, but we know we're compromising on. I don't know if it's sensible to take another shuffle, but I feel like the most energy we've seen is around baseline plus B. And just to put a finer point on it, that gets us what? 40K below? Is that right? It gets us >> Yes. 40K below the 2.5%. Which means an override is unlikely or very minimal. Which certainly means that the capital requests that we make will be more palatable. And the bigger ask will be received with maybe a little more open-mindedness because we've done so much. I think an emphasis on the the work we're

242doing is appreciated in the member towns. I think I know when we went up to present our override last year, the story was we did our work. We cut we reduced our budget by $800,000 to make this feasible for the three towns to fund their appropriations. And here we are back at it. The voters appreciate showing that we did our work and we did the hard work. Just unfortunately, those positions are unfilled. I would say that this budget baseline plus B may also show that we've listened to everybody. Yeah. And we've listened to the towns, we've listened to parents, we've listened to teachers. And we've taken all of that into account when Matt has been putting doing the groundwork to put this together when we've been discussing it with him. So, we're listening. You don't

243always like what you're hear when you listen. Sometimes we make things up, but I think that we've I think this may represent that we've actually heard things. So, we're going put thumbs up on the bill or you want me to do it on the straw poll? >> Another straw poll, please. I got the ones in the straw poll. Baseline plus B. My hands. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 still. All right. I'm there. Um So is it fair to ask that those that did not vote for it um what would make you change your mind? Me, it's putting the Chinese program online. If we're going to compromise by removing everything else, that's my only You I do not I come back. I'm just so unsure. I am so unsure. And I feel such a

244responsibility as a I just I I can't wrap my head around why this department over that department. I just want to say here are the cuts. Make the decisions after we approve the number budget. I don't want my name attached to agreeing for certain positions. I'm fine with the amount of cuts and I I I do understand the need for all of them and I just have a really like ethically I didn't realize that when I became interim. I also feel like I'm I'm interim, too. So for me, you know, I don't want to be the one person. There's two other people like that's So I'm having like just to agree to agree so we can go home or like stand by what I believe, I don't I don't know. Here's the last one. Oh.

245Is the pair rolled too far? I I didn't want to give Chinese another chance. Um I'd really like to keep, you know, visual arts as I've been rampaging on all day. Um I'm not either there today, but I could get there by next by next meeting. So we have to add something back into the B. I think these cuts a little too far. And what is this What will be that's too far? All of those lines. I think removing the visual arts and the Chinese is too much. Is this in there? That's not on the table. Chinese is not on the table cuz I don't kick up the emails here, so I'm trying to keep track. Chinese is in there. So, what? It's not in there. I could probably get there. On the list, please.

246So, it's So, it's taking up Yes, What's the name of this one? It's Oh, sorry. I forgot I have a touchscreen. It's keeping the Chinese. It's taking out the English, staying out the social studies, about the head, and the visual arts. Well, yeah, that's a little too much. Okay. >> And then it's taking out the English. We changed the wording to to recommend it two department heads under the leadership guidance of Say no. What do you want? We have EL one's guidance. I think moving forward it will stop with this conversation, but as an ELT that should be our responsibilities to own your space. It's, you know, I think Maggie makes a very good point that, you know, in general you're the only educator here. All of them are teachers. Um it's it's unfair to

247put Oh, yeah, I think we definitely have to we have to talk about for next year. You know, do we offer intricate detail on the budget or do we just approve a number or is it somewhere in between? So, yeah. I will throw out one idea. Um when our this position if we're say 40,000 under, is there a some sort of a part-time position that we could offer to bring back in like a graphic design program? We got a part-time. They don't have any part-time positions. Not like that. The point 0.4 in the Chinese program isn't The 0.2 0.4 in Chinese. There's drama is part-time. That's kind of it, right? Is there anything that's stopping us from doing that? I don't think that's the Just finding a person is always the hard part. I don't

248understand. What's that, Trevor? I don't think graphic design Is Is that >> Well, I think it's more of we're losing a figure. Is the whole >> It's not necessarily What if we could hire somebody part-time to committee consult with or support or something along the lines with the remaining department head. Guys, it's a it's 10:50. I'm trying to come up with some ideas here. >> Could you offer Could Could there be a stipend offered to keep up the responsibilities for the department head for visual arts? No, okay. You can't pay I would be able require a contract >> that says this is the role, so you can't can't pay somebody a stipend and say you're going to do the job that's that's outlined in the contract. But, again >> The full teaching load though? No,

249okay. The person is already teaching four. Oh. Again, my my point is there's a certain amount of role and responsibility that falls onto a visual arts department head that is very, very unique to visual arts, which I think is what Jess's concern is. And there's part of it that's more management and perhaps a little bit more conducive to being able to be performed by somebody outside the specific discipline of visual arts. And I guess with a $40,000 budget, could we do something with that to support I'll just say it, Jared, right? If it ends up being Jared in this role. I get your point. I'm I'm less concerned with the bureaucracy and administration management, you know, at least some reservation when I did I think the risk that Mike articulated of having a hard time

250finding somebody to do that could be difficult. Maybe that's something that Stacy might be willing to do as as a role at this point in her career. I don't know. Both of you are band-aiding something like that. It's it's a bad solution on both sides. I just need to I know. I know. I'm not trying to trash idea. I'm just >> A bad idea. If it could work, would it be a good idea? If you could actually find somebody to like come in and do that role and train Jared for a couple years or train whoever the next one is going to be for a couple years? I think it was like I just don't know enough about the department. I just, you know, I'm concerned that that's a very high performing group. I'd hate

251to add more damage. More damage than what? I hate to what current I don't know what you're getting at. And then there's the leadership in the, you know, it it's a highly competitive you know, it goes back to like, you know, sports. We they have an A team there. And you're you're dropping the the head who's doing all the external work and helping the students make the next level, you know. So, what can we do with that $40,000? Can we hire a consultant? Like can we There's nothing that I don't think there's anything that prevents us from doing something with that $40,000. What's the $40,000 again? >> Yeah, what's 40? The 40,000 dollars if we do baseline plus B uh If we do baseline plus B 40K under 0.5 percent. Did I get that right?

252It is. It's 40. It's 40,000. >> 40,000 707 is what And J&D to 3.1 and you have zero again. Yeah. That one's under. Yeah. Yeah. The baseline plus B we have we're under by 40,000. What's that, Jeff? You said that last time. I'm kidding in a way, but you I mean this is noise. Let's All right, let's be done. We're not we're not there yet. Like we don't have people voting in favor of it. I'm hearing that we could be there. That's what I'm hearing. I agree. We're close. We're 7/8 of the way there. I'm just trying to come up with a way with a little bit of budget left to alleviate some of that. I might be inclined to support Joe. If Joe thinks we're close or we're there, then I'm inclined to believe

253him. Wait, did you have your hand up? I did. I just um Megan, I I'm I'm willing to go back to the original baseline. But I might why why would the online program not be for the seventh and eighth grade? I'm sorry if we already answered that. If we did that. >> wouldn't let the kids do that program. >> Okay. We'd be phasing it out. >> We'd phase it out as a Hold on. I guess I didn't ask the question the right way. The kids that are currently in Masco, like say we do it today, hypothetically, the kids that are in even 7th and 8th grade, or let's say even 8th grade, whoever is currently here at Masco, there wouldn't be it would just be 9th it would just be high school and on? Well,

254cuz you can take I mean, I guess you can do it all years, but it's not uncommon to, you know, I mean, no one wants it. I'm just asking in general. >> can start a different language at right those years. So, I'm the only Boxford person here that's voted in support of this. I've had a lot of conversations with my other town members over the past few weeks. I'm fairly sure they both the two that are here have been saying that they're potentially could be brought around. I'm fairly confident that when we come in here on Wednesday, that there will be at least two Boxford members that will support that will vote in support of this budget, which gets us to eight. So, baseline plus B? Yeah. Should we have maybe just two options prepared,

255maybe baseline and baseline plus B? I don't think we have support for baseline. That's not true. I mean, I guess my last I want to say my last comment, but it's may not be. Were you going to make another comment, or you think I'm just going to say, I mean, I think the uh I may not be coming off as compromising. I I am compromising, too. Same. Can I make a motion that the administration prepare a motion for next meeting that is the baseline plus B. Second. You don't have to Sure, you can definitely make that motion. Bill seconded it. And Bill seconded it, so we're going to definitely vote on that. I >> I just got to say I just and we can discuss it first still. I just want to remind everybody we

256have to pass the budget Wednesday. So we need to vote. >> Is Jeff going to be here Wednesday? I think I don't know. He's not going to make He wouldn't be able to make a change at the table. That's the whole thing. Right, but if worst case we had to recess for Yeah. an hour. It's just a possibility. We couldn't do that. I'm just afraid we're going to recess for 5 hours. I mean like Yeah. I'm just Good. There's no budget. That's not good. There's no budget. All right. True. All right, so my my idea on we have a motion on the table. We can vote on it and we can go do it. Doesn't mean we have to move on from the discussion. My idea on the table about using the $40,000 to hire

257a consultant specific to the art department visual art department is not helping anybody. Specifically Jeff. I think Yeah, I I appreciate the creativity. I think it's not a viable solution. Not a viable solution? Well, yeah, I think it viable It Yeah, viable. I don't think it's solves the the problem, right? Yeah. Eliminating this many student-facing positions in the budget. Back down with a consultant. Like, I'm the consultant. Because that's backwards. Just saying. I haven't thought of it that way. Yeah, yeah. That is that would be a I don't know if the juice is worth the squeeze on that. Right. Is that a finished thought? No, maybe. >> Yeah. Um all right, well we have a motion on the table. Do we want to vote? Let's vote. Uh yeah. Roll call. Everybody good? Repeat the motion.

258Um that the administration will prepare a motion for the school committee to adopt the baseline as presented plus B. Jeff. I'm saying Yes. Lisa. Yes. Chuck. Yes. Kendra. I I'll abstain as well. Maggie. Abstained. Yes. It doesn't matter what I am. I'm going to say yes. Okay. I'm not comfortable. Yes. I'm not saying that in the budget. I'm saying I'm not comfortable with the idea that we don't have eight budgetary people for Wednesday night yet. I fear we if if it turns out that Chris isn't on board or Maggie, Kendra, or Jeff don't have a change of heart, no budget. We're going to have no budget. So, I um More snacks. So, bring more snacks at home. No matter how much we have or no matter you can go down and the language. Apparently we're

259not going to be able to change it. So it's a bit of a gamble folks. So the people that voted yes are all okay with the gamble. Unless we want to come up here and keep talking about the possibility of another motion. I haven't heard one. So. All right folks. Um. Capitals. This one should be a little easier. I think what I heard was Yeah, Mike my present. You just have to split up the slide. Yeah. Yeah. So I think what I heard was we don't have to replace 900. We can reduce that funding down to 300 which would cut that 342 into a third. Which is equals 342 divided by three. 114. 114. Which reduces 587 by 228. So 587 minus uh What I said 228? $359,154. So I I think probably the Chromebook

260parts would get reduced accordingly, would they? If you're buying fewer of them of the Chromebooks themselves. Yes. Yeah, we do. I mean it's They're 30. Yeah, we only want to reduce that by 10, right? Cuz we'll end up with 600 You're going to have 600. half Plus 300s here and then 300s >> 300 they kept in there 300. Yeah, I think it. Yeah. Okay. It needs 650 fast. So So that would get us to 359 or 349 if you reduce the Chrome the carts by 10. So Um It got in half. In half? Well, no, you're right. You're right. Okay, so reduce it by 10. I think we're okay at 359. Oh, no, because there's 587 becomes 359. Oh. 587 becomes 359. March No, that's Friday anyway. This is up there. It's in It was

261in It was in um I found it. It's on um Oh, it's in March. No, that's today. March March 4th 4th Okay. Uh B I Any discussion? You're going to reduce the carts to 20. Reduce carts to 20 and >> Chromebooks to 300 and replace 300 Chromebooks. So moved. Second. Um I'll do a roll call. Jeff? Yes. Joe? Yes. Lisa? Yes. Barbara? Yes. George? Yes. Maggie? Yes. Bill? Yes. Lisa? Yes. Adrian? Yes. Yes. Okay. So That happens. Actually not a passing for the budget. That's passing for acceptance. Bring Wednesday. Bring the vote language for that. Thank you. All right, folks. Uh we're going to we're going to executive session needle car. Um we're going to turn to executive session for 5 minutes. Um purpose of this is to discuss strategy relative to negotiations with non-union

262non-union personnel. Um Superintendent elect Heather Gallante, uh executive session purpose number two, the school committee will not return to open session. Thank you, everybody. Good night. Do we need to send it motion I move. Second. All in favor? Aye. We've got a roll call to go into executive session. You said we won't be returning. Yes. Let's go. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yeah, I did that with the language. All right. Uh we can fill the >> I