001All right. Go. There's gonna be a picture of Call to order at 7:02. I will start. Do it again. I will call to order at 7:02. I will start with uh comments from the audience. Do we have any comments, Jackie? Uh I will just remind everybody that uh comments from the audience in our discussion debate or dialogue between or among citizens committee to come up and y yeah you just state your name and your phone on this side of public comment. Jackie Jubois Middleton um here um on behalf of the CPAC, the Tritown CPAC. Um I have had a few parents um reach out to me uh regarding the foundations and perspectives classes with concerns um that they either were not made aware or they were confused as to why the students were um not
002going to continue receiving these services or this this particular class. Um, I actually spoke with uh Brad today and I know he'll be clarifying it further. Um, but for parents, my understanding was that this should provide a better and an improved service for students. um as classes previously that were foundations or uh perspectives classes were often weighted more heavily in towards students um having more students with IEPs and receiving special education services therefore not really reflecting an inclusion classroom which should have an even balance or a fairly even balance. So the goal of this class is to provide more of an even balance uh more equality between students uh gened students and uh special education students. It should not change how the services are reflected on the grid. If a student receives small groupoup services
003or receives a special education support um those should still be there. Parents should look for that. And um if parents continue to be concerned or your students are concerned, they should uh be aware of their accommodations and modifications, which uh parents should be aware. Also, if you look at the new IEP form, they're much more clearly laid out. Um and that's also the hope is that for teachers to be able to do a better job specifically individualizing um in in the co-taught classes, especially given the format um of the new IEP uh form. And if parents are concerned, then their first stop should be to their students special education liaison. Um, whatever that person is called at Masco. Uh, next stop could be could be Brad Denton. Um, and if parents continue to have concerns,
004certainly they can reach out back out to the CPAC and we're happy to continue advocating and and working. Um, but it it sounds like there could use to be better communication um, which Brad is is working to do. um but that it's not a disservice to students at this point. So, thank you. Thank you, Jackie. You too. Okay. Uh with that, uh just a couple quick remarks. Um so, first I'd like to acknowledge the MTA culture survey that was provided to the school committee a couple weeks ago. I've discussed this with the administration and the school committee will work with Dr. Harvey over the summer to put together a plan to address uh the issues highlighted in the survey. Dr. and Dr. Harvey and I would encourage school committee members uh to meet with him
005if they have concerns that they'd like to discuss with them individually. Um I'd also like to congratulate all the students, teachers, administration on another year complete. So thank you guys for all your work. Congratulations to the students. I hope everybody has a fun and safe summer. And with that, I think we'll turn it over for the audit report. Okay, Frank, you're on. Frank's ready. Uh, unfortunately is not able to be with us in person this evening. Our auditor, um, Frank is, uh, under the weather. So, um, you don't want him in the room. Let's just put that. Um, so Frank, you actually have the ability to share your screen, too, I think. So, I'm going to turn things over to you. All right. Thanks, Mike. I actually didn't do a PowerPoint. I just have notes
006that I was going to speak off of. Um, yeah, just apologize up front if I There's a good chance that I might end up coughing during this presentation, but I'm going to do my best not to. I uh I came down with COVID later last week, so I'm uh feeling pretty good now, but uh not quite 100% yet. So, do my best here. Um just like to start off by thanking the uh superintendent, assistant superintendent, director of accounting, treasurer, rest of the finance team for all the cooperation and assistance that we received during the course of the audit. Everybody was really great about getting us the information that we needed, answering our questions. No issues whatsoever with any of that. As part of the audit package, you should have received uh something that we refer
007to as a governance letter. It's a about a fivepage document and uh there's some information in there that's considered to be uh required communications. We're required to, you know, give that letter to you, but I thought I could just highlight some things in there for you and then I could just move on. I'll try to make it as brief as possible and try not to bore you too much with this the stuff. Some of this can be a little bit dry. Uh but I can get through it pretty quick. Um first section in there talks about auditor responsibilities under generally accepted auditing standards. And you know our main responsibility is the expression of an opinion on the financial statements as to whether they are fairly stated in all material respects in accordance with generally accepted
008accounting principles. Uh we're also responsible for uh the uh required supplementary information uh that's included in the report that includes management discussion and analysis which is at the front of the report. Uh also uh the general fund budget to actual schedule and then there's some net pension and net liability schedules in the back. They're 10-year uh trend information on on those uh liabilities. Uh our responsibilities are to perform limited procedures. We don't express an opinion or provide any assurance on those schedules. And then the schedule of expenditures and federal on schedule uh of federal awards included in the uh single audit report is considered to be supplementary information and uh we're required uh to uh basically uh review that and perform procedures on that and uh give an opinion uh whether or not uh those
009are fairly stated in relation to the financial statements as a whole. Uh next uh section talks about uh plan scope timing of the audit. Um out of the audit we're responsible for obtaining an understanding of the entity, its environment including internal control sufficient to assess the risks of material misstatement of the financial statements and to design the nature, timing and extent of further audit procedures. It goes on to talk about our responsibility for reporting significant deficiencies or material weaknesses that might come to our attention during the audit. I'm happy to report that there were no deficiencies in internal control that we not noted during the course of the audit. Right below that it talks about uh significant risks of material misstatement and the one risk that's listed there is management override or controls and we
010are required to consider that a significant risk in all of the audits that we do. So, it's nothing uh that is like specific to anything that we found or um that occurred during the audit. And what that refers to is management's authority to bypass, disable or alter controls designed to prevent or detect fraud. And that can undermine the reliability of financial information and increase the risk of fraud and misstatement. So, to respond to those risks, we're required to incorporate an element of unpredictability in the audit. And we do that by um you know picking procedures each year that are random and different from what we've done in the past uh to have that unpredictability as part of the audit. We also examine journal entries because that's another area where management can override controls. Uh we
011review the supporting documentation and make sure that they're valid entries and that they had a valid purpose. uh and we evaluate the rationale for any unusual journal entries that we might have uh selected for testing. Um and then we review accounting estimates for bias and based on all those procedures that we performed there was nothing that we found that indicated any kind of management override controls that might have occurred. Next section talks about qualitative aspects of accounting practices and uh talks about management's responsibility for the selection and use of appropriate accounting policies. The significant accounting policies can be found in note one of the financial statements. There were no new accounting policies adopted during the year and the application of existing policies did not change. And it goes on to talk about accounting estimates and
012that they're integral part of the financial statements and they're based on management's knowledge and experience about past and current events as well as assumptions about future events. The most significant estimates in the financial statements relate to the uh useful lives that are used to uh depreciate the fixed assets and also the net pension liability and the net op liability. And uh we found the key factors and assumptions that were used for those estimates to be uh reasonable in relation to the financial statements as a whole. Uh next section talks about uh difficulties encountered in performing the audit. I'm happy to report that we had no difficulties in dealing with management while we were performing the audit. Then it talks about independence and some of the procedures that we perform uh are considered to be nonattest
013services. Those relate to preparation of the financial statements and also converting the financial statements to the acrruel basis of accounting based on information that was provided by management. We need to evaluate those services and based on our evaluation we were able to determine that you know performing those services would not impair our independence. Uh corrected and uncorrected misstatements were required to accumulate all known and likely misstatements unless they are trivial and communicate those to the appropriate level of management. We did not find any uh misstatements known or likely misstatements during the audit. So that's always a good thing. Uh disagreements with management um related to financial accounting reporting or auditing matters whether or not resolved to our satisfaction that could be significant to the financial statement of the auditor's report. Happy to report no such
014disagreements with management occurred. And the last one, management consultation with other independent accountants. This is when management might decide to consult with other accountants about an auditing or accounting matter. This is similar to obtaining a second opinion on an accounting matter and uh if that does happen, the other accountants are required to check with us to make sure that they have all the relevant facts. To our knowledge, no such consultations occurred. So those are the uh required communications. There's a little more information in there if you want to read through, but I think those are the most important things. Um just the uh overall results of the audit. We're able to issue an unmodified opinion on the audit. That's a clean opinion. Means the financial statements are fairly stated in all material respects in accordance
015with generally accepted accounting principles. Reporting deadlines were met. The information that we received was accurate and no inter no internal control deficiencies were noted during the course of the audit. As I mentioned, all of our interactions were professional and courteous which we always appreciate. Financial highlights. If you were looking at page 15 of the financial statements, you'd see general fund fund balance total uh $6.3 million. Of that, $999,000 uh is committed and that relates to the capital stabilization fund which is required to be reported as a component of the general fund in the financial statements. Another 737,000 is considered to be assigned. 284 of that relates to incumbrances and another 454,000 relates to subsequent year's expenditures. So that's END that was voted for the next year's budget. That left you with 2.4 million of unassigned
016fund balance, which is about 5% of your budget. That number usually approximates your END. And your END actually got certified at roughly the same amount, $2.4 million. Um that was as of 63024 available for spending in 25. that was about 302,000 over the do END limit. Uh operating results, you can see those on page 49 of the financial statements. General fund operations resulted in a $335,000 decrease in fund balance and that was mainly due to the planned use of 1.1 million of uh END to fund the budget and that was offset by revenues coming in over budget by 456,000. uh that was mostly related to intergovernmental revenue and investment income and your expenditures came in 285,000 under budget. Those results indicate to us that you have a structurally sound budget and that your budgetary controls
017are effective. Uh other significant items, your other post-employment benefits liability decreased by $780,000 during the year total 60.6 million. It's a significant liability. Um the decrease is mainly due to an increase in the discount rate and that changes based on the change in the 20-year doubleA municipal bond rate. Um you didn't uh contribute any additional funds to the trust uh during FY24. The balance in the trust increased by $29,000 and that was due to the investment income that was earned. The balance totaled $544,000 at the end of the year. Uh the net pension liability that relates to individuals that are not uh eligible to participate in the Mass Teachers Retirement System and they're part of the Essex Regional Retirement System. That liability decreased by $527,000 and totaled $8.5 million that's required to be funded by
0182040 required by law. And uh the funded ratio of the retirement system was 61% at and that was up from the prior year uh which was 58%. You had no long-term debt or no short-term debt outstanding. The other two reports of the uh single audit report in the management letter. The single audit report is a report on federal awards required for entities that expend uh more than $750,000 in a fiscal year. The district expended 1.4 4 million 256 of that related to child nutrition program 463 for special ed 618 for the ESSER fund that's uh co money and 49,000 for other educational grants that esser grant was audited as a major program there were no findings no question costs uh that was a clean audit best results you could hope for there and the last
019thing is the management letter there were two comments in there um the management letter it doesn't highlight the things you do well it's critical in nature The important thing here is that there are no material weaknesses or significant deficiencies. And of the two comments that were in there, uh, a cyber security risk assessment was performed after year end. Management's currently evaluating the results implementing procedures to address matters that were identified. fraud risk assessment. Uh that is an assessment of uh areas that are susceptible to fraud within the uh district's operations and also an assessment of controls that are uh designed to mitigate any risks related to it and then doing an assessment of whether or not you think those controls are sufficient or if additional controls should be put in place. Uh it's important to
020do that periodically just to make sure that uh you know you're comfortable with the controls that are in place and to get that documented. I know that management spoke uh with actually um another division with in our firm who does internal audit type work and uh we're considering uh possibly having that done in FY27. And so that covers everything. I don't know if anybody has any questions. I know that was a lot, but uh Jeff told me I got limited time, so I just tried to get through it as quick as I could for you. Okay, this might be a mic question, but I think he said there was a cyber security audit happening. When are you expecting the results of that? I don't know. I have to find out from Jeff. Do you have
021any idea when the results? So, that wasn't done by you, right, Frank? The cyber audit. Okay. No, that was another firm. Um I think it the results probably came in within the last month or so, but I don't know exactly. So I know um Middleton had a cyber security issue and they might be willing partners to learn from um and how they address their issues. That cyber security audit, is that just a routine audit we always do or is that driven for cause? It's something that we we haven't done it in six years that I'm aware of. So there's a there's a breach earlier this year that I'm not sure if we got closure on that either. So it's not related to that. No, it's not. Okay. Do we have any closure on that? Um
022the you know for P school you're talking about. Yeah. Yeah. So I mean P school is uh let people know that they can sign up for monitoring software know like credit monitoring ID monitoring on them. That's the that was the resolution. uh just two I don't know stickler questions maybe but you said that there were no misstatements found but the letter here says management has corrected all such misstatements in addition none of the misstatements detected as a result of audit procedures and corrected by management were material so did you mean to say there were no material misstatements I think you said there were no misstatements found I'm just trying to understand this just the only things that were found were not significant. So, um that probably could have been worded a little better now that
023you bring that up. And the second question I have is just one of um you guys are located in New Hampshire. There's no state um licensing requirement or anything like that's federal audit. Okay. Well, what's that? There's no state license issues. Joe was asking because you're located in New Hampshire, your firm. Oh, yeah. So, we have a Boston office. We have, you know, we have offices all over the country. I'm licensed in Massachusetts and New Hampshire. Okay. Frankston Frankston audits for us. That's the right answer. I know. But my entire career, I'm a mass resident and uh my entire career was spent working in Massachusetts. We merged um a year ago last February uh so about a year and a half ago with uh Markham and then we merged again with Cabbiz in November. So
024we went through two mergers in one year and um one of the the firms u they had they had an office in New Hampshire and I had the choice to either drive to New Hampshire or Boston and uh New Hampshire was a much easier commute for me so that's that's what I did. Okay. Thank you. Yep. Yeah. I'm just looking at just to clarify on your question about the journal entries. I was just looking at the file again and yeah, that wording should have been updated. There were no um misstatements that um that needed to be recorded. So, else folks, Frank, thank you. I hope you feel better and uh Thanks for all your hard work on this and to hire you. Jeff, thanks for doing a great job. Thank you, Frank. Yes, always a
025pleasure. Yeah, my pleasure. Thank you very much. I appreciate it. And uh yeah, I'm on the road to recovery. Hoping I'm feeling pretty good by the time the weekend rolls around. All right. Thank you. Yeah. Yep. Have a good night. Thank you. Okay. VA between the MRSD and the Massomic Association of Professional School Administration administrators. You want to do this, Bill, or um Yeah, sure. Um at the last meeting we held with the uh the association of professional school administrators, we we came to agreement. Um and the deep the I guess the important thing in it was um the cola that we agreed to was similar to what we agreed to with the teachers and and other subsequent uh uh union contracts which is for FY26 is 3.75 increase FY27 4% in FY28 it is
0262%. Uh the point being that with all of them our our going in assumption is to reset um the uh the increases to that level work everything else out. I mean the other the other benefits uh again mirroring what the teachers teachers from parental leave uh course reimbursement children of of administrators as well as 43b contribution and it's supported by our budget. Yes. Absolutely. What we budget can we get clarification on the senior credit piece? So um we weren't actually we wanted to actually correct the language there. We weren't able to do it. Um they wouldn't wouldn't agree to it. Um the thing that does cover us um from management's perspective is that um the language that you're talking about I have to find it now is specific to an involuntary transfer. Right. So which
027is not something administration just not do that. So, so it becomes sort of a non-issue in that way. Is this what's on the top of page six in purple? Uh, yeah. Six, bullet six. Our our position and not sure to what extent we discussed this in this environment, but our position overall was that we didn't want that language in there at all because we think it it um doesn't really give them the benefit that they think that it does, but not really sure it's enforceable. You can't commit a different contract to do something unless they agree to it. And that's what this section seems to do. So, are there any changes from our LA this contract previously with any of the like section D assignments or the FTE of like teaching assignments for coaches? I
028know we kind of touched on that during budget season. Just want curious if any of those shifted at all. Uh, nothing. If it hasn't been marked up, it's not a it's a change. So, I presume we need a vote on that. Motion. Yes. Motion to approve the uh collective bargaining agreement between the Mascanama Regional School District and the Mascanama Association of Professional School Administrators. Erica or Melissa. You got it first. Uh we don't have a video on mine yet. So we can you just do it voice. All in favor. Sorry. What's the required percentage of people? Super majority. All in favor? I I guess anyone abstain? Abstaining. Better than not. So yeah. Thank you. Thanks for the all the folks that contribute to this. All right, moving along. Brad, you update on perspectives courses at
029school high school. Anybody care if I grab a chair? No. Okay. All right. Well, thank you for making time for me to come back and um kind of clarify um some of what we talked about a couple weeks ago. Um I appreciate that. Um and since that last meeting, I have had um conversations with um different staff people, administrators, um some parents, CPAC. Um, so, so I I understand the uh, I guess some of the concerns, but just to try to describe where we are, I I have, um, going to run through some things. I know I usually sort of take questions on the fly. This time, I'm going to ask that we hold questions till I'm done because I hopefully we'll be able to answer them by going through this, but if I didn't
030anticipate your question, feel free to ask at the end. Um, so just so everybody knows the the perspectives and foundations classes, the key to those classes is that they are co-taught classes, meaning that in the class there's a general education content teacher as well as a special education teacher. Um, and we've been working with um sort of the co-eing model for, you know, 20 years. I think I've been here 20 years and I think in my second year it was um we started co-eing I a world history 2 class in nth grade and a science nth grade. So it's been um an evolving process. um we did put co-eing on hold for a period of time you know during that that uh period but when we removed the CP2 classes which was um about 10
031years ago we brought back the Kota classes there was really a a sense or a belief in the building um at that point in time that all students should have access to the full curriculum um so that's where um we we created the Kota classes and put a a special ed teacher in the course with the content teachers to help them with accommodations and modifications. The interesting thing about the perspectives titles and the foundation's titles at that point in time 10 years ago, our learning management system, the LMS, had no way to identify which sections were co-taught. So it was a nightmare for the guidance counselors to try to remember that you know this teacher's period 3 class was co-taught. So we actually created the term um perspectives and foundations to identify those courses as
032the co-taught courses. So that's sort of like the derivation of of the title and the name um perspectives and and with these courses and with all courses at MASCO um I know you've heard me talk about continuum of services from the elementary schools from 6 to 7 um we've got the same aim you know from from 8 to 9 on those transition years um and and the middle school does a really good job with her co-t talk courses. So they have um you know an LC course and an LC I mean LC English and LC math which are um in the middle school the those are all students on IEPs but students um in science and in social studies are included in Kota classes. So that's one of the reasons that when we get to
033the high school, you know, it's always sort of kind of been an interesting fact that we have had perspective social studies when there really wasn't a corresponding course in the middle school. So um that that may have been limiting, but the number of courses has and it does kind of eb and flow year to year as the needs of the students eb and flow. There have been years um where some grades have had no um co-taught talk courses or prospective courses, but um what we're what we're trying to do now is really um I guess purposefully sort of align what we're doing. So, um we have these courses in the B-grid um which means they are in the general education setting. Um we we do believe that students can be heterogeneously grouped and educated with
034their peers, their friends, their neighbors, their teammates. Um it's it's a really high bar to um separate kids and to sort of make that statement that you you can't be educated um in a general education classroom. um in in some years our foundations and prospective courses have I'd say unintentionally drifted that way and have had um more students on IEPs um than general ed students by by a large margin. So, so what we're really hoping to do is um sort of balance things out to a point where um our Kota classes in 10, 11, and 12 and in social studies throughout will um be more reflective. And um I think it's the next slide where the new IEP, as Jackie alluded to when she spoke, um it's really explicit on this page. On the old
035IEP, it was just kind of a list format where you would just list accommodations or modifications that a student might need. But the way they've done it now, you can see it's really um it's really quite clear when you get to classroom accommodations or classroom modifications. That's where we can spell things out. You know, this student needs extra time or this student, you know, if they're reading, they might need audio books if they're reading behind. So, you can really individualize, which is, you know, ironic that it's, you know, taken something like this to individualize an individualized education plan, but but this page is really great for that. So um and the key to um to the Kota talk classes is really the concept of differentiated instruction which is um not a new concept but I
036think sometimes you know it's it's a challenge but it's you know it's doing different things for different kids and that's okay. It's not an issue of you know of fairness. I think anybody who's um coached a sport, you know, you don't you don't coach every kid the same way. Um so it's, you know, makes sense that in a classroom you might not teach everybody the same way. So that's really where differentiated instruction comes in. Um and the last slide, this, you know, we've got a a full complement of um co-t talk classes. So there's not a large um you know concern that we're going to leave anybody behind. I think with these Kota talk classes with the way the new IEP spells things out. I think students um at MASCO will continue to be fully
037supported. Question. I had a couple questions. I I missed last meeting, so thanks for getting my chance to get my question. Um I This feels like a fundamental change to the way the school's organized. Is it? It It's not really a fundamental change. Um the the perspectives designated courses were in the B-grid of an IEP, meaning it was a Kota course where students were getting services um with a content teacher and a special ed teacher. As Brad said, the B-grid is general education, which means that students should be fully included. So, should be a a mix of students who are on IEPs and not on IEPs in the class. The real issue was that wasn't happening. There was nine kids on an IEP and one kid on a 504 plan. That's not an inclusion class.
038That's really what we have to fix here. That's that's the that's the thing here is and because the students IEPs all said they should be included. They it didn't say they should be in a substantially separate classroom. I guess my concern is you're taking students that need a lot of extra support. It's throwing them to sort, you know, a more standards class and it's going to be disruptive to the kids that are there. It's not serving the people who need extra support. The mandate for the law is the student must be educated in a least restrictive environment. And as Brad said, there's a higher bar that's required to take these students into a a a restricted class. Least restrictive that gets the job done. No, least restrictive, period. General education classroom is the least restrictive.
039And it's not it's really more aligning with what the IEP team is proposing, right? like the team of of school-based people and parents are saying begrit and for for whatever reason some of these courses drifted more towards looking like a crit course which is not what that's not anybody's intention um for these kids I don't know um I I just find you why are we doing this this year why we doing this now you know the towns all just got raped over out of district and I think people are sensitive to that already and I feel NASA is not serving these needy students already and now we're eliminating a service whether it's true or not. That's service actually says that students are in co talk classes. Yeah, I'm happy to meet with anybody who thinks
040like I I did speak with one parent on the phone uh couple times, but that's not necessarily the like that's not the case. So, I remember us talking about the accreditation that we get. Would would this be something that would be flagged throughout that through that process from the the New England Association of Schools and Colleges? Probably not. Um, we did have a visit from the Department of Education recently who did flag this. Okay. And said, "You have a substantially separate class, but none of their IEPs call for that." Okay. Thank you. Um, well, I'm just going to guess that I'm probably the only the oldest person in the room um that went to a high school where they were off by themselves, people who needed special services and and and clearly that didn't work.
041Clearly that was not that may have um been more efficient from from an organizational perspective because um um kids who didn't need those kind of services or attention were not in the same room with kids that did. Um, but my understanding is that for years it's it's been well researched and documented that that that actually isn't in anyone's best interest to to um put them off by them themselves and deal with it separately. That's not good for their educational experience or for their integration in the in the community or amongst their peers. So, um, this certainly seems like the right approach. You know, let's let's make sure we execute it well. Guess I just have a question. And um, if a student flounders in a co-op class where they may have not in a a
042different setting, what is like that's addressed as part of an IEP meet? Yeah. I mean, I think, you know, every student who has an IEP has a program coordinator and, you know, the team of teachers. So, when somebody is struggling, it's not uncommon. It's actually common to have, you know, a team meeting and a progress meeting and to sort of dig into why that student is struggling. um if necessary amend the IEP and and you can you know we've got infinite number of tools at our disposal um at a team's disposal to to work that out. Okay. So I guess I guess my question I know if the IEP says an inclusion class I I understand that but is there like a so what happens is that I mean the IEP individualizes things right so
043if somebody is struggling in a class we have the ability to figure out why they're struggling and and fix that issue rather than you know move the student into a class that might fix that issue also but also might provide some other um issues or concerns or yeah or limit that student in a different way that would be um okay yeah I'm just trying to I'm trying to figure out like um I know that one of the goals is to address the needs of all learners we IEPs but when sometimes you don't know until you actually get in the setting I guess is what I would think Um would academic support success center step in? Is that what happens? Well, um we would probably go with the students academic support class which is a you
044know like special ed version of that. Okay. Um Okay. And then I guess my concern is we talked a lot about making sure we had the programs in place, the steps in place to keep kids at Masco. Yeah. Um, so that's my I guess that's my concern like are we doing enough? Is this are parents happy? Um, are kids happy? Did they pro you know I Yeah, it it's um I I think it's hard to answer. Okay. And if and if we're I think on an individualized basis, we we know when kids are are doing well and when kids are struggling and we meet um and look to Yeah. And I guess if there was a change, so it looks like we're offering it. So there'll be a ninth grade. So, we're still gonna have
045what's been the traditional perspectives classes for English and math. Okay. Um, which is probably most likely where an LC 8th grade English or math student would transition. Okay. I guess my question is if if there's been a student who say been there been in one of these classes for their freshman and sophomore years, then all of a sudden it's gone away and they start to not maybe they did well in that class. I don't I don't know. Yeah. Well, it it's How are we supporting everybody? We haven't traditionally. I think I looked back through to see I mean oftentimes we did nine and 10 and we didn't do 11. Okay. and and kind of our our thinking was that we could, you know, by the time kids leave Masco, you know, they're they're going to
046college, they're going to, you know, the service, they're going to to work. A lot of those environments, they need to be independent. You know, I say like there aren't that I'm aware of. I ask Julie all the time, any colleges doing co-eing yet? Not yet. Um might be afraid of that that price tag based on what I'm about to pay. Um so so we're really working hard um in these courses to sort of promote those skills. Okay. All right. I guess my question is that before those those classes were taught by certain faculty. Are the co-taught courses going to continue to be taught by the faculty? And the reason I say that is that I think after a number of years teaching a course like that, you probably understand the approach that you need to
047take with certain students. Yep. Better than if you Yep. That's that's something um I mean the special ed teachers are the same. Y um in a lot of cases the general ed teachers are the same. Not in all cases um just for a variety of you know scheduling nuances but Okay. and everybody was aware of this. So these changes Yeah. Yeah. We've met I mean the special ed staff and I we've talked we've met where um you know within my department talked it through. At this point I believe all department heads have had conversations with their departments about it. Typically I don't go to other I may start go to other departments um but it kind of filters through department heads. So, I kind of share some of Melissa's concerns and we hear the process
048is just to amend the IEP to ensure they're in the correct environment, but that's not an easy process. And once the infrastructure is taken away, that's an even more challenging process where we no longer have the infrastructure where this class is taught in a separate environment. And then I also am concerned we're being told that these classes aren't don't fit with the spirit of the law, but then we're still offering two of them. So which is it? Is it in the spirit of the law or is it not? So to the the first part, the infrastructure, we're not we're not taking anything away. Um, it's it's still the same teachers, the same B-grid level of support. Um, the the question about the law. Yeah. for those perspectives classes in the ninth grade, the foundations and
049the perspectives. As this summer, we look at schedules, we're going to have to make a determination as to, you know, it's going to be able to stay in the B-grid. We're going to have some general ed kids in there or it's going to have to go to the C grid. And so, if it has general ed kids, it can stay in the B-grid without an issue. A mix. It can't be. Yeah. It can't be nine and one. Nine and one is not a mix. Would What's the process for a general ed student being placed in that class? Is it random? The whole point is that it's a regular ed class. It should just be So why don't we just call English 9 and algebra 1? So now well yeah now going forward we we will
050um do you mean for the ninth grade? Yep. nine English and then algebra one. I think the the way we have it um I mean I guess as I look at it we could do that. Um if it if it goes to the cid then it's going to be you know the perspectives or foundations. So we're going to have to as the schedule comes out look is there any cost savings associated with this or more or increase it's the same okay the same number of sections can you clarify what B-grid and C grid what you mean by those terms and is there an A grid there is mean exactly Yeah. Um, so the CG grid happens in a special ed setting, a non-general ed setting, so only students on IEPs. The B-grid happens in a
051general education setting, so students without IEPs and students with IEPs. And the A grid is happens um it's like for consultations or communication. It's outside of, you know, any classroom. My question is, what's the optimum ratio for a B-grid class that works best for all the students? I'm you can't have 90% IEPs and 10% general ed, right? But there's got to be a a level you're shooting for, I would hope, as opposed to we run the schedule and see what we have. I would think you'd want to somehow say we can only allow 40% of the students to be IEP and 60% general letter or something like that. I mean, are there some guidelines behind this? Yeah, I mean I think I think as um as close to you know 50/50 as we can get
052um you know if we can get 40%. I think um we're going to have to you know kind of see what our number turns out to be before we can you know if it if it trends to you know 90% or 80% or something then we might look at moving to this but from a teaching perspective is there literature out there somewhere saying hey you really should seat a certain percentage when you're trying to do these mixed classes is there is there a guideline line out there that we we work it. Yeah. I mean, when we started with our code talk classes in the middle school, we we tried to do um you know, if the class we try to do like a five, you know, five out of 18 or or 20. Um I
053think as as the teachers probably get more experienced and as the tools um become better the number can can increase. Um but yeah, I think you know if you're looking at at literature you're yeah you're probably at 50% um or below that point. Are you going to manage the ratios actively or how's this sorted out? Yeah, I mean I think we're we're um we're kind of always looking at those to see because you know if you if you're too far one way and a student moves or you know you unintentionally end up with a you know a special ed class that's in the B-grid we don't want that. Right. But you don't really have an idea of what that ratio is though. You know, Trevor asked, "Is it 9010, 7020, 7030, 6040?" I guess is
054it just I got call I heard him say 50/50 would be would be ideal. Yeah. And I I don't I don't have we're kind of a little behind with our scheduling right now to be able to pull up a class and and look at it to tell you. But um just one last question if you um so you said you heard from one parent, you know, were the students affected or who will be affected communicated with? Do they know this is coming? Yeah, this this parent learned this in an IEP meeting, right? But the whole totality of the students affected, do we know what that number is? And have those parents been contacted and any outreach? There hasn't been like a it's not a large number of students. It's, you know, I think when we
055counted up we were, you know, under 20 I think the number was. Um, but from from there from I mean even from our view it's not a material change in the sense that you can say that. I don't know if I agree though. I'd have to walk you through. I'm not sure like if you've seen the IP and understand how it's, you know, set up and delivered, right? Because that's where that's where it comes out, right? Like when you look at the accommodations and the modifications, there's going to be no no change, right? That's in your IP. You're entitled to that. It's just a question of whether you were in a class where that was delivered broadly or whether you're in a class where it's divid delivered individually. And that's a change programming from from
056this year and the program next year are not going to be the same. That's significant. And you said there's about 20 students affected. Seems like it'd be good to reach out to those parents to let them know ahead of time so they're not shocked when this change occurs. And if you have any feedback, these are the, you know, the stakeholders, right? I have Yeah, I mean, we could do that. Um, I mean, I I I have no issue communicating that. um making a phone call. It's I I just it's not um yeah I mean it's not a change in that in that sense for that student right like that student will be receiving the same services that are outlined in their IEP right but the way it's delivered is different so the structure of the
057school services not the way that not really you're limiting the environments the environment there is. Yes. You so the the mandate is the free and appropriate public education in the least restrictive environment. So therefore if you provide students with services that are more restrictive than they actually require, you're violating their civil rights. So when I foundations this year was overly restrictive and we weren't right. Yes. That's what and that's what doesn't Yeah. It's tricky if you give something to somebody that they don't need. Right. Right. That's that sounds like, oh, you're being nice, but that's not okay either. I don't know if I agree with that. I guess my question is around like what Desi said because these types of classes, right? Like this is in between subsparate and CP. Is it a like CP?
058There's C CP course, right? There's we only have CP courses and then honors and AP. So perspectives is a CP course in terms of the content that it covers and in terms of the credit and in terms and the manner in which it's delivered is different. It's in the secret grid or it has been traditionally and I I think what I'm hearing you say is that it's been in the grid. It's not it's been in the B. That's the problem. The kids I should be should be in a setting in the B grid. So is the IEP wrong or the services wrong? Like I'm just thinking about you know Brad and Kate's letter which I really appreciated clarifying that the teachers who teach these courses were not on board and do not believe that students
059in this class are ready to move into CP courses. Those are the people who know these students and their skill sets better than certainly any of us do. So in thinking about what that shift would be, did the IEPs need to be amended? Do some students need to move in out of perspectives into English 9 perspectives? Two things. They they're they are CP courses, right? like we're not all courses at Basco are CP courses except honors and AP. So it's not like we're moving in and out of CP. There's only CP. And in in that letter and you know the group that we met with, we met with a subset of general education teachers. Didn't meet with all of the general education teachers. four teachers raised a concern that they were characterized as being part
060of this decision. So that was where the letter was clarifying that four teachers were not part of this decision. the special ed teachers who are the ones who know the students, know the families, and know the IEPs the best and are the ones that I communicate with regularly are are by and large saying we're going to be fine. This is not going to be an issue. In science, interestingly enough, there has never been a perspective or foundations level course. So, the science department and special ed folks have co-taught for years without, you know, reducing or um limiting the curriculum in science. So that is is you know one of those variables that we look at and go geez that's interesting and that should happen in English and in math. So when you say CP, we're
061talking about the content. When we say Kod, when you say CP, what do you what do you mean? I guess because well I heard like CP CP2. So I'm thinking about levels when I hear CP, right? So to me when I my understanding is like perspectives CP2 CP honors AP. When you say CP, you're talking about the like the content of what's presented. Is that accurate? Yeah. Yeah. And when we talk about levels, we perspectives has has kind of almost like morphed into a level, but it's not it wasn't as I tried to say earlier, it wasn't intended to be. it was o taught. Um and then as I think as the course drifted in terms of like enrollment and maybe appeared closer to a C grid or a subsparate course um with you know
062fewer general education students it it may have drifted um in its content or expectations as well. So it is on IEPs as being in the B-grade. It's more of a crit experience is what you're saying at this point in time. Some of them are correct. Some are. So there are some education students obviously roster looks different. It's based on data student need when you it's not part of part of our issue with this is that it's not a uniform experience across content across content or grades. So, we've kind of lost and this is, you know, sort of what we've looked at this year is we've sort of lost a little bit of, you know, shape, I think, or or structure of what we're what we're trying to do. And this is really to get back
063to what our, you know, what we feel like our charter and our our kind of purpose is. when you say this is backing up the beginning of actually what you were talking about you were talking about co-taught and so those courses perspectives and foundations are co-taught there are because there are students with disabilities in English 9 English 10 English 12 all those some of those sections are currently co-taught so the students who would be going into a perspectives or foundations that is not slated for next year let's say a 10th grade perspectives they would just move into a part of that co-taught section. I guess my question is there are of course students with disabilities in those sections English 10 English club now last year always there is doesn't seem to be a support plan
064for those students who will be experiencing something pretty drastically different they were in a co-taught environment with the perspectives English 9 they will be in a co-at environment before but there will be a lot more students in the room there and outside of obviously not knowing the typical profile of students in those courses in the perspectives and foundations but given the high level of need that I'm sure constituted them being in there in the first place there is a lot of literature around how to provide grade level rigor and content in a more homogeneous setting does not need to be completely homogeneous but how are we How are we going to support doesn't IEP lay out the support plan? It does. Yeah. And and I I don't think it's going to be I don't think
065it's you know this colossal like shift for for these kids that are going to be uh you know unprepared or un I mean I've spoken like I said earlier I've spoken with the program coordinators and the the special ed staff who are responsible for managing the IEP writing the IP ensuring that things are um are complied with and who connect with parents and there is not a um a you know large concern I guess I'm not thinking about are kids going to get the graphic organizers are kids going to get the extra time are kids going to get the thing that needs to be checked off on their IEP I'm think because I'm sure that will happen I'm sure we will be compliant and the boxes will checked. I'm really concerned with are kids going
066to be able to take the risks that they need to to learn in an environment where they feel comfortable and safe. Is moving from a classroom with I don't know what the typical perspectives roster number is, but I know it's low or seven, eight, nine into a class with eight or 19 kids going to like that is a large transition. Um those are the aspects of this transition. When I say support, I'm sure that the services that are on the IEPs will happen, but the social emotional aspect of this don't forget students doing that learning in a large these students are in those classes, right? Like throughout their day, right? So their science class has always looked like that, you know, their their social studies class might look like that. Their English class might look
067that. Like it's not it's not a situation where we're, you know, taking a group of, you know, a handful of kids who, you know, aren't familiar with with Masco or with, you know, other students. Um, I know it's not a subset transition into general education setting, but these students are were put in these courses because they have significant skill gaps. And the last thing I'll say because my opinion is pretty clear on this and I'm understand that I'm not making the decision here. My concern as a school committee member is about the quality of education and supporting all students. It is also on the financial challenges that we have had with out of district placements. And there is no way that this plan is going to help to minimize or lessen that. If anything, it
068will drastically increase. Maybe not in the next year and not before the start of the school year. But from that, I think that we would be foolish to not anticipate a change with that. Is the DESIE report public? Can you provide us a copy with that? Not now. Just Thank you. Um, are you guys planning anything as you roll this out to audit what's going on sooner than maybe you would in a in a normal year? meaning checking actively planning the check-in with um whether it's you know the gened teacher or the co-eing um for sure. Yeah. I mean I think one of the things that you know that I've learned this year is that I I need to be out in in classes more and these will be classes for sure um that I
069am checking in on and that I'm speaking with my folks at department meetings. I'll be you know actively you know knowing the concern actively looking for problems. So I guess a question from there and I don't know if this is for you Mike or for the principles maybe if we find there's a problem do we have the ability to take a large class and split it into two classes somehow I mean do we have capacity out there uh to address some kind of a you know in a situation we're like oh this isn't working like we thought it would adjust mid year if a team makes a decision that we need to provide that accommodation for a student, we have to do it. And we have in the past like that's not something that's uncommon
070either. Um I can think of years where you know co-t talk classes were split into two and broken up and it would be good to get an update. you know. Yeah. As we move into a new school year just to maybe allay some concerns at a minimum December makes sense. Anyone's first term done this week in November? Seems like a good time, right? Okay. Anything else? Thank you. Thank you. Thanks for coming back. Thanks for Thanks, Brad. Katie, thank you. I know you played all this, too. Appreciate it. Okay. uh superintendent report. All right. So, uh we want to make sure we congratulate our retiring ed educators. Uh this Friday, we celebrated the retirement of eight faculty members. So, we want to congratulate uh middle school math teacher Lois Afro, uh student services administrative assistant
071Elaine Cavatura, high school math teacher Alisa Hardy, uh middle school assistant principal Gavin Monagle, high school math teacher Rich Shenwald, uh athletics department administrative assistant Jan Smallman, special education professional Nancy Walker, and special education power professional Amelia Wallace. Uh these eight educators represent a combined total of nearly 150 years of experience uh serving the students of Masanomic. Uh on behalf of the entire Masconomic school community, I wish them the best as they enter into this next phase of their journey. Uh and I did a lot longer post uh actually on my blog with more information on the retirees. Uh we also have um some displays uh from masconomic history that our social studies department just installed. Um first off is after 15 years in storage, the Kllum collection of prehistoric Native American artifacts is back
072on display uh at Masconam High School. This uh this collection was on display uh from the early 1960s to the 1990s and then again after the school was rebuilt in 2001. uh and now it's made its return uh this week. Uh in collaboration with social studies teachers, uh AP US history students researched, curated, and created a permanent display uh of these artifacts as well as the history of the Kilm family uh and of their donation of these objects. Uh we want to uh send our gratitude to Robin Seagull of the Bos Boxford Historical Document Center uh for her support and expertise uh working with our students on this project. Uh and we look forward to collaborating with the Mascanom Educational Foundation to create more permanent signage and displays uh to supplement the excellent work students
073have started. Um the exhibits actually right outside the high school main office if anybody wants to take a look. Um our AP US history students uh also created a mural exploring who was Masanamit. Uh that's now displayed on the second floor of the high school. Um students learned about the Native American legacy of our area and why the school was named after this leader of the agam. Um, did you know that Masanamid uh the name means he who overpowered a black bear? Um, we look forward to continuing to learn and explore Masanamit's local legacy in the coming year. Uh, and social studies department uh will install more permanent exhibits around the district uh honoring our namesake. and our AP US history students also created a display chronicling the evolution and development of the regional school
074district uh using original documents, brochures and artifacts that have been collected through the years. Uh the artifacts include a brochure of recommended curriculum uh from 1959. Uh juniors in high school were to take stenography and bookkeeping uh and seniors were to take glee club and commercial law and salesmanship. uh exploring this engaging permanent display of history uh of the school from 1959 to 2001 is also uh out in the main entrance of the high school. So great work on our social studies department and looking at uh the local angles of of mass economic history. Uh I'm going to provide a turf field project update. Um as we all know back in February we submitted a notice of intent to the Boxford Conservation Commission to construct two turf fields on campus. uh conservation has uh retained
075the firm Williams and Sparges to provide a peer review of our application and to advise the conservation commission in its decision on the project. Uh Williams and Sparges provided Stantech, our design firm, with its comments on our application on April 2nd. Uh Stantech reviewed the comments and submitted a detailed response to the Boxford Conservation Commission on April 24th. And now Stantech is awaiting Williams and Sparge's response to this document. uh was on a call with them today. They don't have it yet. Um in order to provide a timely response to the comments from Williams and Sparges, we've asked the Conservation Commission uh to schedule our next public hearing on the project uh at the Conservation Commission's July 10th meeting. Uh although as I said, I was on the call today. If we don't receive Williams
076and Spar's comments soon, uh that hearing may be pushed out till July 18th. Um, and then uh on in my blog there's a link to the conservation uh commission's agenda uh and also uh some information on where you can send letters of support for the project uh to the conservation office. Um conservation commission is looking for letters so anybody wants to write one. Are we able to I already have are we able to communicate with the peer reviewer directly and ask when are you going to be done? So that's what um Stantech was going to do today. Um that was one of the two views for our Stantech team. Um, so it was Stantech. Um, Crystal Huff, our attorney, and myself, uh, did a conference call uh, this afternoon to talk about how we're going
077to move forward. And that was one of Stante's to-dos was to get get in touch with uh, both the KNCOM and, um, Williams and Sparges and say, "Hey, we need this. you know, if you want us to to be there on the 10th, um, we've got to get, you know, the cons requires that we give any materials, submit any materials to them a week before the meeting. So, we'd have to have it done by July 3rd. Um, so we're running out of runway, but they chose the firm that's doing the correct, right? Yeah. College is the actual owner of the contract for the school for Yes. Yeah. I mean, you can't get a date. It's a little It's frustrating. Absolutely. I mean, I said it's it's been since April. I just went and kind of
078did the chronology there and said, "Wait a minute. They sent us we sent our response to them on, as I just said, April 24th and whatever it is, they should be at least project a date." Right. Right. So, we officially retain meet um our council. So she's uh Crystal Huff is our current labor council anyway who actually has a background in environmental law. So um but did she clear her conflict? Yes, she did. She was she consulted with Oxford Town Boxford give her a letter saying it's not a conflict. So she's just representing us. Um, and I think Jeff had mentioned a couple meetings ago, since we don't have negotiations really happening this year, you know, our our our legal council budget should line items should be fine. Okay. So, our hope is that somehow
079we have some leverage to prevent the Boxford Com to not just jerk us around for the next six months. Yeah. I mean that was that was a part that was the piece of the meeting today was really how do we push them to say let's get this done. Um, so that's what that's that's what Crystal's job is is to be that I know at some point do we sue them because you know I'm I'm I've lost patience. This is nonsense. And what you know really what we want I mean we want the KCOM to give us Yeah, I know. Okay, thousand cuts in order conditions. If that doesn't h you know then you're right. I mean, what we need to do is push them to say either, you know, either accept the project on with
080an OC or deny it. So then we can do other things. You can appeal to D, you can appeal to the, you know, superior court. We can do things, but they have to actually do this. And you're right, it's kind of, it's getting kind of other than jerk us around. Let me ask, sorry, one more might know this answer best. I don't know the So if they is it better for them to approve with conditions or to deny and have us win because if they deny and we win, do they get no conditions? Sure. I usually have to go back and get an order. You have to get an OC. So I got to go back. All right. There's an order ending either way, but you good question. Sorry, are you finished or on the
081retirees? Is that in line with the expectations when we did the budget? Is that um some would be some not probably. I think you know we as we had the conversations we knew about some of them. We did factor those in. you had that breakdown. Um I'd have to go back and look and see which you know like I know the administrative assistant we knew the admin assistant we knew the middle school assistant principal we knew uh high school math we knew the other couple of math teachers actually the retire the retirements were much earlier in the year. So we did know that we had those factored in they actually retired back in the fall. So knew about the power leaving you I had that conversation I think right um par no there was an
082additional par there was a reduction of a regular red power position but the the power positions are pretty fluid so there always some movement there okay last item consent agenda approval of May 28 and June 4th 2025 meeting and warrants in the amount of $1,776,832.92. Do I have a motion? Second. Thank you. We'll do roll call with Adrian online now. Adrien, I Bill. Yes. Yes. Joe, yes. Yes. Erica, yes. Yes. Thank you everybody. Oh, we need a uh just just adjourn. The agenda is done. You don't you don't need to just meeting at 8:19. Thanks, Adrian. Get your name on that. I can never get