001That was the gavl. Member Campbell will come to order. Call to order the uh meeting of the Salem school committee May 5th, 2025 7 p.m. This meeting is taking place in person at 29 Highland Avenue, room 227 in Salem. You can also join via Zoom posted in the meeting agenda. Uh first order of the meeting is approval of the agenda. Motion to approve the agenda. Second. Motion made by member Cornell, seconded by member Miranda. Under discussion, seeing none. All in favor? Any opposed? None. The matter carries. Public comment. The Salem School Committee would like to hear from the public on issues that affect the school district and are within the scope of the committee's responsibilities. Spanish interpretation is available for anyone who needs it. The members of the school committee would like to remind the
002public that Salem public school students regularly attend school committee meetings. We encourage all meeting participants to model respectful and productive public discourse for our young learners. Do we have any public comment in the room? Of course. Uh, good evening, Mayor Pangalo, Superintendent Strike, members of the school committee, and members of the Salem community. Uh, my name is Anne Burman. I'm president of the Salem Teachers Union and I am honored to stand up here today, the first day of teacher appreciation week, to say thank you to our educators. Every single one of them, regardless of their role or title, deserves to be recognized for their service to our kids and community. every single day from August whatever day we started this year. I don't even know what it was. 26 27 something like that. All the
003way through till uh June after Labor Day. Pardon me. After Labor Day this year, Ann was after Labor Day. I I don't even remember the whatever. Um it's all been a blur. Um but even better than that, I see you all have your new contracts all printed, ready to go, very prettyl looking. Uh we'll be back at it again in about less than two years. So hold on to them tight and they're looking lovely. Um but tonight I would like to publicly congratulate Annie Cruz, our family engagement facilitator at Bentley and Harris man for being awarded a distinguished service award in the category of non-licensed member in the prek to 12 system from aft Massachusetts. Annie was nominated by the union's executive board for her work in getting the family engagement facilitators recognized in our
004last contract as well as her work on the union's negotiating team during our most recent contract negotiations. Annie was honored at Friday evening's awards ceremony which was held at the Edward M. Kennedy Institute in Boston. So STTO has had a number of awards um awardees um award whatever you want to say it um in the past um I want to say five years we've had a number of our members uh receive these distinguished awards. They're up against um members across the state of Massachusetts. So um I'm really proud of Annie. Um she and her two children attended the ceremony with her um and it was great. So, um, we have another another awardee in our, uh, rank and file members and, um, just want to let everybody know about it. Thank you. Thank you. Any
005further public comment from the chambers? If not, do we have any public comment on Zoom? Great. Our next item on the agenda is approval of the consent agenda, which are the minutes of the regular meeting of April 28th and the warrant of May 1st. Motion to approve. Seconded. Motion made by member Cornell, seconded by member Campbell. Under discussion, seeing none, all in favor? All opposed? The matter carries. Student representatives report. No. Mark. Yeah. Can I? Yeah, I do have a brief report. Mark is being inducted into the National Honor Society tonight. So, let's give Mark a round of applause. Um, I did have a chance to meet with the student advisory group today. We had a strong meeting um and um unfortunately Mark is moving on but we talked about elections for next year already
006so we could get somebody seated uh for the first meeting of the next school year. But I did want to point uh the students um we had Z was there um again to talk about um what he did to address or what the facilities team did to address the bathroom concerns that the students raised especially the locker room bathrooms with flies and toilet seats that needed to be replaced. um access to we talked a lot about access to menstrual health products about location and the students gave us some ideas for that and we also talked about the feedback that the students had given around the new building uh we've already that's been shared in some of the design meetings in the last uh week. So I wanted to show them that their input actually is
007making a difference and the work that we do. We also looked at the recently released dropout and graduation rate data and we discussed the following questions. What specific concerns do you have and how would you address them? What solutions and ideas do you have for ensuring that a higher percentage of students graduate in four years? They pointed to concern about female students graduating at lower rates than male students. They also pointed to concerns about multilingual learners and the higher drop. Even though we've seen a significant improvement in dropouts or a decline in dropouts, um they it our numbers of MLS and high need students are um higher. And so they we talked about creating a buddy program, creating um a system for newcomers when they arrive at the high school, what that could look like.
008They've also they also talked about the importance of how we use ontrack conferences, which are the students seem to like, but they don't feel like uh they want it to be a little more intentional for students that are really struggling and to help them um who are off track what that looks like. Um they would like there to be a little more intentionality around that. So, we talked a lot about that. And what was great is for the first time we had almost as many New Liberty students in the room as Salem High. We had four New Liberty students and they seemed jazzed to be part of the group. I asked they I thought they had very compelling feedback around we asked them I asked them about the location of the new school about whether
009they'd wanted to if we could build um a new Liberty at the new high school. They at first they were like no way. And then they would like then they said well if it would make it easier for us to get to sports and other activities they would like that but they don't they basically want to be close but not too close is what they said and we did talk a lot about um their this issues with their space today and they invited all the students to come to our final meeting which I am going to invite the school committee to. So our June meeting is going to be at New Liberty and we're going to bust the Salem High kids there so that they can get a tour of New Liberty. They I think
010there's a lot of fascination about what New Liberty is and what it looks like, how many kids go there. Um and so um and we'll start planning for next year like I said with election. We have an awesome group. Um and I do feel like it's it's grow grown stronger and I do want to thank Mark and we'll recognize him at the next meeting for his uh leadership of the group. Um and congratulations to him on uh the National Honor Society. So that's the update. All right. Do you want to just keep going with your super? So, Ann stole my thunder, but you know, she she gets the microphone first. I do want to take a moment to extend my gratitude to all the Salem public school staff during this week of educator appreciation. And
011we have some real life educators here in the crowd. So, I do just want to call out Laura Tui, TA Stephano, Kelly Quinn, Van Burman is a teacher, too. I don't know if people know that, but no, I'm just a music educator. And I I do want to just call out because this is a true story. The other night I was at the design meeting. This is a true story. And the parent um one of the parents who's a Spanishonly speaker who came to the event, she told me that her daughter had tea in or I think daughter had tea in class. I think it's a daughter and was so uh she first of all she loved Miss Stephano but said that she was so impressed that she spoke Spanish and she didn't know that
012at the beginning of the school year but the fact that she can communicate with her every day and I know you're not the Spanish side of do language but I do know you speak Spanish and she made it very clear that that changed so much of her experience is that you could communicate with her on a regular basis. So I want to give you a round of applause for that. That is not made up. That is real. Oh, and you speak another language. That's Bulgarian, too. Bulgarian. Okay. Okay. Excellent. All right. And you do speak English. So, you're you're triilingual. Um uh but I do want to just say that our employees um every everyone in Salem are educators because every single one of them helps craft the student experience. So, we call everybody. This
013is for everybody in the system this week. Um, and anything I say or do is not going to is going to fall short of what our dedicated staff do each and every day. So much goes unnoticed. So much goes without fanfare, but these folks give hugs, wipe tears, they cheerlead, they uh they bandage cuts, they organize field trips, they attend sporting events. This weekend I was at the little league uh opening day with the mayor and there were staff who did not have kids there who were coaching and who were also there to support students. Uh I was blown away by that. Uh they were they open snacks, they celebrate academic milestones, they prepare engaging and challenging lessons. They inspire and above all are constant present for our youth. And I'm grateful to every individual
014who embodies the core values we have of belonging, equity, and opportunity. This school system and the lives of almost 4,000 children are better because of all of them. And so please join me in celebrating our staff this week. It's I know it's one week. it should be all year long. But um it is uh important that we take a moment to stop and just acknowledge I think we have some of the best in the state of Massachusetts. So with that um I'll move on. Um Ann already mentioned she stole the thunder. You have brand new contracts in front of you here. She took all my talking points here. But um thank you to the STU for taking the time to really clean this up and make sure that it's a solid this is as good
015looking a contract as I've ever seen and this is through a lot of work. I know it feels like we negotiated. It was a long time ago, but it needed a lot of cleanup work and and there's a lot of changes. So, thank you to the STU. I do want to congratulate all the inductees to the National Honor Society. We have 33 tonight, which is the most we've had uh at least since I've been here. And national um and also the National Art Honor Society, which we have 13 inductees this evening. And then tomorrow, one of my favorite events is the seal of biiteracy event is tomorrow and breakfast uh at 8:45. We'll be recognizing I don't know the exact number. Do you know Dr. T? Okay. It's it is a record number two tomorrow.
016So we look forward to celebrating them. And I also want to wish uh happy mother's day to all our Salem public schools mothers, grandmothers, and those that play the role those roles in the lives of our children whether they're biological or not. There's many. Uh, so I want to shout out to all those folks as well. So those are my updates for tonight. Um, and now I get to turn the microphone over to the Bentley School. We're very pleased to have uh the Bentley team, which I sort of already introduced here to talk about the innovation plan. I do think um tonight the goal is to listen to the team um and then ask questions, give some feedback. I didn't intend for the vote to happen tonight because I think there are some adjustments that
017we might want to make um or suggest to the school because ultimately the school committee has the authority to approve the um innovation plan. Um I do want to acknowledge that the STU also gave me some feedback, thoughtful feedback that I want to incorporate as well. So the idea would be to get a final vote on this at the next meeting to sort of put this on the table after we hear from the Bentley team. You have a copy of the slides. There have been a few minor adjustments since I sent we sent you the slides. Uh so there might be a little updated, but I'm going to turn it over to Principal Rogers um and the team from Bentley who all seem to be wearing some sort of green. Well, no, at least half
018of you. Happens. It happens sometimes. Yeah. For Celtics. Yes. Thank you. For Bentley. That's our color. That's our Those are our school colors. Well, that's our school color. All right. My um as you know, I'm Liz Rogers. I'm the principal at Bentley. So grateful to be here um to be able to talk about our innovation plan renewal. Um which just also gives us a little spotlight to brag on some things that we've done over the last five years. Um I'm going to have the rest of the team introduce themselves. Slide. Hi, I'm Laura Tui. I am an ML coach now and I am on the Balt which is the Bentley Academy leadership team. Mrs. I'm one of the teachers in the dual language program in fourth grade. I'm also a member of the Bentley Academy
019leadership team. Kelly Quinn. My name is Kelly Quinn, school counselor at Bentley. And I'm also part of both of the leadership team as well. Great. We're two slides. Two slides. Oh. Look at that. Look at that. It works. Those are our names. All right. Um, so when we started to work on the innovation plan renewal back in October, it was a big job this this year. Um we wanted to start at um in a place of like recognizing the things that recognizing the things that we've done um over the past five years since the innovation plan started. Um and these are just a few we have more slides with some of our successes but um just a few things to highlight is that when we started in 2020 with our new innovation plan we also
020started the dual language program and also if you don't if you recall 2020 was also a global pandemic um when we were practicing when I said that I would I went dun dun dun like as if we could have music in the background but that is how we started in 2020 um and it slow. I mean, you know, it was um our first class of dual language students in kindergarten started remotely um learning language um which was a challenge. Um and now since 2023, we have a wait list for enrollment. So, that's really exciting to us um to have people kind of really wanting a dual language program. Um we also added a pre-K this year, which is super exciting and terrifying to be honest. if I'm an upper elementary, middle school person to have
021four-year-olds in the building. But it's been amazing. They're so sweet and cute and fun and they are all except for one because she's moving coming to our dual language kindergarten. So that's exciting. Um we've also increased our number of ML students as we would because we're a dual language program. So about half of our students, about 150 of our students are MLS or multilingual learners. Um and we've done a lot of work on our attendance. Um we've gone from really really really really high chronic attendance to we're down six% from last year at this point. Um so yeah and that's many percentage points from 2020. Next slide. It's still May. Okay. Um just a brief um we're going to go through some some other glows that we have. Um this is our academics um based
022on MCCAST. The on the left side is our ELA. Um you can see that there's like ups and downs. We've worked a lot on our literacy um curriculum. We have a new curriculum that we started this year. So I'm really excited about that and I hope to see more growth in um ELA and we've made more consistent growth in math as you can see on the right hand side um on MCCAST. Um this is not me, this is Kelly Quinn is gonna talk a little bit about sort of how we built our foundation to where we are now. Um so foundational for our school are our core values. Um which is it spells regard which in Spanish would translate to English is like watering a plant or a garden. Um that's intentional that the acronym
023for our core value is in Spanish. Part of the goal of dual language is to decenter English to create space and elevate not only the Spanish language but other languages. So when we think of multilingual students and their families, um making sure that there's space and community for everybody. So these um five principles are foundational to us as a school and us creating community and connection for students as well as their families and for staff. There's two pictures on this slide showing regard. So um the first one are for PTO for respect. E for Akidad for equity, G for garner cresento for growth. Uh A for authenticad for authenticity. R um for responsibil for responsibility. Um so those are central. The one on the left is describing the expectations in circle. Um we have circles
024with students that was co-created with their teacher and the students. The one on the right is for whole group learning. You'll notice there that the core values are reflected in both languages and spelt out in both languages. Um because we're constantly using and switching between these languages. Our families are familiar with regar as well. Um and they celebrate with students as they meet these achievements whether it's individually or in a class and it's common language. You'll see if you come to our school in the hallways, in the bathrooms, regard is constantly posted and the matrices are co-created with students in both languages so that we can continue to ground ourselves in our values and support us as a community. [Laughter] So, building building and improving on our building and improving continuously our school culture has
025been a huge um has been a big thing for us as well. If you step into Bentley, you know that our school culture is literally the the heartbeat of our thriving learning community. and we will we will continue to do that. Um but here like in these two pictures up up top um you'll see uh one of um I believe that's a third grade classroom third grade classroom um participating in that morning circle where we root all of our practices in restorative justice. So that's one of the what's that's one of the things that we focus on as a school. Starting off the morning, right? Um we gather together as a community, share, talk, address things, areas of growth, areas of glow. Um so that's that first picture right there. It's really special. that has
026made a really big impact on our classroom like our classroom community um environment, our school community and then also the adults as well. Everybody is on the same page. We know that restorative justice and even just starting the day just like that um has made a huge difference in our mental like attitude about how we approach the day. that picture down below. Um, we've really leaned into embracing more joy um with our students and feeling we want our students not to just feel but to to be like passionate and excited about coming to school. Um that is those are some of our teachers getting down during um during one of our um dual language professional developments in the summer. Um I think it was was it a trans languaging activity? I'm not sure. It was
027It was really fun. Yeah. Um and part of that is embracing each other and honoring our differences and similarities as educators. And when we're able to do that, it also translates um to the students. They see that. So improving our school culture um in focusing in high high expectations and also joy has been really really important. I think I'm am I also the next one? It is. It is me. Okay. Go ahead. No, no, you go for it. You want Okay. Okay. So, anyway, building on building community. See what I did there? Um, as part of our efforts to not only build our community in the school, but also to reach out to the the rest of the Salem community. You'll see here a few pictures. That top picture is something that's called Cafe Home
028Learning. Do you want to add to the cafe con learning a little bit? That first picture? Yeah. So, cafecon learning is when we have parents come in and the kids just share what they did in their class. We do it by grade level. Um what? First thing. First thing in the morning. So, the kids get parents drop off their kids. Um they have uh some refreshments. The kids gather, get their all organized, and then parents and staff and everybody comes in and they can share what they've been learning. They can share it in English, they can share it in Spanish. Um and it's fantastic. It's been very wellreceived. Yeah. And they feel like well they not feel they should be they're very proud of like their academic achievements as well. And if you're looking from
029the beginning to the end of the year, students still reflect on events like these. Um you'll see in the picture to the right, it is a picture of our fifth graders. They wrote um Valentine's cards to senior citizens in Salem um in Spanish and in English using all the multilingual resources. And it it created a really um it created an opportunity for students to lead and like initiate something. And it also it was a natural kind of it was a natural opportunity to spread more of that joy. Um that picture at the bottom is what is that picture at the bottom? Um this year we also have had our first um we have an assessment now for Spanish language proficiency and we were able to give out um several Spanish proficiency awards to mostly fourth
030graders but a few third graders that have already reached proficiency in Spanish um reading, writing, listening and speaking. And we went we gave these awards out at the first ML night in the fall and that's all the staff that attended on that in that bottom slide our Bentley staff just to be a part of that. And then the last uh last picture on the slide is four of our fourth graders, which is our oldest dual language grade taking on leadership roles. They're recess coaches in this picture. Oh, and then it's me again. Okay. Um this slide is just an overview of the process we went through to re um to look at our innovation plan and make um adjustments that needed to be made. And there were there were many because when we and Laura's
031going to talk she is going to talk in in a little while about kind of like the big changes that were we had to make. But basically the process was that Laura since she was one of the people on the original team that wrote the innovation plan and I kind of looked over the plan. We reviewed it um and then we made a plan of how we wanted to involve as many people as possible in rewriting it and making it um reflect what we actually are doing at Bentley right now um with our dual language program. Um we brought it then to the Bentley advisory board where they we shared with them our plan and they did an initial um look at like the overview part of the innovation plan and gave some feedback on
032that. Then from there we took it to different groups. We took it to our ILT which is our Balt Bentley Academy leadership team where they reviewed and revised specific sections that were of interest to them. So we have people from all all different part uh different jobs in the school like pair professionals um uh different grade band teachers, special ed. So they all took different sections of the innovation plan and um revised specific sections that they were most interested in. Um and then we you um had opportunities to work with pair professionals and non-classroom teaching staff um to do other sections so that they were interested in. So there's like sections about specialists and and things like that. Um and they gave feedback and further revisions. This was all from October on so like right
033through the end of April. Um and then we had teachers, classroom teachers and also other other like um specialists and uh interventionists and things like that also do feedback and revisions of their specific instructional sections. And then we brought it back to Balt um brought it to our school committee partner who is um Amanda Campbell who was also on the original innovation plan team and for final revisions and and that's that brings us to today. So that was uh essentially our process and we the process was intentional around bringing in as many people in our school community as we possibly could. Finally here I am. Okay. Um so as Liz said I was part of the original um innovation plan. We worked together. It was a very long process. Um, initially when we first when
034we first started, um, the dual language was sort of put in there sort of not I don't want to say last minute, but it was sort of added into it and it was supposed to be a strand, right, where it was going to be working with the uh, gened classrooms and it's now completely wall-to-wall dual language. So, we had to really go back, like Liz said, and look at all the things that we initially thought were our focuses and then go back and say, "No, no, that's not who we are anymore." So, let's take who we are and really incorporate it into the innovation plan. Um, this right here is you see the first picture is um when we did some work with our pairs. That's the other part of it. When we first did
035the innovation plan, it was really sort of done. We had community members, we had partners, but the staff itself, it was a lot of like me running around to everybody saying, "Here's where we are. These are the things we're thinking about." You know, we gave it to everybody to read before they voted on it. But it was it's a big document, you know. So, this time we were very intentionable intentionable intentional about making sure that everybody had access to it so that you could put your own expertise into it, which I think was great. And um the one in the middle is also the Paris and then this is the reading specialist um who also looked at it. So everybody looked at it from their lens which really I think made it a really great
036document and and incorporated everybody is do I have the oh that's me applicant team I think that's oh it says me but that's this is just a list of the people who are the official applicants for the for the renewal um which includes several people here now one of our parents that's on our um Bentley Advisory Board school site council um our literacy coach a classroom teacher and an ML teacher. And you'll you'll find all of their resumes in there. And I think Laura sort of already talked about some of this stuff. Yeah. But also, Kelly Quinn is going to come up and talk. Um Sorry, I like left it like it was my desk. I left everything up here. You're good. Um so my understanding is back in 2020 the innovation plan that was
037proposed at that time described the social emotional and behavioral systems as in development and we're going to be defined. Um and we've made a lot of growth and progress and we hope to continue to build on that growth and progress in terms of our systems that we have in place. So as I mentioned before regards foundational to all of our systems. Um I would say as well our families are foundational to all of our systems. we engage with them as part of the social emotional behavioral supports and partner with them to support students in that way. Um not unlike other schools we have multi-tered systems of support. So the MTSS um across those three tiers and embedded across the three tiers are both restorative justice and PBIS. So the positive behavioral interventions and supports. Um
038so what that looks like tier one supports that are available to all students would include the classroom circles you saw highlighted before. Those happen in both Spanish and in English um throughout the school throughout the start of the day and at the end of the day to continue to build connection and community. Um it also is town halls where the whole school comes together for assembly. Those are conducted in both Spanish and English by staff as well. So we continue to center and elevate Spanish and create space for other languages as well. when students break into flocks um because we're roosters. Um they are multi-grade level groups with different staff from across the school so they're able to connect um with different staff as well. That's when they do activities like the one highlighted um
039with the community center bringing the Valentine's for our seniors. So having opportunities like that as well to try to build connection within the school but also within the community um as well. So we continue to try to find ways to connect with students uh in those ways. In tier 2 we have targeted interventions and supports. So based on different data points um DESA we might know at a school level there's certain lagging skills we targeted in town hall for tier one but then for tier two we might have different groups um or check-in checkout. Those are constantly referring back to rigar but they're also um opportunities for students to learn skills that could help them feel more connected into the community so that they can feel successful. um when there's uh situations with students, we're
040using restorative practices to have conversations to help students build perspective um about where another student's coming from, where they're coming from to again continue to build on connection. And then tier three supports are more intensive and uh individualized supports that uh a smaller number of students may need. We continue to build on Rhaegar, restorative justice, and PBIS. Um we're constantly partnering with families and community providers. Um they're familiar with Rhaegar as well. they're familiar with zones of regulation. So, we're constantly trying to between home, community, and school use the similar language both in Spanish and in English. We have the materials um to help students build um their capacity. So, that's where we are so far with our um tiered systems of support, but we're continuing to try to use data to um inform those
041systems and to build them out as we go. And this is just sort of touching upon what I said earlier is that now we are a wall-to-wall dual language program. Um so who we were before we have to readjust um and our educational programs every uh the educational focus is based on the guiding principles of a dual language program. We use that sort of as our guide and then we build off from there. We just implemented I think Liz said this a new literacy program um curriculum. Um, we just got some preliminary access numbers back. When I look at the scores, because that's my life. I love the when we get the access scores back. Um, and if you look at second and third grade where they really had a good chunk of learning using
042that curriculum. Um, it's they have grown. I think there's only in both grades there might be three kids who either stayed the same. I don't think anybody went down in writing, which is unbelievable. I mean, that's always the focus, right? It's always sort of the focus with our ML students. Um so being really intentional about our ex um educational programming and then collaborative model which is the tandem teams. Um so we have like when I think about second and third grade our ML teacher works very closely with um the grade level teacher in both Spanish and English because she's bilingual. Um actually all of our ML teachers are bilingual which is great. So they're able to push in for Spanish and for English. And so they can use the SEI strategies or the SSI strategies.
043Right. So, you're able to support students who are learning English and students who are learning Spanish, too. Um, and so that collaborative model, um, is, you know, always a work in progress. Um, but we're already starting to see the benefits of the of the way that we're doing it. So, I think that's pretty exciting. Yeah. And and that um those two things were major shifts in the innovation renewal plan. So, they they look very different. We basically in the 2020 version of the innovation plan, we were tasked with creating behavior systems. So we it's and we I think we have like a two pages of our document is is dedicated to that. And then the the dual language bilingual program obviously takes up much more space in the in the new um renewal um innovation
044plan. All right. So in the innovation plan, I just wanted to briefly mention the autonomies. Um, so there are six areas of autonomy that an innovation plan can have. Um, and I just wanted to go over a few that we have used over the last 5 years. Um, in the curriculum instruction and assessment area, I feel like that's where we've used the most. Um, obviously we're a different program than the other schools. So, we're using um, at this point we're using a different a different literacy curriculum in Spanish and English than the rest of the district. We're using benchmark. Um we are about to start a new math curriculum next year. Um and for the reasons for for using different curriculum is basically because of what's available in both Spanish and English and the and
045the quality of them. Um so we did a lot of work last year to find benchmark. I don't I don't think we could be happier um with that program and the outcomes for our students. Um, writing is something that basically did not exist in our previous program, uh, previous curriculum, and the kids are writing like crazy. Um, Bridges Math has what seems to be more authentic Spanish language, um, resources and, excuse me, and vocabulary and all of the things that students need to learn math more effectively. So, we look forward to using that starting next year. Um, and we are have also, you know, over the last few years and going into next year have a have a bit of a different assessment calendar than the rest of the district. Um, and we keep tweaking
046that as we go so that we're making sure that we're not overassessing our students, but we are assessing them in both languages and in content in both languages. So, we're not just assessing their Spanish language skills, but we're assessing their math skills in Spanish and in English. And so, it's it's tricky. It's a a tricky balance because we want to get the informations because we want to we want to make sure that we can give students what they need. Um but we also don't want to over overassess them. Um in the schedule and calendar area we did have we used the autonomies to have an extended day and that will end this year. Um, we are still going to ask for that autonomy in case um, so going into next year, we're matching the district
047in as far as our daily hours, which for us is a reduction of 25 minutes a day. Um, and that doesn't seem like a lot, but it's it feels like a lot going into next year. Um, we're having to adjust our our schedule. Um, and we I hope that we we'll everything will be fine. Uh but if we we would like to keep the potential to extend the day again um if we can find the funding for that um at some point and if if we feel like our students still need that. Um for staffing we have the autonomy to create have unique positions. We do have um a couple of tutors and we have a steam teacher. One of the things in the original um innovation plan that we were also tasked with was
048to create a steam program. Um, and so we have a steam teacher as one of our specialists. So that's a unique role that we have. And obviously for staffing our building, um, when we write job descriptions, when we post jobs, many of our positions in including non-eing positions, it really is beneficial for for people to be bilingual. Um, professional development. Um, we've we do a lot of the professional development that the district offers. Um but this year we decided that because we were starting a new literacy curriculum, we asked if we could do our own um professional development on early release days for teachers, whereas the rest of the district, the elementary math teachers were doing math a math PD on early release days. We use that time for co-planning with our new um literacy
049curriculum. As Laura Tui mentioned, um our ML teachers work very closely with the classroom teachers. So having that co-planning time was invaluable, especially with the new curriculum. Um around district policies and procedures, I'm sure you're all aware of our enrollment policy, which is different than the rest of the district. It's connected to the district and it's and it's it um aligns with the school choice policy. Um but our enrollment has the um lottery as a part of it. Um Julie and then and then also our educational model. I think that's that comes under there. I'm not sure. It also comes under curriculum instruction assessment, but for some reason it shows up under the district policies and procedures as well. And then for budget, we're not using any autonomies at this point. Um there's the autonomy
050that we could have our a lump sum budget and and do something with that, but I've I have not explored that and we haven't used that at all. And that is basically it. We have time for questions if anyone has questions. Member Campbell, I don't have a question. Just a general thank you and an appreciation for all of the work that your entire team does. It's to no one's surprise here. I love dual language. Um and it's always such a privilege to get to work with you guys. Um and so I had the chance to come in at the very end and get to see not at the very end. I didn't don't want it to sound like that. Um I got to come in and see after they'd done all of the heavy lifting
051and I just got to review it and enjoy it. Um, and I could see so many changes from the initial plan that really reflected such a deeper understanding of like what you wanted your school community to be coming out of the charter school and into this innovation plan. Like a deeper understanding of dual language, just like much more refined and developed and having personally gone through the experience of, you know, going through that own learning curve, I can really see how much hard work and dedication has gone into it. So, I just I'm incredibly proud of all the work you do and so supportive of everything and I just really appreciate everything you guys are doing. Thank you. Thank you. questions. Member Cornell, I also just want to say thank you um you know for
052inviting all of us in and and letting us take a tour. Uh it's when you talk about the joyfulness of it. I think we were even talking about that on the way out the door. Like we we were watching TA's class and it was it just feels like there's a learning buzz in there and so it's I know this has all been really hard work and and when you talked us through it, but it feels like you've been doing it for 10 years, you know, when you're when you're sitting in there. So, um that joyfulness thing, it was it's so palpable when you're in there. Like the school just feels it feels like the teachers are enjoying themselves. It feels like the kids are enjoying themselves. They're totally invested. Like even just walking in the
053hallways, it just feels really good. Um I wish I wish that this had been around when my kids, you know, when my kids were little because they were 100% be in there um with member Miranda's daughter. Um but it's just it's a great opportunity for all all Salem families and super impressive. So also thank you. Thank you. Appreciate it. Member Manning. Yeah, just a slightly different comment. Um, not that I don't agree with everything you've both said, but sorry, let me restart that one. I like flocks. Really, I do. I love flocks. I just wanted to call out the sweatshirt because somebody mentioned the color in the Celtics and all, but I really want to call out the statement on the sweatshirt because I think that's um pretty cool and we should sort of mention
054that. Yep. Sorry. Any other questions or comments? Yeah. Question. Hi. Hi. In your budget autonomies, are you requesting permission to carry forward the funds from one fiscal year to the next? We have not used to that. You've not used that, but are you planning to include that in the plan? We we did we would like to leave some of those that we haven't used in the plan in the case we would like to use them in the future. My my one caution for the school and for the school committee's consideration is that that is as you know that would be challenging with our year-end budgeting process when we are often balancing one line with unspent funds from other lines. We have the practice of prepaying tuition. So, as you know, we scramble to find any
055unspent dollars. So, I just offer that as a note for consideration on both sides, the school side and for the committee side. I don't usually have a problem spending all the money. I'm just we don't usually have much left. It's not a dual link. Yeah, it's just not it's not been a practice to carry money over from year to year any, you know, with the city of Salem. So, I want to stay in in sync with that. So, I'm not sure that would be I think that'd be an autonomy we would be have a question about. Okay. Um, and then I I want to say something. The other thing I would say is the the length of the day I do have questions about because, you know, we worked really hard to try to get
056equity across the system. Um, I'm, you know, I'm not opposed to schools that need the mo, you know, more to get more, but I want to be careful that like we don't set ourselves up with innovation plans creating inequities. Um and and we talked a little bit about this during the budget season and in the case of Bentley, Bentley does serve some of the neediest students in the district. So I you know I don't have concerns giving Bentley more support and if you look at the way that the budget is set up, Bentley does get a lot it does get more resources because it is more expensive to run a dual language program and we're very supportive of that model. I I just want to be cautious though that like I don't want to commit
057ourselves to something that might be inherently inequitable down the road. Um in terms of the time we worked really hard to try to get like a consistent day for the district. Um in your case it did mean a reduction but for many of the schools it meant an increase so that you know no kid was get no every child in Salem was getting universally you know high experience. I just want to that's just something that will give me pause. I'm not saying that you and and and certainly we would it wouldn't be something I'd support giving in um operating dollars to because that would mean that we were giving potentially more to one school. Um which would has been I mean Carlton has gotten not Carlton but like Salt and Stall has had a longer
058day for a long time that the district funded. Um so I just want to that's something I want to u just call call out. Yep. You're not the mayor. You can't call out. Oh sorry mayor. member Campbell did let you throw out the baseball pitch in the softball. So, you know, the only thing I would flag on that is that I I would I I do typically agree with those types of things in regards to innovation plans. But in dual language programs where you are expected to do not just literacy in English and literacy in Spanish, but also biiteracy, not only does it take slightly more resources, it takes slightly more time as well. Um, and then in e even by literacy aside, the ability to bridge between both languages and set up those intentional
059bridging opportunities, those those things do take time. So I would argue that having the option to consider returning to a a longer day as somebody who does it in a very short day. Um, I'm quite envious. Um, so I think we would, you know, I would I would recommend leaving it in on the off chance that we did want to consider putting it back. Okay. Yeah, that No, I can accept that. I just wanted to I I just want to be careful. It's more about precedent for any of the innovation plans. Yeah. That we don't do something that creates inequities down the road. And I I think it's the difference between like in the inherent model and I think what's so important to consider about dual language is that it is English learner programming. That's
060how Desi builds it as and that it's specifically designed for English learners. Whereas it's not just um a doing things differently for the sake of doing things differently for some kids. It's it's intentionally designed to be for um you know students who are best served by this model. And so inherently it keeps its its strict balance just by nature of the program. And so I think it just normally I would agree with you if it you know just doing a more expensive model for some kids um it may not be the best approach whereas I think dual language is such an intentionally designed program for our English learners and our multilingual students that I think that's such a huge component. Yeah. Member Cornell. I just have a I actually have a question for you member
061Camel. So just because we were having this conversation about innovation schools in the last meeting is you said Desi sort of has a particular designation for this. So like in this moment you know we're going to say that the innovation model is the right model to support you know growing the program out and and for the staff and leadership to be able to kind of experiment and do what they need to do in order to to make it the school that they um that they want it to be. Do you think that like going down the line like I always forget how long these last five years um like that innovation status is better would be important to continue to have around Bentley or just from your experience in the Yeah, I mean I I
062would obviously defer to Principal Rogers on this. So if you disagree, please jump in. I do think that innovation status, unless you're intending to expand it into additional schools, I think innovation status is really important for unique models like dual language because they do inherently need different curricula, different assessments, different approaches, different PD, like everything is really completely different and it's all well and good when you have a school committee that supports it, a superintendent that supports it, that that's great. You don't feel like you need the innovation model. Um, but th those times are not guaranteed. The people are not for forever. And so having those innovations in place gives you some amount of that like for the next 5 years dual language will continue to be supported like this. And I think that
063that can be really important especially I mean like we're seeing a national conversation shift in how education period is talked about never mind dual language and bilingual education. Um, so I think the more you can do at a local level to sort of give that trajectory of for five years, we know that these types of differences are guaranteed for a program that flat out needs it to be you won't have a successful one if you don't do it this way. Um, I I would say yes. Thank you, Dr. Yeah, I'm sorry. I'm I'll I'll make sure I respect the chair. Um, I do just want to say um I do want to really compliment Bentley School, too. I I uh and and Deputy Superintendent Carboni can attest like this is a school that has the
064improvements at this school have it's and the folks that have been there. It's been a journey and I want to thank Miss Rogers and Miss Tui like for sticking it out uh because you were there through a lot of ups and downs. the school had it's really a joy to see as many people said but I I've se we've seen firsthand there were some very challenging times around the pandemic implementing a new model like this um was really hard to do and I and I really credit the people on the ground because to see the transformation it's a it's really a a privilege to to watch what's happened in the school through really intentional work around culture climate shifting expectations for kids setting up systems um you Well, Bentley is um deserves a tremendous amount
065of credit and Principal Rogers and the team. I I it it really is refreshing to see the the changes. There were moments of, you know, there were some dark moments um as the school was trying to write itself, implement a very complicated um work and to move to a wall to wall. It is a it is a joyful place. It's a place where kids are getting um what they need. and I I'm proud that that we have a dual language school and I'm proud that it's a school that's pursuing excellence um and is moving in that direction. So kudos to all of you um and to the school committee who you know who had had you know I can't take credit for the fact the decision was made to have a dual language even though
066the timing was rocky. Um but um we're still we're here and we we're fortunate to be able to celebrate the program. So, I do want to credit, you know, you to that and I hope it never goes away despite and I think your points are really well taken, Miss Campbell. Um, uh, so, um, it's a good way to, so what I, what I would suggest now is that we take some of the feedback I know we have from some from the STU and, uh, from others. Um, and we'll bring it back to this committee. Probably won't be substantive changes. Um, and if there's any other changes that you would like to see us make, if you could just email me or or let us know and I'll talk to Principal Rogers about that. And so
067we'll ask for a final vote um at the next meeting. Okay. Any other questions, comments? Member Miranda. Um, in terms of the budget autonomy, do we have an idea of what kinds of funding um might be available for 501c3s if we were to establish one? you know, uh, in terms of like funding to create a 501c3 or just to have like the opportunities for for funding. Um, I don't know that we've had an intentional strategy around fundraising. There are um there is a robust education philanthropy community in greater Boston that is focused on equity. So, I would assume that there would be opportunities out there, but I couldn't say with any certainty about what a goal might be without doing a little more digging. Okay. Thanks. Um, and also just want to echo what my
068colleagues have said. Um, and obviously my child goes to Bentley and um, we've had like such an amazing experience. I wasn't really around or paying enough attention um, before when there was like this darker time. So, all I can referred to it as a dark. So, all I can hard it was really all I can speak to is like the very positive experience um that I've had as a parent. Um and I look forward to to her growing throughout the school. So, thank you all for everything that you do. Yeah, I'd just like to double down on it. I spend I spend a lot of time with Liz and at the school and it it really has been transformational the work that you and the team have done um both from a like culture um
069aspect the culture of the school and making it welcoming for kids and the family just the atmosphere it's just brighter and cheerier and um I think you know you've done an excellent job recruiting uh staff who are committed to the vision and the mission reflect the cultural and linguistic backgrounds of the kids. Um, and I just think it's a real uh shining star for the district. So, I just wanted to add to that and say thank you to you and everyone on your team. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you. Further report. Yes. So, um, moving on. I do have um a memo here about um interd district non-resident school choice program um and which we do every year for those that have been on the committee for a while.
070Um we have participated in school non-resident school choice. This means Yes. Can I just interrupt and let the Bentley staff know y'all can head out now. It's been a pleasure to have you, but no need to stay for the rest. It's a school night. Thank you. Continue. Thank you. No, no, no worries. Um, and I'm sure the green will bring luck to the Celtics tonight, too. Um, and so the um we have participated in it uh in the last few years. Um, and we I think we've had some good success uh with the program. Um, I did just want to share uh some changes to the recommendations. Um, I am not recommending that we accept choice students into New Liberty. Uh, we have enough need here in Salem for those alternative school spots and I
071want to reserve those for Salem residents just because the demand is high. Students need it. New Liberty is providing an exceptional experience for young people. Uh, and you know, obviously we want to make sure we prioritize that for Salem students. And in the past, they have accepted kids directly into New Liberty from other communities. So, I am um I'm asking that we just focus our seats, open seats at Salem High School. Now, obviously, Salem Prep is uh you cannot accept choice because it's um it you have to have the appropriate IEP to be enrolled in Salem Prep. Um I'm not recommending a change in K to five. We do not accept choice students in preK. We have accepted the um the children of staff per the policy we have um for staff but not choice
072in prekinder uh garden. Again, I think those need to be reserved for Salem residents and for staff uh in the Salem public schools if we have extra spots and those are highly in demand, as high as they've ever been um in the last few years. What I am also recommending, and this is a shift, is to not accept school choice in middle school. Um, I've had a number of conversations with principal Safik about the transition um of the Salt and Stall students here. I do think that's a a bigger shift than uh we anticipate. Well, I shouldn't say maybe not for the students, but for the adults, it's going to be a shift. We want to make sure we get the culture right. We want to do it intentionally, thoughtfully. Um, and I am also
073concerned about the class sizes um at the middle school a bit more. They they're larger and I want them to settle a bit. um and we're pushing, you know, 25 and in some cases above 25 at the middle school level. I think this will help make them more manageable at a pivotal time uh for young people and I really want to make sure we set the culture right. Um we have a strong um speaking of a transformation, Collins has undergone a transformation in the last few years and I want to make sure that it continues on a strong path. So I am recommending that change in grades six to eight. The rest of it is very similar to what I proposed last year. Um the language has been approved by our attorneys. Um I do
074just want to call out that last year we made a shift in school choice that we uh did not would not accept students after the beginning of the school year. We found many um well not many but we had a number of students coming in in the middle of the school year and that proved to be could in many cases was disruptive. um uh just anytime there's new students it can be a challenge but oftentimes when students apply for choice it's because there was a challenge in their prior district and do and bringing them in in the middle of the year can be um you know can be a difficult transition for the student and for the the school. So uh September 5th would be the uh would be the final date in which we
075would accept uh students for choice. We are uh we try to be supportive and flexible of families who um move in the middle of the school year or we learn that they their housing changes. We try to accommodate them uh to the to the extent and you can see some of the language here related to that and we've worked hard to try to support them and then they can apply for choice um in the in the ensuing year so students aren't unnecessarily displaced during the um the school year. Um so that is my proposal. As as you may remember the school committee has to vote um every year um to you have to vote not to participate in school choice but I still want to bring my um recommendation to you. I also would like
076to have a vote to support my recommendation. But from the states um from the Department of Education's perspective, all I have to do is report that we are participating or not in school choice. And they they do need to see a vote of the school committee only if the school committee chooses not to participate in school choice. But I hope that you will accept my recommendation to participate with these conditions. And you know, I'm open to any shifts that you'd like to see. But this is in my I think in the best interest of the district to per to pursue um the you know this configuration for the upcoming school year. Turn it back over to you mayor. Thanks. Any questions for members? Member Miranda. How common um would you say that it is? Like
077looking at our numbers here looks like we have about a total of 81 students. Um would you say that that is like the average number that a district Oh um I don't you know I don't know. I think we um I think we're s I mean for us as a district we send as many students out as we take in. So we break pretty much even there. Um I don't I don't know. I mean I think it's becoming more common now because districts enrollment have been dropping. It's very common in western Massachusetts because um districts have um have had declining enrollment and it is becoming increasingly true about districts now in eastern Massachusetts because a lot of district more districts have seen declining enrollment. I think um you know I think uh it is I
078think our numbers are pretty much in line. We've tried to I know ours are similar to Beverly's and how many seats we allow per grade level because I was just on their site. Um but not every community allows for choice. Um so the ones that do I think we're pretty comparable in that area. Salem has historically allowed choice at the high school level. Um maybe I don't know back in the day whether they opened it up to other grade levels, Mary, but not not a lot. No, not for quite a while. Yeah, that was more recent. Yeah. Um, and I do think we've seen a lot of interest in our district uh for different reasons. Um, I I think that's a good sign, especially when our staff want our staff can send their kids if
079they don't live in here under it's not under choice. It's under our policy. So, they're considered um not choice students. They're considered I don't want to say actual students. They're all actual students, but they're um because of our policy. Um but I we have seen more and more kids apply um who are not having good experiences necessarily in other districts. So um but I also know that um it it's better for students to start the year with us than come you know all throughout the year. We'd pref we have enough of that happening with students moving in and homeless students that I'd prefer not to add to that. Thank you. Additional questions, comments? Member Manning. Yeah, I I have a just sort of a thought looking ahead and and a question maybe um look jumping
080ahead to when the when the uh new high school is uh is open and we have the whole CTE y area. I I sort of can I can see like certainly folks a jump in folks trying to um come in through choice from near neighboring neighboring areas that don't have those programs. Um, and I just I just wonder if um I just want to I guess put make sure we keep that on the table that maybe that may affect how we think about the number or um also is I I assume there's no provision if somebody comes into like if somebody's wants to send their child here, it has nothing to do with what program they want to get in, right? It's just they come here and then they can take any courses like any
081other student that's already here. Yeah. Because I mean mostly that's where you can't restrict that. Yeah. So is that our decision? Is that how we do it or that's just how school choice works? That's how school choice. So we don't have to worry about that. But we do have to maybe think about the increase in numbers as this because some of those programs are going to look awful appealing, you know, to kids who aren't in this living here. Yeah. I mean, I think when I had recommended a more aggressive approach to school choice uh a couple of years ago, our enrollment had really declined and particularly at the high school level, but um I for a lot of different reasons, our enrollment has increased quite a bit over the last couple of years, which is
082a good problem to have. Choice has helped with that. Some of that is that, right? Some of that is choice. Yes. Choice for kids who want those programs already. And I do think a new high school will Yeah, it's going to be like Yeah, we we have to watch that because I'm already worried about the size as we've talked about in the public meetings. So, um I think that's important for the committee to consider and that's why I should every year should we should have this conversation. Any further questions? Um I just had a couple questions. So regarding if um a student has a sibling in middle school or is their middle school age, they they still cannot choice them even though there's a sibling preference. No under this. Okay. Now once you close it,
083you close it for Yep. And this is uh the closure of six through eight pertains to new students. So if you're a fifth grade student who's choicing from another community, you wouldn't lose your ability to enter six. Once you accept somebody, you own own the student till they're graduate. Very good. No further questions. All right. Do you have additional update? Just the last update as in the building project and uh member Manning and U. Member Cornell can certainly jump in because I know you've been involved in some of these meetings. We had two meetings last week about the design alternatives for um the new um high school. Uh we had the in-person meeting was very well attended. I think we had close to 40 people there. Strong engagement especially when we discussed the design options
084of new construction rena or hybrid of new and rena. Uh and then people got really engaged around costs of the building too which you know unfortunately happened later in the meeting but there was uh good energy around that. The the zoom portion of the uh or the next night was less well attended. Uh but I was very pleased to see how many people came out to the inerson uh session. Um the design team and the project manager met with the executive team and the academic team um on last week which I thought was was a very good conversation about adjacencies in the building. Meaning we looked at the different floor plans um to see what needed to be near what and on what floors things were. and to have many eyes of like people who
085actually live in buildings every day in those schools was super helpful and that we pointed out a couple of thing significant things that were problematic in what they were doing and so I was really appreciative that they asked for the input of you know so those folks sitting over there gave a lot of really good input um and then they'll be meeting with the high school leadership team to do the same exercise around uh you know how they've started to look at the different floors of the of the building uh on Thursday night there is a meeting it is a public meeting for the it is on Zoom of the school building committee uh and they'll be discussing which of the design alternatives they're going to move forward with. I think there'll be a vote
086of that on Thursday night. So again, I want to remind people that doesn't mean that that's the final design. We have not picked the final what it's going to look like. It's just to decide whether it's going to be a renovation, whether it's going to be new construction or a combination of both. I don't know if you want to add anything to that, member Cornell or member Manning. I just think we need to keep reinforcing with folks what you just said that it's not the design of the building because I know people that were there the other night several of them thought they were look going to look at for designs for the construction choice that had already been made and were surprised to find they were there to look at renovation b versus you
087know whatever. So, and even the even the the article in the news the next day after one of the forums was sort of misleading in that in that sense, you know, design choices, blah, and they're not. And I don't know how to clarify that um quite what the terms would be that would clarify that better, but I think we need to try to keep that even if it's just every single time we s talk about it, we say we don't mean this, we mean this. And the good thing is that that decision will be made on Thursday. we won't have to of of those three options that'll be done. But I think it's interesting. I got a lot of and I'm sure I was sick last week so I missed both of the the um
088public meetings. But even though there are some like placeholders in those designs, I thought there was really good public feedback about those placeholders because I had looked at the design and and somebody gave me really good. They were like, why is why would special ed be so far away from everything? And I was like, oh yeah, I didn't I didn't see that. and it's not the final design, but just to like if that's where their heads are to be able to say, whoa, like we need to start asking questions about these spaces. So, I thought that was useful, but I think that's a really good point that like and the mayor said this, I think in the last meeting that this is really going to be now come, you know, we're in that iterative process
089where teachers really get have to provide that feedback and it's going to be a constant conversation until until that final sort of interior layout gets um gets solidified. But I think that's that's also can be part of our better on you know communication strategy going forward. So, it's a good point. Yeah. No, I I appre I think there's been some good uh and there'll be opportunities for more people to weigh in about where specific classrooms are and the layout. That's not we're not done that yet. So, Mary, thank you for pointing that out. And we're going to continue to do engagement in the community over the next couple of uh months around that with different, you know, with younger parents, with some of the seniors in the community, with uh, you know, I think we
090have a meeting with the Salem Partnership, the business community. We're going to continue uh this is the mo this is beginning the moment where we really have to engage the public around the project. Um, because it's coming sooner than we know. There'll be shovels in the ground and we'll be talking about, you know, building uh whatever it's going to be soon. So, um I'll turn it back over to you, Mayor. That's my update. I think there's a finance and operations report transfer. Uh yes, thank you. I have um two uh memos in the materials uh asking for your approval of several transfers. The first set of transfers total $5,647.50. So while that is below the threshold um that requires school committee approval, the funds are being moved from non-personnel to personnel. So it is these
091are um ML multilingual stipens. They are budgeted to the ML cost center, but we are moving from instructional supplies in the DL program and the ML program to um the dual language stipens line to cover yearend uh stipens. So, even though it's below $15,000, we're bringing it for your approval because it is moving from non-personnel expense to personnel. The second memo uh is uh the transfers total $32,527.65. That does exceed the threshold um that requires school committee approval. And we are bringing these materials uh to you. These are needed to move money from uh stipens to supplies including contracted services and training um to help plan and fund our summer leadership institute which is a large year-end uh professional development opportunity for all principles, directors uh and leaders. So and all our instructions. That's right.
092Uh sorry about that coaches. Um, so these are both timely because these all of these transfers are being requested so that we can continue to plan for and fund uh year-end expenses. So these are for your consideration. No further report. Are there any subcommittee reports? All right. Motions and resolutions. We have our first item is um motion to accept the recommendation regarding school choice for the coming year. So moved. Second. Motion made by member Campbell, seconded by member Miranda. Under discussion, any further discussion? We're talking the one we just that the superintendent just the recommendation. So all right, all in favor accepting the recommendation. Any opposed? Seeing none, the matter carries. We have the budget transfer requests that have just been described to us. And uh is there a motion we can do both of
093these in one vote? Move to approve both budget transfer requests. I'll second. Motion made by member Campbell, seconded by member Miranda. Under discussion, seeing none, all in favor? Any opposed? The matter carries. We have third reading of policy 5103 controlled choice student assignment. We want to do these together. Okay. And third reading of policy 5501 responsible use policy and media. Motion to approve both policies for a third read. Seconded. Motion made by member Cornell. Seconded by member Campbell. Under discussion. No discussion. All in favor? Any opposed? Seeing none. Matters carry. Any announcements from school committee members? Any further motions? Move to adjurnn. Motion made by member Campbell, seconded by member Miranda. Under discussion, seeing none. All in favor? Any opposed? Mary, you want to stay a little longer? Thank you.