001Yeah. >> I don't think they're available. >> Oh, of course. Yeah. >> All right. call the February 2nd, 2026 school committee meeting to order here at 5:02 p.m. And uh we will jump to our action items. Approval of minutes from January 5th, 2026, I guess that day after vacation. Any questions or comments about those minutes? Not. I will entertain a motion. I'll make a motion that the school committee vote to approve the minutes from January 5th, 2026. >> I'll second. Okay. All in favor. I >> All right. Thank you. We have our SHs program of study second meeting here. >> Like to invite Mr. Langer and Mrs. run up because we do have a little commitment that we >> perfect. >> Hello. >> Hi. Thank you for having us. >> How you doing? >> Um
002so this is the second reading to the program of studies. Um we sent an addendum to you last week that we are adding a dramatic arts um program with the addition of three additional courses in dramatic arts. Foundations of Theater, Acting One, and Set Design and Production. These classes are two credits each, and they are open to 9th through 12th graders. That was not in the previous program studies. I'm hoping >> you'd like to add >> We'd like to add it. Okay. Questions? Anyone? Addition. Are they happier? >> They'll be happier for us. It >> be great. Great. >> Great. Super exciting acting and Yeah. fun. All right. Um, anybody else questions or if not, we will take a vote here on the SHS program of studies. I'll make a motion that the school committee
003vote to approve the student high school program of studies as presented. Thank you, Janice. >> Um, I'll second. Do we have to say as amended? As present. Okay. >> As present. That's okay. Perfect. >> I'll second that. Okay. All right. All in favor? >> I >> Great. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> All right. We have our interim pushing principal contract uh for Kate Schula. >> Thank you. >> Kate's been doing a fantastic job since December 24th, and this is our first meeting I've been able to put the contract in front of the committee. Uh, so the contract is from December 24th, 2025 to June 30th, 2027. And she's guaranteed back into the world languages department chair role on July 1st of 2027. So that's all in here and all guaranteed. Otherwise, it's a standard
004administrative contract. There's nothing terribly special about it. >> Sorry. >> But she's been doing a great job. I told her she didn't have to come for this portion of the She's been doing a great job. I've been out front in front of the school. She's dove in and has just made a world of difference. So, it's good. >> Great. >> We thank her for that. >> Um, having spoken to a few Cushing families, I don't know that it's um clear to all families that that she's intended to stay through um some setting of Cushing School. So, um this could be a good opportunity to kind of renounce that and make that clear. >> Absolutely. >> Just out there. I've gotten a couple questions about that and so I was just thinking it's a good opportunity
005to clarify. >> Excellent. >> Great. >> Perfect. We'll take a um take a motion on contract for >> I'll make a motion that you want to >> No, no, we're all got to be a more professional title for what you just motion. Um, I make a motion that the school committee vote to approve the interim Cushing principal contract 1224 2025 to 6:30 2027. I'll second. >> Okay. All in favor? >> I I 630 26 >> 27. >> So she'll stay through the sunsetting of Cushing >> in 2027. >> Hi. which we like that. >> Sorry, I just asked that. >> That's okay. >> Excellent. Okay, we are on a roll. Robotics team donation. >> Okay. Is this thing on? >> Okay. So, we have somebody in the community who has kindly offered to donate a
006trailer to us for use by the robotics team. Uh, for those of you unfamiliar with robotics and competitive robotics, there's a lot of stuff to cart around every time you go to a competition. So, this would be lovely. I am waiting to hear back from the insurance company in terms of making sure we get it added to our policy and then checking to see if we need any if the um coach who at this point in time has volunteered to tow the trailer with his own vehicle if there's anything that he should do, you know, giving that he'd be towing the school own trailer. So, I'm wait I'm waiting to get that back, but it's it should not matter a whole lot except that I don't want it used until we've got it, you know,
007formally on the insurance policy. But, uh, he gave all the information on it. Uh, it's an enclosed single axle. It's an ALCM mission, whatever that is, construction model. It's, um, about 18 years old. It was a 2008 model. We have the VIN. The approximate fair market value is $3,000. And at this point, my recommendation would be we go ahead and and accept it. >> Uh, no, I think it's great. Um, but the question that comes is where is it going to be stored? Who's going to maintain it? >> Property here. I'm not sure exactly where, but I maintain the robotics team. I love it. I I think it's great. >> You know, I think it's great. I think that we've learned over the years that whenever we receive anything of value, we don't always know
008who's responsible for it. And this it's just it's just kind of ironic at times like I know that parking is kind of at a premium. >> So, this take up a student a student parking spot. >> We won't take a lot of where we can put Yeah. Yes. So, store it where it would be stored definitely is um concern I guess you could say, but >> 100%. >> Yeah. I mean, this is great. I I I I want to accept it and I will, but it's just something to think about. >> Yes. We'd like to advocate that it not take up a student >> or a visitor park spot. >> But leave that in your hands. >> And we'll have to pay for that spot. >> Yes. Peter and I are a little salty. >>
009Sorry. All right, fantastic. Well, we also, yes, we thank Mr. Scanzilla and Scanzilla Corporation for that donation, too. It's really generous. Um, take a motion on that, Janice, or anyone else. I will make a motion that the school committee accept the donation from Andrew Skinsello for the robotics team. Great appreciation. >> Second. All right. All in favor? >> Fantastic. >> Okay. Um, the need district needs assessment contract. So, in your backups, that should be in here. It might actually be in February 2nd folders. But uh Maria and I, as we've discussed previously, attempted to get several different options kind of going to see about our district needs assessment and should be in there. So, oh, >> um, first beacon group is sort of who was um, available and kind of um, engaged with us on
010this proposal and you can kind of go through and see the breakdown of what we're looking to accomplish here. the terms of the agreement are included and there was a solid attempt both Maria individually and myself individually um met with Patty on uh Patty Synicoli's uh who we will be working with there and her team and we tried to really kind of break down what this will look like in terms of responsibility. Um, so you'll see page seven sort of breaks that down a little bit more. So we're looking for broad community input um and other input from stakeholder focus groups. Yes. So um in an effort to not have this cost um a ton, >> we would be conducting the focus groups that are mentioned in level two. So what we wanted to do
011is we wanted to do this broad survey that'll go out to all the families and community. We can kind of determine that that'll be three or four questions. Then we wanted to do some stakeholder focus groups. Um those would be we would develop with Patty kind of a script norms questions so that those are consistent across all of them. Um but she herself would not be conducting those. We would be. Um, and that's partly just to keep her time down. Um, and so that would just be us organizing ourselves into pairs. Um, and doing them. Um, so it would be pretty straightforward to run in. We can record them or have some we can talk about how we want to, you know, collect our notes from them. Um, she will help us go through the
012notes and kind of think about what are the highle findings. Um, but that is of note, >> right? >> She's not doing that work. weird, >> right? So, we've kind of broken it down to three levels. >> Yep. And then we added this little level 2.5, which was community groups that we felt would be, you know, important to reach out to to make sure that they their leadership and their membership were aware of, you know, the surveys and other opportunities for committee input, um, but not necessarily needed like their own folks. Do you know what I mean? So, those two levels, like level two and 2.5 is really us conducting that work. Patty can help us with the summarizing of the notes. Any questions? So, we'll need to vote on this today in order for
013you guys to authorize me to sign the contract with Patty to do the work. So it's not a flat rate for >> Yeah, it's 300 an hour and we've kind of she has ballpark estimated what she thinks each portion of the work will take for her in terms of time. She was very um transparent and aware of you know not going not sort of like that we had some parameters and that's why we broke down the work and kind of separated out so that we would take on some of it and that she would take on the rest because we don't want to keep we want to keep it in you know at a reasonable obviously cost. So you see that kind of broken down within this contract. >> Can you just help me understand
014a little bit level one what what that looks like? So it's a it's like a Google a Google survey like how the district does sometimes surveys >> and we're going to send that out to what distribution >> probably families >> through parents square so it' be three to four questions so manageable on our end to not have like so much data but you know an opportunity for the community to give some input but she would help us develop those questions. She said she's done that before so she has you know kind of a bank. No, I'm just I'm just hope I'm just trying to anticipate >> the number of surveys that will come back. >> Yeah. >> And if we're reaching the right people. Obviously, we want families, but in reality, this >> right >>
015is a larger hire for the community. >> True. We can I mean, we can have that go to the community. >> I don't I don't I don't necessarily I don't know. I just want to be sure I want to make sure I understand how it's going to be processed. I think that could be something we work with her once we figure out like she'll help us think about what we want to get out of that and therefore where the audience would be. If you could have a question at the beginning that asks their role and depending on what they say could even direct them and how they could branch two different directions. So if it was a community member that was answering if they didn't have kids in the school, >> you know, it might
016ask slightly a different question than if you actually have active kids in SPS. Yeah. So we can certainly do that. Oh yeah, and you'll see level 2.52 kind of hits various community groups which may or may not have kids at the school. >> Yeah, >> we can add to that list. That was just a starting brainstorm. >> And then what's um assuming we approve this night? What's the what's the anticipated time frame? Do you think? >> I honestly think it's probably about a month's worth of work at most between hers and ours getting done quickly. Yeah, >> it's kind of buried in here. the deliverables, they're not kind of bolded, but if you look at um in the level three paragraph, it says Patty will draft a candidate profile. Um and then below that, review
017the job description to make sure that reflects requirements based on feedback from all stakeholders. She will also review the contract to ensure that it reflects findings based on feedback. So those are kind of the three deliverables that would come from the work in addition to kind of the actual conducting of interviews, the parsing of data. >> Does she has this um person done one of these before? >> Yes. >> Did you guys see one? >> No, she does. Um well, I think we're sort of we're also sort of tailoring this to our needs. So, I don't know if she could give us >> exactly what this is for us. >> Uh, because we're sort of cherrypicking out different >> elements. She's worked with public and private um companies and school districts um through this this
018type of work. So, any other questions? We're also hoping it gives us and just like the it's a it's a great way to just collect input and data and sort of use that even as a potential springboard into strategic planning since we'll be heading in that direction in the next couple of years too. So we're looking to really refresh and freshen up. I know our students aren't here tonight, but we were also wanted to include them in this level two in asking them to help us organize a student group of high schoolers. We thought that could be a really nice activity for them to kind of think through that process who how they might go about finding students to join us that we'll spring that on them when they come. Hopefully, they'll be excited. So
019it's approximately 20 or so hours of work. We think if you take the high end of all our estimates. >> Yeah. All right. If no other questions, we'll take a motion on district needs assessment contract. I will make a motion that the school committee vote to approve the district needs assessment contract as presented. >> I'll second. Okay. All in favor? >> I >> wonderful. The Suit wrestling team donation. >> Yes. So, we have received um several donations which I'll read in a minute totaling $1,400 for specifically for the wrestling team. Uh these were all done in memory of Kevin Curtis and there's a tournament that is run every year, the Kevin Curt Curtis uh wrestling um tournament and we uh received donations from Karen F. cardigan uh from Jim Anne Curtis from Grettha R and
020Van A. Lovejoy from John L. and Susan G. Gil joint trust uh from Peter G and Lauren A. McCarthy from Robin Shears and from Marilyn Jordian. And again, the total of all of those donations is $1,400. >> Great. Thank you. It's very generous. Upon upon your approval, the checks have not yet been cashed. The checks will be cashed and, you know, put into the appropriate donation account and then um allocated to the rest of the team. make a motion on this donation. >> I will make a motion that the school committee vote to accept the situate wrestling team donation in the amount of $1,400 with great appreciation. >> I'll second. All right. All in favor? >> I will turn it over to Dr. for the superintendent. >> Okay. So, just quickly before that, I do
021have one more donation. I think we were planning because I I dated the memo January 28th. We obviously would not have been for last week. Don't know if you can take that or if you wanted to put it on for the next one. Okay. So, we'll not for the wrestling team. It's a different donation. >> Okay. Perfect. >> Yeah. since we're meeting next Monday. >> Really pleased to announce today we launched our Facebook and Instagram accounts. So if you go to Situ Public Schools, all one word plural, you can search on it on Facebook. And as of just before this meeting, we were up to 174 Facebook followers and 607 Instagram followers. >> Wow. >> So Mr. Lynch showed me how to figure out how many Instagram followers we had. So I was real excited
022to see that. We've done two posts. um one on the high school stress less and laugh more campaign and some Peggy Heroes over at Athletics. So real exciting stuff and the point of these is not so much for district news and announcements. That's what we have parents with and we use those to for any news and announcements we have to give parents. This is really for the wider community to celebrate what we're doing, to understand what we're doing so that when we start discussing things like the budget and we start talking about the new school and what's going on in the community, it's an opportunity for those people to celebrate as well. So, not just parents, but grandparents, anybody who's not necessarily directly connected to parent square. Um, so we're really excited about it. Um,
023we did have over 100 families opt out and so we're certainly respecting of that. Um, and you know, we've heard a lot of concerns about security on this. You know, I think you'll see from the first two posts, we're not naming students. And if we do name a student, it's going to be first name only. We're being very careful about that to make sure that we're we're really following some security protocols. But we're excited about it and um hoping to get at least two posts a day. And the way it works is the teachers or principles themselves um teachers will submit to the principal and then the principal submits to the consultant that's helping us out. So everything that goes up there has to go through one of the six principles to provide another level
024of security as well. So we're really excited about it today. Um I don't know how many hearts we had on Instagram. They were climbing as of five o'clock. So very exciting stuff and I think it it's just another opportunity to communicate with the public. And this will be also a way to share upcoming events too. Like I'm thinking about kindergarten registration, redistricting, things like that. If you don't have a student, those will affect you, but you don't have a student. So you won't be on. Great. Thank you. >> Any other questions? >> Can you tell us just like quickly maybe a little bit about the consultant who's sort of helping the >> Sure. process? >> Sure. They're a consultant that's actually out in the western part of the country, but they work with hundreds of
025school systems. So, she's a marketing into digital marketing into Facebook and really started to partner with school systems because they found that we're not experts at putting things out on Facebook and so she's really worked. We have one consultant who's been assigned to us and we send everything to them and we send the the words but then they make it a little bit more Facebook friendly or Instagram friendly. They make sure that the pictures are highest quality. and make sure that it makes sense and they have the lingo of how to kind of present. So we we heard a pretty lengthy presentation from them. We sent a presentation out to the teachers as well so they could see what the company was all about. Um and they work with hundreds of districts. We actually learned
026about them through Marshfield. So the local connection here is Marshfield. We were at a conference and we learned about them there and uh you know hooked up with them over the last month or two. So it's been great great partnership. um slow launch but I think um we're being very careful uh to to make sure it's launched well and >> the name of the company is called social school for edu and anybody can look that up online. >> All right, great. >> And um Tom, you said you mentioned the cadence is two a day. Is that what they recommended? >> Yes. >> Sounds like a lot, but that's what they recommend. >> That's their goal. So, we'll see. >> Today is day one. >> This should make our job a little easier when we go
027to do the Monday update. That's true. Giving us a source to look at. >> Yeah. >> I think we had talked about um tracking usage and pieces like that. And so one thing that they taught us was since this is their job, they talked about the ideal time to send things out, the ways in which um the kinds of posts that drive engagement and so and how the algorithm works and things like that and also monitoring for appropriateness in any responses. So, um I think where we look forward to like learning a little bit about when's the best time to send things, when do we get the best responses to and so I think that was a limitation of our last web based communication system. But I think um social score school free to you
028complements parent square and that you can really track make sure people are seeing what you put out there. And we also think that this goes beyond parent square too sometimes just like you mentioned Maria that um it's a little bit more community based than just our families, staff and students. So >> yeah, good start. So would a lot of the parents wear in Facebook posts be identical? >> Not necessarily. I'm not looking to necessarily double parent square. Like they actually warn against putting like not to bring up the topic, but like snow days on Facebook because it can it can it can get stale, right? You look at something three days later on Facebook unless you're really looking at it. >> It brings it back up again. The algorithm now, right? Yeah. >> You get
029another. >> So you never know, right? So, so they're very careful about that and they actually said if they feel like it's a post they don't think is really Facebook friendly they'll let us know. >> Okay. >> And kind of ask you know is this just something you really want to put out there. >> Yeah. >> So I you know many of them will be duplicated but not all. Not all because also the principles often will talk to their school community actually through happenings or walk away or here at the high school you know that's a very targeted communication to those families not necessarily something that would be appropriate. >> Yeah. I see them complimenting one another but not necessarily. >> Who keeps track of the kids to whose parents have opted out? >> We
030do. We do. >> Yeah. So we have a running list still open share with all the principles they run their photos by the list and like Dr. Rep said we we have over we have yeah about 100. So um the consultant doesn't do that. So the consultant assumes that if they get the post, it's safe. >> Got it. >> Will we have to do that opt out every year? New group of students. >> We'll include it in the signoffs in September. So where this was a midyear roll out, we did a special one starting in September. We'll include it in the signoffs that people do with the uh handbooks at the beginning of the year. So parents can refresh that down at that time. and he'll use spell check. >> But yes, it'll be an
031annual renewal to answer your question. >> Yeah. >> Right. >> Sorry. Thank you so much for the update. Sorry, I'm late. >> No, great. Uh, Mr. Jyn, update on teaching and learning. >> Thank you. I just want to provide a quick update to the work of the district's bullying prevention and intervention task force. Uh, last Wednesday, the task force met um to review, speaking of surveys, survey data from, uh, families and staff. And so, um, by our measure, we had a pretty good response. We want to thank the 524 responses we receive we received from families which is um which is a pretty good cross-section and 216 responses from staff and that is teachers but also pair professionals and every other role that we encourage to participate. So at our meeting um we began to
032follow a protocol to analyze that data to um update and align the needs of our community with the new bullying correction intervention policy that we're working on. Um our next meeting is of the task force March 4th at which time um Miss Rundle and Mr. will share with us um aspects of uh character strong which is our required anti-bullying and seal uh curriculum. Not required to use character strong but um every district is required to have an anti-bullying curriculum. So, we're excited to learn about that as well as continuing to analyze the data. And once the bullying uh prevention and intervention task force has completed a new draft of the policy, we'll share that plan publicly here at a school committee meeting along with trends from our data analysis and allow a public comment period
033that's required as part of the update to the um bullying prevention and intervention policy. So we look forward to uh sharing that data analysis and the updated plan um in April. So just wanted to let the committee know that and the public that our work is continuing and um we'll be coming back with the results of that data and we appreciate um we know families receive a lot of responses so we appreciate u people putting the time in to provide us really important information. Thank you so much for the update. >> Sure. >> Anyone have any questions or inquiries? >> So, you probably don't anything you wanted to add? >> No, it's just been it's been a great experience. I've enjoyed getting to know the staff and I am also grateful for so many responses
034to the surveys. like we we literally spent most of the meeting calling through data which you all know makes me very happy and excited for more than >> so it was just it was really fruitful and I think it's I think the good news without giving too much away is like I feel like speaking for myself not the committee I feel like the policy we have is quite strong I think what we will be working a lot on is our fidelity to that policy and I think that's where the data is going to be really helpful to inform formed some ideas. We were even our group, Tom was in our group. We were brainstorming like potential ideas which we won't do right now, but um yeah. So, so it's been fun. I appreciate being part
035of it. >> Excellent. Thank you. >> Uh our subcommittee report. Okay. So yeah, our policy sub um I wasn't sure because we got a little thrown off with our snow day um last Monday. >> Yeah. >> Um feels like a month ago. >> Um I wasn't sure if everyone had a chance to look at those C policies uh the beginning of the C policies or if we wanted to uh push those to next week because we're also meeting next week. Um so just is it better to push them? >> Yeah. Okay. >> Um, so just to give you a quick uh they're linked in the bottom of the little memo and I made a chart which I think is going to be our new format. I'm really excited about it. Um, that shows our policy
036next to the mask model policy. Um, to me that's just a really easy format to look at. Um, because it just makes it very clear in the cases in which ours and the mask policy are different. >> Um, so we can look at that going forward. toggling between the toggling is too much and sometimes it's like just a few words that are different and then you're like >> and then you're like why >> what's different? Am I on our page or theirs? >> Yeah. Yes. I I forget what page I'm on. Yeah. So um and we can use that and um if you want you can make a copy of that and use it the third column to make your own notes but we can't elaborate in the notes ahead of time meaning law. So,
037and you know, just keep them separate. >> Keep them separate for now, but then when we're all together, we can take notes over there and then the policy table. It's great to work on. >> Yes, we're really excited about that new format. So, that was the first thing. Um, and then the second thing was the uh kindergarten entrance page. We wanted to talk about return. >> It's back. Um, and it's back in part because we've heard from some families and that's, you know, it's it's fair. I think something that really is like one of those rubber meets the road policies. You know, it really matters. Um, especially because for some families, the decision to send or not send her child to one more year of preschool is very costly. There's a lot of family implications
038with scheduling and all that stuff. So, there's a lot of real reasons why this policy is important for families and so um it warrants another look. >> It's definitely tough. >> Sorry, I'm just trying to find it. >> Do you have pajamas? >> What? >> Uh J. >> Yeah. >> You want to talk about it while I look for it? >> The policy that has we changed it. >> Just you wanted to give the little overview. >> Index open up the agenda. >> You have too many policies. I have too many tabs open. toggling. >> Okay, I found it. I found it. >> Yeah, index. >> Okay, >> I found it. Okay. So, um in the memo at the top is a little table of some age data which we had asked Ryan to um
039sleuth around and find for us because we were curious to understand um if we were to create a waiver exception um what would be the real implications of possible numbers of kids, right? because this will impact the screening process that we help that we hold every spring for new kindergarteners. Um so we'd have potentially like the kindergarteners we anticipate then we'd have this additional group potentially joining and we'd have this additional group potentially coming to kindergarten. So we need to understand what the implications are of kind of widening that number. Um so we pulled the data you can see uh for just a sampling of five years um kids born September 1 through 8 our current cuto off 9 through 15 and 16 through 30 so it's actually not an insignificant number of kids okay
040yeah so do you see there people so people can see that or no is it >> it's in our packet and it is in a but I >> I don't want to obligate >> that's all So, one thing to think about, too, is not every child, not every family whose child falls into that bucket will want to advocate to send their child to kindergarten a year, quote unquote, currently. So, it's not like we're saying we're automatically adding, you know, all these kids. Um, there will only be some of those kids whose families will want to pursue this waiver. Um, so that's one one thing to think about. >> That's a good point, right? Um we talked about how this does create a little bit of wiggle room on this end of the cutoff in the
041same way there is a little bit of wiggle room on the other end of the cutoff you know for millies who want to hold their child. Um we did think obviously anytime you extend any sort of deadline you open the question of what about the kid who's the day after >> right the day after but given the data we felt it was really important to include right in the policy that there will be no exceptions past September it's a gracious exception >> so we're giving that little bubble and then we're really going to have to say no after that >> well once you get into another month I think that seems valid >> yeah and so like you know because then we even up the October 9th. >> Well, we then we open up the
042you know that that September 16 to30 bucket and it just it continues to add again these are just averages but like you know just getting class we that's it could be almost we got to kind of think about that. So all that to say we are proposing this new language if you scroll down it's language in blue to add to the bottom of our existing policy JB There's JB. We would keep our existing policy which is in black and we would add the segment in blue which would state children who turned five between September 9th and 15th of an upcoming school year may be eligible for kindergarten through a special waiver process. The parents or guardians of the child must request in writing to the principal of their assigned elementary school to make the initial
043request by April 30th. The child will then be screened by district staff for readiness before being admitted. There will be no exceptions to this policy for children born on or after September 16. So that's what we're not voting on this discussed. >> Just discussing anyone have any thoughts questions? So just going back in time, originally before this policy was updated, it was September 1st, correct? >> So we voted last was it last year? >> Yep. Yeah. >> To change it to September 8th. Um >> I guess first of all, just looking at the numbers, like I'm surprised, but I guess just based on our enrollment, that's probably any twoe time period, it's probably similar numbers. >> Um I guess my question is that it I'm okay with it. I mean, I recognize it all and
044as you say, it's always going to be that one student or two students there the day after. >> Sure. >> Um, I guess my concern is a little bit just it says um the child will then be screened by district staff for readiness, but it doesn't say what that criteria is and it just says the child will be screened. It doesn't say whether or not they have to pass the screening or not pass screening because it'll be screened, >> right? Oh, okay. >> I mean, that's how I read it. >> I know that's not what it is. >> Yeah. >> But it's like, oh, just get screen for readiness and then they can go >> no matter where. >> No matter what. >> Yeah. >> So, >> yeah, you can amend that. Maybe the child
045will then >> and again so and then with that being said whatever the criteria are I don't know what they are whatever the criteria are slightly concerned that at some particular year the numbers are going to be such that we're just not going to take anyone because we don't have enough space >> right >> I know you indicated that the principles could do it but there may be a situation where >> but that's all I mean again it's probably >> not going to be more than one family that's going to request it >> so we could say the child will then be screened What what are you guys talking about? >> Could we borrow up on the language? >> I was just thinking what's the language for the TR the the what's been the language
046for kindergarten because I know kindergarters are always screened. So I was just curious what the paragraph says referring to that. >> Just age, right? >> Well, I'm not sure the I'm not sure the language around screening for kindergarten is any more clear than >> Yeah, the language I mean the only language we have question kindergarten is above, right? >> Yeah. Right. So that's why I'm saying I'm not I just want I think we want to be careful with our language because we want it to be consistent across the district. We don't want to be adopting a new language that then needs to be added someplace else. That's all I'm saying. >> And then like is this a teacher principal decision, not a school committee decision is all I'm asking. >> I see. Right. >> That's
047what I'm saying. That's what I'm asking. >> Yep. Agreed. >> Yep. Yes. >> Right. Maybe we don't do anything. >> Yeah. >> Well, I think you just have to indicate that just because your kids get a screen, they're not getting it, >> right? >> It just needs to say the principal will >> in I would use the language that the district already uses is what I'm saying rather than us creating new language. >> Yeah. >> Agreed. >> Okay. Okay. So, I'm gonna I'm gonna make a note. >> Yes. >> Um, wherever that is figure that out existing was in the old policy, too. >> Our policy is right. That's it. So, I don't just says questions about readiness like I don't we don't have any like in policy. I don't think we talk about that.
048Um, well, then maybe it's already in there. Um, it does make me wonder though about space. Um, because if we had a case where one child would push a class into size of needing a new another teacher, that would be a reason to say to deny a waiver. >> Um, so we might want to have something that >> it could just be screened by the district and >> complicated. >> Yeah. Yeah, >> it's probably rarely going to happen. >> I agree. I agree. Orwell has this policy. Maybe we can go back and look at that. We looked at that initially, but maybe we can go look at it again. >> Okay. >> We'll go back to the drawing board as a policy. >> No, just some clarifi. I just want to make sure this is
049in the other place that references kindergarten. That's all I want to make sure >> to car's point. It's kind of in there. parents like parents and guardians with questions about their child's readiness. If the policy is that it goes until the 16th and no matter if your birthday is September 15th or if it's January second still be you'd still have to abide by whatever policy they've set for a screening. >> Right. That's all I'm saying. >> I agree. Yeah. >> The clarifications maybe referencing Norwell up to Tom and the class size thing is interesting because I mean that's >> that's a concern. >> Yeah. It might over time sort of flatten out though like if every if it's sort of the norm or would it just become >> eventually? Yes. It's always the first couple
050of years, >> right? >> We can look at some wording that will address the enrollment question as well as >> proposing the policy. >> I think what we want to do is still position it as it's a waiver. You're requesting this. It's not a given that you will >> that's that's what that's what my kind of perspective is, >> right? Because we have to have some sort of >> could be like Yeah, it has to be readiness and space. >> It could be an enrollment issue. Yeah, we have to just kind of have protect, you know, >> because if if we did have a year where say there were an unusually high number of this >> sure we could we could put something that says this is a waiver granted you know enroll enrollment projections
051and you know the screening whatever the screening policy is like we can be very vague about that but that it is a waiver I want to add screening language Okay. So, we'll go back to the drawing board as a policy subcommittee. We'll bring this back. Time is a little bit of the essence, right? >> Uh for families that are looking at next year, I mean, we have April 30th as the date by which a family would need to request said waiver. But, um when are you do you have a date that you're meeting next schedule? >> Next Thursday. So you Yeah. Okay. But I'm just saying like we're going to do this. We're we're I'm worse at that from the public. Like we understand this is something people are really interested in us moving quickly
052on. So I we will try to >> I'm just trying to think also it's um as the new school gets online, did these families know which principal to be contacting? Number one. And then >> um kids going from ECC to kindergarten. Does some go to PLC for kindergarten or is kindergarten >> good? I mean that's through special education too. So it's all part >> So those kids would get and would those kids would be going anyways. Yeah, >> yeah, they already so they've been covered. >> Yeah. >> All right, sounds great. Okay, we'll put this on the next appropriate agenda after you all have time to do a little bit more together. >> Yeah, here. These were great questions. This is why we do this. Thanks for getting that data because I think that it
053>> Yeah, that does help. >> It was helpful to see, right? I think you're right. It's probably any two week period has that number of births, but we just >> before so >> surprising. >> All right. U warrants. >> Warrants. I do have three warrants to read. Uh the first one is dated August 21st. The warrant number is situate in the amount of 95 $594,076.88 and half of that is the Hather building project. >> Yeah. And then the second warrant is from January 22nd, warrant number S for situate 260122 in the amount of $316,52049. And this one um little bit less than half is the Jenkins window project. And then the last warrant is uh February 5th. S is in situate 260205 in the amount of $76,4640. And there's no one item that really jumps
054out, but there's not one from last week. Thank you very much. >> We are going to Yes, we're going to adjourn here tonight for our rescheduled February 2nd meeting before we start fresh with our FY27 budget hearing at 6 PM. So, we'll take a 10m minute adjournment and then start start with our budget.