Somerset Berkley Regional School Committee 5.13.25

001to order this uh meeting of the Somerset Berkeley Regional School Committee at 6 PM due notice having been posted. Pursuant to the open meeting law, any person may make an audio or video recording of this public meeting or may transmit the meeting through any medium. Attendees are therefore advised that such recordings or transmissions may be made, whether perceived or unpersceived by those present, and are deemed acknowledged and permissible. We'll do a roll call of members present. Miss Pereira, present. Miss Ashley, present. Miss Corville, present. Miss O'Brien, present. Mr. Pastnack, present. Miss Solomon, present. Mr. Vieiraa, present. Um, also with us this evening are our superintendent of schools, Mr. Jeffrey Skoonover. Our chief financial officer, Miss Raquel Perin, our director of curriculum, Miss Elizabeth Haskell, our director of special education, Miss Megan Ashton, and our recording

002secretary, Robin Vicaro. or to ask if you're able to please rise for the pledge. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you everyone. Please note that the next reg regularly scheduled uh meeting of this committee will be held on Tuesday, June 10th at 6 PM here in the Somerset Berkeley Regional High School Library. The first item on the agenda uh this evening is the reorganization of the committee. We need to appoint a chair and a vice chair. What are the wishes of the committee? I'd like to make a motion to nominate Mrs. Andrews to remain as chair. [Laughter] You sure? Uh any discussion? She's moving it. Uh thank you. I

003think uh we have a motion and a second on discussion. I just think you do a great job. So I think you should continue unless someone else anyone. All right. Uh thank you very much. It was my pleasure to serve as your chair. Um and then next um we need to appoint a vice chair. What are the wishes of the committee? I'd like to nominate Kim. Second. Okay. So we have a motion to nominate Kim Breera for vice chair. We have a second. Is there anything on discussion? All right. We made a motion and second. Yeah, we have to vote. We have to vote for vote. Oh, did I forget to vote? Oh, see, look. Maybe you should have someone else in the chair. You should maybe. All right, let me back up. We had

004a motion in a second on chair. All those in favor? I got it. I'll abstain. Uh, thank you. Motion carries. Um, for the appointment of the vice chair, uh, we have a motion and a second to appoint uh, Kim Ferrer. Anything else on discussion? All those in favor. I so voted. Motion carries. Thank Thank you. Thank you. Congratulations. Just my copy. You need your plaque for the plaque. I just need Let me make it official. There you go. Thank you. All right. All right. Maybe I can do this right. That's right. Thank you. Um Okay. Um, we have lots of wonderful recognitions this evening. So, we're going to get started into the fun part of tonight's agenda. The next item um on the agenda is uh recognition of Nick Cavic uh for his swimming achievements.

005Where's Nick? Come [Music] on. Um you're going to have to come forward so we can properly acknowledge and maybe a little bit embarrass you. All right. So, let me Oh, and I need my glasses. Um, how are you? Good. How are you? I'm good. All right. We're going to read this for you. Okay. Um, at a meeting of the Somerset Berkeley Regional School Committee on May 13, 2025, a citation was prepared, signed by the members of the committee, and will be voted inscribed in the permanent records. In recognition of your numerous swimming accomplishments, including state championships in the 50 and 200yard freestyle, setting numerous new state records, chosen by both the Boston Herald and the Boston Globe for all Scholastic Awards, recognized by USA Swimming for the Scholastic All-American Award. named the Boston Globes winter

0062024 2025 boys swimming athlete of the year. Your perseverance, your discipline, and athletic excellence have brought pride to Somerset Berkeley Regional High School and motivated and uplifted those around you. We commend your achievements and celebrate your commitment to excellence both in and out of the pool. You will be attending the University of Tampa. Good for you. Take us with you, majoring in biology with a concentration in marine and environmental sciences. And we extend our warmest wishes as you embark on the next chapter of your journey. May it be marked by achievement, fulfillment, and much happiness. We hereby resolve that the members of the Somerset Berkeley Regional School Committee commend Nicholas Cavic in the official minutes recording the expression of appreciation and gratitude to a distinguished student at Somerset Berkeley Regional High School. [Applause] [Music] next

007on Oh, can I sing? Please do. Um, so one thing that I just wanted to bring up is that for all of our other state championship winners, um, the school committee and the district has presented them with rings and Nick tomorrow, Mr. will be calling you down to size you for your state championship. So [Applause] [Music] that's fabulous. Thank you. Next on the agenda, we are here to recognize Brian Vieiraa and Allison Kettle, who's not here, so we'll read her recognition into the minutes. But Mr. Vieira, come on down. Okay. Do you want to read? No, I think you're doing a great job. Okay, Ryan. Um, at a meeting of the Somerset Berkeley Regional School Committee on May 13th, a citation was prepared and signed by members of the committee and will be voted inscribed

008in the permanent records. The Somerset Berkeley Regional School Committee proudly recognizes Ryan Vieiraa for his exemplary service as the student representative to the school committee during the 2023 24 and 2425 school years. Throughout his terms, Ryan has demonstrated leadership, responsibility, and a deep commitment to representing the voice of the student body. His thoughtful insights and articulate contributions have enriched this committee's work and strengthened the bridge between students and school leadership. We commend Ryan for his dedication, integrity, and advocacy. and we wish him continued success in all his future endeavors as he attends the University of Oklahoma. Go Oakis for aviation to become a professional pilot. Wow, that's awesome. Thank you. That's awesome. Be it hereby resolved that the members of the Somerset Berkeley Regional School Committee commend Ryan Vieiraa in the official minutes recording this

009expression of appreciation and gratitude to a student member of the Somerset Berkeley Regional School Committee and extend best wishes for happiness and success in all his future endeavors and future educational and career endeavors. Thank you very much. [Music] We're uh fortunate this year to have um two student reps. Um and um Allison couldn't be with us this evening, but I'd still like to read her citation into the record. Um, at a meeting of the Somerset Berkeley Regional School Committee on May 13, 2025, a citation was prepared, signed by members of the committee, and voted inscribed in the permanent records. It is with great pride that we recognize Allison Kettle, who served as the student representative on the school committee. As a dedicated and passionate advocate for her peers, she has provided invaluable insight and leadership,

010ensuring that the voices of students are heard in critical decisionmaking processes. Throughout her tenure, Allison has exemplified the qualities of responsibility, integrity, and perseverance, inspiring others with her unwavering commitment to education, and student welfare. Her contributions have made a lasting impact on our school community, and we commend her for her exceptional service, dedication, and leadership. Be it hereby resolved that the members of the Somerset Berkeley Regional School Committee commend Allison Kettle in the official minutes recording this expression of appreciation and gratitude to a student member of the Somerset Berkeley Regional School Committee and extending best wishes for happiness and success in all her future educational and career endeavors. [Applause] So, at this time, I just want to um say that not all school committee meetings are um sunshine and roses, but the best part of

011our job, I think, is to um work with and recognize the achievements of our amazing student body. And so, there are three here or two here, three this evening. Um, it's been tremendous to work with you and um, Nick, you're a legend. Um, at this time I would entertain a motion to adopt the citations as prepared for Nicholas Cavic, Ryan Vieiraa, and Allison Kettle. Second. A motion by Miss O'Brien and seconded by Miss Breer. Is there anything further on discussion? Hearing none. All those in favor? I opposed. So, voted. Um, okay. We're not done recognizing folks yet. Um, the next item on the agenda, I'm going to do my best with names. I want to recognize our April visionaries of the month. Um this month we would like to recognize Cecilia Costa, Nicholas Deo, Lexi

012Phipe, Cadence Gu, Jonathan Gene Marie, Kyle Pacho, Jacob Pavo, Kaden Pavo, and Aiden Zabod. So congratulations to those students. [Applause] Um the next item on the agenda is our student representative report. Our last one. All right. Good evening everyone. Um so just to talk a little bit about um academics and what's going on uh in the school. So uh as we know seniors are wrapping up their last few weeks of school uh with the last day is on the 30th of this month and graduation being uh June 6th. So the past two weeks has been uh this kind of like AP season for a lot of students. So this is the second week of AP exams. So in total uh there is 18 different courses of I guess exam courses being administered here uh at

013the school where a lot of these courses students take with uh teachers at Somerset Berkeley and some students take through virtual high school and then take the exam um in person. Uh moving on to different school events and clubs. So last Friday was the junior senior prom. Um despite the the rain and the uh the poor weather, everybody uh had a great time. It was a great venue. Um it seemed like everybody was happy with the the prom itself. Uh moving on to uh talk about clubs. So Model United Nations, which just uh a couple weeks back came from Washington DC at their national uh trip and they placed uh 10th place. So that was uh a great achievement for them. That's the first time uh somebody or a group went to um nationals because

014prior when a student made it they had to do it uh virtually during co so it was uh not only a great experience for them but placing in the top 10 was definitely a a great achievement. Uh and then to talk a little bit about HOSA future uh health professionals which I know we'll hear from uh in a little bit. So this is a group that's focusing on different medical topics ranging from um uh pharmacy science, physical therapy all the way to different project based um events where students are to create different uh medical innovations for example um and present it and it's a great way for students who are looking to get into that field to get involved at uh the high school level and compete with others. So those students that placed are

015um looking to move on to the international competition in Nashville, Tennessee. So currently trying to raise funds. Uh so we're doing some independently uh trying to raise funds to support um the group moving to uh internationals. Uh moving on to performing arts. Uh last week was senior pops night. So that was uh successful, great turnout of uh individuals who attended. And then uh mostly the Adams family um which was I I enjoyed it. It was a great great uh great time. I went with some friends and everybody had a great time and enjoyed it. So that won nine uh Ocean State Star Awards from the Providence Performing Arts Center which is uh obviously great great achievement. So that kind of wraps it up. So I I would just like to say thank you for letting

016me for the past two years come to the school committee meetings bring uh student perspective to um to the school committee. So thank you. Uh so with me is Adrien Boures and Isabella Gardini. So these are going to be uh the next student representatives. I don't know if you guys want to of course introduce yourselves. Hey y'all. I'm Adrian. Um I'm a junior here at the high school. Um I know some of you already. Some of you, you know, I I've already had the pleasure of talking to some I know your sons and daughters and then others uh have taught me how to type. So that's uh I hope here uh to do a slice of what Ryan has done and you know sort of take the place of him along with my lovely buddy

017over here. Hi. Uh my name is Isabella. I'm currently a sophomore here. Um I'm really excited to be able to, you know, help out and just kind of give a student perspective on everything. I'm really looking forward to getting to know all of you a little bit more because I don't really know you guys. So, um, a lot of new faces, but yeah, I'm really excited for everything coming in the future. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah. Thank Thank you so much. Welcome to both of you. It is um these meetings are always such a delight, you know, and so for you to volunteer your time to come after your full day at school and um all of your academic commitments and then to be here and sometimes we try to make them not go late,

018but sometimes they do. And so we really we want to thank you and recognize that that's really an extra commitment and shows a lot of leadership and character. and your student body is fortunate to have you lead them and we're fortunate to have you here to help us better understand the student perspective. So, thank you for doing that. Okay, great. Um if it's and if it's okay with the committee, I'm thinking what we'll do is move on to the next um item on the agenda under events and then maybe take a brief pause in the event that there need to be maybe some pictures taken because we have lots of citations and I don't want to make folks sit through the financial report unless they really want to. So, is that okay with the committee

019if we do that? Okay. So, we'll make sure that we give Mr. Austin an opportunity to snap pictures. Um, okay. So, um, as Mr. Vieiera mentioned. The next item on the agenda for the committee is to consider the approval of the um HOSA, which is the Health Occupation Students of America Future Health Professional Trip to Nashville, Tennessee um June 18th through 21st, 2025 for the International Leadership Conference. And I know that you all have um information. There's a presentation in your folder. updated recently. So, I'm not sure if you have access to it, but I happen to Okay, great. Great. This one appears to be from 2024. Oh, that's for those of you who haven't met me yet, my name is Lindsay Littlefield. I go by Miss Littlefield here at the school. Um, I am

020the PLTW teacher and host adviser. Prior to this, I was a dental assistant and did every weird job in the medical world. So, I'm super passionate about medicine and especially in our high schools, making sure that students feel supported in entering that field. Thank you. Thank you. So, HOSA is a club here. I don't know anybody heard of it before. Yes. Okay. So, those of you who haven't, um, no worries. Hosa is pretty relatively new. We've only had it here at the high school for about 3 years, but it is about promoting kids in their health and careers for medicine. And the idea of HOSA is to really treat them like a actual professional in that career, not only competitively, but also conference-wise. So, when you're in a medical career, you have to attend a

021conference and keep up with your C, CTE, excuse me. And that's what these kids are actually learning to do right now. So, I'm actually going to turn it over to them so they can introduce themselves and what they've been. And together we place third in the medical innovation category of OSA, our research project on 3D printed um bio bioengineered hearts. Um and I also place first in the pharmacy science category. Um that category usually consists of a test which is a 50 question multiple choice test and then also performing a skill related to pharmacy science. The skill I performed was withdrawing liquid from a vial and also making sure that I got all my PPE on, making sure I protected while doing that. [Applause] My name is Louisie. I placed in clinical laboratory science in

022this third. For my category, I had to do 50 50 question multiple choice tests and I also had to demonstrate a skill. Um, my skill was staining and preparing a blood smear on a slide or microphone. [Applause] Hi, I'm Hi, I'm Maya Jackson. And I'm Gabriella Marqu. We all together second in the emotional baby challenge. And we basically make a project and let the teachers go to the class and we have them take a pre and post test to much pertain to information where we summarize our findings. Our topic for our project was the effects of underage drinking on mental welling. Hi, my name is David Perry. Hi, my name is Matthew Barbosa. And together we both participated in the physical therapy individual event where I placed first and I placed third. And so for

023this event, we had to take a 50 50 question multiple choice which was timed where we had 1 hour and we had to upload a skill that we had to perform and our skill was helping a patient ambulate a patient. [Applause] Uh so hi I'm I'm I'm back again. Uh so I I placed uh third place uh in pharmacy science. So at Grace uh as Grace mentioned, it was a uh 50 question multiple choice test that was timed. Uh and then we also had to record a video uh and submit that of us performing the skill uh that was required. So uh withdrawing liquid from a vial was one of them. So you're in in scrubs and everything. I know I was I was in my house late at night in scrubs and just withdrawing

024liquid from a vial. So it's it's uh it's it's a lot of fun. And even if it's something that you're not going into that field, just widening your knowledge on on different talks is something that's very important. Absolutely. And then we also have Julia who cannot be here and Nathaniel and Jasper who also speaks in their categories as well who cannot be here. Um they're at meets and games whatnot. So you can see them running outside but not in here. Um I also wanted to commend that we have 70 students in our club. We're one of the larger clubs at SB. Um, so this competition that they compete in at states is extremely rigorous. It is not like a easy first. Oh, if I just enter and submit something, I'll win. Like this is a

025very difficult project. And these students can attest they actually were in during all of February vacation in my classroom. Um, my husband loved me because I was here all February vacation, but but they all really dedicated their time outside of school hours on top of already being in some rigorous courses. A lot of these students are in the field pathway or in AP classes and they're going through a really challenging time where they have so many courses that they were studying for and they still were able to come on top and receive a placement. Um, placing in the state competition does allow them to advance to the ILC, international leadership competition. That is a super privileged opportunity and we want to make sure that we're supporting our students in receiving it. It's something that in

026high school I only got to go to once and when I was a member of this way back when and knowing that the effect it had on me going to it once it is very important to me to make sure these students are able to achieve getting there and going there because it is not easy to get the ticket to go. Um the international leadership is much like our state leadership conference except on a larger scale. It is also international so we're meeting students from different countries as well um as well as states that are in our backyard. It also gives students an opportunity to meet healthcare professionals because they also fly into this to do their CTE credits. So they actually get to have a little bit of mentoring from healthcare career professionals that

027are in their career. I'm actually going to turn it over to our treasurer to talk a little bit about our experience last year. So I attended in Houston, Texas and I think it very nicely. It's just such a great opportunity and it's really I'm very happy that I was able to have the opportunity to participate in and especially again this year. You get to participate in something called pin trading. Um, and that just is one of the little parts of it. We have things to show you. We know that this is like a new world for some of us. We brought things to show you this year. Um, but that's kind of one of the things you get to do. You get to meet a bunch of different people from uh all over the world.

028It's an international competition. So not only meeting people from the United States or meeting people from um we had a group come from China last year had group come from American or meeting different people from different places that we never had the opportunity to meet. Um and I was seeing you do a lot um it's very competition based very rigorous like said it's basically everything that you did states but it all has to be combined into just a couple days of um couple days of competing. So I had to do a multiple choice test. I not make it to round two. The other two people that uh went to Odyssey last year actually made it to round two. They placed top 10 internationally which was a really big thing. Haven't had that ever happen for

029um summers at Berkeley. And overall I see it's just it's a really really good opportunity and it's I can't stress it enough that it's something that you should take the opportunity when you have the opportunity. So If you have not heard of anything of this sense before, I know this is a lot of Michelins. I did kind of give you a little taped up version of what we just went over just to explain it in case it just feels overwhelming. Um, but to the fun part, money. Um, so we are really championing our fundraising this year. We are really diving hard on it. I know last year I came to you and we were like, ah, you know, we didn't know how we were going to make it work, but this year we have a

030plan. We have really executed a really awesome plan with our treasure grace. So kudos to her. Um going through it, our national fee is 125 per student. And then we have already covered our hotel. We actually got a discount from the hotel and we were in a lottery system with that. So we did get that and that's secured already. So we're awesome there. And then our uniform blazer. I'm actually going to turn it over to my fancy dancy models. Do you mind standing up to show off the uniform? Our uniform blazer is $98 a student. you might just come around so they can see like what makes it special cuz I know it looks like a blazer but it's not. And then I'm actually going to ask Ryan Lea when you feel comfortable standing and

031talking about why the uniform is so important to us. So this does just look like a normal blazer, but the difference is the pins and patch present on the blazer. Um, we actually get bonus points for wearing these two ILC's and not having those points could kind of be a make or break for a lot of us and it would put us at a big disadvantage if we didn't have the blazer. So, it is more than just a fashion statement. It is something that is really important and valuable to our placements and performances at the competition. Very well said. Good job. Thank you. Um, so like they said, you know, I know asking for clothes is kind of silly. This is something we do recycle in our clubs. So we asked for our donation last

032year. You guys granted us three jackets, which was so helpful for the three kids going. This year we do have 12 kids going. However, because we have three pre-existing jackets, we're only going to ask for nine because we can use those three. And we'll continue to recycle jackets. So we're hoping we'll never actually have to ask you for jackets again. Hopefully. But we're building a HOSA closet. And I will say that these students who did compete, they actually we recycled the jackets. We had them put them on and some of the kids we had to like pin and clip it to make it look like it worked and fitted really well in the video. So, I'm hoping that asking for a nine additional more will support our club in continuing to grow and then students

033will have better fitted clothes for the state competition as well. Um, so it'll stay within our club and it gets donated back to us, but it's fitted for them at least for their ILC experience. Um, our plane tickets we've already secured and we've gotten a group discount with, so we're all set with that. And then our trading pins is our last bulleted point that we are asking you for. If you don't mind showing it off now, thank you so much. So these trading pins are given out the conference. This is like a HOSA staple moment. These pins are a way of students communicating and really initiating. You're okay. I'm sorry. Really communicating a conversation with somebody. You know, it can be really scary to be at an international conference and just go up and be

034like, "Hi, I'm Leila. I'm from Somerset." That's a little intimidating to students. HOSA initiated the system that when you meet somebody new, you have to trade a pin with them. Um, that way you can go up to them and say, "Oh, I like your pin. Do you have Massachusetts yet?" And they'll say, "No." And now you have a little bit of an easier way of starting that communication process. I'm actually going to turn it back to Grace, but she did an awesome job. You just saw her pins from last year. Um, do you want to talk about your experience with the training pens? So something that I it offered like said it offered the opportunity to go to someone. We wouldn't normally just start introducing someone or talking to yourself but this gives someone who

035myself I'm very very very shy. I don't like talking to people. This gave us an opportunity to connect without just going up to someone and saying hey do you want to be friends? You have the opportunity. Hey do you want to trade friends and then you get to know each other. It really gives you that way of kind of connecting people way you wouldn't normally connect with someone. It's really fun. You get to express what it's about with each pin. So like for example, I think one of the pins they had their um state shape and each state shape had different things about their state that was famous for it. So you get to really learn a little bit about state through pins. you can learn about people through pins and then also um the

036different booths that are at they do some different like networking opportunities. I got a couple pins that were related to pharmacy science because I was able to go out and talk to different people with different professions and I say like hi I'm Grace I'm interested in pharmacy science um and then we kind of just have a conversation I was at some booth for upwards of half an hour just talking to them about different things all because of a pin. So the pins really offer the opportunity to depth into the conference that you kind of would be missing out on if you didn't have those pins. It's something that every single person in HOSA does. So, I think that it really gives you that feeling of inclusion. As a host member, they get 10 to start

037off with. Our state board gives them 10. Um, and that limits the students. And a lot of states are comfortable with just 10 and they're like, "Yeah, we'll make 10 fronts." But that's really tough for the kids. So, I like to request 40 more. that gives the students at least the chance to potentially collect 50 friends. Um, but it also doesn't limit them either. And then the extras we actually from last year we saved and we sent to people who donated to us as a thank you gift. Um, which you'll potentially receive later. Um, but that was something that we included there. Uh, I know some people in our club used all 50 and they they made 50 friends like period. And then some people maybe just got 30 and that was okay too. But

038nobody just stopped at 10. So that's just not enough for our students. And just to add a little depth, I like I said earlier did this cause art as a kid and I am still a trading pin buddy of like some of my friends. Like they came to my wedding and we showed up and we were like let's trade pins like like it's just like an added thing that is a staple to HOSA that only HOSA kids will understand and it'll go for them for a lifetime. Um so flipping to page six it goes through what we are asking you. So, as I mentioned before, we are championing fundraising here. We are committing to raising about $3,000 for this trip um through donations, kiss the seniors goodbye and selling chocolate bars and car washes. We

039are asking that you match that donation um with a $2,781 donation towards us. That would cover all of our national fees. That would also cover the nine host of lases for the students who don't have them yet, as well as 40 treating pins per student attending. Thank you. Thank you. Does anyone have any questions? I just um in addition to obviously the fabulous work that the students have done. I want to commend you. You've quadrupled the number of students who qualify for this event in in just a year. Thank you. So I have a feeling you'll be back needing more money next year at that rate. And that's and that's a good problem. That's a great problem to have. So, um but um thank you for um advising the students and growing the opportunity to

040be here and especially through the PLTW program. You know, this is my dream job, so I wouldn't want to be anywhere else. Um no questions. Okay. Um in that case, I would entertain a motion. Um we're going to do this in two parts. First, I would entertain a motion to approve the trip to the June 2025 Health Occupation Students of America International Leadership Conference in Nashville. So moved. Second. Motion um by Miss Ashley and seconded by Mr. Pastnack. Is there anything on discussion? Hearing none. All those in favor? Opposed? So voted. Part two, I would entertain a motion for the district to fund um as presented the national fees uh nine uniform blazers uh that will become property of the district and trading pins for students in an amount not to exceed $2,781. So moved.

041Second. Um motion by Miss Ashley, seconded by Mr. Pastnneck. Is there anything on discussion? Um, only just to say, Miss Andrews, I believe this is what we also provided um last year for the students and I would like to continue to do that for our growing population of students participating in this program. Yeah. And I would just like to add, I think, you know, from high school age up through, you know, your career as a teacher or superintendent or whatever you do in your life, things like this are very important, not just for networking, but continuing education. Um, Jen and I were just discussing the cyber security summit last week up in Worcester, but I mean, I go to national summits and you know that there's it's very important for your career as you get

042older. So if you can start doing this when you're in high school and you know making these contacts throughout the network and you know putting in the hours I think it's a very good thing. So I think I'm very happy to support it as I'm sure everyone else here is and I congratulate you all for placing where you did I have just one question since it's in Nashville. Is there any fun built into this? We going to the opery or built in? They're not happy with it. But I said that we should all go line dancing. I was like, you can't not go line dancing. Uh we do have a little bit of fun built in um where we can afford it, but the students are paying for that individually. That's awesome. All right, enjoy.

043Thank you. And then we have a token of appreciation. You guys want to go ahead and stand up and pass them out? We're going to just do the vote and then All right. So, no, that's okay. I I forget that often. All right. So, we have a motion in a second. Nothing further on discussion. All those in favor I opposed. So voted. Awesome. Thank you so much. I appreciate it. You want to stand up and say hi? I said that you play. So maybe you can just wave and say hi. They made it all sweaty from tennis. What dedicated students we have in the host class. Yeah, we went last year as well and it was a great experience especially not having to worry about um the cost. We thank you guys again and this

044will make it easier to worry about what we have to worry about with competition, not have to worry about funds. Thank you. Great. Congratulations. Thank you so much. It's an obstacle course around here. Thank you. Thank you. Good to see you again. Thank you. You can bring one. Um I I've actually just been informed that our friends of music have a meeting like right now. Um, so if it's okay with everyone, I'd like to um take up the next item on the agenda and then we'll take a nice short break for pictures and celebration. Okay. So, the next item on the agenda is the endorsement of the 2025 Music Town Parade. I'll make it quick. Um, all right. Good evening everyone. My name is Brian Johnson. I'm the president of the summers of Friends of

045Music. I'm just here tonight to present to the school committee for your endorsement. Summers of friends music plan for the 52nd music town festival. Kicking off festivities as we do each year with the music town ball. This will be on Thursday, October 9th, 2025. As in years past, we'll have the show choir and the marching band performed during the evening. Music town court will also be announced and again this year will be four students chosen from the selection process. will then have the music town concert on Thursday, October 16th, 2025, where the concert will feature the concert band, concert choir, and orchestra. It will then end the with the music time grand day on Sunday, October 19th, 2025. For this year's grand day, uh we have made a decision to only just have the parade

046and no field show performances. Plant the parade start around noon to 1:00 p.m. and hope to bring in more bands and groups to showcase at the parade. The summers of Friends of Music are in communication with Jay Young and music department to make sure the CS festival is a fantastic event and will showcase why Somerset is music time. Thank you very much. And if you have any questions? Anyone have any questions? I don't have any questions. I just I just think it's great and of course I as my past president self um think it's fantastic that it's still moving along and we're at 52. I think it's a great that we're still able to do the parade even if we're not doing a field show. Um that's what brings everybody out and that's that's how

047why this started was to give back to the community for all the support that they gave to to students. Um so I think it's great. Okay. Um with that then I would entertain a motion to endorse the 2025 music town parade. So moved. Second. Um u motion by Miss Ferrer, seconded by Miss Corwell. Anything further on discussion hearing? None. All those in favor? I opposed. So voted. Thank you very much. Sorry we made you late for your meeting. Um so much good news tonight. Um so and with that we can take a brief break. I think we should do one more round of applause for all of our amazing students. [Applause] Um okay. Um the next item on the agenda under business and financial matters is the April financial statement. Miss Palin. So the April

048financial statement uh for the general fund is within the school committee folder. Um we're about almost 95% expended and encumbered. As we're wrapping up the last few months, we're looking at our year end close. Um, we also are aware of the changes to the policy. So, at the next school committee meeting, we'll be bringing back budget amendments and at a future meeting, we will probably bring back a vote um for prepayment of special education, tuition, and other things to wrap up the end of the year. Does anyone have any questions about the April financial statement? We know the end of the year is almost as much this budget season. So, toss up almost. Uh, so thank you and everyone um in the um business office for all that hard work. Um, next um on the

049agenda is continued discussion of the 2526 budget. Um, I'm not sure what's new. Um, we do have one update. Uh, it's with um the cherry sheet. The update is from the Senate Ways and Means Means Committee. They released their financial figures. Um we are slight there's a slight um change from the House to the Senate. Overall, we're still about 25,000 to the good. Um the major changes really are our expenses for the out of district tuition cost. Um but net we're still at 25. We're hoping for better figures when it comes to the conference committee. Does anyone have any questions? Okay, great. Thank you. Um the next item on the agenda um we are fortunate to have um four um new scholarships before us for approval. Um so thank you to the generous um some

050cases family, friends, um businesses and donors, PTO's folks who um support the post-secondary pursuits of all of our students through generous scholarships. Um you have specifics in your uh folder. Um but I would entertain a motion to approve the following scholarships. the Joseph Ramos Memorial Scholarship, the Higginson Family Scholarship, the Somerset Middle School PTO Scholarship, and the Carl McDermott Scholarship. So moved. Second. Um motion by Miss Ashley and seconded by Miss O'Brien. Is there anything on discussion? Anything need to Okay, great. Um hearing none. All those in favor? I opposed. So voted. And then we're going to move into the student teaching and learning portion of the agenda. Um, and the first item, oh, look at that. Perfect timing. The first item on the agenda is the overview of the Desi school report card. Thank

051you. uh every year uh based on the accountability numbers and achievements of schools and districts from the previous year. Uh Desi uh creates this district report card. Uh Miss Haskell shared the link uh maybe about a month or so ago when this information came out. uh so I'm just providing u quick overview of the main uh points of this school report card. Um so first when we look at our attendance so we the components of this it's looking at um you'll see mass uh mass core completion uh MCCAST achievement student attendance uh the percentage of students of juniors and seniors who are taking advanced coursework percentage of students who are taking digital literacy and computer science classes uh and some other measures. So it's really trying to understand the overall uh kind of pulse of

052a school and and uh how students are achieving in that school and what opportunities the school presents to to its students. So first just in terms of uh student attendance this is for the 23 24 school year uh we have our average attendance rate of about 92%. Uh each student is absent on average about 13 days. Um And then just with our we keep going back to our major subgroups. Our two two major subgroups of students are students with disabilities and high need students. High needs um if you recall it's a little bit um of a broader subgroup of students. It includes students with disabilities, low-income students and English learners. Uh so those three groups uh comprise make up high needs. So just first of all looking at this um the one that clearly jumps

053out is our students with disabilities uh with an attendance rate of 86% and the the average student is missing 24 days of school. And does Mr. Skoonover are students considered chronically absent if they miss 18 days? Yeah, chronic absenteeism is 18 days or more. It's 10% of the school year. So 24 days that's now uh was about 13%. Uh so grade nine passing rates uh and uh the bottom is uh some information that Desi has but we've talked about this in the past. We know the research exists that if students students who uh fail a grade nine core class are far more likely to not earn their high school diploma. This is why Massachusetts is tracking this uh this data very closely. Uh so you can see that for our grade nine passing rates, 77%

054of our students passed all of their classes. So 23% failed at least one core class. And then just looking at the various subgroups. Um we have male versus female, 71 to 83%. High needs again 61 our students with disabilities. 51% of our students passed all of their core courses. So half of our students with disabilities failed at least one core class. And then low income that other major component that makes up the high needs is uh 61. So access to the arts uh this includes uh visual arts, music, theater um and uh general arts. about 65% of our students have access to the arts. And uh when you look at this really the breakdown of classes from 9 10 11 and 12. So 61 and a half% of our freshmen uh have are are completing

055or participating in an arts related class whereas uh close to 80% of our seniors do but this is I think uh when we look at the schedule and when we look at computer science there's a reverse trend uh because a lot of our upper classmen uh so many kids want to take classes in the arts and uh they tend to be uh more for seniors and juniors you'll see a lot of upper classmen in those classes. Um, so it's it's not that freshmen don't want to take the arts, it's just that they are uh we fill them with our upper classman work backwards. Um, and then I think is the next one. Um, I'll get to the computer science that must be on the next slide. Uh, so advanced course work. Uh this is as

056I was saying students, juniors and seniors who are taking advanced courses. Advanced courses include AP project lead the way as we just heard from uh Miss Littlefield uh dual enrollment classes and others. And there are some special classes in there that don't really uh fall into the AP or uh project lead the way like um uh an honor statistics advanced algebra and trig. Those are considered advanced courses as well, even if they don't have that AP uh designation. Uh so almost 63% of last year's juniors and seniors, so 289 out of the 461 students took at least one advanced course. Uh the state average is slightly higher than that at 67%. uh students with disabilities uh only about 11% of them are taking advanced courses in the junior or senior year whereas high needs is

057at 43%. And just to see the breakdown of of how the um where the students are in what departments they're taking these advanced courses that's what the the bar chart shows below. As I was saying for the uh digital uh literacy and computer science, uh we know that um we've been talking about access uh to computer science and and how important that is for future skills and um future uh jobs in the in the workforce. uh with the grade level trends as I was saying it's sort of the reverse from what we see in in the arts whereas we have a lot of freshmen taking uh courses in uh uh computer science technology uh digital literacy u and then it it tends to drop off a little bit. You see a little uptick there in

058the senior year. Uh but this is also um when students are trying when when the high school is scheduling freshmen and there are only so many all those arts courses already filled up. So the electives that are remaining uh tend to be in uh in an area such as technology which is why we tend to see uh more freshmen in these courses. All right. So for mass core completion as we've been talking about this quite a bit uh just as a reminder the uh what makes up mass core is at the top u uh the two areas where some at Berkeley uh currently does not align with mass core is the four-year requirement in math and the two-year requirement in world language. Uh so we uh for the class of 24 we had 67.4% of

059our students graduating earning that sort of designation the state average is uh just under 84% uh and then again as I showed on an earlier slide just the breakdown uh by all students and by the various subgroups please all right so just as a reference so this is getting this is not found in the school district report card but since we've had these discussions I know they'll be ongoing uh just to compare share someone at Berkeley with some of our neighboring districts. You can see at least on uh the DESI's website what the percentage is uh identified for those. Um so I I will say that if you look at someone at Berkeley maybe about three years ago, it says um that our mass core completion was 100%. That was uh a data error that

060we had that we were not able to fix. So it shows that we were 100%. We were not that year. It was more like 75%. Um, so when I look at that and I look at some of these numbers, I just don't know if these others are truly 100% or not. Um, but what I did do after that, I did look at each of those schools programs of studies just to see what the graduation requirements uh were listed there. And uh you can see that uh such as uh I'll say case um there they do have uh four years of math as a as a graduation requirement. Word language is a graduation requirement for anyone identified as college prep. Um so I would assume that there are there is some small percentage of students who

061are not considered college prep but the school is identified as having 100 100% so that may be accurate. I don't know. Uh Dyon Rhobit and Freetown Lakeville both have full mass core alignment. And you can see some of the others. I won't read them all, but um they they tend to each school tends to have the four years of math, the two years of world language with some exceptions and waiverss available for different situations. All right. So then jumping into MCAST So, what I have here is M the MCCAST results uh in ELA on the left, math on the right. First for all students, then for our high high need students, and then for our students with disabilities. Uh so, we've seen these numbers in the past. Miss Haskell walks us through these every fall.

062Um we are always at um right at the state level or slightly above typically. Um so, in math, I'm sorry, in ELA last year, uh 56% of our students either met or exceeded the standard compared to 57% in the state. Uh and then you look at uh the does not meet 12% of the students in the state did not meet the standard as someone at Berkeley that number was only 5%. When we look at the graph on the right uh we outperform this uh the state in mathematics if you look at the blue columns compared to the red exceeds and meets. And again, we're uh far below about half um of what the state average is for the does not meet. When we look at the when we look at the high needs students, um

063you can see that uh our high need students overall um outperform the states high needs students uh with in both exceeds and meets uh with fewer students in the does not meet category. So that's uh that's how we want our graphs to look and and the more we can get a discrepancy between us and the state the better the larger that graph uh gap can grow u but that is the the typical trend that we want to see and we want to see those two columns on the left those blue columns continue to arise but when we look at our students with disabilities and we've talked about this thank you um which comprise that high needs group it paints a different picture. Um, and and we've been talking about this. So, we had in ELA

064last year, 0% of our students um exceeded the standard in ELA. Uh, 0% exceeded in math. Uh, compared to 2% in the state for ELA and uh 2% also um in the state uh in the state for math. When you look at the meats, um, nine for us, 19 for the state, six for us, 13 for the state, we have our work to do certainly in this area. And then when you look at the does not meet, we are about on par with the state, one slightly below, one above where they are. Um, and I'll I'll talk about special education a little bit in my um my update, but this is where we've identified these patterns. We've been working to implement changes with students with disabilities and when we as I was telling this high

065school earlier today when we start to move this needle that's going to improve the outcomes of all of our students as well. Uh the other uh another measure for mass um uh the report card is the graduation rates. The top two are for um for the uh for Somerset Berkeley, the 22 uh class of 22 in blue and then the class of 23 below that. So we're at 94 and 95% of our students graduating in four years uh compared to the state's averages of about 90%. and our collegegoing rates. Uh as you can see this is for the uh years 21 22 and 23 uh students percentage of students uh leaving somerset Berkeley and attending college uh is at 78 77 and 70%. The state is holding pretty steady at 62 63%. And then the

066last piece of information uh is on state uh spending average people uh per pupil spending. Uh so when you look at at these numbers uh in 2022 uh the regional school district averaged about $16,500 per student whereas the state was 19,700. Uh in 2023 was a similar pattern. It grew uh slightly 17,752. versus 21,256 as the state average. So um you know it is something else that the state is tracking and uh obviously we are um yeah I think it's not just some said uh Berkeley this area tends to this area of the state tends to uh fall under the uh the state averages and just some highlevel areas for improvement we've talked about increasing mass core completion uh we we do know that uh the more uh requirements that we put in, it's less

067we're taken away as electives for students. Um but 67% versus 84% in the uh in the state that is a pretty sizable margin and uh increasing our math score completion is something that is part of our strategic plan. That is one of the one of the goals that we had when we developed that plan about four years ago. Uh improving student attendance. Uh so 92% is certainly better than the state average, but we can do better than that. And that's actually been a goal that we've been working on in um the five schools in Somerset and Somerset Berkeley for the past couple of months. Uh and in fact we've um we've improved our chronic absenteeism numbers pretty significantly just over that period of time by some of the interventions that our principles uh have implemented

068and we're um as of right now we're ahead of our uh targets for next year that were established for 2025. So hopefully the the last 25 days or so of the school year, we can maintain that same pace that we're on and um and come in under where what we're uh was expected of us uh in boosting the access to digital literacy and computer science. We've just talked about the importance of that. I've talked about the importance of that uh and not just computer science but technology, STEM in general. And um the bottom right corner, closing those gaps for our students with disabilities. Um, and also the uh the advanced coursework completion uh some of the priorities that we are um we're already working on. I think that was the last thing, right? Yes. So,

069it's a lot of information that is there. Thank you, Mr. Scoover. members of the committee. I mean, how long do we have, right? Like, that's a lot. There's a lot here. There's a lot to digest and and talk about. Um, obviously, there are some positive things here and there are some not so positive things. Um, I think personally I I think we need to talk about like the most strategic way to sort of approach this that makes sense for everyone because we could sit here for five hours and talk about this, but I'm not sure that that would be an effective use of everybody's time. And sometimes with our existing subcommittees that we have, we can delve a little bit deeper into some of these topics and then come back with recommendations. So that's something

070that I would kind of throw out there as as an idea. So I'm thinking specifically um policy and perhaps and strategic plan are probably the two um and that's most likely sort of places to sort of tackle this in a in a working format. Um sense. Okay, I'm curious. I don't really want to put them on the spot, but I will. I'm curious, actually, just looking quickly at that information if our three students who are here have just any initial thoughts, would it be appropriate for them to Sure. They're part of the committee. Absolutely. The only thing I I would say is looking at the mass core completion and thinking about like um the majority of students that that I talk to who are taking uh four years of math and that two years of

071world language. the mo most people that I see do um especially in that that fourth year, that senior year, do take a math class, whether it's um whether they didn't take like a statistics course uh because that's like oftentimes that's kind of an it's not an elective, but that's what they take senior year. So, most kids, I would say, do take four years of math. Uh and then world language is something that um I would say not as many people take that two years but um definitely a decent amount. Would you agree? Decent amount take those take those two years. Um yeah that's all I have to say. I think uh for world languages especially um most of the time I think it just depends on the batch of kids that you get. I mean

072sometimes they they work you know with each other to sort of uh boost morale a little bit because you know it is another class another honors class that you know it's another thing to to work on. So uh I think when they you know push each other I think definitely you get swings of kids who want to take you know all four years of language and then maybe sometimes you get people want to take two years just enough. I think at the end of the day, what like relates to all of this, um it all kind of boils down to like no matter what you do, um it's really up to the student to how they're going to choose to spend their time in high school. Like you can take a thirsty horse to the

073river, but you can't make a drink. That sort of idea. So you'll obviously always have your students that are doing all four years of language, all four years of math, English, all of that. And then there's going to be students who choose not to do that. And that's really just an individual decision at that point. But there definitely are, it really does depend on the students. Like there are ones who do all their courses and stuff because you know, college applications and stuff, but it is down to the student, I think. Well, I have one comment and it's maybe more of a question actually because I'm not well versed yet in this area, but so say like we're looking at 67% for Somerset, we're looking at like 83 or 86% whatever it was for Dery,

074but they had a waiver for um foreign language. So I thought without knowing is that they probably have some kind of waiver for kids who can speak a second language at home with Portuguese kids because they have a lot of Portuguese speakers in there and if they can test out of it they just kind of let them you know fulfill it through the waiver. So, if we had a waiver like that, would that bring up our score there? Because I I know we do have kids in this town who can speak a second language. And maybe they're already taken two years, but maybe they're saying, "Hey, I can already speak Portuguese. Why do I need to take Portuguese or Spanish or whatever?" Because I already know it. So, they're taking other classes. It's a It's

075a good question, and I don't know um how schools work if someone is already proficient in another language. Uh there is something else and I I think Miss Andrews has mentioned the PI literacy uh seal u by literacy seal of bi literacy. Thank you. Um as something else to explore but some of the waiverss that I'm familiar with are um if a student is in a a chapter 74 program and so they're taking all of their core classes but then they're also taking a shop. Um whether it's you know such HVC, electricity, whatever. Um so because that there's such a course requirement in those um often times kids are allowed to wave the language requirement because they need the extra credits and in some of those um chapter 74 areas. That's one common waiver. Another

076uh might be a student uh with a learning disability that has a significant language disability and um if if learning English is such a challenge, learning a second language would be a great even a greater challenge. So um I know that there are sometimes there are waiverss for situations like like that as well. So do we have any waiverss in place here? We just we just don't we don't require world language at all. I we we we inform students that in order to go if you want to go to college, colleges are looking for you to have at least two two years in a language. If you want to go to a highly selective college, they're looking to have four years of the same language. U so and students know that when they're meeting with

077our counselors. Uh and and that's probably why we have we saw that we have 70% of our students going to uh college and we have a 67% uh rate from Massore. So there's those two numbers are uh similar because of that students who are going to college take two years with community colleges being exception. So I guess my question is is it because we don't require the two years of world language that kids don't take it and that's why our score is lower. I would say world language is the bigger component. Certainly not requiring four years of math is is the other piece but as Mr. Vieira said uh many students are taking a higher percentage of students are taking four years of math versus two years of a language. So it's really is it's

078a combination of the two things but I think more language is more the driver. Thank you. Any other questions? I'd be interested to see what the waivers look like to see if that's We may if we're going to talk about policies be interested to see what they are to see if it's something we as a committee would like to look at as an option or I just be interested in what their requirements are. I guess my observations is are a couple of things. I think that um I try to look at this sort of through an equity lens particularly when we're talking about students with disability, high need students, low-inccome students. And I think that um when we talk about, you know, students who are going to go to college, there's a little bit of

079an assumption in there that they know like everybody knows at the same time, you know, what that path might be. And I think in the world we live in now, there's there's fluidity, right? And we also have there are different access points to higher education. And um one of the things that concerns me is that if we don't I view the waiver the waiverss to me the waiver process is um really more about our graduation requirements. Right? So if we're going to so that there that's a backs stop for students who legitimately whether it's a because they have a specific learning disability or um you know the state in terms of chapter 74 just because of the number of hours that are required to engage in those and complete those programs. Um but I I

080I I think it I would like to look at this as not how are the the students who are achieving at the highest levels doing but how are we serving the students who have more obstacles maybe to um those levels of achievement. We know we have great, you know, we spent the whole first part of this meeting celebrating tremendous success of our students and I think and that's important to do and it's fabulous. What worries me sometimes is that we um we we need to pay or and we all need to do this. I've been on this committee for a long feels like a long time and really haven't had this discussion so this is like on me. I'm not pointing fingers at anyone. But I think it's important that we look at these things

081and we think about our most vulnerable students and what are we doing? I think raising expectations, high expectations and high support. Um I sort of like I I think the approach that I would like to see us sort of double down on. And um there are students who will sit I did this as a school counselor who will tell you I am not going to college. That's not my plan. And then that changes and if we haven't sort of put in something like mass core when they change their mind if they change their mind they're behind they're we're making it harder for them to to move down that path not impossible but if you're putting if students have to take nonredit bearing courses they have to take remedial whatever the term is now right math

082that's not credit bearing um and in order to get to that case, you know, um that can be discouraging for students, too. And you know, how how well prepared are they going to feel to take on those challenges. So, for me, um I am all about celebrating the wins and we have lots of them. But I think um if if Norton if 86 87% of their students can meet Massore standards, there's absolutely no reason why Somerset Berkeley students can't do that, too. You know, I think like we have talented, skillful teachers. We have tremendous students. We have supportive families and community. Um so there's there's, you know, I think is it time to look at maybe some processes and some um structures, you know, that maybe we need to think differently about so that we

083can open up some of those doors and expectations for students. I think that we want students to have voice and choice in everything, but we also know, you know, as as professionals and as educators what kids need to be successful in whatever their post-secary path is. And everyone doesn't have to go to college. There's lots of um and even colleges, you know, what does that mean, right? Certification programs, there's all sorts of pathways. But I think we have an obligation that when you get that diploma, we're graduate. You know, a lot of high percentage of our students are getting that diploma, but we we have to um I think feel confident that they've got the skills, the knowledge, and the tools they need to be able to make those choices and be successful in them.

084And I think we can do better. And I think you know and it may and I my question would be for the administration to um think about what support might be needed from this committee to help implement some of those things. Um I think going looking at policy and strategic plan and maybe sort of turn it back to the subcommittees would be smart. Very specifically for me I think math is a huge priority. I I don't you know if if 80 I think Dr. I think it was around 80% I could be at a previous meeting, but 20% of students aren't. That's that's that's a high that's significant. Um, and pretty much everybody else is requiring it. So, I don't think our kids are capable of it less than anybody else's kids. Um, that for

085me is a priority. World language, again, it's about an entree into um four-year schools. you know, kids might not select that, but don't we have an obligation to prepare them? And if we know those are the requirements, I think we I think we have a duty to to um do that. Now, I think that we could maybe look at being more flexible with our program of studies in terms of electives because we want kids to do the arts and do all those other things that bring them joy and and allow them to showcase their talents in other ways. So, I think we need to look at semesterized courses. Um, so that it doesn't have to be either or for kids all the time, right? And also, if if your electives are a year long and

086you don't know if you're going to love computer science, if I'm a student, I'd like to try it. Let me do it for a semester in an introductory level or art or jewelry, whatever it is. Let me try it, right? And then let's move along. So I think we have to make sure that whatever structures we have in place are serving our kids and not you know like year-long classes are the are easy like in terms of scheduling relatively nothing's easy in terms of a master schedule but right when you start breaking things up it's harder but it also gives kids more opportunities. I don't think it's an eitheror. I think we can elevate our standards and our expectations. We are I think fully committed to providing more support for students to ma meet that

087um and that doesn't diminish student choice because we can be creative I think. So um you know I'm very concerned about when you know some when we look at um things like advanced coursework completion like again that's you know I think we can do better than that and I think about equity when I look dual enrollment is a perfect opportunity and it's not supposed to be about stacking stuff and patting your resume really dual enrollment in early college is about giving students opportunities, particularly low-income students, first generation students, to sort of challenge themselves that way and accumulate the credits to make them be able to move through four years because we all know every year of college is super expensive. So, whatever you can um accomplish earlier. So, I don't mean to go on and

088on, but I I I feel pretty passionately and strongly about it because I know um our I know our staff can accomplish it and I know our kids are capable of it. And I just think it's I'm grateful um for the presentation and the thought that's gone into it. Um and I think we've got like some working group um activity to do. Um, I don't know. Is there a policy meeting between now and the next meeting? I don't think we have one scheduled, but that's easy enough to to do. I don't know if our friends on the call would be willing to Well, we're going to talk about subcommittee assignments, too. Uh but I I think you know as a starting point because we already had a one a first reading on some proposed changes

089and perhaps after this presentation and discussion perhaps the policy could committee could come back and look at that with a with an updated proposal for for things like the graduation requirements to start and obviously those are a phase in usually. So, um, and then I think for the strategic plan, maybe that's more things like supporting early college or dual enrollment or, I don't know, expanding AP and other types of things. I'd love to see sophomores taking AP classes, you know, or even freshmen. If freshmen at Totten High can take AP classes, and they do, and they sophomores at Tatton High can take AP classes, so can our kids and be successful. I know they can because they're awesome. Um, so, um, those are just sort of my my concerns, my observations. Um, you know, there's

090statistics and lies and whatever that Mark Twain quote is, right? But I know that our kids are not below average. uh below the state average in any way. So um I would ask I guess for the policy committee to perhaps convene and look at graduation requirements and we have to remind ourselves his own strategic plan but maybe tackle some of the more structural um things that we could do to try to support increasing achievement for all the students. Sounds good. I think we have the next school committee meeting is June 10th. I don't know if we have a meeting schedule with our student advisory council. Um I know we typically do first the first first Wednesday of the month which would be June 4th. Y um so if we have a meeting that day, I'm

091not sure. I know that that week is extremely difficult. Yeah. But if we have a meeting that day, Mrs. fair and I can certainly uh bring the two school committee policies that are uh being looked at in terms of graduation requirements and also the commencement participation uh and we can get some student input into both of those as well. That would be Does anyone else have any other comments or thoughts? I didn't mean to monopolize. Okay, great. Thank you for this. Lots of lots of good things happening and and more work to do. Um okay, the next item on the agenda is the extended school year update. Ashton. Okay. So um you know per special education obviously um law we you know we do have to provide an extended school year program for students who

092are eligible um students who would demonstrate substantial regression without having a structured program in place. Um, again, the purpose of ESY is not necessarily to make progress, but to sort of maintain your skills and um, you know, avoid that regression. So, with that in mind, Somerset uh, and Somerset Berkeley, we run um, an extensive extended school year program from preK all the way up to our transition program, adult services to 22. Um, we run a five-week program. The f the full program is um, four days a week, half days. Each student is recommended um for the service time that um they require to again you know meet their IEP um their IEP needs. So each IEP team meets and um they determine what that time might be. Students in our specialized program are often um

093recommended to attend the full the full program the five weeks for the four half days. Um but we have students you know that may just have a math goal. So they might be um offered, you know, one one or two days a week for s sort of like an academic tutoring for that subject area. Um so that's typically how it's run. Um we we were going to move the middle school and the high school who we usually house together um for ESY to the middle school this year, but with some um work needs to be done at the middle school, we're going to maintain it here at the high school. So um 6 through 12 is here at the high school. Um it's it's run that way for a while now. It it works well.

094And then our elementary is down at North Elementary. Our um our students are there. Um I do have to say that I'm very grateful. We get great turnout of our staff who want to come back and work with our students for the summer. Um it's a wonderful thing for our students because they get to see familiar faces. Um you know, the whole purpose of these this program these programs for a lot of our students is that structure and that routine. So seeing those people that they know and love already during the school year to come back for the summer, we're very grateful for that. I have a lot of paraprofessionals that come back, uh teachers that come back. Um we sometimes do have to um advertise outside the school just to, you know, to get

095all the staff that we need. Um but again, I think it's um I I'm very appreciative of the staff that do come back. Um we do provide transportation for students to ESY. um any any student that has specialized transportation all year long throughout the van their van service forces continued. We are required to also if we recommend ESY for any student to provide transportation. We are asking um that parents uh sort of work with us and support student transportation um if they're able to um because we do put together um our yellow bus routes and we know we've tracked it the past couple years and you'd have you know buses coming with one or two students on it. So um we do appreciate many parents are willing to bring their students again because they might

096be only coming for two hours and the bus is only going to come the beginning and the end of the program. So a lot of parents choose to drive their um students anyway. Um, but we do provide transportation as we're required to do. Um, I think that's we've sent the registration information out to parents. So, we're just starting to get the, you know, parents who um, it's an optional program. You don't need to accept it. So, we're just starting to get the inquiries back and um, acceptance of the um, of the program and then I hire staff according to the number of students that we have that will be attending ESY. So, we already are listening the staff that are interested same time as we're getting the student interest and then we'll sort of match

097our placements. Um, but again, just appreciate that we do tend to have um good turnout for both students and um staff at our programming. Any particular questions or anything for me? Thank you. That's very clear. Thank you for that presentation. Um, if there are no questions, I would then entertain a motion to approve the pay rates associated with entitlement and competitive grants for the 2425 academic year as outlined in the memorandum from Mr. Skum. So moved. Motion by Miss Ashley, second to Miss O'Brien. Is there anything further on discussion? Hearing none. All those in favor? Opposed? So voted. Thank you. We hope you have a great summer. Um the next item on the agenda is professional development update. So I um was just wanting to kind of share the update from this year. Some of

098the things you've already heard. So there um it's just a recap. Um and we have actually had some successes um and worked um with some outside um PD providers. Um and so, uh if you recall, we have PD pathways here at Somerset Berkeley Regional High School. And so, uh teachers, um have had the opportunity to be part of a different pathway each year, but when they're in the pathway, they are in that pathway for the entire year. So, every time we have an early release day and we provide professional learning, they're going to that pathway. So, the pathways um include integrating social and emotional learning into classroom culture. Um and we have worked with uh both Wayfinder um and also uh Donna Tobin um who is an SEAL uh director um in a school district

099in Massachusetts um and she has worked with our team on not just um the castle competencies um but also how we can integrate them uh into our core curriculum as opposed to it being one more thing we have to do. Um and so really building those competencies in our students helps prepare them for life um now and as they move forward into um college career and real life. Um we have Mr. Croft uh who is our tech integration specialist and uh he is uh facilitating using technology to enhance learning. So our teachers are not only um using their new tools or learning new tools, they're also again working on their curriculum and their instruction and how to integrate that into their classroom. Um and we really try to support a make and take model where

100teachers are able to take what they've learned today and go into the classroom and use it tomorrow immediately. Um and it also as we kind of talk about those scaffolded supports um you have uh Mr. Croft who is here kind of doing that that share out and the support in terms of designing but also can push into the classroom and provide ongoing support to teachers um as they are integrating into the classroom. We are also uh just like having uh Mr. Croft who is uh internal and facilitating we also have three teachers um who are uh running building thinking classrooms the humanities edition. So Peter Lily is the author of a book called building thinking classrooms and the book is really focused on um math and he has done uh a lot of research related

101to best practices best instructional practices. Um and our team had the opportunity to uh participate in a course with uh Peter Lily doll. Uh it was a uh synchronous um course that actually the principles um and I along with these teachers um and some teachers from the um elementary have um participated in. It was a 700 p.m. course um and it was Peter himself who was teaching it which was really cool. Um and uh what these uh our teachers did our team of three teachers um Mr. Chase and um Miss Bermire and Miss Cabraw um work together to design a humanities version of these strategies, instructional strategies. And so our um team of teachers who are in this cohort are working with our their um non-permanent non-permanent um vertical surfaces whiteboards um in teams of

102three um so that teachers are able to see the learning that's happening. it's visible um but also talking about how we might um integrate these different um instructional practices in a humanities classroom which is different than a math classroom. Um so uh it has been really um inspirational and they've worked really hard on that collaboration. Um we are also working with uh another facilitator uh from throughine and reaching and teaching all sophomore learners is the title. You may remember last year it was reaching and teaching all freshman learners as we were working to DLE our courses. This is the um the cohort of teachers who are teaching sophomores. So these strategies are about how we are um best meeting the needs and responding to the needs of the students who are in front of us.

103Um with this um reaching and teaching all learners, we are also um doing a student experience survey and we are surveying the entire school and so we have data from last year um and data from this year. So we did a middle of the year and we're uh we just on Friday was our endofear student experience survey um that we administered. So at mid year we took a look at the data and the growth and already we are trending um in positively that there have been some um changes in the work that's happening in classrooms. So basically what they're measuring is the student experience based on the teachers that the students are working with. And so we're looking forward to taking a look at that endofear data. And again, if you recall, we kicked off

104this school year um and worked with um our teachers on reviewing that data together. And that was our August uh early release day or our very first day of school, the two hours of professional learning. And we are going to kick off the um 2526 school year with um those same interdep departmental teams who have the opportunity to look at that data along with MCCAST data um AP data and really talk about what what we have seen and and the patterns that have emerged and then being able to plan as we move forward. Um the new IEP was something that we rolled out this year also. So that was a year-long uh pathway as uh we looked at kind of the the technical and adaptive changes to the new IEP and and how to implement

105that at Somerset and Somerset Berkeley. Um and uh Rocket PD um is uh they are the actually that is the group that uh provided the live PD with Peter Lily doll but they also have some asynchronous um modules that we are looking to offer to our faculty and staff this coming year. Um we piloted a couple of them as a leadership team. And um last but certain certainly not least uh the monthly faculty meetings. Our team has worked on um designing and piloting a new writing rubric. And so again, teachers are able to give some feedback uh use the rubric, make some adjustments, and we're looking to roll that out next school year. We're also looking for some vertical alignment as we look at the middle school and eventually to the elementary. in Somerset. Um

106our jumping off point was uh the AP writing rubric. Um and we have made some um adaptations and modifications again to make it age appropriate and um and we're we'll be able to again make those adjustments as we kind of move for some vertical alignment. Anything that I I missed, Dr. Gford? I would love to highlight. Yeah, please do the honors. So, behind me you can see the remnants of our book fair that we uh we all of our students grades 9 through 11 participated it and this is our new summer reading initiative that was kindly funded by the Berkeley Foundation. So, we started by surveying teachers and students. What are you reading? What do you think other people would like to read? And we narrowed that down to around 40 titles, which are all

107around you right now. Um, and on May 1st and 2nd, this whole half of the room was set up like a book fair. So, these books are all over and students perused around this half of the library and then they checked out and they went home with a copy of a book. I can't even tell you the energy that was in the library that day. We had students that were talking to teachers. They were talking to each other. What are you going to read? What am I like? There was so many awesome conversations. What do you think I should read? Um just like you would I don't know if you're all avid readers. I am. Like just like you do in a bookstore. People were picking up the book based on the cover, reading the

108back. There were kids reading the first couple pages to see if this is something they were really And um some of my teachers over the past week have said um they're already reading them. So they're not even waiting for summer. Um there was one anecdotal bunny story. I'll I'll tell you all that there was a teacher that you know was calling out a student, hey, you know, Miss Hassel, turn around, get off your cell phone. And when the student turned around, they were reading the book. They just got in the library. So the teacher came down and told me the story. I said, "Well, that's a first. I can't write that." Um, so now what we're doing um is we're working with both Berkeley and Somerset Middle School and Mr. Silva, our English content coordinator,

109met with the eighth grade teachers at both schools. We did a big Zoom and there we are going to facilitate the same process down there so that when they come in, they will have gone through the same process. And then our first two blue raider blocks are going to be book club. So, everyone's going to be in groups based on what they read and we're going to uh staff are going to be invited to read a title and pick a book club and we are going to that is how we're going to you know meet the expectations of the summer reading program and I'm super excited about it. The students were really really excited about it and I just think it's it's fantastic. It goes right along with our reading, writing, and literacy goals. So,

110just really, really, really happy. We're really trying to replicate the excitement of the Scholastic book fair that children go to. Um that we did, uh the adults were having the conversations about, you know, maybe adding the posters and the um you know, smelly erasers. Um because I don't my my kid would always come home and I'm like, I gave you money for books. She's like, "I know, but they had puppy posters, too." I think we're talking about the puppy posters. So, um, best day of the year, and we tried to replicate that up here, and I think we were pretty successful. And, and Mr. Silva and I, um, we we met a lot. We had a lot of conversations about this. Um and he has just been nonstop um in terms of the planning and

111the structure to make sure this and it's no it's no easy reason kind of banded together hunkered down um Mr. created all the technology to check the books out and make sure that we knew which group was going to be where. Um, making sure that we communicated out to families exactly what book students were going to be choosing and perhaps what, you know, different parental adisements there were on different books. So, that all went home. That will all go home to the eighth grade parents, too. Um, and we were also really, it was very important to us that students had voice and choice. We tried not to give them too much push in one direction. You want to read this, you want we wanted them to pick um and to get the copies of what

112we what we have here. We did a survey of the students. What do you think you're going to pick? But we didn't force them to to commit to that. And thus we that's one thing we do have to work on next year because and I think it's a great problem to have. They came down and they didn't necessarily pick the book that they thought a month and a half ago they were going to pick once they saw the different titles. That's a good problem that we now have to solve. different way to do that. But that was something that, you know, we were really excited to see them really be thoughtful about what they were doing. Awesome. Any questions? Thank you. Getting kids to be excited about books and is fabulous, amazing, wonderful. There was

113some really great feedback. I know during our student advisory council meeting, the kids really enjoyed it. So, it sounds like it was a hit. Dr. Cer said, there was a buzz in this room all morning long, uh, at least the day I was here. And, uh, when I first walked in, um, the first conversation I caught was a student asking Mr. Silva, um, the student said, "You mean I can keep the book?" And he said, "Yeah, that's yours. If you want to give it back, you can give it back. But yeah, that's your book. Like and just like the possession, the ownership of the book was something I wasn't expecting. So, there were just so many wins all around with that event. And it's a it's a really wide variety there. They got to pick

114whatever they wanted, but there is there's a whole lot of choice. Um, you know, sometimes people they they want, okay, I'm that reader, right? Like, I need something that is going to keep my attention. I'm going to spend my time on it. Um, so it's really nice to be able to pick some, you know, style or genre or, you know, or maybe you just like the cover, right? Um, so, uh, we're really pleased with that and, um, we're hopeful, you know, that that kids, you know, saw something, had trouble choosing, and maybe they read two books. Um, you know, because we know that the more kids or the more anybody reads, the the better we we get at it. Um, and so, uh, and we would really like to cultivate that that joy of of

115reading, um, and find your reading bliss. Um, so that's our aim and I we're pretty happy with the the kickoff and we are planning to continue it next year again, get some feedback, make some some adjustments as needed, but but we do plan to do it again next year. So, I'm very grateful to that team for putting it together. That was fabulous. Thank you. Okay. This is not a good professional development. Um the next item on the agenda is a superintendent's update, Mr. Schoolware. Okay. Uh so just quickly with staffing, uh you have here one appointment in our food service. Uh and a uh resignation of our um part-time administrative assistant and guidance. Uh so we have that positions uh I believe has already been I think was posted earlier today. Um but in addition

116to that just a few other um items. Uh so for the the turf update um we have uh we actually had a site visit last week where we had the the pre-bid uh site visit that occurred last uh Tuesday. Um there are some uh any questions and uh clarifications uh that those are due uh tomorrow and the bids are due on May 21st. Uh so as we said at our first meeting when um when the information was presented uh to you, it's really a tight turnaround from the bids uh bid openings on the 21st to the potential mobilization on Monday, June 9th uh the Monday right after graduation. Um and uh that'll get us um on track for a substantial completion in mid August with the final completion at the end of August. Uh so

117I'll keep you posted once those um bids are coming in next week. Uh last week was teacher appreciation week and one of the um the events that it wasn't on the Monday, I think it was on the Tuesday that was sort of the kickoff to the week. It's one of my favorite events uh that week that takes place throughout both districts. Uh Dr. Browford um uh started a uh teacher um future teacher signing program here back in 2019. So this was the I think it was really the sixth because of COVID, but uh really seven years I suppose we've been doing this. Um and uh we had uh about a dozen or so students, right? Um and and what's what's really nice about this event is these are these are graduating seniors who are entering

118the field of education. Uh and they get to uh they sign a commitment letter. So we've got the summers at Berkeley board behind like an athlete signing a commitment letter to a college to play. Uh and each student uh signs this commitment letter to become a teacher. Um their parents are invited uh and they also get to recognize and invite a teacher who is inspirational to them. So it's a nice teacher appreciation week connection there uh and each student gets to uh you know speaks shares why uh they want to become a teacher uh and then they sign the commitment. So it's really a a great uh kickoff to that week. It's a nice celebration of recognizing people who want to go into teaching but also the people who were inspirational and that want wanting

119to enter that career. Can I just jump in there? Dr. loves to come up with these big ideas, but Liz Kugan and Melissa Anderson did the bulk of the work to put that together. So, I just want to give them a shout out because it's it's lovely, but I do not want to take full credit for that because I showed up, bought it, and endorsed Um thank you. And uh one of the unique things this year because we have so many students who are uh completing internships in the elementary or middle schools as well as some students who are doing capstone projects related uh to teaching. Uh so there was this strong component of kids were already getting this experience outside of someone at Berkeley at least several afternoons every week. So that that that

120was nice and and some of the teachers who were recognized are the teachers who are mentors to these students either through capstone or the internship. Uh we have just shifting gears slightly um artificial intelligence. We haven't really talked about it much, I don't think, here, but it's something that um we've been I've been working um with a team of teachers and and leaders throughout the year as I think um for those of you who are on the committee in the fall. Uh we were invited, we were one of a few districts in the state uh selected to uh participate in the day of AI through uh MIT. So that kicked us off in October. We had um really an emphasis on some professional learning at our November meeting and now um we are we have

121this team of about 12 teachers and uh school and district leaders who are beginning to put together um uh some guidelines for student and teacher use. Uh with that there will also be because MASC has not really stepped up yet for a policy. There are some sample policies that are out there that districts have created for school committees to approve essentially saying that you know some statement about AI and um that the school district will create some uh some guidelines for safe usage and responsible usage by teachers and students. Uh so we're beginning to develop that that work now. Only about 5% of all districts in the state in the country have uh have really gone down this path so far. Uh so we're trying to get ahead of the curve. Um and I'm working

122with a few other superintendents. We're also doing some similar work. Uh and everyone's doing it a little bit differently, but our outcomes are all the same. So, uh, we we have a network that's there and, um, we'll have something to share with you, uh, in the next over the next several months. Certainly, we want to have language in our student handbooks for next year as we saw that there was a situation in a Massachusetts school district this past fall where there was some plagiarism and uh, that district did have some language already in their handbook and that and you know, it it it worked in the district's favor. Uh but to that point, we've also uh I sent out a survey to all of our staff about a week and a half ago. We had

123160 plus responses to that just getting uh teachers perceptions and and knowledge of AI uh for both teacher use and student use. And Dr. Brford and I last week and and Mrs. Fer when we met with the student advisory council, sorry, just to ask it's a small group, it's simple uh but uh just asking them what their input is. on the use of AI and it's it just uh it's interesting because there were only six or seven kids who were there and they had a wide range of different opinions on AI uh from it should be banned to we should embrace it and and everything in between. Um so anyway and we'll continue to seek student input as well as uh teacher input as we craft some of that uh that work. As I mentioned

124in the presentation as I highlighted our uh uh achievement gaps for students with disabilities. Uh, one of the things, uh, Miss Haskell, Miss Ashton and I when we, um, attended a conference a few months ago, uh, one of the teams that was there were, uh, my old friends from Portsouth, uh, Rhode Island, and, uh, they were talking about some of the changes that they just implemented in their special education u service delivery model as well as the their interventions that they have at their high school. So last week a small team of us went and visited Portsouth High School just to observe and to learn a little bit more about that. Some uh pretty unique things um that we came back with and and our brains have all been uh working on on trying to

125figure how this could look in Somerset and Somerset Berkeley. And Miss Andrews, when you were talking earlier, you mentioned high expectations and high supports, and that's exactly what this model is. Um, so I'm excited about trying to take that and see how we can fit that into our structure here at Somerset Berkeley and then also um in Somerset. And I think that wraps up everything I wanted to share today. I know it's a little bit longer. It's okay. That's all important stuff. Thank you. Have any questions? Okay. Um All right. Next item on the agenda under new business is to discuss subcommittee assignments. Um maybe to facilitate this, I went through I copied I made a copy of the current subcommittee assignments. Um which might have needed a little updating because Mr. Pastor N joined

126us and um made a new column for 25 26 preferences. So I shared it with every all of us and with Robin and I'm wondering if the easiest way to do this is for folks to just fill in what your preferences are. and you don't need to do it right now, but maybe by the end of the week and then we can gather that up and sort it out with Robin and try to accommodate as many um preferences as folks, you know, have. Um, generally speaking, you know, some of the committees there there's some there's a committee of one in a couple of cases. Um, most of them are two or in some cases three. So if you want to um do something you have not done before or you want to sort of stick

127with the status quo just put your preferences in there and we'll sort of that process work for everyone. Yes. The only thing I wanted to mention um somerset K through eight is started a new one called central office which they're kind of running with superintendent go. Is that correct? Yes. Okay. So I didn't know if we wanted to also have a member if we want to do a slash superintendent schools central I think that Mr. Mashado was the one that shared that if I'm understanding it correctly kind of just looking at job descriptions like for central office and seeing how would you be most efficient. Is that correct? So I don't know if that's something that we would also like to add. So would someone from the Somerset K8 I don't know if there's anything

128in writing but is there a little description of or or what that there there isn't yet? I was going to say no I just heard it mentioned when I was at the meeting. So okay we can certainly put a minute superintendent administrative central office type of thing. Okay. Um all right great. So by Friday if you can Robin will compile and we'll we'll go from there. Um next item on the agenda is to discuss an act on the 2526 the meeting schedule. Go back to um and you have a a Google sheet in your folder with proposed dates. Um um we've got some new members. So, traditionally we've we've met on Tuesdays at 6 for starting time. Um generally speaking, overall does that time and date generally work? I know there's some exceptions here, but

129No, that's that's fine. I'm just trying to pull up the But I'm trying to see and Robin maybe I'm looking sort of at the the March we've got like one of those as a placeholder for public hearing maybe or we might need to add depending on how efficient we are with our budget subcommittee but we may need to add some dates in there in the February March time frame. Um but um does anyone have any um major issues with any of the proposed dates? The only thing is that February 25th deviates from the the Tuesday. There's a vacation in there, right? Um, is that because the budget? I was going to ask why. Why Wednesday, but not that I can't make it. It's just I think it's a February is tough because of the vacation

130week and trying to fit in, you know, enough Tuesdays for both committees. Oh, great. I think and and I'm not sure if this is part of it, but um we've run into problems in the past coming back from a Tuesday following a vacation with the posting requirements on the Friday if there is someone, you know, people are also on vacation. So the Wednesday after a vacation allows us to post on the Monday. I just changed that. That's why I was wasn't sure if it was something budget related or if it was something I saw. Well, it looks like the K to8 has booked the 24th, which is the Tuesday. Tuesday. Um Oh, because they needed to. So, starting the 25th. Okay. We can we can go with this framework and obviously with enough notice to

131the public, we can change things if need be. Um, unless anyone knows for sure right now something doesn't work. I do appreciate the March 16th versus March 17th. Robin, do you have something to do with that, Robin? All right. Because I think we last we had to meet on St. Patrick's Day. Yeah. Um, okay. Um, and I know that um, we have typically not met in July unless there was some urgent business that we needed to attend to. So, we can probably make that final determination at our June meeting. Um, I don't know if with the Turk project or if anything might come up that we need to address, but generally speaking, um, we won't meet in July. just maybe keep it as a placeholder. Um, we'll cancel it unless it's urgent and reconvene back

132in August. Um, okay. And just if anyone if anything arises, maybe just communicate with Robin if there if you foresee any problems with this schedule. All right, great. Moving on. Next item on the agenda is the regional school district budget transfer authority. Um, this is a policy for a second reading. The policy is DBJ-1. Um, we did the first reading at our last meeting. If anyone has any questions, if not, I would entertain a motion to approve the second reading of the regional school district budget transfer authority policy DBJ-1 as presented. Um, motion by Miss Fer and seconded by Miss Corville. Anything on discussion hearing? None. All those in favor? I opposed. So voted. Great. Um, next item on the agenda, our updates. Miss Solomon, do you want to start with Berkeley K to8 updates?

133Sure. Um, so we just had our town elections on Saturday. We have a returning member, Caitlyn Rosha, and we have a new member, Lisa Sullivan. Um, it made things a little tricky yesterday because our meeting was yesterday, so they weren't able to get sworn in. um just a little conflict with the town clerk. So, we had some things we couldn't vote on, some things we couldn't do, but so it was kind of a shortened meeting, but anyway, one thing we were able to do was appoint me back here to the region. Um and our chair, Tara, is our chair. Um so, that's it there. Um our superintendent updated us on the budget and where we are with the budget because we So, we do not have it fully approved. We didn't want to approve anything.

134There's still some things up in the air. We didn't want to approve anything last night without our full committee meeting. Weigh in on that. Um, we are closer to a compromise. Um, that is not as drastic as it originally was. We were talking um possibly 10 positions that we needed to cut because it was pretty bad. We're looking at at this point five cuts that may need to be made. Um we have we're waiting for the state. We applied for um some special funding. It's one time one year um funding. They have sort of let us know that we're we most likely will not get the number we asked for but some number in between. So that will affect the teacher cuts that we might have to make. we may be able to receive um

135one position, two position depending on on where we're at. Um but we will be we we are expected to get that information in the next couple weeks and our town meeting is June second or third second or third somewhere in there and we'll approve the budget right before the meeting and present to the town that um that's really all that we had last night. Do you want to tell them about the party? No, you're N. Go ahead. Why? Okay. Um, some some senior parents um thought it would be um fun, a good idea that remains to be seen. It's an idea. So, we're throw basically throwing a townwide graduation party for to kind of bring back our seniors from Berkeley that went to, you know, different places and bring them back together. We're have we're

136throwing a big party for them um at the Legion at the American Legion on in Berkeley on the 18th. 18th, right? June 18th. It's a Wednesday. Yes. before the Junth holiday. Yeah. So, um we're hoping to get some good attendance and and bring everybody back together and kind of celebrate their achievement, their accomplishment, and they can catch up on where they've been, what they've been doing, and where they've gone. And we're hoping to include some teacher appreciation in that as well, so that so bring back the kids from BA and if they went to private school or, you know, Aggie or wherever they ended up, bring basically bring back the eighth graders. and also have them speak to the teachers who um impacted them in Berkeley K to8 and celebrate the teachers as well as

137the the graduates. So hopefully it's not a disaster. It's the first annual. We'll see where it goes from. Awesome. Thank you. Somerset updates. Who's who's going to take agenda? All right. I did pull up the agenda. I may have anticipated this. I I think we actually had two meetings technically since we've had an update from the Somerset side. Um so the first meeting uh we h held at Chase Street Elementary School so that we could tour um the installation of our new windows um and and look at the work that had been completed there. Um and then we had a reorganization of the committee. Uh our new chair is Mr. Mashado. um and he is no longer here with us um as we now have Miss Corville joining me on this committee. So, welcome to

138Miss Corville. And um our vice chair on the Somerset Committee is Mr. Gaw. Um and that meeting was relatively short. I honestly did not open that agenda. Um we did have a lengthier meeting uh most recently last week um where we ha we started out with a joint meeting with our board of selectmen talking about the FY26 budget um and they had the opportunity to ask all their questions. Um and we also talked about, you know, some capital improvement um articles that we are bringing to the community at town meeting, annual town meeting for their consideration for our ongoing capital improvement projects according to our 10-year capital improvement plan. Um we also um had of course April financial statements and uh we presented a citation for Miss Ferrer. um who is officially no longer a

139member of the Somerset School Committee um but obviously still continuing to serve here and we're very grateful. We honored our students of the month. We also had um an open meeting law complaint that we discussed and um decided how to respond to. Um we had a healthy superintendence update from Mr. Skoonover. We had um a healthy professional development update. We had a healthy extended school year update. So, we feel very well informed on the Somerset side. Thank you. And um we also discussed who would be serving on our subcommittee assignments. And um just to go back to that question that was asked before, the name of the subcommittee that uh Mr. Mashado proposed um forming for this year and joining with the superintendent's goals is called central office model and that's to examine the central

140office model. Um my understanding that we use for both the Somerset and the Somerset Berkeley Regional School Districts. Um but I can certainly let Mr. Mashado know if you would like a description of what that fully entails. We can circle back with that information. Um and then of course um the reestablishment of the tri district collaboration of which I was appointed to that subcommittee. Um we also voted on our meeting schedule which you already saw on the document that was in our folder this evening. Those are the dates that we've approved. And um other than that, you know, we also approved um the second reading of the budget transfer authority policy and approved some minutes as well. I think that's everything. Thank you. Okay. Next on the agenda, um topics not anticipated by the chair.

141I have nothing. Does anyone else have anything? Okay. Next on the agenda, action items for future meetings. anything that we have not discussed this evening that folks can add on. Okay. If anything comes to mind, just contact Robin and we will add things as needed. Um, next on the agenda um is to consider approval of the open session minutes of April 8th, 2025 and April 28th, 2025. Um, so everybody had a chance to review that on the Zoom meeting. I think the date needed to be updated. The one about the Zoom meeting about the turf that was at least the the document I have I don't think has the right. We can just amend that. taking forever to open. Sorry, that's the 28th, right? Yeah. Yes. Oh, right. Just at the top. Rob already. Perfect.

142Great. Thank you. Good catch. Okay. Okay. If there's nothing else, then I would entertain a motion to approve the open session minutes of April 8th, 2025 and April 28th, 2025 as presented. So moved. Second. Motion by Mr. Panette, seconded by Miss Ashley. Anything further on discussion? Hearing none. All those in favor? I opposed. So voted. Next item on the agenda is to consider the approval of the joint open session minutes of April 8th, 2025. I would note that these were approved um by the Somerset School Committee. It was last week contingent upon the approval of this committee. So that's for the April 8th um joint open session. Um if there are no questions, I would entertain a motion to approve the joint open session minutes of April 8th, 2025. So second motion by Miss Ferrer

143and second by Miss Corville. Anything further on discussion hearing? None. All those in favor? I opposed. So voted. Um and next I would consider um the approval of the release, reduction or withholding of the joint executive session minutes of April 8th, 2025. And you can Are there any questions as to how how they're presented? Um I would note that these were approved for release with redactions last week by the Somerset School Committee contingent upon our approval. So I would entertain a motion to approve the April 8th, 2025 joint executive session minutes and release with redactions. So moved. Second. Motion by Miss Ashley, seconded by Miss Corwell. Anything further on discussion hearing? None. All those in favor? I opposed. So voted. Um and the last item on the agenda for tonight is public input. Do we

144have any public input? You're very patient. Cheryl Crossley Simmons, 570 Main Street. And um actually, it's very wonderful to see the young people here. Um I have a lot of respect for the young. They're the hope of our country. And there are so many changes going on right now. Uh and they're growing up in a completely different world. And with all the the things going on with parents and and you know, knocking heads with school committees all over. So, um I admire you for being here. I I have um grandchildren. Um the youngest is eight, the eldest is uh 40. I have a great granddaughter who's 14 years old. And I have seven children and um the uh one of them is strangely uh 61 years old and I have a 49 year old. So,

145I've been and and I was a a teacher for many many years in a lot of different arenas. Um, I've taught special needs in public school. I've taught just about everything else. And in a prison system, I saw I taught absolutely everything. People who didn't speak English. I taught the GE in Spanish. I went to You can do this, by the way, if you I took Latin, French in school, but um I took eight classes at BCC and If you're trying to travel someplace, that's really helpful and Spanish is pretty easy. So I could actually read the GED book in Spanish and I'd always get a hand from class. Um so uh there are all kinds of things and I've tossed postsecary and um every level and created most of my own curriculum. The thing

146is though um you've been talking some of you have been talking about when people are graduated from here and that there are a couple of ideas. I think a couple of you said maybe people need to be walking with their peers um across the stage even if they haven't been graduated. Well, I've dealt with a lot of people who've had those problems and I I've seen people to uh to teach math to who had grown up prisoners who had tears in their eyes because it's the same thing over and over and over and they never really heard the right sales pitch. Uh which is what teachers do. Teachers practice art. They have a bachelor of arts. They have a master of arts. They practice art in a classroom. And I think the teachers here do

147a wonderful job. You'll never hear me try to take a no matter what the The answers are you'll never hear me try to take a job from a teacher. You'll never hear me try to get rid of sports or music. There are people who come to school and they hate it from the day they start out till the day they get out. But if they're in music or if they're in art or if they're in sports, they learn to cooperate even if people are hateful to them on the internet or in school. And a lot of those people up and they just move someplace else where they're a little more comfortable. But the idea of having somebody walk across the stage um pretending to have been graduated uh is a problem from my point of

148view. And I'll tell you why. Because because it's an opportunity. When you don't make it in school, it's hard to grow up. It's hard an adolescent and by the time you're 17 years old, you are in fact an adult. You can join the military and if you join the military, you swear to be an honorable person and an honest person. And if somebody is is not uh actually graduating, maybe they've never met a peer in school. When I went to school, my father told me I might never meet a peer anywhere except in a book. The fact that you are together with people with whom you they have no real uh nothing really in common doesn't make that person appear and I would tell my children when you go to school if things are unhappy

149you don't like what's going on fine because these are the people with whom you will work when you get out of school you work with them for the rest of your life so you need to learn how to deal with people who don't like you or you don't like but the thing is if you are 17 years old and you are not making it in school and you're doing the best you can when you are 18 and you know graduating or not. If you if we as a school community say to them we want you to lie ste lie sheet and steel. If you walk across the stage and you are not uh actually a graduate, you are stealing really from the other students the value of their diplomas. Um if you uh then you're

150lying because you get your parents to rent you an outfit to do it. Um you pretend you're somebody you're not. You know, I was on the school committee for six years at Diamond, elected to Diamond. We would not have had someone from the carpentry shop walking across the stage who hadn't completed uh what was needed to be a carpenter or an electrician or or that sort of thing. That would not have been a very good idea. Or if you take courses after school um to to learn to do different things, medical things, would you really want somebody who really didn't complete the um courses? The other thing about it is not only that that I would not want a school community encourage someone to li to lie uh and and that's what you look like

151to steal. There are nasty people. There would be people audience that that kid's not smart enough to graduate, for example. That's the kind of thing that you you offer them if you're telling them to pretend. Um, it it's it's it's a it's not a good idea. But I've also worked with an awful lot of adults who had terrible times in school and did not graduate. And I can tell you there is an opportunity that's a learning opportunity. you can do something besides be good in academics. Uh and you can learn academics if you have the right sales pitch, the right teacher for you. And it it also puts you in a you know, it puts you in a a a different path to decide what to do with your life. So I have enormous hope

152and faith in young people. I've got a lot of them in my family and I've dealt with a lot of them. Please have enough respect for these young people to believe that they don't need to pretend that they're somebody they're not. That they can get out of school. And if it's been the most horrible place uh for them, if people have been on the internet saying nasty, rotten things about them, they are learning to get along in the world. They are adults at 17 years old. And please give them the respect of being the wonderful young people who will figure this out. There are opportunities everywhere for these people to find the right path for them. Thank you very much. Anyone else for public input? Okay. With that, I would entertain a motion to adjurnn.

153So moved. Motion by Miss Ashley, seconded by Miss Corwell. All those in favor? I so voted. Thank you everyone. Have a great night.