001Good evening everyone and for those of you um who are not in the learning commons this evening. Um we have a lovely full audience today. Um today is Wednesday January 21st 2026 and uh this is the regular meeting of the Cohassid School Committee. Um we will call to order with a roll call. Mr. Dial is um unable to join us. Mr. Evans >> Evans is here. >> Thank you Mr. Evans. Um, Mr. Mlullen >> present. >> Mr. Squatrio >> present >> and Jen Leky present. We have a quorum of four. So, we can begin our um meeting and we are going to begin um with Sammy and Leila from the Deer Hill second grade. >> We're going to do the pledge of allegiance. >> All right. So, everyone who's able to stand, please do so.
002>> I pledge the algiance 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. >> Great job. >> Thank you very much. So, thank you everyone. We do have a full agenda including um our Ozgood second grade um and we're very much looking forward um to their presentation um this evening. Um but we will take a moment for any public comment if there is public comment at this time um either from our in-person audience or um from anyone online. Again, we are on Facebook live. We're on 143TV. Um you can always come join us at the learning comments um as these folks are doing this evening. So not seeing any public comment at the moment. We will
003um begin with our invited guests and principal Godette. Would you like to introduce us to what we're about to enjoy? >> Absolutely. Great. I'm actually going to set up here and we're hoping the presentation shows up there. >> Yeah. Thanks. Yeah. Okay. So, uh, Emma, >> there she is. >> But if we're showing, we're not going to see. >> No. Would you like them to be there and then the presentation can be up there? >> If they stand there, >> they're reading the presentation from the slides. >> Yeah. >> So, we've got to Oh, did I? >> No. >> Okay. Do you want them over here though so that you can see their their faces? >> Yeah. >> Okay. Okay. And maybe before I share this >> principal God >> and maybe before I share
004we could introduce so that we know who's here. >> Excellent. and families. Anyone please do if you would like to see from the front, please feel free to come around and um stand wherever you feel comfortable and get a good look at your beautiful children. >> One of the best things about being an elementary school is we are flexible. That's one of the things that we're learning. Um why don't we start this way with introductions and school committee just so that you know um they're going to tell you the whole story of why they're here and what's happening. Um it's a little bit less, this piece of the puzzle is a little bit less child- driven um just due to time constraints, but they're going to give you the whole big picture via this presentation
005and talk about a little bit of things. They do welcome questions at the end. Um why don't we start with introductions? Remember, we don't have a microphone this time, so it's nice big loud voices. Emma, why don't you start with introductions? Just say that. Say your name. >> I'm Emma. I'm Sienna. I'm Nash. >> I'm Sammy. I'm Bridget. I'm Charlotte. >> I'm Leila. I'm Miles. >> I'm Caroline. I'm Ron. >> And they're going to give us an idea of what happens when you ask second graders to throw an assembly. So, Yep. You can start. You can speak from your spot. Okay, that's okay. >> Remember, nice loud voices. >> Oz staff develop a matrix. >> This matrix explains what is expected in every area of the school. Then Miss Godette held big stairs chat at
006the beginning of the year. Next, Oscar staff working groups decided on monthly assemblies. So teachers choose students to plan and present our first. Oh, let's look at those pictures a little bit. Aren't they cute? >> This was the actual assembly. >> Oh, I see. >> I know. Even preschoolers came to the assembly. >> Wow. >> We use Mrs. Scott at slid shows to plan the whole thing ourselves. >> We decided to make up some motions to help you remember the skipper cream. Be respectful, responsible. We'd like to teach you them to you. I told me be respectful. >> Be respectful, >> responsible, >> and safe. >> Now, since you know it, let's do it a little faster. >> Be respectful, responsible, and safe. >> What's next? We will have assemblies every month which will be
007planned by a different group of students each month month. >> Tickets are respectful, responsible and safe. >> Does anyone have any questions? >> Um, thank you. Um, Mr. Quadr,o, do you have any questions for our students or our principal? >> I can't say I do at the moment, but great job you guys. That was really awesome. And you guys give better presentations than adults I know. So, >> Miss >> I'm sure. So, um any of you can answer my question. So, how uh how did you like the experience of leading the assembly? >> Yes. >> Um it was fun. >> It was fun. Fine. You had a good time. How were you? >> It was fun. >> How did you feel when you were up there in front of everyone? Any feelings? Yes. >> Nervous?
008>> Yeah. Yes. >> But also excited. >> Yes. That's great. Have I saw you in the pink sweater in the back? You want to share? >> Um I felt a little fear. >> Yeah, of course. Yeah. A lot of eyes looking at you, right? Yes. >> I was mostly excited but a little nervous. >> Yep. I think those are all reasonable things to feel when you're up there in front of everyone. Did anyone feel >> proud of themselves? >> Yes. >> How amazing is that that you were able to do that? It took a lot of begins with a C. What did it take to do that? To get up in front of everyone. >> Confidence. Courage. Yes. Absolutely. Confidence and courage. I hadn't thought of confidence, but absolutely. Yeah. So, uh we are super
009proud of you guys. That is an really really exciting um exercise that principal Godette had you engage in. And you guys also by the way did a really good job reading all those slides. Some big words in those slides and I was pretty impressed. There wasn't one slip up. So I think that you did just as well as all the adults would have done. You guys should be really really proud of yourself for doing this in front of all your classmates in the whole school. Was the whole school principal God? >> It sure was. All at once. >> That's right. You said even the preschoolers. the preschoolers, >> the hecklers. >> So, you guys should be really proud of yourself. And then doing it in front of all these adults was kind of nerve-wracking, too,
010right? But you guys already knew it, right? How did that practice at all? >> How many times did you practice >> once for this one and then like four times for the other one? >> Well, it showed because you guys were basically perfect. So, thank you for doing this because I was curious about how it went. I was curious what you did in assembly at Osgood. So, thank you very much. >> To be clear, Mr. Mlen, this was actually different than what they did for the actual assembly. They went through all of the different areas of the school and the expectations within. So, this was just to tell that story. So, they actually summarized for us. >> Yes, they prepared this today in all of maybe 45 minutes. >> Oh, so you guys basically didn't
011even really practice this one too much, right? Just the one in front of class. So, that's extra impressive. Well, I'm glad that you informed me of that. >> Got it. Thank you guys. It's so nice to meet all of you. >> All right. Uh Mr. Evans, do you have any questions for the group? >> Nice job, everyone. Thanks for coming tonight. >> Thank you, Mr. Evans. And I will just add my thanks. I know that some of you may have a little bit of homework or have dinner to eat or lessons um outside of school that you go to. So, I'm very appreciative of your time. Um my question is about after giving your presentation to the entire school. What did you notice about the way kids were doing things on the buses at dismissal
012in the cafeteria in the hallways in their classrooms? What did you notice? >> I think we kind of came up with motions to change it up a little bit and to have a new idea to see if it works. >> Okay. And what are you thinking so far now that you've tried some motions? >> I think we are doing good. >> All right. What else did you notice? >> I noticed that a lot of people are doing better than they usually were doing. >> Okay. Fantastic. Yes. >> I noticed that it was probably a good idea to make to make up like all of the things that have kids in it. >> Oh, excellent. And here's what I'm wondering. What do you think about the power of your voice as students in your school? Because
013I'm thinking teachers have gotten up in front of groups of kids since the start of schools and said probably the exact same things like be safe, be respectful, be responsible. But you get up there and all of a sudden you're seeing all these changes around the school. Is that true? >> Yeah. >> Yes. So, what do you think about your voices as students? >> Better. >> They're what? >> They're strong. You have strong, powerful voices. >> Oh, and we have a friend over here. >> Let an adult. >> Oh, okay. I stepped into that one. >> As adults and you have strong voices and good things to say and you can be leaders within your community. Um, and this is a really wonderful first step to doing that. So, thank you. And thank you parents
014for coming out on a Wednesday night. Um it's freezing cold, weather is coming through and I'm sure you have lots of other things that you are moving on to next. Um so we appreciate you taking this pause um in your days to present to us and thank you Miss Godette as well for all the same things for leading this group um and for getting everyone here tonight. We had 11 out of 12 of our kiddos show tonight. 12 of uh 12 students were in the process of planning and presenting this. the only one who didn't come has been outsick. So, I really appreciate the support from families because it really is important that we shout from the rooftops what your kids are capable of and what they're doing at the outskirt school. So, I appreciate
015you too. >> Great job, friend. All right, as our guests depart, we will get ready for um our superintendent report of one moment. Yes. >> Get your gel out. >> It's actually All right. Well, I can promise you I will not be as entertaining or as fun as our kindergarteners were or our second graders were. >> Slightly more boring. >> Slight I will be slightly more boring. Yes. Um there is nothing like an elementary school child and group of children who like just make your day. >> Remind us why we're here. It >> does remind you by working. Absolutely. So um so I will try to be as entertaining as they were. Um so tonight I would like to just share some good news about the MECO program. So Cohasset has actually been a proud
016partner with METCO since 1968 and in that time all of our students both um Boston and Cohasset residents have benefited from this program as has our community. This year MECO is celebrating its 60th anniversary and we are supporting them in their celebration. Um, as part of that celebration, Mechco is hosting an anniversary ball on Tuesday the 24th, I'm sorry, Tuesday, March 24th, not January, at the Artists for Humanity Epicenter in Boston. This gala is an opportunity for fundraising for the MECO program as well. So tonight, I'd like to extend an invitation to you, the school committee, and our community, to purchase tickets to attend the MECO 60th opportunity ball, which is what it's being called. Um, tickets are $250 per person. Myself and Alisa Gens Carl will be attending, and we would love to be
017able to share a table with other Cohes supporters. If anyone is interested, I'll be sharing the information in my next newsletter which will come out Friday or people can reach out to me directly for more information. Additionally, this coming Tuesday, Alisa, Dr. Scolins, and I will be attending the Meco Legislative Breakfast at the state house. We attended this last as well. It's a great opportunity for us to meet with our state reps and senators who continue to work for and support the MECO program and to learn more about the MECO's legislative agenda for this year. Um, and on a similar but different note, I also want to commend the cohasset diversity committee of which Alisa is a part for the Martin Luther King Jr. breakfast that they hosted at St. Steven's Church this past Monday.
018The honored speaker, Reverend Edwin Daniel Johnson, shared how he continues to live Dr. King's message and legacy and how we can all continue that work as well. His message is one of being glad, which is being grounded in the work, linking up with other community members who have similar values and passions, acting in small and big ways, and continuing to dream to make our world a better place. Um, so that was a great way to kick off the week. That's my update. Um before I move into other items, you can ask a question. >> Um uh Dr. the legislative breakfast, the the mech legislative break usually precedes the um the advocacy day. I don't know though if they were committed to doing another one of those like they have in the past, although they were
019saying they might not have done one last year and then they did. >> Yeah. Um my question is I I've always thought it would be a really nice thing to include students in if it happens. >> Yes. >> So can can we try and keep that in mind because I think it'd be like a really good experience for kids. >> Absolutely. >> Other schools other districts have brought up I mean you you've seen in your >> last year was my first year there and so but we certainly saw students from other districts. So absolutely um if they run it again we will work to bring students with us. >> Okay. >> Yes. Great. It's awesome. >> Yeah. >> So, I know Senator Okconor does like a little presentation in the Senate after. It's a good
020sort of learning opportunity, something different. >> Wonderful. Yeah, it's a great day. >> Any other comments or questions from the committee on that part of the update? Thank you. >> All right. So, I am very pleased to share with you tonight that I have been in conversation with Mr. Carrie Simmons about recommending him to you for appointment as the next director of finance and operations for the cohesive public schools beginning July 1st, 2026. As you and the community are aware, prior to the winter break, we had three finalists for this position. One of our finalists withdrew her candidacy and based on our finalist days forums and feedback, Mr. Simmons rose to the top as our candidate of choice. Some of the feedback from those who attended the forums was as follows. Um, quote, I think
021Carrie would be a great addition to the office. He brings a lot of experience and I would be excited to see the contributions he would make to the team and what I could learn from him. End quote. Then quote, "Mr. Simmons had a strong experience and a compelling background. I think his prior experience working in tight financial environments could lend itself well to some of the challenges that we and all districts are facing." End quote. And the last quote, and there were lots of quotes, I just chose three, is Carrie is an excellent candidate exclamation point, which I think sums it all up. So, since his finalist day, I've had an opportunity to speak with Mr. Simmons, and I'm very much looking forward to working with him. In collaboration with Cherleski, our attorney, and Mr.
022Simmons, we've come to an agreement on a future contract. And so tonight, I ask for your vote in appointing Mr. Carrie Simmons as the next director of finance and operations for the Cohasset Public Schools beginning July 1st, 2026. And I just would like to say the reason he is not here right now is because he is actually presenting his budget at his school committee at the exact same time. and we are trying to be very respectful of the role that he is currently in and not taking away from the district he's currently serving. Um we'll take any comments or questions um from the committee um before seeking a motion to approve um the appointment of Mr. since I speak at will >> I have any question where he was >> okay >> I just want
023to speak um I want to recognize Dr. Shannon and everyone that was in the group that met uh we had a lot of really interesting candidates a lot of really great conversations and I think that uh it speaks to um Mr. Simmons kind of as Dr. appreciate I put rose to the top. We we really did have a lot of really great people and um I'm excited for this. So, um but thank you to everyone that was involved in this. Thank you to all the people who did apply. Uh every application gave us perspective. Uh so um really every conversation we had was was really quite helpful. Um so I'm very excited for where we are. >> Thank you, Mr. Evans, for sharing that. Um I think that the hiring processes in general at in
024our district are quite robust and involve lots of stakeholders. Um and so your additional window in there um is helpful to note um at this time as well as your thanks to everyone who is involved. Um so at this point um we will seek a motion if there is one to approve um Mr. Simmons as the new director of finance and operations beginning July 1st, 2026. Happy to make the motion. >> Take the second. >> Mr. Evans. A second. >> Second. >> All right. Seconded by Mr. Squatrio. Do a roll call vote. Mr. Evans. >> Cory Evans. I >> Mr. Squantredo. >> I. >> Mr. Mlen. >> I. >> Jenleski. I. Um. Please um let Mr. Simmons know that we are thrilled um to be welcoming him to our district and look forward to his
025skill set um as we move forward. >> Thank you. >> We'll do that. And also just as a note in conversations with Miss Owen, there will be overlap time. We just as we get closer to that time of the year, we'll decide if that overlap time is in June or in July. So, >> thank you for making that possible because I think that can be really critical in in terms of a smooth transition. >> Yeah. >> Okay. So, I know that it has just turned 2026, but we are going to start talking about next school year right now. Um, and we're going to start talking about the calendar because it's that time of year. I think the sooner we can capture at least some of the dates for families, the better. people often are trying
026to make plans um and so I think it's helpful. So in your packet you actually have two different calendars that we're going to talk about. Um and we're going to start the conversation tonight. And I say start because I think we're going to we may need to do this in two phases this year given some of the work that we're doing. Um and so right now I would like to at least start to identify a start date, the full day professional learning days and the vacations. Um we are still working with our professional learning committee to identify what days our early release days will be and I would pose to all of you if we are ready to make a a decision about Good Friday. So given that um I want to talk a little
027bit about what's being recommended so far and have some discussion on that. Again this is just a first read so we have plenty of opportunity. So in the packet you have two draft calendars. They are almost identical at this point. The only difference between the two is that draft one has Good Friday, March 26 as an early release day. And um with that, the last day of school would be Thursday, June 17th. Draft 2 has Good Friday. Again, March 26 as a no school day, which would push the last day of school to Monday, June 21st, 2026. It's important to note that because of Junth, June 18th is the day that we will federally recognize that holiday. So, there'll be no school on June 18th, no matter where we land. Um, other than that, both
028drafts include the first day for teachers being Monday, August 31st, and the first day for students, grades 1 through 12, will be Wednesday, September 2nd. I want this to be something that families pay attention to because this year that first day of school for students grade 1 through 12 is before Labor Day because Labor Day is late. Labor Day isn't until September 6th. So students would come back to school that Wednesday and Thursday before Labor Day, have Friday and Monday off as a long Labor Day weekend, and then be back into classes on Tuesday, September 7th. Our two full day professional learning days are proposed to be Tuesday, November 3rd, and Friday, March 12th. Winter break unfortunately will not be quite as long as it was this year. However, it's not terrible. Um we'll begin
029with a half day on Wednesday, December 23rd. Run through Friday, January 1st with students returning to school on Monday, January 4th, 2027. February vacation will be February 15th to the 19th, 2027. April vacation will be April 19th to the 20 23rd, 2027. And again, depending on the decision about Good Friday, the last day of school would either be a half day on Thursday, June 17th, or a half day on Monday, June 21st. And so again, I'm hoping what we can do tonight is have a discussion about the scheduled calendar thus far and be ready in a couple of meetings to vote these dates so families can really have them firm in stone. Um, by the end of February, our professional learning committee in February is going to survey the staff to learn more about their
030preferences for early release days once we have that data. I'd like to come back to you to have conversations about those dates and then we can do a different vote to add those dates to the already approved calendar. And with regard to Good Friday, I will leave that up to you to decide if you want to start that discussion tonight and over the course of the next few meetings or if you want to hold that discussion until Good Friday occurs and you have more data. This year, as a reminder, we are trying it out as an early release day. Um we don't know what will happen um with that but um that is something for us to consider whether we want to have that conversation as part of this first round of calendar vote or
031the second round of calendar vote. So I would open it up for questions and discussion. Before we do that, would you be willing to give anyone who is listening and didn't listen last year and Mr. missed some of missed the conversation we had last year as well. Um Mr. Mr. Evans, were you on the board uh committee at that point? I don't believe so. So um we had a conversation about basically are there enough students and teachers attending on Good Friday um to make it an operationally feasible um day for us which is also complicated because it is a religious holiday and we want to separate sort of our decisions around holidays from religious observances and give people the flexibility to celebrate as needed. I'm not sure I did that exactly correctly, but so please
032>> that was great. Um, I think what I would add to that is it really is an operational challenge or has been an operational challenge when it's been a full day and many districts um rather than have it a day of no school for Good Friday, it's a it's a day of low attendance. um which seems like a little bit of a a way to get around um celebrating a religious holiday because really it's not about the holiday, it's about the operational capacity of the district. Um and so really the decision was made to try it as an early release day because then it would still count as a day we could still get learning in. um and those who wanted to observe would be out of school in time to do that. Um and
033so, you know, I don't know what impact that will have on staff and students. Um and I think last year we talked a bit about not knowing sort of which came first either, whether it was staff being absent or students being absent. Um but in reality, you know, there's a a rationale for those absences. Um but either way, it made running the date a challenge. >> We can start with committee member thoughts and comments and questions. Um Mr. Evans, would you like to begin? >> If we make this a I'm looking just scanning the calendar, but it's just hard to kind of do it in real time. If we make it a closed day, where's the additional day that we're putting on? >> Goes from June 17th to June 21st, >> but that's only for
034the high school, the prek, kindergarten. Is that for everybody? Sorry, the text is small. I'm trying to read this live. >> Um, prek and kindergarten tend to end >> their 14th, then it would go to 15th. Okay. So for that week, we'd have one or two days anyway. But really what we're doing is pushing the school year an extra past an extra weekend to the 21st, which is a new which is a Monday. >> Yes. >> And that's a half day. >> Junth because Junth is a holiday. >> Okay. So I guess the question I have is purely operational, right? I think that that's a really good kind of rubric to to for us to be in, which is number of teachers absent, number of students absent. uh if it's the last day of school
035and it's in a whole new week and it's a half day on a Monday and at the end of June, what's the likelihood that our enrollment is going to be any better than than on Good Friday? So, um and that, you know, families want to go away starting on, you know, the 18th. This this can, you know, or the 19th that weekend, this can really throw a wrench in that. So, um I'm not that's an observation. Obviously, we thought about that. The one question I have is about that is if we are expecting to add on snow days anyway. We've got this big snowstorm coming. So maybe that's a week we're here anyway. So um some guidance on that if if if you feel like that's typically a week that we get into anyway and
036we're going to have this operational problem regardless of what we do. That'll that'll kind of sway me. >> Yeah. So, if as a committee you chose to do the either a full day or a half day on Good Friday and the 17th was the last day of school, if we had even one snow day next school year, we would be bumping to the 21st. If we have if we're already at the 21st and have a snow day, then we're bumping to the 23rd. And in terms of guidance, that is so hard to predict, as you can well imagine. I I want firm numbers here. >> We have had many a couple years now with not a single snow day and I, you know, no predictions for next week, but we've already had more snow, I
037think, than we've had in the last few years. So, >> I I think it's it's safe to assume that whatever we do, the exact opposite of what would be convenient is going to happen. So, um I don't I don't feel especially strong like strongly on this, but if I were to choose, I'm probably 51% making uh Good Friday uh a day off and bumping us to the 21st considering that we'd probably have to bump anyway for at least even one snow day. >> Thank you, Mr. Spriita. >> Um I came in tonight leaning more towards just having the day off. I think there's a real risk of the half day kind of just being a wash and we're really just like short changing ourselves by that. Um I know that this year is a half
038day, but we don't necessarily know what it's going to look like quite yet, but I don't know. I I just see risks of, you know, having to bring in a lot of substitutes, which costs us, and then how many students are here and whether, you know, what really gets done on that day. Um I know that we've pointed out kind of if the last day of school is on a Monday if that's also a loss, the last day of school is always kind of a wash. So like um you know I I don't know it it's a small change but I think there is kind of a risk of just kind of losing that day that you know wanting to keep the separation but also being realistic about the fact that not much is probably
039going to get done. And also on the point about obviously the 4-day difference between closing it or not is a big change, but the risk of one snow day is probably pretty possible. So that's where I come in tonight, but you know, I'm open to all suggestions and everything. So Mr. >> um yeah, we we had the debate uh last year and you know, we talked about Good Friday. I'm adamantly opposed to having any ruler solid days on our district calendar. I just don't think it's it's equitable and fair if we're only observing one whatever the whatever the the justification is being. That said, um you know, I think it was Principal Scott maybe that had given a presentation on the operational challenges um or at least discussed them. He may have happened to be
040here for something else and just discuss them. Um and it was persuasive, but I think that and that's why we came out with the half day as a compromise. as far as waiting to see how it goes this year. I think it's really incumbent upon us to move forward so people can plan in terms of the beginning of school um with as much um solarity as possible and I don't think we should wait. I think that you know we get that data and then we can incorporate into our decision next year um for the calendar but um you know my personal belief is we should just move forward. I know this is the first read tonight. We're not making any decisions. We're just bringing it up so everyone can discuss it and ask questions whatever.
041But, um, you know, I think we've had this Good Friday debate and we sort of made a decision already and until we have some data, which I don't think should delay this decision, we should, uh, keep in line with that. Though, we do have two new members, so and they're entitled to have their vote and they might vote against it, that's fine. But I'm not moving I'm not I'm not changing my position on that. Um, the the 4th of September, why is that no school? Maybe you already talked about that. >> The 4th of September because typically when schools go back before Labor Day, they have that Friday off. so that families can have that long weekend. So the students would be in on Wednesday, Thursday. They would have a 4-day weekend for Labor Day
042and come back that Tuesday. >> Okay. Well, I mean, it's already a three-day weekend and we're already back at school. So, I don't know. I mean, is that something because then we can get another day. We can get another day. >> So, I actually would want to consult the teacher contract because I actually think it's in the contract as well that they would have the Friday and the Monday off if they were >> that. But that's fine. It might be. Yeah. So, let's look at that. I mean, what are I'm just raising it as an issue because that because we're already up against Junth. >> We are >> at the end. >> Um and um so that's the other thing. That's the other um argue in favor of of of Good Friday being a half
043day because it seems silly to come back on a Monday. I mean, that's that's just that seems silly. And I understand it may be unavoidable given a snow day, but I don't think we should base our decisions on the chance there might be a snow day. I mean, let's just look at what would be reasonable if we don't have snow days. And it would be to me wholly unreasonable to require families to come back for one Monday at the beginning of the summer where they might otherwise be able to go away. But they'll disagree. I don't know. And that would give us another buffer day. You know, we didn't do that yet Friday. So, um I don't know if that's in the contract or not. And who knows, maybe the teachers would even prefer that
044we don't do that even if it's in the contract. I don't know. But who knows? I don't know what the perspective is. Um um I think that's I think that's all I had on it. Um but um again first read so we're not making any decisions. Hopefully people will share I guess the only thing I want to say is if you're looking if you're watching this or here um you have any thoughts I mean share them with either um the assistant super or any committee member so we know what your perspective is if you have any um I think we kind of made the decision around Friday at least once so we haven't I don't think had too much negative feedback about that but again we haven't got through it yet so but let us
045know. Thank you, Madam Chair. >> Um, I would just add I I think maybe I'm in the minority here, but I part of me would like to see the data from this year before making a decision about that, but I also understand um that I'm probably not in that part of organized people that vacation or figure their schedules out so far in ahead. Um but I I do appreciate those who are um managing complicated household schedules, work schedules, child care schedules, and so I I think that that is is probably a a a priority um and allowing people to plan accordingly. So hopefully to maximize student attendance. Um and I think that's that would be the reason why I would say we can sort of start to move ahead on this. Um I I agree
046with Mr. Mullen that unless we can do something for all holidays that people in our communities might be celebrating um it feels um doesn't feel quite right to be sort of balancing the way we do as our culture does on specific um holidays. Um that is just an aside. Um, and I think we also do get into um, as we get later into this summer period, we do get into up against some summer camps starting as well, which may impact um, attendance that there are camps that start that week of um, right after um, Junth. Um, and so there may be additional attendance impacts um, there as well depending upon when those snow days happen, etc. Um that's just another >> I had one two other things. >> Go ahead. >> Just to to build
047off um >> uh the idea of pulling of getting feedback. Is this something we should actively seek feedback from the community on with some sort of outbound communication asking what they would prefer um just to kind of get a really I mean sometimes I think we get feedback but it's usually three or four weeks too late. Um so if we could be ahead of that. The other thing is um just on planning uh I think the first question I got at the bus stop about what our schedule was occurred four weeks ago. So we're already I'm already getting the questions about what next year is. So we're certainly under I think we're under the microscope on that. >> And just so that um we actually did do a survey of families and staff around Good
048Friday last year. So we have all of that. Okay. >> This decision based on that data. What was Do you mind do just off top of your head? Do you remember what it was? >> I don't. >> Okay. But the decision bring it to the next meeting. >> I think in favor of what we did. >> I think it was um I think >> knew it was there but I wasn't able to look at it. >> I think it was actually fairly kind of split but I will I will dig it up and I will bring it to the next meeting. >> All right. >> And I do think we had a public comment. I'm so sorry I didn't see you earlier. if you could just introduce yourself, give your um street address and your
049question. >> Okay. >> Thanks, Stephen. >> Thank you. >> Um can we maybe go back five years and get data and we'll just like wait. We're saying let's maybe it's too late to just wait for this coming um Good Friday. But that's possible. I think an a um a data search from previous year's attendance was part of our discussion last year I believe and that data is >> yes and that we had that data looking at teacher attendance as well as faculty staff attendance as well as student attendance. >> So we have the data that led to this decision about the half day. We've never done the half day. So that's why we don't have data about what the half day would look like because we haven't done it yet. But five years ago, like
050let's say 2021, it's always been >> we were always closed >> close and then full day. >> We've never done the half day. So we don't have that data to shift. >> Thank you. >> Well, Ash 125 down street since you solicited from the audience. I agree with what Mr. Mlen said. When I looked at the calendar, I thought that we should go on September 4th if it's a uni day thing. understand. But that's I think better than staying over to next week and doing for sure. >> Thank you everyone for your input and thank you Dr. Shannon for putting together the school calendar. Um I know that that is um it's a tricky thing and it it requires a lot of accuracy. Um, so I'm glad we had the time to do a couple
051of reads on this and and to scrutinize um so that we get it right and get our committee uh community's input as well. Um, moving on to our teaching and learning block with Dr. Les. Do you mind actually letting um making a co-host? I actually want to show you another thing. >> I do not mind at all. While you do that, Um, but while you should be set. Okay, great. Um, first I wanted to share that our high school continues to get accolades on their achievements. Um, the College Board awarded high school with the AP honor role for their students and their strong scores on the AP exams. So again, that's always so nice. um picture of the sports earlier. So that was a nice little accolade to get. Um and then yesterday share um
052I was fortunate enough with Dr. Shannon to go to Dr. Dr. Duncan's marine science class. Um and you can see um the students were doing their presentations so for the end of their um course and they were such an impressive group of students and all of their work. Um they do it with CSCR. They um travel to uh to CSCR. They get outside. They are taking samples. They are running it through um testing. they have um looking at all of their research. They make hypothesis and I think I was so impressed by their ability to share out their whole process um and at the same time everything they're doing has impact here in Cohassid. So um it was really exciting to look at all the different um all the different work all around the harbor
053and looking at the bacteria levels, looking at the salt levels um and how those impact our harbor here in Cohassid. So um so that was really uh amazing and to hear the students talk about their experiences and um and how deep of learning this was. So just a perfect example of that project based learning um that we have talked about and we talk about in our strategic plan. So it was uh it was really exciting. So um and just one of the things that we do um and then also we um talked about my computer. I apologize. Um, we talked about the CTE for the middle school and how we had to create our pathways and so we have made our website um for for our student for our families. So you can go into
054the faculty resources. Just make sure you too many windows open. Just always thing is trying to update at the same time right now while I'm trying to do this. Of course I know. Let me see if I try. Ah, here it is. Okay, great. Trying to ignore the update. Hopefully it doesn't have doing this. So, um we wanted to make sure that families had all the information on our procedures. So, as your um child is thinking about their next steps, um the pathways exploration is on our website under family resources. It explains to you what it is and it's around career and technical education. Um and it gives students the opportunity to look at our vocational or um schools in the area. So, um, we have Southshore Regional Vocational Tech High School and we also
055have, um, Norfick Aggie. And so, this just explains what they are. It lets you know what kind of information students get, what kind of information you as families can get. Um, and then also, um, all of the process as well as then all of it's already been done this year because it have its own fall and it will be updated every year. So, you'll be able to see when they are coming to visit, what opportunities there are if you want to go visit the school, um, and what the timelines are for all of the things that will happen in the fall for them. >> I want to thank Lisa Poor Lisi for managing all of this for us. She does a really nice job. All right. Um, and then also and then do it again.
056Um, and so also I wanted to present to you that we have an application for an exchange student which we have not had in a really long time. Um, so I put in your packets the um policy so that you can see what the policy is for exchange to. Um, and so this student is part of the EF program. So, um that is part of the criteria under the policy um as well as having a family sponsor. So, that's wonderful. Part of it is is that um there's no reimbursement to us and so because times are different financially. I wanted to bring it to your attention. Um and so the they've asked that we wave our any kind of contributions which would typically be the cost per pupil which would be paid out but um
057that isn't something that typically gets done with or any of the other programs. So I just wanted to notify you at this point. Do any committee members have questions or comments about the um the policy >> just about the process. So yeah, someone >> maybe Dr. Shannon, it seems like you're anticipating one. >> No, go ahead. I'll let you finish. >> Well, no, it's fine. Go ahead. I mean, maybe you just don't answer the question. seems like you wanted to add some information about the process. And >> I I think it's a valuable experience. I think anytime we can enhance our student population with um students who bring different experiences, it's valuable. Um, I know that and we're going to talk about this that we're in a difficult place and I think that the last
058time that we've had a a family bring um and want to do this was um five or six years ago. Yeah, it was um yeah >> and so requesting the you know in other instances there have been times where I think the per people expenditure was not requested to be waved. I think in this case it is and so I think um I think there's value in bringing people to the district but really wanted to just >> so I guess so a family has indicated that they would like to host someone and that's that's how this has come. >> It wasn't someone from another country saying I'd like to attend class and it's not a true exchange where or are they is the host family looking to send their student to this >> not that
059I'm aware of other country? Not that I'm aware of. This is just an application through EF for this tube to come here. >> Okay. Um, and when does the decision like do do we make this decision or is this just at the discretion of superintendent of schools? >> Yeah, it's the discretion of the superintendent, but because of we wanted to bring it forward just because we haven't had in a while and because of where we are financially, we just thought that we would bring it to you. But I I I mean I think there's value in >> Yes. Maybe one >> um I I agree. I I think it could encourage future um exchange students. I I I had an exchange student when I was when I was a younger person and it was fun.
060It was a fun experience, but um I was just curious about how this originates and and uh and so it but it is an additional cost to the district if we're not being reimbured. So, something we have to think about, but maybe, you know, the juice is worth the squeeze, so to speak. >> Um, all right. Well, um, I just was curious about the process, how we got here. >> It's a good question. >> Any other comments or questions? >> I just have like a small question just to clarify. um kind of like in the event that there are like disciplinary issues or anything like that, >> obviously it says subject to all district policies, exceptions to the criteria are at the discretion of the superintendent. So you have >> an extra degree of freedom
061>> if something goes wrong. >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> Yeah. and and EF also has a contract that they um you know that they have the family and students sign and there's all sorts of things around discipline giving you know if you're worried about those pieces and um what their policies and procedures are >> I would also say that I I agree with um what Dr. Shannon and Mr. Mullen said around the the it it's enriching for all um for the exchange student coming to Cohasset to have a new experience um different from wherever they they live currently um but also for our community to um hear and see and have friends of different perspectives. >> Thank you. I think we have another comment from the >> Yeah, Cassandra 290 stream. I think it's wonderful.
062a huge proponent of international exchange of education. Having come from a background in that, I would just add to see if we could get a little more information about this particular student to make sure that we have the proper resources and the environment to meet their needs in terms of one English language proficiency and two a lot of times people um will choose uh alternatives to their you know traditional education system at home because of certain um cultural attitudes toward learning abilities or learning disabilities and things like that. And so in those environments, I have seen um some questions pop up in international settings whether or not they're equipped to meet the needs of that particular student. So just to be aware of but overall great idea. And there was another situation prior to this
063year where we had some of those especially like the the English proficiency um and that was a situation that we chose not to bring forward because it would have made things very difficult >> for for everybody >> but socially >> socially and it would I think it would have added stress for the child actually >> as well. Thank you for that insight. >> All right. And then finally, um, so I would like to let all of you know that after 30 years of private and public education, I, um, have decided that I am going to retire in September. Um, it's been, um, amazing being here the past seven years, and it's been a really nice place to end my career. Um it's absolutely been a privilege to um be in a district where the students
064are the center of everything that we do. Um and so I have appreciated the fact that um my values have aligned with the academic plans here. Um the collaboration and all the continuous improvements that we have um that we've accomplished and I'm so proud of all the progress that we've made. Um, and this is a really special place and you know we talk about the cohasset bubble um but this is really a wonderful wonderful place um and it's because of the people and so I've been really fortunate to work alongside dedicated teachers, administrators and staff who consistently demonstrate their deep commitment um to the students and to one another other and I'm so grateful for the school committee. we rode a heavy wave during COVID together. Um, and some of you were along that ride.
065Um, and so I'm so thankful for all your leadership and your support. Um, and then on a personal note, want to thank Dr. Shannon for her leadership, collaboration, and trust. Um, I thank Dr. Sullivan for bringing me on board a few years ago, and um, it's been so professionally rewarding. count and so on. So I wanted to let you know it is a little bit early but I want to make sure that uh you have the pick of the crop. Um and so um so it'll be um next year on my birthday on September 26 and so that will be my last day. Um super excited little bittersweet but I'm really excited to be able to start the next time of play in my life. So be it'll be a little sad but also be
066exciting. So, thank you everyone. >> Well, Dr. Scholins, I hope you will accept our thanks um as a district, as a committee, um to you for all of your leadership over the last seven years um and from everything from curriculum to teacher induction um to riding on school buses. Um I think you've done it all. Um and you have weathered big storms with us. Um, and um, I wish we could keep you or clone you um, forever, but also send you the biggest congratulations because a 30-year career in education um, is something to be very proud of and um, you deserve all the rest and travel and books and um, feet up um, that you can possibly fit into your days. So, thank you. Thank you. Thank you. >> Yeah. >> So, if I could
067just follow that up for a moment. Um, so I'm not gonna say a lot because I won't make it through. Um, >> it's a it's a long last meeting, too. >> Yeah. Yes. We have a lot of time, >> a ways away. Um, so, >> but >> I am personally just so grateful for Dr. Spelins and being able to work with her and making the transition easier for me, but it feels as if we've worked together forever. And so I'm just grateful that we've had this special time together. Um, and I'm going to be very jealous. Not that I'm going to be very jealous when she's on a sailboat in September and or in October um, sending us pictures. So, but we have had lots of conversation about next steps and just wanted to share
068with the community that we are um, ready to move forward. Part of the reason that she announced this evening is because we do want to um put the posting out probably early next week because we want to be some of the first to hire in this position so that we get the best candidates. We will run almost identical process to the process that we ran um with the director of finance and operations. We will form a full committee. We will um screen all of our candidates. We will have initial interviews that will identify finalists. We will have um forums for lots of folks to be a part of. We will gather all of that feedback before we make decisions. We will check references thoroughly. Um, so I will be putting out in the next week
069or so uh an email to the community to see if there are some parents or caregivers who are interested in being on that committee. We'd very much appreciate if there was a school committee member on that committee as well. not to be decided right now, but you know, within the next couple of weeks, we'll have staff members on the committee, administrators, teachers, department heads. Um, and so it will be a very, very robust committee. And then because Dr. Small's her retirement date is at the end of September, there'll be some nice book time, too, so that we'll have a real continuity of experience. So, we're very excited for Dr. phones and at the same time we're excited about a process of finding a new team member >> you you'll update the um the posting I'm
070sure right it's not recycled so you're going to because we gone through a whole strategic plan everything >> that and we had separated some of the responsibilities when we had the position where Roberts was in there and now it's so there's some work to be done there that we've started on um to block F budget resources and governance over to you. So I'll start with we have a gift from the PSO um which we did recognize the last meeting um there was some question on um one of the items which was I believe at Joseph Oford school um which was not discussed but this question um so they have since um forwarded an additional check $626 to um purchase clocks for the I think it's six clocks for Joseph um which was part of the
071bigger package. It just um was left out in the total amount of check. So just looking to accept that and thanks so I do believe we need to approve that gift um with our appreciation to the PSO um and to the grant writers. Um, so for a motion to approve >> the additional $626. >> Thank you. A second. >> Second. Um, we'll do a roll call vote. Mr. Evans. >> Evans. >> Mr. Squadrio. >> I. >> Mr. Mcclullen. >> Hi. >> Jen Leleski. I. Please accept the gift um by the clocks. And thank you PSO for your continued um support of our schools and our programming. >> Thank you. And next I will give you a brief just a brief up update of um the summary of the budget which stands as of um the
072end of December, beginning of January. Um I'm not going to read through the whole thing, but basically we as of today we have actual expenditures in a little over $10 million. Um we've encumbered 14 million6 resulting in about a 99.96 utilization of the budget. Um, in order to ensure that we maintain a balanced budget by the end of the school year, we have implemented a soft freeze. As of today, this morning, we have implemented a hard um so um didn't have time to update, but we had our own hard freeze. So, if it's something that's a necessity um for safety or educational reasons that we have to have, we're certainly purchase it. Um but we've said to um leadership that if it's something we can live about, let's live without it for now and and
073try to um have some savings um and keep the budget as tight as we possibly can. We also um have some staffing um openings. We still have several positions. We have an ESP at Deill, which is a one-year leave of absence. We also have an ESP at Deill, which is due to a retirement. I believe we just hired. Um, we have a bus driver do a retirement and I believe we're about to have another bus driver position open. We have a point five rating specialist at cause good which is to fill a long-term sub position. We also confer food service work our dual resation utility cost um the usage as we watch is declined. However, we have higher rates which have driven up our costs. Um so we're being conservative in that area. Um, we
074also got a notice um from one of the pieces of that we have a contract with the utilities that they're increasing their contract rates. So, um, TBD, we don't really know what those rates are going to be. Um, but we know they're going up even though we have a contract. Transportation. Um, we'll talk about the 14 passenger van that we purchased. Um, and we've been utilizing for field trips and athletics. It's resulted in 30 trips. Um we didn't have much data um in the last few months, but we're certainly utilizing it now. We've had 30 trips completed um by using our own um vehicle versus contracting out with a cost savings of approximately $10,688 when compared to an outside average of about $125 per hour. um state the total cost for our drivers to actually
075utilize it about $2,500 whereas outsource would have been probably $13,000. So we are seeing some savings um and I'm sure as we get to infrastructure and more into springports we're going to see even bigger savings are utilizing. We also um brought in a seven yeah 77 passenger bus um because some of them move to a capacity or having a longer time. Today the bus has been used for 17 offsite trips. The total cost for district drivers to complete those trips are about $2,800 compared to a little over $10,000. Um again resulting in savings by the additional bus of approximately $7,745 which again will continue to grow. The savings will continue to grow as we utilize that additional bus which is very great. So these programs allowed us you know allow the transportation revolving to not
076only reach a balance but to maintain the positive balance fund um which is expected grow um throughout this year. sustaining positive balance in the revolving fund is essential to ensure that transportation expenditures do not encroach upon other operational priorities. Um present day the account holds a positive balance of the low health which has not deficit. So it's it's definitely showing um increases. The athletic budget um revolving is still maintaining a negative balance as the winter sports season begins. Um all athletic related expenses including transportation and rentals for buses will continue to be supported through the operating budget until we can grow that reweling account back to a um a comfortable sustainable balance where it can offset some of our operation costs which is what we've done in the past. Um we're closely monitoring what's happening
077and you know consistent with approach with utilities any budget overages will be offset through identified savings and other budget areas. Um deficit right in the athletic development account has been substantially reduced. Um we started off beginning year in negative $154,000 um and we're down to $47,000. So, as winter sports um continue and spring comes in um we're confident that that that b that budget will clearly be in a more positive fund balance. Um you know short all athletic rate expenses as I said will be charged to the operating budget. Um and as a result, the school's athletic budget or the school's operating budget for athletics um is currently funding approximately $32,000 um in deficit. Um obviously other other areas in the budget are offsetting that area. So we are watching that closely. Um but because
078the negative balance in athletic revolving um the only option is to um pay for our expenditures out of the operating budget. Special education, transportation and tuition has not changed since the last report since um last month continues to represent one of the largest categories um and therefore by ongoing diligent oversight. even you know minor fluctuations or one um one in additional enrollment could definitely tip the scales in that at present special education tuition account remains in the positive balance um we remain balance of about $75,000 so we're in good shape um we're still doing our ongoing monitoring with you know tracking utilities tracking athletics tracking transportation um as I said we put a a hard hard freeze on our budget so um unless it's an absolute necessity you won't be purchasing a lot of um
079things that we develop for them. We also have all sets for grants um which I've listed. They have not changed so I'm not going to review them. Um grant you know DESIE provide additional funding to our schools and districts um and help offset some of our um some of our FTE some of our staff will pay from there and some of our supplies materials some professional development as well other things. So grants are definitely helpful. Um however based on you know our economic status we don't get a lot of grants. Um we're limited where other districts who um aren't as fortunate as us have a much greater list of grants. I've also listed our revolving funds where you can see the balances um and athletics is the only one currently in the minus of the
08047 that um will go along and then you know school self-sustaining um funds who collects and spend the money for ongoing activities with leftover funds um reused for future needs or to offset some of our operating budget. Um and you can see our FTEES where we are um versus 25 to 26. And just the conclusion, you know, we continue to demonstrate sound fiscal um stewardship at this point. Although utility athletic expend expenditure overages remain in the area of concern. Um they require ongoing monitoring. It's imperative that all schools and departments exercise deliberation in their spending practices which we talked to leadership this morning. Um through continued strategic costs saving measures and thoughtful budgetary adjustments, the district is well positioned positioned to conclude the fiscal year in a stable and fiscally responsible manner. If there's any
081questions and it's available online um it will be on our website tomorrow. um for the actual reports from our county system. >> Great. We'll um we'll take committee questions first and then I I think we do have some some public comments. Uh Mr. Evans, >> do you have any comments or questions? >> Yeah. No, I've got a lot I I do want to dig into a bunch of this. Um but I also don't want to hog up a lot of time. Um and I'm sure a lot of the questions I have other people will have, but I'll just I'll try to dive into some of the top levels. Um so first thing is um let's jump just jump to athletics. Um the sentence as a result the school budget's athletic allocation is currently reflecting a
082negative balance of 33276. Um so that's we're ignoring completely the revolving account because that's still negative. We budgeted in all ex all all athletic expenses into the operating budget. Does this sentence mean we've already exceeded what we built into the operating budget? We're currently even running that account above what we had budgeted for in the operating budget. >> Yes. But we knew that was going to happen. Um and that's where our savings and salaries is going to cover us. Um so this not something that we're worried about. It was something that we're we expected. Um, and it's why when I do my presentation for FY27, you'll see that we're trying to increase the budgeted line item because now we have a much greater we have a much more secure sense of how much athletics actually
083cost us. >> Okay. And that's just to date. So, what sort of visibility do we have on the rest of the school year and and that that line item? We expect that to continue to grow as a deficit, but we also know that that is something we can cover through our savings and salaries. >> Okay. So, let me jump into the savings and salaries. Um, just in the report, again, I'm just reading here. I don't know anything otherwise. Um, it says salaries comparison to budgets blah blah blah indicates a shortfall of 227583. Uh, so that's I've heard the the discussion about salaries coming in under budget, but it looks like that sentence to me says that maybe not be the case. It's only going to be we're only going to be able to uh realize
084a um, you know, some extra budgetary flexibility once we have the the revolving fund transfer. And even then, it's not going to it's only going to be, you know, $70,000. Am I misunderstanding that or am I doing math wrong? I'm just worried about th that those numbers. >> So we have we've encumbered um salaries for the district from now till the end of the school year. Um we have not accounted for any offsets from revolving. So um with the collection of kindergarten um going through the year we can transfer and offset um some of those salary shortfalls that you're seeing in the 227. Um we can we can charge we usually do a transfer at the end of the year through preschool. Um >> yeah know. Yeah. But I'm just trying to get to the
085the final number because um the the numbers are I'm not quite understanding the math yet. Um because we have it doesn't look if we have a shortfall already and we are going to have a transfer and then we're going to have a surplus with that transfer. But that still doesn't leave us a whole lot of room for other things. So, I'd like to I'm just trying to add the two numbers together and then I'm also looking at utility costs. I think we went over this last year, but this sentence also um it's just grammar which I which I'm getting lost in the sentence. It says that updated projected shortfall in this category is 188 inclusive of the 180. Um, does that mean we are going to be uh 360 above budgeted uh above budgeted plus
086encumbered or does that mean we're going to be $8,000 above uh budgeted plus encumbered? >> I'm going to be honest and say I'm not sure I followed all of that to be able to answer that question. What I can tell you >> is that Miss Owen salary incumbrances account for the amount of salary that would have been if those staff members who retired or left hadn't. And because we saved money with the hires that we made, we know that in that encumbered, which looks like we already spent it, salary line item, there is about 200 to $250,000 there that will cover the overage in athletics and in utilities. >> Okay. and the utilities >> over and above the offsets for kindergarten preschool. >> Okay, that's clarifying the the sense about we were already in a
087short form for salaries is one that kind of gave me pause because it was a little a little different uh as I read it than than what we've we've been talking with before. But that's very clarifying. Thank you, Dr. Shannon. And then for the utilities um just that sentence which says that uh the shortfall in this category is 188698 um so if we take the FY26 budget plus the 180 uh what's the rest of the gap for the projected shortfall um if we take if we um do do the if we include the incumbrances in our new projection for for total >> following on that money. >> I think he's asking this 188,000 shortfall >> is Are you asking whether it's inclusive of that 180? >> It is. >> Yeah. Yeah. I'm trying to figure
088out what inclusive in this context is. >> It does include the 180. Okay. >> Um but again, we we have encumbered or put on a purchase order a worst case scenario of what utilities would look like. um in the hopes, you know, we took last year's expenditures which we knew were were over and we added like 7% to it um and we encumbered that. So that number isn't spent. It's just sitting on a purchase order um that will continue to spend down with the hopes that there'll be some savings in that purchase order. So again, it's similar to the salaries in a sense that it's almost over I don't want to say over encumbered, but that's what it is. >> Totally understand the mechanics and and the effort and I I I applaud it certainly.
089I'm just trying to um understand the sentence. The updated projected shortfall in this category is inclusive of the additional 180. So do I have to add those two numbers together or do I have to take 180 away from the 188 because we are accounting for the additional 180 in that encumbrance mechanism encumbrance mechanism >> trying to phrase this question correctly >> put it in that figure. >> Okay. So if we our projections would be 8,698 above our budget plus additional encumbrances. So, we're we're still within we're we're within the landing zone still. >> Yes. >> With our adjustments. >> I don't know. Now, now I am confused. >> Okay. This is why I didn't want to take a bunch of time. All right. I I will um I'll follow up with with um both of
090you on this during our budget meeting. Uh I just want to be sure if there's a better way to phrase that because I think we talked about a few times and every time I find myself confused. So, um I will uh I'll leave it there, but thank you. >> You're welcome. Yeah, we I mean we can certainly you said the the budget subcommittee meeting we can dig into the the weeds of it um and maybe come up with better language. >> Thank you, Mr. Squatta. I just want to I don't want to take up more time because I know we have something big coming up. But on the salaries, this is $225,000 that we are short or we are saving. >> Our reporting is showing we're short. >> Okay. So basically we need >> we
091have a purchase order. >> Okay. >> It's holding that bucket of money over here. It's not spent yet. >> Yeah. Just at a high level, we need an infusion for that. I was just trying. That's what I came in thinking, but I started to get confused. >> No, no, >> that's not true. >> No, it has the extra two. >> Do you want to do it on >> I'm sorry. So, one issue is what you're about to say should be articulated on this summary, right? Because I know what you're about to say, but it's not clear to anyone. >> I agree with you. And so we need to find a way to portray that in our monthly budget reports where we actually are versus where we are based on incumbrances because where we are on
092incumbrances is very different than where we actually are. >> Um and so we need to start showing that in a way that is clearer I think to everybody. Um, so where we actually are is is though the encumbrances show a shortfall, we know that we're not actually going to use all of that what is encumber encumbered. >> Yes. >> And so there is no real shortfall in actuality. >> Okay. In >> to put it way too simply, it's a good thing. >> Yes. Yes. >> In a sense. >> Yes. >> Okay. I'm just because I saw this I saw a shortfall and I immediately added up. We are $400,000 short between the utilities and the >> and we do know that. So I will share like when you take the actuals and we need to
093find a we know we need to find a way to communicate this differently and you take the incumbrances away. We should be potentially close to $100,000 in the positive at the moment. So, if we if we haven't put the salaries or the utilities on a purchase order, which has happened in the we've done in the past, um it would be showing right now that we have about $17 million available to spend. Mhm. >> It's just we're trying to forecast and say, "Okay, worst case scenario, we need this." And that's with everybody coming out of this operating budget, which is not technically what happens. Like cafeteria doesn't, bus drivers don't, kindergarten doesn't. So all those things um are are not or they are included all those hours are included in that purchase um where they really
094belong into a revolving account. And what happens typically is if our operating budget we have enough money um we leave the revolving alone and let them build up which is what we're trying to do right now is build them back up. a few years back or five years back now we had an abundance of revolve funding in revolving accounts and it was um discussed that we need to start spending it down >> I just wanted to know >> quickly >> if at a because when I read this it was like red flag but >> absolutely >> at a high level >> we're in a decent place >> had we not encumbered anything >> we'd be looking like we have 16 or 17 million to spend >> okay Sorry. >> Good. It's a good question. >>
095Never apologize for questions. >> No questions are always good. Um, Mr. Mlullen, >> no. I think we've addressed my, you know, reading this looks like we have a $420,000 shortfall, right, in the end January. And that's not accurate. So, I'm sure in the And look, it takes a lot of work to put these things together. So, it's not just like a simple thing. So, I'm not It just happens to be confusing, but I know that a lot of work went into it. So, I'm sure the subcommittee will figure out a better way to >> publish this info so it's not confusing. Um, that's that's all I have and I know that >> um >> and then I would just add I'm phrase it as a question. Um, athletics still has income coming into it or
096anticipated income as of spring sports starting. Is that correct? >> Yes. Yeah. We haven't started collecting. >> Okay. >> And there's I want to say over 200 participants in spring sports. >> So that will that will significantly help with any deficits that we're running currently. And then my other question is about the staffing updates. Do we have people in those positions currently or are they unfilled at the moment? And I'm just thinking from the financial perspective, whether or not those are open positions with no one in them currently or whether or not they're filled and we anticipate them opening >> or or they're o we have information that they'll open but they they have a human in them getting paid currently. >> A combination of all of that. Okay. >> Um like we have somebody
097who's going on a maternity leave. She's still in that position, but we know that when she's leaving. >> Um so we're looking to cover that. Um, in other cases, people have already retired, but we're still looking to build a position because we need it. Okay. Yeah. Perfect. Thank you. And thank you, Miss for um your preparation. >> Uh, public change. Um, I am very excited to hear what I just heard that it um as a parent to me is confusing. What I hear is there's no money. there's no money. I'm like, we just pay. I have a kindergartenner and I'm one of the parents who pay the 3K. So, I know a lot of parents with kindergarteners, you know, resting like for me, I'm going to speak for me. Um, I would like to see
098like how how is that money being spent or was it spent? I have another uh son. I have three sons in the future. Are we going to continue to pay 3,000 for kindergarten? For how many years? The answers like that. I think we need for clarity. What's the What are the plans for the future? Is it only kindergarten who should be paying this 3K? If we're not using this money for kindergartener, for kindergarten, you were using the money for other items. Can we maybe ask other families to then also pay in some money? We're talking about being fair. >> So the money that's coming in for kindergarten that that the parents are paying is paying 50% of the kind. So it's paying we have six teachers, six pair professionals. It's paying for three teachers pair
099professional. So as like you can see here we have a balance of 229. that number you're going to see go down each each bi-weekly payroll. That number um decreases because their salaries are being paid off. Um and it can only be used for people. It can't be used for anything. And I would just add your thank you for sharing that perspective of families and I think um Dr. Shannon's presentation that is coming up next will help um give some more information about the trajectory that the school's budget and spending is going to take. I think having that information I don't know is it accessible on the website or like the newsletter. I know I read your newsletters every Friday um or every two weeks. Um if there's like a link so parents can click on
100it and see information about the budget. So this is our initial budget presentation and after we present we post everything online. So it will all be available and it's actually available in the packet that was sent out. So every school committee meeting of public packet is sent out and all of the materials are available there and then we also post them on our website under the school committee tab. So everything's available and I do share it after I present it. I do share it in my newsletter. So it'll be available in three different ways. >> And Dr. Does the agenda still come from you with the links in it so that families at home? >> I know that it used to net but now that I'm on the >> my used to be my name
101is right now but she used to send it with my name. So, yes. No, I'm looking to see >> just I was just thinking for families if you're like going through those emails and figuring out well which one it does has this school committee agenda in it. Um I think it's titled school committee agenda so but which is helpful but that's just >> it is yeah it's >> we do get a lot of district um communication which is great. Um I you know I can't >> I I can also figure that's a great it always was me on the bottom but now I'm looking at the staff one says chef or so I might be from Jennifer now >> yeah without further ado so um I'm just going to set the stage that this is
102a lengthy presentation so um I will present it in full and then committee answer any questions that you may have. Um, I'm so sorry, Dr. Sh. Um, that got sorted. >> There is there is a a a quick comment and I I'll just read it into the the public that uh Courtney Murphy of 480 Jerusalem was um having problems seeing the document beyond the first three uh paragraphs. Um so, Ms. Murphy, I believe that that did get um adjusted and as we just mentioned that all of those documents are online. Um and apologize for you not being able to follow along live with us. And I think she actually added another comment. She found it in the packet. >> Oh, good. >> Um so she ended up being okay. >> Okay, good. >> Okay. So
103I am gonna present. So, um I think that presentation from Miss Owens set the stage nicely for this presentation. Um we worked really hard in this budget cycle to create a budget that is incredibly reflective of the costs of the district. Um, I think last year we worked to get to a place where we could have a balanced budget and this year we've taken it a step f step further where we dug deeper. We looked more closely at everything every single every single thing that gets spent in this district we looked at and talked about. Um and so we have um really tried to capture a budget that is reflective of the spending in the district. Um you know it's a lengthy pro project to build a a budget. Um it starts in the fall
104with recognizing our what our needs are and our enrollment projections with setting our budget priorities. It was important to the committee that we built first a level service budget. So that means that we were tasked with building a budget that provides everything that we are currently providing this school year. Um the budget that you're going to see is that and it includes some additions that are guided by our strategic plan. And part of the reason that this budget process, as you're going to see, is still a little bit unclear is because the governor's budget doesn't even come out until December. And then the updated governor's budget came out today, which we actually haven't heard anything about. I saw our interim town manager earlier today at 11 and it hadn't come out yet. So, um, we're
105still waiting on that information. So, we're presenting to you a first pass at the FY27 budget. We will continue to refine this budget based on final numbers from the town for what funding allocations we'll receive and your direction. Um we will get to a place where we have uh a joint meeting with select board and advisory and then in March we will have a public hearing as a school committee and then you will vote and we will then have the the town has the chance to weigh in at the annual town meeting to vote the budget. As I said earlier, everything that you see in our budget presentation and our budget recommendations are guided by our strategic plan. Um, we have a new strategic plan. This is year one of it. So, we are looking
106to move into year two. Um, and the fourth compass point of the strategic plan is resources. And our resources are human resources and financial resources. And we need both in order to make our district run and to maintain the excellence of the current district that we are all a part of. And so just a few things that we do have a a real strong tradition of excellence in this district and I think have made great strides even in the last 5 to 7 to 10 years. Um none of these will come as a surprise to folks but we have earned our blue ribbon status. We have one of 13 districts in the state to have returned to pre-COVID achievement levels in both ELA and math. Our high school is recognized as number four in the
107Boston magazine ratings. Middle school is number nine in Massachusetts. And for the I think the third year in a row, we've received the AP platinum status for our high school students. And I'll talk a little bit more about that later on. Um, we have 1382 students, 254 staff members, four schools, and our graduation rate is is it's really 99 plus%. Um, it's interesting how that's figured, but you know, we have an incredibly high graduation rate. So again, so far this year as a school committee and with collaboration with the district set budget priorities and a budget calendar and we're not going to bury the lead um as a district in order to maintain level service which continues class size, honors our contractual obligations and moves us towards the goals outlined in our strategic plan. We
108need 27,781,999. That is an 11.88% increase over our current budget. Um the difference, the dollar increase is 2,950,510. And I think it's really important that we note right now and throughout the entire presentation that all of these numbers are estimated because we are currently in contract negotiations with our teachers union um both our educa our teachers our ESPs and the secretarial union as well. And so while we can guesstimate where we may land, those numbers won't be secure until we have finished our bargaining with those three unions. So it does make things a little difficult. So we spent a lot of time looking historically at where we are and where we have been and we really went back to 2019 FY209 for everything that we looked at. We talked about going back even further, but
109there was a real change in education with CO. And so to compare true true precoid to current felt a little disingenuous because how we approach education has changed even financially our world has changed and what we have for resources. And so we thought it was important as people look FY29 through FY27 to see that year overyear in order to maintain a level service budget and to grow in ways that the district requests. We've constantly been looking for close to five all the way to 8 9% in order to make our district run and to maintain that level service. At the same time, our allocations from the town have ranged from two and a half% to 4.3%. So, our requests are constantly outperforming what we actually receive from the town. Um, but what we're trying to
110do right now because we are working very closely with the town in collaboration with the town and we're actually trying to stop saying the town and the schools as much as possible because we are one community, but we are talking about just school funding in this case. Um, and so we really are trying to create a budget that accurately reflects our current the current FY20 or the FY25 and current FY26 spending and includes the contracted and recommended FY27 increases. As we look at how our budget functions, it's important to note that 79% of our school budget are salaries. Those are contracted costs. They are not costs that we can change. In addition, 5.2% of our budget is for out of district tuitions for special education and utilities are 3.8%. So 88% of our budget is
111based on numbers that we actually um don't have a lot of control over. Anyone who I've had a conversation with in the last few weeks has heard me say I I get really frustrated with utility costs because in the in a few slides you'll see that our usage rates continue to go down. So, we're controlling what we can control, but the costs continue to rise. And that's really frustrating because that's out of our control, but that equates to teachers. And while we can't always learn, you know, we can't have no heat, we can't have no electricity, we need our teachers, too, because they are the ones who make the difference in our children's lives, in their academic achievement, in their social emotional well-being. And it that's a hard thing for me to reconcile, but we
112have to reconcile that as we're talking about a budget because this is real and there's only so many there's limited resources. And so as we look at the requests for this year again, you'll see salaries are a huge component of our budgetary drivers. Um in addition, special education, utilities, athletics, we'll talk about that. Um, and we are looking at full day kindergarten as well. Before I go any further, I just want to take a moment and just explain how schools are funded because we don't really make money. We don't bring in a whole lot of revenue. Our our jobs are to develop children. Um, not to bring in funding, although we do bring in some. We are looking at creative ways to to bring in more. Um but most of our funding comes from state
113and local funding sources, municipal funding. Um a lot of the folks will hear about chapter 70. That is the state aid. It's a funding formula. We rely on that. It comes to the town. We get a portion of it. It's based on a lot of factors that I'll talk about in the next slide. But the majority of our funding comes from local appropriations. And so that is what the town brings in through property taxes, through um meals tax, things like that. And we get a portion of that. We actually get um 61% of that. Um and then we have some grants and offsets and then we have some fees as well. But the way that schools are funded and not just Cohasset, every school in the entire Commonwealth um is is based on some of
114these funding formulas. And this is a structural issue. It's not an issue we are going to solve alone. It is an issue that the um government is working to to try and solve. Our local and state reps are have taken up this cause. Governor Healey has created a task force to look at this. And so some of this is a structural deficit. It is not the fault of the schools. It is not the fault of the town. It is not the fault of our community. It is a structural um system that is has become ineffective and outdated. And the problem is is that changing that is not moving as fast as we need it to move in order to fund the schools this year and next year or even the year after. Um, so to
115go a little bit deeper, and some people may want to tune out for a minute, but if you're tuning in, chapter 78 is based on a a calculation that calculates the minimum adequate spending level for our district. It's based on enrollment, wage adjustment factors, and inflation. and the state will tell the town of Cohasset as a municipality what the minimum amount of money they need to provide to us is. Cohasset's a wonderful community and they always go above that. Um, but our high property values and high income for residents and the municipal growth revenue growth factor, all of that makes because of the formula makes it seem like Cohassid can fund more of the budget that they c that than they can and that's not reality. And when they look at the enrollment factors that
116determine our per pupil expenditures, for instance, they're basing that on 13 categories. Categories 1 through 7 are for everybody. And that's your base rate. It's categories 8 through 13 where districts often see the inflation of money. As a district, we don't have as many students in categories 8 through 13 as many other districts. So, we aren't getting that extra infusion of cash and that's part of our district's. And again, that's the state funding formula. It's not anything that anyone who resides in co has it can change. So, this chart just shares with the community and you as a school committee what our chapter 78 aid has looked like over the years. And you can see that it it it's changed and there have been years where there's been no change. There's been years two years
117ago they tried to give every district a little bit of a bump. Unfortunately for us, that doesn't equate to a whole lot of money. Um, so it it is a component of how we're funded. So as we started to look at, we know that's how we're funded. We know that, you know, times are hard. So we really started to look at historical trends in a lot of different areas from our spending to our enrollment to our class size. And so when we look at enrollment trends from 2019, which is the year that COVID began, right? We be co started in March of 2020 to now. Um you'll see that we have excuse me, we have our our student body numbers have declined from 2019 to now. We are 121 students fewer than we we were.
118And there's a little bit of an up and a down because that's how student enrollment works. There are some years where there's high birth numbers and some years where there's low birth numbers. Um, and we have to account for that. That said, when you see this, it makes sense for people to say, well, how come we haven't reduced more staff? And there are two points to make here. One is because we're down 121 students doesn't mean you're down the same number of students in a grade level. And it doesn't always equate to a whole teacher. So if you're down four students across every grade level, that's not a teacher. Now, when you look at these numbers, you'll see though that in some grade levels, the numbers are higher than others. And that makes sense for
119us to start to look at, can we make staff reductions in those areas? Can we rightsize the district a bit based on th those enrollment trends? and just so there's the grayed out um column. That's our projection for students for next year and that's based on who's enrolled this year. We obviously don't know our prek numbers. We don't know our kindergarten numbers yet. We should know those by the end of this school year. We always start doing kindergarten and preschool enrollment now. However, it takes a little while for that to get happening. Um, and so it's not until like Mayish, sometimes June, that we know our true numbers there. So, we're basing this really on what we what we think historically is happening. And so, I've also provided, you know, eight years, seven years of
120historical class size data at the elementary school. and what it could look like next year based on our current numbers. Um whether we maintain the sections that we currently have or if we get to a place where we have to talk about reducing sections and what those class sizes would potentially look like. You can see that right now if we maintain our sections at the elementary level our class sizes will range from 18 to 21. If we have to reduce sections that could look like anything from class sizes of 21 to 25 26. Um, and every year we have moveins, we have some shifts, people move out, and so that it's always hard to predict how many students will end up being in a grade. So, it's easy to predict and to look at historical
121class size data at elementary school because it is as simple as you have a 100 students, you have four classrooms. We don't. I'm just using as an example. Therefore, you have 25 students per class. When you get to middle school, it's a different ball game and then it's even a whole different sport when you get to high school. So, we're going to talk about that in a minute. But middle school class size is different because all of a sudden your students are switching classrooms. They have a diff teacher for English, another teacher for math, science, social studies. We also have um levels at the at the middle school level in seventh and eighth grade for accelerated English and accelerated math. We also have choice for students. They can choose French. They can choose Spanish. All
122of that impacts class size. And as someone who built a middle school schedule for a long time, it while we're always trying to look at balancing class size, sometimes those choices that kids make or the recommendations that happen drive some class size as well. Now, at the middle school several years ago during COVID, in order to address some of the gaps that existed for students because of hybrid learning, at home learning, all of those things positions were added at the middle school. an additional English teacher, an additional math teacher, an ELA reading specialist, and a math specialist. The return on investment of those positions has been huge. It's part of why our scores are what they are. It's part of why we don't have the learning gaps that other districts have. It's part of why
123our kids feel successful. That said, when you look at our class sizes at the middle school right now, there is room for those class sizes to be different. And so, as we look at what reductions could be made if we have to make those reductions, this is an area that we have to look at. It's fiscally responsible for us to to look at the class sizes that currently exist. At the high school, it gets even more complicated. So, at first glance, for example, this is just ELA. At first glance, it looks like we have a class, English 11 college prep, where there are seven students in a classroom. But that's not the reality because English 11 accelerated and English 11 college prep actually happen at the exact same time in the same classroom with the
124same teacher. They are one class though they are two rosters and the teacher differentiates based on level and they earn different credit but there are really 21 students in that class. So, it is really hard to represent true class size at the high school on a slide because it's incredibly complicated. In addition, at the high school, course levels really come into play because almost every course is leveled, electives and choices come into play, and postsecary planning starts to come into play. And so in order to accommodate all of those things, which any good high school does, it manipulates class size. So that said, as I look at maybe a different department, science for example, when I go back to English for a minute, all of our English courses are required courses. There aren't actually any
125electives in our English department. The same can't be said for our other departments. So, science, for example, has required courses and elective courses. And so, this is part of why you see some discrepancy in what class sizes look like. So courses like um just looking to see um biology accelerated and biology college prep that's a required course. Now you'll see that there's only 55 students registered. So the other thing that people need to understand about the high school is that it is on a block schedule. So half of our students are enrolled in some courses for first semester. So September through it's finals week or midterms/finals right now. So through the end of January and then in many cases if it's not a full year course they switch courses altogether from the end of January
126to June. So again this plays a role in why we can't just divide out students and average class sizes for high school. But we also offer a lot of opportunity in many of these other subject areas because we are a district that values having opportunities for students. We are a district that is prioritizing um providing professional pathways for students so that they have an opportunity while they are here in compass at the high school to explore their interests to help them make better decisions for their post-secary planning whether that's college career military whatever it is Dr. Scholan shared the marine science presentation right now. Marine science it has 20 students in it but it's there's two sections so 10 students each. Can that be reduced to one section? Yes, probably. We have to figure out
127what that impact is and it might mean that some students who want to access it can't because they're also in accelerated um or probably it's junior year so probably AP statistics AP lang history >> AP euro um so and all of that creates this bottleneck of what sections students can be in. It's one of the most complicated jinsaw puzzles to schedule a high school that you can imagine. Um, and so some of the conversations that we're going to have are going to test our values because it's going to p our values against our financial responsibilities and that's going to be really hard. And one of the things as I've been talking to people, the question has come up was, "What about the block scheduling? Does block scheduling costs us more?" I would I would challenge
128us to define what cost is. um as a district that in our strategic plan we clearly state that we are looking to be at the forefront of education and be the innovators and have other districts follow us. Block scheduling is a component of that. As a district that says we want to be a district that really provides project based and deeper learning opportunities for students, block scheduling is set up to allow us to do that. is a district that says we want to take care of our kids academic excellence as well as their social emotional well-being. Block scheduling allows for that. What you see on these slides are two quotes that came out of the NEAS report which is the accreditation for high schools in New England. The report came out this year. It praised
129our block scheduling as one of the components of Cohasset High School that allows us to be the great school that we are. In addition, our guidance counselors really analyze the block schedule versus a regular traditional high school schedule. And some of these are the benefits. And I will say we took two individual student schedules and we translated them into a block schedule. One student was a um higher performing student. One student is a student who has been on an IEP for several years. Um and the differences between what both would experience in a traditional schedule versus the block schedule was staggering. for the student not on an IEP, that child would not have had access to many of the AP courses that they took or they would have to take five APs at a time
130in order to do it, which is not good for anybody. Um, they also would have had a dramatic decline in their GPA, which would have changed their trajectory for applying to college. But I would say more importantly for the student who has been working incredibly hard and is on an IEP, that student was able to change their trajectory dramatically because of block schedule. They had more access to intervention through student services. They were able to get more support. And so this student came in to the high school with algebra 1 and is now as a senior taking differential calculus. In a traditional high school schedule that would never happen. I've worked in many districts with traditional schedules and one of the biggest challenges is how to support students who come in developmentally in one place
131and they grow as high schoolers but they don't have the opportunity to show that growth because the schedule doesn't allow for it. Additionally, our time on learning is especially in our year-long courses offers our students far more than students receive in other districts. And I believe and we'd have to do a study to really get the our data that it is why our students come back and they say we were ready for college. Our kids are set up for success. So, we also looked at historical trends with staffing. Sorry. Um, and this was really interesting because, sorry, I'm going to move this because I see that number is important. This was really interesting because I think there's this um belief that we have dramatically grown in terms of staffing from 2019 to where we are
132currently. But in reality, we have increased by nine FTE. And for those who aren't familiar with how FTE translates in schools, FTE is a full-time equivalent. So, as someone who works full-time, I am a 1.0 FTE. Um, many of our staff members are 1.0 FTE, but we also have many part-time educators who are 0.4 4 FTE8 FTE and so 9 6 FTE may or may not represent nine humans. It may represent more but pieces of of those of humans. Um I don't know how else to phrase that. So um but we are even looking into this a little bit deeper and really thinking about what who was added and why. But what we do know is that many of these additions were brought in to support students academically and social emotionally through co and again
133the return on investment in those investments has been really helpful and beneficial and we see in the data that it was important to bring those positions in. Does that mean there's not room there based on our class sizes and our student enrollment? No, we're looking at that. But it also has been helpful and we're not as we didn't balloon in staff as much as I think people think we did. Historical trends in terms of utility costs, you can see that they continue to rise. This slide is there for everybody. I actually think that this slide is the more interesting slide because on the right you can see that from FY22 to FY25 in every single area our usage has gone down. Over those same years our costs have continued to less. Again we're controlling what
134we can control. there's not much else we can do to control our utility cost at this point. Um, we also looked very closely at athletics and so we may we don't have as much historical data necessarily in all areas of athletics that we would like to have. We have some, but one of the things I want to share with people is that 86.4 4 of all high school students participate in at least one sport. That is an incredibly high number. Most high schools that number lives in the 50 to 60% range. So for us to be at almost 90% of our students participating in sports, that says something about where our students place their values. Principal Scott recently did a survey of of students and many of them said that some of what they learn
135the most through their high school experience comes through athletics. And so as we look at the cost of athletics and we talk about the cost of athletics, it is high, but it is something that is incredibly important in this community and to our students. And not just because of the athletics, it's what they learn from being a part of a team, what they learn from being a performer in that sport. Um, and as I talk about this, I don't want this to sound as though we don't support the arts. We absolutely support the arts. Our student choice in what they're signing up for though is very much heavily placed in the athletic realm. So we're not cutting we're not we're still supporting all of the arts. I want people to be clear about that. So
136spending though for athletics has been interesting because we have always funded athletics in two ways. Through a revolving account and through the operating budget. Our revolving account used to be higher. as it was spent down, what didn't happen necessarily was an increase in allocated amounts in the operating budget. And so we ended up overspending because it didn't transition in the way from one to the other because we didn't stop spending money for athletics when the revolving account went down. We just stopped accounting for it in the operating budget the way we should have. So as we talk about the athletics in the FY27 budget, we are trying to rightsize the athletic spending. It is going to be higher in the operating budget because we have to rebuild the revolving account. As we over the next
137couple years build back up our revolving economy, we will be able to bring the operating side of athletics down. But it's going to take us a few years to get to the place where we are sharing the expenses in a way that makes sense between operating and revolving. Um, we've also been looking very closely at cost per sport and we started that last year. So, I have data on every sport from FY25. I don't have data from FY26 for winter or spring because we're still in the middle of winter and we haven't had spring yet. So, I can only do a comparison of of cost per sport for fall sports right now. By the end of this school year, I can do this. And I say I, it's Mr. Rotundi who really is providing all
138of this data. And so, I'm very grateful to him for pulling it all together. But we can provide this data for all sports by the end of the year. I I'm going to share I was surprised by this data. I went into manipulating this data with lots of assumptions and those didn't play out the way I thought they would. Um so you can see that the cost per sport is very varied by sport and that depends on number of athletes, number of games because of the more games you have more refs which cost more money, travel, all of those things. And I have a breakdown of every cost and expense and revenue resource for each sport. But this is a a good overview. But you can see that as we talk about, you know, last
139year we increased fees for athletics. Though it may not look like every sport is covered by that fee, when you look at the cost per participant, we actually are covering that cost right now. We don't know yet if that will be the same for fall for winter and spring because we haven't had those yet. So these are winter sports and what the costs per student last year. So 2025 to 2026. No, sorry. 2024 to 2025. Um, and again, you can see some of the costs for the sports that costs more. Those are sports where we have to rent facilities. Um, some of these will be different next year. Our gymnastics team is now co-opted with three school, two other schools instead of one. Our swim team is now co co-oped with Hangingham. So, some of
140those expenses will go down because we're sharing wherever we can. We do that and the numbers capture our students not so like gymnastics last year was Cohasset and Norwell. This only captures the Cohassid students, not the Norwell students. and then spring sports um you know similar process but again we're going to be looking to see what that 2026 looks like as well. And another question that's come up is the number of staffing that we pay for athletics. Um, we are very much aligned with everybody else around us on for most sports. We pay through our contracted stipens for two coaches, a varsity head coach and an assistant coach who usually becomes the head coach for the JV team and as an assistant for the varsity. any other coaches that families or community see on the
141sideline. The majority of them are volunteer coaches that do not get paid at all. Some of them get a small siphon through their sports boo booster to be there as a volunteer coach. The only sport that has more coaches is football due to the nature of the sport and because they have about 55 students. Um and so you need more adults with that sport. Um but we are very much in line with the number of coaches that other towns have for football. And we have we have unpaid volunteer coaches in addition to the five paid state positions for football. So I'm going to switch gears and talk about special ed. So we have in district special a costs and we have out of district special a costs and it's important to know that as a
142district we are first and foremost morally obligated to provide our students with the services that they need. We are also legally obligated to provide our students with the services they need. And because we are a small district, we can't always provide those services here because we don't have a cohort of students where financially we could create a program. Tuition rates at out of district placements are somewhat regulated by the operational services division of Massachusetts, OSD. In 2022 to 2023, OSD allowed out of district placements to increase their tuitions by 14%. That was an almost untenable increase for most districts at that time. How most districts handled that was they used the circuit breaker funds that they had been keeping in a rears and they used the circuit breaker funds that they received that year. It
143was the only way to cover that 14%. What that did was left us with only the current year's circus circuit breaker, not anything else. And you can see that they continue to increase their rates at a higher percentage the following year. Um, not higher than 14, but at 4.69 and 24 to 25, 3.67, it's now coming back down to three. But that has a huge impact on a district-l costs, they're they're relatively high. Um, and circuit breaker doesn't cover all of those costs. So, we know again similar to chapter 70 that this is a structural issue with school budgeting. And we're very fortunate that Senator Okconer Okconor, who is our senator, is leading the charge in changing how out of district placements are funded. Right now, out of district placements, the way we're funded is
144you take the foundation number. Anything above that, we get funded at 75%. his push and those who are working with him is to fund districts 100% over that foundation number. That would make a huge difference to districts like Cohexit. In addition, um special ed transportation to out of district placements is actually completely unregulated right now. And so we have no choice but to pay the rates that the transportation companies are charging us. There are other state reps and senators who are working to create to pass a bill that will provide oversight for specialized transportation. So while all of that is happening and we are really glad that's happening and we are supporting all of that work, we still have to fund the special ed placements and the transportation. And so that all gets factored into
145our budget. So again, our historical spending over over the years, you saw this earlier, um gets us to sort of where we are now. And I think it's important to think about where we are now in relation to where we were last year. Last year we knew that we needed to both address the gaps that existed the year before and we knew that we needed to close a gap that was a result just strictly of what the district needed to maintain level service as well. And so we had to make some painful cuts and significantly increase fees that were transferred to families. And so as we look at this year's proposed budget for level service, we're going to dig now into what actually makes up some of those costs. And I apologize for the lengthy
146presentation, but I think it's important that people understand the the history of how we got here. Um, so this year I've talked about how we are trying to most accurately reflect our current spending and the accounts that were underfunded up until this point. We also in our processment there were some sorry costs that were unaccounted for. Everything is now accounted for. So when we say we are looking to increase the budget line items for utilities by 237,995, that is because that's how much utilities actually cost us. We're not out trying to get more utilities. We're just trying to pay for the utilities services that we use. Same for custodial supplies and materials. Same for athletics. Increasing the operational line item for athletics by $33,000 reflects the actual athletic spending that we are currently doing. It
147also accounts for our low revolving account fronts. So again, though we need this amount for FY27, as our revolving account builds, this number can actually start to go down in subsequent years. Not all the way down, but down. Transportation, we're still trying to rebuild that revolving account as well. So we need to offset it in the operational budget by about $50,000. And this $51,000 of instructional resources and supplies, this is where we recognized that there were some things that were unaccounted for that the schools were doing and that we need to do because that's how our classrooms run, but nobody had put it in their budgets before. They're now in everybody's budget. So that accounts for $667,398 of our 11.88 increase. These are the additional funds that we are looking to be able to add
148to our budget to meet current needs. Salaries again estimated because we have ongoing contract negotiations is about $1.5 million. Instructional resources, these are some additions to the budget. asks because we need new AP textbooks. We need for history specifically, we need new textbooks for our social studies curriculum. It's books and digital resources. Credit for life is a program that we run here at the high school. We're looking to incorporate that more fully into the budget because first of all, they've just passed a law that says we have to teach financial literacy to students. And we rely on grant funding to do some of that right now. And we're very nervous that some of that grant funding may go away even though it just became a lot. Um, professional development. We are looking to increase our
149professional development budget because we cut it going into this year, but our strategic plan has really lofty goals around project-based learning, around rethinking grading, around shifting some instructional practices. Without that funding, it's going to be really hard for us to do some of that work. We can do some of it in-house but we are not going to make progress at the rate that we would like to make it without outside resources that do cost money. And then we would like to continue well we would like to go back to fully funded free free fully funded full day K which is a $300,000 increase to the budget. So that's where the additional $1.9 million comes into play. So to think about those last two slides in one screen, this is that um this captures the salary
150increases again estimated the increases that we've asked for with utilities, custodial, athletics, everything down to full day K. Um, again, some of those are just accounting for what we are already actually spending. Some of those are true increases. We're also we do account for retirements. Um, but we just don't have that many at this point. Um, and we can't predict them and we can't rely on. And so, but we know that there's one and that we can factor in some savings there. Um, and so that's how we got to the increase that we are looking for for FY27, which is a total of 11.88% increase. Um, Miss Owen has shared that we do receive some grant funding. These are the grants that we currently receive and how they are utilized. Um, some of those grants
151I feel more comfortable saying will still be in play next year and some of them may not. We weren't quite sure for some of them this year. Um, so we are always keeping that in the back of our list. And our revolving accounts, some of these will support some staffing. So, we talked about the kindergarten revolving account does fund three kindergarten teachers, three ESPs. The prek revolving account funds 1.8 prek staff members. All of our cafeteria staff are funded out of the food service um revolving account and some athletic staff comes out of the their revolving account when that is in a positive. So we've asked for a lot in order to maintain level service. Um and the town is in a really hard place. our entire community is struggling financially. And so I've been
152working very closely with Michelle Liry, who's our interim town manager, and Beth, who is our town accountant, and Linda, our um Linda Cole, our town treasurer. We meet weekly now to talk about how we move forward as a community to fund both schools and town. Um, and at select board meetings, Michelle has shared some of the concerns, some of the budget clusters that impact all of us. Um, health insurance being one of them. The um, Shrek, which is the um, my goodness, when we call 911, it's the food that answers that call and sends all of our life-saving folks to support us. Um, and in my conversations with Michelle and the town, their budget requests are also exceeding their funding allocations. So, they're trying to figure things out on their end, and they know that
153they're going to have to make reductions as well. Um, and so, Michelle, because as I said earlier, there's so much that's still up in the air, the governor's budget really just came up today, so we don't know what that looks like. We had a meeting with U. Maya who provides all the insurance for town employees today. Right now the insurance increase is expected to be around 14%. However, their board meets this week and they're going to make a vote which could decrease that amount. That would bring more money into the town which then gives more money to the schools. So there's still a lot that's up in the air that we need to figure out. So when they say that they're looking to fund us between 1 and 6%, I can tell you that they
154are very much committed to being able to give us a 6% increase this year and they are trying really hard to get there. But it's it's work, it's effort, and it's going to take a little patience. 6% though is a big difference from 11.88%. The other thing that we've talked a lot about is that we are beyond the timeline to seek an operational override for the community for both schools and town for FY27. And as I said, the governor's budget is is still unknown at this point. So what does that mean for us? It means that we could be looking at between a 1.2 and a 2.6% funding gap. We're very much hoping that we're closer to the 1.2. If that is the case, there is an impact. We will have to reduce essential teaching
155positions because last year we reduced as much as we could without really impacting teachers. We will be looking at larger class sizes, potentially loss of critical student support staff, loss of programming that define our excellence, specifically at the high school level, fewer supplies, and probably no professional development. Um, which will inhibit our ability to make progress in our strategic plan. And so our next steps, our leadership team is meeting regularly. We are starting to look at what it means to get our 11.88 down to 6% and though we don't want to we are going to be prepared if it comes in lower than that. Um we will have recommendations about what that could look like for you at the next meeting. Um there is going to be a joint school committee select board and advisory
156presentation on February 10th. That is a different date than what was originally scheduled. Originally, it was scheduled for February 3rd, but in my conversations with Michelle, we both recognize that we're just the more information we have, the better that meeting will be because we'll have more firm numbers. Um, provide continued updates at every school committee meeting. I would encourage everybody in town who is interested in this to keep coming to these meetings, whether it's online, you're just following along, or you're here in person. Um, if you have questions, reach out. I am here. There will be a full public, excuse me, school committee budget hearing on March 18th at 5:00 PM here in this room, also online. And then March 25th is the date that you will vote on a proposed budget. So, I know
157lengthy and long. I appreciate everybody's patience and attention. You know, the last thing I would say is that as we look at this coming year, the FY27 budget, we also want to start thinking about FY28 because the problems aren't going away. And so, what does it look like as a community for us to invest in our schools and in our town? um because if not this year we'll we'll see an impact. If we go even further into FY28 without finding ways to invest differently, then we may be looking at, you know, further dismantling some of what the good stuff that we have going on. So again, thank you for for listening. Um happy to answer any questions that the committee has. Stop sharing. Um, Mr. Evans, we'll start with you if you have any comments
158or questions you'd like to share. >> I don't know how to say this, but th this your presentation, Dr. Shannon was a master class in context, in detail, in explanations, in reflections, and I would like us to with all speed clip that whole thing and give it to everybody in this town that has any questions. That was superb. Uh, and I want to mention that the beginning of this was that our direction was to level fund. We instructed the superintendent, we want to keep this district a blue ribbon. We've got these great scores. We have tiny class sizes. We have student support. We have electives. We have all these wonderful things. We want to keep that. We didn't say uh expand something. We said save what we have. And that's what and and now we
159see that that direction leads us to some choices that we now have to make. And I had this discussion with with um some teachers the other day where there are no sides to any of this, right? There's no winning. There's no town side as as Dr. Shannon said, it's not town and us. It's everybody together. The money that we get comes from the same pile, from the same people, from the same neighbors. Uh the teachers are, you know, both they're educating our children. The coaches are teaching our kids life lessons. And it's all that this piece, the puzzle only fits together when we get all the shapes to line up. And the way you laid it out made it clear that we've got our work ahead of us, but we can do this. Um, I
160do want to mention, thank you for clarifying specifically the athletics number. If you look at the year-over-year, that's one budget that bumped up. But what's important to know is that we it's not an increase of what we're spending. What the Dr. Shannon has done is basically captured what we have been spending and now is properly putting into it. And this is actively working to fix what led to the budget crisis from FY25. So I want to contextualize that again and applaud your your department for it's not easy to to publish a number that's so big and so different, but we have to do it to get back on the right track. So I applaud you for that. Absolutely. And then I did mention coaches, but I noted our coaches for years haven't seen pay increases
161even though our our teams win things. Our kids get, you know, just our are performing so well. And as Dr. Shannon mentioned, is such part of the community. When anyone pays when you pay your athletic fee, that's going to the coaches. And we do have to have a discussion about how we make sure that teachers and coaches feel like they're being appreciated because we also saw earlier we have the lowest we have the best attendance of any district anywhere really when it comes to our teachers. So the the teachers teach the coaches coach. These are the touch points with our kids. They're doing a great job and I think, you know, there we have to start being able to recognize that uh in more ways than just, you know, claps and thank yous. Um, so
162that was more than I wanted to say, but I would encourage anyone that watched this to watch it a few more times and know that this is the beginning of a long conversation. There's no decisions yet, but we all have to digest this multiple times to figure out what the next steps are. So, thank you, Dr. Shannon, and thanks for letting me be so wordy. >> Thank you, Mr. Evans, >> obviously I also have to thank you because coming into this, obviously I viewed last year's presentation and everything and still learned a lot and it's really important. Um, so I appreciate that. A small note, I think it would be worthwhile if as we look towards our joint meeting if we we had like a homework video of like this is chapter 70. this is
163circuit breaker that sort of thing because being able to talk more about the schools and the specific impact which is really important and it's something that we really need to focus on just an idea but you know all of that information is super valuable and I think we could disseminate it potentially a different way but ultimately you know when I first looked at this on Friday night I had planned Saturday night so I looked at it on a Friday night Um, as I looked at it, you know, it made me reflect on why I'm here and what we discussed on October 1st and what we discussed at my first meeting with the citizens petition and the idea of maintaining a positive trajec trajectory for the district and it made me reflect and think that we
164are at a critical moment. We are at a point where it feels like that is turning. As we talk about, you know, teacher reductions, as we talk about the high school schedule, it that is hard to convey, but I understood what you were talking about that massive puzzle piece and something as small as this English class happens during this period, so you suddenly you cannot take neuroscience or something like that. That is very real and it's a challenge in a small district because these are such small numbers. But getting back to my larger point, we are at like a turning point here and you know it it's really frustrating and it it is frankly you know really frightening in a lot of ways to see what we are looking at and just noting that a
165lot of the increases are being proactive like I noted in the utility budgets I I think per FY25 which was not yours there was actually a bit of a decrease but you know that was 2024 2025 like utilities were going up so I think it you know not only is it about being proactive but it's about maintaining this trajectory and I'm worried that it's potentially starting to reverse >> and it's at some sort of breaking point and in some direction something is going to have to change but I don't want to cast a negative note on everything that was just presented because it was really impressive. It was really, really valuable and obviously there's a lot more to talk about and this is why I'm happy to be here. But, you know, I I think
166we just we have to make sure that we maintain this district. And I don't want to keep talking, but you know, it's a massive part of the town budget for a reason because it's a massive part of why people live here. >> Thank you, Madam Chair. Um, thank you, Dr. Shannon, presentation. Um, you're a high performing superintendent. It's why we hired you. That's I think that showed in the last budget presentation at the uh during the crisis last year. So, it's no surprise that you put this together and um you know, we're very proud of you and happy to have you serving as our superintendent of schools. Um I I I am going to say negative things here. I'm This is So, I have been on this committee for several years. Um Dr. Collins and
167I have um have been involved in a number of different committees where this work started years ago. All the accolades we see, all that it was it was the culmination of a lot of work. We've always really slowly added to the school. We've never had to confront really um reductions until last year, significant ones. Um but as you noted, and this is the critical piece that everyone needs to understand. This is the very very important piece. Those reductions were not something we we wanted to do, but they were something that we were able to do without impacting the caliber of education that we're offering to students in Cohassid right now. The next series of reductions will absolutely impact the caliber of the education we're offering because we are going to there they're there some of
168the educators that would be um vulnerable to these reductions are excellent educators. They are incredible. They add to the value of our district in extremely uh important ways. Um, and I am very concerned about this because we're not getting 12% from the town as you note. Um, we'll be lucky to get 6% from the town. Very lucky. And that's still only going to basically account for the estimated increase for the contract negotiations for the teacher salaries. That leaves all those additional needs for level funding, uh, level service, excuse me. And um I I I it's to me I'm very protective of this and it and it's I I I'm I'm worried. We're just moving in such a good direction here. We have this great strategic plan and and and we have all these wonderful ideas
169and all these wonderful educators. This is going to this is this is this is this is going to impede our progress significantly if we're going to have to make these reductions. And people need to understand how dire this is. This is a very serious situation and I'm worried about it. And I I I until I saw these numbers when I was looking at this presentation, you know, I I I came in here and I was already in sort of a bad mood because of it, right? And um I I don't know whether there's some sort of, you know, private fundraising we can engage in, but even that is only a band-aid because you can't expect to do that every single year, right? I mean, is it possible that we find a million and a half
170dollars um to make up for that other 6% that we need in the community? Yeah, we can't do that every year and expect people to do that and and we're lucky enough to live in a community that maybe that's even a possibility. A lot of communities that's not even enough thought. Um but we need to figure something. I mean, you know, the main problem here are a lot of unfunded mandates, okay, from the state. And and to me, I blame the Commonwealth of Massachusetts for most of the problems that a lot of the districts are experiencing and confronting because it's just it is impossible to meet the mandates without the funding. and we brag about our schools in Massachusetts and how we have the best schools and education is so important to us, but then
171we underfund our schools, you know, and we have these chapter 70 mechanisms that just do not properly fund the majority, the bulk of the districts in the Commonwealth. So, I'm I'm basically venting here, but I'm also trying to I'm trying to emphasize how important this is to everyone. It's it's just it's this is so critical. We need to figure out how to get that money. if we lose some of these educators, it's it's going to be a very bad thing for our district. Um, you saw you had that slide there that was like, you know, the the impact of of um, you know, of of not getting the money and the the impact of of of getting the money. You know, I don't know how you how you phrased it, but you know, there's two
172two different and there's some bulleted points there. All of those are accurate. They're all accurate. you know, diminished reputation and performance and and property values. That is that is absolutely accurate. That is going to happen. So, we have to figure a way out of this. And I don't know I don't know. I don't know what it is. I don't know where this money is going to come from. And even if we're able to to come up with a band-aid this year, I don't know where we're going to find this. This is this is troubling because we have such a good school system here in Ghaz. It is so good. It is excellent. Mr. Squido can attest to that. I'll talk more about it. >> So, I don't know whether maybe we need to we have
173to like Mr. Evans said that we need to get the presentation out to everyone, but that in of itself isn't enough because people it's going to be daunting for people to process and read on their own. I don't know. This might need to be like a PR campaign that we do for the schools and we'll have to do that online. But I just I'm I'm just it's the whole thing is very upsetting. So, I'm taking this opportunity to make sure that, you know, I'm emphasizing that as much as possible as someone that's been involved in this person. >> Thank you, Mr. McF. Um, I share your thanks um to Dr. uh Dr. So Shannon um for putting this presentation together um and for your commitment to detail, to accuracy, to transparency um and the level
174of vigilance um that you're bringing to the budgeting process. I think these are things that the community has asked for. I think they're things that we need um and really you have brought this to a very fine point for us. Um and it's not what we want to hear. And I think listening to uh Mr. Mlen speak. Um I wrote down the words heavy responsibility. Um it's a heavy responsibility for our school leaders. This is a heavy responsibility for us as a school committee. Um and I think it's I I would I would ask that's also a heavy responsibility for our greater community here in Cohasset. Um I continue to say that um the people who live in Cohasset are some of the smartest, brightest, um most giving um and generously spirited people um I've
175been lucky enough to come in contact with. And I I hope that some of these solutions that were in your plea, Mr. Mlen, can be found within our community. Um because I agree that when we have to think about significantly reducing our teaching force um to changing the program of studies um for our students who have experienced to date um a lot of freedom and flexibility and um enriching opportunities um that it is um bad. It's it's it's really sad. It's scary. It's it's hard to think about. Um, so I hope that we can sort of pull together in this moment. Um, and to do continue the good work that we're starting from a realistic point here, which I think is is the really shining bright light. And so I'm appreciative of seeing a very
176clear picture of where we're at and and what we need to do to to to hold on to our level service um status. Um I will I have one comment online and then um our our um we still have a few people. One thing >> Yes, please go ahead. >> Um I appreciate all that has been said. I just want to state that while I was the messenger of this presentation, it was the result of a lot of hard work from lots and lots of people specifically Miss Owen, Jerry Ballard, Dr. Collins, Lisa Porter, all of the building principles, everybody. Michael Stapleton, everybody was a a hu Steve Roundi, everybody came together to pull all of the data and manipulate it and Sue kept chart after chart after chart that I asked for. So, I
177was the messenger, but there were a lot of people who were involved in creating this presentation. Well, please extend our our thanks um for that really exceptional work. Um uh Jennifer Chu from 25 Virginia Lane um comments, "The additional funds required for the schools to seamless seamlessly function in FY27 is approximately $400 per household. It seems like a small price to pay if it allows us to fully support our students and add full day kindergarten, similar to what is done by nearly every other community across Massachusetts. Absolutely. >> Thank you, Miss Chu. And that those are the sort of engagement and um proclamations we are um interested in. So, thank you. Um and then Mr. Ashton. >> Uh yeah, Will Ashton 125 comments and one question overnight question. I second what everyone said. Great presentation.
178Um it was both detailed and approachable. So, I think that that'll go over well with people that maybe aren't as involved. Um, and I 100% agree with Mr. Mlullen that it is a dire situation, which leads to my comment or question that um, everybody keeps saying it's too late for an operational override, but given how dire the situation is and that we've known this for at least one year, possibly two, whatever before, I think that every effort should be made to make something like that happen because I think that's the only option left. So, that's kind of an open-ended question comment, but I don't think we should rely on that we can't do an operational override this year. >> Thank you, Cassandra. Beachwood Street, just to add to that you said about the community here
179in Cohasset. We're really um we're a community that stands behind our students, our kids, and our schools. And there's nothing more important than our children's education. It's one of the reasons why people want to continue to live in coast and it attracts newcomers here. So I think if we could um use those community resources to get the word out about the crisis that we're in, I think that it could have huge impact on swing. >> Thank you. Any other further comments from the committee? I'll give you the last word if anyone Yes, Mr. Squatrio. And then or >> just it just occurred to me that if we are able to even if we I don't know what the mechanism is in order to get the the the pro the override I'm not sure like what
180that timing involves and why that's not a possibility that said it did make me think that you know when I was saying we have the bandaid if we're able to privately figure that out we will have the time to do it >> formally the following year that would be the that would be the long-term solution I think to do that so that's something that I thought about after I speaking. So, but and and and Miss Chu's comments were right on. I mean, we need to look at it that way. The pro the overrides would be even less of an impact because it would be everyone involved. It would be just school families. I don't know how she calculated. I don't know if she was talking about school families or everyone or whatever. But, um you
181know, it would I think it would be it would be a surmountable uh figure I think >> per household. Um, >> no, >> just sorry, >> just a similar comment and I know this was something I asked a question of you is I know that in a lot of the select board meetings, something that chair Maher has brought up a lot is people want to know what is it going to cost me? So any ability we have to put this in terms of property taxes per year per million dollars of value I think is important because I I can't I can't do back of the napkin math on what Miss Chu stated. But if that's true look I I don't own property in Cohasset. I there's no way I could. Um so it's really easy
182for me to say just pay the $400 a year. I believe she said obviously it's really easy for me to say that like I don't have any credibility on that but you cannot convince me that that that is not going to be more than made up for for an increase in sustaining the reputation of this town. Right? So that was something I just I know we have time to go over this, but something I wanted to emphasize. You know, putting this in terms of actual costs to people in a way that's quickly understandable, I think is really val valuable because we're talking about major impacts to the district, which we've established major impacts to the district, but then once we actually whittle it down, what does it actually look like? U Miss Chu did clarify
183her math and um indicated that she was calculating $400 per household for every household in Cohasset. Thank you, Miss June. >> And I did not want I was not doubting her math. I just don't have the ability to do it right now. >> Mr. Evans, >> yeah, I was just going to say, >> yeah, just for clarification on timing. So when we're building a budget for FY27, right, our budget has to be done and it has to be passed June, you know, basically before the next fiscal year, which starts June 1st. And the budget that we get is given to us, the amount of money get is given to us basically by the state about what the projected levy is going to be. And that's why at the end you have free cash because we
184project blah blah blah. Projections don't work. So don't work perfectly because of projections. So the override if we are I'm not saying we're doing one or we're not. I'm just saying for the mechanics of it, um it's it's just not possible for us to get an override built, voted on, and passed before we're going to have a town meeting, which is going to come up in in May. The other problem is we can't build a budget with an unknown, right? We can't build a budget saying, well, we're going to go for an override of let's say 2%. And our budget's going to be even, but we're we're making a budget with money we don't have yet. So we have to the budget cycle if we are going to do any sort of uh additional tax
185revenue increases would be for FY28. I also want to my brain doesn't really work the same way that some of my colleagues does. This is a challenge and it challenges are made for us to rise to. So I see and I see the numbers and they're intimidating but they're not things that we can't get together and solve. Um, you know, I think uh to to Miss Chw's point, and I brought this up the other day. It's all possible for us to go to the the treasure collector and give more money to taxes and say it goes to the schools. We don't have to do an override. Every family in Cohasset that has a kid could walk into town hall, drop off a check for thousand bucks. We would have no budget problems whatsoever. We wouldn't
186have to have a vote. Wouldn't have to take any time. So, there are mechanisms to do these things in creative ways. I'm being a little hyperbolic about that part, but it that's why I said they're puzzles. It's not going to be one thing. It's not going to be an override that solves everything. It's not going to be a new bus that solves everything. It's not going to be cutting it one team that solves everything. This is going to require every piece to fit in. And we can get there. And I, you know, I think we're we're in small ball. I think we're where we can save a lot of things this fiscal year. And if you look at the other communities that have kind of gone for the moon and have failed, it's been tragic.
187You look at Ducksberry, you know, you look at a lot of I don't want to name towns. I feel bad. Towns that have tried to go for the moon and failed and have been basically forced to do a triage. And I don't want this district to ever be in that position. As long as we can control our destiny, we should. And we should keep working towards getting things where they need to be, being creative, being collaborative, and looking towards FY28 to build something which is going to actually help us for 5 10 years. I think we can do it. >> Thank you, Mr. Evans. Any other final? >> Thank you. Um do we have any reports um from uh school committee subcommittees or liaison at this point? We can speak at will. Nope. Fantastic. Um
188oh oh sorry I I'm sorry you are out of my line of sight. I apologize. Go ahead. >> Um I know we're done talking with the budget but going back to when I was looking at numbers I saw professional development. There's a number then curriculum. What are some of the professional development that will be done and also curriculum? Is there like new initiatives happening for the you mean for Yeah. >> process wise? >> What's that? >> Process wise probably not the right. >> Yeah. So, I'm sorry. >> This is a a a a wonderful question. >> Um, and certainly one that I would encourage you um to I think probably Dr. Scolins would be the best person for you to shoot a quick email to tomorrow morning and she can give you that information about
189what professional developments are scheduled. It's it's not technically sort of related to um >> the reason why I'm asking is because when I saw that number my hope professional development will help reduce the cost but since teachers will be doing some of the lead for teacher leaders could be maybe doing some professional development instead of having other companies come in and you have to pay these companies to do professional development. That's like um because you know companies will be more expensive than having >> um late features but I can send that email. >> Yeah. >> Thank you. >> And I think that's actually like the lovely ideas that I think that our community can come up with um to help and I think some of the seeds of of an idea similar to that have
190been um planted already um in the district um given the December um professional development that was led um by in-house um faculty. But I think as a keeping to think in those sorts of ways about ways in which we can economize I think is is is fantastic and so I I hope you'll connect if you have other ideas. That's great. Thank you. Um I do not have any topics not reasonably anticipated. We do have approval of minutes. Um all of us who are present today were present at the meeting in October 22nd 2025. Um I would just enter in that um Mr. Rotundi is listed as having been in attendance and presenting. Um, and that is is not accurate. He was not at this meeting. He was at a meeting previously in the fall. Um,
191but otherwise I think we can approve um with that note noted unless there are other comments from committee members. Okay. If not, um I'll look for a motion to approve. >> Thank you. A second. >> Second. >> Thank you. Um roll call vote to approve. Mr. Evans >> Evans I thank >> uh Mr. Squatrio >> hi I >> Mr. Mlen, >> Jen Leky, I um we can enter those um minutes in with the correction as noted. Um and that we have no reason to go into executive session this evening. Um so thank you. There are a few of you who are still listening online. I'm sure there are some of you watching on Facebook that I cannot see um here and um for our residents who are here with us in the learning commons. It's
192actually quite lovely to have a a group here. So, um, thank you for your time, um, your attendance and your care. Um, we will, uh, see you again in another two weeks. Um, but I'll at this point look for a motion to adjurnn. >> Second. >> Okay. We'll call vote. Um, Cory Evans. >> Thank you, Mr. Squadrio. Hi, >> Mr. Mclen. Jenleski. I The meeting is adjourned. Thank you very much.