School Committee Meeting - 12/20/2023

001okayy we are now live on Zoom excellent um welcome everyone to the regular meeting of the classic school committee Wednesday December 20th 2023 we are in person here as the learning Commons we are virtual on Zoom we are not virtual on Facebook which is because Facebook uh the app is is down so if you're watching on Facebook you actually can't be doing that so there messages for you um but if you're trying to watch on Facebook then you can't you know this message anyway but just so everyone knows for the record Facebook is is not cooperating with us tonight um we're going to start with our uh our call to order and now roll call I'm going to go around Mr Kierney pres uh Mr car not here yet miss leki pres uh Mr MCL

002pres Mr dial here so we have a quorum for the five uh members uh now we'll stand for the Pledge of Allegiance Pledge of Allegiance I algi to the flag the United States of America to the Republic for which it stands Nation God indivisible liy and justice for all so we have a action packed uh school committee agenda tonight lots of things going on um but we would be remiss if we did not recognize the outset uh that yesterday uh Marshfield announced a new superintendent which happens to be our superintendent Dr Patrick suin superintendent schools um we uh certainly wish him the absolute best in his his future endeavors over at Marshfield and uh we certainly recognize his contributions to our schools our schools are better for him having been here so even though his

003departure is is uh sad in some ways uh the fact that he's been here and that it is so sad is something to be celebrated so um later on in the agenda we are going to talk about the formation of a superintendent uh search committee uh that will kick off the process for finding a replacement for Dr s or rather a successor to Dr Sullivan because a replacement I think might be too strong a word um but in any event I do want to give Dr the opportunity to quickly uh say any words we are going to have a uh later on in in one of the um meetings here a more formal way to recognize Dr Sullivan's tremendous accomplishments and contributions to the district but uh given that this is kicking off the process

004wanted to just give him a chance to speak now well thank you chairman Di and um first of all I'd just like to say um that this particular opportunity was very unique for me and special for me because of where I'm from I I grew up in Marshfield I went to school there I was a teacher and a principal there for 20 years and I have four children ranging from high school down to alary school gr there um it wasn't uh me it wasn't decision made easily but for me it's my complete career Arc and it's something that I've I've wanted and I've worked for um my whole career and this was an opportunity I did I did take and I'm very happy to to be um to be the new superintendent of um of

005Marshville but I want everyone to know that job doesn't start till July 1 and until July 1 I am completely committed to go housea public schools I've loved my time here um this isn't a situation where I was putting my application out other places you know that that wouldn't and happened and if I hadn't got the job in Marshfield I'd be really happy here in Cohasset It's a Wonderful Community with amazing students um a very active and fantastic uh family base and amazing staff so I'm very proud to be the um superintendent of kasset and I'll continue to work diligently to make sure that we have the best educational opportunities for our students and um I'll be very supportive of any role I can play uh in the train transition process making sure that I

006give the person who comes in um you know the the help that that they need and an assisting in any way the uh the committee or the screening team sees sees fed uh so uh again I'm uh I've been very humbled by my opportunities here and I remain very thankful very committed until I do move over to Marshfield so once again thank you Dr Sullivan on behalf we do wish you the best and uh we will work diligently in the next coming months to find successor and to uh accomplish many of the punch list items that uh we want to accomplish before you move on to your to your next chapter so we'll do it together yeah thanks again um so uh now we'll move on to uh public comment um this is the area

007of the agenda where we open it up to the public for items not on the agenda if you want to raise your hand and speak about something that is on the agenda to let us know that you'll want to talk about it that's fine but um if it's not if it is on the agenda we ask you wait for that agenda item to uh to participate so do we have any public comments we do not have any comments at this time no public comments thank you very much public comment uh we now move on to our section on invited guests we have a couple invited guests uh and we'll start off with Miss Ella Lynch a super the superintendent student advisory Council update thank you very much l maybe I'll have Ella um because I

008think this is the first time you you've had Ella here as a um representative am I right about that Ella and um I'll let Ella introduce herself she's a junior she's been an active member on our um student advisory committee um it's been really amazing getting to know her she's a great person and an excellent student and maybe Ella just start off telling everyone some of the things you're involved with in coass public schools and then take it away with the update um okay so my name is Ella Lynch um I'm a junior and I'm on the track team I'm involved with student council um obviously the superintendent uh committee um the national H Society and then some clubs like uh the debate team ma team stuff like that um and there's definitely been a

009lot going well with like the student life of cocid High School winter sports have just started up which has been really great and I know a lot of people have been enjoying those um last week there was also the all School band concert for the high school and chorus concert um and there was also the middle school band and chorus concert if before which was really great um some of the high school band and chorus members also got the opportunity to go down to the OS good and Deer Hill schools um which was really fun for the Holiday Tour you have to play some fun music for them um which was great there's also the uh National Honor Society induction ceremony a couple weeks ago which was really well done that was um and uh

010right now student council is hosting uh pickle ball tournament at utility which I a lot of people participating in and are really excited about so that was fun today you have to watch them be the second day of it um and then some other clubs have had like meets and for their first like sorry yeah meets stuff like that um I know the debate team had their first meet um a couple weeks ago which was great and a lot of people had some success there um math team had their F first and second meets which was great um and then also I know model un was just assign their countries for the upcoming conference in March um which were India and Afghanistan so that's going to be a pretty cool opportunity for people who get

011to go there was you said India and Afghanistan uh India and Afghanistan nice and people got to choose their committees yeah wonderful thank you that's great um and I'm I'm sure you're looking forward to to break as well uh yeah I think everyone teachers and students yeah you throw a you know sort of a storm day in there and it becomes kind of a top every week for sure a lot of assessments and stuff recently absolutely well that's great well thank you for the for the update let head over to chim thank you very much I'll uh see if the committee has any questions comments for you security yeah Ella good job first time doing uh and also too is I you kind of checked all the boxes too it's kind of like what all

012my kids are doing right I had the pleasure of being judge on debate team last week matter of fact that's why I missed the committee meeting because we were down there yeah I was supposed to be the last one as well yeah and U that brought me to like thinking like it it was it was great too they had schools from all over the all over the situ Handover uh and I just noticed that uh it would be nice if we had some sweaters that say us great idea I think that would be because we saw some other schools that had so I was hoping to maybe come up with an idea that kind of raise M to do that I talked to Jason too so hopefully we can do that and nailed it SC

013good job for no notes awesome that's cool the um did did did you uh sing in the court were you I was in the band you were in the band okay cool good job good job was excellent the concert was great and well attended and I would agree it was um it was fun to see young people with tremendous Talent all in one place so that was that was great we welcome you here we look forward to having you back again nice job thank you Ella I I I feel like it's such such a gift to us to have a window into what's going on with the students in your report I feel like hit everything from Athletics to academics to the Arts to social life and so thank you it's great well done and

014helpful enj your break just just welcome Ellen thank you for being willing to do this it takes a little bit of coverage so thank you so much did a great job look forward to having back thank you um L I U I just have 17 particular notes I want to give to no I'm kidding I think you did a great job and um just to Echo as leki said this this these reports are very important to us as a committee so that we have a good idea of what's going on in the schools from the students perspective because our role is to make the schools great for you so thank you for taking time out of your evening to come talk to us and look forward to seeing you come back thank you have a

015happy holidays and thank you you can go to got than thanks very much so next next on the agenda we have a report from the school facilities committee from uh Mr Jason Earls uh just for a little background here this is a a slightly new agenda item but not really so new we used to have a standing agenda item for facilities committee um when we had overlapping membership on the um facilities committee Mr mclen would give a report of what's going on in the facilities committee and then um as we change membership at that committee um that fell off so we'll have more periodic but updates on facilities committee as a reminder actually as a reminder for people uh who are watching in the committee itself maybe give us a little background on the facilities

016committee what you're doing and then you know what's what's going on there with um the initiative you're taking on sure um obviously we're formed to assess the conditions of all schools we got a preliminary report on those from those we had that priority list um so um we were working through that put forth obviously two articles at town meeting um both ped so we're working currently on the feasibility study which I'll get into a little deeper in a minute um as well as um trying to prioritize the stabilization fund to there's a laundry list a lot of items a lot of big tickets so it's it's a long list we're just trying to pick through it prioritize it and to you guys to the select board so that we can get it on the the

017next for the next 10 meeting as what we're doing right now um we had our meeting last night um we as a committee we're going to form a subcommittee uh for the feasibility study to um send out a procress proposal um to get some firms in to help us with this study um so we're going to we're going to start that I got the wheels of motion I sent an email to Michelle um suggesting membership I have to reach out to the parties involved to see if they have the time for it so once that is is completed the town Michelle has already uh created a draft RFP which looked at briefly today um has everything um that I believe we want on it uh but we'll bring that at a later meeting to you

018guys um to for approval so on and so forth um so that's feasibility study as for the bigger ticket which is the stabilization fund um I have requested some information from Nick verardi the facilities for the town um because one of the big items that we're looking at right now is roof Replacements because that's one of the one of the top priorities uh and I know there was some talk with the alternate energy committee about solar I want to see where that stands because if we can get that then most likely we can get the roots paid for through grants through the state so on and so forth so I am trying to get with Nick and what the head of that committee is pres um what backgrounds been done who talk to what I

019try to push that one way or another so that we can actually um present something to you guys to the select board to the town on how we're going to start allocating uh this money so that's where we're at currently great thank you very much the other update I think that is overlapping is msba yes unfortunately um B hung bug the Grinch showed up we did not get accepted um we are going to March forward and apply yet again so I need your help you got it submitting that again copy paste change the data no keep keep you know so we'll just we'll just keep at it and um we'll go from there um one question that was brought up to me on msba in in connection with roofs is there a um I think

020there's an accelerated repair program that's also separate that is every couple years and I think this is the open window for application on that yes it's been closed for the past three years and we just recently learned that it was open again yes so we can apply for that which I suggest you probably should but I also want to like I said earlier if going the solar I would rather get that money different route and then use that alternative repair for I I raise that just because I want to make sure we don't miss that window if it's a it's an open window that closes so let's it's it's the same if my understanding is correct it's the same basically time frame as it is up until I believe early April April yes okay usually

021it's right prefer April so we got some time to assess typically lines close to that just we'll be here before we know oh yeah great um well thank you I'll turn it all over to the FL to the um committee any questions Mr County J first and for thank you for years so I really understand that um it's gone from really nothing to putting applications together stabilization funds um it's just your work is it's just so good appreciate that um also too is like what I'd like to do is if it's okay with you want to reach out to Senator o Conor and ask him if we go meetings I'm sure he would to try to educate us on what other school districts do because he represents eight8 town cities and wayth that just did

022a middle school so I think his he'd probably be valuable to see what we can do to kind move it forward because it's basically work kind of stuck in neutral here like you know we talking about like are we going to get new school we not going to get new school meanwhile we have these problems that persist as far as air conditions and gym that we still have in accomplished so like I I really want if we can maybe ask you to come to subcommittees and Facilities sub and really dial down on some of the air conditioning issues especially the ones in the gym itself gets you know 90 Dees in there and it's really UNS so would like to work with you on that sure and then as far as the stabilization fund we

023trying to prioritize what we going to do as far as like what can we do now what can we do you know tomorrow the next day the next day and the next day because basically that's what we should be having is is a a really thought out plan of what we can accomplish six months from now a year from now five years from now 10 years from now so not knowing what we can do we're kind of stuck in the middle you know so I and I also like I think that you guys could take the opportunity to kind of see if there's an appetite for a $200 million school I personally don't think that this town would go for it I I just think because of where we're at as far as like the

024funding be 20 25% we only have 7,000 homes in the town it just it you know like I just want to get kind of a broad like what are we G to do like I just feel like we're just stuck in N so if we can try to get that well I I I think that's part of what the fees will help and that's why we want to get this subcommittee going like I said we have our proposal already written um so that's you know that was a bigger step getting that piece of paper together um so I have no problem presenting next month on that and we can just get it out the door and start rolling because yes we don't know what we don't know right and again thank you for you and

025committee for us yeah thank you Mr Mr car uh so um thanks for coming this is great excited to hear from you so thank you for that um so I'm the liaison to the Alternative Energy committee and they're eager to talk about roofs and solar opportunities and the chairwoman her name is bodell and [Laughter] I'm perfect should probably call before the end of this meeting thank you for the the perseverance of the committee to stick with this through some some hiccups um I think that that that is critical to this whole project is to keep momentum going and I'm looking forward just really close collaboration going forward around um working together to prioritize the needs of building so that's just a cap we do have one open position that this committee needs to app um

026so uh select board has two which I believe is going on their January um agenda kind where committee is kind of light right now so is it excuse me is it because we three of us were on it at one point now is there any of us on it now there's there there's still Kathleen Burns who was a school can beo and Jen was but she decided against it after few months of service she would be able to F the obligations so um we need that just happened fa yeah like so um so could a school Committee Member be like could I no no no it's I think that that folks took issue with that you know you and I had ini done that so we can get it off the ground it's hard popular

027commit at all thing rolling and uh now it is and Jason's beener that exception so we just need to name someone so I'm sure there's someone out there willing to do it maybe I don't know we to message and get some volunteers maybe people know right can I SK s looking for anybody I would prefer somebody that has children in the school system that would be good some Finance background building background maintenance backgr Mr I work pretty closely Mr so I don't have any questions for him um Mr R thank you for coming taking time out of your evening for this thank you for all the work that you've done on the facilities committee I guess my only um my only uh comment is to make sure that we're working closely together especially with the

028finance facility subcommittee on the um priorization of of funds for our stabilization fund any of the giant Capital expenses we want to make sure that we're growing in the same direction we don't want to have a situation where we got cross recommendations and whatnot so um but very much appreciate all you do all you do for us and looking forward to hearing more about the feasibility study as that develops so thank you thank you very much right so we've move through our invited guests agenda Block C we'll go to school updates with any um School news from our from our superintendent of schools Dr Patrick Sullivan any news um well I did a nice job as you as many of you pointed out um kind of encapsulating what H what what has happened over the

029last couple of weeks I will mention in addition to the Middle School and High School concerts and the high school going to OSG good and uh sharing music with them that was a really wonderful scene by the way I I I actually I tweeted it out or ex that out what it's called now um but uh to give a feeling for it it's really a sing along with our youngest students and our high school students and what one of the things so special in coet is these traditions where the students who are actually performing remember when they were the students watching you know like these rock stars come and perform for them so it's a really nice moment and um Miss Mori Mrs Mori does a wonderful job she's our director of Fine Arts and

030Music uh six through 12 does a fabulous job orchestrating that um and uh that was an amazing amazing moment and then also um we've had OSG good Joseph Osgood what she call principal par refers to is the holiday strolls and um that's a reference to the fact that after watching their students perform at every grade level families get to take a stroll down the hall to the cafeteria to do some um arts and crafts with their with their children very warm um and just absolutely adorable to watch those kids perform and this year was special because principal Farrell added a story believe was called the 12 days of winter which was very participatory um great job Mrs Farah principal farell if you're you're listening out there but um they were they were great um and

031then we do have a deer Hill concert tomorrow that was delayed because of the storm and that's only my my last uh update is just to thank everyone uh particularly our staff uh for working hard uh during the storm you know it's it's not an exact science predicting what's happening and listening to forecasts um yeah it looked fine when we were leaving in the morning and you know the the the storm was uh a bit more um violent I guess uh than than maybe we had thought it would be uh and we did make a determination during the day that it was better to have our students in the buildings it was oh nearly 60 degrees so our buildings were warm not a great learning environment however learning happened at every level our teachers uh

032and other other people work together to to make sure that everything was safe and the learning was happening we were able to serve a hot launch in every building but certainly not an ideal scenario so I really want to thank the staff at all levels and the principles at all levels for everything they did also our safety officials were great and very collaborative with me um and and making sure that you know we made the right call on on what to do in that circumstance and then uh I tried to be as communicative as I could uh over the the the time when it was happening and then also the day uh you know that we had off so um we will make up that day so you can add that to the calendar and

033my newsletter I'll put the calendar we making the adjustment on the um on the uh the website to to not the last day of school so it ships one day forward for everyone that's really all I want to update on uh and we're all looking forward to to a a nice break and a very welld deserved break for our staff and I know our families are looking forward to it as well so and certainly students thank you thank you Dr Sal that brings us to our uh teaching and learning um block agenda block here and we'll start with um an update on the elementary digital District digital citizenship curriculum and I'll turn it over to Dr scollins to kick us off we also have some uh some other participants as well too so we have

034l k who is the middle and high school instructional technology specialist and we have Cassandra O'Brien who is our elementary of instructional uh technology specialist and so they're going to give us an overview of uh digital literacy and citizenship um from grades K through 12 and so I am going to start that thank you both for being here really appreciate it they will talk us through thank you um I just wanted to so you can go to the next slide if you want um just give an overview of devices and and things that go on with technology um not just in the classroom but computer class so in grades K to2 there are 12 shared iPads all the classrooms and in grades three to five third grade has 12 shared Chromebooks and um there are

035one to one Chromebooks in fourth and fifth grade uh the district uses in K8 clever as our single sign on for students to access District digital um learning resources and that can also be a a launching place for teachers to share links in addition to Google Classroom um our curriculum is based in Massachusetts state standards as well as the istd standards and the international Society for technology and education and students in grades K to5 have a technology class once a week and in addition a during common planning time it rotates uh as an additional technology class uh the instructional technology specialist which is my role meets with the elementary computer lab instructors to collaborate in lesson planning and curriculum that's kind of how we start out so at the osid school our digital lit literacy

036program involves um students learning just how to manage a device the Chromebooks during computer class and logging in manipulating The Mouse and the trackpad managing headphones for their keyboarding lessons navigating to websites or location needed for instruction and and it involves coding and participates in the hour of code every year students are also introduced at the K to two uh Google Apps for Education and Israel kindergarten they are joining Google Classroom this ways to to coordinate instruction um so as far as digital citizenship lessons our um kindergarten through second grade uh they're reviewed and throughout the year and reinforced from kindergarten from in first and second and and recently common sense media for education has partnered with keyboarding without tear and it's sort of integrated in that curriculum that we use for learning keyboarding um

037some of the specific U lessons on digital citizenship include um that's private where students are learning um uh what is considered personal information and what's not appropriate to share online uh another lesson includes media balance which is balancing screen time knowing when and where they should be using online um resources and another lesson is pause and think which is reviewing the being responsible safe and respectful online and uh how technology makes us feel I think this is a really important one how sometimes when you're using technology can make us feel different ways and how important it is to to reach out to an adult and and share how they're feeling about the use of Technologies and safety in my online neighborhood is being safe online in the different various places that they may be going

038online and pause for people it's a nice transition for when it's time to put the technology down and transition to something non technology related and um the digital citizen uh pledge sort of reviewing what what's important and time spent screen time and being safe and respectful next so at the Deer Hill School in grades three to five the literacy is composed of keyboarding which is increasing their words per minute and finger key combinations and the device Basics they continue using Chromebooks in computer class class and using the digital excuse me using the Google Apps for Education tools you know increasing and spiring on that learning um inre skills they also uh participate in the hour of code and and they do coding throughout the year and data analysis using Google uh fors to collect information

039and looking at graphs and things we also have a 3D printer that's um mostly used by the graters for part s and using coding program T cat and it's been some wonderful projects with that they definitely do and they also touch on navigating the mcast online practice test so they can be prepared for doing that and as far as the digital citizenship uh portion they continue the same you know lessons a little more detail for Online safety information privacy um they have you know the digital pledge being safe respectful and Connecticut they don't use email at the elementary schools but we sort of do a mock you know what we don't cck on detachments and we don't open email for people we don't know also delve a little bit more into the copyright what's okay

040to use fair use and um the public domain information um also touch on media literacy at this grade uh at fourth and fifth grade level [Music] and go to the next slide in terms of the amount of time that they meet is it similar to the was that for all elementaries I just want people to get a sense for right they have computer class once a week for for one period once a week but then also are rotating um a specialist during the teacher company that make sense that's right so the same as it was presented I think that was encompassing oh sorry I just I'm sure you did I just want to make sure you knew that that was that there's time there set out in both both buildings for our kids to get

041technology instruction once a week once a week and then a ro the a rotating uh common planning so each it be twice a week every once in while correct and I was going to say this later but also the classroom teachers with the devices in the classrooms are mirring the language and the concepts of digital citizenship you as needed because that because that curriculum's woven into everything we do so they're getting re enforced in it but it's specified specific instruction definitely reinforce in classrooms and I also wanted to point out that in um health class at at dear Hill there are some uh there's a book that the health teacher um uses called The Mouse and the monster and working on students being assertive and communicating ation and you don't have to reply especially to

042negative communication and taking a break from relationships setting boundaries identifying unhelpful or helpful communication and using eye statements which um addresses the istd standards but also as if you go to the next slide it also um I really like how the um digit uh collaborated with ist and using these I these positive statements for I'm inclusive I'm informed I'm engaged I'm balanced and I'm alert which um I think is more of a positive Spin and uh we wanted to put in some quotes from students when they were asked what is one thing you've learned about digital citizenship so um I'll just read them aloud so when strangers talk to me when I'm playing a game I don't respond and when I do it's private chat with someone I actually know in real life one thing

043I have learned about digital citizenship is that when you send something on text it is always there and you cannot take it away even if you delete it um I learned anything that you post online can be seen by anyone and place oh I learned that anything you say or Post online leaves a digital Footprints so they're actually using the language that is being used in instruction when you set up an account on a site they use your information that's a really saig one um and only say things online you would say in person kind of um the like saying never it's never a good idea to post information that you wouldn't want your parents or teachers to see and Choose Wisely what you say or do online because anything travels anywhere so it sounds

044like they really had concept of that but to also enforce the digital citizenship and curriculum um I have was taking a class this fall and I decided as part of my professional goal to meet once a week no once a week they wouldn't let like that once a month with the classroom teachers and go over the istd student standards just so we can all have you know it's always good to review and refresh and have common language for not just digital citizenship but digital standards as well it's important teachers do weave this in and out just like um Cassie was saying and it come these topics come up it comes up in stories and articles and all sorts of things so there's lots of conversations around how to be safe um what your impact is

045and they do tie it to bullying and having those conversations about what's appropriate what's what's safe Behavior great you linday will be looking at middle and high school so at the middle school and the high school um we are a BYOD building so the students are required to have their own device before they get here on day one in sixth grade um and because of that we can't really look at digital literacy or digital citizenship as kind of a standalone technology only kind of topic it has to be kind of approached by basically every subject in the school it's not a standalone thing anymore the kids it's their life you know so um that list on the right is just some examples of the classes that really touch base on it hard but I think

046every teacher in the building will say that they're driving home reinforcing the topics that were already introduced at De Hill and oar but um good so one of the classes they have in middle school is digital literacy and computer science they can take it in sixth or seventh grade um I can speak a lot about this one this is actually my class that I teach so we do a unit um in a program called everi Ignition and it's all about digital wellness and safety and they go through four topics connections and Community which kind of touches upon sort of the pros and cons of social media and online relationships um sometimes you can make great friends sometimes you might be people you don't want to talk to that type of thing um safety and privacy

047how to keep your information safe how to avoid online Predators um the students actually just finished that lesson last week and as kind of a wrap up they had to create they had to research a social media app that's pop with their age group right now so they may or may not have used it but they at least kind of know the gist of what it is and they had to come up with an infographic to share with someone else their age on how to use it safely um and kind of give a background on like the company that made the app average age of the users what kind of safeguards are in place um are there age restrictions if there are age restrictions is there a way that the app actually verif the age

048or can the kids just put in yes I'm 13 I and the app lets them on so it's pretty eye opening for the kids um and they also did an activity where they had to Google their own name see what came up if anything came up is this what you want to come up are you happy to see this how could we have avoided this um and then they got really into that they started Googling their parents some of them went home and had a lot to share with pars about what they may want to tweet settings on their social media um screen time versus online M type there but screen time that's basically a media balance screen time versus offline time and then technology and data we just finished today actually um that was

049about like online scams fishing for information um how to really dive deep into those emails and texts that they're getting saying you know your Amazon packages about to be delivered but you need to click here to verify it takes you to put in your name address phone number data all that stuff and um they did a great job they actually had to make they had to design two scams and a legit message and we put it into a cahoot for the whole class and they had to try to figure out which one so that was a lot of fun um and then when we move on to coding which will be after vacation we don't necessarily use the language of we're still learning digital citizenship but it keeps getting reinforced because we use um online

050coding communities where the kids are encouraged to kind of remix other people's work to learn from what other kids have done and then give constructive feedback um they get warnings if they are kind of behaving in a way that they shouldn't be giving nasty feedback or anything like that um and then we also do an activity where um it's called how will this post affect me and what will this person think of this post and they're given like simulations of text messages or Facebook Instagram post whatever they're posting and then it pops up and says like okay your grandmother just read this post now how do you feel about it you have to kind of think like oh maybe I didn't actually want Grandma to see that or maybe I should twice so we really

051do a lot we cram a lot into one trimester so that's six in seventh grade um in seventh grade guidance class they do a unit on basically how to manage the feelings that are caused by social media um so again they discuss the positive negatives um they under they talk about technology addiction why it happens um why it's so hard to like break away from technology addiction um they watch a episode called um social media it's on brainchild on Netflix which I guess is kind of like a middle school aged sort of um modern day Bill n Science Guy type of thing um and I actually watched it today to kind of review what it was about it talks all about how the posts you're seeing on social media are not the reality and shows

052actually a girl taking a selfie and she's in this beautiful dress and her hair is all perfect but then it kind of zooms out of the shot and it shows like her clothes all over the floor and it shows her mother like yelling at her and it shows kind of the reality of the situation and she's not just this perfect happy calm girl um it talks about kind of the psychology behind following what other people are liking online and seeing a post that has like a hundred likes kind of makes a kid's brain think oh I must like that too if so many people are liking it and then they start to to kind of follow the trends um and it also talks about how people's inhibitions are lower when they're posting from behind the

053screen and anonymously and how they um just feel more I don't want to say empowered because it's makes it sound positive but they're just a lot braver about posting things they might not say in person yes um so more emboldened emboldened that's the word exactly so that's seventh grade um the intro to research class in grade 8 is when I touched Bas with Mrs Cudi about this she said my entire class is digital citizenship the whole class she was very proud um they kind of Step a little bit away from the cyber bullying and the social aspect and she focuses totally on Research plagiarism copyright fair use public domain databases um sharing of files legally versus illegally um evaluating websites citing sources and she wraps up her class with a gigantic um research Symposium I

054don't know if any of your kids have gone through middle school or high school yet but it's a really awesome project that they do it's a sustainability showcase and they have to get all sorts of different sources from databases they have to conduct interviews with um local experts in whatever topic they choose um but all of these topics that she's covering are also reinforced in ela and Civics as well so kind of leaving through the ccul whole building health and wellness they have this um they have health and wellness grade six through eight the entire second trimester which is right now is f focused on health and wellness so they don't go to Fed as much they're pretty much in the classroom learning all this stuff and they touch base on everything they've already learned

055once twice maybe even three times already but they're just kicking it off the notch so they're learning about the Digital World um cyber bullying their digital footprint they do a similar thing to me where they identify their own digital footprint where have they been what have they left behind what's going to follow them in the future um friendships in person versus online and um oversharing online coding and technology which is an elective in the high school they can take it any time while they're in high school it's a one quarter class they focus on um the digital divide which is essentially um the way that opportunities may or may not be available depending on someone's access to modern technology or lack of access and opportunities that may or may not be presented because of it

056and how it sort of disproportionately affects um people of color people of lower income housing um low income households um potentially people with disabilities or older adults might not be given the same opportunities because they don't have the same access to modern technology and then they go back to digital footprint which we teach apparently every year or every other year um they start to dig in to kind of the back end of the internet and how it works as well as data security network security things like that and then of course reinforcing cyber bullying ninth grade Wellness um is all about bullying not just cyber bullying but bullying in general and relationships in general so in there um ever five bullying course they talk about relationships on and offline leadership resilience courage and community so

057how to be um how not to be a bystander how to stand up to bullies stand up for someone else who might be being bullied all that type of stuff and then they also talk about texting and messaging um they use a video called straight talk about texting and messaging actually sent me the exact description it says true life stories offer cautionary tales about the dangers of texting and Anonymous messaging on cell phones and on social media students will learn that privacy is not possible on the internet and once a nude photo or racy text is sent it is likely to come back to haunt them viewers learn the downside of sexting including possible charges of of sending or receiving child pornography being blackmailed by Exes who threaten to release private photos being labeled a

058sex offender and experiencing severe depression about loss of control of their images videos and reputations um Mr gon that's a very impactful lesson and conversation which is good um in 10th Grade they follow up with documentary called the social dilemma which is all about um addiction and the corruption behind the social media companies and how basically their main goal is to get people addicted and they keep pushing their ads and making money that way um social dilemma this investigative story on massed cell phone use cell phone addiction and social media corruption the documentary includes a series of classroom discussion questions the classes cover the questions in breakout groups and then classroom discussion students are encouraged to make changes in their own social media behavior and then finally in 12th grade Wellness they are very focused

059on relationships in general whether it be well focuses having healthy offline relationships however they talk about how being online can affect that so they work with a foundation called The One Love Foundation whose goal is to end relationship abuse it's a nonprofit organization um and uh Mr Sweeney says we have partnered with the one love Foundation to discuss how we navigate our relationships one love has created a video video called behind the post in this video the students see how romantic relationships can be affected by online posts and social media influence students are encouraged and reminded that relationships should be lived in person not online or on social media explanations and examples of toxic relationships propped up by social media influences are discussed in the workshop one love includes a series of questions for students

060as well as role playing and skit options so I just wanted to add this in um if any families have any questions about how they can start to keep their kids a little safer online I think especially the younger kids um Central charging location this was actually Mr Mill suggestion to me he said he did this with his family I guess he picked one location in his house was in his kitchen he said and everybody's devices including him and his wife they all had a curfew and at say 700 p.m. everybody's computers phones whatever they're on the central location that's where they remain um until the morning basically until everything till they're ready to walk out the door breakfast is eaten teeth are fresh clothes are on homework's in your backpack um it just kind

061of keeps the kids from a being too addicted and B having them in their bedroom and getting into who knows what they're getting into um families can identify some tech-free times that are kind of non-negotiable so maybe that's just the dinner table maybe it's from like Mr Mills from 700 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. something like that maybe every day the family goes for a walk together and that's a tech free time um another one this is one I've actually been talking to some of my friends who have kids about a lot um ask your kids permission before you as an adult post about them or post pictures of them um it's really oh see tempting parents are posting pictures of their kids all the line all the time they're cute they're proud of their kids

062they want to show them off but it can kind of create a psychological effect for the kid like where people saying about me oh I'm online um if your kid is a shy kid they might really have an issue with that um and you also kind of want to set that example that kids shouldn't be posting pictures of people without permission either so just kind of a leave by example type of thing um and then discuss your expectations and the consequences of different actions often so if you have if you're buying your kid a phone or maybe it's their device that they need for coming to Middle School what do you as a parent expect of them and do you have a consequence if certain things get um if certain boundaries get crossed um there

063are parental controls on most devices that parents can look into um and they cover anything they cover turning off the internet at certain times turning off notifications um requiring the App Store to only be accessed by the parents versus the kids there are sleep settings on the phone that can turn on automatically I actually have that on my phone so at I think it's 8 or 8:30 my phone starts vibrating and it says time to wind down and then my home screen no longer has any social media or anything it just has like my alarm clock and the com app um so that's super helpful there are productivity timers you can use with your kids so a lot of these will lock the phone down for like 20 minutes while they do their homework and

064then after 20 minutes it will pause and maybe give them a five minute break so maybe for five minutes they can go on and phone and play a game and then there's a lot of apps that give you even more parental controls that than what's already built in um the screen time app is awesome and the bark app which I highly recommend you were the last slide for me um I'm pushing this one because this is the one I have the most experience with it's a really awesome app it lets you monitor pretty much anything your kids are doing on their phone from seeing their messages um seeing how often they're accessing different apps what they're doing on these apps what websites they're on how much time it has geolocation Geo fencing you can be

065alerted if they go out of a certain area so maybe kids that are starting to walk home by themselves for the first time maybe if they take a right instead of the left they were supposed to take you can get notified about that um but when this app first came out I at the school I was at at the time we had the benefit of kind of testing it out as a school um just to sort of get a grasp of like what it was all about and it was great we got notifications anytime the kids anytime there was any kind of bullying going on we got an almost instant notification I would say within maybe like a five minute um time frame but it also alerted us to other things that we weren't even

066really thinking of like kids who maybe were showing signs of having an eating disorder or any like suicidal idation ideations anything like that like any kind of questionable anything that was coming up school olist was getting notified it it's just a really cool thing so I mean that was six or seven years ago and they've come a long way since then so I assume the parent options are probably even better than what I got to try so um if anybody wants more info about that you can feel free to reach out recomend that thank that was really really um inform open up the committee for questions and comments Mr go first awesome awesome awesome um and you know I'm a prevention type of guy very that's a very proactive approach especially like now that my

067kids are in 10th and 12th grade I saw like progression that we went through from like sixth grade first all what are you do there and I think you guys nailed it with like okay describe it then and then ninth grade and then how how important it is to um not post something that you might see 10 years from now Googling your parents like you know that's just great stuff because I think it just tells them how important it is and you know really don't want to hurt yourself at the beginning life right to post something wrong um you know I always try to avoid text because it no matter what you say in a text it's just going to come out with that you say you know I have staff which I I call

068talk so I you know I use that telephone way more than I do social media so the idea like even with with people texting back and forth I get so aggravated with it because it's like you know you just keep going back and forth where you just pick up the phone um so that's I I love the prevention piece you know I I do sit here sometimes and just say you know I'm so blessed to be on this committee to see all the hard work that you guys do but I always at the same breath I feel like you don't get this message to the parents like every parent in Cohasset should see this we got 11 participants so like what did we all do here tonight you know and like that b app that

069that is a fantastic that every parent in Cass should know about so you know if if if somebody's listening out there because these are things that take a lot of time and effort from our our administrators that I I don't feel like the parents are listening enough and and and I got to tell you honestly as a parent it is such useful information that I get sitting I just I I I feel like I just wish other parents would get the information we'll put it in the Navigator we'll post it on our website so it'll be there yes I think but one one thing I do I do think I I think the last two slides that ly showed really is I think the impetus of this conversation that we're moving into because I feel

070moving forward clearly there's a lot happening and there's a a breath there's a sort of a a pattern of of when we're teaching what when however um I think we need to do a few things we need to figure out first of all Gathering data what our kids are going through and what they they really need at their particular age levels you know these lines shift as technology shifts downward and moves moves all over but more perhaps as as important and more important is what we do with that data and I really think um that as we move into our strategic plan just as we did if if you think about when we had that safe schools committee and we brought people together around physical and social emotional safety I think it's really crucial for

071us to bring the outside Community the families into the school and to talk about what we're teaching and what we're doing so that we have this balance you know Lindsay mentioned the things that parents can do um even principal Mills suggestions a great suggestion but I think having the conversations at the family level with the school presents and partnering and thought partnering would provide a lot of support for families and it would also provide us with a lot of information on what we can do to better support you when the kids get home so I really see that as we look at our strategic plan and we look at Wellness we look at family and Community engagement we look at social emotional learning you know all those five competencies that we talk about castle are

072all wolen into this and um you know and as a father of four um kids who are at various levels in this technology Spectrum I'm going through it too so I can absolutely see the need for that so today we really just tried to give you a sense of what we're doing but we know there's a there's a desire for a deeper level of Engagement and partnership and I think that's something we need to commit to in the next strategic plan so just wanted to say that Mr car this is great um I learned a lot um at the lower grades those loner assets are do you have any thoughts on do we have the right amount of them out there 12 seemed loow to me or I think it was decided that it was

073an age appropriate to be on device okay enough to have a one to one situation okay so everyone in that class gets one fourth and February you know as they older there are more opportunties that to instruction remember third grade though they are taking the mcast on they are and our hope is that we'll have a one to one in third grade so that's we have that in our bu for that and then they have iPads they do have the opportunity to be on um Chromebooks in their classes but you know we have enough iPads so that they're doing you know Center work and things like that and if I can jump in at the third grade level we they have Chromebook Partners so if there's ever a time where the whole class does want

074devices they know who in the building they can go to and they arrange that I I love for instance coding I mean that's amazing right it just blows my mind we're teaching coding at that AG our code is great love it remember they are following the St standards and the and the curriculum set by state sh Paul's thoughts about got figure out how to get this espe this kind of stuff out because I agree with you you know before I got got here I missed stuff all the time and I read everything like that comes out from this I just would missing and I don't know how to do that but get it out more anyway thank you for the work you do it's great thank you Mr Garis leki I would agree that I

075feel like it's both a communication issue and a cultural issue around I think what you're kind of alluding to to sort of a a community wide the issues around safety great Behavior online kind Behavior ethical use of of technology that that is both a a school and a home um thing and and so I guess I I have a bunch of questions I learned a lot thank you for all of this um are you finding um or how often do you feel like teachers in general are seeing issues that have started online entering the school day so whether it's hurt feelings distract actions um Etc that whether it's coming from gossiping about school work or gossiping about each other um in terms of entering the school day and distracting from the working at the middle

076school I'd say a lot um like pleas um maybe we uh I think it comes and goes in waves um and the severity of it I think is kind of in the eye of the person who's involved in it I think a lot of times it's so and so didn't like my shoes and she said that online and to us were like okay but to them it's a huge thing because it's Middle School um but I I definitely think it weaves its way in and out um it helps we do have the phone away for the day rule of the middle school and that's actually huge so they've got their phones on the buses and maybe they're dealing with those issues on the bus but at least it can't escalate while they're in the building

077because the phone's away they might still be thinking about it we can't get it out of their head but we can try to distract them or if it's bothering them enough try to get it out of them and deal with it but at least it can't hopefully can't escalate too much with bones away but it's definitely an issue um there are school districts that do that of all across the district Boston public schools for instance that's what they do we call YOLO bags those zip things y bags put them in there at the beginning I mean I'm sure kids find way arounded at times but but that's their rule right and and there is a a move within the state right from desie to encourage communities to consider that um but again that's a community

078conversation that's something we want to have as a community but these are the things that are are at play here at the state um and then finally because I know where I I mean go on forever but the concept of sort of bystanders bullies and then there's also the upstanders I wonder if you could just flesh out a little bit more sort of how do you teach children because in my mind this goes way younger than I mean in ocod probably when they're playing Roblox and chatting with each other do the children know and are they specifically and explicitly taught how to diffuse redirect um stand up for someone provide support who are The Trusted adults that they should talk to what should concern them what shouldn't concern them so what are those sort of

079messages that are taught explicitly and maybe maybe it's less more so in that sort of Elementary age that I'm thinking now oh those actually some of the things that are they are told that you know tell an adult lock and report and take a screenshot and share with an adult those sorts of things and to not be a right and do they understand to do that not just when it's someone who's um an unknown but when their actually their nextdoor neighbor or their friend that they like to sit with on the bus is is doing like sort of talking about those nuances of that of that behavior because I feel like taking action when it's a little more nuanced it's easy to block someone who you don't know it's a little less easy to do

080that and there may be ramification socially when um it's it's somebody you do know and whether or not that's sort of discussed as part of that conversation right it's broader than just in technology right so we have responsive classrooms and all of those components are in responsive classroom which is k25 um and then um in their health class they talk about it and so it's part of kind of the conversations that happen out I you know absolutely and I think and even just on our playground you know at J Hill we're we talk about we follow the skipper Creed but then we also talk about using your wit so you walk it away you ignore you talk it out you tell an adult and I think those are that's ingrained their processes for how they

081problem solve a situation in an unstructured environment um and it's really tricky because in my six years I've seen the technology trickle down when I first started a deer Hill know there really wasn't there weren't many students with cell phones and now cell phones are very present all the way down the third grade and apple watches are like the vein of my existence um because they they're a phone they're a phone they're just tiny and so um we have similars the Middle School in a way for the day policy um and today one was brought to you know student came to my you know office teacher told me to give you this because it was the second time they had it out you know and so um you know we're always working with families and

082and we also understand and as parents ourselves that you know these kiddos are walking home and doing things where their parents want them to have that access and you know all the safety things but that that that gray area of the school day is really tricky and so where that middle ground the middle school and I have landed on is it's off it's away for the day there you know we have all the resources you need in the school day and then sure once you're dismissed you can turn it on and then it kind of leaves our hands which also sometimes fads into our school yeah and I think the point of tricky and I think partnering with families is I'm definitely hearing this message and brainstorming and thinking about the PSO and other ways

083we can get this word out more I think night we spend time with our curriculum nights and things but this is an important topic and this would be a great way to tag on with a different kind of curriculum night or something like that I think just you know getting that engagement maybe we F TRS I don't know remember psychology I don't know at the high school the philosophy has been to allow allow students to learn the responsible use at that age these this is what we have to explore we have to explore what does that mean is that actually happening and is it better to take the device away from them in the learning environment knowing they have other electronic devices that they're using for learning these are really important discussions as well as

084how can we support you as the schools and then what do the kids really need to learn which I we're doing a nice job with but it's as Alex said it's he evolves things are moving constantly and we want to make sure we know we're teaching to the right population the skills we should be doing some of that's set by the curriculum and the standards but we need to shift that and get information um Mr M thank you um Mr chair I I um I'm really worried about this stuff uh because it's just no one sitting in this room experienced a childhood with with this with this threat to the level that our students our kids are are living it so it's almost in a sense difficult for us to even fathom what what is

085actually needed what is actually relevant so so I want to just preface my remarks with that I just I I I am very concerned about this area and there's also the consideration well how much of that is on the schools how much is it on the parents and the community and I think that I think the answer to the question is that the burden should be equally shared um and not everyone that is an education would subscribe to that I I also want to just perhaps my comments with the notion that when oftentimes I don't know how to say this without I'm not targeting to of you at all I I um I feel like when the school committee requests a presentation on a topic um there is like um there there is a concern

086that we have identified a failure in a particular element and and that is why you're like here to report you're at the principal's office and that's not what it is at all um it's it's not I I I've gotten that feeling from a lot of different groups to comeing here it's not what what is happening is that we're trying to it's I'm sure the guy sitting that chair right there would agree that a a school system is is a is a really complex entity and there's so many different elements to it that we're just trying to keep our finger to the pulse of of any possible problem concern area for improvement and as Dr someone just said or maybe it was Dr scolin someone just said the word evolving this this is certainly one of

087those areas that evolve so I appreciate that you um both just went through everything that we're currently doing and I appreciate everything you're doing I I do I I think that it's amazing and and and I think Mr K's right on the point where we need to share that with the more so other people you know parents totally understand because there is not an understanding I don't think generally to the degree that What What In terms we are doing you know right um a full comprehensive understanding of that I didn't even have it I'm on school um I'm wondering though like the to me the point of these conversations is to be critical of ourselves and think like what what is it and Miss leski was sort of hitting on this like with with your

088comments like well you know what exact discussions are you having with the kids at which level and how you know what what I you know I'm wondering like and you were the two people to ask is there is there are there areas for improvement do you feel that all the instruction is relevant like when I'm listening to this I'm listening to some of the high school con um the high school Concepts and the Middle School concept I'm thinking can't somebody just be shifted downward at this point in time like aren't the kids even like I feel like you know like the you know addiction of of of devices and the social media dangers could be introduced at like an earlier age like in the elementary school level instead of just the Middle School like there's

089a lot of I don't remember all of them I don't have it in front of me but the Middle School page like the sixth and seventh Pages um the the pages from the from the slideshow the slides um listed uh areas that I felt are very applicable to like elementary students now and um the elementary slides are certainly still relevant to elementary students but I feel like I feel like some of our older Ellie students are past that point and same thing for some of our like our eighth grade students like you're introducing things about relationships and and things like that for the seniors but I think we need to get that into like the eighth grade I mean they're they're already having relationships and these this the use of digital um devices and and

090social media that is hurting our students healthy development in those areas and I you know only so much of this can be cured through instruction right I mean it's it's a there's a maturity issue there are you know self-control issues there are supervision issues there's all kinds of things that go into this but I'm just wondering if I'm really concerned about our kids and the exposure they're getting I'm wondering if if our if our curriculum is completely if it's still relevant if you know how how often we're reviewing this um and and this isn't I'm not again I'm not trying to point any fingers of blame I'm I'm I'm I'm asking the two people that are most in touch with this area in our school district like what you think like where can we improve

091this where can we bring more to the kids how can we how can we broaden the Ellie students exposure to these Concepts throughout the day like you mentioned like you know they're going to be once a week pretty much in in Tech uh or sometimes twice a week um and it's used throughout the classroom it's inter moven into the the lessons well how much though um because I'm seeing it I've seeing a much more robust exposure in the middle and high school level because there's like health and wellness there's guidance there's different like a lot more um different parts of their day where they're exposed more formally to these to these Concepts and the LA students just aren't getting that I feel like frequently enough um and uh you know we have to worry about

092standards and and we have to worry about the basics and math and writing and reading for sure but um I'm just wondering if you see any room to integrate these Concepts in a little bit more of a robust fashion especially for our younger students late Ellie and the middle school students so that you know we're arming them with I I want them to like basically I want to train our students to think twice whenever I I tell my clients dance like nobody's watching but text an email and use social media like it's going to be used against you in court one day because it's going to and you know I I want I want kids to start thinking like that you know like you know is this really something I need to put out there

093right now and uh so so I'm just trying to explain myself because I I I don't want you to think that that the school committee thinks that our you know our instructional technology department is doing an inadequate job we don't think that at all but I feel like this is a very risk-prone area that we we may be able to do more about so I don't know what do you and I'm try kind of putting you on the spot but I I kind of gave Dr scolin the heads up in terms of what specifically we're looking for so just to and I'll let you answer and they are experts at at at work through this but philosophically just I think this is a conversation to have is we need to talk about certainly you know

094what we need to filter down to the younger grades but also philosophically when you think about what the students are capable of handling in terms of a conversation I'll give you an example when Common Sense Media sends out guidance about how we handle a traumatic event with different age levels the guidance is different some of the guidance when you're in K to to you know really looks at you don't you don't tell them about it you make sure that you know they're safe and they keep them safe so I guess what I would say is I think we have to work together to make sure that we're not going to have conversation with kids when they're not emotionally and psychologically ready to actually deal with the concept so that's when it's really incumbent upon families

095to work with us to to say you know don't don't have them they shouldn't have a device in first grade that is a computer that has access to everything and we can't teach a first grader some of the concepts they're dealing with on that device because they're not emotionally and and and not ready for it so we can't we can't do that that's why the standards look at Child Development they look at where children are and we target our work around Child Development so I think I just want to make sure that philosophically we all have that handle like we can't teach a first grader the concepts that a first grader is going to deal with if that a first grader has these devices because they don't get it they can't they're not ready for

096the device so I think we do need to kind of temper everything we do with that now with that said philosophically I think there are certainly things that are trickling down and even though we mentioned a few of them like the digital footprint which seems to be happening in t too right there's there's probably to your point some more substantive Concepts that we can really work on together but that's why I think it's this partnership between the two of us I I speak as a par too because you know I I I see them being um you know definitely uh submitted to some of this as well so I just want to say that because I think that's a really important piece in what we're educating you know you can't teach a second grader things

097that they're just not ready to be to learn but it's kind of my point it's kind of my point is is is are we sure that we're on the on the crust of wave in terms of that are are we making sure that we're actually presenting relevant information it's not too um you know dated in terms of what their ability to cope is because they they've actually been exposed to this a lot earlier than they may have been the same might have dated like that right I mean this information gets it's dated quickly well that's why we're here right and so we're also um on the 7eventh we had the health and um physical education curriculum committee come together because we're reviewing all of that and we have all new standards and there was a

098large topic of conversation specific Ally around this and so because we have health and wellness at the table we have our C teachers are also teaching Wellness all of us were there and this was a topic um and that was K through 12 so um I just wanted to add to that that yes this is something that we do need to look at that we are looking at and um will continue to do that because changes like this and I think more robustly as we move I mean this is a great time to talk about this because we're about to launch it on the next strategic plan that's plan Echoes the needs of the whole Community um from a a data standpoint and part of that data is the qualitative conversations we having with people

099about what are your students dealing with and we need to partner together to make sure that we create a solution as a community for some of these issues really some of it is keeping the devices at an agent level appro to them some of it is educating the students on the information the kids are just dealing with at a younger age right a lot of have ages on it 13 14 just as linday the saying but can bypass so we have to just together work together to keep our I think a lot of the good conversation stuff that might not necessarily be listed in what we're specifically teaching does actually come up in like the classroom discussions when it's being taught because kids love to talk about this stuff like I saw someone text this

100message and then it kind of naturally the teacher has to deal with what they just said so it does kind of naturally come out not necessarily on purpose um and sometimes I think that's actually kind of a better way to do it because you're not purposely being like hey second grader that's never heard of this let me tell you all this stuff that might be too much but two or yeah two or three of them are bringing it up in seven year old language okay let's deal with this now so I think some of that is trickling down more organically in like a formal structured way but I do think I I think as we regroup and look at this I think we need to decide what we're going to approach with intentionality and some

101of that intentionality to your point maybe at a younger age um that's that's a fact of just where we live so that's something that I think we have to think about as well so I'm gonna shut up a little bit let them talk but it is it's a we got fourth graders on group text chats now right and it's like and they're and they're not responsible and I don't know if they're again it's a maturity issue so I I don't know if how much you're able to impress upon them in a classroom setting I don't know how much of that is on School District but it may be something we want to give thought to yes I'm worried about our kids saying something mean to someone and blowing up into some big thing where someone

102is hurting themselves or feeling bad about themselves or you know or or or sending naked pictures of themselves when they're in middle school and it's just and it ruins them you know I'm worried about that and I just I don't I just making sure that if if so Brian M K think that we're doing everything that we can and that the instructions as relevant as possible and we have to White walk that that that that tight rope right of You Know M pointed out like you don't want to introduce the concepts that may be like to to you know emotionally mature for a particular subset of students but at the same time you also don't want to ignore it if everyone in the room already knows about it's like you know you decide to have

103the talk with your seventh grader and it's like yeah goes and so it's like okay well then there was only so much value in doing that at that point like maybe you should have done it two years ago so you could you know so to like the roblo when you're talking about that I don't know how many parents let their kids you know play games or do have the conversation about oh this game is really cool and you talking like kids are like I can't really play that my parents don't let me so having time would that help would that that gives me an ideaa like would it help to do like like some sort of tech survey with the families do you have a idea of like PR grade what the kids are actually

104doing I wanted to do that before here but I thought now we should do it more organized with I think it's right there I think I think that I really think we need to look at that as part of our social emotional um branch of our next Ching planner really own in I did that when I was the computer teacher and I just remember asking the students and I was surprised a lot of them didn't have parents that let them do things so I think that's probably 10 years ago I'm sure it's quite different now okay I'm sure that's a really good idea they know what what the the topics relevant topics I'll speak as a as a parent for a second I I was determined to to to wait until 8th grade to give

105my oldest son a um a device I didn't as Co hit and and we made a decision that we were going to do it in sixth grade so you know that was a decision we made um it it I don't know if it was the best one but it was a decision we made so I'm right with you on this you you're making calls and we need to talk about it I I don't know there's a right answer I want to be able to figure out all together you know we have the two experts for our district here you know and that's what I I just want to make sure and I think that's a great idea give you know an option to tell you what's going on you guys have a better concept of

106per grade level what is most relevant that's I think Mr Bri that's a really good idea you should do that um you know and I you know I think the principles can add a lot of value to this too you know you you guys are throughout the entire buildings all day every day and you hear the conversations it's not just in a particular class you know you guys hear everything so that that can help too in terms of trying to identify what is relevant for for different subsets of of kids different different levels of kids right it's it's um so hopefully we can I don't know I I I've been going on for a long time but obviously you know I I I really push to have this thing I'm worried about it I view

107this as a student safety issue and that's why I'm worried about it I see that and during my common planning time when I go over student standards I'd like to asking teachers getting those coming up well thank you thank you Mr um first it feels like an eternity go but the presentation was awesome um very very detailed um I love the uh I think that's I think that's one of these things that we should talk about with the community because for all the all the right reasons it also underscores that the kids information is their information and that they should be responsible for and it it gives them some agency um well the the idea of the the bar cap I'm definitely going to look into that and I like the ideas that have been

108floated the the thing for me and I share a lot of uh Mr mcl's concerns and I'm sure I share broadly with the um with the community the concerns and no one here I think is blind to the risks of of what's going on with technology the great unknown that you have really raising a generation through devices through through social media which we never had before um but I worry about as the technology does move down I we have fourth graders on group chats third graders and I've as a parent of a sixth grader you know I've seen the what I'd say some not good use of Technology already some kids making bad decisions with their phones uh either you know posting or submitting things they shouldn't have taking things other things have put put

109posted put out of context so given that it's happening I that's that's to me like should can we be doing more to make it not happen like so you can only teach so many things and there going to be people who as many times you say don't post stupid pictures yourself they're going to do it anyway because kids are kids but I just want to make sure that that um we are doing all the things we're doing this is a great list that you showed um and I love that it's integrated in the curriculum as well um but I like the idea of keeping this top of Mind as we finding new ways get to get information um and I think my takeaway from the committee here is let's do keep this on top of

110mind let's keep finding new ways to drive home what kids should should be thinking about and more importantly actually I think what parents should be thinking about because I don't know that all the parents of third graders know that I mean how many third graders have devices at home I don't know um and then their friends have friends I mean I I heard someone tell me today that um second graders are playing fortnite that's crazy um but you know that so so thisor if technically are playing fortnite then we almost have an obligation to kind of teach some things that we may have thought 5 years ago but they weren't playing fortnite weren't relevant or they weren't able to consume so anyway I think this is a journey not a uh not a single meeting

111and um you know this may be something we come back to in the spring I think we should I I'm telling you we're formuling the plan that's it so I guess my ask for you and uh principal Solan you as well and everyone Administration please come to us if there's things that we can do as a committee to help out if it's a funding issue a capital need if there's programs if there's things that we can put on for our kids speakers we can bring in whatever it is to kind of help us protect our kids from the potential risks of these things and recognize they there I think you have the committee's full support on so thank you for for everything go beyond that though and like you've seen the convers you've heard the

112conversation you've been part of this so can you please like we are going to revisit it in the spring can you try and in meantime like I I guess you know Mr Brian one of the things would be you know maybe we create a survey for the parents to to better inform you um as to where the kids are can you please think of a few ways to sort of uh capture like this conversation you understand what we're trying to to do here and it's not it's not C holes in our in our in our in our Tech program at school it's to figure out how we can and how we can most effectively address this need amongst the student body mark my words if we have a major student issue I guarantee you it

113will be link social media or or or texting or something like that usually and we were try I I would love to avoid that if we can so um that's so just take it a step fur like so so it like when we do come back oh yeah as a result of that first conversation we had back in December here's what we we looked at and and Miss Kay and I or Miss O'Brien and I or principal Sullivan and I we talked or principal F and I we talked and we you know we thought we'd do this and we sent or we sent out a survey as you might have seen or this and that that's kind of what we would love to see not to give you more work but to sort of help

114our program evolve a little bit if you feel that there is a need after you discuss yourselves I I'm not expecting answers or Solutions right now as Mr di said it's a joury and we have he and like I said we have health and wellness that we're reviewing all of that so in conjunction with them things of such a big conversation of our six and a half hours together um so I think we can work andate I didn't think um too not to add to this project but recommendations for parents um that are sort of whether you just maybe like what you had up with that bark screen I found very impactful as a parent it was very it was specific it wasn't sort of these generalized ideas and I know we've done parent nights

115before around literacy mathematics Etc I think that you know age level um parent nights around um technology and whether that's some sort sort of smaller Round Table discussions or just even presentations about specific actions parents can take or how parents can be more thoughtful in their U managing of Technology um at in the digital world at home I think is is helpful so I'm GNA this is where I might um draw the line no no not draw the line I'm going to expose myself we not Hing up ATT to our subcommittees we have a subcommittee on committee community relations um and what I'm worried about is that I'm on it and don't don't realize it but I think this might be a job for that subcommittee is let's have that subcommittee get together and talk

116about this particular issue how can we better engage parents on this issue with the school um and first of all who's on the committee and then and then um we'll we'll uh get a report from them we have these at the end of our meetings so that and that'll help keep this fire going and keep the keep eyes on so say farers can play a ro outside organization we've done screenagers with them and we've done other uh like it's time for more of that I always feel like that three three Community engagement areas every year should be something on drug and alcohol there something on anti-bullying and something on social media awareness like at every level yeah like those three things really should happen every at every level and that in terms of presentations so

117look for subcommittee together to uh to do that so thank you very much great work thank you for really impressive happy holidays thank thank you for coming principal Sol of course so with that we will move to academic initiatives update with uh Dr scin um well I already talked to you about uh our health and physical education we have any standards just happen to work out that way that was the cycle um for us so um we started our work on the sth they actually have been doing it all along done a nice job aligning um their curriculum we for 12 they had time last year to do it also so um we're working on that and so um they are moving ahead quite nicely um they really wonderful group all the committies that come

118together du to CRI work are really really so thoughtful about what they're looking at and and how we are aligning um and the curriculum mapping is still uh at the front of what we're doing in particular with Rock and he's looking at all that with those committees um and wellness we do have a wellness meeting next in January you are absolutely right um and we had a unfortunately we're having a dlex community with our committee but unfortunately after you come so um and Monday is the day and so we'll be meeting in February it's the first Monday we did get but on February 5th so um lots of things are happening um just because we were coming up to a break there's as you heard Ella talked about exams that were happening for a but

119um I think uh no one is taking their foot off the gas that is for sure um and we had our reading specialist and our MTH specialist meeting we meet them monthly um and our read meeting we talk about a lot of different things but writing is very high up on our list of conversations um and so um there were some really nice collaboration that was happening and talking about how we can um what things are happening what we can do continually improve our writing for our students so of a quick update it's interesting also is as we really getting more refinement data being able to cross reference data points that are pointing in a particular direction and I see that as a as a definite direction we're moving where we're not my op on

120one or two data points but we're seeing trends of data that are are absolutely telling us right writing is coming up a lot of things it is it show yes we already we knew it was there um but having the data to support that and then allowing us to then dve that data um Lisa P Le is extremely helpful she has that the data techn Tech side um and rock has the other kind of gathering the data and analyzing the data so um it's really kind of a nice relationship right now really help yeah very interesting so and am I hearing that the data that we're looking at is U proving out that we still have work to do and improving our writing something we knew but it's it's we're now seeing more evidence of

121that we it is and it's also seeing how um think um resources that we're using and assessments that we're using were being able to kind of we're being able to see oh well that is an indicator and it is supporting our students and it's also an indicator of where they're going which is that allowing us to dig deeper and say okay how do we then improve their U their learning by really being targeted and very specific that's because some of the things like I ready is allowing us to be able to do that in map and reading um is just one of the ways that we're looking at they have their my paath diagnostic um allows us to really pinpoint not just say they don't know fractions what part of fractions do they know or

122in their writing where is it specifically you know it's not conventions up the you know High School level it's idea generation okay specifically what can we do around idea generation and in particular what kind of generation so those are the pieces of so that that's great and that's that's kind of what we I think we're hoping this director of data position to be well to do that I would be interested in kind of one of your upcoming academic initiatives updates is to give us some more um specificity on what you're seeing and especially the things that you're putting in place especially on writing I know I said especially three times I could probably use um my own help on the writing part that's that's clear bad style but um that's something that I know that

123we're we're interested in um and so anything else for Dr scollins I would love to know a little bit more just about what kinds of data you're talking about whether it's all standardized um measures or whether or not this also is including things like teacher surveys how many formally graded written assignments are children doing each year um you know what how do the curricular tools that that the district uses support or could better support what our performance on standardized has and whether or not those pieces of like I'm not a statistician type person like how our real life work in in the classrooms is sort of supporting and or needs adjustment to better support sort of the standardized testing data if that's what you mean by data if it's all sort of within that standardized

124test right it's not all standardized right there's all different things we look at so when we had our meeting with the reading Specialists and dear was sharing specifically how they were looking at their writing prom the the prompts then the writing and how they were drilling down to where were those patterns where were the strengths and where were the opportunities and then how are we going to address that so that all but and like AP performance like taking something like writing and then going as far as like so what are the AP scores um of the children at the streets C right no I agree thank you thank you very much Dr scollin I think we'll move on to our special education update with uh Miss swanka Miss swanka is um zooming into our meeting

125um because she has graciously decided to not risk infection um of the remaining committee members so very much appreciate that uh so Mr SW swanga you are in your Brady Bunch box on the screen here and we appreciate your uh you're you're joining us wonderful thank you so much for allowing me to come at this time this month and um and in this in this venue um so if I have the opportunity to share my screen there are a couple of things that I would like to be able to present to you this evening one is my regular update and um another one is um regarding some of the information on out of District that I'm going to share with Sue Owen you do have the ability thank you so much you're welcome she she

126I am I'm just sharing sharing my screen times I minimize it and then go back to share screen it'll be there minimize whatever you have on your screen and go back to share screen and then you'll see it in an image you are sharing now all right here we go your uh your volume's very low on your uh mic I don't know if you can turn it up anybody else getting that that well give it a try okay so you can see here our um our November report as I usually present to you um our annual reviews totaled 19 two of them were out of District reviews which were mine nine were Elementary and eight were secondary the annual reviews once again are the meetings in in which we take a look at you know

127what the students have made in terms of progress over the course of the year that an IEP typically runs and make predictions for the following year our re-evaluations and our initial evaluations are of course the meetings which involve testing and qualifying for special education services you can see at the elementary level that we held for um meetings at which students were found to be continuing eligible and one meeting where student was not which you know is a cause for celebration they've made sufficient progress and have really been able to put into place all of the strategies that they need to kind of continue without an IEP and at the secondary level you can see that there were six meetings there um four of them resulted in um continuing eligibility and two of them um also

128came off of IEPs if we look down at the initial evaluations you can see at the elementary level during the month of November we had four initial evaluations one which came through mtss and found the student eligible and then three parent referrals all from Cohasset Public Schools one which found a student eligible for services and two not eligible and at the secondary level we only had actually One initial evaluation um it did come to us from a parent I do not tonight have the data as to whether or not that was within or outside of Cohasset Public Schools but that student was found eligible for services um it was a a very busy month as you can see uh sorry about that um even though it was a shorter month with the holiday there but

129um but we we had a lot of good meetings and a lot of good things happened there so I'm going to stop sharing this um I'm also going to share with you at this point in time that we've gotten a lot of parent surveys back since we last met and um all of them have been 100% in the positive range so we're always happy to send out those surveys with the IEPs and hear back from Families how things are going um any questions around that information before I um move along just ask a quick clarifying question um it's Jen lki um is secondary 9 through 12 12 or you considering secondary 6 through 12 6 through 12 yes including the Middle School open the floor any questions comments for the committee Mr Wonka please proceed

130all right so um this month we also had a CPAC meeting at this CPAC meeting we had our annual basic rights presentation and um it was very well received there were you know some nice questions and feedback from CPAC members um and I know um some people actually did Outreach and said oh I wasn't able to come where can I find it and they were able to find the basic rights presentation um very easily under um my section of our website so um that was all you know really kind of um a very nice meeting and always a good thing to share and very clarifying with families um so I would encourage anyone who has um any questions around special education that's kind of a a good place to look and a nice resource okay

131um finally I know that there were some questions regarding in District programming outof District programming so on and so forth and I think that's actually the next agenda item that I'm going to share with Sue Owen so I guess before we go into that I should turn it back over to you um chair Rend and see if there's anything regard regarding what I've presented so far anything Forte on the special education update before move on next agenda bullet hearing none I will um then turn the floor back either to Mr wanka or Miss Owen to talk about Miss Owen is vanished um actually I'm going to start by sharing my screen okay right I'm going talk about some IND District PR programming and out of District programming and I believe just for context this was

132a request I think I requested you did yeah month or so ago to talk about are there ways that we can maximize our own resources instead of spending it on outo District yep and in a programmatic sense can we build some some some programs out there spend the money anyway spend it here it's a great question so that's it's a very good question and and building IND District programming is something that um we always like to do um so if you if you can see on my screen right here what I did is um I've taken the years that um that I have been here and just kind of shown you so that you have some perspective about the kind of programming that we're talking about the types of programming that exist the number of

133students who um are currently out of district and the percentages for each area so for example in the 2020 21 School year there were 24 students who were um receiving their education in an out of District program 20% of those students were in residential placements 30% were in what we consider to be private schools that meaning that it is um not a collaborative which is considered more of a public entity 33% in collaboratives and other in 177% now typically other here what that means is that um we partner for example example with situ around some programming that they provide for students that perhaps our students May benefit from so when I entered that was kind of where things were at in terms of out of District if you look at the the next year you

134can see that 21 of our students were out of District that this percentage of out of District students the actual numbers of students in residential programming doesn't change it's that other numbers changed and therefore it changed es the percentage because they're all just kind of compared to each other but you can see there that that private went down and collaboratives went up um a collaborative is considered a lesser restrictive environment than a a private placement um additionally what's kind of interesting here was that one of the things that I really worked hard on when I came on board was I noticed that a lot of our well it seemed to me a disproportionate number of our students who were outplaced because of issues around social emotional or mental health um possibly could be served in

135District and there was a lot of work that was done very early on um from the time I came on board through this 2021-22 school year to kind of address that some of those things were we added a school psychologist at the secondary level specifically at the middle school instead of having one service both the Middle School the high school we placed one at each school and built capacity for them to do counseling in addition to testing um we added a social worker we um added Consultants to you know to our district as a whole and in addition to that we started to build some features of some of our programming at the secondary level that would really lend themselves toward building into what we now have which is some therapeutic programming and some of

136our numbers I believe that are reflected here are connected with that so we saw a need at the secondary level we started to address that need some numbers of students being placed in private situations for under those categories went down um some collaboratives increased but also the number of students who were outplaced went down if you look in the 2223 school year um you can see um again you know our private placements stayed at around the same place um our collaboratives were also staying pretty steady with that kind of slightly increased number and if you look at the 2324 school year you will see that that trend is kind of continuing there um as far as other things that we are are looking at in terms of outof District programming and our own programs we've

137we've built out therapeutic programming opportunities for students at the middle school and the high school level here in casset the other thing that we really turned our Focus to as you well know after that was expanding our prek programming and we've really doubled that and what that is going to enable us to do is to look at those students who are with us as preschoolers as three and four year olds and what are the needs that we see there and what can we build into our Osgood and deerhill programming specifically into some of our programs that we have there such as stars and the ilc that will enable us if some of our very young students are at a higher level of need of service that will enable us to be able to address those

138needs and keep those students in District as well and that um that is our our next lens and our next Focus for really being able to address the needs we see and through expanding some of our existing programming being able to keep more and more students in District um we do see students who if you look here at the other there is a um a program in situ that we partner with for students who may not be necessarily getting a diploma and need some Services you know beyond the age of 18 and or you know whatever the graduation age is and require Services until they are 22 years old um those numbers are so very low for us what we've done in our high school programming is we've really expanded it to look at a

139lot more prevocational programming for those students and we continue to build on that and build things into it um and we are fortunate to have a neighbor who has programming that is more vocationally based and is a much bigger district and has the capacity to do something like that than we do that we can partner with in a very fiscally responsible way to provide what we need um for some of those students um if it's all right with you I'll stop my share for a moment so I can see you and address any questions if you would rather me keep it up so you can look at it and ask questions I'm happy to do you don't mind leaving it up I think I think I think it'd be helpful um absolutely um before I

140go to the actually let's I'll open the floor to the committee any um I have I have some questions and thoughts but I'll open up the floor first any um I'll just open for on this one any any questions for Mr Wonka about this presentation is Mr Wonka is that um this is correig mlen um is that the overall number like next to the years in each colored column is that is that overall number is that a percentage or is that a number of students that's an actual number of students so that is that's the added District number for each year yes okay so that's I mean that's essentially stayed the same for the last four academic years I think if you went back further I think for the three and I I guess what

141my question was going to be is we've got we've got the number of of students who are out of out of District 24 21 20 22 for each of the years what I'd be interested in and I think you started touching on this at the at the um at the end of your remarks but what I'd be interested in is I'm I assume for each one of those students we have a reason that they are out of District um and you know whatever that reason is and obviously we don't want to share confidential information in a public form but what I'm curious at is have you can you collect those reasons and kind of give us an abstract of you know it's you know what are they what categories do they fall in and to

142those reasons suggest that we should be investing in anything so like let's say I'm just going to make it up let's say 22 of the 22 you know eight of them are out of District place because language mixed language uh so if we were able to build a language thing here we could cap recapture those students bring them back into our district and not spend the money that we're spending on that out of placement and instead spend it in District and then we have you know we're supporting our goal of having a school Community maybe take in students to G and potentially even taking taking other students as well so I guess is is that is that a breakdown that you have available and that you'd be able to put together so that is something

143that I can speak about at this moment in time if you will okay um our students who are um for example you know outplaced residentially they they clearly have a a high level of need that we cannot provide um our students as I was speaking about earlier who back here in the 2021 school year were outplaced privately a good number a majority of them looked as if those reasons were social emotional and um mental health and it was perhaps um felt that it was not being addressed as robustly here and that they needed that support elsewhere and since then we really built out that staff and that programming and have addressed that and we've seen those numbers go down we've seen some numbers go up in the collaboratives um that is a lesser restrictive environment

144while there is a proportion of students who participate in a particular program in the collaborative the the grade levels are widely varied for those students and it would entail the building of three programs for a very small number of students to retain those students in our district and provide appropriate programming for them which would mean you know three teachers probably nine esps or par professionals an additional bcba an additional occupational therapist physical therapist speech and language therapist adaptive fizzed the the cost breakdown of all of that is equal to or higher than what it is for us to partner with our collaborative and and the sell shore collaborative is ours um in in order to provide those students you know with the programming that they need um it gets very tricky because there are age

145range that you cannot cross with students so students in a program cannot be more than 48 months apart so when you have students of such different ages participating in the programing even if they are of a similar disability type building that programming gets very very tricky um program building was was something that um I I really did in um my previous District which was a larger District um and so you know I I I can um you know recognize kind of a little bit about you know where that Tipping Point is and when we really can grow something out and retain students as we did earlier and where we need to really kind of use the resources that we have um one of the things that I am looking at very seriously right now as

146I said is kind of our students who are coming in at prek and what does that mean because programs do always develop and change for our Elementary programs Our Stars and our ilc programs is the complexion of the needs of the student changing and what do we need to do to make sure that we're going to be able to meet those needs so those students don't have to go out and that is really going to be the next Focus much as the social emotional was when I first came on board the expanding of pre this year that is kind of going to be the next Focus to continue to retain our students here in District so it sounds like what what I'm hearing is that you've you're the the ask that I was hoping for

147you are looking at is you know let's look at the reasons that our students are going out of district and seeing whether it's economically efficient to to do that here and it sounds like for the collaborative we're getting more value out of the outplacement service than it would be if we were to bring them in into uh into into the fold here and build out a a similar C capacity in this District at this moment in time yes now do I want to continue to build our programming of course I do yes yes yeah so um but but you're satisfied at this point that there's not a whole in our programming through which we're losing students that we should be retaining here and that the you know the economics would work out but remember I

148this is quite M Clown again Mr I I think part of the issue though is that the first time I ever heard this concept was Ashley ker had raised this sort of thing in 2019 when we first got on the committee it's not just Mr Dial's point which and he may be making both points I don't know but but yes we'd like to retain our own kids our own students and provide them the services they need here in District and not pay out of District tuition for that but and I think Dr San just just noted this there's also the potential for uh our AB The District's ability to actually make some revenue from hosting um non-district students um you know that who whose District does not provide the services and then they come to

149Cohasset and pay the added added districted tuition to Cohasset so now it's the reverse not only are we not paying the out of District tuition we're also making the out of District tuition dollars from other districts and I'm not trying to turn it into a business but what I'm trying to do is we can we can actually turn a negative number into a positive number um and and that can actually help us to expand the program um in years to come so it's although the economics might not be there initially or it might be a break even proposition um or or maybe even a little bit in the red it may be worth it to do it if we're able to build out that program in the long term and draw students from outside the

150district to our district it may be um that may be a consideration as well and and um that so I'm just pointing that out also saw that Miss Stefan must be watching and she had raised her hand I don't know if she's commented or anything like that but I did see I don't miss obiously no comment if Miss has a question definitely uh ask it um I I think she just raised sometimes it's I know from being on these sometimes I'll click something that's fine I'm not saying that's it that's that's what I do miss Stephan if you're if you're if you're watching you want to comment just use zoom because Facebook is down and you would be able to comment through Facebook anyway but um but use the Q&A feature on zoom and and

151you know how to do it you've been a member of the committee so um just wanted to make sure you knew that we saw that in the event that it was intentional and not unintentional um all right thank you that's just the only point I wanted to make one of the things yes Mr M I I do understand that and I I hear what you were saying um it's important when we are building that however probably for it to be self-sustaining first you know with students who are currently in our district and then continue to grow that yeah one one of the really uh good points that I know um that M AA stresses and I think she's right on is in a small District in any District but particularly a small District you need

152to build flexibility and you need to build capacity within your and that's what we're talking about I know that but but really to make sure that are because you know you can have you may not have the the the depth of programming to handle every particular student that comes in but you want to be able to be nimble and fle your staff to provide with every what those students need so there's a lot of that happening too I I know Barbara um as we and I think that's you know you made that point about looking at you know your the needs of your students coming in is the profile Chang in and do we need to be more Nimble and flexible with our staffing and our training to help them that's really it's kind it's

153a it's a unique situation when you have a small District to be flexible because you know you easy to do in a bigger District so I guess um anything else from the committee members hi sorry oh please so I was just doing a a little bit of math and it seems seems like actually while the overall student population has changed and the percentages have changed that the actual like number of students in each category has remained relatively static so I'm seeing four students across the board in residential programs for these four years I'm seeing a drop from seven to 4 and then back up to five um in private um which sort of makes me wonder just about um well what makes me wonder about a couple things things um but one of them is

154just sort of when we're talking about identifying children earlier through the pre program um providing services at an earlier time um whether or not that those opportunities are remedial or as to the discussion that we were just having whether or not um investing more money there um would be um sort of prophylactic in terms of taking vulnerable students and providing them with services very very early in their career um and really putting the energy towards um sort of hyper early identification and intervention um and then a sort of a secondary question just while I have the floor um it seemed to me from your comments that private placement was due solely to um emotional or behavioral SL mental health um challenges but I'm wondering too if that also includes uh language- based learning disabilities um

155or other such learning disabilities who where a student may need um placement otherwise because I think that that we do provide some of those services at the school but we certainly in my understanding have students who are leaving the district uh to receive um um different kind of language-based um instruction so I certainly didn't mean to imply that it was the only area it was the area in which we could put some of our resources to retain our students um and and that that that um disability area was one that we could address and was disproportionate in the sense that it was an area in which we could put some energy and some focus and really develop out you know what we needed to do to be able to support students here in the district

156in that instead certainly there are um you know a vast amount of reasons and disability areas Why students go out to all kinds of placements and that is not the sole one um I'm I'm very cautious of providing percentages to you rather than numbers and um not being you know overly um I don't want to say transparent but divulg with information about you know parents children um because we are so small and I I do have a comment that bar St did just say I'm also set just a reminder about student confidentiy and cohort numbers so that's just exactly Mr W was saying she's correct anything else um Mr you can stop sharing your screen now um very much appreciate the presentation I guess going forward into underscore the purpose of this agenda item and

157also um as as recall and ra you know this is just something and it sounds like you are obviously looking at program building as a as a priority and you know let's let's continue to keep our eyes on the Tipping Point where it may become prudent for us to do our own investment and then I also want to underscore Miss ley's suggestion as well if there are ways where we can you know potentially reduce that overall number from 24 to 18 through hyper early intervention coming out of our pre program also sounds like you're already on um I think that that's that's um that's a great directive as well so uh again thank you very much for that and um we I think we I don't know if there's anything else from Mrs Owen on

158on this I think this own was on the the economic side of it but uh I think we we covered that so thank you both thank you B have a great night thanks thank you good night see you tomorrow bye now um coming up now I think Dr s I'll turn it over to you this was an agenda item that had been tabled from our last meeting yes on U participation rates and Mr Kierney this is a um this is in response to a specific request youve made for a future agenda item I'll note that uh here it is we're we're using our future agenda items you receive and I should mention um to Mr cing and the rest of that' be glad to share uh win um participation rates when you know when they

159time this of course was um the fall but you can see how our how our student yeah what I think this shows is a um I hope is a growing we're not there yet but a growing um sort of breadth of activities that we have at every level so this starts with high school and kind of goes goes down but you can see um our AC capella group our Arts magazine club we have a newly formed black student Union which is is um thriving and um doing well goal of um M skitt car M Lisa um our Meco director to help work with that but all of our staff really it's a it's a great a great program chess club Comics Club um debate team diversity Club Dungeons and Dragons Club entrepreneur Club film club

160French Club Green Team read through all I'm not reading them all we can we can take it as red no if you could not that would be ideal I I will I will jump to the to the punch line I think what I'm most impressed with having we saw this in our so have been prepared is not only the number of decimals that you calculate that ratio out but also if you'll go back up we have uh total enrollment in activities from doing the math right 994 which exceeds our total enrollment by 2.37 times meaning that the average student would be in in 2.37 activities that's correct um or if you want to take it out to the 10th deal 2.37 2315 035 and I'm going to read all these numbers 799 52 um this

161is a very engaged student body it seems and and I think it's growing over the years here uh Middle School uh tricular activities it's great we didn't have these years ago is there um is there any way I guess can we open up the floor absolutely unless there's some I think there may be another page okay well yeah this is Deer Hill I Just Want to sure let just go through it quickly yeah I know you you've probably viewed it reviewed it but I love these activities some really neat ones yeah and was good I'm not sure what Daisy is oh it's um it's before brownies Brown oh W new every day hello miss miss you a daisy what did you say I said you want a daisy I have a daughter she a daisy

162she wasn't Daisy but no I was not so boys so get get the sports volleyball's really picked up 42 yor R participation there that was a huge boom into the district so great not surprised that that's far so this one all up to the floor Mr K I know you had the well first I'd like to thank the chair for bringing this up it's nice to be heard um I you know it's it's funny because it's like there's I I don't think there's ever really I talk about like how everybody's part of that right like I never knew the debate team like that was such a like a good thing for me to see great cross country never thought of cross country I'm a big cross country fan now son it loves it so I

163think there's um you know when you think about school you think about sports you think about football and and to see this is is is incredible um you know I heard this talk about a baking club yes and my son's really interested in that he's a great baker um so like I I I just wish we could maybe um you know send that out once in a while did you know kind of a question mark I've always seen like and and this will get this will get into some of the communication part that we we'll bring in from the finance why it's important to have TVs around so that we could advertise to these clubs like I I would see like a big question mark and say did you sign up for something right you

164know because that's all parents are looking looking for you know I didn't know there's an investment Club sign me up you know how credit for life is coming to February again yeah I mean there's so many things going on and I and you know again I I speak to the fact that I'm sitting here so lucky to be on this committee and so blessed to be here and to be advised of all these things I just think that I I'd love more parents to know that they're out there so like if you have a child that is sitting around and you he's on social media too much and he doesn't want to play a sport Jess Club I love your idea of posting it around is a little more I will say I know that

165all the make and I just put a pitch for the individual School newsletters because this is put out there in in that and that just know it's if you're looking to try to have those conversations with your student you know that's a good place to point them let's take a look at the newslet did you know this's this because they are putting them in right so that's just by way of a good connector for parents because you're right on right just keeping busy that's my effort and another thought Mr Kenny um brought this idea in my head um investment Club this town is filled with people who are professional investors this would be a great way through all these various clubs to you know get some of that parental involvement perhaps there's a a parent

166who's an investor and she's a portfolio manager you come talk to the club you know so you we've often talked about trying to tap into the resources of our of our town so you know have letting these clubs know that they can access somehow that's the that's the authentic learning that's a deeper we are doing doing that in places but your point is right on we need to do more all I know Mr mlen himself has up been helped with mock trial then finishing it tomorrow first period right so but your point is right on the money and that's another place the Strategic plan needs to go yeah yeah also too to your point about that it's it's it's like I had the opportunity to basically judge a debate club and I thought that was

167such a great thing to do and you know I was asked to do it so like I think think those are the things where parents can get more engaged to your point about being an investment banker you know if you like to play chess and you want to teach kids to play chest I mean there's there's so many opportunities and again thanking Greg for uh for all you do for the school because um like like no I know that you mentioned you mentioned uh bringing you know my daughter's been part of a class that you had brought in that again you know we bring something you don't s it and you do it and that was one of things to recognize yeah this this is kind of links back to I know I used all

168my talk stuff already the digital citizenship thing but but I um this goes back to our trying to create a community resource book with all the parents or or family members and what they do and people that be willing to volunteer and then Distributing it to the staff so they know that was I that was a goal of the school committee we just sort of didn't we've talked about that and and even like as we develop our new website because we are doing a new website format to have a community resource age I'm gonna do it I'm gonna take care of it I'm get it done this is a big one and and this is when you know vendors who we approve can can put information on there um right now I don't share that

169information of my newsletter or any newsletters but there's no place for me to direct them if that's bul community bulletin board with resources donation button community Resource page is big big idea that we can do yeah I love that this could also be something if we are we are dusting off that Communications and public relations sub committee this could also be an agenda item there they were going pretty big about um digital literacy so we're writing the whole strategic plan right now yeah excellent so thank you very much Dr Sullivan um we'll close off with agenda block e and go to our favorite agenda block that starts with an F agenda block F budget resources and governance F is for favorite F is for favorite um and it's our favorite primarily today because we are

170accepting a gift so is f for fast I'm just for freezing well it's econom Finance so there are there is materials F1 agenda item F1 and the materials and the materials um so we just want to thank um and accept the gift from the coass Education Foundation yes they um donated a check to us for $23,550 455 I will share the amazing activities that we have activities benches and picnic tables as you can see ADHD professional development PA curriculum high school code curriculum e print printed agendas Neuroscience elective course and d and supplies do you know what D and suppli Dungeons and Dragons for the club so we were remember all of these uh items that are funded by our CF come through applications that are submitted by our staff and they review them and

171they're very um I think they have a very good uh process for determining what indeed is a uh is a need that they can fulfill and they they're they're very respectful and they try to try to accommodate everything they have conversations with Dr scollins and I come in when needed uh and we're just incredibly thankful for our CF they a great Educational Foundation and I'm really happy that these um these amazing Educators put uh these these grants and they're able to be funded um in this cycle well there's a a little bit of a administrative we do have to vote to accept the uh check so it's not funded yet I have a motion motion made by Mr mclin seconded by Mr Kierney all in favor I opposed unanimous so we uh thank you very

172much CF for your continued support of our schools and our students and this these are great um initiative so very much appreciate the gift um and now we'll move on to budget and finance with uh our Director of Finance and operations M Susan this is our monthly update excuse me FY 24 November Finance report um today our budget is 4.71% expended and we have 41.67% through the year so we're we're pretty much right on target um a little bit ahead of the game you know we've encumbered supplies materials that you know we still have remaining balance of 13 million to continue us through the remainder of the year um it's just you know month to month the expend go up the remaining goes down um the the next item is the spend tuitions which we've

173been following so uh unfortunately last month our spread tuitions went down a little bit our deficit and this um this month it has gone up um we had a new student move into the district and had to be placed in a collaborative um up so um our deficit went from 473,000 to 544 um so again we're watching that as you can see you know saw this is looking at programming and and and what we can do to bring um students back um I did reach out to the town just to see put it on their radar that we may or may not be asking for money from the SP stabilization fund to help offset this deficit um we're just going to follow it for the next few months and see what happens utilities again um

174higher than they were last year both electric and gas have increased compared to last year you know some of it based on cost some of it is based on usage see the electric this year we spent 28,000 compared to 165 last year and the thing the gas um we spent 26,000 this year compar to1 18,00 from last year um you'll see in my f25 budget um draft we're look we're looking to increase utility budget special education to budget question utilities sure are there like associations of schools that buy utilities different we do buide directly or some sort of we group with the town group with the town so they do contract with different different companies ties and locking rates here is just a breakdown of each school um and what their budget was what they've

175expended what their cces are um what their balances are you can see um most of them are under um under under budget date and then the last col is which is a full-time equiv tells your hom staff are in each building bre has to changed any that that's a locked number Capital um for the current year and then we have a draft Capital list here which we'll talk about in more depth um and one of the next items these this is the request um for our Capital item items the draft obviously you'll see C's and s's one's for regular Capital One for stabilization fund um we'll go into more detail another item that did the um I know we were maybe we're not doing that through the capital the uh gate between at the top

176of the pathway and Osgood Street yeah we so the facilities I talked to facilities in the fire department and they they went down there and they put a padlock on it that's how they it okay we just need to follow back up with Chief quickly um and I talk special Town um election a new school special purpose inflation fund was patched provide District um for next year of this current year 1.5 million fund that we can pay for part project I just want to thank Community for all their support um and getting that t our our grants you can see they're they're pretty similar from year to year the the ones in yellow highlight are new to us this year you know not not big ticket items but they every a little bit of Finance

177helps um with the different programs and the furthest Department over column I'm sorry but it will give you what we what we received in FY 23 um versus what we received this year R fund about 12.4 additional St and then our revolving funds we have worked diligently to bring down those balances um they will play high so you can see here most of our balances are um under 100,000 we have the school kindergarten it says it's minus 78,000 it it's not technically um the school does not have access to the 300,000 it's a it's an account on the town side um so we're tracking it here through the revolving account and then they'll make a transfer at the end of the year 300,000 school facilities um that that deficit is going down slowly but it's

178going down and you can see um same with school lunch we had a very high balance in school lunch um last year and the year before we we did a lot of upgrades to our cafeteria and now that we have um a new food service director Vinnie um we're definitely looking at some new equipment new freezers refrigerators um all kinds of all kinds of items M the receipts here is that s of sales of school lunches to students 2 144,000 that a receipts those are our reimbursements from the those combination of um lunches paid for so Alat items um and then fed State reimbursement breaking it in yeah um would that would that go up at all the 244 yeah yeah we get we get reimbursed every month oh every month so every month that

179every month that number okay cool because 318 would 316 would be going up so every correct so this is based on November um so for the month of December we'll get um probably anywhere 60 to 00,000 in reimbursement again is that about every month you get 60 it's it's pretty much the same I mean some months are a little bit less okay and the revolving account um fund approximately 25.7 Personnel so definitely helpful and I just have you know saying items how the school budget's broken down how many FD head count we currently have FTS then we talk about just broken down regular education special education and undistributed and then this gives you um Staffing by school and their FTE and how they're funded either by budgets or by Grant and involving that will give

180you the F each middle of the P same thing here's summary of our November um electric we to see you know what 208 this year versus the 155 last year same thing with gas 26 18 the breakdown of Grant the Grant and how many FP are funded um through which grants the biggest one would be our uh special education um 240 Grant support 9.4 F and resolving account FTE and then we get into the enrollment numbers each month I'm I'm updating and then I'm giving a summary you go back to just is big class try to figure out that was well second grade second grade but we've been really helping out the current third grade moving into fourth grade but remember that was also a huge concern of ours coming out of coob that group

181was the group that was really um on the C meting in early num Mery and uh we just wanted to make sure we provided them as much support in uh teacher help as possible they could use more small structure so Food Service here's quick update we excited to announce that we you know we had we' hired Vinnie Quon venio quone as an service director he's been with us for several weeks now we've heard great positive feedback and you know what their their work was exceptional during the um the storm because we had to move to get uh food for our oos good students without a significant delay because the lack of generator there put us in a little bit of a problem and they snap to action got a h launch for them minutes to

182and and I can just tell you my my kids they love it you it's been such a blessing hearing from other parents that what are we have today you know and we' we've always talked about like starting it here and hopefully it'll other towns will start to see that bringing good food is and and and especially Ted you've always brought up like how can we help other districts hopefully they won't try to steal our chef chef um but that said I'm hoping that other districts follow suit to what we're doing and seeing that bringing good food in I just can't wait to like really dial down ordering food and making sure that it goes there because you know if you look at it too kids some kids might go to school just to eat you

183know and in on the district so if they can learn from us I I I'd love to see this being to other districts so I'm just so proud of everybody that participated in that thank you for that yes and I know we had a meeting um T we scheduled was it this week with the kids right with the kid with the kids we had do that but I know at down at De Hill they have um they have had a meeting yep yeah Mr met with the students to hear that see they see what they have to say we're doing it all over the place um moving on to Transportation the work has started with the charging station for the new electric bus as soon as that charging station is done the bus is waiting

184in Boston for us to receive it um so we'll put that a good use and again Point school year without the normal concerns for utilities and special education tuitions um things are progressing um based on projections if there's any questions any questions fromone on the budget this is the rep utility cost is that mostly rates or is there anything inefficient excellent thank you M for that for our monthly update now I think we're going to look at a preliminary y25 um budget very preliminary um we have met Vis the leadership team we met several times remember this is multiple times um there a collaborative process so we meet at least three or four times a year here to look at uh data and to look at our requests and at this stage everything is on

185the everything you're going to see is on the table here we haven't started to to really go through any process of uh whittling Down based on whatever may be coming our way we're just giving you you know the the these are the cold hot facts of what we feel we really need a rough draft it's a rough draft it's good way to put it and I think we're going to talk would like to next meeting talk about this in a workshop in a workshop with the with the school committee in the princip because then we can really talk about some of our thoughts and but we but we're committed to always showing people what we need because if you don't show that these are all don't realize we need it which really aren't a lot

186of asks um unfortunately I roll over cost it's it's the the third year most of our contracts the highest percent so you can see that the roll over a little over million which is already over 2 3% increase um we also had a decrease in CC breaker so we start to make up the difference of 136,000 we talked about that we have an increase of 404,000 in special tuitions because we've had five um students move into the district or transfer from collaborative to residential um and then you know a normal 180,000 projections in retirement Sav and then you get into the Staffing requests um so this is as Dr Z said this is everything that we're looking for um we had projections for the next five years so you can see um there a there's

187a request to increase our OT from point8 to 1.0 at the middle of high school um grade four um dear Hill enrollment um we've been following that we may if you see look over to the the left here we've prior are by need um if we do not increase the grade four the co the group of kids will be about 22 if we do increase it will be about 18 in the CL class size so I 22 was where they're at now um so you can see that um we've also crossed out some items we still we still would like to do that but we're also being trying to be a little bit practical so you're kind of seeing our our workings here like for instance the 0.20 increase of the OT we we think

188we might be able to find that from another source um and then you can see the prioritization the reason those are are stricken is that we our our approach here was to make sure we have a certified technology teacher um teaching technology you I remember the the uh the the folks who came today are our instructional technology Specialists so they're coaches and and and uh they as you can saw Lindsay does some teaching but we also have people who are teaching these classes who right now are amazing but they're not certified we've encouraged them to get certified in technology the district deserves a certified technology teacher at in front of our kids at all levels so that was an we we we thought we wanted but we want to keep it on the sheet but

189we also think we could possibly hold off on that another year because we do think we're getting a good product from our our current staff knowing that they're also being trained simultaneously so those are not they're not an ask right now and they're not ads that we need because we we don't have the resource there certification ISS it's a certification thing so we took those off our ask but we wanted you to see them we do want that down the road yes we're looking for a social worker um for the elementary level social worker counselor to increase what we have with the elementary I think right now we have someone who split between the two one one school and we're seeing a higher level of need right we are and so that would support um

190those younger students those kindergarten and first grade we're seeing or just kind of those Behavior pieces that we want to help students regulate so that they're able to access the curriculum and so being able to have a a full-time social worker or adjustment counselor at each school um with would be extremely helpful in managing those because we do have an escalation of behaviors and really Target our our our support as you can imagine the scheduling you're moving back and forth and if things are going on you know you have have something happening in one area another area it can be it can be quite difficult so it's it's a good use of U data points towards it we can talk about that at the workshop there was a request for um a special education teacher

191at kindergart so OS the other two levels have a dedicated special education teacher the kindergarten does not and this goes back to what Mr W was saying we if we start really really early to identify um need we may be able to keep some of our students um in house and is the is the special education and I was hoping it was a kind teacher you were looking for but I guess kindergart always kind they always kind um will this be a teacher that helps in I guess can you the difference the teacher and then like someone who does the assessments are that the same is that the same assments are no assessments are done not by our special education teachers but it would be a special education teacher dedicated to kindergarten we have right

192now we have a kindergarten and first grade special education teacher and then a dedicated special education teacher for second one for third one for fourth and one for fifth the feeling is if we could have one for kindergarten and separate it out so you'd have a k excuse me start dedicated for kindergarten dedicated for first grade um that would support in class it would be some pull out depending on what the students needs are um but the more support we can give students within um the classroom setting at an earlier age will allow us to be able to um give them more opportunity for growth and and to to support them the reason we have prioritized that at number three is just the data point it's just how many students would be impacted and if

193you compare that to number two which is our social worker adjustment counselor we felt that more students would be impacted posi by the addition of that based on the data we can talk about that at the workshop and we've growing our preschool so we're not you know so kind looking at all those pieces too that's the other coming in so this first read right um and you see the request and we put it as our first request is to increase our eln um our ESL teacher from A5 to 1 right now teer we only have a and and within theast English learner English language learner you're G to start to see it's actually been changed to multi language learn you're see you're actually see ml um as we move forward excuse me um but um

194although we are not as impacted as other districts are um we we had um I believe two students move in last week and POS and then then I believe another student prior so we we doubled our numbers in we which our numbers are relatively low compared to others it doesn't matter we still are required to and and there are some unique challenges that happen in a to a staff when you don't have often but you have we have we're required and we want to help student appropriately there's there's a lot of coaching that has to go on there and we really the the of just a few more students it's a lot is going to up the the need for this this is this is kind of it's going to happen and we need number

195one absolutely and these students are coming in um with um little to so that's been a shift over the past few years population so and then as I mentioned um I added in an increase to the utilities budget an increase to the custodial supplies materials budget because um custodial supplies materials have have request have grown quite a bit consider you know considering we're now doing all the Landscaping so we that's an added piece but we haven't added to that to that budget um collaboratively between all the department heads um 44,000 increased the supplies materials to include some textbooks that's lower than last year significantly if you remember we had a onetime expense 27 yeah well yes and lots and now our curriculum review cycle is is starting to spin so you're starting to see it

196should be lesser amounts spread out right and then the $300,000 um yeah I want it know I want it visible um that one out Chapter 70 increases that um we should get portion the allotment to the schools should see um the addition that comes from the fulling it's really important that we keep that front center particularly as we're shifting leaderships at both levels town and that that that was something that you know should come from Chapter 70 which again goes to the town right and we should get our portion of chapter 7 to fill in that promised amount yeah it's very important doing the issues we have we we have to we have to pay for all the stuff and it's it's got to come from the town no matter what so I know it

197but but this is Chapter 70 money that we we dedicated it to yeah I I didn't mean that in any other way than that so I mean if you look at the bottom the bottom line um we're an 8.82% increase that includes that 300,000 and that includes that includes everything so it's it's a little $2 million um increase so we definitely have some work to do but this is very very broad preliminary um of what our requests are we haven't you know we've talked about um getting getting together leg and putting together The Not So Nice List yeah we're doing that that's an exercise that we're doing as well but we're not putting that here but but anyway we're we obviously have a have a have a duty to to help our current staff to

198make sure that we're you're doing right by them that that that goes out saying um but we are looking at how we can what we can do without without actually doing anything with concer trying to fix problems so that's that's really what that's about it's not about cutting positions necessarily it's about fixing problems so um this is this is great this is just first read we'll have to work work with you on this I me I'm sure we have have comments recogniz the time but I do want to look forward any any immediate reactions from the committee on the budget list as proposed it's great draft none we'll um we will uh move on to this uh 25 Capital update revisions to priorities and that I believe the document a draft capitalist is this you

199missen this is me okay sorry no worries taking it all U so this is the FY 25 draft Capital list we did meet as a budget subcommittee um and we extended that out to um the facilities Department the assistant Town manager um and then Ellen ma who is the Leon so we could get a a better feel of um the stabilization the capital stabilization fund um and get clarity on who who is deciding and what we would deciding on um so the the letter c is our regular capital and some of it is just year in a year our bus leases the electric bus the replacing of Chrome books um the you know the projections um replacement project yeah for replacing the projectors um so last year we did the middle school and this year

200we're asking for high school um Middle School's asking for the enhanced audio you can see um finished retirement de Hill replacement furniture and then you get down um to the bottom where you see the s's so um the primary and most important was the fire alarm system after talking to facilities um the number went up to a million or more so he was going to get back to us on we don't like yeah he was going to get back to us and we didn't know if that was going to be more or less we can use the what we have if we need to go through through the whole system it would be a million but to see what we can use so that's kind of been messing us up a little bit too because

201it's such a a important part of it but if you would we talked about like being able to like uh either bond that out or because it really it take it's that one swoop puts us at 2.9 as opposed to if we were at 1.9 right we usually get about a half a million from the town so if if if if you take that off then we have the stabilization plus plus plus and also too the AC is not even on air conditioning is not even on there so do we adjust this from our convers because we talked about putting some money outside for no this hasn't been this hasn't been adjusted since that meeting it hasn't so this doesn't this doesn't uh okay right so still work in progress it it's definitely work in

202progress um because we talked about um with the roofs we know we can't do a roof in one year um based on the stabilization fund but we could maybe do something off this list and then put a dollar amount 500,000 um or so aside and hold it for a roof at Oscar um and the next year we could add another five until we could get to the point of um fully supporting the cost of roof well yeah also the the fire alarm I mean so one of the things we talked about is getting true pricings for these items yes right and and the TR those those numbers don't necessarily reflect TR pricings for instance the million doll fire alarm right was that's very fuzzy that was adjusted it was much less before until we T

203well yeah but but it's fuzzy so I guess my point is this is just a I wouldn't worry about the numbers so much right now and looking at this list I think this list more represents what some of the items are that are our priorities because we really have to get true numbers that was the first thing we talked about and then we also talked about um the idea of putting away some money right uh and this goes to sort of Mr Carr's idea of not necessarily spending the whole 1.5 allocation right away but putting some money aside within that within that amount whether it's goes up to the 1.5 or is less and then take care of a lot of items and then the next year would be a little bit more put aside

204for roofs because we'd have less it to take take care of and then the next year it might be if we get another be a full investment in the RO so the idea would be a progression of money that we could really advocate for to the town as a plan to uh to be ready when indeed we are um putting in a new roof and the ne the roof will be I would imagine o good because that's our our most needy of then we still have a workshop coming so absolutely this is very preliminary we can all dial the capital figures look fairly accurate I mean Capital figures can you do subtitle sub totals on these so that because first of all I thought M you're saying we get usually a half million in capital

205I thought we were around like 750 800 some years some years we have but mostly mostly it's about a halfway yeah really that's why like to be honest with you guys like that's why we get a really dial down on Workshop because if like we're talking about putting um we have $50,000 in there for communication being TVs and all all the U all the areas so that we can communicate messaging and try to put a sign out front like tell people superintendent meeting tonight or whatever we're trying to do we've been asking for that for the last five years so like to be honest like we put it in this capital I almost want to switch the capital to the stabilization fund because it's like you know every time we go to ask for that

206we don't we just don't get it so like there's there's limits on the the stabilization funds really only about significant Capital expenses on like facilities so I think I think though as we as we get those major I hear you but yeah because if we say to them like the major stuff is 1.5 really they're going to give us 500,000 that's what we usually get and I think that's where we get a dial down on like with with with getting the communication messages in there and letting them know why we need this because it's been like every year well we have that 1.5 we know if we get the big items there right that will help us get some of those other items because we'll take care of the big items but I do think

207we have to have a strategy for saving for the biggest item which is the RO and and and the other big Windows roofs Windows both both buildings deep Hill and um you know there's more to learn all those things but I agree we we we have to attend to the needs and we can't just keep saying we need it we got some money we got to be honest with you there's no money in there and I've been talking about it like at the bathrooms in the middle school the high school and and we haven't even got to that level we haven't got to that level the electricity of like we have lights that don't work like so like I I would like to see when we talk about the workshop is to say you know

208$100,000 for f fixing the electrical and having $100,000 and there and just go and have an electrician company come in and analyze what we have and fix it well even like talked about that yeah I was gonna say yeah like that will take care of our air conditioning I I would imagine yeah the feasibility study would really um help us in getting an actual estimate not just a an overarching estimate for things like an air conditioning so um what's the so we see this in front of us what's the what's the next plan for this and what do you need from this committee at this point probably the I would say on our next meeting we're gonna we're going to talk budget and I think we got to talk to DP have conversations with DPW

209and um facilities to really try to hone down on some of these prices um we we can't you know we're just going off of rough estimates we really have to know know uh particularly if you know these aren't on the D I'm looking at asphalt sidewalks and asphalt roads and they're not on the dpw's perview and they have a stabilization fund as well I get it they have a lot of other needs but we really do need the pricings to be able to that I'd also be curious and I'm not sure where this information comes that deferring any maintenance isn't causing additional expense for example leaving roofs that are leaking are we then ending up needing to do interior Renovations or repairs due to leaking roofs or Windows or any of these little pieces I'm

210thinking roofs and windows because those are big but I think there are also sort of smaller things that just if the if they if these things fall off of that list in terms of repair that they could end up costing us more in the long run remember rofs are going to go through the msba process too and we're just hitting the age with 25 years when our roof of O will be considered so it's all it's all and then solar we might get the solar companies to pay for so there are they definitely conversations going so this is a work in progress any questions for the I have a couple points that I want to make that I want to the other comments um so on my end um just a couple the agenda items

211on the stabilization fund the bus parking lot um that's a from in my perspective bus Park I know we need it but it's also an economic issue so before we ask for the money we need to know what the price is because if it's not worth it to do it right because it's cheaper to continue to lease then we we have a different decision to make right um the other items on here let me just add we did discuss that we agree with that um we feel we should keep it on the list now because it's something we considering I agree with you um and then the the other item is really to me Dr s we had this meeting on Monday Dr mentioned I I do think far St we do need to have

212a plan how we're going to use this fund to attack the large items that are coming before we before we commit to uh any amounts out of that fund for other things because that's the story we told the town when we asked for the money so uh look forward to that Workshop now is the intent for the this the capital budget workshop and the um the budget workshop and the capital Workshop is going to be a dedicated meeting or is that going to be in one of the school committee meetings I guess what's dedicated the workshop is is usually scheduled for in the uh it's a school committee meeting it's a schol now whether we have it um at a different time and post it I think we should have we in the past we've

213had that in the community room for instance and we've had it this is preco but it's dedicated to that purpose and it's a separate meeting that's why if you looked at the the budget calendar we determined needed this rough draft first yeah and we wouldn't because in our calendar we actually were going to have that budget today yeah we do so I would suggest after B on when Miss Owen decides when it's appropriate we get together during the day and have that conversation yeah makes sense I would say very greate on right I would and also too you know we got a lot of little things that out on this so is we've been talking about putting water fountains outside that's been um we've had a gentleman here talking about that so there there are

214there are things on there that we we we have to kind of consider too again with the the sinks and the and the uh you know these are common things you go into the if you were a student right now and you went into the middle school you can't wash your hands correctly it's just you got to hold I mean those sinks need to be replaced for you know and and it could be yeah IDE ideally it would be a a hand sensor and you could do hot water cold water so you can actually this this way you got to try it go in there and try to well we had those sets of that gave at least 30 seconds of water porage but if that's not looked at all the time it can't slide

215so it can be inconsistent it's just it's just basically comes down to it's just not as good not as efficient as having I'm G to close this off just the and this is all going to be subject to a to a workshop so um and the next item is a little meaty I think um so next superintendent update um our superintendent will be leaving us at the end of this year um that's the the update um the potential formation of the search committee this is on here is potential because we did not know our superintendent would be leaving us with certainty and the way we have the certainty today so some of us had doesn't matter um so the process to replace superintendent is uh really important um so the idea that I think would

216like to pitch to this group here is the formation of a search committee um and I think we'll probably actually request that to be on the agenda as a voted item for next meeting uh but wanted to get some initial thoughts on the um from the group on the search committee and what the Constitution would be I know that um Mr CL and I both since we've worked closely with superintendent would like to volunteer to be on that search committee um and um kind of help shepher that process forward but wanted to get some thoughts on uh from the committee on on how that search committee could be constituted uh what the membership could look like and so on and then we'll eventually vote on it at the next meeting so with that I'll open

217the floor so like which stakeholders do we put on this how many people in total um so you know staff faculty principles parents what do we think uh I'm glad you brought this up because U I looked at I looked at what Marshfield does did and we can pretty much copy what they did they had Parents they had so I'll forward you the they used the ma they used masc so that's what maybe the first thing you decided you're G to use outside no we'll use MC I don't know why we've done that in we've always used the executive Search in the past I don't know why we did that that takes too much time masc has is a great resource we should do that's what most so I'll forward you you guys then that

218what saw from the because they just did it so might as well just call and they had a parents they had some parents on there I mean you know more than I do very very comprehensive right I mean very comprehensive process but I think that's the first choice is what you you you do internally or do you use outside so we should decide that as a group my personal position or would that be committee they'll help you with all of that I I I I I don't I don't know I I I don't know I guess I guess it would be a decision for that sub commmittee I guess I think it's a it is a critical one yeah Mr car so I was on the search committee twice for a superintendent here in Kass

219and it's exactly like that we did have um a union rep from the schools um we had a select person um we had an odd number and I call it being like nine it was something like that and um we did have a professional help both I don't remember who he is but had a professional that we brought in it may have been that group it may have some hir when we did bring that group in when we did that wasn't masc that was a different two different group had ANP outside and and after a nationwide search we landed on our assistant superintendent yeah so I don't oh I don't disagree with yeah I mean I masc has a huge amount of like experience in this I think they're a really great resource I I'm

220my number one thing is I'm worri I just want to make this is a this a critical time to to find candidates right because people will be looking onward to the next academic year and we time is not our friend in this process so you know we're learning this at the end of the calendar year so you know like where Marshfield just did theirs for the next year at the end of their fall semester we're behind the aall a little bit so I've done ahead of school search uh which is sort of similar but not because it's not working within the same sort of um bureaucratic constraints um but I think having multiple constituencies and even if the committee the search committee itself is small having opportunities for Community voice um and even if that's

221a selective smaller group say a panel of parents selected by the by the subcommittee that seems to allow for um stakeholders to have feel as if they they have some representation um because I feel like the search committee I worked with was led by a search professional um but did include members of the school administration um faculty um Board of Trustees um but then there were other times where you know a group of Faculty would sit down with the search committee and the C Cates typically you have is M there's also NASDAQ right there's a two big ones right now I'm on a search committee for the sore educational collaborative executive director that's being run by NASDAQ um vice president of that group represent quassa so um and what they do is it's they're all

222their processes as you said you're right on are and you are as well they're pretty well well aligned where they they you know get stakeholders form a committee that's the screening committee and then they do both a survey to to various stakeholders and then they do focus groups with with stakeholders so focus group of teachers focus group of families focus group of students and they get information and they create what's called a candidate profile and then they um actually they advertise appropriately they screen for applications and then they go through the applications with the screening committee they pick candidates who they want to bring in for interviews they create interview questions of course based on the profile candidate candidates profile they have those interviews and then it all comes back to this committee to determine

223and the five of you determine who your next superintendent is they're all kind of similar and it's just you might want to talk to them to get a sense for who you feel comfortable with and then that will kind of lead you to if you want to use an outside organization who's appropriate to use for goass do they develop the position statement or is that something that this group should probably start thinking about sooner rather than later yeah um that's developed with them typ with you lead it's yours you own it right but asked for that earlier usually that happens at this usually the my experience is the school committee develops that with the person you choose and then you get the committee together and you kind of sort of simultaneously work in addition to

224duties you would also create sort of a a profile description um that's not that includes personal characteristics as well yeah so I had asked for I haven't taken a look at it it was my intention to have some sort of Redline version done the meeting today so that I It's Tricky that you know because of open meeting laws in order order for us to all participate we either have to physically edit it at the meeting or kind of do it individually and then talk about it together at the meeting so whichever way we should do I don't know maybe um what do you think I think we should put this on the agenda item for next meeting the position statement or the um job posting um in the end room we could circulate it individually

225so people can see what where we're starting from and we can come with ideas and adopt one at at our next meeting creating the search okay I'll send that to everyone right now any other thoughts fair amount of time that excise let's um Dr let's keep that in mind for our um agenda planning that we're going to this will be a major component of that uh of that meeting Mr car you were on the committee did you find it to be particularly rewarding and yeah very much no it was good it was um was on a twice because I have to I was the select person yeah and I got it on the second time because I was the select person that happened to be on it the first time but no look I learn

226I learned a lot and I thought having an outside person was excellent facilitate and the the committee was good I might suggest also we should see it maybe we consider um CF to have somebody on you know like the stakeholders was very important to put all that together that could be see not I'm not volunteering but I if I think you guys do a great job so um but yeah that's that's that's a good thought as for Parental reps as some PSO see um select board some teachers un I think our our input so let's think about um what we uh what that committee might want to look like and then we can be in touch individually not as a group uh in advance the next meeting so we've got a good proposal work out

227for that because as I share Craig's concern timing we want to make sure we get the this uh uncertainty resolved as quickly as possible so any other thoughts uh concerns worries on that score hearing none we'll close off the superintendent update um feasibility study update we kind of caught a little bit up from Mr ears but uh is there anything else that um Mr from your perspective Adam feasibility study um Food Service um we did kind of touch on Food Service a little bit while we're doing the budget but anything on food Serv the Food Service front um no other than I know he just he's just became fully staffed so now he's and he's made some changes here at the middle high school that have been positive um and after the holiday break he's

228going to spend um quality time down at the El we like to get that Senor and he he is working on the Senor C I mean spacewise a lot of so the senior c um he's also looking at help me to about getting another c c Stu had a few spontaneous um Community emails just complimenting out of the blue how their their students come home and said no amazing meal I had I love one par had three three three three yeah just kind of nice to the unsolicited yeah input well to be honest with you like I my kids never ate the food now I don't have to prepare the meals and easier it's so easy like would you have you know would you have and they're excited to tell me okay I'm excited to

229learn when you had so all right um awesome is so anything on the transportation fund no no I C on that as well that's going well that's good excellent I'll to close off our favorite agenda block f um and now the great agenda block G community relations and Communications any reports from our subcommittees are Liaisons uh I am the liaison to the middle school council and our meeting was canceled because of the storm so I have nothing which is great because not make it anyway so my street but have one I'm sure no reports there are no topics not reasonably anticipated by the chair I don't believe we have minutes to approve for this one minut um do we have any we had we had a future agenda items we covered earlier in the meeting

230anyone want to uh underscore some other potential future agenda items yeah I had two um one had eventually like to talk about Lockers in the high school and how we can utilize those lockers stigma um and the other one thank you um when people donate I thank them with kind of a letter from all of us like just basically it could be a form letter I had donated some Fitness to my high school and I got one so we can use that let's do that that's that's that's low hanging FR let's just School P have we'll have our five signatures when we accept gifts we'll sign the letter and send it off yeah Susan we have to probably have that come from your office it's a good idea thank you notes for donations you know

231it's nice to get the come put it in just letter we can personalize and you and I can sign great idea that's not even an agenda item that's just done see that um there is no reason to go into executive sessions uh for this meeting we will likely have an executive session for the next meeting so we keep that in mind as well uh other than that now it's my favorite agenda block at least for this evening agenda block I adjourn I have a motion to adjourn motion made by m have a second second oh let's go so Me seconded by miss lesie all in favor I I unanimous to adjourn the meeting is now adjourned thank you everyone for your time everybody have a