001We're good. >> Okay. So, will read the >> Yep. Mission and vision. The Fountain of Public Schools creates worldclass student learning experiences. Our Clippers are empowered to pursue their goals with curiosity, integrity, and resiliency. Clippers are creative, inquisitive, and engaged learners who participate in their community as socially responsible citizens. Clippers effectively communicate and solve problems that impact the world around them. >> Okay. Um the recording statement, this meeting of the FA school committee is being recorded in accordance with Massachusetts open meeting law. Anyone who wishes to make an audio or video recording of this meeting must first notify the chair. Please raise your hand. No, Katie. Okay. Thank you. Or anybody else? All right. Um, next we will um hear the Wanoic land acknowledgement from Mike. >> Land acknowledgement. Felmouth Public Schools acknowledges that we
002are gathering on unseated ancestral land of the Wampa Wanog nation. We recognize and respect the Wampenog people include including those of Sakanesset, Wakoy, Sepoiset, Tataket, and Chapquick as original stewards of what is now known as the town of Falmouth and honoring their enduring relationship with this land. This land acknowledgement is an intentional act to counter the erasure of indigenous people and to demonstrate respect for their sovereign rights. We are committed to educating ourselves and our students about the long-standing history of the Wampaog people. In alignment with the core values of Falmouth Public Schools, we pledge to build an ongoing partnership with the Wampenog Nation. >> Thank you, Mike and Margaret. One last reading. We will read three of our operating protocols. Thank you, Margaret. >> Okay. operator uh exercise leadership in vision, planning, policym, evaluation,
003accountability, and advocacy on behalf of students and district while respecting the authority of the superintendent and district staff to manage the day-to-day operations. Maintain an open environment where each member, the superintendent, and the public is empowered to respectfully express opinions, concerns, and ideas even in times of disagreement. Recognize and respect. Our authority exists only when a quorum of the committee meets and is derived only through a majority decision of the committee acting as a whole during an open public meeting. >> Thank you, Margaret. Now, we'll hear from the student advisory. >> Thank you. Um, a few updates from the high school and then all the schools. Um, we have the faculty follys tonight, so I'm going to go catch the end of that. It's a staff talent show um or performance of the teachers and
004it hasn't been done since 2020. So, it's a super fun class fundraiser for all of them and so that's a big hit. So, it's pretty packed there. And then athletics, we had the powderpuff game, junior versus senior um girls flag football. So, that was super fun. That was on Sunday. Good turnout and it was a lot warmer in the morning than it was usually under the lights. So, that was great. And then more on football with the home Thanksgiving game versus Barnesville. So that'll be awesome. I think that's their last game of the season. So that's good. And then winter sports registrations open and then tryyouts are December 1st. And then fall sports, we have the awards night on Thursday, December 4th when we come back from break. And then we have the All Cave
005musical festival was a few weeks ago and found a lot of musicians. So that was awesome to see them representing. And then Spanish Honors Society recently had a beach cleanup. Math Honors Society had their induction for um this year. So that was great. And then I think they inducted like 45 kids. So that was great turnout. And then our honors, we have the Renaissance Fair coming up, which is our main fundraiser to raise money for our New York trip in the spring. So that'll be good. And we've made gingerbread houses and Christmas trees for that. So that's at Woods Hole. And I believe it's um summer six. >> Very nice >> update. Very nice. Thank you. >> Have fun making fun of those teachers. >> Now that I'm not one say that. >> Um okay.
006Um next Oh, I have to say public comment. Um public comment will be limited to 20 minutes. Members of the public are welcome to speak during public comment. Um, comments will be limited to 2 minutes in length. Due to open meeting law, the committee cannot respond to or act on public comment. Additional comments and feedback can be submitted by email to school committee at balmouth.k12.mma. us. Okay. Um, I don't have the list. >> Okay. I don't know who's first. >> Can't get good health these days. Thanks. Okie dokie. So, the first person on our list is Megan Sati. >> Before I start, we just want to hand these out. Just before you start the timer, I'm just going to hand it to you first. Is that okay? Can we restart the timer? Do you want
007me to restart? >> Sure. Go ahead. >> Yeah. Go all the way down. >> Do you think I need to change the angle? No, it worked from here before and it worked just fine. >> Make my do. >> Can Ryan help us? >> I did. >> Sonia, you you >> Oh, there it goes. >> Okay. You knew how to do it too, didn't you? Or no? >> No, I didn't do it any differently than what Ryan did. >> Happens all the time. >> Okay, you got to go. I'm Megan Zodley. I live at Carriage Shop Road. I'm here tonight to urge the school committee to keep MASC provided JICA sentence in our dress code policy. First, I need to address sever several incorrect legal claims that have been presented to you. The school attorney stated
008that Lawrence School is not a secondary school. That is simply wrong. Desi classifies Lawrence as a secondary school, and that matters because the legal standards the attorney tried to dismiss actually do apply here. Second, the attorney cited Middleboro case where a student wore a t-shirt saying there are only two genders as if that somehow justifies our dress code. But that case is completely irrelevant. It dealt with hate speech targeting a protected class. It has nothing to do with uniforms, collars, or restricting everyday student clothing. Using that case to support our current dress code is illegally unsound. Third, our dress code does not align with settled Massachusetts law. In Pile versus School Committee of South Hadley, Mass, Superior Court determined that students may wear any clothing containing any message whatsoever as long as it does not
009disrupt is not is it is not disruptive or obscene. Our dress code is enforced as is inconsistent with that ruling. Removing MASC JICA language would only deepen that inconsistency. The superintendent used the JICA sentence and said that it depends on whether Falmouth has accepted chapter 71 section 83, but that is not true. Glenn Cooer, director of the the executive director of MASC, has made it clear JICA is a general dress code policy and does not rely on the 83 acceptance. And the sentence does is exists to protect districts from violating student rights. So, at some point you have to ask yourself, why is this district fighting so hard to remove protective language? Why erase a sentence that aligns with Desi, aligns with constitutional law, aligns with Pile, and prevents inconsistent and discriminatory enforcement? Thank you.
010>> Thank you. Okay. Um, the next person on the list is Jennifer McCarthy. Hi, my name is Jennifer McCarthy and I live on Marav Vista A Extension and I'm just I didn't have anything prepared, but I was driving here and I had a couple thoughts and um I figured no better place to say it than here. So, I want to talk about the last meeting on Wednesday when we were here. Um, the superintendent said that she needs to be financially responsible and I get that. And she said she could could have closed an elementary school, that K through 4 would fit in three schools. So that's I'm looking for the recording so I can make sure I have my facts right cuz I feel confused. Um, but what about preK, right? Like we have preK.
011So we wouldn't have been able to close an elementary school at all because we need to the students all need to be have a home within the schools. So I was wondering about that. So um you know hopefully you can get back to me with the answer. And the other the other question I had she had said that um she would have to close the school. If we don't make changes we'll have to close the school. Um, but how how do we do that safely with so many students with special needs that have certain circumstances? You know, that would be very difficult to do and I'm not sure where all those students would go. So, I just I'm just looking for some clarification on that. Um, and the other thing you had mentioned was that
012wouldn't the school committee as a whole want to help 115 parents? And I just want to point out you already are they already are helping them, don't they? They get free preschool and um and they're already enrolled. So, I just wanted to point that out. There were a couple other things that I had questions about and I was wondering if it was recorded so that I can go through and kind of check my facts. And I had more questions about the meeting as well. Um so hopefully I'll be able to see that. So, thank you. Okay, thank you, John. Okay, now we will um you only get two minutes too, Lori. See if she put it up here. Superintendent update. >> It says 10 minutes. I'll try to do it with >> No, you know
013me. I'm always making jokes. I know you are. >> Just ignore me. >> Joking back. >> Excuse me. All right. Thank you. Um so I'll start with uh my safety update. I uh want to thank the town meeting members um for voting uh the safety uh articles uh at town meeting on November 17th. Uh one of the articles uh uh allows us now to purchase the enhanced campmer software. Um we will uh we have uh a contract uh ready. Uh, as you know, Paul is always always doing the homework ahead of him just in case. And so, we're ready to sign a contract and um and get that uh enhanced software um online. Uh along with that, we are um hiring two safety monitors, additional safety monitors to monitor the camera. So, we're going to
014create a internal um Gamoth Public School command center. So, um, not to be confused with the town's command center. This will be, um, two people that will be watching our cameras, uh, on the consistent. And just a reminder, we do have a safety monitor in every single school. And we have, um, we now have a float monitor, uh, meaning that if anyone's out, we have a a monitor that, um, can take their place. Uh, is still full-time. So, if nobody's out, then uh they're still floating around um the schools um to to offer extra uh hands and and support um where needed. Uh along with that, um I'm going to be asking the school committee um to approve a third SRO uh on December 9th at our next meeting. Um we uh working with um
015Chief Lori uh we um think that's the right direction to go and um I highly recommend it and I hope we can have a a discussion and approval in December. Uh my team has uh done some extensive uh training and readings around uh what keeps um uh schools safe and the number one line of defense in everything we're reading um is uh our mental health support and I'm very proud that over the last few years that we have really built up our mental health supports. Um we, you know, right now in our budget, it's you know, somewhere around 28 to $2.9 million that supports our counseling teams across the district, uh including our uh psychologists, our counselors, um our um school adjustment counselors. And uh we also have our partnerships with um Fmouth Human Services,
016uh Child and Family, and Mlan uh Hospital. um that also uh adds additional supports there. And so the um and what we're we're learning is that uh when you have the counseling supports, the counselors that know our students the most and needs the supports were getting the the help the kids need uh right away. And so uh and that uh again is considered to be the uh number one defense against um anything escalating to an unwanted event in our schools. So, um, we I hear from other districts all the time about how well, um, we're we're staffed in our schools, and I think it's really important that that, um, you know, we've been able to maintain that and that we can continue to maintain uh, at the level that that we have. I'd like to,
017uh, announce that um, while we're still looking for our director of technology that uh, Ryan Weber has agreed to take the role of interim IT uh, director for us. We're very we're all very pleased with that. >> Great. So, um so thank you and we are still it's very important for us that we make sure that we find the uh the the right and best um IT director for our district. Um and uh Mike Falcone as we'll miss him, but he has really set up our district um to um successful. And so, um, I'm very confident that we will, um, have someone on board, but not worried in the interim because Ryan has us. Um, it, uh, I meant to mention, um, uh, at the last meeting, uh, regular meeting is that, uh, the select
018board approved, many of you probably know that, approved the solar panels at Felmouth High School in North Fmouth Elementary. Um the uh so we have been moving along just to let you know that the uh engineers have been in they're marking the the sites. Um things are moving along too and we are on uh the right path to put the canopies in next summer. So things are moving quickly. Appreciate that. Thank you Paul. Um many many things you're on top of. Um the most recent uh reports of the federal uh about the federal government um the majority of the programs currently managed by the federal office of elementary and secondary education will transition to the US department of labor uh via uh an inter agency agreement. Um the programs that will be included are title
0191A, title 2A, title 3A, title 4 A MB and the McKenna Dentto homeless act um among some of the others. um the Individuals with Disabilities um education act IDA um programs will for now remain at US um ed but uh as well as the office of civil rights um but there's uh you know more information to come but um the the one section has been decided and at this time uh there's you know we we won't know anything till the end of January but at this time um nothing has been cut as far as the funding Um, so more more to come at the end of January on that. And then my Clipper update, um, because it's the year of the Clipper. >> Yeah. >> Uh, the North Bmouth Elementary Regal Siglets, uh, won their,
020uh, the Innovation Project Award, second place for it. Um, so this is the first first um uh robotic competition um they they went to this weekend and uh and they got second place for the renovation project. >> That's huge. It's their first time in a major competition. So um very pleased with that and that's where I'm going to end on the happy note. >> Nice note. Is that the group that came last year that we saw? So that those are the high school the um the um high school team and they did their first competition last year and continued to move along. Um they were doing very well and so now we got the uh North Thomas Elementary that's why they're the regal signlets. Um so the high school team is working with the uh
021elementary team. Um very exciting was uh so they had a practice run um last week last week. Yeah, it was would have been last week and so we got to go and watch that um and they did a fantastic job. It was it was really exciting and that was their practice run before they went to the the actual competition. So uh lots of engineering um processes there and so we um so even our youngest ones are doing well. It's so cool when the older ones teach the younger ones too. >> That is >> Yeah. >> Such a >> both sides benefit. >> Thank you, Lori. Very happy update there. >> Is there any chance for a question or are we >> Oh, yes. >> Um I was just uh two quick questions. The solar panels
022um there's some deadline with the federal government on July 4th. when you said they'll be starting next summer, we're not going to have we're not going to run into that federal >> deadline. They already fell under the old um >> regulations. All right. All right. Thank you. I heard about that on the radio. >> Um and the the robotics team, that's so amazing. Do we have any other schools aside from the high school in North Valmouth who have a robotics team? >> Not at this time. >> Okay. So, North Falmouth is our STEM school. >> Thank you. >> Yes, sure. I didn't mean to ignore anybody. >> No, no, no. Um will there be so I know you had mentioned about um talking about a vote next next month. Is there going to be another
023I don't know more opportunity to ask a few safety questions? I don't want to do it now to take away from the meeting because that's at the focus of the meeting but um is that going to be part of next month that we can ask some questions? Yes, of course. You can ask now if you there's a question you >> Well, I mean I don't want to dominate the meeting on uh you know on questions. >> We can put time in for that. >> Okay, that would be appreciated. Thank you. >> Oh, just quick comment. I just I appreciate the um the re the re research that you mentioned into you know strategies that work because like we rely on the police department for a lot of our kind of safety information and knowledge about
024how to create safe spaces but theirs is a specific um alley. So, I appreciate the research that's going into social and emotional and mental health services and how they benefit because I would have guessed that to be true, but I I'm not an expert in it, so I appreciate some of you taking it on. >> Any other Melissa? >> Um, a couple things about the circling safety. Um, I'm excited to have uh further discussion and um support the third SRO. I'm excited. Um I don't know if excited is the correct word to use. I am hopeful that our students who see their school district putting social and emotional and mental health forward and recognizing that it is extraordinarily important that as they grow up to be adults will recognize that in whatever profession they go
025into. I'm just going to hop on a soap box that we do not do enough for our mentally uh for our mental health in this country. So perhaps Felmouth being a ambassador, sure we're not the only one, but I'm going to give you credit here that I I'm hopeful that our young clippers will recognize that this among other things that we Felmouth has um stated is important to Felmouth that they will then in turn um recognize that and hopefully continue to make that a priority in whatever profession they go role models. >> Yes. >> Anybody else? >> No. Thank you. >> All righty. Um, next we will have a presentation on literacy and mathematics. >> So, I'd like to introduce Karen Carson and Erin. They have been before us before, but we appreciate it um
026that you're here and that you're giving us a presentation. Thank you. Thank you for having us. carrots. so much easier in the olden days when you just like sat at the table. Um so um thank you again for the opportunity to share um an update on our case math emergency work. Um, we're going to walk you tonight through some of our spring screening data. Um, and kind of talk about where our students are thriving, where we see such assistant need, and how we're using this information to strengthen our instruction. Um, we know we know um, UC MCAST data and that's certainly very important information um, that we can use and look at progress over time. Um however internally we have other data sets that we um use on an ongoing basis that come from our
027benchmark and screening assessments. Um they are also a norm reference um and allow us to make comparisons both to other districts in Massachusetts and um across the country. But it really goes deeper than that and allows us to see strengths and weaknesses in individual students in classrooms. Um it provides resources to intervene. It provides support. Um the data shared tonight in most of our slides is from our end of the year testing in June. Um and just as a reminder that we do our diagnostic testing three times a year. We do beginning of the year, middle of the year, and end of the year. Um so this is a snapshot of kind of where we were at the end of last year. and um we'll talk a little bit about kind of how that shapes
028some of what we're doing this year. So, we're going to start with math. Um as you know, we are two full years into our implementation with Ready and currently in year three. Um, across the district, we have seen increased consistency in lesson routines, expanded uses of I Ready resources. Um, the program itself is so rich in what it offers, and often times in year 1 and two, you're just kind of trying to muddle through and teach the lessons, but there's so many other resources there. And that's really been a place we've been able to go this year. Um, what other assessments um, the assessment suite has? um what are some resources to work with kids? Um so we're also seeing you know the alignment um across schools and across grade levels with the um adoption
029of the new ELA program that Aaron will talk about in in a few minutes. Um, math is kind of taking a little bit of a backseat this year in terms of our professional development um and and the constant um focus on that. However, um I'm confident that the good habits we created in year 1 and two will take us through um the next couple years. Additionally, there have been many opportunities in the implementation of EL to make um connections both instructionally um and kind of just shifts in in teaching um through both programs. So, as we see new things come up in EL, we can reflect back and say, "Yes, that's like this part of I Ready." And really starting to see um some crossover in some of the language, which is kind of fun.
030All right. So, let's look at some data. Um, it's always nice to kind of start with how we did compared to other people. Um, so the data in this graph, um, if you'll see it does represent all I Ready students and while my focus is K to 6, we use I ready K to8 and I don't have the ability to disagregate just those grades. So this represents all of the students in Felmouth K to8 that are using I Ready. Um some of the other slides we'll look at are specific to K to 6. Um but overall our kids compared um comparatively speaking are doing really well. Um you've got these four bars and balance bar is on on the far right the 42% and the 20% that are early on grade level or mid or
031above. Um and then moving which is counterintuitive but moving from right to left um you see the mass year to date in the national year to date and how we compared in the spring of 2425 um for all students across the country in the commonwealth that took um the diagnostic. That last bar that um national norm bar is a precoid cohort. Um, so, um, I know we, you hear a lot sometimes in the news like they talk about how we're not quite back to COVID standards or not quite back. We rarely, we've surpassed that here in terms of this one assessment, right? When you start talking about assessments, you got to remember every assessment is a piece of a pie. There's not one that is the be all end all. It's looking at all of
032them together in and making some decisions. But in this particular assessment um we are exceeding those precoid um numbers. So the next couple slides are really just um the same data, the same four columns but broken down by grade level. Um and as you just even if you just look at the colors, right, and not even so much the numbers. Um, you can see that consistent, this isn't in everybody's way, it's just in mine, right? Um, you can see consistently across the grade levels, we continue to outperform the state in in the nation. So from from the placement distribution um we can we can take it down to the next level and look at um breaking things up by domain. When we talk about domain we really just kind of mean groups of standards, groups
033of light standards um within a content area. Um so this graph looks really confusing. It's not that confusing. Um the top numbers are your grade levels. Your numbers down the um your left y are um those domains. And then you have within each grade level um the the percent of students placing mid or above grade level compared to those national norms. Um navy blue is really good. Um, we like to just again I'm a big like the color kind of can tell a quick story. Um, that that mean so number one we don't have any gray. So all of our grade levels at every domain are performing above the national norms. Um the dark gray the the dark blue the navy blue is that that is more than five percentage points. Um whereas um the
034the brighter blue is between 0 and 5%. Uh so that's really encouraging. Um when you talk about achievement um you have to also look at growth um and it's it's not just about doing well it's about um you know that growth for students um from their beginning. So I already one of the the data points they use heavily and we're going to talk about it a few times tonight um is this idea of progress to annual typical growth. So I already sets two growth goals for every student based on their fall score, their fall placement score. They set what is considered a typical growth score and a stretch growth score. And I know um I've talked about that here before, but just um as a reminder, typical growth is that amount of growth a student
035should make in a typical year. Stretch growth is the growth a student needs to close the gap. So for our struggling learners, they need to make more than typical growth. um that typical growth is just going to kind of keep them doing this, whereas this stretch growth is going to bring them closer. Um in order to change baseline placements going forward, um it's a multi-year journey, right? They don't just make it up in a year, but if a student in is to to make to close that gap, if they make that um stretch growth, more often they're going to that we're going to start to see those baseline placements change. So here at the top, you see that our median annual typical growth is 122%. So that middle value. So if we took all the
036kids that took the iity diagnostic and we lined them up lowest score to highest score and we found that middle point our our middle has scored has has surpassed their typical growth score right which would be 100 by almost 22%. Um, and so that's really encouraging, right? Because that means everybody above that has done more than 122%. And you know, you've got some on the other side that have also. And you can see down at the bottom, sorry, my throat is um um down at the bottom is the actual percentage of students. And again in that typical growth we had 62% of our students meet or exceed their typical growth score which is phenomenal. Um on the stretch growth side um we have 33% of our students meeting their stretch growth and um that's kind
037of needs to be kind of where our focus goes next. Um we did a lot of um work around typical growth and having um data chats with students and you know um helping them to see how um some of the work we're doing can help them meet their growth grow um their growth goals. Um this year we shifted a little bit to start looking at that stretch growth because that's now the work we need to do and we'll look at that again a little bit. um just we can also look at verment because you look at subgroups through MCCAST um I wanted to just share some of those we don't have the same subgroups that they have in MCCAST available to us um but we have a couple that overlap um and you can see
038our um English language learners um this this is our overall group right all of the students at the top and then the yes bar are are students that are identified as multilingual learners and even there um that median score again is at 108 which is more than 100%. Um I's gold standard is 120 in order to close close gaps but anything over 100% is considered um really strong. Um same with our students with disabilities. um they're performing a little bit better on this assessment than our multilingual learners um in terms of their growth. You can see that typical um annual typical growth median is 115%. Um but overall really encouraging. If we look at um how relative placements have changed from spring to spring um so on the left is 2023 is 23 24 compared
039to 2425. Um and they look pretty similar. um and that that's something we're really going to watch and pay attention to because we don't want to be stagnant. Um however, this really is similar to what we have seen in our MCCAST scores and what um districts around the Commonwealth and the nation are seeing. Um I was in an I Ready we were at an I Ready conference back in October, beginning of November, October. um in that that stagnation, for lack of a better word, is something that they are seeing a across across um the country. But it's it's something we're aware of and something we're watching. And in my conversations with our partners at I Ready, um when a question is asked like, "So, what do we do about that?" That's where that stretch growth
040goal comes into place because that's what's going to move those baseline placements. Um, at the end of the day, you know, I love to share this slide with everybody every year. Um, because I think it just really highlights all the good work happening across the grade levels. Um, this is the four square quadrant um where it compares growth to achievement, right? So, we looked at achievement in the beginning, then we looked at some growth and now this kind of takes the two and say what what do we what do we learn from that? um and Felmouth across the grades K to 8 continue to be high performance, high growth in this assessment. Um and you so I've highlighted it was hard to see the grays were were a little um kind of close. So I
041highlighted that top quadrant in pink. Um and all of our grade levels fall in there. Um so that's really that's something that as a district we should be really proud of and I know that the teachers work hard every day. um to make sure this is the kind of results we see. So the last thing I want to share with you is I want to come back to this idea of stretch growth and um how important it is and why that's been our shift this year in terms of like as teachers are writing student learning goals, right? We've always used typical growth for math as as our um value that we're going to use and in this year the suggestion was made like we really I know it's hard but we really need to look
042at the stretch growth. Um so you can see here across the grade levels um K to six the percent of students who have actually met their typical growth. Um again I's gold standard here is 50%. We're much higher than that in in across the scores. Um but you can see down in stretch growth um our scores are a little bit lower there. So we So that's where we want to move the needle. And um here's why this to me is like where it all comes together. And if you if if all this data talk is making your head go, "Oh my gosh, there's a lot of it." This is where it's all at. What you have here is cohorts of kids compared to the fall of 23. So right so the beginning of the year
043and our first year of implementation the second column is the end of the year at the end of year two. So it's two full years and basically what it is showing is so this is considered a cohort analysis and I'm going to start on the left you can see the baseline placements for those for this cohort of 654 kids who did not meet their stretch growth in either year 1 or year two. So they may have met met typical but in year 1 or year two they did not meet their stretch growth and you can see where their baseline placement ended. They still made growth right? The data still looks better. So the next the middle columns the cohort is now down to 552 kids who met their stretch growth in one of the two
044years. So in one of those two years they hit that stretch growth. Look at the increase in the green. The last column are the kids who met their stretch growth in both years. And then the the the amount of increase in the baseline placements for those kids is amazing. So that's where it's at for us right now is looking at that helping kids meet their stretch growth goals. Um, and we're doing that through a number of tier one, um, tier two and tier three supports. Um, we want to keep the positive momentum moving. So, we're focusing on setting tier one learning goals that push for stretch growth. Um, using data systematically in our um, MTSS structure, our multi-tered system of supports. Um, expanding our UDL practices. um strengthening the use of my path making sure
045we just had a grade level department meeting um last week and one of the um we did a little mini data dive for the teachers to look at their own class level um and just make sure those kids are hitting those my path minutes um because that's where that intervention um in helping them with some of the skills they're missing is going to come in addition to small groupoup instruction from teachers Um we've worked really hard to ensure um schedules that are designed to support the core core curriculum. Um and then um Morse Pond has been able to um in include an intervention block this year. Um we did a lot of training around that through staff meetings. Um and we continue to look at training and resources. um in the program itself um that
046can support learners at all levels. >> Thank you, Cameron. >> Just turning up the brightness on here. I don't I saw I but I didn't want to put my my finger on there while you were speaking. Um so, yes, we'll do some reading updates. I have a lot of um views that will really um mirror what you saw for for math. Um I say data, she says data. So that we're pretty aligned. Um but before diving into that that data, I mean it this is a really um important opportunity just to really touch upon um the implementation of EEL education in kindergarten through grade six. Um so I just have this one slide for you for this evening um to just kind of um frame the goals that we have for our year one implementation
047of this program. Um so without my truly reading from here um I will just kind of like point you um in the direction that our our goals really focus on building strong consistent instructional practices um that support all learners. Um this slide highlights the key priorities that are guiding our work from strengthening foundational reading and writing skills to promoting um academic discourse equity and um you'll see in here that habits of character is something that is um is actively taught and learned within the curriculum. So that's um very exciting for us to be um taking this on this year. Um, and then together these goals uh really reflect our commitment to high quality teaching and learning as we build a really solid foundation for deeper implementation in the years ahead. I know there's a lot
048on here, so I don't want to blow past this too quickly, but um one of the things that Karen um talked about with finding kind of parallels between I Ready and E education is they're so strong in academic discourse. So, what we've noticed is that some of the some of the routines um they might be called something different, but they really are about having kids really talk things through, really um focus on oral language, which is very exciting to to see those those parallels for teachers and students. Um so, just take a peek here. So, I am actually going to start with grades four through six for the simple reason that grades four through six, we use the I Ready reading diagnostic. So, what you've just heard, the information you've heard about I Ready, this
049just flows. We use something different in um kindergarten through grade three. So, I just kind of put that and that's led into the end of the presentation um by design. So, we utilize this at grades four through six because the diagnostic is really that's the information we're really looking for. When students are already in there and they're reading, we want to really see like what are they comprehending? what's their vocabulary like? And um some of the standard benchmark screeners, they're not designed to do that. So the diagnostic is u we found to be a better fit for um our students in grades four through six. So as you can see um we do have we have the same um graph here where we have the spring placement distribution for district and benchmarks. um very similar
050um trends to what we were seeing with math is that we are consistently um outperforming the state and the national norms which is um always encouraging to see. Um just going to give you a moment to take a peek at that. So it is it's really encouraging to see um especially like as they're getting through and we look at and say sixth grade for example, we've got 56% of students who are early on grade level or mid or above grade level. So it's really promising to see as our students progress um how they're they're really hanging in there and doing some terrific work. Um we have a similar view here um where Karen mentioned remember she said navy is really good, right? Um, I just want to point out where it says funological awareness, high
051frequency words at the top, those are blank, that's simply because um, in grades four through six, those aren't those aren't measured through this test. So, while it would be something that's measured in the lower grades, it pre-populates there, but it's always a little confusing because it comes up empty. Um, and then you have phonics that isn't coded. Do you see how there's just a percentage there? Not all students will see phonics related questions if they are um showing that they're having a hard time because it's a computer adaptive assessment. The computer will go back to that. So that's why that's not um there's there's not that um national average comparison there because it's not all students. Um and so you know as we're looking through so we see vocabulary um we're we're um above the
052national percentage between zero and five percentile points in fourth grade. Um and then five uh% or more higher in comprehension literature andformational text. That's exciting to see. We can see um sixth grade was all you know navy all the way which is fantastic. Um and then um just going back to fifth grade, we had in in terms of comprehension um we were close. We were between that zero and five um percentile points there. So some some very uh promising data coming in. Um what are the relative placements in growth by English learner? Um again as you saw earlier that top bar is all of the students who who took the diagnostic the yes would be students who are considered a multilingual learner. Um and as we know they're a multilingual learner for a purpose. They're
053still learning the language. So that's not something that um you know is is jarring to see. we understand that they're in the place where they're really working um towards um towards increased language proficiency and at the bottom that teases out the number of stu like the students who are non um multilingual learners. Um but one of the things that is very cool to see. So in that yes bar line we do see 42% right of of students who are considered three or plus grade levels below. But when we look at their progress to annual typical growth, that is really high 165%. Right? So we know that they're not quite there, but the growth is really happening. So we're getting to benchmark, but we still see that they are making really significant, which is um so
054important to to be able to tease that out and and um dig deeply like that. And this is a similar view. It's just that we are looking at the relative placements in growth by special education. Um so again top row is everybody how those placements um sort of like shook out. Um and then yes would be that is the performance of special um education students. Um and then no is the progress of um students who are not considered special education. Now we're going to switch gears a little bit. Okay. So, in kindergarten through grade three, we actually use um a tool called MClass. Um that's an all-in-one system for science of reading based universal screening, dyslexia screening, progress monitoring, and instruction. Um the found public schools utilizes MClass in kindergarten through grade three. It goes
055beyond that, but we found again that in grades four through six, we just got a lot um more information from the I Ready reading diagnostic. It this is powered by by Dibbles 8th edition. Some of you may have heard of Dibble. So, it's a really tried andrue um measure of foundational understanding, but it's put together in a platform um called MClass that is really has some really neat features that I'm going to show you just to see so that you can see what teachers have um at their fingertips. This is just a really quick snapshot so that you can see the types of things that we're looking at and um working on. At the end of the day, we're looking at foundational skills that um are really necessary to have in place to become a
056proficient reader. So um the the purpose of doing this is just to kind of this is um you know if a student shows a level of risk we might say we might look at their profile and say oh this you know they might need a little support um in this area or this area or overall. So um we can see that there's letter naming fluency that something done at kindergarten first grade. Um, we've got some focus on phonological awareness. Um, specifically phmic awareness, the ability to hear, isolate, manipulate individual sounds, right? Um, in words, the alphabetic principle, so being able to identify letters and sounds and blend um words together. Then there's word reading um and there's oral reading fluency. There's also a a comprehension measure called maze where students fill in um you know
057the appropriate word so that we're we're gaining we're gauging their comprehension um and their understanding of syntax a little bit more and that starts in second grade. This is just an example. This is what um this is what we looked like in spring of 2025. As you there's a lot of information on this page. If you take a look at K 1 2 and three, you can see that there is the composite score is the overall score. So this is sort that's sort of the merging of all of those individual subtests, right? So it's their overall score. Um BOI means beginning of year, MOI middle of year, and EOI end of year. So, one of the things that's very cool to be able to see is when you look at even just look at the
058blue, right? The blue are students that are um above benchmark. And so when you look at even just from kindergarten, right? That goes from 24% to 21% to 44%. We can see that um we really become heavier and heavier, right? And we want to see that that blue. We want to see that green um with diminishing red. And it's really cool to see um from K to one to two how those blue and green bars are getting larger the more instruction they get. And those yellow and and red are shrinking. So there's something really special about this view because of the way it's organized, right? It's just a really simple, powerful view that shows um you know our our students progress over time. Um here's um an example of a um subtest for phenemic awareness.
059So again, this is just showing again this is just that kindergarten and first grade. It um is showing their performance over the course of the year. Um, one of the things that you might notice is if you're looking in um, it's important to keep in mind when you're looking at benchmarks, if you're looking at beginning of year in kindergarten, for example, it suddenly looks when you get to the middle of year, like what happened? Their scores went down. It's not that. It's just that they're being held to a higher standard. So often what we find at the beginning of year, especially with like our, you know, kindergarten and first grade, is that the bar, the benchmark is rather low and they can really do their thing because they haven't had instruction yet, right? So that
060benchmark is sort of lower and then all of a sudden that true read comes kind of mid year because the bar has been so it's a moving target if you will. They're really um the antie is up um for for each benchmark. So, I just wanted to to show you that. And then the one addition that you'll see to the data in grade one, do you see how there's suddenly the addition of like this this you know striped green line that um essentially just means that those students place they bypassed that test. They did so well in another measure that the gates closed. So um it's it's understood that that they have that skill. So that's what that the addition of of that um really is. And then um we just see the very same
061thing. So um scores by subtest. This is the reading accuracy um in grades one, two, and three. It begins in grade one. And it is again what a really terrific view to see how that um accuracy increases with with repeated instruction. Again, the benchmarks are going up. The expectations are are heightened, but it's it's really um awesome to see that at the end of year we had 92% of of students in grade three that were um accurate. >> So, this is last year, right? This was Yes. Just last. So we Yes. So it gives you the the full view of like where we started to where we ended. Yes. You're very welcome. And um this is just another view. This is the oral reading fluency which is really like how quickly they read. That's the
062piece. It's it's a piece of information. It's not the end all be all but um you can see some really promising trends here too where um kids you know the more the more they're doing their thing, they we have more and more students who are right with practice with with the support that they need. Um we we see um improved percentages of students who are um at benchmark above benchmark or in that yellow is really just below but um sometime sometimes closely approaching. I just wanted to show you the um MClass teacher view. We were really excited to get this tool last year. Um really excited because it it has such powerful tools and reporting. And so this is the class summary. So basically a teacher can just take a peek and say, "Oh my
063goodness, you know, here here's what my class looks like." So if you take a look for example of um well below benchmark um and below benchmark in word reading 20% of students were well below benchmark and 40% were below benchmark. Just that snapshot can help them kind of adjust like some of the things that I might be doing in small group like could I turn that into a whole group lesson? It seems like it would benefit a large number of students. So, that's a tool um that they have in their arsenal. Um in addition, one of the things that's very cool is um not something that we've had in the past, but you're able to go back and look at what errors students made. So, for example, if the reading specialist screened, you know, some
064of your students, the teacher missed that opportunity, right, to kind of see like what were those errors, you can go back and see um you know, is it um B's and D's, right? like, oh, perfect. We can look at that. Or is there a certain letter that, you know, repeatedly they're missing? So, it's a really nice tool to be able to go back instructionally um to lean on for sure. And then what the coolest thing um I didn't realize that this feature um existed and we were so excited to see this happening. One of the things that that MCLASS does for teachers is it allows them to take so we have this benchmark data and we've got several months before we get new benchmark data. Right? One of the things that's really neat here is
065as you progress monitor students as you so you're looking at those same subtests and checking in with kids it will update instructional recommendations for K for for students. So, do you see how it says update recommendations in that like purpley pink button? >> That brings you to an absolutely incredible arsenal of of actual lessons to do with students based on what um the system is saying like here's what they need. Here's their areas of area of most significant need. Start here. And so um it is really cool because as students progress between benchmarks we get accurate data where our all these groupings are redone. So I blocked out student names. I just put student name, student name, student name. Each teacher has between their class is broken into roughly between five and seven or eight
066different groups and it gives you the materials that would be needed to work on that skill. Um but again over time the more you update it those groups are fluid it's it keeps updating which is a really cool tool. Um so instructional next steps for reading. Um so in terms of tier one instruction obviously our focus is to continue that year one implementation of EL education curriculum for um kindergarten through grade six. We have a strategic planning team that is comprised of um our assistant superintendent and our principles, myself, um Karen and some of our department heads. We have Molly Drain, the world language um department head, and Christy Nicholson, our ELD department head, and Sarah Cox, our ELA department head at 7 through 12. Really working together to make sure that everyone is really
067understanding what we're doing in the K to6 space. Um, so I'm really grateful for that. We've already had um, let's see, two full days of professional development with EL education. We have 10 um, we have 10 different days this school year that we have an EL coach coming into the schools and it's really exciting so that teachers have that really like close time with um, with individuals to kind of work through challenges and so forth. Um, as Karen mentioned earlier, we do have new schedules at kindergarten through grade six that were designed to support time on learning. We knew that um, we hear a lot like, oh, there's just not enough time in the day, right? And so we realized that if we bring things back and create something that um create, you know, something
068that that works synergistically together, right, that's put together um at the at the building level that we could really prioritize when students were were hold. So we're the schedules are doing a really fantastic job of keeping kids in for really um core instruction. So that's been something um that's working for us. And then one of the things that's very cool is that the addition of the skills block, which is the foundational um programming at kindergarten through grade two is actually differentiated tier one. So they have 15 minutes of a grade level lesson in which all students in the classroom are are, you know, learning that grade level lesson. are exposed to that work and then they break into groups for the remaining 45 minutes where um they they based on um a placement test they're
069working exactly where they're at. So it's the best of of both worlds. They're being held to those grade level standards but then also working exactly where they need to be. So that's been really exciting. Um so for tiers two and three we certainly continue to lean on the instru instructional recommendations provided in MCAST for K to3 and we didn't talk about it today but what is in I ready for this in the same way >> the amount of resources there are are really staggering that are connected directly to student data. Um, and then, um, one of the things that, um, we I talked about a little bit, uh, last year, my goal to make sure teachers are aware of it again this year to keep the conversation open, just the what works clearing house. It's
070something that I know when I work with Katie Novak, she's brought up just real evidence-based resources that they can go to and and say, "This is what I need." And you sort it and and you have those really quality um, tools there for you. And then certainly progress monitoring of students who have not yet met benchmark or grade level goals is an important part of the journey just to make sure that we always have a pulse on where they're at. That's where we're at right now. Thank you. A >> lot of information here. >> It is. >> Yeah. >> Okay. Margaret, do you have any questions? >> Not right now. Okay. Can you just remind me when ELA U reading was implemented? I don't remember. Was it just last spring or there was like a
071whole year's worth? >> The new curriculum. >> Okay. >> Um just started in September. >> Oh, okay. So, the what we were looking at was not the same as like the previous year's math, right? It was just >> what was that data from? I'm sorry. I was like wondering what you're absolutely fine. So, our the data is from we use the diagnostic the assessment that's part of I Ready but not the curriculum. Does that make sense? So in for for math, they utilize the entire the curriculum and the diagnostic is a part of it. We just use that as an assessment to see where kids play kids are at, but they were using a different curriculum last year. They were still using journeys. >> That's what I thought. Okay. >> Yes. >> So they're doing
072when you say diagnostic, they're doing little tests on regular basis starting this fall. Yes. And that's okay. So that's where the data came from. >> Yeah. >> Okay. Um and I didn't see what is there stretch growth for reading as well. I didn't see um graphs looking at specifically stretch growth as there were for math. >> We would be Yeah. No, that's that's a great question. We had a lot of um slides that we we had kind of like moved out. We had there were so much that it was sort of um outrageous. That was Yeah, I mean this was you know in and of itself a lot to digest. I we'd be happy to >> Oh, no. I was just wondering, but yes, there's >> for the irony, not for McLass. >> MClass is
073a separate company. >> So, >> okay. Um, >> uh, oh, oh, I was wondering what percentage of stu do you know what percentage of students nationally use I Ready? Because when the national norms spring 22 to 23, I didn't know what that number meant. >> I've seen the information. I off the top of my head, no. Um, I is amazing for like there are all sorts of documents, so I can probably find that information for you, but like talking about the studies that they do, um, how they come up with that information, they have all the correlation documents and everything, but off the top of my head, >> it's hard to know what that number means compared to the numbers we had in those graphs without knowing like how many students that is or Okay.
074So, I think there was one more. Um, that was a wonderful presentation, by the way. Thank you. And I missed I just feel really bad, but I've forgotten you are Karen. >> I'm Karen. >> Aaron. Karen. Aaron. Okay. >> Uh, the math. There was one question. Um, have have the older students who were not using I Ready. So the current thirdyear third graders are the ones who started with I Ready? Is that right? So have the older students who are now using I Ready has that transition gone smoothly? Are they Yes. >> Have they learned? >> We're This is really probably the first year. What we're seeing is so when you implement all grades at one time, right, there's some what we call implementation gaps that happen. Um when a program does something a certain
075way, but you haven't had that in second grade and now you're a third grader, right? This is this is the first year um I'm hearing consistently in the classrooms that I'm in or in talking to teachers like some of that's gone away. >> Like now like the kids are familiar with the routines and they're familiar with the instructional strategies and they're they know when I say this they know what I'm talking about. Um so we're seeing that implementation those implementation gaps >> go away. That's great. Yeah, it be interesting to see the next three years of data a full >> sure >> range of K6. >> I think that's it. >> Thank you, >> Mike. >> Um, I just had two questions. Thank you very much for the presentation. It was very in-depth. Uh, my
076question which is actually what Katrina just asked you on slide I also like how you put the slide numbers on some of these but not all of them. I think it's slide five. On the bottom it says uh the national and mass year-to- date population. >> I'm sorry. It's in um it just basically it's what was just saying how many students are in I ready cuz it says here 10,200,000 national and 203,000 in mass. And those are just qualifying numbers for where you're getting these charts from. And then the overall question is not nationally but in mass of those 203,000 I think and I don't want to steal Katrina's point but like where they're coming from and how many >> how many districts >> Yeah. how many schools are using it so we kind >>
077I could certainly ask our um sales man would know that. >> Yeah. Just to kind of get like a map because it' be interesting to see and like the percentage of schools. Then my last question which I asked often is um on your charts and this goes for both of your charts with the I ready um it breaks down like grade K1 23 and I see I'm looking at MC class right now composite uh beginning of year middle of year end of year you have all those grades can you break those down by school >> and I ask this every time and I so but just because with the when we did the MCAT scoring. I had viewed that certain schools and certain grades were changing the the median. So, >> yep. No, that's a
078great question. Um on on my end, I am able to see all that. I just want you guys to be here until to have midnight tonight, but but um you know, perhaps that's something that um we could follow up with, but for the purposes of this we did at the district. >> That's perfect. If we could that'd be great, but thank you for keeping it. Liz >> Karen. >> Yeah. >> Um why? Sorry, I know you're struggling right now. Why the stagnant in the spring to spring? Um has there been any national reporting on that? Like >> no, I haven't been able to figure that out. like, oh, well, I keep kind of asking that when I meet with my the part our partners at I Ready and there's there's no >> set reason for
079it, but it's not a but but it's something they're seeing across, right? So, um, you know, which is why I think for us here, we've just said like, nope, we need to kind of watch that and and here are some things we can do to help. >> Sure. Okay. And then Erin, um, in the four to six, the habits of character, I can't help but parallel that with the atomic habits written by James Clear, it seems to be a lot of the same, and I pulled it up on my phone. Um, small consistent habits lead to significant change. The importance of systems over goals and focusing over identity based habits. It sounds like you're implementing that or the program is implementing that at our young learners at a young age so that when they are
080in their 20s and 30s and they are then you know making up for loss time. So again I think that you know thanks for being a leader with something um that's really important to recognize yourself and um how small changes can really make a big impact. So >> thank you for that. That's it. That has been very exciting. Um, so you I've been, you know, observing in in classrooms and you can see these little first graders talking about perseverance and talking like what it is, >> how big it >> in the lesson and that is it just goes from year to year to year to year. And um, one of the things that's very cool there is a um there's an opportunity for like service related projects that come at the end of the module.
081They do four modules over the course of the year and I just started first grade classroom. Um they were developing um it was it was a maker mission that they had and what they decided to do was um research how to make American Sign Language cards for different parts of their building. But the it was incredible when they were going through their process of this is what we need. This is how we collaborated on that. some really um just ve very very cool things um that you know and to see them like trenched in that in that literacy in that world discourse and having them do the writing but also like owning what they did and feeling so good about it is been has been very cool. It's a very interesting um little like spin
082on it. It just it's it's feel it's I'm seeing some really tremendous things that make you feel good. >> That's great. Thanks very much and thank you both for the presentation. Yes, it was a lot, but I think that it encompassed a lot and I I appreciate it. So, thank you. >> There's a lot to be proud of there, you know, like I think it's it's so easy sometimes to get bogged down in the the the dayto-day and the, you know, the but there's so much good happening. >> Thank you. >> Um, just a quick question before I have my longer question um for Erica the Eron. Erin, I'm so sorry. >> Totally fine. >> Um, color glass. >> Yeah. >> Um, for the ELA component, um, does the assessment piece of EL replace the
083STAR test? >> No. So, the the EL education is the curriculum, but they don't have a screener. Do you know what I mean? like there are there are um there are little assessments that students take to place them into this appropriate places and skills block. Some of it has become um it's a little bit redundant and we were feeling we're feeling our way through that like is there a way do we need to do both but the state requires us in kindergarten to grade three to use a DESIE approved screener. So the the MC class is going to certainly remain. Um but the so while I Ready has the curriculum the diagnostic um E education doesn't look that same exact way there are many assessments that are that are built into it but not that
084type not that diagnostic type of assessment. So while there are a lot of parallels there also some really um significant differences between the curriculum as well. Thank you. Um and again, thank you for your presentation. Very impressive data. Um and as you said, it's a piece of the pie, right? >> Um and it's an internal view. And so, um just to follow up at our October 14th meeting, um Dr. Teller had given us a presentation on MCCAST and we had requested hopefully by the end of this year a followup that gives more comparative data. And um so I'm hoping that perhaps we could um if it's possible tie in how this growth connects to external data for the MCCAST and I also like to request that the um DESIE accountability report which factors in MCCAST
085and student growth be part of that presentation. So, I'm hoping that we'll get that presentation at um I don't know how many meetings we have in December, probably just one, but um we did request that by the end of the year. So, I'm hoping that we can hear hear more about that. >> Thank you, >> Chris. >> Um yeah, so thank you very much Karen and Aaron for your presentation. Um, yeah, kind of just piggybacking off of uh what Katrina and Mike had asked, you know, I'm very I'm just curious about, you know, kind of the percentage of I Ready students statewide and how that compares to all students statewide just just to get an idea of how that compares and I don't and like so I will you know certainly look that I was
086just thinking as you were asking the question again that I was just at a um DESIE math leaders network meeting this past Thursday. Um, and it brings together math leaders from, you know, around the state, whatever. And what what was interesting, and again, it's anecdote, purely anecdotal, >> is um in one of our sessions, I was sitting with a a group of other um uh colleagues, elementary, you know, people with like jobs like mine. We all used I already at the table because like I I said something and somebody else was showing something. We had to work on a a joint project and and whatever and what we realized is we all used I already together. So I don't have exact numbers but anecdotally random I was with these seven or eight people from different
087districts. They all used I ready. >> Okay. So just as like a anecdotal, it's it's quite >> they've got a pretty good piece of the market here. >> Sure. Sure. Thank you. Um and see what it is here. Um you know, kind of piggybacking on Mike, I feel like it would be extremely helpful to kind of see it. It seems like it's just a great comparative tool. So kind of seeing how, you know, we have four different elementary schools. I would I would love to see how each elementary school kind of compares to each other in terms of growth. Um, and you know, one question I had related to, you know, kind of comparing our our high need students with our general education students. And you know if if our you know for maybe like
088the same cohort if our general education students are performing well but our kind of special education students are not. Is there a way of how they are assisted to be able to keep up with their with their cohort or you know like are they able to like let's say if they are three grades behind their current level and their cohorts are are at that level and then moving up do they stay back um you know almost a comparison of how how the the data here compares to kind of like the new grading um situation like if how that kind of correlates between like the high performing are they kind of you know kind of the higher level meeting expectations moving up whereas um kind of students who aren't performing as well if they're kind of
089on the lower end and how how that kind of >> so I think one of the shifts we've been trying to make in the last year um I don't know if this exactly answers your question but I this is kind of what's coming to mind is um oftenimes our our struggling learners we spend so much time intervening eating that they don't always get tier one they're so right their grade level standards >> and and at some point this isn't going to catch them up this is important the intervening but through our work um with MTSS in um the training we've had recently on UDL there's been a real focus on um a solid tier one and now we have a math program and an ELA program that are both high quality instructional material. Um, and
090we've designed these schedules so that our our our mediious kids are in for tier one. >> Um, Katie Novak, who's somebody we've done a lot of training with, one of her favorite lines is, "You can't intervene your way out of a weak tier one." Right? All the intervention in the world is not going to right. So, that's really been a focus shift. So, it's getting to that. What are we doing for those students? And that's part of it is really solidifying our tier one, creating schedules that allow them to be part of that >> and then also providing within that schedule a time for that intervention. >> So, does that >> Yeah. Yeah. No, that definitely helps. I mean, I would love to uh you know, I know we have a packed packed schedule. So,
091um you know, at some point, it would be great to kind of hear more about kind of what the intervention or not intervention, but just what the kind of strategies are for addressing kind of our higher need students. um since it's so really interesting. It is to >> those will be very cool charts to see next year after we've gone through like an entire year of like having like you know that those those schedules that support students um being in tier one, right? And and having them receive like like those supports at like more opportune times, right? >> Do you know what I mean? I I that just that's a very cool way to to look at it. I feel like it'll be nice to see that side by side >> next year. >> Great.
092Thank you. >> Um, one more question. Um, >> for for students that may not >> that it might be difficult for them to kind of do diagnostics or they're learning on a screen, are there options where they are able to learn or do the diagnostics without >> without using a screen? Are there kind of accommodations for that or >> not? For I can speak to I can't speak to MC class because the diagnostic is adaptive. Um it's not it's not a paper and pencil test. >> Um we do use um if a student has um MCCAST accommodations in an IEP or in a 504, we honor those through the diagnostics. So whether it's small group testing, one-on-one, um we can turn readaloud on for a math student so that they're getting it read to them.
093Um so we do accommodate them. Um the diagnostic piece is that like this is how I ready in math is whittling it down to exactly what a student's strengths and weaknesses are >> by throwing a bunch of different things in a very logical way kind of at them. So you wouldn't have that um adaptability >> paper and pencil. >> It's kind of learning as it >> it's right. So, I put an answer in. I answer a question on this domain. >> It's going to give me another harder one. Well, at some point it's going to stop. I'm going to not be able to answer those. >> So, that's going to be kind of my ceiling for that domain and then it's going to move on. >> Gotcha. >> Um, yeah, the test is pretty much
094made up of 50% things the kids are going to know and 50% they're not going to know to it. It's amazing at how they can pinpoint exactly what skills kids can and can't do. and then which you know we didn't really even get into but and then offer what to do about it >> lessons small group lessons um online tutorials like it's amazing so >> and then for literacy and K to3 the like 90% of the assessments are administered onetoone so the teacher right is is sitting um you know with the student the only exception there would be the maze which is just like a three minute time like kind of fill in the blank um um activity and then >> um I mean but with that being said like for students who have maybe
095like issues with attention that type of thing like I'm thinking of my youngest for example great reader his rate is always never quite where it needs to be because he's looking around thinking about so those are things that happen but the difference is is that teachers can observe those behaviors as it's happening and sometimes you look at score and say this child is reading is is doing tremendous work but we know their profile right so that's how we it's it's a piece of data do you know what I mean but um that that is something that that we deal with in classrooms all the time right we just say oh gosh these ts are telling me a story in the middle of this time you know we had one minute to read this um so
096so those are just kind of like things that we have to take into consideration when we're analyzing the data >> okay sounds great >> okay One last question. Do parents get um kind of almost like the MCCAST score. Do they get um kind of a print out of like how their child is doing growthwise just so they can think, oh, okay, let me try and work more on this or I was just curious if if >> we there we haven't used what's available at this point. Um >> it's hard like >> more kind of teacher based. >> Yeah, they really are. And teachers are sharing that with with um parents. There are some teachers that kind of have their own little form that they they send home. A lot of the teachers do the data
097chats with the kids. So, the kids are bringing it home are sitting with the with the kids saying, "Look how you did. This is your your your growth. Um, you know, this is your goal." Um, and then through conferencing and things like that. Um, it's like there is a family report to be quite honest with you. It's I don't as a as a mother if I didn't have the context or the kind of what I do know I think it would be very confusing and sometimes those scores out of context >> can be unsettling. Right. >> Um and I think we do a good job at getting the information to families in other ways. >> Sure. So, in kindergarten through grade three for reading, we're actually required by the state now to um to send
098it doesn't have to be in the form of a report from class, but some sort of a notification saying that their student is is well below. So, what you saw like in those red zones, we are required to to communicate that. Um, and so we haven't gone beyond that for the reasons that Karen just alluded to, but it's something they were always talking about and thinking about. I was recently in a a parent meeting with one of our principles where they were like, "Oh, we would have really loved to have that." Do you know what I mean? So, I feel like there's there's certainly room for that. Um, but perhaps like some parent education, you know, first would be really important so that we make sure that everyone really understands like >> what it is
099that we're sending home. Do you know what I mean? Oh yeah, absolutely. >> Yeah. >> Great. Well, thank you very much. Appreciate it. >> Sorry, I didn't mean to take up so much time. >> I don't have anything. That's what happens when you go last. >> Thank you. That was great. Great. >> So, I was Yeah. >> Thank you everybody. >> Ter has to go. >> Oh, sorry. Sorry. >> Oh, no, no, no. I I was just making another joke, but >> Oh, thank you guys. >> Really good information. >> Thank you so much. >> Thank you. Okay. >> Review and discuss Lawrence school grade configuration. No problem. >> Okay. So, um I just like to um uh acknowledge we have um Principal Bushy, Principal Adams, and Principal Hoka. uh with us tonight. And while
100they're transitioning um up to the table, please as part of this conversation, um I'd just first like to um let the school committee know I really appreciate the thoughtful conversations, the time you're taking, requests for more information. um you know to to say that you know that first presentation we did on the great configuration was a lot of information and um so breaking it down again uh focusing tonight on just the fifth grade and then uh and then in December we'll focus on the eighth grade could be helpful just to to help continue to have conversations. These conversations are happening across Massachusetts, across the country. Um, and we're seeing declining enrollment everywhere. And so some of these changes are necessary. And I just want to again say I appreciate the thoughtful conversations. Um, just as
101uh just briefly to get us u focused. Um, I just again want to say there are no wrong answers. Fifth grade into elementary is perfectly acceptable. Fifth grade into middle school is perfectly acceptable. Um we um as far as the curriculum and pedigogy um it's it's not about the the location, it's about how teachers teach in their classrooms. Uh it's um as far as lure um there are, you know, we've we've learned that there's um u offering many many lentures now. Um and and even if they weren't, you can still have different licenses in one building. The building doesn't dictate what the license uh licenses are. And I think uh most importantly is that whether fifth grade's in the elementary or fifth grade's in the middle school uh the achievement outcomes um it that that
102location or that grade configuration doesn't really dictate what the outcomes are. Um so um with that said and I should mention the social emotional because we talked a lot about that um as well. Uh and that's it's really um more about the supports that are put in place and that's what we we heard and we do have um really good strong supports. Um so really then it makes a difference like so what's the better choice for us right and so um just looking at what the history has been um with fifth grade already being out of elementary you're really adding that seventh grade one of the concerns that I've heard is well what's the structure going to be and so uh when you think about within a building you could have multiple structures so fifth
103grade could look like fifth grade does now and seventh grade could look like what seventh grade does they all could look differently they it could all be um you know uh the same, right? And that really would be the next step where administrators and teachers with the input um hearing the input from families would really determine what they think the best structure whether it's teaming or individual classes or um teamings in two or teaming in five, you know, what what that would look like and and that can all happen um in different buildings. And that's whether fifth grade went back because one of the concerns was would fifth grade go back to being a self-contained if it went into elementary. Well, it doesn't have to, right? It could doesn't have to. But the same is
104would uh fitness sixth grade look like what seventh and eighth grade does. And it could, but it doesn't have to. It can look exactly the way it is. And I so I just wanted I'm not sure that we really focused on that piece of it. Um that has come up. So I wanted to share that. But at this point uh my team uh my my entire team's here. ask any questions um that that you may have or you guys can start out a little bit um if you want um but I just wanted to give us this opportunity to to hear more and discuss more >> the side stars. >> Okay. Can >> I just ask a quick question about So I hadn't really thought about um the what the structure would look like >>
105and that it could be split in a building that it could be it could look different for fifth grade than >> than seventh grade. So coming back I think off of Glenda's comment like I don't know last meeting about how this is just this all of a lot of these pieces fall in this muddy area for us of whether or not it's in our purview or out of our purview. So those conversations about that is that something that we have a role in or would that be an administrative decision or do we not know administrative? It's administrative decisions with the input of you know their staff obviously and uh and then you know and certainly um through this several year process that we're going to take getting that uh input from families as well. Um
106so um so so the decision the decision has to be made so that the teams can go off and work on what that looks like. So we'll we would okay I think that I think >> but understanding that any of that's possible right I think that was just one of the questions that had come up that I don't know that we had answered before and I just wanted to to uh there's you know lots of schools across Massachusetts that have both fifth grade and elementary and fifth grade and middle and there's lots of them that have you know all kind of you know whether it's 47 48 56 five I mean sorry 58 um 57 and they do have different structures within a building that that all of that exists. All of that is true
107and and all are successful or not, but it doesn't have to do with whether the the structure >> I hadn't even thought of it. So, I appreciate that. Chris. >> Um, so, so it sounds like with community input, we would be deciding, and correct me if I'm misinterpreting this. Um, so does that mean we would be waiting for community input to decide the configuration or no, we would be deciding looking to decide the configuration before um train. >> Yeah. No, I I don't want to determine whether you want or not want more information on the configuration. What I was saying the structure within that building really then lies on the administrators. >> Right. >> Yeah. Right. Okay. >> Okay. Yeah, that's what I was trying to separate you. >> Gotcha. So, so the structure would
108just depend on what we decide in terms of fifth moving down or >> Yeah. >> or eighth moving. Okay. Um >> I mean, you should come back to me because I think I just lost lost what I was talking. >> Um well, where do we where are we coming down on community? Um I we we've talked about having workshops. Um are are we I I guess I guess I'm still wondering where we are in that process because as you were saying, are we are we thinking that we're going to take a vote without that or are we going to ask for that? Uh are we going to have a workshop? Um I would say I would before having a workshop to hear that. That's my comment. >> Um I was going to say something you
109know I usually don't speak to the end but um yeah the talking about Kelly said and Linda said where are we in this process? We're in the process of listening to all sides of the equation and the where people go the the structure and everything. I think parents and teachers that's their level. That's another thing that I think we're missing that I thought would be included. Um so maybe I can make a suggestion as a chairman. This isn't what you usually do when you were commenting that we set aside January as you know our individual workshops um to get like the parents would say okay what part of the building my kids going to go in. I mean they're envisioning things that we don't know either you know that we need principles to not talk
110to us but to talk to the so I'm hoping principles you're going to give them a bonus pay right if they go and do all those workshops. >> Are you approving it? Yeah, I'm approve. Yeah, can we approve that? No, I mean that would be helpful if the parents if some of the principles would go to the workshops and those are the kind of specific questions we don't know, you know, and we don't even know what to ask, >> you know, that's the thing. So, so, um, that's where I hope we would move from here. I'm sorry. Was I did I butt anybody out? Too bad. Go ahead. Listen. >> So, are you excuse me? So are you going to go across and ask the questions in order like that or like do you want
111us to input any input in at any point or is that is everything open? >> You know we get muddled when we have these discussions don't we get muddled in and the best most efficient way to do it. or Stephen, if you have something to say, please. >> I've been kind of thinking a little bit about this and I think some of the things that come up like you just mentioned the parent forum, but it's also like we need to know the configuration piece first to then and then well, hear me out in a little bit to know what the those things are going to look like. So, you know, we can't tell you what to what grade configuration to pick, but we can tell you that if we were K5, we may we're open
112to this. Or if it's eighth grades at the high school, five, six, sevens at Lawrence, we're open to anything because I can speak from experience. I've worked in a building that was 5 through eight. Um, that building had in fifth grade, they were in teams of two, 14 sections of teams of two. The other part of the building was sixth grade wing, some teams of two, some teams of four where they they departmentalized the classes, right? And then I worked in Morse Farm for a long time where you had some teams of two, some teams of four, it's no. Um, and the the that those systems work well because that building was able to decide what to do with the the grades. Some of those questions like where would fifth grade need be? I almost
113think like we're we're speculating on questions that don't need to be answered yet because we don't know where they're at, where they're going to be. We could talk it's almost like when we have these safety conversations and all those what ifs come up like we could go we could talk whatifs all day about security but so for and I was in a then master I was in a three through sixth grade school you know and that was different as well. fifth grade was was every every grade level within the building had a different format. They all worked in in their own way. You know, I think I don't have a opinion as to where we should land with the configurations, but I know that if fifth grade was for sixth, seven, and eight, there'd be
114benefits for them. You know, fifth graders compared to 10 10 years ago are ready to fly a little bit more than they were um 10 years ago. So putting them with an older student, older student population might benefit them to grow. Um, same thing with the high school students in eighth grade. You've got people that are, you know, in the arts or some of the fine arts where they can take their art, they can be in the m the band because they're in the building. You've got kids that can take different classes in high school because they're there. whether whether sometime you know we actually had in Hannibal we had a student that walked over to the high school for her accelerated math classes but you know if that person was at the high school
115they could have it so the benefits are all around I think we might be mudding the waters trying to get into too many specifics and we don't know what the configurations are and there is that administrative power like you know there's a trust in all of our administrative people you know whereas I'm new to this role of administration I I have vast experience experiences, you're going to trust us to make the best decision within our team, within our school community on some of those answers. Hope that's helpful or interesting perspective. Anyway, okay, Liz, >> um, so I appreciate Stephen your um that we your comments on we really need to know the configuration first. Before you spoke, I was going to say something similar in that I feel like there's a lot of fear and
116apprehension right now because parents don't know where their kids are going to be. So they they don't know where their worry is. Are they, you know, are they worried? However shakes out, eighth at the high school, fifth to stay at the elementary level. I feel like anticipation is the worst of a lot of situations and um not just in this instance but especially for parents when you get their children involved. So I Terry I like your idea of you know having January be may workshops, listening sessions, however we whatever you want to call them, I am all for that. But I think that we need to make a decision because I I we owe it to the families and the the staff and the students. Um so I because again I feel like anticipation is
117killing us here. So um I'm happy to support a January listening January whatever. Um but that's my on that. >> Um, yeah, Tom, Tim, Steve, thank you for coming. Wish I had questions for all of you so you would have a reason to be here, but I have no questions for you. I apologize. Um, the one thing I will say, and I understand what Chris and, uh, Glenda say about the listening sessions prior to voting on this, um, and I understand what Steve had gotten to regarding they can't make decisions until we have that decision. Uh, that all being said, I have in the community, I have heard a lot of people, every person I've talked to, for the most part, uh, has asked for K through five. they don't want the eighth at the
118high school. Um, and the reason for that is different, but a lot of the reasons are, and I've said this before, they don't want their eighth grade child at the high school level. Um, I personally, uh, I think that fifth grade would work fine at the elementary school. If we had a vote tonight, that's what I would be going to. Um, and wait, there's something else I want to say. Did that did that. Um, oh yeah, we Dr. Door had said there's no wrong reason, no wrong answer to either of these. Um, and with that being said, because the only people who've spoke to me have pretty strongly said not to put eighth grade high school. That's how I would vote if we had to vote. But if we could actually have more of those
119listening sessions to get to that point where we all feel comfortable voting one way or the other. Um, and again, I'm not against eighth high school or whatever you all whatever we all decide, but I'm just saying that the community input to me has been overwhelmingly fifth to elementary school. Um, oh, I remember what it was. Um, I don't know the how that would work with K through five with the spacing and all of that stuff. So, I think that we kind of have to look into into that or if a went to the high school where that would go. But, I would wholeheartedly support some listening sessions and then give the community an opportunity to come and speak and then that would be it. then we can decide something. And again, I've al said
120that I don't think we need to do this until the MSBA thing comes up. >> Um, thank you for coming. I sort of mistakenly thought that there was going to be something you would say first and then we would ask questions, so I apologize that we're doing it this way. Um I u I I realize these are questions maybe you can't answer, but from your opinion, your experience, do you as a collective or individually feel that there's um that moving all fifth graders into the K through four buildings, if there were only three of them, do you feel like that would work? And I I know that two of you are not in those buildings, so perhaps it's just a question for you, Stephen, spacewise. and like vibes >> not knowing exact numbers of space
121but knowing that the research that I've heard Dr. share with us in our administrative council meetings there's enough space in all the buildings to do that I think that there's enough there's many rooms in each building at least in my building I know that can be transferred to another class not extra another you know class probably being used something else right now that is in the classroom space that that person that's now be used elsewhere plus you know you figure some of those things that be moved around based on the number of grades in there and you know I assume that when we're talking about the three buildings like you said there will be a redrawing of attendance lines as well so that's that's going to change you know not She's going to dictate speech
122numbers, but for every intensive purp. >> So if you had like an influx of a quarter of all fifth graders tomorrow in your building, you feel like that would you can picture it? >> Yes. >> Um I guess a question for you, Principal Adam. Um Adams, excuse me. Um uh last time you came in and spoke to us um you mentioned that the the fifth grade students feel really small to you when they first arrive on campus and that they seem really young and um there's like extra shephering that has to happen for them as they enter Morris Pond and they need extra supports to know how to get between classrooms. Um, I'm wondering for the two of you, do you have opinions about the um, developmental readiness of fifth graders and whether you personally
123have opinions about whether it's better for them since you work with them. Is it more um, beneficial? I hear the argument about about they can push themselves and maybe like model the older students and I understand that. But is there something also to be said in your opinion about um giving them extra time to grow and develop and be ready to navigate the halls with fifth through seventh graders? >> I don't know that an extra year school necessarily solve that challenge in itself. I started my teaching career in a K through5 building. So the fifth grade included um when a transition happens it happens and you have to you have to support a new level that's going to be fifth grader new building or will be sixth grade that's going to be something we have
124to develop kids it's hard to say they're at this all they're at this level all together one year they range and each cohort is different so you know one year I might get a What's wrong with fifth graders? That could be different next year. That next group of fifth graders could have an entirely different character. So, you know, does that solve a transition problem in itself with not really? We're going to have to solve and have a good plan for how we transition between. >> Um, I I hear that. Sorry. >> The other side of it, uh, you know, coming up, if it's a it's a sixth grade, sixth graders coming in, just like our seventh graders now, it takes time to get into the building. Uh, if it's fifth graders coming in, same thing.
125But I see you saying before, you know, once the decisions made, start planning on, you know, how to how to make it happen. >> The second part of this opportunity that we have found that not only are we talking configuration. I think an advantage we have right now that other districts may not is that we're also getting to plan space for what that space can be. Often times in districts they're making a sh this sort of a shift into an existing building and having to compromise big and small as to how we can do things because of what the space dictates. We now get the opportunity to say if we want to have, you know, fifth and sixth look like they do now and more respond in teams, we do that and seventh transition for
126instance to an individual schedule like they have now maybe in a slightly modified form to stop that so that they then transition to eighth grade and high school. That's how it's configured. Um, so I think that's just something to keep in mind is that we're also going to take the advantage of designing the space around you know, how we want to do things that fit the students where they are. Opportunity we have here. >> That's a good point. >> Um, just a couple more uh sort of feeling questions. >> Sure. >> Um, when when we think about moving eighth grade up into the high school, do you think that moving that whole cohort of eighth graders, is that a significant enough number of students? And I realize we don't have um the principal of the
127high school here, but when you picture the eighth grade as a whole, and you're probably more familiar with the inside of the high school and how it feels, it's been described as half empty, ghost towny. Would moving an entire one grade fix that problem? Would it make it feel significantly different? Do you have any thoughts about that? >> My my uh my inkling is that it would make a significant difference. Um I don't think that we see the same kind of uh the same kind of dip in enrollment from uh from 8 to 9 uh as we as we would from uh as we would the 7 to 8 hours of the high school. Does that make sense? I don't know if I said that properly, but um we uh yeah, I mean it would
128be you guys have seen the numbers, it would be an additional human beings going into the building um you know compared to what the last several years we've seen in the building from 8 to 9 it' be bigger than that number so yes would it would it fill it or I mean that's it's probably a matter of perspective but I think it would certainly uh get to some of the concerns about the high school's overall enrollment participation activities. Oh, I forgot to say uh some of the more school students now compete with the regal eagles. So, um that was when that came up earlier. I want to jump in some kids over there. >> Um >> that answer. >> Yeah. No, that was very helpful. Thank you. And um I'm sure the high school principal
129would have had something else also to say, but um >> I just want to remind everyone that we're going to focus on course. So, you will have the the and actually u Tom's going to come back in December. So, he'll be there for that discussion, too. But I I don't care that you asked questions. I just wanted to let you know that you're going to have an opportunity to talk to >> that was not met as a criticism of the panel we have tonight. That's just um I recognize that you're not working in the high school, that's all. Um so, from a curriculum standpoint, uh we've heard that it doesn't really matter which way you go. Do you again have opinions um based on your experience teaching about whether it's easier? There was some I
130I wish I had the presentation with me, the print out um the bullet points when I went through them during our initial meeting to discuss this. It seemed to me looking at it that you really could go either way the way it's been said and that the points for eighth grade going up are the same basically as the points for fifth grade staying down. um when it comes to incorporating K through five under one curriculum, it wouldn't be under the same, but having that be a curriculum bubble um versus having fifth, sixth, 7th is is there something clunky about fifth, sixth, seventh or um easier about keeping fifth under the elementary bubble umbrella? You want to see that? >> One would be harder than differences in each one so much aspect configuration if that were
131going to be the decision. The other factor that goes into that just how we share spaces like cafeteria recess to accommodate in those spaces. how many lunch seems like small things but that's part of the schedule the specials rotating rotation additional grade level so we just have to account for that the curriculum piece not so much so it's always going to be dividing we have great oversight district the amount of curriculum leadership we have that helps us with the alignment smoothing that out so that we are divided five or divided Yeah, I was going to say the building management general space scheduling those types of decisions. I think it could totally work. Uh but I you know also like Tim said um we have a really outstanding team in the office of teaching learn that's
132likely better to answer the questions about like overall curriculum how it could fit with lure pieces and sorry deferring but I think even as to what we just heard from Karen prior to this is both of our math and our language arts curriculums are up until sixth So regardless of even where you put that they curriculum expertise and you know the building consider that building considerations that I just mentioned lunch is huge for inance for me you know it we have a 6 library art teacher so one of my biggest challenges >> what's that mean I'm so sorry what's that mean >> so what our um our art teacher works four days a week and our wearian teacher works essentially for 60% of the week, right? So that was my one of my biggest challenges
133was developing a schedule that would be equitable throughout the specialist teachers to accommodate like all those special classes. So I have two specialists, three specialists that work five days a week. So if I didn't have if I had more students in the building like you know say three sections of fifth grade that would have been that would have been a point in the schedule very very easier to navigate right whereas those those open spots that were created by not having the additional time there would be fit you know it's hard it's hard to explain if I didn't have like numbers to show Some days I have holes in the schedule where they weren't equitable because we have three three sections of kindergarten >> an odd number. >> No. And then Yes. And then the time
134space I know we can accommodate more lunch time but that's then that brings in the the hours that the staff and the service department works that it's all but it's all doable within you know the parameters of our buildings and our skills with the knowledge what's going to happen. >> Okay. Thank you. Um, sorry, last question. Do you feel as a group that it would be beneficial before making a decision to have any more input from the community? Would that be do you think a good idea or do you feel like there's enough information and expertise? I realize that's like a personal feeling. >> Well, uh, I mean, I think, uh, whatever the group decides is best is best. >> Or I guess I'm so sorry. Can I just add one thing to that? I
135guess what I'm I guess what I'm really wondering with that question is have you have you received feedback from the parents and the family members at your schools that leads you to think that they would like to have um an opportunity to chime in on that if uh I can't say I've had a lot of family members reach out family members that are having the kids at the school now know that when this is all done their kids are going to be down the road. Uh but if family members have reached out. I' I've counled them to reach out to Dr. D school. Some of the people who have reached out to you may have come to myself or other principles and redirected without saying to Tom reach out to you. So, if someone asked
136me on my way out of here, I would say you should really reach out to Dr. Dor and the school community. They've both been steadfast saying that they want community input on this. >> I don't know if that answers your question. That's a weird question. >> It's not a question at all. I probably am not answering it properly. >> Thank you. >> I can't say I received feedback in one model or the other discuss looking ahead. So discuss compared small direct. >> Okay. Thank you. I've had significant input from staff wishing to be heard a little bit more and had a little bit more input in the process. But, you know, again, I'm about three months or four months there. As far as parental input or anything that I receive very little what I feel
137I feel like, and I can only speak to my school particular is is the anxiety over not knowing what's going to happen, what building closed for lack of a better term that if that's what comes down to I think it stems from the situation last year and that's where a lot of the anxiety is carried over I would say um but I don't receive much I don't receive any questions about it by email or directly from any parents but I've had some they would like some more input as far as their educational professional expertise about that and I think that that if you're looking at doing community forum month or things like that that will be an opportunity to those staff members that feel like they would like to be part of like that and
138I can't I can't say delineate whether that feel like they haven't had the input I just feel that's the feedback I been significantly being a being a um citizen not an employee last year of the town I felt like there was a number of listening sessions and a number of aspects so what what kind of redundancy are we going to have and how is that going to affect the efficiency of the process going forward yes I have had feedback >> I would I would expect that more from the K to4 >> crowd versus Yeah. >> Thank you. Thank you for answer >> Margaret. >> Yeah. Um first of all, I want clarification, >> Kelly. Uh and did did you say that the configuration is your administrative decision or our decision? >> The configuration whether it's
139going to be 567 or 678 is the school committee's decision. >> That's what I >> Yes. I'm sorry if I wasn't that wasn't clear what I heard. Sorry, >> but the structure how the school runs is the principles and the teachers. >> Yeah, your responsibility. Okay. >> Okay. So, I'm going to repeat myself a little bit, but then I have lots of questions for the three of you. Okay. >> Good. I'm glad you're all here. >> Are you ready for me? Okay. Well, first I'm going to repeat myself. I believe that no matter what we what decision we make it is going to be successfully handled. >> Okay. I also know that there are some some students >> who in fifth grade will be well able to move into a middle school and there will
140be some who will have a hard time. Okay. Um so um the one thing I want to say and I want to before I go to the questions is I think one of the important things that really needs to happen and I don't mean we do it today or next month or whatever the most important thing for any of this reconfiguration is the planning it is going to take from the administrative team to the principles to the teachers to make it work. And if we do not give you folks enough time to do that, the problem that will happen will not be your fault. It will be our fault. And I think we all need to hear that. >> Okay. So now my >> Okay. >> Um what would be Steve, what would be your
141ch and and it's interesting. I'm glad I heard you say you've taught in different configurations. Um what would be the challenges to you if in fact the fifth grade were to move into your school into elementary school? >> I don't think there'd be any challenges. >> Okay. You don't think they need challenges? I mean I think the challenge would be with the staff that are moving from a different configuration making sure that they're supported prepared they have materials around making that happen that's I think that I think it'll be more the adult making sure we support the adult and the personnel that it takes but I don't see you know be naive or totally optimistic because that's how I am. Um I don't see many challenges with that. >> Okay. um you know developing you
142know I'm not a schedule person some people can look at a schedule and build it in a second and it takes me three weeks or some change so many hours in the day there's minutes people need people So I don't really see any huge challenges that but then you're looking at changing dynamic it's an adult challenge you're looking at changing dynamic staff building but you know it's going to happen whether it's at my building or Tom's building or building >> well not yet >> okay you know and I want to go back to what uh Kelly said at a previous meeting where in fact fifth grade is already in middle school and it was misunderstood last time when I said we'd be demoting them. I know we're not demoting any individuals. We're demoting a whole
143class to return them to elementary school. I'm not saying we shouldn't do that. I'm just saying that that's what we are doing. And so Tim, I have you really come from North Falmouth as well as being at the middle school. So you have um sort of good understanding I would think of both of those. >> So when you think about fifth grade going back being put back to elementary school from your experience, can you sort of talk about that? >> Well, yeah. I mean it's >> particularly now that you've already had them in middle school, >> right? I guess it's a little tricky because I never saw them included. >> Sure. >> At least in this town, previous teaching experience I have um a while ago now, but it the more grade levels you're trying
144to service at one time, especially when there's a lot of rapid development that happens from kindergarten to fourth grade, there's a lot of growth and change, social development happens. So I think having another grade on top of that, you know, we have to be mindful how that's going to work. support them and the schedule will be a big part of that. Opportunity um it's it's a wide developmental but there's there's I think advantages to that too and there's challenges to that. So it's it would be complicated but I think it would be successful if we did it. I think just some of the challenge I look at would be compromising at any one of our schools and elementary where the enrollment would be. Say you have three sections of fifth in each of the three
145buildings maybe fewer opportunities for team teaching and would the spaces accommodate a team approach like we have now that supports that I think is really beneficial for fifth grade that you would get it build that would be designed to do that. So Steve's building had maybe two sections in fifth grade you have a lower cohort come through there's only those two teachers maybe That's not as successful a team combination for instance. It just doesn't you wouldn't have anything to do about that. You're locked into that building in a bigger setting. You might have six sections all day. We could have two three person teams. You could have three person, right? You've got more options that way. More sections just gives you more. That's the compromise you have. Curriculum wise, I can see it fitting seamlessly.
146Teachers teach what they have and they become their those other opportunities that we lost. >> Okay, I'm going to continue with you. >> Good. Um, and actually when we were at the um at Mars, I was when the fifth grade came in, I was like, "Oh my god, they are so tiny." Um, but I'd like you to tell me what what are the strengths that you've seen when the fifth graders go into middle school? >> Um, big one I see right off within the first month. Uh, the increased social connections that they're able to access. I think they get to see the entire town. They're ready for that. Often times they've been in activities that span different schools. they know some teammates from this or members of their scout troop from over here that go
147to a different school. Um, where their social skills are, they're ready to broaden that and have the full breath of our available to them and to have friends from all across the community. That's such an amazing thing that happens in the first first month or two, you know, see where they sit at lunch. You can tell where they're elementary school. It doesn't stay that way for very long. >> And sometimes it's well, you know, they're a team together and they bring in the third friend and now it really starts to blend in and they become they really start to view themselves as a class. When we actually in our community meeting this year, fifth grade, I did say kind of struck me at the time. I know I didn't say this a couple years ago,
148but you know, look around. Look to your left, look to your right. This is your graduating class for the first time sitting together. And they I don't think they ever thought about that. It's now a collective me. And I think emotionally they're ready for that. And that's kind of exciting. You know, all of us and some of them I don't even know yet. When they're younger, their world's a little small on that social skills to take advantage of very early on in the year. That's a powerful thing that happens. and they're still young enough where I think the aspect of play kind of being up on them a little bit um that that's still a component of their school day that we haven't as well that they're able to mix socially with each other in
149that very light fashion accelerates those a larger group if they didn't come up until sixth grade might be a little more challenge as development goes on it play looks different social interactions different so I think that's a nice >> and what what would be the challenges or what have been the challenges when you've had you know with the fifth grade moving up to middle school >> no I really think it's they're not challenges that the challenges that exist I think would exist on a book is to us. It's just getting new students into a different setting with a different staff that has before. It's really comes down to that data you heard earlier to us now and department structures we have and the administrative support we have. We have meetings. We learn a lot about
150the students. We send our staff out to visit their elementary schools and get to know them there and observe. They come to us. We do a lot. too great my school council this past month get to know you back to school party comes down to that matter that happens they have to go through that process know who they are one thing when they're on paper and numbers and know a little bit about how they function socially when you put them all together for the first time is chemistries so whe that happens in fifth or six that's going to happen right So those are really the four challenges I think now but I don't think anyone >> okay a question I asked Alan he sort of said you know we can't know what's going to be
151difficulties but um I I do know we talked about the social emotional needs of students I do know that you know we we tend to focus on those and I I know the teachers do I've been very impressed with that um for students who move into the middle school for fifth grade that may have a difficult time doing that and I assume there are some >> uh what supports specifically do you have now that help them >> so child >> I'm sorry a child who moves into film brand new they don't know anybody how do we handle that >> no no no I'm saying that that when when the fourth graders move up to to fifth existing students, >> okay? They've already been here, >> right? >> Uh but some of them socially may not
152be quite as sophisticated as others. Okay, because I did see this some fifth graders were sort of big, a lot of them were Okay, so if you have some that move from fourth grade to fifth grade, they're famous people. >> Um or >> what what supports do you have for those that are having a hard time with that or do you ever have any have a hard time with that move? And if you do, what are the supports you presently have now specifically to help them? >> Yeah, biggest one comes from our counseling teams and holding social groups um weekly. So we hear input from teachers like who might have struggles like that and just having the number of students we have. It turns out it's probably commonality. There's probably a group that all would
153benefit from the same intervention whether it's a lunch group together that we can do with our counseling team. um maybe focus specifically on more social connections because they might be more introverted and turns out when they get to meet other kids who might be going through the same thing they identify and being in group together. I think a lot of that small groups or call lunch groups happen throughout the day, our counseling team does, even our teaching team, it can pop up between the two classrooms that are teamed together that because they can mix the kids fairly freely. they can create space and do something just teachers support recess a little bit outside when you as the challenges I was picturing what my challenges would be but I was thinking some of the comments as
154we talked about sections and so forth and let me just ask him maybe about the fact that like those those some of those challenges we talked about the social emotional challenges but um identifying challenges you finding people that are kind of people and so forth it's like if down to say I don't know the numbers I had three sections in fifth grade we're losing that ability to maybe I haven't fit in with my friends here. I haven't made great friends here or I, you know, I wasn't I didn't wasn't comfortable with the group. I didn't see anyone that I could recognize as another peer or someone similar. when you spread them out into 10 sections or I'm speculating how many great classrooms there are. Now you have you might have an opportunity from somebody in
155North that you never knew that hey you know you like it could be as simple as you know they fence and you fence and you know church you like but you know I'm not and I'm being I'm I'm overly like I'm glossing over it quickly but even people having trouble identifying with who they are inside and what they feel like they need to portray about themselves are going to have more opportunity as a larger hole like that class like you know that's your class you're gonna see something that you might right now navigate towards a lot sooner and that's going to be helpful social emotionally then you can have those lunches then you can build upon those things we're looking at this pretty pretty meaningful >> thank you any any of you the question I
156didn't mean to pick on Tim no so thank you so much now I'm going to pick tongue. >> Okay. So, and and sort of the same questions. >> Margaret, could we stop because we're getting into mechanics which I think didn't we want just >> I want to ask questions about the strengths and weaknesses and I think that's important. >> Okay. Um, we will have more conversations and we have I mean maybe I'm out of line here but could we like because we are going to have more conversations in January, right? and >> okay responses that's helpful >> um >> because what I'm Margaret not to interrupt but what I'm hearing you ask are questions that parents would gain a lot of taking their anst off of things >> and I'm going to be recorded and
157they can hear it and that's why I'd like to finish with Tom >> okay >> if that's okay with the committee >> she's last right She's the last person. >> Yeah, Chris. >> Um, I did have a couple questions where I didn't really get a chance to speak, but but um >> I like the questioning and I think it would be very helpful, you know, for someone in the public to kind they have to watch this video. I feel like the information that's kind of being presented here would be best distributed if it was something that was like presented. You know, I'm not looking for a presentation, but I feel like it would just be a better format um for the public to hear in terms of it sounds like a lot for the pros
158versus cons of different >> I I I'm trying to say the cons and the pros. I was not trying to >> No, no, no, no. I'm not saying you're But but I feel like it's helpful information that, you know, I I feel like some committee members have asked for kind of the pros of moving eighth up, fifth down. pros of moving fifth up and board down. Um, and so, you know, I think that additional kind of format would be very helpful whether it's a future presentation or something. But >> sorry, >> we are an hour and a half over our our agenda time and we all have it's clear that we all have questions, continue to have questions. It's clear that the community continues to have questions. So uh supporting the idea of a workshop
159or some kind of informational forum in January. I think that that is is the best uh venue for us to ask our questions um together not just um because we are an hour and a half over and we have still a full agenda. >> Yeah. Yeah. And can I just say one thing from regular um we I have a template that I have to sign that MSBA puts out before they finally let loose with the money that says show us a community forum. We haven't had one this year. So we really need to do that just for that. The other thing is too, we always got to remember that the reason MSBA does that is because we have to get the money to finish this project just because we get some from MSBA. We have
160a lot of money to get from the town's people and if people are happier, maybe they don't agree with your decision, but if they had some input. So, I just think we need to we have a we have gotten a lot of input ourselves and we've asked questions, but I just really think we should put to the public more. >> I'm sorry. Can I just say one thing that I think that um we've had some great discussion here tonight and there's been some amazing information that have come from our principles and some great questions that have come from our committee members. I I don't know how, but I wish that we could have a fact sheet for the parents who especially the parents that have continued to show up that aren't perhaps here tonight. I
161think that there it would benefit from them. So looking forward to whatever January looks like. I hope that the um whatever we call it, I don't want to get caught up in the nomenclature, but whatever kind of meeting we have that we are able to continue to have our questions and that the public can also ask questions as well. I don't want it to be this is only for the school committee to ask. This is only for parents to ask. I I just want like an open place that everybody can ask their questions. Anyway, that those my thoughts >> table right now table is can I can finish asking my questions. We were here until 11:30 for a previous meeting. I'm I'm sorry, but uh the questions for Tom are about 8th grade, seventh grade,
162and sixth grade in the middle school. And I would just like to ask him the following questions. And since people thought that some of those questions were valuable, I'm just asking to continue my point. >> Did you say six, seven, and eight? >> Yeah, >> but we're only supposed to be talking about fifth grade. >> Well, I know, but so >> well, okay. >> Ser all the questions you want in the world if we have a one topic meeting, but this meeting has so many other topics on it. >> Okay. >> Are we talking about uh the next eighth grade? >> We need to hear about the budget. We need to hear about policies today. >> Uh Terry, I'm just saying uh Lori, at our last meeting, you said that our next >> that was
163the plan >> meeting in December, our next regular meeting, we would have a followup about 8th grade. Yes. Okay. >> So, I'd like to ask Tom about fifth grade and >> Okay. Since you since you're in the middle school, what what do how do you know how do you feel about sixth fifth graders moving into an environment that you're principal for? >> Fifth graders are coming to law school. We would have time to plan something that would be fifth graders >> challenges would be planning for fifth grade. >> So you need time to do that. >> You need time to do that. So >> okay. And then the last thing is I assume that you do have some students that move into uh Lawrence who um have a difficult time. What are some of the
164supports you have for them that can help them to adjust to being in a new environment? You know, I know you won't know what would happen if you bring fifth grade in, but um what are some of the supports you have presently that help students who have a difficult time challenges moving into your school? And that's the last question. >> Uh so overwhelmingly um the the feedback that we get from students really come from grade six to seven. By the way, I think it's extraordinary. Uh overwhelmingly the the feedback is that uh the students enjoy the ability to move more throughout the day and like the sense of uh the sense of like a more uh like more grownup responsibility from traveling from point A to point B uh and moving around the classroom. Now
165because uh if it if we're provisioning for grade five uh when we do that we would probably not be for something as robust as the current seventh and eighth graders do. Uh but grade six absolutely and it's grade five like kids were coming in that are reluctant or are you know having a harder time with the transition some of the very same uh strategies that Tim referenced he uses. Um we also have because we have a team structure uh and the and the teams meet uh at least once a week uh as a team focusing on just the kids on that team. They are are uh diligent in identifying a kid that has is having a harder time and the counselors are at that meeting as well with the team leader uh and responsive teachers.
166So they are able to see a student like maybe even before maybe before we hear from the parent that parent or guardian student's having a tough time and uh we'll work together to come up with some strategies to support the student uh you know work with guidance team uh there's a there's a number of things that we can do to help kids okay thank you thank you thank you all and I've asked these questions because since we're making the decisions I thought it was important for us to hear this information thank you Okay, Chris, can you >> I'll end it. >> Are you sure? >> Um, yeah. Yeah, I'll try. >> He didn't really ask a question, so I feel like >> Excuse me. We It's over. We >> That's okay. Thanks. All right, guys.
167Thank you very much for coming. And >> thank you. >> That was very helpful. >> Very informative. >> Yeah. >> Too bad you have to do it a few more times, but that's okay. >> Happy Thanksgiving, everybody. Well, it won't be for us. You'll have a new audience, Jim. >> All right. Um, so now we will have an update from student services. >> Okay. So, um, we've been talking a lot about preschool and I just wanted to make sure that everyone was aware that we're opening up our 10th classroom of preschool in January. And that's because we have that rolling admission based on student need. So, we do have um we'll have an AM and a PM session. And currently, we actually have um because the program is integrated, we've had our application process for
168peers and we have 11 peers on the waiting list right now. So, we will we will have a full program um for you know as we go into um January. And then I just wanted to highlight some of our transition services. So for our students who are on IEPs when they get to the age of 14 we begin to discuss their transition plans as they prepare for their futures and we think about you know education, training, employment, independent living. So I wanted to share about some of the programming that we offer for our students. So, one of some of our students actually participate in a program at 4C's called the Massachusetts Inclusive Higher Education Program. So, we're pretty lucky here on the Cape um because 4C's is actually one one of 13 state colleges and
169universities to pioneer a fully inclusive post-secary education program for young adults regardless of um attaining their diploma. So, we have some students that participate in that. We also have a parallegal assistant training program that's at the Barnstable Courthouse and we have a few students this year who are going to participate in that. So that program focuses on students who may not receive a traditional high school diploma. Um it is focused on students who have uh autism and they offer them a structured exposure exposure to a parallegal assistant training program with professional um in the in the courthouse. So that's a pretty u pretty awesome opportunity to develop some uh clerical skills, vocational skills, uh promotes inclusion and independence. So that's a nice opportunity for our students. And then we also have other partnerships um within
170our community here. So we have students who do some work at the service center, uh Betsy's Diner, the Fountain of Public Library, Meals on Wheels, and the Swap Shop. Um and then we also have programming um within the high school as well. So there's opportunities for students who can work on some um employment skills and daily living skills like cooking and laundry and um actually practice taking the bus um as well for public transportation. I wanted to highlight one of our partnerships this year. So we have a dental program, a mobile dental program that we work with. They are um working with our uh all of the elementary schools, Morris Pond, and then there's going to be some programming at the Lawrence School as well. So, this is pretty awesome. They come to the school.
171The parents um fill out the necessary paperwork, and then they offer not only cleanings, but they can do a little bit of dental work as well um for students or make referrals as needed. So, it's a pretty um a pretty valuable opportunity for students who may not easily be able to um get to see a a dentist. And this is a new program for us this year. And the feedback we've had from the nurses thus far has been very positive. Um we also have a partnership with Duffy Health Cent's alternative peer program which I've mentioned in the past. Um but this year we're working with them to implement the I decide curriculum. So this is a substance abuse reduction program developed through a partnership um between Harvard and MGH. So two of our counselors at
172the high school have completed the training um to use this program as a proactive like tier 2 measure for students who have expressed some concerns about substance and nicotine use. So this is another opportunity that we have. And then last but not least, um we talked a lot and I think we ended in June um with our sharing kindness presentation and we have been we last year we had that program at Morris Pond, Lawrence and High School and this year um we have it at the elementary level. So it's starting at the East Vance School. So that's a nice and again an opportunity to um support the peer grief groups that from last year. Anyone have any questions? It start in the middle time, right? >> Okay, Glenda. >> No, thank you. >> I'm so
173excited that the sharing kindness program is is in the elementary schools. It's going to go around to all four of them. >> Yes. >> That's so great. I love that presentation. And also the dental program when we went on our tour of all the all the schools with Lori, that was happening at Morris Pond the day we went and that was so cool. I had no idea that that was possible. >> So, thank you for the update. Thank you so much. Very impressive. Thank you. >> No, thank you. And I had not heard of the parallegal thing before. So, >> it's always fun. >> Yeah. So, that's a new program for us this year. I think it may have been discussed a few years ago, but we um we have some students will be doing
174that. >> Very cool. >> Yeah. No questions. It sounds like great collaborative program. So, thank you, Sandy. >> Yeah, they're really interesting programs. Yeah. Yeah. >> Very interesting. Anything else? Okay, thanks Annie. >> Okay, next will be a discussion on budget for FY27. >> Um, thank you. So, we always uh in November try to to um just give a brief update discussion about where we're heading and then the bigger presentation will be in December. Uh, so December 9th, uh, Paul and I will present the uh, budget. Um, if you can hold on to this before I I just want to talk about the budget priorities before we start getting into the numbers. >> Thanks, Paul. Thanks, Paul. Because we're going to be more interested in the numbers. >> Um, and then we have our um
175PTO uh meetings planned for early January um before we come back to the school committee to vote on the budget. But um to talk about my strategic uh priorities, uh safety of course is one. Um you heard the safety um my update. Uh so um Paul will talk a little bit about how uh that's going to be reflected in the budget. Um to incre uh another priority is to increase the special education funding levels in the budget that reflects today's increased um cost. U Paul will um talk a little bit about that. Um uh and and uh although the enrollment is declining um I just want to continue the student needs continue to grow. Uh and so we uh we always address um students needs um and and make sure that that the level of
176uh services and supports in place matches the needs of uh the individual students. Uh, one of the things I'd like to talk take a minute to talk about um is uh beginning to regain a budget that allows from for growth. And we have been in a pattern for the last several years of uh just um just trying to keep up with what the needs are. and um the town of course support are supporting us and see that uh the need um that we we can't just meet needs we have to also grow and uh I believe that they are supporting us so although in um FY27 next school year which is the budget that we're working on I will not be able to move toward these things um Paul has done a a nice job
177um working us to a point that I began I believe in uh FY uh 28 which is the fall of 27 just so we opening school 27 that we will be able to start talking about um the the elementary world language program again. So I started thinking about it. I know >> we see >> but I when we first mentioned it and it was a priority of mine um those students that would have started the program in fifth grade this year and I really want to point out that that um it's unfortunate that that many grades have missed out on what um the benefits of a world language program um can be. So, it's it's important for us to get to our budget that we can allow for that growth. So, in the fall of
1782027, opening a school 2027, we're looking at uh starting with our world language program and then also um uh growing our preschool um by two two classrooms. So, we believe that we can get there by by then to to begin um you know shifting that budget from just meeting needs to also growing. And then of course um uh the uh high academic uh achievement for all students uh we will be doing that by maintaining or increasing staffing as needed um for special education for EL for reading specialists for the needs of the students. That will always remain true and first priority um by improving our processes. Uh we've been talking to you within our goals u multi-tered systems of support and our instructional support teams. we're um improving those processes which therefore um you know
179help students uh be able to achieve meeting those needs. And then um and the the third way of improving achievement is making sure that we are addressing a child holistically. So the counseling supports that we've talked about um partnerships with our family um human services manide trauma and community care um all support that's social emotional um improving our breakfast and uh lunch program um improves um how students perform when they're they we know that they're fed and with our partnerships with family service center and found human service and Cape Kid meals. So, um, all of that is is is kind of the package of how we're moving forward in, uh, making sure that our our students are showing nice growth and outcomes. >> Paul, now you can talk about numbers. >> All right. Um, let
180me just give a quick recap just over the last couple years. Um, so, you know, we've done a fiscal year 25 budget. We increased the budget by 3.7%. Incl $300,000 draw that was built into that budget for fiscal year 25. For fiscal year 26, we had a 5.5% increase in our budget. Um, and included in that year was a $340,000 increase in three categories for special education. Uh, namely out of district tuitions, out of district transportation, and special education contracted services. for this year we increase those categories fiscal year 26 340,000. So now in to the budget for 27 we continue that growth uh in discussions with the town we should come to agreement of the 5.8% 8% increase in the budget, you know, from 5.5 and 3.7 plus 300,000 draw. And if you look
181down on this sheet that we just passed out, you can see some of the drivers of this budget. Some of the key non salary increases. Uh this is the busing contract that was settled last year. There's a small increase 56,000. Out of district tuition, looking to increase the budget number by 200,000 out of district transportation by 250,000. Uh uh special ed contract services by 250,000. And just to give you a sense uh to go back over that uh if you look at the other district transportation uh we were about 587,000 over budget last year on that line. So even though we increased it substantially um it was uh over budget last year. We're trying to get to a point where you're no longer going forward after any stabilization fund for the future in case of
182a rare emergency. These lines now have sufficient budget in them to handle the variance that may occur year. So in special ed contracted services um there was 219,000 for budget that's lo therapeutic related cost for students etc. Um the other category that's a smaller increase is utilities and often use this category in conjunction with maintenance. So the more we save on utilities, like we did last year, we were down about $100,000 in our budget on utilities, we actually increase in our maintenance spending outline. So we kind of swap those two together. >> Um but uh that's the utilities here is largely the supply side of it on the distribution side. Um the uh and then the other line down one below that the security line that's uh the cost of the half the salary of
183an extra road that we would share with the police department. Uh the two new safety monitors uh that we talked about for our school command center, central command center. So that uh that they can now be you know monitoring through the software and the cloud program that uh any activity that takes place on any of our campuses u you know across elementary and high school. So it can much more efficiently identify some crossing boundary etc. They be fully concentrated on that with the uses of the software. Um and so and then the in addition to that is about $88,000 in software related cost and services cost that contract. Um final categories is really other uh and it's really an estimation attorney benefits that were part of the contract. So um you know the contracts have
184been you know some assumption the ratification of the FDA is all built salary line um so on so that the salary line reflects those increases. The nonary item that is on this nonary expense increases the estimate on the maternity leave >> I'm sorry what was that last thing you said maternity leave >> yeah maternity paternity leave I should say >> that's in the other >> oh non can I just point out there was two things here um you have not voted on the um excuse me have not voted on the SRO or the um contract that that's the proposed but we're budgeting because we don't yet know about the um the others. So that's but it's it's projected um at this point. So total salary uh increases would be about a million80 that compares to
185about 830,000. This is again this is early stage u you know getting a sort of narrow down the focus that conversations with the town >> nope I'm good >> Chris >> I'm I'm sorry if I missed this so the the salaries for the safety monitor and cost of the SRO that's >> in the security one >> in the securities so that's salaries but it's non salary expenses >> right we've put it in there to sort of highlight the change if you put it the salary increase and the salary expense line it's going to get blended in >> you won't priority >> yeah just to make it a priority >> okay No, thank you. >> No, thank you. >> Um, just a couple real quick ones. Can you just remind me real quick the busing increase,
186was that because of our new Luchi Lucini contract? >> Yeah, exactly. >> And it wasn't to do with buying vans and mini buses, not what we >> those were the capital articles that were approved. >> Okay. November. >> Um, and then the um the uh utility cost. I was just wondering two sort of a two-part question. Uh, are there any more saving costs that we can realize through doing things like you did all that work last year with turning the heat down earlier and later? And is there anything additionally that we can do? >> Yes, there is. We're constantly looking at it. Our goal is to try to get this dollar for dollar at a much lower level again this year. getting to the 100,000 that we stated might be. >> But our goal is
187to put >> You mean to be able to repeat that or to like >> Oh, I thought that would be like an iteratable expense saving year after year. The same. No. >> Well, no. the once you've saved the 100,000 because you've compressed the heating and cooling time depending on building um you know you can only go so far tweak it >> okay we don't want to freeze people um and the upcoming solar canopies that are going in in the summer is that going to directly impact our utility payments and we'll have a lower >> Yes it will >> price only for those two schools or districtwide >> district wide I thought you had said that before, but I just couldn't remember. Thank you, >> Margaret. And >> okay, thank you, Paul. >> Were these your
188colors or Lor's? We were these your colors? >> No. Paul, he understands how I like my colors. >> Yeah, these colors are very helpful. >> Okay. Okay. So, now we'll do some work on policies. Um there's first reads on CTE. Uh you can read that and we'll go over it. Um Lori, did you want to say anything about the first reads? >> Uh yes. So we'll we can go over this. Um I'm going to ask um Dr. Tyer to um to talk about the middle school career. Um sorry, can't talk. >> All right. Um so coming out in late summer um we are now required to implement this policy. This is a a model policy that came specifically from Desi. Um and so part of it is just articulating what's available to students um both
189at Elmouth High School but also at schools for which we are ascending district. So Upper Cape and then um Crystal Agricultural. So spelling that out and then um within that to setting up um what career exploration will be and what the conversations will be with our middle school students specifically in this context more school um but also bridging that into some introductory work at Morris Pond. >> I'm happy to answer questions but that's the the broad brush. >> I have a question. Do you want to take me last? I don't know where where we are in our system. >> Um, you always have a lot of questions about policy. So, why don't you go first? >> I I only have one on this one. I have one edit and one question. Um, so under student
190I'm just going to give you my edit. This is a typo. Okay. Um, under student data release >> for this section. I don't know. It's right in the middle. >> Yep. I'm with you. Um it says that um we have to give notice to adequate notice for parents and guardians multiple students reasonable time to request that this information not be shared but it doesn't say how to do that. So does that the howto exists somewhere else for how people opt out of sharing data? The how to be part of our communications that the principles will send out and then the information. >> Yeah. Okay. Great. That was my only one and then I'm just going to give you this. >> Okay. >> Mike, >> um just one question. Uh under collaboration, you mentioned Uppercape Tech.
191It's in there. You also mentioned Bristol Aggie. That's our agric agricultural. >> Mhm. >> Are they to be named in here as well or just prepared >> on the second page? It's about halfway down. Bristol County agricultural. >> Yeah, I got I I see that. But I'm saying that under the collaboration heading, it just mentions collaborating with uppercase tech on sort of page three, let's say, on the top. So I I can clarify that with our teams that looks a little different. >> We don't have the same volume of students that go there. So promoting the opportunity and if they asked to visit, we can coordinate that. But maybe we can articulate it a little differently. >> That's I just because you sent them both and I only saw one in the second part and
192that's why I asked but thank you very much. That's it. >> Okay. Um I don't know if you said this in your intro and I missed it. Was this did we have a policy relating to CTE at all and this or is this brand new? This is brand new at the requirement of Desi. >> At the requirement of Desi. All right. Thank you. >> Chris, this is kind of like a a generic question. Um, so so this is to a policy for public schools to kind of introduce students to CTE programs outside of the district. It's to introduce career technical education, but then also because we are a sending district, we're a member district, right? Is also to have it codified what that relationship is, what communication around that >> like. >> So, is this
193something that could potentially lead to more students leaving the district and going to other vocational schools? >> I think it just curious. It ties with ties with our efforts also to promote our own career technical education pathways, right? And to to really make sure that students and families are aware of everything that we offer and the extent to which we offer them. I mean, there are certain pathways that are only going to be available if a student studies at Upper Cape Tech or if a student studies at first, but there are some that that >> align, right, run parallel to what we have, right? And so we need to be able to showcase that as well and help make informed decisions. And so our counseling staff, our guidance counselors are also part of that as
194well as our career technical education team. >> Okay. >> Thank you. >> Okay. So policy will I don't know what we'll do with it, but it'll come back for a vote again. Okay. That's how it works. >> Next one. >> Okay. So um EFBA is school food and nutrition u meal modification. This is a new masked model policy. Um and it asks districts to commit to um that the district will provide meal modifications at no extra charge for students with disabilities um or special dietary reasons um that restrict the students diet on a case-byase basis. in this policy um is uh written as mask uh suggest to make sure that um we we and I just this is great. We already do this. I just want you to let you know. Yeah. This is this
195is a practice of found public schools um and you know our nurses work with um the uh food services um our special education teacher you know so whatever needs to happen we we do that. It's it's kind of seamless. Um, and I and and uh really it just doesn't point out any difference with any of our students. We do it well. Now it's a policy saying that that we do it. >> Any questions on that? >> I just I'm sorry once again I missed. Is this from Desi or MASC? >> This is mask. >> Okay. >> This is a mask model policy. The other one was uh because Massachusetts regulations um changed and so that that one came out from because of regulations and then oh any other questions on that can okay KBG um
196parent advisory council um this is just uh again it's uh a new mask model policy um developed to comply with state law that requires us to have two parent advisory councils um special education parent advisor advisor council and English learner parent advisor councils both of which we have been doing um again um very proud that we ha have both um and they're both um you know functional um parts we can always grow both of them um and we we do try but we really put an emphasis on that and and that's a a point of pride um now we have a mask model policy um that reflects Any questions from anybody? >> No. >> Okay. All right. So, the next one is to act on policy JJ student fundraising activities. Is there a motion? >>
197Make a motion. >> I'll second. >> Okay. Um, all those Any discussion? Can I just ask a point of clarification that the the neon yellow and the red are those the only changes? >> Yeah. >> Okay. I just want to make sure. Okay. Yeah. >> Okay. Um so where were we voting? Were you agree to vote? Okay. All those in favor? >> I I Any abstaining? Okay. Next is to act on policy JICA student dress code. Um, is there a motion? I'll >> make a motion. >> I'll second again. >> Okay. Any discussion? >> Yes, >> Katrina. >> Um, I just want to remind everybody before you vote that once again, I'm just reminding what I said before that this is the last instance of this MASC model language that will be with us. If
198we vote this out, it will no longer exist in the handbooks or in our policy manual. And um similar to the two MASC model language policies that we just looked at for a first read, this is the same. Is that correct? >> It's also it's also an MASC model policy, right? This one that's how it came to us. >> The mask model policy. So, um, we have been advised, our legal council has determined that it's legally permissible to take this out, um, of our policy manual and, um, instead just point to the individual school handbooks, which is what we will be doing. Um, it'll just say student dress codes are published within each school's student handbook. Now, the reason I keep making a fuss about this one is that we will be very much an
199outlier if we do that. Um, legality is a separate issue from in my opinion what is best for students. It's separate. And as a school committee member, my first priority, our first priority as a committee is to look to these students um and what's best for them. And I believe that removing language that is meant to protect their freedom of expression does not align with my personal understanding of my role on this committee. Um, this was recommended by MASC and although taking this language out does seem to protect the district from a legal conflict between the JIC language, JICA language and our specific district handbook dress codes. There is a conflict and taking this out will remove that and it will protect the district in that way. I just don't think that it protects students.
200I've said that over and over. um it just protects the school district, not the students. And as I've said in our previous meeting, I reviewed a lot of um districts, not all of them, but the ones that were on the MASC website, 127 districts. We will be one of the very very few I could count on one hand, maybe seven. I think there were seven, so two hands that do not have this language. Um so we will be the outlier. We will be removing freedom of expression language from our policy and unless somebody puts it back in at some future point, excuse me, that's just a protection that is gone for our students. Um, that's all I can say about >> Well, I just want to clarify too because I think that um there may
201have been a misunderstanding um between us. So, I just I just want to make sure that we can clarify. So, one, this is taking it out here. We could do one of two things. You could take all of the school different school policies because they're different different uh uh age levels. We could take all of those and we could put it in here and then it would exist here and there, right? Um but you you don't have to do that because the school committee votes the handbooks. So in essence, the the handbooks are the policy. The second point I want to make is that we we have to abide by the law whether you have a policy or not. So that always supersedes. So we will always follow the law and I do believe that
202all the dress codes in all of our school handbooks has the protective language. Um and then the other thing that you know I just I think there was some confusion. I was saying that we do not have to have J JICA in order to have that protective language. So I want to I I stick with that. What I was trying to say is that um I mean you could have JICA and and even though our town has not adopted the the health um the health policy of chapter 7181, you could still have that in there. That doesn't mean that just because our town does it, you could have it in there because it's a theory that we support it, right? So, it's not wrong, right? It's two, but it's two different things. The point is
203if all of our policies are different in all of our handbooks, it doesn't seem right that this doesn't reflect that. And then the the point is that you vote the handbooks. So, in essence, you're voting the policy of each of the different handbooks. I think um perhaps the misunderstanding in my view is that when people when the districts that do have JICA language in there, most of them have actually added to it and at the bare minimum they will say something like um the dress code must uh adhere to safety guidelines and um and health and safety and sanity s what am I trying to say? Sanitation like it has to be clean. There's like some basic guidelines, but they won't remove JICA and have nothing in their policy or their handbook that specifically says
204that students are entitled to freedom of expression under state law. All I'm saying here is that this is the it's different than our handbooks. All of our handbooks are different and they are unique, but the handbooks are not the same as a policy that overarchingly protects student freedom of expression. If we take this out, we don't have that umbrella under which our handbook policies will exist. Do >> you see what I'm saying? Like >> we have we have the law. >> We have the law. But what I'm saying is that in our manual, and I'm not going to beat this dead horse. It seems like people don't agree with me, and that's fine. But I just want to make it clear that of the other districts that I looked at, many, many, many of them
205have actually added to this language to make it really clear that you can't pull a student aside and discipline them if their if their dress code is out of alignment. You can't do it in front of other students. You can't have a power differential. You can't, you know, they've gone to extraordinary lengths to actually broaden the scope of what this policy language says. And we are going in the opposite direction. And although we have language in our handbooks, that language is not the same as protective umbrella that says these are your basic rights. That's all I'm saying. It won't exist anymore. It will be individual handbooks. And I I don't think there's any point in being redundant and putting the handbooks in here. That's not the point I'm making. The point is that they're separate
206things and that the policy that protects student right to self-exression through dress, which is protected by the state, is is not going to be clear. That's all. >> Okay. Um the policy manual is a living animal. I'm going to tell you in 18 years there was one day, one day. And I I wish somebody who had been on the policy could verify that I'm not exaggerating that fact that it was up to date. It changes constantly. One thing we do when we work on the policies that we eliminate or change is if we don't do what the policy says at the time, we have to edit it or eliminate it. So we have our handbooks doing dress codes right now. Okay? So the policy isn't reflecting of that um for all the different um different
207dress codes for each different school. So taking it out is what I think you really need to do right now. It's not saying you can't bring it back at another time if you change the dress codes or do something different. Um so and there is no law in Massachusetts that says you have to have a dress code in your policy manual. Um, so we're not breaking any laws by doing that. So, um, I'm saying for right now it's just I think a good decision because we do have the handbooks and we are always revisiting policies. So that's my opinion on on this right now. Okay. Is there any other >> just a clarification question? >> This is what Dr. Dor just said. All of the individual dress codes for the schools are in the handbooks.
208>> And then this is just deleting the umbrella language and pointing to the handbooks. >> Yes. And according to um our legal advice, the protective language >> um that I think Katrina is trying to to say that would be lost, it is in the individual handbooks. So this vote does not change the individual handbooks themselves. It just points to Okay. >> For example, >> at the high school, kids can wear things that as long like they they can't wear those spiky collars uh necklaces that are spiky collars or um things that talk about sex and drugs on their t-shirts, but anything else they want to do, they can at the high school, right? I mean >> they can wear hoodies now. Probably not. >> Um, have you walked? >> Excuse me. I spent a lot
209of time in the high school. I beg to differ with you about what goes. >> We made our handbook for the high school a little more specific in June. >> So there are some limitations. >> Yeah. But still, so I mean there is those freedom of action. But the point is um right now um and I I'm telling you after all these years if you don't do a policy you have to take it out or edit it and we don't really do that. We do other we you know by the way handbooks are as legal as the policies. So anyway, so that's my comments on this. Chris, >> just a quick question. And so this language is in the handbook >> like this language is written is in the handbook. >> We we would have
210to do a cross reference on work because every every handbook is different, but the protective language that keeps coming up, the protective language um for our students is in in each handbook. >> I thought we out in June. Didn't we vote JICA out of the handbooks in June? >> We did that in June. So, I don't think it's in the handbooks anymore. We had a whole vote about it in June >> and then the only location of it was in the policy manual after that. And so, that's why I've been making such a fuss about this because it really is the last stand of Ja. I'm going back back to the notes just >> Yeah, >> I don't know if this is proper, but if we're going to be going through notes, looking up stuff,
211I would make a motion to table this considering the timing and >> I would. >> Anybody want to second that motion? second that >> if it's that confusing because I I said it at our last meeting that we took it out of our handbooks in June and I I guess I should have pulled up the notes so that we could confirm that but that was in our meeting and if it's a source of confusion I don't want to take our time right now to do that. >> Well, if we still need to do research I think Mike made a good motion to >> it wouldn't take a second just to look in the policy and see it wouldn't take but a second to look in the policy and see if it's there. I mean the
212notes the handbook the notes say that that's there. I'm just, you know, but I I don't >> I think to to clarify my point, I think what Chris was, not I don't want to speak for Chris, but he had asked if similar language or the exact same language was in every handbook and that's where the research would be for every handbook. And that's why I mentioned tableabling it just so we could get to that. And so when policy met, did you guys talk about it? >> Did we talk specifically what talk about? We did talk about this question. >> We talked >> because you guys were going to take this back up. So I'm just wondering about your conversation because I I defer to I mean the policy subcommittee spends a lot of time on
213these and you have legal councils all over. So if you talked about it and came to a conclusion, that's what I'm going to base. conclusion was to take it out. That's why it's here. >> Okay. >> I don't have the notes from the committee meeting. The only note I have is >> Let's stop. Let's stop right now and vote and table it. >> Okay. Cuz we're doing what we often do. We go on this tangent. We have a solution to look it up offline. >> Make a motion to >> All those in favor because it was seconded. >> Yes, I second. >> All those in favor of tableabling this. >> I Yeah. How many is it? I can't >> It's four so it doesn't >> Okay. >> I'm sorry. >> No, four and four. So,
214it doesn't get passed. >> So, who is T I'm who's voting to table it? Because I'm just trying to >> One, two, three, four. >> Okay. >> Five. Okay. It gets passed. >> Okay. All right. So, we'll >> when just curious >> I believe if you table it, you have to vote on it the next meeting. I believe that's the way it goes. Give us time to clear up Katrina's questions and everybody's questions. >> I don't think actually we should have tabled it. That's for like an extreme situation supposed to definitely you don't necessarily have to table it and never bring it up. >> So tableing it doesn't mean you have to bring it up at the next meeting. You've tabled it and whatever happens happens. >> Well, isn't it killed for >> if it
215doesn't come up in the next meeting? >> If it doesn't come up at the next meeting, so indefinite. >> No, it doesn't have to. Once something's been tabled, it can be tabled forever. >> Okay. So, I think that the the intent was just to look into those handbooks. >> I think you should postpone to the next meeting. You have to get the put it on the agenda. >> I'm honest. You can trust me, Mike. >> I'll bring it back. >> I motioned to accept the minutes as written. >> Oh, wait. Are we there? >> I second that motion. >> I haven't looked at it yet, though, so give me a second. Oh, come on. I seconded you. Come on. I was trusting. >> This is discussion time. >> I'm good. >> Okay. Any other discussion?
216Okay. All those in favor? >> I. >> All those opposed abstaining. Okay. Passes. Committee reports. Any committee reports? >> Same old same old. Hopefully um maybe by December meeting we will have um a contract ratified by FBA. It would be nice for staff to get all of that pay. Um so more to come hopefully. >> No news here. >> Okay. Um um connecting to the report we heard from Aaron on the EL program, BIPS is um wants to hook up with Aaron actually um we haven't asked Lori yet though um to help out with this new program which is so interesting um because BIPS has a lot of volunteers that really want to do literacy and there aren't enough um things that they can get involved with. So, this is an opportunity. So, maybe even
217if Aaron doesn't need the help, they're going to, you know, try to get some people in there. Um, anyway, it just was when she was talking about that, I was saying for that and, um, so that's a BIP report and there's so much going on. I'm um with the, um, collaborative right now because this is their 50y year anniversary. So, I'm going to get some handouts to bring to you to see the events that we've um been involved with this year. Um, and also from now on um I you have to uh I have to be on the agenda. It's some new legal thing from the uh that the collaborative um liaison person has to be on the agenda and give a report every time. So, um just to let you know that's coming. Uh
218what? Whatever. Okay, that was my committee report. >> Mike, >> I missed the DEIB committee this month, but we have a new member, Suzanne Thomas, and the Indigenous People's Day went swimmingly. That's what I got from the notes I was sent. >> Thank you. >> Okay. Well, this isn't exactly committee reports, but number one, I want to thank you and appreciate your indulgent to me to ask my questions. Number two, I did send to the school committee, but I've checked on in previous after um going to the convent the convention last week. I realized the importance of us getting together, not just at this table, but in a more social environment where we get to learn and talk to each other as human beings. And so I sent to the committee, but I'm also inviting
219the other members around the table December 19th to my home at 5:30 for some holiday cheer. Uh the only thing I ask is that you let me know if you're coming so I can understand how many people will be there. And the last thing that's really not relevant, but I think it's relevant is I think it's farm family tomorrow between 10 and 2 where normally the um far farmers market is they're going to have vegetables there for ve root vegetables there tomorrow between 10 and two. People should know that so they can be invited. Thank you. >> Okay. Was that Sy's recording you just gave, you know, used to get the recording about >> Oh, Fresh Market. >> Fresh market. >> Yeah. >> Could I uh request for >> followup? >> Oh, yeah. That um
220the uh update on staff attendance. You had an update about that on November 18th. And I was just wondering if we would hear about that at maybe I thought it maybe it would be tonight or maybe our next meeting. Well, we out u performed the state average um on attendance for administrators uh teachers and staff. >> Yep. >> Wonderful. >> When it came out that we >> Oh, I saw that. >> Did you see that? >> Yeah. >> I scrolled down. I couldn't see us right at the top. So, I'm like that's not bad because they write them all. I have one request for followup. I've mentioned it before, but that I ready stuff. If we could break that down by school, um that would be great. Thank you. Okay. >> At a previous meeting,
221I asked that um that we do a workshop on um operational procedures and I asked that Sean be invited to lead it and I'm asking if there's any uh negotiations or anything's been done about it >> so far. >> Yeah. >> To be honest with you, no, Margaret, because there's a lot of other things that But we usually do something like that in January. So >> yeah. >> Well, I I just think it's a I I think other people have said it's really important and uh I think it really be important in terms of our working together that we do have a workshop as soon as possible. >> Okay. >> Any other requests, Chris? Um I would second Mike's regarding kind of the breakdown and kind of in preparation breakdown of the elementary schools just
222to be certain. Um, in terms of in preparation for our next and I don't know if it's going to be our next special meeting where we're going to be hearing about 8th grade um, moving up, but for that meeting, it'd be nice to to kind of have, you know, not a presentation, but like a brief um, explanation of kind of the pros of eighth grade moving up or staying down. And also, you know, I was kind of thinking in terms of how, you know, in terms of our educational strategic plan, how um 8th grade, whether it's moving up or staying down, how that kind of aligns with our educational goals. Um, I feel like that would be helpful in kind of, you know, almost giving us a path in terms of some options are going
223to be better than others. So, so that's kind of requested as best possible. >> I agree. >> I I agree with both of those requests. Just so you know. >> Motion to adjurnn. >> Second. >> Third. Third. Maybe third. Any opposed or Oh, we'll be slack.