001So, uh, with three people missing, it's going to be harder for you to remember the order of the votes, but I'm sure you're up to it. So, to begin, I would like a motion to adopt remote participation as written in the agenda, please. >> So moved. >> Second. >> Roll call vote. Pam. >> Pam. No second. And yes. Maggie Sharon Dover. Yes. >> Linda Herbison Bolton. Yes. >> Oh, sorry. Linda's next. >> This is fun. >> Lexington. >> Helps if you unmute. Sharon MTO. Lexington. Yes. >> Jeff Stan. Yes. >> Alistister Lucasto. Yes. >> Very good. Uh my understanding Julia that remains the same is that there's no uh written submissions for public comment for today. Is that correct? >> Correct. Very good. >> Okay. This consent agenda for this meeting consists of grants, donations,
002and draft minutes all of which were in your packet. So I would like a motion to accept all the items on the consent agenda. Please >> moved. >> Second. Any comments on any of the items in the consent agenda that should be removed from the consent agenda? Okay. Very well then. Um, seeing no further discussion, roll call vote. Pam. >> Pam Norton. Yes. >> Linda Herbison Bolton. Yes. >> Maggie Sharon Dover. Yes. Sharon MTO. Lexington. Yes. >> Absolutely. Yes. >> Alistto. Yes. We're going to have this down pat by the end of the meeting, but Charlene is going to show up and it's going to throw you all off your game. [laughter] Okay, chair's report. We begin with for the good of the organization, I got uh two items, one of which will require a
003vote. They both have to do with the MASC uh conference which is coming up in a few weeks. I believe that we have uh three school committee members attending. Is that correct? It would be Alice, Charlene, and Sarah. Is that three? The three. Okay. So, at this conference, uh they usually have a uh a number of uh agenda items that they want um votes on like possible policies or statements or the view of the MASC. Now, in order for us to have a voice at this meeting, we have to choose a voting delegate among our three attendees. There was a deadline to sign up for this yesterday. What I did is I said, "Charlene, since you brought this to my attention, you volunteered to become our voting delegate as long as it as it is
004confirmed by the full school committee at our next meeting." So, you have the ability to go with the chair's suggestion or choose somebody else. And Charlene does understand that her role or whoever the voting delegate is [snorts] is when they vote, they're representing what they believe the view of the full school committee should be and they will consult with the other delegates from Minute Man at this meeting. So I'm going to ask for a motion to appoint Charlene as our voting delegate for the MASC upcoming conference. Then you can either say yes or make a different choice. It's up to you. >> So moved. Second. >> Very good. Any discussion on this issue. >> Just want to say thank you to Charlene and Sharon and Alice for attending the conference on our behalf. >> Charlene
005for her voting >> work. >> Okay. Very good. Very well then. Roll call vote. Pam >> Pam Nurse Actton. Yes. >> Linda Herbison Bolton. Yes. >> Maggie Sharon Dover. Yes. Jiren must Lexington. Yes. >> Jeff Stulan. Yes. >> Alice still. Yes. >> Great. One other comment related to this meeting is that our own Alice Duca is going to be uh receiving the MASSC leadership life membership award. >> Wow. uh at this at this meeting. Now, let me just read now uh the statement of awards can range from um no merit to merit. I want you I'm going to just actually read this uh description of the award and you and I can tell you which which which range of that spectrum this award is on. Um, it's the MASC Division 8 Allstate School Committee 2025
006award. This honor recognizes your contributions to the Minuteman Regional Vocational Technical School District. True. Both through your commitment to the role of the school committee. True. And here comes the important part. And through your advocacy and efforts on behalf of the highest quality education opportunities for the children of the district. That's that's the most important point and anybody who knows Alice knows that she's at the forefront of doing that. So I would like a brief round of applause for Alice in recognition for the award. And Alice, do you have your 20 minute acceptance speech that you can share with us in advance of this presentation? I just real feel lucky to have been serving Minute Man and the kids of Minute Man for all this time. And also I am the third member of the
007Minute Man school committee to receive this. Jeff received it and so did Ford. So I think actually Minute Man has stacked the deck in terms of this award. They only give out 10 a year. So we are winning again. >> Welld deserved. Congratulations. >> Yes. I want to say again the highest quality education opportunities for the children in the district because unfortunately not everybody on a school committee not anybody uh who is involved in these endeavors keep that part in mind which to me is the most important aspect of it. So congratulations Alice. Thank you very much for your service here and uh for all the children in the district who will never even know your name you did for them still remains a fact. >> Thank you. >> Okay, very good. Put this side
008and that completes. >> I do have an item for the good of the organization. >> Committee goals. School committee goals. You have something Heidi before we do school committee goals. >> We do. I have two short items for the good of the organization. I do want to point out I I'd like to request that we take 6B out of order because we have two students here who are helping us present um okay information on that. And um for the good of the organization, I want to commend Michelle Rosendis and our athletic director um I see Michelle here so she can share the good news um with all of you. Hey all. Um so what we were uh sharing with you is that we will have some uh bleachers that will be delivered tomorrow. Um they
009will be here for our tomorrow um our homecoming game, our Thanksgiving game, and our soccer senior night um game. So, we were able to get that done, >> right? >> Thank you, Michelle. No problem. >> These are temporary bleachers for a time certain to handle your most important events. >> Yes. Yes. >> Great. Very good. That is good news. And I'm sure that everybody will be shocked to see them >> bleachers at Minute Man and they'll want to grab them and want to keep them, but that's not how it works. Okay. So, why don't we, even though we're still in item uh five, let's fit between A and B if there's no objection. You wanted 6B. Is that correct? So, why don't we do that right now? Because I'm sure that whatever students you have
010appearing in front of us are so eager to get back to homework that I don't want to delay them for even one minute. >> Thank you so much. Um so we are coming to the committee today um because even though last year we approved five years of our graduation dates to get our gorgeous location settled um an interesting conflict came up because of the World Cup and pushed national skills USA date a week um off. So that um would conflict our graduation date as it currently is would conflict with our students participating in National Skills USA. Um so uh Leah, I don't know if you know her, but she is a Massachusetts um officer and Xavier is a minivan student who came to my office today um to make the point that he wanted to
011request that this happen. So, I thought they could share with you um why they feel that um it is important that students not have to make this choice and we vote to move um the graduation date and give people plenty of notice um because it's >> October and Xavier. >> All right. Thank you everyone. Uh, can you hear me? All right. >> Yes. >> All right. I appreciate this committee taking the time to hear from us. Um, my name is Leah Schneer Vanzyle. As Superintendent Driscoll said, I serve as the Skills USA Massachusetts state president. Um, I have been a Minute Man Skills USA chapter officer for four years, a state officer for two years. Um, and of those two years that I've been a state officer, this conflict has honestly really plagued me. Um,
012I've been attempting to advocate for this change for two years. Um, I've been to M to Skills USA Nationals twice. It's been an incredible opportunity. Uh, it's something that, uh, every student who qualifies absolutely deserves to have the chance to attend because going to Atlanta for a week. You're bonding with people from uh, from across the the school, people you might not talk to otherwise, and you're meeting people from across the country. Um that's a really invaluable experience beyond even thinking about competit competing and uh how gratifying that is for students. How uh fulfilling that is you spend months and months preparing for your maybe your district competition, your state competition and then getting to nationals. It's a really really huge deal for these students. Um it's a really great opportunity uh and one that
013I would hate for people to miss out on. Um, Minute Man has been really really increasing our Skills USA involvement. Uh, we've come to this committee before to talk about funding for our national conference and uh, hopefully some of the members here have been able to see the passion that we have for what we do as Skills USA members. Um, and it's without a doubt that that uh, the presence of Skills USA is really growing within Minute Man. And uh honestly, when I think about uh when I found out maybe a year and a half ago that they were moving nationals to the same week as my graduation, uh I was absolutely terrified. I I admittedly am absolutely terrified sitting before this committee ready for you to make the decision because um the thought of
014having to choose is almost impossible. uh whenever graduation would be brought up by school administrators or by friends, uh the feeling that should have been excitement and readiness and uh just looking forward to that really important moment in my life was was dread. Um I was afraid I would disappoint my parents if I chose to go to nationals. I was afraid I would be abandoning my state officer team and the team of Massachusetts delegates if I chose to go to my graduation, which is a really really unfair choice. Um, and you know, I'm speaking as someone with a very unique perspective. This would be my third Nationals. Uh, I am by far the most uh nationals experienced person uh from Minute Man, but thinking also about students who this might be their first opportunity. Um
015it's it's another thing entirely to make them decide to forfeit a state gold medal that they spent so much uh hard work uh to attain uh and for them to have to say no because they want to experience and they want to have their families experience a once in a lifetime opportunity. >> Um so our Minute Man chapter vice president Jav Reynolds Zuckermanman is here too. He's going to talk to you a little bit about some more of our perspective and some stats on just how many students this would affect. Um yeah, so I went I I attended nationals this past uh summer after getting a gold medal with my team. Um we were really looking forward to expand our project and um try to to give it another shot. And we got sixth place
016uh last year and we were trying to hopefully get even like a gold medal at nationals this year. Um I I've written down a few things here that I I want to bring up. Uh we had nine class of 2026 people at nationals uh this past year. Two of those were voting delegates. The rest were uh gold medalists at states. Um this additionally we had nine silver medalists at states which now have another year to prepare and improve and uh get their shot at nationals. Um, we had uh Minute Man is the team at Nationals of Massachusetts that did the best. Um, we yeah, we're we're a very big and high quality team at uh nationals. Um, and I I just want you guys to consider that like if it was say a star athlete
017or team that had this conflict, like how it might change your consideration of it. um preventing people from being able to go to nationals is preventing some of uh Minute Man's best students from um and like highest achievers from representing them on a national stage uh which they have spent so much working towards and that yeah that's my my piece. I would really hope that graduation could be moved to a time that would make it more convenient that we could actually attend uh nationals. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Thank you so much. >> So before >> one more one more thing real quick. Sorry. >> Um I wanted to clarify as well. Minute man brought 19 uh 19 people to nationals last year which is tied for our school record. Uh we are looking to
018surpass that record this year. hopefully something we're very very proud of. 17 of those were competitors and of those 17 competitors, 12 of them walked away with a national medal last year. Uh which is an unbelievable statistic. Minute man has been exponentially growing at Skills USA. Um and I also just wanted to mention a couple of testimonials. I've heard classmates say that they have excellent uh ideas for Minute Man projects that they believe are nationals worthy uh that are that they are not going to pursue if it they do not have the opportunity to go to their graduation. Um and I think it would just really be a shame uh not only to deny them the experience but to deny them the ability to even pursue a project they're passionate about because they're worried about
019missing this opportunity. >> Thank you so much. >> Thank you Leah. Thank you. Before I call in Alice, Heidi, what is the negative about changing the graduation date? >> Um the negative is we traditionally have a graduation on a Friday. It's um something that's expected. Um we are changing because of our venue and because of we out our venue, we would be changing it to a Monday at one be switching the half day to the Monday. Um and then those students who are in Skills USA would be able to attend graduation and then hop on a flight to go to nationals. Um Karen Ward, the um the uh Skills USA advisor said she can make that happen. Um and that is that's where we are. Um so Diane Dempsey, who is our graduation coordinator, um
020worked very hard to figure out what we could do to make it work. And um this is the best case scenario for all parties um that we have. And um might that mean oh we postpone a graduation party? >> Oh yeah. >> No, go ahead. Finish. >> Oh, might that mean a graduation party doesn't happen that day or it's postponed till the weekend or it happens? That might be the biggest downside. Um but those are things that are within famil family's control. Um but Skills USA is not and um we we want to keep our graduation venue. So that's where we are. >> So I'm going to >> we're happy to answer any questions. >> I'm going to put the motion on the table first and then we will continue our discussion of it and
021bring it to a vote. So, I would like a motion to approve June 1st, 2026 as the official graduation date for the 1pm ceremony and to designate June 1st as an early release day. >> So moved. >> Have a second. >> Second. >> Okay, we'll start with Alice's hand. I saw first. Go ahead, Alice. >> I was just going to make the motion. >> I was going to make the motion. That's all. Maggie. >> Um I appreciate Heidi giving us the um sort of the the co like cost or the downside. Um I see um Mr. Diva and maybe Miss Dempsey here. I can't see it that well in the >> That's Nancy Paladino, our Skills USA advisor and >> Okay, there you go. >> Minute Technical Institute director. do. So I guess my question
022um for discussion would be just do we have the support of the administration and Miss Dempsey and Mr. Diva for this decision if we decide yes to change. >> I mean I'm nodding my head yes but yes you are are supportive of this change. >> Thank you. That's only that's my only question. And I just do want to say to Leah and Javier, like I know it takes a lot to come to a meeting like this and ask a question that is so clearly been on your mind for a very long time. And I just want to commend both of you for taking the time this evening to do that. And I very much appreciate hearing your perspective and and sharing that on behalf of your classmates who are impacted. >> Good. And Linda had
023her hand up. I believe >> I had the privilege of going to nationals one year as a chaperone. It is amazing. If you ever get a chance to go, it is we had 7,000 of the most talented high school students in the country all in Kansas City. It was a blast. Um and I also wanted to mention that winning a gold medal can be very lucrative. There was a Minute Man student who was in culinary and she had won first place in her sophomore year and her junior year. So each year she got a full ride scholarship to the Culinary Institute of America. Plus lots of pots and pans and all lots of companies donate this. So winning the gold is its glory, but it's also very lucrative. It's it's a cool thing. Alice I
024was just going to say that the two students present and all of your colleagues will have great stories to tell when you're old. You're going to be able to say my graduation was moved because of the World Cup and you can go on and on and you know or your grandchildren. So, you know, keep it in mind. Put it in your pocket and save it for later. >> See no other hands. So, I'm going to bring it to a vote. And remember D has joined us. So the order you got comfortable with the order now it's changed a little bit. >> Um >> can I interrupt for one second? Looking at this it says to approve June 1, 2026 as the graduation date and it also says designate June 1st as an early release day.
025We are actually changing the entire Friday to the Monday. So that means the Friday would not be an early we're swapping the graduation date, >> right? That's that does not have the motion. That's what's happening because this is being designated. >> I just want to make that clear. >> Great. All right. >> Yes. >> It does not change the motion. Uh discussion is over. Pam >> Pam Norakin. Yes. Dorter conquered. Yes. Linda, Linda, we couldn't hear you. You're on mute. >> Sorry. Linda Herbison Bolton. Yes. >> Maggie Sharon Dover. Yes. >> Sharon MTO Lexington. Yes. >> Jeff Stanm. Yes. >> Oh, BTO. Yes. >> So, you won and it was unanimous. So, there you go. Sometimes things work out. >> Thank you so much. Thank you so much. >> Have a great night. >> Now
026we go back to less exciting things. >> A little exciting. The school committee goals. Uh would it be possible somebody to put these up? I can put it up if you need to, but we should have them on view. Um Julia, Heidi, or me. So I can share my screen if you want. What do you think, folks? Who can bring it? Who can put it up? >> If you give me one minute. >> Okay, I'll give you the full minute. I won't even start counting yet. The agenda may seem a little short, but don't worry. We do have two executive session items. So, don't worry. Plenty of meeting time tonight. You'll get your your share of it. I know that some of you are worried. You say, "I get emails every once in a while.
027Mr. Chair, the meetings are getting too short. Could you please add additional items or extend the conversation on them?" Got about those all the time. >> You're a very funny man, Mr. Chair. >> Got to start somewhere. Got that. So, I have it right here. Julia, if you want to uh it'll be easier for me to share my screen. >> Yeah, you can't see it, can um Yes, go ahead. Go ahead, Joe. Okay, let's see if I can actually share this. Here we go. Ah, so >> uh in your packet you had uh uh two pages of goals. One was the list that was submitted by all school committee members. The we receive comments and based on comments uh the officers are suggesting these as our goals. They do reflect the things that the superintendent
028is doing and we also are accepting some multi-year goals this year. There should be no surprises in this list, but I'm going but of course you can change your mind because we haven't voted yet. But I'm going to ask for a motion to accept the recommended mini man school committee goals as presented. >> So moved. >> I have a second. >> Second. >> Right. Any further comments? Second time we've seen these guys. >> Very well then. Roll call vote. Pam >> Pam Nurse Actton. Yes. >> Linda Herbison Bolton. Yes. G. Orner conquered. Yes. >> Maggie Sharon do. Yes. >> Sharon MTO Lexington. Yes. >> Jeff Stoen. Yes. >> Also Luca Stow. Yes. >> Very good. Uh our goals are as ambitious as the superintendent. I'm proud to say we will not finish these goals this
029year. Uh but the idea is to make as much progress as possible. and I think we can make a lot. So that's the end of the chair's report which brings us to the principal's leadership report. So I believe we're going to hear a little bit about uh this year's MCCAST. Is that correct? >> That is correct. As well as accountability. So uh thank you everyone and I appreciate uh presenting in front of the school committee tonight. Uh, I just have a sort of side note because I know this is a See, something a little dark in here. Whoops. Um, I just wanted to remind everyone we just recently had elections. So, we will be having our two school committee reps coming to the upcoming meetings. I know that's not really part of the report, but
030I did want to let you know that starting November. Um, Matilda had won her election, so she's be the 12th grade representative. Um, and she's from Arlington and in early childhood. And then, um, Jamie Donahghue, who is 11th grade from Lexington, um, she is the 11th grade representative. So, they will be doing the student reports, uh, for the upcoming meetings as well. So moving on to MCCAST and accountability. Uh one thing that we always talk about is uh growth and especially in a regional school district. We have students coming from all different areas. But uh we're able to look at ELA growth and math growth because they have scores throughout their history in MCCAST. And one thing is a reminder and I'm sure we all remember that this is actually the first year where MCCAST
031was not a graduation requirement. MCCAST still exists, but it's not a graduation requirement. So, um the upside is that our students participation and their willingness to do the best that they can on MCCAST uh really did shine through this year even though they knew that it wasn't going to affect them in a certain way of graduating. Um that being said, if we look at our growth, we um if you look at the blue that's on the left of each bar and the gold that's on the right, the gold is of last year and then um the blue is the previous year from that year and we are significantly growing uh in each uh subgroup that's there. So if you look at our all students uh we have uh high growth. What was really great to
032see is that our low performing students went up uh 8.5% each points of increase in growth. Um our students with disabilities also went up like 5.4%. So Minute Man is really um within English is really hitting their marks and their targets moving forward. So that was really great to see in the upcoming year again with a a test that they didn't really think that you needed to graduate for. So the continuation of improvement is there. And if we look at math, we are in the typical growth range, but we do have some high growth um numbers to go through again. And again, we're looking between 2024 and 2025. So, if you look at our lowest performance groups as well, we're up 7.1 percentage points. Um, and then students with disabilities was also up uh 1.7%
033points. So, we're really again hitting our targets of moving forward and showing growth uh within our MCCAST scores. This is a um this is something where we don't want high numbers and I will say that this is something that did end up having high numbers. Um we're up 4.6 percentage points from last year if I'm looking at all students uh for chronic absenteeism. So again, we want a lower number here, not a higher number. And we ended up with a higher number. Um towards the end of this presentation, I'll talk about some things regarding what um we're going to work on regarding this. But if you note here, um there's percentage points up at each category for absenteeism uh from last year, which then affects us on our accountability. So when we're talking about accountability,
034we're obviously talking about progress towards targets. And what we tend to look at a lot is our percentile ranking. I know I've done this presentation last year as well. And we're comparing ourselves against other schools within the 9 through 12 grade. And that's the number that we really tend to focus on. So when we are talking about accountability, um we stayed the same as last year. We have 74 percentile, which is again 74% uh is where we at comparing ourselves to other schools. And then uh we ended up with 42% with a moderate progress towards our our targets moving forward. So what I did here was I uh did a little comparison of our sending districts with that 74 number uh that we were doing our percentile ranking. Um and I wanted you to see
035from each area what they had from the year before and what they have and compare it to Minute Man. As you can see, uh, Minute Man is still doing well, but, you know, we could work to get, uh, up higher with our other districts that are being sent here as well because that's something that we want to make sure we have a higher enrollment. We want to have data that shows that why uh, students should be coming to Minute Man as well, not just because it's, you know, a sending place and all of that. We want to make sure that people see that as well. And I'll give it just a second to kind of overview each one as you know the >> Absolutely. Do you mind if I jump in for a second? >>
036No, go right ahead. Go right ahead. >> Um, so I just want to make sure you know that these are not percentages. These are percentile rankings. So all 9 through 12 high schools get a ranking from a one to a 99. Um, many districts strive to be above 50. Our sending districts are leaving districts in the state. As you can see, if you look at our demographics of Minute Man, our percentage of students with disabilities, our percentage of low-income students are substantially higher um than all of our sending districts. So, for us to be um where we are and maintain that um on a year where MCCAST didn't count is absolutely incredible. Um I'm totally impressed with our parents, our teachers, our students um to make this happen. Um, and if you look at the
037targets, which that's something for Paul and the admin team to really look at, that's all those individual pieces that they look at to give us this percentile ranking. Um, I think that this is something when we look yeartoear, I hope that we continue to climb. Um so that I don't think we have to go over each separate district or anything like that but at a glance um this is these are our sending districts. Thank you. >> To continue though um we also did a comparison with other regional vocational schools uh as well and Minute Man does stand the test of time comparison to other vocational regional schools. Uh, Blackstone Valley has been high. I think I remember reporting that last year as well. But on the upside, uh, one of our neighbors, Shasheen, has actually
038gone down in percentile ranking and we are still at the same percentile ranking. So again, as Heidi stated with a test that basically, you know, and again, there's a lot of factors that go into accountability and percentile ranking. It's not just MCCAST, but one of the big focuses is achievement and growth. And the fact that we're showing that achievement and growth is really um a testament to again as Heidi said the teachers, the students and the parents of understanding why, you know, this needs to happen. I think when it even came to the whole MCCAST vote, accountability wasn't going to go away um because of that. So, we had to make sure that, you know, we're still being held accountable for the things that we need to do here at Minute Man. Um, and just
039an interesting note, um, I don't know if you know this, but Blackstone Valley does have a longer school year. Um, which is very interesting. Um, but, um, I'm very proud of where, um, Minute Man stands in relation to, um, other districts. >> Yes. Um, so again, what I wanted just to do on this slide is kind of talk a little bit about enrollment. Um, some things to note with our enrollment. I know it looks really funky because if you look at 2025, you know, it's our numbers are a little low, but one of the great stories to tell is this number here, 173, um, comparison to now being sophomores at 169. Um, we were able to retain more students than we have before in the past. So, it's not even just about getting our students
040in. It's also making sure that our students stay with us throughout the four years that are there. And again, being my first year, again, this is one of my goals of trying to make sure that, you know, we're making sure that all students do come here as well. And we we're as I saw on the school committee goals, we want to make sure all our shops are filled and everything like that. But at my same point is I want to make sure that we're retaining all our students and that they're moving on to next grade level and they're at where they need to be to move forward. So, um, yeah, I think it's only going to go higher from here. I mean, again, you're looking at the 12th grade and you're like, whoa, look at
041that disparage G there. But in reality, if you're looking here, you know, last year it was 157 and they're at 154. So again, the idea is to make sure that we're retaining as we move forward. >> So I do want to clarify your your chart. Um so that blue 176 and the yellow 154 does not mean we lost that many kids in that year of graduation. That means last year we had 176 12th grade 12th graders. >> This year it was a much smaller class. So, it all goes back to that freshman year like Paul said, how many students do we have and how many do we retain? Um, last summer when I was new, I want to say from 9th to 10th, we lost over 20 students. Um, moving away, shifting back to other
042districts. This summer that did not happen. Um, >> so I uh again, I commend the staff and um I am excited that we're in our new admissions um cycle right now. Yep. >> Yeah. And again, uh just to even highlight that our freshman class um from 2025 is at, you know, 178. So it's even higher than it was before. So again, as Heidi said, focusing on that freshman class and then we focus on them being retained. That's the main goal uh on my end down here. So as we say, what's next? Well, one of our themes this year has been, and it's with the staff, um it's with administration, it's with students, and it's with um everybody is we always talk about engagement and ownership because I think it is the umbrella of everything that
043we're trying to do here. So, some of my conversations with students is, hey, what's your ownership on you doing this? uh similar to our students that just presented regarding asking why they want to change graduation date. It's because they're taking ownership and wanting to be, you know, put Minute Man in a light where they're able to participate and be part of graduation. So those are the kinds of things that we look at. So my main focus if you looked at that number that you know I'm like oo you know up 4.6% from last year is attendance. So that's our engagement piece and that's our pieces where as administrators we we do is um we do our big leadership student support meeting and these are the topics that we're talking about and then we also divvy
044up certain things of of tasks where guidance is doing things. So one of the things when students aren't coming to school we have guidance counselors calling families to see hey what's going on? Um, and we try to make sure that we're on top of who is what and where when it comes to attendance. And then from there, we're going to look at things quarterly and make sure even bi-weekly to make sure. So, we're basically going to look at our data numbers as we move forward every time to see what we can do to make sure that we improve that uh in any ways. And even if it comes to um doing some makeup stuff, you know, in a sense of doing some stuff here at school to make up some attendance pieces, we're going to
045work on that to get that there. So that's really the what next in our accountability because like I said, there was a lot of good things uh that were there that was really exciting to be there, but the attendance is one that needs to be focused on. Question. >> I am done. If anybody's has any questions, I'd be happy to answer them. >> Yeah, I have a question. This is a hard question. I know that um uh when I was a teacher, of course, it's very clear that students who don't show up aren't going to learn anything. That was when people were saying, well, why aren't students doing well? If they don't show up, they don't learn anything. So, the students that I had and who didn't show up, there were various reasons for that.
046uh what do you believe are the major reasons for poor attendance by some students at minim and I asked that because some things can be fixed and others cannot >> a child has a lot of medical issues and they're out for medical issues obviously you cannot uh magically fix that but there are other reasons why students are absent so what do you think do you think that there's a particular trend here at Minute Man or do you think that it's uh too diverse to have a um kind of conversation on it. >> It's well I don't want to get into particulars because then I start isolating students and that's something we just don't want to do. But I will say there's a diverse number of reasons for that and a lot of the goals of
047that leadership team that we meet on Mondays is to look at each one and look at everyone's administrative strength of of trying to figure out where we can improve or how we can help students. So I there is no just definite one piece that's there that I could say that and if I did I'd be targeting uh individual students which I kind of don't want to do uh at a public meeting. >> Okay, very good. Any other questions regarding the report? It is uh most districts are having a drop in MCAST scores. Um, so the fact that you had an increase is is quite impressive when it doesn't count. Of course, next year will be another year. >> Yeah. >> We don't know what they're going to do about the MCCAST. If they do bring
048out uh some of the things that they're talking about, then MCCAST might actually disappear. >> Yeah. And just to quickly interject, um, one of the things we did do last year is we had we did this big assembly, student assembly, and met with our 10th graders and explained, you know, the importance of caring about Minute Man and your pride of Minute Man, and these are the ways you can show pride in Minute Man kind of thing. So again, kudos to staff and students for really taking uh initiative and caring about ownership, right? ownership of Minute Man. >> Alice, you had your hand up. >> Oh, I just wanted to thank the administration for their cander and for the data and for discussing real issues with real facts and it's not every day that you have
049that right now. So, I'm just very glad. Thank you. >> I will I will second that thought. See no other hands. Therefore, I believe that is the end of the principal report. Is that correct? That is correct. >> So, thank you very much. And we move on to the superintendent's leadership report. It's just like four little words on item A. Just >> Governor sounds so innocent on such an important and large topic. >> Yeah. And um things are moving so quickly from our governor's office and the department of education that I'm actually going to bring up an additional topic that needs your attention more urgently right now. Um, if you have not heard, um, the Governor's Graduation Council, um, came out with, um, some guidelines for what they would like to see the new competency
050determination, um, for the state look like. It's still in the works. It hopefully will be released by November. Um, and right now, we have no answers. The good news is we do have our policy in place for a CD for this year. Our students are in good shape. Um, but whatever the state comes out with is going to have a pretty big impact. For example, might there be end of course exams that look like regent exams from New York? Um, which courses will they be? Will it be algebra 1 and algebra 2? will it be? Um these are very big um huge topics that will drive what happens at all Massachusetts schools. Um so I want you to be aware that that's happening once things are communicated. Um I will be sharing out whatever is
051public with our uh with the school committee and we'll be talking about how it will impact um Minuteman. Um, again to bring up Diane Dempsey, our um our guidance lead, she has been working closely with the other leads and with me to make sure we're preparing scenarios to say, okay, if it is this, let's make sure we're safe with this for the schedule. If it if this, then this. Um, so I want to commend the leads and Diane and Paul for working together to make sure we um we're preemptively preparing and we don't just have a reaction which would be um which many districts might find themselves in. Um so tomorrow um I will be at the Marramac Valley Superintendence Roundt where this year I am one of the two legislative chairs. That means that
052once a month um the two of us attend um a meeting with the president of MASS to talk about their positions on um particular legislative issues that affect all of Massachusetts and all Massachusetts schools. So, um not only will I continue to report out to our school committee, but now I'm working with all of the superintendent um in our region. And a hot topic or two of the hot topics for tomorrow will be the middle school access policies which I think all of you know I've been meeting with our sending district superintendent to make sure that we're all on the same page. They have been absolutely wonderful. I actually attended the um Arlington school committee meeting. They loved our Minute Man cookies by the way. Um and they um they've all been super cooperative to
053make sure that kids have access to Minute Man. Um, the other issue that I want to bring to your attention, if I was a teacher, I would walk to another side of the room to get all of your attention, make sure we're refocusing, is that the state is talking about redefining and changing the chapter 70 funding formula. That is a big deal. Yes, if you have not heard this, um, I am going to repeat this. The state is having conversations and o listening sessions about the chapter 70 funding formula. This does affect us because we are funded through chapter 70 because we are a public school. Um within the chapter 70 funding formula, there's particular amounts of money that people or districts get for students with disabilities, students who are in chapter 74 programs. How
054is that defined? Um, so questions like right now chapter 74 is quite literally chapter 74. Does that open up to include pathway programs from comprehensive schools that are elective classes instead? There's it's just could be wide wide open. Um, so this could take a whole meeting in itself. So, what I'm going to do is follow up and have Julia send to you the information about the listening sessions and um the basics that are out there right now that are a part of the conversation, but I would encourage everyone please attend a listening session. Um please uh if you do go to it, I can't go to every single one of them, but if you do go to those, please communicate back to me with what you heard in the conversation. Um and I'll be working
055with um other superintendent um to make sure that we are um our voices are heard in this dis discussion of the chapter 70 funding formula and it is not just uh sort of an an overreach and uh impacts our districts negatively. That is a whole lot in a in a tiny little amount of time. uh questions. I probably don't have answers for many of them, but if you have questions, I'd be happy to. Okay. So, you will receive >> I do have a question. How do we obtain the information you were you were suggesting that we read or learn about? So, I am going to have Julia send out an email just the same way you got the school committee packet and the school committee minutes. Um, Julia sends that out with all of the
056information. >> Okay, good. Thank you. >> You're welcome. >> Anything more, superintendent, or is that enough news about what the state is doing at this time? Okay. Well, I saw all your faces, so I think that's about enough from me um tonight. >> Great. So, again, may you live in interesting times. We have admissions. We have graduation. We have all this other stuff. We have a new commissioner. Don't know where any of it's going. Don't know if they're considering uh chapter 74 schools in doing this. We can keep informed and see if we can impact this at all or not. Uh many of these things are going to be extremely controversial. Some of them going to have a great deal of trouble getting through. For example, uh having uh stategiven end of course tests. Uh
057I think that they will have some trouble with that one. But um yeah, so you know you got rid of the your your wish was to get rid of the MCAST. Watch out what you wish for, Alice. when they started the chapter 70 um funding formula um there were like two people who had this kind of mystical property of being the only people in Massachusetts who understood it and you would go to the MASC meetings and Dave Tobin would would be the person he was quite an old superintendent at the time and he was the one who knew how it worked and he would try to walk people through this formula And um I never figured it out entirely. Um I went through it many times trying to and I couldn't couldn't get there. So
058I'm expecting that if they tried to tinker with the chapter 74 meal again, it would require a lot of eyes on it to find the errors before um they start affecting people negatively. >> Um I hope we get our hands on the actual formula really fast. Yeah, good luck with that. Okay, very good. Then, um, finance report. Well, Sarah is not here, so I will give the actually I'll I will introduce the finance report. So, it's mostly going to be the Nikki report because she's going to present most of these items. So, uh the finance committee of course uh we met we approved some warrants and we had a uh uh another conversation on the member town assessment reduction which I believe that we have presented to you in the past and we also had
059our uh end of previous year quarter general funding reports uh all of which the finance committee was very happy with. So, the news that we're getting uh today from Nikki is all stuff that the fincom has looked at. They've been pretty happy with and we're going to take some um bookkeeping votes which we also are recommending to the full school committee. So, that's all I have to say Nikki. The rest is up to you. >> Thank you for the introduction. I going to share my screen. All right. Here we go. So, I put together a memo for the committee to read, but um just so it's a little bit easier to go through, I'll start with the PowerPoint presentation that we um put together that again, as Mr. Schillin mentioned, went through with the the
060finance committee. Um and this is an update on the FY26 budget, and that's our current budget, which we are in the July 1st, 2025 through June 30th, 2026. And why am I coming to you with with this information? Um, part of the budget this year um was that the state budget increased the minimum chapter 78 aid from $75 per pupil to $150 per pupil. So what does that mean? When the state finalized their budget in July, that minim actually received an additional $47,625 in state aid. So what we are um presenting to you today are the different options that the school committee um could could move forward with and what Minute Man's recommendation is. So there would be three options. Option number one would be increase our district budget. Option number two would be keeping
061our budget the same um and just reducing town member town assessments by that amount. or number three would be a combination of increasing the budget and reducing member town assessments. So, um what we wanted to um reiterate or let people know was if we were going to increase the budget that would require um additional appropriation or or town town meetings going to our member towns. So what we are recommending is that we move forward with option two which directly applies the increase in revenue to um a decrease in member town assessments. So this um lowers the member town assessments for all of our towns and our total budget remains unchanged and there would be no town meeting or appropriating authority action required. So what would this do? This would decrease the membertown assessments in our
062FY26 budget from 26,121,364 to 26,000 26,73,739. So from a 1.68% increase um from FY25 to a 1.49% increase. And this is how it would affect all of the towns that you are a part of. So um it is you know the um allocation so to say um strongly based on the four-year rolling average. So you know Arlington with about a third of our students will be getting approximately a third of the money back. And then this is the comparison from FY26 to FY25 again showing the 1.49% 49% increase in the the total member town assessment um despite the four-year rolling average increasing 7.1%. So our recommended vote here would be for the school committee um to approve the reduction u by the $47,625 and happy to answer any questions. >> So I do let's first
063put the vote on the table and then we'll have a discussion on it. So, who would like to make the motion as shown on this slide? Alex. >> So, mo so moved uh to approve reduction of the FY26 member town assessments by $47,625 as described in the agenda. >> I have a second. >> Second. >> Right. D, did you have a comment? Your hand was up. >> Yeah, I do have a comment. I'm I'm wondering um why you su uh why you selected option two. What were what were your factors in examining the the three options? >> Um I can I can explain that. Um so in in short um the if we chose another option we would have to go back to town meetings to add that to our own budget and for 47
064some odd thousand. We want to make sure that we're budgeting within what we said we would budget and give that back to our member towns um as a as an olive branch um to make sure that um we're giving back to the towns whenever we can. >> That's the rationale, right? >> Yes. in your decision making. What were the factors in the other two options that led you to take option two? You explained why you did it, but were there other considerations that you looked at for option one and option three? So for option one um to increase the district budget by that amount for $47,000 >> um we would have to determine what we would want to increase the district budget for. >> Mhm. >> Which would require us to go back to all
065of our towns um are which are many. Um and we couldn't even move on that until we had our t uh all of our towns vote on that. So it would essentially be locked up for quite a while. Um reducing member town assessments allows us to give those funds to the towns and it is not locked up. It is we're reducing their assessments. They will have additional funds. We're just not billing them. And a combination wouldn't make sense if we you know if we're favoring two over one. combination would still require us to go to the towns and and have the the town >> option three. Option three have to go to the towns. >> Yep. It's a combination of one and two. So, anytime you increase the the district budget um and in or
066um member assessments, it would have to go to the town. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Yep. >> Any other questions of the motion of the table? Seeing no hands to do I got Sharon. Yep. No, I just Nikki and Heidi, I I really appreciate the um a I appreciate your decision, but I just think it's so important that we're respecting the big ask that we have of our member towns every year and the fact that this money was not expected and I think it's just I think it's very important that we've chosen the option or hopefully we'll be choosing the option when we vote in a minute to um to give that money back to our districts because for some of our districts it's very difficult to come up with the funds for our students.
067So, the fact that even though it's not a whole ton of money for each town, it's something and I think that that really goes a long way when we need to ask them for things every year. So, thank you. >> Thank you, Sharon, for saying that. >> Any other questions or comments? Very well then, bring it to a vote. I bet I know how Pam is going to vote. [laughter] Pam >> nurse acting. Yes. D or conquered. Yes. >> Linda Herbison Bolton. Yes. >> Maggie Sharon Dover. Yes. Sharon Mto Lexington. Yes. >> Dev Stolen. Yes. >> Gusto. Yes. >> Yes. And my final comment uh on this issue is is basically the same. Uh uh Nikki brought it to us as um uh uh the best option. You know, there's no argument or going back
068and forth. that her argument was very clear and it was totally correct in my view. So I think this is what we do. We had a budget uh that we um as you'll see we did very well with. we got a uh unexpected windfall and uh the idea of keeping the unexpected windfall uh would not have um done right by me because we had a reasonable budget that we did well with. And uh it's not just the fact that it would have been technically very challenging to go to all nine towns to their town meeting and have them vote on this. It's more than the challenging detail. it really was the right thing to do under these circumstances. And I and I uh appreciate the uh extremely fine presentation that was done to make what
069could be a fairly complicated issue quite simple to understand. >> Yes, >> a lot of moving pieces here and I think your explanation was extraordinarily good. So, thank you for that. And now you can move on. lots of other things for you to show to us tonight. >> Wonderful. I believe next on the agenda is the general fund report. Um so just to summarize, we um have completed and close out FY25, which is our July 1st, 2024 through June 30th, 2025. The general fund report is the school committee voted budget and um we went in and through this report in a lot of detail because of our newest uh finance committee member Dort Ortner um to get a sense of you know the reports and and how things are flowing. But again just to summarize
070we have our function code on the lefth hand side. This is how we report all of our expenses um to the state and we have the sum of our original budget and the sum of our budget adjustments or our budget transfers. So as you will see um there are budget transfers throughout the year as um as I present to you each quarter you also get budget transfers that require school committee approval any of those that are over $10,000. So, all of those budget transfers um over $10,000 were already approved by the school committee. This $424,95 uh just as a reminder was the budget amendment or the budget increase that moved additional funding into the capital stabilization fund to get our total budget um just shy of $32 million. Um and what you'll see here is
071our total expenditures. um were just shy of our budget and we were under 1% um as far as uh expenditures in what we had remaining. So all of our accounts are in good standing and um you know it was strategically planned um you know part of our capital stabilization um because we did have that funding available as well as the transfer to our oped at year end. So, I'm very happy to report that we were um within budget and under 1% um and the general fund is uh was in great shape as of um June 30th, 2025. >> Happy to answer any questions. >> I don't see any hands up, so we can move on to the fund report. >> Great. Did you say the fund report? >> Fun report. The revolving revolving accounts is
072always the fund report. Um so again, just a reminder, uh revolving funds are funds that um revolve or their ending balance becomes their beginning balance at the end of the year. It doesn't close out to anything. So again, we went into um a lot of detail at finance committee, but you know, happy to report or highlight a few items and one in particular um that you'll see a little bit more detail on. Um happy to report um MTI um our fund over here, our post-secary program, um ended with quite um a good balance. Um, we were able to with the CTI grants offset um some of the administrator uh salaries as well as get some space rental um money um from the grants for MTI hosting the programs. Um so in addition to um you
073know the programs posting a profit um the additional space rental um revenue and you know offsetting of salaries has put MTI in a really great position as of um June 30th 2025. Also wanted to um just go into a bit more detail on our facility um account this account 13 here. Um you'll see here there's a bit more detail um as requested by the school committee. We have broken out um the Paul River, the gym, the theater, classroom rentals um to see what is being used each year and how much money it's making. I'm happy to report here that um we have funded the athletic field reserve as well as the uh facility debt reserved as promised. Uh and um overall um you know in great standing continuing to to make money in on all
074of those accounts. Um all of our trades accounts are in good standing as well. Um there will be a vote today um anytime we create a new account um which requires a vote. So, our DVC program, design and visual communications, um it is somewhat of a reclassification from our um our printing, which was mostly um DVC printing different um posters for the seniors, um different things like that. but they would like to uh have their own account now that um they frameworks have changed and they're able to kind of create more things and sell more things. They're going to have a little bit of a store. Um and then our capital fee and our outofd district tuition, we will use the ending balances here to be able to fund our FY27 budget. Um, and our
075food service was um, pretty consistent um, throughout the year. So, happy to answer any questions here on this report. Uh, so the school the FINCOM of course looked at these two reports. um of the of the things you're going to see today, these are the two most important reports and they both show um a consistent story of financial health at Minute Man. Both the fact that we pretty much targeted our budget within 1% and the revolving accounts which indicate the various sort of businessish things uh we have are doing well. They're supporting themselves which is what we like to see. So both these reports are are extremely positive and indicate a uh a good financial health for the district at least for this previous year. Would that be a fair thing to say, Nikki? >>
076Absolutely. >> Any other questions before we move on? Okay. Oh, we need a vote. Uh I would like a motion to approve the new revolving account design and visual communications DVC. Can I have that motion please? >> Moved. John moved. >> Second. >> Any discussion? >> Roll call vote. Pam. >> Pam nurse actton. Yes. >> Linda Herbison Bolton. Yes. >> Gortner conquered yes. >> Maggie Sharon do yes. Aaron Mosto Lexington yes. Jeff Lanen yes. >> Alistto yes. Right. Student activity report. >> Wonderful. >> This is a report of all of our um student fundraiser collected um money. So these reports you will see um or these accounts um have different codes as well as the student activity fund and the advisor. Once they're presented to school committee, they're also sent to the adviser for transparency
077within um within their account to ensure um everything that they feel as though has been collected and expended is in line with um what we have in our in our system. So, we've had beginning balances, revenue throughout the year, as well as expenditures and ending fund balance. Everything um has a positive ending balance. A majority of our activity um that flows through these accounts are our skills USA which you've you've heard lots about today um as well as our kind of class of our senior class our junior class. Um, so what I would be recommending today would be to um approve a new account which would be our our freshman um the class of 2029 as well as early education. >> Okay. I would like a motion to approve new student activity accounts early education
078and class of 2029. >> So moved. >> Second. Any discussion on adding those two new accounts? I have Sharon his hands up. >> Well, it's not about the two new accounts. It's a different question. So, I'll be quiet until we're done with this. >> Great. Okay. No other questions. Uh, roll call vote. Pam >> Pam Noctton. Yes. >> Linda Herbison Bolton. Yes. >> Dorder Conquered. Yes. >> Maggie Sharon Dover. Yes. Aaron MTO Lexington. Yes. Jeff Dulan. Yes. >> Alice St. Lucas Joe. Yes. >> Very good. And Sharon had a question on the report. Go right ahead. >> Yeah. When you say that there was a refund check issued for the class of 2025, where does that money go? >> So, per the school committee policy, the senior class does have options of what they want
079to do with their their money. Um because again, we are um a a fiscal agent, so to say. holds the money but it is is truly the students money. Um there are additional controls surrounding this money which require three students sign off an advisor the principal and the business office. So we are just holding holding their money. Um the senior class um each year per the policy has the ability to um transfer money to the remaining classes um which they did um do a senior gift um or um they can ask for a check to be written out to them. They actually have to show us the bank account that was created with the treasurer's um name on it. and they typically use those um funds for um like reunions class of um those kind
080of activities. So it' be something that um it's strictly kind of their money and they oversee it. Um so we did cut a a check to them. Um you typically see the senior class account at zero. Um so I just wanted to note that because it was a check we issued um after um we had closed out the fiscal year. Thank you. >> You're welcome. >> Just a comment, this is not a report that we always had or have to have, but things change and we were asked to add this on a regular basis and I find it very interesting. So, I'm happy we have it. >> It is an audit recommendation, so we're happy to um provide it to the school committee as well as the um the adviserss. >> Any other questions? Right.
081Well, then bank reconciliations I think are next. >> So, uh this is a report um school committee preference report that shows the bank balances of all of our accounts. Um what I am reporting to the finance and the school committee is that our accounts are reconciled through June 30th um to our our bank accounts. Um happy to answer any questions. We did submit our treasur cash report um to the state um which certifies um the reconciliation process through June 30th, 2025. >> Alistister Luca. >> Um I just want to thank the district for producing these quarterly reports. um the the younger members of the school committee wor around when we didn't have them. >> Um and it's very important to have an understanding of the quarterly financial status of the district as part of running
082a professional organization and I'm really happy that it's gotten to here and it's continuing. It's just really gratifying to see it. Very good. And uh my favorite, the budget process calendar. >> Wonderful. So I just wanted to wrap up um FY25. Just noting that um we did complete our end of the year report that's been um submitted to um Desi and has our wonderful chair's signature on it. You will um get a report back from the auditors every year with our audit. um they let us know how did the end of the year report um was and reconciled through to our audit. Um in addition to that, our audit did start this Monday. So they are currently working on our FY um 26 audit as we speak and we'll plan to um bring that to
083you um in the spring as usual. But we are now talking about three fiscal years FY25, 26 and 27. So this has been shared with our finance committee. Um it's very similar to how um we have done things in in past years where we get input and um feedback from our teachers. So um we're gathering all that information now. Um we did have their submissions due um [sighs and gasps] gosh on Monday and we'll have our supervisor submissions due next Monday and we will work to compile all that information and bring to the finance committee uh November 10th kind of the first departmental um request or wishlist budget. Um and this year uh the superintendent and I will will meet with um different groups to discuss and talk about um the budget and the budget
084process and their budget requests to get to get real time feedback. Um as as we normally do, December is kind of our time where we um hone in on the budget. um we really look at those department requests and determine um what would be the best um financial interest of Minute Man in the district and we'll present um the superintendent reviewed uh budgets to our finance committee uh December 8th and December 22nd um and then we will start with our budget presentations um the beginning of January to first our finance committee then our school committee and finally our public hearing. So, we just wanted to share um this calendar, what it's look like, what it looks like, know that we're currently working on it um and we will um you know be happy to share
085that more information um as we get it. >> Any questions about the the budget calendar? So you see there are many um rounds between the finance committee and the uh administration and that's when they present it to us. We make some comments on it. They take it back, think about it and and come up with another one. And this process was very very short last year because Heidi came up uh and the um admin team came up with a uh a very uh doable budget very early in the process. So we'll see if that magically happens again this year, he says with a smile. Okay, great. Any other questions on this? Very good. Is that the end of your report, Nikki? >> That is it. Thank you so much for your time. >> Okay, so
086thank you very much. Thank you for all those extremely clear and easy to read and understand reports. The fact that they're so clear and easy to understand uh with all the important facts right out there makes it uh much easier to process understand the situation here at Minute Man and I'm going to double down on Alice's comments. This is very important is not always how it was. It took a long time to get here and it's because of people like Nikki that we can keep this tradition of clear reports going. It's greatly appreciated by the school committee. Okay, great. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Subcommittee reports. Alice Duca policy. >> Well, I'm hoping these will be quite quick. So, um we uh met on October 9th and um as you know, we're kind of
087we have a shared purpose of streamlining and getting a more useful manual. It's too big. has a lot of policies we have no use for. We learned from our attorney a couple years ago that we only have statutory requirement for 30 policies, although they wouldn't tell us what they were. And um so we're we're working on getting them um reduced the the book shortened um and more appropriate for Minute Man. Um there's a new person um who's working with us and maybe Heidi wants to introduce um Stephanie Albernaz. >> Sure. Absolutely. She is here with us tonight. Um Stephanie Alberz is our newly appointed director of HR and compliance. And um in retrospect, I wish we would have said it was compliance in HR because um a lot of um this position of course is
088making sure that we much like what we've done with finances, we want to make sure we do with the other systems that we need to run Minute Man. Um so Stephanie, um I don't want to put you on the spot. Um, but if you'd like to introduce yourself, tell them where you came from. They can hear your voice. Um, and you will you will see her regularly because she will actively work with um with our committee and she's a part of our ET team. >> Sure. I wasn't prepared to speak, but uh here I am. Um, as Heidi mentioned, my name is Stephanie Alberz. I've been an educator for a very long time. Um I started as a classroom instructor um teaching business and technology uh chapter 74 licensed educator. Um and then I moved
089into instructional technology. So teaching teachers how to utilize technology in the classroom to streamline you know their their uh processes and helping students learn. Um and then I moved into um I was the director of um admissions and post-secary education in my previous uh vocational district and I am happy to be here at Minute Man um in HR and compliance. So um I have worked with Heidi in a previous district. Uh she has served as my unofficial mentor um and I have also worked with other people at Minute Man um in previous roles. And so I'm very excited uh to be a part of this district and everyone has been very welcoming, kind and and professional and um I just can't express how excited I am. So thank you for having me. >> We're very
090happy to have you and um we look forward to me and becoming even more professional with you here. So Stephanie's going to work with the policy subcommittee on this streamlining and chopping I guess weeding of the policies of the policy manual and making it um editable and consistent and everybody knows where everything is and things like that. Um every district in Massachusetts has a hard time keeping up with the policy manuals. We had a couple of years ago 132 policies that the MASC decided to give us for revision um in the summer and it was not manageable. So a bunch of those were from I and we decided to slice off a bunch of them today. So we have we forwarded you 14 policies from section I um and to have a discussion about it
091if we could um move to approve removal of policies I E I G B I H A K I H B CA I H D I I E I J I J N D I J O A I K A D I K A I K B I K C and I KFB from the school committee policy manual. then we can move along. >> So moved. >> Second, >> Sarah. Okay. So, these policies, you you got a little note on each one when you read it that showed why we're we're suggesting we delete it. These are all policies that already are in somewhere else that we have nothing to do with that are archaic, whatever. Um, so if you have any questions about them, um, now is the time to ask. There were no comments
092submitted to Julia in the week. My only comment is that what bureaucracies often do not do is prune what is unnecessary over time. That's why they keep getting bigger and bigger and bigger. So they add new stuff as they need to, but they forget to go back and to prot prune uh what has changed because as the laws change, as education changes, as the school changes, there are policies that uh just don't have merit anymore. So, I'm uh grateful that the policy subcommittee has worked with the administration to identify 14 policies that they have demonstrated do not have merit anymore. We now have a motion on the table to eliminate them from our policy book. So, are there any further comments on this before I bring it to a roll call vote? Very well then.
093Pam >> Pam Nurse Actton yes. >> Linda Heron Bolton. Yes. >> D Ortner conquered. Yes. >> Maggie Sharon Dover. Yes. >> Aaron Mto Lexington. Yes. >> Jeff Dulan Nem. Yes. >> Al Lucasto. Yes. Great. So that's the policy subcommittee um report and thank you everybody. Um you'll be getting more more to do from us. >> Thank you. [clears throat] >> Sure. >> To add policies later too though. [laughter] >> No. Oh. Um, so the next one is a capital planning subcommittee. Okay. So I'm going to report on that. We met on October 6th and there was um Maggie uh Ford uh Steve Leoo joined us as uh sort of an auxiliary member. We have that policy that allows that um for his expertise. Jeff, Heidi, Nikki, Michelle, and Julia were all present. Um uh the
094district I'm I'm just going to let you know ballpark stuff has accomplished a lot of the work this year was budgeted for in the for by the school committee for capital maintenance and there's [clears throat] a service contract with a controls company and they have a ticketing system to identify things that need to be worked on and they're all happy with that ticketing system. So that is all really good news. Um the big question that we're looking at is the scope and order of magnitude of the annual expenses. So what is a dollar amount and how do we store it appropriately so um that we are proactively responsible for our beautiful not as new as it was building. Um the communication with the member towns uh will be taken up when there is a clear
095plan and the superintendent the business manager are discussing this. So we do not as a school committee need to talk to our towns about this at the moment. Um we have to get more information. Um so we have some information about the general aspects of capital expenses in the c uh on-site insight report and we have some also real world experience. Um there are some items breaking that shouldn't be breaking partly because they were not used during the warranty period. You've heard about that before due to the pandemic. Um, and most of the warranties have expired. Some items that like to be used weren't used because of the pandemic. So, this is a key capital maintenance issue. It is a timing problem. It was beyond the district's control and it is not unique to Minute
096Man. It also affects other districts in our member towns with new buildings. So, um, this is not something that you haven't heard before. We're discussing how to get ahead of the lifetime of the mechanicals and other things in the building, um, and not just be in a reactive situation like many districts end up in. We already know from the report that maintaining the building at the level that is needed to keep up with everything is going to require sourcing and structuring of the funding to do it. Um it is under discussion at capital planning meetings and at the finance committee and what is the annual amount? How do we go about meeting that need are the questions. Um it's going to be a major point of discussion this year and probably be the subject of
097a special school committee meeting. So that's what I got >> to add to that. look at uh school committee goal number one that we just voted on and um it's number one in my heart. Uh and this actually goes back to when we were in the old building and we were planning on a new school and members of the school committee said because that building we had let to deteriorate that we weren't going to do it again. And so, uh, we got knocked off of our timeline by CO. Otherwise, we would have addressed this earlier, but here we are now. We have a a great subcommittee with a lot of um uh leadership on it. We're going to come up uh they're going to come up with some recommendations and we're going to have to
098have some conversations with our member towns at some point on how we can do this in a way that is not harmful to them. but allows us to to maintain the school in a number one shape for its expected lifetime and not let it deteriorate to the point that we have to do a new building early because um physical deterioration. That's the goal. No vote is required. This is just information uh from Alice are going to have uh at some point this year. There will be a very very detailed meeting on this. Um this is what an overview meeting but a really detailed meeting is going to come up sometime later in the year. Is that the end of your report Alice? Very good. Thank you very much. All right. As promised, we have two
099executive sessions. I am going to have you vote in a minute to go into executive sessions. Uh I remind you that Julia sent a separate link for the executive sessions. So, we're going to terminate on uh this Zoom link once we've taken our vote and then you'll just log uh you'll just rejoin Zoom on the other link that she sent earlier today labeled email executive session link. So, I would like a motion to uh enter executive session, not to return to open session. And I believe that we want uh Julia and Heidi to join us. >> Um and Michelle Rosendes for a >> Michelle and who else? Anybody else? So Julia, Heidi, Michelle, is that correct? Good. To join us, >> not to return to open session for the following two reasons. Reason A to
100consider the purchase, exchange, lease, or value of real property if the chair declares that an open meeting may have a detrimental effect on the negotiation position of the public body. And reason two, pursuant to purpose 3, MGL chapter 38 section 21 A3 to discuss strategy with respect to collective bargaining with the Minuteman faculty association as an open meeting may have detrimental effects on the bargaining position of the committee. So could I have a somebody make those two motions please as stated? >> So move. Second >> discussion. >> Roll call vote. Pam >> Pam Nuracken. Yes. >> Linda Herbison Bolton. Yes. >> D Ortner. Conquered. Yes. Maggie Sharon Dover. Yes. Must Lexington. Yes. >> Jeff Stan. Yes. >> Alistister Lucasto. Yes. >> See you in a minute.