001Let's Wait Another Minute for Jose Jake I mean sorry not Jose Kurtis for Curtis yep it's been a long day sorry Jose hi Charlotte Christina in an earlier message to me today you thought he might be late did that change yes it did change yeah he got out of the volleyball game early busy parents on this committee busy busy parents wonder if the committee would allow me to put GPS trackers on their phone so I would know where they were like my kids you can you can feel free to propose that Christina your my policy is always to Second so I will second that they do Carrie so far but I know that that is probably going to end soon there he is hi Curtis Jee are we waiting for anybody else on your end
002I see the Welch fames here and I see Charlotte and Cindy and Nolan and Jake and Joe let me let me just look at the participants is Mr schutz here he is yeah got him okay yeah I think we're uh I think we're good are the are the Welches good to go Vincent everybody here that okay thank you okay Ursula will not be here tonight okay I would like to call the Mount Greylock Regional School District school committee to order it is Tuesday October 17 2023 at 6:02 p.m we are meeting remotely via Zoom um this meeting is broadcast on Wily Net TV channel 1802 in Williamstown and it will be posted to the Mount Greylock Regional School District YouTube page within 24 hours after the meeting if we could call the role alphabetically by
003last name that would be awesome starting with Julia Bowen here conry here Constantine here Elin B here green here Miller here thank you at Mount Greylock Regional School District our mission is to create a community of Learners working together in a safe and challenging learning environment that encourages restorative based processes respect inclusive diversity courtesy integrity and responsibility through high expectation and cooperation resulting in lifelong learning and personal growth next up on our agenda is public comment I don't see anyone from the public and I do not have any comment in my email inboxes so we'll move on to the student update and I'll turn it over to Charlotte hi everyone um I don't have a lot to say but so I'll keep it pretty short Mount Greylock recently had our homecoming and I think there
004were over 350 tickets sold and of course a lot of thanks to Vincent Welch who is currently here for such a great turnout um the student council has started their typical practices of subcommittees and brainstorming topics we have brought in Dr Dr mckenas Joe Bon and Miss Von Holtz to talk about our beginning questions about why sports games have turned to being ticketed and priced and they really provided great insight and we also have started the process of bringing back the vending machines with potential collaboration with the language Department as they're looking for additional fundraising for the Argentina exchange trip um we recently had three special elections which included the student government day position junior class fall and spring terms and the senior fall term position on the council Student Government day is this new
005opportunity that's available for juniors and seniors and they're elected by their class and they get to go to Beacon Hill in Boston to meet with their with other high schoolers and politicians to work on ideas and challenges in the state such as reducing Public School lunch costs um and for sports girls soccer has gone undefeated in over 12 games and the boys cross country is ranked number one in in our division many of our teams have had huge successes this season and the state tournament will be really exciting for the school Community thank you so much for your time and have a great night thank you so much Charlotte thanks Charlotte next up on the agenda um is the mass certificate of excellence award presentation so I'll turn it over to Jake uh thank you
006so much Christina and thanks to all of you and uh Vincent and to your family thank you so much for being here thanks to Mr schutz for for helping with uh with this selection process uh that this senior class I was I was at the senior class lunch today and talking with one of the people that was there um supervising it and we were talking about how Superfluous it seems so many times to actually have supervisors in lunch with uh this group of fantastic young people with the Junior and seniors and um this individual who has known some of these students from the time they were seventh graders was just remarking of what an extraordinary uh group of young people this year's class the class of uh 2024 is and I couldn't agree more and
007so to to identify this year's winner of the the mass award for academic achievement was was quite a task and thank you Mr schutz and and to the folks over at Mount Greylock Regional School for the help in identifying um a truly remarkable young uh person to to to take this award tonight the Massachusetts Association of school superintendent academic Excellence award is presented to students who have presented who have distinguished themselves in the pursuit of Excellence during their High School careers the superintendent and the school principal may choose the award winner from among the top top 5% of academic performers in the high school over my many many years as a superintendent in the birkar it's been my real honor and my real pleasure to present this award to just an extraordinary and remarkable collection
008of young people um each of whom exemplifies the utmost in terms of work ethic and the utmost in terms of integrity and this year's recipient is certainly no exemp exemp exception and uh in fact this year's award winner just simply exemplifies and personifies the Very traits that we look for in making this award this year's recipient is a scholar he's a performer a musician an athlete and a leader he's a bunch of other things too which I will talk about throughout the course of this conversation he takes service to his community very seriously and he recog recognizes the importance of serving in a role model not only in a high school but in a school um where he is in a position to be a role model and a mentor to to uh our full
009seven through 12 spectrum of students his leadership is evident in academics it's evident in the Arts and in athletics and it's evident just simply in the life and the vibrancy of the Mount Greylock Regional School itself this year recipient is Vincent Peter Welch the son of Jeffrey and Jennifer Welch and uh Vincent we are so pleased all of us just incredibly honored I get to say the words but I know I speak for everyone on the screen when I say that it's just simply thrilling to recognize you with this award so if you can hold on for a few minutes while I attempt to make you blush uh we will be very appreciative and then uh and then the floor will be yours and I've seen what you can do when you have the floor
010so uh you know I'm looking forward to it let me there we go uh I have yet to see any event involving the Welch children where the uh families of the family of the Welch children are not uh well represented um and uh so we just will stop here for a moment and welcome anyone related to the Welches uh who is watching this tonight or may be watching it in its recorded form um it's always a thrill and always heartwarming to see you supporting uh children grandchildren and siblings and it is uh and the same goes for this very special event that we're celebrating here tonight so thank you Vincent to you and your whole family for joining us this evening in the annual Mount Greylock celebration of the Arts play bill that the Mount
011Greylock Friends of the Arts publishes every year Vincent quotes a fellow Western Pennsylvanian uh Jean Kelly you dance love and you dance dreams and I know if I can make you smile by jumping over a couple of couches or running through a rain storm then I'll be very glad to be a song and dance man Vincent you bring the gift of your smile and the gift of making everyone around you smile every day and I've seen it in action so many times classmates staff members friends and audience members everyone around you sees and appreciates the very positive power that simply is Vincent Welch your mom and dad in my opinion as a parent got it 100% right on your parent Guardian brag sheet when they said this about you Vincent is a top scholar and
012leader in sports and the Arts these are the most important accomplishments because they attests not only to his work his hard work ethic but also to the fact that Vincent is a very good person who is a friend and colleague to all and who is deeply invested in making the Mount Greylock and wider Community the very best it can be a former colleague of ours here in the Mount Greylock Regional School District Miss Cook uh said the following about you I had the honor of teaching Vincent as a middle school student in e8th grade English and then continuing to work with him throughout High School seeing him grow in maturity critical thinking and Leadership Vincent is one of the most exceptional students I've encountered in my 17 years of teaching teaching both in the classroom
013and in the larger School Community an incredible student Vincent challenged himself to take a rigorous course load excelling across all subject areas he has a true passion for Learning and questioning literature and history in order to create connections from the past to the present to the Future a leader in discourse Vincent is an Engaged student who truly cares about the voices of his people years there's never been a conversation where he has not invited his peers in thoughtfully challenged assumptions and encouraged everyone to be thoughtful Vincent's Insight is a reflection of both his wide sphere of knowledge as well as his charismatic personality and interpersonal skills his cheerful nature and ability to both take an active role in conversation and learning are admired by his peers and teachers alike and again that's for M cook
014uh and every word of it true Vincent I wish we had all evening to talk about the magic of you and I wish you had the power to suspend the modesty and the humility that you carry with you all the time and did again I have witnessed firsthand because I suspect from knowing you that you're just about at your complete saturation point with hearing yourself praised so as I close and prepare to offer congratulations to you and then hand off the uh the floor to you for any remarks you may want to make I just want to thank you for being a scholar for being an artist for being a leader a humanist and an inspiration to many including your superintendent thank you for sharing so many of your talents and interests with all of
015us thank you for sharing your baking your ability to MC a really powerful and positive pep rally your uh gift of public speaking which you share so frequently thank you for scaring uh sharing with us your your scouting side of yourself and I think that's the first time that I really met you and talked with you was as you were putting together the uh the GaGa ball pit at Lanesboro as part of your Eagle Scout project and just thank you for sharing yourself with this school and with the two community commities we serve and with the larger Burkshire County thank you for sharing so much of yourself so well so graciously and so positively um Vincent at the end of the day just thank you for being you congratulations on being chosen as the Massachusetts
016Association of school superintendent academic achievement award winner here's the certificate that I will be um tracking you down and putting in into your hands in the next day or two I'd like to thank my wife for serving as calligrapher for the 18th time uh in our 29-year marriage of this certificate and um she got to hear me brag all about you as as she was um trying to keep me shut up so she could concentrate on getting your name exactly correct so you now have one more fan uh added to your menu so Vincent congratulations congratulations to your whole family and with that uh the floor is yours well thank you so much superintendent MCAS for all the kind things you have said about me and for everyone who is involved in this process you
017may be the first person to successfully make me at a loss of words um I would just I have been very fortunate over my time at Greylock to be able to be in contact with so many people and to have the opportunity to just see so many parts of Greylock um and it really just I mean everything you just had to say I mean it just really made me very happy and to like think of when I was a seventh grader and on the cross country team and the track team looking up to all the seniors and to think it's me now and the end of an era it's a very Bittersweet moment and I would just like to thank everyone for acknowledging that and uh making my time at Greylock a amazing time and
018giving me the environment to really shine and be able to show my true self so thank you to all of you thank you Vincent and and thank you to your family for joining us and uh congratulations congratulations well done yes thank you definitely one of my favorite favorite things okay next up on the agenda approval of minutes would someone like to make a motion to approve the September 14th minutes so moved Curtis moves do I have a second Miller second Miller second any discussion on those minutes seeing none all in favor B and I conry I Constantine I Elfin Vine ey green obstain Miller I okay thank you that motion passes would someone like to make a motion to approve the SE September 19th 2023 minutes Curtis Curtis moves Miller seconds any discussion on those
019minutes seeing none all in favor bow and I conry I sorry Constantine I Elfen B ey green abstain Miller I thank you that motion passes next up on the agenda principal reports is there an order that we have determined we drew straws before for um and I drew the biggest straw but I decided to go first all right and and before before Nolan jumps in I would just like to to thank Nolan and thank Cindy and thank Jake um you know the these uh our annual visiting of the mcast uh test results give a give you know me an opportunity at least and I think give the community an opportunity to really uh consider the role of of academic leader am among the other 150 things that principles lead for uh and and above all
020of the things that they lead for they lead for the good of children in terms of uh their whole selves their their uh their social selves their emotional selves their physical health their mental health and wellness and their academic uh health and wellness and so uh having the opportunity to look through these the data that the mcast presents to us um had a good conversation with a senior today about uh you know the role of the mcast as it's being questioned across the state and uh and and particularly its role for determining who graduates and who doesn't and um you know really it's it's good to keep in mind that the the mcast gives information about individual young people and about their academic development measured against uh benchmarks uh but but the mcast really its
021most appropriate purpose is to provide us information about ourselves about where we could be doing better uh as the people that lead districts and Lead schools and the people that lead and facilitate the work that happens in classrooms and I would just like to to really thank and acknowledge all three of our principles and our entire Administration at building level particularly but also here at the central office for for taking all of their roles so seriously um but particularly on this evening that role of academic leader and uh for making sure that our students are as close to where they need to be as they can be so that they are ready for whatever is next when they graduate from the mount R Greylock Regional School District and so with that Nolan is the lucky
022recipient of the longest straw hand off to you thanks Jake uh do I have permission to share my screen be really boring if I can't I think Christina can you do that I don't seem to all set no one thank you perfect and thumbs up if you can no you're looking at the wrong screen I can tell you right now oh technology does everyone see slides yes perect so let's uh start with a quick building update or quick little agenda we're going to do school updates then we'll go top view top of our mcast scores we'll dive into subgroups student growth percentage is then we'll do some highlights and our next steps um we've had a great start to the year we hit our stride as we turned into October even though it felt like
023summer in the beginning of October um so some brief highlights are all of our students got to experience a conversation with simron Singh who drove drove home thoughts that uh kindness and compassion should drive all of our actions um and speaking of kindness we've had so many wyverns of the weeks already this year we have students going going above and beyond to be kind to one another and compassionate to one another we have had two field trips already grade five went to Hopkins forest and grade one went to sheep Hill and we launched a before school program to complement our after school program to help parents and families out making sure the kids can get where they need safely um during the school day the PTO started after school mini courses that run about six
024weeks so far we have a bacon class a art class and a yoga class for those of you concerned about baking at school they only make the dough here then they go home and bake it in their own ovens and lastly Trunk or Treat the B um last year I think we had like 200 students come through people from out of town come through trunker treat is on 10:28 and it's from 2:30 to 4: and you might see someone dressed up as a pirate just if you stop by um so mcast let's talk about the mcast starting with Ela what you see here is each grade level uh with the state levels in the box to the right our goal is always to be as far left as possible so we want to see as
025much blue and much green as we can um and every year our goal is to move left everything we're doing is like how can we move our students to the next column um this year we are not as left as we would like to be which is okay because it gives us concrete information to create systems to address our gaps a rough goal we have each year is to always be higher than the state and exceeding and meeting and lower than the state in partially meeting and not meeting and as you can see we have some gaps um getting our students from meeting to exceeding um make sure I have all this so I'm going to talk about like we have a plan to address these gaps and the plan already in place and we'll
026be talking about that in our next steps these same strategy here we have our math scores compared to the state again we're not as left as we would like to be and we have our gaps in partially meeting for grades oops grades four and grade six so again overall we're still doing better than the state however we're not exactly where we want to be as the school science so I think science is a really interesting assessment because the fifth grade fifth grade is the first time they take at the science mcast and it's built on the foundation science skills taught in grades three four and then it's finally assessed in grade five um these scores I think are pretty good given that circumstance and it shows our ability to align our curriculum vertically in science
027to allow students to have success on the mcast so we always like to look at our subgroups it's uh important to us however mcast reporting requires a minimum of 10 students to report in specific categories and lboro is small so we can only have that available for presentation at the grade 3 through six level combining all the students um so we do have some pieces that bring us concern first of all we have zero students with disabilities exceeding we'd like to see at least one two 3% of our students with disabilities exceeding we would like it to match that bottom column right in ela we had 5% of our students exceeding and we had 0% of our students with disabilities exceed another thing to comment on is we had six 72% of our students in
028ela that were partially meeting and not meeting um students with disabilities and for math we had 76% of students with disabilities not meeting or partially meeting so that is a a big area of concern with us and we have some next steps in place for that another an important thing to notice is our lowincome students and our high need students their scores are match closely to the scores of the general population which is important I think that's that's kind of what we strive to do is to have that distribution the same in all of our categories and we're close to doing that in our low needs and high needs categories so student growth percentages so our student growth percentage allows us to compare our growth the growth of our students compared to like peers based
029on their previous mcaps there's a way to look at longitudinal growth and our goal is always to be above 50% I think the state wants 40 we always want to be 50 and higher we want to be as high as we can um we did a good job last year I think given our the implementation of what we're doing this year I think we'll see more student growth in the years to come so some highlights and next steps we uh so we hold ourselves to a very high standard and anything short of anything short of that is just an opportunity for growth we play the win the World Series every year but you can't win the World Series every year um so I am proud of our students and teachers and the effort they get
030they gave to do the best on their mcast and a highlight is we had a few grade levels had 0% students not meeting um which is always a win and it's always important to highlight how well our lowincome students and our high need students scores matched the general population I think I said this like four or five times already our goal is to always move left and this year we have implemented um mtss and data meetings so every six weeks we're coming together as teams special Educators interventionists teachers and me and anyone who's involved with the students academic growth we sit down and we look at the numbers and we create groups for students to receive specific instruction on their gaps the first the first meeting we had which was the end of September we
031looked at an item analysis of mcast and we being the small school that we are we looked at every student's mcast we looked at the information that we had we looked at what questions they got wrong what questions they got right if it matches them in the class classro through observational data and we found um gaps or two gaps or math Gap is measurement um and I don't know if this is the use of a protractor on a computer because that's just bizarre to me or um the understanding so we we are piloting a math Intervention Program called number number worlds for our tier or three instruction and another Gap that we noticed was vocabulary for ELA and we are bringing in a professional development on vocabulary sometime this spring to help address these gaps
032that is what I have for our mcast what questions do you have for me all right no questions I will pass it to Cindy hi everybody hold on give me just a second to share my screen I need someone to give me permission should we all set Cindy all right um Jake you might have to share for me I'm getting an error message on my end let me see I will get your present ready to pull up thank you you go through the 80 tabs that I have nope no no no no I'm sorry it's not working for you okay all right I think I've got it me thank you okay Cindy you just per Point your finger and I'll and I'll move it forward great you can go ahead in advance um we are
033pretty fortunate we've got a lot going on right now at school so want to give you a quick update and some highlights about what's happening at Williamstown um we are full in the swing of every um beginning after school program that we have at West um a homework club chess club and our Rainbow Club are underway one of the biggest things that we're working on right now is we're going to be working with um assistant principal rhetts at the high school and working with her and their Multicultural Student Union to bring a smaller version of that to Wes um again with the goal that we are creating these clubs to have everybody to have spaces at West but also give them the ability that when our students leave Wes and transition to the Middle High
034school that they're able to carry on um with different participation in groups and they've had that experience at elementary school and we're really fortunate that the students at the high school have been incredible about wanting to infuse their work and make connections with our kids in the elementary school which we all know it's great for adults to do it but it's pretty powerful when older students come down and are able to share experiences and knowledge with our kids so we're grateful for the opportunity to continue work with um this students at Mount Greylock we had our first all school assembly and I say that because anytime I feel like we're able to gather again is still a big um moment to celebrate for us we have a spirit committee that meets that is sixth graders
035who come together the sixth graders work on picking some sort of a text that really highlights messages of kindness and respect um the music teacher has grade levels get up and sing different songs but this one was a little bit special because it was one of the first times that our West band performed during an all school assembly um our music program has definitely transitioned over the last couple of years we are really happy that we moved our instrumental music teacher from a halftime position last year to a full-time position this year and one of the things that I think should really be celebrated is we now have over a hundred students who are enrolled in our instrumental music program um so last Friday when the curtains open and the entire stage was filled with
036chairs and kids with instruments there's pretty um amazing things that happen in elementary school but watching little ones be able to go up and play music and have the entire crowd of student body cheering them on is pretty amazing so definitely a huge shout out to Erica Howard for being able to start that mission at Williamstown and being able to have so many kids want to participate and go up on stage in front of their peers so we're always going to be grateful for that um a couple other shoutouts um of note we have had the really fortunate ability to have a lot of our sixth grade teachers last year start to participate in social studies curriculum through the state so they did a lot of work with the state they did a pilot social
037studies program this year they are continuing that work but we also have our fifth grade teachers who have joined in the social studies piloting of a new curriculum what that means is they participate in professional development they are learning as they go they are providing the curriculum for the state and rolling it out to the students within their classrooms um and I think probably one of the greatest things is when you know something is successful when the teachers are interested and anxious in participating in the pilot they've seen a need to want to bolster social studies curriculum so to have two full grade levels every teacher in both of those grade levels participating collaborating working with peers across the state um it's pretty important one of our sixth grade teachers Sarah Stricker asked after her
038work last year asked to see if she could apply to be a fellow for social studies across the state her application was accepted and she is a fellow for this entire social studies pilot program and what that means is we have a lot of people who are visiting Williamstown to come see the new social studies curriculum in action um something we're really proud of I know all of us who have been teachers it is great to have people in your room and also anxiety inducing to have people in your room so the fact that she been able to open up her classroom as have the other sixth grade teachers to neighboring counties to neighboring teachers and let them see the work that they've put so much effort in um we're really really proud of this
039group I think it also really Champions the idea that both of our fifth and sixth grade teams are departmentalizing this year it's something we've been talking about for years um it's something they've wanted to try and we kind of said you know let's give it a go let's see if this is something that is powerful for our students let's see if we can meet student needs differently um it's definitely been a work in progress we are definitely going to probably tweak a million things for next school year but I couldn't be more proud of these two teams for trying to see a need with the kids in front of them and seeing what impact we can do and what can we do differently um and as I said you know this social studies curriculum that
040they're involved in is something that we are already seeing skills and things that are transforming and going into other areas that in our curriculum we're watching them apply skills that they're doing in this social studies pilot into science and into math and so we're really starting to see the gains of buttoning up all areas of our curriculum which we're really excited about lastly words are wonderful week probably one of the biggest celebrations at Williamstown every year we look forward to celebrating words celebrating with authors with Community readers this week so far we've had the pleasure of having olly Burnham come in um Storyteller Rona lethal tomorrow starts our big character parade if anybody's free between 8:45 and 9:15 feel free to come to the front of Williamstown you will see an incredible display of kids
041dressed as favorite book characters or as their favorite words we will cap off this week with um I want to say annual it used to be annual but it's the first time our entire elementary school will be walking to the 62 Center since before coid so we're pretty excited that we're going to take all 430 kids out of the building walk down the street to be able to do a celebration to cap off the end of this week with um a presentation about the Magic School Bus so really really excited and looking forward to that Jake if you can go ahead and advance and one more time so lucky for me Nolan went first and already gave the enormous leadin to what every graph already means um our grade three data here the graphs on
042the left the top is Ela the bottom is math you notice that the graphs on the left are Williamstown Elementary School specific the graphs on the right are State specific just as Nolan mentioned you're always looking you know in terms of colors you're always looking for more students to be meeting or exceeding than the state um and you're going to notice in grades three four five and six the elementary school is doing that in all areas um I'm going to kind of just walk you through just so you can see the visual and then we'll talk more specifically Jake if you can go ahead and do grade four so similarly grade four again the data showing many of our students are meeting or exceeding in the area of both Ela and in math in grade
043four and Advance grade five pretty similar again and this one I just want to give a big shout out much like Nolan gave this Science Tech and engineering mcast is always really challenging for our students it's the first time they've really been presented with testing that speaks specifically to Science and Technology often the vocabulary is challenging if you have students who are struggling in any sort of area of reading this particular mcast can be very very challenging and this is an area where our fifth grade teachers last year worked really hard to see if they could teach Science and Tech and Engineering in smaller groups smaller settings with that be a way that they could make sure that students were mastering more Concepts and their scores reflect the work that they did so we're really
044proud that we can see this kind of growth for this particular mcus and sixth grade Jake sixth grade as well we had a lot of students especially in ela um meeting or exceeding which we're really proud of similarly in math meeting or exceeding um are areas that we also notice um big growth Trends in if you can advance um this is the similar graph traffic that you saw from Nolan's presentation it is Williamstown specific um I think generally speaking when I am looking at the data for this um you look at Williamstown scores and if I was going to say you know what's a highlight for Williamstown our data is pretty consistent our data is pretty consistent over the last 10 years we when you look at the graph comparisons we are performing better than
045the state in grades three through six um but I also think while consistency is great I also think it's still consistent um what I would love is to see more of our kids meeting or exceeding just generally all of our students but I think specifically with this particular data we're noticing especially in the categories of high needs or students with disabilities the data has not really changed over the course of a number of years it's something that our special education teachers and our interventionists but also our school data team were really really examining to see what can we do differently how can we meet the needs of our kids and what are the pieces that we might be missing that are causing kind of this consistency or where the data is really remaining unchanged in
046these particular subgroups um you know when you look at the very bottom where it says all students it's great we've got 10% of our kids who are you know exceeding we've got 54% who are meeting expectations but I can't sit on the end of this screen and tell you that this data is truly reflective of the capabilities of the kids that are in my building nor do I think it really reflects the the things that my teachers are doing on an a daily basis um while one data point for sure as an mcast it's an area where I know that the teachers the kids um myself we want to see different growth percentages because I want it to really accurately reflect the little people that are in that building to really be able to show
047the incredible things that they're doing across Ela and math the next screen is our math subgroup scores so again pretty similar um the high needs population and students with disabilities those are the two areas that stick out for us as far as wanting to make sure that our programming um and our service delivery and are we meeting the needs of the kids that are in front of us um collectively yes our scores are consistent collectiv our scores are above where the state is but we want to make sure that we are providing instruction and providing instruction in a way that the kids who need it in a different way whether that's presentation style whether that's small group whether that's different curriculum that we're meeting the needs of the kids within our building so while yes
048I'm always looking at us and the state I'm still really looking at us at Williamstown Elementary School because our needs are different than any other school um across Massachusetts and last lastly Science and Tech I I have to say as I said before this is one we're really proud of this test is hard the vocabulary is really really challenging so the fact that when you're looking at this on the bottom that 14% of kids were exceeding 56% of kids were meeting the expectations um that matters to us that means a lot to us because it's an area that historically has always been a challenge um and it's the test where most of the kids will tell you the day they come out of this test nobody feels confident um they will say that this one
049was challenging and it's something we as educators are always trying to make our kids feel more comfortable and feel powerful and successful when they're confronted with material so to watch their scores come back and it truly reflects the effort that they put in as kids but also the effort from the teachers who were providing instructions were really proud of this and last one highlights overall like I said um consistent performance um the number of students meeting expectations or exceeding are across all grade levels the significant growth in grade five Science and Technology as I said areas for improvement we'd love to see it across all areas we'd love to see our categories of meeting and exceeding you know increasing in percentages and as I said the area of improvement we want to see marked growth
050going into this next school year especially in our high needs and students with disabil subgroups um to be able to do those things we have a lot of things much like Nolan said that are in place um I think it's important to note that one of the things that Nolan and I are most proud of that is that I feel like this year he and I can say programmatically we are giving the kids in our district together similar programming similar curriculum so that we are truly working together meeting the needs of our kids so that when we are able to have them leave our elementary schools and head over to Jake at the middle and high school our kids are coming from similar experiences and similar programming and that really matters five years ago we
051couldn't say that um and that's a big deal for us we're in year three of the Wht and wisdom English language Arch program any research will tell you it takes anywhere from three to five years once you've implemented a new curriculum to truly see benefits and gain in regards to data with new curriculum three years ago Williamstown Elementary School had different programs going at every single grade level we can now say we have a program in place that addresses the five components of reading from kindergarten all the way up through sixth grade Nolan and I can say that we've been able to have staff members in both of our schools working together to support the growth of other Educators um and it's something he and I really know that the best thing we can do
052is to make sure that our tier one instruction so the instruction that every single child in either of our schools is getting is really solid instruction that is we're using research-based materials to give our teachers to do the instruction we know that if we're providing the right things that we should be able to see growth and we're looking forward to really continuing this year and the next two years when we've really really gotten comfortable with wit and wisdom to see what our Ela scores look like then um similarly last year I spoke about fast bridge and Dibbles so in Williamstown Elementary School we've always done the Dibbles as a measure of students fluency in reading and stuent students percentage of accuracy it's been something that is very very um I would say common when you're
053assessing reading skills but we started to look at whether or not it was assessing everything we wanted it to assess we know that it's not just about how many words per minute we also know it's not about how accurate a reader you are but it also matters how well you are comprehending the text that's in front of you that was a huge area of Dibbles that was lacking there is a comprehension component of Dibbles but it wasn't being used and didn't naturally lend itself to the assessment tool and it's when we decided last year that we would bring fastbridge in as a comprehensive assessment tool it's an assessment tool that's used in both Ela and in math but it gives both Nolan and I the ability to look at student growth across the entire school
054year um students are engaged in ela and math assessments three times a year that fastbridge truly pinpoints different areas within Ela and math that give our students and give our teachers an idea of hey where are the foundational gaps that's something at Williamstown we decided not to do the Dibbles any longer um that was a decision made in conjunction with our reading Specialists um with our curriculum director we piloted last year doing both to see what would the data show us would we be missing one or the other and we really found like Dibbles was wasn't giving us a full picture of what we wanted for each student so this will be our first year using the fastbridge as this assessment tool to pinpoint really specifically the needs of our kids um similarly we're about
055to bring stmath which is an online program um ST math reflex and ref refract are all supplemental math programs in terms of what do they do for us it's the ability to really provide instruction in math that really hits foundational skills math facts fractions um really quick you know computational things that are designed to be something where the whole class can get on or 10 minutes as a center but it's the ability to use a high engagement strategy through technology to continue to use yet another thing that will hopefully build and supplement foundational skills um our school data team which is something we started last year is also in place well underway with meetings trying to figure out and meet with teachers deciding what are the best things we need to do for the kids
056in the school um and lastly targeted reading intervention in grades K through three and I say that we have two reading Specialists our reading Specialists are busy from the moment they get there until the moment they leave we are making a very big push this year to have our reading interventionist infused specifically in K through three everything we know about research is the earlier the intervention the better so we are going to have our reading Specialists not only in the classroom but also pulling out small groups obviously there are grade there are students in grades four through six who might need reading support those kids are obviously getting support but we are truly putting as many resources as we possibly can into K through three along with that targeted reading of intervention it also goes
057back to speaking to this is one of the first times where we have systemic programming where our students in kindergarten first second and third all using foundations everybody is using Integrity everybody is using wit and wisdom so that we can really really put into place common language and common programming so our kids are getting the same thing whether they come in kindergarten whether they come in first they're going to be getting that similar language and I think that's it sorry that was a lot of talking are there questions Jose thank you Cindy and uh and thanks to Nolan this this is sort of a larger question kind of speaking to um the elementary school students across our district and this this is probably for you Jake you know um some of the press that had
058released uh at least some of the general results from from our mcast chor for our third grade cohort across the state spoke to a significant dip in those scores in both Ela and math it's hard to know um because I can't recall and I'm sure you have the data for you like how our third grade scores in our district compared to years past and whether we you know across both of our elementary schools have have some concerns about how that cohort you know who this is kindergarten first and second grade I think were significantly impacted by by the pandemic um what what's your sense Jake about how we're fairing as a district and whether we have some whether we should whether our real concerns for this particular cohort I think what when I when we
059talk about this internally when I speak with with other superintendant about it and when the commissioner of Ed and and his team speak with us about it um our our third grade is is holding its own compared to years past um the state is really urging us wisely so and most of us don't need the urging to you know just be very aware of the trajectory that our students that started school or had their their earliest days in school really overshadowed by a pandemic that kept them physically out of school uh to just be incredibly mindful of their trajectory you know sort of sort of mapping backward from where we know they need to be as as 10th graders who need this test to graduate to where they are right now where it's where it
060is informing us about individual performance but more importantly informing us about how we need to perform for the good of the children um I don't know if Nolan and Cindy went to weigh in or if you want me to go back to your third grade slides but um and we we could have uh and Jose I'm happy to send out sorry about that my lights went out I am happy to send send out looking a a a look back at at third grades from years past uh and that's that's pretty easy to get to on the State website if you if you put into a search engine like uh M A DSE uh School profiles but I I don't think we saw the significant drop that that just quite frankly school districts where kids are
061walking in the where where a large majority of kids are walking through the door as kindergarteners first graders second graders and third graders with with already years of significant buildup need and and sometimes significant real buildup deprivation uh in in terms of socioeconomic status in terms of of what learning has been happening at home but uh I am happy to take a look at that and send that out so you have it certainly a Statewide concern and certainly a local concern but a concern here not a panic here when I think Jose just to add we're we're always going to be concerned I think if it wasn't the pandemic we would be concerned about something else um my third grade group I am concerned about them just because you're worried about the learning that they
062missed or different presentation Styles and they they were so young at such formative foundational pieces we're always going to worry but for me I feel like as Educators we are masterful diagnosticians I think it's changed our practice I think it's changed you know the scope of the Educators within the building being able to say hey let's get the curriculum in place let's get the small groups in place let's have more staff in more classrooms let's do more small groups because our needs are vast but our needs are vast not primarily just just because of the pandemic it's just because families family Dynamics are changing the community is changing people the way people's lives are greatly affected I just feel like there's so many components that I can't say that I'm just worried about third grade
063um I'm more worried just collectively about social emotional status amongst all of my kids that are in the building um because I think everybody on this screen knows that if we if we're not meeting kids social emot needs they can't access all the things we're trying to teach them anyway so for us we've got to be able to meet our kids where they're at we've got to be able to see like what do we need to be able to have them feel good and confident and successful before we're super worried about hey where are you in math and in language arts because you can't have one without the other um and I think it's something for for both Nolan and I it's kind of that program piece you know as a result of the pandemic
064it gave us the opportunity to say like hey what are we missing what are we missing not just now because of the pandemic but what are our kids missing when they go see Jake what can we do so that we are collectively you know giving over to the middle school kids who have the same foundations and who've been ex given the same kind of programming and that's really not been done in our district um so it's a moment for us to pause it's a moment for us to infuse curriculum um but it's something you know our third grade scores do I want our kids do I think those scores are reflective of the little people no I think it's one day or two days um and I'm anxious to see what do they look like
065next year in the next year because for Nolan and I it's more about are our programs and our systems working because if we're doing it well and anybody in the building and any educator knows if we're doing it well we are constantly reassessing we are constantly diagnosing we are constantly changing our instructional practice to meet what our kids need we can we can no longer nor should we have ever given one size fits-all it just just makes you think differently and make sure that that's your lens going forward always and um maybe krie if you w to ask the question but I Christina if I could have like two minutes I can I can do a share screen and show like a just a quick a a a quick look through going back in time
066which I would be happy to do big Carrie what was your question uh Jake you can do that first I can let me so I everybody can see this so I was trying to do this from a district level where in this screen where my cursor is right now this drop down I would look at Mount Greylock the challenge with doing that is that Mount Greylock was not a school district previous in in desie terms we were not a school we don't really have data prior to 2020 for a district so Cindy with apologies I am going to pick on Williamstown because it we do have school level data that's contiguous so um you can see here and this is just looking at grade three English that we're focusing in on this graph the uh
067Williamstown Elementary is right here the state is right here this is this this past Year's testing data that Cindy started with you go back in time to 2022 you can see that there was um a few fewer kids in exceeding expectations a few more students in meeting expectations and I believe a few more in partially meeting if we comp if partially meeting if we compare to to last year I think moving backward you will see some of this consistency this is when the mcast sort of changed um yeah and then we're into like old generation mcast which the state would say please don't compare um Heritage mcast with current mcast but again if if we were to do that I think you would you would probably see similar looks and our and our math data
068is is no different um it it is um as I said you know and and Cindy thank you for putting it as you always do so eloquently we're always concerned um I I think some of the good news for us from a foundational level is now now we think longingly of the days when we had Federal coid money um coming into the district uh but you know the the the Investments that were made in this District to to try new things and do new things at the at the secondary level we primarily invested in um just straight up mental health supports through licensed social workers at the elementary level we now have both of our elementary schools with with very specific strategic discreet seal classes as a special and um you know just to par
069it what Cindy said um our our ability and our willingness and to some degree not having the immediate get your scores up pressure that some of our neighboring districts are consistently under allows us to focus on the things that we know really matter and will allow us to more organically raise scores because we have happier healthier more centered young people approaching the academics so so I concern yes uh an eyeball on the trajectory of of all of our students always yes specific concerns for some of our subgroups who historically underperform across the state and and historically underperform here in our own district and within our two towns yes uh great concern there great Focus there but but not um not grave levels of concern in general about or this group of kids because of what
070they have been through uh going to continue at a deficit so thank you for giving me that time for that and Carrie thank you for allowing me to to present that for a minute so um I have two uh small questions for Cindy but I'll start with the larger one which is for Cindy or Nolan or jakee um will is mcass and will mcass ever be a good instrument for measuring progress for our students with disabilities and do we have other measures that we use that tell a different story I will jump in if I may Cindy and Nolan and then feel free to jump in with smarter ideas probably put more beautifully um no it it's it's you know in in some ways it's a very appropriate instrument because we have a state that
071is saying to us not that most of us need it to be said that our expectation from the Commonwealth level on throughout its its uh 351 individual community ities is that all students can learn high level stuff at good rates um and that all students are capable of highlevel learning over the course of not only a school year but over the course of a a 13 or 14 or in some cases a 15 or 16 year Public School career and and and so it does give us information that we can use um e even for students for whom the the tool is not the most appropriate I would still maintain it's it's a tool that gives us information that's useful about how are we doing as we work within um special education world to make
072sure we're on a trajectory not not only of high level learning by the time a student graduates but as independent of a life as that student can have when they graduate the I feel better about giving that answer that mcass is good but not perfect for that um and not as good as it is for students that are perhaps not on IEPs but the IEP process by itself those individual plans have more finely tuned individual goals that that really drive the curriculum and instruction for students who are served by an IP and served by the people who help create and carry out the vision of an IEP so um yeah I I don't think any of us on this screen would say that mcast is the endall be all for any individual student uh for
073sure it is less so for students who have um nuances I I often found it troubling in all three districts in which I've been a superintendent that you are asking students um uh are multi-lingual learner students who are adjusting to a lot of them New Town in a new state in a new country in a new climate in a in a completely new culture and trying to learn subject matter as they are trying to learn the English language and then taking a test that is above all else it's a reading test even the mathematics test is a reading test the science test as Cindy and Nolan alluded to is a reading test um so I I am more troubled by what it means and what it does to those students to have to slog through
074the test and and and of course all Educators work to make sure the students understand that this is not really about whatever report comes back is not as much about you as it is about simply this test is perfect or what we can do better so I I don't know if that answered your question or not but it's it's certainly not the best tool and and I think the the the the larger current conversation around using it as a benchmark or or one of the primary benchmarks for graduation I really question its appropriateness uh for that use I I'm much more comfortable with its use to help the grown-ups who are paid to do the work to help facilitate learning learn about what they're doing well and what they could be doing better I'm I'm
075I grow increasingly uncomfortable with with seeing students 18 19 20 year old to however long they live trajectory altered knowing how hard some of them work to achieve what they're achieving and understand ing that they're not getting a diploma um often times simply because of one examination or or a series of examinations and Carrie I just want to add just for my two cents on it um I don't think there's ever going to be one test that can truly show aptitude or a measure of any child but I have to say you know I've got a student who was in fourth grade last year and that child was reading 17 words per minute 17 words at fourth grade that child if you look in any research textbook that child on papers becomes the statistic if
076you can't read by fourth grade what does the rest of your life look like that same child who read 17 words per minute last year read 108 words per minute today in fifth grade is that the Benchmark for fifth grade nope but that to be is a greater celebration than any mcast score could be um the teachers are always going to be masterful at you know doing assessments and doing data points point and making sure and part of school in general is being really individual so while mcast takes you know the bulk of standards and assessing all we have a lot of kids who are nowhere near working at those standards and it doesn't necessarily celebrate the things but that little person in fifth grade who can now pick up a text and read it
077matters um all right thank you um so I have more questions on that but thank you both for for your responses Cindy my my um two smaller questions have to do with some of the terminology that we heard in your slide so um or uh names that I'm just not familiar with so the Rainbow Club um can you describe that a little bit what is that yes absolutely um so the Rainbow Club is another new club that was started at Williamstown Elementary School last year um it was originally designed so that we could give our lgbtq plus students or any students who are wanting to find a place of community and belonging and a place where they felt truly included um no matter how you identify um it became a space for that and really
078stemmed out of some professional development that we had at our elementary school um the person who came to do the presentation really has championed starting that club um but it's kind of twofold it also is a club at the high school that they have where LGBT Q Plus students um have started a club there and are working with our kids too so it mirrors we just felt like Rainbow Club was something that our kids could really wrap their heads around rather than saying lgbtq which just spelled like a different name for them um it's been amazing it you know it's broken down it was so large last year that now we have basically two separate sessions running one for K through two and one through three through six every other week nice thank you um
079and then you talked about fifth and sixth grade teachers departmentalizing could you just describe that a little bit more so typically at Williamson Elementary School whether it's grades K 1 2 3 four five or six prior to this school year every teacher in their classroom was responsible for teaching every subject area as students got into fifth and sixth grade many of the teachers have felt that they wanted to specialize in a particular core subject area that stems out of a myriad of things whether it's a teacher feels more comfortable and stronger in math more comfortable or stronger in language arts um or whether or not they feel like they can add a different skill set to any one of those curriculum areas in fifth grade what it looks like this particular year is that there's
080two teachers that are pretty much grouped together one teacher does the English language arts and social studies one teacher does the math and science and children rotate between those two set two teachers to get all of their curriculum um in sixth grade looks pretty similar however um they do a little bit more rotating to be able to give the kids the experience of having each of the teachers meet with them during the school day um similar models but truly the opportunity to give our professionals especially after becoming especially after piloting the social studies curriculum people felt like how am I going to really be creative and delve into this if I don't have the time to do it and do it really well and so that's what led people to want to break off and
081be able to really dive into a particular area of curriculum and and also think ultimately our sixth grade teachers will tell you that part of what they aim to do is start to prep the kids for middle school and get them ready for transitioning and it lend lend itself naturally to providing that natural transition too great thank you Cindy Julia did you have your hand up I did um but I thought maybe we'd wait for Jake to Jake schz to present and then I've got some like other some bigger thoughts so I didn't want to again the way thanks everybody thank you Cindy sounds like I'm up good evening uh I'm going to need to share my screen it looks like it's set here right if you're looking at anything other than the mount greylac
082Regional School presentation like my email or anything else please let me know so similar agenda here we're just going to go over couple m mcast scores at the end of the presentation so for updates uh middle school high school is very busy two things I want to bring your attention to is the uh seal of biliteracy uh I don't I don't think I have mentioned this to the group before but this is the first year we are participating in that it's a seal that actually goes onto um diplomas and it's offered we're offering it to seniors every year for seniors for anyone who demonstrates Proficiency in English and another language so we're we're very excited about that and also I wanted to give a shout out to our new parent caregiver reps maryan Matt and
083Jennifer so they were just elected to a term um and so we have our first meeting coming up I also want to thank Mary McDonald Gustavo gero Gan o Larry and Matt Smith um actually Jane and Matt were our parent reps last year and Mary Gustavo were our faculty reps this year's faculty reps I should probably point that out too this year Joe Johnson and Luke palidoro are our faculty reps okay first up we have our mon GAC scores for El over the past three years we'll see some similar numbers with slight variations between the three years but pretty similar looking at the 23 scores on the far right in comparison to the state average we score 12% higher in exceeding standards that's the uh the far left the blue blue column 12% higher in
084meeting expectations that's the green column 15% low lower in the partially meeting expectations and 8% lower in the not meeting expectation column so that's Ela over the over three years math overview similar numbers again slight variations looking at 2023 in the far right we're 11% higher in the exceeding standards 10% higher in meeting and then again 15% lower in partially meeting and 8% lower in that meeting looking into Ela specific data for grade 78 is the top left eight is bottom left I'm sorry 7 eight and 10 and 10 is on the bottom right so generally there's a trend from 7 to 10 that shows an increase in exceeding expectation scores and reduction in um partially in that meeting scores quick look at seven 78 and 10 in math uh again a general trend from
0857 to 10 that shows increasing averages of exceeding in meeting and a reduction in personally in that meeting that grade 10 is where we really want to get everyone to pass because that is what is required for graduation science taken in only grades eight and 10 um here I'd highlight that the increase in exceeding expectations and the reduction and meeting expectations and again this is the 10th grade is the time where you need to be in one of those columns on the left in order to receive your diploma going into the subgroups so I just I pulled some data out um so it looks a little bit different then Cindy and Nolan's but it's a snapshot of two major subgroups the high needs on the left low income on the right and this is all
086just for 10th grade and so you'll see on the um on the left you'll see the student growth percentage and then where folks were in um in the four levels exceeding meeting partially meeting or not meeting expectations the good thing though so we look at our our goal is to get everything further in the in the the graph to the right but is to make sure we have zeros in that not meeting so that is um an area of focus that whenever um we see scores like this in the eth grade we really go into um overdrive having to come up with individualized um IND individualized plans with teachers and families to um have those 10th graders you can retake the mcast as many times as you need so this is when we we develop
087those individualized plans to help get students to um to at least partially meeting Jake quick question when you when students retake the mcast do they have to take the whole thing or can they just take the subject where they didn't meet just the subject they didn't meet yep so they're all separate so say if you pass everything except for math you'll do the math retest good question uh the student growth percentages here and again I I I pulled them out and didn't present them in the the same chart so you see we have it from 21 through 23 and then Ela and broken up in ela and math so for example in 2023 for ELA uh the student growth percentage for 7eventh grade was 51 the student growth percentage for grade eight was 51 and
088the growth percentage for grade 10 was 54 so it's it's really nice to see numbers um in the high 40s and 50s and and and above um so that that's pretty impressive uh anything lower than that is is something that um we would spend some energy looking at and looking into and again the they the student growth percentages raise from uh range from 1 to 99 higher numbers represent higher growth and lower numbers lower growth uh so this shows how one student MK scores compares to other M mcast scores students mcast scores with um uh within this uh percentage so higher the better so some next steps and these are some sort of higher view uh themes number one identify and close the gaps an opportunity or achievement that the test reveals so I think
089that's sort of a theme you've heard from from Nolan Cindy and Jake you know to use this test to identify areas we need to improve upon um number two better understand the data by talking about it with multiple stakehold holders we do that in various ways we do it um within within individual departments department meetings we do this with um team leaders as an administrative group um and then we do it individually for um students who we really need to um rally around and to support and to get them um to have uh the ability to get a get a diploma and third we want to meet students where they are and consistently challenge them academically so we want to move you know just like noan first said with the graph we want everyone as
090far left as we can and here is a snapshot in time of AP test data so on the left are the test scores from 22 on the right are the scores from 23 not always the same um tests so we always we offer these tests to students um it doesn't necessarily totally correlate with classes that we offer you can you can take an exam and not be enrolled in a um in a AP course so pening your questions and I know Julie has some and I don't see any hands I'm sorry so let me uh stop sharing here for a second um yeah I'd love to field any of your questions okay Julia go ahead thank you um and this isn't necessarily for Jake um but maybe across the district and and um I just
091wanted I wanted to share a couple of thoughts uh one is um we all we all I I agree in many ways with the CATE the description of mcast um but I do think it's an incredibly valuable measure of our system um and how we are serving our students and so I I don't I think I heard some language that was like well it's not it is not the be all end all but I do think it's a valuable measure of our system I want to add that um when I look at when we look at our data um what at least I'm looking at as a as an educator myself um one is when we think about who our comparison set is it's the state makes it really easy for us to compare ourselves
092to the state I want to point out that the students in the state are far more diverse far more lowincome a higher percentage of special needs and many more students who are El students than our district has and so for me it raises the question is the state the right comparison for us if we want to be comparing ourselves to somebody um I and I want to name that um what Jake was just describing that SGP the student growth percentile is perhaps the most important metric in my mind um because it measures the impact our District had on the students in the year that they were with us it kind of strips away their previous history as a student and says what's the impact we had this particular year it Compares for those who don't
093know and and maybe everyone on the call knows but maybe the public doesn't know it Compares a student's performance in a year against all the other students across the state with a similar score history so kids who've had similar score history then this year they entered this year at the same place how much did they what did they get on their mcast compared to all those other kids who had the similar score history um and so the SGP is a really really fantastic measure of the impact our school is having um and so I I wanted to just underscore that because Jake um all three principles shared those scores but for those who may not understand that particular metric that one is a super important metric um and so I wonder I don't necessarily I
094mean I think I do have a question um I think we can be doing better I don't think I could point to any one person or and say that person can be doing better because I think it's incredibly complex I think the ways that um supports in a school are structured is a piece of it I think the professional development the teacher coaching I think it's all a piece of it and I'm wondering what could be done what can we encourage as a as a governing body to help the team understand what levers might yield the greatest impact um because I think it's incredibly complicated and I know we have a district full of professionals who are working incredibly hard um and I think we're talking about a system that I think we could could
095be doing better I I'd just like to add to that that the um the student growth metric in eth grade math has been consistently low and I think we've tried to address it or we've talked about addressing it and I'm just wondering what we have been doing to address it so Jake that Jake schz that might be a question for you yeah so we haven't done anything I would say specifically just to Target that I mean we had a math interventionist last year but there's other other than you know everything we do each day every day in each classroom there's there's nothing in place just to help eth grade math I would I would say so maybe I I misunderstand your question well so I guess I'm I'm my question is um does the fact
096that the the eth grade math number is is consistently lower than the other numbers indicate anything about our um middle school math program that we should be focusing on it sounds like the answer is not necessarily so are you looking at um my the what I shared with you yeah but I remember it from years ago it's it's been consistent that um I think it it the last slide if I yeah if I can share it again um let me see share screen so here we are so I mean other than these These are slightly lower but I mean other than that 16 um in e8th grade in [Music] 21 you know I don't nothing has as far as I'm aware nothing has sort of jumped out as being consistently low okay well I guess
097you and we heard it from Nolan too that we want to see everything in the 50s or you know 60s ideally High 40s and we haven't out of the 30s um and now we're at about 30 so I'm not trying to um um I'm I guess I'm I'm just wondering is is this indicative of anything in particular uh curricularly or pedagogically or shouldn't that number um bother us at all I know it bothered us when it was 16 um so should we not be bothered when it's 31 well I mean that's that's quite I mean it's quite a jump I would I would say um so I mean I feel comfortable that it went that it's not 16 anymore um and and I don't I don't know how to really address you know the rest
098of your question anymore um you know we there's there's nothing specifically in place right now just to address um eighth grade um but it doesn't mean we can't look into it and if if I can jump in and say um sort of to to carry to your point into one of Julia's points um yeah I I agree the Statewide comparisons are nice but you know we we also have a subset of local schools and by local I mean western Mass Berkshire County uh and then a subset of of schools across the Commonwealth that are more like us to whom we th those comparisons much more uh those comparisons mean more in terms of you know we we we don't do so publicly because that just starts to feel a little bit cruddy but um internally
099comparing ourselves to more like districts and districts that we know are like us and that the state would perceive are like us are very meaningful um around Carrie your point um yeah I I think when we do those local comparisons and Statewide comparisons to schools that demographically are much more like us than the rest of the state is like us um there there is you could make a case that there is a slight dip at strategic grades and historically there has been particularly you know not only in performance but in that student growth percentile I see those numbers and Joey and I actually had this conversation in September I see those numbers and I think we we probably need to look at like our five six S8 math sequencing and and that is that's District
100level work that that we're trying to get a handle on some individual pieces so we can do a better job of looking at that but when you when you do have one set of uh of data points and I tend to like I think I heard Jo say and you say Carrie that student growth percentile to to me if if comparisons have tremendous value they have value in comparing a student to themselves in previous years and then comparing themselves to to like scoring profiles from previous years from the other uh you know several thousand students that are in that grade level taking the same test from year to year uh those growth percentages are I think the most of us among the most meaningful and when there is a super high growth percentage that can
101say something about a set of teachers it can say something about the program it can say something about the previous years program um so that's that's sort of a that's sort of where we are in trying to assess how do we get that growth profile for eighth grade mathematics to be more in line with with its neighboring growth percentiles uh in terms of seventh grade 10th grade and even looking down into fifth and sixth we we definitely layer hearing I see Steve's hand up yes um two items one as a you know quick comment could we have the slides added to the packet online perfect thank you and then the second one is for Jake about the AP exams so echoing something that Cindy said I I agree strongly that there is no way one
102exam is going to be able to tell us everything I have some I'll use the word concerns about the AP exams especially since I know not everybody tests as well I also know since it's on a very discret scale 1 two 3 4 five a very small difference can move you tremendously I would love to see how the schooles students get on AP exams correlate to grades they get in classes at Greylock and I understand that this is going to be potentially very challenging to do is we don't have that many kids taking some of the exams so this might be something where you have to amalgamate data across several years and I know this is not anything to be discussed in Greater detail tonight but I think it would be interesting to see data
103like that to get a sense of how are our classes doing in terms of um preparing the students you know who is doing well on the exams what's helping some students do well what's hurting some students I just think that would be a good conversation to have thank you Julia um I realized I'm not sure I probably did have a a question or encouragement at the end of my let's let's look at this um and that is I I want to reiterate how hard I know everyone is working and how much everyone cares um and I also know that we aren't um it often is helpful to have somebody from the outside come in and observe and help us see the whole picture and I I guess I want to encourage our district to think
104about so you know if who if you know is there anyone who can help think about how the system is working collectively and in its various parts um to to ensure that we are able to provide the best education um to our and and so that that all those hardworking well-meaning really intelligent um adults who are who are pushing students in all the you know in so many ways can also feel that success um and and you know learn how and I know they are learning individually ways they can do better but collectively um because I believe all of our students could be I I believe this is not a student issue I think this is a um our system um issue so I guess my question or my encouragement is that um somehow we
105look and find somebody who can help us like hold up the mirror for us in a way where we can learn um and and grow thank you Julia any other questions thank you so much Jake Cindy and Nolan we really appreciate the presentations and the time and all the information that you gathered and presented to us okay um next up on the agenda the field and track project update Joe is that you sure the the quick update is that the um the revised documents are um out for biders now um over the course of the next few weeks um uh biders will be submitting all of their all of their figures um and then we're looking at um the field and track project committee meeting to review the results on November 1st um with with
106those results and and recommendations from the architect and and OPM in hand um and then having a special school committee meeting on November 2nd at 6 PM um so that's a Thursday um where it would be a special meeting to to just review those results and and whatever recommendation comes out of the field and track project committee um so that's where we are and I'm my fingers are crossed um and we're gonna we're going to keep on plugging away trying to make sure we get the the best attention and the sharpest pencils possible coming in great thank you Joe any questions for Joe Jose thank you Joe just uh could you give us an update on in terms of the what was provided regards to our bid bid documents where are we in our ad
107alternates are we do we have a a list we are asking folks to submit bids for we we as a as a part of this process we took the the ad alternate that was the bleachers and Press Box we we took that out um and we made sure that the walkway area along with the the base that would be there for the bleachers and Press Box um that they are paired down in a way that hopefully presents as a very straightforward easy to C calculate easy to bid um type component of the project um and that if numbers come in low and if we're able to tack on some portion of what would be those Bach bleachers and Press Box um we already know the type of change order the type of minimal additional work
108to build up that layer where the bleachers and Press Box would be we already know how to specify that um if the budget allows and then in terms of the bleachers and the Press Box themselves um those are items that that we now know pretty clearly uh I mean we've always known but we we have comfort internally with um how we would be able to um get best prices on those get them shipped directly and be able to put them in place and have a path to saying you know with bleachers it's very straightforward they arrive and you put them in place um with the Press Box the way that area is defined in terms of the electrical connections the the fiber you know all of that that that would come into that area um
109it's now defined in a way um that will make it really just a a vertical placement process where that can go on top we we know all the specifications for how the conduit then rise up alongside the building so we we've got all of that planned so that it can be done in layers with without complicating the way and I I you know if biders are listening right now we we made this as easy to to price and to put forward as we can um we internally have a sense of how we would add layers onto that onion to make it so that it's so that we then get ready for the bleachers and Press Box and then add the bleachers and Press Box on top that's that component of the project um with respect
110to irrigation uh the path that was that was taken um we have um a pair of quick connects um on the interior of the track um that are designed strategically to make it very convenient to set up water reel type irrigation on the field any anytime we want to um so Water Reels are what you see across a lot of um fields of All Sorts especially in you know within Sports where um they start off at one end they gradually roll and and work their way across the field um casting water across in in an arc um so that type of irrigation very functional um can serve honestly as a as a permanent option for for many folks and I think it could for us in the future um if the water itself makes itself
111available um and coming off the two interconnects that are on the interior of the track within the design design um those then go and they um they surface in the utility closet which is in the um Administrative Building um we have a 2-inch water line that comes in there which will allow us to draw off of our water um as we see fit but it's also a very convenient place for if you bring a water tank or water tanker um back it in uh within the parking lot there you can very easily run a fire host to then interconnect right there to be able to deliver water if for some reason we wanted to fill up the tank somewhere and bring it in so we've got both our own water supply as well as external
112Water Supplies um ready for connection so that's the approach that we took if in the future we're able to somehow bolster um what we have in terms of total water tanks or water supply um it will make it very easy for us to then upgrade that in in a variety of ways but without disturbing what we already have in place so we it it it was the simplest best most flexible solution that we could that we could come up with and I think we internally as well as the project team we understand all the all the tradeoffs and and what it means for us thanks Joe yep any other questions for Joe thank you Joe of course and then the next one's coming up I I might need to speak to as well okay so
113next up on the agenda is the finance subcommittee report um the the first item A Williams College gifts to Mount Greylock and West um we unfortunately we don't have updated numbers in in yet um we should have them in over the next week um we will definitely itely have them in time for both the finance committee and then the school committee prior to needing to figure out what that means for bid results um in in early November um so I don't have anything there yet but but will soon um that's that item are there any questions on the non- update update okay um and then with respect to a grants update I apologize that this did not make it into the packet um but it it will um and I'm going to go on ahead
114and share this now um this is kind of the the annual update that that you often see and during the upcoming Finance subcommittee meeting we're going to contextualize this a bit more but I wanted to get these numbers out um now that now that we have them and then once we've contextualized it for the finance subcommittee um I will bring something we we I we will bring something back that describes it within the context of of the current year budget and what it means for the coming Year's budget as well um but all of our Federal grant um sources um came in um in a way that was very predictable given given our enrollment and and given where Federal funding is um none of this here surprised us at all um with respect to the
115title grants as as well as the special education grants the Ida related grants um so this this total of new allocations for fy2 four um total right around $550,000 in funding um we have that uh the the news that came in today that did not make this slide um is that uh within the rural school aid um that we along with other qualifying districts in the state receive um whereas we have we had expected to receive about $100,000 through that through that source of which is a state source of funding it's a it's a state budget allocation um to augment funding for uh more rural school districts um whereas we budgeted for we expected about $100,000 um we're actually seeing about $280,000 that was just announced today um Jake and I both received that that
116notification from the state um which is great news um it does mean that we that we can and should take a look at at how that um funding can be used um it's something that I think we'll we'll bring to the finance subcommittee over the next few weeks um we certainly have some you know and that is funding that um just to be clear um that's funding that needs to be used in this fiscal year um it it cannot be carried forward um and the state is pretty clear in saying saying that the amounts will can and will vary from year to year um so don't don't use it to um stake out new ground in terms of uh salaries and and ways that you want to go about your work um for many years
117to come but um it's certainly good news for this fiscal year um so that $180,000 difference is is pretty it's very significant for us um so that's that's the great bit of news that I'll end the grants update on great thank you any questions listen to his big boy bark such a big boy all right on that note superintendent report Nolan's new dog and his big boy work um the per per our calendar that guides our work for the year for the school committee tonight is to be the presentation about the district Improvement plan we're just not there right now and so we'll look to do that next year or next next year next month in conjunction with my goals which seems appropriate um and uh I I would just say uh as as I
118have very little to say tonight by way of a report um last week was a really difficult week um because of world events we have people feeling anger fear uh it it was just a difficult week a difficult week to be a parent uh a difficult week simply to be an incredibly difficult for some uh more than others and so it was uh particularly edifying and and wonderful together last last Thursday for our first musical performance of the year um those of us fortunate enough to be in the education business have these really natural ongoing ways to find some temporary relief from the the worries of the World by um getting amazing reminders of how talented and wonderful uh the young people are the next generation of people people that will be leading uh communities
119and leading States and leading Nations and being leaders in our world and uh so thank you to uh to our musicians um for putting on a wonderful show to a packed house and then some uh last Thursday evening thanks to all of you for the flexibility around this meeting so that we could uh hold that Gathering it was really interesting fames stuck around for a long time after that uh after that Gathering um it was it was a good opportunity for people to be together um in our community as are our athletic events and our Theater events and everything but I do want to say uh thank you to Jackie and Patrick for for leading such a powerful music program um I spent some time in a music class at Lanesboro today with a with
120a brand new instructor Bonnie mccubbin uh we we heard uh Cindy talk about the the amazing work and the the magic that's happening at West and instrumental music thanks to Erica Howard and um it's just it's really exciting to see an already strong arts program really start to get some additional fuel in its rocket engines and uh can't wait to see what that looks like in years down the road but but thank you to those in our community who give us the opportunity to gather and to have nothing but positive uh feelings moments emotions and experiences for you know an hour or two at a time so that is my report for this evening Christina thank you Jake okay next up is the um masc division update so I will turn it over to Carrie
121so uh there is a um document in the packet that U outlines eight resolutions that the resolutions Committee of the masc is bringing forth at the annual meeting for a vote um I saw in the recording that I was voted as a delegate I'm happy to accept um I will be there and we have also um the possibility or the option of voting for an alternate delegate um somehow you got muted yeah if anybody wants to put their themselves forward as an alternate delegate the only catch is that you have to actually show up in person um so um that's a that's just um Wednesday at 3:15 in the afternoon of whatever week that is November early November so um anyway back to the resolutions so I think last year um we voted to support
122I think we voted to support all the resolutions but there were some questions that the committee asked me to bring up which I did and then I think I reported back so we have that option again of you know moving support of all the resolutions um um the reason that there is the potential for multiple votes on the agenda is because you may want to support some and not others um not all of them are directly relevant to our district um I would say you know the regional transportation one and the mcast one um might be of particular relevance most of the resolutions are brought um by the Eastern uh part of the School committees there's one that is um the title not or sorry um Division 10 which is the um I think U
123Multicultural division um and the resolutions committee bringing it together um and then there's one that should look familiar to you about Firearms um which I think we had already voted to support at a previous um school committee meeting so with that said um Christina do you would you like a motion to support all the resolutions or do you want to see if anybody has objections to any one of them first um I I don't support all the resolutions if that makes it easier you do or don't I'm sorry I didn't hear you don't okay I don't so it's it will probably be easier if we don't have a motion until we figure out which ones we want to so um one way to do this is to pull out the ones that you that we
124want to debate and then or discuss and then um approve the rest of them or we could just take them one by one why don't one by one Curtis says one by one yeah that's what I was gonna say too okay so um the first resolution is a full stable funding for metco and metco stands for the Metropolitan Council for educational opportunity and it has to do with um the funding that covers transportation of inner city Boston uh students into suburbs uh to attend districts that um may not be as racially diverse and it serves it's an odd well it's an interesting program I should say um it serves to diversify those districts but also to provide quality education for the students who are participating in the bus busing program so um is there a
125motion to support this resolution so moved is there a second I will second all right um is there any discussion again not relevant to the district but something that um we may or may not want to endorse Julia yeah and apologies um I guess when I was prepping I didn't see all these um but it's not relevant to us and I guess I'm quickly trying to see is it if we were to say we support like part of me is like it's not irrelevant us so I don't care what we do um but part of me is also thinking is it a program we're asking the state to spend money um and is it a program that we think is um valuable that would use State money that could otherwise be used in other ways
126for Education that make sense yeah that's a really good question and I I'm not sure I see in my quick read about the impact of the program I can see that that it's been around for a long time and a lot of kids have participated and what the mission of the program is but I'm not necessarily seeing the impact of the program on either theing or the sending districts and just to clarify the resolution is I probably should have read this um to call upon the governor and the legislature to create a stable funding structure to support metco and its partner districts that fully funds the support provided by Meco and the cost of providing Services delivered by meco's partner districts so those would be the Suburban districts that um kids are busing into or
127being transported [Music] into so Julia has raised a concern we is there any other discussion or do we want um I I have similar concerns about voting on resolutions where I have not seen extensive arguments on both sides to really get a sense of you know what the effect of this will be for example one of the other resolutions it might be resolution four is calling on all districts in the state to establish a certain position I am very hesitant to say that every district has to establish a specific position when you use language like that which gives no leeway for Lo situations I get very worried that another District might have found a way to solve these problems with different allocations of resources and thus I'm very very hesitant to support a lot of
128these resolutions I just don't think we have enough data Steve do you wanna do you have a list of the resolutions that you find problematic I just find part of this is just a general principle of you know just all I see right now is you know today or a day ago I got you know list of resolutions we are supporting or asking to support without sufficient documentation as to why this is what we should be doing and I'd like to see some evidence and arguments from the people who are proposing these resolutions that this is what we should be doing and you know again hopefully that will be discussed at the meeting and this is one of the reasons why you send delegates to go to meetings and discuss things and you know we
129can share our concerns right now but I have a lot of trouble just you know supporting something for example this is why we have a policy of you know proposals you know changes to policy go through a two-step process you know first you know the policy committee looks at it and then it comes to the school committee for a first reading and a second reading with plenty of time for people to make comments and so to see something within 48 hours and you know vote on this as to this is what I'm telling the governor to do I'm just not comfortable doing that so just out of curiosity did you all receive something from the masc in the mail um with the resolutions you should have received something directly um either by email or in
130the mail um so um if not then then um I might want to look into that because uh this this shouldn't have been the first time you were seeing the resolutions um but I do understand your point um you know another way to do this I suppose is to not take any votes and just have me um make my best uh get feedback from you based on what you see before for you you know the whereases and and the therefores um and then um ask questions when I'm there to help inform any decision that I make for a vote so that's another way of doing it Jose yeah I I think that that was what I was going to suggest Carrie is that maybe we um if it's resend the motion and and um thinking
131about um Stephen's point you know as as members of the committee who may not have had a chance or taken the opportunity to review the resolutions um is this something does this kind of push us into territory where folks could reach out to you directly regarding their own I'm just curious about like what what that process might look like in terms of giving you feedback on particular resolutions um and none of them that I see uh do I find problematic um including metco which has served to help desegregate you know metro area Boston in in incredibly important ways I think um so but I just don't know in terms of how we best as a school committee support you as you know as a delegate will'll be making a decision on behalf of you know
132School committees across the Commonwealth I think raising your concerns here is is you know in the context of this meeting is the most helpful so that we can have a conversation um so I've heard the concerns about the first um the first resolution do are there are there more questions or concerns about that one or or should we move on to resolution yeah and I want to correct myself K I don't think there has been a motion is that right Chris there was a motion sorry I should I should resend the motion I'm happy toiss in the motion and then who oh actually there did I someone else I don't think there was a motion I don't think there was Curtis and myself yes Curtis moved it and Christina second it um so do you
133guys want to retract the motion sure okay okay thanks Jose appreciate that um and thank you Curtis and Christina so um is there anything else on the first resolution or should we move on to the second one um I just want to share my personal ancient experience with metco and it being a very positive one having been a part of a sub suburban school um who had the great Fortune of developing very close friendships with Medico students and being able to share in their lives as they were able to share in mine and it was really fantastic um positive experience for for everyone um I I I feel like we had a student present to us a former Greylock student who had been a metco student way way back when um I don't know if
134I'm the only person remembering that but it at some point I think kids were bust out here they may poost families or something yeah I think what you're thinking of is the ABC program which is very similar um but um kids would come from Chicago or New York and come to a rural area well I don't know if Rural was a component but you know a good good school system and live with um not with families but they would live in in a um ABC house where there was a mentor um a teacher who lived in the house and um they might have also had host families in the community so yeah it's similar kind of thing yeah and um was a very powerful program for at Greylock for a long long time all right
135um so resolution two regarding investigations and recommendations for transportation bidding procedures um the resolution is that the um Mass Association of school committees Prevail upon the office of the state auditor to investigate bidding practices of school transportation providers and to present such findings and recommendations as may be necessary to contain costs and make more efficient transportation services available for public schools any comments or concerns on this one yeah I just want to make a brief comment that I like the language in this resolution a lot where it's basically saying you know we are encouraging you to investigate and you provide this information to the districts we're not saying districts will have to do X Y or Z we're not saying all districts you know we're going to have a one siiz fits all we're going
136to investigate provide some data to help you make good decisions okay thanks and as a as a general rule I prefer resolutions like rooted like that y other comments All right so this one was brought uh or sponsored by the Southeastern vocational technical school committee the first one was sponsored by the Arlington school committee the third one is sponsored by the hamen wilam Regional school committee and this is about Regional Transportation one of our favorite subjects um so the resolution is that in such case where a pupil resides greater than one and 1 half mile from the school of attendance measured by a commonly traveled routee and the Commonwealth reimbursement does not fully cover the amounts expended for such Transportation the Regional School District may allow pupils to opt out of such Transportation or may
137charge a fee that an aggregate may not exceed the differential between the amounts expended for Furnishing transportation and the Commonwealth reimbursement and there is a continued resolution but um what do people think about this one Joe what do you think about this I mean I the the very selfish side of me I I would vote in favor of anything that more fully funds Regional School Districts transportation and and I very selfishly I would want more funding to go there than to other resolutions in places um just knowing knowing the balance of funds that we pay out of taxpayer money to fund transportation that is not necessary or or even reasonable within more urban environments um we're we're footing bigger bills per pupil for sure um and so to have that factored into the way the
138state operates on a more complete basis would be fantastic that that's the only thing that I'll say there okay thank you anything else on this one uh yes I'll defer to Julia if I'm understanding this correctly it's not that the state would be making up the difference but this would allow districts to charge amilies to like make help make up the difference am I reading that correctly [Music] so the Regional School District may allow pupils to opt out of such Transportation or may charge a fee that in aggregate yes so they're charging pupils or their families so that um and and so it feels like this is Shifting the burden to families like the just we as Regional districts Joe I'm with you right like but but I wonder if this lets the state off
139the hook and I don't feel as good about um uh setting I it would be an individual District's choice and I think in as long as I'm on the committee I would not feel comfortable asking families to pay that fee um and I I feel like it shifts the burden to families instead of keeping it with the state so isn't that fee applied only if they are capable of walking they're within walking distance but they choose to take Transportation instead greater than one and a half mile from the school of attendance this just to the way I had originally read it and having looked at some of the broad and Carrie this might be actually something great to bring back for discussion um any school district that has students that it transports who are less
140than a mile and a half away from school using a Google Maps type calculation um those students we don't receive any we we actually get penalized effectively for transporting them because the the the state takes our their total expenditures and it it pretty much requires us to use a per pupil you take the total and then you take whatever percentage of students you transport who are under a mile and a half and you need to reduce the reimbursement eligible money by that percentage um for a school like say Lanesboro elementary school they're actually at you know it is fairly Central in town that mile and a half radius using roads you you cannot reasonably walk that stretch safely um you know it's it's less true in Williamson but the way I had originally read this
141I had read that that the state was going to try to come up with ways to to give us more flexibility to deal with that inside the mile and a half which then gives us a wedge to then talk about how those actually are really ethically required bits of Transportation um but I understand how others are reading this right now and I'm realizing may maybe I'm not correct so that that's a point of clarification that I would love personally Okay so uh two items on this m uh first I think it's extremely good that they have uh the phrase commonly traveled because you know especially in Brookshire County you can be very close as the crow F flies but not have good roads are good ways to do that and then of course as was
142just being said what can be commonly traveled by a car is not the same as can be commonly traveled bya walk and that's a extremely important distinction to make the other thing thing is I don't know if it's really relevant to this but does transportation just involve going to and from school at the beginning and the end of the day as opposed to also extracurricular activities at the end because that that might be something to have in future conversations is the transportation needs to make sure that after school activities are accessible to all current regional transportation funding only involves the the two from school it does not involve Athletics or co-curriculars okay yep yeah so that's a good point to raise though um in terms of when we're trying to figure out the transportation needs
143of students in the district that it's more than just those two times yep okay anything else on this one okay U moving right along resolution four diversity equity and inclusion so this is submitted by division 10 and amended by the resolutions committee um this is the one that Steve had brought up previously um masc recommends that all districts adopt the position of Dei coordinator to work toward an anti-racist school system system now I don't think they're necessarily I didn't interpret this to mean that um every school district should go out and hire someone new um more that someone on staff excuse me on staff should be appointed as the Dei coordinator um to take responsibility and accountability for the district so go ahead so you know again I I would like very clear language as
144to what is meant there I would much rather have you know language saying that we want districts to work to being you know inclusive places you know along those lines rather than specifying a specific way that should happen G may I may I say something thing related to this uh resolution although these are school committee resolutions but just just to contextualize this a little bit um this is one of the few resolutions that come before you that that don't really it's it's this recommendation is if it is to pass the delegate conference um in that second week of of November I think it's Wednesday Thursday Thursday and Friday maybe the 8th 9th and 10th of November um this will this one will not go on to the legislature this one will not go on to
145the State Board of Education this is really a this one reads to me as a solely internal masc is suggesting and recommending that every District identifies somebody like we're required by state law to have a title 9 coordinator where we have to have a health and wellness uh coordinator we we we are required to have certain people identified as certain things they're not new hires they their jobs that that a a a homeless coordinator is is by title one that the state requires this is not even going that far um again and I'm not you know it's I hope I'm not out of line talking about strictly school committee business but this is a recommendation from the masc to its member districts and that's where its Authority end just to be clear thank you Jake
146Julia did you have your hand up um I was going to share maybe similar to what Jake said um that there are coordinator positions in districts that the state actually names those and it just means they get the mailings uh about homelessness that need the district needs to know or they report on the numbers or whatever and I um with that understanding that this is a recommendation from the asso from the masc to the um districts or to the members um you know I I feel like this is a low something that we really should be recommending or I would really want to see recommended I I would just like to see clean a language on that you know use language such as as other issues facing our districts have a point person named in
147the district you know we recommend that each district have a point person named for M okay um resolution five uh Mass School building authority dear all right so the resolution there three of them that the MS masc call upon the legislature to amend the mgl chapter 70b section 7 by removing the 800 million doll cap and that the masc call upon the massachusett school building authority to reinstate The Accelerated repair program for 2024 applications and that the masc call upon the mass legislature to allow public preschools to be included in the accelerated repair program and core program any issues with this one is that a typo 800 million not necessarily um so let's see [Music] um it appeared was that for the whole state that's for the whole state that's for the whole state not
148individual projects that's how that's that's how I was reading it but again the language could probably be clearer okay all right um next school bus stop arm surveillance act and enforcement and penalties this is submitted by pebody peid excuse me peid and Marboro School committees um there are districts in the state and I've heard um some real horror stories about um the rates at which um automobiles pass school buses that are stopped with the warning arm out and kids are crossing the street and kids are getting hit kids are getting um severely injured um and uh it's been a real problem I know uh some districts have already installed uh cameras on the school buses so I'm not sure why there's a resolution um permitting that or maybe that's not what this one is doing
149let me just see oh it's the penalties yeah the enforcement and the penalties okay so the resolution is that the masc calls upon the legislature to enact legislation to pass into law the ability for cities and towns to install on all school buses Live digital video detection monitoring systems for the purpose of enforcing violations against the owner of a motor vehicle whose vehicle failed to stop for a school bus when required to do so by law further resolve um that um they raise the fine for passing a stop school bus to a significant schedule of fines as penalty were e whether witnessed by a police officer or recorded by a digital video detection monitoring system and then they present a rationale so any issues with this one uh yes I have an issue with this
150one okay and so my issue is that it talks about uh get the exact language for the purpose of enforcing viations against the owner of a motor vehicle what about the driver of the motor vehicle as well now I I know that it may be difficult to find who the driver is you know you can take a picture of the license plate and then track down who owns the car but I was surprised that there was no language at all about the driver of the car okay anything else great thank you Steve um resolution s related to mcast um masc urges Massachusetts to develop a wider more consensus built strategy for an evaluation system with meaningful input from legitimate stakeholders masc urges the state legislature to launch a comprehensive evaluation to investigate the extent of
151biases pertaining to mcast testing and make these results public that masc urges Massachusetts to enact a moratorium on M mcast testing effective immediately that's my favorite that masc urges Massachusetts to develop an alternative to the high stakes mcast test what do people think Julia well pursuant to my comments earlier I think this is incredibly misguided um I have no problem with studies to see if there are biases um to try to build consensus around the exam though that first one indicates maybe they didn't they don't believe they were legitimate stakeholders the first time which I'm not so I don't love that language but putting a moratorium on something that's helping our districts understand our how we're serving our students uh feels really misguided um so that's the my real issue I would support that statement
152as well Christina is also a thumbs up all right you're that's a thumbs up to the comments Christina is that right or to yeah okay all right Curtis gave is given his thumbs up too okay great um and then finally uh resolution 8 safe storage of firearms submitted by Framingham um the pre previous one was also submitted by fra Framingham all right um so where is the actual resolution here oh I see it's oh sorry sorry have to scroll down uh masc recommends all districts to urge their superintendent and staff to create an appropriate communication to parents and Guardians that explains the importance of secure firearm storage to protect children and teens from unauthorized access to unsecured firearms and their legal obligations consistent with Massachusetts safe storage law further resolve that mesc urges other communities
153to work with their local law enforcement agencies Health agencies and nonprofit organizations to collaborate and increase efforts to inform District parents and guardians of their obligations regarding Secure Storage of firearms in their homes and vehicles Jose no this is uh sorry K I'm happy to wait to ask this question it's just just a general question about process at the um at this upcoming event so I can I'm just going to pause and wait for other folks to ask questions regarding this particular resolution okay so again I think we did already vote to support this at a previous meeting probably isn't going to be much discussion on this so just making the same comment as I've been making I think all night I like the language of this one a lot better where it's you know
154urging the super intend staff I would say you know to create an appropriate communication the appropriate communication might already exist and so I would just you know have the language you know again different districts might solve the problems in different ways we want to make sure that the information is getting where it needs to go and it might already be present so there's no need to create it it might be being done by other Community Players but we should make sure that the information is getting out so I like the word urge but I think the rest of this should be tweaked a little bit it's to urge to make sure that each district the information is made you know available okay great Jose thank you Carrie um I just wanted to confirm that you
155know you're receiving feedback from us that you may share at the annual meeting but you you were in no way beholden to vote on these resolutions in a way that reflects for instance what we might suspect to be you know a majority opinion so that that's correct right Carrie you're technically um technically a a delegate is um it's recommended that they vote as their committee would like them to but they are not it's like any delegate to anything um they're not obligated um by any rule um or law to do so but yes I would like to be able to vote as the committee um as is the um you know will of the committee um so that it's not just me making decisions on things that might affect the committee or the district down
156the road would like a a straw poll of sorts be helpful to you I guess I'm not sure that we have given you the information or given you what you'd like to be prepared for the annual meeting is that is that right um I have a sense of what the concerns are with each of the resolutions and that some are you know more supported than others or some are more objected to than others um so you know once I hear what all the questions are that are raised Ed at the uh delegate assembly and there is usually you know quite a bit of discussion about these I have the feeling there'll be more than usual um this year um then I I should be able to make a you know H make an honest vote
157of it I I would say can I just quickly make a comment yeah yeah I I I trust you krie to go to the meeting with the feedback we've given you and to listen listen to what's being said by the other delegates and to act accordingly this is why we send delegates through Gatherings like this because there are often you know subtle issues that you are not initially clear or it's not coming across as people meant it to and that's why you have discussions and so if we were to discuss these things in Greater detail right now that may be different than the final thing that you're voting on and so I I feel like I've done a good job of conveying to you my general concerns in terms of the language that's used and
158then specific concerns about individual items and so I am quite happy to have you uh represent uh myself in the district sounds good Jose does that um satisfy your question yes definitely I mean I just a second uh Stephen I think um you know I I very much trust your your judgment and and Trust how you'll how you think uh you should vote on these particular resolutions but at the same time want you know it sounds like that you have received the feedback um that would help you you know M make decisions regarding these resolutions at the annual meeting yeah I appreciate the committee taking the time to provide that feedback um so as as Jake said the the um the conference which is a joint Conference of the masc and the Mas is Wednesday
159um November 8th through Friday November 10th which is um H the the day we celebrate Veterans Day this year um and the delegate assembly if we wanted to vote an alternate um is that Wednesday so the 8th at uh 3:15 p.m. and it is in hyenas so it's a bit of a drive to take a vote on eight resolutions but just putting that out there if anybody wants to be um the alternate we do need to submit that to the masc I think Julia has her hand raised well I have my hand raised for something very different it's been raised for longer tried okay great that's it for this can I ask a a um quick I want to say thank you Carrie um thank you for taking the lead on this and representing us
160and I Echo what Stephen um Jose said I also want to apologize for not having watched my school committee my masc mail better um which I will attend to in the future um but also I think our November school committee meeting is November 9th while you guys are there I just want to flag that because it feels like we should be rescheduling that meeting yeah good point thank you yeah definitely would be the ninth because it would be that's the second Thursday of the month right which may be problematic for people given that it's just before a long you know a three-day weekend anyway but we will work on getting that rescheduled Julia you upended months of planning and diabolical planning on my part to get out of avoid one one one sentence you no
161we'll we'll get to work on I already got out of my one school committee meeting for the entire year so I'm not allowed another one from what I'm told you're done I would just throw out the following Tuesday I think it's the 15th as a potential date for the postponement of that meeting just lobbing that out there in the hopes wait I'm confused the 14th is a Tuesday the 14th the 14th do you think would be a good reschedule date okay we'll we'll get out of we'll get out of poll figure it out but I do like the Tuesdays I'm not gonna lie it's probably difficult for the district though because they have to get the uh packet out on on a Friday which is probably a little trickier it's fine we're we're just grateful
162to have it you know to be able to to get through to do it so we'll we'll make it work no matter what but we'll get something out tomorrow but um do be thinking about that Tuesday folks um and and we can see if that could work works for me yep works for me too I'm seeing a lot of nods is there anybody who knows for certain as you're sitting there that you cannot do that date could we pencil that in we can check in with Ursula tomorrow I think that's a great idea okay okay thank you Carrie anything else for carry resolutions are we sure we don't have an alternate delegate who wants to go to hyanis okay so next up on the agenda is the school committee officers discussion and this is what
163we talked about last month where people could come forward and say I'm interested in doing this um and then we maybe avoid some of the um confusion that we had last November um when we went through this um and I know Joe we we meant to get this into the packet if how it works of multiple people get nominated in November um but um we couldn't find it so I apologize maybe you can find it at some point um I will throw it out there that I would be more than happy to to chair the school committee for another year um if that was so desired um it's been great having Carrie always as Vice chair and especially um Carrie in her role that she has been serving serving on the finance committee has been
164um exemplary and honestly everyone who's taken up leadership roles in um our subcommittees and serving on our subcommittees and serving on this committee is just appreciated above and beyond I know it's not easy all of you are parents some with very active children you are all career-minded people with very active career so I appreciate all of you and the time um that you serve on this committee so throwing that out there if anyone else is interested in chair or um Steve do we call it secretary I always forget what that is secretary right it is secretary okay you happy happy to continue doing that awesome Carri Curtis Julia Jose I really like uh the stability that comes with the consistent leadership that we have I feel like we have this really great intricate machine that's
165working at a very high level uh and I also in self-defense uh have just begun teaching again in a new District so uh my brain uh is exploding at the idea of adding anything more to that bandwidth uh where are you teaching Curtis I am teaching at uh HK Valley Middle School and their seventh grade math teacher because I wanted a big change from sixth grade math that's awesome congratulations thanks uh but yeah I just I uh and it's every aspect it's the reliability of Stephen's uh accuracy in detail and ie for detail in capturing uh everything including Nuance uh it's our chairs very uh evenhanded and uh smooth leadership and uh carries incredible depth and breadth of knowledge as the vice chair like all the all the assets being uh utilized really well uh
166that make this such a great team to be on so I say great job everyone I wish you would all keep doing that great job so I don't have to do any more of a job because again my brain is exploding thank you thank youness uh I swear I just saw a hand up I think I'm getting ghost hand okay are we ready to move on thanks everyone okay so um I would like to make a motion to enter enter into executive session with intent to return to open session pursuant to mgl chapter 30A a section 21 A2 to conduct negotiations with non-union Personnel FY 24 superintendent and business administrator salaries and contracts as I'm taking the notes I'll I'll second thank you any discussion all in favor o and I conry I Constantin ey
167elf and B ey green ey Milla I okay thank you it's 8:42 um and Joe are you able to create okay awesome thank [Music] you scares me every time oh okay it is 9:05 and we have all successfully moved back to the main room I would like to make a motion to accept the contract and salary terms for the superintendent and assistant superintendent as discussed the title change from business administrator to assistant superintendent salary increase of 1.5% for the superintendent and 4.5% for the assistant superintendent and length of contract of six years for the assistant superintendent being the key terms of the agreements thank you Curtis has made a motion would every anyone like to second that Carrie seconds any discussion Julia I I just want to um share publicly um How uh much we
168appreciate uh Jake and Joe's leadership and um appreciate Joe's uh growth in this role from uh business manager to assistant superintendent and all of the work that got you there and and that's part of that increase um and how we our district is stronger so much stronger for the two of you thank you thank you Julia definitely Echo those sentiments same thank you okay hearing no further discussion all in favor B and I conry I Constantine I alen Bine I green I Miller I thank you that motion passes unanimously next up um upcoming meetings and important dates um there will be a policy subcommittee meeting to be determined um as we discussed earlier there'll be a field and track project committee November 1st at 10:30 a.m. at Mount Greylock is that an inperson meeting yes
169it is um there will be a finance subcommittee meeting November 2nd at 4M and there is a tentative um special school committee meeting November 2nd at 6: pm. um for the field and track project and and just a note um due to [Music] um scheduling conf conflicts with the um Masa division meeting that's happening we will um tentatively be moving our regularly scheduled meeting from November 9th to Tuesday November 14th um I have no other items for discussion are there any agenda requests okay hearing none would someone like to make a motion to adjourn so moved second moves Miller second Stephen second all in favor boen I conry I Constantine i alen b ey green I Mila I thank you it is 9:08 p.m. and we are adjourned thank you every one for your time
170have a good night night thank you