001Welcome everyone to the North Middle Sex Region School Committee meeting on September 16th, 2025. I'm calling the meeting at 6:04 p.m. This meeting is being recorded. I'm going to take a roll call vote. Randy Rous >> here. >> Lisa Bloom. >> Kenan Francois here. Uh, Patrick McFillips >> here. >> Jackie White >> here. >> Alexander Vancudi >> here. >> Carla Lima >> here. Lisa or Kim here. and myself here. All right. Um below is a consent agenda. Are there any questions? It's approval of the minutes from and there are some finance operations f and policy minutes in there as well and we'll get those complete. Randy, >> um I was on Yeah. I was just curious why the policy uh minutes made it in here. We meet every two weeks or every two to three
002weeks and we've been approving them right along. >> I think we were just putting them on here just to get them complete. But it's up to you and take them off Randy. >> Yeah. No, I have >> if you want or >> No, I'm not. >> I think it's just to get it off off the packet. Yeah. to get so that we can release minutes to people if they ask and >> Okay. Again, I was just curious because it's a change in process and what we've done. >> Y >> understood. Um Brad, >> um I'm just noticing it looks like it looks like Nancy Haynes is in the waiting room >> or is a panelist. I'm sorry. Uh so we may need to promote her and >> Yep. I'm not sure if um this >>
003I promoted her. >> Okay. And um Mr. Hammond as well. >> All right. I'll promote him as well. >> Robin happens to be on vacation everyone. So give patience as I'm the operator of the >> All right. Going back to the consent agenda. Anyone have any questions about consent agenda? Someone want to make a motion? >> I will move to um to accept the uh the I apologize. I move to accept the consent agenda as uh presented in the agenda. >> Second. >> That was Randy Ro and Lisa Bloom. [Music] Roll call vote. Randy, >> yes. >> Lisa Bloom, >> yes. >> Alexander Vancoui, >> yes. >> Kenan Francois, >> yes. >> Arla Lima, >> yes. >> Kim Craraven, >> yes. Jackie White. >> Yes. >> Alexander Vancoui, did I get you? Things pop around.
004Okay, I did. And myself. Yes. Consent agenda is approved. >> I'll also be a yes. Pat McFillips. You missed me. >> Oh, I did miss you. You things pop around on my screen. Sorry, Patrick. >> Totally fine. Public communications. There were none for this evening. Chairman's report or chairperson's report. Um there are two community relations in the news. We did a story was done on the lasting memory memories of Townsen's past through an oral history project and Kenan Francois was a member of this with our um honor society our history history honor society did this at the school. It's a great article and I think everyone should also visit the videos and watch. It's a great history. Also, the high school earned the continued education from the North or New England Association of Schools and
005Colleges. That's also an article that everyone should read. We have several happenings going on in NM. There's several um open houses going on. There's some committee meetings as well as homecoming will be coming along as well at the end of the month. Um, and then that is all for my chairperson's report. Did Natalie Stupck stup is that how you say it, Brad? >> Um, yes. Um, and I do not see >> Dupac, I think. >> I'm just checking the list. >> I don't see her on the list yet. >> I don't see her on the list. And I know that um she was going back and forth with Miss Ivy this week. So, I'm going to assume that she could not make the meeting this evening. >> All right. We'll keep an eye out for
006She's a student representative and she'll give a report as well during our school committee meetings. So, she may join us. I'll keep an eye out and see if she joins. All right. for that I'm going to hand it over to you Brad for your superintendent report. >> Sure. Thank you. And um as I do every year um I generally share the open houses uh but those are in those are on the agenda. Some have already happened. Uh so this evening I'm just going to go through the retirees, the 25-year service award u people that have been recognized and our new hires as well. So, it's a fairly lengthy list. I will share this uh superintendent's report uh with all of you and also for the minutes uh at the conclusion of this meeting. But I
007am just going to read off the names now as I as I have done in years past. First and foremost, would like to recognize our retirees who retired um at some point in time, many of them at the end of the year, but some over the course of last year depending upon um their birthday and retirement dates. We have Elaine Berlandi who is a par profofessional at the high school. Lisa Caro who is an art specialist at Ashby Elementary. Claire Cooper a French teacher at the high school. Deianne Patrick a par professional at Spalding. Robert Fletcher a special education teacher at the high school. Michael Gaggin math teacher at Hawthorne Brook. Sarah Joy an English teacher at the high school. John Judge the assistant director of special education. Debbie McMaster a second grade teacher at
008Spalding. Janine Roberts, a teacher at Spalding, and Frank Spinelli, a custodian. Ed Varnham Brookke would also like to recognize the following individuals who have now in their 25th year of service to North Middle Sex. They began their service in 2000. Um, Maryanne Buts professional, Ed Varnenbrook, Olga Conant, high school, uh, English teacher. Dena Daniels, a special educ special education teacher at Nissat Tisset. Michael Davidson, an English language arts teacher at Hawthorne Brook. Lisa D. Pasquali, special education teacher, Spalding. Judith Gravel, district technology technician, uh, districtwide. Suzanne House, a Squanook, preschool teacher. Carolyn Khalil, performing arts teacher at Varnenbrook. Sharon Lejudis, foreign language teacher at the high school. Richard Mayo, a multilingual learner teacher at Hawthorne Brook. Uh Beth Poniac, a par profofessional at Varnham Brook, Val Travado, special education teacher at the high school, and
009Shawn White, a math teacher at the high school. And obviously would like to thank them for the years of service and dedication to the students in the NM learning community. And then we have a list of new hires. Again, we will share this with all of you. So you will have it um for the minutes. Districtwide, Margaret Simpson, speech and language pathologist. Arthur Karu, second shift's custodian. Sabrina Congr, the special education coordinator. And then at Hawthorne Brook Middle School, we have Alyssa Fay Matsius, a long-term school counselor at Hawthorne Brook in the high school. Arun Vegnapal, a long-term substitute counselor, and Megan White, a speech and language pathologist assistant. At Nissat Tisset, we have Donna Bonedz, special education teacher. Megan Capone, speech and language pathologist. Laura Francis, music teacher. Abigail Hamson Wol Wolridge, special education
010teacher. Madison Wrestllo, par profofessional. Elizabeth Sorrowos, a grade eight science teacher, and Denise Walker, a par professional. at the high school. Heather Aceto Delore, biology teacher. Jill Cario, special education teacher. Lisa Driscoll, school psychologist. Bessie Grippo is par professional. Amanda McAnd professional, Joseph Pamales, par professional. Jessica Renul, assistant principal. Kenneth Savage, math teacher. Olifan Tortoelli, Spanish teacher. And Gabriella Verano, par professional. It's Guanakook Early Childhood Center. Griffin Case, second shift custodian. Carrie Mahoney, general assistant, Stacy Sheldon in the special education leap program. At Spalding Memorial, we have Eleanor A, visual arts teacher, Amy Dagghastino, PAR professional. Bonnie Fitzpatrick, general assistant, Sydney Gray, guidance counselor, and Tamara Hadley, the second shift custodian. And finally, at Vernon Brook, we have Emily Anderson, long-term substitute for grade two. Shaylee Boucher, title one teacher. Blaine Budi, second shift custodian.
011Caitlyn Dolan, par profofessional. Emma Hagar, it's a onetoone par professional. Judith Kakyra, one:1 par professional, and Caroline Morales, school counselor. So again, this will be shared with all of you for the minutes and uh we will also be looking to do a hiring profile later on at our October meeting as well. Any questions on that? >> Okay, thank you. That's all I have for this evening. >> Like to Okay. Whoops, Brad. I just want to congratulate everyone that has served 25 years, our retirees and the new hires. Anyone else have anything? All right, moving on to new business. Number one is adherence to established procedures. Um, this was requested by Kim Craraven to be put on the uh agenda and so I'm going to hand it over to Kim. >> Thank you. I appreciate uh
012the opportunity to talk about this. Um I know recently uh you had sent around as chair >> some policies or practices for us to adhere to so that we could ensure that we are not overloading administration with uh requests um and sort of streamlining our processes. Um I think that it's really important that we follow protocols and processes and things that are outlined in meetings. I recently participated in a meeting where you as the chair had given some instructions for me to do some followup and unfortunately another member that was in the meeting took it upon themselves to to do the followup. I think that we need to be respectful of sort of lanes of what folks are working in. I think that when we cross over and step on one another um with given
013responsibilities or tasks or what folks are working on, it can cause a level of confusion. It can be disruptive. Um it can cause a waste of time for folks that are working on things. So I wanted to talk about it or at least bring to light to the full school committee that you know we need to um be respectful of one another make sure that we are not walking over what someone else is trying to do and that if you have an interest in what someone's doing um not to go around above or through them but to talk with the person um that has been assigned so that conversations don't go a skew I don't think it's in anyone's best interest to have to kind of then dissect conversations that happened around something that was
014happening. Um I think that you know it just it puts barriers up and it creates more work for those involved. So again, um, Madam Chairperson, I appreciate that you had put that email out, but I think that we need to really adhere and think about those policies and practices um, as we're going to different meetings and not sharing things outside of meetings um, when someone else has been asked to do so. >> Thank you, Kim. I do know I'm going to add to this. We do have at our next meeting which is going to be a retreat of professional development for the school committee. It's going to be going over the roles and responsibilities of all the members. Um MASC is coming in. Randy has lined it up with MASC to come in. Randy, who
015is a presenter? What is her name? >> Alicia Melon. And so she's going to come in and offer a professional development on how what roles and responsibilities. I also suggest to the committee to look at our policies that are around governance and the roles that we take on because that can help um give you some homework before we go into this retreat. Anyone have anything to add? someone. Randy, >> um I just want to add that uh Alicia Melon did say that she has a PowerPoint that she's going to share before the meeting. So, I'll make sure that everybody gets that so you can uh get a little bit familiar at least uh and get questions for her. Um I have not worked directly with Alicia. She is new uh this year. Um we had
016uh you know um we had somebody else last year that they have retired. Um Dorothy Presser was our uh field director before her. Um Alicia Malin uh seems very competent. Um has all the resources. Um I've worked with her now uh just in the background trying to get all this put together for some uh training for the school committee and I am very happy so far with everything that MASC and Alicia has been putting together for us. So hopefully we'll have a good training. >> Yes. I also want to bring up something else that we need to follow too. The superintendent has his um chain of command that he follows in his system and it's put in his weekly updates of where and who to direct your questions to. So, I want to make sure
017that the community knows this as well and that we as a committee are following this as well. Brad, do you have anything to add to that? Sorry to put you on the spot. >> Sure. Um, no problem at all. No. And this is um I just want to be clear um just with regard to communication. This is not this has nothing to do with me not wanting to communicate. It has to do with giving the people um at the building level, whether it be a principal um a teacher um or anyone else that may be at the building level the opportunity to address a problem that's being brought forward to me before I actually get involved. It is it's very important um you know to the members of my team that they have that ability
018to try to address the problem first. And again, the same thing would be would be true if a parent or a community member were calling a um a building administrator about something that happened in a classroom without calling that teacher first to give the teacher the opportunity to address it first. Um, everyone feels pretty strongly about having the opportunity um to address issues before again it makes it to um a level that's beyond them without them actually having the opportunity to try to address it themselves. So again, it's it's um I I don't like the term chain of command. That is what it's called in what we send out. It's more or less just giving the appropriate individual the opportunity to address the issue that's come forth before um other people get involved. And usually
019that initial person that we're asking uh the communication to be directed to has the majority of the information anyway. Um, and when a step is skipped, it usually involves someone else having to reach out to that individual to get the background information that should have really have been shared with that initial point of contact to begin with just to eliminate again unnecessary steps. That's all. Thank you. >> And I did see that um that Natalie joined us. >> Yep. I promoted her. And if anybody does anybody have any more questions >> I u >> about this agenda item. >> I just want to be clear that um that that under this item there's two very separate and distinct what the superintendent is speaking of um with communication. Um and then what I was speaking of
020are two separate issues that did not have to do with the superintendent. Um it was someone else carrying forward information from a meeting. Okay, thank you Kim for the clarification. All right, anyone else? All right, we are going to step back and Natalie has joined us. Natalie, is she >> There she is. Hi, Natalie. She's our student representative. Natalie, if you want to introduce yourself to the committee um >> and give your report. >> Uh my name is Natalie Stupac. I am a junior at North Middle Sex. Um I don't really know what else to say for that, but I'm in like a number of the clubs at the school as well. Um so the first thing we had was student council. We have homecoming coming up on the 27th which is going to be
021hosted by the class of 2026 and 2028. We have um the girls powderpuff game which is on the 28th of October and it's like a tournament between 9th and 10th and then 11th and 12th and then the winner. And then the other issue that was kind of raised by student council was I don't they just asked me to kind of bring it to everyone's attention was that it's a student organization that directly benefits the school. So, they were they had a concern just with the club fee impacting them, but that was kind of the only other thing they had. Um, National Honor Society had their applications due on the 12th. Roappa National Honor Society had applications on the 15th. Uh, sports, we have a pep r pep rally scheduled for the 26th. And we have
022homecoming games kind of spread between the afternoon of the 26th through the like morning to afternoon of the 27th. And then I didn't really hear anything from any of the service learning groups or the tri national honor society. That's I think that's pretty much it. >> Thank you, Natalie. And so homecoming is with the soccer teams this year, correct? They're having soccer games. Is Lori, maybe Lori can help us with this, too. Lorie Smith, sorry. On the >> Hi. So, the homecoming is actually all >> Yep, that's okay. The homecoming is all the sports are playing. Um, it's on different days. It kind of starts on Wednesday, but um and then on Friday night the 26th is volleyball is at 5:15 and then field talk is at 5:30 and then on Saturday cross country is
023at 10:00 a.m. Um girls soccer is at noon and boys soccer is at 2:30. We did a little flip from last year. Uh field hockey was on Saturday and the soccer games were on Friday night. So they made the switch this year. So field hockey is on Friday and um soccer is on Saturday. All right. And everyone is invited to those games. >> Oh, absolutely. Anybody can go. We're also having school committee members. It'd be great to see [Music] >> and and that that's on Saturday afternoon, correct? >> Or Saturday morning afternoon. >> The activities fair. >> Yep. It's from 10 to 2. >> The activities fair is Saturday afternoon. >> Yeah. 10 to 2. All right. It sounds great. Thank you, Lori. Natalie, thank you as well. Um, hey, >> back more information to
024the school committee. >> Of course. Thank you. >> And Patrick McFillips has a question for you. H >> how do you feel how do you feel uh the the no backpacks is going? Do you think it's impacting things or do you feel like it's it's working out? Well, >> I think that like we're starting to get the hang of it now, but for me, I know me personally and other people like in the morning it's kind of a struggle. Like if you're getting in like if you're not getting in by like 7:05, then it's kind of a struggle and people are kind of running a little bit later. And then the other struggle I'm kind of seeing is rushing out at uh 1:54. Like I know the buses are being held back a little bit,
025but it's like kind of feels like a mad house trying to get to the lockers at the end of the day. But like in between passing periods, it's been working pretty well. >> All right, thanks. >> All right, moving on. Thank you, Natalie. All right, the second item on the agenda tonight is about Tony Bent and the retreat that we are doing October 7th. It's a retreat of professional development. So, I'm just making the committee members aware that I will be sending out information about Tony and he will be requesting to have a Zoom meeting with each individual and we will I will help him arrange these with you. So, look for those emails and also timely responses on these because those need to get done before our October 7th meeting and I know everyone's
026schedule is booked. So that would be great if we can do that. Any questions about the retreat? So the next two meet just to be clear with the community and everyone the next two meetings that the school committee is is handling will be in person and they will be retreats professional development for the school committee and they will be in person at either the LGI room or we're talking about another location as well inside the school building. Any questions? Lisa Bloom. Whoops. Lisa. Whoops. You're on mute. >> Sorry. I was trying to must have hit the raised my hand twice. Um, so we have the next one >> the 7th for the retreat. >> Nope. September 30th is MASC is coming in >> to do a retreat, a professional development. And then October 7th, Tony
027Bent is doing a professional de development retreat with us where he's going to be doing team building. >> Okay. Right. >> Thank you for clarifying. Yep. >> Thank you, Randy. >> Um I believe uh you had mentioned that Tony Bent was going to reach out to all the school committee members. Do you know when that would start? I have a meeting with him tomorrow and hopefully he's giving me the email for you guys to get the Zoom meetings and so they'll be like within these next two weeks. So, >> okay. Thank you. >> So, that's why I'm saying to you, watch for those emails because he's looking to talk to each individual and it's he's going to ask each of you the same questions and get a sense and an icebreaker kind of mode is
028what he has said. All right. Any more questions with that? All right, moving on. Do we want to do the outofstate travel so that Lori can have her evening back? Would that be okay if everybody if we can move that up on the agenda? Um c can I just add if if we're going to do the out of state travel we would have to do the um the the change in the positions the names because Lori is needed for that as is Miss Upton. >> Okay, we can do both of those. So let's do out of state travel and then let's do the names and responsibilities so that they have their evening back. And do we want >> do we want to excuse Natalie or at least let her know that she's free to leave
029now if she'd like to? >> Yes, Natalie, you are free to leave if you'd like. >> Okay, perfect. Thank you. >> Have a good night, everyone. >> Good night, Nana. >> All right, moving to agenda number seven, outofstate travel. Miss Smith. So, the first one is the New York service learning trip. Um there, you know, those of you who have heard this in the past, they go for a few days to New York, um New York to do service to the to the city this year, um because our advisers are the same two people that are doing our Nola trip. Um they we're moving the dates from April to May so that way that the adviserss can go on both trips. Um May is going to be during the the Memorial Day weekend um for
030f for four or five days. and they're looking they things haven't been officially specifically settled yet about what they're doing, but it's kind of the same idea that they're going to be doing as they did last year in the previous years and staying in the same same area. And the the other one is the Nola trip. Um they're still going to New Orleans. >> Go ahead. >> Oh, go ahead, Lori. I think I'm delayed in my response. Go ahead. Keep going. Um the next one is the Nola trip New Orleans. They're going the same time during um April vacation where they're going to go from Friday to Friday. It's the exact um kind of same itinerary. Just the specifics about where they're going doing their service might change a little. That is still being worked
031out because you can't do some of those until a few months before. Um but you know, Mr. Angeluchi and Mr. Lunchstrom the advisers for both of them and for both trips and uh they're seasoned veterans at this and they are working right now about getting students to to go in in the next steps. And they're looking for approval to be able to go to both trips this for in May, April and May of 2026. I know that the students enjoy these and our students come back revitalized with volunteering and doing service for their own community. and different communities. So, I appreciate both of these trips that they go on. Randy, >> I too I I think these trips are absolutely wonderful. I know a number of uh friends of mine whose children went on um
032all four years in some cases uh for these two trips. These are wonderful trips. Uh the question I have is with the new dates for the New York uh service learning. Um it looks like they're going to be missing a couple of days of school. because the Memorial Day weekend is only a three-day weekend if I'm correct. >> Correct. So, they're going to be um leaving on Thursday the 21st after school um in May. So, they're only going to be missing on that Friday and they be returning to North Milk on that Monday. So, they're only missing on the Friday. And that's similar to the New York I'm sorry, the NOLA. They leave on Thursday afternoon and they're just missing Friday from school. >> Okay. I I actually didn't notice the dates on the on
033the no one that they missed school too. Okay. Thank you. >> You're welcome. Any more questions? >> I think Lisa disconnected there. Um I don't know if anyone else noticed that, but I will ask Miss Smith. Um just curious on uh the NYSL. I understand they usually go during April break. Like is there just any reason why they're going in May now? >> Um yep. As I said that we had the same advisers for both groups this year, Mr. Angeluchi and Mr. Lundstrom. Um the previous adviser from last year had to step back. So they took it um they took it on. So they're that's why it's split split in two. So they're doing April for Nola since it's a longer trip and then New York is going to be doing for um Memorial Day
034weekend because so they can go on both trips. Thank you. I uh I I must have missed that. I was typing at the same time. >> That's okay. >> Are there any other questions? Oh, it looks like we're all set with questions. Martin. >> Lisa, you're on mute. >> Sorry, my system shut down on me for some reason, but I'm back. Can everyone hear me? Okay. >> Yes. >> All right. So, Nola, did we take a vote? >> We have not. >> We just need >> All right. Do I have a motion on the floor? >> I move that we approve the New York service learning and the new service learning trips as outlined for May and April of 2026. >> Second. >> That is by Kim and Lisa Bloom seconds. All right. Alexander Vancoui.
035>> Yes. Randy, >> yes. >> Lisa Bloom, >> yes. >> Craraven, >> yes. >> Keenan Francois, >> yes. >> Patrick McFillips. >> Patrick. >> Yes. >> Carla Lima. Yes. >> And myself. Yes. The service learning trips are approved for the coming year. >> Thank you. Um moving on to the roles and responsibilities from old business. >> Sure. >> This is with Aaron Upton, our special ed director, and uh principal Miss Smith. Correct. So I I can briefly des I can briefly describe these >> if you'd like and then we can um >> Okay. >> Miss Upton and Miss Smith could be here to answer questions. Does that make sense? >> That does make sense. >> Okay. So at the last meeting um both Miss Upton and Miss Smith present. I >> was going to jump
036in real quick. Hey guys. Sorry. Real quick, >> guys. Sorry. Just real quick. Jackie, that's going to be repromoted to panelists. >> If we can just repromote Jackie to panelists, that'd be great. Okay, I'll put her back in. >> Sorry about that. >> Okay, thank you, Patrick. >> So, again, um, Miss Upton, and Miss Smith presented at the last meeting, but the job descriptions were not align aligning with what you had in your packet. So, as you are aware, we have had a change in leadership um, in special education that took place. Um we're in year two now with Miss Upton and she had the opportunity in her during over the course of her first year to look at the uh administrative positions and basically look at the job descriptions to make sure that they
037were accurate and current. Um so she had proposed the move from the position that was formerly known as an evaluation team leader or ETL to a special education coordinator. Again, that more aligns with what that individual is actually doing. Um same thing at the high school. Um we had a change in principal um last year and with the reduction of an assistant principal at the high school and kind of the combination of an assistant principal then the assistant principal athletic director um Miss Smith had the opportunity to look at the assistant principal athletic director position that shared position and look at that job description and wanted to better align that from an assistant principal athletic administrator to the director of athletics extracurriculars, test administration, and after school supervisor. Um, so all of those current updates
038are now um in the packet. Um, again, these new positions basically align with what the roles and responsibilities of those individuals really are and have been um at this point in time, especially now um with the reduction of that full-time AP at the high school. Lisa, you're on mute. >> Thank you, Brad. >> Yes. >> All right. Uh questions, Randy? >> Um I have two things. Um one is a technical question. I think I'm looking at the job descriptions, the old and the new for both of the positions uh that we're talking about. I can't find any differences other than the title. I don't know if this is just we're doing all the same responsibilities and just renaming it or if the wrong items were put into the packet. Do you want to answer that
039Erin? At least for the um for the position. >> Yes. So the uh we did not change the job responsibilities, but we did change the title. That's correct. The title more align with the job responsibilities of a special ed coordinator. >> Okay. Um then I guess my other question is um other than job title um is there going to be any compensation changes, any kind of um I guess hierarchy change um any other changes with this uh new job title? >> Great question. So no, there's no additional um financial impact to the district and the um the assignment um and sort of hierarchy is also the same. >> Okay. And uh are we just aligning the titles with uh what's uh commonly out in practice elsewhere? >> Yes, that's correct. um to it really um
040allowed us to um acquire the best candidate for the position. Um when um people who are seeking positions as an evaluation team leader, they primarily think of that position as as really chairing meetings and processing the paperwork. Um, and what we were having our evaluation team leader do was to also be supporting programs throughout the district, evaluating staff, some of those more administrative pieces that require that special ed administrator license. >> Okay. Thank you. Um, and and would it be the same for the high school uh position? >> So, there is a couple different changes in regards to um not just the job title, but also what what's required. instead of a sister principal, that's taken out of the o the the the new one. But also, we've enhanced the parking responsibilities and also the
041extracurricular responsibilities of the fees and the rosters and making sure like who's doing it and the the dates and times for meetings. So, it's pretty much the same except for we're enhancing we're just enhancing the what the responsibilities are under those topics and there's no more financial change and um to that and the title change uh then is just again to align with what's out there or what the expectations of the different >> it's aligning with the expectations that we're having at at the high school at North Middle Sex. and the responsibilities. >> The individual is also no longer considered an assistant principal either. >> Okay, thank you. >> So, we would just need a motion and a vote to have these positions. >> Any more questions? >> All right. If somebody would like to
042make a motion. >> I move that the school committee vote to approve the title changes of evaluation team leader and assistant principal/athletic director to special educ education coordinator and director of athletics testing administration and afterchool supervisor respectively. >> Second. Thank you. Lisa Bloom seconded. All right. Roll call vote. Lisa Bloom. >> Yes. >> Kim Craraven. >> Yes. >> Jackie White. >> Yes. >> Keenan France. >> Yes. >> Alexander Vancoui. >> Yes. Patrick McFillips, >> yes. >> Carla Lima, >> yes. >> Randy, >> yes. >> I think I forgot you on there, R and myself. Yes, those are approved. All right. Now, we'll move back up the agenda. I'm going to go to election of officers. So, this is something that um Robin Ivy, our our administrative assistant to the school committee and I talked about
043because she is off tonight and she has seen this also in the list serve about appointing an acting clerk that would help during a meeting like this and help monitor the participants, take notes and um when she is unavailable to do that. Would the committee be interested in making this appointment? Any discussion or would there be somebody Randy >> going to say I was going to ask is there anybody that that you had in mind or somebody who's volunteered to do this? Are you looking for somebody from the committ? >> I was hoping for volunteer. Okay. So, >> I was hoping for a volunteer >> From the committee. Yes. >> And is this for um just a school committee meetings or is this for all subcommittees that she can't make? >> Just just the school
044committee because it's hard to if the chair is doing it, even the vice chair things like that. It's It's a difficult task. So, I was wondering if somebody besides myself could help take notes when Robin is missing or not missing. She's gone on vacation. >> I can certainly volunteer to do that for right now. I I probably would suggest that we look at this position um and make it an official position uh maybe with some other uh job duties. Maybe send this over to um the school committee operations subcommittee to take a look at what a school committee secretary or an internal school committee secretary uh could be responsible for. There may be some other things um that we can make this an official um uh position that does more um and helps the school
045committee in other ways. Anyone else have any suggestions or Patrick McFillips, are you okay with taking this on as one of your tasks to look at? >> Just grabbed the notebook >> for an acting clerk. >> Got it. All right. Thank you. Anyone else have any more comments about this topic? All right. Moving on to number four, the legislative advocacy subcommittee. I am handing this over to >> uh Lisa, you have on the on the agenda for it to be uh actually voted for the appointment of the acting clerk. I didn't know if you wanted to >> Well, we can hand it over. It was just a suggestion if we had the motion tonight, but >> that's fine. >> Patrick can can look at it. I mean, would somebody want to take some notes tonight?
046Randy, would you give me a few notes tonight? >> Yeah, I can do that. things. I have some as well. So together I think we can accomplish this. All right. Going Jackie White. >> Just one more thing too. I don't know if we have the ability on our Zoom instance, but um there are some AI tools now too that are really great at note capturing from Zoom meetings. So that could be an option for us. But we Okay. >> Yeah, we do use um Robin has her notetaker in here as well and we use that. Um we do have to watch AI sometimes. It doesn't give us everything. >> Does the closed captioning >> and we do record >> if the closed captioning is on too. That would be useful just for ripping through and
047reading notes quickly to pull out the important parts. Yes, I had it on earlier, but it has disappeared now. >> It's on for me still. I still see it. So, you might have just hit it at the bottom or you have such bandwidth that it might be just stopping it for you. >> Okay, thank you. And if someone is looking to find something to help Robin, um, you can take the YouTube and put it in to AI and get a full transcript and then search by words that you're looking for like vote taken so that you're getting the actual information from the script versus um an AI interpretation. There's a lot of tools out there that we can make and use. So, thank you for the suggestions. All right, any more questions about this topic?
048On to topic four, legislative advocacy subcommittee. I'm going to hand it over to Kenan Francois. >> Yeah. So, this is something that we uh uh voted on and brought in at the organizational meeting in May. Um we've had other things uh going on. So, we now have it uh a scope to be approved. I'll just read it out uh straight from the agenda. Um the legis the scope of the legislative advocacy subcommittee shall be to identify key fiscal policy and operational issues within the district, research and identify laws and regulations pertaining to set identified issues and work closely with work closely with and strategize with local lawmakers to form legislative solutions. uh the legislative advocacy subcommittee shall not pursue any direct advocacy testifying or otherwise representing a position on a specific matter without a vote
049of the entire school committee. Um pretty cut and dry. I'm happy to hear any feedback or suggestions on that. Um but hopefully we can get this uh going tonight so we can get a meeting scheduled. Anyone have any questions? There's also policy BJ that I think everyone can look at as well. It says about advocacy from the school committee and things. So review that policy as well with this. Any more questions? Is there a motion to accept the advocacy subcommittee scope. >> I will move to uh approve the legislative advocacy scope as presented um tonight. >> A second. >> And that was Randy and Kim. >> Yes. >> All right. Um Randy, >> yes. >> Lisa Bloom. >> Yes. >> Kim Craraven. >> Yes. Jackie. >> Yes. >> Keenan Francois. >> Yes. >> Kenan. Okay.
050He's saying yes. >> Okay. Alexander Vancoui. >> Yes. Patrick McFillips, >> yes. >> Carla Lima, >> yes. >> And myself is Yes. >> So, the legislative advocacy has a scope of a new member. Carla Lima was appointed by Ashb to represent Ashby. Carla, at this time do you know what committees that you would like to be on? And if you want to say something about yourself and introduce yourself to the group, that would be great. I I'm still um getting a a sense of all the different committees, so I haven't made a decision yet. Um, Lisa, um, I'm hoping to make that decision by the end of this week if that's okay. Um, if there's a rush on me making that decision, I can definitely try and expedite reading all of the different subcommittees um,
051and getting a better understanding of what each of them, you know, entails. Um, to understand what how much of my time that'll consume um, and if I can appropriately dedicate the time for each of those subcommittees. So, I don't want to overcommit and underdel. Let's put it that way. Um, a little bit about myself. I think I have introduced myself to some of you, but I obviously live in Ashb. I've been here for about a year and a half now going into the second year. Um, at the end of the year that I've been living here, um, absolutely love this area in our district. Um, came from Lemonster. In my prior world, I used to work in IT. Um I was a global um relationship manager for IBM and for Fuse. And once I had
052my son, I took the time away for family. So I um decided to walk away to just focus on Daniel and raising my son um and just spending more time with family, which got me focused into working with my husband's business. And now we're a family-owned business in the construction industry and we're general contractors. So, um, I definitely, you know, I've been following the committee for a little while and, um, definitely been advocating for, you know, our school and for our students. Um, and I, you know, I absolutely appreciate the opportunity to be here. >> Thank you, Carla. And you can take your time on the subcommittees. That's fine. you. We probably won't do appointments until the October 21st when we're all back together unless we do put it on one of our training retreat
053meetings where it would just be votes to put you through on a subcommittee. I'll look at the technicalities on >> Perfect. Thank you. because we'd have to develop the agenda and have those votes on there just to be clear if we're there tonight. It's okay as a liaison to Ashby um to talk to the select board as we do have liaison if that is okay as we need to take a vote on that Carla. >> Okay. So would somebody make a motion that Carla be the liaison of Ashb? >> I move to make Carla Lima the liaison from the school committee to Ashby. >> Second. >> Oh, we had a whole bunch of seconds. So we have Kim and I'll take Lisa Bloom on the second. All right. Roll call. Lisa Bloom. Yes, >> yes,
054>> Kim Craraven. Uh, Jackie White, >> yes. And welcome, Carla. >> Alexander Vancoui, >> yes. >> Patrick McFillips, >> yes. >> Randy Rous, >> yes. >> Kenan Francois, >> yes. Carla Lima, >> yes. >> And myself, yes. That appoints Carla as the liaison for Ashby. Um, moving on to the next item on the list is the Ashby Elementary School working group. Um, this is going to be um two appointments. It's going to be Carla Lima who is a liaison and Crim Craraven is going to work with the town of Ashb school to talk about next steps and their building. Any questions or Kim, do you want to say anything or Carla? Um I can just say a few words here. The goal is to just um be forward thinking on what the possibilities might be
055um and in keeping with the the policy to explore all options for the school um while it is in its unoccupied classification. There are some things that superintendent is working on and there's some thoughts from Ashb leadership of some things that we could explore as well and continue to look at all avenues of possibilities. Randy, >> um I would just like to know what the process is going to be as far as um updates uh to the school committee so we can vote on anything that looks like it might be a possibility uh to make sure that the school committee is behind um what is being discussed before it gets into too much detail. Um and if there's any kind of a scope or parameters that the school committee wants to put on this working
056group. Well, as with the nature of a working group, um it's their responsibility to bring ideas forward to the school committee for vetting. So that would be the process here that the opportunity for a group to get ideas put down, thought through and bring in front of the the school committee for moving forward. It's not for the school committee to place um its sole agenda. We've got representatives from the school committee on there um to discuss potentials, but it's for the working group to come up with ideas to bring back to the committee. And is there a time frame um because we have a very tight time frame uh for uh deciding on what we're doing with this building. Um if we're going to give it back to the town, if we're going to be
057using it for something, we have the MSBA. we need to get back to. Um, so what is the time frame for this? >> Understood, Randy, that it um has the the time frame of when the superintendent went to the state to ask for the year of unoccupied to come up with the plan. So, working under those parameters. >> Jackie, wait. Um, it might just be me, Kim, but your audio is really low. I don't know if you can jack it up a little bit. Um, so you had mentioned a couple of the stakeholders like talking that the working group would meet with Ashby, um, town leadership and also the superintendent's office. Is there an opportunity for community members from all three towns to be part of the working group or does it just have to
058be committee members? Do I think there'll be a variety of opportunities? And is the sound better? >> Sort of. Is it just me? Okay. >> Um, I think there'll be a variety of opportunities as the working group moves forward to have um people weigh in on thoughts and perspectives of things that could happen. um we've already discussed other folks outside of the appointed um members who could weigh in with different ideas and thoughts um for the future for the vision for information. So it certainly would not be limited to that small number um in order to make the the best effort possible. It will have to be inclusive. Exactly what that looks like, Jackie, we don't know yet. Still still too new. >> Yep. Got it. And I think obviously we've talked about this like
059communication will be key, right? just getting the word out there that this working group is coming together and that we're going to be soliciting input. I think however that factors into our process is is going to be important. Any more questions? Does somebody want to make the motion to appoint Carla Lima and Kim Craraven to work with the town of Ashb regarding Ashb Elementary and related next steps? And this is a working group. >> So moved. >> Can I just say that or do I have to redo the whole? >> That's great, Kenan. So moved. And do I have a second? >> I second. So that is Kenan Francois and Lisa Bloom. All right, a roll call vote. Lisa Bloom, >> yes. >> Kim Craraven, >> yes. >> Jackie White, >> yes. >> Alexander Vancoui,
060>> yes. >> Patrick McFillips, >> yes. >> Randy Roush, >> yes. Carla Lima, >> yes. >> Um, Kenan Francois, >> yes. >> And myself is yes. All right, moving on. We are down to the drama fee number eight as we've already done out of state travel. Um, Superintendent Morgan. >> Sure. So, um, thank you for putting this on the agenda. I greatly appreciate it. U, when we did the fees, um, back in the spring, um, it appears as though, um, an area we're going to have an issue with, uh, the drama fees. And the reason I say that is currently the fee says it's $50 uh, for the first event, excuse me, $100 for the first event and $50 for subsequent events. And there's there's two events at the high school. There's the fall early
061winter play and then there is the spring musical. The issue we're having is that um I would like to flip those in conversations with the advisers um to be that the play is $50 and that the musical is a hundred uh just because of the cost of the musical overall. It is the second event and not everyone necessarily participates in the play and in the musical and there is some concern from the um staff at the high school in being able to pull off the musical due to purchasing the rights, costumes, things of that nature. So, I've been asked for uh to see if we could possibly flip those again so that if someone participates in the play in the fall, it's a $50 charge as opposed to a hundred. And then if they opt
062for the musical, it would be a hundred. Either way, um anyone that does both, it would still be $150. It's just a change as to how the money is allocated into the student activity account because they are separate accounts. Kenan. >> Yeah. So, um I just I pulled up an email. I was at the uh performing arts booster uh meeting earlier this week. Um there are two I know last year we only had one play, one musical. Um but typically the high school does two plays, one musical. Um and it seems we're going back to that this year. Is that $50 uh for the play? Does that cover participation in play one and play two um or $50 per play? >> It's it's so the way it is right now it's $100 for the first
063event and $50 for subsequent events. What I'm so if there's two it would be and they and a student participates in both it's $150. What I'm asking the committee to do is allow me to flip it so that the first event which is the play is $50 and the second event is the musical which is $100. So again, if you're doing both, it's still $150. It's how the money is allocated to the student activity account uh so that the musical will have enough money um and they're not having to borrow from one account to the other. But um at this point in time, it looks as though there's going to be two performances moving forward. At least uh for the near f in the near future, it looks like that's going to be the plan.
064A play in the fall winter and then a musical in the spring. >> So I I don't I don't know if I got that correctly. Um in in the motion here, it says $50 for a school play. One school play on the schedule. There are for this year there are two plays in one musical. So I I don't I don't know if I if I articulated that correctly. Theif because we're we we already approved these fees. We're just trying to flip them. The $50 will cost will cover attendance in the plays and if you want to participate in the musical, you will be charged an additional $100 when that time comes. >> No. So if there are two plays, it's 50. It would be $50 and $50 and then the musical would be a hundred.
065>> Okay. So $50 $50 100. Okay, I understand. Thank you. >> Mhm. >> So should we be more clear, superintendent, that it's $50 for plays and $100 for musicals and and restate our emotion attached to the fees that way? Yes. Whether it's one or two. >> Yes. So, I move that. >> Hang on, hang on, hang on. >> Is there another question? Sorry. >> Yeah, we have >> I have Randy and then I have Nancy. >> Sorry, I didn't have them on my screen. I apologize. >> Um, so I got >> I have a couple of questions. Um first is um as far as being in the play um does this include people who are doing set and um you know um and do we still have classes right now that the requirement is to
066do the sets for the plays as part of the class and do they have to pay if that is still the case? So, if it's a requirement, it's my understanding. And again, Miss Smith is not on the call. Uh we don't charge students for something that is a requirement. That's my understanding. But again, Miss Smith is not on the call, so I cannot speak to that uh completely. But if someone is on if someone is on the crew, it's yes, it's a $50 charge. >> Okay. Um and my other question is, has anybody looked at the middle school? We keep concentrating on the high school. Um, but the middle schools put on a musical, at least back when my kids were there, and that was a long time ago, it was a musical in the
067fall. Um, and a regular play in the spring. That could have changed. Um, but are we still doing the same? Are they still doing the same thing? And are we charging the same, you know, $150 and or sorry, $100 and $50 for the middle school place? you're on you're on mute. >> All I was asked to look at this evening was the high school uh because of the cost of the rights and the cost of the actual production. Um you know using the Little Mermaid as an example, it was ext that was an extremely costly musical last year. Um and there is concern primarily due to the cost of the rights uh just to get to purchase the rights so that we're able to do the play. Um I have it has never been brought
068to my attention that there is a um budgetary concern at the middle school level for drama. It's it's this is strictly a high school concern at this point in time. >> As far as I know, they have to purchase um playrs just like the high school. >> They do, but it it's it's beyond that. It goes into um the the amount of money that was spent on other items last year as well. above and beyond um above and beyond the rights the the the play even for the plays that they're they're purchasing um the rights to those but it appears as though the actual musical cost at the high school again I can only speak to the high school because that's what has been brought to my attention um and that is the more timely
069of the issues because um I believe the drama production is coming up quite quickly and unless it's put on my radar by the middle school administration um the middle school will stay the same this is strictly a high school request at this point in time where the fees for that are new. I would imagine it's something we'll have to adjust um at some point in time um after this year as well to see if it worked. >> So the drama fees stand for the middle school as we voted uh because the drama fees were for both the middle school and the high school. >> I I don't have the fees in front of me. I'm strictly speaking of the high school fee right now which again is was the $50 fee for the uh excuse
070me $100 fee for the first event. $50 for subsequent events. >> Okay. Uh could somebody else clarify because I don't remember there there being any um distinguish >> I believe they were the same. The middle school and the high school were voted as the same. That's how I have it in my notes. >> We're we're already re we're already slightly restating this motion. So we can just clarify that this is only for the high school in the motion. That that shouldn't be too difficult to >> I just clarify >> jumping in here. I just don't want you to have $50 for a play um and 100 for the musical at the high school. But then the middle school is $100 for the first or 50 for the first and 100 for the second. You have
071different rules in the structure. It I mean we can live with it but it's going to be confusing. I think the same I can I can access it pretty quickly. Yeah. >> Okay. Can everyone hear me? Okay. >> Yes. >> Okay. So, Dr. It is. So, it it actually says it's $100 for the first show and $50 for the subsequent shows. So, what I would be asking permission to do um would be to take that and make it $100 for the musical and $50 for plays. And that would cover both the high school and the middle school. Again, the the prices are still the same. If someone does two, it's still $150. The difference would be is if someone does one, if someone just does a musical, then it's $100. If someone just does a
072play, it's $50. Um, this would only really impact um, again, the students that are doing two, but the financial cost is still the same. It's just flipping instead of it being $100 for the first show, it's $100 for the musical and $50 for subsequent shows, which would be the place. Jackie, wait. >> Um, have we already started to collect fees from families? Like, is this going to cause any issues with that? There are a few that have been collected. So, I think we'll have to take a look at those and >> potentially provide a refund if needed. >> And we will make sure. Again, at this point, they're not coming in uh really strong for the for the drama productions because they haven't been fully advertised yet with where the athletic have been advertised and
073they're up and running. So, anyone that has paid the $100 upfront, that will be addressed and they can either take it as a refund or as a potential credit moving into the musical. Randy, >> um, been thinking a little bit. I know a few people that were in some of the plays over the years, and again, correct me if uh, things have changed. My kids have been out of the high school for a little while now, but I seem to remember um that members of the cast, at least some of them, were purchasing their own um costumes for uh some of the plays and or the musicals. um is now that there's a fee is are those going to be covered or are um is that going to continue as a practice that they they
074purchase their costume on top of these fees to join? >> I don't have that information. I didn't have it when we passed the the fees either back in the spring. >> Say Kenan, you you were involved in a lot of the plays. Um is that still going on when you were there? >> Yeah. So this is more so a issue at the discretion of the director. Um last year we did not have fees. So I can like like m Mr. Morgan here I can't speak for what um old Thompson or Katie Simco will do at the high school level. Um it how it worked last year was where um they could provide um they did um but that was not absolute. Um, The Little Mermaid, if I remember off the top of my head, the
075bikes for the show alone were close to $2,000. So, um, the budget was already stretched. Um, I think that is not necessarily, uh, something that we should look at in this purview as a school committee. I think that's better handled at the operational level with the with the directors. >> I don't know. are putting fees on uh the students and uh I I I think it's very important that I know um if they're already being charged and responsible for $50, $100 for costumes and now I want to put more money on them, that's a direct uh impact on who's going to be able to afford this. Um so I I do think it's in our purview. No, and I'm not questioning it's not, but this this was not a question that was raised back in
076the spring when the fees were passed. Um I would also add that um that if a student is financially um stretched to participate um that is something that we do work very hard to take care of. To my knowledge, students have not been excluded for that reason. And again, I'm not asking I'm just asking for a change in how it is. It's anyone that does both, it's still $150. Um, it's just one the first event is 50, the second is 100, and subsequent would be 50. >> Kim Craraven, >> thank you. Um, to follow up on something that that Kenan said, we're getting into the operations here. Um, the superintendent has asked us to flip a fee that we've already approved. He's articulated why I don't want to get into the minutia of of who's
077paying for costumes or not. There's avenues within the community for support. If someone can't afford it, we should not be getting into the minutia of the day-to-day operations and just focus on what the superintendent has asked us. >> With that, I'd like to move the question. >> All right. your question. Do I have a motion? >> Yes. I move that we adopt a $100 fee for musicals and a $50 fee for plays for all schools. >> I second. >> Second. >> All right, we have Kim Craraven and Jackie White with a second. All right, everyone ready to vote? Kim? >> Yes. Jackie, >> yes. >> Wait. >> Alexander Vancoui, >> yes. >> Kenan Francois, >> yes. >> Lisa Bloom, >> yes. >> Patrick McFillips, >> yes. >> Randy Roush, >> yes. >> Carla Lima, >>
078yes. >> And myself, yes. piece have been updated and changed for the plays and musicals >> for all schools. All right, moving on to topic two under old business school start times working group. Kim Craraven, you had request. >> Yes, I had brought this to uh the attention of the group last time based on an inquiry that had been made of us to look at this and just to refresh our memory looking at the the research. Then there was a request to put together a scope. I've done that. It was included in the packet. Um certainly um entertain any questions that anyone might might have on that. >> Randy, >> um I see that you have a school committee liaison nonvoting. um how is or who's going to be leading this group and um basically
079chairing it and getting everything together and organizing everything. >> Uh that would be the responsibility of a member of the working group and the liaison is just to be there to help. I don't think that with um this working group that the school committee representative should be voting um but shephering um supplying any information that might be pertinent to the school committee uh reporting back if needed if a working group member um can't make it um but that the working group would be the one to facilitate this process. Okay. And I assume we'll be putting out a uh statement uh asking for volunteers for this. And >> I would suspect uh that this document with any changes that the school committee would like to make. Um we would then put it out um put it
080on social media, put it in, you know, if the superintendent feels it's appropriate for his weekly update, he could put it not um but we we would circulate it. um to get interest and I think whoever is that we should >> you know uh to expedite this I don't think we can wait till our next meeting I think we should whomever the liaison is should be able to um you know work potentially with the chair um or whomever to select the folks to get this moving forward. Um this goes back to I want to say May or perhaps June when this request I think it was May um came in to the school committee. And then my only other question is do we think 3 months is sufficient to get all of this information uh
081from everywhere? I know Susan when she was working on this um one she had worked on it for at least two years gathering a lot of information. um most of the districts at that time and this was a couple of years ago um that looked into and tried to get feedback from the communities and looked at possibly changing start times. It was a several year process. Um so I'm not sure if three months what we're going to be able to get from this group. >> I would say let's be ambitious with our time for gathering information. This is not to make a decision. This is to gather information and if the group assembles and they request more time um let's give it to them. But um I think coming up with some information leading research
082and what's happening in the district um you know should be sufficient. You know we'll be coming up on some holidays. So, if they wanted to do a survey, maybe they would need a little extra time, but uh let's let that committee drive the information to us um as a working group. >> Jackie White. >> Um so, I love the idea of this group coming together to look at this. Um, I know personally I probably don't have like the time to serve as the formal liaison, but I'm just wondering if that number Kim was arbitrary or if like someone like myself as a school committee member and also as a parent could sit on the working group or is that like we shouldn't have more than two of us there. Um I would have no problem
083if it was more school committee members being as a liaison sharing the responsibility as long as it wasn't a quorum if that's what you're asking that if it was like co-leazons I think actually Jackie that's a great idea to have backup >> okay >> that's a great suggestion actually so yes you're it find a partner >> um and and I'm happy to to help behind the scenes um just because of the research that I put in before I brought it to the school committee. Like I've assembled a ton of articles um that I've archived. So I don't know if there's someone else that that wants to join you in your now self-appointed role. >> Randy R. And I haven't looked recently um but I know Susan Robbins had a number of different resources. They're a
084little bit old right now. Um, but I'm assuming that we're going to um make those available to this group as well, so they can see um any work that's already been done. >> Yeah, I would make it available to them. >> We can find those articles and things, Randy. They might be on the drive. All right. Did do you want to make a motion for your working group or was anybody else wanting to join Jackie in the working group and then we'll take a motion? >> Please, anyone any takers. Okay. If not, I will move to make a motion to um create and move forward a working group to study the school start times. And that will be Jackie White appointed in there as well. >> Do you want to point yourself? >> Sure. And
085I appoint myself to serve as school committee liaison. >> All right. So we have a motion >> in the background. >> All right. We have a motion on the floor that Jackie White will back in >> hope along with Kim's hope for a working group on school start time and I think Lisa Bloom second it is that what I heard Lisa did you second >> yes >> all right >> yes >> okay now we'll take a vote Kim Craraven >> yes >> Jackie White >> yes >> Alexander Vancoui >> yes >> Kenan Franis Yes, >> Lisa Bloom. >> Yes, >> Patrick McFillips. >> Yes, >> Randy Rous. >> Yes, >> Carla Lima. >> Yes. >> And myself is yes. All right, moving on to old business item three, the superintendent's evaluation. This is from our
086previous meeting where it was sent back and um the process that I did was I cut off or cut out everyone's comments and I sent them to Kim and the markings and sent everything to Kim. So Kim did not know who said what. Um, and now I'll let Kim address what she had found with the evaluation pieces. >> Thank you. Um, I read through the comments um and put it up against what had been prepared. >> I'm sorry, Kim. Can you get closer to the microphone? I can barely hear you. Thank you. >> I am. I'm gonna have to get like a microphone enhancer. Um, I spoke at a public hearing last night and everyone said that I spoke softly too and I feel like I don't, but I guess I do. I apologize. Um,
087so I looked at all the comments that were sent over to me and I compared it to the narrative that was prepared. And when I dissected and circled comments that were inserted that had nothing to do with the evaluation questions, um, that took out a certain subset of the comments. And then when I looked at different language that was in the variety of comments, I could see them reflected in the summation, I could see points from the various um sort of subsets of the groupings of comments in various places in what Lisa had prepared. So could there be like endless word smithing to take a different word from someone's and place it in there? Sure. But the composite is not supposed to be these um direct quotes or correlation to any one individual. It is
088an entire committee representation of what was said. And what was clear is that no amount of word smithing would change the overall score that the superintendent received of proficient. There was um you know the configuration of the proficients were were just that so changing the words wouldn't change the outcome of the ranking. So th those folks that might be looking for a particular comment or sentiment might be looking for something that wasn't actually germanine to the actual um information that we were supposed to be rating against. Everything else would be ancillary. What what I mold over quite a bit and you would see now that it is attached is the bulleted points. Um because to be fair, if someone were to look just at the evaluation and not at the self assessment, they wouldn't get
089the key bulleted points. So that was added as a piece to the overall evaluation so that someone looking at the packet wouldn't have to look at both pieces of information um because those bulleted points were appearing in different um comments and in some comments there were more um in some there was more like a summation of them. So I did feel it was was fair and appropriate to add that as an addendum. But short of of word smithing, I I don't know that the sentiment would change. In the bottom line, the the ranking would not change. Um in it, there's areas um for changes um and improvements and there's areas um that we showed appreciation for what the superintendent is doing for our children in the system. So what um was resent around is what
090I would suggest to be the final um evaluation to provide to the superintendent. >> Any questions? Randy, >> first I'd like to apologize to the school committee uh for the last time uh with a clarification on the um individual evaluations not being handed out. Um, I did go back and I did find um a legal document that clarified um that those could not be sent out before the composition. Um it would have been Oh, apologize. I just realized my camera was off. I apologize. I'm not sure why my camera was off. Um, so anyway, um, so I would say that the next time, um, having that information up front instead of just saying legal reasons, we can't do this last minute, would help to, um, mediate any kind of surprise to everybody because this was
091a very big change to what we had been doing before. I understand now that we were doing it incorrectly, but the explanation uh with that legal document could have uh circumvented the um the arguments that were being had as far as those individual um evaluations going on. Um, two, I would also like to uh just clarify that the DEESC has three formats that they say are acceptable for the superintendent evaluation. So whereas Kim you were saying that this is the way it should be MASC and deesc rather um does have the way that we used to do this by putting everybody's comments in as an acceptable form for a summitative cumul or a composite um evaluation. Um the the other uh part of uh their recommendation if you're going to use this they also recommend
092that somebody outside the committee assemble it and and be the and compile it. Um so I would suggest that next year if we do continue with this format versus one of the other two formats that they have suggested uh that we identify upfront and beforehand who is going to take the individual um evaluations and uh make a composite out for everybody to go ahead and take a look at. Um there was a big problem with this coming out the night before. It was a big problem with this coming out um with such a huge change with no explanation of what we were going to go and see and why it was that way. There was no legal reason why we had to switch the formats. Um that was just a preference and maybe our legal
093says of the three they prefer this but all three are legal uh formats to have. Um, so the uproar really was there was no warning, no information and big changes not being discussed by the school committee, just being made um and then presented in front of us. And that is all I have to say on the composite. Thank you, >> Kenan. Prince, >> just a question. Hopefully it's uh helpful to not just me and the new members, the other new members as well. Um, when it comes to these evaluations, um, when we discuss them here in committee, are we just discussing what's written or is there like an a goal here? Um, like what are like what are we doing with this uh, this being on the agenda? Just a clarification. I'm just unclear. This
094is presented from what Brad will propose like goals at the beginning of the year which he'll probably do in one of our next meetings. Then we as a committee he gives his self assessment throughout the year. He does maybe a halfyear self self assessment as well and gives us feedback of how he's achieving goals. Then at the end of the year we get his full self assessment and what he's done. And then we go to this document and we fill in the appropriate things on the document. And so it has like the four standards. Um it also has the um there's the four standards. There's the a professional practice goal and different goals he can do during the year. in um I would recommend that everyone get familiar with the um what Desi has put
095out for their documentation on the evaluation to know how to do it. There has always been talk that DESIE is changing this format. We haven't seen it in a number of years change >> right and I Yes. Yes. And I I apologize for asking this in in meeting when we're taking up people's times. I I would have beforehand but I didn't see it. Um do we do we need a vote on to approve this evaluation as it is presented or are we just okay with it? >> Yes. Yes. Because this this is in draft form. >> Okay. So a vote is required. >> So it does need to be >> Yes. A vote is required because as a committee you only hand him one um evaluation and not individual evaluations. Any more questions, Lisa Bloom?
096>> Um, yeah, I kind of totally disagree with this change as before we did have individual valuations as public record. And I believe that all of us school committee members are elected officials that are individual evaluations should be known to the public. So the public can see what each of our, you know, evaluations are as they have a right to for transparency especially. >> Anyone else? Any more comments? Randy? Yeah, as far as uh the superintendent's review, um speaking to this document and Kenan, uh yes, this is an evaluation. Um it is a performance evaluation uh for how we feel that the superintendent did on his goals and in the different areas for the year. Um Brad, I think that you have um accomplished some really good things this year. Um, I agree with um
097the performance goals on what is written here. Um, as far as uh the success you've had with uh coaching the new high school principal, I think uh you being at the high school allowed you to do a lot of really good things for the district. So, thank you. um the student learning goal, the student uh leadership and engagement. I think it was um very valuable for uh the students to go to the different conferences that you brought them to to get that real world experience. Um and uh to expand uh their opportunities in that way. Um thank you again uh on behalf of uh the students in the district. I hope that's something that can move. >> Excuse me. Can I point of clarification? I think that we are talking about our evaluation amongst the
098school committee members. I don't know that we had on the agenda to give individual comments to the superintendent. >> Um we are talking about his evaluation which is up for vote. We can talk about his evaluation. This is the time to do it. But I think that we are to be talking amongst the school committee members and not directing our comments to the superintendent. Okay, I'll readress school committee members. I think Brad did a fabulous job in a lot of different areas. Um, continuing on with his uh district improvement with the NEAS accreditation. I think it's great that the superintendent was able to uh continue with our accreditation through the NEAS with all the help that he did um at the high school. Um where I disagree with this um evaluation is there is no
099mention at all in here unless I've missed it and it's very small about the closing of a building um in regards to the uh crisis that we had in our budget and the way that that was handled. Um I don't think that it's highlighted here that there's a lot of room for improvement um in that um in in how that was handled last year. Um but again I think he did some really good things and that is my uh major um disagreement with the way that this uh composite was written is um there's just no mention of the budget and that was a huge part and is always a huge part of the job. To be clear I already stated that there were things in people's comments that were not the purview of the superintendent.
100Um I would be cautioning school committee members to be careful of things that you are mentioning that are not the purview of the superintendent. I will clarify with the recommendation for closing a school with the recommended budget that was given to the school committee that is in his purview. >> Amen. >> I'm uh I'm I'm satisfied with the way this evaluation is written. Um I think it covers I think it's comprehensive and covers all the points. I did not submit an evaluation because I was not a school committee a member for the whole year. Um and I would move to move to question to uh approve this evaluation as written. >> We have a motion on the floor by Kenan. Do I have a second? >> Second. >> Patrick McFillips is seconding the motion to
101approve the superintendent's evaluation. Um, it's a roll call vote. Uh, Kim Craraven, >> yes. >> Jackie White, >> yes. >> Alexander Vancoui, >> yes. >> Lisa Bloom, >> abstain. >> Kenan Frans, >> yes. Randy Rous. >> I'm gonna say no. >> And Patrick McFillips? >> Yes. >> And myself is yes. All right. Any more questions as we move on to the next? We are on to the subcommittee reports. Kim Craraven on the FY25 budget. Nancy Haynes may have an update in this as well. >> Um, one one quick question. Did we catch Carla? I was just counting votes. >> Oh, Carla, hang on. Carla's down on the bottom here. Carla, she doesn't have her camera on, so I >> It's okay. Am I even allowed to vote on this one? I have I wasn't a
102part of >> It's up to you. You can abstain. You can say yes, no. It's your decision. >> I'm going to abstain because I haven't seen this document and I don't know what it's in reference to. >> All right. Thank you, Carlin. All right. Now, we will move on. Sorry, I missed you, Carla. >> Um, on to finance. Nancy and Kim. Um, so in your packet there were two documents and it shows um the budget closeout as of the 10th of September. Um, I appreciate all of the work that has gone into this and some of the explanations. Um, one of the things that I did want to bring forward to the committee in in its entirety is there's been some questions regarding um the remaining balances in the use of those funds and some
103requests to be able to use those funds right now and there's a process that has to happen where Nancy will submit these to the state and they need to be certified. So, to be clear, while there could be lots of possibilities for use of funds, um the district can't actually use any of those funds until they're certified by the state. So, that's vitally important. One of the other things that we have asked um uh Nancy to work on is um to help us budget for the future to look um now at the uh complement of staff that have been hired, all the teachers, what's in place so that we can project out um based on the the uh weekly payroll, what that will look like moving forward for the rest of the year. and then
104considering some of the um contracts that are up and things that we might be looking at so that we can start to um build that um FY27 budget. We did have the district umwide meeting yesterday with representatives from the leadership from each of the towns. Um Ashby Townsen and Pero were all represented with the town administrators and two members of the board of selectmen were able to uh attend one from Townsen and one from Pero to discuss um you know some of the thoughts concerns moving forward and how we can work together to bring the acceptable budget asks. Um one of the complicating factors um as we know is some of these numbers come at us a little bit late in the game. So, you know, we'll continue to work on that um with with
105the finance committee. Um the other thing that finance committee has to think about is um we need an additional member because we did have a resignation. I know you had asked about um appointments to subcommittees. Um a little bit concerned that um you we'll be waiting now until October to seat some other folks onto the subcommittee. Um, so if people could consider whether they join the finance subcommittee, I'd certainly appreciate that. Um, those are in general the things that I have to share. And Nancy, I'd love to have any of your insight that you would like to share with the group. >> Thank you. >> Can you hear me? Okay. >> Do you want Do you want to take Randy first? >> I want to take Randy first. Nancy. Randy. >> Um, I just had
106a question. I know um any money going into the END account needs to get certified before we can use it, but I do believe that some of the excess money from the insurance claims came in and went into one of the revolving accounts to replenish what we had originally taken out of that that revolving account money I don't think needs to be certified in order to use. And I know the towns are not looking for a ton of money and I believe what we put in there could cover um what the towns need for FY26 and that can be released immediately. So, it's something to consider. >> Thank you, Randy. Um Nancy, >> you're on mute. Nancy, >> sorry about that. Um, can you hear me? Okay. So, I I just wanted to give an
107update as to where we are in the closeout process. We we did finalize the FY25 numbers. We have had most uh of our audit done already, which is really early. We have a few more things to provide them, but essentially we're going to have an audit fairly soon. Um I'm almost ready to submit the information to the state to go to the next level for certification of the access and efficiency. Um and I guess um that should go through in the next I would say a few weeks. Uh we also are working on the endofear report which is the document that gets submitted usually prior to September 30th where the state um updates uh all the end ofear reports with all expenditures and revenues for all districts and that's where those numbers that are on
108the district profiles reports are coming from. Um, as far as uh something for the town, I think that's for the school committee to discuss. This the school choice revolving fund uh can be voted uh for at any time. It's really not connected to the budget process. We do use more than we bring in uh during the budget process for school choice. And I just also want to um caution that if we were to increase a revenue like a usage of that and then take it away next year, it's going to feel extremely painful next year when they try to when we try to present a budget without that revenue source. So, I just um throwing that out there that it's it's could really be just like this year where we had an $800,000 reduction in
109END if we provide u a certain amount of say school choice funding to lower to offset our budget. Um they're not not going to have that next year necessarily. In fact, what we've been using is more than we've been bringing in. So, that's it's just likely that's going to go down even further. So, um we can look at that. I think maybe finance subcommittee would look at that first and then maybe make our recommendation if we're going to make a change. >> Yes. And if I could just follow up comment um u madam chairman, I do see Kenan has his hand up as well. Um, I'm I'm in favor of evaluating where we might be able to help out the municipalities because I do feel that just because we're schools and municipalities, we are one.
110Um, the budget is the same. But I think we need to wait until at least October to evaluate um at least a a straw man budget for the next year because otherwise we could find ourselves in a difficult position of having to go back to the towns for more and put them in a difficult position. I also would like to be able to work with the administration of the municipalities. I don't know what the landscape looks like for Ashb and Pepper of course, but I do know in towns in there's some vacancies and how that plays into the budget itself um based on the weekly payroll and when positions might be filled. So I think um some of that work needs to be done on the municipal level as well. Um but I do believe
111in you know the partnership approach that um both entities can be looking at it um so that we can have this discussion in October when we all know just a little bit more. Um I I again I'm I'm not against it. Um I I think it's a positive approach. I've been very um candid about that all along, but I don't want to have the discussion until we know just a little bit more information about what we're going to be asking for um moving forward. And there's some potential um budget implications on us um with increases that we don't have control over that we have to watch out for. And like I said, I don't want to put oursel into a position of having to ask for money um that we might already have and put
112the towns in a worse position. I just think we need to think about it very methodically with the leadership in the towns, too. But so yes, that Randy was that was I agree with you just a little bit slower pace. >> Uh Kenan. >> Yeah. Um I'm comfort uh I know Kim you had mentioned earlier that uh you have a bank vacant position. Um I think we have the opportunity during here. Um, I checked the meeting times and I if it pleases you and if it pleases the chair, I'd be happy to step on to finance. Um, if that's something that we want to take a vote on tonight just so you have somebody. >> Well, you're not just a somebody. I would love your skills um to join us on finance um if if
113you're willing to do it and I can certainly um you know work around your schedule to um with the other members. I'd appreciate that. Kanan. Yeah, I'm comfortable doing so if we uh someone wants to make a motion for it. >> Yeah, I think we would have to revert back to that agenda item, Lisa, after we're done this one. >> Okay. >> After my >> We'll go back We'll go back before we move on to policy. Any other questions in finance? >> All right. Now, moving back. >> I'm sorry. I do have one more question. Um, remind me when the the subcommittee meets just because I if I'm remembering correctly, >> I can listen in and observe just as a non participating member. Is that right? >> Yes, you can listen in. You can watch
114the recording. >> As long as there's not input and voting, you're okay to listen. Okay, Randy. >> Um, I guess I had a slight misunderstanding. This uh originally was talking talked about in the last couple of meetings. I thought that $2.8 million that we had going into END was including unanticipated um revenues. It appears that it is not. So, I am curious how much did we get in unanticipated revenues that's on top of this $2.8 $8 million that we have in the expense side. We received about a million dollars. H about half of that is the uh other half of the minute mana funds. So half of the funds went into school choice and half into the general fund. So a fund is that we were not anticipating. Um and then we also got additional
115closeouts for uh Valley Collaborative again which we've gotten a few years in a row. Um beyond that uh just sort of the regular uh increases. I can give the committee a uh an update on the revenue side as well. >> I'm expecting that the END number will be in the range of 3 um three and a half million. There'll be some changes and adjustments um during the process, but again, it's not not final yet, but >> until it's actually certified, but that's where I'm expecting it to come in. >> Okay. So, uh just so we know, I think 3.3 million in that range is the 5% that we are allowed in our END account. This is indicating we very likely will have money we have to give back to the towns. Um, so again, I'd
116like the finance subcommittee meeting uh uh subcommittee to please take a look at getting money to the towns as soon as we can, especially if we have to be giving them money back. Um, we have money um in the revolving account that we can figure out how to replenish to get the money to them now before we have the END um uh actually certified. Um I really you I've been talking with the towns and uh uh border semen Valerie who I am the liaison with um and they are still trying to figure out how to uh get their budget um in uh balance. So what whatever we can do especially if we have to give money back to the towns because we're over that 5% um we need we should hopefully make decisions as quick
117as we possibly can. Um, the other thing I would like to say as well is, um, I really hope that, um, we as a district are taking a very close look at what happened this past year on how we wound up with this much money after um, looking at a complete crisis where we were talking about at one point closing multiple buildings and having class sizes of over 40 um in order to have a balanced budget for this coming year and we wound up with more than 5% of our budget. again the unanticipated revenue we we could not anticipate and I you know I don't necessarily want to um have that in there but we voted um hastily and very quickly without going through a um a long enough process in my opinion uh to
118close a school and wound up with well over the amount of money that we needed for this coming year's budget or the budget that we're in right now. Um, so we really need to take a look at this before we start saying that we have another budget crisis. Um, and we can't afford things. Um, how did we get to such a good place with the money so we don't repeat this again? Because it's not a very good look uh to the communities and to the towns uh when we do this. So to to be clear um in the finance subcommittee the question was asked for us to look at the areas where there was um significant amounts of remaining balances and to evaluate why. And to be fair, the municipal side um only speaking for
119Townsen because I know that well um also had a significant amount of unspent funds in their budget as well. So there is a certain expectation of some buffer in everybody's budget but both on the municipal side and the school side there was um a fair amount of remaining funds. So both need to look at it closely but again um for good partnership. I believe um in in the validity of your request and I've been very transparent about my thoughts around it as well that we need to work in partnership. Um, but we need to look at it, look at the numbers where where they're at. But I do think it will be October, which is just two weeks away. You know, it's around the corner. >> That that is fine. Uh, but Kim, this is
120more about just having extra money. We went and closed a town's only school on the basis that we didn't have money. We did that without getting um as much input from the town and the community as we could have if we had time. I understand it was a but it was a constraint. Uh by the time we looked at this, we did not have the time, >> but looking at how much money we have, >> we obviously had more time and didn't have to make that decision last year. We could have been continuing these talks. Um if we know how this happened with this much money then hopefully going forward if we think we you know we won't be in that situation again of thinking we have to make immediate drastic choices and then at
121the end of the year wind up with an excess that we haven't had in years. >> Yes. Um and and I don't disagree um but if you could clarify that it was the prior school committee. Yes. >> Thank you. Which >> included you, Randy. >> You're right. There were other people on the school committee then, but again, um we're all working with the same information now. >> Yep. I'll wait. Sorry. >> I just We're past 8 o'clock and Ry's on her soap box about something that she had the same numbers in the same amount of time. >> So, I'm I'm just I'm just sick of this. Like, Randy, >> no one listened to Patrick. So, >> Patrick, stop. Hey, stop. We're going to stop. You had this, Randy. You had the same numbers we had
122information after the vote since that school year. More money's come in because the entire state's in dire need. >> Patrick, we're going to stop. Everyone stop. We're moving on to policy. We discussed finance. We are moving on. >> First, we're going to go back to the agenda of the appointments. You you had said we would do that. We're going to appoint Yep. We will appoint um Kenan Francois to the finance committee for the year. Do I have a motion? >> I'll make a motion to approve Kenan Francois to the finance subcommittee for the 2526 school year. >> Point point of order. Um, I do believe that we need to vote as a school committee to go back to a prior um item. Okay. We can't just skip there and with somebody saying we're going back
123to it. >> Okay. All right. >> We'll take that back. We're going to rewind. Jackie, hold your motion. May we have a motion to go back on the agenda? >> Right. I move that we go back to agenda item number five, appointment of subcommittee members. >> Second. >> All right. So that is Kim Craraven and Patrick McFillips. Roll call. Randy, >> yes. >> Kim, >> yes. >> Jackie, >> yes. >> Patrick, >> yes. >> Kenan, >> yes. Carla, >> yes. >> Randy, >> yes. I I answered already. >> Oh, you moved. >> Sorry. Alexander, >> yes. >> Jackie, did I get you or did you move? >> You got me. >> I got you. Okay. And myself. Oh, Lisa Bloom. >> Yes. >> Lisa, >> yes. >> And myself. Yes. All right. We are moving
124back to agenda item number five. Now Jackie, would you make your motion? >> I make a motion to appoint Keenan Francois to the finance subcommittee for the 2526 school year. >> Second. >> That is a motion. And that is seconded by Lisa Bloom. All right. Roll call vote. Randy. >> Uh I actually have a question. >> I I I just have a question. Okay. >> And this is >> I thought you left your hand. >> Yeah. Hang on. Question. >> Um >> Whoops. >> Yeah. Up to now up to now we've been talking about wanting Ashp representation on the finance subcommittee and >> yes >> um I know Carla was saying she wasn't sure what she wanted to be on but you know we also didn't talk about the finance subcommittee. Um, and Kenan, I
125think you are 100% um, capable of doing this. Uh, but there's been a very big deal made by a lot of different people about having Ashb representation uh, voting um, on that subcommittee um, to the point of last year we had a a community member who could vote on that subcommittee from Ashby because we did not have um, the Ashb rep on there. Um, >> absolutely and I agree with you Randy. Um I think in the like Kim brought up um this is I'm volunteering myself in the interest of time um I will absolutely love to stay on the subcommittee but should it uh be the case that Carla after reviewing the um reviewing the list of subcommittees would like to volunteer herself I'd be happy to step aside to allow for representation or if
126she'd like to present herself now she's absolutely free to do so. Um I'm simply volunteer volunteering myself at this time. um because uh they are down a person. >> Okay. I I do appreciate you volunteering for that position. Um and just so everybody on the committee knows too is there is no requirement that there be four on a subcommittee. Um that is an internal um thing right now that's uh being asked for for the finance subcommittee. There's nothing in our policies, nothing in the law that says there has to be uh four people. It just they cannot be a quorum. Um, and Randy, while I appreciate you looking out for all of that, um, I do want the additional folks on the finance subcommittee, and I really appreciate someone, um, that has skills, um, with,
127um, calculations, with formulas, with drafting things, um, such as, um, you know, infographics and things that we need. So, I I can't I I can't wait. All right, Carla, you have your hand raised. >> Yeah, I mean, I didn't realize um the urgency on, you know, the subcommittee and finance. Um, you know, if if if you do need an additional person, I wouldn't mind participating, but I don't have um Kenan's, you know, knowledge in finance as much. So, And we do have the um community member representation opportunity for folks from from Ashby to participate too. >> Well, I I think it would be appropriate um Carla, I think it'd be fantastic um if you uh did serve on the subcommittee. Um, if you would like uh to give yourself some time uh to get adjusted
128to the committee um I can take the role for now and if you'd like once were a little bit further down the road if you'd like to step in um I'd absolutely step aside for you. I think Ashby repres representation is important. This is like I said before this is just in the interest so things can get moving. We have a we have a budget to get on. Any more questions, concerns? All right, we have a motion on the floor to appoint um Keenan Francois to the finance subcommittee for this next year or in term. If board. >> Kim Craraven, >> yes. >> Kim, >> I voted yes. >> Jackie White, >> yes. Lisa Bloom. >> Yes. >> Patrick McFillips. >> Yes. >> Randy Roush. >> Just real quick, Carly, give me a thumbs up
129or a thumbs down whether you're okay to waiting. >> I haven't reviewed it. I'm okay with waiting and um making that decision afterwards. >> And I'm a yes. >> Carla, >> yes. >> Kenan, >> yes. >> And myself is yes. All right, moving on to policy. back down to the agenda on policy under the subcommittee policies number two, Randy. >> Okay. Yep. I'm not sure why under policies for adoption that regional agreement update is there. Um, but I did have some information that I was able to gather on the regional agreement on the representation um that I can go ahead and give if I can just find my notes. Oh, I apologize. Oh, down here. I put them in a different file. All right. Um, I had reached out to the MASC listerve. Uh there
130was a question last time on how many districts have November elections and how many of the regional uh school districts um actually have all at large members with uh town residencies. I heard back from one two three four five from five different um districts, three of them being regionals. Um I'm assuming that a lot of them that didn't answer didn't have um the situations I was asking for. Um Westboro um actually has their um elections earlier in March so that uh it is before a lot of the um budget um activities happen. Um, Mount Greylock, which is a regional school district. Uh, I believe that's way out west and north. Um, they have elections in November. And, uh, they have, um, very different populations in their towns. The larger town has four representatives, the smaller
131town has three, and they are all at large members. Uh, voted in in November. Um, New Salem, uh, Wendell, uh, is a a tiny tiny regional school district and they actually have a ridiculously large, um, school committee of five and five from their two towns. Um, uh, they didn't give me too much more information on when they were voting that in other than, uh, they just, um, have at, I believe it was at large, they were trying to tell me, um, with town residency. uh gardener uh which is not a regional has November elections. Um they did not mention anything about whether they're all at large or not. And then Berlin Boilston is a regional that has at large members with residency um and elections in November. Um they have uh 65 35% population between
132the two towns and they have equal representation between the two towns. So, it looks like a lot of these uh town residencies uh are looking at equal representation uh when they have at large members for the entire district regardless of what the population is. Uh the one thing I did get on the November elections from another member who uh had answered on there is that it looks like um we would need to have elections on odd or on even years two and four. the three that we have currently right now would not be able to um work because the November elections would need to be on the off year from when the state has um members or elections on that ballot. So that may or may not work for us as far as November. Um
133a lot of things would need to change for that. Um as far as the all at large um I'm trying to reach back out to find out what are the pros and the cons because I had asked that as well. Uh, not a lot of people gave me their pros and cons of having the town residency and everybody at large except for one person was saying that it's worked out really really well for their two towns. Um, that's my update and I will continue to try and get some more information on uh those elections and the representation. Moving on to the policies. Um, we have policies for adoption. Um there's one I'm going to pull out separately and then I will do the rest of them by themselves. Uh policy IKF uh has some additional
134um suggestions from uh the assistant superintendent uh Ree. Um he says because of some requirements the DESSE has put out now he has added a paragraph. Um the paragraph just simply says and and this is on the competency determination. Uh the paragraph adds as far as students who enroll in the North Middle Sex Regional High School after their ninth year will be afforded the opportunity to earn the competency determination through successfully meeting the requirements as outlined in this policy and or through a transcript review of prior coursework by a review panel under the direction of the principal and his or her design. Um, basically what this is just putting in the provision for students that come into the high school after 9th grade. I will leave it up to everybody here if you think this
135should go back out uh for review from the community. I've not received any other comments from anybody in the community or if this is a small enough change that you are willing to just put this in and adopt it as is. Um it it's not changing anything in the policy just adding in my opinion just adding the uh condition for somebody who joins in after 9th grade. So if anybody has any objections I will make a motion to adopt this one. Um so I will move uh that we adopt policy I KFA um for or that's it. just adopted for for IKFA. >> Second, >> just a big >> Can I make a friendly amendment? >> Can you actually do more than just the letters, Randy, in your motion? >> Okay. Yes, I can. Um,
136so I will move that we approve policy IKFA competency determination with the added paragraph um that was read um that was added by the assistant superintendent um for adoption. >> I second. So that was Randy and Lisa Bloom with a second on policy IKFA competent competency determination. >> All right. Um it's roll call vote. So Kim Craraven, >> yes. >> Jackie White, >> yes. >> Randy Roush, >> yes. >> Carla Lima, >> yes. Kanan Francois, >> yes. >> Patrick McFillips, >> yes. Bane. >> Uh, Lisa Bloom, >> yes. >> Alexander Vancoui, >> yes. >> Lisa Martin, yes. All right, moving on to the next policies. >> Okay, >> um, I have not received any feedback from any school committee members, any staff, or any community members on any of these. So I will do one
137large um motion to adopt all of these. So I move to adopt policy IKF graduation requirements. Policy EFCD meal charge policy. Policy EHA district security relating to technology. Policy EHB data and records retention. Policy DKC expense re reimbursements. Policy ADDA background checks. policy JLCB, immunization of students, and policy FA, facility development goals. >> A second. >> That was Randy with a motion and Lisa Bloom with a second. >> And it's a roll call vote. Kim Craraven, >> yes. >> Jackie White, >> yes. Alexander Vancoui, >> yes. >> Lisa Bloom, >> yes. >> McF Phillips, >> I abstain. >> Kenan Francois, >> yes. >> Carla Lima, >> I abstain as well. >> Randy Ro, >> yes. Myself, yes. Reading Okay. Um and then we have two pol policies for a first reading. Um so I will
138move uh that we um you know have for a first reading policy JB equal educational opportunities and policy JBB educational equity. This puts the policies on the website and out for the public to have any comments. >> I that was Randy and then was a second. It's a roll call vote. Kim Craven, >> yes. >> Jackie White, >> yes. >> Alexander Vancoui, >> yes. >> Lisa Bloom, >> yes. >> Patrick McFillip, >> yes. >> Rous. >> Yes. >> Carla Lima, >> yes. Keenan principal. >> Yes. >> And myself is yes. >> Okay. >> All right. Moving on to >> um sorry I got one more item on here. So I apologize. Um got too excited about the policies. Um so one other thing that came up in a policy subcommittee and we wanted to bring
139it uh we voted to bring it to the school committee was the idea about doing some audit and compliance on the policies. Um ju and this is not looking at the policy for whether it pertains to the law or if it needs updates or anything like that but just a quick way to look at a bunch of policies and say yes we're still follow we're following that or no we're not following that. Uh we had discussed whether we should do it at the policy, you know, asked for permission for that to be for something the policy subcommittee does and uh Lisa Bloom had a what I thought was a fantastic idea is to make this uh committeewide. Um it would allow everybody to kind of read through policies very quickly um and get familiar with
140policies as we're going along. Um, you know, one idea I had was, you know, uh, we could just kind of give five policies per person per meeting and it's just a quick, you know, you give a, you know, quick, oh, we're following everything that we're doing or I need more information or no, we need to um, look at how we're following this policy or at that point if we're not following it, whether it needs to be referred to the policy subcommittee to take a look at changing it. So, I didn't know if the school committee had wanted uh to do that as a whole um just to kind of go through very quickly um you know throughout the year uh just to make sure that we are in compliance of what we have in place
141in France. >> I I'm just noticing my video is off now. I apologize my camera died. Um but I'm I'm all in favor of accountability and you know auditing and compliance. Um I do think these meetings are with just the amount that we have as is. Um we are going on two and a half hours and you know usually we're actually making good time now. Usually we're doing a lot worse. Um I think that would be more appropriate for to stay in uh policy subcommittee uh the the auditing of the policies um and bringing and then instead bringing those results out um say on a quarterly basis to the full committee um to review as opposed to the whole committee doing it. That's just my two cents. >> Okay. Uh it it was just an
142opportunity to see if the school committee wanted a new a different way to actually be able to um get more familiar with the policies that we have in place. Um, I'm open to having it on the on the policy subcommittee. Um, but I'd like to hear from other people. >> Um, Jackie White. >> So, I'm on the subcommittee and Lisa Bloom, I thought that was a great idea, but Kenan, hearing your um, you know, argument that perhaps adding to our already um, precious time here is probably not the best idea. So, I'm converting back to thinking it should be within the subcommittee. >> Anyone else's thoughts? >> My thought is that we we do need to be familiar with the policies, but I appreciate a more careful look by the policy subcommittee with that being
143like their focus. And I feel like with the other things that I have going on um that I would be afraid I wouldn't have enough time to fit that in and I don't want to you know not be able to to fulfill that. Um and I might not even know how much you know true time it takes but I'm like I heard you say that I was like yikes how am I going to fit that in? Um, so I think if there's something that you're finding, then we kind of dive in as a committee to help out, but otherwise I'm like trusting your review and your due diligence. And that's what kind of the delegation process is for. Okay. Um, then I guess the sentiment is first to stay on the policy subcommittee. So I'd
144like permission uh from the full committee. Um, I I can make a motion. Um, so I I will move that the uh school committee approve that the uh policy subcommittee add to its uh charge to um do a uh compliance and review along with or a compliance along with the review and updating. >> I second >> that is R and Lisa Bloom. Any questions? All right, roll call vote. Kim Craraven, >> yes. >> Jackie White, >> yes. >> Randy Rous, >> yes. >> Carla Lima, >> yes. >> Francois, >> yes. >> Patrick McFillips, >> I abstain. >> Lisa Bloom, >> yes. >> Alexander Vancoui, >> yes. and myself is yes. All right. Now we've finished policy school committee operations number three. >> Patrick. >> So we had a very successful first meeting. Um since then
145I have lost every member of the committee as it as it began and gained uh Jacqueline White. Welcome aboard. Um, I believe Jackie had a busy two weeks of work since we got on this and and didn't have the time and now I'm in end of fiscal year and haven't really had much time to look into this. I have spoke with Robin regarding how agendas are created and timelines on which they should be presented to her for release to the public. That is ongoing. That's really all I have at this time. And now I have find an acting clerk for school committee in Robin's absence. >> All right. Thank you, Patrick. Um, any report? Whoops. Randy. >> Uh, yeah. I'd like to just, uh, one idea I had, um, I know one thing I've been
146looking for for a couple of years, um, is a method to kind of document a lot for the school committee members for our historical, um, for an easy lookup. And um I've apparently been overlooking something right in front of us is we have um a section in our drive for school committee documents. Um I've recently really poured through everything that's in there. There's some really good stuff in there. There's some stuff that could be updated. Um, I think there's a lot more that can be done in there. And I'd like to suggest that maybe the school committee operations take a look at that folder. Um, and decide and and you can put out a survey to the school committee. What kind of information would be helpful? Uh, I know we have a lot of new
147members that came on. I know whenever I want to look at past uh budgets, I have to uh search through the drive to get the information I need. It might be nice to have a folder um with all the historical budgets, the budget, and then the end of the year um all information that the school committee can have at their fingertips um and that uh we can go ahead and review. And I would leave it up to um you know the subcommittee to kind of determine what is useful to have historical and to keep track of um and then we can work on and um who's going to keep track of that as well because this certainly should not be something that Robin takes on. This should be something internal to our committee because it's
148all information for us. Um so I think um I would leave it up to the subcommittee to figure out how that's going to be maintained, who's going to maintain it. If it's a new position on the school committee, maybe this would be great for the school committee secretary. It could be the backup um recording um or uh the clerk um along with keeping this file up to date and improving it. um or look at other um districts and see how they do it. Um but I think that's a great way to kind of start to get the information that the school committee needs on a regular basis. >> Yeah, do just tell me where that file is located and I will get going on that. >> Yeah, it's um Patrick I can show you where
149it's at. There's three files that the school committee has access to. One's school committee meetings, another one subcommittees, and then the other is school committee documents. And so it's the school committee documents area which is full of information. And so I've used it for a number of years. It has all the things. >> Okay. >> Yeah. And I know we discussed in the first meeting maybe working on some training documents for the uh appraisals for the superintendent just because that was a confusing process for for new people, but yeah, we can get on that. >> Okay. >> All right. Thank you, Patrick. >> All right. Community outreach and liaison. Carla, I know that you were just appointed, but this is where you would give your report about Ashby. You don't have to give a report
150tonight. I know that you're just familiarizing yourself with things, but if you have anything to say, I welcome you to say something if you'd like. >> I don't really have anything to say today. Um I know Kim and I joined uh one of our, you know, committees earlier today with Ashb, but um that's as far as I'm not really sure what I can say or not say at this point. So I'll just um you know not say much at this time on the next one. >> That is fine. Um I have nothing to report from PPO. Do you have anything Patrick as we are both liaison for PEPro? >> Uh we have we have a meeting I think in a week or two um to appoint the new >> tech. Yep. >> Member. >> So
151>> that's coming up. >> That will be on the 24th. So Jackie White, Patrick McFillips, and Alexander Vancoui since they are PEPAL representatives also get to vote on representation to the tech. So they will be taking part in that. Um Townsen, anything from Kenan or Randy have any updates? >> Yes. Um I have uh spoken with um Valerie Goodrich uh who's u one of the newest uh border selectmen there. Um, and uh, most of what she was telling me was just the finances of the the finances in the town are still being negotiated. Um, and that anything that the schools can give them. Um, they're not looking for a lot. They're looking in the $200,000 range. Um, they don't have exact numbers, but they can certainly work on getting that. Um, but anything would be
152very much appreciated uh, that they can get for this year for FY26. Kenan, any >> uh No, I don't have anything. >> All right. All right. Any other matters? Oh, Kim Craraven. >> Uh, yes. If um if I could make a request to the towns and representatives, um Kenan and Randy, if you could get with Valerie and ask if there's a way for her to get from the treasurer the uh payroll runs and a calculation based on the current staffing with the vacancies in place and going back to July 1 with the vacancies in place of what that looks like because with the vacancies the payroll hits and calculations through the end of the year would be different, right? And and we understand this is not a knock on them. We understand that when you're
153when they're putting the budgets together, there's certain personnel in place and then it changes. So what those changes from July 1 till now and kind of projecting forward what that difference looks like in the budget. So over the next few weeks as we're working to solidify with Nancy the school numbers, we we know what it looks like in a in a more concrete way for the town as well. I I can ask. >> Okay. It sounds like a lot, but it's not it's not so horrible to do. >> Okay. >> Yeah. U Randy, we can Am I talking right now? Yes, I am. Um uh Randy, if you want to if you want to take that or I can take that. Um but regardless, Kim, if you could send that in an email, that would
154be wonderful. Just so I don't lose it. >> Yeah, absolutely. All right. Anything else? It is 8:34. I If no one has anything else, I am looking for someone to make a motion to adjurnn. >> I moved. >> Second. >> Okay. So, we have Keenan and Patrick, I believe, on this. All right. And a roll call vote. Uh Kim Craraven, >> yes. Jackie White, >> yes. >> Randy Rous, >> yes. >> Patrick McFillips, >> yes. >> Carla Lima, >> yes. >> Kenan Francois, >> yes. >> Lisa Bloom, >> yes. >> Alexander Vancoui, >> yes. >> And myself, yes. Good night, everyone. Thank you.