School Committee Meeting - 10/19/23

001started a little bit all right uh good evening and welcome to the October 19th 2023 meeting of the holl and school committee uh we're set up a little differently tonight because we have some very special guests uh and we wanted to make sure that they were comfortable and felt welcomed um so um with that though we'll quickly go into the consent agenda and I'll entertain a motion to approve the consent agenda move bya second by Lisa All In okay that passes unanimously um next we have a report from the student Representatives [Music] okay you guys want to student Representatives go first yeah so this past week it can it's for H so you can got speak right okay um this past week we had Civic day at the high school for the senior class and

002that went really well we had um the uh representative um James ARA de R Roa UMC come we had Susan nickel from the Senate president's office as well as Mr Rooney um the high school government teacher um and they talked about civic duty and the importance of it and help students register to vote yeah um thank you Rachel um we also have the NHS can drive coming up um which is one of our biggest events of the year and so citizens all across hollon can put donation bags on front steps from 6: to 8:00 p.m. next Tuesday 10:24 and members of NHS are going to come around to specific neighborhood hoods to pick up these goods and then donate them to the food pantry and with fall Sports we have a very important football game

003tonight against Hopkinson raising awareness for mental health um due to Tim Gary's passing away um this past spring and girls vars City soccer just did a breast cancer fundraiser and girls cross country was the tvl large champs for the fourth year in a row and they have their tvl showcase coming up on 28th of October yeah and also coming up is the flag football game for the class of 2025 and that will be the half day next Wednesday um as well as um the same day a Deca fundraiser so the business Club at the high school which has a record number of new members this year I feel like was over a 100 I want to say I heard which is incredible um and that will be at 400 p.m. um to the close of

004Corner Market to raise money for competition fees and they have comp competitions this year in Worcester Mass in um for districts States in Boston and then Nationals are all the way in Anaheim which is pretty incredible and 10% of those profits go to Deca which is really important for them yeah um and just to add on to Deca last year I think was either the first or second year that they've been around and last year they did go to Nationals in Orlando which was super exciting I think 11 high schoolers went down to Florida um and then the senior auction is coming up quite a bit away from now but we just wanted to put it out there um the 7th of December which will fundraise for the senior class and paying for prom and

005last thing is just term one's ending on next Friday yes next Friday Friday the third FR there we go yeah yeah that's all from us you know about the food drive like do we get a is there a way for us to know which neighborhoods like they're going to our neighborhood what I had a flyer on my door yesterday okay yes I'll see if I can find that F I'll send you information but um I think they're also going to post on hon happy and so if they didn't get to the neighborhood there's also a drop off point but I'll make sure you get it too yeah that's all yeah great thank you very much okay thank you thank you sure um next we're uh moving on to school committee individual comment we'll just kind

006of go down the the the line I have nothing tonight thanks um I have a couple PTO updates there's a PTO Community Gathering next Thursday October 26th 7 to9 at Anthony's um and then they will be having an Elementary Book Fair which is they're partnering with asap's fables which is great that we're doing a local business um that'll be Monday and Tuesday October 23rd and 4th um we encourage you to visit the Holliston PT o.org website there's events are posted there volunteer needs um we also have the teacher wish lists are posted there so it's a great way to kind of keep um helping out the teachers um and then the last thing is Holliston Youth and Family Services parks and wreck and then the drug and alcohol awareness Coalition are hosting a haunted house

007at the parks and wreck building on October 25th which is that half day again so it's from 1 to 4 and it is a fundraiser for the Community Action fund that's all I have nothing for me um just quickly an haap update um the middle school will be putting on their production their one act production and that includes a taale of Two Jacks and um contemporary scenes and that's November 3rd and 4th and then the High School Musical is approaching it's hard to believe it's less than one month away um and that is firebringer and that is November 16 16 17th and November 18th and and just a thank you to Mr Rooney Miss Lasher and all the high school teachers that made Civic day possible and were able to uh help our seniors register

008to vote really important work thank you great thank you and uh just one quick thing our time meeting was on Monday uh it was a quite a quite a robust attendance actually um and uh you know appreciate the town supporting this the school's uh request for Chromebooks that's it for me I don't no one emailed me for public comment I don't see anybody in the audience so uh we'll move on to the presentations uh from Dr Kus and your team sure let me just get this up all right so we're here to do our annual district and school Improvement plans connected directly to our strategic plan and I have our four principles that I'll let them introd reintroduce themselves as we go along but I'm going to start with just sort of um let me

009just put this off the screen here um I'm going to start with talking about the work that we've continued to do this is year two of our strategic plan and we have our four arches of that we've discussed this past year and prior to this as we were developing the Strategic plan Arch one commun around communication Arch two social emotion wellbeing Arch three teaching and learning and then Arch four talent and resources I'm going to ground us in our vision again it's embark on your journey personal local Global we gave um cups out at the beginning of the year to all our staff so that they can never forget our vision it's really about how we start here and expand to the local community and then the global world is what we aim for for

010our students and I'm just going to repeat our mission cuz I think we really it's a powerful statement to collaboratively create a safe inclusive environment that empowers all Learners through Innovative teaching and learning to be life long active Global Citizens so you'll hear us again this year talk about how all of the work that we're doing is directly connected to all of the Arches and we'll speak to each one in each of our presentations we're going to go through it pretty quickly and save questions for the end so please write down your questions if you have them because something you might ask the high school might also be applicable to Miller or placentino or Rams so I think they could answer collectively at the end so I also attached to you um you should have

011in addition to this presentation the school committee should be able to see the more detailed notes that go along with this as well but we're only going to talk about some of them tonight we're going to highlight under um there's just too much to share there's so much work going on but we're going to highlight under each Arch some of the things that we're doing so under communication some of the key takeaways that we're working on this year some of it's continued from last year and some of it's added on we're really working on that web based form for the community to sub subscribe to regular Communications we've already already done that thank you Dan you actually helped us get that off and running with Dan McLoud and we won't be able to add people

012every time they enter it but we're going to do it periodically throughout the year I think we've already had what about 150 or more people sign up for that7 so they won't get every single communication because they'd be inundated like those of us are that get all the communications but anytime anything's going out to the larger Community staffs uh and Community they will be in that group um included in that and they should have gotten something recently for me that's been successful and then a new thing this year is we've as you know we piloted star a couple years ago then last year we were using it fully and this is um now a year that we're going to be actually sending out the data we didn't want to overwhelm people cuz it's confusing until

013you get used to it so that data was going to be going out next week from all buildings and then also some other data that I'll let the schools talk about and that is something new this year so we're working hard to make sure we can get that out smoothly and obviously we know there'll be questions from parents when that comes up as well the website we continue to expand our res resources on the website and getting our staff portal updated and easily accessed as well this year is important and then we just started the family portal for elementary families or we're in the process of starting and that will be I'll let the elementary schools talk a little bit more about that but it'll be nice for them to have some real time access

014and we're also trying to eliminate as much as possible paper as we go along because we know we don't want to be adding to the environment but there will always be an opportunity for parents to request paper copies if they can to access through technology we're going to continue to review our resource guides for new families we are working on that ongoing and um the technology department is continuing to work on data govern governance and family digital safety and resources the webinar will be taking place we've also had the two Factor multiactor authentification as you know so many places are getting um their data governance issues and we as a school Community often Dan will send something out or one of the teachers will notice lots of things come out from my name and if

015you look at the email they have nothing to do with me so they're using everyone that has a authority figure because they know that if they get it they might go to the link and then you can hack into our system so we work really hard with the staff to get this multiactor authentification going under social emotion well-being some of the key takeaways for Arch 2 we're launching that ready work and we have a just a ready team racial Equity diversity inclusion team to promote Equity under Desy safe and supportive School framework that is now being expanded obviously under the direction of Jerel ver so stay tuned you'll hear more about that as well we're continuing to work on all of the professional development that we've been working on these past few years and jarielle

016and Jess both talked about this in their presentations but that trauma sensitive teaching and learning the Leslie courses are incredible now what now that we've had so many people trained it's almost like how do we enhance the capacity there PBIS has been ongoing social emotional behavioral and cultur responsive teaching and all the building teams have been established you'll hear us continue to talk about how we're going to support our schools to grow student leadership and peer voice as well around the safe and support of work the schools will do more discussion on ruler I know Jerel touched upon that as well well and the schools will tell you exactly what their roles are in ruler this year and some of the training that's going to be happening and then we're working on convening our district

017and mental health team as well under teaching and learning again some of the key takeaways for this year is really working on making sure that we are being transparent with that stage one it's on the website but it's really just the standards it's not in the units we're going to be moving into stage two and Stage stage three however the curriculum coordinators and Joanie manard will be talking about that at our next meeting we'll get more details we won't go too deep into that tonight we're also as I mentioned in Communications and also again on Tuesday night when we had our Equity audit presentation we'll be starting a steering committee and we'll be rolling out some of that work and I have already spoken with jarielle ver I think he's the perfect person to lead

018that work so he has agreed to facilitate that committee and we'll get details out of that to the community once we kind of put together what it's going to look like because I think there's a lot to think about we're looking at through our curriculum review process the vertical and state alignment in order to Encompass bias equity inclusivity and diversity our PD plan is really aligning with all the Strategic initiatives and again that'll be we'll talk more about that every time we have a PD day you'll hear Joanie present out on some of the work that they're doing at the building level or the district level we're working and you should get another small Community newsletter out next week we were planning on trying to get it out this week but it's going to be

019next week and we'll have some of the work that we're doing Shad out related to the equity audit and um the goals as well and we're working with we and Mark Outreach to rebuild the language based Continuum grades 3 to 8 and I know J Bey talked about that at our last meeting as well Arch four some of the key things we working on under talent and resources we started something this summer as you recall when we were struggling to fill positions like all other districts and Nationwide there's been so many articles about this and the shortages of staff so we came up with the plan to have this building liaison pilot program in place so we do have in all four buildings a building liaison so that when staff on board during the year

020they have a go-to person it's primarily for our par professional staff and maybe some building subs and people like that that don't have a mentor a formal mentorship program because we do have for teachers a formal mentorship program so they have someone connect to no matter what time of year they come in you also heard us talk about the SOI and we recently had the senior study October 4th 2023 and obviously we've had some communication about that that I think we're going to talk about tonight I I'm pleasantly optimistic based on the conversations we had that day that we may be moving in the future but we won't know until the vote comes in around December but it was a pleasant and actually David List was with us and it sounded very positive but we

021won't know until they both come up Jess Bey and her bcvas work to do new par hired training modules five of them and we're able to roll those out so that they can do them on their own time but they get paid for those hours once they submit the hours um after they get to them I already mentioned the ready work that's happening is part of helping to support our staff with raal Equity diversity and inclusion as well on to the High School good evening they voted this order because I'm the new guy U David List principal of the high school um so I just wanted to take a a few minutes to talk about our plans and and what we have moving forward and um a little bit about what I what I've learned

022in a month and a half um at hollison high school um what you're going to see throughout all of it I want to sort of shape it all for you with under the umbrella of learning and and asking lots of questions for me coming in you know in a month and a half and what what are the what are the parts that help us learn it and you're going to see through each of these slides the nees um that is the accreditation group that comes in um and and every 10 years you get an opportunity to really focus in um on your school um there's a lot of self-reflection um it's peer guided review process um and it really acts as sort of the Catalyst for advancement um for goals for for the for the

023schools um so as you're sitting here reading through this this is a lot of what I learned this summer um what we can move forward right now but a lot of the work will happen you know starting next week when neas comes to visit I'm going to put a plugin we could use some more parents out there um to come as part of the group next Wednesday uh at 12 o' look at the Weekly Newsletter it's coming out tomorrow um to sign up please we could use some more folks on that group um but that's neas really pulls together a chance to to um for for self-reflection and then creating space for conversations about the school and um ways that we want to move forward using teacher voice student voice uh parent voice um and

024goals that come out of the the community as a whole so um it really is a great opportunity um looking at at Arch one and the communication practices one of the things I heard a lot this summer um in meeting with about 50 different families um was about communication whether it was about process whether it was about things like the student handbook or or programs just lots of communication so we're really trying hard to revamp all the communication strategies and and enhance any of the media presence that we have throughout the school to make sure people are informed right now um we're looking at how we get information out to families um that's all different groups how we're reaching our y population um and really spending a lot of time focused on that to make

025sure that everybody's well informed and that includes uh all all of the the students and the parents and all of the families so that was a big thing I would say that of 50 I know out of the 50 families I met with 48 of them um all mentioned communication is something that uh they would like to to see us work on at the high school level so um that that's you'll see that throughout all of those pieces of of arch one and then just I just wanted to go back to the neas piece because you'll see that again on this slide um just so understanding what it looks like that NES focuses on everything from the learning culture um to the physical plant in the environment um to the learning support to social emotional

026well-being to equity and all that so it really is a comprehensive look at all of these components um but so far what we're looking to do is we look to work with Leslie diamandis to sort to reimagine and redevelop um the Intervention Program having the opportunity for teachers to present students who might be struggling um having all of the resources together in one space and really understanding um what what tiered support systems we have how we use them um how we have used them what we need to support students further um and really pull together data to analyze the effectiveness of those systems of support to make sure that we're using them effectively in the building and for students um we're going to be working on putting together you know student and staff climate surveys

027and culture surveys and understanding what what the feeling of the school school is building wide um and we're going to continue our work with uh the Seb Academy the mental health Academy partnering with um EDC um to understand how we can support students and staff in the building uh and then introduce different types ofal programming to engage students uh like for example bringing in challenge day which really helps students to understand the experiences of everybody else in in their building um and then looking into and learning component there are specific pieces that we're working on here in terms of looking at like the new res State Frameworks in Wellness um working through the curriculum review process and continuing the work of the vision of The Graduate uh one of the components of the vision of

028The Graduate is is is how do we know like we have this Vision how do we know that students have actually achieved that um we have rubrics when it comes to writing and reading we have standard in in math and science and we we we test those but how do we know uh that this vision of a graduate is happening um and that will be done through the development of a rubric that would eventually connect to The Curriculum maps and what's happening in the classroom and in each unit so that's the goal of those components of the vision of The Graduate uh so it's important to have those those curriculum pieces mapped out and the unit designs mapped out so that we can then attach the the vision of The Graduate components to it um

029because that's just as you know if we if we want students to learn that we need to understand what we want them to learn when it comes to the the other components not just the academic side um we'll continue our Oop There sorry um and just the other piece there is we'll be beginning our work on the Innovation Pathways Grant which is a state Grant um that really engages the school in looking at students as they progress through different Um passion areas I would say so they have we um we already have like our computer science endorsement for example and so the state provide you can apply for the Innovation Pathways Grant in computer science and they help provide resources and planning to help you enhance those programs um and connect students to outside resources

030throughout their time in the high school to eventually finish up doing Capstone projects um and internships throughout the year so it's it's a really exciting program that will we get our process it's a it's a year in a half Grant process so you start it now and then it's for the not you have to go through a year long Grant process to apply so um it takes about a year and a half to to finish the whole application process um and until you find out if you get it or not but it's it's a really great program that the state has been um putting a lot of energy and efforts behind um and then finally they're looking at um the implementation of the star program continue looking at the the data that comes from that

031and and data sources elsewhere and I just have to say with the pathway grants that's a perfect example of why we need an updated new High School because of the limitations we have so ideally this would could continue to expand as time goes on if and when we get a school in place and then finally looking at you know how we um what we're working with this new staff um you know coming into the building this year we had um quite a few new staff members looking at how um you know we're supporting those staff members um how we're supporting them in terms of what they are getting in terms of their training in terms of their mentorship and and terms of how we can support them better in the classroom um looking at our

032work in the evaluation process and really understanding all of the resources that we have at the high school and again even just just like I was talking about before with the multi- systems of Support also all of the resources all the subscriptions the apps all of that how are we using it are we using it effectively how are we how do we measure that we're using it and that we're using it effectively as well so those are the pieces that come under Arch 4 and the middle School let's go to Arch one for me um don't you want to reintroduce yourself yeah David Jordan uh year 11 I think I've had uh everybody either have or had uh everybody's child children that are sitting at this table and the students that are here um as

033well so uh that's me dck Jordan um so that being my uh 11th year and I'm looking at Arch one which is on communication it made me think how I was going going to kind of just uh start this presentation uh and talk about it and those who have worked with me you all have worked with me know that I I don't shy away from a difficult conversation um and I'm open to that and a conversation um on that so the way I want to start is first um I was a bit inspired by Tuesday by some of the comments that Chim Maya um had had mentioned and I I want to just acknowledge one um as I present um um I am asking myself to be very direct with all of you and for

034you all to ask very direct questions back to me and I've been somewhat inspired uh by Ted lasso uh as well and um am embracing curiosity and I would just ask that of you all too so with any question or wonder that you have out in the community um whether it's now um or whether it's some some point after this night I would love to provide you the research the data the information about any claim or statement that that I make all right so um I do want to talk about Equity uh I do want to talk about privilege I do want to talk about fragility uh if we can jump to slide three or Arch three for me first um so uh I'm very proud uh of uh the Robert Adams Middle School I've

035been there for 11 years um um so I'm very proud of the results I'm very proud of the performance of the teachers and what they've been able to accomplish Robert Adams Middle School is the highest performing School of any Middle School that I've looked at in this past year with uh a low income rate of greater than 11% um you rate yourself against any Middle School uh in the area uh anybody that's performing higher in proficiency um they have an income rate less less than 11% uh and I would argue because we look also look at um hopkington off often time as as a measure that we we sometimes measure ourselves against um is that rsgp um as a middle school is higher for ELA uh than Hopkinson it is high as high uh for

036or is higher in math um for all students um in SGP uh it is higher uh in um low-income students it is much higher for uh our L population um and it is higher for our um our students with disabilities as well um it is in my opinion u based on any metric anybody wants to ask or look at is one of the best performing middle schools in the state of Massachusetts all right so um one of the things that I'm most proud of um which is a goal that we set forth last year was our writing and literacy initiative um we last year by me my by my measure my measures were um were some areas that I would like to improve in writing so we put a large scale initiative to move towards

037a common writing rubric across our entire Middle School in all subjects um in this past year um we doubled our differential uh from last year uh to the state um so that's an exceptional uh gain uh in one year with one year of implementation of a writing rubric um and I would I would Charter that are linked that to um a lot of that reason um we have across Ross the entire school um demonstrated SGP increases and proficiency increases across all subjects um in the past uh past year except for one that being seventh grade math um as well uh but uh saw improvements in our uh in our subgroups um as well so um with that I just want to indicate some of the areas that we are working for this year we are

038in a pilot forl uh which is in in order to Target kind of a lot of our um are atrisk population students um students who may require tier one tier or tier 2 tier three intervention um and I would say that that's our area for our greatest growth that we can make and these are some of these initiatives are things that I'm very very proud of um if we go backwards to arch2 David srg is SGP sorry student growth percentile so um for a a general rule of thumb if you are in a high income Community you see high proficiency just like the total score um if you are typically you take a look at lower income uh schools you see lower proficiency but where you can measure a lower income Community against a higher

039income Community is in the SGP um meaning the growth that they can make with the students they have um and I think that this community should be within the M middle school should be very proud of the SGP they show and and many times it's it's unfair to compare yourself to a Weston um or a Winchester um when you're looking at proficiency but I would encourage you to look at SGP in any of those communities that that exist and can I just add before we go on so the SGP is a three-year data source they take the trend data from the students and relate them to their peers within the community and within the state and it's a three-year data source so when you're looking at what they have today it's going back the previous

040two years as well so it's comparing them to their past years or to each other to their own growth like is both a combination of both yeah it also has the norm against like how the whole assessment progresses and where that like Middle Ground is too um uh the other piece that I'm proud of that while we've seen academic and performance we've also uh quadrupled um our staff of color in the Last 5 Years um and so that's something I'm incredibly proud of um additionally if you're looking at our social emotional well-being um we're in year two of working with the ADL uh in their peer leadership program they've already been our abil this year twice uh to work with um 20 of our students uh student leaders uh who are implementing change across our

041building um and have been essential participants in creating our safe and supportive schools lessons um over the last uh two years uh we have 10 Educators in our building that participating in the department of EDS uh CR academy uh C Cally respon or um culture responsive education uh uh Academy um we are in partnership with with the high school going to be participating in a challenge day um at the end of the year uh in combination with Medway as well um we're continuing with project 351 Celtics Playbook uh which had great success um and uh are really working hard um at the implementation of tier 2 and tier three seal um supports for our students that are indicated um there our our major area of focus this year are a notice of like a challenge

042for this past year past couple years has been behavior um so what we where we see it Center ourselves um while we have academic uh improvements to make I'm very proud of our academic per uh performance I think where we have the greatest Improvement is actually in our student behavior um and um their their growth as human beings when we talk about personal local Global and the type of Citizen that we're trying to produce um kickboard is a tool that we're using and if we were to go uh to no actually it can stay there is um kickboard is uh which is Behavior Support um is a tool within Power School uh that is basically like an online Amazon for PBIS uh and an reward system that we can acknowledge and students can trade in

043their points and almost create a banking system uh it also allows us when we were using care cards for our project based learning uh process which Sarah can attest to this um it is a lot for the students to collect keep retain their care cards um it is a lot for the PTO to replenish little gadgets and things uh constantly uh but if there's an online system we can set up online structures for students to build towards certain activities and lessons um and then we can also share with whoever is providing whatever those items they want to purchase with it's kind of almost like a purchase order of what the kids are looking for as well so it's a system that we're hoping for uh to really help um support um our Behavior as well

044so I know that the last Arch um is the fourth Arch could pause one second I just think I know probably you all do know but some of our people watching don't know what those acronyms are if we can try to so just going to frame Us in PBIS as positive behavioral intervention supports and then ADL you saw me share out something recently at that the Anti-Defamation League is um something that we share resources and we have the No Place pain campign but this is another piece to that which I wanted to highlight because I think it's a very important piece of trying to bring that into the schools and I'm I'm glad to see that PR leadership up and R yeah I think I think the combination of the Anti-Defamation League uh in partnership

045with the Department of Ed's uh cultur responsive education academy uh are providing like a two-prong support for our staff through the C Academy and then the ADL through peer leadership is uh training and providing supports for our students on how to lead change within their building uh as well so it's I think that two-prong approach is very important and will lead to positive change um going forward which we know for sure that our students are more successful when they learn from when they we can say whatever we want we can do our best but when they learn it from one another and they have peer leaders that will step up and not have that bystander effect and be complicit when they hear and do things it's much more powerful obviously when our peer leaders do

046the work and where it says you're two of the ADL peer leadership Club there was other work with the ADL prior to that too I remember them coming in and doing um seminars with kidss yeah yeah so we we've had a partnership with badl for for a while one on like a smaller scale as like single one offs or a couple times a year um this is the second year of having a very direct partnership with them where they work explicit with with a core group of peer leaders to train them um so that they are peer models then out into their Community or out into their school um which I think we'll pay dividends not only for the middle school but we'll pay dividends forward when they go on to the high school uh

047as well um um and being kind of that that leader I think similarly um these are students that do participate along with others in the uh project 351 Celtics Playbook which similarly is trying to confront bias and confront um the fragility and privilege that exists within within Holliston and as a student uh that you often times you know at 12 through 14 years old um are just becoming to be open your eyes to a lot of that um and that's again um why were also adding to looking to bring in challenge day as well to kind of um cap off the year with that um same experience um cap off the year with that um same experience and as those middle schoolers that received some of that work with the ADL whether it was um

048implicit bias or sexism or racism we're talking about anti-Semitism they've now aged up to the high school or do we bring the ADL back in for additional seminars at some point or is it just the peer group that's teaching peers yeah so th this is explicit the the peer group that we work with I will say the ADL is a part of our safe and supportive schools lessons so they consult so our peer leadership group is the ones who are actually crafting and editing the safe and supportive schools lessons and are delivering them to all of our students and the ADL is the one that spends the time with that group working on those lessons and what to do and how to be a model person so what it's like train the trainer almost so

049we're training the students who then go and Lead that cont conversation and that curriculum um outwardly uh with all of our students in the building we aged up um uh some of our peer leaders from last year but we have like a new crop of peer leaders this continuation of some of our seventh graders or eighth grade but now we have like new new seventh graders new sixth graders who are participants uh as well and I think I forgot to mention and maybe that we um actually Sarah cun and I worked together to get the Celtics Playbook initiative up and running with two peer leaders Danielle and kala last year Sarah um just reapplied and we will be Celtics Playbook again um we're doing that work with the middle school students and this year it's

050kala and um I I'm trying to think of the there's a new student I I'm blanking on the name right now but Sarah did share that with me so we're excited that they'll continue to work you know do their work with the middle school and those students will filter up I believe it it's a d I think it is a d yes a d is one of our was our one of our eighth grade projects ambad when he was in grade um so that great for to be one of the ambassadors for this off and the peer so we tried to bring in the peer leadership of the high school right now to the three-year wait list to bring them in so we're looking for other avenues that do that so we actually were reaching

051out in this we're looking for other avenues to support um the student advisory leaders to do some of that training moving forward but we did try to bring it but there's a lot of schools trying to do it they don't have enough trainers so we're on the weight list I love the idea that challenge days with the high school but what what's going on with challenge days this is the first year we had uh it is M it's middle school has a day the high school has a day and then Medway high school has a day so like to bring in and I I don't know why I'm speaking to it because he told me about it his challenge days of social emo learning program that it engages 100 students each time you bring them

052in um and it it's working with them to the best example is like the iceberg right you see all the students on the top and what's underneath um and bringing that out um especially in in you know communities that a lot of kids look alike and have the same socioeconomic background understand that there are um differences among us there as well um and building that empathy and then using that to move forward within the school um it's an amazing program that I've been lucky to be a part of and it involves um 100 students and 20 staff members um working with those students so thank you I don't know if you have anything to add to Arch one but I think you hit a lot of it already um I'm Al like kickboard the behavior

053basically touching base on on all those things and on to L school so first of all um I would like to thank my entire staff because I started the first 6 weeks without an assistant principal and the first three weeks without an SSA and um my staff was really really supportive uh and I can't thank them enough um we now have Dr Emily Lori who is my SSA she started the third week of September and uh Brenda Morrow uh started uh last week uh fulltime and so officially uh and so I am just um so thankful for my staff um that had really helped me get through uh this time and my colleagues so um we are going to go through but first of all I know you think everybody knows you but I am

054David K and um I am the principal of the Miller school I have been at the Miller school for 25 years uh and so really proud was uh started as assistant principal and then principal for the last 22 so it's been a while so sorry about that that's okay our prek 2 parents may not know else do you know principal David didn't you probably the original yeah the OG so this year we started the s'more platform um we're really excited in uh both our um Family newsletters that we're sending out weekly and our uh we're sending out a staff uh newsletter as well um this year uh with our um School coun so we want to partner our school council with our we're going to have a new student student leadership group that I'll share

055in the next slide we want to help the new families that are coming into town and so how do we partner up some of our new students with um some of our student leaders uh in the building um we're going to be Susan talked about it uh launching our family power school Portal what that means at the elementary school is parents will be able to access our report on student progress and any progress notes um after they've gone out and they won't have to call us to get a paper copy or things like that uh we don't have grade books so you won't see that aspect at the elementary level and we'll still um Brenda has already continued to uh keep us up on uh Facebook uh the other thing is uh they they mentioned

056it earlier we'll be sending out our beginning of the year assessments uh both the star assessments and our Diles results and we'll be doing that three times a year and so that's another way we'll be trying to be transparent and communicate with families uh we are starting year two of culturally uh responsive Academy um we um had a little bit of a regroup uh because we weren't sure that each year what was involved with it so we are currently we took a diagnostic with them to see um where our first year teachers were and we're currently developing kind of a a a plan in how we're going to continue uh the rest of the year so it's kind of almost individualized for our building which I think is is really cool um we are in

057our second year of rise and with Brenda just coming in real quick she's like this rise you know it there was a lot of teacher jargon in it so she's already trying to uh make it really kid-friendly um so that um our um students better understand we are going to be rolling out ruler uh and ruler stands for recognizing understanding labeling expressing uh and responding so it's getting people to identify their emotions so that they're able to talk about them understand them so we're going to do this with staff year so that we can get staff to do it with students next year we haven't started it yet um but we'll be rolling it out I think December January uh at Miller um we're going to expand our student leadership into grades three and four

058this came out of our culture and climate Committee of teachers where let's get the third and fourth graders involved let's get you know um schoolwide assemblies going to take a look at some of you know the areas we want to focus on in rise or ruler um so we'll be starting to implement that throughout the year next slide so this year uh we are piloting three different uh math programs we are looking at I ready um we are looking at Eureka squared and we are continuing to look at um enVision Math and so we've got uh pilot teachers at each grade K through five uh that are looking at each one of these programs our hope is that they will um get through uh a unit each at each um program so that we're H

059able to assess this by budget time January so that we're able to come forward um with which area we want to go with in science uh in grades three and four we're going to be um moving moving science from the unified Arts into the classroom starting in January uh where um one teacher will do social studies another teacher will do uh science and they'll switch uh every other week or it could be every other you know every two weeks um that's in the works right now uh Wellness because um we'll be taking science out of the unified Arts will be developing Wellness um units of study in grades three and four and the new Wellness standards actually came out the old ones were from 98 or something like that it was ridiculous um but those

060finally came out in E Ela we've got a big push last year I think you heard us talk about writing uh we brought Bill Atwood in um what we realized last year is our our kids really had no stamina in writing and I think part of that was Co um and so we really worked on that and so each level started to map out what they were doing uh in writing so this year what we're doing is we're developing like David's already done we are developing those common writing rubrics at each grade level and writing prompts that go along with them and each one of the grade levels has communicated with each other so those rubrics are going to be similar in grades three four and five another big push uh we did last year

061is we looked at our Wind Block when is what I need and last year we only had one per grade and so you would have 11 teachers and whatever uh support Personnel helping out during that time so you were limited in the number of students you could service during that time this year what we did was we broke it up into seven different wind blocks two per grade and then uh a monori block so that we could get our interventionists in to support smaller groups of teachers so that more students could be supported and now that we have a um prek through grade five um math specialist we're able to have that person help coordinate our math uh instruction as well so the students who need math intervention and um reading intervention will come out

062of that block and I think you heard during the equity audit there were times when we had to pull kids from the Spanish piece this wind block allows us a different spot because during this wind wind block um teachers are not supposed to be teaching new instruction during that time and so it it really is a time where if the students need support and if they um need challenge the teachers offering them opportunities uh for that as well you know we're also the other big thing that we're getting is we're looking we're getting a lot of data with the assessments uh that we're having so um with uh a software and I don't know a lot about it but amplify it's able to help us to um take those scores and and show us it

063it's able to measure growth oh Jamie's got a little um but if we look at the Wind Block we really need to to look at our tier one instructions so we're continually looking at especially in the math especially in the ELA how are we instructing all of the students in tier one so that we need less tier 2 interventions uh with the students I think we can go on to the next one um and I think Dr Kusa talked about it it's really helped having a a per Professional Building liaison at each one of the buildings that sometimes you get new staff and a lot of times it's a pair of professionals who come into the building I know my liaison is setting up a meeting with them with them within two days to go

064over everything that they need to know uh to get working in the building um all all four of our buildings are calibrating our our etal and we've been working with central office on that um we are uh in November going to uh roll out our second culture and climate um survey with our students and our staff um we put one out late uh I think it was in March uh that we had done ours and the and the last one is um really looking at solo leadership uh Dr Kusa brought in Rick Rogers uh to meet with our admin team and it and it's taking taking a look at um I don't know David List give me give me a capture it David's uh one of the the just I mean Soul leadership really looks

065at the bringing you back to where you are in the moment uh uh at end time and really able to focus in on on what's important and again it's it's sort of like the I would say it's the the seal piece um for leadership the scps for the adults and helps to ground um Everybody in the work that they're doing in the moment I think it's important to note that um Brenda is a facilitator facilitator for Sol of Le leadership um I'm in the um State group uh with with Brenda being one of the facilitators um David has gone through it entirely before and and we're bringing it uh here as a district um was not hired here when we contracted with him it was and I've also gone through it and and it no

066I but but what it does is it grounds you and we start each one of our staff meetings with these touchtones and these touch tones really get um teachers to focus on the moment and each each time we go over this you know some people might say Norms these are a little different than norms and each time they look at them they can pick a different one where they are at that moment um when they're when they're in that meeting you know first couple meetings we had the teachers share out what they were feeling now it's just like pick it in your head and and realize it but it it grounds you after a busy day of work to come back and and um uh come back to earth and I'm just that's it placentino

067and I know Jamie's going to be thrilled because she's going to be repeating a lot of things so she can just fly no I'm going to be concise Dr you can be concise so at placentino we did a survey at the end of the year last year to our families asking their preference on social media platforms and our families chose Facebook so we launched that this year and then nobody's following us on Facebook so we are trying hard to um get that out right now our Instagram users are up this year what we're going to examine in a developmental way how our students can share the story um for us so I've been talking to Winnie Perry about how we can utilize seesaw as a way for students to be taking pictures around their classroom

068um we're thinking about maybe doing a theme where they are thinking about their learning so it reflects it they can take a picture it can go into seesaw we can utilize that picture and then put it onto Instagram and show out so that it's not just me snapping pictures around and that is through the students lens so that's something that we're working on we also are utilizing sore and we're trying to turn our newsletters um a little bit more than just I mean they're important you know no cook Thursday and you know those types of things but also informational that families need um and you know when I hear that there's a resource needed trying to get that out to our fames as well we have a staff newsletter which the um the name has

069changed um so now it's Pep's press it's not placentino press it's Pep's press and again trying to turn that into small opportunities to share information and um grow Professional Knowledge in there um we are also utilizing seaw more and more and we're really trying to use it as a digital portfolio for students to show their reflection second um so I think that you guys stole my ther on a lot of these but I think what I really want to highlight is um talking a little bit about what Mr K was talking about for ruler we each had a set of trainers who were trained in ruler so ruler is not a program it's an approach and I think that's really important for us to think about and everything that we're doing everything on this slide

070is laying the foundation for social emotional learning and wellness throughout our district and we're really proud to be starting it with our youngest students but it really starts with our staff so this year we're focusing only on staff and that is what um ruler recommends ruler ruler comes from the Yale Center for social emotional intelligence I think that's what it is and they really talk about if our staff can't recognize their own emotional regulation and their own emotional intelligence how do we expect them to teach children so we're going to invest the time and we're going to do that and that's year one of that we are in year one of the CR Academy which I think that we've already spoken about and this year um the way that we partner with the ADL at

071our level is through literature and we have monthly read alouds that we utilize questions from the ADL to really in an age appropriate way teach students about themselves um others bias bullying discrimination but in a very age appropriate way so this slide Is My Jam so this is what we're really focusing a lot on at placentino so when we think about um our professional learning this year for our teachers it's going to be our school-based professional learning it's going to be divided up between ruler and structured literacy as many of you know in July um the state of Massachusetts passed a new dyslexia law and we're really proud of where we already were in that and what they were requiring of schools we had almost met almost all of the benchmarks with the exception of

072the communication for families which goes back to our first tier so we are um as Dr Kusa and my colleagues talked about we are going to be utilizing different measures this year we've streamlined our assessments to focus more on normed based measures um Dibbles which is the dynamic indicator beginning early literacy skills is one of two of the measures that have been approved by the state of Massachusetts as a dyslexia screener it's a screener it's not a diagnoser it tells us about maybe there's red flags of what we need to do to support students it does not diagnose it so we are using that in K1 and two and we've increased the measures we use we also started um a phonic screener this year kindergarten through 2 grade which will build on phonic skills so

073the students will take this portfolio fio with them as they build skills it will move with them throughout this the our school and it it mirrors a systematic phonics approach which we're using in French um we are using the ipel which is the French Dibbles it's not exactly the French Dibbles but it's like the French Dibbles and we've also um added two dibles measures which is the rapid automatic naming um subtest and the pH name seg so it's not really fair to test our student students who French on letter naming fluency where they might not know those letters or first fluency when we don't instruct them in that but there are measures that we can use that can show um if students are at risk for learning differences in reading and those are two of

074one so rapid automatic naming for the dibles is letters we're using pictures colors shapes objects um for our students in French to remove that barrier so it's giving us some um indication if they need support So In addition to French French in addition to interventions in the French language they'll also be able to receive interventions in English what research tells us is that if they're learning in their first language and getting support in their first language it will transfer to their second language um it does not take away from them learning French so we'll be able to support them in both languages we've really looked at our tiered interventions and our support so um our teachers are really looking at how if they're not um if students aren't getting support in Reading support or math

075support from our reading and math tutors um they'll be providing their tier 2 interventions within the classroom and we're building you know ways that teachers can do that in small doses um that will be able to you know increase how they're doing we're going to be progress monitoring students that are at risk on the dibles every four weeks so that we'll be able to really really watch um how their growth is and if we're not seeing that growth then we can revisit that and we change our instruction as Mr Kim talked about we're uying we're using amplify this year um Dan helped us with that that partners with Dibbles so teachers can able to um have the research right at their hands instead of going through all the booklets or looking at a spreadsheet they

076can look at the growth profiles of their students on dibles they can look at progress monitoring um um indicators it helps them with grouping so we're really excited about that Family communication will be sending home um not only the progress monitoring not only the benchmarking results that we were talking about but we'll also be sending home the um progress monitoring results so families who have a child who is at a higher indicator of risk they'll be receiving those um results every four to 6 weeks as well um in addition um we saw through uh Mr Kim's data that we have an increase in our multilingual learner um population forly known as um English language Learners it's much more um positive instead of deficit of an English language learner and we are um providing specific reading

077supports for those students as well in addition to their multilingual language Services as well so hopefully as they're building skills and their language as they move up through the grade levels they'll be um better prepared that's Postino great thank you guys number four is the same oh yeah else said so so before we get into questions I just want to apologize to the to the four of you for the omission of the zoom link during the equity audit that's uh that was an oversight on my my part but uh we watched it on YouTube it's F okay oh yeah all right anyway um questions Perfect all right just to go over the um David List you had indicated you're waiting for the neas review when and that will help inform you when do we receive

078that 6 to 8 weeks okay and the completion dates by end of October so it's 68 weeks from 68 weeks from next week from the visit next week next week yeah um I'm just going to go back I got to look at the slides to figure out what I was thinking at the moment so we'll come back you don't okay thank you IA do you have a [Music] question um you were talking talked about in social emotional well-being and again David List um analyzing what we've done and how we used our resources is this part of we I think at one point we had a a conversation at a school committee meeting about trying to analyze almost like how often people are going so we know whether we're whether we need more counselors or you

079know do kids have to wait a few days for an appointment is that part of of what you were envisioning about or or if you could just tell me stuff the systems of support right so when coming into a school you get to ask a lot of questions and you get to see what's going on and you get to look at a lot of data and a lot of information um and just really understanding what what supports do we have how are they used uh when are they used um what supports are needed what is they going to tell us about the supports that are needed um and how can we bring those supports either into classrooms to support teachers and instruction there is it is it social emotional wellbeing work with counselors or wraparound

080supports it's really just an understanding of everything that's happening within the school and um you know most of my this past month that hav has been asking just a lot of questions and trying to understand what we actually have uh to sports students and and this predated you but I remember we had a student rep so was the end of their senior year and they were surprised that you could in fact have like access to a counsel or therapist in some way and that was after all of our years and that felt like maybe that's an area of communication with students that we about the services that are available that maybe a missed opportunity to make sure we're communicating that often so that we don't get to the end of senior year and find out

081that that was there and that that I think showed in a lot of my the summer work that I did speaking to people like communication across the board was really an area that we needed to work on as as a high school and so that's something that we're trying to engage in as I said with all stakeholders not just parents but the community as a whole the students everybody with what's happening at the school and what's available at the school and I guess it's it's both for David Jordan and David list because you said you had also watched the equity audit had a opportunity to read it and and you had referenced chaya's comments but I thought that was an an awesome opportunity for enhanced communication to support access to Opportunities right and things like

082um making sure all of our our students families Guardians know about override and how simple process might be and here's the form and maybe it's also the repetitive nature of it too but one of my big questions and this is kind of like a are we especially as we move to electronic communications whether we communicate with people via Facebook or Instagram or power school do we have a way to know that we're reaching out um and people are not receiving it do we have a way to feedback that families you know this family's been sent you know 11 emails but they've never opened it and if so can we pick up a phone like do we have that capacity and if not and we don't have to answer that I guess it's just a question

083that I'd like us to look into the one I can tell you that we can see numbers and actual numbers is for example when we send out s'more s'more gives us a lot of data for example when I sent out I think it was the chip challenge one um I think I'm still getting hits on that and I believe we're up to almost 6,000 people have we get emails from s'more saying like you're a super user 6,000 excited it doesn't mean that theyve RIT the ruins they definitely opened it and what they do and that's why we try to put big S average amount of time in it as well you can see that as well so some people only in for a minute some people in for multiple time you know and it's more

084a question of so it's great to know that we have 6,000 people that have read it but I'm more concerned about the family that we've sent 11 emails to and nobody's read it so if we if we can just look into whether there's like a technological capacity to know we're sending this out but they they're missing might be a to give you I thank you d I guess and again that was just responsive to that that question and comment from Tuesday um no so we've asked brighter of this question uh because we we get it a lot so can we see if the parent actually open it their response was it's it's a technical issue there's so many email programs out there they can't lock in on a certain you know to see if it's

085readed there's just so many so such a variety so that was their response it doesn't mean we can't do it but I can ask again uh but that's bright Arrow we can we can see the messages that the parents received for sure we just can't tell if they've open them there's no read receipt on that is what I'm hearing cuz like I know when I send emails sometimes I'll do read receipt if I know I'm need to know for sure that people have read a certain thing because it's time sensitive but they you can't do that through right hour Don are you talking about mass emails or like individual individual emails if we don't get a response we follow up and then we try something else like if an email's not working we try a

086phone call um sometimes we use bright Arrow like sometimes I've use bright Arrow text messaging and um hey I sent you an email could you give us a call you know those types of things so we don't leave them I would also think like um thinking about the equity audit um how how we communicate and the ways that we communicate we need to understand the lens that we're using um when we communicate and who's that reaching out to um often times when we think about like me being a white male and the way that I communicate it may be a strategy that I'm communicating out to 90% of the population that lives in Holliston so can receive it in a certain way but may not an appropriate form of communication for another population and us

087um us being critical of that um and being curious about like how we're receiving information versus making assumptions that like well it's on the website or well we sent out the Rams news or well um you know it's on power school like yes the the there are many uh many most of our parents have the the skills wherewith all the know the knowing of how to Advocate and look in that way uh but also we need to acknowledge that many do not is it wor thinking about maybe there are certain Communications especially at the beginning of the year that maybe should just go via snail mail I mean sometimes if you get something in your hand granted it's a lot harder to do it in multi language but sometimes you know IEP process maybe even

088just just something if you get it in the mail you have it in your hands it's sometimes more more so I'll I'll just say to you that we send out actual mailings about kindergarten registration and often people just don't open them so you know so I I think that it's not cheap well and that's fine but I do think like what David's talking about is sometimes we get feedback of I don't read emails but if you could text me and we have teachers who use apps that um in bright Arrow so we text people so I think it's about being curious and asking the question and you know when we think about some of our families who English isn't their first language you know thinking about how we can partner you know if somebody called

089me in Spanish um that would feel very uncomfortable to me CU because I don't speak Spanish so how we can do that so we've been using like some really great translating Services as well so I think it's about us being curious and leaning into families and making connections so it's not just um I I feel that we know our families pretty well so I mean to to Jam's point for example I had three families that I can think of where my primary mode of communication is via text using a system I'm not using my own cell phone but it's texting translating back and forth I'm even adding the link in on the text message to the person so that they can have it but that's the mode of communication not not email I do think

090we're getting even old for email um I I agree I think I can find like emails are going dead now and I think this is why we keep expanding expanding like I mean I'm I know when I'm I'm I'm tweeting I'm using s'more I'm using bright Arrow Instagram um it's going on the website I mean I we're doing the same thing in multiple places because you know the entry level is like so we're just trying it all you know I also think um sometimes it's it's what type of device you're using like even having to log on to a computer get started up is is even that as a barrier it comes directly to your phone or if it's a true or if it's you know modifiable so that it's a screen that you can

091look at versus I to scroll around on what should be something that you would see on a on a we're getting into a generation of families that also don't have Wi-Fi at their house they have their cell phone hotspot that so the the lifeline is actually the cell phone not the computer um and all it is is they have the cell phone they set the hot spot for their house and that's how their student accesses their Chromebook um at home and I think that's one one of the reason we went to s'more last year too because it really it does scroll Ian it's a lot but it's you can scroll through and at least they they're hitting the titles that they want and they can translate that as through bright Arrow right cuz it's coming

092to Bright Arrow translates itself I'm trying remember which way it doesn't I know it translates but and um Jamie I I appreciate you're talking about like the kindergarten registration and this gets mailed out is that based on like census data or who are we mailing to okay and then my next part is I think I've seen a transition over the last few years where I thought I saw something on like some of the local Town web pages maybe maybe yes I think we do about registration um so so I'm not part of those okay but maybe some but people help us with that they post um I think actually the PTO helped us last year Facebook ones yeah they they but the town website we can't the town does can help us push it out

093through the town communication tools as well if but I haven't done that those creative approaches and early enough that we know that families who are completely new or don't have exposure to this already see it right um do we ever do things like sign at the library or sign at the food pantry or sign at other like various places we want to we and and I really appreciate that we've seen some online presence about it too because we we want to get be we want to make sure people who are completely new to our programs know about them early enough it might be worth printing out some flyers to your point in putting them in different places for sure yeah and one of the big things from the equity audit I think was um exposure

094and recruitment into the special programs um and that would include even montau preschool right because it's much easier to get into Montas k um when you've been in the preschool so that would not lately but yeah that's that's really interesting so another question for everybody and this might be premature because it just came out on Tuesday and we're all going to be talking about this later but while you're all four here how can we support you and sort of processing the results and then like looking forward to next steps um from the equity audit uh I think that it's important for us to really ask questions and look deep into the data and the research about it um and know that maybe some of the things that we find um challenge our conventional wisdom and

095our narratives that we've experienced in the past and so like I think that that's important as we dive into that know that maybe what we find might not be what we like um and you know wondering and being curious about that um and figuring what we want to do next because I do think that um there will be a steering committee there will be recommendations on next steps um and you all um will have the lovely responsibility of saying yes or no and I think that like if you do that with curiosity rooted in uh the research and and um wanting to ask the right questions and really know what the what the committee is he got to I I think that's all we can ask yeah and I think we heard people the other

096night comment on how some of the comments were jarring right and uncomfortable and I have to say I can't tell you who made those comments cuz it's confidential I don't know um but somebody said that right so I can't fact check for that I can't correct that out cuz somebody said it but as we dig deep if it is one person well then it's a perception right but then we want to at least we want to be able to analyze some of the things that were said and dig deeper and find out if that is a big problem or not and if we find out it's not we don't put our energies there right so I just like you said the Wonder wondering and trying to dig into to find out what are the things

097that we really want to equity work is uncomfortable it makes you feel uneasy um and I think that uh in order to do it well you have to step into that uncomfortable place um and being be comfortable being uncomfortable um that uh and that's if we can do that um as a community and when we talk about like what are the needs of this community um and how we do that um one giant step is this this committee these principles the individuals here uh getting comfortable getting uncomfortable so and I think I think you also have to remember three of us have been here for a little while and one of us hasn't and so you've got to give some Grace when you're taking look at that because everything you know what's there is mine

098you know and and I got to own it or the teachers that sort of thing so we we've got to think about that when we're looking at each one of the schools per se we got to support one another right which one's new you can guess David you're probably right can I can I just I'm just shifting GE a little bit David can you send me the data that you just or send all of us at that appreciate that you're always willing to like look at that and be uncomfortable in that space and with the lessons that you're doing in middle schools are so important so thank you forting us on that there are super cool graphics that I well I I think it's cool um if you want to say hey David can you

099can you give me these 15 towns um and give me a graph of their sgb and proficiency against this subject this subgroup and then hand it to me in a one pager I do that in 35 seconds it doesn't mean impr I guess what I'm saying I will tell you I was I spoke with Carol Kavanaugh who's um actually as you know I'm um the chair of shade on any other committee it's just I want to know what's so Carol Kavanaugh is the superintendent in hopkington and this is my third year as the um chair for the accept board and Carol has graciously is my vice chair on the except board this year so we really work very collegially together so I reached out out to her to ask some of those difficult questions cuz

100we know that people sometimes aspire to be hopkington when they look at their data and their performance so she is doing a full-blown data U presentation tonight and she said please tell your school committee to feel free to watch um because I know you had questions about some of this and we might be talking about this another night but I you know she said it hopefully it goes well but her presentation is at the same time and it'll be taped and again I just think seeing these other perspectives because they're doing very well in many areas but they're still highlighting some of the strands within mcast for example they're struggling with or some of the um the low-income groups or the um disabilities we are all we all still have areas of growth and Improvement

101and that's why it is important to be able to an analyze strands and see where the struggles are you know I heard Dave talking about acknowledging that staff are concerned that their children are struggling with writing and it co hit us hard with that so now we know this is an area to dig in into and I appreciate that the teachers have become uncomfortable trying to relearn how to do that in a different way because our students need it so whether you're the highest performing District or the lowest performing we all have growth areas and we always want to strive to improve there I just um and then my other question was about um the math Pilots that you were talking about so can you just give a little background for those who don't know

102like why are you looking at a new math program for example do we have to look for a new math program we hadn't done a math review in a very long time uh and with the math review um we wanted to look at the different math programs that were out there uh and we had been using Envision for a very long time and we had reup it just because there was a technology component that we could use during remote during Co so we we reup it because of that piece not necessarily because it was the best math program out there I'm not saying it's not but we we again we've got and so from there we we looked at different things we just look uh was there a French component to some of these and

103so it's tough to translator have a different book if we don't have because in K1 and two they are so math is taught in French but in 34 five it's taught in English so we were taking a look at that we were looking at the reviews that were out there uh and and how that played into it um but it was probably a year long committee before we even came up with three to take a look at this year and who was in the committee um probably one or two per grade yeah one per grade at Miller teacher y all the way up yeah and I will say two for preschool I think when the common cor um standards came out in I'm get now it's been a while I don't the math standard and

104the ELA standard came out a number of years ago and one of the Invision was one of the ones that got jumped on and aligned to the the standards however I mean many districts went with that and the standards have started to change and things so I mean we always need to be reviewing only looking ones that have been rated by curate number presented that in the past right so they that means that they are vetted by Massachusetts teachers to how closely they align to the standards and how user friendly they are for both students and teachers so that's curate rated so those are the only ones we even started looking at this committee so you know we started with vetted products to begin with and then and then got hollist in feedback from the

105the teachers themselves what they wanted to look at we had demonstrations of different products come out um people physically coming from companies to hollon us having Zoom meetings with other people talking about what they offer what they don't offer so each grade level um K through five they are um piloting each one of those right and I know that um we're trying to keep this brief because we're already got but I will say um as as I mentioned earlier the um November 2nd meeting you'll have some of that discussion when we talk about the curcum reviews process talk about next thank you two additional questions so one is directed to you David Kim it was regarding when um with two wins per grade that's not like each class has two wins is the same amount

106of win in the schedule that's right so I've got I understand it eight classrooms in third grade eight in fourth four will go here four will go here the three interventionists that I have don't get split over eight classrooms they go into the the four they go into before it's just much easier many more students you can service okay so that that portion of the equity audit that talked about like the pull outs that was was on the way of changing last year and is changed more now because corre correct um so the other question and I'm trying I mean I think this was probably one of many things that really bothered me when I first read it bothered me Tuesday night I know someone made a com got up and spoke to this but

107it was the hon districtwide chronically absent chart we all saw it absolutely shoot up and the the problem with the data that I had a concerned about is it told us the picture in 2122 remember back in those days when when we had a CO family member or we had we had a lot of Co going on and some of this could be Co related the picture that I didn't see and this is because of probably the process of doing the equity aotter was 22 to 23 so I was a little frustrated because I would have liked to have seen a snapshot from like August to even January or whenever like a cut off date at some point but I assume they probably got this from desie can you help me to understand like chronically

108absent does that mean more than two weeks are we I just need to understand this and I need to know that it improved so let me let me we actually had a meeting with commissioner Riley today to address this because there was a big article in the globe was it I think about chronic ABS news and so yes when they collected the data from us that was like last fall into January so we didn't have the data and they though they went they had to stop somewhere um so yes you didn't see the 22 23 data and the problem is the at the state local and um Federal level there was an expectation that we would have been improving more last year than we did and that is the big worry we are nowhere near

109preco and so that this is now a state issue that we're trying to delve into and then can you talk about a little bit cuz I need some of it so they are identifying chronic absenteeism as 18 days or more for a student so 10% that is the state and so what the state what commissioner Riley was talking about today is that he's going to be spearheading a new initiative to see if districts are interested because over 75% of the school the public school districts have a problem with chronic absenteeism right now so um we are Not Alone um he is going to offer some creative ways and asking superintendants to give feedback to what we can do at the state level which impacts the local level um but it's definitely a problem still for

110Holliston but we're among 75% of other districts and I understand it's happening other places but to the extent that we can look at our own data not wait for the state to it back to us but and look at what it looks like this year and have any solu at all that we can prioritize through the budget process if you think that's what would be helpful but that was alarming there will be things coming out though from the commissioner in this next week so they're having a board meeting next Tuesday think so and then some of his potential initiatives will be coming out which can make an impact for this school year can we get the 2223 data for our for holl yeah yeah we can put that together no just and just just to

111be clear so we can compare it you know maybe this give us the numbers that were put into the charts in the things so we can in the equity audit so that we can actually compare it and we have Apple's TBL so broken out the same way um I think the equity audit used more than 10 right is that the me can I work with you on because Jody Rene would be able to run some reports with this and set it up we gave them this information I do think it's really important um that I mean that data was alarming for all of us to be honest with you I think that when we look we often look at in at students versus versus subgroups and it was a really eye opening to be able

112to kind of look through that lens additionally I think it's important that it's not just about you know getting a child to school for the point of getting them to school it's looking at our social emotional piece like are we having school refusal because of anxiety um are safe and supportive schools do do our children feel safe in our schools um how we're looking at teaching and learning do they feel that they can access do they feel like they see themselves in the classroom do they see that they are heard and valued so that goes to the relationship piece so a lot of what you heard tonight is addressing that and it's an important lens that I know all four of us were like whoa that was data that we haven't looked at in that

113lens before we've looked at individuals but not cohorts thank you good just say one more quick thing all right sorry just cuz you're all here and this might seem like insignificant here's what we've all talked about make when you have a chance could you all just see if there's a working copier in your buildings or like just this is like what we saw one thing we heard from teachers could everyone there working copers that MTI work cop yes do they print yeah do they do they print in a in a working fashion I'll talk about this later because I've already talked with Dan about I mean I think we're talking sometimes copers are down and they're Printing and then there's also individual printers so there we're talking two different things and they're getting mushed together

114a little bit so I think we can talk a little bit more about that there's also a time we have to shut down color printers because we run out we run out and at a certain budget Point what we ask people to think about how they're printing in black and white versus color you know just just put that on radar thank you and thank you all so much thank you thank you thank you thank Youk you good night thank you everyone nice job appreciate it give just a second to uh we moving on to uh policy [Music] um do you want to take that thank you everybody thank you good night thank you say hi to all right are you ready okay um so policy we have two policies this evening those sort of housekeeping

115policies but um just figure attention um we had just this just to start with IG d igig curriculum adoption um masc came up with an alert saying that we just wanted to combine these two policies together it was curriculum development and adoption and just combine them this actually was a pretty new policy for us to have around um how we um vet curriculum Etc um and which we had was it from last year yeah from last year so um so there's only the highlighted area that we're looking at to add to this policy and I'm just going to read it constant adaptation and development of the curriculum is necessary for HPS to meet the needs of the students or just students to be successful curriculum development must be a collaborative process involving staff and administrators

116using their professional expertise people don't like that words about that that's not showing up in my version Oh the version that oh in mind be purple in mind so I think the issue is is what you shared because you have to have editing access and we've tried to not give editing agenda copy so I think that the agenda copy can you see it on there I know it's it's not it's something to do with the share drive we found this out last year Dam can we talk about that again you can see it there yeah right because you have editing access because you're on the policy sub and I think that's the issue too but some of you might have had from last year I'm not I us can I share it with you let

117me see let me might let me let's see so yes so man it is about EDI any accent and yes some people only done as commenters so I can it probably is cu I just sent it to you Lisa can you see if you can see it but it's weird that everybody else can yeah but when I just clicked on it this way it didn't no Lisa should have been able to see it but when you open it just did you open there verion I can I just added you but when you don't have editing access you can't see the the weird about chair Drive I remember that last year got it yep okay all right any comments questions where do we discuss uh curriculum uh rigor not in a policy that is not a

118policy is there not that we is there not a policy that [Music] we are don't is there like just that we're looking for uh it it towards the maybe under foundations and basic commitment SE so I don't think there's policy for that if I'm not could be wrong but I I think that's where we this is something we really want to talk about related to the steering committee for Equity right I think that's is going to be part of that conversation as well um like under educational philosophy of different yeah we talk about that under some yeah we talk about riger I mean I can add a see if there's a policy cross reference one second so it's under the foundations and basic commitments which I'm just you know we don't have to necessarily change

119this this one but I just thinking about it and where it says the superintendent or designate is that at some points like principles who have authority to approve new programs or courses like within it would be likey or yeah and I typically the principles work with Joan and if they're adding new programs um we would have her be involved in that discussion with them the curriculum coordinators potentially and teachers here as well it seems like it's more High School than we see um mdle School yeah yes and then the committee considers and officially adopts new programs endorsements and courses so we have like computer science endorsement or something new courses rigor we talk about from our strategic plan all the way down so that's not necessarily part of policy it's out of how we as

120a Comm as a community curriculum reviews right I feel like it is under foundations and basic commitments under our educational philosophy and then at least in one other I think we we address it somewh right right but I should link the commitment to accomplishment or educational philosophy right search we had it but we can move on but um yeah that was just my thought here let me look at educational phos hold on C what do you so I'm just saying we can add the there's there's a policy called policy ad that talks about our educational philosophy and it talks about okay a cultivating a challenging safe supportive learning environment it's you know we I mean I haven't looked at it well I have looked at it but it we haven't revised it um since 2017

121but it still does say all the things that you're mention but you could look at it okay talks about intrinsic value of high performing School District brings to a community it's called ad and that actually was directly from what what we believe in we took it from our strategic plans so since we've updated our strategic plan we should probably update this to add that language list what's that add it to your list I'm going to add it to my list but it should be linked to the policy so we can link it's currently it's fine I don't know that we're going to change it all that much but we should at least update it from that perspective but I can add that as a policy reference ad um so we do do we need a

122motion about I yes I'd like a motion to approve the revision as amended mooved by Dawn second all in favor opposed it carries um and then we have policy jhd I did not see any sorry it's U exclusions and exemptions from School attendance did not get any comments from the committee so I'm asking for this policy to be um adopted as presented and wave the third reading or any discussion all right so let's entertain that motion I move to adopt this policy jhd seconded by Lisa all in favor that carries thank you great thank you that's all I have for tonight thank you thank you for your attention all right central office administrator update yeah I'll try to be brief cuz I have had a lot already um today I was really excited I had

123my first student round instead of student advisory I've superintendent student roundt I don't know why I like that better but I had my first at the middle school today and they were wonderful it was a smaller group because we haven't put our sixth grade um Pier I'm not sure how they're choosing to be on it but um I haven't I have some of my seventh and eighth grade so it was nice CU I had them last year as well and I I talked to them about some of the things that are going on globally and also in our our local environment and I asked them if they were aware of the swasa incident happening on um Dell field and most of them were not and you know I do encourage when I said not to

124Parents try to have these conversations with your students but not everybody knows how to have these conversations right so we really had a great conversation about it and how we can work together as a school community and you know with our peers and you know not being complicit in Me by standard and I thought they were just a wonderful articulate group because last year they didn't know me as well and now when you have the second year they were much more communica plus it was a small group they also asked me um you know I asked them sorry about um you know what's going on in the global world and some going to talked about how in their civics class the eth graders are looking at CNN 10 which is the student version of CNN

125so it has a modified um news news information but it's not graphic and uncomfortable and I asked the students how they felt that was if they do like 10 minutes a beginning the day to get their social class started off and they were very positive about it they felt that our sixth and seventh grade students should be doing that more as well so these are all things I share back to the administration um but they were very forthcoming about this and how do we I talk about you how do you reach out when you feel uncomfortable and you know connecting with a safe adult if you don't feel like you have if you're uncomfortable with things that happen in the class who are you safe to go to so they were great about that they

126also asked me CU last year um we talked about flag field and some of the things that Tom was asking for put on that as you know we talked about this before and one of the students said Dr kaska I just want to know what happened did is anything going to happen with flag field and I said I'm so glad you asked because yes we think it is um so I talked about kind of way we were they didn't have any of that information and I said I'll share more about that but I said some of the things that you told me and that Miller students told me are in that plan so I think it's just the power of student voice and they felt that power as well so it was nice to hear

127that we hopefully will be moving forward with that project another thing is really I'm working on my efforts with um educator voice as well and trying to find different ways I I've tried office hours I you know there's been so many platforms I try and for varing degree of success this year I'm trying something different I reached out to our team our grade leaders our team leaders and um department leaders at all four levels and said I'd love to meet oneon-one if you have the time to do so or if you feel more comfortable meeting in your grade leader group or your team group um and things like that so I'm I'm starting those meetings as well I had two today and that's been really powerful I've only booked half an hour so I'm not

128sure how you know it's it's something new I'm trying and half an hour is not enough but I'm going to start with that so I'm getting good information from those meetings well it's how can I better support I'm really here just to listen and um and support in any way that I can um you all probably um recall that I'm now the co-president for Tri County roundtables and this kind of came up I wanted to bring it up because connects back to the literacy that we talked about earlier but I had invited um the state um the Secretary of Education at the state level Patrick tutweiller I invited him to come attend um our Round Table he's great wonderful I worked with him for years really so he came to our um Round Table super

129round table last week you might have seen it on Twitter and he talked about all the work we need to be doing about balance literacy and all the changes I will um but anyhow I think that's really this is where we need to engage our state stakeholders because they're asking us to do things at the district level and sometimes there's a disconnect so we need to kind of write down that disconnect um and work together um I do want to follow up I mentioned already with the equity audit happening on Thursday night that I am working with jerielle and who's very excited about helping to facilitate the steering committee that we already talked about and then um he's actually already engaged with um diverse Holliston and Fa leaders we've had meetings in the past with

130different entities and now I'm hoping that this can be part of how to move that work forward um as we go into some other efforts and and I'm not sure who'll be on the saring community yet committee but stay tuned for that another area that I think is important to highlight last week I had reached out well I had reached out to Rabbi meanie to talk with her about some of the things that are going on and she and I had been talking but I had also engaged with our Town Administrator um Travis aarn Kathleen Buckley the assistant Town Administrator Jackie Wier from Hall newth and family services and Jer and I um about can we do more as a school and Community together engage leaders at the school and Community level to work on

131um a coalition of incidents and hate at the school and Community level so I reached out to them last week they were very receptive so Jal and I already met with Travis Kathleen Jackie and jelle and I met on Monday we had a great conversation about how to move some of this work forward and what would be the next steps we are meeting again next week and we're actually bringing in either Lieutenant Barrett I believe is going to join us and we going to engage the stakeholder and we're going to kind of map out what are our next step as this community and schools Coalition so I'm excited that they were so receptive to support us um so I did share some of that out I actually talked about it with Rabbi Mimi she was

132very thoughtful about how this Coalition might really be beneficial to us and obviously we'll want to somehow engage with some of our um Faith leaders and our communi leaders as well so that was one more thing can you talk a little bit more about um what how many people do think that you to that you haven't really formulated that yet right now we think there might be sort of two levels how do we in if we have a situation happen in the schools Andor carrying home to the community I mean we're all on the same umbrella what are some we're trying to put in some proactive communication steps like who do we engage with so it might be first we have that small group of if there's something that needs to go from the um

133the Town Administrator and the collectively or the police and the collectively how do we work together to communicate what's going on and then the second part might be who is the larger group that we want to work with to now come up with what kind of things do we need to put in place to deal with any trauma that might happen afterwards so this sort of like two tiers but we haven't had time to flush that out um but one of the things I did was really about that proactive not having to react when a situation happens but almost kind of put in some templates to start us thinking like who are the people we would engage if this type of situation happened who would we reach out so there might be so like a

134tabletop exercise yes kind of map it out cassid does it in terms of and M cassid might be part of that conversation as well but they're very supportive of trying to support us this with this work so I do think we're fortunate um I can tell you that from meeting with my um superintendents in recent meetings not all towns are having successful relationship with with the municipal leaders and the school leaders I feel like we are fortunate here that we've been able to Foster some very collaborative trusting relationships with our town leaders um and I think that's going to help us immensely because we really want to you know we have this problem at the schools we have them for 6 and 1/ half hour days we need we need the help of the community

135and I think we've tried for you know since I've been here to come up with ways to kind of set this up because I'm more than open to try to facilitate this work but having someone on the town side that can help do it collectively with us I just think we're stronger in numbers in that that way so we have work to do but I felt good about the initial conversations and you know some of the people that we can add to these potential tearers of work that we're doing well it just it gave me pause when you were saying that you know you sent out the communication about concerns about what happened with the piece of swas asking parents to talk to their kids and then those kids saying well they didn't talk to

136couple of I guess my point is that we're doing a lot of work in the schools as that's part of you know moving from getting Jerelle in the door to working with the ADL and all the the lessons and all the work that Jerelle is doing in our schools to teach our students how to address these issues and how but like where is the you know the I guess the family is sort of the gap or the community is sort of the Gap in that because I feel like we need to do I don't know if it's just us that has to do a better job it's it's us as a community has to do a better job I guess and maybe not everybody's reading some of those Communications I also think the more proactive

137you are it's because it's really hard to react properly every single time right and so if we have a plan in place not just to how do how do we deal with the situation itself but also who do we talk to who's who are the right people to be involved in the communication to fully understand the impact in the trauma and all of that I think it's really helpful and you're probably aware and this is another person we may be engaging with is um forgive me I'm blanking on the title cuz it's late but um the police department has developed this collaborative with is it Ashland yeah hackington it's three towns three towns in this collaborative so we will have a um a a person on the police force that were able to engage crisis

138interventionist for yes for and I think I believe they have social work I should know this but I'm just I'm tired yeah right now but we talked about that the other day and that would be a great person potentially to add to this group at these meetings for when we deal with the incidents in the immediate and then what do we do and who do we engage in the after phase you know go ahead so I some of this work had started and maybe stopped I think in Fall of 21 when there was at that time I thought jel um one of the select board members I thought someone from f one of the the rabbis um from be Torah and some of the numbers of diverse hollon um some community members too and students

139maybe as well and the principal but what would be different because I feel like this started and then it stopped so what would be different now so I will say the formal meetings with the larger group stopped because we weren't really getting um some traction with it however um Jarelle has continued to work with a lot of our faith Bas leaders we've had other meetings that maybe were a smaller group with um at different times some of our faith faith leaders and divers holling groups uh like last year when we had other incidents so I don't think it ever stopped but it has not been as formalized I think we really need to go back to formalizing it and setting those expectations because we start the work and when we don't have a formal process

140in place it's very easy for people to Splinter off and this is why I really think it's important because it was jerielle and myself trying to get this going and I I think it's really critical that we use some of our resources on our um Town department leaders as well because then we have more people pulling this together cuz I we we just can't do it on Sarah that's so the other thing I think if we can have defined like deliverables from for what what what is this group tasked with so that it's going to take us time there were great conversations and it was really good to have all of those people in one room talking from different perspectives so it was a very valuable thing but it was just hard but then what

141then it was like okay and I do it also was hard to have it was important to have all of those perspectives and voices but when you have the larger group it also makes it difficult to get things and with respect you know to to what was done uh earlier and Dr kusu kind of jumped the uh the agenda a little bit you know I do think that um you know there is an opportunity here too for us to take a leadership role and to actually take this under the school committee's umbrella create an advisory committee and keep the discourse elevated at our level our oversight and basically keep the same players in in part but have it part of our responsibility our oversight role I just think that there continue to be these instances

142and we need to take a stronger stand the school commune needs to show leadership in this matter so you know I I I think it's it's it's a great sort of idea but I think that it's something that that the school Community should be doing I will say I had no intention to jump the agenda I didn't know it was on the agenda until I mean I've already started this work I didn't know it was on the agenda until someone pointed it out to me um a couple of hours ago well I I told you last week I was I I didn't so so is it something like is is the vision that you'd have two or three school committee members and then I guess we need to talk it is is that the idea

143that that there would be my vision I don't know I think I not to the extent that well I think it's important because we can support this work um as conductor Cusco with policy and budget um I I think I think what we we heard in in terms of our our feeling that the equity audit was something to move forward with and then receiving it and seeing a lot of the things that we have to to uh work on I think there's a level of commitment to doing this work and that we need to stay engaged with it I feel like um last time this work was done and this group was put together was there school committee members on I know I know maybe through the PTO Sarah you were you were on it

144um do you think it would be it would be helpful to have more than one school committee member on it and that we could put it as part of our agenda also regular committee MERS know that it's necessarily something that the school committee should but certainly have AAS on that I mean more my if we use our policy to create this we create a a public body that is uh that has meetings that are subject to the open meeting law they're publicly posted minutes are created people can attend them easily because they will know when they when they're happening suest an executive board of the town do that's good the other thing is though like I want us to be involved but and I understand I'm not against the idea of us owning it for

145the purpose of making it more concrete and have and such but we aren't really the ones like on the ground as much as I would like it to come from what the folks I guess primarily the teachers and students mhm and building administrators are seeing as the issues that come from right within those buildings right and the equity audit is a huge part of that um but as we sort of discussed on Tuesday like there's deeper conversations that need to take place and I don't necessarily think it's the seven of us who are having those conversations and hearing and seeing the things that are going on in schools and the problems that are happening like on the daytoday personal interaction level and so maybe we facilitate but I feel like I want the meat of

146it and I want it to be driven by students and teachers to be clear we're not going to lead this group it's going to be led by our Dei Guy De guy or may or co-led with a with a principal or or whatever this is we're we're the school be representatives to this would just be members right we're not leading it yeah it's just the school Community as a whole if we create it we own it but I think I think that's the difference though is that if it is your task force you do lead it and we would no that's that's not that's not true at all it subject to uh if it's subject to meeting laws open meeting laws and establishing something then putting on somebody else to do it yeah how would

147it work because then I mean you are also we are also clamping down on organic conversations that actually might occur outside of those meetings which you really really want to well I mean if the group is large enough it would be imposs not impossible but it would be very difficult to create a a quorum of this of this body right and so the the group would would organize and either appoint a chair we could appoint a chair I mean it's obviously you if you read the policy it's it's pretty you know wide in its ability we we can talk about this later when we comes to that agenda item but I wouldn't worry about you know stopping sort of organic conversations outside of the outside of the uh I I just I do want to

148be mindful of the capacity of um Jerel ber because he's been asked to facilitate the steering committee I just don't know the B withd for him to facilitate and he's also helping me with the work that I'm doing on the town I mean regardless I'm still going to be working with the town leadership to develop some proactive things around communication that we can do who who would lead your your group then I would be leading it with um I that's what we're still establishing but I'm I'm asking um someone on the town side to do facilitate it with me and jar will be part of it but he doesn't have to read that B has anyone on the town side committed with you we are we we just met Monday so we're still mapping out

149what this would look like so I don't want to you know I I believe that we're getting there but we haven't decided we haven't invited some of the other people so I'll probably know more after next week also people in the community yes we're in the middle of the meeting here I'm aware um so I was just asking if Susan was envisioning leading this with someone else on the town side who that was and whether they committed to that but um I I I do think that it's important for us to be involved in some way um and but I also agree it it there's absolutely room for us to not be leading this right I want to I want to make sure I understand where we're going I think it's so I think we

150all learned how important it is to hear from staff we know it's important to hear from students and I think part of our job too is to engage with other boards in the community to make sure they know the importance of that work so I can't think of a better topic that we would need to be puts on the ground and part of now is that seven of us no is it five of us no is it is it three of us probably not maybe two um but obviously that's up for discussion and debate um but I think that also shows I mean I think we were preliminarily talking about Amanda you had suggested as one of our school committee goals and I know we're still working on it all that's going forward but that

151that part of our Equity goals so this is part of our commitment to that work absolutely an engagement with it um and it that doesn't mean we have to run it so I just I felt like I wanted to take this the TCT of the same thing that we did with the students dress task force where we had a larger group that was outside of the school committee school committee members were part of it but we were not leading it it was very much led by the community right and then after that year they came back and gave us recommendations to the school committee and we implemented all of them there was 18 recommendations that came from that I'm still speaking this was TR this was TR I'll argue with I don't think I don't

152think when we met before it was a very reactive thing directly to some very serious hate incidents on and at that point again it's it was a reactive thing we were putting a we have learned a lot over the last two years even like it's it's a constant process I think at this point like I think we were not ready to come up with deliverables back it it's really hard to to figure out how to address these things it's a huge this the the all of these schools have done a ton of work in all of these areas whether you're talking from learning disabilities race religion all of these things is it enough no we're still we're still doing that and so I do feel like at this point we have more bandwidth and more

153understanding of what are some achievable deliverables that could come up with right now some of what Susan just talked about in terms of continuing the education continuing the conversation continuing students and and teachers and staff to raise their awareness understanding all of those things but what can we do we can establish some proactive steps who do we talk to what ha you know when something happens whether it's sasas whether it's a hate thing on a mirror in a you know who do we talk to who do who is qualified to come up [Music] with communication that has understanding and empathy with that so I do feel like we have some deliverables that we could work to right now I don't think we had it before so I don't think it was I think all of

154what happened before was very valuable it's hard but if we have some more defined deliverables I think we can right so let's build off of that and let's make it so that the shell of the overall thing is has the school companies over that's all that's all I'm asking I'm not really trying to change the the underlying work or the controler the Le leadership but if you're saying who do we we I mean if you to have the school Committee involved and ensure that we're kept involved and we're able to sort of be part of the process we need to create this advisory committee let the administration run it let's get let's partner with other stakeholders in town we'll reach we'll have to reach out to them and and see gaug interest but if you

155if if you want the school committee to have a you know ensure that we have sort of a say and part of it and really the school committee that we're we're talking about this and we're we're taking that leadership role we need to create the advisory committee I do want to clarify there was there's always been I mean my assumption would be that school committees would sit in this Coalition um and also I mean we'll have school committee members sitting in on the steering committee I mean that's as we did with the equity audit so I it without this idea I I guess one thing I see as a difference is I want to make sure there's a level of um this is the agenda the things we're working on and then almost the minutes

156because as we know to be inclusive to have good communication that that's a part of it because we have seen you can have a group working on something but without that right communication piece of it um it's just a great conversation right I do want to clarify that like Sarah said the meetings we had before we weren't even getting consistent people this is the difference of trying to formalize us because we couldn't get that buy in and I now see a a switch there was more of a willingness to know cuz what I was what often Jer and I were hearing is that's great what are you school's going to do and yes we have a responsibility there but we keep saying we need the community help and we couldn't get that buy in before

157because I think people were struggling with and now people are outraged and we should be we should be outraged every single time we have incidents of hate and bias anism they all go together and it's horrible and we need to do better but we couldn't get that willingness for somebody to join us in the work collectively and that's what I feel like we're ready to do now and I feel like I I I I'm pretty confident from my conversations that we will get um a Town lead to join us together because that this just I think that word can get out better when we partner together that we haven't had that piece um in that so I think we're talking the same thing I just think you know the idea of this Coalition is really

158important of the coming together collectively and I and I agree with you that the work is important to do and that we want to include a lot of people I guess I just don't see the disadvantage of having a agenda and and publication of what happened in fact I think sometimes it it pushes us to get more work done right because it's kind of organizes us gives us a direction and gives us more of a ability to communicate right and check back okay well this is on the been on the agenda three four times what's the outcome but what is the what is the detriment of an agenda or minutes for a group like this I'm not suggesting we wouldn't do some of that like I mean I I just it's for me to speak

159to this without because again I'm not trying to own this alone right I want this is something we want to work out and I think it's premature to have all those answers right now but certainly we could I mean when we have Opera meetings those are not um subcommittees Opera is a steering committee steering committee and I don't think we have to publish all of that but when we go through there's always an agenda so we would do an agenda so I don't we don't see what sorry I'll let you finish just going to say I'm not sure what what you're losing in all of this um but I also have because I didn't I mean I I shared with you that last week that I was moving this work and I already had meeting

160scheduled um prior to um this coming on the agenda and um I think I have the willingness of these Town Meers already and I don't know have you already started those conversations as well I just want to make sure that with the agenda and stuff that it's not like specifically like our ideas for the agenda like the creation of the agenda is very important because again like we want this to be driven from the folks who are experiencing it not like you know I have my own things that I'm fixated on and so do you and so do you that's a town leader to do that because if I have to do the agendas with that person and we'd be doing it at the meetings we'd be discussing kind of what the next steps are

161you know can you give an idea of what town leader you're talking like who have you talk to that has agreed to be part of it in terms of a town leader it's as the Coalition idea I've already Travis and Kathleen Jackie and Jal and I are the ones that met and are all open to this idea I haven't gotten them to say who would be co- facilitate yet um because again we just had one meeting I feel like we're put in the cart before um the horse right now because I literally this was an idea I came up um middle of last week and started moving forward thinking that this would be important um work and I you know which is what I Shar that so um I I don't see this as any

162different in the steering committee as far as we have to do this work we have to report back to the school committee can't happen I just I guess we need to just think about like the degree of like flexibility we want and like how our involvement will perhaps just stifle that and how we want to make sure that asson school committee allows for like publication and communication with the community and an easy way to inform folks but it doesn't stifle like the conversations that are taking place what people are comfortable to say and bring up and things like that did you feel like the number that was in the group before in any way or or School committee's presence stifled any of the conversations or did like how did how did you feel it worked

163before when we didn't have a this what we're talking about now is not what we did in the past it was let's meet and talk about what's happening in our schools it was really just let's meet and talk about and can we do something can I that ideas we can do and we kept saying there are things we can do with you in the community and we we never got there because we didn't have I think this is the difference for me is that I already will be having a co- facilitator on the town side and we couldn't get that before um and then we had inconsistent people showing up it was different every time so this wasn't a formalized group it was like hey let's come together and talk who wants to talk you

164know what I mean we were just starting that um so I don't know like I said I've heard of lots of struggles of different superintendents who have been attacked in their communities because they haven't done the right thing I don't know there is no right or wrong here right we're always need to improve um we're all learning through this and I'm constantly reassessing but I think what we have unique here in Holliston is that we do have a strong partnership already with our community um leaders um I think we've been we've been fortunate that Our Town Administrator when I reach out to him he's right back I was talking with them today um and Kathleen Buckley as you saw showed up the other night there's an investment from the town side That You Don't See

165everywhere and I think we should capitalize on that you didn't have that back in the fall of 2021 when you've been here a year so well that doesn't change that the school committee has has you know created this that that I'm just um I I think that there's been enough happening in our in our in our schools in our town with these issues that the school Comm needs to take a more active role and and and not you know be as sort of passive as as we've been I don't think that we've been passive at all we we are elected to represent the community we then you know hire the superintendent to run the schools but we are the elected representatives of this community we need to take a leadership role this is a huge

166issue I'm not saying Susan's minimizing it I'm just simply saying that this is a huge issue if we're not taking a leadership role I don't think they're necessarily we're doing our job I do want to I just do want to caution I hear you and I do want to just say that um the school committee does not have oversight on the um the Town Administrator they work on you don't govern those other departments and that's why to me it's a little uncomfortable that you're speaking for those departments no no we're not speaking for those departments and we're going to see Partnerships with other stakeholders we're not committing anybody uh from the town side to to to doing this we're we're going to see by and I I have had some conversations with with some people

167on the town side about this um so um and no no one's committing but it's because I wanted to take it here and have this discussion I wasn't asking for commitments because again the school committee hadn't taken any action so I I didn't feel like there was uh you know it was my my place to ask for any kind of commitments but um again there are certain times and certain things that I I think things should be elevated and and that's not the the view of the committee then then then so be it but um you know we can we can take it up completely agree I think absolutely we should be very very involved in like this should be our district priority like as we've seen from the equity audit and not from the

168equity audit like we have we have serious serious issues of equity in this town that need to be addressed I 100% want that to be a huge part of our work the only thing I'm saying is I want to be careful that we don't exclude folks from feeling comfortable communicating or voicing anything because it is you know a a governing body or a group that folks are intimidated by who is running it and in charge of it I want other people to feel as if they have the agency to speak up that's all I'm saying yeah I agree with that and honestly if I didn't have to you know cuz I started this like I said over a week ago trying to move something forward if I didn't have to leave that for the schools

169I would try to find someone else people are at Capac on the administrator side have to it I I think I do right now and hope to transfer it over because I don't have another administrator that I can and I think it's too important for me not to be not J well he's already doing the steering committee so what about one of the principal I I don't want to speak for them right now no I'm just I'm just saying I mean we we have I think it might be a good idea to float honestly Susan there no question but I I I had one meeting so far so I feel like we're getting ahead because this is what I want want to talk out with the group that we just started the conversation on Monday

170and then um we have a followup meeting we're trying to wrap around what what this might look like again you didn't you didn't include a member of the school committee in this conversation so you're you're you're moving forward with this but again you're not taking you're not bringing in the representatives of the community into this conversation so I just we haven't we haven't put the group together yet this is just I have Community leaders asking them they will they support this work I immediately share with you this is a conversation I've already started on Friday when I started this conversation so I don't know how that's not including you because when we when we get to what the makeup will be then I can tell you but I I can't be speaking for other leaders

171that I'm looking to co- facilitate because we haven't put together the structure yet I guess I agree with you Amanda especially where we're making we're likely to make this one of our goals for the year and and we're invested in this work that I think we need to to be part of it um and again not leading it um alone but like a strong part of this with if it's something we're committed to and I'm sure between the seven of us we can find several people who would want to be part of it agree is it is it something that we revisit in two weeks is that what where where are we guys I mean I think we should start as soon as possible well no I mean as far as whether we want whether

172there's a desire to do it as an advisory committee of the school committee or uh to let Dr CA um run with it per per her plan that's sort of are we talking about two different things the steering committee the steering Equity audit group and that's different that's completely separate this is this is a The Advisory Comm the advisory committee or you're calling it a I I called it a coalition coalition look into incidents of school Community incidents of hate and vience I'm not in all suggesting we get involved in the equity audit not in you know any kind of you know way like that I think that's but that's completely different right that's looking at a much wider breadth of of of uh of issues right this is this is just sort of you

173know trying to address you know hate speech and intolerance in in the schools so here my suggestion would be like maybe give it a little bit more time so that uh Dr PKA can actually go and figure out who would be interested to be a part of this advisory committee that would give us a really like a better idea I agree well well no I mean if we do it as an advisory committee then this is the the the policy says that we appoint those people that it's it's a it's a school committee sort of created thing not that we lead it necessarily but it's it's a school committee created thing if uh what I'm trying to say is that before we do that if we can have a buy from the people to actually

174know that there are people who would come in and speak their mind without feeling intimidated I think that is where we are going so are you suggesting that Dr Kus could get kind of an idea of who's interested and then we we put together the advisory committee with selection is that what but then we still have ownership the buy people are going it's open to open meeting law and that means there's no work I'm sorry that's exactly then we get to decide what we want to do what kind of body we want to make people will be buying into something different than what we would be slight slightly different but different enough that it it if you had buy into one you might not buy into the other if it were it we I don't

175you know I'm I'm not sure it would work like that I mean honestly I mean is a bad idea I'm just saying I don't know if no I agree I agree with everything that you're saying all I'm saying is that that coming out from the town meeting I just kind of worry a little that people might might not be very open to discussing things like widely as we would want them to be unless they feel truly comfortable and I I would like at least on my part I would want to make it make it sure that we have a body where people can come in and talk like speak freely well of course right you know so that is where I'm I'm coming from so how do we how do we ensure that that happens

176can I make a suggestion too you guys have the power to make statements as a school committee like if you have views on something I mean that's what a lot of governing boards do that's true I think we just want just for show but we shouldn't not be doing that in addition to other well in in the package as part of this proposal I had written a statement up for us to put out it's a little too intertwined with the whole idea separate tonight to put it out um and um But I me I agree with you we should be making statements but and that was sort of part of part of my My Hope for tonight but so I think the the one thing that I I'm hearing in this um is that you

177you mentioned the policy CU I haven't even looked at the policy cuz I like I said I didn't see this on the agenda until someone pointed out a couple of hours ago but um the policy allows you to appoint but the people in the community that we're looking to you can't appoint because you don't have authority I mean like that's where I think you might be limiting you that's that's not accurate that's not accurate all the tuition freeold day kindergarten uh commit was uh formed under this policy and and appointed 20 members of the community including you some of them are employees in other departments well then there's a there's a there's a role in the policy for them to be Consultants or or members there's there's different ways of doing that would all be

178part of the the sort of the seeking input and and you know seeking sort of feedback from people and what they' be interested in in in participating in how and that is also another way in in in theory that you would not if they're just Consulting with the board they're not members then the open meeting law for them anyway wouldn't necessarily apply so um at the same time the the meetings that were being had would be still subject to the open on statements that they made uh to it would would would be so um I'm just wored so Dan can you just outline because we sort of jumped into the conversation we all know was coming can you just outline exactly what you had hoped to create tonight right so tonight I hoped that we

179would vote to create an advisory committee to address you know hate spe intolerance in the schools um and that we would appoint two members of the school committee to work with seeking out uh Partnerships with stakeholders in on the town side and whether they became members or Consultants or whatever you know there would be a conversation and that we would then also as part of that sent out an email to the community seeking um volunteers from the community and not just you know parents uh students uh teachers and staff um religious leaders non um nonu Guardian community members um really trying to you know grow and and so the work would sort of we create the shell tonight with the two school committee members because again they need to some the school committee needs to

180make the appointments right um and then next week or once we you know we would we would next week two weeks from now then we would sort of make the appointments or sort of hopefully have the Slate of of of uh yeah members so if we are not the leaders then who is going to drive it and how how do you see it could be it could I mean hopefully we would have a partnership I hope to have a partnership with with the administration on this uh it could be that there are co-chairs one person from the administration perhaps one member from the community who's really dedicated to it I mean again I think that in this case a lot of this could be driven by Community involvement and people who are passionate maybe don't

181have who have a lot of stuff on their plate but this is very important to them and that could also be a big difference in in in the two different options um and so and then you know again this would be something where we would review what's happened in the past not the details of every incident but just sort of understanding the number of instances of data um and then looking what what are the schools doing because the schools are doing stuff I don't think it well tell think as well sort of you know communicate to the community exactly what we're doing but we heard it from the the uh the princi a lot of it from the principal say what are we doing and then what are different ideas that we have and you

182know how can the the clergy in town bring it back to their own sort of uh you know groups and sort of continue that work within the disparate uh different uh religious organizations in town how can different community members bring in back to to other groups that they're involved in um and then eventually there there'd be a report with recommendations by you know April or so before uh you know we get too deep into the end of the year so even if it wasn't an advisory body there would still be a report that would be submitted to us right I not necessarily there could there could be but I mean we would have no sort of control over it I I don't think we have any standing to appoint members of other boards to our

183advisory and it's you know for us to say we want to have an advisory Council but then we're not going to run it like what do we we either have ownership or we don't have ownership so we can I just I doesn't make any sense for us to create an advisory that we're not running and we can't appoint say select board members to be part of it we just that's an overreach of the school committee like that's not within our purview to appoint them to be part of it the differen is with Susan doing it is that she is a community partner as the district leader to have those conversations at a high level and with the development the Partnerships that she has with the select board with the Town Administrator with their office be

184able to assemble all the people that were talking about wanting to be part of those conversations with two of us on that committee but not as a plurality of that committee with with respect there was a member of the select board at the time current member of the select board Who was appointed and was a voting member of the uh tuition free full day kindergarten advisory committee that was created uh back in the day that was a task force it was run by the superintendent no that was not that was an ADV it was an advisory committee to the open meeting law formed under this policy I believe it was under the offices of the superintendent it I I'll have to look it up but I it was it was subject to the open meting

185law I guess we could ask Stacy raffy since she was the head of it so I I forgive me so if that was the intent of that group but you didn't have full dayk I what was the deliverable at the time like putting together recation then we didn't have the money for real at the end of the day it all came down to Mone time limited it was like just they came together they met for year they did had a great fantastic report on it all in on it I I could not be because of the finance comme see and this is why again I know that it was an actual official board because the finance committee could not actually have a representation I I went to to the meetings because again they were open

186meetings but I was not a member of the committee I was on on their email list so I support this as long as we are sure like as as a friend of mine once said to me like two years ago after like you know graffiti in the middle school bathrooms or whatever she said we don't need another committee we need a community conversation and so like I just want to make sure I don't think this is your intention or what you're saying it's just how I initially perceived it I don't want it to be like a school committee thing that we all run and like everything takes forever because we have to adhere to these laws and we have but we do still have to Amanda Bigalow follows her agenda of what she personally like

187I want to be having us all talking about it and having all this input you know I think it gives us an opportunity to really hear exactly who like we want to be able to hear from people and be inclusive but it also adds a layer of accountability and I think I I feel like we're saying the same thing in terms of mm where's everyone [Music] else prepared to vote on that tonight it's put that way very quiet me yeah I'm thinking I mean I'm thinking too cuz I think that I'm a little bit worried about what the deliver would be because I know the the kindergarten task force I know it was in that report coming up with some kind of deliverable for something like this is really tricky because it's really more about

188the conversations and the collaboration over a long period of time it's not like we're going to come up with you know three or four great ideas like events that we want to have by the end of the year because they're all doing things each school is doing its own thing they could be looking at Best Practices across different school districts and and bringing those back and putting those into a report it could be you know different uh types of programming that could be put on not events but but programming that could we could put on that may have a budget impact that could that we could bring into the schools I I think that there are a lot of things I don't want to you know start listing them all because I don't want to

189limit what they know people think about because I really this you know as unwieldy as a large group can be I think an LGE group can also be very powerful when it gets together and starts thinking and M up right you know I think armag getd in all the time just you know nassa group of scientists anyway um it when you have you know when you just bring a large group of people together and think about ways to solve really comp we're not going to solve this but how do you address it in and and try to move our community by that I mean you know especially our our schools um forward that that's sort of what I'm hoping yes the deliver would will be tough I mean AB you know it's not going to

190be easy but I think that there are a lot of different things that could be um delivered and at the very wor very worst maybe it Sparks some more conversation and continues uh and and it continues can I just clarify the conversations I had already started um with some of our faith leaders and um our town leaders was really about not reaching out to the community so that they can tell us what to do on the schools about what can we do together in the schools and the community that's been The Missing Link everything I've heard has always been what are you doing on the schools we are doing a ton but we shared that tonight it's not enough but we need that next piece like when I said to you I asked these students

191how many of you receive this communication or had this conversation with your parent I'm not blaming anyone I'm not here to judge but how by getting the community piece in how do we get you to Market this for us to get out into the community as well CU their voices are more powerful and some of them may not even have students right now but how can I get that buy in together so that it's not looked at as a school thing that we're going to come into the schools and fix you how do we breing cuz our kids are the community you know and we again I'm reaching out to the community cuz I I'm saying we need your help together it was disturbing what I've heard you know from different superintendents about communities the

192backlash you know the the criticism we're all struggling nobody goes to you know I didn't get a doctor and they telling me this is how you communicate in this incident it's like we can always do better I can always do better but I would like to be able to have a group that we can feel safe to ask for help is as far as how can you get our message out better with us versus come in and tell me what to do and fix it that's I mean that's that was not my intent about tell have the community tell us what we can do better cuz like you said they don't always know what we're doing so how do we get that it's how can we share this work better too Susan to that point

193cuz you had talked about that before and a student saying they hadn't heard about it and we've talk tonight about enhanced opportunities for communication um sometimes Beyond like a reactive email to a situation um is there an opportunity whether it's back to school night or when we bring the incoming ninth grade parents here to talk about opportunity like school here at the high school for you because this work is important to you to come in and talk to them about having difficult conversations with your children and hear some resources because sometimes when it's at the bottom of an email that's reactive to a situation people aren't going to click on five links but if you are the face of that with those opportunities like welcome to high school or back to school nights and if

194and and prioritize that as a topic and talk to them about how you would talk to your kid about something like that and where to find those resources that way there's a face and a conversation instead or at least an oral communication versus an email no I I think that is something that we want to strive for whether it's me or again I'm not trying to add another committee to jald because I just assigned him the steering committee but he is someone also or a principal what can they what can their message be to the school I think that message can come from different leaders it could come from me it could come from the principal um but regardless I do agree with you the proactive piece is what we've been missing because we haven't

195always been prepared for the things that happen I will say one of the things I keep learning more and more every time I do communicate I hear more and more that these are not these things are not new in this community we are trying to be as explicit and transparent about it um and keep sharing those every every time we've had an incident I've been really clear with the principles we need to know we need to get this information out and sometimes that actually leads to additional situations right or additional incidents which is concerning um so this that's the piece I think we need to get that word out as a community entity together with the schools because that's the piece that how do we get other people to be saying the same thing we

196can't do it [Music] all what you guys want to do I'm not prepared to vote on this having just really seen it today I like I want to talk about it a little bit more and find out more information from [Music] Susan about how we comeing forward yeah I guess guess so I just worry about you know one of the biggest things about being in a formal government body is everything takes so long and if we table it I just feel like I'm not saying to table it I'm not asking to table I'm just letting I've already shared that I have another meeting with my smaller group next week so that we were starting to flush out what we might do next I mean so my concern about delaying it again is we meet in

197two weeks so that's two weeks and then we actually don't meet again for a month after that so you know if if it something that we then decided to do we're talking about you know a month and a half before it gets formed and then you know you're kind of in the the holiday the mix of the holiday season it's a tough time to to to get things started so uh yeah I mean that that's that's a concern for for putting it aside tonight I think it's a statement about whether we the importance of the work to us and the partnership between us and the superintendent and community members and and it to me it's a statement about how we value this work if if if we're part of it and that's why I think

198it's I definitely think we should be a part of it Susan's already scheduled a meeting to continue the discussion there's nothing not [Music] happening there isn't there's nothing not happening right now I just got this information today I'm not prepared to vote on it today if the rest of you want to support voting on it that's fine but I'm telling you that's not how I feel right now and nothing is going to prevent Susan from moving forward to getting more information and talking with the Community Partners that she's already reached out to to start these preliminary discussions so that we can be moving forward In fairness I've also had a number of conversations with different people in the in the community so um I again I wasn't doing it with any sense of like we

199had we're doing we've done this because we haven't it where this is a decision that we all need to make um but [Music] okay so if we wait until next week it's going to be or until November 2nd that is like can we like hit the ground running immediately after November 2nd no because we'll need to seek the you know we'll need to seek volunteers from from the community you said you've already done that like work and already reached out to no I didn't cnia please I said I've talked to some some people in the community I haven't had a reached out and asked hey are you going to you know I'm looking for two to three volunteers from a number of different groups that that you know it's going to take a little while

200to to to collect those statements you know that interest so could we use these next two weeks to actually get some of those volunteers and their buying and actually have a concrete idea about who are we going to point how many people are interested basically have a little bit more concrete we we can I just I I didn't certainly want to start doing all that before knowing if the commit is interested if if if there is interest in doing that we can look at at the the email I not the email the communication and we can tweak it a little bit to say the the school Community is is considering I I mean I think it may be harder to get volunteers that you know something that may not happen but you know we could

201we could certainly tweak it and send out that that uh that email to to see who we get so I think I don't think anyone doesn't want this I think we're just sort of unsure about exactly what what will look like and how we'll go about it so is it possible to vote tonight on like supporting the creation of um you know this steering committee with several factors yet to be determined we could certainly and would that help us sort of move forward between now and November 2 when we would more formalize certain aspects yeah so the the the motion that I had uh sort of drafted s for consideration would be that you know to create an advisory committee on addressing hate speech and intolerance in the schools under policy BDF and appoint member

202a and member B uh to seek Partnerships with different stakeholders in town as well as make recommendations to the hon school committee on the appointments of different uh administrators teacher staff students Guardians and other community members um and we should probably also add just because of the way the polic written you know in conjunction with the superintendent because um the policy makes clear her uh her role in all this um so so essentially that was kind of what I was envisioning doing it's just that we need I wanted to make it official that we were doing this before sort of starting to really sort of you want the person facilitating it though reaching out I guess I'm kind of confused yeah I'm I'm little confused just about the ownership piece like I who who is

203who is the ultimate person running this de% think this is something that needs to exist and needs to this work has to be done with all of these people I just who who well I think well I think part of that could be the committee could decide sort of who leads it I ideally I would like a a sort of co-leader an administrator and and then a Community member to sort of run it together again in the partnership that that that Dr Kus is talking about how do we sort of bridge that gap between what what's going on in the schools and what's going on in the community maybe maybe it's one of the faith-based leaders um I maybe it's a very passionate uh person who doesn't even have children in the schools I I

204mean you know we have an incredible just Community to to to draw and and um I I wouldn't want to limit by saying who's going to lead it right now um it would sort of be dependent on who who who shows interest and then again who on this on the staff side uh on the school side shows interest too so if we were to actually let the word out in the community that we are like you know contemplating having such kind of advisory body and we would like to impress people to contact you or and then come back in 2 weeks and have more that's that's pretty much what I think most of us are looking for that having a more substantial bodies like people who are interested because once it doesn't to to a

205Layman if I wasn't on the school committee to be very honest if I got this email to me it wouldn't really make a difference what kind of advisory body it was because I wouldn't know a to be M right to me until I became a school Committee Member open law meeting meant nothing right olm had no existence so if you're looking for community members who are just community members who are going to come in to them it won't matter if it is an advisory body or if it is just a body that school committee is looking for to for just and then at and on the other end if if the it should also look like a school committee Outreach for the other you know governing body members and that might also give us a

206little bit more flexibility as to who can come in before we form a formally formal body that's where we're looking to see Partnerships right with with other stakeholders I'm not I'm not looking to tell the select board who who they're appointing of anybody I'm not looking for them to you know to dictate anything the list sort of that I put on there were sort of more suggestions uh of people that I thought would be interested and many of them Dr kuska mentioned um but again that this is going to you know require select board uh B and in fact this is on their agenda um for Monday what's on their agenda for just the Travis has one of his updates uh the discussion of this pending whether we we voted on it or not so

207um I have been I me I have been having these conversations with people to to to get this lined up again I I felt I felt a little uncomfortable trying to like step too far out of Lane before we had the conversation but at the same time you know there there move we need to move it along There are rules and requirement you know the posting things that needed to happen so um so um the tuition free full day kindergarten was a task force of the superintendent and the school committee okay I mean this the if you look in in the the policy is also called an advisory comme parentheses out to you so um oh Stacy yeah she sent us an email with what it was and the dates and asking for yeah it

208says the school committee is forming a task force well in the policy it says and superintendent the school committee and superintendent of hollison are working on initiative to offerring yeah the next sentence is the school for task force um well this the the um this is the advisory committee may be created by the school commit to serve as a task force for special purposes so let me it's it's one and the same thing I don't know you know I think if there's enough flexibility then voting to start it would just sort of get the ball rolling but I don't know if everyone agrees I agree if this is a little more Loosely defined at the moment right and then to be more conely fut because both of you have started some of the Outreach already

209which is great it's just a matter of flushing out how it'sing well if we're going to do a motion are there two members who would be interested in serving sounds way this so now you just yeah know I would like I really this is the kind of work I'd like to do but like could I go could I get off of a different committee also like I sure [Laughter] dead you need to Trade communications yeah budget or like I don't know there's like this is the important work that I'm most interested it's just like I'm real stretched right now with this yeah understood as as we all are no kidding [Music] yeah sounds like a lot important a lot more you would do great no I I got I'm not making it to CPAC meetings

210regularly I'm not making it to diverse holl meetings I'm not like I got enough on my plate that I'm not able I can't even do the things that I've already used to do and this sounds way more involved than what I was thinking wise this is a this is a big deal it's a heavy lift it's a lot it's going to be a lot of work to keep it moving and I think it's extra challenge well hope hopefully not I mean hopefully we get some really you know passionate uh community members and and students maybe even student needed I don't I mean know these how awesome would that be right like it's an opportunity to listen too right and and make sure these conversations are happening and the it just it's important but yeah to

211your point do we have a second person do we have two well I don't know that we even have one at this point Amanda wants to do it but you've got too I want to do but I can't do teacher negotiation budget communication regular meetings I have a EXC from reg regular me okay know I'm serious though is it Communications would you trade it for it because I think you'd be great at this work I I do too like this is the work that I'm like trained to do yes so why don't we figure out some way either would you we just switch chairs of commun communications has gone down to two people before if they feel like they could do it with two instead instead of three is that a possibility guys we we

212want to support this work can I just make a motion that we just table this like we clearly have more that we have to think about and figure out in our own schedules about what we can fit in what we can't fit in and how we want to look I we have so much more to get through and it's like I feel like we're just throwing in and I don't want to just be dismissive but at the same time I'm like I haven't really had a chance to really understand more about this and think about it and I feel like we do need to reach out to our Community Partners and just making this is a I I just I'm not ready to do this I'm not saying that it's not important of course it

213is and I think it's a culmination of the work that we've been ongoing in the district starting with bringing Jerelle in here and all the work that our students are doing and I think it's really important that we have the buyin from our community and from our Community Partners we're doing the work here we need them to help us outside to be doing that work and if we have ownership of it that it becomes Daniel I would like I would respectfully ask that we could just table this until our next meeting I just want to be clear though that earlier you said you didn't want to table it I do want to table this discussion until the next meeting I said I I'm not with tabling it forever I'm asking for us to have until

214next meeting to discuss it you left it with us to look at today okay and that's not enough time for me to digest all of this and consider it and consider all the ramifications of it it's not it's un and I just being presented it tonight I feel like we need some time that's [Music] all I mean I'm okay waiting is if we can try to do some leg work between now and November 2nd and if we can put it on the agenda like early in the night when we're fresh like maybe before whatever presentation we have well yeah because on the second we have curriculum yeah and that's going to be that's important but like you know it's harder for us all to talk ex session after that and if we could move that

215to the so why don't we put this early on the agenda okay and I'll Talk Amongst ourselves well not too many among we'll think amongst ourselves all right so now where we Joan do you have any uh any updates yes I do um I want to do a huge Shout out to Taran Lang and all the incredible work she's doing with this Tek Deca students they had a spotlight interview on heartbeat of Holliston so please check it out three very well poised very confident students very proud that they are students at Holliston October 25th we have our first halfday PD day coming up it is building based and I will report out on it at our next meeting um please be on the lookout for teaching and learning newsletters um uh just a shout out

216to parents if you would like your children to be included in pictures please make sure that you have help me out here Mr McLoud the annual student verification form completed thank you they have to opt they to allow their child to be photographed yes they have to choose yes or no so if they are not choosing anything it has to be an automatic no correct so please be conscious of that so if you would like your children included please make sure to fill that out um and please be on the lookout I've been working with Mr McLoud director McLoud along with the principles along with curriculum and Tech Personnel working on letters that have already gone out to parents regarding upcoming um benchmark assessments um and um screenings information coming out there will there they're

217all going to be mailed out next Friday so please be on the lookout for that and we will be mailing those out two more times this school year for a better communication thank you great [Music] um we do not have uh Mr M tonight so we will skip over his updates I ask permission to just hop on real quick you you are an administrator so absolutely that I'm sorry yeah now I'm I'm not on the agenda but I just wanted to highlight the acting assistant super just kidding the work of uh seven of our Educators they uh presented at Mass Q which is a huge uh conference that was at Gillette Stadium and it stands for computer us and Educators which ironically the the executive director said that's everybody today so it used to be

218a small group now this group is massive so anyway we had s seven presenters um Sarah and Taran lag were presenting there was a topic about advisory and all these sessions these are in the sky boxes in Gillette Stadium which are I don't know if you've ever been in them they're we're cramming like 70 80 people in there so these were jam-packed um Ally Curley and Michelle Hastings I heard one participant said it was the best presentation of any that went in both days oh wow nice that was on their fifth grade engineering and digital learning project such a shft for her Linda canal and weie Cary presented today this room I could not even get in good picture they had 108 participants in that little Sky Box and then Ron Taylor I've never heard

219him speak but uh he did outstanding he was talking about grading and equity and standards based grading and um he shared a lot of stories about him being a teacher for 19 years um so just an awesome job that all of those Educators did today cool that's and we had 24 people total attending the conference from the districts that's awesome thank you thank you thank you than thank you for sharing s a short I know Inc is perfect um no Personnel um so reports from subcomittees do we have it we do let's do it reports okay so um this fi the uh Communications committee man I said finance committee um settle down no there um we developed a newsletter somehow newsletter is not we're going to talk about it under Communications because it's it's an

220update but it's a Communications update no no it's fine but and it's in everyone's folder that's my bad it's not on the agenda it was in my folder but it's not in the agenda it's a Communications update I think it is I think newsletter is on there we usually have it but somehow it do not it's not on there I don't it's on there like literally every single night um so I I'll take that one but at the same time I think we can cover it under under Communications update and and we're good you don't want to discuss the news no I'm happy to discuss no I'm saying let's discuss the newsletter if we can one of the so we met and here's the other thing we met when we discussed on our meeting we

221would like to do a office hour um soon like either last week like I it's probably too late for next week mm the other possibility was the week of like November 6th a non Quorum just two or three a non Quorum two or three and Eve we cited our best participation in the past had been from an evening time zoom okay a 700 p.m. Zoom um I don't know who was interested so in general we talked about longterm we'd like to do this like once a month or once every couple months y um seeing how it goes and how our participation and feedback is from the zoom thing um we'd like to do that and you know different folks seven of us could do different times um no particular specific topic cuz we think we'll

222get better participation if we keep it General yep um and so we thought tonight we could throw out some dates who would who would like to participate in the first one I mean I'm happy to do it since it sort of my idea what other dates you can't find your oh here it is so Monday 10:23 no Ian Tuesday I can't do it next week so not next week because it's to soon so what about Monday 116 um Tuesday 11:7 is election day I don't know if that's a bad day I mean you thinking Zoom 7om at 7 in the evening so Monday Tuesday Wednesday is out for me uh Thursday 119 is out for me but other people could do it Thursday I can do of course I'm having to do it but but

223I think it's a good opportunity for others to 10th is a Veterans Day so 10th is veterans um don't think I'll be I could do the six if aend I would recommend not doing the sixth no I could do third I recommend nothing I I would recommend if you're going to if you want to participate just holding it open for now but I thought you were saying that you can't do it Monday Tuesday or Wednesday I do but I can do Friday the 3D if that works at 7 we can't do we can't do Fridays 700 p.m. the second we have the school committee meeting um of what day the second oh yeah what about the ninth though the ninth I can't do but somebody else could do yeah ninth I could do or the

224do we know who would like to would like to do it and then that way those people can I just you know if we know the two or three that that are going to do it then those then they can figure out I could do 26th Thursday 7 something somebody wants to join I can't do that's a Thursday a p all right what we'll do is I'll send out you know people can can throw out dates that they can do and we can sort of try to merge those together because scheduling can be done um outside of the meeting yeah and I guess if we can't do the newsletter tonight I I want no no we we can CU I wanted to I want to put it in the newsletter yeah but and then up

225and then we'll do a separate email just two day or two before just to remind people yeah oh you want to put the so we I'll send that out we'll get we'll try to get the date so you can we can pass the newsletter with date TV no but but you want to send it I mean there's like not a lot of substance in this newsletter the main thing is we're having office hours here's when so what Wednesday the 8th I can't do it but you what days can you do Monday 116 or the following week how about the following week okay so the following week we do not have a school committing right committee right NOP 11 16 17 1815 something like that 11:15 th 11:15 is a Thursday 11:14 is a Wednesday wa

226we're talking about November 14th is a Tuesday 15th is Wednesday day would anyone like so I sure I'll I'll do one I could do the 14th 15th or 16th I [Music] believe so want me and Sarah to do the 16 sure and then if one other person frees up they can they can join you [Music] okay oh we also have a communication meeting that day so maybe we'll like I eat sleep and breath School commit no offense to all of you but it's a lot it's a lot guys I wouldn't mind someone else doing but that's okay so motion to approve the newsletter does anyone read the newsletter I I read it really minor little style things yeah I'm not a good writer like you are Lisa so I appreciate you're a GRE writer so

227as a and I'm taking off those policies cuz they weren't updated on the website other than acab and but they should be up now can you check again I'll check again okay all right I won't check right now but I'll check later and can you do me a fa like I try to have um Jon or I remind Lisa but if you if you don't see it just send her an email yeah we did I sent her one and and I forwarded it all and then I asked her make sure those were updated and posted and I think that okay all of them were except for there was some question about AC and ACR which I think was because we had um revised that and then she just hadn't reformatted it so it wasn't posted

228up yet but it should be by the time the newsletter goes out so please a link it if you can so please be our checks and balances I appreciate sometimes we forget to check the website I always say like this one's approved and what but you know it just sometimes gets lost in the shuffle it happens oh good you're emailing Lisa I I try to perfect thank you thank you very much okay so with with my help from Lisa um figuring out how to like disseminate this newsletter cuz I don't know that yet cuz I'm new Communications but um we don't have to discuss that right now but subject to that would we like me to send this out adding that our office hour will be November 16th at 700 p.m. yes move by Lisa

229second by all in favor the motion carries and Mr McLoud I think can can help you with that getting it out to the people and I will set up a zoom so that I can include that link in the newsletter as well I'll just run a zoom for my personal good idea perect you need you need a license no I just made an account with this email and it is fine we're transitioning the licenses to update all of you great it doesn't cut me off after 40 minutes or anything like that all right py you know I did not schedule a meeting for next meeting me in November we will have one in November I'll have one by the time we come to our next uh meeting on November 2nd okay budget uh same here

230I anticipate we'll have another meeting before our next general meeting but we don't have one scheduled at this moment great and superintendent evaluation uh we'll be setting up a meeting soon hopefully by next week okay great um all right now we get into the uh the fun um Lisa was was kind of to to take some of the conversation discussions that we had at our uh meeting uh prior to town meeting uh put them together I then threw it into the uh the format and so if you want to bring up the SOI vote letter version School commune edits um yeah and I had reached out I I don't know if you saw my email Susan I emailed you and I just saw it a little while ago are we looking at the one that

231says edits on I think I have right B edits yeah okay I only see the one edit that's why I'm confused it's just what it's in the folder still doing the edit are you not doing I already did edits oh no but I had a couple suggestions H you can go into the document and put them in okay I just didn't know if you were doing it so I didn't I don't even have it open right now so the only one I see is submission as we edit yeah I try I thought I actually fixed that but apparently not so did you do it as suggested edits or did you do I can't actually edit the access cuz it does I don't have access no I I thought I did it as but I I

232changed it is it in the folder it is but I don't have it says request access I don't have it it's like when you I'm not seeing it all I I must have created hold on second you might have created a separate one then I I I I thought I made a copy of the original one okay so that you might have but I don't this is the only one I shared with 18 people let me just see okay you guys are all all editor editor I don't have access Daniel be an editor did a nice job it it just reads well editor editor all right everyone in the school committee and the administers who are here are now editors yeah oh wait sorry I need to save it just you shouldn't have to it

233should automatically up oh I don't have edit access either should know no is it it says you're it says you're an editor it's a 10923 no I got a button that says request edit access to I have a button that says request Ed M so but when I click it nothing happens let me it try try refreshing okay F5 I'm reing it so when I refresh request edit access have you have you restarted [Music] so we unplug 30 seconds I I had just a couple things that I wanted to consider just floating by we we Ed the term additional and then add and I was wondering on the first sentence whether we could say instead of recommendation to add we could say include or supplement our s SOI submission I think I already edited that

234no it just says add it says additional recommendation to add and it I think you I think we talked about this I was saying like either um incl or supplement what sentence is this first sentence voted an additional recommendation I don't I don't know what you're I at this time there are no it says voted an additional recommendation to add and I was saying to supplement or to that's the second time so additional ad was in there twice yeah yep um say includ so I don't know if you want to say include or supp no just say voted take out an additional recommendation just say voted to add thank you um and then the other one I um I didn't know if we needed to flesh this out but it was about uh in the

235third line in the second paragraph where it says Elementary campus with prek through 2 and grade 3 through five population in two buildings um connected by shared space did we need to say like shared space as in like the cafeteria and gym cuz like I feel like that doesn't make it clear shared space could be like a corridor do you know what I mean I just shared cafer shared cafeteria and gymnasium gum library library like those kinds of resources they don't share a library do they you're right they don't cafeteria it's gym yeah well it's a CAF it's cafetorium a CAF it's a cafetorium yeah and the um and the gymnasium right the sh it's the same thing isn't it it's separate they're oh right right right I'm sorry cafet the auditorium cafeteria thank you

236and then connected by a shared C oh God guys we should not be doing this I know by a shared cafetorium and gymnasium okay perfect would have and then the last thing on the last sentence um I was concerned about where it says small group settings the last sentence of that paragraph instead of saying appropriate can we say optimal I I thought we didn't like Optimal when we talked about it before it's not optimal it's appropriate because it's in their IEPs like literally in IEPs IEPs will call for small group settings we already says say far from ideal it's not optimal it's appropriate for for that okay but then Bas saying we're not doing it then it's like we are doing a small group but it's in a large you what I'm saying no we're

237not doing it the way we should be doing it I mean if a parent complains and said I don't know where else do I still can't see the one that you're talking about because did you refresh your did you refresh okay um I see two different ones I you're you're part of the shared thing so it's called s SOI vote letter VSC edits 10923 and try again I refresh here it is I see okay now I see you in it but okay okay are the edit in a different color though they're not no oh that's color yeah sorry that's I couldn't see that I couldn't see it at all before though so I can I [Music] started um that was all that I had in terms ofate yeah I appropriate I don't it's it's kind

238of a middle word okay so is there another example Susan that we can put in about how our space is inadequate or obsolete I just would love to have one more example yeah um I mean I feel feel like the special needs example is a strong one one the other example I don't think is as strong it's just kind of a wish that's the biggest one is the small groups using multiple small groups in one space is really a big problem is there another good example anything else um I think we don't have any ability to add any programs as student needs start to change you know that's my other piece but I don't know if I put that in there right or even in terms of like space for Behavioral programming I guess right

239I think you know why don't we do that why don't we say something about that as the number of children cuz we've had IEP the number of kids on IEPs go up yeah as the number of children on IEPs and 504s right continues to increase and 504s continues to grow increases we don't have but we are struggling adequate space or struggling struggling I like struggling struggling is a it's true we're struggling too confidentially and um there you go that's critical that's a good one confidence the biggest thing when you have all these and behaviors act up we don't have other spaces to correct give the child the Privacy they need correct do you see with des's new dyslexia um like the framework of what's being rolled out do you anticipate any increased numbers there as

240we do more screening but they were already screening last year they were screening but I think just because we're communicating it differently I think you'll see mayad to increased no okay no because you could be served in many different spots challenges just say the number we are struggling I think the trauma sensitive needs would be corre the biggest piece right as we see more children escalating and um trying to provide them confidential locations the number of our children on IES confidence Ela um and work in additional trauma sensitive and behavioral right [Music] the comple the complex needs [Music] of you yeah struggling to accommodate the academic behavioral the academic behavioral and privacy needs yeah required let's just Behavior okay I think the biggest part is they want to see confidenti we have identified that we

241are struggling and this this is going to be this high school would be a place to address pre 12 that's what they want to see that wide range inapoi SP so I think you're just saying that this would be a solution pre- well because we will not have other opportunities to address the limitations of the other campuses any other things that we can wanted toate all the AC I'm so brain dead that well you did an incredible job you know thank [Music] you because of limited space availability yeah I was just going to say because we simply don't have enough space um I think I would just say any additional spaces and that is our that's the real issue if we had to if we had another cohort and had to add another home room

242we don't have another place for a home room we would have to literally um maybe put UA on a car you know what I mean go after and that's not real okay is this okay as the number of children on IEPs and 504s continues to grow we are struggling to accommodate all the academic and behavioral needs because we simply don't have enough space don't have any additional space any additional space what does that mean though on the Woodland campuses if we had to create a how's that different then we don't have enough space well one what I mean well my whole point is the woods the the elementary campus is maxed out completely and that's why we need to shift them up like if we have to add another I think they're both fine this

243is this is a little more wiggle room versus like we have no more space but one is very definitive at 10 12 again we're just just to be clear we're just it would be that we would be considering considering it's not that we were going to definitely does it just allows us to have the option to look at um and can I make a motion to approve this yes I'll second it who seconding it so made by Don second by Cynthia okay um all in favor all opposed oh okay who sends this out so if I get a signature on it then I can I will then I I'm sending it to our contact electronically she has already received the letter from Senator spilka and um I have to assign some things tomorrow so I'll

244stop by you put the I'm putting the date in right now yeah um all right yay let's move on thanks Lisa yes thank you very much l and thanks Susan for putting that together you're welcome got thank you you putting that in there good where where did my agenda go okay um so I get further discussion School comme goals no one sort of send me any updates I guess maybe we just sort of continue to to think about them I will say um I have I I just think we need I think we need to have a meeting so we can actually really them out and discuss them and in that sort thing I did I did reach out again to uh to to to uh to to someone to sort of help facilitate that

245I'm just we're just trying to set up a date the problem is we need to do it in person and it's just just she just wrote us back with two dates and so why don't we mail that down and probably tomorrow I think um and then I just put this on here so I I I met uh with a uh esteemed former colleague uh just to talk about sort of creating we're moving on to the next topic to to uh create a a survey to get some real sort of dat impact data from from from parents um had a robust discussion of different ideas I've also sent an email to the administrators to see if there's any testing data or or um tardiness data or just any anything that we can sort of use to

246show a change between 2019 2023 um I again this is this is more we you know this is a something that the school committee at the time you know sort of let the community know we would do and so I just think it's important that we we look at it whether it leads to anything or not I think have to sort of be determined we have to see the the the final results but at the same time you know we really don't have any options right now either so um it's going to be hard but I do think it's important for us as a committee to understand as best possible what what kind of impact the the changes s times had so yeah I still think there's going to have to be such a huge

247caveat though because of Co yeah well I'm hoping the 2023 mcast like for instance mcast data right if you if you assume that the whole state was impacted by Co and that as you average it out across the state it kind of averaged out certain some communities certainly did worse than you know did worse than others had more challenges but if you think about it over the course of the state and you compare Holliston to the rest of the state how do we look compared to the rest of the state in 2019 you can you you can I don't know I haven't looked at the data but there there is the potential that that that has some I I don't know but okay and fgp is probably a good thing to look at that compares

248the growth of our kids versus The Grow that's a great point so may maybe we get Mr Dr sorry Dr Jordan uh involved in his 35 second exercises um but anyway there may not be anything but but but perhaps so I've asked the the administration to help us with with that data I guess I'm I'm kind of more concerned with not just that but like then how do we mitigate for the issues that people are bringing up is it did didn't um Mr K said that he was putting out another culture culture and Survey clate culture survey and I think that there was supposed to be some questions about that on the climate and culture survey do we know I don't I I I haven't looked did the cou they did them last year I

249can't remember I either last year there were some questions within a broer survey maybe it was that survey I really want sort of a targeted survey that asks sort of very specific questions you know how many times a week do you have trouble get you know waking your child up to get to school how many you know time how many times a week is your child late to the bus just things that are not so much like you know I hate this or this is awful but just trying to quantify sort of I'm just trying to remember D and I meant to ask I me wasn't it you and I and Catherine worked on was it you Catherine worked on a survey to send out and it had questions like how just you and Catherine

250someone else was someone else not me I can't find it that's my problem and it could be because um but I can't remember if it was ever sent out cuz we never I don't know if we ever finished it I thought we did but it might be two years ago now before she and it could be because her account is not closed somehow you can't access it is there a way access P account like we give somebody open account access for like 2 minutes so they could get pull something out of it I wouldn't want us to necessarily go looking through somebody El could help me find I just haven't had a chance I'd want to do it with their permission just again even though technically it's a public record you know just uh um

251but but any event you know I just think that one of the things that has surprised me is is that this has sort of stayed within the Forefront of of the community and people continue to talk about it people continue to have concerns about it and I just think that you know it's it's important to to listen to those and at least you know take a look at the information um I I will admit I I was not expecting that you know back in 2019 when this was all going on um so we we we learn to move on um the only thing so under new business obviously discussion of the creation of the advisory commune we've obviously talked about that at nauseum the only question I would have is it is on the select

252board agenda would people like me to go and still meet with the select board to discuss this idea with them or should I just ask Travis to to take it off of the agenda y it's really do you want to read on interest and continue to obviously not saying we've done anything but just sort of saying you know we're we're thinking that's the whole idea right to actually prolong this so that we can have the conversation yeah I just wanted to ask the question because definitely um updates from uh our uh our our teacher and staff for from last week am man I know this is something that you've been working on did you I know it's late yeah I mean we're just like looking at a lot of stuff behind the scenes talking to

253Keith about certain things there's some small stuff brought up like can we you know fix a magnet on the door that doesn't work and stuff like that and some of the stuff but like a lot of folks have been small but impactful stuff and pack this up and like you know um I may follow up some more about the Cofe or just so there's system cuz I only cuz I'm a teacher and like and you probably know too and everyone else is taught like the coffee or brace Joy too like so um but then yeah that's required like there's yeah you got to have coffee you got to have coffee no copier copier oh cof Cofe cof too did not come up but you that did not come but but you're right for you're right

254you know what and I heard it as coffee the first three times they said it at the teacher form too so in my brain it's still cof machine even though it was cop can I just share a couple things related to that cuz I I have been actively I don't have the whole list it's it's hard when I'm getting bits and pieces and I don't have like the list because if it's the first time I'm hearing it I have to now dig into it but one of the things I already I met with Bobby cadra and Keith today Keith jumped in my zoom um and I wanted to find out what where is the breakdown of communication here and one of the things is our our current platform was homegrown did you know that by

255our former um Tech person at the high school also ticketing system so the ticketing system for maintenance for maintenance not not it no was homegrown and what I found out is that teachers didn't can't even send stuff through it that's a problem so I did talk with um James ke about I knew that we had started and we did the school assessment I didn't realize that the town CU I've used School D before in previous roles and it's a great program what I didn't realize is that we could access the school DED maintenance Reporting System already we don't have access to it yet but the town already purchased it so I've talked to him about seeing if we can expedite that's the better way to communicate I don't see if like if a teacher puts

256in complaint about a concern about a copy or whatever it is I guess what they've been doing is even though we had this electronic reporting that's not happening they're going to a secretary who's not even necessarily putting it in electronically it's not their fault they're just trying to expedite it and they're still using paper and giving it to an individual in the building we have no tracking system because of that this will track and we can know it in real time and it works tremendously so James and I working I asked him if we can expedite getting at least the the way we can send in the maintenance because that's going to really help and I want access to it so then I can actually um how we're doing it so I'll have I'm having

257bi-weekly check-ins with Bobby and Keith to kind of go through how we can up we've had a shortage of staff so if we need to bring in people temporarily to get us caught up on some of this since I'm first hearing of it that's another piece um and then you mentioned the magnets so we purchased new different magnets for everyone um I'm not 100% sure that every building has passed them out yet but I'm working with Kim seon as um works at our office working with her the last few weeks cuz we did have a we have a form that people can put in safety complaint safety requests um so right now we have already purchased little drawring bags with our H logo on it and the staff doesn't even know this yet but it's

258it's coming up um very shortly wedges ropes um whistles and the magnets and be going in those bags so I'm working on getting those out to staff I also put in a plan today with Bobby is the maintenance staff I put starting next week they're going to work on those night we were going to talk about that but I think that was some of the things that I was hearing from The Forum as well right we about did anybody make a list of everything I think we have some list list yes just just one thing on on on the printer copier SL fax machines I just I'd like to we should really do this more mainly during budget probably but just getting an idea of how old some of these things are I did look

259up online that you know sort of a heavily used copier should be 5 years I don't know how heavily used uses but others are you know 8 years but one it was reported that by teacher who been here since 2015 that they hadn't been replaced since then you know the town we do a lot of things like Chromebooks where we have just kind of that automatic replacement cycle do we start like looking into doing something like that with the printers I just want to and this is where I don't know is it cuz there's printers in their rooms and then there's a copier that you can print to so I don't know if we're talking about the this was specifically the cop but but we should do we should look into it on on the

260on the printer side as well I think just again making sure that uh the teachers and staff have the tools you know that and they're working and as much as possible I get everywhere has printer issues right I mean there's they're always breaking um around a toner but as much as we can just making sure that the little things don't clog up people's days and they're not using 15 minutes of of their planning time to to to hunt down a a copier or a printer to to do their job and Technology does have a ticketing system already so they should be able to report the small printers The copier is not being communicated way I think we need to add that in there as well right and I would say like if the copy I

261agree I taught 15 years so yes it's you can't do anything so yes reach out to me directly take care of it we'll make sure it's running um but to your point like we before we do the you know printer and copier well the cop is for sure but the printer assessment we we need to establish the vision MH because I mean some buildings have a class a printer in every classroom others are going to team printing so we need to get like a group together like really to establish that Vision I agree we refresh you know just make sure we have that clear picture how we want to do printing but The copier for sure there should be plenty of copers available and they should have plenty of toner so we're going to do

262better at that that's great yeah thanks guys all right I have a question here and something that we talk about to me just a question for both Jo and so um I know that your Specialists are working and you know there there's a lot of things going on there but what we at least what I heard from you guys here somehow it's very different from what what we heard from the teachers that day so um there was a widespread feeling about not feeling included and also the fact that they used to do some of the things that made them feel that they were more aligned across the schools than they feel right now did they Define what that was so in the sense that they used to have more meetings about curriculum alignment right now

263Everything feels very disjointed to them so I'm not sure if I'm we did curriculum Council meetings and those were once a month that's the only change something someone says something to the fact that like they used all the subject teachers from all the schools used to meet together and now they don't I think I think the only thing I can what J Joan's describing is we had department leaders curriculum Specialists and um technology Specialists well 25 people would be monthly here correct but then um the people that sometimes have to map the work themselves weren't being able they weren't able to get out cuz they're in the building to do the work so they were meeting to discuss those but the difference in the model here again there's not one perfect model but having the

264the coordinators going into the building so they're not just working with the lead the grade level leaders or the department leaders they're trying to work with the teams that are doing the work as well and that was the change because people are locked into teaching schedules and can't leave the building during the day for example to go down but one of the things we're trying to do is actually we're building in a lot more curriculum review in curriculum mapping time during our PD days correct we heard loud and clear if we can do it more during those days so they're not getting pulled so we have a built into the p and when we had ccum counil they wanted to be able to talk a subject wide K through 12 that's what the curriculum reviews

265are for wait I thought the curriculum Ms were done they're not all done stage one for some are done and some not and that's we that is that yeah so I I we I'm I still I don't know why maybe it's just me I still feel like I need sort of like more information and like I know we're going to hear this next week but like or or even more of like a review like discussion evaluation reflection on the curriculum review process and changes as far as like how is it being implemented and how is it being received cuz we do hear a lot of stuff from teachers the curriculum review the curriculum mapping the creation of the curriculum coordinators like the old system versus the new system okay in general like the curriculum coordinators

266model versus the department heads model to to you know not to not to put too fine a point on it but and everything that goes with that like not necessarily the work that's being done on the individuals but like the efficacy of the new model with whereas how it relates to PD to um teachers having access to you know resources time planning time with other folks has it increased vertical alignment um has it increased vertical like work time um and just like how it's going sure we can talk about that but The Curriculum maps are the evidence right of doing that so Curriculum maps well so I guess one of the goals of this whole thing was to create these curriculum apps right and that has been something that's really been successful like we've all

267seen that now we have all the stuff available on the website and it's very accessible parents can see it um in addition to that I feel like there were other goals and it also right because otherwise it would be over because the Curriculum maps are done or almost done right so I know they're never done those are living breathing documents Curriculum maps are never done okay so but but Joanie it's not just the Curriculum maps correct that was the whole purpose you know CU that's that's phas one two more spaces yeah sorry I'm not speaking very well because it's 10:30 and I got up at 450 so do you mean more their job responsibilities cuz they are going I just want I want more of like a review of how is it going how is

268it going like from the teacher perspective how is it going from your perspective how is it going from everyone's like how is it benefiting students how is it benefit teachers cuz they I think what we're hearing from them is they don't feel like they're getting as much collaboration among themselves they don't feel see one thing that came out of that talking I'll be I'm very being very very open about it is that they don't feel supported the emotional well-being that we keep talking about every single meeting the teachers are not feeling it I know Susan you also have like you know we have been trying very hard and I think all of us have been addressing this over and over again but I do think that we need to do something I don't I just

269don't have the answer to this but can I just clarify something no mini the only thing that's changed meeting wise nothing has changed other than that curriculum console has disbanded nothing else has changed the collaboration time that they can work with their team members their other teachers that has not been touched but I think that's what we might be that then the communication so J we get it and you know what whatever we have seen whatever I have seen I have I I'm completely on board with you don't get me wrong it's just that I feel that whatever you guys have been doing has not been communicated and whatever has been communicated it has not been received well and it has created a certain amount of anxiousness distress and a constant anxiety that I mean

270we heard things like oh I'm so afraid to speak because I am afraid I lose my job that to me I mean honestly and this is not this was not one person two person it was just something coming out from all all places so it was a feeling if if if I'm making any sense it was not something that that was somebody came with an agenda it was just something that organically came out so I'm just kind of trying to think that I know this Administration would never hurt teachers that's what I believe but the segue to them between here there is there is a disconnect and we need to do something yeah we need to do a better job if people are feeling that way and because if you're talking about social emotional feeling

271every single time and then we walk into this huge group of teachers and they say we don't feel emotionally supported they're not going to transfer that to students that the entire thing is failing right then and there so and that is that was my takea away from that right I mean everything stands at as is there are so many things that I've said in the past I stand by it but this is also a new reality was it all about curriculum I'm not quite sure what no but I think we have these curriculum coordinators that could be used as a resource and I just want to make sure that they're you know they're three awesome people then like I just want to make sure that they're being utilized in a way that's like getting the

272most support to the teachers and like the most and they are probably spread too thin right now because if you think about it how many years before we had since we had curriculum I mean part of the problem is we're playing ketchup and that's why the process is going to take longer than it normally would because it's been so many years since we're it's been 11 years from some curriculum reviews 13 years for other curriculum reviews that's a long long but another area to better support would be like the mentoring program there's a lot of feedback that it would be helpful to have have that information those meetings in August before things are underway I mean imagine being a teacher right now in the middle of October with a term about to end tests exams

273what are you teaching next you're going to get new students in within another term and now we we have to start up with the mentoring but wouldn't it be a better time to get that information and get that rolling in August so that's totally agree the issue that we hit this year was a lot of people were not hired goes back to the hiring until late August early September and then the principal as current staff members whose interest in mentoring yes we agree with there's capacity to do it twice just like we talked about with like the training of Paras making sure we have a training midy year and things are saved and so people who come on later so it just looks like an opportunity to that we could improve and build better relationships

274too because if you are that veteran teacher agreeing to Mentor it would be nice to and and is it possible that the people who agree to Mentor me you you're trying to fill four positions does it matter who's taking those like could they get that information in August when they're less busy and then as you hire someone you tag them to someone it's just it's an an area TR to fit though the principal tries to fit depends okay that makes sense to but if I know I'm hiring a fourth grade teacher or a social study a middle school social studies teacher I know the position so I feel like I could select the mentor even even though I don't have that person maybe we don't feel that position and we say thank you for offering

275but I just think that they would they would feel listened to if we could assure them that it comes earlier yeah we can do better for sure and last year I ran different people could not make different meetings so I did six different trainings right and you know for that so I mean we do have a capacity issue with with the the leadership I know sometimes people think we're there are too many leaders but I have to I have to disagree because we do have a capacity issue that way and that that part is part of the problem as well for her to have to do six train is cuz it's just her and get there fairness it's it's hard you know and I know it's a new roll out on like the electronic IEP

276thing but here's feedback that resonated with me if I have to do five clicks to get there and I'm a UA teacher with 700 students and now give me the percentage like let's say I have 10% or 20% I have 140 IEPs all throughout the day that's your asking going to click five times to pull that up divide by five I know we might not be seeing everyone every day but I think it's a lot I but we are not asking them to click the the product requires that and a lot of it is about the confidentiality you know what I mean like it's but is there a way to is there a way to allow like I want to know which kid has an allergy I want to know like could I go in

277and create could I get four notes on like the the high level stuff I need to remember about the four kids that end up here and then 40 minutes five other kids so that it's like one click and I can pull it up it's there we purchased the product already uh we're actually meeting with them next week to uh get trained and launch it it's going to give those we were thinking about the UA teachers a lot because that's always a challenge also the PA professionals talking do they get access to this information as well the pair professionals uh the PA professionals can if they're co- teers for that class so it's just hard cuz I know the pars sometimes have to be pulled into like different situations and they're not familiar with the needs

278of who in the past in the past with the old system they didn't have electronic access right they had correct they could only get the paper room have you had focus groups just to kind of like Get feedback to see where the pain points are yeah I could tell you we've we've talked to the UA teachers and we hear their frustrations we purchased a product it's a power school customization it layers on top and what it does is gives we only have four core alerts in power school this gives us the ability to have unlimited alerts and run run reports on those for example there's 14 individual healthcare plans at Miller Elementary well if you teach 700 kids you're going to have to weed through and find this 14 this this product will allow you

279to pick this alert ihcp give me all those goods and run it for all 700 so you can see these 14 students in one screen okay and Print in or whatever you want to do so right now that's not possible we bought a product that will do this we we looked at the demo we're going to get trained on it and I can't promise when it's going to be out there but have you I mean we're sort of doing this now I suppose but have you like communicated that with the teachers so that they know that like they're being listen to when help help is on the way Happ this just happened we just purchased it last week so we like we make when we're going to get it you tell just tell them we're

280working on and this is what we've done HT you I hear it you're right we could we could tell them we purchase something I just I would love to give them a timeline like once we get trained and say okay question you know I'll give you this tell them you'll update them on the timeline but I feel like it would go a long way to know help is on the way got yes that makes sense so you're right I think communication and actually getting putting them in and talking to them I think would go a long way I think this is what all this is about they probably are waiting to hear from you guys that okay we hear you this is what your problems are maybe if you have 10 problems we can only

281solve two but we will solve two I think that will go a long way in you know at least making them feel that they are being hurt yeah that cuz that was another theme throughout not feeling Hur yeah yeah not feeling like they were being heard Y and The copier machine thing too like that's great but so even just send an Emil like oh we've heard that there's been some issues with the c just you know we're rolling this out you know it's not up yet but but like I said I think the the we had a problem that there was no play I didn't realize that it was bottlenecking there not yeah and you didn't even realize now that now we can solve this and I this is why I really do encourage you

282to encourage staff to go to their building if they're not go to the building leader and then if they're not getting if if they're getting ignored I'm not I don't think they I'm just saying I think think we have a communication problem have them go up the chain and come in because I want to make sure that if there's have I want them to reach out to the right whether it's a technology issue danan is there if his staff haven't been able to solve a problem Keith is there for facilities bump it up to me if you haven't you know I mean this is where that school D thing now that I know that we can access that cuz I didn't that will really help a lot and so I am going to put together

283a memo on all of this you know but I wanted to this has been like happening so fast like I said I got pieces and bits from Friday if I mean if we were in the room I think I would have been better able to respond to this so now and I talked to Cynthia she gave me some things you gave me some things hearing from you tonight so I'm going to hopefully be able to work on that but we got to have a better way to get that information up to the right people because it's not helpful to the staff who are waiting answers when I didn't even know what the question was or the problem was or or anyone you know well that's why I think the form was helpful because I'm sorry

284no go ahead do you have any kind of like open Office hours where staff can come to you with these sorts of little issues like even if it's a cop not that a copy machine I'm going to get murdered um a copy if you don't have a working copy machine I know it's a big deal but I'm saying like regardless of the size or scope of the issue is there how to staff communicate with you so I I did office hours in the past and I was finding them not necessarily effective you know sometimes they were sometimes they weren't so and it's hard to have open Office hours because they can't get to me you know what I mean I have to be in the building so it it worked better when I said I'm

285going to be there this day and I would sometimes sit there all day and have two people and then I wouldn't be back for a while you know what I mean so that just you or do you like bring the principal does have maybe the principal have their own I mean their no no but I just mean like you know this is yours synergize just you know have have one one office hour where you you both are sitting there I I I guess the only other part I'm I'm really worried about and I guess I'm reflecting back on um just spe's presentation where we saw the increase in in 504s we saw the increase in IEPs we know we have a focus on we in Gillingham we also have we we're watching almost that bubble

286the year where it's not as many kids went to kindergarten but then the following year we saw a bigger those kids are moving through I'm I'm I just the is there correlation with our IEP and our 50 course and the space that our kids need for those special education services and then just making sure like especially as we approach the budget season and I don't know I hope it doesn't mean a mobile classroom but if it does it does but I just want to make sure everyone has the right spaces they need to get that incredibly important work done right um because as you know like at my experience if you have a kid um getting services or language based there might also be other components in there like ADHD or other things going on

287and so we want to make sure they're in a really good space to make their best progress so if there's any way we can really be in touch and and see what that looks like especially as we have kids from that bubble here moving moving through right so yeah and this is a complex question but I will just say one thing I am worried about when you bring up a mobile I was kind of visually trying to map out thinking about that myself when talking about enrollment I'm not sure we could put Mobile on our building the way they're set up because the way the camp with the with the roll on the back I don't I can't picture a space where you could attach it cuz you wouldn't want kids walking outside off the

288campus you know what I mean so I think had to and I could be wrong I hasn't really visually mapped it out but when I was thinking about other places I've been where I have seen mobiles connected they usually had like a big open space behind the building that some place that you could attach it to and I don't I don't think they have to be attached I think a short walk is fine no but I'm thinking in the winter time when it's snowing and heavy you know things like that what snow we don't I don't think no B we don't get snow anymore we don't have B transitioning up we don't have to like we're like throwing this on you and like you probably don't have the answers to all these we sort of

289table a couple of things like number one like the issue of space is going to come up and we'd like to have that before budget season and also we heard a lot of feedback from the unified Arts teachers and the lower levels that 700 kids at once not would we be open to in the future looking into plans for maybe look re looking at the Miller placentino UA schedule so that like kids have art every day for 6 weeks then kids have gym every day for six weeks or something like that so that like the teachers have fewer students you know we don't need to discuss pros and cons now but like these are just a couple issues that came up that um seem like four future issues for us to with one person maybe

290one person needs to take responsibility for communicating what we heard from The Forum I wrote a bunch of stuff down but I don't know if I wasn't there for the last part of it and I'm sure you guys have already shared stuff I'm happy to type up it and I know Sarah did too but maybe we could just pass it along with everybody to make sure that we include everything one person should collect the notes and make sure we have a make sure we them okay so if you would send any notes that you have to to Sarah and you'll put them together my spret that already started because we don't want yeah I mean it we have to communicate all that stuff because for whatever reason people were saying they didn't feel comfortable going

291necessarily to their principal or necessarily to the administration so for whatever reason we have you know this information we have to make sure it gets passed along otherwise we I really believe that School dude's going to be a huge part of at least the break fix kind of stuff you know think that's going to be the maintenance stuff just just figuring that that's H be huge and I think that's going to solve a lot like I said I can't promise you it's fix immediately but I did ask James can we expedite that now that I know we have access to that as well which is wonderful to you all right let's talk about the equity audit because we still have that to do so we have sort of discussed the equity audit throughout the course

292of the meeting but if if you want to continue to I have a couple okay um I think maybe you can be in charge of this as our venerable chair passing along with permission all the the emails that we got from teachers about passing them on somebody needs to be in charge of passing along to LNS the concerns about accuracies so that they can be I can I can is it a a role where you reach back out to the person and make sure this is what they want past that's yeah that's what I'm saying like one guy today I I emailed him and said can we share this with LNS yes you can I said great Dan why don't you do that cuz I don't know I don't have connection I mean it's going

293to have to go through one of I don't have I don't have emails for LNS so it's going to have to go through one of like right on the front of the report I'm not I'm not I already I already reached out to them on a few of things like monor's prek and some of the things we did correct and I just didn't get corrected you know I mean I don't know what happened it was aak but it it is what it is um some of the things that were statements that people made I don't think we can fact check those as far as like accuracy because somebody said it even but that wasn't the bul of no but I'm saying the one she would look into the transcri because I think some of those

294some of those I've read that were the I don't know who said a lot of those well but I think she might have labeled some of like who's in administrator I'd rather just say if a statement is factually inaccurate we can correct it if it is if it is a Feeling or oration then then no of course you can't do that but but but what I'm saying is that we have six or seven emails with DET yeah so that needs to get passed along cuz that report needs to get corrected we're going to want and I already gave her a list and they might be some of the same things but there probably others that yeah it was a lot it was a lot which is a little concerning but I think the other piece

295is that I totally lost my train of thought we need to have action I it and continue this discussion we need talk yeah we need to talk about the equity we need the steering Comm set up and and yeah we so we have a steering committee though yes that we're let me estblished let me throw something out here because it is 10:45 or 10:50 at at night um we have a meeting it's going to be a curriculum meeting it's going to be pretty long is there any interest in having a second meeting to sort of discuss all of these Dei issues I I I've just Le out there I know there a lot you know um and I'm not saying we need to decide the date now if people want it but want no okay

296but it was good to ask because we are finding ourselves having a lot of important issues and it takes time and we don't want to it's it's an important question um all right okay so a committee wouldn't be as long as it's not in November and December it's I think we need a little bit of a r over and then I think we no I think okay I feel like we need to get started on the work sooner rather than later January but when when will the steering committee be put together that back to us to look over it again right could we get started at least meeting while we're waiting for but I you know Susan will convene that I'm not sure anything that we're going to change fact the facts that we're going

297to change are going to change the recommendations I think it's important just for for just for people's confidence in the report to fix the inur absolutely absolutely yes so I mean what is your what is your time frame with all the other committees I'm working on all them I'm working on the wellness Council right now I'm working on the Coalition I'm working on this I mean I so let us take the Coalition off your plate what is what is that's fair point mean that's a fair point a fa do we think it's reasonable by I mean what what are you thinking in terms of dates because I'd really like it to be this year right oh gosh that was the to get done but I haven't we haven't sat down to figure out like what

298are the what are the positions that make the most sense you know I mean we have to flush that it's different than the Strategic plan for example there's different stakeholders that should be in this group and again jerel's going to be running it so it's something I have to work on with him is it something we could get an outline of in advance of the November 2nd meeting and and I think we could at least yes I think we could have a little time to think about it and give you some input but then also meet and discuss by November 7 yes I think that we could have that yes does that work yeah so one thing I just one concern I do think we before everything gets really established I think we do need

299to really understand who's doing what because I think the equity and the Dei it's all so in mesh and needs to all happen but it also involves the them people and I feel like the steering committee for the equity audit is the Dei work right now you know what I mean I think that's the bulk of that and then we have this other group working on the hate and buys which is part of Dei but I'm just saying I I think there a separate Dei committee is probably not the direction to be going right now I no no no I don't I don't think anyone saying separate I think I think people were saying de is in the the hate speech and intolerance so there's two things there's the equity audit and and the recommendations

300that it makes which are are more or somewhat more curriculum based and sort of structureal of of of the of the school based and then there's the the hate speech and intolerance right so yeah and it just I just want to have the deliverables kind of separate enough that so the stuff actually happens so that and that's why I really think it's important that Jerel steers the steering committee because I think that's such a huge part of his role and he's he's got the right personality as well so but but before the November 2nd meeting you can give us an outline of your of the the people or positions or or yes he and I will work on that I feel like it's not okay or do we want to have more of a discussion

301about it tonight I think that's okay okay okay is Cynthia are you good is there anything more for on the E on the equity I'm try sorry I didn't eat dinner um so the only thing that I was saying was that the equity audit in particular those recommendations are going to be have to be implemented by our teaching teachers administrators Etc and it just so it just makes more sense that they're more heavily involved in that I agree that's because they're the ones I mean I have no insight into some of their recommendations of how those decisions get made because they're very much in the classroom very dayto day and I feel like that's the level where I feel like they can really make a huge impact to be realistic about what things they can

302actually Implement and with Fidelity um and I don't that doesn't mean that we shouldn't be on it we should absolutely be on it but I feel like that's where they can make a huge impact about where those recommendations we need to not we but General we need to get the teacher buying for this work and no I agree and the reaction that I've heard so far from the teachers is is some concern just given issues that they see with the report so um not not necessarily not the conclusions no one's even really bringing up the conclusions it's more and I've already I've already initiated that conversation so if you can get me those um least of those examples to add if there's others that I didn't share with me and that would be great wait

303I'm sorry oh Sarah was getting them oh sorry Sarah SAR SAR Sarah's getting the stuff Sarah the form okay are we are we good yes okay so policy sub me minutes read them into the record our next meeting is not October 19th but is November 2nd um and at this point um I will entertain a motion to adjourn from Open Session into executive session from which we will not return for three purposes I if we're going to get to all three but we'll try uh to discuss strategy with respect to collective bargaining or litigation if an open meeting may have detrimental effect on the bargaining or litigating position of the public body uh and the chair so declares and this first strategy related to collect the bargaining with the hft um and I'm declaring so

304um second is to discuss the deployment of security Personnel devices or strategies with respect there to uh and this is discuss additional concerns that were raised uh at The Forum and then finally to comply with or act under the authority of any general or special law or Federal grant and aid requirements um there may Provisions in state statutes federal grants uh that require um read the whole thing and then basically it's under compliance with with furpa the family uh education rights and privacy act in Massachusetts student privacy and Student Records laws 603 CMR 23-00 mgl c71 34d and 34e okay that's cynia second by that requires a what that requires a roll call vote Minnie yes Amanda Cynthia yes Sarah yes Lisa yes Don yes and yes that uh we are adjourned at [Music]