001is um okay all right the time is now six o'clock we're going to get started welcome everybody to the june 9 high school committee meeting start off with the pledge of allegiance the flag is to the left of myself and to your right pledge allegiance [Music] just a point of conduct if anybody is recording this meeting please let us know for the record first meeting agenda item is the vote to approve the meeting minutes of the may 26th open session has everybody had a chance to read those yes any questions comments concerns nope entertain a motion to prove the minutes as written all those in favor hi hi this is cohen i wasn't here so i have to abstain correct yes all right the next agenda item is the warrants i'd like to enter into
002the public record that i have approved school expense warrant dated june 2nd 394 145.58 school payroll bar also june 2nd 124 879.42 next item is the student representative update so i am no longer solo this is my new co-representative and he's going to introduce himself hi my name 10 is i'm excited to be here okay not so much detail i am pretty much here to make sure that every student's voice is being heard um through this committee that's it it's nice to have you at the table malia oh yeah we've only seen you on tv this year but yeah that's pretty much kind of what we have for you guys today i thought about it i'm just kind of getting into it a little bit before we go right back into the updates so yeah
003we're excited to start as a team that's great you have some big shoes for sure no pressure but with malia guiding you and true you'll do fine so what do you guys have poorest roommates yeah just i just wanted a lot of kind of fans i was waiting for the punchline it's very happy the middle school play is tonight if anybody after this wants to go downstairs i mean the plane is happening um tonight we just have the history field trip for the jcs which was fun it went around 40 third graders yesterday that's a lot from that a little bit to be honest um oh yeah the eighth grade um like uh tour and panel was today [Music] um i feel like they were excited i guess it comes a little bit it took
004a little convincing but i feel like they're ready to come up and save the third and fifth grade too they're also starting they're like it's cute because i remember them in middle school it seemed like the biggest all right move on to the next agenda item three apprentice program so along with me i have come on the program that we brought into the high school the week of may 23rd and it is from the math cot program fully funded through them and we were looking for opportunities to give students who are looking to go into the union go into the workforce right after high school um maybe go to college a little bit later but maybe go into one of those fields right after high school and be brought in the program and is the
005conversation we're just i'm just telling them oh sorry so again it's fully funded uh the students get paid for it we didn't pay for it but um you're allowed 15 to 20 students to go through the program and there are huge benefits for students that do outstanding in the program which we have some of the students here that were qualified as outstanding so some of those benefits are if they end up going into the apprenticeship program for one of the unions they get 30 credit hours they also get any resume services they help them get jobs they help them get jobs mock interviews any of that sort of stuff they also um will pay for any sort of licenses that they're interested in so hoisting licenses drone licenses the cdl license any of that sort
006of thing the program is also partnered with every job so i wouldn't remember it umass transportation these state roads so any classes that they want to further their education with or take classes there will be fully paid for as well so um wait one second i apologize the picture of all the students with the bulldozer in the back yeah that's the first picture holding it up right now so if you want to continue while we're waiting for the presentation um can you share it can you turn off your camera can i yes just turn up your camera for a second there we go okay so these are all the students that were part of the pre-apprenticeship program so next and again this was kind of what i was talking about so it's four full days
007of instruction one day they did go on a field trip to hopkinton um to the labor safety academy up there and again it's 15 to 20 students and they were given um all the ppe that they would need the hard hat safety glasses work gloves safety best equipment bags the whole program itself everything like i said was fully funded um and that's just a quick like schedule of what the week was so monday the intro they did went over their resumes updated those they went over work zone safety tuesday they did construction math surveying the students all got their ppe wednesday they went on the field trip thursday they got their cpr first day training and then friday was all hands-on concrete work so next and then these were the benefits that i was saying
008before they get 30 hours of credit towards the first year's class if they get into one of the labor's apprenticeship programs outstanding graduates skip a four-week paid co-op possibly with the highway or maintenance department and then the program graduates are eligible for all of those employment opportunities the resume review interview preparation all of that and then again like i was saying the class b cdl license the hoisting drone and other training programs so a lot of benefits next then do you guys want to talk these are just some pictures of what they were doing probably the first day was really just getting to know each other and uh we did resumes which really i think uh helped it showed us where to go to get into the workforce and when he provided us with dates
009and locations as well as he helped us make resumes and had those resumes revised by other people so that we could really see like um what we should put on like references and experience and what would be relevant to getting into the workforce which i thought was really helpful just because a lot of people don't know where to go to actually get into the construction business to get into a labor union uh because a lot of construction is just like knowing people so once you are given those connections given those um phone numbers it's a lot easier to get started and have a ground work so so do you guys all now have a regular ready resume to go yes up there we all have his uh contact information as well as some of his
010comments and he's somebody who will stay connected with them as long as they stay connected for years um there was a s um yeah that was in norton i worked for him and they're gonna pay for a cdlb but he was what five years ago so now is there anything i know is there a certain age limit for this like do you have to be 18 to get some of these licenses yes so the program is for juniors to seniors they prefer seniors because they can take you right after the program into the workforce but absolutely juniors getting them involved and then sometimes um they actually look like if you do it junior year and they come back i don't see your hair again so there's that opportunity as well on this day we uh
011basically we're learning how to use the tripods how to set them up so you learn how to keep the tripod level and then we use the um this little camera that you see on top of the tripod that is the level that you use to survey the land we used a you gotta do an x mark so that basically that mark is your starting mark and then you have to use all these other marks and we had to measure the land and then survey it so and then we all got tested on it so we put it up on a whiteboard everybody score and then base it off who did the best so on that day we learned a lot and that day actually helped us out pretty much because we got to use the
012equipment we had to go hands-on which i feel is very important for us because it teaches us how they work at a site and how the beginning of the site just starts and it's very neat for us it gives us great opportunities for the future and it was a really good day as well um a number of the groups almost hit perfect marks on it so when i walked in to kind of check the group there were all circles and there were a couple groups that were completely perfect and um mr lemon pulled me aside he said i want you to know all those circles there that's unbelievable i had to take a screenshot and send it to um jeff because he's like we've never i've never seen anything like this so the kids did
013an amazing job with it i think one of the important things is we are the first non-vocational public high school to go through the program so we're even more impressed that these are not students who've had you know that experience that this was all right from their college and that's something i forgot to say at the beginning we typically would not have had this program been able to come into norton but because of the chapter 74 classes um we were able to bring it in we're the only school public school non-tech school that has ever had a program and because of us um they've gotten a couple calls um so uh it was great and how many students were in it 15. and was it like was that the match or we could've had 30.
014you could have gone no 20 to max 20 is what what they will take well i mean i i actually i saw this in the pack and i was kind of excited because my son is in the trains and at graduation i met one of the graduates of this program he was ecstatic that he had another option um so i think this is great i think this is something we need to look to trying to keep up with so the field trip today we just kind of went to the training facility and you talked about a lot of the renovations they're having and actually a lot of stuff that you talked about was being used on the construction sites and then we just kind of drove the little big machine um you guys had to
015do the water test yeah we had to pick up a pal with it on one scaffolding and take and then the last two days they all were certified cpr training first aid and then this is the concrete day um so the concrete day we uh we all got a concrete bag all the tools and equipment to like make a little standing platform concrete we uh poured it mixed it and everything and then we got to actually keep the concrete afterwards so they learned to build the forms they did all the cutting after you sent that email i went out and i asked all the janitors mr sumner like the office and it was like gone and then i even went after school and asked the construction workers that were like working [Music] next and this
016is just more concrete work so um steve had come and helped us and we were just outside and it was basically a whole day project but completely hands on um they had to do all the math calculations by hand um they were not allowed calculators cell phones to use any of that so now they're actually applying everything that they're learning in math and in their algebra classes um to real-life situations so that was a huge benefit for them to see next and then these are all the graduates um his name was mr lemon so they love dog dog yes and they gave him a bunch of lemons but that is all of them so um [Laughter] but within that week they were able to form like these great connections as well and again these two
017are men that will if they remain connected with them they will do whatever they can so one of the things like the cdl license or the hoisting license he said the first time you take it we know you're going to fail it it's it's a hard license to get but they're willing to pay and they'll just pay and if you stay connected with them like the example pj gave um that person owns his own business and he found out about the connection goes hey does he have who was the cdl license right yeah he was like does he have a cell license i don't know he goes find out tell him if he doesn't have it i'll pay it for it he hadn't talked to that gentleman in like five years and so it's just
018it's a great connection to have so next and then these are just some of the things that the students had said so i don't know i know you had a comment pj comment about uh just how you guys felt like it was worth it right yeah i i feel like it's more important to the public schools than the vocational schools because the vocational school kids aren't going to take it as seriously as the public school kids were because they get the opportunity all the time for this to get their co-ops they get all this stuff to get set up by the school but this with the public tools you don't ever see this happening you don't ever get set up like this yeah i i mean i think construction as a whole it's it's somewhat
019recession there's always a need you know i think it's it's a tremendous career opportunity that you know people are seeing the trades change now that these the trades are more needed now to happen in i mean they were talking about starting off some of the outstanding students if they were able to get in you'd start off at like 40 45 000 and he said within two years we'd potentially be getting you up to like over a hundred well i probably should have gone [Laughter] no but i can just make a quick comment i think that one of the things that we strive to always do is be leaders in sort of a lot of different aspects of public education so um a huge thank you for really finding an opportunity for once again norton to
020kind of start this trend because my guess is is that other high schools are going to be following in the footsteps so um whoever brought it to the school whoever found it and kind of brought it to the school huge thank yous it was just she found it she asked me to do it she'll support here yeah it's pretty i mean it fits perfectly into the whole idea of the pathways that we're talking about uh the one that you've already approved so miss miss king came to actually to mr cersei and mr cersei came to me in the fall and said hey what do you think because it's only a week so it really became my job to just make sure the administrators recognize the flexibility that was needed for both this crew and the
021student's schedule rank as they were pulled out of their classes for that entire week and if anything is probably motivational to catch up on any work or anything because we hope to do this we have a follow-up next week or the week after um with the folks on the other end of this to to really formalize this into something a little bit more there's some more opportunities that we can bring in more things programs like even week-long things over the summer and different things like that that i think that's what we're always trying to do is to meet individual needs and we talk about that a lot is that um there's sort of this preconceived idea i think a lot of times that students who are in high school shouldn't automatically and immediately go to
022college and i'm not sure that that is the option for all students and i think um just sort of something that we've talked about for a few years now is what other opportunities can we offer to our students to let them know that there are other options and really good options so this is just one of those opportunities that i really appreciate you um discovering and introducing to our campus one of the things that's really interesting i went outside the day of the masonry where guys were moral different together boxes and all that i think i told a couple of you the other day right before tommy i mean uh mr lemdog he literally treats them without any swearing or inappropriate language like they're on a construction site i mean he's i mean he's just
023letting them know hey that is not the right way to do that and that it's not it's not monotone it's let's get this done the right way so i appreciated that the students were kind of like hey this was a great week to just learn how the real world in a labor type of situation best comment for me is the student that said um this was the best week of school ever i mean if that's if that's not motivational that's that's kind of cool the juniors that are in the program if they do get those benefits now going into senior year they already have plans they already have something going on which is great it's not going to seem here i don't know what i'm going to do or i need to try to they
024already have this plan they have these connections and they can formulate something and there's also job opportunities that you guys represented for summer um potential to apply for so congratulations guys thank you so much good job really good job you did a lovely job thank you thank you the next agenda item is about to [Music] so is there a motion or an individual who would like to be considered sure we're all looking at you i can tell you're all looking at me yeah i'll do it again i would uh nominate cherry going i'll second the nomination all over favor to appoint sherry killman capital improvement thank you all right next item is oh thank you mr kellen next item is for mr cersei discussion on transition specialists and our professionals english industries all right hi
025guys thank you so much um so we are proposing a new job description for a transition specialist special education teacher as well as a paraprofessional job coach um students who have disabilities or on an iep are we're required to look at post-secondary opportunities for them starting at the age of 14. um and it is really um not so much a mandate but a strongly suggested requirement to have a transition specialist in the school system to help those students prepare for post-secondary life whether that be college career or um preparing for adult services for those of our of our students who are there um until 22 their 22nd birthday so we're proposing that um we had been we had posted for a 0.5 transition specialist originally and we got a whopping zero applicants for that position
026um so it's a little difficult but we were able to attend um and collaborate with some other districts in the area who have actually done this previously worked to create a a combined transition specialist special education position and the person works not only with the students on their caseload but a lot of the other kiddos who are working on their transition goals as well doing the transition assessments um to help find to clear and define that that pathway that they want to pursue based upon their interests their ability levels things along those lines um really working with um adult service agencies to help collaborate and connect and build those those bridges for them um once they leave norton high school again whether that be community college um four-year college employment or again like i said
027going after those adult day programs um helping with independent living skills all those kinds of things um the person would also be responsible for the step out classroom um so really being the liaison for the students in our 18 to 22 program really focusing on more of those independent living skills those iadls as we call them um independent activities of daily living preparing for post-secondary work um and taking taking a focus more away from the classroom setting and really putting it toward the functional skills that we should be looking at for those for those kiddos or young adults i should say um we currently do transition assessments with our special educators um this would take a little bit of a bur uh that load off of their shoulders and really have this one person doing
028those assessments being able to specialize in that role um and we've also done some transition assessments that we've had to um contract out for for more specialized stuff and we're hoping that this will alleviate that as well for our transition specialist to be able to really hone in on certain skills and things along those lines um and then to go along with that we've had two paraprofessionals in the pro in the step out program currently but really wanting to make one of those people a job coach again focusing on more of those adult um focused skills less of the high school student academic type focus but really working on those job readiness skills how um the personal hygiene stuff working on the punctuality and effective communication modeling all of those things for the person but
029the biggest thing here would be that the individuals both the transition specialist and the job coach we would request that they get a seven or mandate that we get they get a 7d license our students in the transition ages really should be getting out more often working in the community doing volunteer work getting exposed to different settings now that we um now that we're hopefully over the hump of kova we can start getting out and doing those things again um they had been previously doing that prior to covid and we would like for them to to get back into that role we've been able to collaborate and connect with some people at the league school and in other um local districts that have really made some great connections with vocational opportunities for their students and
030they've been very um forthcoming and sharing those with us and giving us some real some good connections as well um so really just trying to to build on that independence level of our students kind of tag teaming off of what has been doing with the vocational piece on her end but doing it through the special education aspect for us i think one of the other things that the person will be responsible is making those connections to community agencies so we do have some relationships with like out of our enterprises and we'll try to do some of this work but making those connections building that strength here in the school system but then making those connections for families as these students turn 22 and move forward i'm really developing the collaborative relationships um that is just
031harder to do if you're doing you're not that isn't your focus so having this be their focus i think will not just support our students while they're with us but honestly we'll support their transition in what they do as they enter their adult years and really support the families because they have to navigate a pretty tricky adult system so um they'll be that piece of it um the other piece of that is as casey said we we do hope to have we need these folks to have a 70 license we're going to advertise when we do our job search for that hopefully we'll get somebody um but that may be something to just be for coming that we may have to support financially in order for them to get that depending on what we get
032by but it's a small relatively small price tag for what we're going to be able to do with this and we're not adding staff we're just reorganizing any questions from the committee so you know should we talk about costs you want to just kind of go over that yeah so in general what you're looking at because it's everything's done um internally as you know we've posted for as part of our operational budget 0.5 uh position so what we're going to see here is the savings probably if the person gets the seven if we get the person with the 70 probably be a positive to the budget above 10 000 um so could be a little bit more um you know the person doesn't have to test the first time we have to do a second
033reimbursement but i i we feel comfortable um i appreciate very much the special education department doing this because it is a opportunity for our students number one just for the general public to know since we're also being taped um public schools have a responsibility for certain populations of students until the age of 22. i just want to make sure that everybody knows that this is not something that we're trying to create this is our responsibility per state law and federal law and getting these students out to the to the potential community college or four-year school specialized programs as you've heard a few years ago before code we have students that are going off to one of the local colleges then you have the whole career connection um and right now with so many businesses really
034hurting for employment locally that could be very fruitful for our students um in this particular age and to be mindful the classrooms part of this is that this starts at 14 right because they start when they're 18. uh this is a something that as they're coming into the ninth grade really for me the ninth grade we b to that process so debt to the district budget very positive net to the ability to meet a best practice for these for these students that we'll be servicing is also very and i should say the the transition specialist is not mandated however the activities that they're going to be doing are mandated so somebody has to do it um this is just something to both specialize these positions are um as you know by the titles teacher in
035para they are union positions of the district the job descriptions have been shared with the mta the nta has endorsed them as published tonight okay that's how you don't have to have it but if you don't have it you're going to be in trouble when we come see it so it's during the stirring so just in my last district this this was a big deal um many years ago but it's still the same honor report what happens is they argue for it and then when something happens with the office of civil rights this is one of the things that they come after and i say well you didn't do that part and you should have had somebody in charge of that and so on and so forth i do need to vote because it is
036considered a job description and that is uncontrollable any other questions comments how many about how many students would the uh transition specialists have on their caseload yeah so um in terms of the classroom setting there is currently four students in that class that step out classroom um so for students that we have between the ages of 18 and 20 in their 22nd birthday um but then they would theoretically be working with all of our students on ieps at the high school level at some point which is a significant number i think it's about 110. i'm a little confused so is it are these both new positions are they both kind of more of a reorganization um the we had a step out teacher um and that person is going to take on the transition specialist
037role and then the job coach is a paraprofessional position that has a little bit more responsibilities um to do some of that vocational work um pursue some of those those pieces um so it's a little bit of a reorganization of of the special ed department in terms of both the step out and step up kids um but also are some of the the work that our inclusion teachers now will have a specialist during those transition assessments um and that's where we say well it could be up to a hundred kids they need to get a form of transition support i guess my last one is have we brought in any parents or cpac in terms of talking to them yeah yeah cpac is on board with this yes anything else mrs cohen did you have
038anything i do not all right this time entertain a motion to approve the transition specialist special education teacher and paraprofessional job coach descriptions as they are presented so for seconds all those in favor aye all right next item is going to approve the fy23 budget so as per every year once town meeting is over which this year was late or later than usual um the school committee has to revoke its budget that has been provided by the top meeting that budget is now set at 32 billion 915 996 dollars for an increase of 645 412 your recommendation recommended by the budget was 1 560 926 therefore we have to absorb 915 414 cuts we will zero out the federal grant at half a million um that will take care of all of those grants that
039we receive throughout the last 18 months and then we have uh informed the permanent subs 10 in each of the buildings that they are at this time laid off for 250 000 uh and then we had a student information system at 60 000 uh that we are not going to go forward with and we have numerous support contracts let's talk clear gov leadership pd um college career readiness library uh and uh and non-highly used software that will make up for the other 140 000. we'll take thereby zeroing out the budget to your comment you'll get a line item budget after this approval that shows all these changes the number on the bottom would be the same as the one that you build tonight can you guess um i don't read the lineup yes uh we'll
040we'll give you the line kind of budget and with a number attached to what those changes were okay and that'll be the other one that's like 18 pages yeah we'll send you something else we'll send you the email on which one you want if you want both we'll give any other questions or comments on the budget no yes just take your name and answer this chuck gallagher to one bay road i'm just curious as to what has happened between last year about the last pledge in this budget for you up so high i mean all those contracts there's raises it seems like an awful lot of money it's checking out sure so the the mandated um the total increase to the budget from the town is two percent the mandated part of the budget itself
041is 2.33 so right off the bat being mandated so this would be ell 504 special education is already not fully funded and i'm federally required to stay required to federally fund that budget the general education budget meaning everything else uh excluding transportation which was up less than i think 0.19 the total is about 60 000. i have to transport the kids i don't have a choice in that contract and then the all of the general education requirements that go into the regular general education have to absorb the remaining income so we took the federal grant to take up 50 of that and the 114 000 really comes out of what would be general education because i am not allowed to touch the mandated i can't cut for example a special education teacher that's giving direct
042services to students because then i violate civil rights uh so those cut the direct impact is district-wide we are not playing on any teachers in the classroom but what we did is we took all of our teachers that cover on absences and so on um they're called permanent substitutes those folks were all relieved of their duties at this time things changed throughout the summer because of people moving saving money because people move and all of that then we'll probably at some point have to have some type of substitutes in that romance so that's the general but i guess what i'm saying financially what has gone up six hundred thousand dollars uh all of our contracts and all of our special education costs for example i have um an increase of of from last year this
043year of students that go out of district of 12 so if i had 1.2 million dollars worth of students out of district add another 12 percent of that from last year to this year so every line item that we have that are mandated services i have to cover those i can only cover those by either getting more money or by taking it from other accounts within the operating budget how many students have gone out of district we have 33 students out of the district currently which we're getting at 60. how much district last contract uh we had 33 last year 33 currently again that number can change that the number of students going on district is day to day first time here for example um from the day that we voted the school committee budget
044and it got sent to the town before town meeting we had an out of district placement that is costing us over 200 thousand dollars a year starting on july 1st we have no other way except to pay that bill you can't go to the state for it you can so on and so forth so that's what happens with these costs a few years ago we had eight students move into town during the months of july and august that cost us eight hundred thousand dollars so we had we basically took from other line items zero them out everything from paper and software uh personnel um if needed and then went back to the town for some more of those sponsors okay any other questions or comments okay entertain a motion to approve the budget as presented
045for a second second all those in favor aye okay uh next item agenda agenda item uh summer transfers mr buzz yes so um first date regulations cisco committee has to promote any transfers that occur between expenses and salary accounts it's certain annual request to uh for a vote of approval to allow us to make those transfers between now and july 15th which is the end of the fiscal year not to be able to balance out these accounts now so this is just moving like a to b yes yeah the bottom line does not change it's just simply balancing out the finding questions comments do you have an idea on what we'd be taking from more to replace something with would it be more from line items to salaries or salaries no idea at this point
046we have uh three more sal uh three more payrolls this year one of them is the final payroll of the year which is the largest payroll we do it's about five and a half million dollars roughly so once that closes out that gets us a little closer to understanding what our transfers are going to be but again we're still waiting to receive may bills for all kinds of expenses right now we only have april bills that have kind of finalized so we still have to see may and june as well so this is a one-time vote that will kind of let you do your thing yeah it lets me close a year out so yeah so the town can close they can start there if they're moving on certifying for cash um and we can
047close out the year and start moving also motion to approve okay the next item is the superhero's evaluation um so this this evaluation is for um so this is super dense evaluation we as a school committee will learn each are given a packet um so some of the comments or i shouldn't say professional goals student goals district approvals were all met as far as step two assess performance on standards uh standard one instructional leadership standard two management operations standard three family and community engagement standard for professional culture uh instructional leadership was proficient the remainder were exemplary um overall the summary of performance was exemplary by the committee do you want to read the comments your decision your evaluators uh some of the comments that were set by the committee are sent in dr does an
048excellent job of managing our district we are lucky to have him progressive creative and intelligent leader collaboration with all aspects of time management supports every child academically and socially uh under joe's leadership nps continues to be a quality academically and emotionally strong institution uh dr fayette has led the district for some extraordinary times in the last few years all of the decisions were made best interests of students and staff in this challenging time dr beyetta has continued to seek the brightest and best for positions at mps continues through nps is one of the best districts in the area superintendent's performance goals student learning goal professional practice goal district improvement goal one two three and four insurers effective and timely supervision of evaluation of all staff and alignment state regulations and contract provisions that was met
049insurers effective and timely supervision evaluation of all staff and alignment state regulations and provisions was met sure shares all instructional staff design effective rigorous standards-based units of instruction it's met ensures all practice in all settings reflect high expectations regarding content quality of work engaging all students and personalized to accommodate diverse learning styles needs interesting levels of readiness was met implements a cohesive approach to recruiting hiring induction development and career growth was also met let's see instructional leadership curriculum instruction assessment evaluation data from decision making student learning um curriculum was proficient instruction was proficient assessment was exemplary evaluation was proficient data from decision making was exemplary overall rating was proficient some of the comments you were successful in making procedures of fallout empowering individuals to solve their problems at individual levels first we continually put the
050right people in the right positions to maintain successful teaching learning outcomes and expectations that supports our budgets bottom line strengths include instructional learning walks and classroom visits leadership discussions about classroom accountability using surveys and portals to continue to assess needs and accountability dr bana is a hands-on leader to make sure he visits all the schools even going so far as to sub into classrooms if needed dr beyer empowers his staff to problem solve issues that arise in their buildings he has continued to surround himself with some top tier administrative staff and continues to stress accountability within the district as far as management operations all categories were exemplary which were environment human resource management development scheduling law ethics policies fiscal systems um dr bannon continues to look outside the box to find creative ways to bring
051money into the district to fill our otherwise pronounced budget gap as we saw because we just voted the budget uh you continually put the right people in the right positions to have positive effects to the budget and maintain successful teaching and learning outcomes um legal accountability and depth of knowledge um has lead led us through multiple projects including doors and windows our current train project our current athletic complex and our hopefully 19 pandemic he has looked to become a leading district in responding to emotional social and emotional needs of students and staff lastly for analysis continues to go above and beyond for all families and staff supports delivery of service services including school resource officer positions transportation athletics one-to-one technology internet connectivity student safety via home visits by staff and if necessary himself has had
052multiple parents forms to address concerns his address he has available for conversations even tough ones with parents staff members of the school committee he can be regularly seen at school and town events dr bender enjoys engaging with the students through his superintendent-led student group he hears what the students concerns are and looks for ways to address them dr pirate has made nps a better place for all and has done routinely with a tight budget and making tough budget decisions every year about staff supplies as he carefully considers the impacts to the district that is any comments i have a few questions just so i'm doing new to the process here i obviously abstain from voting well doing an evaluation because i don't think it's fair to be aware yet um the second piece of that
053is is it just us who evaluates the teachers and admin also have an evaluation process only you might know something okay um okay um no it requires committee thanks to the committee to my staff administrators the community there's nothing better than being in a public forum and being told how good or bad you are it's the only employee it's the only place it's the only public employee in the commonwealth of massachusetts superintendent school that has a town manager um everybody else's personnel record so it always makes you feel kind of blocked about it but it's a good working district my own child attends this district so i think that speaks volumes to what i think about it is not perfect it's never going to be perfect but we have a lot of things to address
054but um i think that the future looks good i think coming out of this pandemic situation will only move this forward to address all the other issues that need to be addressed and then um and then begin working probably on july 1st begin working on the fy 24 budget because i think that's going to be a very difficult gear for public entities in general from police fire in schools because of the amount of the amount of federal money that's come in that's going to be going out the door and not available and then lastly the the general um process after this kind of cycle will be that i will present to you all branding goals brand new initiatives in terms of the things to do over the next um two years um and uh including
055the new strategic plan we'll have that for the fall and that'll be a major part of the next four years and uh you'll vote on that as well um we'll be getting back to skin improvement planning um you know coming out of this whole corporate situation and planning for that as well so i think the committee all right um so this was provided to the committee so hopefully you've had a chance to read it so at this time entertain a motion to approve the evaluation aspect of it so for a second second all those in favor all right i'm gonna upstate okay thanks thank you um so a couple things this is our last school committee meeting of this school year you're all almost there students and staff so at this point is there any
056other business i just i just have three um general statements um there'll be an informational going on about friday the 17th and monday the 21st being the kid 12 earlier next day sorry 21st because we have to be close on the 20th celebration of sunday the 19th um so we do have to come back to school on the 21st um so that friday and that's my date will be half days um to my left i want to thank matt for his service to us over the last four years as he moves on to another district um the um the other thing is i want to wish the kids and the parents a really good summer safe summer and i want to thank my staff all across the district all employees from our bus drivers custodial
057administrative assistants powers teachers food services although they're privatized that they do a great job for us and and then moving into july 5th the beginning of esy our extended school year program that casey anthony um overseas so everybody have enough to save summer and see you on tuesday the sixth for grades one through twelve and kindergarten starts on the set operation on the 8th yeah everybody is staggered does anybody committed anything yeah one thing from the permanent building committee with the town that was uh sure i'd be liaison too if you will uh met with them on monday night went really well uh updating them with the athletic fields and whatnot uh just a few concerns as far as town hall goes uh developers have that at about 3 million over budget right now due
058to the inflation every cost so they're kind of looking to hopefully cut some areas try not to cut the structure so much and you know reduce square footage uh so trying to find some other areas that way it's [Music] some reason 31 sticked out my head but that could be way off too i was going to say 32 so we're pretty close yeah and they put in a good buffer but they're unfortunately the buffer wasn't enough because no one expected this right so um then my one other thing here that i have um is i want to talk about policy around lawn science and around school property um obviously i know this is coming where we have loan signs on our school property um i want to be clear that this come to my attention
059due to the fact that these signs are not from norton public schools uh my concern is that we don't have some type of policy in place and we could open a floodgate of all the private groups and organizations to ask us to promote on their behalf this could be problematic because it's it's becomes a very hard spot to say no to some groups and yes to others um you know you know ultimately it's hard to put a value on one group organization over another and not all of our groups may uh fully directly align with normal public schools belief uh i did send along to the school committee and um school admin the u.s supreme court decision of i believe that's how you say it versus the city of boston has a point of potential
060reference the city of boston violated the first amendment uh due to the supreme court ruling are refusing to fly one flag while allowing others though i know there's not a much larger scale we could be opening ourselves to potential issues in the future uh i'm a type of person who likes to be proactive rather than potentially reactive especially as a district um we did talk to legal counsel they sent us over some options and one of the best options that i thought would fit very well for a new policy around lawn science banners you know stuff like that on school property and on on town property as well um which breeds something along these lines uh norton public schools will not allow any outside group or community member to post any signs on school property
061all signs must be furnished and have tied back to educational learning and or promoting school sponsored events with a little star in there except obviously on election day since we do open our schools for those all signs must be approved by the norton school committee prior to being placed um what i would suggest is i would like to make a motion to adopt a signed policy uh as stated and make it effective july 1st 2022 so we kind of go into the new fiscal year with uh with a new policy in place that's it yeah i'd want to table that until we could actually think about it i don't want to vote right away do we have any discussion yeah we can discuss that i don't think it's i don't think it's a bad idea
062to have a policy um and this is not a this is not me saying i don't like your policy but i want to read through and think about it before i just kind of voted on it um nick knows that um there are law and science there and nick knows that i i somewhat disagree that this is the same case as that supreme court decision um because these signs that we have now uh were were donated by an individual we we took him in and we decided we put him up here so i don't think we're necessarily open to the same legal exposure um i think council when they gave that opinion did not know all the facts so um i i don't think that currently we have exposure but going forward i think it's
063absolutely fine to have a policy um and if so if you want to circulate that to us we can take a look at it yeah i would definitely say in regards to the policy we wouldn't need the table it couldn't motion and vote tonight because they're just required by a lot of two readings in two separate meetings so if we look at you know potentially working on this over the summer we could potentially have a first reading in fall if we decide what policy to adopt but as far as motioning and voting tonight it can't legally be done if if it's delicious in the committee i can work with nick on trying to attempt to utilize his language and as i said in the email any other language that folks have around we there is
064an advertising policy but this is not the same thing because you got to work in a way that for example i tech does that have to come to um the school committee to be improved it's a community-based program that fundraises for the community so and you can't have a policy that's going to happen that really can't have political exclusion so you've got to make it some type of connection so if it's educational or connected to the mission it's connected to um football it's gonna be yeah like football sign ups would have to come to you guys right so we have to find out because we don't meet over the summer and if we're gonna take a look at it he's probably more comprehensive than just one sentence too it should be something that we're thinking
065about beyond just our front door you know well i guess i think nick suggested like banners for example to come up so for example no no i'm talking about it so i think i think that you read it fairly quickly but i think it kind of kind of limited it to what we would put a display on the side of the school i would i was thinking more outside of the school because outside of the school to me starts representing the town as well because it is town so we're going to make if we're going to make a policy we should make it we should make a comprehensive there's no reason not to make a compromise at this point um rather than do a piecemeal because things are going to come up you know it
066is what it is right so um if if you you want to take a stab at it with joe then it works so so the other thing too is um i just did some trying to figure out when i i got that from nick i started to kind of see like what communities have in schools just community because so i think one of the things we have to look at is also the is there a language in the bylaws of the town of north around lawn science so there are communities that have that i don't know that all communities do i just saw some of the communities on the list and they're restricted from putting any law signs up they're restrictive they're either restricted to only private homes or they're restrictive to uh not-for-profit organizations
067that meet the goals of a b c d e that type of stuff so they're actually 13 or something right so like arlington and i mean they just have like like an abc this is what is accepted by the select board and it's kind of like a one it's what's done for the town regal so can i just can i just add to that as well i have some some real concerns about the policy or nick how you kind of read it there because we've got to think about some other signs i know you mentioned itac but when we lost um deputy chief peterson you know we had a sign up supporting him um when we lost a student abriella we had a sign up supporting her so and her family so i i think
068that we really need to think long and hard about this because at the end of the day we're all about supporting our students our families and i think limiting it i think we have to put some serious consideration into this uh yeah i i'll just leave it at that because i definitely have some concern yeah i mean like i said my bigger concern is it's not the sign right now that i don't want to come off that way because i'm fully in support what i'm afraid of is opening that can of worms that what is the next sign and then we're all going to be trying to sit here trying to be like oh we're going to allow this sign but we're not going to allow that side and so on and so forth and
069how does and then when does it stop and how does it end you know um so i get that's my bigger concern is you know again sure i completely agree with you with you know some of the community aspects and things that we need that's why i think putting something in there that must be approved by north school committee gives us the ability to say hey this makes sense you know obviously two i think tommy peterson we can tie back very easily to the schools being a coach on football and helping out within the community as well obviously students um you know student passing away obviously is another one but i just think we need to be very careful in terms of what we are promoting um on school grounds because again it is a
070public entity and you know we don't want you to make it look like we're favoring one group over and over that's all right so i think the plan for this if you agree is something you can work on and bring to us in the fall um and again you know we'll have to go through yeah you have to do two readings you gotta send it to legal which is not that difficult but legally probably maybe they already have some that would fit the the wishes of the connection i don't know again that's something we can work on i'm happy to do it and get the information and make the decisions on the language that it wants to use my concern just to not forward put this to bed is you may have to make it
071such that it has to be approved by the superintendent in case we're not meeting you know for for example like if someone wanted to put something up over the summer we're not we don't have any meetings scheduled we would have to you know enable them so that could be a consideration sure yeah so so just think about the fundraisers that are done at the local level by school jcs as a fundraiser our lgm apparently as a fundraiser they put out some on sites now we have to go through the process potentially of either that's considered a you know educational because they have the pto pta so it doesn't matter um so we'll have to come up here but i think there's some work to do the online comments are suggesting well that could take time
072and then the fundraising gets held back because of it what would the process be correct correct i think yeah completely great we need some definitely type of process but i think like the jcs fun run that's a school sponsored event i don't think that would be technically based on what i'm thinking right now that would need our approval because it's schools sorry still sponsored you know it's just like if we were gonna do a football game you know same idea that hey we're doing homecoming we can throw a homecoming sound out there and we don't need us because it's you know from different communities between outside sponsors exactly if i can just add it i think that i'm not necessarily opposed to having the superintendent who sort of oversees our schools through the decision maker
073i don't know i know nick and your um sort of proposal you said the school committee but i really think that we have a superintendent who should be able to have sort of the authority to make those decisions um i'm not i think a policy is fine but i i do wonder if it should be directed to the superintendent and not to the school committee um they're like really no different than like flyers that are submitted like when there's a flyer for itech or anything park and rec that we used to do nick um we would always send it to dr baieta for approval and once he gave approval then it would go out you know then it would go from there so i i agree carolyn i think it makes more sense yeah i
074mean there's some work to do on it at this point i think we table it um to brainstorm if there is anybody that wants to address the meeting for public comments at this time you will be given three minutes on a timer no statements that are deemed inflammatory will be allowed state your name and address for the record is there anybody that would like to approach hi good evening everybody my name is james thomason i live here in norton 10 james street uh and so maybe to push that ball along a little quicker uh that you were just discussing i would like to propose based on a track record that signs uh bearing the christian flag be placed in on all school grounds every year uh from palm sunday through easter since uh the supreme
075court decision that's already been mentioned and to allow religious speech which is noted in that decision uh is not uh establishing a religion but allowing so since speech has been allowed by a non-school entity a public civic entity um i would like to request and i will certainly submit this in writing that again each year beginning on palm sunday and after easter that signs that the christian flag be placed on all school grounds christian flag is a blue red cross and a blue background on a white field generally accepted if you've been in churches i'm sure you've seen those uh before so i'd like to make that request based on the supreme court decision and uh the fact that norton as you have said has allowed speech and the supreme court did uh identify those
076flags as speech uh so uh and since it's allowed non-school entities civic organizations to speak in this way i think that we think that it opens up also for uh this flag to be placed in uh speech speech so thank you for your time i appreciate it very much and i'm sure that might light fire under your policy uh debating discussion thanks even again check out a 201 ray road i concur with last week i said the reason i'm up here is i'm concerned about i have a daughter that's seven years old in first grade and some of the literature that she has access to i think should be investigated she brought on two books during the school year that um one of them was about a vietnam veteran a marine in vietnam uh getting
077into firefights fighting get shot at a fight and fighting hole and i don't think that type of material should be accessible to a first grade another book that she brought home was what's titanic and one of the signs uh sentences says the unspeakable shrieking of hundreds of people dying filled the night frenzy tariff terrified screams i don't believe this is material that i first read i should be reading or have access to i understand the realities of life and they're going to learn all the stuff and they should learn all this stuff but first grade should not a seven-year-old should not be coming all the material like that so who knows what else is in these libraries i really think it's important that we set research and the material that's available to these kids a
078seven-year-old should be learned about hundreds of people screaming to death in the middle of the night with that i need the rest of my time to kill the others um i'm going to stop you there okay you cannot yield time when federer is not allowed to apologize it's out of expression you gave me three minutes you gave me three minutes i took a minute of that and i gave the other two minutes to this woman and you're not allowing it because you don't want to hear what you want to say that's your choice that is the truth um my name is kelly gallagher 2001 29201 bay road um i would appreciate some members of the board particularly on this end wouldn't last when moms of the public come up and speak their piece i think
079it's very unprofessional and rude um i bring my children to school to learn reading writing and math i never imagined i would be dropping off my children at their preschool in elementary schools surrounded by signs displaying and promoting sexuality does the school committee think it's appropriate to display sexuality signs to our minors is it appropriate to display them in elementary schools is it appropriate to display a particular political ideology to our children why is it so important for this district to share sexuality speech with our little kids but most importantly is this legal there are laws in this state that protect parental rights regarding curriculum involving human sexual or human sexuality issues i believe this district is violating the parental notification law also known as section 32a which requires you to notify families in writing
080of this material and requires you to inform families they may exempt their children from such material i believe i i believe by placing these components of the human sexuality curriculum on school grounds in the manner they have in place you are unable to comply with the exemption clause of section 32a and are therefore violating the law by allowing signs created by a private group of citizens to be posted on school grounds you have now opened up the district to all private groups being able to display their signs on school property as we discussed the recent u.s supreme court decision affirms this to say i'm disappointed about this district is an understatement all in the past six months this district introduced videos and pictures to first graders about children changing their gender children were illegally tested
081for a covid by nurses who did not obtain the required parental consent children's private medical information was disclosed to their class by their teacher a disturbing health survey was approved by the school committee and only postponed after a backlash by parents barbecue and other flavored crickets yes insects were served to and eaten by elementary students without written parental consent a school library is unable to provide a list of recent books they ordered and when the request was adjusted there was a stipulation of seven hundred dollars to release that information you the school committee willfully violate your own policies as someone who deals with regulatory compliance every day the actions by this district and the lack of transparency are shocking our children deserve to have their innocence protected when i was in elementary school i never
082knew if my teachers were married let alone what their sexual orientation was i didn't even know what sex was because i was a child and my parents thankfully gave me the gift of childhood it's amazing to me that not wanting my young children exposed to gender ideology or sexual content from other adults or strangers is treated as a controversial position it's my job as a parent to have these discussions with my children teaching one philosophy or social ideology to public school students is indoctrination not education we the parents want our schools to teach our children how to think let's get on with your time okay please perfectly request 15 more seconds just gallagher your time is up just 10 more seconds please thank you it says right in the school policy and this will come
083in your time is up right don't raise your voice to me sir i've been nothing but playing twice and i'm respectfully asking for attention return to your seat please don't tell me what to do about returning my seat sir you can return to your seat or you can leave my meeting okay your meeting this isn't the people's meeting this is what you're meeting next meetings thank you not the taxpayers not the parents thank you thank you for exposing everybody exposing yourself to everybody any other business i'm sorry hi um i'm shannon taylor i'm the president of the northeast association this is not about sex or sexuality this is about identity mps strives to maintain an inclusive environment that is safe and supportive for all students this district also maintains that diversity equity inclusion are our
084initiative ours it's consistent with our state directives and our curriculum frameworks we have students colleagues and families who are lgbtq plus and they deserve to know their learning in an environment that accepts them from who they are without question our jobs as educators is to foster a safe safe and respectful environment especially for historically marginalized students and colleagues who face difficulties that others do not the flags are aligned with our values this is about empowering students helping them feel seen and appreciated it's about helping students see that their community is diverse in ways that they don't always see and telling them that they are part of the exclusive space inclusive space again this is not about sex this is about identity and i as a part of the lgbt plus community i'm extremely proud to
085be an educator here in northern where diversity inclusivity and pride matter not just on paper but in practice thank you okay there's no other business entertaining motion hi um my name is amy weber i am teacher and norton and vice president of the norton teachers association and i'm seeking as a parent of an lbg lgbtq child not a nords who is not a norton student um i spoke actually to a norton parent whose children did ask her what the signs were about um she has a preschooler and a second grader and i thought she explained in a really age-appropriate way just said that these signs allow kids to be themselves and show their true colors my experience is that my son came out in ninth grade with the loving support of his father and myself
086it was still an extremely hard time for him um and it continues to not always be easy but luckily his school community and his hometown have been loving and inclusive i believe that lgbtq students need to feel accepted as shannon said it's not about teaching them anything it's about acceptance um my son thankfully feels accepted in both his school and hometown community but we obviously have a long way to go i recently read a book called house in the cerulean sea by tj clune and i wanted to share this quote with my son and all students who are facing such kind of hate and questioning their place he is loud but i think you'll learn it is because it is only a few people shouting desperate to be heard you might not ever be able
087to change their minds but so long as you remember you're not alone you will overcome as a teacher norton um and a parent i want to i want all my students to feel as supportive as my son does thanks anyone else entertain a motion to during the meeting so is there a second second all this in have a good favor the rest of the school year same summer