001[Music] This meeting is being broadcast and recorded by Milford TV and any copies can be obtained at the request of this board or through the central office. All right, everybody. Meeting is adjourned. I mean adjourned. I was like, "Wow, like wow, that's quick." Yeah. Great. Right. Let's open the meeting. So 7 o'clock. So the first that line all the retirees. So Craig, why don't you uh take that one off? Sure. Why don't the Ann, John, and Sandy come on up? Have a seat. One of the spots. You're on the This your last last um role, I guess, in the Milford public schools. So, we're going to start with you, Sandy. Um tell us about yourself. How long you've been here? I've been here for 31 years. 31 years. So all Milford High School? No. Um
00220 26 years here at Milford High. Uh I subbed I was I taught third grade in Northbridge before I came here. Mhm. And um fifth grade in Framingham. I was all over the place. And so I've I don't know what has it been 20 plus years that I've known you. I've known you for 20. Yeah. In role of of special ed. Right. Well, and in the role of parent parenting too. Yes. Our kids went to the same uh child care place. Um so a long time. Congratulations. Long time special educator here. Um early childhood prior to that. Awesome. And middle school. A little bit of everything until I found my place here. I appreciate your service. So thank you. Thank you. Thank you. This was a wonderful place to work and uh fantastic people. and
003I'll be back to uh sub and so forth. I can't separate myself right away. Well, that's excellent. You set the bar really high. John, you're next. Thank you. Um my name is John Mitchell. I've been with Milford Public Schools, Milford High School for 12 years now. I was a mid-career change. Uh so being a teacher here in this building was the fulfillment of a lifelong dream of mine. Um there were 12 glorious years. I loved every minute I spent in this building. Um, mornings were my favorite time. I used to get in early. Uh, thanks to Josh helping me out with the passes. I I was able to get in uh anytime I needed. But, um, it was just a wonderful experience. Um, I just wanted to say this much um that the people that
004work in this building are very special. Mhm. Um I made some lifelong friendships while I was here and um it was an honor and a privilege to have served this community. Thank you. Yeah. Social studies. All of it in history. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Um what what contents did you cover while you were here? Yeah, I covered world studies too. Um until they changed the pathway. Um so I taught freshmen for many years. Uh I love teaching freshmen. just full of idealism, you know, coming up from middle school. And um so I probably would have taught that class for the rest of my uh 12 years. Um but when they changed the pathway, um I went into a US2 role um and at least temporarily until we uh had a contemporary world issues curriculum go online
005for the last three years and uh I did five blocks of contemporary world issues for the last three years and I loved every minute of that. So yeah. Great. Well, I hope that uh you'll follow Sy's lead and sign up for subbing. We can have you work every single day. Absolutely. I will definitely look forward to that. The middle school, I believe, is hiring, right? Thank you. Thank you. All right, Ann. Hi, everyone. Thank you for inviting me tonight. Um, I've had 19 years at Boston public schools as a third grade teacher and 14 years here at Woodland Elementary School and I even got to sign my name on the steel beam when the new building went up. So, I will always be a part of Woodland. Um, it has been it has offered me
006so many opportunities. The the largest one is being able to go to China and represent Milford. And I was able to work with seventh graders and 12th graders and helping them get ready for college and do interviews and and then I got to teach the professional development to over a hundred teachers there and all they told me was you just need to come and talk with us and hang out. I didn't know it was going to turn into what it did. So social studies I taught to the seventh graders and it was a wonderful opportunity and I felt like I've you know forged so many friendships not just at Woodland but across the district which is what's so great about Milford. I mean it truly is a community and we're able to interact and I've
007had you as a principal and uh that was special. Right. Tell us more. Um it's really great though. It's just so wonderful. And when I thought about it, I said, I've affected over 10,000 students in my career. And so I'll take all those memories with you, probably more than that, too. And the kids always ask me like, "What do you like best about teaching?" And I always immediately come back with the children, you know, their random acts of kindness and their outlook on different important topics and their creativity. And it's like every day it's just like I'm wowed by them, you know, and being able to do the research with all the technology we're provided really helped immensely with their learning. Yeah. So, it's been an honor. Really has. I've enjoyed this community. Thank you
008very much. Thank you. So, let's open up for comment. Meg, go first. Oh, sure. Thanks, Michael. Uh, thank you all for coming here. I really appreciate it. I know once you've retired, it's probably you're ready to go do other things. So, thank you for taking the time to come back and speak with us. I think we should do that math on all of our retirees because I think about when you think about the number of lives that you've impacted, it's just amazing. So, I hope you take all those memories with you. I love that you use the word community because I truly believe that's one thing that makes Milford so unique. This is the first meeting after seven years. I can say I have a high school graduate of Milford. Um, and I can tell
009you that, you know, the people that are in these buildings make such a difference in all their lives. So just thank you for all the work that you've done and the impact that you've had. Enjoyed retirement. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah, I will echo e echo that. U lot of a lot of relationships, a lot of friendships, a lot of community building. Appreciate all the work you've done. Having any special events coming up? Anything to celebrate? Well, I'll jump in here on that one. Um so the 4th of July is my birthday. Oh. And um so I've turned 60. So, that's that's kind of a milestone. Um, and uh my wife and I and uh several of our friends from college are all getting together for a reunion in Tangle Wood to see James Taylor
010on the 4th of July. That's pretty cool. Nice. We're looking forward to that. Yes. Um my husband and I booked a a trip to Greece. And it's in October. I have never traveled in October. So, that's funny. pushing that button for the flight. I was like, I can't I don't I can't do it. Doesn't seem right. But we're looking forward to that a lot. Awesome. My daughter has booked a trip for me for my retirement. We're going to Germany and Italy in October as well. Fantastic. Fantastic. Looking forward to that and spending time with my first grandchild in September. Sounds wonderful. Awesome. And she lives in Brooklyn, New York. So that's travel and I'll enjoy that. Brendon. Yeah. Yeah. No. Um, thank you guys. I mean, it's amazing that you've dedicated, you know, a large
011portion of your life to educating the children of this district. I think it's incredibly special. Um, I think all of us in this room have a call to the community. Um, so I really appreciate your commitment to it and enjoy your long and healthy retirement. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you. My wife is a high school teacher, Milford. So, it's interesting. She used to teach freshman and then seniors and she loved it. she loved the freshman and then seniors because she could see the the growth between the four years and so um and my daughter's in in Woodland and it's just nice to see her her, you know, career and journey through our school system. So, thank you. I don't know. I really don't know what to say because it um I'm happy for
012all three of you. I'm happy for all of our retirees, but um I don't know like I get said also that um it's just I think about all that that you all have done and um for our community and it's I don't know they get a sense of loss I guess that that other kids won't have that um from you three anyways. Um but I do I do look forward to also the time when I can book a trip in October. I've never done it again. So, thank you. Well, thank you for coming tonight. Um, yeah. All right. Is there anything else for the I They can stay as long as they want. Yeah, they can stay here for the whole meeting if you want. Tomorrow, go for more vacations. Thank you so much. Yeah.
013Thank you. Thank you. You can tell what teachers were pushing in. Any uh announcements, correspondents, or distributions? You got anything, Craig? Uh I do not. Okay. I don't think anybody's here for invitation to speak. All right. Um no chairperson update. So, let's roll into the handbook and school improvement plan. We have Stacy first. That was fast. Yeah, good news. The committee reviewed it ahead of time. Oh, wow. So, you're ready with all the So, the plan is to keep it like at a, you know, highlight level and let's let's run through it. All right. Well, good evening, everyone. Thank you so much for having us. Don't get nervous. I just have a lot of papers because that's what I do. Um, so just to quickly, do you want me to do handbook first? We pause
014and then do the However you feel the flow goes. Um, sure. Yeah. All right. So for our handbook um most changes are minor reflective to day-to-day um names uh years, page numbers. We did change the font. We changed the we added page numbers because there weren't any before. So minor changes like that. There are a few major changes. Um for example, we changed uh teacher detention times from 210 to 235. We changed that to 220 to 250 because teachers are still teaching at 210. So they can't be they can't be at detention. Good catch. Um we removed the online payments for food service. Uh that's because we no longer have to do payments for food services. So that was um removed and we changed the language from free and reduced lunch to universal free school
015meals which would just read that all of our students um are eligible to receive free breakfast and lunch every day. No applications or income uh requirements are needed. These nutritious meals are available to every student to support learning and well-being. We encourage all students to take advantage of this program. So, it completely removes just the language around how to apply for free and reduced lunch and just talks about what the universal free school meals looks like. Um, we also changed the summer school prices because they change every year. Um, so we changed that to 250 for um residents of Milford uh Milford and to 300 for um who are not residents of Milford. Then we also changed our advisory. Um it used to say that we were meeting once a month because that's what we
016were doing. However, we are now dedicating on a weekly basis um a sore block which is going to be dedicated a dedicated period to uh designed to empower students with tools, strategies and support needed to achieve academic excellence. This structured time provides individualized guidance and skill building opportunities that enhance learning effectiveness across all subject areas. And those are the major changes. Any questions so far? I do have a quick quick question. The summer school prices, what do people pay for? Do we do we pay for summer school if a kid comes? Do we? So, sorry. When a student comes to summer school for whatever reason, do they pay? Yes. Okay. That's new to me. Okay. Any other questions? No. Right. Keep going. Great. All right. So the next one is our school improvement. Sorry, you
017totally done with the handbook. Can I ask? Oh yes, sorry. Here. Yeah, go ahead. So I know that we have um some guidance in our high school handbook, Cardon around artificial intelligence, which I would think is just a glaring important topic. I was just curious if that's something that we've considered adding to Stacy and I had a conversation with someone in another state that was talking about their third grader leveraging chat GBT for an assignment. And I'm thinking, oh wow, we've really um you know, we're all adapting and using technology. I was curious if that is a policy that we want to think about either as a district or that Stacy would want to contemplate incorporating just for consideration. Yeah, I'm happy to incorporate it. I thought we were working on something districtwide. That's why
018policy subcommittee. Perfect. Great. That's why I didn't add it to Stacy's. Um but if it's something that's going to be in the far future and we want something that is in the near future, I'm happy to draft something that we can add to our um academic honesty piece. Yeah. And I think um I think that's where it belongs for now. Um however um Tim has been creating something uh there is also some legislation that's happening um at the state level that we're kind of waiting on guidance from. Okay. So that's that's sort of where we are right now. Thank you. Should I add some type of language in our academic um dishonesty piece that that incorporates AI? Okay, no problem. Thank you. Keep going. Okay. So, our school improvement plan, we revised and enhanced it
019from last year. So, um last year we presented a three-year plan. Um and we we're still continue the three-year plan. However, we just looked at it and made it a little more specific uh measurable and um added um targets and timelines. Um so for example you'll see that the first goal last year the goal was all students will have all students and staff and students will have access to high quality instructional materials. Whereas this year, we changed that language to say by June 2027, Stacy Middle School will achieve 90% fidelity in implementation of high quality instructional materials as measured by classroom observations, learning walks, teacher surveys, and student performance data with incremental progress benchmarks of 60 by 60% by June 2025 and 75% by June 2026. So all the goals that we presented last year
020are the same as this year. They're just enhanced and measurable and specific. Um, so I'll quickly talk about what each goal looks like and where we've seen some accomplishments and where we're going to go next. Um, so our goal, our first goal, as I mentioned, is um, high quality instructional materials and implementation where we our goal was to see 60% by June 2025 and we did exceed that where we saw 90% in ELA reading and 75% in math. um our focus will now be really look our um English language learners program and increasing that um implementation there and then looking at our other core contents to see what that looks like. Um some of our key accomplishments are uh really compreh completed comprehensive professional development across um liter for all literacy teachers and for all
021math teachers and we developed grade level curriculum do documents and pacing guides for ELA reading math and English language learners program. We also collected um baseline data which I'm sure you guys have all reviewed. So I'm not going to talk about every single piece that we looked at but this data um is what led us to be able to really look at the goal and make it more specific and measurable. Our second goal is question could you just speak like two bullets sort of how did amplify go and kind of what was the general Yeah absolutely. I know it's a challenge so I'll start with that. I I appreciate that. I'm just curious kind of what the reception was or I think um Amplify went very well. It's intense. Um and from a user standpoint,
022the feedback I received that is the feedback I can get that it was intense. Um I would say that towards the end of the school year when teachers did were more comfortable with the platform than they were more comfortable at saying, okay, this is going to be a platform that we use or this is going to be an assignment that we do online. this is going to be offline and really going back and forth between what's going to be online and what's going to be um paper based. And I think that that was like at the beginning of the school year what really was stressing everyone out is just how much of the work was online and not knowing how to bring it offline. Um but I think we've met we're in a good place
023now of knowing which pieces we're going to take offline and do on paper um paper based. Awesome. Thank you. Yeah. How what what do you think that percentage is online versus kind of tactical? So it's all you can do all of it offline but we were encouraged to do it all online. So I would say teachers did the majority of it online. If I had to say a percentage I would say it was probably more like 80 to 85% of the work was done online. And is that going to be the you kind of the future is is to keep it online or is there going to be any movement to do anything paper based? I think we're still going to keep it hybrid where some assignments are going to be focused on what students
024are doing on paper, what you know written assignments look like um which reading assignments are going to be um you know a novel and then responses on their their their physical um book and then keeping some of it online as well. Right. Thank you. Um for for goal number one, do you have any uh the one that we're talking about now? Um do you have any additional budget asks that you are foreseeing in the future to to get to the I love that question. I'm just thinking about that already and I would love to know what your thoughts are. So, as of right now, um because our our Gleam grant has really taken on the literacy piece of it, um we aren't asking for that those funds, but it'll be similar to what we did
025with IM where we eventually absorb that um those funds. when we did IM and Carrie, correct me if I'm right, it was the grant was maybe like $40,000 and then we absorbed that into our um budget. Okay. So, I'm assuming that it's going to look similar to um to what we did with math. Thank you. So, look forward to that. Yes. Well, the only reason why I ask is like because I love these goals and I want you to achieve them. You know, when we see the the ask, you know, in January, just make sure to highlight like, hey, this is part of my my goal and do that. I also think that um on top of the material ask um what our grants give us that uh we don't have funded after the fact
026is the professional development that the teachers get. Um we use TNTP for for this grant. Um, and I think that that the coaching that the the teachers get through um through TNTP is critical to the success of the implementation of the program. We didn't have it um we definitely would have mixed reviews with with how um Amplify is being rolled out. So that's the part that I think we really have to sit down and figure out what's going to be the plan when when this TNTP walks away. How are we going to make sure that we're supporting the teachers? Which is when is that which is when I think we have it for another year, right? No, this year Gleam at Stacy ended on June 30th. So this year we got to figure that out.
027I I thought we had support. I thought we have support Yeah. for the upcoming year. Um, it's just won't be Chris anymore. And then I thought that we were done with Amy. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Amy is TNTP for math. Amy's definitely done June 30th. Yeah. Um, I think we're a year behind in math in ELA. Um, correct. But but obviously I think we all know this that Carol's attention is going to be in the elementary school. So, it's going to be hard for her. She was spending every Friday over at Stacy, um, working with teachers, um, in their meetings, uh, in their comm planning time meetings. I don't know how she's going to do that this year when when she's trying to roll it out down at the elementary. So, we're going to lean, I
028think, on Alyssa, um, Alyssa Holland, our instructional coach. Yeah. But she's also being pulled in a million directions, too. So I also just think the other thing to name when we have these consultants come in like they're providing our teachers with the support but they're also providing our instructional coach with the support. They're also providing our building based administration with support and district administration from support so that it's an outside view of what we're seeing in classrooms and where we should be kind of pushing and pulling. Um and I think it like at least for myself it checks my like biases um of what which are the high quality teachers and where do we need to kind of push and go. So, it's important that we continue to find the funds to get this professional
029development and consulting because it pushes instructional practices in the classroom, but I also think it helps building administration and leadership and central office leadership to push instructional practices as well. So, I will make sure that I highlight that in January when I request funds for professional development. Thank you so much. Of course. All righty. So our second goal um is focus on equitable and culture responsive practices and high quality instruction. Um and again similar to what I had mentioned the we've revamped it to be measurable. So 90% of instructional staff will effectively implement culturally responsive teaching practices and high quality instructional strategies including co-eing models as evidenced by a 15% increase in student achievement across all demographic groups and a 20% increase in student engagement as measured by surveys which one of the ones that
030we use is our SQM and classroom observations or learning walks. Um so we some of the key highlights or achievements is that we have completed our professional development with Dr. Sher Shari Holly um and we've established a 11 member cadre that has been working on um both implementing some of the strategies and protocols that that the program has taught but also they've been um leading workshops for teachers to teach them about some of these strategies and supporting. So even though the KAJ is of 11 members, we have tried to provide opportunities for other staff to to join and be a part of those um those experiences as well. Um another um something else that we noticed is that um our co-eing partnerships have been effective specifically in our English language learners programs and then you
031know we'll look at what special education looks like next year in focus there. Any questions? No. All right. And then goal number three looks at student uh student support services. So we're looking at NTSS and attendance. Um and we're looking at um reducing chronic absentism um from 19.5% to 10%. I know that's ambitious, but work with me. Um and increase the overall attendance rate from 93.6 to 96%. um and still fully um implement a comprehensive MTSS framework with 95% fidelity as measured by program audits and attendance tracking data. Some of the highlights that we've had there is that we have established a MTSS uh team that meets weekly. Um we are in the early stages of that looking at what does that look like and supporting our staff around when those forms are filled out.
032Um and we have also reduced our grade 5 chronic absentism from 50% to 40% which is our students who are in the milestones program um our sub separate program. So it's actually a great success to see that they are coming to school with more frequency and then overall chronic absentism rate went from 19.5% to 16.5. Um, so again, I know that the 10% seems ambitious, but based on the growth that we've seen in one year, I think it's something that we can get to by June 2025. Um, yeah, I think that that's really it for my goals. Um, year one was really foundational. We were trying to, you know, gather some baseline data, really look at where we're at and where we need to be and where some of the gaps are. So, we're really
033looking at year two as an acceleration year and start thinking about what are some of those moves that we need to make to start pushing it forward in bigger buckets versus kind of like the smaller um content areas or smaller buckets that we've been been doing. And then we're hoping that by year three we've met mastery which is fully achieving all of our goals that we have just shared today. Questions? Me? Just a quick one. card out on the attendance and I'm totally understanding there's no magic bullet. Do you feel like there were certain things that were done this year that were really effective? I'm just curious. Yes. And I'll let Rachel speak to that because I know her and the other assistant principles met with our attendant supervisors monthly. So I'll actually Yeah, we
034met um formally monthly but almost weekly because we were focusing on small pods of children per grade, inviting families in, going out, speaking to families. Um, I think when you bridge the gap between school and home, families are more comfortable explaining what it is. Um, that's difficult. You know, the attendant supervisors are great with helping us with students who sometimes it's as simple as it's raining and I walk too far. So, they're really supportive with families when it's a need like that. Or maybe a parent has a really young child at home and they're not comfortable with the distance their older child walks. So they're walking them. So in the bad weather, they're not doing it. So sometimes it's transportation. Um when you find out the need or even when they think there's just a
035super friendly face on the other side of the doors, it brings the students in. Great. Um lots and lots of contact with families. Okay. Awesome. Thank you, Brandon. Yeah, I actually had a question on that, too. Uh given what happened very recently, do any families and or students feel unsafe coming to school or things that are happening a little bit more globally or nationally? I would I don't I I believe that students feel safe once they're in school. Okay. I think it's the travel piece of it that they're feeling unsafe with. Um but I I will I feel confident saying that once they're in school, they feel safe. Yeah. Do you need any support from the either school committee and or administration to convey to parents and students to feel more safe in that process
036of getting them to school? Like what can we do to give them that confidence to get here? Because I don't want that to be a barrier for students to not come to school. I Oh, no. Go ahead. I was going to say um two points. I think parents are more reluctant to come to school. Okay. So, we've shifted a lot to a Zoom meeting. Okay. You know, they'll be on their phone or just a phone call with F FRC doing some of our interpretation. Um that definitely them we've been just saying it's okay. A meeting is a meeting whether we're in person or we're on the phone. It's okay. um the the students um I I would say I think yes once they're they were in the building and we've had lots of support and
037and from central office um being able to communicate with students and families to say like who do you need to talk to how can we help you feel safe? How what can we do to support you? Um we have SEAL monthly um themes that were shifted a lot um the end of the school year and were really about like how do we make a safe and inclusive environment for all. How do we ensure that we're all being respectful of one another and you know so they stuck with the themes that we've had but also just kind of emphasize the fact of like we want you all to be here at school and we're going to do whatever we can to make sure you feel safe once you are through our buildings. Yeah. and we open
038we open the offices. There's no doors that are shut. I think when the students come in emotionally disregulated, they just need to connect with someone they know and trust. Um the eighth grade would land in my office sometimes three, four at a time, sometimes one for an hour, whatever it was that they needed because once they're, you know, settled, they're able they can I go to class now? and they're um they they just need to know that whoever their trusted adult is is there. It's really as simple as that. That's all it takes. Yeah. Validate and acknowledge their emotions. Thank you. Great. Thanks. Does that make for the safety handbook as improvement plan with potential addition of some AI language in book? Motion. Have a second. Second by Brandon. All in favor? Motion passes. Thank
039you. Great. Thank you so much. Great. You're taking minutes, right? Yes. Yeah. It just dawned on me. I was like, "Wait a minute." Okay. Summer. Thank you. You too. It is also recorded, too. Melissa is going to do notes. Okay, good. But I have I have my own little notes. Yes. Thanks. All right. As long as have a good night. Thanks. Appreciate. Bye. Come on. Thank you. Uh good evening folks. Um I'd like to have my colleague uh Ben Leberto join us for the first part of um our proposed handbook changes tonight. I'll explain why in just a moment. For those of you that don't don't know Ben, he's a veteran social studies teacher here at Milford High School. Um I'd like to um start off with the proposed handbook changes um and then we'll
040get to the um get to the school improvement plan. So I'd like to start off with the proposed change to the grading policy. Uh so we can wrap that up and get Ben on his way if that's all right. Um so uh uh I want to uh sort of talk briefly about um what the change is. Um I'd like to uh then invite Ben to talk a little bit about the impetus behind the change and the the rationale behind the change because Ben was one of a number of faculty members who um had advocated for the change and served on a subcommittee who proposed the change. And then I'd like to share with the committee a little bit of the um some highlights of the deliberations that happened within our school improvement council who ultimately
041did vote in favor of these changes to bring to the school committee. Um so the uh the changes are um that the required number of assessments per term would be reduced from four to three and for the fourth term in seniors it would go from three to two. Um and we would also make an adjustment to the maximum weight per assessment. um whereby no single assessment may account for um more than 30% of the term grade and it used to be 20% uh of the term grade and uh in the fourth term for seniors uh no single assessment may account for more than 40% of the term grade. The sentences where you see the strike through in the um in the last uh segment there uh this is not a substantive change. I think this
042is just I think these are lines that cause confusion that I I think by taking them out it's bringing some more clarity to the policy. So it's not substantive. Um so again just to repeat we're talking about reducing the minimum number of assessments per term and increasing the maximum weight for a single assessment in a term. So with that let me give Ben an opportunity to share um a little bit about uh again where this came from and the rationale from the teachers perspective uh for proposing this change and then I'd like to share some of the deliberations that happened at a council. All right. Thank you. So, um, a number of teachers came to me, um, I'm one of the union representatives of the high school, um, saying that they felt that under the
043current schedule and the current model, um, getting four assessments in a term was a stretch. Uh, we have 180 days in the school year obviously, but then once you take away, you know, the final exam period, the mid-year exam period, the two orientation days, uh, the course recommendation day, we're down to 168. Divide that by four, you're looking at 42 days per term, give or take. Each class meets um four days out of our five day cycle. So really a class meets approximately like 33 34 days a term. So if you figure trying to get like four assessments in a term, you're basically giving like you know a test, a project, a paper once every eight or nine class days. Um from a teaching perspective as someone who has like between, you know, 90 to
044110 students um in any given semester, that's a lot of stuff to grade. And teachers also felt that, you know, trying to get four in in a term was simply impractical to the point where in order to meet the standard in the handbook and all that stuff, teachers were basically taking things that they normally wouldn't count as an assessment and making it an assessment grade, which we just all agree was bad practice. Then there's the other side of it from the student perspective. I mean, we have some students who are taking multiple APs, you know, multiple honors level courses, and they were just getting burnt out. I mean that it's like an unrealistic standard we felt to push our students to say hey if you're taking you know five core classes you're looking at a
045minimum of 20 major assessments a term and I predominantly teach seniors um getting them ready for you know college and one of the points that came up over and over again is that you know when you go to college you know you have you know basically like a mid-year exam and a final exam. So saying, "Hey, you're gonna four, you know, major assessments a term isn't really preparing them for that next thing in college where it's, you know, a mid-year exam can make or break you." So that was sort of like the overall um like big picture view. Thank you. Um thank you, Ben. Um so again, as I as I stated, I want to um shed some light on the deliberations that happened in our council and I want to emphasize, and I think
046this is pertinent to um the second change that we're going to talk about tonight as well, that the majority of the members of our council are students. I just want to stress that the majority of the members of the council are students, right? The students have voted in favor of this change. Um there was a there was a very healthy debate within the school council as to whether or not this was appropriate. Uh we did have some students who expressed reservations and apprehensions about how um fewer assessments would mean higher stakes assessments. Um and this would run the risk that if a student stumbled um on one assessment that it would be harder for them to recover. Um I think that that concern that students expressed was um I think largely addressed by uh their
047peers who reminded them that in a fullyear academic course if you have three assessments per term that's going to be 12 assessments right there plus a midyear and a final exam. So that's going to be 14 assessments over a over a school year at a minimum. Right? This is just set in the floor. In some classes it's going to be more. Um, and in addition, assessments only make up 75% of the term grades. So, your homework and your classwork and your class participation, uh, these also factor into the grades. And I think for the students who initially were apprehensive about having higher stakes assessment, um, I think those fears were mitigated when they realized that, all right, well, you know, it's only your final course grade that appears on your transcript, right? So, all the
048quarters get averaged out. And um I I think that that that put their minds at ease. Um the the strongest support from the students um was for the reasons that that Ben spoke to. Many of our students, and I I should uh note that all of our council students are very high achieving students, highly invested students taking very rigorous courses. Um they talked about especially our older students having this experience where there was there was four weeks a year that were completely unmanageable for them. Right? the last week of every term was this tsunami of assessments that teachers were giving them um because the teachers were hustling to sort of squeeze in the fourth assessment per term. Um and some of our uh highest achieving students um spoke about how while there was four weeks
049of the school year, the last week of each term that was particularly sort of unmanageable, um that it wasn't limited to just four weeks as as Ben indicated for a student who's taking, you know, three or more AP courses concurrently. Um they're running, you know, typically multiple major assessments per week. Um maybe that's not true in the first sort of three to four weeks of the school year, but once you're five weeks in, it's pretty much non-stop. Um you know, two to three assessments per week um every week for you know, the remaining, you know, 35 36 weeks of of the school year. Um, some of our students spoke about how um, they had often felt like the pace of assessments was so fast that it was really inhibiting their ability to focus on learning
050for mastery and it was pushing them to study material in a more superficial way and really where assessments were becoming really sort of transactional, right? Like I just got to do this, I gotta get it done, I gotta, you know, and and I gotta move on to the next thing. um where hey this is complex content this takes time I need practice I need to get help from my teacher um and uh there was um strong support um ultimately from our students for this proposal because they thought that it would be um good for their learning and uh good for their health. Um I um initially when I when I heard the proposal I had some reservations about there being uh sort of higher stakes attached to the assessments. Um and then I sort of
051you know reflected on something that I've shared with some of you on the committee before and I've certainly shared with some on the faculty. Um students academic performance when you look at how they do across all of their courses across all four years it's actually really consistent, right? Um, so changing the stakes that we're going to attach to sort of one assessment, one term, I think it all comes out in the wash as a mathematical matter. Um, so I don't want to pretend as though having higher stakes attached to each individual assessment cannot pose some problems and some challenges for some students along the way. I think that will be a there will be a consequence of this change. I think there will be some students who stumble on assessment on an assessment and then
052you know find themselves in a challenging position to sort of recover their grade for the quarter but again let's remember that transcripted grades are course grades not quarter grades right our major academic courses are full year so while it is true that higher stakes assessments can create some new challenges for some students it doesn't change the fact that students academic achievement is remarkably consistent across all their subjects across all four years of school and I don't think that um uh uh what I would consider to be a relatively marginal change in the number of assessments and the waiting of assessments is going to change the fact that students academic achievement is is highly consistent across courses across all four years. Thank you. So with that, let me pause and happy to you know answer any
053questions and um try to respond to any concerns. So first off, thanks for the context. It's very helpful not just to have the change but to understand it. Then I'd love to hear kind of how is this seen or what's the impact from a teacher perspective? um from lowering it or just from the current standpoint making this change. Um so we feel like it's going to lead to better practice overall. Okay. Okay. I mean uh you know just as an example in my government classes like in order to get assessments in I would give a case study to my students and I would say hey I want you to read this 20page document I want you to annotate it you know answer these questions um and I'm going to count that as an assessment grade.
054that's not really like in line with, you know, what the goals of our assessments are where it says there, you know, an assessment is a task designed to measure a student's performance against specific learning standards. It's like I'm doing that just to get the grade in instead of like having them like read it, learn that, hey, in college you're going to be expected to read a text, figure out, and then your professor is going to be asking you questions about it, you know, in class the next day, and that's where you get, you know, the uh grade on. So, for us, it's about like, you know, just being better teachers. Yeah. Okay, that's great. I appreciate that feedback. Um, I'd be curious just just how we think about, and you don't need to answer this,
055but just as we think about just communicating it because I know families that have multiple children be very used to sort of how we used to do it. So, just so it's sort of well communicated in terms of the change. Um, and then Craig, this is just this is like a one-off issue. Um, but I'd also be sensitive to is there a requirement in terms of how timely people need to put grades in? Because if there's only going to be three and someone waits until the last week to add them all, as a parent, um, I've had instances where it would be helpful to have known earlier the child's grades on set assessments. So, not that we need to have a hard and fast rule, but some visibility from a parent standpoint, particularly if we're
056going to reduce the number that's in there, I think would be helpful. So, with regards to communication, at the at the start of every year in my back to school letter to uh parents and students, I highlight um any substantive changes to the handbook. So, and I speak directly to all of our students at on the first two days of school and I uh speak to them about substantive changes in the handbook. So, um I'll do so and and with regards to uh the latter point, um you know, I would defer to Dr. Kinigley. It's ultimately a matter of the subject to bargaining um with the teachers association. So, I'll I'll leave that one with Dr. Kinigley. Perfect. Any other questions? Yeah, just curious, how long have we been doing four assessments per term? We
057uh so we made adjustments to the assessment policy, I believe, for the 2018 2019 school year. Um I do not believe that the previous policy had stipulated a minimum number of assessments, but I'm not 100% confident that. No, it it did not. Okay. In fact, I think that was one of the reasons why we went to this policy because every department sort of did things differently and we want to have a consistent approach across you know the entire school. Okay. So the so the last se several years it's been kind of overwork like a lot just been a lot. Yeah it has. And I mean keep in mind you know 2018 2019 was you know the last year before the pandemic and I think it was 2019 2020 when we went to our current flex
058block schedule. Correct. So yeah, so I think that was really where we started see these issues. Okay. And I and I I think that um in terms of the years of experience with it, I you know, as as Ben noted, teachers were hearing from students what students were telling me on the council. And I think it took kids reaching their junior and senior year and having three or four years of experience with this system before sort of they were sort of recognizing um the dynamics this is was creating, right? where again you had these four weeks a year where the workload became really unman where a lot of students were reporting became very very unmanageable. Um and where our highest achieving students were saying like this and this isn't limited to four weeks a year,
059right? It's it's kind of every every quarter is sort of like a just an unrelenting race to get in these assessments. Okay. Yeah. And especially for you know seniors in fourth term. Um you know I think fourth term for us began April 1st and for seniors it ended on May 16th and you've got a week of April vacation there. That is not a lot of time to get in three assessments under the current policy especially when those seniors are all thinking about you know where they're going in a few months. So, right. Thank you guys. Um, yeah, just a quick comment. I really do appreciate the background on it. Um, because my initial concern was exactly that of like, well, you know, I'm not a good test taker, so having that extra pressure on the
060test might give you more anxiety, which kind of snowballs a little bit there. So, I appreciate the input that you gained from the student body and from the teachers. So, the context is super helpful. I appreciate that. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Ben. Thank you. Okay. And do you want to uh go one at a time or you want to review the um the next two before voting on the handbook changes? Um we can just list vote on each one. So yeah, I'll make a motion to accept the amendments as presented. Motion by me, second by Derek. All in favor? Motion passes. Then you're welcome to stick around, but I know we got a mic. Thank you so much. Thank you for being here. I appreciate it. All right. Um, so, uh, let's deal
061next, uh, with the proposed change to the cheating plagiarism policy. Uh, this is quick and then I think the next one's more substantive. Um, we're, uh, we're just adding a clause here, uh, or a a paragraph that specifies that if a if a student is bringing their own device to school, which we do permit students to bring their own devices to school, and a teacher's given a computer-based assessment, you're going to have to bring your Chromebook in that day, right? Um, our Chromebooks have controls on them that allow us to administer online assessments in a more secure environment. Um, if students are using their own devices, we're losing that control. And so, this is uh this is all about academic integrity. So, any questions or concerns on this proposal? Motion to uh No, I had
062a question. Just a quick one. I know we were just talking about AI going into the kind of cheating players piece. I know you have one in the handbook. It's not in front of me. Um but does that cover cheating and plagiarism? So our language in the handbook um that deals with artificial intelligence and academ it's called our the title is artificial intelligence tools and academic integrity policy. It follows directly under our section on cheating and plagiarism. Okay. Um and so it is specifically about prohibited conduct with respect to artificial intelligence. Okay. Great. Yeah. So with just with AI there's two pieces. There's the integrity piece and then there's how to use it to teach piece. Right. And so I want to make sure that really we cover the the integrity piece which sounds like
063we have. Thank you. Can I motion? Yeah. Motion to accept. Moved by Brendan. Second by Derek. All in favor? Unanimous. Motion passes. Okay. So, the third proposed change is with regards to our cell phone protocol and this is a um this is a substantive change. Um I want to again explain sort of what we're proposing a change, why we're proposing this change and I' then also like to um talk share with you some of the deliberations that happened at council. Um so we are um essentially looking to make a practice that is already happening in some Milford High School classrooms uniform across the building. Right? And what that so what that practice is is that when you come into the classroom, you take your cell phone and you place it in a classroom cell phone
064holder and it remains there for the entirety of the block. When the block is done, you take your phone and you leave. Right. um today that is not the requirement in Milford High School classrooms. And so we have some teachers using this approach and we have others who are not. Um since we put our current cell phone policy in place, which I believe was also for the 2018 2019 school year, um we've gained a lot of experience with cell phones in schools. There's been a lot of research conducted on cell phones in schools and uh it is clear to me as a administrator and as an educator, it's clear to my colleagues in the classrooms that it is uh unequivocally in the best interest of our students to have them physically separated from their devices
065when class is in session. Um I think the committee is aware and many community members aware that the state legislature has been contemplating so-called bell-to-bell um cell phone bans and they may still do so. Um I am uh for what it's worth, I am not a proponent of such a ban at the high school. Um I believe that um older adolescents have very legitimate purposes to have phones available to them um before school and after school and during passing and at lunch. And I also think that it's part of preparing students for the responsibilities of adulthood in society. Um so uh if the state says that we're not going to even let phones on campus, then I will deal with that. Um, but that's not what I'm proposing to the committee and that's what I'm
066not what I'm proposing to the community. Um, uh, we do not permit students to use phones during class time now. Um, but we know that when students have their phones on their persons, they a significant number of students are using their phones during class time. Uh, our teachers uh, try their best to monitor cell phone use, but they have a lot of responsibilities during class time and being the cell phone police officer is not their sole responsibility. Um, and we also have students who are missing significant time out of class because they are asking to leave class and go to the restroom so they can get a few minutes on their phone. Um it is uh a reality that we have to confront that many of our students are struggling to um control sort of
067compulsive tendencies um with the use of cell phones and uh recognizing that I think it's only responsible for us to um to take some additional steps to separate students from their phones um during the school day. Another substantive change is that we're also clarifying here that this this policy applies to our our flex period as well. Um, so not just when class is in session, but during our two flex blocks a week. Um, again, we know that there are legitimate reasons why it is helpful for young adults to have access to cell phones periodically during the school day. We also know that it is not constructive and in many cases it is destructive and unhealthy for students to be spending significant periods of time on their phones while they're here in school. and we have
068high quality activities for them to do during flex block and being on their cell phone is not one of them. Um so uh we're proposing that uh we have a clear prohibition on cell phone use during uh flex block as well. Thank you. So uh how are these phone holders like what do they look like is a big bin? Uh yes I think that the the simplest version and you know what I will what we'll purchase for for every classroom if if this is approved um they're basically shoeholders that hang on the back of a door. Gotcha. Right. And so they'll have like 30 slots in them. Awesome. Y we do have some teachers who've either purchased or have uh manufactured in our building trades class has made some like kind of like docking stations,
069right? We can kind of like dock, you know, 30 phones. Um those are a little bit more expensive. And while you know, they're kind of nice. They're not necessary. So, you know, very inexpensive shoe holders in the back of doors are are totally adequate. Okay. Uh I saw the the smartwatches on there. the the students taking those off too. And what about like meta glasses and like the technology is just always expanding. So yeah. Uh yeah, I mean I think this this applies to uh I just want to refer to the language here. Um we're also changing the title from cell phone protocol to electronics to be more expansive. Right. Um it does say devices into a locker. Yes. Yeah. Uh place their devices. Yeah. So we're so you know our expectation is that um
070if you're using technology in the classroom you're using a computer because the your teacher has directed you to do so right um and when at all other times the the technology is is away um when you're using technology it's a it's a computer right all right thank you um yeah to Derek's point though I think the the first paragraph upon entering the class cell phones was silence blah blah blah blah cell phones will remain I I think maybe making that a little bit are um all-encompassing to devices etc. Um to clarify a little bit has a good point, Meta Glasses, Apple's going to be coming out heavy like in the next year or two they're going to be coming out a lot of those type of devices. just a Yeah, I mean we could certainly
071um you know and I can uh we can approve this tonight and then if we make it we we could certain I think we could add very simply in the first sentence we could say cell phones, earphones, smartwatches or other types of mobile technology. Okay. Or other types technology. Yes. Brendan just one question. I don't know how you feel about adding a sentence in at the end of you know this you know policies and effects within state law. So if the state law does change, you have to come back to us to essentially wipe all of it away or wipe most of it away. That does that make sense to you or the committee? It does. Yeah. For what it's worth, I think if if if any state law if any statute goes into effect
072which supersedes a handbook policy, the the handbook policy is rendered moot. Um we would, you know, we would clean it up for the next year. Um but it would it would be rendered moot as as soon as the statute went into effect. Okay. Thank you. So, back to my original communication comment. This might need to be communicated even more than the prior on the assessment chart, which I'm sure you have a plan for. Uh, I appreciate that, you know, the change itself will not be popular probably initially, but I'm just thinking of the comments. I remember our student representatives coming in when we first put the cell phone policy into place and the positivity around that change was like it was mind-blowing. So I think this actually is a great and needed change but um
073I appreciate it and you know I I I neglected to to share with you some of the deliberations that happen in our council amongst our students. Um there you know our our students first of all most of our students have experience with this approach in many classrooms. Right? So we're not talking about introducing a radical change for our students. Right? This is something that many of our students are already experiencing in some or many classrooms during the day. Um two, we did have some students who um were um were not supportive of extending the prohibition on cell phone use to flex block. Um and something that I shared with students and uh ultimately um the you know ultimately uh the majority were able to sort of embrace or at least endorse uh is while we
074recognize that the impact of cell phones varies across individuals. not all impact not all individuals are negatively impacted by cell phones in the same ways or to the same magnitude. Um that the evidence is indisputable that there are large percentages of adolesccents who are being very negatively impacted by prolonged cell phone use. And knowing that and then permitting students to spend two hours a week glued on their cell phones rather than engage in productive activity here in school, it really it amounts to a dereliction of duty and it's inconsistent with our our values and our mission here as a school and you know you know the students again the majority of the students understood that and respected that and and were able to get behind that. So um you know there's no question there will
075be some challenges with implementation. Um, and there is no question in my mind that this will be a net positive for our students and that any challenges that we encounter will be challenges that are well worth engaging with. Brendon. Yeah. Actually, to go off your point, Megan, my brother's uh he's a principal in Connecticut and they instituted a similar policy this year. And actually, the hardest people to get on board were the parents because they were so used to texting their kids throughout the day for X, Y, or Z. And that was actually a bigger learning curve than the students adhering to the policy. So that additional communication to the parents and reinforcement is probably going to be your biggest barrier. Y and I, you know, I would um I I do want to remind
076both the committee and the community at large. Um if students have an exceptional life circumstance and they need to contact someone at home, they just got to speak to their teacher. We're not going to say no. Yeah. Right. Um, we want to be we we know that uh there again as I said earlier I believe that there are legitimate reasons to permit adolescence to have cell phones with them during the school day. Um and uh we will flex to support our students when they need support. We just want them to handle that responsibly. Um, and I would also just uh uh um note u Bren as you pointed out um this approach is not only I I mentioned that it's happening in many of our classrooms. This is a very wellestablished approach to cell phone
077management in high schools in Eastern Massachusetts right now. So what we're proposing right now, this is not novel. This is not experimental. This is happening at scale in Massachusetts. And I've heard from many many principles who've made this change that while it has not resolved all concerns about cell phones in schools, it's been a very healthy positive step in the right direction. Um, so I thought I sent the the committee the article about North Bridge. One one stat that caught me is that their number of failed classes for seniors went from 113 to 21. I mean, that's like mind-blowing. Like I figured it'd be like, you know, a trend, but not like that's that's a cliff, right? So anyways, I'm in support of this. Um, will it improve our bandwidth? Huh? We'll improve our IP
078because all the kids won't be on their phone. Network glue. If they're not on the Okay. Sure. Yeah. I mean, so look at that. Uh, do we have a motion to accept the policy as presented with the addition of or other types of technology? Derek makes a motion. I'll second. All in favor? Motion passes. Thank you for your support. Thank you. Thank you. All right. So, uh, our school improvement plan, uh, this is a, uh, very, very different type of plan that I've presented to the committee in the past and something that I've been working with Dr. Kinigley on and our council um, in recent months. So, um, the the the strategies that we have had to improve Milford High School are not changing at all. Okay? So, I want to be clear about that.
079The format of the plan and the ways in which we are sort of stating goals and measuring progress towards our goals is different than past plans that I've presented. But the strategies that we've been implementing since I've joined the team here at Milford and that the committee has been instrumental in supporting advancing the strategies are are unchanged. And I also want to make it clear that the type of quantitative comparative analysis that we're using in this school improvement plan, while this is new for our school improvement plan, this is not new for Milford High School. Um, as some of you know, I have regularly engaged in quantitative comparative analysis of Milford High School's performance on key performance indicators against demographically similar schools for some time because I believe that this is an important management technique
080for answering a really basic question. How are we doing? Right? uh if you're not comparing your achievement against comparable measures with demographically similar schools, I don't see how you can make evidence-based claims about how we are doing. Right? So, this is not a new mode of analysis. You're not going to hear me talking about new strategies for improving outcomes here at Milford High School, but this is a very different approach to packaging our school improvement plan. Um the first thing that's different is that this is not a one-year plan, but this is a three-year plan. Um, the second things that's different is that all of the goals are framed in terms of measures of student achievement. So, these are all student outcome measures that we're focused on. On page two of the plan, there's a
081table that I think when you first look look at it can be a bit uh complex and confusing. Um this is uh laying out nine key performance indicators that we are tracking how we are performing against demographically similar schools. And uh for members of the community that don't have the document in front of them, I want you to know that Milford is one of a a very very small number of high schools in the Commonwealth of our demographic profile. Um, there are only five other high schools in Massachusetts that are even somewhat similar to Milford High School. Really are quite unique. They are DHY Memorial High School, which is one of the high schools in the Worcester public schools, Framingham High School, Malboro High School, Somerville High School, and Waltham High School. For folks that
082are in Eastern Massachusetts, you know that while we are demographically similar to these communities, there are significant demographic differences between these communities as well. But these are the communities that are most like us. What you'll see in the table is the indicators that are highlighted in green are indicators where we are where our performance is best in class compared to demographically similar schools. And we're looking at our performance average across three years. So we're not looking at just one point in time. You can get year-to-year variation that I think can can skew your analysis. So it's more more appropriate to look at sort of a three-year measure. So our student growth percentiles in English and mathematics are bestin-class. Our achievement on the ELA MCCAST is bestin-class. The percentage of our 11th and 12th graders completing
083advanced coursework and our graduates completing math core are best in class. Right? The indicators where we are not bestin class is overall achievement in mathematics, overall achievement in science and uh I beg your pardon. This is achievement is measured on the MCCAST. So we're not bestin-class with overall achievement in uh mathematics. We're not bestin-class in overall achievement in science. Or on the last two, which is our post-secary outcomes, which is students enrolled in post-secary education immediately after graduation in college students persistently enrolled for the first two years after graduation. You'll note that on these four indicators, we are not best-in-class. It is Framingham that's best-in-class. For members of the committee that do not know, I believe that most committee members are are well acquainted with this. It's really important to understand that every measure of
084educational achievement in the United States of America is highly correlated with socioeconomic status, more specifically household income. Right? We do not have publicly available measures of the distribution of household income within these communities. Right? So we do know that there are real demographic differences within these communities. So for example, right now the median home price in Framingham is about $750,000 and the median home price in Milford is a little under $540,000. Right? there's a much higher concentration of highincome students in Framingham than you see in the Milford public schools. Right? Given that Framingham is one of the five high schools that's even close to Milford and so that's who we're going to compare ourselves to, right? Um, I also want to note with respect to the post-secondary outcomes, um, that while as you as you
085will hear and for those who've been on the committee for a while know that this is this is my number one priority is improving post-secondary outcomes for our students. I believe that it is noteworthy that Framingham's data is to some degree, I believe, a reflection of the fact that there are two public institutions of higher education within city limits that are available to Framingham residents with public transportation. Framingham State University and Mass Bay Community College. So there are structural barriers that Milford High School graduates are facing to accessing higher education that do not present the same way in Framingham. Right? I don't offer these points up to say that we can't do better. And as you'll hear, it is my intention for us to do better where we are not bestin-class. The fact that we
086are best-in-class on most of these indicators suggests that we can be best-in-class on all of these indicators. Right? But these are important demographic and geographic considerations that I think we need to understand as we're interpreting this comparative analysis. So our goals are twofold or there there's two goals. Goal number one as on all the indicators we're bestin-class is we're going to stay best-in-class. And goal number two is on the indicators where we're not bestin-class is that over the next three years we're going to cut the gap between us and the best in the best-in-class school by 50%. Right? I don't believe we can close it by 100% in three years. Maybe we'll be surprised, right? Um but the goal is to cut cut the gap by 50% in the next three years. Again, the strategies
087are not new, right? The way that we are going to maintain the exemplary performance that we see in English language arts is we're going to stay the course with our writing with colors program and we're going to continue to tweak it and refine it and make it better. that primarily lives with our English department, but also with our ESL and our special education departments. In terms of maintaining our best-in-class growth scores on MCCAST math, we're going to stay the course with our illustrative math implementation that lives primarily with our math department, but also with ESL and sped. And the way that we're going to maintain the high levels of achievement that we see is we are going to continue the good work that we are doing to support students who are not thriving which is
088our work to improve our multi-tered systems of support. This lives with all of our faculty and our interventionists and our administrators. um as I've uh communicated previously um just to sustain the good work that we're doing um means is going to require more resources because the challenge is changing. Um I want to stress to the committee in the community, right? Students who are chronically absent from school, which is 30% of our students, we've not been able to move the needle on chronic absenteeism this year. We are not going to get better achievement out of these students unless we can address their absenteeism. Okay? A luster of math is not going to make the difference. Writing with colors is not going to make the difference. Right? We need to get them to attend school regularly. Right?
089So, anything that we're going to do with respect to curriculum and instruction assessment has to sit on a foundation of good attendance at school. Right? And we have a major attendance challenge here at Milford High School. We also have um a significant percentage of students who are struggling with their health and wellness and in particular their mental health. Students that are not healthy and are not having their mental health needs addressed, it is unrealistic that we're going to be able to raise their achievement through improvements in curriculum and instruction and assessment. which is why I believe that we need to make investments in a bilingual Portuguese-speaking adjustment counselor and a dedicated high school attendance interventionist. We are also going to need to make ongoing investments in the illustrative math rollout. So, we've invested heavily in
090both fiscal years uh in in the fiscal year of closing right now FY25. We're investing heavily again in FY26. And as we roll up our elective of math implementation to the algebra 2 level, we're need to make significant investments again in FY27. Um, I'm scrolling down to the the the next page, which is goal number two, narrowing our performance gaps. Again, the goal is to cut the cut cut the gap in half by 50% in three years. I also just want to highlight here that um in addition to stay in the course with illustrative math in order to improve math achievement and stay in the course with our work around multi-tered systems of support. We're going to need to do a couple other things to close the gaps on a few of these indicators. Number
091one is that we need to take a really deep dive into our science curriculum. We need to make changes, right? So our science achievement is lagging Framingham significantly but not our English and math. Right? So that says to me very clearly that this is a curricular issue. Right? And it's a curricular issue that once we adjust I'm confident that we are going to see um that we are going to close that gap um between us and the highest achieving school. So our administrative team needs to work closely with our science faculty over the next three years. I think quickly in FY26 we need to develop a change strategy for science curriculum and then we need to be laying the groundwork for implementation in FY26 so that once FY27 hits we are beginning to implement change
092and that change is then working in FY27 and FY28 and I believe that with two years of change I think we're going to start to see a change in results. Um we are not there yet. I'm not ready to say to the committee, this is these are the changes we're going to make in science. I know that we need to make changes in science. I need to work with my colleagues in the science department to figure out what those changes are going to be. It is likely that we're going to need the committee's financial support to implement changes in FY26 and FY27. I do not anticipate that we're going to need investments in um durable equipment or consumable materials. uh the committee and the community has um made uh significant capital investments in uh durable
093equipment um as recently as the past four or five years and our science labs are well equipped and our um budget lines for consumable materials are are where they should be. I think we're likely going to need to invest in in professional development. Um so I think we need to send teachers to trainings. Um we may need to invest in coaching um in order to you know execute a change strategy um in science. And then lastly, in terms of improving our um post-secondary um outcomes, both college metriculation rates and persistence rates, um we need to continue to expand one goal in our early college programs. Uh which the committee has enabled us to do. Uh we are going to be doubling one goal enrollment um in FY26 from where it was in FY25. As the
094committee's heard me say before, but I want to repeat it because I'm so proud. Um our outcomes for one goal right now are low-income students in out in in in one goal. their post-secary enrollment rates and their post-secary metriculation rates are double that of low-income students in the Commonwealth broadly. So, we're re we are producing results with our low-income students in one goal that are double of what you see statewide for uh for low-income students. This is a um researchbacked evidence-based, highly efficacious strategy for improving post-secary enrollment and persistence for students. And I'm so so grateful to the committee and the community for enabling us to um to double enrollment and I'm confident that you will see a significant change in the numbers. It is noteworthy that the numbers that you see in the chart
095on page two postsecary postsecary data is always lagging. Right? So your data here comes from FY 22, 23 and 24. Right? So these are students that graduated from Milford High School in the class 2020 21 and 22. right? We did not have one goal in place right at that stage. So, I'm confident that our numbers are going to be going up right and the fact that we're expanding one goal um enrollment and the fact that our early college program is so much more robust now than it was in 2020 21 and 22, I'm confident that we're going to see the postsecary indicators go up. Um and again I want to stress that um if we're going to bring up science achievement, if we're going to bring up math achievement, and if we're going to bring
096up postsecary um enrollment, um we got to we got to focus on attendance, right? Attendance bar none is the most important challenge facing Milford High School today. Um a brand new and improved science curriculum is going to be a wonderful thing for everyone has good attendance at school. But if you don't have good attendance at school, that new and improved science curriculum is not going to help you, right? Uh we got to get coming to school regularly. Let's pause you there for a minute, take a break. Any questions so far? Just moving quickly, Josh, on the attendance piece. I know we had tried a new bus route. Um curious, I don't see any funding related to I see the attendance officer, but maybe not necessarily that in ancillary stuff. Curious if there's any needs there.
097Um I mean, listen, if if I wave my magic wand, I'd love to see universal busing here in in Milford. Uh that's a big ask. That's a big ask. Um I don't know if that's within within reach of the community at this time. Um particularly as we're looking to fund this new high school project, but um you know, our uh our rates of chronic absentism were not distributed equally across the student body. They're highly concentrated in our low-income students. Our low-income students primarily live downtown. Um they're not eligible for bus service. Um we do have students downtown who literally are walking uphill between a mile and a half to two miles to come to school. Um it is a structural barrier that is negatively impacting attendance. It's a very very profound challenge for us as
098a community to address. Craig, we had implemented that like additional route. It was a temporary thing I believe. Is that um can we get an update? I thought Josh would so we on that we listen that that additional bus route is not operating at a scale that is enabling us to see impact right um at max we're providing transportation a transportation option for perhaps 20 students right um who didn't have access previously a bus can't carry more than 40 high school students. Thank you. Any other questions so far? No. All right. Yeah, that's all I got. Oh, it's great. Yeah. Um, it's a lot of information. Uh, yeah, it's a complicated school. Yeah. Um, yeah, thank you for that. I I really like the table to compare to the other schools. I thought I always
099said that's super helpful. Um, it's also makes me proud, too, because we actually We stack it very well. So we do have a motion. Well, just really quick, just back to that transportation piece. I mean, two miles is a super long way to walk to school, you know, and that's what our policy is now. I mean, if we got it down to a mile and a half, I don't know what that would look like if we could even millions. Yeah, I'm sure it would be. I mean, I don't know if we can even game that out just so we can have a It's something to explore because don't we have a RFP going out at some point? Yeah, I mean if maybe maybe in the RFP we have multiple but for certain types of you
100can even cut it down just does that get us 50 more students you know another bus or I whatever it might be I don't know if we can cut that down for you I think that's something that we should absolutely at least look at I I I do want I do want to note that even if we had universal public transportation that that is not going to eradicate the challenge with chronic absenteeism and you know my my persistent request for uh high schoolbased attendance interventionists. Um it rests on a on a on a premise that's that's grounded in fact, right? Which is not all students who are walkers and who are low-income students are chronically absent from school, right? So while transportation barriers are a significant piece of the puzzle, we have students who face
101very significant transportation barriers who have excellent attendance at school. Right? So it is a there's a constellation of socioultural factors that are driving chronic absenteeism. Um structural barriers like transportation exacerbate those socioultural factors. But this is a socioultural challenge which I believe is best addressed through case workers essentially, right? Human beings who go out and develop relationships with students and families and become advocates and allies and coaches and in some cases accountability figures as well. Um and uh even with that, we're not going to eliminate um this problem. But I believe that to make a dent in the problem, I believe that a problem that is fundamentally socioultural in nature requires a human intervention in order to address it effectively. Thank you. Thank you. Do a motion. Sure. I'll motion. What are you motioning? Yeah,
102I was going through waving. Yeah, I was like Yeah, you're right. I think you want a motion to approve this school improvement plan with the changes. I'll motion for that. Is there a second? Meg. All in favor? Thank you for your support, folks. I appreciate it. Thank you. You All right, let's move on to the report of assistant superintendent for curriculum instruction and assessment. Uh just quickly, this is more of an an FYI, I just wanted to inform the committee that um we received word from uh Liam Mian, Liam Mian of the human resources department and Imperial cars um that they are for the summer creating a u I guess they're calling it cram the van where they u work with school districts to supply school supplies. Um the reason I guess I'm informed, we
103can't take it on as a gift because we don't know what they're giving us. Um but I just wanted the community to understand that they're going to be advertising this uh across the region. It's not just for Mil Public Schools. It's for a few other different districts. Um, and I just wanted, I guess, your support for um, to be included in this this drive um, that Imperial Cars is um, putting on to give us some school supplies. They've asked us to create a list of of just different things that our teachers would need and different things our students might need. So, we're doing that right now. No need to vote or anything like that. Just letting you know. Thank you. Thank you. All right. report of the school business administrator. Thank you. Um so the
104first item is um the vote to use the student activity account interest as part of the student activity accounts. Um I think uh of course um Dr. Lopez brought it to my attention. I think this should uh extend expand to uh high school activity accounts too. Okay. um to the motion. How much interest are they making when so the June statement won't come until July? So um I don't know if in the past anybody provided a whole year in so um based on my calculation is about 1,800 for a high school and less than a thousand in the middle school. Right. Yeah. So this is to change the process not not the amounts. Correct. This motion. Yes. just to allow to um vote to allow us to use the interest. Great. Do I have a
105motion? Michael, do you know off hand? Is there a policy on that? Uh we um actually we just we high school. That's my only ask. Yeah. Hold on. No, actually let's look. Sorry. Um yeah, we have a student account policy, right? Just that we might want to update that. Yeah. Sorry. Update the policy to include interest. Yeah. That's the way it should be done, Craig. If if we're going to make the update to me, it would come via the policy. Sorry. I think it's a great idea. I just go through that. So, update the student activity account policy, which also probably needs Does that need to include Stacy? Maybe. Yes, there it is. File DG. Thank you. DG. Actually, you know, elementary and the middle and high schools are included in here. Okay. Just needs
106to include the part about the interest using the interest. Yeah. And I think Meg's right. I think we just put in the policy. Better be done with it. Okay. Great. Sweet. Okay. Oh, you have to vote this time, right? No, we don't have to vote. No, we'll change the policy. Oh, no, Michael. Sorry. So, there it's in the policy now. announces the school committee will take an annual vote in June prior to the new school year to approve the allocation of interest. So, right now we're allocating the interest, but we don't know how much it is, I think. Okay. Okay. Interest earnings may be expended for costs related to the operation of the student account not used for operational costs. Oh, sorry. Interest earnings not used for operational costs would be turned over to the
107clubs, classes, and organizations having monies in the student account. So, this is what we typically do for the high school, but now we're doing for the So, where are we allocating it to? Right. Back to the account. So, it looks like they just have been carry car carried forward year after year into the account. Got it. It's a high school for the like the vending machines when they usually come with like okay, we have $1,000. This is how we want. That's different. Looks like looks like it's a lot more than the yearly. Where I'm confused is to make point is is this a process change or are we actually voting on moving money? Right. Right. So, I'm we're not moving money. We just allow them to use the money. The money is in the same
108same account. Okay. Yeah. So, how is this different than the vote that we take to the high school vending machine? Yeah. Vending machine was deposited to a town dep like um what they call the general fund account and it has to be allocated to a different account for us to use. Okay. Yeah. So, we're h we're happy to take a vote that you think we need to move forward on this and then I think we need to make sure the policy just reflects this. So, let us know what you want us to vote on. Um to vote on um allow the middle school um student account to use the interest. Okay. Make a motion. Make a motion. Derek seconds. All in favor? Motion passes. Thank you. And then again, personal update is um all the
109hires, the summer hires uh and the next year turnovers. Um it's very busy uh hiring season we're going through. Thank you. All right. Consent agenda. Right. We have a warrant 17 warrants for 1,111 $111 8729. Motion by me. It's the consent agenda. Second. Oh yes. Right. consent. I understand. I got it. Um, yeah. And then we're going to actually include the approval minutes, which is June 6, 2025, the regular meeting, and then there's June 6th, 2025 executive session. Any questions on those minutes? Sorry. Do you want to pull? They'll be pulling. That's fine. I just don't think the minutes from the 5th say who was at the meeting, which I think they should. Lieutenants. Which one? Just the meeting. The regular meeting minutes from the 5th. June 6th. June 5th. You're right. There's no attendance.
110Sorry. No, you're right. Okay. Good catch. So, I'd like to pull the minutes from June 6th. So, there was a motion already on the Do we have to defeat that motion? I never finished the motion. All right. Thanks, Brandon. Um, yeah. So, so there's no um wind up in jail, Michael. Yeah, there's no second on it. So, anywhere. Good. Um, yeah, there's no there's no attendance. Same for exec. So, we should just on the regular meeting. So both of them. Yeah, both of them. Yeah. Yeah. June 5th. I see it. So back. I'll pull them out. So we have a 17 warrants for 1 million $1001. 87. Anyways, uh do we have a motion to approve the warrants as presented? Motion by me. Second by Brendan. Unanimous. Motion passes. And the approval of minutes. We're
111going to uh kick to another meeting. Okay. Then PD, right? So, we're going to roll into the PD. Any questions on professional development? I'll have a motion to approve. Motion by Brandon to accept it as presented. Yes. Second by Brandon. Any discussion? Second by Derek. I mean, yep, Derek. Any discussion? No. Thank you. Right. Vote. All in favor? Move on. Thank you. Motion passes. All right. Material to to be cleared as surplus. Uh when or Craig, do you guys have anything to talk about on this one or is it pretty self-explanatory? So So those are um Carrie, you can you can chip in. So um those are obsolete test books um at at Stacy and High School and also um at Woodland. And the last item woodland grade three grade four foss science kits. Um
112if you want if you see the list it's uh what currently included in the science kit is not um everything we're going to get rid of and that the teachers has been so those are a really old science kit and um they're not relevant to the curriculum anymore. So the teachers um is going through all those items and trying to salvage whatever they can use and then um just to remove um those are like take too much space or they're all out. Great. For the math that it's helpful the grade six through algebra one is um IM materials from 2019 but they've updated to IM 360 um which is more inclusive. um it's incorporated a lot of English language learner standards um right in there for us. Um it's more the workbooks are better for
113kids. They're more teacher friendly and so sixth grade six through algebra 1 will adopt IM3 this fall and then geometry is as we bring in IM we need to get rid of the old textbooks. Thank you. Do have a motion to declare these materials as presented. Motion by Meg, second by Brendan. All in favor? Unanimous. Motion passes. Thank you. Can I ask a workbook question? No, we voted already. Okay. No, it's not about the ones we're getting rid of here. Like on IM for example, right? Your student brings home the workbook. Like what's the expectation around and I appreciate they're not going to finish the workbook end to end, but is there like are teachers supposed to be doing specific components or just how does that work? So the workbook should be used on a
114daily basis as they're teaching each of the lessons. Got it. Okay. Yes. And so when they're returning it, theoretically they're through all of the lessons that are contained in that context. Correct. I would add that like some of our younger grades warm-ups, the kids are doing it verbally in class and not always writing it down. So there are pages that will not be completed, but the expectation is that it is being used. Got it. Thank you. Where do the books go? Oh, I get mine. The books. Oh, these ones we Yeah, the surplus in the trash. In the trash. Okay, great. All right. Out of state conference travel requests. Um, we have the NAEYC annual conference in Orlando and they have a I don't know how to say it conference in Albuquerque. Um, do we
115have any questions on those those two requests? Just Yeah. One maybe for when just confirming that all the budgetary is baked into the budgets we've already approved. Is that fair? Yes. So for the first one um it it it's on their contract so we have to cover it. So the first one will be from the PTE um budget and then the second one will be covered by title three. Great. Thank you. Great. Thank you. Have a motion to accept these as presented. Motion by Meg. Second by Brendan. All in favor unanimous. Motion passes. All right. And then there's the MHS world language department international trips request which sounds fantastic. Yeah, they sound amazing. Um Italy, Spain, France, and Portugal, Spain. Do we have any questions on those trips besides wanting to go? Now let's modify
116rates still somewhat favorable. All right, if we have no questions, do have a motion to accept the MHS world language department international trips request as presented. Motion by Brendan, second by Derek. All in favor? Unanimous. Motion passes. [Music] Oh, we have no new new business. That's fine. Do I have a motion to adjurnn? Motion by me. We going to executive session. Nope. Motion by me. Second by Brendan. All in favor? Meeting is finished. Thank you. Great job. Yeah. We don't need it.