001like to call this meeting of the Naransa Regional School District School Committee to order. Would you all please rise the pledge? >> I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thanks everyone. Um this meeting is being recorded but unfortunately it is not being livereamed um due to technical issues um which we're aware that other folks have been experiencing as well. Um so we will make sure that the meeting is available as as recorded um as soon as we can after this meeting. U moving into our business for the evening. Um, we do have some meeting minutes and I would entertain a motion to approve the meeting minutes of June 5th, 2025 as
002written. >> Second. >> Motion by Sean. >> Second by Heather. Any questions or comments about those minutes? Seeing none, all in favor? >> Opposed? Abstained. And I say yes. So that is unanimous. We also have bills and payroll. And I would accept a motion to accept the bills and payroll warrants as presented. Second >> motion by Danielle, second by Sean. Any questions or comments on those bills of apparel? Seeing none, all in favor? >> Opposed? Abstained? And I say yes. So that is unanimous. Um we do not have a student representative this evening, but we are looking forward to them joining us um once school is back in session. Is there any public input this evening? Um please uh state your name and your address. Um and just so that you are aware um we
003are holding everyone to three minutes this evening. Um and just as a reminder um no names outside of Dr. Cassid can be met referenced in case anyone is referencing staff. Um, sure. >> Hi, I'm Sophie Haley, 5 Mass. Um, I was at a meeting this week and there was mentioned um that parents are concerned from Philston that they're being told that they're not going to be allowed to go to the elementary school. >> How do you know about that? Is that just a rumor or I guess there was some mention uh during the meeting. I don't know if I can mention the meeting um but um during the meeting and Matt voiced parents concern from Phil. >> Thank you very much for bringing that to our attention. We'll make sure that we um talk a
004little bit more about Templeton and Phil agreement during the superintendent update. >> Thank you. >> NDEA is still on a muchdeserved break though I hear they're all coming back very soon. Um, we look forward to hearing more from them. Um, FY 26 budget update. Is there anything we need to know about Annie? I did everything early this year and there wasn't really any changes. So, we're in good shape. All right. Excellent. Um, we will move right into business manager report. I just actually posted them in the right spot. So, they were in the wrong spot. for you. Um grants were just beginning to start writing them. >> Um and we're just beginning with the general fund, so it's not a slow start, but there isn't much show yet. >> Okay. Does anyone have any questions
005or comments about what's been shared so far or doing good? >> All right. Um, we do have an update to the student and family handbook. Um, super chief, can I ask you to speak to this? >> Yes, absolutely. Um, you'll see um it's it's a pretty minor update, but you'll see on I apologize. I don't page number one of the opening pages where we have our notice of non-discrimination that we've added a clause in there um regarding content of curriculum. Um, and that has come out of some recent federal updates. page five. Thank you. Um, and out of the recommendation of our district attorney as well as MASS's attorney, um, we will likely be having some procedural updates down the road. We're waiting for um, for updates and suggested procedures, but in the short term,
006we wanted to put that notice in our handbook to make sure um, folks are aware and that it's included in our current handbook. Additionally, staff names were updated. I did not turn those red because when we originally voted gave us permission to update those, but there are a few updates to some administrative staff uh names and roles as well. >> Okay. Um so we'll get a motion on the floor and then we'll see if there are any questions. Um I would entertain a motion to approve the updates to the 2025 2026 student and family handbook as presented. >> Motion by Sean, second by Heather. Any questions or comments about those updates? Seeing none, all in favor? >> Opposed? And I say yes. So that is unanimous. >> We can get that out. >> Are there
007any other curriculum and instruction updates at this time? Um not formally, but we are excited next week to be uh welcoming our newly hired staff members for our mentor new hire orientation and um induction. Um, and we currently are slated to have six new hires um, attending that this year, which is a low number for us, but um, a really strong pool of folks. And I would be happy to report out on that um, at our next meeting too on how that went. But um, you'll likely see some pictures of them on Facebook as we welcome them and take them on a tour of our communities on the bus um, and talk about our new district's uh, strategic plan and some other really important things for them to kickstart a great year. and they'll have
008a chance to meet um their mentors and do some work with their mentors on the second day if that as well. >> Okay. In terms of surplus, we do have some surplus items this evening. Uh Susan, any details you want to share around the surplus items? >> I'll let Molly talk about that. >> I can't tell. Just a couple pieces of equipment. um a stationary bike, excuse me, that's in fair but very old condition. Um not usable anymore. and some cheerleading gym mats that have seen better days and those kind of those um the curriculum materials that are on the list to be discarded are materials to be honest that teachers have pulled out of the closets and out from underneath um bookshelves and desks and they are uh not programs we currently utilize. So
009they were some of them are reading materials from before we adopted into literacy into reading um into reading into literature, excuse me, at the middle school. So they're outdated, no longer used program materials. Um and a lot of them are in pretty rough shape as well. So um they've been reviewed by the district and we would recommend that we discard them. >> I would entertain a motion to accept the listed items as surplus. So moved. >> Motion by Sean. >> Second by Heather. Any questions or comments about any of those items? See none. All in favor? >> Opposed? Abstained. And I say yes. So that is um our next point is just to remind everyone that we still have a vacancy for them um that we need to fill. So if you know anyone um
010we are very eager to fill that vacancy and have a full committee. Um MSC annual conference. I kept this on here. Um, we talked about it last time. I They don't really have an update. They still have not posted an agenda. Um, which makes it very difficult for me to make a Oh, they sent it out today. Of course, they did. >> It was not. >> Okay. Well, then they sent it out today. So, you're going to have a chance to review it. If you are interested in the content, um, you know, please give me a shout. um you know plan budgets are very tight this year so we didn't you know I guess pre-plan for folks to attend like we usually do um also there was no agenda so it was a bit tough
011for us to see whether or not it was one that whose content um really fit our needs as a district um but we can now take a look at that and I'll I won't look at my email thank you very much Danielle um the superintendent report >> thank you madam chair So, uh, welcome. We come out of the summer and as we summer's officially over. It's the beginning of August, um, in a lot of ways because we are really, um, steaming right along to get the the buildings, um, and everything, uh, moving forward. And one of our biggest endeavors every year is, of course, staffing. Um, I really don't want to jinx jinx this quite frankly because as Molly had just pointed out the the very low number for you know new new staff orientation
012or teacher orientation indicates that we at least at this point have not you know we don't need to or have not had to replace one at least um well midsummer right because we we the whatever openings we did have um we posted at the at the end of the school year May and June. And so far um as of right now we have um across the buildings we have very few actually. We need just one parent professional uh down at the elementary school. Uh we need uh the middle school is completely staffed at this point. Um the high school uh is in the process of securing a foreign language teacher. Um I'm not sure where we are in that, but we certainly we would still consider that of course an opening night. Um and I
013believe four pair positions at the middle at the high school. Um but probably three after tomorrow unless something has changed in the last hour or so. Okay. So, um, all told that, you know, that's, you know, that's that's good, um, this time, but the witching hour is upon us within the next couple weeks. So, we cross our fingers and hope that no one um, what Molly is doing is she's double checking the doors because we not able to get a hold of them. So, it's she'll be because of the staff report. Um so in other you know we've and I'll get into the summer facilities and those other things but um the the regional agreement as we've as we've talked about on multiple occasions as you may remember May 11th is when the date I
014sent out an email to the school committee uh to both towns to inform them on all that we've sent voted draft regional agreement for their review. Um and just as a recap, Templeton voted on the town floor two years ago um with an um to that draft. The school committee voted prior to that sent to their um to those the town meeting um and then and then not much happened. um meaning Philipston did did not put it before exposers and has not the last two two years or three years at this point. So what we did is we uh you know on the behest of the school committee how I can re-engage department of ed said how would I go about this? Um and so with the amendment that was made on the floor uh
015that fateful year from Templeton, the school committee just last May voted affirmative to accept that um and it was sent again to the town of Templeton on May 11th. I'm sorry. Um on May 11th and the uh the chief administrative officer um Montaigne did send me a confirmation email that he has received. I do not have any followup or further information on that. Um, in regards to conversations that are taking place, I remember that student enrollment is because we're going to get student enrollment here in a second. Although I don't have numbers for you because we're just still compiling and kiddos are still coming and they're going and we won't have um well, we don't have the real number till October, but it you know, as we get closer, certainly the September will be a
016good good uh guide to how we will be in terms of how many students we have and where. Um you know we are full um at the elementary school. I I have we've we've talked about that a lot. Um we are nearing its capacity um depending on how you not depending on when you look at the um the occupancy rate um limits um depending on whether or not you take prek um as as an entity as a whole. Right? So in other words, if you have 90 students in preK, they count 90 every single day. Well, as we know, we have one full-time class, but kindergarten generally runs, you know, in 3 days, two days, etc. So, so I there has been a lot of conversation about that. Um I think um at least from
017you know from honestly the Templeton side of things u of the ledger we of course have talked about it for a long time in terms of the district. Um but moving forward you know we do we going to have to keep our eye on the numbers. Um we don't know what it's going to be coming up. Uh there are no plans to stop students that we are lawfully um engaged to educate. That is the that is absolutely our charge regardless. I >> think the way I would state it is that the state recognizes us as a district. >> Oh, sure. recognizes the member towns as Templeton and Philipston and therefore Templeton and Philipston students will we are obligated to receive them into our schools for the 2025 2026 school year and for the foreseeable future
018unless the state for some reason approves a change in that. So the state views us as a district regardless of whatever the current state of our regional agreement is though they would like us to get that signed and therefore students from Templeton and Philipston are are welcome at our school. >> Um yes >> yeah m absolutely and that has been confirmed that we are in fact a valid district. Of course we are. Um I mean I say that I shouldn't say it so you know blas but we are of course a a school district. Um and so at this point um there's certainly this is a a conversation that needs to be had needs to happen with all of the parties in the same room. My humble opinion um and this is a an issue
019that that we need to address um and we want to address obviously as as we move forward. So in so like there any questions um from the committee on that? Okay. Um more more to come on on that as well moving forward. So the when we start talking about our summer facilities update, you know, I think folks that just really take it, you know, take it for granted when I say the custodians are amazing. And every year we go, "Oh my god, look what they've done." Um look what they've done. um two very large buildings. They have been working, you know, tirelessly since the day after the last day of school. Um I don't think a lot of people understand that everything comes out of those rooms. Everything goes back into these rooms um across
020the district. Um and so they have been working hard not only just inside the building, but outside the building to make sure that we are we're we're ready to go. you know, you know, Keith Parker and his crew just do a fantastic job every single year and our buildings are ready to welcome students, you know, for the school year. But specifically, you may have noticed that we have pavement on our drives. Um, and I say that because the drop off inner circle has been bit of an adventure um for those folks who have to drop their children off. Um, you know, it's it's been an adventure. So, you know, as I as we talked about probably in April, I'd have to look back, but Senator Durant's office gave us a call um in in April,
021uh, early May to see if we had any projects that if approved from the Fair Share Act, uh, and it's called Fair Share Act requests. Um and we we sent them three we sent them three one-time projects that you know would fit the description and of course the one of those was the main parking lot and the inner drop off. So um you know as our as I reported out the grants office was able to secure $100,000 um to that um to that venture. What that what that has done is that they completely rebrand um and leveled and fixed some very broken um runoff drains. Some of them were um concerned very candidly. Um so you know that that happened in the inner circle u the drop off circle. The the larger parking lot um
022is is not going to be regground um because the you know that would have been more of an expense obviously. So, they are going to um give it a top coat and repave it and reline of course all the parking spots. And um they fixed a pretty uh pretty broken um uh sewer drain, primar drain in the middle of the parking lot. So that so that was we were happy that this all happened because it would have just caused us more problems down the line unbeknownst to us. Um this is because we just received we received it not in time um for this meeting. We we received as as folks know the MSBA came out at the very end um of the summer last year and uh to see if we would qualify for the
023roof for um green repair and we did and we've been in that process moving forward to see um where it would land. And so for the past, you know, over well, it's been a year that through many of the processes going up on the roof doing all kinds of coarse samples, um, infrared, uh, just just the whole, um, the really really the whole deal. It's taken me almost five months to do that. we now have their their proposal or at least what's what is wrong with the roof, what is right with the roof, what needs to be fixed, what should be fixed and that it will need to be on our next agenda item and we probably would step through the facility subcommittee and work our way up through through that. Um, of course the
024towns, you know, we did communicate that this we were in this process. So, we will we'll message out this information to them as well. We'll hopefully have a you know a meeting you know of all to talk about this but that really needs to be on the agenda fairly as soon as possible only because the implications of if there's going to be funding for that it has to happen at a at a a town meeting and um we did receive it very late though I I will say >> we just got the report this week we haven't even talked to the uh company yet we have a meeting on Tuesday to go over the report and they were supposed to get this report to us in June. So, you know what I say to this
025is that well, you know, they certainly know the timeline of things. It was supposed to be June and it came I think yesterday, the day before. So, we didn't have time and and at this point we haven't even talked to the to the um OPM about what what is what are we looking at, you know? So, um more more than that obviously. Um, do you want to go right into cell phone? >> Yeah, that's fine. >> So, I know that certainly in the students, um, you know, there there's this is this thing going on at the state house that there might be a, um, so as as as you know, um, the the the Senate did in fact vote um to enact a statewide all schools um, bell-to-bell um cell phone. And so without going
026into all of the detail, but it they said they passed the bill. They were hopeful that the house would um consider it before the August break. They did not. So it it technically still need to go before the house and then to the governor's desk. And the governor has already stated that she is, you know, she is for this in many conversations. Um what does it require? Well, it's, you know, it's in draft form or at least the bill has not been voted, but it's it is in fact a bellto bell um uh you know um banned. Thank you. Excuse me. cell phone B telephone and that includes lunches and they're very specific and there's some there are some there's some other things that may may or may not make the final bill but um
027it would require school districts to have policies in place at the start of the 2627 school year. What the school committee will need to ponder at some point is that we this was on the docket um to at least consider um for a local policy. Um and so one, you know, I guess the consideration would be do you put something in place at least de facto for this upcoming school year 25 26 in preparation for 26 27. um you know that that'll be something for the committee to to um consider, but that it it is not in fact law. Um it still needs to be voted at least one more time from the house and um and for from the any questions. >> So anything else? >> No. All right. Items not reasonably anticipated. Um
028so for transparency to the public um we did receive a complaint about um Dr. Casant that complaint was received on Tuesday August 12th means that I could not follow meeting law and uh that was an agenda item for this meeting. Um so I did talk with legal counsel today and our next step will be to schedule a a meeting to review the complaint. Um, so we will not wait until the September 18th meeting, which is the next meeting. We will schedule something before that. Um, so please expect to see something in your email uh very very soon about um scheduling that date. Um, so uh more to come on that, but we're not going to discuss it further today. Uh, school committee comments. >> Anybody have anything else to say? >> Yes. I am a
029lucky parent. an eighth grader who attended Warrior Academy yesterday orientation over at the high school and my son when he attended it a couple years ago did not tell me any information. I couldn't believe the amount of fun like you took something that could be very boring in your locker and made it a game made it memorable. Um so I know looking at Annie because she's a high school person here but like thank you. Thank you for hosting those kiddos and doing such a great wonderful job. I'm actually really jealous that Mrs. Os fantastic. >> Absolutely fantastic. >> Yeah, >> master. >> Really neat. >> Well, there's lots of fun events coming up. So, can't wait to hear all about them and how the kids are enjoying their their back to school days. Any other
030comments? Okay. Um, subcommittees are that I need to get out an email letting everybody know their subcommittee assignments for this coming year so that we can get all those scheduled. As you can tell, there's already already work to be done. Um, as always, um, and I'm sure for most of our liaison, um, you're still waiting for the school season to start back up, but, um, Danielle, since you are our legislative representative, I need to know if there had been any updates beyond the cell phone ban. >> Yeah, surprise, surprise. Cell phone ban wasn't that was my only thing to Okay, I started watching that days ago, so it's progressing. We'll see what happens. >> Yeah. Okay. Um, we did have one correspondence. Um, this was actually came back in June. It was a certified uh
031letter that was mailed out. So, I just wanted to make sure the public was aware. Um, the the letter is attached in full. The original letter is attached in full um on the agenda. It is very long, so I'm not going to read it in public session. Um, to summarize the letter for for everyone. essentially um a parent contacted school committee asking for us to reconsider the uh the I want to say deadline that's not the word I'm looking for the date at which a child is eligible to attend kindergarten so a cuto off date that was the word I was seeking the cuto off date on which the a child is eligible to attend kindergarten um I did explain to this parent essentially that we're not meeting as a school committee again this summer.
032This is something that would have to be considered by a subcommittee and then reviewed by the full committee and then voted on in both of those spaces. Um, and so I did indicate that I would refer it to operations as a matter for um, review and consideration, but that we couldn't make a decision based on one child's needs, but rather it's our responsibility to consider the needs of all the children in our district and to make a responsible decision um, based on a number of factors. So, I will refer that matter in this letter um to discharge operations um for initial review um of that policy and to see whether or not we need to make any changes. Um so, I did want to make sure I share that with everyone that I I did
033suggest a >> Okay, our next meeting. >> Yes, you may. >> So, my I think my only concern is is that is this a this year problem? No, I I clearly indicated to this parent that we were that we >> did not follow process. >> Yeah, I'm talking about for the student. Would it have been initially? Well, the student >> they wanted it to be >> understood. >> They wanted a one-off decision for that student um or for this year. Um and I explained that there's a process that gets followed that this would need to be reviewed by subcommittee then main committee voted on etc. Um and if we couldn't make a decision for one student we need to make a decision for all students. >> Understood. Thank you. >> Y okay. So, next committee
034meeting is uh sub next school committee meeting outside of planning this other um executive session meeting is Thursday, September 18th um at 5:30 p.m. And we do not need executive session this evening. So, I would entertain a motion to adjurnn. >> So, move. >> Motion by Sean, second by Danielle. All in favor? I. >> And that is the end of our meeting. Thank you everyone. Right.