001e we can't supervise kids and as we looked at the decision of our numbers coming in what we see is that a majority of our positive cases are coming from our adolescent population they're mixing a little bit more in the community they're out with friends and so as we moved into Monday and looking at uh Consulting with nurses and looking those tests came in um we just decided it was best to hit pause for this week knowing that there was a high transmission rate over the weekend that was reported to us and we just did not have the Staffing available to think that we could hold it together for a week um because we know that it's hard for for families and for um for students to not know on a day-by-day basis and and
002you can get a decision that comes in at 6:30 in the morning and that makes it hard we value inperson learning we know that that is what is best for our students and we're going to do everything that we can to make sure that we can stay in school um but when you also think about school it's more than just teachers principls you have to think about food service you have to think about your custodial staff you have to think about your bus driving staff uh and if we need to we're going to do our best to make sure that our elementary schools uh are supplied with enough staff to stay open because we know that's so challenging for parents um another piece uh that we will have is that today uh worked with a
003local supplier um that is local Hyperlite and uh we had used some of those masks in a year or so ago and we bought 10,000 more today to share between the two communities uh because they have a really good nose piece and they seem to fit pretty tight to the face that we can tighten those strings up for kiddos um and then that way if we have masks that kids need at school will'll have uh more on hand um and then you know again I can't say enough to families uh and to staff if you're not feeling well stay home contact us we can help you with testing if we need to we know that testing is difficult to acquire in the community um becoming more difficult for schools but we'll do everything that we
004can to make sure that we provide that first level of uh health care for for kiddos um secondly just again thank thank our School nurses been a rough couple of weeks uh principes who are out there helping to test anybody who's available uh today at Soco middle school I know that uh Joan Joan was sitting out front and parents were doing drive up if they were in a positive pool and uh we'll continue to provide that support as needed so a lot going on covid wise one of the other things that we are still working on uh is pushing the the building project forward we've had a couple of meetings uh in the in as we return from vacation and uh the last one was a site committee meeting where we starting to talk more
005about the sites that are out there that are available for us to use I want to thank uh two members of the committee uh in particular uh and that's um Don pylon and Kevin roach who just have a lot of knowledge about our community and about um what some of the sites are and kind of have their ear to the ground because one of the challenges with sites in Sako is that if you have a nice piece of land that piece of land um is very desirable and so we have uh tentatively scheduled a February 2nd meeting for the community um to talk about what those um some of those sites would look like because depending on grade level configuration you might have different requirements for the size of the site so if you had
006800 students in a school that would require a different amount of acreage than if you had 400 students in a school so you'll have to do some mixing and and matching we have not selected where that will be yet because obviously depending on virus and all of those pieces of where we are as Community looking at Space Room Etc or even if it will be best to have it that night um we've got to we've got to con uh consider that piece so any questions thank you superintendent Ray any questions for superintendent Ray no questions moving on to item eight the chair report chair Le Fortune I have nothing to report this evening thank you brings us to item nine there are no staff reports indicated in the agenda that moves us on to item
00710 uh same there are no board subcomittee meeting minutes to review that brings us to item 11 which is old business item a adopting policy jlf jf- e and jf- motion who approve the policies Mr Mayor School Board member Johnston I move we accept policies jlf reporting child abuse and neglect jf- suspected child abuse SL neglect form and jf- R report reporting child abuse and neglect administrative regulation second motion's been made by school board member Johnston second by School Board member Truman discussion on the policies School Board member Gail no um I just had a a couple quick um quick things one just a just an observation that um I think what was what's before us I just want to get a little bit of clarity is a sample administrative procedure and Sample policies from
008the main School management association so I think maybe inadvertantly or the assumption is that this will be updated to reflect Sako and some of the stuff will be removed um that's not applicable uh the other the other item uh I think I would like to to maybe make a motion to amend the policy specifically to the training of um policy jlf on page four um the policy as as written here um notes that any school unit employee who is required to make a report shall at least once every four years complete the mandated training approved by DHHS um yet in the sub uh section two subsection a on page one it says um any employee of the school unit who knows or has reason to suspect that a child has been or is likely to
009be abused or neglected must immediately notify the building principal or designated agent so I'd like to to make an amendment to this policy for clarity that um all School Employees shall complete mandated approved mandated training approved by DHHS at least once every four years as required by law and then add uh and within three months of hire to ensure that um new hires are are required to complete the training uh within a reasonable period of time once they get hired motion's been made by Schoolboard member Gail to uh amend item excuse me policy jlf subsection sub uh seven subsection seven training on page four to add in uh and within three months of hiring is there a second to the motion Amendment one point of clarification it's uh in addition to that within three months
010of hiring it's all School Employees so so change any school unit employee to all School unit EMP all oh School unit employees is there a second to the amendment second for the purpose of discussion the amendment's been made by school board member Gail second by School Board member of Fortune any discussion so the school board chair the question that I have is with this even though it says sample policy on the the one that we have um it was my understanding that this is required uh from the state and that it basically comes to us verbatim um and has been you know run through all of the legal processes it needs to run through to get it into this form so I guess the question I have is do we have the latitude to make
011an amendment to the language like that you certainly have the latitude to make that Amendment um but this is the policy that comes to us from Main School management that would say this is what their recommendation is to us what I would recommend is that while your policy says this you may have a hiring procedure that looks like something else that's not in that policy that the procedure for hiring would be to have that done as part of the onboarding process um and watching those pieces I don't I you know this is what comes from Main School management this is what I'd recommend in that policy we can have a procedure for onboarding that says this happens at this amount of time or at this rate I have a question a followup can we pass
012it as it is and then take it up for review in the Strategic committee to decide if we amend it further or add it to the um hiring hiring policies yes you could do that certainly we can review that they're having a meeting next uh Wednesday night and we could add this one to the A's list I just feel very strongly this policy needs to be on the books for us that's kind of why I was leading that way just to make sure that we get this on the books and then we can then take it up for a review to make it more in depth if necessary any further discussion uh just to follow Amendment just a followup question to Mr we were having um around the uh on boarding now do you know
013off the top of your head Jeremy if we have such things built into onboarding where we have assumptions or expectations of completion of certain required trainings and things like that employees so we have videos that people watch for training videos when they're on boarding but I can only speak to what I saw this summer I could not uh speak to what has normally happened over the process you know again as you look at teaching positions typically those are pretty stagnant and steady throughout a year when we have positions like Ed teexs that can turn or hourly employes they can turn over rather quickly and so I would want to have a greater conversation about what the capacity and what the plan would be because if you put a thing like 3 months uh in I
014think that we would want to have a Time where we' say okay how do we map out the calendar so that you pick a date on whatever day to say anyone who was hired during these times hits this orientation session and so on forth so I think it would take some planning um to do something like that Kevin School Board member Johnston I'm sorry um yeah I'm just trying to follow I'm just trying to follow this conversation in terms of I do think we need to get these policies on the books um and I do think that um the concept of making a certain timeline around when new employees are trained and this is very um important but I'm just going to ask the superintendent maybe he said it I don't know would you recommend
015that we add Mr superintendent this three-month um requirement or are you suggesting that we just go ahead and do it as the sample policy indicates and come back and review it as Sarah had suggested I am going to say that you need that this policy is about 10 years too late M and that we definitely need to get this on the books and if we want to add that other piece I would like to have the time to say is it part of this policy or is it about a policy on onboarding that may a standalone which we can review in two weeks at a meeting I think that we should have reporting and in reviews one way or the other this needs to get on the books thank you any further discussion superintendent Ray
016just a question uh because this is a sample I mean this is something that they send out to all all municipalities that that participate and you do have much like contracts you have the ability to uh build upon the floor but not go go below the floor this policy would act as the floor uh as per as prescribed by the msma is that correct yes you can always build upon them you can add others you can sample those things my ones that are required by law are ones that I will always recommend to go with what that sample policy is um so that you don't inadvertently create something that's in conflict with the law or those pieces that puts our again this is about protecting our employees here and making sure they know what the
017backbone is and what the requirements are um because there are some pieces in there that if things aren't reported correctly we want need to make sure that um there's a clear outline of what needs to happen next so that they're protected as they've done their they've provided what they needed to do um to Administration thank you any further discussion on the amendment only on the amendment only School Board member Gail yeah and I guess that's kind of the intent of this it's you know uh this what we have in front of us is the floor the training says once every four years for mandated reporters but the amendment that I'm trying to get at is uh in in this policy we say that all employees are required to report if they suspect child abuse or
018neglect but not all employees are required to take the training only the mandated reporters are so we want to protect number one our children number two the employees so without the proper training for all employees uh it leaves our children at risk and then also you know us at risk so I guess I'd be glad to take this up in two weeks but I do feel strongly that you know we need to do something a little more than just once every four years for mandated reporters School Board member L Fortune all I was I was just going to reiterate that there is a um there is an an msma review that's underway right now and that we are getting documents that have um that they've identified as being either missing or needing adjustments and this
019one is in a section I know at the time when this came in that they hadn't even reviewed yet it was it's just one that's been known to be a gap for a long time that that we haven't had I suspect that at some point given how thin the Personnel section is um section g that when we do get and and I know I'm speculating at this moment we when we do get the full list of work that'll be coming through the policy committee that there may in fact be something that we can anticipate seeing around how um the guidelines are laid out for you know expectations of of the school department to ensure that people are trained but I I totally agree with the path that you're taking any further discussion on the amendment
020only amendment only roll call vote on the amendment only School Board member Archie yes School Board member prebble yes School Board member Richard no school board member La Fortune yes School Board member Gail yes School Board member Truman this is just on the amendment on the amendment only no and School Board member Johnston no Amendment passes 43 back to the main motion as amended main motion as amended so that the main motion is to approve all three policies jlf jlf e and jlf r and jlf is as amended any discussion on approving the policies School member Fortune so this is probably a question to to Jeremy as well as the full board so if we approve this with the amended change is this going to require us to follow up within that period of time
021to ensure that everyone that perhaps has been hired at the beginning of the school year is treed up on that training I think I think we have some concerns about whether the training has ever occurred appropriately um and so we are going to have training this once we have a policy we are going to make sure that people have training on on this reporting policy so just saying again what I'm going to say is we've got to have the floor and then we've got to have training um and so whether it's within three months or on we have videos people C can watch for this it just needs to occur and I need to have the policy in place so that I can make sure that we are following the policy and not only following
022the policy but have an ability to start a recording and tracking process for all of this if that makes sense so superintend Ray uh with the importance of getting these policies just on the books uh it's fair to say that training is going to occur anyway regardless once the policy is put out there so the three-month window really has no bearing as everybody will be entitled to go through that policy change as we put the new policy on the books that is correct because the policy talks about every four years and without with the absence of the policy we don't necessarily know what the tracking would have been to ensure that this has happened thank you any further discussion on the main motion as amended on the main motion as amended roll call vote School
023Board member Archie yes School Board member Preble yes School Board member Richard yes School Board member La Fortune yes School Board member Gail yes School Board member Truman yes School Board member Johnston yes adopting policies jlf as amended jlf and JFR pass 70 brings us to item 12 new business item a is new hires you should have seen in your packet a memorandum of new hires superintendent Ray is there anything further to add on that no there are no action on those items any questions from the school board on the new hires seeing no questions moving on to Item B resignations there was also a memo in your packet that talks about staff resignations superintendent Ray is there anything to add no nothing to resonations any questions from the board moving on from resignations brings
024us to item C nomination of interim principal at SMS superintendent Ray yes so I have uh the recommendation to um appoint Jeff Rodman as the interim principal at Sako Middle School uh if you all remember Jeff from last year Jeff served a full year as the interim principal at Young School uh did a fabulous job for us and he has expressed interest in returning into this position um as we looked at the availability of candidates and when they can start uh we know that we had a great track record with having uh Jeff here last year he's someone who knows um the system Sako and the players coming in mid year uh and so Jeff has 23 years of experience as a middle school principal um in Kennebunk fouth and Wells and I think you
025will be an excellent choice to to fill up uh to uh fill the rest of the year at SMS thank you is there a motion to approve the uh nomination of Jeff Rodman for SMS interim principal Mr Mayor Schoolboard member Truman I move we approve the nomination of Jeff Rodman interim Sako Middle School principal and issue a cont contct for the remainder of the 2122 school year second motion's been made by Schoolboard member Truman second by School Board member prebble any discussion roll call vote School Board member Argie yes School Board member prebble yes School Board member Richard yes School Board member Le Fortune yes School Board member Gail yes School Board member Truman yes Schoolboard member Johnston yes motion passes 70 to approve the nomination of interim principal for Sako Middle School of Jeff
026Rodman uh item D is bde committee assignments Schoolboard chair of Fortune Mr Mayor so um we have just come through an election and have two new board members um earlier in the fall um as a result of some vacancy we backfilled a few of the openings and so now that we've got a full compliment of of a uh seven member School Board um I've received some feedback and and uh requests from several of the school board members and so what I have here is what is ultimately the final or final version of of what the committee layout will be um I've tried to make it such that that everyone has got two and it actually works out that every single School Board member will have two committees um with the exception of myself um who
027is not on any officially so going down the list um on finance the committee will be uh Jeff Richard and Beth Johnston who are currently on the committee and I will be adding uh William Gail in place of Jennifer Preble the Strategic committee um which is primarily the policy committee is Beth Johnston and Sarah Truman who are currently on there already um and I'm I'm moving William Gale there in place of Jeff Richard infrastructure uh and Facilities is uh currently Jennifer Preble and I'm going to replace Beth Johnson with Jeff Richard and Sarah Truman with Arthur Archie and the last um standing committee is personnel which currently has Sarah Truman Jennifer Preble and I'll be replacing Jeff Richard with Arthur Archie so the final list is finance is William Gil Jeff Richard and Beth Johnston
028strategic is Beth Johnston Sarah Truman and William Gail infrastructure is Jeff Richard Jennifer Preble and Arthur Archie Personnel is Arthur Archie Sarah Truman and Jennifer Preble and that will make it such that each of you have two committee assignments um which should make it a little more manageable for all of the board to attend all these committees the next committee meeting as I'm aware is policy the Strategic policy committee which will be meeting on the 26th at 4M um and I believe the plan was for that committee to meet at the back table in the auditorium here on that date thank you School Board chair of Fortune any questions for the chair regarding committee assignments scho CH of Fortune you will be sending that out I'm sure in an email to all school board members
029I will and the other thing that we um need to do ultimately is add that to the school website the committee page is is just a general page right now and doesn't have a listing of what the what any of the Committees do and who is currently on them thank you moving on to item e a CO update superintendent Ray so this update one of the good things about this page is it updates live from our nurses that come into that and so as we looked at last week um we ended the the week with 94 positive cases throughout our school Community which some of those go back to weekend pieces as we look at this week we're at 71 so far um and that number I suspect will as we go through a week
030contines to be very high at the beginning of the week and our numbers after we go through pool testing seem to come down until we hit the weekend cycle again and that shoots back up um and that seems to be the the piece that just continues to uh play itself out Monday Sunday through Tuesday Wednesday seems to be high Thursday Friday it starts to come down because you've gone through your pool testing cycle um and then you play that back again for the weekend now one of the things that you'll start to see to see changing is the close contact piece because now the SOP has changed close contacts and so we won't be keeping that number um like we were on the past because again that so much of the close contact piece is
031driven by middle school and the fact that they're switching classes inside and out and going to different places that you'll see that number change questions on covid questions from the board for superintendent Ray based on the co update there was a memorandum in your packet and also updated on the website any questions no questions moving on to item f a budget update informational superintendent Ray yeah so just to give everybody an idea of where we at we're at and what the timeline will look like uh so principes have those budgets into Jason um in the next week we was actually hoping to spend a little bit more time on budget this week but things got derailed a little bit based on other needs um we'll start reviewing those line by line internally and then over
032in the I would say by the second week uh or third week of January we'll start having principles come in to go through those budgets line by line still putting some Final Touch is on student enrollments for Thorton Academy to make sure that we have things uh in place and that we've looked at and reached out to all of those other little schools that we can have so that we have a good estimate with the budget uh with the buffer built in on top of that piece um we need to look at Power electricity uh and some of those gas rates as those fluctuated a little bit again looking at electricity rates those ones are a little bit of a bigger concern because if you look at your household electrical bill you'll see that that
033you've had that Rise um and then uh we will be planning for which will come through infrastructure committee but I would like to see us be able to have that same goal of putting at least another half a million dollars into the budget for uh Capital Improvement projects um I think at a first glance at the budget very very preliminary on the expenditure side I think we're feeling pretty good about this things um what we then have to look at is obviously the other side of the coin which is revenue um this will be an opportunity for the first time in many years where we actually start the the year with some carryover funds because we had a positive end to last year so I think the pieces that you look at that set us
034set ourselves up for hopefully what will be a successful budget season is one starting with a positive balance that's always a good one number two two recognizing that we used all of that additional subsidy last year to pay down what we owed back to the city almost a million dollars so we're using that additional subsidy that we're receiving this year to pay that off which means that we didn't have expenses that used any of that subsidy so if and I say if subsidy levels stay at a similar amount theoretically we would be in a very good Revenue space for that so I'm hopeful that uh as we get to put things together that we're going to be um hopefully in an easier Place uh as we start to have those discussions and not talking about
035huge hopefully we're not talking about huge gaps between expenditures and revenues that's what we'd like to avoid so very very early what I would expect for the finance committee is that by the end of January early February we will have those Revenue pictures from the states the 279 and that's when I would like to hand you guys your budget books in that pieces so that you're looking at both sides of the coin at one time um which will put us on Pace for I think the charter says uh sometime in March or some some very doesn't even have like the third Monday in March type uh uh piece that sometime in March we have a conversation with the city Council on that piece but we'll have uh plenty of time between now and then to
036to get our picture together and to figure out where it is we are uh planning I believe Jason correct me if I'm wrong we put 10% in for health insurance um this year which is probably a little bit higher than some of the other years but a little bit nervous on um as you think about health insurance cost nothing like a pandemic and what those cost that scares me a little bit of what those rates could do um because it's so unpredictable and there's nothing to compare that to uh from in the past so feeling uh pretty positive about budget at this point Thank You superintendent Ray and that language is in section 602 of the charter that says at a city council meeting in March of each year the city administrator and School Board
037shall each submit to the city council their respective budgets yeah you have four of those in March right so we just got to narrow down which one any questions for superintendent Ray on the budget no questions on the Budget moving on to item 13 any other information this evening no other information this evening brings us to item 14 executive session is there a motion to enter executive session Mr Mayor Schoolboard member of Fortune I move we enter executive session for labor contract negotiations under uh 1 Mrs RSA 456d with possible action motion's been made by school board member La Fortune is there a second second is that school board member Archie thank you any discussion on entering executive session roll call vote School Board member Archie yes School Board member Preble yes School Board member
038Richard yes School Board member L Fortune yes School Board member Gail yes School Board member Truman yes School Board member Johnston yes motion passes 70 at 7:41 p.m. executive session will be downstairs in the conference room downstairs in the conference room e e e how are you good you I'm all right crazy okay it looks like we're back from executive session is there a motion to exit executive session so moved motions made by Schoolboard member Truman is there a second second second by Schoolboard member L Fortune discussion on exiting executive session roll call to exit School Board member Archie yes School Board member prebble yes School Board member Richard yes School Board member L Fortune yes School Board member Gail yes School Board member Truman yes School Board member Johnston yes motion passes 70 at
0399:45 any report from executive session no report from executive session no report from executive session brings us to item 15 on the agenda is there a motion or adjourn so moved made by made by school board member La Fortune second by School Board member Truman any discussion on adjourning roll call vote to ad June School Board member Archie yes School Board member Preble yes School Board member Richard yes School Board member Fortune yes School Board member Gail yes Schoolboard member Truman yes School Board member Johnston yes motion passes 70 to adjourn at 9:46 have a wonderful evening everyone e e