001Ready? Good evening one everyone. I officially call the school board meeting for January 10th two uh 2024 at 7:05 to order. Would you please join me in the pledge of allegiance? Thank you. Item number three on the agenda this evening is the approval of the school board meeting minutes dated December 13, 2023. Is there a motion to approve the order? Madame Mayor, motion made by uh Sarah Truman. Uh I move we approve the school board meeting minutes dated November 8th, 2023. Second. Motion has been made by school board member Truman, second by school board member Roach. Any discussion on the minutes? Councelor uh school board member Johnston. Thank you. Thank you, Madame Mayor. Um I'd just like to correct one tiny little tiny little error on the last sheet of the minutes. Um relating to
002article J, which is first reading of policies as it stated at the beginning. then names the policies um that are to have first reading. But when it mentions that um I move to approve these policies, it says the second reading of policies and it should say in fact the first. Thank you. We'll get that changed. Yeah, I would I I think you can approve with the change. Simple change like that. Okay, we won't need a motion for that. Okay, any other discussion or comments? Okay, not seeing any. Roll call vote. School board member Archie? Yes. School board member Prebble? Yes. School board member Richards? Yes. School board member Roach? Yes. Yes. School board member Gail. Yes. School board member Truman. Yes. School board member Johnson. Yes. Motion to approve the minutes. Passes 70. That now
003brings us to the adjustments to the agenda. Are there any adjustments to the agenda? Okay. Not seeing any. No adjustments. Item number five, there are no correspondence. Item number six is public session. If there is any member of the public that wishes to speak, please step to the podium, state your name, address for the record, and you will have three minutes to address the school board. Okay, not seeing anybody wishing to speak. That now takes us to item seven, which is the superintendent's report, and that is Superintendent Ray. All right, good good evening, everybody. Um, wouldn't it just be nice to have a regular storm that just was predictable snow? Just clean, no-brainer, 18 inches is coming in, make the call the night before, not have to deal deal with weather, wind, rains, and all
004the other possibilities. Um, but it does sound like Friday and maybe next Tuesday could be more of it for us uh to deal with. Um, this is the the kind of the season where uh job fairs become important for us. um as you know that uh you know there used to be a day where you just open positions in uh May and plenty of applicants came for teaching positions and that's not ne necessarily the environment that we live in today and so it's uh more of a year round piece but a lot of the the major college fairs um and job fair opportunities in the springs to recruiting teachers uh start after February vacation and so we'll be getting into that mode of uh attending those, making sure that we have outreach uh to employee
005uh possible employees, etc. Over the next several months, superintendent, heads of schools will start to meet uh later this month to start developing the first drafts of calendar for next year. Um that's a process that um we have a law that we have to follow statewide of trying to be within five days of each other uh in each vocational region around the state. And so we'll meet as superintendent so that uh we can work with our committee here and hopefully sometime in March come out with that first draft of the calendar uh for the upcoming year. Something that school committees, city councils, mayors, uh should really pay attention to uh from a from a law piece is that um the department of lab labor will be having listening sessions about the paid leave law that
006was part of the governor's uh budget last year. and that has a could have a significant impact on schools when when that was kind of put into the governor's budget the the funding for that and as you know school employees tend to have very good paid leave already in their in their contracts. This is an additional process that can run parallel. So there's the administration of the plan, but it also started with the conversation that the there would be a in order to fund this statewide, there would be a 1% payroll tax that would be borne half by employee, half by employer. And there's definitely some talk in the recent weeks that's coming out that that is a consideration of a shift to a 7030 or a fully employer shift is what we're being told.
007And so if it was at the full 1% for this municipality on the school department side, that has over a $200,000 price tag that we need to add to the budget. Um, and that starts on January 1 of 2025 that the tax has to be paid. Now, obviously, we wouldn't be budgeting for the full 1% or or percentage because we're only would be dealing with six months, but that is a number that we will need to put into our budget not knowing the direction that it will go. Um, but why I think that's important for us is because we all work really hard to make sure that we do our best job to present budgets that are low. And while this is just one example, this is a rule tax, something that's being passed on
008to us that impacts our taxpayers. And while we can all talk about the benefits and you know why we should have paid leave, um it is something that is going to be something that you'll see a line in in our budget that there's an impact for. So, uh, if you go on the Department of Labor's website, once I get more information from Maine School Boards Association, I can, uh, funnel it, uh, your way. I suspect on the city side uh that John uh is working on that as well because there's also a municipal piece uh to be concerned with but you know when you think about that piece of school and city combined that's a significant increase that would go on the mill rate when you think of every thousand every $100,000 is typically four
009or four and a half pennies on the mill rate. Um that's a that that's just another hit. um budget process, draft budget is in hand uh that we'll begin to review as principles, directors uh over the next several weeks in preparation for um hoping to have the subsidy report is due to us at the end of January from the state uh with the kind of initial presentation of subsidy overview would be at the February 7th school committee meeting. Did we win? Did we get money taken away? How does that react to first part of the budget? Um by that time, budget committee will have um finance committee will have a draft budget in hand looking at late February, early March reviews uh on school staff side with first presentation to the city council um on
010March 18th. Um so that's a Monday night. that's our night to go in front of the council and be ready to uh present where we're at as a school department. So, a lot of work to do over the next couple of uh couple of months financially. We know that one of the big factors when you talk about um health insurance, we tend to not have that number until the first week in April. So, that hopefully hopefully you have an adjustment downward when you get that number. Um I also suspect that you know there will be We know that we've read in the papers that the state of Maine has a budget surplus uh like over revenue like 258 million. Um I suspect that when school departments all see subsidies and all those pieces always usually
011a push in the second session for more. It doesn't mean we're going to get that or anyone would consider that. But we do suspect that uh you know there's always a lobbying effort for more money to come to education. Um, so as we play that out for the spring, because when we get to about the second week in May, that's when the council is finalizing that budget uh to be ready to send to voters. And then during school uh construction piece on the agenda, we'll report out good news that we received today. Any questions? Any questions for Superintendent Ray? Okay, not seeing any. Uh, next item eight. We do have the chair's report. I don't have anything major to report this evening. Thank you. Brings us now to item nine. There are no staff reports.
012Item 10 is the board subcommittee minutes. You have been presented with the policy and personnel committee meeting minutes for 11024, the finance and infrastructure committee. Uh the next meeting is 12424 at 4:30 and the curriculum committee the next meeting is 1224 at 4:30. Item 11, there is no old business. Item 12 now takes us into new business. And the first item A is new hires. You have received a memo in your packet with the list of new hires. There is no action, but are there any questions or concerns? School board member Truman. I believe we have a motion. Um, I move we approve the nomination of Jeremy Allen, Young School Strides teacher, and issue a contract for the 2023 2024 school year. Second. Yeah, the memo does state that there is no action for any
013of those items at the So, so I just I want to talk about that piece because I don't believe that um seeing that that you're going to need a motion. You did accept his resignation at the last meeting because the employee was going to leave. But in further conversations, they asked if they could stay. There's been no break in employment. There would be no new hire date. he'd stay with the same piece because he he hasn't left us. Um, so then I rescend my motion. My second, sorry, school board member Johnston. Sarah withdrew her motion and I was withdrawing my second. Okay, thank you. We do have to do the siphon. So, yes, I'm sorry. The next one I gonna move um I move we approve the stipen nominations of Noah Ko CK Burns RTI
014coordinator and Jessica Cook Fairfield RTI coordinator and issue a stipen contract for the remainder of the 2023 2024 school year. Again, there is no motion that is needed. If you look at the bottom of the memo, there's an asterisk that states the appointments requiring no action. All three items have been identified. doesn't say that on mine. I I have We usually approve the stipens. Okay. Yeah, I don't I don't see it on my copy either. Second. Sorry. It says that there's no action on Right. It says transfers because they were actually transfers requiring. Right. I'm doing the stipen positions. Yeah. So that is for uh information purposes only for the new hires. Okay. And item B is resignations. And again there are five resignations. Um and again this is identified as not needing any action.
015Hold on. Hold on just a second. It may it may just be the the way that Facebook. We why don't we take action on the stipen positions and then Okay, I do apologize. Um little miscommunication on the way that the memo is written. So we are going to take an action on the stipen position of Noah coach Jessica Cook. Is there a motion to approve the new hires for those two positions? I move we approve the siphon nominations of Noah Ko CK Burns RTI coordinator and Jessica Cook Fairfield RTI coordinator and issue a stipen contracts for the remainder of the 2023 2024 school year. Second. Motion has been made by schoolboard member Truman, second by school board member Prebble. Any discussion or comments? School board member Gail. Um what's the RTI coordinator response to intervention?
016So, so it would be the teacher who's leading up the work on the response uh response to intervention um looking at student data, collaborating on those pieces, presenting that to teachers, those types of things. Thank you. Any other questions or comments? Okay, roll call vote. Schoolboard member Archie? Yes. School board member Prebble? Yes. School board member Richards? Yes. School board member Roach? Yes. Schoolboard member Gail? Yes. School board member Truman. Yes. And school board member Johnston. Yes. Motion passes 70. Okay, that now takes us to item B, resignations. In your memo, um, in your packet, there is one item for a motion. That is the resignation or retirement of Ashley Damboyce. Is there a motion to approve? Madame Mayor, school board member Truman. I move we accept the resignation of Ashley Dan Boyce, Fairfield math
017interventionist, effective January 19th, 2024. Motion has been made by schoolboard member Truman. Is there a second? Second. School board member Johnston. Any discussion or comment? Schoolboard member Gail. Just a quick question on the the memo and the two bus drivers that look like um be leaving us. uh already left. Um how is that affecting the transportation routes and do we have in terms of the job fairs and recruitment? Is there any specific plan to go after bus drivers? We're always going after bus drivers. Um certainly we need to look at uh the salary situation of those. Uh for one of those bus drivers, they drive the Arundle run for Thornton Academy and that's going to be a Thornton Academy employee. So there's basically no change. Uh, and for the other one on Bob, um, I'd
018have to get more details on that route. We I know that we are short a couple of routes and we're combined right now. Thank you. Any other questions or comments? Okay, not seeing any. Roll call vote. School board member Archie, yes. School board member Prebble, yes. School board member Richards, yes. School board member Roach, yes. School board member Gail, yes. School board member Truman, yes. Yes. And school board member Johnston. Yes. Motion passes 70. Okay. That now takes us to item C and that is a school construction update from the state board of education. Okay. We had a very good day at the state board of education today because the process of site approval went before uh the state board and they approved our site which means that we now move on to the second
019part which is concept approval. uh concept approval. We are targeting the March, is it March 13th or March March 13th meeting um is our hope that we will be there and Meg certainly come up because you big part of this piece. Um working really hard to get all of those pieces done. The big piece around concept approval is one the structural and p and and layout of your building, but additionally that's where they uh the architects would present to the state board really the funding costs for the department of education and the breakdown uh knowing that the building's going to cost x amount of dollars. This part of it will be state funded. Um certainly we know that there's 5,000 square feet in the current building that is locally for gym and um cafeteria. Um
020but we're moving ahead and that March 13th date is an important date because of the timeline that it takes for all of the things that the city council has to do in order to get something on the ballot. um that's the target date that works with their meeting schedule, our meeting schedule, um etc. And there's a lot of people who are pulling things together. Um Megan and I uh meet every week with Oak Point um typically on Thursday mornings to talk about the building, to talk about those pieces. Um been spending some time really talking about materials like what would the outside be made of? Is it is it brick? is that metal some you know certainly don't want all one material on the building because it will have no character and uh those pieces
021but uh I think very soon we're going to be fairly close to I know you've kind of seen a little bit of what the outside could look like and they're very drafty. I think with over the next probably three to four weeks you'll get to see something that looks a whole lot more real. Um, now it doesn't mean that everything that they put on that paper that day will be like final colors or, you know, designs or anything, but it'll give you an idea of what the concept of the building will look like um, as we move forward in that process. So, pretty exciting day um because that's a huge hurdle to get over is the site approval piece um, concept approval vote and then a whole lot of design over a year. Um, and
022you realistically uh can be thinking about a a groundbreaking from that piece. Um one of the things that we have to schedule is that we will be scheduling another straw poll. So you have a second straw poll for concept much like you did for site. Um and one of the pieces that um we're working on on why we can't give that date is because the um the date for the state board of education's uh subcommittee for construction is February 23rd which is school vacation week and they're going to change that meeting date and they haven't made that change yet and we need to coincide with what that meeting date is. Certainly, school vacation week is not exactly the week to have a straw poll meeting. Um, and we're trying to get all those ducks in
023a row so that we can put all the necessary uh kind of information out there to the public to know that this is what's going to h uh this would be the meeting date, etc., etc. Um, I think we did get some good feedback from folks um about how we would structure the next meeting where they would really like to have a time on when the vote um would be and have some like kind of have the boards and stuff out beforehand before but we got into the questions and presentations um because there were some people there. It's just like, hey, I've got kids that I'm here with me and upstairs and we got bedtime. And so that we can structure that as here's kind of like a gallery walk of things first, short presentation,
024time for questions, vote will happen at this time, and then have the ability to still stay in and answer some questions. I think that might be a little bit more helpful for um those who have plans in the evening time and had to take off last time because it was rolling a little bit late. We can ask we can answer any questions about the building. Pretty exciting stuff. Any questions? I just had a question about the I'm just looking at your um January superintendent report email that went out. You had um Thursday, February 29th at 6 PM at SMS. Is that that was TBD now? Yeah, that's kind of what we were hoping for because we knew that the next we were hoping that we can get the next day to be the um school
025construction subcommittee hoping that they don't move it forward and they just move it back a week. Um so that's what we're still working on with the chair of that comm board. Supposed to be the 23rd with the state but that's not going to happen because of school vacation. Correct. Okay. And you're hoping they'll move it somewhere between those two? We're hoping that they'll just they always meet on Fridays. They'll just move it to the week before. Um we we would actually we want to go the week back to uh March 1st. Okay. Go even further back. Which again in any other month doesn't have 28 or 29 days. We would have been perfectly on um for that one. Okay. I just want to make sure because I just read it earlier and I was like
026so thank you. Any other questions or comments? School board member Gil, just a quick question on the concept. Um, will the new is the concept for the new building to have enough in the prek? Is that going to have enough space for any and every SACO prek student to be located there? So, I believe we have 22 classrooms, Meg, in that building. Is that correct? I think there's 24. There's 12 and 12. 12 and 12. It would it would accommodate the same number of students that our K current K accommodates. So in in the answer to your question, yes. Okay. So there'd be no essentially no lottery. If there's there's a student that wants to go to prek that lives in SACO, there'll be space for them. Essentially, that's the plan is that we would
027bill for that. Now, obviously, the one thing that's a little bit tricky about K is that if you have a bubble year, you could add a teacher. you I'm not saying but if you were at a situation where you were full and you had a bubble year, you're only allowed 16 students in a prek classroom. So that would be the only negative and that would you know I think that we would feel pretty safe on that because that would also be the assumption that every parent is going to choose that option. I don't know that anybody who has universal prek or only say is seeing every parent choose that option. Okay, any other comments or questions? All right, moving on to item D and that is a Thornton Academy tuition update. Okay, while we had
028all hoped that every December we would see that, we didn't get quite as lucky this year, did we, Anarie? We were well we were well past the date where they promised it to us. Um but we did see an increase this year of 5.57% and that MAT is at $13,30012 um plus a 7% IVF insured value factor. Um and so we have a situation where the total amount is 14231 for students. Our October one count was for uh 861. We had budgeted uh for 890. So unlike last year where it was higher, we are in a better situation that we have some flex in that account uh for this year. Any questions on tuition rates? Okay, not seeing any. Uh, so that will now take us to item E and that is an update on
029the literacy grant. And thank just wanted to provide a notification. This grant is slightly different than the climate grant that we talked about in that this is an allocation per district. So, it's coming from the Department of Education. You still have to apply for the funds and lay out a plan for spending those funds. It's a very tight turnaround. We haven't gotten the application for those grant funds yet. The full application will be due at the end of January, but we do have a sense of what the allowable spending is for the just over $66,000 that SACO has been awarded in that grant. And the intent is to support foundational literacy skills, which is something that we've talked a lot about in reference to curriculum and areas to continue to support our earliest learners and
030teachers of those students in acquiring foundational literacy skills. We will be looking to spend some of that on professional development. And there's also uh an ability to spend that on student instructional resources. So, we will be working with our English language arts curriculum design team that's already aware of this grant as well as working with those prek through five teachers primarily with some options to look at some middle school resources as well to make sure that we have a solid plan to spend those funds which need to be expended by September of 24. So it is quite a a tight turnaround in terms of knowing what we get hopefully midFebruary what we've applied for and has been approved in that grant and then we can begin spending through September. Happy to answer any questions. Any
031questions? School board member Gail, I guess. Um later on when we know later on in February, could you come back and give us more details into what what the money is going to be used for and all that? Be great. Thank you. School board member Roach U where it says grant monies will support professional development instructional materials. Is that the grant rules or is that your estimate of where it should go? That's the rules of the grant and in our early conversations we are looking to kind of balance that between those different areas. I don't think that where we've just purchased a word study curriculum for K5, we we aren't necessarily in need of that quantity to kind of dump all in one bucket. So, I anticipate we'll spread that out over those different pieces.
032And this is a question on professional development. Um if a teacher to get um professional development credit um could working with students directly like after school for an hour and also get paid through the grant for this would that count as professional development? There was that would not count towards professional development unless you were using it in kind of a coaching model where a teacher was getting feedback about their instructional practices. But there is some allowance for like a tutoring program or something that we might come up with which which may be as we kind of apply for the grant and see what will or won't be approved. that could be an allowable expenditure not not for professional development credits but for instructional purposes to pay for additional instructional time. The word I was thinking
033of is tutoring if that was it. Um similar to say getting a stipen for after school athletic activities, you know, coaching the student, you know, helping this student extra time for literacy initiatives that might not being done right now where the teacher of course can benefit with direct uh stipen, but also you have that one-on-one with with with those students that I don't know how you'd select say it was 25 30 students with that type of money or not. But yeah, and I I definitely appreciate that idea. One thing about this grant is I I believe from what we've heard in the Zooms and webinars is that they're really trying to target core instruction for students. So, they're looking for that funding to hit the largest number of students rather than a high impact with
034a smaller number of students. So, we would be unlikely to consider like a smaller scale one-on-one tutoring with this particular grant. Thank you. I think the the other piece that we just have to, you know, what's difficult about a grant like this is that Meg needs to and Meg and Mandy will work together to come up with the plans, you know, of what's happening, but you have to put that in the application, not have a long delay of the state approving too far outside the box because the money has to be out the door uh September of this year. And so you don't really, you know, the Friday email that says good news um also results in some things that you have to do in a short turnaround of time. School board member Gail. Um
035actually just in terms of the grant program, is this it says it's recent due to recent legislation. Is this going to be an annual grant program for the next couple years in the budget or I don't want to speak for the DOE, but I doubt it. My understanding is that they're reallocating returned ESSER ARP funds for this purpose. So districts that might not have been able to use some of the COVID relief funds that were allocated in earlier grants are returned to the state and the state has a short window of time before they're going to be required to return them to the federal government. And so they're trying to bank on past legislation to dump the money in something that will further that. Thank you. Hey, anyone else? Okay, not seeing anything. Thanks, M.
036Thank you. Now moves us to item F of new business and that is a second and final reading um of the policies listed. The JA field trip and other student travel, JND website and social media, EA student transportation services, JJ instru instructional and library media material selection and the JJ challenge of instructional materials form. Is there a motion to approve? Schoolboard member Johnston. Thank you. I move we approve the second reading of policies J O A J N D E A um JJ and JJ- E. Second. Motion has been made by councelor John uh schoolboard member Johnston, second by school board member Truman. Any discussion or comments? Okay, not seeing any. Roll call vote. a couple school board member uh Roach. More of a fun question, but on the field trips um um when I
037was young, they uh it was a fun trip at the end of the year and um we went to Candy Lake Park and up here of course you got Funtown, Splash Town, whatever. Is that done anymore for field trips or here? Cuz it says in addition some school sponsored trips may provide social experiences. Um, but it seems like the heading, you know, rules on the educational value and other trips are more about academic trips or maybe even non-school. So, I don't know what's counted it really is that type of thing counted as a field trip. I think it probably would be and I do think it would be something that would be um social but fun thing. I mean, there are fun things that happen in school. One of the things that we've had a
038lot of conversation about in the last year on field trips, uh Marie and I have had these conversations with others, is that one of the things that is a priority for me is that any of those experiences that we offer throughout the school day cannot come at a cost to families that prohibits a kid from attending. Uh, and that's something that's really important to me. Like, and I'm and I'm just making this up, Kevin, but let's go to Canoby Lake Park and I need to charge every family 40 bucks. We can't be in the business of sponsoring things that put the halves and the have nots out there. And so yes, we need to first make sure that we have uh programs that are academic focused as well, you know, at the for but there
039are times that you, you know, when you have something like Funtown in your community and you can get kids over there. Again, thinking that there are many kids who have a season pass and there's kids in our community who have never been. um we just make need to make sure that all of those experiences are not uh there's no barrier for a find a family piece and so yes those things still exist but they've got to work in the in together in the right way that's where I was going with it with kids that are are more underprivileged that you know these are great memories for school and great motivation where they might not be able to get to those places and make it you And it's a reward at the end of the year
040for them as well. And you know, plenty of plenty of great memories as a kid for that for for other kids that weren't necessarily going out to vacations like that or doing things. And and I think that in the last year we really were able to get into a place where we said if we feel like this is an important experience for our children then we will make sure that there is no barrier financially whether that's school funded donations and not making sure making sure that nobody's feeling uh like they don't want to ask. We've got to take care of it upfront. No barriers whatsoever. And I think that uh Marie has done a really good job with that piece of making sure that that message is because that's a big cultural shift too. Um
041and and sometimes we don't always understand the why, but it's just as simple as you know when the ice cream truck shows up and you've asked everyone to bring in $5, we've got to make sure that every person goes to that ice cream truck and has the opportunity to get the same item. uh as everybody else because we just we can't operate that way. Okay, any other questions or discussion? Okay, not seeing any. Roll call vote. School board member Archie, yes. School board member Prebble, yes. School board member Richards, yes. School board member Roach, yes. School board member Gail, yes. School board member Truman, yes. And school board member Johnston, yes. Motion to approve the policies passes 70. Okay. Okay. Item number 13, there is no other information. Item 14, there is no executive session.
042And that takes us to item 15 for adjournment. Is there a motion to adjurnn? So moved. Second. Motion made by schoolboard member Truman. Second by school board member Prebble. Roll call vote. School board member Archie. Yes. School board member Prebble. Yes. School board member Richards. Yes. Schoolboard member Roach. Fairly well. Yes. Schoolboard member Gail? Yes. School board member Truman? Yes. and school board member Johnson. Yes. Motion to adjurnn passes 70 at 7:41. One.