Nov 12 2025 School Board Meeting

001Perfect. I'm going to go to order again at 6:00 and we're going to rise to the pledge of >> allegiance again. I aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands one nation indivisibley and justice for all. Okay, we're going to start with two presentations. I love school. Getting used to the microphones. Hello. Um, I'm Rebecca Lugo, Middleton's kindergarten teacher, and I'm here with America, um, my amazing kindergarten student. And our presentation today, we're so happy um, that we were able to celebrate our with a wonderful Veterans Day assembly today. Um, just to pay a wonderful tribute to our amazing veterans here in our community at Middleton. Um we kindergarten sang a beautiful song um to pay tribute to our amazing veterans especially um part of America's

002family um standing beside him um as well as part of our amazing school board. Additionally um we made beautiful decorations and part of our interior classroom. We also incorporated our entire school by asking our students to fill out wonderful hearts to ask um which veterans they had in their f their families to try to bring in our community and also incorporated our helpful hearts to um just bring in that incredible school community dynamic. Um and Americ has come to present our amazing song. So I'd love to give the floor to him. Mario, are you ready? >> Oh, so great. Oh, so great. Thank you for your service. Thank you for your Thank you for your service. You're so strong. You're so strong. We remember on this day on this day for fight for you. We

003thank you. Great job. Okay. And with that, we will move into public input. Um, I will have the floor open for 15 minutes, three minutes per individual, and then after we will do our public input response from last month. >> Go ahead. Um, so do we have final financials for 71 2024 to 6 2025? >> Yes. That would be filed for the final budget final number. Um, and so I know that the the Eagle Scout came and did all the evacuation route when we had the uh town hall parking lot strike. We actually had a crosswalk put in across the building to the church parking lot. So because that is my understanding is an evacuation from the school to the church parking lot. If that is that is the case is u going to be

004kept clear in case for evacuation. Um >> so just to make sure your question was is the the walking path kept clear. >> My understanding the way the boy presents that this is an evacuation route. >> Gotcha. >> And one of the things we confirmed was that we don't have a crosswalk down at the end. So as part of the painting when we came in the town hall strike, we asked them if they could throw that in to do a you know legal crosswalk from the municipal building to the church. that is um did the war article get funded last year the bus and uh which leads to I guess did the insurance how is the insurance show up all paid >> a lot of this is on the agenda so we won't have to

005wait till next Oh, great. And uh later >> and then as a note um follow up is uh is the video available that was shared that I'm asking is the video is that video available that available to >> you going to get that in about three seconds. >> Okay. Um because my understanding is that I'd like to know at what voted on to have that put on parent square and um I went to back off the minutes and I see that it was presented at a meeting and voted on by the board to have it put on the school website. >> Okay. Um, please get your name for your name. Sorry. >> My name is Kate Pazard. I'm on the Middleton Conservation Commission and I represent Middleton and Regional Planning as a commissioner. Um, I've

006been working with Souls Smart and um, clean energy New Hampshire to upgrade the solar ordinance in the town of Middleton and an opportunity has availed itself where we can get a free feasibility study for solar for all municipal buildings. But what I need is one piece of information and I'd like to add the school to that is the electricity usage for one year the copy of the most recent bill and I'm just wondering is that possible and I would seek you Kathy. >> Oh yes. Okay. That's something. Would I be able to make an appointment with Kathy and find out, you know, if I can get that or if you want to talk and I mean, you're not going to give me an answer now. Obviously, >> what is the time frame that you need

007to have the what is the time frame you need to have the information? >> Well, the um I have till the end of the year, >> but I would like to get it in ASAP. If >> you can make sure we have your um email information, I think we can get that to you fairly quickly. >> Sure. Okay. Thank you. You're welcome. Thank you. Go ahead. >> Yes. My name is When would be the appropriate time we can bring out the a subject as far as salary for the public? >> You are open to do so now, but it's also another thing that's on the agenda. >> Okay. At this time. >> Sure. >> All right. I have some coffee here with some information like the school board comparisons of salaries from other districts that

008they're paying their bus drivers. I've been driving for Middleton now for 13 years. >> And I've addressed the issue of pay numerous times. Excuse me for not standing up, but I have a back problem. So, um, right now my salary is, I believe, 2122 an hour. They have a heavy commercial license with air brakes and uh a bus certificate and I'm transporting 45 children on a bus. um little we used to have four buses transport the children in the the uh town and it's going to run down two buses and the load of the children here we're getting more and more ch every year on the buses I've got 45 to 50 uh elementary students on my bus I've got a larger area to cover up more streets I got a limited amount of because

009we pick up our students that we went with at 2:30. We leave there and I got to have them all right back here to their homes and I try to get here by quarter past 20 3 to pick up the elementary students. Um my area is getting spread out more around. I find it a little bit more, how do you say it? I got a lot of patience, but it's tends to run a little thin because with the m middle schoolers, high schoolers, they tend to catch me. Um, a little bit of my background. I did 40 years of corrections before starting to drive the school bus. So, when I'm behind the wheel of that school bus, I make my kids sit, I make them listen, and I make them behave. Um, so while I'm

010driving and trying to also make them behave in that it gets kind of tedious. Um, I most of the districts that you're going to see on here are getting 28 $29 an hour for their drivers. the over pay scale that you might see on here. Uh those districts are at the over pay scale are offering medical dental and offering uh oh gosh, give me a minute. Disability middle not getting these kind of benefits. They used to get them, but they stopped giving those benefits to the drivers. And they also load the pay. Um, dump truck drivers, they get $29 a stock. We got a driver now. She's done the end of this week. She's going to be, she stopped the new job in May and start to pay. She's getting $26 an hour to drive

011that cost. Um, one thing that we're going on this is we got brand new drivers coming in with a bus certificate. A busificate allows a driver to be able to drive a van with in a small bus with 13 students on it. That's the limit on um the bus that I'm driving. I have to have a CDL class B uh vehicle license with air brakes to drive that. Dump truck drivers are getting $30 an hour to drive. Garbage drivers, they need $30 to drive a garbage truck. And I think my load is a lot more precious than my grandma. And I'm offering 22 or $21 and some odd cents to drive that bus and watch 45 children. I'm being honest with you. In my opinion, it ain't right. I got high schoolers that are working

012part time after school and they make $40 an hour. My grandson is one of them. And I feel that a pay raise is in need for the bus drivers. Um I'm 71 years old. I don't know how many more years I'll be driving, but once I'm done and that they're going to try to hire more drivers and offer that kind of pay, they're not going to get the the districts that have offer more pay and benefits. They're the ones that's going to get the drivers, you got to retain them. So, it's it's as you all know, bus driver has to come by. You cannot get people to drive your buses. So, I'm just voicing my opinion to you. kids. I I believe I'm worth more than $21,000 for my set to drive that bus. And

013don't get me wrong, I love my job. I love the kids. And that's why two years ago, I was offering $32 an hour to come drive a bus with our company and I turned it down because I enjoy my children. I live in the community and I love what I'm doing. But I think consideration ought to be made up pay and you got to look at a different basic scale as far as the way you got incoming drivers, new drivers get a set day and if they are uh have a bus certificate and that that's a second day you get someone who comes in with other qualifications as far as the CEO and such that a skill should go up because that's How do you get a CDL license? You go in most most people

014fail first and second time when they go in for the CDL because the state troopers are really strict on that. And you know if I duck it off go like this and you're done. You have to go back in for another retest. We got one person now going up for a third time to try to get a license. So I'm just bring this information to you. you could consider doing something for the drivers and it would be appreciated if you give us the consideration of funding. That's about all I got. Any questions? I'll be one happy. >> Thank you. Any other public input right now if need be and I'm not sure how to go about it but for one person if that's something that I have to do I will go that far and

015address it with the town and I'll go to a foundation and say everything like I said now to let the gun people know I know there's a lot of gun people I talked to already and there's support I see >> thank you just so you know that would have to be done at the school deliberately not the town >> I I don't but >> no I just want to let you know because that information does not get conveyed and then you'd be lost it would be able to do it >> I I did go to a deliberative session before in the pass and the town people voted that we should get a raise and shortly after I conferred the school board on it and they said that just because the deliberative session said that uh

016they voted on a raise for us didn't mean that they had to give it to us. We never got it. I had to push that issue again. So, I'm just, you know, that's what I'm talking any other public info right now. Okay, I'm going to move into agenda review. Does anyone have anything they need to add to the meeting? when we go through the policies. I don't know if we can maybe just take a quick second before we vote to see if there is any public input on any particular policy before we vote on it. >> I I'm fine with that, especially since we have a couple extra minutes that we didn't get to use. So, I'm totally fine that the rest the policies that we're putting in. I fig before we vote on it

017if you did want to make comments for that. >> Does anyone have any responses to >> I'm sorry. >> Sorry guys. Um so the questions that we had last month that were asked um this will be posted on the um web page tomorrow so that anybody who wants to actually see it and ready can see it. Um the first question we had was please share where to find the budget and I wrote it as budget but it's budget video and provide a copy. Um so I put the schoolboard website there and then once at that homepage you'll see options that are there. Um you're going to click on annual meeting. It will bring you to any budget information. As far as the video itself, it's on the back of the page with the link to

018the video that was posted so you can actually review the video itself. Um the second question we had was did the school board review the video in the prior um video to approve it before it was sent out. The video was not reviewed in the meeting prior to publishing. Um in January of 2025 we discussed ways to increase the attendance at deliberative session. The video was sent via email to the board after it was created. Um Heather had offered to work together with Tim to make a video. It was sent to us. We reviewed it and no one had any concerns. Um so then it was posted on the Facebook page um for Middleton New Hampshire used a discussion forum and I believe principal Bronson posted it to parent square >> without the approval of

019the board. >> We did not discuss parents square. I don't recall in the meeting and I didn't see anything in the minutes but I don't know that that was done by anyone at the board. It was just given to principal Bronson and he he I I wasn't aware that it was going there. I'm not sure if anyone else has any knowledge, but not to my knowledge. Um, the third question was, is the school nurse currently paid permium? The school nurse is currently an employee of Huggin. Um, and it's uh through contracted services to provide nursing services. Um, will the school nurse be employed by the district next year? And what will the salary be? Um, Huggin did notify us that they're not going to be extending their contract to provide nursing services. Um there's currently

020work to work on making a contract for a nurse for the next budget year and the district is working with the teachers association to develop that. The fifth one was um is the $85,000 residual before or after the war articles were deposited. Um I also $85,000 is not um an undeserved fund balance. It was revenue which is not eligible for articles. Um what was the revenue before? have that information because I wasn't able to get that. Do you know that later? >> I don't think it was miscellaneous revenue. So, it could have been rental, it could have been prior year um refunds payable amount of assets. Okay. And did was anything deposited for the work? Um and then Why were two people not paid for their voting duties? Um, privileges or those two individuals experienced

021civilian payment because they had not submit submitted the necessary paperwork. And I was not able to get clarified if that completed and that really was a question. It was more of why did it was everything was handed in at once. You saw that we didn't have to pay more. So why weren't we notified? Why did it take us coming to you guys in so long? That's the real question. >> The point of contact was Andrea who was not responding to the emails that were being sent. That's what I was >> but they have to go through the supervisor checklist for all of that. So they reached out to Andre several times which didn't respond. >> And then the last was um was it stated in the video that there was a budget crisis. The video

022stated that our schools are facing a serious budget crisis and the video was posted again on Middleton news and discussion Facebook page um and I put the link on there. So if you guys go to the actual document once it's posted tomorrow you can actually see it. So can we go back to that the residual funds left over from the 2024 budget? So that 81,52782 is not what was not spent out of the budget. That's different amount. >> It's not budget. It's not expenditures. It's revenue. It's excess revenue >> that >> the expenditures were expended >> everything. So there was no money to pay more. That's what I'm Okay. >> Yes. Oh, that's going to be the question. >> Sorry. Okay. And again, those will be posted on the website if anyone wants to review

023those um answers or have a copy that they can print out. Back to agenda review. Other than um Heather's request, any other items that need to be added to the agenda? Okay, we'll move into the acceptance of minutes. Um having said time to review the September 10th, 2025 committee meeting minutes to all in favor. Yeah, we're gonna have to do my >> Heather Nicole Kelly >> the October 8th, 2025 finance committee meetings. Same request. Are there anything that needs to be amended or changed? Okay. All in favor by roll call. Samantha Nicole, Kelly, and Rebecca as well. And then the October 8, 2025 school board meeting minutes. Have you guys had time to review those? All >> Samantha Kelly. and superintendent to work. Thank you very much. She wrote a little too. Well, I'm very

024pleased to uh introduce Daniel Harvey. So, we'll set up her presentation. Uh Danny is our new director of curriculum and um she's already uh working with staff um on grading on instructional practices on assessment um and so this is our annual presentation of um um statewide and local assessment scores. So, I'll hand it over to Danny. >> I apologize. I think I'm going to end up with my back to you guys as I clip the screen, but I will try to turn. Um, so again, thank you for having me here tonight and allowing me to share an update on Middleton's assessment results and our work around curriculum instruction and assessment for this school year. I'm going to begin with the math New Hampshire state assessment results for grades 3 through six. As you know, these

025assessments are just one way that we look at student achievement. It's a snapshot of what they can achieve on one type of assessment and our teachers use multiple data points as they look at the student holistically. So again, these are the scores from last spring for math broken down by grade level and the proficiency levels. So red is significantly below proficient, yellow is below proficient, green is proficient, and blue is above proficient. So you can see on there, third grade did relatively well with more kids on the side of being proficient or proficient with distinction. Fourth grade had some struggles last spring and then fifth and sixth were pretty comparable to each other. In this graph, the state is blue and Middleton is red. This shows the percentage of students who achieve proficient or above

026on the math assessment by grade level. Again, these are the grades for students last spring. So, it's not your current sixth graders, it's your current seventh graders, but you can see the state um average of proficient or above and then Middleton's average of proficient or above. In this chart, we compare the achievement of how different groups of students perform at each grade. So students who were in the grade in 2022 are blue, 2023 are orange, 2024 are green, and 2025 is purple. So with the school the size of Middleton, there's often going to be fluctuation in each student cohort since each group's needs are very diverse. One of the ways that I like to look at this is kind of to see how a cohort does over time. So if you look at grade five

027and look at the green, those fifth graders in 2024 were 28% proficient. And then if when they go to sixth grade, they would be purple for 2025 and they went up to 33 proficient. So you can see not only that grade piece, but you can follow the cohort and see increases in proficiency that way. This is the same information but in a linear form in case that's easier to see. Each year is at the bottom and each line is a different grade level. One of the things that we do with this data is ID's running data teams for teachers to dig into each student's performance and to make plans to support their individual growth. So, she's planning for three different times this year, and we'll talk more about that, but this basically shows you that

028there's a lot of fluctuation between each group of students. It's not like, oh, third grade's always low. It's depending on the students in that class, they're going to have different needs, which is why those data teams and the individual conversations are very important. We'll switch to the ELA assessment for grades three through six. This assessment is made up of two sections, a reading and a writing. So, I followed the same kind of format of graphs, but I'll walk you through it again. These are a results from the spring broken down by grade level. Red is significantly below proficient, yellow is below, green is proficient, and blue is above. In this graph, the state is blue and Middleton is red. This shows the percentage of students who achieve proficient or above by grade level. So, you

029can see that third and fourth grade had low proficiency. Fifth grade is close to the state average and sixth grade had strong growth um when they from when they took it as fifth graders. So even though they're a little below the state average, I did want to call out that when I looked at them historically, they actually grew their proficiency there. Here's that year-to-year comparison chart. It's the historical view. So students who were in grade 22 are blue again, 23 orange, 24 green, 25's purple. So both fifth and sixth grade actually increased proficiency from where they were the previous year. So, wanting to call that out, but again, you see the variability depending on which group of kids is in that grade at a time. So, that's why looking at the cohort growth is important,

030too, to see that we're moving students. same information but the linear format. Um, as I mentioned, this is a reading and a writing test. We know that writing is a challenging task for our students and we have a task force looking at two different explicit writing programs this year so that we can support students to be able to really show what they know. Often times when we dig into the writing results, students aren't writing what they would typically write in class. Um, they're shorter. they're not as detailed as we typically see in their classroom performance. So, two of the programs that we're looking at and piloting this year are explicit um structured learning programs that can be used with any content. So, we're hoping to be able to bring that in and really help boost

031those scores. Next, we'll briefly look at the science assessment, which is only given at fifth grade. The top bar is how the state performed. The bottom is uh Middleton. Red is significantly below proficient, yellow is below, green is proficient, and blue is above proficient. So we do have a science task force and Middleton's participating in that as well. Um we're looking at instructional resources for science in grades K through six. So last year when the CIA teams were validating science assessments, they found that one of the resources we used wasn't meeting the rigor of the standards and we were having a supplement. So we're adjusting um our assessments to really make sure we're meeting the standard and the expectation, but we're also working with the task force to see if there's a better resource for

032us to use so that teachers don't have to do so much adjustment. This is um science. So Middleton is the purple line and the state average and professional month is the blue. Uh this is a area of celebration for Middleton because the students were above the state average and performed better than the previous week in fifth grade. So last year's fifth graders actually did very well on our science assessment. So we want to make sure that we can keep that growth going. Up next is Exact Path. Our district uses Exact Path for remediation and skill building. I'll be showing you this data, but a reminder that Exac Path is not the same as the SAS test. Dr. Phillis has previously used the analogy of building blocks for Exact Path. Exact path assesses the skills students

033know which they need to have in order to do the application of skills that they're asked to do on that New Hampshire state assessment. Last year, Zap Path testing was required in the fall and the winter. The fall test gives teachers an understanding of where their incoming students are after the summer, and the platform uses the students individual results to create a personalized learning path, providing targeted support and practice in each student's specific skill weaknesses. The winter testing updates those learning paths based on any new learning and helps teachers know if they're on track in terms of instruction. Because spring is so busy with the SAS and the cadence reading benchmarking, we didn't want to over test students and take more time away from instruction. So, it was given to some students if it was

034useful for their individual plan, but it wasn't required of everyone. So, I'm not going to report out on any data. So these charts are a national percentile rank for reading grades 1 through six and it tells us how our students compare against students assessed across the nation. So in the first testing window, that fall test, we had 89 students test and you can see the distribution percentage of students in the 1st to 24th percentile, the 25th to 49th percentile, the 50th to 74th percentile, and the 75th to 99th percentile. We want the students in those darker colors because that means that they're outperforming other students at their grade level across the nation. Testing window two was that winter benchmark. 92 students were assessed and you can see the colors started to shift. So we had

035fewer students in that lowest rank, more students in that secondary rank, but then um our 75 to 99th percentile did go up. So we want to see it keep shifting that way. We'd like to get those students out of that 25th to 49th percentile and bump them up to the 50 to 74th. Here's that data from math. So, this one's a little bit more cleaner in terms of seeing that skill building. You see the first two columns are high in the fall testing window, but in that winter testing window, they're lower. And then we've got more students in the 50th or the 75th percentiles. So, they're building those skills, which is one measure of um academic success. and then other measures how they can apply those skills in more concrete tasks of the SAS assessment.

036All right, before I wrap up, I wanted to share another data point that teachers are using to support student learning. In addition to exact path, we also have a tool called Acadians. The Acadians reading composite score is a quick overall indicator of whether a student is on track with essential literacy skills. It combines several brief measures like phonics, fluency, word reading into one score that helps us identify who may need additional support to become proficient readers. Green and blue indicate that the student is on track to meet end of the year expectation. Red and yellow indicate a student might need additional support in a skill. teachers can dig into that skill and provide targeted support to meet their needs in multiple groups that I mentioned earlier. This slide shows our current K to6 indicators that

037were reviewed at data meetings. So to give you the nice visual, I couldn't use last year's data. I had to use this year's data, but it there's a another reason I wanted to share it too. Um while last year's spring fourth grade state assessment, if you'll remember that one with all those numbers in correctly, the fourth grade state assessment was only 16% of students reaching proficiency. But we use multiple data points to provide a more complete picture of student learning. this fall as fifth graders, that same cohort performed noticeably stronger on the Acadian reading assessment, suggesting that their skill development is better than what that single state test indicated. Taken together, these measures give us more balanced understanding of student progress and needs. So this um just a little more context for you, it goes

038from kindergarten, first grade, second grade, third grade on the top row, and then fourth, fifth, and sixth on the bottom. But I just wanted to highlight that it's why we look at lots of data points, not just one. So how does all this data inform our work this year? IBS facilitated data team meetings and in addition to the fall benchmark data like a cadence and exact path, the upper grades also looked at the breakdown of how students scored in writing on the SAS or in writing in particular. All of this data is used by teachers to target instruction for students at grade level as a whole and for needed interventions and differentiation. For example, this fourth this year's fourth graders struggled with their conventions in writing last spring. So, the team will keep an eye

039on their progress those skills over the course of this year. Middleton creates flexible and dynamic groupings based on the needs seen at data team. There's some pushing support and some pull out support. so that students are able to work on the skills that are needed. This fall, Middleton was included in our building and learn which is our math professional development that our Governor Wentworth Regional School District math coaches set up. Teachers were able to go and observe another teacher during a math lesson and they often hosted a teacher during one of their math lessons. In December, once everyone's had a chance for an observation, they will meet as a grade level to debrief the visits and the instructional practices that they saw in action. They will have time for planning with other teachers at the

040same grade level. This embedded professional development is helping to share the expertise of teachers to share practices that work well for their grade level. Our monthly CIA meetings for K to6 are focused on social studies this year, articulating what is proficient by creating task neutral rubrics for each competency. This allows teachers to have a common understanding of what is expected for students to be able to demonstrate while still allowing them freedom to design assessments and learning experiences that will work for their class. Each meeting also starts with a time for them to share practice, a tool, or an assessment with their colleagues. And although we're starting with social studies, that work will expand to other subjects in future years. Um, as I mentioned, we have two um task force currently going on, the science task

041force and the writing task force. The writing task force is piloting two different writing programs and we are also looking at pulling together a language arts task force for grades three through six. So Kina 2 is very strong with their work in IMSE and those students haven't reached third grade yet. So we're not seeing that in the same assessment results, but we want to look at how we can increase and build that work that we have at the K to2 level into three to six for comprehension and continued word and language development. So now that students are readers, how do we help them with their comprehension? That is it. If there's questions, I'm happy to answer them, but I know I tossed a lot at you, too. Um, I will put this on your website.

042I will get the slides up so that you can also look at it, but I wanted to make sure I oriented you to it tonight. >> So, it sounds like there is a plan to address the deficiencies that we are seeing and retention because as you start the year, it looks like they started off a little weaker and if that as the year goes on. >> Y >> um when would you think would be a good time to have them come back and report on how they're doing? >> So, we can certainly come back after the midyear data and give you an update on that if that's something that the board is interested in. Um I has those data team set up already for January. So we could reflect between her and I can come

043and share some of what's going on to address what we're seeing with the data. >> I would question March or probably April to collect the data. >> So we'll have your data in January. So we can probably talk in February if you have time. Could you give me an update? I mean, it won't be as this. >> I just want everyone to have an idea as to when >> we'll aim for March and always. >> Thank you. Thank you. The spotlight is our main. All right. Uh thank you so much for that presentation. We look forward to information and we that's our annual presentation uh comes at this board meeting every year. Uh so next I'll hand it over to I for the Middleton Elementary School update. Thank you and hello everyone. Um October and

044early November have been very busy at NES. Um we completed our third fire of the year. very proud of our enhanced safety protocols um in ensuring both accountability, accuracy, and speed. And we have the fire department on site for that. Um as Danny just referenced, intervention groups are in full swing. Our reading specialist is meeting with many kids per grade level to help students make gains in reading, both pushing in and pulling out some small groups, as well as interventions that are happening within the classroom by our classroom teachers. Haven visited our school this month teaching students about personal boundaries, personal space through puppets in our younger grades. They'll visit um our older grades a little bit later in the month. Haven visits each year and their presentations are something that students really look forward

045to. I'm really excited about this and as was mentioned earlier, I had the opportunity um this week to meet with Eagle Scout Drew Filer. On Monday, he completed his Eagle Scout project in restoring the path between our town offices and the school. Drew shared that the work came together nicely and he learned many lessons about managing the project. He learned about ground hornets and about how the picture in your brain doesn't always line up with what other people are thinking and picturing. Um he worked on I believe two culverts, moved a slab at the beginning of the path by the town offices with permission. He wanted me to make sure everyone knew. um installed or updated a bench um and did a whole bunch of grading and ground work and branch work to make the

046project complete. I believe there are signs at both ends. There's certainly a sign at our end. Um his project came in under budget and thanks to many of those donations that he solicited and he donated as he is required to with his Eagle Scout project, the extra comes back to us to maintain that trail. Um, so we'll be earmarking that for upkeep and maintenance and we are so thankful that he had a chance to do this project. So, thank you schoolboard for approving it. Um, I will be sending out a photo of him by the trail in our next newsletter. So, hopefully that can get shared around so people can can see what great work he did. Um, we also kicked off our helpful herds this month with students in grades five and six with

047a 2.5 or better being eligible to join our herds. These are kind of an internal student leadership position where kids find ways to be helpful throughout the school. And you heard from Mrs. Lugo about how the herds had a hand in our Veterans Day assembly today. Um, as you heard from her, this might have been our first Veterans Day assembly at Milton Elementary School and it was led by our kindergarten class. That was today. Um, you heard from the teacher and a wonderful song earlier in the evening. We're hopeful to continue to grow this assembly and involve more students and involve more community members as the years go on. So, we are so thankful to Mrs. Luggo, her class, and to our helpful holders. We also just completed our conferences. It was wonderful to have

048families in the building to check in on student progress. And I want to shout out and thank our alpaca house PTA for coordinating lunch for our teachers this year. That was a real treat for them um to be able to have a meal with them during the long days of conferences. And then I think this is my final piece. I'm sorry this was so long. Um I would like to mention that we have alpaca pals PTA meeting on Wednesday here at NS at 5:30. We're looking forward to our first dance of the year. More information coming soon and our collaborative Christmas time event. Our school concert's also coming up just after our next school board meeting and we're very excited for all of these events. And thank you all. Thank you so much. report means

049many wonderful things going on. So, thank you. Okay, next school calendar. So, just an update for the board regarding the 2026 2027 school calendar. Uh we hope to bring it early to you this month. However, we have information that the buildings will be needed um for um three days next year for voting. The first of which is September 8th. Uh that is the Tuesday after Labor Day. So, we need to take a look at that again. Uh we had to, you know, typically we bring it to Governor Wworth and then we bring um Middleton's the next week so that you can make decisions based on where your 7th through 12 are going. Uh so we have to go back to them and then come to you. So we'll be doing that in December trying to

050work around the first day of voting next year. So thank you for your patience with that. And then the next item on the agenda is the school care assessment. Um as we have mentioned before um the school care assessment is an assessment for member districts in the risk pool um to recoup their uh reserve funds. Um so we have shared with you that um as of the end of the fiscal year June 30th 2025 um we had a revenue balance of 81,527 right uh revenue of $81,52782. So this amount represents an overage of revenue. None of this represents the unspent amount of the operating budget. So um our recommendation is to use uh revenue in order to we have permission from the commissioner. She gave permission to school districts to use whether it's unreserved fund

051balance or revenue from the previous year. Um so our recommendation would be to um use revenue to pay I believe it's um 69,000 um for the school care assessment. So, we would um take any questions and ask for your action. >> So, by using that money, we're not doing anything that's going to impact the tax status for the sheriff. It wouldn't increase taxes for the residents. It would be taking out money that we were with revenue from other things. >> That's right. >> I'll make the motion. >> Do I have a second or something? Okay. All in favor? >> No, it just saves us. >> Exactly. >> We get a reduced amount, >> right? We don't have that. there would be an interest if you put it off after each month. >> Perfect. Thank you.

052>> And then lastly in this section are the financial reports for the past month and those are included if you have any questions for us. Yeah, along with the memo that went along with the financial summary, there really is nothing changing, nothing new, nothing um nothing to note. Um expenditures are running uh as usual every two weeks. Nothing unexpected. No news of good news is what I like to say. >> My mom said that too. >> Any questions for Kathy? Okay, thank you. That's the end of the superintendent report. So, as Dave brought up during public input, um, school bus driver, um, pay is something that I wanted to discuss. So, I did look up the New Hampshire state requirement to be a bus driver. Um, the driver of school bus in New Hampshire, you

053must be at least 18 years old. You have a valid driver's license for at least two years. You have to obtain a commercial driver's license or CDL with an S for school bus and a P for passenger endorsement. Um, you have to you'll also need a separate school bus certificate, pass a criminal background check, a physical exam, a medical card, and complete specialized training and written exam. So, that's the minimum requirement to drive a full set bus in the state of New Hampshire for schools. Um, I did pull up pay scales um for the area. I got information from the district and the bus company. So in April 2023, the bus driver wage was increased from 1575 to622 per hour to a flat $20 per hour. Uh the $20 per hour wage was in effect

054for the 2023 2024 school year and then the wage increase to 2122 for 2526 um school year. Governor Wet has um a step plan for their bus drivers. So they have a four-step salary schedule based on your experience. So step one is 20 uh $2085. Step two is $21.35. Step three is 21.85 and then step four is 2235. They did give a disclosure that there are drivers that are kind of grand covered out of that. So the wages are some of them are higher than that, but that is their actual inface step scale for the bus drivers. And then I kind of went through the area and pulled a few um there's a few rubble towns uh Wakefield and uh Milton that and Barnes I think that don't actually have their own buses. They hire

055companies that do that. Um Farmington's re the most recent that I could find which was from a while ago and no one answered when I called was um 1906 an hour and I I doubt that that's probably still accurate but that was the most recent that I could. Um Milton is contracted with Butler's West Service and their They said it was $24. Wakefield was 26 to 29 and their contracted with first student. Um, and I believe Rochester used for student as well. They had the same um bus rates. And then Barkstead it said was 24 and they were part-time contractor with Butlers as well. Um, so I do think it seems like there's some of a discrepancy with the local wages and I do think it might be a good idea especially where we're part

056of another district that's doing a step scale to maybe contemplate setting up this type scale for a bus driver. So that those that do have more experience are making a little bit more than someone who's just coming out of date. And my proposal would be to change the rates of just the full size bus drivers for right now. I think it seems like we're pretty competitive for the the ones that are driving the vans. >> The governor went hard as the bus drivers or is that part of a collective bargaining agreement? >> Yes. >> So that's the steps came from there. So we would be looking to do this outside of a bargaining structure. >> Yes. Okay. Just want to make sure I understood I from what I think they had the steps program before

057they did their parking agreement. >> They did not. They had a zero. >> Okay. I that is correct. I apologize. >> I think it would make sense rather than us setting what can happen to sit down with the drivers and like we could have a sub committee that talks about what they're looking for um and kind of identifying the needs and come up with plan. >> How can we do that? Because my concern is the try to get into the street budget. >> Yeah. >> The proposal we had would have increased the rate to what So about your thought process to do the 3% for this year and then work towards setting up um a steps planner with >> I'm trying to course um I I think lots of Um, I think since it is

058part of the overall budget, I think we should pause this part of the conversation until we talk about the overall budget and back into question. So, the current background we through all that. >> Yes. >> Anything else? >> So, it sounds like we are looking to make a separate committee. So, we would need to vote to make that committee. >> So, That's just part of it. So, >> okay. So, I >> have to vote, right? >> Um, so I proposed to set up a committee of two board members, myself and Heather, to work on um building a bus plan for our riders um and with reviewing pay rates um to determine appropriate changes that need to be made in pay scales. You think that's not making a motion for a head of myself to sit

059on a um committee for the school on behalf of the school board like for reviewing the bus drivers current pay rates and possibly making changes to steps. >> Do you want to change that? Feel free. I would just alter that to be a committee to discuss bus driver. >> Okay. Take >> Okay. Motion made to get a second. >> All in favor? Um, the academic affairs committee. >> Um, okay. So, we have we are bringing some uh policies to the board for a second read today. Um, So I would start with the the policies that we are recommending to adopt and then we will um sorry each individual one or all of those as you can unless unless people want >> okay so for the policies that we are recommending for adoption we have ACF

060which is the food and nutrition services anti-discrimination and civil rights complaints policy. Uh, ACN, nursing mothers accommodation. EDC, chemical safety and chemical hygiene plan. IH extended learning opportunities. IHI alternative learning plans. I J instructional resources and instructional resources plan. IKFG career exploration readiness pathways and credentials. IMBA remote learning. JLCK physical and emotional well-being of students and JLA supervision of students. Maybe have anything that you would like to discuss about the policies for adoption. Um if not um oh does anybody in the public have any comments about any of the policies if you had a chance to read them? >> We were provided them. They are available online. >> Was it changes made to the occurren? >> Yes. Most of them were um most of them were like statewide policies that they were like you have

061to have it in this and the polic These came from did we pull them from this area or were they already in place? >> So they were pulled from the schoolboard association and then did we make changes to them or did you figure out mostly what that was there? >> Um we had questions about some of the policies um just you know how relevance they are to the elementary school students. Um there >> thank you guys for working on that. There were definitely some where we were like at an elementary school because we really needed like yeah because um so if there are no questions um do we have a motion to adopt a motion to adopt? >> Do we anticipate all in >> favor? Um the next set of policies um to for second

062read are the ones that we are recommending to reaffirm. So we have ACA harassment and sexual harassment of students. ACA harassment and sexual harassment of school employees. Does anyone have any comments about any of those? If there are no questions or anybody in favor um okay so the next set of policies we are recommending for revision um for the second read we have AC nondiscrimination equal opportunity ACA US Department of Agriculture non-discrimination statement ACE procedural safeguards non-discrim sorry discrimination on the basis of disability IHCA summer activities IB homework daily physical activity JIC student conduct and JLCF wellness does anybody have any questions about those anybody from the public um were any changes made to those policies from what was presented to us but I don't think okay and then so last thing we reviewed another

063set of policies today that we will bring to the December 10th meeting for April Thank you guys very much. Next up, you get the vote on the second set of um recommendations. >> Yeah, there were three sets. >> Yes. >> Okay. Thank you very much. While we get set up for this week's part of the press meeting, so this is the finance committee update. Tether and Nicole are on that committee. Um, You're just starting No, >> we'll have more. >> Yeah, we just need some edits. So, we'll definitely be posting that. Okay. So the budget process has been underway for a few months. What goes on at the building level is that and this is true for all of our schools, certainly Middleton, but all of our schools where the principal works with um the

064teachers, hears about the needs of the school and puts some proposals together. By the way, my name is Caroline Erillian, superintendent for Governor Wentworth Regional School District and for H Middleton School District. So, the principal works with her staff, brings some proposals forward, um, and then sits down with the business administrator and myself, the superintendent, and we go through the budget proposal very carefully. Um, and so in this timeline, tonight is the first time that we are sharing this with the school board. So, this is called the preliminary budget review. We're sharing it with the school board. There's no action for the board tonight um because it's the first review. The next review will be at the town budget community meeting which is Monday night. We'll give a very similar presentation on Monday night. And

065then um with that feedback, we'll present again to the school board at the December 10th meeting. and that's when the board will adopt it if it's ready or it will um push it to January if that's when we will need more time. Any questions so far? So, overview of the major budget drivers. Thank you. The majority of the increases are contractual obligations. special education tuition, contracted services, and special education transportation. This is a big number. It's $775,000 of increases. If we looked at special education alone of increases, that would be 13% on its own. Everything else is 6.8%. So everything else includes we have a brand new teacher association. We have a brand new contract the first year that was approved by the voters is $50,750. Okay. Um we're currently in year one of that

066contract and next year will be year two. The SAU services that's a formula that formula is uh in that's the increase for the SAU services. The 10-year contract with Gartner Renler was 56,000. We can talk about that what that includes if you like. The tuition for students grades 7 through 12 is um also increasing $108,000 $108,000. The reason that is increasing to that amount is that next year is the first year of a 5-year phasing plan to the per people amount. So you have a 10-year contract for tuition for grades 7 through 12. And I have those numbers. Currently 38 students in middle school, 58 students in high school. So it's a lot of kids in 7 through 12. How many? You have 38 kids in middle school and 58 in high school. These are

067projected for next year. 38 middle and 58 in high school. This year is the first year of a 10-year contract for tuition. Okay. Now this year they delayed the increase a year. They said, "We're not going to increase you just the usual formula for year one, but over the next five years, it's a phase in to get to the per pupil amount. Middleton has been charged a lower amount for since it opened." Um, and I can tell you from the perspective from the governor, Wentworth Regional School District, they have memorandums of understanding. They have contracts with two other outside districts with Wakefield and with Freedom and also if there are any other students who want to tuition into those schools, they're requiring them to pay the per people amount. So, but because Middleton has had,

068you know, contracting for services all this time, they didn't want to just instantly raise exit for people in one year. So, it's a five-year phase in plan to get to the per people amount. Okay. So, next year will be year one of that and that explains that increase $180,000. Now, the nurse position is I'm just going over the major budget drivers. Okay. The nurse position, you may have heard uh our contract with Huggin is ending this year. So Huggin Hospital provided services, nursing services for us, all of our schools, Middleton included. And um they came to us last two years ago and said, "This is not fiscally uh feasible for us anymore. We're ending with you." We said, "Okay, that's ending." Um so that means we have to hire our own nurses. And it costs

069a little more to hire our own nurses. Um, so there's more on that later because we had to they're part of the CBA. We met with the Middleton Education Association. It's always been part of the CBA. They're recognized in the first page of the CBA, but because we've been contracting um we've had that contract, but since that's ending now, we have to get a nurse and it's part of the CBA. There's an addendum in the CBA on the very last page that says both parties will meet in the fall of 2025, which happened last week, and the board will discuss that in nonpublic um to decide on what your salary should be. We have um estimated, so this isn't confirmed yet, but we have estimated that it will be an increase of $38,000. That would

070be um in a separate warrant article, but that's pending depending on the board's decision. >> I would say so. Yes. Insurance. >> Health insurance. Good segue. Um the health insurance, school care, it's actually not 17% that's actually in those documents that you have because we were just informed yesterday by The increase is 9.4%. So that is very good news. Okay, moving right along. Wage overview. So you'll see in that document, if you wanted to follow along, there are the subtotal at the bottom when you see it in all caps, that is um on the on the actual finance page. That is the end of the category. So the all caps is the subtotal for that category. The first category is regular programs, regular education. So what is included in here? It's all the teachers wages

071and the substitutes. Um this section also includes the 7 through 12 tuition. Now there are wages in different parts of this document. The Paris technology custodial and bus drivers they're in later sections. Okay. Food service is not in this document because it's self sustaining. It's one site supervisor and one assistant. Non-union staff in Paris. We included a 3.3% increase in this document, but that does not need to be um the final increase. That's up to the school board. >> Okay. >> And that 3.3 is what? >> 3.3 is the cost of living estimated for this region. >> So where did that come from? From the last meeting, we asked we asked the two figures at the last meeting to come back to us. related to that CPI for the northeast. >> Yes. For the regional

072region. Yes. Thank you. >> Okay. So, let's get more specific. Function 1100 regular programs on page one. As I mentioned, it covers teacher and substitute wages and benefits where it says tuition regular. That's the year one of a five-year phasing plan toward for people cost of government for students. 7 through 12, 38 middle, 58 high. The increase is 108,2714 based on student projection next year. >> This is on page one. >> Count currently for the high school is I believe 17 more. So we're dropping down 58. Are tuition that much higher this year? >> You're phasing in per pupil. >> Yes, you're phasing in per pupil over five years. >> Well, in five years, that would be something I don't know now, but the per people now can look at that. Is this the is

073this going to be what's in this budget? >> Yes. So in this budget right now the letters went to the chair from the agreement that I'll just read straight from it. So for the based on the DOE 25 to 2025, the middle school DOE uh cost per pupil at Governor Martin was $26,1342 and the phase in for those middle school students is $17,752.78. >> Wow. >> No 17 is what's being used the previous Yeah. the c the current year that we're in right now, I believe the tuition rate for middle school and high school is a straight 14,000 something. >> So it's an increase of a few thousand. The cost per pupil for the Kingswood Regional High School students based on the DOE 25 from this past year is 25,421. So that makes the phase

074in for the high school students for um Middleton 17,57453. Those are the tuition rates for middle school and high school for middle school. Okay. So also on page one, supplies are double funded. Workbooks slight increase half funded this year and increase in replacement furniture uh by $2,000 to stay on our chair replacement cycle. Okay, let's talk about special education. It's function 1200. This is on page two. You'll see their wages here as well. three full-time special education teachers plus a half-time preschool. These are in the CPA, so they're subject to increase. We had to hire two new pair professionals this year for student need. Um, so pair professionals are all in special education. Contracted in professional services include speech and language, occupational therapy, physical therapy, behavioral and support. Uh you'll see two other lines, tuition-leas

075and tuition private. These have increased due to an increase in services needed for students at the middle and high school as well as an increase in out of district placements. Any questions for the board? >> Um, are the new parents students specific or are they specific to the fact that there's more need? >> It's one ones. They're one ones. Thank you for the question. So then page three and the top of page four, guidance and health services. So the guidance counselor, more wages, she has her own section because it's just guidance our counselor. She's included in the CBA. You can also see the nurse salary. Um, so when you see health services in parenthesis, that means it's subtracted from the budget. So that's a contracted service. The hugging service is subtracted and is shifted to

076payroll. Transition to in-house nurse management, then the increase will need to be in a separate loan article. So although there is an increase, we're decreasing by that HUD's contract. Next is improvement of instruction. This is page four, top of page five. Again, the the section the subtotal is actually at the bottom of the section in all caps. So, the staff development you see there for $11,000, that's the professional development that was approved in the teachers contract. Um, there's 8,000 that's part of the principal's contract and there's $0 in travel because that is not part of the teachers contracts. You'll also see as far as wages the top of page five, that's a new section for educational media services. That is the part-time library media specialist that we're required to have. and in the CDA. Just

077stop me if anybody has questions. My goal here tonight, I do have a question. The media specialist is not currently correct. >> It's not currently available. So the insurance and wages is estimated how >> it's estimated on a half time teacher >> family plan >> family both family plan for health and dental to to show the maximum um liability for her teachers >> and the same for nurse >> correct >> thank you special >> yes So if they're half time that time doesn't get benefits teachers and the CPA do >> they pay half of it >> if they choose >> they pay half the premium if they choose to take the other half then they pay identified in CPA Okay. Administrative and support services. This is the bottom of page five. So the where it

078says schoolboard services, that's the SAU contract. That's a formuladriven increase. Uh the principal's office is the principal and the administrative assistant. Those are non-UN positions. So we calculated 3.3% column dues and fees is the principal association membership and then fiscal services also on page six I believe are guiding fees $3,000 the goal of tonight and you know some may not um be pleased with these numbers but the goal is to explain them as much as possible so people can at least have the opportunity to ask questions and understand. So on page seven is operations and maintenance. Custodial staff, two hourly employees, we calculated 3.3%. Repairs and maintenance. We're requesting $15,000 here, up from $12,000. This building is uh experiencing some wear and tear. I can share that. Uh, so this year we budgeted 12,000 and

079we've already spent 10,400 and it's only November. So that's what we're requesting a little more in that line. I also want to point out the service agreements, the building service agreements line that includes many contracts. It includes um contracts for fire locks, for service for the boiler, uh JP pest, security, uh required annual water testing, heating, all of that lives in that line. I want to mention the electricity. This is the last year of a three-year locked in rate with the consortium. Uh we'll be rebidding on that this spring as well for another locked in rate. Next is transportation and the technology that's on page eight. More wages regular transportation three bus drivers. We calculated a 3.3% increase but the committee may you know decide what they'd like to do. Also on that page is

080special education transportation. So we do have in-house uh bus drivers who do some of that but sometimes there's transportations that that is needed and we don't have a bus driver for it. So then we have to contract. Sometimes Middleton can contract with Governor Wworth and that's a better rate than going all the way out to contract. Um but sometimes we have to um contract with private companies as well. Also on that page is technology services. Um we are requesting uh a small increase there so that we can have access to our technology staff during the summer. Custodians technology do so much work over the summer to reprogram to network to upgrade our services. Um so that is that is next. Next debt service. So you'll see on the next page bond redemption paid annually to

081the New Hampshire Municipal Bond Bank. I just want to bring to your attention that um we do have trust balances. Uh we prefer not to come to the board to request um uh a hearing to dip into these balances. However, in a default budget that is a higher likelihood. So I did want to provide you that information. Um the next slide is trust fund balances. So as of last June maybe slightly different today the trust balances for Middleton you can see there special ed $372,242.99. The bus fund is $144,000210. Uh technology is $62,61.51. Construction and repairs is $270,92.11. And then there's the total of all of our trust funds. So that is a review of the entire proposed budget. Uh the next piece are warrant articles of course. So the budget would be one horn

082article. Um this is what we proposed and what we had on the ballot last year, what the board uh promoted and had on the board last year. So we had uh maintenance capital reserve to um add 75,000 special capital reserve 7,000 the bus capital reserve 5,000 and then we also have a special education case manager which is a DBT diagnostic prescriptive teacher for grades 7 through 12. Um and that would be the amount of the warrant that would be the salary and benefits. That warrant article failed last year. We would be advocating that again to offset uh special education costs. Uh that person could serve some of the LEA uh services and um other services for specialized instruction for kids at the middle school and in school. Do you know how much it would reduce

083that line item under the budget if we had that position? So we currently reduced it. If so, if this is not approved, we we So what we're trying to do is phase in the special ed costs as well. Um so if we don't have this we would have to uh charge more for LEA. So the LEA is the case manager line. >> So I'd like to see a budget that shows what that would be without this position. >> Okay. >> Are we currently being anything for LA services? Um there's some there's some in there for LEA, the tuition LEA. Um however, when there's one person who's dedicated to Middleton, you know, that person is case managing, that person is delivering instruction. Um so it's not exactly a you know one for one tradeoff. Um but

084that's something we could build some of this for. >> That's right. That's right. >> Last year was the board for 6 through 12. >> It was 6 through 12 last year. Yeah. Trying to um this year offset the uh you know considering the tuition contract, considering the services for 7 through 12. Um I think we wanted to focus on 7 through 12 instead. Uh last year we had the idea to do 6 through 12 um so that kids here could kind of you know have a transition with the same case manager and then they would you know it wouldn't be like a cliff. Um but in looking at the costs for 7 through 12 in talking with the special education staff they said we should keep it at 7 through 12 but it's still an

085assignment. It's up for discussion. If the numbers changed a little bit you know they could look at that. So the 105 the special ed case manager for 17 12 this is to help because of the tuition grade that we're going up to. So basically when we get to full tuition is that job going to be eliminated. We are no longer going to have to pay that. That doesn't sound like it kind of sounds like five years paying full tuition that position. >> They're billing for the special education services necessary. So they're not including it in that per capable tuition rate. >> No, no, but at the end of the five years, we're going to pay full tuition plus the billing for that because my understanding is what you're saying is because of the because we're

086grading up. So we're not paying the full tuition each year. But at the end of the five years when we are paying full tuition, we're going to still pay the full tuition along with the billing of this of this. >> Right. But right now, we're paying the tuition, right? And then they're billing us separately for it >> for special education. >> When we get to the full tuition so we got to the full tuition they would be building us separately for special education. So we get to like the 27 what 20 what was it per right now? >> Okay. So it would be 26,000 per pupil plus special education. Right now >> the per pupil rate is for a pupil that assumes zero special education services. I I understand that. But the way it's being

087presented is we're doing this 105 because we're getting the grade because we're grading them. So we're not paying full tuition rate each year. No, they're just saying that they're it's completely separate. So they're saying like we're being graded up in your tuition per pupil. The special education services are extra. So right now we're paying 15,000 per pupil plus the special education. So if we were paying the the full tuition rate, we'd still be paying the plus. They're just saying rather than paying the plus and billing separately to have one teacher that that focuses on that population of students. So yeah, it's not going no matter what it's not going away. >> Look on page two. The other LEAs for for that line item tuition went from 172,000 last year to 270,000 proposed for next year

088which is why I said okay how much is that going to increase and if we put this position what is that going to save us and do to that particular line item? That's what I wanted to know. Any other questions? >> I think I mean I would like to discuss the special education program because of that is does it I would I would encourage us to include the sixth grade only because it helps in that bridge to go to middle school. >> So the um the budget and the war articles um that's certainly something for the board to discuss. Um and um you know we'll be bringing this to the budget committee Monday and then um so more opportunity to discuss and then in December um we can review this again and the board can

089then vote on how you want to move forward. Any other questions? I so the superintendent services that we pay for it is a percentage of Kingswood's budget. Correct. >> No, it it is the cost of the SAU services. If you read the agreement, it states what the calculation is. It's based on the expenditures of the SA the increase from year over year. So I take the actual expenditures from FY24 and Y25 has increase from one is what is the accepted increase for SA services. So now services went up. >> Yes, it did. So why did it go up if you default budget should not receive any expenditures that has nothing to do with the budget. It has to do with the FY24 and FY25 and FY26 default. And the contract states that the rates for

090next year's SA services are based on increase from the expenditures at the SAU from 24 to 25. We haven't hit 26 yet. So next year when we're talking right now, we're in a default budget. So therefore, there might be a slowdown of expenditures or a decrease of expend. So just so I understand this correctly, we're looking for a 20.77% increase to the budget. So that's coming in roughly about $3 to $4 on the tax rate. I think it's important to note that a large majority of that over 13% of that is special education costs which are completely out of our control. And we have a we have a uh capital reserve fund that we could probably potentially pull from it to kind of help offset that increase maybe over the next year or two which

091is why that money so that we would have that. Um and I guess I guess the question I have is like we're just all blindsided by special education. just saw happen this year. >> You look at the legal line I think for special education from last year, it did go up significantly and extremely over budget. It went up. Why >> went up? >> Well, legalization special education >> legal um services, placement, transportation can be $500 to $600 a day. Um the costs have I was just in a meeting today with uh legislators and superintendents um around the Lakes region talking about the increase in special education costs and all the superintendents were were talking about that. They were trying to tell us, oh it's it's something else. You know what what are you trying to

092do with the schools? You're hiring too many people. That is not the reason for the costs that have increased around the state. it is this special education costs. So there's no regulation or cap on special education transportation uh contracted services companies around the state. They increase by 5% every year at a minimum and uh you know we're not in a populated area where we have a lot to shop from. So when a student's IDP has services we absolutely have to contract. Sometimes we even have to contract for a whole position. Sometimes we have to even contract for a whole pair professional. If we can't hire them, if we don't fill positions, we have to hire someone and it literally will cost three times as much. So, it's essential that we're filling, you know, these legally

093required services. Um, but there I'm hopeful that we can work on this with the legislature as far as regulating the contracted services. Um, but it's everywhere. It's everywhere. Yeah, I was wondering what I use for >> Oh, I'm sorry. Individual education plan. >> I'm sorry. >> Individual education plan. >> So, when you qualify for special education, you get a >> and ramification if you don't provide services for a student that has an identified need on their IE is >> uh legal action legally required. Yeah. The district is responsible for special education and to provide education for all students with disabilities and all students who live in your town. So I guess what is the curriculum that is being used because it seems as though it's not working looking at the test scores um looking at

094everything um it seems as though whatever is going on is not working. And then if our special our IDP and special ed services are going up, um I don't know, everything needs to be readressed. It's it's probably not a good news for me to come to today because seeing everything that I'm seeing um and seeing huge jumps in the budget and then seeing the the very disheartening test scores. Um this is like the foundation for these kids and I mean, if they're struggling now here and they're going over to a much larger environment, what's happening to them and are they? Um, so I I mean I think whatever whatever's going on fairly is not working and I think that the board needs to sit back and assess things. Um, also all of the contracted lines,

095how many bids have gone out and have reassessed and rebided with everybody to renegotiate because you you got to find the money somewhere and you can't kill the taxpayers. >> That's something we can bring to the budget committee member. As a budget committee member, I would recommend that you go back and I would like to see at least three bids for everything. Contract services. >> No, I'm not. No, I'm talking about you know, oh the, you know, your electricity. Well, that's that's a fixed line because it's a contracted line. you know, this snowplow guy, you know, that's a contract of however much. It's all of those little things, they add up quite a bit, especially when it's just easy to say, "Oh, yeah, we like your snowplowing services. We'll keep you another year, even though

096they might go up 15%." versus going and putting it out to bid. And I I really do believe that when you put everything back up to bid every year, the people that you have, they need to stay competitive and not stay comfortable because it's easy for them to just say, "Well, they've been with us for 10 years. They're not going to go anywhere. They like us." >> What is our current practice when we're having contracts that are coming to an end? >> So, the consortium for the um we had two different electric companies. Um, I think you might remember when Scott Ferguson was on the board and the board um was presented both um electric um consortium bids. Um they went with so there was there was two for three years. They went with a

097lower bid. Um snow plowing would go out to bid and we bid it for three years because it takes time and effort to go out to bid and obviously the snowplow um companies want some stability too. Um, and I'm pleased to say that the gentleman that lives here in town, um, has gotten the bid two times in a row for three-year contract, Sebastian, um, septic, because he does in the winter time the summertime stuff. Um, I want to say the waste management, we've tried to go out to bid and we only receive one bid because other companies will not come to Benson. Just like the water situation, we had to um find a company that would supply water bubblers until the water filtration system was taken care of. And we found a a really good

098price through Governor Health with Governor Wentworth in the SAU office, but the company said we won't deliver to Middleton. So, what we're doing is we're making due and having it delivered to our SAU office and having one of the buses deliver it and take the empties back once a week. So, we're doing what we possibly can by going out to bid. The HVAC, um the system, the buyer system, we go out to bid. Zach will go out to bid or get quotes from other companies. Some of them will quote us and some of them are astronomical. Those don't like to lock in for multiple year contracts. They like to go one year at a time. So everywhere we can we we go out to not bid but we we we negotiate price at our SAU

099office through Governor Wentworth for paper pricing. Our our accounts payable cl um purchasing agent is phenomenal and she goes around and she works the different vendors for large ticket items, you know, multiple rings, multiple cases, even pallets of of paper. So, we're we're doing what we can. We're in a five-year contract with our copers. We we we're part of a consortium with the copers where they go out to bid with five different SAU offices with a total of God, I can't even remember, millions of copies per year by using all of those school districts um going out to bid at once. So, we are really reaping what we can where we can. Case, I just had a question for clarification. So each each contract varies year to year depending upon the vendors and who you're

100dealing with some from one year to up to five years >> usually. Is that what I'm Is that what I'm hearing? >> Okay. Thank you. So going off that, I know at the last meeting you talked about the school cares. I think there was the discussion of reaching out um to the teachers contract, the teachers union about um potentially looking at someone else besides school cares. Did that move forward anyway? >> So there was a um non-public meeting last week that the board needs to review and public but that was one of the topics. So right now we >> right now all we can say is that the quote for school care went from 16% increase down to 9.4 which we can update this budget to show less. >> Absolutely. So that I guess so

101that becomes acceptable for you know but so I guess what one of the other things that I might recommend or suggest out there is um so like the company I work for and I don't know if it's in the contract for the teachers as such and whatnot is the company I work for if my husband can get insurance through his employer I can't cover him I can't even cover him separately so error is very agree anything else No, but I'm just saying so these are these are options that I'm just saying that for me because in two years we're going to negotiate the next. >> Yeah. Well, I think certainly when you talk a million dollar increase when the town is stuck at a 2% tax cap, which we are 2% on a, you know,

102$2 million budget. So we get stuck at eight $40,000. $40,000 that doesn't even cover a teacher salary here, but that's what we have to cover all of our employees in town and any other things that we need to increase our budget line as well. So, we might be looking at tax. >> Any other questions? Okay, thank you very much. Okay. And then next is our community relations up. Um so the again the public input questions that we had responses to will be posted um tomorrow on the um website. >> Okay. Um, so we did make some changes to the schoolboard site as well as the Middleton elementary school site. So when you visit the Middletown Elementary School site, you're going to see in the top menu bar, it says schoolboard. You go through it, there's

103a little drop down minutes, a couple other things I can't quite remember off the top of my head, but it'll take you to the schoolboard site directly. Um, so easy to find schoolboard site hopefully. Um and then in addition to that, we've just made some minor adjustments to the website so far. Um we've added the schoolboard um collective email to the um to the address section so it's easy to find for everybody instead of trying to you know hunt down individuals. You can you know email one one email and get all of us so that whoever is available first can get back to you. Um, in addition to that, if anybody does have any suggestions because I've heard that it is difficult to navigate the school board site, please feel free to email or um,

104contact us and we're happy to um, you know, try to figure out what we can do to make it better. Thank you. Perfect. And then moving into closing activities, uh, planning. So, upcoming dates, no school for Thanksgiving recess, November 26 through 28th. Uh, the finance committee and I think just the finance committee uh will be meeting at 5:00 prior to the next school board meeting at 6:00 on December 10th. And then the Middleton Elementary School holiday concert on the 11th at 6 p.m. And we'll move into public again for 15 minutes. >> So going back to the um request for electrical usage data, I I should have type something up. I have this I give this to >> you. Yes, of course. What was I thinking? >> Thank you so much for including for that.

105Well, thank you for getting our information as quick as we can and get that off and see you can come up with >> energy cost. >> Oh, I think she's in Patty's North. Um, with the I think I passed the information on to Heather with the adoption thing that you guys have here. Uh, school board meeting budget adoption. Are you going to do the first uh students act where you have to seven days before this post some of these graphs on cost per student the last 10 years and is that going to be available so people can see it here they can see it online they can see it at the town >> it's very strict the legislation on that so whatever it states it's very strict uh legislation what cannot be what can only

106be on that So it's it's going to cause a lot of questions that's for sure because >> um but it's legislation but yes it's very strict on 11 mandatory report it has to be posted at least three appropriate places. >> Yep. Y >> okay it will absolutely before this adoption date you guys have here. 7 days >> 7 days before the adoption date >> and we'll be able to find it somewhere >> the three places that it's required. you're here. We can certainly discuss where those three places are, but yeah, don't >> because most of the people in this town don't well, we can't maneuver through the the school website. I'd like to see it on the town website where most people look at. >> I have no control over the town. So, if it

107gets placed on the town by, you know, us giving it to the town, then I would certainly hope so. But the town, it shouldn't be a town hall. The school is >> Yeah. when we uh it was old town hall and regular town hall and then here the three places posted and then on our um Facebook pages. >> Okay. >> Yeah. Any other? >> Um, yep. So, I just wanted to um let everyone know for the Elsto um we were at the craft fair on the first and thanks for everybody who stopped by and supported us. Um we did pretty well on the first day. So, we still have um lots of Christmas ornaments and we have um I think a Christmas wreath left and we have some other items. I did post them on

108our Facebook page. Um so, you can contact any of us if you would like. I have some of the board members here. Um if anybody would like to support us um we are have kicked off two fundraisers. Um one is starting on Friday. um as the schoolstore.com. So all the kids will be going home with little lanyards and an explanation of um what it is. And basically the kids bring everything home and parents will hopefully help them enroll. Um if the kids enroll, they get a special code that they bring back to the school. they'll get a little um Book Buddy stuffy and um from there the what happens is is that anybody that wants to shop using their link um a percentage of the sales come back to the school. So there's I think

109two or 300 different stores, anything from Old Navy, Barnes & Noble. Um, anytime you go through the link and you shop, a percentage of the sales come back to the school. And there's also, I did not realize it until I rolled in early just to make sure everything was going smoothly. Um, but with that enrollment, you also have the ability to um, if you don't want to shop, you can gift a gift card to a teacher. Um, and if you do that, the kids get points towards getting more prizes, but they also gets a percentage of that. And you can also um give the kids gift cards to for books and for reading. Um my in-laws are all in education, so they were all excited about those two things. So the teachers and Ben got

110a bunch of gift cards already. Um so it's a great way to support the school and support the teachers. Um, so if you don't want to, you know, give your teacher another month for Christmas, um, maybe a gift card would be a helpful thing. Our second, um, or our first fundraiser that we have going on, it's going on through the whole month of November, is our, um, sock fundraiser, and it's through softballs. We have the QR codes as you're coming in and out of the school, so you can take a picture of it with your phone. um and we get a percentage of the sales through that and so hopefully we can start raising funds and so we can start help with the cost of uh field trips which are coming up. >> I actually

111have a question with the school.com for families who have multiple kids. Can they group them together or do they have to use separate links? So, I actually noticed that when I enrolled then there is um when I went ahead and enrolled then there's on the bottom it says to enroll another student. So, you should be able to like set one up for Ethan and then set another one up without having to like go through all the process. So, >> did I miss anything? Nope. We already because Addie already mentioned what our next meeting is. >> So if they participate, they get everything buddy and then it's not it's not like their prizes are based on how much they're collecting. The money is just all going to the school. So they're not getting more prizes for

112like So when you have multiple kids in the same family, so like one kid's getting all the prizes, the other kids are getting none. I guess it sounds like it's like everybody gets everybody and then the money that is collected. The percentage factors goes to the school. Yes, they can. Kids can earn other prizes. So, it's primarily with the um like the gift cards for the teachers and the students. They get so many points per um per purchase of that. >> Okay. >> Can I add on to Christine? Sorry. >> Um >> can you say your name? >> She might not mention right. Um, I'm with the Apocalyp House as well. Um, Christine, you said that I missed something. Yes, in my I said that afterwards. So, a lot of people have been, this isn't

113necessarily schoolboard specific, but a lot of people have been posting on our community pages like wanting to help out with food drives and um getting, you know, meals to people who might need it or like transportation for that. We had a special meeting um with Yale Pocket House last Wednesday, Christie. And um ultimately what we're tailoring it down to is partnering with the Educ Pantry in Farmington and then there's one in Wakefield. Uh Kate Saxon is our uh secretary. She's been communicating with them. Um I think what is going to end up happening is we're going to kind of do like a cost share sort of deal because they have the space. We really don't have the in this town uh to have an official pantry like based true standards. So, um we're we're working

114it's still under under refundment of how we're going to get food from those pantries back to folks in town and set up like different pickup stations here or drop offs for folks who might have limited transportation. Um, but uh Kate is actually working on finishing up a flyer to post to our pages and like maybe we could share it with you Ivy for the teachers want to have it at school, but setting up donation boxes for this um for the students and for the town. >> That's kind of neat. Um, one of the board members of the interfaith food pantry was just talking to me the other day. He said, you know, Middleton doesn't make enough use of the the food pantry. He said, um, they tend to go to Wakefield, which is cool, you

115know, the the working together, but he said, please let officials in town and school know that that that is one we're one of the towns designated to receive assistance from that. more people in there. >> That's awesome. >> Any other Okay. Um, closing comments by the board. But first, do we have any on public tonight? >> Okay. Um, and is it legal personnel? It's um Okay. All right. Uh, closing comments. We'll start reducing it. >> If anybody again, if anybody has any suggestions for the website, please feel free to reach out to Christine. I have the stock thing open on my iPad already. You said till the end of November, right? >> Okay. Um, also I wanted to I know that they already left, but I wanted to say that the veterans program was really

116really nice and the kindergartener they came and said here I'd like to win A+. I know like give him a shout out or something. That was really awesome. Um, also my my girls both commented on how the math specialists came to their classroom and like watched their teacher and they taught and their teacher taught. My girls do not always tell me about something going on. the fact that both of them specifically mentioned about the math coaches and their teacher. I just wanted to note that that was clearly a big deal in sixth grade. Um, also we talked a bunch about papers for that. Uh Kathy, is there any chance that you could print out the um presentation that was about the test scores for me? And um there was a lot of information at that

117meeting and I have to wrap my head around all of it between the test and the budget and everything, but I just wanted to know that I am going to wing my head. So um thank you everyone else. their son um to the kindergarten. It was an amazing presentation. It was super cute, especially because it sounds like they are a military family. So, super impactful. So his name is America. >> Collected them all. >> Um well, thank you guys for making that um a priority and to make such a big deal out of that this era. I come from a long line of military and was a military brat. So I think that's hugely important and it is a family sacrifice. It's not just the veteran, there is an impact in the entire family. So,

118I think that's huge to celebrate them. So, thank you for that. >> Um, thank you to all of this subcommittees that have been working so diligently and for Samantha for doing she is doing most of the amendments to the website. So, I give her credit on all of that. Um, and she is working diligently. uh you know we hear you guys and we know that you are struggling with getting access to information and we are trying as diligently as we can to make it as easy as possible so that you guys have the data you need and you don't feel like you're not getting access to what you need. So we appreciate all the feedback you've given us and appreciate all the feedback to come so we can make it easier to get you guys

119what you need. Um, and lastly, I am not gonna be able to be at the board meeting next month. So, unfortunately, Kelly will be standing in um to leave unfortunate of a family commitment that I can't I can't miss. So, I apologize for that. Um, but we'll see you guys in January. All right. I will take a motion to move into nonpublic if for I just want to make sure that I would like to access to someone's child's um fundraiser so I can make sure all the things I'm buying this holiday season are getting credit for Milton Elementary School. >> Yeah. Someone get me someone's info. >> Sweet and I'll let you take another into nonpublic second. Did you have all >> Thank you guys very much.