001Good evening and welcome to the May 28th, 2025 Ashlin School Committee meeting. Uh I will be chairing the meeting just for a moment as we have a reorganization of the school committee as typical after the uh board of the elections through the town. So, but let me get the agenda started first as we always do uh with our vision statement. The Ashen Public Schools strives to be a model district that creates a culture of inclusivity for our diverse students and staff who feel safe and supported, are empowered with the academic and social emotional skills to pursue their chosen path and embrace their roles as positive contributors to local and global communities. We are having this recorded through WACA cable TV. our opening procedures, agenda review and adoption first uh public participation uh administrative item re
002reorganization of the school committee and we'll go back to those items uh reports and presentations. I'm um going to ask the school committee to allow for the superintendence report to be moved up and as part of my report I'm going to have the Ashlin Middle School do a presentation today uh with regard to the playbook and and they're here. So, um, then Warren School improvement plan update, warrant approvals, uh, short assistant superintendent report, right, Dr. Kyra? Excellent. Uh, and then some action items. Um, AHS crosscountry trip to Vermont. It's their second annual uh, Thatford. Yeah. Uh, the a Wacka request in terms of participation uh, for future school committee summer retreat dates, superintendent evaluation process, first read of a number of policies, and then the consent agenda. um and report to school committees then to
003adjourn. So are we okay with that agenda in the in adjustments? Great. Thanks. So the first we'll thing we'll do is reorganization of school committee. As I mentioned after the elections we then um come before the committee to choose first the chair of the school committee for the next school year. So um I'm looking to take a motion for nominee for the chair of the school committee. I will nominate Miss Tosti to set a statewide record. Statewide record. Is there a second? Second. Any discussion on Miss Tosti? And does Miss Tosti so accept the nomination? Okay. Um I don't know if we bring Yeah, I don't know if we need a roll call for this. Um but all in favor of Miss Tsy becoming the chair for the 2526 school year. I I right now
004I'm going to turn it back over to you. Did you Did you vote for yourself? I I abstain 301. Then next up is the um vote for the vice chair. We have any nominations for that? See any reason to change if still willing to do it? So I would do it. Mr. Terry, second. All in favor? I I I'll vote for throw monkey wrenches. Yeah, something to check. Okay. And uh we need to nominate a secretary. Tina to be our secretary. We have a second. All in favor? I I thank you. You want to vote for yourself? Appreciate that. But thank you for taking that job. Um next up, I'm going to ask if there are any members of the public that want to give public comment. Seeing none, um we will move on to
005our agenda where we are going to start with the superintendent's report and the AMS presentation. Good evening everyone. I'm super excited tonight to be here and to not be the one speaking. Um, I have four amazing eighth grade students here who are going to talk about the work they did to run playbook workshops with um, students over the past um, four weeks or so. We did two workshops. They're going to they're going to speak and tell you all about it. Um, and I think Grady is also going to share a little bit about the work he did with Project 351 and the um, project that he did um, through that organization as well. So, come on up, guys. Hello everybody. Hi. Uh, I'm Grady and I led the playbook workshops. And with the project 351
006project that I participated in, I we held a clothing drive at our school and we collected 25 bags of clothing. And with the playbook workshops, uh, Sammy Levenson, uh, huge thanks to him. He handwrit hand handw wrote all of the um scenarios and stuff that we did straight from the playbook website just so we could do it at our middle school even even though he's a high school senior. And Miss Makuchi who is here, she let us use her classroom for both of the workshops which was a which was very helpful so that we didn't have to find another place to do it. Um, I participated in the Zoom meetings where I was taught on how and how to lead the playbook workshops and uh we a bunch of people came and talked to us
007on the zooms. Um, playbook is a workshop that trains kids for real life scenarios and to be a leader in their community. And during the workshops, I opened it up and then I introduced Vidant who uh led Hello everyone, my name is Vidant Absangi and I had the opportunity to lead the icebreers during our second playbook workshop. For the activity, we showed students a series of zoomed in images and asked them to guess what each object was. Once the full image was revealed, we discussed how our initial guesses could be completely different from reality. Just like how our just like how people can have different perspectives and interpretations, this fun and interactive game helped us connect to one of the key themes of our workshop, understanding and respecting diverse web viewpoints. Thank you. Hi, my
008name is Claire Jakes. At the playbook workshop, I led the agree disagree segment. During this, people would move to one side of the room depending on their stances on topics. We discussed if students agreed or disagreed with statements about race, leadership, religion, and gender. It was really interesting to see their different stances on these topics. Hi, I'm Katie Smith and in the playbook workshops, we ran scenarios that represented real life problems and true issues that people face. Everyone would participate and share in their small groups how they would react to to the scenario, but also had volunteers share to the whole group what their views were and what they discussed. The scenarios were very diverse and covered many present topics in today's society like race, religion, and gender. So I think important to note for
009these four is that playbook workshops are normally run by high school students for middle school students and CME came and ran the first workshop for us and really took the lead. Um, and then due to his schedule with AP testing and and other senior commitments, he was not able to come back. And these four did not hesitate at all to step up and and take the lead to run just among their own peers of sixth, seventh, and eighth graders um and lead really tough conversations on difficult topics. and Miss Makuchi, I don't know if she wants to speak, but following the second session really highlighted on feeling like it was one of the best workshops that AMS has had and the takeaway of students in our building really being ready to have these conversations and
010wanting to impact um change. So, I think of a really important note again is that these guys stepped up and did something that typically their their age their age peers are not comfortable doing and they did an amazing job um leading. I am going to miss all of them. I I wish I could keep them for a few more years. They are going to have a huge impact um in life and and at the high school especially. So, excellent job, guys. Mush, do you have anything to add? So, we have a a running list now of topics that, you know, are specific to AMS that um students identified are are issues that we want to tackle and we're going to work on ways to try and hit more students with the playbook workshop and be
011able to to work on that next year. So, that's a goal of ours. Just ask a quick question. Is this a new program for us this year or it's not a new program. third year that have been involved um with it and Sammy really stuck with it in high school um and continued and I have no doubt that these guys are gonna continue being leaders and I'm sure we'll welcome them back next year to help us run some workshops with the middle school. So yeah. Wow. It sounds like it was a really meaningful experience and that you guys are are real leaders in your building and that you'll carry that with you and it sounds like do you think a lot of your um your peers at school got a lot out of it? Yeah,
012definitely. I feel like um it made a big impact on the people who were there and hopefully that they'll uh they will spread it throughout the rest of the school with their peers in each of their grade. Do you think that it started any conversations like people would talk about things outside of the workshop that they might not have talked about before? Yeah, definitely that. And they could if they see some of the scenarios that we were in that we showed them, then they could implement what we did in the workshops into real life and maybe stop a bullying scenario or someone making fun of someone else. Awesome. Does anybody else have any questions? Yeah. Yeah. Thank you so much. We really appreciate you. You're awesome. Great job. Okay. And as always, you're welcome to
013leave. You don't need Yeah. You don't need to stay here for the next exactly x amount of minutes. We appreciate you. Awesome. Thanks. Pete, thank you guys. Warren school school improvement plan update. I will bring this up. Pete, thank you. Is that the entirety of your report? That was it. Okay. Yes. Second. Well, so hold on a second. Well, you get to take credit in the superintendent's report for that. Thank you. Good evening. Just to to thank our council members, Lori Tossy is our representative from the school committee, Kathy Kenny, Tiffany Farrell as two of our teachers, Erica Lanaris, our assistant principal as a non- voting member, Caitlyn Montas Diora as a parent, Donna Shaw as a community member. uh the team works very closely together and thankfully this team has been together for some
014time now. Uh so they work extremely well and share ideas together. Some some highlights that I just want to point out that we're accomplished this year. Our work we were in year two with S3 which is a group through Desi. Um we not only met we exceeded our expectations this year on our group and we're actually selected as uh one of three communities to get and speak in front of the state uh group for the S3s and the staff did an amazing job of just sharing our successes, our challenges and advising some other uh towns and it turned so much that the afternoon workshops that the S3 group had designed um they changed them and they asked for us to continue our presentation and we had over 40 participants just to sit in to listen
015to ours which was every element member of the of the U group session. So again, great accolades to the S3 team and what they've been doing in their rollouts at our school. Um as well, our data teams continue where we're looking at identifying specific needs for our students and creating plans that are differentiated. Our community service projects are really getting a little more traction right now of where we've had cards and letters going to different members of our communities mainly focusing on our seniors as well. Our second graders have taken on a role of just cleaning up the playground and making sure that lost and found actually comes into the building, doesn't get left outside. And as well, as you'll see as a later goal, our STM math champions. U we've had second graders and
016now first graders as well that are actually going into other classrooms to help students in their problem solving. Our goal to be to continue as part of this grant is to have 80% of our journey um completed by the end of the school year. As a school, we've already surpassed 91%. um kindergarten who got a slow start last year because of a technology roll out, they've already met 100% of the journey being met. Grade one has met 88%, grade two has met 83%. Uh so again, just some some great work that's been happening from our old plan of what was going um this year, the additional pieces that are new for us, it's continuing these other pieces, but a big push from our site council is to improve our volunteerism at our school and to
017get back to preandemic levels. um to bring out new ideas that are coming through. We've surveyed families this year to gather some thoughts and ideas and it's more about how we can bring people back into our school more often. Um as well continuing to be a unified school champion through the Special Olympics. This year, Erica Zipsy has been serving as year two as our liaison for our school. Uh, not only was Erica selected to be a presenter at the fall conference, uh, but she's also been highlighted twice in their, uh, newsletter updates of where they're writing stories about what is happening at Warren School and how we're being inclusive and making sure that we're supporting our students and our families. So, something that I'm very proud of of how we've been working through this. Finally,
018the the last major shift for us, which will be a lot of work for us, is revamping our report card. And it's really about making sure that our report card is more parent friendly and making sure that it's written for the audience who is the parent of a child. So this way they can understand how their child is doing, how they're progressing through the grade level skills, how they're doing with social emotional skills, all of these aspects. What we have found from our work in talking to parents in the community is the first uh trimester parents really don't gain a lot of insight because they're based on end of the year expectations. Uh so they struggle with saying they're not sure how their child does. Thankfully, our teachers do a great job communicating throughout and
019through their parent teacher conferences, but this is one of the large drivers for us to make these changes that we need. So, next year, we'll be looking to create that, bringing it to the uh to the school committee for approval and then with an imple implementation during the 26 27th I don't what do you mean my kid's nodded? just I just I just skipped down to the comments especially for the first half of the year which is unfortunate that that's what most parents are doing and it's really we do need to make changes so that it's written for our audience not for the staff and and even the staff right so on them if the only real communication is going to happen in the comments and that the other work they're doing isn't meaningful you
020know to communicate to the parents then they're wasting their time too so it's going to be efficient all around right but it's not like a five minute even though seems like a simple, you know, you've got to make sure that it's in line with what Mindis is doing and there's a lot more to it to make sure that it's consistent and that it's all this all all your staff general and I have been working together to coordinate these efforts. Um, and then as well, you know, as Lori just mentioned, and it's been a large part of our conversations at the site council, it also impacts all the curriculum that we're using, the assessment plans that we're doing when these conversations take place and to make sure that everything aligns with the plans because we do
021have some thoughts about making some changes and to make things again so it's serving the purpose of informing parents of how their child is performing. I have a couple different questions for you on the report card piece. Um, have you thought about, and maybe this will be part of the conversation next year, but how the data team meetings and the data you get from those will play into the timing for report cards, the what's reported on the report cards and kind of what you use to Yes. Yes. That's a big part of the that the timing of all of this is making sure that our five time a year data team meetings, all the assessments that we're doing that they right now not all of them work perfectly and that's again the need for a
022change. No, that makes sense. And then my second question is you mentioned the community service efforts that you're kind of putting into place and the the programming to the second graders you know kind of are in charge of cleaning up the playground and you know other things. Have you thought about um what's that what that might look like as you continue to grow it moving forward? We have we've had a lot of conversation at the school level and then at grade levels as well of just talking about how do we create something that we can have some ownus of so we can get make this stronger so it's not just within the uh warren school but in the Ashlin community with our younger grades it does make sense that we're doing it more closeknit because
023that way the children can see the impact of their actions um in addition to the cards and the letters that they're still writing because we do want to maintain that but really looking to make some of those more of an impact in our community not just in the war in school property. and not about the community service but well we we mentioned that you know Mendes has been sort of a model for the community service and I want to mention publicly that the Warren School has really been a model for how we're moving forward with data in in the district and as we make that a huge priority next year we're going to be really revamping and and improving all of our MTSS strategies districtwide we're going to be following the processes and procedures that
024Pete and his staff have put into place because they truly are the model for our entire district of how to run quality, effective, efficient, meaningful data team meetings. Uh, one of the things that we did this year is, uh, Christy Arnold, Britney Hawkins, myself, Jen Taylor. Um, we all went and observed different data team meetings that were happening throughout their district. And every time we went to see one happen at Warren, there was just a a clear difference in how it's working there. And they're utilizing the data so effectively. They're coming out of those meetings with true meaningful plans that are going to have that that have had impactful results for our students. And uh you know it goes without saying that the S3 piece has been a huge part of that, but Pete and
025his team have gone so far beyond what S3 is even offering. And uh their work has just has been so fantastic and I wanted to make sure that he gets a little public praise for the work they've done in in the folks who have participated in those teams, especially Erica. Erica has led a lot of those meetings and she really does a nice job and teachers come out of there with with with real actionable work that they can help to make true intervention strategies that that are having great impact on our students. So kudos to the the whole Warren crew for all they're doing in that area. Thank you. Great to hear. Thank you. Okay. Uh assistant superintendent report uh warrant approvals. Okay, not linked uh between May 15, 2025 and May 28th, 2025. I
026Paul Kendall authorized by signature payables in the amount of1,300,1946. [Music] This includes general fund expenses of $95,775 and 29 cents revolving expenses of $384,557.36 and grant expenses of $9,587 and meals taxes. Thank you. assistant superintendent really just that our seniors had their last day and they wrapped up and it's going to uh be now a fun senior week for them next week. They're doing their finals now. Uh so we're wishing them well. We hope they have a fantastic senior week next week when they have a boatload of activities leading up to our big day in in on June 6th for graduation. Other than that, I I have nothing new to add from last week. That's awesome. um the proposed AHS cross-country trip to Vermont fall of 2025 for having us. Um, one thing that I
027would like to start this conversation with is last year, our first annual um with our first annual application, we talked a lot about team building and as evident um in September when we brought some of our uh student athletes with us um saw what a great time they had. I know that we have to talk about the logistics and that's what these questions are about tonight. Um, but Emily is our I will um yeah, so it's basically going to be the same format as we had last year. It's Friday to Monday of Labor Day weekend. So that first week that schools in session, um we're going to go up to Vermont again. Um it's my parents property. Uh the kids camp outside. Um, and then they make the food and we go running and we
028did a hike last year. Um, swimming in the neighbor's pond. Um, we went and visited their alpacas. Um, we had movie night. We had an incredible talent show. Like, well, we called the talentless show. Not everyone had to have talent. Um, talent was optional, but it was amazing. It was amazing. Um, yeah, we had a movie night with um, McFarland USA, which is a great cross country movie. Um, and I think the kids who went just had a had a great time. Um, so wouldn't make any changes made last year. And well, I guess the only change we would make is last year it was $125 per student. Um, this year it's $150. We came out even last year, but that's because t-shirts got messed up, so we had some money refunded and then some
029parents donated some food. So those things don't happen this year. We just wanted to make sure um we had it all covered. Um and if we're going to make it clear to the kids that if you know money is a concern or anyone can't afford it. Um we have money in our Clocker Club account that you know we can easily cover that. So the trip itself is optional and we make that clear to the kids. Um and then you know if they need financial assistance cover it. When you u you guys came forward with this last year and I think a couple other teams have done something similar. usually came in with a purpose and a goal. Wondering if you just speak to what that goal is and whether you felt like doing this program
030last year helped you in that respect and team building, but I don't want to speak for you. Right. Well, and I think that that was first and foremost and I knock on wood limited drama like the kids. Um but it was even impressive to us as we these goals going in, but watching them all work together. There is always a plan, who's on meal prep, who's on meal setup, who's on meal cleanup. Um, there was participation from everyone. We were kind of fortunate. We had a few boy scouts amongst us. So, so that helped and that actually gave some of the kids who, you know, crossc country wise that may not be their greatest skill, but like we did not have a single match used. The Boy Scouts lit every fire with sticks. Um, and
031so it like it was great because it gave like every kid a chance to shine. Um, you know, they whittleled we have a a team flag and we told them they need to go find a flag pole in the woods. Um, and they not only did that, but they got it and then like whittleled it and did a whole they were working on it all weekend. Um, so um, you know, that was nice to see that like some kids who may not be specifically leaders on the team running wise got a chance to, um, to stand out. And then, you know, for the meals, we we had a red, white, and blue team and assigned them, you know, each they each had a lunch, a breakfast, and a dinner. Um, and those teams were made
032of different grades and boys and girls and we tried to split up all the friend groups so that um, and I think a couple of kids commented afterwards that like because of that they got to know you know kids that they may not work with otherwise. So do you see that have proof to have benefits throughout the season? Absolutely. Yeah. Absolutely. Um because even some of our our practices on a leader to bring along different levels of um ability running. So even that it was not um you know competing to them to say you know go with go run with this or you know and even some of those kids have been on track indoor and outdoor. So they're really um the skills keep going um which is great. Uh the other thing that happened
033on the trip was we have different levels of ability for for the kids. So, you know, making sure that there was a level of um workouts and running for everybody and there were a few that that kind of held back and enough of us. Yeah. Yeah, I think the one challenge I would say is that for the freshman or the kids who are new to the team, it can be a little bit intimidating to, you know, it's two weeks into practice and to be like, you're going to go away for a weekend asleep in a tent with these people you just met. So, I think that's one thing that this year we're going to try and reach out a little earlier and then definitely emphasize to them that, you know, it's not as scary as
034it sounds. And we def we had some freshmen go last year and they loved it. Um, but I think that's, you know, one thing that we want to work on this year is making sure that we get as many. I know there were like two freshman last year who keep saying they're like, "Oh, we but we didn't know. We didn't know if there were going to be bathroom." Like um and they're they're all in on going this year and so we just want to make sure we get all those kids. All it takes is a few kids to spread the word, right? Yeah. Right. So, I'll probably duplicate some of the stuff we talked about last year, but uh logistically, how did things work last year? both from your perspective and I also know from
035there was leaving our meeting there was stuff to work out uh cory's and and all the other things for uh for everybody going including I think said it was your parents place whatever so they were going to be up there you know core and uh so how did the logistics go how what would you change um and things like that yeah so the parents that um came are parents that worried and I conversation I had it with you after the fact or Kevin but um because Emily's parents are in Vermont. So that that that's not true. Cory's a core is for us. It's not for them. It's it's for us to do nothing would show. It only shows mass records. It doesn't show unless you do the national fingerprint. I I I'm sorry. I did
036check on that. I wouldn't But yeah, so the same thing holds that, you know, and Emily's parents are very willing to sign if there's a Vermont version of the Corey that they need to get. I know actually both of them work volunteer the schools up there. So they Cory only does Massachusetts things. It doesn't do any federal stuff. Correct. There's also a fingerprint, but there's a federal one. That's different. Correct. Um so they were they were not quied but the other parents were absolutely so like other logistics uh you know it's like it's like a 5 to1 you said ratio roughly right uh were where they split into groups like hey you you make sure you know this this chaperone uh ensures that they're keeping tabs on on certain groups rather than just hey the
037parents are around or whatever. How did it work logistically to change it? I mean, I guess when we were at the house campsite, um they were basically all visible like they were around their tents. They I mean, they played manhunt and were hiding once, but um you know, they were all kind of visible to all of us. Uh when we went running, um we had someone you know, at the front, someone bringing up the rear um and then people kind of in the middle. Um, and then same thing when we went hiking and we went swimming once and there were I think that was only about that was twothirds of the kids maybe because I know some of them went into handover. Um, and we had three adults there. So, two of the kids wanted
038to look at Dartmouth College. And Emily, your dad and Jim, I know one of the other things that was going to be worked out afterwards was some of the medical stuff like, "Hey, you know, have you making sure they have first aid? How was all the what are you going to do and and in these events?" And did that all get worked out and everything? We had a first aid kit and you had all the um the ad and everything. Okay. Amy's our trainer. I think we did have one minor fish incident um that that was actually dealt with at Boy Scout um knew exactly what to do, but yeah, we had the you had the first aid kit and then um I think we said this last year that it's about 10 miles from
039Hanover where there's Dartmouth um Hitchcock Medical Center which is um medical center. So if anything Unfortunately, that actually we have worse things track meet and cross country. I think we had a blister and a fish. Yeah. Nope. Not for not for cross country. Well, it sounds to me like it's been a great experience and will continue to be. Any more questions or comments? before we vote to approve the proposed high school cross country trip to Vermont for the fall as provided. Second. All in favor? I I have fun. Thank you. Have a good summer. Thank you. You as well. Okay. The Wacker request that is I was there the other day. They had asked me um to come in and uh interview our students from the chorus who were going to be coming the next
040day to perform and be recorded. There were 40 of them. So, and they were amazing. And it turned out that I was available and I could run right over. And I was just so impressed with their talent and reminded about how much talent we have here on all different levels, right? the athletics and the debates and the music and all of it. But this was really special. While I was there though, they asked me if I'd be willing to come periodically after our meetings and give a report on what happened at the meeting because I guess Yolanda is doing that for the select board. I saw one posted the other day. I don't know if you guys have had a chance to see it yet, but what they're looking for is just a like five
041minute, 10 minute, you know, on May 28th we met. These were the items on the agenda. you know, it's just kind of a way to broadcast to the community what we discussed. Another way to get some information out there about what we're doing. Um, so my answer was just that, you know, it sounds great. I'm available. I'd love to, but I want to talk to the committee, make sure it's something that you guys want. And also, if there was somebody else dying to do it, give whoever an opportunity to throw their hat in. So, that's the request. Um, number one, do you think it's a good idea? And number two, um, wants to do it. I think it's a great idea. um just you know get more information out there even though it's not going
042to be you know a super in-depth but just these are the things we people really interested they can go find the minutes they can watch the recording um can tune in on Wednesday night they can tune in absolutely yeah and I mean I saw I didn't see the whole thing but I saw the snips snippets that were on social media you did an amazing job so I vote you I am more than happy to let you take the lead on that I think I think it was great looked like a lot of fun it was a lot of fun but um like you like we usually pick people on committees in the summer. I just wanted to make sure before I said yes that it was supported by everybody and and again the intent is
043not to go too deeply into anything. It was really just a summary of what already happened. Um and it's more going to be a moving forward kind of thing because we only have we're probably only going to have one meeting left after this because the other thing we were going to talk to you guys about was possibly not having the last meeting of the year because it's after school gets out and there's probably not going to be a need for it. So there's really only one meeting after this one as far as this goes. Um, so were they looking to have us have somebody come after every single meeting or I can't remember. Do you remember Paul? It's either after every meeting which or after every or maybe once a month but Yeah. Yeah. Okay.
044Sure. Okay. So yeah, so it would be um however often we have meetings and if there is something and actually I think it's a nice opportunity for us. It's a nice tool um if there's something that we're talking about and sometimes I know we're wishing like if only people knew this or even myself. I mean if we didn't have these students coming in like we did this year like there's so many things going on in the buildings that we might not otherwise know about if our kids aren't in those buildings anymore. So things that we see at the meeting that we want to highlight, it's an opportunity I think it aligns with our policy that you speak for us anyways. Uh if you're willing to do it, then it's great. And I'll just throw it
045out to Paul that when we do have those uh student things in our meetings and you talk about it, maybe he can just hack splice that onto the end of that so that we they get an a bridged version for somebody wants the aided version of what happened, but also the parents can have a snippet of just when the students did their That's a great idea. And I think that the the choir coming in uh and I don't want to speak for Wacko, but I I I think that them coming in was like such a success and such a nice thing for everybody, right? Like for parents, for the students, for all of us that were there witnessing it. Um it's just making probably everybody think of more opportunities to do more of that, like
046let the kids go in there and be showcased on TV. Um in addition to even coming in here, you know, I think this kind of follows on to if you remember last year when we had the uh the the mistake where we didn't get coverage for the students in here and then uh Wacka went to Warren and did something, right? I think this is just a building tried to record with their phones or something, right? But but I think it ended up being better that they went and did a a special on them. So I think it is kind of special for them. The kids were really excited about it and it was very professionally done and they do such a great job over there. So anyhow, um I'll just add my support for it
047too. I think it things we talk about better community Um, I think while it's not the exact same thing as we've talked like showcasing our successes at the district, I think it's a great opportunity to show the successes of our kids important sort of talking about it as a structural showing how special they are and their unique talents and all that. I think would support you doing it. I think if there's an a time when you're not able to else from the committee who can pinch it for you. Awesome. Let's go forward. Perfect. Thank you. Okay. Uh school committee summer retreat dates. Um Jim can weigh in, but I'll just start too, but I know Jim put out some possibilities. The one where most of us were available, Marcy is not available. And I know
048it's like such an important meeting that we try to only do it when everybody is available. And I don't know if that's ever going to happen, but also, you know, budget is a big part of what we need to talk about and Marcy is such a great contributor in that area that I for one, you know, would love to have make it possible for her to be there. So, in order to do that, we need to come up with another potential date. And um we talked I asked Jim, Mark and I asked Jim about, you know, how important is it that it even happens this summer? Because if there's nothing urgent that needs to get settled before September, um could we start the meeting after start finding dates after the summer if we really can't
049come up with a week when we're all in town? Um so, we talked about potentially September. Um I did chat with Marcy today. her suggestion was maybe end of June. Um, while we're still things are still fresh in our mind and we have data and whatever. I I know Mark's away for some of those dates. So, I mean, this could go on. Um, but I guess we should at least try to expand our time frame a little bit and see if we can't find a date that includes everybody. And so, I don't know how you all feel about that. I want to add to that. So, when we we sat and talked Jim about the agenda setting, right? Um we we started to have that discussion about was there anything that we need was there
050in the middle of that really didn't feel that thing except budgeting. So we kind of realized that was thought focal point of discussion thought you know what doing that September which is just an earlier lead in to the budget than we typically have that probably works well working on budget. So, well, and I would imagine it then gives because one of the things about doing a retreat in June is most of the time Jim and and others want some time to prepare for the things we're going to discuss. And if it's a little piggy piggybacked on the end of the year, then they probably don't have the ability to prepare. Right. Right. Need a a break and a to get refreshed and everything. It's been a lot this year. So, um, and then we I
051guess if it if it's if it is September, do we want a Saturday or I mean we we usually I'm not speaking for myself, I'm speaking for all of you, but usually people do end up taking a day off for the summer retreat. So, if a weekday is a possibility, um, we can for that. U, if you prefer not to look at week dates, then we would have to look at Saturdays. Marcy had a concern about that. uh she has more kids than we all do that are still involved in in all of the activities. So that that is bit of a challenge for her. So again, I don't know that we're ever going to find the perfect time or date, but um we we just want to put a little bit more effort into
052trying. So I don't know um how are people feeling in general about I mean it sounds like there's it doesn't seem like there are any issues that you need our input on before the beginning of the school year. there's nothing that we maybe need to, you know, decide or kind of collectively come up with our, you know, thoughts on before the school year starts. So, I think September makes sense. I think it it's beneficial to have all of us there. So, I think I I I would agree to to wait for when Marcy would be available. And in terms of timing, I mean, with enough advanced notice, a weekday would be fine for me. It's just a matter of I I think my only concern day is is it possible for you guys focused on
053all that happening and we're we're at the point where again I I think we have these conversations even in our admin team meetings now. Uh it's unless you know Rome is burning, you know, leave us alone. Let us do our work and let us have no serious day. Give us a couple hours. We can take a few hours. We can take a half a day. We can take a day. Um if something was so urgent, they know where to find us. But but to piggy back on your thought, most of the time when we have these, unless you're talking about macro level budget stuff, when we talk start talking about, hey, how does this affect build, we typically bring in correct uh our administrators, too. And so to to piggyback on that, that seems like
054a big ask that we're pulling you, Mike, Chris, and potentially other building administrators in during school. Well, but then we're the other flip side of it is we're asking them to give up Saturday. So, I think it it depends, I guess, on what's on the agenda. If it was the kind of year where we really need everybody, then obviously it's we're talking about like a person here or there depending on what we want to talk about, then it's probably not the agenda items. I have no it it's I I think our focus will be budget financial and and where the it was pretty evident at town meeting right when not just the school committee but select board as well as the fincom uh in their statements and their comments about we we really need to
055to dig deeply in into where we are as a community. uh and even before I would bring in principles or directors, I I think we need to sit around the table and have these thoughtful discussions as to what it is we're trying to accomplish and then we bring in, you know, the the micro level, if you will. So, I think we have to look at it from a macro standpoint, start the starting point. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Happy to try to find a date. just pull up my calendar. Can I You're here. And Marcy said the same thing. With enough notice, she could take a day from work. There's Yeah. And I guess the only other thing is how do our conversations around that parlay into conversations you need to have with Michael that we need
056to maybe have with the select board and fin? And is there just from a timing perspective of waiting until that time to have our conversation and iterate through whatever is is that going to compress any other conversations that you think might need to happen? I don't think so. Uh in the latter part of the year? I don't think so because I think any of the conversations that say Chris and I might have over the summer uh once we you know close out the year which takes quite a while through even through August um then we're kneedeep in 25 26 but then starting to look at 26 27 already um and we are uh I think the process of those communicating with the select board fincom and Michael um I don't think he's in a he's
057going to be in a position right now with the turnover he's had uh and and onboarding of of people within um you know the general government. He's got a lot on his plate right now. Uh and I think we need to we need as a even an admin team uh as part of our retreat this summer will be to talk a little bit about where we are in in terms of the district and our needs um from a you know resource you know standpoint. So I think having our conversations before we come together uh will be really beneficial. So we'll have a taste of of what principles are thinking, what directors are thinking uh in September. Uh and you know I I I was pretty clear with them the other day about our our budget
058already for 2627. I said it's probably a year we're not asking folks to to to continue to include more personnel. Um I I think we've got to really take a deep hard look at what we have again uh in terms of of human capital and and move from there. I think it's premature to try to answer this question, but what I thought I'd put out there is to what discuss to what extent might we need benefit from some discussion with Mike or somebody from office talk a little bit about what they're see I think we did a lot of that work in the couple of um tri board meetings I obviously wasn't able to make the second one so I may have I missed some stuff that's important I'm But if if we think that
059there's benefit of hearing that part of the dialogue y asking or coordinating somebody might be called to sort of talk about what they're seeing. So let's let's think about that. Sure. Yeah. Michael and I typically have a July August time frame where we come together just to talk about the beginning of the next year. So, can we have you throw out some potential September dates that would at least work for the three of you? And in the meantime, you guys can send over any blackout dates. Um, not not the last week, right? Not the last week of September. I think I'm out of town. Yeah. It works. I We will send a Yeah, we'll take it. We'll we'll do we'll do a doodle poll. Yeah. So, one additional thing, one of the things, Mike, that
060you've been able to do um during our summer retreats the past couple years is kind of an indepth um discussion of the data teams and how all of that is implementing what the data is showing. And I always love to get those updates. And so, you know, if we're going to going to push this to September, just kind of putting the bug in your ear, obviously that doesn't have to happen at a retreat, right? And so, just kind of I would love an update on that at some point. It doesn't have to happen next meeting in two weeks or whenever that is, but either it at whenever we put together the retreat or just at a regular school committee meeting at the beginning of the year because I I think a I I I enjoy
061hearing that data because we're doing a good job and I love hearing about the work that's happening. I think it's really impactful since it's been expanded to Mendes. I'd love to hear an update on on what that looks like and I think it's really nice to be able to share that um as well too. So just to put the bug in your ear whenever it happens. It doesn't, like I said, it doesn't need to be at a retreat, but I've always appreciated that you've been able to share that during the retreat. No, that's actually a good reminder, Tina, for me to say. So, if anybody has suggested agenda items, because the agenda can be whatever we want it to be. I mean, budget is something that we have to talk about, but we also this
062is our opportunity to bring forward the kinds of things that we want to take a deeper dive into. We we may end up talking a little bit more of our about our evaluation process, which you can bring up in a few minutes. Um Marcy had, you know, still has um questions about fields and things like that. So anyhow, what I'm saying is this is the time because we only have one more meeting this year and then Mark and I will probably sit down with Jim just maybe one more or two more times before everybody breaks for the summer. So now's the time to let us know if you have um a request for the retreat agenda and anything is appropriate and then we can figure out what makes sense timewise, priority wise and anything that
063doesn't get covered there will get covered eventually. So and in terms of what Tina is looking for, yeah, actually moving it to September makes a lot more sense from my perspective. Typically when I'm talking to you in summer, a lot of the data that I want to talk to you about has been embargoed, so I can't really talk about it anyways. Yeah. Okay. So hopefully by that point I'll have more of a robust discussion about our MCCast data, not simply the in-house data that I so might be helpful from that. That makes sense. Okay, good. So we have a a plan forward. Yep. Um superintendent's evaluation process. So um I I shared within the folder a link to it says a copy of the summit of evaluation. you can download that form and then use
064it to for your own um written uh this isn't um your written evaluation. What I wrote in here is I will have to you um for the 20 Oh, that's pretty good. 2025 20150 um uh school year that that by May 30th um I'll have a document and a folder set up so you can start reviewing some of the data. Uh I've asked that by June uh 8th that you provide Lori with your evaluation. It's it's the same process we've always undertaken um filling out this form. Uh you'll notice in here I have listed the seven goals um that were set at the beginning of the year. Some are long-term, some are not long-term, some are going to be met, some are not going to be met. Um and your process again is to go
065through it. It starts on page really on page 33. um or where the goals are. So you can download this in word Google and type in it. That's what you can provide to Lori or you can do a narrative however however you want to do it. I'm just trying to provide you the template um for the summitive and I will provide my own narrative and my own rating that I always do. I do a self-reflection provide it to you. So I will share those folders with you. I just wanted you to know that this document, please don't take this, download it into your own so you have it opposed to writing in this one. Then everybody's writing in it. I assume you only shared it read only. Say that again. I assume you only shared
066it read only anyway to us. Um, I probably didn't, but um, I if you copy it, then you have the ability to to edit it, download it. Um, so it was June, what' I say? June 11th is our next meeting. That gives Lori three days unless Lori wants it earlier. I'm fine with that. Um, I I put it in um, doesn't get any earlier when she Well, correct. Right. Somehow we think if we make the deadline earlier that people will do it earlier, but it doesn't. No, it doesn't happen anyway. That's okay. It's as long as it's not like the morning of kind of thing and so that it leaves me like scrambling to put it all together. Yeah. Because it does take a little bit of, you know, try to get it cohesive, right?
067Um and again, in the end, as as we have these conversations with our educators and our administrators, it's, you know, we've got the four standards plus an overall rating. That's what we report to the state are those ratings. And you know the conversation I'll have in the future is about the evaluation itself. We have evaluator you know professional status teachers who are on two-year cycles. Uh so halfway through which is a year in you do a formative assessment and so you're not looking at the ratings at that point in time. a lot of school districts and superintendents. The superintendent's rubric is actually designed for that. Uh if your if your superintendent is proficient, uh you you just do a rating every two years. We have always done a yearly evaluation partly because in my mind
068it was merit-based pay was based on the summit of evaluation. We've moved away from that in for my contract. So it's sort of um we may not need to do that. But again, it'll be a choice. We'll lay lays out the pros and cons as to summitative informative retreat agenda. Exactly. That's exactly what it is. So we that's what I had shared with Jim when when he brought it up with me earlier. I thought it was more more appropriate for a correct in-depth because I just want to understand there's one I think there's one thing in terms of like dealing with Jim of course because we've worked together for so long and at this point you know we know your strengths and weaknesses like everything you're you're fabulous and you know that we think that
069and whatever but it's also kind of preserving a process for the next right there was a conversation that came up within our superintendent round table. Yeah. How many folks are on yearly summitives versus the two-year um plans for a formative and a summitive? Right. Until Jim told me, I didn't even know the two-year was a thing, right? Um and you know, the only input I had now without really delving into like the pros and cons. I mean, at least on this committee, when we do the formative, there's a lot more work that gets put into the summitative than the formative. And I want whatever process we have, I want it to be me, right? That's all. Um, so and and you want any all the members to have the proper input y carry forward. So
070if we did on a two-year cycle and somebody left during on in between, we'd want to ensure that they have the ability to their comments carry forward into the summitative and that puts the onus actually on on you or whoever is aggregating that stuff. That's a downside to it, right? Again, that's why it's a good conversation, I think, for a summer topic. Exactly. And again, I'm not looking to change it. I'm just saying the formative does have uh pros and cons to it and the pros from a from a logistical standpoint. Uh it it's it's less time consuming for sure, right? You're focused on the goals themselves mainly and you're saying okay where do we stand with the goals? What goal attainment what do we need to adjust? We sort of try to do that
071in midcycle you know in a January February time frame to say hey Jim you know what's happening. Um that's sort of what so let's put it on there and Jim if you can come with hey if we were to move to there what would you recommend because would then we not do that midyear you know is the is this that's what it's formative for is it for because only do it annually so right or or is that check-in yeah a good thing for you that midyear check-in you know so kind of lay out those how that would work and what your thoughts are on it and we have good good conversation Perfect. Yep. All right. So, that's that. Um, so if you have questions, as always, call me and say, "Hey, you know, Jim, can
072I get more evidence on X?" Uh, and and we'll try to provide it. So, again, all of our goals and we've had this conversation from the administrative side, uh, has they're all intertwined, all of us, uh, in terms of our goal setting. You know, Mike, for instance, share one uh working with the AEA coming out of our negotiations with our evaluation tool and whether we had, you know, we didn't perform as many walkthroughs partly because Mike has been really working hard with AEA to uh revamp and look at whatever um evaluation system we're going to use in the rubrics. Eventually, that has to come before you because that's part of the negotiated contract, the evaluation cycle, right? Um, and it was out of out of nowhere. Kristen Scully actually wrote me a nice email, which
073I'll share as evidence, saying, "Hey, we didn't get everything accomplished this year, but we've made a lot of progress and we're going to continue to make progress in standards three and four next year. We've worked on standards one and two, and while you guys didn't meet your goals, we understand like so they're sort of recognizing it as well. So, it's good. That's that's good just to hear from yeah, you know, with the change over the collaboration is still going forward. Very close. We still meet every Friday morning, she and I. And yeah, it's great. Excellent. Okay, next up, policies. We did have a subcommittee meeting. Uh my best recollection is most of these policies had minor changes. Um Yeah. So So maybe we'll we'll go through just give you you want Yeah. Because you obviously
074see some in the consent agenda right now. So we had a conversation about what do we do because part of what we're doing in in the in the Palestin is Jim Haz goal to go through all policies and it's and it's not necessarily hey we certainly are addressing ones we think we need change first but we're still also just going through them. So um we're kind of tearing them in three tiers. ones that are hey either just want to mark them review um or there's just some very minor cleanup that there's not really notable changes to them. So, those we'll be putting in the consent agenda. Um, you can obviously always pull them out if you think there's something needs to be addressed in them, but uh and then there are ones that we might
075put on uh and I maybe put them in the all in the first. I thought we had one that fit in the middle category that uh here, but I don't see it. Then we might put it in in a uh it's just an agenda item because it's not substantive enough for our to read um polic trigger that. But we just want to note something. Hey, there there's a notable change, but not not something that would rise to the level of, hey, it's a significant enough for that that be listed that's like approve for approval that time independently, right? Not need a second read because the consent agenda we're not going to discuss at all where uh that one was like, hey, we want to just point out what we did here, right? Like there were
076a couple things where they just changed like the vocabulary. I forget which one it was, but I may have included I may Yeah. Which is which is fine. Uh there was that wasn't yeah it wasn't wasn't wasn't blatantly hey put it in the middle but uh so so there's those want to go through policy the ones that obviously trigger more substantive thing of the of this first read second just to give you an idea of now you seeing stuff consition so with the policies like the first read policies and I'll preface this by um saying Jen King, our attorney on record, uh, has reviewed these policies. I I share, especially the ones that have significant changes. All of these policies have been um, redlined to meet MASC recommendations after general law changes. And what I've
077done is made sure that if there are significant changes, all these first policies have gone to Jen King. And for instance, I'll give an example of one where she just got back to me and we had a conversation with regard uh to student um uh discipline JIC and it related to uh whether we can use the term principal and or design uh for uh suspensions and the answer is yes and no at the same time. But but she recommends having a designate in certain areas because deans, assistant principles are can be the authorative uh figure in in issuing a suspension and then informing the superintendent if it's a 37H and 3/4 violation which is significant. So but if it's 37H and 37H and a half which are sus are um potential for exclusion those have
078to come through as a principle. Um, so, so it's a good delineation, right? And that's where Jen's like, "Yeah, we can put it here and we should because you do grant authority when the principal for a dean or an assistant principal to perform a suspension uh if need be in house and or out of school. Uh, so it's in the certain areas where she's recommended it and that's it." um she's been she the the hazing this um policy she's like no we like it the way it is the way you've written it the way it's adjusted because of MASC um so yeah when we come to those things this is where the balance of varying greatly from the MSE template versus doing our own that's a situation where a section that defines terms and then
079you use the term and then it would in there you and say this, you know, the whatever you turn deem the person that can that can uh issue the suspension or whatever and you lay out those conditions, you do it there and then you use that term the rest of it. That would be the cleanest way to do it as opposed to remembering which sections you can say designate. Um but I don't you know so we'll talk about whether there's a time when it makes sense to say hey let's do it this way because it's it's cleaner and easier to maintain that way. All right. Should we go through one by one? Start with student absence and excuses. JH having trouble asking. Okay. So I I mean I can if you if you're able to
080just summarize what the change was. Well, if it's if it's my Yeah. I don't think this one was a lot of stuff, right? So changing terminology from child to student and adding guardians. I'm sharing it right here. I mean, there it's it's really it's moving a couple things around. Um, no substantive nothing substantive. And again, you know, yeah, I I can't think of anything we looked at that was substantive significant the it was just updating. This is again it it was 2014 after you know uh it was 2021 and MASC updated it and we had not updated it. Yeah. Now that now that we have this up there there was one that was primarily just updating the references. Right. Yes. Uh I can't remember which one it was and that was the one that we
081were going to we were going to move over. Yeah. Yeah. So I again I mean going through them I I think it's important because they are first reads um that if if you want to go ahead and um I guess the only thing it would have been personally I'll all of you been working on say I'll take a closer look I think what I'm most interested in there substantive changes that no I think we really hammer out no no if it's just wording Yep. Yeah. So, so the overall majority of these are changes to align with the updated MASC policies. Correct. And there were a couple and there were a couple that we we asked Jim, hey, you make sure Jen checks this one and obviously she she has. So, uh, so for the most
082part, it's aligning with there and and so I guess he double checks both both MS and Jen is taking. Um but there were enough changes where it's like okay let's do two because at the end of the day unless we need to enact it earlier what's the harm in two reads gets more more pe people more time right but none of them are really like debate worthy you know there was nothing that we talked about the other day that like oh wow we're going to really want to dig into this you're really just aligning with the with the law no so I mean personally you guys want to go through it policy by policy, it's fine. I I don't have the need to look at it more carefully. Yeah. I mean, I prefer to handle
083it like if people have a question or a concern on a particular policy, then you can bring it forward and we'll answer it that for you to the best of our ability, but if if not, then there's no reason for us to just sort of rehash. I mean it was it's vetted through the subcommittee and then anything that we had concern about um we beded through our attorney. Most of this isn't our input. So typically if it was a first read and we had hey this is what we wanted to do we would be noting that to you right uh the overwhelming majority of this is hey going back realigning it with an updated policy uh and potentially agenda. So, um, I I would I if there was something on there like, hey, when we
084modified it or we added this, we would I think we should summarize it and to make sure you're highlighting the stuff that came from us, but most of this did not. Just jump at me as the agenda. Yep. You have um two references to JFA prohibition of hazing hazing. Is that one policy or the No, it's it's or is that a dash e? It's dash E. It's its own category. We and we spent some time talking about what that was. We had to we had to investigate that as well, but it is its own little category for some reason. Um and I know R stands for regulation, but I don't know what E stands for, right? Yeah. I don't think we ever got to the bottom of what it stands for, but we looked at
085we looked at it and said, "Yeah, right." Like we're not gonna fight about, you know, we saw no reason to get rid of it. Yeah. Yeah. So, do we want to uh how are we approaching it? Are we going to vote them all? These are first. They're all their first reads anyway. So, we're just going to move on to the next subject and then we will have the second read at the next meeting. Yep. So, take some time to go through those and then which will probably be the last policies for uh this year because we don't have any enough meetings left to do first and second read. uh I mean the only thing we would do is I mean if we had some for consent agendas put those on. Right. Well and we can
086still do updates and stuff like that in preparation for and we can you know do a first reader. Sure. Board over the summer. You want to come in 40 of them all ready for a consent agenda. Jim's Jim's got to get through this. It's it's in his goal. A lot of stuff in there. Never found a policy we couldn't write. All right. Who's got a motion to approve? All in favor? I I We have gifts and donations. Okay. Do that anymore. Remember we go back to the first part of business. The organizations. There's nothing new here. Same old, same old. And I still got retired. It wasn't on her paper that she printed out ago. Exactly. I printed this out today. Really? Is that beat up? Before we go into your school member reports, uh
087I I do want to remind folks that 11th is when we recognize our retirees as well. So that'll be 5:00 start down. Okay. 5:30. Uh I think may have put five, but typically 5:30 is I think 5:30 was the invite I got. She did put 5:30. Yeah, I'm pretty sure. Okay. Reports. Abishek. Yes. So, this has been kind of a chaotic uh past couple weeks. Um AP exams have just finished and this past Friday, as Mr. Dr. Kyra alluded to, we said goodbye to our seniors. Um and they had a couple meetings. They had a meeting today and they're going over what they're doing senior week, graduation, um, and class day and all those things. They're they're getting right into that. Um, but right now we're more turning to final exams which will be coming
088in around two to three weeks. So, I'll see you guys um right when that's about to happen. Um, but finals final exams and school elections are also happening. So, uh, I am up for re-election for this position as well. Um, do you have a content? Do you have an opponent? I think there's there's six people running and five slots. So, I think we have one opponent. Um, but a lot of grades have very high participation. As you get to senior and juniors, it kind of dwindles down um as things get more set in, but we're looking to a compet competitive election season and uh the conclusion of the school year. So, it's been a pleasure meeting with you guys. Oh my gosh, it's been so great to have you. Um, and if if you're busy
089studying for finals, you know, we totally, you know, I I got one final, I'll be here. Don't worry. Okay, good. Swing that. Uh, I took a lot of AP exams. So, yeah, that's worse. Yeah, but at least you're getting it done and hopefully, right? Exactly. And you'll get yourself some college credits. Yeah. Tina. Um, well, and Abashek may want to add to this as well, too, but the junior class had their prom a couple of weeks ago. Um, it seems like it was a a smashing success. Everyone, you know, seemed to have a good time. You may want to add in. Yeah, I mean, prom was amazing. Uh, the venue was very beautiful. Sunrise on the lake. Um, and we got some amazing pictures. Grand March was great, too. It It was just an amazing
090time. Oh, good. You all looked great. Seemed to be a lot of fun. Um, and let's see what else. Um, I haven't been to any substantive meetings. There hasn't been an Ashpack meeting um since we last met, but um I was able to go to the um the per the last performance of the band um last week and uh they you know honored their seniors and it was a great performance. So they all did great. Um that's about it for my update. Oh, and tomorrow's the No, not tomorrow. Friday is the reality fair which I'm looking forward to. One of my favorite events of the year. Yeah, I probably forgetting bunches of things that I don't really have much to to report. I went to the Grand March as well, so I'll seem to be
091just the reality fair organizational meetings that go awesome. Um, and I don't have anything to add. I already shared the whack of stuff. Um, and I guess before we come back, right, is going to be graduation class day. Correct. So, class day starts at what time? 9:10. 9:15. 9:15. And and I don't want to elongate the meeting, but I do I did forget to mention how amazing the the high school art show was. Was able to attend the high school art show on art saves. Good. Yeah. And uh the the work that our students do is just it's amazing. It's mindboggling. I I I saw so many different pieces that were on display that I would have paid for. It was just just amazing work that they do. So our our art department at Ashlin
092High School has much to be proud of. I mean to to that I mean Mike and I had a nice morning uh this morning. Um, one of our um, young ladies, Rebecca Kriezmann, um, participated in the MIA state uh, girls golf championships today and finished fifth. Uh, wow. Uh, yeah. And I don't remember how many players were there, but hundreds. And she Great. So, we Mike and I went over and watched five holes of her play this morning. She actually played at my golf course. Um, which was great. Um, and she's as as always, she's just this big bundle of smiles. Um, she's a great kid. Great kid. And, uh, proud of how she rebounded well. I mean, she started out not playing well, but then had a great rest of the day. And I
093think shot 78 maybe today, which was amazing. Top five. Just once. Top five. Yeah. Yeah. It was great. Good for her. Well, let's make for her second round of the year because she played softball. So, her dad was telling us it was only her second 18 hole round of the year. Wow. Pretty impressive. Yeah. Yeah, that was it. No, thank you for sharing that. Great. Yeah, thanks for reminding me. That was one of the things I forgot. The artist. It's always the best with Scott. Okay. So, move second. All in favor? I Thanks everyone. Um, so