001e oh good all right good good evening tonight is March 13th this is the ashin school committee meeting we start each meeting uh with a reading of our vision statement which is the Ashton 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 Global communities our order of business for this evening is going to be um review of the agenda and adoption which I've just cover I'll be covering now um public comment if there is any administrative items student recognition overnight travel requests for Europe of April 2025 with Mr McAn an FY 24 Financial update and budget
002transfers an assistant superintendent update including some student data analysis uh the assistant superintendent update I'm sorry the superintendent update warrant approvals gifts and donations um acceptance of minutes from February 14th and February 28th any member updates and then some action items and then we will go into executive session to talk about collective bargaining uh with regard to our education support Personnel um so let me just start with the U the agenda make sure everybody's okay with the agenda for this evening Marcy I yes Tina yes yes okay I for me so the uh first item on on the agenda is public comment do have anybody here in person or on Zoom that is here for public comment anyone on Zoom just use the raiseed hand feature public comment going once twice do not see anybody
003I'm not seeing anybody okay thank you um first item student recognition Mr Adams great thank you and uh I don't know if the audience can see the folks who are in the room with us today but uh it gives me a great pleasure uh to to welcome the ashon wrestling team uh here tonight and and uh spend a few minutes just to recognize the outstanding season uh that you all have had and and for seniors too for the the great four years of of work that you've put in and uh as Mr uh zil and I were talking uh the the records that uh were set this year were amazing and num numerous um with not only individual but from a team standpoint and I want to share a little bit of that uh pre-co
004we used to have a lot of time where we would bring students in and and recognize the Great accomplishments um not only Athletics but academics music drama Etc and I feel like we need to get back to be doing those things uh because we do have some phenomenal students uh in our district and who are doing wonderful things so thank you for taking the time we won't keep you here very late um just a few minutes of your time if you will so I just want to highlight some of the things um this year so records most sectional finals in program history we had n uh highest mixed gender finish in the state school history of second place phenomenal uh highest girls finish in all states in school history second first New England Champion since
0051985 Norah quit congratulations uh and we'll continue on that the first Triple Crown Champion so States all states and new englands since 1985 as well um with Nora and and I think it's you know I I look at wrestling and I look at all the different sectionals that have to go through so there's a lot of time and effort and to to win each one of those is is quite amazing and I remember you're looking at Nationals as well coming up so it's uh hopefully perform well there and uh bring back that uh title as well but from a school all sports records the class of 2024 uh won three League titles and three District titles um first ever in any sport that we've that we've had here in Ashland uh four individual State Championship
006Champions this year so Norah uh Angie Nami Adrien Guzman and Anon phos uh so tremendous work um on that um State best most points in the state sexuals 291 and a half points 2024 most Allstate qualifiers 11 um and as we stay before first ever division three girls state champions uh and the combined girls state qualifiers and uh gender mixed gender state qualifiers and mixed gender girls points at state so uh great work um you know as I said to Mr zilly today when we were meeting uh it's it's been awesome to see the development of the program uh and from going from a co-ed or a co-op program and to individual having just Ashlin uh is a testament to the folks who came before you but your work as well uh in getting this
007program up and running uh and and succeeding so thank you so much for for being here uh and thank you for all the work you do and representing Ashlin first class and that's people who uh talk to me about our programs talk about how classy the ashon athletes are and it's certainly um you know with the wrestling program uh is Top Notch so thank you so I'll just add a little bit of that um so I mean I want to add my congratulations to all of you I mean every one of you has competed um as most of you know I've seen a lot of it firsthand um and you know you've all put in such a tremendous amount of work to achieve the success that you've had both individually and as a team um
008and the way you've represented ashin um has been Stellar I also want to just acknowledge the coaches when you have probably as many coaches as you have athletes um who've put in a tremendous amount of time um to make the program what it is to support each of you and if you haven't already take the opportunity to thank them at some point along the way for for all their support um certainly you have our support and uh thank you all for being here anybody uh I mean uh most important thing for me is you know what Mr Adam said about how you represent yourself in Ashlin so the success is great U but when you do it the right way and you represent yourself and us well that's that's even better so congratulations thank you
009congratulations you guys have done an amazing job not only for yourselves but for all the students coming up behind you because you've created the Bedrock of a really incredible program um obviously the coaches but also the student athletes you guys have set an example for those coming up behind you and you should be really proud of yourself car anything so I think I'd like to end it by just saying I I don't know if you heard Mr Terry Reed um I think you may have heard him I don't if you're were listening but our vision statement and I think it's really critically important uh especially with our student athletes to to just listen to this for a second we strive to be a model District that creates a culture of inclusivity for our diverse students
010and staff uh and I'm going to read the last piece that Embrace their roles as positive contributors to local and Global communities and that's what I talk about when you're representing us your community your families one another uh out outside of you know the town limits you do that so well and so thank you so much for that um you are and do embody what that vision statement clearly means to us in the district so thank you and for those at home I wish the camera was on you so they could all see you in your matching tshirts and and uh everything showing well they should just walk walk in front so and that was it thank you Mr than everybody for coming in congratulations again thank you thank you course thank you thank you
011yeah if we get a picture of that how do we get this on camera I don't we normally we have that I yeah get a picture of Mike out there okay I'll get a I'll get a picture of everybody yeah that'd be great and we can have do do a right on the front stair on the on the stairs yeah right on the stairs be perfect thanks thanks thanks all right we don't need mik for this one you canum photos going on outside um next item on the agenda is overnight travel request for Europe April 2025 from Cory McAn Mr McAn yes it's okay great thank you uh hi everyone I'm Cory McAn um school counselor uh at ashin High School uh I've been doing uh the trips to Europe uh usually every other year
012um going back to when I started at Ashland um uh the trip that I want to do for next year is um uh starting in Switzerland going down to Italy and then over to France and Spain um I always try to mix it up and but I always try to incorporate France and Spain because we've got kids learning French we've got kids learning Spanish so just they always they always go into it thinking that they they know more than they realize they do and then they come back all excited like I spoke um but it gets them to learn how to travel learn other cultures um they grow as people um they connect with each other really strongly um and I just think it's such a huge vital thing for them to to see the
013world in a safe way so any questions for Mr McAn not necessarily and I I think I love these trips I think they're great for the kids I think they're incredible opportunities to offer um you know one thing usually Paul brings this up as well too but in terms of you know the financing obviously these aren't cheap trips yeah right and so in terms of making the opportunity accessible to all students um what does that look like so that's my first question you may be able to answer these all at the same time um and then the second question is you know what does the roll out look like I know in the past couple of years there's been such an an enormous desire to go on these trips and a lot of kids have
014been um you know showing up to the info sessions a lot of families a lot of kids have been signing up for the trips and I think there's a a perception that you have to sign up right away or you're going to lose a spot so it's felt a little bit like the Hunger Game seems to parents like I have to make a decision right now and sign up right um and it's obviously a big commitment with the financial piece so you know kind of those two pieces how will make how can we make it accessible to all students and then what will the roll out look like in signing up and if I could just piggyback on it because I I had the experience last year of trying it so uh maybe you know
015you can address if there's any changes you plan on making uh last year there was an info session yes that seemed to be optional but it really wasn't optional uh because at that at that info session you learn that immediately after the info session uh is when it opened up and it was actually during a school committee meeting so I couldn't be there and my wife was also occupied so uh my daughter went with somebody with a friend and her her mother so we weren't able to get on in time and do that um and so to couple that with the with the equity piece and and we talked about that last year and how can we improve on that so that um um that everybody gets that that fair shot right so I've already
016made some changes from especially to last year all right so I'm gonna I'm going to answer the second part first and then sure I'll come back to the first one so the information session that I had for the trip that's happening in April uh in in a month um that was two years ago and I I advertised as I usually did I had in the same exact location as I always did when I showed up I had planned for you know I was doing the library three times as many people showed up at that information session that I had ever had before so something occurred that changed the desire to travel Co right I was just gonna say that yeah yes that's definitely piece of it um so that caught me off guard um at
017the same time I I definitely don't like to take more than I always want to fit in one contained bus I think there problems happen if you expand so much and go on to two buses and just add more chaperons and more this more that safety always has to come first for me and I start to get I mean I don't sleep properly on these trips anyway it it becomes a Tipping Point of things can go wrong I like to keep it in and every time we get on that bus I want every single person hearing my voice so that when I'm giving instructions it's clear on what's Happening so that was one of the reasons why instead of doing it every other year I realize like every year might need to happen in order
018to make sure that we can satisfy the demand that I'm now currently seeing because back when I started in 2010 every other year and I wouldn't generally I didn't max out i' get I'd get third I'd fill a bus I'd get up to 30 34 35 but I never would like be capped and so quickly so doing it every year is going to help part of that the other thing is um rolling it out where the first week it's the rising seniors that can that can um that can sign up and the sign up is a $95 refundable deposit so you sign up but then you change your mind you can you can you know drop out um Rising seniors first dibs for a week and then I'll send the link to Rising Juniors and
019then Rising sophomores um just to make sure that from a access standpoint if you didn't aren't able to go as a sophomore you'll have a shot at Junior if not sophomore junior and then Senior I just ask that point is there any prohibition on somebody trying to go like as a freshman a sophomore junior like if you go once you can't go a second time or has that not been an isue I've never I've never I've never run into that so I've never had to I can't even think if I have had a student that's gone I've had siblings go but I can't remember remember if I had but I've never I've never run into this kind of demand before so I've never had the past couple years there have been a lot of underclassmen
020on the trips which is great I have no problem with it but kind of in thinking through who gets first dibs also potentially thinking who's already gone on a trip so if it's a student who's already had the opportunity to maybe last year go to Italy this year is it London and Paris and April right and I know that there are some sophomores going on this year's trip as current sophomores going on this so just kind of thinking through I have no issue with putting that in place if that's I think that that would be the fair way to do it to be honest with you yeah I think and not really not one that likes the micromanage processes right but I think communicating that out when people are first looking at it so asample
021my daughter is one of the people who's going next month as a sophomore maybe if when we went to the first info session that was communicated she might have had to have the conversation in her head or with us about but would I rather think about doing a junior year right I don't know that we ever had the thought that she'd do it more than once because we might not support that right it's it is expensive but it seems like integrating that Concept in might cause some people to think a little bit about it at least in terms of priority for getting and I think it's not saying well you can't do it it's only if if everybody has had a chance to sign up and then there's still room then you could exctly it
022doesn't necessarily prevent them but it does allow for other students who haven't been able to just to spread the opportunity as far as possible yeah I think that would be which I think is ideal for sure a fair and also if if you could have the information session and then a gap between that and sign up um because like I said that caught us off guard but also you know we talked last year how do you get the students who look at that number and like my parents and never be able to do that how do you at least get them in there and then maybe H have them meian information and then have enough of of a gap to work out the process of how to because it's also daunting okay 95 it because
023it's it's not your process it's the right it's it's the um it's the Consultants or whatever whatever's system right and so it's not built for that and so you know if there's a way to because that seems daunting to someone who might need financial assistance for oh it's only $95 I'm like but what if it we we looked at it was it wasn't as clear as as as it it it's probably easy as as far as what it what it effectively will be right but when you look at it it's like what am I signing up for when what yeah when is it not when I want when won't I get this back and it can be daunting for that so if if there's some way to to have be able to have more of
024a of a a process ahead of that that for anyone that you know we want to we want to see if there's a system there there's time for that as well okay just a suggestion you know I'm with him I don't want to micromanage but that's what we experienced last year and totally toally surprise to you and we I know we we exchanged emails and so I cannot stress enough it was Bonkers I I remember I was texting um uh with uh Miss Shields um I I was because she's been to my information sessions I said you will not believe how many people are here I cannot believe this and it really caught me off guard cuz you don't I don't have people sign up ahead of time for the information session it's it's come
025and and certainly it it hasn't been a requirement I've had kids that have not attended the information session come see me the next day get the information and so I've never run run into that kind of problem before so um I learned I learned my lesson um but it it had shifted so quickly that I I I I did not I'm not trying to harp on that just to just on it so the other thing um I think that a lot of schools I won't say most schools but I think a lot of schools they roll it out for for April break trip they'll roll it out the very beginning of the school year in September and have their information set and all that I purposely I keep hitting the microphone so I apologize to
026everybody that's listening um I purposely do it before the summertime because I want to build in and and actually in future I actually want to back this up more so it gives more time for families to be able to chip away at it um for students to get a summer job to chip away at it to fundraise is to do things that they can do to make it more accessible rather than just September there's a information session and we're leaving in April and you got to be able to have all that money up front that's really hard for families um I know EF give scholarships I know that they one of the best things I think EF does is they actually create for the kids to use it's kind of like a GoFundMe link where
027they can share it with family members friends um whomever um to do fundraising that way just to like have people contribute to their um their trip so but the earlier they can know about it the more they can so this is actually like late for me because usually I do it every two years and I'm like it's two years before we go so all the London Paris Madrid kids that are go like they've been on for a long time so I'm okay doing it every year um but what I'm going to do is back up the approval process so you know you'll be seeing me earlier in the year to say it's not for this ail but it's for the next April but that way people can chip away at it because it is tough
028can you talk about the um the scholarship component and what we're able to do to support kids who even with you know the most advanced lead time aren't able to afford the trip um that's always one of the things we worry about is right the equity Equitable access piece never mind the procedural stuff that we kind of talked about but you talk about what we're able to do and and how confident you are that we're communicating the opportunity to go and what funding opportunities might be there for those who can't afford it so when I advertise it I say if any if any families have any are interested but have Financial issues come see me at the information session I always reiterate that as well um so there's opportunities for family to come see me
029to to you know I I can't guarantee anything because a I don't know how many families are going to come forward um and be how much money is at our disposal I know the high school has a fund that has a little bit of money in it um you know it can always use more um but but we we make sure that you know if they're interested they can have a conversation with us to see sort of okay where where do we need to meet you at and are you getting enough kids coming forward and talking to you or exploring that to feel confident that we're that message is being received because I I'm guessing there would be a number of kids who would say like they wouldn't even think about it right they just
030see the think oh Europe I can't never afford to go and then that's the end of it like and I'm hoping that you tell me now every year I got like four or five kids that come forward and I don't get that okay I don't get that the other thing I just add to that is if we are thinking about Equity getting a passport and how you do that and like aiding someone through that if if accessibility is an issue like that would be something maybe to bring I know it's responsibility no I absolutely help with that and I communicate sort of the steps provide the state department link and let families know if you have any questions yeah that all that the like the travel piece of like how to do this I walk
031all the families through that my my son went on the Italy trip last year so EF the the travel company also does that so you get lots of reminders both from the school and from the company I mean they don't do it for you but it's kind of the steps to take theyve got a they've got a hotline that families can call and literally ask any question and they will they they bend over backwards for that stuff it's they're really good about that that's great so so Jim maybe um the work that christe's doing and and and and and all the different other ways we're trying to outreach to all all the different uh groups uh demographics maybe you know kind of share this with them and see you know have them look at it
032see if there's a way that you know and you might be doing every you know might doing everything you can so and but you know we can always try to do more and because if we're not getting any um you know I would think that at some point we should there would be interest if the financial piece wasn't there so uh and I have confidence if we're back it up far enough that um if if we said to the community that we have a couple students that want to go on a trip that I I have no doubt that we could that the community would come and and help if needed so especially if we if we were able to identify those kids get them signed up they get that GoFundMe link if we shared
033that out you know maybe even anonymous people would donate to that so okay any other questions for Mr McAn if not is there a motion to approve the overnight travel request for Europe April 2025 so moved there a second second all right any further discussion um call the vote all in favor iOS no have a great trip thanks in 2025 in 2025 and have a good trip this as well that's great tell them that's not the time to wrestle yeah right we'll keep them under control I run sh thank you all right thanks Cory all right I'm going on that trip just we you're going on the one this April I didn't approve that part the LPM I'll keep my daughter in line then and um I've got my group already okay um next item
034on the agenda FY 24 Financial update and budget trans first we're looking to Cris on this we are I'm just going to I'll just preface it here I just want to make sure my screen is being shared here um Chris I think this is the one you sent me today I I just want to um Chris will walk us through this but uh as as we approach the end of Believe It or Not fiscal year 24 um and enter into fiscal year 25 in our budget conversations uh this weekend for the budget Workshop uh which is taking place at the David mes School folks just so we're clear um where we at the middle school no and not at the middle school um thank you for the reminder it's in the it's in the music
035room it starts at 8:30 um so as we go through a a school year in our operating budget that was approved at town meeting quite often we might have a variety of um expenses that we expected throughout the year salaries for instance which is 80 plus per of our um of our budget uh where we don't fill positions Andor we might have for instance special education um out of District costs that we anticipated that may not come to fruition or can we bring students back into the district partway through the year so there's a savings there so when we go through the process of looking at our line items and and Chris will walk through walk this walk you through this um we have relied Upon Our revolving accounts to to balance our budgets uh
036every year we do that so last year it was pretty significant um to balance f y 24 budget so as we go through the process we want to make sure that the board is fully aware that instead of using all of those revolving funds uh we can offset it to the actual operating expense account lines so those funds revolving funds can move forward to use in the next fiscal year okay um so Chris if you want to just explain uh the chart here and what what this means uh and this chart will look familiar uh hopefully on the weekend uh I wanted it to be consistent with our approach so this is a chart that we've shown for years uh in my budget book but also uh in the budget Workshop these are our major
037categories turn it over to you Chris make sure you're green y it's on thank you so what you see here is the general funds Budget on the far right you'll see an available budget it's $1.9 million that that's funds that have not been committed at this time or at least not financially recognized on our Ledger yet the request right now is pretty much what Jim just summarized to alleviate some of the expenditures within our revolving accounts and move them over to the general fund and I can speak specifically to that um there are one two three four five different requests um first one is we had a $162,000 set aside for International tuition um that fund which is salary related instead of expending expending the International tuition revolving account would like to move that into
038the general fund what is that pay for typically International right now it's it's two teachers it's two Educators typically weage teachers oh okay we that one more or less so it's their salaries yes okay I'm just confused by the the title of it that's it's well you know what it was in in the past we used to have Revenue coming in for agreements that we had with International students and things of that nature yeah I don't know if you recall I think we did it since you've been on as I said maybe time we set the tuition rate each year now this year I don't think we had it we haven't yet yeah we haven't had yeah but but I think it was it was like 12,000 something 12 something uh and so that's that
039tuition goes into this revolving account so this is is we're just seeking to move money out of this into the other well so it's and correct me if I'm wrong Chris when we passed the budget it included utilizing $162,700 uh provided um once per year okay um getting my the benefit of the revolving account is if we free it up we can use it again next year this particular account we haven't had Revenue in it in in the general at least uh in the revolving account we have not had Revenue going into that in at least three yearsa y since Mar you're familiar with revolving accounts I don't know if you deal with them in your work or different names but yeah that's why I'm just trying to connect the terminology it's a purpose specific
040fund money comes in and money that's used out of that should be used for the same purpose or tied to it so if we have like building rentals that come in we use that money to support things that kind of offset the cost building rental revolving accounts typically are fee fees go into it generally so busing and our general fund is is a standard Municipal fund that has to be expended within the fiscal year and if it's not it goes to free cash so these allow for rollover so there's a benefit to keeping the funds in there because then we'll have them for next year where uh if we left it in the general fund and there was a surplus it just goes to free cash so so Chris let me ask a question on
041this one that we're talking about the International tuition so if I understand it right um there's there's money that we are going to use out of the International tuition revolving account to cover some of the budgetary costs we had this year we don't we're now in a position where we don't have to do that and maybe it's just the way this is phrased but I'm reading it it says request to reclass International tuition of 162 to the general fund and that makes it sound to me like we're still moving it from revolving to General where I think what you're saying is what was in general is actually not going to be expended and that the money is going to stay in the revolving account it's reclassifying the the money as general fund and not well
042if you but if you do that I think what you're ultimately doing is instead of being able to maintain in the revolving account and you're moving the general fund if we don't expend it by the end of the year for some purpose would it not return to free cash to the town no I think what I'm saying is it's just it's It's oddly phrase is talking about the money reclassifying the money to come from the general fund so so you're tagging that money as general funding not that correct I want to get it out of International tuition move it over to expend the general fund so it's reclassing International tuition spend as bringing it over to general fund okay and it's it's it's tough to okay so I think I think I'm following what you're
043saying is that the revolving account funds in the amount of 162 plus or minus are being moved from that revolving account to the general fund the expenditure correct the expenditure of the anticipated or the actual expenditure we're not going to expense the uh International in tuition we're going to expense um the recommendation two teachers that you're talking about that we would have funded we're going to charge that to the general fund rather than Char that's correct correct all of these are going to be the same and it's all consistent so that methodology that's conceptually well done Mr Terry I sometimes you know you always want to be able to answer this question when somebody says why are you doing that yeah no that's so and this is part of the reason why I I wanted
044Chris to bring this to the board because these are significant numbers might not bring it to you if it was a $110,000 adjustment from a revolving account into the general fund but these are significant funds m we are going to be expending in fy2 so I wanted obviously the board approval on this so not not flipping sorry I know you were talking about flipping in between funds but on the year-to date expended what year what month year end is that so that's month I know but through what month February Clos the Year date expended would be through today today okay yeah that's that's real time that that was those financial R this oh it's a whole different world here okay oh I I can have my bad Clos we can do that no I'm just
045curious basic because you know ask them now and see if it changed it probably has changed not materially okay the ones I proved I got you signicant okay all sorry good so just continuing down that same thought process School Bus revolving we had anticipated 530k same same concept we like to move that over to the general fund okay building rental a little bit smaller but dollar but it's 80k are are all of these the same because those don't say to general fund are are you are you doing the same thing yes to General fun that that's me moving too quickly so I apologize I saw that before and I'm like are they doing something different with those three no it's I should have caught that didn't the concept is is the same all right just
046because I'm still catching up here because I don't understand I don't understand Finance the same way that all of you do just to make sure that I understand this correctly in essence we were originally going to to be taking money from the school bus revolving account to pay for something and we no longer have to do that the general fund is going to pay for those correct but we have to we have to state that in the budget where the money's coming from so that's what these changes are going to do well I don't even know if this is more for Jim and policy and and you I don't know necessarily if we even need to this is just a more of a healthy conversation to make sure that we're being fully transparent on what
047we're doing right right right you know so you know opposed to me just doing General fre but in essence these these expenses don't need to be paid from the account we originally thought they would correct so we're just clarifying where the money's coming and going correct so so so when we go before town meeting right we're asking for the $ 4,216 as our operating budget that's not truly our operating budget right I mean in we we have used all of these revolving amounts okay you could generally just add to this operating because we need more money to actually satisfy our cost it just doesn't show that in the operating money that we ask for the town so now we're saying of that 4,211 these things that we were make it $42 million budget we don't
048need that extra $2 million of the revolving accounts to make it balanced make meet right so this is what we're doing is just saying hey we want to be able to use this money in the future years so anything we were had planned on using the revolving for can actually be absorbed within the operating budget that was approved at town meeting okay perfect because you got like so for instance sorry to cut you off so for like the bus revolving you got enough fees to cover that and you didn't think no it's not even that I'll just do a private session so I no it's a great question okay know what it is it's operating savings that we have in other areas that we're able to offset revolving C expenditures so Mar think of it
049this way so let's let's assume we had a million dollars in salary savings right why don't you explain where salary savings might come from to start uh okay so could come from I get that unexpect a variety not positions whatever right I get all that yeah so that being said y we didn't anticipate those savings y right so we were going to have to use building rent uh uh using the bus the bus revolving to to make sure all of the bus expenditures um balanced but because we had Savings in salaries we're just going to transfer from a salary line to the transportation line that amount of money so now we don't have to use the r Ving account I got you okay just an adjusting it's really just adjusting entries for us right but
050it'll make more sense next year because this time last year when we have the budget workshops and we go through the the budget hearing we talk about how I I get I just I'm used to see Revenue expense net we have no Reven or whatever I you know I get it I get it I just we had this conversation we were going to use this much of these we we no longer need to I got you so I I was just going to speak to Chris your point about whether or not we even really need to vote on anything and I I think when we go through the budget here we approve the budget we don't really talk about the source um but it probably at least in my view is healthy for this committee
051um to be approving any material transfers you know I think Jim's right if it's if it's a nominal amount and we can figure out what that ought to be like I don't know that if we need anything more than a reporting on it once a quarter but I think for the the volume of money that's involved here um you know we made a lot of policy level decisions based on what we thought numbers would look like and um you know that these kind of numbers could cause somebody to say geez if you've got that why don't we do x z in in some fashion and and I think we should probably give some thought to that and it's certainly not a conversation we should be having right now but U maybe over the summer looking
052at some of the sort of the financial practices we have and and refreshing ourselves on what those ought to be I think I think we've done like last year we had similar discussions right I mean it's it's definitely a summertime thing I mean when we're talking about these are savings that allow us not to dip into using these These funds I would probably say great that just means we're we have a a little bit of a a little bit of a cushion we're kicking the can K down the road so I wouldn't say hey we can do that unless it see how maybe somebody listening to this conversation or somebody from the outside is going to say well if you have all that extra money why aren't we doing the things that are on our
053punch list right why you're doing other things that we want when we already committed to using those the funds that were there so I think it makes sense to just think through our own policy in terms of how we whether we you know I don't know that we need to like you said vote on or approve them but just kind of how we you know yeah and and how and how we communicate that right we talk about it when we do the budget cycle that dipping in in these ways is not sustainable that's right exactly sorry Chris you um school choice the one of the larger um categories that we have is school choice requesting to move that fund uh utilize the general fund free up about school choice funding um 600k and the last
054one is more kind of not so much um punch list items at the highest level but punch list items at at a facilities level um to utilize 67,000 in I don't want to say miscellaneous because you know some of them are larger um but miscellaneous facilities request that are you know that are necessary we just looking to move forward with those so do you tell zil if they won the championship you get him a new mat he already on the list so but so so just question is it a typo or yeah yeah Paul I I saw the same thing so the 37 below the detail we added right so the 30,000 um for the gym dividers was added this afternoon it didn't get added to the top which was 67 that that's the the
055last line says 37 detail below 6 because we added 30 Chris after we had a conversation so no that's fine yes I just didn't know if those were already planned expenditures it's it's I added the gym dividers because they came in y y wor yeah but those were so just so we're clear those $67,000 of items would have been on on FY 25's punch list budget items if you will but we've got an opportunity to there are certain things we can get in advance we can't we can't pay for um services for next year with this year's money were any of these on your 24 list that you originally had last year at the budget on the plan okay so as we look at you know even the the bottom number there right the favorable
056favorable variance after recommended adjustments um was 1.1 million there and yet I don't think we typically end a year with a what would have turned back to the town as a favorable number so what what does this represent in terms of like where we are year-to date compared to where we historically are year-to date and you know what what do we end up incurring as unexpected cost or or what have you that that money might might go to sure there there are a number of variables that that 1.1 million can can can swing I mean utilities alone can uh come up uh some of the outou of District expenditures come up any onetime needs I mean I'm just thinking over the past month when we needed uh you know generators and boilers it boilers I
057mean things we're comfortable enough right now where that is you know we're in a good position right now where I'm not nervous by making this recommendation can I just ask so the bottom line up there on the top is 1.9 yep yeah that but you how do I get to the 1.1 yeah so so over to the right because the top three are already accounted for there and it's just the this the 668,000 um the last two yeah the the majority of it for for buses for an example are already picked up so the notes over there the right that they're already captured in the above financials when at the end of the day if our budget is I'd be doing if we were completely on budget there were no savings that 1.9 wasn't recognized
058I'd be doing General entries um to adjust the budget for the bus right now we have a requisition out there encumbered under the encumber the million that picks up the bus expenditure already so I'm just acknowledging that the 1.9 million already captures that yeah I'm just so if if the top three are already in that 1.9 school choice hasn't been touched yet right so but that in the last two are only $668,000 MH but there's an $800,000 difference between those numbers right the the 57 57,000 plus 80,000 plus 27,000 should all that would net out 67,000 so basically the the school choice for 600 1,000 and a 37,000 and a small amount of the um or 10 something 130,000 of the International tuition is already picked up in the encumbrances oh oh I didn't I
059didn't read this okay so you not all when it said I I'm sorry when I looked at I didn't see that it was only partial of of those pict okay that's right that makes sense yeah now I got it sorry great okay any any other questions from Chris anything else you wanted to address Chris no thank you so I think um J I don't know if we had a motion on this to approve the requested fund transfers um it feels to me like it would be appropriate to get a vote on that no I agree that's why I put it on as yeah um and budget transfers okay so is there a motion to approve the fund um transfers as presented so move is there a second second all in favor I I I anybody
060opposed hearing none motion passes for nothing thank you Chris all right uh next item on the agenda is Mike assistant superintendent report you're going to give us a data dive of some sort I am going to I just want to share my screen here and I will pull this up our favorite Software System by the way this is open architect so um what what I wanted to spend some time with today is to uh share with you just some general data um and my hope is that uh today we'll focus on our I ready last last time we were together I chatted with you all about the fact that this is this year is the first time that we're actually utilizing a common assessment point for students in K through 8 we have adopted um
061I ready software which allows us to do a comprehensive diagnostic assessment in both math and Ela for all students um K8 uh what you aren't going to see today is data for k um because they do not necessarily take the fall data they don't take it in the fall they're not ready to take a a computer Diagnostic in the fall um but what we will be able to do is see their their growth from from Winter to Spring and then ultimately from their Spring to Fall of next year when they're in first grade but we'll focus today on on really grades one through eight uh what this diagnostic does it really allows for our staff to understand where the students are and they've been using this data specifically at Warren and Mendes as we developed
062our brand new um data teams um to to really give some uh pointed interventions for students who are struggling in certain areas uh what I'm sharing with you today is uh a more generalized data set um that talks about the diff the school the district as a as a whole uh we can look at it as a school and we can look at as a grade level um as a team of Educators we we can get even more granular this and we can look at this student by student by student um by nature of this report which is in and you know my what I'm talking about today we're not going to be talking about specific student data obviously because of the confidentiality piece um but we are able to to essentially analyze how each
063one of our students is doing in in four basic areas when it comes to math and and then in ela um there there are significantly there a few more areas so when we look at um Ela I'm going to start there and looking at it districtwide what you can notice is that in the fall we had uh just over 1600 students uh take our I ready assessment and essentially when I look at this data what I'm trying to determine is what is what is our difference between blue and red and that's one of those really quick icatching things that we can see so students who are falling in that red and light lighter red cat category are students who in the beginning of the year were were uh testing below their grade level uh and
064the way this test works is that they they as as students answer questions it gets more challenging for them if they get the questions correct it will get more challenging and more challenging it's a it's a software that's you know pretty pretty intuitive and it allows for it to get either a little bit easier or a little bit more challenging based how the student succeeds and then it will determine what their what their grade level equivalent is so as of the Fall um students you know one through eight uh who were tested only 47% of our students were averaging on or above grade level um for our Ela so does that mean if I'm a sixth grader or look six sixth grade coort when you look at them in September half of them are already
065grade grade level 47% y the rest of them are not but are you measuring against where they should be at the end of the year already or yes yes they're me measuring where they should be at that given time okay with with with the growth towards the end of the year so one of the things that we want to see is what their growth measurement ultimately will be as well so they they're they're essentially measured against the national Norm um in and where they are at that moment if they're on grade level or not uh the students that would be above grade level have reached the point at that point where they have gone towards the end of the that sixth grade so let me just I want to make sure I understand that so
066does this mean that 47% 47.1% are below grade level for if you did this on September 1st they're below where they should be on September 1st or is it that they are below grade level for where they should be on the last day of the school year for example yeah below it should be for the last day of the school year yeah yeah thank you yeah okay so yeah so that that 40 7.1% being on or above is end of year benchmarks correct yeah but measured at the beginning of the year yeah I'm sorry if I didn't say I wanted to make sure that we talked still though about the fact that they're they're showing you your potential growth as well which is really important yeah okay so so so so if if they are
067on track they'd be on if they are on track to to reach that yeah so that's that's a different that's a different thing that we see but yes so each individualized student gets a growth plan that they can that they'll get from this so if a student for instance was um this exact breakdown that you see in the bottom uh was and it maybe maybe it'd be helpful because when I looked at it earlier three plus below two below one below early on those meant literally nothing to me because what is early on so three plus below means three grade levels below okay two grade levels below one grade level below early on in the grade level right there okay or mid to above so really what you expect is our students in the beginning
068of the year to be early on or mid to above right so our early on kids are really right where they need to be our mid to above kids in the fall are are a little bit ahead of the game okay if they're one grade level below no that's that's not that's not a terrible place to be either in the fall okay but we want we want to make sure that those kids have a full year of growth and we can measure that with this so I thought I ready was kind of a a point in time assessment so like if they tested in September they're looking at where they should be at like grade you know 6.1 like six grade six first month grade six second and is my understanding of that incorrect because
069I thought that they they were kind of like they were look if they were tested in September they were normed against where they should be in September of sixth grade versus what they should learn by the end of September yeah well that's what that's why they they give you that mid or above because some of our kids are testing to the above point because when you that's why I wanted to explain in the beginning that once you get more questions right they continue to test you and and that will take you to that above grade level so each students test grade level are below where they should be at the beginning of sixth grade not not they're not looking at where they are in sixth grade and saying if you're if you're still here in
070June you're going to be below grade level but right now now in September of sixth grade you're you're below where we expect you to right right yeah yeah maybe I'm not doing a very good job explaining confuse it because so many you said they look at different they look at it so many different assessments look at it different but the the the most important thing to understand is that we want everybody at in the spring to be on right or or mid to above right we want that's why I want to really focus on the students that are in red right now at the beginning and then watch how that changes in our breakdown when we look to the winter just to show ultimate growth already in this short period of time for our students
071so you can see you can just see the change so if you look at for instance comprehension and informational text which is a breakdown all right in the beginning of the year 30% of our students were either two grade levels or three grade levels below okay now in the winter that number has gone down from 30 to 22 and the number that is increased in that area is 26 and 16 um were our students that were mid or above to early on and now you see in the winter comprehension informational tax is 36 and 18 so there's some significant growth that is occurring districtwide for our students and we went from 61 we we went to 61% of our students who are now considered on or above where they should be and in the fall
072it was only 4 47.1% for our for our district uh and this is I just really basically want to show you that this is great growth that is happening and we're able to measure this um throughout the year now what we like about this tool is it can tell us where our biggest challenges are so if you look in the winter already we we have made significant progress in things like high frequency words right 64% plus 12% right my quick math says 76% of our students are on or above grade level that's great because in the in the beginning of the year that was only 55% so we've really seen some significant growth there and if we get down to the grade levels why okay well obviously there's going to be significant growth there in
073grade one right in grade one you notice now I can just I can just make it only grade one students grade one students 68 of our students were tested where 34.5% of the students were on or above now in the winter we've got 62.6 and you can see the real difference there in the high frequency words so they're they're getting there um we talk a lot about phonics here right this is one of the things that we're focusing on this is something that we have to focus on we've spent a lot of time with that in terms of our foundation work and our work with hegerty you can see the growth here in the fall in phonics our first graders only 45% were testing on on or above grade level 3% of our student population
074was two grade levels below well in the winter in phonic there's a significant increase uh it's still 3% or our two grade levels below but look at the difference in our students who are on or above it go it Rose to 68% so that's something to be celebrated in terms of our in terms of our first grade population and this is one of the data points that the data teams are using too for both literacy and math that's right and what they're doing is they're they're taking it more granular and they're actually looking at the student in particular and saying all right this student uh did test below grade level let's look at which exact breakdown by domain did this student actually actually need work in so if we determine that the student was below
075in vocabulary we're going to Target vocabulary for that particular student um so just just continuing that was a quick look at first grade uh you can see the significant increase from the fall to winter I want to just be able to show you grade two um grade two again 34.1% um and you know phonological awareness take a look at phonological awareness right there 8 84% of our students were were two grade levels below in grade two when they were tested in the fall okay in the winter it's it's now 73% so it's it's obviously not what we want to be but there's some growth there right so we we've we've dropped that number um by 11% but we know that in grade two that's where we need to be focusing right now so it allows
076our teachers to say we're going to spend some significant time on phonological awareness at the grade two level because we we need to ensure that our students are showing significant Improvement but what an affirmation of the programming you have brought on right because the kids who have had more time with that program they're doing great with this skill correct right this is the grade that hasn't had as much time with ha and the other that's right our our first graders have our first graders have so but what do we know we've got to really hone in on that now just phonic is a little bit of a different story right phonic we have we have about 40 there were there were about 46% of students who were on or above grade level in the fall
077and in the winter that increased to 65% okay so but then when you get to the phological awareness it's a different piece as you know I mean it's a different aspect of it we've talked about that um but just again really great data to see and and when you look at third grade now we've implemented um we've implemented uh fundations at the third grade level this year for the for the first time but those kids had it in second grade but we now implemented in the third grade so you might see some differences in third and fourth grade as we look at this data so in the fall again uh 25 23% of our students uh were phonics were mid to above where now in the winter it's it's up to 33% okay 33 so
078there's there's a there's an increase there uh we still need to do some better j a better job in our high frequency words that's a place where we're where we're challenged and this is helping us to get there so now we know we can hone in on those high frequency words with our third grade students can can I you just um pause for a sec yeah so on the top of this page right there's the three periods fall winter spring yes is there a direct correlation between what you're seeing in the spring and then what you're seeing so cohort goes through this assessment in the spring of the say second grade right when you do it again in September for that cohort that's now third grade right what what's the sort of correlation where you
079see like the red bar here because what what this is telling me is that the high frequency words what we whatever we did the year before yeah didn't get them where they needed to be right yeah and so we have not been using this one through eight until this year so now that we are truly going to be one through eight I feel like we'll be able to better answer that question to follow cohorts okay um we had only been we' only been utilizing the assessment data three through five uh so we were able to track them for a certain number of years and we have found that um the the fourth and fifth grade data would very much correlate to how our students were doing on the mcast um but we still weren't able
080to truly figure out what that fifth grade data meant for sixth grade because we weren't doing it so I I hope that next year when you asked me that same question I can say well yeah here we just tracked it we saw how they did in the spring and now we know um but that's also sort of going back and saying okay if this is where the kids are coming in at whatever point I don't what year have on the board anymore yeah that means that we didn't do something right for the year or two before that right and obviously we we now know that inform we now know we now know that we have to spend more time and and and that's these are the conversations in particular right at Warren um they have
081such a Focus right now on small group instruction they they have made it a point to change the way we are instructing our students and they are giving pointed uh interventions for our for for our kids who are struggling in these in these areas well if this is a particular um place where students need work that's where we're going to hit and and that those changes now being implemented at the third fourth or fifth grade level as well I mean I want to you know say that Jenna is doing a great job in in changing that culture of of small group and I think Kate has a huge say in this as well right Kate helped bring this over to Warren and now she's bringing it over to Mendes in terms of seeing more small
082group in these data teams where teachers are sitting and looking at this and and making a job adjustments to practice because they know that this is what our kids need to follow up on what you were saying the other thing it might tell you is that hey if these sixth graders aren't coming in at this point but now when we have the data on the fifth graders they're not showing the same same issue right uh it might say hey the changes we've made you know had an effect because you know previously there was obviously an issue that trickled up to the to the next grade maybe the shows now that they're on or above or or where they need to be and that says hey the change now we didn't need to wait we could
083say hey this issue was in that Upper Grade now these students don't seem to be having that same same Gap in that same area but I just had a question um sorry to cut you off um on the on the on the flip side of this I'm just curious and this is wonderful because I love these things um just not to interrupt you when Mike sent this out I emailed him back saying I think you got a lot of Deep D diver data divers on the school committee everybody's gonna love this yeah know it's wonderful so and Kudos that even a third of the you know middle school starting the year mid or above so as you disaggregate the data are you also looking at enrichment opportunities for the kids who are because you don't
084have the are they one grade above or two or do you have that or I'm just curious on the flip side of it like how are we further you know growing that opportunity so that's where I'll commend the the Middle School in particular because they are the ones that are the the the most ahead of the curve right now in terms of our individualized Student Success plan work that they've been doing the isps that we're talking about okay um and and they're looking at this to say okay we've got students who need to be challenged a little bit more and we've got to make sure we're getting there um this does actually this this you know when when we get down to the student level it shows us where students are in particular and and
085um how much above they are in specific domains right so we get to say well a student may be scoring on or above in math but wow they really are killing it in Geometry right so we've got to make sure when we get to our geometry unit or we get to that particular unit we're we're giving them some work that allows them to get themselves to the next level okay and and I do know that uh the Middle School in particular has has done things like that for certain students when when the time comes particularly in in terms of um some some independent projects and some independent work that they can do um in and just differentiated assignments for students that need a bigger challenge okay um one of the things I also want to
086bring to your attention though like when when we look at this data because I want you to dive in and I want you to come prepar to questions and email me questions and this is one of the reasons I wanted to share this with you um first for a little brief point and then and then go over it rather than give it to you like two weeks ago and then then come in and be able to talk there are going to be certain times where you notice wow 100% of students are listed as uh below grade level like for instance on um sixth grade ELA high frequency words well it's not something that they were looking at so it just comes out as that because then you look in the winter I mean in the
087in the fall and then in the winter it disappeared okay so I'm not sure why that's a glitch in the system but don't think that our stud none of our students so they just didn't take that they didn't take that piece and for some reason it showed up there so I I don't want you to think that 100% of our students were failing in that area on that specific gross anomalies are you know obviously gross anomalies something something's terribly wrong and it's probably data so you know that was the ELA um quick quick look at some of the math stuff as well obviously we talk about this math it looks at only four domains algebra algebraic thinking geometry measurement and data and number and operations one of the things that was really interesting was the
088other day um when we were having a conversation with our vertical math team we were talking a lot about um our some typical struggles uh with measurement and data with our students specifically on mcast uh and and you see that you know for for our sixth graders um in the fall uh we only had U Know 35% of our students were mid or above 17% were on uh We've we had 21% of our students falling either two or three grades below uh and then in the winter it was significantly better so it it it's good data to look at because it's showing me that I know our teachers are spending time and energy to ensure that our students are improving in that area they they've they've worked hard on that they've discovered that that is
089one of our Improvement areas well that jump right there alone shows that what they're doing is working and it's it's nice for them to be able to visually see that and when we talk about it in our in our vertical teams they go back to their team and say look it it's what we're doing is working right now now do all students straight across the board take it or is it just selected classes that are doing I ready or it's everybody so it's for every student so you can see for sixth grade 210 students took it oh I didn't even notice that Sor thank no there there there are some students who have not taken it there some students that don't uh for particular reasons um you know one one of the things that I
090am going to point out to you um when we talk about all of our students is if I come off a sixth grade and go back the one big weakness that I'm seeing in I ready in general is uh it's a very language Rich assessment and it's very difficult for our English learning students to to perform well on this test it's a weakness of it uh so you'll notice that when I click on our El students the number numbers the numbers go way down right we we had 100 students that are El districtwide that took it and only 10% were on or above these are things though that we know we we know that right now we've got to figure out what to do to better serve our English learner population when it comes to
091mcast we also know that the best way to measure Student Success for eel is through the access test I was just going to say I would assume there's other and we have a dashboard on this for our access test as well and you know that as part of our of part of our goals in our school in our new our new um strategic plan we're focusing on access when it comes to our English learners but we still have to look at this and understand that there are specific areas where our students are really struggling um and why isn't there a percentage of growth that's higher for for our English Learners like that would match the percentage of growth that's happening for our for our students who who don't speak a second language um so I
092I didn't want to point that out that's an areaa that we're looking about and talking about we can also disaggregate this uh by ethnicity we can disaggregate the data by um special Edge status um we can look at a whole school rather than the whole District or just one grade level at a time um but it's it's in general it it shows it shows some real growth um across the board in in all areas as you can see in math here um 16 just under 1,700 students were tested in the fall 37.4 on or above in the winter in math 56% of students but really that that growth that we see in algebra and algebraic thinking is impressive um as is the the growth in measurement in data and I know that our teachers have
093spent significant time talking about that so I I I'm not sure if there are any other things that you want to see I'm happy to to to take you through some specific things is this I know you sent us you know kind of a dashboard that we'll have access to as is this what ours I haven't had the opportunity to log into yet this is your dashboard so the dashboard that I we again we worked with open Architects and we said we want to give school committee um the ability to be able to get reports on air and also be able to look at it themselves without without breaking any confidentiality so they created a school committee specific dashboard that that only you Jim and I have access to uh and and it doesn't include
094any specific student data and so it's just for the I ready and the DBL data yes but eventually it's going to include more eventually um it will include our ST Math data uh as well as our teaching strategies gold data so teaching strategies gold is the assessment tool we use at the prek level um so that will be on here and stmath is that new program that we're utilizing at Warren and it will also um next year hopefully if the grant gets approved be utilized at the Mendes as well um they knew that right now the the the most significant data sets that we have are these two um so that's where they did that far as first um there's there's other there's other dashboards um that are that are pretty impressive and and I
095I feel like I can show it on a small screen because you can't see the students names on this when it's like this but essentially this one here um my student Explorer is going to be the dashboard that sort of changes the way we do things here in Ashlin so ultimately what this is going to be is an issp at our fingertips for every single student so if I were to pull this up right now you would see um student names with their scores for all of the different tests that they took so it would have access it would have mcast it would have all I ready data uh at the middle school level would have their I Exel data that they're utilizing right now as an assessment measure it would have Dibbles everything that
096they've done and you know specifically I'm excited when once our current waren students you know become middle schoolers because we'll just have a plethora of information to really watch their growth progress over time and we'll have it in front of them and anything that we want to you know hone in on will be there we have a we have a student attendance data as well that you know when you asked me uh recently for which day was the was the day where we were out the most it up easily can look it up in in in seconds uh to be able to to find that information for you sorry I was just going to ask Will you I know like when I said through parent teacher conferences they hand me the I assess will the
097like individual dashboard that informs the I SSP did I say that right will that be handed because I know as a parent of a younger child there's a lot of Home sometimes intervention as well on what to work on I know I did a lot of spelling in the last few years so I just feel like that would be great data to have especially for the younger kids where you know you can influence more My Hope Is that we get there eventually um right now we're not ready to be there yet because those those are just we're still we're still in that phase right now where the majority of the folks that have access to this are the folks that are um are in leadership positions or um department head positions uh we haven't given
098full access to teachers other than during data team meeting times yet because it's not it's not fully equipped with everything that we need okay uh we're still working with the open Architects team to make sure it has all of the stuff to be one on it but this particular one that I'm sharing with you is is is is done y um and our our teachers are using that when they get together for their assessment meetings the data team meetings okay yeah Mike how many other if you know boxman other the districts are using a tool like this is this a relatively new new item so I don't know how many districts are using it I know that they're growing faster and faster um what what they started with and I think I told you this
099maybe last last year a couple years ago when I got introduced to them is they were they were doing free dashboards for every town in Massachusetts for mcast so that's what sort of got me hooked like oh I look at this mcast dashboard and then they get you in and we and we decided to become full partners with them uh but you know I was doing our our year two three Mentor program today that we work with Milt Milford and and men and Upton and they both use it you know the same way we do uh and it's been great because we bounc ideas off of each other and the reason I knew that they could do a school committee report is because one of those folks does the same thing um and and also
100Pete uh at Warren he's he's working with that S3 group that we've talked about on the mtss and they have given us some specific information about how districts that they're working with are utilizing this tool to help with the mtss work to make it easier so that really has driven that my student Explorer page that using so we're we're we're having them model ours based on what other districts that that S3 works with how they model their dashboard one of the things that that's I'm thinking about sort of down the road because I don't think we're there yet in terms of how we're using it but to me you know I think we struggle to communicate our successes to our student community and and mean our parent Community as well and you this is is
101a tool that when you have some comparative data better longitudinal data to be able to show parents or show the community the success the district is having and identifying where kids are at first grade and and seeing how they progress on these multiple you know standards or whatever the right terminology is there over time and seeing the pink shrink and the blue expand um I think would be a a great confidence Builder to parents to understand that we do know what we're doing that that everything is is really now calibrated much more to the individual student how that's being shown and I think to me that that is some point a state of the schools type of program um around presentation of this kind of data I I think it's too new like I think
102you're you know if you haven't even rolled it out to teachers to be looking at at a granular level we're not there yet um and so I understand it takes time but I think this is a phenomenal tool to be to look at and to be working with yeah and since you kind of gave this segue of talking about specific things I mean looking at in particular the math Thea at Warren you know 18% so 18% of students in the fall were on or above and I alluded to this last last time 18 to 43.8 that's a that's a pretty impressive number that growth number is is is really great and when you think about what they've spent the majority of their time on in the first few months ofo school it's it's where we
103see this increase in the blue in the algebra and algebraic thinking in the numbers and operations that's what we're focusing on there right so that's that's impressive work that's happening at at at the grade one and two level and I I really not that I should not that we should har on those particular students right now but th those are the kids though that we're we're really looking at because that those are our I want you know our post-pandemic kids right now who did spend so much time in their very early childhood being away from any socialization right those first graders they they were like one two years old when this whole thing was happening right so how are they doing it how are they adapting well they're adapting pretty well and and they're doing
104a pretty good job and they're showing some real growth that they should show once they once they get to school so it's it's it's exciting for us to see that so the other piece in terms of the data is I know you know Jen Cutler has talked about some of the tools she uses are those things that are also tracked in open Architects as well or or or will be potentially added to it so I thank you for pointing that out um that is another one of the areas a domain that we're going to be adding to the my student Explorer uh and probably to the combined assessment is is all jens's data right yeah that's going to be it may it will probably be a completely separate dashboard which will be oural dashboard um
105but it will be included in the my student Explorer data when we pull up everything because that that is comprehensive yeah anybody else then we start playing with they have 100 more questions well but that's I'm glad and I want you to you know ask come come with questions for my reports that I do and I want to be able to talk about this and pull this up now that this really is very usable from from from my vantage point I can get things for you pretty easily in terms of I mean just a thinking aloud kind of thing if we all have the opportunity to play with this right and Lori does too it may be something that even you know is driving budget requests right and so maybe one of those things that
106we spend more time with you and showing yeah you know this is what it's showing this is the support I want to put in place this is something that I want to make sure is prioritized Y and you know we we've done all the work on the Strategic plan over the last two years right and as you're implementing that this gives you an ability to say this is something we need to Target and you have a an idea of how to do that sure um I think that would just be another time time for us to potentially check in on it and have another you know deep dive into it as people may want and and know that um we we'll get prepared to present the Dibbles data to you as well I just want
107to be able to have Kathy here uh to be able to do that as well as probably probably Pete maybe even Erica at that point um because it's really primarily at the Warren school obviously where we're where we're doing that um but next time next report I give we will'll focus on Dibbles okay okay all right anybody else all right no thanks man yeah that's fantastic uh next item on the agenda superintendent's update I've got nothing I was going to say there's no way you're going to follow that so you know nope all right uh Paul Warren approvals uh between February 29 20124 and March 13 2024 I Paul Kendall authorized by my signature payables in the amount of $234,600 186 this includes general fund expenses of $176,500 34 revolving expenses $ 52,2 327 and
108Grant expenses of $ 5,867 125 good and maybe it's it's good time the reason we do this is we used to have have warrants here we all had to sign the warrants um and what about five years ago now or five or six years ago there was a municipal efficiency act came Mass mization act something like that that allowed us to um uh authorize a single member to do it and so that's uh so we do that so it just streamlines it so I got tagged with it but you're around you said you do it thank you um next item uh gifts and donations Jim yes we've got a couple uh Planet a uh $277.00 general gifts and donations uh and Special Olympics of Massachusetts $500 for the Warren school Unified sports so a total
109of $777 do we have a motion to accept the gifts and donations so moved okay and that was as presented correct as presented yes thank you sorry thank you team do we have a second second Marcy all in favor I I I and oppos bothe passes for nothing uh minutes let's do two separate things um anybody have anything on the minutes of February 14th I wasn't there you you wasn't there okay Paul Marcy no all right is our motion to approve the minutes of February 14 2024 as presented I guess I'll I'll I'll move second the gr all right all in favor you can still make a motion all in favor I I I and T yeah okay um and any POS you hear passes for nothing February 28 anything on that one all right
110can I get a motion to approve those as presented no moved second all in favor I I any oppos n passes for nothing uh any member updates we got I feel like there's a couple of things I'll remember May if I look at my calender I did go to uh the High School production of Chicago Chicago that was that was really good went to a band concert um feel like there something else me the middle school also had their theater production make uh the band actually played uh it was Middle School band they actually played in the Middle School auditorium which was an interesting more squished in well I mean called The Little Theater what they what they did is they just staggered it you know U I think we did the same thing during
111during Co where it's like hey you show up this time you leave you know only if you have a a student in a different grade and so they kind of did it in shifts and so it wasn't it was it was comfortable it's kind of it's different it's different feel so that that was interesting and I wanted to think I'm forgetting something else that I wanted to bring up but yeah no similar I did pretty much the same things as Paul okay yeah I'll just say even though it really was not school committee hat on I spent a lot of time in wrestling gems I can tell you they're smelly um all right uh any action items people have for future agendas okay if there's something pass it along to to me or Lori and
112our last item on the agenda is an executive session so I will make the motion on this um move to enter executive session under section 21 A3 to conduct strategy with respect to collective bargaining or litigation if an open meeting may have a detrimental effect on the bargaining or litigation litigating position of the P of the body excuse me and the chair so declares and not to return to open session we will be discussing the Ashton Educators Association ESP bargaining unit do I have a second second right being a roll call vote Marcy I Tina hi Paul hi and I for me we are um moving into executive session thank you not to return to open session not to return to open session you guys mind if I head out to the B um the
113opportunity to chat um so he kind of filled me in and it all works for me okay right thanks Tina is this Alex or it's both of them both of them okay for