School Committee Meeting 1/10/2024

001good evening everybody it is January 10th this is the Ashland meeting of the school committee our vision statement which we open every meeting with is the Ashland Public Schools is a forward-thinking district that cultivates the academic and social emotional growth of each student through a supportive collaborative Innovative and challenging environment students will develop into self-motivated resilient lifelong Learners who who Embrace their role as responsible contributors to Global Community this meeting is being recorded by waca cable TV our order of business this evening is our Open Session call to order opening procedures agenda review and adoption there'll be time for public comment our administrative items include appoint a new school committee secretary the grant approvals FY 24 fund code 274 individuals with disabilities Education Act Part B idea fy4 fund code 240 262 idea Consolidated Federal

002ENT application new position special educator to work with aged 18 to 22 young adults paway School Improvement plan Warren school Improvement plan the vacant School Committee Member process superintendence update warrant approvals the consent actions includes the minutes gifs and donations committee reports of activities member updates action items and then we will adjourn are we not doing the tour rate uh or did I just miss you saying that um I think I missed one uh thanks Paul um the fy2 preschool tuition rate increase recommendation is number four on the list so are you guys uh okay with the order of business this evening and I'll also take roll call Pa kle Tina yes and Mark Terry is absent this evening and we had a resignation of one member which is why we have an open seat

003uh we have enough of us here tonight three of us to have a quorum so we will move forward with the meeting and uh we will start by asking if there are any members of the public that would like to offer any comment this evening and then seeing none we will move to our next item on the agenda the grant approvals actually schol the school committee secretary oh gosh that's very important is there anybody at this table that would like to be school committee secretary will to at least I'd be happy to do it I'm happy to to step back into that role okay I would appoint I would make a motion to appoint uh Tina as the secretary and I will second all in favor I I secretary congrat conratulations thank you okay moving

004on Grant approvals and thank you thank you Tina much appreciated please um so where to start I guess learning how to write grants this year was really really helpful and informative um the 274 is a unique Grant this year that was specific to funding allocated for the new IEP development and the roll out for school districts um obviously it's a big lift and I think obviously the state decided that there would be some money that should be allocated at with that um so I was able to write the Grant and get awarded $266 48 to be used towards that new rollout so in my proposal I broke down um the need for support from an individual to come and work with the district um Alan Bloom has been identified as that individual he's um a

005special ed kind of everything he's worked in a lot of capacities over the last 40 years um he has committed himself to Ashlin for some time for next school year and with his IEP work and goal writing he's created a new or an application that helps teachers and special education professionals right really concise and meaningful goals specific to obviously student needs which we do anyways but there's always room for growth and Improvement um he's also written a manual and in the grant I've written um an ask for about 60 manuals to be distributed around the building and to our ashack to our special education coordinators um to our superintendent to make sure that we're all on the same page with that so that was approved and that's how I plan to use that funding hopefully

006if you say yes thank you thank you for that the grant writing process can be a lot so so Jim uh she's already got award the Grant and this is our acceptance of the funds yeah and is it at FYI or do we need to actually vote and no we actually need to accept all grants so we can expend the money okay yep so we can do one at a time so sure if you want uh do we have a motion to accept the has described so moved in a second all in favor I I I that's how it's going to go tonight easy note taking for uh Gretchen both the 240 and the 262 have been grants in existence for I don't know how long but certainly for as long as you know the

007last at least 20 years um in those fundings were they're pretty much together about $800,000 worth of funds that support um a cleric salary one being the administrative assistant that works in our office um a Koda which is an occupational therapy assistant seven esps um there's money in there for contracted Services supplies and materials other expenses um to support any special education needs that come up unexpectedly uh about really the the bulk of it is all professional salaries that have been used um or alloc ated to this Grant and just kind of really looking at those salaries long term and that'll be a conversation at some other point is there a better way that we could be using our grants to these professional salaries need to be absorbed in other positions but right now it's

008working with what we have and and Jim the uh at least this this grant this was already put you know consider we already knew about this and it was part of our budget there's not a yeah we just didn't we didn't have the funding amount over the summer typically when we approve appr the grants like Tittle one title three we just didn't have the number so okay but it's been part of the budget process for fy2 but and and I assume we were pretty close with the with our budgeting it doesn't change very much it was like $220,000 more this year compared to last year so what is the amount Britney if you um the 240 is $742,500 the 240 and 262 grants as presented second all in favor EXC totally got it backwards that

009time mess sorry I wasn't gonna say anything um I jumped the gun yep thank you so we're going to keep Britney up here yes let's do that and while it says new position looking to add a new position what I've asked Britney to do tonight is to describe as we're going through our budget process uh it's important to to get out there that we're looking at potentially creating another in District program for our um students and while we're not quite ready to to determine what that position looks like uh partly because we are going through the negotiation process right now with with the bargaining units that I wanted Britney to still be here to you know give an overview of of what we're looking to do as we move forward within our budgeting before we

010meet as a a committee with um the budget Workshop so uh it's sort of just an overview of what we're looking to do I fully support it mikee fully supports it Chris does as well we've been you know we had a nice long meeting today to really hash out some details that we wanted to um ensure that we have answers to uh the questions that we have uh before we present it to the board so great um so just to give an overview um students with disabilities can potentially receive support from a school district up until 22 um a lot of our students in District that have needed the support of a team to make that determination have had to be sent out of District just because we didn't have our own internal program um

011in the last year and a half what I've seen in those placements largely that are not necessarily close to Ashland is programming that is tailored to the community in which the program exists although the students remain ashin residents so if a student is working a part-time job it might potentially be in NAC and when they turn 22 and transition out they're now back in Ashland and how logistically do they get from Ashland to NAC um in my previous District I worked through some of the things that Jim has spoken to and obviously specific to ashleen there are other considerations that we need to work through um so I'm I'm fortunate to have that experience and how to create a program from start to not necessarily finish because it's still inexistent in my previous District but

012start to success right and maintain a successful program um and as many say if you build it they will come thinking about those factors and how we work with families and the community to make sure we're giving our students what they need without building too much into a program too quickly um Christine cavy is here if it's okay if she comes up and stands with me I'll have Christine introduce herself good evening everybody I'm Christine caveny I'm one of the co-chairs of ashack and I appreciate Britney inviting me here tonight um we fully support the idea of an 18 to 22 program we think it's important to keep our students in their own community and um I appreciate that all of you um your support too for our special education students so thanks Christine so

013and thinking about what we could do better more differently this is one of those programs that we've had conversations with um has you know Christine's been a part of a lot of the conversations to make sure that there was community buyin and an understanding of what it would look like for our students I've been meeting with a handful of parents identified as people that I think would be valuable voices at a team to make sure that we are developing programming for our students um with integrity and uh planful lens instead of just saying we need this and this is what it looks like um knowing you know full well that this has to be accepted and approved in a budget process but regardless of this year in the future it will be something that I

014continue to ask for just because of the value it can bring to a community in the program we had um reached out to some local businesses in advance and there is a significant amount of support that is already in existence you know here in Ashland it's a little unique because students are 18 through 22 versus that traditional you know up to 18 maybe 19 um and what that looks like can be very different than what is standard in existence we're focusing on jobs and transition Independent Living budget um and successful access to communities as I'm sure many of you are aware uh programming in adult agencies after 2 22 looks very different so I feel very committed to making sure that we give our students the best chance at independent access to their communities prior

015to that point because because I can't control what happens after 22 so uh so just quick question uh curious as to whether any of this was happening in your previous District as well I know from the town side they have uh personnel and services and things like that and particularly as in in an older age like this uh will there be any kind of coordination to you know uh both support them during the same the same time period but then they'll be transitioning potentially moving services that are provided by the town staff as yeah so in kind of anticipation of a seamless transition with this program I've already reached out to um mass rehab commission um palal which is a parent advocacy League that has a built-in transition program um not program necessarily but a

016a curriculum that they use that they can work with families to support those next steps um speaking with the Social Security office could they come in and do a training to teach our families how to budget appropriately they're all on board um Mass Down syndrome they're all you know outlying kind of existing agencies that can't really give us necessarily direct like once a week we're going to be here and help you but they're going to come and speak to our families and our Learners at the same time about how we can support them collaboratively as they transition into that 22 year other questions no I'm fully you know I'm we I we've had the opportunity to speak about this at Ash packam I think it's a wonderful idea I'm very curious to see how it

017works out when we have the budget discussion I think it's a very worthwhile thing to pursue and I'm hoping we're able to make it happen yep yeah I I can't speak highly enough of the work that Britney's been doing on this program but all our programs in general right it sort of I think we counted we have 15 uh individualized programs I think currently uh since I've become superintendent we've really focused heavily on keeping our students in Ashland right we we value that we believe in that and this is just one more step uh that for those 18 to 22 so we're looking forward to having something more concrete by the time we get the final budget together excellent thanks thanks you're welcome Happy new year thank you Christine take that long ride home get

018out of here okay well you're the best Sarah sure Sarah you're up your turn whatever you want Sarah you're going to be my assistant sure okay whatever you want the tuition rates first oh Chris is doing that oh Chris are you are you doing that Chris is the money guy sorry hello I'm just I don't if you can see that but go ahead Chris must be an increase he wants nothing to do with ex I let him do all the right but it's a decrease you it looks like fiscal 23 though um but I can talk about the form that was given to me okay um I don't know I got I got 24 here so I can speak to it um yeah I noticed that too when I was looking at it this the

019packet I thought the email that I have um from from Gretchen that PDF should have fisal 24 the list on it um fiscal 25 I apologize um so page eight though for reference if anybody's looking for it on their computers so um similar to last year we're back uh again this year looking for um a rate increase for the um prek program um essentially it's 2 and a half% um and the intention of that is to offset incremental expenses you know inflationary expenses primarily and you know the the salary dollars um to to kind of keep the program running at the same capacity it's been running at um very good capacity ad if you want me to use um so that that's why we're here and that's why uh this is here so they can

020plan their fiscal 25 um rates Jim are you you able to find the uh the Excel it's just the third tab there but there's another tab down there there's three I did the same thing I'm not person so I missed the other tab got does anybody have any questions about that no I mean it this seems in line with with the the amounts that it has has previously increased and every year our job alike we pull other area preschools and their cost of their tuition too it's pretty um Equitable with the increase of a 2.3 to 2.5 every year and we still remain kind of in that high average when we compare to about I think the last response I got 42 responses um out of areas and we we fall in that higher average

021range for tuition costs but we also have a lot of full day programming trying to meet the needs of the community too and that's at a cost too to be able to keep the kids longer and is that a comparison to private and public programs or just other public program I've just looked at other public yeah just to see how they're managing a budget um with that integrated inclusive model right because it's a lot of special education Sal not easy either right it's not no two preschool programs are the same there's so many variables and unfortunately it's not mandated yet um for Universal prek um so there's not a lot of guidance that's hard and fast with the Department of Education um it's using our best guidance for three and four year olds and supporting

022that special education entitlement so we're just trying to offset that with some Community peers because we know it's right to be um you know in an inclusive integrated model and also try to offset our high budget cost for all of our Personnel so Sarah apologize if you did say it um this the spreadsheet shows our current rates are next year's rates but carrying the same enrollment so and I know that fluctuates based on our capacity and the number of students we have uh in the program that are getting Services right so do you do you expect it to be the same enrollment or yeah so that's a great question and if you talk to Mrs LOL who might be watching watching from home um she is in the middle of preschool registration for 2025 which

023is crazy for me to think about September already but this is when all of our area preschools are doing their enrollment and we want families to be able to choose the right program for their kiddo based on our special education placements and what our PTO and our site Council have been talking about there is that need for full day care um but that does limit how many positions I have in the space at paway so we did make a slight change to what our sessions are we're keeping the same number of classrooms um but we're running two halfday sessions the morning for the three-year-olds the afternoon we're making um multi-age because we also have um with a changing demographic families that are looking for afternoon slots as well um so we want to make that

024a multi-age opportunity then we're doing two multi-age full day rooms and then our two straight grade four-year-old year before kindergarten um so the same number of classroom rooms um for the integrated model and we'll continue with the two specialized program classrooms to support our higher need students okay so it sounds like the change is based on uh the the peers in wanting to adjust that but like programing but other other students that are coming in for services sounds like that's going to be relatively constant not the changes aren't driven from that side yeah and I think we've talked about it before preschool is a world so different than that traditional K through 12 we're dealing with early intervention referrals doctor referrals and we are entitled to provide those Services if a child qualifies for special

025education as soon as they turn three and I know you're routinely getting oh somebody just turned 2.9 I got five this week yep yeah yep lots of referrals this week so so you're not anticipating a significant uh change from that from that yeah no it still would keep us at about 120 if we're full I obviously will not fill that this January thinking about September because there's so many variables that happen over the summer and throughout the year but it allows for about 64 Community peers paying tuition and up to 56 special education Slots of any varying need because if you qualify for an IEP regardless if it's just for articulation or if it's for more specialized programming that still is an IEP when we record that to desie so we have to keep all

026of our rooms integrated for that ratio yeah great thanks does anyone have a motion to approve the tuition change so moved thank you I'll second all in favor I I I Mrs L will be busy the next couple weeks with our registration sounds for sure so moving on to um our school Improvement plan I think you've seen everyone's but the Warren school and ours so you're pretty familiar with the format um esmer did a great job making this format for us so hopefully it looks familiar and you'll be able to navigate it pretty well um we have worked really hard um since I've been in the position um with Jim and really trying to align with um the elementary school so you'll see a lot of the initiatives especially around equity and curriculum planning um

027and professional development to really align with providing um support in our curriculum hegerty foundations to get our Learners ready for those more traditional grades um and to be able to work collaboratively as we move children through the age groups um looking at them vertically as they grow and um have that exposure here at the preschool level um we have a very small But Mighty site Council um Ronnie Pi is one of our Representatives as well as our wonderful nurse Karen who is a jack of all trade she does a little bit of everything um really took this lead we workshopped it out to staff our preschool PTO um and really tried to get consensus of we have a lot of things we'd like to do but where do we want to really prioritize um utilizing

028the new new strategic plan those four buckets as Jim refers to so under Equity we really want to kind of take the model that the Warren and mindes school is doing and utilizing some data teams data at the preschool level is very hard a lot of it is work samples right you have to draw a person and you need so many um uh you know identifying components or added things um so we're looking at how can we look at inter rator reliability how can we talk the same Lang language about classrooms and how can we make sure we're scoring kids on our standard-based report cards to really be able to show where they're at and where we can see them grow and progress um so we're going to kind of utilize their model and obviously

029modify it for our tools we still are leaning into the teaching strategies goal the tsg assessment that Mrs White had established probably almost 10 years ago um making sure we're keeping up with the INR reliability that looks at all of our early learning um early cognitive skills as well as social emotional development teachers have always looked at that independently to write their student support plans or to look at their class but we've never really looked at analys analyzing the data across a whole program so what do all three-year-olds look like what do all four-year-olds look like is there a teacher that has a strength could they Workshop off how they're teaching the specific skill um and that's been even more apparent since the pandemic especially around that social emotional learning that kids need more explicit

030instruction because they didn't have those Early Learning experien going to the library going to the play group even going to the grocery store um so we want to make sure that that's embedded in our learning so um our also our professional staff is pretty small But Mighty we have about 11 professional staff of service providers and um special education um staff and they have developed a committee to really identify what are the areas that we want to Target for data teams we're going to have one in February have another one in May um and then really kind of work on them quarterly next year to kind of move forward with those along those lines um our curriculum leader um jeie this year she's been instrumental in helping plan those and analyzing the data as it's

031come in and being creative with looking at some of the data is really streamlining just how we analyze work samples or when do we take data so we can look at everyone's development on draw a person or everyone's letter ID at a certain week um you know within a certain months so we can see how they grow and progress over time um so those are pretty much the highlights there the resources needed is intentional time you know um we utilize our curriculum meeting this year I've also established um a rotating schedule of common planning time where the halfday teachers can meet together on Fridays and the full day teachers can meet um you know on the alternating Fridays and they're planning small group instruction so they're focused on an area where all classrooms are getting

032the same instruction um working together and identifying how they would do it and differentiate it based on the kids in their class um the next one is our social emotional learning you've heard a lot from probably Jenna already you'll hear from Pete too and also Jen Cutler we have a lot of seal um initiatives going on in The District Preschool is really the foundation for all of them we continue to have a lot of kids having their very first experience outside of the home with us um and I like to call it curb to curb we're supporting them literally how they say goodbye to Mom and Dad whether that's good bad or sometimes really challenging um how to support greeting peers working you know from the ground up so that they can be successful um

033parts of their classroom and Community um and and enjoy school so we utilize our PBIS it's be kind and be safe our little bumblebees that you see around last week we had a PBIS reboot so um we were all dressed in yellow and black all day we have a Great Seal Team that supports that we also are um part of the zones of Regulation which is a prek through five initiative that Jen Cutler has supported reported Us in obviously we have to modify a lot of those lessons um because three and four-year-olds don't even know what feelings are yet so really shaping what they're feeling and putting words and vocabulary to that before they can begin to take perspective for someone else um so that's embedded within there the over the last two years our

034staff has also been researching a new social emotional curriculum which Jen Cutler was able to purchase for us with grant funding last year called paths um and that's great it uses utilizes puppets for a lot of the self-regulation and emotional it's very preschool based um we piloted a bunch of different ones um borrowing um curriculum from different preschools and we settled on that so we're in full implementation stage with that this year um responsive classroom is another initiative we like to lean into that K through five is doing and working with Mike to continue to um slowly train all of our staff so that they can utilize that so that's all familiar programming once they get up to kindergarten um and our needs to kind of meet those kind of um initiatives is really the

035responsive classroom training um money that you know Mike and I are already in communication of and then working with oural team and Jen to really support um some coaching and being able to get in and give some positive feedback to teachers who are teaching all content areas every moment of the day with preschoolers and really like learning how to embed that as part of their language every day about being kind and being safe um and being able to support how they're feeling the third is Resource Management we all know paway is now officially the oldest building in town um yeah um definitely School building maybe I don't know I I'll roll into it you win the prize you know we see Mr pay's ghost or hear him quite often Pat had warned me about that

036um and so we joke about that but um obviously facilities and um you know Chris working with us on kind of the ongoing maintenance of the building that is you know definitely something that we need to stay on um and focusing on safety and really making our space now that we're going to live here probably for most of our educational careers um making it inclusive you know making sure that we're updating the accessibility um you know the the new pavement the new stairs the ramps the playground um you know as well as just overall Building Maintenance so um what our staff really wants to focus on is making that playground more accessible because that's also Town use outside of school hours so bless you we have a lot of um parents willing to help out

037we have a lot of really great ideas from staff um the preschool PTO which is separate from the K through2 PTO they've acquired a lot of funding through the baa Grant process and that's all been allocated for making our outdoor education or I should say indoor too cuz it's inclement weather recess more accessible and more equipment to provide for everyone so we'd like to do a playground audit we have a committee going on that too reaching out to try to um find a good price to be able to ask for money and you know looking at maybe doing a long-term multi-year plan for a campaign to make it fully accessible and inclusive um in the meantime we've got some nice grant money that we can be mindful of you know what could we Implement now

038to make the short term better but also you know we can use once we get a full playground remodel um there's a couple districts that have recently done that so the committee is also reaching out to them to see how did they start a campaign could they find any um businesses in corporations to help match donations things like that um so they're really excited about that um I think that has it's a great space like we have a full field a track the the playground equipment but there's a playground structure there that was put in when kindergarten went over there which was maybe how long 12 yeah was it before you Jim it was your kindergarten moved back to Warren 15 almost 12 12 years ago when my senior was in so years so they

039put that green and blue structure in there but our preschoolers can't use that during the school day because it's not a regulation and we'd like to remove it and reallocate it someplace else in town that could use it but that takes money to be able to take it down and make sure that it's certified and able to be used in that capacity so finding some short money for that maybe to get that moved and you know a better use somewhere else in town would be helpful and it would free up some space for us I think all the other facility stuff Chris is on we'll talk about when we have the Strategic plan presentation um and then the last curriculum planning that aligns a lot like I've said with Warren and mindes we're really trying

040to provide an early childhood experience that is fun and play play based but we're also trying to set them up to to be successful Learners when they move to the Warren school we are a small I talked about maybe 100 to 120 kids it's a very intimate setting we can do a lot of really great teaching um within that to get them ready so we've implemented you know the hegerty the foundations that you've heard about all theal curriculums we really just want to make sure that we're aligning and we're having more intentional time um you know Administration comes down and occasionally we get some teachers coming down but when we had our spoiler issues and we were closed for a day we were able to send our esps up to Warren and just to give

041them that perspective of what the expectations are some of them hadn't been in there since their kids were in there you know I'd love to be able to find a way for teachers to go up and do that and observe some teaching um just to better align us vertically um and then P professional development is the other committee our staff has chosen to really find preschool specific that's a really hard thing there's not a lot of people in the prek world um and our preschool PTO has also recently allocated some funding for us I haven't even told you that to help out so I won't be asking for as much um but to really Identify some people during our professional development days to look at how can we incorporate um good teaching and learning with

042the preschool standards specifically while still you know trying to support whatever the district's initiatives are that's where we're are right now lots to do questions for Sarah no it always amazes me all of the stuff that Happ know there's a lot going on there's a lot yeah there's a lot going on but it's like an an awesome time to capture and have kids our families are fabulous the kids are sponges um it makes it much easier to go to work every day you know when you're greeted even when it's pouring rain this morning you know and uh the snow has disappeared there was some tears that the snow had gone um but hopefully that will come back so Sarah relative to the uh to the playground uh did did you say you already put together

043uh a team to look at I'm ready for you to join us I'm not volunteering that wasn't a volunteer this has been built yeah no we are you say yeah we're trying to look at a a model of a public school district that maybe started it from start to finish um Bellingham just put one in um and for our beginning research and Outreach it was around 300,000 I don't know you know the cost of all of it how much they matched but it was multi-year campaign and fundraising um so I'd like to think about something long-term wise if if the money is that big I mean I think there's two reasons why I asked is one if you start getting different funding sources sometimes there's conditions and different things things that you need to be

044aware of right and so um you can use them but if you're not sure what the end state is or how long it's going to take some of them are like hey if you don't if you know it's not 20 years or however long usable life is there's all sorts of yeah depending on the funding on funding source right and uh so you do it strategically like that um and just if if it would be helpful I can uh ask the the team to get me the um some of the data on the pricing for stuff that we did you know like the play surface you want to be accessible I'm assuming that's what you're you know that's one of the components you can't have you know the the current play surface is not and

045the cost of mulch every year is you know a lot um so thinking about something that's going to last and be more sustainable is definitely something I think the committee my hopes are is that they'll help us when um keeping us forward moving right because I've got a lot of balls in the air and making sure that we're thinking about if we are taking funding how can we make this you know place it in action immediately um so that people see that how their money is being spent it's not 5 years down the road here's a playground where maybe those teachers aren't there anymore those families aren't there so just having a thoughtful plan of could we do pieces of it at of time maybe just do the surface for and the other component is

046if they're like wait hold on a second now you figured out a strategy and they don't that you got this funding from Source a and now that's not going to be permanent right and so being thoughtful of that obviously you will be but if you want to help out we'll gladly take your guidance talk to me a few months okay I'll give you a few months awesome a little busy yeah and should have a well-deserved break after mes any any further questions concerns we don't have to vote on this uh it's just an FYI but thank you for all the great work thank you for the folks on the site Council um thanks for your staff at the school great thank you appreciate you thank you Sarah Pete hi Pete thank you so you're you're

047looking twist my arm you're looking at Britney so we know where this is going no that was to encourage her to go home yeah uh first just good night thank you thanks BR to acknowledge and just thank our our council members from last year uh Tiffany Farrell Ben cre Roselia Morell Kristen quern Kerrie cober Donna Shaw Daria Tucker Kate Alman also served as a non- voting member of the council and just their their work is instrumental in helping us to collaborate with the entire School our parent community and determin where our goals were for this year one second if you have a can you send it to us we don't we don't have access to it in the folder either so okay the first one but okay um one of the parts that that really

048worked well for us and you know as now my 20th year of being a principal I will say that this is the first year ever that I've felt just the cohesion of all the work that we're doing that it's all coming back to our data team meetings and that's driving our decisions of what teachers are doing on a daily basis in their classroom to the goals that we're setting as our whole school and how everything just continues to come back to to this process U we're very fortunate uh Mike had written a grant to connect us to S3 the systemic student support team that is connected through desie uh and we were able to be the recipient of that Grant this year so what's great as you'll see through the plan is just how many

049structured meetings we have with this team and with other schools who are going through the same process um we have run into a few glitches as we've been identified as a year one school and from our last in-person meeting U the S3 team that visits us there were three individuals that came from the team they recognize that our school isn't quite a year one school we're almost like a 1.5 or 1.7 because of how many things we've already had in place prior to this year and they recognize that when we're doing some of our collaborative work with other communities it may not be as meaningful for us because we are a bit ahead so um they're spending a little more time with us when they come to the school for their site visits uh so

050much so that they're actually coming for our next round of data team meetings to observe and then meet with the teachers afterwards and uh give more specific feedback for our teachers that are on this team um so as you'll see in the equity piece the data teams is one of the big drivers of how we're bring Equity to all children and it's with that idea to make sure that we're challenging all students and equally important that we're having strong documentation of what was done so that each teacher isn't Reinventing the wheel for a child each and every year and the goal is that by the end of this year through working with S3 that we'll have a strong document that identifies for the teacher what the goals were for the year how the child progressed

051towards those goals what successes were and also what challenges were so that we're not repeating those same challenges um another goal around our Equity piece is to continue to be a champion School through uh Special Olympics with the unified pieace um this was actually a goal that started with two teachers and their individual goals for their practices by Daria Tucker and Erica zipy and they came to me and they said what they'd like to do of really investigating and could we receive uh that recognition of being a unified school uh in meeting with the special Olympic team they came in and they were really excited by what we had already had in place and we ended up qualifying immediately for that U delegation and as we move forward it was now saying how do we

052create more opportunities for our students to play with one another to have sports activities alongside of each other and where it's not something separate that's happening um and really to give some great credit on this as well of someone who's not part of our site Council but has been instrumental in this is Tim Ryan our PE teacher uh who has really embraced this U and has made it part of his daily instruction uh each and every day with all of our students as we continue we look at our social emotional learning and again as I started tonight I mentioned about that cohesion that I finally feel after such a long time of doing this work is Jen Cutler's role and her work in supporting our data teams as well and now she's at a place

053where she's using the data points that we've had from Desa a couple with our attendance data our Behavior data our teachers anecdotal records and we're creating individual plans that now take place to support our students it's now where we're looking at our atrisk students and working with Children and Families at times of where appropriate to bring parents in and work with them in outside resources as well about how this moves forward again that matches up so well and you heard Sarah speak about this I'm sure that Jenna spoke about this as well is the responsive classroom component and that's every teacher and adult in our building using those pillars of just how looking at our students and teaching treating them with respect and building relationships for our children with each other and our adults in

054the school so it's continuing that commitment to ensure that we're training all of our our teachers with responsive classroom which is an undertaking and you'll see this is probably the first line where it list is a price uh because this is an outside training that takes place Mike and I have had a lot of dialogue about this uh where a past trainer that we used is absolutely outstanding and it would be a little cheaper for her to do our trainings but we do want to make sure that we're contining with responsive classroom and continuing that relationship with responsive classroom last year we were actually able to have an audit from them as well so it was great to get some feedback about how our implementation has been through these years um and where we're continuing

055to go with this work um as well as mentioned from the piece of a community service piece and that all of our students will be having that community service project uh by the end of this school year we have not identified that as the staff we've started our conversations dur confy meetings uh but we have not final ized exactly what this will look like for all of our K1 and 2 students but it will be something that will be during the school day so all children have that opportunity and they understand that importance of just being part of a community and how they do give back to our school and what respect looks like of of their uh responsibility of being part of the community as we look at at Resource Management uh the the

056providing that safe environment and this goes with some of the changes that we've already made with the new buzzer system that has been put at the war in school it's the drills that we're practicing on a regular basis uh the Safety Committee that Mike leads at the district level with uh with other emergency organizations in town where we can collaborate play in our drills talk about our potential liabilities how to correct these liabilities in addition to that we have a voluntary Warren school safety committee meeting where we meet and we talk about the the pieces specifically at Warren school uh what has been great is working with the Ashland police department and specifically with the Ashland fire department deputy chief Morgan has been the flexibility that they've given us so during our drills we've purposely

057created problems um so the first fire drill of the year which happens within those first few days of school we do a typical fire drill uh the deputy chief is excellent about doing it early in the morning so before kids are transitioning because we have kindergarteners where this for many of them it's their first time in a school so we want this to happen from their classroom not when they're in art class or one of these other locations um after that first drill takes place uh she works with me and her staff and we actually begin blocking EG esses um at our last fire drill we block two esses and we do it during in opportune times so it's during lunch and recess passages um and what's very exciting for me to see and again

058I've done this for a very long time to see how our young students are responding so well that when they come to a problem in the hallway and we set up carts with red uh rep bulletin board paper on it and they see it and there's no hesitation they turn and they just go to the next exit uh it's become just something that's normal for our kids to react to which is sad and sense uh but it's great that they are getting that preparation and again kudos to our teachers staff and and support staff because they're supporting the children to learn all these Pathways and and uh plans of how to be safe during emergencies uh as well and this is a large shout out to our it Department U led by Paul Carpenter the

059technology infrastructure what's happened in our school um our Wi-Fi is working far better this year which is a a critical part because it comes back to some of the pieces that I'll speak to in a few moments uh but the the IT department was able to roll out cromebook carts for every single classroom this fall every child now once again has one to one Computing in our school and that's an important piece when we talk about the uh curriculum components that we're doing right now and some of the changes that we've made again it comes to our data team meetings which is which is guiding all of this uh but at this point in time I'm excited to share that since the fall every kindergartener first grader and second grader has their own Chromebook they

060do stay at school each day um and the teachers have Chromebook cart that organizes this so that they're not trying to figure out how to manage charging every device every night to make sure that they're ready to go for the children and Pete those were some of the ones that came came over from the mes right some of them are recycled machines from from the other schools but they are meeting our our purpose that wholeo ofs exactly yes yeah Paul Paul and his staff was able to re repurpose all of those cards uh to each room um as we look at the curriculum piece of this and again it stems back to our data team meetings and what's guiding this is Sarah spoke about this earlier the importance of small group instruction is that all

061of our classroom teachers are now doing small group instruction on a daily basis with our children and this is really where we're seeing that great growth for our students that are excelling with the curriculum our student that are students that are on Pace with the curriculum and that our students that need remediation or in some cases introduction to some skills and it allows the teacher to now look at this and every six weeks because we have five of these meetings throughout the year where we look at every single child they're coming back and we're creating goals creating new groupings and we're moving this important to note as well is when a teacher creates their groups they don't have to wait six weeks to move a child if a group is advancing at a faster rate

062than one child that child may move down a group or move up a group as well if they're advancing at a faster rate uh as this goes through different data points have become critical for us and this is where we're using the Amplified data um if you remember last year Kate Alman spoke about the Amplified data and this is where we're doing the mandated testing from the state for the dyslexia screeners it's not just for that dyslexia screener though it's giving us great reading information about how our students are performing and how they're growing during the year and the nice part is because we've now been using it for more than one year we can actually look at the child over more than a year's rent of time to look at that growth of what's

063happening in addition we're now using I ready as well for mathematics and we're able to do that same piece of looking at math skills with growth and it will be able to support us for growth over time um an exciting piece about the IR is similar to the Amplified U platform it also allows teachers to create groupings based on specific skills So based on student performance on the assessments that they've done online it will then tell the teacher here are the next skills that the the program is recommending that the teacher should work on next that is what drives our data team meetings of when we sit with our experts from those fields whether it's Taran Marquez in math Kathy FIA Su Nash sui in Reading uh myself and the other administrators supported that but

064then we're looking at that data we're talking about all right let's now look at the informal data from our day-to-day work that the students are performing at and that's how we're creating the day-to-day lessons that happen for our children um that other big piece and I spoke about this earlier in the year is stmath and that was the necessity for the Chromebook initiative that we had to have is as a recipient from the grant for stmath through the 18 Foundation um every child needs to be in stmath every single day and as a reminder stmath the beauty of this is that there's zero language um so with our large e population and our many children that come to the war in school that do not speak English they're all able to access this problem uh

065this program and it's a challenging program U it's solving puzzles and when I say puzzles I'm not talking about the the jigsaw puzzles but it's mathematical problems that are going through geometry it's going through addition at the beginning kindergarten level it's about one toone correspondence recognizing that um one of the pieces that we've done based on a recommendation from another school who had been a few years into this we do not send this home with children and when we find that children are logging their minutes at home we have some conversations with parents to keep it as a school activity because we've found from the other districts and we've now seen from our handful of students that have done this at home at times we have children who are moving so quick at home they're

066getting support from a parent they may not understand the concept um and this by doing it on school we can guarantee that the child still understands the concept starting at grade two and then moving up because this is a a program that mes has applied for the same Grant it actually gives quizzes and where the quizzes do have language involved um so they're able to then check to say how is the child maintaining these skills and doing these pieces as well U as I mentioned about the difficulty of these puzzles and Mike not to put you on the spot but as Mike and I went to a training for the first time last year we were told to start with certain puzzles um Mike and I obviously could figured we could move to through this

067pretty easily um I think I went into like a seventh grade problem and quickly realized I have no idea what they're asking me here because there's no language so I went down to a second grade level uh Mike started with a fifth grade go back to kindergarten I I was more frustrated than anybody in the entire room yeah it was just one of those things and the kids the kids are so resilient which is incredible we as adults we were probably a lot less resilient right for sure exactly well and to that resilience is is what I've now been able to watch with our students and children that I know well our second graders who just started with this program but knowing these children now for over two years before they started the program is

068it does support resiliency but that's not what the frustrations I think were from Mike and I know from myself it was it builds on its own knowledge of how the puzzles are are moving forward and there are pieces that are consistent so it allows the children to tackle new information on a regular basis and keep being pushed in their mathematical thinking it also allows us to differentiate so if we have children um that are in one of our specialized program programs and that grade level work is not appropriate for them at this point in time it allows us to change their place of where they are on the program as well if we have students who are moving very quickly and they are showing Mastery of this it allows us to move forward with them

069as well and continue to challenge them that information is also used during our data team meetings and our teachers use that of determining what's the next steps in stmath but also what are the next steps that they'll use during their small group instruction so coming back to to my beginning of this is again for the first time my 20 years as a principal I finally feel like we have this one piece through our data team meetings that's bringing everything together and giving our teachers meeting so that it doesn't feel like we're just chasing that windmill all the time of what's next great news questions comments no I'm similar you know to to my comment um about pway it's always amazing to hear all of the stuff that you pack into every day thank you thank

070you for all that you do and I love to see the the data teams and how that's continuing and I can't wait to get I'm sure at some point you know before the end of the year we'll get an update about what the data looks like and I I I'm really excited to I'm sure you're excited to see it because you see it all the time right I'm really excited to see how it's it's pretty impress together thank you one of the pieces that's also nice is we were able to uh include Kate Alman in this S3 team uh that works with the data team because she had done some of the work where we originally put it to us that was before her transferred to MZ um and when we spoke to the S3

071team although they said this is isn't something that other districts do uh they saw Great Value in keeping her so that way there is the vertical articulation that will occur at some point even better right that's fantastic well thank you to everyone on your site counsil it looks like some of them came back so for this year people having fun which is good that's a good thing um and uh thank you for all you do thank you you thanks okay folks um next up thank you Jim just a quick just quick question um with with the departure of Aaron who was did wasia St Council Le on someplace that we should consider putting that is a good question do we want to wait until Mendes yeah no I'm Mendes are you no I'm Middle School

072okay and Mark's High School yeah she might she might have been she might have been warmed she is safety I mean well yeah so they're going to be some well we we were doubled up on good yeah Paul yes so that we don't need to double up anymore anyhow um we're talking about U the the vacant seat on school committee um and I just wanted to give you uh whoever's watching because we we have had some interest which is wonderful and we want to uh there are two things that we need to do is one is follow the law um the law dictates some of what we're doing here and then the second piece of it is we need to create a process so everybody knows what to expect moving forward so so the legal

073piece is is that we had to post within a certain amount of time that the position was available and we have to make a decision within a certain amount of time after that so that has all been done um January 18th is the deadline for submissions and January 24th is the evening that we will be making our decision after we have a public process of interviewing all the candidates the decision is also a joint decision between the school committee and the select board obviously it's our appointment um but the the way that the town Charter is written um the the select board will um be partners with us in this selection um again for anybody who might be watching this meeting now or tuning in later to find out more about um what we do

074um on the school committee first of all I'm the chair my name is lorri tosy this is my 13th year um Tina I think it's is it your third year this is my third and Paul eight eight or nine sounds right um yeah and Mark is um few years behind me I think um Jim and I probably have been around the longest at this table so my kids were students when Jim was high school principal um and we've worked really hard um both Jim and I and everybody since to create a culture of collaboration um not just with each other but with our administrative team and with the other boards in town and we have seen a lot of progress because of that uh and because of that we're also you know looking for a

075you know somebody who has a collaborative Spirit um for sure that's important to all of us because that's how we operate there's no drama we focus on the work and we don't always agree but we always listen to what everybody has to say with respect um the school committee position itself Again by law we only do three things even though uh we sit here and we're talking about all kinds of different things on the agenda everything we talk about fits into one of three buckets um the first one is we hire and evaluate the superintendent um as far as the hiring that part's been done I've been involved in that many times and and fortunately Jims have stuck around for a long time so I haven't had to do that recently but uh certainly the

076evaluation process happens every year and that's how we set the goals for the superintendent is how we set the our um goals for the community our educational community and um we work with the superintendent all year long on those goals and that's a process and it's a public process so you would be part of that if you're looking to do this job um the second thing that we do is policy um we do have a policy subcommittee but it's really the whole board that's involved in voting on any policy that comes through um and that's kind of the overarching um sort of budget well but budget also but I'm what I'm saying about policy is policy means the overarching sort of rules of the district we don't deal with the day-to-day um we don't hire

077our fire teachers we don't supervise teachers we don't uh hear about you know what the problems are in the buildings we hire um the superintendent who then hires his administrative team and so just so that everybody understands because I know I know I knew nothing about what school committee really was responsible for before I joined this board um so we're more working at uh the policy level and then we have administrators that make sure those policies get enforced and then the third thing is budget so um we are responsible for the budget of the whole District um there are lots of different levels to that there's a certain amount of money that we get from the state a certain amount amount of money that we get from the town and then within our own system

078there are uh priorities um that uh we have to prioritize where a certain pretty much finite sum of money is going to go so we spend the whole year Jim mostly with his administrative Team figures a lot of that out and then we start we hear about it along the way and then at some point we join in on the conversation and ultimately the vote on the budget is our responsibility so the person you know needs to understand budget or be willing to learn and understand it um a great collaborator understand policy and um participate in the evaluation of the superintendent so that's the job um I can share with you in the community that so far we've received eight people have put in a talent Bank request to uh for the position and the

079deadline is the 18th so we may get more um the I've only been involved in this one other time some people dropped out by time we got to the public hearing so I don't know whoever is interested in this job I don't know who how many people are going to be here on the 24th but whoever shows up that night will and they fill it out a talent Bank um will be the people that we interview and so now we're GNA I'm going to open up a discussion because we do need to talk about what that process might look at like um because we do have a number of people we need to be mindful of the time um I'm sure people who are interested in the position want to know what to expect as

080far as questions or whether they're going to need an opening statement that sort of thing and then um tomorrow Jim and I are meeting with um the town manager and the chair of the select board to um get their input again because they're 50% involved in this decision so that's what I know so far and then the rest of it um I'm going to ask ask my colleagues to just chime in on you know what your ideas are about a process I'm thinking opening statements at least you know for sure yeah I think to give everybody the opportunity to just share who they are why they're interested and want to be a part of the process um I think it but I I think it would be nice to have all of the candidates answer

081the same questions yeah um to kind of get input on kind of I don't want to say foundational things but so that they're all they're all given the same opportunity to answer the same questions um what those questions are I don't know what the process should be to come up with them if we should discuss those now if we should take some time to think about it and give feedback um but I think it's fair to in how many questions I think we need to be mindful of how many people are here um I don't think we want to ask 10 questions of each person you know I think we need to to be thoughtful of of their time of how long the meeting will go of our you know obviously there'll be deliberation um

082you know after the fact as well too so right um I don't know what the magic number is but I think I think it be if you multiply it like let's say we're going forward with what we know right today which is eight people if you multiply that times you know even five questions that's might be too many lot right so even so I would ask people to come up with a few I think maybe you know any two or three of your most important questions the ones that you feel are will give you the most insight into you know the person that's applying for this position um the other thing I will say too is as far as process because you know the appointment ends on the 24th but then in May uh the

083seat becomes open again for an election so I I think that the person that does apply for this job um I would hope that they would be prepared to commit to running in the election I mean obviously things happen or you may decide you don't like it but the truth is uh being on the school committee from Fe feary till May maybe gives you the opportunity to attend you know five seven meetings maybe maximum um and there's a learning curve it takes a long time so I think even though technically the commitment is is to the end date is the election but if there's not an intent to run in the election then it we've got to start over from square one all of us um the other thing I'd add to that is given

084the so the way that it works is you're appointed until the next election and then uh you then run for the remainder of that particular seat's term so given the the cycle that this is on you'd actually be in back-to-back elections just I want to make sure people know what they're signing up for right um that if you were to continue you'd be back to back personally that's not a big deal but I know it can be intimidating process for people well and also just the the timeline for getting your name on the ballot you can't decide in May that you want you have to make that decision and I don't I need I'm actually my my seat is up in May so um I'm going to have to be pulling paper soon to get

085signatures um and and I want to say that the timeline is is March well it starts soon it starts end January the timeline to turn in signature in order to be on the ballot is March so it's a decision that needs to be made pretty quickly um probably as you're in the process of interviewing right exactly and whether or not you would have an opponent is completely out of our control unfortunately I mean I I've run for election five times I've had an opponent twice um and so most of us we get a lot more interest in the school committee position when there's an appointment versus having to run a campaign and not all of us love doing that um but that might be a reality for the person that signs up and it might

086not be sometimes when you're already in the seat and if people are paying attention and they understand the circumstances then that might and encourage others not to run against you but we have we can't guarantee one way or the other but we do want everyone to be aware that that's a factor so having said all that if you're still interested um you know I I don't know if you want to try to hash out questions tonight Mark's not here so I think you know I don't know that that's yeah you know I I think I want to think about my um suggestion is also we're on a timeline that is because these deadlines are uh are in the town Charter or the the state law don't don't yeah we you know we can't have additional

087meetings to figure this out so which also goes for us in terms of forming questions so I I I'm going to propose uh if you trust me with this is to send me you know your most important questions and because some of them may even overlap with each other so if you send me anywhere from like three to six questions and H let me put them on a list of everybody getting whatever number we decide to maybe everyone gets three questions um and then the night of the meeting I will present you with the three that you're going to ask hopefully they're the three that you came up with but if you've overlapped with somebody else you might be asking a different question so um each of us asking three questions so 15 well the

088number that the number is hasn't been decided yet do you think maybe two I mean one I'm even fine with the entirety of the committee asking three questions like if we come up with with the same three or whatever whatever number whatever ever magic number we we land on yeah well and so I I intentionally wanted to make sure you you spoke first I I did send something to Lori I think what you said overlapped with what I sent her you know totally pretty well so what I had said what might be a good idea is that um we give them n each n 90 seconds you know we take them in turn not like 90 90 90 but you know when a k is getting interviewed give them 90 seconds to introduce themselves provide

089any information uh and then my thought is if if if we give it to you that's what you you can be the Arbiter of hey if I if I give you three questions and order them in the priority I would like to ask and and in the ideal world we only ask our our number one question but in the case where her than I is over the same question then you just you know choose hers and bump mine to the second one or something like that and we or maybe we do four though Tina since Mark and then maybe then everyone feels like they at least say and then I would ask the my question that you've said hey this is the one that that that worked and then I asked that to everyone you

090ask your question everyone and then so each of them so get four and then certainly you can you know if I asked the question you can ask a follow-up question because based on their answer at the time right we'll have to time the answers if you've ever watched the debates in town like we will have to time the answer just because we really could be here for hours um and we're not going to be throwing trick questions at anybody I mean they're going to be questions related to the position look we're looking for people who are you know invested in this community invested in education are good collaborators are willing to understand you know budget and policy are good with managing people that or people you know that might fill you know where we have

091we all have different strengths and weaknesses that we have three lawyers on on the board and you know what I mean so somebody's you know we all com things from different angles a very different experience exactly so I mean it's not going to be like a popularity contest or anything like that it's just going to be like who's really a good who's interested at the right you know level Eng of Engagement and who's a good fit with uh with the board yeah so so so what I what I did the 90 seconds each of us ask a single the single question um and instead of trying to figure that out at the meeting if we send them to her she can you know give us what that those questions are and then turn it over

092to the select board for general questions and I think the expectations they work it out with with Rob is isn't that they will all ask a question it's just like does the select board have any questions or comments um and maybe there's only one or none or two or whatever and then come back for um any general follow-ups or I want to also think we should if a candidate put something very specific to them in their talent Bank form to be able to ask a question at that point about you know hey it was very interesting that somebody has done this and maybe there's a question about how that would apply here how um and then provide the candidate an opportunity to ask us questions because you know if it was me on the other

093side I'd be as much interviewing them as as they are me um and then just give them like a 30 second wrap up of their you their thoughts at the end and if if I did quick math on that I I think that probably Keeps Us in in in one to two hours time frame for if we if we're diligent with the time but and any body's welcome to reach out to me or any of I don't want to volunteer you but I think you'll be fine you know uh reach out to us beforehand if you have questions that are going to assist you with making your decision about whether you want to continue on with the process or even just to connect with us and hear more about what it's like from our perspective

094because we all have different Paul's I've been chair for 10 year 11 years Paul just chaired the building committee um for several years Tina's on ashack I mean we all have different um ways that we've contributed to the committee so um if you want to hear more about any of that I strongly encourage you to reach out to anybody so I think that I mean if you guys will send me questions I'll make a a list of the top four um that will get asked to every candidate and so everyone should come prepared to do a 90c opening just of introducing it's going to be on wacka um and it's going to be a public process we're going to have to somehow figure out how to make a decision you know in a public way

095just like when we hired you know the superintendent um so should we not require but should we you know really ask them to come in person um as a preferred way I mean somebody can't they can't but I don't think they should be disqualified but you know to to say that's our preference for them to yes to be it is a hybrid meeting all our meetings since Co since we were were back we've been hybrid so there's the opportunity uh and that by the way moving forward too the the preference is for all of us to be here when we have when we can't um as in my case I there's a couple meetings I'll miss next month and I will tune in and other people have had to miss and they've tuned in on

096Zoom but the preference is if you can be here in present I think it's important to to understand what our expectations are we is we've tried to come back in person so yeah so that's um that's the job uh you guys will send me your questions I'll ask Mark to do the same um um and then once you get feedback from the select board will you kind of and kind of figure out what the whole format will look like yes will you be sharing that with the people who filled out Talent Bank forms even if it's just a a rough overview 90 second intro questions from the school committee questions from the select board yeah because on everybody's Talent bank I believe um they had to leave their email address so I think what I

097would do is sometime before the meeting I would write up a final like here's how it's going to go because there's a piece of it that I won't know till tomorrow after Jim and I have our meeting um and and and probably to get back to you that they're still interested to to know so we have an idea of if because I mean at the end of the day if if somebody's filled out and they're no longer interested if they let you know then we don't need to publicly say they didn't show up right and be be thoughtful of that absolutely um right like your name won't go on the agenda or anything like that I don't I don't think um but it will be good for us to know who to anticipate being here

098so that we can Pace Pace the evening so I think we have a process um and I'll Circle back with you all with just FYI tomorrow after our meeting or Jim will um to let you know um the input from the select board I mean it is their decision too so I do want them to feel like if they have to make a vote they're you know going to need to feel like they've they've done their due diligence so whatever that looks like um and then hopefully we're voting on a new member on January 24th so you guys you good with that yeah that that sounds good yeah just thanks everybody for their their uh yeah uh their interest people interested I know we're thrilled to have the interest and I got a feeling that's

099going to be the most difficult meeting we've ever had regardless of all the other AG I know I'm already stressed out topics you know um because we have a lot of people with just a lot of great things to offer and um so but my hopefully um you know we'll we'll run a a a process that helps us get the right person and um you know and then if it's something that interested you and you weren't the person then just keep watching for opportunities to to be involved so cool all right good and then that does do some things to our meeting there's there is one thing I am going to keep in our agenda because I do have somebody from the Warren site Council who had uh created a really wonderful very brief though

100presentation about communication and it's presenting it in a way that we haven't discussed it before and um she had to get child care and things like that so she's planning on coming that night it will be short and this uh the select board isn't coming till 6:30 anyway so we do have 30 minutes in the beginning I'm going to give U at least probably 15 to Caitlyn perfect um but if there's something else you need to squeeze in sure um figure that out so we're not we're going to push some of our other business but Jim will will talk more about that we dive into that yeah please thank you I want to extend uh an offer to any of those who have filled out the talent Bank form to either reach out to myself

101or Michael to um if if they have questions about you know our role and how we've worked uh with the school committee again it's um it's an exciting time to bring another person into the fold uh I always look at these as great opportunities uh for uh our our committee and uh to to grow and get stronger so it's um it's uh exciting uh the last time we did this uh going back to 2015 uh we we actually had a I found the agenda today I went through all of the old agendas and tried to find it and and was able to and we booked three hours that night just for for the uh wer eight people I say do you remember how many people uh we had I want to say three ended up

102being yeah so but some people had had more than three had contacted me with interest but by time we got to the date people had changed their minds but I mean that's how you I mean you start the process it's it's got to be a thoughtful process after you find out some things I can contact Adam and he can keep the clock and like down meeting sure that be Wonder prefer we don't do that I was ad so uh so just for an update I I think it's important um a couple things one uh before I get into the next meeting which is um in February the first meeting in February uh because of the 24th being taken up due to uh filling the position uh there are a number of of major pieces that

103we need to discuss as a board uh and you need to be involved in and and waiting until the fifth member is part of this group uh seems appropriate uh and one of those is the Strategic plan uh I think we're Michael we're ready yeah I keep it's time we have we have a new vision for almost year now no no no we no we I think we uh it's good to go we had a really good meeting with our um Mike and I with the Prem a couple weeks back and then we brought the whole administrative team in together uh and finalize the plan uh and so we want to finally share it uh and get your final input on that but waiting until uh the the the February meeting is is important um

104then there's another component is the calendar survey uh that was sent to the community uh well over 900 responses uh to that survey I am not going to tease out uh the information that that I've sort of um starting to uh go through uh but we have a presentation that we'll present that night as well I do need to at some point get the calendar set uh for 2425 uh what I can tell the community is anticipate us going back to the starting um pre Labor Day uh this year was an anomaly because of the MZ school right we we started later partly because we needed the time to ensure the building was ready to be turned over to us and we front loaded P PD too and correct right so but that being said

105um the calendar is important but I know families are always wondering when the year is going to end versus you know when it's going to start it's going to start before Labor Day that's we're going back to that that model um and we'll have have that Wednesday Thursday of the week before Labor Day Friday's off because that's part of the teachers contract uh and then we start in Earnest again after Labor Day so those are two really important pieces that that we need to discuss in February will you be asking us to approve the calendar that night or just a presentation I think I'll just start with the presentation because I think you're going to want to have some good thoughtful dialogue and I believe the last time I did a calendar survey it was

106we had tremendous Community input um as part of the uh school committee meeting that being said I think that is on February 13th is that I think it's the 14th you think it's the 14th 14th no no Valentine's Day think it is is that a Wednesday I think so so Mike and I will will be remote because we're at actually at a conference but we're still going to present the meeting is still going to happen with us as we talk about hybrid we be hybrid that day um with those two pieces but it's critically important we get those um in front of the committee uh as soon as possible um so couple other things we are starting um negotiations uh tomorrow um with our first bargaining unit with the teachers unit starting tomorrow uh and

107then the the rest will follow if you will there are five units that will be bargaining uh this year uh and uh so that's that's starting I sent out a memo yesterday to the community just to remind them about inclement weather uh just you know it's going to happen at some point maybe when I'm not around uh there might be a snow day called someday uh but you know um I think you got a lot of hopes up some kids saw that were like wait a minute yeah no I I actually had a couple students email me Mr Adams we're not no sorry you're going to school today uh I'm just trying to let you know that be prepared it's somebody might reach out to you and say hey uh the weather's not cohesive to

108have school so but that being said uh we do follow the pattern and and I want to be clear with the community it's not a you know Jim Adams decision strictly or me I mean when you listen you know I'm from Vermont I don't make those calls lightly I take my time but that being said it there's a tremendous amount of collaboration that exists with our facilities of Maintenance Crews uh with Chris with John Murray uh with the the DPW with Doug Small Roy carera um chief of police uh Donna Walsh who's in charge of the busing for Conelly busing all of these individuals even this morning at 5:00 a.m. we were texting uh and I'm driving around looking at the ponding that exist from the rain at 5:30 but that's the conversation so it's

109not just the simp a decision that one person makes and we're having conversations with the 20 other superintendents within the Metro communities uh we you know we have to understand that we have 400 plus employees and a lot of our employees don't live in Ashland and they're coming from different areas as well so we're trying to be mindful of of making sure our staff is safe as well so these are all things that uh people probably think it's just a simple hey it's snowing don't have School you do that and we extend to June 27th and 28th and um then people are really unhappy with me so coming back for a day here and a day there so uh that's really all I have um for the update uh so excellent oh we have and

110you're not on here Mike so I guess no he's not this week okay cool unless he wants to be you been shut out no I think when he was when he had his surgery I'm I'm officially back so I've been back um and I I look forward to giving you update next meeting I guess excellent it's fine welcome back thank you I hope you're feeling good feeling great awesome looking Paul do you have a Wars I do uh between December 14th 2023 and January 10th 2024 I Paul Kendall authorized by my signature payables the amount of 1,126 n48 this includes general fund expenses of $727 N9 52 revolving expenses of $420 $42,715 and Grant expenses of $3,274 111 and meals tax expenses of $68 91 thank you do we have minutes we did we did

111just one set or just one okay because the date's not here on the agenda it was um December 13th okay thank you anybody have anything no want to make a motion to accept the minutes make a motion to accept the minutes from December 13 2023 second or I move too sorry all in favor I I do we have gifts and donations we do so I've got a a little list so bear with me uh $100 to the helping our own fund from Alison cognetti cognetti uh bright funds $200 for gifts and Don for EDP ashin PTO $243 for the grade S field trip Rebecca Williams $50 to helping our own fund the me family $11,000 for helping our own fund the jrom family $50 for helping our own fund Planet aid $27.90 for miscellaneous GI

112donation turncliff family $100 for helping our own fund then Maguire family $2500 for helping our own fund and Roberta and Juan Flores $50 for helping our own fund for a total of $672 3.90 thank you for all those generous donations do we have a motion to accept them so moved second all in favor I I um member updates I have no idea uh hold on seems like it's been a while since we've been here yeah let me let me look at my calendar last me was roal so that probably makes it yep um let's see what what what's happened um yeah I don't know there's been a there's been things we we're actually having a we're giving a tour to another District uh of Mendes tomorrow um and I know there's a bunch of other

113things but I didn't I've not gone back to my calendar and a look but so yeah I have no update since our last meeting Ash pack I believe is next week though I'm going to have to double check with my calendar um it and yeah me and you observed a budget meeting yeah oh that's right yeah so we had thank you for reminding me of that Lori and I had the opportunity to to sit in and observe um one of the administrative budget meetings and it's always I know I've always known how much work goes into this before it comes to the school committee and how many different layers um there are to but it was nice to be able to kind of you know see the process and see all of the you know

114the collective Brain Trust if you will of our administrators come together to identify the needs and figure out um you know some of what we need obviously this was only one of a million meetings that they all have together but it was nice to be able to to to watch the process and hear their conversation so thank you for including us in that perfect thank you and I don't have anything to add besides that um so I will take a motion to adjourn motion to adjourn second all in favor I I thank you everyone have a good night have a good night