001all right all right hello everyone good evening I would like to call this meeting of the Berlin Boon Regional school committee to order just a reminder that this meeting is being recorded your image and or voice may be broadcast please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge allegiance flag the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands One Nation God indivisible andice all so this is uh GNA be really difficult but the very first thing I'd like to do tonight is um I'd like us to have a moment of silence in honor of Rachel janeski who is the young woman that our district lost this past month um I didn't know her but I know there was an outpouring of love and support from this community um and it's just
002it doesn't matter it's awful to hear about the loss of a young life with so much potential so let us just take one moment and let us all think about Rachel and her family thank you all right next up we have public comments so uh is there anyone here that would like to make a public comment okay so you can just stand up yeah sure just state your name um and introduce yourself who you are and um then feel free to go ahead I'm Jennifer mapy they working cafeteria here at Tanto I'm also a parent and student here at Tanto um and we're just um hoping that if witson stays um because we're not sure where things are at the moment um that we all stay District employees it's the most important thing to all
003of us many of us have years of longevity here and have put lots of years in energy and effort into working here and um we just want to make sure that that doesn't get lost in the transition of things thank you so much for standing up thank you all right do anyone else want to speak I had a question sure I saw I just noticed tonight when I check the agenda that that one of the things being covered is a vote for our school choice so I don't know if I could just you know say 30 seconds worth sure did you want us just introduce yourself for everybody sure you guys okay if I sit sure yeah of course just say your name and then you can go ahead all right Jason Carol hi Jason
004probably half the people in the room know me um and know my kids story um so um I only have one little one who's now fully grown and she did all of her going through this school system um Berlin Memorial and people so um I'm a proud parent of a kid who who is in this district and I chose multiple times to have her in this District through school Cho school choice so um she we never lived in um Berlin or Boon I lived on the Town Line uh for a while and watch the bus circle in my neighborhood but not be allowed to put it on the USS so that was like you know that little negative was the only about the only negative I've had um through and it's nothing that anybody can
005do to change that so um we've been happy sending our kid to brother Memorial Tonto for the last two years um so I just wanted to make clear to the people who were voting that there are many people like me I'm one of at least five um parents with a kid in the seventh grade in Clinton that s Aid here at least at the beginning of this school year there were at least five that I know of that come in from Clinton and um at least three of them including my daughter are on highest honors every every semester every quarter and um as Carol and Lisa know I chose at the beginning of this year to keep my kid here instead of sending them to amza um because I you know I really like Carol
006and mixa and everything that this school system has to offer so my hope is that um other parents like me and my kid have the option going forward to send versus CL you know public school so I'm very appreciative and hope that you guys consider that as an option going forward if not this coming year after that thank you thank you so much did anyone else have comment they would like to make okay we will move on to Communications does anyone have any Communications they wanted to share adjusted yes April 2nd I attended the master plan implementation Committee in boyon um as you passed it on to me and then the select appointed me um the plan is to meet quarterly and um they gave us the the plan to review and to come back
007um so I was thinking of something in the sub commmittee um St success could do and then if there's any concern certainly you know we're concerned about more housing and room in the schools um will report more it was more of an informational that's great yeah I think that's a great spot for that to sit thanks so much anyone else Communications okay um all right next up is consent agenda is there a motion to approve the consent agenda so move lau and Julie all in favor I'm I as well any opposed that motion passes all right first up uh my report so uh it's been a pretty busy month um but I don't really have anything uh to report tonight um the only thing is that just a reminder that we have town meeting in
008both towns I believe it is the night before our next school committee meeting so we will not meet again before that it is is it May 7 in both towns May 6 Monday May 6 it's the Monday yep thanks Janelle so it's Monday May 6th so I would urge anyone listening to go I know the the committee we usually go to our towns um we see I might stop in Berlin and try to make an appearance in both Town um but it's going to be really important especially in Berlin for the Berlin residents to go and vote in favor of the school budget because I believe the school budget differs from the town budget in Berlin in Boon we came to an agreement so the budget matches with the fincom recommend recommended in oilon so
009it's going to be really important for parents to go and support the schools and the budget um all right and that was it for me okay Emerson do you want to give a quick update okay great thanks so it's finally the fourth quarter which we all know which is the busiest but also the most exciting time for students I would say um this week is our last Spirit Week in pep rally for the high schoolers which really marks the beginning of all of the of the Year activities that are going to come um our spring Sports officially began yesterday the girls lacrosse and the Varsity Softball had amazing games and won against both middle sex and Clinton um the record for both the boys varsity baseball and the girls lacrosse is one in one and
010the Varsity Softball is two and0 which is quite strong um track is having their first track meet right now actually I think which sadium men are coming from to talk to you all later um for clubs everyone's planning with of our year is going to look like whether that's submitting the final draft of the yearbook which we're doing tomorrow um or the final touches for prom and scheduling The Last Cafe for cause on the prom tickets have been getting sold at lunches which will be sing very fast which is May 17th at the Cho in and I feel like all the classes are trying to sneak in a little last fundraiser to raise all the money for next year the class of 2024 just had the volleyball tournament and the class of 2026 had a
011Chipotle fundraiser over the weekend um and lastly I would say all the seniors are getting in their last college acceptances and weighing their options see where they'll end up next year and for Middle School the sixth and seventh grade just finished their Ela Tass today and the eighth grade is doing that tomorrow and the next day yeah we're excited to see what the last quarter for everybody thank you thanks so much erson okay um so next we have Nancy who is not here tonight so I believe there is someone from Woodson that's going to present the um the bid that we are voting on tonight so why don't we do that now it's the food so it's the wit bid that um we going to be voting on so car you want to yeah y
012I have with me right now Alissa Charles the district manager for witson and she's going to answer any questions that that you might have I have I have some information myself you have a a paper um that was submitted regarding There's a summary of proposal on it from the business office that includes other information in the report but I think you'll find information that's valuable in terms of making a decision tonight for a vote but do you want to come up you want move over come sit here so we had a chance to talk today with Rob who could not be with us this even we had an emergency but we're happy to answer any questions you might have and if it's okay with you um if there are any questions I'm gonna just um
013put um our Christine certon who I spoke with you all before from our business office on the line um in case there's any questions that I so I wasn't um going to present anything tonight um I believe that you all received the bid materials and if you have any questions I'm here to answer questions I was curious um they said um that you were going to that prophets were posted and I I was or you were trying to post profets I'm curious like is that just from State funds for Massachusetts and that's our profits plus like doubles and cart items or I just didn't understand that sure so the way the revenue works is after expenses anything additional stays with the school district so um we have a certain guarantee and then beyond that anything
014additional that's earned stays in the Food Service revolving account those funds have to be used for the Food Service program but they stay with the school district does that answer your question so then it's the state fund you want to talk about that we can talk about that sure yep so this school year um for the past few years the state has been giving supply chain assistance to every school district more or less in the state and so this year there was an additional $3,000 um that was deposited to the Food Service program in February and that again it goes into the Food Service fund it's belongs to the school district and it's used for any expenses related to the program the other piece I know that we have our folks here from this from
015the cafeteria Services who ask a question about keeping our our staff tax yeah and um our current our bid does propose that you all stay employees of the school district um and that's you know for the term of the Contra where can we see that in the bid because I was looking through some of the proposals in there uh I know the letter that we received through email says that but then one of the flyers or the proposals it was a whole section on welcoming the bbrsd employees into our family and the way you know as an idea or a gesture that sounds nice but the way it read is it read like an onboarding system to be an employee um Christine do you know exactly where in the um I was trying to grab
016it but Tech issues oh I apologize oh I apologize um so the H committee is wondering where in the bid it states that the employees will remain School District employees that I I did I remember reading it was the RFP I know that is it in the bid and it will it be in the contract you'll that for the hourly um team members are is associated with the so pretty much everything is going to stay the same as it is right now in terms of op operational structure yeah well what would change um the team M would at Team MERS our manager would a li manager um so there's no operational changes what's SSA again SFA the school Food Authority the program but what would anything else change um nothing just as everything's outlined in
017the big we've kept it you know very consistent with how things have been the past few months that we've been here um the the elementary schools haven't seen the dramatic change that the high school has seen that be changing so yeah so as you know we work you know more and more with the district as Rob becomes able to um you know work more and more with each school then absolutely you'll start to see those changes implemented at each school just takes a little bit of time which is why we're glad we'll be able to hopefully continue this partnership with with the school district so that way we can continue to make those changes because we do find it does take a little bit of time um to kind of get everything in place the
018way that we'd like to see it and is there going to be like a formal feedback process from kids yeah so we do have um wson annually does surveys twice a year so we do have Rob our food service director is working to get that survey ready will open the day we return from February break andil bre yes April break I'm not ping us back so the day we return from April break and that's open to parents to students um anyone who's interested in filling up that survey can complete it with the school that they're at and any comments that they have and we kind of review all of that feedback and we do it in October and then again in April Rob did put together a survey in February I think early on in
019in in the transition but we only got 13 respondents back to that so it really wasn't enough to get what it went in newsletters newsletters yeah so it was was early on so vacation I don't I thought it was right was the beginning of February but so with that then they'll do another one now which will which will really guide us I think it's important to note that even though we have not had like a first read of this there a lot of material to digest that if we don't vote tonight we're going to lose the opportunity to bid and Woodson they were the only ones um who did um submit a bid to us so that's important to know it it doesn't have to do with whitson's time frame so much as desie time
020frame um and desie they Chang their time frame I thought we had a 60-day window from the date of that letter which I think was the was it the 18th that's 60 days this bid is good for 60 days or something like that so the bid from witson stays good however desie needs the executed contract by their deadline how what's the deadline um May 3d days right so we have a possible meeting on the 23rd we could if we need more time to look at it do that yeah if if you have a me and I was going to talk about that in my report mik I didn't know what everyone wanted to do that is is that over oh no that's the that's our as needed meeting that's the as needed I wanted to
021talk about that with everyone when I get to my report so that's a consideration the original date was in April right April 12th to to send the draft decision back to desie they've just moved their their date so we're trying to monitor it's not them it's it's meeting desie deadlines to make sure we get this in at the in the right time frame so that's I just want you to be aware of that too so but I think that's why Al will help answer questions that LE need to make informed decision can I ask a question on the bidding process up to I know you said there was only one company submitted a what was the process up to that I have a followup question along Julie's question there so how many separate people did
022you interview to become the district food service director outside of the witson bit we to my know we didn't do any interviews for an individual person at this time no so you didn't even advertise for it I think she did did you advertise for it I thought she yeah that was back in well Nancy would have been Nancy should be here to answer these questions where is Nancy she on leave she's on leave oh I wasn't aware did that communication go to the committee bement was it bement she's on bement leave right now so she'll be back by the 23rd I can't answer that at this time yeah okay she nany's on bement leave right now she's on leave right now is it bement leave or is she just leave leave okay because she I
023know she's spearheaded this whole situation have a lot of the answers a little bit the way the process works so generally I know Nancy you know um enacted it on behalf of the district generally and what Nancy did was the procedure where she uses um the Desi template for the RFP which is required for service providers it was posted publicly so that any interested bids were able to come there was a tour um of the Food Service facility which I believe was required um required attendance for or in order to place a bit you had to come to the tour which is pretty standard um witson came as did one other company and it was all sort of set out in the schedule in the RFP with the time frame for the first meeting one
024bids were due Etc and we have a copy of the RFP here if anyone would like to take a look and then um of the two companies wison and the one other who were present on the bid tour woodens was the only one that submitted a bid and then we didn't interview for because I remember last time we talked about this in December the committee wanted you to interview as well as do rfps I could be mistaken but I'm almost positive we put that in our motion when we voted on it I believe she did post it but I think it was posted for it was posted before we hired witson she posted it like back in right that was posted in the fall I don't know a job description was posted to hire outside
025at this time for next year yeah we might need to check the minutes because I there might have been included in the motion that we voted on that we wanted to see that what meeting was sure was December meeting I could I know we discussed it I don't know if it actually went in the vote or not but I know we discussed it and you said you would okay I don't recall that but I'd have to go back and all right so do you want to wait until April ail 23rd to vote I mean I think if we do a meeting on April 23rd it'll be a zoom meeting just G to go ahead and say that right now I I have some other questions too that I don't know if you guys can answer
026or if Nancy would be better to answer them when she comes back um you have in that letter here you have the increased lunch meals that were served from January to March and it shows pretty decent increases there yeah yeah I'm curious if that is because of witson or is that because year to year with the state's free launch program inflation families maybe trying to save on groceries just sending them through I don't see the September to October numbers which might help answer that question i' said f well that's my well that's my next question I don't know I can speak that unfortunately Rob our food service director had an emergency and could be here tonight I know he you know we were just sort of looking at since we've been here so since Woods
027Woodson has been here that's sort of what we're looking at that's understandable I'm just curious is that because of Woodson or is it because of the economy sorry again oh yes and so yeah Christine we're looking at a supplemental document that Rob created Christine was explaining that um projected increases that are indicated as well are comparing similar with since districts that have Benchmark against similar districts that have um a comparable size and scope all right so Carol if you can find that information for the next meeting um and then I guess it would be nice you said you sent surveys out it sounds like a lot of people may not have seen that y but I'm just curious Julie you say the food is 100% better but are the kids taking it 100% better or
028I hear conflicting reports from people that we talk to there's a lot of extra food prep there's a lot of extra food waste what is the food waste situation with this versus a different program that we might have had before um those are concerns that I have yeah I can't answer the food was I can quality is is is I mean I I hear you I tend to believe that probably relates I I tend to believe you on that but I'm curious about that waste we don't have that information here so we don't know I don't know if they know where they can tell us from I could say that in general you know a big part of witson after and philosophies is you know we try to introduce a lot of new foods so
029things that maybe are like plant-based or meatless you know um sort of The Greener initiatives as well as just sort of things that are a little bit different introduce students to new foods and so sometimes when we try one of those new items we don't know exactly how many to make so the first go around there could be a little extra we also um but you know like the subsequent times that meal is served we sort of are able to correct for it similarly um in general we like to make sure that the first student and the last student have the same choices so we never like to see that the last student to come through the line at the last lunch only has the choice of cheeseburger or salad and not all the other
030array of options and that's very important to with since um as a whole we believe that every student should have the same choices and so sometimes it does end up with a little extra waste especially on days where maybe pasta is the main entree and it was going to be you know it was really popular last time and it usually is and so we cut back on some other things but maybe for whatever reason it was too much and so there's a little bit of extra or we didn't realize that the special the day was going to be so popular and we ended up with a little bit extra you know extra cheeseburgers or pizza that day so it's sort of a learning curve for us as we come in and see what are the
031students tastes what do they like um what do we need to create what do we need to you know push up the numbers on and what we need to come back so it's definitely a learning process um you know that being said we do have a lot of green initiative as well um we work with a lot of school districts on composting um plastic recycling and things like that as well to try carbon will you be doing that here next year absolutely yeah and we can do you know any of the programs outlined in the uh bid which include like our the next TR program which is like a a thin plastic recycling as well as composting or things that we can certainly work with our team and with the school committee and school districts
032on um on implementing absolutely does food waste ever get donated to people who have no food um usually know it's a little bit of a liability for the school district because the school district owns the food so it's sort of what's going to happen between when it's sort of picked up and where it gets where it's going um we can do a bit of a food safety issue um that's the same for restaurants yeah you can't you can't yeah there's laws against yeah you can only donate I think for food pantries will only take they don't want the muffin TOS yeah it is and as Christine mentioned there's a lot of regulations for health regulations and also um some of the food we use is USDA Commodities which have their own regulations because they're subed
033by the subsidized yep yep yep yep that's unfortunate we all hate to see it we really do wases the wor so as you as you go on and get more familiar with the kids that cuts down is that what you're saying yes that's definitely the hope the Hope was that it happened like we're in April now so has that happened here so again right it's every time we introduce a new item we don't know how it's going to go but we like to continue to introduce new things right um you know to keep the kids palets fresh to give them new options so like from the start of this program in January to now is that cut down at all I don't know yeah I don't have that I don't know how how would we
034measure the food waste we'd have to we're not that I think that's that's not something like you're not going to be able to answer that you're not in the cafeteria the only people that might be able to answer that is people serving the food but they'd have to be paying attention to what gets thrown away so I mean what you could do Carol is well if you're paying attention to what's thrown away so I mean we have a panel of EXT so why don't we so can you guys not all right Tammy Tammy are you able to answer Mike's question yes do do you I want to put you on the out she also sees what stays in the K I have okay so do you want to speak could you speak so more or
035less since we started doing this the food fluctuates it depends on if it's something new to the kids we tried an appetizer for an example and I never thought it was going to go like it did we ran out it was crazy um but that day we had a lot of burgers left that they eat every day and a lot of chicken petties that they eat every day so the next time you prepare for sampler and you don't make as many of the other things but unfortunately we do have food waste um but like I said it we off likes to try the same thing twice even if it doesn't sell um because second time it's new the first time so the second time they have you know they have a better idea of what
036the be serve um so it does fluctuate by and we're getting better on our numbers we're not throwing we as much chicken patties and burgers as we were in the beginning okay so that's good so that seems like yeah it's trending in the right direction but yeah you started in January it hasn't even been four months yet it's been three months and we had a break there and I can say that you know um just I can only speak to Tanto personally um and Renee and Rich and I are at lunches you know at almost every day and we you know talk to the students the students um definitely are feeling like they're compared to the beginning of the year so I can say from the beginning of the year till now the kids absolutely
037feel as though they're the portions they really enjoy the meals um and you know I don't want to but you all seem to be in a good place right now better than the beginning so like so I make sure I we talk to them and the students all of the time um at so that communication is constantly happening we are constantly asking the kids what do you think of this what do you think of that what do you are are you feeling full you what do you wish you had more and I have noticed that kids are absolutely eating more fruits and vegetables with 100% they're eating like the cut up cucumbers one day like big fresh strawberries those were like I mean those are all incidental reports but it's like every day we are
038seeing this every day so we do I what we run out of in Sal more than trying to get grasp ons really are wanting Sal because they're big and they have protein to them and which was really nice I think in the beginning it was a big shift for everybody and that was you know difficult for the kids too there were certain things that they didn't like and they missed the old but I think it's kind of been a good combination and the fact that they've all been here these are this is their this is their state like their teachers Chang but you guys have been their safe people and so that made they were worried about that too and the fact that they keep seeing you has been really huge and making them feel
039feel good okay so do you guys want to vote on this now or do you want to wait until a April 23rd and have a meeting then to do a vote on this has Nancy reviewed like who reviewed this she did review it in preparation of the meeting tonight I did have questions for the school committee at this time out as a body I'm I'm hearing a couple of things I heard mention of the survey a survey going out again I was unclear about the I didn't quite catch the last part of that other than witson survey going out in April is there another survey that you want to miss the last part mention February survey yeah so I missed the last part Michael what you said about the survey I it was what Jess
040had mentioned about you know I was curious just how parents how kids are are liking it how the staff are liking it is there food waste not food waste is it more or less to prepare just you know overall how is it going and then we have the numbers for this year um but I'd be curious to see if that's because of witson or is it maybe just a trend this year because of the economy um that's a September to December you asking participation so the survey is is a school committee comfortable with a survey that will go out in April from witson or did you want us to create another one in addition to I no just one nobody's gonna answer two yeah just do one so wens is doing one that's great now
041when is that going up but my the information I'm asking for car doesn't need to come from survey at least not all of it it doesn't need to come from survey it's just dat yeah so the Ser is April 22nd and I believe it's open for two full weeks yeah so that's not gonna help us for We're not gonna get that information for our April 23rd vote so yeah I mean Carol Mike you're making some good points it would be great to have this data before we vote on this this um I'm also curious why nobody was interviewed for the in-house program that be discussed yeah I was just trying to look back but I'll have to look back on that again Mike I will tell you that and this is just the way it
042is we would have to go out if if with some's income in we would post for a director but to your point about whether it were supposed to go out simultaneously I'd have to go back and look if that was done I'm una aware I don't know if we dictated a time when it was supposed to go out but just in the normal course of business so that you can get it done I guess would be the timeline the the posting for a a director yeah I believe we talked about you know this was a stop Gap measure for this year because of the issues that we had in November and December we were curious number one about the employees staying employees uh and then two about whether this is the route to go based
043on what improvements have been made measure those improvements by the users what's their experience with it financially what's the experience with it are we doing better are we doing worse um you know all those questions that we would think would just be normal questions to evaluate such a big decision like this just aren't here how long is is this bid for one year or for three years for one year for one year okay and then renew for three or up I it might be the best option we just don't have the information we're just doing this because you say oh yeah they're cool we like them go for it please vote for it we don't have any data that says that it's better well we talk to people in the community we talk to our
044kids you talk to the 13 and 14 year olds is it actually better yeah they're gonna tell you yes okay they're gonna say well then that would be one that would be one that would be one set of data that we could we could have so do you think it's a matter to teenagers what their Bears think and food so Julie L H do you Jess do you guys feel that we have enough information to vote tonight or do you want to wait Julie I feel like we have enough information okay La what are you thinking I mean I I love the real food I just don't I feel like I'm making a decision based on what I think and not I don't really know what yeah Mike as much as I hate I really
045don't Ian I got a shirt and C your cup I say yeah this is gonna be the only time tonight is there a way is there a way that we could shorten the window of that like have it go out tomorrow and close by Friday yeah so the the survey yeah it's unfortunately not because it's for does it for all school districts so it's really beas simultaneously companywide for every District that we're in I do have one final question as well the 8,000 guaranteed Surplus can you explain how that works because you say you know so guaranteed surplus of eight grand you give some numbers about what you project is going to happen uh and then you say you project by the end of the year we're going to be in a $30,000 Surplus so
046where does that 22,000 go to should we not have a higher than 8,000 Benchmark how does that all work and Christine I'll let you speak to this did you hear the question yeah so um the question was about um the $8,000 guarantee versus the projections for the full year I believe the $8,000 was what was stipulated in the RFP right so $8,000 was kind of what was stipulated by so it says here it says witson submitted their bid with a guarantee of a surplus of 8,000 next year oh okay you're looking at Nancy's notes uh I don't know who they came from we email yeah it's Nancy yeah Nancy onp yeah so that so that's for um this current school year and that $330,000 no that's for that's for next year it says witson submitted
047their bid with a guarantee of a surplus of 8,000 in fiscal year 25 that's next year right yeah and then where are you seeing the 30,000 uh yeah so then it says uh well she says she reviewed the p for the last few months um she goes on to say uh projecting uh $ 31,300 uh profit from March to the end of the school year right so the so the first line that you were reading the bid with the guarantee of a surplus for 8,000 is for fy2 correct um that second paragraph that Nancy included is a prediction for the end of this school year and that 301,000 includes that supply chain fund um that I mentioned earlier that which was around right around $30,000 in change so those won't be here next year we
048don't know that's determined by the state government okay it wasn't very clear from this so I wish you was see to answer these if you don't mind because I um just could we allow if they have anything else to add or to say because this I think would impact them would you would that be appropriate just to sure because I think they have in they have information y sure did you guys have anything you wanted to add or say well I know one of the reason why our number is kids love the hamburgers and chicken patties and cheeseburgers and fries they can get every single day so and our numbers have been up since the kids have done pretty much oh yeah our that went way up when that St but different kinds sweet potato
049the main L is sandwich and I get Fri no I'll have a cheeseburg so the variety options are better I'm sure does that Mak more work for you the best Cho sometimes every day they would be forced to take something they are taking fruit too but the H has been great they do love all the fruits and vegetables that they can get and salads we do salads as a meal but we also do side salads within the hotle not every day they love the seesar salad you can't put enough health no but I think numbers I mean they are up a little bit more but I think they've been up since the kids have get pre lunch I mean our numbers have gone up since then pre lunch was last year right yeah so so
050and these these the comparisons from last last last last a lot more running there's that's one of my concerns is just that we don't have time for break some days which is not legal probably or great yeah what do you mean we're just scrambling to get everything done so that can be a lot of components Taco you something that has a lot of components so do you need another person umor all right all right let's get back on track so uh Carol wants to share one thing and then all right uh just how do you feel do you want to wait till April 23rd to vote or do you want to vote now I mean I'm have to make the decision before May 3rd we don't have to make a vote tonight I mean I
051think I'm a little uneasy because Nancy's here I mean she did review it and I guess she approved it from her end was that conclusion of her review Nancy she was comfortable pre presenting to you know what what what you have in front of you tonight as far as making the recommendation I did just go back to the December 3rd meeting um there was an approval of this is the minutes approval of Woodson's Food Service management company a vote the motion was made by Mrs Hart and seconded by Mrs Lee Mr totman made amended motion seconded by Mrs Lee to ensure Uh current staff remained sorry employed with the same pay and benefits and that the school committee will be consulted before making a decision for next year six six to4 amended motion passes so
052that was a discussion there was nothing about going out again for an individual so it wasn't in the motion Carol but I distinctly remember Nancy sitting here and saying yes they would advertise for the position and compare what would be the best interest of the school I also feel there was some discussion around like the the food distributor was you know then that would add that other element to the quality of the food that we get which much more that's we had before definitely was part of the conversation yeah also some of it at the at the end of the day some of it has to be the school's decision and it so desie we need to approve this bid right it's a desie rule that the school committee approves the bid you know when
053you have an outside company but it's not necessarily our decision to decide if the district keeps it the director of Food Services in-house or out of house that I think is a Carol Nancy or Carol you know we did in all due respect for the committee did agree to have a consult consultation with the school you did yes we said we would talk about it so we're talking about it so I mean I kind of feel like it would be it includes employees who are paid by the district through a budget that this committee approves so as far as I'm concerned it is our decision Well yeah if we decide that if the cost is different so Lisa sorry I haven't asked you how how what are you thinking about this do you want to
054wait to get more information to vote or are you feeling do you feel one way or the other do you like witson I do like witson I think it's a vast Improvement I think the kids are getting healthier food I've heard good things from the parents about that they're happy about that okay the contract is for a year right and then the option to renew so I almost feel like we can gather all that information over the coming year because this is just you know and have just a better data set to actually evaluate it from so actually comfortable with voting tonight although I do respect that you have some good questions I agree we can gather that date over the year but can we will they because they were supposed to have something for
055us before we made the next decision and they don't what if we did this what if we voted tonight and we made a motion but that we only approve this bid if the district keeps the staff well that's already in there no that that was for last year that's not for this bid I mean I guess B right Sheely I mean again I I guess it's not black white enough for me did you all the staff will stay on as um employees if we were to take them on that could be considered a material change which would force you to go back out to bid right changing okay all right that's my biggest concern is you know um go if they're saying they need more help no we do but we don't have somewhere to
056put somebody that's the thing is there's not enough space to have another person necessarily well is this T we [Music] don't and we could certainly work with Rob to figure out where a person could fit in maybe it's someone just sort of helped for a few hours during the day when other people are taking their breaks that would free up time we could certainly work with Rob to figure that out and you know again it's as the School District staff that's your decision and this does include just the current staff so that is something that we might have to adjust for if there is somebody added um not in the sense that we have you know go back up to bit but just that you know we make our conceptions based off of the the
057labor model that's presented to us in the labor schedule so if we're adding other people in that's just something we have to keep in mind what if you added a witson person to do to do the dishes or to do whatever so I think would we have to change the bid for that yes because we incl all the labor got for anyone gotcha gotcha so at this point this is kind of the bid at hand I I would prefer that I mean I think that in line with everything we're doing here that we keep that you'd like to have if you hire something you'd like to keep it in absolutely okay okay that should be consisted I don't think I have any problems with the bid as it stands right now it's just not having
058the information that I thought we would have to make this decision is kind of annoying so I have two things number one is um one of the reasons we're really adamant about keeping the good people that work for us is that they have pensions and you know they they they their time served and to go over to another company they would lose all that so it's I think that's what's really important to the committee is there a lot of them are parents or they or they were parents or they're people in the community and so it's important to I think that's just so important in in a community school um my concern with when we vote is if we come back a year from now we going to get another say in this to make
059sure that we can Advocate um one way or the other do you know I mean like right now we're involved and I'm just worried I'm really worried about this piece right here I just think that it's important one of the reasons that people stay in these schools is because of the community because of the feeling of home and we obviously can't provide what witson can provide so it's wonderful that you can come in but I feel like it has to be a mix of the two or it should be just I I would if the school through Lor what I would suggest is that Wiens comes back again and we put together a plan with the school committee of what you would want to happen in a more formal way to Mike's Point whether that
060I mean if that discussion happened I have to tell you it's not anything in the minutes I don't recall that comment it isn't that it didn't happen or was said for example things that were said but I think we have to formalize what we we do going forward and these kinds of discussions are great to have but in the end planning for this in in a more formal manner is going to help keep every everybody on track and keep clear um and have all of this clean if we if we do that for next year a formal evaluation process surveys and so on I I I and I question that too as far as if we if we postpone this vote until the 23rd I think we just talking about if we're going to have
061the I mean Megan had just talked about not having meeting I I did want to bring that up in my report but we have it on the 23rd I just want to make clear what information would matter to you to make a change in your decision so I can try to put that together I I can't guarantee I will be able to put that together by the 23rd I would do my best but I'm not here next week all right so you know let's let's vote let's vote now and if you wanna if you want to vote against it then you vote against it and we'll see if it passes because I feel like very mixed feelings I think the motion could include that when the the contract comes up for Renewal that we have
062surve data to review that we have staff Give opinions on their experience and whether they support that renewal parents and kids feedback parents and kid yeah yeah teachers feedback you know is this have they seen an improvement in their classroom behavior issues because of the better food I agree so maybe we put a Julie but anything like that the motion that's a good idea but teachers would know better than you or I would yeah so this year you the principles can work where have witson or whoever is in charge of that can work to try to gather that data for cafeteria staff pany over there and um all right all right let's vote so it will so so it the contract begins July 1 and ends June 30th so I think within the motion we'd
063probably want that data before our last school committe meeting in June I will I will add that the renal the renewals have a due date every year with desie that's usually around the end of April so it thisel it'll be this time so will not data in February of 2025 February 25 for our February meeting so that we can vote in March or our March meeting so we can vote in April all right all right so um could I where where am I okay could I have a motion to approve the awarding of the Food Service Company bid to witzens with the stipulation that the school district and witson must provide specific data to the school committee by March of 2025 such as feedback from parents and students and teachers and and the committee will
064be involved in the decision next year and staff and the committee will be involved in the decision for the next bit you get all that I don't think it would be a bad idea also for if Rob or whoever is I'm imagining Rob will still be here as the Director in this area to come in and give regular reports to the school committee before March I think he should should come to at least some of the meetings in the fall and the June move the motion second all right lar second any more discussion just before we do vote just general nod of the head in the back here in favor or absolutely against all right glad you guys came and had your voices heard I think that's important I appreciate that thank you for listening
065all right any more discussion all in favor all right I'm and I as well that motion passes all right thank you so much to take thank you guys feel free to all right and up next is going to be we're gonna bang through these principal reports and then we'll talk about school choice everyone's gonna bring school choice oh students all right you guys want to go on now we just broke go home sure you all right so I'm sorry what are your names Ben Ben and STI okay so we have Ben and stie here next we'll do that next so they can that's perfect timing um and they're going to talk about their senior field trip overnight to Great Wolf lods that we will be voting on are you ready yep all right take it
066away yeah we so I know you guys got these in the form that we initially sent but I updated them a little bit more in depth so you pass one on it's just a little bit more in depth with like the price distribute getting the price distributed to between our class fund and then to students um and then also like chaperon are listed and so information on our do you guys want to present or do you want us to just ask you questions um questions yeah I don't want to put you on the spot yeah I mean um our field trip is going to be um May 29th to May 30th so it's a Wednesday and a Thursday um students will arrive at greatwolf lodge at 4M and then they will be dismissed the next
067morning at 10: a.m. and then they will have to report right back to the school that morning um for graduation practice so so student go there sleep over have do spend their time every watch and then come back right away um we are not providing um busing so um students will have to provide their own transportation we're send we're sending out permissions lists and on the permissions lifp is going to be stated that you will provide your own transportation to and from the event um and parents will have to sign off on that if they're not signed off on then um they do not attend a field trip um so yeah and we have three teacher chaperons lined up so far and then we also have a parent um it was kind of cloudy on
068how many you were going to need for an overnight so we have three teachers confirmed and then we can get more parents that are quy or more teachers if necessary all right great does anyone have any questions sounds like fun I just have one you pick that all great spot well gonna be super fun the weather will be nice yeah I mean it's all contained it's actually if you think about it's kind of a brilliant idea because it's all contained in the building go ahead sorry we have a lot of people lot of students wanting a like outdoor to like a beach trip um and that kind of is hard to plan for May you don't really know what the weather's going to look like um so we thought that this was kind of a
069big compromise we also wanted to do an overnight so it's kind of like everything that we really wanted yeah go ahead car I I do want to say to all of you so you know when I was hearing about this I was feeling a little parenty like but I did come to their meeting when they they've been planning this out and listen to everything and they're very responsible I respect you all and I know that you're going to make good choices you are kind of leading the way in something like this um for a senior trip that's an indoor overnight kind of experience other I know other districts do that but you're kind of I think the first at least to do this so so so I just ask you and nobody will leave the
070way with with all good things happening and and being responsible and respectful as you go there and representing Us in the district how many how many graduating members in the class or members in or maybe about 80 I think it's 807 80 36 yeah so why only not even half the classes gone uh people think they're too cool for it honestly do you think more people will sign up as uh gets closer to the date we already planned out and like we asked if they had they had like two weeks to sign up to go or not um and I think the main thing was that we came up with this idea we had a good amount of people saying that they would want to go and when we asked if people had other ideas
071especially people who didn't want to go on this trip they didn't really have any ideas that were like like some people were saying I trip to Florida or something like that there's definitely plenty of opportunity to sign up and uh I gave people opportunity like there was a form people said no on the form I gave them the opportunity to come talk to me and I changed a bunch of people's decisions got some stories behind that yeah there's definitely plenty of opportunity for people who want to go thank you his probably not all students go on the senior trip right no I've heard in past years I know last year there was a good amount of kids that didn't go I know I have some friends who graduated last year who didn't go on the
072senior trip and it's unfortunate I mean we want everyone to go but we also know that we can't please everyone um we haven't been able to the last two years to yeah senior trips usually overnight are senior trips usually overnight no this is this this is a TR laser event right and not in this district there other districts do do yeah so I don't know I'm in favor of you guys going but less than half the class is participating you're asking for school committee approval because it's an overnight trip you're doing private transportation we have specific policies around private transportations do you know what they are can't drive with people can't car for y need permission Insurance all that I don't know I just less than half the class that sucks so and and I
073um I I think it's it is it is a hurdle that and it's something that the students and I been talking about over the past couple years is how to engage you know students in general how to get them more involved with one another and it that is a difficult hurdle and it's one that it's challenging you know how because the Dynamics of how we socialize growing up is very different the Dynamics that the socializing it's also the timing to be quite honest with you it isn't overnight trip and at this point it's the it's the week before graduation and people are like you know my job is ramping up you know they they're working they they can't take that much time off you know those so so that it might be a factor in
074that people are working so it's a little bit more complicated than we all might think you know and and it's a challenge and you and you never as you have found out you will never please all the people all the time I also think that if we tried to plan something new now then it wouldn't probably be as good it probably less you have put a lot of thought in and work into putting together this triu and I think too sometimes it takes you the first year maybe the numbers aren't going to be 90% you know but you know the students know there's a senior trip and it's an overnight and it starts to grow I think so $1600 of the total cost is coming from the class funds yes the people that aren't going
075there they're cool with that that their parents help fund raise for that they're cool with that yeah the students are aware that a portion of it's going to be paid through class funds and then each student who's attending will be getting $75 and that was detailed when we had the sign up because we've had issues recently with fundraising and parents and not being happy with the way the money was being spent so I just want to make sure everybody's know going in sorry yeah no it's all right I feel like um the participation in fundraisers from our class is um extremely disappointing that not a lot of people are wanting to certainly people aren't volunteering to help in the fundraisers like maybe their parents are going to the carwash but there's there's never people who
076are trying to come up to us and volunteer during thing that's that's unheard of in our class yeah we hosted a talent show last year that we ended up getting around a littleit over $1 thousand dollar from but that was basically run by me and the other officers we had like maybe two students that are close friends that helped with like the lighting and that was it so we Tred our best I also um this would be after the school year concludes after graduation stuff like that but I've also brought to members who aren't attending the trip that um they can plan they're free to plan something like a beach trip I know a lot of them do that and if you plan a beach trip in late June early July where the weather's nicer
077and you can kind of pick your day um I encourage them to do that I encourage them to let the students know and be like this can be the trip for you guys if you guys want to do this or this can be like the final end of the thing after graduation to see each other one more time um so I'm trying to please both sides of it guess I just I want to say I I love the idea because I think of senior year as like it's like you have one foot in each world you know what I mean and I think you're really celebrating the fun and I love the idea of it being an overnight we keep talking about how we want the kids off their cell phones engaging with each other
078this is two days I just I think it's a wonderful idea and I I love how happy it is and I love your presentation your energy and your enthusiasm helps to really sell it too thank you okay um ready to vote okay could I please have a motion to approve the senior field trip which is an overnight to Great Wolf Lodge still sorry Julie was that you J oh sorry j any discussion all in favor I ionize while that motion passes thank you guys they have report would you like question would you like go report but I'm not GNA do that did a nice job I do want to um thank you for allowing me to share some of the amazing things that are going on at BS um I'm gonna highlight a few things
079and I'm open up for questions number one casses going on in all three schools but I'll talk about um Ela so we had third grade last week we had we had fifth grade the last two days and we have fourth grade the next two days we're hoping to finish all that before a vacation fingers crossed um we'll get through the sessions but we do have some makeups for kids that have been out uh Nature's Classroom fundraising is continuing on I want to give you a heads up that next year I'm going to come to you in September to get that approved so we can start at the beginning of the year because is quite substantial we have some amazing parents the students and the two fifth grade teachers have really spearheaded this with the parents
080and the students to fundraise we're not where we're want to be but we're plugging along and then I want to talk about an enrichment piece because it kind of ties into the climate survey which you also have the report on as well um we have some amazing staff that are trying to bring on that oring piece but it's not after school at this time that's coming I keep saying that but it will be coming um we're uh teachers are working on math during their lunch recess time kids are coming in and I just want to say a brand started out in fourth and fifth grade and now it's gone down to second and third grade um Joey floro I say that right say that wrong um and Mrs Lo a great teacher have been kind
081experiencing that for second and third grade which we're hoping to Branch upon that and that ties into our climate survey because I just wanted to talk about um one of the areas that we know at the we need to work on um and it was 74.4% about us providing um interest for students so there was a couple um places on there but this this an area we need to improve upon so that was on uh let's see VES provides quality activities that meet my students interest and talents such as sports clubs and music and we only hit 74.4% that's low so we want to work on that so now I'm going to open up to any questions about app yeah your school choice recommendations oh yes ask thank you so you have that as well
082um currently we have two spots one is filled this was filled before my time when that child came in last year there was another spot opened up so we still have that spot because the child that was in the other spot moved so I don't think that spot went away we didn't close it we just didn't fill it so if you're looking at um my report the second grade we have three classrooms total of 47 that is the one grade where we have a little space and I say little because I'm still very um concerned about that apartment building at the end of we do not have the NOS for that so there is one already there that's existing is what I consider existing and we have space to bring someone else in there the
083one child that's already there has a sibling coming into k um I thought about this long and hard and talked about it with Carol to me if you have a sibling there already and you have a child coming in we have to look at that any questions about that the rest of the grades I would not open them up and I'm very hesitant about kindergarten don't know our kindergarten numbers a prediction right now is the kindergarten if you open the one for the kindergarten Caroline I talked about this is it guaranteed to go to that sibling because what if you open it up and it's a lottery and like 10 people applying and The Sibling doesn't get it there not preference goes oh all right that's what I thought read that right yes and it
084goes to staff and it's also a teacher correct that's so it's two things yep all right that's I'm I'm fine with that does anyone have anything to all right sorry Cindy did you have anything else okay we want to monitor those numbers I I being I was a kindergarten teacher prior and we want to keep those numbers well you really do this year 21 in there that's that's to me is High um it's an unknown right now we have 40 um families that have expressed interest and through the you know they started sending in their registration paperwork around this time looking at last year again I wasn't here so I do some researching we were at 4045 at the same time we ended up at 63 so we really have to look at that but
085I do think the sibling should be allowed inow spot what when are the apartment supposed to be opening they're they're Fring right now the model is open now they're list June this'll be be open next year Cindy can I ask you one question you explain that the one new and one existing but I apologize I'm a little slow for the for the the grade two yes can you just explain that one more time so prior to this year two spots were opened up so there was a child in that spot now MH and there's one that moved so that's still there gotcha I don't think it closes I'm not sure about that oh I yes I what you're saying now yeah there was a kid and then they yeah I remember thank you because that
086grade is smaller yep okay anyone have any questions for Cindy oh sorry should we wait on the school choice until we have a yeah discussion on the vote all right the um the climate survey yeah the one you pointed out I noticed that too there's another one in here um student feel safe from verbal abuse teasing and exclusion at school almost 20% disagree with that that seems like a big number especially I know there's been some issues at that school last year there there was a potential hate issue um that seems like a big number for elementary school I agree there are some areas in that climate survey we have to work on um I did did bring it to my team of teachers who've been breaking down each question and say how can we
087grow with that I brought it to my school council and got a lot of feedback from the the parents that are on that as well there's areas we have to move and to me every single one of these question should be in the 90s that's what my goal is hire in the 90s and there's some we need to work on there I guess that's related to the one way that students don't feel that there's a feels that students who demonstrate inappropriate or disruptive behavior are not held accountable about 20% also feel that yep and so we talked about that too some of that is from previous year and some of that is when a student gets in trouble is confidential if there's a consequence with that student I so somebody comes to me and says
088I'll use John John did this I can't and there's a consequen I cannot tell that parent what that consequen was I can say it's been taken care of but I don't want into details a lot of parents want those details I understand you can't go into details um it doesn't sound like this question is a question about details I mean if there's a kid with disruptive behavior it's pretty well known and if they're being held accountable you would expect that disruptive behavior to calm down I not necessarily that's a typical Campbell move I I want to be honest I I there are some behavioral concerns but it's not destructive Behavior at this point there there's there's kids um that act out occasionally but they're not destroying property or anything like that um so with these
089behavior issues I know um parts of the budget that either did get included or didn't get included were would they have helped address that like kind a recess AIDS right is this disruptive behavior of Rec recess Aid there was a point4 of adjustment coun adjustment Council area so these made it in or these got cut remember these got cut yeah so these things got cut they would have helped solve disruptive behavior issues which 20% of the community feels are an issue and we're not going to happen okay all right anything else um I saw one of the item was that um that parents didn't know what was going on in school or communication and I just from my perspective like mag first sorry my child first through fifth grade um different teachers would use and
090then some don't and so you go from a year where you getting posts and pictures like oh they did this experiment which helps ask like not just how was your day like oh you did this at school today and then the next year you get like one email for a month or two um so I wonder if there was any thought to all using that app or some Collective Agreement on how to communicate with parents that was right our school council as well because I asked um for a little bit what they thought about that and they said that the the newsletter the the information that goes out is good where the inconsistency is is with the teachers that is something we started talking about with the teachers a little hesitant making them all use
091the same thing but as long as they communicate regularly is what we're going to be working on and since this came out I have asked them to share them with me if I wasn't receiving them and there are going out again inconsistently but we're going to work on that because I think it should be if not weekly by we for them just let more we can let parents know thees know more I mean that the open house not wasn't called openal earning yeah was really nice because you could see and the kids could show off and so it's nice to feel you know what's going on six hours in the we got a lot of good [Music] feedback okay anything else I'm just wondering is there any way to tell from the survey data if
092the people who said disagree and strongly disagree for you know kind of consistently for a bunch of the questions if they come from the same respondent like which out without identifying who they were like I'm just wondering is there like a small disgruntled group I'm G to be honest when I first started getting the results um there was one always in the strongly in every category there's a strongly disagree I can't I didn't collect emails I collected you know grades what grades they were at we did get a little uh some parents reached out said they wanted a narrative and I didn't include that in this one going for try that the other thing that was brought up which when we redo this we'll that a little bit more is if they have more than
093one child in the school doing that now they could have submitted more but doing it separately like one child might they might agree with something and the other one they might not so we wanted to have that VAR ask for so we plan to do this again next year with the feed back to to see if we can grow always room to [Music] grow question sorry um in the DMS report they mentioned how many was going to go to Nature's Classroom the participation level do you have that um I do not have that yet we're pretty high um I don't have the exact number yet but I can get that okay John question started testing today we were able to do all three grades all at once so it goes a little faster for us
094first day went very well no crumbs first in the Flames there were other schools children I didn't have another it happened in I forget it's in first FL that's earthquake solar eclipse earthquake solar school choice no thank you um given the signs of our building and the signs our classes are growing to now we just can't as much as I have enjoyed that in the past um and then in terms of the survey um we had some similar scores we had some different scores one of the ones surprised me was uh it's I have information I need to support my students learning at home 78.2% agers agree now part of the problem was it was one of the only questions where you could say neither and there was like 10% that was just should um
095but it was interesting because they people say they're not sure they had the information but then they feel like they can support their kid at home with the information they just told me they don't have so we got to poke more at that one um we also had around those Behavior things that Cindy not talked about those Behavior numbers um we kind of have the same feeling when something happens to your kid you want to see action um and sometimes that's just not possible what's nice I think in Berlin because the school's so small is that parents find out you know they they hear about it other kids will come home oh John got in trouble today um but it's still an area of of concern I it's it's one of those things where you're
096you're always kind of looking to further establish trust um because and you know I've had this experience you know Mr C I'm not happy with what you're telling me but I'll do what you said and uh that's that's always a blessing um so yeah we there a couple of things that we want to further look at um communication I thought was interesting as well people expressed some discomfort with that which surprised me because my teachers already do send me there it's because you don't update the subject line on your emails John I know thank you Mr Thomas for embarrassing me again yes occasionally I will copy my emails and forget this occasionally lately really bad but it does go out you're winning there I'm winning there uh but that's still something I think part of
097that is one of the nice things about Sur business you can go back to teachers you say this is what parents are saying whether it's you know their perception or it's you've got a problem there's something we have to do to better clear our communication style I send stuff all the time correct label or not but I'm always amazed at you know what about this what about that it's been in three emails I think people open emails and like they'll read them but I don't think they retain them right that's me questions concerns mean comments about my emails I like your emails thank you Mr okay uh Lisa so to to Highlights um so this has been a difficult month um and I think that I can say that our I'm very incredibly um proud
098of our crisis response team um for showing as I wrote in report Swift compassionate and effective coordination of all kinds of resources to thank the community both Cindy and John um allowed their staff to come over and support our staff and students and as well as a an additional staff member we had Clinton high schools send over one of their adjustment counselors and then shrew very high said that they could support us um with two adjustment counselors as needed um this is something that rocks the foundation of any um School community and continues to and that ongoing support and ongoing understanding of what's needed for students is continually being assessed and looked at we did receive a lot of support from the Riverside Trauma Center who continues to be a touch point for all of
099us we've all mentioned mcast those are continuing at Hanto we are we finished sixth and seventh grade um we are moving on to 8th grade ELA we Carol and I had a um a nice um event we both escorted one of our students sh in to um the wer County Superintendent scholar um award then and that was really spectacular to see so many young people doing such a wide range of amazing things and really to see um one of our students excelling it was a very proud moment for both of us but I think for himself and for his family as well um I Emerson did a wonderful jump kind of highlighting our Athletics and you know kind of upcoming events I will identify that probably one of the happiest um moments in March was
100the performance of disenchanted that had happened that was a wonderful reflection of student creativity and the commitment of Mr Hagar and Mr glant to put that production forward and really involve so many wonderful young people hopefully this it's it's a growing program and it really is a wonderful asset to our community um the student showcase we were talking about this and I have received a lot of just feedback you know in um informal feedback that particularly at the middle school level families seem to enjoy this venue this opportunity to experience what's happening in classrooms much better than the previous open house so that led to a conversation that we just had today that the Middle School really they felt this format so we're going to really it is wonderful opportunity to say so what have
101we been doing what do we you know what have we tried what's going to work better so perhaps using a student showcase format where you're partnering with your child to come into to do it that model for our open house as well as a later you know a work showcase so using that information because I think families appreciated the time to spend spend in the school um as far as our school choice I when I first put out the report I was doing the current enrollment with grades 6 through 12 as they were seeing um and I do apologize about that so I did put in um for fy2 the new requested numbers so it and I so I went into power school and pulled the numbers for the current fifth grade which would equal
10275 um for our incoming sixth graders so right now I just so you know that it is when you're at this time of year you're concurrently working with this year's numbers and next year's numbers so you're constantly kind of flipping in between this what is we're living in and what we will be living in and so what we will be living in is that we we will have 75 students in sixth grade so if we wanted to open up five spots that would bring us to a total of 80 that we've seen the trend and so in my report you'll see a number which is the for the total there will be a total number and then a number in parentheses that is highlighted I don't know if it comes through the report but the
103the parentheses highlighted number is the total number with the existing plus the school choice number added to it so that that's what those two numbers reflect so I would say that there would be five spots for sixth grade but no um no school choice for seven eight or nine and then for 10th grade we could have four spots 11th grade five spots 12th grade we have the space and so I put in five for 12th grade it's it's it really isn't something I recommend I although there's space having someone school choice in as a senior right is something that you want to pause um because they're not in for the Long Haul so I would I would pause on that number um but I wanted to present we would have space for that so this
104is what we would have space for so my proposal would be we have space for five in next year sixth grade for in next year's 10th grade 11 five and next year's 11th grade we have space in 12th grade but I I actually in good faith can't recommend school choice numbers for for 12th grade if it doesn't it it doesn't feel comfortable for me would that possibly be like kids coming from a bad situation it could be there's so many I think the variations that you see school choice at on grade 12 I think there's a lot of variation that you would see the reasons why um a student and we're really not um we're not allowed to do background you know you know so that is why I would pause because there's such a
105wide variety whereas the natural kind of um enrollment would be at sixth grade and then either at nth at eth or nth grade so that's when school choice numbers tend to be for students who are making a really conscientious effort to this is where we want to be for the Long Haul that's what I've seen in the past just had a clarifying question so the sixth grade numbers I thought for some reason the number was much higher on a projected report maybe in the budget report yes so so it was so I the actual these are the actual numbers so I am giving all in my report because those those were from the budget report so in in this report all my all these numbers are coming from our power school of currently enrolled students
106so these are the actual numbers so the projected sixth grade for tono would be 75 in the budget report you would have seen the 96 which I think was just a I think Tak from it's taken from this like I think it was just like it was doubled I think it was that line was taken and all those numbers no I think the budget includes out of district and no she's talking about fy2 fy2 District it's just the it's the enrollment projection slide and all right so these numbers are what we're looking at from school choice all right so you guys want to talk about school choice go ahead yeah wait I'm just so confused though still I get that point okay however in the enrollment history what we have in our budget report these
107dates back to FY 17 right all the way up through fy4 our fy4 numbers are not those those are significantly lower so for instance if we take I'm I'm on that so so it's um okay so may me just give you an example good that would be easiest so if you guys don't have the thing in front you you won't know what I'm talking about but okay so you look at fy4 yeah right look at the current grade seven 83 kids yes right now we look at this chart that would be projected eighth grade kids so it's 7 so 71 correct me if I'm wrong 71 is the brown Boon kids 14 are the existing school choice kids from other towns five or zero in that case is requested new so you're right 83 to
10885 85 current seventh graders so that number so it is so yes that's 95 so so that's 95 am ICT so it's it is I see okay all right anyone else Mike did you have some questions lot questions started yeah this is the time for school choice and no will vote with all due respect to the parent who's here who is school choice in the district I just don't agree with these kinds of numbers for school choice if you look at any one of these uh 11th grade currently 14 school choice proposed an additional five more that's 19 school choice kids to 61 burlin Boon school choice kids that's a third of the class oh I would prefer to have I I would I know you want more kids no no no I actually I
109I if if it was me I would say zero all the way okay good I agree with you but I was asked like if I had to open it up so this is only space this is not a request no but it's giv US money okay we'll get that's sorry that so I'm in I'm um in between a rock and a hard place like if me I would say no for a lot of stabilization reasons for and notc just because of an unsure of how our staffing is gonna happen I'm just what we what we're voting on right now is based my understanding is based on these numbers in this page yeah we're voting on what we open up we don't know how many we'll actually get but I agree with you so so your
110I thought my understanding though Mike sorry to interrupt was that these numbers should be yes and and I'm I'm saying like so because I also know the hard place between this is The Rock and then the hard place is that the budget the money yeah money because if you don't open up any then the school choice revenue is the same it's not growing and we're using it up exactly so for that reason I am saying this is where I would be comfortable opening up spaces so that's your max basically Max ma if we have to that is my Max where I would be so we're not jumping up to 90 kids the class so my my opinion on school choice in this case I'm just going to use these numbers if we were to approve
111this number of five additional spots that's 19 students who are school choice students versus 61 students in that class who are Berlin boil and residents that's a third third of the class what class you talking about 11th grade on this page grade 11 6114 57580 that's a third of the class who com in in 11th grade were not with these kids from kindergarten on from sixth grade on it's a third of the class that Berlin and Boon taxpayers are paying for I mean like it or not they're paying for it in some way I know the argument is well the money's already there the teacher already there we have the space we can we can accept it but every time you accept that we also have in any class and any subject when we see
112these mcast reports come in we have anywhere from 20 to 60% of the kids who are struggling right however you want to call it they're struggling who could use that extra attention every school choice student that we bring in just the dirty facts of the way it works it takes attention from the teachers away from the kids who are struggling who the taxpayers are paying for if we were getting 19 $20,000 per if we were getting $20,000 per school choice that can help the budget we get five and it's going to be five forever whatever the number is now is it still five it's five yeah it's five the from State yeah right so I mean you look here you've got roughly a third of each of these graduating classes and and when it comes
113to seniors I absolutely agree with Lisa I mean you know if we were If This Were A a four profit Enterprise or a college and we can go out and recruit kids and we can get kids who are going to be in AP classes and are going to be on Sports and are going to help us build those programs that's a different story but we don't know what we're going to get we might get those we might not get those we might get kids who come in and they need additional Services additional services that are going to far strip $5,000 so that's my philosophy on school choice and it's not personal and all due respect to the parent that's here I already here what's that mine's already here good you're good all right that's just
114my personal opinion on it for the taxpayers of the Town we're already asking them for a lot for the kids that are here that's just $5,000 is gonna make it move I want to piggy back on what you said I've always been a pretty big supporter of school choice because I know it's what allows us to have more programs um more classes you know we have smaller classes my concern right now and and I'm feeling like maybe it's a school choice freeze for now we're in the only state in the Union that has a law that anybody that comes to the state gets housing if you are considered homeless you are you know allowed to come to the schools and I I'm not going to not here to debate that my concern is you have
115students that are coming in that probably don't speak the language of our country at some point are those school choice positions going to be opened up to students who may not speak the may not be in this area may be from another town but are now being busted in and now we have this huge expense of trying to educate them and that's going to pull from the education of our students that are here I just feel like we're in a very tentative time right now and to not look at the elephant that's in the room that might be very very costly um and I'm not talking you know I'm talking if you just look at it from the amount of money that we're going to get what are we spending like $188,000 a student average
116for people's expense someone who you know can speak the language Let just average it's just a so you're already at a deficit of 13,000 now you get someone in who you know might speak let's say you get 10 kids in and they speak six different languages how do you we we are supposed to educate our children to the best of our ability and my concern is that we'd be pulling from what our students have right now the very little money that we have that we're getting by with we've already talked about things that we've cut that are going to affect the schools as far as just all different things we cut did we no we just didn't increase it wanted to increase it but the things that would have helped so we cut it from
117The Proposal yeah so that's and that's my concern my concern is we're sitting in a really we're we're in unprecedented times and so I'm feeling like it's it's a time where we need to hesitate and not always do what we've done and really just consider the cost and the impact of that um before we make a decision I think also like the apartments in Su Street I mean that's a lot of units that could move in with teenagers and and I did look up they're they're available June 1st so that's as well in advance of state to yeah there's Studio one bedroom two bedroom and I agree with you like I think when I you know not to overgeneralize but like I think about who's moving into Apartments it's probably people that got divorced they
118might have older children you know they're right here the school is closed close they're commuting they're professionals they're they're expensive you know they're they're very expensive yeah you're you could have a huge influx of children um both for BBS and um Tanto so I mean if I'm not opposed to to approving zero school choice across the board except for maybe the one kindergarten spot being in real estate yes you're never going to know the students until the lease is signed so even if they say they're going to cap it at however many children yeah until they move in you don't know because you're not allowed to ask yep so yep it's a crap Sho there yeah no I I agree uh Lisa what do you think I think you make a great Point yeah and
119I think we should be concerned about that what about Julie I I I I this is a hard conversation to have because we were here last year we did the same thing and I brought up why don't we do exit interviews on the kids that leave and so we have no understanding of why kids are leaving again wondering about what we should do for school choice numbers without any understanding about why our kids are leaving but yet we can look at the enrollment history and the numbers are alarming from 6 to 12 but yet we don't have any data to support why that happen we have been asking for that since Jeff was here y we have been asking so I think that needs to be an initiative if possible by the district and again
120I don't know if that it probably should come from Monto and maybe one of the assistant principls you know maybe the Middle School assistant principal should that should be something that that person owns and you know if there's children that are exiting in middle school or in high school I think a lot it's usually like between eth and nth right yeah and like Mike's Point about you know even Lisa's Point know 11th and 12th grade you generally probably don't get kids coming in right school choice I mean it's be yeah but if we could you know talk about those two kids were here talking about that they have half their class going on this senior trip but if you can build a community in sixth seventh 8th grade that's where you have to build it
121jul I with you I'm with you on that so by not saying no to all these school choice numbers in six seven eight I think that's a mistake but how do you build a local how do you build local only only saying okay Julie you had half not even half class going on this trip rightone for eight she already says None for seven or eight right none for S I do that's my point that's my point I could see seventh because you have 95 I I think that number is g to change I just want to put that out there that we do lose kids in seventh grade and we're going to lose some because of the private schools now having a middle school option from 7 to 12 correct there's going to be a
122good handful of the sixth graders that off to St John's correct um and then again we lose them eth to nth as those ninth graders either go on to you know larger high schools you know for for more Sports and academic opportunities um but I think yeah really collecting that data rather than I I have a lot of informal data you know what I mean but um and I do have those conversations already so I would be comfortable with making something you know a standard kind of data you know template for that um you know I think that would be important to also hear from the parents right you know I think that's a really important piece right exactly yeah no I'm with you you have to build that Community 678 but the class that
123was just here tonight not even half of them are going on the senior trip you're not going to improve that by school choice you're GNA improve that by like you what you want more opportunities more clubs more classes we don't know why they're leaving there might be nothing we can do about it there might be something we can do about it until we know what it is we can't make a decision we can we can we can we can we can't well well I have four kids in the district that are 10th sixth seventh and eth I know all their friends are leaving okay why lot of those numbers why are they leaving it's Sports so let's just become Sports opportunity there we don't have a lot of Club offerings here after school we don't
124have clubs after school they run during lunches because we can't run them after school because Sports starts after school there's a host of reasons people are leaving so how does school choice fix that I don't necessarily know that school choice necessarily fixed that but it creates a bigger number it's a better opportunity for kids because then you have more kids participating in the drama so if we approve the number that you want to approve whatever that number is I I don't know I don't don't tell a number don't say no no I don't even have a number if we approved a number yeah you're telling me this time next year those clubs and sports and classes will exist and we'll be on our way to Improvement no everybody that's a bigger conversation I think Sports
125needs to be pushed back I think the clubs need to start from go from 25 I think that's a different conversation it is a different conversation school choice you're 100% right but this if we continue to just say it's okay we're gonna just let these kids go no it's not okay we've been asking for this data on exit interviews for three years well we just I I don't know I think I think 90 is a good number in that Middle School obviously you're over in some of those classes but to not have 90 in middle school when you know these kids are going to be leaving 90 thr Boon kids would be awesome 40 Berlin kids 50 out of town kids is not awesome and it's not fair to the taxpayers what percentage did you
126just say I don't know I just made up random numbers 4 that's not we we don't have we don't have that data that but yeah they have it there you want 90 all right so you want 90 kids in every grade so you have 13% of the com eth grade or school Choice that's a pretty that's I mean that's that's a pretty low number I think it's high I 14 out of 71 13% I'm curious for like AP classes and stuff is there a minimum to hold class um we have to get school committee approval is five like under five like under five right okay um so do you guys want to vote on school choice now I'm curious like is there for when kids enroll other schools is there any sort of like like
127deadlines for those schools that we know so at that point we know better numbers of who's leaving I I haven't I mean there are deadlines but I don't I mean I haven't gotten anything off that would be part of an exit for school choice you oh you mean if kids are going to private school private school usually opens their enrollment in January and usually they need their numbers by March um that working in also in the private school you know system at different places it it doesn't then necessarily mean that they're cutting off in March but people start that application piece in January and that's why we really wanted to make sure we start having those nights you know we pushed up our nights for high school right to you know the kind of the
128informal session those those pieces um to get um that information out there what Tanto can offer we pushed that up a bit um and um yeah I mean I I think I think the I think something also to realize and and I don't I don't know what those Trends look like over the years but something to think about as I have a junior in high school myself right these these numbers of high school you know this projection of the senior class and our junior class here not feeling maybe as settled as a community really goes back to what we went through with Co so many of our students you know my daughter I live in West Bo and she goes to St Bernard High because there was no school yeah right in public schools right
129I mean so there's a lot of kids right now in our high schools that are that are either school choice or transient or have gone somewhere else and then just kind of stayed there right so I think it's going to be really good data over the next couple years to to to take and then really I do think this Middle School piece having those senses of community seeing what we can offer for them in middle school so they want to stay as a group not leave their friends not leave their Community for high school is extremely important um and I would just ask and very comfortable doing you know those exit interviews with the families but just really making sure that we're getting the data that you want right so thinking about some of those
130specific questions that you would like me to ask um you know I have some in mind but I think that's important because we talk a lot about data and then we come to meetings say well oh could we have that as well which I you know so just taking some time to kind of think about what that is because this will be the time right it's April right we're going to know within a month or so you know by by June if kids are not returning and I already know certainly some boys are heading St John's for seventh grade for various reasons so and I know maass Academy I there there's always you know three to five that go to Mass Academy and that is the school associated with WPI and that's a very small
131very pointed particular group of students who do that and and then they've been wanting to do that there's no I don't Le it's very yes it's very elite so I mean at this point we don't know what data we don't know we need right so we need to just my first question is why why did you leave Toano if it's for a trade nothing we can do is it for sports maybe we can do something maybe we can't is it for math science business we can probably do something for that we can culture climate portra portra a graduate internship program I mean we probably need more internships with actual companies but those types of things Julie is the program that's going to build the the Homegrown the organic growth in our own students if we
132don't have those programs right now there's other reasons why people would want a school choice to Tanto what are those I don't know but they're not you want to build Sports we don't have the sports I want to build the arts program okay you want to build the sports and arts we don't have those right now so logic would say a kid's not school choicing to tato to take art or Sports because we don't have them well no we do we do but we often times the numbers prohibit I understand we have sports I walk by a trophy quesos right yeah yeah yeah I know we have art but the point like you're trying to build a program you have to build it from within you can't build it by trying to convince people to
133come here and then don't give them what they are looking for you also have no idea for school choice who you're going to get so you can't a lot of school choice kids that are high performing I'm sure I'm sure same thing as uh the um people from the town you have no idea who's going to come up and play sports or who's going to do drama or who's gonna do nothing or who's gonna need services or who you have no idea um so if we are going to vote Lisa my understanding was these are requests but you're saying that's something different no I you're what you just say you would request zero these are these are requests because I think my understanding is this is what I was asked to do so I looked
134at the numbers and these are um these are the Avail what I view as being the available space in the grade levels that I identify yeah you were asked to give the available space but this isn't necessarily what you think is right what you want that's what I said she doesn't that's right yeah exactly can I just ask what let me just ask this why why would we do 5 and 12 and none in8 um because I think that 95 885 and 89 um are for 78 and N I think those are good numbers that we can we can manage I think 95 is that a lot of kids but I mean and I I question well 12 would really I mean at at 12th grade I put five in there I mean we could
135have five but are we really gonna get I don't see any point for any in 12 one right yeah but I would just shift the numbers up to your middle level but no I like that doesn't but she's saying that's too much there's no space no how how is there how is this this is my question because we're not how space for 95 because you like you it's it's like like a little Rubik's cube of you know we're shifting like we're shifting resources for those kids know at the at the 85 you know it's for the teachers in the classes for the teachers classes still have you still have doesn't matter we still have 20 20 2020 22 22 22 22 I think 80 is your your ideal yeah 80 is an ideal number for
13680 class between 80 and 85 for this building for this building Julie we are not a big CH I understand well in this building we've already talked about space issues in this building I mean you know you know what I'm saying I mean you can't even have the whole senior class and even park the cars here that's a can I I just can I make one comment to it's something I want to earlier and very positive needs to be said you noted that the middle school there was so much um with the parents that showed up and that gives me hope because that shows a cultural shift here that shows that the parents and I think that the reason maybe the high school didn't is because when when we used to get here in sixth
137grade it used to be like okay thank you you know like the kids are on their own now and that was that was just the way it was but now it's like okay your kids would please come in we want you to see what we're doing we want you to know and I think that's really important that the community is involved and I'm hoping that that's going to shift as time goes on to the upper grades and maybe it'll be a different model I don't know but that to me says that you guys have done a lot of work and the teachers have done a lot of work to get the parents and the students interested in coming in and showing off their work and so I just want to applaud you for that because
138that's huge I mean it's I just wonderful thank you all right we're going to vote on school choice I just have one more thing go ahead last thing I just you guys have two minutes we're not going to be hour it's not happening Megan can I can I say something Megan you've been rushing this whole meeting we meet once a month on the whole freaking School District stop rushing us through the information that we need you talk to these guys one-on-one every day you know what's going on the other five of us don't stop rushing us we'll take the time that we need um I'm curious with the numb so I mean you know we're concerned about the soul stream construction right um you know we don't think 12th graders maybe not live with greaters
139I mean do we think because that there's that such are you would your preference be zero across the board I think my preference I I'm I'm worried about the build I really am worried about the building I'm worried about like I don't know what that's going to do so I we could say we we're voting and then we have 80 for the um sixth grade and then all of a sudden you know we get 12 to 15 kids from the apartments I mean that is worrisome but then I hear all the budget talk so as so you have to understand from my point of view where I'm where I'm sitting I I here the budget stuff and then I I live in the building and I live with the kids so there's these two and
140they they there's kind of opposing views in terms of school choice because school choice monies have funded things and then to say no school choice but we're still getting the income from the current scho choice right but if we have hypoth not be adding right that income do we have any data from the barlin apartments that affected Tanto enrollment we know we have students living there right we we know the students who are living there numbers wise was very suris right that's what I mean so we think about like oh my God these apartments are going to bring in 40 kids you don't know right but there their studies right when that was presented on the burlo I remember they got up and they had charts upon charts upon charts that said how many kids
141are be coming into the school district I don't understand the numbers on all that but you say it was accurate it ended up being we were very afraid when those went because it's huge got to be double theze bedrooms I many most of the bedrooms in Trailways Trail whatever it is are there one that AP in the Boon one in the Boon onein is more of a mix well that's there's two there's two and three bedroom apartments that are big right in Boon there's a couple of apartment complexes so there's a highend behind Clinton savings I don't think I I haven't seen anybody coming from from there but the the new ones that are just opening up that is next or like right on off of 140 those are there's one two and three bedrooms
142and there are yes I mean to Lisa's point about the budget I mean 10 kids that's 50 Grand the budget's 20 some OD [Music] million I think the tough thing is to as far as the numbers you know these are the projected numbers based on what we have now we and we don't know like like I said I I know that that 95 is not necessarily the same 95 students that are here now right because I do know probably at least five that are not going to be returning right um but again you don't know how many are be coming in is that seven for like right the rising right seventh graders right yeah right Lisa did you have a question yes so I just want to build a little bit on what Lori brought
143up I'm usually in favor of school choice like I I think it's a great thing in general but to Lorie's point we are in unprecedented times and we do have an influx of migrants and many more are coming right and they have a right to shelter and these are people from all over the world speaking many different languages and like if we look at if we accept four kids in 10th Grade and they all speak a different language we're require them to translate all of the materials for them right and be able to present to them and educate them in their language and that's for every class for three years right and I'm just wondering how disrupt would that be and how much would that cost that's and that's my concern I I love school
144choice I love I love the um what it gives to the school as far as numbers and and the money and I just just people from different backgrounds I think it's wonderful but this year that's my concern is I don't want to take from the education of the kids that are currently here right taxpayer school choice well whoever everybody's a taxpayer you in the state um I don't want to take from any of them where we don't know there's a lot of um we just don't know what's going to happen and and I feel like it's it's a risk and especially I mean even if you take that piece out and you just go with this enormous like I we were just looking at the listings there are there's one bedroom two bedroom three bedrooms
145at the end of school and I don't know that the other apartments had three bedrooms that's a that's completely different um I just feel like I've always always support it I feel like you Lisa it's a wonderful program it's just I feel I'm not a gambler and I feel like it's odds we're gonna not do it this is the year to not do it yeah I'm curious I mean if we vote now a certain way is can you or if you desire to suggest a placement like I don't know come August is that because I know one last you advocated for an additional slot after after num and like that yeah you know but can you open up school in it has to be for the following year it can't be like if in December
146you say oh we no I I mean I it is if school committee votes for it yep and that's and that has always been my understanding that this is a a school committee decision so so when when the this to me reflects the available space it really is a school committee decision in terms of what you want to see I I can give my input I can reflect on it um I think school choice is great at six eight and nine I think those are pivotal years those are are really great years to get students in the other years are are very tricky because um you know why you want to you want to understand the why and we can't so this this request is a reflection of opportunity that is available but it really
147is what school committee's desire is are there any um current siblings that you know are offline that would advocate for not that I don't I'm not aware of any siblings everybody who's in is already in with their siblings there maybe a couple of middle scho again school choice siblings right so there there's a couple of current school choice here at Tanto in the high school that I think they're hoping for the Middle School sibling um to come in and then I know that we feeled calls in the office as far as do what do you have and you know not always the grade levels match up right so there's a lot of those calls that come in with siblings mat can we allow no school choice except for siblings it's a lottery so speaking speaking
148of sibling Cindy does have one sibling request but you also have one open you also have one opening one open spot second because we know that specific sibling oh no she said that was from uh we already that was a one that we approved before the child is in school full right so it's not full there's an empty spot there instead proving a new one we can just use that one or or transfer it or switch it or the existing yeah if it's existing it so that's that was your question is it existing the kid left you mean but it's the different it's a different grade you mean transfer the one from second grade into all right yeah because you don't no one needs the spot in second grade is that true Cindy do you
149well we have applications for that um with stat members in the district staff members is my understanding so this is non-teacher staff members because the teachers my understanding they have a right to r as teacher so te so so am I so teachers can school choice in if they to do so but it doesn't need to be approved as a school choice it's part of the one of their benefits is through their contract we looked at the policy yeah I thought the no I thought that was a CO thing that came out of Co no no all right we were going to change it we never did it's teachers it's not staff and it's it's only open right that's what we're talking about teachers yeah but it's only spots that we approve so we have
150to decide on school choice then we open up the lottery teachers children and siblings get first preference in the lottery but we have to approve the spots first based on the space in the buildings okay so which is what we're deciding now so so both so one at be es so Cindy said that there's another staff member that wants the second grade spot as well gotta so that could be the existing one instead of the existing one and then she wants to add one in kindergarten for another staff member sibling all right you guys want to vote on yes school choice because that seems pretty simple is it is a staff member or a sibling it's a sibling who's also a staff member she said it's a teacher so there's a there's already a child
151in there in a certain grade that has a sibling coming in kindergarten and I a staff member with a second grade child and a kindergarten child um that being said if we keep the second grade like it is one knew the existing one or just the existing one and brings that child in I'm hesitant with K I did put du to The Sibling bring one in I think we need to see those numbers more I don't want those numbers to spike up um just it's an unknown yeah we want to keep those numbers low especially SC keep them low now and if we know different in June we can revisit so you want one you're supporting you're recommending one in K and one in two no she just said she doesn't she's not so sure
152zero in K and one in the sibling in K so the sibling of the already existing so that's one in K one in K and so then and then the one in second grade one and two one in second one in second second and onek all right so so that that's how you have your it in your report is what you're recommending um but if you're looking at it it would be one existing in second grade so there's one already there open if that's open we don't need that spot if it's still open there's even if we can get that staff memb Channel we can't what's going to hold that up is thek spot right now I'm suggesting just that one because onek okay all right so yeah so we have to vote on adding
153one spot in okay and The Sibling is not related to staff no staff members yeah there's all right so there's possible two students uh kids of staff that want to go into K second and K second yeah yeah second we're talking just K you just said zero for second for right now the onek the one existing second if that's still open keep it open yeah um and then one in K right now and I like the idea of waiting till August to see the number Chang these numbers that we're looking at on your sheet to zero for two because there is an existing we don't need to vote on an existing right in 1K that sibling in K is that the staff member or is that just sibling that is the staff member that already
154has chat okay I think I think you have to vote again we haven't voted yet on the no I bet you have to even though there's an existing spot because somebody left you have to kind of revote in that that spot even though it's already there it's kind of a we're not sure that it exists after the child leaves so rather than have to worry about it somebody raise a question later if you just when you vote on these acknowledge that existing school choice slot still ex not new so so it would be could I have a motion to approve school choice at Boyston elementary school as follows one spot in kindergarten and one spot in second grade right uh no it would be uh is it two spots in second grade it's one spot
155it's one or zero it's one or zero spot in grade and one in K it's one or zero it's unknown the one in Kinder one in second would be for only for the existing spot that has already been voted to remain open yes it's not two in in second no it's one in second and one in I yes I just said that you said two my motion was one no it was two Lisa one Nicole one in kindergarten the motion was one one in kindergarten two in second you said no Lori said two I said one in one the motion on the table is one in one one in second and one and K okay that's the motion on the table that's Cindy's needed so moved second any more discussion on that all in favor
156I I all right I'm an i as well all right so do we have to approve adding none in Berlin for the record I'm opposed oh I'm sorry I thought you said I no all right so one opposed do we have to vote in Berlin on zero just do all right could I have a motion to approve no school choice spots for Berlin Memorial School soov second any discussion on that all in favor I hi right any opposed all right I'm an i as well that motion passes all right so it sounds like Tanto I'm gonna put a motion out there and then we can talk about it all right so could I please have a motion to approve zero school choice spots at Tanto so mov right Lisa second all right lari discussion I
157don't like it yeah ad [Music] it we know we know we know we lose kids from 8 to n massively we know if we can build a middle school culture our kids I firmly believe will stay in District not all of them we're not going to keep the kids that want to do the trades you know we're not we we're not going to keep those Stellar Stellar athletes maybe that want to go to St John's and play for be youy right um but we we we we we can we can do better to keep these kids we have to build let's do that I think we and I appreciate having a vice principal there that that's driving and helping at that Middle School level or and I've been saying this for a long time that
158if we can lock in that Middle School we're going to be a good John do you have rumors of any sixth grader or current for Cindy not going to not a rumor I had a request for a reference the siblings already in private school so brother brother wants to go and a lot of those private schools again it's that seventh grade opening you know um you have a lot of private schools that are like you know a prek to K to eight and then you have a lot of the midd high private schools that now start at 7 or 12 and that is also something to Just note as a difference in the last 10 or so years Notre Dame St John's that's new that they opened those seventh and eighth grade programs um holy
159name as well which is now St Paul's that's new that's s grade so that's new in recent years so what I I with the numbers I I opposed to zero not for budgetary purposes at all um although that helps but I would move I would just shift the numbers around that are here do 1 and 12 three and 11 the 10th grade is so small and you don't know unless you're like in it with your kids you know and their friends and you it's a it's small can be detrimental that's a small 76 kids is small graduating class of 65 is small um and then at that Middle School level I understand your point you know you like to keep it at um but I mean we we have we have seven we have currently
16089 residential kids in 7th grade I think wanting to wanting to keep it at 80 is I don't think sth grade 95 already eight at 85 89 y I would go to 90 every all that seventh eth nth I mean 9 kind of looking at the sixth grade like but sure not five as room to for the apartments yeah I don't I don't know if I agree with that at it's already one of the biggest classes in the upcoming nth grade those numbers also I think do will shift right because that's current without any as St John St Marks and that numberers we could vote that if that number is low can't we vote it again in like sep you know what I mean I don't so when do you so I know by now
161St John's has said to the middle school and the the high school they do they let you know or is it at the mercy of the family the parents they're not yeah they're proba not going to want to let any so that's why we don't have like I I can ask the guidance counselors all I want but they will if the parents don't say anything I don't know who's leaving I I have no way of knowing who's leaving right so to guess yeah that usually happen over the summer then is that like they didn't enroll for fall classes or something everybody still in roles everybody still in roles even if they go to aset because they be a last minute change so everybody who everybody who's a resident still en roles for a class in
162case something Falls you know what if what if a parent loses their and they're like oh I can't afford the tuition you know I mean there's there are reasons for right until we get the exit data until we get dat no no that's true we won't know we won't know why they leave but we can certainly en history we can certainly look at the enrollment history what happened from fy7 up now we can see how many leave we can't see why they the numbers of St yes yes why are they leaving is it because we don't have X or is it because they're just we don't do trades I mean I don't know well you know you know you know the vote there's a motion on the table let's vote on all right anyone else
163any more discussion so just historically speaking it's around 10 10 to 13ish but 10 except 23 yeah we're with is the same we're going to vote and then if it it fails then we'll make it another motion all right so the motion on the table is zero ready to vote all in favor I I I'm an i opposed no okay so that was two opposed four in favor that motion passes sorry can can we have it on the agenda for like June if there's any recomend like recommendation from Le like if there's sibling or in that or once we get a better idea of who more data but we already voted on it so yeah we have more data yeah if there's if there's some changes absolutely Jess I'm not to that all right Janelle
164okay right I am um sure so um I I submitted a report in collaboration with Sally and John um and as we were finalizing our budget needs for FY 25 putting our proposals together um des's annual local special education determination was released we were extremely disappointed to receive a needs intervention rating for 2023 um leading up to 2023 the district always received a meets requirements which is the top tier rating um so this definitely came as a a bit of a surprise and as an admin team we took some time to um dive into that rating and the data um to better understand it there's there are a couple pieces that still working on and desie frankly has been a little bit slow in in rolling out some of that information so there are a
165few details that um I'm not entirely um at full speed with just yet but we're getting there um so the rating is among um eight interconnected ways that desie supervises school districts and there's a graphic that I included in the report to show you that so that graphic represents um this annual rating that we received and interestingly it also includes that TFM rating that we had received um and that I spoke about earlier this school year when we did our tiered Focus monitoring earlier this school year for special education and for civil rights um the district was found to be in compliance with all criteria reviewed so there were no um there weren't issues there and that TFM included an extensive um look at our procedures our policies our and as well as our student
166records and have included interviews so it was a more holistic look at our um practices and procedures and um but going back to this rating that we're talking about today um this report indicates that despite all of that proper implementation of special education requirements and civil rights the outcomes for students for special education students is not what we would like it to see in some areas the data points that are included in that 2023 rating are from 21 22 and 23 and I don't believe that they are necessarily news to us as a school Community um some of the issues or most of the issues actually identified were corrected before the rating report even came out um as required we're engaged in des's technical assistance root cause analysis and Improvement planning and and the details
167of that Improvement planning that are already underway are also described in the report any questions opening up for questions for the tier Focus monitoring who was the body that did that that's also desie that's also desie yes so and that's the part of they take a look at districts in so many different ways which is why I included that little puzzle piece graphic to show that they it's not just a oneandone look and review at school district districts they have many different ways to come um in and take a look I have another question for for indicator three the item one that you talked about what are the standards they're talking about is that MC that indicator three does refer to mcals and that's the graph of data that's on page that is also on
168page three coincidentally um and there's there are four areas that indicator 3 is broken down into um and so ultimately indicator three is a comparison um of proficiency rates for students with and without disabilities and the issue is in the Gap um for achievement in those students what what is the approved or acceptable it is that's a great question I'm not sure that I I would have to get back to you on that what the acceptable Gap Gap is it's a good question done by percentage right so um yeah yeah no I'll keep an eye out for that detail I would imagine it would greatly vary upon the students that have the IPS and what their accommodations are you know I don't I actually I doubt that to be honest I I really do think
169this is a really a comparison you have this many students with IEPs without IEPs that are taking the test uh I don't believe that that's differentiated by disability or level of me real life yes yes but I don't believe it's taken account to in this rating or in this data feel free um in the elementary um kind of interventions that you mentioned you mentioned the origin Gillingham program um I'm curious when that was implemented like what year so maybe we don't see that effect those effects yet and then if that program is evidence based because I know there's a lot of you know old school reading versus yeah um Orton Gillingham definitely follows the science of reading it's it's up to speed on all of the modern um you know philosophies in Reading instruction it's
170definitely up to par the district started training um Educators in Orton Gillingham I don't know maybe five or so years ago um but we have definitely increased um our focus on that and we have been able to train additional Educators especially in the last couple of years um at Tanto there is an Orton Gillingham certified educator and there's one at Alan Boon who's in process of earning her certification hopefully by the end of the school year it's an incredibly intensive process um and there is one in Berlin as well that is um certified and in addition to that we have Educators who have received train in those methodologies but perhaps haven't received full certification as you mentioned your report the 10 half days that we approved in our calendar I would imagine help absolutely that
171y absolutely more you implemented acral District [Music] um I also have questions I know Lisa has questions but no Jess are you all then go ahead Jess okay um it was awesome to see that you mentioned the quest block is going to be moving not only from the middle school but now into Toronto so have the teachers will have that period of time to do those interventions without them missing out in subjects um and then also the Stag program and the bite program but it has social emotional learning components and adjustment counsel and a par professional to help kids coming from absentees into you know back into the school um and actually just due to a grant that we just received we now have a coach from Des that's working with individuals that have that
172and giving them additional suggestions and those kinds of things so they've just died and go for it I have to figure not Julie did you I was just wondering do you have any idea if this is a trend that is being seen in other school districts in the state um you know I don't have a sense of that to be honest with you I think that you know the rating comes out each year to be honest they change the criteria for the the rating each year I my understanding is it was changed quite a bit this year um and I think that there's so many different VAR variables and it's so data driven um that I do believe that the size of a a school district can contribute to perhaps the rating um you know
173there was one area that was you know not a strength for us but it really came down to we only had a data set of one student um and unfortunately it was not it wasn't even about the student it was about like the meeting date um so I know that the district size sort of worked against us in that one way but I don't have a I don't have a sense of that did you say the goal po change or the the criteria change this year yes my understanding is that it actually changes each year um and my understanding is you know that shifts a little bit I mean I don't think it's over here and then over here it's it's sort of swaying a little bit in the same area it's all about Federal
174indicators um and the um my understanding is there were more substantial changes to it this year than perhaps in previous years and schools aren't told those changes beforehand so they can work on it um I don't I don't believe so I believe that they're announced I mean to be honest this 2023 rating didn't come out until just a handful of weeks ago so it it feels like it's that information is coming out much later and I don't know that this is it's it's so data driven I don't know if this is necessarily something like a test that we can study for and really rip up on well there's there's things you are supposed to be doing to fix this so you can't just start working on those before the evaluation like they're going to change
175the yeah actually some of these pieces that were corrected before the rating even came out right so you have now so that's my question do you know how the rating or how the evaluation criteria is going to change so you can start to address that but you're saying no not necessarily no I mean we know what those Federal indicators are we know what that whole set is I mean those are well known which ones they're going to choose to include in the rating each year can change a little bit so what I mean are you H how does the school fall so far I mean this is the the lowest rating no it is not there's a rating there's a rating low so one rating below so we were high there's a rating below that
176and then we're here and there's one lower yep and we were um half of one percentage point away from the the the rating above you know it theate the score is the score again we're very disappointed by it um but in looking at it statistically you know we the the very high rate of that so last year we asked for a lot of money from the towns in the budget for special ed we asked for a lot this year again not necessarily getting everything we asked for this is a tough blow to the taxpayers that we're asking money for but it was 23 right so our budget this year didn't Mary doesn't care about that Mary's going to see this and say you know you asked for all this money and yet you're rating fil
177that's so how do we how do we address I mean our response is why that's why we needed it because we saw this happening and and better you know we hear from the teachers all the time when we're talking about MCAT scores we heard from him uh was it January February the state wants these kids to fail they set the test up for them to fail and then theyve now failed the school because the kids did fail how is that how does that relate so we're expected to have all students particip ipating um in mcast and you can see actually that we meet that standard right that we have 100% of students participating um and you know we have students with a a range of needs and we are providing their services through special education
178the majority of our students are receiving their instruction um in the general education setting which was a strength in the report that they're included this is a very inclusive School Community our students spend most of the day in you know regular classrooms in the least restrictive environment I think it goes back to the point about professional development um having more time with our teachers so that our teachers are increasingly equipped to meet the needs of all students it's it is particularly complex it certainly doesn't boil down to um a simple fix or a simple answer it seems like such a high or or or large fall in the rating I agree it was pretty it was a tough um it was a quite a as you might imagine and you know I I think it's
179important too to remember that um of many of these issues the district was able to address before this rating even came out and some of those issues don't necessarily come from with inside a special education right these are this is about how factors are impacting students with special education not necessarily special education practices and procedures so it it's not just one concentrated area it's so the state doesn't think that we're impacting them well enough that that according to that rating that's correct but those issues have been addressed previously before this report and interventions have been put in place so like indicator 13 two out of 40 students there was technical compliance errors that were then fixed could you respecting Hippa and any of that like could you allude to what those those technical errors were
180like just so we yeah I can yep so for indicat 13 rate so the data set was 40 students um and as you just said there were technical compliance errors for two students one was related to so in I so in special education we WR a document um an IEP an individual education program what drives that plan that program are annual measurable goals that are meant to be updated each year and at a certain age um those schols are meant to be connected to the students postsecondary vision and so this was that the error that was related to that that there was a there was a technical error that one of those goals didn't get updated fully um it doesn't right we we had the meeting we we we still you know did right by
181the student we still did many things right but when it came to checking 10 or so boxes there was one of those boxes that we couldn't check and that's the reason why so there's one the second one is evidence that if appropriate a representative of any participating agency was invited to the IEP meeting so some students work with additional outside agencies especially as they're approaching um leaving high school so they might be getting services from the Department of Mental Health or Department of Developmental Services they might be working with MRC to get job related skills um and we had a student that was younger than expected to be working with an agency like that we missed inviting that outside person um in the you know the expected amount of time it was a staff misunderstanding
182we retrained the staff we corrected that error we made sure that that person's input was available for the team and that the student was not negatively impacted it was very much a technical um error and then there's also a pro a problem resolution system PRS that anyone can submit concerns or complaints to that's correct and so there was five five different there were different areas that came out of that and those areas have all been corrected as well um and again some of those areas are um very external um to special education but that do impact all students of course including special education um and it so happened that there was a connection between those two areas and those um between those two groups in in those areas and so I see the the bullying
183policy needs to be reviewed again in 2024 November of 2024 it needs to be updated again yes please yeah I just missed that one I'm curious like are there other policies that need to be like grasp or like that need to be reviewed at a certain schedule um I believe that there are yes I'm not necessarily prepared to to speak to those at this point but I I do believe yes that there are the masc lets us know that when we when policies need to be updated do they yeah that's how we know what our policies are they they like they just gave Mone date say they have a whole date on in terms of like which are as far as they I don't know like every two years like they I mean because they
184wouldn't know when we voted on this in November 22 so I don't know they usually let us know when when something when a policy needs to be updated that's within the policy within their in their like yeah they send out bulletins all the time as far as it relates to this I'm not exactly sure what what to answer you but yeah they they send of updates we just didn't we just update it last year November 22 november22 I know yeah that you missed it 23 but we missed it for we missed it so it was 22 right it was done in 2018 and then done again in 2022 so so you missed it for 20 for 20 and I mean 2020 see how it might have happened I'm curious like is is there maybe we
185need to create a calendar for policies like one we need like Just for future committees like this is poliy need to be reviewed by this point we have you have a calendar okay and so your agendas are B 2020 I wasn't here so I don't know what they were doing then but yeah now there's also that page we were on it yesterday F does anyone have any more questions thank you I just have this committee poliy um actually I think laor and I work at yesterday yes did anyone do you want to speak to it or do you just want questions on um sure I mean I'm just happy to say that um Lisa mayor was on the wellness committee with that with me as well we had a great opportunity through frham State University
186to take a course that basically taught us how to assess our current policy and how to write a policy that would include all the necessary Federal mandates and so we put it together we also had it reviewed by coaches that work for firmingham state that are also associated with desie and they were all very happy with it so um yes there was a question that I am looking into I've gotten some answers back but I'll follow finish up on that before the thank you anyone have questions on the wellness policy Sally was nice enough to come into our policy subcommittee meeting yesterday and um we went over it and I Lea you weren't there but I I was so impressed by this whole document it was really easy to read to read and it was
187actually enjoyable to read like oh um but very professional um and comprehensive so nicely done well it was a really great update compared to what we had but it was really what we learned from that from the class so and there were a lot of tools from the government that made it easy for us to you know know what to add and everything and we put her own little you know flare on it but yeah I I feel really happy about it thank you foring to desie didn't you also share with desie yes yes they had a couple of peopleas random question on wellness policy Lisa I noticed walking in on the door there's a u was it a Chipotle fundraiser going on is that what it was oh Saturday oh yeah yeah so there's
188a part in the wellness policy about any fundraisers involving food has to be certain types of food so we scho during the school day and up to 30 minutes after the day end all right but was the sign up during the school day uh I don't know it's on the front door well it's a fundraiser for and so this is opportunities that a lot of restaurants provide a a lot of local restaurants so they partner with student groups and a certain percentage of the meal goes back to the school so if a family decides to go there for dinner a certain percentage of that you so it's very common yeah the phrasing says parent teacher Association so I assume that would be refering to like what the PTO did from Boon recently send the Flyers
189home Andy Frozen cookies yeah but the so the wellness policy here says the committee recognizes the value of fundraisers for school sanctioned student groups and clubs so PTO I believe falls under School sanctioned it's they're completely separate uh organizations right but they're fundraising on behalf of the schools so it goes through the fundraising policy page five the phrase says parent teacher associations are asked to research new fundraising opportunities to replace programs promoting unhealthy Foods so would that really affect like Nature's Classroom or yeah that's what I'm asking like are there existing things that the kids are doing for various fundraisers that this is going to impact so that was one of the things we talked about at the policy meeting yesterday was actually going through this and because this does reference other topics that are
190covered in policies like there's a harassment piece in here we have harassment policies so we just need to make sure that all the policies line up with what this is so wait this policy is going to give what the PTO and other outside separate entities can I don't know it says I'm confused on that that was that was a concern I have as well I think it's just on school ground right this is during the school day and up to 30 minutes dur so like if the PTO wants to send home flyers and they're selling cookie dough they can still do that well we I think I think that part needs to be we talked about needs to specified so this document needs to be specified with that language because I maybe one of the
191EDS it got cut out or something yeah I mean the general idea is that we don't want to be promoting unhealthy Foods through the schools no I to I totally agree with you yeah you sell pop darts every day roll up every day well well that's the question I didn't have this question before I walked through the door and I saw it on the uh the door so that's why I had the question but you know if the booster sells something during a game for instance at night this doesn't apply to it because it'ser in the day it's after but there are rules about signs being up well the marketing yeah the marketing yeah the marketing is on like things like the ice cream case or something like those kinds of things and that's another
192policy there's a separate um corporate advertising and in policy I forget the name of it but it covers what type of advertising community school so we just need to make sure this lines up with that and any other policies out there yep yeah I mean just you know having a kid in Nature's Classroom like it's it's all food based basically like you know a night at papaginos or you know um spaghetti dinner which was after school hours but well we verified that it's after school hours right this was not dinners are after school hours those cagino yeah all that stuff that's all after school but this is saying that the PTO couldn't send home magazine yeah no I yeah I agree I know where it it would be the parents decision to purchase that or
193not I I just it's hard to raise funds as we know and so I I 100% on board healthy food but I think it's gonna handcuff some efforts don't they do a meat raffle too at Santo that's are these directives from desie it's more f okay yeah just because I'm looking at like the the last on page five the last bullet says in school Publications and media like advertisements in school Publications School radio stations and school television computers School sponsored internet sites and announcements on the Public Announcement system so like I'm thinking when we do like our weekly end of the week Roundup if there's an advertisement for something is that does that follow underneath that I think it's just we just want Clarity on it yeah so that language is added publication right so
194advertising like a Chipotle night or um wouldn't that b a smart snacks I think Chipotle would does chipot would you're go that one of the first things I thought of that I oh John just crammed a bunch of crispy creams Dallas the booster club does like every fall like um bread braids and cookie dough and different things like that so would they not beow owed to advertise their fundraiser like on the door and in the weekly Roundup yeah I think they wouldn't be I I think so we've had problems with and to be clear this is not like you and Sally didn't come this is federal this is you guys are putting everything in alignment that's what I wanted to get out there yes yes that's exactly it but it just encourages us to find
195better options yeah or I just am curious about this because it it says it's for the marketing of foods so that's a marketing of a fundraiser it isn't marketing a food item so none of these like the Chipotle or the I mean that's that's that's a pretty great area Lis that's like the difference between the school didn't send out a sexuality survey they only encouraged the student to send it I mean that's a great Coca-Cola or something like that right right right but you can purchase it at any one of those locations right right did you guys like run this by the PTO and all that before you are putting it in front of us or did you have the PTO or uh bef or the groups that actually do the fundraising are they aware
196of this they may not draft we haven't put it into into place but it's a federal directive they just I I agree I agree and I'm trust me I'm all I don't like the cookie dough fundraisers I don't I don't buy that stuff we talked about it a couple of us in the PTO group are aware it for Tanto I think that you guys if this committee would be able to at least Loop in well that's the thing after this is all approved then we need to communicate okay after it's approved yeah all right when it's all in place then you know we'll do more Communications I just like to say I have personally cookie one even though I love our goal for this this put the policy into place and then moving forward it's
197about communicating and and monitoring the policy okay but so but it's not school it's parents I mean I don't know like it's School sanction groups fundraiser for Nature's Classroom so I mean then that that severely limits how many fundraisers yeah understand some of these things are you know and don't get me wrong when we were talking about some of the fundraisers we have here already we're we're kind of sad you know oh the kids won't be able to do this or that we get it you know but these are the things that were you know Federal mandated but I am also happy to reach out to those coaches and just get further clarification if you might can look into it some more I well I just I'm curious to the phrasing because it says our
198ask to research new fundraising opportunities so is this I guess how How firm I mean this is like suggest or is it 100% if you don't meet smart snack which prohibited totally familiar with yeah you can Google there's links in the policy yeah is that there's sections on here about the school meal programs so is wion's proposal including all this I believe so but I I don't yeah I just you know so right so that's just interesting like you look at the snacks that we're able to sell to them and they you know so you know I don't know if we've had communication it's just it is interesting and we also make revenue on that right so that's just just fair amount right so tell me that the amount of rollups you're right there's pop
199tops Bo CHS pop are a smart snack that's what I'm curious like I don't I don't know the answer because because this rule was already in place I mean this was already a federal rule that we were supposed to be following yeah I guess just in the application of out of school not 30 minutes after school from Midnight to 30 minutes after school does it really apply guess is my question no it doesn't it says in there it does not sold during fundrais it's exemp but then does that apply like then we can't send a flyer home with kids that if your parents decide to make that decision I don't think sending well I guess it's the that's what I want to go back to okay all right so if you want to do that
200that would be good and then we'll you'll bring that back to us next time thanks Sally anything else on that my only question is the discussion around like 20 minutes of recess for the whole day was like because I think it's currently 30 at the schol Le like I'm just curious what the conversation was and why it was only 20 minutes because that seems really I think minimum it's just a legal minimum yeah and and then we just checked around and said what are we actually yeah I do no I just had a clarifying question it sounds like so if if when the policy gets approved then it goes into effect and then anything I get from newsletter advertisement which I'm approving for like PTO and so on that involves food it feels like we
201need to have a some lead time to educate the different organization that we won't be able to comfortable it might be worth before we actually vote on this is only a first read so it might be worth sending it to them that's what I think in their because we also have to go through this for actual policies that do exist now are they in line like to Jess's point about recess like is this giving an Avenue to cut recess out yeah more recess not less when when it's a simple change to 30 minutes and to your point it doesn't have to be this isn't time sensitive right in terms that we have to vote on it in the next this month or next month even if we look at it in June or we identify
202those different areas in the meantime talk with can still do that sh W as well I don't know if their bid would change based on this I don't know they've got to be in compliance with Federal Regulations well I know before they were here when Michael anado was on this Wellness committee and at the time we were in compliance so imag we are Jess you might want to email the recess question and the other one you asked to Sally so that she could and maybe look into that or change it I think May 20 minutes is a minimum but maybe for our district we can hold higher standard that would be great all right so that's good and then we'll get an update next time all right between now and next time I will sharing
203yeah okay and then I'll if you want to send me questions I'll than the recess time and then the the P and if this is approved it doesn't mean that everybody's going to follow it exactly and part of the wellness commit hold on what if it's approved then yes everybody is gonna follow it that's the appr part but part of our the wellness committee's Charter is to monitor compliance with it and and that assumes that you know that not everybody's going to be following everything exactly and just to get feedback on that and to yeah to educate people and to report back and just to to make this healthier food thing and healthier lifestyle thing more of part of the conversation you know more of a consideration okay if we approve it they gotta follow
204I think she's saying at first it's gonna learning curve and well that's why you said it around now before we approve it yeah but I think it's great that you'll be doing oversight as well because you understand it like you guys have worked so well you put together so you'll be able to disseminate and say listen that you may have done this before but this is what we're encouraging for good reason yeah that beautiful 14 page document two little concerns out of that whole document so thank you for all that time yes thank you so up until the policy approves the cookie D do you have any format I justify it by saying I'm helping the children that's why I like it you know there's uh you know there's one thing in here that's uh
205going to be an issue in the elementary schools food as a reward or punishment I think when the state senator was here we walked in on a popcorn party so that's that might need to be a looked at well was that for a says it says schools will not use food or beverage as rewards for academic classroom or for sports performance but is that what that party was for uh yeah it was for a reading I think we should just all drap ourselves in Gray and TR through the well listen they're gonna monitor this and you're gonna fail they're gonna monitor this and you're gonna fail fail you John wait Watchers is watching you I mean it's a good idea but the unintended consequences of this need to be looked at but there's not like
206failure and it's not like a punitive thing it's just more like monitoring and what are we doing so your recess is okay though I saw that rewarding with extra res just not push-ups or running pushups you do ice cream socials for honorable anymore is that a thing still what's that ice cream socials for making the honorable do you do that anymore all theun gone seriously Dre gray and drab like John says I mean we have they had like a celebration with the um ice cream and pizza for um the integrated sports right I mean there's a celebration like it's 30 minut after school but they're during during lunch time so everybody can particip yeah I don't know if you'll be able to do that anymore this so This ex has it's supposed to be it's
207coming the CDC or the USDA no that's a it's a reward that's a reward it's a reward doesn't matter what the food is it's a reward but if it's during lunch it's a reward if the kids got from the cafeteria went to the room this is schols It's policy jul they love it I'm yeah I'm for healthy this but the new service I guess is you know just to what I'm also saying is the new service right that's following these these mandates we still are selling ice cream every day we still have you know what I'm saying there's still chips available like that is still somehow working in their configuration right for the meals well we have snacks too additional right that's not their meal additional pieces it's it's like snacks so once they're finished
208with their meal and they're C up they can buy a snack luckily otherwise they're going to make us crazy because bunch is a half well we'll have to find out about that that yeah just there I mean I think it already must be allowed so kind just to understand that like why it's allowed I mean they're they're getting the the backing of you know the government funding right for those right abely stand this might be another when Nancy comes back this might be another question to ask her during this whole process with witson did they go overhand this could wouldn't Rob I mean would know them too unfortunate I do remember with the snack line because I was working the snack line for a while while we were short staffed and during the changeover I
209do remember the ordering became different because we had to adhere to stricter guidelines so while we still have ice cream like like some of how we were ordering right we had to fit in this mold so like we have a lot of more baked chips for example right we have like the gummies maybe went out or the fruit RS there's some changes there that probably meet these guidelines I do think that that shift has happened yeah so this is and kids haven't been dramatically like yeah you know compromised because it I think they're still hope better so what you're saying is this is based on federal guidelines Federal programs federal laws we don't necessarily need a policy to have been to know that we're supposed to follow this or we need a wellness policy I
210mean we need a wellness policy to educate people and and make sure we're we're doing it but we don't need a policy to say follow the law that's what a law is you gotta kind of follow it right I don't know they took us class one yeah I mean those things do exist yeah yeah so you don't need this if this policy didn't exist we would still have to follow federal guidelines for serving food in schools so there's a lot of federal stuff that's out there that schools are supposed to follow even if we don't have a policy for it all right so it brings it all together yeah it brings it it's a centralized document it helps us make sure we're doing what we're supposed to okay thank youbody W so confident they didn't
211bring a spread like last time there anything else no great thank you for that long work on C Jess would you like to give the update for Student Success in technology sube have you met we have not met okay so I mean the only thing would be to review the master plan in the future all right the budget sub committee has also not met so there's been no update since the budget was voted um Lori do you want to give an update on the superintendent evaluation sub committee yes so we we haven't met because we're going to be meeting a lot come May um but in May I think the six may be our meeting um and then the week the week after that is when you will be getting your um your individual we
212do a self- evaluation for the um school committee and then shortly thereafter we'll be doing the superintendent so more information will be available at the next meeting but just that they're coming up those those color Mike did you have an update for the policy yeah uh there's a handful of policies that we got from MC the around the use of technology that are new policies there's a handful that are also just changes to existing ones that we haven't sent to you yet but the new ones I think you do have them for first read uh Paul weighed in on them uh so his changes are in them there are a couple things that you know there's a placeholders because they're a brand new policy they don't have all the bbrsd language in there so that
213will get in there uh cross references to actual policies might need to be updated but you have the handful of those we did talk about the wellness policy with Sally so we covered that already uh the only other thing we updated was uh related to the surveys that were sent out a few months ago masc does have a policy on that so we looked at that that is uh a policy based on a federal ruling or or law again we had some changes that we discussed on that not not necessarily changes but clarifications that we might want to do we're going to send those to Kim before they come to you so that she has a chance to weigh in on it before you guys look at it I mean you can look at it
214if you want but before we bring it forward to the committee is that I uh I yeah yeah that's it okay thank you uh Carol do you want to give your report yeah sure couple things um in my report I did have um information here about the student nurses I just wanted to make you aware of this I was excited we have an ongoing relationship for years with qcc um they asked if they could bring in student nurses to work with us and we do have them coming as April they do a rotation so there'll be extra pairs of hands in um we asked all three nurses who wanted them so they'll be working in Boon and Tanto and we're excited they're all cored soared fingerprinted um but I think for the remainder of the
215year it would be great to have those those students helping out in in the in the nurse's office I'd love to keep them all year i' come bring them so any I just want you to be aware of that U Berlin lease agreement uh as I you had a chance to vote on the one lease agreement the draft um Chris Kristen Rubin and um Spencer Holland from mer o Connell they their our attorney Heather White we all got together in February to review the changes after we went we voted they went to Berlin they looked at they had some changes the lawyers was fascinating fought it out on all about real estate issues it was really interesting because the it's just about the language you know that's used so they cleaned it up they work
216together on it anyway what you see in front of you is what we hope to be the final product I think the big piece of this um that I wanted to point out in the lease agreement that we we came to agreement on and I think that it's a good decision um and Kristen and I felt felt very comfortable with this basically the town will follow what our policy is so what so that they don't have to keep redoing a lease every time if we change policies Through The Years so for example the facilities use whatever our policy says is what they will follow what they will ensure anybody who wants to use the building follows and what they will follow as well um it's for example Town meetings and so on so that's on
217page two um de of release premise and that's a really big change I want us to have a chance to vote on it do select board for and we'll be voting on it on April 22nd and we're hoping that we finally have our lease in place to to meet the regional district um Regional agreement um and then I know that Boon is anxiously awaiting this so that they can use similar language probably have less of TR so does anyone have any questions on the lease Julie you you're good with the use part for basketball and whatnot yeah I I read it I read it as um that the town I this done that when it's Town sponsored events then we lesser should be responsible right so if any Town sponsored events basically it says on
218page two the Lester shall comply with all building news policies and so whatever policy we have in place right it's our policy it's a school committee policy yeah okay because they don't really have the policies in place they'd rather just follow what they what we want them to do well didn't we didn't we kind of go around that when we had the um covid with the Board of Health remember we lifted The Mask mandate and they still have the mask mandate in Berlin and I remember the gentleman from the Board of Health said no we want the school make decisions for the school building I like I like that it gives us the the control and the oversight that we need to have of I agree of what happens in the school even though Town
219owns the building they're still giving us a lot of latitude that makes sense to me yeah because posi you have to pay for no I thought they Chang that but for this year right yeah yeah and I thought that policy was they were going to look at so again I you I think that's I thinkc I can't remember yeah uh yeah we we we've sorted it out for now and then we were waiting for the lease to come yeah so then you guys can take a pass so they're saying decide what you want policy I think that's good because it's ever changing and it's on the school commit shoulders so they'll have to look at that policy after we approve this lease right so then that there's a vote on that tonight just the lease
220on the lease yeah we'll vot right we can vote right now yeah that's why I want to see does anyone have any other questions on it all right could I have a motion to approve the Berlin lease as written so moved L Jess any more discussion I all in favor hi thank you and thanks to Kristen rubben um and our Le attorneys Spencer Holland and U Heather White who really did a great job with this and everybody worked really well together sorting this out I'm happy it's finally done check um any any we just had a vote were there any any opposed no all right sorry no just want to finalize the vote all right I was an i as well so that motion passes did you get that Nicole all right thank you and
221then just a question I wanted to put out to everybody in the preparation for the town meetings we we talked about this earlier in the meeting um I didn't know if you want to do anything or if we just on April 23rd we do have that meeting time available to talk in preparation of the town meeting to to to sort things out to to know who's going where what what are the potential questions were going to be asked who's going to speak just basic prep things or leave that to the budget subcommittee to meet on that I just wanted to bring it forward to all of you because I don't want to go in if there's anything that needs to be brought up we probably should meet as the full committee but um okay so
222speaking of that I was maybe this the time to ask you what the situation I guess I don't know the situation last meeting we had the budget Forum we had Mary brought new numbers to us that we weren't where it changed so when Nancy comes back from her leave will she be able to give us an update before the town meeting of have any numbers changed uh what is the actual numbers that we need to make sure we're doing what do we need to say maybe we should have a meeting with her to figure it out well that's that's why I'm wondering if we should have to discuss all that do we need to reach out to link to to do another effort our budget is different Carol and I are meetings link on Thursday
223to see anyone that's from that wants to come and welcome it's Thursday at 7 right Carol yeah so I just want to throw whatever you so why don't we do you guys want to plan for um so Nancy will be back for to leave by then she can give us the updated numbers in the state all right you guys want to plan for attentative Zoom meeting on April 23rd okay all right so we'll do that we'll plan for a zoom meeting all right Carol did you have anything else to say yes all right we've got two votes so the first one is the approval of the PF Bingo fundraiser and the service of alcoholic beverages so I'll speak to that and then I'm going to abstain from voting on that um who is speaking to
224the Nature's Classroom is that you Jess or is that Cindy I can do that oh what I just donations that we received okay all right so you guys all right so why don't we do that one first so let's um did anyone have any questions about the donations that that's the stuff you've received thus far correct Cindy yes from your fundraisers th far Okay so we've have some donations we need to approve tonight does anyone have any questions about those donations there'll be more coming and in in May 7th is the last meeting before the trip okay so I just I just all right yeah yeah no it'll be on agenda for May 72 y yeah because I know Keith um from Keith's music house they're doing a fundraiser there so we'll make sure we
225get that on the agenda it's both schools it's both schools all right all right so could I have a motion to approve or to accept the donations to pay for the bbrsd Nature's Classroom field trip so moved okay l no Julie didn't obain no I all right you can I need a second all right Lisa all right any discussion on those there's a lot of documentation on these donations I like it did you hear that good job that it's about time nice to hear that hey you don't want to run into that situation where the parent wanted to take the money back last time all right all in favor I uh any opposed I abstain Jess is going to abstain I'm an i as well that motion passes all right so for the Bingo fundraiser
226um and the service of alcoholic beverages did anyone have any questions on that there was a blur this is exactly what the group did last year um so they have post a bingo night and then they're going to purchase alcohol from a distributor and sell it to make a little bit more money um the event is outside of the school in the event of rain alcohol will still be kept outside the school sold and kept outside the school um there's police detail was there any other questions on that how did it go it went well it went well we raised an extra thousand from the alcohol yeah yep yep any issues that arose think there's there's limits on the DRS you can't yeah limits on the DRS so you can charge a lot for alcoholic
227beverages now I know we should increase the prices yep were there any issues that are real with p no issues at all everyone behaved yeah it was fun it was a fun little event all right um so could I have motion to approve the bef Bingo fundraiser and service of alcoholic beverages so L second Lisa any discussion okay all in favor any or any opposed I'm going to abstain so that motion passes all right I think that's it we're going to have a zoom meeting on the 23rd with that said could I please have a motion to adjourn the meeting soor any all in favor all right I'm I well thank you thank you