001[Music] good evening everyone I'd like to call this meeting of the dman school committee to order for Monday January 6th 2025 could I have a roll call please Miss gner Chris Oliver here Elizabeth Coughlin here Mary Beckwith here Kathleen Amal here John NES thank you very much everyone uh good evening happy Holidays happy New Year to all of those watching uh at this time the uh school committee is going to adjourn into executive session for the purpose are pursuant to Mass General law chap uh chapter 30 section 21 to conduct grievance hearings with the Dartmouth Educators Association pursuant to the collective bargaining agreement between the Dartmouth school committee and Dartmouth Educators Association also pursuant to Mass General Law chapter 38 section 21 to discuss strategy with respect to Collective baring where an open meeting would
002have a detrimental effect on the school committee's bargaining position which would be with the DEA uh on uh we're going to adjourn into executive session at this time and we will reconvene into Open session at 6:30 [Music] n [Music] n [Music] n [Music] m [Music] m [Music] he [Music] I would like to reconvene this meeting of the Dartmouth school committee for uh Monday January 6th 2025 would you please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all please be seated well Happy New Year everyone I hope you all had a uh wonderful holiday break uh you and your families just a reminder that this meeting is being
003videotaped and audio recorded by uh our wonderful Mr parate and his students here at Dartmouth High School and it will be uh re broadcast on DCTV channels 9 on the following days Wednesday and Thursday at 5:00 p.m. Friday at 6:00 a.m. Saturday at 8:00 a.m. and Sunday at 2 p.m. the meeting will also be rebroadcast in DCTV channel 18 on the following days Monday and Saturday at 12:00 p.m. and Thursday at 3 p.m. and as always you can watch it on our doou high I believe media YouTube channel um whenever you would like uh at this time please silence all cell phones and um just a reminder that we have allotted 10 minutes for anyone wishing to speak on any of tonight's agenda items so if you would like to approach uh the microphone we
004need ask you to keep your comments brief uh but we have a lot of 10 minutes for anyone wishing to speak on any of tonight's agenda items did I miss anything I feel a little off since we went into executive session first I think you got it I think you got it perfect thank you very much uh seeing no one approaching the mic we will move on chair will entertain a motion to approve the regular session minutes of November 4th 20124 so moved second a motion by Mrs Amaral a second by Miss Bess on the motion any other discussion Jay hering none all in favor I I opposed abstentions motion carries unanimously thank you at this time we're going to turn it over to our student rep for the school committee to give us an
005update on all the happenings around the school I want to thank you for having me so we are coming back from an amazing winter break and ready for the new year and we hope that everyone had a great winter break the end of the term is quickly approaching and we have some exciting things at Dartmouth High School Potter Elementary School visited Dartmouth High School before winter break for our holiday performance and it was a great way for our chorus band and Orchestra to Showcase their talents and bring the community together our Helping Hands committee provided support for over 20 families this holiday season and we just want to send out a thank you to the Dartmouth High School staff and Community Support that made this possible the winter sports have also been going well on
006December 21st Jackson Hart said the boys school record with the 55 meter dash and currently the girls varsity basketball team has won all their scheduled games and they are ranked 10th in Massachusetts the Dartmouth High School theater company will be putting on High School Musical for the spring show and tickets are on sale now for the show debuting May 1st through May 3rd our after prom committee is currently planning and looking for donations to help this year this year's after prom make to be another great success and if you are interested in donating they are in need of concession items items for gift cards and prizes monetary donations and paint or construction materials so these are just a few of the exciting things going on at DHS over the past couple weeks and we're looking
007forward to see what the new year brings and thank you for taking the time to recognize us this evening thank you so much for your report questions from anyone comments no thank you so much you are welcome to stick along uh stay with us and uh attend the rest of the meeting but if you have other things to do homework or any anything else you're more than welcome to leave as well so the option is all yours thank you and next up we're going to have a presentation overview of the Dartmouth Public Schools Food Service program I'm going to turn it over to Dr sabba Maguire and I'm going to promptly turn it over to Mr Kylie who's then going to promptly turn it over to Mr Sheridan everyone's going to get in on the
008action so tonight I have the pleasure of uh introducing Jean Sheridan our director of school nutrition um Jean uh has done an amazing job over the last seven years really elevating our food service operation from what I would describe as a a very institutional program um to one that's customer focused um and really an integral part of the daily experience of kids here so um tonight Gan has a presentation sharing some information recent developments and some plans for the future of our food service operation so thanks Jean Mr and I'm sorry Mr Nunes is not here so much of this is stuff we talk about so regularly so please hopefully he'll be watching he said he would be watching it on TV no worries there you go um you know a year in review what
009is you know food service is the same as everything else it's our staff it's our menu it's sustainability infrastructure and participation and I'm going to talk briefly on all of these first part of our life is our staff we have five members who have been here 25 years or more which is a tribute and three of those are managers so they kind of come they stay um when I came on board we had 26 staff members we now have 38 so you're going to see the effect of school free School meals on everybody and the things that we've been able to do with our program our menus are all um analyzed through a program called healthy Pro we have very strong USDA requirements um our mobile app allows parents to review both the nutritions there's
010pictures of every item we serve all the nutrition all the allergens so if you want to filter out egg items parents can do that from their phone um and the USDA really does restrict the amounts of fat sugar and salt in all items served so when you know you say we're serving Honey Cheerios at school those Honey Cheerios are not the Honey Cheerios you buy in the grocery store they're very much whole grain they're reduced sugar so they're not apples for apples much as um people want you to believe they are they're not um and we know as things go on we're looking for a lot more scratch cooking and in our world these are just some of the items you know that are served regularly if you look um hold on you know we
011promote we do and I lost my train of thought um you know goal is always to buy local last year we had $221,000 in Grants just to purchase local products um you know we really want to get rid of the highly processed foods but there's always the challenge with kids you know we can make meatloaf which is highly labor intensive but if we can't get anybody to eat it so it's glow it's going into the introduction of those items slowly with items that kids are much more familiar with we just started a partnership this week with Coastal food shed they're going to supply both um Massachusetts grown lettuce and tomatoes to us so we're working on it we've had um Red's best which is fish coming right off the boat of New Bedford we've done
012they've actually made fish sticks for us we do baked hattic with them meat Works um you know locally grown Westport beef um which I don't think we even tell the kids it's Westport you know they don't know that it's Westport beef um but as importantly it's training how do you take your staff and and bring them to the items that we want to be serving Mr Oliver you know where it is could you go back a slide for a minute or oh thank you how often are we sourcing uh foods from these uh vendors locally is it like once in a while or is it on a regular basis it's on an absolute regular basis there are certain items and because of the way we purchase produce we use our our general produce vendors but
013they're supplying like Lenny Orchard does all of our apples they produce the apples that are the sliced apples that the kids get with their lunch so you know they're not the farm down the street but local in my world is within 100 miles of Boston so I would tell you on a daily basis there's exposure to local product great thank you um so back to training you know how do we get the kids to start eating the things we want them to eat and it starts with training our staff we've been very lucky to work with John stalker Institute and starting this Wednesday and on each of the next four release days they are going to bring a chef in and we're going to have our managers our cooks and key people come to the
014high school our first lesson on Wednesday will be Asian Fusion and the the follow up on the Asian fusion training with the staff is then they provide somebody to Comm in and do taste testings with the kids and the following week those items are menu with a chef on the line cooking them so we're excited about it we've wanted to try it and we were finally able to make the dates work for us for this um this spring so come Wednesday Asian cooking the other thing that's been a major Focus um we all hate styrofoam trays I I we hate the word of Styrofoam trays they take up a lot of space they're the bane of my existence um we've been trying to get away from styrofoam trays right now we have the dish machines
015operating at Dartmouth middle school and at Potter um John told me today that we're going to have dellos very quickly they finish some of the electrical work we will then go on to Quinn um to make that work the option these days rather than plastic trays because if you think about a melamine tray it's still putting plastic in conjunction with the food are these lovely prison issue stainless steel trays um we were very lucky to get a $20,000 Grant last spring so we have enough stainless steel trays to service at least four of the schools and again they've been at no cost to us so we're working on it is it slow yes is it slower than I'd like absolutely but we've got two going and are going to continue to go further with that
016um infrastructure our building you don't need to hear it from me our buildings are old our kitchen are old um they need a lot of work we like to play whacka with the guy in the picture but he has been absolutely great to us he's in a um milk chest at that point um doing something with a spring in um the last since 19 from the last Jonathan there you go um in the last two years we've invested back into our program over a million um if um in we have new walk-ins and refrigerators at poto Dello Quinn and DMS we've put additional Refrigeration at all schools kettles brand new 60 Alon kettles think institutional kitchens at Potter and Dello Quinn got all new ovens and ex um kettles and um the M the high
017school has got a steamer and a new oven which is going to work with us on the um cooking there another way that we've been able to play with okay now this is the one we're going to is these I'm going to talk through but we've been able to spend some money on infrastructure this happens to be Quinn and Audra was in absolutely instrumental we have a graphic designer who comes in and does everything start to finish so we've gone from White institutional to both kitchens looking like like that it works with the kids um and we like it so next you're going you're going to get a short video of all of them Dello was my favorite of all the projects Liz this is Joey Joey got reimagined in terms of a logo but
018watch watch the difference with Jo with with Joey again the windows got washed everything got clean um Mr Kylie recently as probably as recently as today we're going to be able to put all new tables into um Dello and Potter for all of these fold Downs so you know we're investing in our program for sure each principal worked with the graphic artist so the schools were designed specifically but as you look at these look at the white joists up on the ceiling because we're going to show you but one of the how old is how old are Potter and Dello 1955 okay so I can almost guarantee that 19 um 2024 was the first time that we washed the joists the joists were scraped the joists were cleaned there you go this is the kind
019of stuff as we look at what we can put back into our schools and do these things that just they're they're amazing I love the transparency there you go um same deal we had the we did um murals at the middle school also in the big cafeteria you know in in my world it always gets down to the bottom line it just it's how my brain works so what's happened um right now free meal you Massachusetts is one of eight states that will continue with free meals forever it's in the budget and I don't see it changing but in conjunction with with that because our free and reduced population is now over 35% um we are a c District which means no more applications um which makes it easier and more difficult but if you
020watch participation in 2019 42% of our kiddos ate lunch we're now at 69% of our kids are eating lunch every day so there's value in that um breakfast 5% participation in 19 this year to date we're at 22% so God bless the whole grain breakfast ratings AKA we don't serve Donuts we serve whole grain breakfast Rings just think if you wanted to know um Revenue again has gone consistently with the um increase in production if you look you know in 2019 we did a million five this year last year we did a million 2 million3 and it'll be up from that so the resolve of that is we have more money to put back in the program we have more money to pay our staff we have been able to increase staff because food you
021know I firmly believe food service is one of the most difficult jobs in the district I mean it's every day it's hot it's work people are calling in sick and our staff is absolutely Stellar in what they do what's next you know cafeteria is as training labs to introduce students to all different kinds of things we're starting it again at the high school as early as next week hoping to bring that into all of the schools scratch cooking we talked about you know I keep that the farm that's on Bakers I got to find them because that's the kind of stuff they're so close but we don't have a relationship with them but if we can figure out the transport and that's always the issue how you get it there um I'd like to do
022that you know we need to do a better job of communicating who we are and what we do um I I'm getting personally away from social media but I understand the value of it and how we you know we tell people what we're doing um this is for Mr noones who's someplace doing something wonderful I'm sure is to implement a preventive maintenance plan for all the kitchens you know because we've never had that how do we really start looking at you know where we've replaced walk-ins you saw the ceilings continuing with that um you know Implement and emplore sustainability and then as many grants as available we like to apply for them so that's my story I would love to have any questions you might have to this is you know our program we're proud
023of it we've got a great staff I can't you know are we perfect no but nobody's perfect you know so we are always moving forward and eting kids thank you very much for your presentation I'll uh Stack Down at that end of the table for any comments or questions I just a comment your your spirit uh and your presentation were wonderful um I I just can't see I can't foresee anything but wonderful things growth and getting better all the time um but this was wonderful I I loved seeing the transformation of the the the actual SP Wen they great they were just incredible um so much fun and comfortable and I'm sure that it was fun right it was fun going through [Music] that um so thank you for bringing this to us and the
024community that's watching um because we do often hear from folks who talk about uh the um the health of the foods and those conversations do happen on social media um I too have stepped away but there are lots of different perspectives so to hear it and to see see it um and to talk through some of those examples of the toasty ring wheat Rings or whatever they are um is is is you know I'm just grateful to hear that from from you and for for um all the great work that your staff's doing yeah ditto of what Kathleen said and I I thank you for making it fun because it could be just easy to focus on churning out the food but making it fun for the students I think is really important just one
025quick question about how do you identify grants and who does the application in the grant reports is that all you um to a large extent um for those who know what is the name of the program from the state now that's very difficult gems j a lot of fun so it was the first time I was using it usually you can just write a little letter and you tell your story and this was I waited till the last minute of course it was a Friday afternoon and all of the sudden I had to get permissions I had to get approvals you know we're on the phone um so it's primarily me at this point I would love some help but it's my it's well good for you it's hard it's hard work to this was
026a it was a lot of work for a little bit of money we got to choose where we're going down that road exactly um great food is so important important for learning absolutely and if we can make food interesting and introduce the students to food might not get it home all the better um so in terms of Revenue you're going after grants but was it a million in Revenue approximately two million um that comes mostly from the state towards the free lunch program those reimb those right now um probably 5 years ago about 60% of our Revenue was reimbursement it's now well into the '90s oh wow so we are we are getting both Federal money and State money so it's and they figure that out by increasing by how many plates you serve or
027how many pounds you serve by meals terrific um I'm like thrilled to see how many students are using the fre lunches are eating in our dining Halls um I'm also thrilled that we have two schools up and running with um reusable trays and I love the metal trays over the old trays we had when I was in school um is there possibility of grants for the silverware and plates or silverware is so challenging because it's almost a 25% replacement every month for some reason we can hold the tra we can keep the trades trades don't in the trash you know they have magnetic handles to catch them um and they're not expensive in a fork is probably 15 20 cents for a metal one but the replacement is huge so could we go to um
028metal silverware absolutely is it the most cost effective probably not I we can further discuss it I've just always been of the impression you can't keep up with the silverware because it just all vanishes just you know disappears so the trash not a consideration that had occurred to me yeah no no no no no I mean it's it I flp with it I flirt with it all the time and I just know from experience it just yeah it it seems like a place that we could improve but maybe not um the other question I have and it's kind of twofold um do we do anything with composting with the town because I know Dartmouth doeses now have a food compost program do we work with them on that we have had one school come forward
029and ask for us to get more involved with compost um generally my answer and we've worked a little bit with Mr Kylie is there's got to be a champion on site there's got to be somebody who's going to own this it's not realistic to say fifth graders are going to sort trays clean trays separated who's picking it up how much does it cost to get picked up yeah so what should be a simple wonderful thing to do is complicated I don't know where we went with the last conversation with Potter right we began to explore with the Potter School and and um thinking about doing that on a trial basis because they have someone who is would certainly Champion it at um at the potter school and we are interested in moving forward with that
030they um this was pre holidays um and we were in the process of um contacting the folks who manage it currently for the town and to see what because our volume's a little different than than than the normal home um and how that would work and um you know obviously with compost Inc comes concerns like rodents um which are problematic which we currently you know have to um you know we have a we have Pest Control um regularly in our schools to protect our uh our inventories um so that is a concern and then and as as uh mardan uh mentioned it it has to be something that people are willing to do extra work for because this is not um it's not going to happen by itself we don't have the staff to do
031it from a from a food service perspective it really has to be something that the school wants to do and incorporate into um the curriculum and so we're um we're working on that all right well we've got some model we've got some models we're looking at other districts who have done it but they're a little bit bigger than we are and a little bit more resources so well thank you for your good work and your staff's good work um the food looks delicious thank you I just uh I commend the job you're doing Jean I think you're over the past several years you've turned the program around um it's clearly viable not only through the numbers but also all the the programs and the art on the walls and the schools and uh so uh
032kudos to you and your staff as well because you can't do it it's all the St it's all the St you certainly can't do it by yourself you can't turn out all those meals uh by yourself I do have a question one of the things that comes up we we obviously hear from uh community members or parents specifically or students around the meals how how are the menus actually uh planned out like the rotations of the of the meal choices we are on a five-week cycle at the elementary schools and at the middle school which allows us to run a full month before it's repeated um we then in that program that we talked about earlier healthy Pro it's got a component where it identifies items that are selling items that are not selling what
033needs to change so we do a lot of work with that at the high school we run three separate menus in terms of Hot Grill cold Grill and then just the entree of the day so me okay the answer is the answer is I do the the answer is I do the menus based on what cells and what we know the kids will eat and you know we got we and we have requirements we have to have a dark green vegetable every about every week we have to have a lagum we have to have a you know so it's all wor it's a lot moving Parts yeah no uh that's great uh thank you for your presentation it was really informative and I know we've been asking uh or someone's been asking for a little
034while to uh have the Food Service presentation okay thank you as I said our goal is more St Lis getting more two more dish machines up by the end of the spring so no it's great to see the the turnover and the equipment and replacing replacing the equipment in the kitchens okay thank you thank you thank you Jean that was great uh next up uh resolution 25-01 I'm going to make a safe assumption that I can turn this right over to uh Mr Kylie it's very s thank you so much Mr Oliver so um resolution number 25-1 is a resolution awarding a contract for design service for the Dello and Potter fire alarm and detection system replacement project whereas request for proposal for Design Services for the Dello and Potter fire alarm and detection system
035replacement project were duly ad advertised and proposals received were opened at 3 p.m. Friday November 8th 2024 and whereas ggd Consulting Engineers Inc 375 font Conor Road Sweet D Dartmouth Massachusetts as presented was selected by the designer selection committee as the most responsive responsible and advantageous proposal therefore be it resolved that a contract for Design Services for the Dello and Potter fire alarm and detection system rep M project for the Dartmouth Public School District be awarded to ggd Consulting Engineers Inc at a negotiated fee of $488,000 so I'd like you to consider um this resolution um we did have four um applicants four designers that applied um strong pool and um we feel confident that we've selected a designer who's who's certainly going to meet our needs um this project the design portion of this
036project is um we currently have the funding for from a capital Improvement article that was voted at a prior town meeting the construction um portion of this project uh is on our Capital Improvement plan that we're going to talk about in a few minutes questions regarding this resolution I do have one Mr Kylie okay um in the uh design process one of the things I would would just ask and I I would assume that you already do it is be uh mindful of uh proprietary Hardware going into the buildings and as such just one vendor would be able to service it I know you know what I mean as far as a Simplex system and just Johnson Controls specifically um so yep no it's it's certainly something we've faced in uh you know through the
037years with situation so now we we are aware of that and we'll consider that figured you were thank you anything else chair will entertain a motion so moved would you like it read or are we good since you've read it you you could make a motion to um to award the contract as presented i' make a motion to award the contract as presented by Mr Kylie second a motion by pass a second by uh Miss Beckwith on the motion any other discussion all in favor I I opposed motion carries unanimously thank you Mr Kylie thank you uh next up under old business uh continue discussion of the FY 26 budget so um again I I did warn Mr Kylie that he was going to be very busy talking speaking this evening um but I just
038want to say that we have been and he in particular has been hard at work on developing this budget and it's been an ongoing process really uh I think we all recognize that never really ends and we're not as much as we we are preparing the FY 26 budget we're thinking ahead and I can't tell you um really how important it has been to have that District strategic plan in place because it is helping to shape our thinking in terms of where we need to ensure and bring forward um to the committee and to the community where we're going to need funding to be able to implement the plan that that we have that you have approved and so Mr Kylie I think you have a couple of things that you wanted to yes thank
039you Dr s Maguire so um We are continuing our budget process at the moment we're um going to be having some meetings with our administrators um in the month of January we also will be um reaching out to the budget subcommittee members following those meetings and a little more work ahead to set up a budget subcommittee meeting so we'll um look at some dates obviously tonight you're going to take a look at your school committee dates so we'll we'll factor that in uh with the hopes that we would present a budget in February for your consideration and to start that process off great have we heard um anything from the town side as to uh numbers I I had met I've met twice um with um the town director budget and finance good meetings um
040productive meetings uh we talked this morning about it um and plan to meet again um they're still working on their side of the equation um so we don't have any there's no set number at this point which is fine right um but the encouraging thing is that I you know I think that they are open to dialogue so okay I look forward to those meetings anyone else Mrs Amaral I'm just curious um I haven't haven't really been paying too too much attention but have there been any sort of um is any guidance or any um thoughts relative to any potential changes on the federal level with um with talks about you know Department of Ed no se and such yeah so I mean it we're all very interested in this obviously um to see what
041the impact is on us um particularly for us um the primary impact that I'd be most concerned about is grant funding from the federal you know from the federal grants um which make up a fairly significant amount of money um and you know I I think uh that with us receiving almost $2 million in federal grants um I mean we we can't operate without that um I don't expect that those grants are tied to laws that exist I'm not thinking that those laws are going to be repealed um they are primarily to support lowincome um and needy students as well as special needs um students so I I feel like those have to happen but who knows don't really where we're going with it in a recent um presentation that I attended at a conference
042there were a couple of folks out of Washington DC who were saying exactly what Mr Kylie is saying it's that that funding that Federal funding is so closely tied to statute that it will it would be really hard just to come in and make a blank as we know it's not just a blanket statement that we're not going to provide Federal funding um to the level that we did in the past and it just happens that's just not our understanding of of the way this will work and we're hopeful that that won't be the case got my fingers and my toes thank you Mrs amiral anyone else M Coughlin be with all right thank you Mr Kylie for that update you're welcome under new business FY 26 through FY 35 Capital Improvement plan Mr Kylie
043okay you have I didn't know if you were sick of I was distracted for um so uh you have before you the FY 26 through 35 uh draft Capital Improvement plan so this is a draft for your consideration certainly looking for feedback um from everyone um and it's not uh a requirement that this get gets approved tonight by the way um so this is the first time um that we've developed a 10-year Capital Improvement plan um so it's a little different and for casting out 10 years when you're dealing with 70 80 year old buildings is challenging so um I'm sure over the life of this plan uh as we you know will be updated and require um you know require some changes and things that we haven't anticipated but we attempted to to anticipate
044um what we you know can reasonably expect um so your packet incl a few things it includes a a memorandum summarizing the year one requests um the following three pages um include requests by year for the next 10 years and then the final six pages of of the 10 uh include a brief description of each of those requests so I'm I'm going to start and walk you through year one of the requests since those would be um up for consideration through the capital Improvement planning process that we're currently going to be involved in and um hopefully at the June uh the June annual town meeting as well as still uh able to be considered at the fall town meeting so that's the usual cycle we we present now you will approve at some point and
045then uh we'll move through the capital Improvement planning process with a Target towards June and and then the fall town meeting for things that haven't previously been approved at June so the first thing on our list is technology Hardware replacement so um you know for we were involved in some discussions regarding uh technology Hardware um in the budget planning process um previously where it was cut out of the capital Improvement plan um by uh by the town Administration and um that has since if you recall at the last town meeting um been reinstated so we feel pretty confident that we're going to receive support to move forward um so we have built in a $250,000 request for technology Hardware replacement uh it's absolutely critical that that we um receive funding to maintain our technology levels
046um to be able to do what we do and um you know continue our support of kids on a onetoone basis and and and all of our instructional technology in the classrooms our SE and feel free to stop me anywhere along the way but um our second request is $550,000 for the fire alarm and detection system replacement at the development part of school you just awarded the design for this um so that is to actually complete the construction our hope is um to I mean I'm going to call them tomorrow and say get to work um hopefully we are are awarded uh at the June toown meeting These funds and then we can construct over the summer it's a super tight timeline to get that done um but we'll bid out in anticip IP ation
047of receiving those funds at the June toown meeting as long as we have a reasonable expectation that we may receive those funds so that's our plan we built in uh $285,000 for security upgrades so um we we've been fortunate that um we are collaborating with the Dartmouth Police Department um and have begun doing some security assessments of our buildings um we are hoping that we'll receive funding from the town to address some of the recommendations um things that um you know without getting too specific um things to improve security at the entrances of the buildings um primarily um as well as some internal improvements to the to the to the different schools so our hope is that we'll uh be able to begin that process with um with those funds we built in a $567,000
048request for the high school track that's the outdoor track um this request was one that didn't get funded if you recall from um from last year it it definitely does need to be I mean we've we patched it again and it it's just eventually going to not work that way you know that we're not going to be able to continue um the use of it so we do have to do it we can continue to patch it short term but it really does need to be done um we built in a $6 million request for the Dartmouth High School roof replacement so um you know this you can you only need to look up and see the the stains on the ceiling um this would replace the roof system on this building our next step
049would be to submit a statement of interest to the mass School building authority for their accelerated repair program Dr Sabre Maguire has already alerted the mass School building authority that we are interested in submitting a statement of interest and they'll be contacting us regarding um setting us up to be able to do so that will require votes of the school committee and the select board uh so and it's a fairly tight process process um with with those being due in April um the all of the all of the votes by the boards um so we'll we'll keep you posted on that um as as that that process is going to just be opening up at msba um in January they'll pay about 50% of the cost of that project if if we're awarded um the
050project we have a request for 200,000 to continue flooring replacement of a those containing materials we did a number of classrooms about a dozen classrooms last year um and some other spaces um we need to continue to do this it's we have old buildings that are deteriorating and they have asbestos in them needs to be removed um we built in a $300,000 uh request for ongoing hbac equipment repairs and Replacements again old buildings we need to continue this work we've done a lot of work and some really good work in terms of updating controls on some of the buildings so we're digitizing controls in some cases um like we we still have pneumatics I don't know how familiar you are with pneumatics but it's air that runs through little tubes from the thermostat and it
051tells the heating system what to do when that stuff gets to be 70 plus years old it doesn't work well and it's a nightmare to fix so um so we're hoping to continue that process and we work closely with um the town's energy manager Kathy Stanley who is a contractor um who works uh very closely with us on on these projects and we get all the grants that we possibly can um and utility incentives we have a request for 250 ,000 to continue to monitor uh modernize our school playgrounds we have some funds now we're actually working on um updating one of the playgrounds at the Quinn school and this will help us continue at at some of the other schools um so hopefully we receive funding for that we have a a bus that
052we use it was parked if you walked in the front door it was one of the buses that was parked out outside earlier um it's uh it's 2017 it's got a lot of miles on it it's beginning to get to the point where our um the folks who maintain the bus for us are saying okay you need you know be aware you need to you need to think about um replacement of that bus so we built in funds to uh to you know hopefully do that and the last item on our list for this year um is the stadium renovation so this has been continued to be on the list and and I don't want to take it off the list because it w it has to be done eventually and um you know we
053started this this project in 2018 um yes we did there had been previous discussions about lots of different things relating to athletic fields and PRI where prior to that I mean I've been living this for a long time um but anyway in 2018 we started actually renovating the stadium in 2019 we started using the current field which is a fantastic Improvement that has has been so important for for students here um but um the infrastructure around that field is poor crumbling it's poor yeah it's poor well in some cases literally crumbling agree to the point that it yeah was a safety concern so um so we want to maintain it there's a lot of value in the structure there there's um you know it's people um people who um you know experience the stadium recognize
054that it it is a pretty special place there's not a lot of stadiums like that locally um so our hope is that we can maintain it um but if we let it go forever we won't be able to so those are our current year requests um um but we have other things on this list that are pretty important so we built in a request for a new or renovated School in fiscal year 27 that's the second year of this plan um we think it's important to move forward with this we have uh Dr sa Maguire and I have a along with John Bernard our facilities manager have a meeting with the msba tomorrow morning to um in anticipation of them uh coming down at some point and um and taking a look at our facilities
055um so we're hopeful that we can encourage them to do so um I'm sure they will and uh really you know similar to um the high school roof this would be a process that we would submit a statement of Interest saying we would like to partner with msba on a building project and we would not um necessarily have to at that point um indicate exactly the details of the project they don't want that they want to have discussions with us about it so at some point hopefully in the next not this January but in the following January we're in a position where we feel like we can have an agreement with um with the select board um and hopefully obviously with your support um we would we would push that forward and and have that
056discussion it ties very closely into our long-term capital planning process that we're working on with the town we have a meeting with them on Wednesday um and they're interested that group at least is very interested in addressing the long-term needs needs of the infrastructure in the town so hopefully there'll be momentum um and we can move forward with that request can I ask a question in regards to building a renovation project because I'm I actually had it here number four um because we we've had we've kicked this can down the road for for quite a while I I personally for one am thrilled that you brought this up and it's as early as FY 27 cuz I think it's long over do and I think a lot of people in the town uh feel that
057way and I know that we this committee has had this conversation around what would make the most sense as far as maybe and this was just speculation making this the middle school and building a high school but at the end of the day I've been doing some research and I correct me if I'm wrong uh Dr St Maguire Mr Kylie that it's really comes down to what the appetite of the msba has for building a school in the community of Dartmouth cuz uh having conversations with other school committee members in other districts I don't know if it was East Bridgewater or West Bridgewater but one of the Bridgewaters they're actually building a new Elementary School in which msba said you need to close and consolidate three elementary schools they are much smaller than the elementary
058schools here in Dartmouth and we're going to just give you we'll a you the funds for just one Elementary School and we're going to consolidate those three into one so um is it safe to assume that really msba and based on what you had just said that you're going to entering just having some preliminary conversations with them that that is the case in which we we do kind of have to take our Direction a little bit from them Ms I at least what we hope to is going to happen and we what we believe is going to happen is msba is going to assess all six buildings um and then at that point um we'll they'll have more information to have that conversation with us clearly we have a building that was built in 1922
059that's still in operation and I would imagine that part of the part of any discussion with the msba will be that the use of that building long term is probably not you know not in the short cards so as to how that all happens um there are different there's different ways to you know to to move on from you know assuming that that is a um is a sort of recommendation of msba but but yeah I think you're right I think it's this step will hopefully lead us as we move forward into the statement of Interest process and and and provide them with more information in which they can be logical offer recommendations but yeah I'm thrilled yep yeah me too I think it's a really good place for us to be when I think
060about coming in here last year as a new superintendent um one of the things that we immediately started to talk about was building recognizing the fact that we needed to build a new school building and I know that wasn't because I had just started here I know those conversations had been ongoing but I was so excited to start to have what we were hoping was going to lead to real next steps on how that was going to happen and so to be able to have this conversation again get back to that and know that we're going to be able to put a planning I mean there are there are a lot of different steps that need to happen but it's really an exciting place to be to think about putting a plan into place that
061really is going to lead Dartmouth into the next when you think about it really The Next Century um and and it's definitely much needed here great it's fun good stuff so I I think you know there are lots of other things on this Capital Improvement plan obviously uh more flooring more HVAC more playg ground improvements Energy Efficiency improvements bathroom Renovations um lots of other projects that'll be needed over the next 10 years to maintain the Integrity of use of these facilities um one one thing that I think is important to note is that we also built in a second new building at the at the end of this um because this town is cannot be in the position where they don't move forward with multiple construction projects in the next you know 20 years I
062mean it has to it it has to happen or else what's going to happen is they're going to end up doing three projects at the same time um you know and that would be unfortunate and and shortsighted the the other thing to remember is the longer we wait to do these projects the more it's going to cost yeah um both in on a couple ways so yeah right in ongoing maintenance yeah there's a lot of requests on this list that are going to happen unless we do something but also the construction escalation um you know the interest rates for borrowing are low construction escalation cost is high so if construction ES escalation is somewhere between 5 and 6% and our interest rate is 2 and a half I don't know what we're waiting for because
063it's just costing us more money right and um so anyway so we're going to try and push it and and hopefully you know over the course certainly move forward and hopefully work with msba and get one project done I'm not we're not trying to get ahead of ourselves but we have to think about it for the future so so that really is um you know what we have in this uh Capital Improvement plan questions for Mr Kylie no but I I love the long Vision yeah yeah I think that's great to put it on paper and have a plan whether it changes or not over time that's fine right to have a plan right huge uh just a couple of questions Mr Kylie uh security upgrades for $285,000 is that something uh maybe next time
064we go into executive session you can just discuss in detail a little further under the security Clause my my point of being vague is that is as you probably guessed is that it is typically an executive session topic when we're talking about security upgrades and I yes I'd be happy to share some more specifics about that that would be wonderful and then the high school roof for 6 million um have we confirmed and I know you're working on that have we confirmed that this roof would be eligible age-wise we believe it would be okay it was installed on the so it obviously you can't begin to do the inside of the building until there's a roof right so in terms of installation of the actual roof on this building it will meet the 25y year
065requirement um by the time it's considered so yeah we believe that I only asked that because we're fighting the same exact thing in the district I work in for our Middle School that was built the same year yeah so it's it's a little tricky and the reality is that over the the last couple of Cycles with the msba so they they they took a year off of The Accelerated repair program um the the previous approval Cycles have been that they've had a lot more applicants than they've been able to award so I don't know what it's going to look like right now um but I mean it we may not get approval we won't be the oldest roof applying um for sure you know so we'll have to see okay um but we can only
066try and um you know make our best case and I think we have a good case so we'll do our best thank you Mr Kylie you're welcome uh let's see next up uh school committee policies section B school committee in governance operations and school committee policy section A ADF wellness policy first reading like to save or yeah well I said Mr Kylie was going to be busy tonight give him credit for um I mean really recognize the work he's done on taking the lead on this and I know it's been quite a while since the district has done this level of detail and looking at its policies so um and I know we had a as far as the wellness policy is concerned we had a number of people in the district that were involved
067in certain parts of it right so um yeah I'd like to thank everybody internally who's who's uh you know participated in the policy review process it is a lot of work and I'd also like to to thank our our uh fine uh policy subcommittee members from the school committee who've who've been integral in this process and and to get to our second section to a vote at school committee I think is a big deal because it is quite a bit of work so um I'll walk you through and um I I guess I'll leave it up to you as to how much detail DET but I I have kind of a summary I can I can get through here I think fairly quickly um so the policy subcommittee reviewed policies in section B which is
068school committee and government operations as well as one policy from section A the wellness policy policy ADF so I provided you with a summary sheet of all um the policies in section B with their recommended actions so that that's in your packet there there's um 12 policies with recommended revisions um on those you'll note that there's uh deletions of language are struck through and that additions of language are highlighted and red just to so that they'll stick out um we recommended one new policy for your consideration so bib um was is a policy uh is an masc recommended policy for school committee conferences conventions and workshops you might remember that there was a little discussion amongst the school committee about this previously um earlier this year so uh we thought that as a policy subcommittee
069we we thought that it might be worthwhile incorporating that seems like a pretty thoughtful policy we also recommended uh revocation of two policies so bdfa E2 and bdf3 which are not masc policies and are already covered in bdfa and bdfa um were recommended for revocation this was a lot of fun doing this right so um if you'd like I could just go briefly through each of the recommended actions and why we're why we're requesting I'm not going to read the policies I hope um but I can just go through and and let you know that BBA is school committee p uh powers and Duty so we Chang language regarding um the school committee employing a from what was the school committee employing a staff to the school committee selecting and terminating the superintendent That's the
070Law so we changed that bbaa school Committee Member Authority we changed it to the masc model policy um so what we did was we changed his and her to their and he and she to they are bbbbbb um School Committee Member qualifications and oath of office we changed that to the masc policy which really involved changing his and her to their he and she to um he and she is to they are and it added ethics online training language which is a requirement section BCA school Committee Member ethics uh we changed that to the masc model policy so his and her to there he and she is to they are and him her to them BDA uh school committee organizational meeting we changed clerk to secretary of the school committee which is what we have
071here um bdb school committee officers uh we changed that to the masc policy so his her to their he she to they are and him her to them bdd school committee superintendent relations we changed the masc model policy so his and her to their he and she to they are and him her to them we also changed language that indicated that the superintendent will I I love this old language will have the privilege of asking the school committee um to language stating that the superintendent may see which is a little more you know I mean I don't know it is a privilege I'm not saying this isn't a privilege but you know bdfa E2 submission and approval of school Improvement plan so we propos the revocation of this it isn't an masc model policy it's
072already in it's already in bdfa so I don't know why we even had it there but we had it um similarly bdf3 conduct of school council business this we proposed revocation again not an masc policy already covered in bdfa so um we propose revoking that bdg school attorney we changed the masc model policy so he or she to they and him her to them BG school committee policy development we changed the masc policy which um corrected references uh to um from the old language to the board of Elementary and secondary education which is what actually exists now bhc school committee staff Communications we proposed revision to remove uh the liaison language which is not currently a practice bhe use of electronic messaging by school committee uh that one was pretty dated um and it was
073I when you get a chance read the old one it's kind of funny um changes to the masc model policy so we addressed email archiving instead of some system where you all send emails to somebody and they keep them it's like I don't know anyway bib um school committee conferences conventions and workshops we proposed as I mentioned proposed a new policy this is the masc model policy uh and then ADF there's quite a few revisions in there um that have been developed by The District Health advisory committee so I know this is a first read I encourage you to just you know read through that that that policy has the most revisions um but it was you know some thoughtful uh thoughtful revisions reflecting how we do um what we do in in the uh
074in the district now um so that's sort of the summary of all of the changes um again this is a first read I'd be happy to answer any questions you might have um after this next step will be a second read and a proposed vote hopefully at uh hopefully at the next school committee meeting so be open to any uh comments questions that you might have I will just start off by saying thank you Mr Kylie members of the subcommittee and anyone else uh that joined you in this endeavor I know uh certainly was a lot of work uh so uh the committee certainly appreciates it thank you questions for the first read now I reiterate thanks for doing this overdue thank you uh I do have a question and I'll keep it brief uh
075bbbbbbb uh School Committee Member qualifications oath of office I think this got up this got brought up once in the past and I'm not sure if um legally wise uh ality wise uh we're able to do it um but I think if all of our um employees of the uh Dartmouth Public Schools is required to uh take in pass a Corey uh that I would love to see some kind of language uh in the policy that reflects that uh school committee members uh should have to pass a Corey I don't know uh if that'll be challenged uh in you know uh through legal how however I I just think that if everyone else in the public school system should have to take and pass a Cory that uh school committee members should also I don't
076know just for what it's worth I don't know how the committee feels about that um but I and I don't know if that's IL legal from a political standpoint okay so if if the committee is interested in um you know in looking at a possible change there we'll certainly U look into it and Report back but yeah yeah that's so I think in the fairness if we're asking everybody else to do it yes we should do it but I also think the idea of Corey is um that that is for people who will have one-on-one contact with our students with not another adult um whereas I don't think that anybody on this committee ever does so is it just an unnecessary an additional expense um just so that we're correct or would it serve um
077a purpose I mean I'm have no problem with it I I I feel like visually it would look good if we all did it I I guess personally I just feel if someone's going to be throw it out there running for office for a uh and I don't want to be political right now but if we're running for an office for a public school system to oversee a public school system that I I don't know I I'm just I could go either way but I'm just I want to put it out there I think it's important you know we're supposed to be representatives of the dmouth public school system yeah I think it's worth checking out with legal council yep we can check it out and report back I don't know if any other districts
078do it but I just threw it out there ask around sounds good uh let's see going back what else do we have here proposed meeting dates January 25th through June 25th uh June January 2025 through June 2025 uh everyone should have received uh the dates no yes yep yep there we go comments questions around these proposed dates I'm good with them I'm fine with them I'm fine with them we'll be very busy from now until the end of the year because they're almost every agenda is already sort of prepopulated and there's a lot um really to bring before the Committee in the next 6 months uh oh wow so Monday January 27th is already we're looking at the proposed date for the great idea school choice hearing okay yeah I just was noting that that
079I appreciate that it just um seems to be quite an effort to get ahead of things I think we were sort of I think we have to do it by a certain day but by doing it at this time I think aligns with allowing people to make a more meaningful decision about who where they want to go and and and applying to be part of our community um makes a lot of sense in terms of getting ahead of it so thank you whoever decided to propose this earlier date we've been getting phone calls Kate has been receiving phone calls inquiries already I I to have been receiving from the community what's that I've been receiving inquiries from the community as well so that's a good sign y great sign certainly is and I do have
080a question around school choice but I'll save it to the chairperson report so we're good with this calendar yes perfect all right next up we have the school calendar proposed 2025 2026 Dr Sab Maguire yep so we decided to present you with two options you can see um if we can just start with looking at option one where uh we would come back our staff would come back the 25th our students would start school uh the first day of school would be the 27th I think what's probably the most significant difference though is I'll just go down to um December because of the way the holiday falls and so with option one our students would um be in school on both December 22nd and December 23rd and that would allow for an earlier last day
081of school which would bring us to June 11th uh that's without snow days with snow cancellation days that would bring us to the 18th uh one of the positives with that calendar too is is that the 19th is a holiday and so that would allow us to finish up the school year on a Thursday and not go in to the following week so that's option one oh oh and let me just go back for a minute with option one we would um come back from that December break on January 5th so January 2nd would be a a day off this year we came back the Thursday Friday because that made sense to get kids back in school um we think that was a great decision uh going into next year though it would really be
082bringing kids back for one day so if we go to option two again the major difference is that we would not be in school on the 22nd and 23rd those would be days off and we also that we would also uh not be in school for that January 2 so in in effect we'd have an entire two weeks off um so the I guess you know something to consider there is again getting into June that brings you to your last day of school being a Monday June 15th that's without snow days um and then if there were snow days that would bring us until June 22nd which would mean again coming in in that following Monday with the June 19th being the holiday so those are things that we're asking that you consider and to
083make a decision and I'll just let you know um I did talk to Mr noons he prefers option one um and one of the considerations that he asked to bring forward was that the 23rd be a half day so if we were to be in school on December 22nd and 23rd the 22nd would be a full day and the 23rd would be a half day so the big difference is do we come to school the Monday Tuesday or take an entire two weeks off thoughts comments questions you want to go um did my own little research on this I don't really have a hard I I can see you know just having a family that kind of a kiddo that sort of relies on routine I can see some negatives of having a longer time
084off but um the community that I've heard from has spoken and over arching and look at that table I've heard in all caps I'm in my head I say that's like all caps two weeks so I I'm feeling like the community has an appetite for two weeks weeks off um irregardless of how I feel about that um but I don't really have a strong feeling either way you wanted to share my research Miss Beck I would say exactly the same thing so it it really to me it's no no different but I have also heard from some community members um that they would prefer the full two weeks small sample no small sample um small sample par um I know that many of our families do travel for that holiday and being in school on
085the 24th would be a hardship 23rd 23rd 23rd um and I wonder how our teachers feel about a week and a half versus two weeks not in terms of time off for them but um the lack of routine and how much harder it is after two weeks is it easier after a week and a half or does it not make a difference um but I I lean on the two weeks um but am not firm certainly a good good point Miss coflin so I've actually over the years and I just haven't brought it up in past years but I'll bring it up because we're having some good conversation here one of the things that I've also heard from parents is the um bir I don't want to say burden but the parent teacher conferences in
086December um that they're not f a lot of te a lot of um parents are just not fans of the parent teacher conferences in December um it just seems as though we're especially we look at the calendar here and we look at the 17th the week before Christmas that it's it's just very difficult to um try to get in whether I don't know if we're still doing them on Zoom or not um or if they're in person no they're in person but trying to do that so that's just one thing well that's definitely something we can take a look at we've actually had some internal conversation about outdates for parent conferences and some um possibility to make some changes I just and and that's you know certainly your purview Dr s but I know it's
087on the it's on the calendar it shows up on the calendar so I figured I'd just throw my two cents into it thank you for that but yeah whatever whatever we can do and as far as the uh option one versus option two I personally don't don't have one way the other um other than um two weeks certainly I think for the for the community might be nice do we know the dates of Hanukkah for next year um up yep I would just um and again I don't personally I don't have a preference but I I would say to you that from talking to some of the area superintendent some of my colleagues um there is more of an appetite to be in school the 22nd and 23rd um so and in some of the
088school calendars that have already been set maybe not local school calendars but uh Kate did some homework and pulled some calendars where communities have already set their calendar for uh next year most districts are in school on the 22nd and the 23rd just for your information certainly appreciate that that research so Hanukkah does end Monday December 22nd for next year it ends it begins on the 14th and ends on the 22nd do are you looking for a vote this evening I mean if you're prepared to make one okay so what do we know what the rationale of the superintendent is for liking being in school the 22nd 2 I think that um two things that you've already brought up one is that uh consistency and that being away from school for two entire weeks can
089really be disruptive to families and to kids in particular and I think it it can do the very that Mrs Amaral brought up and I think that is disconnect students from the routines that I think are really healthy for them um the other thing is uh maybe you didn't bring it up but I think it's important is you know we can't predict the weather and sometimes it's not just snow days sometimes there are other factors where you may have to call off school and if you get too deep into the month of June what happens is you run out of room and you could I mean you conceivably you could end up with not having enough days to complete the 180 days um I don't think that that's necessarily true in Dartmouth because we do
090start before Labor Day uh but I would still say that that's a worry for people and then the other thing that I think people have to consider is that when you go later into June as much as that two- week break for the holiday break is nice it means your summer break is shorter and so somewhere there is um there whether it's DEC the two weeks in December or going later in June you're um you're going to lose some vacation time and I guess the the other thing and this is obviously the educator in me is that I think you know instructional time is really important and instructional time in December might look really different than later in June in buildings that can be really hot um and I think that has impact so again
091I don't have a preference but those are just things for you to consider um I will say I like Mr nun's idea if we go with the first schedule of having a half day on the 23rd is a brilliant suggestion Mrs Amal I just wonder if we if if it's timely if we were to would there be an opp would it be would yeah I wonder the benefit of waiting for Mr noon's just in case we get into a situation where we're tied here and we realize we wasted 25 minutes of our precious time to come to a tie I don't know if if we're able to do that I think we at least right now tonight we we know instead of kicking that I know you would just kick that can down the road
092uh that's what we get paid the big bucks for right uh to make these decision decisions um so I think we know where Mr nud stands um so if there was a tie uh we could certainly wait at that point and bring it back at the following meeting is that a third option then Mr no's option that would be a third op oh yeah and you know there are some parents who'd want their kids in school on Monday and Tuesday for reasons and it could be a little bit selfish I can see both might be busy I can see that I can see both sides I can see both sides here yeah that that would be me but I do know that the voices of lots of folks did say a small sampling of lots
093of folks is that is that a that a real statement but I I I did hear overwhelmingly request for two we seems nice yeah does anyone want to make a motion weighty decision it is it wey decision we can if if we really want to think about it I guess there is no harm in taking it back there isn't we're here in a what two weeks anyway right all right so everybody call your school Committee Member your favorite school Committee Member in the next two weeks all right so is that the committee's pleasure that we'll you want you want to digest this a little bit and think about it yes I do okay committee has spoken we're going to uh take this back up and kick it down the road to the next meeting I'm
094going to take a poll at the supermarket do a straw poll make sure you go at different times of the day thank you though honestly I have to save aguire for uh the insight and your thoughts uh next up superintendent update okay this is all of most of the fun stuff some of it anyway um but obviously we have had a lot to catch up on tonight so we'll go right into our update I'll start off with just talking quickly about the mcast because at a future meeting I am going to have um Dr t-bolt talk about what this means means in ter in in a very detailed way but what I think it's important for people to know is that although the mcast is no longer a factor as a graduation requirement as a
095competency determination we still are we are still giving the mcast tests students are still taking the mcast test it is still a requirement in fact it's a legal requirement of a school schol District to administer uh Statewide test and that is tied to something that we talked about earlier and that is federal dollars and so we're required to give the test um what I'm excited about with Dartmouth as much as you know there's some confusion and I do think the state still has some details to work out and and we still have some things to work through darmouth has done a really good job you as a committee you as a school district and setting graduation local graduation requirements that are completely aligned with state and federal requirements and so I think that overall we're
096in really in a really good place and that what we need to do is we need to just be really clear with the public and with our students and with our families about what the course of studies now means here in Dartmouth and how it's all you've always had to complete and passion your course of studies here at darmouth high school in order to earn a high school diploma you always have had to do that that hasn't changed what has changed now is that that is now also at the committee once we will bring it to the committee because you will have to take a vote on it it becomes the competency determination which was formerly the mcast so um the other thing I would just say to you is in in Dartmouth really right
097now Dr tbolt took a look at the high that's some of our high school students who right now may be impacted by some of these changes we we really are looking at seven students that we're going to be working really closely with to make sure that we're supporting them them in the way that we need to to make sure that they're able to meet the graduation requirements here at dmouth high school but more to come on that um so but what I think is the most important takeaway is we all we're all still giving and taking the mcast it is still a requirement and I really have confidence that the kids when they take these kind of assessments are going to give it an honest effort I think I don't think just because it's no
098longer the 10th grade graduation requirements that kids are just going to throw their hands up and say this isn't important because what we're instilling in our students is a sense of importance in being able to assess for helping us and helping them to assess their own learning because after all that's actually what the assessment is about is it safe to say that John and Abigail's scholarship will still it is absolutely safe to say that there will still be a John and Abigail Adams scholarship yes yes I ask a question um something for Ross's presentation um that or L uh maybe Miss denisio would have um a response to this I would just be curious of of those seven um on the other spe end of the spectrum if any of those students were meeting those
099graduation competency requirements now are not held or Bound by the threshold of the mcast and and is their acceptance of their diploma going to impact those critical potential necessary um transition to 22 require no okay well I I think that there there's there is one student in uh who May yeah yeah who I think it's going to benefit oh well that's good sorry okay so there are other you know there are lots of different I think ways that this is impacting individual students but overall I think we're in really good shape here um so I also wanted to update you on where we are with the Playbook initiative we should be so proud of the work that we're doing here in Dartmouth not every community in the state is part of the Playbook initiative as
100you've heard Dr t-bolt talk about it is a competitive process they've made some changes this year and and this year what they I guess they're going back to some of their roots in that in the past you've been partnered with a district and this year we are partnered with old Rochester um so what that means is that we're going to have a couple of opportunities where our St where students from Rochester actually come to Dartmouth and work with our students then we go to Old Rochester and do the same and we're talking about up to 30 middle schoolers from each of the districts and then our own School our own internal first of all our staff who are the leaders but our student leaders who are the ones who are really truly in leadership of
101working with the the younger students so that's really exciting um we are um working with I just want to mention um yeah I've already mentioned Dr TBO but I also want to mention that Senora Chamberlain has uh is also one of our leaders at the high school level and that's been really wonderful so our middle schoolers will plan a day of action and that will happen in the spring and I'm sure we'll be back here to talk to you about it next we have in math I have to mention um and our high school math department has worked really hard this year with a new curriculum uh we just met with them right before the holiday break to hear some of the concerns that they have about with any new resource the challenges that you
102can be that you need to overcome both as a teacher and a student we are responding to that we are working very closely with the Carnegie Representatives who are going to uh I think they've put an action plan in place where they're going to come in and more directly support our teachers uh Fall River is a community that's actually using this resource and they're using it well and having a lot of success so we're we are working with Fall River and with Dartmouth to arrange some opportunities for our teachers to go into visit the Fall River Fall River dery High School am I saying that right dery High School um to uh work with their teachers and to learn from them and to hear about some of the challenges that they probably also had when
103they adopted this resource and at the same time I want to say it's really important that we recognize our teachers voice when we select a curriculum and we'll be sure that we're true to that and a good example of that is the work that Mrs poo has been doing with literacy across the district and I'm going to ask her to come up and to share some really exciting news because I think this is a great example of what we can do when we do it in collaboration with our teachers whose voices are incredibly important happy New Year everybody um you've been I feel like you've been on this journey a little bit with us you know it has been and a journey is a good word for it because it hasn't been a short process
104um this has been a year and a half in the making where we started last year by just vetting uh we had five different publishing companies come in and share their product with us we narrowed it down to two um and we did a halfe pilot we did a um 8we pilot with elel education and then uh a similar length pilot with CK and right before the break our Ela team came together did some work we will share a full um kind of the data with you um but we wanted to share that CK is the program that overwhelmingly is the one that our teachers who and K I will say and our students the the best part for me was going in and listening to students um I had a I had a I
105went into one of the classrooms I feel like I know the the kids and it's really it's done a lot of good for a lot of things to be back in classrooms and to to interact with kids on a on a regular basis and one of the kids said to me you're the lady from the Middle Ages right and I said well I am and don't I look so good for being from the Middle Ages um but the the kids and and I'm talking to the teachers um they had a lot to say about it at parent teacher conferences they're excited about it so CK stands for um core knowledge language arts and the premise of both programs is that they are knowledge-based programs so our students are being immersed in things that they may
106not otherwise have um chosen El use that word um I had a fifth grader who said to me I never would have chosen to read about ancient civilizations but I'm so glad that I did because it's cool and now I know about it and um I had a second grade teacher who told me that at during parent teaching conferences her her uh parent shared that their family they had done a Greek mythology unit right in second grade but that their family did this whole sort of uh investigation into Greek gods and goddesses and the conversation that the kids are having about it so it's really um in-depth Rich learning the process is one as Dr Sab McGuire said that our teachers were super involved in all the way across they could and I will ask
107them to come speak to you because I think you've heard me talk at nauseum about it um but you should hear from them sort of the process of how we got from um just really doing a revision of our or review of our current curriculum in knowing that we needed to go somewhere and saying so so what now what and kind of taking those next steps um but you will hear a lot about CK going forward and I'm excited to you know share any information we welcome you to come in and see some of the lessons because they are very fun um and it's good stuff thanks thank you thank you great thank you so we're excited and again we'll have a future presentation that really takes you through what that process looked like it's
108not quite the same process uh that we're using here at the high school but what is what is the same is that teacher voice is important in this process it's different here because we're all on into one roof what we're doing at the elementary level is bringing together people from across the district and multiple grade levels I ask a yes um in in terms of like the math and and the going through the um uh the um utilizing the curriculum um have some of the like the feedback from the teachers have some of the feedback related to uh I'm just thinking in the high school level like grades grades are always important but um are student grades affected in a way that is noticeable is has that been a potential impact I'm curious as to
109how that's is and has student voice been part of that process I think that that's a great question and I can't answer it off the top of my head but we have talked about that okay and we hadn't quite if when we we had just met right before the holiday break with the math department and what one of the teachers said was we're you know we're 40% through the school year well we're 40% through the school year we have a lot of school left right and so breaking down how grades have been impacted I think at this point we would be able to make some comparisons um and we could do that so that is a wonderful I'm glad that you brought that up it's something that we've talked about and we'll be able to
110provide that information and student voice does also have we we we also have to consider student voice it's a little different with selecting a curriculum right um so we I meet with students so I listen when I meet with them with the superintendent advisory I have had a couple of students talk to me about the new math resource I intentionally ask them how things are going for them in their math classes and since the beginning of the year to now I've heard that they're feeling better and better about it um but at the same time we know that there are some concerns and so what we're working to do is put the appropriate supports in place for our teachers so that they feel more comfortable and confident and have less doubts because right now it's
111coming from a good place for our teachers they have some some doubt that the resource that they're using is having the intended impact on students and so we need to do that work with them thank you and so I'm going to move on on to uh some of the things going on under budget Capital Improvement HR starting with HR uh I I think I might have mentioned this at the last meeting but I can't remember but we do have an elll teacher did I I did mention that um her name is Maddie Carrera apparently she was our student representative a number of years ago name sounds familiar yes so she is now working uh as an eell teacher in the school district and she's sharing responsibilities between the high school and the middle school we
112are still seeking a stepup teacher for the high school um that has been really difficult I don't think that and that's not about Dartmouth and even us being able to identify uh somebody to come in and take over that ell Ro that has been difficult and that is a state wide problem and it's probably a national problem but it's certainly something that I'm hearing from my colleagues across the state now I'm really pleased about Staffing levels here in darmouth I really truly am because I hear from some of my other colleagues that there are multiple positions in both mostly special education and English English language learner um teachers where they're just not able to find somebody to fill those roles so I continue to be pleased to see that people are attracted to coming to
113Dartmouth working here staying here and really making the commitment um at the kushman school uh you know that we had been interviewing for a new director we had many qualified candidates for the position uh the interview process I thank Mrs denisio for for leading that and making sure that it was an inclusive process there were many voices that were consider considered and making that selection and Jim and I just recently met with the finalists that the selection committee uh put forward and we're pleased to announce that Stephanie ricardi who's a longtime New Bedford educator will be assuming the role she was absolutely a resounding Choice by all the folks that were involved in the entire process again we're in a really good place because we had a very qualified applicant pool and this person Rose
114to the top both Jim and I were so pleased when we met her we really have a lot of confidence that she is going to come in and be able to hit the ground running and make a real difference at the kushman school she'll be starting in February uh she's in New Bedford now and wants to see out um her responsibilities there and transition her duties to whoever it is that will be uh replacing her but in the meantime how lucky are we that we have Mrs Brooks and we have Karen McCarthy who are splitting the responsibilities there and that the feedback that we're getting is that that's been a really nice bridge for for the kushman school Community uh you also know that we advertise both the Quinn and Potter School principal ships and
115obviously uh highly qualified applicants so we should be excited about that uh people want to come here they want to lead here they want to work here that's what we want to say what we want to see Mrs poo is leading that process very similarly to what Mrs denisio did at the kushman school this will be an inclusive process there will be a a SC there'll be a committee a screening interview committee made up of of teachers made up of esps made up of the all important school administrative assistant because we know that that person works so closely with school leadership um also uh we're we're going to be reaching out if Mrs poo hasn't already to uh ask School Committee Member to sit on on that team and then when we uh when when
116that team makes uh a recommendation just like we just did with the kushman director position uh the person will meet with uh with Mr Kylie and myself and so that we're all part of that selection process I just want to thank you for thank you for moving forward and Miss p as well for uh for putting these uh in Mrs dionio as well for having an inclusive process I think it's so important think it is too it's important that the community can see that their voices are important and those are important positions and we want to make sure that we're we're doing it right as best as we can um I'm you know I'm going to have to say that we're always looking for monitors substitute teachers even esps custodians Food Service workers so you
117know the application Pro that process is just always ongoing it's just never a finite process uh so with that I'm going to ask Jim to update you although he did a lot of talking today I don't know if there's anything else that he missed no in terms of uh no I think we've said it all in terms of budget Capital Improvements all that stuff I think you got it all in I think we did I think he did all right so he's off the hook for that this part um are safe and supportive schools these are the things that I think are just really critical to our school communities and I'm excited about um this opportunity that the high school and middle school partnered on I can't thank Mr Shay enough I can't thank Mr
118Christa Foy uh Mr Rossy the middle school high school everybody involved but what we did was we had the middle the high school sports captains cheer um they actually traveled to the middle school and met with our eighth graders to talk to them about their experiences and the opportunities that they were able to uh enjoy benefit from here at Dartmouth High School and that was very intentionally done and it was done in response to student voice where at one of our superintendent advisories uh one or more of our students shared with us that well you know we think that maybe at the middle school level it seems like we hear a lot about other opportunities but not necessarily about what we have right here at Dartmouth High School and that could have maybe impacted some
119of the decisions that some of my classmates made to go elsewhere and so our team here jumped right into action and put something together and I was able to to see it in action and I have to say what a benefit it was for both the seniors at the high school and for the eighth graders um you know both of those groups of students really got a lot out of that one one of the students the seniors who was speaking to a group of students she was so nervous at the beginning and then by the end she was just really beaming that she had had that opportunity to engage in that kind of interaction with younger students and then the eighth graders were invited here to Dartmouth High School to participate in or to be
120sort of like onlookers at the pep rally and we do believe that those kind of experiences can make a difference for students who are making really important decisions and families who are making really important decisions about where they're going to attend high school so that was done very intentionally I know that there's a spring there's another visit being planned for the spring and so we'll continue to do those kind of things really because we want to keep our Dartmouth kids in Dartmouth right uh I just want to mention because it was so long ago um but it seems so long ago but really it couldn't have been that long ago um but the unified basketball and the gmur we had a group of traveling Educators from belgaria here did I already talk about this I
121might have mentioned it in my Friday update Friday email yeah yeah so but they came to Dart they were so incredibly impressed by that jeree and how um multiple communities came here to Dartmouth High School to participate in that and again can't give the special ed office and the folks here at the school who are so committed to that work um um Mr bro Mr Capello I mean really just amazing leadership to really put Dartmouth on the map but for the very re for the only reason is to do what's right for kids and to give them experiences that are incredibly inclusive experiences um and as a matter of fact our teachers now have been invited to Bulgaria so they are actually traveling when are they going in July I think yeah so they will
122be no we're not paying for it but that's how impressed this group of Educators were with what they saw Dartmouth the Dartmouth High School Educators doing here with their stud with the students here so that was really exciting um I do want to mention our dhsv media students since they're working right now somewhere behind closed doors um they were able to with Mr parate travel to New York City for a fantastic trip I think it was December 27th they were able to visit the Museum of moving image in austoria they went on an NBC Studio Tour they visited 30 Rockefeller Center 30 Rock and then they had a nice dinner in New York City apparently they were on a beautiful coach bus um they really enjoyed it and part of this is um in part
123of this we we have we should be grateful to it's Devin Rob robitel robitel um at Mass hire of Greater New Bedford who has helped get us funding for this trip so really exciting and to get the students from here where we have a beautiful TV studio here at this High School out to New York City to be able to see you know what the bigger world has and what opportunities they may have if that's of interest to them so I thank Mr parate for that and I share those things because under safe and supportive schools because the correlation between being safe feeling safe and supported in school is connected to a sense of belonging and what a wonderful opportunity for students to be together as a group I think there are about 20 students
124um and five adults to be together as a group from Dartmouth and to have that experience together and that really is what leads to a sense of belonging um and finally we want to be intentional about how we engage our families in the community and in our schools since our last school committee meeting um we have uh I've continued to go out to PTO meetings to talk to our pto's about our district strategic plan I have I I think two PTO meetings that I'll be attending this week and in case you've missed it uh the what's cooking in Dartmouth um that was apparently now on the front page of Dartmouth week so yep so but I can't thank um M mag Magnolia mcomish enough because I mean that's her her creativity right and her commitment
125to doing that for the community gave me an opportunity as a superintendent to talk about something that's really important not only the baked mac and cheese but the district strategic plan even more importantly um and she was you know I just think that's such a wonderful thing for the town but for us it's a way for us to get our story out there in a way that may engage the public in a different way and I'm pretty sure Mr gashaw is scheduled I think he's going to make it Chile if I'm not yeah I think so and so um you know maybe one of you might be interested in appearing on what's cooking in Dartmouth cuz could be really fun it was not as intimidating as it seemed once you once you get into the
126routine it just kind of flows and Magnolia is a wonderful host so she does a good job leading you through it I just also finally want to mention that um Bridgewater State University continues to be a really promising partner for us you've seen we've got you know a leadership course that we have offered to our Educators we have course that a cohort course in for a masters and reading that we'll be offering to our Dartmouth Educators that's coming up sometime this month and those meetings are happen joint meetings those professional development meetings are happening on a monthly basis with our district leadership team and with leadership from Bridgewater State so lots of great things happening and thank you that's I there's more but we only have so much time comment questions thoughts thank you no
127thank you for your report you're welcome lots of great stuff Happening Here uh I will keep my comments brief I just want to take this opportunity I don't think I did at the last meeting while it was cancelled um uh to thank the principles I had an opportunity I scheduled some time to go visit all of our schools with the exception of D Melo school I I was supposed to get there but um I ran out of time and I got to get back there but um thank you to Audra and all the rest of the uh principles had a great time it's great to get in the schools and see what's going on in the classrooms it's been a while since I've been there and just listen to you know what's specific to those
128buildings uh but certainly uh I encourage you if you haven't done it in a while to try to get uh boots back in there on the ground and uh see what's happening in the schools so thank you to all the principles uh that was certainly a lot of fun um just a couple of other things one being you might have noticed that uh you had received an email from Kate gner regarding uh being added to the district email list I had asked uh for the school committee just to be part of the district emails that go out I think it certainly helps with collaboration as well as just seeing the communication coming out of the district office and we are charged with uh evaluating the superintendent of schools and communication is certainly one of those
129things so it's just helpful to see some of the things the postings that are going out um so I thank you for that Dr s Maguire and um yeah no I think uh just just to be able to yeah thank you Kate as well um just to see what the The Happening that's going on at least at the district level for sure um and then just circling back we had talked about when we were uh discussing the uh public hearing for school choice I'm just going to throw this out there that um for to for our next meeting for the which is the public hearing on school choice uh I would love to hear the district's the administrative administration's thoughts on the possibility of opening some school choice slots at the middle school level um
130I'm curious uh just to see if one we had space at the middle school level if there was a desire um if we could accommodate them because I feel as though with school Choice uh we certainly it's helped out significantly uh being able to maintain our course offerings at the high school and if we were to maybe open it up to seventh or eighth graders uh those are students that would be certainly interested in coming to dmouth high school so I would just love to hear the administration's uh perspective on that and you know if if it's feasible and if it's not that's fine too um but uh I just think that maybe just thinking outside of the box um okay we can make that put something together for yeah I know it's shot notice
131it's only two weeks I'm sure we can put I didn't realize that this public hearing was in two weeks so that's all I have okay great my fellow committee members no all right uh let me pull up the when's the next meeting 2 what did we say the 27th you so at this time uh the next regularly scheduled meeting of the dma school committee would be a Monday January 27th at this time chair will entertain a motion to adjourn so moved second we have a motion in a second on the motion any further discussion all in favor I I I opposed motion carries unanimously have a good night everyone good night [Music] for