Dartmouth School Committee Meeting, February 12, 2024

001wish [Music] good evening everyone I would like to call to order this school committee meeting for February 12th 2024 please stand if you're able for the Pledge of Allegiance the 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 uh roll call Kate Kathleen ameral here Chris Oliver here Elizabeth Coughlin here Shannon Jenkins John new yep just want to make a note that uh to please silence your phones and laptops if you can I just did mine um the public is able to access this meeting via a live stream at uh www .y youtube.com dhsv media um it is also being recorded to be rebroadcast on DCTV channels 9 on Wednesdays and Thursdays at 5: Friday 6:00

002a.m. Saturday at 8:00 a.m. and Sunday at 2 p.m. as well as through uh channel 18 on Mondays and Saturdays at noon and Thursdays at 3: and um without further Ado I would uh will begin our meeting um with public comment so if anyone wishes to comment on any item that is on our agenda please step up to the podium and please state your name before you make your comments don't all run looks like that's a no all yell um and so it looks like um we do not expect a student rep this evening that's right she could evening no worries Lots on her plate uh we yes as we've lots and lots and so good for her and uh no worries with that so I will um next I will entertain a motion to

003approve our minutes we have both the regular and executive session minutes for January 22nd um Adam J make a motion we approve the regular session minutes of January 24th second that's 22nd it's the 22nd yes it says 24th on the agenda but it was the 22 listen I got 22nd yep it's okay I'm all right it's so we have a motion we have a second by Mr Oliver any any discussion okay um hearing none all in favor I I passes unanimous Madam chair make a motion we uh approve the executive session minutes of January 22nd 2024 and hold them until the matter for which they were completed is complete second okay we have a motion by Mr noones a second by Dr Jenkins any further discussion all in favor I I motion passes 5 unanimous

004um my compter okay do 29 um so we have consent agenna I'm going to turn it over to Dr Maguire did we do the 29th oh I'm sorry I'll make a motion that we approve the uh regular session minutes from January 29th second okay we have a a motion by Dr Jenkins a second by Miss Co Miss Coughlin any discussion on those minutes regular session minutes of January 29 all in favor I I motion motion passes five zero uh unanimous now I'll move it to the consent agenda items Dr sa Maguire great as you can see on the consent agenda we have a couple of exciting events coming up for our that our students will be participating in um all from our all with our Dartmouth High School students we have two World Championship competitions

005one for indoor percussion and one for varsity wintergard and that's going to be happening in April of 2024 which is not too far away now um and then the other significant event for our students is that a group of our students will be attending the masc annual spring conference and that's really an exciting opportunity for our students like yourselves and myself we got to experience the masc conference um in the fall and this one is geared toward our students so this offers them an exciting opportunity to be really involved in Civic engagement I know that Mr Shay is here and if you have any questions about any one of those three he's happy to answer any of your questions no Madam chair make a motion we approve the U three consent gender items the uh

006indoor percussion to uh World WGI World Championships in April the vity went toot also to WGI World Championships in April and the uh High School uh Student Council masc annual spring conference in March excellent second have a motion by Mr Nunes we have a second by best Coughlin any discussion Mr Oliver thank you madam chair so my my only question and this is for maybe Mr share anyone on the board here is this the first year I don't remember approving the the masc um we have not past so is this the first year we're doing that that I know of since I've been here yeah so um our student council was really excited about it so we're sending four officers or five officers four uh four seniors and a a junior okay excellent perfect yeah

007no that was my only question and as always best of luck to the uh to the other groups absolutely I agree with that any other questions or comments no thank you thank you great so we have a motion by Mr noones we have that uh was it best for the second um best yeah best without uh any other discussion be had uh all in favor I I motion passes um unanimously 5 um next I'm also going to turn it over we have old business uh we're going to have a discussion around the fiscal 25 budget update Dr s and again before I just turn it o right over to Mr Kylie I think it's important to preface our update this evening with some caution I mean although the re we have to be optimistic and

008at the same time we have to acknowledge the fact that our budget will in fact be impacted by um the decrease in in the aid from in local Aid so I'm going to turn it right over to Mr Kylie thank you Dr sa Maguire so um you know we've had a lot of budget discussion up until this point obviously uh what we're doing right now is we're working to identify areas um to consider so that we can present an at our next school committee meeting on March 11th A reduced budget uh from 6% where we originally were down to 3% um so we have to reduce that budget by a million A5 dollars we know that school choice is going to play a role in that reduction um but we're finding uh that you know

009we need to pay attention to a variety of factors in terms of bridging that Gap so uh on March 11th we will present to you uh our plan for fiscal year 25 it'll be a 3% budget um and then on March 25th hopefully uh we can hold the public budget hearing and then April 8th would be a proposed date to vote to have the school committee vote for the budget obviously we can have discussion and dialogue at any of those meetings regarding the budget but that's uh that's what we're working on right now meeting with principles and and and their staff so that's where we are with it any comments questions Mr Oliver thank you uh this Amaral I guess my only question for you Mr Kylie is um with the school choice playing uh

010it being a factor um after our vote to use it uh to help bridge the gap do we have any idea of the uh FTE that we're that we're looking to to cut at this time or is that you would like to hold off to our next meeting yeah I mean I think we'll we'll have a presentation at the next meeting with all the details so everything will be transparent at that point and we'll have recommendations obviously we've had to change gears throughout this budget process a couple of times um and are in the process of doing that we want to do it right um so we didn't want to rush it tonight we still need to work with the schools and identify areas but it's safe to say that while school choice will be

011utilized to bridge the gap it's not the only thing that we're going to propose so um you know we need to do our due diligence and be cautious and obviously you know think about the future here um so we're we're in the in the midst of that putting a plan together for you is it too early to speculate or is it safe to say that we can expect uh Pink some some amount of pink slips I think that what um our focus is going to be is to attempt to make reductions based on attrition okay however it's not necessarily true that that will be the the overall solution I mean there may be um a need to look beyond that um and that that's if you're going to do that you have to be very

012careful about you know the decisions you're making and um we want to make sure that you understand what the impact of those decisions will be so that's our plan to present um you know almost a month from now now but uh with March 11th but um is to have that all for you so you clearly understand the impact of what we're what we're going to propose well thank you and I and what we're going to move into school choice which I think is an important decision as well you know what what gets shifted there right so agreed well thank you for that and I will I will certainly hold off on any further questions till uh next month I saw Mr noones yeah thank you madam chair okay so now I'm totally confused which I

013know sometimes doesn't take much but when we had the joint meeting with the select board and the fincom MH there was a million5 gap and we said we went back to our meeting and we funded that with school choice money much to everybody's one-time use etc etc type of deal what has changed I'm missing something here no I I do I don't think you're missing anything I think I think you're right that that is what the course of action that took place however um I do think that there were items in our original budget proposal that um were then added back into the budget for the purposes of looking at it from an override perspective potentially that never you know came to fruition and so we still need to do our due diligence in terms

014of looking critically at our oper a um the school choice money I'm glad we glad we saved it yeah it's not going to be around forever and I do think that we need to be cautious as to um you know what we can and can't do moving forward in terms of making decisions I don't think that the long-term future of our budget um I don't think it makes sense to just fund all 1.5 to5 million of uh what was on the table at that January 20 what January January 8th meeting um I don't think that that necessarily is going to be the plan that we're going to present to you because I think we need to think critically about our operation and okay I would it be worth I'm sorry you no go ahead I

015got another but go ahead because I'm going to change gears um would it be worthwhile to convene uh meeting of the budget subcommittee y to seek maybe our input we'd be happy to do that that would be a great idea that's a great idea yep yeah we'll reach out with some dates potential dates and we can pull before the next full committee meeting I think that would be at least educate me a little bit yep we will do so Dr Jenkins and then back to Mr so I think we have to be careful here too because to John's question about the 1.5 million it now looks like we asked for 1.5 million and we didn't get it and now we're like oh oh well actually we don't quite need 1.5 million so I think as

016we make choices about what's coming back out of the budget we need to be really clear about what the implications of that are because otherwise it looks like we are asking for things we don't need I know the reductions that we're talking about will create some pinch and I think we have to be honest with that otherwise we sort of lose our credibility um as we start to think about an override in the community yeah exactly uh I want to still in the budget but I want to shift gears a little bit and go back to the update that Dr Sabre Maguire gave us uh Friday the cross and the crossing guards are going am I what am I missing well it's not the crossing guards it's that we're we we met with the police

017department we we met with the chief and we're what we're losing is the traffic director um and that's because they can't the police department can't fill the position and that director currently uh you'll see that that person is outside of the middle school and outside of the Quinn school and so that was basically I think they were down to their last traffic sup director and that person now they're they're unable to fill that position and so we're working very closely with the middle school and obviously with the Quinn School admin team to make sure that we have a in place to mitigate losing those really important that person is really important to directing traffic in the morning and the afternoon because so correct me if I'm not that's not about money though no no I'm

018not trying to mince words here traffic supervisor tra crossing the people that are outside directing the traffic to let the buses and the pedestrians go across it's not thr in officer it's on an is it an officer not it's a traffic supervisor who's a trained employee of um you know by the police department but is not a police officer right that we used to have four of them um they've been unable to fill them and the last one is going to take another position with the police department um and unfortunately this week will be the last the last week that that person will be on duty um if anybody wants a job uh we'd be happy to point them in the right direction to go talk to the police department about uh about a potential

019position but uh unfortunately like many jobs it's really impossible to find people right now um so we've we've worked with um as Dr sa Maguire said we've worked with the police department with um the middle school and the Quinn school to try and identify you know potential mitigating um factors that that you know we could help with such as offering transportation to kids who are currently walking from to the Middle School from south of Hawthorne Street so um and that will all be communicated directly to the to the families impacted and in general to the Middle School Community um the Quinn school doesn't have unsupervised kids walking uh but there's a lot of people that walk and cross there and get picked up we've expressed our concerns regarding that um I know the police department

020is uh certainly going to approach it from a um from a police officer perspective in terms of enforcement but in terms of having somebody there at this point okay it doesn't appear that that will be the case so um can I just perhaps this could be passed along to the police I mean I'm thinking about it like as a parent right those are the times you have to be there when you're you're getting your kid I don't wonder if the police have not reached out to UMass Dartmouth um you know there are students who are always looking for jobs and they might be more flexible in terms of you know they may be available in the morning and in the afternoon and I do know we have a large uh crime and Justice studies Department

021those are students who are looking um to get into work typically in law enforcement um so you know to have that on their resume as they go look for a job that might be a good place um they're welcome to contact me um but if you could pass that along we could see maybe if we get that posted there um and see if we can't you know find someone you know to do that work suggestion Le okay good thank you anyone else I'm good thank you appreciate it thank you thank you so much um and uh on to long-term capital planning long-term capital planning do you remember those words longterm capital planning seems like it was a lifetime ago that we talked about long-term capital planning but we have been actively working toward um continuing

022to keep long term planning as a priority for the school district and as you know Mr Kylie serves on the long-term capital planning uh committee and we just want to update the public as to where we are with that and start thinking about next steps because we do need to continue to move forward thank you thank you Dr s Maguire so um and thank you all for the opportunity to sort of renew the discussion that we've had um I prepared a presentation I don't intend to go through all the slides in detail because they're repetitive based on what we've already presented to you for the most part although there are some changes um that I'll highlight as we go so to review the process um really I I I don't know if I said this

023before but I think it's important to understand that long-term planning has been going on for a number of years um you know that the school department Department committee have been a part of that for quite a quite a number of years and um you know really the modern era of longterm planning dates back to the msba site visits in 2016 and numerous steps um you know have have been taken since then so this is not not something brand new no new ideas here really um I think the difference is that we're finally at the point where the town is prepared um to uh at least publish some sort of plan um and I think that our role in that is that um we need to provide them some guidance as to priorities and projects that

024are on the need to be on their radar um so that's you know what we're trying to accomplish with this process um I I think it's also important to note that the plan's not set in stone you know this is going to a flexible document anytime you're planning I mean jeez you're planning one year ahead it needs to be flexible right but if you're planning 40 years ahead it needs to be a flexible you know plan um and I I think that everyone understands that and that this is some sort of it's essentially a framework um that will enlight be able to you know it be transparent and Enlighten the community as to what the needs are of the community so um you know I think that that's sort of where setting the stage for

025where we are right now the goals we've reviewed these before um I'll just highlight you know obviously we want an appropriate learning environment for kids that's our number one you know our number one uh goal and and um you know Quality quality learning for all um you know we need a building to be able to do that and I don't think we're in the best position um because uh again you know 72 with without factoring in this building the new building 202 years old now um you know 72 years is our average our average building so you know I don't think that places Us in the best position to educate kids but I do think we do the best we can with what we have so so we had presented some options and the and

026the three options we presented aren't the only options there's other options um and these were things to think about um option A was to replace Dartmouth middle school with a high school uh and then tackle the three elementary schools in some in some order with Potter and Dello being first and then the Quinn School third um option b was to uh approach the elementary schools first then a new middle school and then um the the Quinn School final and option C was to really look at the middle school first and then three elementary schools so replace the middle school and interesting um so we've had some discussion with the mass School building authority on this um what the recommend ation that they're giving us is when we're ready to present a statement of interest to

027them tell them that we are going to replace the Middle School it they said it is not necessary for us to decide at the moment whether the building is a high school whether the building has grades 5 through 8 or whether it's 6 through 8 or 9 through 12 all of that can be part of the feasibility study process working with the msba so what we would be doing is expressing our interest of why that building needs to be replaced and I think we can easily you know justify that um but offer that the community is interested in looking at options um in terms of the our intent for the project looking at options to consider for the community so I found that to be quite helpful because it sort of places us in a

028and C are kind of the same thing now um and you know it's great to have discussion but it's not necessary for us to decide right now that um or to decide 5 through 8 so the kushman school could be closed like we don't have to do that today so just something to consider that that's pretty new information like today talking with the msba so that's why I didn't really change the presentation but um but I was very uh you know very grateful for their Insight on that for sure um you know we did a comparison of options and talked about you know talked about the different things that that I mean this was our thoughts um you know in terms of the impact on students and you know whether they're looking at a high

029school and middle school versus an elementary school would impact more students initially with the first pro project and you know talked about the location in town and placing a new building in the center of town and some of the some of the different um you know different factors that um we considered to be positives or or negatives too in terms of expense um be happy to revisit any of this stuff as we go this is this is a new slide um so looking at timelines and this probably could have changed based on my discussion today a little bit too but um it's generally pretty close so the high school roof can't go to the msba yet so it's it doesn't meet the requirement until 2026 so it was installed in 2001 it has to be

03025 years old before they'll consider the project they just have too many roofs on their list so they can't it's it's an arbitrary number but it's their rule at the moment um BAS based on the volume of uh of statements of interest that they've received so um with that said we've got to wait a little bit longer before we have a major project on the high school roof um a new school as a suggestion could be applied for in the next few years um it does the process itself can take five years so um you know if you apply for that next year or the year after it's it's a ways out before you're going to have a new building that I mean we're just talking about the possibilities for a feasibility study and determining

031what building you build in terms of the grade structure and everything that could probably take a year um you know before you iron everything out and then get the town meeting votes that are necessary we only have two Town meetings it's it's a process that's going to take some time so we have to be aware of that and think of that then if we were to follow up with a second School five or 10 years out from you know that would be a logical you know a logical progression of events this is a little ambitious for sure but um then a third school maybe 15 to 20 years out that depending on whether you're talking about starting with elementaries or starting with a middle school or um it would it would take a bit to

032accomplish our goals obviously ly and then the final school 20 to 30 years out so um it's a long haul and it might very well be longer than this this is sort of an ambitious timeline um so we have to consider that when we're talking about 1955 1956 even 1967 as the ages of the four the four buildings that were really focused on um 30 years out before you start yeah that's a lot of time to keep that building in uh in top condition so something to consider for sure um you know we we had talked about this briefly I I think it is important to keep in mind that the stadium should be addressed somehow um it would be irresponsible not to and it will get to the point at some point where it's

033go we're going to be the water infiltration in the building is going to become a bigger problem that you know we won't be an easy fix not that it's an easy fix it's but it'll be a much more difficult situation if if that's not addressed at some point so I I do think that needs to happen um you know a Dartmouth High School renovation well if you're talking about a 40-year plan and this building's 20 years old I mean in in in 40 years from now I think I think within that scope there's going to be something else done to this building I don't think it's necessar necessarily true that you know we can just this this will be all set no problems outside of a roof that's not realistic um and then you know

034all the implications of if we don't do this or if it takes us too long to do this what do we do with our systems with you know the HVAC with roofing systems are going to come up again and need to be replaced like we I've been a part of all of the roof projects here and so five buildings um but and they should be 30-year roofs but some of those are now like 13 years old so that's going to be in the scope of this you know so that we've got to consider all those things Windows like at the potter and Dello if it was going to be a long-term weit before we tackle those buildings those should be done we've got a there's a lot of considerations to factor into this process um

035so next steps obviously your discussion your questions that's all critical um the thing that I think we need to do is figure out some priority because I think we need to give some information and guidance to that longterm Capital planning committee so um my hope would be that we can have some discussion tonight and see if there's some consensus that could help give direction and I could relay that to that group again doesn't need to be set in stone um but I think they are they are doing good work and trying to put a plan in place um and I don't want to be be the part of that that you know I don't want to hold that up the momentum's great so um we want to we want to be a part of that

036so I think really that's that's the next step in our process here um so I'd be happy to answer any questions you might have or what's the committee Mr Oliver thank you Mr Kylie that certainly is good news the fact that we don't need to make a determination uh whether or not how what that facility would be used for for the grade span and whether or not it's used for a middle school or a high school because that was my number one concern right now es before seeing even a fe feasibility study because I've already had this conversation with some people in town is you want did I hear you want to do what did I hear that the the school committee wants to build a new high school so I'm happy to I'm happy

037to hear that um I think in all honesty I think this town is about 10 years behind the eightball already um maybe even more with um keeping up with our buildings and and renovating or or building new buildings so I think the time to act is now especially if we have a um if we have a long-term uh Capital planning committee that's willing to um to listen to us and willing to make some priorities um yeah I I think uh I think it' be prudent for this committee to take some kind of action through a vote on uh what our priority is uh for me um I think that does make the most sense um after considering it and after hearing what we heard tonight uh that we would uh like to see a uh

038a new building on slokum road uh the site of the current uh middle school that's uh for what it's worth that's my two cents and like I said I think the time to act is now because every every year that goes by the the prices are not going down thank you Mr Oliver Dr Jenkin yeah you know I would agree that the middle school is my priority I'm also glad that we don't have to make a decision about what that is but that building it's just not a 21st Century Learning space it's not I mean they do a great job with what they have but we need to do that um my concern a little bit is seeing this I'm thinking whoa this is really aggressive right and then I don't even have a sense

039of what the town priorities are and what the town is slotting in there do you have you had any conversations right do you understand what they're prioritizing over this period what they're talking about I do um so there's without you know sharing too much detail about other departments that I'm not the expert on I can say that the water and sewer projects are a major component they should be um it I've been very encouraged by um sort of the collegiality of the group in terms of being open-minded and not being siloed I mean I get it like if we don't don't have good clean water or the or the toilets don't flush okay well we can't have school anyway so I get that right so but there's some big projects on that end not as

040big as what would be building a school um but but sizable projects that um are important for the town so there's a lot of discussion of of that what I do think and some of those are pressing um but I think they recognize that our projects are pressing ing as well and I think that you know if if there's consensus tonight um bringing that back to them and kind of sharing our or our projected order of operations we'll try and figure out how um the town could could approach that I do think that um we've sort of charted out debt and uh taking a look at what what it might look like and what it might mean to to the taxpayer we begun that process in that group it's super important part of the process

041and I do think that the town has the ability to undertake multiple projects at one time that it's not necessarily okay we've got to pay off the high school like we just you know we just did before we start the next project I don't I don't think that that's necessary so um granted some projects might be bigger than others you know if we build a high school okay that's a very expensive project the middle school is really expensive too not as much but um so uh you know I I I do think that um there's going to be a way that we fit those projects together that hopefully might not be absolutely ideal for us but it'll be something that we can live with and I'll report back to the group as to once that

042starts to progress but without prioritizing it's a little hard for them to do that too yeah I guess I I guess my concern in asking that is is that right there's always limited appetite among the voters for supporting overrides and as we like the first one or two there might be more appetite and then the further we get and I I worry we end up in a place where while the elementary school on that side of town is brand new and the elementary school on this side of town is still you know nearly 100 years old by the time we're at the end of it so just thinking about sort of the politics the politics of it and you know because we do ultimately even if we're all convinced that the town can take on

043multiple projects ultimately we have to convince the voters that the town can take on multiple projects and so just thinking about I mean obviously Water and Sewer are a good example everyone wants their toilets to flush and you know the water to run but we should think about that in terms of particularly the timing too of right if we're all in agreement that middle school is first right second third and fourth are elementary schools and you know you're looking at a gap of 20 25 years like how how does that work and so I think for me it's clear that the middle school is up here what falls down after that I'm not really sure except to say some rotation of elementary schools right maybe a couple at a time makes more sense than 111

044I don't know yeah I think that is the difficult most difficult challenge we face is I mean I think that the Quinn school would be done after the other two however um how you decide which identical building built by the you know under with the same design same architect same contractor same materials at the same time you're going to replace first that's a tough decision that's why as you can see on my options I said building one building two you know and just I pumped it on that one [Music] um maybe we use the same footprint all right for the again maybe you know and if we could get msba to buy into something like that that would be fantastic mean other districts have right it's possible um so those are things that you know

045again we need to be flexible and we need to be able to change the plan along the way somewhat but Mr thank you madam chair uh two questions Mr Kylie uh on the uh the timeline the high School roof goes to msba in 2026 I'm going to make an assumption that's just the paperwork to get their approval uh yes a statement of Interest would be filed so we're looking at 2728 before we get the roof so we're still we've got to extend the life of this roof we do so I um I don't think I've talked to you about this I don't think I did some engineering work not me personally I hired an engineer um it would be pretty shudy work if it was me but um we I hired an engineer to do

046uh sort of a a survey of the roof condition um highlight areas that we need to focus on and um they came back and said kind of what we knew which is it's in rough shape um lots of things need to be done to this roof and they can't be they can't all be peac meal little you know $20,000 fixes that's just not going to happen so um so we have a challenge ahead of us okay um it's going to be a rough a rough stretch but you're right that's you're talking 28 probably before it's done and that's if we I mean we'll we'll submit a statement of interest is it a guarantee I don't think it is I think what we have going for us is we we've not done an msba project in

047a little bit where trying to preserve a building that um although it wasn't an msba uh building it's a fairly new building um so I I mean I think they'll take that into consideration I think we have a real good shot at getting you know getting funded in the first year but um but yeah it's going to take a going to take a while going to take a while we may need some more funding yeah we may need some more funding you know we've got a little bit of funding that the finance committee um voted our away uh from their Reserve fund for for some you know some roof repairs but um yeah that's it's not we might have to do that every year I I really don't know okay uh another question I have

048before I get to my my options uh if we if we we get in and we end up with slokum road but for whatever reason we end up with that as a middle school fight I mean what's in here what does that do to this building in the sense besides the roof you know I mean can we get another 30 40 50 years out of this building I think we have to we would have to I think we have to and I think we can yeah um you know I I I think one of the things that we put as a as a positive uh an advantage with you know option A which we don't really have to do right now but was that we could possibly have a state-of-the-art high school uh that instead

049of a 50-year-old high school at some point you know um so I mean conceivably by the time that building's done this building will be 30 years old yeah that's all it's not not a brand new school anymore it just isn't um so that's something for the community to consider but if we end up building a middle school I mean we I think I hope you know that um you know we're committed to maintaining the buildings and as long as the town continues to support us through Capital Improvement projects which other than this past year they have been so you know we it's no secret we didn't get it really anything funded last year um outside of some uh some flooring repairs but as long as the town is committed to maintaining the buildings moving forward

050then we'll do our best and and keep this building in good shape as good shape as we can anyway I mean overall I think my agree with Chris and Shannon I like option a type of deal I mean you know take you know fix fix slm Road it moves everything as we've talked about in previous meetings you know there for athletics and Fields and and such uh kind of in some instances would be a little bit of money saving because we wouldn't have to have the buses transporting students here there and hither and Yonder type of deal so uh but I think I think that's the one that you know again you you make it you know a you know early uh you know mid century 21st 21st century uh building so that that's my

051recommendation thank you um I agree um I think middle school should be first um and the fact that there's open space right next to the existing one makes it easier I don't know how any of the middle school or middle schools would be easy because they don't have a plot of land right next to them and you can't just raise the building and what do you do with the kids while you're bu building a new school that that we have to figure out but I guess with plan a or plan of just making a new Middle School we have time to figure out what to do with um the elementary schools so an elementary school obviously costs a lot less than a middle or a high school is it conceivable to do more than one

052Elementary School at a time or is that just like what do you do with the students okay so um I'll I'll give you an idea so well first of all to your first point in terms of the piece of land so we actually have some land um that is developable uh right next to one of the elementary schools so the Dello school um owns actually quite a bit of that property is actually quite large um behind that building that could be a consideration it's big enough to build a school for sure um part of school not as much it might be possible though to to build an Elementary School on that property it would be tight for sure um it would have to be really up in really on the back edge of that property

053um which might not be ideal but that's something to consider and the Quinn school I don't know it's 30 years from now uh or 20 years from now I don't know I don't know we'll have to figure that out I guess sorry Mr Grandfield but you know in terms of doing more than one so so I I think um I I'll mention that we were fortunate we have a um a Dartmouth president apparent um his name is Nathan Silva he works for a major um uh contractor um who um and he has a a great deal of experience with uh building projects and school construction and his his the business that he works for does some very major um School construction projects so he reached out to me quite a while ago offered his assistance

054provided some cost estimates based on our options looking at that um including escalation Clause um costs and and looking at it over timelines and everything it's really he he did a lot of work and and uh you know we're super thankful I I think um you know what we're talking about in terms of projects though it's pretty expensive an elementary school might be $70 million in today's in today's money uh you know a high school might be7 million so I mean could you do multiple elementary schools at once well I mean it might cost less than doing a high school at some point you know so I guess maybe you could but you know we're going to have to look at how all of these projects work within the town's structure what it would mean

055to the tax rate in terms of debt exclusion votes and and what it would mean to the taxpayers so you know we know that there's a lot to do there um and uh the town has be that that long-term capital Group which has really been working well has done quite a bit of work looking at this um that we currently have a lot of capacity and that we're not really paying for very much right now in terms of debt um since the high school was paid off a couple of years ago so um you know it's it is time to start considering these projects and whether you could do two at once I don't know I'm not sure but it's it's something to at least talk about quick just on on does this uh does

056msba still have the model school program they do still have a model school and they're also pushing energy efficient uh projects so so um it's a good point uh in terms of msba so we would be eligible around 50% reimbursement from msba um if you build a model School you get extra reimbursement so that's sort of a bit of a canned design so it depends whether you can fit that on your site whether it meets you know meets your needs it can be scaled according to you know enrollment and everything but it it's um it's something to consider you get a a little extra money from msba and they're also very actively pursuing um Energy Efficiency initiatives through the msba through um you know in terms of using heat pumps to heat the buildings and

057a variety of technologies that that you know are are very um you know very efficient trying to get to Net Zero buildings and um so and you get extra money for those two so things to consider as we go thinking so this is kind of a maybe a crazy idea and you can tell me that maybe it's a bad idea but again thinking about the politics of it and worrying about going back to the voters repeatedly for um debt exclusions has anybody ever thought about doing just one Capital override that we generate $10 million a year that goes into account every 5 years we've got $50 million right that's a if you if you figure out what the projects are and you figure out what that is you only have to go to the voters

058once right and then the money that goes in there just goes into whether it's a stabilization fund or whatnot right and it just goes we just work through the projects um and I don't wonder whether maybe that's a better approach than having to every five years go to the voters and say and we want to and this this just occurred to me after seeing bess's reaction when you said $70 million for an elementary school right we can just say oh we're going to pull out of this account and we're going to pay 70 million I mean so it's something that I think is worth considering um at least we because we know that we that for the next I don't know it's not like 40 years from now all of a sudden we're like okay

059good don't ever have to replace a school again or no we don't need another water plant or a police station or whatever our Capital needs continue right and whether it it might be better for us to do a one-time push um to get the money we need because I I just am I'm sort of cynical about to keep going back every five years for another $50 million project I can share that with the group it's an interesting idea I the one thing I will say and not to be a downer on that idea because I'm not I think it's interesting and might work well in terms of votes we will need to keep going back in terms of submitting statements of interest and voting the the town meeting votes that are required to participate in

060the msba projects we'll need all that too not not that's easier all right would you say look we got 100 million in the bank we're ready to go to msba right I agree think that's just a little bit easier way to approach it yeah yeah I'll uh I will share that with the group we're meeting tomorrow Z via Zoom okay via Zoom since uh everything Clos oh the snow day yeah anyone else before I no um I I you I I agree with my colleagues I think like leading from a place that really uh you know um looks at the age in in of the buildings I do agree with the middle school is is one at the top um but I wonder about any opportunity to sort of phase out kushman school as as

061say um thinking about the age of that building um is that in consideration is there anything that you could share I I think that our um and this sort of you know some of the options obviously illustrate that um closing of kush kushman school and I think um that was part of my discussion you know our discussion today with msba and that would be included in our project intent um which which I think would be an attractive sort of piece of that that might lead to them being even more favorable okay we're thinking creatively we're closing a building that's outdated that's small that you know isn't ideal um trying to be more efficient in that way and um you know I think it that leads to oh are we looking at 5 through eight are

062we looking at a shift are we you know some some sort of different uh configuration but those are things that we would do in that feasibility process with them but I think that would certainly be a goal um and that could be done with the first project we get one project one building built we could accomplish that so um and so in meeting with them tomorrow other than hearing our you know our consensus some do you need an official Vote or um you need for us to do anything more more official I I don't I don't I mean I don't think you're voting for for specific projects yet or anything I I I think I don't know if if you um I have enough information I think enough feedback to go back to them it's

063fine I appreciate it perfect we yeah this was very productive sounds good yeah definitely great thank you I think um thank you for that uh I we're moving on to new business so we have superintendent update I'll turn it over to Dr sa Maguire great so um February is about to live up to its name so we finally uh and I finally um for the first time get to announce a snow day so um I was going to wait for this evening to do that but there seemed to be so much interested in it in it that we didn't want to keep people off because I know people were making plans but I just want to make sure that people understand that we don't take decisions like this lightly I mean this is really an

064important decision to make and it's not just one person's decision uh the superintendent may get some uh sort of you know uh accolades for making the decision but really it's a team decision including uh our own School folks here you know Mr Kylie talking with the town DPW officials other school-based folks across this region I mean I've been in touch with other superintendents all day long and certainly Community leaders and all it's always about the Safety and Security of our staff our students and our community and so although we love to call a snow day it really is serious business I just want to make sure that everybody understands that we do take it seriously um but congratulations seniors you get your snow day apparently that's a big de deal here in darmouth so a

065few items under teaching and learning that I just want to bring to your attention and if you remember earlier and I did um bring this up in one of my uh school committee updates on a Friday but we had publicly discussed chronic absenteeism and that the commissioner was bringing that forward to the board and I just wanted to make sure that everybody understands that although we believe this is really important uh the board did not approve the commissioner's recommendation and so what that means is that chronic or absenteeism won't take on increased weight in our accountability stand standards moving forward um you know we're happy about that but at the same time I want to assure you and the public that student attendance is really important to us and we're starting to have not starting

066because I know this conversation has been had in this District before I ever got here but really thinking about some strategic opportunities to re-engage students so it's not so much about the punishment that students receive for absenteeism but it's how how we as a school district are considering what what kinds of things are keeping our kids out of school Beyond illness which we of course want our families to keep our students home if they're ill but there are other things that we need to be doing as a district and I'm really pleased when I talk to the leaders and teachers in the district that that is at the Forefront of their mind but we wanted to let you know that that wasn't going to affect our accountability um also I wanted to bring up at

067the last school committee meeting we talked about the need to explore curriculum resources uh you probably seen and I might have even talked about it um recently one of you know on the news or the globe uh you've seen that Governor Healey has come out with an initiative around literacy and one of the things that I think is really important for you to know is that here in this District folks are already at this work and so it's not the state coming in or desie coming in to Dartmouth saying we're going to force you to look at your curriculum resources I know uh Bess and I have had this conversation I think since the minute I walked in the door here and and she as well had just started as a school committee member we

068recognize that we have worked to do around selecting resources and even more importantly putting this District on a path where it does in fact have a curriculum um a curriculum review cycle and so I'm going to ask M Pavo poo to come up to the microphone and talk talk about some of the work that she has been doing um and really it's almost every day I see her with a care at least one curriculum team a day uh digging into this work yes we had our science group with us today so um I'm going to just first give you a little bit of an overview on a curriculum review cycle and the work that Mr tibo and I did um with the curriculum Council last year to develop this curriculum review cycle um Dr Jenkins

069was part of this work and so this should look familiar first you know what is a a curriculum review cycle and really the importance is just that cyclical nature of looking at our curriculum in a way to revise it to make sure that it's up to dat we know that things change we want to make sure that we remain current with what we're doing um and it really it gives us the opportunity to make data informed decisions about what the efficacy is of the curriculum materials that we're putting in front of our students every day um and so when we look at the elements of the curriculum review cycle you know obviously we want to make sure it's standards based and so as standards get updated it's imperative that we also make sure that we're

070updating our curricular materials um the alignment piece so it's kind of an ongoing joke but not really that anyone who works with me here as me talk sort of ad nauseum about uh horizontal and vertical alignment we talk a lot about the journey that our kids take right it's not so so much necessarily about just the grade level that you're teaching but the journey that that our kids are on and making sure that there's alignment between what they're doing let's just say in my world in second grade with third grade and as so there's that cohesion and that coherence that runs through the Journey that the kids are on um the equity piece we want to make sure that our curriculum resources are reviewed make sure that there there's no bias or cultural biases that

071are in our uh materials that we're putting in front of our kids we look at the professional development needs what are the needs of our educators to be able to not just give them a material but have them be able to use it effectively um and be able to um use that tool to teach our kids and Mr Kylie no offense that I last on my list but certainly there are budgetary implications right so we can't we can't get into a place where we suddenly need to review all of the curriculum and replace all of the curriculum so we need to do this in a cyclical nature and really have a budget and and a plan for making sure that we're looking at that that and so I'm not going to ask you to um

072look at this tiny little font I'll go through very quickly just there're really four tenants of a curriculum review cycle and you can really hop on anywhere right because the point of it is that it's cyclical and that you can do these things and um as we're developing that we're looking at our various curriculum areas and saying what makes sense with where we are right now um so just for I'm a I'm a kind of linear person I'll stop upper left so when we talk about reviewing the curriculum reviewing the curriculum really is is when you're taking that deep dive right so we've done some we've had something in place and now we're really taking a deep dive into what we're doing making sure that there's alignment to our Mass state Frameworks making sure that

073it is that has that alignment vertically and horizontally a great across grade levels making sure that it's not written making sure that it's free of biases um making sure that it's based on current research and I'm going to talk a little bit more about that in a second um making Mak sure that it's Equitable to all students so we're looking at the diversity piece of that not just in the um cultural biases piece of that but also are our students able to access it do they have entry points regardless of sort of where they are or their learning styles can we can we is Equitable for all students in all learning styles um and then you know we need to make sure that it's we have alignment with things that we do to measure our

074students right so our SATs our acts our mcast making sure that the things that we're doing like I always say to my elementary folks mcast should never be the first time that these kids see something that looks like this right and so making sure that we're preparing kids for something that is a realistic part of their Journey um assessments making sure that our assessments are telling us what we need them to tell us about how our students are learning and so the outcome of that sort of first phase is you know a report or a state of the Affairs of the of that curriculum review um and then you may end up saying we need to look at something new or we need to write some revisions to this curriculum you know it could be

075a great a great framework and we just need to make some modifications to it so regardless of what your decisions are your next sort of phase in that um would be to do that development or revision right so we're either going to be piloting something new or looking for something new or we're going to be um doing kind of a deeper revision of what's in existence already um once you do those things right we need to implement and we need to implement it with Integrity um and make sure that we are uh implementing the the things that we're saying in the intent that they were intended to be done right and so um then we get into that monitoring phase and this is a multi-year phase where we're really looking at the data and making

076small shifts we're looking at scope and sequence shifts assessment shifts and really throughout all of these phases we're also very heavily focused on professional development what are the needs of our teachers whether they're new teachers whether they're veteran teachers sometimes that looks very different sometimes it's programmatic professional development around the materials sometimes it's instructional practice professional development so we're really looking at what the data is telling us our students need and providing PD around that and so I'm going to make a little shift and say that one of the when we're talking about current practices and making sure that we are um doing what our kids need I'd like to talk to you a little bit about science of reading as Dr Sab Maguire said there's a lot to be uh said heard read listened

077to around the science of reading although it really is not something new it has really come back around um because it it is a comprehensive body of research it's a lot of years of research and what it tells us is that um there are five foundational skills to learning how to read the bigger picture that we need to remember is that learning how to read is not reading as a whole right so we're really just talking about the foundational skills of reading and these are the Five Tenant of that sort of foundational skills we talk about phic awareness and phonics and fluency and vocab and comprehension and if you don't live in our world and use those words every day um as I know many people do not this is what that means so phenic

078awareness when we're talking about reading it begins far before you ever talk about your eyes on a page we're talking about being able to discern sounds and manipulate sounds and so we this is a real early foundational skill um but we need kids to be able to um be able to articulate and hear different sounds in a word so that when you hear the word bat you know that there's a b and a a and a t in there um and then we move forward and learn that letter there are letters that come together to make those sounds and sometimes two letters come together to make a new sound um and so those are sort of all those core things that kidss are doing before they're ever really reading or if they're having struggles in

079their reading that were looking at deficits have come up along the way fluency is just that sort of smoothness automaticity being able to read so that students can understand what they're reading so um it's that sort of muscle memory that you can do things without ever thinking about them right like sometimes you drive home or you think you're supposed to go to the store and suddenly find yourself in your driveway right cuz you're not really thinking about having to do that you just your brain knows how to do it automatically that's that sort of piece about you can lift the load of decoding and trying to figure out the words and really give yourself that opportunity to understand what you're reading vocabulary right I mean it's pretty self-explanatory um building the repertoire of our kids

080vernacular making sure that they have words that they can use and they understand and vocabulary has a direct link to knowledge based to knowledge and comprehension understanding um and there's a lot of research around just building our kids knowledge base right and so I again am such a nerd about this stuff but I'm like the Neuroscience behind how you learn is your brain is forever trying to make connections anytime you give someone anyone new information your brain instantly goes to work trying to connect it to things that you already know right and so we have to put things into kids that they already know and understand and that's you know a big part of what happens here and so um foundational reading skills how do we measure those well the Commonwealth has come along and

081really helped out in that and said you're going to do it and so they have a uh a early literacy screening guide that was passed in July of this year and so um this is the guidance that came out we had the guidance says we have to assess kids at least twice per year using a valid valid developmentally appropriate Des approved uh literacy instrument and then for students who are identified as not meing the Benchmark we need to inform parents of that and have a plan for what to do with the kids but there is good news in dartman public schools we have already been doing that so um we use the Dibbles eighth edition to do some screening of our kiddos and we were already doing that uh and we actually do it three

082times a year in Dartmouth we do a beginning middle and end of the year Benchmark and for kids who are not meeting The Benchmark we do a progress monitoring between so our students who are identified as struggling readers are being benchmarked five times a year in the area that we have concerns about which works out to about every six to eight weeks which is a great RTI cycle so we're looking at our kids we're looking at their data we're looking at what they're telling us so dible stands for dynamic indicator of basic early literacy skills it tests four of those five what Dibbles does not address is vocabulary but um IT addresses four of those other five basic skills of reading that are identified through the science of reading um and these are the grades

083in which they are assessed so you heard me talking about that phic awareness piece that's like a real basic foundational skill we're testing our kids in K and one in phic Awareness phonics we're testing them all the way through third grade reading fluency we don't actually look at kids oral reading fluency until around the middle of first grade because we're still teaching them to learn how to read that word reading fluency piece though is words on a page right so it's that to build up some of that automaticity so that we can get them to be fluid readers and then um the reading comprehension we test in grades two and three now we certainly test their comprehension in other ways but in Dibbles we're looking at grades two and three they do uh a maze

084which is a actually I gave you a little information about what each of those subtests looks like if you really wanted to see it um and and then I'm going to talk a little bit about some of those and what we have been doing over the last year and so when we were talking about the data and talking about what do our kids need um the group of kids in front of us we need to remember are some of the kids who had a very different Early Childhood experience um our current fourth graders are kids who went home in March of kindergarten and had a very different first grade year than any other kid would have right um our so play that forwards and backwards our third graders if they were in our preschool went

085home and had a very different kindergarten experience and so we know in looking at some of our data that our kids were really struggling with some of those foundational skills um and so what we did is we um graciously went to Mr Kylie and I said I really need some money and we were able to figure that out uh and we were able to get the foundations uh foundations is is a phonics based program um if you've heard ever of Wilson intervention it is based out of Wilson they're sort of the gurus of foundational reading intervention um and we were able to put that into the all of our classrooms so we had a group of teachers who piloted this last year in K to 3 all of our classrooms this year and K to2

086implemented it one of the things again going back to that curriculum review cycle you learn from your pilot was that a third grade implementation is a very difficult thing for something that's very dependent on kids learning the basics of it in K1 and two and so we actually had our teachers go to some training with Wilson and the the recommendation was that you hold the third grade for a year let the kids get some of those foundational skills under the belt and then they can really fly with it in third grade and so what I've done um it's important to note that our kindergarten Dibble schedule is a little bit delayed so our our beginning of the year kindergarteners our introduction to school is certainly not one that we want to say welcome now come

087with me and I'm going to give you a test on something that you know you maybe have heard before but maybe not and so we try to get you know six weeks of instruction under their belt before we start looking at kids we don't want to over identify we don't want to under identify we want to make sure that the data we're collecting is accurate so what I've done is put together some um information about our kids in grades 1 through three so if you go back to the the test those there are four sub tests that are kids in grades 1 through three and I wanted to look at what does it look like this year compared to last year so we're talking about just one year not even a year right we're talking

088about six months of good solid tier one instruction and so we looked at middle of the Year benchmarking last year and middle of the Year benchmarking this year and at first glance you might look at it and say it doesn't really look so different but I think the other thing that you need to remember is that typically there's an implementation dip when you dip when you start a new program that the kids are all trying to get on board and you have to sort of bridge that Gap from what they've been doing before to what they've been doing now and so I look at this in this data and I go well overall we still have we had 65% of kids at or above the Benchmark before now we have 66 and so they're they're

089shuffling out a little bit different that can mean a couple of things right these are different cohorts of kids so this is an average of the one to three last year and an average of 1 to three this year so the cohort is a little bit different but we're making moves that we want to see we have less kids in the well below we have more kids at The Benchmark we took a little dip in the above Benchmark piece but in the overall at or above we're trending in the right direction that's true again when we're talking about our nonsense word fluency so nonsense word fluencies is we give kids madeup words right and so it's not we're not dependent on their ability to memorize a word we're giving them a word that is not

090a real one and they have to really depend on those foundational skills of knowing being able to segment words into into their sections know the sounds of those sections and be able to come up with it and so we do that at the phon level or the piece of the word level we do it at the full word level and again you'll see this was a great one you know our kids at The Benchmark again we're moving in the right direction word reading fluency is the ability to read those words at a singular level again you know that at or above number is trending in the right direction and our oral reading fluency um we're right we're right there is where we were last year and so you know I think the connection to this

091is that we have to continually look at the data and what the data is telling us about the efficacy of the programming in front of us and then if we need to make moves making sure that we're putting high quality research-based materials in the hands of our educators giving them the professional development that they need to be able to execute it well and then continually looking at how our kids are doing making small shifts were necessary making big shifts were necessary um and so you know what we have done is we address the foundational reading skills which we knew was a huge deficit post-pandemic these are like I said kids who just didn't learn how to read in the way that we know kids need to learn how to read and so we had to

092address that um and so in the longer term we are looking at our overall um Ela programming um our we have four curriculum teams that you've heard me talk about before our Ela team met with two publishing companies uh the week before last they have a couple more coming in next month and then we'll be looking at making some decisions um and anxiously also listening to what happens at the state level on what they're thinking about as far as uh literacy curriculum because they have a lot to say about it um which will be great as long as they attach funding to what they have have to say because um you know that tends to sometimes be the case but uh I'm happy to answer any questions that you have about the that was a

093lot of information in a short amount of time so I'm happy to answer any questions that you have well no questions but I'm really happy you're doing this and I look forward to seeing the next round of tests and how our students are developing and hopefully yeah so just say thanks I think the presentation is super useful I mean I think people sometimes think well I learned how to read like how different is it they don't understand that the what we know about how kids learn to read is continually changing and updating um and so to hear about sort of our understanding um like I know I'm I would probably do really bad at the madeup word test cuz I'm I'm like my kid would come home and be like how do you break these

094words up and I like I don't know like I I just know the word um so I think it's you know breaking it down and focusing on that makes our students better than perhaps we are but it's not as transparent because they're just learning to read that's what they see it um so I think it's super helpful for people to see these different components of that and I appreciate it thanks Mr it's this is this is great thank you and it's it's interesting it Dibbles this still around still around eth Edition huh eighth edition but you know I mean I can I can then again I can remember it you know being talked about yeah and and such but uh this is excellent you know I I'm and not that I'm looking for a kindergarten

095the first grader to have a lot of home but you know do the do they take sheets home for Mom and Dad the guardian to sit down with them to try and deyer some of them I think the biggest thing that we can do is create a literature Rich environment for our kids right and so reading toe children when they're learning how to read is has so much power in that ability to build vocabulary to build content knowledge and then also it's something it's time spend right and so if you can create a joy of reading I would tell kindergarten and first grade parents and typically at the elementary level the expectation for homework is that you're going to do some kind of reading at home it can be reading with an adult it can

096be reading to an adult um you know there's a lot of benefit in reading things that you might consider look at your child and say well that's too easy for you now no there's so much benefit in building their fluency and their ability so read to I would tell my kids read to the dog read to your dolls read to your little brother or sister right like if reading in general in any way shape or form will have tremendous benefit for your kids and it doesn't need to be a worksheet necessarily it doesn't need to be something that they're pencil to paper just creating a really liter Rich environment for your kids is truly the best thing that you can do thank you yeah no thank you great presentation Katie and um no I I

097certainly appreciate the work that you're doing along with Mr tibo and the rest of the uh staff in the district I look forward to seeing where where we go from here yeah thanks we appreciate your support yeah thank you uh thank you for this I really uh you know uh in particular um selfishly really love the focus and the the curriculum um cycle to those onramps for those students who learn differently um you know I uh and also selfishly sort of being kind of close to um those you know Audi books or I remember um one of my kiddos early on like U um participating in uh counting how much time in the summer they they were reading and it really was all of the things that we were able to help uh them access

098to be part of that whether it be audio whether it be thumbing through magazines and pointing to pictures and communicating in just alternate ways so I really love the focus to those on-ramps for all of our Learners um I I'm wonder I'm the good news is we're already doing it with the Dibbles um but that added component which I completely understand and and am in support of uh but I'm just wondering your thoughts I'm looking over there like to parents receiving because that you know yes we would have parent teacher conferences we would talk through um you know the struggles that we have on those individual basis if if a teacher teachers are able to identify through the way that we're doing it when a student is is not um to the level that they

099think they should be um what has been the response to parents receiving That official sort of 30-day documentation saying your student is not meeting the thank you for bringing that up so that that part of it is new for us right so um we do a lot of assessing of our kids and We Gather a lot of information about them the the new piece to that right is that requirement to be in contact with parents to say your child is struggling and so I I don't love the idea of only contacting parents when your child is struggling and so we made the decision to contact all parents about how their students were doing and um the other thing I don't love is when a parent finds out when they receive a report card or that

100that's when their child is struggling that should never be the first idea that you have and so you know because it's done pretty early in the year sometimes before parent teacher conferences the timing of it for kindergarten worked out great because we could give the letter to all of our families at parent teacher conferences but the 30-day requirement didn't allow us to do that for our our older kids so we built time into their day for a phone conversation for any student who was getting a letter that said that your child is below the Benchmark and so a conversation with a family is so important because the other thing to remember that Dibbles like all of our assessments is one snapshot and so that conversation with a teacher who really has been doing work with

101a student could sound something like you're going to get a letter that says that your child didn't do so great on this I read with her every day and I want you to know that this isn't reflective of what I see from your child and this is what we're doing and this is right or this you're going to get a letter today and it might seem a little bit concerning but I want you to know this is what we already have in place your child might be seeing a reading specialist they may be doing some tier 2 instruction with me in the classroom so the other part of the requirement that's great is to have a plan and so you know it would be one thing if we were communicating and saying just want you

102to know they're not doing so hot but not have a plan for it but to be able to say this is what we're doing in response to that um and make sure that the parents you know and I think it softens the blow when you get that letter because this is let's let's be clear like this is dyslexia guidelines right and so you're getting a letter that says your child may be at the higher risk for dyslexia and what parent wants to get that letter certainly without context it's terrible and so you know we provided some time for our teachers to be able to have that conversation and provide the context but also what they see on the everyday basis not just on these one minute Subs that they're doing with these students excellent of

103course you already had a plan for thank you for um explaining it for the public but and for me but um thank you thank you Katie I just want to say again been leading great work before I got here one of the things that I was really excited about was when I finally um got to Dartmouth that foundations was in place because that was something that I was committed to in my prior district and also what you didn't mention but hegerty um is also another aspect of a resource that you have brought in to the Dartmouth schools to help support again around the science of reading and I want to just also mention the curriculum review review cycle because it's really not unlike the capital Improvement the long-term planning for Capital Improvement so if you're

104on a cycle you don't get to this point as Katie pointed out that we need resources in every single content area and that becomes really expensive but if we budget for it over time and it's connected to a cycle then it's almost like what you said Dr Jenkins earlier we're banking right so we we know that money is there it's there in the budget every year and we're able to make decisions based on something that we have in place um supposedly and I'm I'm believing this might be true is that there is is going to be funding attached to this and the thing again that I feel really confident confident about in Dartmouth is that we're so well poised that whatever it is that's eventually released um that will be right at the front of

105the line ready to ready to move on a resource and again Katie's been doing a lot of work with a lot of your Educators in this school district plenty of teacher voice so important so thank you thank you thank you Katie thank you you so you know my favorite thing to talk about is entry planning that's why I invited Ross up here to help me with it so um part of what I want to help us to do and help me to do really as you're still I'm still saying still your new superintendent as I'm moving out of the entry entry phase um into strategic planning um we're not going to really be digging deep into strategic planning until we have collected all of the information that we started really way back in July or

106April really um we have partnered with teaching Learning Alliance I think I mentioned that at a prior meeting and they're going to be helping us to they're going to be facilitating this process and one of the reasons for that was that we all meaning the entire team here including some of yourselves want to be part of the process and not necessarily directing the process because we want to be part of the teams that are doing this work and so uh Mr tbolt is going to talk about our next steps thank you Dr Sabre McGuire so um our strategic planning actually um you can pick where you want to kind of put a PIN to say we started uh I know Katie talked Katie and I talk about this all the time but on March 11th

107which was a Wednesday of 2020 um the District strategic plan te actually met in the community room at Quinn and then on Friday March 13th 2020 we know um the whole world shut down so if that's the point you want to pick as a starting point that would be fine um but last year really uh in 2022 2023 school year we started partner partnering with Envision learning um to really develop our portrait of a learner and the portrait of a learner uh for folks who might not be familiar with it it's just it's basically a promise from darmouth public schools to the community this is what you can expect your uh you know the students in the district to be um working on on a daily basis as they're with us some districts call it

108a portrait of a graduate or a vision of a graduate we made a purposeful decision as a strategic planning team to call it the portrait of a learner because we want it to be applicable to students prek through 12 in our district and we really wanted to serve as that North Star that would eventually guide our district strategic plan planning work and so as Dr Sabre Maguire said we're now at that point where we have a draft portrait of a learner we presented it to um our Educators uh in the early release day in January to collect feedback from them um and again one of the things that's so important to strategic planning work and to the development of our portrait of a learner is input from all stakeholders within the community and so last

109year when we started this work what we really did was ask every single educator to kind of create a prototype if it was up to them in small teams what would the portrait of a learner look like for them at their level and it was from that that the strategic planning team really developed our portrait of a Learner in addition to that we surveyed all of the stakeholders in the community um parents and uh families and caregivers um elected officials uh received a survey uh from from us um students at the high school level were part of of that as well and of course our Educators were were surveyed and and actually developed their own prototypes so it was a very inclusive process and that uh strategic planning te spent all of last school year

110really synthesizing all of that data and all of that information and put it together and so now we're uh shifting from partnering with Invision learning which helped us with that work and they're a nationwide uh National Consultant Group that does this work around portrait of a learner um but we're shifting and partnering with the teaching and Learning Alliance now which is a consultant uh Consultant Group uh in the ma in Massachusetts made up of uh recently um serving superintendents or assistant superintendents they've worked with over 80 districts across the Commonwealth and I think in in some other states Across the Nation as well um to to do various types of educational leadership work strategic planning work um Etc so um we're going to be expanding that core team the district strategic planning team um has

111consisted of representation from each building in the district including central office um so there's been administrators and either coaches or teacher represent uh representatives from each building but we're going to look to Branch out and to include um you know a couple of uh folks from the school committee Board of Selectmen the uh fincom also uh families and um you know parents um we're going to look to increase our educator representation on that uh on that team as well because now we're really shifting to the uh intense work of moving from a poster for the portrait of a learner to our practice what do we need to do to go from that poster to actually living you every single day so that every single student of ours has that experience um and that's going to

112happen fairly quickly which is exciting because it seems at time uh at times it seems like we're moving very slowly even though the work takes time time and so I'm I'm glad we've moved at uh the pace that we have because we I think we've done some really great work um but over the course of the spring and then into the fall we're going to put together a plan that really um that's presented to the school committee for approval um and it will really address how we're going to move from poster to practice and the endgame is once it is approved by the school committee that the teaching uh and Learning Alliance will produce a professionally designed print ready strategic plan for the next five years that's going to really drive the work in this

113District um along with a data dashboard that can be used to um monitor our progress as we achieve the the goals and the uh um initiatives that we set forth in that plan and communicate that out to the to the public as well so that it's fully transparent and everyone knows exactly um you know how progress is is is being made I just wanted to share because I talked about the portrait of a learner ignore the graph the graphic here is not what the final graphic will be this is a placeholder graphic um our unified Arts students at the high school are actually um taking these competencies um and branding it and designing it to reflect Dartmouth um and so the again the idea was that we'd you know some some communities will just have

114a uh graphic design deser do it for them we wanted our students to have a hand in owning this because it's ultimately about them um and so we uh met with Christine MC our unified Arts Lead Teacher here at the high school she's working with the teachers in her department and the students uh and they're actually in the process as we speak of creating several designs that will be considered um in terms of the graphical representation but these are the five comp competencies that were identified by uh stakeholders within the community as being important to our portrait of a learner and they are critical thinker and Problem Solver Communicator continuous learner contributing Citizen and collaborator and these are the skills and competencies that we said every effective learner needs to uh employ at some point

115um and again prek through 12 um what you don't see is the actual work that took so long which is these are all very well defined and broken out by grade level so it goes prek through two and you know for each of these competencies there's definition and uh performance outcomes that go with them so from prek through two what does an effective Communicator look like and it's all laid out and then for grades three through five what does that Communicator look like 6 through eight and then 9 through 12 and that's done for each of these competencies and again that was done um through a series of meetings throughout the course of last uh school year where um a very talented group of of Educators really looked through and had good discussion around what

116are the skills that go into being an effective communicator and what are what do they look like at each grade level and so on and so forth and that's what was presented to all Educators in the district earlier uh in January as I talked about to get feedback because the design te the uh planning team created it but we wanted educator feedback as well so um you know to make sure it was going to be a document that is useful to all teachers and all students in the district um this is our core team as of today uh so this is the team that I said we'd be adding to um and I just want to um kind of acknowledge there awesome folks who either from retirement or left the district who contributed to the

117work you know it started with Dr gford obviously uh retired and and so um Dr sa McGuire jumped right in there um same Lori jwin was part of it um Bill Garcia and will Higgins um all contributed significantly to that portrait of a of our learner draft and and of course these folks who are listed here on the screen are still very much part of the work and so we appreciate their hard work um a lot of hours uh of work and good discussion have kind of gone into it and I think we're in a very good position to add um to the team like I said with members from the school committee select board uh fincom parents and Guardians caregivers um you know and and some students as well so we're excited to do

118that we're excited to continue the work and part of um what teaching the teaching and Learning Alliance is going to do for us is to facilitate focus groups to continue to bring uh input into our process and so um one opportunity to be part of such a focus group is going to occur at the superintendent's Family Forum um um which is going to be held here at on March 6th from 6:00 to 7:30 p.m. um all members of the central office leadership team will be on hand talk about uh different topics we hope we'll get a large turnout of family members community members who want to meet Dr Sabre Maguire if they haven't already or uh meet other members of our central office leadership team hear about some uh of the exciting work going on

119and perhaps most importantly take advantage of the opportunity to share their voice um to help us prioritize the the work of the district moving forward just to build off of that I want to make sure that we're clear that we're we are not jumping into strategic planning without first reporting out to the school committee and the public on what our entry findings are because the entry findings should and will inform the strategic planning process and so that is something that we're working on and part of this superintendent family form is meant to gather us together more information from the public um so this will be sort of a combined effort where we get a chance to and we've talked about this really since since September having this opportunity to meet with families but on so

120we'll do that and you can see the topics will include school budget teaching and learning student services technology and more and then we'll hand part of this meeting off as Mr tbol was saying to the folks the facilitators from teaching Learning Alliance who will then be able to work with the this family form to gather information that will again go into our report on Entry findings so there won't be any actual strategic steps for rest strategic planning until we complete our report on Entry findings because the findings are critical to informing what comes next with with our work um I also just wanted to mention the stakeholder groups are are critically important as a matter of fact we have a group this week yes yeah so this week um our middle school and high school

121students will be meeting with representatives from uh TLA um on Thursday afternoon and that will be the first opportunity as Dr Sabre McGuire said to continue to collect stakeholder input into that will inform um the strategic planning process but again it's a it's a group of uh middle school students and high school students and then later on uh in a week or a couple of weeks after uh vacation I believe the elemente school students will have um the opportunity as well um and then eventually it will our staff uh you know faculty um and staff will have an opportunity to meet with representatives from the uh from TLA family uh and parents um community members and then there will be for anyone who can't come in person there will be a virtual opportunity to do

122so as well um that TLA will host um to be able to you know really reach anyone in the community who wants to be part of this this work will have an opportunity to do so super any questions fantastic nice thank you thank you very much appreciate it so how are we ading the family form that's great question and in particular I mean I think it' be easy to reach out to families but what about Community how how are we going to engage the community in that so part of the way that we'll advertise the Family Forum is through our weekly backpack that's one way but we also realize that not everybody probably looks in the weekly backpack on a weekly basis um so this will be something that we also will will um do

123a a call through parents Square so a text so we'll give the community as far as the community is concerned though um we have Dartmouth week I think somebody from Dartmouth week was here earlier is up in cor so we'll be counting on their help as they help us with uh advertising and promoting a lot that's happening here in the Dartmouth schools and so that's another way we'll get the word out to the community thank you any anyone else no right you know I have a couple more things yeah I'm just thinking in terms of the Family Forum the special the CPAC special parent advisory Council was scheduled for a workshop the following week but I'm thinking it might be very fruitful to um advertise this as an opportunity to advise the school district that's

124the point um for this purpose and leading this to be our meeting or directing families to to this forum in lie of you know so we're we're willing to be flexible and I think that's a great idea to to offer families a real real opportunity to have an impact that's a great that's a great suggestion okay and I see Miss Denia over there noting her head yes so here Mrs Redland so yep we'll make sure that that happens I'll get that word out um so just a couple other quick updates I always have to talk about Personnel in HR we are going to be advertising for the position of Early Childhood director we spoke about that today we're hoping that to do that in probably uh early to mid-march um that's when these types of

125positions are generally advertised and we think that'll give us the time we need to be able to attract a qualified candidate pool uh I always have to say you know I'm going to say it educating educator um Specialists educator esps educator support professionals thank you so much all right and then um always substitutes and so again Katie and Ross have taken over the interviewing of substitutes for the district and I think that that's helped to promote a smoother process for getting people in and getting them out into the schools as soon as possible and of course I Kate doesn't like to be thanked but I always have to thank her because she really does so much work on making sure that we get our candidates um you know that we get their paperwork done and

126that we get them out into schools as soon as we possibly can um but then you know we have a lot of fun stuff to talk about uh this is always my favorite part to continue to just talk to you and the community about the wonderful accomplishments of your Dartmouth students uh this past week I had the opportunity to watch the girls basketball game this past Friday night um they had their second victory over Bridgewater rum which is apparently an anomaly here in Dartmouth and with that win they won they secured their first ever League Championship and so that's a really big deal to to them I could see how excited they were and the celebration that took place with that win and we're going to be looking forward to seeing what happens next so

127they they completed a perfect Conference record they were 80 in their conference and 16 and one overall so that's pretty exciting news to see where the girls basketball team goes next um at the same time this game was happening I was able to um pop in and see a what was a double session of the six through High School school strings section of the orchestra and so um that was directed by Heather church and Mike Daniels and they did have uh apparently uh nationally and internationally renowned uh musician here who was working directly with the students it was really exciting to see I have to say it was it was incredible impressive and the first time that I've had the opportunity to see that part of the orchestra at work and your sixth graders unbelievable

128when I heard that they had just started in January to play some of the pieces that they expertly played so it was like you know you're going to really literally an orchestra concert right here in Dartmouth in the middle of or the beginning of February um the DHS boys and girls indoor track teams both third and second place finishes at last Tuesday's indoor championships um I didn't get a chance to see them yet because they're playing in I mean they they compete in Boston so perhaps we can talk about that at some point and try to figure out how to get them closer to home um but definitely many combined and individual efforts I got to meet with all the captains of the sports teams and the track team was really well represented so you

129can tell that there is Gen genuine commitment to that sport here in Dartmouth uh so I also want to mention the hockey team continues to pile up some wins they started off a little slow but it looks like they really put things together um but beyond Sports there are some public facing that are all public facing and they certainly get quite a bit of attention in the Dartmouth week but I do want to thank the Dartmouth week for cover and offering a sort of a two-page I think spread on what's happening in the outh schools and what's so incredibly impressive about it it's all written by our students and I don't think you'd know that unless you read the the um opening paragraph describing what this particular spread was about so lots of great things

130in here a couple things that I've learned I also got to participate in a podcast with the with the students who are running your school newspaper and let me tell you they didn't lob any softball questions it was really challenging and one of the things that I I'm so impressed about because just last me last week I met with speaking of the roof a group of sophomores so four sophomores who are doing a Civics project about the high school roof and they had some excellent questions the um the report that Mr Kylie had uh had a group come in um I had it in my hand it's it's about this thick and I have to tell you it's page after page of problems there was nothing in it that said this part of your roof

131is in excellent shape so lots of photographs to go with it um but back to meeting with the students they had they asked excellent questions they're really interested um Mr Kylie and I are going to take them up at on the roof at some point because he offered to take me up on the roof to see where all these problems are and so we invited them along but really thoughtful questions thoughtful kids and again the podcast was so incredibly impressive so professional and Mr Higgins does a great job leading those students and I think that's important to close on thinking about all of the wonderful adults that are so committed to kids in this community because that's how they're getting all of these are being exposed to all of these wonderful opportunities in the community

132of darmouth there's so much more to talk about I know the boys basketball game maybe just Ed they're up 12 oh they're up 12 so that's exciting news so we hope that they're going to also be victorious this evening but great stuff happening so we should all be celebrating those kinds of things because that is the commitment that the community has to its schools and so thank you thank you thank you um so before uh I really don't have much uh do anybody um else have anything to contribute Mr n thank you mam chair just to real quickly follow up on Dr Sabre Maguire talking about student athletes and the standard times is uh getting caught up with their uh last year spring and this year fall student athletes and such and we've had uh

133a couple of our athletes make that uh uh those the the awards and such so just congratulations to them uh I know I briefly touched on it uh last month but uh March Saturday March 2nd starting at noon time here the uh music association is going to be hosting a nesba show both color guide and percussion uh starting at 12:00 noon uh our JV is on the JVS Color Guard goes on at 12:45 uh the vity goes on at five o'clock and awards will be right after that and then uh we'll kick into the percussion and dmouth is scheduled at the moment to be on at 8:50 with a Wards right after so in the next couple of days I'll get an email out to everybody looking looking for presenters for the trophies and again

134you know the times that they're there I realize it's a long day and such but if you want to if you're able to help out we would appreciate it that's all I have thank you Mr Nunes anyone else um the the only thing I have uh really is just I I started talking about this um uh I was approached by a Community member um and then I did see this end up a conversation on social media um but I just wanted to mention it because I know we have a policy around naming facilities and um uh I just couldn't occasion the exact process that I believe it's through if anyone has such a you know there are policies around how that is determined and and and the fairness and the the the Outreach to other

135interested parties I keep looking at Mr noon just as your historical um but uh yeah I was also contacted by community members well I didn't see anything on social media but I was contacted by commun by a Community member yeah so they would what what how does it start through the superintendent's office or is it just in it starts with like a letter of letter of interest to the superintendent they come before the committee here's what here's what they want here's what they would like to do and you put a you put a group together to filter the potential uh honores and such and then you know and there's a whole policy on that yeah I have it in front of me that type of deal and you know certain things you know the looking

136for a wow factor yeah and such and then uh you know then they come up with a recommendation and it comes back to was mhh okay deal great that's the digest version yeah no no no CU I know it's sort of like you open it up for other folks who might have a different thought around how to approach a certain building or in the part about seeing it on social media which is I didn't really read but it looked like there might be some someone else already um named after particular space so um lots to consider so thank you for I just wanted to bring it up I mean and what's the at that point as I said you know you may have to try and you know somebody's going to have to do some

137leg work to on so it's a process that process yeah yeah it's not yeah I think that's important it's not as easy as saying it's not cut and dry right it is not it is a process and it's a community process and there needs to be a lot of involvement in that and ultimately the committee does make that kind of decision yeah I do remember we had the we started out with those discussions a staff member came to us about we uh and it took G coach gasar um naming the court after honoring him um and so that took took a lot of community involvement and and uh I wasn't on that committee but others were and that that was really meaningful so I just wanted to bring that up because it was brought to

138to um my attention by a constituent yeah great um I have nothing else and so um and I don't have my agenda in front of me to next meeting is March 11th March 11th 6: p.m. here at the Dartmouth High School library media center um with the live stream of course so with that I will entertain a motion to adjourn so moved second we have a motion by Mr noons second by Miss Coughlin any discussion all in favor I I Happy Valentine's Day everybody thank you happy snow day everybody that too [Music] thank