Dartmouth School Committee Meeting, January 23, 2023

001thank you [Music] foreign [Music] good evening I would like to call the school committee meeting for Monday January 23rd 2023 to order we would stand for the Pledge of Allegiance of liberty and justice for all right foreign at this time if you have any cell phones Pages electronic devices and such uh if you would kindly either shut them off put them on silent or vibrate would appreciate it uh roll call please miss Gunther John Nunes yep Mary Waite here Kathleen Amaral here Shannon Jenkins here Chris Oliver here all right thank you at this point in time we have allotted uh 10 minutes for public comment so anyone has any comments here we go okay yep right ahead hello my name is Deborah August and I am a Community member parent of a graduate um eight-year

002math teacher at DHS and a 28-year teacher in August my 92 year old father was maybe I won't be able to get through this okay I was diagnosed with a terminal medical diagnosis Steph yeah I'm sorry with the terminal medical diagnosis my family decided to support his wishes of spending his last time being cared for in my home while in hospice care I immediately became his primary caregiver and made the incredibly difficult decision to take time off from my position this was not taken lightly as I am an AP Calculus teacher honors pre-calculus and Grade 9 algebra teacher I sincerely appreciate the importance of establishing routines in the beginning of the year but as all of us would agree family comes first since I have never been faced with this type of situation I assume

003that I would be able to take my earned time off to care for my father and utilize a small portion of my 80 plus earned sick days under pfml leave when I went to apply for pmf pfml I was surprised to learn that since I am a part of a municipality I did not qualify for paid time off I was able to take the five weeks off needed to stabilize my father and ensure that he has adequate care while I'm at work but this time was unpaid I could not use the days that I have earned through my years of great attendance at DHS although I was disappointed I again decided family comes first I returned to work as soon as I felt I could and I continue to have late nights caring for my

004father but I still come to work with a heavy heart ready to teach I calculated my missed pay recently and those weeks off have cost me more than seven thousand five hundred dollars yet I still have 86 days that I have accumulated our membership is asking simply to be entitled to access our earned time to help support our family similar to what private companies now provide to employees the difference is we just want to use our earned time please consider making a change for these stressful times I would like to say that I was treated with the utmost respect and kindness by human resources when discussing this concern I really appreciated this because it was not easy to make this decision even though it was the right one this has been difficult time a difficult

005time for me and my family and I appreciate the support I have received from my school Community I just hope that my experience can help make a change to support families in difficult situations I am sorry but I will be excusing myself from the rest of this meeting because I need to get home and take care of my father thank you thank you [Applause] good evening and thank you for the opportunity to speak tonight for those of you who don't know me my name is Stephanie Mello and I am one of the district's substantially separate program teachers I am here tonight to paint a picture of our special education teaching assistants now I understand there isn't a delineation between special ed and regular edtas on paper however their jobs are vastly different a day in

006the life of a program teacher consists of providing direct instruction under the guidance of a program teacher supporting students in inclusion settings following IEP accommodations implementing Behavior plans taking data on IEP goals and behaviors intervening in social situations fostering friendships navigating communication devices providing sensory breaks and helping with self-care toileting changing diapers potty training washing hands brushing teeth feeding all for a 500 stipend five hundred dollars I pause here for a little math for you 180 days of school six diaper changes toileting opportunities per day per child equals 1080 per year again one child now take that five hundred dollars and divide it by the 1080 diapers that equals 46 cents a toileting opportunity that 46 cents is cut in half to 23 cents when you factor in potty training at 30 minute intervals throughout

007the course of the day this math does not account for any of the other self-care tasks that our special education teaching assistants assist with our special education teaching assistants who work in programs must be CPI trained Crisis Prevention intervention trained they provide for the care welfare Safety and Security of our children those are the four tenants under CPI training that training helps us de-escalate our children and instructs us how to keep our children and self safe when physical intervention is required to be clear physical intervention is sometimes required in our district the special education teaching assistants who work within our programs that intervene when students are dysregulated may be slapped punched scratched bitten kicked spit at headbutted head-butted hair pulled and tripped by students the students are not removed from our classrooms as they would

008be from a general education classroom instead we help them regulate themselves record the data occasionally fill out a staff incident report for any injury we sustain and continue working with those same students we work with the district's most vulnerable population I want to emphasize that the staff who work within our programs do so because they genuinely love the children and have dedicated years of their lives both into strict and out to educate and support students with significant needs the salary that is paid to these men and women is not commensurate with the responsibilities and duties for which they are assigned the trainings in which they must participate in nor the physical demands of their job I am not saying that general education teaching assistants have it easy either what I am saying is that they

009have two totally indifferent distinct jobs our building could not run and would not function without the dedicated men and women who work for nineteen thousand thirty three dollars 56 cents to twenty six thousand one hundred ninety three dollars and forty four cents a year I urge you to consider the following not all teaching assistants have to do yearly training to keep up their certification sped Tas do not all teaching assistants have to go outside to recess daily and participate in support children's in special areas gym Health art music library spedias do not all teaching assistants get the opportunity to sub on a regular daily basis which which puts additional money in their pockets regular edtas do not all teaching assistants get substitutes when they're absent special edtas do teaching assistants who have been here for

01020 years are making the same pay as someone who came in on their first year on step six we are losing good people to other districts because of poor pay something needs to change and it's time to properly compensate our teaching assistants and recognize that regular red and special ed Tas both exist and do different jobs thank you for your time and at the chair's discretion I'd love to answer any questions you may have we don't have questions Steph during this time okay thank you thank you before you start I just want to let you know you're going to be the last one because you'll have taken up your 10 minutes thank you and good evening my name is Vicki Cloutier I am a first Year ta at Dartmouth High School my family decided to

011relocate here to Southeastern Massachusetts to be closer to our family I hold a bachelor's degree in Business Administration I also followed my passion to work with children for the last 10 years I have worked in the special ed as a ta I recognize on a daily basis that a TA in special education is asked to perform many tasks that the majority of people would say you couldn't pay me to do that putting those feelings aside I come to school every day determined to give the students that I work with a safe supportive environment so that they can Thrive as a student simply put a TA does the job because we love these kids so much and they deserve the best that our community can provide for them I want to share with you some perspective

012prior to working here in Dartmouth I worked in another District outside of State I was fortunate to have a PPO that District had an 80 20 split when I looked at the PPO option here in Dartmouth I quickly realized from the HR administrator that I would not be able to afford at that PPO option with the salary being offered foreign in fact I was told that there was a chance that I'd actually have to pay the town and work for free so I opted for that high deductible HMO and if I can just on the side note here explain that I have two children that are in college outside of New England that HMO does not cover them so I now have to pay for Health and Care for those two other children my gross

013pay is 623.65 per week when you might add my high deductible HMO the cheapest option and my family dental I pay 287.94 per week that's 46 of my gross salary going toward Health Care remember that side note I have two other children that I have to pay for I have to care for I'm left with a net pay of a whopping 252.59 per week in fact that salary that I was offered here at Dartmouth puts me below the poverty level we are asking for Affordable Health Care and a livable wage thank you Dr Jenkins so at the last meeting we asked for the chance for the school committee members to make a few comments so I'm wondering if we can do that now yeah we can um is it all right if I start all

014right so I just want to say I grew up in Chicago and in Chicago the school district set their own taxes they don't have to go to the towns they set their own tax rate and they set their own budget I wish we had that power here in Dartmouth because I don't think there's any person that is sitting at this table that doesn't recognize the hard work that all of our School Employees do but here in Dartmouth the schools have to ask the town for money and the town is limited to a budget increase of two and a half percent per year right we don't control we ask we don't control what we get from the town right now if you're at the budget subcommittee hearing we're asking for a 4.4 percent increase we're not

015asking for anything additional for any of our schools that's a level funded budget so we're close to two percent over the increase in the town's increase in revenues we're trying we're asking every single one of us wants to do more but we don't have more and so all I would say is that I would hope that people would recognize that we are doing our best to balance the interests of the kids in our school who need Services who need teachers who don't need teachers or teaching assistants that have more children on their caseload right we're trying to balance those needs and we're trying to do the best that we can and I hope that we can move forward in a productive way where we're Partners in improving Dartmouth schools and doing the best that we

016can to recognize our employees that's all I have to say Mr Oliver thank you Mr chair so yeah Healthcare is the single most important uh and problematic issue that this town is facing I have had the opportunity to serve in the budget subcommittee with Dr Jenkins I've had the opportunity to have conversations with our some of our select board members um unfortunately the way dartmouth's tax rate is and I know everyone's tired of hearing that but it's the simple truth is that we cannot offer a split that's you know feasible to what I think everyone here is looking for without significant Cuts in this town um we've said it before we'll say it again or I'll say it again the only way around this is an override there needs to be an override in order

017for the town to compensate for a 40-60 split or any other type of split um that you know our staff is looking for I agree health insurance is out of control it's completely out of control and I wish that there was more power it was more things that this committee could do however the facts of the facts there's one bucket of money in the town and unless the town and I mean the entire town is willing to do something about this I don't see it changing I wish it would I we're willing to continue you know going to the plate for our employees because you deserve it we're here to advocate for you and to advocate for fair health care and I think the high deductible plan is certainly that's one thing that I did

018not know thank you um for bringing that to my attention that it did not it does not cover out of state costs for for students that's certain I'm sorry outside of New England okay that that is certainly something that I will certainly look and take back to the uh the Town Administrator um because I think that is certainly problematic especially when the school Department's budget is definitely by far the largest portion of the town's budget however we have some of the lowest paid employees in town so the town does need to recognize that I think some people do in town however there's still more work to be done so I thank you I hear you and we're trying anybody else you're good all right yeah well not not necessary well I I was just gonna

019have something yeah yeah I just um I'm not really going to get into it because I don't want to get emotional but um I just want to thank the folks for speaking um respectfully um and with dignity uh about the incredible care needs of our most vulnerable students um and I just appreciate you and I thank you for for sharing it with such respect and dignity thank you Ms White no I just you know would Echo everything that my colleagues have said and just say you know I mean our our teachers our staff our students they deserve so much more than what our town is giving them and again we're we're pushing as much as we can and we will continue to do that you know again it's unfortunate I think you know we really

020have to convince to Echo my colleagues the town as a whole you know we need to get the message out I mean we're here we're seeing you but we need people to understand that you know at our tax rate we are limiting ourselves and we're limiting you know all the folks that are sitting here and it's a real shame and it's a it's a scar on our you know on us as a town so I really hope that you know we continue to to you know do better get the word out and have people understand you know the predicament that this tax rate is putting us in thank you all right and thank everyone for their comments they are appreciated all right next on the agenda is approval of the regular and executive session minutes

021of January 9th I'll take a regular session minutes for us so moved move by Miss White second second by Mr Oliver on the motion any discussion chair hearing that all in favor aye aye opposed motion carries unanimously and the executive session minutes of the same night January 9 2023. I'll move with the usual stipulation that they be held until the matter for which they are intended is resolved all right everybody miss wait second by Miss Amaral on the motion any discussion chair hearing then all in favor aye aye opposed motion carries unanimously thank you all right next on the agenda for the first time this year and we welcome our new student rep for our meeting tonight Dallas Phoenix the Phoenix City Phoenix Telecaster hello my name is Phoenix Stella Costa I'm a member of

022the student advisory Council I'm a enrolled in Dartmouth High School class of 2023 senior this year a member of the Dartmouth High School robotics team and the sailing team for today's report I don't know very much to say I'm hoping to cheat today as more of an observation session it's my first meeting I'm trying not to be too nervous so just oh you're fine figuring out the ropes so term three is just kicking off students are expecting to see their report cards next Monday grades closed last Friday so looking to be a good term three for Dartmouth High School thank you thank you questions for food thank you and welcome thank you what are your plans next year so next year currently made I'm hoping to go to college reach school at the moment is

023MIT I'm expecting denial as one should applying to a school of such difficulty to get admitted into my um Top Choice is the U.S Coast Guard Academy New London also a bit of a reach scope but I think I have a much better shot at and then from there around solier Polytech University and UMass samhurst already have been accepted so that's an option very good good luck to you thank you very much great that's great all right nice to meet you okay uh if the Dr Jenkins has asked I have no problem with it uh the rest of the committee do we have an issue if we move the reopen discussion on the student advisory if we just move that up while uh Phoenix is here in case he has homework and things he wants

024to do he can at least listen in on our discussion and by the way you're more you are always welcome to stay but we also understand that you have other commitments uh mainly homework so once you gave your report if you needed to leave you're always you're more than welcome to leave you're more than welcome to stay but you're always you know it's not an issue if you have to leave to finish up things that you need to get finished thank you so Dr Jenkins so I'll just you know reopen I I'm a political scientist right I believe you know um youth engagement and politics at any level is super important um and so I would like to see a student rep Beyond this committee and be here for our whole meeting right there are

025items on our agenda that we could use a student perspective about um for instance we're going to be talking about the calendar what do students think about the calendar what's their perspective how do they see things and so for me you know people say well there's homework there's other activities this is an activity political activities are just as important as we talk about having something to engage all students whether it be band whether it be Sports whether it be the math club it can be politics so what I really want to see is sustained engagement from our students who come in here and who participate fully as members on this committee that's just my two cents I I would like to have some someone here regularly engaging with us it can rotate on the committee

026that's fine but I just really think it's important to have student voice as is consists and I will point out with Mass General law Chris so yeah I I will certainly agree with Dr Jenkins I think student voice at the table here especially in you know municipal government such as the Dartmouth school committee is very important I have no doubt that you have a uh your own perspective to share and a lot of the topics that this committee discusses so I would agree that you know I would certainly like to see a student rep Student Government however you know we've talked about it in the past I'm here for our meetings we we get it things come up obviously please I don't I hope we're not scaring scaring you Rick you feel like you have

027to stay tonight exactly this is your first meeting but I think that your voice or your um your friends voices other students in school how would have a lot to offer not only to this committee but to the community at large so from my point of view I agree that I would love to see someone a student rep here throughout throughout the media foreign within the school you know before you came to this meeting were you having discussions or how is that like you know how did you come to this position and how is it you know being organized I know we've you know we've been talking about like you know taking a second look at this you know from years past where it was just reporting on you know just current events so I'm

028kind of curious about the the background of what's been happening with in the school you know before you came into you know tonight so so far the student advisory council is still somewhat in development it's still unknown 100 exactly how things are going to shake out we've had two meetings so far with the five members and our advisor Miss O'Neill um so so far we haven't had any if you mean meetings with the student body as a whole no I just think like among yourselves even I'm just kind of curious about the development you know within the school because I know it's something that's that's novel that's new yeah we've had two meetings so far and uh so far they've just been about getting acquainted with the style of these meetings as a whole so

029in the last one we discussed Robert's Rules of Order just to get the hang of those and I'm getting the hang of those it's still not 100 but hey we still got 100 okay that's great so in the future I'm hoping we can discuss a system of actually as I was saying surveying the student body in a way that that's a little more than just passive conversation or assumptions so we'll see how that goes in the future oh great that's thanks that's really helpful thanks Phoenix for that insight one and again as I said you're more than welcome to stay if you've got to leave because and I understand what my colleagues are saying but that's my two cents on iPod and the other thing I always say to uh the student Representatives that we

030have is your our eyes and ears in the school so you know never be afraid you know of bringing something to us type type of deal there are some things that maybe we can look at and there are some things for a number of different reasons that are not an opera view type of deal so you know that for the most part that door is always open so thank you for being here and good luck thank you all right thank you thank you that's good and that one's good all right uh the consent agenda for uh cultural to Portugal and Spain we're going to hold that till February because the teacher is unavailable tonight so we're going to hold that until February 13th meeting so it looks amazing all right uh connect you want to

031introduce okay okay next on our agenda we have director of Music Ian Flint he's going to present some information mostly about the music program at the elementary itself and how it feeds into all the great things that we see happening at the high school level excellent thanks so much for having me here tonight um so we're going to talk a little bit about the elementary program and specifically how it does incorporate and that's that's a big thing that goes into the entire music department because it is a holistic department and sometimes we lose track we see a lot with the instrumental program the choral program here there's obviously a lot of focus on that because of the successes there but I kind of want to talk tonight about what we're looking at the elementary level

032we've made some adjustments in the last two years so uh first up I'll start out with our Elementary staff so this is a change this year um right now at the metal school we have uh Miss Monique salemi um she's three days a week um and she's no longer sharing uh the middle schools no longer sharing with a second teacher before the the teacher at Pottery used to come over to the Mellow and teach some of the students which created issues because you might have one teacher one year and then two another teacher for two years and then back to that original teacher um so she's now full time at Demello running that entire program she's primarily vocalist by trade over at Quinn school we have Mrs Shirley Byers she is off full-time at Quinn

033now she used to teach at Quinn and a little bit at Cushman maybe one or two classes but now she's just full-time at Quinn she also serves the High School Musical director she accompanies the high school course in the orchard programs she's a Pianist and vocalist so she's integrated across the system all the way to our high school level and then our final teacher is new this year it's Mr Cameron Siegel over at Potter School in Cushman school he's a music educator he as a music educator worked in Oregon for a number of years um he's actually completing his Doctorate music education at the University of Oregon currently so he's on his final semester of that towards his dissertation um he's a 2007 Dartmouth graduate which my my first year as a teacher here in

034the school he was a senior and he's a percussionist by trade so he went through our Band program as a percussionist and has degrees in jazz drum set and music education and all kinds of stuff so he studied in Florida and here at UMass so super excited to have him and it's been a kind of a you know something fresh in our Elementary music program with having Cameron around him talk a little bit about Pre-K uh Pre-K to five musicals so creating a lifelong love of music for all students no matter their background or access to music outside of the classroom we want our elementary students to enter into the middle school program where they couldn't imagine their school day without music second point is providing foundational musical skills for future success success in the

035music classroom the three main places we focus on are Rhythm pitch and Melody we also want to provide a wide variety of musical experiences for all students some students enjoy singing some enjoy playing musical instruments some enjoy physical movement through music fourth point is performance opportunities are very important for students at the elementary level these performances could be in a small environment like their daily music classroom through in-school performances for their peers or at nighttime concerts for parents in the community and the final goal would be preparation the middle school and high school music program in the fifth grade students are asked to select music classes for sixth grade it's important that they are informed and prepared for whatever their choices or classes no matter whether that's banned Orchestra course or the general music program

036the elementary level we offer two different kinds of curriculum some music some schools it's uh focused on just one of these two aspects there are a couple other um curriculums that you'll see in music education but these are really the two key foundational ones so here at Dartmouth uh the teachers come with different Specialties so we allow them to kind of go with what their specialty is there's a lot of crossover in these two curriculums too um so in the ORF curriculum you'll see a lot of singing in the classroom movement placing movement with music that is being played or performed so you see them moving around the classroom and singing at the same time you'll see a lot of instruments in the north classroom so you see what we call like Boomwhackers you can

037see the students on this slide you know they they're pitched percussion instruments that they they hit and they they do the sequence it it's a Melody keyboard instruments like the ORF instruments are um kind of like percussion instruments shakers rhythm sticks recorders so all kinds of different stuff with instruments and then the final part of or of his literacy understanding of musical elements as it relates to notation so that's a real big focus in ORF is being able to relate those two things back to notation which is key in middle school and in the code eye method it's very singing based and it's very folk music based so we see these hand signs as they relate to pitches rhythmic proficiency is a key part to the Kodi method a lot of collaboration in the classroom

038too so we'll see students that are working together in different songs where they pass that song along around the classroom and in code eye it's based on cultural connections so a wide variety of cultural connections and we do try to incorporate both these because I think all these things are important but one of the teachers might focus on one program more than the other there's definitely some crossover um so in our curriculum right now we offer Essential Elements now this has been a change since the pandemic um in the pandemic it was really really difficult obviously singing was not permitted in the schools um so we have students that lost about two years of vocalization you can see in both those methods that singing is the primary thing and we lost that um so we

039did have a a curriculum that we had that was computer-based and it provided the widest range of access for our students but we moved over to a new one this year which is our essential elements music class most people growing up in Elementary music you got like a book and there's like all these folk songs believe it or not most of those folk songs are not maybe the best thing for a music curriculum because of uh things we found out throughout history that maybe they are based on racial or some sort of thing that's maybe not appropriate for music classroom so what's great about the Essential Elements is that they keep everything up to date so everything is current with curriculum and they're all resources that teachers can use and we know that they're vetted

040and they're current to the nafme standards for music education second part is the ORF keyboards you can see the xylophones this has been a big push for us so we have one full set of ORF keyboards that are currently being shared between Demello Potter and Quinn schools we're in the process of purchasing another full set in the next few weeks so we actually got a donation and we have some music some money we've set aside the school year in order to complete out a second set and then we're hoping that next year we can get to have a third set so all schools have a full set of orif instruments it's actually very expensive instruments um we we uh we've been you know to work towards that Investments uh you know really quite a process

041we can see in our inventory that we've had full sets three or four full sets but most of them are 50 60 years old even so quite old um so we're working towards that um and uh the second one is the Boomwhackers which is the pitch ones so for Boomwhackers we have those across all the buildings they have all the same thing access to those instruments the recorder curriculum takes place between the fourth and fifth grade levels these instruments simulate the experience of playing a win instrument they might be seen in the Band program of the middle school and the high school level and then recently we uh purchased our first set of ukuleles for elementary schools to be able to introduce string instruments at the elementary level this is in preparation for our string

042program at the middle school and high school level so lots of stuff with instruments you know we found that what we're trying to do and what I talked to the staff about is what haven't we done in the last two years that we can get in the kids hands and part of that's just kind of investing back in the program you know it's a lot of instruments they'll last 20 30 years but you know making that Financial investment is important from the music department standpoint and then the final part is technology you know we're trying to integrate technology in our classrooms so the essential elements does a great job at that a lot of this stuff is interactive with the students there'll be a song There's a video along with it that has the beat

043bouncing along the students can see how that works but it's all interactive inside the classroom now instead of one-to-one with a computer Ian quick question for you the keyboards that you're getting how much do those run um a full set of Orphans from the skin costs from eight to fifteen thousand dollars depending on the model that is being purchased so yeah so a full set of Orphans from is quite the investment actually so we've been saving up you know we have concert funds we have different things that you know throughout the years that we are able to piece some money together to make that happen um supported DS may all kinds of stuff right so so that's that's working towards that first set getting that purchase one of the issues with purchasing right now is

044they're not available so we're kind of trying to Source them you can get half of them you can get all the wooden ones but the metal ones aren't available right now it's just has to do with supply chain thank you so performance opportunities um in the second week of January uh the fourth grade students performed in a Winter concert this is new in the past it was just fifth grade level we did do fourth grade concerts during the pandemic and that was kind of out of necessity and we found it was just a great success for the fourth graders to get introduced that three music teachers were able to present three unique concerts featuring what they've been doing in their music class for the first half of the school year and I kind of said

045to them like do what you do and then present it to the parents like it's almost like an exhibition of what we're learning right in the classroom so that was kind of the focus of these concerts so you'll see the three different versions The Demello concert features songs that were accompanied with rhythm games that were performed during their class time there was also selections uh that were calling response with song leaders and they Incorporated the audience into those performances the students performed a wide variety of modern music and students presented the narrations between each piece at the Quinn school they presented a music for musical theater throughout history there's a wide variety of material from throughout the history of musical theater along with this there was a script that the students performed that they told

046the history of musical theater and at the potter concert they Incorporated the use of orif instruments into their performance they prevented presented a wide variety of cultural music part of their preparation for the concert involved they were our high school course director Mr sambianco came to Potter School to work with the students on vocal and performance skills so there's collaboration with the high school level two which is great and then moving ahead to later this school year we'll see a spring concert from all three of our Elementary School fifth grade classes these performances will be a culmination of the musical skills that the students have learned throughout Elementary School we see the performances on percussion instruments as well as on recorders along with singing and themed concerts unique to each School talk a little bit

047about how this incorporates into our middle school program I know there's been a good amount of questions on this um and so with the pandemic we were forced into some different versions of what this looks like key thing was being able to get lessons for the fifth graders two years ago was a challenge and so we had a year where we started the students of sixth grade it was highly successful and that's what we didn't really know how it would turn out but right now our seventh grade instrumental program is one of the largest programs we've ever seen here at Dartmouth and you know part of that is um when you're in music education the students they get to a certain age and there's a maturity as a player and when they're in sixth grade

048it's totally different than fifth grade just the the consistency of player and their physical ability to handle these adult size instruments we say um and you're going to see that in if you go to any large State like California or Texas they've moved to the sixth grade model we do a lot of things in music education specifically it's a regional based thing I know when I worked in Vermont when I moved when I got rid of my fourth grade beginning band I had every teacher in the region saying what are you doing we all started in fourth grade I said it doesn't work at this school it's maybe not the right thing because we had fourth grade Elementary fifth grade was middle school so it was better to just do fifth sixth seventh eighth grade

049middle school um and it worked because the retention rates were higher and the continuity from elementary middle school we didn't have to make that leap so the other main factor to be completely honest is in the fifth grade when they were having lessons they had 400 minutes maximum lesson time when we're in sixth grade they get 4 000 minutes of lesson time so when we take the teachers and we take them to all these elementaries we have to have huge classes in the sixth seventh eighth grade because they can only be in the middle school for a little part of the day and then now they don't have to leave to go to the elementary for an hour and a half and then drive their car and get set up and all these kind of

050things now they have two sections of each grade level so if you're Mr Souza and you have a clarinet class now you have a flute and a clarinet class instead of 30 kids in the classroom at one time you have 15 or 15. and what was happening before was worked with the flutes clarinets sit there work with the clarinets let's sit there we don't do that anymore so those 4 000 minutes are much better used than we can do that over three years so we're gaining so much time on learning with these students it just it seems to make sense the other thing is that the elementaries spaces there's only so much space in the classrooms and when you're playing instruments they're loud so we have to be in specific spots in the school just

051doesn't really work out so that was another thing that kind of played into it and the final part was with the elementary is it gives them flexibility they had to base their entire schedule off of an hour in the day when the music teachers could get into the building so the lunches had to be at a time and all the class changes had to be a specific time so we feel like this is going to be a not just a positive thing for the instrumental program in terms of retention but it's going to be great for the elementaries to give them more flexibility in what they do and really at the end it's about a better overall experience for our students you know by having them in small our classrooms with more Focus instead of

05240 kids in a percussion class in sixth grade you know they can have 20 students in a regular side classroom we're able to just be more focused and more detail-oriented with each individual student and then final thing is you know in Dartmouth music is the fundamental thing right this is just what we do here so it's highly valued in the town of Dartmouth begins at the elementary level and without high quality music education at the Pre-K at a five level we would have nothing that we have here in the upper levels we're grateful for the support of all the administration teachers staff and members of our community now this is possible a total buy-in from all parties involved I feel that we provide a life-changing music opportunity for our students in Dartmouth and we'll continue

053to strive to be the model for high quality music education throughout our region thanks for having me here tonight and uh letting you know a little bit about what our Elementary music program is thank you Ian very nice questions comments Chris we'll go first thank you Ian for the presentation um it's great to see a little bit of background about the the elementary level and the music program both of my daughters went through the elementary school Sierra um and one of them is still a junior at the high school but you know certainly some things to think about as far as you talk about updating some of the um the instruments as well as one of the questions that I had was in our three elementary schools and I guess is it safe to say

054that our Cushman receives music does Cushman School receive any type of Music Services music teaching they do so Cameron's there on Fridays okay she's a full day Friday there to work with those students so I believe it's for 35 or 40 minutes uh on that's right on every level yeah so they have Pre-K all the Pre-K students have I don't have a class and there's a very specific curriculum for that okay you know like a lot of it has to do like they'll have like an art project that goes along with a song that they learn about you know you know Mozart mouse or whatever it is right exactly now very cool my last question is in regards to the elementary schools what do the spaces look like how are the how is music instruction

055being delivered to the students is it uh pushing into the classrooms or are there dedicated spaces in the elementary schools for for music classrooms there's three different versions of that right now this is part of the flexibility that I'm talking about is that um actually works out really well at the Mello um she has she's on a car so she's going classroom classroom but she's primarily a code eye teacher which works really well in that kind of environment okay because she's able to because it's mostly song based it's activity based but not like with the larger instruments that she has to drive around and at Quinn School it's a massive music classroom I mean it's it's used to be the middle school band room okay so she has all the space you could ever ask

056for and she is kind of a hybrid of the two things orphan kodai and then um Siegel's on the stage at Potter it's only a little overlap with lunch I think it's a 10 minute overlap um so it's a really minor and he's very instrument based so that works out for him that's great that they're able to be you're able to be that flexible yeah the teachers are flexible with it they're like this is what I have and they're very well versed at the different options great thank you thanks I'll you know I'll just say this is great um you know my kids were came up through the schools and when they brought their recorder home a testament to early Music Learning I ripped off a Hot Cross Buns right away all that muscle memory

057from elementary school right so early learning right um but I just really appreciate you know coming from outside this District to how well music education has integrated into our curriculum into our schools and so many districts that's been cut it isn't part of the curriculum and we know how good music is for helping children's brain development and for them to learn so I'm just really pleased with all the work that you've been doing to provide this for kids so thank you awesome thank you yeah and to expand on Shannon's Point too I just uh really grateful for the program for you and and and our instructors here in in town and in the program that we have uh because it really is also you know it's a brain development but it's also that bridge to

058inclusion it's also uh you know I have these wonderful photos of my son um who he he's not able to to speak but he he is one of his first well he had a few first time but I won't modifications of signs that don't look appropriate when I do them but but for music you know he was able to you know illustrate his love for music and I just know that um you know for I'm sure for many students like him it's it's a it's a place where where you can then Focus your passion and and and and and be more included and also just um you know it does something to to the students who really love that for all of the things that you described I'm not musically inclined but I do also

059have a seventh grade and I appreciate you explaining uh the the change in the model so I have a seventh grader who plays trumpet uh and um you know it was covid you know first it was we we don't have fourth grade talent I look at Mr Fair we don't have fourth grade talent show we don't have fifth grade this that the other thing and we don't March in the you know but uh and then parents were sort of you know uh of the buzz of like you said in your other school like fourth grade they were little teachers were like why how did you do this same thing here like parents are like we don't have fifth grade you know instrument but the way that you explained it I'm sold and and obviously the

060it you know the fruits of that labor are coming to fruition with like you said a strong program and what you mentioned about the brain development and you know the the older more focused and long-term players that's the right word but thank you for for overviewing that as well and uh you know we're really fortunate to have you um here in town yes so thank you Mr Flynn as as always as a wonderful presentation and again I was about to say to you this I'd like to see the flexibility with the elementary and it sounds like it's going to help make a much more robust program in the middle school and it is interesting to you know to see my own children at you know various experiences go through is that you can see that

061you know in so many cases when they have that you know early experience it might they might not get that aha moment until much later and I've seen that you know even like you know my son accessing the piano program that you have here so I think it's just uh you know again it's a testimony to you and your program and you know and also the families in this community who really support you know everything and prioritize music it's uh it's great that's such a foundation of this this district and you're such a part of that so thank you thanks Ian for for being here and uh truth be told I'm when we kind of had a workshop in the fall as to what we wanted for uh you know any special topics of that

062that type of deal uh my thought was we all know what the high school band does the chorus the orchestra the color guide that type of deal but what about the feta programs down the elementary and middle school and that and you know could Ian come and talk about those it's the same in Mr christopholi will be in later in the school year to talk about phys Ed and health because we all again all know what Athletics is like what's the other what's the other hat that he wears type of deal so that I thought it would be great for you know everyone me included to even though I'm very much involved with it to uh to see what's going on in that type of deal and I thank you for that and you know

063one of the things that Ian talked about as the continuity and you know I've said this to people outside and they wonder how we do so well and such and I told him in my opinion my opinion only is we have the continuity you know and if you're doing drums in fifth grade you have Mr ranks when you get into seventh grade you have Mr wrongs you get into the high school you have Mr ranks it's the same person everybody knows exactly what's going on and even the instructors you know that give our students the lessons are familiar with what we're doing and are able to to work you know I mean my grandson is doing wins this year and he took his music for wins to his lesson teacher his sax lesson teacher to

064help him get through you know work with it and everything else it was great so thank you sir yeah I would say like I'll just leave it with one thing I I'm only here today because of Holly Schnitzer my Elementary music teacher you know I grew up in a school district where music education was valued at the level that it was at Dartmouth I was fortunate and you know I didn't realize when I was in sixth grade that my Elementary music teacher was oh probably one of the best in the country and I would say she she kind of brainwashed us in a Little Love and Music there's a lot of people I graduated with 60 kids in my graduate class there's 10 of us that work in the music music profession I mean people

065that sing in the Metropolitan Opera College like professors like with doctorates 10 out of 60. it's crazy statistic when you think about it you know I'm here and I'm just one of us you know and it's the reality that having that influence and having that early on and even the teachers the the you know the middle school and high school teachers they always said it's like well it was her it was all her like we could do anything with you because you would just be like yep we'll just do it because she was that influential and just just great people person right and so it's like telling the teachers you know it's all about Connections it's about getting the students to have this passion for it not every student's going to you know grow up

066to be a direct your music somewhere or whatever but if they have an appreciation walking out Elementary then who knows what's going to happen with the Middle School in high school and then later on for those people so you know I value it highly because I know the impact it had on my life um and I don't think honestly without her I would definitely not be a music teacher like this was not what would have been in my head when I was growing up but you know I just knew what how important it was so yeah thank you all right thank you sir thank you much appreciate it thank you foreign okay next that's all set old business superintendent search Mr kindly do you have anything I can just uh let you know that I

067followed up based on your comments at the last school committee meeting we made the changes to the brochure got those over to Mr hardy at masc the position was posted I believe on Friday it went up and the emails went out we saw you know I received one today so from masc so that's out there closes February 6th Mr hardy couldn't be here tonight he was scheduled to attend but yeah the weather up that neck of the woods is a lot worse than here he was Ill yeah family it's that time of the year that's going to happen all right thank you questions for people anybody have any questions we all got did everybody get an opportunity to look at the uh list that uh Miss Gunther thank you very much ma'am sent out and

068then was very helpful today by modifying it as to where they were that was great thank you I appreciate that and uh you know questions or comments on it think go ahead oh no sorry nope nope I apologize it's the intent of this committee to make the appointments this evening uh uh I hadn't gotten that far I'll be honest with you if you want to talk about this now you want to wait till our next meeting on the 13th and then they'll be ready to go for as was my schedule uh uh ready yeah ready to uh ready to go on the uh the 28th which is when the the uh Mr Heidi is going to have the training and all the paperwork signing for everyone that type of deal I don't okay if you

069go back and you look at yeah let me take a look here okay if you go back and take a look uh it's actually out a week early everywhere a little bit ahead which is fine the uh it says the list that we have that he provided to us that I have says February 13th membership of screening committee completed and then following week at school vacation and then the 28th is formation and training of screening committee completed uh uh March 2nd is when the applications close I'm not sure if that changed or if that's the same in the same ballpark that's changed yeah okay these dates are a little uh this is the old one all right that's what I had yeah right so that's what I have from December 12th I think it got

070updated no that's okay so one of the concerns was that in order to be able to you know be seen it in a timely fashion and get try and get ahead of there are a bunch of other postings right now obviously out there um so the intent was that we what we did was we moved up the application deadline date um to February 6th the semi-finalists would be selected so interview candidates would be selected on February 13th so you really you really should act regarding the screening committee semifinalist interviews would be the week of February 27th through March 6. so if there was a reason tonight that you you know you needed more time to review the the search screening candidates you could do that um but there is a you know fairly tight timeline

071with uh finalists selected on March 6th you know the email date that that went out on without flow because I'm trying to find it with all the dates um it's in the brochure so if you if you want to look at the last last meeting um it was in the brochure it's the one thing I didn't print so February 6th application is due February 13th semifinal is selected okay February 27th through March 6th would be the first round of interviews so when was Mr Heidi Hardy's first yeah I have that here yep um but as far as the screening committee training them uh it would be sometime between [Music] um it would be sometime in before February 13th February 13th would be when semi-finalists are selected by the screening committee so okay that I reckon

072because I mean obviously you know these dates can be somewhat flexible if you folks need them to be something else but um that is what was published I think it would make I think it would make good sense to to get this settled this evening no I'm I'm good with the committee's and I miss this I'm going to be honest my fault the uh February 13th we have a school committee meeting so that that's going to be changed yeah well something has to change in there and okay because you've got I'm eating on the 13th no disrespect Tuesday is Valentine's Day all right and I'm not going there that's up to the committee I'm not going there I already got chewed out last 20 20 years ago for that we did that last year we

073met on Valentine's Day last year but I if I remember correctly I sat there and said what's your option people and so that would I would think that you would have to go Wednesday the 15th that's my only thought there yeah and you know I see any reason that that can't be flexible day you know that that type of deal so Kathleen I just have a question um that you I made the assumption but I just wanted to make sure that the selection criteria in the brochure is based off of the results of the survey right and Mr hardy had planned on being here tonight to share those results but obviously he was unable to he will be available on the 13th um and could share survey results with the group then well we could

074ask for some written information about the survey from him if we need it before then but yes it informed the brochure okay can he can he get that can you I can ask him for uh some sort of person some type of a reporter summary I will get to us so you can get it forwarded to us so we can take a look at it and just to be proactive if he I understand he is not well or personal reasons but if he's unable to travel if we could plan to have him at least zoom in at a minimum because I I feel like I would agree I'd like to see someone from masc here on the 14th the 13th oh yeah if it's not Jim it's Mr coot it's coach someone someone needs to

075be here in person or on Zoom yeah exactly now we're gonna have a major snowstorm on the 13th with an hour out of it don't say that I was a kid we had one so I'll leave it at that yeah so okay okay all right and it would be great Mr chair um Mr Kiley if we if he could provide us with some kind of summary like Kathleen said um prior to that meeting so we can at least have have a look over it before that's right that's what I said if we if if he can get that to us the sooner the better so that we at least have it to look at agreed you know per se you know no disrespect you know an email at five o'clock on February 13th isn't going

076to cut it if you know what I'm saying yep okay so that being said uh I still I still have my wonderful notes uh if you remember Miss Gunther uh sent us an email on the 29th of November with uh what the search committee looked like back in 2015. okay and just so that everybody at home in our audiences it had two Central administrators two school committee members one curriculum director three principles Middle High School and one Elementary three teachers a union designee slash teacher two parents and a retired administrator uh we had some discussions at our last meeting about having like a maintenance a custodian secretary Food Service person on that so that answers Gene's question to replace the retired administrator replace the tire retired administrator the other change was the curriculum director was

077going to be a related services provider right because that would be Central yeah yeah so so my only question is there's no Community have we so from the uh emails or from the drive that uh scanthers uh included us all on I did not see any um parents right I did nor did I okay okay so I thought one Community member which would be Miss Brooks She's Not a parent but she's a Community member she also fought even though we took it out she falls under that uh retired and retired administrator type of deal my thought was asking the building administrators you know to reach out to their PTO presidents or something and see if there's someone who is interested I mean this is a time commitment okay that type of deal so this is

078you know this is this is not a 12 to 1 meeting type of deal when you have you know specifically with the finalists that I read on Chris you've done it it you know however many you have in a day they're usually 45 minutes to one hour type of deal so you have three or four of them so you're talking you know a four or five hour you know over a couple you know a couple of days so that's that's my recollection of you know when we've done it when I've done it so so do we want to just go right down the line and start discussing our our choices yeah so yeah I guess what I'm looking at here from the FY uh the 2015 superintendent search committee info so you have a two

079central office administrators we did receive some uh several we have uh they're with me here for a second we've got uh Miss Gunther and we have Miss Miss paveo troll office I mean because we did have the director of nutrition Ms Sheridan who really is a district-based sort of right that's what I I don't know the answer to this question I'm I'm looking personally I'm looking at Miss Sheridan as on into the maintenance custodian Secretary of food service that's that's where I was looking at her that's my my thought and again I'm only me yeah I guess when I was nominating that um that for that slot I really sort of envisioned um someone who's not a director someone who has that to be frank I don't mean this in an insulting way but at

080the lower end of the pay scale and has more in tune with those sorts of issues a front-line custodial staff a TA in the classroom a food service worker in the cafeteria right I think we need more representation from the lower end of the pay scale as opposed to the higher end of the pay scale just my two cents well I I think the problem you have there Shannon is is the fact that with all due respect we didn't get anybody from maintenance a custodian or a secretary you know the one quote and unquote cafeteria worker we got was the director there is a teaching assistant yes I and I was looking at her as being one of the teachers I specifically said teaching assistant when I made that point and that's in the minutes

081okay that slot so secretarial teaching assistant custodial food service or maintenance staff all right in a race I didn't write ta though yeah okay yeah I mean and so then that's it so I don't know the answers to these questions the categories are not entirely clear your drawing Venn diagrams there's some overlap here yeah so I mean if you in but go back to what you just said secretary Kate's Kate's the secretary correct or she could be considered Central Administration she could how fine do you know this how fine do you want to split this you know and I'm not trying to all I'm trying to get is Clarity I don't understand who falls into what category it is not clear to me what do we mean by central office someone who works out of

082central office or an administrator I think right I don't know that's what I'm asking okay Chris I'm going to go back to you because it was you and miss the goth do you remember who was central office when we hired Dr Gifford okay let's see that's right no I don't yeah do you remember you're on the committee as well yeah Michelle Michelle and the Mystery yeah she was the curriculum person then Michelle Tracy and and yeah and Jim okay yep okay thank you thank you Renee again I wasn't part and parcel of that so I I am Flying Blind with this as far as that one goes so thank you so that's what we again that's what was central office okay so So based on based on this list if I may yeah based on

083this list I'd like to do are we gonna do we need to make motions here to appoint these people to appoint your staff I would yeah I'm just trying to you know I'm not trying to one two three I mean how I'm trying to make it a lot easier but I think we're probably going to need to do that we'll take it one you know make it one second one one category at a time yeah that sounds good yeah no no that's fine thank you well I'd like to make a motion that we appoint for central office uh this is Catherine paveo as well as really um Mrs Gunther those are my two one second that that was gonna be my choice for central office okay so we've got a motion and a second for

084uh miss paveo and miss Gunther for central office and Central administrators any other anybody else everybody good with that all in favor aye aye aye opposed unanimous okay that takes care of that one thank you thank you okay two school committee members well there were only two that applied Mr Oliver and Dr Jenkins Mr Oliver and Dr Jenkins okay don't mind me I'm just trying to make notes here so I can big star yeah there we go thank you very much any okay so we got a motion by Dr Jenkins and I think it's yeah that's right second by Miss wait and the other volunteers no all in favor aye aye aye opposed carries unanimously thank you for doing this thank you I'm sorry I didn't say Miss paveo thank you yes thank you thank

085you thank you thank you yeah she's hiding I got that all right that takes care of that okay the curriculum director we talked about we have our curriculum yeah we thought it's going to be it was a discussion about related service provider okay uh so defer to Mrs Amaral we get a we're reading reading reading yeah reading specialist on the tech specialist we haven't Uhl teacher instructional technology specialist a reading specialist and a special education teacher I got I got a reading I got I got a reading specialist thank you specialist because I couldn't read that either I was going to separate them into I got two reading specialists no SLP or no not that I saw thank you you got an ell oh you were good yeah huh yeah I'm looking at no disrespect

086I'm looking at Kelly Dua uh has she's an ell system teacher another business who's a special education teacher go ahead or I mean I I I I miss Lynch is wonder I mean they're it's this is hard right I think they would all equally be um valuable members yeah so I mean I don't know I'm not here to break a tie I don't know they're I don't care no there's not a matter of defer to you because you go go ahead you know I I really I I this is hard yeah listen nobody said it was going to be easy this is why we get the big bucks yeah okay and so the ell is Kelly Dua yeah yeah okay oh you can't do it I'll do it since we have the Jeopardy theme song

087I mean I I know you don't want to um all right that's fine I'll make a motion that we appoint Mary Lynch as the um related Services person that was really tough I said I did it I'm good with that not have that type of deal all right so we have a motion and a second for Mary Lynch from the middle school as the reading specialist anyone else all in favor aye aye opposed motion carries unanimously thank you Ms Lynch okay uh three principles High School Middle and an elementary so we have Mr Shea from the high school Mr Rossi from the Middle School to be principal by the time this really starts to to work out we have Mr granfield MS from Quinn and uh it's a quarter no Mr did Mr I didn't

088see Mr Porter's name today yeah I have it here that was past the deadline because I asked for these to be in by Friday with all due respect and then I got Miss Javier who's the associate principal here at the high school so those are those are those are what we got Shannon I'd like to make a motion to apply Mr Shea Mr Rossi and Mr Porter bye let's second that can I ask a question though sure do you just say that Mr Porter's though came in too late like yeah I thought I thought we had said that we were going to have everything in for last Saturday last Friday was there a posting um a date was that in the minutes wow if it was in the minutes I'm done I think we should

089abide by that but to send in an email to miss Gunther by January 20th 2023. well then can I make a motion uh we have a motion on the floor I have to withdraw I will withdraw my motion okay so go ahead oh so then can I make a motion to appoint Mr Shea Mr Rossi and Mr granfield yep I'll second Okay so Ms Waite has the motion Miss Amaral has the second any other discussion Dr Jenkins um so I know this is going to sound maybe you know given that I just made a motion to nominate three men but I don't wonder whether we nominate a woman whether we consider that well can I ask that can I just are we having opening this to discussion yeah I mean motion we always discuss we

090have a discussion so so just on that you know I would say I think in this you know when we talk about administrators it's most you know we do have other women that are going to be represented with miss paveya miss you know you know Dr Jenkins misgender I think it is important to have someone you know for talking about a principal one principal from the high school one principal from the middle school and one from elementary we have to have one from the high school in the Middle School the question is whether it was the elementary principle well I know that but I'm saying I we need to have one I think from one of the elementary schools as well like because it you know wasn't that like part of the discussion yeah no

091no that's no no my point is the other two are women I'm Sorry Miss Korea is Miss Korea as a woman who's an associate friends yeah I didn't say that Miss Korea actually okay so I think I didn't see that she had applied it's just it's this is her discussion too okay yes everyone is qualified and good work we're choosing between really good people here yeah yeah that's fine all right so we've got all right so we've got Mr Shea Mr Rossi and Mr granfield right happy Okay so we've got those three that's the motion and the second three years no no I said I'm happy I'm happy I think they're all yeah I mean there's no wrong answer right right this is the nice thing about this right now is there is not a

092wrong answer huh it's just discussion that's it okay support any other questions comments okay all in favor aye aye opposed all right Dr Jenkins four to one okay totally understood that's fine yeah yeah totally understood okay all right what do we have next up next is teachers three teachers that's what was on this list so we got two four five eight eleven twelve thirteen at the moment and if we go right down we'll be at 13. okay I'm just trying to make sure we gotten no disrespect we've got an odd number okay so we're good with three teachers yeah we're good with three teachers okay that's fine okay so who's let me let me give you uh Mr chairman ask one question sure um can I skip one category very quickly we have a union

093designee slash teacher as the next category and I don't wonder if the union designee might take one person off of our list as we consider do you know what I mean I know what you mean so can do we consider that and ask the union president first do you know what I'm saying because I know it's like if we use one of our picks then sorry they get another pick right for for their pick so maybe they pick first you know I know what you're saying I know what you're saying yeah you know employee yeah so might we invite Miss Vieira up to the microphone and ask her who their designee slash teacher might be is that how that works Maureen yeah either either if it's an office yeah either either Miss Viera or if

094Miss Boyle's still here yes technical presidents correct yes we're co-presidents so okay so just to clarify police one of the slots on the committee is the union designee's last teacher okay you are the union I believe right the representative of the Union so okay Santa rock paper scissors for it real quick so um Renee so she's designated I'm designating okay yes I'll make a motion that we appoint Renee Vieira as the Union designee to the search thank you yes thank you and and it's and so and then it's three um okay so time out okay so we go to did somebody I mean I was making a note okay did somebody second that three yes shoot second yes all right I don't know what would happen if we don't approve okay all in favor aye

095aye opposed okay so let's go back so let's go back to uh teachers and uh if you don't mind I'm gonna I'll give you my picks just to be in here uh I'm looking at Mr Bosworth uh where the heck yeah yeah uh Mr Higgins and even though we've got it later on I was looking at uh Trudy Santos who's a TA at the Quinn that's who I was looking at those were my those were my three one more time Mr chair sure Eric Bosworth who's a technology teacher here at the high school yeah Mr Higgins who's English and who knows what else and uh and everything else which is fine and uh Trudy Santos who is a TA at the Quinn hi can I yeah no one thing I I do want to make

096sure though is that we are representing I think it's great that we have a TA and I think that's you know included in this I do want to make sure that we are representing because we do have um you know we'll be a little heavy on the high school so just as which I think is fair but I do want to make sure we're not leaving out you know early childhood you know Cushman and we don't have anyone from Demello you know or Potter in this so just as you know thoughts we do have it we do have a demelo we have the Mellow teacher we have a Quinn teacher no I mean like on our list I apologize yeah so that's what I just want to make sure yeah I understand what you're saying

097that we have some balance there yeah yep nope I understand what you're saying ah but again I mean like I love all those choices but again I just uh I just want to make sure that we're I mean sure do we have anyone representing Potter right now I don't I don't think so I could no no I have uh I have I have a tech tech specialist uh Sandra chica from yes from Potter yeah yeah so I can go Dr Jenkins I would prefer to leave Miss Santos for the TA slot oh and again that would be my preference that's fine I'm good with that and then that would allow us to give us a little more flexibility to miss Waits Point um about um having some teachers that are not just at the high

098school level [Applause] I would agree with that no I'm and again no uh no sweat all right okay so go back I'm I said Mr Bosworth Mr Higgins and who was the one I just said I apologize uh Sandra chica from the tech specialist at Potter does that work so um go ahead yeah I would just want to speak I think for Mr Bosworth I think it does Phil again and again as all the candidates I think it fills the the tech you know piece so I do think you know I certainly support I mean again I support them but I think that is for that to fulfilling that that need on the committee yeah and that Vision so yeah it's just everybody okay Chris I'm good with that Shannon it's fine so I'll meet

099you I'll make a motion that we for our teachers that we appoint Mr Bosworth Mr Higgins and Ms chica as teachers to the search committee that's good all right all in favor aye aye opposed motion carries all right so we got those three we've got the union rep the PTO or parent two parents we don't have yet hopefully our wonderful administrators can get somebody from the PTO we'll go from there yeah and the last one go ahead I just have a question I'm I'm just a little leery of us giving up our appointment Powers um over two members of the committee I mean it is the duty that this is one of the primary duties right so is that who are we giving up the community the parents are we going to approve of them

100at the next meeting I think I thought we decided that was too late I I did put put it on Facebook as well welcoming people to apply for both I'm just a little concerned with about two members of the committee being appointed without the committee's review and approval I would certainly agree with that yeah I agree I agree I I hear what you I mean I'm not above if we want to have a 10-minute special meeting at some point the point people I can do that we can certainly come in but I this is the school committee's Duty and I believe it's important that we review and appoint all the members no and it's good go go go back to what I said uh when this first all started type of deal was this is

101you know this is this is all us type of deal for argumentative sake all right so let's do this uh uh I don't know what everybody's schedule is today is the 23rd give them if the uh if the school administrators can reach out to their ptos and get some get someone with interest by January 31st okay and then we can have a 10-minute meeting on on February 1st does that work sure Joanne do it by Zoom I can't make the first but that's fine I will trust the four of you to do that oh gee thanks uh I'm so second but I can't do the first yeah I do you want to do the second I can do you know the second is okay too again Chris I agree if we do it by Zoom

102instead of trying to I have a school committee meeting in my district on the first the first or the on February 1st so should we do the second you want to do this is the second good it's not good for me but I trust all of you and and again if we did advise Zoom so you're not schlepping someplace I'll be facilitating um okay I got it yeah yeah good um would it be okay for me also to share well I would anyway but share towards you know CPAC parents who also may be in you know dual role with the ptos and that sort of thing but yeah can I ask one more question so we have designated this slot as parents I'm sorry parents yeah um can we broaden it a little to say

103anyone who's ever sort of had their kids in the Dartmouth schools I mean there are people who maybe the kids are out a couple years no no no my fault personally okay personally I want act and I don't mean it I want parents of students in the system right now that would be my preference as well that is just a wider net and then we'll see what happens we can come up with without this 3500 students in the system right now give or take and I would you know somewhere down the line we should be able to find hopefully find two and that that's that that's my thought I'm not kin to going out to someone whose child graduated 15 years ago and I'm being facetious but understand one of times that things have changed

104type of deal so that that that's my thought okay so let's go back get well go ahead um by parents though like a custodial Guardian yeah it could be a grandparent that sort of thing just to clarify yeah because it's got to be yeah it's a custodial man and in all seriousness as I said someone that has the time I mean you you can't especially when it comes to reviewing the the applications you know and and being a vote to come up with all the semi-finalists and you've got to be there for both sets of interviews otherwise it's no it it you know it doesn't work that type of deal so that's that's the key is is somebody understanding the commitment that's going to be there so all right so do you want to does

105five o'clock on the second of February via Zoom work for a majority of us what's the date again February 2nd if it's at five I probably could log in so does that work for you ma'am well somebody's got to set the zoom link up oh we can do that no problem thanks and you're going to trust me with it no I can set it up yeah no uh I'd like to give it'll set it up it'll get set up five in the second I can zoom okay yep you can do that all right okay let me do this yeah I just wanna and Dr Gifford or um I should maybe I shouldn't like ask John with noons so at what date do we want these letters again from parents are we saying my general language

106January 31st okay I just want to clarify that okay January 31st the close of business Bush Street closes at four o'clock okay so if you're responding by mail or email it's got to be in by four o'clock okay and just for people's just knowledge they should email Miss Gunther yeah yes okay and thank you okay no problem okay all right and the last one is was the retired administrator that we changed to a TA maintenance custodian secretary Food Service so Dr Jenkins I'd like to make a motion that we appoint Trudy Santos to that possession second now okay so we actually Kathleen breached you to it so we have so we get a motion by Dr Jenkins to uh appoint Trudy Santos a TA at the Quinn as uh neck in that category uh second

107by Ms Amaral any other comments questions all right got you a hearing none all in favor aye opposed motion carries thank you very much everybody thank you to everyone who applied it is appreciated more than you will know yeah okay if you'd let those if you'd let everyone know I mean I know some are here but he just sent out the general email to everybody tomorrow that type of deal that'd be fine and also Mr chair just thank you to all of those who submitted a letter of interest we certainly appreciate it yep absolutely okay all right pupil supported service administrator [Applause] okay [Applause] and I will oh here we go I do have it okay uh foreign goes back to 2014. uh was do we Okay time out let me take a step back

108do we want to talk about this do we want to get this committee formed I mean we don't have any dates at the moment the the request the job it is it is posted type of deal so we've got what's the closing date on that ma'am February 3rd okay so yeah is there a date tied to um letters of interest to be on the committee as well with this one there was yeah so it's not like we're gonna get any more right yeah I get them all yeah shall we continue we got we got quite a few yeah go ahead Kathleen and um if if it is keeping me from being on I understand but I had submitted um interest but not again after so I I may not be selected I understand that but

109um my misunderstanding if that's because I don't see my look at the name I have from the last minute okay plus I'll note we only have one other school committee member who put his name in yeah I saw your name I thought oh goodness that's okay uh seriously uh makeup from the spring of 2014 was two school committee members one CPAC rep slash parent uh one parent of a special needs student one central office administrator one high school administrator one Middle School administrator one Elementary School administrator one psychologist slash sped team facilitator one sop and one sped teacher which by my count is 11. so how do you want to do this you want to discuss this tonight you want to what do you want to do open if it has it has a February

1103rd deadline so I mean I think maybe we could go I would say we should probably go ahead and do this that's fine I'm good so I'll start can I nominate Mr Nunes and Miss Amaral for to be the school committee members women do I have a thing in this okay where the heck am I okay so myself and Miss Hammer all have been uh nominated and the others all in favor aye aye oppose motion carries unanimously one CPAC representative slash parent do we I didn't see one of those I do not see no disrespect either of either of the next two I don't see any parents no I don't either so again maybe that's something that uh Miss Townsend and Miss Joker you can also reach out to see Patrick to the CPAC group

111to see what we can we can get what type of deal again use the same January 31st close up business January 31st and we can take care of them yeah on the second that's fine that's good okay central office administrator uh chair I'd like to nominate Mr Tebow to be the central office representative yep second I'm reading properly that's you know what's that the one that's the only one we have properly yep so motion Forever Mr Tebow any others all in favor aye aye opposed motion carries unanimously thank you Ross uh one high school administrator Mr Martin that's it I'd like to make a motion that we um I'm Michael Martin on the committee one second yeah so we have a high school all right so we have a motion for uh Mr Martin any

112others all in favor aye aye opposed motion carries thanks Mike thank you okay Middle School administrator can I make a motion to appoint Mr Hayes so we have a motion by Dr Jenkins second by Miss Waite for uh Mark Hayes on the motion any discussion that's great nope all in favor aye opposed motion carries uh Elementary School administrator we had I had one yeah Adam we've got Adam Hill Thomas and we have uh Audra Thomas and Miss Ms Y I will not attend I'd like to make a motion that we nominate Audra Thomas Elementary School administrator okay yeah sorry you can stick his nose in there uh all right so all right so we have a motion for Audra Thomas yep in a second second on the motion any discussion hearing none all in favor

113aye aye opposed motion carries okay psychologists sped team facilitator I'd like to make a motion that we nominate Caitlin colbeck who is a psychological psychologist DHS part okay so we excuse me do I have a motion for Caitlin colbeck has the psychologist sped team facilitator on the motion any discussion none yeah we got a motion in a second am I correct yes uh Miss Amber all second yeah thank you I made the motion Oliver I apologize I'm losing track that's all right that's all right high and quick all right all in favor aye aye opposed motion carries unanimously all right um SLP make a motion that we nominate Sandra posa to the committee Sandra I'll second that for SLP yes Alabama reposal faculty speak language okay I got stuff on two pages I apologize all

114right so we have that that's the SOP all in favor aye aye opposed motion carries unanimously and one sped teacher I'd like to make a motion that we um nominate Stephanie Mello for that position my second match good choice good choice yep all right it's okay so we have a motion for Stephanie Mello from Quinn special as the sped teacher all in favor aye opposed motion carries unanimously thank you everyone who participated and sent in your request that is greatly appreciated the interest in the district Wisconsin will you make it in the next couple of days to notify those people please thank you Kathleen will you get to CPAC to absolutely thank you okay oh all right uh next finally going uh Capital Improvement plan giraffe Mr Kiley thank you Mr noon so based on

115your feedback from the last meeting uh the major revision to the capital Improvement plan is to add a new or renovated school or schools um to the plan it was added in 2028 I I put it in at a cost of a hundred million dollars now not right not 400 million as was reported in some local media um talk about the Taj Mahal right right uh so the 2017 facilities master plan uh noted some options and it talked about Renovations and and and two and additions to several schools as options the range of options was between 54 million and 83 million in that plan now in today's dollars probably the 54 million from 2017 is the 100 million dollars today um that's just the reality of things so we put that in there there's certainly

116some more analysis that will need to be done to determine what's best for kids and what projects we can identify that would make the most difference for the district moving forward so that would have to be done but we did hear what you said and certainly want to begin that process looking at our options and trying to identify a project I was approached following our meeting by a member of the select board who was very supportive of the idea of thinking about big picture planning in town and I told him I'm absolutely on board with that so if we can be a part of a town-wide process where where that takes place I certainly want to be involved in that you know obviously there'll be opportunities for school committee involvement as well so so that

117was the major uh the major change to the plan I will note that we were talking about uh you know music instruments earlier well there is a music instrument request on this as we talked about last two weeks ago so um there's some great projects on there some that are really desperately needed so I'd be happy to revisit any of those if you'd like or answer any questions you might have the vehicle okay I'm sorry I just very quickly um once we approve this Mr Kylie when do you typically present this to the capital Improvement committee it's really up to their schedule and I'm not quite sure how they are scheduling meetings yet this year normally we would be meeting right around this time of year with them I have a feeling that that might

118be a little later okay I would just ask and if it's all right with the committee I would like to attend that of course and share some of our sentiments and feel free if anyone wants to join yeah I usually yeah I find out far enough in advance I I you know unfortunately sometimes you know I get an email at five minutes of four yes I'm meeting at seven you know nine o'clock tomorrow morning it's right you know that type of deal so yeah no I I agree I like I like to go in and see what else is going on there too I'll make a motion that we approve the uh fy24 Capital Improvement plan as uh stated second so we get a motion by Mr Oliver or a second by Ms Amaral to

119approve the uh FY 24 to 28 Capital Improvement plan on the motion any discussion all in favor aye aye aye opposed motion carries unanimously thank you Mr Kiley thank you thank you sir all right okay FY 2324 school calendar Dr Gifford sure thank you we did make the changes that you suggested last meeting including we kept the four day weekend for Labor Day weekend we added the 22nd of November as a Thanksgiving part of the Thanksgiving recess and also in December we moved that parent conference as you can see one is on a Monday and one will be on the Wednesday that's great that's great so those are the changes we've made questions comments do you make a motion to accept the 23 24 school calendar as presented I'll do that by Dr Jenkins second

120by Ms Amaral good so it just means that the high school has to move all there day before Thanksgiving thanks to two days before the day before before Thanksgiving Eve day yeah and it'll probably be okay yeah I think so yeah that'll that'll work out fine no problem yeah that's it you're absolutely right okay all in favor aye opposed motion carries unanimously you can smile miss fiori you got variety or you got the Friday off hmm my battles all right uh new business 2022 annual report Dr Gifford so I hope you had time to read through it it was quite lengthy or you will read through it but yeah and once again thank you to the schools for providing the information as well as our curriculum leaders and and everybody that participated in submitting information

121on that report so we would ask for your vote of approval for that before we forward to the town hall comments questions Dr Jenkins I have a question this might be for Mr Kylie and it's about the trust funds um and so I noticed some of those trust funds don't have any expenditures and I will note that one of them is I noticed that to be used to promote music in the Dartmouth schools and I don't wonder have we considered tapping any of that to support you know some of the expenditures I'm not saying we shouldn't ask the town but at the same point in time it's often good when we can say look we're going to also chip in some money but I don't I don't wonder whether it might not be a bad

122idea for us to look at using some of that if that's what that's fund is intended to use that it is what it's intended for and it could be it certainly could be utilized in that capacity we've been fortunate to be able to support some of the music purchases in the last few years with either with uh end-to-year monies or or planned purchases um so we have not utilized that money for that purpose but we certainly could and that has that has been tapped over the years yeah not recently but yeah right but since we just had a presentation about need and there's a source of money I just thought hey yeah maybe we could give you know Mr Flint some money just saying whatever that is yeah okay yeah see and it pays off

123to present that's right that was the the shortest like right oh he's coming back you're coming back the 13th okay I'll make a motion to accept the annual report I'll second that motion by Dr Jenkins second by Mr Oliver to approve the annual report I'll just say was very well done you know getting all the looking at and again with Mr Kiley all the financial what's there that's a bear to do that's got to be a bear have fun no doubt about it all in favor aye opposed motion carries unanimously all right uh superintendent's update I'm gonna fly through all this so uh just okay so a bunch of things that are happening one uh Quinn is celebrating great kindness Challenge and students are participating in the activities all week long and next Friday a

124big celebration for 100th day of school at Cushman they have held a Special Olympics young athletes day you may have seen on Justine's um newsletter if you ever get that some pictures of that Mr Capello Miss paveo Miss Phillips the officer Amanda and other offices came as a unified team and with students from the high school and they worked with a preschool student so we wanted to thank all of those that participated in that speaking of Cushman we get tired of saying it a little bit but they received another 600 6 500 award from the Feinstein group I don't know how much money is in that Foundation but it seems to be endless at this point fantastic yeah I know it's great Justine's been doing a nice job of outfitting some you know with new

125things at the playground some tactile sandbox kinds of things things like that so anyway Demello had a mad scientist day today and the students were entertained with a science program called Fire and Ice the programs were paid for by the PTO part of their fundraiser last year they raised six thousand dollars so those are the kinds of things that can be done with that and every Friday they wanted me to report that they're holding some stem classes in the cafeteria where students are collaborating on stem challenges and Lynn Liz volche the tech person over there is running some of those and on Friday it'll be World reading day with virtual children's author visits at the school and also they are bringing back the New Bedford Symphony Orchestra I attended one a couple months ago where

126they come and they it was fabulous it was just um people and they they they're playing music entertaining but also talking about math Within the Music it was fabulous so they're doing that again with grades three and four and we oh they're also doing fifth grade student councils running food drive for the Council on Aging and at the high school level we were received from the high school the college boards AP Computer Science female diversity award for expanding young women's access to AP Computer Science principles and the award acknowledges 1105 schools for their work toward equal gender representation during the 21-22 school year and we were one of 832 schools to be recognized for achieving this this result and as you know we've had an emphasis on expanding our computer science program so this was

127very good to get more young ladies involved in that also across the district school-based teams we continue to we brought the portrait of a learner work to the school base and we were very appreciative of everybody's work on that and we had another successful PD day and so I wanted to thank everyone including our directors a special ed department for planning and securing speakers our staff who presented oftentimes our teachers will present and as well as the tech department for running around school to school to ensure the technology was working for these presentations so that's it in a nutshell Mr chair yeah um well I just had one update um so uh the district is currently the uh as part of the tiered focused monitoring which Miss Townsend talked about uh reached out to um

128part of that process is conversation with myself as in my put my CPAC chair hat on um and uh we have a um parent orientation which is part of this process where deci has we have scheduled with the office of monitoring whatever it is a person is going to be hosting a parent orientation via zoom on February 7th and the link for that is accessible on the Dartmouth CPAC Facebook page and it may also be on a flyer in our weekly electronic backpack um I believe I did that and basically we hope to engage parents of students on IEPs in the district to be part of this orientation where they're just going to you know review basically the policies the procedures and and related to special education and so we hope to have a good

129turnout for that and again it's February 7th 6 p.m just for a half hour online via Zoom if if parents um and any interested parties so the CPAC is for parents staff interested parties uh to just you know tune in to that for that half hour to engage in that way it would be great beautiful anybody else Chris thank you Mr chair so just a quick question I'm just trying to understand um it came I came to me from social media the hanging of the banner in the gymnasium I'm just wondering how that came about the hanging of the Dartmouth Indian Banner um that was that was something that has been discussed for a while in this process going on and we left it to Mr thank you Chris Pereira and Mr christopholi to you

130know once it was ready to come up with a date to okay have to have it displayed in the gym that type of deal so that is something that has been talked about yeah I've been I was you know obviously been involved with the plaques and all that but for some reason the um the banner just doesn't seem to ring a bell with that and I just say that because as we all know and we just recently dedicated our our um our gymnasium um this has got um coach Gaspar yeah coach Gaspar is that that was one of the things that was my understanding that was always a big to him was that um there would never be any banners hanging from the rafters um I've heard that from several people um so you know

131I I'm just throwing that out there um I just wish we would have had a little more conversation about this because it's um obviously with the meteor it's just opening up another political divide um that being said I think that's one of your terms Mr Nunes that being said um it is what it is I just wish that the at least the committee was briefed a little bit more about it because I was taken back a little bit about seeing it in the media yeah no that's again as I said that is something that has been in the works for a long time in all the conversations that were going on was you know the plaque and the plaque here yeah the black ear the plaque at the football stadium at Memorial Stadium I believe

132there's individual plaques in the schools yeah and that was Tastefully done I have no and that was all part of the uh the thing all right the panel just doesn't just doesn't seem to ring a bell with me but that's you know I it could be my ADD ICT it's an agent AG e Factor yes um on another note um it looks like our our next regularly scheduled meeting is February 13th is that correct and that is our only meeting in February February um I don't know what the committee's thoughts are on this but that being uh seemingly being Dr Gifford's um last school committee meeting I I thought maybe it would be uh nice to have a small reception uh before I thought you were going to say give me the day off yeah

133I'm not going there are you gonna have much for a swap that's right um maybe a small reception uh maybe Mrs Sheraton could put something together Mr Kylie um we could invite some Town officials uh Dr Gifford has been here for almost eight years yeah um yeah so I you know we we've had our upset we've had our ups and downs so we've had our disagreements but overall I think the district isn't a better place and I think it would be nice that we we look to just do a small recognition for Dr Jeffrey absolutely prior to prior to that meeting or we could do it or we could do it after providing we have a brief agenda which unfortunately is not happening absolutely so I just that's great yes we'll work on that thank

134you that's fine um a couple of things that I have uh in the standard times uh yesterday uh they've started coming out with the fall their top fall athletes for the different sports than they had the volleyball and we had the privilege of having the top volleyball the you know All-Star type of deal plus we also had several other uh players at as All-Stars and or honorable mention so congratulations to them that's coming out and I again I don't know if you've been you know you know following the fall Sports uh you know the teams that can compete in uh fall tournaments and everything else and so far having a wonderful season and moving right along so you know we're in pretty good shape for for that or I know in our track team is

135got some students that have you know individually you know more so team-wise but also individually uh doing well so we wish them good luck as they continue on we'll have see what February 13th being anybody else with anything no all right that being said our next meeting is Mr Oliver said is going to be uh February 13th we are going to have a brief Zoom meeting on February 2nd at five o'clock for the purpose of getting uh the uh the parents for both search committee hopefully parents for both search committees uh if not we'll just go with what we have simple as that uh that being said the chair will entertain a motion to adjourn to Executive session for the purposes of negotiations with Union and non-union personnel and a pending legal matter and not

136return to open session it's all moved moved by Dr Jenkins second by Miss weight on the motion any discussion chair hearing on roll call oh before I do that Phoenix I hope you enjoyed your meeting you found it I hope you come back I'll come back and hope it was you know hope it was informative it was quite informative very good I think again thank you I apologize Miss Gunther roll call please yes yes Sharon Jenkins yes yes thank you very much everyone and have a good evening [Music] thank you [Music]