District Committee Meeting (May 7, 2024)

001e e e i' like to call a meeting to order please please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance andice please stay standing for a moment of silence like to remember our service men and women here in overseas especially our graduates thank you Cheryl can we do the roll call we have enough Miss Ferris miss dla Mr Jones Mr Mahia present Mr Mercedes Mr Tatum yeah Mr ha him I'm sorry Mr toox I'm Sor excuse me okay uh exceptional uh Reggie lvo going to have the pleasure of doing that yeah that makes sense good evening everybody um I'm going to say a few words about Charlotte uh lavali and then she's going to also say a few words to us about who she sees herself as so Charlotte lavali is an 18-year-old graduating senior enrolled in

002the health assistant shop at glts she and her twin sister Carolyn lavali were born and raised in Lawrence Massachusetts Charlotte's long-term goal is to follow in her older brother's footsteps and become a police officer someday Charlotte has a GP a of 3.45 and is an active member of our school Community participating in various clubs and activities currently she is finishing up her fourth year as a Vos softball player Charlotte lavali is being recognized tonight as a distinguished Reggie because of the beautiful person she is on the inside and outside Charlotte overcomes obstacles with a smile and optimistic attitude her calm demeanor and thoughtful approach to situations had Led Led to favorable outcomes for her personally and professionally she is a role model to most that meet her and is a reliable friend and Confidant we

003know that Charlotte will do amazing things in her future and are excited to celebrate her as an outstanding member of the glts family this evening char [Applause] this award is presented to Charlotte lavali for her outstanding contributions to the greater lawence technical school Community given the 7th day of May 2024 [Applause] yeah can we have the podium over oh yes yeah thank you so my name is Charlotte I am a senior and health assistant as Mr lvo said and my plans of after graduation consists of serving in the United States Air Force I'm leaving for San Antonio Texas a month after gradu uation for boot camp um my job in the Air Force will be military police that basically means I'll be securing the base wherever I'm stationed and making sure nobody gets in who's

004not supposed to be there um to join the Air Force you need to pass and take the ASVAB test and then pass the physical requirements for each job military police is extremely hard to get into and only a select few that scored high and is eligible eligible in the physical aspect can go my long-term plan as Mr lvo said is to serve um as in the Air Force and then become a state police officer I'm going to strive to become a member of their SWAT team just like my brother is and um I'm also going to further my nursing education in the Air Force and attend their college serving my country is always something I've known I've wanted to do since I was little and I really can't be proud of myself more in my

005achievements so thank [Applause] you Charlotte congratulations I'd like to know if your brother's one of our graduates I am is congratulations to you too thank you thank you for your service what year did you graduate uh 2017 oh I 1978 I had five I had five brothers that came through these Halls 76 yeah I remember your brothers I carp oh no kidding yeah that's great good stuff lived in South lawence right yeah about that thank you very much moving along um Mr Lavoy we don't have a student rep you're welcome thank you we don't have a student rep so I think I'm going to hold on to us for a little bit until he if he does show up we'll take care of it y um I'd like to get a motion to uh approve

006the minutes last meeting motion to approve second second all those in favor say I opposed any discussion on them thank you Mr Deano would you please we know you have to leave yes sir yes the cash balance report as of March 31st 2024 count balance on February 29th was 4,631 778 79 we had deposits for the month of 4,372 6849 transfer out to mmdt of a million do less payroll on March 14th of a million 188686 43 payroll on March 28th of a milon 165 55455 we had warrant number 24 on March 12th of 469 438 51 and warrant number 25 on March 26th of 1,756 2390 leaves us with a book balance on March 31st 3,424 86039 and a corresponding bank balance on the same date of 4,994 0598 in our mmdt account a

007total was 6,200 64257 at the beginning of February uh end of February I should say beginning of March um we had transfers a net transfer in of that million doll and interest for the month of 38,5 12.98 leaves us with an mmdt balance of 7 million 239 15555 and a total operating cash balance of 10,664 01594 very good can I get a motion to uh accept the minute the uh cash balance report motion to accept second second for Mrs Ferris thank you all those in favor say I I opposed any discussion thank you Consolidated cash uh that was a pass out from uh Mr Deano I think everybody has it Julio was a handout everybody has one any questions while Mr D Stefano is still here and he's not running out the door yet okay

008cash balance report we' accepted the votes put the hand out Mr Deano thank you very much thank you revolving fund uh the pages in there does anybody have any questions on the handout F no questions Finance report uh Mr Lavoy you're going to uh talk to us on the transfer of funds am I missing something this has been oh you're talking about the bre yeah so we have um we we when we closed the graphic shop we had some uh funds that left over from the revolving account and number here see the number um that number was Melissa 8,000 about $88,000 about $8,000 so we're looking to transfer that to the regie locker to support students and families with financial hardships so we provide to the regi Locker we provide food clothing home supplies Etc

009so we would like a motion uh from the committee to approve the transfer funds as I presented it those funds into this account sorry I missed it what is the to being transfer well this is when we had a graphic shop yeah I know what what was what is the transfer where's the it's ended Finance report transfer of funds microphone please yes so you'll see it under uh the last page of the finance report that's the three maybe you maybe didn't get a new book you can have mine is anybody else missing that pcture so uh I believe she's referring to the amount of the transfer not necessarily the document just the amount M monel said it was $8,000 8,638 it's on the revolving report okay thank you thank you you're welcome so so you

010I just wanted to see the line can I get a motion so it's the revolving fund it's on the the account motion to approve discussion got a question please Mr is that money to cas yes so it was it was part of the graphics program so any Revenue that they raised through that program was deposited into the revolving account and then those funds in there can be used for anything Graphics related but since that program is closed um superintendent would like to move it to the Reggie locker and out of that account that's more like a donation account and they use those funds um for financially type exp should that just go into the general budget no you you'd appropriate into a different revolving account yes so we go to that okay can I uh

011we have the motion we have the second can we get a vote on it please Mr Mahia yes Mr tbox yes M Ferris yes M TLA yes Mr hayum yes see no donations we have an article on Mr Gerald we dedicated the to her we have a little party for her here it was very nice had some pictures in there uh here to take a look at participation I see alumni Mr will do some speaking on the alumni okay we we invited uh the one active alumni member at this time which is our oh you are yeah oh two active members then Tommy and Danny H and sometimes I'm active but but someone who works like he's retired well they're both retired so let's say two active alumni U members right now so uh I

012invited Danny to come in and uh talk a little bit about the alumni Assan where it's at where it's going and uh he said he asked if I would do it in his place so I'm going I'm going to do that so the alumni has been up and down uh We've the alumni has struggled over the years to continue to exist although it still does exist um one of the challenges uh um that we have with the alumni um we haven't kept up or the alumni hasn't kept up with uh the IRS reporting over the last few years so uh our uh nonprofit status was uh revoked taken taken away from the uh Association so I recently resubmitted a new application for recognition of an exempt under five uh 501c3 of uh eternal revenue code

013uh and so we'll uh I've cleaned the somewhat the report although we don't have a full uh committee uh of members at this time uh I sent in what we did have so I'm not sure that we'll get it approved uh but the commit the uh alumni has been functioning uh with Danny leading a lot of the activities so the main activity that the alumni continues to do every year is the golf tournament uh and each year the golf tournament brings in anywhere from 12 to $166,000 um and uh most of the work uh Danny does with some help from Tommy and a few of the other uh instructors and oldtime uh teachers some of the teachers continue to support and help with that uh uh function and so it's been able to continue to

014stay alive I think we've had seven tournaments seven about seven tournaments since its Inception um and so again this year the on August 2nd will uh be again the Reggie alumni uh Association golf tournament um and so I would invite anyone that knows of anybody that would be interested in participating in the ter tourament tournament uh to uh can U notify either Dan habab or Cassandra Aela who uh also supports uh is on and on our website you can go to our website and uh fill out an application to sign up for yourself or for some uh in order to play in the tournament um the alumni did uh donate $10,000 uh to the scholarship for scholarships this year so that each shop has received I believe $500 is it each shop received $1,000 each

015shop received a th oh so they got 20 20,000 oh no sorry two5 sorry I think there were two $250 scholarships for each shop plus two academic Awards right for a total of 10,000 for a total 10,000 right B he the alumni uh donated $10,000 overall for scholarships for the seniors this year from funds mostly the funds come from their um golf tournament so each year uh they donate some money to the school uh from the funds that are earned from the golf tournament there uh right now they have in their account about 20 they have $ 27,9 52 uh but now they gave the school 10 so they have a balance of $1 17,9 52.90 um they do also sell we the alumni also sell sells bricks out at the field if you go

016out the field you'll see you can if you're an alumni you can buy a brick and have your name put on the brick and it goes out uh out where the flag is at the entrance of the Alumni field uh so if you go there you'll see different names of different alumni who have graduated um have their name on on a brick so I think they're $100 each or maybe $50 each um in any case uh if you want to buy a brick you can notify Danny H or Cassandra aella so um we are um if we are going to continue to try to get um our exemption back uh so that we can then try to pull the alumni committee back we have a lot of graduates who work here uh we have actually

01710,000 students who have signed up to be a member of the alumni but no active uh leadership committee uh overseeing alumni right now uh on a regular basis so our goal is to try to reinstate that and get that back on track okay yeah if you allow me I like to say a few words about Danny hup he is a 69 graduate y along with Mr LaVoy 68 68 graduate I'm sorry he was also a 34e carpentry instructor yes before he retired yep and he's been doing this Ever Since U he was also uh a vice president the local 1707 and I I would have loved to have had him here to uh put a feather in his cap but he didn't want one but uh thank you for all his hard work Mr habab

018if you're listening it's very much appreciated yep thank you truly one of the long standing Reggie uh graduates to come through glts and uh if you meet him you'll know he's a wonderful awesome person so uh come to the golf tournament and play you'll get to meet him um he plays himself I think he tries to win every year might have won a few times himself but he's a great golfer and a great person so thanks for all the work he does to keep our alumni alive moving along uh reported to superintendent director uh superintendent lvo evaluation form is in here he's going to speak a little bit about it so you have a copy of the uh typical the annual evaluation form that we've used uh the last 14 years um I know it's

019very difficult for you to complete it so I'm going to send you um a working document that under each one of those standards I will have a list of bullet list of things that I've accomplished that would fit for that standard that you can evaluate and determine uh where you might think it its value is in terms of Exemplar proficient need Improvement unsatisfactory or you can highlight if you're aware of any other um uh efforts that were done under that standard feel free to add to that uh or select anything that I might and trying to make it easier for you to because some of it unless you're here every day it's hard to know exactly what are the things that are going on day in and day out in terms of these standards so

020you'll get that uh before Friday you'll get an email listing all of those uh with this completed so that it will help you guide you in completing this form and if you have any questions or concerns would like to meet with me feel free to call uh Susan and she'll schedule a meeting and we can talk and go through it I'm happy to go through it with you so any questions for the superintendent on that before I move on uh next up is school calendar and we'll need a vote on this everybody has a draft of the school calendar I looked on it I looked at it they worked hard on it looked good so this is a a draft form until you approve it that's why it has draft on it if you see

021anything on there that you feel you'd like to possibly speak to look please can you put the there you go thank you I don't like the mic okay so I I was looking at this and I see the Zone um color code yes but in the calendar I don't see the color code as it's supposed to go like for the green the green for example it has professional profession professional development dates yes but in the calendar itself doesn't show that so I was just wondering why and so because I didn't look at all of them you know the yellow doesn't match the yellow there's no greens there even though there are states there that are development dates on those on those months so I was wondering about the color C and whether um the matching

022dates for those col Cod so the um today they're outside the calendar keep it not so confusing no no they're not the right of the if you look at August for instance you look at August okay it says important date so it has 819 to 822 is the new staff orientation so that's when we bring in the uh new teachers we give them an orientation on those dates so um and then on 829 we have the grade nine new students half day uh on the 29 nth where we bring in the nth graders for the first time um but they are not the colors are not inside the calendar but uh they represent important dates if they're in red look at green professional development days so that represents days that those are full days the

02327th 28th and 29th they're faculty professional development days so that's my that's exactly why I question it because not because of what they just specifically mean but you have a color C and the color code when you when you color code those dates that's what it means what that so back to my samples you have professional development let's go to February February 12 on February 12 it's not it's not green 12 is yellow so is that yellow for you and green for you see what I'm saying yeah those colors represent the uh what suppos represent different weeks changing of the weeks um so it's it's simple as that it's the color code within the calendar month and day it's not matching is what I'm saying because I did try to look at this but the

024color didn't help me so that's why I'm questioning yeah so you're if you look at the calendar it doesn't have all the colors built into the calendar itself right yes so okay that's yeah can I just comment on one thing I think part of the reason for that is because where the all of the days are colorcoded like we have an orange week and a black week in some cases if we put the color on that date then it would also Co cover up the like if it was an orange day so I think that's probably why they keep those colors separate we get to confusing maybe we need different calendars for different things so we can do I'm just suggesting because it's hard to follow a calendar with a color code when the color

025code is not there well that's a good idea we could do a second calendar a calar in the calar yeah for different things it's it's a calendar for the school year and the and the um shop and academic weeks and then there's a calendar for all the professional you know events calendar it's different calendars because that way you can follow the col yes no I like the idea we we'll do that we'll put a second p this one would be utilized but it's basically to let the students know what week are in as well as give some information about the days but color coding it to the events and the color code on this side is a good idea so I like your idea you want a table until we get it corrected it's say

026yes I I I guess can we table this please I think they need to finalize well if you could just finalize that the dates and everything okay this we will then next meeting having another calendar okay with you sure anybody else you be hand okay uh we need a vote on this please um um so if we want to be specific in the motion to what Miss DL said so the uh motion is to approve the dates on the school calendar as is pending the uh adjustment of the Calendar's format colors yeah the colors yeah just the format of it yes okay that was his motion Mr Mahia yes Mr tbox yes M far M dla Mr haam yes thank you uh superintendent director school choice we also need a votee on this one so

027every year the uh school committee has to vote on whether to uh glts to be a school choice School uh which means we could take students from outside the school outside the district and and in the past we voted no because we have so many kids on our wait list we have hundreds of kids on our wait list so we typically committee has voted no because of that so I just need a vote from the committee uh stating that they want to continue to vote no on that as opposed to yes so we either need a no or a yes motion regarding school choice so it's to vote either in favor of school choice or against against school choice as is right now we do not have school choice that's right okay can I get

028a motion we got the motion yes I pulio was that the motion well I mean the motion is to to to not go into school choice yeah did you bring to not approve school choice yes okay do I have a second second let's call a v on that Please missla Mr Mahia yes Mr toox Miss Barris Mr hayum yes put the admissions report I believe uh the assistant superintendent was going to do that yeah all right thank you so um we this past Saturday we had our accepted students day we had 426 um students come to that event which was great it was a great turnout so we currently have 469 um enrolled students for the class of 2028 our goal is to um to get up to 480 so we will be sending out

029a few more acceptances um within the next couple of weeks we have 831 students currently on our waiting list unfortunately sorry 83 1 you finish question sure um our enrollment went up a little bit this year for um North Andover for just in terms of enrolled students we went from 5 to 15 currently and from uh for athuan 117 to 128 and then uh there are separate pages in there for transfer applications which will be really tough this year because we we have still have very high numbers for our current um sophomore and Junior classes uh we have 173 applications for the class of 2027 so that would be for sophomore transfer students um and we're still at 479 our for our current class and we have about 59 applications completed applications uh for the

030class of 2026 and I don't know with I don't believe that um we typically add waiting list to this admissions report so I actually just pulled it up while I was here just to run that number to see where we are that's a good problem to have uh M Richardson thank you very much thank you um next up is uh update on in-house suspens I'm sorry I'm sorry Zoo you had something question she did she said that it's not here okay thank you uh in-house suspension we're expecting Miss Gillis are we tabling that or are you going to say some words on that I'll say a couple words on it so we've been uh we met on it a couple times and we uh Miss Gillis is still doing some uh research and has been

031reaching out to other districts regarding uh how they run in-house and whether it's something that um if we were to run it what would it look like so uh I should have something for the next meeting um what direction and what that would look like at glts if in fact we were going to go to to in-house suspensions so we're not ready at this time to make a report on um we're not done our research and the work that we're looking at to in order to put that together sir yes any questions this yeah okay I I please it's coming back the next next week next meeting next meeting she's coming back y I understand so y don't we have to make a motion to make sure no uh no I don't think so no

032just being continued um next one uh we were supposed to have an attorney's handout on the dri's education we did not receive one did you receive one do you have one for us so we've been uh working with our attorney on uh the driver's ed situation where the uh we were going to sell the cars to the school for 2,000 and then buy them back in September so we uh he's been um working on well we've come to we've come to a um realization that we need to look at this more closely see and maybe go down a different pathway but he is prepared and has started to put together a contract that we would use if we sell them um but we're now looking at if it's a feasibly cost uh uh feasible in

033terms of costs and um until we can finish that work um we haven't made a final decision on what the contract should look at look like so he's been he's done some work on it he started to do some work on it late because he was working on the uh preparing for the uh hanger um lease and changing of our uh our uh Charter with our communities preparing for those meetings and meeting with them so he hasn't spent a lot of time on it but just late last week he started to actually look at at the contract that or the really not a contract but the agreement we had we've had with uh the Driving School uh and so at this point um we will push that off until uh next school committee meeting to

034until we can make a final determination what's the right way uh to present it to the committee in terms of whether it's feasible for cost we do one of the things we are um that we believe is important to make sure that uh students that have already taken a driving uh the classroom's part of the driving course uh and ready for driving we have to make it possible for them to get their driving in so that's what we're trying to figure out and negotiate with the driving school right now how to do that uh that's cost Fe that's cost feasable and also what should it look like moving on in future years so we're trying to figure all that out right now but we'll have it ready for you in the next meeting as we

035have the attorney continue to do the work he started along with our uh insurance agent with dhy insurance has been part of the discussion as well so this is also going to be continued until the next meeting yep do we need to uh table it no no we'll just we'll bring it up we'll add it on next agenda so well this is differ between the other item to this item this item says approve I know I shut mine this item is different than the other one where this one says to be approved so we should make a mo we need to make a motion to table and come back yes because it's different motion to table second Miss Ferris yes Miss dla yes Mr Mahia yes Mr tbox yes Mr haem yes thank you uh

036superintendent we have three out of state travel requests so the first one is uh looking to approve the out of state travel for Miss nari uh malonian n she was selected as the by the national athletic trainers Association uh as the athletic trainer National athletic trainer of the year to receive that award this year at the National Conference so uh she's asking to uh be able to attend that conference uh so we're looking to have the committee approve the out ofate travel for her uh at a cost of $1,965 all right you need to vote on that one I so this one says that is founded funded right it's funded well jts would be funding it by operational budget that yes okay so it out of operational out of the operational budget okay so it's

037a little bit confusing yeah because usually when the something fund is f is founded by a some type of gr Yep this one says fed y but is but is for funded by the school it's funded by the Yeah there's no Grant that's supporting or paying for the the uh conference for her to go to this conference so it has to come out of you see where the confusion is yeah so it's actually coming out of school fund no fund it's schol not not yeah it's not fun yeah not funded by any other source um outside Source let's say it's if she's going to go it has to be funded by the school's operational money yep anybody else just out of interest Mr ly um is there a line line item for this or this

038just comes out of the general budget well we have line items in the budget for conferences be under conferences would that be the same one as the teachers uh education it could be well it may not be specific for teachers it can be for administrators teachers it can be for anyone that is going to go to a conference not necessarily just teachers not just necessarily teachers anyone that works for the school it could be a cafeteria worker if there was an event that we thought was valuable we have the funds yes yeah I I'll make a motion y second second okay let's take a vote on this one too Mr toox yes Miss Ferris yes Miss dler yes Mr Mahia yes Mr hayam yes number two so we have in uh couple weeks ago the

039uh skills USA had their state championships and in that state championship uh event we had a student from uh Metal Fab who won a gold medal uh and uh for welding uh sculpture welding and as a result of that qualified for national competition so in order for that student to uh participate uh we would be sending uh two teachers the uh the skills um skills USA uh advisor and the students teacher who worked with that student in preparing them for competition and uh the student themselves whenever we send a student to National comp competition we usually send a second students so there's not only one student there with the teachers and the adults so that there are two students so in order to um fund this opportunity for our student to compete at the national

040level uh it would be a total cost of 11,600 uh to uh which would I need the school committee to approve U move forward for them to to participate for this particular student to to participate at the national level this is not completed it needs more information so it's for four people only one name is listed um like the other one it was already the other one's very well um filled in but this one is not and the amount of money very significant to just uh have a baby um I mean the cost obviously it's I'm sure it's what it is but it's missing information so it's missing three names the names of the students and one name of the teacher and it's not checked that the p is coming from where um that's just

041my observation I don't know if anybody else have any other questions anybody else M Ferris sorry zo you all set with a question you know I'm not I'm not questioning the amount I I would like to see this amount so much that you know you have to go to the bank and get a loan for it because I'm just not seeing for a technical school of this quality we don't have anyone sent to skills USA and it's getting lower and lower and lower and to have just one I know they start with an exam I mean why is it that our students are not succeeding in this area I have a problem with that so I'm I'm just putting that out there we should not have just one student going we should have several and

042certainly to begin with at the first round in wherever it was malor um we only had a few I don't know the exact I'm just saying a few and from that few one emerged and I'm just saying the quality of this school is such that it wants for nothing we have um many staff and everything is in place for students to succeed and I'm not seeing it and so I'm just putting that out there making a statement you don't have to do anything with it but anyone else sure I mean I'd actually like to know why but Mr Loy so skills USA um well in in terms of uh qualifying for national competition you first have to win state competition and um we only had one student that got a gold medal in state competition

043we won I believe three or four medals in state competition um this is an individual medal in terms of gold that we only won one gold um we I will say that in terms of the amount of um effort that we put into skills USA not be may not be um what we need to put into uh in order to compete at that level we are we have made some changes starting this year where we're doing school competitions so that the student who uh each shop has its own individual competition and then that person is the three top students or four top students in that shop then gets to compete at the state level and in terms of preparation and getting ready for skilled USA uh we're still working on uh how to improve our

044uh improve those programs uh and uh and uh I would say to that that we still need to do more work in terms of you know we have we have advisors right we have we have teachers that work in and in the shops with each kid yeah um it is kind of like a premier thing yep well I guess it depends where from where you look at it whether you how important and how much value you bring to skills USA uh but it starts with an an exam right and isn't that an assessment of what you learn in the career areas yep and it also depends on the kind of some schools put many many hours in preparing kids to uh compete we don't do that true you know we don't we don't take time

045away from teaching and learning and preparing kids for the for their careers in lie of preparing them for skills USA in all honesty you know we don't stay after school and have kids studying uh skills USA uh protocols and procedures and and all these other kinds of competition uh that you know may or may not bring value to what we want the kids to be able to do when they graduate um so as far as it you get out of it what you put into it when it comes to skills USA and in terms of the effort we put into skills USA I'm not going to put us at the top of the list because we we're not at the top of the list nor do we seek to be at the top of the

046list uh because it depends on where your priority in my mind it depends on where your priorities are um and so um but if we're going to compete I always say you want to do the best you can if we're going to send four students to compete in carpentry we want want to make sure we send our four best students and are we doing that every year maybe we are maybe we aren't um but the only way we're going to be competitive if we send our four best kids year after year uh and if we put a lot of time and effort into preparing them to succeed which means that the teach it has to be important to the teachers if the carpentry teachers don't value skills USA and think it's important then they're not

047going to do a lot of work to encourage the kids and prepare the kids to succeed in competition that's the truth of the matter I don't want to belabor it because I mean you you you gave me an answer you get you put in what you get out of it or you get out of it what you put into it and and that's the answer so I mean that's the truth of the answer right but I I I feel as though we're preparing them for the workforce are we am I to know that this is a two separate curriculums running parall well the truth but when you think about skills USA it's not just preparing them like I'm if I prepare students to be carpenters and then they go compete at skills USA there's a

048lot other things that go into that preparation for competition in skills USA you know there's you know kids lose points for not being dressed properly kids lose points for not knowing the model the the uh some of the information that you need to know about skills the organization itself you lose points for that do we prep and prepare and study for all that some schools do do that they put a lot of time that some schools have are meeting twice a week after school with the kids that are going to compete to so that they'll be the best they can be when they compete we don't do those kinds of things when it comes to skills USA we don't put that much effort into the you know winning I guess is in other words well

049you know what winning isn't everything but I mean like I said when you just said you know they put points take points off of the way you're addressing the the way you're speaking the way you make you know you're presenting yourself I mean those all come down to personal characteristics that we're I'm hoping trying to you know mold the best person as well I mean but I would think that we don't have to win but I think we have to be a little bit more competitive and that would be a nice thing I think that's all I mean so I think the work that we have to do to be more competitive is to try to get our instructors more passionate about it that's the bottom line to want a girl that's the bottom line

050if we want kids to be more successful if your teachers really buy into it and see a lot of value in it and are are passionate about it students are more likely to succeed that's that's what I would tell you and I would tell that and I tell that to them as well I think if we're going to be successful and we really think it's that valuable and important then we've otherwise don't even compete I guess right well the state values it and the state thinks it's pretty awesome um you know state federal government provides funding for it um so they value it as well um you know we had 285 kids on Co-op this year probably only one other school in the state that has more on Co-op that's a better Mark of our

051success than the success we have at skills USA no that's very promising I like that yeah all right can I call you back to the request please may I make a uh a statement I don't know like said there's no names on it but for these two I'm going to say two men two two young women I don't know for them to be able to be accepted to pass the test I think is fantastic for them to be able to go to Atlanta uh with their teachers is eye openening for these kids um I believe in skills we did skills and um I I know industry believes in skills and I'm sorry I didn't mean to take away from you go ahead please I mean I'm okay with the full USA and sending two kids

052and the two teachers and the money it doesn't matter what but this is not compl that's right we need to know who are the teachers and the two students that been selected and it needs to be listed here and it needs to say where the money is coming from so as long as that's completed then we should move forward but this one is not completed at the time all right do we have a date on when this has to happen excuse me uh June 24th they need to register so we got time not really not no because you got to register by a certain by tomorrow I guess you have to register by tomorrow I do know the names even if they're not in the paperwork I can give you the names we can give

053you the names yeah we don't have it in the paperwork and the funding would become we' be coming out of operational not three students U uh well I can the two we have the names of the teachers and the students but we don't in terms of the funds would be coming from the operational budget no Grant or to check where the money is coming from and I'm not sure that we maybe Melissa knows we have enough money in Student Activities to pay for this I'm not sure that we do I'm I think what we determined it had to come out of operational budget when we were looking at it yeah I know I believe the other teacher is um Stephanie DEA she's another um metal fabrication teacher um and the two students who were going

054um one was a Gold Medal winner and the other one was a silver metal winner from Metal Fab nice so the question remains do we table it or do we go for the vote and make the deadline I'm sorry I can't hear you you want to add the names to it oh sure I don't know where I don't see it let take place for the names am I missing something this is the original form could you put it on the original that I have to sign I see a place to put the names oh the name of the traveler is right there so you got Christine remind me Mrs Fitzgerald that's what you jumped on all the time who M Mrs Fitz Joe sign it Tom's gonna sign that I want it done right next

055see I'm doing uh um I'm doing her job tell I should just watch um does anybody want to view these signatures I don't want to read them on air I mean the uh names Brenda already did it she's putting it down but does anybody want to see give us you can give us copy right okay Sor we're good y can I get uh a motion motion to approve the end of the meeting I'll get yes must top R second any more discussion want you call this one please Mr tbox M Farris yes got one more Miss dla yes Mr Mahia than Mr hayem yes we have one more the uh Yes program mot I believe have the names that um I can't read what that says name of Travelers now but I have two names

056on the board oh you have two names I don't know what that is go back this is the original so we're looking for an approval for the out of state travel for the automotive technology department grades 9 10 11 and teachers to attend the NH Yes program field trip on May 31st 2024 total cost is $1,142 20116 for buses but it's all the 9th 10th and 11th grade students in automotive that will be going on this field it's basically a a field trip but it's out of state class field trip it's a class field trip and and it's out of state that's why we we need uh approval from the committee second Miss Ferris yes M dler yes Mr Mahia yes Mr tbox yes Mr hayem yes I'll sign all of these and I'll give

057them to you order uh next one Mr Lavoy uh District Comm the msaa which is mass School administration Association am I right Y and there's a paper in the back of that I'm sure do you want to speak on it so we have uh one of our uh administrators who will be uh presenting at the summer Institute on uh um July 23rd uh which is uh and it goes from July 23rd to Friday July 26 um Josh uh will let uh will be doing a presentation on leveraging the potential of the Wind Block for enhancing intervention and student support uh and it's going to be on the 20 he's speaking his presentation will be on July 24th at 10 11: a.m. and um so we want to keep inform the committee of that of his

058presentation I think everybody remembers Josh wette he had uh he presented to us last meeting yes uh good luck to Josh thank you reports of the committee we see none old business we see none new business we see none table matters uh little Reggie's daycare uh are we going to address that there was uh a rate increase um you should have that in your yeah so you should have your packet I think it was on table matters was it not itable so you'd have to take it off take it off the table maners are we ready yep okay I'm sorry we have to remove I have to ask to get uh uh please did you anybody second second that's to remove it from table matters and uh we need a vote to approve the new

059rates you want to explain the new rates Mr so the uh rates rates were increased by about 3% so on you you'll see the rate sheet oh wait a minute yes um and much yeah it didn't go up that much but you'll see the rates on um handout that you got for 2024 2025 tuition rates for um the different uh grade levels and and based on how many days um they would be attending uh you'll see what the monthly rate is for those particular uh individuals so we just need the committee to approve the increase on the tuition rate which is still like 50% below the going rate please so what are we increasing from we don't have more data this is the only data we have those are just well those are the uh

060what the new rates will be that you're looking at I understand but we don't see what the actual rates are the old rates yeah so how do we know what we increasing well the old rat would be 3% less than what you're looking at there um okay so we I can we're missing you want you want a you want a a sheet showing the old rates I can have that for you next meeting we can can we table you want to table it until then that's fine we'll have to vote to table it again yeah we'll table it motion to table me uh pending missing information second M Mr Mahia yes Mr tabx M Baris yes M dler yes Mr Hayden yes Personnel considerations um we have one two three four five six seven looks

061like eight of them can I break them down to uh let's see three three and two sure that be all right with everybody yep we got um resignations don't see any leaves of absences I don't see any retir and none appointments Miss Melissa L Food Service secretary affected April 1st uh 2024 it's going to be a full-time position I believe Mr superintendent yes and I did ask the question um no relation to uh H Mrs L the uh superintendent secretary is that right that's correct okay thank you that's one um LPN full-time non-rep LPN provide a one-on-one nursing care to student with complex medical issues 45 to 55k per year school year 2024 25 it's a new position and there's an attached um paper on it please so just just uh there could be a

062possible change right now we're looking to hire one LPN for this role but we've we may have an additional student that may need one-on-one n coming in um with our new uh students coming in so I guess uh since we're voting on it I would like to have a possible option to hire two if we meet them right now we we think we're going to need two originally we only thought one but we found out this week that one of our students coming in has special needs and has a need for a one-on-one nurse as well so then we'll have two students who need a one-on-one nurse how many um nurses do we have currently we have three nurses regular nurses but these are nurses that have to be with the students uh full-time always

063want to so that wherever the student goes the nurse has to be with them is that what El PM means a licensed practitioner okay yeah so these are just a one to one yeah one to one nurses and they're only for the time period in which the student is with us we would be hiring them for okay okay anyone else r that justo this is a full-time position or it says full-time nonre why nonre why wouldn't to be a union position uh because these are um temporary positions so not they're not part of the contract thank you um why don't we vote on this one separately since we had questions on it please uh can we make a motion I'm going to vote on this one separately because we've had questions on it so I

064if I hear correctly IR ly we want to add a second person to this posting correct okay motion to approve you get a second second any more discussion all right so the record's going to show two would you call a vote please miss dler yes Mr Mahia yes Mr tbox yes M FIS yes Mr haam yes second one uh new I exemplary writer up to 10 Department of special educations new IEP incentive required uh per local 1707 up to but not exceeding $5,000 May 15th 24th November 1 24 this is a new position see the attached flyer any questions on that or can I keep going M dson um so I tried to make it up but I I'm not sure what the IP IEP needs but that IEP is an individual education plan for

065special ed students so it's uh um they have a because the um their regulation changes in um how an exemplary writeup should look like the department is being proactive in developing um templates for uh for different issues of IEP or student needs whatever the different needs that might arise they're doing some uh templates writing up some templates that staff can utilize when making recommendations for IEP so that's what they'll be developing those I those uh templates so what the up to 10 means what is that up to 10 at 10 up to 10 staff members would be um working on this so we need up to 10 people to to do the writing yeah because total of 5,000 yeah not to exceed five uh the stiens when you add all up all the stiens it

066won't exceed $5,000 so um that would tell me that you're looking at about $500 a person to write up these so the 10 so what I'm so okay just let me I just need to understand take your time yeah I am take your time so this is a writer that needs to write a new a a imple a new plan for an implement ation that is now required for a special education correct yep to write that plan we need so are you saying that we need about 10 people to write that plan it's one person that's going to write this new I'm that's can you clarify that for me please yeah no it's going to be more than one write up different depending on what the issues are they're writing up many different kinds of

067plans to address whatever the specific issue is that the student may need an IEP for so the up up to 10 people or yes PL up to 10 people okay I'm still confused take your time I'm I'm not sure if they're going to write 20 plans or five plans I'm not sure all I know is the director of um special ed is asking to hire 10 people to work on this project which is to write up uh plans template plans that can be utilized in the future that meet the standards and the requirements of the department Ed when we're writing up new IEP plans for particular issues that kids have so these people that are going to do this are they going to it's do we need all these people because they're going to work

068with individuals and they're going to Rite they're going to um they're going to each I'm not leading this initiative so I'm not sure specifically on the work maybe Brendon knows more about the work itself yes so um under special ed there are 13 um different disability category so with the new IEP there are significant changes so what they're looking to do it's almost like writing curriculum in a way so they're um having these 10 different people create an Exemplar for each one of those disability categories what it would look like what would be included um and of course they modify it for every student but there should be sort of a basic um overall format and template so that's why they have I think 10 people working for there would be at least 13 of

069these different types of plans depending on the disability so um I think that missing information because okay this says up to $5,000 um so what do that means it position is a stien it's what what is it what are they getting paid yeah and it's it's like they get paid well they get paid the contract rate so whatever the hourly rate is for their work so but but that won't exceed so many it won't exceed over um 50 yeah it won't exceed probably 100 hours because I think they get $50 an hour so the work should not between so if 10 people work 10 hours each then that's your $5,000 so but um you might have seven people work 15 hours depending on who signs up to do the work but regardless the work will

070won't exceed $5,000 so we won't spend more than $5,000 in getting this initiative done okay but you know that I mean how you try I guess well they spe they'll sign in there's a protocols and procedures we use when students I mean when teachers do this kind of work they have to sign in and they work here at the school and then they sign out when they're done they don't do the work from home they do the work from in school and it's after hours they do the work after hours not during the school day yeah be after hours yep we had stud one one second please still feel like I need more information all right can we ask a couple other questions we'll come back here Mr M you were next so is this

071going to be an internal posting or is this external this is an internal posting We would expect our special ed teachers to work on this project okay thank you m first you got to kick it I'm just wondering what did we use before um before yeah when we've had special ed ed students with certain disabilities are these new disabilities or new initiatives so um the state has changed the IEP so it's you know I can actually share a present Kate Burnham who's the special ed director she's done a bunch of trainings and shared this information with staff um so there are significant changes to the IEP to what needs to be included the process um things like you know the student Vision um and I guess there are different parts of the IEP that have

072to be completed depending on the disability so from what I understand there are significant changes to the document itself so I'm happy to share um or ask Kate barnham to share the her presentation that goes in um through and explains all of the changes to the IEP yeah I mean I'm I'm obviously in favor of it I'm just trying to get clarification um but I I you know I mean it seems like it's making somebody's work easier I'm not sure who because if these templates are all in place now we're just going to go and check things off and maybe write a couple of different things well but I think what it does is it ensures that we meet the requirements of the department Ed when we write these IEPs that we don't you know

073we have to meet the requirements by the changes on based on the regulations and this just ensures that we do that it's not a hit or miss it's like these are the requirements and they are much more complicated and they need to make sure and we need to make sure they're all correct in order to uh meet the letter of the law so that why it's important that we develop these so that the quality is uh at the highest level we can share we can share the documents that Brenda has we can we'll email you those documents so you'll have more information that gives you some clarity on what it is that work really going to look like um can I make suggestion um special education is very important I understand that if we have

074to write um a step by step uh process based on the 13 um disability categories I understand that what the part that I understand is that we already know we need you know how many people and what are they doing and more so now we know that they working of power we know that um in um that it should be no more than $5,000 but H how that how that whole thing is not it's not that's whole thing was not clear so I'm I'm not against the whole situation like we need this we need to make sure that if if um now we need to um we need to create this plan because Qui we need to do so um but it's not clear on the yeah we need up to 10 people and this

075is how much do we know for sure it's it that's what we me and what are the specific that they need to be doing I mean this says that they need to work with the with the um with the head of um um special education person um but doesn't it doesn't show much I mean I can come and approve this but would you be more comfortable if we ask the special education director to come and and discuss these questions and that's fine I mean again uh we need to post this I suppose like everything we need to post everything immediately and things like that I just I just want to say one second please I agree with zoa that it would be helpful to I think the district committee and to payroll as well if

076a position pays up to $5,000 we need to know how it's being paid so if this job description said $50 an hour for up to 10 positions we would know how it's being paid and how many people are being paid Mr to box I'm sorry you done Mr tobox yeah is is there a timeline to when this has to be completed as far as the training and new work being done I'm not sure when they work it's when they expect to start the pro if it's going to be a summer project or a more information I would assume it's going to have to be in place for next school year and the students are here and are coming back into the school should we get the special education directed down here that will wonderful let's

077see so reporting to the director of special education or her designate the new IEP exemp writers rol to work on a step-by-step implementation of the new IEP through in-person and potentially virtual collaboration new IEP exemplary writers will create a model of new IEPs based on at least one of the 13 identified disabilities and categories um so they post the performance is to review the models of the new IEPs as provided by the department of Elementary and secondary education review related training materials as provided by the Department of Education and great laoren technical school participate in an in-person training and professional development relative to the position objectively create an Exemplar of the new IEP to be used by staff members at gr lawen technical school based on disability categories that is of high occurrence within the

078district this will include an IEP for initial evaluation on annual review and re-evaluation collaborates with the colleagues in person to develop exemplary IEPs this position will include in-person collaboration with potential for virtual collaboration uh as time times as well that job description should be in your packets in the presentation that Kate bernham put together um and the last slide it has links to a lot of different documents that are helpful too in explaining the work and and why it's changed so there's a new uh blank template there are example EPS um and links to a resource center so I think the presentation would provide a lot of clarity on why the work is needed so anything else uh we just need to understand no um I'm still need um I need the posting to be

079more clear of who's who are we hiring for that and what they going to get paid I don't think a committee has been put together yet well no in terms of no one's been hired yet that I'm aware of until this P this pulsing hasn't gone out so there's nobody hires we got to post it in order to get names we have to get more information post it first actually need to hire and what they're going to P well I can get I can get you more I can get you that information I don't think you need the director of special ed to give you that I mean I can get that information for her the what she would present to you is what she wrote here in terms of the information in terms of

080how many people she I would say she expects to hire 10 people because that's what's listed here 10 people and we yeah up to you know I mean it could be less but the contract rate per 1707 which is $50 an hour that's the rate so they would get paid $50 an hour uh so she hires 10 people um they could work in total of 10 hours each and we would reach the $5,000 but they're getting training and they're doing some writing so first they have to get trained so they're going to get paid to get the training that'll count towards their hours and once they finish training then they know how to write uh the way that it needs to be written uh that meets the standards for the Department of Education then they'll

081do the writing so all of that should take about 10 hours per person I would assume based some what I'm reading so that would come to $5,000 please is there a reason why the dates are May 15th to November first the only thing I can say to that is that uh it probably will depend on what the needs are that come in in the beginning of the school year in terms of IEP you know they'll Target those they'll Target what the needs are of those kids coming in uh in September in terms of what the what those new IEPs have to look like so we won't know all of it until September when all the students arrive that's fair yeah anything further can we get a motion on this motion I mean I'm going to

082vote on this separately okay can we get a motion to vote on this as it stands is that what you saying as it as it is I'm asking for a motion no motion pass do we want any Clarity on the salary I mean you want to be more specific and and say $50 an hour no we got to go by contract figure well that's what the contract says local 1707 has a contract they have a figure even if there's only two people amarie they still have to put the hours in to make the 5,000 if they don't put the hours in it's going to be under that If you hired one person they work 100 hours they get $5,000 if they put the hours in somebody's going to sign the time sheet okay all right

083I make a motion make a motion I have a second Mr the top box second call the V please any other discussions first anybody said everything Mr Mahia so we've been getting a lot of job postings related to the 1707 contract but I mean I know the the contract was was uh agreed on before I came along but can we get a copy of that contract so that we right online or I can give you one yeah it's right on our website okay the clerical contract everybody cafeteria it's all on our website it's public knowledge but if You' like I can get you a copy yeah a physical copy please okay thank you thank you would anyone else like a hard copy of the teacher contract we can or all the contracts we'll do we'll

084make enough copies for everybody we'll make a copy for everybody for the next meeting thank you y any further discussion Mr laox yes Miss Ferris yes Miss dla M Mr Mahia yes Mr Hayden yes moving on reading specialist uh no we missed one Co-op oh I'm sorry Co-op education program liaison uh to support the development management of the Cooperative education program by providing clerical and offer support per contract this is a new position C the attached I get a recommendation this um just so that you're aware when it says per contract the this is a clerical position so uh the pay is based on the clerical contract no clerical no this one's a clerical I believe should be an in-house person or is this yeah the way I understand this this is uh someone to

085help out the co-op director who is uh thankfully overwhelmed putting students out yeah because am I right Mr yeah so because we have so many students out this year at one point we had almost 285 students out on Co-op and uh the regulations requires a co-op director to go out of the building and do uh site visits to check the safety of the sites in which students are working and also to communicate and see how the students are doing out there so when that when the co-op director's out there we need someone to be in the building to help with the paperwork and because there other students that may be filling out paperwork and applying this person will also go out to visit different companies to try to get additional employers to hire our students

086so she well it's a lady in this I mean um it whoever does it whether it's a lady or a guy um would be um out there doing uh recruitment of uh job opportunities as well recommendation I'm going to motion to approve I have a question um you used um Mr Lao you used to bring um reports um that would show us students that are in the co-op program can you can you start doing that again sure I'll bring you one uh next meeting I'll I'll update you where we're at yeah I have a second discussion question for you Mr Lavoy how will this be funded out of the operational budget under operational budget yeah can call it please any further discussion I guess I'm going to do them all separate Mr Mahia yes Mr

087tbox yes Miss Farris yes Miss dler yes Mr Hayden yes moving on reading specialist looking for two reading Specialists well we're not sure we need two but it's possible we will we're still trying to uh finish up the scheduling there's a chance we may only need one we're trying to do it with one but in case we have to go beyond the one I did put two down here um because once we finish the schedule we'll know better what the need is uh it looked like we may be able to get away with one but we're not positive yet so we're looking for a reading specialist uh it's a new position uh which uh the job description is a is attached Mr Mayor so it says two here but this is per 1707 contract yep

088so on the contract it says two specialist right yeah it's two they're basically in the teachers Contra it's in the teachers contract yeah we putting two here because there's a possibility we're going to need to but we're trying to build the schedule in a way we could try to get away with one but right now it looks like we're probably going to need to but we're trying to see if we can adapt a um schedule a little bit so we can not have to hire two and only do one but because it's so late in the year it would be June before I come back and we really need to get this posted if we're going to find somebody it's a late it's late in the year to find somebody that has reading Specialists are

089very difficult to find there's a real shortage of them Y what I'm asking is is what does it say in the contract is it two reading Specialists or is it one no it's neither it's just it's just a teacher position okay yeah right thank you and it's a new position and it's a new teacher position basically we haven't had it but the job description of what that person teaches and um she this particular person I say she most of them are women but it could be a male that applies for this um uh will be working on working with students who have uh uh reading who who come in with low literacy skills and so we've uh we'll do a a special reading program and have uh support programs for students who have who come

090in with low reading ability I we did have a specialist before yeah reading a specialist so we we haven't had one in a long time no we haven't had one in 10 years yep Mr M you all set thank anything else who service no okay can I get a a motion motion to approve second yeah we're approving two what happens up to two can we say up to two Mr Lavoy if you're not sure yes can you write that notes two two we had a second can we get a any more discussion can we call the vote Mr Mahia yes Mr toox yes M Farris yes M TLA yes Mr Hayden yes instructural uh coach from math pral 1707 this is also a new position uh City attached do you want to say anything on

091that Mr just um because we're um we don't we have don't have a math coach right now but because we're putting more emphasis on uh the need to improve the quality of um both instruction and some professional development around a math uh initiative uh we're looking for a math coach that can work closely with the administrative team and uh the teachers to support instruction curriculum and learning around math uh we don't we've never had a math coach we think that'll help improve the we're finding our performance uh we want to try to increase improve the uh performance of our students and this is just another one of those uh support systems that we think will make a difference in working with teachers to uh help them improve their both curriculum and quality of instruction can

092I get a motion on the math coach to appr second any further discussion please so we have all this positions local 7 single 7 contract we need to have people to help and like you just explain the coach math so that um we can have better um coaching for the students are if can we have teachers that have this need to come and you know give us a presentation and show tell us what they need so that we can understand all these new positions that they are that are needed from because this is loc they are I suppose that these are needed to help this is the teachers contract 1707 yes yes so like we have all the people come and give us information presentation we have that um well I would say this that

093an instructional coach a math instructional coach like other coaches fall under the teacher contract so depending on their in terms of their salary they'll be placed on the salary grid based on their years of uh experience and their educational credentials uh will'll determine what their salary would be just as it would be for a teacher so we don't know until we hire somebody what their salary will actually be we just know that they're they they'll fall under the teacher contract yeah I'm not questioning this so I'm not questioning the salary what I'm so what I want to understand is all we adding all these position and okay we are here um we don't know what these people based on three you know few sentences we actually don't know what these people are actually doing when

094we actually hire them so I need to so we want to just put one and two together is what I'm looking for you guys understand what I'm saying yeah yeah okay thank you I can I piggy back on that I I think I don't know if this is what you're asking me please thank you I don't know if I'm going to help you or hurt you but I'm interested too uh who who do all these people answer to who holds people accountable how do we know that it's a successful program I'm looking look I'll approve anything here to help kid that's what I'm here for I'll approve anything and everything but I need to know is it working who's watching who's holding people accountable who's holding those people accountable I mean we have a lot

095of people running around but I don't see I mean I don't know maybe I should spend a couple of days in here if I'm invited and to see if people are being held accountable or do or are we just throwing money and titles at people and we're not seeing progress and that's what I'm here for I want to see progress I don't want to to see everybody getting a new title a new paycheck I want to see progress and I want to see it in the students and I don't know if that has anything to do with you may I please you do yeah um yeah exactly we are approving all this and we adding new positions and we but what are they what what are the results of these new people coming in here

096and getting and getting paid to do what we are asking them to do we that's the part we're not see yes thank you um Miss par please I'll just respond a little bit to that so when you let's take the instructional coach for math that instructional coach is considered at the teacher level working with teachers and that person would we will report to the math uh Vice uh the assistant principal uh uh math under math that will be their direct supervisor and so the plan and how and where that specialist will or that instructional culture work will be dependent on uh through evaluations and observations and data as to who that coach will work with in terms of specific personnel and so in terms of determining the success or no success would be in looking

097at a lot of data which would include the the uh evaluation of teachers and ultimately the performance of students so we would look at the performance of our students both in terms of our uh our local assessments as well as state assessments so we would expect if we providing all this support that we would look at the state data to see are we improving in our math course and if we're improving in our math scores that's a data point that says that the strategies and the methods we're using to try to improve students um learning and ability and skills and uh performance overall should be reflected in those things but also in we do uh uh our own assessment as well which we have the students Tak in the beginning of the year so if

098we look at the ninth grade assessment then look at the 10th grade assessment we would expect to see Improvement in those assessments that tells us yeah our strategies are working our strategies are not but it also tells us when we look at observations of teachers if I looked at five Math teachers this year and I looked at five those same five the next year there are recommendations in the evaluation that's that make recommendations to teachers of what they need to work on or where the gaps may be that having a coach we should be able to see in the next evaluation that those gaps have have been uh filled and that the teachers are performing at a better level uh is is one is one of those indicators to ident ify that there is in

099fact Improvement happen happening um so those are kind of the indicators that we happy to share with you each year so you have a sense of how well we're performing yeah I would love I would love I would love to see that I would love to look I don't need nitty-gritty I don't need any I need to see Improvement there's an awful lot of money being spent a lot of a lot of and and honestly I don't care if we employ a whole Community put one adult with each kid I don't care I want to see them succeed but I don't I'm not seeing that and I'm not what I'm not seeing is your answer is exactly what I expected you to say and that's and and yes but who actually is following through just

100let me ask ask you this how many times is a teacher being evaluated based on the contract they're evaluating it depends on if they're a new teacher if they're on an impr be once a year no they observations are more than once a year observations have there's a observation that the teacher knows they're coming and when that happens there's a pre-conference there anation in postc confence then there's another uh observation uh that teacher doesn't know the obser uh the uh supervisor coming to do an evaluation so that's another observation that happen but that's only part of it there's also data that's collected on the curriculum there's data collected on looking at student work there's data collected on looking at student grades and there uh so looking at student work tells us if the teacher is

101giving the students feedback what kind of feedback they're giving that's all part of the evaluation system now can the the the work of evaluation we continue to look at and try to improve and I believe you know this year we have um we've been doing a lot of work particularly in the last month couple of month um you know looking at how we can improve the work of both uh uh of uh teachers administrators upper Administration all of us to say how are we going to get do a better job and we're we have a focus next year across the board improving expect upping expectations for for at every level including students teachers administrators and at my level and it starts at my level and Brenda's level holding the people below us accountable and so

102that's a process that we'll be starting with our summer Retreat which we've hired a couple outstanding Consultants who are going to be working with us on this to help us get to a point we believe we need to get to so the work will look differently the schedule's much different than it's been in the last 10 years and those those the schedule itself is uh holding everybody more econ to meet higher standards and the kids will be um teaching and learning time will be increased from this past year for the last three years the amount of time students the teachers were in front of students were is going to increase students on tasks is going to increase uh this upcoming year so all of those things are things that we know we got to work

103on and we will be working on certainly honestly sounds very perison I I mean I'm not going to lie sounds very promising I just you know I listen I'm not I'm not a a dinosaur I haven't been gone that long and I still hear people not being evaluated for two years that's who's watching the person that's supposed to be evaluated yeah so um that's what I'm looking at people making big salaries we watching what where you know I'm all about giving people money I'm all about it education is a hard job but honestly you just can't come here and look pretty I I want to see results yeah so that's it and I know that you don't have to answer me anymore it's it's part part of what I would say is this if people

104from within the building are reporting things to you you don't always know if they're true if you want to know truth if you want to know the truth come and meet with me that's if you want to know the truth so uh you can't always listen I'm not saying people are not telling you the truth but the fact of the matter is I work for you and my job is to make sure you get the right information and I'll make sure you get that I'll second yes oh look sounds good um um you know if we look at evaluations and how the kids are doing and all that but all I'm asking that as simple than that just an add up to everything that we approving here to make sure or at least to un

105to to uh understand that what we paying people it's what it is we are we as a committee are not in the school we don't know the dayto DAT even you mentioned that earlier um on on the subjects we don't know day to day to day on how things happen here um and we sure we are improving in many things but again we are approving a lot of positions that we leave and we don't know what's going on with these people so like you mentioned already this um in instructional coach math is going to report to the math principle so all I'm asking is can after the fact the principal of math come and give us a presentation of how things are going with hiring these people that's all I'm ask and that should not

106take away everything else and all the trend and all the information that we get from you which um you know it's to keep us informed just looking to make sure can I ask question oh sure yeah um so I I understand what you're saying how all these pieces tied together so um as Miss Ferris had mentioned years ago right they had reading interventionists um I don't know how many years ago exactly that went away um and all of the teachers were supposed to be teaching you know reading and literacy in the core classes and we know that now you know and I don't know what the numbers were like 10 years ago but a lot of students who come in are below grade level in Reading in literacy and math so and I I think

107it might be helpful to hear from uh Mr Mr wette who is here for the student Opportunity Act who's the mtss coordinator so what we've been working towards and really building a foundation is what's called mtss and I wasn't coming today prepared to talk about about that so I probably wouldn't do it justice but basically we're looking at our whole system and structure so all of the changes that have been made over the past couple of years with our schedule significant changes that was all to meet the needs of our students within mtss so there's um tiered supports so some students are fine with you know tier one um curriculum I think um Josh talked about um adopting highquality instructional materials as a strategy to help all students um so that's just one part of

108mtss but once uh we're also trying to be more data informed making decisions based on data so for example on this past Saturday our incoming freshmen we gave them the star assessment we give our current students the star assessment to determine what what their levels are but currently we don't have in place all of those extra supports that we really need so once you ident identify those students and what the need is they have to have a place to go that's beyond that tier one instruction so that's where your literacy coach comes in your math coach um all of those other um support staff who are helping to work with those students so some it might be a class you know considered like a tier 2 class with 10 to 15 students other students may

109need something much smaller called high dosage tutoring so that's all part of that mtss system and I think that's kind of what you were um sort of alluding to and how it all ties together so it really there is a plan and I know you're getting these things um you know at different times but it it really there is a very coordinated plan and that is so you're explaining ahead of you know what all this mean and then how can can we see it afterwards MH and it's simple as somebody come and say okay why did you said and this is where we are yeah now that these people are working with us right that that's that's not difficult right yeah so are you on so I just want to U say that we're happy

110to provide you any information you want and you know up front you know where our stand you tell me what you want we'll make sure we get you that information to yeah and uh no I I understand that uh but I do want to say this because um I don't know what the perception is but I do believe our school culture is amazing I think we have really good teachers uh like I'm not going to sit here and CRI ize my educational staff we have terrific people who are working hard day in and day out is everybody doing the best they can maybe not but that's no different anywhere right but the highest majority of our teachers are doing a great job are outstanding working with you know some of the diff huge challenges that

111come before them in terms of where students coming to them you said that that makes it even easier they'll come here they'll prepare they're going to tell us exactly what we want to hear and everybody's happy yeah we yeah and we'll continue to do everything in our power to give the kids the best opportunity to succeed and I think most people come here with that in mind I really do and we hold every and have we had a little bit of a breakdown in our process the last couple years I think yeah maybe we have but we've had a lot thrown at us over the last couple of years too in terms of all that we've dealt with everything from mental health issues to per low performance and the mental health issues alone are astronomical

112from where they were you know 5 years ago before covid so you know and teachers are dealing with that in the in the classroom and just the cell phone issues alone are it's hard to imagine the challenges but now that we've got a plan in place it's working not 100% the way we want but it's a huge improvement from the past we still have some work on trying to even improve that standard that we have with regards to cell phones alone so anyways I'm not make an excuse for anything we are here to try to do the best we can for kids and I believe our whole staff falls under that category okay before I call for the vote we have the second before I call for the vote I have a a question uh

113actually the business office Melissa how are we paying for all these new positions if none of these are in the 24-25 budget where's this money coming from so um they did remove some positions which again it would probably be helpful to have um a listing of positions that were put in for the 25 budget but then have been replaced with these new positions um but John did stop in my office the other day and did um he did note some of them please we've made some changes in terms of some of these have already been in the budget okay and then some we've added some like the I think um the reading Specialists no they were in one of them was in the budget I believe we had a we had an English position yeah

114so the ones that aren't weren't in the budget we're not hiring some other positions that were in the budget like we had an English another English teacher another math teacher another so we're not hiring those extra teachers because we don't need them because we've made some changes in the schedule so those salaries were able to uh use them towards like some of the other new positions that we have here so the B the budget will still be balanced and we'll we reconcile like I work with Melissa to say well is there is there money or do I have to do I have to eliminate something or what do we have to do we're trying to put the priority on what the educational needs are of the students and if I had to cut other things

115to make sure we had we're meeting the support and the needs of the kids I will cut other things if I have to you know we'll buy less shovels we'll do whatever it takes to make sure the kids have the support systems they need to suc succeed that's our priority what happens in the classroom and the needs of the educational needs of for the kids is the number one priority and yeah we have made some changes from what we expected in October because we've done some data work and we' found that we need some other kinds of positions we didn't have but then there are other positions we don't need so we will reconcile the budget to make sure it's balanced in the end will be balanced and then we'll we can give you a

116report in June of what we eliminated and what we added so you'll have some clarity on that yes that report would be um welcome because I got we got to keep in mind that if we can't afford this we're going to end up doing layoffs and we don't want to do that so if this balance is fine Melissa you can give us a sheet on how it went I mean I don't mind going in the hole a little bit but I don't want to have to uh I'm all for the kids too but I want to be able to pay these people well I can say this Tom Melissa is the best Finance director I ever worked with we will not go on the good I will hold you to that Mr ly that's the

117absolute truth thank you all right can we call this vote I'm glad we're doing this one at a time because instructional coach M Miss TSLA Mr Mahia yes Mr toox yes Miss Farris yes Mr hayam yes moving on summer reading uh faculty staff PLC which is professional Learning Community for 2425 school year up to seven people yes $500 stipend equal Grant funded uh Equity Equity Grant funded new position facilitator needs to develop resources plan discussion sessions and coordinate plc for staff summer reading groups the facilitator will meet with PLC team to develop summer programming maintain attendance for participants pdps and help coordinate schoolwide discussion uh session on opening PD in August the opening PD I believe we have two or three days in the beginning of the year is just for the teachers correct three

118days three days y can I get a motion on that second discussion see none Miss Ferris yes Miss dler yes Mr Mahia yes Mr toox yes Mr Hayden yes Early College Planning team facilitator one meeting for June 1st to December 31st 24 Grant funded finally $5,000 new position details the Early College Planning team facilitator will guide the team through the planning process ensuring alignment with Grant goals accumulating in an application of Early College designation through the mde duties for this role include leading team team members uh leading team meetings developing action plans fostering collaberation among team members developing and analyzing stakeholder surveys and overseeing the process of meeting Grant requirements motion to approve second AG [Applause] discussion Mr toox oh yes Miss Ferris yes Miss dler yes Mr Mahia yes Mr Hayden yes Early College

119Planning team up to 8 June 1st 24 to December 31st 24 Grant funded hourly rate by contract new position uh details Early College Planning team members will participate in the planning process in preparation for application of Early College designation through the mass deese responsibilities include reviewing guiding principles conducting High School visits for program assessment participating in focus groups to gather feedback collaborating and planning meetings and assisting in the development and Analysis of surveys additional responsibilities may include reviewing and updating myap and curriculum development uh mycap is uh strategies for students I think Mr Lavoy might have a myap the uh um I'll let Brenda tell you more myap it stands for my career and academic plan it replaces the old career plan thank you motion second Mr Mahia any discussion ni Mr toox uh yes

120M Farris yes M dla yes Mr Mahia yes Mr Hayden yes future agenda items I don't think we had any No Agenda items uh we have a need for executive session we going to execu session did I do read one thing please oh I'm sorry no no no it's okay it's okay um if you get the Tribune or if you don't whatever this was in Monday's paper and we always talk about the students here at the school if good The Good the Bad and the Ugly sometimes this was in the sports page and um whether it was the coach that prompted the article I don't know but uh there's a senior in in the school named Steven Carrol and um when he was a junior the headlines reads after quitting JV a year ago Carol

121has made a bigger hit so he plays baseball he says all Stephen Caroll has ever wanted to do was play varsity baseball at Great Lawrence now this was last year when he was a junior my grades went down I was acting out I was making some poor decisions he admitted I was upset about not making the team and I it really let me I really had to get a hold of myself I ended up quitting the JV team and it goes on and on but I'm going to read just different parts about a month ago this is before the season started this year tryouts were being held at Great Lawrence and he's a Lawrence resident um Carol has and and he went to the coach step seir and he asked coach seir for him to

122have another opportunity to try to make the team his senior year Carol has since worked hard to get his grades back up in class and on the baseball field he leading the reggies with a 421 batting average he asked me for a second chance and I and and I said absolutely said Mr seir that's how we learn about how we build character there's a lot more in the article however at the end it says not only has he turned his high school baseball career but more importantly Stephen Carroll has turned his life around after graduating next month he plans to take EMT classes eventually be a firefighter and to save people's lives so I mean here's some good stuff coming from this school from Steven Seer I think is a math or English whatever he

123is giving this kid an opportunity and that was in the paper so here we are glad to hear that very good thank you Billy yep I'm sorry uh can we get a second to go into executive session before we break please I told you we'd get back to the student rep I don't see a student rep but I asked the assistant superintendent if she just do a quick recap on what we had for the students sure so Morin is uh unable to make it tonight I think she's at her Co-op job and um Jason unfortunately had a situation come up he sent me an email and apologized uh to the committee um so really quickly um so right now Morin and Jason are um trying to recruit a new member for the committee to a

124student rep uh as Moran will be graduating um so they set up tables during the lunches to provide information to students um sent out some flyers they um created some great Flyers to to put around the school um we have over 30 students who are interested so I believe the um the goal is to have two rep two additional reps in addition to Jason who's just a sophomore this year um to try to help out to to share the workload I know it can be a lot at some at points um putting this together so um they do a great job and hopefully by the June meeting we'll have another rep uh or two more reps to replace Morin um April 9th was the National Honor Society induction ceremony I believe some members of the

125committee attended that event uh 27 sophomores were inducted as well as 22 Juniors and um of course a high standard to make it into the NHS including a 3.5 GPA and a 95% attendance rate so that was a great ceremony um this year I think was uh Mike saier and Andrea papadinis their first year as the advisers and they did a great job with that event April was poetry month um so the library um hosted a number of activities to celebrate po uh poetry month that was a lot of fun for the students I think they had a poetry slam um event so that was um well attended and the students really enjoyed that um we heard about skills USA so we had 36 students who attended the state competition in malor uh accompanied by

126advisers um Christine Smith and Mike wette from Autotech um I know there were a number of other chaperon as well as uh as well of some as well as staff members who participate as um judges and they have a number of different roles um so that's great and we had two silver medal winners uh Olivia bagat for extemporaneous speaking and yulani Perez for welding sculpture and then our Gold Medal winner frenchel Pria um also for welding sculpture so the two uh metal fabrication students will be going to the Nationals in Georgia at the end of June yeah our day of silence for the GSA was held on April 26 um so that was a a really great event that was led by our GSA advisor Rebecca Reyes so um staff and students in the morning

127were able to pick up a sticker either saying that they were going to be um silent all day or a vocal supporter so there were different stickers for that and for students and staff who uh chose to remain silent um they went into the pack during the Wind Block um as a group to sort of formally break the silence which is kind of a really nice um and really powerful moment and then you know talked about the event in the day and and what that was like so um Mr Rees does a great job um with the GSA and um you know participating in so many different events I know there are a couple of events this month they took a group of student students to a prom um with a bunch of other students

128from different high schools in the regional GSA um and they'll be going to a pride parade in Boston um on May 18th so the guidance Department hosted uh their annual job fair on Tuesday April 30th that was led by school counselor Ellen Mahoney and that was really a great event um I think we may have had to turn some employers away this year um so in addition to local employers some are Co-op employers some are new um companies that we have haven't worked with yet in that capacity and we also had Representatives um from the different um military branches so that was open to seniors and um Susan almano also invited students from the after dark program um to attend that event so that was that was great to see them there uh inter Club

129Car Wash fundraiser was also held this past Saturday during accepted students day that's led by um Chris Seer who I think is um who Mr tarbo was referencing in that article and um this year they raised a record $1,200 that will be donated to St an's Home in Methuen so that's a great um community service event and there was a flip-flop sale for the class of 2026 I believe that was spearheaded by uh Miss Martha Carrasco um are they still available I thought they were running out so I have a pair myself for $15 I believe you can order them on the school website um again we talked about accepted students day this past Saturday 426 students attended that the um pack was full of families um so there was a parent presentation we had

130different members of the school staff present to the parents to talk about everything from academics from you know CTE exploratory school health services um somebody from the safe office uh bill vogle um who I think was voted speaker at the event talked about the uniform policy the cell phone policy vaping um so it was really um informative very informative for the parents um there was an Athletics and activities fair in the gym um in the cafeteria we had a book sale so the summer reading I know that just talked about a posting and approved a posting summer reading is a huge um schoolwide event um they I I guess I don't want to quote how much money was made but they sold a ton of books as well as the school store was pretty much

131cleaned out um so that was great and then also this year um in the library we supported families with our online enrollment in the past our enrollment was all through you know paper through the mail this year it's it's online and it's through Aspen which is our student information system there were some glitches this year in rolling it out some fam families had a difficult time especially with the mobile app so um staff members from the admissions and guidance Department were there to help with that on online enrollment process uh Spring Dance is Friday May 10th from 6:00 to 10: p.m. and that uh money will support um the different classes of 25 26 and 27 number of sports updates here that you can read about um one that I wanted to highlight so um

132we have a state champion who's being recognized at the State House this Thursday I don't know if I hope I don't mispronounce his name it Lardo melenciano who is a junior so he's uh being recognized as a state champion in the 300 uh meter during the winter track session um and he's being invited by centor Senator Pavel Pano and you can read all the other details there and I know Mr Nelson sends out the schedule and appreciates um all of the support um for people attending the games and showing their support and finally an update on senior prom and class trip at the end of the slides there so they did a great job there's um a lot of work that went into the presentation I'm sorry the students couldn't be here um to present

133it themselves I know it's a lot more fun when they're here Brenda thank you that was a lot there I didn't want to let it go uh yeah they did a lot of work un noticed thank you can we take the vote please to go to Executive session Mr tbox Miss Ferris m d Mr Mahia yes Mr Hayden yes awesome thank you um um after the executive section can you just send oh yeah I can come back in hard it's really hard yeah I'm in this meeting I text I Chang the camera you said something I was going to but I'm like it's fine yeah I was looking at the email waiting for something to come up water for e for e for e for e for for for know what I me EX she

134gave me a high copy of this evaluation the same thing that's in the binder oh okay yeah do you want me do with it I'll just hold on to it with this you're taking this whole thing right here y all signed yep thank you e e e second all in favor I no I want to stay put that down than