001thank you superintendent are you all set I'm well set okay I'm gonna call the meeting to order would you please join me in a pleasure a pledge of the flag and that remains standing for a moment of silence I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all please keep in your thoughts this evening the men and women protecting us around the world okay thank you if you could could you call the roll for the purpose of attendance please Miss Fitzgerald Miss disler Mr Hayden Mr Cirillo miss Mama yeah okay minutes from February 14th the chair would appreciate a motion discussion all those in favor anyone opposed oops when you call the roll please
002when you have a moment miss Mama Miss Fitzgerald yes Miss disler yes Mr Hayden yes Mr Cirillo Mr LaMontagne yes Mr DeStefano uh cash balance report please sure cash balance report as of February 27th 2023 the account balanced on February 7th was one million 873 229.03 we had deposits from the 8th to the 27th of four million 167 489.76 less payroll on February 16th of a million 88 650 272 and warrant number 33 on February 14th of 581 985 49 leaves us with a book balance on February 27 2023 of 4 million three seventy 080 spot 58 and corresponding bank balance on the same day of 2 million five nineteen six eighteen ninety two in our mmdt account uh year-to-date interest of 172 000 131 spot 79 and a beginning balance of nine million three
003Thirty One three seventy two forty three leaves us with a balance of 9 million 503 504 spot 22 interest for February has not posted yet because it was the 27th and we have a total operating cash balance of 13 million 873 584 spot 80. second discussion okay thank you very much thank you um so I've printed this presentation you have it in front of you as well as the supporting deci information straight from the website um but this is just a high level overview of what our fiscal year 24 budget is going to look like um and this is um it's just a summary so I'm planning to have the complete budget book at our next meeting which will have all the underlying details that go along with this um so whenever I present a
004budget I think it's really important to start out with what the budget process is it's how we get to our line item budget at glts this process starts in September really when we bring the budget calendar to school committee and then it starts with the planning phase where the lead teachers really lead the charge and each Lead Teacher in each department is looking at what their current year budgets are what their past expenses were and they're looking for Trends in you know trying to determine what the needs are for next year and then once they once they get all that information they load it into our financial system and it's sort of an ongoing process of review and Analysis kind of at the same time um but we take all that information and we start
005to have meetings with the whole leadership team where we go through each line item line by line and we're looking at what the budgets are again and we're taking into consideration some of the things that came out of advisory meetings and we're making revisions as we go and then it's just using historical data and state guidelines to try to make the most informed decisions for our future needs and then we bring that whole budget to you as a district committee to the superintendent for approval and then that becomes our line item budget so if we're looking at fiscal year 24 the biggest budget drivers are definitely our colas cost of living for all the new contracts that we settled we're looking at adding some positions to Staffing we're looking at a 1.0 mtss coordinator a
006data specialist which is a current position that we have but it's been unfilled this year so we're going to add that back for next year a Freshman Academy administrator a dental teacher and then we're adding additional positions for Co-Op students we also have three new programs coming online Aviation child care and programming and web design and then we also had a large increase in our transportation contract which you all saw at the last meeting continuing increasing costs and health insurance and we're still continuing to upgrade the building and make renovations so this is a roll-up of our preliminary Foundation expense budget these function numbers correlate to the destiny chart of accounts so basically we're looking at if you look at the bottom of this our total Foundation budget for fiscal year 24 is 43 million
00768 000 and nine dollars which is a little over a four million dollar increase from the year before that number represents our net School spending amount so we are required to spend that amount of money on educating our students what I think is interesting when you look at this is that almost three million dollars of our increase is going straight to instruction and that's all instructional costs not just salaries but your teacher salaries are in there but also all of the equipment and supplies that that go along straight to instruction I always like to look at the budget in terms of our salary expenses and our non-salary expenses so this is sort of a visual that shows you that about 55 percent of our budget is strictly salary expense and then 15 is employee insurance
008and opeb which are also sort of salary related expenses 29 of our budget is non-salary expenses and then we have a small one percent of our budget going towards debt right now so our non-foundation expenses these are our transportation costs our opeb costs these are capital projects as well as long-term debt yep um we're looking at a little over a 1.5 million dollar increase on these items which would give us a total estimated fiscal year 24 budget of 47 million 694 962 dollars so when we when we look at this we need to consider how how our budget is funded and one of the key components of how our Chapter 70 funding is allocated is based on enrollment so this is just a visual of enrollment by town so you can see the increase or
009decrease per town from fiscal year 23 to fiscal year 24. so Andover had a zero percent increase Lawrence is down 31 students Methuen has an increase of 59 students and North Andover is up two students and then when we look at our total student population three percent of our students are from Andover 71 percent of students from Lawrence 24 from Methuen and two percent from North Andover so this is a breakdown of our general fund Revenue which is how our line item budget is funded so in fiscal year 24 we're looking at and this correlates directly to the handout that you have from Jesse the two-page format so our fiscal year 24 estimate right now is 35 million 549 375 dollars and the towns have a required local contribution of seven million dollars five hundred
010and eighteen thousand six hundred and thirty four dollars which brings us to required net School spending of 43 million 68 000 and nine dollars that makes up our foundation budget when you look at the line item budget um and then if you keep going down we have a regional transportation reimbursement which is estimated at one million one hundred and fifty three thousand two hundred and eight dollars and then we're looking for an additional local contribution from the cities and towns of three million 745 again for a total general fund revenue of 47 million six hundred and ninety four thousand nine hundred and sixty two dollars which corresponds to the expenses that we just looked at a visual of our funding sources so 75 percent of our budget is funded directly from Chapter 70 funding which
011comes straight from the state 16 is the required local contributions from the cities and towns we're looking for an additional seven percent from the towns to get the additional local contribution and then there's a small two percent which is our transportation reimbursement question zero I don't know if you want to hold all questions to the end but I'm interested in what we are looking to fund with the additional local contribution of seven percent increase that yeah so that money funds our transportation our opeb costs the capital projects that's it thank you so this is just a breakdown of the revenue assessments by town so this is what each um each town can be expecting to pay for fiscal year 24 so again the required minimum contributions per town are based on that percentage that I
012showed you in the beginning on enrollment Andover is looking at just over a million dollars Lawrence is looking at just over 1.4 million dollars Methuen is a little bit over 4 million and North Andover comes in at 6 765 238 dollars then we have our non-foundation assessment so here we look at what our transportation costs are the opeb the capital I'm sorry the long-term debt is in there as well um and we take off the Regional School transportation reimbursement to come up with our additional local contribution so Andover is looking at 106 569 Lawrence is 2 million 461 338 dollars Methuen comes in at 827 960 and North Andover is 77 877. so the total additional local contribution or the total local contribution both required and additional is 10 million 992 379 dollars so that's
013really just a high level overview of what our expenses are going to look like and how we're going to fund those expenses are there any questions at what point do we notify the um for sending communities of what their anticipated increase are going to is going to be so I think when we go to the towns to present the budget we'll be presenting this to them the required minimum contribution they have to pay that and then we'll be explaining the additional I I guess I'm just thinking that each of our cities and towns are already working on their budget so um I wouldn't want to wait till May at town meeting to ask for more money since the budget is already there for the vote so we'll have we'll have the budget book completed for
014the next school committee meeting and then that'll go straight out to the town so they'll have the information before that thank you other questions yes sir still thank you um can we make sure that somebody goes to Methuen I mean that one of the biggest complaints I get that there's never been representation from glts at budget time to talk about the budget [Music] um I'll move the recommendation um I thought it was just a summary are we voting on this to move it through to accept it so this is really a high level summary but this is what our budget is going to look like the budget book will just have a lot more information in it for you [Music] hi thank you very much and okay superintendent uh concussion policy this will need to
015be voted on ladies and gentlemen we have uh you should have the microphone through please Heaven you pack it up a uh the concussion policy that was revised originally created in 2018 and just recently revised for you to review and if you have any questions I asked nari to come to the meeting tonight to answer any questions you may have regarding the policy you may if you want to take more time over the next few weeks and then our next meeting uh um we can put it back on if you feel like you need more time because you've only had it since last Friday you got I think you received this in your packet last Friday if you haven't had a chance to review it would like to wait till next meeting we can do
016that questions have gone yes uh zayla sorry is this is this a device it is revised from 2018 so 2018 was the last time it was revised yes uh yes so this is what we what we oh well not this one but yeah this is exactly so how do we know what the changes are is there any changes different from the 2018 one yeah so the uh I can now do you know if we've made a lot of changes sorry about that um section two has not been changed because the law in the state of Massachusetts has not changed at all the only thing we did was we cleaned it up and took out a lot of the repetition because it kept saying the same thing over and over and over again so we just
017cleaned it up and just made it look better section one however we did add because we did not we didn't really have a concussion policy for within the school during the school day section two is more for athletics and that's what this whole document was for is basically for extra curricular activities but um section one is just written we put it kind of together on school day policies and procedures for the teachers because a lot of people don't really know and we felt that since we were putting it in we would just add it and um it actually makes it read pretty well I think um we've been working on it since since September and um everybody you know the doctor and the nurse practitioners and everybody um we've all come to an agreement with
018this so they all weighed in on it so are you saying that the aspect of the concussion policy section one is the main change yeah we added that and section two is pretty much similar to what was in the last uh guideline in the last policy correct we just added we just changed it around a little bit so it actually read better because before I kept saying you know they have to have their a physical so we just kind of made it more easier to read and understand okay I'm sorry my name I'm nyeri melconian and I'm the athletic trainer that's it um and some questions I was able to answer myself in the next page but I would like to know Mr Hayden Harry this is not State language this is all our policy
019it's it's not the state language um but it's how do I put it it is a state language but it's written that you can actually read it's it's the policy like on it's adaptive yeah we just adapted it to our school and what we do because like on page 10 it talks about physicals and the Mia Rule and things like that it was all over the place so we just kind of put it together to make it look a little bit better the return to play guidelines um these are all state the return like the return to play guidelines are the state returns or play guidelines um some of it is some of their words some of it is um made for other people to understand the lay person to understand a little bit better
020than um just us as the medical people um and you're happy with all of this language is there anything we should be concerned about as far as legalities did you check in on that anything we've changed um in the section two that we I we um we worked with the school physician who does a lot of who is Big on the concussions and all that information she's very up to up to date on it um there was kind of some concerns at one point is this document and the state law has been in effect since 2010 however concussion and how you treat and how you return kids to play has changed over the last 13 years so the problem is is we have a 2010 document but the knowledge and how to treat the patients
021have changed a little bit so we kind of went back and forth with that but we can only do what the state I can only do what the state law tells me what I can and cannot do so thank you Mrs Fitzgerald yes I'd like to um I guess piggyback on to Thomas question about the legality um I'm pretty sure that each coach and official that is here in the school has to take the mandated concussion course show that they've passed it produce a certificate so my question on the legality is that is totally covered under our at what we do for our athletes but now we are adding this on for the everyday school life shops academics whatever extracurricular activities but we are not mandating that those are is it will be mandated that
022every teacher has to pass a concussion course um because that for me that's a conflict if we're saying it's vitally important that we have it over here but if we don't require it over here then you is that a conflict so sorry do you want to answer that superintendent well right now we don't have a policy that states that the staff needs to take a concussion um exam or get certified in that it's not that's not to say that we won't look at it and see if that's something we should do because this is new I've had no discussions with anybody in the school at this point so at this time until we get a chance to discuss it and then I'll bring it back to the committee once I have a chance to to
023review this myself more thoroughly thoroughly and sit down with the principal to make some decisions and then we'll get back to you the other thing I want to just say that and I would say to nari the main question is does the policy align to state regulations are we aligned to that and if we are that's the key and what's most critical and so we've done that I I feel good about that I think the specifics about who we are the language may be specific to gray Lawrence Tech but everything we've done and the communication and the in the writing of the policy was done in a way that aligns to what the state says we have to align into overfalling all state regulations and policies this is the show yes I I totally agree
024that the policy especially regarding the athletic part that was pretty since 2018 that that is totally in line but my question is if we're now adding this other pot and not getting a ruling either from attorney or whatever else so you're give setting one set of standards for the athletic component and another set of standards for the day-to-day thing and I'm not I'm thinking well I shouldn't be holding this up I'm thinking that I feel good about the fact that we're doing it my concern is are we saying there are two different standards and has our attorney looked at this as a policy because I wouldn't want to vote on it until that had happened where our attorney has not looked at it as a policy and uh in terms of a certification of our
025staff uh I don't know if that's a state requirement or state law or not that they have to do that but that doesn't mean we shouldn't have a policy that requires that so that would be something I would bring to the committee if the Committees would like to see that as part of a policy they certainly can require that you all set Marilyn are you here I'm sorry I know the principal wanted to make a point so I'd like to have her before I make one final comment I think I've been misunderstood in what I'm looking at I'm sure you have yes I have one second Frank yeah principal Solinski I just wanted to add on to what superintendent Lavoy said since we haven't had the actual policy um in terms of like in the
026day what happens um one of the things that certainly would be considered is in the beginning of onboarding like we have the arc Ed platform now which has all the training materials and so um there hasn't been discussions in terms of teachers actually taking the same trainings as say a coach but definitely something would be put in our training platform and our acknowledgment of policy Platforms in terms of like every teacher and every staff member knows what the procedure is and so it could be um maybe we could find a quick video in terms of like what it is um because if you actually look at the actual procedure for the day the first thing you do is call the nurse right because we have Professionals in the building like 90 for athletics and our
027nurses we're not looking for our Educators to start to diagnose but we have had a few we've had a few incidents that have occurred during the day and I think too just making it making staff more aware of what to look for so I think that um you know the superintendent and I and I think you know having it look for but it would definitely be something because it could be that a a teacher like on any given day if they're not a coach they might not even we want to make sure that they are aware that we have added this section so all staff members should know that we have this in the staff section so once it's moved forward I would work with Janice to integrate a component into our onboarding um again
028I'm not sure of whether or not actually going through the full train because they wouldn't be treating anyone but actually just at least having them acknowledge that they know what the procedures are if that helps Mr Fitzgerald you want to conclude no oh you're all set yes sorry I just wanted to add um in the rules and regulations of the state it only requires coach all coaches are required for CPR and they have to do the concussion training it doesn't have it doesn't State anything about teachers um having to do that as well as um the principal um Solinski said that you know the nurses are in the building there is a section that I will let everybody know of um it's called return to learn and it's what the teachers have to ex or
029what teachers are expected to monitor the children in their classrooms getting back into academics because academics comes first before the sports come so there is a section of that it's called return to learn that is and part of it is stated in the law but it's not um it's it's in there but that's about the only part that I believe the teachers are aware of Mr ciruelo you have a question yeah um first and foremost thank you for adding um part one because as you know Winter's here and people do fall on kids or even have walking down the hallway somebody could sleep before and bang their heads so this is a good thing my thing um and to Maryland's Point yeah there are some of the realities and stuff that we need to look
030at but I believe that if a student falls the first person that should be called is the nurses station the nurses in their medical professional before having our teachers diagnosed our children with that I will these times to dissect this and I would have preferred a copied of the state guidelines to compare the two sections um that's not that difficult to find but for me I want to make at least next time to the next meeting too to look it over and compare anything further it's time to chill except the motion the cable is Matt until uh the meeting of the 28th discussion only thing I would ask if you do have questions that do come up if you could uh send them to contact the administration so maybe we don't have to have Navi
031come back again just to approve this if you have any major questions that will report to the principal's office okay and if I'm sure if she has to you know that can be arranged also but it might be nice to uh not have to inconvenience her to come back all those in favor anyone opposed thank you very much okay this time the chair would appreciate uh you put them to the table of matters please next time okay uh this time the chair would appreciate a motion to adjust the agenda to do the little Reggie's handbook Ms Carpenter is here the director to uh along with the superintendent to explain it you have a motion please all those in favor anyone opposed superintendent received a copy of the little red piece handbook looking to open uh
032our child care centers next Monday March 13th um and uh as part of oops I'm sorry as part of the uh before we open the facility we would like a vote from the school committee on the handbook so we can Implement them and ensure that parents have a copy of this who are going to be enrolling their child into the program so if you've had a chance to look at it and have any questions I think you've had a preliminary copy of this provisional copy earlier I think we did we gave to you earlier so this is just a finished document so if there are any additional questions you have I asked Brandy to come this evening to answer any questions you may have specific to the document I have a motion to accept this
033document to move a second Vivian my apologies for missing last meeting so I'm not sure if I'm going to repeat a question that was already answered um was this handbook modeled by another organization or any other handbook that um that belongs to another agency Child Care Agency hi I'd be happy to answer that so the the handbook is um modeled through the department of Early Education and cares guidelines and policies that are required to be in here so the language is developed based on those policies for um the individual program that it's representing yeah I will just I don't know if Vivian's done okay okay does that also include like the late fees and the tuition costs um is that like we created that or is that also modeled uh the late fees and the
034tuitions well I'll take them out of uh individually the late fees um those are common industry standard practices of the ones that I developed to put into the handbook if you'd like to change them you know that's fine but these are the norm things that are charged the tuition I did create based on enrollment and Staffing to try to balance each other and cover the cost of the employment for the daycare uh Mr sorello hi actually name and title for because I don't know who Brandi Carpenter director of uh child care Brandy thank you for coming and thank you for your work um and I was looking over the the handbook I think is very interesting um it is a lot lower than most places I've seen um but which is good so I want
035to I commend you and I took a quick little tour of facilities deal of the day which I know a lot of people gonna be jealous thank you for coming and thank you for putting this together you're welcome thank you Mrs Fitzgerald yes this would be more of a school committee thing this is the handbook that we are being asked to adopt but normally we would be adopting something as a policy um which the handbook we're asking to be a doctor this evening okay not as a policy but as the handbook and do we have a policy for our child care center superintendent Europe we we haven't we have not at this point taken the handbook and developed into a policy yet we will be doing that moving forward but in order to get the
036facility up and running um I felt like we needed to get this in place so people had something to that we had some kind of regulations or expectations uh for um anyone that's going to enroll their son or daughter into the program Mr Fitzgerald one last thing my same old question have our district attorneys reviewed this the attorneys haven't reviewed this because um wanted to take the time to look at how we would transition this into policies and then forward the policies to the attorney at that time anything further anyone all those in favor all those opposed thank you very much and good luck oh I'm sorry yeah that's okay um when is um the opening I don't think John said that John the opening is Monday uh the 13th of March uh Thursday uh
037from 2 15 to 3 30. we have an open house for the staff uh to come and visit the uh the facility toward it so committees any of the committee members would like to do that's welcome or we can do a tour quickly at the end of today's meeting if you'd like to take a tour of the space tonight we can do that Thursday the open house Thursday from 2 15 to 3 30. for this coming Thursday not this week next week this week this week the society staff member who um child is coming on Monday gets a chance to look at it before they bring them in all right okay Mr Hayden do we have any early applicants and how many do we have thank you for asking um currently I have um an
038interest list which I started the first day that I came on board here so that I had an idea of who was interested and based on that interest list we would be fully enrolled for September and um probably about 80 enrolled starting probably in April when you say based on that's not the people who have actually signed on how many do we have actually signed up for when you open up um I don't have anyone actually signed up because I didn't have a start date so now that I have a start date what I can do is take that interest list tell them that they are now able to enroll and then we can move forward from there Vivian would you have a question no yes superintendent so we didn't have a start date till
039today because we were the state inspectors was inspected by the state today and so until we knew it was going to pass we couldn't have a start date so there was two items they want uh resolved which we're doing tomorrow which is putting a fence up in the in the playground area and putting in a dishwasher in the day in the infant room which both things were doing tomorrow so then she's going to come back Thursday and if those are all set then we're ready to go on Monday which we know they'll be all set so we're letting staff know tomorrow but we had already given staff a preliminary date that when we expected to open so um we'll open with as many or and I feel like we're going to be there's quite a
040few people waiting to come so they may not you know sign up for this Monday but within the next couple of weeks uh more staff members will be bringing their children so we've like uh Brandi said April 1st we look to be about 80 percent full you all said Mr Hayden I guess one of the Mr LaMontagne police is any faculty member exempt because they don't live in Massachusetts no not at all that would be most of the staff yeah anything else okay thank you very much okay thank you and good luck thank you Brandy moving back to the regular art of a business marketing strategy superintendent so um I'm not uh I'd like to table this for now because I have not had time to sit with the soup with the principal to develop
041our strategies um it's going to take us some time because it's it's more than just the principle of myself sitting down to develop this we uh have we're putting a committee together to help us design this because it has an impact on a lot of the different uh programs and things that are going on here in the school and we also want to get some expert advice into in developing this who someone that has a little more that's done a lot of work around marketing so until we get a chance to do that I didn't want to bring something that's incomplete and we're not positive it's going to be effective so I want to bring something we believe Will Be an Effective tool moving forward for marketing and make recommendations whether it's to uh again
042pose for an in-house person or post for somebody on the outside of the school but once we have that once we have that study completed I'll bring it to the committee you'll appreciate a motion to table of marketing strategies discussion all those in favor I'm going to polls okay moving right along professional development superintendent please so let's see right thank you so do you have those slides okay I'm just going to review our last professional development which was was last week I believe uh it was focused on two different uh areas um one of the areas was um let's see student Student Success plan on and failures so um and the other one was on a strategic plan so at this point I'll go over the Student Success plan some of what was talked about
043at the professional development program and so we utilize this professional development day to talk to the student I mean talk to the staff about Student Success plans because we had we required all teachers who had students who were failing to develop a Student Success plan for those students and uh I think both myself and the principal felt that we needed to give them a little more clarity why we were this expectation was now presented to them and why it was required that they do success plans just so that and then ask for feedback from them as well so we want to give them an opportunity to weigh in on some of the philosophies and and some of the work that we're looking to do moving forward around student failures and how we deal with that
044so we use some of our professional development time this this last Wednesday to review that we spent about half our time on that in in the auto in the auditorium and half the time on the Strategic plan which I'll I'm going to be reporting on my goal for this year which is to develop a strategic plan which was I'll go through the some slides with you on that which part of it was presented at the professional development on last Wednesday but if you look at the slot if you look at the slides we started the presentation with my particular philosophy on um on failures and Student Success plans um so I won't go through them but that slide kind of outlines um the goal for uh for the goal of Education you know is to
045for students to continue to learn and talked a little bit about uh failing students and what it does and how to Mo and what until we talked about motivating kids and uh the sixth plan uh reflecting uh that the teacher is going to what they're going to do to continue to support students moving forward after they've missed and that a grade time forever that grades need to have students need the opportunity to continue to reflect on and go back to making up or doing work that will that they can approach and learn what it is they missed or don't understand so that uh that the grade will should always reflect what students know and are able to do and if a student let's say give you an example we've got a 40 in the first
046quarter but in the second quarter did makeup work did we did a new assessment and now knows 80 percent of the material you didn't know in first term that grade should be changed to an 80 that that 40 shouldn't stand forever and if we wanted to do a grading regarding responsibility and expect meeting expectations that maybe we needed to have a separate grade but that grade needed to be reflective what students know and able to do moving forward and then we talked a little bit about there was a lot of teacher perception about um the idea of of success plans and what teachers what we were hearing or some of the um things that we felt teachers might have had preconceptions about and so we went through that and talked about each one of those
047bullets that are on there regarding students failures and what that made how that made teachers feel in some cases and had conversations about that and then allowed the we allowed the teachers to turn and talk three or four people got together communicated what they had heard over the first 15 half hour and then we gave them another half hour to respond and ask questions of myself regarding and make comments about what they heard so that they could express their own feelings so that we had from that point we were able to move forward moving forward we can look at strategies and methods we're going to use in terms of grading we have a grading committee that's looking at you know how we grade students and Grading policies and we're looking at whether we should have
048a common grading policy that it's adopted a school policy adopted but it will be part of our five-year strategic plan moving forward to take a look at our grading policies and how we grade students and so that we use that time to reflect on what's going on with students who are failing and how it we should be addressing that so we had a I think a good uh give and take and teachers got to really talk about how they felt about our expectations and we got to talk to I think respond to their thinking in the auditorium which I thought uh went well um and I think that the teachers appreciated being heard and I appreciated hearing you know their thinking so it helps us as administrators our whole administrative team was there to continue
049to do this work in a way that supports students at the highest level we can particularly those students who are struggling for various reasons one of the things they had everyone had to do in their Student Success plan is first to do an analysis on why the student was failing anywhere from having difficulty with the work to struggling emotionally or dealing with something at home that might have impacted their ability to learn in the classroom so you know the idea of how do you develop a success plan first we have to know what we're dealing with before we can move forward so that's some of the way we ask teachers to approach it until that was part of the professional development and the other part was on the Strategic plan which I will outline you'll
050see as I outline where where we're at with where I'm at with the Strategic plan and my goal for this year uh will uh you'll see that we uh utilize some time in professional development for that as well questions for the superintendent yes [Music] in about students career having to have a certain great um no let me think this through so you were saying that they need to have they need to pass that's what you're saying yes yes and then in a strategy to for those students that need help that's that's why you are explaining and all that and yes and um so what about the students that don't want to that they actually don't learn even if you give them the help what happened with the students how you're going to pass them so
051well first of all I believe all students can learn so we've got to figure out why they're not learning we have to figure out how we can help them to learn um you know there's various there's lots of reasons why students struggle or having a hard time learning so we've got a our job and our responsibilities and that's what the whole success plan is uh is all of the uh Student Success plans all about us first to analyze why is that student not learning what are the things that are going on whether it be something going on at home having difficulty with the work sure I I don't think I asked the question the right way they are students that actually don't care so my question is what happened with those students that actually don't
052care and they're not going to learn more than what they what they're here for yep so we have lots of students who feel don't care and that's the reason they don't they don't learn but students don't care there are many many we need to know why they don't care so if a student doesn't care what's going on in their life that we've got to understand and figure how do we motivate that student to want to learn is part of our job so we can never accept the fact that a student doesn't want to learn we have to we have a responsibility to work with some people that they want to learn and not our job is to help them learn motivate them and figure out what it is that's causing them not to want to
053learn that's not normal I'm sorry I'm Different to you again because I'm not sure you you got the question I need to I want I'm looking to know what happened to a student because you're talking about giving them a grade to pass why so my question goes into if a student don't want to learn and you find out that they don't want to learn are you going to give them a passing great that's my question what happened to the student are we going to continue to have a student taking a seat of for another student that do want to come here and they didn't even make it here because somebody else is here and don't want to learn and we're trying to pass that student somehow that's my question yeah and I just yeah so
054first of all it's not about passing to be honest with you it's and if a student well let me just explain it's if it's students are not automatically passed students have to earn it's not about passing or not passing we we have expectations in terms of students knowing the material and able to do what it is we're trying to teach them whether it be skills or whether it be knowledge whether it be what are the materials the content there we're trying to teach them they need to be able to know and be able to do what it is we're trying to teach them now if they if they don't reach competency in these areas we're not going to automatically pass them the what we're going to do is figure out how do we help them
055so they do pass and there's no time what I'm saying is there's no time limit whether if they got a 40 to 4 first quarter and then they by the second quarter they know what they didn't know in that first quarter we need to change the grade because it's about what it is they know and able to do that we always want to measure if a student doesn't want to learn and is refusing to learn then we work with the student through guidance through all kinds of support help it might be an ell student might be special ed student that has all kinds of plants so we that the point is all any student that doesn't want to learn we've got to work with them to motivate them to want to learn and that's just
056not acceptable in terms of and once the students get here by law we can't just tell kids that we can't throw students out or we can't expel students because if that's not acceptable because the law doesn't allow us to do that number one and the other thing is my belief and I say this all the time if a student comes here they are are responsibly in our students to teach not to get rid of but to work with them and figure out every student we have to figure out a way to teach them and help them learn what it is we want them to learn I don't want to see I don't want to throw any student out I don't want to send any student back to Lawrence I want to work with every one
057of those students they I feel like there are students there our responsibility we accepted them so we have a responsibility to do everything in our power to help that student learn because that student is going to be an adult someday and he's going to be as one of our citizens and if we can teach them and help them gain skills and knowledge they're going to go out and be successful we want that for every single student no matter what their challenges are because a lot of our students are struggling with a lot of issues at home a lot of things that they're having difficulties with that we've got to help them we've got to help every single one of our students and that's why I convey to every teacher I convey that to everybody that
058works at greater Lawrence Tech where family and it's our responsibility to educate our kids not to quit on kids we should never quit on a single student if we quit on them they're going to quit on themselves how can we quit on them if we get we do what we got to do no student I'm not going to quit on any student if they don't want to learn I'm going to we need to figure out how to help them deal with whatever is causing the problem that they don't want to learn and it's easy to say absolutely and this does every single student learn not always but we don't want to quit on them we don't want to give up we'll keep working at it as long as there are student we'll keep working at
059it well anything further okay we'll bring on superintendent new programs Aviation child care and programming web development you're going to fill us in on those so uh the three programs that we're working on now Aviation all of those programs we're working on Part B Part B is due to the Department of Education on Friday and we are in actually very good shape in meeting the um the standards that are required for Part B in fact we had tonight in one of those requirements is to have a advisory meeting so tonight I think it was uh let's see one of the programs programming was uh meeting tonight and or uh Earl uh it's either next week I mean next tomorrow Thursday I think is Early Childhood advisories meeting and then Aviation we had part of that
060meeting today we had the FAA in today to meet with us three people from the state FAA to meet with us today to go over and talk about what the criteria is and uh for uh to get the program certified by FAA which are very similar to the ones for the Department of Education we have the consultant uh for uh for Aviation from the school out in Westfield who's been working with us so we've met we're pretty much there's about 15 different areas and standards we are required to complete in order to get approval and in each of those programs and we're in pretty good shape I feel confident that all three programs should pass Part B and that would then next last part would be for them to visit the school and look at
061the space we're going to run the programs which would happen in the spring sometime in May so but I I think we're in pretty good shape for all the programs everything from developing curriculum to purchasing and having equipment in place for the spring everything looks good at this point for a Go in all three programs the questions for the superintendent Vivian superintendent um do you mind providing me an update in regards to the hanger space I received a phone call from the director of the airport regarding some concerns which I've tried to reach out to to kind of touch base on that um so I just wanted to make sure if anything has changed from our last meeting visiting the airport so um there was the hangar that was for sale at the airport we
062made an offer to the gentleman out at the airport also asked to be on the airport commissions next to meeting because they have to vote and approve us purchasing a hanger um since then um the other part is I've turned it over to our attorneys to determine what the if there are any state regulations or laws that prevent us from purchasing the hangar out there or purchasing another building uh if there needs to be any legislation to approve that um so I'm still waiting I called them again today but he didn't return my call um waiting for the response on that but we have made an offer on that Hangar since then the manager of the airport did call me and asked me if I would reach out to the gentleman who owns who wants
063to build a hanger out there who wanted to partner with us to see if he was still interested uh he would like to see us pursue that partnership I called the gentleman at least four or five times he has not returned my call I called Francisco the manager out at the airport and informed him that the gentleman was not returning my calls if he had any influence in communicating with them so I could communicate and see if he's in you know where it's his interest lies before we make a final determination on the purchase of the hangar hasn't returned my call no one's returned my calls yet at that point so at this point I I'm going to wait for once we know the answer from the attorney which I'll reach out to him again
064tomorrow on the final purchasing of the uh Hangar that's available I will um if there's no state law that prevents us from purchasing that uh then what I would do is uh move forward with the commission and I've asked to be on the agenda to purchase the hangar I would move forward with purchasing that hanger I don't want to wait on somebody that's either not ready to do their project or not responding in a way that's just going to make it difficult moving forward I don't want to get caught in something that's going to derail our opportunity so what's available is the hanger so I would continue to pursue that yes yep Mr Hayden Mr lavois this Hangar falls through I just want to confirm that this will not affect any other existing shops in
065this building if we have to bring this into this school no it won't have any impact on it but we're also building a hangar here at the school so it's part of the uh three projects that we're pursuing the architect is doing some drawings for us and um so we need a hanger here and we also need one of the airport so it won't have an impact we don't really need the hangar at the airport for another year a year from September uh although there'll be some work that needs to be done to that existing one but rarely doesn't hang or become available that's a rare situation and this so we we really need to take advantage of this opportunity because it may never come again we may never get the opportunity to get a
066hanger out there if we miss out on this particular one and it's actually uh it's in a nice location and it's also it's about 3 000 square feet which is a perfect size for what we need to do what we want to do out there so and it's at a reasonable cost was on the market for 320. I tried to see if he would donate it to us but he wasn't interested in that he had he had already had an offer for two seven 275 000 so we offered him 300 and he took it uh till now but we got to move quickly because he's anxious to get this thing sold um that's why I want to get back on track with the uh but again we can't actually purchase it till the airport commission
067approves us purchasing it uh because they have to approve any owners of the any hangers out at the airport so that's why I asked to be on the March agenda at the uh for the airport Commission so these three programs we already had the child care with a director which is the lady that was here Randy Carpenter and we have a star day of 313 right and we also have a Hamburg and we're in the process of doing a polisa uh how about the other ones can we have some details of that what I just um program yes the program on who's who's going to be in charge when it's a start day and how are we working on the policies for those yeah so all three of these programs won't start until September in
068June the child care center is opening now only not as an educational program but just as a service for our teachers it opened in September as an early childhood education program so it'll have different rules and the handbook will be totally different this handbook only is utilized for the child care center under chapter 74 they'll be totally different policies and regulations they'll be the same as every other shop in terms of our policies but this only is for getting us through until then except for there will be as long as we're going to continue to take students in there'll still be some alignment of this policy book with the chapter 74 policies then we'll have to work on between now and September and need to be approved by the department an event so that will
069also be going into the department of Ed as one of the requirements so but the third program programming the space we have a space to put that in for our ninth grade program so next year we have all our spaces designated with a 9th grade exploratory programs will be I'll be doing a report at the next meeting I think it's on the agenda on space on for all moving opening up next school year all the additional space we need for classrooms and for all the shops outlining and going over that with the committee I'll have that ready for you at the next school committee meeting but we do have space for the to open up all three programs including programming programming is meeting tonight the advisories meeting tonight which is a requirement of the part
070B so we have a committee put together the curriculum's all done and written all the standards we need is completed all that there's all those checklists for that particular program is all ready to go we even have an instructor what we know we have the possibility of an instructor I should say we've posted it we have an instructor that applied that is licensed so we feel good about that also in uh child care we do have an applicant for that for the ninth grade teacher and Aviation we actually have one instructor that applied as well that person doesn't have a chapter before license yet but they can be put on a waiver so we're actually looking pretty good for all the programs including programming so we're in good shape for all those programs to open
071up next September also anything further okay thank you moving on uh superintendent uh evaluation timeline John yes yep that's you buddy you're the superintendent so um so my goal for this year was to develop a strategic five-year strategic plan so at this time I'm going to give you an updated report on where I'm at with that with that process um so you can see what we've done and what we still have left to do it's a extensive long a lot of work program program it has a lot to it a lot of work to it and trying to Encompass our total Community both inside the school and outside the school in this process so I'm going to kind of go through the process with you at this time so you can see kind of what
072I've done and what I haven't done I'm going to go through some of the slides pretty quickly because it's lengthy I think there's 25 slides so I'll try not to I'm not going to spend a lot of time on every slide but certain slides I'll spend a little more time on so you have a better picture of what's been done already and kind of the direction we're going in with the Strategic plan all right so the Strategic plan give me one second Mrs Fitzgerald sorry John this before we start um I am wondering how many people are have been involved in this strategic plan yep so there's been quite a few people already involved in it but there's going to be hundreds of people involved in it before it's completed so you can see the
073process and how everyone gets to participate whoa so it's strategic plan it starts off the the plan itself will probably have two or three pages of text to start the plan off before it gets into details with all the focus areas but of course we start off with our mission statement which is our school's mission statement our school vision and our core values they're all part of the Strategic plan so they align both to our school Improvement plan into our work that we've done around accreditation and the work that that the whole faculty in the school has done in the past so that doesn't get changed so we have we utilize that as our starting point for the five-year strategic plan is the foundation of what is critical and important to our school then we
074have the vision of reality um so the foundation the vision statement and the glts core values will be reflected in the overarching goals of each Focus area so the focus here is we have nine Focus area that this strategic plan is going to develop uh where we are we're starting off where where are we today in these Focus areas and where do we want to be five years from now where do we need to go five years tonight from now uh so it's going to take a lot of research and work to look at you know in each of these areas where the world is going and education is going and a lot of the things that are critical to who we are as a school uh and the work that we've done the last
075few years and how that has to progress moving forward so the areas that we'll be working on is leadership and governance curriculum instruction and assessment teacher recruitment teacher retention student support increasing student access finance and asset management Workforce Development School culture and climate so you'll see you can see in there there Just Hits about every credit card or important issue facing the school and a lot of work that we've already accomplished trying to move that work for uh further but also uh how we're going to implement some of the work we've already done over the next five years so that uh that it brings meaning to the hard work that it's been accomplished in the past so we're not letting go of the the work that we did in the past we're embracing it and
076implementing some of it in our five-year strategic plan and that'll be outlined in the plan itself so each of the areas I outline just uh some samples of some of the things we'll cover within those different Focus areas I won't go through each of them tonight but you can take a look at it and you'll see it's just a small outline of the work that's going to be done in each of those areas areas so so so just well I'll just just to give an example in governance and Leadership the governance body that oversees school policies budgeting operations made up a school committee superintendent advisory Council and administrative leadership team examples of responsibility that fall under the umbrella of governance and Leadership is determination of policies outlined in the student and staff handbooks hiring practices
077compliance with federal and state laws so these are all things we're going to look at as we start to develop our plan and and make decisions about the future but for each Focus area this a lot of the slides you're seeing I went through with our administrative team already and the faculty as well so um there's a slide for each one of the focus areas so it takes us to uh what has happened so far so what's the work that's happened so far on February 16th I did a presentation to administrative team soliciting feedback from on uh on the Strategic plan moving forward in um and also did some work assigning them some I assigned the administrative each administrator to co-chair one of the focus areas so for each Focus area there will be a
078co-chair uh there's uh co-chairs one is an administrator one is a staff member so um Susan and I um uh assign the administrators the principal and we are going to look at tomorrow we've had well we'll go through this but I have applicants who want to co-chair faculty members who want to co-chair these particular Focus area that the principal and I look at and assign them to different Focus area on three on March 1st did a presentation to The Faculty did approximately I think about six slides to The Faculty regarding the um a strategic plan uh and as part of our work on our professional development day last Wednesday we used some of that time to solicit solicited solicited feedback from each collaborative planning time group so the CPT groups got together and we gave
079them a activity to do on the Strategic Focus area priorities we collected the work that they did at the end of the uh professional development day which will be you uh the each of the Committees will be utilizing um we filtered faculty input data by Focus area and designated priorities distributed to the administrative co-chairs so the work that the faculty did on that day we pulled all that information together all that data together and Destroy and have shared that data with the administrative cultures of each of the focus area we've posted a job for staff co-chairs for each Focus area committee which can be approved at our last meeting we've reviewed those applications as I said tomorrow we'll make selections as who will be the other co-chair of each of the committee to work with
080us with each of the administrators currently soliciting exceptional ideas on how to engage our singing community members met with uh we've met with the director of special education director of erl department and assistant principal for discipline each of these have different committees uh uh fat uh parent committees and other members who participate in some of their uh their specific committees so we met with them to talk about what kind of uh how we could uh reach out to their the people that they work closely with uh from members of our uh parent groups um where oops um oh we have upcoming uh meetings with the chairs of the bypoc committee which I think is tomorrow and all the CT administrators and directive guidance in the mission we still haven't met yet but we will be
081meeting with them also so solicit ideas how to reach out to our uh greater community uh outline the work going forward so the week of 313 committee chair excuse me committee co-chairs uh will be setting up initial meetings the week of 313 committee chairs made contact with staff who have already expressed interest in sitting on a particular committee and I quote additional members a link to a sign up sheet will be also posted in the ready Spotlight the members for all them staff members they'll be also in the newsletter uh we will send in a separate email and postings around the building to solicit members to participate other staff members support participating on the committee on our committee we put out some documents at professional development to solicit people to participate on the different committees
082as well depending on where their focus area interest slide lies on the week of 320 co-chairs share staff feedback with committee members committees to speak for the first time so all the co-chairs will schedule remaining so meet with people who are interested in being part of their committee on 324 discussions regarding strategic plan uh I will presenting our legislative breakfast on the 24th when our legislators come in to talk a little bit about the Strategic plan and what direction we're going with the Strategic plan on March 28th on myself and the principal will facilitate a discussion on the Strategic plan at the school council meeting game preliminary input on April 1st strategic plan workshop at the school County it's on April 4th I'm going to do a workshop with the school Community to get your
083input on particular levels and Leadership which is the area in which you oversee and promote the score and the policy so what should that work look like over the next five years so I'll put a I'll be put in a small program together so I can solicit your input and give you an opportunity need to give me feedback on that and I'll see um if they're interested in give me feedback on any of the other Focus series as well so we'll do some work on our meeting of April 4th throughout April the committee developed a basic overview of the work to present Intel communities to be held on April 11th and uh so we're going to be doing Zoom meetings so which will be uh looking for are parents and other members of the community
084to participate in um the committee develops a few key questions to put in a survey to be distributed via home happenings which is our ready newsletter and email to the community from myself and in a chat during the Zone meetings questions that we'll put out to most people who are will be attending the zoom in a specific population to be targeted for communication advisory council members current families perspective families students foreign [Music] um and so that kind of outlines where we're going moving forward I just gave you some example of what some of the focus area work will look like so this one is built on the sample that I uh shared with uh the administrative team and then some members of the different committees so uh just a small example of some of the
085work that they'll be doing is so increase access which is uh the goal so they in each of the Committees will start off by developing a goal statement uh so the goal statement should explicitly reflect some of the key elements of the school vision and the core values to in this case we have uh on this particular goal statement is to increase student access to Great Lawrence technical school in order to provide greater opportunities for students within our sending districts core strategies expand and renovate the physical so these are some strategies regarding the goal that um that I put in there expand and renovate the physical plant was one of the core strategies and the objective was this automatic marketing plan to educate the community about the core strategy complete a feasibility study to identify
086industry needs and Community Support file an nsba letter of interest for additional funding secured City and town approvals increase faculty square footage in order to support existing programs expansion and new programming implementation except more students to all programs so it just gives you know and that's all in specific to uh giving more students X access to the uh school and so the expected outcomes uh that they'll work on is in this case we did do a feasibility study architect complete within the first two years Community meetings msba letter of interest necessary funding and school committee and approval marketing allergy Outreach plans additional building and expansion of current buildings and the outcome is a 15 growth in student population was one of the outcomes of it um and additional strategies are needed is necessary goal statement
087should explicitly reflect at least some of the key elements of the school vision and core values I think I gave you that already and then so um so in the final slide a superintendent will bring the Strategic plan to the school committee for a vote so that just kind of outlines some of the work that's happening and some of the work that needs to still happen so still a lot of work to happen and a lot of work will be committee work in everybody in the building and outside the building have opportunities away in on the Strategic plan questions to the superintendent okay John enrollment procedure after acceptance so you should I think I um I asked the director of admissions guidance and missions to provide you with uh the the documents uh just so
088you're aware of what our um let me see our procedures are once students are accepted and you can take some time look at it and if you would like to respond to it at the next meeting we can respond to it our next meeting I know you just got some of the documents tonight so um any we can have more discussions about it but I thought it's important for you to understand because you've had committees had questions often on this and I thought it was important for you to read some of the letters and the communication that goes on to parents after we do the acceptances you have microphone please thank you so I was looking at the letters um and one I mean I would like to see the director here um every time
089something like this is presented like we have the other ladies that were here that was nice um so this petition is that she comes and presents these things at least I asked her to come next week rather than this week yeah thank you that's that's good so hopefully she'll be here next week next meeting next meeting so in the one where the student is accepted I know it says in there's a sentence that says they have 10 days to return you know to respond or otherwise they're gonna be taking that seat is going to be taken but I didn't see any date of the acceptance so again I wish she is here to answer and unless you know the answer I guess I missed the question on what was what was the question so the
090letter that shows that the student has been accepted the first one yeah it says there's a sentence within the letter that says you had 10 days to respond correct or to to provide the required documentation otherwise they're going to be taken that that acceptance is going to be taken exactly but it's not a date so I don't know if it's it was um left out or that's not a day on the letter so how they know let's see go ahead sure okay where are we here now so so did you have a question an answer I mean excuse me John sure I mean superintendent was trying to say that the reason why there's not a date yet is that like once it's the ones that that they determine the actual date that they're going out
091to it would there would actually be a there would absolutely be a date on that yes they will all be dated right if she didn't give you an example on it no yeah and I didn't have her come because I thought you would need some time to review it more and then she could be here once you've had that opportunity to do that yeah okay just trying to chill except the motion to table this matter to table matters discussion all those in favor anyone opposed admission reporters in your packet ladies and gentlemen did the veggie little reggies report from committees none District committee priorities policies who need a vote uh share to appreciate a motion on Section B bdg School attorney you have a motion on that please discussion all those in favor all those
092opposed new business I see no table matters here Personnel consideration resignations non-leave of absence social social studies instructor on a parental leave effective February 27th of June 20th 2023 no retirements appointment a Miss Cali La Chapelle a PT medical secretary office assistant effective February 14 2023 the Mr Alex Torres LTS for social studies effective February 14 2023 the following ladies and gentlemen job postings it will need to be voted on John want to take take the first uh the first two please because they're lenti the uh yeah the athletic I'm sorry I didn't mean to interrupt your athletic and the guidance admission please yeah so the first one is uh job posting for athlete this is a posting that we do every year um it's an annual position athletic rental security I'm sorry athletic athletic
093rental security field maintenance will work during the evening to assure the fields are only used by organizations that have authorization to be utilizing the facility as well as maintaining upkeeping property and assist rental organizations Monday through Friday 5 30 to 9 30 uh 20 hours a week 40 dollars an hour annual position this person does mostly maintaining when there are issues that are happening when people are utilizing the field and also doing an inspection at the end of each after the facilities rentals are done going around and checking the facilities to see if there was any damage because anyone that utilizes the field has the responsibility to um maintain and keep the field in good order and if they don't then um we have it in every contract that we can charge them for any
094damage so we go around and check that at the end of every at the end of every evening to see if there's any damage and then also that person is responsible to work with the facility uh director to ensure that something that things are repaired sometimes that person will do it themselves whenever possible okay guidance and admission specialist kind Mission special one-year position to provide administrative support to the admissions and guidance Department with primary responsibility for admissions and enrollment process per contract this is a replacement position feelings of the motion to accept those chairs up the motion to accept those of a second Mr Zillow athletic no no that's every year every we have that every year every we we posted it every season in the spring and in the fall watching Vivian okay so
095just again Clarity because as I'm hearing you read this position I'm like Oh I thought we had someone already that handles that so when you say uh so it's a seasonal position then and is that the reason why it's considered annual as opposed to a replacement yeah so it is we do have someone that's done it and but we still posted we still posted every season we're required to we should we're required to post it every season because someone else might be interested it's not a full year position Mrs Fitzgerald at the present time is this an unfilled position like we had somebody but didn't they leave that was a different position this is they only they only work 20 hours a week okay they work weekends and uh a total of 20 but we
096have someone on security um every night and throughout the whole weekend are you looking for this be an in-house position yes all right thank you anything further all those in favor and anyone opposed hey John math instructor environmental math instructor CBA effective August 2023 replacement position environmental science instructor teaches CBA effective 2023-24. this is a new position and one more please and then HVAC instructor pulsing for two teachers currently on waivers annual position Joseph the motion a little second discussion all those in favor anyone opposed continue sir electrical instructor pulsing two teachers currently on waivers this is our annual positions Plumbing instructor posting for two teachers currently on waivers annual position Horticulture instructor two pulsing for two teachers currently on waivers annual positions jail accept a motion for about a second remember second okay uh
097comments questions all those in favor aye they want to pose future agenda items ladies and gentlemen okay there will be a need for an executive session for the purpose of collective bargaining uh negotiations I have a motion on that please all those in favor anyone oppose could you call the roll when you have a moment please Mr Hayden cyrillo and his mama Miss Fitzgerald Mr LaMontagne yes we will be coming back to uh okay [Music] oh that's not working oh [Music] me too nice I feel like it was already October I'm excited better not be October I know it's like how was that I've never had that I mean neither but I would rather that over the country in the afternoon yes time to me what's that the uh the watch and all that yes
098yeah I haven't signed off on it yet yeah you're welcome thank you have a good evening oyster dragons with our new security we are awesome no problems everything got open and hold on hold on yeah yep