001Good evening and welcome to the Greenfield Public Schools School Committee meeting for Wednesday, June 11th, 2025. This meeting is being recorded by GCTV. If any other persons present or doing the same, you must notify the chairperson at this time. Not hearing any. Secretary Den, will you call the role? Yes. Chair Johnson Assad, here. Secretary Den, I'm here. Vice Chair Ston here. Member Goodwin here. Mayor here. Member Childs here. Member Martini. Member Martini, are you with us in virtual space? Here. Okay, we are all here. And you have a quorum. Wonderful. And it is 6:31 p.m. We'll move on to public comment. Any anyone in the room wish to make public comment? Please come forward. Hi, Judy Bennett. I live in Greenfield. I just wanted to say how much I appreciate that we were able to
002get contract negotiations concluded while Karen was still here. I think that made a really big difference and will make a difference to the district and the morale. Um, I know it was not easy and we all put a lot of time and effort into it. So, I just wanted to come forward and say I appreciate your time and your willingness to be part of the process. So, thank you Stephen and Karen and Stacy. Yeah. Thanks. Thank you. Hi, Margarite Rancort. I live in Greenfield. Um, I just wanted to talk about this is our superintendent's last school committee meeting. And I don't know if you all know that this was the first year in years that our community was rebuilt with faith and trust because of Karen's work. I have been here for 29 years. I
003have never never seen a superintendent who comes to every event that is important to staff, families, and students. She is at everything. And it is such a great loss. I don't know how you're going to replace her and find somebody that is as intelligent and dedicated and loving and wonderful and amazing. And our school district is hurting right now. Our hearts are hurting. You are never going to find anybody that is as talented and dedicated as she is. And that does not mean we all agree with everything she's done. What we do know is everything she's done was with one intent to rebuild this community. And I am very worried about next year. But I just wanted to personally thank Karen because you inspired me. I didn't know I could work harder than I was
004already working and I did. You know, she handed me a class of 26 students and said, "Whatever you need." This was one of the best years of my teaching career. And it is because of her leadership and her belief in us. And I am just heartbroken at where we're at right now. And it's going to hurt us. And I just needed to say it publicly that Karen, thank you for supporting all of us, our students, our community, and we recognize the work you did and we are going to miss you dearly. So, thank you. Thank you. Any other public comment in the room? Any public comment on the line? Not seeing any. Thank you. Okay. Um, we'll move on to um the Greenfield Public Schools parent teacher organizations end of year reports. Uh, please come
005forward. Full of chairs. And if you don't mind introducing yourselves and we look forward to your reports. Do you want to say what we represent? Yes, please. I'm uh Melissa McKenzie Webb and I represent Newton and I also am active on GMS as well. Uh excuse me, Andrea Michael. I represent uh GMS. Great. So, I'm just going to read I think you guys all possibly have copies of this. I may add a few things along the way. Um, AAL, the update was done by Leah Herrick, I believe. Um, she would be the PTO president at AEL, and that's not on here. They they purchased and planted two trees in the playground area um to replace a critical shade tree that was lost this year. They actually did it with a bunch of kids during um
006their spring cleanup. It was really cute. They hosted community events throughout the year such as a fun fall day clothing swap with a community meal. I believe they had spaghetti, cookies and cocoa movie night, a sweetheart dance, Earth Day cleanup, and a gardening event. They supplied five new dramatic playsets, a grocery store, a bakery, a pizza food truck, and then there were some other little things as well to be rotated throughout each classroom throughout the year. PTO fully funded and executed teacher appreciation week. The total funds raised were $5,241. They spent $1,991 on um the things listed above. Today they celebrated with their end of year party and they had a touch a truck event also that happened with their end of year party and they're planning on purchasing an outdoor storage and an outdoor
007classroom setup over the summer for next year's use. On to Newton. Uh presented by Maggie, Liz, and myself. We recently hosted a family dance which was a huge success and we hope to offer more parent engagement events next year. We just had our Scholastic BOGO bookf fair and we also had teacher appreciation week as well. We raised a total of $3,914.80. Some of the money that we did raise was through original works, which goes to an art fund directly for our art teacher to help offset some maybe extra things she wants to do with the kids. We spent $2,370 on Turkey Trot. We did a monthly staff appreciation this year. We also did teacher appreciation week, Dino Man, MCCAST snacks. We did a community readers night, aloha dance, a graduation stepup. We also participated in
008some district things like the parade and the cardboard challenge. And we also just offered general support to our staff and students. We had fourth grade stepup today and we have kindergarten step up tomorrow. our field day. Even though we did not have a gym teacher, our staff did an amazing job executing that and we had 20 volunteers from NHS come over with Tara and it was really a truly community GPS field day. Um we've already started to work with Miss Jacobs to plan our 2526 school year. We're hopeing to try and get some field trips earlier in the school year and some events in the year. Um, quick notes bringing back after school PTO events. This was the first year we have had any afterchool PTO funded events since pre-COVID. So about 5 years we
009did a lot of community projects with other PTOs and I think our PTO's within district started building really great relationships and getting out in community more and I think you'll see that reflected in some of the other reports. This year we did a monthly teacher appreciation and many items were donated by local restaurants and we really enjoyed providing this for the teachers and staff and we hope to continue to build community with them as well. Okay, Discovery School at Four Corners. Um, this was presented by DEA Defendorf. Um, they highlighted that, um, they had a PTO presents with Jason Tardy, which was an anti-bullying program, um, using juggling, etc. for engagement. PTO presents is like they bring um, uh, educational enrichment into the school day. Um, and then they had a plant sale for Mother's
010Day weekend and completely sold out of 75 plants. Um, this one differs from the others in that it's only reporting financials from the past month, but they raised $825 from that plant sale and they spent $850 on the Jason Tardy event, which is much cheaper than ours. Um the upcoming they have field day school fair um with treats sponsored by the PTO and the scholastic book fair although I think some of those may have recently happened. Um their quick note was that teachers expressed gratitude for celebrating them during teacher appreciation week and their lunchon at four corners. The PTO puts on a um like get guys lunch for all the the teachers um once a year. All right, Federal Street U presented by Sarah Mhfka. Um highlights are um she really highlighted community building. Um
011they're in the process of building of purchasing a sandbox to enhance the playground and make it a more of a community center. Um they're talking about monthly playground gatherings next year to bring community maybe with a catered food truck once a month and snacks other months or one month and snacks other months. Um, they're talking about a Federal Street PTO. Um, oh, they're talking about applying for grants because they have a 5013C, which none of the other schools have. So, they're planning to talking about using that to try to raise money through grants instead of doing fundraisers since much of what we do is spending our energy on fundraisers um to pay for the things we pay for. And then uh the pride parade um we all together as PTO's um paid for t-shirts for
012the pride parade for kids and teachers, anybody who wanted them at the schools. Um but Sarah really um took the like spearheaded that. I'm gonna interrupt Andre just to exit off the 5013. So she's talking about it like for all the PTO's to utilize Federal Streets grant, not just Federal Street to apply for grants. US as a whole, AAL, GMS, Newton, and Four Corners. Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Sorry. No, no, thank you. I don't you think it was just for them? Maybe we can pilot this. Yeah. Yeah, but you're right. Okay. Yeah, I misread. Okay. And so they raised a total of $5,117.70 this year and they spent $6,56257. Um and I think you can all see what that was on. Um they coming up at the end of your party which is tonight which
013is why they are not here. And then um she wanted to note the importance of community building. So again that we've grown together been growing together as PTO's um working together um which she called out Ruthie McDonald who is at the high high school now. Yeah. But um she really started our calendar fundraiser that was across all the PTO's um and she said points out that we are um it sorry it is hard at times but we think very important to our school community. We're sharing ideas, resources, and joining together. The Pride Parade was an example of that. Small things like having coffee after all school meetings seems to help folks join in community with each other. Sarah's really been leading a lot of that now, too. I'll I'll call her out. She has a
014lot of great ideas. Um, okay, moving on to the middle school. Um, we had for our second time, second year in a row, we did penny wars um as a fundraiser that was really a lot of fun for the students. Um, and then also raises a surprising amount of money, uh, $1,733. Um, the motivation is that the students who the class who wins gets to decide. We donate half of that to to a place of their choosing. So, they get to decide who that goes to. And it was Stone Soup Cafe. Um, we're going to be writing them a check uh next week, I think, and then trying to get that in the newspaper so that we I think it happened I think it happened today. Oh, today. Yes, that's right. That's right. Sorry. Yeah.
015Yeah. It didn't happen. No, it was next week when I last heard about it. Yeah. Ro uh one of the teachers at GMS actually volunteers there, teacher Skiroff, and they helped make the connection to have it today. Yeah. So, hopefully we'll get some some press there, too. Um just to let people know that we're doing good things. Um and then we and then that that class also gets to decide how the money is spent. And this year, it was spent. um I don't think it was their first choice, but they didn't get they wanted a bounce house, which we couldn't do. So, we ended up giving them um cookies and ice cream uh for dessert one day. Um so, they um we as a PTO continued helping out the school events. Um, the school does
016a great job of having these events after school, so they really run them. But there's the bike rodeo, the dances, and and trivia nights that that the staff really puts on, but we put money towards some of the things that go on like the food and stuff like that. Um, Scholastic Book Fairs, we um we use the funds that we get from the Scholastic Book Fairs to buy books for the students. um not all the students but but a good amount of the students every year. Um so we raised $3,944 this year. We spent $2,39. Um we have $12,000 about in our bank account. So um skipping down to my quick note, we're thinking of well actually I'll go to coming up because we have a couple of things that are earmarked for very early
017next year. One is the BMX bike um anti-bullying event. Um that's uh relatively expensive, but we want to do it early in the year to to um push the anti-bullying early on and then buying t-shirts for all the students to give them some, you know, school spirit. Um so both of those are relatively big ticket items. But um my quick note is that we we we make more than we spend. So, we're really thinking about for next year either just not doing as many fundraisers and putting our efforts towards community events, building community um and and we're also trying to think about ways to spend off that money. I think a lot of it comes out of CO and you see in a lot of these notes that people had some extra money from CO
018I think because we just didn't have events so there wasn't much to spend it on. Um, so we're we're gonna we don't want to take money out of our community that we can't spend. So that's it. Thank you very much. You open to questions from the committee? Sure. Yeah. Questions for the PTO reps? Member Den? Mostly I just want to say something really quick because I'm so giddy with excitement that we're having a PTO report because it literally took a full election in order to have the space and the support to have you come here and tell us about all of the good work that you've been doing. So, I'm just so excited to hear about it and to get to create more of a relationship with you from the school committee to the PTO
019because you are so important to um to student achievement. And I just really want to thank Karen for also supporting that relationship and that's why it's so important to have such a fine superintendent who supports us so that we can do these things because it literally took two years to get you all to be able to come in and give a report. So, I guess I do have a question. Um, an end of the year report is great. Is that all that you would like to do as a PTO or would you like to come in and speak to us every six months or something like that? Do you feel like this is a great way to give us your report or I feel like the report we gave you was like very brief. Like
020this is just a clip I would say from like a month to two months of what we've really accomplished like throughout the whole you there's so many like little things along the way that we we do that sometimes it doesn't always go noticed by anyone. Yeah. I mean I think we had talked about maybe three times a year something like that maybe not every meeting but but on a regular cadence so that um so you guys are so we develop that relationship. Yeah. Would there be interest in uh the community engagement subcommittee contacting you and maybe you can come and speak with us because we're trying to figure out how to engage also with the community. So all of you knowing about all of the events is really important because we're creating a calendar. Sure.
021Definitely. Okay. Thank you so much. Thank you. Member Ston. Yeah, I think Elizabeth took my actual questions, but I did just want to note that my quick math says that you all raised over $20,000 for our community. And I just want to like note that that is a significant amount of money. Possibly more than that. Well, no. This I was sort of including a a rounded up figure for Discovery School, noting that that was just for the past month, but so it's probably well over $20,000 and that that is money that clearly our schools need because you are doing important work of community building and providing these sort of after school or even in school resources and events and activities for our kids that we otherwise would absorb in our normal budget. So, I can't
022speak to that enough about how much we appreciate you stepping up again because you pay for us with your taxes, but you're also paying for us in this way as well. So, just want to call that out and note it. Thank you and hope the rest of the community thanks you as well for being able to do this for our kids. Thank you. Thank you. You're welcome. And thank you. Matt B Childs. Again, not a question but a comment. I'd like to commend all of the community building, especially when all the PTO's have been joining together, even just some of them teaming up and I'm excited about that and I hope that is something that continues to be explored and brought bigger and bigger. Yeah. The calendar fundraiser is where we've done most of that
023and that um it's was $2,000 per school, right? So, it was like $10,000 this year. This year? Yeah. Just alone. So yeah, that's I think that's where it started um a little back precoid I think is when Ruthie started it and then I think I I mean I'm at all the schools so I was like you know feeling like okay I'm on GMS and we're doing AL and I'm here and then Sarah really just took it over and was like we had talked last year we're like we're going to go we were too late for the pride parade last year and that's where the it started and then we did the parade for the fair which was a lot a lot of fun. We were actually at my house and I really enjoyed it and
024people would just like show up whenever and like work on stuff. We had this little outdoor tent that was a lot of fun. Um it was a lot of fun just building it with everyone. Um and everyone had different skills and everyone came together and then we did um light up the fairgrounds. Light up the fairgrounds and that was like another way that everyone came together and we put it out there. And I mean I'm just going to repeat what everyone said. Karen has been super helpful, especially at the beginning of the year. She got us all together on Zoom. I was in a hotel room. Andrea was somewhere else. We all, none of us were where we were like, you know, able to be a per in person, but we all kind of got
025together and gave uh the superintendent the rundown of what we were hoping to accomplish for the year, a little list of things. So, but it's been a lot of fun just having that community engagement. And we actually have a group chat that we've now moved I think to remind possibly who were on the WhatsApp and we kind of just check in with each other there even just monthly like oh I'm doing this event our Federal Streets done what's called a Boohoo breakfast and we're going to we're going to try it this year at Newton after kindergarten drop off. So, it's really nice to also check in with other people so that way we are I don't want to be like doing the same things but like use utilizing each other's resources instead of trying to
026just be like this is really draining. I just want to thank you because without PTO's sticking together um I know that people were dropping out right and left um and I think you have strength and numbers and that's a great thing without PTO's and um that collaboration everything from the playgrounds and the kids appreciate everything you do um I was talking to some 11th graders today and everything they remember about elementary school has to do with a PTO event. Um, from field day to falling off the monkey bars and getting a new playground. Thank you. Any other questions or comments? Mayor, I just want to say thank you, too. This is wonderful to hear. And is that Boohoo breakfast? Is that after people drop their cry? We've we've never done it at Newton before. Um,
027and I think it's Federal Street's second year doing it was this past year. And we we were just talk like when we were doing the float build, it was a it was many weekends. It was like four weekends for like four hours and then during the day too. So, we all were just chatting about it and that's how we heard about it was they're like, "Oh, we do the Boohoo breakfast." And you know, it was neat. Great idea. Thank you. Thank you so much. It wasn't us. It was F. It wasn't me. It was Federal Street. Well, I'll echo everyone's appreciation so much and really glad that you're here and look forward to having you back uh sometime early in the fall. It' be wonderful to have you back and hear about your plans for
028the year ahead. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Moving on to reports of the administration business manager. All right. Good evening. You have the first of we'll be doing another June report as the year officially closes, but this is the report for June. Um, as you see, we're again our normal process. We start with our uh the deficit I say deficit in quotes and then applying the uh other expenditures that we anticipate having to expend in particular the special education maintenance of effort um to get us down to how it is that we will balance the budget. Uh a couple things just to highlight like I say in the memo to bring your attention to circuit breaker in particular. uh as I've been reporting through the year, we charge that actually two times a year.
029We do a midyear and then we've done the final charge. So, I know that has been brought up repeatedly as to an account that had a balance in it. As you can see, we just have under $1.4 million committed and charged to it. Um, one of the other things on the revolving account report, uh, that came in after the fact that I just want to share, I was a little concerned when you look at the food service balance of only $170,000. Uh, there is $395,519.86 of unposted revenues that are yet to be posted by the city. So, when that gets posted, it gets it back up to the healthy amount that we're normally used to seeing. So, uh, I don't know if anyone else was alarmed by that, but I'll admit I was. So, um,
030there's that. Uh, we have, you know, the final reconciliation as to, as of right now, how we're going to see things, uh, go. We are constantly reviewing purchase orders. We have year-end expenditures coming in. We are reducing purchase orders as a process for purchase orders that were done that are no longer needed. So the es and flows uh will continue on in accordance with the schedule that the city sent as the closing out of FY25. So that's a summary for the report. Um I do feel I need to address something that uh I've heard um and similar to you know like member Goodwood and the mayor. I'm a math person. You know the mayor numbers don't lie and so we all deal in facts and everything. And so um I heard a comment about concerns
031of embezzlement of funds in the schools um so as somebody who's advising administration and you as a school committee regarding how it is that you manage your budgets you know that's of a concern to me when I hear rumors like that as much as we don't like to address rumors I do feel something of that level of severity needs to be addressed so you know I was thinking about how best to see as far as the management of what it is the school has done regarding its operations. We get audited every year as a part of the city audit. You know, we are a city department. So, we are audited. And so, the past two years, management has done what has always been done regarding their financial operations. And and as a testament to the
032city as a whole, I'll say the independent auditors, if they find any issues or challenges or questions or concerns, they issue what's called a management letter. The city of Greenfield has not in the past two years received a management letter of concern regarding the financial operations of the city as a whole, including the schools. So that needs to be said that, you know, rumors of embezzlement. I know they're rumors, but that's something that we need to nip right in the bud regarding that. in the past traction based on at least two years shows that there's been no management letter citations from the independent auditor related to the school management or even the city as a whole. So that's a testament to the people you have in key positions running not only the school but the
033other city departments. So I just felt the need that I had to say that. So that being said, I'll take any questions you might have regarding your reports. questions for the business manager. Member Ston, I was just I was wondering if you could um share what the balances in these two named revolving accounts will be after these uh funding after the funding sources are actually used. Uh I can give you an estimate because we still have there are final uh we have some tuitions for sped tuition that hasn't been posted and there's still some outstanding receivables that we'll be receiving. For example, in in addition to 395 there's $16,28848 of sped tuitions that haven't been posted yet. School choice has 25,453 that hasn't been posted yet. So, if we were to take a look and
034see the revolving account balance report and looking at, let's just say I'm just I'm doing this back of the envelope as much as again I'm a numbers person, but when we're looking at the uh ending balance in school choice as of right now of the uh 9003 839, we reduce that by the 50,951 850ish. Yeah. and then we'll add to it um the 25 plus the June payments, you know, so that gets us, you know, back up another, you know, 30 or 40 grand, we'll say. Um but again, we do have like there are incumbrances that are not showing that will increase the use of that school choice. But then again, as I was said earlier, when we are cancelling purchase orders, that is going to increase the balance available as well. So, we're talking
035in the ballpark, I would say, of that amount. The sped tuition revolving account, again, doing the same exercise. If you look at the balance of that sped tuition revolving account, it is 1,14,000. We're cutting that in half by the 73,000 that we are going to charge to it. That leaves us 700,000 and change plus the 16 grand and any other outstanding receivables that would be in added to that come June 30th. Other questions? Member Goodwin, can you tell me what the $3,000 for marketing is for? It goes to TMS. That's communications work and support that the we do with the superintendent. Uh, one of the survey results from families was to actually engage via social media. So, they monitor our social media accounts. They assist with all of our newsletters on s'mores. They do our
036messaging. So, uh, if we had this morning a a situation at the middle school, so they help out with that instant messaging so we can let families know what's happening in an instant. um they do any posts like for our softball team if you didn't see our post today on Facebook and the tickets that you can purchase to go watch the girls tomorrow. So it's really just monitoring social media because we don't have the capacity to really take on that and then helping with communication and marketing of all the things that the schools are doing. Do they do our Facebook or or our Facebook, our Instagram? Um they do all website uh they work in conjunction with our IT department because some of the login has to go through our schools which they don't have
037access to but they do assist. Okay. Other questions? Mayor, um I have a question about um some of the incumbrances. Um on page it's five. Um athletic athletic referees. Um, we budgeted 52,000 and we have 67,000 encumbered. Um, it looks like we've um um prepaid or budgeted 40,000 for um Arbiter LLC. Is that for That's for paying the referees and the coaches. So, not not the coaches, referees. So, the referees for the officials, it goes through this system. So we create a balance for that so that it's used for end of the year and any balance that gets carried over will used in subsequent years as well. I missed that. Could you go over that more slowly? So uh the way that referees and officials get paid is through this arbiter sport system. It's it
038expedites and makes it more efficient as far as so that they're not getting individual checks cut from us. We go it's almost like the equivalent of a postage machine. you know, you put the balance in there and then they submit it gets approved by us and then it gets through the arbiter system that it gets paid. So, we put in bas to help out coach K uh regarding the uh what it is that he's projecting to pay for the coaches. I keep saying quotas for referees through the year and then if there's a availability to help out for subsequent years uh based on things that could happen for example it creates balances for with indeed which has happened I almost believe yearly uh referees and officials get their increase in the rates that we have
039to pay them so we end up you know it it's good budget practice to have the balance to cover any of those unant anticipated needs for referees So, follow up if I can, but so we budgeted for 52,000 and um we're just about, you know, we're done with the um paying the referees for this year. So, that the incumbrance or the payment just for the 40,000 was just put on in June. That's for next year. It's next year. But I also need to see because I believe that also includes because that's a Is that the contract? Let me I'm just trying to find it and of course I had it up and my computer went to sleep so I can get you the detail but let me see if I can just double check one
040thing while we're talking I just I saw the last couple of years that was about what we spent or less. So, we've encumbered a lot that would make a difference going into next year and I had a couple. I'll go on, but I'll let you look for that one first. Yeah, I'm going to need to relog into Munis because it kicked me out. So, I couldn't get in now either, but I if you go to your next question and I'll was on they were supply the supply lines um that have actually increased these increased from from May to June and we're at the end of the year. So, I'll just say them. Line 13, uh, this is on page six. Um, in the in the first grouping about, uh, a little more than halfway down
041instructional supplies. Um, and we've got encumbered 239,500. And um on the next page um again a little bit more than halfway down instructional supplies is encumbered 169,470. Some of the poss were actually just opened the end of May or June or early June and then sped technology an incumbrance for 124,293,000. And I just wish that we would be like think about revisiting a next year account where where if we have something that's that that is left that we could put it in the next year account to discount whatever expenses we'd be having because it's kind of a lot of incumbrances. So first I'll deal with the sped one because I know that sped one is go that has to go towards meeting the maintenance of efforts. So that's non-negotiable. If we don't spend those expenditures
042in special education, we are in risk of losing our entitlement grants for special education. So that's what that that bullet in the summary is for. So you're going to see with all due respect, you're going to see another 330 some odd thousand dollar of expenses that Mr. Messing is going to put through because if we don't do that Exactly. you know, so you know that I say that but the other things I'll say with all it's normal year-end process where we go to the administrators and say if we've got the availability you know I remember Goodman shaking her head when she was a principal we would do the same thing as to what is it you have for supplies to help out for subsequent years it has allowed us to do these things and also
043potentially as far as if there's need be for other unanticipated expenses um potentially negotiations and things of that nature. So, and I do remember your honor, you said at the city council meeting beforehand that was just happened regarding the public hearing on the budget. I believe the exact quote was, "If you have funds available, of course, you save it." This is what we're doing. We're doing exactly what it is that you're recommending. Thank you, member Goodwin. I just have a question about under middle school on page four there's these big transfers and the math hit me in the face as a math teacher it said GMS faculty math and then it like $276,000 adjustment did we do away with some math teachers if you look and see down below this was the exercise start to
044worry if the if you remember the workshop that we did where we talked about our chart of accounts is not in align with the desi function codes. Okay, so this is if you look and see down below there's a plus $68,000 to 627. So we are we are combining and collapsing because when time comes for reporting purposes whether it's math or English or science it's all one account regular education correct okay and would the that also explain the um what was the other one I think it said like integrated arts yes same thing they would still be teaching staff yes so P art music. Those are all regular education. That's correct. Okay. Thank you. Other questions? I have one question. Do you think it'd be possible going forward to include on the business manager kind
045of calendar to report to the school committee when the audits are done? Just is that I mean just like you did tonight, but when when the audit report? Oh, sure. I mean, we're uh we don't get they usually conduct an exit interview with city officials. I'm imagining we're not involved in that. But um the normal process is when if there's a management letter finding that is related to a department, I would like to think and again it's a testament to the city that it has never happened at least since we've been here. Um that if it was a school related management letter finding, they would ask management always has a chance to respond to a management letter finding. So, we would be able to respond if there was one. Um, but yes, obviously, uh, I
046can always stay in contact with the finance director as far as when an audit is complete. Uh, whether or not you want to read through the audited financial statements of the city or if you wanted to see if there's anything school related, we could we could do both, you know. So, even just a sentence or two in the business manager report that, you know, the audit came back and there were no there was no management letter, whatever it is. Yeah, sure. That'd be great. Thank you. All right, we'll move on. Thank you very much, Andy. So, the assistant superintendent. Good evening. Um, I just have a couple of things tonight. Uh, grants update. I mentioned a couple months ago that we received 35 a $35,000 equipment grant for the advanced manufacturing career pathway that we
047are working to implement. Um just wanted to provide an update. We are um we are spending down that grant that is due to be to come off our books at the end of June. Um and we're making investments in computer controlled um milling machines, manually operated milling machines, 3D printers, screen printing machines, um embroidering, all those things related um to the career pathway. It's important to us that as I've said before, the career pathway is intended to be a broad look at an industry spec sector, which is a little different than a chapter 74, which may start to narrow a focus. So, we feel like the equipment and materials that we're purchasing through this grant will provide students opportunities to use different tools, gain different skills that we anticipate them being more marketable. um be
048it if they're pursuing post-secary education or a career right out of out of school. The other thing that's connected to the innovation career pathway is part of it is that they'd have a 100hour internship or capstone project at the end. So we hope that as they make relationships with industry partners in the region that they have a connection to a network that um might be able to offer them employment be it full-time or in summer and breaks when they come home. Also, um it was announced last week that we received the uh civics grant once again and this grant is focused on support for the grade 8 and high school civics projects. Um so we'll be working with the history teachers at GHS to identify opportunities to incorporate this. I I think they started a
049conversation with Superintendent Pat Node last year about this. they're doing the work, but how can we maybe find other ways outside of the history class so we're not taking from that curriculum to still offer this civic engagement? So, we look forward to having that conversation with teachers and um working through this grant, the endofear benchmark assessment. So, it started last week. We're getting to the end. There's some data showing up in our spreadsheets so that I keep watching for and um we've made some really nice growth in places. We've thrown a lot at teachers and students this year and um I think Miss Rancort said earlier that we might not always agree with what with the way that it is going, but we're doing the work and we certainly see that and we appreciate the
050teachers for being willing to take on so much new and um we are thoughtful about saying like we don't want to just keep piling on. We don't want to keep piling on, but we see these opportunities. And because our teachers have shown a willingness to take on take that on, it's like, okay, they can handle it. And we're saying a lot of these things have been optional, but teachers haven't taken them so much as optional. They learn about it, they dive into it, they get the data submitted, they're looking at it, they're using it. Um, so appreciate their growth this year. And um just want to note that under the superintendent's leadership, we've made significant investments in highquality instructional materials and resources to support interventions, not just the core curriculum. Um but especially for our
051elementary students and staff. Um really looking at phmic awareness and phonics and getting into some of those discre discrete skills. Um, and I think myself and some of the teachers had these aha moments like, "Oh, we've been working so hard on this, but this struggle, the students struggles with phoning seg segmentation or rhyming like that hadn't crossed my mind." And then they're doing some work on it and students are showing growth um pretty quickly once they're able to target those things. So really excited to see the end of the year benchmark data and some of this stuff the core and pass is stuff that we just started in February I I think so um we haven't had a long time with it this current year um and then we're looking ahead to next year already
052and I probably could have mentioned this in a a March or April report we start talking about the next year but we have our administrative retreat um July 1st and 2nd to review successes that we've had this year, challenges, look at the data, and identify goals and priorities for next year. And that's also part of our instructional prioritization planning that we're doing in partnership with um our DESIE statewide system of support partners. So, thank you, Superintendent. Good evening. Um, you do have just a quick report for me with the updated enrollment numbers for June. Uh, the majority of my report though, however, is going to be the DESIE district site review. Uh, we have our final report for the district. Then let me just get questions for the assistant superintendent if there are any before
053you do that. Sure. Big piece. So any questions for the assistant super member Goodwin and this may be both of these reports is what kind of I don't know if the word is commitment or oversight do we have by the SOS folks? It's a fair question. It doesn't feel like oversight. It feels like we're collaborating in this work. Good. We're having midyear and endofear data reviews and check-ins and such with them, but I personally haven't felt like they're coming through and digging and looking for problems. We're looking at the data together. Oftent times we're seeing some of the same issues and challenges and then working together with to identify potential solutions. And I think what they are able to bring is Greenfield's not the only district that they're working in. So they're able to identify
054successes other districts have had or challenges other districts have had and you know then it's really up to us and our team to say like how could that or would that work in Greenfield? So, you feel like they're functioning more as coaches than I would say partners even and maybe their role is intended to be more of coaches, but it does feel like they're on our team. They want us to succeed. They I think they like being in Greenfield when they come and work with us, but I Okay, their job is to work themselves out of Greenfield. That would be nice. Okay. Thank you. Of course. I do want to add too though that they don't just come to uh district leadership. They've participated in walkthroughs in all of our buildings. So, they've been in
055our classrooms. They've been watching our teachers and um we reflect back on that as well. So, they're part of the culture as well. They're not just looking at us on paper and certainly know what's happening in our buildings and are able to reflect with us after they participate in those walkthroughs, which has been really good. Yes, member Ston. Um, I just wanted to say thank you to Assistant Superintendent Steven Sullivan and also Superintendent Karen Patnode for really continuing to pursue a lot of these grants that add a lot of value to our students um, education and their curriculum. And I'm I'm really excited about this equipment grant because that from my understanding is an unusual uh kind of money to get that you don't get to buy stuff usually. You just get to buy people's
056time. Um and if you are a local business, an employer, a hopeful employer or somebody and you are learning for the first time that we are getting some of these machines and that excites you, please reach out to our administrators to get connected for you in the ether who are out there. Um, I just, yeah, I'm really looking forward to the ways that this can add add value to our students learning, but also really strengthen ties with our community overall by getting more of our kids out there um, doing stuff, showing what they can do, and showing what they've learned as part of being Greenfield. Other questions or comments? I saw in Senator Cmerford's newsletter today, a $50,000 earmark came through for us. Is that what you I saw it in the newsletter, so I
057think it's real. And um I don't know if we can or if we had designated that for something in specific, but maybe if that's public, we can. Um uh Natalie Blford had both reached out to us, so I'll have to connect with them tomorrow to see which one that actually was. we had to designate to potentials. So, um I'm not sure which one that is and we'll we'll connect tomorrow. That's great news. Stay tuned for some good news. We could all use it right now. Mark's finally. Yay. Yes. Well done people. That was a good team effort between the administration and the school committee and the legislators. So, thanks to everyone involved. Now for your report or presentation. Okay. So if you recall just to put a little time perspective in this uh Greenfield was
058chosen for a desi district site review and they were on our campus in November. So just keep that in in the back of your mind as you hear some of this. and then uh we'll also address some of the stuff that we've been doing all year that actually um assisted with a lot of their findings and their recommendations. So I'll give you a brief intro, a little background on what they actually entail, what happened with our review, and then some of the next steps that we are going to proceed with. So I won't read it verbatim. You do have in your packet all of this, but they are conducted um each year. They pick about 20 schools. We were the lucky chosen ones this year. And they do it in uh partnership with what is
059called uh American Institute for Research. So the people that run the actual site review are not Desi folks. Um but they collaborate with AIRIR and compile all the data after they do all the interviews and all the site visits and whatnot. and then they um spit out the report for us. Uh we do get a draft review so that we can look at factual inconsistencies and report back and then once the factual uh timeline is over. They do issue the real report. They do however suggest you do an internal um digestion of it which we did with our faculty and staff and our leadership team before it actually gets presented to all of you. And then tomorrow I have a school messenger going out to all of our families that has a link to the
060whole report. I do believe the report's like 126 pages long. So I'll be giving you the short version this evening. They um chose Greenfield. There are targeted reviews where they only look at some indicators or full reviews and we were so lucky we got the full review. So they reviewed us on all of the district standards and indicators. So they're listed here. The full report goes into much more detail in depth about each of these and what their findings, commendations, and recommendations were. Um but they do there's a link in this PowerPoint which is online and you can read all about the the um district standards and indicators. So um when we got notification, uh Dr. DBarge uh received that in May of last year and then I took over on July 1 and uh
061worked with Desi to get the site visit here. They were on our campus from November 18th to the 22nd and then in April of 2025 is where we got the draft one to review for factual errors. The six uh begins the six standards and indicators begins with leadership and governance. there are much more indepth but I highlighted a few of them that actually align with a lot of the work that we've been doing. So they show you some strengths and then they give you areas for growth and then you can look at um there's more standards and indicators that actually are in the actual report. The two that I wanted to just highlight though is really our leader leadership team structure, the internal leadership team, the ILTs at each building level um that have led
062some of the work in the buildings have just really been a strength this year and we've really come a long way with that work and we were recognized for that and I really just want to commend our uh building leaders and the ILT members at the buildings for all the work they've done. The area for growth is really getting our uh independent school councils at each building really up and running on a regular basis, reporting out and aligning the work of our community and family members with the work that we're doing internally. And we knew that was an area for growth and it's on our list of next steps to really try to improve for next year. With regards to strategic planning, implementation, and monitoring, we were noted for having uh strength with redistricting for
063addressing our equity issues and using progress monitoring data to inform adjustments in our instruction. Um the other area for growth that aligns with our school councils though is having those individualized school improvement plans that align with the district's plan and then really sharing out our progress monitoring more often with teachers and community stakeholders. So we um have that on our list of things to do at the leadership team retreat in July and how we can actually be a bigger presence on that for curriculum and and instruction um equitable practice and access. We were uh identified as having a strength in an array of academic interventions for all grade levels which we were happy to hear. We do really need to improve though in some areas where uh addressing staff barriers where they could actually address
064SST meetings and meet student needs. And then really our subgroup populations that we've been talking about all year, ensuring our students with disabilities and our EL learners have access to the supports they need. We know that is something that we need to work on because we also had a tiered focus monitoring review from DESIE for our L's and we had a coordinated program review for our special ed program. So that was not a surprise to us. um with effective instruction and implementation. Um our instructional strategy work was noted and I really want to commend the teachers that it's been a two-year process and they have really been putting their heart and soul into those instructional strategies and working to improve engagement with our students. Um, some of the areas for growth were our SEAL and
065our behavior management systems and really uh working on that collaboration time that teachers have and having it be a little more effective in the use and implementation of that time. For the assessment category, one of the strengths was the data collection that we have started our uh partnership with open architect is really useful in that area. And then we use that disagregated student data to inform the decision planning that we make, which is always um embraced. I think the area for growth that we're all aware of is diving deeper into the data. What does that data say? What do what does it say about the students sitting in front of us? And how do we change our instruction to improve the work that we're doing? Human resources and professional development. I don't think it was
066a surprise that we have uh a need for an improved human resource infrastructure. Um I am the HR department. So it is definitely um an interesting set of uh systems going on at central office. Um the business office helps out a tremendous amount. But really establishing some systems and um improving accessibility of our human resource policies and procedures certainly does need to happen in our professional learning. They noted us as having a strength in our PD opportunities and the walkthrough process that we aligned this year. So I I was happy to hear that because that really has been something the leadership team has um embraced. And then areas for growth is really um we've talked about this a lot as building leaders, giving teachers that bite-sized a actionable feedback so that you're not overwhelming them
067with so many things that may need to change, but just little pieces or little tweaks that can happen to really have an impact on instruction and learning. And then allowing teachers to choose um differentiated or specialized PD opportunities. We get a lot of feedback from our staff on that which I don't think was a surprise to any of us. Student support section. Um they noted that we have a strength in resources for addressing students social and emotional needs and mental health needs. I think the district is really strong and having counselors, accessible adjustment counselors, guidance counselors available for our students. I think an area of growth was that consistent behavioral support systems. We've talked a lot about that, having that be districtwide so that students don't have to relearn certain systems or protocols or procedures
068as they go through our system. And then creating an opportunity for all students to exercise voice and leadership. um something that's near and dear to my heart and I'm happy that there has been some improvement in that over the course of the year from November with our sustainability club at the high school, our students of color club and they've really been uh leaders in exercising student voice. So I hope that continues and grows in the coming years. Uh family and community partnerships, we certainly have a lot of strong partnerships with community organizations. I think that our area of growth is really having that universal consistency with family communication. You know, I think as families realize sometimes you may have a teacher that overcommunicates or communicates a lot and then you have a teacher that communicates
069maybe once a week and you want more. So just really figuring out what that communication looks like in some consistent manner. And then um Dave Messing's office has really done a nice job this year of uh this piece of growth from November that we have improved tremendously in offering all of our things in multiple languages. And then lastly, the category of financial and asset management. Um they and remember this is from November the business office. Um they had a strength that everyone is qualified individual that our district effectively applies for state and federal grants that we establish process for purchasing supplies and service and we comply with state laws and have effective contract management. We have systems in place to track the inventory and we collaborate with the city on capital projects. Um the area
070for growth that we've seen is that funding for key uh instructional resources and support roles and providing user-friendly budget documents, but I think Andy's done a great job this year and trying to improve upon that for you based on your own feedback with that. And then obviously maintaining and repairing aging buildings. They were in all of our buildings. So certainly we're aware of what is happening in most of those areas. So with all of that, I know there's a lot of information and there certainly is a 126 page report you can read at your leisure some other time. But uh some of the next steps that we have already been planning for uh for next year was continuing to provide our administrative uh team and our teacher the training they need to really dive deeper
071into that student data. Until we know what those students know and don't know in front of us in how it informs our instructional choices, we're not going to be able to target the interventions that they need. Uh principles already have on their task list to really collaborate and get those school councils up and running to create those school improvement plans that align with the district goals. We have started the investment already in the highquality instructional materials for L's and then we want to provide our administrators and teachers with the support from the WEDA look force to support those L learners and then provide administrators and teachers support in developing increased inclusive opportunities for special ed students which we know is a focus that we need to continue and those strong tiered intervention supports for elementary
072and middle so that we can also address not only the behaviors but the interventions that we need to make sure that our kids are reading at grade level and learning um as they should. So I am happy to take questions on that before we go to the budget or I can certainly go to the budget and you can take all questions after both. Let's pause for questions now member child's. Okay. I have two questions. First one quick, uh, the curriculum and instruction SSTs. Can you define that for anyone watching at home? Student support teams. My apologies. I just figure that would be a good one for. And then the other one, um, the HR, I wanted to know if you had any recommendations based on your hands-on experience for what Greenfield should be doing to
073improve. How can we make the areas for growth happen? if you have any ideas that you're willing to share. I I don't know if I have any right now and I'm certainly happy to digest that and think of some. But um I'm an educator. You know, I went to school to be a teacher. I uh have my admin CAGS like everything I know and do is around education. and the amount of questions I field about FMLA or like sometimes it's just, you know, it's not my wheelhouse. So to have to have a lot of that HR hat too, I really just think the the district would benefit from even if it's just a part-time person or something of that nature to collaborate with because a lot of things come up that are just not um
074an educator's cap. But I'm certainly open to thinking about how we can get there. Um Andy and the business office do a great job of collaborating and we are often in um conversations with the city hall and asking questions and trying to collaborate there. But it definitely is time consuming and you know detracts from the work that really should be being done versus what needs to be done to handle HR matters. Other questions? Member Ston? Sort of in a similar vein. I was sort of wondering um sort of where you see the school committee's role in supporting some of this happening and if there's anything more that we can be doing um to help make some of this happen. Um, and I specifically wanted to ask about the school improvement plans and wondering, obviously, unfortunately,
075you won't be here for it when they're final, but I'm hoping or asking if they can be reported to us in some way as well, so we can have some more insight in the building specific stuff. Sure. I mean, obviously, the supporting uh building leaders and faculty and staff and the work that they're doing is always welcome. Um, I think with the school improvement plans, making sure those school councils are up and running in September and you know, we usually have the elections on the night of meet and greet because parents do have to be elected to school councils and there's certain ratios under the guidelines that you can only have so many parents versus so many community members. So, I think just really I'm advocating to whoever's watching. If you are a parent that
076wants to get involved, it's a great way to actually sit uh with your principal, with a teacher, and with community members and really be a leading voice in what's going to happen in your schools for your children. So, it's definitely a place where you would have a voice. Um, I think it's really just important that the alignment of what the district needs based on this report is also trickled down into those school improvement plans. And I know um a lot of times in the past even when I was a principal that they were very disjointed from what the district was doing versus what we wanted to do as a school in our school improvement plan. So I think really uh being up to speed on what is happening in district so that that alignment happens
077through every channel of involvement is really important to keep the work going. Great. Other questions? I guess my question is um it seemed like one of the recommendation was don't overwhelm teachers with all of these recommendations all the time, but give them in kind of bite-sized like quantities, but then they come and give a report that's like this thick with recommendations. So I see that you have kind of I don't know did you write these next steps or did these come from the report? We digested the report and we picked the next steps. When you look at this report there's probably 300 next steps that they've recommended and it's just not possible. So, you know, we also realize the amount that we can take on that's actually going to have positive effect on student growth
078and achievement. So, there are so many other things in the report that they would love to see the district do, but there's only so much capacity for a lot of this work and our next steps really have to be focused on our students and the HR stuff. That's fine. like we can figure that out. Like I would rather take next steps that are actually going to directly impact student growth and achievement and that's why we picked these so that if our focus is going to be on anything, it's going to be on what's going to matter most to them. Great. Thank you. And it, you know, going forward, whoever's listening out there, if you any support the school committee can offer in terms of making these changes and narrowing the focus to what's actionable and
079like you're saying, what's going to impact student achievement, um, we're happy to help with. Thank you. What's up next? Okay, next is sorry one more slide I have to find. This tool to toolbar keeps getting in my way. My apologies. Okay. So, one of the things that um we wanted to share with you tonight is sorry, this Zoom bar keeps getting in my way. Um I wanted to remind everyone that we do have um collective bargaining agreements. So, I know along the course of the budget development and the budget um cuts and conversations that happened, uh everyone's wanting to know, well, who are you cutting? And we really have uh some constraints with collective bargaining agreements on letting folks know when they are going to either be non-renewed or their position is going to be
080cut. So, I just wanted to reiterate that because I think a lot of folks wanted to know that early on and that is just not what the collective bargaining agreement aligns with. So, um I was just going to go through how we got to the cuts so that everyone knows what um we decided to do as a district and where we're going to go from there. So originally we had um decided to uh build our budget and when we were building our budget um we were offsetting the original budget with some grants. Uh so can you make it bigger? Oh I'm sorry. Sure. I'm looking at my screen so just tell me. No, no problem. Okay. You can make it bigger over there. My glasses are failing me. to full screen. See if that gives
081you a little bit more space. Usually, not here. F11 gives me bookmarks. Sorry. Is that a little better? Yes. Okay, that's a little better. All right. Column B could be shorter. Really? Okay. Let me do this. How's that? Nice. Is that better? Okay. Sorry, a little technical difficulty. Okay. So when we started to build the budget, we were using um grants to offset as well as revolving funds, which got us to let me make a a little smaller too because I'm missing some information over here. I think your scroll bar at the bottom that is Thank you, Ann. Okay, which got us to the proposed budget that the school committee adopted, which was the original 7.97% increase, the mayor's proposed budget, and then that was the total mayor's cut, which was the 188960. And then
082at the city council budget meeting, they funded the schools $254, which gave us a cut of 1889706. So we had already offset our our budget with grants and revolving funds. So now we're looking at where can we cut 1.889706 from. So as you recall we had four positions that we had worked into the budget for redistricting and those four positions were no longer needed because we put a hold on redistricting. So those were budgeted at $75,000 each. Can you say that really loud for the people at home? The part where you said no redistricting. Could you say that like so loud that everybody in Greenfield you put a pause on redistricting? So um those were the four positions that were going to be um at the eighth grade uh the team for history and science.
083And then with uh the lack of a restructuring program for a special ed program at the high school along with the lower enrollment, but with eighth grade at the high school, what a lot of folks don't realize with scheduling is that you can be an eighth grade teacher and teach one or you can be a high school teacher and teach an eighth grade class. So you didn't need an eighth grade team up there, an additional one. So, those positions in row 13 are just uh an English, a science, and a um history teacher that were not needed due to enrollment and the ability for the high school to absorb an eighth grade class and a restructuring of a special ed program. So, those were four positions there. So, those cuts brought us down to still
084needing to cut 1.277040. And then we have heard a lot about um administrative topheaviness and we looked at our internal administration costs and where we could cut potentially. By no means do I think any of these positions should not be at the school, but we had to make cuts somewhere due to the increased budget deficit. Our nurse leader is being cut. An assistant principal at the middle school is being cut. Our director of behavior services is being cut. Our network administrator is being cut and we reduced our registar receptionist position. Our registration uh was absorbed by administrative assistance at the building level and our receptionist is no longer a dual role. So the salary decreased. So those cuts brought us down to still needing to cut $888,990. We looked at other departments because we are
085trying to cut those things that are not studentf facing and really want to keep those positions that support our students. We ended up cutting our second district-wide maintenance worker, a CDL driver from transportation, and we reduced the 7D driver line. Uh, we left money in there because we do have subs that come in our 7D drivers. So, we needed some money to absorb the sub costs for drivers. So, what is a 7D driver? I get them confused with CDL. I believe they're the van drivers, but Elizabeth can confirm. Yeah, I think it's van. 7D is the bus, correct? Yes. 70 is the van. Van CDL is the bus. I don't hold either license, by the way. So then that brings us down to still needing to cut $772,728. And if you recall, you voted not
086to renew the high school's NEAS accreditation. So we cut the $7500 that we had allocated in there. So, the district is using an additional $765,228 of savings in order to meet the budget, which is a total funds allocated by the district of almost $4.3 million to offset this year's budget. We had three other positions in our teaching staff that could have been on the chopping block, but we chose to use savings to reserve those. They were counselors and our librarian. With our focus on literacy and our social and emotional needs, the district did not feel that that was the best cut to absorb this year and we needed to keep them in the budget. So that is how we got to uh meeting the budget number. Go ahead. Okay. So you were okay. So, back
087at the the using the savings like so which lines like school choice or did you have a preference for where you were taking that from? I mean which uh I'll say yet to be determined because we may end up as I said if you remember back to that workshop come July 1 we rebuild this budget from scratch. you know, this is one of the big foundations for doing so once we see where it is that um potential changes might occur. Um we don't know final circuit breaker numbers. Uh we don't know, you know, some of the entitlement grants for next year as far as what it is balances that we could end up using. That could change what it is we ultimately end up using. But primarily, I would say that you would be looking
088at school choice and the sped tuition revolving account as the uh primary ones as well. I mean, I'd say the third one would be the transportation as well. So, I guess in all my days today, can you turn it on your microphone? Thanks. Please go member. I'm going back to the need to spend more money on special ed, which just seems like of an unheard of need to keep our meet our maximum effort. So if you use money from how do I say it? Can you use money to fund make that difference up that would meet that maximum effort or is it the mainten the maintenance of e effort calculation is based on local and state funding. So yes we can. So for the tuition revolving account and if transportation funds go toward special education,
089transportation, those do uh can be applied to meeting your federally mandated maintenance of effort calculation. Yes. Okay. Because I just think of all the equipment we buy every year. Um I think we need to um vote actually to um on a budget tonight. So, I have a motion prepared and the motion includes um an expression of concern about the uh loss of the nurse leader position in particular and expression of interest in the administration doing all they can to pursue funding for for that role in particular. So, I'll make the motion and then see if there's um see if anyone will make this motion and then see if there's a second and then we can discuss. I move that the school committee approve the superintendent's recommended FY26 budget as presented and further direct the administration
090to pursue all appropriate avenues of funding to support the addition of a nurse leader position including but not limited to grants, municipal allocations, and available state or federal resources. And um Susan Farber, I did email that to you just a few minutes ago. Um, is there someone who would make that motion? I'll make the motion. Motion by member Den. Is there a second? Second. Second by member Childs. And discussion member Goodwin. And then in the past before we had a nurse district leader, we had a stipend for somebody an a local nurse to do those type of leadership things. Is there a way to find funds for that? The question is, is there a way to find funds for a stipend for nurses to take on leadership roles? So, we've had the comprehensive school health
091services grant each year, and it actually hasn't been allowable to use for staff, but in next year's application, they've changed that. So, we are hoping we can acquire those funds and pursue that. um in conversations with the current nurse leader, there are just some things a nurse needs to do for the schools. Um like I am not HR, I am not an RN either and some of the med delegations and some other issues that actually are are needed to be done by a nurse. So, we will be um actually seeking that grant out again and hopefully if we get that funding that could actually support a nurse leader even if it was a day or two a week instead of a full-time position. I'm the grant has been anywhere from 3,000 to 20,000. So, um
092depending on what we can actually allocate will determine how we could use those funds. Member Stton. Um I had a question specifically about the reduction of the director of behavioral services. And this could be this could be just me not knowing exactly what that position does as compared to maybe um what Mr. Messing does, the director of pupil services. Am I remembering that? Great. Um, and I was looking just, you know, one of the areas for growth that we had was specifically establishing and implementing cons consistent behavioral support systems with specific rules and expectations for both I think maybe students and staff. But I'm wondering is that going to be rolled into somebody else's position? Like who who is going to take on that work if we don't have the person who I think normally
093would lead that? Yeah. So that's what happens with most cuts though is the you know you can talk about any line item that's actually a viable position that someone was in and when you lose that someone else has to absorb that work. Um our director of behavioral services works with you know uh cso crisis etc. Uh works with our community organizations to help families find support service wraparound services. They attend all of our attendance meetings, work on chronic absenteeism. They chaired the restorative practice committee work with CES this spring. Um they go to site visits. They hold counselor meetings. They do counselor PDS because they are LICSSWS. So, um, a lot of that will either be absorbed, um, or put off because there will be, um, a capacity overload at some point where a building
094leader won't be able to take on all of those additional tasks as well. Mayor Dorger, um, I have a question. When initially when you gave the um budget report um to Ways and Means, there were six open bus driver positions. Is that still the case? I know I see that one of them was eliminated in the budget, but you said that you had only 14 filled. Is that what we still have filled? 14. Um, I would have to double check on that, but our two dispatchers and our transportation coordinator have been driving. So, those three have been absorbing the runs, and I don't know if there's a fourth still open, but the three of them who are normally not driving are driving. Thank you. Other questions? Member Goodwin. How many positions do we have that
095are unfilled or open right now in any department? Well, I'm thinking instructional assistance. Yeah, anything. I don't have those numbers. I do have them, but not on me. They're on a big board in my office. I can get them to you, though. They are. Yeah. Other questions? Uh, I'll just say this is devastating. I mean, it's really hard to look at this plan. It's not a good plan. I mean, it's it's the best plan possible, I think, under the budget conditions. Um, but I really think that the combination of the insurance situation um causing so much havoc with budgets all over the place um as well as the particular number that the mayor put forward and the city council's decision not to um meet our $350,000 request that could have really helped with some of
096this. and uh our staff will be feeling it, our students will be feeling it. I just don't think we should be um softening the blow of that. We need to look at that directly. That that is the result of the collective decisions of uh the richest country on earth. um forcing local communities to fund education um when when there's billionaires out there and uh and the decisions of the of our representatives not to figure out health care and and then the the local decisions and priorities that happen in the in the acrimony some of the acrimony that we've seen over the last months. Um, so we all need to be looking at that collectively and we all need to do better um for our students. So I just wanted to make that comment before our
097vote. Um any uh so let us move to a vote then. Um why don't we do this as a uh roll call vote please? Um, Secretary Deniv, I can let me repeat the motion just so people know what they're voting for. So, the motion was that the school committee approve the superintendent's recommended FY26 budget as presented and further direct the administration to pursue all appropriate avenues of funding to support the addition of a nurse leader position, including but not limited to grants, municipal allocations, and available state or federal resources. Chair Johnson, yes. Secretary Nema, yes. Vice Chair Ston, yes. Member Goodwin, yes. Mayor, yes. Member Childs, yes. Member Martini, yes. It's unanimous. Motion carries. Thank you very much. All right, we will move on to the consent agenda. Um so the consent agenda includes approval
098of meetings for May 13, 14, and May 30. Uh approval the Greenfield Middle School guidance counselor and college and career readiness coordinator job description. Approve the Greenfield High School program believing every adolescent can open doors. Beacon coordinator job description. Approve the donation of three ringbinders from First Federal Credit Union. Um, anyone want wish to remove any of those items from the consent agenda? All right, let's have a motion to approve the consent agenda as presented. So, I saw a motion from member Goodwin and a second from member Childs. Okay. Uh, any discussion? Um, I guess we all have to do roll call anyway. Um, Secretary Deniv, Chair Johnson. Yes, I'm a yes. Member child. Uh, member sex, sorry, vice chair ston. Yes. Member Goodwin. Yes. Mayor Disorger. Yes. Member Child. Yes. Member Martini. Yes. It
099is unanimous. Okay. Um, so on to um my report and the superintendent educator summitive evaluation report. So, you may remember um at our last meeting I announced you would be receiving a survey um the next day, which you did. Um six of the seven of us completed that survey to complete our role um in evaluating the superintendent's performance. Um the day after all of those were received, we received sadly received the superintendent's resignation. So her evaluation doesn't hold the same relevance. Obviously the purpose of it is to improve the superintendent's performance. However, we do have um to uh present those numbers in some of the required reporting um the um the average of our ratings for the different categories. So, I've uh there's an U memo that I wrote to the superintendent giving her the
100the results of those um numbers and I'm presenting it to you to you here as well. So, that's just an update on the superintendent evaluation process. Any questions? Oh. Um, we did not have on our agenda, we have an unanticipated item, which is a report from the redistricting committee. Um, so, uh, as long as it doesn't involve a ton of deliberation from us, um, go ahead and give us your report. Can we stay on this for a minute? Oh, yes. If if there's Yep. Um, so one, I just wanted to say thank you again for providing all of the evidence and I took my time and I spoke to staff and I spoke to parents and other people and while I was, you know, doing my work to try to fill this survey out. Um,
101and one, I don't know what your next plans are, but I am hopeful that this evaluation is useful to you, whatever they might be, um, in letting the people who you plan to serve next know what a good person they're getting. Um, second, I I had asked uh the chair about this and um I know that this does not this is not the same as an exit interview and I just wanted to make that available to you if you wanted it. Um because I think that there's a lot of valuable information, insight, lessons learned that you have that would serve us well and would serve any incoming superintendent well as you know additionally. So yeah, member Deniv, is this the only time we'll have to discuss the evaluation? Are we going to discuss it? I
102don't know. This is it. Yeah, I mean there isn't really I mean the purpose of the evaluation is to improve the superintendent's performance. The superintendent is leaving at the end of the month. So I'm sorry I didn't fully digest that because I'm not fully taking in what's happening right now because it's so tragic. Um, I wanted to tell you, Karen, that when I was doing the evaluation, and I've done like a bunch of them now, um, I was completely overwhelmed by how incredibly wellthought out and put together the evidence was. Like, there was so much evidence for all of the good work that you were doing that at one point I was just like, I can't even take in anymore. It's just so much. It's all so great. I mean, pages and pages and pages
103of evidence. And I just wanted to thank you for that because this is the first time I've ever done an evaluation where I felt competent and supported and like everything was in front of me and I was able to really digest it and and give a good evaluation. This was the first time. So, thank you so much. It was truly lovely to read about all of the good work that you've done. I'm I'm sad. in this moment. Okay. Any other questions or comments on the this I guess maybe I know that you worked with a a third party to help compile these. Did you receive a more thorough report? Is it in our packet? So, um we did work with the collaborative for educational services to compile the results of the report. Um because the
104superintendent was announced her resignation so soon after the data came in, we did not I didn't think we would need to engage their services. Um we the assistant superintendent assisted in working with them to get us the data we needed to present to the thing which did invile involve compiling everybody's responses but I have got that so recently I have not had a chance to review it understood the the reason that I'm asking is because I think that some of this evidence speaks to your person and your character which cannot be replicated some of it speaks to practices or things that we could want a future superintendent to continue. And so those are the things I'm really interested in pulling out, especially as we might be interviewing candidates moving forward. I want to be able
105to ask, hey, would you be able to support this thing that seems to be working well? You know, that is a continuation of a past practice. So, if there's anything like that that we can learn from this information, I would love to be able to do that. Yeah, we'll have to think about it because at the same time I I don't think it makes sense to have a report a full report of an evaluation by the school committee when the superintendent is not here to to respond and address. So, um so we'll put our thinking caps on. It's a unique situation just given the timing of everything. Um, so member Goodwin, was there going to be a redistricting re update there? Yes, I was. Yeah. Yep. I got a little I It's not on our
106agenda, but I I think we can allow it as an unanticipated item as long as there's not a ton of um deliberation and decision- making this the committee is doing. Um but anything else on the um evaluation report? Okay, Secretary Denive redistricting. I also have a brief legislative update. We have a Zoom meeting scheduled on June the 26th with Senator Sal Domenico's office. Don't quote me 100% on this, but if anybody would like to join to discuss the school funding followup from our day on the hill, let me know and I can send you the link. Um, all right. The ad hoc reorganizing our school subcommittee met in May with a second meeting planned for June 3rd. I secured the library venue, invited the PTO's, and prepared the agenda, but had to cancel the meeting
107because I did not receive materials requested from the mayor's office. The current status is that we are not closing any schools for the 2526 school year. And as always, we appreciate ideas and suggestions about possible reorganizing of our schools. So, please send us an email and we will keep you posted when we have another meeting scheduled. Thank you. Okay. Um, great. We are moving on to the business manager position update. So, um, if you recall, I was tasked with, uh, refreshing the business manager posting as well as engaging in a procurement for a bid. We refreshed the school spring and Mazbo pro postings. On April 29th, we had two additional qualified applicants out of the seven that applied. We offered interviews to both of those. uh one withdrew prior to the interview process. The other
108candidate we interviewed on May 19th with the same committee that did the original interviews um a few months prior. Um after that interview that candidate act actually withdrew their application as well. Um while we were doing that we also engaged with the collaborative of educational services in Northampton and they did the procurement bid for us. The bids were due on June 2nd and one bid was received. Thank you. Questions, member childs. So, we've been having a lot of issues with candidates withdrawing. I wanted to know if you could speak to if there's something we could do that would make candidates for any job really in the future more likely to follow through than to leave or if it's just a matter of you meet with them and you can just mutually tell yeah this isn't
109the right fit. Um unfortunately when they withdraw based on school spring there's no um need to put an explanation. you're just hitting a link and you can withdraw your application. Um I think that the uh moving forward it's really about uh you know I think a lot of candidates especially for a role like that are watching meetings, watching city council, watching ways and means, watching school committee. So I think you know you're looking at what kind of environment you're getting involved in and where you're going to end up working and who you're going to end up working with. Um, I can't speak to why those two withdrew. You know, I offer um, you know, if they wanted to discuss, but neither candidate um, actually engaged. So, um, it's really just kind of you don't know.
110Some people apply for jobs because they're hoping that their current employer counters. Some people are just looking to see if there's potential out there and then don't really want to follow through. So, there's, you know, a litany of reasons why it could be happening. And I think the candidate pool like any jobs are is very small. So I think there's um just a lot of factors that are going into it. Um our posting is still up obviously and the bid requirement as directed by the school committee has a 30-day uh clause in it. So um we will continue and um you know we'll reach out to Mazbo again and see if they can refresh again or if they have any leads. But um you know it's like other positions. We just keep trying. Any other
111questions or comments? Okay. I have a comment. Yes. Mayor, I just wanted to say on the redistricting, I did send the information, but it actually was not on the date that you requested. It went the day before and I was away where I was didn't have internet access. Thank you. Noted. All right. Um let's see. Um superintendent, I believe that you are leaving after this after the or before we go into executive session. Are you still here? No, I'm still here. Oh, okay. Great. Okay. Terrific. Um great. Then I would like to uh hear a motion to enter into executive session pursuant to Mass General Law Chapter 3A subsection 21A um number two to conduct strategy sessions in preparation for negotiations with non-UN personnel or to conduct collective bargaining sessions or contract negotiations with non-UN
112personnel and to comply with or act under the authority of any general or special law or federal grant. grant in aid requirements. The committee will return to open session. So move a motion from member Goodwin. Is there a second? Second. A second from Vice Chair Ston. Um any discussion? Point of order. Um, one item that was on the executive session agenda um shouldn't be should not be discussed in executive session as it would be a violation of open meeting law. Um well, I guess since it's on the executive session agenda, we can um evaluate that in executive session and the committee can choose to um table that if it's uh agreed that that is somehow in inappropriate. Any other discussion on the vote to enter into executive session? Secretary Den, will you call the vote?
113Chair Johnson. Uh, yes. I'm a yes. Vice Chair Ston. Yes. Member Goodwin. Yes. Mayor Dorger. Member Childs. Yes. Member Martini. Yes. All right. All right. We will enter executive session. Okay. We are um back from executive session. Um moving on to the um interim superintendent interview process. Um so working with the Massachusetts Association of School Committees. Um the uh position was listed. Um I think we were um surprised at the response. Um we have a number of applications. Um I had thought we might be doing uh some interviews tonight but that has not been the case. Um we are working to schedule um interviews on a fast time frame. Um uh so we are looking at a um interview half day on Saturday um morning. Um the thank you very much to everybody who responded
114so promptly to the poll. Um we have six that I know of who can be there until 11:00 a.m. on Saturday. Uh five who can be there until uh 100 p.m. and uh seven who I mean and only four who could be there for the whole time. uh that forward just does not even though it is officially a quorum it just doesn't seem appropriate for such a momentous uh decision and deliberation process. Um so my first question is anybody who said they had to leave early on Saturday, can I beg you to stay longer? Is there any possibility at all that you can stay longer on Saturday morning? Secretary Denine, I can I can stay until 11:30 or I can come earlier. Earlier. Okay. I early in the morning isn't a problem. I just have
115to open the shop by noon. So, okay. Um, great. Um, so the challenge for me is I think that you would be very interested in interviewing uh four of these candidates. And I don't think even I don't know how early we can start, but um I'll do what I can to get for interviews in. Uh does anyone else have any limitation on the the um time of day the ear the period in the morning when you can when you can start? Okay. So, um, so that's one thing to explore. I don't know how reasonable it is to ask someone to come in for an interview. Um, but, um, you know, they're school people and they're used to early starts, so who knows? We'll see what we can work out. Um so if not I guess
116I'll just um I'll have to you know basically weigh the options uh in terms of number of candidates versus amount of time and amount of time we spend interviewing them. Um so stay tuned. Yeah. Member Goodwin what time does the store close? Could we like have a come after 7 p.m.? Do you want to um Some candidates might want an evening. So possibly a Saturday night interviews. Um okay, we could explore that. Sorry. Anyone else? Uh would anyone else have availability after 7 p.m. on Saturday night? Um I'm sorry. How many people did you say there were? Uh we've had seven applications. I think four of them would be interviews ideally. So the uh the other three we we don't interview. Is that what happens? Yeah, that's my proposal. I don't I don't I mean
117you we would need we would need essentially seven hours of interview time plus probably an hour of deliberation with that number of candidates. And I honestly think it doesn't make sense you, you know, you authorized me to work with mask to coordinate interviews and that you want to look at everyone. Is that what you're saying? Yeah. Not everybody may sorry, not everybody may come, but if you invite everybody, you may Why not? I guess my my question to that is were were the three people who you were not planning to to ask in for an interview people that you wouldn't want to consider for other reasons? It's like we're where is there a reason why you know I don't we don't need it's balance it's balancing what's going to be good use of their time
118what's going to be the good use of our time and um you know the the amount of time that we have to find a interim superintendent given that it is you know second week in June. Yeah. I guess I was just trying to get at, you know, we may have had seven applicants, but if only four were met our qualifications, then we would only interview the ones who met our qualifications, right? I mean, the minimum minimum qualifications as described in the interview in in the job description, I think, yes, I I think there's there isn't anyone who you would just say no, they didn't they they don't have these particular certifications or whatnot. So I may be asking for a vote on this from from you all. Um member childs and then member Denive. Is
119there any way that we could also do some Sunday interviews just because of the time crunch? I I can explore, but I think um yeah, I mean if you want to do four hours of interviews on Saturday and four hours on on Sunday, you know, with a vote, um we can explore that. I I um I don't recommend it, honestly. I don't I think the the other the other thing you want you know in in a compressed timeline like this you don't have the opportunity of having a screening committee that where someone could apply without being in a public session and being interviewed publicly. I think it's generally understood if you come to the committee for a public interview that's being streamed on YouTube that you are the the committee thinks you're likely to, you
120know, be hired for that position and it has a reputational impact in terms of wherever you're already currently working. So that's the other thing I'd like you to weigh member Goodwin and then member Deniv. So is this something we have to do public? We can't do it in executive session. I mean no they it has to be done in public. Yes, that is required. I always thought the second that is why that is why I appreciated the vote of the school committee to authorize me to coordinate the interviews because it because everyone that we choose to and I think at that time we may have anticipated not so many not so many people applying within you know five days of the interview. So that speaks well of Greenfield and the opportunity that that is here.
121Um, so, uh, I guess before we do more discussion, I'd like to hear, um, if anyone is willing a motion to authorize me to, uh, select and put forward to you in in, um, consultation with the Massachusetts Association of School Committees for candidates for you to in for the for the committee to interview. Is there anyone who would make that motion? not hearing it. So we will pursue um all seven and try to coordinate um times for uh for the seven hours of interviews. Member Goodwin, can we get materials before the interviews? Yes, they're they're um their resumes and cover letters and and re recommendations and everything. Yes. Thank you Secretary Deniv. Um the interview process will we be asking questions and if so who has decided on the questions are we using past questions
122there uh I will work with mass to create um to create interview questions and there will be a period of time for the committee to consider those questions and go over the process before the interviews begin. Okay, great. member childs. So, how much of the deliberation and decision is at the end of those interviews, same session versus at a different session? I've never gone through this process before, so I don't know how it works. Uh well, um neither have I, but um uh I think that we're talking about seven hours of interviews. Um it all depends on the committee's interest in meetings. Um, do you want to um have the interviews and then have a separate meeting to to vote on um the candidate? I'm just saying we're running out of time. I mean, I
123want all these things, too. But my concern is if we just go straight from interview to deliberation decision, that doesn't give much time for our school community to weigh in. No, there is not a lot of time for this for the I mean the compressed time frame does limit the amount of engagement that can be done with the you know when you're hiring for a full superintendent and you have many months to plan then you have meet and greets and you go and visit their schools and you um you engage the community and all those things and we're do you know part of what we discussed at the meeting was it is a compress press time frame and needing to factor that in there. I you know we have made a commitment to have representation
124of staff and unions and community involved in the process. Um but it won't be as much community engagement as if you were looking for an interim even if you were looking for an interim and you had more time to find someone you know would we at least be able to have a public comment after interviews prior to deliberation? Yes, we will have we will have public comment um at any at all full committee meetings and we can time that public comment um whenever we want. So I could certainly put it before the votes. Secretary Den, what is the time frame we're seeking from an interim superintendent? One year I think is what we're looking for. Go ahead. So essentially, as soon as we get this person, we have to be immediately at work to find
125a permanent. Yes. Correct. And then we can have all of the time to do all of the searchy and the talking and the planning and the Exactly. Okay. just making sure everyone knows that this process doesn't stop in two weeks when we find a temporary member Goodwin. So, um, in my history, there's sat through three interim searches. Um, I don't ever remember them being public. they were always a private and it was really out of respect for the candidates because they didn't want people to know they were looking. Um so it was executive session um with the full school committee and I think what you might be referring to sometimes the school committee has the capacity to create a screening committee um and then they would put forward their recommendation and then the school committee
126would vote on that particular person. that the deliberations and the interview of this of the candidate is done in public by the school committee and the vote happens uh in public. The deliberations happen in public. There is no executive session for school committee members to deliberate about the hiring of an interim or a permanent superintendent in executive session. Okay. Um, okay. Well, I my uh I guess what I'm going to do is um talk to Liz Lefon and let her know the committee's decision to offer an interview to every candidate. I would like I I will also tell um Liz the Liz Lefant for mask um that to inform the candidates of that decision. I think that's only fair that that that essentially every candidate is being interviewed so that they can weigh whether or
127not they want to withdraw um based on the fact that there has been no pre-screening. Okay. Um, great. Um, I that's the end of our agenda, but I'm going to take a point of personal privilege for a second. I just wanted to send my appreciation to you, Karen, for your incredibly hard work. And I've never heard staff come forward during at the end of a negotiation process and talk about what a pleasure it was to work with the superintendent in that process. That just has never happened to my knowledge. We've heard so many testimonials from staff who follow you and uh appreciate you, don't always agree with you, but see how hard you've worked every day that you've worked here. um you have worked here for 16 years as a teacher, administrator, superintendent, and um
128I've had the immense pleasure of working with you and I felt like I um learned so much from the way you lead and um and your friendship means the world to me. So, I just wanted to appreciate you and thank you for all you do and wish you the best of luck with your future endeavors. I hope they I hope they deserve you. Okay. I'd like to hear a motion to adjurnn. So moved. A motion from member Childs and a second from member Goodwin. Um any discussion? Secretary Deniv, will you call the vote? Chair John Mousad? Yes. Yes. Vice Chair Saxon? Yes. Member Goodwin? Yes. Mayor Disorger? Yes. Member Childs. Yes. Very unanimous. You're adjourned. [Music]