MSAD #51 School Board Meeting November 6, 2023

001call this meeting November 6th to order I need to practiceing this there we go no one's here it's good at nice Target okay so we're gonna so you got a vote to go in executive session and site the reason right okay I have a motion to go to into executive session so move I move that we go into executive session to discuss do I have to say what we're discussing yes we're not being recorded will you just to consultation with legal counsel that you have it so moved can I get seconds second all in favor okay all right e so Scott said he'll be a minute but he said we could we can get started so hello we're back um so we are moving to the items for action oh wait sorry we already did

002that we just left the executive session and now we're on to recognition and I would like to invite Mari to the podium for the first hi everyone um I'm pleased to be here tonight to recognize our RTI MTS mtss interventionists in case those acronyms are new for you they represent response to intervention and multi-tiered systems of support and serve as a foundational approach to meeting the needs of all Learners in our schools to implement mtss is a huge huge shift from business as usual to thoughtfully using data to determine who needs additional instruction what that instruction should look like in terms of research-based strategies and how to determine whether they are making sufficient progress with set it instruction it's a lot of work and our interventionists do much of the heavy lifting in our school

003so Allison hinley is our math specialist and tier three interventionist she splits her time providing um support to teachers as they Implement grade level curriculum and tier 2 instruction for small groups of students and then providing tier three instruction to students herself um Mercedes grandon who is not able to be here tonight um but I did want to recognize her as well is our literacy specialist and also a tier three interventionist um she's Allison's counterpart in our school offering the same support for teachers and instruction to students in the realm of reading and writing um and then Lindsay Horowitz is our RTI mtss coordinator and also tier3 interventionist for literacy um Lindsay oversees all of RTI programming and is instrumental in helping shape our path forward as a school because we're not there yet in

004terms of everything we can do to create robust systems of support for our students um Lindsay also provides tier three instruction in literacy um so all three of these women deserve credit for our programming at gayley middle school they're smarter than I am more knowledgeable than I am and more trained than I am in diagnostic assessment and implementing evidence-based instruction with Fidelity they've created a mindset in our school community that we relentlessly pursue meeting students learning needs um even when it's complicated it's not an exaggeration to say that they've changed gy Middle School for the better through their work with students and staff so I want to thank them um here tonight and recognize their influence on our school and especially on our students thank you both for all you [Applause] do hi everyone thank

005you so much um Mari told me not to talk too much but um but I really love RTI and I wanted to say a few things about it um like Mari said RTI or mtss is a really powerful system but it's also super complicated it's really hard to do well and I think that at GMS 68 we do a really good job doing it well and it's because of a bunch of different people that I'm going to recognize and try not to take too long doing so um so first I actually want to thank you guys the board for allowing and supporting our positions me as the RTI coordinator Allison Mercedes and then our new RTI executive functioning teacher who hopefully you're approving tonight um we're all able to provide these robust tier three interventions

006and then also support teachers in their tier 2 tier one settings to do what they need to do so that all kids are getting what they need so we're tier three but then there's also all the ELA and Math teachers teaching tier two um on top of the planning they already do for tier one we also have some of our modern language teachers our social studies teachers our science teachers teaching Mastery interventions which is transferable skills like how to give a presentation how to write an email that there isn't usually space for in a curriculum but we have space at GMS 68 for kids to learn those skills so those teachers do amazing things on top of the tier one instruction that they're already doing um then at tier one the entire staff is engaged

007in RTI because it is is a schoolwide system so I just want to recognize a few things um that we do at GMS 68 that I think are really special um every team so not just grade level teams but also modern language Allied Arts meets once a month to discuss student progress and problem solve um and I think that's really special that we get to meet in a small group and really talk about students um three times a year we have these things called kid talks where we talk about kids whose needs are not yet being met with their intervention and we problem solve and we figure out next steps and every single staff member attends those which I think is amazing um and then we give I ready which is awesome but teachers at

008different grade levels have found gaps in what we can find with I ready and they've innovated and found ways to do Universal screening Beyond I and that wasn't something I organized that was something they did so I think that's great and then the last thing is that even though RTI is general education special Educators also have a huge role in helping us problem solve for students who we share or if we're not sure what to do next with a student they can often give us ideas and then of course the families we have amazing families supporting our work trusting us collaborating with us and that helps make the system successful so all of this allows me to say that we have a really strong system of RTI at GMS 68 we still have room to

009grow but I truly believe that we're meeting every kid's need in general education that we can um and when we're not meeting their needs then there are other steps but I think we're doing a really good job and I'm really grateful that we're being recognized tonight so thank you so much I think Lindsay really knocked that out of the park and I'm not sure I could really follow in her footsteps but here I am um thank you to the board to Mari I appreciate your your support and your recognition um it it's been a long journey for me as a teacher we all have our ups and downs and um I appreciate this High moment or highlight in in my um short career I also um want to say that I look forward to continuing

010my work and serving Cumberland in North Yarmouth thank you so much thank you so much and thank you for also being able to tie that to the position we're approving today that was really help nice mark thank you um so we have one more item for recognition it's a Hashi meain and Linda is going to come up and give a short presentation thank you just G to connect to the Brian I'm not finding it right off is that because of all the numbers I'm getting yeah got it okay sorry about that for the number of times I do this in a day so for those of you who might not know me I my name is Linda McAn Olen and I am um a visual art teacher at Mabel I Wilson I work with K

011through third grade and I want to share with you our what has become one of our favorite projects um that then is connected with Hashi which is an exchange of student artwork so Maine and alore Japan are sister States and in 2019 I was invited to Amore on cultural exchange to learn about a printmaking project that happens in the elementary schools every year the word Hashi means bridge in Japanese there's the kanji um Amor and Maine have very similar climates we share similar crops apples for us in Cumberland and North Yarmouth although I have to admit that that's closer that photo was taken closer to my home in South Portland and then um apples in amori with mount iwaki in the background so the relationship started many years before the formal sister State relationship with

012a shipwreck off the coast of shariki which was a little fishing Village in alore of the 24 crew members on board four survived made it to the beach and were taken care of by citizens of alore and then returned safely to Bath main the Tory gate in the lower right is commemorating the Shipwreck and honoring those who passed away Amore is also well known for the modern print maker shiko Muna and a mod we might think about typical Japanese print making uohi style print making where there might be as many as eight blocks each one Inked with a separate color and printed and there are an entire team of people who work on that but a modern print maker is one who creates the designs carves the block himself inks it and prints it and

013it is typically done with just black ink so the color that you see in those two prints would be a layer underneath first and then the block would be car just one block per design would be carved so micata began an artisan residence program in the elementary schools in Amory and that continues every year I was invited during that time in the the upper leftand corner I'm working with an artist in the studio of the Muna Museum the top middle is a building administrator I worked with artists went to Galleries and museums observed in the schools so the building administrator is proudly showing me how he worked he's a print maker as well to train the classroom teachers to help students with their print making project on the upper right our students at namioka Junior

014High School which is the same school that for many years we had an inperson exchange with as part of the Casco Bay exchange thought you might enjoy seeing my Japanese breakfast each morning and then um also in the lower middle prior to going to observe in the classrooms we had to meet with the administrator have tea and there was lots of business to go over so the Amore morning rotary helps to spons sponsored this um Artisan residency programming in the schools each year and then a resulting exhibition and I got a bit of news coverage although I couldn't read it or understand the um television tape that I was sent so the process and I learned a lot by observing there some tricks simplification the Japanese traditional process is very low Tech which is a

015little bit ironic here are my students using using the planning process that they used in Japan um here are some examples of a Japanese student so they would do a line drawing the teacher would make several copies of that and they would plan out several different ways to use a range of value you can notice in the slide on the right it's the same plan or drawing but they've just um plan different ways of using the solid black or the black and white and the white and then the school room these are fifth graders that I am visiting there um here are our students printing their blocks it's messy it's involved it's active so they just love that um and here I am with some second and third graders giving me the info on how

016they do it in Japan and at different levels they're using a different process with um a different technical need so the SE second graders were using paper cutouts which here our KN And1 students are using paper cutouts it's a little more challenging to keep track of um and there we are and the resulting print here are our students evaluating the quality of their prints no smudges no fingerprints nice um even lines parallel to the paper and did they get enough ink on there to get a good image so all of this print making has resulted in an exchange over the last four years in January I send about a hundred prints to amori mostly from our students but I've been able to gather some interest from other art Educators in the state um they have

017a show of the the prints that they created that November our prints they receive in January in March which is I believe is essentially the end of their school year then this is the first group that we received from them and these were made while I was there in 2019 and that exhibit was in our little Gallery by the art department at gy middle school last year we had our first big exhibit here in the of the gy Center for the Arts and I was very honored that my primary host from alori Dr Suzuki wanted this has been sort of his life's dream to create this cultural exchange of student prints so he came for the reception honoring the artist he brought his daughter and another doctor friend of his who was actually his student

018Dr Suzuki teaches in harasaki medical school so they were delighted to join my class to observe students were painting apples and then they were just thrilled with our venue and reception so this year here are students making prints make they um red is working on a foam block and pressing down with pen to create their design or intaglio and then families at the reception lots of smiling faces in addition to our shows and the shows in Amory I had been invited to do a little display in the exposition Hall at the Cumberland fair which was kind of fun and it was also great for students especially this year with Banner attendance at the fair to go and see their work on display and I could um refer to that for second grade ERS who were

019all going to the fair some posters from the alori exhibitions and um just my little plug for why this is important to me and I think so well received by our students as well so as as we work to be a globally connected World cultural exchange whether it's in person or of artwork um helps us gain perspective on our own Traditions values and beliefs in relation to those of others we learn new ways of viewing the world or creative ways to approach everyday tasks or challenges these experiences instill empathy and cultural agility when students experience ways that differ from their own they are more inclined to accept difference in peace as adults thank you has any questions [Applause] does anyone have any questions I so appreciate you bring this forward I know I have a

020number of prints um from my own kids hung up in my office uh at home and I love seeing them thank you the GCA thank you so much they love making them so we're going to move to approval of minutes can I give a motion I'd like to make a motion to approve the minutes of October 2nd 2023 as presented second thank you any discussion questions okay all in favor wonderful okay so now we are going to move to one of two public comment SE sections on the agenda so um this first is our general public comment um because we have a workshop a few items down about the new school project um we are having a second public comment after that specifically about the school project um so if you are coming here to

021speak about that um please you're welcome to wait um and just a reminder moving into public comment the board welcomes and recognizes the value of public comment and to ensure the public comment is fair and orderly we follow procedures outlined in board policy BH and we ask that all members of the public do so as well we follow this policy to keep the meeting civil respectful and productive we also hope that this allows for all community members who would like to speak to be heard we ask the speakers use the designated po Podium when making their comments and speaking to the microphone if you're interested in speaking please wait until recognized by myself the chair comments by individuals are limited to a maximum of 3 minutes at the meeting a clock is visible on the

022screen to help keep track of the time after 3 minutes the timer will go off and comments should be wrapped up please state your name and town of residence before beginning your remarks residents and staff members will be given priority over non-residents within the allotted time our policy allows for 30 minutes of public comment although this can be modified at the discretion of the board as a reminder public comment is not a time for a discussion Q&A or debate between the board and speakers or the audience remember is a chance for members of the public to express their opinions on school and educational matters the board will not comment on remarks made by speakers during the public comment period please know that this does not mean that we are not listening and it does not

023express any agreement or disagreement with your statement lastly please keep comments respectful and civil we are neighbors please be kind that includes members of the audience please do not interrupt or respond to speakers comments we also ask that comments are addressed again to myself and please do not direct comments at at or about individuals in our schools or Community I will note that I will stop any comment that is contrary to these rules and that individuals who disrupt the meeting may be asked to leave okay so is there anyone here uh for the first public comment period great thank you Larry ofier Cumberland Center generally speaking I'm against the Banning of books but let's consider the following what about a book that would detail how to build a homemade bomb or a book that would

024present in detail the least painful way to commit suicide or a book that explains how to break into a school of Massacre students or a book that is pornographic all of these books obviously and understandably are baned this is not really book Banning it's just responsible librarianship isn't it the only book that isn't banned and we still have in this library is pornographic books and we can all agree that we have them here you've seen them you've heard them you agree with me and the community that we have pornography in the grey libraries by definition and I quote pornography is designed to stimulate erotic and emotional feelings and often leads to acting out sexually you know we don't want our children acting out sexually and pornography does that you say you want tolerance inclusion and

025equity in our school you know what I want it too the community wants it but having pornography talking about transgender and allowing boys to enter the girl's bathroom is not the way to get Equity parents do you know that if a a boy who identifies as a girl can enter the girl's restroom and also the girl's lockers and parents if you think your family is immune to all of this danger because you discuss things with your family well good luck with that my miners typically do not tell their parents when they see pornography our children are being harmed by this radical wokeness Jesus was preent when he warned us and he said if anyone causes a child to stumble it would be better for him if a millstone was tied around his neck and he'd

026be thrown into the depths of the sea parents be strong and do not be intimidated the only way we are going to stop this indoctrination is for all of us to get involved call the superintendent librarian and let them know get involved what as Rabbi tone wisely said you were not called to complete the work but neither are you free to avoid it baruk hasm you is there anybody else who wishes to be recognized okay we'll close our first public comment period so now we're going to move to presentations I think we're going to take them a little out of order we're going to start with the French immersion scholarship with Taylor pulin thanks hello sorry let me set this up here my name is Taylor pulin I'm um a French teacher at gy high

027school um and so just just to give you a little context last school year uh gy High School is contacted by Adam Le a French teacher at G Academy he asked us if if you would be interested in participating in an exchange scholarship funded by the French education system where one gy student would spend time at a French high school and one French student would spend time at gy high school we said that we were interested and I started collaborating with delin Gavin a teacher at the lisu in Keno um funding for costs related to travel has already been released by the French Department of Education and the leis AMU is looking for confirmation of our interest in in sending a junior from gy to attend classes at their Institution for a period of three

028months I have opened the application to all of my juniors enrolled in a French class and we have selected a willing and deserving student whose family has also agreed to participate in the program as a host family the dates for this program will be solidified upon approval by the board if approved tonight I will meet tomorrow morning with the French school in order to confirm travel Arrangements and I'm happy to answer any questions you might have related to this wonderful opportunity and thank you for the consideration I have a question um what um either level of French or grade well you said Juniors what level um so they would be in French four um and the grant was written for juniors in mind um so a French Junior would come over and we would send

029a junior over there and my second question how is the student being chosen do they have to apply and write and write and speak interview in French or how are you doing it yes so I opened it up to all my juniors and um there was a um a series of essay questions in French and we know our students pretty well we know their level um and we we had a student apply that she's her level of French is amazing and she's very motivated and her um um family is uh very motivated as well um so her level of French is very good but she did write essay essay response essay questions in French how much interest was there how many students did you have apply yeah one okay it's a big ask it's hosting

030for three months so it's it takes a certain um student and family to be interested but for that student or family a free trip a free immersion experience is great that's incredible yeah questions so this is a little different where it's not like the French student comes here and spends three months and then the the American student goes so they won't actually meet so they will meet I know I can I can consolid a little bit because there's a lot of information so yes so they will meet so the French student will solidify dates but the French student would come first um dates to be determined um but they would arrive sometime in February and then our student in order to make it work for our Junior schedules um they would go at the very

031end of our school year very very end so hardly missing any class here and their school year goes on another month so um that student would be able to attend classes for about a month and a half you there questions okay thank you sure thank you so we have um a friend immersion scholarship presentation as well um wait no that was what we just have we have the grade eight trip to Spain sorry I'm like out of order um let's put them back in order um and then we have some items for Action that I may be asking to to move up in order just because uh we have our attendees here so I'd like to welcome Sheila and Florencia thank you hi hi I'm Sheila conin I teach six through e Spanish at the

032middle school and this is Floren ler she she is six through eight Spanish as well uh we work very closely together at the middle school and uh collaborate a lot so we're very excited um thank you for having us here tonight we're really excited to talk to you a bit about a trip we have put a lot of thought into and um some a lot of planning as well so um we're we've been planning a trip with F tours EF Educational Tours which is a very well-known very established tour company and we would take a group of eth graders who are in Spanish classes and we would want for them to in the trip we would travel to Madrid for four days go from Madrid for a day trip in that amount of time to

033Toledo and then we would go for three days to Barcelona and there is a combination of language learning happening where there're in with facilitators and language learning and then we go out um into Madrid and Barcelona and practice some of those skills that they've been learning and there are some also cultural events and activities from culinary experiences just song and dance um involved as well we believe that this is a trip that aligns very nicely with your 21st century uh learner uh policy I don't know goals goals thank you I guess not a policy um it will give our students that have dedicated so much time to learning uh language to have have the ability to experience it in real life um the the tour that well not the tour but the trip that we

034we are looking at has classes in the mornings to allow the students that immersive experience and then they'll take them out into the community to practice what they've learned so it is a tour that is specifically plan planned with middle schoolers in mind to keep them busy happy and learning which we think is great we are thinking that since this would be the first time for us doing it to have a smaller group of about 25 students it would be a ratio of six students per one um staff member as a chaperon we do have other Spanish teachers that are potentially interested and we know that we can find staff within our school that would want to come as well um we also have a there's also a 247 tour guide that would be with

035us um the tour director who's um stationed in the in Spain and then there's a lot of support through EF um with the places that we stay and the places that we go it's a very like wellestablished trip um and they have connections and well vetting on all of the um safety measures and all of the places that we're going as well we're going to require our students to complete an appli ation process it's only this time around open for Spanish students since it's a Spanish learning focused trip but we want them to have an essay application as well as naming three current teachers as reference that we can talk to as well um we ask that our students are in good academic standards in the same way that it applies for the um sports

036teams so not failing any classes as well as good behavioral standing um yeah yeah I that's the basic just I don't know if there's any qu oh we didn't say the scholarship opportuni oh yes the EF does have a scholarship uh that is Merit based for students that need them and we are more than willing to help students fill out the the process as well as some fundraising opportunities that they can have uh if the trip does get approved we want to get pulled together a family um information as soon as possible to get the ball rolling and we're looking at the week after school ends so that the students don't miss any academic time because we do value that as well thank you for bringing this forward as your questions I would just say

037excuse me I really love this idea um I went to a school that emphasized a lot of experiential learning and so I certainly appreciate seeing these opportunities being brought forward for our students and I think know of a number of parents uh who might have middle schoolers who would be excited to hear about this possibility coming forward as well um and you know it was interesting to have Linda here at the same time tonight as well and talking about the Japan trip that uh used to happen and um I believe is not unfortunately coming back but great to hear that there is uh something else that is coming forward I was curious um and appreciate all of the information that you all provided it was very detailed and EF sounds like an amazing organization and

038I I know that I've heard of them before and I was trying to remember have I heard of them in the context of the school working with them I'm seeing Jeff nod so we have even as a district experience working with this particular tour operator okay yeah yeah they're actually very well vetted by our district and we've um EF is actually it probably is the Premier um educational tour agency you know in the United States that is used by US groups but um and U no it's an excellent um group we've had many actually Kim McDonald has used um you've used EF many times I know um as well on trips at the high school so U very well vetted actually one of my own two children went to um on an EF trip and

039it was an excellent experience so yeah I would jump in an ad as a teacher I was a chaperone on EF tour um to Greece once with about 15 students and um the goal was not necessarily to learn Greek um but they didn't lose us nobody got nobody got run over I almost did but it really was we were well taken care of by their tour guides as you said they're they're they stick right to you so great well the good thing about EF is they use their tour guides are actually native to that area so you are in contact UM as as the eth grade grou going over they take care of all the logistics and do the tour and um they're just very well organized um no concerns for me at all within

040the F Tor I think it's great well I I know I also appreciate the fact that there are Merit based scholarships for any of our students who may need them which I think is different than perhaps some of the other trips that um we've sponsored before um and I appreciate um you noting how you um landed on going after school so after the school year I should say so that um our students weren't missing instruction time but I'm wondering if you foresee any sort of if that could be a barrier to some kids maybe being able to go um and it's also the first year so I know that like this is a little bit of kind of like ironing things out but and we're hoping that by starting uh the process now it will

041give families time to plan around and nobody's already committed to Summer Camps or you know trips if we can make it early enough um so that that does not become an obstacle I'm just curious I obviously love this idea as well and I wish my son was still in middle school because he would have wanted to do this um I know that there is a high school trip through the Spanish program and I'm just curious if you've taken that into an account um so that it's a progression are they completely independent of each other or are you sort of working with the high school Spanish Department to to make this um progression that's the only word I come up with I think they do an exchange through CH to Chile uh and yes we've been

042in contact with Margaret Coral who's um the head of the Spanish Department uh to kind of create like a continuity we do think it's important but being the first time there's a lot of things that we need to figure out as we go but we do think that if we can do this and do it well continue doing it in conjunction with the high school so that there's I think it's a nice introduction to you know being in a Spanish speaking country and it's obviously not as long as the high school trip I think right so I think it would it already is kind of set up with a little more of um you know that stepping stone toward um having that immersive experience without being there for a longer period of time kind of

043getting a little bit of taste for what it's like and what it might be like um even if it's in a different country just to even just use your Spanish outside of gy um in a place where you're immersed in it um is really exciting to think about as that next step toward it doing that more I think this is great and I agree EF is an awesome organization to do this with um I kind of want to follow up on one of Ann's questions in terms of access so I know there's there is a financial burden on the families and there's like there nice payment options at EF as well but just what what level of um access are we making sure that like kids feel motivated even to to apply even if they

044might not have the financial means right now like what what level of communication are we to kids that might be burdened by the financial uh cost of the trip we're going to have a meeting with our students that's like our first step and I think we all the three teachers that teach eighth grade we have a really good relationship with them uh where we not only will introduce the the the trip the opportunity but we'll also open the door to like hey if this is something you're interested in but you are concerned come talk to us privately there's ways in which we can help you the scholarship that fundraiser we're here to support you because we want as many students to be able to access it regardless um and I think that we are able

045to encourage it encourage them once they've they've reached out to us we can then follow up with the parents as well we're not just going to be like okay cool now you go convince your parents like we will work collaboratively with the families and the students to make sure that this is something that they want to do that we give them every possible opportunity to be able to do it um we don't want it to be a financial thing we want it to be a learning thing regardless okay and do you antici ipate there'll be more than 20 25 people very interested they're eight graders they're always interested the interest I think is g to be big it's going to be exciting but we're kind of you know we haven't done this before so we're

046kind of like gonna see then after the parent meeting and then I think that's another reason why we've been putting together the application process to also have the students kind of show us a little more of what their interest is and how interested they are are and what are the reasons why they want to have this experience um and then kind of looking at those I mean I'm open to a little more I just I don't want to take on too much and then later be like it's so many people so we want to be realistic with what we're capable of and part of like the application process is involving their current eighth grade teachers because they do see the students in a in a different light that we don't so we want to work

047collaboratively with everybody in the school to make the best decisions uh that are not necessarily influenced by the relationship we have with our students we don't want it to become oh because seora is your teacher you're going no we wanted to be very clear that it is Merit based it is you know because we think this is the best opportunity for you regardless well I recognize this is a lot of work so thank you very much for putting this together I think it's really special for the kids yeah well thanks for letting us present on it yeah and I did notice the materials for the scholarship is Merit and me is what it's so that's wonderful um and just to confirm so we have the French students there's no other equivalent eighth grade trip for

048French students no the only trip um we had overseas for middle level was the Japan trip that um since the pandemic in the Casco Bay uh Japan Alliance club uh or Alliance um went by the wayside that trip has not been um available so this would be the Middle School international trip anyway way um the only one and it's nice to have that back as Linda um Theon had mentioned earlier and it sorry no go ahead it is our hope that at some point we're comfortable enough in which we can include the French students because we don't want this to become exclusionary only if you're in Spanish but right now like we it's such a baby project that these are the group of kids that we feel most most comfortable with because we've known them

049for three years but if this goes well then we can look into opening it to more students um in the French program and maybe do I mean I'd love for it to be a think that the language students get to do right you know like step one no and the commitment that it takes um on the have of the teachers to bring this forward like yourselves is incredible So yeah thank you for bringing this forward um is there other questions okay thank you thank you okay so if if the board is on board uh i' like to move to items for action and I'll just take these in order as they're listed um for the the two presentations that we just had can I get a motion on the grade8 trip to Spain I move

050to approve the trip request for the grade eight trip to Spain field trip request as presented can I get a second I second um discussion I'm just worried that kids are going to watch the Lizzie MaGuire movie and think that's what this trip is going to become so can I watch that before I vote I'm not familiar soorry one thing that wasn't noted but um we have a policy on obviously on everything so uh we do have a policy on this um if anyone's interested in um and there's all this information has to be um taken care of obviously um the teachers have already submitted that information to the district office we've reviewed it um and gone through it and make sure everything is in place so it is um and then if for some

051reason U there was some sort of a um imminent issue um the state department has a list um and we have to check the state department list for some reason if there's a world event or whatever um that impacts the trip um we go by what the state department has on their list and we've um during the pandemic obviously we had to take more note of that um generally it's a rare event but just wanted to put that out there um I know that sometimes on parents Minds um on these trips so any other questions or discussion okay all those in favor great thank you and then we'll move to the next uh the the JJ French immersion scholarship can I get a motion I'd like to make a motion to approve the French imersion

052scholarship request as presented a second thank you any questions discussion I do like it that we're voting on one Spanish item and then okay any other all right V to approve in favor great thank you okay now back up to presentations Kim McDonald welcome you for the IB update just gonna take a minute to load up my presentation here I was in it earlier today so okay so what an international night I love it um good evening I'm Kim McDonald I'm um I'm in my 26th year of teaching a French 15 years at gy I'm a G Alum alumna and um this is my second year as the IB coordinator so um feeling a little more at ease here this evening than last year um and so it's it's really great pleasure to be here

053this evening there are a lot of new faces on the board um so gy high school has been a leader in the state in becoming and embracing what it means to be an IB School and it's really thanks to you to our district and the community um your commitment to this program um students find success in this International educational program every year our our teachers receive training by the IB to ensure um their strict standards of um teaching and learning are adhered and um the IB program has become um our proud identity here at um gy high school and for that I want to thank you I want to start by thanking you for all of your support um so it's my um my opportunity to um just inform you a little bit more what

054what is the IB Program especially if you are if um you're new to the board um and also give you some statistics um bring in some um some students who what students have to say um what some alumni have to say about the program and so I'm going to read some of the screen some of them but some of them G to let you um take a look at as I'm speaking so the IB Program turned 50 in um 2018 and the IB U Mission encompasses its goals um from inception to create a better and more peaceful world through Intercultural understanding and respect and um as we can see this is something that our district really values by all the opportunities that we um give our children um IB works with schools governments International organizations

055to develop challenging programs um of of International Education and rigorous assessment the ultimate aim is to encourage students to become active compassionate lifelong Learners who understand others and their perspectives uh they learn what it is to be human they learn how to learn and manage what they're learning the IB prepares students to be like lifelong Learners and at gy we also believe in these attributes they actually make a part they're they're a part of our mission statement um and um they help stud we help students to become responsible members in their communities um there are 10 um attributes of the IB learner profile and I'll just briefly describe um what it means we we need we know the words but what does it mean in IB World um and also at gy so nurturing curiosity

056developing skills for inquiry and research so becoming inquirers um for knowledgeable that students develop and use conceptual understanding exploring knowledge across disciplines that students become thinkers use critical and creative thinking skills to analyze and take responsible action on complex problems that students become communicators um expressing themselves confidently uh creatively in more than one language collaborating and listening carefully that students are principled act with integrity and honesty take responsibility for their actions that um students strive to be open-minded appreciating their own culture and histories and that of others showing empathy compassion and respect through caring approaching uncertainty with forethought and determination resourceful and resilient um in the face of challenges and change as we um hope they strive to be risk-takers being balanced it's a hard one but we help we hope that they understand the

057importance of balancing different aspects of their life intellectual physical and emotional and I'm smiling because we have two IB students who are on the board here um reflective considering the world and own ideas and experience thoughtfully so that's this is this is at the heart of the IB Program so it is a two-year um program it focuses um at the center you have the student um focusing on their 10 attributes each subject area encompasses um IB approaches to teaching and um learning um there's a common framework for teachers as they prepare students for Success um in their studies and life beyond school um it's a cohesive compr comprehensive program explores local and Global challenges um the the diploma candidates um so students can be a diploma candidate or they can just take one or two

058or three courses IB courses um but if you are a diploma candidate you take three standard level courses and three higher level courses and the difference between the SL and the HL is um the breadth of content um and that is covered SLS are rigorous um courses but they don't cover as much content as a higher level course um and a way to think about the difference is um like a major and a minor in college so we have the six um subject areas so students um can if you're in the diploma program you're enrolling in um one of um each of these groups and we have some images from last year's classes so you have um there's one English um option there are the three languages U for language acquisition individuals in societies we

059have two options um geography and history of the Americas in Sciences we have biology and chemistry mathematics are analysis and approaches and applications and interpretation and the difference between those is the um the AA the first one is stats Pre-K and celk and the applications and interpretation are it's Al Algebra 2 stats and intro to celk and then we have the Arts we have um music and visual arts so again you can see at the core of the program is the student moving out um from the inner core the approaches to teaching and learning that's our that's the IB standard of approaches to teaching and learning then the focus turns to theory of knowledge creativity um creativ um creativity activity and service and then the extended essay so you can see those um oh I

060do have a pointer sort of sort of oh this is like gonna be challenging here I think okay I'm not even G to try um all right so um these three um requirements are in addition to their six academic classes they support and are supported by their academic disciplines the theory of knowledge is an academic class um but the two other components are outside of the school day um in theory of knowledge it's an inter disciplinary course designed to help students to question and understand how they know what they know um the creativity activity and service um is 150 hours outside of the classroom um where their um activities are mindful experiential learning opportunities um and in those three um those three domains of creativity maybe um looking at an original or interpretive product um

061an activity maybe it's physical exertion um contributing to a healthy lifestyle or service might be collaborative um engagement with the community in response to an authentic need and then the extended essay is doing personal research um communicating your your ideas effectively writing a 4,000-word essay in an area of personal interest and um so you have the six courses um the highest score you can get in um in any of those is a seven um that adds to a possible of 42 points and then the um theory of knowledge and the extended essay are worth three additional points so the highest amount of points you can get is a 45 um on the diploma so this year we're starting something new and as IBT teachers we it's our goal to collaborate um interdisciplinary connecting our our

062themes our units and it's often a challenge to meet that goal and really it comes down to time so um um this idea um came up at the end of last year to what if we all worked as IB teachers on one theme that we wo throughout our um classes U throughout the year so we brought it to our teachers and we brought it to our students and we landed on our first annual theme of food for thought which was um definitely a big hit with the students um and I think it's a great great theme too um and actually as a um just a kind a footnote um of where this idea came from Colby College does this um in their Humanities classes and they've been doing it for quite a few years now

063um and um last year their their theme was food for thought and it was an article in the Portland Press Herald um this year their theme is play so across all of their Humanity classes um how does this so anyway we've got a lot of we've got a lot of options for our um annual themes um so um weaving Food For Thought throughout our classes throughout the year um and we have a description of what is what does it mean I'm going to read that so food we need it to live it's our sustenance and fuel within our bodies we are formulated to take what we give it to nourish our mind and body even our spirit we rely on food for basic nutritional needs but we also look to food for Comfort supplements and

064Medicine at the same time our food requires proper conditions to grow it needs light water soil chemical reactions within the within plants and animals without enough food societies and people have fallen into famine food has also been used as a weapon and a way to subdue populations as well as an impetus for war conversely food inspires creativity function and playfulness in art and music we celebrate around harvests we express our thanks for abundance and as food for thought as a theme in our IB classes at ghs we will examine connect to and reflect on the complex world of food around us so throughout this year we will regularly connect with other IB teachers and different disciplines on how we're integrating this theme into our classes uh we'll also organize um schoolwide activities that correspond with

065this theme and we're looking at actually for the month of November um a screening of the documentary called gather which is um um about food um sovereignty among our indigenous people and in our nation so that is our annual theme and in in ESP FR so now a little bit back to some um numbers here um we currently have for May 2024 um 87 candidates and that's out of the High School class of how many students in the high school in the senior class rather 148 148 so 87 students out of 148 are enrolled um in at least one IB course many people are many students are enrolled in multiple IB courses we have eight diploma candidates this year for and among our seniors and we will have 218 um exams um this coming May

066the um obviously we don't have the statistics um of results that's just for um May of 2023 and these are from the previous years so we're actually um back up to uh where we were in 2021 2022 uh with our statistics this year which is nice to see um so I'm almost almost done with my presentation um now it's the student side which is really um the best part this is I don't know if this looks familiar to you but this was some advice so you know this IB Program what is it um um what does it mean to to be an IB diploma um program student what do you need to do um in order to Su succeed and these were um seven pieces of advice from our current seniors so um having good

067time management skills knowing what's best for you um for when you study have an appreciation I think somebody actually said a love of learning um be willing to put in effort keep track of your stuff and by all means that means many things to many people um have you how you stay organized um reach out when you need support that is really um important and it's important for the success of any student but um um that was one thing highlighted and then finding balance with your extracurriculars and students will speak um often about how being active and engaged in athletics actually keeps them more on on track with um their time management we have a couple Reflections from iy alumni um uh we have Katherine like at bar class of 2017 and so I I

068put out last uh winter um a survey for alumni to fill out um asking them some various questions um what did the ghs IB program contribute to your post High School experiences um and I'm going to read this one it's pretty short um IA was such a wonderful program for me and first of all I'm so thankful I participated it contributed in many ways to my post High School experiences but I think the two most important ways words follows uh independent work with the IAS which is um the internal assessments um and EES the extended essays were very beneficial in college Princeton requires students to do a thesis and a junior paper knowing how and knowing how to structure an extended research project not only of how to conduct research but also how to man

069manage one's time over a long extended project was very useful a very useful experience the inter um dis interdisciplinary nature of IB courses was critical and shaped my academic path in college my major in college was very interdisciplinary and the training in IB seeing how different subjects fit together was very useful in my college coursework and Alexander Perry also from 2017 what did the ghs program contribute to your post High School experiences and this was actually repeated by a few students um I got almost a Year's worth of random college credits that went toward my liberal arts core and I ended up graduating early that's something that students talk about a lot um what had what do you U what do you wish you had known as a high school student um I wish I

070had a recording of these really I'd love to have it in their voices um ohow so many things but chiefly don't take life so seriously and let it pass you by high school is a wonderful time for SE self-growth and learning more than just about what's in a textbook I don't remember anything about mitochondria or ribosomes but I do remember trying to study for Endless hours to cram my brain with information so I think it's you know it's a good reminder of yes students want to achieve we know that here um at gy but also you know take time to appreciate find balance um yeah so um students um graduating with the IB diploma are able to study at universities around the world often with Advanced Credit um they report that the IB has given

071them the tools needed to succeed in college and Beyond and the IB has significantly higher levels of critical thinking skills um in their students sorry um thanks to the work in their IB classes so thank you again for giving me the opportunity to share our students achievements um in this solid and effective program um our teachers and students are grateful for um your commitment to this program and your support and um we see a lot of success in our Ivy program so thank [Applause] you questions from the board um I just had one question I um only learned recently that IB is actually available um in the lower grades too and I don't know if that's anything that we've considered as a district and expanding Upon Our programming yes there's a middle years program and

072a primary years program and um from what I understand there has been um some discussion in the past about um looking into say I think the a normal kind of progression is to to bring it to a middle years's program and then the primary years program um but that was with my predecessor Vanessa gribbon and and I it was probably numerous years ago so if that's something that um the board or teachers Administration want to consider again I would be happy to look into what that what that entails that go ahead Den hi Denny gadet uh the events of October 7th where U Jewish people were were killed and and uh and also taken hostage has precipitated it seems to me a crisis in higher education uh a professor at the University of Pennsylvania says

073we in higher education have failed to teach our un teach our students how to think critically about this tremendous problem and it seems to me the IB curriculum is organized to help students think through such a a tremendously uh upsetting time how would you how would you hope that your IB students would would parse the many sides of this terrible problem that we're experiencing right at the moment I think um the the way that the curriculum in um in all of the content areas is set up most of them I should say I'm thinking maybe more with um the individuals and societies and the language acquisition classes specifically perhaps um more than um a math course but still the way way that the curriculum is set up is to not just um learn um knowledge

074content knowledge but also to be looking at um and analyzing the um the topics within that content area so I think what the what helps students um develop their critical thinking skills is the types of questions that teachers ask um in looking at um how um um just an example of my class specifically um you know how it is that um as a society we in the United States we um accept genetically modified organisms but in some countries they won't even allow them to be um entering into their country at all like so we've really we think critically about look at perspectives I think that um a lot of what we try to do is is help them see the different perspectives um in their um as they approach a topic I you know we

075hope that they the students um take those um those ways of opening up to the world and other people's um views as they go forth um after after their time here that's what you know I think that's what we can hope for we also um provide them you know with lots of opportunities outside of the IB program too to um to see to see perspectives and to to understand each other um as we've talked about this evening so I think it's I I don't think it's just one program that can solve solve those types of um issues across our community but we come together in in various ways to to say hey let's let's learn from each other and how do we um how do we we grow as a society and learning from each

076other it's a big question it's a really big there a debate going on uh in your in gy high school um my grandson is a freshman at Harvard uh and uh he's questioned daily about which side he's on and uh news reporters come up to him and I think I would say to you students who are learning how to think critically to have the confidence to stand on your own two feet is what I what I hope you get to when you get to College because it's going to be uh it's going to be complicated definitely I just want to follow up a couple things one is a great I think it's a great program because just including languages just by doing that students are exposed to just other ways of thinking and it's amazing

077so one followup is in the curriculum committee this this has come up a lot um last year and this year about having um more language in the lower and lower grades as low as we can go whatever we can afford so I'm really happy to hear about this IB thing and I'll keep following up on it for both levels lower um secondly I just wanted to um follow up where was my point here it is um has there been any talk or um any exploration of doing more World languages beyond the the basic ones that are offered now um Beyond Europe or just more around the world um I don't I don't think there has been much conversation over the last 15 years um that I've been here to um to look at other languages

078other than perhaps maybe Mandarin at one point um and some of it comes down to at resources or at what levels I mean if we're looking at um adding a course another language at what level do we enter you know put that in Latin right now starts at ninth grade rather than sixth grade so um is there a way to kind of expand on what we have even before we start adding other languages those are all the different types of questions I think that come into play uh when we're looking at expanding the languages is there ever collaboration between different um IB programs at different schools I know we have a one that's fairly Advanced but yes if there's Arabic or whatever and Falmouth we could well there are only four schools in the state

079of Maine that are IB schools um and Falmouth is not an IB School but grey new glester is and um kabon High School is and then the other one is do foxcraft um and so there there is um there's there have there's been a lot of collaboration overall with we actually have um what's called roundtables that are organized um New England so that all the New England IB schools can um can work together um as far as sharing resources I'm not sure if that was an element of your question is it a possibility has it been done before could it be done I'm not sure I think that's it depends on municipalities there's a that that sounds kind of complicated but not that it's impossible so you know I'm a big fan um and for

080those of you who don't know I have a a 2014 graduate who was full IB and still talks about how wonderful it was and I'm just wondering um especially given that's now your second year are you strategizing for more ways to bring more kids in and kind of part of that is how do you Council kids who are debating between taking say IB English or AP English how are you helping them make those choices so I um last year was really you know the learning of all the learning of the all the aspects of um being a coordinator but also bringing in um more visibility um especially after um a couple years of really just not having a lot of chances to be visible so um uh getting more information out there to students and

081parents and the community what is IB what are the options with IB um how can um how can you succeed in IB and part of my philosophy that comes into being coordinator is that all students and in many of the classes I can't say all because there there are prerequisites but many students can access this IB education and it really should be open up to students of all levels so that's another opportunity of of conversation with students and some students it may be really pushing their um um their their academic um limits but um if they're willing to put in the effort and if they're organized and if they um they have a love of learning that they can do um not only course or two but maybe even the diploma program so having those

082conversations organizing my time with the guidance Department um so that we are all on the same page there are you know supporting the students because we don't want the students to um to not succeed in the program if it's too if it's too much for them and one way or another um so those are the different ways that I've I've started started in you know the last last year and this this year to um to ensure that students feel like they have this opportunity we also are looking at what other classes we can be offering um and that's that's that's more complicated than I had thought coming in I'm like okay we're gonna you know get get these classes on board you know but there it is complicated because we only have a certain number

083of teachers and a certain number of um sections to offer and then there's you know the whole school student body right so how do we um ensure that we're meeting the needs of all the students at all levels so yeah there's a lot lot that comes into play got a lot of um um lot of things in the works I guess you know hopefully some um new course offerings eventually and then also just the a lot of conversations about how this could be how this could work for for students so um thank you for the presentation um I am curious I loved the alumni portion of it and hearing the voices I think as it we kind of focus in on our goals and long-term Student Success and what that looks like and if you're

084thinking about you know how to alter it or improve it so way students kind of feel that long-term success how you know in terms of alumni engagement and our ability to follow up with students that graduate from it um how do we have any sense of success rates in college between the two are we hearing like do you hear back from a lot of them like different experiences positive negative so last winter I think was the first time that we reach out reached out to alumni and it's it doesn't seem to be as easy I mean we we should just have this Bank of email address but we actually don't I don't think that we get a lot of we we always have a lot of access to students once they graduate with you know

085how to contact them so it was really kind of through searching through kind of um different social media you know ways of hey can I can I send you an email with this link and if they responded saying yes okay with the email you know so it was um so a little more um uh leg work to get to get to you know reach them initially I probably sent out I don't know 30 emails saying hey if you get a chance could you fill this form out there were I think seven questions but it depends on people's time right it might fall you know um at the bottom of their list I got um eight responses and so that's since 20 2009 um you know kind of reaching out to a few different years here

086and there so I do have more that I can share eventually and I shared in um the IB quarterly that I um started last year of kind of giving highlights of the whole program um and I'm going to continue that this year as well so um hopefully I'll you know I'll continue to reach out to alumni um you know I think that um I think it would be good helpful to reach out to um to students who graduated even in like say 2019 you know 2020 where are they are they still in their four-year um university did they transfer you know what what what's where is their path gone yeah I'm not sure how much we do like how big of a alumni tracking we do with national student Clearing House or anything like that

087but I do I do think like maybe that could be a core part of the program just to see the success long term I agree for our students so that's that's really great that you incorporate that so we we had a communic Communications and and Community engagement and development officer director a few years ago um we all had the position for two or three years um and that was part of the the role but it would it proved to be much harder to find students after they leave us like Kim said because they don't they switch their emails their emails switch they go to college and they you know everything changes so it's not really it was never as we said oh give us all our emails we had their emails in June of that

088first year but they change them you know and that's not always an easy way to reach some students don't read their email they do other things so it never really worked the way we thought it was I was going to mention a couple quick things um um we did have in the Strategic plan two things that have come up tonight that have been asked one of them was around World languages in the younger grades that was in the 20158 Strategic plan and then the other one was um should IB be expanded what's the role of IB it should be expanded in the high school and then could it be expanded in the middle uh grades that also was in the 20158 Strategic plan there were probably I don't remember how many items in that plan

089but those two never got done and they were the only two that never got done and on purpose um and it was by the end of three years um I think you know between um myself and the board uh we felt there was we had a lot of things that we had to work on in that strategic plan those were two that felt really weighty and we weren't sure we're ready for them um and it never made it into the current strategic plan or this might be the third one um the current plan does not have that in there so if that's an interest um you know as we develop a new strategic plan those would be areas that we could certainly look at uh again because I I do have an interest in both

090myself um and I think it would be good to open that conversation again at some point interest put my vote in there thank you great thank you thank you this was a very long presentation sorry I took so much time but thank you thank you well that actually segwayed really nicely because we um are still operating on the Strategic plan that came after the one that you're referencing and part of the reason well I think it's been extended a few years and this year we're on another extension because of in part of the next topic which is to discuss uh the new school options um and so we wanted to make sure we focused our our efforts this year on that but I'm looking forward to being able to go through a strategic planning process

091and I think having those context on those items is is really helpful um so as we move to the the workshop I want to um you know open this by um thanking our North Yarmouth uh neighbors for hosting the joint um session with the two leaderships of North Yarmouth in Cumberland in the school board um a few weeks ago um we had a really great conversation there and some wonderful food provided by John Carlson and Food Service um it was after the meeting was great seeing people bagging up their cookies to take to take home so thank you for supporting that through our food service um and I also want to thank um as we've been discussing and going through the various options over the years to to thank our partner and O point Who's

092put a lot of work into all the designs that had brought us to some of the conversations um that we had uh at the meeting um that has led up to where we are today but really in in short order we had pivoted during the joint session to talk about um a new opportunity with the land that have been purchased next to the campus and so we did end up focusing most of that conversation and really look forward to having our first board discussion um on the opportunity with the the new acreage next to campus and what that could provide for us with the the school building project so Jeff has prepared a presentation that he's going to walk us through um that sort of takes us up to where we are today yeah thank

093you lean um I just wanted to also just say um I'm sorry Kim left already but Kim is an outstanding Ambassador um of the IB Program um and uh really um very fortunate to have her in the coordinator's role um and Vanessa griin was in that role for about 10 years and she did an amazing job um and then uh handed The Paton to uh Kim McDonald who has taken it right up and has done an amazing job so um thank you to Kim for her all her work so tonight the recommendation um largely comes from the joint meeting but just solidifying and putting things into one place for the board to be able to look at and the public to be able to see the recommendation um at this point and I'll start by

094saying that this has been an almost fiveyear process I've said four years and I went back and looked at the information we actually started a steering committee started in February of 2019 submitted their report to the board in December of 19 um so that February and February it will be five years since we started the the discussion around a potential new school um where are we now right now obviously these are obvious things referendum vote uh on November 8 2022 did not pass um for the 80 Grade Road plan uh in the interm the board approved a short-term plan which is the temporary space plan that um we have uh implemented at the Mabel Wilson School and we'll continue doing this coming summer at the middle school and then the long-term plan which is the

095area that needs updating obviously is the school and everything associated with it so just bring everybody up to speed um what has changed so we've been saying I've been saying all along that it is not possible to build a school on this campus um and that has been the impetus um even though we had a design for a school on the campus um two two and a half years ago that was with land that was under option next to the campus um so that was allowing us to do that there are a lot of question marks about that plan at the time so what's changed again um is that the the voters of the of the two communities did go ahead and purchase the 2.3 acres of abing land again my line had been um

096we need this land but it's not to sustain a school we are required to update a master plan anytime there is any change on our campus um we had to update it for the modular units um that were rearranged this uh this summer and added at the Wilson school um and we also had to update the master site plan uh in respect to the new purchased land that the voters approved in June and closed in July so that is a big part of what's changed it's a different parcel of land that we were dealing with two and a half years ago um and I think the proverbial question has been you know can you tell us definitively not just say you don't think a school can be on the land um but can you can

097we actually answer that question and actually Analyze That is it enough this parcel of land that the voters approved to actually sustain a new building so that question was put to the architect who has been um the keeper of our Master site plan Steven blat um he has um this I don't know 20 years or or so um been the uh person who developed our our site plan for the campus and every time there's been a change on campus has been the one that has updated the master site plan so um we use different Architects for different purposes um and we ask Steve to continue his work with the master site plan and this new land in along with the uh the modular units that were changed uh in order to submit that to the

098town and I did ask Steve uh the proverbial question that we kept getting asked is can you actually put a building on this campus given that there is new land available it's a different parcel of land we really haven't vetted out that particular piece like we did uh the one that we were under option for two and a half years ago ago next to the campus so I said you know I figured the answer might be probably no um but let's throw it out there uh he came back a few days later and said you can do it depends on the size of the school and depends on how much you want to um change your plan with grade spans but you can put a 500 student or less school on this campus with the

099land that has been acquired so uh that was the first thing that was asked the second question that were asked a lot is even if you could fit a school onto the campus what I'm if 5 10 15 years from now you you know your the projections are even more than were expected and you outgrow your other facilities what can you do can you actually expand and um so in getting a second opinion from Mr blat about that he was able to identify areas at the Wilson school um one particular area which is where the modular currently sit behind the building and two areas at the middle school one on the end which was the new addition to the middle school you'll see um in The Black Arrow let see if I here we go

100it's not really a pointer like Kim mentioned but oh doesn't really work as a pointer here we go and then the other area is behind where the um air conditioning units um current sit and could actually go on the roof it was always designed to be a pad U where there could be an expansion going out from this part of the building and going this way the other area that's not um on here but and this is a more expensive option but it's certainly an expansion option is that there is a um water retainage uh area right now it's a beautiful little you know I don't want to call it a pond I'm not sure what it is retainage area that actually can be and many school units have done this when they've run out

101of space um you can go over this you can put um Concrete in the in the ground I don't know the logistics U but uh Steve also mentioned that this is certainly an area that can be uh utilized differently and put underground and not um in the same manner so there are expansion areas on the campus um that are sufficient enough to be able to handle um growth and enrollment um does it mean that the campus will be more congested yes um but are there ways to mitigate the congestion so that was another question that I asked is if that gets to the point where we have to start looking at parking in traffic flow differently can these roads be adjusted these are the question the questions that we went into the weeds that we

102did not go into the weeds before um but these are questions that I started um and Scott started asking um of Steve is you know what happens if we move this road or can you move roads or can you suggest moving a parking lot if that was uh you know cleaned up the efficiency in the in the flow on the campus so these are all key questions that we asked after we closed on the property in Late July so the one campus model um if it is going to be retained with a new building in continued enrollment requires investment by the community um the investment identified in three areas and again a lot of these things came out at the Joint meeting and have been discussed by the board in the past uh building obviously

103looking at grade spans uh building a new facility that would be prek to1 um I'm recommending that if you're look if you're going to build a building because it's a smaller infrastructure you don't need a lot of the components of a school that has other grades in it when you have prek to one for example you don't need a separate cafeteria in a separate gym for a school of 450 students and right now we're projecting over the next several years looking at the numbers we currently have that the school would be no more than 450 students it would actually never be at a point where it's more than 450 it' be closer to 410 415 uh with those grades the grade span shift um would have to take place at Wilson and and GMS which

104is different than what we've been talking about with the ad0 gray plan it goes back 2 and a half years years uh to the uh the grade spans that we were talking about when the design was on the campus before which would mean Wilson school is a two to four school it can handle three grades and the middle school would become a 58 school instead of a 68 school that school um at this point with the numbers we have in front of us can fit four grades in it will get comfortable at some point and that's where the expansion pieces uh would need to be looked at where can we EXP expand if we needed to the other thing I just want to remind uh the board um tonight is that there is an enrollment

105study being updated right now this will be the fourth one that we've done since 2016 and it will be completed by early December if not before that the second part of the investment is site adjustments um offsite turn Lanes uh two and a half years ago three years ago the Department of Transportation uh told the Town of Cumberland that there are certain requirements that needed to be done on Main Street and Tuttle Road in order to get uh a school uh onto this campus another school onto the campus um at the time that was a concern U for the town but since then um the town has at the Joint meeting you heard that the town said that these things are doable and they uh would like to work with the district on these things

106traffic flow and parking upgrades um again whether it's for the long-term or there's some short-term pieces um in order to make some efficiencies on campus to make these things work better with the current parking lots uh and traffic flow um and having another building on campus um I think it's going to be very important that we have uh architectural designs to move roads parking lots whatever needs to be done in order to uh bring more efficiency to the campus as it's grown uh a lot over the last few years mael ey Wilson school facility upgrades in the current plan with 80 gry road it made it makes me very nervous and i' I've said this before that we have zero dollars for any sort of retrofitting of that building for grades uh two through four

107school um we've had it in the past with other designs we took it out in order to keep the current plan uh cost down I I'm very concerned that there's nothing and I think it's important that the board consider something um in order to make sure that we retrofit correctly into that grade Span play in athletic space upgrades um as we consolidate a campus and continue consolidating um obviously there's um you know a lot of opportunity for losing some of this and we want to make sure that we have the best plan um so that the campus is sustainable for the long term if we retain the one campus model with a new building and then this particular um plan I'll go back to this for just a second and with my trusty pointer up

108here you can see this is the current Maintenance building uh that we have in order to make a school on this part of land this parcel of land work this Maintenance building uh which is about a hundred years old would need to be not removed and I'm going to recommend you flatten it because it has to have a lot of work done to it already and it's not worth it it's going to cost you a lot less probably to just build something else um that is more modern and can handle it the other piece is that down at the Fieldhouse we have been trying to get the maintenance this is a safety issue we've been talking about this for years get this maintenance out of the Fieldhouse and move it up to the maintenance uh

109building so no idea where that would go it would need to be on campus again you'd have to have an architectural rendering as to where that could go but just kind of put that out there so those are side adjustments um long-term Investments um support of capital projects and repairs in other words in order to stay on campus make it a one campus model even if it was a two campus model either way you have to have support of capital projects and repairs um the board has signaled that many times in the long-term facilities plan that you have continuously updated for a long period of time that there are other needs on campus uh We've let the pool go for example for a long time um it's the same pool I swam in when I

110was little um it needs work I think everybody knows that um but it's important to keep saying that um a budding land acquisition um if there are people that are interested that live around the campus and whether it's shortterm or 20 years from now we'd love to have a first refusal on any land AB buding the campus Because I think sustainability wise a one campus model I love one campus model but you got to have enough land in order to do that you want to have the opportunity for the board to purchase land or to ask the voters to purchase land down the road and then uh the last thing is designated expansion areas which I already talked about um when we did our Master site plan we identified those expansion areas that are actually

111already in place and I you know I've been here almost 10 years but I didn't know some of this and some of this goes back to when the middle school was first built which was I think 18 years ago now um there were designated areas and we just kind of had to refresh and dust those things off so my recommendation uh to the board tonight for debate um and I'm sure this will not just tonight but in the coming meetings um is that the new information that I've talked about tonight allows the sustainability of one campus model and um there's three reasons for that one is location um obviously I think a lot of people whether it's staff parents um community members who like the campus being here um it retains that model that we

112have hesitated to say and I've hesitated to say that we can do it um I think we needed some really hard information and and to take another look at it in light of closing on this 2.3 acres of land in July so we've had the model for nine and a half years um and it has it has worked for the population it has gotten very crowded and adjustments have to be made if we're going to keep it location because of shared services um we have a lot of staff that work between buildings um we have a lot of pre 12 staff that work between buildings those are efficiencies and sharing of services having one campus model if we can do it um makes sense for this for this purpose proximity to First responders the fire

113department is literally across the street the police department is 2minute drive and if they have their lights and sirens on it's probably 30 seconds um to get to the campus it's very um close we also have one and a half SRO uh on our campus cohesive School Community we have a lot of um whether it's bigs and Littles we have um older students working with younger students I think I have a picture in this report of um students from 4 five going down working with students at the Wilson school this is we have the an I'm just making some things up I can think of we have the annual um graduation parade which is a huge hit there's a lot of things that go on on this campus um quite frankly the GCA has brought

114a lot of opportunities for students to work together um people love that we we've tried to do that and if we can do it we'd like to do that Transportation convenience and efficiency I know for our bus drivers but also for parents dropping and picking their kids up to have to go somewhere else to do that um a lot of districts have that Arrangement but I know people are saying well if we can do it we really want to do it on one campus makes sense educational benefit it aligns with the steering committee uh back from five almost five years ago now that recommended at the end of that uh nine-month committee uh their one of their first recommendations keep this school small for young kids um it was a primary school project from the

115beginning continues to be one and it should be a small school not an overwhelming school if we were to do a school of 450 students it would fulfill one of the most important tenants of that 18 person committees work over the nine months moves fourth grade out of the middle school that's been our plan from the beginning um fourth graders uh in a middle school even though we have a good arrangement with the fourth and fifth it's worked very well for the past decade we know that um it is difficult to run two programs in that building it's a very large school with now over 800 students and um making sure that our youngest students are in an elementary setting uh is important it removes all the modular learning environments at all of our facilities

116so if this went ahead with the numbers that we have projections that we have we could remove every single um temporary space in this district for the forese future designated expansion areas if our projections are off we have more students moving in we know now that we have um at least three uh expansion areas um that we would have to go back to voters and ask for additions but at this point based on the numbers we have today we would not need to do that fiscal responsiveness um even after the campus adjustments making sure that we've got the campus where we think it will be um I'm estimating just right now without any hard numbers that the cost of putting a school on this campus is going to be well below the 80 grade uh

117Road plan and one of the reasons is that there's millions of dollars just to get into that site we all know that uh the road is 1.6 million um we've got the sewer we've got water line that's one mile long we've got all kinds of um trees to to clear it's not a an area that's ready right away to put a school in that's what you do in rural main you have to you have to do that but if we have another opportunity um you know this will save taxpayers money annual operating costs we know will be less too because we're talking about shared services reduced Transportation costs um we have not we don't have hard numbers but Scott and I talked we know it's going to be less just the way it is so

118we we'd have those numbers if the board was interested we go ahead with that so finally what are the recommended next steps if this recommendation is accepted by the board the facilities committee my first recommendation is the facilities committee uh recommends an architect to move forward with the concept design in the budget for putting a prek-1 facility on this on this Campus number one number two the board approves the concept design contract um there has to be a contract with an architect to do that with the selected architect recommended by the facilities committee next step is to direct the superintendent to identify and recommend necessary oncampus adjustments and upgrades to sustain the one campus model again I've you know there's certain things that I think um in order to get the campus in order for

119another building um there are things that you know we would recommend and identify and work with the town uh and the architect to make sure are in place so that the efficiencies and the congestion on campus um can be minimized and we can move things around that need to be moved direct the superintendent to enter in discussions with the Town of Cumberland in the MDOT um again we had these discussions begin two and a half three years ago on the other plan plan that was uh near the campus enter those discussions early and and make sure that these um pieces are in place and there's agreement on um what the costs are and making sure that everybody's on the same page next one is to direct the superintendent to create a new financial plan for

120potential voer Bond question which I would happily delegate that away my colleague Mr Pand but you have direct me to do it I'll I'll delegate it immediately direct the superintendent to develop a timeline for statutory steps needed to reach referendum um obviously uh this is a new design new project and depending on where the board wants to go with this um you'll need to know all the steps that we would need to get to referendum I think whether it's shortterm or longterm again seeking other potential um adjoining properties to the campus um you don't need need an adjoining property to make a school work of 450 students um right now but it would be extremely helpful if there was potential more land down the road to do that um cross check the new enrollment study

121that will be coming out in a few weeks uh with the school projections and making sure that those numbers are in line with everything that we've been looking at update the s's long-term facilities plan that plan is based on the 80 Grave Road plan right now set a referendum date and communicate and engage with the public so again some of these are only if you're going to move forward and some of these are waiting into this so these are the recommended steps um and again um a lot of this came out of the joint meeting just putting it in front of you as a recommendation so it's um a little bit more solid and the board can then start conversing on it so that's the recommendation as it stands all right thank you for putting

122that together so now now's now's our opportunity to discuss so questions comments so um I think it's a great opportunity but I I really want to be sure that we're building something that works for the future not five years not eight years you don't want another board up here in less than 10 years saying there is no land and we need more land and and we can hope and and I do think maybe you know things may move around the perimeter here but that's my biggest concern it doesn't mean I'm against it or for it I just that's my biggest concern we need to know are all the horses going to fit in the barn before we decide where to put the barn to put it simply so um for me the biggest the first

123step for me would be to be sure we await which is coming very soon the enrollment studies to find out um what Rebecca says because my understanding is Rebecca's been pretty accurate um in in what what has occurred so that that would be my my thoughts yeah and Rebecca knows um she wants to be as accurate as possible with this even though she has an abbreviated timeline um usually she's taking three four months five months six months even um to do a comprehensive study but I told her we need to take the current numbers and just make sure that they're right update them as much as you can so um she has told me that she's hoping to have them right after the Thanksgiving break um if not early December Jeff can you um talk

124a little bit more about why it is that Mabel Wilson could fit second third and fourth when right now we have two grades in Portables um I mean when my oldest went there it was Kindergarten first second third I mean you could you know One Wing for each grade um how do you see second third and fourth fitting there so we didn't exercise when we were at 80 grade to see if third through fifth could fit in the building so a bunch of us sat down we sat down um with Oak Point we also sat down with Carol MacArthur who would um who has the third through fifth grade population um and um Susie Robbins Julie Olsen myself Scott buan and we really studied all the pie pieces that were um the whole layout of

125the school without any temporary space to see if it would fit and why it fits is because class sizes are larger in those grades so when you have prek K1 you have to keep your class sizes pretty small after you get past first grade your class sizes start to go up and that's why you can fit more students into a facility um and so we would do that exercise again but it's not going to be different than third through fifth in terms of um class sizes so that's that's the reason we can fit in and we had two Flex spaces when we looked at the 35 model before um that we still had two Flex spaces that we could um Flex rooms that we could use for Flex enrollment so maybe kind of following up

126on that um and I think this was discussed previously when the one campus um opportunity was previously discussed but I can't remember what um the details were in terms of splitting four five uh and how that would work so that's an educational obviously decision um I will tell you and I know that a lot of people have very strong feelings about fourth and fifth grade being together and developmentally they are very similar third grade is similar too so the 0 Gray Road I think everybody was pretty comfortable with third fourth and fifth developmentally being together um there is no research that says that grade one grade span is more effective than another I think that we've just long had those two grades together and it would be a shift in the way that you know

127the staff that's working together the curriculum offerings um it would be a very different way of doing things we can do it though it is very possible and I know that you know the question has come up why would you put fifth grade in a middle school setting um you know Yarmouth just discontinued that practice two years ago go that's because well for 20 years they had fifth grade in their middle school but they had a building project they were able to do it um based on space and moved the fifth grade um out of the Middle School their middle school had gotten crowded and they needed the space there anyway so they had to shift things around and as they were doing that they also kind of went back to well fifth grade makes

128sense in an elementary setting but it it also can work very well in a middle school setting as Yarmouth found out for 20 years um and there are other middle schools in Maine that have a fifth through eighth grade um configuration you know middle schools do a fifth grade where fifth grade is more by itself um or fifth and sixth are by are together in seventh and eth grade isn't um but there are definitely ways to program it takes planning to get to that place but I I know that there will be some disappointment with not having the fourth and fifth together because it's been a longterm practice here this district and that's just something that the board will have to weigh um in looking at this um the only alternative is to build um

129a fairly significant addition to the Wilson school in order to accommodate fifth grade um but you have you know one thing we've wrestled with is that the Middle School can fit four grades in it five grades is too much but four grades it can fit um you know again down the road who knows population may increase but that that is a significant driver too in in these decisions but there is no research that anyone has ever found um on grade spans the only one I've ever found that had some credibility um and I think most people um who have looked at it would would see this as beneficial is k through eight schools in um either rural areas or very urban areas tend the students tend to do um scholastically are doing better in those

130configurations uh in those two areas but other than that I haven't seen any hard research on gr spans Danny Danny might know more than I I was yeah we were okay let's see uh we had the middle the middle school has to be separate from the high school that's that's one thing it has to be sure uh I I really appreciate you're taking the time on this Jeff to think it through and to be thinking forward I especially like the flexibility in the one campus model that we do have room to to grow if things don't work out uh I think that population or uh population forecasts are are great I'm looking but they they don't always pan out the way you think they're going to so you need some flexibility and I I was

131telling Tommy that I picked out uh the the art the article in the port press h in 2012 in which his mother with great regret uh decided to close the school there because she said the forecast show that this makes the right this is the right choice and and and the forecast was correct for eight years but in the ninth year it turned so I think we need to be thinking certainly for five or seven years ahead but then beyond that we need to have options and I think the options that that Steve put forward are are there I think we'll be able to buy some of the neighboring properties the the the homes that are there uh from what I understand from the neighborhood that those opportunities will emerge so um I think it's

132I think it's a really uh good upgrade from from where we are now yeah and I'll say that I have been a really strong proponent of the 80 gry road plan um and I have been someone who has said the campus is crowded we can't do that um however sometimes you have to go back and take another look and you have to look at it again with new eyes and new opportunity and get some new information and um after we had purchased the land I was committed to doing that because a lot of these questions have been raised really you can't put the school on campus why can't you work a little harder on looking at that um so I think that was you know that was an ask that from a lot of people

133and um I feel like the board has done its due diligence and at least looking at this talking about this considering this asking for more information um and you know we're at a spot today where you can you can debate this you can have a discussion which feels like a good spot to be in to have options so this is Bittersweet for me um because I am glad that we landed where we're at and I want to spend the majority of our time talking about those the two options that are on our plate because I think I think there's still a lot of unanswered questions um but I I'm disappointed in the way that I feel like we're getting there because just two meetings ago we had a vote on which direction we were going

134to go and we had the land by that point when we bought the land I was directly told you know when I asked and I'm sure a lot of other people in the public were told this as well can we build we had the those two acres and the answer has been no and it's been no since we've had the land you know we found out in our last meeting with the town which I appreciated kind of where we um fell off of like in terms of the main dot which has been in question and so we found out that that was kind of more of a you know something that now we can push right we've had Steve around for a while and other Architects that we could ask in our last meeting with

135our current architect we pushed about a one campus model I think we did a really good job as a board asking those questions and we were again fed kind of the complexities of that which I think still exist I think those complexities are still very very real and so I think we'd be remiss to not recognize that there's some broken trust probably because we were pretty definitive and we've been told a lot of things that I think are coming you peel it off a little bit not so firm and due diligence is something that we really need to show that we're doing and so I appreciate this recommendation but I don't I think that we should take a breath and really dive into let's get the numbers from Steve let's consider another architect other than

136Steve 2 to see what other plans are possible we asked one other architect and all of a sudden these doors open up with the two lands right let's I know we want to build something quick and we need a solution fast but if we want this to pass we have to really be thoughtful about all the long-term consequences like you know are we going to split fourth and fifth grades right what does that look like what is the you know are we if we do 80 Grade Road are we still going to need to expand on our own campus Because when I did that facilities tour I think we're going to have to anyway I think there's some serious upgrades to be made anyway so I think you know I tried to push this a

137couple meetings ago and I think we just need to take a breath and rebuild a little bit of the the trust that we're doing a due diligence because I'm really proud of the fact that we did Circle back we didn't necessarily need to do some of that we did ultimately come to that point but I think like we we we can't just pretend that all the stuff we didn't we just said or we've been saying or other boards have been saying wasn't said like we can't we can't just do that and pretend like had ourselves in the back that we came to this like we are now doing our due diligence good for us but let's continue doing that and show that like we're doing it differently now and so we can when we say

138something people believe that no this is real like this is firm we've done our due diligence and so I I'm proud of where we're at and I want to focus in on this but when I look at this I think we just need to spend a little bit of time looking over some more of the details and getting more of the pros and cons and and really con still considering any gy road and still considering another architect or other designs I just I want to see more and I think I think the public deserves that I think we deserve giving that to them so not to be the fund police I just think that it's necessary to be said yeah well I appreciate you saying that Tim because I think that does raise a lot

139of questions from people who are like well you've told us this you told us that I just just to put out there and just so everyone is aware too um we have to go back in time just a little bit because we did say that we could do a school on on campus just what two and a half three years ago we had a design and we were all behind that design we we said it could work it was a different piece of property and so the answer was yes the answer was yes based on a lot of other factors like moving the district office literally moving it off its foundation moving it to another part of the campus so there's a lot of things that went with that yes to make that land work

140for that school so when we purchased the 2.3 Acres there wasn't apparently a yes for me because if we had the maintenance building there that was in the way we would have we really have to look at our traffic flow it's different than the plan we had two and a half three years ago on campus it's not the same traffic flow so I think it wasn't for me an automatic we did it once we can do it again it there was there's a lot of other variables involved um that go with it and in order to make this a yes that's why um I had mentioned in the recommendation Investments have to be made we can't just say yes put the building there and that's the end of it there other adjustments on this campus

141have to be made in order for this to be yes so for me it was a no until unless there is yeah we're going to invest in the campus can't just put a new building on and that's the end of it you have to invest there's got to be other improvements made to this campus if efficiencies in traffic flow parking aren't made this isn't going to work I'm just putting it out there I guess I want to um concur with Tim um regarding a a breach of trust of sorts or least questioning um I think not only in the public but on the board um speaking for myself there's some Whiplash going on um again I'm not for or against on the campus I just really feel we need to know the numbers before we

142decide where it has to be built and also the numbers of how you know we need need to do other adjustments and on the site how much is all this going to cost is it is going to be that much less by the time we're done or not because that's what it comes down to how much does this cost so I like the idea of sort of taking a breath and and the idea of even you know Steve baton knows the area well and and Scott you've worked with him a lot and know him really well and trust him which is a great relationship but at the same time maybe we do need to just have another architect um to look at the on campus possibility on that site I know it takes time but

143at this point I would just respond to every time you hire an architect to do a concept design remember that that's a very large number yep okay so what you do is you select an architect that you have trust in and have worked with and you try to build off that relationship to look at the designs doing a concept design is a major undertaking well and that that makes me wonder I mean we already have a prek-1 concept design yeah it's for a different shaped property but can oo rework that for this property I don't know I mean I I also agree with everything that that Tim said I think I I need more information overall I'm I'm frustrated um I want to do what's best for the community I want to do what's best

144for our students and I feel like we just need more information on what each option would look like for on campus and for ad0 gry Road and be able to sit down and talk about this um and I don't know if it's something that we also can have an executive session about I don't know if statute toally If This falls under any of that with land acquisition I mean because because if we're looking at wanting to acquire more land moving forward I mean wouldn't it also behoove us to see about getting more land now to have another prek-2 school uh and to answer your question um that's that's a good one um it can be an executive session if there's an actual specific property that comes forward if a property owner for example around the

145campus were to put a proposal forward um and then the board um has to actually go into executive session to protect the um negotiations that are going on so if that occurs then we could go into executive session to discuss um property but in terms of process and everything else um still has to remain public so I I do want to recognize we have seven of the nine members of the board here tonight so we have two members who aren't here and but I think also reflecting of what what's just been said a lot of us are are pretty new um on the board and so especially those who are in our second year which is myself included um what we went through last year and the no vote on ad gray and then the

146reiring and then the conversations around not having other options it it's been challenging to to figure out is there a choice on campus and I'm I'm glad I feel like we're maybe a half step closer in that um we have some ideas that there may be um expansion options available a site that could work for a smaller school um but one of the biggest shifts that I think really came to light for me on the joint session where some some of the reasons why behind no on campus were in play was around the conversations I think back in 2021 about um changes in the um from MDOT that would be needed in Cumberland and there didn't seem to be a lot of interest in that at that time um which seemingly shifted um of recent

147and so I think that is one of the things that was it like we couldn't exactly put our finger on um why 21 failed for an oncampus option there was a variety of reasons one of them being the MDOT um which is why we shifted ahead and it does seem like the interest um had shifted since then um and so I'm glad we can have conversations now about what the options are on campus and absolutely want to do the D do diligence for example on the long-term plan if we are looking back at the campus I don't want to be shortsighted if if there are additional properties um that could Abu campus that could be considered I absolutely want to do that now um so we can consider that as part of the conversation versus

148um it being you know coming up after we've we've moved forward with with a plan for a particular site so I absolutely agree that we want to continue to understand what options there are I think also relatedly um regarding the um changes that would be required on Main Street I I think I would want a little more definitive answer from I mean really both towns but obviously Cumberland in terms of whether they support that option because I I we can't go down that path again if we get there and it's like oh no sorry that's that's out of the option again and um so I don't know if it's possible you know and the other thing too that we talked about the benefit of 80 gry road is that we're a two Town District we

149don't have any physical presence in North Yarmouth and being able to have that again following the close of the memorial school and I think um while there are a lot of benefits to one campus that that is something we would really be losing by pivoting again back to one campus and um just something to consider so I I don't know if there's any way to get some sort of um I don't know recommendations or or somehow letter of support for either option both options I don't know from from the towns yeah the being a resident of North yarm with the sentiment did seem to have shifted um and I don't know if it's just everyone's used to coming to this campus now and the thought of having the school back in North y myth it

150um I guess some of the history isn't as um it's been closed for a long time for a lot of people having a school in North Yarmouth at this point and so it's not as I guess fresh in in you know having the school there um but it did seem to shift some of the conversation um of recent I will share that some of the feedback I got and and this would be this is a very very small sample but um North Yarmouth folks who said my first choice would be one campus my second choice would be a school in North yarith and then my third choice would be if we had property so like if we had found property in Cumberlands instead of 80 gry road um then that would have actually been worse

151to to them than one campus if that makes any sense so yeah I I was surprised um to hear that as well that that North armou families would actually prefer the one campus unless they could get a school in North I would just like to I I I try to make the point again is that for me that the the the two new pieces of information that I had at the Joint meeting as opposed to the me the first meeting I had tended was that uh there were more expansion points on the existing campus than I thought there were the the reason that 2021 plan was not accepted and Mark seis made this point to me very clearly he said I I we just couldn't see a way that within 10 years it would be

152out of room and so the new expansion points that Steve has put together give us flexibility in that way and then the second one was uh the the lack of constraint around the MDOT concerns so those two pieces were new to me and I guess I'd have to say thirdly which we really haven't put a number on it is the fact that it's it it should definitely cost quite a bit less money it was very discouraging to me to to put all the work that you did in lean you know on cost reduction and wind up in the same place and uh and and so now that we have have some Flex Bay on the cost side is very important right yeah and one of the biggest reasons is it's it's a much smaller school

153that we're we're looking at right and the infrastructure and the infrastructure costs were huge would we need to make the other changes in traffic flow on the campus in order to build on campus or would that have to happen later or could it happen later I mean not have to um I don't think I have any answer an for that um I think that it needs to be looked at though um and for efficiency to have you know permanently have this many more students on the campus I think same thing with the MDOT which also was a reason it was a no um for since two and a half three years now is that we assume that there was no flexibility with the MDOT and we learned two weeks ago that there is flexibility now

154that we can look at this again I I do think there needs to be a real look at how the roads in this on the campus work especially the Campus Drive which is the main drag that goes from the Main Street all the way down to Tuttle Road by the middle school entrance I think that road really needs to be looked at again and um I think that is is not as efficient in terms of moving people in and out of our facilities right now um it we've outgrown the road system we've got basically I also question the roads in between Mel Wilson and the central office you know is that working right it really doesn't seem to work at all um so I think there's there's definitely things that have to be looked at

155to make this work that's my opinion I'm only I'm not an architect but I could suggests that that be looked at very strongly those were some of the things that Steve mentioned was looking at the campus drive that goes down through and what would be the redesign of that is that road required by safety vehicles I always wondered it was done as part of the site plan and how does the traffic come off Main Street and then exit to Tunnel Road without having to tie up everything at each end of so it's not needed to be able get a fire truck behind the building or it could be narrowed there's different points of access of how they would have to get to areas on the campus and you would have to have trucks and stuff

156that could get by areas fire trucks and stuff yeah okay like we have an emergency road that goes um up you know from campus drive all the way up to the Fieldhouse um and behind the high school stem area so that definitely is an emergency access only um but could we utilize that road in a different way that's another thing that's come up could I me can still be emergency access road but can it be also utilized or can it be moved you know I think these are things we we do have to find out in order to make this work on campus Because the buildings are actually located in okay areas on campus but I think it's everything else the parking lots the traffic that is the concern you'd actually have a traffic engineer

157look at all that I do a study on it and produce what what the bottlenecks are and how that could be included I was just going to say I mean I definitely support taking next steps to get the information that we need and I think it's just making sure that we're getting all of the information that we're going to need um including possibly you know letters of support from the towns that were recommended including possibly you know looking at a couple different Architects I don't know those are two of the things that I heard tonight that are not currently explicitly laid out in the next steps and I think we've talked about some other things as well so how we make sure that we're getting all of the information we need to eventually make an

158informed decision but it's a great option and definitely I support looking into it further do we have any sense when Steve might get some of the information back to us or is it a process that we have to formally ask for for plans because I you know I think I think just the I understand that it costs a lot I'm sure to have another architect do another design like but what is the double check that we had because we put a lot of trust in another architect who said that we couldn't really do this on campus option and then we check with another one so what is like just the process to make sure that the information we're getting is validated and when is that when are we supposed to get something from Steve because

159we do have a certain amount of trust with him for sure well technically the board has to has to go ahead with that process process um so the facilities committee I recommended that they be the group that you know vets that out and then makes a recommendation to the board which is the uh process that was used last time um so uh whatever that process looks like um it can be condensed um we don't have a contract with a current architect right now so there is no contractual obligation um however they've been instrumental in in working with this for the last four years um and um so I think those are decisions that have to be made by the facilities committee uh or not decisions made by the it's it's made by the board with

160the recommendation of the facilities committee well and I feel like 0 point2 I mean they weren't given the opportunity to present anything for the new property because under our impression it wasn't an option that wasn't what we were buying the land for so um yeah I don't thought Tim could I just follow up Tim uh my understanding was that the on on that 2021 meeting that Oak Point did present a viable oncampus plan they never said we couldn't do it they said it was it it was it was challenging but they did present right now so my followup was in our last meeting we pushed them pretty hard on the one campus and their option was it's not like they were like well we have the two new Acres and this is how that could

161change things right it was pretty the impression that I'm getting out of it and you know we can give him the benefit of the doubt is we've gone so far down one road how can we kind of you know what's the advantage to ad gry road because what it was very clear to that meeting that any oncampus building would cause a lot of traffic like he was like anything could be done like of course like anything could be done he said that but there would be a lot of on campus congestion which is probably still the case with construction and also the costs would probably be as much like that's what I came out of it like we wouldn't have a lot of cost savings for doing an oncampus build and so that was like

162oh okay well we're gonna have all the congestion and it's not going to be done at once and we're not going to have the flexibility in terms of size then and it's going to cost the same then as a board obviously we were kind of in the position of yeah the one campus model that he's presenting to us and that they've looked at doesn't work but I think think what is troublesome is that during that meeting we had the information of the new land and so in terms of due diligence like maybe they you know we haven't I'm not sure the history of US asking for them to reassess but it might be worth them reassessing and or like they didn't want to do that and so I think that's the challenge that I have

163right now is in that last meeting after having all the information that we've had for the last couple months nothing has Chang changed right I understand why they made the decision when we didn't have the land but now we have the land and that opens up everything and so I I just think you know it there's just a a trust has been shaken in the process not in in anyone individually or anything just the process of are are what's the motivations of the people giving us the information that we're getting from various different stakeholders whether or not that's the town board or The Architects from Steve who obviously wants the contract right like what what are the motivations and we should be asking these questions because I think I think we have to make sure

164whatever we put forward next really has a lot of trust behind it yeah on all fairness um to Oak Point I would just say that they've never been formally as to analyze it um so Steve blat as part of the master site plan review um I did ask him to formally hey while you're doing the site plan can you see if a school could get on here do you know just figure you know give us an answer um and so he had to do an analysis with square footage to see if a um prek K1 building for example could fit on the campus which was the last design that we had had for an on-campus plan um so in in all fairness to Oak Point they've not been asked to formally review whether that could

165happen or not and and what that would look like if they had that opportunity to do that so and the other one is is Steve was not act uh Steve blat was not actively pursuing this project we asked him to come in and take a look so so I think that's important he wasn't like pursuing us to do the project we reached out to him so I don't want it to appear like there was some kind of a you know back door entry into this so can we ask Oak Point to an's Point can we ask Oak Point to do that if they're already our they've told me they've told me if the ask is there that they would be happy to look at that if the ask was there okay I'm asking so I

166mean this these are decisions the board must make um I we cannot make them yeah um so which is one of the recommendations um it sounds like the facil the facilities committee needs to have another meeting and Christino just had one but we can have another no I mean we yeah we need to have another meeting and and so Megan can be here and and so and and have chance to think about it yeah so that's what you're asking and number one and to remind people Christina's the chair and Denny and Megan are on the facilities committee I'm an ex official member you're an ex officio member yeah and the enrollment information is coming out possibly early December we'll be able to cross check that I mean it will be you know what three or

167four weeks before we get it if we but we can cross that and yeah yeah maybe we should meet after we I think the most important thing is to cross Che that information to see if it aligns with the current projections because the current projections are giving us the information that we can do this right but if those projections change or are quite a bit different then that that's a different story yeah I just want the most up toate information before we start investing money on yeah because it's going to be another investment right yes that's so lean do you feel as though the next regularly schedu meeting of the facilities committee is adequate well in the time frame the timing of that because I was just I have that calendar up because I was

168I was looking at that um because there isn't one scheduled for a few weeks but it could be aligned with when we would get the enrollment study that's what I'm thinking we had one Friday it's usually the first Wednesday Friday yeah so it's Friday yeah Friday of the month yeah it's on the 1 December 1st yeah um is the next scheduled one um and just Tim I just wanted to bring back to one point that or question that you had um about oako and them answering questions at the meeting I I my understanding and I did uh touch base with with Tyler from o point last week um was that between the 2021 meeting where they said you know the both towns said kind of clearly at that point to the the no to the

169one campus option that was proposed at that time the the sentiment that I think he was coming through with around the the not on campus was partially because of the understanding that they didn't want another the towns didn't want another building on campus at that time um and also throughout last year um the the sentiment or what we are understanding was that it was a no to being able to build on campus so I'm I'm sort of assuming some of his responses were based on his understanding of of what had been happening in the community at that time as well and yes he was not asked specifically to look at the new property yeah I don't mean to infer any motivations I think Oak Point's been great I think they deserve a honestly another shot

170to to consider the the the two acres I'm just saying that like the there this information has our our land has been there for a while and I think that we have an opportunity to do our due diligence and they do too Oak Point does as well and Steve does as well and all of us do so I think I think um I think we can just learn from the process and recognize that it's it's been imperfect to this point and and that includes I think just our first few meetings here just what I'm responsible for of being here you know so um I think just learning from that and and building that trust with all of our agencies both Architects and the various towns I think is something that we're coming away from this

171and I'm really proud of a board as I said for doing our due diligence and asking and being in this position where we're at but I think we just need to recognize the fact that this is H what do we call it like a whiplash Yeah Yeah Tim I I mean it's I've been squirming and it's it's in a very uncomfortable position to be in very uncomfortable and it's not like I was thinking about this it's not like a fairy godmother dropped a parcel of land that we didn't know about before and it just checked all the boxes that you know Leanne um had worked on with the RFP like no it it it is a shift in thinking and um a realization that information just hadn't been processed the way it should have been

172and so as I've just kind of had to sit with this and um realize all the things that I have to take back that I you know put myself out there in the community people who trust me um that I have to go back and say you know here's what we're at um it's that posture of humility um so as you said exactly you know what what do we learn from this so that the same mistake is not made Again by Future boards and the humility of yeah we didn't somehow did not have all the information and um I think that that having to eat that Humble Pie and there's a different noun I want to use but I'm not going to have to eat that Humble Pie is like I can take it because

173I do believe that this is a solution that is ultimately going to be better for the community like and I believe that this has a much better chance of passing um because everybody I feel like can at least have a better conversation now without all the stuff that ad gy Ro ad Grey Road just came with so much baggage whereas this feels like something we can really work on as a community and I think that that's going to really outweigh our discomfort and the ickiness with regards to which architect are we going to go with and how do we reframe the conversation and how do we undo what's been done like that is so uncomfortable But ultimately I think this is this is going to outweigh that I would just like to add um to

174what Kim just said and just say that um I also am feeling Whiplash for designs later um and five years later um however um I will be super honest and tell you that I do not feel the 80 gry road plan would pass again um and it failed once um I think that's also new information we had a project that failed and I think we have to um acknowledge it and to the point where is it going to fail again and I I'll be honest with you I I was getting some pretty cold feat that there just continues to be so many questions about the 80 Grade Road at this point in in the process that should be that should have been over we should have overcome that by now and we haven't been able

175to do it and I think some of it is because there's conditions outside of the board's control um around that project for for whatever reason and I really question we cannot have two failures on the same project um and I think a lot of people are still holding out for don't tell us you can't put a school on the campus just do it you know I I think um I will tell you that we're not unique there are many districts that go through this process I know it feels really hard but I've watched other districts go through the same exact process where it just it goes it's like one thing to the next what how that how do we get here politics sometimes sometimes it's a regulation that comes in and then the regulation changes

176and the information changes it is not perfect and there is no perfect process to building a school of any kind schools are expensive and they are so important to a community and to build one you have to be willing to go through the sludge to get to the prize and the prize is a new building for kids and that's what we need and I'm willing to go through the Sledge I'm eating the crow The Humble whatever pie you just said I'm eating it too because not long ago I talked about why we can't do it on the campus um you know we have to keep going through a process to get to the place where finally we find something that is going to work for students and meet the community's U requirements and it's a

177hard process it's not easy and there's no we could analyze this one 10 times over and it wouldn't matter it might happen again a different way you know it just it's just the way it is and I think we just we're trying to also be honest with each other and the community too about everything that's how we got to this point um a long and Winding Road yes um but we we hope ultimately it leads to a school that our community can be um I don't even want to say bought in on but can understand the need and it being responsive and responsible so okay I'm also looking at the clock in front of me and I I we're we're not making any decisions tonight as we've said we've laid out some recommended next steps

178we've asked to add an additional school board meeting um so we'll have more time to go through um items that we have in addition we have lots of other things other than just the new school project um so the step that we've laid out is for the facility committee to work on recommending an architect we acknowledge the next meeting is um December 1st I guess we can confer if we think that's soon enough and maybe just double checking on the the the numbers of recommendations um but that that I'd like to close discussion if if we're we're good for tonight okay and also recognize that we have another public comment period if uh the public would like to speak um to the school project um at all I'm opening it back up no new memb

179same rules apply I'd like to recognize you thank you let we get the three minutes back up thank you good evening Tim mik I've lived in Cumberland for 44 years I wanted to speak to the public trust issue that you raised 10 years ago we gave away for 442,000 I believe a very good school the down drown Road uh school with the promise we would realize operating efficiencies uh from a central campus so going back further than the last two or three years I think that's where the general public views the tri but more than that is all our concerns about our environment and greenhouse gases and U I'm a little shocked that it's not a consideration in um deciding where place a school because uh the Grey Road School involved bulldozing 15 Acres cutting

180down lots of trees um making the sharing of coms space impossible and also U losing the operating efficiencies of uh more fuel being burnt as people went back and forth be between campuses and uh so I think in some ways not considering um the impact this grey rad property has to the environment also breaks the trust you have with the community to be stup stewards of our community from an environmental perspective and um that folds into the MDOT because I'm always confused they say well you can't have this because all the traffic going through Main Street well people have to and buses have to drive the kids up to uh North Yarmouth and then they have to come back either to their homes or to go to work in Portland the majority I know some

181of people work elsewhere and so I think you can really push back on the MDOT when they built the uh freeway through Frank conia Notch the feds wanted to go with a full width uh interstate and people push back and it's a much uh smaller Parkway and just for the future uh I circulated some school plans for three story buildings and one building even had a parking garage underneath so I think you can uh feel comfortable if if you uh build the new schools with the potential to addon stories uh and um work with the parking you can you can get there so that's just my response so thank you thank you and thank you for for staying okay close public comment um so we have a few remaining items for Action we got through

182the first two initially um now we have professional positions can I get a motion uh for the GMS 68 position please I'll move to approve the appointment of professional position as outlined thank you okay you a second second do you want to present this position yes this is a new position um and the position has been vacant for over a year uh was first um advertised um in the spring of of um 2022 um and we have had um five applicants over that period of time but um no one who met the credentials um or the um would be able to do the position um in the way that the school was looking for so um finally an an applicant came forward um the administration at the school felt it was better to leave the

183position vacant than to hire someone that um wasn't qualified or um wasn't the right fit for the position finally U fifth applicant in over a period of a year this is a very specialized position um and it is a new position and um it's one that you really have to have the right mix to be in this this particular role and so uh this person um that is before you tonight uh is the right match and um the team at the middle school is very happy um and they interviewed four out of the five um applicants over the last year here um but we had a team of people that have been doing these interviews and um finally found like they have found the right fit for the position um so moving forward with this

184tonight any questions call for a vote all in favor unanimous okay now we'll move forward with the motion for the waiver request can I get a motion I move to approve and submit the waiver request of October 28 and 29 2023 26 and the 27th 2023 thank you adjustment for the calendar for the 2023 23 24 calendar per mdoe rule chapter thank you Christina can I get a second an second yes um I appreciate pointing that out that is a typo on the Blue Notes should have been October 26 and 27th thank you pointing that out um so we are requesting a waiver um and I say we myself and Leanne um and on behalf of the board it has to be uh sent to the Department of Education the commissioner has to approve waiver

185um we're asking for the two days to be waved um this is very um consistent with all the school districts in our area um we had several meetings during the time that the events were going on in Lewiston um and afterwards um one of the considerations um was how are we handling these two days and pretty much everyone um agreed that um we would be asking the commissioner for waivers main School management has already weighed in with the commissioner um and has asked the commissioner to please Grant these waivers um there's a lot of reasons um one is just um I think just the the feeling Behind These two days and the messaging that we'd be giving by saying we're making these up in June because of let's look back and see why um I

186don't think that sells well and or looks good um the second reason is that um even though we have 176 days built into our calendar One Day More than the state requires um we do have a portion of our district that's not in line with that so with the ninth grade coming for one day and then 10th through 11th and 12th grade not um they would not have had um we would not be able to uh to just wave one day we really need to wave um both days for the whole District so there's no opportunity there even with the 176 school day um so that's our recommendation um and Le you're part of the recommendation obviously and it would be written on behalf of the board board we wrote it as if you were

187approving it obviously we would um file this away in this in the file cabinet if you do not approve it any questions all in favor okay so it's now 9:02 um I think per policy if we to continue with the meeting um past nine we want like the board to it's not well it's it's actually a practice a practice it's a practice if it's after 9 um do we want to still continue on with uh the agenda what's left committee reports it's committee reports and how long's your superintendent report I can make it as short or as long as you want the highlights I know there's some good highlights sure so we'll Contin I have to say um I really I have to say that it's been a long time since we had a regular

188meeting I know had a joint meeting so there is there's a lot of stuff in this report um you might want to read it in the morning but um you know we had the main Su these are actually things that happened in the last month I know they feel like they were so far away but since we last met these are things that happened uh main Supreme Court um visited uh gley High School it was really a great experience for we had students coming in and out of that um experience uh all morning and they actually heard real cases before them um and then the attorneys after each of the three cases would um answer questions um and um Steve morard state representative was the attorney for the day um and the students were able

189to ask questions about law we have an introduction to law course at the high school that class also stayed after and asked questions of the justices of the Supreme Court so as really um there's only three high schools in Maine this year that were tapped for this experience and I want to thank uh representative Mor Ari for making sure we were one of them um at gy high school um we also had um a two-week exchange from students from bar France um so uh Kim McDonald and Taylor pulin who were here tonight um were involved in uh planning that exchange um and uh the high school students from our school will be going over to Bar in the spring I believe it's April um as part of this exchange that'll be going during the vacation

190in April also at the high school um there was a day earlier in October um that was really kind of a big hit for everyone um English teachers worked with seniors around their senior essays for the common application Juniors took the uh PSATs sophomores um were able to visit um a school of their choice whether was Colby bden Bowden or USM so a main school um freshman uh had in onsite um experiences with Camp Kev this is the second year that we've had them come in that was all day um just kind of bonding and community experiences so it was a really good day for the high school the Middle School um really 48 uh has been involved in a lot of um Spirit Week stuff so did the high school but a lot of

191dress ups you can see um a lot of the staff got into it in fact they were probably even more into it than the students were um you can see principal MacArthur is down there in the Barbie box I just want to point that out um at Mabel ey Wilson school um there was a dedication um Janet hoam um was as a long-term U staff member ated Tech at Wilson school and um in in the district in general um and she um unfortunately passed away about a year ago um and there's uh plans to do something for her this beautiful bench on the new playground um it's just a great place um and I knew Lan Bono Brooks who's here tonight too she was involved in that um process actually you were well with Lori

192vogle um we're very instrumental in making sure this happen so uh just a really nice addition to the playground so um thank you to all those staff also at mael ey Wilson school um there was the annual costume parade for the kindergarten they paraded around the whole school with the older students kind of cheering them on as well as the staff and then you can see officer Owen here um she had a c actually there's probably three or four students that I saw wearing a police uniform so she had she had a basically a whole contingency crew there helping her out that day bbel Wilson school also uh Joanne matuso art classes have been working on uh watercolors and painting that's kind of kind of one those lost arts per se uh in our modern

193era with technology so it it's really great to have students working with mediums um and Joanne and Linda who both work at the Wilson school um do a nice job bringing that in and Jonna King a kindergarten teacher uh this is an annual thing she does is organize um food pantry items and then take them down to the um Food Pantry in the Cumberland Town Office so again her students were involved in that U making sure um there's a lot of food for the holid for the season um in the athletic world I'm not going to get everything at this point it's been so busy with Athletics but the girls girls cross country team won the Western Main Class B title so congratulations to the lady Rangers um and then in every Sports um Team

194um or game there was an event for every sports program where a student spoke about the C's CARE program and cow cares is um a student who passed away in a neighboring state I think it was Massachusetts um as a result of a mental health um uh event and um his father started this program and it's been spreading uh throughout New England uh and came to speak to the students and staff at the high school here um and now this program is at really high school so we're really proud to have it here um senior Molly Mulligan who's on the volleyball team this is just an example U we had a a player or a student talk at the beginning of an event at each of our sporting events this fall so uh Molly took

195care of the volleyball team and again we had that everywhere probably know by now that the Rangers football um is having a great season um and they are off to the state championship this Saturday 11 o'clock in Bangor on Garland Street um and they just won the um what's called the big school um South Regional Championship so against Brunswick on Saturday night so very excited for our football team in advancing to the state championship and again I'm not getting all the athletic teams right now and all the shoutouts that go out to Athletics um I believe David Shapiro will be here at your next board meeting scheduled to and he can kind of wrap the season up and then Sarge's shout outs so Sarge says seres our mascot in case you're wondering um thank you

196to um one of our teachers uh Katie cess I never say your name right but that's her name um who is one of her GT teachers she was selected one of very few teachers in the United States um to participate in the National History Day um and to help uh the Library of Congress um build up its resources around history um and historical arguments um this is a an amazing program um that we've had in our district for a number of years Kathy Carney was um a teacher um before Katie and Katie has taken the Baton and our students go on to Nationals year after year um and so it's such an important program in our district especially at the middle level um and uh so congratulations to Katie for her work on that and

197helping the Library of Congress I think there I don't remember how many teachers in the United States it's a very small group that we Ed to do that so um shout out there from Sarge and that's my report thank you I don't know why I don't think I've seen Sarge before well Sarge has been updated um Sarge used to we had to keep Sarge away from young children um because the the mask costume that we had this is true that we had for 40 years um was some of the young children were crying and um there was this was a years years ago we had to put the costume away and then we bought a new one probably two or three years ago and this is the new and improved Sarge what do you look

198like he's a lot friendlier he was grumpy he never smiled he never smiled he always had a bad attitude and we had to put him out to pasture um so he's enjoying retirement but uh our new mask is friendly and everybody loves him sarge is a big yeah in fact sge comes to assemblies oh so all right you can make an appearance at a school board meeting point great okay thank you um moving on to committee reports I'm excited to hear from our students I'll start yeah so this is the first full week into quarter two very exciting quarter one is over um yeah the Juniors took the PSATs a couple weeks ago and today was the day that we got our scores back so that was exciting um the bouncing off what Mr Porter

199talked about it's really exciting that the football team is going to States considering that last year was their first year being back to just really students on it um I went to the game against Brunswick and it was just really really nice to see how much support there is for from students for the sports teams um this weekend as a French student the seniors not Juniors so not me will be going to Quebec which is also very exciting and fun um we have parent teacher conferences coming up so that is also exciting right before Thanksgiving break yay thank you and on the senior end with the end of the quarter for everyone definitely a bit of a stressful time with wrapping all of the kind of end of quarter assignments and it seemed that those

200last two weeks are always just the most busy um but coupled with the end of the quarter all um early deadlines were either November 1st or earlier so the seniors are busy getting their applications in and if you follow the gy guidance Instagram you'll see the Deluge of pictures and smiles of people who have just submitted so um it's definitely a bit of a weight off uh the shoulders of many people who were applying places early um and it's a little bit of a lull until um when the rest of the applications are due in January another super fun thing that we got to do is to kind of celebrate senior year um was carve pumpkins and every senior got to carve one or more pumpkins and they were um displayed outside of the Guyer

201gymnasium so I don't know if any of any of you guys saw them while you were driving by but uh I definitely had a lot of fun carving pumpkins and it definitely felt very festive and with election day tomorrow um there was a voter drive at the high school put on by the student government where the um where we registered over 45 people to vote so that was super exciting um registering and pre-registering for those who are not yet 18 uh I registered and I think Sophia you no not yet I was sick oh yeah okay um but there were there was there was a lot of people who came to register and um was an increase by about four times from last year so that was exciting and overall yeah it's it's been a

202it's been a fun time and long time since since the last meeting so I'll try and I'll try and just keep it brief and end with that thanks I me they had that here at the high school again right the voter registration yeah because that was be we've done that before I just wanted to I I just wanted to point out to the that the high school does a great job um with Helping Seniors submit their applications their essays uh voter registration this is something you do not see in every community and I think our community does a really really good job of it um and I know I've gotten a lot of good comments from families about the support that their seniors get in this community so I just want to throw that out

203there definitely it's definitely something I've noticed the the guidance Department with like with students coming in definitely I've been I've been like oh my gosh I need this question answered right now I'm like and and they're so helpful and so understanding so they they do a really great job at at helping helping students apply and just uh with their post-secondary plans in general and they do an excellent job really really great awesome thank you community engagement I know Megan's not yeah I'm not I'm not sure we left or she left this off last time but we've met um a couple of times um to go kind of go over the the mission and vision of a new committee um and we've we've kind of built out a framework for us to more regularly connect with

204the public and have more two-way conversations um with them so we are looking at um either expanding on our website or building like an independent um website or communication tool where there'll be information from the board directly FAQs um and you know just the the most up toate um direct conversation from the board but also a place where people could ask us questions um I know we're also looking for other opportunities to engage so we'll be at um we're going to try to to to be at the polls tomorrow um we you'll see us more at some craft fairs um and then we're also looking to to develop um or put on a couple facilities tours whether or not that was ad gr Road originally we might still do that um or around kind of

205um our campus and just kind of get a sense from the community what they feel um um about you know what's going on with the new school and uh the new different campus options so we have some things to work out with that but um other than that it's really just finding ways to um different ways to engage with the public that works and um just improve our overall communication ises that cover it Kim Jeff I think so yeah yes great so I know Tom is not here from finance and I don't know if we have I know we had the one um meeting that was around the 0 gry Road financing but I think the reg have't anything sense so moving to policy um since our last board meeting um the policy committee has

206completed the initial edits to the graduation policy which has now been sent to Drummond and woodsom for their review um we have our next meeting tomorrow on Google meet where we'll be discussing policy bed remote participation at board meetings um because there was a change in statute regarding that or not statute but maybe statute sorry um and then if um hopefully we'll also be able to discuss be BDF I mean sorry BDF board advisory committees and bde board standing committees um just to make sure that everything is following our current practice with the board because as of right now um we don't have BDF um as a policy it's been presented but it isn't um was never finalized by the previous committee thanks an facilities Christina uh so last Friday as you heard um we

207had a meeting um it was our second uh all facilities tour um open to board members and we had a good showing and the first one we had the prior month um saw the new land saw the high school and discussed what the needs upcoming needs would be and the second time we did the uh what we did we did the mael ey and we did the middle school and the uh administrators were able to walk us through and talk about what other needs and showed different places that we need to be looking at in the future um do that cover that yeah okay and we'll have another meeting soon sounds like it okay the tours were awesome so thank you for yeah I'm glad people can make it good and also some of the

208administrators that we may have surprised when we came into their building were very gracious no they loved it actually they they do like they enjoy the opportunity to to let board members know what they think needs to happen in their schools um and and repairs and all that stuff so um they they thoroughly enjoyed it yeah it was nice all right curriculum I know Tom's not here and I don't think there's been another meeting we did have another one um we went over the uh mea scores which um they were stable SL strong um so that was good and then we went over the annual report um the data um you know how many students are in the IB versus AP which we were previously discussing and um anything on that Tommy was there anything

209else I was I was not able to make it to that meeting there were a bunch of upgrades Denny Den so the annual report there's a lot of upgrades we spent a bit bit of time talking about those yeah that's right yeah and then we just talked about future topics um that we need to interested in going over great thanks for that update um Equity we have our third meeting on Wednesday at 3:15 in this room and we are still working our way through the plan uh we decided to look at it from a different perspective and make sure that uh the district leadership team the administrators were very clear on what their responsibilities would be as the plan is written right now uh along with what Jeff's responsibilities would be a superintendent and so

210it's important to just give the district leadership team a chance to make sure that they have really thought through that and that we can just make sure that we're offering something that can realistically happen through through the administrators so that's that's going to be a big piece of our meeting on Wednesday great oh and sorry uh because we we're pushing back a little bit uh so much is happening with this conversation about the new school and that tonight needed to be about that plus understanding that we we maybe needed to spend a little bit more time with the district leadership team we will not have the plan for the board to look at and finally approve before Thanksgiving which was our original goal but hopefully before January we will be able to to present that

211to all of you okay thanks k um ad hoc committee reports any I'll just say quickly related to Community Partners um PTO and Foundation 51 we're meeting next week um and this is the final week of pto's uh parent power appeal so um people can donate to help support the enrichment in our school in our schools thank you any other at hoc committees okay so closing committee reports moving on to Communications um as I mentioned earlier we were looking to add an additional um board meeting to the calendar um because we had quite a a pause with the joint meeting and then as you've heard throughout tonight quite a bit going on have we confirmed we are looking at the I don't think we've heard from everybody yet okay um I think Melissa had heard

212from most so would you want me to just go ahead and schedule it sure if you um we were looking at the adding Monday November 27th so we would have uh three meeting dates in a row the 20th the 27th and the 4th of December okay so we can go ahead and we'll just send it out okay at this point great and that was the only item I there um can I get a motion to adjourn so moved okay a second second all right all in favor thanks everyone