001e is everybody ready so ready all right well I will get the show on the road all right so welcome everyone to the Handover or Handover School Board organizational and regular meeting I have the meeting getting us started on reorganization and the first item of business in that regard is the appointment of a chair so I will now take nominations for chair of the Han School Board tell me I nominate Ben Keen Ben keen's been nominated do I have any other nominations unopposed all those in favor of Ben's chair congratulations Ben thank you everyone I appreciate your support all right I will take the Reigns and we'll move forward to to be the appointment of the vice chair would anyone like to appoint somebody to be Vice chair at the hand scho I appoint Kelly
002McConnell Vice chair she's so good at it the vice chair of all the things any other nominations for vice chair right seeing none um all those in favor of K McConnell's V is unanimous 60 and I know that ter loo is not here at the moment um can I hear a nomination for secretary please oh I nominate Tara to be the secretary any other nominations for Secretary of the hover School Board all right see none all those in favor of Tera boso as secretary 60 sorry terara then moving right along to the Schoolboard committees like we talked about uh last night for folks who are there I think we'll do this at the four chairs meeting probably at some point in early April kind of do the best we can for Equity purposes for board
003level involvement but if someone has strong opinions on what they wish or wish to not be involved with this year at the Handover committee level please feel free to say so now or let me know by email and otherwise the four chairs will let you know what you're doing in a few weeks for example Deb do you want to continue to be NH hsba delegate or doesn't matter I'm happy to continue second that can comments yeah no okay all right any want to do Finance I second that too as the vice chair well why will let that go for now all right moving right along with the conflict of interest policy remember we did not talk about this yesterday because it's more of handle and Norwich school boards and I note welcome back Marcel and
004I don't feel a huge need to go into huge level details on policy BCB conflict of interest because we've all dealt with it before but if you wish to take a look at it and make sure it refresh your memories and I think we need to sign this don't we J this was sort of a hold over from what Norwich does we decided that it would be maybe a good idea to test that you read it to it do we have a printed copy of this at the moment I do not okay all right well we can save that for the next meeting if it's not immediately handy so we will move right along to agenda review does anything have does anyone have anything they wish to add amend or subtract from the agenda tonight
005seeing none we're going for efficiency tonight public comment if anyone in the room or on Zoom we do a people on Zoom tonight we should talk about anything on the we should talk to us about anything that is not on the the agenda please do so at this time you have three minutes please talk up come up to the front if you wish to speak and please identify your name your hometown and if you're representing any particular group right there Hi everyone my name is Elena Turon I'm from Hanover in a recent meeting with Miss amrhein and Miss Parsons I learned that in 2022 the ray School eliminated all ux history from 1492 until the Civil Rights era from its social studies curricula no history from this time frame will be taught until the new
006social studies curriculum is put in place in 3 to 5 years time it will correspond to the National Council for social studies so-called C3 framework when I asked what specific knowledge will enter this framework or this new curriculum Miss amrhein referred me to the framework on page six of this framework I know this is long it said well it's up to the states New Hampshire leaves this question largely up to local schools that means it's up to us so I ask you today to please ensure that the race willo reintegrate usuf history from 1492 up through the Civil Rights era into its social studies curriculum as soon as possible Miss ammer Hein is right that quality revision takes time and our history is violent and complicated but many current children's books sensitively deal with issues
007such as Conquest slavery the American Revolution and its unfinished work Miss amim and her amazing teachers know these books let them teach them again miss Parsons told me and I do hope she was joking that every day she removes books from the library that quote tell lies about history I would expect book Banning in Florida not Handover and I worry that our children will not be prepared for the Middle School's robust social studies curriculum should the first time they hear about Columbus be in sixth grade learning also takes time it is so good to start early finally bringing in US history in ways that teachers deem fit will help achieve the portrait of a learner someone inquisitive open to new understandings nuance and diverse points of view but in the end our children should learn
008American history because it is their story it belongs to them and it will be for them to make do not keep it from them common ground is ever more difficult to find in our polarized country Let's Build It by sharing our common Val values and our Collective histories is it not our duty to do so as soon as we can I thank you for your time any other comments from any member other members of the public seeing none we'll move right along to the principal's report Miss AMR what do you have for us tonight good evening everyone welcome back and welcome to board members um I update for tonight follows pretty much the same template that I've been using so you can see enrollment but I won't go into detail holding um pretty steady uh
009important upcoming dates include a PTO meeting on Friday is live and in person if anybody is uh Desiring to join us it'll be at noon um in the office conference room I just wanted to extend a thank you to the Handover Community for supporting our budget and other Associated warn articles uh on our voting day on Tuesday um we're fortunate to work in this community and that does not go and noticed how supportive we are and we're grateful for the time and the effort that went into building the budget from all of the ray staff the SAU the Handover finance committee the Hanover School Board and any other folks that were involved along the way so thank you for our confidence in our school and for your continued support of Rey our staff our students
010and our mission um probably will not surprise you that we are still looking for folks so if you are watching and you are interested in working at the ray school please reach out to us we're looking for you uh we were fortunate to have an inservice day that provided us time a full day uh that provided us time to collaborate and work on curriculum and so teams around the ray School in specialized areas like specials ESO foreign language uh we're joined by some of our Mary and cross colleagues uh to work on alignment as well as documentation of our curriculum in those areas and our classroom teachers is engaged in a full day of science professional development and collaboration which continues to be led by wonderful gr fifth grade teacher Shane Clifford uh you can
011read about our agenda of the day and I just wanted to point out the picture that's part of our principal report this was uh gathering together to conduct a gathering ideas meeting so Mr Clifford introduced us to what we what was to come this air circus activity what you can sort of see around this room is that there were various centers put in place where we were going to experience different phenomena that had to do with um you exploring air and the properties of um we were able to create hypotheses and then go and conduct experiments and gather data in order to then come back together for a making meaning Circle and after we had our making meaning Circle all together uh we learned about claim writing so after we experience what we experience and
012gather that data how do we then transmit what we learned in a way that helps us understand what we're learning about um Mr Clifford also told told us about the role of direct instruction in the Next Generation science standards so there can be a misconception that there is no direct instruction that happens in ngss that it's all constructivists it's all students we are there to guide the way um but he was careful to also let us know that there are going to be moments where direct instruction is appropriate when we're teaching science and we went through some of that uh and then very exciting is that we moved into the real planning beginning some grade level planning on a collaborative ngss unit with the mar and Cross School um today in our Wednesday afternoon time
013we continued that work and went over to maryan cross um engaged in collaboration and really started to dive into the storyline so our PD day was extremely busy really engaging filled with discussion and activity um and it helps us continue our understanding of ngss and how to teach science uh parallel to all of this also our educational assistants attended training at the Richmond Middle School with other District educational assistants that Robin helped coordinate Robin Steiner helped coordinate you can see some of those topics as well um we're glad to say that we've wrapped up the first portion of our New Hampshire Statewide assessment system testing uh this year was different from previous years typically our students take Ela math and if you're in fifth grade you also take the science module all within a window
014of time that typically happens between April and June but we received notification this year that they were pulling writing out of that testing window and doing it separately you can find the explanation that they gave us within the principal's report um but what that meant is that for the past couple of weeks we had a very short writing window where students took their New Hampshire SAS writing assessment the other pieces of the assessments of the reading portion of ela English language arts the math portion and then for fifth graders the science portion will still occur within the normal testing window of April 1st through June 7th and then interestingly enough we found out in this update too that next year they plan to put the writing assignment back in with the other tests so we'll
015do that next year um I attached some information about uh our data from this year uh sorry from the previous year so in 2023 because we have not taken our 2024 testing yet with the exception of writing um so I attached some information for you to review there just with the overarching you know headline that we continue to outperform the state um and our students continue to achieve very well in in uh English language arts mathematics and in science um I am happy to dive more into Data if folks would like a more micro view this is definitely the macro level um but I'll open that for question time moving on uh we are really excited to start uh kindergarten registration so we're Gathering names as of this morning we have 45 registered kindergarteners and
016that will will continue to accept those names in preparation for our kindergarten registration days that will occur in early June um in case you're curious a couple of fresh picks Ray Cafe updates for you including transitioning to a new meal planner um website that will help student or families understand for their students accurate nutritional information especially around allergens that has been some feedback that we've been receiving that it's hard to find that information so moving forward that's one of the things things that this new uh system will highlight for families there if you're in uh board docs there is a live link that you can click for more information on a flyer and um not so I guess surprising for for the ray school because we already have had this going our relationship with the
017ray Cafe manager Trevor is wonderful and we've shared with him that um we would like to see um more meatless options and more vegetarian options and he has actually been working to do that already throughout the year but now there's the name for the initiative so in in addition to what he's already doing to provide those vegetarian options like salad bar and actual items on the hot menu um we're going to have meatless Mondays too so another thing to look for in upcoming menus we received uh guidance around the new covid guidelines from the CDC just reiterating that we follow science we continue to follow the CDC and so we are aligning with what that guidance is and there's more information the principal's report but if you really want to get the real information go
018ahead to the the links for the CDC um we have had one half day for parent teacher conferences and we have one more that's coming up that will be on Wednesday March 7 27th that's next Wednesday and just a reminder that that's a noon release day for the race school only and unbelievably we are already doing summer planning so thinking about curriculum work extended services um other plans that we're going to have have uh to support students and to support teaching and curriculum work over the summer and I just can't believe that we're you know rolling into April and that our April break is coming as quickly as it is so let's go team think you for that information Lauren any questions for from board members all right Tony and then de um so I
019knew Colonial day was eliminated some years ago I didn't realize there was no US History being Tau I don't know if that's true if you want to comment on that I'd be interested and it does if that's true it seems to me a little lack hope that some most history would be T yeah so as Elena mentioned we did have that meeting with her and and we are certainly we were very honest with Elena and that she presented that information here tonight um I would not state that it's a total elimination of US History during that time period but I would say that there is much work to be done to make sure that the teaching that we're doing is not oneoff pieces that it's coherent and cohesive and well vertically aligned across the school
020um one of the things that we shared with Elena was that you know we have units of study but those units aren't necessarily tied into something that's a prior knowledge that was given to students in a previous grade so what yes well we did make that decision to move away from colonial days and how we taught it we are certainly working towards creating a more coherent cohesive and aligned curriculum that really to Elena's Point helps tell the story all the way through US history and prepares our students for telling their own story and understanding where they came from why we're here now and where they're going but for the time being like gets off limits can't talk about anything in history no it's not off limits that's has never been a mandate we would never
021say that at all we encourage um teachers to bring in knowledge of US History to teach units that address the hard topics in the way that's uh developmentally appropriate but but consider what that will look like and be really thoughtful and how it's being planned and carried out in the classrooms so if I were to go into a second grade classroom you know they have uh units about um change makers and those change makers can exist all throughout US history and that includes the period of time that Elena commented on um but again to her point that knowledge is not necessarily situated on a timeline that's cohesive um I'm not sure that answered your question it is not off limits we would not tell teachers don't teach this thing we understand recognize and and value
022the importance of this knowledge and want to make sure that we're doing it well up to that um so I guess what I'm I'm trying to understand right so um is it that you you all right not just you learn but you all have um identified that there is not a aligned curriculum in Us in history perhaps in general including social studies in general and that you kind of acknowledge that that there isn't that kind of step and track and this is I'm out of my range of knowledge here but you know the scope and sequence um and there we go not step and track that's Union negotiations close really close so you know that that scope and sequence so so as far as by saying you know we don't have a comprehensive US History
023curriculum if you say it that that's what you're it's not that history isn't being taught it's just not being taught in aligned View and therefore there are pieces that are missing yep right okay so but I I because to to me what I hear like it's not being you know there's no curriculum it feels like it's not being taught which is confusing to me because I you know know in the first you know first grade in know e had discussions about social studies and history and figures from that time period so that's why I'm a bit I just maybe try to inter if you can maybe say it in another way that is for somebody like me he um with what is currently being done and when this decision was made or maybe view of
024the curriculum was adopted um I'm still a little confused about what's actually happening versus yeah so you can kind of clarify that I think I'm G think and try to decide how figure out not decide but like figure out how to respond to that yeah and maybe it's another agenda item for next month I I just when you're more prepared so I I just I really would like to give a good answer on this because it's really important and I'm trying to figure out how to answer that on flly at this moment so yeah I would appreciate the time to really um think about your question and come back to the board with a more cohesive answer and thoughtful answer about what is occurring and what is not occurring that sounds perfectly reasonable that cont
025test from my own kids who are currently here that from what I can tell they're getting plenty of history as well so maybe it's just more discretionary at the individual teacher level which is a whole another conversation so we look forward to more detailed response next month Social Studies is also sorry yeah that's also just quite a beast right because it's all of geography and history and culture and I mean it's a lot of there a lot of pieces to try to put into social studies so yeah any other conversations from board members on this immediate topic Robin and just a couple of others if you approach the bench yes sure so social studies is very complicated right now because there are no New Hampshire standards they've been working on them for several years so
026when we looked at the overall curriculum you know that we put math first now we're working on science we are kind of waiting for the social studies we will follow the C3 standards but again they're very broad so they're Broad in terms of lant civics history geography economics those topics but there's no specific like when we think about a history curriculum from previous years it was laid out like you should teach this at this grade level this at this grade level that has all changed it's very much inquiry based so I think we are seeing a transition in social studies curriculum at the elementary level at almost all the levels really but probably most so at the elementary level and that will literally probably be the last subject area that we tackle as a K
027through five team because again it's still in flut we can take the C3 standards but there's no State Direction either so and they keep saying every year okay we're going to give you a curriculum from the state that we want you to follow but that has not happened so I think you know they've made some tweaks at Ray and we'll continue to do so but we want to do it with the most knowledge that we have when we start doing that so I don't know if that helps but we can certainly give you more answers about it thank you for that background Robin it was my turn this no um I I've been thinking a lot about this topic and trying to recall what my own children did when they were at the race school
028and you know obviously colonial days stands out in the Japanese study unit and nothing else I'm sorry to say except things involving sugar cubes and horrible constructions of items but I I do think it's important for you to have the time and for us to have the knowledge about what is happening so that we can address and respond to community concerns that there's this Gap and nothing is happening um I have a more uh easily answered question would you please just REM oh shoot where' my screen go would you just remind me easy ngss stands for no problem it's the Next Generation science okay thank you I just couldn't remember Tony again then Kelly I just had a question on the testing and it I don't know if I'm misreading it but it looks like
029they're they're all results from 2023 last year spring um and I'm wondering how it compares to Prior years and what would be I have uh percentages that I can share with you right now um thinking you know grade to grade so acknowledging that if I say you know grade three in 2022 had this level of proficiency and grade three in 2023 had this level of proficiency we're talking about a different cohort of students altogether it gets a little bit tricky to do an Apples to Apples comparison if you'd like me to come back to the next board meeting and try to help you track Co cohorts through I can bring that information um but what I have tonight is I can tell you third grade you know Ela in 2022 and what it looks like
030in 2023 third third grade math 2022 2023 is that would that be helpful or yeah I don't need it right this second but it would be interesting to just see and I'm even interested even though it's a different cohort and that's always true so like for third grade are we relative you know obviously they're going to be bumps but are we staying the same you know for instance so I don't need it right this second but it would be interesting to see okay if the numbers are trending up down maybe like three or five year Trends on all these things would be good to see when this is introduced okay that that's an inable question I was going to ask myself as well okay I wasn't sure how high level high L okay then then
031do you want me to answer that question right now if you have it immediately handy I think we we all here okay I'll start with what I have tonight and then other questions I'll make sure to address next time all right get ready and I I'll have this reiterated next time in the principal report so you'll have it in writing too all right so in grade three Ela in 2022 the proficiency rate was 84% in grade three in 2023 it was 78% so 82 sorry 84 to 78% for grade four Ela in 2022 it was 82% in 2023 it was 89% in uh grade five for ELA in 2022 it was 84% in 2023 it was 89% those cohorts are actually improving two out of three yeah yeah two out of three yeah that's interesting
032shall I continue with math or is that not helpful at this be others for me I'm not going to look at just I'll put it in the report yeah yeah so put it so thank you put in the report um and then you know yeah so same grades and trends of the same cohort because those are roughly more similar kids than different grades or same different years I guess of the same grade um but I I it's always been a question for me because the doe reports um student progress um and and like they they basically what they do is they I don't know how they do it because it's kind of a magical number maybe it's a little black box and it doesn't actually mean anything but you know I I think it's some
033sort of like taking the same cohort and comparing year-over-year versus where where they would have expected growth to occur based upon a growth expectation that I don't understand um but you know I did see that the most recent report is we were above average of the growth so not only did we have high um comparative against state but we exceeded the growth expectation of our cohort but I don't actually really understand what that growth means um I don't know how it's calculated and what it is but it it is something that people talk about in is of proficiency is like you know we might have high proficiency but if kids aren't learning more you know faster whatever you know it's that's right so I think both of those are kind of interesting and and if
034May you could just help explain what that is I will I will try my best I don't create that metric yeah I mean I don't know if it's a yes I've got all that data I've can share with you over the last four years with comparison so I can do that yeah okay I I did that up to last year I didn't plug it in for this year because I think when I presented it last time probably because it was so great there really weren't any questions so I thought maybe we go even higher levels yeah I I also have that data I'm not sure how they calculate that growth expectation but I can try to find information that oh perfect I just I just at the state level they're talking about you know like
035incentivizing programs based upon per you know performance and growth and proficiency so I just if it just see feels like a number that's important but I don't know what it means yeah so maybe next time we can have Robin and more kind of tag team of what does it mean how is it measured with trends for the last couple years that'd be great to have anything else specific to this topic okay Kelly Kelly so I was curious to see how many is it fours the blue is that four yes yeah that we have in the ELA it's wonderful and then we I don't know that it matters but we seem to have more green especially in a couple of the grades right um in the math and then the science so that's a level three
036and I don't know if that's just a testing difference on looking looking over your shoulder and see that wasn't necessarily the case in 2022 so that could just be they shifted how they were testing and they change it every year so it's not always Apples to Apples right but I was just curious and that again that might be a when when we get the full data done might be something to look at but I was curious about that too the three versus four ver marel new topic sort of okay we're trying all right um I was thinking about the social studies history curricula if you're coming back with some more information next time um I was wondering if there's an easy or quick way to give us a sense of how this is being handled
037well where it's being handled well because maybe this is just uh where I am but it's really hard for me to separate out like economics and history like aren't those related um and so or or like literature right they don't have to be separated out quite so much by discipline it seems and so I'm wondering um if part of the like overwhelming feeling of the is like keeping them all so separate whereas like thinking about integrating them would make it seem less overwhelming again could just be good it's a good suggestion it's not just a hand problem that's up yeah it actually sounds B similar to what Miss Herold saal was all about not seg way to that yeah okay um I have a question for Lauren I am very happy to hear about the
03845 students already signed up for kindergarten noting that this year's kind cor is 46 it seems like hopefully we'll pass that fairly soon does that surprise you that we have so many early on in the year or is it really we get that many right now and it's kind of stagnant in summer that is more what we would expect okay um last year was pretty wild because we had really very few registrations up front and then and we were looking at maybe like two classes of kindergarten and then it really picked up over the summer that was not how it usually goes we usually get sort of the initial um registration of students because we reach out directly to the child care centers um you know we spread the word really quickly up front and
039then we have folks that make decisions over the summer about whether the kindergarteners are going to come to kindergarten or repeat another year in um in preschool and then we have the folks that move in as well and we have the folks that just haven't done it yet so yeah we're we're pretty much where we would expect to be at this point in the year are there more kids that you know or at least know are coming like younger siblings haven't signed up yes okay any other questions for Lauren from board members or the public see none we'll move right along thank you Lauren as always all right moving on to business requiring discussion a draft agenda topic template is attached if you want to look at similar to what we talked about at jesden
040last night so if anyone sees anything that they would like to change or uh add subtract from the template knowing it is just a template we can adjust things as needed on the slide Kelly I'll make the same suggestion I made last night I think there's been a lot of discussion about curriculum in the district um I said same thing Dr last night um about math and social studies um so I'm wondering if you might want to add for maybe the June meeting as you head into summer work or may meeting as you're heading into summer work um kind of looking back at the year what is the curcum work that's been done and what are we looking towards over the summer just sort of an update on that and then as well in this
041in the fall how did we do this summer right yeah but calling out cor I know it's always in your reports it's always in Robin's reports but just calling it out as as an item I excuse me I would also um it this only occurs to me now and I didn't think about it at all last night but I would really like to know in the fall about an enrichment grants that Ray School teachers received and and just five minutes saying this was because I know the the board pays for those or funds those enrichment grants and I think it would really be useful for the board to know more than just you know I know what they are and Tara knows what they are but other people don't and I think it would really
042be helpful not to say those teachers need to come in and report on it I think that's prob too much time on their part sounds good but then I also um Wanted just to re add the spring discussion of potential Newry School Board Association resolutions that we might want to bring before the board in say April with I mean in May with time to vote on it in June and then as you so thoughtfully added last night then on the September agenda to make sure we have time to go over what the published resolutions are and the board take a position on them any other comments or ads right seeing none let's move right along thank you for those comments everyone and now we're on to retreat topics so again sort of just like last
043night if you have any ideas for things you want to specifically discuss after the retreat which is scheduled for Saturday May 11th specific location TVD yeah so we uh Ryan if she hasn't already reached out to each of the chairs she's trying to pull together chair four chairs meeting for that this purpose oh okay right so if you have any particular topics or location requests please send them uh to me and or J and or Ryan and otherwi at the four chairs meeting we will let you know the outcome of that any questions about that right moving right along to the appointment of the accounts payable approver so this is signing off on checks and whatnot we're trying to make this more consistent have it be changed quarterly so if anyone wants to volunteer please
044please please for the next three months right Z thank you sometimes just resps to I I will just say that KY and I U did it most recently I wasn't mentioning that it was Ben and me so Vol told all right so Marcel and Deb will take that on to the next three months thank you to both of you and now business requiring action um this is kind of typical expenditures and minutes I would like to hear a motion for approval by consent for those things anyone move to approve items B through d by consent any seconded by Tony any questions or comments seeing none all those in favor please raise your hand thank you it is unanimous 60 again noting tera's absence tonight moving on to report of the chair first welcome back everyone
045and thank you for your support uh become make chair welcome back Marcella thank you for joining us again thank you uh Kelly and Deb for running and joining us one more time and thank you for the voters for approving all of the things we asked we know it is a lot and we thank you for your understanding and patience and love towards the schools and that is all I have any questions for me for any can I just yes to I mean truly I mean having a support in the 92 you know 92 pertile for our budget is really great um a good vote of confidence and good support for public schools a good budget process yeah okay sorry I on the back right moving along to the committee reports any committees have any updates
046noting that we did have a change over anything from Handover Finance or anything else from the last month Handover Finance I I did report this last year but there was talk at uh the select board about the possible possible warrant article to create a tip a special tax district for West wheels that could potentially siphon tax funds from school funding um and that is not going to be placed on the ballot this year thank you for the update any questions for Tony now we talked about it last night as well not to keep saying that all right moving right along the superintendent report J what's been going on all right well there's been a lot going on sorry committee I realized it should be discussed here um the cipc is for the town of hover
047of which there's a as for an RSA there's a school board rep is on it they are restarting their what sorry Capital Improvement program committee the long-term capital plan committee that the town works on um they are starting next they just finished the report like few weeks ago and now they're starting again um I as part of the board chairs discussion maybe we'll think about also like who should serve on the cipc um you know given all of the the various committee work that needs to be done um so I just wanted to let you know that that committee is starting back up again even though they just fin you're in Kim for that comme that's what second and of course member of the four chairs committee is play as a public meeting if you
048want to attend as a member of the public please feel free if you want the opinions known on particular committee placements or non placements Tony was your hand yeah I just forgot it's not directly Handover finance committee but as a Handover Finance Committee Member I attended the select board meeting and the select board is planning to um allocate funds in their budget for creation of a child care center in Hanover R town which not previously been aware be the pilot is for 12 2 to four year olds to start it would initi four members get first priority no and it would be at an average cost of $6 per hour no I mean that that's what it would work itself out to everyone doing works on doing the math that's what was reported they didn't
049actually report it they did they did have the their annual feed right back but that's what it worked out to yeah and yeah and how are they going to determine the first kid there there are a lot of details to be worked up yes would you like all right moving back to Jay sorry the inter quite right um since we're making such great progress on the agenda tonight I'm going to take the liberty of an extended superintendence report um in my position as a resident historian um with only Kelly McConnell having been here when I was hired um and having served on the board prior to my arrival um I think it's worthwhile uh especially in the context of these questions about curriculum to sort of let you know where we've been and where we're
050going so when I arrived here in 2017 not that long ago but seven years ago um I was kind of amazed that a district like this didn't have a readily available written curriculum um I could find old binders from maybe as recently as the year 2000 or so but beyond that um all that really existed was a failed attempt to use an online curriculum documentation tool that Rubicon yeah which had been rolled out only RMS had really embraced it certain grade levels had dabbled in it and it was some lessons filled out in some of the grade levels and so forth and my initiation here was that curriculum is the domain of our teaching staff they're the education professionals those decisions have been um really handed to them the board had no Direct involvement in
051curriculum development curriculum authorization um and had essentially delegated that to the staff uh I was told flat out at the high school that that they were okay working with me talking about curriculum but that I should respect teacher autonomy um and we began the board had questions about curriculum and there were no good answers um and and I in my conversations with our staffs would say what do you do when a parent is interested in the curriculum he wants to know what's being taught at certain grade levels in each subject area and there there really was no good answer um what was really interesting too is when I was hired there was a person who was in charge of curriculum instruction and assessment prior to that there have been an assistant superintendent in charge of
052curriculum and an assessment but for whatever reason from the time I was offered the position in January to the time I took um office in in July of 2017 that position was eliminated from the budget and so I I had the very I think the legitimate question when people raise issues around curriculum and exp Express their belief that the curriculum is really important I said then why did you eliminate it from the budget um it then we had a turf field that needed be needed to be put in one year so we couldn't restore that position I was told then that I had to I had to make the case to the board to um to restore that position and part of that effort was to actually have an outside agency come in and do
053a curriculum audit so um new board member Ben Keeny I remember whispering to me you better get a really good um preferably a top tier I college to do that work so I hired a group from pen um to do a curriculum audit um they confirmed what I'd already observed which was there wasn't much for documentary curriculum and that you could go into two different second grade classrooms and have two very different experiences in terms of curriculum instruction um I think that was enough to helped solidify the the ask to restore the position and then I was authorized to hire Robin Steiner to be our um our assistant superintendent with primary duties for curriculum instruction and assessment unfortunately the pandemic hit and instead of beginning her work in curriculum Robin was drafted into the position
054of Co coordinator which she she did an outstanding job of um and only as the pandemic has has come and gone has Robin been able to focus her attention um solely or not solely primarily on on curriculum instruction and assessment and so each of our we really cross the board at every grade level there's been a lot of work going on much of that work has simply been around documenting what we're already doing and then um you can read everything available on curriculum development typically a school system has the capacity to take on one subject area a year um to take on multiple subjects in a single year is just stretching resources um we're working we're trying to do multiple subjects though the documentation effort that Robin is leading as T is is across the
055board our K12 groups are working um again across all subject areas in an effort to accelerate this process so just the process of documentation when Robin began it looked like a three to five year job and that's essentially what pen had said as well um so not faulting anyone it's just um that's that was the culture here the culture was teachers are in charge of the curriculum we UST our our staff and trust their expertise um another thing that has sort of uh been a headwind as far as curriculum work is that in a lot of districts the state the state has had curriculum Frameworks through the years I just just now pulled up online the two the latest that I could find in social studies which was 2006 where there are clearly delineated standards
056AC Accord across the grade levels yeah right exactly um and and nationally the national standards for social C3 standards that were referred to before but um in terms of account accountability the um this the New Hampshire Department of Education holds districts accountable to um to uh alignment with standards and attainment of Standards uh and and had had a survey essentially where you had to input all of your your course documentation into a big Survey System called ibass they're bringing it back but there were two ways you could be deemed having provided an adequate education one was to submit all that work through the ibass survey and have the state look at it and say yes and give their blessing for your curriculum the other was simply to score proficient or better on the assessments and
057since social studies well and since you heard tonight that you know we continue to outperform everybody in the state on our assessments the doe just looked at us and said oh you're adequate and so there was no State pressure to do anything different change anything or Justify any approach that we were taking in terms of curriculum so um we have over the years had some push back and then most recently we had some again sort of faculty-driven changes um that were developed at the middle school which raised a lot of parent concern at elementary and middle level that came to this board um and in and and really honestly took both Robin and me by surprise um and when thinking I just had a meeting with administrators on Monday and we talked about the difference
058between Authority and Leadership um sometimes it's really nice to have authority um because when there's a when there's a simple yes or no or black or white decision to be made it's nice to have things like policy and laws to sort of uh say this is what we have to do folks we don't have to spend an extended amount of time arguing about it or or researching we just need to do it um I feel like we're there now with documentation just takes time but as far as the board one of the essential duties of the board is approval of curriculum but there's not specific we don't have a policy on the books right now there's a reference in one policy about the board approved curriculum but there is no policy in our our policy
059manual right now that um asserts board authority over the either approval or development of cric nor does it grant that that Authority to me and Robin um and so that that's always bothered me and so I I found sample policies for both curriculum development and curriculum authorization that pretty much every other district has that somewhere along the line we decided not to adopt or maybe had on the books and took it off the books and so um without going into extensive disc discussion about this U those of us on the on the U policy committee will be very soon looking at um policy IGA uh which is and again um policy IGA is not required by law but the essential duties the board outlined in state regulations do list curriculum as one of an area
060of Authority for the board U there's IGA which is Po um curriculum development and then there is really very simple policy called policy igd which is curriculum adoption which quite simply says it is the policy of the board that no basic course of study shall be eliminated or new courses added without approval of the board nor shall any significant alteration or reduction of a course of study be made without such approval new programs and courses of study shall not be acted upon by the board until the meeting following their presentation by the administration so that board members may have opportunity to review the proposed program um and then on the development side sorry I've got to toggle between a lot of open Windows here this is policy IGA this happens to be from the Dober
061School District but um it's very similar to the Shell that we were given um by the School Board Association it says the school board will encourage and support the professional staff in its efforts to investigate new curricular ideas develop and improve programs and evaluate results the superintendent or superintendent's designate will spearhead curriculum development for the school system the superintendent or Robin will set up curriculum committees for the study of curriculum improvements including the selection of new instructional materials as found necessary and desirable the superintendent will submit to the board recommendations developed by the curriculum committees and the professional staff and the school board will make final decisions on curriculum change the board in reviewing and evaluating curriculum recommendations May solicit Community opinion all teachers have professional obligations to the school program Beyond regular classroom duties
062and these obligations include work on curriculum committees it is expected that all teachers will make contributions to curriculum development so those two missing policies would sure be helpful in answering these sorts of questions and sure limit surprises that come before you when all of a sudden people get wind of things that are sort of either thinking out loud or the professional staff thinking oh you know we really all to think about aligning with the C3 standards since that's sort of a trend now in education or we really ought to be looking at the science of reading and re-evaluate our literacy curriculum or wow we really ought to be inquiry based in math or or we we should probably do some um integrated curriculum in high school to engage students and to combine science and art
063and other things there's there's so many of those things that gets get talked about um they're subject of some of our professional development and then the next thing you know they're we're making big changes when in fact we may not be um we just went through a very um L linear um logical and um I'd say very thorough math adoption at the elementary level that that brought together both Mar and cross and the excuse me and the ray school and resulted in the adoption of a program that now Robin reported several times on as has Lauren about how well that's coming around um again realistically taking on a subject area per year um that to me is an example of where we will go in each each content area and it's a lot of work
064and again it's it's it's something that we just can't do all at once um I would say if we didn't have the pandemic we'd be further alone but um we're getting there and I think by adopting these policies we can make it even clearer for our staffs about what's expected of them and how the process will work and that you should be a very integral part of that process in because you're our our governing body and this is one of the things that really should should be occupying a good good good amount of our deliberation and um and it's ultimately what you're promising and delivering to the people who elected you um so so we're getting there and I'm optimistic and I'm hoping that that's one one way that when I do decide to leave
065here I can I can leave with a clear conscience knowing that this has been sort of restored and set up so that it's it's renewable we got keep my conscious M so I'd say that's that's my report and stay tuned the policy committee will be looking at this soon and deciding which of these policies we want to adopt and as we related to yesterday as well I Dred in there any any questions now okay so I think Kelly and then Tony one I saw so thank you for the history Liston I think I'm the only one who is kind of around for all of that um and and I think you know I just wanted to give sort of a shout out to our teachers and our administrators um and especially the two of you
066because I will say the reason that that position was eliminated is because it was essentially ineffectual because when it was there there wasn't enough buyin at the time for for that person to be able to do the job that that they were trying to do um and it wasn't that person's fault it was just that it wasn't working right and and we knew leader new leadership was coming in and and you know start start fresh um and so you know I think I have seen in those that seven years now yeah such a shift in um culture and willingness to collaborate um and to work across the buildings and across grade levels and um really dive in and recognize the importance of curriculum and a documented curricul curriculum and some sort of communic communicable standards
067right um and I think in a way we're sort of a victim of that success right because I also see you know if we take the math story as an example I think there is now this willingness to say hey let's work together and make conscious decisions for what's best for these kids right and I think now we're just figuring out okay what's the process for doing that but that's actually a really lovely moment where people are really thinking intentionally about oh we're all doing the same thing now and what's best for us to do to work on together to work towards you know next Generation skills right and I think that's kind of it's It's a beautiful thing but we just have to now figure out how do we do that in the right
068way going forward so absolutely so thank you for that and all the work that you and Robin do on curriculum and everybody um I guess one thought I had and thinking about that in relation to like social studies at the ray school for instance is there's a difference to me between saying we have a comprehensive coherent curriculum and we're not teaching the subject or we are you know we don't say we didn't have a comprehensive math curriculum but we were teaching that so the fact that we don't have a curriculum comprehensive curriculum and may not for three years to me doesn't mean well then we're not going to teach social studies because we don't have a com so I'm not saying that's what's happening at the race school but you know I see a difference
069um between those and so I'm still interested what is happening on the ground even it's not companies during the history lesson I was in the share Drive pulling up all the social studies units and so I will be prepared to present great more cohesively and coherently and comprehensively any other questions for J from board members or the public J on I'll just explain that in addition to her other numerous qualifications social studies history was Robin's area mine too yes so very nice speaking of Robin anything you want to report on Robin already heard about the PB and so I would just like to follow up with what Jay has been speaking about which is the curriculum and I think you probably all know this about me now having worked with me for a few years
070but I'm a very impatient person and I like to get things done and get them done quickly so this has been really hard for me to you know well I also like do things systematically but knowing that really this is truly my second full year of doing the curricul work and I've had to pull back the RS and slow myself down in doing it and Lauren honestly has been a great help with that because we were able to put the math curriculum in place and we did it over a two-year period and now we're in our third year with really the second year of putting the math curriculum in the schools and um it's been a good process you know I think we did the right thing by having the committee having people look at
071variety of programs looking at the research rolling it out doing the PD but you know that has been three years in the making and this year I'm hearing now as we get later into this year really good things about that process so I think we've done that the right way we started science this year it's way more complicated than math math we could we could actually purchase a program that was comprehensive in K through five science is a to different thing so I honestly when we started it this year thought we could finish in the year it's really going to take us two years and then we're still going to need more work on it so it's not a fast process and Jay mentioned this previously too we can't ask the teachers to take on
072too much I mean as it is I'm like trying to now get an Ela curriculum committee together just so we can start thinking about that and planning for it and you know preparing thinking about budgets for it and all of those things and I always have to think to myself I've got to slow down a little bit because I don't want people to be overwhelmed and not be able to do the things that we're asking them to do they're still in the second year math curriculum we're trying some new science things so it's constant learning so it's that balance of you know helping people move forward but also do it in a way that's manageable and on top of of that we have never well I mean I don't know I'm just speaking for the
073time that I've been here we hadn't been collaborating with Maran cross so bringing two different sets of teachers in at each grade level adds further complications because people are wedded to what they've been doing so trying to bring that along and you know increase that collaboration has been it's not easy but we're you know working as hard as we can and moving in long as best as we can so thank you for your patience and know that we do have you know a long range plan to do all of these curricular areas and social studies is dear to my heart but I want to do it as well as we've done with math so we will continue that process so any questions for Alin from board members of the public Deb this actually isn't a
074question it's just something I want to emphasize but I think that it's important and I I know we all know this that to recognize that the same teachers are making the changes in math and then they are making the changes in science and making the changes in ela and in social studies whereas at the high school level if you're working with English that's one group and then they can take a deep breath and you move on to a different department so I think there's an additional toll simply to State and recognize about making all these changes and doing all this curriculum work at the elementary level in particular while teach right initiatives that were also stff yeah so and then you pull out that zero based budget let's start all over again yeah so and
075it's beyond that it's not only the curriculum but it's looking at assessment and professional development and tying all those pieces together so people are working incredibly hard um and it's not like you know people aren't teaching any social studies or anything like that it's just it's a good process to go through and to have a timeline for and I've said since the beginning when we started this work that I said the curriculum work it's like a living Constitution it's never going to go away we should be looking at that every year every two years in revising based on changes that happen in society when you talk about pulling out the Britain curriculum I had so many people bring binders to me that were literally 1980 and you know decades old and so it's and they
076were still printouts of you know these old mograph sheets in some cases so it's it shouldn't be like that we want to have a process in place so that we're updating and look at our curriculum over time so hopefully we're starting that and not that that hasn't been done in the past it has but now it's just time to do it again so okay um so all of the history right about um kind of the role of the school board it was not that it was necessarily surprising because you know we've lived but I just do want to note that even how school board members are educated across the state has changed because I was actually just I just pulled up what the orientation packet is for a new school board member versus comparing it
077to my like five six years ago um and it it didn't really talk about curriculum in fact we were specially told that's getting in the weeds it's not yeah so I just I there is you know a shift also that's happening as well and so I just I do want to because it's mentioned at least 12 times in this orientation packet you know now right so I you know I so I just wanted to highlight that as well um that it's um maybe time for well and also I think there has been a culture in climate and that's not just here but you know 2030 years ago in schools people just did whatever they wanted to do in terms of teaching that's changed over a timeon because we know better about the way students learn
078and progression of information and knowledge and so I think with that we have a culturing climate of being autonomous and so that's another hurdle that you know we're attempting to get over to so so farbe it for me to curriculum explain at all please forgive me for this but I'm just wondering if there's not um some communication that could be done around I'm thinking about like if we think about reading right we kind of collectively agree does it really matter what first graders are reading it matters that they're learning how to read and they're learning to enjoy reading it they're learning right those those skills that will enable them later on to be able to be independent readers Etc right um and I'm wondering in social studies if we can't do some communication around that
079but it's as much about learning how to history right like how to read maths how to read history in3 less the facts and more about the how so wonder if they're in the intervening period we could maybe work towards some communication around that and what we are do right and we are doing like Community is a big piece of C3 curriculum developing students students Knowledge from that level in the classroom to the family structure to the community structure so those are all things your children are being taught now at the elementary school level that fit in perfectly with C3 and they fit in with government pieces with the Civics pieces with economics pieces history so yeah so it's just really taking a look at that whole K through b progression saying okay these are some
080areas where we can strengthen this these are some areas that maybe we're already doing this in kindergarten and third grade we can and maybe what some of the scaffolding we can put up while building the house right yeah right yeah so than you okay now I'm also building plan really shouldn't be doing stop thank you right we right along Jamie is with us virtually tonight hi Jamie hi everybody I hope all is well please uh be very careful on your ride home tonight we've had snow squalls in our area um so I have posted under the business administrator section report um two documents for your review I think it's going to load here we go maybe whoopsie so there should mine for some reason my board docs is stuck it's thinking so there is there's
081a copy of the ms22 report which is the financials that we report to the Department of Revenue Administration um that's done within 20 days of the vote and there's also uh a copy of the ratified minutes along with the vote tallies uh posted in the board docs for you um in addition I have put in the expenditure folder that Jay has brought uh to the board tonight the ms22 um cover sheet for you all to sign and then we'll be fully in compliance um I did want to Echo what Kim had said mentioned already uh when I was reporting on all of the warrant articles again kudos to the town of Handover um the article two Bridgeman fund passed with a 96% uh vote and the article 3 officer salaries also passed with a 96
082percentage yes vote article for the collective bargaining agreement passed with a 93% uh yes vote Article Five as Kim mentioned passed at 92% and article six the uh redirection of aund of $100,000 of potential Surplus into the maintenance fund uh passed with a 94 percentile uh yes vote which is that's incredible to have all of your articles pass over 90% um so thank you uh as everybody has mentioned to the constituents in the town of Hanover um who really support their educational uh programming for the schools um I will bring you an updated Financial at the next meeting as it will be um much more in depth folks will have everything fully encumbered for this fiscal year um and we have been meeting Tony and myself the director of facilities um over all of the
083uh maintenance projects that have either been started not completed or are are still on the list for this year to see where we're at uh I'll be typing up some notes for Lauren and her crew so they know what the plans are I know he's been working um through all of those for all the schools and trying to set up all of the vendors uh for the break times that are coming which would include the week of April break and then directly after school closes so that's all I have for tonight great thank you Jamie any questions for Jamie Kim yes it it looks like maybe is it just for me Bo okay so it's for everyone but um so I I'm gonna make this comment Jamie with a question mark at the end of
084it um up it's back okay well maybe so I I do recall if you were are we um open to make any suggestions on the minutes that were posted there because you said it was for our review but for the annual meeting for the annual meeting you can absolutely if if you want to send in um if you want to send in some comments we can we can revise them it's a pretty minor one I just I call actually in the Dresden meeting um and I'm assuming it's here here too um the just to correct K asus's name yes the same oh double s's yep I'm sorry I did see that I mentioned it to them so if they didn't correct it I'll pull it down and fix it okay thank you yep thank you
085Kim I I did see that when I was reading through I mentioned it to I think Deb but I'm not sure so but I'll go back in and check it we'll get them fixed and reposted thank you Jamie anything else for Jamie yes J Jamie should I plan on meeting you um by text at 5 this morning are we okay I really think we're going to be okay but there are squalls in I 89 between conquered and Lebanon right now is at a standstill so everybody be very careful there's been a there's been a heck of a Squall come through so if I need you I will wake you up right thank you we're going to move right along we do have need for a non-public tonight for a Personnel matter and a student tuition
086matter so if I memory serves I believe that's number c and k I think yes if anyone like to make a motion that'd be great right Kim move to enter into nonpublic session at 8:12 p.m under RSA 91a column 3 C personnel and K tuition seconded by Deb we have to do this individually please starting with Kelly McConnell yes Harman yes key yes yes Nelson yes fa yes thank you everyone we'll be back in a few minutes remember to ex remember to get out of zo if you're in it e chill it's always we do still have members on the public public with us online so let's get right back to things as we all set stuff off backr okay there's a second opportunity for public comment if anyone wishes to speak please raise your
087hand or to the mic you skipped didn't you under public session returned public session don't we have to do the nomination list first oh thank you for that all right so speaking of that you want to make a motion yes I mooved to approve the 2425 certified staff nomination list as present seconded by Tony all those in favor it is unanimous 60 thank you everyone and then as I mentioned a second opportunity for public comment if anyone wishes to speak please come to the mic or raise your Zoom hand seeing none we will move right along to if there's any agenda items for the next meeting please send them to me that next meeting is on Wednesday April 17th at 700 p.m. and I will take a to aour if anyone wants to leave all
088right no one wants to leave we'll keep talking second by Marcel go around the room McConnell yes yes ke yes love Nelson yes yes thank you everyone we'll see you next month and my kids say it is really