001All right, everyone. >> It's 6:30. Let's get this thing going. >> So, noting the hour in the presence of a quorum, I call the Actton Boxboro Regional School Committee to order. Members of the public who wish to watch the meeting online may use Actton TV's YouTube channel, which is found at the top of the agenda. The meeting is being recorded and will be posted on Actant TV's website at actantv.org. It is great to have everybody back here. Yay. Because I think we have we have folks we didn't get to see last week. So, this is awesome. Welcome back. Today, we get to hear from DMG Group and they're going to bring us up to speed on everything that's been going on. And that is actually going to be a fixture of the first meeting of
002the month for us for the foreseeable future. And that's good because that's going to help keep us all up to date and give us the opportunity to ask questions, which is a good thing. And then we are going to actually end our meeting um upstairs with some workshopping. We are going to get up out of our seats and do some writing and some thinking together and uh work on developing our school committee goals for the year. So with that um do we have any public participation? I see a headshake from John. All right. In that case, um, Peter can continue to the superintendent's update. >> All right. Great. Thanks, Tori. Um, so one of the the nice parts about being an act in Boxboro is when we welcome educators back and we actually do some
003we start our year with staff recognition and two of the things we do, one is we call up any educator um who has earned professional teacher status, which means they're entering their fourth year in the district. Um and the act education association recognizes all of them with a pen um in a ceremony that they do with all staff and then we also recognize all of our educators who hit 30 years. So I just want to give a shout out to all of them. There are too many to read everyone's name um but that just want to recognize that you know we had a number of staff achieving those different milestones this year. Um just want to call everyone's attention to potential job postings that members of the community might be interested in. We are seeking
004some community help. We are pleased to be almost fully staffed at the start of our school year in classroom teaching positions. However, we do continue to have several openings in our classroom support and operational uh support positions. All of them are important roles in our school. Specifically, we have openings for special education assistants, both full and part-time high school Spanish teacher and a high school reading teacher. Um, so we would encourage interested members of the community to consider applying for the positions and we have information on our website. Um, a number of our positions may also be suitable for college age students who might be going to school part-time in the community. Um, and then obviously substituting over breaks and things like that. We always welcome college students back. So, uh, we will be sending
005word out, uh, where people can get more information. Um, Kelly's Corner update. Um, you know, there continues to be construction at Kelly's Corner. I don't have specific details of what is planned in the next week, but I do know they are working their way through paving. Um I do believe at some point in the next week they will be out in front of our campus. Um that is an important project for the community. Um you know we are working with the police to make sure students are safe. We do recognize though that we are hearing some family concerns um where there are students trying to cross actually at Kelly's Corner right now and the the signals aren't working. So we do want to just encourage our families to exercise caution um when deciding whether or
006not to have students crossing there alone. Um it may be that there's a brief period of time here where parents want to make sure that you know age appropriate kids are supervised um in that area. Um Tori and I have our first community coffee of the year coming up um on Tuesday, September 22nd at 7:00 p.m. That is a virtual meeting and we will send a link out closer to that date. That is an opportunity um for our families to hear kind of beginning of the year updates from us um and also a great opportunity for them to pepper us with whatever questions are on their mind. Um and I have guaranteed them it will be an entertaining time having Tori answer all of them. Um we will pass along to families. The state annually
007asks us to just pass along information on the E911 program. Um so we are including that in the update. I'm not going to go into it tonight, but I do want to just share some highlights from each of our schools as you came in. Um on the opening slide, I did share um you know, some photos from each of the schools um scrolling through. So hopefully you got a chance to see some of those while you were coming in. Um but here's some highlights that principles have shared with us. Um over at the Carol Hubner early childhood program, um during staff professional days, they participated in activities learning about positive psychology and relationship building. Um during orientation, parents and guardians and students had an opportunity to meet the CHCP staff and explore toys, learning materials,
008and play in the classrooms with their their children. Um students participated in circle time, story time, and learned about classroom jobs and routines during the first days of school. Um and the rain did hold off long enough for our students on their first day so that most of the classes were able to play outdoors on the playground. Over at Blanchard, their theme this year is stronger together. Um and they welcomed many new staff. This was a big hiring year for Blanchard. They had a lot of big retirements of people who had been in that community for many years. Um and so the new staff have been embraced um by the new school community and with energy and curiosity and really exciting for Blanchard and Boxboro. Uh they had their ribbon cutting on the new playground
009space last week. Um so that is uh really really exciting for everyone. Conan Elementary School. Um the entire staff actually participated on a professional learning workshop focused on neurodiversity. Um the Conan kindergarten orientation and new family orientation events were very well attended as well. And then this year the students um and staff at Conan School represent 42 different languages. So really impressive community. Douglas staff professional learning focused on the importance of creating a sense of belonging for each other students and families. They welcomed many new staff members and students to our Douglas community. Similar to Blanchard, this was a big year for Douglas and hiring. Um, and Doug the Eagle made another appearance on the first day of school, welcoming all students back from the boardwalk. So, I've heard. Um, over at Gates Elementary, uh,
010students spent their days getting to know each other. Um, a lot of focus on morning meeting and routines. That is part of our SEAL structures that we have in schools to support students social emotional learning. Um, students have also been uh learning classroom routines and all of the school expectations. Um, and students definitely enjoyed their first day of recess on Thursday. Uh, seeing everyone spend time on the playground. At MCT, they welcomed 24 new students um and uh new staff members. So, that was very exciting. In addition to their kindergarten, obviously um they gave their kindergarten students their traditional white carnation that they receive on the first day of kindergarten. And then they actually get the same flower, not not the dead one, but a new a fresh one. Um when they graduate at the
011end of sixth grade, too. So that is very exciting for MCT. Um student work on team challenges to know how to learn uh to work together, generate ideas about classroom agreements. Um and every class works on classroom agreements during the first few weeks of school. Um that align with schoolwide expectations of be safe, be kind, be responsible. That is also part of their responsive classroom structures and part of our seal structure for the school. At Miriam, staff professional learning focused on inclusion and belonging, setting a positive tone for the year ahead. Classrooms are alive uh with excitement and collaboration. Students are working together on projects, games, and activities and celebrate connection and community. And the youngest learners are already showing independence and confidence as they navigate their new classrooms and school routines. Um, over at
012RJ Gray, they implemented that new schedule that we talked about during last year's budget season. So, they successfully launched seven teams instead of eight, and they want to make sure that they also acknowledge they appreciate everyone's flexibility in the early days of the school year in getting that launched. Uh, they welcomed 30 new seventh and eighth graders to AB over the summer in addition to their sixth grade class. Um, and they have been thrilled to get to know the 13 new staff members that joined that community this year. at the high school. Uh they welcomed about 200 staff members back to the building on August 25th. Um two days of professional learning and celebrations of community um including some of the certified staff who had reached the 30 year of service mark. The high school
013had a successful 9th grade orientation on Wednesday, August 27th with nearly 400 9th graders and many 11th and 12th graders coming back as ambassadors. Uh we always appreciate our upper classmen coming back. The day was filled with students visiting classes, meeting teachers, counselors, assistant principles along with an assembly, um a student experience panel, a class photo, and team games. And after a week of school, high school students are now deeply engaged in the new classes, looking forward to homework. No, excuse me, looking forward to many upcoming community events. That's what it meant to say. Uh including the student council's first ever movie night, uh which is happening um on Friday night. and they are showing the greatest showman on Liry Field this Friday uh September 5th from 7:00 to 9:00 for our high school students
014that is sponsored by the student council there. So uh great to see some really community building events happening at the high school and thinking about kind of the overall student experience. >> Awesome. Any questions or comments for Peter? >> Hoay for movie night. Yeah. >> All right. Thanks. >> All right. All righty. In that case, we are ready for our presentation and I'll invite Joe Costello from JMG DMG Group to come on up and uh catch us up on everything they've been up to, which >> whatever's next. So, think about the questions that you think are most important to ask first, and we'll see how many we can get through. Sound good? Yep. >> HDMI. >> Uh, I'm gonna actually be your driver. I'm going to put up the slides here. >> So, >> terrific.
015Well, um, as Peter's pulling that up, uh, it's nice to see all of you again. I hope you all had a wonderful summer. Uh, very excited to be able to share, um, a few different things with you. number one, a process update on all of the work that has been happening over the summer with both the working group um as well as the AB forward steering committee. Really the main drivers of of the of the work that we're doing with you all related to strategic planning and district uh reorganization. Um and then really we'll spend the majority of our time talking through um the specific findings from our needs assessment, our diagnostic analysis, which was a deep dive into all things Actton Boxboro Regional School District, understanding the current state of affairs with how schools
016are currently organized, how uh changes in enrollment and and demographics have played out across the district, what that means in terms of student outcomes. Um, and then really some some deeper questions about how the district might allocate its resources differently and design its programs and systems a little bit differently to to really cater to the evolved needs of students. So, that's really the the goal of our time for today and um we'll we'll we'll uh save uh about 20 minutes or 30 minutes or so for your questions and feedback um so we can make sure that we're answering any any questions or reflections or or concerns you may have. So with that uh we'll go through uh just a quick uh project process goals and methodology um in terms of our uh next slide. Um
017so went through the objectives for today. So again share findings and really we'll spend uh the majority of our time on that first objective. Um saving some time for for discussion and then we'll clarify some really specific next steps um for how we're going to move this work forward. Um so where we are at in this process, we're still really in the second phase of work. So we just wrapped up conducting that diagnostic and we shared the the the learnings from that diagnostic in our last steering committee meeting about a week and a half ago. Um and we saved time for discussion with that steering with the steering committee. Um and then during that meeting we started to to workshop some of the initial draft language for the strategic plan. Again our goal here is
018to have a really strong strategy in place before we dig into options for reorganization. Now, my team has been quite busy over the over the summer to understand the ins and outs of the district, understand the operational details, the the the specs of different buildings, things like that. So that as soon as the strategy is in place, the the language from that strategic plan is is in place, we're able to use that information to design some uh reorganization scenarios with the steering committee that will then go out to the community for uh for confirmation, validation, and all sorts of feedback. So, uh, and you can see where we're at in terms of our our general process there. So, again, our last steering committee was on Monday, August 25th. We're going to be meeting with the
019steering committee again on September 9th, really to confirm that strategic plan language so that we can then take that that strategy and use it to to design some really actionable, worthwhile options for the district to consider for possible reorganization. So, we'll be coming back together as the steering committee October 7th to discuss those specific options and then that will allow us to then go out to the community to get feedback on all of those different options through a variety of focus groups, surveys, additional community meetings uh really as many as many opportunities for engagement for all the the people of Act and Boxboro to be able to weigh in on these specific options and then we'll come back together uh distill the insights from all of that feedback uh workshop the the options for reorganization
020that will then be presented back to you all uh in early December. So that's where really where we stand right now. So we had quite a busy summer doing all sorts of data analysis uh drafting preliminary language for the strategic plan so that we can dig in this fall for options for reorganization and really re-engaging the community uh in that work. Terrific. So in terms of our diagnostic findings, really the goal here was for us to get a cleareyed outsers view on the current state of affairs in Actton Boxboro Regional School District. So this is a needs assessment. Um and in terms of the the way we structured this this needs assessment. Um Peter, next slide. Uh there were really three main themes that emerged to us that um we used to to structure our
021analysis and really pull out the key insights for the community. Number one is starting with or number one is evolving student needs and enrollment across schools. So thinking about over the last 10, 15, 20 years, how have the needs of students in Actton Boxboro changed and how have the needs of students really uh gotten distributed out to all the different schools in the community and then from there understanding student outcomes and well-being and really the impact on staff members. So we know that a lot is invested in in the public education system in Act and Boxboro. We wanted to pull up the stats that really tell that story. Um, and then the last portion, understanding district finances, operations, and long-term sustainability. So again, these three chunks serve as the architecture for our full diagnostic findings
022here. Now, the first portion of this, I just wanted to give a quick overview of really the executive summary of our findings. Um, so we're not hiding anything. It's all out in in the in the open here. Um, just to really tell the story of of Actton Boxboro Regional School District. So a few key points that I want to highlight across those three chunks of information. The first related to evolving student need and enrollment across schools. First is that enrollment has declined significantly. Students have grown more diverse and the needs have increased. And then when you look at how those needs have changed across the school district, there are actually significant variations in the composition of need at each school largely driven by the the district's policy for enrollment. So, we'll get into how that
023actually works and and how that's playing out in different schools, but a really important connection there related to the design and the execution of that of that policy. And then really importantly, the Actton Boxboro community is torn on open enrollment. That came through loud and clear in our in our survey. Um, and some key points related to that. There's uh this feeling of inequity and and fueling misperceptions about the actual differences between schools. Moving into student outcomes and well-being and staff well-being. The headline here, academic results in actin box are excellent. You you work really hard, your your educators work incredibly hard and they deliver those results while spending below the state average and on par with tier dis uh with with peer districts. However, as we dig into those data points a little bit
024more, there are some persistent and significant gaps in performance across student need groups. Again, we'll get into exactly how that looks across uh across different student need groups, but wanted to to start with that. Um, and then a key point there in terms of how the needs of students are evolving. Um, the data shows that educators are reportedly stressed and struggling to both meet the uh increased needs of students as well as the increased demands on on what it means to be an educator today. Um, again, more more to come there. And then in terms of the headlines for finances, operations, and long-term sustainability, key point here, over the last 10 year or the last five years actually, spending in Actton Boxboro has increased pretty dramatically by about $16 million. And both towns have needed
025to increase local spending due to inflated costs. But then a really important change in how the state funds uh public education. So the amount of money that comes through chapter 70 state aid and and the the the the methodology by which that that funding gets distributed to to local communities has changed which has shifted the burden on local taxpayers. And while the district has taken some really uh significant moves to uh to balance the budget and made some really uh really significant changes um there are still uh looming capital expenses and looming expenses that need to be addressed. Um, and that may prove challenging to address and really set up some some deeper questions about the trade-offs that the school district really chooses to make. So, within that, we'll go through each of these uh
026each of these sections. Um, starting with that evolving student needs and enrollment across schools. But again, throughout all of this information, the main question that I want you to be thinking about is how should Action Boxboro design its schools and programs to really meet the changing needs of students? because at it at at its core, this process is is trying to do exactly that. So, digging into this first section, as I mentioned before, enrollment has has decreased over the last 10 years by about 10% and as we look ahead to the next 10 years, enrollment is is projected to continue to decline by by an additional 4%. So, we looked at all sorts of demographic data that that digs into exactly how and why that that is and and how it's playing playing out across
027the two towns. And while total town population is actually projected to increase, um the data shows that that is due to actually an an aging population and not growth in the population of school-aged children. And while the the total number of students has decreased, the needs of students have actually increased according to the data. So here you can see a few key categories that we typically show related to public education. The first on the far left is the increased uh percent of multilingual learners. And this is broken down into two categories. The uh darker blue f l is first language not English. And then eel is the actual designation for an English learner based on their English language proficiency. So you can see an almost uh a 1.7x almost 2% inc or two 2x increase
028in terms of multilingual learners. Another category, students who are from economically disadvantaged um has increased by almost four 4x from 4% to to 16%. Um and then in terms of the the change in race and ethnicity from 2015 to 2025 about a 30% increase 1.3x increase in students from Asian, Hispanic, multi-race, non-Hispanic, black, other Native American, Hawaiian, etc. Um so an increase in the diversity of of the student body in Actton Boxboro. Um, interestingly, something that comes up a lot, while the percent of students with disabilities has remained uh roughly flat at about 16%. Um, the the the needs of students have grown more complex um and especially uh behavioral needs. Now taking a step back, thinking about how the district currently configures or organizes its schools. You have a fully sec uh a fully
029regionalized model at the secondary level, which means all students go to the junior high school and then to the high school. So those schools roughly represent the dem the changing demographics of the community. However, there's a different approach for your elementary schools as you all know better than anybody else, right? six elementary schools uh that offer differentiated instructional approaches and models, school and educator autonomy. And there are some nuanced differences between schools, both real and perceived. I think a really important point there. Sometimes the perceived differences are actually a little bit greater. And this model for elementary education depends on this policy of open enrollment to determine how students get placed at individual schools. And one of the unintended consequences of uh how students end up in individual schools through this open enrollment policy is
030that the composition of student need at each school or the composition of students in at each school does not represent the total uh the the the the demographics at the district level. So the data that you're looking at here because there's a lot going on on this page on the far left is the district averages. So the same information that I had shared previously for 2015 to 2025. And then underneath that SWD stands for students with disabilities. E is English learners. Again that designation of students who require English learner services. And then ECD is economically disadvantaged. And then we have that same information for Blanchard, Conan, Douglas, Gates, McCarthy Town, and Miriam all the way across. The number that you see, the percentage that you see on the left hand side represents the actual percentage
031of students with those needs. And then the percent in parentheses represents the percent difference or the change from uh 10 years ago. So, as you can see here, there are significant differences in the levels of need across schools, which is largely due to open enrollment policies and how students really end up in different schools. Um, and this is really due to uh the the process by which students are entering into that uh the the kindergarten lottery. And then basically as there are uh more open seats or vacancies at schools that ranked lower in that kindergarten lottery, as new students enter into the district, they get placed wherever those open seats are. Now with this model of open enrollment, there are some intended outcomes or benefits for this model as well as some observed challenges. So
032in our analysis and in and in and understanding open enrollment models uh all throughout the country, there are some really terrific strengths and and uh aspects of the of this model that work really well for the community. You can see a few there. A menu of schools with different focuses and teaching styles, which is a really wonderful thing. Differentiation and variation. Um lasting school and family relationships, providing schools some level of autonomy to do things a little bit differently. Um however there are some observed challenges with this kind of a model as well. Um number one is that the differences between schools are highly nuanced and sometimes the diff the perceived differences become greater than the actual differences where schools are quite similar in terms of the curriculum and materials that they're using things like
033that. Um however there's a perception that there are some larger differences between schools. There's also a concern that some school offerings may not fully align with some famil family's educational priorities, especially today. Um, and then no guarantee of first choice for families. And many late enrolles, which is a really important statistic here, about 23% of elementary students are late enrolles, that means they're they enter into the district after the kindergarten lottery has happened, have a those uh students and families have a low chance of getting into their preferred schools due to those limited spots. And then as a result, you end up with a mix of students, a combination of students who actively choose to enroll into a school versus students who are placed into a school, maybe leading to challenging dynamics for educators and
034families because there's a mismatch in in terms of expectations for how that school operates and how that school is designed to support students. And zooming out, thinking about how the needs of students have changed in Actton Boxboro over the last 10, 15, 20 years as student needs grow more complex, services may be really challenging to coordinate as students with uh differing levels of need are distributed across schools. This also creates some efficiency challenges as well. When you think about how some of those those student needs could be serviced differently or or more efficiently and frankly more effectively by regrouping students with similar needs into the same area. The information that you're seeing here are uh the themes that emerge from the community survey and the community is is very much divided and has different opinions
035about the the validity of an open enrollment model. You can see the three themes that emerged on the the positive side. The pro open enrollment model there really celebrating the unique identities of schools and and and the culture of schools. the the push for community engagement, having this this opt-in model where families are really leaning into the the school that they believe matches the the needs of their students and their and their families, etc. Um, and you know, not for nothing, there is uh an aspect of an appeal for the district. Families move to this community because they have the opportunity to opt into the school that they want. Um however there were some concerns that came through in the community uh survey about the open enrollment model. Some concerns about community separations about how
036students and families may uh uh may enroll in certain schools based on on different cultures and different uh uh different needs etc. Um community divisions and inconsistencies. um basically challenging this idea of having one common approach to elementary education under thinking about what some of the non-negotiables for elementary education should be. Um which is particularly important for students with more significant or complex needs. Um and then there were also some concerns or or questions about financial inefficiency. Um some key points here. There are some that uh are more perceptions than actual actual issues. like one that came through there was a lot of concern about issues with transportation and how we could have a more efficient district by just busing students to uh geographically connected areas. Um that's not a big issue for Act in
037Boxboro as as you all know based on how transportation is funded in this district. Um but in reality there are opportunities to provide services a little bit more efficiently um based on uh in a in a different kind of enrollment model. So taking a step back from all of that information, how should act inbox design its schools and programs to meet the changing needs of students? Thinking about what's the right blend of facilities? How you then design your programs and your schools within those facilities to meet the evolving needs of students? And then how do you design an enrollment policy that intentionally brings communities of learners together that leads to the strongest outcomes for students, staff, and families? The next section I want to dig into student outcomes and and well-being and then making the
038connection to staff well-being. And as I mentioned before, the headline here is is a good one. Um this chart that you're seeing uh represents all of the different school districts in Massachusetts. Each one of those tiny little gray dots represents an individual school district and the placement of the dot is based on two different variables. Uh the bottom running across uh running across the bottom is the per pupil expenditure based on 2023 figures. And then the relative height of the of each dot represent represents the percent of students meeting or exceeding expectations. And so again, the placement is each district's performance based on those two data points. And what this reveals is that Actton Boxboro is in the top 5% of school districts while spending below the state average in Massachusetts. A really impressive accomplishment
039um that a lot of other districts and communities could learn from frankly. Um yeah, much much to be celebrated there. And this is this is just one data point. You can see some some additional data points. Um and the yeah on the next slide um you'll see this structure come through in in the remainder of our slides really comparing Actton and Boxboro to some comparable districts. I have a slide later on that lists out all of those comparable districts based on a cohort of districts that the Massachusetts Department of Education compiles based on similar characteristics, wealth status, things like that. Um but you can see far and away Actton Boxboro outperforms the state and peer districts on all of these key metrics. grades three through eight MCCAST scores. I know that's that's just one academic
040outcome and there are a whole host of other other academic outcomes to to look at. College metriculation also graduation rate AB posts some really impressive results. Um and importantly in elementary grades the district has rebounded in MCCAST performance in math science um but not in ELA. These stats are fairly consistent with with other districts in terms of the broader trends. Um, but starting to peel back the layers of of these academic outcomes to dig a little bit deeper than than just the headlines. And where we were particularly interested because as we're reviewing this information, we're saying, okay, the needs of students in Actton Boxboro have changed a lot in the last 10 years. How have students from these different student groups performed relative to the average uh headline? And so three categories that I wanted
041to highlight for you. This is all uh ELA MCCAST results aggregated across all grades where the the line represents the percent of students meeting or exceeding expectations on uh on the ELA MCCAST. And you can see there's a pretty significant performance gap for English learners. It's slightly smaller for students with an IEP that's students with disabilities. And then that persistent gap exists for students from lowincome backgrounds. So headline here, as the needs of students continue to change, continue to evolve and grow more complex, there's an opportunity for the district to think about how it's prov uh supporting or providing supports for students with with different levels of need, especially as some of those needs are growing more complex. Um, additionally, I know one of the the key areas that the district has invested in historically
042has been social emotional learning and wellness supports. Um, there still are some uh persistent needs in this category. You can see the student survey social emotional learning results from winter 2024 across those three questions for elementary, middle, and high school students. So, still some some pretty uh important data points for us to keep in mind in terms of the social emotional well-being of students. Um and while the while those those needs have have been uh pressing in the district for a long time, the district has made some pretty significant investments in a few key areas in terms of leadership and tiered supports uh teleaalth partnerships for mental health and then SEAL curriculum and advisory structures actually many of which Peter acknowledged and and referenced uh in his in his update earlier today. So some really
043important structures that are getting to the heart of supporting students social emotional learning needs but still an important point for us to keep in mind as we think about the broader set of needs for students. And then the other point that I wanted to to bring in here is the uh the the impact on on our educators. Now with this data a few um uh just caveats and and and context points. This is outdated data from the spring of 2022. So this is like in the midst of COVID. There's a lot going on. There have been a lot of improvements. However, in our conversations with uh district leaders and in the survey, the needs of educators was still bubbling up as a really important point to talk about. And so we felt that this was
044a really important data point to include in our in our analysis here. So during the past week, how often do you feel stressed out, overwhelmed, or exhausted at work? 66% were in that frequently or almost always category. And as we move into the next portion of our work, which is engaging uh educators much more deeply in focus groups um and community meetings and and the second round of the survey. We are very curious to uh understand from educators how different structures at the district level could lead to improving opportunities for educators in terms of uh reducing workload and reducing stress, reducing the demands on our on our educators. So that's really why we wanted to include uh this data here. Um because what came through in all again all of our conversations, all of our
045survey results is that the educators really are the backbone of of this community. Educators are what makes schools great. Um, everybody in in all of the survey results, whether they had concerns about the district or not, talked about how wonderful their children's educators were in terms of delivering really strong outcomes for for students. And you can see the the this is again a summary from the the uh the community survey. What are the top three greatest strengths of our school district? You can see that the trends broader trends on the far right side. Academics number one, one of the greatest strengths, but educators a close second. 57% uh of of respondents listed teachers and staff as one of the greatest strengths of the district, far and away compared to uh all the other categories there.
046So question for reflection here, slightly different from before. How should the district support its educators to continue to meet the evolving needs of students? Right? you've your educators and and students and families have delivered really exceptional results uh academically um and a lot of really tremendous work has has happened. And as the the needs of students continue to evolve, how can the district really be a support for educators to continue to to deliver really strong results for kids? Now, the last portion here want to dig into district finances, operations, and long-term sustainability. And this is a a fairly nuanced story. Again, as you all know, I know we've had conversations with each of you unpacking details here. And for folks listening at home, there's there's a lot of important details to really get right. And
047so, we wanted to start with this data, which shows how total spending in the district has changed over the last five years. As folks in this community know, the total spending in the district has increased by about $16 million. Um, and part of the reason for that is because of the increased costs of running the district and as I mentioned before, the changes to the district or to the state's approach to funding education through that chapter 70 aid. Right? So, the the state is providing proportionally less funding to to districts or to some districts. it's just changed the the formula by which funding is allocated out. Um, which has has led to the district um needing to uh come up with more local local tax dollars to really cover those same costs. And at that
048same time though, the actual size of the district has grown smaller and the district has made some pretty significant cuts to its total staffing levels to be able to balance that budget. So wanted to highlight some of those cuts here in terms of changes in staffing. So the the bar that or so the chart that you see on the right hand side of the screen here shows the total budgeted staff in fiscal year 2022. So school years 2122 and then fiscal year 26 the 2526 school year. And you can see from uh during that time the district actually made 86 cuts in positions to be able to add back 35 positions functionally uh shifting staffing around to be able to more effectively meet the the evolving needs of students. So this very very difficult work
049and challenging it's a a challenging pill to swallow where total spending in the district has increased and yet we're making cuts to our district. It's sometimes hard to hold both truths uh in our in our in our minds. We wanted to dig a little bit deeper than just that though to understand how spending has changed across a variety of different different categories. So the the categories you see here running across the screen are all of the different uh accounting codes functionally or the the accounting categories for how dollars are spent in the district. The vast majority of dollars going towards teachers and and and benefits other teaching services. In fact, um, in Actton Boxboro, similar to to every school district out there, about 80 to 90% of total dollars are spent on people. Um, because
050people are really what makes school districts run. Um, but you can see all these other key areas. Um, and you can see how some of these categories have changed over time. So, increased cost of of teachers and benefits, increased cost for labor and and that other teaching services that includes paraprofessionals. Um and then uh some other areas where some costs have actually gone down or I should say spending has gone down not necessarily costs. Now what we wanted to do is understand how actin boxboro compared to quote unquote similar districts and we opted to use the comparable districts that the department of education here in Massachusetts so desi department of elementary and secondary ed um which is based on two key factors by demographics you can see those there and by wealth. Now, if you're
051curious, any of you or folks listening at home, um the links in in in these resources actually allow you to do similar kinds of comparisons yourselves. The the data is really wonderful. Would encourage you to dig into that to really understand differences in spending across communities. But this allows us to show how ACT and Boxboro performs or or operates similarly or differently uh than similar districts out there. And then um we know that this community has a long history of comparing itself to some very specific districts. So just wanted to name that that here and provide the links to be able to to run some of those comparisons. But on the the next slide we have um the headline of of how actin box compares to both the state and that very specific set of
052comparable districts. So below the state 7% below the state and just marginally above comparable districts. And then digging into specific categories, we wanted to show compared to those similar districts, what was really making up the difference in spending. So again, a lot going on on this slide. To orient you to this slide, starting on the far left hand side, we have the average per pupil spending in comparable districts. So that $18,700. And then on the far right hand side of the screen, we have the average per pupil spending in Actton Boxboro. And then all of the purple and yellow bars in between show what's making up the difference between comparable districts comparable districts and AB. And so what this shows is that AB is spending less relatively on operations and maintenance slightly less on administration
053and then more in all of these other categories with instructional leadership and pupil services uh being the the some of the larger categories. Now, a really important distinction here, the the way um this data is is recorded, especially which positions belong in which categories can be a little complicated, especially when you think about, you know, someone like Andrew Shen and all all the things that he does, like which bucket do we want to put him in? Something something along those lines. Um, so sometimes it's not a perfect apples to apples comparison. However, this is really helpful directional data to understand what is driving some of the key differences between Act and Boxboro and similar districts. Similar data from before really showing how Actton Boxboro compares to comparable districts and the state across these key categories.
054So, similar to to other places, teachers and benefits really do represent the most significant chunks of of of spending, pupil services, other teaching services. Um and then you can see in coded in green are the the areas where this the district is below the state figure. So uh about 26% below the ops and maintenance of this of the the average district in the state and about 23% below the average average spending for administration. There's again helpful directional data in terms of where the district should be investing its resources to really create the optimal system to get the best results for the community. And I'll just go through these last last couple of slides very quickly. Just wanted to highlight basically some of the same data from before. So differences in administration. We included instructional leadership
055here just because those categories are very similar to each other. And the the title of a of a position uh could lead to it being placed in one or the other. Um and then that ops and maintenance piece. And then on the next slide, similar data but uh looked at in a different way. So rather than looking at the total cost, this is actual uh the actual staffing levels for some key positions where the the data that you're seeing on the left hand side for each of these bars shows the FTE or the the staffing level per 100 students. So not the total spent on staffing, but the actual people, right? And then what that means in terms of the number of staff members supporting 100 students. And this really shows the the differences in
056the actual level of staffing um the the district is able to provide based on the the salaries and benefits for those positions. So you can see that the district's below uh so even though it was above in that leadership staffing uh the the salaries it's actually below in the total staffing level. Um same thing for clerical support and for teacher staffing levels. Um going to highlight two different uh position types just because there's such important pieces of the puzzle here. One, we called out pair professionals or or teacher aids just because it's an important category to look at where it's a a larger uh share than than similar districts out there. So you see the the level of staffing per 100 students where the the district is above both comparable districts and the state. You
057can see where Actton Boxboro fits in compared to other similar districts out there where the placement of the dot corresponds with the dollar spent as well as the staffing levels. And then the other uh position that we wanted to highlight on the next slide is um what this means for for teachers, right? So we have on the far left side the average teacher salaries in Actton Boxboro compared to comparable districts in the state. And then some important data about how the composition of the the teaching staff or the the faculty in Actton Boxboro has changed over the last five years or so where the even though the total number of teachers has actually gone down, average salaries have increased and staff is growing more uh more senior. Right? So, it just sets up some some
058important decisions for the district in terms of how it uh continues to invest in its educators. Now, the other piece to the puzzle here is facilities. So, we wanted to lay out key data points for each of the of the district's buildings, recognizing that two buildings house two uh two schools each. And you can see the year that those schools were built, relative square footage conditions based on assessment from from the the district and other district partners, and then current operating budgets. Now, an asterisk for the school year built um is that even though some uh some schools are are on the older side, the district and and individual towns have invested a lot in those schools. So those years may not totally represent uh how much work and how much money has been invested
059into those facilities. Um and then we specifically called out the the Conan operating cost just because uh many people have been talking about Conan throughout this process. Um so we felt it was important to to name that here. And on the next slide you can see some of the additional uh projected expenses for each facility. So again, looking at the buildings boardwalk all the way up to Conanit, the projected planned expenses by schools uh by by each school for the next 10 years. And so you can see there's a a a long list of things that need to be invested in across all different facilities. Um and there's a story behind each one of them. Um, but really the the the main takeaway here, Conan has the the largest uh total expenses needed to to
060really bring it up to the level that's needed for the for for operating it. Um, you can see some really significant significant expenses at the high school uh for HVAC, heating, uh, some roofing uh, uh, expenditures as well. Um but this is really taking a step back on the next slide just uh thinking about the the larger sort of financial situation for the district right where there are these structural uh revenue limitations in terms of the limited tax base uh taxes uh or total total spending in public education has gone up and up and up. There are tax constraints in terms of how much taxes can go up based on proposition 2 and a half etc. um shortfalls in state aid, but then some challenges on the on the cost side of the house as
061well. So, rising costs that are continuing to rise. We're not it's it's uh steadying off a little bit, but uh on the on the horizon, we're expecting costs to continue to rise. Also, the evolving needs of students require different kinds of services to to to support those needs. And then this challenge with with aging facilities on the previous slide, there's a lot that needs to be invested in. And so a really important conversation for the steering committee and then later this group is which or where do we want to be investing our resources to really get the strongest results for our community more broadly. And so you can see some of the headlines there in terms of the unclear path forward. Cuts significant cuts have already been made. Ongoing cost growth this question about what
062the future's going to look like. Um, we included this this like kind of combination quote on the bottom there. Um, just because I think it captures really well the the challenge that that this community is facing. Just the frustration, erosion in trust, this feeling of of needing of having to do less with less. Um, which makes a lot of people nervous in terms of maintaining educational quality and morale across the district. So again, want to close with this this key point, right? Where should the district be investing its resources to really create the strongest education program for students? Recognizing there are a lot of different categories, a lot of different levers that the district can pull to create really strong education programs for its students. So, let me pause here and and turn it back
063to Tori. >> Thanks, Joe. Um, can we go back to slide 40 real quick, please, Peter? >> 40. Um Joe, can you define for us when you're talking about All right, that was the wrong one. Uh >> professionals. >> Uh there's one about paras paraprofessionals. Yeah. Okay, that is the right one. Can you define what you were looking at um when you say paraprofessionals, please? >> Yes, exactly. So paraprofessionals is um a category for non-certified staff members. Um, so other names that that are typically used are are teachers, aids, assistants, uh, positions like that. And important distinction here, um, there's a a difference between general education pair of professionals and special education pair of professionals. And actually to go like way back, um, or not super way back, the one that shows the changes in
064staffing levels, slide 29 or yeah, this one, right? you can see the shift from uh instructional support, so a reduction in those gened general education uh instructional support to special education instructional support. So, a really important distinction there where those positions are supporting students with with disabilities or more significant or complex needs. >> Thanks. That's helpful. We talked a lot about this last year, so I know people remember that conversation. Just making sure we're using language that makes sense. All right, I already see hands in the air. We'll go around. Ben, >> if I could ask on slide number 36 or page number 36, uh, you break down per or I guess it's pupil services. Can you go into more detail what pupil services are? Is it paraprofessionals? Is it additional staff? It's not very
065clear. >> Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Um and we can provide the detailed summary of exactly what is included in each of those descriptions, but yeah, it includes uh attendance, parent liaison, medical health services, transportation services, uh athletics gets included in there, um school security, um but uh so a whole host of other other sorts of costs. Victim, >> uh, since we're on the slide, uh, so you're saying that 19,48 includes transportation costs which are reimbursed. >> Yes. >> So once those are reimbursed, what does that number come down to comparatively with the 18747? >> Oo, that is an excellent question. I'll have to get back to you on the exact figure there >> because does it come is it still like a lot because now it looks like a huge amount of money because we're not
066even talking $1,000 per pupil. Obviously it adds up but you know when you take the transportation costs into effect does that really you know bring them almost even kill it it yeah um in terms of a proportion of that I have to to dig into the numbers to give you a specific answer but you're right it does it does represent a significant portion of that chunk. That's a great yeah great point about what the the actual difference between schools are or districts are >> okay Adam >> so a quick for Vicram it should be normalized across all districts so their transportation costs are included as well so this is for a municipal versus a regional that's the way the the data gets sort of parsed out so removing our transportation puts us at an unfair
067comparison to the comparable districts because they have their transportation in there >> but I mean with all things being equal if they're all being reimbursed. If you remove them all, no, >> then percentage is roughly the same of what we're seeing here. Joe, my question is on slide 16. Um, and this was something that we talked about in the in the steering committee as well, which was your the data on no guarantee of first choice for families and roughly 26% of elementary students. That's 20 sorry, 23% of incoming kindergarteners, right? Um, and I think the district's got some more information and maybe Peter can clarify. When we look at kids leaving sixth grade or kids leaving 12th grade, what percentage of those kids actually had a choice at which elementary school they went to? >>
068So, Andrew, I'm going to try and clarify what I think Adam's question was and see if you can respond. The 23% of elementary students who are late enrolles, is that does that include kindergarten who enroll after the lottery? [Music] I believe it does. I think if you are a kindergartener who say moved into the district um in June before kindergarten starts, but after the lottery, it does include that percentage. I'll double check the the memo that I wrote, but I'm fairly sure it does include that. the the I think the clarification I'm looking for is if I'm a third grader moving into the town, do I get a first choice or and and I think the the ultimate question is by the time you've got a graduating senior, what percentage of those graduating seniors have
069gone through with their first choice of of elementary school? Um, we had Joanie confirm the my recollection of this, but the the high school does um, senior exit surveys every year and what they've come to see in recent senior exit surveys is it's about 50% of the senior class started after kindergarten. >> Yeah. So for me that's sort of illustrative of while open enrollment might be valuable by the time you're leaving the district it's it's only been an important decision for about half the students in the district. >> Not a value statement either way about whether or not it's important but I think it's interesting to understand that it's super important when you've say got a four and 5year-old but when you've got a 12 or 14y old um obviously you don't you don't have
070that choice anymore. All right, Lisa. >> Hi. So, I wanted to inquire about methodology for the data analysis and more specifically the tools that were used. >> Yeah, absolutely. Um, just broadly for all the analysis or for specific areas. >> Um, when aggregating and collecting the data, did you to analyze the data? Did you use AI humans? Did you How is like how is it like what types of uh tools or programs were used? I think. >> Yeah, terrific question. >> Sorry, I had it too vague in the beginning. >> Oh, yeah. No, good. Um, so for the survey results, we used a combination of human and AI. It was like a it's baked into the thought exchange program. Um we ran a bunch of uh very thorough tests to confirm the the insights that
071we were pulling out. Um but we did use the AI capabilities that are built into that tool. Um for the financial analysis that was all done by hand through Excel largely. So >> thank you. >> Yeah, no problem. >> Yen, >> thank you. Um I have a question. So slides 22 and that was the chart for math, science and ELA. And you had mentioned during the presentation that math and science seems to come back up, bounce back. ELA remain to be undesirable at the moment. I was just wondering if there's any correlation between the ELA performance of the district and the number of multilingual students that are now in the district but do not have sufficient support. >> Yeah. the the correlation is there. Um I think the question would be uh I think there's
072there's a lot more to unpack to really understand that correlation. >> Liz, >> um I have one quick question about uh the student surveys. Yes. Uh, since I think that a lot of the conversation is going to be happening around elementary, I noticed that elementary um, you know, from the winter student survey, they they were kind of grouped. Um, were you able to capture all age groups of elementary? I'm just wondering like what ages we started at because I can't imagine a kindergartener could answer all those questions. >> Yeah, that's a a great question. Um, we use the designations from the from the district. Um, we can get back to you on uh exactly which uh which grade levels were included in that student survey unless Peter you can answer that right now. >> I
073believe it's 3rd through sixth. I that that's my best recollection. Andrew, I know you were here for that too. Do you remember when we did the surveys with students that was 3 through six? We we can get more information on that, but that's my best recollection right now. >> If it was through the panorama, right? >> Yeah. Yeah, it was three through six. >> Okay. I was just curious because I wanted to make sure that it wasn't like just the sixth graders type of thing to get the broader. >> Oh, it definitely wasn't just sixth graders for sure. Whether it was three or four, I'm fairly sure it was it went down to three. >> Andrew, >> thanks Rory. And thank you, man. Thank you for this. I know it's uh it's comprehensive and it's
074the result of a lot of hours of work and I do have a question but I want to make one thing to state this is a data report. It's a really good data report and it's one that can drive folks to conclusions but it's not yet report that's providing conclusions. It's one thing to think it's and I think it's important to re reiterate this that no decisions have been made regarding any changes to the district and it's important for anyone listening to this discussion, anyone who's interested in this topic that we state this. There's a lot of stuff I hear it in the community. um people that heard that this school's closing or that that school were closed or that there was a presentation that showed the plans or that the schools convert to 2
075to three and 3 to 5 and that six and that the junior high is going to move to the high school. Nothing's been cho nothing's been done. It's important for us to be able to get that out because it's in the public that we've already made our decisions and we haven't. Um, I I think it's most important to reiterate, you've shown some great answers here. We're fiscally responsible, which is great. Thank you, Peter. We've got great outcomes. We've got great teachers. We've got some issues with some buildings. Um, and that school choice is something we can talk about. But I also know that when it comes to these types of um, human qualitative research, biases appear in the people that come and choose to provide additional information. And my question comes, leading off of what
076Lisa mentioned, how do you filter for that kind of bias in this knowing that most people will talk most about the things that matter most to them, which is usually when they want things to change for some reason or other. So, in our analysis of the survey results, we were able to filter based on different uh demographics and different uh characteristics that people chose to respond to. where we're at right now is we there there are there's still work for us to do to make sure that the feedback that we get from the community is more representative. And so I'm excited for the next round of stakeholder engagement where we actually have once we generate the options or scenarios for reorganization, we'll be able to use those as anchor points to get additional feedback from
077community members. and we'll continue to make sure that the feedback that we get is representative using the tools in in in these different platforms to I think it's important the one data point you have up here is when you talked about the pros and cons of school of school choice and one of them being the financial implications therein and specifically the the presumption that transportation was less efficient than it actually is is I think a key component of understanding some of the misrepresentations that exist in the community and biases that are there just as an example of that. Thank you. >> Yeah, >> Joe, can I jump in just to elaborate a little bit more on that? Um, I think the idea of, you know, participation has been one that we've been thinking about a
078lot over the last couple of years. And what Joe and I have talked about is using some processes when we run focus groups. um similar to what we did last year extensively which is that you know a portion of the focus groups are open to individuals who are choosing to participate um and kind of on their own want to participate but then we're also looking at about half of the members of focus groups are individuals where we randomly select out of the district. We just use a random number generator to pick people and then we actually invite them to sign up for focus groups so that we're getting both perspectives because we we actually need to value the perspective of people who care passionately about this and we need to try and think about how
079do we expand the participation among all of our families. >> Much like our elementary schools, there's a lot of nuance that goes into developing qualitative research. I appreciate that you're doing that, >> Glenn. couple of questions. Um, >> pick the one that's most important and then we'll circle back around. >> Yep. Um, were the survey res were there populations in our survey results that there was more difficulty reaching? Um, I know that we stressed that being able to have the survey go out to members of the community whose first language is in English was a priority, but so there was there must have been some challenges, but I heard that the the response rate was pretty good, I think. But are there populations that may not have been represented in the survey results? >> Uh,
080the short answer is yes. uh certain certain community groups were more challenging to reach. Um and you're always uh limited by the response rates from communities. Um I will say though um compared to other districts where we do this work, the results in this survey were extremely strong and quite representative um compared to again other other places where we work. And as we move into the next round of stakeholder engagement, to Peter's point, we have some really specific, more intentional approaches that we're going to take to invite people into uh being a part of this this process. >> Leela, >> yeah, thank you for the presentation. I think it was affirming that academics, teachers, and staff, and diversity and inclusion were kind of the three strengths of this district. I think many of us share
081that perspective and I'm glad to see that represented in the survey. Um I I had a similar question to Glenn, but I'm wondering if you have the information in this moment about like which communities um were not as represented as maybe they are in our district. Um and if that's something you need to get later, that's also fine. Um, but would be really interested in in a plan to reach folks because I think you know like there is a perspective that folks are just like hard to reach. I think there's also a perspective that like we can do more. I think there's always more that we can do. Um, so just curious about which communities in particular. >> Yes, absolutely. In the the uh stakeholder engagement like survey results packet that we had shared, there's
082a breakdown of of demographics there. I think one of the challenges is that we couldn't force people to respond to the demographics question. Um, and so, uh, the results were 17% Asian, 2% each for Hispanic, Latino, black, multi-race, 66% white, and then a 17% chunk that said I prefer not to say or other. Um, so makes it a little bit more complex for us, but I completely agree. So based based on those results, not quite proportional for for the the for the the community population. Um however, there are steps that we plan to take to be more or be even more intentionally inclusive um both in terms of how we can invite folks to be a part of uh the specific focus groups. um how we can then uh create these community meetings that that
083intentionally uh bring folks in and then how we can um be even more intentional with with getting the survey out to to various uh communities. >> So yeah, yeah, I appreciate that. Um and I think I'm especially curious about like families with disability or students with disabilities. Um because like when we talk about >> um enrollment and choice like that isn't the same for everyone. um multilingual families. So, kind of thinking more broadly about like identities and perspectives included, but appreciate that and appreciate your thoughts about going forward. >> Yeah. Um and just a quick point actually students with disabilities and um students who are receiving English language services. Actually, we're pretty large percentages. Um there are 300 responses out of about 1,200 responses for students with disabilities. So, that's a larger uh larger proportion
084there. But I think a important point for us to continue to keep in mind how we keep engaging families who are engaging in the whole variety of services in actin boxboro. >> All right. So I'm going to start second questions on this side. Glenn, I know you have another one. >> Yes, I do. So regarding the one one concern I've heard and I have myself is the that the self selection or frank perhaps more bluntly self-segregation of communities with school choice. I I find that concerning. Um, one thought I had is so if you have the elementary schools and students with more advanced needs are more proportionally represented in that school versus that school versus that school. Um, what is the staff allocation? Like for instance, are there more there must be more staff for
085English language learners assistance for the schools that have more English language learner needs. Um, would it be easier on staff or from an administrative perspective to have the like over the C like in a hypothetical scenario where over the course of the next several years in this hypothetical scenario where open enrollment went away and the perhaps the enrollment of population with advanced needs were more evenly distributed. Would that make it easier from an administrative perspective to meet student needs as opposed to students being students being clustered in one school or the other? You know, I think it's going to be easier for us to answer that when we start to actually see some scenarios come forward because it's kind of hypothetical right now. What as I think about this, any any scenarios we do, including
086the ones we have, are going to have advantages to them and disadvantages. Um, and there's no magic bullet that's going to solve all of our challenges. And so I think it's important to recognize that um we already allocate like English language learners based on you know the number of students in schools and the relative uh need based on kind of the WEDA levels where they're kind of newcomers just learning English or whether they have been in you know with us for a couple years and are progressing. Um, one of the things we talked about last year with our elementary budget task force and given that we were entering the consideration of a larger reorganization, we didn't do last year, but I think it's safe to say is on the horizon is really looking at like
087math and reading specialists and thinking about allocating those based on the need that we're seeing. Um, and that's not, you know, demographics. That's actually how many students are at grade level and how many students need tier one and two interventions, what skills do they need, what, you know, size group is appropriate for that. That's on the horizon where we'd be allocating that out by school regardless of what we do. Um, I think one of the challenges we found with our specialists right now like math and reading interventions was when we started to look um at some of our data last year during the elementary budget task force. A recommendation that came out of that was your group sizes are generally pretty small right now. And so we looked at potentially larger group sizes, but based
088on kind of the size of our schools and the way um student groupings need to happen, if you're providing a math intervention or a reading intervention, you don't just group all of your second graders who need math intervention together. They actually have to have a need for the same skill development. Um otherwise, the intervention group is is not effective um if they're all working on different skills. And when we started actually looking at the number of students in our intervention groups, um we were finding that there might only be two or maybe a third student at a grade level who needed that intervention. And so we actually couldn't based on the size of our schools now actually increase our intervention group sizes and you know allow for maybe the most efficient use of staff. So
089that is kind of a long answer, but it's a really really nuanced answer. in terms of, you know, being able to get to it specifically. I think that's certainly something that, you know, DMG will talk about and we'll be able to talk about more once we see scenarios. All right, Adam. >> I'm just gonna really quickly return to selection of first choice of school and and just remind everybody again that if you do have a a specific need and there's a specialized program and that specialized program is only housed in a certain building. Then again, you don't get your first choice of schools. You get placed in the school that has the program that supports you. So another thing to consider when we we're looking at percentage of students who get their first choice in
090elementary. >> Lisa One of the questions that I've heard a lot in the community is where the final decision for anything that does or possibly happens. Um, and more specifically, people have asked if things would go to a town vote. And so I just wanted to ask the question to get a little bit of clarity for some of the community members around that. Um, so I actually did a little bit of, you know, legal work on this just to I'm not a lawyer even if I dress like one. Um, the but in all seriousnesses when you start to look at the law, it's really important to understand what the role and responsibility of school committees versus town meeting is and and different boards and committees that might exist in a town. Um by law, school
091committee is actually tasked with the educational programming which includes the number of schools, the grade configurations of schools, the educational programming of schools. So by law, school committee has that final vote where town meeting would be involved is say the school committee decided to add an additional school and needed to acquire more space in order to acquire new buildings. You would need town approval to do that. But in terms of how you choose to configure your own schools and buildings, that is by law the school committee's final decision. >> I'll just add to that a little bit. Um the other thing is that we are elected to represent the needs of all of our students. We are tasked with um supporting the the strength and the integrity of the district. This includes all of our
092educators. And so when we make this decision, it's not it's not based on a popular vote. It's how do we do the right thing for everybody? And we already know this is going to be hard, right? Um and and we can tell that this is going to be challenging. There are a lot of different opinions out there right now. Um so I really appreciate that question. I think it's just something that that we have to hold close to our hearts as we go through this because it will be a challenge and we have an important role here. >> I wanted to talk about the data on slide uh 23 that these these numbers seem to correlate with the not just the pandemic but then the subsequent year upon year reduction in staff. So the resources
093that are needed for English learners and students with IEPs and low-income students have been dissolved over the past three years, you know, and I think does does that largely account for this drop in all three areas? >> I think it's a very very complex question to unpack. uh and staffing is definitely part of it is right >> the conversation >> but significant probably I would imagine >> it's I think there's there's a lot of uh there's a lot of judgment that would be baked into that and this would this is a very highlevel snapshot of of data so I would be cautious about drawing really direct uh uh connections there but I think it's it's a worthwhile part of the conversation and I think to the to the larger question that we're we're faced with
094what are the right kinds of positions that would provide the right kind of support for kids. What are the right ways to design systems of support? So to Peter's example before about having group sizes that have maybe one or two more students, now you have a much more efficient way for uh uh educators or specialists to reach students and like what would the the systems or structures need to be to allow for a system like that. So staffing is a part of the a part of the the puzzle, but it's also how you design the larger system of supports uh for intervening with students. >> No, I'm aware of that data. The I think the optimal was was five it seemed. Right. And you have to break down like you said specific arenas even within
095mathematics and specific things >> for group sizes. >> Yeah. Right. Right. >> Typically five to six is effective on the needs of students. Yeah. It depends on what tier, what skills, things like that. Um, you know, I just to piggyback on what I think Joe said, I think there's a lot of data in education that makes it very easy to correlate one outcome with a change that happened. And correlation is pretty easy. What I think I'm always thoughtful of in educational data is we don't necessarily have the systems and education to then figure out what the cause is. And so it has to stop short of, you know, reaching quick judgments about, well, I saw this happen here and and that changed because there might be six other changes that also happened at the same
096time that aren't accounted for in a slide. So just based on this, I think it could be easy to think it it that they're somehow causational, but I I would hesitate to jump to that right now. >> Yen, >> thank you. Um, this is a comment, not a question. Um I hear the word segre self-segregate or segregate a lot when we talk about open enrollment. It is a big question. Um I think when people choose their schools for their children, some people choose the school that wi with a a group of people they think alike and there are other groups that choose schools based on where their culture or family or or people they look alike. I I think in conversations we often forget that people choose groups that they feel like they think alike,
097that's not segregation. But if you choose a school based on what you look like, that's segregation. I kind of want us to like move on from that word in the following conversations if that's okay. Okay. Any other second questions that I've missed here? Okay. I would like to make a comment and then I think I'd like to have us move on. So if I think if there are any other questions that we haven't gotten to, if you can send those along and we can pass them on to Joe. >> Did you want to since we're ahead, did you want to give any members of the public an opportunity to ask a question? >> Um, we aren't actually ahead. >> Oh, we're not. Never mind. Okay, then you go. So I don't have it in front
098of me because I'm projecting. >> Right. Um, so just one thing I wanted to share. First of all, really appreciate all that has gone into this. This is a lot of great information. Um, and two things really popped out to me. One is that I think you've you've done a really good job of capturing where some of the tensions are and letting us see what the various conversations are that are out there um and the some of the hard choices that you know we may end up talking about. But with that also, you aren't tipping your hand. And you know, to Andrew's point, there the decision isn't made. we don't even know what the scenarios are yet. And it was interesting for me to read this and go, well, I can't tell any sort of
099approaches that you're favoring. So, um, kudos on kudos on leaving us still in the dark so we can continue to work our way through this before we're really ready to bring stuff forward. >> Thank you. >> Thanks, Joe. >> All right. Um, with that we are moving on to our second read of the district goals. Peter, any updates you want to share with us on this? >> No, at this point there there weren't any really significant changes that I heard asked for in the last meeting. So, what you're seeing is largely the same um as what was presented last time. So, we're just asking for your vote to approve if that is your inclination. I would like to move to approve the district and superintendent goals as presented. >> Seconded. >> All right. So that
100was Liz with the motion and Vicram with the second. All in favor? >> Any opposed? Any abstensions? All right. That vote is unanimous. So that brings us to the items on the consent agenda which do not usually require discussion and are approved with one vote unless any member would like to hold an item for discussion and a separate vote. I will read each item and if a member would like it held, please say hold. Members do not have to have attended a meeting to vote on the minutes. So item A, approval of ABRSC meeting minutes 82625. Item B, recommendation to approve budget transfers per policy DBJ. Item C, approval of warrants as presented in the packet from September 4th, 2025. >> All right. Seeing as nothing has been held, is there a motion to approve
101the consent agenda as presented? >> So moved. >> Second. >> All right. Adam gets it just out of being loud and Leela with the second. All right. All in favor? >> Any opposed? Any abstensions? All right, consent agenda. We are done with that. So, we are going to transition up to room 23 for our school committee workshop. And um now that we have some approved goals, we're going to figure out how to make them successful.