##VIDEO ID:8XuBZZgGglM## [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] you [Music] recording in progress good evening everyone and welcome to the Brookline school committee meeting for Thursday January 23rd 2025 you get me tonight uh Andy's here here remotely he's a little under the weather Steven's here remotely he's a little under the weather and Val I believe is remote and she is a little under the weather so we hope all our committee members get well soon like flies yeah like flies and we do appreciate that you are attending the meeting uh even when you're not feeling well so thank you for those efforts it's not not always fun okay we're going to move right along um first is our consent agenda do I have a motion to move the consent agenda thank you Mariah do I have a second thank you Carolyn um are there any questions or comments before we take a vote Jesse I just uh in Reading in rereading them today again I wanted to um just thank Betsy for a really comprehensive and descriptive job I felt by reading them like I was there again so thank you very much it was really really that was thank you also theen the art students uh trip to New York sounds fantastic it does it reminded me when I was just on the side when I was at University of Connecticut and the art teacher took us down to New York City and it was so much fun and it's such a great experience so I'm excited for that trip excited for that okay um we'll take a vote Jessie Yes Sarah yes Mariah yes Helen yes Carolyn yes Stephen yes Andy yes and Val yes and I vote Yes as well thank you uh what's up to you our student report um all right so this is the January school committee report um life at BHS once again um this will be a little bit of a short a report um but we are looking forward at BHS to a lot of things in the coming weeks um so first and perhaps most importantly this week uh is our midyear exam period um so yesterday was the first day of midyear exams began with um language and social studies today was math in English and tomorrow uh for me at least there's only one so that's a blessing um but for some there are two um the midyear exam period actually just as a personal comment this is my last midyear exam um at the high school um and the other day I was just thinking I was like this is such a Bittersweet moment um but then I realized that you know in college you will have to do a lot of major exams so um you know Closing one chapter and opening another um but we also had at BHS our Student Government assembly at the beginning of the month um so just a week after coming back um the student government held a know your rights assembly for all BHS students um this is an annual production um by the student council the student legislature and then the BHS student Judiciary um and really what it focuses on is ensuring that all BHS students are sort of in tune with the handbook um and that they know what rights what freedoms they're accorded um per the BHS student handbook um you know so a lot of the questions that for example the student government got from the average student was you know can I postpone certain tests um you know can I do all these sorts of things you know especially relative to to testing um that's one of the biggest sort of concerns that students have um and also one of the biggest areas in which a lot of students don't know how many rights they're afforded um and so this is always you know just a truly it's always well put together um by the student government and it really is informative for a lot of students and I've had a lot of students come up um to me after it's done and just say you know that they didn't know a lot about what their rights were for the handbook um and that these sort of assemblies always helped them out a lot um moving on um BHS theater um this is a very brightly colored slide I apologize for that um but uh BHS the theater and the drama societies at BHS um have a lot going on um this month and next month so next month the BHS drama Society will perform their show Mean Girls every year um they put on a production uh this year they chose Mean Girls um and our Headmaster Mr Meyer actually commented that he hopes that the spirit of sort of the production can um sort of foster open dialogue among everybody um and continue to build a BHS spirit and then the theater for social change uh which is a class offered by the performing arts department um performed a show on censor censorship last week uh I believe it was last Friday um in the 22 tap in theater it was called sensor I hardly know her um and it was about censorship just how censorship affects everybody in their daily lives um and different scenarios in which censorship exists um and I actually had a lot of people um you know a lot of friends of mine who saw the show and they really commented that it was a very well together production um and then it's also January busy month for BHS Athletics right now we're in the winter season um which will last about um until about the end of February um so the boys VI the boys varsity ice hockey game they hosted skate with a warrior um so they actually got youth hockey um so those who are in middle school and Elementary School to come down play with them January 11th um and fans actually contributed donations to the Brooklyn food pantry so it was a really really good way to build community um and the boys varsity ice hockey team has actually been on a tear recently um I do have to say they came in third at uh the state bean pot tournament um so congratulations to them um the BHS squash team um which as a lot of you guys know um has been coached by Steve Lantos for many years um they actually uh we won the inaugural Boston Public High School squash championships um which was a tournament that was actually um in large part contributed to by Steve um and so it was a very good win um VHS squash is actually the best public school team right now in the state um so you know really really great um and then looking ahead they wish didn't they win the Nationals last year uh two years ago yeah um but looking ahead to big things this year um as well um and then on the theme of looking ahead um next week is actually going to be a very busy and very important week for BHS students uh quarter 2 ends Tuesday um so the first semester will officially have ended uh we also celebrate Lunar New Year uh on Wednesday um the brook Lin's U Asian-American Pacific Island Club APAC uh usually puts on a an annual celebration uh near the end of February um so right before February vacation we usually have a celebration um and I imagine that that will occur this year um so just a few weeks after Lunar New Year we're also on uh Tuesday going to be celebrating our annual day of racial reform and solidarity so doors um this event was pushed back um but now it's going to be held on January 28th um for four blocks out of five in the day uh and then we'll also host uh details fourth coming um from Clifton Jones who will be putting on this uh but we'll host an annual uh Martin Luther King Day celebration uh later in next week um I imagine either Thursday or Friday um but once again more details are going to be coming from Clifton Jones um who's one of our administrators at the high school um so I can certainly provide you guys those when students receive them uh that was the month of January uh and VHS students are looking ahead to February looking ahead to the start of the third quarter and the start of the second semester yeah um Kiran a question um the January 9th meeting where kids know their rights students get to know their rights um is that the only one held during the year and if so why isn't it like I don't know during the first two weeks of September so students aren't as confused about what their rights are say mid year yeah so this was actually the second assembly that the student government put on um usually we have one at the beginning of the year and then one like Midway through just so that students like are able to recap um but this is usually a bigger assembly um like a far more formal one um takes place during advisory um in which all students nth grade through 12th grade um get to listen [Music] in are R bety we can't hear the room or we can hear sorry I was asking what on this slide on the calendar what the two red outlined blocks oh yeah yeah so that was just marked um for us by uh our administrators when they sent us the schedule just to make sure the students knew uh know that we start with C block instead of a block uh usually on Tuesdays we actually don't have a block um so this was just a special schedule uh and they just wanted to ensure our administrators wanted to ensure that we all saw um that there was actually an a block and that the day started with C block yeah okay thank you so much you know you're welcome to stay as long as you want or if you need to go study you can do that too okay we're now up to the superintendent's report do we know who our guests are in the audience I I'm just curious do we know you with NBC oh did we did we know you were coming oh okay I'm sorry what well you don't have to I guess but nice to know good a is this on can you hear me let me see yours good afternoon everyone little loud there I want to begin um our superintendent update walking through a few slides and then I will have some open commentary on a few items based on a few questions received um feedback on our updated civil rights and bullying um policies PSB um places High importance on ensuring students safety and fostering a welcoming and affirming learning environment and working environment for all of our members of our community as part of that commitment we are revising revisiting and revising our uh student civil rights and bullying policies protocols and Reporting forms so this information has been shared out uh to the community but the Highlight that we want to make sure is that uh the survey will be open for providing feedback until Jan January 31st so this is a reminder there sure um I had a question about this because right now we have an interim uh filling this position that would be overseeing these uh policies and procedures correct so as well as uh other team members as well okay I guess I was a little bit surprised that we were revising things when we had an interim in place and not a permanent person well this remember this follows up under the office of student services which uh Lisa is very much okay it's being over not by just the interim but absolutely okay thank you um multi-tiered systems of support the office of teaching and learning has established a multi-tier I had a question too to follow Marias um if I may um maybe Stephen can help me on this but in policy subcommittee are we in the middle of what's going on with this or is this coming from the side in terms of the policy side so part of it you get update on uh there the policy itself um undergo some minor tweaking uh at each year I think you're supposed to review these every two years okay as such but it won't be a hard scale rewrite uh in that regard but more of an update so we're in the process of gathering feedback on that and that will help inform the work of the committee as well so which committee is working on oh sorry Stephen thank yeah the policy subcommittee there's five documents that OSS has been working on um and they are forms protocols and policies the forms and Protocols are being updated by OSS and the policy recommendations are going to be taken up for consideration by the policy subcommittee at their next at the next meeting which is I believe on Monday right um in the in the documents that we're going to review for that we're going to also review the forms and protocols with which the policy recommendations align but the school committee's purview to adopt new civil rights policies and bullying policies is that the gist of your question Jesse not really I was I mean I mean like I'm not a a parent of a kid in the system so I don't I didn't even know the survey was sent out so there's feedback that's going to come in to somewhere from parents about how they feel or issues that they've had in terms of civil rights and bullying in the district look looking at the materials that have been shared with them so feedback on those actual documents that have been sent out and that went out in the I think it went out it went out um to staff last week and I believe it went out to parents this week earlier this week so Stephen we take this input in subcommittee and then utilize it to tweak the policy by anually is that the question is that the process the policy isn't tweaked with any regularity it's what OSS is recommending updates to bring it into compliance with changes to Title 9 since it was last reviewed so that's why it's been docketed um I think uh OSS and its consultant when they meet with us will review the reasons for the changes to the protocol and the forms uh I can't speak to that though thanks can I ask a question sorry I didn't hear the answer to Jesse's question where does the feedback go who uses the feedback is it the committee is it the staff who then digest it and goes back to the staff I see y sorry I I don't want to really belabor this and I'm trying to bring it up and it's five things so it's a policy but it's not being done by our policy school committee the policy there I believe is the title 9 um the the title 9 regulation um which at the time um if you recall in August there were new uh the Biden Administration issued new regulations around Title 9 those new regulations have since been vacated by a judge as such uh but we're still um bringing that forward for the committee to actually look at so right now the um my understanding is that we've reverted back to the previous iteration of Title 9 um but it's still um our label Council to answer your question about who generated the the actual policy our label Council actually uh built the policy for us um to make sure that we were compliant with the new regulations at the time okay so is our is our outside Council the consultant that's being referred to no that's um uh the interim oh yes I see okay so it's a bullying prevention form a community incident reporting form a student civil rights and bullying incident I guess we'll see it when we see it those are more digest yeah those are more the the protocols are more of an FYI for you as they relate to the actual policy pieces just to say that we're getting more current with um with the collection of information okay and then one more question following on what somebody else asked about the feedback so feedback has been solicited from staff feedback has been solicited from um parents parents and caregivers and then some from I believe it out to some high school students as well like randomly selected High scho I'd have to look I'd have to check with the high school to see how they send it out I think the request was for Mr Meyer to send it out um to students okay and I'd like to follow up on what someone else asked will will the school committee be able to see the feedback that is gathered sure yeah okay thank you you're welcome multi-tiered systems of support the office of teaching and learning has established a multi-tiered systems of support design team this team consists of Educators representing a wide variety of roles and grade levels our partners at new teacher Center have an integral have been an integral thought partner and facilitation partner with us as we work through this process our work on tier one literacy curriculum and strategies is nested within this body of work literacy curriculum professional learning has begun for our new tier one literacy curriculum with fish tank learning our first train the trainer session for the district level leaders was on January 21st and our first session for literacy specialist is on February 5th a team of 10 Educators visited Bradley Elementary in East Boston today to see the program in action and another team of 10 educators will be visiting tomorrow and we're excited to see our implementation plan come to life that's through our office of teaching and learning Brook Lon CPAC summer camp Fair on January 11th the brook Lon CPAC par uh CPAC hosted its first ever summer camp fair at the florita ruffen Ridley School and Leisa sheares it was a resounding success drawing great turnout from families and vendors the fair featured programs that specialized in supporting children with special needs 15 summer programs were in attendance and the event showcased a diverse range of opportunities designed to cater to various age ages and support needs the program highlighted everything from academic enrichment to social skills development and therapeutic recreation families had the chance to speak directly with program Representatives ask questions and find the perfect fit for their child's unique needs the event created a welcoming environment for connection and resource sharing and the enthusiasm and energy from both participants and program providers made the fair and invaluable resource for the special education community and here are a few photos uh from the event from the various uh vendors that were there and they even had a little play Space uh for children who were in attendance so we want to thank uh the CPAC and OSS for coordinating that a few updates General updates um there were questions around uh the uh since we're talking about oss the um student services position uh that position has been posted the deputy superintendent I think it was posted January 9th and will be up through January I'm sorry February 7th so we generally held our postings up uh about a month a question was um asked about the compro uh the makeup of the interview team that's uh written in policy I think under G2 which says um a principal um a member of senior cabinet uh curriculum coordinator um and then three parents and uh three uh teachers generally but given that this is a a broader the superintendent uh has discretion to add more members to that body generally with um positions with which the school committee has statutory Authority for appointment a school Committee Member is not supposed to sit on that committee uh as such that's what the policy says um but there are ways that we can um get folks introduced um that are needed there so the committee itself hasn't been formed as of yet I'll be doing that over the next two weeks um and certainly members of the um student services team team are very interested in participation and I'm sure as well as CPAC um and um those types of groups a question on that sure um in terms of CPC then what would their how how are you looking at their involvement they would be members of the interviewing committee okay and would they be able to um determine within their organization who they want to offer yes that's how that works yeah they would get like a slot or two and then they'll come back to your tell us who who their representative would be who their representatives will be okay thank you um other questions around that um I think some of the other questions are better suited for finance subcommittee but they may come up and we'll uh a little bit later um and we can address them there um that's OSS for the baker Baker's uh princi principal spot has been posted as well um and I've sent out I believe a communication went out today to that Community um inviting them or sharing the timeline as well as uh letting them know uh to uh if they're interested in joining the committee to submit their names or their information so that we can work with them um on that and I'll be posting rle um soon as well so we had again if for context both rle both F frr and Baker had interim principles that were appointed in 2023 that appointment was for a two-year period um after and now this is the juncture at which we need to search for the permanent principal we know then that Donna finnean uh who's been at RL for the past five years as the building principal has shared that she's retiring uh my goal is to run the position uh hopefully get solid candidates for that um andun that process as well so that will be three principal processes that we're running through at the moment and the last part of the superintendent's update is um there's certainly concern with um and I'll be sharing out a communication tomorrow with our community around um recent changes to uh immigration officials and their abilities to come in school so very clearly that uh agents are not allowed in schools uh unless they have a Judicial warrant as such um but I'll be sharing this information out with the community at large as well as our staff so that everyone's clear about what expectations and um student protections are there so no student should be released uh to any individual no individual should be coming in our buildings we have secured buildings which is a great thing for us um but we want to make sure especially during our transitional moments as well that staff are aware um and um are taking appropriate safeguards with our with our students as such that communication going to is that is that communication going to staff exclusively or to the community as well so that everyone is aware of the okay thank you the community and then and to finish that then Monday we have our building leadership meeting um our district leadership meeting and Town Council and the town administrator will be joining to give additional updates uh to our district leader so that we can make sure and the uh this is certainly emerging as we see lots of of orders are coming out of Washington at this moment um and so we'll TR do our level best to keep up with uh with the pace we're also um awaiting guidance from the Attorney General's office uh as well and so but until we have that ad that guidance this is the the uh information that we're going to put out um for our community okay Jess um yeah a question going back to the OSS position sure so I just wanted to make sure I got the dates right it was posted on the 9th the 7th January yeah of January right right right and it and it does have a closing date on February 7th so February 7th and what would your I mean on based on experience what would the length of time be between February 7th and the time we're actually seeing candidates so my hope will be and again we have a lot going on in there we have F frr we have Baker uh as well and so and it's the same people uh the same small Cadre of people that are involved in many of those so uh my goal would be to try um to run an accelerated pattern if I could um but given that we have February break in there right that's going to be uh a challenge for us um and another question was about uh the interim the possibility of an interim um well I again I think the question as I phrased it um earlier was um if we found amazing candidate and offered that person a position and they accept it but they're working somewhere else let's say and they can start in whenever the beginning of the contract would be let's say July 1st or something like that so there's almost for sure going to be an interim period right where if Lisa's um resignation was effective in March yeah and there's April and May and June for school and all the services and everything OSS does um I would imagine we have some kind of articulated plan for how to address three and a half months of support and you know if it's not someone from the district then they have to learn everything before she goes you know and that's a tremendous amount of handoff it it definitely is and so um and when we brought leer on it was a similar situation um where our previous Deputy left I think in June and Lisa came on mid to late August as well and so there was a period where um we had directors who were certainly qualified uh they car at the low but the summer uh period is very different than than than this and so um the goal would be to identify a short list of possib possibilities reach out to them I've been doing that uh as well um but that position as it's uh codified in the committee would then have to come to committee for vote uh as well and so all of that's going to be happening in very short order so our goal is to have someone in place prior to the transition uh as well and then um the other thing is talking with the directors uh as well to get their input about what would make sense um for an interim period as well because again that notion of that much change in very short order is also hard so I want to make sure that I have their thoughts and thinking as well okay and and is it possible for us to know if there have been people who are interested in the position so far I mean it's out there almost two three weeks now I think when I looked just before coming in there may don't hold me to this number that there may be I think 11 people that have applied okay it's good to know thank you oh Val thanks Dr Gill my understanding is that there are at least a few of of similar jobs available in eastern Mass is that accurate based on your M meetings ask that again Val sorry I'm a little sick um that there are a few OSS assistant uh superintendent Deputy superintendent type positions open in oh I'm sure yes metro area yeah yep thank you Stephen um thanks two questions on this one is I know last time there was some issues around communication with the school committee um around the OSS position um can can you can you share maybe your your plans for how you might communicate with the school committee around um around the hiring process especially if there's a need for an interim candidate and especially if there's a I mean given that this is a school committee approved position and there's a chance of course that the school committee would would not approve of the candidate can you just talk a little bit about how how Communications might proceed for this position can you say more uh Stephen because I'm I'm not remembering that right I think there was some confusion about what the uh process was for the administration to bring candidates before the school committee and when we would be updated by the administration or um candidates for this position last time if I remember correctly so I just wanted to hear about the the process for communicating with the school committee on this position I may misremember yes so so two things we're we're looking at simultaneously we're looking at the permanent position which is what I just describ to Jesse that process for building a committee and then looking at the possibility of what would be the interim process so if we are able to identify um a short list of interim candidates it's we'd go through um a truncated review process for those individuals and then bring them bring in individual to school committee for consideration and recommendation realistically that's going to have to be um I would say realistically the uh around the 1 of March the first week of March would be the the designated time frame that's still but that's you know with a person that's available right at the moment and so that's the the the the struggle point that we're in right now is just given the shorter time time frame around it but the notion would be that we'd have to dock it or bring someone up uh pretty quickly um am I answering your question yeah I think so so so likely the first the school committee would hear about this would be when it's docketed for school committee consideration of a specific candidate or would there be an update about the process prior to then oh no I'd definitely be keeping you updated along the way as well so um there may be um and so the the the the tricky part is if there's a person for example that's applied for the permanent role that may be available now um and the um interview committee uh is pleased with the individual then do we just bring them in at this juncture rather than an interim than a permanent uh if that's not the case and the person that's they're selected is uh the preferred candidate but they're not available until July then that means I have to be thinking about the interim process as well so uh it's both of those and it's just the the time crunch that we're in and the number of holidays that we have also in here as well but we're we're we're shaking the tree leaves um and reaching out to individuals that may have uh some interest or ability to help us out okay and related to question is are there any exit interview plans for Dr okay yes yes yes and that came up I think at the last commited meeting as well HR will uh engage in that process is is part of that process are the results of the exit interview sharable with the school committee or is that privilege information as per hr processes well I will certainly the parts that are um are Global for improving the system will certain be taken and and shared with and I'll look at the if there are any specific uh Personnel matters that can't be made public um but will be addressed as such as well but Dr Giller couldn't we look at that in executive session given that it is our higher possibly could as well okay thanks and I think Andy's Andy head then Mariah and then Helen Andy go ahead am I next thank you yeah just looking for more clarification on this process for um for selecting the permanent um OSS Deputy so the um the committee that is being put together right now Dr Giller is the purpose of that committee to narrow it down to a list of finalists who would then be interviewed by a different and smaller group yeah so great clarifying question so the the process that I've used um previously for uh Deputy superintendent is to have an interview committee that does the first round or first body of work um then they recommend or they say these are the pros and the cons of each individual from there we do a a second round of selected individuals that's a different group um and again it could be some overlap from the first group uh uh and more than likely it will be just given the size and scope of the bodies of work um that are there and then the superintendent um is then charged with bringing a single candidate forward for the committee to um to consider um and so that's the the process that we've used uh in these roles before okay so there's nothing in policy preventing uh a school Committee Member uh from participating in that second round um if if if that that seemed appropriate I'll I'll review it uh as such but the the goal would be to uh as we've done with with other positions is have the uh committee meet the candidate and get to know the candidate uh prior to uh the formal announcement piece as well okay this is really def is the school committee going to have any role in this process before it's narrowed down to a single candidate who you know is then it's then an up or down Choice yeah I mean I think given the given the the need and the nature and the the prominence of the role I think we can we'll figure that part out but make it available for you as well thanks okay I I so I had a different question but now I'm confused because isn't it a school committee higher it's a school committee so I'm really confused how the whole process can happen without school committee input before a final candidate but I'll just I'll leave that out there that is a comment and not a question um my your hire is when you vote them up or down yeah but right that's not very pleasant process if you're going to get voted down um and I think that um I would like to suggest that you completely accept the reality that we are going to have an interim and that we should not um not try and squeeze something together so quickly um that we should just plan with the appropriate amount of time in place and that means um identifying an interim um likely within the current team and having them step up and be that transition and glue and not assuming we're going to be able to get it would be an amazing rush to be able to get anybody into the position by March 15th and I just feel like it's it's it's doing a disservice to the office and to the community and um to to not put that interim in place and plan for a more extended time period that allows for appropriate Transitions and and that's the that's the the idea but even with that that interim still has to come to committee for approval as such it's it's not disma pointing as such so well that's even more reason as soon as possible exactly wait for the PO candidate yeah that's even more reason to do it as soon as possible and not wait for the pool of candidates to identify their availability with Helen yeah I the one thing I want to caution us all about I know people are interested in this position and want to make sure that we get the right person as does the administration we also don't want to scare away candidates often times candidates need the um privacy because they're usually the good candidates are in positions where they're very valued and so we have to be careful not to scare away the good candidates um and so it's it's a balancing act what I'm trying to say uh I've been on these committees before and I believe me it's it you have to be careful and people do leave especially if they don't think they're going to get the job uh or there's you know three people out there you know it becomes kind of complicated well just just to add uh they also are not going public on their search so um anyway it is a balance because um we want to attract the best candidates but we don't want them to be fearful that that will go public and then they lose their current job but they don't get this one so it it is a balance and so I I I trust that the superintendent will help us get through that uh so we can especially because of the open meeting law and if there's more than four of us in a room together or committeed together that that becomes yeah I was just going to add then to second on what Mariah said that um when I was talking about articulating a transition plan in terms of knowing that any and following up on what Helen just said if if we're finding looking for an individual who's currently employed most likely they're not going to be available until they finish the current year and so it's 99% we're sure that we're going to be getting you that we're looking for a person who's going to start in the summer and that means that we definitely need to get somebody from inside to help to be ready on March 16th you know so that's I think what school committee would like to see is that plan come to fruition pretty quickly because that even allows us essentially if we're not too worried about finding a permanent person by March 16th we have a little more time to do it very very carefully and judiciously and continue to and continue the engine of OSS running as well um until such time as we have a permanent person okay is that it that's it thank you so much um Mariah are you gon to lead us through our budget I'm gonna start okay and I think I'll turn it over to Susan later on and I might actually flip around the last two things so that we could I could I could finish all of my part before we go to your part Susan okay I see a thumbs up so the first item in finances discussion and possible vote on FY 26 fees for beep Forin Early Education Program so this was discussed at Finance last week um and Betsy thank you so much for my handy notes here um I will I'll just say that we had a lot of conversation about thinking about the all-in costs of beep um and considering um the changes that have been made from um FY 24 to the current year fy2 when um the program has now gone to full day and we had done an a a first analysis last year of a revision of the um the tuition at that point and we reconsidered it um more fully with additional information that was provided to us the memo that you all have um is this one which is the one we received at Finance um and then additional information was provided by Susan over the weekend which is this piece of paper with the all-in costs of beep and the various sources of um funding um and so um the things that we talked about where it relates to the um beep charges were to um and this was the um finance committee voting three in favor and one opposed with zero extensions um was to increase beep tuition by 8% each year for the next three years um staff presented to us three um ranges of costs those are on the backside of this chart however um the committee noticed that um the 5% increase that was proposed was essentially um uh not it was barely covering the base program it did not do anything to address the um other substantial costs of the program that are in provided to you all particularly benefits on the on the second sheet that we received over the weekend um and so we recommended to the full committee to increase beep tuition by 8% each year for the next three years um there was a also a discussion about whether or not to reduce the number of um financial aid seats which if if you recall several years ago was increased from 20 to 40 however the data that we received in the memo um shows that um although there are other programs in town which are offering more financial assistance which is wonderful and there's many more um or I'll say there are more opportunities for students who need financial assistance to access um Early Education um the the financial aid numbers that you see on this um table make clear that at least for beep there is still a strong financial and so the committee voted um to maintain the number of tuition assistant seats at 40 and not reduce it and then lastly um on the back um there is also a beep extended day program um and which was new last year if you recall because schools for children um stepped away from the district due to going from a half day to a full day program um and so um we voted to increase the extended day tuition by $200 per month in each of the next three years again our conversation was looking at the um cost to deliver the program um and also considering the benefits that um are accured to um that same program so we looked at bringing that cost closer to covering um the annual cost per pupil and we also discussed revisiting that if for example um the principle of beep could um increase the program such that the cost per pupil there was a different number in future years and so she's she's certainly um interested in that and looking at that as well but at least for um the upcoming year it would increase to $1,000 a month and um so I think uh the motion that the subcommittee um made to the full committee was to as I said um recommend that the school committee increase beep tuition by 8% each year for the next three years maintain the number of tuition seats at 40 and increase beep extended a tuition by $200 per month in each of the next three years years to $1,000 per month in 26 1,200 per month in 27 and 14 per month in, 1400 per month in 28 just quick um well you need to get a second first well I was just reading the motion I don't think I made it I'm saying what it was and I'd like to to comment on it um I would actually like for us to go back to the initial tuition recommendation I think going up to 8% respectfully I know you guys discussed it and I understand the number however um there are two pieces I think in this one is the parents ability I mean these are probably parents who are stressed the most in terms of um tuition um with young children also I think that um if we do it logically for three years the 5% 5% 5% people can plan and know what's going to come the third piece is that um I don't know people read in the paper but the trust Center got a $450,000 um arpa Grant from the town and said they were going to be having 38 uh full scholarship students so I think that will also cut into some of the students who might apply here uh their timing is the same time as our program um and so that would be my recommendation well I'll make the motion of the committee okay and then we can go from there does that make sense okay do we have a second I'll second it okay thank you now more discussion I just have Mar could you could you tell me what the extended day what the hours are for the extended day do you know that I believe it's 2:30 to 530 same as our extended days yeah it's like that it's three hours a day five days a week five days a week Y is it an extra hour for the day that's early dismissal yeah Frid so it's 16 oh yes y 16 16 hours a week I mean I'd like to make a friend well an amendment it's not necessarily friendly uh uh to to substitute 5% for 8% do you want to do that now or do you want to wait and see if the motion fails cuz then we just have to do the sub we have to vote The Substitute motion I guess I mean it's up to you I guess but yeah I can okay uh Stephen hold on to that Helen I was not at the last subcommittee the finance subcommittee meeting and I'd like to request some more Elementary discussion of this matter um would you mind restating the motion please Mariah and would you mind also restating the rationale for the motion sure so if you look at the back of the memo um that you got there's three the memo is is the letter to the finance subcommittee from Dr given and principal aart correct okay on the back of that page there were three different numbers provided 3% 5% and 8% um staff landed in the middle but you know just between three and eight was five um and they chose the 5% number to recommend to us the discussion at the committee was that essentially the 5% um does not it barely covers the um cost of the program which if you look at the other document that we received um the revolving fund expenses in FY 26 are estimated at um 3,47 th000 and however that does not include the classroom capacity which is at 162,000 nor does it include the benefits that are accured to the Educators um paid from the revolving fund which is another 1.85 million um and so you can see that the because the um all of those expenses particularly benefits are reducing as we've had a whole bunch of conversation basically reducing the expenses to the extent we can um have the revolving fund more accurately represent the true costs of running the gened portion of the program that um helps uh the overall school district and it more accurately allocates the cost to where they're being born where they're being generated I should say and so what is the motion so the motion is the 8% which is of those three options at the bottom um the 8% is there so it's the difference between $1 16,74 per year or $ 16,2 $7 75 per year so it's around $0000 yeah $450 or something like that um and then the second part of the motion is um staff recommended again to be able to increase tuition paying seats to reduce the number of tuition assistance seats however the data shown um reflects that there is still a strong demand for tuition assistance seats because of that the committee said we we understand the desire but until there is actually a data sort of evidence showing that there is reduced demand for those seats we don't want to reduce the number that we hold aside um this will allow us to to maintain the Sev the same level of non-tuition paying students or to expand that number it would um I don't think we talked about expanding that number but the data we didn't talk about it but the data also doesn't like it shows that for the past couple of years they've been slightly under the number as well if you see the data showing in that table on the front page shows 38 in the current year 37 last year 38 the year before so they're not quite using the 40 seats but they're certainly they're not five seat I'm just trying to understand this allows them to better meet costs while maintaining the same level roughly correct correct and there's still excess demand for non-tuition paying students correct okay thanks Mariah yep you had a just where's the re where's the revenue side this is all cost like see 9 million so the revenue is well there's the budget from the town and then the revolving fund expenses I don't think that Susan show Federal money that comes into that's yeah the grants that are there um and then I guess my question is this this um view doesn't allow one to see why the three or the five the 8% how it's going to affect uh like either creating a deficit or providing a you know over overflow if you look at the 3271 compared to the 3,47 you'll see that that um or the 3364 we create basically if we go to 5% we're generating 3.2 million of of Revenue okay of Revenue and then you have to compare that against the expenses shown on the separate page and so we would be generating slightly more another 100,000 that then could be used to um look at other expenses for example the benefits costs so the so the 3 five and eight are to address the revolving fund expenses correct this is only the revolving fund yes yes because this is fees so we the fee is tuition we have to set the tuition so Helen thank you um so one of the things I think we need to keep in mind is this is an a mandated program that we need to provide um beep for special ed students we do choose to make this a a balanced program there are some schools that uh have 49% of the kids in there with IEPs and you know 51% with um without typically developing we tend to do 25% with IEPs approximately I'm not you know this isn't true for every single class but approximately 25% with kids who are at risk whether they're elll students or students who uh you know haven't had any kind of uh education um and then 50% of typically developing students so that you get a balanced model and because of that it costs us um but it's also an investment in my opinion it's an investment in our students who who we are going to have throughout and who hopefully we can somehow get a return on this investment by not having special ad costs uh later on by and it's been shown that early childhood is is something that is critical especially for low-income students for kids who are English language learners for kids with IEPs um it having that base and having that understanding makes a huge difference um staff talked about the um inclusion program specifically if you look at the bottom of the memo underneath the table on page one um and so it talks about what the appropriate um ratio of students is and if you look um in the second paragraph basically because the program this year for example it says we have 40 students on IEPs enrolled in the full inclusion program to support the 40 students on IEPs we would need 60 peers to form our early intervention special education program the the peers that you were mentioning Helen and so the total enrollment associated with this program would be 100 of the 283 students enrolled in beep this year um and so I think that um the data shows that the that there are many students who are um that we are in providing it more students in excess of the model the special education model yes no we do do that I know that and then it's important I think we do the right thing and that's what's really critical so here's what I'm struggling with if if I had a child next year at 5% increase that'd be 16,27 plus if I want the full daycare the extended day it'd be another 12,542 on top of that 12,542 well it says annual cost per pupil where are you sorry I'm under extended dat no that's not the that's not the annual charge per student that's the cost of the district it's the fee right now they're paying right now they're paying $8,000 800 a month yeah which is times 10 months and the proposal is that they would pay 10,000 so we are still would still be losing $2,500 per student which is um okay so but but the cost to the family so if it was a th a month it's 10,000 correct it's 10,000 so now we're up to 26,000 right there was a 10 month program the program is wonderful I'm staff the staff did the comparison against other programs not out of the out of the range range okay I just think going forward we have to think about I don't know I mean it's so expensive for our families and I don't know I don't know how we get around that but it just $26,000 a year for a 10-month progam I mean it's not a year 10-month program I hear you I mean I think that like I think this is the problem that we are experiencing across PSB is the issue of cost and and I'm not sure what to I don't know what this is a conversation we're going to have like five more times in the next hour if we ever finish this one this was supposed to be 5 minutes you guys are messing up sorry it's my fault Mar I take full responsibility uh Carolyn thanks um just to clarify from what Suzanne was just saying so we have moved this to beep is now full day in that it mirrors the PSB day roughly 8 to 2:30 extended day is like up till six or something 5:30 or exactly yeah so just to be super clear on that thank you [Music] um so I guess my main reason for supporting Margaret's recommendation and what was voted at subcommittee which was the 8% increase is just like obviously preschool and child care is expensive and that is a separate issue I think we the committee school committee before I was on it talked about comparing beep to other programs and I don't know that it's more but we want it to be sustainable like that's so that's how I'm looking at this is that to sustain this program and not be dipping into the reserve serves in the revolving fund [Music] um I I I um that's why I would support the motion as recommended by Margaret um and voted at the subcommittee I was no we didn't vote oh the way you voted at the subcommittee the way the subcommittee voted that wasn't Margaret's recommendation we voted 8% Margaret recommended five oh okay okay and I thought she was maybe she was commending uh or I maybe I took that as a recommendation or she was talking also about the reducing of the seats I also just have a quick question full IEP seats does that mean those are comp free to those okay so that's fully subsidized and then financial aid well it varies it varies okay varies and I don't don't see a relation to the asterisk there but so financial aid is some kind of scale the IEP seats are complete are it's not need based Financial need based correct okay perfect thank you is it possible to do a gradual increase I mean could we do like a five six and eight or there's a motion on the floor can we like can we vote and then if it fails we move on okay I'm just hoping like friendly Amendment first so can we vote that then and then move on I just I have I have like kind of a hard stop okay so okay um Stephen you need to speak now I just want to know why Margaret recommended five over8 Susan's here so maybe she could respond for both of them since they were that was their joint recommendation you need to unmute not on it's got to be green ah okay um so the recommendation was really twofold it was 5% and the reduction of five seats and so the combination of that you know was basically equal to eight right so by going with eight and preserving the seats financially it's the same dollar value basically net yeah okay um Helen you you have a friendly amendment I don't know if it's friendly but you have an amendment yes I have an amendment to go to you to still put that forward but I need a second you do need a second yes do we have a second okay we don't so seeing Oh Andy uh well I would second that if it were coupled with um the rest of uh staff's original recommendation which was to have the 5% but also reduce the number of um of financial aid seats by five per year well then you would have to change your right so that that's that incorporates Helen's motion but it goes beyond it goes back to the original step I'll accept that friendly Amendment because I do did see the article where there are 38 students who will be accommodated at um at uh the trust Center so that would be fine so so now we Andy's Amendment and you've seconded Andy yes so I guess we should vote on that not I was it I thought it was five per year can you I'm pretty sure it's five per year each year yes it says that somewhere here 5% per year and five seats per year so it would go to 25 at the end of three years and I'm sorry sorry Mariah um my question there is if we're talking what would be if financial aid is not a set amount is there is there a dollar amount Associated was that sort of like was it present with a an amount a dollar amount in the reduction of financial aid so I think I put that on the 77,000 yeah it's 77,000 yeah so by reducing the seat five seats we estimated would be 77,000 each time each yeah so for a total of 77 * three so if you take the 77 plus the revenue for a 5% it's actually pretty equal to an 8% so you're actually reducing the revenue even lower from what is being what is shown in the sheet if we are okay yeah so help me out here I think that we need to vote on the amendment yeah and then depending on that vote we vote on the correct the original yes okay so we're now voting on a 5% increase over three years with uh understanding there'll be a reduction in um a reduction of five of tuition each year I believe we're voting on whether to make that the motion right or not not taking the actual vote on the substance correct we have we take the vote on whether or not to make that the motion then whatever the result of that is we have to vote it again whether it's the eight and zero or the five and five not sure follow but I will just do what you say Okay C's right of course that's why he chair uh so do people know what they're voting on we're voting on the 5% now no we're voting on 5% and five seats and five seats yes to reduce by five seats per year and to take 5% increase per year are we right and the extended day proposal staying the same we accepted staff's proposal on that so so we're voting on that or we're voting to make that the amendment subtitute the whether or not to substitute that for whether that's going to be the main motion yes understood thank you Jesse yes Sarah no Mariah no wa I'm really confused okay Helen yes Carolyn no Stephen no Andy yes and uh Val no and I actually vote Yes so that was five to four where the eights and zeros got it I think the eights got it yeah so now we vote on now we vote on the original one two yeah it was one two three B five yeah yeah okay now we're voting on the original which is an 8% increase for the next three years no change to number of tuition paying or tuition um financial aid seats okay Jesse yes Sarah yes Mariah yes yes Helen AB stain Carolyn yes Stephen yes Andy yes Val yes and I'll vote Yes as well okay thank you um Mariah do we need to do a time check here do you need to I don't have a choice we have to keep going well what I was going to offer if you wanted to is we could go to like our public speakers are they are they here no that won't help me that won't help you no we need we need to go the only way through is through okay so the next item on the um agenda is discussion and possible vote on non salaries for principles so we also discussed this at Finance um you have a memo a separate memo here we um got data from presented by um Susan given on High School principles Middle School principles and Elementary School principles um and the committee voted um very similarly to what the memo shows um we voted um to increase the um prek to8 principal salary range from 160 to 170 instead of 158 to 168 and I'll explain why in one moment and then we voted the recommendation of 185 to 195 for the high school principal um and the reason why we increased it is because if you look at the um salaries in the table the last table on page two those are current year salaries the 140 you'll see like the unit B director and coordinators and the assistant principles um and those have another 2.75% increase um for the next fiscal year and so um again like the there there has to be um a certain amount of distance between the different um uh reporting levels um and so as described in the memo um and so the committee recommended I think unanimously am I remembering right it's I know it's here yep um yes unanimously 400 to recommend um the 160 to 170 range and the 185 to 195 range so I'm going to make that motion second thank you thanks Helen we're gonna make up time on this one make um any conversation Jesse Yeah I guess my question is how does this I mean I see the um the numbers for other communities are these communities also under the same or similar Financial pressures that our district is that is to say if we're looking you should mention that go ahead yeah well like Lexington we know is one of if I recall correctly is one of the communities that we've heard I think Sarah shared with us um some of the uh Financial pressures as far as I know Newton is as well I don't know about all of these do you know any more Susan about that yeah yeah I don't know if we have documentation the one thing I would say though too is um uh there was an extensive conversation at school committee about some of the you know the salaries that we have and ensuring that we can retain people so um I think that if we're looking at retention and looking at stability in the district making sure that we have the ability to pay people in a way that um allows them to feel valued and to continue to have that um uh motivation to be a building leader for example when um going one step down might or or so might actually mean almost the same pay so we really have to these are actions that we should feel good about taking because they help ensure retention stability and um internal growth I guess the second part of my question then is how are we going to pay for it because other suggestions are to potentially freeze salaries until we can get ourselves out of a deficit situation um because there's no other place we you know where we going to get the money from it's like we were saying we we going to get the money for beep we we just voted an increase um but we can't go out to the community next year and say we need I don't know what this percentage by the way these numbers don't tell you necessarily what the 2.75% or 3% raises are but we can't go out to like kulage corner and ask everybody 3% help us cover our 3% which is a very large sum of money over the entire District do we know what that amount is by the way in other words if we go up that amount totally yes at the very bottom of the memo it's slightly different so um because we increased the range to 160 to 170 for the prek to8 principles but the Delta um now it's minor is small that's right right but I'm saying overall for the district all these salaries going up by that amount what those are contractual all the unit B salaries are contractual so that is that's what's that the total is 104,000 approximately correct yep what the increase would be I will just say if you if you do not keep up and we have freezes then it will come to haunt us even down years down the road so then suddenly instead of a 2% increase they're going to need an 8% to catch up to our competition and our okay comparables and these this is a typical list of who we look at we added this year after a conversation earlier at Finance we added um Milton and um what was the other one we added was it Nic we added I don't our peers we added Milton I'm trying to remember the second one that we added n and Milton okay so um we we have used this peer district and then Susan suggested some additional peer communities that we we looked it we had a whole conversation at Finance about this before adding them uh Stephen and then I think we'll go to a vote um I just want to say that I think principle retention and stability is critical but so is Jesse's line of questioning um we're going to we're the last I heard we're facing a gigantic budget deficit can I can someone help me understand why making this decision now before we've I understand you have a hard stop Mariah but before we've had the finance update and before we understand the size of the deficit that we have to trim and we're going to be faced with a a lot of very un well you don't have to vote it I mean is there an option to instead to postpone this vote until we've fully heard the current state of the budget Stephen if I me yeah if everybody remembers our teachers got a 2.75% in increase this year in September we are now in January I assume this is retroactive for the Year this is for next year this is not current year yeah okay so I'm not remembering if we gave any increase this year to our uh principes we did yeah okay Carolyn thank you Suzanne um just for clarification in that second to last p paragraph the total increase to the budget for principal compens compensation 104 369 is that the high school K8 and the assistant principles not the assistant principles this is only principles okay so even though assistant principles is in this table we're not voting on assistant principles that's to show you um principles versus their supervisors sorry because the assistant principles are un sorry got it thank you thank you okay let's take a vote did we lose Sarah Yes she'll be back in a moment okay we'll come back to it Jesse abstain Mariah yes Helen yes Carolyn yes Stephen abstained Andy yes Val yes Sarah yes and I vote Yes as well thank you thank you all um is it it's okay with you Susan right if I swap things around okay so I forwarded to you all well so let me let me take two steps back on this one to my suin so we if you recall at our last full school committee meeting had a discussion about the statement of work but you all had not seen the statement of work so then I forwarded this statement of work and there um and we disc we were going to discuss it at Finance anyway and so we had a robust conversation last Wednesday at Finance about the statement of work um and H at that meeting multiple school committee members were present and were opining on the topic and there were several members of the community who are in attendance who who um Express concern that we might be violating open meeting law um by having other members of school committee there and participating in the discussion um and all I will say about that is I'm going to park most of that for new business but we're bringing it back tonight either way um we were going to anyway because when I heard that conversation I said we had originally talked about doing a straw poll because we were trying to go back to the to the vendor to get an updated quote when I understood that there was a concern about open meeting law I thought let's make sure to bring it back to the committee so that the vote is ratified either way and we can sort of redo this conversation in the meantime because Brookline never sleeps um we got some uh as I forwarded to you all earlier today we received um some feedback from the chair of the advisory committee that some of the members of advisory committee um had some um additional questions that they thought um are statement of work might benefit from considering whether or not to include those um and so I forwarded those to you all earlier today for your consideration I apologize I got them late last night and just wasn't able to send them until I did when I did but I also um sent the and I think you'll have this I put my own comments on it so um you just got it and so the top is the previously discussed draft revised statement of work from January 15th finance and then the bullets and bold below um the questions are the ones that came from advisory and then I just put my notes on the side and my notes are not meant to be determinative in any way it just helps me to write it down and I thought it might help other people if you hadn't had the full chance to consider them um and so I don't know how exactly we want to proceed to this other than I think people could recommend where they want to add things or I could go through my quick sort of notes on what I think we might want to add and I just want to say too um thanks to advisory for um for um engaging and and sharing their thoughts with us and I I think we this was touched upon at the finance up a committee meeting the the the client here is going to be us and also the audit committee or not also the AUD Committee in partnership with audit committee and audit committee is meeting on Monday at 9: am I believe to talk about this yes okay and so you're looking to sort of well okay at this point I was looking to get a vote from the full committee to ratify what happened at finance and now I'm saying you know do any of these questions speak to people a couple of them do to me and do we want to make any more tweaks while we have this sort of last bite at the Apple which at this point I feel like is it the last bite at the Apple will there be other bit because in parallel the audit committee is going to meet and presumably perhaps have their own input and might come back I don't know what's going happen in audit I don't want to okay perfect yes Andy uh yeah thanks Suzanne before we get too much into the substance of this I did want to ask like what is the purpose uh of the document that we're working on this scope of work because we now we just got in like a proposal from cbiz which is the successor firm to powers and Solan they're the ones that we asked for um to to to do to consider doing this and they're I mean they they delineate a scope of work that is not exactly what we sent them it's um kind of pretty much based on what we sent them but in a in a somewhat stripped down form um and I assume that whatever contract we sign is going to embody that and not whatever tweaks we might be making to a sort of more substantial document here so you're saying we should be editing the CIS um statement of work as opposed to ours it felt like theirs was pretty close to me it it's close but it doesn't you know like where we have three sentences they sort of have one well Susan's coming to the mic so seems like she might have a a thought or an answer yes I think there was two parts to what I had sent to them based on our conversation at Finance I'm not sure you're getting picked up by the mic you might want to go a little closer this better yeah oh um so there was uh two items that um I thought were uh called out at the meeting one to send the new scope of work over to them and two to see if there was ways in which they could reduce the price so I think what they returned to us was a response to those two requests so if we're going to expand the scope of work we can expect that this that the price is going to go up from what it is but I think if you're going to get the audit done you should get the audit that you want done done right I mean so sorry Susan so they didn't actually provide us a price for the scope that we had at Finance yes I'm sorry yes they they did or they did not yeah yeah no I I thought they did it they just you know they were more maybe efficient with their wording yeah they rewarded it but for example it does include question their estimate is4 to $45,000 um for a scope of work that is essentially what we um what came out of Finance but the wording is just stripped down like I said where we have three sentences they tend to have one right and so that's my question Susan is are they going to adjust the three sentences for $40,000 or are they going to address their one sentence we don't have a price I guess for the full for our full submission I think um I think they were attempting to capture what you had requested in three sentence with one sentence and if if you feel that you know I'm I'm happy to explore with them to ensure that uh the essence of what you wanted in your three sentence version um was you know their understanding of what theyd be providing us for services let me if it's if let me just read the like we can take the mystery out of the one sentence versus the three in two seconds um this is what they I'll just read it real quick with respect to the engagement cbiz would review internal controls processes and procedures related to osss including budget practices hiring protocols procurement contract and requisition processes Grant Administration overall financial management within the department we will seek to determine the following they have our five questions there more or less I would say they're pretty close um they just sort of rewarded them as Andy said and then to accomplish this we will perform walkthroughs of processes scheduling and conduct select interviews to confirm processes and identify controls and control mechanisms review any uh existing standard operating procedures for update opportunities Andor suggest the elements that would constitute an adequate procedural document gain an understanding of the organizational and Reporting structure including budgeting and planning create a risk and control Matrix that identifies any control gaps and Report out on all findings and recommendations so the deliverables are the risk and control M Matrix and the report um I still feel like we should work from our draft statement of work and if we need to go back to them and sort of say please add this word or you know what the committe is concerned that your wording is a little bit different and can you affirm that you're still going to meet our docum even if you've rewarded it I think we can do that I think that the question in front of us today is um do we want to add any of these bullets and I'll just I'm going to put my own again I'm trying to move us ahead so my my feeling was that bullets two and three could be added to question three to essentially bulk up question three and it and it was my opinion that most of the other ones were already contained within the statement of work or addressed by doing by making the tweaks under under bullets two and three bullets two and three of the AC yes the bullets two and three not numbers two and three so like the one that says are there controls that meet the best practices criteria that um do exist and I was thinking if you look at our original questions one and two had these follow-up sort of are there internal cons controls processes procedures that could be established but three didn't have that and so I think if we essentially add a parallel question to three that bulks up like that that address is um bullet to cuz they're they were basically saying well what what should we be doing specifically um for that it's not just what were they but what is the problem like what should we do what should we be doing and they want the recommendation part which is this which is in question one and question two but wasn't in question three Ellen Mariah it seems to me at the end they put that piece in at the end of their proposal that you just read where they to provide internal I forget what it was they said but that last sentence seem to repeat that but maybe I'm wrong um sorry I have to pull it open again I guess I don't I think it makes less sense for us to try and cross reference cbiz against us I think that we should put the document to them that we want rather than rather than doing that and um so do you think the document you we want is the S so that you have at the top well I think that we could add a sentence to question three or a a a question if you look at bullet two yeah see how I said we could add a follow-up question like what internal controls procedures processes could be established or modified to address these issues meaning the issues of communication I'm sorry the issues of um delay interruption or non-pay of special education services and then the next bullet down below that is advisory suggested adding where the FY 24 and 25 deficit substantially impacted by the absence of these controls and and I think we could add that as well and those would be the only two changes I would make because um what about the next to last bullet the um because that one I feel like if we add the two changes I'm proposing it actually addresses that bullet I think those that that next to last bullet and bullet two and three yeah if you are the if you change the beginning of the second bullet are there controls to enumerate their controls then yes I would agree with that I think their idea of of coming out positive and say here are the list of controls that would really be good to have in place that so as opposed to saying what internal controls say enumerate controls yeah that's fine that's fine yep and when we're talking about controls Mariah are we talking about oaf controls OSS control what are we talking about controlb if you look at the very first line of this the statement of work it's review all PSB internal controls it's related to OSS but it's not only focused on OSS uh controls procedures and controls processes and procedures okay I just want to make sure we're looking at oafs as well with respect to right so would you like to move um are PE do people understand what I'm even suggesting are people on okay then in that I just want to make sure like because I'm going so quick okay so I would um make the recommendation to add um enumerate what enumerate the internal I can't even speak anymore Jesse enumerate enumerate enumerate what internal controls Etc could be established or modified to address these issues and then were the FY 24 and 25 deficits substantially impacted by the absence of these controls so we would add those to question three well actually the third bullet is just a yes no answer and that that's not going to get us too far I mean if we assume so we could just say how are they if we know the controls are out of alignment or that we don't or that we lack certain controls that would have helped us so maybe we should change just the were which is a yes no answer to how explain how it happened they're going to have the information that's what the audit's purpose is but how assumes that it that it was a yes correct right should we ask for both how about and if so how yeah yeah yeah okay okay we have several hands up uh I don't know which one went up first uh I'll do Stephen and then Andy thanks um so Mariah I agree with your suggestion of just including that um two questions one um in Lisa's resignation letter she alleged two things one a hostile work environment and two Financial mismanagement it's my assumption that um uh the appropriateness of communications is covered it covers whether or not there is a hostile work environment we want to make that more explicit or do you think that's sufficient do the Auditors know that that's supposed to cover that claim so um I I would defer this to lonus but I would expect that that's a Personnel matter and not covered under this no it's it's not our intention to investigate that with this audit that's a question I wouldn't answer but um I guess well I guess I POS that to the entire school committee then is it not our interest in investigating that matter with this audit I don't think it it goes with this audit necessarily and I think that it's a it's an a legal employment matter that would be investigated most probably by uh an employment lawyer or Town Council in consultation with okay then I do want to follow up on that question then so what is the process for investigating that I'll speak up about that one I've been in touch with our labor Council about how to handle that but um it's not something um I think we can discuss an open session okay and then my second question is about the Dr okell's allegations of financial mismanagement are we intending to investigate that with this audit yes this audit is specifically to investigate that like these questions refer to specific allegations that were made both in that letter and in other venues it seems to me that this investigates mostly um questions about whether there is sufficient processes in place and her her allegations of financial mismanagement suggest that there are accounting numbers that are off not just process seeds does that and that's referred to in um question four are there charges allocated that would be better allocated to another unit that's an allocation question not a calculation question are we not intending to validate any of the calculations made in the process of calculations are some of some of allocations uh not entirely it's the it's allocations are where the charges are being uh where alloc where charges are being brought to what accounts not whether the whether the sums add up well I in my mind they're not different but okay uh to mind that are you're you're saying that theoretically OSS has $20 allocated to their account and and someone else is presenting $100 receiv from doct oconnell she cited different amounts of funds that the Ida Grant uh offered to us and that and that it was uh not reflected in the budgets that she saw that suggests that it could have been an allocation issue or it could have been an issue that does not have to do with allocations that's budget management okay so it's not clear yeah okay hold on it could be where they're put in the budget or it could be how they're how they are calculated as a result of expenditures right I work with budget too Susan do you want to comment to this but my feeling is I feel like this is covered like whether you're talking about clear to me that it's covered or a um I hear what you're saying mariia overall financial management issue it's covered under overall financial management right what I'm saying is it's not explicit to me that it's covered and do we want to add something explicitly saying that the auditor needs to validate that the uh that the accounting is correct not just the allocations I think that my concern is um your your mic is off Maria it was off um my concern and this was something I framed question five pretty carefully about this because um I think we are talking about a broad audit and not a forensic audit we are not GNA and as far as I know we are not having this audit firm go through individual transactions that would be incredibly expensive and timec consuming so question five says does it the auditor believe that the cost increase represents a broadly accurate picture of the district special education cost because what you are asking for and we've talked about this by email as a forensic audit to the best of my knowledge and that is not what we are doing here or proposing to do here okay so does it necessarily have to preclude then looking at a sampling of them so if there are some specific accounts that that we have heard that that people have suggested has have been specifically mismanaged we couldn't have the auditor look into those as examples which and you're referring specifically to idea yeah sure I'm suggesting making it more explicit that they look into the accounting and not just the allocations if you really think the Auditors think it's the same thing and the rest of the committee agrees I back off completely but reading it to me it do I think that the that the auditor and the way they described their statement of work is that they're going to do sort of spot checks in certain areas and specific interviews so if we want want to suggest that the Ida area is a great area for a spot check I think that that's okay I think that's somewhat included under question one but we could talk about the the questions of idea specifically what does the rest of the committee have an opinion on this one I was just going to comment to follow follow up on you I saw Carolyn had her hand but just a quick comment Carolyn if I can so Stephen maybe one way would be if Dr oconnell uh is able to provide input to the auditor group about specific questions she had on the financial side not on the work environment side of course and that would help guide them to you know to issues that she's that she identified and then the Auditors then Mariah could actually determine the veracity of the situation like she could guide them to places where she thought there were I imagine that that's going to I mean they're going to interview people and and they're going to look at friction points and that's like that's what we're asking for and don't think it need I she' be able to help them in that point I think everyone would I like okay right I don't think it's a um I don't think it's a secret it's I'll say it's not a secret that Ida is a question so I think it's a very obvious area I don't think it needs to be specified here but if the committee wants it let's add it but you have to propose warning and I'm not sure we need it uh Carolyn we'll go to you thanks and I appreciate these questions and answers because this is sort of new territory for me so I'm I'm flying by the seat of my pants here so I appreciate the education by osmosis I have a a few questions but they may be answered by what you just described Mariah which is the ways in which this is meant to be a management not um forensic but I'll ask them so in number one does the district fulfill its legal obligations in a timely way um that seems broad like do we not need to Define what timely would be is there a statutory definition of what timely would be um Andy has his hand up but I think this was Val's question and I think Val I can help out um okay I mean it's it's an it depends and I think that's part of why um we wanted someone who has Municipal experience and knows about special ed particular because sometimes it's sometimes it's the next day sometimes it's for the fall um and you know that's why I I think I also at some point added um language about something about when appropriate I'm sorry I don't have it up in front of me at the moment but um you know the legal mandates because sometimes it is the next day and sometimes it's something for the fall and sometimes it um carries through the summer and and things like that so it's it's case specific and um there is language in there about is there an expedited process right for when things do need to start the next day okay thank you so the hope and assumption is that this will be done by somebody with the requisite experience or obviously the capacity to check the statute okay thank you Val that answers my question number two [Music] um um um um um um for this is for number five um does the auditor believe that special education cost and I understand Mariah you've described this question we've talked about this too represents a broadly accurate picture with the same sort of maybe concern that that's sort of a broad question and vague like could it possibly make sense to say something like what is the minimum level of spending that is required in order to fulfill its legal obligations or maybe which is not to meant to minimize the need for spending or suggest scaling back but would would sort of framing it that way be helpful I don't think you can sorry I'm gonna jump in again because I I just don't think that you can ever know what that is and that's okay that's the whole dynamic piece of os okay okay we have a student who is going out of District tomorrow y that's an amount of money that okay y understood thank you thank you thank you um and then I guess it's sort of the same with number four are there charges that would be better allocated is the question more like are were charges correctly allocated but I don't know if that's then more forensic than what you're looking for I think you could possibly reward it but I think also there could be cases and I I don't I'm just giving one example where like possibly it could go to two PL you know like sort of okay yeah so I don't want be yeah thank you thank you okay do we have did we have a second to a motion I'll second it okay oh Andy you want to say something before we vote um yes I just wanted to ask is the plan that uh we to fund this we would be asking the advisory committee for a reserve fund transfer that is what I believe the plan is because we do not have money for this and it is an unanticipated expense so it meets the criteria all right so the advisory committee will have a chance to weigh in directly then on this um well hopefully this is their chance to weigh in directly on this we cannot continue you know we took the questions and we're taking that feedback um um but I really hope that this allows us to move ahead with a statement of work as opposed to continue to iterate because whole point was expediency yeah I'm I'm on the same page there I just want make sure that all members understand that this now has to pass muster with the advisory committee well the request has to be voted favorably by advisory committee I would say that there's a distinction there but yes um okay sorry I do have one more question um in terms sorry in terms of how this is typically done and worded you talked about that the assumption is people get interviewed um would it make sense do we want that in writing like does it need to say Dr oconnell will be interviewed Etc to list um I personally don't think that I would micromanage the work of the auditor to that level they know they're like they know their business like so I'm I'm not sure that we would write that and I'm not sure I don't know for example if the auditor can compel her to do that or how that works so I think we need to let the staff and the audit or do their work and that's my opinion and again is this the this is the committee statement of work but um I guess the sort of reverse concern would be ensuring that people who may wish to be interviewed get interviewed and are able to be interviewed and that that's our Direction I also don't know that we can you know I don't if 80 people want to get interviewed I'm not sure we can say all 80 people are going to be interviewed I agree with soy hard to to do a statement of work which has a very open-ended mandate um Can it state that that the deputy superintendent of the office of student services will be interviewed yes well that was my question earlier is she going to be one of the ones that gets an opportunity to help guide the process or well gets an opportunity is different than will be well I was I didn't go as far as no I know I'm just saying it's not the same thing the auditor will make every effort well I guess my I mean honestly my anticipation was the answer was going to be of course but since I you know now it's come out okay good okay great even better do you want it written down I would like to see it written down I would like to offer a friendly no I don't want to see it written down I feel like we're really trying to micromanage I do too we're giving them our um our s so yes and and they've already taken a first glance at it and uh unless it's something we really missed that's big but how is it micromanaging as opposed to any of the other enumerated items supposed to do this without talking with her exactly like this is like that like you know like the basic I mean so I mean it's it's sort of it's obvious but without it being spelled out in a statement of work then we don't have to accept the report right well we spent the money by then um just we don't pay let's let Sarah speak she hasn't spoken yet so Sarah I think I'm going to be in the minority of voting no so I don't want to belabor the point but I just want to explain why I'm voting know I think that the auditor came back to us with what is they're able to look at taking into um account what we wanted to see and offered us what they were going to see as the scope of the work so I would have rathered go with what that was with a a price that we already knew and to get going more quickly so that's the only reason why I'm voting no you're voting you're voting no on the whole thing yes on when we vote for the scope of work I will be voting no I see but my understanding is if we vote Yes it will be pretty much what Mariah has suggested so it's actually very minor clarifying questions that it's actually what we sent yeah to the basically right just what we sent okay let's I'm going to call the votee yesk you let's see what we've got if you don't like it hold on I'd like to offer amendment that would supersede that which is that we add to this that the auditor will make every effort to interview the deputy superintendent of OSS has not been here for each of the last two meetings and I think it's possible that she may also not wish to be there for this meeting or for some reason that we don't understand not participate in that as well so I'd like to offer a friendly amendment that the auditor make every effort to interview the deputy superintendent of OSS okay do I have a second seconded okay I guess we're going to vote on that friendly Amendment and then depending on that vote we will go to the original Jesse yes sir no Mariah no Helen no Carolyn yes Steven yes Andy no Val yes and I vote no as well so what does that come out to that's a no five NOS okay now we're going to go to the original which was well the revised revised yes the revised one with the two additional question uh Jesse yes Sarah no Mariah yes Helen yes yes Carolyn yes Stephen yes Andy yes Val yes and I vote Yes as well thank you for all your work that's a lot of work thanks everybody yeah um are you leaving now I cannot leave now we will I think hear from Susan and yeah okay okay and then I will I'm not trying to get rid of you I'm trying to help you out here I know I just feel like I need to be present this part of well I was going to say we could do like you could get back on at home I I will I will be distracted when okay okay fine great this to our speakers but there'll be a few more minutes there's a 15 more minutes a few I said a few a few well there's only three slides so maybe you're right well really two because one's just the title there you go yeah so uh I wanted to provide you with uh a few updates got to be closer to the mic that's just Clos how's this is this okay I'll try to do this hold it is this all right we good close up it's great okay all right so uh we have some news from um uh the folks upstairs uh they've made some adjustments to their revenue forecast and I wanted to share that with you that uh free up um some additional Revenue um that is then allocated to us as well as the town and so this is just um uh the updated information so I'm going to just take a minute and walk you through this is really hot off the press so um uh I the First Column of course is what we received um this year in fy2 so those numbers should look familiar the school allocation of 136 mil8 47618 that's what we got for this year um their original forecast in FY for FY 26 uh that uh they published on December 11th um had a a revenue forecast of $39,600 is 141 mil1 19,799 um so what that means is that available to us at this point in time in New Revenue to help support next year's budget is the 4,172 175 so when they had published this back um on the 11th of December we were to receive the 2,779 um and so that number has grown to the 4172 so um on the second uh section of the table I thought it would be important to kind of call out what the differences were between the December and the January um um iteration and so the the adjustments that they made on the town side um was to increase uh their estimate of of Revenue um by um um uh adding some additional resources on the state aid line so that was 319,000 and so what the town um has done is to reduce the allocation of CIP funding from 6.6% to a six um 6% so that they reduce that by 6 uh which means the expenses less which gives us more Revenue below the line and in addition to that um where they were forecasting health insurance it's still at the 12% but uh they reduced the participants by by I I think it was 10 and so the combination of those two freed up um additional revenues for us okay so some was they lowered the uh above the line expense and they raised um some of the revenue forecast okay now we'll get another iteration of this when they publish the Cherry sheets you know gov one um will be translated into local Aid distributions for each City and town and Regional School District in the state and uh we should have that any you know in the next couple of days and then um Melissa Goff will run through this iteration again we have a town School partnership meeting next week and I think it's Wednesday um and so we'll get yet another version of this but I thought it was very newsworthy because um you know that's a significant amount of uh additional Revenue now if you remember when I did the presentation with you um last month um the town uh when you had gone through the override process uh they were you were expecting another um like $6 million in Revenue right and so there was a there was a Delta between what was being shared with us for a revenue now compared to what you had estimated a couple years ago um and so this gets closer to what you were expecting not there yet right not there yet but I'm certainly closer so when I looked at the Gap back then with you maybe you'll remember this number the six Million number I I said and 3 million was attributed to revenue loss on the town so we've made up you know 1.4 million of that Revenue side that was creating a problem for us um and hopefully that will improve again um either by having those above the line expenses uh be reduced or the revenue number being increased so uh more to come you know you know last year we went through this process you know uh we we get these periodic updates so stay tuned um Susan can I ask a question on the adjustment to state aid sure does that include the $75 per pupil in the governor's budget no because that information wasn't available when Melissa gave this to me I think she gave this to me on Friday um so yeah that has not been taken into consideration she did uh put some additional money in but it wasn't $70 so I I think we'll we'll have some more favorable numbers after she gets uh you know the chair 75 right up to 75 for pupil yeah that was my yeah and she also in um made some adjustments to their forecast on the town but we'll have that we'll have that and then that won't be a mystery and it won't be a guess so as soon as the Cherry sheets are published um and I'm assuming she's anticipating she'll get that I in fact I I had asked her if you know maybe she could run the number numbers before tonight's meeting and she said I don't have the cherry sheet so stay tuned on that um in tandem to this of course we're going through the budget build process and um we're pretty KNE deep into that and I'm going to share a little bit about where we're at with that so when we develop the budget it's a needs-based you know budget and um and so uh we've been going through the process of you know collecting information from budget U managers and uh they they present their requests and you know we roll them up and we have conversation um about you know what does this mean and you know why are you making this request and and all of that so those have been ongoing um pretty close to having the Staffing plan which is of course the most significant um uh portion of the budget is comes in in the in the way of staff and then um Diane uh is is uh oversees the um non-salary expenses um and so she's actively building that that side of the equation so I don't have uh many details on the non-salary side but I thought I would share you know how some of these numbers land there's always questions about what are the breathing costs of your contract right so when I go through this process I I try to capture um you know that data so that when we're asked um we can share that so the cost of cola and the cost of cola in the contracts is uh 2.75% as you know from the information I shared around the uh the principles so uh a cola of 2.75 would will cost us about you know $3,600,000 step and column so in all of the uh the teacher contracts um Unit A and Unit B um there's steps and there's columns so the columns are sometimes are called Lanes some you know degree columns um so staff are uh actively engaged getting graduate degrees and and so as they earn certain numbers then they can move along the Continuum of of the columns in the in on the scale and then um they also move another step you know for each year that they are employed here and so the impact of step and column is $2.2 million so that's that's good information to have now I can't tell you um if that's uh what it typically is because I'm just starting to track this information for you I tracked some of it last year I'm tracking it this year the younger your staff is the more uh your cost and step and column are right when you when you have an older staff you know and you're looking at the bell curve of of how the staff profile is um you know if you have an older population then they're getting Cola so you so uh that can vary depending on where you are in in in your um you know your Staffing um profile in terms of where they are in their career so then there's the adjustments it's like what the the heck is that so um I go through the process of taking anyone that I have retirement information on on and I you know take take and change the salaries around um based on the information that I have there also we looked at sectioning you know we looked at what our enrollment numbers are in the forecast um and we updated that and then we've made some adjustments there so you know we might be adding a kindergarten and and lowering of first grade or whatever so that that that has been that process has Tak in place but also it's a time where uh you know new staff requests are put forward the only new Staffing requests that have been moved forward because of this tough Financial circumstances that we find ourselves in are those that are associated with kind of more mandated services and so uh there's uh a request for 23 new staff members 18 of them OSS Associated and five El Associated and so that's predominantly case load oriented and um and or we have students that are in beep that are then moving out of beep and require you know one to ones or whatnot so um the 23 staff members are are associated with the case loads um and student uh direct student needs and services is this in addition to the new staff that we have already looked at in the position control for the first half of the Year yes okay so it's 23 Plus whatever that large number is that we have already Yes okay thank you yes so in the base of the budget what has been approved in the current year gets into the base and then I roll it from there and so these are 23 additional staff members okay um and so and then we have the grant shift piece that we've been grappling with right and that's a problem we see in this year's budget and um you know and and so we're going to try to fund that through through onetime Revenue sources Andor reductions in other areas nonetheless this is going to come online in in Mass next year right we have to come up with a recurring Revenue source and so um I'm estimating that to be about $1.4 million in additional um cost to that hit our operating budget okay so when I use one-time Revenue which it's not advised to do in a year to cover recurring expenses it creates what we call a structural deficit and next year I don't have that onetime Revenue it's gone I can use it for one year and then um then we have to bring those expenses online and so that's what we're we're seeing here on the grant shift I haven't finished the grant shift work I plan on doing that piece tomorrow um but that's my estimate of uh based on my conversation so far with all of our uh budget managers um what I believe is going to shift off of grants that we anticipated for the current year and onto our operating expenses and need um a funding source so that's that's that and so when I add up those four components on the salary side it uh comes to about 9, 900,000 so basically $10 million in costs on the non-s salary side this is not a scientific number I just put a plug number in here Diane's been working um actively on that and um she wasn't able to give me a an an all-in number on the increase but I wanted to put something out there so that we you know it doesn't uh you know you don't think that 10 10 is and this is the Allin ask okay so when we go through the budget process this is normal and now we have to like iterate right we have to iterate and we have to bring this down so the next question I I figured would be important you know that you'd want to know is what do we got to bring it down by right and so if these numbers hold true and we have this Revenue number that I shared on the prior slide of 4,172 that means we're going to be reducing our budget um as it exists right now by uh 8,227 th000 so that's a lot that's a lot and we'll be coming to you with a list of what we're calling bad ideas because we don't want to do any of this right um but we'll give you a list of uh of of kind of the menu of things that um we can do to reduce it down to that uh number hopefully we'll get additional Revenue again which will help soften the blow a little bit more um but we have a lot of work to do to get um to get our budget into um alignment with what our allocation from the town is going to be so that's where we're at so we have lots of we have lots of hands up yes lots of hands up let's start with Andy and then we'll just go around Carolyn Helen and Sarah did you have your hand up yeah Andy go ahead oh okay thank you yeah yeah thank you very much Susan I guess it's great news for now that we seem to have a million and a half more more than uh than we thought we did six weeks ago um I also wanted to say I really appreciate the work that you did in breaking out um the breathing costs that are due just to steps and Lanes uh and nothing to do with Cola that is something I've been wondering about and asking about for years um and I do Wonder like what is it about our demographics that causes uh that growth right because you can imagine theoretically a situation where everything cancels out and steps and Lanes don't uh don't actually add anything to your budget year on-ear um because you have Junior people coming in while senior people move out and meanwhile everyone in the middle advances do you have any sense of sort of what's Happening um to cause that growth I actually when I look at this number Andy I don't think that this is unusual in my experience so in my experience you know a 3% uh increase in your salary cost due to step in column annually Is Not Unusual sometimes that can Spike up to 4% if you have a lot of young young young staff uh that join your ranks um so I don't I don't think that that's that number of 2.2 because if if the cola is it's it's kind of low if you if you think about it uh as a percentage because if the cola is 2.75 right and uh steps and columns are 2.2 that that tells me that your staff is on the senior side of the equation so you don't have a lot of people moving up and through at the same Pace I've seen before now that can change tomorrow that you can have you know your retirements and all of that now the other thing I'll say too is that in the adjustment line that's where I capture what I call the breakage from a senior staff member leaving and then um putting in our placeholder which is a master six right so if somebody's leaving at Master's 45 um and they're here for 16 years on the top of the scale we're not budgeting at that level right we take that breakage um to your point and it kind of it it it mitigates the impact of the 23 new staff right um that we're adding so that gets netted on the on the adjustment line um and then like I said typically we wouldn't have the grant shift either like that's not something we'll see uh we should not see that that that's not something that you would typically be experiencing so that that's another kind of wild card that that we have to Grapple with you know um so did that answer your question um Andy yeah I don't think I have my head around it but yeah okay I can look more once I have time and staff of course i' I'd love to dig into this and then I can look at your profile uh in a deeper level and then share with you my Impressions there but I just uh time is the enemy always yeah okay so I'm looking at the time we're running quite late so we have lots of people want to speak I'm going to let you all have time that's fine but just be aware of the time because we still have a lot of business so Caroline and Helen thanks and thanks Susan for this update um um oh I know Stephen's up there I know oh sorry yeah go ahead um just so I'm super clear is this unit a unit B this is this every this is fifth floor everything everything so the cola assumes that that non-aligned you've plugged in some number for non-aligned that assumes as a particular ways yes um and then if I'm doing the math right 23 new staff is that if they are largely OSS is this a lot of uh one to one Paras different kinds of Staff because I'm seeing that that's on average one7 and change per person which seems high but is that because is that is are these numbers inclusive of benefits no no benefits oh benefits come out of the town on the revenue side yeah okay the adjustments are are a variety of things so like I said it includes when I when I um I call it rolling the Staffing plan right I do it incrementally so I can capture each piece of of data but when I get to the adjustments I just make all the adjustments at the same time including the ads um so it it um it's not that um the cost of the 23 new staff is 2 mil 700,000 2,700,000 is is is a combination of all of those changes but I wanted you to also be aware that if we didn't add any of those staff that number could be actually negative you know because of things like retirement but it isn't the case we have students with needs um and some of those are coming up for example seven Paras have been added in order to meet the needs of students coming into the elementary school from beep okay but why aren't they on our budget already in the beep because in beep they don't do typically one to ones oh I see right so when they come out and they're going into a much more rigorous independent environment um then they need one to on right so there's seven one to ones coming out of beep that they don't currently have them and the Staffing um is Rich enough in beep um in order to be able to meet the needs of the kids and the programming there without having onet to ones in general so in beep I think we only have one one: one right now but when they graduate out and they come into um our K12 then uh or k8s then uh there's a need for that additional support does the 2.7 also include the 750 and the stiens that we had you had identified this year is that one of the other elements in there is all of that has beened in right right so that's also in that adjustments bit already some of that is some of it was captured um yes so it's everything so anything that's changed just gets netted out I just thought you know usually people I try to go by what what are the typical questions that I'm asked and so is there new staff uh in your proposal and that's uh that's why I thought I'd call that out the other things are just kind of the way you do business and yes of course we had to add and it includes our proposal includes all of all of those forms of compensation that were missed I think if there's nothing else when you get this proposal I think I uh jod um the directors this has been very collaborative it always is a very collaborative process uh internally with with Administration um with a lot of input but we feel like um when you get this budget uh it it has all of the costs associated with running your programs and uh that is uh a big deal because I don't think go to Helen had that clearly yeah um I think my question was answered though I think the adjustments it's hard to see how they take into account the people who are retiring and the lower cost for the new people hired that's the one piece that I was asking like Carolyn but it's okay I mean I can I can certainly give you what the cost of the 23 new are you know and then you can see this is the to cost of that and then and then de facto all of the other things are netting out in different ways but I it's okay it's all right I mean this is all you know this is going to change it is as we go through it so Sarah I've been wondering if as you get this information are there um and you will provide us with the list of bad ideas later y are there things that we're already doing are you already have you freezed any spending for operation have you um requested the people hire with less experience is there anything that's been done already well uh I think uh making sure that everybody's on the same page for what is in for one and then two things like that you know what we're putting in as our placeholder is a master six and that is what you're expected to ensure that sometimes you'll hire a bachelor and sometimes you'll higher above but the idea is that as a budget manager you're trying to have your average cost be a master six so it doesn't limit people to not hiring somebody with a lot of experience but it's it's it's being mindful that you know we have X number of dollars here and so we have to be um thoughtful about that now sometimes in certain positions when you're hiring like let's say you're looking at a physics teacher or some of these other really you know yeah I mean you're going to pay what you're going to pay because there aren't many of them you know and if you land a good one you're going to you're going to pay for that but um other positions you get many more applicants so Kinder you know kindergarten or lower elementary school you typically get a really rich pool of candidates so it's like taking all of those things into consideration when you hire but we do talk about that in terms of um this year you know yes we are we are right now um actively asking people to submit POS for what they think is essential to complete the year so we'll know in another uh week or so for the next Finance committee meeting you know what we think we're going to be able to you know comb out of those non-salary accounts to be able to address some of our deficit um challenges that we have so we're doing a lot of things for this we're g go to stepen thank you Susan Stephen thanks Suzanne thanks Susan for this presentation and for breaking this down for us so I just want to make sure I understand some basic things uh last school committee meeting the projected deficit you had for us was around 6 million um now it's 8.2 is that correct it is and so what's the difference and so no so the only change data point was that the town's Revenue the projected Revenue that goes to the to us is increased by 1.4 million so the the big change is that the projection model has changed and that your budget build now includes the slide that's currently in front of us right correct so um are there future major changes to the projection model or should we start considering this number because I'm I'm finding it hard to understand how seriously to take this current figure given that the model is swinging around so wildly I I don't know I I guess I wouldn't say it's swinging around wildly it was 6 million last time and the only data point that changed was an increase of 1.4 but now we're seeing a decrease of 2.2 million from last week's projection then the only difference that we're seeing at the school committee is a major change in the model that led to a negative change of 3.6 million which we couldn't have anticipated right the last time we saw it or should we have known no so two the two things that changed the model hasn't changed its circumstances uh have changed right and so the grant shift when I when I presented this last this in December when I presented this information to you about FY 26 we're talking about just be clear we're talking about FY 26 the adjustments to add the new staff weren't something that I was aware of right so I couldn't report something that I wasn't aware of on the grant shift that became um known to me in a real concrete way only in the last couple of weeks so those two things um are are really major factors in why the expense side is going up at a pace that we didn't anticipate at two weeks ago right um and I'm actively working on this and a variety of other things um to try to hone in on you know what what is our need and um what is the implication of some of the challenges that we faced this year and how does that play out for for for this year I'm sorry could you say that one more time I'm I'm listening and I'm I'm not getting it what changed on the expense side that you now know that you didn't know previously I didn't know that the requests that we were going to have requests for 23 new staff and that just came in yes okay thanks I appreci appreciate that yeah this week this is like work I'm doing right now actively with our budget managers um the grant shift uh was probably has been evolving in my understanding of uh what has has to come off grants that we originally had planned on being on grants um in comparison to what the grants um were written for and approved um the amounts that were approved in them and and we had projected zero new staff yeah I I wasn't aware of any staff some of these things evolve so I have to say that like for example the El uh Jody's been taking a deep dive in that because we have had an enormous influx of students coming in that have uh El needs and um that are above and beyond what we can actually deliver on right now and so if you ask Jody um because we talked about this earlier today how many do you really think you need in order to meet the Demand right now it's 10 and and these are needs we have right now that we're not able to to fill so we're you know Jody's trying to be reasonable and say well at least let's add five this year and then maybe next year with the override we add five but we still have to meet the needs of the kids and on the uh OSS side I've met with um all of the directors um for OSS as we've built this up up in the last several days and this is what we've put together um for what those needs are and it's asking those important questions like how many kids are coming out of beep and what are the implications for that what do their iepc say so that we can make sure we don't get into these recurring what I call part of our challenge here is a budgetary um problem right in other words if we need 20 let's budget 20 let's not say 15 and then we wind up in this kind of squirreling process where you know we don't have enough money and we have the needs so this includes everything that they believe um is essential in order to meet the needs of the kids and their current IEPs for the upcoming year and it's a lot normally you don't see a 23% increase but I think some of this um is is people are very sensitive to the circumstances we're faced with today and are looking really hard um at what our case loads are what the needs are and what is our staffing needs in comparison to what those Service delivery um um aspects of el and osss uh thanks very much okay Val thank you um I heard you say seven Pais for beep I'm not clear what the 11 other positions in OSS are I'm wondering if we'll get a breakdown and I think I heard you say that there's also money in here that's not the 23 staff is that right yeah yes so there's there some of what's on the adjustment line the adjustment Line's a net number I guess is what I've been trying to say right it's not yeah and so is that a 100,000 a million can you give me a a ballpark of what the that non staff number is I I I can't off the top of my head i' I can look at it and I mean I'm just wondering if it's half or it's 10% do you have a ballpark Susan I'm sorry can you can you say a ballpark of whether it's you know 50% or 10% other expenses other expenses versus she's asking of the 2.7 million of it what fraction of the 2.7 million is referred to costs associated with the 23 new staff versus other of that okay yeah the majority of that is yeah and it so to answer your question I said seven be because I just happened to meet and we just did that more recently but uh there's a couple of special education teachers at AT some schools um related services so otpt speech bcbas um increasing Andor adding U full-time positions sometimes it's it's increasing somebody from a point8 up to a02 um and Paris so I think I'm gonna we're gonna wrap this up for now because we've got a public comment that's quite quite late um but in addition there'll be a lot more conversation about this so when is your next Finance meeting well thank you for that transition our next Finance meeting is February 5th right feary and just super quick can this can this slide Susan go into the meeting materials online thank you yeah okay thank you very much y I appreciate it uh I just want to say I'm sorry for those that have been waiting so patiently but we are going to move into public comment um step away yeah you're going to TU away that's fine thank you so much Mariah for all the work you're doing course and uh Nick rothin you up first thank you for waiting you've been very patient I appreciate it thank you um you guys hear me okay all right that's um my name is Nick Rothstein I am a long-term resident of Brooklyn BHS graduate um both my kids are going to graduate Brookline High and I'm still a resident here like I said and I've been teaching at Brookline for teaching English for 24 years at this point okay um and uh while I'm resident while I'm a teacher and while I'm a parent of students here I I I like to always say that I I'm speaking for myself um here even though I know that some of uh the things I say tonight are mirrored by my colleagues again I apologize and all I tired you guys are I'm tired too I'm neck deep in mid years and things uh make matters worse uh the brookly uh police surrounded my house last night trying to chase down a car the woke us up at 2 o'clock in the morning so I've been up since then um so um I I I got a lot to say but I'm not going to say that right now because um again I'm too tired and I know you guys are too and I appreciate you I'm here because I would like to express my dismay at the decision um for the second time in three years of The English Department to remove its proposal to offer advanced placement English in our curriculum um and again I've got uh uh I had a whole lot to say but I'm going to shove this and I'll just let me see I'll be as brief as I can um I think um AP English is important for a number of different reasons uh for the high school all right first one this is I think it's Equitable all right I think it adds to equity uh for a number of different reasons um we've been running after school programs after school prep classes uh for three years now at the high school and we've been specifically targeting lots of different students to try and come and join and be part and and sign up to take the exam um and that's been pretty successful in my eyes uh from what I've seen and and and from what I know um but besides from all that um the opportunity to be able to open up AP English at least to the junior class all right at the moment right now all we have is a push uh AP US History as well as AP Chemistry um for those of you who've ever had kids who have gone through Brooklin High um if those are the only two things offered junior year I don't have to tell you there's about 200 250 kids who are taking those right now and I love my history Department got plenty of friends in the science department as well I don't have to tell you if you had any kids who are in either of those classes while on one hand they're working hard and being tested but they're also probably cursing the high Gods the fact that they're in it right now because it may not be their favorite subject they might be in it just because they think they need to take it AP English would open up at least another opportunity for other students to be able to take a course they might like you got to imagine there's at least 50 kids in the junior class who might English might be their favorite subject either way AP English opens doors to a number of different kids second uh second reason why is the community demands it all right and again if the what I witnessed a year ago for the community demanding um at least another examination of unleveling the freshman classes three years ago at least a 100 kids took the AP English exams last year around 85 took it this year we have 130 students signed up for the AP English exams between the literature and language exams um if that's we've had two petitions going around this year trying to get people to again encourage people to U again I I'll be honest I don't know what happened to those petitions but I know at least two of them went around one from a body of parents one from a body of students um who were at uh asking to see if we can get AP English into our curriculum so the bottom line is this there's several hundred students who want this to happen third thing is this you can take AP Physics aush AP Chemistry you can take AP music theory you can take AP art design you can take AP Computer Science every single discipline in the high school has an AP section with the exception of AP English um and it's just absurd to me that we don't have it um uh at this point it makes no sense to me in in a lot of different a lot of different Arenas um when we offered it um and brought this proposal up over uh two years ago as well as this year um there was a handful of teachers who wanted to teach it a number of teachers who were on the fence and then there's been a very strong vocal opposition against it some from my department some from other programs in the building some administrators and I'll say this um if you speak to any of the people who are opposing this they will come at you with a lot lot of maxims a lot of platitudes about the history of the AP system about the culture that it might create which I I think is uh arguable and provable and founded in a lot of different ways all right and so I don't really have a problem with that argument with anyone being philosophically opposed to the AP system what I do have a problem with is anybody who's cloaking any other ideas that they have or any other um ulterior motives that they might have um behind those particular maxims and behind those particular ideas right now um I feel like this this has become an ethical issue for me it's become a moral issue for me and and I'll finish with this here's what this community can't do we can't on one hand say that AP systems are wrong or the AP system is wrong for um a a portion of our community and therefore it's wrong for everyone and at the same time these same people who are extolling that are using the AP system for themselves you can't in this system say we don't want to use this we we can't say in in our community that we don't want to use this system because it has been traditionally um segregating traditionally um elitist except it's okay for my kids to use it okay thank you very much uh next up is Linda Roseman good evening everyone I'm Linda Roseman I'm the community liaison to the hay school council I'm a retired Driscoll prek parah and hay School substitute teacher and I'm former chair of the police commissioner's advisory committee almost four years ago our well-respected school resource officer program fell victim to the Nationwide anti- police sentiment generated by the murder of George Floyd I believe that those who advocated for abolishing the SRO program did not fully understand what they were eliminating our program was a model for other municipalities and ironically we are now the only school system in this area without a school resource officer program at the August meeting of the policy subcommittee you invited principles to come and discuss their top priorities for the school year reinstating SRO was in the top three building leaders spoke eloquently about the void created by the absence of the school resource officer program and on November 12th the select board voted to ask you to revisit this and consider returning the SRO program to our schools sro's were not security guards surveillance teams or disciplinarians they forged relationships with students and often connected students and their families to services and resources in our community they helped steer misguided students away from the criminal justice system by negotiating diversionary contracts so that first offenders could avoid a criminal record SRO SRO augmented the health and wellness Curriculum by teaching about Internet safety relationship safety drug and alcohol use and abuse and how C certain behaviors can result in criminal charges some have argued the police officers should not be in classrooms teaching our students the sro's came in as experts just as many parents and other community members are invited to come and speak to students about their area of expertise I was inspired to come forward to speak in support of the SRO program after hearing a mom speak about her daughter who sought help at the Brooklyn Police Station one night when she was feeling distraught and suicidal her daughter viewed the public safety building as a safe haven because she had a positive relationship with the SRO at BHS you have heard your building leaders say that they value this program when SRO were initially cut several building leaders and school counselors urged you not to eliminate that program and they were ignored community policing is about relationships Public Safety officers are part of our community the sro's acted as another trusted adult students could go to for support as well as a resource for staff and principles forming and maintaining relationships between our young people and our police officers is good policy and given your budget deficit I should point out that this program will not cost you a dime SRO are funded by the police department I urge you to put this on the agenda for discussion and a vote thank you thank you very much uh next up is Dan Salzman hey good evening thanks for letting me speak I appreciate it uh my name is Dan Saltzman I'm a town meeting member from Precinct six I'm a pierce parent and a BHS parent I have two kids in PSB now and one who graduated from Brooklyn high school last year I'm a former School administrator I currently own and operate a small firm uh Consulting with schools of all different sizes on issues of Technology including School Life Safety Systems um I've been in and out of dozens of schools over the past 20 years I'm also a practicing attorney with significant criminal defense experience and child advocacy work ultimately I've both interacted with the police more than most people and I've been in and out of schools more than most people I'll start the substance of my comments and I and I'll end on the same note by saying that regardless of your feelings about police and in general SRO and schools it's about it's it's a safety benefit for our kids SRO are a safety benefit for our kids at a time when safety is Paramount when all is said and done schools are safer with SRO SRO know the kids kids they know the facilities in ways in which the rest of us don't pay attention they know the staff they know the town they are undeniably an asset to school safety but there's other practical reasons to have sro's I'm regularly in various leadership and executive team meetings at schools in District central offices I count the I I couldn't possibly count the number of times that principles and superintendent reference the need to consult their SRO maybe there's a big basketball game happening and there expecting a large crowd or maybe there's an ongoing issue with a child and a non-custodial parent coming into the building the refrain I hear in these leadership check-ins is so I talk to our SRO and she's going to do this or our SRO I I asked them about something else and here's what he thinks or simply I alerted the SRO to this situation and he's now aware of it I've heard that some people believe that the counselors can fill the role of SRO but counselors are not trained to manage large crowds at a basketball game they're not trained in law enforcement and while they are indeed trained in working in areas of controversy and stress it comes from a very different perspective a counselor's role is not to manage and maintain Public Safety and SRO is trained to do just that and to do that in our schools I can tell you with 100% certainty that not a single School in which I've ever worked over the past 20 years would ever consider removing their SRO they would never consider doing something that could denigrate the safety of the children it's a safety issue since we've removed our SRO from Brooklyn we've experienced some awful situations and I think that those situations could have benefited from sro's being on site in fact I just heard a few hours ago literally just read this four hours ago that a Brooklyn resident former youth swim coach I guess and lifeguard here in brookln was arrested for using Snapchat to lure several young children into sending explicit and deg photographs and videos our SRO is used to teach classes on Internet safety I don't believe that role has been filled since we removed them it's my understanding that our principles want sro's back they know we know SRO are a security benefit to our schools we should invite them back to our schools to help our principles to help our community and to help protect the safety of our students I hope you'll do the responsible thing and make that happen thank you very much much thank you for your comments and we have one more speaker Debbie Debbie you're going to have to help me with your last name I'm really trying okay de yes hi it's uh Debbie hatsy Alis but I'm also known as Debbie hats officer hats um I'm a Precinct 15 and thank you for your time uh precin 15 town meeting member I grew up in Brookline I went to pierce I graduated from Brookline High I ra raised five children here in Brooklyn I'm still here and um I'm a retired Brooklyn Police Officer I taught the Dare program and then I was stationed at Brookline High School so I was basically the SRO officer before they named it the SRO officer and um I just wanted to tell you a little about what I did and uh my experience and um because I was there it was me I was it everything that everybody has said before me is absolutely true um I was really sad when I heard you know I wrote this I was really sad when I heard uh for the Brookline kids when I first heard that they were um what they'd be missing out on um I just wanted to tell you my experiences at Brooklyn High School I began and ended my school day in front of the the high school in front of my police cruiser where the kids were comfortable to stop by and ask questions joke around or just say hello I had lunch at the restaurant attended sporting events school events plays um what you know the kids would invite me to things and I would go they were comfortable with me the kids trusted me I was able to refer kids to um the diversionary program instead of the court systems we worked together I was able to talk to kids about the pressures of being a teen their choices about drugs alcohol all in an open honest setting I was in no way there to spy on them or punish the kids I was there to help to be available to their needs teachers had my phone number and they would call me regularly the nurses the nurse had my number the social workers um anybody at the high school they all had my phone number and I had no problem answering it and just like the previous speaker said you know I would you know in in the second I would go to a classroom or we Tau you know a kid that was having problem or having a hard day they'd call me and I would talk to them it it was it was these are things that aren't measured there and the trust that was built there I see adult children that I had now that that were my students um and they run up to me and hug me um that and they remember me they remember the police officers that were good to them you know now some children they have experiences with police officers and it's a negative it could be a negative situation if you don't have somebody there that's um guiding them talking to them that they can trust that's what they're going to think about police and that's not true especially here in Brooklyn um let's see I had the um the special ed class teacher would call I'd go in there and see them um at the time they had um early um Early Education I would go there the nurse um and uh I I helped in so many different situations um I I hope I wrote here that I hope this shed some light on the value of this program and you'll consider putting it back uh into the schools it's really difficult to be a kid and they have so many disra distractions so many new laws so many you know the phones the you know social media and um and you know we have the tools to teach children about all that and you know now there are laws that the kids don't know about when they're texting and texting and that kind of stuff and they don't realize that they can get a criminal record because of that um and you know we we want to prevent that we want to be there we want to help the kids there and so um you know I think that the kids deserve all the support that they um can get in in this time um it's it again it's really difficult to be a kid I have two two grandchildren at the high school and I hear a lot of stories and um I think that uh it would be such a benefit to have us back so thank you thank you very much and thank you for your years of service um that concludes a public comment and we are going to move on making progress here we're now going to look at the Brookline High School course change catalog changes for next year I have some notes that Betsy gave me so hold on Jody we'll see what we've got here because Betsy's really good about this so there are um you have the course descriptions uh there's four courses one two three four so construction a tour through the trades contemporary United States history social studies friendship in literature and film is English and Justice in action unpacking crime law and consequence all four courses were presented uh to the curriculum subcommittee on January 14th we would we discussed them in great detail we had the directors of the coordinators of the Departments come and speak to us about their uh courses um the curriculum subcommittee voted unanimously to recommend that the school committee approve all four new courses all courses are budget neutral so they will only run if there is a student interest in registration and uh we do have Jody here to uh answer any specific questions we might have a few of our um Department curriculum coordinators here there they are there they are welcome sorry it's so late for you um so uh I I move that we do in fact uh approve the four courses but I oh I think we have to do each course you said right Jody and I want to let you know that the friendship in film course has been removed from the courses um it didn't receive Innovation funding it when we um we didn't know that when we presented to the subcommittee friendship in literature and film back page I think even if it's receives that funding we still need to approve it it didn't receive that funding so we pulled it oh it did not sorry it won't be in the for catalog next year sorry okay so we're down to three okay um should we just go one by one and vote for them yeah absolutely okay so the first one is construction a tour through the trades it looks really exciting uh if you want to learn how to do a hammer hammer nail I'll move it second okay any questions or comments I think it's great awesome so cool great okay we'll take a vote then H Jesse yes Sarah yes Mariah are you there I am here how do you vote yes okay Helen yes Carolyn yes Stephen yes Andy yes Val yes and I vote Yes as well okay next one contemporary United States history social studies I'll move it okay I'll second it any comments or questions I never seen Jen so quiet and calm but that's great but there's that great smile she has right why she's got so much energy um Jesse how do you vote Yes Sarah yes Mariah yes Helen yes Carolyn yes Stephen yes and I'll move it and second it too we did that already oh are you sure yeah that's why you're voting okay Andy yes Val yes and I vote Yes as well and last one this is a cool one too Justice and action unpacking crime law and consequence almost move it seconded second it comments and questions Jesse how do you vote Yes Sarah yes Mariah yes Helen yes Carolyn yes Stephen yes Andy yes Val yes and I vote Yes as well can I just take a moment to thank the three coordinators for hanging with us through that meeting thank you all you're wonderful as always thank you too Gabe thank you very much thanks for being here so late okay we're moving on oh so Stephen is this you the personal electron device policy yeah it is okay go for it all right can I share my screen yes um you should be able to Stephen let me know if you have an issue um all right let me know if you could see it yes we can okay now we can was that a yes suzan yes yes okay so you are looking at the draft PSB personal electronic device policy I think you also do you have a copy of it as well yes we do we do this is this was fairly easy to put together because the principles did all the work the K8 principles um put together policies for their schools um we in their August meeting they identified this is one of the areas that U we could assist them by coordinating this policy um the process of putting this together was to identify areas where there was clear consensus an overlap which was fairly um straightforward um we also looked to masc for sample policy and so the process was really taking an masc template for a PD policy and plugging in the areas of consensus directly into it there are two sections of this policy three sections one a very brief Preamble two a section for the K8 schools and then three a section for BHS um I want to make I think just three comments here one um the K8 section follows an off andway policy uh which is exactly what it sounds like um it followed directly from what the principles had already developed the school committee slightly broadened the exceptions to make more explicit it exceptions for students who whose IEP or 504 might require an exception um but otherwise it's pretty much uh taken directly from what were in the policies to begin with it's also left Broad in terms of how exactly they may Implement as per the principal [Music] suggestion um point two is that um uh BHS had its own uh separate handbook language which I reorganized to match the Lang to match the organization of the K8 version so it has a little Preamble and then its approach and then consequences the version you're looking at here has two changes from the version that is in front of you one is thanks to Dr Fortuna thank you Dr Fortuna um she sent me uh um some scholarly literature on ped policies and I found very helpful a division of peed policies into three types which helped me um come up with like a philosophical category for the BHS um policy which is that it's a limited use approach so I added a one- sentence preamble to the grade 9 through 12 just to say that it's actually not an of and Away approach it's a limited use approach specifically which means it's often out of sight except during instructional perience instructional periods except during designated times which Dr Fortuna's literature specified as a lunch and passing periods but I just said otherwise um and then the other part is after consultation with uh the Deans at BHS they suggested restoring language that the school committee had cut which is that teachers in the handbook were asked to State clear classroom expectations about eeds and the consequences for use in the class so I've restored that to this paragraph here otherwise it's as is the third point I want to make is that unlike most school committee policies this policy recommends consequences um the reason we don't typically recommend consequences is because uh that's typically within the school's jurisdiction to recommend the only reason and rationale for the school committee for doing so is that it seemed to be the consensus um preference of principles to have a standard set of consequences for uh for across schools so this was taken from um directly from policies that were in the K8 schools however um I spoke with a principal last week who suggested that perhaps we reconsider having consequences this was in the K8 schools saying that this might not be a good precedent for the school committee and perhaps this might not age well and also in my conversation with BHS Deans they suggested that we not include the consequences section here so I want to leave open that part for discussion among the school committee so those are the three points I want to make for discussion thank you Stephen and just to be clear this is a first reading so you want a a conversation discussion about the policy and I'd like yeah just your overall comments about the policy it's quite brief um I'm particularly I'm interested in your overall reactions but I'm specifically also interested in whether you think it's appropriate to include consequences in this policy okay Caroline thanks Stephen um I agree with your direction that you just mentioned of not having consequences in the high school that doesn't seem appropriate I'm interested in hearing did you say you spoke to a principal who suggested taking out consequences for K8 I spoke to a number of principles sent feedback and one Principal suggested removing consequences among the K principles and sorry I'm not meaning to put you on the spot was that feedback shared with the policy subcommittee and I missed I received it after the last policy subcommittee meeting um okay so I'll have to directionally I I do I am comfortable with consequences in K8 and my sense if I remember correctly from the initial meeting with building leaders was that that was something that the the sense was that would be helpful if that was at the district level I might be getting that wrong um and I also this is small but in the last paragraph of the high school um students may use peeds in public spaces during passing time or box um phone calls must be taken or made in private spaces such as Dean Suites empty classrooms or outside of the building I'm not sure I understand sort of the origin of of that or the practicality that was language taken from the BHS handbook um and that was to that was to ensure that the use of PEDs the phone function on ped s was minimally disruptive if if if you think the language could be changed to emphasize that we could do that that was what that was how I understood it that makes sense having two children at the high school it that just doesn't the the specifics don't seem realistic in addition to the fact that they almost never use the phone function right um but I I think I don't to me it doesn't seem unreasonable for a kid to be able to make a quick phone call in a hallway so but that's minor okay okay Val thanks um so Stephen I don't know if you've seen the study act which was filed I think Friday um it has support of both desie and the MTA uh and it's essentially a um all day ban on any kind of personal electronic device uh with exceptions for things like IEPs or um 504s or Emer in a case of an emergency um it does have a section I think I don't think it calls it consequences but it um ways that you enforce it I think was was what I read there's also a requirement that districts have um some sort of like proactive social media like impacts of social media on young people that's part of the policy and I'm not remembering all of it but um I just sent you the link and so I I think we should maybe look at it before we um come back to this so that we're not um spending a lot of time line editing something that might have different requirements on the state level thank you I'll review that thanks okay I would just like to say about the consequences so I I see both sides if you have uniform consequences then then whoever is enforcing that has something to go back to and it's not arbitrary but the other side of that is is that one size does not fit all and there's very well could be circumstances that we can't anticipate where these consequences may not be appropriate for particular situation so I actually am torn about that and um you know I don't you can make him suggested I I don't not sure how to how to address that but I could see both sides to this in terms of consequences and I'm not sure how I would land I I probably would feel better not having specific consequences that could be suggested suggestions maybe for those Deans or whoever is enforcing this Vice principals principles but that's those are my thoughts right now yeah Jesse Yeah I was going to add that um I know in the policy that I provided um Stephen from Philadelphia for their school district which is fairly large there are no consequences listed but the question I had as we went through it was how do you guarantee some fair and balanced approach to handling situations in which you find them and one of the things that happened when we asked the building leaders for their policies at the end of last summer was that they all had consequences in them pretty much every school and they I'm sure that the building leaders discussed some of this anyway like amongst themselves so no surprise that they had that but it does tend to send a stronger message I think to parents that we have our arms around what to do when the rules are broken and without it how can we really stand up and say to uh the community we take it seriously you know that that's I agree with all that but like s SWS as a particular program parents don't know what the what the students have done or not done it's it's part of their program that they have their own kind of tribunal or their own well I think I think the choic is between having consequences in the policy for standardization versus having consequences in the school handbook and it's possible to have eliminate the consequences section for the for the 9 through 12 yes yeah and and we could also say something like Jesse um if we want to that each school will articulate consequences for violations of this policy in its handbook or something like that again though I I just I guess all I my only opinion is we should only provide this section if it's uh if it's useful to and requested by principles otherwise it feels like an overreach from the school committee Sarah so then I would like to go back to um the three points that Carolyn made and reiterate those keep the consequences for Middle School um eliminate the consequences for high school because they just don't feel age appropriate and they don't feel like the type of relationship that the high school teachers have with students and then I would actually um be a little bit stronger in what Carolyn said that last line before consequences in the um high school policy phone calls must be taken I would eliminate that last sentence and just keep it with as long as they are used silently phone calls must be Tak as long as they are used silently no I would eliminate the whole sentence that starts with phone calls must be taken I think that you have that idea with um as long so long as they are you Sil all set there I'm just saying a little bit stronger than Caroline said but she had she had made that point prior and just overall just you know thank you for for this policy that just helps student mental health so much I really appreciate it thanks okay seeing no other hands um thank you Stephen I guess this will you'll take some of this and um come back to us or you'll take it back sharing I can't tell if I'm still sh oh yes I am yes I stopped thanks everyone does this go back to policy or does it just come back to us I think it just comes back to you so I'll integrate the edits I'm going to I think I'm going to run it by the principles one more time on the topic of K8 consequen then I'll bring it back to the full school committee um maybe check with Val how long this bill might take to get through because if it's another year we can have the policy and then adjust it or if not it may be somewhat moot I don't know how they if the state can decide for us what we want as our policy um I think it's going to take more than a couple of months it will probably take a few months for to get a hearing oh so it's still in the education committee I don't even know if it's been referred Helen Bill filing deadline was last Friday I got it okay yeah I think we can have a policy first well thank you Stephen and thank you to the policy subcommittee for the work okay we're moving into subcommittee and lays on reports um if you don't have anything to report that's okay but if you do that's fine too Helen hi I'm sorry but I have a lot we've been busy in capital yeah we had a capital subcommittee meeting on today is Thursday yesterday um and discussed the repair and maintenance budget the request for next year uh there was some push back by Me by the chair on the increase on the repair and maintenance budget and keeping the 167,000 possibly in a separate line item in our budget that if we were to go over in the repair and maintenance then we would have that funding but otherwise would be in the school budget um and uh help me committee members what else SBC yeah that I'm going to talk about but the capital capital it was mostly the repair and maintenance budget that we discussed I'm sorry oh yes and there was some good news about Driscoll and their energy costs comparatively to last year and there were like in one month $30,000 of savings uh with the new system of uh the geothermal Wells heating up the building there was no need to go even in the coldest days just now there was no need to go back to the electric boilers that we have there as just in casers um if if the others doesn't don't heat the building enough and everybody was very comfortable in the building so that that's really critical uh it's a good sign for that school it'll be a good sign for the peer school um so those are the the pieces that we discussed at the um Capital subcommittee I'm sorry oh and oh gosh yes um one thing and actually Stephen I was going to call you and I'm sorry I didn't uh one of the issues that came up um Mr Mas gave a presentation on C outdoor cameras at BHS that were included in the original BHS project but weren't ever put in and um the question of whether we we would whether we would recommend to the school building Committee of the high school to allow monies from that project to go towards uh putting in those those cameras one of the questions that came up and I think you may be dealing with it on Monday is in your safety um I'll talk about this at the policy update okay all right but that so what I'm hoping is that you know we can at least get if we need to and I'm not sure we need to but if we need to because we do have cameras in the elementary schools and the front doors and we hav't at the high school at the front door but anyway so that that was one of the is isues that came up and I think the cost was something like 150,000 approximately he's I think he said low sixes low low six figures low six fig 600,000 so I think you it close to 100 um like yeah around a 100,000 um whatever it is we will uh check on and it I mean we'll we'll manage that part but I think the the first part maybe he was going to get the policy from Newton that has a policy on that and forward it to bety who would forward it to the rest of the committee and I'll forward it to you okay um and then the other good news is the peer school project which has come in under budget um significantly the original budget um was um I think 168,000 for the construction for the GMP it came in at 164 362 millions millions did I say thousands I meant Millions I'm really sorry uh what's a few zeros among friends right um but the the the important part is it came in under there has been some added scope uh from the town uh in terms of possibly sprinkler the library um garage and the Town garage which were not part of the original project and that's U being carried now in the budget um for 1.5 million that's above the ones 64 that it came in and there's also monies for mitigation for the park that we had to do in order to get the article 97 approval um that's about a I don't remember the exact number on that there's an allowance carried there's right now a um U one of the bids is being contested by the electrical company uh Town Council is working on that and um we've asked the AG's office to um aine on it uh if the bidder who is the second lowest uh bidder um prevails it would be about about 1.5 million more so they've added that into a final figure of 167 million so it leaves us about a 100,000 uh under budget um there's one other thing and right now I'm not remembering uh that was also added into the SC oh and that includes the 167 million includes both ad alternates that were included in the project one for the windows of the historic building they're about 10 years old and um it was determined as they were looking at them that they're not in great shape and if we're redoing the building and renovating the whole inside it makes sense now since the roof has been done on that historic building the pointing has been done everything has been done we should do the windows too so that's add alternate one and sorry how much is that sorry I asked how much is that I know I know uh I mean I just wanted to do it in the mic yeah I understand and right now I am I want to sh I have it here but I don't know oh alternates so it must be about a million because the um a little under a million because the photovoltaics which were the second uh ad alternate were 2 million and these are the windows on the historic building only hold on something's not making sense I'm Sor lot are you abely talking oh I don't know if people yeah can you hear me yeah okay um the two add alternates together were 2.2945 4 uh that's included in the 167 million so we could get both at alternates it was recommended at the meeting and we will be voting on all of this once the building commission votes on it the select board and then we have to vote it and that will be at our meeting on um the 6th of February that's our next meeting yes correct because we have to accept the bids by the 10th otherwise they they won't hold their numbers um the at alternate for the photo voltaics um The Building Commissioner Janet fman uh requested that we hold on that one right now uh from the school building committee recommending it to be taken uh primarily because we want to discuss it with the um sustainability director Alexandra Veo she's been doing a lot of research on the the difference in cost and Main maintenance etc for both owning or leasing our roofs and uh we felt that it was really important to get her input and this the other piece in this um is that um it may be less expensive to do it after the fact and to put it out to bid to solar companies right so we're looking at all those factors right now and um so that's being held back um the uh the other piece that's also included in the 167 million is the higher amount that the electrical company I think they came in at a million more something like that um that higher amount is being so the the total of 167 million is basically all in with some pieces possibly going out yes yeah um you said that the windows are about 10 years old yeah and they are recommending swapping them all out yes there what's what's the problem I mean some of them are leaking some of them are going to be changed because of the the configuration it was it just seemed to make more sense to do the whole thing and have it all be airtight and and done well okay thank you now by the time we get into the school they'll be 13 14 years old so car Caroline thanks can you just explain what the park extra cost is I think you mentioned yeah and how much is that and what is that um I didn't get the number but it is so there are certain things that were included in in the base you know re replacing the ball field that's there where the geothermal is going replacing the basketball court putting in um a new entrance way into the Park those were all things that were in there in addition to trees um more trees and fencing well the fencing is some extra um that's being put in the reason that we are doing that is in order to meet the conditions of the e e NR I think it is am I right the DP had conditions for us they wanted us to do a percentage of work of what the value of the underground space was we figured out and worked with them on what that percentage cost should be it seems to me it was around 200,000 something like that and so we worked together with the Parks and Rec Department to see what they really needed in the park that needed to be improved and um came up with the slide area that has a great deal of erosion on the two sides of the slide if you're familiar with Pierce Park and yeah it's down a hill um and so the um the idea is to redo that space so that the erosion won't happen there'll be some climbing areas for kids to be able to to get up and some steps up too um so that's going to be fixed and some area where there's mulch right now we'll have that harder bouncy surface that we put in and and some more trees for the park it's Park fixing but not really related to the project because it's on the other side of the park from where everything's happening uh no it's actually the so the ball field is where the um right and this is on the hillside slide is on yeah it's opposite that's what I mean correct y thank you correct so this is because the geothermal Wells are going underground that we have to like rep pay ourselves back for using there's a value to that land and under article 97 we're taking that value correct okay and so we have to come up with stuff to do that's a percentage of that under value of the underground and we worked we worked in coordination with Parks and Rec there was no originally there was nothing we were going to do at the park because the park had just been redone five or 10 it wasn't 10 years I think was like 5 years ago so so but this was one area you know even when you do a park sometimes you make a mistake on how it's being done and so this is this worked out well for both sides okay how you doing I think I am done it's good news and I just wanted to share it with everybody for all the work you do Helen on for sure um curriculum I actually haven't reported in two meetings so just two meetings ago just to let you know recorded right Betsy if if people want to see it it was a great conversation about science and K to8 and that was a lot of fun and then we had um three principales in to talk to us about uh the success of the Middle grades program and that also was enlightening so if if you have a chance and it's of interest to you you might want to take a look at that and then our last meeting we actually went over the courses that we just approved and that actually took the whole meeting um we went in depth with that and um what's coming up Dr funa can help me with this is um we actually are going to talk about uh an agreement with middleberry what no what's the mass Bay Mass Bay it wasn't middle I know it wasn't middle Mass Bay Community College and doing some um offering some coursework through there and then talk a little bit about uh High School graduation now that mcass is uh no longer required although I do believe the states coming out with things as well but I'm not sure when so anyway that's on the agenda for the next time so join us if you can um Sarah diversity Equity inclusion and Justice we talked um with the office of educational equity and we sort of heard kind of like the updated way that we think of equity and they also Incorporated the way that desie asks us to do things so and Mariah do you have uh other additional uh thoughts from Finance um we've covered most of our last meeting and I mentioned earlier that we have our upcoming meeting on February 5th um and of course we're getting into sort of the peak of the budget period coming up so lots of updates to come from Finance but not tonight anymore thank you Andy on government relations um nothing new to report uh we just a reminder that we have our annual meeting with legis lers on February 10th Monday right you know I don't know Andy I'm also thinking I don't know if they will we may want to have some conversations most of the our priorities are around funding and budgeting uh and the money we get but I'm also wondering if we might want to add something about some of the executive orders that are coming from the federal government and how that might impact the state or what the state anticipates they might do to I don't know respond to those orders you mean at the February 10th meeting or the February from us to them to give us some well we it goes back it's a conversation right yeah so I'm thinking we might want to say some of these things are really important to us and do they have thoughts about what might be happening it's a great idea this state legislation that's new since when we set up our government relations priorities earlier yeah just a thought uh policy Stephen um nothing new to report since I last reported out but just want to note that the next meeting is on Monday and um instead of having two separate sessions we're just going to combine both blocks into one mega block on um what uh OSS and um oee has been working on uh uh what they're calling the student civil rights policy which is a proposed revision to j6 and j7 in the policy manual I also just want to note that um if the if three of the public commenters are still listening that um in the last block we're going to take up the uh building and school safety to set parameters for um a the for a discussion the following week on what should be included in reviewing sections E2 and E E3 of the policy manual which is student safety and well-being and School Safety and Security which should include both um Helen should both include um surveillance and cameras as well as uh sros so the that last block won't uh undertake any draft reviews or or substantial substantial policy review but just setting the parameters for that discussion we're also going to have uh uh an overview of a generative AI working group at the um at the suggestion of uh the administration so that's coming up on Monday it's a really packed docket what what time are you starting Stephen uh Still Still 5 to 6:40 oh okay thank you okay uh additional lons and updates for anybody I have one yeah Jesse so um last Thursday evening um at the um urg of the leadership of CPAC for which I'm one of the Liaisons with um Stephen uh they com they convene a community meeting um to discuss the issues that are currently in front of us in the community um last count there probably about 40 parents or more that actually got together for the zoom for an hour and a half with Stephen and I I think Carolyn joined us as well I believe if I recall and um I believe they recorded it but I haven't seen the link yet to it um essentially they um uh had a lot of questions and concerns and they very much value the relationship that through the Le Ona school committee and we basically um an tried to answer their questions as best we could and when we had gaps in what we could do um we uh penned some questions down that we reviewed with them and then um they actually made their way finally to Dr gillery uh most of which he has addressed in some fashion during the superintendent update um and we'll be meeting uh with uh CPAC at their next meeting February 7th to open it up to the entire Community again and continue this conversation as almost on a daily basis with the folks that are uh impacted by what's happening and then questions other people have about it so thank you anybody else have can I just just on that um I'm not sure I think Dr Giller is still online um one question most of the questions that came up out of that was were I think answered at this meeting one question that wasn't though was um about potential Paris shortages um I'm wondering if there are any updates about um par shortages either on a onetoone basis or otherwise do we have any numbers about parah hires if uh if that situation has changed at all since we met last I don't I don't know that it has uh Stephen but I will ask um both HR and OSS for their perspective on that I checked in with uh with um HR and I think there were five openings but I think those are the ones that have already been reported okay sorry for thinking you were online well you see my name there yeah that threw me off yeah thanks to Jesse and Stephen and Carolyn for representing us at that meeting with families and having those difficult conversations yeah thank you yeah Caroline I'll do a quick I'm the bef liaison um I attended their meeting great fun their fundraising just to remind people um we did get an invitation to the trivia B so whether people want to I'd be up for doing a school committee table or not but if people want to go individually it's a great event I will say that one time I Won With My Team it might have been because Tom galatan and Margaret hmer and Deb Abner were on my team but we did win well the school committee in the beginning when they first actually they had a spelling be before they had the trivia be and the No No they had the trivia be excuse me they had the trivia B and Terry Quan and Nancy heler and myself one all right so but it would be great um it's a fun event and obviously the BF is is a great uh organization it's a fundraiser so it's a fundraiser raer yes so we want to help them raise their funds okay any new businessn um I'll do a new business just following up on the public comment and noting that I think which was referred to I think it was end of summer beginning of school year so maybe four months ago that our building leaders did come to us um with a a sort of urgent plea for the school committee to um reinstate sro's or discuss it um it sounds like the select board moved it to us on November 12th I'm not sure I understand what Stephen means about setting the parameters of a discussion um but I would I hope that can um I think it's kind of slow at this point a response in terms of um the need that was expressed um we've had some really tragic uh events recently involving students um being a High School parent I would I would dare say it's exactly the kind of situation um that sros perhaps could have really helped um prevent so and it's really really serious people's lives um so I hope that that will move to our agenda I just add that I um I have previously asked for that in new business and um our chair mentioned that it was going to be docketed but with no schedule so I believe the words were um Andy something that it would you know would be a long Glide path to discuss it um and that's fine I think given what we've heard to this evening and what sort of we just I think know from building leaders and Society at large um we should probably think about moving a little faster I don't know what the um plan was in terms of when it would get docketed but um it's a it's a zero you know zero cost and uh school safety so I'm thinking it's worth having a preliminary conversation maybe late in February our next two meetings in early February are very budget heavy sure later in February I think we could start sending out the school committee on where we might be headed thank you and I'll just share usually before we take up a brand new topic I just like to have in that last block a brief discussion of what that new topic entails the meeting after the next one um E2 and E3 are fully docketed for review so that's a sneak preview two meetings hence well where we'll fully discuss student safety and well-being and School Safety and Security which can Encompass both SRO and uh School surveillance camera use I think there's overlap but the SRO topic doesn't fall entirely within the topic of security I mean some of the arguments have to do with safety and some go beyond that okay well with that we're going to adjourn thank you everybody thank you Suzanne and everybody feel better I know everybody feel better good night goodan night Suzanne we were supposed to have new business and I was GNA talk about the open meeting law thing we did just do new business that was no but you cut it off like right at the end like I didn't get the chance to say it oh oh well we're here we're here hold on recording in progress okay just saying um so as I mentioned earlier there was the um question raised about what happened at Finance next week and the only thing I want to add is that um uh I reached out to Town Council and we're getting Clarity on the applicability of the prior ruling to the current situation that's it okay oh yeah more updates yeah thanks yeah yeah thanks Mari I didn't mean to not call on you I'm sorry I didn't see you okay we'll try again have a good night everybody all those who are sick please feel better yes and we're now Jour good night