Oh, should know where I am. Welcome to the Monday, April 6, 2026 meeting of the Dennis Jarmouth Regional School Committee. The Dennis Jarmouth Regional School Committee will enter into executive session to return to public session to discuss strategy with respect to litigation. Executive session
is necessary to protect the litigation position of the body. May I have a motion to enter into executive session? >> I move to go into executive session to discuss strategy with respect to litigation and to reconvene in open session. >> Okay, we have a motion. Do we have a
second? Second. Okay, we will have a roll call vote. Uh, Miss Marshall, >> yes. >> Mr. New? >> Yes. >> Mr. Martin? >> Yes. >> Miss Bemis? >> Yes. >> And I vote yes. We are return. Thank you. Welcome back. Uh, will you please rise
and join me in the pledge of allegiance? >> I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.
>> Thank you. Uh, and we're going to start first with our Superintendent Excellence Award. >> All right. Good evening. Uh, Mark Smith, Superintendent of Schools. This is Mr. Maximus Ross. Uh the Massachusetts Association of School Superintendent
affords each school district superintendent with the opportunity to present a current senior with the MASS assoc uh academic excellence award. This award uh is provided to an outstanding high school senior that is minimally in
the top 5% of the graduating class and has regularly demonstrated strong leadership. As the DY uh superintendent, I was fortunate enough to have many strong candidates for this year's award. However, it was after meeting Max uh
after uh or at a recent breakfast hosted by our local Rotary at which Max was being honored there as well that I was able to determine that Max would be this year's 2026 recipient of the Mass Academic Excellence uh award. Max has a
long list of accomplishments, some of which I'll highlight in a few minutes, but it was hearing him speak about his time at the Rotary Youth Leadership Awards, otherwise known as RIYA, that helped me make my final determination. When speaking with the Rotarians, Max
shared uh the impact that this experience has had on him, both in his ability to develop leadership skills as well as in the opportunities it created for him to meet other like-minded individuals from across the state. Max demonstrated strong such strong leadership during his time at Riya that
they asked him to return the following year as a youth leader for the next cohort of students. Ria is one in a long list of accomplishments that have defined this young leader's high school career. Max is currently ranked number one in his high school class. This has been accomplished through dedication and
hard work that have have resulted in high honors recognitions his entire high school career. Currently, Max is a member of four honor societies, including National Honors Society, Science National Honors Society, Math National Honor Society, and the Spanish National Honor Society. Max has chosen a
rigorous course courses of study during his time at DY High, excelling in a wide variety of advanced placement courses, earning himself an AP scholar with distin distinction recognition. In speaking with Max just a couple weeks ago, he shared that his successes
success is driven by internal motivation for self-improvement. Whether it's a focus on his grades or his health and well-being, Maxis shared that his biggest competition is with himself and that he's continually striving to get a little better each and every day. He noted that he's thankful
to both his parents for the ways in which they've supported him and they've helped him develop this internal motivation. He also shared that much of his confidence is rooted in the subtle ways that they've provided him with praise and encouragement throughout his entire life. Beyond his strong academic
achievements, Max's leadership is on regular display within the walls of DY and beyond. Max represents uh represented the high school in the American Legion boy state, giving him the opportunity to live and practice his leadership skills as well as practice civic engagement in real world
situations. He serves at a wide uh range of leadership positions within the school including vice president of the stat the Spanish national honor society financial advisor for interact and serving as a senior class representative and as one of the lead ambassadors for the DY high uh student ambassadors which
is a student group designed to act as a community service agents within the school uh and serve as role models to role models to the school community. He's also dedicated over a 100 hours of his time to community service to events such as youth football, the local food
pantry, and tutoring students for both academics and driver's license uh preparation. Beyond all the academic and leadership skills, Max is also a young man that has fond memories of growing up in Dennis. He shared with me that he and his family
spent their summers at Crow's pasture as well as camping camping in Nickerson State Park and that these are extreme extremely fond memories for him. He added that he's been playing baseball uh since he was 5 years old and that baseball provides him with great social network as well as um another part of
his life where he can focus on incremental improvements from day to day. when he's not studying and volunteering or maintaining his bed busy schedule of leadership commitments, Max shared that he truly enjoys his friends. He shared that he has a strong group of friends uh that have similar interests.
And while some of those friends he's had since early elementary schools, other early elementary school, others are new uh to his group. It is clear from listening to him talk and and only after a few minutes with him that
Max is an extremely affable young man who sets uh those at e those with him at ease and he's fast to make friends. As Max looks towards his future, he's looking to pursue a degree in business. However, he also wants to ensure to keep
his options open. Max believes that no one should uh that one should be open uh to opportunities when they present themselves and he wants to ensure that he keeps his mind this mindset as he goes off into college. In closing to
steal words uh written about Max by his guidance counselor guidance counselor Miss Dale Fornoff quote I have no doubt wherever Max goes he will not only thrive but he will also elevate those around him. His su success is not a
matter of if, but when. Congratulations to Maximus Ross, his family, and all those that have supported him to getting him to where he is today. Congratulations. We're going to take a little picture. There are folks up there.
>> Congratulations, Max, and good luck in your in the game. Okay, they already won. We didn't have the student rep. Congratulations. Hopefully those uh dirty knees are from tonight from sliding into home. Uh our student representative report. Uh
we will we don't have representative here tonight. So we'll move down to our school choice program participation. So uh annually each year the committee uh has to take a vote about whether or not DY will participate in school
choice. This is meaning whether or not we will accept school choice. We can't stop kids from leaving but we uh have to make a determination about whether or not we will accept school choice. Uh so this is [clears throat] the time of the year uh committee um last last year I
don't remember exactly the time but uh approved a new policy which um so this is basically the timing here is just so then the the superintendent uh can then start to put some of our uh practices which are in that new policy in place. So this is making sure that we're moving
along with that timeline. The first step is for the committee to make a determination about whether or not we're going to participate. And then if you vote yes, then that triggers some things out of uh my office for notifications, establishing the number of seats, etc., etc. So, uh if uh well, anyways, that
that's what I have and the committee can determine whether or not we would like to make a motion. >> So, we'll take a motion. I move that the Dennis Yamath Regional School District participate in the 2026 2027 school choice program.
>> We have a motion and second. Do we have any discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor say I. I. Any opposed? Any abstain? Um passes unanimously. Perfect. Next, we will have uh our MLL
director entry findings presentation. >> Good evening. >> It's a pleasure being with you tonight. My name is Kate Watts and I'm the director of multilingual learner instruction here at Dennis Yarmouth and I am thrilled to be here with you. Um I
wanted to start with some statistics about the ML program here at Dennis Yarmmouth. Um, some of this we already went over earlier this fall, but just to kind of reorient ourselves, we have approximately 500 English language
learners in the district. And then on top of that, we have over 200 students that are former English language learners, meaning that they have already exited the program and shown proficiency in English. Of the 500, we have 12
students that have been identified as students with limited or interrupted formal education, which means at some point in their education in their um in their home country, they either did not
have any formalized education or it was interrupted for a myriad of reasons. of the 500 um English language learners and 218 of the former English language learners, we have um 98 of them are also
identified as a student with special needs. Programmatically, we have 21 English language development teachers. We have four bilingual pair of professionals, one ML coordinator, and myself as the director. As far as the
languages spoken in the district, we have 18 different languages that are currently spoken by students in the district and they are listed for you there. Um the most prevalent language being Portuguese and then um Spanish and
Haitian Creole following suit. Earlier this year we um we reported out on the access test. The access test is a state measure of English language proficiency for our English language students in that it's similar to MCCAST
that all English language um students have to take the test every year and it determines their proficiency in four domains speaking listening reading and writing. We boasted a 100% participation
rate which is wonderful. Um last year the number the average number of years to attain English language proficiency stood at 3.9 years. The state gives students six years to attain proficiency.
Um last year 17% of the students exited the program and 57% of the students made effective progress as determined by them hitting their benchmark target um from the previous year.
So when I entered Dennis Yarmouth um I was thrilled to be here. There was a lot to learn. Um so we took it in four stages. So, the first one um was I wanted to connect and listen with families, students, staff um and just
anyone that was willing to talk to me about the English language program here at Dennis Yarmouth. And I found a community that was excited. I found a community that had grown exponentially over the last few years. Um and I found
I found a department that had put in a ton of work to ensure that the students were getting the education that they needed. So we started with connecting and listening. Um planning and communicating came later um more in the
fall and then implementing the initiatives is ongoing. So even though this looks like a linear um cycle, it's it's definitely recursive in nature and um we're always trying to, you know, collect data and then improve our
practice um based on what we learn. So in the summer of 2025, um I met with the ML department coordinator regularly. We shared program information, analyzed data, met with staff and set or organizational
priorities. I also learned a lot about how the um the district is approaching the work in general with the strategic plan. And so our work is nestled within the work of the strategic plan of the
district. In fall, uh we were participating in a ton of learning walkthroughs. We were calibrating our observations and collecting data on the ML classrooms. Um the practices that we were seeing in those classrooms, the
strengths and maybe what we could find time and um intentionality to work on with teachers. We also spent time um implementing a benchmarking cycle and starting um to
work with the MLP pack which is the multilingual learner parent advisory um council and so we started working within um within that framework as well in the winter um which seemed like it
would never end um we we had professional learning um sessions anchored to instructional priorities ities. The access testing occurs every year in January and February. Um, so students were busy testing and we also
started a seal of biiteracy programming which I will speak to a little bit later in the presentation at the high school. And most recently this spring we have hosted a community resource fair. Um have we're starting the second
benchmarking cycle and we are working with the other departments to leverage the u master schedule and make sure that the instructional minutes for our students are being met. Thank you. So when we talk about success of a
program um such as this in the district, DESIE has a blueprint that is readily available for districts to use and so we wanted to leverage the practices that are highlighted as best practices. So DESIE does um equip
districts with the te tools and resources that they need to implement high quality programs. And so all of these are grounded in research and based on four tenants um including school culture, access to educators,
opportunity and support and a plan for future success. So based on those four tenants, we wanted to take a look at our current practices and initiatives and take a look and see what is happening and and
where um our strengths are and what we can look at for future goals. So when you take a look at the four pillars, the first one being school and district culture, um I'm happy to report that we are in the process of hiring a Haitian
Creole. um liaison for the district. We've been working really hard over well since before I even got here to find someone who can take on that role and we are almost done with the hiring process and hopefully we'll onboard somebody
soon and that will um that will complete our suite of um Haitian uh liaison across the district including Portuguese, Spanish and Haitian Creole. And the services that they provide are um well mainly to onboard new families
in the enrollment process through the central registration, but then also they work with our teachers with teacher conferences um providing uh providing interpretation support to families and teachers and then also they work
strongly with the ML PAC to make sure that parents are able to participate in that process. We also were able to support an adult ESL class. We over we had over 50 adults this fall um that wanted to improve
their English skills. And we feel very strongly that if we're able to support those parents and um and older siblings that [snorts] we're able to use that to leverage support for the students themselves. Um so we were able to offer
that class for 4 and 1/2 months. It meant twice a week and um we had strong participation throughout. We engaged in an MLPAC listening tour where we were able to ask the parents four questions um and collect their
information. Um the questions were what are your hopes and dreams for your child? What has your experience been with communicating with the district? What positive experiences and difficulties have you faced? describe the ways your child
participates in extracurricular activities. What's going well? What barriers have you encountered? And we were able to use the findings to um communicate with the building principles
and other stakeholders to help um to help create pathways for increased engagement from these families. We did, as I said, um host a community resource fair recently that had a dozen um agencies from around Dennis Yarmmouth
and beyond. And um we also offered a book bingo for this for the kids. So they had something to do while their parents were talking with the resource um tables. And that worked out re really well. And another big thing that we were
able to do this year was to provide language ambassador training for all staff. Um that includes paraprofessionals, um office staff, food services. Um and that
is a really great way for for the staff to understand how to interact with an interpreter when they are communicating with families. And so we have, I think at last count, 438 staff members that have been fully
trained this year in language ambassador training. So pillar two is all about access to educators, high quality um high highly qualified educators and having them have the tools that they need to be
successful in the classroom. We know that students um they really need a lot of support with the academic vocabulary especially as they go through the grades and one of the ways that we're able to support them is through sheltered
English immersion strategies in the classroom. So we were able to provide some PD to the related arts teachers this year and we're going to expand that to other content areas next year. Additionally, we were able to secure a
grant to provide tier 2 and three language ambassador training to um select staff that are bilingual. And this allows them to participate in more specific specialized conversations
such as uh communications between nurses and medically fragile students, IEPs, um things of that nature. Pillar three is all about opportunity and support. And so this speaks to our
commitment to ensuring that students regardless of what their learning background is like have equitable access to honors classes and AP courses. Um so we've been doing some work with the high school principal surrounding that.
Social emotional learning support um is to ensure that the students that are multilingual learners have the support that they need to assimilate and to um to work with other students in the classroom. And um we were able to use
the Vista um uh uh data from this summer to take a look at the um ML students specifically and how they feel about the culture and climate of the schools in which they in which they attend.
Another thing that we were working on is um providing the English language teachers PD um on lesson and unit internalization and we have just finished that series.
Lastly, pillar four is a plan for future success. This really speaks to the work of the high school, but it starts much earlier than that because the pathways that are in the high school are um really beginning more at the middle school level and then and then kind of
trickling through. Um we have been working with um all of the principles and the ILT to ensure strategic scheduling for um inclusionary practices to make sure that the ML students are
getting the minutes that they require by the state regulations. As I mentioned before, we have in we've um developed a seal of biiteracy program for the high school and we also are working with um co-curricular and
extracurricular opportunities as they come available. One of the things that we were working on was with the community resource fair to make sure that parents know how to sign their students up for those opportunities. Okay. So, initial findings. I'm going to
I'm going to read because I really want to make sure I don't leave anything out. So, the initial findings show multiple strengths which speak to the f strong foundation of the ML program that has grown exponentially over time. The
district has demonstrated a a strong commitment to multilingual education in terms of the student ratios, um the number of of teachers that are available to teach these students, the quality of the instructional materials
that are selected, and the depth of instructional support provided by the ML coordinator. The 2025 access results reflect solid gains in student achievement and growth. The needs that were identified included
the need to support teachers in um a cycle of benchmark testing, instruction, and pro progress monitoring for students that are not making effective progress in their targeting in the um benchmark target that is supplied by the state.
And um we do know that the high school students have made a progress um incrementally year upon year, but we do know that we have more work to do in this area. And also overall we look forward to our subgroup proficiency
rates being reflected in the MCCAST data because when you look at the subgroup of ML students they are not making the same kind of um they're not making the same kind of impact that the other students are m I'm
not saying it right. They're not they're not achieving at the same level as the aggregate I guess is what I would say. So, next steps. So, for a student to exit the program, they need to earn a 4.2 overall and a 3.9 on literacy. And
so one of the things we're going to do to try to support those students moving from the mid3 high like low fours up to and past that threshold is as I said before we do have
a plan to increase the SEI strategies in all grades um in the content area classrooms. We are looking at the K through3 literacy block and the implementation of the HMH program to provide some guidance to principles on
how that block is structured to ensure that the U multi- lingual students have equal access um and the the support that they need. One of the things that we did notice across the district, and this is not just an ML thing, um is that we do
need extra support in writing. And so we are working alongside um the the tier one um classrooms to make sure that students have multiple opportunities to write and get support in their writing
progress. One of the things that we've been looking at as a district also is academic discourse, student discourse um and students being able to talk about what they're learning and uh kind of
work through any um misconceptions that they're having and work through any cognitive struggle that they're having. And so we are working alongside um the larger district and making sure that our students also have opportunities to talk
and listen to their peers. And lastly, increasing student progress. As I noted before, we are doing a series of unit and lesson internalization professional development opportunities for our teachers. We are trying to um
establish a benchmark testing schedule um that includes goal setting for students and progress monitoring cycles. And then lastly, I did want to share some information about the seal of biiteracy
program because that I think is a really great example of what can happen when multiple entities are working well together. I was able to work with um Megan McDonald, our ML coordinator, Michelle Dick, who is the um AP at the
high school, Dale Fornoff, who is a counselor. I think she's the head of counseling. Um although I'm not sure. Sorry about that. I'm still kind of new, so I'm not sure. Um she's great though. And also two of the teachers, one is um
Diane Ross who is the world language um chair and the other being Ranada Dos Santos who is the um she's the team leader for the ESL department up at the high school. and we were able to
identify the students that are seniors that are bilingual and that could qualify for the seal of biiteracy that's offered by the state. And in order to gain the seal of biiteracy, a student needs to be able to show proficiency in English. And so we were able to use the
10th grade MCCAST test for that. they were having to um hit a se a certain score to be able to be qualified um for that part of the seal. They also need to show proficiency in whatever language
they um bring with them. And so we do that through a process of identifying um qualifying tests that we can have the students take. And depending on what um language they spoke, there's three different tests that we can provide to
them. And so pretty recently, a couple weeks ago, we had over 20 students that um spent I mean really almost a whole day in testing. It went way longer than we thought it was going to. We thought it was going to be about two two and a
half hours. There were kids that went to lunch, came back, and continued. We are waiting those scores. Um we do have several students where the scores have come in and they have already shown that they have um attained the seal. So we
know that we already have seven students that have qualified. Um but we're still awaiting some of those um languages that are not as um prevalent. it takes longer for us to get the scores back because it
needs a human raider and it's kind of hard to come by. Um, so I just want to showcase that as an example of something that we were able to achieve this year um and provide students with that um
seal for um them to take off to college or wherever they want wind up going. Um so we're really proud of the work that we've been doing. Um it is in it's important work. It's not fast work. Um
it takes some doing to really kind of um synthesize information, have time to let it marinate and um so we're I think that we're we're moving along nicely. I'm happy with our progress and I invite
your questions. >> Thank you so much. Any questions? [clears throat] You're about to help me with my own vocabulary. >> Okay. So, what does the acronym EL stand for? Because I see EL teachers and then
I saw ELD teachers. >> So, yeah. So, ELD is English language development. And so, that's the that's the umbrella of the program. >> Okay. carry me through a little bit further please. >> Okay. >> So that means that that particular group
of students or that teacher is working with students who are early on and sort of their progress or >> so the progress is measured in levels and so there's there's six levels overall but the student needs to get
through the first four levels to be able to gain proficiency. Um there's also a subtest which is the um which is the literacy component. They need to be at a 3.9 overall for that. But the number of
minutes that a student is required to have English language support is determined by their level. So students that are in levels one and two, we're required to um have EL instruction for
them 90 minutes a day. for students that are three and above, that number goes down to 45 minutes a day. Yeah, thank you for asking that. >> Any other questions?
>> Thank you so much, Dr. Smith. >> Just because she won't toot her own horn. Um, so, uh, you know, Dr. Watts has done a lot in a very short period of time and and while I will agree because it's her nature, she did pull a team
together to bring the seal of bio literacy forward. It's no small task and it's been something that I've been um pushing to say that it's something in a district where 18% of our students are active English language learners and 30%
of our students are first language, not English. And it's something that I I just didn't understand. It's been in the state for a long time. Why don't we have this as a district? And it it took Dr. Watts, I don't know how long you've been working for with us, nine months, eight
months to make it happen. Right? So, it it took the creation of the position, which the school committee supported, and then the right person in that position to to to lead the work. Right? She didn't do it alone. She she she gave credit where credit was due, but it took somebody to to to lead the work. Um, and
it's just part of really seeing something that is an asset as an asset, right? As a district, you know, I don't I only I consider myself a fairly educated person and I speak a language, right? So, to really recognize as a district something as an asset, being
able to speak more than one um language uh in a district where that's a really prevalent part of our of our student population and quite frankly our our family population. So, to be able to to grab something like that and and take it as an early win um is something that I just want to make sure she she gets recognized for. Um and then to your you
know your point or to your question uh Miss Beimis is it's a education as a whole loves acronyms. Um that particular um department you know the the teachers are ESL teachers they teach it's the
course the EL program and then we have English language learners or multilingual learners depending upon sort of who you get the information from. So yeah, it is it can be it can be a bit of a alphabet soup to try to navigate >> for sure.
>> Thank you so much response. >> Thank you. Have a good night. >> Um the next part is uh a very difficult conversation. The FY27 budget update and then override contingency planning. >> All right. Can we just go back to the
other conversation? All right. Um, so yes, so this is largely focused on the override uh contingency planning and but I am just going to just take a slight step back just to just for largely just for framing purposes.
So start Whoops. Whoa. All right, let's try that again. Whoa. What is going on here? please. Okay. Um, so the school committee budget uh was built on some
shared values that a healthy school district is uh supports healthy communities that you know there's a lot of research that'll support that a healthy school district um helps promote strong uh property values, helps support
uh a well-informed electorate. You know, as students and strong graduates graduate, they produce or they contribute back to their community. Um whether that's the local community, the state level community, or even more broadly, the global community. It's
built upon this idea and the shared value that our two communities, Dennis and Yarmouth, deserve excellent schools. And simultaneously that, you know, I think the committee really took seriously the and as I know we did as well on the the staff side that we have
to be good stewards of the taxpayer dollar um that we have to bring forward uh an effective and efficient school system at the same time. And so the committee on the 9th of March voted an operating budget of $83,748,973. Unfortunately, as the committee is well
aware, that approved budget was already a reduced service budget. And this important for the context for what I'm going to present on in a couple of minutes. So already that operating budget was a reduced service budget. Um the committee uh saw or a presentation
that included or saw several presentations. the original level service budget was roughly a 7% increase uh over the f current FY26 budget. So to get to where the school committee
uh approved at that 83 uh $83.7 million budget uh that budget includes 13 staff reductions as well as some use of excess and deficiency to move some things out of the operating budget. and the committee had deferred over $2 million
in initiatives and projects to land at a 4.223 operating budget increase over the previous year. And what you see on the right hand side are the operating budgets going back to the 2020 2021 school year. Uh and what the increases
have been. You can see the average increase over that time period is a 4.6. So it's under the average increase over that time period. Now, it's also important because it's going to play sort of building here over time over the next couple of slides, but it's
important to talk a little bit about the difference between the budget for the school committee and then the assessment to the two towns. And this is something that's often confused and you know I know we have a lot of these conversations in the office about how do how do we describe the um assessment
because it is a complicated thing and oftentimes people focus on the 7030 split and that is part of the assessment piece but it is not the whole picture. So I worked with um you know I hand drew this picture on the right hand side that
is a joke. Um I used my used AI is actually pretty handy when it comes to certain things that it can help you create um some images with a lot of prompting. So through several iterations um I was able to create this uh image on the right hand side to try to help
visualize the assessment process. So if you imagine the assessment process as um trying to get from a large bucket of water and to determine how much of those that bucket of water is going to actually have to be go to the two
different towns. Uh it goes through a three-step process. So the first if you imagine again the the bucket of water on the top leftand side being our operating budget that the school committee approved roughly $83 million.
The first part of the uh assessment calculation is to remove water that will not be a charge to the towns and that is revenue that comes directly to the school district from the two big things our state aid and local revenues. this
year. That's roughly $17 million that's coming either directly to us from the from the state or monies that are coming from uh places like the solar farm, Medicaid um and some other um places, but roughly it's about 17 million. That
leaves uh I can't do that math in my head. I think it's like 66 million or 67 million left to be assessed to the two towns. That then brings you down to that next container where it says wealth factor and that is the second step in the in
the uh assessment and that is where the minimum local contribution comes into play. The school district has zero control over the minimum local contribution. That is determined by the state. And just about every year that
number goes up a little bit. It is determined by two factors. It's determined by the property values in the town and by what the state sort of determines the ability to pay by the residents. It's largely determined by
median uh income taken from the tax taxes tax filings by everybody in the town. And almost never does the minimum local contribution increase proportionately between our two member towns. Last year
it went up more for the proportionately for the town of Dennis than it did for the town of Yarmouth. And then this year it went up uh more for the town of Yarmouth than it did for the town of Dennis. So the town of Dennis's increase uh percentage for their minimum uh
required contribution was just about 1.5% where Yarmouths was just about 3.5%. So that increase for that minimum local contribution is imbalanced in that second step. But that's the first that
if you sort of imagine it as a bill in two parts. The first bill the first amount of water that has to get taken out is disproportionate in that first amount. But then so it has to get taken out and go into the two buckets or the two cups. Then that leaves a certain
amount above the minimum that still has to get assessed to the two towns. That's how we get down to the last little container down there where it says enrollment filter. So, whatever didn't get taken out by the minimum local contribution is what's left. That's the
third step in the assessment formula. That gets split by the five-year rolling average, which this year is uh just almost a 7030 split. It is 69.547
for Yarmouth and 30.453% for Dennis. That is whatever that remaining amount is gets split by that amount and then goes into the remaining amounts. Now, unfortunately, this or for several fortunately and unfortunately,
fortunately, for several years, we've gotten increasing state aid from the state by on average about a million dollars in increased state aid. But this year, we're seeing a net decrease in state aid of about $130,000.
We're also seeing a net decrease in the amount of regional transportation aid we get, about $35,000. So all of a sudden we're getting less money taken out or we're yeah we're getting less money from the state that very first step. So the state is giving
us less money towards the budget. So that means more money is flowing down into those bottom two steps. So more money is getting charged to the two towns. And then Yarmouth is seeing a bigger
increase in that second step, the wealth filter step. So that's why when you get down to the bottom when you see the operating budget increases at a 4.2% but the Yarmmouth assessment increases at a five almost a 6% increase and the
Dennis in uh assessment increases at a 4.2. Now, as we start to talk about an override, the school district will have to reduce
the operating budget by either 1.1 million or 2.2 million depending upon an override failure in one of the two towns or both towns. We're going to talk a little bit about how that all plays out.
And it's all due to that part of the um cup which is the above the minimum spending. And it's all again due to that because we can't take the
um assessment from one town and not from the other. It's not allowed to do that. And we're not allowed to take it from the minimum because the minimum is the minimum. Everybody has to pay the minimum. So it can only come from the portion of the assessment above the
minimum. And it has to be taken um from both communities. So it's has to be proportionate. Whoops. My god. Why does it keep doing that? So if the Yarmouth override fails, the AR
Yarmouth override is 1 48 million. So you have to apply the 69.54% to that. So 1.48 million is 69.5%
of $2.1296. So the budget would have to if the Yarmouth override failed, the budget would have to be reduced by 2.129 million in order to uh make sure that
that that 69% was met. Same for the Dennis override. The Dennis override is $348,000. 3 $348,000 is 30.4% 4% of $1.142
million. So, the budget would have to be reduced by that much in order to meet the Dennis override number. Any questions so far? None of this is fun. Now, couple of other important facts to know
about the budget. 72 cents of every dollar budgeted dollar goes to personnel. So when we talk about where does that $2.2 million come from 72 cents of every dollar is people. Now this is important to know because we
invest in people. Those people are part of our community. Those people spend, you know, pay their taxes back in these a lot of our people are from Dennis and Yarmouth. They pay our tax pay their taxes back in our community. They take care of their families back in this community. they support this district, but it also when we have to talk about
cuts, there's not a lot of other places to take it from. And there's a couple of other, you know, when you start to add some other places in some other important bits of information, 10 cents of every dollar goes to tuition paid to
students that are going to other places. So whether it's out of district places tuition, so that's another 10 cents that we can't cut. Seven cents goes to transportation. So that's
89 cents of every dollar right there. I'm This thing's I'm nervous. It's going to jump on me again. There we go. So if we work from the worst case scenario, which is the $2.2 $2 million, which would be the Yarmouth failure, the
Yarmouth override failure. the I've had the staff work on um the um oh there's a slide out of order here but um we've we've worked uh
worked on what the potentials would be and overall what we're looking at is just under 37 and a half positions cut from the district. I'm going to give you some details on those in a minute. And that's an addition to the 13 that are
already in the operating budget, which is an addition to the 33 and a half that were cut just a couple of years ago, which gives you a total of 84 positions since 22 since the 23 24 school year, which represents 26% of the
DY school district staffing. to summarize some of the stat and we're going to get I'll show you some more of the details in a minute but to summarize what we're talking about from a service perspective looking at increased SLA class sizes in
several places over 25 we wouldn't be able to offer after school activities uh K to 7 reduce counseling services reduce world language offerings reduce responsiveness to family concerns student behavior community inquir inquiries I'll talk to
more about that um in a couple slides. No intermediate sports, no freshman sports, cuts to JV sports, no winter percussion, color guard, reduce general ed intervention services for struggling learn learn learners and
and increase cyber security risks. Part of the challenge and where this becomes compounding is because with the this number of layoffs, we get into what's referred to as bumping. Um, and
this because of the way the contracts are laid out. And ultimately what this means is newer um and almost always lower um salaried staff are the people who ultimately end up getting laid off. Regardless of the position, as long as
somebody is um more senior and is licensed to do a position somewhere else in the district, they're going to be able to move into that other position, which is going to bump somebody else out who's lower from that position. And then that'll carry until finally you get to
somebody who um can't bump somebody who's less senior um than them. And when you're done with all that, you usually end up with somebody who's been recently hired to the district um doesn't have professional teaching status um and
usually is a lower paid st salary staff member. So we when we started making the calculations on the positions and when I had to give the staff the principles numbers to use to start to determine positions we had to use an average
salary number for people in those positions. Um and that's also what drives up um some of the numbers because you you know you don't it doesn't end up being the top salary positions um in in some of the positions we know
like because there's only like for example if it's a leadership position or um then there's only so many that um people in those spots but when you get into the teaching positions and the the pair educator positions etc it ends up being the low the lower end because of the seniority rights within those
contracts. In addition to that, and I think I've said this before, but because we are a region, because we operate on our own, um we carry all the unemployment costs, um which,
uh is a is 21,000 per teaching position. So that further, so essentially the sort of the rule of thumb is for every um three teaching staff that you're going to lay off, you have to lay off a fourth one to cover the cost for the three that you're laying off. Um so again, the more
you lay off, the more unemployment costs you're carrying, and it just becomes further compounding. So here are some of the details behind um
we'll start with staffing um that as we worked with a leadership team that we proposed and before you know we were looking for high impact low impact positions there is nothing on here that doesn't impact us in a negative way. Um
the directions I gave the leadership team was to protect the core. We can't not provide special education service. We can't not um teach English. Can't not teach math. Um but
uh well, let's just say it wasn't wasn't a pleasant couple of meetings. So, uh, we're looking at, uh, a couple assistant principal positions, uh, which will impact our ability to respond to student behavior, parent
concerns. Um, provide feedback for instruction, which impacts our um, strategic objective number one. Um, the principles will have to take on more um, work. Similarly, administrative assistant
positions across the district and at central office. Um, which will again significantly impact our responsiveness to families, to the public, to staff. Uh, place an administrative burden on school leaders, which is going to mean less time for those people to be able to
respond to families, to be able to lead instruction, to provide supervision, to respond to student behavior, to uh to intervene with student behavior. uh cuts to the world language program would would result in end ending the the K to7 world language program and reduced
offerings at the high school. six classroom teacher positions um is where we see that increase to class size. Um as well as reduced elective offerings at the high school, particularly in the arts. Um virtual high school program, academic recovery
and dual enrollment. Uh pair educator positions and duty assistant positions. Uh ability to we have challenges with some increased safety issues especially at lunch and recess. some [snorts] individualized supports for students, uh
reduced support in kindergarten. Uh interventionists across the district, we'd see a 30 to 40% reduction in the number of students to be able to receive general ed academic uh support. Uh e uh we uh reduced two there, which
would reduce our ability to provide English language instruction to some of this population. we'd likely see lost some of the gains that Dr. Watts was just presenting, which would extend the amount of time students would spend in the um ELD program, which would um
create long-term costs for the district. Counselor and psychologists and other related services, a nearly a 2.0 reduction there. Uh so reduce mental health supports for what is a rising need in the district. um potentially
redist uh increased out of district referrals and then uh the remaining staff would really have to be mostly fuc focused on the highest acuity needs. So you'd fewer and fewer supports for lower acuity needs in the district.
um instructional coaches, uh two positions here, um uh decreased job embedded professional development, uh and assistance to teachers, espec especially with the implementation of the new curriculum. It's going to hamper
our strategic objective number one, librarian from the district. It's going to close library access. um no book book checkout digital literacy instruction at a particular selected school.
Then um as we move on from specific staffing to other places. So we utilize stipens to offer programming to students. So we uh we looked at ability to save a
position by looking at some of the other ways we provide programming. So um unfortunately though the stipens don't go a long way. So you got to take a lot of stipens in order to save a position. So uh this would result in uh cut to all
after school uh activities at the middle school. The DYI cross country freshman sports some uh or JV cross country JV golf the winter percussion and color guard. There's a DEI committee that would end.
Um and then afterchool activities at the elementary schools. Uh then technology uh made a cut there which is uh we had a plan to replace we have a bunch of aged out Windows 10 computers and this is
technology wonky but Windows 10 is no longer supported for upgrades um for security for virus software all that stuff which just makes them vulnerable to cyber security attacks. Um so the plan was to replace them. um that would
have to not happen which makes us vulnerable uh from for a cyber attack. Um and then uh we had a plan where we've been slowly replacing smartboards across the district that are um
uh what's the word I'm looking for? Um broken, you know, as they fail. Um so we would have to stop that replacement program. um meaning some classrooms would not have a display technology in them next year. Um and then we had a plan to replace the library Chromebooks
and that would not happen for next year. Um and then a supply line reduction uh which would mean shortage for just basic supplies, pencils, paper, notebooks, pads, etc. Uh and then just some additional information. I was able to work with
both the towns to understand the impact for uh the resident taxpayers. So again, those the the the Armouth override numbers uh just over 1.4 million. Uh the town for me, the median
home value is 700 just over $710,000. The estimated tax increase of this override is 13 cents uh per thousand. Uh so for the median home um that home would see an annual increase of $93 uh30
on their tax bill. Uh and the Dennis override again is at just under $350,000. The median home value in the town of Dennis is 9 almost $93,000. The estimated tax increase for uh the DY
override is just under three or just yeah just under three cents per thousand. Um so the median home would see an an annual increase of uh just over $25. Then finally um just for context you
know I think it's important for the committee and others to understand so where do we fit relative to the both the town spending and where has it fallen over the last couple of years. So there's a lot on these two slides. Um
but what you're looking at on the top on the left and on the right is uh from the department well all of this is from the department of revenue and what you're looking at is general fund expenditures for the two towns. On the left is the town of Yarmouth and on the right is the
town of Dennis. On the top is 2020. So, just as we left COVID and then on the bottom is the most recent year. For whatever reason, there's nothing for 2025 in Dennis. Um, but there is for Yarmouth. So, you have 2024 on the right
and 2025 on the left. And the purplish color is um what each town is spending um on education. Uh and what I want to just draw your attention to is in both towns in 2020 the percentage of general
fund expenditures in both communities was a greater percentage. So in Yarmouth 47.85% of the Yarmouth's expenditures uh were on uh education where in 2025 it
was 46.26% and in Dennis it was 32.84% 84% of the all their expenditures were on education and 27.99 in 2024. Now, this is us and Cape Tech, right? So, it's all education expenditures. But the point largely just
being as both us and our partners at Cape continue to provide, you know, an efficient program. We're not like increasing the demand on the two communities as what the the cost of education for the two communities isn't
growing and expanding as a percentage of what the communities are spending. Um if anything over the last 5 years it's it's gotten to be a little bit less. Um and you know one might say well for Yarmouth as a simple example 1.59%
what's what's what's that? That's nothing. Well, 1.59% of in 2025 the o the total operating or total expenditures were 103 just over 103
million 1.59% of 103 million is 1.638 million. Um so you know that's a good chunk of the override. Um so just the
the the district is again costing or or is not continuing. I think there's a there's a belief I would say that district is just continues to to demand more and more and more and more of the of the two towns and just it's just not
factually accurate. Um the percentage of the expenditures has gotten to be less. Um and and so again, it's just just just a just a fact. I'd be happy to take any questions.
So, nothing good. [clears throat and cough] Sorry. Nothing good at all um to think about what a a no vote would be, but any specific questions about anything? It's hard to digest.
Mr. >> [clears throat] >> Thank you. What is your plan for informing the two towns of this document? Uh are you you know what what is the plan? How do you
get the message across to them and in a timeline as well? >> So yeah, I was going to speak a little bit about it to in my uh superintendent report, but um I'll just skip over that. So the um so what I've done so far is I created
anformational um uh a slightly different version of this presentation. It doesn't go into as much detail at with each of the specific cuts. It just has the overall summary um slides plus it has a couple of other
different slides in there because I also am trying to uh or I worked off the assumption that maybe some people they're getting information that like haven't been haven't gotten any of all the other presentations that the committee has gotten. So I worked sort
of like how was the budget built? Anyways, I I it's a like a 20 minute presentation that tries to give everybody some of the backstory plus just the override stuff as well. And so I created that and it's
a voiceover PowerPoint that's a video and it's just been uploaded to our district um YouTube page today. So I worked on it last week. It's been uploaded today. I've shared it with um it'll start going out on our um
communication channels. um very shortly. Leela, unfortunately, was sick today, so she'll start pumping it out soon. Um but I started sharing it. I shared it with both towns, like the the staff at both towns for them to put it
out on their channels. Um and so that's step number one. Step number two was again I when I reached out to both towns, I talked to talked to um staff on both towns about seeing if I could get to set up like um a a presentation
slashlist listening center a listening session, excuse me, at the senior center in Yarmouth act senior center for active living in Dennis. Um I want to set up something similar for the DY school
community. Um, I'm I have a scheduled to go on the Yarmouth has a podcast. I'm scheduled for the 13th. It's a couple Mondays from now. Um, like and it'll it'll broadcast like right before town meeting in
Yarmouth. Um, like the week before. Um, those are the things that I currently have scheduled. and then continue to point people towards the website. Um, I feel like there's something else that I'm forgetting, but those are the ones that
are off the top of my head. >> Any other questions, Miss Beus? >> So, some of this uh information has been out for a while um and all the different presentations.
So I I have you been contacted by uh outside community groups uh elected officials beyond us um and others sort of saying what can we do or ask for more
information. I mean we do know that both select boards did support we do know that both finance committees do did are on record of in support. So I'm wondering sort of um
basically who are our allies or interested parties or those are willing to work with us have you been contacted by anybody? Uh yeah, I have been uh contacted by um a parent
uh who's it sounds like there's a parent group starting to organize. Um and then I've been uh contacted by um like the local teachers association looking to get organized. And then I have been
connect contacted by a um local uh uh elected official not on this group um who's also looking to organize as well. Miss Landers >> and not so much a question but as you
know it's sort of in response to John's question. So, and now it's up to us, right? Um, you know, we we have to do our part and whether it's
posting on social media, talking to your neighbors, talking to, you know, your kids, friends, parents, your neighbors, when you're out walking your dog, whatever it is you can do. All of us now bear this responsibility. And I'm sure
if Phil were here tonight, he would be giving us a lecture on the history of that. Um, so and you know, uh, how we can move the needle. Um, so it's up to us in conjunction with, you know, we
always get I'm Michelle Dun's not here tonight, but I'm sure, you know, the the teachers and the staff are always out there um in support of um overrides and so yeah, we all have to do it. Thanks. In response, right before the meeting, I
did see the our YouTube page does have the video and I on social media on the parents page, the video has already been posted uh by a parent. So, I'm sure by the end of this meeting, there'll be 700 comments already. Um, and the number one
comment is, you know, we didn't know. Um, and as Marilyn stated, we we've had five budget meetings. We had a public hearing with zero people in attendance. Um we've had talks at select board meetings. Um but now that the word
override and ballot is in question, people are concerned. Um but this process starts in August. We have meetings straight through. Um and then you know numbers are put on paper in January in front of the public. So uh
this is this is not new stuff but um you know we have to do our best to share uh correct factual information. um because what's out there is not always that. Um so I appreciate the the effort that was put into you know
sharing this information um because you know people need to know what the truth is and I'm sure at town meeting in a couple weeks next door we'll have lots of people for lots of people against. Um and typically the reason they're against is they don't want to see their taxes raised. Um, but
we have to explain why it's important and talk about the the services we're not providing because we're told we can't. Um, and then the impact of what no means. Um, 37 people is a is a lot of people. Miss Landers
>> and and Tomas, you know, not just show, you know, obviously the impact um on our students and our families, but show that I mean, I love I don't love, but I'm I'm so glad that, you know, we have this number in terms of what, you
know, what the real impact is on someone's tax bill. And this is what really helped, I think, when we were trying to get this school building passed. You know, when you tell people, "Oh, we're building a school building. It's going to cost $17 million," people freaked out. And when we said, "It's
going to cost you $10," they were like, "Oh, I mean, it still was a tough battle." And it still was a very close vote in the end. But if people know that, you know, in Yarmouth, the median home would see an annual increase of $93. You know, isn't quality education for your
students and worth $93 a year. So, preaching to the choir here, but these are great numbers for us to use when we're out talking to people. Miss Beos. >> So I I did look at a website that sort of listed all the overrides and all the towns throughout the Commonwealth and
there it's active. And so the good news or possibility of good news if we choose to honor it is most of the time in both towns the override has passed. I mean, Dennis hasn't had one uh in a long
time, but so if there's any winning formula, those who have been through it or in public comment, that'd be helpful to know what sort of galvanizes everyone. >> Well, I think the big thing is people need to show up. Um when you know, when
you talk about numbers, you talk about 7% come out to vote. So 7% whatever that 7% is made up of makes a decision for 93% of the town. Um so that's the problem right we're getting only 7% of
people are deciding on what's happening. Um so it's ensuring that you know people do show up uh they show up April 28th and then they show up at the election when if once it's on the ballot and and vote it through as well. um typically you get more people that show up on
voting day than you do on the um town meeting, but it won't make it to the ballot if we don't make it through town meeting. So, it it's it's the actual fact of getting people to show up um because there's plenty of people that want to talk about it, but it it's
getting people to show up and and make those and raise those hands or mark those boxes and you know, whatever we can do. I know the town doesn't tries very hard to to get it, but year after year, these are the numbers we're looking at. I know it's hard to even ask questions
because it's it's just don't even want to look at the papers, but anyone else have any questions or comments? Yes, she preached the choir. We there's nothing there's nothing good. There's nothing for us to say. These are, you know, not exact sciences or what will be
taken out, but these are what building leaders were asked to do. Um, they were asked to make hard decisions and, you know, these are the things that, you know, have been come up with. Dr. Smith, >> um, on a tangential tangential note, uh,
when we do get to town meeting floor, I just, uh, because I think I forgot to ask this question and all of a sudden we were up against the clock. Um, we need uh a Yarmouth representative and a Dennis representative to make the motion on town meeting floor. I know last year
it was the chair and the vice chair. I I just don't just sort of planning are we going to go in the same direction and >> Yep. I will I will make the motion for Yarmouth and Marilyn will make the motion for Dennis. >> Okay. All right. Perfect. >> And then obviously the support of all of our members at each town or both towns
is appreciated. Um, but those will be the we will be the ones for the motions. >> And then the only other thing that I would say is is you know, you're all community members. If there's groups that you're a part of that you think um between now and the respective town
meetings or the vote that um it would be valuable for me to come and do a presentation in front of um and I can you can schedule a time for me to come to speak to them. Just let me know and I'll be there. Okay. Um,
we'll move on. Uh, next is subcommittee uh, school committee less to select board. Anything additional from from the town of Dennis? Uh, nothing additional from the town of Yarmouth. Um, we'll move to our superintendent report. Recognition of donations,
acknowledgements. >> All right. Um, so [clears throat] donations, uh, two, uh, donations that I just want to just take a second that are in your packet. Just want to say a couple of quick thank you. So, first to the, uh, MLK action
team. I've actually done work with this group back to all the way back to my previous uh, district. A great group of dedicated folks. Um, and they do a wide variety of things. Um, and some of those support directly support school districts. So, uh, you have a memo from,
uh, principal Riley, um, acknowledging the donation of several books specifically to the first grade at Ezra Baker that supported, uh, Black History Month. Um, now, I happen to know because I'm on the email chain that wasn't just Ezra Baker that got these. They went to
all three um, schools that serve uh, first grade. Um, principal Riley was just the one who was Johnny on the spot and got the uh, memo in. Um but so I just want to thank um the MLK action committee uh for their for their support for their continued work in our
community. Um and again I like I said I I happen to know that um it was supported all of our first grade classrooms across the district. And then the second is uh from the middle school from M uh principal Bevino u for the donation of uh feminine products from
the Dennis Union church. Uh this is a second donation this year from the Dennis Union Church of the same um ilk. Now anyone who's raised daughters or probably remembers this own experience um themselves, I can't personally attest to that. Well, the first part I can, not
the second one. Um you know, middle school's a presents a a new time um and phys physiological development um for our biological female students. and a lot of them are learning new habits and
routines. Their bodies are all changing and adjusting and it's not uncommon for the young ladies to be caught underprepared. Um, so this donation is ve is very supportive of the schools. It allows the schools to continue to be responsive to our students to pro provide a safe and supportive
environment for our students with minimal interruption to the school day. Um, so we're very appreciative of this donation. is very thoughtful about uh allowing us to educate the whole child and support the whole child during their school um experience. So, we're very very uh appreciative of the Dennis Union
Church for this donation. Next, um moving on to the Emmy small principal search. Uh so, we've had three rounds of interviews. uh initial round conducted by a committee led uh by uh
Miss Lopes that lifted three semi- finalists to [snorts] a next round of interviews that met with uh a leadership team and that produced then two finalists who were here just last week for site visits
and uh spent on two different days spent all day at our uh at Emmy Small um with a mix of staff groups, leadership team groups, parent groups, touring classrooms. Um it was really a a long
full day, but allowed us to get a really good round picture of the each of the candidates. Um and I'm pleased to announce that um we're in contract negotiations with um with the selected finalist. I'm not ready to announce the
name yet because we got to get ink on a on a piece of paper. Um but uh once we do have that done, we'll get a press release out uh and we'll have the the candidate here at a future meeting to meet you all. Um and then we'll start working on transition planning um with
this particular individual. Um, I'm I know I was able to spoke speak with the candidate uh on uh last week and we're both very excited um for their future and really looking forward to getting
started. Uh be um we're all sad to see Miss Mahadei go, but I'm really excited about this candidate and and their future and helping us helping um carry on the good work that Miss Mahade has done and and moving Emmy Small into the future.
All right. Um, next, uh, last week, Monday through Wednesday, uh, NASK was here doing their denial accreditation visit at the high school. Um, so NIASK,
you may remember, um, Principal Bennett did a NAS presentation not too long ago. um that was for their collaborative conference and then they come back just two years later and do their dennial visit which is when you get your actual
accreditation letter from um from NEAS. So they'll this was the visit the high school will get an official report which will be around the um each of the standards. It'll give the high school
some areas of focus for the next 10 years um which principal Bennett can use for long-term improvement planning um as well as their accreditation. There's no signs that they're not going to get accredited acc credited based upon the meetings I know that I had with them. And I just wanted to share a
couple of highlights um from my meeting with them. Um they shared that in their meeting with student groups that students report um loving all the options that they have at the high school. Um that they love being able to pursue their interests. Um that they
feel supported and cared for by their teachers. Um and that they uh deeply appreciated um the way that the the staff was well prepared for the visit and that they really felt like it
w and we were just there I think we met with them what on Monday. Yeah. And like how smoothly everything had uh run just from the very beginning. So I'm looking forward to reading the full report and we'll have principal Bennett here to present that once we get it. It may not we may not get the report until the summer. So that may be a fall
presentation for for um for the committee. And last but not least, uh uh as you all remember from my goal, one of my um things that I'm working on is thinking about how to put different
communication structures in place to not only uh share information differently, but also how to um listen um in new and constructive ways. So I had my uh first superintendent listening session since
my entry work. Uh it was this one was a virtual one. Had it on Zoom. We had just under 40 participants. Uh we had worked to establish um to have interpretation available. So we had interpretation
available in Portuguese, Haitian Creole and Spanish. And we had um many participants in those languages um at the meeting. um and general. So I started with uh sharing some information. The topic was
around advantages to to to coming to DY and sort of how as you progress through the district, what are the advantages and opportunities for your student as they uh are in the district and then it we I opened it up. I had some framing questions but then opened really sort of opened it up to a form of conversation.
um some concerns came up around student bullying and we were able to talk through sort of that like what is bullying, what isn't bullying. Um and then some uh conversations around school culture and belonging. Uh some praise for the work that we've been doing
around sharing uh around social media uh as well as like some very specific things people were wondering about around expanding our preschool offerings about how do we do step up between the grades like specifically third to fourth grade. Um were there opportunities to um
expand there? people looking specifically for the eighth grade experience. You know, how do we help kids transition um as they're eighth graders and doing some like eighth grade centric um things because they are not quite not quite high schoolers yet. Um
so, and they still need some of those middle school like things like a eighth grade only dance was the suggestion that was made. Um and trying to think what else. Um yeah, so I don't know. It was a great great
conversation. Got a ton of um feedback. And then we recorded the meeting. So uh at my next um it's currently on our YouTube page, but I I don't think anybody really knows and navigates to our YouTube page. At least we're trying to that's the next thing we're looking to build up as our YouTube page. I have
Leela working on organizing it and building it into playlists. Um but at my next um superintendent's uh message which is scheduled to go out this Friday, I'll be sharing that out so that for anybody who wasn't able to be there at that one. And then I have an
in-person one scheduled for the 15th of this month uh from 1 to 2:30 based upon the feedback that I had gotten from when I originally sent a survey about about times and you know in person virtual um you know there was a split between who wanted in person who wanted virtual and
a split on like times like some people like after school was better and other people in during the school day was better. So I offered both. So I was going to do the same topic. This one's going to be in person up here in the library. Um at the middle school, um it'll cover the same topics. I actually
have students coming from the high school um uh like video production team. They're going to come and they're going to record that one as well. So again, the idea being to if you can make it, great. If you can't, then we'll have
another way for at least for the information and the conversation to be disseminated for people that weren't able to make it. So looking forward to that conversation um in a couple weeks and again I'll send reminders out starting um at the at the me my message on Friday and I think that's it. Any
questions through the chair? Any questions? Great. [clears throat] We'll move to school committee business. Um when we talk about the calendar, the superintendent evaluation is on there. So we need to make sure as time I know we're all busy people. as time is
available uh to continue to look at that, add notes, and start working on the evaluation. Uh you'll get an email on when it's due so that we have time to present it um on May 18th. Um consent agenda includes the two donations and
the minutes from February 2nd. We have a motion in a second. Any discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor say I. I. Any opposed? Any abstain? Thank you. Um, bills, requisition, payrolls. I don't see a red folder, so I think there's I didn't see an email recently, so I think we've all
signed everything to date. I'm sure that will change tomorrow. Um, school calendar. Our next meeting will be April 27th. Um, followed by the town meeting on the 28th. The week prior to that will be uh April vacation.
And then, uh, May 4th, we'll have an ELA. Also on the 27th, we'll get to hopefully meet our new principal. Um May 4th we'll have EA curriculum contract approval transition program presentation from DRHS and then on the
18th we'll have the superintendent uh evaluation vote. Uh and then everything else will be announced at our next meeting. Uh public comment. Anyone looking to
speak for public comment? Excellent. Uh policy and public comment is uh our policy and public participation at meetings can be found at the table with the agenda. The public's reminded that a school committee meeting is a meeting of a governmental body at which members of the body deliberate over public business. We welcome your attendance and
appreciate interest in viewing your school committee as we conduct a regular business meeting. The school committee believes that the school district community should have an opportunity to comment to the committee on issues that affect the school district and are within the scope of the committee's responsibilities. Some questions you may have may not be within the scope of the committee's responsibilities. In that
case, I would suggest that you send or give your question in writing to the appropriate person so that your concern may be given proper considerations. Individuals may address topics on the agenda spec items specific specified for public comment or items within the scope responsibility of the school committee. This is opportunity for individuals to
address topics on the agenda. Each citizen will be allowed to speak for no more than three minutes. >> Thank you, Mr. Chair. Um, Joyce Flynn, I'm from Yarmouth and I'm a strong supporter of the school override. Um, I have noticed with past town meetings
that even the hard-hearted voters who are voting, you know, you're not going to take any more taxes from me, love your students. They just love them. When they appear at the beginning of a program, they just love that. And if you think of that combined with the need for
more information that has been here but that people haven't noticed yet, I wonder if we would ever consider, and I realize this is walking an odd line between elected officials and staff. Um, could we consider having
some gregarious math students with computers at a table outside um a a an appropriate distance? whatever that's decided to be um from the entrance to the town meeting. Um who would have, you
know, signage saying, "Oh, this is the override. It's less of the the whole budget is less of the the town budget than it used to be. Would you like to find out how it would impact your house?" Um just give me the numbers.
Um, I just think, of course, you could do a handout with that like thinks every 20,000, but having the young people there and having them engage with the young people, I just think is is is worth a try. And I have the feeling that the people in this room could probably
make that happen if they also thought it was a good idea. So, I think it might work. Well, we're I can't tell anymore whether we're uphill or not, but you know, let's go for a really big majority. Thank you. >> Thank you so much. Anyone else?
Seeing none, we have a motion to adjurnn. Do we have a second? Anyone? >> Second. >> Second. Any discussion? All those in favor say I. Any opposed? Any abstain? Thank you so
much.