##VIDEO ID:CPG9XbI4Qho## calling this meeting to order at 6:00 for the Holio school committee just a little bit housekeeping first on March 29 2023 Governor hilly signning into law an act relative to extending certain state of emergency accommodations which among other things extends the expiration of the provisions pertaining to open meeting law to March 31st 2 specifically this extension allows public bodies to continue holding meetings remotely without a quorum of the public body physically present at the meeting location and to provide adequate alternative access to remote meetings the ACT does not make any new changes to the open meeting law other than extending the expiration date of the temporary Provisions regarding remote meetings from March 31st 2023 to March 31st 2025 roll call please mayor Garcia here um Dr Rivera col here present present lez here here here mran here here present I'll rise for the pledge of allegiance of the United States of America and the Republic for which it stands one nation godice for pursuant to Mass General Law chapter 38 section 20 I'm hereby informing all attendees that a video and audio recording is being made of the meeting and then the meeting is being live stream and run live on the city's Community TV channel we would like to welcome Sullivan middle school for our student showcase yes Mr we have our principal uh Mr ratre here um if you could just uh briefly uh introduce uh what what the you're here to Showcase is the microphone on I don't think I'll start over that's better I'll do it better this time anyway um it's nice to be back um we brought our student ambassadors here which are the Future Leaders of the city so in 20 years when you all are on school committee and mayor and this is where you're going to be seated um I wanted to recognize the adults who are here who have work by their student ambassadors but also just in general in our school miss chapelli and miss Rivera freus our assistant principles Miss De Jesus M Marquez and especially M Olivia Rivera who's an e8th grade ELA teacher and really has uh done the most work with our student ambassadors um they're well prepared as you're going to see here in a moment so I'm going to I know when I should stop talking listen to the student ambassador so I'm going to pass over the microphone to them all what is a student ambassador a student amb oh I'm sorry my name is Zoe Rodriguez it's student ambassador is a student who embodies the values of reach serves as a representative of their classmates and promotes various school activities and initiatives student ambassadors are chosen for their exceptional communication skills and abilties to advocate for the ideas and perspectives of Sullivan student bodies hi my name is lla Rodriguez and I will be continuing of what a student ambassador is the student ambassador program is highly competitive opport open to all students previously ambassadors visit every Home Room to promote the program this year seventh and eighth grade ambassadors were selected based on their prior participation and had to reapply and complete an interview process participation in this program remains highly selected hi my name is Angel cologne and I am talking about the requirements to apply students interested in applying to the program have had to meet the following criteria they had to send an application with three teacher references had to follow the reach values have no more than four referrals have no more than five absences be in good academic standing and submit their application forms by September 30th hi my name is Sophia kamacho and I'm going to be talking about the current ambassadors this year's ambassadors represent a diverse group of students from a house B house tip the Dual language program and the newcomers a Academy this the program includes a total of 37 ambassadors five from fifth five from sixth grade 15 from seventh grade 15 from 8th grade a wait a wait list has been established and the and the new opening will be received in the coming year hello I'm Patrick Smith oconor uh and I'm presenting roles and responsibilities student ambassadors play a vital role as school leaders the program offers us the chance to develop our leadership and communication skills while inspiring our peers to take an active role in representing Sullivan and uh in representing Sullivan ambassadors support new students lead by example provide constructive feedback and AD ifate for Meaningful changes within the school hi my name is Miles for example our ambassadors recently collaborated with sedexo representatives to advocate for improvements to the lunch program demonstrating their dedication to enhancing the school experience for all students hi my name is Xavier Rodriguez and this is hi my name is m leoy and we're going to be talking about what ambassadors are actively involved in act ambassadors are actively involved in uh morning announcements to inform students of the events for each day at Sullivan supporting school events and activities such as trips for students and incentives and assisting the main office by collecting papers or passing out food drive boxes to classes they are also involved in performing other duties as needed like helping other peers advocating for the student body and speaking up for others when something is wrong as Role Models ambassadors are expected to keep up with their grades and behavioral standards they are held accountable for making up any assignments missed due to Ambassador duties or weekly meetings students who fail to meet these expect expectations may have their Ambassador status reviewed which could result in a suspension of privileges in addition to their responsibilities ambassadors participate in team building activities serve as a voice for their peers and offer ideas to school administration and stakeholders to better shape the school community hello again Mia could not make it today so I'll be presenting her part um for the rest of this year uh we ambassadors have some goals for ourselves last year we met with Holio High uh high school students who led the restorative justice work at the high school we would like to continue this work at Sullivan we would also like to raise money so that we can have some fun funds to use for different school projects Also earlier this year we participated in the middle school student leadership conference at AIC it was a great experience and we hope to participate more oh in more events like that hi my name is Sophia fona and I will continue listing some of our for we want to keep giving feedback on the PBIS systems five we want to keep giving feedback to our principal on different aspects of the school and lastly we want to keep working to improve our food does anybody have any questions yes first of all thank you so much for being here and were any of you nervous to speak I still do so no worries if you do and if you don't good for you um what does it feel to be an ambassador it feels really good being able to be the voice for people that don't have as much of a bigger voice as certain people like us so it it feels good to be able to to be that voice for other people anything else anybody else wants to add anything it feels really nice because there's not a lot of people like us who are willing to get up and speak their opinion and say the things that we really need to work on in our school so it feels really nice thank you Miss Wilson um I have a couple questions um first of all what do you do to lead by example can you give me an [Laughter] example so basically we just are following our reach values which is respecting and being like a role model for the younger students and even if you're a six Trader you there's still ways that you can be a role model and for yourself so we be like respectful stay in our classes we get good grades yes I was I was just wondering um do any of you have the aspirations of holding like an office once you get to high school for like class president vice president I would think with a lot of your leadership you would be it would be a great position for you thank you you Mr wellan M D Williams first of all I'm very proud of every one of you I'm W to school committee Miss tensley Williams Rosalie Williams if you need anything whatsoever from me please call me this button says if you mess with kids you mess with me okay so I'm really serious about that it doesn't matter which Ward you're in so call on me and I'll be there welcome Mr willan thank you you guys are great um when are your meetings are they during school or are they so yes we usually we pick a day of the week that works best for all of us and then we will meet at that time for however much time we need and we'll go through everything in those meetings Miss LEF thank you guys for coming so real quickly just to get a better understanding of the layout of your school and I heard something like a house B house you have the tip program so what does it mean to be an ah house what does it mean to be in be house and when we're talking about those who are chosen for student ambassador are there any from the tip program um yeah there's a few from the Tiff program that we um like like to have a house is mostly English side where um where people who don't do do language they go on that side and then for B house it's most likely dual language program where we have the newcomers and oh it's the other way around my bad all right my bad I'm thinking thinking of something else anyways yeah we have um I don't think do we have oh yeah we do have a few newcomers in our in the ambass Miss Le Martinez I actually admire this because this is some of the this is one of my my my always thinking of Youth leading our communities right but my question um for the newcomers this is one of the concerns I've always had as a school committee before newcomers especially those who do not master the language they feel left out how do you welcome someone like that being an ambassador what do you do for somebody that it's new in the school it feels isolated sitting in the in the cafeteria by themselves what do you guys do do you do anything about that or um yes just curious yes we do for the newcomers if we're as an ambassador what we do in our meetings sometimes is that we do team building so we can get to know each other more and during lunch some ambassadors actually I see a lot um actually sit with some newcomers or they make sure that they're included like we had a few newcomers I think last year where we were very interested as ambassadors to know to get to know more about them and we got to sit with them and we got to talk and it was really cool and we got to learn a lot of stuff about where they where they were from and all that thank you I appreciate that very muchen Ley Williams um I just have one question it's nice to see Mr rat right here um if I need to get in touch with the group would I call you here I would like to speak on the newcomer program too for the most part A lot of the people in ah house are in dual language so there's a vast majority of them and a lot of the ambassadors like down there are also um part of the Dual language program so if you are part of the Dual language program it's nice to try to approach someone who's from the newcomer program in their own uh native language which can really help you just connect to them on a deeper level like I have a uh I have someone in my gym class who I um I play soccer with a lot and I was able to connect with him by speaking Spanish with him so by using certain programs that we already have pre-existing the ambassadors are able to connect with more people get to practice correct pretty much yeah thank you Mr so yeah I don't I don't have any questions I just want to commend you for your leadership uh it makes me so proud to see all of you speak with so much confidence to be well prepared today um and you know the qualities that we try to instill in all of our students you guys you guys are just right on on par and exceeding those expectations in terms of the leadership the public speaking the preparedness the empathy for the others and caring and and advocating for for the what you want in your school Community I know a bunch of you um are not afraid to to reach out to Mr Soto himself and and uh ask for anything I've I've spoken to many of you individually and I'm just uh extremely proud I want I want you to embrace this opportunity that you have being an ambassador and apply it everywhere you go when you get to the high school make sure you're getting involved getting in that Network hanging around the right people uh advocating for yourselves when you get out into the real world it's going to be the same thing make sure you're surrounding yourself with people that um you know that that uh that are just like you uh and and always constantly advocating for for doing the right thing so uh again just so proud of all of you and and keep doing what you're doing thank you Mr colore yes can one of you tell me what your capacity is in a cafeteria is is there a group of you or is it just one person that wants to be in a cafeteras could you repeat your question what what the ambassadors within the cafeteria what what do they do to help other students in the cafeteria get along with others and work work together to make the cafeteria a better place to uh join hands and get together and really enjoy what you're doing some of us student Masters like to go to kids who sit alone or kids who just just don't like to be with anybody and make sure that they're okay make sure that nothing's wrong or if they need somebody to talk to when there's arguments in the cafeteria mostly make sure to tell a trusted adult so they can handle with it I personally don't um sit in the cafeteria but when there's kids around in the hallway I like to make sure they're getting where they need to be and where they need to go and I just like to make sure that they're all in a safe um environment and make sure they're all happy thank you very much Bravo I'm not sure who can answer this but how long has this program been in place and and what was the inspiration to start it hi so I'm Mrs Rivera um a long time ago I would actually want to shout out Mrs De Jesus had introduced student ambassadors to me when we were beus SL um HMS from there I decided to take on The Gauntlet and I really wanted to inspire and promote our youth I believe student voice is important and diversity and being in hoo as an educator um I really want to push forward with this program I did get support from my principal Mr rat Ray and we had some other student um teachers and other people join us ever since then like we said we it's been selective it's been competitive it's been growing it has grown from last year as well I had originally maybe 20 applicants and then next thing I know I had 40 applicants applying so I was like whoa so the program is growing and we are keeping it 6th 7th and eth and we're trying to get new recruits in we also have make the way for eighth graders our eighth graders who are hopefully going to enjoy the ambassadors in high school um that's my hope uh we are also making sure they promote for sixth and seventh so we can have some more seventh graders who will be in the eighth grade we're promoting the seventh graders and then hopefully getting interest of the new sixth graders coming in so it's a growing program it's been about more than four years so thank you you're welcome thank you Mr so yeah I'm sorry I again not a question but um a little bit of a push uh I you know listening to the criteria of what it takes to to be a student ambassador I'm hoping that there's been some thought put into some kids that might not meet that criteria but that uh being a part of a group like this would really really help support them I have a couple of friends in mine that you know might feel excluded because they they don't have the attendance or they may have uh you know uh more than four referrals or I was it four yeah um so I would just I would just encourage some thought around that and and students that might be interested that don't meet that criteria how do the student ambassadors help them to get there where where they need to go or how do we as a a school community help support uh someone that's interested in being a part of you know uh of of this uh student ambassador group thank you thank you thank you so much let's give a round of applause to solivan middle school student ambassador Miss Denley Williams I have one more question uh the parents do you have a special time when the parents can meet or can they go to your meetings our meetings are normally held during the school day but we have been Mak sure we're communicating with families and the families also uh get to see the application process as well and give them feedback and like why they might want to apply and then also I just want to follow to we do have a few students that yes we have high criteria but we also have trial periods for some of our students to be able to try and succeed um we do have openings coming up soon so we're hoping that watching our student ambassadors will inspire some other kids to maybe start going onto this leadership path and we've also asked our student ambassadors to talk to some of our students that we really would like to have a part of the program um so again we're constantly growing and then we would love to have more parent involvement in the future uh that is something we're going to be talking about in the next couple of meetings as well thank you my son started out at Sullivan they graduated from Dean so I'm a mother that's been around thank you so much guys thank you thank you so much Miss Feliciano do we have any public comment yeah so moving on thank you again Bravo thank you I was going to say a picture would be helpful thank [Laughter] you do we have any of our of our student reports maybe online okay then let's move on to the superintendent report Mr Soto all right so I um include included in your packet there's a there's a few things that's uh in the superintendent report and one of them is just an update on um on our contract employees we have um you know about 13 people that uh they're they're at the end of their three-year contract um this ranges from directors to principles and I know that we're you know we're right now we're in the middle of talking about local control and and uh starting July 1st normally how I've handled renewing contracts for for those individuals is we work we go through the you know evaluation process and determine you know uh if we're ready to renew somebody's contract um and I just wanted to update the school committee that we're you know we're at a point in the school year where we have to make those determinations you know there's all of the the ones that are on the list in terms of their contracts ending this coming year are are people that are in good standing with the hoolio public schools and have had good evaluation so um I'm looking to uh engage in that process where we where where we have those conversations with those individuals that have expiring contracts Miss LEF I'm just looking at the packet I don't I see that it's on the item agenda something that I was supposed to click on no no I I I didn't you didn't put anything names no no not names I just mean like departments or something I thought you when you said I submitted know dur in the packet I'm thinking I'm looking for something I'm just going to put it that way okay so mean I didn't want to include any of those details just because it's easy to identify who the person is if you put their there so um get to level of conversations around this I just wanted to make sure I had your blessing to kind of continue how we would normally do uh and and disregard you know the getting out of so then I'm sorry so then what you're asking for is sort of like a motion um in regards for you to extend their contract for a certain amount of time renew their contract for a certain amount of time that's the question correct yeah the question is you know normally I would just engage in that process now whether I'm going to extend non-renew or you know but um typically we have done three-year contracts for those individuals everybody that is on that list contract and uh normally come know expiration time around this time of year is when we engage in those conversations to renew for another three years so thank you mayor Garcia so it so there so these are folks that their contracts are up June 30 right and we're looking to forward start local control in July 1 from now to June 30 you're the receiver you currently have that power and authority to go forward but you're just being mindful of this transition in into local control and just trying to seek direction or or blessings from the school board like get that correctly yeah that that's exactly it I mean these are uh you know everybody's paying attention to the news everybody's seeing and you know many of them are wondering like what does this mean for me do I have a job next year Anthony like what's going on and I'm looking you know especially for those individuals that we're are are doing great work and we want to retain I'm looking to be able to move forward and and with confidence knowing that the school committee is going to support um me moving in that direction so I'm of the opinion that like as a school board focusing on transitioning into local control and having turnover in positions can can contribute to some complexity in that trans transition and so I I yeah I hear what you're saying and I'm I'm in strongly support of you know you're the receiver right now it's under your power control and authority and if you're saying that they have good reviews under your uh performance evaluation while we had a good system reporting back to us um uh your processes and your systems I feel confident in superintendent going forward with those but that's just you know my opinion not the rest of the body so Miss Wilson so thank you for sharing that with us um I believe this is in your purview so this is not something that even when we are in local control that we would not be like discussing because this is in your control to manage the day-to-day operations of the school committee I just want to make sure that I'm in the in the right mindset that this was a a courtesy um in some regards because this is in the normal even if you weren't the receiver and you were the superintendent this is your job to okay I just wanted to be clear that that is the correct thought process Mr Sheen yeah I was going to comment similar but so I guess unless it's the only thing where there's some gray area is the positions that the school committee actually approved the contract so like assistant superintendent fed director business manager those ones so I think that those are the only ones that I mean but it's still like your receiver so get that and don't the contracts even at the time of expiration there's not a one-year automatic renewal if they're not told they're not renewed I mean it's not a at this point in time if we had somebody's contract expiring they would be talking to their supervisor about renewing their contract and if there's no conversation which has never been the case if there's not a conversation of like yeah we're renewing um and let's say for for whatever reason that conversation NE never happens that person would stay employed it's just they wouldn't be under a contract they would be an at will employee at that at that time okay so the terms of their contract doesn't carry out at extra time correct okay Miss Li Martinez so concerning to me not as a body um speaking so I know that there we have a shortage of teachers are should we be concerned that we may lose and not make the I think those are these are two completely independent conversations our shortage of teachers has nothing to do with these these contracted employees Miss lefave motion to allow the current receiver superintendent um to review and determine uh renewal of contracts for contracted employees I I don't however you no per was proposed goad de I mean sorry madam chair Vice chair Mr Sheen um I'm just going to say that since something has been moved in seconded just for the record um I'm going to vote against it and not for the purposes of that I don't support the superintendent doing what he done but I just don't think matter on so I'm gonna just know Myas voting no Miss Wilson I will be doing the same I'll be voting no as well based upon the same thought process mayor Garcia I don't I don't I mean yeah there is a motion on the table unless you want to withdraw but we don't have to vote on you just just just tell the superintendent to do your job and good luck Miss LEF okay so I think we all need to be on the same page and apparently I was not on that page even though I fully understood what was being said the facial expressions reveals something else so now that I fully understand I will withdraw my motion because it's your job anyways I second tow it thank you motion has been withdrawn um uh the next item on the agenda is the Panorama survey and normally we go through a very you know lengthy presentation um I've included it in your packet I don't I don't want to go through the entire presentation um I promised that we would come back and and revisit it when we talked about the Panorama survey window coming um I did want to highlight some some bright spots so um it it really does align pretty nicely to um our Focus areas for for the current year you know we got a lot of feedback through the teacher uh retention work group and through Panorama last year around um around retention efforts and we did see that more teachers Express greater interest in remaining in holy o long term um and we got a lot of feedback on professional development there's a section in there that talks about District leadership and it was it was uh pretty low last year but when you drill down to the actual question being asked the one question that they ask is does the uh professional development offered by central office and uh School base does it help you improve your practice and we saw an increase in that uh you know we we we got a new schedule this year where uh we got that early release on Wednesday where where teachers are coming together for a longer block of time um that was a change that we made based on a panorama last year and teacher retention work group last year um and we you know we did customize or not customized we tried to differentiate professional learning as much as possible based on feedback we've received so it looks like some of the efforts that we have uh put in place in those Focus areas um you know have have have garnered a little bit of increases uh in in those particular areas but there's still you know I think the biggest one of the biggest areas for improvement that we saw is uh students reporting low levels of Engagement and uh perseverance and grit so you know one of the questions is when you fail at a task how how how uh How likely are you to try again or uh and and you know students responded unfavorably to that question so we are you know at the way what we've done with this Panorama data um is we we've made sure that each principal is reviewing it I was actually at um at a couple of schools on January 3D when they were having their professional development and that was some of the this was some of the information that was covered at professional development is uh you know the principles going through the results with their with all of their teachers and all of their staff and then talking about what their you know what their glows what their grows and what their next steps were and I think that's the most powerful like way we use panorama is principles actually look at their data look at their information and work with their teams to say okay based on what we're here hearing from staff from students from families um what is it that we can do to address you know to to strengthen some of you know uh the things that are positive in there and continue with that momentum and what are some things that we need to do to address some of the concerns that were brought up in our Panorama data and um I put together a chart that's also in your packet that goes school by school so that you can see from the student survey the family survey the teacher survey and the staff surve survey what are some of the glows grows and next steps and I think that's you know that that's the you best use of this Panorama data and uh you know one of the things that you know at the district level we got to figure out a way to get more families to to engage in this survey um you know a couple of years ago we we had pretty strong participation from families um and this year we've seen a continual dip in in participation from families over the last couple of years um down to the 600 range when you know last year was we were in the 800 range I believe um so we gota you know as a as a team we got to figure out what is how you know what did we do in 21 and 22 that that helped get you know 1,200 families to to respond to the survey versus right now we're seeing half of that so um we've extended the window we've you know we've blasted it out districtwide we've had our family engage engagement team uh members you know grabbing parents in the in the you know in the drop off line uh so we've tried a a bunch of things but you know that's an area that that as a district we need to come together and figure out like how do we get participation up with from um from our families Mr wellan thank you for the report um thank you for breaking down by each school too um um yeah the family uh the family participation was was a little lack I just noticed that I think the families are they're mainly surveyed out you know they had so many surveys during covid and you know people have more time on their hands to answer them during Co too you're home so I just think Nationwide I've heard that where just you know the surveys you know they're just down because you know their the families have just they had so many surveys so I don't I know whether how we can make that you know you know give them some sort of bonus points to participate but it's important to have the families um respond thank you m Denley Williams when I read the survey I was very unhappy um if if there's anything you know that we can do as school board to be helpful um let me know because when I read it I was sad so we got to do some picking up there anything in particular that made you sad yes the questions um let's see how effective is the district's evaluation system and helping you improve um grades without my glasses grades um it says favorable and then um the the grades I was looking at what the um without my glasses on this is kind of tough but the scores were very low like this one here says um how effective is the district's evaluation system in helping you improve 34% went down to minus three um then it says when the district makes important uh decisions how much input do do the staff uh have 28% went down to plus two yeah you know kind of rough and if we can do do anything to get these numbers up please let's try Miss wson I guess my concern was over the um the low and dropping scores for uh student surveys about school engagement yeah I mean that is um you know pretty significant in my mind that you have from 6th to 12th grade 177% now are I I guess saying that they're you know positively engaged is that how I'm supposed to be reading this that's on on our form it's on Page in the packet it's on page nine just if you want to peek at that page nine page nine in our packet the numbers that are in the white the number that's highlighted in blue it's five but if out of the nine oh I see yeah yeah yeah so School engag it went from 22% last year responding favorable to 177% and it also dropped for um uh younger students as well yeah yeah that that is um you know I think that's really what I what I list what I highlighted as a as a an area of focus you know one of the things you know one of the things that I think that we need to do as a district is listen to students more and and have them you know grab the student ambassadors and and share this these questions with them and share this data with them and ask them like what you know from your perspective what is it that we could do to make you know your your classes more engaging it was I don't know if if any of you had an opportunity to catch that short video that we did on the student Summit but we talked about it at the last school committee meeting where we had um over 80 students participate from Holyoke High School and they went to the the Sheridan in Springfield and it was student L it was funded by the bar foundation and uh that was a question that actually they engaged in themselves like how could we make classroom activities more engaging um and they've already had two sessions I haven't gotten a report back from from Lori on like what what were some of the ideas that students had but I think one of the biggest takeaways here is like that that's clearly an area of growth for us and we need to hear from students themselves um you know what what we could do to uh make classroom activities more engaging so I'm just going to follow up and saying this would be something I think each School having a school council and meeting on a monthly basis with the principal would be a very positive move um in order to get student feedback um and and students involved um in every school just like you know Sullivan is doing other schools are doing I'm not sure every school has a school council um but in my understanding it's an actual legal obligation now so that's going to be something that I'll be pushing for um is having a a a school council at every school in our district well um Miss Wilson the school council that you're referring to I don't think it's it's not comprised of students no the school council I am talking about is a student school council where um students are meeting with uh the principal or design on a monthly basis to discuss topics that are of concern to them just like uh the group is doing at that we just heard from but I it would be something that students would be uh leading I hear you and I don't disagree with you I just think that the school councils that are listed in your school committee policies aren't the same thing but they could be it so I'm saying they could they could be discussing broad issues so that's what I just wanted to bring up for just one comment one of the things that always I focus on when I looked at the Panorama survey results is the school belonging yeah that's not where we want it to be if we can if we focus on the school belonging the engagement follows but if I don't feel like I belong why would I engage in any of the content they I don't belong here why would I be here right so and I you know as we often see in the younger grades is a little bit higher a lot higher actually so it's almost double um and as they grow then they feel like they belong less and of course there's no magic wand or anything like that but that's something that we have to make sure that it's a priority so that then students want to be in school and want to engage in the content right it's Williams um I was looking at the wrong survey at the time uh one says um if you are working on something that matters to you how focused can you stay and it went from 39 to minus 19 and then one says how excited are you about going to your classes went from 36 to minus two so like I said there's a lot of work that um we need to do yeah um and just so folks know um the the questions that fall under that category how connected are uh School belonging how connected do you feel to the adults in your school um how well do people at your school understand the kind of person you are and when you are at school how much do you feel like you belong those are the three questions that fall in that category and I want to say from from the years uh 18 all the way way through 22 we were at about 42% um and then saw a big jump last year to 60% and then it went down to 56% you're right it's still not where we want to be um and it's definitely something that we you know it's if anybody anybody saw my convocation speech that's what it was all about is trying to inspire teachers yeah um on the impact that they have on students and not just teacher staff you know I I I talked about you know when I was in school one my the cafeteria worker her name was Sylvia and she made she made a significant impact in making me feel like I belong cuz every day when I walked into that cafeteria the smile on her face the way she engaged with me when I wasn't there and I came in the next day she was like where were you at I missed you and and it's little things like that that just made me feel like a community like I belonged and everybody in the school can play a role in making that happen um but you're right it's not where we need it to be and we need to continue to to try to uh do uh find creative ways to to make students feel like they belong Mr calore yeah excuse me uh along the ways of communications and getting students and parents involved in all this what are we at the city of hoo I'm talking about is there any group of people out there Chamber of Commerce or or whatever to bring back suggestions to us to uh think about to improve our school system um we have a a lot of Partners Mr Kore I mean we work really closely with with all of our partners really um and uh we have a family engagement coordinator at every single one of our schools um and they have relationships with a lot of our partners in the community uh we meet um we meet monthly with the attendance task force and that involves members of the community so we have uh different different you know we have folks from the Holy Oak Medical Center we have folks from uh one holy o and we have folks from from all around Holy Oak that are invited to you know help try to tackle you know I think a lot of a lot of this belonging that we're talking about has an impact on attendance so in those conversations um belonging is always uh a topic that comes up um so I'm not sure if that answered your question we do work with a lot of our partners um and I know that many of them are are very ready and willing to support in any way that they can thank you Miss wesam I just wanted to clarify Miss tensley Williams the numbers I understand are concerning but it didn't go from from 39 to like minus 17 there was a change of 17 in a in a downward trajectory and then the other one there's a there's a change again that's just the the number change um it didn't go thank goodness it didn't go to negative -2 because that would be you know it was just that's just the change number okay I just wanted to clarify that to you and the audience thank you thank you Miss Wilson Miss LEF yeah I think what's important is really looking at the breakdown overall within all school um versus looking at an overall average between all the schools and the responses because although I hear what you're saying regarding School belonging those numbers are actually bit more higher uh when we're looking between the 3 to5 and middle school high school when you get to that engagement piece that's where you see the huge difference when we're getting to middle school high school where the lowest is 133% and the highest is 19% um that's favorable um I'm not going to count the Success Center because if I'm not mistaken that's the same school that has 90% of um chronic absenteeism yeah I think 100 they're at 41% of school engagement they're higher than they're operating under a different schedule a different absolutely yeah um so I'm just looking at the middle to high school I was trying to go back at the same time and my apologies because I really wanted to see if each individual school is really including that in their grow glow grow nextstep plan um I see a lot um it's just like one example grown no I don't want that one that's not the right one because it's not really it's based off of what staff say versus what students are saying um yeah so I'm wondering if that's something that maybe that could be like an extra type of grow plan um on how do we engage the students in each of the schools because those numbers are just flat out low um and if you expect for participation and for Student Success you got to get those numbers up there Mr Shen yeah so looking at all this and I went into Panorama and looked through all the data as well um after you sent us the link so one thing that I going to focus on a little bit because I mean all of the schools like the principles and the different School leaders and the schools are focused on that but I noticed the central office was considerably low um compared to all I think for belonging it was the third lowest out of every site for that so where is the I didn't notice in the plans that you gave us with the school responses where's one for central office with the glows grows and next steps and what the plan is with you and your leadership because I mean that is an area that you have the absolute direct ability to influence so what is your plan to raise those numbers yeah um as a Cabinet uh we we focused on what was what you know the the schools and District level action the the next steps of of our cabinet is to go into a deep dive we actually had it on the agenda for our cabinet meeting this morning um but we do go through that process as a leadership team to uh deep dive into the Panorama data and see you know what it is that we can do to support this also includes uh people that are at um at Central Supply as well it's not just people sitting at Central Central office itself it's people that are at Central Supply as well so um you know some of the things that have come up in the past Devon I can tell you is trying to connect you know I I can tell you when I was know when I was a financial analyst as an example in Springfield my first couple of years it was really hard for me to to like connect to what the district was doing and whenever I was brought to you like a professional uh learning opportunity where I was engaging with everybody from central office um it made me it reminded me why I was doing the work and and how like the work that I was doing is actually connected to the work that's going on in schools and you know when we looked at Panorama last year those were some of the things that we heard from some of our staff is like you know the professional development that we get we hear about all this professional development for teachers we hear about all this so we designed uh uh you know a quarterly meeting with our central office team uh where they were engaging in you know we were doing the equity last year we focused on the equity training and there was a lot of conversation about the middle school and about uh local control so those were the real topics so um this year you know we got to really dive deep into that and as a team get together and figure out what are the action steps that we're going to take to address the survey that um that was filled out do think it was also like participation was not where I'd like it to be either with uh that that group Mr she so I understand looking at some of the connections of how people may perceive themselves impacting the entire District what you talk about that but just simple questions about like um how often do you receive feedback on your work and only 49% of the time did people respond favorably I mean that's not a connection to like what's going on in schools that's how employees whether they're working in Central Supply or working at central office are less than 50% of them are feeling like they get um receive feedback on their work I mean that that's General management that's not just climate of the district as a whole so I guess I'm as this is being rolled out I think like what the plan is for you that you're going to direct your staff to do to change some of these things because this is these the people who work in central office and Central Supply are their bosses are reports to you so I think that I mean whereas the schools I mean there's a school leader and culture and climate schools can be different you can drives them of that like this is where you can make change and I and I think that especially language around evaluation some of the workplace stuff like I mean some of the questions about would you recommend working here um as some of the questions and I mean it was um variable in that so I I guess I'm looking for the plan I mean every principal is expected to do a plan I'd like to see a plan for C office yep all right moving on to the next topic and I believe it is the school calendar so um in your packet we have uh a draft of the proposed school calendar for next year um we have gone through a process a vetting process so you know in you know we get feedback from our principls got feedback from the teacher Advisory Group um on you know on the calendar for the upcoming year and I I highlighted you know in that memo to all of you what some of the highlights were so we're looking to start school on Monday uh August 25th from um which would be the first day school for grades 1 through 12 unlike previous years we've normally had like a week before uh prek and K start um and that's some feedback that we had gotten from both School leaders and and staff that um it shouldn't that we should shorten that so that feedback was implemented in this new proposed schedule where uh prek and K would actually start two days after the first day of school not an entire week after the first day of school we we managed to still preserve all of the holidays that we have and the professional development schedule aligning um to our assessment calendar um we you know uh again just like this year uh we we have that little bit of a longer break for for students um after the the holidays uh returning back on January 7th which is you know uh very you know similar to what we've done the the last couple of years and uh Fe teachers provided favorable feedback to that um they say that now but um in June when we're going an extra couple days they might feel a little differently but we do have some professional development days built into uh that week when students aren't there um so what I you know the The Guiding questions that we Ed um to solicit input from all of our stakeholder groups including DPAC and um and principls and teacher Advisory Group is we talked a lot about the the Wednesday uh 1126 the day before Thanksgiving being you know an early release and and got feedback on that um we got feedback on whether or not quarters should be split equally um you know or should we just end it on a Friday end the marking period even if one quarter has 45 days one quarter has 43 days and that was you know that was incorporated into the proposed calendar that we have um and then just got General General feedback So based on all the feedback that we got from all of those stakeholder groups we put together the calendar that you have in your packet um what I'm hoping to do is is if you guys have if any of you have any feedback if you could email myself and Rebecca Thompson uh no later than January 18th that would be greatly appreciated um because we like to move forward with the the calendar that's been proposed a lot of people put uh have provided input to us and and we've Incorporated that feedback into that the calendar Mr Sheen I would just ask that if we're doing feedback that way that all of the feedback with the named person becomes available to us when it's given I mean if you're soliciting feedback from school committee members then normally we'd give feedback in a public meeting I would like the annotated feedback that says Mr shien okay provided this Miss Wilson provided this I mean it shouldn't just be kept in an email happy to provide that at the next meeting or whenever it's January 18th yep oh yes the next meeting is the 27th or something right yeah Miss Leo Martinez no it was interesting because yesterday I saw on Facebook somebody asking what's the calendar for next year I'm like I don't think next year yet and everybody's thinking but I think probably parents are planning you know some trips and stuff and that probably is the ca thank you yeah I I was seeing it's because a lot of families that do send their kids to camps like the camp registrations and when they're going to start and everything to get the seat now um the longer they have to wait there may not be availabilities so it's just be mindful of the timing of one can have this ready yeah we are in and this we're way ahead of schedule compared to when we presented this last year so um we wanted to make sure that you know the first meeting we had in January we got your feedback so we can move forward um the the last item in my packet is really you know um we said we would oh Mr Sheen yeah I'm just wondering how is attendance on those late start days for mcast um I could I don't have that information for you right now but I can get it okay thank you so attendance on the late start days that we're actually doing mcast testing students actually show up late okay like or is it just the students that are te like just to see if there's a benefit to actually doing late start days yeah yep I I'll I'll pull that information together I'll have um our data team pull it right out of open Architects um the last thing on the agenda is I I'm seeking kind of uh the school committee's Direction one of the things that you know we talked about um and we talked to the school building committee had a meeting last week but we you know you are all aware we went through a process to to land on P remaining the the name PEC as a school and um in the building committee um so one of the members a few of the members actually uh recommended that like hey these are great people that didn't get you know didn't uh that didn't get selected to be named um on the PEC building but there are other ways that we can honor those people um and based on the the survey you know there a few people that that had a lot of responses in terms of um you know so Felipe panoa was one of them Carlos Vega ha bla Hal Blain an McHugh and Betty Medina lichenstein uh those were all uh folks that had come up uh more than a couple of times in the surveys so um we could like I'm I'm looking for direction from the school committee if is is is that something that you guys want to do um if we want to start naming some of these rooms in the new school we would you know we we got to start like working with with the um um with the building committee to to get that work started uh I'm not trying to push this in any way but I I promise the the building committee that I would bring this forward to the school committee so that we can start the discussion about if you want to name a room or a library or an Atrium or a gym um what you know what that process could look like and uh these are some names that came up during the survey uh of naming PEC Miss Wilson so our current policy um FF for naming facilities um does talk to um the school committee May develop an orderly procedure for that and it does require a two-thirds vote um I can let you know that this is a policy that is going to be reviewed tomorrow night um uh but I would I I would not I do not believe that this policy will be updated you know in a time you know based upon the process that we're taking in order to you know for uh public comment review so I would think that we would still follow um the policy um FF um and it does talk about in uh selecting a name the committee will give higher preference to names of deceased persons preferbly local people who have made significant contributions to education and again 2third vote Mr cmer are are we just talking about PEC school right now I I think that so like how I presented it was just PEC school so we could have like the Felipe P pentoo language Services room we could have the Carlos Vega Family Center but I I don't think we like we're not limited I to just a PEC school right like as a body if if you feel any of these people are worthy of not worthy that's terrible choice of words but if you feel compelled to name a room or a gym or a a uh anything within the any of our school buildings that Mak sense um you know you the you know what what is that something the School Comm committee wants to do do we just want to move forward with the project without doing that right now and kind of take that up at a later date like it's that's really what I'm looking for from well it was just my thoughts if we do it for one school it should be for every school in the system if if uh if this wishes of the school committee says it could be Sullivan School it could be Medcalf school it could be anywhere at all correct it's the decision right here Mr Sheen but in regards to PEC um is it a reimbursable expense if it's done at PEC now it would be reimbursable okay so that's the big difference yeah I mean if it's if we're naming something at Sullivan school then 100% of the cost of that is on the city of polio if we're naming something at pack I mean it counts as part of the overall School building project which yes is that um so if if you're asking for for guidance I guess I I have two things to say about that I think that the first those people that have been on that have been named and mentioned are great people I know have met many of them so none of these comments are reflection on any of them but I think that when you're soliciting names to name a school you may be thinking of different people than thinking of names to name a Auditorium or a library so it's just like those are great people but there's other people who could have met some of that criteria that Miss Wilson said about impacting education and who they look to be deceased and those types of things I also um whatever we decide to be a naming process I think there also needs to be a I don't know what type of deep vetting went into some of the the the process but like we just need to make sure that once again not a reflection on anyone named but there's nothing embarrassing that could embarrass the district the city the the anything about people we name so we just need to make sure when we're vetting people that we I mean naming is a big thing we've seen things go on all around our uh country with naming and I'm not saying that but we just want to do this right and and that's and there's a lot of good people and I think that um I think what I would be more interested to see like if they're if the committee is interested is some sort of proposed process specifically for pack because we're going to need an interim process since we're not as WIS already said that there's not going to be something right the current but there needs to be something about submissions for this and those types of things so whether that lives again with the um leadership committee how it was transferred over um with the the naming that could be an option but I just think there I would be more interested probably to to see a um list of spaces at the new school as well I mean because we're not going to get down to naming a locker after someone I don't think but like um though my name is available we're giving out lockers so but I I think that uh just to see what some of the common spaces are that could be options for that but I think it if there's going to be a community process a larger process because naming a something other than a school is diff different names may come upy Williams do we have to name no we we're not obligated to this is this is just feedback that came out of the building committee they said you know gosh like I know we're recommending it be peek but we heard some really G great names and like um I wonder if we could honor these people in a different way so I'm bringing it forward to the school committee not not as a recommendation but just to let you know that that conversation happened that's the feedback that the building committee had but I think if you name people we're going to have people that's going to be very upset because their names should have been they should have been nominated so sometimes it's best to let sleep in i w say that but just leave things alone that's up to the group I disagree with naming Miss Wilson I think if we move ahead um and start naming whether it's at PEC or um at any other facility um you know of course I did planning for tomorrow's meeting so um you know part of the proposed change um that's going to be discussed at the meeting tomorrow would be you know we need a written request from the person who's requesting the change um they need you know background information on the person or the organization um you know and so that should be the process even though it's not in our current policy I think that if we are thinking of naming locations within a building we should open it up again we should not just generally assume that these names are the most appropriate um I'm you know I'm just thinking be because I I can tell you my husband would probably have a name of a favorite teacher at PEC that may have you know instilled in him some values that he carries to this day that he would like recognize um as someone who attended you know the school so I'm just saying that if we do I think we need to reopen it again and ask the community um to send nominations in mayor Garcia I was just going to say you know I think that that's the feedback right there um that we need to stick to our policy for Clear reasons that were brought up tonight I know the intent was to number one right we heard a lot about these names that had came forward and they the building committee it wants to honor them in some way shape or form and also number two because we're in currently in construction phase we can build those costs into that project but it just sounds like our process is going to align with that which I think is fine you know if if if next year or two years from now we we're going to name the gym after somebody we can you know we don't have to um you know be concerned around C like I think we can deal with it at that time too so I think going back to the building committee saying we spoke about this at length there were some clear good reason why um we shouldn't just jump at it and we should stick to policy of the school board which is and we can educate them on what our policies are and then that way we can you know the the folks from the building committee and our Consultants can just move forward um but obviously a communication to the community that right like when it comes point to when we're going to name these these are names that we hope to hear when we have a process to name X you know what I mean I think that's going to yeah it should be I think we achieve what we wanted to achieve and we'll bring that information back to the school building committee thank you that report good ice chair report so we have our subcommittee appointments and we have the recommendation to approve the following appointment mild laf to the leadership accountability and measurement subcommittee as the chair and continue with the current second open for discussion you guys are really quick with that motion but yet if you look at the attachment the attachment is different so the attachment says that you're going to have to also include the local control subcommittee the attachment is different than what the the recommended motion is so does anybody want to amend that make an amendment to add sorry I'm just having a glitch with my computer here trying to get out of a pop a window I hate them whatever she said SEC make a motion to add uh local control s so the assumption is is that that that's what what we wanted to do correct I just want to make sure leip accountability that it's not just leadership for cheer but then it'll also be an appointment to local control and chair by Miss Fano you look very confused right now you're killing me here so if you so may I miss so if you scroll down under subcommittee appointment list not the first but in the second if you keep scrolling down it just has um milder leabe listed under uh leadership accountability and measurement subcommittee that's the only uh place I see uh your name under subcommittee appointed list 2025 okay I so I Mr Shen um this a very quick turnaround and the vice chair can appoint interim appointments I'll make a motion to table this and she can appoint interim appointment so the work can still go on and then we can solidify this at the next meeting discussion yes Mr colore second okay second In by Mr cmer any discussion all those in favor I and you oppose motion carries passes unanimously all right so I need so we need to take back that motion sorry about that so someone with who made it made oh I Ted the whole thing didn't I meant to table the whole thing no someone made the motion initially and I seconded I moved the motion that and you can only I tabled the main motion right so that that was the motion okay thank you for the clarification all right so then moving on to the calendar for our school committee meetings already had access to that Mr willan thank you for the calendar yeah um I was looking at it I know we had two two meetings in September that were back to back September 8th and September 15th that correct so two weeks in a row on holidays holidays I [Music] think rashash is the 23rd and then yam kapor is you know on the October 2nd so um there's no issues with Jewish holidays but it we so it would be sundown the 22nd so I think that's why you moved it to the 15th because Jewish holidays are actually Sundown so the 22nd would be the start of the Jewish holiday so that's why you probably put it back to back by me have then just one meeting on September or could we move it to uh September 29th so that there's a break in between because then our next meeting is October 14th that would allow still break between the two so I'm you know I I'm just when I look at my calendar yeah yeah that that makes sense that we would have so the dates in September would be the 8th and then the 29th do I make a motion so make a motion that we change the proposed date for the September 15th meeting to September 29th second by miss liave any discussion all those in favor I any oppose so move and thank you Mr willan set my on to new business have budget transfer January 2025 motion to approve the budget transfer of 10 109,000 from the teacher salaries to contracted services for tahu Morgan and stem to contract for registered behavioral technician one for each school to support the AL program I second that second by Mr William discussion Mr willan thank you um just wondering why this wasn't put forth through the finance committee first before it comes to this body that's my question my apologies I thought it was are um so I can I'm surprised that this wasn't sent to you in advance okay wouldn't it come here first and then we send recommend it to sub motion to send a finance committee yeah that's so the recommendation should have been yes that's what the recommendation should have read come here it gets recommended to the finance subcommittee and then gets approved there well that that's not what it says right yep you're right all right my apologies I will take that back and you're withdrawing Mo I am going to withdraw the m motion and I am going to make a new motion and the new motion will be to the finance and operations subcommittee discuss Miss Wilson um so a constituent reached out to me about this um and there was a lot of concerns um you know the first question was why are we taking money uh from teacher salaries and putting and shifting it to pair professional Sal PA professionals because that's what the rbts are listed under for contractual reasons um you know my understanding is that we have not been able to hire those positions in this in those three schools and so that's why we'd be looking to shift that money um and then we just don't want and then the second piece is we have several um BTS um Behavior therapists who are working on becoming registered Behavior technicians and um we I just want to make sure that we and the entire District um you know recognize this and and just acknowledging the fact that this is filling the vacancy now and that if any internal or external candidate comes forward that we would be ending the contract if they if they are hired I should say let me rephrase that so if we if we have any registered technicians sorry any Behavior technicians currently with an HPS and they become registered and they apply for the positions and are granted it then we would then end that contracted time does that make sense yes it does and I believe I um yes so the answer to your question is yes that um had we had any internal candidates that could fill these roles we wouldn't be looking to a vendor to provide that service and the minute we and we're going to continue to actively uh try to fill these roles and once they're filled we you know we we would um we would be able to uh ex like cancel that portion of the contract so we're able to fill one of the positions we would be able to produce the contract and work with the vendor we've been working with stepping stones for for uh you know many years now um when to fill some of the gaps um that we may have and then a follow-up question I'm just wondering why we so my understanding is both rbts and BTS theoretically do the same job I'm not sure if you if you know that or not um the difference being is that you know one has gone through some additional training um and you know they they are registered um so I'm just wondering why we wouldn't just be hiring Behavior technicians if we're open to that or why we're not posting for rbts because I think I saw on the postings that we're looking for the position that we can't fill but I don't see us looking for rbts or BTS which could fill the position that we're Contracting for um I'll have we'll have to bring that I you know Ellie if you could reach out to me and I'd be happy to provide you with a uh you know a written response that we can share with the rest of the committee as well miss LEF yeah uh we referred this to the finance and operations so like that the concerns or what but before we even go there because so that I understand technically shouldn't it just have gone straight to them without us having to refer it or it comes here first and then we refer to them so they can refer it back okay because once you put it here there's the information is already attached for the public public to access so then now we're going to be raising questions here and having that discussion before it even got sent to finance and operations to do that discussion to then bring to us for a vote but maybe it's just me Mr willan yeah yeah I'm not sure you know if it's technicality I think the city council comes it comes to the full Council as a uh motion gets referred to finance this case finance committee will will vet the order and then they'll take a vote on it um the vote might be a negative vote in for for finance and then that negative vote could get referred back to this board the board this board might over rule the finance committee that's one example or the finance committee will approve it on their level it gets referred to to to this committee for this board to vet on it so both boards don't have to agree with the Motions okay but should be vetted in the finance committee first voted on there then move back here for the full discussion again or vote that's how I take it there might be procedural matters on Roberts rules and I'm missing but but generally that's that's the order Mr Shen I do have a question about the process so I recall when we had approved this policy um a couple months maybe two months ago now or so um I had brought up in the policy because it was one of the the standards for the local control plan and I had asked so is this policy with approving transfers supposed to start now or does it start in July and I was overwhelmingly told that it starts in July and I even voted against the policy um when we had passed it because I wanted the clarity because in one area of the plan it said that it starts now and another it said and I was told as a commune member it doesn't start till July so what is it and is this transfer really not going to occur until it's acted upon by finance and the school committee or have this money already been transferred anyone who wants to answer anyone who wants to answer that at the local Control meeting where we discussed it we talked about the warrant process the budget thresholds the cost you know centers as part of the budget develop and the question specifically came up like how soon can we do this and the respon response was that we could we could implement this right away um and we were ready to do that so I was just assuming that that was the charge from the school committee that moving forward now based on the thresholds that we talked about um I believe it was in maybe a month ago or three weeks ago uh we now have the ability for the chair of the finance and operations subcommittee to review the warrants electronically and they have been being regularly sent to to him um and he's been signing them and this is the first budget transfer we have had that meets that threshold within the uh since the meeting that we had um that would trigger the transfer approval process okay so I mean that's not what was described I think in late November early December it was that this doesn't go into effect in July um but I'm I'm great with it starting now so this hasn't been transferred yet and it's waiting on action by the committee whenever that occurs okay Mr wellan yeah I a agree with Mr Sheen I don't think you know formerly you know we're still in receivership okay we all know that I'm checking my watch yeah we're still in receivership okay but I think the state you know as part of their plan they want us to see that we're following the the procedures as we go so we're getting a head start that's how I I take it I've been reviewing the warrants I've been signing off on the warrants I wish my last name was look shorter Amazon okay I say a lot of Amazon a lot of Amazon bills okay um so I've been reviewing those um that's in chest you know me um so you know again I think the process is moving forward there's going to be hiccups like we said um because we haven't done it in so long but um I think the process is working I think the administration and the and the and the school board have been working in um Unison thank you mayor Garcia yep you're absolutely right Mr wellan also I add too because I think there was question around the original order currently being discussed versus going to committee um certainly all items that get put in front of us we're in a public meeting there will be room for discussion if members want to bring up questions I think the best way to navigate that without without really you know understanding that it is going to committee for further discussion is to bring up those questions make note of it and then that way when you have your committee meeting and you're not able to go to ask those questions you'll know some of the comments that were made when the agenda item originally came up probably would be a good way to deal with it rather than try to solve the problems now because I think the Habit here is we want the work to happen at the committee um and it'll save us time at our regular meetings so that we can go through other agendas items that are on our agenda so that might be the best strategy to kind of deal with that so still ask your questions Mrs Wilson or any member and for the appropriate committee to just jot down those notes and be prepared to you know bring it up in the working group Miss wlson I just want to ensure that if I email Mr willan as chair of the finance subcommittee with questions I have about this that I am not violating the open meeting law if if I just email him with my questions because we know that I okay I just wanted to make sure that that if I email him with my questions to follow up on that I'm just double-checking that thank you I appreciate it and I will follow up with you directly Mr SoDo thank you right so that's the end of the discussion vote Senate commit is there a motion yeah the motion to refer to the fin second second already yeah all those in favor I any oppose so moved you remember the motion missano okay good just making sure right so moving forward approval of meting minutes recommend we take these as a package make I'm sorry I make a motion that we take these as a package to approve second that missley Williams discussion all those in favor I and opposed so move meetings minutes approved Mr Sheen yeah um I spoke with uh Vice chair right before this there is one additional item of new business I want to bring up that couldn't be anticipated part of the printing of the agenda um and it's just to refer our Title 9 policies back to the policy committee on Friday there was some dramatic changes to Title 9 UM that went into effect on Friday with a Court ruling so boards were advised to send those back to policy to be revised second second In by Mr colore discussion I seeing none all those in favor I any opposed so moved right almost there update of committees starting with policy and governance subcommittee Miss Wilson so I've added that to our February agenda um prepping for February our agenda for tomorrow night is already in place we'll be reviewing sections oh my God God I already forgot because I'm busy um with all my sections enf tomorrow we're doing enf tomorrow um so uh just so everyone knows um it's not as lengthy as others um but we're getting through enf um and then in February there have been some policies um in other sections that we have not brought forward because we're looking for clarification or trying to get more information so um we're looking to um you know bring up some missing ones as well as G and H will be in February along with those missing ones yes I am doing the alphabet in my mind thank you very much I appreciate that giggle thank you so much finance and operations any updates oh thank thank you um we're going to be meeting on January 23rd I'll uh I'll probably going to have some minutes for approval for the full uh um the full committee soon join city council school committee any updates uh no update at this time thank you local control subcommittee wasn't that [Laughter] tabled we'll have up um but one of the last things that we did work on um in our last meeting um was talking about what our options will be as we are exiting receivership and starting what the process would look like for the search of a superintendent um the the team team from Desi did some research for um the local control subcommittee to review and then be able to present to the full board um about processes where they when they start when do you get the strongest candidates some examples from other districts around the area so that we can make an informed decision as we move forward Miss Le a quick question local local control did meet in December correct yes so are they still wanting to do every other month or did they want to hit January then March so they do want a meeting this month I would have to go back and check okay I know that the March meeting is happening I don't know the other two okay I don't remember I would have to look okay thank you they send they send an email with when the possible times for meeting where that the commissioner was okay actually Miss Wilson so for the community advisory team I believe I was going to be part of that yes I never I did not get any uh communication about that uh Mr Sheen was kind enough to share with me but I didn't find out where the meeting was going to be held or anything so I was not able to attend today so I would like to make sure that I'm if if I'm still um I need to be part of that communication yes going forward just so you're aware there was the meeting got canceled canceled so you didn't miss anything that's good to know but we have to tighten up some communication issues for sure thank you I appreciate that M Le so hearing that from Miss Wilson that's concerning I believe it was two of you um look at the Timeline that we're at right now we're almost at the end of January we approved approved to fund an organization to start doing whatever it is that they were going to do with the community advisory team the expectation was for them to come back to us in March is that still a possibility or are we looking at it's going to have to extend we can't be rushing um forums and hearing back from stakeholders um I don't know the reasoning behind a cancellation but we've got to make sure that everybody that was assigned and I'm sure they have the list of everybody who was appointed we we appointed two from here that everybody's getting the notification nobody's being left out but they've got to kind of they're picking up the pace a bit so originally sorry Mayers yeah um originally when we were all in discussion phase and trying to agree to an agreement and um once we finally approve Pro then it had to um internally go through our process and and whatnot so when we were in that discussion uh initial discussion phase yeah we anticipated that the first meeting start in December and be a three to four month long process um that Pro our internal um going to you know the different departments and the signatures and agreeing to a contract um didn't really come to fruition until probably mid to late December and then also holidays and all that this meeting um uh today was canceled there was some communication errors or whatever but I would say the combination of things will has caused our timeline to move up about a month considering that we were anticipating a start date of December we're we're now going to have a start date of January and if we're looking out we can anticipate still three to four months January February March April time getting a recommendation back to this body hopefully if things go as planned according to the scope now that now that we're in motion Miss Wilson no I'm fine thank you that actually was from the leadership accountability and measurement The Advisory team is M yeah um we're going to try to schedule something especially with what you spoke about out because I believe I I looked back at what you guys discussed and in regards to superintendent search and stuff like that then it would have to come back here by February we only got one meeting left before February 1 um so we'll schedule something soon Mr Sheen to just with the local control subcommittee there is a pending recommendation that the subcommittee made that's just waiting to come to the full board so for the next meeting there is we did take an action so regarding um positions stuff so or regarding the superintendency there is a recommendation coming back that it it will meet at end of January of the 27th so have announcements as this s Back event 5:30 Mar go round no no go ahead read the ones there but I do have one oh you have an announcement okay got it January 14th 5:30 lry go around January 15 Lauren schoolside council at 400 p.m. mayor G yeah uh just so that everybody's here bring it back to your neighbors your networks and for anybody watching at home there is a special election scheduled for January 28th the question on the ballot to change the position of whether or not you want to see the position of treasur change from elected to appointed there's information voter information and other um related information on the city website uh obviously you can call the city clerk's office as well um but just just put it in your calendars make a plan go out and vote let your networks know that January 28th there is a special election thank you so much Miss Wilson and again there's a policy uh governance subcommittee meeting tomorrow at 5:30 at suffk Street miss this is the first time I'm seeing what's the Lauren School site Council yeah it's a a a group of family members maybe business I don't know who exactly who is on it but they meet on a monthly basis and uh with the uh principal um this is a group that when we're ready to talk about the budget process you know the principal would actually work with them and you know ask them uh I think Ellie was talking about student councils earlier but this like School councils are made up of um you know it could be anybody it could be parents it could be a a business partner that is in the community of that school Ward um but that's that's what the school council is Mr Sheen I'm just going to add on to what the mayor said and ballots are actually available now so if you want to vote by mail um you can early vote um turn mine in today so at this point may I take a motion to a journ I make a you made a motion I'll second it oh those in favor I thought you okay will second all those in favor I thank you everybody meeting a journ at 7:45