##VIDEO ID:O5NquWzaL_Q## SCH America on Friday and iction in also hilarious uh we had a lot of big sporting events happen in the past couple of weeks on the 23rd our team did a great job at St Monday we had our football G and got but the Juniors put up a good fight so they're looking good2 um I also wanted to thank the teachers and everybody else that helped coach and together te Alum start ofs many teams my hockey practice and then Flex block on Tuesday seniors had a mental health collaborative which was a presentation about Mental Health Essentials for Beyond high school we discussed signs for symptoms in regards to mental health and a pyramid which showed us the levels of mental health States and our presenters Miss Hanley and Miss prisco did a really good job using visuals and personal anecdotes to discuss really hard topics and make the conversation about mental health easier and more accessible to finish up I wanted to give out some dates for upcoming events on Monday the nth there's a winter band jazz concert and Tuesday the 10th there is going to be a chor and or concert and both are going to be thank you anybody have any questions comments for you I did not then if you want to move into the construction upate okay thank you um so just going through uh the project uh at this point there's still been no safety concerns um in the month of November the schedule the project is on schedule with the final completion um slated for August of 26 in terms of the budget we are 86% spent at this time there have been no quality issues um FF Furniture fixture equipments technology and security we are putting together the package to procure the it equipment and there have been no issues so far this month or the month of November again just a overview um looking at the construction site just a review the yellow is again the existing School in the play area the gray is the driveway the parking and the Loop Road the Orange is the new building and the construction trailers are way over on the side in the dark GRE so looking at some of the construction activities the exterior wall was taken down um in the pods that are between the classrooms on the far side this is where the new addition will break through into the hallway so you can see that initial demolition they took down the exterior siding um put up another uh sheet of plywood on the inside um but basically getting prepped for that um connection this is a view of the geothermal the supply and return lines uh that go from the the field down to the Vault so you can see also the picture of the Vault and this is where everything gets connected from underground into the Vault and then into the building this first picture is a view of the CMU block that's installed at the foundation um that outlines basically the future concrete slab on grade pour that will happen and the next Plumbing shows the underslab plumbing that was uh taking place before they can pour and again the underslab plumbing and the electrical conduits that are getting in place before they pour the slab so looking at the progress this month uh the geothermal circuit piping was tested flushed backfilled and the geothermal Vault has been set in place trenching for the geothermal Supply and return lines from The Vault to the addition is in progress underground plumbing and electrical install is in progress ledge hammering and removal is in progress as needed uh excavation for hydronic piping and remaining drainage structures is in progress the base course of the CMU block at the foundation walls uh prepping for that slab on grade core damp proof proofing rigid installation install and back filling has been completed at the foundation walls next month look ahead so the month of octob uh December uh obtaining the building permit allowing the struct Al steel install pouring that slab on grade at the new addition begin the structural steel that's when you'll the building gets real when you see the steel start popping up continue the site work um continue the submitt process uh and continue the contractor me coordination um and there have been no change orders for this month looking at the budget update the architect expenditures to date is 66% thought I had a loud enough voice apologize OPM expenditures to date is 26% and the construction uh Billings to date is 10% moving into charleswood not much has changed from the last uh update but the one bullet point that is very important that did complete is the meepa process so getting the meepa process completed allows us to get our Project funding agreement from the msba which will then begin to start the cash flow to the town so that is an important Milestone the rest of the bullet points are the same uh as the last um update so again looking at the next major Milestones these again have not changed but the general contractor and subcontractor preall process will happen concom public hearing on the street improvements and potential select board impr approval the final estimate of 90% CDs will happen in January of 25 with bidding documents in March or April of 25 and the Construction contract award in May of 25 and just to continue to put this timeline in front of the community for both the charleswood and uh Hopkins school in terms of completion you can see that the building completion for charleswood would be in the first quarter of 28 and the building completion for the Hopkins lower middle school will be in the 4th quarter of 26 to the first quart first second quarter of 27 with the modular moving in the third quarter of 28 that's it if there's any questions in the next month look ahead it says obtain building permit yes so there's certain things that they're allowed to do with temp building permits if you will so they've been able to work with the permit that they have um but the next step is getting that final P permit got any other questions thank you very much that then moves us uh into the superintendence report all right we've also received some advice from the outside if you're talking tonight into a microphone you've got to be pretty close to it they're advising us so just so you know and for those of you who are coming up later all right so thank you this is the superintendent's report for December say the fourth the fth I don't know what dat is uh 5th 20 2024 I don't know how I got to that right there anyway um so in this presentation tonight I just want to share with you that we have a high school teacher who was one of the finalists um of teacher for Teacher of the Year in Massachusetts I want to talk a little bit about the Middle School US News and World Report ranking and then I also want to spend some time clarifying um some information around swatting um in other kinds of hoax events so here's CM Breen she's an English teacher at the high school um she as you can see uh desie says congratulations your school has produced a semi-finalist for the 2025 Massachusetts teacher of the year so we're very proud of Sam Breen uh she does a great job um and she works in the English Department which is among our favorites um okay at the middle school you probably saw that US News and World Report uh ranked them 11th in Massachusetts which was really nice um um in terms of reading proficiency we were at 16th in a tie and math proficiency 11th in a tie uh what they do is they rank individual middle schools so there are really over 400 different middle schools across Massachusetts I think it's about 437 if I'm remembering the number correctly um so it's really quite an honor I think for us to be ranked that high and as I always like to do I like to show some of the per pupal expenditures for the people who are ranked above us so I took them out in order Brooklyn Lexington melmont and Needum uh there were a couple other communities in there um for example Weston's in there we always talk about Weston because their per pupil is close to 30,000 but Brookline is at 258 Lexington 22736 Belmont 18, 294 NM 22808 and our per pupil expenditure in Hopkinson is at 16 so as I like to say our kids a very good education at a very nice price U so I want to talk about emergency pre procedures again and you're probably thinking didn't we just do this a couple of meetings ago and the answer is yes we did just do this a couple of meetings ago um but on Tuesday December 3D which was just a couple of days ago uh we met with the select board the police officials and fire officials and we did that because we were invited to that select board meeting to really review the Hopkinson High School swatting event that took place on October 1st and it felt like at that meeting there was some confusion in our community about why shelter in place was chosen so I want to go back to the Alice protocol because that's what we did not use on the day of the swatting incident and you can see that I have put those circles all over that that screen because I want to really emphasize that Alice is not something that happens chronologically um while it will make an acronym with alert lockdown inform counter and evacuate any of those things could happen in any order and then they can even happen reiteratively so uh we could alert and inform and then continue to inform we could lock down uh we could evacuate we could counter we could evacuate all of those things continue to happen in an ALICE protocol the Alice protocol is really only designed so that we have a means of practicing something to ensure that a school or any really other institution uses this protocol as well is prepared to uh respond proactively given the threat of a shooter or some kind of an intruder so we did not use an ALICE protocol on that day um but instead what we did was we went into a shelter in place so when we determined or I shouldn't say we determined when the police determined on October 1st that the hopkington High School event that was taking place was a swatting event meaning that it was a hoax it was not real um that kind of eliminated the threat of an intruder or an active shooter and when you eliminate that threat that's when you decide to do the shelter in place now can you ever fully eliminate that threat probably not but the certainty is like greater than 99% and I'll tell you how they get to that decision um coincidental L uh the administrators in the district were actually signed up for a um a webinar entitled responding to and investigating bomb threats and swatting hoaxes and that was to take place on Wednesday October 9th so we were already registered to take that that webinar when our swatting event took place on October 1st and it's important I think for people to see who was presenting that webinar to us so that was presented to us by the FBI Boston Unit and also by the Massachusetts State Police so we felt like they were foremost authorities on this and when we attended uh we learned a lot so what did they promise before we signed up they said that that one-hour training would provide attendees an overview of the reality of bomb threats and swatting hoaxes and include a detailed review of statistics and current trend Trends as seen across the country the training would also cover the characteristics of hoax calls law enforcement best practices for assessment and response and the decision-making process for evacuation or Sheltering in place nowhere on that DEC description does it say lockdown it talks about evacuating or Sheltering in place and I think that that's important for the community to understand uh so what criteria do we use to determine that it's a hoax what you see on the screen inside that big box uh is actually a slide from their webinar what they shared with us in the webinar is that six s since 1764 there have been over 500 acts of violence at schools K to 12 and college and then they also informed us that no school shooter or active shooter had ever provided a direct warning via telephone email or social media that is the first and number one one indicator that it's a hoax so when someone called the police station on that day and said that you there was an active shooter in the building and two people had already been shot he was in a second floor bathroom there was a high likelihood at that point that it was a hoax that it was a a swatting event so what other criteria can be used to determine that it's a hoax if the receiver of the call so someone in the police station is able to keep the caller on the line and ask particular questions for example questions about geographic location or favorite teachers or courses or home rooms or names of hallways so examp for example we could say oh second floor which Wing um and that person may not be able to answer at all because they have never been anywhere near Hopkinson High School the caller won't have answers so that's another way to help us to decide that um it is in facta hoax um if the caller is using inflammatory language and the presenter actually said sort of Call of Duty language it's another very strong sign that it's a hoax if the call is coming from a far away place and ours came from Missouri we believe if they mispronounce the name of the school or of the community if the call comes from a virtual private Network or non-traceable number it's very likely to be a hoax and also if there's sort of an uptick in cases in a particular geographic area so if what we start to see is uh in Massachusetts starting on Monday there are five different hoax calls and then on Tuesday there are seven and then on Wednesday they're at two it's not unlikely that the ones that come in on Thursday and Friday are also going to be swatting calls um and then on October 1st if someone really had been shot in high school we heard no gunshots and the police only received one call what we know is that when there's an actual Intruder in a school building what will happen is the local police station will be flooded with calls literally thousands of calls people calling and calling there was only one call and that was the call that came from the swatters so once we determined that that we were near to certain and I like to say near to certain because we say we certain at about 99.9999% um the police came in and it was Officer Walker who said you're going to do a shelter in place and when we talk about sort of that command unit or you know who's kind of governing what's happening for a while it was the Hopkinson High School administration but when the police came in they sort of take take over in that that position so we were asked to shelter in place and that's what Mr Bishop did with his faculty and staff um so I want to talk a little bit just to really clarify the differences between Alice and shelter in place Alice is really used for times of intruder or active shooter threat a shelter in place is used in times of a hoax a medical emergency so for example if we have a student who needs to leave the building in an ambulance will shelter in place just to give that student the Privacy to get out into the ambulance um or other low threat emergencies so you know some of those kinds of things could be some kind of a chemical spill or something where you would want kids to be you know secure inside classrooms or other school spaces um with Alice the decision making will eventually fall um and that's according to the protocol and it's based on best assessment to the adults in charge in the room so all five of us sitting at this table could have classrooms one next to the other in a hallway in a school and as over the public address system we are learning the movements of that Intruder we're all decision makers I could decide to take my class and run to the exit Mrs Ric could decide to stay in a lock down in her classroom with her students so the decision making really does become uh more distributed I think in analice and in a shelter in place that that's not necessarily true um go ahead do you um work with the teachers on how to process and make that decision we do U the middle school for example has already done one of these drills and then what happens afterward is um if you go back to the scenario that we are all adjacent classrooms in one hallway and I decide to take my kids and everybody else doesn't we'll have conversations about Carol Kavina why did you decide to evacuate your students when everybody else didn't because that that is what really it all boils down to is decision making that you think is the best possible decision in the moment uh and then in Alice the ideal end result is obviously elimination of the threat but also a safe evacuation uh what police will tell us all the time is that we used to do lockdown and that might have been about 15 years ago and then they started to say lockdown is really not optimal because if you have a group of kids in a corner of a room um it's you know untimely death is all but certain if somebody is able to sort of penetrate that that door that wall of that room and get in there um so a safe evacuation is what we're always kind of looking at it's always harder to hit a moving Target whether you are a trained officer or whether you are someone who is using a gun for the first time so the difference between shelter in place and a lockdown is simply where your students are in the room correct it kind of is that yes when when we're locking down we ask kids to kind of hover in a place where they can't be seen through the door and you know where they're nice and quiet so that someone would even believe someone was in that room shelter in place our teachers kept teaching on that day U and so during that shelter in place people didn't really know what was happening and we had people you know I I create a scenario in say some people were doing acids and bases some people were teaching the unit circle some were reading novels and that's what kept happening in that shelter in place um the ideal end result ing the shelter in place is that student and staff remain in place until the emergency whether it's real or perceived is eliminated now even though we are 99.9999% sure that what this is is a hoax because all of the signs are there the police still come in and check all of those bathrooms to ensure and then they clear the building and so that's what we mean when we say that a threat that is either real or perceived is eliminated the shelter in place is lifted and then you know or if the Shel in place could not be lift lifted some other course of action could be pursued so I just wanted to make sure that people understood why we chose shelter in place on that day because it seemed like there was some misinformation around that and that's all I have for you thank you other questions or comments from the committee or Savannah I know you liveed through the the swatting incident okay and seeing none I will move into the school committee chair report uh payroll warrants I'm just going to move this so it goes into hcam payroll warrants S250 one0 and s211a have been approved and included in your folder I did receive uh we all received an email today from uh somebody with regards to the budget uh also have received some interest from community members about serving on the screening committee that we discussed at the last meeting so we'll discuss that later in the meeting tonight but just wanted to pass that along are there any liaison reports that people have tonight okay um the lpac met on 11252 24 that's the English learner parent advisory Council um there were two board members present sha Shan Lin and Marcela Rodriguez we met with Jen suker they were discussing future event ideas to be inclusive of the family members kids and for parents only um they're really focusing on developing Community among families from multiple angles which was great and they discussed the benefits of a virtual Workshop to improve access for families with an interactive Q&A at the end thank you all right if there are no others for now we'll move into the new business uh which is the first thing on our new business is the budget presentations we have all of our principles here as well as the athletic director I have in the agenda uh starting with Marathon unless there's something that you guys would prefer to to move around so and then I'm going to invite I know Jean burchman is here from the Appropriations Committee Gan if you want to come up and sit on stage so you're ready right by the microphone to you can sit on either side you can pick this is the longest walk the loudest chair it's kind of like beauty pageant yeah I know I'm not used to that welcome well hello everyone thank you for obviously having me to share what our budgetary needs are for next year so I'm sure you took a look at the marathon proposed budget and you saw there's not any asks in here quite honestly but overall the FY 26 Marathon budget it to me sounds like a large number because that's not certainly my my budget that I'm used to dealing with and my personal life it is 4, 85,500 per. but when you look at the budget and not requesting staff at this time or anything those are really contractual obligations that make up that increase there are there's an increase for the Personnel summary which is the daily substitute budget over the last few years we have been short in that that line item we aim to cover our teachers our PA of professionals our staff when they are out to best continue and carry on our learning that is essential so recognizing that was regularly short over the last few years a decision um you know and an ask is to increase that that account you'll see that our supply item is Lar larger than it's been in the past this year the proposed budget is 77,000 um 500 um $30 and what makes that seem larger but it's really not is that Marathon now has the budget for everybody in the building which seems to make sense in the past special education budget supplies came out of special education preschool supplies had come out of preschool esol teachers needed things they came out of the esol and it was a lot of different accounts for people that were all in Marathon so now in terms of streamlining the process ideally eventually it's efficient because we're ordering and it's coming to one central location buying perhaps items in Greater bulk but when you increase that volume it does increase the total when you look at what Marathon spends a lot of money on it is consumables being an early childhood school we are going to use construction paper we are going to use a variety of paper chart paper lined paper plain paper paper of different sizes and That's essential to unlearning that's never going to be replaced with um a stagnant um whiteboards are great but white birds are not everything we need um you know to be able to cut and glue and shape and do all sorts of things with that but but something that I did not yet go over and I'll go over that now I apologize for skipping that is our enrollment when you look at where we are projected to be that is why we do not need to ask for additional classroom teachers additional Staffing at this point we've been fortunate in past years that when we've had a request to add a Kindergarten class and please increase those related arts or adjustment counselor we've been able to um receive those requests and help us do um the best job that we can do next year we are projected to have 437 um students at Marathon in kindergarten first grade so with kindergarten that would be 258 students averaging 18.4 I always love how you get the points when you're talking about children in class size 18.4 in a class in first grade the projection is 279 students with 19.9 students in the class for an early childhood building philosophy approach those are fantastic numbers for us um so we are really really looking forward to that um coming true as we know that's often very difficult I remember years ago one of the projections they said kindergarten and Ninth Grade are the hardest grades to predict enrollment because families often change and I do see that this year one little Side Story um we had information about our open houses in our newsletters shared out with details but on the online calendar it just said open house we had families drive from hours way asking where to go and I said well you go see your teacher they weren't there yet they were checking out our school so next year I will make sure that I put a description on the online public calendar that go here and then you come to the open house yes um let me see here uh any special education requests are in um Abby hanscom's budget she presented that your last meeting so there might be special education requests that would uh support Miron but that would be part of that budget preschool teaching staff would be part of that budget it's the preschool supplies for general education that are part of the marathon budget so hopefully that makes sense in terms of where where those things lie with that do you have any any questions great any questions from the committee you may not have this answer Dr Cav how accurate are the Dr Wagman projections because the email we got today plus I've seen other stories in the last year that there seems to be some numbers or projections that contradict Dr Wagman is that a real person or is that the name of no it's a real person um so Mrs rmck actually has the enrollment numbers open right now on her laptop so she can tell you how far we are from where we need to be in predicted to be in June of 2026 um right so when you look at where uh Dr Wagman had us projected for the 2324 school year um we went over that projection by 133 students for this year uh where the projection is which is where we should be at the end of June there's were only 49 students away now from where we could be at the end of June so last year we went way over what the projection was and at this point in time students enroll all year long so we're only 49 students away from hitting where we should be in June so they're they're very true and again last year we went way over the projection historically do we I mean that's we're going we're going over the projection every year every year yeah I can't say we ever like significant below what the projection is you know if we get that Target that's great yeah we have not we have not been below his Target so as you set up the budget you're basing it on his Target yes right which we always go over so does that present a problem it did one year and then the next year we added a Kindergarten class because that year we had 24 children in the kindergarten class and that was not ideal it was very challenging so we we played catchup if you will in the moment we couldn't address it because we didn't have the space so that might if we had had the space maybe we could have addressed that earlier than the next year that was a factor with that so can you remind me now what what is the status of the art room at Marathon it is back to an art room so with um the addition that was completed approximately a year ago at this time everybody was moved in at this time into their new home October November we moved into that addition the art room returned to an art room the music room returned to a music room the library returned to only being the library the health room is still a preschool room it will always be a preschool room um the these numbers for next year something that they allow us to do and I just want to knock on wood that we've never done is hit the target that the building was built for with class size so part of the educational plan you worked on that a lot with charleswood you know what is your philosophy what's your design how are you going to instruct your students the numbers predicted for next year aligned with that um we've never met them because of the enrollment that will increase but we very well might next year and that would be super Jean do you have any questions for Appropriations just one what is what's the enrollment this year I knew you were gonna ask that so I've got that so kindergarten in first grade this year we are 552 when you add in preschool we're 647 awesome thank you yep that's all I and I know shy du from the select board often watches from home I don't know if there's um somebody else from the select board here that wants to do you have do you have any questions Amy okay do you want to come up in case you do for the next one you're welcome to come up and Crouch do you want to come up so if you have questions for the next presenters we could move back we got a spot right over here up to you though is it a problem that the health room is not a health room it was lovely to have when we had it our teachers fantastic she teaches from a cart she does amazing things is it terrible that we don't have it no would it be nice to have the health room back yes okay so when you're talking health room it's not like the nurse's room no no no it's an instructional course so our Wellness teachers teach phys physical education okay and our Wellness teachers also teach health class like uh right now great incredible lessons it's on personal safety and personal um you know safety with children like these are important lessons they're teaching about how to take care of their teeth their body their health eating habits but also helping keep children safe in terms of what's appropriate what's not appropriate um so she travels uh we have our our house teachers travel to classes to that now thank you unless there are any other questions we can move sorry go ahead it may not be just for the might be more for kind of more globally if Dr what is his name Wagman and he is real he did come I remember when we were in the Middle School in 2019 before the pandemic he came and presented here all right so we rely on him for projections across the district and we base the budgets on his projections and we always go over so he's wrong every time well to be fair we used to use a company called NASDAQ and and they were we would go way over so he tracks a little more closely to be fair okay I get it's not an exact science but You' think sometimes he'd get it right okay so but does I assume that presents a challenge to all the principles and all and the district and the budget how so how do we do we then just start robbing Peter to pay Paul and how do we fix that if we base the budget on projections that we always exceed so it's interesting because if you have 14 classrooms at a grade level and 14 kids come into that grade level you can absorb them pretty readily because 21 kids go to 22 and then if another 14 come in 22 go to 23 it's at that point where you'd have to have a lot of kids come into a grade level for it to be really so there's a margin of error there is essentially okay all right but I will say in the one place where things are d Dynamic and you don't really know what's going to happen sometimes our special education numbers fluctuate so we may have to take a bcba out of one school or a special moderate or an intensive special educator an OT or PT and just move them around to kind of follow case loads it's that's not ideal but it's one of the things that we do yes that's right and so yeah so missing the projections from a budget standpoint is not the projections aren't so poorly projected that classrooms schools principles can't absorb those additional students typically we can do that yes all right got it thank you a worst case scenario sometimes is and Mr Bishop can speak to this but sometimes you plan to have 50 kids sign up for a French class and 75 kids do and now you're short a teacher during one period right so those things happen okay all right got it thanks are we thinking at some point we ought to have another set of projections done um like a deep dive not obviously this year but is that something that would be recommended now since it's been since 2019 to recalibrate yeah and just to keep in mind we did a projection preco and then we did do a projection postco so there already was an adjustment um so yes sorry these projections aren't done every year every year that's budgetary I so when you're because you're doing a 10-year projection uh a lot of the assumptions are kind of going to be the same so the information isn't going to drastically change but a couple years later and you start to see more actual then then things could change a little bit more so annually you probably wouldn't see a big shift but after a couple years and you look at your Trends you could see a better shift got it what's the cost to have one of these done about 7,000 less than 10 okay anybody else thank you um for all of that information uh GNA invite Mr Bron Ander to come up to present on El oh yeah go ahead wait can you wait for the short short microphones here because we're not at HQ yeah the um filment numbers I think you presented to us early in the budget season um but where would one find that on the website um in the packet from that meeting date need and a so yeah well it's not for me morly for the public like if it was sorry if it's on the budget page or or the just the budget presentation would be on the budget page probably right that would be helpful yes we can do that sure great welcome hi nice to see everybody nice to see you um all right so um thank you for the opportunity to does that work uh thanks for the opportunity to be here tonight to present the uh Elmwood FY 26 um budget request um so at Elwood currently we have 645 students that uh make up our student population and um you know looking ahead to the projections that we just spent a minute or two talking about uh Dr Wagman has us projected for 674 students in second and third grade at Elmwood for next school year um so I'm looking at calculating our c costs uh we did Round Up to consider 680 students when considering our costs uh thinking about our budget requests um so overall the El school budget uh increase for fy2 excuse me to FY 26 uh we're looking to uh request a 3% increase um and that includes our new Personnel um specifically we are uh asking for a Personnel increase of 130,000 $550 71 and a non-p peral expense account increase of $769 excuse me one um excuse me um our most significant request is for an additional 1.0 assistant principal position um currently we have one assistant principal that supports our 645 student population U Mrs tinan uh she does an outstanding job um and I'm sure folks can appreciate and understand it is really a demanding job uh the assistant principal supports all of our students and families uh supervises and evaluates our staff uh leads and co-leads educational initiatives and professional learning opportunities um and also supports Positive Behavior Uh work within our school building and also on the school buses um adding a second assistant principal beginning in FY 26 uh would allow for each uh position to provide a more individualized uh attention and support for our students families and staff um and also uh making it a far more manage manageable case load of roughly 340 students um rather than you know the 680 student number if one assistant principal were serving in that position um our other Personnel increase and principal deau spoke to this as well uh we are looking to increase our Elwood substitute account um and we're looking to increase that to a total of $80,000 uh that is a fairly significant increase that's a 76.4% increase from our current fy2 uh line item there um and as principal deau alluded to that's being requested due to um just what we've seen in an increase uh average staff absences over the last several years um and that will really help us to um provide our highest level of support and continuation of learning for students um when staff is absent um finally we're requesting um a $3,829 increase that's about 6.2% to our Elwood expense accounts um with only really our general office supply account showing increase greater than $1,000 um for that it's important to not too we are not looking to increase the amount that we're spending per student um but we are considering 680 students as our number rather than sort of our 640 which we used as our projection last year um we did decide based off of review of existing materials and estimated needs um not to increase three line items and those are specifically our guidance supplies March Madness texts and our PBIS expense accounts so that is a a quick sort of overview I'm happy to answer any questions that folks have is there an ideal kind of ratio ass system principle to students so that's a great question um I don't know if that number exists in my head I can tell you just seeing the day-to-day work um that an assistant principal does it's it's vast um you know it's many directions and I do think 640 students which is about what we're projected for last year 645 students right now um um the time that goes into working with each individual student and family um as things arise things that are planned and unplanned um you know like I said Mrs tinan is awesome she does a great job um I think we're functioning really well right now and I think that the need is such that as we continue to grow in in both number and also just diversity and um student you know coming with with students coming with various needs and and um you know looking to support every student I do think that 680 students for one assist is a number that does really feel too high I agree with oh sorry correct I just wonder if what research said I I think even at 300 and some especially at that age level that that's still a a lot of kids and parents for sure um yeah there's never a shortage of work absolutely um so I don't know if that number exists for anybody else but um you know like I I said I think that that number has reached a point for us where it's really important that we start to look to add that additional staff um and also I think part of the consideration for asking for this position now is thinking ahead you know couple years down the road as well when the charleswood building opens and the staffing needs that absolutely are going to be required at that time um so I think by us starting to think about it now it allows us to set us set ourselves up a little bit for the future as well what's the um and this may be a question for Dr Kavanaugh what's the principal assistant principal ratio amongst the other schools in the district so they are it's principal and assistant principal right yes for so two people for 600 yes um in Mrs deo's building she is working with just one assistant principal however U if we think about the integrated preschool she has an administrator who runs the integrated prek so the students who are in there like the hundred students there you could take them out because they kind of have their own administrator um so it's probably more like 550 or so something 5ish yes to the assistant principal in that building last year the reason we added one at Hopkins is that they got up to about 687 students last year with one assistant principal and typically elementary schools will have much better ratios of you know principal to students in to principal to students ours are just getting very high I think one of the slides I have shown uh at town meeting is when I started here there were about 480 students at Hopkins and today there were like 680 students at Hopkins so 200 more students and we just recently added one assistant principal and do we have testing or some type of metric that shows how are the students doing at Elwood they doing good the students are our stud students always do well I think academically however um and maybe David you could speak to this far better than I can but you know our kids when they're seven and eight they don't always do very well in unstructured places for example the school bus so Mrs tinan ends up with a stack of bus slips and has to call down a number of kids and talk about behavior on the bus um and then there are things that happen in the classroom so Mrs tyan will call down kids and try to figure out what is happening whether it's as know big an investigation as bullying or if it's something like two kids just aren't getting along at recess so that happens all day she's dealing with kids and in Conflict but also as Mr Broner said evaluating teachers making sure that schedule goes off for the day making sure that substitutes are in the appropriate classrooms like all of that work happens behind the scenes as well it's a lot of work she'll tell you that she uh when we have absenteeism letters for examp example every time a student gets to their seventh absence we have to send a letter home and she probably sends literally hundreds of letters to families and that's a lot of work putting them together every time you know we get to another seven benchmark yeah thank you and we really I'll say that we would not be asking for a position that I didn't feel like we needed know I say to our directors and our building principles all the time know we are living in a time of need to have not nice to have got it thank you all right and just want to go Jean did you have anything for Appropriations all my questions Amy do you have any questions the letters so yeah so I don't think I have any questions and then I'm just going to ask a quick question Susan do you still have the um projections pulled up the enrollment Pro projections what were the enrollment projections for Elmwood for uh this fiscal year oh I I have the actual you the actual okay so I'm just wondering how far over we were to get to the 645 maybe you know that so I'm I'm don't quote me 100% but I think we estimated 640 last year with the projection sitting somewhere around 631 or two and we're currently 6:45 so a little over projection and the projection for next year I and the reason why I'm focusing on projections right now just we did receive a an email from to the school committee on this specific to Elmwood and I just want to make sure that it's flushed out a little bit for folks at home but and so the 674 is what we have as projected that the budget is based on and that's tracking looking at the grade behind the first graders coming in correct thank you apprciate that thank you sorry so in trying to find um any research to support the number of Administrators to staff um the only thing that popped up relatively quickly is from 2019 um which has a formula of 0.008 times the number of Staff what what's the number of staff that we have at Elwood sorry um no that's okay yeah it's uh it's not an exact it's just over a 100 if you include all staff members so according to this two is less than the result all right so if there are no other questions we'll move on to uh to Hopkins thank you thank you very much thank you and we'll invite Mr Carter up so before we get started Savannah I know if that you had stuff you had to take care of at home so feel free when you've hit your time limit to to step out I don't want you to last time I was on the stage I believe I performed Ken at the uh fifth grade show if anyone remembers that it was an Aller I can only do it once though I gave I left it all out there on the stage so um thank you for having me and thank you for uh considering the budget requests that we've put in here for Hopkins school um currently uh projecting that grade four next year would be around 336 students grade five being around 347 currently right now we have 15 sections in fourth grade and 15 sections in fifth grade to balance out those classes so they would be around 22 23 kids per class at this point it doesn't really matter how many more kids come we're sort of running out of space to put those extra kids hence the building project that we're going through but I think that our class sizes will probably be around the same as what we have now overall we're asking for an increase of $15,452.57 [Music] and just to kind of go into a little bit of the reasoning for that um right now we have students that act access our tier 2 reading supports there's around 50 to 60 students uh during the year that access that however we do have about 100 to 120 kids that will fall into that sort of um partially meeting range on some of our assessments so it doesn't mean that every kid needs tier two most of the kids that need it are getting it um but with the addition of this position it would allow us to provide those teer true services is in the classroom um part of the mtss model that we're implementing really stresses kids being in the classroom uh when they can be right now for us to get all of our kids to access that tier two support we sort of have to pull groups of kids from different classrooms to then go with the reading tutor or the reading specialist so uh having this person who specializes in Reading they sort of have that expertise um above the the gened who's already supporting classrooms would be really valuable for our kids that are in the yellow range that we're looking to sort of bump up in reading so that's where that ask comes from um like the other elementary schools we are requesting to increase our sub account to $770,000 which is a 62% increase and that does reflect a three-year average that shows an increase in staff absences uh we do use Subs to cover teachers and Par professionals so that we can make sure that kids are getting the support they need every day uh We've also in included an increase to our Hopkins General Supply um we did not last year and this is just as a result of certain thing items that we buy going up in cost uh the reader notebooks that we've purchase for each kid has gone up in cost our PBIS initiatives uh have gone cost so um that 3,700 is a reflection in in the increased cost of of getting all of those General Supply items for our kids and then lastly a request for 750,000 $750 um to increase the assistant principal's professional development uh account um and that is something that is contractually obligated with the addition of the assistant principal at the school um we do have funds for professional development for each of those staff members and so this would add that into the budget that's it thank you yeah are there questions uh comments from the committee the 62% bump in the sub I mean that's obviously substantial is that just based on kind of Po projections and prior years based on I assume it's just teachers missing school and being sick or maternity or sick days all that kind of stuff it could be all of those yeah all of those things um I just want to say thank you for asking for the extra reading support being able to provide that support in the classroom we know is so incredibly valuable thank you do you have anything Amy did you have anything 750,000 oh no yes so we're hoping to save a few minutes for that I can't prise anything for this year but I will be up here with something new we'll make sure that we we do that for our budget for next year then and I will say the the staff that do it with me carry me so hopefully they show up for me again all right thank you very much absolutely appreciate it all right and with that we'll move into the Middle School Mr the fave good evening thank you for welcoming me tonight to uh present the middle school budget um for next school year um I'll start with uh the enrollment projections which has been a topic of Interest tonight um so our projection for next year is 1,63 students um of note we did hit our Milestone this week of um over a thousand students interestingly enough um as of today we're at a th in one which was the projection for this year so we'll at least be over it so thought that was thought that'd be interesting to point out yeah we did pass the way to go yeah we're not there yet so we'll yeah forget it take it we'll be be a little over yeah we'll be a little over so yeah at a,1 today and projected to be at 1063 um next year so um overall the the Middle School bu budget for next year that's being proposed is a slight decrease of 4% it's a total representing a total of decrease of $2 29,8 se5 I think that money is largely coming from a reduction in um one-time purchases like big ticket items that we were able to purchase last year um furniture for classrooms um Etc so there's a slight decrease um to the to the budget um the the one position that we are looking for for next year is a point4 FTE for orchestra and this would support uh the growing number of students in grade six Orchestra and I guess what I'll call the unique needs that they present so in um grade six um as students are still learning in some cases to hold their instruments properly but definitely tuning their instruments that takes the bulk of the teachers time so um this position uh is being proposed at 0 4 to support essentially the two periods of related arts in grade six um specifically the Orchestra program um so that point4 um is budgeted at um $ 29,6 um as you heard from the other principls this evening um we're also asking for the increase um to cover for substitute teachers at the middle school um looking at previous years um came up with a number to propos of 56.8% that is equivalent to $36,000 for the for the year um in terms of expenses um there are four line items that are um increases over a thousand three of those are purely due to rising cost and Rising student enrollment um and then one new item um newer to the budget is our math supplies budget um one of the unique things about the math experience um in grade eight at hopkington middle school is um we're essentially using a textbook that's been designed by our own teachers that um functions as a workbook so it's really a consumable um we have for the last um years that I've been here we've run those packets and workbooks off on our copy machines um that's not a cost effective or time efficient manner of doing that so um I've priced this out to um send these packets out to a printing company um to get it turned over um quicker but um that is that is a a new addition um to our expenses at the school that's our so does that you're talking about something about now yes to a to a printing company so that's not taking you know teacher time standing at a machine while those workbooks are being so also cut down on the amount of paper it should cut down on the amount of paper as well I was thinking back to last year and I don't remember if the middle school was one of them but we discussed a lot of copers last year in the need for replacement we would be one of those schools on the the copers is probably helped by that as well for sure I'm more Curious the drop from the seventh to eth grade projections that's due to kids going off to private schools is that typically why there's fewer eighth graders than there are seventh graders I looked at that number as well I mean there are a small number that moved to private school um this was just a smaller class so we're we're seeing I mean our current seventh grade historically not that's correct while you might say a smaller class I have very Vivid memories of when we had very few classes that had over 300 and we're looking at your grade seven inching up towards 400 yeah it's the current yes y next year's grade seven how is the middle school for space with that many students in a classroom 25 seems like a big class for um Middle School um 25 per class makes the classroom feel very small um it's tight um I was joking with uh Mr Bishop the other night that when I speak to the ninth graders when they come back to visit um they immediately tell me how much better the hallways feel at the high school because they're they're so much bigger so um it's it's it's it's tight they physically bigger in the high school yes so in the students no the students feel they are physically bigger and the students notice that difference um right away yeah we're we're pressed for space for sure there questions questions Jean Amy you have any okay great thank Youk you thank you right appreciate that invite Mr Bishop up for the high school all right hello everybody nice to see you all uh thank you for having me and giving me the opport to talk about the high school and the FY 26 budget last time I was on this stage similar to Mr Carter I was in a performance of bye-bye birdie where I was a reporter and have not been asked back yet since then so clearly I know my Lane here um but thank you very much uh this is a process that is uh very collaborative I know uh my colleagues talked about this it starts in the end of September beginning of October our budget process there's a lot of meetings that get taken place with subject matter leaders Central office assistant principles so I want to thank all of them for their help in in crafting this budget um you know I think we have put together what I believe is a fiscally responsible budget uh but also one that supports our students and staff so for our budget we are looking at an increase from FY 25 to 26 of 2.5% uh before Personnel requests so I thought I would go into our Personnel requests and then I'll talk a little bit about our expense summary requests so for our Personnel requests I know we've talked a lot about projections but even if you look at the actual numbers our eighth grade is bigger than our senior class uh by a total of about 15 students right now so we're going to see an increase there we usually get uh movein around anywhere from 15 to 25 kids so that number is going to increase our projections from Dr Wagman for next year are upwards of 1300 our current enrollment is 1276 so we are looking to add some positions at the school for next year 1.2 FTE which roughly adds up to about $888,000 uh to meet the increased enrollment and make sure we have class sizes that are appropriate we have multiple levels at the high school as I know Savannah knows well uh and we have different kind of class averages for those for reasons we have AP classes that usually are around 27 students to 28 students per class honors classes are generally around 25 to 26 our College Prep around 20 and our foundation class is around 10 to 12 students so we are looking for 1.2 FTE uh the breakdown for that request uh is a 6 increase in Staffing in our business Technology and Engineering Department specifically to increase the offerings for computer science we currently have a point4 computer science teacher which means that they teach two classes of computer science each semester so four total I think Mr lefave talked about it earlier when students sign up for classes we try to give them the classes that they want but sometimes we just don't have enough options for them computer science is one of those subjects where we could have run many more sections but we only had the Staffing to run two per semester so by adding some staffing into that department making that individual a 1.0 computer science teacher will'll be able to offer four to five sections of computer science per semester to meet the needs of students which I think would be great the other um Staffing we're looking for is a 6 French teacher uh to meet the level of interest of our students our French numbers are on the rise which is great uh but unfortunately we don't have the current Personnel to meet all those demands we've unfortunately not been able to run as many French sections as we we wanted to for those numbers we had to collapse a French five class as well as a French four class this year uh many of those students had to take French online which you can imagine is probably not the easiest discipline to learn so by adding a point six we've hoping to be able to bring the class averages down right now they're around 27 in French as well as um making sure that we like I said reduce those class sizes and making sure kids don't have to take French online if they want to take it so that's really the 1.2 increase at the high school uh in addition we do have a point4 wellness teacher that was approved by the school committee back in July that will be uh reflected in this FY 26 operating budget and similar to my colleagues we will be uh increasing our substitute account from 55,000 to 80,000 which is a 43% increase going to our expense summaries which includes equipment supplies textbooks and other expenditure accounts uh we're looking at an overall increase of 13,000 uh which is about a 3.9% increase from FY 25 to 26 we have 34 non-payroll expense Accounts at the high school 16 of those will be level funded or show a decrease between FY 26 and 25 of the remaining 18 accounts only five show an increase of $2,000 uh and so I have on the uh executive summary those five accounts with the reasons why the numbers are over 2,000 I'll quickly go through those one is in our co-curricular account we're up 5400 and that really is to uh make sure that we provide transportation coach buses for our students to the junior prom we have moved to this back in 2018 students used to get their own transportation now we try to provide it for them prom is a very expensive endeavor it's also a safe way for students to get to The Venue it's been a very big success for us uh we've been working with hop hop is an organizing of prevention they've been helping with grants to get those buses unfortunately we were told that that might not be the case this upcoming year uh so we wanted to make sure that we put the appropriate funding in this in this account so we can fund those prom buses yes um students buy prom tickets correct does any of that bus transportation go into that ticket cost not since we've had this process now that possibility it would increase that ticket price quite a bit but uh generally 60 60 to 75 yep yep and it's you know if you're bring a date from outside the school it cost might yeah so it's about $60 to $75 depending on the year and the venue so that's one account uh another account that's up is our um contracted Services we actually uh have installed uh new Vape detectors at the high school uh and there's an annual fee is associated with that so that is the increase in that account um we are also uh moving our graduation ceremony uh to be outside permanently we have done a little bit of both in the past um we've had it inside we've had it outside obviously during covid but now our classes as we've talked about over 300 are getting larger and larger and and while I think inside is a very nice ceremony um there's just too many kids and if kids want to invite their families and upwards of a number of guests we just can't fit everybody in the Athletic Center so we are making the decision to go outside starting this year permanently uh and so we need to put some additional funding in the graduation account for chair rentals ramp rentals other things that are associated with graduation and then the last account that's up that I wanted to comment on is our new equipment uh we have a lot of the equipment in our uh fitness center I know Savannah can talk about it uh was bought when we opened the building back in in 2001 2002 so some of it needs to be replaced um and so we have updated one treadmill this year and we're putting uh money in the budget for next year to purchase a new another new treadmill so we're trying to do that kind of over the course of many years as opposed to coming and say we need three or four new treadmills um and so those are the counts that are up in our expense summary that are over 2,000 um and that's pretty much it for the high school uh so I'm happy to answer any questions that you have thank you there questions from the committee san I don't know if you you have any question questions for Mr Bishop this would be a good time to well we're getting another one with the current budget but yes you Jean anything I think this is such a much more Equitable and safe way to give kids to so I wholeheartedly support it but that might be also an offset certainly we can certainly look into that Amy did you have anything thank you I think great thank you so much you up here for the next the next agenda item as well but um I can I can come back up yeah back yeah that's that's totally fine yeah I can make the Long Walk that's all right thank you but literally oh because we still have Athletics yeah we have Athletics and I have two on thank you all right so the next and final uh budget presentation for FY 26 is mrr for athletics nice to see you good to see all of you good evening and uh thank you all for having me up here to talk about Athletics budget for the FY 26 um so overall um the budget is looking at a 1.9% increase and I'd say most of that is from already pre approved stiens from last year um that you all approved that's varsity and JV um boys volleyball assistant varsity boys volleyball JV wrestling and a middle school track and field Sion and so um additionally we have a little bit of an increase in our contracted services and this is mainly due to our officials um the officials fees are going up by 7% and our ice hockey um rink fees have increased substantially but this is all offset by some um changes to what we've used for pools and so it's actually a decrease in that subject line um and a couple other decreases in some other areas of contracted services so the addition is actually only $4,600 um and then from the supplies and equipment line um you know I took a deep dive into what we've been purchasing over the last couple years and there's a number of things that we haven't purchased that we haven't the need to purchase which actually accounts for a decrease of $3,200 um for that subject line as for you know professional development event staff um that's all remain the same and so all we're looking for is an increase of uh $ 31,1 159 which is 29,000 of that is from the coach's salaries previously approved thank you are there questions on the Athletics budget comments okay so is the pool cost is that a different pool or is the pool cost um so it's a different pool that we've been using and um so previously we'd use a couple pools and we've gotten away from that we're only using one pool so it's actually less because we've only been using one okay Jean do you have any questions thank you so I I it's hard just because the microphone is not that close to you but it sounded like you said something about the Unified sports I said great job on the Unified sports sorry it's old news yeah we have a great um unified uh Sports Group and coaching group that has been doing this a long time and so you know they you know when we Matt introduced um Middle School unified botch and you know I I I helped out a little bit but that I know that went very well and um you know I'm excited about potentially expanding unified um you know at the middle school and U maybe even at the elementary schools eventually I'm excited to see the Unified sports expand I do remember when they first started and I know that um Hoppington has been recognized for Unified sports by Special Olympics as well so appreciate that as well Amy did you have any questions all right thank you very much appreciate and appreciate all of the um the budget presentations tonight um I have to also comment I don't know what others feel about this but I liked the way that we did this this year where we had more budget presentations on each night and we had fewer nights of budget presentations so I think last year we had like four nights of budget presentations so we ended up having an extra meeting in December because of it so all right then we're going to invite Mr Bishop back up thank you thanks Savannah night Savannah good night good night all right and this is for the Hopkinton High School Club advisory stiens for Mr Bishop who's welcome back hey thanks for having me nice to see you all again this for the reprise of the bye-bye birdie as well say again the the reprise of the bye-bye birdie role as well yeah yeah yeah I didn't get those prizes I still remember my line though actually it's just one line but uh so uh you want me to say it he's coming he's coming con Redbury is's coming yeah right there I nailed it yeah yeah that may have been better than it was when I actually did it gave you one line right I know after that yeah yeah I'll talk to the new Drama teacher we'll see what we can do um so I have do you is what order am I in is it the clubs first and then so Club advisory STP awesome all right so um I'm here to talk a little bit about uh our our club process at the high school and hoping and asking for your approval to reallocate some funding is as well as requesting some additional funding for our clubs uh one thing we pride ourselves on at the high school is having uh as many opportunities for students to participate in different things after school we currently have 72 different clubs uh and we have students coming into the office almost daily asking to start new clubs uh so we did put a formal process in place where they have to meet with the assistant principal and kind of go through a process of why they want to do the club who's the adviser how many kids are going to be part of it uh because we were getting so many requests and so year to year what we do is we have a club fair and September we see what clubs are running based on interest and advisors and then there's some clubs that might not run and we try to take those the funding for those clubs that are not running and have them go to clubs that are running right so every time a student comes and says I want to start a new club and we approve it it goes for one year without a stien if things are successful then we hope to try to fund it the following year so you can see on this this memo here we have 13 clubs that ran last year successfully that are looking to get a stien six clubs that are in the contract have run before but are not running this year because of either interest or advisor so what we're hoping to do is take the funding for the six clubs not running and fund six of those 13 clubs and then ask for an additional 38.92 for the seven clubs that have started for a year and run successfully so you can see the clubs that are no longer running on your memo on the leth hand side and then you can see the new clubs on the right hand side so happy to answer any questions that you have about the club process um or any of the specific clubs that are on this list is there a what's the minimum requirement to so we no we really try to have this the if a student comes forward our form has you must have an adviser and five students that are interested yep and is typically what what's the St usually it's about $556 yeah there are some uh clubs that might meet more often or participate in some type of uh competitions that might get paid a little bit more these ones are all $556 and that money would pay entry fees yep yeah all that stuff if it's not an entry fee what what are they using the money for usually it's just for this the coordinate the adviser yeah to run the clubs yep to run the clubs yeah so all these clubs would meet probably once a week after school yeah any other questions I I love how this is generated by student interest and that there's so many different opportunities for the high school students to be involved in different ways in the school so thank you for bringing that yeah know it can be confusing the way we do it but we we like to have all the clubs out there see which ones have interest almost like the club the classes that they pick right we have a bunch of classes we don't run them all we run what the students are interested in so that's basically what we have here with the clubs I think that's great yeah is there somebody that would like to make a motion I move that we read allocate $611 16 in the high school stipend account um and approve an additional $1,112 to cover newly established clubs second right so that's a a motion by Jamie and a second by Chris all those in favor I it's unanimous thank you very much for that you have one more which is the hopkington high school model un awesome yes so this is a uh overnight trip uh and so uh I know that in your packet you have some of the details of our model un trip it's coming up uh in February uh this year it's in Boston which is nice at the uh Marriott Copley Place uh this is one of those clubs actually if you look at the uh 13 that we've added uh this upcoming you one is a second advisor for the model un the number of students in model un has like tripled in the last few years uh congratulations to our advisers Savannah hison uh and Shay Eller they do a wonderful job and so um they are hoping to take students to the conference that's coming up it's a two and a half day conference it's an overnight so we need the approval of of school committee um 21 students have expressed interest in attending this conference uh they have been working really hard leading up to this uh focusing on different types of things like research skills diplomacy civil discourse um anyone's unfamiliar with a model un conference basically students kind of get assigned a country and a role and they have to debate students from across the country on different Global issues um last year we had students win Awards such as best delegate best position paper and best negotiator which is really awesome uh and exciting so this is a club that is um is really kind of taking off uh and I think the advisers have done a really nice job so we're looking for your approval and allowing them to go overnight to Boston uh for this uh really special experience there any questions on that you need a microphone I was just saying it was H I think it's a wonderful um event the skills that the students are learning are amazing and I make a motion to approve travel for the model un on February 7th through the 9th 2025 motion by Kyla second by Chris all those in favor I okay so that was also unanimous thank you very much thank you for thank you everybody thank you for your support we really appreciate it right have a good night have a good night great that brings us into the Adaptive uh playground Dr Kavanaugh thank you um so you know that uh thank you Mrs Rother MC has been working with a group um derived of um people who are citizen towns parents special education parents uh the director of student services suffice it to say there have been a lot of people on the playground committee and uh they have looked at multiple Parcels in town and it was decided that they would uh choose the marathon school to put the new adaptive playground um one of the reasons that they liked that spot is that they thought many of our most vulnerable students and students with special needs uh would be at the marathon School 183 days 180 days of the school year and then when school wasn't in session you know families could come and and enjoy the playground we were hoping that uh there would be a possibility that that project could be funded by the CPC um but but in the event that they don't approve that um and it does not seem likely that that they would uh and they you know we've already been before them and so what will happen now is they'll make a determination um whether or not they would like to but we're talking about it at this particular meeting because in terms of timing it works out so what we're wondering is if you as a board want to put that project forward without the CPC funding and have it go um as one of the school's capital projects Susan go if it um if we do that does that mean we won't be considered for CPC funding well the CPC will be making a determination about whether or not they want to fund it and so I mean if you if you do that they may take that as a sign that they that you have another plan um however I don't think that it I don't think it takes you away from the C PC option it would just be plan do we sorry go ahead when will they have that I believe meeting next we to at all theirs and has there been initial reason why not F you know do they have they said it's not appropriate or it's not what CPC funds are used for or the school committee should fund it or you know the school budget uh so I do believe that that is a big piece of it um the feedback that we received when we were before the committee uh was that it really was a school ask and not an Adaptive playground committee ask so it was difficult to uh separate the request from just being a school request so if a separate committee that wasn't a part of this the district requested it they would say oh that's a great idea we would approve CPC funds I mean this it's hard to say because it was the separate committee it was the Adaptive playground committee that was requesting would it have made a difference if the site selection had been different like fruit Street uh potentially as well they also do um consider requests of the park and Rex Department significantly so I don't think the fact that it came from the school committee is a determining factor in that way I do I do believe that they have a lot of requests um this year particularly I believe and and I think this is typical I think they do receive a lot of requests um so I think we as a committee just need to be prepared like I said have a plan B um a determination from this Committee of what you want to do in the event of not getting full funding or not getting full funding will not allow the project to move forward and watching the select board meeting on Tuesday night it seems like they're highly interested in the center School reion reuse plan that will take a significant amount of their funds so again you know just a request to the committee of what would you like to do in the event um because we will be presenting to cic Capital Improvement committee all of the capital requests of the school committee that you've already approved of which the playground was part of the presentation but it was always with the intention of moving it to a CPC Grant and just to clarify the cic meeting that we'll be attending is next Thursday night that's before or after they're concurrent actually same time well yes and no so the CPC is meeting on Thursday the 12th but I think their final review is the 16th which is a Monday but the but the we will not have another meeting before to determine what we want to do um to be able to get it in in time for the cic to to consider it if it does not get funding so we need to kind of signal one way or another if we're going to take ownership for the entire project if CPC either find funds none of it or only funds a small part of it or whatever the decision if we need to fund it it comes out of a capital Improvement it's part of the capital and what's that process so that would mean that it would go to town meeting so all capital projects um the town would decide whether they have enough free cash or whether it would be a borrowing a debt exclusion so they would determine exactly which side of the bucket that falls in and then that would be how it is requested at town meeting even if we present this to cic Capital Improvements that is still not a guarantee that it will be approved by the select board and moved forward to town meeting so so we we we we submit it to cic select board then says we will put it towards town meeting or not or not and at town meeting it gets voted up or down correct cic makes recommendations and for reference this is the third time that this has come before the school committee and the school committee has recommended it to go forward we did seek CPC funding last year as well did not get the CPC funding it was I think ultimately not included in the final budget that went to the slick board but we Advanced it as far as we could correct and I just I want to note that um as far as building an adapted playground on a school property there are 45 communities in Massachusetts that have used CPC funding to build adaptive playgrounds on school property so it's not an an inappropriate use of CPC funds it's well established it it is a legal use so you know that that has been clarified by attorneys it is a legal use of the funds but it is up to the committee with all their competing interests what they would like to fund so and members of the public are certainly welcome to share their thoughts with CPC if they feel that they like certain request a million dollars is that what it was uh it's a little over 1.2 what's your recommendation I don't believe it's going to be fully funded by CPC um sorry they can partially fund it they they could partially fund it but that wouldn't help unless you still went to town meeting right we'd then have to get the rest of it through the correct okay yeah so and and again if this is something that is going to be a debt I don't know that cic will approve it so it's really up to the committee where where they want to move this but at any juncture it could get stopped even if you move it forward so that's just what's out there sounds to me like we should push it forward and it doesn't sound like sorry all that CPC I know CPC sounds like they won't approve it or maybe they'll partially approve it in which case we would need to push it to cic and right and then even if um CPC approves it partially or not or fully or partially we would need to send it to cic as well correct so at least my feeling would be let's push it to cic this has been something that the CPAC group feels extremely strongly that we need in our community and it's really been a and it's not just for kids with disabilities that can use it I mean the whole town and all the kids can use it it just allows kids with disabilities to have a playground really suited for them but kids with non- disabilities will enjoy it and those families so it's really a town playground the only drawback is that during school hours only the school students can when the kids are at school right right and Marathon playground frequently when I bring my kids to EMC on the weekend we and every other family at EMC playground are going back and forth between marathon and EMC yeah and so it allows a space for families with typically developing kids and kids with other needs to play side by side in a public space which is not often available yeah I think that's that's really the the drive behind the committee is that typical kids and you know non-typical or however you want to use that word are able to play together in the same space yeah and I think we can also remember that at Marathon school we have a prek so kids start there at age three and so for the 180 days kids are in school three year olds to six year olds so three four five and six all would have access to that playground yeah I I want to add I do feel very strongly that this us advancing this forward sends the message that we really believe in this project whether whether it gets CPC funding or not my hope would be that we get some funding but I I feel like it's an important value uh to be inclusive of all kids to be able to play side by side and not have to as Jamie said go to different spaces abely there's also been an awful lot of of time and effort put into it and it's I I'm really impressed at what we've developed there and I I think it should go forward however we can get it forward so are we making a motion I was just going to see if somebody wanted to do that for with this to the cic the capital Improvement committee um as part of our Capital plan for fiscal year 26 I I think so does the motion need to be that or does it need to be that we are um approving the adapted playground as part of our FY 26 Capital plan is that okay is that can I make a friendly Amendment sure so I'm making a motion that we include the Adaptive playground in our Capital plan for fiscal year 26 second motion by Kyla and a second by Jamie all those in favor I it is unanimous and so passes much appreciated okay that brings us into the superintendent search did everybody receive either I I apologize for the duplicating of the emails but I wanted to make sure because the last proposal came in yesterday that people had seen it so I sent it out by email and then Georgette was um kind enough to organize it nicely in the Google Drive so that people would be able ble to access all of the proposals together without having to search through your emails so um just for folks at home that what we're discussing here is a consultant for um the superintendent search and this as required we did get three proposals um and they were all I would say very comprehensive providing services that I think would be very helpful to us uh as well as to the community and helping us to make a a selection for a new superintendent that Embraces kind of the the values of of our schools but also from what the community is looking for the three propo proposals um there was masc uh proposal was $11,500 uh we do get a member discount since we are members of masc the NASDAQ which is actually the firm that we have used previously for superintendent searches was 16 $1,660 and hya which is not a Massachusetts based uh organization but they do superintendent searches and they did come recommended as well was 14,000 so the three proposals there are definitely some slight differences in them but I felt like they were all fairly good proposals um would love to hear what if people had specific thoughts or questions about any of them in particular and then we could where did hya come recommended from so there are a bunch of different um it was used by another District in Massachusetts but they have a they significant number of districts they've worked with there's a significant number of right oh yeah you said it was recommended so I wasn't sure so no it recommended by the people that have like in terms of they have a lot of happy districts in there that I received names of different like in talking with Kim pnck who's our former HR Director um to get names of superintendent search so consult spoke to the other districts and they said it went really well we were she asked she asked from other districts that had had successful searches for names of like who people had used they which which which um group did you use last time NASDAQ NASDAQ so and they helped steer the committee to hire Dr Kavanaugh correct and in fact in all of the searches that I could look at in the most recent ones where we used a consultant we did use NASDAQ I don't know why I wasn't able to find information anywhere that sort of looked at what proposals the committee had received and why NASDAQ was chosen um either from what they were offering or from a cost perspective so they all look similar the price points are all similar I don't they for the previous searches I don't know what the other ones were no no no for the the proposals we have now they're all corre similar correct the one note that I wanted to make that nesda didn't seem it seemed an add-on to do the community survey Community whatever point to that and I feel that is a really important if we go with them we should add on that piece to it the other ones I think included that in their base price I survey I think is included it's the focus groups that are not included yes um in theirs that the whole the idea of that is really enticing to me did we use sorry what's the name of nezda nezda the New England school we use them for Dr Kavanagh had we used them prior to that as well we we used them all so for Dr McLoud uh and I believe we had uh how was Dr moud Dr Dr moud was excellent and we used them use a nezda Dr lman um I believe also was a NE nezda and it I know masc I have to look back through the the am nesda both if there is a search that does not produce a candidate that lasts longer than like a year they will do the the search again minus the with the cost fees but not the entire search fee right I really like I'm sorry go ahead is there a reason we don't use them again they've seem to have helped get us great superintendence and so one one piece of information I want to remind you is we used to be a member of nees so we don't get the discount we are no longer we used to use nesda for their enrollment projections um and I think you heard Amy oh they weren't very good they wer they weren't exactly accurate not their skill set yeah so we're no longer a member of nesda what's the what's the uh price break you get the 16 sub 1660 for Nasdaq which compares to the 11,500 with masc who gives us the discount for the masc would be a little bit more expensive I was really like NASDAQ where they MC Scout for districts um throughout the Northeast with similar characteristics to Hopkinson I'm sorry can you repeat which one are you discussing nzda yeah because I think that's there is um I think this is a distinct community and um I think that would is an important part of it does anyone not want this deck or do we have to choose one tonight is that what so I would if we're able to choose one tonight I think that would be the preference I I actually really like masc okay part of it was the the price piece in there and they felt comparable but I also really lik NASDAQ and I was pleased with the search process that happened that well we were able to hire Dr Kavanaugh and Dr McLoud before her although I wasn't part of that search but I I was for Dr Kavanaugh so I'm happy with either of those I The hya Proposal felt less it it felt more generic to me it didn't feel as and because they're out of our immediate area I and I know they have a lot of different districts that they've worked with they would not have been my Top Choice um against either of the other two but I would be happy it appropriate to get feedback from yes Carol Susan and Jeff about I do think it's about a 5050 split I see surges go out through masc and I see them go out through nesda yeah both would do job yeah sorry what's the cost savings with masc so it's about it's almost $5,000 but less to go to When comparing NASDAQ to masc and we get included the focus groups I got to go back to the I got to pull the actual proposal if I read correctly I think that was an add-on for Nasdaq where the focus which is why I prefer M yeah Mas includes the how much is does it show the add-on price for it's not an add-on for masc no no no for Nasdaq is an extra $2,000 500 what's the 425 per group $425 per per group yep how many groups do we know how many groups you normally do I think in the past we've done like one for one for faculty and one for we've done probably three or four all right so15 $1,600 so it's an an extra six grand to use NASDAQ approximately I mean if they're again I it's not broken I'd say don't fix it the devil you knows better than the devil you don't to go with with nesda nesda is a little more money but you know you we've had success with pay peanuts you get monkeys so spending a little more money might be worth it it's pretty big position it is a big position and and we do want to make sure that that's that's rounding error when you look at someone who's going to be leading the district and if we got to spend an extra 5,000 and we've had a this consulting firm do a great job three times in a row now to me that that's who I would go with if everyone feels strongly about you know I won't break my pick over it but I I wouldn't say I feel strongly about it one way or other did they bring a lot of quality candidates so in the last search I believe there were four finalists we had a lot I wasn't part of the screening committee so I can't speak to that angle of it at all but the screening committee they aim to bring it down to to three or four candidates so that's what they did the last time but the consulting firm will work with the screening committee as as well as kind of through the entire process I I imagine we will get there'll be no shortage of really strong candidates for this job whether we use a consult in fir or not I'm sure they will age we just need someone to guide us through the process right and I I think that in part because we it's a big job to do the search I don't think we could do it as successfully without a cons yeah yeah it's money well spent did you want to add no I I agree it's um what do we know what the masc discount is like what it would be if we were going on list just out of curios I I couldn't find that in the actual contract oh it's in the cont do that on the masc website they do list the districts that they have worked with recently so I I can tell you what some of those are recently uh nant seon Northampton Weston walam Melrose Norwood Marshfield GR Farmington River Regional School District coass at lemonster Malden Fall River Swansea Marblehead West Springfield lanx Georgetown King Philip Webster Bedford mil Milton Danver we Provincetown chiap ly Le subury Palmer Westwood Dartmouth and Somerville they currently have searches going where they've closed um for Quin Springfield Brock eastampton and winon and then they have open ones right now in mashby nset and Mansfield in your experience with a superintended from out of state be comfortable here or would it be a learning curve jump no I think that if you're working in New England for example um you could certainly go from say Rhode Island to Massachusetts and Massachusetts to Connecticut and I think that that does happen I just wondered about school law from state to state differs a little bit yeah I did hear from some colle I was was discussing Co with colleagues at work today about a another community that had a superintendent search and they had quite difficulty in their search but they're very different District than ours is I think we will do better at attracting high quality candidates then do you know who they used they were one of the ones just mentioned by Dr kavanov and those were the ones from masc M yeah was an inner city district currently I'm just looking to see if I can find we're currently looking at nesda and they have two searches going right now Bolton Connecticut and sa35 must be New Hampshire is it yes it always is it's I know there is a discount though and I could be it could be a thing that I I thought it was 600 something they said because they said if we paid it we' get other stuff oh I was I was wondering what the what the discount is for masc like is like if we weren't members would it just be the same as nezda fee or I don't think it's that large of a discount I don't think it would bring it up that far that significantly do we need a motion to so we will need a motion if we would like to to do this tonight I think the advantage of doing it tonight is we can engage with the firm immediately um and have them help us along the way with everything we can get jump on it sooner I also don't if there are pieces of information that you feel are missing to be able to make the decision I honor that as well I move that we go with NASDAQ for the superintendent search second motion by Susan a second by Chris all those in [Music] favor sign the contract as school committee chair you you have that Authority okay all right so the other piece and I we don't have to vote on this exactly tonight I had sent out an email I was able to pull out the composition of three different screening committees and the screening Committee just for folks at home but also to remind people here is the the first step of we look at when we're looking at the applications that we have in the screening committee it will require that the people on the screening committee will have to give up probably a chunk of two separate days uh to in order to be able to do it we I will definitely want to have nzc help us with that process but I want to talk about composition in terms of what the biggest piece I think right now is we from the community reaching out and the two things I think we want to think about are one is how many community members do we want to have on the committee and two um how do we want to select and I can say from the last search and that's the only search that I I can say for sure what we did is we had two school committee members review the applications and uh make a recommendation to the entire committee um in terms of after reviewing the appliations and talking with the applicants it's a lengthy process both I think for the applicants and the the committee to get involved in having to interview each and every one but it does offer the school I think the school committee should be the group of people deciding who the specific people are on the committee would be my thought on other thoughts for I mean did did people see I sent it right before the meeting started the document that indicates the last the last two and then one I couldn't find what the year was of the thing I think the 13 to 15 member composition is probably about as big as we want to get it I think bigger than that reviewing seems big seems big um I don't know from a practical standpoint how that many people get into a room or beyond that number of people that whole committee would sit in on the interviews so they would do through the initial interviews and they it's a confidential executive session type of situation so that the people who first apply they'll go through the resumés and they'll get those first steps and they'll then recommend finalists at that point when they have the finalists out of that group that group will disband and it'll be passed on to us I mean we're part of it anyway and the other piece is if we want I saw one 2017 there were two school committee members on the screening committee the one 2011 before that it was one school Committee Member I don't know how people feel about how many people are available to do something like that day and would have the interest if it's dur in the day I have availability you do in the de okay interest sure also interesting okay so everybody's interested I do think the um actually I I would prefer to take a different role than being on the initial screening say it's the four I mean of you interested but are there because I don't I I haven't seen at least yet a detailed what the process is like because also if we're oh there's this committee okay you yep Susan and Kyla did that so now you're not going to do this next like I think we need to understand the entire thousand foot view before we so and that's the piece that as a committee we have to decide upon do we want to do we want to interview have one or two probably two of us select who the community members are going to be on the committee by looking at the applications so that would be one opportunity for school committee members to participate in that the next and it it again it kind of comes down to the magic number of two because that's a quum of the more than that is a quum of the committee the next piece is the screening committee and then beyond that it's all of us and it's looking at bring well sorry there is one other part that would not be all of us and that's the site team visits that would go out to the sites where the finalists are from so that would be like the Su you know an assistant superintendent or a superintendent or somebody else from another District we would have a group of people that would include one or two school committee members who go to that site and listen to uh different staff that would come and talk about them the opportunity to ask their staff questions to see some of the work that they've done and be in their District so there would be that piece there is another piece um at the end where they the finalists come here and then we're able to they get a tour of the district obviously if it's somebody who's in District they know the what the district looks like but it's an opportunity then there would be actual the school committee will interview the finalists individually and they will have uh forums for the committee for the to be able to discuss so those are the the high level but also some of those steps we're going to work with the consultant to figure out timing and exactly how how we want that to be to have them guide us so if we're it seems like it would make sense to talk to the consultant before we make decisions on that so I think for the the larger PCS but I think it's important to start thinking about how many community members we want because if that's a process we're going to go through we want to be able to get that up and running with the Consultants fairly quickly and also the community is reaching out and saying I want to do this I want to be part of the scening committee and what's the process for it we can do those concurrently right as we Engage The consulting company and also put is it a posting that goes out and says yes and they will work on the posting um and oh the consulant for consultant will work on the the posting are you talking about the posting for the community or for the superintendent the community that piece we can do ourselves right so we can do that and engage NASDAQ concurrently right we don't have to wait till correct yeah correct and that's a pie and then they will then help steer us through what those next steps are right how many were on the the um screening Comm for the director of student services that's a good question I don't actually recall I'm trying to remember there wasn't a screening Committee of that nature because that wasn't because this is just there were high higher they didn't go through the screening process like that correct oh right they didn't look it was the direct student services we went through resumes and looked at the ones that then a committee interviewed those but it wasn't like we took 20 of them and people all sat down rather a small group of us took 20 Whitt it down do people want to wait for the consultant or do we want to start looking for the community members now would be the I mean I see value to having someone who does this every day and we're paying a lot of money to to give us a best practice rundown how would a Community member would do they send to you an email as I'd like to be considered so we actually had an application form the last time that we sent out in the committee U the last time I know we did the we put the committee together before we engaged with the consultant be done either way there's no all right I mean can't I can't imagine it'll take long to engage NASDAQ right and then quickly they'll tell us what best practices are and we can then po I mean we don't have to meet again to say okay let's activate them and put the application we do have to vote on what the composition of the screening committee is we do okay so but we but say NASDAQ says hey put 10 people on it or whatever right could we then just do a zoom if or if we if it was um if you know it was two weeks before our next meeting do we have to can we just schedule a zoom call okay all right so as soon as they give us a recommendation on what those best practices are for the screening committee we can quickly just get on a zoom or if our next meeting is in a day or two then we'll we won't lose time we have a meeting in two weeks yeah yeah but again it might be I don't know maybe they could have this info by next week and but I assume it can't take more than two weeks scre together well for nesda nesda for us to activate NASDAQ and then say we want to get moving on the screening committee can you give us um some advice on what to do that I imagine is a very quick phone call I would say yeah okay so let's do that let's activate them get their feedback on what those best practices are and then we'll go from there and then we we'll need a vote on what their recommendation is or talk about it and come up with a number that we want on the screening committee and then it can quickly get posted to wherever gets posted the application all right great it would go out I would think through serve and we want to advertise it I'm sorry I will reach out to a contract signed anding yeah get them to throw in the uh focus groups yes I I I like the focus groups too yeah they should they should they should throw that in say hey we're going to go with this other group unless you throw that in just do it hopefully they're not watching we discount of using them for two times yeah we got to have a there got to be something it's got to be something in there all right so that then we'll move into the schoolar so you all received that school year calendar and what I did was I merely took the opening to that calendar and changed it I modified it very slightly so that it's for the current day because um in the past we've talked about 2019 2122 and now we're in position where we want to know what the community thinks about the calendar and what kinds of time that people would like off or not like off and uh I think I've said it to this group before that one of the things that's exciting about this calendar is it gives us information about people's uh religious needs or you know cultural observances or holidays and very hard information to G you know desie will help you to understand Lots about your demography but it does not have this kind of information so it is helpful so you all had an opportunity to take the survey kind of get a feel for it and I don't know if there are things you wish were there that you would like to eliminate I thought we were going to add in the question about the vacation weeks that's like it's a little it's like the fifth option under question s yeah it was okay there it does say collapsing February April vac vacation in March each year after what I did recall that we had that conversation in one of the iterations of the calendar subcommittee and what we realized was if you are thinking about February vacation there are really only four days out of school April there are only four days out of school so if you collapsed them and went for the week in March it would be five days out of school so the savings three days on the entire year long we're just deciding tonight if what the survey looks like is the one we want to send out to the community right yes I think last time we talked about not wanting to send it before Thanksgiving because it certainly gets lost in the shuffle of the holiday survey look good to me the yeah the only thing that I there didn't there's one that says like I don't I want to reduce all the holidays except for the federal holidays and then there's another one that says I'd like to redo some of them yes because we did have people who want to maintain something like Good Friday but or like rashash sh and yam Kor but they were not interested in having that were Beyond those but that was our traditional calendar when I first got here was Friday Russia China Y and none of the other holidays have added okay I just don't know if that was that's clear when you read the responses because when you read those together it does look like a large majority of people when in fact like you know what I mean in the so you're talking about when we shared the responses from the previous survey with you um if you can tell me which question it is oh I see it's question seven maintaining the non-mandated holidays included in the current calendar so now that means Raj sh yapor Good Friday e aler Luna New Year andali can we make that clear in the question like do you want them listed out yes that's what I'm saying thank you that way people know what they're answering yeah because they might not realize since like Good Friday has been included for so long that that is actually a non-mandated holiday yes Christmas Eve not mandatory otherwise do we need to make a motion to go forward a Ved last time it go because you had a calendar sub committee last time the calendar sub committee approved this think we're okay send it away go ahead I move to approve the items by consensus by Jamie second by Chris I then I would seek a motion toj motion to adjourn all I regular meeting we have a joint meeting next week no with this and the 19th is the regular meeting yeah but it's it's listed on the agenda so we have those to look for to sorry the seven 17 is not joint it's not going to be any we did clarify that we have just gotten the 17th back and we're going to have the joint meeting on the 19th um as well as our regular meeting and that for folks at home will also be the superintendent budget recommendation I'll be remote what they're saying you got use it wisely than