i'm going to go ahead and open the meeting and just uh let everybody know that this meeting is not being broadcast live but it will be available for replay it is being recorded uh so welcome everybody to the Wednesday April 9th special meeting of the school committee
hi we now called to order uh just want to make sure that everybody can hear us uh since we're remote i know Susan I'm good yep kyla yes jamie yep chris yes and then we have Dr kavanagh
here as well can you hear us Carol yes thank you okay so let's start uh with the uh director of student services uh position and where we we are in trying to form a a subcommittee for the next piece and sure if you could explain a little bit
just about the hiring process where we are in the timeline uh and then we can discuss uh school committee composition sure thing um so as you know we need to hire a director of student services and I think the interesting part about this
process is that um while I'm involved in this hiring process the next superintendent will be the person who is working most closely with this director of student services so um I want to be very transparent and say that Evan Bishop and I are working very closely in
this this process um we are pretty much doing the exact same thing that we did last time um there is a group of administrators who um is screening the applicants i think last time Mr lead and I screened the applicants but this time
because we're working with Evan um Evan and I are there Mr leadro Mrs rothermick and Dr goch so we have been looking at them and I think on Monday I had sent you sort of a timeline that we can go through and as you know we are probably
a little bit under the gun in terms of timing because um Mrs hanscom's last day in the district will be June 30th so right now uh we have 14 applicants and the posting
will close this Friday April 11th um the interesting thing is that last time we did this we had 12 applicants and I think we put four five forward to the large panel last time and I think this time we'll probably come up with about the same number um it's interesting when
you read through because uh as you're reading you start to realize that people aren't sure exactly what a director of student services does so you have folks who will apply and they don't know exactly what the position is that they are applying for so there were I don't know maybe about
seven folks in there right now who are like kind of credentialed and viable um so we should finish the screening process by Monday and then the plan is as I shared
with you last Monday that we'll have that large panel interview team just like we did last time come to the central office the makeup of that team is pretty much set right now we just need a couple of school committee members but I can tell you the roles i won't tell you the names
of the people but we have two school committee members one CPAC me member one additional special education parent a building principal and a building assistant principal a special education team chair one of the special education
directors for curriculum instruction and assessment we have two teachers one who is a moderate special educator and another who is an intensive special educator we have a related services provider and then someone who works in an administrative kind of secretarial
capacity in the student services office so there will be 12 people alto together um in that subcommittee so on Thursday April 17th the week from tomorrow at the central office um that large panel that I just described will gather they'll interview
the candidates and then they can offer feedback to um to me to Mr bishop Mr lebr Mrs rothermick and Dr goch and then we'll do exactly what we did the last time we'll select some of the uh people that you interview and put them forth
for a meet the candidates night on the evening of Tuesday April 29th and at that time we'll do what we did last time so that we'll have the candidates meet with the school committee meet with the CPAC meet with teachers faculty staff
administrators and then have an opportunity to um you know just kind of go through those groups so and then the people who are there will have an opportunity to fill out feedback forms and that's always very helpful to us as well
um so I think tonight the two tasks at hand are to appoint two members of the school committee to serve on the interview panel and then um vote that 12 panel group to be a subcommittee of the school committee hopefully we will have a successful candidate to bring to you
on the evening of May 1st when we have a school committee meeting and at that time we could disband that subcommittee of the school committee great so just want to highlight one difference for people at home uh in the hiring of
the director of student services which is that the school committee actually votes on the recommendation whereas with other hires um that you bring forward we we are just voting on the appropriating the money for the salaries um as you know but I'm not sure everybody at home
realizes that difference do people have any questions first i do yes um so when Miss Hansum sent her notice um she said that in her email that she
was retiring September 2025 um but I understand from an email that Carol sent that the contract only goes to the end of June so is there a is there a reason for that discrepancy uh well I I I can't surmise what Mrs
hansum's plans are but yes her contract does expire on June 30th 2025 um she has indicated that she has no interest in renewing that contract and I don't think it would be in the best district interest of the district to do that either if the retirement date is
September simply because these jobs typically run July 1 to June 30th so if you were a person interested in the job and we weren't going to hire you till September 1st when people knew that you had the job your school district wouldn't want to pay you anymore from
June 30th to September 1 so there would be a time that you may not be being paid um so what also happens when people retire sometimes they'll retire at the end of a contract but they wait until say September 1st because that might be
their birthday and so if you know anything about the um the way retirement works in Massachusetts it's a combination of your age and your years of service so it might be that that is the month during which it's her birthday i don't know if it is or not but it's
her intent to fully retire then um how would we handle that if she wanted to stay until September um would we pay her some kind of um stipend or would she just be
volunteering her time so I don't think that I would re So one thing that our former HR director used to say all the time is you can't suffer or permit so you really can't allow people to kind of come in and work at the old job without compensating them
financially um but again just because of the timing I don't think that I would recommend that we extend that contract because it would limit the potential candidates that you have coming into the position um does that mean that the district wouldn't say
to Mrs hansum you know if we would like you to come in and show the new person you know how the grants are working how transportation works those kinds of pieces maybe and we would think about doing that on a PDM basis
that would be excellent my concern was if we don't move quicker than and move later is that good candidates could choose to go with another school district yes right yeah it doesn't sound
the best it doesn't sound like it makes sense to delay the hiring my question was because of the timeline that Aby's email had said and so we I don't that I know of have access to look at the contract so I didn't know when the contract ended so
that was information that I didn't have yes so thank you for clarifying sure yeah and just to talk a little bit more about what Kyla just said it really is difficult to find a super highly qualified director of student services
anywhere these days so having 14 applicants feels good um and um I I do think that moving expeditiously is is a good idea it sound from what you said that our pool is actually down to what about
seven who are have the special ed component we need yeah so you do have to have the special education administrator license and then of course we look at people's work history and you know you're probably better off if you've had
someone who's done the job for some time rather than if you have someone you know who may never have done the job um and that doesn't mean that there aren't people who this would have to be their first time being a director of student services that's that surely is true and
you can find people who are very competent to do that work um and they typically come from you know other special education positions within an organization and just kind of know the drill all right so are there any other
questions before we move into um talking about who would like to serve in this capacity okay so who is avail both both available and interested in willing to serve on this
um subcommittee jamie is one is there another person who would be interested and available chris would you be available or Kyla what's the time commitment look like
uh so it's Thursday April um 17th and you'd have to be in the central office for maybe like four or five hours it would probably run from about 10 to 3ish i'm traveling next uh Wednesday through
Sunday for work okay i'm out i'll be in Florida at a graduation enjoy the warm weather that's great i am not able I I have to be at work that day did you say April 17th yes that
would be a very early vacuation it's May okay i just made the decision today kyle are you a I'm looking right now hold on
sorry um the 17th 17th 17th [Music] i could do that okay fabulous all right so then I would look for a motion to appoint uh Kyla and
Jamie to serve as the school committee members in the interview panel for the director of student services i move that Kyla and Jamie serve as the school committee representatives on the screening committee for the student
services director okay so it's not exactly a screening committee it's it's a subcommittee in subcommittee okay i move fabulous okay can that Do I have to say it all again i I think we'll take that as a friendly
amendment um if that's acceptable to you all right so a motion by Susan is there a second on that second second by Jamie we'll do a roll call starting with you Chris yes jamie
yes kyla yes susan yes and I am a yes so that um fixes that part the other thing that we need to do is just procedurally to establish this as a subcommittee um and that would also require then that
members be sworn in at town hall um is there somebody who would like to make a motion to create the subcommittee as outlined um by this the composition as outlined by the superintendent
i'll make a motion that that we create a subcommittee committee to hire the director of student services as outlined by the superintendent Kavanagh so just a friendly amendment the subcommittee is not actually hiring it's
in interview sorry just in terms okay as a subcommittee interview panel I second okay motion by Kyla a second by Susan we'll do a roll call again starting with Chris
yes Kyla yes Jamie Yes Susan yes and I am also a yes so that um creates that subcommittee and then Kyla and Jamie if you guys want to go get sworn in uh sometime between now and uh the 17th
that would be great and then Carol if you can ask the rest of the uh group to also go get sworn in I will provide the um the list to Connor oh that's okay all right so
at at this point I would seek a motion uh to enter into executive session and somebody who would be willing to read the um the reason for the executive session off the agenda good night thank you Carol
good night Carol um I move to move into executive session to comply with or act under the authority of MGL chapter 30A section 21A2 for the purpose of discussing strategy with respect to contract negotiations with the superintendent
candidate because discussing an open meeting would have a detrimental effect on the school committee's bargaining position and to adjourn in executive session thank you motion by Jamie is there a second on that i'll second second by Kylo we'll start with you chris yes kyla
yes jamie yes susan yes and I am also a yes um so and the will adjourn out of this group into executive session at 7:17 the link for the executive session is in an email that Geette sent out um
does everybody have it yes okay I will see everybody over there in a minute thank you