back to let you take any questions from the meeting. >> Big question from the committee. Does the budget subcommittee want to make any comments? >> No, I mean I'll just [clears throat] underscore some of the points that John made. So we've seen 23 24% decline in
student enrollment over the last 10 years. we've decreased the number of teachers um kind of proportionately and and actually have been on the front foot of trying to getting rid of our um combining into the Brown school, getting rid of our three schools, combining into the Brown School, trying to be proactive
from a budget front. Um I just think the you didn't specifically touch on it, but we did in the last meeting. It's also important to understand the makeup of the student population is much more complex. fire needs which we also see in the data. Um so while the system itself
I think a lot of people get asked the question of like enrollment is down 24%. Why is the budget not coming down 24%. The system while smaller is much more complex much more highly regulated and I think that that's an important point for folks to understand. >> Thank you.
>> So before we begin I I should have uh made this more clear. So this is different than public comment right? Public comment is one way. Um, this is a hearing, so this is conducive to two-way, so questions can be asked and answered by the appropriate folks. I just want to make sure that's obvious to
everyone. Um, Sally, >> I want to know how many Yeah. how many folks are signed up. I only have one person on this sheet so far. Three more.
>> Three more. would be uh since so it sounds like we may only have five people would the committee be open to maybe extending to five minutes people making their comment just because the three minutes can go very quick and we obviously want to welcome input as much as possible
>> Al do you want to pull the people who are attending virtually to see how many people might have comment online >> there's work. >> Okay. All right. Thank you, Mike. >> The only comment I would make, Al, is that in the past we have not limited
people to three minutes during public hearings. Um, typically it's a pretty sort of um looser form. So, folks have an opportunity to really either, you know, state their opinion, ask questions. Um, you know, obviously we
need to be cognizant of a time um but um we haven't limited people in the past. The other thing I want to make mention of uh which I was going to wait till the end but I think I should bring it to your attention. We you called for a vote earlier to close the open meeting
which probably shouldn't have been done because that means our open meeting is closed after you called it to order. So normally we don't close the meeting. We just open the public portion and close that. So I think we need to be a little bit cognizant um about whether we're going to go back into our regular agenda because it's a potential open meeting
violation. >> All right. Uh, Jen, do you want to make a motion then that we reopen? >> We can't do that. Once you close it, you close it. Once you've adjourned, you've effectively adjourned the open meeting. So, I'm just I'm just pointing out
Robert's rules and how that works. So you as chair can make the decision how you want to go forward. But I'm I'm bringing that up now because >> um you know depending on what happens, you know, we may have plenty of time to hear folks and I wouldn't want anyone to feel
that they didn't have >> time to be heard or or and or time to get their questions answered. No, und understood. And I was expecting more input and that's really was just to allow individuals to we can certainly have people um come up a second or third
time if we feel that you know the time limit is really constraining some input that we'd like to receive. Um and around the open meeting, Jen, we I talked with council about this and this is how I was instructed to do this. So >> you were instructed to take a vote to
close the public meeting. I don't >> Yes, I was. So, um, and that's the reason it was done. So, um, all right. Um, let's start with Sarah Batuza. I apologize if I'm not saying that name correctly.
>> Thank you. >> Hello everybody. My name is Sarah Matusa. Uh with nearly 20 years of teaching here in Marblehead, I share your passion and commitment to providing a fine education for our children. I want to thank you John Rodo for speaking
so eloquently about really the challenges that we are facing with this uh proposed budget. Uh the level funding budget is putting us in quite a pickle uh with the growth in teacher salaries. I know we have to cut positions. Um, as
a teacher who I'd like to think I'm a valuable member of our teaching community here. Um, I would argue that every member of our faculty at at Bets and I'm sure all the other schools are valuable kind of inexpendable people.
You know, we we we pack a punch every day. We really do the best we can. Uh, we are all essential. We are professional. We are effective. uh recent data. We got the Desi report card recently. We are one of the higher
performing schools in the state, much higher than the Massachusetts average. Our spending is right even with the Massachusetts average. So, we are accomplishing much more with each dollar, I think, than than many other districts in the state. And it's something to be proud
of. Our expert student surveys, which I know were shared uh recently, showed strong connections from students to teachers, showing that they really appreciated our teacher connections. They felt supported by our teachers. Um, and then we've got data from EXL and I
Ready showing uh all of the strengths and weaknesses of our students and helping us to kind of parse out where we can provide enrichment for students and where we can provide RTI or response to intervention. My concern is that we're spending a lot
of time frequently, multiple times a month, multiple times a year to talk about all the data and decide from there how to pivot, how to provide data driven in instruction, provide enrichment where it's needed, and provide response to intervention where it's needed. my
concern by cutting positions such as the math interventionist at Bets, which I know wasn't filled this year, and potentially any other positions this year that would those would be probably the positions that provide those
responses to intervention. Okay. So, our students who are just on the cusp of meeting expectations, who aren't necessarily on a special ed plan, but would receive services from an RTI teacher. Those are the students I'm most
worried about kind of slipping through the cracks, right? And we don't want any of our students to slip through those cracks. Every child is important. They're all someone's son or daughter child and and we we don't want to let them go. So I'm afraid that students
will slip through the cracks and that'll it'll just weigh heavy on our shoulders. I'm getting too excited. Okay. So um teachers who provide the math interventionist positions, academic support, um interventions we offer also in terms of response to intervention
would be homework club after school. So kids can opt to stay after school if that's available in their schedule. We offer curriculum support for special education students. Um, but when we find that's not all working, we think, okay, what else can we do outside of our scheduled day, outside of the class we
teach? If we can't pull them for extra services, we often say, well, let's maybe try a sped referral and see, do we need a a TAT process? And we end up adopting more students into the special education system, which isn't necessarily the only thing that can be
done. I think many of their needs, especially if they're right on that edge, we could make the difference we need to make with an interventionist, with a math literacy class, with, you know, 3 days a week, 20 minutes before a lunch. Let's fill in those gaps that we
need to learn. Uh, and my concern is that with fewer bodies in the building, we won't have the opportunity to provide those services. Um, so really, I agree with everything you said, John. Thank you so much. Um I really fear a potential decline
eventually in testing performance, increased spended referrals, higher enrollment in private schools. Um whether it's for for uh more enrichment or for special ed services. Um and I really just worry about those few kids on the cusp who might slip through the
cracks. We don't want to let anyone go. Uh so we will always do our best. We're we're going to put one foot in front of the other and do our absolute best for every child every day. I know we make a difference. We'll continue to do so, but I don't want to stand back and say I'm okay with someone losing their job when
I know that what they do is so important. Um so I I will do anything I can to just fight for. Thanks. >> Thank you. >> Okay. Uh, Samantha Rosado. [clears throat]
>> Good evening. Samantha Rosado, three Martin Ferris. Um, I am here to ask for a fully funded budget so our students receive the education that they deserve. As a school committee, it is your legal duty to pass a budget you believe is necessary to operate our schools
appropriately under the guidance of our fearless leader, superintendent. The last time we level funded the MPS budget was fiscal year 24. We all know what followed serious consequences and our schools are still recovering. While working in the schools, I learned the
term job creep when staff are asked to do more with less. There's also budget creep when the budget is expected to cover more and more without the increases required to sustain it. And when things fall apart, staff is left to take the blame. Since 2006, Marblehead has not approved a Proposition 2 and a
half override. Even when NPS receives a 2.5% annual increase, it rarely keeps up with actual costs. This year, a 0% increase. I've heard some residents say they'll support debt exclusions like the Marvel High School roof, but not an override. But only a Proposition 2 and a
half override can fund salaries and recurring expenses. Buildings don't educate the children people do. So right now, based on public information, we have vacancy vacancies for three special education IAS, five special education teachers, multiple lunch and recess
staff, and a Medco bus monitor. Are these positions necessary? Absolutely. But I don't see any job postings for most of them. So over the past few years, we've made cuts, but we don't call them cuts. These are some of them. Asking residents to fund raise for outdoor facilities
because maintenance isn't in the budget. Pulling instructional assistance from students to supervise lunch and asking unit staff to cover lunch and recess. Raising user fees and shifting costs onto families. Increasing kindergarten tuition to fund special education
administration. using savings from unfilled positions to prepay special education tuition. Reducing special ed IIA hours from 32 and a half to 30. Limiting training and collaboration. Adding administrators without proportionate budget increases.
Expanding technology and security. Hiring staff to manage it without sustainable funding. And I'm not against any of this. I'm for it. I'm just pointing out some things that have changed. Who's losing in all this? The children. And they're our children. So, the police and fire departments are underst staffed. Their chiefs have said
that they can get by. But is getting by the standard we want for our Marblehead public schools? Our students deserve more than that. Please consider proposing a budget that restores some of the painful cuts and maintain services. If not, you are denying this community
the opportunity to debate and decide for themselves. So, this is what I ask. Why do we consistently end the year with surplus funds? And where does that money come from? Is this truly the budget you believe best supports our students? I'm sorry if I missed that part because I
was a few minutes late. Uh why did the previous school committee say an override was absolutely necessary after contracts were settled, but now none is being proposed? And can the superintendent and school committee please recommend an override? Our children deserve a school system that is
supported, not one that is simply surviving. Thank you. issues. >> Yeah. Do you want to address the the few questions there at the end? We'll address those. >> Thank you very much. >> So was about um
>> yeah, I'm sorry. I was >> I was surpluses at the end of the year. >> Oh, surplus at the end of the year. Um yeah, I mean surplus at the end of the year like like for instance if there's positions that are funded and you know either someone leaves early or
um we don't fill it or you know sometimes there's uh you know someone retires we hire someone lower and sometimes that creates um some surplus some surpluses and you know if we have if we budget for certain uh you know uh utilities etc lower so that maybe have
short money there. Um, what else would I what else am I missing? >> Yeah, I mean I can't speak. >> Can can I just interrupt for one second and maybe ask Mike could talk for a couple minutes about just the general concept of a surplus um because I think that would be helpful. It is new to this
district over the last few years, but it is as you know we've been we've talked about um the hallmark of a um wellrun and well financed um municipality. So I maybe you could also just address just the the the concept of how surpluses
work, Mike. >> Absolutely. Um so I have a lot of respect for my predecessor. I think she does a she did a fantastic job here in the other communities she's been in. Um obviously every school bus administrator, finance assistant superintendent, whatever you want to call them. Uh they have a different
style in building a budget and and Michelle and I certainly have a different style. Um, I walked into what she had built for 24 and I think she probably built it long before it got to this point. I think she left right around this point in time of the year
when uh her budget was presented and I think she did part of the district right around that time. Um, she did an amazing job. We just have a different philosophy. Um, she also was working in softright which is not not a budgeting software. It is a an accounting software. We are now in Munis which is a
budgeting software although we are only eight months into that. We are using that to better understand our budgets double check our numbers because I did everything in the old way of spreadsheets and now I'm importing it into um munis and identifying little
little pockets of areas where I I might have had a mathematical error or whatnot. Um when we get to the end of the year, thank you very much for your comments, Mr. Um when we get to the end of the year, we have built um because of a a special education out of district
problem five or six years ago, I think it was 2019, so probably seven years ago now. Um they began a practice at the end of every year if there was a surplus to prepay tuitions. Um, and that's the only thing you're allowed to do by the state
uh from a school department budget is to prepaid. The only prepaid you're allowed is is out of district tuitions. Uh, that began that practice and and every year they've had a little bit more surplus. So, they've prepaid a little bit more. We've gotten to the point we're at about a million dollars that we're prepaying and I think that's probably the cap we want to be at. I don't think we want to
get any higher than that. Uh, so we've gotten to that million dollar that million dollar mark. Um, so at the end of every year, provided there's not an explosion in out of district placements or an explosion somewhere else, we should have a a surplus at the end of every year of a million dollars just
because we we budget for what we know. We prepay at the end of the year. So, we're budgeting now in February and between now and June something could go ary and we may not have that full million dollars to. So, but we anticipate prepaying a million dollars every year. Then you add on to that what
the superintendent talked about utilities coming in lower uh than anticipated. Uh and I got to say that when we before I arrived in um I think at the end of the last administration's um
process they always underbudgeted utilities and that was a practice here because the town had a um some type of a fund. I don't know what it was, but it was the utilities fund that all the departments could draw off of when they spent down their budgeted utilities. So, uh, they
they the town then said at one point, "Please budget accurately. We're not going to have this fund anymore." And I see Pat and Molly shaking their heads because this is what I've heard. I wasn't here for it. Um, so we're now budgeting for our own utilities. We took, as we said, three schools offline, put one new one online, and I
know it's been a few years now, but that takes a while to flush through. um a more efficient building, but a building that also uses electricity in the summer because it is or you know late spring, early fall the summer because it does have full air conditioning throughout the building. So there there's
trade-offs. So we I think we've got a better handle now on where our utilities need to be. Um we also did just sign a new gas contract. Uh our gas is broken up into two pieces. We have the supply which is handled by um a company called NRG. May have heard of them. And we have
the delivery which is handled by a company called National Grid and I'm sure we've all heard of them. Um we were we we cannot negotiate or or or get a better price on the delivery. National Grid sets the prices I believe that's set by the by the state. Um but on the
supply side we can actually negotiate a little bit and we were able to lock in a lower rate for next year or for that I'm sorry for the next three years. Five years >> I think it was three. Uh next three years at a lower rate than we were locked in before. So, we're going to see some utility savings and we've captured
some of that in our budget. That's one of the areas that we're able to save, but there are so many factors involved and I think the biggest one is that um you know, we have historically had an issue filling vacant positions and if you budget a position um Miss um
>> Latusa mentioned it, the math intervention position went vacant all year. Well, that was probably budgeted I'm just top of my head probably at $75,000. So, if that was vacant all year, at the end of the year, I should have a $75,000 surplus from that one position. I had an assistant HR person
position that's been vacant all year that we've cut from the next year's budget that we didn't fill this year. So, that's probably another 65 to $70,000. The crumbs start adding up and at the end of the year, you end up with a $600,000 surplus. On top of the million of the prepaid that you had from
the year before, you could end the year with a $1.6 $6 million surplus of which we're going to we're going to prepay another million special ed tuitions and it's still going to leave us with a $600,000 surplus. The risk we have is we have to budget for those positions. We have to budget that they're going to be filled because our goal is always to
fill those positions. It's not to leave vacant positions so that we can have a surplus at the end of the year. That's never our intention. So that's why we have surplus at the end of the year. It's I would say a little bit utilities, a little bit here, a little bit you know that we budgeted for a conference that somebody didn't go to. Those are the the
really small crumbs, but the bigger crumbs are the the bigger pieces of the cake or the pie or if you want to whatever dessert I want to I haven't had dinner yet, by the way. Um the bigger pieces are the really what would quickly adds up to that $600 $700,000 surplus.
Um the only thing that I wrote down that you that you mentioned and I need to go back and check. You said we level funded in FY24. Not sure that I thought the budget went up. >> That's not true. We've I just I was going to mention that later on. We've always had an increase to our budget in
the 20 plus years I've been in or around school committee. Um but I think you know perhaps what um >> I think what happened >> saying is that we didn't get the full amount. We always got an increase but we didn't um always get level services means enough additional funding to cover
every single >> without >> uh contractual uh obligation and that we did not get. So we always had an increase. Um this is the first year that I'm aware of in you know sort of my generational um participation with
school committee that we have been um uh asked to uh come forward to to town meeting with a level funded budget with no increase at all. And you know, as we can see, um, that in order to do that has necessitated that we we cut, might
correct me if I'm wrong, two $2.5 million out of what we would have needed >> cut services in other areas, right? Um, so I think what what what and I don't mean to put words in your mouth, we didn't get level services in 24, but we also we were somewhere between level
funded and level services. No, and I just I just >> No, because did we there was an override and it failed. So, >> right. And I think we raised user fees that year or going into the next year, we voted to to we I wasn't here. Um it was voted to raise user fees to save some of those. >> Mike, I'm going to put let everyone know
we the town appropriated a higher a greater amount in FY24 than they did in FY23. So we did have an increase to our budget, not just from user fees from the town appropriation. >> And it's also one of those things, you know, right now we're talking about the FY27 budget, right?
>> Well, we just started 20. So sometimes if when we start talking years, it's confusing that what what year you're actually in as far as what what how much the money went up from one year to the next. But you great comments. Thank you so much. >> That answer all your questions, Sam.
>> Um is this truly the budget you believe best supports our students? >> Um I think that to answer that question, I I c we drafted a budget, created a budget that um met the expectations of the town at this point. Okay, that's the best way I can answer that question.
>> And again, maybe you can't answer it now, but I'm hopeful that maybe the superintendent school committee could recommend a friend. >> I'll do better at answering rights. >> All right. Uh, Mary, >> hi. I want to thank everybody at this
table for all the effort you're putting in, plus all the great teachers that are behind me. I'm in a unique position as a senior citizen and a mother of a 13-year-old and I've come here every year to say
that somehow and your your article in the paper was awesome. Now, that should be sent home to every single parent or family in town. It really should because it breaks it down. And it's great that
we do have a newspaper, but does everybody read that? And being a senior citizen to be, but um a lot of them uh what's the percentage over 65 roughly?
>> Yeah, that's I have it right here. >> 50 something. >> Um it increased by it's now 23% of our population. So we have about 1,100 more or have residents over 65 than we did 10 years ago,
>> right? And a lot of them are on a fixed budget. Now I go and talk to my neighbors who are all senior citizens and I sat down with them and I said we need a two and a half override. We haven't had one in 2005. So I've been
before here and years ago when my boys were in Swamp Scott, we had a problem. We had these excellent teachers. It was a mass exodus. And then finally the parents had were going doortodoor because we didn't have social media back
then and um we didn't have cell phones. There wasn't as much um mental health problems. We have anxiety. Um I learned a lot by um walking with the teachers at the strike last year. I
really did. And I'll tell you by the end of this vacation if I heard my name one more time. So I could just imagine what these teachers have to go from their vacation with their kids and go into school and then you would have 22 kids
saying Mrs. So and so Mr. So and so okay I was happy and and it's tough and I've been lucky that I've actually had experience in the Glover School, the Brown School village and now vets again I was very lucky to
be able to volunteer in all those schools and I see what these kids need. We have like up the bets we only have let's see one therapist for seventh grade and counselor and a counsel for the eighth grade. We really only need
two of each with the with the kids and and these teachers work so hard and and I just I admire them. Now I was a um permanent sub in the city of Glend with
the alternative school so I know how hard it is. We didn't have we had a padded room from the ceiling down and we were able to put the children in there to calm them down. I've seen a
couple of kids go off in my years of being in Marblehead schools and your first reaction is to make sure that child is safe but also yourself because if you're not safe you're not going to be able to help that child or
any other children that become in there. It's a tough job and you know I think you said we having a a problem filling it. Um what was it the math? Um >> yeah and I had my son had a grand mouse
seizure when he was five and a half and I fought to keep him in the Swansport school system but it got to the point we needed an override and they were cutting teachers. So, and then the mass exodus. I pulled
my kids. One went to St. John's Prep. The other one went to the learning prep school down in West Newton. And swaps had to pay that extra money where I would rather have him staying in town. This is what's going to happen.
And if we don't get the override, we're going to be losing teachers, which we need because there are kids that do fall through the cracks, might need a little extra help in the math, doesn't qualify for IEP,
and not maybe a 504, but still struggling. And I've seen how important those teachers are because I've seen kids go up and said, "Oh, M Miss so and so, I need a can you can you explain this to me?"
And it's it's really frustrating to see that a town like Marblehead won't give the two and a half over to give what our schools need. So, >> 15 seconds. >> Okay. So, here's my advice.
get your article out to all the families and then put your article on social media so that it can be shared with the senior citizens. And then if you don't get the senior citizens, you're going to be in really
a place and it's a shame because you know we have some really great teachers and I really appreciate this. One last thing. I went to our neighbors and asked them why did you pull your kids from the school. They said because of what happened last year and they didn't want
to see happen again. So two two kids went to tower one went to Charta. The girls that ended up leaving last year because what happened you know Mald and Catholic this one this one this one because the parents didn't want to
take a chance that it was going to happen again. So thank you. >> Thank you Mary Sarah. [clears throat] >> I came prepared for a typical um hear what we've always done as a hearing format where I have multiple questions
um on different topics. So just cut me off at three minutes and then I'll find that increased to five. So let's show >> but I'll go over. So um because I just I thought this was going to be a typical hearing. Um all right so first of all
just as far as we talk about things like the energy reserve fund and things like that so people understand the history is that was um schools have line item autonomy unique in it town government. No other department has line item autonomy. You guys can move money around at will within your own budget. It
doesn't take a vote of income. it doesn't take a vote of town meeting because of that when the original stabilization funds were were created was to lessen the amount for energy um at that time it was energy there's
other ones in our actual budget so if there was a surplus the school committee couldn't just move it around that the town had control so once it hit a certain amount it went over to the town basically to stabilize where that money was going that was getting really dedicated to what it was supposed to be,
not used. We have a really warm year to fund something else. Um, agree with it or not, that's how it was established. Once we got to a regular period of always expending that that stabilization amount and then it would come back to our budget. Once we had several
consecutive years to that, there was a decision for FY25 that it would move back into our budget because it wasn't like we were sitting on a surplus that we were then going to expend to another line item. It really was an insurance policy to make sure money allocated to
schools was being spent as is appropriate, which you know is what we were doing. So, just to explain that um the prepayment in the past, you guys have changed how you did that this year, which is a little concerning. We worked really hard. We all know what happened in 2019 with with once the year prior
circuit breaker came well maybe we actually I shouldn't say we all know. I don't I think actually many of us don't know. Um, when circuit breaker came in as low as it did, that really destabilized our special education payments. Luckily, through Michelle Cresta and then Mike has has brought
this on, we started carrying over as is legally allowed up to one full year of circuit breaker accounts. That really is a good stabilization technique. That's why this the state allows you to do that. Marblehead had not been doing that
prior than to 2019. going to 2019 when we hit that crisis and everything happened that it did and years prior to that too people who had historical knowledge of that will remember we were freezing budgets October November you couldn't get paper I can remember people
saying can you believe those high school teachers are saying telling kids to print things at home there's no paper and I go no no no there really is no paper like that that is what our school budget had had come to there was a tremendous amount of work done to properly document and and to work
towards the point where we were not freezing budgets. That's the alternative to a surplus, folks. Nobody in municipal government or in any government, even privatized, to the tune of $49 million, ends at zero. We don't have the ability to borrow or do something midyear. So,
if you're not ending the year with a little bit or somewhat of a surplus, and why little bit, it's a marginal and a 49 or $50 million budget, a million dollar surplus means you were within 2%. In the budgeting world, that's pretty
darn good. So, so people need I think there needs to be a general education of how we got there and what these words mean because I think people it's nice to feel like you're ending on zero, but if you're ending on zero, you were darn close to freezing that budget. Um, so we
really worked hard to not freeze budgets when we the first year we used the surplus was FY20. We were all doing Zoom meetings. Uh, a new super intern, Superintendent Makalda. Yeah. >> And it was actually my idea for better
or for worse. You know, we were in we were at the beginning of our fiscal cliff. And at that point, we didn't have enough money to balance the budget. We were going to have to cut because when we put it back, the alternative to a surplus prepayment is it goes back in free cash to the town. We used to
certify free cash in October, November. Last year we went into turn town meetings still hadn't certified it. If it's not certified, you can't use it. So when I suggested that first year using that 200,000, it was to save three teachers jobs. And the reason we do that
is if you prepay with a surplus, you have that money right available right away to stabilize your budget versus waiting till it's certified. So as we moved forward, we worked very closely with Fincom who was very collaborative and what we got to was the point where
we were accounting for that because the public needs to know what a public education a marble head costs and so we would note all what our total out of district placements are. Below that, we would have a deduct line. And the deduct
line would show what are we prepaying so that the public knows we have currently own 4.1 million on district placements. We're prepaying 1 million. We're going to deduct that and we're going to put 3.1 million. Your current budget doesn't show a deduct line. Now, after the
second round, you put 200 in it for a deduct line, but you're still carrying. That's what that is in opposition to the policy that was developed in conjunction. Can I just finish this one thought with VINCOM to accurately show what that deduct is. If you're prepaying
a million dollars, which is what you're estimating to do, if you show that full deduct of a million, that means that frees up another $800,000. And so all I'm on this topic, we'll go back to other topics. I'm asking you go back to the pra best practice that was
established with FINCOM to show that deduct to account for what you truly are paying prepaying so that the public knows this is what it costs to educate our avid district placements. This is how we pay for it partially. They see both things in conjunction not just part
of the story. It's about transparency. >> Let me know. >> Thank you sir. >> Can I respond to summits while Sarah's still in the room >> and she's probably running out. Um, first off, I guess we'll stop where you ended on the deduct. Um, if we were to
do it that way and we would deduct a million dollar off of our $5 million out of district tuition, that means we would be going into next year with a $4 million out of district budget and we would be absolutely dead in the water for FY28 because now you need to make up that million by the next year. So
there's with all due respect, I would not support going in that direction whatsoever. Um, but thank you and and I appreciate having the history and the knowledge because I don't always have all that information. Um, I would like to see the policy that was developed in between the school committee and the
fincom because I'm not sure that a policy >> I can send you videos. >> Oh, you said policy. I just didn't know if there was a policy that I'm supposed to be. >> Oh, okay. I just want to be sure this wasn't a policy I was supposed to be following. All right, good. as sitting in all of our ventil meetings, it we've been doing it consistently. It's, you
know, maybe it was it was presented differently, but the process has been the same. >> Yeah. But not this year. >> No, it is has been the same. >> Oh, my two. >> No, it's but the the the policy you're referring to and the way we've done it in the past, we have done it. We have
laid it out with every source the same way that we did in previous years. So I think maybe some of the language is different but sitting in those meetings from last year to this year like you know we both been there. >> So the budget was if we prepaid a million the budget as we
look at all sources of out of district tuition and transportation we look at all the sources and then what needs to be funded by the general fund the full picture. We did that last year but we did this year >> but you're saying two different things. Mike's saying you're saying you did the same way as last year. So you were the
general fund request has been reduced by the prepayment amount. >> No, because and can I can I just sorry and Molly, thank you so much for your comments on this. >> If in February or actually January when we when we finalized this budget
January, presented it early in February, if I deducted a million dollars and something blows up between January and June, what do we do then? Well, you have north of 2 million in circuit breaker. >> We have safety nets in place. Correct. And intentionally built safety nets
because of 2019 circuit breaker special education tuition stabilization which requires a town meeting vote which we can't get till May or June. By that time it's too too late to do anything. And we have the prepaid. So those are our three safety nets. Um I'm happy that we have all three.
Um, that's why I said I don't think we need to go any higher than a million on prepaids just because we've got the other two safety nets there and to get to the sped stabilization something would I mean there would have to be a >> and I mean something something drastic
devastating um but I I don't feel I would not feel comfortable in January taking a negative million dollars out of the budget not knowing what's going to happen between February and June. I mean, I say nothing. No, we have a good idea. I mean, M's got a really good handle
handle going. >> Um, but also, I'm going to take that $5 million budget and reduce it down to four million. I'm never getting that back in fiscal 28, especially if an override doesn't happen. If an override doesn't happen and I and I use all that reserve now, we are a million dollars.
We're already We're already probably about 3 million behind for fiscal 28. Now, you're going to put us $4 million behind. And and I that Do you know how many positions that that would be? We're 80% salary in our in our budget. How many positions it would take to fund $4
million shortfall? That's that's just too much. >> Can I continue on top? >> Yeah. Just is it is it >> varies? So last year on the um on the circuit breaker, you guys convinced me I I was a holder. You know this. I was the one I already signed. I wanted to carry
over 100% of circuit breaker. I felt that was the safe thing to do. You guys convinced me 80% was safe. >> Oh, we carried 100%. We carried a full year circle breaker last year. >> I went to pull a couple meetings cuz I know that you guys were very unhappy that we said we can get by with Amy.
We're totally safe. It's okay. You may have carried over, wound up ultimately getting to carry over, but the plan when we presented in those meetings was 80%. >> And you'll have to pull the notes. I I can tell I can never imagine myself saying that I felt safe with 80%. when
they allow you to carry 100%. Every district I've been in, we've gotten it to 100% and that is our benchmark. We do not go below 100%. >> So, so, so we're in agreement. I I don't find we're in agreement. I just don't believe that I Yeah. >> Can I just chime in just just on the circuit breaker piece? What folks need
to understand if you don't is circuit breaker is a reimbursement mechanism. Just so folks know that that money we have to pay upfront and then we get it back. And the money that we give back is not. So if it's a $100,000 tuition and circuit breakers funded at $75,000,
we're not getting $75,000. We're getting 75% of over the threshold that set a state, which I believe is 61,000 I think right now. Somewhere in that ballpark. So it's 58 somewhere in there. >> Somewhere somewhere somewhere in that they keep changing. OSD just came out
with rates. So I I might have the number wrong, but it's somewhere between like 56 61. Anyway, 75% of the overage of like what's difference between the threshold if it's 56,000 and 100 we're getting a reimbursement on that 75% of that not 75% of the whole.
So, it's it's a little when we talk about fully funding circuit breaker, it's it's fully funded if the if the state funds it that the 75% they're supposed to, but it's 75% of the money that's over the threshold that they they So, it's not you're not getting 75% of a
full tuition. >> So, it's um it's four times the average of the state per pupil spending, which is about 15,000. So, four times that is 60,000. So, we're right in that range. the district is on the hook for the first four times that. So that's district is on the hook for the first
60,000. Anything between 60 and and above anything above 60 the delta. So let's just say using your 100,000 that $40,000 delta they'll reimburse us 75% of that. So we're still on the hook for the next
10,000 that the state will reimburse us 30,000. So for $100,000 tuition truly we pay 60,000 70,000 and the state reimbures us 30,000. So it's not it's not as they're not reimbursing us said 100%. >> So I don't want to flog any horse here.
I just want to make sure people understood what we're talking about there in the second. >> I believe we have someone hand raised online. David Patton >> David can you hear us? >> I think you may need to give him All
right. Hold on a second. Maybe >> Sarah Matusa. Well, he's Are there any questions I didn't answer for you? I think you I think you were just making nice slowly. >> I just want to make sure I All right, David, if you can hear me, I
think we can hear you now. >> I just unmuted now. Can you hear me? >> Yes, we can hear you. >> Great. Thank you very much. So, I am not a school committee member. I haven't paid a lot of attention to the to I
don't have a child in the school system, but I do pay taxes in this town and I have watched my property taxes go up significantly as have all the residents in this town and I pay close attention
to the budget and I attend every town meeting and I listen to it and I appreciate a lot of conversation that's been going on here as a way to make this presentation more understandable maybe to people who don't really follow
this as closely. But some of the numbers that I've been following are the numbers in the uh that that have been described in the in the newspaper of our actual student enrollment. And I saw the slide that you put out in this presentation
that said we're down 23% over 10 years and that the budget then is or the I guess full-time equivalent for students uh for teachers is down 19%. And so that's kind of a relative similarity in
your mind. Um, but I believe I also saw data that said that this particular year you're down 8.5% from last year and the other question I have is you talk about what it's going to be for the
2627 budget and you showed us a number as to how many students are enrolled on February 2nd of 26. But you don't tell us how many students are going to be enrolled in September of 26, which is the coming year for which you are
budgeting. So I would like to know what you think that number is going to be because every time I've read any articles about what your forecasted student counts are, you typically estimate that there will be an increase in students and yet year after year
after year there has been a decline in students. So, I would like to know what your actual forecasted student enrollment is going to be for September. I would also like to know what the staff to student ratio is going to be. I think
I read in a newspaper article some weeks ago that it's currently down around 11 to1. And if that's the number, gee, that sounds pretty low. And I guess I'd like to know apart from special education
classes because I know special education classes require a higher student toteer ratio. I'd like to know what the class size is and the student teacher ratio is in the the general education classes. So
those are my questions. projected students in September, staff to student ratio um and uh and you know how many how many students there will be in in um in in those
classes. And I guess I'm kind of one of those guys who are saying if you lost 8 and a half% of your student body this year and you're going to lose some more next year, then all of these cuts seem perfectly reasonable to me and maybe
should be greater. >> All right. Thank you. >> Thank you, Mr. M. >> Was it Mr. Patton? Um, >> yes. So the projection for the fall currently is uh roughly 2,349 students based upon some of the enrollment
numbers come in. That's a moving target. Um any given day it goes up and down. Desi the department of education looks at the October one number. So that's kind of where we do the comparison. But for the for the start of the school year we are anticipating somewhere in the ballpark of 2349
to answer that first question. The second question, um the staff to student ratio, I believe that 11 to1 is is fairly accurate and that's in line um with uh state averages right right around there. Um so that we feel pretty comfortable with that number. Um that
allows staff um staff to uh address student needs in the classroom. Um and as as Melissa Lucas had mentioned earlier, our staffing our staffing is such that um we need to make sure that our student needs that are much greater than they they had been previously are
addressed. So 11 to1 ratio is uh I feel like I feel comfortable with that. And then the third number was I I I forgot I didn't I didn't catch the question. >> I guess I'm interested in the uh staff to student ratio, the class size in the
nonsp special education rooms. So we sit we sit around I'm sorry I just add up I think it's an important clarification. So the 11 that you're describing does not imply that there is 11 students in a classroom. A studenttoteer ratio is all
licensed teachers that support the students. So special ed reading specialists interventionalists library librarians. So I think it's I don't want the I just don't want to be misunderstood that our class sizes are that small. smaller class sizes are much closer to
20 25 depending on kind of what you're looking at. So I just want to make sure that that point is kind of underscored I think what >> let me let me make a a comment there um Melissa. So yeah the student uh to or teacher or teacher to student ratio is
definitely inclusive of all um of all staff. So, no, we don't have classes with 11 students, but but but it is ind, you know, it's indicative of, you know, in general what your what your staffing is. And the important thing is to compare us to statewide averages. I
mean, that's that's really the, you know, the important thing. Um, and you know, our um class averages for the elementary schools vary widely, particularly between the two elementary schools. We have some as low as 16 per students per class and up as high as
maybe I think it's 20 20 21. Um, we're not at the 20, you know, five level at at this point. Um, or I haven't seen any, although I have been trying to get those reports. Um, John, those class- size reports, but for some reason those reports have stopped coming. So, um, but
I think the important thing is that you want to look at where we are um, compared to the statewide averages. >> Okay. Okay. And that, forgive me, that 2349 number you gave me for the start of the coming school year is compared to how many as of February 2nd?
>> 2435. >> 2435. Okay. So that's basically down almost another 100 students. That's your projection. >> Okay. Well, >> I'm sorry. The the other question you asked was the so K to6 our average
student classroom size is 19.7 right now. >> Well just that he's in a class with 24 people. >> That's that an average that that doesn't mean that the class are 19.7. It means that some classes may have maybe special education classes that have you know fewer students and some classrooms are
larger. Um but that's the average K to six. It's um like as well pointed out it it varies. It varies at vets in the high school, you know. But that that number is probably um similar you know throughout well >> I just looked through the Google classroom um I'm in classes with 23 24
and 22 students. >> Yep. >> So >> also if you look at all the the data from DESIE on every single public school in Massachusetts and what that ratio looks like for teacher to student we're like squarely right in the middle. We're squarely average. We're not we're not
above. We're not below. We're kind of middle of the pack. So when we're thinking about benchmarking ourselves and are we overstaffed, understaffed, I'd say we're we're right right at the average. >> And I think, you know, when we talk about staff and we talk about there's just so many factors. It's not it's not
black and white. It's not really easy to paint the actual picture. You know, we met with like Fingconom, we talked numbers. It's, you know, it's easy to say numbers. You know, this many students should equal this many staff, and it's not that simple. Um, so we're working with our administrators and our
and our staff and and just looking at what what's what is needed for certain groups of students and how do we staff that how do we staff that appropriately? Uh, we we're trying working really hard to, you know, uh, increase our special ed programming across the district so we can educate our students within the
district by the like age peers and that takes staffing, that takes resources, that takes that takes energy, and it takes money to to make that happen. And you know um that's just part of the equation. And you know going back to the 11 to1 ratio I appreciate you saying that Melissa you know as an educator I
talk this talk about time so I don't always think oh I should explain that better. So I appreciate you kind of explaining where that 11 to1 ratio is. Um but again you know we as Sarah Tus said earlier like we are um achie our students achieve really well here in
Marblehead. So, we're doing a lot with realistically a a little like when you when you start talking about our funding, our our expenditure, our our ratios, and our students are still achieving it. That that speaks volumes to the staffing that's in the classrooms. That speaks
volumes to the caliber of educators that we have and and the and the parent involvement and the collaboration between the schools and the community. And that's honestly sounds corny, but that's what makes Marvel Ed so cool. I mean, I've been in other districts and we don't have this level of
collaboration with the community, with the parents, between the parents and the teachers, and between the teachers and the administrators and the support of the school committee. That's all the factors that make this work. And we can have all the discussions in the world about we shouldn't, you know, we shouldn't cut that or we need to fill
that. And that's all good conversation, but it's all conversation that we're having in a consistent way. None of these decisions about cuts, reductions have been made lightly, have been made in the vacuum, have not been made without thinking about what are the further ramifications. We are in the
business of teaching students and we have to make sure that we keep that at the forefront of our discussions when we talk about how we budget whether we need an override or not what that override looks like how will that be funded how you know who's going to vote for it who's not going to vote for it the percentages of uh the elderly versus the
percentage of of of parents that have kids in the classroom and I mean in the in the schools and percentage of parents that don't have any stake in the game. It's all those things are factors. So um I think these discussions are great. I think, you know, we we are doing what we've been asked to do from the town, but we're also doing it very
thoughtfully, planning, and collaboratively. Mike's doing a phenomenal job working with the the town side, working with Fincom, working with, you know, everybody to say, what is it like? How do we get in here? How do we get to where we need to get to in a in a way that's not schools versus town,
isn't um, you know, us versus them. It's how do we do this collaboratively? And I just I have to keep saying that this is this is a process that I've actually as much as I never want to cut anybody or look at reductions, the process so far has been I think more collaborative than
I could imagine. And it's and that's that's what help that's what's helping us get to where we need to get to. So I just have to continue to share that. It's it's important. It's important information. John, I think it's also important to share that I I think things have changed a lot in special education from even
when I was in school. It's not really as clear-cut as this is our general education classes and this is our special education classes. We, you know, there's it's an integrated approach and so we can't really break those numbers down into this is how many we have per
class for special education and this is how many we have for gened. >> Yeah. And and I I appreciate that, Henry. And I think you know we had this conversation last time too and it's you know if we look at a classroom of say 21 students right let's just use that at the elementary level that that classroom may have you know a prepoundonderance of
the kids might be on an IEP so it might be a code talk classroom might be a gened teacher with a special ed teacher and two instructional assistants that have to come in and and do that and it might eb and flow within and out of the classroom so it's not as easy as saying hey there's 21 kids in that classroom and there's two teachers it's not it may
be two teachers for this 20 minute block and and two teachers for 20 minute block later and one teacher and a need the rest of the time. And so it's it's all it's a moving target. Um it's not the old days of we're just stick everybody in the classroom, face forward, have 25 kids, five kids to a row, teachers
teaching at students. That that's the 70s. We we don't live in that world anymore. And you know, we have to include our students in the classrooms. And that inclusion means that we have to staff it properly. So I I'll get off my soap box, but I think it's important to still continue to have a found solutions. All right. So I think
everyone who has wanted to >> I didn't put my name down but can I ask a quick question? >> Sure. >> As Lee Blander Westport Lane also the Marvel Head current. So there are definitely people who are listening tonight like Mr. Patton it seems who are comfortable with the proposed level
funded budget and then there are a lot of people who are listening also who may say no that I don't want those kind of cuts and we should definitely push for an override. What happens now? We all have seen the same level funded budget. We know that we're 10 weeks away from
town meeting. Um what do you say to folks who who don't want to see those cuts and who who some of whom spoken tonight? What's what what happens for for people who are new and paying attention new you know fresh what what
do they do now or or is what's what's the avenue for folks who are interested in in seeing um fully funded but I forget what was the phrase you used or maybe no it was Samantha Rosado who said like a fully funded budget >> service level service
>> level service I think she went beyond level service though and I think >> she did say fully funded in her in her comment Yeah, >> it might be somewhere in >> somewhere between level and and green. [laughter] Um, what what's the what's the process
in the next 10 months 10 10 weeks? >> You want to speak? >> I like um >> can I just make one comment, John? I want to hear what you have to say, but the question that is a question for this committee. >> Correct. That's what I was just going to say is I can start it, but I think I
should need to turn it over to school committee. So, >> um I was I was just going to say we're we're discussing the level fund of budget tonight, right? And then we're slated to vote for this budget at the next meeting. Um and then this conversation um hats off to happen with the town and that's is my segue over to
the rest of the committee because that's the appropriate deadline. >> Okay. So the school committee votes at its next meeting on this level funded budget and the school committee is required to bring a level funded budget to the town meeting.
>> So what happens? >> So Lee, we are not required to vote next week. We have to vote sometime before town meeting, >> right? >> Slated may vote it next week. We we may not. Um we aren't require we aren't required to do anything when it comes to town meeting other than present a budget
that this committee believes is what is necessary for the students of Marblehead. Um okay the town meeting is required to pass a balanced budget. >> Right. >> Right. So town meeting cannot um wouldn't be certified to pass a
budget that is knowingly unbalanced based on projected revenues. >> Right. So the process um of you know making the sausage is that you know we work with the other areas of town um based on the projected revenues that
were laid out at basically at the state of the town meeting about a month or so ago. Um and we are we work with the finance committee to come forward with a budget that together with the town side will be balanced right because town meeting has to pass a balanced budget.
Now if there is a desire on the part of the town to have a budget that is um higher than that with higher revenues than are projected then the town would need to find additional ways to
generate that revenue. >> Right. >> Yeah. Thank you. So if if people were interested in protecting those positions or and seeing that cuts weren't going to happen, what's the next step? I think I mean I would just answer that
the next step is that the committee this what we have right now is the superintendent's proposed budget. The committee itself hasn't deliberated or voted the budget. And so that's really the next step is for the committee to deliberate whether this is a budget that
we you know will bring forward. Um, and then as Jen referenced, mixed in that you have the work that's being done still on the town side and within that may or may not change what we are asked
to do. Um, and so it's really just an evolving situation over the next 10 months. >> Override coming into the conversation if at all. That's what everyone's talking about, right? is are we going to have an override on the town side on the school side? So at what point does that does
that come into your conversation at this table? >> I would think it comes in as we start to deliberate the budget. >> Okay. >> Just one point of clarification. You said we were required to do a level funed budget. That's not accurate. We were requested to present a level fun
budget. We are not required. Tom cannot tell us >> how to what to present for a budget. But obviously we have a relationship with them and we are trying our best to play nice in the sandbox. >> Right. >> Okay. Well, thank you. >> Um, somebody does have their hand up.
Al, I don't know if you saw that. Um, >> yeah. Thank you, Jen. Um, in Marry Jordan, >> Marie, you should be we should be able to hear you now. >> Can you hear me? >> Yes. Thank you. >> My name's Amorie Jordan. Um, I live at 8
Broaden Road. Um I have had two children who are adults now who went through the um Marblehead public schools. I'm also a retired teacher and school administrator. I just wanted well first I wanted to thank you for all of your work but I also uh that and and doing
this very challenging process which I know is very difficult. Um, I did want to just possibly not for the school committee or school administration, but to the community at large, and this goes to um Lee Blanders's um question about
what happens next. My children were um in elementary school when the last general override was passed. And I just wanted to share with the community at large that one of the reasons that it did pass was because there was a very
big concerted effort um from community groups and family groups, PTO's to really have a big um um kind of a a public service campaign to be able to really put very complex information that
is a school budget into very readable and understandable um uh presentations that really did um convey what was going to happen if an override didn't get passed. So I just want to encourage people to think about
that and to gather and to collaborate so that and start early if there is an eventual override that is presented to the town to be able to canvas the community so that people really do understand in um in a very basic way
what will happen which I know is challenging in and of itself because as I said earlier school budgets are very complex but that I I think in my my memory from that time was really what helped P uh move the needle um so that
the general override was passed. So thank you. >> Great. Thank you. Um next up is uh Cindy Tower Lohan. >> Can you hear us? >> Thank you. Thank you. I wasn't planning
on speaking but um there's just a couple things here. is as as you as everything got shared today in terms of what John had to present, okay, or was asked to present.
My question to the school committee is there anyone on the school committee right now that does not believe that we should have more funding for the schools?
And I asked that because it's been what 20 years since an override and every year this comes up in terms of the budget. There are times when the school
committee clearly clearly knows that we need an override. But in playing in the sandbox, as I think it was Mike who said, you know, it ends up school committee does not go and
ask for an override. And so I find it very disturbing and I continue to find this topic disturbing. For 20 plus years, my kids went through the
schools. I am obviously one of the older folks in this group now and I personally think that as a town, as a community that we need to step it up in terms of
an appropriate budget for the schools versus level budget versus however we want to term it right now. Okay. Um, you know, what I'd like to see is that John comes to the table with what he really
believes should be um the best in terms of the education for our students and that the school committee gets behind that as well as the town. And obviously this is a picture perfect scenario and I
know it isn't but you know like even when the comment in terms of you know what the enrollment was going to be in September okay so it's a hundred less well that could be because the graduating class is higher than the some
of the classes coming up okay so you know like just saying oh we have a 100 less students does not mean that 00 students um you know have just decided to pull out of Marble HUD and you know
in ter like the state all across the state there are budget discussions as well as um decrease in enrollment decrease in enrollment is another thing it is not necessarily indicative of what
our education system is here um but it ends up being equated to that. And so I do want to ask the school committee if um any any of the members believe that you know we should not be raising and
asking for two and a half or even something in between versus what John has presented tonight because I honestly believe that um bringing it to what John has had to do is not appropriate for the
education and the best um situation for our students here. And this is a parent as a parent of kids are not even in the school system anymore. And so yes, I would be um having to pay more taxes, but you know, I value education. Doesn't
mean that just because I'm older and my kids aren't in the school that I am not going to um agree to do that. So, any um feedback with what I've said? I'd appreciate it. [snorts] >> I'll answer that. Um I absolutely think
we should give more money to our schools. I think that's a no-brainer. For me, it's more about collectively getting the community to understand the facts of the situation that we're in, where we've been, where
we are right now, so that we can't have misinformation brewing within the community and people understand where we are to be able to have an honest conversation about, okay, we're properly staffed. What does that actually look like? Yes, I I'm fully supportive of
giving our schools more money. My focus as a new committee member has been around level setting the facts and the honest conversation around that within our community because I do not feel that an override would be successful with misinformation in the community ahead of
that override. So >> yes, more money for our schools >> with factual information as the basis of that conversation. Um, I would just agree with pretty much everything Melissa just said. I don't think people get themselves onto a
school committee because they don't want to fund the schools appropriately. Um, I do think we have to find a way to walk this line of understanding the demographics of our community, the financial situation our community is in
and balance that against what the needs are in our schools and working to fund those and working to be successful when that request is made. So, it's, you know, somewhat what the needs are and somewhat what the timing is, but, you
know, I absolutely, you know, agree with Lawson. >> Yeah, I agree. I think I think if we did decide that an override was important, I I don't think there's anybody on the committee who wouldn't throw their full support behind it. I know or I I don't want to speak for anyone. I would
certainly throw my full support behind it and and work with the community to get the message out there and and to you know convince people that this is the right thing to do. I think we do have to have a specific plan though. Of course >> yeah I think we have
>> 10 10 weeks. Is that right? >> Yeah. The only thing I I'll try to be additive because I agree with what people said before, but um you know, there's also areas that I think that go beyond level services that
may make sense for our district, right? I think one very obvious one is tuition for kindergarten, right? We're having our taxes should be paying for K through 12, full daycare, you know, full
kindergarten. So, I'm not sure when the right time to introduce that might be, but I do think maybe there are three different types, right? The level funded budget, the level services budget, and then I think as people have talked here is a fully funded, right? Would more the ideal that we would like to see. Now
that being said, I think we should have that data, but then we have to also work with many other people to um see how that eventually works out. >> Jen, did you have any any comments? >> Again, to quote you, I don't want to be um add want to be additive. Um uh Alf,
you know, for sure and all really really good points that were were raised um in terms of, you know, what it is that we want this school district to be. what do we who do we aspire to in terms of, you know, other model districts? Um, and
what what kind of programming and and funding that they have in in those communities. Um, but I think to Melissa's point, again, no one's on this committee, myself included, that doesn't believe that we should be properly and fully funding our schools to give the best education we possibly can um to all
of the students in Marblehead. you know, I would love to have every single student aged child in Marblehead coming to our schools. Um, which we which we don't have right now. Um, but to to Melissa's point, um, we have to, you
know, I guess balance that is if that's the right word or or make a judgment in terms of our ability to get something to get an increase in revenue um, you know, through the through the ballot in the town. And that's um, that's not taken very lightly. And I I don't know who
made the comment earlier, someone one of the commenters said, you know, that we haven't asked for an override, and that's simply not true. We've had multiple failed overrides um in the early, you know, 2020s um up to 2023, I think, was the last failed override. Um, so it's it's it's important and it's
something that we need to um, you know, to consider and work towards, but it is a large hill to, you know, to climb here in this town. Um, and and it's important um, and I know, you know, Kate, looking back at some, you know, um, comments la
this time last year, you were very vocal about the, uh, need to fully fund our schools. um you were you know you were very very clear about that out in the public and in the press um and I agree with that um but you you know now on the committee can see that um it you know
it's a very very large task um and so far this committee hasn't given um you know the message to either the superintendent or the subcommittee to go forward with that um we can u but we need to get through this first round because like I said we you know we have
to pass a budget or we have to present a budget at town meeting um that will get approved at town meeting that will cause you know give us the best possible scenario in the event that we are not able to get an override to fund our schools.
>> Thank you everyone. >> Okay, I did say we don't we allow a second round. I know there's at least one person that would like to take advantage of that. Oh, >> second class. Question. Um, Melissa Theod. I live at
180 West Shore Drive. I'm currently a special ed student who's at Veterans Middle School and a Brown Elementary and second grade student. Um, parent. I was a former educator of middle school students for 10 years. Um, big promoter
of public education and I really enjoyed your article. Um, my question comes from a couple of those viewpoints. Both as a teacher, a former teacher, a parent, someone who lives in the town, someone who's paying taxes in town. Um, is there
any discussion in the budget about recapturing enrollment of students who have moved out of district? Something like brought about you were talking about uh funding kindergarten. wouldn't funding kindergarten increase
our enrollment and allow those bodies to come back into the district and by increasing enrollment aren't you also increasing retention of positions for all of those well well educated teachers that are in our district because we have excellent teachers my students both of
my students get uh a proper and um well well-rounded education in Marblehead um I just wanted to see is there any discussion question about recapturing enrollment retention of good teachers and then what is I don't know it um only
live in town for eight years um what is the policies maybe within the district on um just are do we have student teachers and and people who come into the district who are educ being educated to become a teacher like does that are
we I guess are we actively seeking people who want to be in education to come to for a district to look at what we're doing here and to be part of it when they graduate. Are we trying to bring new teachers up? I guess is the other question. Sorry if that's complicated.
>> No, John. I think that's best for the superintendent and others to potentially answer. Yeah, I think um I think a lot of that is is is happening and things that we talk about all the time like how do we the student teacher one for instance like um I'm a huge proponent of getting student teachers in to to not
only just to help out in the classroom you know as as student teachers but to grow them and to help them and and say hey maybe there's a place for you Marblehead um you we run into you know it's tough we have Salem state and we have and you know so the the feeder systems for us aren't as robust as I would love um that I've seen in other
districts, but we do try to capture that when we can. Um, and then, um, as far as, um, yeah. Um, but I'll let >> I just also want to add, it's been really nice in my time here to see um, returning students become now uh, counselors, teachers. So, we have such a
great product, they want to return home and be part of our system. We do has have a partnership with Salem State. Um, Indicott has a different kind of graduate level program that's a little bit different. It's like a fellowship program. Um but we >> correct >> in Beverly. Yeah, correct. Yeah. Um but
we do have that and this year we we hired one of our uh Salem State um that he did, you know, some hours with us and found the home care. So we we are working on that. It's um logistically with our >> correct me if I'm wrong. That's part of our cuts for this level funded budget.
>> Just no we we decided not to fund the fellowship. That's that's a little from the student teacher, >> but yeah. Um and then the other piece that I think you talked about kindergarten, you know, um Al's Al's discussion about you know fully funding kindergarten. Does that increase
enrollment? Potentially. I think um it it could it's also um you know it's a good thing, right? We we should be providing kindergarten. I think the problem with the kindergarten of prek is is our birth rates are low been low. So the incoming numbers aren't aren't what they what they have been. So that that
definitely has a trickle up effect. Um but we're having convers a lot of the internal conversation right it doesn't help right now in the conversation we're having but we're talking about how do we how do we u make transitions between the schools a little bit more robust how do we have um the high school present more
to the middle school students so that they're not more enamored with going elsewhere and they say hey there's some really cool things happening in mobile high school so how do we retain students which then also helps retain teachers um and um Julia in the office of teaching
learning And the PD committee is working really hard about how do we create and um and provide PD in districts so that um you know teachers are getting the resources and the and the things that they need and the training they need so they and in in a robust way so they want
to stay on and you know like hey we're spending the time and the energy uh training folks so that we can provide the best education. So there's all those things that are happening. It's it's it's not as easy to quantify. Um but there are there are all those conversations happening. Um I wish I had
the magic wand. I don't. Um but but I think your points are really well taken and those are the those kind of some of the intangibles that are hard to kind of say like what are you doing too? And I think um we've been have you know we're all kind user newer. Um so we're we're
having those conversations. It just it takes a little bit of time to to get those that culture ingrained and we move forward. But I think I think we're doing some good work. >> Yeah. >> Well, the other thing too um the other thing too to keep in mind is we you know working with Lisa Marie Epelo is we are
you know trying to work to bring back out of district placement students um hopefully back into district that we can provide the appropriate education um for them and also to build robust programs um you know as importantly that will will preclude students from going out of
district. Now, obviously, there's always going to be some that we'll need to we can't meet their needs, but that work also takes an investment and that takes, you know, more dollars in our budget um than a level funded budget allows. Um so, these are the kind of, you know,
pressures that we we have to deal with. >> Yeah, I don't think I I heard this, but like a couple of meetings ago, a couple of months ago now maybe, um what I heard from you to which I really liked was we're also trying to get as much data as to why. Right. So when when students
leave or whatever it may be teachers, we try to have other formerly call them exit interviews but you know we try to work with those individuals because I think the best way to figure out what we need to do is to understand the why right the data behind that and I think that's an important component >> and again yeah it's hard to take all
these things off off the cuff but yeah absolutely and and I just Julie I just asked Julie to share a little bit more about the enrollment piece. to what Mal was speaking about, we presented um the team presented in December on enrollment and looking at the historical perspective and through the research and the deep dive into that, it really we
had some very um like productive conversations as administrative team and we've actually shifted our strategy. So, we've been more strategic in um the points that John identified as that we we think that we could maybe hopefully recapture or gaining more enrollment and
that is kindergarten. So, we just launched enrollment. Perhaps you got the flyer that we created. For the first time, we added a data point that we are very proud of that the students that start in kindergarten in Marblehead public schools tend to outperform students that enroll later. So, we've never done that before. So, we're adding
more. We've also >> you're getting >> and we and we thank you so much for reminding me. We also launched everything a lot earlier. So, as the superintendent mentioned to the the previous speaker, enrollment is a moving target, but we have opportunities and we felt that if we move things a little bit earlier, that would be an opportunity to
hopefully get some more. Um, and then we had a phenomenal open house last night at the high school for the 8th to 9th grade transition. So, we're definitely being more strategic, I would say, ever in the last few years that I can recall. uh because we do see that as we know we are up against lower birth rates and
competition but we have a phenomenal product and we want to make sure that we are very strategic and very uh public and and as much as we can sharing and and you've heard from teachers tonight we they work incredibly hard we have phenomenal parent support we have a great product and we're very proud of
that so I think that all the things that we can do collectively and that's why it's important to bring these things up when people are here and listening this is really important for us to to shed positive light on that as well >> and even just the the night last night that Julie just talked about. We already talked about, hey, next year we need to do that earlier so that like we have
kids that haven't already committed to, you know, X, Y, and Z going somewhere else. So, let's do that earlier. Let's really celebrate all the great things that we have to offer at Marvel High School and do it early. And we talked about not just targeting the eighth graders, we should start targeting the seventh graders. So, there's all those discussions happening and it's just born
out of like, hey, what can we do better? What can we do different? What can we do for all the things you just said? And you know, I'm I'm excited about it. It's again, it takes a little bit of time, but you know, yeah, those things are happening. So, Lisa Marie wants to add some >> Yes. And so, um, prek um, talking about
enrollment. So, uh, we actually have a wait list. Um, the application closed February 13th. We did a lottery yesterday. Brown is full. We have a wait list. Uh, and Glover, we have one, uh, peer partner opening left. Um, and so, you know, this is I'm a year and a half
in. Um but what we did hear as um Superintendent Ferrero was saying that parents wanted earlier admission, right? And um so we did open it up earlier. We're going to be doing our screening. And so again, we're very proud of our prek team and everything that we have to
offer within this community. And I think having that solid base for our 3 to 5 year olds um and then building up into the kindergarten is a is a wonderful thing for Mobilehead public schools. That's really good to hear that there's a growth program initiative to pull the
enrollment early to support those students that are being you know more successful than others and that we take some pride in that. Um it's good to see the students taking pride in wanting to talk to those younger grades saying these things are so great. Uh like I
said public school educated public school teacher for a long time. Um just uh really love Marble Schools. Uh I've been here since both of my children were in kindergarten. So we paid for tuition and and did the kindergartening uh interview
process and all of that. Um so we are hoping that you will bring forward a budget that will encourage retention of teachers enrollment and keeping that enrollment from year to year. not just
new people through district but everybody who's you know already here staying in and holding on to what makes our land so great. >> Thank you so >> okay um thank you uh Shelly you should be uh can you hear us?
Yes, I can. Hi. Um, >> I have a I hopped on a little bit late, so I'm not sure if you guys had brought up the topic of Essex Tech yet. Have you or No. Has anyone asked a question on that? >> No. >> Okay. So, I understand how the money
works with charter when people leave the district and go there, but how does the money work with Essex Tech? I know our slots rose this year from I think they tripled. I think they were like in the they were up to like almost like 39 and it was significantly less
last year. So does that mean obviously we're losing seats or heads if they all go there and get up to the our full aotment but does that mean all how does that money work? Um is it one Yeah, I guess that's just the question. How's the money work with Essex Tech and the
increase of people going there? How's that going to impact our bottom line? So >> like I might take that one. The number's 37 just so you know. Um they the number is 37 that they will um that they the cap it at. Um so anyway
>> 37 Marvel head students potentially. >> They potentially taken 37 Marvel head students. I don't know what the final column was but I think it's less a little bit less than that but more than last year 27. >> But isn't it significantly is it significantly more than last year? Like I thought it was >> Yes. Yes. I I believe it's 27 is is
where they landed right now. Um which is which is more than doubled. Yes. >> But Mike's gonna Mike's going to explain how the money follows the kid. >> Okay. >> So um >> the vocational school as well as charter school are not built into the school department's budget. They are built into
the town's budget. So to answer your question, if the cost to educate a vocational student is 20,000 per year, called tuition and 10 additional kids go to vocational
school that were not there last year, the town would be on the hook for an additional 200,000. Just using rough numbers. I'm not sure exactly what the tuition is. That does not come out of the school department's budget, but the town does need to find money to fund that. Uh same thing with charter school
students. If charter school students uh the parents send their kids to charter school, the town does have to fund that. So it's not in our budget. It's not something we keep from a finance side. I don't keep a close eye on it. Obviously from teaching and learning and from superintendent's perspective, we want to
retain as many kids here as possible. But we also want to make sure that if a student is geared towards vocational school that they get the opportunity to go to vac vocational school. Uh so it is on the town to fund it. It's not in the school department's budget, so it might be a better question for
a joint school committee select board conversation. >> Well, I think the thing to keep in mind, correct me if I'm wrong, Mike, too, is that we also get state aid from the state to the town of Marblehead for schools called chapter 70 money. And
it's a, you know, in Marblehead, I think it's around up to around $7 million. It's a it's a formula that comes through the state budget. So, ostensively there's funding you know that comes to the town you know for that as well. But you've kind of got uh you know a sort of
a double whammy where you're getting now potentially um almost two or more two and a half times more students go you know going out to the the voke as well as the same student number of students we have going to the charter school and our declining enrollment. you
know, more and more of that is going to affect the chapter 70 money and that balance and that is factored into what is appropriated to us and how we work with fin. But unlike most towns in Marblehead, that chapter 70 money goes to the town side and it doesn't directly
come over to us, right, to your point. So, we don't actually see that, but it is part of the entire, you know, recipe of the funding for the town. So I think chapter 70 I don't want to go down that rabbit hole right now but just a really briefly the state does give us money for education it's called chapter
70 and the amount of money you get per pupil is dependent on the comm there's so many there's so much involved in the in the formula that you have to be a a mathematician statistician historian to understand it all but the bottom line is the higher your town's
ability to pay meaning the wealth factor of your town the less money the state gives you for education. So, Marblehead is at the floor, which I believe is either 16.5% or 17.5%. So, if the cost to educate a student is $20,000 per
student, Chapter 70 comes in at 16.5% of that number per pupil that we have. Take a community that's uh does not have the ability to pay. And it's just because I I dealt with in my former district. Lawrence is 100% funded by
chapter 70. They get 100% of that state money because they don't have the ability to pay. Marblehead has the ability to pay in in the eyes of the Commonwealth. They don't know that we haven't passed an override in 25 years, but they say we have the ability to pay, so we get less. To Al's point earlier,
sorry, Mr. Williams, >> Al's fan. Um, on the kindergarten side, this is something that we should explore if we were in a community like somebody that gets 50%. Somebody that's at the 50% level and you're charging for
kindergarten tuition, you're only getting so you you're educating that student for half a day at state dollars because you're only charging tuition for the second half of the day. the state reimbures us for the half day,
not the full day. So when we drop tuition to zero and we no longer charge tuition, the state will fund that child at 100% of our 17% 16 and 12%. So there will be more chapter 70 money comes in when we stop charging tuition. The
problem is because Marblehead has the ability to pay. We're at that 17 and 16 and 12 17 and 12% range. If I was at a 50% range, they'd be a no-brainer. we're going to stop charging tuition and and the state's actually going to probably pay us more than we were actually
collecting in in tuition money. But truthfold, we charge a fair amount. I use the word fair amount for kindergarten tuition. Some may disagree with that. I'm just going to be neutral on that. Um because
we're charging with 7,000 plus for kindergarten. No, I'm sorry. >> I'm sorry. 40 confusing with special education um sorry prek. >> So 4,000 >> just over $4,000. We're not going to we're not getting 8,000 per pupil. So we're not going to get 4,000 back from
the state as the other half in the day. So some point we have to bite the bullet and I built it into the 27 budget a year ago. I built in kindergarten because because it was the leadership team talked about how important and we heard from the committee how important
kindergarten full day kindergarten was for our families for our students learning and for them to get that jump and that head start placed under the enrollment also we I I did a factor and I I factored in what it would cost to do full day kindergarten and we talked about fin with a fincom in the poor
selectman and the other piece that we we also talked about funding was technology within our own school department so we didn't have to go to capital for And those are two things that we built into the budget. And those are the first two things that we had to take out immediately as soon as the town told us that the the funds just weren't going to
be there for fiscal 27. So we I mean we got models, we know what the numbers are, we know how it's going to work. It's we don't have the funding on the other side and 2 and a half% when inflation in the early 2000s 2020s was 67 and 8%. I can't remember the three
years but there was one year was 6%, one year was 7%, one year was 8%. So everybody out there was spending more money. The only thing that didn't go up by more than 2 and a half% were taxes. But inflation goes up because people got races, right? People made more money, so
they spent more money. So they made more money, but they didn't want to fund more taxes. I don't want to get into a philosophical question here. Our cost went up on utilities by seven, eight, n%. Our cost went up on special education out of district tuitions by 14% one year. our costs went up on
supplies and paper and and gasoline for our our vehicles and and everything that we have in the district by six, seven or eight%, but we were still locked down at 2.5%. There's no way that we can keep our heads above water with those numbers. Now, if inflation was 2 and 12%
and and the tax override was 2 and a half% great, we're even. We're make we're making ends with do with what we have. I think our teachers were clear about that last year when they made their statement, leave it at that, that
they were stuck at 6, 7, 8% increases in their inflationary rate also, but their salaries weren't keeping up with that and they couldn't afford to do the same things they were. I'll just leave it at that. Sorry.
>> Well, I will say just from, you know, let's be factual here. For many of those years, our budgets were going up more than two and a half percent. I mean, they were they they really were. I mean, our we were usually I mean, that's part of why we are where we are is we were looking at, you know, five, six, six and
a half, even some years 7% increase in our school budget. And that was driven a lot by the cost that you're talking about, Mike. But, so while the town levy might have gone up by two and a half, the school budgets were going have been going up more than that. And I think the Tom funded that using the free cash
reserves, correct? >> Yes. Yes. >> That that's kind of why we don't have the free cash reserve. >> That is correct. >> All right. Um >> I just really quick because I have to go put kids to bed. Um, in the spirit of
um, mis or misinformation, sorry, me pelvin fel um, also I work in the district, but I have a p uh, I have a second grader. He is in he's at Glover. He's in second
grade. He is in a class of 22. Um, it's I think one of the biggest classes in the district. Um, and so this is also speaking to Mr. Patton's question about um special ed ratios versus general ed
ratios. And I just want and Henry did clarify that that's not really how it works. But so in my child's class there's there is special ed kids, there's gen edits. It's not a general ed. It's a gen ed class, but
it's not. It's and I my point I guess that I'm trying to make is that there's really no such thing as a special education classroom. I I mean there are but most of our classes are
a mix of kids and it's difficult to ask what the rate what the ratio is of Jenna versus Spatula because we we put them together and that's where they belong, right? Um, and then I there's also been
I want to clarify also there I've seen people suggest that we use Eveith School as a special education school and I I want to say that that's like and Lisa Marie correct me if I'm wrong but that's just not really something that
can happen and I'm told that and I want like because everybody is together and that's how it should But so just quick comment before >> yeah Jess Desessie doesn't to your point
Megan Desi doesn't allow you to create a separate >> right uh school for special unless you're approved by the state to do that right so like that's why we have collaborators that's why I have private special educations um schools public schools have to have their uh special
education programming and classrooms in with the general population um integrated when you can sub some center classrooms have to they can't be off in >> another building another wing of that they have to be in the mix so that's that's part of the regulations it's also
good for kids so yeah >> and I think the conversation around um Eveith was about a transition program what >> this is something I know what you're this was something I have seen in years past people anecdotally saying like why
don't we just use evidence to reverse to get kids back into district and that's not something that >> not legal. >> Yeah. >> Thank you. >> Well, we've also um talked about it in the, you know, facility subcommittee meetings this year about a potential early education center.
>> Um and that, you know, is different, but that would, you know, that would be also a potential use for that building. Um and that goes to I didn't catch the woman's name who sat who spoke before. Um but talking
about trying to um you know have less students leave district and retain students and attract students. If you know I thought if we you know we can start early and we start in prek um we can capture these kids and have them probably not the right word but you know attract these kids and and um students
and keep them through through graduation in 12th grade. >> Okay. >> Thank you. Any other first- timers? All right, sir.
>> First of all, I owe Mike an apology. It was FY25 with Mary Dely and I I'll send you the videos tomorrow um for the for that. Um I just want to start off by talking about the way we talk about our students. It is probably for
years before I had children. We talk about I we just heard um nurse Ken say special education students, general education students. We have students. We have children and I have children. The whole town knows there about a million of them. And some of my children get
special education service services. They're not my special education kids. And my other kids have general education kids. When we start talking about our kids and this quote unquote special education problem we have, we put our fiscal problems on the backs of children
and that is not okay. These are children. Some of them need individualized education plans. Some learn in different ways. It is our job legally and morally to talk about them in a way that is respectful to that. So
I really just hope we can start to to that end Melissa, you spoke a little bit about 20 um the stats in 2016 versus now in our student demographic about high need students and them requiring. Yes, our
certain students do do require lower student toteer ratios to say are their high needs. You really have to understand what the high needs is. Desi over the years has changed that rubric of what is factored into high needs. All students that dese qualifies as high needs do not need specialized
instruction. So to it almost further adds into that stigmatization. If you're high needs, you must be a kid that needs to learn with mult that is not the way classifies it. It it's it's on a multitude of things. Lisa Marie can
really explain that. And I encourage anybody that doesn't understand to sit down with Lisa Marie. She's very giving up her time. in my experience as both a parent of a special education student and um as a a former school committee member to really make you understand
because if you're in charge of educating our students, it's really important you understand the nuances and also you know how we how we speak about our kids matters. So right there I just want I want to speak on that. Um, in regards to the budget, well, I have a question and
the presentation this year, you talked about bringing some of the salaries into reserve funds as a way to stabilize, which you know, kudos for for teasing that out. >> Revolving account revolving, I'm sorry. Yes, revolving.
>> We don't have We do not have reserve funds in the school department. >> Well, we do have a townwide one, but anyway. >> Yes, but not in the school department. the revolving fund. We have multiple revolving funds, >> correct? >> Last year's or maybe two years ago, we brought the director of of
>> food service into his revolving funds. Um, you're bringing Could you could you talk about what additional positions you're bringing in this year and if it's partial salary or full salary? >> So, um, previously we had charged off in our kindergarten revolving fund. So, kindergarten revolving is tuition money
we bring in because we charge tuition. We were charging off about half of our teachers sorry we were charging off half of our kindergarten teachers salaries to the revol in the proposed budget
we are charging off half of the teachers and the kindergarten aid because there is kindergarten uh instructional assistant power professional ESP whatever we're doing. So the proposal is to tap that revolving account more heavily. In addition, our pre our kindergarten
and prek revolving account is one account. They are not separated. So we we had not previously taken prek teachers out of that account. So we are taking half of the teachers from prek also out. So we are tapping that very heavily next
year. Okay. >> We could probably do that for 3 years before we need to tamp it back down. So this, you know, if Susie May is a teacher, you're not taking 50% of her salary. You might be, she might be one of the teachers. You're taking 100% of her salary out of environment. >> No, I'm going to take if she's a
kindergarten teacher, I'm taking 50% out of the revolving fund, 50% out of the local budget because >> Okay. >> The because and the reasoning is is because they get half day included from the town. Okay. >> They're paying half day for the other half. >> Are you taking half of their benefits out of your fund?
>> Um, we are not. >> Okay. Because the right now the chapter 63 um paragraph B1 in the bylaw says the department or agency head, board, committee or office are made for liabilities against spend monies from a
revolving fund established and authorized by this bylaw without appropriation subject to the following limitations. Bridge benefits of full-time employees whose salaries or wages are paid from the fund shall be paid uh from the fund. to their insurance. So I from from the
bylaw it looks like 50% of anybody whatever percentage you're paying from the revolving fund that percentage of infringed benefit. >> So I think this is where our relationship with the town comes in huge because if they want us to pay 50% of the benefits out of the revolving fund then I'm going to be able to charge less
salary to the revolving fund meaning there's a bigger burden on the town to fund the local. So, it's a >> So, right now we're >> and I'm I don't want to say this disrespectfully, but it's it's like the moving I want to call it the shell game, but it's not because we're not hiding anything. But if it's under this shell
right now, I can't also have it under this shell. So, I I I can only have it in one place. So, if it's in one bucket, let's call them buckets. If I have money in one bucket, it only goes to so many I can only spend so much money out of that bucket. So, it's either going to go to their salary or it's going to go to their benefits or combination of both.
At some point, there's only so much money in that bucket. So while yes I can take French out of there that means I can pay less salary out of there. So to answer your first question kindergarten there is a special education tuition revolving fund for kids that we tuition
into our program if we have a specialized program. We did for a few years and we had a little bit of a a buildup in that revolving account. We are taking um four 25,000 out of four different people's
salaries and they are OTPT type salaries. Occupational therapy, physical therapy, speech and language. Um 25,000 to four different people out of that fund next year. So 100,000. Uh in addition, we also um fund part of the assistant director and part of the um
special education uh secretary out of that fund. So uh there are six people which portion of their salaries coming out of there and educious we are tapping that for two salaries I believe next year uh out of educacious uh which is
our for lack of a better term foreign language program uh but it's not not foreign language uh foreign exchange >> foreign exchange program not called foreign exchange anymore but it's where students pay to come here uh for their senior year of high school and uh they get a a diploma from if they meet all
the criteria um that fund had grown a little bit to the point that we felt like we could take two salaries out of there for probably 2 to 3 years. So again, we're we're everything we're doing is getting us two to three years. There's nothing that's going to solve
the problems of of the the future of Marblehead Public Schools budget concerns more than two to three years. >> We're in a structural deficit. I don't think anybody can argue. I need to >> We're in agreement. Structural deficit. >> We're in agreement. Um my my question is like what you know
what can we do about that knowing full well that next year we have the it the the the contract was purposely sent to give us some runway so that we knew we would ease up to the point where we know we need an override and next year and
the following year or when the bigger increases incur. So if people are worried now, they should really be worried looking ahead. Um has there been a discussion between the town, any of you administrators, any
school committee members about the benefits, the cost of benefits either in full or partial for health insurance being for school employees being charged to the district. I I I can't I haven't had specific
conversations, but I have heard rumblings that somebody says, "Why doesn't the school pick up their benefit costs?" And and I think the simple answer is if you're going to make us pick up the benefit cost, you need to move the money over with it. I mean, we can't just say, "Okay, here's your $49 million budget. Now, we want you to pick
up $8 million in benefit costs within that $49 million." So, there's conversations, and I I think those are conversations that are going to continue to happen. um specifically had those conversations myself? No. To answer your question. Nor have I. No, not specific.
>> Have any school committee members had that with any member of the town leadership or or committee members? >> I have had conversations with members of town leadership about where the town budget stands, what they
might be looking to the school committee for. I would not say that there have been conversations about specifically charging benefits as opposed to looking at the total cost of the district including the cost of health insurance
benefits when trying to figure out how to manage to bring a balanced budget to town meeting in May. Well, so okay, so that's interesting because correct me if I'm wrong, Melissa, on the budget subcommittee, we
have not had those conversations. Um, so those must have been some offline conversations that have taken place. >> Yes. >> Because Okay. Because what is that's a big step for that to take place for this
coming fiscal year. where money where do you propose that money comes from because you're already saying you're level funded maybe >> and if you're having discussions of of going I'm just curious where is that money and Kate in your offline conversations where would did you suggest or where did others suggest that
money would come from >> I don't want to characterize this as any kind of decision having been made by anyone but more of a general conversations that are happening >> about how we're going to move forward through the budget process. I have not
made any representations about whether I agree with that idea, where the you know where the money would come from, whether the rest of the school committee would agree with that approach, but more just sort of a the school committee has done what we were asked to do. We have prepared a
level funded budget. We are now waiting to see whether that is going to be something that can work in a balanced budget context or whether you know we would be asked to make additional changes. >> Are some of you considering
>> You got about 20 seconds. >> You're Are some of you considering reducing the budget more pending conversations like that? Pete, >> it's not my decision to make. you know, well, every individual has a vote.
You're you appear to be the only one having the conversation. Everyone else has said they haven't had a conversation. Would you have in your conversations, have you had conversations about reducing the the school budget more if asked by any
individual on the town side? But I mean that's >> I'm asking you if you've had conversations with town officials where you have you have been asked to and you've told them you will consider bringing reducing the current number that was on that screen to a lower
number. >> I have had conversations where I have said that there is a whole context to this that we are going to have to consider. >> I'll take that as a yes. All right. Thank you, sir.
>> Okay. But no, thank you. Okay, David, you can go ahead. >> Thanks very much. Just uh one quick quick clarification. So when I talked about the difference between general and special education students, I was thinking in my mind about the kinds of
students who can't be in a classroom with um with large numbers of students and actually need more assistance or more support in that way. Um I am aware that large percentages of the student
population have 504s and IEPs. My daughter had that and we went through that process and it was a great um extensive process which was very difficult to get in the school system that we raised our daughter in. We
finally achieved it. It helped her and she was in the class with everybody and she has become a very successful person through her education. So, I just want to make that clarification. And I don't know what the numbers are in the Marblehead school system relative to
the number of students who who can't be in the class at all if there are any. >> I'm not sure. Was that a Can you restate if that was a question, please? His question was are is there any are there any people >> with I will just describe them as such
significant disabilities of some measure that therefore they're still in the public school system but they're not actually in the general classrooms with all the other students. >> Yes. So, we have sub- separate programming um within all of our school
buildings um for students who have those severe needs. But they are some of those students are also integrated, it's called inclusion, into our general ed uh classrooms um as much as possible because we're
trying they're providing the least restrictive environment for those students. Did that answer the question? >> Yeah. Yeah, I guess so. I mean, I don't know how many of those students there are and how many classrooms there are with just those students in them and
therefore that would affect the student teacher ratio and the class size and all those kinds of things. Um, and apparently you're you're not going to tell me what that number is and you know that's the way it is. I'm just thinking I guess if I'm
confused about what the student how the student population breaks out, I'm there may be other people in town who might be confused about that too and your process of getting this budget um approved and
uh and and the town supporting it, you might find a way to help to explain that to people who don't understand. Thank you. I I can I can speak a little bit to I mean I you know I'm not going to go down the rabbit hole of how many students do we have in in a in a subsearate
classroom. That just that's not really appropriate for the conversation. However, I will say in Marblehead public schools, as is the case in most public schools, you have layers of support for students that require those layers of support. They may need zero support. They may need some support through a 504
or some intervention. they may require a little bit more support because they have an IEP and they have uh some um needs in different areas or they may need a lot of support because they have more needs in more areas and or they might have to have an out of district
placement because their needs are so great that we can't appropriately educate them within within the district and you have a whole plethora of that. So the number piece of it is less important than I think if we go back to what Miss Fox was saying earlier is they're all of our students and
educating all of our students means that kids need different things for different reasons in different classrooms and with different supports and different resources. And all of that puts together is why we have the budget that we have and the resources and the teachers and the staff to be able to meet the needs
of all students whether they require a lot more resources or less resources throughout the day. So that probably doesn't answer your question specifically, but that's the general that's the general way. >> That's okay. Could you could do you have a number off the top of your head as to
what percentage of your student body have either 504s or IEPs? Yeah, we're around um 19 to 21% of students um receiving special education. Uh 504 is that is a moving that one is a
kind of more moving target and that's general education. So sometimes people um view 504s as part of the special ed process and it's not. 504s um are for students who have disabilities but are um only require accommodations, not
modifications within the classroom. >> I'm very familiar with the difference. We had to go through that with our daughter in in the early grades as well. >> That's kudos to to to you all because that
number's down 4% in about five year four year five years. Bill McAuliff um had done a statistic on run the statistics and at that time we were one of the highest special education percentage districts in the state at 24% at that time that would meant for FY20 so from
FY20 at 24% to now we reduced the number of students we have on special education so that's a kudos that you guys should take >> it's it's kudos to it's a kudos to a lot of people I think you know when we talk about the MTSS and all the supports we do for all students with within the classrooms and as some tiered systems
supports so that the students are getting what they need. Um those interventions are are there so that we can minimize the need for the you know for for the specialized services because um that's just that's just what we do right. So the the the percentage is we
we are right within where the state is one we are right actually he's um kind of on the lower end of of our area for for a lot of the um special ed had a this is not in desi or anywhere else we had a conversation with our
superintendents in the northshore round table and there was uh one of the superintendents was asking for information about how many IA they have and compared to how many special ed students and we were like I was like I think you know I don't know where we fall with everybody else and we felt like right right there like right exactly where everybody else was. So
again, I feel good. I feel good about where we are. I feel good that we provide the services that we need to for the students and that we have the resources available. So [clears throat] >> I'm going to ask for a motion. >> Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't see your hand.
Sorry. >> Just real quick. Um Molly 388 Ocean. Um I'm a vice chair of the finance committee and also um I work on the school as a school liazison and I just I wanted to say just a couple quick things. Um what I I this is my fourth
budget season um I am living in Marblehead by far the most difficult that we've ever faced. It it is um there will be very difficult decisions that are are coming forward. Um, in my time on this committee, I've attended um, several meetings looking at how other
towns run and best practices across all towns in Massachusetts. One thing that I have seen is that the bestrun towns have a collaborative relationship between the schools and the town and they work together. They look long-term, right? It
is a long-term collaborative effort planning forward because budgeting is really hard. And so to the extent that there is collaboration and a relationship working together, I think that is an excellent thing. And so I just want to make that clear. Since I've been on the finance committee, I've
worked very hard to help establish that. And it has there has been the relationship that the town schools had when I first started was not very good. Quite frankly, there was a lot of stress. there was a lot of um it just created a budget that I think um maybe
could have been improved the process certainly and so the fact that we're moving toward a more collaborative effort I think is something that should be >> all right thank you >> so I before we close this I just want to make a couple comments um Al because I think I guess we're going to move on or
not I don't I don't know >> yeah we are going to move on and and there's only one vote consent agenda vote if and I'll confer with council. If we have to redo that, we can do it next week, but we will continue on with the rest of the meeting. >> Well, I meant in regards to the to the
budget because I think I mean there's just a couple comments I'll make before we close this out. And that is I mean going back to this point about I guess Kate having conversations with other folks in town. I think we need to kind of button up our process a little bit on on how we're doing that. But what I what I will say and what I've been thinking
about this whole time coming into this meeting tonight and hearing you know from several folks here regard in regards to level funded versus fully funded versus you know level services. Well, you know, the elephant in the room we haven't necessarily talked about as well is that, you know, this whole
process and to Molly's point predicated on us working with FINCOM is that we've had this sort of, you know, practice that the schools and the town have really looked at the revenue from a 5050 standpoint. So 50% of the revenue has generally been appropriated to the
schools, 50% to the to the town side, um, including the sal the budget, the insurance and benefits on the town side. Um but what we heard last month um and are maybe going to get an update in the next week or so, but what we heard last month was a pretty significant reduction
in the projected revenue that we were basing on. So what what has been clear in the you know public square to to me is that if that revenue number is actually less than 40 49.1 million as
50% of it we may very well be looking at or be um sort of the reality is for a level budget based on revenue to actually have to cut additional funding out of our budget which would be the first time in
my experience that we've ever actually cut and had less of an appropriation in a given fiscal year than the previous fiscal year, which is a very very concerning situation. Um, and may very well be the reality. So, you know, I think we we also need to, you know, sort
of talk about that, you know, process because I think in the spirit of transparency that, you know, a couple folks, you know, felt strongly about in in the last year or so and ran on that, we need to be open with, you know, what the what the reality is that we're facing as well. Um, and no one has, you
know, talked about that. I don't know, you know, what conversations any you've had about that, Kate, but, um, I, you know, I, that was what I was my takea away from the state of the town that we were making an assumption that may not have been accurate.
>> Is that it, Chad? >> Um, yeah. I did want to make just a couple of other points just for some clarification. Um that we we do have a place mark maker um on the warrant for a general override. So I think someone
asked the question earlier about you know is this school committee going to ask for an override. We do have a placemaker. usually put it there every year. And if that is how this process um works out over the course of the next number of weeks, um we do have that in
place um to to be able to um go forward with that if that is the will of the committee. >> All right. Um yeah, just just to conclude it, you know, this meeting we're talking about that you know, people seem to be implying something on tours happened. Um, I was asked as the
chair to attend a meeting, right? Um, I wasn't available, so I asked Kate to represent us, but there was no authority to work on a different budget or anything of that sort. And Jen, what I said to you at our last meeting is whenever we're doing our next steps
around a different budget, it will absolutely go through our budget subcommittee first. >> Well, I don't know that I necessarily agree with that. I mean, in other words, you're having offline conversations and this is what I said at the last meeting. It probably at this point should be a full committee discussion.
>> Yeah. When there's some and and that's as chair, it's my prerogative to figure out if we're at that point or not. And we aren't at that point at this moment. And as we continue to work with the town, um, you know, we will work appropriately with the budget subcommittee and the rest of the school
committee and obviously the administration. So, I'm looking for a motion to close this budget hearing and to uh reopen our regularly scheduled meeting. >> So, moved. I'll second.
>> Okay. The motion has been made by Kate, seconded by Melissa. We'll do a roll call vote. Uh Melissa >> in favor. >> Kate >> in favor. >> Uh Henry >> in favor. Jen, >> I'm going to vote no because I don't
think we're in a position to reopen our public meeting. >> Okay, it is uh in favor. So, the motion passes four to one. >> All right. So, that uh superintendent district updates back. >> Hang on. Sorry. I'll see the wheel
there. It's my last formal make a consent action first. >> Yeah. Would you mind? I have no ide separately, please. All right. Under the consent agenda, I am looking for a motion. If you approve the following the
identified schedule of bills totaling 1,413,6172 and also the meeting minutes from our February 5th, 2026 meeting. >> So moved. Second. Okay, a motion has been made by Kate and seconded by
Melissa. Uh we'll do a roll call. Uh Melissa >> in favor. >> Kate >> in favor. >> Henry >> in favor. >> Jen, >> I'm going to abstain. >> Okay. Al uh in favor. The motion passes.
Uh four affirmatives. One abstension. >> Okay. We ready? >> Sorry. Yes, I'm ready now. >> Thank you, Superintendent. Long day. Um, good evening. Oh, where did my audience go? [laughter] >> I'm still here.
>> Uh, since we're coming off the February break and a couple of snow days, we are just trying to get back into the swing of things. I don't have a huge amount of things to talk about and share, but I will share um that our next school committee meeting will we will start having our first school spotlights um highlighting student voice, which we're really excited about. Uh we'll have
Glover and veterans come next week. We're actually supposed to have Glover tonight. Uh I my bad. I apologize. I I messed up the nights. Um so we've asked them to come next week, so hopefully that works out. Um and so Glover and Veterans will bring um students to share. Um some great things are
happening in their schools and I don't want to um ruin the surprise, so I won't let you know what it is because it'll be it'll be nice for them to share with you. Um we have our AMP research fair tomorrow here at the high school hosted um Robin Fines where 16 of our student researchers will share their college
level investigations. Um if it's anything like last week last last year it's definitely worth worth coming. It's a great tree they set up over there and um I'm dumbfounded by the the level of uh research that they've done. In fact, I'm going to see if I can find one of the students to do my bowl of my uh
dissertation um [laughter] before I submit it. Um speaking of treats, Max Kane has been announced as one of the international yes international winners of Coming of Age in the Age of Ia film contest. This was a global contest with more than two
2,500 entries. Um, so he's one of the winners. Um, we also had Georgio Batari was a runner up and Avery Sheridan honorable mention. Super proud of these achievements by our students and thanks to Jen Billings for sharing um the accolades and doing all the great work um so that I could share them with you.
Uh I mean 2500 global entries. We had three from Marble Head No, winner, runner up and incounterable and that's just phenomenal. >> Yeah. >> Very cool. So, um, I'll see if I can send the link out so you guys can check out the videos. Um, we're really excited about our last full PD day coming up on
March 13th. This will be held at the high school for all of our educators. There will be many sessions created and presented by our teachers and educators. This approach uh to PD is great because it demonstrates areas of interest and expertise that are shared amongst our staff in a planful and meaningful way.
the office of teaching and learning and the PD committee have done a lot of work preparing and planning and I'm confident that it'll be a fantastic day for our staff. Um there's many different ways to do PD when you have teacher run PD for the teachers. It's generally really well received. It's really cool cuz people
get excited about sharing their their passions and um it's usually really well received by the teachers and the educators because it's not just someone from the outside coming in and speaking at them. It's really you know people that they work with. So it's valuable. And finally, uh, we had a great trip planned to Spain and Morocco that by all
accounts has been a great experience for the students despite being stuck in Paris for the a few extra days due to the storm. Dan Richards and all the chaperons have worked tirelessly to ensure that our students are safe and have been well taken care of despite the huge shift in plans. They will be
returning tomorrow. It is my understanding that the tour company has absorbed the cost of the extra hotel stay, the change in flights and have provided breakfast and dinner for the extra days. So, the unplanned costs have been fairly minimal, including having to buy lunch and the entrance to the Lou,
which is a well worth ice if you ask me. Been there, it's awesome. Um, I'm hugely appreciative of the staff, students, and families who have had to endure this unexpected shift in plans. I've spoken to Dr. Carlson in the absence of will be absolved given the extraordinary circumstances. Um, one thing to add to
that is um, we did have one student who misplaced their passport. So, the students are coming back with their chaprons. Uh, Dan Richards is working with that student's parents and the student. Um, they have a meeting at the MC in the morning. Okay. All the paperwork's been gone over. It's all
ready to go. also just meeting with embassy so that you can get the emergency passport and they'll be on flight subsequent to that flight, but everyone should be home tomorrow. That's the plan. So that's the update to the Spain Morocco trip. I know I've been asked a few questions about that. Um so
that's that's where the things stand. And just one extra thing that um popped in after I did my district update was that um Mechco directors association had rec recognized our MECO um director Katie Johnson. And there was a post and I know um uh current shared it out and the post reads, "Meet KJ Johnson,
Marblehead Mechco director. Kajia Johnson serves as the MECO director for Marblehead Public Schools where she is committed to advocating for students, partnering with families, and strengthening collaboration across the district. Through intentional leadership and strong relationship building, KJ works closely with the school and
district teams to ensure MECO students are supported academically and socially while fostering a school community centered on belonging, access, and opportunity. They're pleased to recognize Kasia and our continued contributions to the Mechco community. So, that was really cool. I thought that was awesome. like cages working really
hard and I know a lot of times um you know we don't celebrate what we do with the um in the metro program and what all the great things that are happening um but uh Kate is working tirelessly with our students with the families she's coordinating with other districts for
looking at transportation maybe looking a little bit differently with some collaboration with bit so all sorts of really cool things happening um but I received that this afternoon I want to share that with the committee as well um that's all I have next next time, you know, get more shout outs or anything on
students. That's all I have to do. >> All right. Thank you, superintendent. Our next item is our school committee communication discussion items. Uh, and I'm looking for subcommittee and andor lays on items or updates.
>> Can I just make one I have one question before we go into that out going back to this issue with the students in um on the international trip. So, um I heard about this from a um parent um actually a couple folks in the community. Um so I
was a little concerned because that it, you know, having students, you know, sort of stranded abroad for multiple days is what I would call a little out of the ordinary. Um I did ask the superintendent about it. He did he did give me a briefing on it, but I
really, you know, don't trying to understand why that wasn't communicated to the to the rest of the committee. and maybe it was and I was the one that was not communicated to. But that is something that I think we've talked about this one of our protocols is no surprises. Um I heard this again from a
couple of folks in the um you know from the community and I just want to try to understand that you know Al as chair I understand you were briefed on it that um have you given a directive to the superintendent that you know that
extraordinary items should not be communicated to either me or other school committee members >> because that's my understanding. No, what I Okay, so you have it. Okay, >> Jen, to me, let me finish. You asked a question. Um, to me, it didn't rise to an emergency, right? Um, an emergency
definitely would be communicated to all school committee members as quickly as possible. And again, it's prerogative chair and you can have a difference opinion and that's fine, but I did not feel that it it needed uh the involvement of the full school committee um because it did not meet the criteria
that of an emergency. and that's why it was not communicated to the rest of the committee. >> Okay. So again, I'm not um so I I'm going to push back and say I think you've overstepped in your role as chair because that is not the role of the chair um to be withholding information
and one of our protocols is no surprises, right? So it your definition of an emergency may be somebody else's, you know, definition of an emergency. And the idea that there's information that the public, you know, when the
public comes to us that is, you know, I thought we had sort of moved on from that because that that was how things were a number of years ago when with information was withheld and you know, you don't know what's going on. I was not telling John or you know anything to do
with other than just trying to get information so I understood what what the situation was. And my concern completely from the beginning was the safety and security of our students. And while it might not have been an emergency, I would define that as something extraordinary to have I don't know whether it was John wasn't sure the
number, but 30 some odd students um you know stranded for over six years. >> We want to add extraordinary to a policy and put a definition behind that. I'm open to that. But I hope I don't have to violating any of our policies. >> I think it's a matter of what's the
prerogative of the chairperson. This might be a disagree item. Jen, I know you don't >> suggest that we consider doing another training around the role of the chair. Just that that's going to be my suggestion. You can take that or the committee can take it, but as they will,
but I I it is not the prerogative of the chair to make judgment calls like that when it comes to >> school committee members not having information about what's going on in a district. >> Okay. Even even if it's operational,
Jen, you stand by that statement. >> It's not opera. It's nothing to do with operations. It's a fact about an extraordinary situation with our with a group of students. >> Again, we're back to the the word extraordinary. Um noted, uh thank you for your input. Uh let's move on to the
subcommittee and lays on updates, please. >> Um I can start. Uh I did meet with CPAC since our last meeting. um mostly talking about the budget. I I think one
of the big questions they had um and and it was sort of repeated here again tonight was you know what what are we coalescing around? Are we coalesing around supporting this the um the
proposed budget? Are we looking to support um an increased budget? So, I think again that we heard that tonight and and we'll just have to we'll just have to make that decision and report back to them. But, um it was good to see
them as always. Um we had a meeting of the communications subcommittee that was focused on getting the newsletter out which we which we published and and again we've gotten some good feedback on that. We're we're working really hard to
increase our circulation, which again, we heard a comment about that, trying to get messages out to people who are not engaged, you know, they're not on the on the district's list. So, um that's a big goal of ours. And then we met uh the
facility subcommittee met as well. We discussed the um high school roof. Um, we discussed the the um vets, the middle school roof projects, which the middle school roof is sort of on hold
with the weather. Um, and we've scheduled some walkthroughs for the buildings. Um, and sort of looking at Mike's list of of tasks that he's accomplished and what's yet to come.
>> Okay. Thank you, Henry. Anybody else? >> Um the policy subcommittee was supposed to meet this week and that meeting was cancelled. So we're looking to reschedu that. Um and then the goals subcommittee met right before February break. Um the
big agenda item at that meeting was uh I thought it was a very helpful discussion with Alicia Malin from MASC about the role of the school committee in strategic planning and particularly um talking about where we are in the juncture of like preparing to approve
the DIP. Um, and I thought she had some she had a slide deck that she was going to send to us and we haven't gotten and I'm hoping we'll get it and we can pass it out. But, um, really characterizing this as, you know, in a district improvement plan, the school committee
should be saying like this is where we want to go and the superintendent says this is how we are going to get there. and she had some good thoughts on looking at year three in the new dip that we are preparing for and thinking
about timing and what's being reported out to the school committee at that point and how we're measuring it in order to set us up for the next round of a DEP and for school committee to really whoever is sitting in these seats at that time to really be able to say okay
here's where we've gotten to and here's where we we need to go next. So, um I'm happy to share that information out with the committee um when we get those slides from her. And then, you know, personally, I'm planning to sort of look at the draft dip like through that lens.
Um and then we as a as a subcommittee then discussed a few things relative to the DIP. One was, you know, hoping to put it on an agenda in March to get an update on where things stand and the kind of feedback John has gotten um thus
far. and also making sure that committee members have reviewed it and have had an opportunity to give John, you know, sort of if you have really substantive structural type feedback so that that can be addressed before we get any further along in the process. Um, and
then the other thing we talked about was it was the consensus of the subcommittee that it would be helpful to have a summary of the district improvement plan that could be shared with the public um whether as part of the feedback gathering process or just sort of as an
educational document. It's a pretty dense document and so if we can summarize it in a way I think that would be beneficial. Um and the subcommittee sort of wanted to come back to the full school committee about whether this is something that the full committee agrees
would be useful and then if so whether that's something that the goals subcommittee should work on or the communication subcommittee. So I think maybe given that it's 8:45 at night maybe this is something that we can put on the the agenda when John updates us on the DIP
we can also talk about that piece of things. So, >> okay. Thank you. Anybody else? All right. Are there any under closing business? Anything under correspondence? Okay. I'm looking for a motion and vote
to meet in executive session for the following reasons. Purpose three to discuss strategy with respect to and preparation for collective bargaining with the model at education association. Occupational therapists, physical therapists, board certified behavior analysts and occupational therapist
assistants, physical therapists assistants, certified nurse assistants because an open meeting may have a detrimental effect on the bargaining position in school committee and the chair some declares without intent to retain open session. Also, executive session pursuant to chapter 3A, section
21A3, purpose three to discuss strategy with respect to potential litigation. J. Bucky as an open meeting may have a detrimental effect on the litigating position of the school committee and the chair so declares without intent to return to book session. >> So moved.
>> Second. >> All right. A motion has been made by Kate and seconded by Melissa. Um we'll vote on this. Roll call. Melissa in >> favor. Kate >> in favor. >> Henry >> in favor. >> Jen
>> in favor. Do you have a separate dial in or are we just staying on this? >> No, we have a separate dial in. >> Can you send that? I I don't have it either, Al. >> Yeah, I'll send it right away. [clears throat] Um and so the motion p uh Al votes in
favor. The motion passes 5 to zero. So we will enter into executive session to discuss strategy with respect to and preparation for collective bargaining with the Marvel Head Education Association, occupational therapists, physical therapists, board certified behavior analysts, occupational therapist assistants, physical therapist
assistants, certified nurse assistants because an open meeting may have a detrimental effect on the bargaining position of the school committee and their open players without intent to return to open session. Also pursuant to chapter A, excuse me, chapter 30A,
section 21 A3, purpose 3 to discuss strategy with respect to potential litigation, J. Bucky as an open meeting may have a detrimental effect on the litigating decision of the school committee and the chair so declares without intent to return to open session. Okay, we are now in executive
session and I'll send that that link uh momentarily. >> Thank you. Thank you all. Thank you.