WEBVTT

METADATA
Video-Count: 1
Video-1: youtube.com/watch?v=DmIiRuS7jak

NOTE
MEETING SECTIONS:

Part 1 (Video ID: DmIiRuS7jak):
- 00:00:00: Meeting Called to Order and Financial Policy Discussion
- 00:02:48: Policy Language Review, Free Cash, Town Meeting Clarification
- 00:05:45: Policy Clarification, Select Board Discussion, Circuit Breaker Policy
- 00:07:28: Policy Vote Process Clarification, Technical Posting Discussion
- 00:09:51: Committee Vote Discussion and Town Meeting Presentation Introduction
- 00:10:57: Draft Town Meeting Slides and Overarching Presentation Goals
- 00:14:46: District Highlights, Profile, Data Points, and Employee Count
- 00:16:43: Achievement Data Discussion, Slide Distribution, QR Codes
- 00:22:00: State Champs, Class Profiles, Success Anecdotes, Scholarships
- 00:24:35: Graduation Profile, Achievement Data Discussion, Learning Gaps
- 00:27:20: Review of Promises Kept, Budget Philosophy, Town Engagement
- 00:31:08: Highlighting Financial Engagement and Community Coordination Efforts
- 00:36:21: Consultant's Report and Strategic Use of Bold/Italics
- 00:38:22: Districts Struggling and Celebrating the Override Vote
- 00:44:45: The Allocation and Budget Priorities, Questions and Appendices
- 00:49:54: Town Meeting Schedule, and Review of Prior Meeting Questions
- 00:50:16: Closing Slide Discussion, Committee Meeting, and FY27 Slides
- 00:51:58: School Committee Goals and Leadership Team Priorities Reminder
- 00:53:44: Concise Budget and Service Overview for Town Meeting Members
- 00:56:48: Tightness of the Presentation to Keep Attention
- 01:00:23: Consolidating Achievements to Create a More Succinct Message
- 01:06:33: Timeline Summary and Discussion
- 01:07:22: Finance Committee Meeting Minutes Vote and Closing Remarks
- 01:09:10: Appreciations and Meeting Adjournment


Part: 1

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All right, I'm going to call the meeting to order here of old school finance subcommittee of 4:15 and we'll meeting order at 8:06 a.m.

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Um, sorry for the delay. Um, all right. We got a few things to cover. I think John has a pretty good stop at 9 or maybe just before. We might be able to do a little bit um without John. So, I'll hold and we'll vote on meeting minutes maybe right at the end uh with the agenda.

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Uh I want to briefly talk through before we get into the presentation uh which I think is should be the majority of this conversation today but uh briefly talked about the financial policies. We obviously read that school committee. We got the email from Nick about the town

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administrator about the um potential to not have to go through so many to allocate reserve or unspent funds that were allocated to the school budget um over into the special ed reserve account. I asked I don't know if Katie or you have had a chance to talk with him

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further. >> I have not spoken with him. Um I think we planned on looking at the original documents from the Baker administration. When these accounts were created by the state um there was probably about seven or eight different types of accounts

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that the the governor created for municipalities in order to save money and do things in a way that made sense for their budgets. Um and um I believe that the reading of that of the account that we're voting on and setting policy for does have a mechanism for the school

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and or the town to fund or see over time the budget. I I just remember it that way and Katie and I um have different recollections of that. Um but I so mine was a little different. I didn't want to go too hard on it, but I just need to find the document and and just look

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through it cuz I I I agree with Nick. I think that if we ever have money that we want to populate into that account, we can do so knowing that that that money then goes from our full charge to now a dual approvals mechanism to come out. But uh I I do think that it has that. So

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I I will try to find that um language. >> Okay. >> And ask Nick about it as well. >> Yeah. I'm not should the policy actually. I don't know if there's language change we want to make to the policy itself

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that would make that more general. Um, so what we say in the policy is the fir I can sorry share my screen and pull it up here just so we're all looking at it together. All

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right. Y'all see that? Almost. It's trying. >> It's trying. It's >> trying real hard. >> There yet. There we go. There we go. All right. So, I think it's this section

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is the one we're talking about. And um first funding source will be free cash arrive from year surpluses from appropriate school budget. If such funding exists and if fund bounces below the TFC, the standard practice will these funds will be allocated to the special education stable fund in the next annual town meeting.

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So I it's this part of in the next annual town meeting that I guess is the place of question of like do we need to go through a town meeting to allocate it or it can be allocated in some other way. So I don't think that's big language change. I I guess I I think

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we're all on the same page that like if we can do this without going through town meeting if that's allowed legally speaking and that saves a lot of hurdles that still accomplishes our goal. that's what we would want to do, especially if it sounds like that's what the town administry and the select board would want to do. Is that is that a fair

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reading from the just the other members? >> Can I can I just pause thinking um the account could be funded by free cash? >> Yeah. >> From the town that may have to be appropriated by Tom as one source. Yes. our our school-based um funding source.

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I I agree. I don't think would need to go through uh Tommy, but I I will >> but that's the piece you're going to. >> So I think I think so I think this language here because we do have undesated fund free cash maybe transferred in the safe fund in addition to the funding source above and I think

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that >> that would again have to be through town meeting as this is how free cash is allocated. So, it's really just a matter of this. Um, and I think I think even getting that clarity within the policy that like we don't need to go through town meeting would just be clear for

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future school committee members and select board members too. >> Um, that we don't need constantly approval. >> Um, all right. So, I think that's the language John's going to take on kind of confirming that for us. We obviously need that. The priority is to get that before we meet as a school committee on

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the 29th. Two weeks. >> Yeah. Um, and obviously if we can get a little bit sooner so we can just make sure it's run through with Winston and them. I did poke Winston and Megan and Nick yesterday or Sunday um on or Monday

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maybe uh on just because I haven't heard back from them on that. Um I'll maybe try and poke Winston and Megan too just to make sure if that like there's agreement on this piece around you know, how the money gets allocated. Is there

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any question on the overall goal of again our end of year allocation, any additional funding kind of moving into there? I think we're aligned on all that, but I just before we get to the 29th and we obviously vote on a policy, I'll I will work on sessing out with

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them. Um Winston did mention that they might be talking about it at the select board meeting that was last night. I've not watched that meeting. So I'll also just check to see if this is the policy itself is something they discussed and got feedback from other members on. So I

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think that's the update on this policy. >> Sounds good. >> Uh and then in terms of this circuit breaker policy, I don't think we've again obviously that's internal, so we're not meeting their feedback, but I don't think we've gotten any other feedback from other members on anything. So, I don't think there's any planned

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changes with the circuit breaker policy beyond maybe what Nathan we like changed in the meeting that Nathan suggested. I'm remembering that right. But is there anything else we need to discuss with the circuit breaker policy?

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>> I don't think so. >> No. Mark, just a process question here. So the idea is on the 29th potentially we are looking to bring both of these policies to the school committee for a second reading and a vote.

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>> That's correct. >> And I I just can't remember how policy stuff works exactly. Do we need to sort of vote on it as a committee as as a signal of our support or is that

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kind of redundant? Um it's there's no requirement that we need to vote on this uh as a committee. Uh we can I think I don't think we need a vote if we feel like we have you know I think this group helped develop this policy. We've talked through it. I I

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think we have consensus so I don't think we have to take a formalized vote. I think when we're in front of the full school committee obviously members can share their individual feedback. So >> um can can I just speak from a technical please? So this has been on the agenda at this meeting three times.

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>> Yeah. >> Uh and these meetings are posted as full school committee meetings and then it was discussed at the school committee meeting last meeting under finance not under its own policy but it it was under finance which is posted like this.

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>> Yeah. >> And I don't know Nathan if you're worried about the technical piece of uh speaking about it and then voting it on the 20 uh 9th. it it does feel like it's been posted to the public uh in in the

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finance meetings which are full school committee meetings uh represented at full school committee through finance although not on the agenda. That's why I want to make sure I clarify that but it this has been pretty explicitly posted and discussed. >> Yeah. >> Uh so I do think that the vote on the

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29th um is is technically in good standing. Put it that way. >> Yeah. Okay. Great. I'm I'm not really I I feel like the committee's had a chance the full committee has had a chance to weigh in and is aware of all this. I just wanted to make sure we weren't missing some sort of procedural

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procedural requirement. Um and if we're not that's good. I guess the other thing I'll just note is on the 29th we will have a new member who will have been sworn in 30 minutes before we talk about this. Um,

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>> so you know, that's just how it goes, I think. Um, >> it is. >> Yeah. >> So, anyway, >> yeah, they'll either abstain or they'll ask questions and feel comfortable one way or the other. >> Um, yeah, >> it is what it is. Um,

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yeah. I don't think N I think your overall like question of just votes within this committee. I I think we've I've tried to ensure we're having votes on specifically like budget things that we're bringing forward. Uh, we could take a vote on this if members would like to. Um, that would even be allowed.

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Even it wouldn't say vote in the meeting. Um but yeah, I don't know if we have a 100% like clarity on exactly when subcommittees vote to approve something to bring to the full school committee uh or not. >> Okay.

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>> Very clear policies policies on like any requirement. There is no I know there is no requirement that we need to vote on this pass. >> All right. Good. I mean we're all in agreement so I think it's fine. Yeah. Yeah. >> Cool. Thanks. >> Okay. Anything else with these two policies? All

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right. If not, then I will move us on to the draft slides for town meeting. Uh again, I put together initial draft. I think Katie um did some ads and updates. I know now Katie F was saying Katie and

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Stephanie uh O'Keeffe met yesterday and went through the presentation, added things, maybe made some comments. I've not seen that, not looked at it thus far. Um obviously we shared this out uh Amanda Nathan with book view. >> Um so I think maybe the way we did this

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with war committee is we kind of just walked through the slides and that was like helpful just to talk through the flow and cadence. But before we do that is there any like highle things that y'all want to talk through or I I I guess I I haven't I haven't

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reviewed it so I apologize. I would only say we should think about as we review the slides, what is our overarching goal, >> where do we think we are, what what's the tone that we want to set, >> what's the goal and then those uh for what the town meeting should understand and walk away with

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>> and that will help decide how long this is and how detailed it is and how much we want to put in the appendix and how many we how much of this we just want as messaging. >> Yes. And I think Mark, your slides related to the warrant committees meeting that we had where we tried to strike an upbeat tone of this money will

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work for next year. We're you know we're moving this work forward. I think is uh was a very helpful tone and um and I I read an article for the times and uh once every quarter or whatever and that was my tone for the article that I think will come out next week which is we're

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happy we're moving along, the district's in good place. So I don't know if that's the tone of this and how you want to work that. >> Yeah. And I I credit Nathan a lot to that that tone shift that we made on the war committee stuff. But um yeah, I mean just talking about the agenda in terms of what we want to cover. I think >> again we want to be able to highlight

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and celebrate the kids uh and staff uh in some ways and just make sure we're grounding the work. We did that we stated that a little bit last year in our town meeting presentation again wanting to ground the work in who we are serving which is our kids and families and staff. Uh and so I think those

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highlights um are good. I did want to make sure we talk about we within our presentation last year because I watched last year's presentation town meeting we there was obviously a lot of discussion of the financial concerns within the district and that we talked about the things we are going to do to help

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address those concerns and I thought it was important that we you know look back at that and talk about here are the things we said we're going to do here are the things we did um >> just to try and you know um because that's the town meeting's last kind of touch point with us >> y >> uh and then talk high level about how we

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approach the budget and then talk high level about you know what does the allocation we're looking the additional allocation we're looking at mean for us next year. So walk through that and see if any of that is kind of overstated or you know too long or we're missing something else in there.

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>> So thank you. >> Can I add one thing just Mark for context I was just thinking about when you were saying this about >> last town meeting. I also want to keep in mind that as we're doing it recognizing that there will be a number of new like brand new town meeting members. So some of this

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won't be it you know there will be a an audience that has remained but also an audience that's new like brand new to town meeting brand new to the school budget. So, um, so I think you you struck you struck a good balance with it, but I

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just want to remember that not everybody is carrying forward. >> Yeah. No, that's a a great point for something we should keep in mind as we're trying to think of the audience here. I appreciate that. >> Uh, so district highlights. Um, the mission, this is a slide again we shared

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last year and this is the framing reminding everybody what is our mission as public schools. Uh this was the suggestion from Nathan on the district profile. This is just a snapshot from I first tried to do something like AI generated and then it

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you know it's that thing where like three things are totally wrong on it and you can't change just those things without totally messing up the image. So I I end up just taking this from the Desi web page which has some basic enrollment information. I had a question of just is is this kind of what we're

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thinking? Is there something else we actually wanted to do that would be more helpful in terms of like profiling? >> I think I think this is great. The only data point I think I would suggest adding is the number of employees or FTEEs, however, however we want to count

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them. >> Okay. >> Then that that enrollment number looks high, but it is it is what it is. as if it's from the Desi website. You know what I mean? >> Yeah, this looks it looks right to me. That was because we've been around the

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four or 4350ish number, but yeah, that's from the October Sims. I don't know if they've updated yet with March data. Um, yeah, the only other one I was wondering is like achievement data, but then you get into a lot. I mean, that there's a

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lot there of like, okay, what achievement data? 33 MCAST, what about high school? What about APs? What about SATs? What >> math and ELA and science and like it just gets it's a lot if you start getting into data. Um >> I like the way you did it later though with the I think the highlights touch on

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that sort of the outcomes and then the highlights because I think it takes into account that it's more than just the test scores. >> Yeah. All right. Let's jump to that. I I'm not sure how much they've updated these slides based upon what we did

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for um warrant committee. >> So I would assume that that's what Stephanie focused on yesterday. Yeah. Um >> in in um in some in in slides like this sometimes in the presentation of it, it's >> letting the audience just read.

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>> Yeah. And also I wonder um in uh we made a habit in my previous district of actually sending out our slides to the town meeting before the town meeting. >> Yeah. Just give it to the like >> you know I think the um

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>> the moderator used to have everybody say if you want you want something in the hands of town meeting to read prior to town meeting you should give it to me by act state. >> Yeah. and we would and uh it really allevi you know generated some questions but it alleviated a lot of unnecessary questions and people wouldn't have to

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really read read through that and you wouldn't >> or whoever's presenting wouldn't have to actually read through that Jimmy >> uh so just a thought um >> I reached out to the moderator on that point also to the point I think we talked about last time of can we share

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you know link to the school budget page because that's got a lot of resources for town meeting members like is there some information that I don't know if the moderator I didn't ask her directly but it doesn't from the email it doesn't sound like she communicates directly with town meeting members she passes on

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her own letter to the town administrator who puts that in the warrant and then they mail out the warrant but they're not emailing anything >> to town meeting members there's no ability for it like she did say she wants our presentation a week in advance of town meeting but I think that's just

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so that she can have it review it and then also that she can give it to the the clerk of the war committee who is the one at town meeting who pulls it up on the screen and stuff so they have that organized in those folders. >> Interesting. >> Um but I I'll ask him. I think that's a

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great idea but >> I don't think right now we have a mechanism for sharing out that information but otherwise I totally agree. >> But I do agree with your point. I don't think whoever presents the slide and we'll get into it in a bit is um should

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be reading uh all these words. Okay. Um that might be I'm going to talk to Nick about that. Does you know getting an email uh whether it's by precinct or by entire town meetings but getting an

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email uh lister for those folks is super important. Yeah, that's been discussed at town meeting for a little while here of like, but do you use their personal emails? Do you set them up with the town email? And then how do you >> Yeah, that there's been discussion at this like board. They've done nothing really. Nothing has really come of it.

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>> Don't let perfection get in the way of progress, right? >> Email. >> Yeah, just two thoughts on this. I mean, I know I get emails from Sue as a town meeting member, so there is some sort of mechanism for the clerk to email things. >> Yeah. >> Um I I do wonder like these slides six

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and seven. I don't know. Could I don't know if this is allowed at town meeting, but like you know where the green sheets often go. Could there be like a print out of these two slides or these three or four slides or something? >> That could be another way just it could be hard for some folks to read this up

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on the screen. >> Yeah, that's an interesting idea because Yeah, I mean you just print the slide presentation to say hey this is >> Yeah, there's a lot of paper to print for several hundred people but >> Yeah, that's true. The uh the other part too is that um

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for folks just to try to be more interactive, we could have some sort of a you wonder if you could put a bar we can put a barcode. I'm sure I'm not the technology guy, but a barcode at the beginning >> that folks could actually uh take a picture of that barcode with their phone

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and they could actually log in. They could actually have it in their hand as well and they could actually have their email. they could actually have it on their device or could email it to, you know, I mean, some way to get it in their hands. Yeah. To your point, Nathan, that if we do reference it, then they actually can walk away with it dig >> uh that they can read later on.

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>> Well, you know what I mean? Like this be nice to see if we can get to them, >> get them this digitally uh so they can >> to save the paper. So, if Stephanie is able to put this on the website, >> they can just click the link, direct them to it, >> then we can Yeah. use the link.

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>> Yeah. embed that in QR code and put that at the start of the presentation. Yeah. >> And then we say if you would like to we have some tech heavy slides if you'd like to view them. >> Yeah. Here's a work. >> Scan this real quick and this should pull it up. >> Okay. Perfect. >> That's a I think that's a would be a

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good middle ground to again allow them to be able to read and see stuff kind of more personally whatever. >> Um >> it's great. I technical point I would just I think that's a great idea. We should just have it as a PDF up on the website just so >> Yeah, we'll put it up before

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>> crash crash the site. >> Yeah, >> appreciate that. Um, uh, state champs. >> Hey, I had a question on this one, Mark. Um, >> yeah, >> I thought, uh, I thought the track team

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also won some kind of championship. Could have that wrong. So, uh, track had individual, I believe track had individual, >> success, but not team success. >> Okay. >> And that was the same with like wrestling too, Nathan. I think we had

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one, uh, one wrestler, three wrestlers do very well, but they did not, it wasn't the team. >> Um, and this this is where you get into that funky zone of um, not recognizing enough folks for sure. Uh we just got word back in our last Stephanie's look

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into it. Our future problem solvers last weekend at Clark University, uh Tucker's junior team came in first and the Cunningham or a Glover team came in high as well. So maybe I'll try to get a picture get something on that as well cuz that's a nice academic team uh story

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to tell me. >> Uh so I'll get on that as well. Uh here's the class profile of graduating class which again gets us a little bit more into the outcomes here. >> I think that's great.

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>> Yep. >> I don't know if we have any information on 26. Well, it she has it down here. We don't have 26 information, but >> yeah. >> Um, >> yeah, I think I think this sends

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>> I think that's okay, though. >> Do you want Do you want to hear a nice anecdote? Uh, I'm not a big TV watcher, but um the show um that's been recognized on uh with awards uh

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I can't think of the name of it. um with the older actress who's a comedian or an actress. >> Axe. >> Axe. >> The the woman who was the co-producer of Axe is a former student of mine from Pierce Middle School. >> Oh, really? >> Yeah.

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>> Uh I don't know if you watch the Sunday morning show on Sundays with CBS with Jane Paulie. >> Uh I knew she was a writer. I've been keeping track of her career because you've seen I've watched her career go off a little bit, but she was interviewed on the show with all the stars and all the and she's the co-producer. It was just just amazing.

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Great. Uh she was a good kid in middle school and obviously she's super successful. So good anecdote. >> Um only other thing I had here thought here is like I don't know if we have any scholarship award information or anything like that but that'd be my only thought on kind of graduating class

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profile or something. Anything else within highlights or profile that we think? >> Yeah. >> So then we have the look back and essentially sorry just one other

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maybe just where did we land? What did we say about achievement data that we were >> not sure what to include or that we didn't want to include anything? I think my statement was I'm not sure what to include. I I mean again I I

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think of achievement data for our purposes as being incredibly important of like how we we're measuring outcomes and thinking about like what what effect we're having on kids. I don't know if town meeting is the place we want to get into that detail. Um just because again

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you have what the three through 8 MCAST 10th grade MCCAST high school SAT APs MCCAST is math ELA and social and um science. Um so just like how do you within any like achievement presentation

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I do it's it's long that just that presentation is long because it's a lot and then if people don't know what is an SGP in MCCAST like how do you explain that what is percent meeting and exceedations what is >> uh one way to do that with with a

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consumable slide could be not the data itself but statements that say stuff like you know our MCAST data shows that we at, you know, at each grade level, we're above the state average or some sort of a couple of like a couple of bulleted statements >> and then you can go into SAT and then

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you can go into AP. uh if we could maybe try to put one or two slides together of that because I agree once we start putting hard data up there it looks different but we can make some uh general statements about student achievement data

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uh that that we have that we can actually that hopefully would be um consumable by the town meeting without the detail and the the jargon that usually is what uh confuses folks like that we can look into that I can look

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into that. >> I think that sounds great, John. Um I think putting something up here will be will be important. Um, and I think we should also be willing to, you know, I don't think we want to get way down into the nitty-gritty, but we should also

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acknowledge that there are important learning gaps that we are trying to close as well. And we're we're making resource decisions to to address those. >> Yep. >> Got it.

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>> I think that's a great point. >> Uh, look back. So these are all the bullet points that we presented across kind of two slides last year and I tried to consolidate the language so we could get it into one slide but just these are all the things we said we were going to

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implement last year and we implemented all of those things >> um the kind of context around the curriculum funding um >> that's great you guys should really take time on that I think it's a really

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impressive slide to be able to demonstrate that um coming off an override where people put faith in the the process and that identified areas of concern and then have them all addressed um is really really really is really important for the school community to

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take credit for. I think it's a really big deal. >> I two two thoughts on this Mark. um agree with John and I wonder if the headline here should be different like if it should be um you know school committee and

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district management have put in place um >> yeah 10 new best practices in financial management or whatever whatever just be a little bit more on the nose >> or or if you if you keep it the same proposed practices presented in 2000 you

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know 25 I mean um pract or uh expectations met in just a dash like you know kind of like a headline. >> Yeah, I thought about you know it's promises made, promises kept. >> Absolutely. No, I I agree. I think that this is the place where you do that. That's what people will remember that

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stuff. It's >> Yeah. >> Um they'll remember the headline before they remember the eight bullets. Even though the eight bullets are the important word, they'll remember the headline. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. And then my other comment was just I thought the green is a little hard to read here. I don't know if it just needs

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to be darker. >> Yeah. No. Okay. I don't know if this even needs to be green. just >> not >> uh then on this I was just I

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I don't know I'm hoping we could add some I don't know if it's a screenshot I don't know if it's just like we are on track for on budget for this year. I think we should just state that >> for folks um >> just because that I'm sure will be a question. Katie Katie will have a copy

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of that that we discuss and vote on on uh the 29th. >> Yeah. >> Uh so whatever we need to add to that I I think but I think statements would be more helpful than anything but we'd want to see what that number is before we say it. >> Yeah. >> I'm sure it's I'm sure it's fine. So I'm not worried about it. But >> yeah,

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>> placeholder for that was great. Uh then our budget philosophy. These are slides we did share with Warren Committee and just one philosophy or philosophy statements that kind of guided our practice.

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Uh this is one I added on just trying to highlight financial engagement with the town and other boards just to talk through like everything that has gone on. Um, again, there was some stuff at last

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town meeting of like, hey, you should add a border the reports, which we already were doing, but like just highlighting some of that. There's obviously been stuff on coordination between us and other folks. I don't know. I was I happy for feedback on this. Maybe this isn't necessary, but just generally trying to cover like

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we've been doing trying to do a lot to keep people uh informed, be transparent, keep people um involved and connected to the work around this year and next year's budget. Um >> yeah, I think

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maybe if we could condense it a little bit and then the one and I maybe I'll finish that thought thought in a second. The other element and I don't know where it would go in and it might depend sort of on it it will be voted on

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on the 29th but I think the idea around codifying um the policies those two I think beginning to codify policy around like circuit breaker special education reserve fund I think that piece is important too because it again we're

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beginning to establish more of a a process um so if that could I don't know if that would be ended it it I don't know if it would be included there or it's in the work that we've been doing. So, this is >> we didn't talk about adding that in the

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best pract we didn't talk about adding that in the fall which I know sort of it's splitting hairs. I mean, so we >> Yeah, we didn't I wonder if it's just similar to the ELA though where it's like somewhat it's connected with this is we're we're not only we not only are building back uh our funding within

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these accounts, but we like you know a sub bullet point there is >> creating policies policies to you know sustain this over time or something something like >> um yeah I don't I don't disagree that we should maybe highlight that. Um

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>> in in in this slide it is dense. >> Um so I agree but when you when the person walks away with it and looks at it later and it might be um again given the presenter and I think the school committee should take a lot of credit for this. This is one of the ones where you say this is also like the

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showing off with the check boxes. >> Yeah. >> You you you asked us to do these things. This was the list that people wanted us to explore last year at town meeting. I want you to sit and look at this slide for a few minutes and and these have all been completed. Let them read through it and then you highlight a couple and then

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you get to this slide and you say the same thing. We were asked about engagement uh with the community specifically >> uh and we took that very seriously and in an effort to provide fully engage a fully engaged community as best we can for the during this school year for

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FY27. Here here's an example of some of those you know and let and let people read it. You know what I mean? Um, and and hopefully they hopefully they do. I think a lot of people are distracted in the audience sometimes, uh, which was my last experience at the June meeting with I was surprised at how many people were

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maybe not always on, but I I think that they should I don't know if I would take anything off because I wouldn't want to not represent the work, but I don't want to I don't want to have them just look at a wordy slide either. So, but you would like >> um there there might just be some like

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use of bolding or italics that would make things pop out here. I I agree that all of this information is really valuable. Um, and it's making me think um I don't know if at town meeting anyone's going to talk about the consulting report that that was produced

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and the consultants work which was also a recommendation I believe of warrant committee last year. Two of their recommendations were to continue andor sort of increase coordination between public boards and and warrant committee and town staff and

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to communicate more transparency more transparently to Milton residents about the state of our finances. And I think, you know, if no one's talking about that report, then it would probably be odd to reference it in your presentation, but I think this this is a demonstration of

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those recommendations as well. >> I'm surprised how maybe they talked about it last night, but I'm surprised at this point it hasn't gotten any air time at the select board. So, just another report that we we get as a town.

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Uh, but I I agree with that, Nathan. I'm wondering how to how to incorporate that. >> We do we do talk about the report. I came back to the slide just because we we talk about the consultant best practices report >> here a bit. Um

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>> it could be a voice over. Yeah. >> Do you mean when you're talking to the slides like >> as recommended in the consultants report you know we can reference the things that we've been doing or have done. you know, this points to the transparency.

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This points to the, you know, engagement among between um groups. The early one earlier ones point to the establishment and the the funding of, you know, this, you know, we've established a circuit breaker policy that aligns with that. We've done the special education reserve fund that aligns with their

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recommendations. So, I think maybe that's where you pull it in more as a narrative. Yeah, that makes sense. Uh, Nathan, would you want to go through this and identify like to your point of bold and italics

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just things you think we should >> um Amanda to the point on the the policy work? >> Yep. >> Does that does it make sense to you to like include it here as a sub bullet? I don't know what the exact word is but

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>> you mean as far as that it's um from the >> just yeah just related to like that we've established these these policies around the special ed reserve account and circuit breaker Yeah, Um,

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uh, this one I think we probably should move. Uh, I just kept it again. I I the only thing here is it's the same. I put it together for the warrant committee presentation. It's really like a a slide presentation where, you know, just things keep popping up. I don't know if you all looked at this when we did the

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last time, but um it's just like all the different and within the last year tons and numerous articles about what's going on within schools and to provide some context. It probably as I'm thinking of it is just an extra slide we probably don't

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want to walk through but wanted to flag that like the thinking is just like how do we give context to town meeting members that challenges around school finances is not unique >> to Milton and we're actually not doing that bad uh now that we've kind of gotten past the override and where we are we're we're not in dire straits

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here. >> This feels I think just personally I felt like it sort of shifted the tone a little bit. Yeah. >> Um, and if we used this slide last year prior to the override, but I think we got there.

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It's not to say that there aren't obviously still challenges on the budget. Um, but I feel like sort of, you know, as John said when we were opening this up, sort of what is the tone and what's the message that we want to put across. Um,

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>> yeah. >> So, just I don't know. I don't know that it lends us anything that we couldn't say, but I'm just if people feel differently, I'm not stuck on it. >> I could just add to that slant. I think that um and I've said this a couple of

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times publicly and I'm not sure how it lands, but um it's it's even uh to Mark's point, what what we have seen over the last 3 months is so many more districts struggling financially. every

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day in the MASSE listerve is five or six more communities that are not um uh getting budgets that are you know sufficient or struggling to get budgets that are sufficient bellweather districts, regular districts, etc. >> And and I think that what what it might

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be nice to do in terms of the tone is to say that all this this town always steps up and does the right thing on behalf of the town and the schools. And I don't want to open a can of worms and say and you did that in April and I know we had

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a um a spat about that in January, February about why wasn't it enough? But the reality is that override vote in April of 25 uh was um incredibly uh powerful

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um for the town and the schools because what we're seeing is a lot of towns not being able to follow through with that. Marblehead didn't get it. Winchester didn't get it. Marshfield $7 million short. Brain is now talking about another override. Um, uh, Newton Brookline,

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>> you know. So, I it I want to congratulate and thank the community for the override >> and and combine that with letting them know that everything that they asked us to do this year kind of goes back to what did you ask us to do last year and that we did it. Maybe it's there that in

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April you asked we asked you for an override and we you trusted us. You voted yes. We can't thank enough. Uh so many districts are struggling right now. Uh but part of that override was an accountability that we obligated ourselves to to ensure that we were

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transparent and uh blah blah blah blah and here's all the things that you asked us to do and here's all the things we did. You know that that that's a good news story that I don't think should be there might be a good way to kind of kick it off in a positive way. >> Yeah.

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And maybe they'll forget about the spats in January, February, but the reality is the town stepped up. They had expectations about uh we asked them to vote the money. They did. They had expectations for oversight and um and uh accountability for the schools and the

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town. And the check boxes is a really nice way to demonstrate that we did that. And we have a Q3 in an FY26 budget coming in on budget. These are all good news stories fiscally. Do you know what I mean? I I agree with all of that. I um

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and I'm I'm I'm behind on on watching all of my warrant committee meetings, but I think this presentation is going to be juxtaposed as I understand it or as I l will be juxtaposed against a warrant committee presentation

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that is going to I I don't know exactly what it will say, but as I understand it from the chair, we'll sort of talk about the town's um what how the warrant committee interprets the town's financial projections which I think may be a

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little bit less rosy. Um so I don't I don't know there it is possible there is some cognitive dissonance for town meeting between that presentation and this one. >> I I totally agree that we should be mindful of that presentation. I started watching it bit uh yesterday

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>> uh because he went through with the war committee on one day. So yeah I I think there at least would need to be some kind of we can highlight the Rosie. We still would need to acknowledge that like future questions and you know concerns around funding remain and will need to be kind of worked through with

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coordination with >> select board and on the budget coordination committee or whatever. So something like that I think just as a >> that's a deficit but I I do think >> just like where where we're at is not we want we want to be we'd like to be kind of in a better spot and we'd like to not

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have the million dollar cuts. They'd like to have greater certainty on future mage projections, but where we are within the context of the state is not a bad place to be, >> right? >> Uh and and I I agree with Nathan as well because I don't want to be I don't want

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to be um uh not sensitive to the bigger picture, but there's also value in this school committee was asked uh asked for an override, got it, and was asked for accountabilities and and this department has done their job this year. Yeah, in

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terms of responding to the needs of the fiscal controls, the fiscal accountabilities, uh coming in with a budget that's um uh within the limits of the town, we're doing our work in in the context of maybe these harder questions that we have from a town perspective and

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that a lot of towns are facing. Uh you know, each year we will continue to make the this work and you know, I just think there's room for a little bit of both. Uh um I just think it just this group did a lot of good work this year and I don't want that to go unnoticed by the

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uh by the town. That's all. >> Totally totally agree. >> I think it is I agree. I think it is possible to do both. It's just that both both will be happening. >> Yeah. No, agreed. and and and I don't I haven't seen the warrant committee's thing and uh and I get that despite the

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fact that we've made good incremental steps over the last year and a half uh and we've got good news to report about how we're stabilizing things and moving them forward, we do have this overarching, you know, statewide challenge that other districts are facing and others are facing about just revenue matching expenses that's not

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unique to Milton. >> Yeah, >> I know know you got here just a sec. just a very lightning fast run through the left the sides just and then we can come back to them with the members. So, all of these are just ones we did to the warrant committee, right? The here's the allocation, here's what we're investing

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in, here's kind of what that looks like, uh what the specific things are and how it ties to our budget priorities. Uh here's the overall changes. That's it. And then like we have with the warrant committee, there are questions. We have information kind of down in the appendix. A lot of those are the information that they've asked

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previously. Um, >> can I pause the the investing in slide with the that's the uh that's the prior but that does not include some of the things that we are restoring from the reduction. So, we'd want to add like the

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BCBA, the extra BCBA, the uh the uh special ed assistant director, um the positions that we actually are filling, the technology person, >> right? >> Yeah. >> That this was one cut of a couple of cuts that we we might want to just flag

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that slide as something that we can just make maybe make different from the and and and everything. So everything that we're posting right for next year are the priority investments are the reestablishing the positions that we didn't fill last year re re realigning

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them and putting them all up there cuz I think that you know to your point earlier today Nathan people might talk about the technology well we're reinvesting in the technology we're making that a data technology person we're adding other special education pieces back to the budget that we're not

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um uh that were not filled last year. So, I want to make sure that that's accurate so people can see the full investment. Uh so, if we can flag that, we'll I'll look into that as well. That's slide 21. >> Yeah, that's slide 21. >> Okay. >> If you want to send me the things you

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want to put in, I mean, obviously there's not it's not like going to tie to this number. It's like cost drivers, but it'll we can list the positions and list how it ties to budget priority areas. >> Yeah. Um, so if you send that to me, I can just format it in the same way. It matches. >> Perfect.

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>> Um, uh, the I we talked last time about looking at the prior town meeting and figuring out what questions they were asking. Um, and so I did that a bit. There was, sorry, I'm trying to find

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>> special education piece. >> I left I left Yeah, Katie a note on one of them. I thought >> it was there was stuff in there. This is the per pupil one. >> Yeah. >> So, it looks like Katie filled that out. Ah, here it is. The out of district placement stuff. That was the question we got um from one of the members of

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just percentages. So, looks like she's I haven't looked at this in detail, but she's filling this in. So, >> yeah, >> Mark, I think um in the in the FY27 budget section, I think we're missing I I would propose putting something like

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slide 27 up in that section, which just shows the breakdown of how the bud of where the budget's going. I don't even you know is I don't know if it's possible to even create like a couple of subcategories under the

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dusty object code. I don't know what's exactly what the best organization there is. Um I think that would be helpful for town meeting. >> I agree. >> Yeah. I think it's that last question of what what would be the subcategory and how would we

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break that up? >> Yeah. I mean I I to me the most the things that I think will draw the most attention are the object codes you know one three and four.

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So you know I don't know if under professional salaries if we could just break it out by like teacher instructional support instructional leadership something like that. I don't know what's captured in admin. Um, and under contracted services,

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um, you know, to me, I assume that that is there's a big category in there in transportation and, um, special education services. Like, I I'm just not sure if there's a way to just kind of big category. >> Yes. I mean, special education goes across all of those. It

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>> does, right? Okay. transportation. Yeah. Could come out of contracted services, but um I mean you have special ed contracted services too. Um that >> that's what I was talking about. >> Yeah, special ed, you know, supplies,

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materials, it's special ed is in there. >> Yeah. >> Um I will I can ask a I'm sorry if I have to run. I apologize. Um, >> thanks, John. >> Do we want a meeting the Wednesday of

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our uh of the 29th 9th? >> Good question. and thought we were going to meet again until after the reorganization. So, we'll obviously be missing Amanda. Um,

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>> it doesn't matter. We can think about it. >> I I think Yeah, let's not let's let's not hold a meeting. Let's see. We'll try and do the rest of this one off. I'll give the rest of you back. go back to work, email you and then we can connect the

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committee makeup will be very different. >> All right. Thank you everybody. I'm sorry I have to run. >> Thank you. Thanks John. >> Thank you John. Um. Uh. All right. So then it's a matter of like the only other thing I was wondering is it felt like we needed a

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closing slide, not just to end it on this and this, but maybe not. Maybe just say maybe there's a slide that says thank you. >> But I know we jumped past a little bit of this conversation up here as they're rushing for John.

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Any other thoughts folks have on the FY27 slides? I I think a closing slide would be helpful. Um, now I don't I don't have I don't know if I have any great ideas

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off the top of my head, but I think something that has been helpful for us over um over the past year is coming back to our sort of school committee goals and the and the leadership team priorities like

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what's on slide 16. And I know I'm sure, you know, we will evolve these for next year, but my guess is these will remain pretty important. I I could even imagine us just saying these articles next year, like or something very close to them. Um, and I wonder if we could come back

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to these as we close >> to remind people of like >> what the board and management's um sort of focus is as the um as we asked town meeting to to

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vote for this budget. >> I like that. >> Yeah, I think that's a good idea. I can work on work on that. >> Okay. >> And then did did folks have any other thoughts as to like content they think

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we might get asked about that they want to make sure we are ready for? Amanda had a couple again last time that we have captured within the appendex. Mhm. No, I I think to

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Nathan's point when I look at the um look at the slide that's now slide 23 um I guess I I I is there any more narrative or information

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that's needed? Um because there's a lot of like a lot about the work that we did. I'm just thinking out loud like there's a lot about the work that we did and the work that went into it, the goals and the priorities and the outcomes. And then >> I just want to make sure that we're

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spending enough time on the actual budget piece of it is and just I think that we are. I'm just kind of keeping in mind like does it feel like there's you know two slides about the actual numbers or are we is there enough?

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>> So I just put it in context of every other department. >> Yeah. >> And no other department presents on their budget. >> None. >> But there's also size of ours. >> No, I understand. I'm just saying the town administrator doesn't even present on the town budget. Right. And so like I

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I do think there's I think the So I'm I'm just saying from like a standpoint of what a town meeting member would expect and would want to see. I I don't see a history of that. I think we're providing more than we have on the school side before. I think the balance is like the Warren

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Committee is the one who dives into the numbers which is why when we talked about this, right, was the the audience. Um, so again, I'm I'm speaking a little bit out loud too, but I I think a lot of this it's like what are it's it's less even just specifically the numbers and

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the finances, although that's what town meeting obviously is allocating for, but it's more uh like really around like how is the school department functioning like what is the service that is provided by this to our families and kids.

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To me that is I think just as much a lens within town meeting if not more so than like let's get into the numbers and say hey is this you know 68% professional salary is the appropriate level to like that's just I think

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something that really can't be a robust discussion at town meeting can be more of a robust discussion within this meeting and school committee and warrant committee >> um my initial thinking on it though Yeah, maybe there's um I don't know. I

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guess if I think about the what we've done and having the budget page and all of the detail that that's gone into that, maybe that's where that is addressed that like there's been robust discussions, there's transparency,

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there's more information that's always been available online about the budget. um to your point. So, it's sort of like this isn't the hopefully this isn't the first that people are hearing and seeing and

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knowing about it that there's context to this and this is really the framing the framing of the budget conversation and the work that it supports as opposed to a deep dive on it. >> Thank you. Sorry. Yes.

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>> On that um the um Sorry, just one thing. I got a message from Lizzie. She's in the way. >> Yeah, I didn't I just got one more question. >> Um I wonder if there's a a

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a just some framing that it can even happen up up top at the beginning of it like when you're when you're on the agenda slide or whoever's presenting is on the agenda slide. um where we talk about kind of the purpose of this which is to um

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you know provide town meeting some basic some basic information around the budget so they understand what they're voting on and remind them that it is probably more information than they've ever received on the budget. Mhm. >> And even though we have all gone to school before

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um to remind people of like the impact that these dollars have on teaching and learning and student experiences. Um, and you know, I think I I think maybe if we book in the

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presentation with like some framing up top and then a closing slide that's like, you know, um, reminding people of goals and talking about just the impact that these dollars have, these dollars have on

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students and families, you know. >> Yeah, I I would feel good with that. Okay. Yeah, I think the f that helps like the the framing. >> Lizzie has her hand up. >> Yeah, Lizzie. Gentlemen.

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>> Hey. Um, good morning. Um, so I've been I didn't get I wasn't here in the beginning when you were going starting it, but I I've heard most of the um slides, I think, and I agree with what you all are saying, but I just wanted to

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um like encourage the tightness of the presentation as much as possible to leave things, you know, be prepared to answer questions when they come up with with slides and

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also just I think town meeting members always appreciate um a concise presentation. >> Yeah. >> So I'm a I feel like the warrant committee is a really different setting.

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>> Um so I'm wondering if there's a way to tighten it. just wanted to offer that you can always bring things back. But I think even in recent years we've even when we've been in a trickier spot than

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we are right now, like I I would just um you know I I I think we need to be prepared to answer all the questions which which we are. Um, but I would almost let like let the

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questions be asked in order to keep the presentation well under 10 minutes. >> Yeah, we're over 10 minutes right now. No, 25 slides. I think 25 slides is is too many.

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>> It's probably more like, you know, like 15 slides of real content. >> Yeah. I mean, yeah, there's >> Yeah. And even that is a lot. But again, it's a it like it's it's

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important to show that the work's been done because that's, you know, but and it will be I I mean it will be up to the person presenting to move quickly through the slides, but um I just think that could ultimately

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undermine what we're trying to do if it if it um gets too lengthy. That's all. Yeah. I wonder if um to that point like starting at slide 18 through 22

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um where there's quite a few tables and a lot of very specific dollars. Um I know this is like the meat and potatoes of the presentation, but I also wonder if there's if this can just be made if this section can be made more

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economical. Yeah, we're talking about expanding it slightly because we're done adding a different table with the positions running back and we added this charts. Um, >> yeah. >> Well, I can do some thinking about this

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offline as well. And >> yeah, yeah, I know we're getting close time. Um, does make me wonder about this if I need to provide this context. I think it's fair to push. I think

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if we go back to John's comment in the beginning like what is the goal of it? >> Yeah. >> And be really clear about it. So is it,

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you know, I do think that there Yeah, I'll just say that I think if there's a way to kind of be very succinct and and and to that point, it's like is it, you know, is it is are we addressing things from

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the past as well? Like are we is this goal trying to give more information than we have in the past? Is it about um I mean it's all like it's it's to your point it's grounded in the kids and the you know the the people that we're

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serving in the community. Um so I think that there's a place for some of that. I don't know if we need all of it. Um or to your point do some of those come out and they're handouts you know kind of the the accomplishments.

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Um >> Amanda to that. Um I I feel like we have two goals here. One is to have town meeting vote to approve the budget. >> Correct. >> And two, I think in order for people to

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do that, they need to feel like this budget is reasonable and we are responsible stewards of it. >> Yeah. And so maybe so let's suspend disbelief and assume that that is right. Um it's probably the

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case that slides three through 10 are supplemental and maybe we do the QR code and just say like hey there's a whole bunch of slides on the district website. Scan this QR code and you can

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like read a bunch of highlights or something. I'm just making an argument. So feel free feel free to argue against this and that slides you know that basically then the second half of the presentation is what's most valuable at town meeting. Um so we focus

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on we focus on that. We could have, you know, we could have one slide with like a QR code and a few things that just sort of highlight um a number of the positive impacts to teaching, learning, and experience that

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these dollars have, right? Like um you know, high performing academic outcomes with room to grow. um multiple like um

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academic and uh athletic and sort of culture. >> Yeah. >> Wins throughout the year and um you know basically 100% of our graduating class like going on to do

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something important when they graduate. And you can narrate through those specific data points. Yeah, that might be a good ide couple pictures. I just think it's really helpful and then say like the kids we schools have done a lot to go

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here and learn about some highlights and then jumping forward to a quick look back then a quick overview of the goals budget summary.

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Okay, >> I think that's um good feedback. Um I will take a crack at uh adjusting all that and then can share it out. >> Great.

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>> The other ultimate timeline is what a week before town meeting. So that is like the end of the month. I think the 29th town meetings on the 6th,

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two weeks. Um, all right. Thank you all very much for good discussion. Uh, we'll talk about um next meetings. As we said, we really we don't have any next meetings assigned. We're going to do the ringorg on the 29th. We'll see who's on this

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committee and then that group will set the next meeting. Uh, our last item is to vote on meeting minutes. Only a couple. So hopefully some >> some light reading. I apologize that I got as far behind. We need a lot. I

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don't know if y'all know this. We made >> a lot. >> So we have um >> minutes for all these. We are the participation varied in terms of like just who's exactly at these meetings. I don't really want to go through and

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separate. I would I would request that we all feel like comfortable approving. Even if you are at that meeting, there's no reason you can't. >> So that is that would be my request. But if anybody would prefer to abstain from certain meeting minutes, then we can take this um kind of one by one.

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Otherwise, we can do it kind of as a whole. >> Let's do it as a whole. >> Okay, great. Then I will make a motion. I I think I got to say all the Well, I'll make a motion to approve all of the finance committee meeting minutes as listed in the uh meeting agenda for

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today. Is there a second? >> A second. >> Uh, all right. We will do a roll call vote. Nathan, >> yes. >> Uh, Amanda, >> yes. >> I am a yes. And then I will write up.

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So, we're done with meeting minutes. I'll tell Charlene that's great. Thank you all. These meeting minutes I will write up and send. And the next board will have to approve those. Um, but I think we're kind of closed out on our work for the year. I'll loop back with you all on what I hear from Megan and

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Winston on the special ed stabilization fund policy and then again I'll send out once I do another round of updates on these slides I'll email that out to to y'all as well as other committee members folks or any single present. >> Is there anything else we should talk about?

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>> Thank you all for your work this year. >> Thanks Lizzie. >> Excellent job Mark. Thank you for all of your uh guiding and all the work that you did on the the presentation and um you've been a phenomenal chair. So, thanks for all of the work.

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>> Yeah, I I second that motion, Mark. It's been great working with you. Thank you for your leadership, >> I appreciate that. It's been a great great group. We got we got a lot done. We got a lot done. >> We did. >> Uh so, I appreciate all of your work uh so much. And Lizzie, you've been you've been to enough meetings. We'll we'll

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include you in this group here. So, thank you for joining us so often. Um, all right. With that, I will take a motion to adjurnn. >> So, moved. >> Uh, second. >> Second. >> Uh, all in favor? Nathan? >> Yes.

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>> Uh, Amanda? >> Yes. >> I'm a yes. Thank you all. >> Thank you, guys. >> Thank you. Bye. >> Thanks, Amanda. >> Thank you.