Speaker 1: So welcome everybody. It is June 16th and welcome to our last school committee meeting of this school year. So yay, we made it on. The first item that we have in our agenda is actually executive session, but we no longer have the need. Sorry, I have what? Speaker 2: Roll. Speaker 1: Oh my goodness. Oh, thank you. Okay, so we're bringing the meeting to order and first thing we'll do is roll call. Mr. Patel. Present. Ms. Flats present Mr. Brand Present. Dr. Fugman present. Ms. Brune present And I am a yes.
So we have six members present. So we were going to make a motion to go into executive session, but we no longer need to do that. However, we can't start the public portion of our meeting till six 20. So we're going to recess from now until six 20. At which point we'll reconvene in open session. Speaker 3: Hi here. Speaker 1: Okay, we're at six 20 and we're back in open session. Not sure why there's an echo. It's gone. Okay. So welcome to the school committee meeting of Monday June 16th. So we've already opened the meeting and done roll call
and now we'll stand for the pledge of allegiance and a moment of silence and we take that moment of silence to honor our troops who are protecting us here and abroad. So now I'll ask if the committee or anyone from the administration has any announcements. Can do it later? No. Okay. All right. So now we'll, hmm. Okay, so now we'll move on to public speak. Public speak is scheduled for a period of 15 minutes. Each speaker will be permitted a maximum of three minutes during which time they can speak about topics within the scope of responsibility of the school committee. All remarks will be addressed through the school committee chair.
Public speak is not a time for debate or response to comments by the school committee and I was made aware in advance of six people who were seeking to speak today. Anybody else here who would like to do public speak who has not signed up yet? Okay. Can you just come and write your name down and if there's anyone else online, if you could just make yourself known. Speaker 3: 15 minutes. 15 minutes? Speaker 1: I can write, I can have seven. So we would have seven. Yeah, so Speaker 3: Clarify. Speaker 1: Yeah, so we do only have, our policy allows us
to take seven people for public speak during the public speak portion at the beginning of the meeting for two minute public comments. I do plan to take comments during the portion of the meeting where we discuss the resolution about the MTA materials. So if you would prefer to save your comments for that time, there will be a designated amount of time which you could speak then as well. Okay. So you would like to go later? Okay. Okay. Is that No Matthew Morey. Okay. Okay. So I do still have seven people, so we'll take them in order and each person will have two minutes to speak.
Let me just get my timer. And Ms. Rubenstein, if you could come first please. Speaker 3: Thank you Speaker 1: Madam Chair. And I'll give you a 32nd warning if you'd like. Speaker 3: Is that better? Speaker 4: Okay. Thank you. Thank you Madam Speaker. Good evening school committee. I'm fair Rubenstein. I live in Arbor Circle and I've always been proud to have my two kids at Natick Public School. Some of you know me for my time here advocating and thanking you for your safety for L-G-B-T-Q kids. And some of you remember when I was here last year with the MTA resolution reminding you it would make my kids unsafe and schools and it would make your kids political pawns.
Today I am not as energized. I'm here, I'm exhausted. I'm exhausted from having to prove my kids' right to exist. And from wondering when and why and how people who are not Zionists got to define Zionism when surely straight folks don't define what's homophobic and able-bodied folks don't decide. Don't decide what's ableist. I'm exhausted from wondering why Jews are the only ethnicity whose right to self-determination is questioned again and again and why? Three countries repatriated by the British in 47 and 48. Only one is called out for not having a right to exist.
I'm trying to understand. I'm exhausted. Why don't you have to be pro or anti France or Spain or the UK or the US wonderful places we all love. I'm especially exhausted from having people who are not Jewish. Tell me what is and is not antisemitism. I'm exhausted. I wonder how you can possibly deny that The men who threw a brick emblazoned with written free Palestine on it through the windows of my grocery store in Coolidge Corner this weekend, how were they emboldened by anything other than the calculated ongoing campaign to demonize the 90 plus percent
of Jews who yes are proud Zionists? I'm exhausted from reading comments. They had it coming. Good. Look at Gaza. A word all there are kids here blank. The 6 million blank to Israel and the Jews and the latest news story about the Holocaust memorial that was defaced last weekend. I'm exhausted from hearing it's complicated or that there's nuance to justify attacks on Jews and that our safety is clearly conditional. I'm really, I'm challenged by rallies and chants and the normalization of Jew hatred in America marked as activism. And I'm tired of watching non-Jews white watch our
experience and water down language that calls out what is happening to our people. What began as chance against what begins as chance against Israel ends with violence against Jews. We have seen it. We were not surprised. I'm sorry if you were. Thank you. Speaker 1: Next we have Mr. Goldstein. Speaker 5: Thank you. My name is Daniel Goldstein. Two minutes. I'm an American Jewish Zionist living here in Natick with my wife and three kids, one kid in Kennedy Middle School, two kids in Brown. We chose Natick for its values of inclusion, integrity, and community. But tonight I'm here because those values feel shaken.
The resolution before you brought by Dr. Fugman responds to the MTAs materials on Israel and Gaza. The conflict is complex but the MTAs resources are not. They offered a one-sided distorted view, lacking context, echoing anti-Semitic tropes and erasing the lived experience of Jewish people. Why is it that the only Jewish nation in the world, a country slightly smaller than Massachusetts, is uniquely singled out delegitimized and judged in classrooms? There are over 2.3 billion Christians in the world, 2 billion Muslims and just 15 million Jews.
A fraction of a percent of humanity. 7 million of those live in Israel, the world's only Jewish state. Also home to 2 million Arabs who live, vote and work alongside their Jewish neighbors. That's what Zionism means to me. The belief that the Jewish people, a small, historically persecute minority deserve a f safe native homeland Israel. No one should or can define the identity for us. The MTA materials are not just unbalanced and distorted. They make Jewish students and families feel targeted, unsafe. So I ask you, please vote for this resolution due
to uphold natick's values, to affirm truth and inclusion and so that every Jewish child knows that they belong here to each committee member. I sincerely thank you for your integrity and the seriousness with which you hold this position. We see it. Thank you. Speaker 1: Next on my list is Mr. Siegel who is remote. So if you want to unmute please. Okay. Speaker 6: Hi, I'm Dr. Michael Siegel Natick resident. And I'd like to address agenda item nine F, the draft resolution on the MTA materials. I am Jewish and I have family in Israel, three
of whom have served proudly in the Israeli defense forces. I wanna start with two important points. First, I think it's very reasonable for the Native school committee to consider a resolution that was drafted by a group of parents, both Jews and Arab Americans jointly, who are concerned about making sure that all sides of the Israel Palestinian conflict are presented to our children. And second, I think it's reasonable that this group of parents made it clear that all students, both Jewish students and those of Arabic or Palestinian heritage must feel comfortable
and welcomed in our schools. Oh, hold. Hold on a second. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Please disregard everything I just said. Apparently I've been giving out this information but I, but I have just learned the truth. So let me correct myself first. This draft resolution was not produced by a group of Natick parents. It was produced by the American Jewish Committee, a partisan national advocacy group that spent more than a million dollars lobbying Congress since 2012 and as part of a national campaign to have this policy implemented by school systems throughout the country. Second, I said that the resolution was about making sure
that all sides of the Israel Palestinian conflict represented to our children. I apologize I was wrong. This turns out to be a one-sided resolution that only expresses outrage at the thought that Palestinian perspectives are being presented, God forbid. And it is only about making sure 30 seconds that the Israeli perspective is taught. Finally, the resolution does not explicitly state that students of Arabic or Palestinian heritage must feel comfortable and welcomed in our schools. It only explicitly states that Jewish students should feel comfortable and welcome. This resolution is nothing more than an attempt by outsiders
to try to dictate what Natick teachers can and cannot say in the classroom time. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Our next speaker is Rabbi Weiss. Is she here today? No. Online. Grace Weiss? No. Okay. So we'll move on to our next speaker who is Michael Holloway. Speaker 7: May I give my comments after discussion of the resolution? Speaker 1: Sure. Michael Richmond. Speaker 8: Thank you Madam Chairman and committee School.
School committee members. I am co-chair of the antisemitism task force at Temple Israel of Natick. I find it perplexing that the largest union in Massachusetts, which represents educators, is promoting biased resources for its teachers, which are clearly pro-Palestinian, anti Zionist and frankly anti-Semitic. What the Massachusetts Teachers Association is offering is not educational. It's really propaganda that will poison the minds
of students and foster a further uptick, uptick in anti-Semitism that is currently rampant and has become dangerous and in some cases deadly. The MTA curriculum should not be in the Natick or any school system if the topic of conflict in the Middle East is taught, it should be factual and expose students to the many issues as well as different perspective perspectives. Thank you for allowing me to speak. Speaker 1: So we'll, we'll circle back to Rabbi Weiss
and you have two minutes, so I'll give you a 32nd warning. Speaker 9: Okay, thanks. Good evening. My name is Rabbi Ray Choise and I'm blessed to serve Temple Israel of Natick and also the town of Natick. As Constable I'm here and many of us are here because of the resources posted by the MTA representing the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Upon perusing these resources, one immediately notices a pattern, one in which a significant portion of the resources in this collection call into question the very legitimacy of Israel as a sovereign nation.
This is different than criticism, which is of course important in any country, but it's something distinct from any other geopolitical conflict. Think of any other country, even one charge with genocidal actions whose very existence is called into question. This should really give us pause. As someone with an educational background. Myself coming from a cultural studies background, I am concerned about the lack of cri critical thinking and nuance in general in this country. And I think we do our students a disservice when we reduce these very thorny complicated issues
to mattachine and binaries that promote an evil versus good scenario. It the, the regional conflict is far more complicated than that with parties who've been living in the region for thousands of years with valid claims to the land and serious pursuits, there should be education around what actually constitutes genocide, including ones that have taken place in the US singling out Israel doesn't really provide the full educational scope in this regard. And we would hope that the resources be looked at with a,
a critical eye and one that seeks to truly understand the conflict with the complexity that, that that very much exemplifies the the issue. Thank you so much. Speaker 1: Thank you. And the last speaker for public speak I believe is online Mr. Morrie, Matthew Morrie. And you have two minutes and I'll give you a 32nd warning Speaker 10: Plaintiff order. I submitted my name for public speak. Speaker 11: There we go. I was about to, I was about to say that there wasn't an ability to unmute frankly
to echo Dr. Siegel. I think the, my fears with this is that this is largely one-sided and bluntly it also could be used to potentially threaten teachers and that's just not acceptable. Thank you. Speaker 1: Okay, thank you. And Speaker 11: Vote, vote, vote no on the resolution please. Thank you. Speaker 1: Okay, thank you. And I apologize for anyone who did not get their name to me in time,
but I did take the first seven people in order and we only, our policy only allows us to have seven people. So we will be having public comments during the discussion on the resolution. And I welcome anyone, I apologize Dr. McKenzie, that's our policy. I do Speaker 10: To come Speaker 1: Here. Yeah. I'm sorry Speaker 10: If I am, I am not. I I did submit an hour before this meeting. Speaker 1: Yes. We already had seven people at that time, so apologies if you'd like to send us an email we'd be happy to take any comments you have. So that is the end of Speaker 12: We have Speaker 10: Any Speaker 1: Updates or concerns from either our student
or our teacher representatives. Speaker 12: Okay, Speaker 1: Thank you. And then we will now have a presentation from Jillian Wilson, Martin and others on a sustainability update. Did you wanna introduce that Dr. Stash? Sure, Speaker 13: Yeah. We're just thrilled to have you. When Jillian asked me if she could bring some students to present today and sustainability that was just a no brainer. We're thrilled to have the kids here and to hear your, your presentation. Welcome. Speaker 14: Great. Thank you Dr. Sp. So I'll let everyone intro else introduce themselves.
I'm actually not really gonna be doing a lot of talking. My name's Jillian Wilson Martin, I'm the sustainability director for the town. I'm joined by Ms. Keller, I and Jen, I'm sorry I always blank on your how to say your last name. Apologies. And some students from Kennedy as well as another student who did a recording for us because he couldn't be here tonight. So with that I'm gonna just turn it over to them. Speaker 1: Yeah. Speaker 15: So thank you guys so much for the opportunity to give an update about our waste diversion efforts in the schools. So students and I will be sharing highlights from this school year as well as opportunities to work further
with the district to make deeper impact. My role in this school district is to help our district reduce the amount of waste that we are generating in our schools and divert waste from the incinerator. This is a hefty job because schools are big generators of waste. So focusing on the areas where we can make the biggest impact has been our priority. A waste study, which you can see graph up on the left side of the screen of the Minnesota schools, showed that 50% of trash generated in schools is compostable and is coming from cafeterias and kitchens.
Therefore, we knew we could make the biggest impact if we focused on those areas. The graph on the right shows our progress since I started in this position in January of last school year. And the the dark green shows the amount of food and liquids that our cafeterias have been able to divert from the incinerator and the light green shows those foods and liquids that we are still putting in the trash. So last year we diverted about 30% of food and liquid waste from our district cafeterias and this year we are diverting about 55% of food and liquid waste.
However, if you look at this chart that now has those orange bars on it, you'll see that our cafeterias are also producing a lot of trash that we cannot compost. That additional layer is adding about 35% to our cafeteria waste. So the students and I will talk about, talk more about that in just a minute. But I first want to share a little bit about the strategies that we've been using this school year to divert waste. So part of the food waste that our schools generate comes from the kitchens from food preparation and the EPA provides us some great information
and guidance on how to deal with food waste and their food waste scale shows us that if we have food waste, we should try to feed it to people or to animals before we compost it. So with Ms B's help, we started a partnership with the Natick Community Organic Farm in just this past February. And we have rescued 720 pounds of produce scraps from the kitchens at Natick High School, Memorial Elementary and Brown Elementary. And they've been using that at the farm to feed their animals. So the way this works is that as the kitchen staff are preparing food,
they're putting the, the scraps from fruits and vegetables into a bin at the end of the lunchtime. They then take that out to a yellow tote out on the loading dock. The farm then comes once a week to pick up that yellow tote and they feed that animal that food to their animals. So that's saving our town costs associated with waste hauling and it's saving the farm money on animal feed. So we've been really excited about that partnership. So in addition to helping set up that partnership this year, I also spent time engaging more elementary students in the
process of sorting cafeteria waste. So last spring we had success at lilja doing waste sorting in their cafeteria. And at the close of last school year, Karen Gani, the principal at Ben him was really excited about getting this going at her school. So we, we started the school year off with waste sorting in the cafeteria and between Lilja and Pen him this year we diverted 32,000 pounds of food waste and liquids from the incinerator by doing liquid pour off and collecting food scraps in the cafeteria. So it's really important that we tie in waste diversion
to the curriculum framework specifically highlighting that waste sorting is one way that we can reduce our impact on the environment as well as making the connection that we are applying learning about decomposition and nutrient cycling. So I continue to provide classroom resources to teachers on the problem of waste and how to sort food waste. And as you can see in this video, Speaker 16: Maybe Speaker 15: Elementary students do really well with following the process of waste sorting and starting this early on in the elementary years helps the students then be successful once they move to middle school.
So as soon as this video finishes up, I'm gonna pass the mic to our Kennedy students with whom it's been such a privilege to work most of this school year with and they will share how they have facilitated a whole school movement around this waste sorting initiative. Speaker 17: Good evening. My name is Jonah and I'm in sixth grade. Speaker 18: My bad. That's right. A second. Hi Robbie. And I'm in seventh grade. Speaker 19: I'm Winnie and I'm in fifth grade. Speaker 17: I'm Maddie and I'm also in fifth grade. Speaker 20: And I'm Phillip and I'm in sixth grade Speaker 17: Along with three Kennedy advisors and foremost students. We formed sustainability club at Kennedy
Mill School this year. Speaker 18: I joined the sustainability club because no one has really been talking about climate change. I found more than one documentary where scientists said that climate change is already a bid deal. So I wanted to do something about it. Speaker 19: We also wanted to feel like we're actually doing something to help the environment. We hoped we could make changes at Kennedy through sustainability club. Speaker 17: At first. At first the club wanted to improve recycling, but we connected with Mrs. Keller
who told us about the waste sorting happening at Wilson. We learned that all of Natick's trash is burned in incinerator and that by sorting our cafeteria waste we could reduce the amount of trash sent to the incinerator and capture the food waste to make compost gardeners could use. Then garden gardeners could then use the compost to grow more fruit. Wilson had data showing the amount of waste that they had in their cafeteria and we wanted to find out about the waste in Kennedy's cafeteria.
So all club planned and carried out a one day waste started where the students put their cafeteria waste item is in the LA into labeled bins. We weighed all the different types of waste and laid it on a big tarp. Speaker 18: Then we used the data to present assemblies to the whole school teaching students about waste and how can, how we can sort our waste at lunchtime to make a positive impact on our environment. Speaker 19: The assemblies help prepare students for the waste sorting that everyone now participates in.
At lunchtime, students volunteer to monitor the stations and the teachers sign up to help too. Ms. Keller works with the club advisors, our principal and the custodians to make sure the new processes work for everyone. Speaker 17: We're proud that we are helping students learn how to sort their waste and that we're hoping our school and, and we're helping our school improve the environment. We're also proud of our teamwork together. We accomplish a lot more than we thought we could. We worked hard, we never gave up
and we're really making a difference. But we also see waste. Our school could reduce waste even more like having less cafeteria trash and recycling and compost of all possible things in locations of the school. Speaker 20: I have not been part of the sustainability club this year, but I'm no, but I've noticed that the way this that food is served results in many unopened items like fruits and vegetables being added to the share table bin. Since we've started waste sorting in the cafeteria, students have been putting an average of 105 items in the share bin. I've wondered if food can be served differently so that students can choose their fruits or vegetables
and their support for and if there is support for our school to help donate food so that the food gets to people who need it. These are a few questions that we will need help answering Speaker 19: Next school year. We want to work on these questions and continue reducing waste at Kennedy. Speaker 17: Thank you for the opportunity and thank you for helping us improve our school and the environment Speaker 15: And thank you to these students for being here tonight and for being so enthusiastic and engaged in this work. So I've been engaging students at Wilson Middle School as well through student council
and one of our eighth grade student council members. Writer Pian has been going above and beyond to teach his peers about waste sorting. He's at the eighth grade social tonight, but we're glad to have a recorded message from him to share with you. Speaker 14: I am sorry May, we may have a problem with our audio, but one second. Come on. Speaker 3: Hello, my name is Roger. Speaker 14: Sorry to, to turn the microphone off that or should I turn it off here? Okay. Speaker 3: I turn that off if you feel you Speaker 16: I'm sharing. Speaker 3: No, it won't turn off your Speaker 16: And then I think it won't.
I'll turn my volume off and then I'll try this. Problem is when my volume off. You can't hear, can't hear him. Speaker 14: I think there's, Speaker 16: I think there's a way to that. That Speaker 3: School committee. My name is Ian. I'm in eighth grade on Speaker 21: The student council and I'm in charge of the Composting Learners committee at Wilson Middle School. I have been working at the NCOF for the past three years and this first got me in a student composting at our school this fall. Ms. Keller came to the student council meeting and told us about a challenge Wilson was facing in the cafeteria Waste sorting program. Students were throwing trash into the food waste bins in our
cafeteria and Black Earth wouldn't pick them up. This meant that the food most students did sort correctly was going to be incinerated instead of composted and that the town was paying for pickups that weren't happening. You can see it, the rejected pickup. On the photo on the left side of this slide, Ms. Keller asked the student council for help and I led a committee to support these efforts. Student council together, student council members presented updates in their homerooms and we worked with Ms. Keller to make a fun quiz using, which is an online trivia game that we use at Wilson As the leader of the Wilson Compost Committee. I have also spent the last year designing posters
and trying to find a way to spread compost awareness around their school. I decided to host a month long event celebrating compost called Compost May. This was focused around May 29th, which is National Compost Day. We hung many posters, made morning and lunch announcements and we even held a raffle. We helped to create, we helped to spread school, we helped, sorry. We have helped to spread awareness about composting and we have helped to keep the kids at Wilson composting correctly. But there's more to do. The plates that we get from the school lunch are non compostable. Even though they say compostable, our silverware still has
to go in the trash and all of our sides are wrapped in little one used plastics. It's sad to say that we compost when almost everything that we get from the cafeteria has to go in the trash. Why should we have to explain to kids what's not compostable when we could be composting? Everything compostable options exist and I would love to see them at Wilson and other schools that made it reusable options would be even better. I recently read about what Needham is doing at a Boston Globe vertical, which you can see on the, in the last picture. They now serve meals on a metal reusable trace and work with a company called Reish to wash them.
If we truly wanna help our planet, we need to join together. Thank you for listening and I really hope that we can move forward in our journey towards a green future. Speaker 15: So Thank you so much Tory for videoing that for us. So like he said, we're excited about some of the solutions that he's been able to implement in his school and about possibilities for the future. But we're also seeing some design flaws in our current system that could increase waste in different ways. So just a brief look at some of the components of the system
that impact waste in our school cafeterias. On the right side we have lunch monitors and at the elementary school level these people help encourage students to sort their waste correctly and they help remove trash that ends up in the the food wastebin. But lunch monitors are not a possibility at our current middle school situation. So this too often results in food waste being contaminated with trash at black Earth, rejecting the pickups that we still have to pay for on the left side. Schools that are short staffed in the kitchen result in a change in the way that these these kitchens serve food
where they are. Instead pre-packaging the food rather than serving it in real time. This results in much more packaging waste. Also in kitchens follow the offer method of serving food. It's shown that less food waste is generated as opposed to the more waste producing serve method. And finally, kitchens capable of scratch cooking, produce much less food waste and those capable of washing student trays result in significant reduction in waste from packaging. So we're aware that there are multiple factors that affect potential changes in this system, like funding,
timing of union contracts and food service management company contracts. And so one of our goals for next year is to work with our district, the administration on a multi-year plan that includes design thinking throughout the system. So we hope to capitalize on opportunities in the coming years to make changes and reduced waste incrementally. I also plan to expand waste sorting at our remaining elementary schools and dive deep into a potential partnership with the Natick Service Council to rescue Donatable food as was highlighted by the Kennedy students.
I'll of course continue engaging with students like these that are here tonight to ensure success and to help make this application of their classroom learning meaningful and empowering and relevant. Thank you so much for your time tonight. Speaker 1: Thank you. That was great. Any questions or comments from the committee? Okay. Thank you everyone for coming tonight. We especially appreciate all the students who are here on their like second to second last day of school. So appreciate that. And we hope you have a good rest of your school year. We're close. So close. So close.
Speaker 22: It's literally two, one and a half. Speaker 1: Alright, shall we turn to the superintendent report? Sure. Speaker 13: I think we can go. Alright Sue, are you driving on the decks? So we'll, do you want me to just go down in order? We'll start with FY 26 strategic objectives and engagement process. And I'm not gonna go through every one of these slides. We shared the deck that we've been sharing internally with the school teams. So we didn't wanna break up the deck 'cause it's in many different links, but we'll kind of give you the highlights. Do you wanna display it? But up there we go. So last year, I feel like I've said this a few times,
but it's always good to say things many times the way we kind of outlined these four district priorities was to go back, as you know I was new here in August. We went back and looked at all the different school improvement plans from the last year. There were 36, 6 different line items and we kind of chunked them into these four categories to really honor the work that has preceded my coming here and to make sure everybody could dovetail into that work. So I'm gonna just mention the four blocks here. Psychological safety and social emotional learning, relationship building and community engagement, instructional excellence
and support systems, and then communication and leadership development. Not surprisingly, these same items showed up a lot in our entry plan findings. The one thing we, this chart used to say 24 25 district priorities and we took that off because these are huge buckets that can last many, many years. And so this is sort of a north star, star of the things we're focusing on. The next slide shows like how we, if you think of a funnel, how we take those priorities down into what we're calling a bridge plan for next school year. We anticipate starting some work around a strategic plan,
which will be more long term. So this is the bridge plan for next year. And this is very focused really on educators and kind of administration work. I'd anticipate there'll be some broader goals as we work on school committee goals and my goals for next year. But this is thinking about like all of our educators and all of our administrators, what are we focusing on in terms of next steps? The first one is bucketed under psychological safety and social emotional learning. And here it's about strengthening what we call tier one or foundational. Every student should experience strong
and cohesive behavior systems implementing PBIS, which is positive behavior incentive systems. This is making sure the basic experience for every kid is, is incentive based, is asset based and is positive. And that that runs through every single class. And then co-developing what we're calling a consistent K to 12 code of conduct. Right now all of our different disciplines sits in the different student handbooks and we want the parent experience, the student experience to be felt consistently across the whole district. We're gonna do that in partnership with labor.
It's very important that our teachers who are implementing these things and our administrators have a, and our students and our families have a strong voice in that end product. So those are the main deliverables for psychological safety and social emotional learning next year. There's already a lot of work underway preceding this year. This is like the next iteration of that in terms of relationship building and community engagement. It's co-developing a unified vision and core values that anchor coherence. This, if you read my entry plan, it's a lot about building a coherent system. So this is around hearing from all
of our stakeholders in terms of the vision for native public schools as well as the values. Some of the values are listed in the profile of graduates. So we'll bring those in and then we'll just hear and update what those values will be. So grounding the vision in stakeholder input that doesn't just mean inside the school system, but our families, our community at large. And then defining how those values show up in everyday practice. So not saying something aspirational, but actually like how does it show up on the ground in our parent meetings at our CPA meetings, et cetera. And then aligning systems and structures with that adopted vision.
So we're excited about that and, and we'll speak about it more as we launch it next year. Instructional excellence and support systems. This one is around really working on formative assessments. So that's when we're in class, we're checking what are kids learning? We're teaching it, where are they, what are they learning so we can reteach so that we can help kids who may be struggling and accelerate kids who might need a boost. And then lastly, communication and leadership development. This is a huge piece around deepening coaching and evaluation procedures in the district with a lot of professional development for our leaders and coaches.
So that's the highlights. When I say this, the, this all came from a lot of the people in our schools wanting this early. Normally this would be something I'd be presenting next August when we open up schools, but there was a great appetite for people to hear kind of where we were headed at the end of this year. I call it like fitting a watermelon through a Pringles can. So we kind of did that work to like anchor it so we could, and I think it helped with people who are starting to formulate the goals inside this, the different schools. As we proceed, let's go too forward just to kind of show how this lays out for each one of these priorities
that I just gave a very cursory overview of. We outlined again what that objective is and then why this, why now. So we tried to elevate the voice that was in our entry plan, the voice that we've been hearing from families, students and staff throughout the year to really bolster why we picked these goals. And I don't wanna spend a lot of time today doing it other than unless people want me to, I'm happy to field questions. But this is a very public document. We've engaged, I don't know how many, over 20 meetings with all sorts of different staff members throughout the district.
We're excited about it. This presentation is quite long. Remember it's an internal document. It's 20 pages long and it really goes through the data that supports this as well as the narratives that support these strategic objectives. So I bring them here today really just to outline the path ahead. I'm always a believer in kind of sprinkling those seeds forward. So we know we're headed, but we're excited about the work for next year and we're lining up all of our educator goals around that. I'll stop there unless people have deeper questions on any of them. Thank you. Questions from the committee? Dr. Coon? I don't have a question, but I just, Speaker 23: Hopefully I don't sound like a broken record,
but I've been really excited for quite some time to build a strategic plan two superintendents ago. Yep. So I'm excited that you're here. I'm excited that you have this plan and I'm, I'm excited we have this bridge year to really develop a long-term plan. So this is great. I'm looking forward to it. Speaker 13: Thank you. Okay, thank you Dr. Stash. Great. The next item on my report is a very brief update on handbooks. As I just mentioned, each of our schools has a a student handbook. We'll bring it up there. So each
of our Natick schools currently maintains its own student handbook. I know the presentation's coming up and that reflects the district's belief in tailoring logistics and operations to each individual school context. But it can also create some inconsistencies across the handbooks, which we wanna try to, to avoid. We don't want confusion for families or even for staff and we don't wanna weaken the coherence of the district experience. The next slide, there we go. So this project that we kind of started this spring with our cabinet and with our administrative council works to make a foundational step.
It's probably the first step toward building more aligned student-centered system. And it really responds to the coherence elements in theme one of the entry plan. The next page. So the project scope is to collaboratively develop cohesive district-wide language to replace inconsistent or school specific content while we ensure alignment with the school committee policy. So these are the, the areas that we're going to do. And I'll kind of walk through an example. So focus areas, student discipline is up there. That's phase one of that code of conduct we just talked about right there.
We're just gonna put in everything we're required by law. So we each consistently have the same letters, the same approach, and that's gonna go into all the handbooks, the cell phone use. The same piece will go through all of the different student handbooks on that. And then everything else you can see their graduation requirements clearly will be in high school, but we're trying to just systematize it. So all parents, all students are reading the exact same thing. Sounds really simple and straightforward, but it takes some logistics to push it through the system. The next slide shows the timeline For anybody who helps to kind of understand this. This was somewhat new to me before,
but the superintendent's role is to have operational authority over those handbooks and the school committee's jurisdiction is around making sure we're aligning that to policy. So when we come back in the fall with those books, we'll make sure we are clear on how those align to policy. And this will happen really in the summer where we're giving people those inserts. The school teams will put 'em in their handbooks and by the time we come back in the fall, we'll publish them and bring them to school committee. It's part of a multi-year effort. We just said the first round of code of conduct will be this year. Next year will be the next iteration once we work with labor on that. And then lastly, for those who are interested,
all the current handbook links are all there in this posted agenda in case people wanna take a look at them. And then a link to the November 20, 24 school committee presentation that we did last year on the handbooks. I think we'll be a little earlier next year. So this is just to let you know some efforts that are going on in the summer to make sure we're responding to the entry plan. Speaker 1: Great. Thank you. Any questions from the committee? Ms. Brunell? Speaker 24: Thank you for doing that detailed work. It's a, it's a lot to read in the beginning of the year, so if we could see those handbooks as soon as possible when we have to when you make that presentation.
'cause I believe we have to approve them. Speaker 13: No, you, I don't The handbooks are actually internal. We just, you just have to ensure we're aligning to policy. Perfect. Speaker 24: Even better. Yes, in the past we've approved them. So that is a lot of reading in the midst of trying to do our own, beginning of the school paperwork. Yeah. So thank you. Sure. Speaker 1: Any other questions from the committee about handbooks? Okay, thank you Dr. Sash. Great. Speaker 13: The next item Mr. Gillis has, who's our assistant superintendent of business and finance and a brief update on MSBA enrollment study update. Speaker 25: Yeah. So in the, in the packet there, you, you got
that we basically only got one bid or price quote from, from a, a vendor that does enrollment studies. It was future think. And so we proceeded with them, Cropper and McKibbin said they were initially interested but didn't respond. The other vendor did have some conversations with Ann, with the wall part companies. They could not fit it in their schedule with the timeframe that we needed. And so check the references on future think. And they've, they've done work in the area, both
Medfield and Wellesley. Their work seemed, seemed good and they've done over a thousand enrollment studies across the country. So this is their bread and butter business. So we're proceeding with them and they expect to actually beat the July 17th deadline with a draft report, maybe a week or so. But they didn't want to commit too much. They, they offered, but then they didn't wanna lock in on a date, but it was, they're off to a pretty good start. They have everything they need from us and have gotten a little feedback.
So I think folks are gonna be happy with the, with the results. And I think we'll have a good independent report to share with MSVA before we meet with them, before we discuss enrollment for both the Memorial project. And they also do other planning. So, you know, we'd have a start if the, the committee does want to pursue a more in depth overall capital asset plan, not just an enrollment study Speaker 1: Questions or comments from the committee. So I think one thing we had mentioned was trying to find a time in the summer to have a presentation on the completed report.
So Dr. Stash and I are looking for a time using the now infamous doodle poll that we're working on to identify a time so that we can hear that report over the summer. Speaker 13: Yeah. Just to add onto that, the scope and the contract includes one presentation and we're hoping to do that in conjunction with the SBC, the school building committee. It seems like it makes sense to have them come to it once and it's really important that, you know, the creators of the report provide that analysis to us. So that's the goal. And we would wanna do it before the last week of July if possible. Just because the MSBA can make
that meeting the enrollment meeting anytime that week. We don't have it yet. I keep asking. Speaker 1: Yeah. Thank you. Okay. Speaker 13: The next item on my piece, we're excited to provide you our recommendation for the Meco school committee rep for next school year. And we have director Adi Lynch here of the MECO program. He's on Zoom and who's going to present this memo to us? Speaker 26: Great. Thank you so much Dr. Stash. And goodnight everyone. So this memo is outlining our process for getting our next Meco representative. And I was a very thorough, inclusive,
and transparent process in that we are looking for someone that can certainly partner with what we've been doing as a meco program. Also being able to collaborate and have family voice. So the process was us initiating a conversation with all of our current Meco families to identify any interest and also ensure that the voice of our currently enrolled families was at the center of this selection process. And our goal was certainly to make sure lived experiences
as a, as a MECO student and family was in our representative, rather than just relying on individuals removed from the day-to-day process and the reality of this program. So we had conversation with key stakeholders, including our MECO staff, my coordinators, our parents, our school administrators. We also consider perspectives of individuals that are familiar with the Mecca program and also the responsibilities of the school committee along with gathering and reviewing recommendations from families currently engage in Mecca. And finally, we wanted to ensure
that the process allowed time for current families to express any interest to participate. So that happened over time. And so we came to have one particular person come to mind. Her name is Kiana Gomes. She's a current meco parent having two students at Benham. She's connected, as I said, to the MECO mission, having students in our ntic public schools already. And she's also an employee of the district, but she does not work at a Meco school site. So she's well versed in what our district believes
and policies and priorities. And she can also provide our district with an authentic and informed perspective that directly reflects the needs and experiences of our Meco families. I, I believe along with many others, that this candidate has a unique vantage point, of course, in her strong commitment and will be able to help foster collaboration and support of our shared mission of equity and access of all students. Of course, this person being an employee. And we thought about the ethical considerations and guidelines.
So prior to even putting this recommendation together, I consulted both the Massachusetts Association of School Committees as long as, as well as the Massachusetts State's Ethics Commission to ensure that the candidate's eligibility and compliance with all legal and ethical standards. So we know that the Meco representative is a non-voting position, but this person having that dual status as a district employee and parent, there was a few we wanted to make sure we understood and there's no legal barriers to the appointment.
So what I was informed, which I wanna share, is that this, this particular candidate should file a few forms. One is the nine 30 CMR 6.02 disclosure, and that's for the dual roles both employee and appointee to the board. Section 19 disclosure due to financial interest through her children being enrolled. And this is optional 6.03 disclosure, which if any concerns arise regarding any overlap with the roles of employee in as a parent advocate advocating for her children, all
of these forms must be signed by the appointing authority, which is the school committee at the time of appointment. These steps ensure alignment with the Ethics Commissions guide and reinforce our commitment to transparent and ethical governance. And so the next steps is simply pending your confirmation. I will coordinate with the recommended candidate to complete these forms that we just stated and also ensure that all disclosures are available to the school committee to review and sign at the appointment meeting. Thank you. Okay.
Speaker 1: Thank you. It's very exciting to have a candidate before us. Do we have any questions regarding the materials? The memo about the candidate, or are we ready for a motion? Speaker 27: I can make a motion. Speaker 1: Okay. Speaker 27: She's Speaker 1: Here. Is is the candidate is not here, is that correct? Speaker 26: No, she's not. Speaker 1: Okay. So since this is, I I, so just to give some context, this is our last meeting of the school year and the appointment would start July 1st. So this is our opportunity to make that appointment prior to July 1st.
And just Mr. Lynch, is it, is the candidate comfortable having us appoint her without her coming to meet us Speaker 26: That I did not ask. So I cannot answer that indefinitely. Apologize. Okay. Speaker 27: We can recommend an appointment. I do. And she can accept or not Speaker 1: Accept or not accept. Right? Very true. Very true. Mr. Brand. Yeah. Okay. Speaker 27: But we can accept the recommendation is what it actually is. Speaker 1: Sounds like you are, someone's ready to make a motion over there. Speaker 27: I Okay. I'll make a motion. Sure. Can I steal your motion? You can steal my motion. I would move to
approve the recommended appointee for the, for the school committee METCO representative of Keani Gomes for the 20 25 20 26 school year. Speaker 1: I'll second it. Okay. All in. Any question about it or all in favor? Just getting to vote? No, Speaker 24: No, no. I have a question. Speaker 1: You have a question? Okay. Speaker 24: Brunell, it's more of a comment. One, I wanted to thank Tamika Lewis, who was Tamika Scott, sorry, who was our representative this year. She and I had a great time together. She dove in right over the summer and we went to school board partners together.
So I hope that Ms. Gomes will feel equally as welcomed on the committee and that we can provide some opportunities for her to get to know all of us. And then also I do think that our, we should re-look at this policy so that we are not appointing this position on July for a July 1st start. I really think that given the feedback of Tamika, this position should be, should run along the election cycle that the rest of our positions run in. So that when we are onboarding new members, we're also onboarding our Met co person.
Met co rep. Speaker 1: Thank you. Any other comments or questions before we vote? Okay. So we'll vote on the motion. All in favor? Anyone against? Nobody's abstaining. So that's 6 0 0. So yay. We have a new METCO rep, so we'll be reaching out to you to get, get Ms. Gomes onboarded for July 1st. Great. Speaker 26: So thank you so much. Speaker 13: Thanks Adi. We have one more item, which is the proj. We gave this a glimpse into this last meeting,
but we'll do it again here. Projected enrollment for 25, 26 kindergarten and Ms. Bel will do that. Speaker 28: So the last time we were here we talked about a concern about the numbers at Memorial Rising. We went from 73, last time we were here, our enrollment was at, our registration numbers were at 91 for Memorial, it's dropped to 90, which is not a surprise. We fluctuate typically at this point of the year. So everyone else has gone up slightly,
but we're still stable in terms of our class sizes. At this point. My recommendation would be to hold steady and see how we do over the next month, month and a half, and then come back to you over the summer if we have any concerns, if we have a significant number of enrollments, and then revisit the idea of needing to add another teacher. But at this point I think we're okay. Speaker 1: Okay. Thank you. Questions from the committee? No, thank you very much. Okay. So we'll turn to the chairman's report
and the first item that we'd like to take up is the draft resolution on MTA materials. So just to, just to frame how we're going to do this, I believe that Dr. Fugman has an updated version of the draft resolution that he's gonna share with us and talk us through. We'll have some conversation amongst the committee about the draft resolution and then we'll invite some time for public comment. And at that time I'll ask people to raise their hands and we'll determine how many people there are and we'll have a set amount of time for public comment. That all make sense? Okay. So I'll turn it over to you, Dr. Fen.
Speaker 23: And is there a way to share on the screen Speaker 28: You wanna share yours? Speaker 23: Oh, oh sure. Or do Speaker 28: You wanna send it to me and I can share? Speaker 23: So you're, you have access to it? I can, if I send it to you again, will you get it again? Speaker 28: Is that a trick Speaker 13: Question? Speaker 23: Just a link. Speaker 1: You're rocking the technology tonight too. Ms. S, Speaker 23: You have it. Okay, perfect. Thanks. So I'll provide you some context for what we're looking at. Two weeks ago I presented a draft resolution, which we dis briefly discussed initially as a committee
with the idea that we would be coming back to it tonight for discussion and hopefully for a vote. I since had conversations with fellow school committee members and others about the draft resolution. And based on that, my best, this is my best effort to bring together a resolution that responds to the comments from the public that responds to some of the concerns that were raised in terms of our teachers. I'm hoping that this is the resolution that we vote on tonight. Just briefly, I'll go through some of the changes.
Clause number one originally stated that MTA has developed and disseminated curricular resources. I deleted the word developed because it, as was clarified to me, none of the resources on the MTA list were actually developed by the MTA. There were there being disseminated by the MTA but not developed. So I deleted that going down two clauses below that. This is actually just a friendly recommendation from someone who writes, well just changing to clarify the language now it reads, whereas unfair unbalanced portrayals of Israel
and its supporters as, as opposed to what I wrote, which probably didn't make sense, have historically contribute to and have potential to continue to lead to the rise in exacerbation of antisemitism. The third clause reads, whereas concerns about the content and tone of these materials have been raised by, initially I had community leaders, educators, and the Massachusetts Special Commission on combating antisemitism given the feedback we received from so many parents in Natick. This was a suggestion, if you don't mind me sharing from Ms. Brunell to add Natick parents as well.
'cause we heard those concerns from NAIC parents and with permission of Mr. Wood. And I made sure to add this as a draft, but if you're okay with that, to add the EAN. So that list too, as an organization that also raised some concerns. I also added two additional clauses, two preamble clauses, and I wanna explain why. As far as we know, none of the materials that are, that I personally find inflammatory, so many people find inflammatory have not made their way into NAIC public schools. We wanted to make sure that that was clear
that our teachers currently do not use these materials. We have no evidence of that. No. And to also emphasize, and I'll say more when I read my statement, to emphasize that we trust our teachers in their roles of selecting the day-to-day curriculum and, and other instructional materials. So this is us doing our job of setting the general tone. This resolution does without necessarily overriding the professional decisions by the, by our educators.
I'll just briefly read it. The two, just those two new clauses. Whereas an NEX school committee deeply values and respects the expertise, judgment, and education of our educators and administrators and affirms our confidence in their ability to thoughtfully engage with complex instructional materials while fostering inclusive, respectful, and balanced learning environments for all our students. The next clause, actually I I should specify the next clause does more than just that. Again, another recommendation from Ms. Brunell, which is to also acknowledge that EAN our education, our local union,
the Education Association of Natick, has made their statement as well on this topic so that our clause reads. Whereas on February 24, in response to concerns raised by the potential use of MT materials in NAIC classrooms, the leadership of the Education Association of Natick, EAN issued a statement affirming that while the EAN is affiliated with the MTA, Natick educators do not receive curriculum or lessons plans from the MTA and emphasize their commitment to presenting political topics in ways that are fair, unbiased, and respectful of all students', students' identities.
Again, those two clauses are meant to acknowledge and and appreciate the efforts of our teachers individual as individual professionals, but also as a union. Just going now down to the operative clauses, I believe these were your edits that you recommended to focus on specifically what we're asking what we're doing. This is, this is the, the action oriented clauses to focus on what we're actually asking. The first one reads be it resolved that the NAT School Committee strongly encourages district staff to continue to critically review and exercise caution when considering the use
of any externally to develop resources. Again, continue is added to emphasize that this is something that our teachers already do, including those related to the Israeli Gaza conflict. Our action clause is about all materials regardless of their source. Then the last item, last, last edit is we already, the previous draft already leaned on our current existing policies. What we did here, the edit is to add the specific policies, IJ, IJJ, and KEC, as the policies that are pertaining
to the selection of of resources. So those are the edits I propose. Again, these are the edits I heard from multiple voices that I think now constitute a full resolution. Speaker 1: Thank you, Dr. Fugman and members of the school committee. I did add you all to the document, so you should be able to see it in the folder as well. Any questions, comments from other members? Mr. Brand, Speaker 27: Do you want, I don't have a question or a comment, but I have my statement. Do you want me to do that? Or what would you, how would you like to proceed? I don't have questions on what Shai just said. Okay.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so I guess I was looking at language intent to see if we're comfortable with the statement as written, if we're comfortable with making a statement, is this the right statement? So questions or comments about those topics, then I guess that could, I guess you could make your statement whenever you like. Yeah. Speaker 27: Would you? Okay. Sure, Speaker 1: Go ahead. Speaker 27: I brought my glasses today so I could make sure I could see, God. I'm getting older. I don't usually write a statement in advance, but I wanted to make sure I got
to everything that I was thinking about. So assuming we make a, a motion to support that resolution, I will be voting to support it the the resolution that was presented by Shai, and hopefully I'll be able to clearly articulate why right now. I understand that this topic is complicated for some people, and I appreciate that they see nuances. I've read all the emails that we've gotten and heard from others, both inside and outside our community. First, I have the utmost respect for our Natick educators with two daughters in high school, one of whom is about
to be a senior and the other a junior. I've gotten to observe their education for years and have been jealous of the quality of the teachers. They've been fortunate enough to have this resolution reaffirms our continued belief in their great work. Second, this resolution isn't about dictating curriculum choices. There are some people who are concerned that this resolution strays outside of our scope as a school committee. While I hear and appreciate those who have expressed those concerns, I disagree. If the resolution stated that educators should use a specific book or even a type of book that would be outside of our scope,
it simply doesn't do that. Third, I am thankful that we live in a country that honors our freedom of speech and expression. I am thankful that we can disagree and hopefully not feel a sense of fear that there would be a retribution for a different viewpoint. I am thankful that I live in a place where I can voice what is hopefully constructively critical feedback in that spirit. I believe that the MTA handled their recommendation of materials related to the Israel Gaza conflict incorrectly. Some people have said that those materials were not intended to be public, but that is not really relevant. If I was driving 65 miles per hour down
1 35, I'm still speeding. Regardless of whether or not I got caught arguing that it wasn't supposed to be public actually makes it worse, in my opinion. Please believe me when I say I'm not condemning the MTA. I'm not suggesting we prescribe what the MTA should or shouldn't offer. I think they made a mistake on this one. It doesn't mean that they're bad. It doesn't mean I don't respect their past or future work or their track record. I regularly make mistakes, and when I do, I hope people will tell me. Maybe it's just me. But when that happens, I try not to get offended. Instead, I try to learn from it.
I suspect we can all agree that if someone was teaching a unit on the Civil War and the recommended materials only had information about the union states or only the Confederate states, or perhaps worse, heavily skewed one way or the other that would be unbalanced in an inappropriate way to properly discuss that topic, it would be appropriate to teach the actual and full history. This situation is no different. The resolution claims three actions continue to do what they've always done and exercise caution when considering externally developed resources reaffirm our commitment
to use instructional materials that align with our district policies without discrimination and continue to adhere to federal civil rights guidelines. None of these are controversial. None are asking for behavior change and our existing policy IJ as it relates to instructional materials. The first clause reads, they must present balanced views of international, national, and local issues and problems of the past, present, and future. I'm supporting this resolution because I believe the wrong information or a lack of balanced information regardless of
where it comes from, restricts our ability to have a reasonable debate and reduces our ability to think critically. We should be able to reasonably and comprehensively discuss all sides of an issue, but the only way we can do that is if we hear all sides of an issue. That's what this is really about. This resolution isn't saying we should only support Israel or that we should only support Palestine, and that's the point. It's saying we should continue to make sure that we always study the entire issue, not just the side we agree with. This is something that the educators of Natick have been doing really well for years now.
I've spent a lot of time thinking about what I would say tonight. I did not wanna take an overly emotional stance on this particular issue just because I'm Jewish. At our previous meeting, a member of the public made a reference to a mezuzah. I'm not overly religious, and I've always thought of them as a form of spiritual protection. I've worn one ever since the day of my bar mitzvah that was around 35 years ago, only changing it once to a new one that my wife gave me on the day of our wedding. I wear it under my shirt and have had this one on for almost 18 years. And if you know, you know,
most people don't know I have it on and even fewer know what it is. Last summer, my daughter went on an incredible trip to Spain and Portugal with her summer camp. It was a Jewish cultural trip that has for decades been in Israel, but given the conflict has changed for now, I was a counselor on that trip in 1998. The trip has a name door Ledor. It means generation to generation in Hebrew. The kids on the trip all wear t-shirts and carry backpacks that have door lado in English and Hebrew proudly printed on them last summer, because of the massive increase in anti-Semitic violence
and hatred against Jewish people around the world, the t-shirts and backpacks just had the letters DLD in English. They didn't want to draw any attention. I know we've all heard about the increase in cadence of violence and hatred directed at Jewish people. Over our recent history. Three and a half weeks ago, yone Hinky and Sarah Milgram were shot and murdered in Washington DC for being Jewish. When the suspected gunman was arrested, he was yelling free Palestine. Just over the weekend, someone threw a brick through a window at the butchery in Brookline. It's a kosher grocery store, the brick red, free Palestine.
It is terrifying that in 2025, the frequency of these types of events is increasing rapidly. Unfortunately, we can't stop that here and we can't stop it tonight. I'm sure most of us wish we could. Whatever side of this or any argument you're on, we should be able to discuss it with balance and dignity and without fear. The Natick Public Schools, its educators, and our community at large has done an incredible job supporting people in times of need and in reminding people of our community that they are safe and that they belong regardless of their political opinions, the color of their skin, their religion,
or any other criteria. I hope this committee will vote to support the resolution tonight and demonstrate to everyone that while this resolution is simply a reaffirmation of practices already in place, those who feel vulnerable are seen and supported. Speaker 1: Thank you, Mr. Brand, Dr. Speaker 23: Fon. Sure. And I have a similar statement of my own last meeting. I provided some context about this resolution, and tonight I'd like to share additional reflections about why this is so important to so many of us, including myself. For years, especially since October 7th, 2023, there has been a widespread campaign
of disinformation about Israel and Zionism leading to a marked and documented rise in antisemitism in this country. And by the way, I recently learned a distinction between misinformation and disinformation. Misinformation, and this others probably knew it longer, but I'm new at this. Misinformation is a spread of false information, whether intentional or not, disinformation is the intentional spread of falsehoods to promote a particular agenda. So let me repeat this again. In the past couple of years, there has been a deliberate campaign of disinformation against Israel
and Zionism that has fueled a spike in antisemitism in this country. Unfortunately, elements of this campaign have made their way into a list of resources shared by the MTA. Many of these materials present Zionism as an extreme one sided in an extreme one sided way. Instead of helping students understand a complicated conflict, these materials do nothing more than to blame and vilify. For example, the Teach Palestine project consistently portrays Zionism as synonymous with apartheid and oppression. The Zen Education Project includes teaching materials
that depict Zionism as the root cause of violence in the region, indicating that the conflict stems solely from the actions and existence of the Jewish state. And organizations like visualizing Palestine offer infographics that depict Zionism as a system of ethnic cleansing. These are not just provocative claims or merely a different perspective. They are distorted and hurtful depictions of what it means to be a Zionist, an identity that many Jewish people, including myself, hold deeply. Why am I a Zionist? Because I believe that the Jewish people has have the right to a state
of their own in our homeland, especially given centuries of antisemitism. This does not mean that I support violence or injustice against Palestinians. It simply means that I want safety and dignity for my people as well as for our neighbors. My parents are Zionists, and I know that because after being born and raised in Argentina, they moved to Israel driven by the growing antisemitism in their home country, and the belief that Israel was the only place they could feel safe and fully at home as Jews. Decades later, my dad, who is now 80 years old, along
with my mom and my aunt who are both approaching their eighties, but please don't tell you, don't tell them. I told you that along with my brother who's a father of three school-aged children routinely join hundreds if not thousands of people in their hometown in Israel, along with thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of people across the country of Israel, proudly holding the Israeli flag in order to protest against the Netanya government, including and his policies, and to call for them to this war. And the immediate release of Israeli hostages still being held deep
in the Hamas tunnels. By the way, most of the people in the Israelis hold Israeli flags, but others hold other flags, including the pride flag. These people, including my family, do not protest despite being Zionist, but because they're Zionist. Also, just last month, the World Zionist organization, an umbrella non, a non-governmental organization representing Jewish groups, held its selections as they do every five years. 20 organizations participate in these elections with a range of political views, including several progressive groups calling for a peaceful two-state solution. That means that Zionist groups are openly calling
for the creation of a Palestinian state, one that coexist alongside a democratic and secure Jewish state of Israel. Of course not all Zionists agree on everything, just like not all Americans agree on everything, but some of the MTA linked resources would not tell you that because they paint Zionism as an extremely narrow, inaccurate and inflammatory portrayal of Zionism. Presenting these materials in our classrooms would not help our students think more critically about the conflict, but rather, I would promote narratives in the dehumanizing and silencing voices like my own, like my family, like those
of your neighbors, like those of your voters and those of your children's classmates. And if you're wondering, how does that make sense? We saw that dynamic play out firsthand right here in our meeting two weeks ago when we were told on that podium that Zionists were so evil that their perspective should not be included in our classroom discussions about the Israel plus sin conflict. This kind of rhetoric is exactly why we need the resolution. I must also address the comments have been made about the involvement of the American Jewish Committee in this resolution. I literally do not know a single person who works
for the American Jewish Committee. I wrote this resolution. These are my words. The attempt for people to claim that this is a broader campaign against the MTA rather than the actual feelings and emotions and expressions of, of parents in this community is false. And it is misleading and it's misleading. And as a reminder that when we address racism in this country, we don't say all lives matter, but we talk about people of color when we address transphobia in this country. We don't talk about all gender identities, but we talk about those who are victims in the face
of the specific selection of MTA resources that antagonize Jew, the Jews, who should not dismiss this resolution simply because it does not address all people. There was also a question about whether this resolution should come from us, the school committee. This is certainly a legitimate question to consider, and here's my answer. Just last week, the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security issued warnings about rising threats against Jewish communities following multiple violent acts committed by individuals who, in their own words, were motivated by anti-Zionist beliefs.
Think about that. Imagine fearing your safety at your place of worship. Imagine feeling unsafe holding a sign in downtown Natick that reflects your values. Imagine feeling unsafe to identify your religious or national identity in your classroom at school. This fear is real and it's the reason why so many members of our community are reaching out to us, their elected officials. In support of this resolution, my fellow colleagues, we are elected to lead. It is our responsibility to set the tone for our schools and to uphold our communal values. Many of us, if not all of us on this committee,
campaigned on the promise of equity and belonging on ensuring that every student feels safe and seen. And this is exactly what this resolution aims to do. It ensures that we uphold our responsibility as an elected body to give voice to members of our community and to protect our students' wellbeing. And let me be clear, this resolution does not critique our teachers or attempt to override their decisions about materials to about materials to use. On the contrary, what this resolution does is support them by proactively calling their attention to the risks posed
by inflammatory materials. There was also the question of whether addressing the concerns raised by our community around the materials was within our purview. The Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, Desi's Advisory on Governance clarifies that while educators make day-to-day instructional choices, school committees have the legal authority to approve instructional materials, particularly when those materials raise significant policy concerns. Our state association, Massachusetts Associ Association of School Committees, also indicates that our responsibilities, including approving major adoptions or revisions of curriculum
and textbooks upon the superintendent's recommendation. In doing so, they underscore our duty as a school committee to ensure that instructional materials align with our district's educational goals and community values. As was pointed by Dr. Pash in the comments about our handbooks and the, and right here in ick school committee policy, IJJ in the resolution states that while the professional staff select instructional materials, final authority for the approval of textbooks and instructional materials, rest with school committee policy A JJJ, because further stating that all materials must reflect the district's educational
objectives and support a comprehensive balance presentation of facts and concepts. So when concerns arise, like in the case of the MTA materials that undermine the balance or contribute to the marginalization of any group of students, it is now only appropriate, but it is our duty as a school committee to respond. So my answer to whether or not we should be taking on this position is an absolutely yes. We should take this position. We should approve this resolution, and we should do so tonight as it stands. And we should do so unanimously. Thank you. Speaker 1: Other discussion of the resolution?
Are we ready for a motion? Oh, pre Ms. Brunell. Speaker 24: Yes. Thank you. Thank you Mr. Brandon, Dr. Forsman for your comments. I just was looking up our policy. So I, Dr. Forsman and I met this weekend. I've spoken to several people in the community and I am the person that is not certain that this is, I don't think that this is in our purview. I wanna say from the outstart that I am deeply concerned with antisemitism, with the uptick
of it, of it being in our schools with the safety of all of our students. I'm so that is an, that is at the foundation of what I am proposing tonight. And I'm not sure that I, none of this is perfect, but I'm, I sent it to Dr. Folkman before and 'cause I wanted to be transparent about my thought process. I can share it with the committee now. Speaker 1: Do we wanna have a motion on the table before we are, are you proposing amendments?
'cause we don't have a motion on the table yet. I see. So if someone wants to put a motion on the table, then we can start. Okay. Mr. Brand, Speaker 27: I would move to approve. The resolution is drafted and presented tonight by Dr. Fesman. Speaker 24: Second. Speaker 1: Okay. Alright. So we have a motion on the table and members of the public don't get concerned. We're gonna have our discussion before we vote. There will be public input. So continue Ms. Brunell. Speaker 24: Okay. So I, I drafted a policy, a, a resolution that is focused on policy. I also drafted an alternative motion that would follow the Bedford School Committee
where they just made a joint statement with their superintendent as a school committee. So I think that there's different ways to address the, the real concerns in this room, the concerns of our own school committee, the concerns about antisemitism, and do it in a way that is in our purview. And I am happy to share those ways. I mean, I, I, so I, the policy focused resolution that I have proposed came from
my first look at Dr. Folkman's resolution. I was troubled that we were starting with the MTA because I think we need to start and stay with Natick students. If this is a natick resolution. I think we need to be speaking about Natick students and about our policies. So I reference policy IJ in the beginning. I hear your point about all lives matter. I I have a, a clause where I want to, where I write that our schools must remain safe, inclusive, and welcoming environments for all of our students,
including Jewish, Israeli, and Palestinian students. I do hear your point about all lives matter. What's the best way, do you want me to continue reading this? Speaker 1: So I think if you have a, an amendment you'd like to make, I think you should make an amendment. Speaker 24: Okay. So I move to, it's, I mean, I move to consider a second an alternative resolution Speaker 1: Mr. Brand, can you help us out here? Speaker 27: Yeah. That would, if, if it's so procedurally, if there's an amendment to a particular piece of Chi's resolution, those are each, each amendment can be proposed, right?
You can propose an amendment that would be multiple, you know, amendments. If you have a competing motion for a whole different resolution, then you should make a second motion for a different resolution that none of us or I haven't seen. But you could that. So if it's a totally different thing, it's a different, it's a whole different thing. And then we'll Speaker 1: Consider them Speaker 27: In the way they ordered time Speaker 1: In waited order. Speaker 27: Yes. Well, the fir first one In first one, Speaker 1: Yeah. But we can discuss them at the same time. And then we would vote in order, Speaker 27: Assuming there was a whole second motion that somebody seconded it, then it would be open for debate. Okay. Speaker 1: Thank you. So that's our procedure.
Speaker 24: Should we first discu discuss the purview piece? Because that would determine how we voted on purview would determine what motion I make. Because there are committee members that believe that the, this resolution, you know, as it is, speaks from our purview. And I know, I feel as if this, the resolution as it is written is taking us out of our purview. So could we first discuss that? Speaker 1: So I think you just raised that as an issue, so we can discuss that. But I think we're, right now we're discussing in the context
of the motion that's on the table. So yeah, so it's in consideration of the existing motion. Speaker 24: Okay. So then I'm gonna start with an alternative motion. And that is to move that the policy subcommittee draft a joint statement with the administration before the start of the 2025 school year to reaffirm our commitment against antisemitism and all forms of hate and bias in the Nat Public schools, with a continued promise to uphold curricular autonomy, ensuring our pedagogy is unbiased
and focused on forming global citizens for the future. Speaker 27: Seconded. Speaker 1: Okay, so now we have a second motion on the table. In order to consider the second motion, we still have to consider the first motion first. Right here we are Speaker 27: Just a, a clarifying question. Yes. Those don't feel like competing motions to me not competing. So I, I think that's a totally legitimate motion to make, but it, they're not mutually exclusive. So True. Speaker 1: True. So, and we don't have to vote on them in order then Speaker 27: We don't, no, they're separate.
So I think, okay. We would take probably procedurally take up the first motion and then vote on it unless there are other, you know, amendments or motions and then take up the second one. Both could, both could be affirmative. Speaker 1: Okay. That is so helpful, Mr. Bran. Thank you. Alright, any discussion? So we've talked a bit about the first motion. Any discussion about this second independent motion, Dr. Fugman? Speaker 23: I'll say what Mr. Bran said, which is, I think it's, they're not com competing. I would support both. I think that passing this relu,
the first resolution tonight makes a clear statement that this is what our committee is committed to. And then the second motion, as presented by Ms. Brunell, provides a further process to build on the first resolution. I also will just address the issue of purview. I provided specific quotes from Desi, from MASC and from our own, from our own policies about the role of school committees in providing the broader context and ensuring the consistency between our policies and everything that happens in our schools,
including the selection of curriculum that is language in our policies, in the recommendations from MASC and in the language of Desi of our department of elementary and secondary education. I met as Ms. Perel, we met for an hour and we talked, and I heard a lot of the feedback and the feedback that she provided was incorporated for the most part into this resolution. I just don't understand where, where exactly is the departure of the school committee from its purview in the language, in the actual words of this resolution. That, that's my question.
Speaker 1: Okay. Thank you Dr. Fugman. Mr. Patel, did you have your hand up? Not yet. Okay. Mr. Brand, I have Speaker 27: A, just a clarifying question. We probably should take one at a time. But in regards to the referring it to the policy subcommittee at, for a, a statement but not a new policy. Is that what the intention is? Yeah. So my, I guess my question is, as the chair of the policy subcommittee, I would happily make a statement on this topic every day. But is the policy subcommittee, given that it, unless you're proposing a new policy, is the intention, like the statement should come maybe from,
I don't know why it's the policy subcommittee, I guess. I mean, I'm happy to do it, but is that's not the, it feels like if, if we were trying to work on a statement that's like the whole school committee or working group, or, which I would also happily be part of, I'm just wondering if that purview is the policy subcommittee or if it's Speaker 6: Somebody something else. So Speaker 1: That's a good, that's a good question. Ms. Brunell, do you have a thought on that? Speaker 24: Sure. To, to respond to Mr. Brand. Obviously we're making all of this up as we go. So yes, it could be a working group. The policy subcommittee created a proclamation a couple years ago, so that's why I just thought it would be easier
to work on in a smaller group. If it was a work, I'd be very happy for an amendment for a working group if that felt better to the committee. Can I respond to Dr. Folkman? Speaker 1: Sure. Speaker 24: So you can always find language to say that this is how big the, this is how big your role is. If you re section I-J-I-J-M and KECI, I think IJJ might be a mistake to be honest in, in the policy. But the, We,
those policies explicitly put curriculum in the superintendent's first, in the superintendent's wheelhouse. And were there to be a specific appeal to eventually to come up to the school committee. And I'm not saying this arbitrarily about this resolution, I am saying this so that we can be consistent throughout our practice. So that curricular objections that come to us go through the professionals always, and that we always turn to the professionals.
We always rely on our teachers that we are not politicizing curriculum and having it come to an elected body as a first stop. So just as, as a, I don't know if the word value is the right word to use there, but my philosophy is that we should always be turning to our professionals about curriculum and then if there is an appeal, it would come to the school committee. So I do not think it is appropriate for the school committee to weigh in, in the first step. That's why I'm open to making a joint statement again like
this, like Bedford did. But when I read, I didn't read anything on the DESI website. But when I read our Natick policies, ij, IJM and KEC, I feel strongly that this is not in our purview. Speaker 1: Okay. Thank you. Ms. Brunell, did you have your hand? Okay, Mr. Patel and then Dr. Fon. Speaker 6: Yeah, I agree with Ms. Catherine's assessment, Ms. Bell's assessment with regard to it not being in our purview as being the newest member of the committee. I was under the impression that the curriculum and what books or what curricula to use
or not use relies on the superintendent's office to determine. And I don't, I think I have some reservations about the, the, the resolution as it stands. It, it being subjective in nature with regards to the MTA re MTA resources being biased or misinformation, you know, from my understanding, the MTA comprises of 170,000 teachers across the state from all over. And they have voted democratically to endorse whatever materials they've done.
And the president of the MTA himself, max page is Jewish and they are standing by, Speaker 29: That's tokenizing, Speaker 1: Excuse me, order please, please tokenizing. We are not, we are not taking comments from the public dollars. Speaker 30: Just, Speaker 6: I, Speaker 1: He, we're not taking comments from the public right now. Thank you. Yeah. Speaker 6: My point with there being that it doesn't to me seem overtly one-sided as the first paragraph of the resolution seems to base the rest of the conclusion off of Speaker 1: Dr. Fon.
Speaker 23: So here's the beauty about policy. Policy is written in words. So we don't have to have philosophies, we don't have to have feeling feelings, we don't have to have thoughts. We have words in policy. I'm gonna read the words of the policy. I policy ij the task of selecting instructional materials for programs will be delegated to the professional staff of the school system. Period. Because instructional programs and materials are of great importance, only those that meet for the following criteria will be approved by the committee. And that provides different criteria. I wanna emphasize the phrase will be approved
by the committee IJJJ says, although many points must be examined, the school committee, the school committee directs the staff to be mindful of the following considerations, and it provides considerations. So yes, Desi, MASC and our policies put in words what our purview is. So to say, I don't feel, or I don't have the philosophy that, or my philosophy is that it, this is outside of our purview is not, is not an appropriate argument. We are talking about the policies, the words are there.
Speaker 1: So thank you Dr. Folks. And if I, I just had a, a comment I'd like to add or, so I, I, I think that the, the improvements that you made to the resolution, Dr. Foxman, I appreciate them. I think that they add some context and do reframe this resolution better within the, within our policies and within our remit. The, the only question I would have is that this is, because this is referring to a list of materials that are available to members of a union.
Do they really constitute curriculum? Because they're not curriculum that is selected by the district, it's, it's open resource materials. So, and I, and that's a question that I'm not sure what the answer is to that, but I would hesitate. IIII would, I would hesitate to refer to this as natick selected curriculum. I don't think you have in this policy, but I, what I've heard in some of the other discussion is that, is that that's what we're doing with this, not this policy, but this resolution. And I'm just wondering if you're able to
gimme some more context about how you see these materials, which I see as a list of resources as opposed to district selected curriculum. Well, Speaker 23: Again, let me read the, the clause in the, the, the action clause, the operative clause. It says be it resolved. The next school committee strongly encourages district staff to continue to correctly review and exercise caution when considering the use of any externally developed resources, including those related to Israeli Gaza conflict. So it actually does not use the word curriculum.
It talks about resources in which is the word that the MTA uses. It's a list of resources. This too, it refers to resources. So this is not about curricular. Just to clarify, my previous point is to say this is outside our purview because we don't do curriculum, I think is not reflective of, of the words, of the language of our policies. Speaker 1: Okay. No, no, I appreciate that. And you know, that's, that's what I thought that that operative clause said that it was referring to resource materials and not curriculum per se. Although there are other parts in here where it refers
to them as curricular resources. So I, I feel that it's helpful to have that clarification. Other comments from the committee, Ms. Brunell? Speaker 24: Well, one suggestion I have is to take a vote on the second motion after looking up Robert's rules quickly. We, we could, I can postpone the resolution vote till after the joint statement vote. We could take a vote on making a joint statement. And so come to some agreement on something that maybe we have some consensus on. And then we could go back to the resolution.
Speaker 1: How do people feel about having a vote on that Mr Brand? Speaker 27: I would rather not, I think there, like, like I said before, and I don't want to broken record, but I will, I don't, I think they're, they're separate. They're related, but separate this resolution for me, I, I guess I'm, I I'm a bit confused. There's nothing in the resolution that talks about setting curriculum. And so the, the, the argument that, and maybe I'm, I'm just missing it, but the, the argument that this is not a, within our purview, by saying
that we encourage the district, the staff to continue to critically review and exercise caution and so on and so forth, isn't, isn't dictating curriculum the second action, be it further resolved that the native school committee reaffirms its commitment to instructional materials that aligns with district policies. Again, we're not defining any curriculum. And then the third one, even less so. So like I'm all for voting to work on a joint or a, I dunno who, who the joint statement is with, but with all in favor of coming up
with a an additional statement, I just don't think it has anything to do with the resolution. So I, I would like to vote for the resolution tonight. We have, we've followed typical school committee policy and procedure or procedure about, we had it two weeks ago. We got a ton of feedback from the public. I I suspect we're gonna get some more tonight. It, so for me, I've heard the feedback, obviously I made my 45 minute statement. The, I've seen, you know, I would vote right now. I mean, I wanna hear from people, of course I wanna hear from people, but
like, I just think they're different. I would like to vote for both of them tonight. I don't, I don't know why voting for, I guess, and I I'm sorry that Ms. Brunell is gonna miss this part. I, I, I'm not sure what it solves to wait to do the joint statement and then come back and do, it's not gonna change the resolution for me. This, this, we have a resolution that I'm happy with. Speaker 1: I hear you. Thank you. Yeah. And I would like to vote for both of these tonight as well. That would be my preference. I also am not sure, does anybody else on the committee have any thoughts about Yes, Ms.
Flatters? I will say I didn't, when I looked at the agenda earlier, I, it wasn't clear that we were voting on it tonight, but I can get past that. I just, because sometimes we do three readings and sometimes it's two. So when it wasn't, there wasn't a vote there. I thought this was like another round of like discussion. I came in this one struggle with this one. I came in very similarly thinking, you know, with the purview, like this isn't my area of expertise. And the first, the very first clause asserts if, if basically I would be voting only,
it was on the purview side, but also on the side of two reasons. One, I also felt like the first draft, I struggled a little bit with it being potentially perceived as anti teacher or anti-union because there wasn't enough. The, I really appreciate Shai the language you've recently added with the EAN and with the reinforcing our, you know, our appreciation of teachers and knowing that they're gonna do the right thing. So as the motion that was in the agenda today, walking in, I didn't see that language. So I, that was making me lean.
No, and on the purview side, that again, I, I tend to take the read that it's not in our purview, but that wouldn't necessarily stop me for doing something that I feel like sends the right message that we really wanna reinforce, you know, for members of the community that I care deeply about, you know, the same as we've done in others. So, but the last piece is that in the first paragraph it's asserting saying that, you know, I am voting that I agree that these are, that these materials are biased.
And I believe, I believe experts that tell me yes, I've had some tell me no, I just, I have no idea 'cause I am not an expert. And so I feel like I would need, it just worries me when I'm voting yes on something that's asserting something that I am, Jefferson's laughing me. 'cause he knows I'm a very black and white. Like I'm very, like he's had four of my children. He knows the, what, what brains they came from is just knowing that I, that I, that I've done all my homework and because I already commencing, you know, I don't understand the curriculum.
I don't wanna throw any teachers on the bus. I don't think this is the right choice of how to proceed. I was leaning towards the no side. Coming in with an open mind, not knowing, gonna have to be put on the spot to vote tonight, definitely have been swayed by, you know, voices in the audience by, you know, you made really compelling cases. It's clear shy that you took feedback that I'd had, that others have had and really did research to try to bring this around. 'cause it's obviously something you feel passionately about. I similarly feel passionately that the concerns around the rise of anti-Semitism, like there has
to be action and like what actions those can be. But then, you know, the policy dork in me is just also saying like, is this like, is this my purview? So I'm just saying right now as I sit here, I'm conflicted with those two sides. Like I, you know, I'm, I remember when we did the pride flag vote very early when I come, came on, I similarly felt like, I don't know whether that's really what we should be doing right now, but there was no way I was ever gonna make a statement that said anything other than like full and transparent support. And so, like, I still am conflicted as
to whether this is the right procedural thing to do. I would be very conflicted about, you know, doing a blanket agreement that these are biased materials. When I haven't vetted, I haven't had enough conversations with experts. Like I would, like, I'd prefer to have those conversations with, you know, experts in the community that I didn't fully have before putting a yes. But I do, I feel like I could be compelled just to make, you know, to approve it just as is an unequivocal demonstration of, you know, my commitment to the community
and my commitment to like fighting against the rise of antisemitism in our community. Like by that I would be overriding my own kind of belief that this is not the right path to take to make sure that, that the voice is strong. But it, it will be, it's, it's hard. Okay, thank you Ms. Lathers. Any other comments from the committee before we turn to the public for input? Ms. Brunell? Speaker 24: I mean, I would be willing to offer some friendly amendments to the current resolution.
I know you were kind enough to already add items, but I feel strongly we should start with Natick students. And so my request is that we, that the first statement would say, whereas under policy ij, the Natick school Committee is responsible for ensuring that instructional materials present a balanced view of international, national and local issues, past, present, and future. And that they provide an effective basic education for all students free from discrimination based on race, age, color, religion, national origin, sex,
physical disability, gender identity, or sexual orientation. Speaker 31: Just wish I could type that. Speaker 24: Well, I've sent it. No, I was just kidding. Yeah, yeah, no. So that's, that's one phrase, that's one clause that I would like to have considered. Speaker 27: May I just, are you just, are you suggesting adding it to the, as the top one? Speaker 24: Adding it as the top one? I don't wanna start with the MTA suggest, I want Speaker 27: Toing start meeting Speaker 24: Students. You're Speaker 27: Suggest to, to be, so you're making a, an amendment to add a, you're proposing an amendment to add a new an additional clause. Yes. As the first clause.
Speaker 1: Yes. Speaker 27: So you're, that is a essentially a friendly amendment that the motion maker, that the, well, I, I guess I was the motion maker. Are Speaker 24: You making my motion right now? Speaker 27: I'm asking, I'm asking procedurally what, because yes, as the motion maker, if you're proposing a friendly amendment, then I would have to accept it. Somebody would second it I believe, and then I would accept it or not. We'll see. Speaker 1: Ms. Lathers. Oh yeah, I have another one that I think it, well let's, let's deal with this one first. I'll second that. I'll second that so that it's there. Okay. Speaker 27: So can can you try you, did you send it to Sue?
Speaker 28: She did. So that's what I'm trying to, sorry, figure out it, it, it was the link in there. Yep. So you want me to pull that up or do you want me to copy and paste it onto copy and paste? Yes. Speaker 1: Probably in the document. Catherine, maybe Catherine should just add it. Speaker 27: Yeah, if you could copy and paste it into the existing working document, because that's the one that we're talking about. And Speaker 28: Then I'll show the current document. Perfect. Speaker 3: Okay, Speaker 27: Great. And you can add it as like a suggesting and then it will be nice and clear. Speaker 3: Yep, yep. Speaker 24: I see what you're saying. Don't Speaker 3: You get, sorry, yet just start.
Just try. I wanna get over live. I'm gonna need to recess when this is over. Speaker 27: Well, at least the formatting is, is it in? Speaker 24: Yes. Speaker 27: Would it be helpful for, for me? Like, for you, do you wanna read it so people can, 'cause not everybody can obviously see it. Sure. Speaker 24: It's Speaker 28: Up there now. Speaker 27: We'll, and we can clean up the formatting later, but, Ooh, nice. You wanna Speaker 24: Talk more about the formatting? Speaker 27: You know, my, I have a thing. He loves Speaker 3: The Speaker 27: Color. Oh, don't Speaker 1: Make me get the gavel out and say no formatting time. Speaker 24: Whereas policy IJ under policy ij, the Natick School Committee is responsible for ensuring that instructional materials are present a balanced view
of international, national and local issues, past, present, and future, and provide an effective basic education for all students free from. And there's the list. Do you want me to keep reading? Speaker 27: So am I supposed to accept or reject that amendment now? I would as the motion maker and then the person who you seconded it. Right? So I'm gonna accept that, but then the seconder has to second it again. I'll accept it too. Okay. We have a friendly amendment that has been added to the document. Okay. Speaker 24: I Speaker 27: Have that's one. Speaker 24: You, I have one other one that I would like to add. Speaker 3: You go Speaker 24: Maybe one other one. Okay.
So this would be, these two paragraphs would be an alternative to the, the, whereas the, the black text that's there now about the MTAI would again turn this more into focus on Natick, whereas concerns about content and tone of materials disseminated by the Massachusetts Teacher Association as being anti-Semitic have been raised by Natick caregivers, community leaders, educators, members of the EAN association
and various outside organizations. Whereas no evidence that any MTA materials in question have been used in native classrooms. Speaker 27: And and what, what are you suggesting it replaces Speaker 24: This one here? Speaker 27: This one here is the, so for people who can't see, oh, you the one that I've highlighted. So the, so both of those would replace the first paragraph or the first clause or that new second clause? Yes. Speaker 24: Alright. Speaker 27: May I have a moment? Yes. I'm gonna read it out loud. Is that helpful? Yeah, I'll read it out loud so everybody who can't see the screen and that will help me too. Okay. So Ms. Ella is proposing to replace,
whereas the Massachusetts Teachers Association has disseminated curricular resources related to the Israel Gaza conflict and its historical context that rely predominantly on Palestinian perspectives and sources resulting in a presentation that lacks balance and does not reflect the complexity or diversity of views on this sensitive international issue. She's proposing that we replace that with the following two clauses, whereas concerns about the content and tone of materials disseminated by the Massachusetts Teachers Association as being anti-Semitic have been raised by Natick caregivers, community leaders, educators, members
of the Educators Association of Natick, EIN, and various outside organizations. And whereas there is no evidence that any of the MTA materials in question have been used in Natick classrooms. So those two additions to replace the first clause. So Speaker 24: Speak to why I wrote Speaker 27: Those. Yeah, please. 'cause I think they're, for me at least I'm having a hard time just I think I know what you're going, but, but let's hear it. Speaker 24: Sure. So what I'm saying here is, again, I don't wanna get into the, into the practice of evaluating curriculum
and saying this does this, this does that. I also do not, we're not taking questions from the public right now. Thank you. I also do not want to make a statement about, frankly my opinion as a school committee member about the MTA is not my goal in this resolution. My, what I'm, my goal in this resolution is to make NAT students feel safe and native caregivers to know that we're responding to the very real threats of antisemitism in the world. If MTA members have a problem with the MTA, they can take it up with the MTA
as a school committee member. I have no voice in the MTA and I do not want to focus my efforts towards the MTA. So what I'm trying to do in a very objective way is to define what I know as a school committee member. There are concerns that have been raised as by native caregivers about the resources that have been disseminated. And this resolution is in response to those concerns. It's not in response to the evaluation of the actual materials. Speaker 27: Understood. So, and I, I don't want to speak for Shai certainly. So I'm going to, if it's all right, I will share my opinion
and then maybe if Shai can weigh in before we, so I actually, my opinion, I don't, I don't have any real issue with the second part. The, whereas there's no evidence that any MTA materials in question have been used in native classrooms. The first part I, my issue is that it remo, it makes, it's too vague for me. It, the first clause, very specifically this whole thing is very specifically about the, the resources and materials related to the Israel Gaza conflict. And to remove those from the clause feels to me to be sanding down the edges of something
that, and again, I won't speak for shy something you, you're welcome. You can do that yourself. So my gut, and I haven't, you know, my gut is to take the second part, but not the first. But I, I'm, I'm an always an of an open mind. So if it's all right madam chair to shied way in before we finish this particular Speaker 23: Sure. Speaker 24: And just quickly though, were I to add that line that disseminated cur, if I was specific, disseminated curricular resources related to the Israel Gaza conflict by the MTA as being antisemitic,
Speaker 27: Certainly better. But, but I would, I mean, 'cause I think that does, like my concern is the vagueness. So I guess before I say anything else, 'cause I've already said so much, I would love to hear from other people. Speaker 1: Sure. So we've got Miss flas, I think we're ending up kind, hopefully ending up close in the same place, is what I can, I can get totally on board with making this as specificity there. The, the amendment I was going to request, which Catherine's paragraph does address is making it around. We, I I just wanna make it that I'm not stating that the materials are biased.
I'm stating that we hear the concerns that they're biased. I believe that that is very likely true and but either way the concerns are enough to say like, please do all of your due diligence. So I feel like getting around all the, I'm looking at you Jeff, just Speaker 32: 'cause I'm always sitting across from you. Speaker 1: No, just say to like all the specificity is fine, but it's asserting here that you know, whether you want it to say concerns about the content and tone of materials and be very specific or say that many experts are concerns, like
however you wanna say that it is, I am not stating that the materials are biased, but that believing that others have stated and raised concerns. I dunno if there's language exactly what we do. I can try to draft a suggestion. Okay, Dr. Fugman, Speaker 23: So I have a similar perspective as Matt. I like the second part, whereas there's no evidence that any of the mt materials in question have been used in native classrooms. I don't like the first part and nor do I like taking out the clause that it's supposed to to replace.
And here's why the word bias was just used in disgusting, you know, is is it bias, is it not biased? The word bias is actually not in that clause that the word we we're not making the claim that it's biased what the claim is making, what the, the clause is saying is that the list of resources on this conflict relies predominantly on Palestinian perspectives and sources. You don't need to be an expert. I mean you might need time, but you don't need expertise to go through the resources and literally google author by author
and realize that most of those resources were developed by Palestinian sources. Meaning either Palestinian organizations, Palestinian authors, Palestinian movie makers. That that is not about bias, which is a subjective word. This is an objective statement that most of those resources predominantly rely on plus the perspectives and sources. So that's why I don't, I don't understand why we wouldn't include that. I will also add just very quickly that the second, the not the second, the, the first part that the first amendment, so to speak, or proposed amendment is also redundant. Because if you go down a few clauses later, it says we're
as concerns about the con tone of these materials have been raised by blah, blah, blah. So it's already there. Yeah. Yeah. So that's why I, I don't, I would keep the clause as it as is and I would be open to including, in fact I would, I would support including the second proposed clause, Speaker 1: Mr. Brand. Speaker 27: So if there's no other comment, I suppose it, it, it is on me to, to either accept or decline the friendly amendment as is. Speaker 1: Okay. I see another hand up.
I did want to make a comment as well. So in the below paragraph where it talks about where concerns about the content and tone of these materials have been raised by community leaders, educators, et cetera. Speaker 12: I Speaker 1: Agree that it is repetitive to have the additional materials there, but I'm not sure that the, where it's placed, you know, sort of the fifth or sixth clause down is the right place. Like I, what I appreciate about adding it in below the, the first clause is that it puts it right upfront
that this is why this came to our attention because of concern, right? So whether we take the amendment or whether we don't, could we consider at least moving that paragraph to the top so it carries the same weight? That would be my comment. And I also saw Ms flat, Ms Lather's hand as well. I definitely like moving it higher to your point. I mean I, I have not done, I have not gone through all of the materials and so I feel like I can, I mean if we wanted to postpone the vote
and just go, like I would just go through all the materials because I've just gotten flicking I'd, you know, I'd, yeah, a lot of materials, Ms. Brunell and then I, I think it might behoove us. Actually let's take a couple more comments from the committee. Let's take a little five minute break. Just everyone can have a bio break and then we'll reconvene. Does that sound fair to everyone? Okay. Will we have time for public comment as well? Yes. Yes. There will be public comment. Okay. Yep. Mr. Patel, Speaker 6: I'm in favor of postponing the vote to a different day so that we can review the materials more deeply and determine
Speaker 1: So we're not taking public comment. Thank you. We're doing the work of the committee here Speaker 6: And, and so that we can all agree on a resolution that is objective as possible. Speaker 1: Okay. And Mr. Brand, could I speak Speaker 27: On the postponement or would you like to wait on the idea of the postponement? There is nothing on the table for that, Speaker 1: But there's nothing on the table for that. No. So I'd just like to remind everyone too where we are. So we currently have two actual motions on the table, the motion for this resolution, a motion to form a working group to make a joint statement. And then we're in the process of addressing an friendly,
an amendment at this point. Friendly. 'cause there hasn't been an actual motion made to the resolution amendment. So if, if you want to speak to that, there's nothing on the table regarding postponement now. Yeah, I Speaker 27: Can wait if it comes up again, I'll save it for that in the spirit of oxygen. Okay. Speaker 1: Okay. Alright. Okay Dr. Fixed, Speaker 23: I'd just like to make a quick ask. I know some people have been waiting here since for over two hours, so I think getting to public comments sooner than later would be helpful
and respectful to that of Speaker 1: That. Yeah, no I agree. So does the committee want a recess or should we just keep going? No, keep going. Okay, we'll keep going. So, alright. So before we get to public comment, I did want to acknowledge that we received 88 emails from the public as of noon today. And I know some additional ones came in after that, but as of noon today, I took a look and we had received 88 emails. The vast majority were from NA residents and or parents of students currently enrolled in na. Public schools centers include several educators, faith leaders, and a small number of community members
who were not associated with native public schools in any way. And, and I'll give AI some credit here, I did use chat GT GPT to go through those 88 emails and find common themes and then I checked it like you're supposed to do when you use ai. But in terms of the themes that came outta those emails, nearly everyone specifically referenced the materials compiled by the MTA and the main themes include concerns that MTA resources are biased or one-sided in their coverage of the Israel-Palestine conflict. There were worries that these materials could misinformed students fuel harmful
stereotypes or contribute to rising antisemitism in schools and in the community. There was emphasis on an ask for the, that classroom instruction be balanced, accurate, and inclusive. There were themes that there was a caution in adopting or relying on MTA resources could undermine a safe and respectful learning environment for Jewish and Israeli students. There were specific requests for the school committee to pass the proposed resolution. And as the writers in the writer's view that this would caution educators against using MTA
materials or other similar perceived biased resources. And it was of note that none of the people who wrote in indicated that they felt that these materials were currently used in Natick schools, but they were concerned about possible future use and wanted safeguards in place. There were two individuals who wrote in opposition of the resolution and the themes of an N of two were that restricting or labeling MTA materials could limit teacher's ability to present diverse perspectives or worries that such actions might set a precedent for
outside influence on educational comment. So that's the summary of the 88 emails that we received. As we turn to public comment, if I could get a show of hands of how many people would like to participate and I'll just count. So that's about 11 people in the room Speaker 33: On Speaker 1: The floor, two more on the floor. I think I counted once. So I think that's 12. Is there anyone on the line who would like to least one, but we can see one. So 13. So I think, and then I would ask that since we did receive such thorough feedback from the public that in, in choosing
to speak today, that you're bringing something new to the committee that you hadn't already shared by email or that isn't captured in these themes that we heard so clearly via email. So if we have 13 people, I say we take about 30 minutes for public comment and allowing about two minutes per person, and then at the end of 30 minutes or nine o'clock, we'll stop public comment. Even if not everyone has been able to speak. So please use your time wisely. So if the first person I know I had someone asked to speak in advance.
So Ms. Barr Halpern, do you want to come first? I'll, I'll take the people who indicated to me by email first. Speaker 34: So actually I'm an expert. I work with radicalization, antisemitism. My name is Dr. Mary Bar Halper and bin. I'm a clinical psychologist specializing in trauma and also the mother of a third grader in catering garden here in Natick. According to the messages that hate crime, anti Jews hate crime surge by 70% in 23 and doubled in K to 12. This is here, this is now. This is happening to our children in naic. And this is why it's important. I feel it's trauma
and in trauma work we say that being safe in feeling safe is not a luxury. It's a requirement. A child cannot learn if they do not feel safe. And right now many Jewish children cannot. As a psychologist, I see the damage is causes. Every day in my clinic, middle schoolers read panic attacks, high schoolers, true afraid to attend class students hiding their Jewish identity to protect themself. One Israeli students whose friend were murdered on October 7th was told by classmate that they deserve it. And another one was told not to participate in a class discussion because she was Jewish and the topic would be too much for her. This is even worse for the Israeli Israeli immigrants,
which we have a lot in the native community. They are held responsible for the action of the Israeli government and being shamed for the nationality. This is not inclusion, this is traumatic invalidation. The term we use to describe what happens when someone pain is denied, politicized or erased by the very system meant to protect them. It can have a devastating effect like depression, anxiety, PTSD, and long-term harm for child development, severe mental health issue, and lack of trust in institution. I spoke here last year and wanted to warn you about this topic and unfortunately the situation has escalated and the problem starts with education.
When the largest teacher union in Massachusetts is promoting one-sided narrative that is Jewish racism and anti Zionist. Or to quote my colleague Anu McKay, who is a former neo-Nazi MTA. Materials are word toward the same stuff I used to say as a white supremacist in the nineties. It is our duty to speak up and protect our kids. Teacher works so hard and have limited time to vet resources. We need to help them set clear expectation when it comes to a topic that even adults as we seen here today have difficulty talking about, they need to be vigilant, they need to be nuanced.
This is not just an education issue, it's a social issue and it's not just a Jewish issue. The problem is that it's about radicalization. Teenagers are already vulnerable to thinking in a black and white way. And when the school push this narrative of fuels hate, deepen polarization, and leave youth vulnerable to extremist ideologist and addressing this require urgent action. And it starts right here, right now. Teachers should be teacher and not just social justice activist. We need teacher. The teacher gets critical thinking. anti-Semite team is the gateway to radicalization. And when we tolerate hate for one group, we will tolerate hate for other groups as well.
In fact, in my organization, we get phone calls from every, every type of terrorist organization and every single phone call we we get has antisemitism in it. But I'm not here as a psychologist. I'm here as a mother since October 7th. I had to make the impossible choice. Do I let my son speak Hebrew in public? Do I are my star of David necklace? Do I tell my kids to hide who they, who they are so they can feel safe? Last week, my 9-year-old asked me, why do people hate Jews to the parents in this room? Maybe your child is part of the L-G-B-T-Q community or has disability or is part of a racial minority.
Imagine sending your child to school each day, not just worried about their physical safety, but whether they'll be excluded, harassed, or humiliated simply for who they are. That's what Jewish family are feeling right now. In fact, from a psychological perspective, that part of the brain that's supposed to study about executive functioning cannot do that. When student hear teacher use words like genocide, a part or colonizer to describe them without the nuance or context, they will feel dehumanized, not educated. This is not about saling voices, it's about raising the bar to accuracy, to empathy for accountability.
I'm asking you to support this resolution because it is more than a statement, it's a message to every Jewish child in Natick that you matter, you belong, and we will protect you. Thank you. Speaker 35: So next, Speaker 1: Next we have Michael Holloway. Speaker 7: Yeah. Hi, I'm Michael Holloway, resident of Natick. I want to emphasize that part of the main business of the committee here is relationship building and community engagement. You're, you're tasked with building
a safe and as non divisive as possible learning environment. In your last committee meeting, you spent time discussing the cell phone policy. Cell phones are banned because it is disruptive to a safe and and successful learning environment. I don't want to be pollyannaish about this, but you've heard the passion in this room and from the Zoom participants, people in this community are involved,
family members have been killed. This is, and the Natick school system has achieved international status and recognition. Not in a good way. I'm not sure if everybody's aware that the Times of Israel had a story on the Natick school high school protest. This is not, this is not needed as a, as a subject matter, it's not academic. It is way too current,
way too hurtful. Students on both sides would be hurt by any teacher thinking that this could be a balanced subject matter to present. It can't. And Dr. Fox man's resolution is a conservative, minimalist way of injecting the word caution. You can't ban the material, but you can recommend that there is caution in in looking out
for the student's wellbeing in even thinking about presenting this material. Thank you. Speaker 1: Thank you. So if we could turn to the person online who would like to speak, is that, I can't see the name Michelle. Yeah, if you could unmute yourself please. Speaker 36: Hi, I'm Michelle Ekman. I'm a NAIC parent and also an elementary school teacher. I'll be quick in the interest of respecting everyone's time. I just wanna say that as a parent, but really as a teacher, I'm so grateful for the resolution that's on the table. It supports me in the work that I do.
I'm grateful for the Natick teachers who have looked at this material and who saw it as extremely harmful to our kids, which it is. It's really, really quite scary. It resembles propaganda from Nazi Germany. It's truly de dehumanizing. The material suggested by the MTA is harmful to our Jewish kids, to our non-Jewish kids, to all of our kids. And I say our kids, I mean my own kids and I mean my students and my classroom. Israel is the only democratic nation in the Middle East. It's the only nation in the Middle East supporting liberal causes like the lgbtqia plus rights and more. I strongly, strongly support this resolution in support
of our teachers, our kids, and our future. And I hope that you will too. Thank you. Speaker 1: So someone from the room, if you wanna put your hand up, gentlemen at the front. Speaker 37: Hi, good evening. I'm David Weber. Be 15 years resident in Natick this month. And kids either already are heading into Natick High School. I'm also a law professor. And a week ago tonight I testified in front of the Massachusetts Special Commission on combating anti-Semitism compiled by the governor and the State House and the Senate. I'm gonna try to just confine my remarks to some
of the procedural issues that have been raised, although I do of course wanna mention it's really important not to all lives matter. This issue, if you look at the New York Times op-ed over the weekend, the data on antisemitism in this country and discrimination and incidents of discrimination, far exceed incidents just go down the list. It's like quadruple the next highest category. It's a big problem. It's a serious problem and it is connected to current events. And that's why I think it is very important that the resolution should reflect that fact because that is the data driven reality of
what is happening in the world and what is happening in Massachusetts. Now. Secondly, you know the point about purview. I've seen this kind of show before, right? Which is kind of proceduralist bureaucratic issues get raised. I wanna say a couple things about that. Number one, failing to act tonight. Now on this sends its own kind of message, okay? We're in the last meeting before it's gonna be, it would be a break of a couple of months. This should be straightforward. Other school committees have done, have taken this kind of action. And to have this get
mucked up in bureaucratic claims. I teach civil procedure, okay? And what I can tell you is, is that if you're not sure what your purview is, that's not an excuse not to act in the face of the overwhelming evidence of hate that we're seeing. That's not an excuse. I think Ms. Flare's point, forgive me if I've mispronounced your name earlier, is exactly right on in the face of something like this. If there is any kind of ambiguity or procedural ambiguity or whatever, that is not an excuse not to act. Okay? From what I heard a little bit was referenced.
One, the claims seemed to be this belonging, the purview of the superintendent. The superintendent's right here, she can speak for herself. If she has a problem with this not being in her, you know, supposedly to be in her purview or not. The language of this resolution is also, you know, it asking to exercise caution and do critical review of the materials. I mean, this should be a slam dunk. This is not a difficult thing to ask of anyone, particularly in light of the fact that, I mean, just what I was called to testify about last week was about this campaign of vilification connected with Israel
and aimed at Jews and Israelis in the state. And part of the reason why it is necessary to call to people to exercise caution is because these materials have been curated and put forth by people who are part of that demonization campaign. As Shai said earlier, I think this is a straightforward resolution. If you want to come back and add more to it later, that can always be done. I think it is important that it not be just pure all lives matter, but speak to the actual factual reality of antisemitism. And I hope it is passed tonight, unanimously would send the right message to this community.
Thank you. Speaker 3: Next Speaker 1: Person. Next person would like to speak at the back please. Speaker 9: Hi, Lisa Banin. I wasn't gonna speak tonight, but as a former school committee member and chair, I have to speak, your job is to protect all students. This is not an issue of purview at all. Over encompassing is the safety of our students. Purview is not an issue here. And I have been to many school committee meetings where
purview has been overlooked. This is about our safety of all of our students. And to hear tonight that two school committee members want to go back and look at the resources. You had two weeks. That's right. This is your job. I've sat there, I've done your job. You knew we were gonna have this discussion in two weeks. You make it a priority. You know what you're telling me that it doesn't matter. That's how I'm taking it. That's right. And I don't take that lightly because I know how important and how difficult your job is. But we are here telling you we are scared for our students.
We are scared for our children. Why can't we be the experts? We are telling you not to not teach this. We're telling you we just want materials that provide both sides of an issue, that provide safety, that doesn't divide us, but unites us in understanding of a very difficult issue. So all I'm gonna say here tonight is, yes, I support this, but I am embarrassed. Do your job. Yes. Speaker 1: Next person. Next. Next person.
Wishing to speak at the front in the black dress. Speaker 3: All Speaker 38: Right, so I really can't speak without writing down what I need to say. I just can't come out with it. So forgive me for just reading from my phone. So some questions. Why haven't you read the resources? They've been a, they've been available for over a year and a half, and I spoke about them at a school committee meeting a year and a half ago. They're all over the internet. Pretty much everyone here knows me and knows I stand up for all marginalized groups. However, my question is,
why haven't you familiarized yourself with the resources and why do you feel that an expert has more to say about antisemitism than the Jews in the room who are telling you that the materials are antisemitic? If a group of black parents told you that part of the curriculum was racist, would you defer to a professor who specialized in racism before believing them? If a group of people from the LGBTQ plus community told you that resources were bias against them, would you defer to someone more academic also saying
that a Jewish person said it or believes it? Or did it just marginalizes Jewish people or any other people that such a statement would be made about? I would hope someone would think twice about that way of thinking. I understand that what some committee members are saying about purview, but we're not living in a world right now where we can only speak up about what we think is in our lane. I just wanna add that as I left the house to come here, I grabbed the plum from the counter and waved goodbye to my son. But then I remember that I was going to a gathering where there would be a lot of Jewish people and that somebody could come into the meeting and hurt us.
As has happened a lot recently because of the wildly increasing antisemitism. And I went back and gave him a hug just in case someone murdered me for being here tonight and being Jewish. Therefore, I can't worry about purview. I can only worry about staying alive from my family and having the MTA use these resources makes us less safe. Please vote for the resolution. Speaker 1: So Rabbi Weiss and how many people left in the room are there to speak? Okay, so next we'll have the gentleman and then Ms. Rubenstein, Speaker 9: Thank you so much.
I spoke before an abstraction and I realized upon hearing this conversation, I need to speak concretely. I wanna raise, draw your attention to three pieces that were in those materials. Three very specific examples of why this is problematic. One of the so-called historians included the materials is Norman Finklestein, who is a widely discredited historian, a disciple of Holocaust and I or David Irving, if you wanna know who David Irving is. Google that. And there's a book called Denying the Holocaust by Deborah Lipset. There was a trial, landmark trial in which she had to prove that the Holocaust existed. That's a real thing. Google it.
Number two, in those materials, there's an image of a star of David with dollars that is nothing but flagrant antisemitism. There's no other way to describe that. Number three, There is post a display of posters showing resistance fighters, as they're called with slogans, such as, by any means necessary, promoting violence, glamorizing violence. Is this what we want our students to read? Is this the material that we think is best suited for children or anyone, adults for that matter?
I would hope not. And then, then I wanna tell you on a personal level, as a rabbi, a congregational rabbi in Natick, I hope we do really care about our Natick students. I wanna tell you about our Natick students. When October 7th happened spontaneously at a prayer session I was leading for our religious school. That afternoon after we came back, a student stopped prayer and said to me, you know, somebody in my class, a second grader, a second grader, somebody in my class looked at my star of David and said, that's a demon symbol. And then other students chimed in from other school public schools with the NAT system, the framing hemp system, the Ashland system,
and the Waylon system to share similar reports. Students shared reports of other students doing a Hial Hitler to them. This is not, we're not making this up. There's no fiction here. I wish it were fiction. I wish I could tell you that I didn't turn to my 9-year-old daughter who's with me right now, before we came here and said to her, if someone shoots at us, you run as fast as you can because that's where we're at. My niece is a survivor of October 7th, and she lives in Israel. I'm not making that up either. And I just turn to you, our representatives for the, the education of our students, which I so fervently believe in the education of our students. Please consider being on the right side of history.
Thank you. Speaker 8: I'm not sure how many of you here who are not Jewish, go to your religious institution, your churches, your mosques, et cetera, and know that there might be someone coming to get you. Do you realize that synagogues throughout the United States now have security? They have windows that are, are shatterproof. Some synagogues actually have guards, some armed guards
in Natick at Temple Israel of Natick where I belong. Police cars frequently come by just to check on things. If they know that there's a program at night or during the day, they're there more often. I don't think that other groups go through anything like this. I'd like to make a comment too with regard to the information coming from the Massachusetts Teachers Association. These are not the experts. If if you feel that these are the experts,
then I don't think you should be on the school board. These are, there's a antisemitism task force at the, at that the state is, is continuing is they've had about five sessions. And, and Professor Weber has, has been called as an expert witness. I have seen the information. Senator Cataldo, the state senator, who is co-chair of this committee, cited and showed on screen 19 different
Parts of the Massachusetts Teaches Association resources. Every single one of them would turn your stomach. And I don't think any of you here in this room would say anything, but that is anti-Semitic, is anti-Zionist anti-Israel. And it, it is just abominable. I think you need to look at these resources and make your own opinion. And I agree. I think you should have done that already. But what's out there is clearly it is anti-Semitic.
Jewish children are worried, they're scared, their parents are concerned. Maybe you're not following a lot of things that people in the Jewish community are following. But it it, these are drastic times and we are, it's not just throwing bricks through a kosher, kosher Jewish, you know, shopping, shopping store. The these are, there are people that are being killed. There are people that are being threatened online. Social media is just awash with what's going on.
It's terrible out there. And I, I just want to, I just wanna say thank you for inviting the public into, into this room. And I think that's really important that you've been hearing from people in the community who are being affected. Thank you, thank Speaker 3: You. Speaker 1: Thank you af after the next speaker. Dr. McKenzie. Speaker 4: My kids' safety, it's in your purview. The learning in their schools. That is your purview. It's why you were elected. It's why we voted for you and may or may not vote for you in the future. I wanna know why you're hiding behind process. Some of you got to know me when I was here
regularly advocating for L-G-B-T-Q students safety and security. Thank you for that. You supported me and my son's safety on that access. My gay kid who tells me consistently he's safer as a gay kid in Natick than he is as a Jew. I wonder why you didn't hedge on that. And this defining identity is up for discussion. It's up for being whitewashed by you. It's great to waffle and focus on policy when you're safe. But perhaps consider that the Jews in this room are the experts on antisemitism. And that those of you who are not Jewish are not experts on our generational trauma.
I know what I'm scared of, but I can't for the life of me understand what you all are scared of. Do your job, take a stand and don't fool yourselves. You're being played and your kids are at risk too. Speaker 1: Dr. McKenzie, Speaker 39: I'm Reese remembering something that my former colleague Mr. Brand said to me when we were discussing Good Friday. And he said he wasn't Catholic. But what I thought of it as a Catholic meant a lot to him. And I'm not Jewish. I do wear this beautiful bracelet given to me by Ms. Dekin with a star of David on it. And I owe much of the goodness of my own religious faith,
the Jewish tradition. But the pain in the Jewish community tonight has been so palpable. And you know, if you, you know anything about me, I always listen to the victims, to people who are left out. And it's so hard for them always to be put on the spot and have to talk about that. And it, and I'm a pacifist. I'm sick of us, you know, killing each other's children to make some kind of point. So all of what's happening in the world is really painful to me. But antisemitism is real
and I've gone back and forth on this. We can make a difference. And I think if we can make the Jewish community feel safer, that you should make and help make the Jewish community feel safer. I responded to Che's proposal and supported it, but offered some wordsmithing. And then I thought to myself later, what am I doing? Like why am I wordsmithing this? And he is actually proposing something really simple. So I, I just vote you, I just hope that you will stand in solidarity with
loved members of our community who don't feel safe, who feel threatened in this very divided time by supporting the statement that asks for balance in sources. Thank you. Speaker 1: Any other hands for public speak? For public comment? No. Okay. So we'll close public comment and we'll return to the two motions that we have and the potential amendment and not Mr. Brand. You look like you have a plan. Speaker 27: Yeah, well I dunno have a plan. I dunno if I have a plan. I would just like to resolve the, the, the, we
accepted the first one, the first new, the additional clause at the beginning. We never closed up the second round. So what I would like to do is accept the second clause the, whereas there is no evidence that any of the MTA materials in question have been used in native classrooms. But I would not accept the first change and I would like to keep Dr. Folkman's original first clause, which is now the second clause. So that's what I would accept. I don't, Dr. Fugman would have to second that plan and then I guess Mr.
Rubal should probably weigh in as well since she was the one that made the proposal. Yep. Speaker 23: I accept those friendly amendments as stated by Mr Brand. Speaker 1: Okay. And then Ms. Brunell, since this was your proposal, do you wish to respond to this or do you, do you just wanna accept the amendments as made? I just need a second. Okay, sure. Anybody else on the committee? Yes, Ms. Blathers. I just wanted to respond to a few things. I have clicked through the links extensively over periods of time in the response to which Shai was saying, I don't think it allowed me to quantify the statement
of predominantly Palestinian perspectives. I just, that was what I was referring to. I really appreciate Rabbi Ice your giving. Very specific examples. You know, for example, I'm not an expert, so highlighting specific items such as Norman Finkelstein's work and his reputation gives me this better perspective on it. I could have, you know, you can always do more homework, but I do disagree that you do require extensive conversations. If I thought I was coming into having to make a determination about whether the materials are biased, I don't think I have to make that determination.
'cause I believe you like, I believe like I believe the Jewish community when they tell me that this is a biased perspective, and I know you didn't use the word biased shy, but you used lax balance, which is similar like that it's an unbalanced view. And I'm just coming from the perspective that I absolutely believe that. And what I was looking for is whether there's a modification to that first paragraph that focuses more on my belief that is the case than prescribing that I have come to that conclusion. That was it. I mean maybe that's a unnecessary wordsmithing.
I can be told I'm a little bit of a perfectionist at times. Can be. But that was really what I was solving for like in that first paragraph it says that the res, that the curricular resources related to the Israel Gaza conflict and historical conflicts that rely on predominantly Palestinian pro perspectives and sources. I haven't counted through all of them and done the attributions to be able to quantify predominantly I'm going on faith that that is a true statement based on the evaluation of other members have done, but I haven't done it.
And then it is a subjective determination that it results in a presentation that lacks balance and does not reflect the diversity. Like that is a subjective determination in that, that I, the best I do is believe you that it lacks balance, you know, for everyone in the room and was looking whether there's an easy modification to language that is more reflective of my belief that it is damaging to the Jewish community, it's damaging to our children and that it lacks balance and that someone made that, you know, and that it wasn't me making that determination. And I, you know, I'm not necessarily mean a place to want
to quibble like language, but I do think words matter. And that was what I was seeking from looking at Ms. Brunes paragraph, totally respecting, wanting to leave in the specificity around the materials, but whether that, that was it. Okay, thank you Ms. Blathers. I don't know, shy if you, if there's any kind of anything in that paragraph that you think because you have made you, I believe you, you're an expert, you community like you, you have written this as a determination that it's predominantly Palestinian sources
and that it lacks balance. And I tend to be someone, Ms. Span, who does her homework whenever I possibly can. But there is, there is a lot of links and a lot of like other context that you'd need to be able to pull together. And I would rather believe the, you know, the parents and the experts in the room. I would like to believe you, but I think the language should reflect my, you know, faith in the community of how you know it that it is perceived versus my own subjective determination that is not as educated as yours would be.
So I think Dr. Fugman, do you have a response to that? Speaker 23: I appreciate your comments. I do and, and it is hard sitting in these seats and I wanna recognize that for all of us, all six of us are sitting in these seats. It is, it is hard and this is a hard, it's a hard issue Speaker 1: And I, and I would rather not delay to all the points. I'd rather not delay a vote, which is why I'm just trying to figure out the right way to just get it to a place that feels comfortable and authentic because, you know, I have a lot of faults, but generally people, you know, I'm authentic in a person my word and I stand behind the things I vote.
Speaker 23: I don't know if this is helpful, but lemme just give you, 'cause you said it was example, it was helpful when Dr. Sorry, rabbi White. Well, and doctor both actually you're accumulating your titles and Constable Wise as well, and I'm not kidding by the way, I'm really not kidding. But when she gave specific examples, I can give you another one specifically around the issue of not being balanced. So for example, there's, there's subheadings and one is documentaries and films. So it has a list of documentaries and films. There's a think I counted 17 of them. The second one is We Will Dance Again, which is an Israeli movie about the minute by minute
retelling of the October 7th attack on the music festival in Israel. That is an Israeli film. All other 16 films were made by Israel, sorry, Palestinian producers and tell the Palestinian story. So when you can, when you say, oh, you know, one idea for resources, which is very powerful and any conflict is we'll have videos, we have resources, I mean we have films. When you provide a list of 17 and only one tells a specific story of a specific incident, it's not even telling the, the broader Jewish story the way
some of the other films do. So for the Palestinian cause literally one film, and by the way, that film, because it's a minute by minute retelling of a an awful, awful massacre of young people in a festival is also pretty graphic. So you're already limiting the, you know, we have a, an expert psychologist who would tell you this is not a film you would show in middle school or elementary school. Some of the other Palestinian films do have more of that age range. So that is an example of the imbalance that we're talking about in case that's helpful. Speaker 1: Okay. Circling back to Ms. Brune, just for comment on the addition of the amendment,
you don't have to comment, just I said I would circle back to you. Speaker 24: No, I'm happy to comment. So I understand your concern and I appreciate you taking my amendments under consideration. What I hear you saying is accepting the second one, dropping the first one. And I wonder then if we could drop the next two paragraphs. And my rationale here is to focus on Natick. I really have no desire to focus this on the MTA
to a degree that is our committee evaluating the MTA materials. I think it's, that's the issue. Supportive. Speaker 1: We're not taking comment from the public and it's very distracting to have these side conversations. So I'd ask you if you need to have a side conversation, if you could please leave the room Speaker 24: In the co in you in the, whereas Massachusetts Teacher Association disseminated curricular re resources, keeping that one stating, stating it, stating it as lacks balance, stating that it does not reflect the complexity or diversity of views. And then moving, moving to
the statement at the bottom. Whereas the use of materials that do not reflect multiple pers perspectives may conflict with native public schools. I just, I have this feeling that we are being asked to put our, like put weights on the scale in a way that I'm uncomfortable with. And, and maybe that's gonna be okay that we're gonna, we're gonna disagree with that. I wanna focus on native kits, Speaker 1: Mr. Brand. Speaker 27: So I I hear you and I appreciate that. And so, but I like the resolution the way it is now and I would not accept those.
I, like we said before, I, I'm comfortable with this resolution as it is for all the previous previously stated things two weeks ago and today. And so I would not accept those other changes. So where it stands now for me as the motion maker is what Catherine, what you propose as the new first amendment. The original. The original whereas clause that Shai added the, whereas there's no evidence that any MTA materials in question have been used in native classrooms. That's familiar as well, Catherine.
And then everything else, the way it is currently constituted, that's where I currently am. Speaker 1: Can we delete the part of the proposed edition that didn't get added just so it reads cleaner please. Yeah, thank you. Speaker 27: Yes, we can. Speaker 3: Okay. Speaker 24: Okay. Are you open to bringing the concerns of content and tone of these materials have been raised by the community leaders up further? Speaker 27: Absolutely. I'm open to that. Where are you proposing to move it to? Speaker 24: I would put it as the second, whereas Speaker 27: So above, so right below your, the, the, the additional one that we added.
Yep. So I would accept that if the seconder would also accept it, but it's up to you. Well first of all, Speaker 23: Moving it as is right now just wouldn't make sense because it says concerns about these materials, it doesn't, putting it above the MTA clause doesn't tell you what these materials are. So what I would, my friendly amendment to the friendly amendment to the friendly amendment is that we move that up right below.
So basically make that the third clause. So we say the MTA materials as aem where we're, we're pointing as as I know we're, we're not allowed to hear from the audience when it's not their turn to talk. But I did hear people say the, and I agree the MTA, let me rephrase that 'cause I wanna be very careful what I say and I, 'cause I wanna repeat something I said last time too. The MTA is an important very critical partner in the state around education. This is not about the MTA, they do wonderful things.
This is, but this is about their list of resources. As Matt said, I, at no point would I ever say that I know the intentions behind the MTA because I don't, I wouldn't assume that there's any bad intent, but it was, but these resources are problematic and so we need to mention those first, what they are specifically the MTA resources. And then I would love to have that clause that you're describing come right after that. Speaker 27: I would accept that friendly friendly and I can move it so people can get a look at it. Speaker 1: Could you do that so we could get a look at it? Yep.
Speaker 27: Moving it to get a look at it. Speaker 1: Very visual person. Speaker 27: Yes. It has been moved. Okay. Speaker 1: So why don't we take a minute to read through this and see if this is where we do Speaker 27: We have a full minute so I can go fill up my water? Speaker 1: Yes. Okay. Yes. Speaker 12: Sorry. Speaker 1: Let's just wait one more minute for Dr. Folkman to get back and that's okay. You can have your minute. Speaker 12: We're all allowed to sign. We all have a sidebar at this. That's fair. Speaker 1: Okay. Alright. So we've had a minute. Any any further questions? I see Ms. Lather's hand one LA is it
possible to consider on that one where it says that reli predominantly on perspective storage is resulting in a presentation that many members of the community are con that raises concerns like just in there saying, raising concerns that it lacks balance and does not reflect the complexity of diversity. Then you list all the, all the concerns where they came from later. That was my only, so you, it's, it's qualifying that the concerns that it lacks balance, the subjective part of that statement is coming from concerns. You mean coming from resulting in a presentation that,
I'm trying to think the right word. Struggling though. Presentation that, so I think the very next clause talks about the concerns. Speaker 3: Yeah, Speaker 1: It's fine. It is just the subjective Yeah, I was trying to bring the subjective p It's you mean the people who raised who you know were coming, who had concerns about things I said, stood at the podium and said, I should believe you. And so like I believe you, like I am addressing the concern that you are telling me that these materials lack balance and don't reflect the complexity. And my preference is that it states
that even though it's in the set, in the very next clause, Speaker 24: I am a little lost. Where are you, you're saying whereas such one sided portray just, Speaker 1: Okay, that's fine. So the third and the the second and the third clause. Right. Okay. I mean we're Speaker 24: Good. It Speaker 1: Read reads well to me. Okay. Speaker 24: I have one more amendment and this may address the concerns about purview every time the school committee and I, I feel very emotional at this point. So apologies every time the school committee acts, we open ourself up for more actions and kids being safe in aid.
Public schools, no matter who they are, is why any of us do this volunteer job. So I am proposing that we root this in policy so people cannot come back to us and use a resolution like this to make more kids unsafe and to say, well you looked at this curriculum and you made a judgment on this. Why don't you make a judgment on this curriculum? And so I would like to propose we include policies, I-J-I-J-M and KECI cut and pasted it into the final before the be it resolved
because it is very important that we stay in our purview, not because we are hiding behind purview. That is not why we use purview. We use purview so that people, children stay safe. Policy is what allows things to be defined in a way so that there are clear delineations of what can happen and what cannot happen. And when you use policy in a way, you can,
when you step out of purview, you can open yourself up and you can make kids unsafe. So I would like Shai, when I communicated this with you before, I wanted this resolution to be grounded in policy to protect us from future comments about peop from people who may use this as an invitation to Enter a curriculum review in other ways. Speaker 27: So just so Everybody who can't see it, this if I, because I thank you for putting it in the document.
This is right before the be be it resolved part. And it's a new clause that Ms. Brunell has proposed that says, whereas under policies I-J-I-J-M and KEC, the school committee provides a process by which any instructional material deemed quote questionable may be formally reviewed by the superintendent for alignment with student interests, with decisions appealable to the school committee. So if I may sort of paraphrase those, that is maybe this is your intention, those policies that we have a policy about formal review if somebody has a question or a concern with policies and that, so this is a just a fact
of like what our procedures are. If somebody has a question about a particular policy, it doesn't actually change. It's almost more of a reference than it is is is that fair to to say? Okay. So even, even though it is a little duplicate, duplicate, it's duplicated a little bit in the be it further resolved. 'cause we mentioned the policies, but I, I, I think, I'm not sure, I would also sort of love to hear from Dr. Fesman. I'm not sure if I have a, if, if I have a big issue with it. It feels somewhat Harmless to me.
But like I would like to hear from Chai if that's possible. Speaker 24: Dr. Fon. Speaker 23: So I I I don't think it should go in there where it's located right now. And, and I have two reasons for it. First of all, the pri the primary reason is that it is, it's, it's redundant. There are three operative clauses to this resolution. One is to caution our teachers, not tell them what to teach, but caution them about how they go about selecting resources. The second one is about policy and it, so it stated there, so to me it feels redundant.
So we're saying where and then we're seeing be resolved. But here's the real reason why I don't think we should entertain this motion or any, any this amendment or any further amendments. Members of this community have been hurt by the MTA resources since the first came out months ago. I've been hearing about these resources and how damaging they are from the community for months now. And I struggled to figure out what can I do as a school committee member to protect their children, native public school children, my children,
native public school children. And I worked so hard, so hard to get this right when this first came to me. I came to you as a chair and we discussed it when the idea of maybe this should be a policy. I went to the chair of the policy subcommittee and we talked about it when there was a suggestion that we should talk to the EAN co-presidents. I went and I emailed them when the president of the, when one of the co-presidents of the end of the EAN said, you know what Shai once don't you hold off once you look at the materials yourself, which was a great suggestion.
I appreciate your suggestion and by the way, can you send me the resolution? Which I did. We had that exchange. In fact, we postponed the first item, the first time this was gonna come up. It was gonna come up two weeks ago. It was on the agenda as you know, Madam Chair. And we postponed it because I wanted to make sure to be respectful of this conversation we were having with the EANI met when the superintendent raised some issues, not about this resolution, but around the, how this could be heard by teachers. We met and we discussed it when Ms.
Purnell asked me on a Saturday morning instead of going to services, don't tell the rabbi that I missed it out. Oh, I, I don't put that on me. No, not you. That was, that was not you. I'm sorry, I apologize. That was not you. That was me being not a great Jew. But I sat down, I sat down with you and we had this conversation and when you asked me to ground this in policy just as you did tonight, I grounded it. I added that that is in red right now. That clause operative clause because you asked me to add it. I'm not gonna wait anymore. I think we should end here the discussion and take a vote.
I think these people have weighed long enough. And I don't mean just the past three hours, literally three hours. I mean the months this, as so many people said, this is an actually a much softer resolution than any of the other com some school committees that have passed it before. This is my best effort to get everyone's feedback to. So to get it to a place where we would all be happy with it, honestly I'm done. I'm done entertaining more amendments, I'm done. Speaker 1: So I would encourage you to rethink that position. And this is why I think everyone knows that I'm a big fan
of belts and suspenders and I don't think that it's an existential threat that insinuating or in any way, not clarifying. So not in by not clarifying our role and the procedures in place by which people can come and review, have curriculum reviewed. I do think that we're allowing people potentially to put a toe in the door and to come at us with all sorts of curriculum questions, opt out questions on all sorts of curriculum that we, that we hear already.
And I don't see any harm in adding this additional policy. I understand Dr. Fugman that you're frustrated and I hope you know that we appreciate all the work that you did. This is a tremendous amount of work. But I would really encourage us to take that belts and suspenders approach to add in that information. It may be redundant, but it clearly defines a process that takes away any question of what somebody could come to the school committee and and expect it. It makes it very clear they cannot come and ask to put something on our agenda. They cannot ask to have a policy made that there is
around curriculum, that there is a review process. It's formalized and we only hear the appeals on it. So that's my position. Speaker 23: So I I I won't, but I'm happy if that, if the amendment wants is placed as a vote, I'm happy to be the minority dissent. Speaker 1: Okay, so then I would move, can I make a, yeah I would move to add the clause whereas under policies I-J-I-J-M and KEC, et cetera added into the document as the below the policy or below the clause beginning.
Whereas our schools must remain safe and welcoming environments to be continued. That's my motion. Speaker 23: Second. Okay. Excuse Speaker 1: Me. Any discussion on the motion? On the motion? So this is a motion to add that clause into the amendment. So all in favor against. Okay. And nobody's abstaining. So we have four votes to add that clause to the resolution and to against no one abstained. So we have a final version of the resolution.
Are we ready to vote on that? Speaker 27: Yes I am. Okay. Speaker 1: Alright. So all in favor of the resolution as printed. Anyone against? Anyone abstaining. So we have five in favor, zero against one abstain. The resolution passes. I have another motion. So we still have another motion on the table and that is the motion to convene a group or the policy subcommittee. Yes. Ms. Brunell, I'd like to withdraw that motion. Is that possible if it's been seconded? Speaker 27: Yes. The motion maker can always withdraw.
Speaker 1: Okay. Alright. Okay, so super. So let's recess. Yeah, let's have a recess. And I imagine some people want to leave thank you to all members of the public who came and participated today. We appreciate it. So we're back after recess. So if I could have a motion for the consent agenda. Speaker 27: So moved. Speaker 23: What's my long second? Speaker 12: Okay. Speaker 1: All in favor of the consent agenda. Okay, so that's 5 0 0 consent agenda passes. Now we'll go to subcommittee liaison updates. And Ms. Lathers, I know you had something fun. Something fun for us.
Yes. I just wanted take a minute. Can pause for a second. Oh, oh sure. Speaker 12: We're having technical issues. Speaker 1: Okay. Speaker 40: We are, Speaker 12: We are. Speaker 40: I think Speaker 1: We look like we're good. Speaker 12: We can on Speaker 1: Oh, okay. Speaker 12: Okay. It's not Speaker 40: Just speak very, very loud. The Speaker 1: Whole town. The whole town can hear. Okay. Alright. Okay, Ms. Laers. Hello. So I am, as you know, the CPAC liaison. There's change in leadership there. So I want to first welcome Liz as the new chair,
but that also means that Danny Newland is resigning her position as chair. I want, oh, I'm gonna get emotional on it. 'cause she's done so much for the community over so many years. She has been an unwavering advocate for so many kids. I personally know dozens and dozens of families who have been supported by her, including my own given information advocacy. And I, there are hundreds of families out there that I think have spent time and when I say time, I mean hours and hours of unlimited time of her, you know,
volunteer attention to make families feel seen, to make kids feel seen and heard. So in our honor, we're, you know, as a committee, we're dedicating, we're donating three books to the preschool that I picked out. 'cause I think really reflect her contribution. The first is the invisible boy. Like she really wants every kid to be seen and seen as their true self and authentic self. Amanda Gorman's something someday about when you see something to fix, you get in there and you fix it. And then the last is how to train your amygdala
because she without fulfill will come with like a really reasonable and, and productive and practical solution to help you, to help your kids. So, and she'll be very missed an our community wellbeing. Speaker 23: Can I add Yes, please. To the same topic? Yes. I just wanna say how well deserving those Danny is of, of everything you said and much more. I did get to, I had the honor of, of working with Danny back when I was in CAC. People would call her literally any parent
and she would be on the phone. She probably still is, I just haven't kept up with her for hours on the phone. Every parent who had an issue, she would help them, she would advocate, she would listen, and she too shed her own share of tears, not just about her family and her children, but for every family that she's ever worked with. So very well deserved. Speaker 1: Yeah, a hundred percent. And you know, Danny, Danny is, I think the reason I got actually involved in CPAC. Like when we first moved here, I called CPA for advice and of course Danny's like one of the first people you talk to. And then before I knew it, I'm like on the board of CPAC and you know, it, it's just, she's just a,
a great community builder as well as helping individuals. So I think we're really, we're really gonna miss her. So she's off to a new adventure in Canada and we'll miss her for sure. Yeah, thanks Kate for doing that. And please let us know how we can reimburse you. So yeah, say something. Oh yes. Brinley, Ms. Vickers. Speaker 24: Thank you. I know you guys Brinley Vickers precinct date. I know you guys don't usually recognize people during subcommittee reports, but I just wanted to say I'm very grateful that this came up tonight. And as a community member who has also spoken with many,
many, many, many, many parents, Danny really has done an exceptional job. And so from the community I say thank you for publicly and, and verbally recognizing her this evening and, and getting her books that are extremely appropriate, grateful, and yes, she still does spend hours on the phone with people helping them and advising them. So thank you. Speaker 13: Can I say one more piece from Oh yes, please do. Yeah. I wanted to, as everybody knows, I'm kind of closing in on my first year here and one of the first people I met was Danny. And so hearing from parents and the school committee is one piece,
but hearing from the administration having such a good and partnered relationship with Danny is something we greatly value and we're really gonna miss as well. So thank you for bringing this forward and for those wonderful gifts and for Danny. Speaker 1: Thank you. Other subcommittee updates, budget subcommittee, looks like that's you again, Ms. Flas or is it Mr. Gillis? Somebody, whoever would like to, Speaker 30: I can, Speaker 1: I don't have my meeting minutes in front of me from the last meeting, so if I forget anything,
I will turn to Mr. Gillis. So the, we did have a meeting, we had four agenda items. One of them, one of them is we do know, just so everyone's aware, the financial policy is it financial policies are being princip, the financial principles being reviewed in, in the town right now. We, we didn't make any, they don't have a determination of timing. I believe the administration's gonna work with the town and what kind of their timing is and whether and how we wanna provide input. So that'll be something that will continue to come up in future meetings. But we'll let that drive it. Remind the other three items.
Speaker 25: There was an update on grants and the revolving funds and the last item was where we're gonna end the year for the general fund will be at $0. The state grants were about 90% expended on June 10th. We're chasing down, making final expenditures and in some cases we're just waiting for services to complete like the Medco grant. We for example, can't pay for the June bus until the June bill comes in.
Federal grants we had about 23% remaining. A lot of that will be used in the summer. They don't end on June 30. These grants will carry over until June 30 of 26, but most of 'em will be expended for December 31st. There were a few revolving funds that, you know, popped in in the red. Most of them will be cleaned up through the natural progression of, of ending the year and a and a couple others that were looking into to clean up before June 30.
Speaker 1: Great, thank you. Oh yes, Speaker 24: Just one more on that. I think we also looked at the budget subcommittee calendar or the budget timeline and spoke about the February 1st deadline for the budget and how we are hoping that the principles and the conversations we have in the fall do not result in that gap conversation that frequently used to happen on February 1st. But that we shore things up in the fall between our committee, the administration, and the select board so that we are, you have more time for budgeting
and it's just not so dramatic. Speaker 1: Yeah. Yep. Low drama is good for sure. Thank you. Anything else on the budget subcommittee? Okay, so we had on the agenda an update on the cell phone policy, but it sounds like that is not ready so we will have to take that up possibly over the summer during one of our retreats. Yeah, Speaker 13: We'll be happy to, if the committee would like send a memo kind of with an update of how the year closed out with the,
just practicality of how the cell phone procedures or kind of the review we gave on the, the update on how it was gonna be handled this year. And as part of that we can give the updated policy based on the feedback of this committee and on the principles, which really wasn't a big anything big, but we'll put that in there at least to send it out so you have it before next fall. Okay. Does that sound good? Speaker 1: Any questions on that from the committee? Okay, I think that sounds great Dr. Stash. Thank you. Okay. Finance update. Speaker 33: So there, there really is, and I kind of gave the pre-close out before Speaker 25: I kind of gave the, the pre-close out before.
Don't really have transfers yet at this point. I think folks might be familiar with some of the line items that'll be over. Whether it be substitute accounts that were, you know, bid under budgeted as we worked our way through last year and this year's budget. The FY 26 is, you know, seems like they'll be pun budgeted appropriately. So some salaries may be over, some other accounts may be under. But putting everything together in the aggregate, we're gonna get to zero fairly quickly. We will a bit of good news have a a,
a better than project earlier projected balance, the circuit breaker with carrying over or saving $400,000 this year. We are able to carry that over and a little bit more. So it looks like our circuit breaker balance will be instead of 200,000 initially projected and then 400,000 in the budget book right around 800,000. It could be a little better than that, but this is the time of year where those last minute surprises. Al always come in today was quiet,
but you know, not every day is Speaker 1: Okay. Thank you Mr. Gillis. Any questions on the finance update for us? Okay, thank you. Alright, so now turning to chairman's report. Can we go to the superintendent evaluation report? So I shared with everybody, the evaluation report did my best to include all the themes based on all the notes that I took. But if I made a mistake, please let me know if we need any amendments or alterations to that. No, we're ready to vote on it. Could we have a motion please? Motion to approve the superintendent's evaluation report.
Speaker 27: Second. Okay. Speaker 1: All in favor? Okay. Anyone against? So that's six. Zero zero, thank you. Okay. And then the next item of business is the draft calendar for 2025. 2026. And these are just the potential dates for school committee meetings. Mr. Brand, Speaker 27: There's a meeting scheduled for September 22nd, which is the first night of Rosh Hashanah. Speaker 1: That is a big oversight. Thank you. Speaker 27: Well, it's not a, I mean, hey, it happens and the date changes every year, so,
Speaker 1: Okay. Speaker 27: I won't be at that meeting. Speaker 1: Well, we will be rescheduling that meeting. Speaker 27: Oh, okay. But my, I would assume, I don't, I don't remember, but my assumption is there school that day, it might not even be school that day, I forget, but whatever. That's the first night of restaurant. It starts that night. Speaker 1: Okay. Speaker 2: Oh, so there is school? Speaker 27: There probably would be school, yeah. Speaker 1: Yeah. No assignments, but it makes sense according to our homework policy. Well, okay, we'll we'll see if we can reschedule it. Thank you for bringing that to our attention. You Speaker 2: Said you can't give us homework among as just, Speaker 1: You know, Dr. Fugman, you're giving me some really good ideas here.
So 22nd. Yeah, but no retakes. No retakes. Okay. All. So if we look for a new date for that, with that noted, do we feel comfortable? I think we have to vote on the calendar. Yeah. So no, just make a list of dates. Speaker 27: Yeah, I don't think we have to vote on it. Speaker 1: Alright, so we've made a note that we'll try to reschedule September 22nd. Does anyone else see any potential conflicts? If you do, please let me know, but we like to post these on the website over the summer so people will know what to expect.
Okay. We already appointed our METCO rep update on the high school field design study update. Speaker 25: Yep. So we have a meeting tomorrow with the designer. If few interested guests are coming. It's at three o'clock here in town hall. This room, if anybody's interested, they've looked at the three options for the practice field that were around that area. And you know, not to spoil it too much, but it with their recommendation is to do the new practice field where the existing practice field is. One of the two options didn't fit
and the other one was kind of cumbersome. So, you know, that's what they're gonna talk about tomorrow. And some interested folks will be asking questions about comparisons between natural grass turf and synthetic turf. And then the design, schematic design part of the process should be winding down soon and we should get a cost estimate for designing the field. And we might even be getting two prices, whether it's grass and or, or natural turf. Speaker 1: Okay. Speaker 25: I mean, grass
or synthetic turf. Speaker 1: Is that the goal to come out of that meeting tomorrow? Speaker 25: Well, I, you know, folks wanted an update and, and we haven't really scheduled a meeting to do that. And what, once we have a a, the concept, we'd have to bring it to the voters at some point about what type of field is it gonna be, what's it gonna look like, and how much is it gonna cost. So there's one cost for a synthetic turf and then there's another one for doing natural grass
and then there's pros and cons to each. So I think we'll be hearing a bit about both tomorrow or at least there'll be some questions that get asked and then some answers that we'll get back from the, from the designer, if not tomorrow, shortly thereafter, before they finish the finish their part of the project. Speaker 1: Okay, thank you. Any other questions or anything from you, Mr. Brand? Speaker 27: No. Speaker 1: Okay, great. And then the last update is about the PowerSchool agreement.
So I think that was attached. So any questions about that that has been signed as going forward? No questions. Okay. And I think that's it for our agenda. Speaker 27: Motion to adjourn. Speaker 1: Second. All in favor? We are adjourned.