all right good evening everyone like to call the April 7th 2025 meeting of the Plymouth School Committee to order at 7 o'clock everyone please join me in the pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States of
America and to the republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all all right next Miss Jackson read our land acknowledgement we acknowledge that we are meeting on
the unseated ancestral homelands of indigenous people whose enduring presence we humbly recognize we honor the Wampaoe people as the original stewards and the Herring Pond Weno as the surviving tribe indigenous to these lands in our commitment to lifelong
learning we acknowledge the historical injustices to the native people of this land and vow to educate ourselves our community and our students on the first people and the hardships that they endured we offer this as a small but essential step towards building a
culture of respect truth and accountability thank you M jackson uh next we have comments from the general public i believe we have a few people who wish to speak please good evening everyone tom Pinto precinct 2 but tonight speaking on behalf of the EAPC some of us we spent a
good amount of time together Saturday so it's good to see everybody again um but uh we're not we're here tonight to speak about the uh the moving of the of the preschool the Peek to P South Middle School i'm not going to uh speak i'm going to have actually people who kind of live breathe that speak on behalf just to let you know they are all
Plymouth residents um so and again and they're also you know work for the preschool but again I think their expertise in this matter uh to turn to them is like I said they they kind of live and breathe the preschools this is our first of three thank you school committee for the opportunity to speak tonight my name is
Jamie McAfeairy and I'm a Plymouth resident and special education teacher at Plymouth Early Childhood Center i grew up in Plymouth went through the school system and now I'm raising my own family in Plymouth and our daughters attend Nathaniel Morton i've been a special educator and board certified behavior analyst for a total of 22 years
and I've worked in many school districts around the Southshore and Cape Cod before deciding to take the position at PEC's substantially separate program serving students mostly on the autism spectrum i knew coming back to Plymouth was an opportunity I wanted to take and that what was happening at preschool was
special as educators we value critical thinking and collaboration we're appreciative for the addition of the extra year before this recommendation for the move to Plymouth South Middle is implemented however the teachers and staff at the Plymouth Early Childhood Center many of whom are also Plymouth
residents um do have concerns about the move to start we want to make sure that our students have at least the same level of accessibility and access to services that they've been experiencing at PEC if not more there are parts of this move that feel not only lateral but a decrease we understand that preschool
enrollment has increased by 41% over the past two years we want to know how we can continue to support this type of growth with a space that seems to have limited potential for growth at this point there are 1.5 available rooms at Plymouth South Middle after we move in
but it doesn't include a classroom that we currently have housed at Manmouth Elementary or the Plymouth Family Network so truly the space is starting out essentially full further after the move from Mount Pleasant nine years ago additional costs had continued to be incurred that were not originally
forecasted to make PCIs accessible for preschoolers hello my name is Heidi King and I am one of five speech language pathologists plus an assistant at the preschool this will be my seventh year 17th year working at the preschool i am a lifelong Plymouth resident a Plymouth
graduate myself and have a child who attended the Plymouth schools in terms of maintaining if not improving the quality of therapy services the proposed speech language therapy room at Plymouth South Middle School has the potential to house at least five therapists in one
room if there are additional classrooms needed in the future the designated room is currently a chemistry room with five sinks and a chemical shower due to the size of the room the acoustics are not optimal for a speech
language therapy space this does not feel like it supports students learning when it states on individualized education plans for students who require speech or andor language services that removal from the general ed education
setting is necessary in order for students to receive more intensive instruction in a quieter space that is free from distractions no other speech language pathologist in the district shares the direct therapy space with three or more other
therapists additionally the computer lab at Plymouth South Middle School will become the new motorroom space there are a number of challenges to the proposed motor room the current room at PCIS is used as a whole school space all of the
children in the school have the opportunity to access this room it is the hub of the preschool the designated room at Plymouth South Middle School is smaller with a number of safety concerns regarding the ability to use the
equipment that we currently use the therapeutic related service providers at the preschool have valuable experience in setting up spaces in an appropriate that are appropriate for early childhood education and we feel that we are a
resource for collaboration thank you last but not least I'm nervous good evening to all the school committee members and thank you for the opportunity to speak my name is Meredith Woodinski i'm one of the 13 special
education teachers at the Plymouth Early Childhood Center i've also been a resident of Plymouth for 24 years i've been a teacher for 30 years and taught in Plymouth for most of the time i have three children two graduated from Plymouth North High School and one is currently a student there all three of
my children began their school experience at Mount Pleasant Preschool i'm one of the original teachers from Mount Pleasant who was moved as a satellite classroom to Nathaniel Morton for one year and then moved back again to Mount Pleasant the following year this was the beginning of the
splintering our preschool with two classes moved to South and one at West i also went through the move from Mount Pleasant to PCIS nine years ago i'm highly invested in what I do and I love the preschool program nine years ago the administration moved the preschool to
PCIS and brought all of the classes together with one extra classroom for expansion over the last nine years we've grown significantly in size population and level of need we had to learn into a we had to learn how to fit into a space
that wasn't meant for preschool it took years to work out the kinks and we continue to change every year based on our increase in population these have included navigating common spaces bathrooms hallways storage parking
arrival and dismissal over the years we filled that extra classroom we grew from nine classrooms to 13 we lost our storage room to house offices for eight staff members and we moved one classroom to Manamett Elementary regarding the
proposed move the entrance that is being proposed for Plymouth South Middle School building is around the back of the building down an access road the new road being proposed will need to have land cleared to be built and will not include sidewalks the pickup area is
going to be from one exit where we currently have five pickup areas for parents and a separate one for buses we feel that having accessible loading and unloading zones that include sidewalks are essential for ensuring that all of our students including our community
peers and students with disabilities can safely and conveniently enter and exit vehicles at school pe is the first school experience for all of our students and families in Plymouth we should be making every effort to ensure that we provide the
best possible space for our students the playground and the outdoor space that is being proposed is significantly smaller our population continues to grow and the outdoor space should comply with the desi requirements we currently have nine
bathroom stalls for 12 classrooms being that our population is so young many of our students are potty training so the amount of bathroom is very important to us the bathrooms at Plymouth South Middle School will be reduced by three and may not meet the DESIE requirements
that maintain one toilet for every 14 students the following quote is taken from the Plymouth Early Childhood C Center's website we shall remember that our school communities are representative of our investment in the future and the right of for each of us
to participate in the fulfillment of that investment is an inherent one let's learn from the past and move forward to create a long-term plan plan that shows our commitment to our youngest most needy population the preschool staff
asks that you consider our concerns during the decision-making process we ask that you please table this vote until there is a viable plan presented to create a permanent home for our amazing preschool program thank you
thank you for hearing us thank you thank you all right we'll move on to our student representative reports first up we have uh Shay Ros from Plum South hi everyone I'm Shay i'm a junior at Plymouth South High School to begin um thank you to our
strive program for for creating a beautiful mural for the autism awareness month that we will celebrate as a community on April 17th our juniors juniors will be participating in SAT during the school day on Wednesday and in addition our sophomores completed the
ELA MCAST in March and are scheduled to take the math MCCAST in May and science in June there's a gig band concert on Thursday night this week at 700 p.m at South which involves musicians from North and South also the Be the Light
event with both schools will um be the April 16th at North um hosted by Plymouth Rotary the booster club hosted a very successful second annual casino night for parents last week it was great turnout and the generosity from many community donors was amazing you can
join the booster club in the annual North and South OneTown Golf Tournament May 4th at 8 a.m at this Southern's Marsh these funds support our students in many ways we hosted the World Language Honor Society induction last week and honored many French and Spanish
students the tri honor society induction will take place also took place last week for honored musicians congratulations to Coette Lapierre who was honored at the Plymouth Yacht Club as a PSHs dar good citizen for the class
of 2025 congrats to her and her family prom ticket sales begin on Wednesday April 9th and it's hard to believe that prom will be here so soon taking place May 9th at Indian Pond and in spite of our weather our spring sports teams are doing very well we're looking forward to
a break from the rain and cold soon senior Vinnie Caparelli was honored as the Boston Herald Alolastic after the successful basketball season and a special thank you to the Plymouth Education Foundation who donated $1,500 to the Plymouth North Implement South
United Athletic Programs we were presented with a check last weekend at the gala yearbooks are still for sale the final date for the purchase is April 30th and finally the student council hosted March Madness spirit week this year adding many new events from the
past and it was fun for all involved thank you all right thanks for that great update Shay next we have uh Ann King from Plymouth North hi every sorry hi everybody i'm Anna King a junior at Plymouth North High School um Plymouth
North had the incredible opportunity to travel to Washington DC during the height of the Cherry Blossom Festival over the course of four days students explored many of the city's most iconic and educational landmarks including a tour of the US Capital and the Library of Congress students were able to enrich
their understanding of American government and history it was a memorable experience filled with learning reflection and fun we are proud of our students for representing Plymouth North so well and grateful for the opportunity to explore the nation's capital together plymouth North Student
Council recently hosted the annual spring craft fair last weekend which brought immense success to our school community we hosted 105 cers selling their handmade products we had over 1,200 shoppers attend the craft fair all
shoppers and cfterers had many positive things to say about our 40 student volunteers who dedicated their time and helped with everything from crafter setup and breakdown to lunch delivery we had support from the Massachusetts Cultural Cultural Council who provided
us with a grant for our event and from Plymouth's Card My Yard who provided a wonderful sign out front of our school that encouraged and invited members of the community to come in and shop this Friday April 11th students will travel to Adelboroough High School to attend the Southeastern Massachusetts
Association of Student Council's spring conference student leaders will be able to expand their leadership skills and connect with others from all around the Southshore plymouth North's National Honor Society teamed up with the Southshore community and organized a
schoolwide March Madness food drive march is often a difficult month for food pantries across the state with donations being significantly lower than during the holiday season plymouth North Plymouth North's National Honor Society joined 16 other community organizations
and competed against each other to see who would be the champion and bring in the most donations throughout the month of March with the help of clubs and sports teams the Plymouth North community donated 1,274 food items to the food pantry nhs is grateful to be a part of this
competition because they were able to understand how this can directly affect students in their classes the NHS chapter project this year is focusing on our environment members have started a paper recycling initiative as well as beach cleanups and working to keep the rotary outside the
school entrance looking clean and beautiful we have sat in meetings with Sustainable Plymouth to get new ideas as well as learn how the Plymouth community is working on environmental issues over the last week an email has been sent out to all senior families that includes a senior letter with important dates and
information senior dinner dance tickets are now on sale and the dance will be happening on Tuesday June 3rd freshman Challenge Day was a fun engaging experience that was designed for our 9th grade students the event strengthened connections among classmates increased
school spirit and promoted both academic and social growth students took part in a variety of academic challenges team building activities and friendly competitions that encouraged collaboration problem solving and communication the day helped students build confidence excuse me form new
friendships and feel a stronger sense of belonging in our school community as they continue their transition into high school on Friday April 25th 17 DECA state champions who moved on to the DECA International Career and Development Conference as well as six additional
students who excuse me earned leadership spots will travel to Orlando Florida to compete with students from all around the country the third annual Interact Benefit show is coming up on Wednesday April 16th at 6 p.m all proceeds this year will be donated to Hope Floats
Healing and Wellness Center in Kingston for the murid services they provide in the area of bereavement counseling and education the show will feature students and community talent within the fields of music dance and poetry along with the information about the important work
that Hope Floats does within our community will be highlighted as well this Wednesday April 9th pre-registered juniors will be taking the SAT during the school day the final session of our freshman inclusion program is set to take place tomorrow over the last six
weeks students have been have engaged in team building activities learned about how students from different backgrounds have different experiences and built skills to help them engage with others in a positive manner to make North a welcoming a more welcoming positive and successful place for everyone the
program wraps up with a celebration in the calf for all freshmen who participated junior prom tickets are on sale now it is hard to believe that junior prom is right around the corner and will be held on May 30th at Lake Pearl in Rethm this April vacation 46
students and six teachers will be traveling to Italy on a cultural immersion trip for 9 days they will be visiting cities such as Milan Venice Florence and Rome they will be experiencing events such as a glass blowing demonstration in Venice riding gondelos visiting the popular sites like
the Leaning Tower of Pisa in the Colosseum eating traditional foods and interacting with the local people with the close of the term all report cards for term three will be published in Aspen and sent home this Friday April 11th and an important reminder that April break is right around the corner
and will be happening from April 15th to April 19th we hope everyone has an amazing spring break thank you all right thank you for that great update Ann any questions for either student all right thank you very much next up we will move to out of town
overnight uh field trip request we have a field trip request for Houston uh Texas Neielson um my name is Carl Nielsen um engineering technology teacher and robotics adviser at Plymouth North High
School um and I'm Sean Dorsey i'm the project manager for the drone club that we're requesting to go on the field trip for so I just wanted to give a a big thank you um to Stacy Rogers and Mark Duffy um for supporting us and helping
get this whole thing started so this is a little bit of a subset of our robotics team um as a pilot program we ran this year um and it's involving drones so through robotics you guys probably have heard of us doing land-based robots and water-based robots and so we wanted to
get into um airbased robots and um and so we found a really good organization that um has been around for a few years we're we're the second school in Massachusetts to um to be a part of it it's a big organization that takes place in Ohio and Florida um but new to this
area um and we had a really successful season um and I'll let Sean speak about what it was involving but we um we qualified for an opportunity to travel to Houston Texas to compete at the national level um with schools all around the country um and we think it's
an amazing opportunity it is an overnight um overnight adventure uh four days three nights um is what we're planning to look at uh in May a two-day event held at the um at a conference the exponential conference um which is an
unmanned vehicle uh conference with people from all around the country really really cool technology and uh it's going to be a great experience for the students involved um there's four students on the team um so we're looking at sending four students myself and two
parent chaperones and um and if you're interested Sean will give just a quick debrief on the on the program yeah so what we did for the entire season was we parted out the electronics for our drone our own drones as well as we designed and made them we've been competing in
online like simulator races as well as videoing ourselves making the course courses in the gym and flying them and also submitting those videos we've submitted a marking video a portfolio and a team display that we've created over the season so this will be our
first opportunity to compete in person which is um which is a great opportunity because it's it's a change in the competition it's head-to-head now so we'll get to interact with other students who've been doing this now for a few years so we visited Belmont High School early this year that's the other
school that is competing and their their pilot Sean's a pilot on our team a top pilot u qualified first um so he's he's going to be interesting student for for us to re-engage with but um it's cool that we made that connection in in
Massachusetts um we we went to their robotics competition for VEX earlier in the year and uh now it'll be great to meet up with them again down in Texas if we can make it down there so open to any questions we're looking for your approval on the budget side um we we
have it covered um we met we had a parent meeting last week um all parents came for the four students um we we're right around 6,500 to $7,000 budget to to make this trip happen um our robotics
program has um some money left over from uh we're basically sponsored by a few companies arion water specifically is the our main corporate sponsor um and we were planning to qualify to travel with the VEX robotics this year but we didn't
um so we do have a little bit of money left over in our budget um for travel so the budget the existing budget for um robotics does have some funds to allocate towards this we're also planning to do a a fundraiser um a quick snap raise because a lot of the parents
um had recommended hey is there a way that family and other businesses can do quick online donations similar to a um you know a crowdsourcing type approach um so we're going to try to quickly turn around a SNAP raise for that um but all
four parents groups um acknowledge that there might be a cost uh associated with each individual student we we figure it will be around $500 um per student or less if we can raise a little bit more through the through the SNAP raise approach but um
and they're all committed to um covering that cost to to get their their child to participate in this event all right questions dr i just want to make it make it clear but I first want to say congratulations i mean for such a new
program to be invited already to a national competition that's quite an accomplishment in such a short period of time so you guys work really hard over over the season i just want to make sure that there are four there are four students in the program and all four
students regardless of financial need would get to go correct thank you that is correct yes and that was our primary objective and and it was a great meeting with the parents and they are all very excited questions
just just uh comment you answer I had a question on the cost how are you keeping it so low but you answer that that already i'll just make a comment that I'm an engineer so of course I think this is a brilliant idea i I love it and yeah echo what Dr sorson said i think it's awesome that you guys are one were able to um you know have been able to
grow the program so quickly and compete on national level and I mean I can't imagine a more fun opportunity for these four kids i'm think not just the competition but be able to roam around a conference like this for two or three days and I can't imagine the kind of you know technology and you know things you're going to see so that's awesome so
I'm very supportive can you demonstrate that um I don't have any of my controllers right we'll come back for a demo oh yeah if you win you'll come back yes yeah we feel like we can do really well too we've been kind of placing top six so
we've been doing pretty well and we hope to maybe get an award or something while take down Belmont that's right all right do we have a motion i move that we approve the field trip as
presented second second m brian seconds all right take a vote it's not coming up either i did I've been trying to join the meeting and it's just coming up like this he does agree he does really good we're here tonight
it says log out i can log out and log in and then log yeah oh that means you're log out i think it's gonna pass i think it's gonna pass back though we want to see them yes this is when having a drone demo would have helped yes you allowed to record when you're there
like video record thank you yes so um one of our seniors who's coming is uh Kayn McN she um she's a part of the Ed TV program and they were potentially going to have their live show at the same time so we were like "Oh could we do a live stream from there but um she's
planning to bring some some recording equipment uh to bring back to to maybe do a segment on EdTV." Awesome congratulations and please come back and let us know how you did i appreciate it thank you so much yeah thank you thank you for the support
all right uh next up Dr gamble job descriptions thank you so before we go through the job descriptions I want to kind of tee this up to kind of explain why we're here to for the the totality of the recommendation so um as you all
know um it's been we've had a lot of challenges in terms of leadership and special education um and in a response to the evolving needs of our district and the challenges in filling key leadership positions we're proposing a strategic restructuring of our
administrative sort of framework so um really to support special education and general education uh to make sure that we have equitable oversight sustainability of our operations both academically and otherwise um and and do it in a way that's fiscally responsive
so that we're not increasing the overall number of administrative positions it's actually would be a decrease putting more services back at the building levels to support special education and I'll get into that in a moment uh so our proposed restructuring um is to
restructure the current assistant superintendent for administration and instruction uh position to an administrative excuse me assistant superintendent um of academic operations so this role would oversee both general ed and special education ensuring that there's alignment of practices and student
support services um are at the forefront of those decisions dr rogers the assistant superintendent of ad administration instruction who has extensive background um in special education as a director for many many
years would assume this restructured position so her expertise not only in her current role but in her role as special education brings strong leadership to this proposed restructuring so to refine uh this even further we would be looking to refine
our existing assistant director of special education who currently also supports out of district um we've had two in the past um and we're proposing to have one so to talk about that structure so we would have one dedicated assistant director of special education
whose focus would be solely on in district special education matters so really dedicating leadership to our staff to our schools in our district um so a revised job description for that position will come before you on the 28th of April at the next meeting uh in
addition to that a new out of district liaison position would be created this is a position we had many years ago when I first came here actually uh would be um and this would be actually a teaching position it was in the teachers contract so an out of district liaison would be created to provide targeted support for
our students that are currently out of district and support those families so we have an in district assistant director and we have an out of district liaison um having Dr rogers sort of overseeing um those positions so in addition to the special ed department
head uh excuse me in addition we would add a special education department head at the elementary level this is again this is a teaching this is this is a teaching position um with additional time a stipened department head they would support our elementary schools we
currently have two this would bring it up to three again providing that support at the building level trying to do that um that targeted support so in order to do this um again we wouldn't have the director of special education
restructuring special education we also would need some support for Dr rogers on the general education side uh and this is this is key so the second job description that in a moment Mr chopi will go over with you is a director of curriculum and instruction so this
person would um oversee the support of the academic coordinators to make sure that all of our instructional programming be the first point of contact to support that so a lot of the work that Dr rogers is currently doing um supporting that work um in on the academic side in order for this to work
we would do an inhouse posting and hope that someone internally would take this on as additional responsibilities so this director would be sort of elevated responsibilities um as someone who's already currently
working under um a leadership position so we would have to see how that worked out um so they would assume the responsibilities of um some of the responsibilities of the previously assigned to Dr rogers position allowing a more balanced focus for Dr rogers in
this structure so why is this necessary and beneficial uh one I think really you know as we look at trying to maintain consistency and support this is really using a strategic use of our existing talent and skills you know leveraging
our current leadership to enhance the support for all students without adding administrative costs um this model minimizes disruptions it ensures continuity of our leadership and it realines the roles um to improve
efficiency in what we're doing um and with the strong leadership and expertise I really think that this really provides a great support for both general education and special education um so you know we put a lot of thought into
this uh certainly has the support of Dr rogers um for this position this new job description so um our hope is that you will approve these job descriptions and if so we would be um posting for the director of curriculum and instruction
so um once Mr chopi has an opportunity to go through the job descriptions answer any questions you have regarding those um we will then go on seek your approval for those job descriptions and then seek your approval for Dr dr rogers or I would be seeking your approval for
Dr rogers to assume the role this revised role as assistant superintendent for academic operations okay all right so the first one is the assistant superintendent of academic operations and the job description is
going to look a little different than what we would typically bring forward because a lot of times we're doing a revision so you would have some stried out language and some red languages to be the new language this looks different because it's just one working document um we took uh components of the
assistant superintendent of administration and instruction and took components of the special education director and kind of blended a lot of those responsibilities under this new job description those two that we borrowed from and kind of crafted those
will still be in existence they'll still live on our books they just might not be filled currently because this model could change in 10 years and we wanted to have those still available to us so when you're going through this we also tried to you know look at the qualifications very similar these
qualifications are what would need be needed as a special ed director uh plus the assistant superintendent role and we tried to kind of pull out some of those key uh functions uh and I put those in bold just so you could kind of see underneath each of those um parts what
those responsibilities would look like uh so there's a a section on administration and instruction a section on special education there's theu uh community involvement that is going to be uh a large component of this role uh
policy uh will still fall under uh this position and um then you know we have our favorite other responsibilities that's the catchall and uh I didn't let Stacy look at those parts we just added those no no just keep carry on um so we kind of built this position due to our
current circumstance um and obviously because we have someone that could fill into this role so before we could even go to director of curriculum instruction we can certainly answer any questions you have um and then this is the first part that has to occur before the second
part's even an option questions um just one question that I sort of know the answer to but also think it's important to just put out there for the general public this restructuring isn't costing the district any more money it's
if anything it's less okay yes thank you for adding that no no other questions i just have just a minor point um most often most often in the on this
agenda item and the one that's going to follow when we refer to special education we always refer to it as I read it as special education so therefore it should always be uppercase if you use it not as lowerase it's very generic so I think when if we intend to
refer it to special education it should be uppercase in lower cases i can easily make those edits we have a motion on this one i move that we approve these jobs descriptions uh with the amendments that Dr sorenson
mentioned to the capitalization of the special education seconds all right that one's good all right that's the first one okay so in the second one the director of curriculum and instruction we took components of the assistant
superintendent of administration instruction responsibilities and kind of narrowed those that scope down to just focus on the curriculum instruction side again we used a lot of the um the talking points or the key points uh just
for ease of following through this uh curriculum development and oversight there's a section on instructional leadership and support uh school and district initiatives professional development assessment and evaluation fiscal resource management and other
responsibilities and then this position would report to the assistant superintendent of academic operations so we're building that side uh to help support the schools and our academic coordinators through the district any questions on this one
right i don't have any questions all right looks like no questions do we have a motion then [Laughter] i move that the job description for the director of curriculum and instruction be accepted and approved as presented we
have a second second all right seconds thank you sorry my computer got locked up all right next up we have a proposed appointment of Dr stacy Rogers as the assistant superintendent of academic operations
yes so um again my recommendation is that uh to appoint Dr stacy Rogers to this newly revised physician as assistant superintendent of academic operations which includes responsibilities um as director of special education
um included in that role i move the recommendation of administration to appoint Dr rogers as as um assistant superintendent of academic operations do we have a second second third brian we'll take it all
right do we have any discussion on the motion um I fully support the uh motion i think Dr rogers is uniquely qualified for the role matter of fact the role was created like for her um my my question my only
question or concern is that say two years from now Dr rogers goes on to be the superintendent of ex school on a southshore to find someone with her list of qualifications to fill that role is going to be very difficult i'm happy to
speak that through the chair um very good question and I probably should have said this um it's very difficult to find directors of special education um it is easier to find assistant superintendent that are also responsible for special education so I think um again I'm hoping
that this is not a problem for quite some time um but in the event that there is a change in leadership I I would my recommendation to the school committee would be to post for a similar position in the hope that we would um have a
broader candidate pool um for that position okay thank you you're welcome that's a good question any other questions on the motion congratulations Dr rogers you're all in trouble now
back up right yes let the record show oh funny all right next up I think we have the uh agenda item folks have been waiting for which is the recommendation for the relocation of Plymouth Early Childhood
Center thank you Mr garin if you could put the slides up so put some slides together i just want to preface um a couple of things one I have utmost respect for the people in this room for our preschool it's it's literally my I think my favorite walk when I do
instructional walks uh with our principles um have great respect for the very difficult work that they do with our three and four year olds um it brings joy to my day for sure but I know after you know an eight hour day with three and four year olds um it can be
very very challenging but I have great respect um I also want to say a few things um regarding the decision if there's any hesitation regarding making the decision tonight and I'm just going to say this upfront we can wait a while
my recommendation would not to be to wait until next year to make this decision because if we were to make a decision to move forward with something I'd want to be able to do it before the end of this year um if if this committee
wanted to see the space they wanted to learn more about some of the things we're talking about here um I certainly would welcome providing an opportunity to actually physically see the space i do think though if we're going to make a decision again this is not for next year
it's for the year after that um we're looking to use available resources financial resources that we have now within our operational budget um to make some of these changes so we would be using that and and there's other ways that we're looking to approach this um giving us that time and
I'll and I'll kind of get into that okay um so this is why we're here because as you know under Mass General Law Chapter 71 section 68 the school committee um in in the town must provide and maintain sufficient schoolhouse and and and this
is this is a schoolhouse within the school so we're here because we're making a recommendation to reconsider the location of the current preschool okay um so the current location as you
all know is at PCIS on 117 Long Pond Road the proposed location is South Middle School in the lower level dedicated floor um of the school and we'll talk about why that's available um again this is not for next year the recommendation is for the year after so
about 18 months out um and o overwhelmingly administratively this is not just coming from me although I am the one that is making the proposal to school committee but we've had a lot of administrative discussion about this um and and there's support behind it collectively
um so just so people know like the geographic because I know geographies come up as a as a concern too plymouth's south campus is actually geographically central to the town um they're both on Long Pond Road they're 3.9 miles uh from
door to door from each school about eight minutes u you clock it so it's geographically it's it's not too far away but it's also more central for um for the community there are there are some folks and some families that are in
the deep part of South could be beneficial there it's a little bit longer for people in the north um as we know the roads are very challenging in this in this town um they happens to be on the same uh one of the main roads that we have in Plymouth Long Pond
Road um so as has said and I've said this in our budget presentation I said this um many presentations that we have seen a 41% increase in referrals over the last 5 years in preschool it's one of the only areas that we've actually seen an increase um there's a whole host
of hypotheticals why that's happening but it is something that we've been concerned about concerned enough that it's been part of the strategic plan that we addressed last year that we need to find a more viable solution for our preschools um and we know it's very
challenging to get buildings and we're trying to get a new elementary school we're trying to consol you know look at consolid consolidating a new school and we know how long that road takes we're looking at at least six years for an elementary school if we're fortunate enough to to do that right are trying to
think strategically about what we have available to us um we currently as as was said we currently have a satellite prek program at Manamemed Elementary mantt's actually presenting this evening um we have DESIE has now approved Manat
as a preK to 5 school we had to get approval to do that um and it is designated if you go on the Department of Ed website you'll see that it says it's prek to 5 um we're also trying to do that in the new school potentially is to to increase opportunities for preschool space we currently have
because of the space challenges um and we the fact that we can't fit any everyone um we're very fortunate to have the Commonwealth preschool partnership initiative grant which has been providing itinerate staff we just had a meeting about this with the state today it's a wonderful opportunity to bring
itinerate programming into our local public private preschools and that's been um wonderful for the families and the students but also um very supportive for us because we would be in a very difficult space um if we were trying to
provide additional space um at PCIS or someplace else um PFN had previously had a space at PAC um supporting the prek families they're here which is completely fine and it's working out really well u but I know that speaking with Miss Tobin that's been of benefit
to have them you know sort of as a resource to families as well um parking and tra traffic challenges these are things that have been uh brought to our attention um and we've tried to we've tried to alleviate some of those we actually expanded the parking uh last
year um but it's still a challenge in that in that space um there's very limited actual storage we have a a storage container outside of the school there's limited space for additional storage um and an additional space for growth and while it's not yes there's
not classroom upon classroom upon classroom available to expand um but we could fit hypothetically the manamett program could fit there today if we were all houseed there um and the possibility of providing Plymouth Family Network
with another space unless it was needed for expansion these are again conversations that we had leading up to today um can I get this to move um the the space is very accessible u
there would be a dedicated safe space drop off area yes it does have to be expanded these are the things we've been working with facilities to to work on and I'll show you sort of the route that we were looking to do for that in the back of the building um and and all the things that were brought forward are
things that we would be taking into consideration for um that drop off um it would reduce uh congestion and enhance safety I think going out that way um expansive parking parking again has been an issue i think it would be great you
know it's certainly an expansive parking lot and I'll demonstrate that in a minute i think it's an opportunity to improve traffic flow drop off and pickup and work on the logistics um another sort of added benefit is the proximity to Plymouth South High School again this
isn't the reason for doing this but it's a good um added benefit plymouth High School currently and has for many many years had a early education and care program um those students could walk over there and be an additional resource but it's also a great educational opportunity to strengthen that career
pathway in that technical program being so close again it's in walking distance just to give you and I know you can't read that from here it's hard and I can't read it from there either um but the spaces so PCIs is uh on the the
first section and self uh middle school is the second section but the additional there's an additional 1,824 gross feet at Plymouth South Middle School this was given to us by our facilities director um and Dr bl confirmed all this and the average when you do the average of the class sizes
they're actually 61 square feet larger at South Middle School you can see sort of the breakdown of uh the number of classrooms and there's other spaces and office areas there that could be used for other reasons and and we'll get into that a little bit um so just for I mean
you all know this but the location with pre of the preschool within PCIS so this is the map of PCIS um the main entrance for the general population is the far but the preschool enters from the back um and I'll zoom in on that so that is
the old Apollo house when it was up the middle school house um that's where our preschool is housed when you look at it up close sorry all right all right there we go so this is the so the
space in the top left hand corner nine from 1 to four to 16 you see those spaces up there that are marked up in the top left hand quadrant that is the early childhood center um there is um no dedicated sort of foyer the reception
areas within the house there is uh a a hallway that is shared two hallways common hallways for PCIs students and the preschool students u because they enter from the topmost part of this uh schematic design and then they take a
take a right into um the preschool um so this is the space that currently exists south Middle School this is the the lower level so there are three levels to South Middle School our enrollment at at the middle schools both
middle schools are down substantially over the last 5 years that this is a this is an area where we've seen a decline um it's a reason why we're able to go to PCIS but self middle school's enrollment is is lower than self elementaryaries with 605 um for a lot of
reasons the middle school administration would like to have all the students from the lower level up on the top two floors they have their administration there the guidance there so everyone's on the same floor currently there are a few um classrooms
that are down below um but getting everyone up on the same level makes sense and there's ample room to do that so this is the South Middle School floor plan um there is no common hallway that would need to interact uh with South Middle School students there would be a
dedicated rear entrance you can see the leftmost of this schematic design uh the bathrooms are more central to the classrooms uh there is a sink in the nurse's office uh there's no sync in the nurse's office at PCIS uh there is a
confidential space for the department head to to hold meetings uh which currently doesn't exist at PCIS uh one room is currently being shared by eight people with half walls dividing them um and and speaking with administration
there'd be dedicated space available for these staff at South Middle School and the rightmost part of that you see 119 10 uh what does that say 101 and 102 to the right of that that is sort of the landing to the stairs up above those
doors would be shut but there's an entrance in that area would could be a reception area um we could also there's also plenty of space to store additional equipment among other options it's very very spacious and it's outside of
the educational space you can see the offices would be the first point of contact going into that space the same on the top two floors when you go in there um in terms of storage uh there are currently again currently the staff must go outside to this blue storage
container to access materials um in addition to shelving in the classrooms and this is something we also would look at if there would need to be additional shelving whether we purchased it or our vocational students which I'll talk about in a minute had an opportunity to put shelving in there we could do that
as well but there is shelving in the classrooms but there are also two additional shelving uh excuse me two additional storage closets um in South Middle School on the in this floor um and again the storage container that's at Peek currently can be transported to
South Middle School if necessary as well because that's it's our storage container just to kind of give you a sense of the parking um this is not the kind and this parking the front lot there uh to the the leftmost lot in the
front of the building the majority of that is empty during the day you you know you could go there in the middle of the day and there's so much parking and there's also parking to the to the top where the where the park uh staff typically park but there's substantially substantially more parking at South
Middle School uh than at PCIS when you look at the current traffic flow at PCIS so this is PCIS from up above um PE is on the bottom uh the bottom side you can see that triangle that looks like the brown triangle
that's actually where the playground structure is but you're coming from Long Pawn Road you're going around the building and you know really intersecting with a lot of visitors and staff parking parent pickup student vans and buses along the way so this this is sort of the route out to
PCIS uh the proposed traffic flow for self middle school again it would be a dedicated roadway to students there is a roadway there it would be expanded our facilities director um would oversee that project um but that would go in the back of the school you can see the red
line there uh that I placed in the back there's an entrance a dedicated entrance that would go there we would actually fence that area that is the area that we would we would start with a playground structure um right there but we would create a dedicated entry there with a
gate as well same way that we did at at PCIS so again outside of the um in the back of the school excuse me clicking the wrong thing i also mentioned just the walking and the access for the campuses so um
there's South High School in relation to South Middle School and there is a walkway and students can walk right over there we've had students go back and forth uh for for obviously um for collaborations between those two campuses but it's very accessible for students to go over there um potentially
to provide additional support to to to add to their education it's an opportunity we would really see this um as an additional benefit to that we're trying to inspire also to inspire students that want to go into early education to consider special education
as well um and this is a great opportunity to support um the preschool and to gain valuable experience for our students that are part of our early education care program as well so um if this was approved and again not
looking for you to make a cons consideration tonight if you want more information you want to actually see the spaces but we would start with an installation of playground the current playground of PIS will will need to be replaced soon so we're looking at like where we would do that and we could we
would propose to do that at South Middle School uh fencing and gate behind the building expansion of the access road a dedicated drop off um and adjusting the bathrooms as necessary obviously signage for exterior interior and our facilities department would have nearly 18 months
to really make this school this space preschool ready and really do as much as we can so you know having that time gives us more time to really do it right and to be very intentional with those spaces some of the things were mentioned in terms of the sinks and the science
the science labs we're we're aware of that and those are things that we're looking to remove from those spaces and that that would give us the time to do that um in addition you know would provide us the opportunity as you all know that our CCT program helped with this building and we did that in a
pretty expeditious manner and they did I mean my office was built Adam Badam's office was built and a lot of others um it was a great educational opportunity for our students but we have plumbing students carpentry students that could be a part of this design and and some of
the work that would go into this space so we're excited about that opportunity as a as a again as a hands potential hands-on opportunity students again are in close proximity because the vocational programs are right there that could do that so if this is something
that is considered um I think that it's a great opportunity for to get our our kids involved um that are in these programs and again you're keeping those low those labor costs low because we're we're giving our students an educational opportunity um so this is the
recommendation it is aligned um with our long-term goals both strategic focus area one and four in the strategic plan in terms of giving students an opportunity but also looking at the space for the preschool we have to figure out something sometime soon um
when asked before um because we went to the faculty meeting a couple weeks ago just to let everyone know that we're bringing this forward we didn't want to surprise anyone with this obviously um if we don't do something we're not we will run out of space um potentially
need to use both campuses South Middle School and PCIS um you know I don't know i mean it's something that we may be looking at long term our enrollment is down at the middle school level i don't see it going up anytime soon we do have the space um
try to address some of the concerns and and sort of our thinking behind this and we're happy to answer any questions that you may have um I don't see anything about cost do you have any numbers yeah can well playground
just renovations in general that we'll need to have in moving costs um retrofitting costs um costs for you know anything else that we need to make the move there there weren't any numbers yeah I don't have the right now we'd probably be looking about $200,000 to
make and about 70 of that would be for the playground alone okay um I have very serious hesitation about this um this is pretty much the entire
staff from PEC uh coming here and sitting in front of us and telling us that they don't want this um so I'm not going to vote for it in front of their faces because they're some of the most highly educated people that we have in our public school system right now um I
also feel like this is a band-aid um maybe it increases space a little bit but it's not going to increase it to what we need um for our preschool program if PSMS doesn't want that space in the bottom floor I would rather see
us do something like move fifth graders um from the elementary schools into the bottom floor of the middle school and that would open up space in the more appropriate place which would be an elementary school um to house in preschool classrooms um I do not like having a preschool inside an an
intermediate school anyway um I don't think that that makes any sense um I understand why it has happened thus far um but we need a real permanent place for preschool instead of just moving
them in into different locations that we think that they can fit in for now um I don't I don't like that i won't support and if you think that there's any potential for us to need both campuses there's no point in moving them now so I
would just to I'm sorry yeah we have some decorum yes brian so to that point in regards to being able to make recommendations now I I would agree i don't feel comfortable
with being able to make recommendations now um but I also don't think it's necessarily our place to explain how to be able to serve um to fix the overall problem i think it's a
conversation that's definitely worth taking offline being able to look at the numbers look at the different scenarios and how they play out and be able to share the scenarios that work best for
the longer term um I do definitely sympathize with needing more space but to be able to get the space that is necessary to fit our needs long term and making an investment
um that that'll meet our needs for the future um I would I would definitely look to make a motion that we we need to to discuss this further m Jackson
um I agree with some of the things that are being said but I also see what you're saying and so I would like to see the space and get some more information like contextually about it because I
feel like there are some good concerns being brought up but I also feel like you've done a lot of due diligence in what you've provided so maybe with some more questions and some more answers we can come up with a solution that works
for everybody rather than just tableabling the whole thing because we may not have another useful space until if and when maybe we end up with a new school and then we're talking about five seven years so I think having more
information seeing the space and you know maybe having a little bit of that would answer some of those questions you say what um I think so I was one of those parents nine years ago and I can't believe that
it's been nine years um that moved from Mount Pleasant to um the PCIS and so I think my concern is if if we are saying that there is a 41% increase
And this is what is considered the current you know solution what does this now look like four to five years later if this is if and and I guess that's a question I'm asking do you do you think that this is
going to get um exponentially you know larger you're saying now we may need to use two different campuses and and so I'm just thinking about this like constant movement that is being made with this particular program um I also I
um I think we I think we can tableabling doesn't necessarily mean that we are not like we are tableabling to have better understanding as to what this really looks like um between these two spaces
um but then furthermore and maybe this is um a question rooted in ignorance um just in terms of this new the new school that made through the MSBA yes um is there a consideration of having that so
I was was asked by the MSBA if we would want to be considered for preschool space i said yes please um OB I knew that this is something that space will be contingent upon enrollment and they'd be looking at it it would be a North Plymouth preschool so they wouldn't be I
tried to get it at the old at the new south full disclosure when we were in when we were in meetings with them I said "We have an early education program could we put a program here?" And they said "No." Mhm um so this has been on my radar for years because I see it as
something that we again it's it's a school within a school and it I was trying been trying for the longest time to find something that is going to be um you know a better solution so we are advocating for preschool space so that
would be a prek to five building potentially we're probably talking a few classrooms if we're lucky because it's it's really going to come down to enrollment projections districtwide then they look at North Plymouth they have their own formula um and also has to do with the the amount of space that's
allowed or feasible in that space so it can only get so big uh but it's it's certainly something um that we're looking at mr morgan um yeah what Miss Shaw brought up I have um
I know we're tight on space for myself school will add some space but it doesn't add a lot of space so it's like a a band-aid if it was a permanent solution I'd be more have to be supportive um also as was pointed out we
have several staff members here who have some concerns do we have any staff members that are in support what's the director of the uh facility are they in support or you said um I don't know about um the principal at PCIS or South Middle where they stand on on everything
it just so happens they're both here she's here like to get their feedback and I like to see the space too i think that's a a good idea to see the space yeah certainly and again that's why I wanted to preface this isn't something that needs to be decided tonight i mean
if if we're moving in a direction um I'm I'm trying to be optimistic i don't think we we will in the foreseeable future get an additional building that would be for I would love an early education center i would I came from a district that had an early education
center it was wonderful i don't think uh but it was a prek to it was a prek building um I don't see that in our future anytime soon we'll be lucky if we get this one building for the next dozen years to be quite frank so trying to
find the best solution we can knowing that it is tight and knowing that we do whether it's two or three or four classrooms that we're going to need we're going to need space someplace um whether we're we we we get the green light to start developing something
knowing that there's like now a satellite program that's north and south campus um these are things that we have again some time to talk about um rather than not looking to disrupt just for the sake of disrupting certainly but I do
think that this space if done right could be a really good space i do feel that and I think that I don't want to speak for the for the for the other administrators but um it you know looking at it now you may not be able to envision that but you know we didn't
come forward you know we didn't think about this for um you know a fleeting moment Dr mr torson I think it would would be interesting to hear from the two principles if you as one well I got to say that it's certainly not uncommon for a Plymouth school committee to be
having a discussion about space we've been doing it for a long time and the questions that that everybody is raising how much is it going to cost how long will it last what does the staff feel these are all the appropriate questions that is that we would ask right and I'm
going to tell you one more thing it's never done in one meeting because you said you'd like to go see it i would like to go see it so it obviously and the thing I'd add to this is that when you come back here for the next time some of the some of the speakers here this evening listed some some drawbacks
some cons if you will when we make a decision on something like this we need to see the column of the pros and the cons and how they play off each other not your presentation tonight were all the reasons why we need to do it i'd like to hear some of the reasons why we shouldn't yeah and we did seek feed yeah
thank you do you have any specific questions or we just want to get No feedback yeah we would just love to Miss Tobin first um so as you heard we are definitely short of space we've used every single inch of that building um do
I think PSMS is perfect absolutely not do I think it has great potential absolutely um you know I came from a district where we moved four times in seven years our preschool and with each of each of those spaces we weren't given
a year long time to make that um building preschool friendly and preschool ready and I think with this plan having this amount of time to really focus on making it um the best possible place I think it can be a great
a great space thank you uh we are excited to have the preschool at PSMS we feel like we can collaborate with them i do feel like it is a good space uh I lived through the move from Mount Pleasant to PCIS many years ago so
I know what a lot of the drawbacks were uh particularly when it came to the facility and parking and the traffic around the back of PCIS so I know that at PSMS we can correct some of those issues to make it a safer environment on the outside of the building inside like
we said I do like that they'd have their own floor uh in terms of my staff they they were planning on moving up to the second and third floor anyway and that was around administrative support guidance support and being able to collaborate with their colleagues in the seventh and the eighth grade so they're
not being displaced because of the preschool so they're not looking at it as an issue like we did at PCIS years ago we were displacing teachers because the preschool was coming some of them were moving to smaller classrooms they were moving to classrooms without windows the PSMS staff is all moving to
comparable classrooms on the second and third floor so I think they are they're excited about the opportunity to be able to collaborate and they're already especially my sixth grade teachers the ones that are moving are already asking those questions about what they can do sure um for Miss Barrett specifically um
are are you concerned at all with removing that space now for the future so if if for the foreseeable future that is a preschool space do you have any concerns that you will then run out of space on the second and third floor should your enrollment increase i
don't because the enrollment has been fairly consistent over the last few years that building opened with about a thousand students years ago and we are down to about 600 200 per grade if you look at the projections it is staying in those numbers okay m Jackson um can you speak about
your thoughts when it comes to the collaboration with the child care at um Plymouth South High School and what that would bring to the program also because I think that's something we haven't touched on yet in our Sure um so right now we actually have a few students that
come over and work with our PT um and their presence in the classroom has been tremendous and a lot of them have moved on to um careers and PT and special ed as a result of coming to our program you know part of the CPPI grant we have an
itinerant team that goes out to area preschools and daycarees and people are coming out of those educational programs without having any special ed experience and having students from Plymouth South that are in that early childhood care
program come over and really get to see special ed firsthand from some of the best teachers I've ever worked with um they would really leave high school with a very knowledgeable um sense of what special ed is like thank you
do you have any other questions all right I'll I'll be quick because I don't know that I'm going to add a whole lot more than what our speakers provided or my uh fellow members but yeah it does seem like we're there's a lot of details
missing that we need a more a comprehensive plan a long a long longterm plan um and more uh collaboration um you know almost like I feel like there needs to be some kind of a uh committee working group whatever
made up of you know admin administration parents staff you know a school committee member too to really figure this out because I obviously we I think we all acknowledge there is a significant uh problem here needs to be addressed and I don't want to design here but I mean it sounds like you know
I think a couple people made the point that this is a mandate so we're probably looking at you know if short of building a completely new campus having at least dual campuses where you're using PCIS and South Middle because that's eventually why we're uniting that very um very shortly so I
agree with MH Sh doesn't really make sense to to move and then literally within a couple years have to be like oh turns out we need the space of PA yes anyway so I think you know h taking a step back and looking at this uh holistically would make a lot of sense i don't think anybody's saying we don't
have a problem it's more let's figure out what let's figure out a long-term strategy here so um cuz I don't have any questions just more summarize so I don't I would I don't know that we don't need a a motion if we're going to do nothing obviously not doing anything tables it
you know naturally but I don't know if we people have ideas for you know specific next steps for Dr gamble just some suggestions perhaps um one we can get detailed costs for some sort of the um any significant renovations that we'd
be doing which really is going to come down to I think um the playground structure one uh the fencing um and any expansion of the roadway which would include some parking in there as well um for anyone who was coming for say a
meeting in the back um so we could certainly get that um sort of a list of things and we've these are things that we would be working on like it whether it was approved you know if it was approved we'd be looking at like the specific rooms what are the concerns about those
rooms what's the suggestion for those rooms for example the science rooms and like what would we do you know to to remediate that space um again we would utilize for that I know that those costs would be much lower than people may
think because of the recommendation to use our career and technical education program which we did here um because we have some very skilled I mean we have trades people in that school that and and a lot of students that are in the trades programs that would support that but we can start with that perhaps and
bring that um to the next meetings just to provide more information we can schedule some tours and and actually physically go see the sites again there is no urgency Um but you know I do
think we're going to have to make a decision sometime in the near future because I do think that we will eventually um need additional space for our preschool program and that's my
concern so it Yeah um one more um when when we make a final decision or at some point in this in the information getting process I would kind of like to see a comparison of all of the options whether that's staying at PCIS moving to PSMS or
potentially just using both um and what we could do with those so if we could see like the three options because I do I I I come off very defensive but I love this program um so I don't like that there's people in the program that are not happy about this so I will always
come to their defense um but I would like to see more options so like if if there is a potential of us having to use both PS uh PSMS and PCIs i'd like to see like what we could do to kind of make that work now instead of moving a whole
program and then kind of putting it back a little bit sure yeah we could do that in terms of any other personnel costs that would be associated with that too because we'd probably want some supervision for that as well so that the if if it was a smaller like say like hypothetically say it was a smaller program at one building there's still
you want the staff to feel that there's someone there to support them right so we'd have to factor that in as well but yeah because we do care we do care about the program too I know greatly and this is why you know we're trying to find something again that is um not a
band-aid um we want something that's going to be more of a long-term solution we do see this this opportunity at the middle school because our middle school numbers are low we we had when I first came to PCIS we had 1350 kids there and there were over 900 at South Middle
School and those are down so we know we have the space and we know that this isn't changing anytime soon so this isn't a short-term solution whatever that may be but it may be an opportunity to phase something in and we can bring a whole host of hypotheticals and
scenarios yeah i just want to mention just because I've done this before when we start to think about splitting up programs the cost ends up being almost double right so thinking about if we were to let's say expand to South Middle and do a south and a north
hypothetically you would need two secretaries two nurses you would need additional right now there's one physical therapist one occupational therapist you would need additional staff because right now correct me if I'm wrong Principal Barrett but um I don't think your PT or OT they're not
full-time there and so they wouldn't have additional time in their schedule to go down to the pres correct and we only have one so that would be an additional cost that would increase o nursing would would increase exponentially over time versus a one-time cost of a move right i think all those considerations are what we want to see on paper so we have
something we know yeah right now there's it's all theoretical so having those clear options and costs to so I'm not Yeah I think you're absolutely right but that's what we want to see so M jackson you had another question um just one more addition um it would be great to
have Mr duffy speak about the integration of the other program and how that would work and if we decide not to move if there's a way that we can do that too because I do see that as the other side of this coin you know that this would be a benefit if they're at
South but if for some reason it doesn't Sure yeah i would advocate for that regardless of what happens because I think that and I've had conversations with the kids at um when we have the advisory night you know I always go up to the early ed kids and say "You need to get some experience in in our
programs because you need that special ed experience." It's really especially with all the challenges we've had with teaching and Yeah and it's just I think it's something and that's that that's the strategic focus area number one in this plan that's what that is it has to do with like creating these pathways for
our kids and also promoting um in the recruitment of our you know for our sta you know staffing needs so um it is something that I think regardless of where this goes you know in a in a in a year and a half it's something that we should focus on for sure thank you
you're welcome dr i don't know if you have specific ideas now but maybe when you come back maybe the next I would like to see some proposal plan for how we you know have uh you know inputs from you know all you know multiple stakeholders like I said whether it's
establishing some kind of subcommittee or working group whatever but I mean I wrote down a nice list of very concrete concerns from you know Mr mr mcaffrey Miss King Miss Wadzinski um and I'm sure they represent you know there's probably plenty other concerns so I think just making this more collaborative process I
think would help everybody if in the end maybe that's where we end up but having everyone be able to get their thoughts out there and you know be part of the process I think would be huge so we have something else i assume we don't have a motion
all right thank you Dr campbell thank you everyone for coming to uh represent thank you since our next two items are school improvement plans I'm going to uh propose that we take a quick eight
minute uh break before we jump into two rather long lengthy presentations say eight minutes eight that's a good number well it's 8:22 i'm thinking about the hour okay so make it easy eight minutes i'm very precise eight minutes i think we're down to seven now
seven minutes angela Costa has a second grader at Indian Brook she is also our PTA president and I'm going to give her a little shout out at the mass PTA convention um conference this past weekend indian Brook PTA won seven
awards yes don't ask me what what they all are but um Jill Dugen our assistant principal jill was a teacher at Indian Brook before she became assistant principal and she also taught at PCIS amy Haramman is our health educa
one of our health educators at Indian Brook she also works at South Elementary myself Becky Mezer she is a fourth grade teacher at Indianbrook and her children also went to Indian Brook in elementary school and Susan Page a lot of you know
Sue she is a retired kindergarten teacher um who is always incredibly supportive of the schools particularly Indian Brook because she spent a lot of time there she's wonderful indianbrook this year we have 515
students that's actually about 28 less than last year um and about 60 less than the year before that um that I attribute to the redistricting that happened uh last year we were able
we kept some of the fifth fifth graders that should have been redistricted um to to Manad or South i think I have that correct yes and um they've now since moved on we didn't keep any of
those redistricting kiddos so we're we're down another 28 students we have 515 we have 24 classrooms K to five four at each grade level we have three strive subseparate um
classrooms about 22% of our students receive some sort of special education services um and we are at about 21% low income we are not an ELLL school we are the only elementary school in Plymouth
that is not designated ELLL we do have a uh a few students about four or five who have opted out of services to stay at Indian Brook i don't think we currently have anyone who chose to go to a different school they chose to opt out
of services to stay at Indian Brook so part of the process for the new school improvement plan we did a family survey so this is just a quick snapshot um we had about 146 out of 383 families who completed the survey
um 99% of our families indicated that they feel welcomed at Indian Brook 98% um feel that Indian Brook is an inclusive environment where they are treated fairly 98% feel that Indian Brook keeps them informed about
important events 92% indicate that their child's teacher keeps them informed of how they are doing in school 98% indicate that their child has an adult at school that they can talk to and this was sort of like a loaded question I put in the survey about homework um and the
question was do you do you believe is home do you believe homework is fundamental to your child's learning and 63% believe that homework is fundamental to their child's learning this next slide is just some of the comments i won't read them all
um you know there's both we some positive and some needs for improvement up there um communication was something I have one comment in there about little to no communication with the teacher and that was definitely something that didn't come up a lot but
enough that we we knew we needed to address it um another one was uh more lessons on diversity whether neurodeiversity cultural racial disability etc um so that was definitely something that that popped out to us the rest of them you
know school can be difficult for kids so when your child loves going to school as a parent it's very reassuring her teacher should probably get a raise for the amount of communication that I do with her she is absolutely phenomenal um so you can read through these another time if you would
like think I went too far yep so we I have um there's three strategic goals objectives for the school improvement plan in no particular order um social emotional wellness is first
and and this is just a snapshot that what's of what's on the um full plan you can see that that's in in your attached to your agenda I believe um so this is just some pieces of it um so for social
emotional some of the things we're going to work on over the next few years are holding um bus expectations and safety assemblies for all students who ride buses um work with our par professional staff to develop a more structured recess program those are the two areas
that we have the most discipline issues um continue to enhance our schoolwide PBS program that includes swim assemblies to recognize students who meet behavioral expectations um and the last one is
about chronic absenteeism meeting with counselors and the nurse to address um to talk about students who are chronically absent and how we can support them so the hope the outcomes we hope for with these initiatives are increasing
students feeling feelings of safety and belonging reduction in bus and recess disciplinary incidents if I could tell you how much time we spent dealing with those things it it would make you cringe um decrease in number of chronically absent students
and improvement in student behavior and decrease in office referrals in general this is our PBIS our acronym stay safe work hard include all make positive choices swim those are that's what our swim assemblies are based off of and the
picture shows our book vending machine that the PTA purchased for us it's amazing um they also help fill the vending machine with books and so when we we do um it depends some are weekly
some are monthly swim awards to students that are nominated either by their peers or by staff and when you win a swim award you get to get a book out of the book vending machine um so it was the PTA was amazing purchasing that for us
it was pretty pricey next strategic objective is family and community engagement so our initi some of our initiatives for this are develop a curriculum newsletter to go out at the beginning of each term that informs parents of what their child been working on in each subject area so this was something that came up in the
in the survey that parents wanted more information on what they can be doing to help their children um and also just more information on what specifically they're working on in school um so we're going to work on some sort of newsletter
around that still a work in progress obviously um with the support of the PTA provide diverse and inclusive cultural arts opportunities for students that is something that can be challenging there there isn't a lot out there that doesn't cost a fortune to bring in um but this
year we had um a group from Rhode Island that was Chinese lion dance and it was amazing I spoke to to um a parents stopped in to pick their child up and she looked at me and said
"My daughter came home and thought that was the best thing ever she is Asian and she just felt so welcomed and so included in the community." So like that's why we do it whether it's for one
child or 515 um we're also um going to partner with a local agency hopefully the the sheriff's department county sheriff's department to provide anformational night for caregivers around internet safety uh we all know social media and the
implications of it it it starts in fourth and fifth grade we have kids with phones kids with smartwatches it it's it's a problem and we find that parents aren't supervising their children and it comes into school and
causes issues um so we'd like to do some work around that um and then our specialists will will do a newsletter um to send to families at least three times a year this we've started this this year this has been really neat because they
can send you know artwork and and examples of different things they're working on um so that's great another just another way to show what we're working on so the um outcomes we hope to come out of this are increasing communication between school staff and
families improve family understanding of grade level standards and curriculum taught increase the school community sense of belonging and feeling of being represented and recognized pictures for you if you look in the top um picture you can see if you look closely you can see Dr campbell in the
middle of the earth he was on a on uh a walk with me and he got Well actually you didn't have to be convinced to go in you really wanted to go in it's great it was a lot of fun really
impressed by their knowledge of It was Bridgewwater Street it was amazing the kids the second graders yes oh and the kids yes yes but the Brit students are pretty cool too um all right our last objective is academic
achievement last but not least um as you know we've been doing admin learning uh learning walks and teacher learning walks over the last couple of years and we just recently did a teacher learning walk at Indian Brook
and the teachers loved it they felt it was really valuable uh so we'd like to implement at least one or two a year too would be our goal every year with different teachers rotating in
um into the walk so we that is one of our goals um also professional development around Amy Barry's engagement continuum and work with teachers to understand how task design can impact student engagement this is something that's also been coming out of
our learning walks um in some of um walkthroughs that that Miss Dugen and I have been doing in the classrooms um we administer and analyze the data from STAR math star early literacy and reading as well as the BAS assessment
and use results to plan for tier 2 and tier three instruction this is this is something that we really want to spend some time on particularly the tier 2 um so that is al one of our initiatives and then work with the special education
department head who's amazing to help all staff better understand special education and how to best support students who are on IEPs our special education teachers are are the experts um but we often find that our gened classroom teachers are not really
understanding or not really equipped or have the time to you know figure out how to best work with students on IEP so we want to work together collaboratively to make sure that they're gened teachers and MSN's
are cohesive teams um to meet students needs our outcomes would be um to improve academic outcomes on state and district assessments for all groups of students increase collaboration between teachers by sharing best practices and
analyzing data together improvement in tier 2 and tier three instruction to better support underperforming students and increase in student engagement and confidence then I just have a few data slides this would be um I just chose
chose a grade level this is grade four for the last four years um this is ELA MCCAST you can see where we compare to the state um the next slide this is math
and this is grade one star data so this is literacy this is the early literacy assessment and you can this is uh on the left is fall and on on the right is winter and this is math this is pretty
impressive if you look at the kiddos in the fall meeting exceeding we're at 40% and in the winter they're at 74% which is impressive I think
and just a few photos there's our lion dance and that is it any [Music] questions sure do you feel like you have enough just
because of the numbers i just did the quick math with the total amount of students and the percentage of special education students um and then the three strive classrooms obviously every student on an IEP is not in a subs separate environment but do you feel that three classrooms is enough for your
strive program or for sure this year for sure okay absolutely um I think we're getting a large group from the preschool next year i think we're projected to get about 11 students from the preschool in sub- separate
programs just subsearate y uh and we're only um having two students move on we only have two fifth graders currently this year so they'll move to the middle school so I am a little you know concerned not I I think
we'll be fine next year but as we go on our we currently don't have next year we will not h we will not have any third graders or fifth graders in our subseppparate program so the bulk of our kids are in in the younger grades and so
having 10 come and then if we get another 10 Yeah we're going to need to look at that a little bit we we would have the space with the redistricting we actually have a little bit more space now than we did so we could potentially add another classroom space-wise okay
dr shortson oh yes uh Miss Man Freddy educa educate me for a second please um the star literacy test that's given in the fall and then given again in the in the winter and same with the math mhm um do do does the test the instrument
increase in complexity yes and difficulty yes so in some respects this is a win-win right because not only the stores are going up they're also keeping up yes and advancing yep absolutely thank you
i I have just a comment um Indian Brook has always had a special place in my heart and I just seeing the um book vending machine is just
continue to talk about the ways you all look for new exciting ways to engage the kids my oldest is turning 25 this month and one of his core memories is book
bingo at Indian Brook where it's it's a memory he shares quite often and so to see you in the space thinking creatively of how to do things keep some things the same but continue to make them exciting
for the additional generations to come after is awesome so thank you i always say you as as important as academics are when you reflect back on your elementary career you remember the fun stuff and the neat and the unique things and and
the and the people and the teachers yes all right thank you very much great presentation thank you all right doc next up we have Dr frame madame representatives from parents and community and staff used to be
um I don't know what the ratio thank you everyone for having me here Pat Fra from Mana Elementary School excited to share our school improvement plan with you are also on a cycle where we're beginning our new plan so we're on
a three-year cycle and we've just completed those three years so this is a a new plan that we have uh for you tonight and And I think you also have two other documents you have this slide deck but you also I think have the more detailed plan itself and then the
stakeholder survey as well if you don't have those I can certainly uh forward that to you as well representatives from from our uh school council have worked uh with our school council over the course of this past year as we formulated the document
so we're very uh very pleased to have them there with us it was something where not only their work at those meetings but also a special thanks to our uh staff who we met and talked about different ideas to share and brainstorm ideas so that we can formulate this plan
and make it meaningful and something that can really drive us and that we can point to over the course of these next several years one of the things that we tried to do and I know all of my colleagues tried to do is to start with the district plan and then build from those goals so uh there are four
strategic planning area goals at the district level we worked under three of those uh one of them was finance and human capital so we didn't work under that goal area per se but the other three we worked directly under to align our goals with those other three goal
areas so you'll see that uh here within this plan hopefully um so MEES core values we talk a lot about our pride acronym uh positivity respect uh integrity uh determination and excellence so we talk about that quite a bit we have our pride assemblies where
we'll meet and perhaps on some days have a guest speaker come in and speak to one specific word within that acronym or maybe we talk about something that's more generally related to all of those and it's a chance for us also to celebrate some of those core values as
far as a theory of action uh to sum that up basically to work in a targeted way with a sense of urgency is what we think of when we think of our uh theory theory of action so our stakeholder survey uh we had 36 of our
approximately 150 or so families participate in that so a 24% uh response rate for that survey we used a liyker scale we don't ever use a a middle ground on that so we always use a one through four scale because we don't really want any fence sitters so uh we
had 18 liyker scale items this is the fourth time we've used the same 18 items so we can go back three years ago six years ago and I think it was eight years ago uh to look at responses so we've started to do some of that as well to look and see have we seen any changes in
perceptions over time on the exact same items so that's really helpful data for us as well there are narrative responses uh a few of those that we have as well few items for that so from the results uh one of the things that we found we we felt really
good about the somewhat agree or strongly agree percentages on every single item from 77.8% all the way up to 100% so uh we felt great that there was a a strong sense of satisfaction with the work that our staff's doing every day with students so we take a lot of
pride in that uh one of the things that was interesting is the preferred mode of communication you know we listed seven or eight different preferred modes of communication and email came out way ahead of all the other ones so it was interesting and Facebook was way down on the list and that really surprised me uh
with some of the different uh modes of communication so that was something that just caught my eye when we're thinking about how we're reaching people and getting our message to people as we're talking about different happenings and events at the school so one of the areas that families
have expressed not only in the narrative comments on this survey but also previously as well in previous years is the desire for more extracurriculars at the elementary level um on site right there at the school so whether it's before school or after school um they're
always looking for more offerings along those lines and then looking at some of our longitudinal data what we did was we took grades three through five and combined those percentages so what you're looking at here is all three of those grade levels so for ELA in the
last four years we looked at MEES versus state to give sort of a a comparison that way so we were very pleased to see uh how we stocked up that way in terms of our ELA longitudinally there and then for science and math we
did the same thing again this is all grade levels grades three through five combined chronic absenteeism bringing that down has been something that's been a a real focus for us uh we've worked very hard on that obviously all of our schools saw a big jump up in that when
we went through COVID uh but we feel like we're getting down closer now toward pre- pandemic uh levels we were pre- pandemic we were always somewhere between you know 3 and a half to 7% somewhere right in and around there so chronic absenteeism is 18 days or more
in any given school year so we feel like we're in a pretty good place as far as that goes right now but we're we're always looking to drive that number lower the state number obviously for this year we don't know what that currently is right now it's a moving target but for ours for ours it's
7.7% by the end of the year we project that that'll probably settle out somewhere around 5 and a half to 6% because now with the nicer weather here with through all the cold and flu season so we should see that number creep down so our end of the year number for that we think will be pretty pretty pretty
close to where we were last year as well so three big goal areas the first one is around teaching and learning and again we aligned all of these with the the district plan as well uh one of the things that we're going to use some of our building based time next year
whether it's during inservices or whether it's during uh meetings is to do a book study on a particular book that I've read recently uh and and and just really found profoundly helpful in thinking about learning it's called Make
It Stick and what I liked what what impressed me the most about it as I read it was the the depth to which u the neuroscience is really backing up just about every point they're making right throughout and they're citing that all the way through uh and a lot of it the
other thing that really struck me is how counterintuitive a lot of what they had uh to say was so um with the best of intentions sometimes if we're not armed with uh exactly what that research is telling us we can go down the wrong path
with regard to a certain approach or uh step that we're taking with students so we really want to try and uh freshen up our understanding of some of those skills and grow our understanding with some of those skills as well we're also going to take a look at some of the best practices associated
with 909090 schools uh 90990 schools there was a study done I think it was in the late 90s and then it was revisited more recently in the last several years where they were looking at schools that were uh 90% poverty rate 90% racial and
ethnic minority and then 90% high achieving so they looked around uh the country at different schools that uh were really performing at very high levels um despite what we're often told with regard to or we often see with
regard to statistics and different reports and outcomes so to look at what some of those successful best practices and strategies are uh and to try and embed some of those and and a lot of them are already in place but for some of those that aren't if we can refine
those and grow them and embed them even further great this last uh this third one on this particular slide Google Keep Google Keep i had never heard of Google Keep before but it's right within the Google suite and I had the opportunity to see another administrator in a
different district use this very effectively it's very powerful in being able to capture images of artifacts from within classrooms and provide notes within real time and get those in a very user-friendly and timely manner uh to those individuals to reflect on that
feedback whether it's for commendations purposes or something where you're asking questions or you're making suggestions aside from more formal lengthier observations and evaluations it's a chance to sort of have ongoing dialogue and discussion in a little bit
less formal way also within the teaching and learning goal uh as Mrs man Freddy had mentioned we've been working on not only our administrative learning walks but also the teacher learning walks both have been very helpful in terms of helping us
to reflect on what we do to look at uh where we can make adjustments or where we can affirm what we know is working we also got a great response on our teacher learning walks we had three teachers last year participate we've had three this year and they'd like to embed
that into our plan as well going forward so if we have one formally scheduled through the district uh we may also add one or two more in-house teacher learning walks to mimic that procedure and also mimic sort of the benefits of
that and grow the number of people who are able to participate in that because if we we have three a year it's it's not really what folks want they want to be able to be a part of that so it's great to have that perspective and and and get into those different
classrooms so within K to5 one of the thing preK to five I should say by the way now we have uh had a great experience this year with our prek classroom over at Man Elementary School so we're very happy to have them with us but for our pre preK to five students
one of the things within this plan that we're looking at is we've put a tremendous amount of time into what students are doing in those small groups or one-on-one when working with an adult one of the things that we want to try and take a critical look at we've done some of this but we want to do more of
it is the quality of task construction for students working away from an adult so if you have a 90minute or you know a 2-hour literacy block there's a good amount of time where there are students working away from an adult and and always looking to refine and reflect
upon what those tasks are when you're working away from an adult just to make sure we're maximizing the impact of those and then also looking at available data as well there and trying to make connections in that data as we're always trying to do so that's goal area one
goal area too is around social emotional uh wellness uh we are I I mentioned we had the opportunity to to tour several of us had an opportunity to tour a school in another district these first two practices came out of that visit uh the morning gather they actually gather
every sing they gather outside almost every single day of the entire school year we're not going to do that uh but we are going to pilot uh something where we're able to come together as a whole school uh maybe a certain day each week uh to be able to come together as a
community as part of our opening activities for the day i don't think it's something where we want it to be lengthy i don't think we want it to be every day but it's something that we're looking at to build that sense of community and to help further um drive home some of those important messages
that we're trying to in instill in our students the the shoutouts are something where basically it's public recognition for students uh for staff uh through those gatherings whether it's at a pride assembly or a morning gather or over the intercoms having a mechanism in place
where we're doing that on an ongoing basis uh in some sort of a regular way uh to recognize folks then as I mentioned our pride assemblies i mentioned that earlier and the other thing that I'm thrilled to say is we are now um
the last elementary school has been able to add an adjustment counselor so we're thrilled to be able to have an adjustment counselor she came on in the fall at Manet Elementary and we are delighted to have her uh with us she's added tremend the the happiest person in
the building to see her arrival obviously is our school psychologist because now there are two people providing a lot of those important supports so also under social emotional wellness we work very closely as a team our school psychologist our guidance
counselor our school nurse myself our attendance officer to talk and try to look um at some of the root causes of different behaviors we might be seeing or chronic absenteeism or difficulties a student might be having so we can sort of address those on an individual
student level rather than talking about them in a more of a a general sense as groups of students student voice seeking to embed opportunities for student voice in a range of ways that we've talked about throughout the school and then also looking through a UDL lens a universal
design for learning lens what what we do there is we try to look at our physical spaces in particular to say how can we be as proactive as possible in designing those spaces and thinking about the considerations proactively rather than saying oh we see someone struggling with
this let's consider intervening that's more of a reactive and that's better than nothing but we're trying to get in front of as many things as we can uh the health the health curriculum uh delivered by our health teacher is something that has been a you know a
real benefit to us within the area of social emotional wellness and uh instilling a lot of really important messages within those lessons on a regular basis and then followed up on and driven home by classroom teachers as well emergency preparedness uh we talk a lot
about that at the elementary level in our meetings or I comes up and and and people become very anxious when you have these conversations as staff around how can we make sure that we're practicing for emergency preparedness drills and talking about these things uh and
practicing certain things with students without having them become um unnecessarily anxious right we try to handle those things in the best way possible and we recently had a great drill where the police came over and uh it was a it was a great opportunity for
us to practice um some emergency preparedness without having students um feel overly stressed about that or anxious the officers actually came over with two therapy dogs too so that was a real treat for the students to be able to um see the dogs as the officers came
through after the drill had concluded goal area three our our final our final uh goal areas around community engagement looking again at that chronic absenteeism that's a big part of community engagement family and community engagement is to getting to
the why when someone's struggling and particular if we're looking at a pattern over multiple years in any given year there may be something where the flu is just you know wiped out a family multiple times throughout the course of the year or a number of different occasions but when we're seeing patterns
over time we try to look to see where we can intervene effectively and meaningfully and helpful ways so our survey I talked about that already uh we have a small ML population uh multi- language learner population but um it is
growing very slowly we went from three up to I think it's five now but we anticipate that number growing and growing and growing over time so we're trying to make sure that we're building our proficiency because we just became a multil- language learner school last year so we want to make sure that people
are comfortable with the different tools the communication tools best practices uh working collaboratively with with our MLL teacher um to make sure that we're maximizing the resources we have so that as we grow in that subset of students it's something where we can make sure
that we're growing effectively and then the partnerships that we have for programs and events at Man Elementary we're very proud of our partners in the community whether it's through our community helper fair or our wellness fair
or family members coming in on an ongoing basis as mystery readers or whatever it may be there's a there's a lot going on a lot of night events a lot of things happening during the school day so we're very proud of that and proud of our partners uh that is all I had for specific goal areas happy to
answer any questions that you might have mr no I just want to compliment you and principal man Freddy for very precise informative um presentations um they they flowed really well uh a lot of
information so thank you for that and great metrics at the school in terms of academic performance keep it up thank you mr jackson I just wanted to say that uh I echo what Mr morgan said but also say that I got the chance to see you know
some of the things that you're doing over there and I was very impressed uh particularly with the social studies classes and the questions that they had to answer when we were there for civics weeks and it was far and away beyond what I was doing at fifth grade in in my
day so you know I think you're doing a great job over there thank you very much they've worked very hard on it yeah I was just going to add I was just absolutely blown away by the uh test scores i know test scores aren't everything but that's about as impressive as it gets and I also love
that despite all the accolades this school has gotten that you're still looking for you continue to look for more and more ways to you know step step it up and you know new creative ideas and int you know introduce new uh new concepts so thank you keep it out anybody else thanks a lot thank you very
much thank you Dr all right turning over to Dr campbell's superintendent report thank you brief update um successful town meeting this past Saturday um happy to say that the
approval of our FY26 proposed budget um article five which is a was overwhelmingly supported um overwhelmingly which was great and I want to thank Ed TV Mr graio for doing the voice over for the um the video that
was I told I told Mr gabrio uh earlier today that was what sealed the deal was the the video but no in all seriousness um very appreciative of our town meeting members i think um it demonstrated the faith that they have um in the school department with the votes for not only
the budget but our 17 capital projects which we were um this largest number of capital projects we've been awarded in in many many years i don't even know when we um have had this many so we're very appreciative of that um and article 5 which is a great opportunity for this
community to potentially have um an equitable state-of-the-art school um for our North Plymouth residents so really happy about that um speaking of MSBA completely unrelated to um this project the eligibility project but MSBA did
visit us uh last week they were here for the entire week this is something that they do periodically to evaluate school buildings across the Commonwealth um they give them a rating so they're looking at your maintenance plans they're looking at like the existing structures they're getting a lot of
information that is in our facilities needs assessment that we did back in 2021 and we had a meet with them a couple of times uh remotely to sort of fill out some information um and then they came on site visited all the schools except for Hedge because Hedge
is going through the feasibility um schematic design process but visited all of our schools um we provided them again a lot of information in advance and they did an on-site visit for at least a couple hours at each school so I just want to thank Mr derky for um the
amount of time that he spent with our the consultant from MS MSBA that week really took a lot of his time for for several several days i want to thank Dr blazdell for all the work that he did leading up to the visit and then our principles and head custodians because
it was time inensive but um provides the state with some important information that sort of helps the whole MSBA process um I think um it also demonstrates that our buildings are wellmaintained which is I think a reason why we were also considered eligible for
um a potential project because they want to see school systems that are um investing in their schools and maintaining them and not just letting them fall apart um but I want just want to thank those individuals for that
um had a we had the sixth annual ed TV student film festival i saw uh several people at um some of them were at this table um well over a hundred submissions can't believe it's the sixth year that they've already been doing that so there was some um photograph submissions and
and some very creative videos animation videos and and um realistic films that were short films that were done and just a remarkable remarkable job i had an opportunity to sort of critique them for for that process which is a little
stressful because you you know it's they they're they all just do a fantastic job but it was at the 1620 hotel this year so they were just really thankful for them supporting that they had a 3D uh 360 degree camera for the students and sort of the paparazzi spot where they
could take photos it was really really well done and again um sixth year just thank the EdTV staff for that just you know uh it's because of their willingness to to give kids these opportunities and to sort of inspire
them to to try these things that um it it just it's a wonderful wonderful wonderful event um and then just federal grant update we don't have like a final update but there is on March 14th we did hear that the Senate
approved a budget plan that keeps some of the federal funding grants in the current funding levels there's some that are uncertain uh there's a lot of uncertainty right now um as you may have read um regarding the US Department of Education um looking for uh state
education systems to make a declaration in terms of what they will and will not support um Massachusetts received an extension of that um from the US Department of Education today um so I think we have an
additional 10 days to respond to that so um because there's a lot of contingencies in terms of federal aid um and chapters title six four four excuse me flip that my head um title four um
you know compliance according to US Department of Education uh conditions so um more to come on that so I I do think by the next meeting I'll have a better idea of where we are as a as a commonwealth on that but just wanted to provide you um that update but that's
all I have this evening Mr pazo all right next up we have retirement announcements yes I can share with you four retirements uh two are recent and then two will be at the end of June uh our first one is Sandy Burgess uh she has spent the last 15 years in project
growth at Plymouth North High School as a PAR educator uh her last day was on April 1st jodie Armfield uh worked in our nurs's office as a health aid CNA uh CNA at Nathaniel Morton Elementary School uh where she has spent 18 years
uh servicing our students uh her last day was on the 28th of March uh then at the end of the school year we have two teachers uh John Leman science teacher at PCIS after 24 years of service and then Michael McGinness social studies
teacher at Plymouth South High School after 25 years of service for Plymouth Public Schools mr jackson we would like to thank Miss Burgess Miss Armfield Mr mcginness and Mr leman for their combined 82 years of service to
the district and wish them a happy retirement all right all right next up we have um committee member reports does anybody have any general uh reports they want to give the rest of the committee
m Jackson I missed you um I just want to say that um I also attended um the ATV um student film festival um as a parent and school committee member um it was great i think this was the sec second time um
attending um and uh it was a great location um I mean myriad of of different types of um films it's good to it's great to see even the progression as it relates to um grades um and uh
just a great testament in terms of um this program that we have at the school and knowing that other districts don't necessarily have that um so um had a very happy sixth grader um who attended
um and and actually won so I just want to you know just uh thankful for for these opportunities awesome yeah i'm sorry sorry I missed it this year Jackson um I too was able to attend the film festival and I echo everything that
Miss Haywood says it was really phenomenal they do a great job and it seems to get better every year um I also was able to go to the gala for the Plymouth Education Foundation who was also one of the supporters of the film festival with Miss Brian um also was
there and uh and that was great and it's they do a great job over there too and we're always super thankful for their support um and then I also attended the Mass Association of School Committees uh chairs dinner for um this district uh Mr
ano was traveling for business so I went in hisstead and there was a lot of really good conversation there's a lot of overlap with a lot of the things that we're experiencing right now and we had um Miss Badger Miss Linatra and Mr fernandez there and it was really nice
to be able to have some time to talk to them about some of our overlapping concerns and uh also thank you to Jason Frasier who's the legislative head there for putting that all together he does a really great job and um we're
really lucky to have him representing us excellent yes and thank you for representing us there all right anybody else have anything uh just wanted to share I've officially joined um my committees i met with PAC
Pilgrim Area Collaborative on April 3rd and that was a very productive meeting um and met with Nathaniel Morton as their liaison today and we'll be meeting with Manette on the 28th all right thank
you for stepping into those roles all right next up we have update on the master planning committee Mr morgan um yes so our next meeting is April 16th and the next public forum is scheduled for May 22nd at Plymouth South
Middle School excellent all right and then building committee we are meeting this Thursday all right all right u M Trophy appointments of essences and resignations yes i can share with you that we approved one
classified appointment uh we did receive and accept three resignations we also approved three parental leaves and five medical leaves thank you for that all right do we have any unfinished business anyone needs to bring up any new
business no move on to Dr campbell's superintendent goals thank you so uh much like last year I've put together two I hope you see as comprehensive sort of updates for the committee i know that we have I believe um two more meetings
before the formal evaluation needs to be done so um keeping in line with what I presented last year I presented um something very similar so the first document is sort of an annual update up until really April 1st um regarding the
goals so you'll see in that document I've put together a detailed narrative the goals are in there as well as um some of the data points um and hyperlinks to other documents that support sort of the evidence towards those goals the progress towards those
goals keep in mind some of these are goals that will continue for the remainder of this year and some of the metrics are endofear metrics but we have some surveys that have gone out and things that um that we have deadlines in there but I've provided as much detail
as I possibly could regarding uh those goals some of the initiatives that have taken place regarding those goals and again hyperlinks that will take you to documents that sit in a folder that that you can can view regarding um that
evidence um the second piece is the so for the superintendent's evaluation which I know the information gets sent to Mr pisano for sort of the compilation again similar to what I did last year trying to trying to um sort of help
capture sort of um what I believe are our collective sort of demonstration of our work towards those indicators i say we because this is not sort of just my work this is a work of of many um but you know looking at the evaluation which
is based on the 21 indicators of standards of effective administrative leadership and again that's linked in there so and you all have that the document that you um complete um as a as a committee um I've I've tried to go
through that standard by standard and indicator by indicator and provide not just a narrative but sort of sort of capture what I feel is some evidence um that demonstrates my leadership towards that
so for example for instructional you'll see a a detailed paragraph regarding that some evidence with links again that bring you to another folder where there's going to be more evidence regarding things in terms of instructional practice evaluation data
informed decision-m student learning etc so it's very lengthy um it's very comprehensive and and again if you have any questions happy to answer them and if you have any questions you know leading up to whatever needs to be done
for the purpose of of this process um happy to answer those as well yeah so um looking at uh timeline so the we are presenting Dr gamble his review at the May 5th meeting so backing up uh from
there we have to uh post it by uh May 1st in order for it to be that meeting it's customary to allow Dr gamble a few days prior to that uh to do a kind of uh pre-review which means that needs to be compiled by 428 i would like a week to compile everybody's uh inputs which
takes us to April 21st um which is two weeks from now so I'm asking for everyone to submit their uh inputs um in two weeks gives me a week to put it together and then a week to get it to Dr campbell and get it um posted so it's fairly tight timeline but like I said
there's a lot of uh steps here um for those that don't have the uh the blank template we can get that uh sent out it's you know I don't think it's changed uh in a while it's pretty much looks like the self assessment that uh uh Dr
campbell did other than being blank so we'll get that out for folks to uh fill in just to clarify yes I I don't know if anybody else needs them but I prefer to have a blank a blank uh Yeah and then and then I can complete that and bring
it to you at our meeting on the 21st do we have a meeting on the 21st we don't that's Yeah we we have a meeting on the 28th you need the week before that but then you need I know that's an arduous task so I I think you're going to need the time so if you could get that to us and Dr i don't know if anybody else needs but I I'm making a request of
there are u there are u 14 pages on your goals and 14 pages on the evaluation i'd like to have c I'd like to have a hard copy oh sure i can make that happen i'll come by your office and pick them up yeah I'll make sure that that's available keep in mind there are this electronic document is more than the 14
pages there are links that bring you to documents there's literally hundreds of Well I don't want components i know trying to trying to provide you as much information to I will I will do my best i'm going to give you a blinder i'll ask
my administrative assistant to print that off for you of course and anyone else that would prefer all right yeah also not the the blank format but yeah like I said everyone it is a tight timeline but like I said it is a um don't envy in the past having uh
uh my predecessors do the compilation so like I said I'm going to be spending my spring break doing that if you guys can do your pieces in two weeks Miss Jackson for the um newer members they may also need the original goals that we
um because they weren't here in May when the when that was sent out the the original document yeah the blank goals i think Miss Miss Shaw missed that too right because that was done before you were elected okay the form itself the
blank form yeah just so they have something to compare it to is what I'm thinking yep yep we got that sent out all right uh next up we have Massachusetts school choice participation
yes thank you very much so this is an annual occurrence um so as you know um under Mass General Law Chapter 76 section 12B to be specific there's an interd district school choice program it's been put in place by the
Commonwealth since 1991 which allows families to enroll their children in a school district other than the one that they reside in um unless a school committee votes to withdraw from it prior to June 1st so this is an annual thing that we bring before you right
around this time for consideration um after you know really our consideration in terms of budget constraints and and just cap capacity issues in certain locations of course not all locations um it would be my recommendation to
withdraw from the um school choice provision that I'll move that recommendation as second show up i gotta keep up got to find the tab excuse me um it was moved by Dr sorenson seconded
by Miss Bryant okay that was a little delay there that's up all right that passes unanimously as it has in the past thank you so we'll make sure to submit that um indication to the state tomorrow thank you thank you for
that where are we next now we're up to the consent agenda does anybody have anything they would like to uh adjust or remove all right we have a motion i'll make a motion to approve the
consent agenda as presented thank you M morgan and we have a second for Miss Jackson all right all right that concludes our meeting i will call the April 7th meeting to close at 9:26 p.m
that's pretty good only four minutes late 6 minutes