So, why am I not getting into my All right, welcome everybody to the 2025 2026 uh school year. I will call the first meeting of the Plymouth School Committee to order to uh uh September
8th, 2025 at 700 p.m. All right. Please uh join me in the pledge of allegiance. I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands nationy
and justice for all. All right. Next, I will read our land acknowledgement. We acknowledge that we are meeting on the unseated ancestral homeland of indigenous people whose enduring presence we humbly recognize. We honor the Wanoak people as the original stewards of the and the Herring Pond Wampao as a surviving tribe
indigenous to these lands. In our commitment to lifelong learning, we acknowledge historical injustices to the native people of this land and vow to educate ourselves, our community, and our students on the first peoples and the hardships they endured. We offer this as a small but essential step towards building a culture of respect,
truth, and accountability. All right. And next up, we have a moment of silence. Um, before we take a moment of silence this evening, we would like to recognize the passing of a beloved member of the Plymouth Public Schools community. Sharon Francer served as our
served our district with with dedication and passion from September 1st, 1977 until her retirement on June 30th, 2012. As a music music educator, accompanist, and mentor, Sharon brought joy, creativity, and deep commitment to her students and colleagues for 35 years.
After retiring, she continued to support our schools by volunteering at countless performances for the visual and performing arts department. A true testament to her enduring love for the arts and for our students. Sharon was more than an educator. She was a vibrant presence whose infectious laugh, generous spirit, and unwavering
positivity left a lasting impact on everyone she met. She will be deeply missed by the Plymouth Public Schools community and by all who had the privilege to know her. Please join me now in a moment of silence in memory of Sharon Francer. Thank you. All right. Next, uh, uh, comments from
the community members. I see no one, uh, speaking today, so we will move on. Next up, we have our student representatives for this school year. First up from Plymouth North High School, we have uh, Miss Anne King. Good evening, everybody. Um, coming up at Plymouth North, open house for the
high school will be held Wednesday, September I'm sorry, I believe that says Wednesday the 24th from um 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. Parents and guardians are invited to attend to follow their students schedules and meet with their child's teacher. We are offering the PSAT during
the fall during the school day. If you are interested in taking the PSAT, please check your email for instructions on how to sign up. The deadline to register is Friday, September 12th. At Plymouth North, it is highly encouraged to all students to be involved with the various club, sports,
and activities it offers. Parents or students can check the announcements on our school website for when any of the dozens of our clubs meet. Meetings are starting over the next few weeks after school or during Kwalk. Plymouth North High School will be hosting college visits during all four lunches or during
Kwalk starting this week. These visits are for students to speak with the representative from the college or university in order to learn more about what each has to offer. A full listing of the visiting colleges, universities, and the armed services can be found on the Plymouth North website.
Our athletics are off to a great start. Both boys and girls soccer have had shutout wins already, and football had a big win on Friday. The Plymouth North High School varsity homecoming game will be held on Thursday, October 2nd at 700 p.m. Following the big game will be our
homecoming dance on Friday, October 3rd from 6:30 to 10:00 p.m. Homecoming ticket sales are on sale now for $10 until September 13th, and regular ticket price will start on September 14th and will go through the 30th. Plymouth North High School picture day will take place
on Wednesday, September 24th and Thursday, September 25th during English class. Parents and members of the class of 2026 can visit the Plymouth North website or view the daily bulletin for important up-to-date yearbook deadlines and information. Late buses will begin
tomorrow. Buses will depart from PNHS around 4:05 p.m. on Tuesdays and Thursdays. This is a great opportunity to get extra help, join a club or activity or cheer on a sporting event. Our principal, Mr. Parcel, offers a great parent page that provides information on what is happening at
North. This is a great way to stay current on all things North. It can also be found on the Facebook page as well as our website. We encourage all families to follow us on Facebook and utilize our website for all things North. Thank you. Thank you, Shay.
Um, hi, my name is Shayen. I'm a senior at Pum South High School. So far, PSHs has had a busy but really good start to the school year. Sports teams have started their games and we're going to be holding a grade nine club fair on September 14 on September 24th to help
share more opportunities with our freshmen. All grades had class assemblies in their first few days of school. Homecoming is in October this year, so a little later. It's Thursday. Oh, oops. That's October 18th. And tickets will be in advance. Open house
is also approaching for families. It's Thursday, September 25th at 6:30 p.m. Lots of dates. PSHs will be celebrating Going Gold the week of the 22nd. We look forward to continuing our strong tradition to support this amazing cause. As a reminder, if students are driving
to school, they do need to purchase a parking pass in the main office. Juniors who would like to take the SAT in October during school, the exam is free of charge, but you do need to register by the end of the day this Friday, September 12th. Seniors, the final day to purchase Oktoberfest tickets and
shirts is this Thursday, the 11th. October Fest is October 3rd. Picture day is approaching quickly. It's going to be on September 23rd. And the final day for students to add or drop classes is this Thursday, September 11th. Thank you. All right. Thank you both. Do you have
any questions for our high school reps? All right. Thank you again. All right. Next up, we continue our agenda. We have an out of town overnight uh uh field trip request. We have Mr. Mike Cable from the uh VPA department.
Hello. Hi everyone. Uh happy new year. Uh so uh I'm just here to uh follow up on our request uh for Plymouth North High School uh field trip to PPAC Province Performing Arts Center on
November 9th to see Hadestown uh run by uh Dave Gman there. We have uh hope to have about 50 tickets and invite students uh from the um visual and performing arts department amongst others to uh attend the trip. Uh it's a
Sunday matinea uh not overnight uh no other stops just to go down and uh see the see the performance and come back and as you know they uh they put on Hades Town last year um so I think the interest will be quite high.
Do we have guys have any questions questions? I have no one. I have one. Um I think you kind of addressed um is it is this intended only for students in the VP department or would it be open to No, it it'll be open. We'll start we'll
start with uh you know uh the Plymouth North players uh and then see how many tickets we get. It really depends on uh once this is approved, we'll we'll purchase tickets and then see the demand. But uh once that's met, it'll be open. Yeah.
I'm sure there's students outside of the great players that would enjoy. Yeah, we would love that to happen. Absolutely. All right. Yeah, I would definitely uh support that. All right. Any other questions? No. All right. Do we have a motion?
I move that we approve the North House High School Proidence Rhode Island. I second. All right. We have a motion in a second. Are we ready to vote online? All right.
Awesome. Thanks very much. Thank you also for uh having a moment of silence for uh Miss Sharon France. That was uh meant a lot and and made at least two people cry. So really appreciate the acknowledgement. Uh my course teacher was she she was she was amazing amazing
human. and she affected a lot of young people. So, yeah, we we do appreciate the moment. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. C. All right, we will keep moving on. All right, next on our agenda is that
transportation study is that right? Yes. Thank you, Mr. Pazano. So the um kind of sort of circling back to where we left off in our remote meeting that was disrupted. Uh I think I believe we went through the
transportation studies. We just we talked about the the content in there. Uh Dr. Blazell was talking about um sort of that threshold that we would need to to hit in order for it to be fiscally advantageous. As you know, we have
another we have an opportunity to to go out for a bid. It's one thing that we talked about is um going out a year early, see where those bids come in. We have some, you know, anecdotally, we have an idea of where they've come in last year, um it may be a good
opportunity to uh get ahead of it to see where those bids come in and then make a determination of the direction that we go in. Should those bids come in very high, I think our recommendation would be to get with the town and have a conversation about how we can move
forward with um a transition of um service in that regard. Another thing I think that we should look at um in the near future is um how we can look at our um our our vans and some of the internal
transportation and and so forth that we do. Um that's something that um while the buses is something that's sort of all ornone that we would need to do, I think we could slowly work towards uh taking over the ancreased fleet in terms
of vans and doing some of those transportations to bring those costs down in addition to uh cost sharing or um you know charging other districts to sort of take you know to share the ride to to certain communities if we were to to own those
vans. So, it's something that we would like to consider. Anything else to add to that, Dr. Buzzel? No, I think I think you've really covered it. I think really if you were looking at the one of the not the transportation study done by MABT, um on page 42, it kind of lays out the cost
difference piece and I think that's kind of a good basis in regards to what we're looking for. Um, but I really think going out to bid at this point in time is a good first step and that will help answer a lot of questions to be honest with you because taking over
transportation is is a huge undertaking. It it's not something that it's not an easy task. I mean, it it's from purchasing purchasing buses or leasing buses, making sure maintenance is there, um,
hiring a whole new staff, and then the human resources aspect that goes along with that. Um, and then there's so many other pieces to it. So, I I I think going out to bid will give us the most information fi financially whether or not it make which direction it really
heads makes sense to go. You have any questions for Miss Jackson? Um, I think that totally makes sense. I think we don't really know what we're working with until we have numbers in front of us, you know, when it comes to what people are going to put
out there as a bid. Um, the only question that I had was, um, I know you had talked about speaking to other districts that had taken over. Did that happen or were you going to wait and see what the they came back with or um you know
I've talked to a few. Okay. Um Carver's one. Carver is much smaller than us. Yeah. So it's it it's not apples to apples. Um I had a a brief conversation with Worcester. Um but I really want to get out there and visit them and see.
Um but I'd hope to do that this fall. I mean, honestly, it seems like a huge undertaking, you know, much like the, you know, switching over food services to something completely different. So, I'd be really thoughtful in moving to a different thing, you know, unless the
money was obviously in favor of moving and switching because that would be like a whole another position for you. We completely agree. Yep.
So um again I think during the original presentation of the transportation study I thought it was extremely comprehensive. I was really excited to see there weren't any um details that I felt were missed or even misinformed.
Um, so I think from an approach perspective, we're going along the right steps to be able to make the informed decision that we need because I agree with uh, Miss Jackson that in in regards
to taking this on, it's like a another whole um, job. Um, so I again appreciate it. And to the point of Worcester versus Carver, I see the value in definitely
seeing um the benefits or the nuances that Worcester has experienced with this because as we know, Plymouth is a completely different animal. So I look forward to hearing more. Mr. Smart Jills. Thank you. Um
so taking into account the the significance of uh you know the recommendation that if we brought it in house what type of venture it would be. Um I think though when we go out to bid we we have to be ready to say that we're
prepared to do it because of the cost escalation and it's almost a near monopoly when you go out to bid. Let's be honest. And and I think it wouldn't hurt if there was some press ticket out there that there's communities thinking of forming a
collaborative to bring it in house. So no matter what the challenge is, they'll undertake it. Cuz guess what? Going up 50% or whatever points there are on the contract shouldn't just be a fade or complete. We shouldn't have to say we
got to do it. Um, so if we go out to bid early, I agree that's the time to start, you know, not playing our hand, but as that's going out, we should be running a parallel track to say what if. I mean, what if it is insurmountable the
next contract, right? Where we say, hey, you've doubled the cost here. I mean, we created a a sped transportation department in Norwood. All right, that's a microcosm of what this community would have to do just on the scale of of the region. But businesses do scale, right?
And you could look you could look at some other models and say, is there a community willing to share? Because we're not the only ones in this boat. Everyone else whose contracts are up for bid. We we're going to be facing some cost increase. And I I just think, you
know, going out to bid though with, you know, the the caveat that the committee, although I I agree completely, it is an undertaking, but we wouldn't shy away because we're kind of showing our hand if we if we say, "Hey, look, yeah, we'll
accept, you know, the price points." Um, you know, but doing it early is definitely a good, you know, jump on this process. I mean it. But I was looking at some of the figures of some folks who just got the sticker shock in other communities most recently and
we're not talking like a 5% jump. We're talking ridiculous amounts that you know there's no relief in sight because once you sign that contract you're saying well in three more years x amount I mean we got to take a stand at some point. Um
so I just think I don't know how we should think of some ways that it's not a bluff. We should be thinking of ways to talk to other communities about a collaborative and stringing together some relationships and say, "Hey, where can you share services?" It's not ideal,
but you could do it, you know. So, I I just I just think that should be known as sort of the pulse of the committee where I I respect that we an undertaking like that is huge. You're right. But sometimes you got to do things like that
if you're going to go broke in the process of signing a contract. So yeah. No, I agree. I think just following that, I think the one thing we need to be as part of that preparation is knowing where our
um what our, you know, threshold is. you know, if they come back and it's whatever $600, $700, whatever that is, and you know, do we, you know, is does our cost need to be 5% less, 10% less, 50, you know, there's got to be some threshold. But we know, hey, this
is if it's more than say 20% different, you know, we're ready to take it in house. So, and and honestly not not publishing those numbers is probably the right approach for now, but knowing we should start thinking about that so we know where is that break point where it just doesn't make sense, you know.
But yeah, I I said great approach. I echo my colleagues. Yeah, Miss Jackson. Um maybe having that conversation if we have some more information by the time we have our retreat would be a good idea to talk about like what our threshold is
or like put together some more ideas that would be helpful for Dr. Stell when he is having conversations with people about where we're at with that would be helpful. It's a excellent idea and I no problem any questions you may
have. So when I go to visit Worcester and have a conversation, feel free to email me questions that you may have um because that the more questions I have, different perspectives, I think will really help that conversation when I have with them. I think that's a Oh, go ahead. Sorry. No, I was just going to say I think that's a
much more appropriate district to be looking at when it comes to size and like roots and what we'd really be taking on. Yeah. Is that when's that schedule for? What's your plan? I don't have a schedule. Okay. But I would say that I'll probably look at it
early October to have that conversation. Thank you. All right. Anything else on transportation? If not, thank Yeah, it's great. Great report. Thank you. All right. Next up, uh summer capital uh projects update now that summer's
wrapped up. Yes, I think this is where we left off at our last meeting. So, uh a lot of capital projects. very appreciative of our town meeting members uh this community for um really providing us uh a and approving a number of projects for
us. Believe over $9 million in capital projects if I'm not mistaken. So um as you can imagine um the the challenge with and Dr. Blazelle will go through this kind of give you a status on some of these. The challenge with um Springtown meeting and then getting bids
is the timing of that. So by the time everything is is wrapped up, it's very challenging to get some of the sum summer projects, particularly the larger ones done within the first summer, but we do have the funds in hand to do many of those come the following year. So Dr.
Blazelle will sort of give you an idea of um the projects that are um in the works and we've completed and ones that we'll be doing over the course of this school year. Um, in the agenda tonight, there is a link um that was back from August and
pretty much we're in the same same status really in regards to all most of those projects. Um, districtwide HVAC repairs is going to be an ongoing process through an entire year. Um, there's a lot of HVAC needs in this district and that that's something that our facilities director is going to put
into capital every year is just a a dollar amount because the list is long and we would need more money than the town has available. So, if we can kind of look at it as a like a $500,000 mark every year, we we'll be able to chip away with at it. Um,
and then one of the big issue, big events we had this summer was man elementary school rubber roof. Um, it's just the front of that building. Um, and that's still in progress because we're still waiting on windows. Um, those are backorded till late November, early December, we're
hoping. Um, is that what we're being told right now. Um the fire alarm system upgrade is basically ready to go. We just can't do that during the um school year. That might be something we do during second shift or most likely waiting till the the holiday break. Um
maintenance garage that looks a lot better down there behind South High School behind the tennis courts. Um that building had not really never really had really any improvements. Um and so they worked on that. Even when the South High School was rebuilt, that was that building was not touched. So that that
really was working at that. Um the so soccer turf, football turf replacement. Um we have ordered the turf and then we're going to go out to bid um later this year to for to hopefully have an installation next summer. Um and
trying to get it in between spring sports ending and fall sports starting. Um so kind of a real tight time line there. Um PCIs parking lot. If you've driven over there, you'll see that it looks absolutely beautiful. Um we do have some punch list items and some painting that do remain. So that's
almost done. Um districtwide roof assessment and repairs. Um he's done some scans of some of our roofs um to kind of see what shape some of them are in and whether or not we could go through um a restoration process versus
a re basically a whole re-roofing. So some schools have been identified that that would be a re re restoration process rather than the whole process. So, um, which is good news to us because it actually saves some money for the the town and, um, at a much less cost, but
gives us still about a 20-y year extended life on some of those. Um, school bus van purchase are done. Um, the tractor for federal furnace is done. Um, we're still working on the Plymouth North main entry drain installation. That's actually with an architect um to
really get that designed and done correctly. If you we're still working on quotes for this building. Um, if you look, there's a lot of work that needs to be done on on some some trim work. There see some holes around the building and the Koopa needs to be repainted as well. So, we're working on quotes for
those. Um, West Elementary School, the tennis and baseball court is is done. If you drive by there, it looks really, really great. Um, South Elementary School, the final asphalt culting coating of the side parking lot is done. Um, we did receive some quotes for the stairwell renovations. again, we just
couldn't get it done this summer, so we'll be trying to do that throughout the year and breaking that up. Um, the generator we'll probably be looking at later this year. Um, and the the RTUs at the HVAC at South Elementary School, we're still working on um getting the
design with that. Um, and we're trying to see if we can work in some utility um energy incentives on that project, too. So, um, the issue with that building is they're all custom units currently. So, it's not necessarily something you can just do a remove and replace. It's it's
a lot more complicated of a process. So, that's where we are right now. And we're actually going to be starting the FY27 capital request soon. Those are due in a couple weeks. So, those we will bring to you, I think next meeting, this the 22nd. We'll bring you that list of what we'll
propose the town meeting. Any questions? No. Busy summer. Appreciate the update. All right, we will move on. Next up is the uh adult school lunch and breakfast
price uh update. Me again. Um so as you know with um all the events that have happened with the cafeteria and food service department um we've undergone an audit um for internal controls. Um we've looked at some some
um review items from previous years that we've we've we've found and one of the items was really in regards to the adult meal prices. Um, back in 2022, they would determine that those prices were too low. And at that time, um, they should have been about $4.70 for an
adult for lunch. Um, at that time, we were charging $4. Today, we are still charging $4. Um, so you'll see the when you go through the document, you'll see some of the items. You'll see a screenshot of in regards to um what we were cited for at that moment in time.
And then on the second page, um what it does is it looks like how to calculate the cost of a an adult meals lunch. Um and this is actually using um last year's numbers. At the time when I produced this, um the numbers for this year weren't available. Um so at that
point in time, the Department of Ed said we should have been charging approximately $5.28 for an adult lunch. Um the food service program cannot cannot um fund adult meals. It can only fund and support
meals for students, lunch and breakfast for students. It cannot have any cut whatsoever in regards to adult meals. Um, if we were to continue the practice of keeping our lunches too low, the Department of Ed can turn around and say the budget owes school lunch revolving
money to make up that difference in price. Um, so right now what I'm doing is recommending that we uh increase this the adult lunch prices to $6. I'm hoping that would get us through this year and next year. I'm hoping. That's my hope.
Um and then also looking at breakfast rates um which are currently $2, um per meal and bringing that up to $4. Um and again, an estimated breakfast for an adult should be at least $312. So um again, recommending $4 for adult
breakfast, $6 for adult lunch effective immediately if it was a positive vote this evening. First I would just share I think based on the type of food that's being served, the
quality of the food, um it's it's honestly very reasonable the increase based on just what we're seeing, you know, locally for individuals not even talking about purchasing making purchasing
um meals out. Um, so I I think it's a great proposal. It's equitable and fair and based on um the documentation that you provided, it totally makes sense. That's right. Smart jealous.
I think the the optics of it given what just happened with the food services department don't look great, right? because you get people who say, "Well, our adult lunch is going up because of some impropriy from one person overseeing a department." That's the realistic aspect
of it. In 2022, when this recommendation was made uh by Desi, acting upon it then, yeah, would have been reasonable. Um, but now I think as a precursor to the announcement, we should
say since we didn't act upon it in 2022, that was three years of keeping the price consistent. All right, but let's not get past ourselves and say the optics don't look good, right? Because of what people I can see someone say, well, you're raising our
prices because something happened in the department. I'm not saying the quality I think they're great prices. But I just think the timing of it, it's going to fall on you. Um, yeah. But but I I would to to play the flip side of the coin here say based on the
documentation that's being provided of a finding that should have been taken care of during the tenure of the person that we're in the situation that we're currently in. That's a reflection on them. Was it their decision to raise
prices or not? That prior administrator would would be able to under my assumption be able to take the corrective action bring it to the attention of administration and make the
recommendation as well. I think I I can agree from an optic standpoint, but I think based on the evidence and the detail that staff are showing, I it's it only makes sense in our current environment. I know for myself to
purchase a salad ingredients is way more than $6, never mind to have it. You can't you can't get this coffee for under Exactly. But my my point is in did we know about this in 2022? If you look at the supporting
documentation, it's there as a corrective action finding. So I just I just want to highlight that for you to ensure that we're balancing how we're reacting to the
situation and the facts that administration is bringing forward. Dr. Campbell. So to your question Mr. Sama Ellis um while that finding was brought to the attention of the former director uh it was never brought forward
to central administration to make a recommendation which is very critical that explains a lot. Dr. Blazelle ident you know came across this information and wanted to act on it accordingly because that information had never been shared even with the auditors
that hadn't been shared with central administration. it only went to the one particular person which is a which is a problem in and of itself. Um so hence the recommendation tonight to try to correct something that should have been corrected or would have been corrected by administration a couple of years ago if you had known about it. Okay.
Absolutely. That's fair. And I think this is something that we have to do annually to be honest with you. This is something that I think that we would want to present to you annually. Um I do need to tell I do need to say that we need to review student lunch prices as well. Um, and that I'll
probably be proposing in the next couple meetings. Second meals, not your first meal. The second meal. The first meal is always free. It's the second meal. Um, and again, those haven't risen and I can't tell you how long either. Um, but tonight we're focused on adults. I'll bring student later. And it's always
second meal. Um, but this is something that I think needs to be reviewed annually going forward. Yeah. Uh, Dr. you you you made a point that the uh the we can't be subsidizing the cost of the adult meals. Are we at risk of owing
anything back because we've been doing this for three years? Okay. Yes, we are. How would that risk manifest itself? Um basically the way you would look at it is the department of ed would look at the number of meals that have been
served to adults. then look at the price in which we've charged and what the minimum should be. Right now, like I said, it's $5.28. So, they look at in essence $1.28 per meal times however and however they decide to go back. And I don't know how far they would honestly
and truly go back. So, we need to be ready for that bill at some point. Miss Bryant. Oh, yeah. No, just a quick question. Um, what percentage of this U meals are adult meals? I don't have that information to tell
you the truth. It's basically staff, right? Yes. Yeah. I think you're going to see it more mostly at the secondary schools to be honest. Yeah. Um I mean, yeah, let's get ahead of it. Keep our fingers crossed we don't get back charged and the optics are
going to be hard to avoid. I don't think we not do this at this point just because of that. and and we add the um additional facts that wasn't brought to the administration's attention by the former director, you know, and that'll explain why no
action was taken sooner. But yeah, typically when we have um audits or you know or independent reviews that come from the department, that information is shared with central administration. There's been no there was nothing that was sent to us
regarding that you know coordinated program review tiered focus monitoring that were a part of that process. Uh in this case the information only went to the food service department and go sorry and this will be corrected moving forward with all of the changes just to
have on record for certain. Yeah I think Dr. Blazley you said you think they can maybe do this annually as a at least assess Yeah. Um, I was going to bring it, but to Mr. Morgan's point, we should at least do some back of the envelope know what our potential
exposure is, so we're not surprised. So, all right. Any other questions or discussion on this? All right. I believe this is an action item. So, do we have a motion, Mr. Morgan? I'd like to make a motion to increase the adult school lunch price to
$6 and an adult breakfast price to $4 for the 2025 2026 school year. Mr. Morgan moves. Do we have a second? M. Jackson seconds. All right. All right. And that passes unanimous.
Thank you everyone. All right, next up we have our 2025 2026 school committee presentation schedule. Dr. Campbell. Yes, thank you. So this is um just for yourformational purposes. This is the sort of calendar for presentations
whether it's a school improvement plan, program update, uh go draft goals, etc. uh our budget workshop. So this is something that we do on an annual basis. If you see anything missing from this that you feel should be there, please let let us know. But we've tried to
carry over a very consistent uh format to to years past. Any questions? Can I make a statement? Hopefully I I hope it doesn't appear rude, but can we just ask as the presentations are being
prepared that presenters stick to the time frame there? There's been within my time here, some take a lot more real estate than others. And so I think that as just individual goals, it's very important that we're
just mindful uh of the time that we put in. It's it's great, but we don't necessarily need to do every single slide and all the details. I think everyone will No, I think everyone will support that statement. I know I know Dr. Rogers does warn people, but yeah, I think that that's worth reiterating.
We will reinforce that message. I will say the things that need to be said. Yes. No, it's important. I think there's a lot of I think we have people that get excited to come forward, but it can it can also be said in a in a shorter amount of time sometimes. Yes. I know I can be a little and I will try to do the same tonight. Yes,
my my piece I can get a little verbose too. The only thing that jumped out I just want to add one question. It doesn't need to be chang south so early in the year south high school and north in the spring. It seems
like you know it's it's so everything else like flows really well. Yeah. years ago, we used to do all the school improvement plans in the last couple of months of school and it was talk about a short amount of time. So we had people that were getting five minutes and we were going through it. So
we redistributed them over the year so that the school councils had a full year to really work on that. So what consequently is we had different months during the year where they fell. So, it's in it's an effort to give them time
to kind of get with their school council. So, um sort of their their calendar year starts for their school improvement plans at that point. If that makes any sense. Well, that's that's that's asking why South is so early in the year because
everyone else is is in that um you know March and Beyond time frame and it has South High School is October 6th which means awfully early for a to that point. Mr. Pisano, is there an opportunity and please no one
hate me for saying this to flip facilities and PSHs because I'm just thinking in regards to going into budget workshop. It may be very helpful to understand some of the facility needs sooner than later.
Yeah, that's I don't know if there was logic behind it because that one seemed like an outlier where all the other schools are in the spring to to your which match what you were stating, Dr. gamble. So, I don't know if South had requested them be that early. Yeah. Or like
Yeah. I don't know if it was a It was definitely wasn't a request. I think the only request was to keep the school the vocational and the athletics together. So, you kind of get the whole picture of the entire school community. The date um there wasn't a request for that date.
It's just something that's been carried over for for some time. If they're ready, it just seems awfully early. So, that's the only thing that jumped out at me. I didn't necessarily have a jumped out as an outlier. I hear you, Miss Bryant. The facilities to see if we could do it a little bit earlier. Is that um
Yeah, I'm just thinking in regards to the presentation we had a short time ago of going over those capital projects that happened prior to and then being able to speak about the ones that are upcoming. and then from a facilities lens being very intentional in the the
stuff that they're um sharing during their presentation. I think it'll help for uh the committee to be well informed as we go into the budget workshop, but also leave enough room to ask questions or look for additional materials if that
was necessary. So that's the only reason I make the suggestion. Great suggestion. All right. Do three of you have any other? That's too much. So the public hearing precedes some of the improvement plans
like is that it always does. Yeah, that's what I was explain. I mean so some people come in before and they tell you what they need for their improvement plans and they give you an update and then we do a budget work. So the budget presentation for FY27 will happen on
December 1st. We we schedule three nights in a row in the event that we need more time. In my 17 years, we've never gone over one one night. It's just But be prepared, right? The following meeting, we open with the public hearing to to for the public. So,
if they have any questions or comments regarding uh the proposed budget, we do we do it then close hearing and school committee will vote on the proposed budget. Okay. All right. Anything else?
All right. We're cruising along. All right. Next up, uh, Dr. Campbell, superintendent, uh, draft goals for the 2025 2026 school year. Thank you very much. And we'll put the presentation up and I will try to be concise uh, and comprehensive at the same time.
Appreciate it. I I do know sometimes I can go a little bit I can go a little bit long. Um, so again, this evening I present a draft of my goals for the 2526 school year. uh just really proud of this district and
the things that we do. So um in keeping uh consistent with last prior years, my my goals for this year are rooted in the priorities in the 202427 strategic plan, our charting the course strategic plan, which we have another
year left on after this year. Um hard to believe we're already there. See if this works. If you could go to the next slide. It's not working. Thank you. Uh so as I mentioned my goals are grounded in the uh 2427 strategic plan. The goals
outlined in the document that you have. So the attachment is an electronic school board in its entirety but I'm going through the slides that reflect uh the draft goals. There are the four goals in the plan are um I believe practical but also aspirational as well.
uh with four focuses related to our strategic focuses. Our district operations, energy conservation, student transitions and transitioning uh and and one focused on developing a community uh volunteer program.
We can go to the next slide. Uh so again, these goals are not intended to operate in isolation this year. really they're really interdependent efforts that really are going to require close collaboration across levels of our district and our community in order to achieve them. So for example, uh the
launch of a district-wide volunteer program will depend on strong partnerships and effective communication. our energy conservation initiatives will succeed only if we collectively approach this uh as a shared responsibility. Student transition and improving that will
demand a lot of crosscoordination engagement with families. um working on our transparency of district operations is going to hinge on uh our inclusive communication strategies and ultimately uh our success depends on the streng the
strengths of our relationships and the shared purpose that we have as a community. Uh next slide please. So goal one is about transparent district operations. This is something that we've tried to work on in some shape of form
um over the our our years together as our team. So as superintendent, one of my core responsibilities I believe is to ensure that our district operations are transparent, inclusive, and aligned with the needs and priorities of our diverse community. So with goal one, I'm committed to deepening our public
understanding and trust by expanding our efforts to communicate effectively and engage meaningfully with stakeholders. So this goal focuses on establishing a consistent schedule of both educational forums that are accessible and informative but also um a a publication
a quarterly publication that will highlight district operations and key initiatives. Right? So within that goal some of the strategic actions that will assist if we go to the next slide sorry um some of the strategic actions are to conduct a stakeholder survey and set topic
priorities. I actually sent that out Sunday night and I've already received almost 800 responses which is great. I you know I actually accidentally sent it out yesterday. I meant to send it out today. So I feel that Mon Sundays might be a good time to send out
communications because I had 5,000 responses or reads uh within the first hour. um scheduling quarterly forums and publications as I mentioned uh distributing those newsletters and information uh translated printed digital uh recruiting speakers and
contributors to our public forums uh promoting it through our communication channel channels and then collecting feedback um for our forums as well as our publications on a regular basis to get feedback to see the impressions of our community and if that's been helpful
which is critically important So to the next slide please. So this chart and I have a chart in here for all of the goals and how do we measure success of those goals. So this chart provides a list of assessed outcomes, way to measure them and targets related to that outcome. So for example uh
holding the forums is a key action in goal one. You know we'll internally track that and and the goal is to have four by the end of June. Um bless you. uh communications in our forums, you know, emails um emails that are open,
social media engagement. So, really looking at um you know, having some measures for um identifying how successful those digital communications are and then getting feedback along the way through surveys um anecdotally um
from our publications and our quarterly forums. Any questions about goal one before I move on to goal two? Question. Um, I know we were talking I know you have in here analytics which I think is great. Do we currently know like what's
working and what's not working like where our percentages are at currently? Or have we ever had like some sort of like marketing specialist look at like what the district is doing now? we could be
doing better because I think we send out a lot of communication. Yes. On everything and we're extremely transparent. So, I appreciate the goal of transparency, but I already think you're extremely transparent. I think it's more about the effectiveness of how
we're reaching people. Yes. So, um we do get analytics in terms of reads, views, time on things. Um, so we could I could actually and we've used that before some of the measures that I showed last year for some of my goals. I think I use some of like the
media the um engagements with certain things. Uh, so depending on the um what the publication is like for example s'more, I can tell you exactly how many people have opened the s'mores, where they're located, multiple countries, how
how much time they spent in that. So that's something that and that's I like to use that because it it immediately translates. So it's it's it's very accessible. So that's something that um we've looked at. We also look at uh when's the best time to send things. So
you may notice that um our ed TV staff may send things out at certain times of the day. Uh 9:00 a.m. is a big time. 300 p.m. I that's that's why I said I mistakenly sent it out on Sunday and was surprised by the number of engagements that I got. So Sunday might be a good
time. So these are things I think we need to to look at too and continue to reflect on when are people people opening, when do we get the best response, and then try to target it that way. So it's it's pretty it's pretty cyclical. we need to to look at that and
that's something that um I know with like Libby and our ed TV staff we continue to look at that. I was thinking it was more I think realistically it's more about focusing our efforts on where we're most effectively reaching people rather than I mean you're already transparent. I
don't think you can be any more transparent than you are right now and I appreciate that. And I think also um one thing that's come I can tell you off the top of my head from the survey so far again over almost 800 surveys as of this afternoon were uh completed.
Overwhelmingly over 70% of people want if there's a forum they want it virtual okay about access. So that's something that we've had good success with. I know that Plymouth Family Network does them for incoming kindergarten and they get a lot of families that way because you don't
have to make arrangements in childare. Uh we're a very large district. Where is it located? You know, so it's either we find success with face-toface events in your home school. If we're doing something district-wide, it seems the virtual events um have greater attendance. We've done some coffee forms
here, as you know, and we get the same people that come to it, but we don't get a large audience. So, um I think we'll try a mix though to see which is best, but um over 70% are looking for virtual options as well. Yeah, thank you.
Welcome. The only question I had similar, Mis, but on these ones where we're looking at percentages or specific quantity, I' I'd want to see what where we currently are because I think it's more important that we show forward progress than hit a
number. If we're currently at a thousand, are we trying to get to 50 or whatever, you know? So, I think without knowing where we currently are, these these metrics don't mean a lot to me. So, I'd rather just like we Yeah. Just like we like we track student progress that way, I'd rather know that they're moving forward. You want to see an like we want to see
an increase than engagement in terms of Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I want to know that you're doing better because I don't know that, you know, if we're already reaching a thousand, is a thousand good or like I said, I want to It's all about doing better. Yep. And and I would just say in past
I've I've been very vocal in regards to communication and transparency um being on the other side of the table and I can see all of the improvements by which you you've to the points made
earlier of you know accessible the times of day the type of of way you're re reaching people as well as the streamline of the communication ations. So to um the committee's point of
setting up some type of baseline so it can continue to show the progress you're making versus you know starting somewhere in the middle and losing that forward progress because I I I agree.
Um, I feel like I without being on the committee, I always know what's going on, whether it's coming from you. And then I also like that if something's coming from you, I'm seeing it come from the individual schools as well and it
being so specific to the schools. So, I I love how um communication is trickling down. Thank you. So we we certainly with that point I think we can even do it um we can do it for just to show the progression month to month or week to week depending on what the frequency is
of that type of communication because we can do that and we we can look at what happened last year and how's that compared to this year to kind of make some comparisons. Thank you for that feedback. Anything else? Any other questions or comments about goal one?
if we could go to goal two. Um so you know I think we have a um both a fiscal and an environmental responsibility. So um this goal is really around modeling sustainable practices that benefit our students, staff and and the broader community really around energy
conservation. Uh so again this goal is committed to reducing energy consumption through intentional datainformed strategies that promote our efficiency and our awareness. So by combining both equipment upgrades, behavioral changes, and we did this many, many years ago,
talking 20 years ago, this district did this, it was doing it really well. And I think we got a little relaxed when we started going solar. And you know, we're saving money because we were solar. So how do we get back in sort of uh improving our behavioral practices and
reinforcing that with our students and our and our faculty? um and and in and looking at our equipment and how we can do some things to uh show some measurable reductions in our energy use um while trying to um create a culture
of conservation. So this goal is is around uh reducing energy consumption by 5% in comparison to 25 levels through a combination of again behavior-based conservation measures, equipment upgrades, operational changes um as
measured by our monthly utility reports in the B building energy use. Okay. So in for the next slide in terms of strategic actions, we will form an energy management team. uh really want to see if we can get some students involved in this as well. I think it
would be really good to get some feedback from them so that they can help promote uh our campaigns, you know, launching awareness campaigns. Just as an example, I put down like power down Fridays, like doing things on a monthly basis just to remind people of um depending on what time of year it is in
terms of shades or use, you know, temperature control, uh appliances, whatever it may be, just to remind our larger community, uh laptops, computers, shutting them down, powering them down. Um, we're also going to pilot on-site energy audits in at least one school
this year to see what we can do to help change our practices and and make some upgrades and eventually do that um across as many schools as possible. So, Dr. Blazell and I met with Mr. Derky and we're, you know, aggressively looking at that as well. Um, and, you know, and
using that information to install, you know, smart thermostats, sensors in places where lights maybe are in fixed switches, that sort of thing. again, anything we can do to help improve our current environment uh and reduce our um and reduce our energy consumption. Um
and then implement some tech power down protocols so that some of our devices will automatically shut off if they're left on. So working with our uh tech department regarding that. I've already had conversations with Mr. Mlan about that.
Again, another uh for to measure our success on the next slide. Um again, I think it's you know, reducing our energy, looking doing the energy audit, our campaigns, um, and really being efficient with our devices. So, looking at our utility
bills, looking at our facility reports, um, surveying our community, looking at our data, um, and trying to build awareness and and hit a threat a threshold in terms of, um, where we are at that. Y Brian,
I um earlier before we went on recording, I had mentioned to you I love that this year it was a more paperless environment. So I think that's something that you should really add on here because it's
it was extremely successful in my household. So um kudos to the team for that. I also think when I look at the management of technology and devices efficiently where you have
um apply energy efficient settings to all computer copers and printers there's an opportunity there to be able to engage each of the schools by the reduction of things they're putting to paper. a lot
of things they could be able to send via Google Docs and and the kids love it that way, too. So, um I would encourage being able to use those opportunities within the school as well. Um and and keep them going. Yeah, that's a very good point because
when we reduce our our need for paper, we're also reducing our need to use the copy machine. So, it's again it's a a behavioral mind shift in getting people to be aware of just you know what they're doing and how it how it affects the environment.
M um given the grant that we just got with Mr. Duffy for clean energy, would this be an opportunity to involve some of the tech kids in coming up with creative solutions? Oh, I think that's a great I know we've had um you know some really
talented people with DECA and things like that. you know, maybe asking them to come out with something and think outside the box would just add to the curriculum. And I think it's a excellent suggestion. All right. Anything else on goal two?
Thank you. So, moving on to goal three. So, goal three centers around student transitions. As you know, there's a lot of transitions um in in a prek12 environment. So, and those are really critical to student confidence, engagement, and their success. So, as a district, we need, you know, we
recognize that we need to be proactive and continuously look at how we best support students and families during those pivotal transition times. So, this goal focuses on developing a comprehensive transition uh framework um really focusing on prek
uh five to six transition and transition to the high school. So really through intentional planning uh getting input from our stakeholders uh and working across levels and coordinating our efforts we're looking to build a system that really um
improve our transitions across the district. Um so in in the next slide talks about some of those actions. So again, it's forming a working group to draft a a framework. So really look at where our transition practices currently are um in in relation to our framework
and anything that we may need to do to improve that framework. Try to do that by the end of the calendar year. Again, conducting focus groups, surveys, getting feedback from families, getting feedback from students, getting feedback from staff because staff are critically important to hear from as well in terms
of how we um how they feel about those transitions, either receiving students or sending students back, you know, where the opportunity opportunities for growth. again facilitating that cross-level articulation and then developing a pilot of family of pilot
pilot of family engagement toolkit that we could um roll out in the coming year. Okay. So, in terms of measuring that on the next slide, it's really um developing that framework um getting feedback from our stakeholders um
building that engagement, drafting that toolkit, making sure that it's translated by languages um and and get some feedback on that. Um and then just um and those are just some of the examples. Again, this isn't an exhaustive list,
but some examples of how we would do that. We've had some conversations at our retreat um with our admin team about some of these opportunities already, but get some feedback from them. Any questions on this one,
M Miss M. Jackson? Sorry. Um are we including CCT in the transition? Yes. Um, and also is there an opportunity to highlight the programs a little bit more a little earlier because
I feel like Oh yes, the seven the seventh grade transition was very quick and there was not a lot of like I don't feel I gave a real glimpse of the depth and breadth. Yeah, I'll actually get into some greater detail at our next meeting regarding
that um specifically for vocational technical education and we'll be you'll see be seeing um probably moving up by a couple of months in terms of um that engagement uh with families as well. So yes, that is that is we had a meeting
about that today. Okay. Actually, so timely. We did very timely. It was good. Good. Thank you. We're good. Yep. And then a goal for which I'm really excited about and we've done some work. We did a lot of work on this uh
last year as a team is uh is is building fostering a community volunteer program um and really launching a district-wide volunteer program by uh the end of this school year with 100% of schools having access to to volunteers. So, um, this is
something that you've heard me talk about the the the, uh, Fmouth Volunteers and Public Schools program. We've had an opportunity last year through a grant to get some education and support from them. So, we have a good framework to work with uh, to kind of build up to
something that they have done for the last 40 some odd years. So, really excited about uh, this and this will be a focus and you'll be hearing a lot about this. Uh, Dr. Rogers actually had a meeting with our um center for active living uh during the summer to talk
about being a partner for part of this as well. You imagine us looking at other parts of the community to to work on this as well. So really excited about that. So, if we can go to the next slide in terms of what this entails, uh really forming a steering committee and we had a we had a committee last year um in in
bringing some of those people in to be um the workers behind this uh developing a framework and roles by November of this year, launching a recruitment campaign, an information night um again trying to identify the needs of our
community with the needs of the community at large. But where how do people want to get involved and how do we bridge those two, right? The needs of the the desire of the community and and the needs of the school district so that we can create some meaningful partnerships. Again, this is not replacing any of the wonderful
initiatives that are happening in the schools. I know of a lot of things. I was just over at Cold Spring and they're talking about some of the things going on there and it happens in all of our schools. This is really looking at some larger buckets that we can sort of operationalize at the district level. So
again building some kind of portal, paper portal, electronic portal where we could um house everything and you know this would have training you know for volunteers, placement opportunities really coming up with a like a well ststructured program that would have
some meaningful engagement opportunities for members of our community and then evaluating and refining that for a full implementation the following school year. because this does take some time to build, but we could build something, pilot some things, really draft a lot of
uh uh great work this year with the with the intent of full implementation across the district in the coming year. So some of the measures for the success on the uh near final slide is getting the steering committee together
establishing it by this this month uh creating that framework and and publishing and sharing that by November to get an idea of the direction that we're going uh working on that volunteer portal. Again, we need paper copies too depending on u parts of our community,
but having something where everyone can find out like, you know, what are we look what kind of support are we looking for? Um, doing a few out outreach events, trying to trying to um reach a a a target number of people because we
haven't done this before. doing some training of our volunteers, getting some feedback from our staff, from our volunteers in terms of the training in terms of the effectiveness of the pilot and and and and to help us to to roll
this out. Any questions about Brian? Um, so just for clarity, the volunteers will be for the entire district community. So it could be specific to
students, specific to um staff staff positions if someone needed a mentor for for something. It's access to all. Yeah. So this one I want to be clear on one thing that this is not so that people don't get nervous. This is not
something that would ever replace a position that we have in the district. So there's no intention here to have it serve as a staff member, but it would be a support to a school, support to students, could be mentoring, um it could be a a whole host of things
depending on where we get when we get that feedback or what people are looking for and where we can kind of prioritize our efforts initially. Um so so more so like saying a support to staff. So if a teacher needed help to
organize a closet or something like that, they could put in a a to because there are definitely I think there are people who want to they want to give back uh but they may not be comfortable working with kids. Exactly. Right. So we have to recognize that and
there may be a lot of people who want to come in do something contribute uh but they're not comfortable doing that. They may get there at some point and want to do that. But then there are others that want to come in. They want to read to students or they want to, you know, volunteer to support some students or to do career counseling and talk about, you
know, they've they've had a career of 30 plus years in a certain sector and we bring them in and talk to the kids that are kind of trying to figure things out. So it could be a whole host of things and we got to kind of figure out what what the needs are of the schools like
the top priorities and then where people are in terms of their desires and try to make those matches. Okay. Thank you. Welcome Jackson. Um is there also an opportunity and thinking down the road of also
flipping this and having opportunities for students? Um because we talk about mental health and one of the biggest determinants of mental health is giving purpose and a lot of that can be found
in volunteering and I know we have certain things in place already but creating like a wider opportunity for students to also find that purpose would maybe address in a small way some of our mental health challenges. I think that's a great example and and that's something and I
know that I'm sure it came up with Dr. Rogers conversation. I wasn't at that particular meeting uh but I've had meetings with them about this as well. Um so the center of active living is a great example and we've had we've had students that come in there. Um we've had students do documentaries with aging
population about their lives and record it and then give those to those families. So it's it's it's it's a wonderful gift um when we can provide students with these opportunities because to your point um mentoring with young children
going into schools when their schedules work out. So certainly I think um I think that's an important part as well for sure. Thank you. So again, this is um just to kind of summarize these these goals really uh
reflect a shared vision. Uh it's a collaborative vision. Really, all these goals require a lot of collaboration and I just look forward to to working with our community as we try to um reach these goals. All right. Any final questions for Dr.
Campbell? All right. Appreciate you running us through the draft. Yeah. What's the timing for your the final? What's the timing for the final version? Um, happy to make any revisions that you want. Um,
it's intellectual now. So, we could Oh, it's already there. Yeah. Yeah. Or if there are changes. I I think all the suggestions were pretty minor. So, I think I'm certainly would be reflected, I think, in the reports for progress reports. Yeah. Yep.
Okay. All right. Do we have a motion then? Miss Jackson, I move that we approve the superintendence goals for 2526 school year. All right. Is there a second?
I'll second it. All right. Mr. Morgan seconds. Mr. Shoot. All right. And that passes unanimously. Thank you, M. Again, Mr. or Dr. Campbell. Thank you very much. Cruising through here. Great. Sorry. Okay.
Right on time. Great start. I should actually five minutes ahead. Auto. Thank you. I appreciate it. I have to go back and look. I have no idea how long I took. Perfect. All right. I'll I'll try with this as well. Super. No pressure.
Oh my gosh. Feeling no pressure. All right. So, a few things just to update you. Opening of school. I just, you know, we had a really, knock on wood smooth opening of school. The buildings look absolutely fantastic. And just want to thank our custodians, secretaries, counselors, and the nurses who really
led the work to start the school year. Uh, and in addition, on opening day, as you know, as a tradition that we've worked with Southshore Community Action Council and the and to collect food, we we we um collected over 400 pounds of food on opening day. and the Southore
Community Action Council was deeply appreciative of that. So, that's really good. So, let's try to hit 500 next year. Uh, that was great. Um, uh, we we've talked about our food service director. Um, the last time that we were here, I'm pleased to report that David
Bedau has accepted the position. David comes to us from Barnstable, uh, where he's been for 12 years as food service director and also has extensive restaurant experience. His official start date is actually Monday, but he has been in a number of times and has
met with staff and is is hit the ground running. Uh it will be a great addition uh related to food service. I want to talk about something that we will bring to you at the next meeting and that's a department review with specific actions. Um just just keep in mind for our public
that some of the things that we were already working on for example um taking over payroll and HR services attendance that sort of thing that was an independent function in food services was already coming over to the uh central office and it's already in Mr.
Chopi and Dr. Blazdell's uh purview. Um but we consulted u through Dr. to Blaze with Clifton Larson Allen uh to do a an an audit and and review of our food services particularly around procurement. Uh we had uh worked with
the food service department, town personnel such as a procurement officers, treasurer, internal auditor uh and and managers reviewed payroll, cash reconciliation, procurement, accounts payable, oversight controls um and have
identified areas and many of them have already been uh addressed, but we'll go through those in their entirety at the next meeting. Specifically, payroll, HR, asset tracking, software, that sort of thing. some things that uh have already been brought in. So again, we will
present that information in its entirety at the September 22nd meeting. Just wanted to give you an update on that. Um I can't remember if we talked about this at the last meeting or not, but our federal grant update um as you know earlier in the summer half of our title
grants weren't uh were not uh provided to the to the state and we were concerned that we weren't going to receive that. They were actually were released by US DOE. So, our allocations for FY26 um fell just under $1,500 below last
fiscal year, which isn't significant, but as you know, costs go up. Um when the grants go down, we have to shift some things. So, um but Dr. Rogers and Dr. Blazell really worked with some of our existing grants that were able to carry over to help manage us through the
current fiscal year there. We're very appreciative of the monies coming in because it would have been a large even more significant challenge for us. But um we're in good shape regarding that. Um as you also know related to chapter
70, the town uh level funded state aid in the budget for this year. those budget estimates. Uh during our April town meeting, town actually received a a final state aid number in July on July 14th uh with an net increase of almost
$2.5 million. Um at the time it was communicated during the budget process that the additional state aid allocation would be shared with the school side 61% town side 39% to address any cuts and amendments to the budget. This will go before the fall fall town meeting
members in October. So, we've issued a memo which we've shared with you which doesn't get into the specifics, but it kind of gives you a general sense. And as you all know, for the last four or five years, we've made significant reductions and cuts to our budget in order to offset uh the shortfall that
existed um the grants that haven't been, you know, haven't been there um and our supply lines. So once we know what we're dealing with, uh we will work to try to identify priority areas that we know we can sustain particularly
as we go into FY27 and be very strategic about how we hopefully receive those additional funds of 1.5 million at our October uh fall town meeting. Again, this uh memo is presented to advisory finance
committee and will be shared uh with town meeting um in at the October fall town meeting. Uh Park Plymouth, we talked about this last year a couple of times in the spring. Really excited. We talked about it in the winter as well, I believe. Um
so Park Plymouth, as you know, Nathaniel Morton is a Park Plymouth site. It's a free site. It always has been. It will continue to be a free site at first. Uh but Park Plymouth uh wants to renovate that parking lot for us. Additionally,
they want to uh they want to uh finance the playground for Nathaniel Morton in in excess of $200,000. In fact, so you may have noticed that we've moved some of the existing uh pieces already,
started squaring it off where the location will be. Uh it's a wonderful opportunity for us to improve not only the playground but the safety and security of our parking lot and our playground. We will we will gain dozens
upon dozens of spots by doing this which will also allow us to stage our buses in the back which will also make Lincoln Street much safer. We've had several accidents out here and people backend backending into people u very recently
actually. Um, so that will be very helpful. So, we're really excited about that uh project. It would not only make the playground safer, as I said, but provide a lot of relief uh off of Lincoln Street as well. And we look to invite Park Plymouth to to to share that
at the next meeting as well. And if they can't come, we will share um sort of some design options of what we're looking at in terms of the playground and the general idea of the of what the parking lot will look like. super appreciative of of this opportunity. It's a great
community partnership. Another good news, uh the CPPI grant, the the Commonwealth preschool partnership initiative grant that u Miss Tobin um has been working tirelessly on for the last couple years, we were granted it again. So $494,000
for fiscal year 26. Just want to congratulate and thank uh principal Tobin for aal her efforts so we can continue to do the itinerate staff at some of our private preschools which is fantastic. Uh MSBA as you know we are in the
feasibility uh stages with MSBA. We had an enrollment meeting actually two of them August 27th and I had another one followup September 4th. Um, so as you know, MSBA conducts their own analysis with districts to der determine how big
of a school they would reimburse districts through their grant process. So by doing that, they're looking at a lot of data. They're looking at birth data, historical enrollment, they're looking at uh public health records, they're looking at population trends,
uh, fertility rates, they're looking at they get information from US Census and UMass Donahghue Institute. They also look at our historic promotion rates in terms of um longevity of grades and how how long students sustain and grades uh
migration patterns, school choice developments that are in process. And then they give you a 10-year average and projections uh to to use that to to determine the capacity. And they're looking at all of our schools when they do this. In the in this case, they're
looking at our K5 schools across the district, not just in North Plymouth, but the entire community. They also have a threshold of 85% capacity when they look at a building, not 100% capacity to kind of adjust for fluctuations. One thing that we learned recently is, for
example, portables. Uh we have Indian Brook has portables, which we've made almost pretty much permanent. um they don't factor those into their numbers. They don't consider that a permanent solution. So those six classrooms there are not a part of their enrollment
projections, but which isn't a huge difference in the total. Uh but long story short, their analysis uh where their enrollment number was was spot on for this school year. uh they're projecting while our enrollment went
down before uh COVID and it's going up slightly particularly at the elementary level right now. They determined that we'll probably go up by less than 300 but in the high 200s over the next 10 years. Um so they gave us some projected numbers
uh two different enrollment numbers. As you know our feasibility study is looking at two studies. We're looking at a study for Hedge Elementary School and we're looking at a consolidated study. That's why we had to ask for $2 million because that's a significant study. Uh
MSBA anticipates that if we were to build a new hedge school, so just take into consideration new school there and not consolidate that that school capacity should be
built at approximately 470 students. Uh if we would consolidate Cold Spring and Hedge campus to a location due to be determined it could be um exceed 750 students. I was a bit surprised by that
number to be quite honest. I think Dr. Blaze and I were waiting for a low number. Um that's very high again. Um and so that hence we had the the follow-up meeting September 4th just to get an idea of what we're really dealing
with. Um but the leadership of MSBA told us you know because we're going through both studies we really have nothing to lose by going through those two studies to look at what a hedgeon uh project would be ultimately and a consolidation and there may be options
within each option. So really to know what all the options are and where we're going to fall and what the desire is of the committee and the community and then we I think twothirds of the way through this process would have to make a determination of the direction we want to go in and then we commit to that. So
I think this we'll have the most educated approach uh gives us the most options. Um so that's the latest update regarding that. Um, another thing regarding the last thing is uh our preschool. So, our preschool
transition committee, uh, we look to to to do those meetings every other month approximately, probably start it, um, at the end of this month or early October. Um, I know that there's interest in many of the people on the school committee to do that. uh we've done a lot of
transition work already and it think it's good for us to meet on a pretty regular basis to kind of talk about that punch list of things that are going on both at South Middle School as well as PCIs. Um we've had administrative meetings internally. Uh for example,
you'll see that the signs up at South if you go to South Middle, you're going to see a preschool sign there already. So we've had the signage is up, the playground is up in the back, the it's it's fenced in. So, there's some things that we're able to accomplish, but we have a lot of things on that punch list
uh to address, not only facility-wise, but um you know, aesthetics as well as um programmatic. So, um we look forward to to starting that up as well. So, if once we know who would be interested,
we'll we can coordinate some dates. Okay. Uh and that's all I have this evening. Any questions for Dr. Campbell. It's a lot lot going on. All right. Next up, we have retirements. Mr. Chopi.
Yes. Good evening. Um, the first retirement I was going to share with you kind of came in quietly over the summer after we completed the year. Uh, Cindy Deico uh has spent 45 years at PCIS as a
special education department head. Uh, so she did not want uh a big to-do at the end of the year uh potentially. So she she shared it with us this summer. So after 45 years, uh Cindy is retired. Uh we had a couple other staff members. Uh Lynn Bututner was a cafeteria worker
at Plymouth South Middle School, also had 26 years and her last day was this previous school year uh in June of 2025. Susan Silva, security receptionist, 28 years at Plymouth North High School. And
then lastly, Mark Fornosari will be retiring after 32 and a half years um in this January, coming January, as assistant principal at South High School. Um I understand he is going to be one of the first community volunteers. Um he will be missing
homecoming dances in prom, so I'm sure he'll be I'm sure he'll volunteer. Oh, absolutely. 100%. Uh so I look forward to seeing him well beyond his retirement at the school dances. Thank you, Miss Jackson. We'd like to thank uh Miss Butner, Mr.
Fornosari, and Miss Silva for their combined I just had it. Oh, and Miss Miso, thank you for pointing that out because I have to add it in. 131 combined years of service
and we wish them a good retirement and they will all be deeply missed. Thank you. Thank you for that. All right. Next up, we have some exciting news. Our MASC lifetime achievement award winners. Who's presenting that? Or
I can cover it. Do you want me to? You can. Sure. You can do it, M. Jackson. Um, so um or is this a letter? Actually, it's a letter. So, actually, yeah, Mr. Morgan, you should probably read these. These are Okay.
um uh letters from uh Massachusetts Association of School Committee to both um James Sorenson and a separate letter to Michelle Badger. They're the similar letter, so I'll read one. Um uh on
behalf of Mass um board of directors, I'm writing to let you know that you've been selected to receive the Mass Lifetime Achievement 2025 award. This honors recognizes your contributions to the children of the Plymouth public schools both through your years of
service as a school committee member as well as through many activities participated as an advocate for children. The award will be presented at mask leadership life member awards dinner on Friday November 14th during the masks
2025 joint conference. The dinner will be held at the Emerald Resort in Hyannis. The board invites you and your designated guests to be our guests for this event. Um, I hope your schedule will permit you to attend on November
14th. Um, and give some information um, uh, information where to fill out the um, uh, they're going. I hope to see you in Hyannis and extend the board's congratulations on your achievements. So, congratulations to both Miss Badger
and Mr. Sorenson and um hopefully some of the members of this committee can make that event. Yeah, absolutely. Yes. So, related to that uh the conference and uh or the celebration, the dinner, just let me know or uh Miss Liskoff know
and we'll register you for that. Happy to register you for that. Y All right. Next, moving on to uh reports for sub uh committee member uh reports. Who has any updates? Mr. Jackson,
um I had the opportunity to go to both the CPAC member meeting and their leadership meeting and I want to thank them for including me. It was really um informative to hear about their first days of school and what they're working on. I think they're doing a lot of
really great things and have a lot of really great ideas. Um and um I think you know like some of their points were very valid and um they bring a lot of depth and breadth and I'm really excited
to be a part of that community. Good other members? No. Oh Michelle, um we did have the capital planning um meeting this week. Uh there were no school department um capital requests on
this budget cycle or not budget cycle but on this town meeting cycle. Um but there was a one interesting project that I thought would be uh worth mentioning is that there will be a fully ADA accessible trail going in um behind
Jenny Pond uh which I thought was really nice and it's they're referring to it as an all persons trail. So, not only will it be wheelchair accessible, it will have things like braille or other uh audio and visual cues for people that might be um deaf or blind. And um I
thought that was a really great project. So, hopefully that one gets funded. Hopefully the town manager enjoys that one too. But I thought that was a good one for people to know about. Cool. Anyone else before I go? Um
yeah, Mr. Just just sharing the Pilgrim Area Collaborative known as PAC will resume October 2nd. So looking forward to that meeting but wanted to make sure to put it on everyone's radar. Excellent. Thank you for ripping us.
All right. Uh I just had two updates. Uh, one I met with the new um chair of the uh advisory and finance committee um Joe uh uh Lai that I've gotten to know from his work on the building committee with uh Mr. from Morgan myself. Um but
he's very eager um for the advisory and finance committee and the school committee to work more closely together to you know avoid issues that we've had in uh previous years which obviously we can all agree is a would be a good thing. And to that end, a specific u
idea that he and I agree would be really uh positive movement is having someone from the uh ANF uh education committee or you know subcommittee actually um uh join our school budget subcommittee
meetings actually have something that's actually you know very kind of ingrained so that you know they're able to liaz with the rest of ANF and really not you avoiding any uh s surprises. So, as I think it's it's Miss Jackson, Miss Shaw, and Mr. Smartel that are on that
committee for us as you guys whenever you guys start meeting um reach out and we'll make sure that somebody from that committee is engaged. I don't think they've named who those lessons will be yet, but the goal is to have a lesson on from each um uh ANF subcommittee to whatever group they work with in our in
our case of education subcommittee. But I think that collaboration will be you know huge benefit going forward. go. Uh and secondly, uh just a I uh Dr. Camp already teed this up, but making sure that we get folks involved
in the PE uh subcommittee. So I believe Miss Bryant, you expressed interest. So okay, that was one I was thinking uh two other members probably one of which I think either myself or Mr. Morgan kind of representing kind of more like the building committee side and then a third member. So if you're interested, please
reach out. But obviously we we can't go above three. So regarding budget comment, I will touch base with Miss Shaw, Mr. Smartellis after the meeting, get together with Dr. Campbell and Dr. Boydale. Perfect. Yeah, I know it's perfect timing since you guys haven't started
meeting yet. So we usually start around now. So be perfect. So all right. Yeah. So I'll reach out to Mr. Let him know that we are good with that. All right. That's all I had. Anybody else? Any reports? All right. Next up, uh, master planning
committee update, Mr. Morgan. Um, yes, we, uh, met last week, um, and we received a presentation from the consultant, um, with the data that's been collected and we're finalizing some language and we should have a draft
proposal in the next month or so. So, more to come there, but um, we have a meeting next month and we can review it. we'll make any final changes and we'll bring it to the town for their review. So, moving along. Thank you. And while we're on you, we'll
do the uh building committee. Uh the building committee will be meeting this week. So, I'll have an update for our next meeting. All right. All right. Then, personnel reports. And we have a whole backlog of appointments, absences, and regulations here, Mr. Chuck. Yeah. So, this will be a collection
basically from the summer. Um but we had appointed 22 certificated positions and 31 classified. We did accept 19 resignations and then we also approved seven medical leaves and six parental
leaves to start the year. Any questions on these? All right. Cruising that uh unfinished business. Do we have any unfinished business anyone would like to bring up? Any new business we want to put on
future agendas? Nothing. All right, we're cruising along here. Next up, our approval of consent agenda. Do we have any items that anyone would like to pull from the consent agenda? We have just uh no minutes, just a few home
schooling plans and a bunch of accounts payable warrants and some uh disposal of equipment. Any items to pull? All right. If not, I think we can vote on that.
We need a motion and a Yeah, we need a move. Anybody move? I'll I'll make the motion that Plymouth School Committee approve the 9 to8 consent agenda as presented. All right. And a second.
M. Jackson seconds. All right. All right, we are good there. All right, that's unanimous. Back to my agenda. All right, next up, we have no items pulled, so we're good there. And then that gets us to our German. So, I call this meeting to order
ahead of schedule at 8:33 p.m. Thank you.