superintendency Union 31 and Silver Lake Regional School Committee um let's start with a roll call vote to open for Silver Lake um Jen here paula here lucas here mark here jean here and
I am present here movian all right to open for union 31 uh Caitlyn Johnson here warren Law yes trisha Arata present and I am present i believe we have quum with one from each two
we are open we're in session so a reminder that this meeting is being recorded and if anyone is intending to make an audio or video recording of this meeting you should notify one of the chairs at this time uh first up on the agenda we have
the approval of minutes from February 25th 2025 i'll move forward side okay we have a second second okay um so this is a roll call right i think
okay um all in favor of approving the minutes all opposed okay is there a motion from the union so move and second all those in favor i unanimous
okay um Mr goals so tonight uh thank you uh we'd like to share our progress as it relates to the strategy for district improvement and meeting our goals for the 2425 school year we're going to start with an overview of our major objectives and
then we have a variety of people here tonight who will speak to you with regards to our benchmark data uh and in terms of our progress with regards to student achievement so for objective one this probably difficult for you to view up there but probably easier on your own
um on your own device um in terms of measuring in and supporting student well-being K through six used the Savers platform this year at the secondary level a survey to meet compliance with the state's tiered focus monitoring process was sent to staff families and
students and tonight we will share some of those results with you uh for special education we implemented a post IEP meeting survey to help improve our IEP process second step is being implemented for grades K through 8 the high school
evaluated and decided not to pursue um the second step curriculum to meet our anti-bullying curricular needs that is going to be continued to be uh addressed through our health and wellness classes so I'd like to uh invite our speaker uh
with regards to savers and tiered focus monitoring i can uh just the the films I I didn't know if it was Trisha or Brian tonight you want to go ahead and talk about this yeah I can touch base since I
did that slide um we introduced a Sabers uh SEO screener this year which replaced the panoramino screener that we conducted I believe the previous two or three years and looking at our our first round of data from the winter uh it
categorizes students uh at the lowrisk level the summer level and highrisisk level and according to our RPI model it seems like we're following that you know a majority of our students from the tier one level seal in that green area uh we do have some students that are at risk
for our our classroom teachers as well as some of our support staff we're trying to assist some of those students and then obviously we have a small population at each school of tier three students who need um much higher forms of intervention and counseling
but like I said this is our first year of this screener our teachers in grades 2 through six do a screening of the student and then the students do their their own individual screening so there's two points of data to use in grades 2
through six and in grades K through two the teachers do an individual screening on so so when we talk about intervention this is this is for possible behavioral issues um it
could be a conjunction of anything could be behavioral could be emotional okay it's kind of where the school psychologist comes in for adjustment okay to help those students yeah go ahead is it just a coincidence that we have 3% that are
high risk yeah that would be a coincidence but if you look at the RTI model the triangle it's usually between 3 and 5% fall okay and um this year we participated in a desier focus monitoring process as
part of that process we needed to be able to survey three different groups students in grades 7 through 12 um faculty and staff and families so three different groups the first group um when we set up the survey to really the objective is to find out if people feel
like they can be um involved in things if they if they feel like um different extracurricular activities are open to them and they feel welcome to participate in extracurriculars or other programs that the school has and um the first results I'll talk about are the
student survey summary um the survey again was given to uh students in grades 7 through 12 there were 624 responses um students put in demographic information and um students reported overall participating most heavily in athletics
theater art and music reasons students did not participate in activities um because they were not interested or participate outside of school in other activities and some sports not offered but interested in they put down boxing pickle ball pingpong figure skating
dance team golf those were some of the things that the students reported 92% of students felt welcome to participate in activities and responses indicated students were well informed about activities so they knew about what was happening as far as things they could participate in faculty and staff the survey for
faculty and staff really asked them if they felt like they could also be um included in extracurricular activities if they could if they could coach or or um if they felt welcome to be to run a club or an organization or things like that um 83 faculty and staff responded
um there were responses from all of the school districts demographic information was collected faculty and staff reported participating heavily in either coaching athletics or running a club theater music or art related activities reasons for not participated participating
included responsibilities outside of school things that they family obligations or other work obligations other things they were doing 93% feel welcome to participate in activities and responses indicated a high level of communication regarding activities the last group was a parent guardian survey
um 154 parent guardians responded responded um every school district was represented in the responses demographic information was shared they always reported a high level of student participation in athletics clubs theater music and art the respondents reported that their student does not participate
due to some maybe a special uh special education needs that they may have um not being interested in athletics they participate in activities outside of the school day either in dance or different things that aren't necessarily within the the school offerings 93% of the
respondents indicated that their child does feel welcome to participate in activities and the responses indicated that they are communicated with regarding activities they get communication they know what's happening um there were many sports uh mentioned that they thought maybe could be offered
one in particular was growing responses indicated that communication was strong in regards to activities so overall three different groups reported um feeling like they could participate in activities they knew when they were they knew how to participate in them um and
um this is something that we should be doing every roughly four years as a compliant uh measure to make sure that people feel included they feel like they can participate and if there are issues that arise we we can be informed by them and and use these often times a school
improvement plan will have some items related to this sometimes and we can use it for those purposes so objective number two um which deals with our high expectations for students and using support and datainformed
instruction uh we accomplished a number of things uh first representatives from across all of our schools and grade levels worked with the Hill for literacy to assess our literacy needs and created a strategic plan which will be implemented next year and has already
begun uh to take to take root this year learning tours continued in all of our buildings and we continued to focus on effective practices and um effective feedback the math steering committee was formed to evaluate potential new math programs K through 8 uh because our
program is suns setting and we anticipate proposals as early as this month and we also included that in our budget presentations as well where where needed uh professional development focused this year on curriculum alignment to state
standards the science of reading literacy needs assessment using edit climber to uh to track student uh achievement and uh progress data meetings were held at all schools the expectation is a minimum of three times
per year um there was the implementation of STAR assessments in in English language arts and math for grades 1 through 10 for the first time and uh we have a spring offering uh of professional development for co-eing
which is going to focus on co-eing teams in grades 9 through 10 specifically we implemented a number of um changes to the IEP forms and training for our new
platform regards to the IEP uh requirements from the state our support teams are using district curriculum accommodation plans to track student progress and um to track the effectiveness of their interventions
um in addition in terms of objective three we've already spoken to the selection of a new math program uh the phase one of the curriculum review cycle is underway for math and next year we will begin for
ELA with regards to improving our structures we update and revise the strategies for district improvement every summer and we present that to all of our committees in the fall we provided uh a link to our professional development to support the
goals for staff this year so that you can take a look at that we continue to use the capital and budget planning process to fund district-wide needs and uh we have begun aligning the chart of accounts to match the changes required
by the state um but and and to support the the structural changes that were required by the state as well no changes were recommended by the evaluation the education evaluation working group this year but we will continue that working group for the future
and so tonight the main focus what we hope will be on is the data what you will see tonight is really midyear data winter data which is what we have available we won't have some of our spring data until April May and until later in the school year um but because
our our progress report is typically given in the spring we wanted to give you the data that we do have please keep in mind that this is midyear data also keep in mind that when we see progress we get excited and we celebrate at just as much as when we see areas that we we
didn't seem to reach uh our goals that we we experience that same level of disappointment but we come back we rework and we rethink about how we're going to approach that for the future so tonight you'll hear from some of the ways that we're going to address those continuing concerns and help us to meet
our goals so first up tonight I believe is elementary our elementary gate grades so our Yes I will our curriculum coordinator uh Mr brian DeSantis will be here tonight to explain our our um elementary data i know you guys get
numbers all the time in the fall and the winter you're enjoying try to summarize your times together comparisons you're going to see some MCCAST results from last year we're going to hopefully look at the trends from the fall and the winter will possibly give us a better
prediction of how we do this year um I'm familiar with Halifax i'm familiar with the district for the last 9 years i've been the assistant principal in Halifax i'm really getting to know the rest of the schools in the district um and it's been great working with principles so I'm sure if you want individual school
data that's probably coming maybe up in SMA school so starting off with ELA just a snapshot of how we've done we call this kind of post pandemic we're on our way back up um our kids are 5 years now
removed from that full um pandemic exposure so looking at 2022 you're looking at 2023 and you're looking at 2024 sports um my goal as a green room coordinator is I believe socioeconomically we're in
somewhat of a similar situation so if we can work together and really get consistency in our teaching and learning hopefully these scores will be more consistent as we move forward so remember our our goal is to get 70% we made this goal for the last 3 years we're not there yet we're going to
strive to be better and better and better dibbles if you're familiar with dibbles dibbles we measured two data points in elementary school with ELA we measured dibbles which is our fluency which uh
some of our early kids K through three we assess them on their letter recognition their decoding skills and obviously their reading fluency all of these skills are very important to go to the next level which is comprehension that's up so here are our double scores
from Kath through third grade so if you look at cases at the beginning of the year 63 now 57 10 53 middle of the year we made some pro and those are the differences and like I said hopefully I come to you in the fall and we're well
into the 70s hopefully 80% my personal dibles so the dibbles measure is uh just for everybody's clarity here we're administering our like a standardized assessment across all of
the schools yes and we're doing that is it three times a year or twice a year and you're third grade three times a year three times a year okay um and is the growth trajectory fairly typical here um in the sense that you know The
hope is obviously they perform better as school so the next slide I think is a comparison okay so if you look in the middle of last year these were our totals school it looks like a few of us have bumped up which is an encouraging
sign uh Pet is working with his grading team to make sure the interventions are in place for some of those some of those students who receive results that we wanted to see if you're looking at Kingston and Malib to be
over STAR now we assess our grades one through six students on STAR but we don't count grade one because they take what's called an early literacy assessment which isn't a true comprehension assessment so I'm keeping
grade one out of that we give them that assessment so they can get acclimated to the star platform starting in second grade so this is a true comprehension vocabulary assessment grades 2 through six in the LA this is our second so once again if you look this year these are
our starting scores are seeing some growth and like I said if you compare us to last year at this point next slide a big one this slide can kind of show
you where we were last year in the green it even shows you that MCAST score where we were in the fall it shows you that comparison from 23 to 24 where we started to where we were at the
beginning of the year it shows you this winter score comparatively last year to this year and I I highlighted this in dark green because it start because we gave this benchmark in March last year we
gave it early in the window and tried because many teachers were frustrated that they set goals for themselves last year and they were put in their evidence but they couldn't see the results of the spring score because previously we were
giving that assessment in May which would be after they would present their evidence and check to see if they achieved their goals so we moved it back to March which is early in the testing window and I don't think it was such a true indicator but we didn't want to
give a May we didn't want to give a fourth one after MCAST so we just stuck with this score today and then revamp things this year we're not going to give a March assessment we feel that it's too early to really see the kids taking so what we're going to do we're going to do
that spring assessment in May but if you compare Califax and spring score if you want to use these two or whatever um you know scores they're pretty comparative this was a dip this is something that I
noticed and looking into this score's writing took a real hit uh last year so we've identified writing um as something to improve upon Kingston so we're going to try to hope hope
hopefully get that score well up these are some of our action steps that we have i've been working with Dr f Dr clifford and obviously the principles to come up with a plan um there's a great level professional development in September 2024 this is how we started
the year because we're identifying our creating program it's not fully aligned to the standard so we are trying to align it and we're trying to supplement have our teachers create supplemental lessons in units to try to align our curriculum uh we also continue that
November professional development we also introduced and prepared for our writing benchmark this year this is our first year that we writing benchmark research we created a district literacy leadership team um and we conducted a
literacy assessment this year to identify our strengths and obviously there needs to approval on we also have a literacy action plan that I believe you will see the draft of very soon so that will be priority next year
to uh implement that action plan i said here and then we obviously always want to continue to analyze assessment data and target specific green moving on to math there's really our test once again
introducing here looks like it's plateaued a little bit here at 48 we obviously want improvements there looks like it went up a little bit you already know about the Arizona data and it looks like Dennis kind of was staying steady there so this is our kind of gauge of
where we were here's our our star data we have one data point for our benchmark data for map if you look at our fall scores this year we're in the 50s the high 50s if
you look at our winter scores looks like they're plateauing looks like the name gains there and then we go to the next slide you can also get a comparison to last year's winter score this year's winter score so looks like that is showing that
improvement from this year which hopefully that will result in some solid scores come spring halifax is set in the 60s platform a little bit and we'll be working with continue to work with and once again just showing the
comparisons for a while these are the last year scores once again fairly consistent if you look at our star spring to our MDS it's not that far off um obviously we want to see once again improve upon those scores
before this year and like I said this year we will be assessing many instead of would Kingston have had any sort of like partial year demographic shifts or anything like that just it it
seems in both writing and in math it seems interesting that they're disconnect is kind of big between star and cows i think there's variables anywhere but I I I I'm the I'm the kind of person that the numbers are the
numbers and there's variables everywhere there's medical leaves and teachers there's demographic issues but I have to base my numbers on analytics and I'm sure other school commations like our ESL student is
okay impact your it may impact your subroof data but the reality is that if you look longitudinally over the data it's the scores are pretty flat this is though the first year that for instance our shelter students have taken
the MCAST um that data is consistent 23 to 24 it was yes that's the first year for the first time students don't have to take right that's what I mean but this was the first year we took them in 23 24
right most will be interesting we'll see how it's a very small Like I said looking at that we're basing that our numbers last year off of that early test off of that
test so I'm assuming this May moving it up about 7 weeks is closer to get us much better resulting steps with analyzing state uh district countdown to one of our strengths again um obviously working on
weaknesses uh we conducted a K through 12 i worked with Dave Korea uh he's a 7 to 12 coordinator we formed a K through 12 steering committee made up of elementary and secondary teachers uh as part of the review the steering committee created an action plan for our elementary and secondary
subgroups to implement so we have an elementary and after you team made up of teachers from all um districts and we are reviewing a few curriculums right now that are fully aligned with department of
ed and we're providing effective implementation plan for a new curriculum to uh implement next year so I think this is going to be very important because we can pick the best math program and the best math curriculum and really have to support the teachers on
really effective teaching strategies um with that uh we want to really introduce our math workshops as well may I ask a question real quick i know that Kingston's piloting we're about to
get a new math program is Halifax and are Halifax and Kingston also getting a new math program so at least we'll all be on the same page yes okay thank you we will have that decision to speak to which one yeah um science that
area that the state assesses us on we go one slide here i don't have science we'll discuss possible assessments in the future kind of all over the place here um assessment i
think sometimes science gets you know gets I guess the success all goes with the fifth grade teacher and the failure might always go with the fifth grade teacher but this is really a true indicator kindergarten science instruction all the way through the end of grade so we really have to uh when
we're looking at science make sure that our teachers are fitting that science in i know at the elementary level we do a lot of language art a lot of mathematics but science is a very important subject we really have to make sure that our teachers are following that scope and sequence using hands-on materials giving
students those lab opportunities really to get excited about the science technology and engineering and these are our action steps once again continue to analyze data and I think a lot of I'll talk to you about our results and our teaching
and our learning in elementary school obviously affects our middle school um the students are assessing again in eighth grade in science and as a result of that we really do have to make sure that we're teaching science because that fifth grade score is important but that eighth grade score is also
important collaborate with ource coordinator to provide professional development Scott I'm going to work with him on the new performancebased assessment that is in trial right now but is going to be fully adopted in 2027
we are going to once again like I said really review our spoken sequence at each grade level to ensure that we are standard aligned and we are giving our students have the opportunity to learn those standards we want to create a common district schedule to determine the amount of time dedicated to science
structure in learning each grade i want to continue support the resources we use history science our program kinderg I want to be able to provide my teachers with those hands-on science lab opportunities so those students can get excited about science continue to
provide one grant training to grade six teachers to support our open sight curriculum so grades six seven and eight we use a science program called focus and then teachers will develop a grade five STE benchmark to implement and guide instruction this is something
that I really want to implement and start over the summer to get a district benchmark so we can use to guide our instruction and our MET scores are missing the blue highlight is what we taken so far grade six is done with ELA
grade five is done forward in the LA today we will continue through 15 and then we will start right back up with math and we will end with just so just generally speaking your guys are sound like there's like a
new lit program math program science program that are kind of rolling out and you're aligning them standards I would say the math is coming decision to we're going literacy review next year
yeah so the question is is there other what criteria do you use when you guys are evaluating how many programs you evaluate that we're using what's called curate now so the partner that just came out I believe maybe two years ago they're taking
programs curriculums and they're doing a full evaluation using Massachusetts teachers Massachusetts leaders previously nationally there's called Ed reports and Massachusetts now has its own produce system so we kind of zeroed it in on the
part of Massachusetts we have some good ideas so we're going to use that kind of sifting i would say leaving out some programs that we might not think are effective so right now we're going with two fully approved testing programs great thank
you now I'd like to introduce our middle school and high school principles to begin introducing the secondary data thanks everyone um as Jill talked about our free testing um windows we do at the middle school we
do have a spring testing window March so that we can use that data to continue to inform our instruction and develop interventions um you're going to notice tonight in regards to math ELA and science we have different data points
and different data systems so because math the math data math did not have STAR last year we are going to compare STAR data with MCCAST ELA has STAR data to compare to last year science has um pair assessment and some performance
assessments i do want to say proudly that yesterday we had MCCAST for ELA yesterday and today yesterday two hours in I still had 390 students testing out of 560 after 2 hours they worked endlessly and I'm very proud of them so
we will look at this data and you know we have ways to go but I am hopeful that we are on our way mr korea hi um so in the math department at the middle school we've designed implemented
and then analyzed data from a variety of um assessments um our common assessments that we use departmentally are either units based or they relate to a cluster of standards um and they're all constructed using items from past MCAST
so um our selected response or multiple choice multiple select type items are using MCAST question stems or the questions themselves our constructed response items are again based on MCAST test items and we use the scoring the actual MCAST scoring rubrics when we um
score student work um all or most of those common assessments are administered on pair assessments um similar to other other departments and that's to help students sort of replicate that digital testing platform experience that
they're going to see in their hands um in addition to those common assessments those sort of teacher created common assessments uh we also administered math uh sorry STAR math twice this year uh we did the winter window spring window um
because we this is the first year we've done it so we kind of pulled it together and got it in place for that winter window and repeated in the spring um and then in terms of data analysis our grade level teams meet after common assessments and then after STAR exams to
analyze that data provide interventions and make justice for instruction so there's two sets of data here the top one is the 23 24 MCAST um the columns to the left are less than proficient so are not meeting or partially meeting categories i know it's
a little small but I tried to put it all on one screen um the columns on the right are proficient uh categories of meeting and seating um grade seven grade eight and all students sort of broke it out separately the second table is that same information but using the
consolidated state report uh from star so using the student star performance to predict hopefully their past performance so to be clear you're using you're using two sets of assessments you're using pair assessments and star assessment
correct um but star is sort of a way to assess sort of the breadth of the standards whereas those pair assessments that I'm using are assessing like a unit of material for specific standards okay um are you you're using
the pair assessment data in like your daily meetings and meetings for teachers yes um so comparing this year's uh meeting and exceeding data from STAR it's 22% higher than last year's pass for grade
seven and then for grade eight it's 17% higher than last year's class all right hi everybody um I know when Dan and I came and presented some updates in February we we compared Star and MC just like today um and I'm going
to be sharing with you some updates on our most recent star screening in ELA as well as some of the work we've done on our standards aligned common assessments in ELA um for our middle school ELA um we do we have so far this year given two of three common assessments that have
been developed and administered to date um those are focused on when we when we re reviewed the MTAS data we realized that some of the areas where kids were having trouble included synthesizing paired text included using uhformational
te text and using poetry so we developed using MCCAST question stems a set of um common assessments to be able to uh help students to practice those skills um our common writing assessments use a common graphic organizer for all students um as
well as a common scoring rubric and then the teachers are able to get together in our data meetings and we can take a look at at how um the students performed i'm also going to share with you our star reading um at the middle school we have had star for a number of years um and so this year we did administrate uh
administer the star screening um in a fall winter and a spring window um our department does engage in regular and consistent structured data analysis protocols after each common assessment as well as after the star screenings uh and we very much are looking forward to
um not only our core program review but also implementing the recommendations of the district literacy team uh there are members of the middle school and the high school uh ELA department on that team so for starving I did a slightly different comparison than Dan because I
did have some some multiple years of data so and I apologize that it is small um we can see that the uh there's a difference between our 2003 2024 um scores and we see a substantial jump in our grade 7 in a screening uh in our
screenings from this year from the 2024 25 school year uh the eighth grade number looks the same but when we think about that um this cohort when we compare them to where they they left off as seventh graders they've actually um
shown some considerable growth there what's the uh what's your take on the seventh graders and similar vein my take on So you said this cohort is up 7% yes what about the seventh graders
um they I need to go back I need to go back and look at all three schools sixth grade star reports but when I look at last year's seventh graders versus this year's seventh graders they've improved in the grade level I'm just I was just interested in the cohort since you knew
the eighth grade cohort data um I can I can go back and get that information from from the three sixth grade uh second yeah Um the next slide um these are our
common assessments like I said the teachers um develop these based on our units but we use the standards and MCESTS what we call question stems um as well as our analysis of previous performance on MCAST to build those so in seventh grade in the fall we
administered a paired text selective response set and again um with that seems to be a challenge navigating and trying to find the through line between two different texts um and so you can see on this chart the standards that those particular questions looked at um
we also did a paired text selected response in the fall in 8th grade um and then in both schools for our winter common assessment we did a paired text write to text writing um common assessment in our school um we have been schoolwide focusing on there are three
modes of of writing that are tested on MCAST um and in our in our middle school we've been we have schoolwide goal of increasing our W2 writing so that would be the standard where they're writing to analyze so we did build some um paired text writing to analyze uh common
assessments that we were able to um look at our students performance on those as well uh so science is as you well know and um Brian mentioned that we're again obviously getting ready in two years to see the webcast and so we adopt the open
site platform uh in seventh and eth support the sixth seventh eighth grade uh alignment uh teachers continue to take part in body to support this effort again it's a massive shift in sort of instructional strategy to help teachers
uh uh be adapted that again like I said the Ara MCAST is also transitional for performance based test uh just again I didn't say before just understand where it's going the state has changed sort of what they're expecting out of CAS first
was this year was going to be a transition and next year was going to be in webcast they brought it out two years uh it was originally going to be a partial golden task and task and now it's back to the 54 total questions plus performance task so
uh a lot of meeting there in that assessment um I think it's just so they can get a lot of data on these new question types to ensure that they're valid for future use so we're at a 2-year transition and so and part of that you'll see with some of the data I
collected uh gave you a sort of a snapshot explain how we're sort of trying to do two things at the same time to ensure that we're aligned to the old MCAST which is fading away into the new MCAST which is coming up um so teachers of both seventh and eighth grade level
use common assessments designed after each unit put that pair assessment platform uh pair assessment is the old age elastic it's really good discuss the technology and answer questions uh but they're vetted so you can either pull direct MCCAST questions or vetted questions that they uh put metrics on
that are really asking the question that align to the standard uh and then we use uh the OSE and the unit assessments which are vastly different uh more of a scenario based assessment asking the kids to analyze data build models uh claim evidence reasoning types of
responses and very open-ended types of responses uh so we we do those two in conjunction with another and then partnering off with the work we did with uh uh the K12 district in terms of the uh the new Desi performance task desi's
put out performance tasks uh and asking us to please embed these in your instruction use these as tools and so we've been using those as tools as well those are sort of like day two day long tasks uh that assess the students or ability to talk reason for problem uh
and then I'm still working with the performance assessment ambassadors which is a program I did last year uh we do have a couple meetings coming up in the next month to sort of see our where our progress is across the state to share some ideas and to see how we need to move
forward so this is uh this is a snapshot of our most recently uh completed OC unit uh in 8th grade uh unit 72 don't worry about that uh it's an eighth grade unit uh on the left is the fair assessment and I just pulled out one
snapshot of data uh in the high school uh snapshot you see another piece of data that that ties directly to standards but this is an overall look at students and we have to set a level that's easy to do a pair assessment of seeds be parsley and the local
proficient sort of aligning that to the the expectations or the the criteria in MCCAST uh you can see where we landed there uh and then this is a um OC end of the unit performance assessment so again this is a one that the teachers are
really new at at delivering and so what we've done over the past two years of putting these together is hone them down uh and then look at rubrics a shared rubric that you can grade these so the grading doesn't show a performance level but it shows an overall uh grade level
um uh score and that's similar to every single teacher so all the teachers grade the the assessment on a shared ring set of expectations both in terms of content that's aligned to standard but also performance task so they uh could they
analyze data could they write a C could they build a model so those strategies as well and so since we still in the infasy of ensuring that those are uh embedded and that we understand the the measure we're doing we don't really we didn't have anything to compare to last
year's the second year of developing this we're going to take this data from this year as a baseline to then make comparison for next year's term in regards to social studies I told Miss Green I would um present this slide
because there's no data yet um 8th grade is the lucky ones that take four MCATs so they will be taking the civics um social studies MCAST right after April break um it will be the first operational one this spring but we did pilot it as well last year they will be
um making those standard settings and figuring out what proficiency means after this test in the spring and then on the next slide it just shows all of our MCAST dates for this month and next month um go so at the high school um we
continue to develop common assessments um using department meeting time and then this year as we stated earlier we were lucky enough um with the support of Dr clifford to introduce star testing for 9th and 10th grade open math in ELA so four years um so I'm not going to rehash the same
things that I already said for the middle school that doesn't seem like a good use of your time um so we'll just skip ahead of slide um so this is comparing the two screening windows winter and spring and we did notice a little bit of a dip in the meeting
exceeding um expectations categories um and so what we're really trying to do first is figure out like possible explanations for that but in the short term figure out what can we do with the students that we have in front of us so the major thing is we're using the Oops
sorry that's okay um we're we are still using the data to inform instruction and provide interventions where possible but we're also leaning heavily on that common assessment data to try and identify the areas that students need help most um and pro providing targeted
practice based on that data and then in the leadup to MCAST really emphasizing the importance of doing their best and having that perseverance we're seeing out of our middle school students right now um and continuing to provide practice and preparation that's really
okay um like Dan I a lot of the same um protocols and data analysis work that we're doing at the middle school and the high school i also do want to give Dan a quick shout out not being a math person and thinking about your question regarding the current seventh graders we
had a quick whispering math moment um and it does look like um this cohort of seventh graders is again showing an upward trend from their performance as sixth graders i didn't do the exact percentages of the three schools combined but it looks like it's about it's like a 52 53
exactly so thanks to Dan for that quick math um love that um so here at the at the high school we uh teachers have really uh enjoyed taking a look at the data that is provided through um star reading uh we had that available to us
for a winter and a spring screening we did our winter screening in December when we first you know had access to the program and our spring screening was in early March um we could see again some some continued improvement i do want to offer the the caveat that due to the
timing of our star screening um and I know Miss Ferrar is here behind me um you know about 70 students enrolled as as you know in our AP seminar program and they have a lot of deadlines for the college board and a lot of performance tests so we were not able to get them
the time to do um their March star testing they just had some demands from the college board we will better figure out that schedule next year with with the full year ahead of us so while it does look like there was a slight decline in our 10th grade scores from winter to spring um again we were taking
70 of our students who are actually doing college level work um and taking them out of that screening number so I think that um does speak to that number um the next slide does go into again we did uh very similar to to the middle school we took a look at our MC test
performance and we found that similarly students had a tough time with paired text synthesis at the high school level they're often asked to um to navigate among three different texts to toggle um among them on the screen and so we um as as a department got together and we
created using MCAST STEM some paired text selected response question sets um as well as some writing text uh writing tasks you know where we do have two years our ninth and tth graders and three roads modes of writing to get through um we were able to do common
assessments on uh the third mode which would be our narrative writing in 9th grade and in the W2 which is the analysis writing our spring common assessments um have been designed to um tackle that that other writing mode which is argument writing as well as
some of the speaking and listening and performance standards so that's on the horizon for our spring assessments in high school are these um performance standards are they shared with parents how their child performs on these tests
um students grades correct well just the data that you're collecting isn't shared with parents um yes yeah yes senior scores oh oh star scores definitely some of the common assessments are rolled into letter grade
assignments so at conferences teachers absolutely discuss that um and the star scores definitely are shared yeah all right and science um and so just again to really in there is no potential
change to the MCAST high school uh it's the uh 2.0 and that's the way it's going to stay for a while until state surprises us and changes it uh what I what we do here is we have in the unit count assessments again using pair assessment as our our tool i think we
have about six total assessments we also have a a fairly comprehensive midterm and don't like to call a final exam but it is a current fair assessment that's doing at the end of the year this sort of includes the comprehensive the second half the year um so the data you'll see
here includes representative assessment from uh before the midterm as well as the midterm the midterm assessment it has no trend uh I came into the department meeting uh earlier this fall and watched them eviscerate last year's midterm they gave so we decided that not
a good idea to compare those two the reason they did that is they didn't like after we thought we looked at that assessment they wanted to change a lot of the questions the way they were asked what they were asking how they aligned to their own instruction so it just showed me a good sense of a lot of good
feedback they get from it using that to uh to make changes that would better align with what we want what our instruction is uh so this is the uh this is a an individual talent assessment one called forces uh you can again see the same pie
chart again showing exceeding medium proficiency there we're at about 73% um seeing medium proficiency and a little histogram of the kids live this is the same one for the the midterm exam
so this is the uh midterm again you see we got performance uh bands set trying to align with where MCAST performance bands are set uh so we use that to get an overall view then on the next slide and and there's other pieces of this I
can go down drill down to questions i can drill down into individual students but this is a quick way of looking at each of the standards so there was five standards uh on this uh there's actually six performance fell off the screen uh but there was five standards you can see
here and you can see them on the bottom and then it gives a a performance level and average score on that standard so again another way of looking you can go in and sort of see HSPS2-1 that was pretty low let's go in look at that standard now start taking a look at certain students what was the
deal who was not performing who's performing uh and we'll do that in department meetings there's a lot to look at uh we can't look at everything but we try and look at the stuff that uh is sort of sort of there this is our our testing schedule we
completed ELA testing last month um similar to what Becky noted so we're on a new testing platform this year um we can see the time that students are spending on it um and we were pleased that majority of them are taking their time um not trying to rush through it
we're a little skeptical with the change in the state's expectations um we will kick off our math testing in May and then our science exam so I'd just like to conclude by thanking everyone for their presentations tonight we have done a lot
of work over the past few years but especially in the last year in terms of um becoming more comfortable with looking at the data comparing the data and I think what's exciting about the data now is that we're seeing breakthroughs in areas what you will see in each of your home districts is much more detailed data by grade level and
subject area well you'll see some um exciting successes and reasons for grades or departments to to celebrate and then you'll see areas where we continue to struggle what I like about what I like about that data is that it
shows that our students and our teachers are capable of meeting the goal we will get there and people are becoming more comfortable with sharing what works and what that should look and sound like in a classroom so um a lot of work has been
done and continues to be done i applaud their uh their perseverance and their their willingness um to have difficult conversations and to self-reflect in terms of what's working and and what we could do differently for the future so I want to just thank them all for their uh
presentations this evening so I'm going to uh add a note for folks who um might be new in the audience or watching this separately or whatnot um tonight's presentation represents a lot of
progress in my view on a number of levels um not just from the standpoint of generally good improvements but from a process standpoint as well um several years ago when I started on the school
committee um we couldn't have a discussion about looking at um grade level sort of assessments or preassessments other than MCCAST and uh we couldn't relate whether those um
preassessments were uh predictive or correlated or related in any way to how MCCAST looked so the fact that we're able to do this now um and to have you know real increased data proficiency and
data driven discussion I think is really really good progress and obviously I think it's turning up in the numbers as well it's pretty clear that the spreading of that is getting down to the levels where it really needs to so thank
you all for that i recognize that's a that's a lot of work behind the scenes it's a lot of a lot to do with curriculum coordination that's a lot to do with data coaches that's a lot to do with individual teachers um all getting together and catching up and sharing
notes and things like that so really appreciate what we're what we see here gordon just maybe you want to make note it is 7 o'clock but we're yes wrapping up the joint meeting still and then it'll go right into the
yes we have uh three hopefully quick agenda items left for the joint meeting and then we will go into the silver lake meeting so joint meeting schedule for FY26 so in your packets tonight you will see a proposed joint meeting schedule on
that schedule uh there are three uh proposed dates similar to this year um once again we are recommending a um an online November date in uh a February date for the joint committee um to
review shared costs and then an April meeting once again uh for an opportunity to give an update on progress for the year and um also just to piggyback on what um Dr group just mentioned about the November meeting that will also be the
curriculum presentation the special education presentation as well as the technology presentation yes instead of individual meetings four times over so thank you is there a motion from the union to accept the dates as presented i
will make a motion to accept the joint school committee dates as presented second all those in favor i do have a motion from Silverlake to accept the dates as presented we have a second
um all in favor i was unanimous um let's talk about the exit interview discussion so I'm I'm not sure who asked for this to be on the agenda i believe it was Katie Barry and the admin review
subcommittee so this would not be a separate subcommittee it would be the designate from the admin subcommittee in collaboration I believe with um Liz or a member of the administration so I
know that Liz conducts exit interviews um and she has I believe conducted an exit interview i have conducted um I offer them to all employees so certainly specifically were um I offer all employees um this year I have conducted
two total um I offer them to everyone um I take their feedback i use them i have one scheduled for the future as well um but that is the current status of exit reviews i I think we were I'm
sorry i I think where we were coming from was school committee representatives or admin review representatives doing a separate exit interview with the senior
staff of the district that's where I think we've come from um I think we're missing an opportunity to hear from individuals from the need some of the details of
their experience here and why they made the decision to go um I think it could be valuable i think sometimes we might think we know why somebody's leaving and we might be missing some information
that would be valuable and I know at least one individual who's left over the last couple of years who did not have any kind of exit interview and thought it probably would have been um important
not important but they would have entertained having an exit interview i'll be honest with you i'm going to go and I know we're crushed for time but I'm going to go back to when um Superintendent uh Blackwood left and we
weren't doing exit interviews then either two of us took it upon ourselves a gentleman from Clinton and myself to take her up to lunch and debrief with her and do our own sort of informal exit interview and it was very enlightening it was so I I think it's valuable i
think we're missing an opportunity by not conducting exit interviews of this the senior um team under the superintendent and the superintendent as well you know should have a superintendent group I think
that's important too so everybody in the senior realm so there just from a just for a practical standpoint they are offered to everyone regardless of their role I think I think Paul's point was that benefit absolutely
So is there something we want to vote about that i think the vote was to be able to name a design from within the admin subcommittee group um or design um as the time um if if there's a
need for it throughout so not to somebody now but to vote to approve right going forward with this type of interview and then when it comes up the um admin review committee could
potentially designate a public question okay um I don't think you should preclude anybody from of course anybody from having accidents you can talk to someone who's needed another business at all correct
correct all of us have the ability to contact anyone at any point this is this would be to more formalize it so that we can discuss this is what was said in the exit interview that was called an exit interview and if someone had I believe
taken it upon themselves they could obviously um contribute that information if they wanted to but um a more formal I think process i I think it's a great idea to have the the uh admin youth committee
have the authority to uh to do that in a little bit of official capacity and have the uh have them designate those We've done have the bandwidth and time to do that within the subcommittee perhaps we we have job descriptions for all our
subcommittees we could add that bullet items that admin review representatives would have as their responses so would we be voting tonight then to um uh make it the uh responsibility of
the admin review committee to appoint a person or persons to conduct uh exit reviews with um departing uh senior district officials i think that that sums it up because um I think it would
just formalize that we would actually have a process in place instead of us questioning every council if anyone conducted it with respect to our HR director from a school committee um perspective yep absolutely
all right welcome Silver Lake do I have a motion then to uh to instruct our our empower our admin review committee to appoint a person or persons to conduct exit interview exit
interviews with senior departing um district employees that's just the amendment just so amended so I'm sorry Lucas moved that was on the amendment to make it a make it a formal interview so as not to
preclude informal interviews i mean other school district other committee members might say I would also like to meet with person but I'll second okay so Lucas moved Mark seconded any further discussion i I'd just like to say maybe
the word annually could be added so that basically when the admin review committee organizes that's when they would designate okay i Mark is wishing to amend I would say just leave it
to my All right any further discussion seeing none all in favor is there a small motion from the union um I'll make a move
that second second by Trisha all those in favor and then um legislative update jason sent forgive me for reading his um message but I will read it jason has
parent teacher conferences tonight yes acceptance and I almost responded back but I believe I'll ask during the So Lake meeting if this is anything to do with the update that Sarah will give us tonight but um Jason says "The House and Ways excuse me the House Ways and Means
budget is set to be released next week while significant increases in education funding appear unlikely MASC and its partners have been advocating for key measures a $200 minimum pure people funding increment enhanced circuit breaker funding exceeding the 75%
threshold and raising the state reimbursement rate for extraordinary special education costs to 90% due to economic uncertainties and federal funding concerns the governor and legislative excuse me legislature have shown reluctance to make substantial
budget increases and may see hope for relief through a sub supplemental budget utilizing fair share amendment funds or interest acrewed in the rainy day account however this seems improbable at present even though such measures would not affect the
FY26 state budget directly recent federal funding cuts have had two major impacts on Massachusetts schools first there was a $16 million reduction in nutritional program support second the clawback of over 100 million in unused ESSER funds currently under review for a
potential challenge by the attorney um excuse me by the state attorney general for FY26 federal funding is projected to contribute 16 billion to the state's overall $62 billion spending plan any reductions even if not explicitly targeting public education will weaken
the state's ability to support struggling school districts and municipalities advocacy efforts remain focused on long-term goals such as reforming chapter 8 and increasing circuit breaker reimbursement meanwhile the push for immediate emergency funding
assistance for FY26 continues with urgency so that was the legislative okay i think with that um especially noting that we're a bit behind time we will uh have a uh um motion to adjurnn um I get a
motion from Silver Lake to adjourn our portion of the joint school committee meeting so move we have a second second okay we'll do a roll call jen yes paula yes lucas Mark yes dean yes and I'm a
yes i'll make motion second okay caitlyn Warren yes trisha yes and I'm a yes okay the joint committee meeting is adjourned why don't we take a quick 5m minute
break for water or whatever call me when you're locked out of the school all right i would like to call to order the Silver Lake Regional School
Committee meeting for April the 10th 2025 and um I will note that this meeting is being recorded if anyone is intending to make an audio or video recording of this meeting they should notify me at this
time um the top of the agenda says school choice meeting yes it is school choice school choice meeting 6 p.m what am I supposed to do with that so
um we probably should have opened with school choice oh yeah um I don't know if anyone still remains from the joint meeting and that wanted to speak to school choice i think it was just an error that it was the 6 p.m on our agenda i believe it was
supposed to say 7 p.m because Oh that is right i don't think I don't think it needs to supersede the Do I need to open a separate school choice meeting is that Yes it just needs to be open and closed and you need to decide whether or not to withdraw from school choice and if you choose not to participate in school
choice withdrawal you need to set the reasons for that withdrawal um okay all right so I will call to order the school choice meeting um and we will open that with a roll call vote um Jen Jeff Paula yep
lucas yes mark yes jean yes and I am a yes so this school of choice meeting is also being recorded and if anyone wants to make an audio or video recording of this meeting they should notify me at this time and with that
said Dr crew could you remind us of our school choice uh present stance so currently we uh last year we withdrew from school choice the state assumes that you will participate in school choice unless you take a vote to
specifically withdraw from school choice if you withdraw from school choice you need to site the reason for that you could site budgetary reasons you could site space concerns uh things of that nature um if you decide to pursue school choice you don't have to
do anything you because the school will the state will assume that you are a school choice district okay um do we have any public commentary related to school choice okay if I recall correctly from
last year we withdrew from school choice um with great concerns about the budget um Dr crew if I recall correctly could you explain how school choice funding works if if kids from other districts decide to come here or vice versa if
they decide sure if they decide to come here I believe the last figure was around 6,000 per student that the school district will receive um I think there's a little bit extra if this if the student attending um it has has special
needs okay and remind me or maybe Sarah could remind us what is the typical per student cost i can get that for you do you mean for Silver Lake yeah which I think on average is over $15,000 it's
more like 18 $18,000 so um so essentially we get a small subsidy in support of a student who uh comes in via schools so it's a maximum up to 5,000
per student for special education students um there's a there's an additional increase right okay um so the question for the committee is uh do we want to do we want to
um withdraw from school choice or do we want to remain um school choice i would make a motion that we withdraw from choice for the financial um implications as well as the um space
concerns i don't believe we can put a cap on how many children can Do we have a second to Jean's motion second okay is there any further discussion about that all right um should I roll call that
vote or is that just a simple voice simple in person okay all right uh all in favor of withdrawing from school choice because of concerns about our budget and about our space i I
opposed lucas is a photo okay so Lucas was the one opposition everybody else was in favor with drawing from school i make a motion that we close the school i have a second okay roll
call Jen lucas and I am a yes with that we uh let's see we need to open with a roll call vote to open a regular meeting so Jen yes paula yes lucas yes mark yes
jean yes i'm Yes i've stated it before but I'll state it for the fourth time tonight this meeting is being recorded and if anybody is intending to make an audio or video recording of this meeting they should notify me at this time do we have any
public participation seeing none we'll move to student recognition do we I I feel like I saw a note that we might have to move to student recognition okay okay
yes sounds good okay let's go to approval of minutes for March 6th do we have an a motion to approve the minutes of March 6th to the meeting March 6th motion to approve contend for March 6th okay second all right any
further discussion seeing none all in favor i all right uh let's talk about the middle school uh resource officer because after we voted our massive budget and all that uh tremendous discussion the town looked
up and said could you please add 22% for benefits so Sarah had approved could you explain please yes so uh the the we had received a request from the chief um to consider for the school committee to
consider funding the the um SRO at 8 FTE for the upcoming school year out of our um out of our budget when I sent the inter municipal agreement to the town the town administrator
um passed it for this year only we could pick up the cost in that 80,000 that we've already allocated because uh for benefits because it was not included in
uh their town budget the additional cost according to the town administrator will be an additional $18,667 so if we have to vote that in does that
also mean we have to vote the entire budget thing all the way over and the assessments all the way over thank you for a tour finance director um correct me if I'm wrong i can't find
that email from the town manager um he said in the email that the patrolman wouldn't be able to start until later in later in the school year
so um I think part of what kicked this off is I had asked our attorney to put together an intermunicipal agreement so that we could have something in writing about what was going to happen and once it came in
writing then some questions came back so what the interimmunicipal agreement that we had sent said was that we would pay $80,000 at $10,000 a month because that is what we were asked and that's what you voted on the
$80,000 so then um it was explained that the patrolman would have to be hired and wouldn't be able it would have to go through the academy and wouldn't be able to start into at the schools until later in the year so the
$80,000 per salary we wouldn't be paying the full $80,000 for salary that there would be a portion for salary and part of the portion that's left over we could pay the benefits okay and so it still
puts us at spending at maximum $80,000 okay to Kingston for patrol okay all so is the $18,000 some more dollars in
benefits is is that for eight months as well that's not full year right that's not 12 months no so if you if you look at uh the town administrator's email from April 3rd um he's looking for an additional 18,667
yeah the annual benefits are 25,000 and he's at asking us to pay so it's prorated yes okay and it sounds like we won't have the resource off we're not going to get them until probably December January something like that
because whoever it is they have to you know fund it they have to post it they have to get somebody through the academy they have to train them and that was still at about 80 that's what Sarah's advocating okay
all right but I I would I would argue that that's not how I read the town's request silver Lake would find an additional $18,667 does it sound like that yeah he says Silverlake will find I don't have will find up to $8,000
monthly of the SO SRO wage cost for the 10 months um email it's not in our Oh I'm sorry i'm looking at the spreadsheet
from the town manager right now so they're they're going to provide services for November through June but we're going to pay the full 80 as if it was September why would you do that
yeah because we're going to the benefits is an additional cost it would have been closer to 100,000 but because it's the prorated amount the salary plus the benefits they're asking why are we why would we pay 10 months of service for 8 months of service agreed
that's one question and I and I believe that they're hiring a new person that we're going to be paying the benefits while that new person is at the academy through the whole thing and my question is is why is the resource officer has to be a new hire and not somebody from the
staff that's already existing within the department expenses based well I think this is we took on the burden of having the resource officer to start with which was a change and I I totally agree we
should have a resource officer but we already took on the expense to have the resource officer and the 80,000 coming out our budget instead of out the town's budget i don't understand how at this point why they can't use this staff member that's already on staff until the
other person trained and switch them out for that was that was experienced office originally i believe to Mark's point it was implied that this was a current staff member not that we're hiring an additional staff member that we were just going to be if I understand correctly we were going to
be absorbing this cost from police department into the school budget but I don't recall hearing anything about a new employee either i agree with you on that i think we could consider taking on the
benefit package and years to come but at this particular point I feel comfortable leaving it but he's he's asking for the reverse he's asking us to take it on this year and then not in the future now one of the things that you're
Sarah's going to talk about is the state right because is sending us an additional $300,000 for trans transportation reimbursement so we have a little bit of um budgetary relief coming
um how to use that is a different story since we capped $1.3 million in EMP um so we
can move to do this and vote it we can not move at all um I feel like it was a bait and switch with the position and I'm not It doesn't feel great accusing I'm not accusing our administration i think that
it wasn't a I said to J I felt like we took a lot of heat um from the towns and particularly that town about uh the state of our uh budget deliberations and everything like that
and uh took a lot of grief over um being able to project what our costs were and now that we've locked them we're being asked to readjust them and it doesn't fit but I don't know that that the
feeling of that is enough to warrant um not moving forward i'd just like to point out based on the percentages this is uh we're discussing half of this bill by piece and already I mean I guess I don't I don't
like this but I guess if it is just for the one year and I actually I thought we were paying fully loaded i thought well that's what the rub is that's what we thought
but even before I actually think that they told us that they were going to pay the benefits yes they did they did like that was part of the discussion that we had absorbing this position was they would cover the benefits and the the last of the because it's more than a $80,000 a year position so I believe
there was a split there that we were told but in full fairness the police department was looking for an override that they didn't get a vote for from the board selectment so it looks like they're still trying to trim things off that they can pass off to other
departments if you would but I just want to make it clear that while I'm not against this position I think that was kind of a crafty thing to do after we've already finalized our budget took a lot of scrutiny about our budget and now we're adding another which came with no
like I'm sorry to ask you for this or anything like that it was can you do this long so could the school committee agree that we would pay up to $80,000 for salary and benefits for the
officer i mean that's already agreed upon it's agreed upon i think where we're upset is it's not even a whole year that we're going to get this employee and now they're asking the salary is going to be raise the price and cut the service correct there you go it's a baby
i think it's unfortunate short change 3 months can I can I ask that we table this um vote about the 18,000 until Sarah's presented about the financials a little bit later yeah we can do that is that
more fair since we have some more coming $300,000 okay we can do that um Princet you're up thank you i my up date was MCAST information so I'm all set i'm going to pass on to this skill
all right no donations or field trips or flyer requests or anything nope the talent show is Wednesday at 5:00 if you want to come see the joy that's all I got field juice was great thank you it was Thank you it was a nice job all
right that's Gill i am not sorry um so I wanted to provide an update on our fall schedule trial for coming into the end of week two of trial one and I just want to give kudos to our staff and our students um this you know came on quick
but certainly with a ton of enthusiasm and support and I'm just so proud of everybody in our building rolling with the punches especially as we learn um a new platform called flex which allows teachers to create activities for students during that later walk and
students select um or required to attend academic supports um makeup sessions things like that so um it's been pretty positive so far after spring break we will start trial number two which will be a shortened later block that will happen every Wednesday um and then we'll
do some surveys and do some digging to determine what we think may be best and hope to make a recommendation for next year um I'm super excited tonight to share with you that um through the work of Scott Frell um our school was awarded a
$47,000 grant for project lead for biomed science to provide professional development and training for our teachers infrastructure um and help us develop solid biome pathway for students is there maybe you want to add anything else to that yeah and it's just
again this just kind of partners off the project the way engineering stuff as well we have a really solid pathway there we have a capstone class senior year which kids do that research on this will lead into that as well um I talked
with our alli health department about this and our teachers to put blending two together we get a ton of alli health from students in anatomy class uh and so this is just a it's a more hands-on more experiential uh way of teaching and I it's hopefully
going to build capacity of teachers to lead that into other classes but to develop this pathway because again this is a hot item we know that in Massachusetts uh we should be using the best quality resources possible sort of led our bio technology
program she did all that herself and it's good but this then elevates it to another they've come through the support project either way uh and a lot of resources that provide us awesome i wanted to honor and recognize student
Olivia SA whose um artwork was collected for best in show and will be on display in Congress in Washington DC for the next year um it's pretty incredible there are many of us who are already offering her artwork it's incredible um
if you get my newsletter you would have seen it like the the back of person pretty incredible um phenomenal artist we're excited to see where her takes her art forward michaela that one
you're talking about she painted did she really does it look like a picture i went to her art class and all of her works like she does like hyper realism she takes like It's good cuz that she's an AP
she's in so I'm in AP like 2D art and she's an AP drawing she will take like weeks to finish a project but they are Yeah there's another she has right now she has a series of like ballerina and different poses and looks like it's
going to be studio pictures she's I have zero talent let's go kill Mark and say you're awesome i just going to say the project leader way was a significant benefit when both of my sons went through
they're both uh master's degree engineers at this point but the unique experience they had in project week courses that's overlay what they still talk about the ability to to interact with different folks from different walks of life and create teams and team
building was essential in both their undergrad and master's program a phenomenal program to say earlier today um our seniors from the capstone project um capstone class they presented their projects to us today they once through one group they made um capturing all
ketchup out of ketchup bottle and then another student developed a new arm and elbow pad that doesn't slide down and I'm convinced we're going to have our own break one day named after him because he needs a patent that he's gonna he's going to make millions i'm so proud of you guys
um all right so I do have a few um donation requests to ask for this evening we have some representatives here from our volleyball team our boys volleyball team raised $10,660 for year two of their team as you know they're still required to pay for their coaches their their travel
their uniforms all their gear um we are excited this year we have a varsity team last year we just had three weeks um so the program is growing um we'd like for you to accept that do you want I have a couple donations all at once um parent Margaret Record would like to
donate $2,500 to the class of 2026 to use next year for their senior prom and the Halifax Country Club would like to provide or donate a golf membership for all students boys and girls on the Silver Lake golf teams which would be a huge help because Mike and Siri that's for Mike
and Siri right he had reached out to make sure that that was on our list wow that's huge and of course we said thank you so those are the three that I have volleyball junior class class 26 and we need a motion to accept those uh
donations i will make a motion that we accept the $10,660 of volleyball um money that was fundraised as well as $2,500 for the senior prom for next year and the golf memberships from the Halifax comes a
second second all right any further discussion seeing none all in favor um I'm an outstate filter request this evening pathways program would like to travel to the Newport Car Museum in Rhode Island um next week this is our um
program for students ages 18 to 22 um this would be to help develop community access social skills community safety planning for trips and traveling out of state as well as we need a motion to approve that i will make a motion that we approve the
field trip for the pathway students um out of state second second all right all in favor i have our student handbook changes for the 2025 2026 school year in the folder for you all proposed changes have been
approved or recommended and approved by our school council and they're highlighted in red for you the first is to update our GPA computation with the addition of the accelerated level next school year the second proposal is to update our cell phone policy um to make
a schoolwide um rule that students have to put their phones in the storage it can't really be optional um the third proposal is that students who are discipline hours would not be permitted to attend school dancing social athletic events
we also added a clause in there um to try to help with some of the unsportsman like behavior we've been seeing at games and events um so that students be subject to discipline or removal from those events the next is to change deliveries
during the school day really lunch but we don't want iced coffees being delivered in the middle of math class either um so just sort of making that a little bit more broad where we want students to be door dashes um and then finally some updates to our student parking just to make it a little
bit more clear um we added the language that we typically have on our registration paperwork um we're going to try to tighten up the expectations but also make it a little bit more appealing and traffic to our seniors that they would have some um right of first
refusal and watering the upper lot spots and then any additional seniors or juniors would have lower spots we have not had a senior lot or a junior lot since 2012 can I ask a bit of a clarification on
that since I read it um it says August 1st for the lottery for the senior lot then the junior lot follow upper lot and lower lot sorry sorry upper lot lower lot and then it says September 1st essentially is is the September 1st one
for anyone that does not have say a license or anything yet either didn't register in time or they get their license at the end of the summer so now we open it back up after Oh it's still the end of the summer so how does a
student with a May birthday get a spot they probably don't but but how do students throughout the year that So it's first serve so anybody after that initial window of opportunities to sign up just like we do our current practice
so it's not a change in practice um if they become licensed they come by the park if you have a spot they get it it's first come first serve otherwise unfortunately our our spring babies or our summer babies they would have to wait till their senior year um there are
we do giveaway lists so there are opportunities student transfers or they lose their parking privileges um or they lose their vehicle their parents take their vehicle away there are certain situations where spots open up um and then we try to make
sure that anybody on the wait list those are the list especially um the seniors are gone and unfortunately we don't have enough spots for everybody gordon may I ask one more question about the GPA computation how will that affect um like
your upper classman next year that did not have the similar weighted um grades for freshman and sophomore year in terms of it they won't because they're they stay together like they're they're the classes they also have they all have the same GPA okay but when they're applying
places and it's say 4.4 out of 4.8 instead of 4.5 you know right i guess I'm just wondering the conversion since it's going to change halfway through their high school well
because they've all had the same calculation the last two or three years but not not within their class like when they're applying to colleges like which GPA will you know like like a 4.0 out of a 4.4 is different than a 4.4 out of a 4.8 so I
guess 5.3 is our right that hasn't changed right that one's for AP right so previously we had the AP honors accelerated was known as our was like our CP1 and then college prep was CP2
i think that's what it's changing to is I think your question is what GPA is going to be reported to colleges GPA yeah so we we wouldn't send like we had to do a specific formula instead of college anyway because every every
school had a different computation so our counselors calculate your GPA based on I feel like I'm not answering your question though i I feel like I'm confusing myself but I think what I'm considering is no one will be no one's GPA will a freshman coming in is going
to have a higher GPA if they're taking the accelerated classes than a junior that did not take accelerated but took a college prep that was not as high of a GPA the college prep GPA would have been the same as now what we would offer accelerated
so if I was a junior and I took a class C1 model but then my friend takes it as a senior accelerated thank you very open yes i just like to speak to the uh the cell phone policy there's a lot of
movement nationwide on being more restrictive with cell phones showing significant reduction improvements with the kids and performance and I know I asked the same question last time and you were assured me that the telephone use is not a
distraction that the classroom is a problem to achieve um I just I think the move to be a little bit more restrictive is is a good move and I'd support maybe further um because of those test results that are out there but I think your
student uh council your student and and all the organizations that that decide how that's handled should role within a school um there is some significant data out there that to do some research on and
anything you can improve the performance of our students there's a lot happening at the state level too in terms of making the state policy for schools i'm curious to see how that that plays out a lot of schools are part of a pilot program now where students have to turn their phones in
the start of the school day to little walking pocketing devices um you know I think for us we are very our schoolwide policy right now is maybe helpful kids aren't supposed to their phones during class
time um but I think by requiring them to turn their phone in and start a class right cuz there are definitely still some things like well I don't have my phone on me and then they leave the classroom so we're just trying to do everything we can to bring these kids in and keep the distraction limited focus on learning
that will help not just with academics but with their social emotional well i I know you have a parent group that you have to play most and I think most of that can can I reach my student and again these little
devices are are not included in your cell phone policy no they are they are not supposed to be there emergency and they can still use it very
much um I think that was the last Before we um policy with regards to students that they allow to go to the events um you might want to check with
legal team or not to see whether or not considerations with disability um related to the display because that would be exclusionary manifestation that you need 10 days to have 10 suspensions
um before manifestation manifestation take place talking does this does that go to the dance on Friday night is that legal to I would consider that that behavior may be related to a student's disability so
I would caution that policy being approved without having legal rights so perhaps you could uh approve the recommended changes pending review by special education legal counsel any other discussion about the student
handbook changes do we have a motion to accept those changes pending review of the student discipline by um special education and legal counsel so move i have a second
any further discussion seeing none all in favor i I'm going to vote no doesn't need discussion no all right um All right and then we have a proposal
from Mr swanson our athletic director copy this is in your folder um we would like to propose the establishment of a structured summer strength and conditioning program for school student athletes that would be supervised by our trainer it would run 6 weeks 3 days a
week um here in the high school uh would be self sustaining through participation fees that would pay for the trainer and the cost needed in terms of materials i would estimate that it would also generate revenue beyond those operational costs um so we can support our
athletic professional um is that is this supposed to be in lie of like the for instance football conditioning that's happened over the summer is this to kind of make it a more formal the idea that quest will be available to all student
athletes who at the school staff um it is in align with MIA on the captain's coaches side um our training working but this would require an art
for registration fee yeah Um would there be so will this be the only working out so to speak um offered on campus or are there going to be say separate gym hours
for the football team besides their Yeah practices that this would just be a supervised trainer program for athletes a lot of schools in our area provided it's huge
advantage um our trainer actually does every summer with us train our own athletes the off season all right any further questions or discussions about
that all right we have a motion to approve the uh summer trainer workout strength and conditioning program as uh outlined by um
director i make a motion to approve this training all right i got a second second all right all in favor i any opposed okay thank you for some student updates
hi everyone um I mean I'd like to like congratulate Olivia and a bunch of other art students in not just like best in show which is amazing but like best painting best photograph best print a department award
um so coming up next week we have spirit week um we do one in April so we have like Y2K day Jackie Robinson Day on Wednesday Y2K day i feel so old
are you going to run like Office Space on Loop or something that's the best movie ever but they did it at the office always jeans we did not wear high so we're doing Y2K day which if we're trying to encourage
teachers to bring the students outside to make like a catch if they want to and if your teacher does that and photographs it and sends it to the student Instagram then you're going to be put in for like a raffle to get culinary lunch um which would be really
cool for the class that needs that then we have tacky tourist day and senior spotlight so bunch of classics um do you really need a prize for Y2K like the person who comes is Bill Lumber with like the suspenders and they're all
going to be Britney Spears yeah okay so the prize is actually on that note what happens is when we're present you're going to be coming to a pool and we're randomly going to have one student
every day to get called out their student ID so their name isn't called out and then they get sent out to the office then if they're dressed up then they get a $1 visa gift card and if they're not dressed up then they just don't get it or it goes to the next
person so then it's $200 for the next person the next person doesn't dress me up so we're hoping that encourages a lot of people especially because it's random to dress up um we're doing a p round too that
week so we have a lot going on for spirit next week um tomorrow we have mass um Leila Pal is running for like a representative which we hope she earns we're all voting for her i hope she does
well um we have the breakfast food election which I'm very involved in but chocolate chip pancakes for um it's like government politics chocolate chips do not belong in pancakes Chris those were raised better than that apples those are
great in pancakes chocolate chips are not apples are good in pies i feel like chocolate chips would be good both sweet but um over bacon and cheese for sure syrup on chocolate chips is nasty
um and to like talk to the maker blog it's been super helpful for like teachers and students i've talked to like my math teacher and even like my art teacher about it and it's just super helpful to have extra time like more hands-on cuz sometimes what
happens is like the day before a test or something everyone's after school trying to get help from that one teacher so there's like 30 kids so it's nice to have maybe if like the later block it's 20 kids and then after school too you can still stay after and there's still
that opportunity so I think so far it's been just great um so I'd consider doing that next year on that thank you thank you all right Sarah you're up
thank you sorry I just scrolled all the way to the bottom of my notes um financial report we last met on March 6th and on March 11th I received a prior
fiscal year bill for Mckin Vento Transportation and on April 3rd I received a prior year bill for insurance deductible uh these two bills totaling $17,8862 need to be paid out of END so
seeking permission to do that i'll make a motion i mean there's no choice so I'll make a motion to pay the bills that um the um director of business just described okay second from from Andy all right any further
discussion seeing none all in favor so moving on um to the financial report that is put in your uh in in the network drive for you um as I go through and prepare for the meeting I go through line by line and I take note of anything
and then I check my notes from the previous meeting and see if there's anything um that is new that I haven't already talked about um so with your permission I'll skip over a lot of the stuff I've already talked about and only
talk about new um on page 10 there is uh we continue to have an issue with our financial software in the health and life insurance line um the software is uh doubling double counting expenses um
so there has been 2,672,14853 spent out of that line thus far this year and there's an actual balance of $630,000 two $630,29127 which is much better than the negative 500,000 that it says on this
print out sarah can I ask we just got this software just a handful of years ago are they coming in to to correct us they There have been some challenges with the in-house payroll and we've
worked with the consultant that trained us for the in-house payroll and sometimes it's frustrating for us because we're told well this is your system so yes it is our system and
and the the the when payroll is run it's basically taking money out of an account not really but it's subtracting it out in the software and then the bill comes from Mayflower Health and we pay the
bill and so it's getting subtracted out multiple times so now that we know that there's the issue we can fix it with a journal entry we've fixed part of the issue but every time we fix something then we can see
that there's other issues that we're still continuing i'm sorry that didn't answer your question no yes it's a new software i inherited this software i really like the software but one of the things I've been saying to um it's Tyler
Technologies one of the things I've been saying to them all along is when you come out and you do a uh implementation of a new software the trainers come out and there's a very intensive hands-on um you know
multi-month process and all of the people that were here for that aren't here now and so there's no documentation for anything there's no business office procedure manual there's there's um I I sat with
Christine Healey and she I took notes and she showed me how to do things and I've done some trainings but the the software company we can contract with them for more trainings or for special help with things and I keep saying to
them we really just need somebody who's a guru not some you know sometimes we're spending time on the on a call with someone who's not so helpful um we really need somebody who is a guru that can come out and say this
this should be here this should be here this is checked this shouldn't be checked the the almost as if it were a new implementation i would be escalating this request for a guru to
the company to demand somebody come up and help us through this and fix this and part of the issue is that different things about this account
have unfolded so we first found an issue with this account last April and so we're we find something new every day so I just need to interject to Sarah no one
ever comes out this is all a phone call or online we've never had anyone actually physically come for training when Dave and everybody did it and I was in a lot of those meetings and it was all
a meeting so we've never actually had anyone and Debbie or Sarah Debbie makes a lot of phone calls she gets a different person every time it's their help desk is tough so she can be on the phone for hours trying to fix a problem
but no one has ever physically come i don't think that's what they do it's all online all right i I mean this respectfully is it possible that this is like user error because essentially the program is not trained properly amongst the employees that are using it that maybe there's a
command that every time you click one line the other lines go away or is it possible that things are just being moved around because because it's being manually entered yeah that that is completely possible but
nobody has been able to guide us in how to fix how to correct it and it's been over a year now we can't be the only ones using this software is there a neighboring school system that could uh lend us somebody
for a few hours they were Tyler has user groups which for like different facets of their so I do a lot of interfacing with people who use it however respectfully um they are a big business and some of the help um
that we get from other districts isn't we're so very unique and I don't mean to say we are but it's four different budgets is four different so even the help even in personnel helpful but I also find sometimes we're on the cutting
edge and just as an example they are a lovely company but sometimes as we're going through a training it will be okay open the manual and go through the manual and the person training and again totally appreciate their training um and sometimes we get to a stuck point and then they're like "Oh I haven't seen
this before." And that's the trainer so to your question G do you think it could possibly be some user error but there are some challenges with the I I guess is this a software that updates itself or is this something that our technology
department needs to continually update to stay because I'm just wondering what what it what's causing the glitch it sounds like it's a glitch through the system it is it is a glitch and it's and it's a glitch that started when we went to the in-house payroll in January of
2024 so um there are other issues with the system um that are because of the way our chart of accounts was set up that you can't pull reports effectively um so but that's going to be solved
through the new charter accounts next year but this issue with the uh health and life life insurance um liability accounts is something
that we identified that it was a problem we found a fix to the problem we thought we fixed the cause of the problem and then we found another problem too so my question is if we have a software
that has only problems and also we cannot get for one year somebody who can train us why are we using this type of software it was here when I got here I will tell you I do like the software it is a very powerful software it is comprehensive
software um but it doesn't work it it the software works the problem is is the implementation Right we are taking an antiquated system of bookkeeping for four separate
districts that wasn't properly set up and now a new person is left untangling when she comes across the bridges the problem is is that we have
four separate budgets so when other school districts set up their chart of accounts or their budget it's pretty routine for us we are not the norm and we have four
separate budgets that need to be able to interact under this same organization okay my question is the software suitable for four different budgets or not yes it is it is
so why are they complaining about this and the and because it's not set up yet properly and it needs it needs more work it just needs more work and that the problem was is that the we are getting more and more complicated and we have
more responsibilities to report out on expenditures people's individual spreadsheets once upon a time might have served us well but we are far too complicated and the amount of reports that we have to run and provide
information to people legally has surpassed that oldfashioned system let's uh let's keep advancing um I I know obviously you will keep working with working with it and working with
the company and doing the best that you can and if we need to talk about the software separately then we can do so but Sarah go ahead and until there is a until it's fixed I will be giving you a an update on the number which is going
to be incorrect on the print out okay um on page 12 to 14 of the report special ed costs as I've said in the past uh there's a lot of moving parts with special ed for tuition transportation and contracted services those three categories are paid out of operating and
the 240 grant uh the special ed bookkeeper keeps a spreadsheet with all of those accounts and uh the expenses and at this time there is a surplus so the spreadsheet was updated today shows
a surplus in that moving on to grants donations and awards so uh chapter 44 section 53A of Mass General Law says that the school committee can ex that the school committee has to accept grants and
donations in order for us to spend them so um we have a report for you from the the accountant with a $500 grant from the MA um Mass School Library Association
$5,940 from Good Nation for the Investigative History Grant and $10,600 for the volleyball donation believe we also have the art sciences grant as well i I will add that to the
list except for the volleyball one next yeah they will be on the list next month okay so we'll we'll vote that one next month we'll vote these right now okay is that I mean is that is that what you want is that what you're looking for um so this this sheet is going to be very
helpful for the auditor when he comes in and for me when I do the end of year report doing end of year reports this year it was a scrap trying to find out where's all the money that came in we're going to have all the money that came in all on one sheet okay so if you could
vote what's on here and we will add the new things for the next meeting okay all right um so we need a motion to accept the grants that uh Sarah has noted for us so move do I have a second second all
right all in favor no okay corrective action plan we've been working with the auditor on the FY24 audit yes we are behind the timeline for getting that done in on time um I expect
there to be continued findings necess necessitating another corrective action plan for FY24 the accountant and I will be meeting with the auditor all day on Monday um hopefully we'll make a lot of progress on Monday um I wanted to share
with you that the house approve so if you think about the the chapter 70 funding the governor's budget uh comes out in January there's initial amounts for chapter 70 funding and then that
goes to the house the um initial um transportation regional transportation reimbursement from the state uh from the governor was $795,726 the house voted to fund regional transportation at 100% which
would give Silver Lake uh $1,151,117 um if that passes the Senate and then the conference committee for the final budget so there is a potential 355,000 um increase in the funds that Silver
Lake would get from the state and I would like for you to consider um additional staffing through the business office if that money does come in gordon can I just ask a point of clarification um this money is going specific to
Silver Lake but if we were to approve something then it's going to increase the assessments of the towns right or I'm just trying to figure it out like it's a $355,000 increase in revenue but Right but
potentially we don't have to use all of that END which would lessen the assessments to the town from the regional budget is that correct they have they have we have a lot of options and we're and because it's not yet approved I we don't need to debate them tonight but any those options could be
anything from uh special education programs yeah special education programs um andor funding an additional position or two in the business office or offsetting the amount of END that we're using or modifying the budget or any
number of things um money in the special ed contingency right fund that's empty right so there's any number of things it could go to um it's probably worthy of a robust debate it's really not agended for this other than the fact that it's
you know a possibility um and I think it's fair for Sarah to raise it but I I don't think we need to deliberate um terribly far on it tonight but we can put it on the agenda assuming that it gets approved we can put it on the agenda for discussion
at the next meeting could I just point is this a shared cost as an admin position well it would depend on how we that those are all the things that we just discussed that because that was actually my other question if we're talking about a shared cost admin position that wouldn't come
from money from the Silver Lake budget that would come from a shared cost discussion right yeah it's all it's all a discussion that's theoretical until they approve it i'd just like to say I do support the position being funded
okay okay uh the last thing I have is a circuit breaker silver Lake has not had a circuit breaker revolving account because Silver Lake has never had a need for a circuit breaker revolving account
so I'm just seeking your permission to open a special education reimbursement fund we will call it a circuit breaker revolving account um and I need the school committee's permission in order to carry over funds in it from year to
year how was it initially funded with any surplus at the end of the RA this is this is not an emergency stabilization fund this is the circuit breaker account which is new for Silver
Lake so um Dr paneres office applied for extraordinary relief for for uh reimbursement for the current year and if we're approved we'll have money coming in and we don't currently have an
account to put it in so this would just create an account for extraordinary relief and then next year we'll be getting a circuit breaker reimbursement based on amounts that were spent this year and we would need an account to put
that into any further questions about that so we need a motion to create a I can just clarify a little bit more so we could never claim to get reimbursement for out of district students because the out of district students went back to
their home original towns now that we have seven prek and 7 through 12 plus kids out of district now we're eligible to put in the circuit breaker claims but we need a someplace to put that money
we don't have a place to put the money once that claims do come in and they paid and they paid for so we need a motion for the creation of a circuit breaker revolving account so move can I just ask one more point of clarification isn't that a reimbursement though so it's money already spent so
why would it go into an account other than the general operating budget because that is um the directive of circuit breaker of you you take the money from the state and you put it into an account and there's only certain things you can spend it on mr right but
I'm saying but I guess my I guess my question is is when we pay for special education costs upwards of $52,000 we're receiving some kind of reimbursement but that's not coming back until the following year yes so why are we now taking that money that we've
already spent and put it into an account for approved expenses that that to me sounds like it's not going to be reimbursing our budget like we're always going to be working two years behind if we're putting the money away you can never reimburse the previous
there's so for example in Kingston Kingston paid money in FY23 for out of district tuitions and received money in FY24 to assist with the budget kingston pays that out of the circuit breaker
revolving account which is pretty standard and was set up pretty much everywhere except for Silver Lake except for Silver Lake when circuit breakers started back after the Ed Reform Act of 1993
so right like prior years it was in a different general ledger account and operating budget you're just carving it out into there a student that was whose peers were in 10th grade here at Silverlike High School who attended Perkins School for
the Blind their tuition was being paid from whatever town's elementary school budget and that's one of the things that Desi had Silver Lake untangle last year so now students
tuitions are being paid out of the budget where their peers attend school so Silver Lake this year is paying tuitions for students silver Lake next year will receive circuit
breaker reimbursement for tuitions and hopefully extraordinary relief this year and that revolving account money would be part of the overall operating budget discussion
yes yes yes okay if you look back at our notes we have anticipated circuit breaker for next year as part of our budget okay all right so we have a motion on the floor do we have a second second okay
any further discussion seeing none all in favor i any opposed okay thank you and that concludes my report dr clifford okay i will make it brief there's really
one important piece that I want to make sure that everybody's aware of we have uh search committees that um are happening for the director of special needs we just concluded a committee of two days of interviewing um so that's been happening and then another piece is
a principal search for the Halifax principal shift which will be happening next week so those two searches are are are going on and are happening right now um and the only other piece are things that we've talked about before as far as the math i'll I'll be bringing the math um curriculum decision for uh I'll
update the committee on the K through six math curriculum also the grade 7 8 uh math curriculum and then um 9th and 10th grade courses there'll be some that will be doing a a a opensource um math curriculum called illustrative math so basically those are the pieces i'll be
bringing the final um the final version of the literacy plan um to our last committee so meeting there'll be a lot of things then so that's it for me tonight dr cru so tonight um I am asking the committee whether or not uh it has a
a volunteer to serve on the regional study communication committee uh the town administrator for the town of Kingston and Halifax will be uh meeting soon to uh get this study underway and they are looking for a representative from the Silver Lake Regional School
Committee uh we have uh representatives from the Halifax school committee the Plimpmpton school committee and the Kingston school committee this is for the study of originalization i don't know uh it's Megan McCannon
megan we we didn't vote that did we or is that just a designated she volunteered jill is asking if we have a volunteer i'd like to volunteer but um I would I would yield to
uh Jean but uh she doesn't want to do it i'm glad to put my name in the hat and Jean you would be so I I just feel like this would be a continuation of the three years of unpengling that we just
sent doing it with Jesse but um well I've had the opportunity to see a lot of different uh aspects of Silver Lake time and years have put on it and relatively short tenure after my uh term here in committee and I certainly can
add a few items to the committee's opinion but I certainly think it's something that needs to be studied and not predisposed one way or the other but at this point to be honest just from the last three years of the work Paul and I have done I think that we could have done the study and saved
$130,000 but and I mean that completely genuinely i mean this is it's been a lot of work but I do I would like to be a designate but I don't want to take it from Mark but I I would like to do it give it to Paul because she's
leaving i don't think so if I wasn't leaving I'd love to do it i've done it two other times in the 20 years I've been here so Jean are you volunteering i would like to volunteer but um it sounds like Mark Mark is also
so you would volunteer if you don't do it oh then I would like I would like to do it um I just don't step on toes so step on toes G okay all right i'll stop do we need to vote to approve Jean as our representative is that You can
appoint okay all right do we have a motion to appoint Jean as our representative to the regionalization study so moved we have a second second any further discussion
seeing none all in favor i you need more things to do yes i apologize because I didn't have this in my notes i had been texting back and forth with the Kingston Town manager the
cost that he is looking for Silver Lake to pay for salary and benefits for next year is $66,667 that's the totality that is the totality which fits within the 80,000 which fits within the 80 okay okay well that in
that case I will What was it 66,000 what was it so we would just go past that we're we're just approving that we're going to cover both the benefits and that but what are we even approveing i mean we
already have a right so we don't have to I don't think we need to I don't think we need to take action correct we already have a budget for Okay um I'm still concerned we're not going to get this resource officer till we get here like go on record and say that but
our understanding is is that someone else would be here until the new SRO who's been trained would start correct in January is that correct Sarah that's not what the spreadsheet says we can I can make her require okay i
was okay uh Dr dr py do you have anything else that was it sla your board tonight okay i thought you were waiting for me thanks for your patience oh no i just hang
this party time what better witness on a Thursday night thanks for being here um admin review i will be sending out um or actually Karen will be sending out
information to the admin review and to um all of the committee members for my uh annual evaluation okay semianual evaluation cte no update no update um I don't have
any correspondence to report about um we had the legislative agents report in the previous meeting is there a further report to make no but I've sent that to Karen for the minutes so if you want to include that to both Sure i believe that might have been um included okay
um negotiations i don't think we have anything to report um we're we're starting with um sports app yes we are okay um pack our rep is out tonight so I
think we're on to policy where we I think need to have um some votes if I'm correct so it's from what Mike Chicane reported in the Kingston meeting the other night the vote will be to wave the actual
reading and to vote to approve a single read per her policy BGB for um these policies which I believe Dr pru will explain to remain in compliance we need to vote these policies tonight with
while waving the first and the second so ACCE was updated to include school meals that was the change there uh as a result of a um a review that was conducted for our uh food services and
JKAA and ICFB were both changes updates that need to be need to be done as a result of our tiered focus monitoring um from the state and Dr clifford can give you more
detail if um you'd like to know what those are in summary so the first one around the bullying and prevention intervention plan is really an update there's two things that need to be um updated in order for this to be in compliance the first one is on page
seven of the um bullying prevention plan it's a student survey the district will administer a student survey every four years to assess school climate and the pre prevalence nature and severity of bullying in schools that needed to be added and on page eight there needed to
be information added about the problem resolution system meaning that it lets parents know what what they need to do if they want to communicate to the uh PRS system the telephone number the the um address and all of that so that those are the only two things that needed to
be added to make this in compliance for the department of education that's that the second one is around the uh student restraint so the student restraint policy needed to be updated um we worked with um our attorneys to update the
student restraint policy in particular what really needed to be added in this highlighted item on page three is around if a student is restrained for a period longer than 20 minutes program staff shall obtain the approval of the principal and such approval shall be
based on the students continued agitation during the restraint justifying the need for continued restraint there needed to be that piece within the restraint policy in order for it to be compliant those are the two um policies and the two specific areas that
had to be added that has to be approved by school committee and then I submit this for our corrective action okay um so Dr crew anything else you want to say about those the reason why we're asking you to approve so quickly
rather than going through two reads is so that we can meet with compliance and that's where policy BGB comes in okay Jean I think you probably have the best handle on language to use here could you make the motion i'll make a
motion that we weigh the actual readings of J I CFB JK AA and ACE and vote to approve in a single read per policy BGB policies
JFB JK AAA and ACE do we have a second second any further discussion seeing none all in favor any opposed
okay um you good Dr b all right safer ah I get there so middle school uh AC uh project clerk of the works uh Sarah has uh included that and I believe in the package and we actually just need to
vote to uh to go forward with that um proposal is $22,400 and um I think we we have to vote to enter into that contract obviously the last piece I think we discussed the amount and the safer
committee voted to uh unanimously support that okay pending review by council yeah thank you thank you okay so we already have a contract with the Vivven Associates and this would fall under their
contract that has already been reviewed by one specific number of conversation we have at 5:00 we wanted to actually have council make sure that this safer meeting that's that was our
discussion i thought we found that council had reviewed that the contract yet all we have right now is a proposal okay okay and the proposal falls within
the contract from our house doctor agreement that we have with the Associates so are you saying we don't need a vote we don't need a separate contract okay we just need to sign the proposal okay do we need to vote anything
uh I believe The larger school committee would need to vote forward to move forward with the Is this the Esser fund project or is this like
this is this is money we're taking out of this year's FY right Sarah so this is an ARPA funded project arpa funded project with monies from the towns and the clerk of the works is something that
we are going to be funding as part of our capital this year is it coming out of this year or next year's budget i'm sorry uh next year's capital for next year's capital all right and it is in our capital all right so we need a motion to move
forward as stipulated i'll make a motion that we move forward with the proposal that was presented okay do we have a second second any further discussion seeing none all in favor i any opposed
very good mark anything else to say we have a capital plan proposal um that I'm not sure it's in the folder right Karen for um the general committee no because we just worked on it right in Saber prior to this meeting
so in a synopsis we had authorized 54 14,000 14,000 for our capital plan we have uh allocated uh specifically to the safety needs uh so far
um the um as a priority but we have some earmarks that Jason's working on for about $13,000 total um in lie of those getting uh not getting approved we have room in our capital budget to take money back out some of the things that are funded
and of the 400 514,000 we have approximately 35,000 of that is sitting in what we're calling a contingency um and what it is it's funding the uh bathroom project at the admin building which has a wide variety of costs based
on how the problem evolves to correct all from replacing just toilets to replplumbing a big chunk of the gas building so that's sort of our contingency funds as we have at the sitting right now uh 300,000 or so will
be going to the envelope to update the schools um based on the fees uh that were in the Kabib report there are some savings but there are also items that Kabib underestimated that will cost us more within that to move forward um we
have a couple of vehicles we're replacing but overall um we have a capital plan that was functional and we feel comfortable with it going forward okay details uh next week have we ever sorted out the uh shop doors yep they're
going to be done in June all right materials left to come back on site before they pick them open mark anything else i think that's all all right we have a treasurer's report that
one okay uh we have 19 vendor warrants for a total of 3,112,89 we have two payroll warrants for a total of 2 million $8,600.71 grand total of 5,153,5423
okay hope you all got the sign okay uh union 31 we have a meeting tonight and we voted to schedule tonight thank you very much all right i don't think we have any other agenda attachments um there is a something of an elephant in the room
that we should address i believe town elections are going to be held between now and our next meeting that I think technically makes this your last formal meeting no don't read the regional agreement you got me in May till June
1st june 1st okay you keep her for one more month yep one more month one more month i mean you're you're saying so many send off things mike I'm not going to have a secret plan do a writing for
you oh my god i'm so sorry i I'd just like to reiterate never say never again you're right about that yeah so we'll see you back soon all
right single signature warrant yes please go ahead we had a large number of expenses that came in last minute without time to get them on the warrants that you signed tonight so we'll be putting out putting together another warrant which will go out digitally for signatures next week
very good all right with that I believe we need a motion for adjournment so um and second okay all right roll call oh no there's no meeting in May you
might have to change because um I'm probably going to try to have you back on June 5th anyway mark is here okay just cuz we'll be have to reorganize then right have to reorganize
and just have me come back with Mark and we're going to have a number of new members contract so I'll drive you off let's finish our measures on