e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e good evening welcome to the Monday June 3rd 2024 meeting the Dennis Yarmouth Regional school committee please join me in the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all thank you very much the first item on our agenda is the acknowledgement of our retirees all right good evening so I was um thinking earlier today about what an amazing time of year this is uh graduation is this weekend um I actually just came from seeing my daughter off to her senior prom uh the weeks are filled with Awards nights final performances five final performances ceremonies um and tonight's another great example um we're here to celebrate and take a moment to pause and celebrate our retirees uh retirement to me uh it's a little bit like calculus um I understand that it's a thing um I know it's out there I understand that there's people who fully understand it um and I understand that there's people who have achieved it um but I don't fully uh appreciate it or understand it um it's too far away from my understanding for me to fully comprehend what I do uh understand is the dedication to students that is necessary for each of you to have gotten this far this isn't easy work that we do uh if it was quite frankly anybody could do it uh it takes a special individual um one who's steadfast in their commitment to improving the lives of children one who's willing to sacrifice name fortune and fancy things uh for a noble purpose uh one who's able to push forward against a strong headwind of public opinion that's quite frankly often telling them that they're and mistakenly telling them that their profession their chosen profession is broken and quite frankly sometimes it takes someone who's just crazy enough to stare down the face of a crying first grader or a bored teenager and say yeah I got this and you've been these people uh no one gets to retirement in public education without a strong commitment to students and your consistent presence has shown our students that our school system cares for them their future and their success so for every one of those students who stands behind you as you walk or maybe just a little bit earlier this year walked out the door on your last day please let me say thank you on their behalf May each of each of your following days be filled with happiness and joy our dolphin Community thanks you for all that you've done and we wish you all the best in your retirement thank you want to invite uh school committee chair uh Landers up to say a couple words chair for another five minutes but um welcome everyone and I just want to thank you all I won't repeat everything Mark said but um um your dedication is impressive I was just chatting with a few of you and hearing how many years you've been in the district and um you know we're all so proud of this district and everything our students are accomplishing and none of it is possible without all of you and you know looking at this list we're reminded that you know um par Educators um secretaries principals teachers bus drivers I mean this you know it takes a village right and this is the Village um people from the start of the day to the end of the day picking kids up feeding them you know supporting staff teaching and and supporting in the classroom so um I looking at this group can't believe you're all allowed to retire nobody looks like they are old enough to be retiring so um but congratulations I hope you have lots of exciting things planned um I've heard a little bit from taking care of grandchildren traveling golfing and maybe just relaxing a little bit and not getting up um with the sun and being allowed to um travel on Tuesdays without um problem so you can get a better plane Fair uh so congratulations to all of you for um this great day and thank you so much for your dedication to our district and our students so thank you um and I will pass the microphone to our state representative Chris Flanigan thank you madam chair it's really an honor uh to be here with you all tonight uh I come from a long line of Educators uh my brother um was a math teacher before becoming a vice principal and he always talked about uh the students that he knew that were going to always do well and be well and they were thriving and stars in the school system and then there were students that were troubled had a hard time and are now doing well um because of Educators like you right I think you all have students like that in your classroom and and your experience and really want to say thank you we're very grateful some of these citations have 30 plus years experience um in the school district and and really we're we're incredibly grateful um for your commitment and your service and with that um on behalf of myself uh state representative Kip Diggs and uh Senator Julian Seer we have citations for you all um from the house and also the Senate uh I'm going to read one citation just so you have a sense of what they'll say uh so this is on behalf of uh the speaker of the house and the rest of the members of the House of Representatives in Massachusetts be it hereby known to all that the Massachusetts House of Representatives offers its sincerest congratulations to the recipient and recognition of your years of faithful service to the uh Dy School District the entire membership extends its very best wishes and expresses The Hope For Good Fortune in the future and continues success in all Endeavors and your retirement so with that I'm going to call folks up individually um as I call your name and please forgive me if I mispronounce it uh come see me and then or actually come see Jenny and then we'll do it that way uh so with that Harriet brought you in recognition of your 13 years of service for school district next Sandra [Applause] Clifford cherl croan for your 27 years of faithful service thank very much next Peter croll for your 17 years of faithful service next mol Dello for your 16 years of [Applause] service Jean erson golden for your 24 years of faithful service to be watch you thank you I lean Foley for in recognition of your 14 years of service [Applause] Malcolm Judson Graham Jr for your 21 years of faithful [Applause] service Mary grich in recognition of your 12 years of faithful service Kim Keith in recognition of your 10 years of faithful service to [Applause] Dy Mary LEF France in recognition of your 24 years of [Applause] service Sonia mobilo in recognition of your 16 years of service to [Applause] be Erin Porter in recognition of your 35 years of faithful service to thank you Nancy Potter in recognition of your 27 years of the [Applause] service Richard Rogers and and recognition of 6 years of faithful service to [Applause] Dy Gary vigilo in recognition of your 11 years of service to [Applause] Dy Cheryl Warren in recognition of your 24 years of s [Applause] this and that concludes our program I'll turn it over to uh the chair thank you thank you also to others who came to support tonight family members colle colleagues um we couldn't do it without um obviously the support of our families and friends and and our community so thank you all [Applause] congratulations you don't have to stay for the boring part that comes next all right so this is my part of the meeting and my only part of the meeting where I get to for a brief moment be the chair of the school committee uh because we need to do reorganization so um uh for just so uh everybody understands the process here we will um because we've had uh our elections we have new members and we need to uh by the regional agreement need to reorganize I will I will take or ask for nominations uh nominations need to be uh by voice nomination and we need to do do a Voice vote um so I'll start by asking for nominations and then um confirm the nominee's interest uh and the nominee does not need a second or nomination does not need a second and then I will declare the nominations closed then there'll be an opportunity for any discussion and then we'll take a vote on the nominations and then once the chair is elected then I'm done all right so I'm going to open up for nominations um I'd like to nominate Tomas Tolentino as chair are there any other nominations oh sorry do you accept the nomination yes are there any other nominations hearing none I'm going to close the nominations any discussion on the nominations all right I take a vote uh we'll do a roll call vote start with Mr Martin yes just yes or no on yes I vote Yes Mr new yes Mr Morris yes Mr tantino yes M beus yes and Miss Landers yes all right I declare Mr tantino the chair and the meeting is yours sir thank you so we will now uh look for nominations for the remainder of the committee um and we will look for nominations for the Vice chair Mr chairman I'd like to nominate uh Marilyn beamus as Vice chair we have one nomination Marilyn do you accept a nomination yes we have any other nominations seeing none we'll close nominations and we will also take a roll call vote uh for vice chair Mr Martin yes Mr new yes Mr Morris yes Miss beus yes Miss Landers yes and I vote Yes congratulations Marilyn I believe next in session would be the the secretary um um I don't think it matters what you do secretary we will look for if there's a a nomination with for secretary we open nominations for secretary um I'll nominate Glenn Martin Glenn do you accept that nomination like a deer in the headlights yeah absolutely so we have a nomination and acceptance any other nominations yeah okay we'll have that nomination closed again we'll do a roll call vote we'll start to my left we'll start with Miss Landers yes Miss Beamers yes yes Mr Morris yes Mr new yes Mr Martin I'm undecided yeah I I I vote Yes congratulations and then last we have our Treasurer um are there any nominations for the position of Treasurer I'd like to nominate Jen Landers Jenny do you accept I do any other nominations for treasurer see none we'll do a roll call vote uh we'll start the opposite way this time Mr Martin yes Mr n yes Mr Morris yes Miss beamus yes Miss Landers yes and I vote Yes congratulations we have our board for 2024 25 through year and continuing on with the agenda uh we have our did our acknowledgements we have our student represent reports and thank you Rosanna for coming back for one more meeting we know it's a very busy week for you hello everybody so as I'm sure you all know it's definitely a Bittersweet one for us today I'm going to talk a little bit about some of our underclassman things and rosan is going to take our our senior things so we had our Juniors take our SATs at Dy on Saturday which went pretty well I had actually taken mine the month before so I can't really reflect on how it went but everybody I spoke to said it went well oh we also have our eighth graders finishing up mcast this week so everybody's very excited about that we had our juniors go on the Bridgewater State University field trip this weekend on this week on Thursday and that was a great day there was an hourlong college fair and then we all got to tour the campus which was really great we got to talk to a lot of reps and make some connections and then we also had our AP science classes go on a field trip to the water treatment facility which I think was in Sandwich don't quote me on that one I went and I honestly didn't know where we were we were on Cape um it was a great field trip I had a really good time I think we learned a lot and I'm excited to maybe keep that one up next year so I'm going to turn it over excuse my voice I'm having a little allergy attack um so this week we're going to end the week off with graduation which is really exciting it's on Saturday and I know everyone's looking forward to it but this week is actually Senior week so we started the week off today at Skull Island where we did go-karts a driving range and mini golf and we also had an ice cream truck come and visit us uh which was really fun we had a really good turnout and I know everyone who was there really enjoyed it it made us feel like we're little kids again like it was Kindergarten or something so that's really fun and then we have P toown tomorrow we also have kaying this week we have um Ryan family amusements and then we have the iconic luau and then we have scholarship night on Thursday which is really exciting it's going to be awards for all the seniors and I'm glad to hear what everyone has and then we also have senior last assembly on Friday which is really exciting it's a big moment where all the school comes together so all grades 8 through 11 come and watch the seniors get sent off and recognized for all their achievements and we also had um sports signing day on the 28th which is exciting for those who are going to be doing sports in college um I know that takes extreme determination and uh good head on your shoulders to be able to maintain a very rigorous academic schedule along with sports and it's not like you're at school where you have your coach pushing you it's very different so I applaud everyone who um signed up to do that and then just in closing I wanted to thank everyone here for the great environment that has really allowed me to grow it's been a really nice two years and this is honestly a really Bittersweet moment it's like another chapter that I'm closing you know I done my last time on the announcements on Friday last time walking Dy on Friday which was really sad bad but this is also just a really sad closing cuz we've moved from Dy to here and my first time ever being at a meeting wasn't even like when I was on the committee it was when we were visiting when I was on like the rise community and I remember Mr Glenn asking a bunch of questions um really trying to get to know us so it was really amazing getting to be here and having such supportive people behind me um and I loved it especially as someone who's been at Dy since preschool never left the community at all it's really nice to see like familiar faces even when I like see toass at work for example it's just really nice to always have someone smile and wave um regardless of where you see them so thank you guys for everything thank you both so much I'm going to ask uh Jenny Landers are immediate past chair to say a few words as well uh Rosanna it's been a pleasure having you here with us for the last two years uh we we have all enjoyed hearing your reports and and um you are truly an impressive young woman a student an athlete a scholar um Community servant you do it all and you come here and speak so eloquently in front of everyone and you have brought great ideas to this committee and to Administration you are a leader um for your peers you are a role model we're just all so impressed with you um we can't wait to see what the future holds for you as you go off into the world um and we hope you'll come back and visit and um keep us all updated on how things are going I'm sure you'll be happy to come back and talk to students when keep um and keep in touch so again thank you so much for your dedication these two years coming to all these meetings and listening to all this boring school committee business and always having great input um and putting together your reports and for bringing on wonderful successors so thank you so much I have a certificate for you that says in appreciation of your outstanding contributions to the Dennis Yarmouth Regional school committee this award of recognition is presented to Rosanna zashin whose selflessness hard work and dedication has made a significant impact the committee is grateful for your support so give this to you thank you Jenny um we're all very proud of everything that you've done for us and we're excited for Isabella and I know you guys said that you've elected someone to succeed her so we're we will look forward to meeting them in the in the fall um I know you won't worry about that anytime soon but uh the dates the dates will come out soon and when you need to be there ad them to your busy calendar but we we appreciate all that you do it's so important for us to know what's going on in you know our one of our largest schools the high school what's going on because the community needs to know about all the events right so we talked about the last couple months the importance of uh you know the budget and everything but it's so that we have the activities that you guys talk about every week so it's it's a great way to remind us of why we're here um is is all the great things that the students do and you know the retirees who were acknowledged tonight you know have seen seen new ladies grow through the the district and it's a great and feeling for them too I'm sure to see the great success that you guys have in Dy so you know it makes me proud to have a son in the district and to see that there's possibilities right so we always talk about the Dy district and you know I use Rosanna as a thing it's said you know she's going to Harvard like this there's so much can happen if you take uh advantage of the things that we offer so we appreciate it thank you so much um and next on our agenda we have a presentation from calmer choice so we invite you to the podium I think I think during the presentation uh they Advanced your slide I think we can get it back just want to make sure the green light is on the microphone thank you good evening everyone I'm Sarah Manion the executive director of commer choice and I'm here with my colleague Stephanie goalie Who's the Dy mindfulness coach I'm feeling very humbled to be here tonight want to say congratulations to the seniors can I take part in senior week because it sounds pretty amazing and also um as a daughter of two Cape Cod Educators just incredible congratulations to those celebrating retirement um we're really excited to be here tonight and to share a little bit about what we're doing on the impact of our work this year and where we'll be going next year so we'll be sharing who we are for those who don't know a little bit about the partnership history our long history with Ty the feedback we've received from Dy Educators about our programming a report about the mindfulness coach pilot that we ran for the last two years what we'll be doing next year so for those who don't know we are a Kate based nonprofit that started in 201 and we serve children and those who support them with evidence-based mindfulness education training and mentorship to build resilience Foster compassion and nurture well-being for all people and communities St um so this is just the highlights of our long history at Dy um Ezra Baker was one of the very first adopters of calmer Choice when we started back in 2010 when they got their Innovation status and then that slowly worked into us being part of all k k to5 um programming at all the schools then we started getting into some research with toughs and Yale and Dy was part of all that research we did based on mindfulness and uh the outcomes for kids the Yale study also included um teachers perspectives and parent perspectives as well uh we piloted a course for educators very early on here and that course remains to be very popular here um last year I had 20 21 people finished the course and this year I had um 20 well there's around 20 both years I can't remember exactly um then of course Co happened and everything shut down but we were working on doing some virtual things and um some Educators in Dy were helping us trial some things which was really helpful and then a few years ago the idea of this mindfulness coach pilot um came about so this is a really long history and we're really grateful to be able to partner with everyone here um with all of these things so I want to start by okay I want to start by just giving a little information on the feedback we get from teachers about our program in their classrooms so this is our 8-week program that we do at all the schools um oh I did change the incorrect spelling on the slide but I I guess it didn't get in we'll see if anybody notices um so this um this is all of the schools feedback except for station AV because we're still doing programming with them and they're just getting their surveys now um we ask questions on about our curriculum and how if what its appropriateness is for the age level the length of lessons the strategies taught and the student engagement with the material you can see that um majority of people are um are rating it as very effective or effective and our overall program rating is a 4.3 out of five for teachers or by teachers um we also ask about um feedback on social emotional learning and really about student behavior um so overall student behavioral changes in the classroom the ability of students to self-regulate relationships among students and then the last one is the teacher's own response to stressful situations whether they've notice some change and there the vast majority have um rated this at least at some positive change and then a few is a noticeable change and then a significant change 93% of teachers um said that they practice mindfulness at least one time per week outside of what we do in our program and many of those teachers it's more than three times and 77% of teachers surveyed um want calmer choice to continue next year I keep doing that um another question we ask is just about teacher interests in additional professional development um if they're interested or full or half day sessions workshops on how to extend calmer choice if they would like to be part of facilitated Practice Group which essentially is um like a guided mindfulness practice for teachers which I offer uh in the mornings a sabatical for educators um individual mentorship so you can see there's a number of teachers that are interested in learning more here are a couple excuse me of quotes um by teachers on the feedback survey that they give a lot of them are mentioning that they love the calmer Choice strategies they work them into their classrooms um they like the the language and um they weave it into their day and then the last one I really thought kind of culminated with a lot of things we hear over and over is that they're seeing students apply the strategies in class and also that it overlaps with other things that they do other seal lessons the social studies curriculum and it's helpful to make connections with this content um in different ways and also just the understanding that mindfulness is not necessarily a separate thing it's really an integrated thing with everything we do we took this slide out so I'm going to skip that um then I just like to give a little report on what I've been doing the past um this past year I've had this role as the mindfulness coach um last school year and this school year and the bulk of my work has been uh providing professional development I created a number of add-on lessons um for classrooms if they wanted to have more uh calmer Choice beyond our 8-week program that could also come about if a teacher maybe was struggling with a certain thing in their classroom and could invite me in to work on that particular Behavior or issue that they wanted support with um I offered guided practice sessions to teachers um in the morning so every school had one day a week that we would meet um at 8:45 and I would lead them in a mindfulness practice and people could join in when they wanted um I created months of mindfulness so I would take one month at each school and I would um offer teachers opport many different opportunities to engage with mindfulness one day might be getting an article in their mailbox or another day would be getting um an inspirational video short video in their email um I offered some dropin sessions during their prep time if they just wanted to come and take a break and do some um some mindfulness with me that could be anywhere from doing a guided practice to doing something fun and connective with their colleagues um um the I did a video project this year and that was my attempt really to connect with parents over the past two years I've tried to set up meetings to give parents information and get them involved in the conversation and I didn't get a lot of traction from that so um I created projects videos with some students to share what they were learning in calmer Choice with the idea that they would be shared out to the school community and then parents would start to hear um what the kids were learning understand some of the language are us using and then they can reinforce that at home and I have a couple of those videos to share we got permission from all the parents to share these widely so um I worked on a collaboration with Brian Spano the science coach this year and we worked on um becoming a mindful observer in mindfulness and Science and that was really fun I uh did a mindfulness newsletter uh once a month throughout last year and this year and then the last thing which is kind of something that was just created is this mindful culture Council we have our last meeting tomorrow and this is just a group of interested Educators who are interested in working on developing culture in the school where um students and teachers um feel like it's a place they want to be they feel safe welcome belonged Etc and then here are video I'm not going to show all of them but I'll show you um a couple these are some first graders from Emmy small oh oh it's not going to play what happened well I don't want to take too much time it's not going to play for some reason but they are in there I don't know if anybody has copies of there but um all the principles have all the copies of the video vide they were really fun to make they were very sweet many of the students also wanted to share in their home language so um they were some of the videos were B were done bilingually um continuing with this I there are some statistics that I kept over the past couple of years and when I was putting this together this was really nice for me to see because sometimes you know I'm constantly trying to find ways to engage people and meet them where they are and they not take up too much of teachers time because everybody's so busy um and you don't always know if you're making any gains so this is just a comparison of what I did last year to this year um with just these few metrics that I that I took and um just the engagement substantially increased so that felt good um I know it takes a long time to build relationships and start getting people on board with things so um it was good to see that that was happening and is this your part or my part okay um oh yeah other supports that we offered this year outside of my role um was the eight-week mindfulness class for educators which I actually taught we did have 21 participants um we also offered mindfulness circles which is similar to the class but a little different it's sort of like the next step after the class if you've already taken that and that was um up to each building if they wanted to offer this for their teachers and so we did three of them at three different buildings and we also piloted a middle school elective and we offered two sessions of that to the sixth and seventh graders um these are just some images of kind of what I was doing this year um I tried to really be part of each School community and that looked different at each school um I tried to create sort of a a welcoming I try to be a welcoming person and a support to teachers in whatever way was helpful to them um sometimes it was just you know walking around the school and giving everybody a piece of chocolate in a little note that said I hope you have a great day and it's pretty amazing how something so small can just brighten someone's day just in that moment and so I think what has happened over these past couple years is I've just been um somebody who's recognizable at the school I'm not attached to any group or any Authority I'm kind of like a safe comfortable person um and also the kids recognize me and so it's like oh yeah that's the that's the mindfulness lady and it's like a reminder that oh yeah I learned I learned all of those things so it's been really fun to be part of each Community each school um okay here's a couple more quotes from teachers um after taking the educator course I'm not going to read all of them but I was just sharing with someone earlier this course is so fun to teach because people often have pretty significant shifts in um how they feel about themselves in their work um and the last quote I'll just point out is says overall I feel like I'm a better educ better teacher when I practice mindfulness because it helps me as a person to be more patient with my students and co-workers increases my creativity with my lessons reduces my anxiety and helps me sleep better so I feel like that's a win and then I'll hand it back over to Sarah thanks Stephanie so for next year we're very excited to be expanding the classroom program that we've had at DY for some years so currently we're doing delivering to K through 4 and we'll be expanding K through five which we're excited about um Stephanie just mentioned and talked about the educator course so we'll be continuing that next year and then also building specific mindfulness circles so as Stephanie said this is kind of the part two to the educator course but it's really a way to help Engage The Educators support their practice in a way that builds pure Community too so we're really expanding and growing this idea of mindful educational culture and with with that continuing we hope to offer professional development as is possible um this is the last year of the mindfulness coach we are so grateful not only for the opportunity to do this work but also just for the fact that this idea came from the dii community and was a collaboration with you all and that's so exciting for us and I think it has really demonstrated what can be possible when we have the opportunity to offer a depth of services and really engage all members of the community not just the students in the classroom and so we do consider dyr Flagship district for this reason for your openness and willingness to engage with us for the length of partnership for frankly the relationships that we've built built and the impact that we have seen here through the surveys and through the feedback um and through the support of the administration and this committee so I just want to really say thank you for that and then this is a quote that I think demonstrates a lot about our program this is from Derek Thompson who is a principal in Middleborough and he said most School experience is telling a kid what's important what they need to know mindfulness teaches kids how to notice what they need for themselves and I think as Educators we want this and we're all striving for this and sometimes the system doesn't allow us to recognize this and so we are um very grateful to be able to support this kind of work and finally and this is the end is just our vision moving forward is to continue to support social emotional learning through mindfulness to advance healing and well-being systemically and holistically for all members of the educational community and to realize human flourishing truly what does that look like what does that mean and how can that start in our classrooms so thank you very much I will just say I have a few um annual reports from last year that I'll leave with Mr chair um in case you'd like to see that thank you thank you so much do we have any questions from the committee um what other schools do you have programs in on the cape or how many districts so for next year this year it's fouth Middleboro and Dy next year it will be uh nset Dy Barnstable and Middleboro possibly some in Thoth it's we're still working on the M Mr new just a couple of questions first of all I'm a great support of the program and it absolutely has a um High degree of popularity outside in the media talking about mindfulness and and how it affects children today uh just a couple questions regarding the survey uh what are do you have any answers or insight as to why people would say it's a negative you know there was 10% or so of the people that said it was not a positive influence in the class yeah that's a that's a great question um just to clarify and I'm happy to send the full survey we can send that to you all if you'd like to see it um no one said negative but the it was is do you see a change a positive change some said no change and it's important to remember this is an 8we progam program and so it's very reasonable to say there's no demonstrable change in 8 weeks we don't necessarily expect that the hope is year over year over year we'll be able to see that but you know in 8 weeks it's hard in the 8we program to see and so sometimes that may be why a teacher would say you know there's no change that we're recognizing right now okay that Mak I was just wondering if it it was if you had data uh that that could talk to whether it was an issue with the individual who was implementing the program or was an issue with the students who are participating in the program yeah we do so we collect survey data about the quality of instruction as well as the curriculum as well as just the teacher experience and from our experience we know with our instructors certain classes can be difficult there are other factors that affect the efficacy of the program and so part of our work internally is to really look at those surveys every eight rounds and say you know is this just the environment that we're in is this us what can we change what can we improve improve and it's usually a combination of things and then is this the first year for the survey or have you surveyed in past years this is the second full year um so we have aggregate data from three districts for last year and we will have aggregate data this year um and we happy to share all of it is there is there a positive comparison in the sense that there is an improvement from the previous year to this year super interesting I think it's a Stephanie do you know I feel I feel like generally it's similar every year and I will say at Dy we've been here the longest people understand what we do and so we generally get very a lot of positive support not that we have negative support in other districts but they're just newer to us in some situations so they're um maybe they don't score as high would you say that's accurate yeah I think so and also you know last year we got some feedback on the curriculum that there wasn't enough differentiation between grade levels in the activities and we worked reworked the curriculum last summer and so I think that's an example of we take that feedback we implement it we make changes and now we're seeing the feedback in that this year um thank you yeah thank you Mr Morris I congratulate you for the progress that you are more than talking about you're actually demonstrating and have been demonstrating ever since you you started getting involved with us at the at the school level I know that the founder Fiona was looking for ways of partnering with Community groups and that has been a source of strength over the years from my knowledge of what you've been doing and it feeds back into relating to the children the students and their families what uh briefly what do you envision your Partnerships with other community groups might look like or have you set up something that you can work on or talk about right now you said be brief so I'm going to be brief we have significant Community work that we're not presenting on tonight because it's not the focus of our work here one example is we have a significant partnership with Cape Cod Children's Place um in the community that's just one example we have staff that just work in the community because as you said Mr Morris it's all interrelated and we have to look at the whole system and so we're very um aware of that and working to invest more resources in that piece as well thank you any more comments well thank you ladies it's it's great it's a great program I've seen it over the years and you know working not only with the students but with the with the staff is something that that I I think is a great thing cuz you know they have a very stressful job right um and I've been at some of the schools when the bell goes off and they say the mindful meeting is starting now and you know seeing teachers show up early they already have a busy long day and teachers who show up early to to go to that is is a great feeling that we have opportunities for them as well so we appreciate what you guys done and thank you for your presentation today thank you thank you thank you ladies and next we have uh subcommittee Representatives Le report um school committee leaz on to the boards of Selectmen does anyone have anything from either of the Two Towns no Mr Mor there's been a change in the board of two of the incumbents uh are not continuing and the uh the select Board of Yarmouth is has a new member and a return of a previous member so there's continuity and newness uh so the person who will is the new member Joyce Flynn is active in the fewu savings of ener energy and uses of energy and at a cost effective level so it'll be interesting to see what goes on as it relates to our the Dy partnership thank you and school building committee I don't see don't think we have anything new there no I don't see David so yeah yeah nothing new to report that the other than we're um contining to move forward with the um punch list which is getting smaller and smaller by the day and the um the turf field the RFS is was out the responses came back for that project and then we'll have something to discuss a little bit more in executive session tonight thank you and then we have a superintendent report recognition of donations and acknowledgements all right thank you so uh first uh recognitions I just want to recognize uh um a donation from Miss Barbara white who donated both a washing machine and dryer to the wave program at the high school uh which will support uh living skills program at the high school that again I know I say it all the time but it just contined to be uh impressed by the generosity of our community they provide uh just amazing supports to our school district that allow for Extended Learning opportunities for students it's another example of that you it seems um it might seem like a odd donation but when you know what the the nature of the program and and the way it supports the specific needs of the students who um uh go to that or attend that program it's very purposeful and thoughtful um donation so I want to thank uh thank uh thank uh Miss White for that donation and then uh two items that aren't listed in bullets under there actually three different items so one just because they came to me one came to me late today so uh the high school as uh our student representative has noted today uh have we have our Awards in scholarship night on Thursday at 6 um as I found out today it's traditional for some school committee members to be present if anybody is available to be present um to be up on the disis and help provide help handing out the awards if anybody's uh available to attend Thursday night at 6:00 p.m. um I'm extending an invitation to any school committee members that would like to be present that evening and then now that we have reorganization complete I just sort of plant a couple seeds for the committee to think about uh and I'd like to put it on if the committee is interested i' like to put it on our next meeting agenda I'd like to think about a setting um and if the committee would rather I can meet with the the chair and we can have this committee this meeting separate or this conversation separate and then bring it to the next meeting but I work on setting some summer dates um I'd like if the committee is interested to maybe have some type of a retreat with the committee this summer where we work on goal setting I'm going to be working with this the leadership team on moving from the report of Entry findings into strategic Direction and what we didn't do all last year is tie like some school committee goals to because we didn't really have a strategic plan the Strategic plan it kind of and I was obviously just starting so I think if we could do some alignment between where the school committee would like to go where the Strategic just try to get all that stuff humming in the same direction and one thing too that I think is a part of that is as as you were all heading into reorganization thinking about subcommittee assignments Etc is one thing that we don't have that I think the committee might want to consider is is some type of a capital and Facilities planning subcommittee we don't have one and we don't really quite frankly have a long-term long range uh capital and Facilities plan and I think that is something that we should be working towards I do think it would be a good purposeful subcommittee for the school committee we uh something that crosses across the political and governance lines because it obviously has a long-term fiscal impact it's long-term budgeting impact you know we're going to have to think about how we're going to approach that with the towns uh you know we want to work closely with myself and David on on the leadership side but we're definitely going to want a school committee subcommittee I think to be working closely on that and then to be able to bring something to the larger committee on here's our plan here's our needs you know we can obviously work on our side to bring the subcommittee what the needs are but then okay how are we going to approach those needs over a five and 10 year plan plan and then start to work with the two towns on you know what's a Yarmouth based issue what's a dentist based issue what's a district based issue um I really think uh that's something that we should be working on as sort of I've identified over my first year or so here so I think that's a subcommittee that we don't currently have that we that you all as a group might want to consider so those are my my two thoughts um that were sort of new to me that didn't make it on to the bulleted list but things that I thought about and quite frankly I thought about today that's why they're the bullet list no as we we all understand it's a busy week and you know as I come into look at all the subcommittees and all the responsibilities and I know we have a finance subcommittee so I don't know if that's something that can fall under that um or if that if we had to create a new one but y Jenny um we technically Capital has been rolled into the finance subcommittee for many years and it was so that committee did double duty capital and finance and I think the focus was so much on budget and finance and we weren't getting very far with capital projects with the town so that got put to the side a little bit but they're natural Partners right because when we're talking about you know the capital planning you have to be obviously integrated into the budget and then talking to the towns so just my two s yeah that's as as you talking through it I you know it's a a lot more known this next going into next year with with contracts being completed and an idea and I know the discussions about trying to let the towns know ahead of time you know best as we can obviously there's a lot of unknown so um that's something we can talk about if it's something that has been done in the past if we have it created um as we go through reorganization to continue it there um I have a conversation with David if it's if it's just too much to have both then we can look into seeing um about adding another one but we can look into that and I definitely think you know Workshop or Retreat is definitely a great idea I know we had some great stuff um Massie last year um we've had some great workshops over the year with them all together just with the the superintendent evaluation you know I'm glad that I wasn't here when they had to write hand write the evaluation in person for three hours I think it was a great process this year so I definitely think um we have opportunities to work that so be happy to work with you with those that's it for me thank you excellent um Pills requisitions and payroll I know we've passed around um we have several gentlemen names that are not on there I've advised them they can cross out their predecessor and write their name and sign we'll allow that um and then um for the consent agenda we have thank you Marilyn for the consent agenda I know we have the two items we have the uh exception the donation of the washing machine which just discuss for the W program and then the minutes from the May 20th meeting move the consent agenda second okay all in favor I I thank you Marilyn and then calendar I know we talked about several times now on Thursday it's not on the calendar here but we do have the awards recognition night uh for our seniors um I know hopefully on the 17th we'll find out the total dollar amount I know every year when I hear the number it's it's crazy um how many great donors we have in our in our community on Saturday the big day we have graduation uh scheduled for 10:00 a.m. um I won't tell you what the weather said when I look today but we will it'll be outside it's going to be beautiful um and they're going to have a great time and be able to invite their family uh our next meeting will be the 17th uh the 18th is the full day of school the 19th is a juneth holiday there's no school and then the 20th is the last day of school is a half day for students um and that's the only page left in my calendar so um and then the next part is public comment do we have anyone want to speak public comment done good evening um Michelle dun fifth grade teacher at DYI and president of the association I just wanted to make two points about the budget I was able to listen to the debate for the ytown meeting while we are here for childcare and um am very honored by the people who spoke and support of the budget and very grateful for the way that both towns voted in the budget and I also wanted to point out how much support we received from MTA um I think MTA can be a lightning rod at times and a lot of people have strong opinions about the organization but MTA provided three rounds of postcards uh one for each of the Town meetings one for election day they did hustles which are text messaging which they did on each of the dates in question um we had some signs left over that they had printed for us at um their cost we apply for Grants which is how we get the funds for the different things that they've done for us and they helped us repurpose the signs with stickers that we were able to use to put on the dates of the election and the only thing that Pat plinsky and I had to do was come up with the text and they took care of everything else um and you know technology is so much greater and they've really um expanded what they they offer um I remember sitting at a friend's island in the kitchen literally hand addressing all of those in the past so um you know I'm very grateful and I just want the community to be aware thank you thank you anyone else yes there we go good evening my name is Megan McFall I'm a Yarmouth resident parent of two Dy students and a teacher at Avenue um I noticed tonight the transportation situation which affects our new school start times did not come up on tonight's agenda and I can tell you that our families and staff are very concerned about the timeline of this decision for various reasons daycare drop off pickup buses work start and end times Etc as you understand um we understand this is a huge undertaking and there are many moving Parts um my hope is the superintendent and school committee will work to ensure that our families and staff will be notified about this matter as soon as possible for planning purposes thank you thank you anyone else for public comment that being said I'll close public comment Jenny I move that the Dennis yth Regional school committee enter into executive session not to return to public session for the purpose of discussing strategy with respect to collective bargaining or litigation if an open meeting may have it detrimental effect on the bargaining or litigating position of the public body and the chair so declares Dy rsaa collective bargaining agreement and unrelated litigation and we'll take a roll call vote to move into executive session we'll start uh Jenny yes Marilyn yes Phil yes John yes Glen yes and I vote Yes so we will move to Executive session not to return to public session thank you for