meeting minutes April 29th 2024 motion to approve the consent agenda by member Graham seconded by a second member brandley all those in favor I all those opposed motion passes for the consent agenda which was the first item of the um May 6 2024 regular meeting 6m there are no reports of subcommittees we have um reports of superintendent update and com updates and comments Dr Vincent um I have very brief comments I too just want to recognize our teachers and nurses as this week is Teacher and Nurse Appreciation Week um we want to thank you for all the wonderful work that you do on behalf of our students and that you truly make a positive impact in their lives um Wednesday May 8th is national school nurse day and um just encourage everyone to go check out our Mustang mall for special things that they have going on um also this month is mental health awareness month and um as school leaders and Educators this is an especially important moment to pay attention to the mental health needs of students and youth in our community according to the National Alliance on Mental Illness one in six us youth experience a mental health condition each year and only half of them receive treatment so so I just want to um point that piece out and I want to recognize the the good work that is happening um with our mental health and social emotional health departments for our students um I want to just highlight this week this Wednesday May 8th from 1 to 2 PM is kindergarden openhouse this is in-person openhouse sessions from 1: to 2: p.m. at all four elementary schools please um work with your schedules to be able to attend the open houses in person also this Wednesday is early release day for all of our students so again middle school students are dismissed at 11:30 a.m. and um high school and elementary students are dismissed at noon time um this evening Mr Paul tashera is going to present um a a brief report on the outcomes of our English learner tiered Focus monitoring review that took place by desie and there will be two reports presented by Dr krushing um for the committee to approve an outof State travel trip to Florida and a building repair for the Skylight at the mcglen um school I also just want to recognize that we had a wonderful first meeting of our msba building committee under the direction of um chair gah and mayor lungo Kern and all the wonderful members that were there more information is to come but it was an excellent kickoff thank you thank you Dr Edward Vincent um we have our report on um English learner targeted and focus monitoring by De desie Mr paulera director of el welcome good evening good evening everyone good evening we should just say evening yes just evening tonight I will be fast all right um so you guys got a pretty thick packet we're not going to go over the whole thing I sent you the um El requirements because even though it just says like parent notification there's like three pages of that so I just wanted you to understand what the requirements are uh on everything that this that this review does so it occurs every six year with a three-year check-in and for the past year I've been working on this with desie uploading they want to know our procedures they want to see samples of all of the um you know uh documentation that we send home to caregivers our report cards our progress reports and then they pull individual student records and they look at you know they want to make sure if it's a student who's bilingual who has an IEP that there was an interpreter at their meeting and they you know want verification for the signin sheets and all of this gets uploaded to des's portal it was probably about a thousand pages of paperwork that they got in preparation for this review they do that every six years they came to the district they interviewed caregivers students uh teachers administrators uh and then they did walkthroughs um through the classroom so that's what the tiered Focus monitoring is for the El department so this is the criteria there are 12 different uh areas that they look at like I said each area has subgroups and um you know pretty involved um compliance at the federal level and also at the state level and this is the legal requirement and the implementation this was a sample just to show you what they look for for one Criterion so upon their review they give a rating system for each um Criterion and then if it's implemented the requirement substantially met in all important aspects if it's partially implemented the requirement in one or several of those aspects like the subgroups may not be met and then not implemented as the requirement is substantially not met so we met or exceeded the state and federal imple implementation requirements in 10 out of 12 Focus areas we received partially implemented in two out of the 12 Focus areas so the two areas we had were El program placement and structure which again that's like three pages of requirements um and el14 which is the lure requirements the program and placement structure was a result of being under 50% for students making progress on the access test we are uh at 38% but I did pull the state data and surrounding districts just to show you we're all in the same boat we just happen to have a curriculum I mean a coordinated program review or tiered Focus monitoring this year um but we are at 38% now I realize we don't want to be in line with the state we want to be higher so we do have to do corrective action on how we're going to adjust that and so um we did um so this is a report that came out in November 23 about the rising numbers of unmet needs with immigrant newcomer students in Massachusetts so again this isn't a Medford issue um it is a Statewide issue um but we are taking steps to you know help course correct with this um so this is the action plan to get us out of corrective action for el5 and I'm not going to go over it because you have it all in your packets this was submitted to the Department of Elementary and secondary education and they approved this plan as a feasible plan to uh make the adjustments that we need to uh there are a lot of things happening in the district that I do believe will contribute to increased scores everything from our you know our new curriculum for early literacy uh the science of reading that's happening in the schools because our El students are integrated in all of those classes that will be a factor um in you know achievement and growth and then we have the map growth we have Dibbles testing so we can do our formative assessments and check-ins throughout the year and adjust accordingly el14 was on lure requirements this wasn't lure for El this was an uh a concern with uh Jed classroom teachers not having the SEI endorsement um so this is a relatively easy fix because our numbers have grown dramatically in the last few years there were many teachers who couldn't take the SEI class because they had to have El students in their classroom in order to take that class um that was one of the requirements when desie was offering that and so if they never had had an El student in their class they were never flagged with desie as uh needing the endorsement but as our numbers have grown and our El students are in more and more classrooms that's what triggered um this and we think we have about 18 teachers who need the endorsement um we're working with principles to get an exact list and then in the fall we will work with the teachers to help them get the endorsement that they need and so by January of 2025 we should be all set any questions have a great night that was the best presentation I think I've ever seen thank you recommendation to approve basketball trip to Florida December 2024 how exciting Dr Peter Cushing who will be brief he's our assistant superintendent of schools good evening ladies and gentlemen coach lucer is also online uh we're looking for your approval to uh take what I believe is a first of its kind in Medford uh athletic trip to Florida uh these are organized by a company out of Florida um that provides sanctioned athletic events that's a critical point with MIAA um coach delcer if you have anything else to add or if there are any questions yeah um can you guys hear me yes awesome um so my name is Dominic Duca for those of you that don't know me I'm the head coach of the girls varsity basketball team at Medford High and we're looking for final clearance to take my dis my team on a Disney trip where we play in a tournament from uh December 26th to December 31st so most importantly no students will miss any school days and there will be no MIAA sanctions um if we are approved for this trip motion to approve second you want speak um I just wanted to thank coach DeLuca he and I spoke over the weekend um this is a great opportunity for our girls basketball team um thank you for uh your tenaciousness and have fun in Disney thank you member Graham also I played basketball for M High School my whole career and we never went to Disney motion for approval by member I'm a little upset about this but member rouso seconded by member Graham all those in favor all those all those hearing none motions approved have a blast awesome Madame mayor we will be looking for chaperon you know what okay okay all right I do love a good game okay thank you recommendation to approve mlin Skylight repair project again Dr Peter cushion so uh we have six skylights at the mlin there are two over the main lobby four over uh the best can be described as around Portico through two or three floor two floors into the Li Library um those have been leaking significantly uh over the past I'd say six months or so we put out an initial uh request for quotes it did not appear that the um that the quotes that were sent to us had followed the scope of work that was issued so we reissued it um and the qu quote that was issued with the initial had met and they are the successful bidder on this um so we have followed all procurement law we've checked with the city and we're good to go just need your approval uh 26,000 hold on I just refresh my memory on the money um we're requesting uh that this would be through Revenue replacement on arpa through the mayor um a total of $26,800 I've put in a 10% contingency fund one of the things I've learned working on the mlin playground is to have contingency uh $2,680 for a total request of $ 29,40 uh we could have this done in six weeks there's a little bit of lead time on the skylights but they won't really know until they're ordered so it will be done within four uh sorry within 12 weeks or three months no matter what motion to approve any questions I had a question I'm so sorry why don't worry about no we're this is a short meeting compared to somewhere years ago don't say that out loud um so last last week we heard comments about roof replacement this isn't going to mess with that this or this won't get uprooted immediately with no no I mean the bottom line is the skylights are leaking now yes and a roof replacement is several years away but this won't this won't get in the way of that should not great we can double check with um facilities and grounds for the city and director hunt who's doing the roof solar project motion for approval by member rouso Graham joh who was it I for Graham second by second member El all those in favor all those opposed motion is approved thank you thank you mayor member Graham I'm making a motion to approve 2024-25 202 24-26 and 202 24-27 thank you member Graham I'm gonna read them real quick yeah can we hear them be resolved the building and ground subcommittee will meet with the universal Safety Committee to review the recommendations surrounding Ada non compliance and near range Solutions at mford high be further resolve the committee will explore possible grant funding through the mass office of disability or other organizations toage engage a licensed Ada contractor Andor support remediation efforts be it also resolved that the subcommittee will provide a report back to the school committee on progress and plans by October 1st 2024 202 24-26 offered by member motion for approval by there's a comment online oh I think so before we um move approval member um Miss mlin name and address for the record please and welcome back hello how are you hi everyone Melanie mclin uh Allon Street in Medford Mass thank you for giving me a moment um I just wanted to comment on 2024 if I could and I wanted to thank member gram for bringing this to the floor this is something that I worked on for a couple of years with the universal Safety Committee and something that I had been really hoping to push forward um before uh my resignation and so I think this is a really important piece and one that I want folks to consider as um you're thinking about the the building of the new high school as well so you know while there's a building that we hope is going to be built in the interim there are a lot of um things that are out of um compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act and that is the access to our building and particularly our high school is really um there's a lot that needs to be done there we have applied for mod uh Grant in the past and have not gotten it for a number of reason so can you guys hear me hello yes yes we can oh sorry I was just hearing feedback um so I was just going to say that we have applied for the mod in the past and um I think that you know it's something that needs to be informed and I would recommend or ask um folks if they would consider collaborating with the um disability commission Andor um members of the disability Community to um work on this because I think well-intentioned folks who don't have lived experience with disability can often make errors that are long lasting and I think this is something that you know is long overdue and should be addressed appropriate so I would um ask the committee to please consider perhaps making an amendment to the motion to um include Disability Advocates in the in the committee I mean in the commission um as they evaluate this process with the ADA compliance thank thank you um M ml much appreciate thank you member grant for putting this forward and maybe we can also make sure that um City staff and School admin calendar when that Grant is open so that we can apply for it accordingly yep motion to approve um with an amendment to include members of the disability community in the meeting and discussions motion for approval as amended by member Graham seconded by member inapa all those in favor I all those opposed motion passes 202 24-26 offered by member Russo update policy be EB agenda Creation in format for regular meetings of the school committee by inserting this meeting is being recorded and bold immediately after existing policy language in person at the name of location only motion for approval by member Graham seconded by second member ol all those in favor I may opposed motion passes motion to suspend um rule 46 requiring a second reading of 202 24-26 motion second by member Russo seconded by member Graham all those in favor I I all those opposed motion passes offered by member rouso May sorry that motion to do we then have to actually motion to approve the policy yes because we're not having the second reading I think we have to then uh motion to approve motion to approve the policy yes so that's our third vote by member Russo seconded by member Graham all those in favor I all those opposed motion passes 202 24-27 offered by member rouso policy beb agenda creation and format for regular meetings of the school committee will be updated by inserting approvals of capital purchases immediately after existing policy language approval of bills and consent toen section of the policy motion to approve second you want me to speak on that mayor if you could explain yeah sure um so um we have our consent agenda and in the policy that explains what's allowed to be in there it has um well I don't have the full set there's a list a laundry list of things we allow to be in a consent agenda and as um we have discussed well I mean last week we actually accidentally had them in the consent agenda but um this just simply adds the approvals of capital purchases so in our last meeting we talked about how we want to be approving them um and then I got a question from an administrator about so how do you do that do we have to come here and do a whole song and dance every time we want to buy a a new Skylight to replace it you know something leaking um and I don't think I don't think the intent of this committee is that we have a song and dance every time we have to replace a skylight so any of these approvals that are capital purchases so we're not actually funding them but the city is but you know the assumption is the Administration has already talked to the city and the city said yes we'll pay for it yeah as long as we make sure that um the administration talks to the city staff you know especially where Opera is um it is accounted for especially with the um air conditioning recom conditioning study turno gear for it's accounted for so yeah and and and we can just sever anything we actually need to discuss for real um but it just seemed like you know there we already had one tonight and I think actually last week after we had talked about this there was another one as well so it's just like when we don't really think we need to talk about it a consent agenda sounds great so that's thank you motion for approval by member Graham seconded by member Russo all those in favor I I all those opposed motion passes mayor to make the song Advance again sorry motion to suspend uh the second reading rule 49 motion to suspend the second reading by member Russo seconded by second member Graham all those in favor I all those opposed motion to approve the updated uh bedb policy approve um the 2024 27 policy by member R so seconded by member Graham all those in favor I all those opposed motion passes we have one condolence the members of the meford school committee Express their sincere condolences to the family of Robert DC English teacher and guidance counselor at the former Roberts jior High additionally served as director of the Medford summer summer school program I'll rise for a moment of silence thank you our next regular meeting is May 20th 2024 here at the Alden Memorial Chambers Medford City Hall in addition to zoom motion to adjourn by member reinfeld to adjourn second by member brandley all those in favor