for just waiting on Carri Julia is still away that sh for Curtis I can hear the music playing in your head right now that's terrifying it's actually just the screams of middle schoolers oh boy Carrie only two more days for me wow great Joe are we waiting from anybody else on your end not a soul only me okay and we can get going I'd like to call the Mount Greylock Regional school committee to order it is Tuesday June 18th 2024 it is 5:01 PM we are meeting remotely via Zoom um it is not on the agenda but it the um meeting is being cast on Wily Net TV channel 1302 and will be posted within 24 hours of the meetings completion on the Mount Greylock Regional School District um YouTube channel and on wiet TV um whatever there URL is do Joe might know better than I do but it'll be um posted on their website as well if we could call the role alphabetically by last name um I I will say that Julia is absent today and I am here here elen Bine here green here Malloy here Miller here you at Mount Greylock Regional School District our mission is to create a community of Learners working together in a safe and challenging learning environment that encourages restorative based processes respect inclusive diversity courtesy integrity and responsibility through high expectations and cooperation resulting in lifelong learning and personal growth um so the one and only agenda item other than what we just did is discussion and consideration of additional funding for Latin at Mount Greylock Regional School District Steve I see your hand up so I'm happy to make a motion just so we have something on the table to discuss so I move we take um I think it was said to 65,000 but you know something in that ballpack from uh school choice and excess and deficiency to keep Latin at the level it is right now as well as commit to any student who signs up for Latin one this year that we will continue and have Latin AP available for them but at this time not commit to having Latin AP available to anybody who signs up in two years before that seconded uh Steve can I just suggest an amendment sure because it's not school choice and Indie it's school choice in tuition that's the fun would come out of end requires a special Town Meeting thank you perfect yep no h happy to take that change and the reason I think it's very important that we commit to anybody who signs up this year being able to get to AP Latin is if we don't do this it's going to be a very difficult conversation and decision for a lot of people as to do they want to risk this and so I think we should be committing to the incoming class making it through but not committing at this time to the class after them thank you okay just Steve uh Joe one point of clarification on that Latin one would be at the high school level Latin seven and Latin 8 would be the the middle school so okay I'm not sure whether the the motion was int it sounded as though it was intended to imply it was meant to apply to the seventh and eighth graders so I I apologize so any in other words initiates Latin in this coming year yes if the school committee would be pledging to keeping the Latin program through uh allowing any of those students to complete the AP Latin cycle correct and at this time we would not be committing to anybody who would sign up in two years we may be able to do that we may decide not to but I think we should have a focused motion on what we want to do so that people can make decisions with enough information right now so that they can plan I know a lot of people are worried because you need three years of language and it has to be the same language for so before we go into discussion on this the motion hasn't yet been seconded I'll second Steve Ursa second discussion Steve no I I was just saying um I think it's important for people to have some stability in planning but to recognize that Lain is not the only issue we have in our school that we have to really look at everything to see are we allocating our resources the way we want to but we need to give some stability so people can make informed decisions Jose thank you Christina and thank you uh Stephen for your motion um I just wanted just from my perspective highlight what I think are two distinct issues the first is um The process by which this decision was originally conveyed um you know in response to addressing effectively an emergency um deficit in our upcoming you know budget for fiscal year 2 um I think this is just my opinion here that any curricular decisions that we face as a district really does need to involve our school councils our parents and caregivers our students and our community members and the the manner by which this decision uh was made prevented any consultation any discussion any consideration of of our situation and and the curricular offerings that we have uh within our district um because we have thanks be to you know the access to tuition and school choice funds we have the ability this year to plug that hole within our our budget um without affecting our curricular offerings or the programming that we provide within the district uh I'm very much in support of of accessing and utilizing those funds I do think any conversation we have regarding curricular offerings whether they be Latin whether they be physics whether they be PE that's a separate conversation completely um and I think and I hope that that you all share that opinion um it could be that in upcoming years via our school councils or via our budget process we are faced with choices that we have to make but making those choices with without consultation with community members School councils parents caregivers students it's just not the way to do it thanks Carrie thanks Christina I'll just offer a Counterpoint to that um so as Jose said a curricular decision of this magnitude would typically come through school governance Council during the budgeting process and it would have been incorporated in into the budget discussions prior to any votes by this committee or by the towns instead it was and I would argue a responsible administrative decision based on budget constraints contract goals teature workload ongoing scheduling issues and enrollment data the decision to move forward with phase reduction was within the budget priorities the administration outlined in the budget presentations as we have seen from the packet documents keeping one Latin FTE for what was 57 students last year and would have been 43 students this coming year requires that the three teachers who are teaching the rest of our students taking Spanish each teach additional classes it is difficult to justify resources for a single teacher while already over taxing our Spanish teachers so we've had concern about how the reduction in Latin would over tax our Spanish teachers but we're already in this situation one Latin FTE forces three extended contracts in Spanish or put another way we need 3.6 Spanish FTE with only three instructors in order to provide one FTE of Latin that's the $65,000 we're talking about is three extended contracts and the administrative um and guidance work that is going to require in order to uh reverse course right now by reducing the Latin instruction to point8 FTE and adding a02 in Spanish we eliminate the need for extended contracts and this was the plan we also reduced scheduling conflict significantly around um Latin being a very difficult subject to schedule around for all of our students who take L the bottom line is that we have limited resources and our student needs are changing we have increased need for reading and math support School psychologists and social workers training for our faculty and our community and diversity Equity inclusion and belonging and the list goes on only 10% of our students take Latin only eight students requested Latin for next year and only 10 students were planning to take Latin in 8th grade and this is prior to discussion of any reduction in the Latin program and on a strictly Financial level you may recall I proposed a percentage increase to Our member towns last April in order to reduce the amount we took from Reserves somewhat ironically the amount we preserved in end was $770,000 so we're talking about now spending from reserves what we had asked our towns to uh prevent us from needing to spend different source of Reserve but same similar amount despite this despite saving that 70,000 we have still used onethird of our available Reserves to support the fy2 budget taking an additional 65,000 out of school choice or tuition funds brings us that much closer to where we will need to draw on end which requires a special town meeting I just ask is the committee confident that this is where we should be prioritizing our funding for this coming year I understand the issues around process I also understand the administrative decision-making process and more importantly I speak with a finance subcommittee chair haton I very much support the study of Latin I'm not sure we can justify it in the budget for this coming year thank you Carrie um Jose I saw your hand up next and then Steve thanks Christina and thank you Carrie for that uh very well thought out you know um statement that you shared with us I I and I you know would say that much of what you shared with us you know those are real challenges that we face that perhaps this particular course faces but it speaks to the great need for for our community to have time time to engage in these deliberations that time to assess what we value and how best we can effectively Finance what we value and the way the process planned out short circuited any of those deliberations by utilizing the funding that is available right for these purposes it allows us as a community not just to have the conversation about Latin but to have a really important conversation about how much we value our public schools for two years now we have asked the minimum of Our member towns we have tried our best to minimize our ask of our tals and now I think it's time for us to have a real conversation about what our towns are willing to do to support a school district that is truly inclusive and effectual for every student in our district thanksuse so in one word ditto and then to expand that out a little bit I think this is a special situation I understand the financial uh complications and this is why I'm only proposing that we pledge that the students who start next year will be able to make it to AP Latin and that gives us time to engage with the towns and figure out just what we want to do one thing that I think is worth remembering is we've talked a lot about some other PRI ities of the school where it's hard to point to how effective is this well Aladdin has gone through a lot over the past couple of years and it's very tough with this lack of stability for people to decide to commit to it the other thing is people are watching and they're trying to decide where do they want to move where do they want to send their kids and when you see schools retreating from academic disciplines when you see schools trimming the offerings people often vote with their feet we've lost families over the years and this sends a signal and so I would like to send another type of signal and I would like to preserve for the next class but only at this point promise for the next class well we have the longer conversation that Jose has so correctly said we need to have we need to really think about how all the pieces fit together and see how do we want to allocate things and so I'd like just you the clean ition let's restore it we have the funds that's what these funds are there for that's why we have them let's use them this year we're not going to do a 10-year commitment thank you thank you Steve Carrie I Echo pretty much everything you are saying I I would love to preserve the Latin program I'm seeing the same data that you're seeing when we look at the information the hard information we're getting we as a committee sat through all of the planning for the budgeting we always welcome Our Town members to come to those meetings and to participate we have school council participation so I don't think the process is broken I think we followed the process I think there's always going to be exceptional things that happen in the course of any Community especially in small unique communities like we have um we are seeing families come in and we're seeing families go that's the nature of the Beast um and I am struggling very much with this I I have read all of the passionate emails from community members near and far um and so this is this is a tough one ctis I'm looking looking at the budget excerpt that is a part of the packet and I'm looking at the uh total operating Capital assessments that were asked to the Two Towns at a 3.38% increase for lboro and a 3.9% increase for Williamstown and uh just because I'm a math teacher in mid June I'm struggling to do the math on what the change in ask would have been and it's academic pardon the pun at this point but what would the change have been to have included this 65 and change in the original you know what I'm saying or almost saying uh because I I I hate that there's uh I hate that this is a choice that we have to make uh and I feel like if we could travel back in time we might have asked for a slight percentage higher but that only would have put this Choice off a year uh and when we look at the forecasted numbers from potentially from the state and from tuition and choice for next year uh it's not the prettiest picture in the world uh but Joe do you have some idea on that or you're you're doing it um while Joe is doing math I probably should have done instead of asking this question um I it is clear to me that every single member of the school committee sees understands and appreciates the value that Latin provides to our district to uh the curriculum as a whole the number of other curriculum parts that touch on Latin throughout High School uh is sizable uh and I feel like it's a program that should be robust and uh well well attended heavily enrolled as it used to be but when I look at the enrollment data that was also part of the packet uh I was confused by the all the zeros for Latin one from 2015 to 2020 and I feel like we touched on that somewhere in the previous meeting but I can't remember what the explanation was of having no one enrolled in Latin one for those five years but somehow having people in Latin too I don't know if I'm just reading it wrong or what so there's two questions so the an the answer to the first one is it would have increased each of the two budgets by .3% each of the assessments by by .3% um in terms of I believe the response is that students were previously transiting from Latin 8 to what was effectively Latin 2 but I am not 100% % sure of that um as it's never a question that I've needed to answer before and I'm reaching way back in my memory for things that I've I've heard um but it so far predates me that I I can't I can't guarantee that answer uh that that jives with some peripheral understanding I was just granted uh so thank you for that uh that would bring the ask for the two tending towns to 3.68 for lboro and 4 2% uh for Williamstown uh and again that would be well well above what we were asked to bring in uh by both towns uh Boards of Finance uh and would only again solve the problem for this year and the issue is like I I I want to say yes let's fund it for this year but I struggle to see where the miracle comes from for the following years uh which is why I if we are going to move forward with something I the way that Steve uh proposed it of just a commitment to this year and through uh if we're proposing anything that makes sense but having the rolling enrollment for year after year I don't see how we could even offer that as a concept right now looking at numbers we have and Curtis just to clarify you're talking about hypothetical we're not going back to the towns and increasing the percentage increase we're we're not talking about doing that because I know there was some confusion around that yeah I want to make sure that the people don't think we're doing that academic in terms of where we would be now if we had type of thing thank you for clarifying um Steve I think I saw your hand next yeah Ju Just to follow up on what Curtis was asking I think what we need is we need a Band-Aid for this year to give us time to look at the entire curriculum the entire school and this gives us time if you doing something like this and you kill the students who are coming in you've effectively killed the ladin program and there's no going back it's going to be very very hard to restart something if we do this we keep it viable it buys us time we have the Reserves that's why we have them and we can start trying to explore other Solutions you know I am a professor I have taught students remotely where I occasionally go and visit them we may need to be a little bit creative in terms of thinking how to do things and sharing Resources with other schools let's just do this tonight let's give us the time to investigate Jose thank you uh Christina and I we we'll just second much of what Steve just shared so I'll keep my comments brief um you know I think uh you know the the questions that you were posing Curtis are all important questions to ask um but again just just a second Stephen we need time um we need data we need an opportunity to you know to converse to be in in conversation with each other Joe I was hoping if you could elucidate for those of us that are here who might be watching at home and and might watch later uh could you explain to us the process by which Latin in this particular decision um was identified as as the way to plug our our our deficit um going into fiscal year 25 uh I can explain parts of it because I I was not in involved in in much of it but to um to summarize um as we presented the budget in March um we had a number of planned retirements and departures that did not materialize um so we were left with with a hole there that we needed to fill um the conversation turned to what what areas within Staffing as we've spent the last uh let me see I've been here for four years we've spent the last four years trying to squeeze every bid out of the non-staff side of our budget that we can to make room for Staffing um so we've we went through that exercise very publicly for four years so at that point this year we needed to turn to um the staff question um as we looked at that um there are certainly services that the school provides around um in in other areas social workers in particular where where there is a conversation around can we can we maintain that level of support um and so that was one area um Latin was the area where we have seen declining enrollment for years not just not just a one-year blip or two-year blip um typically a teacher within our districts serves about um 100 to 125 students over the course of over the course of their school year um Latin was the one area where where a teacher was serving um students in numbering in the in the 40s and 50s total um which which led us down that path of of taking a look at what would it do in terms of the current fiscal year um as well as in future fiscal years if that was the program that we were to phase out um at that point I was not involved in the discussions around around the details of that until it came back to to calculating the numbers um we have been in a situation where as Spanish enrollment has increased um significantly over the years um we have needed to increase class sizes as well as um produce what are called extended contracts for Spanish teachers um where they pick up teaching an additional course Beyond Beyond um the typical course load for a teacher at the school um a decision like this one would allow us to um not need to go that route hence the the savings um and it also in the conversation around scheduling um The Challenge when you have any um subject where there is only one section of a given class is that then the rest of the schedule needs to to some extent revolve around that um so if a student is in a certain um level of Latin then that triggers the rest of the schedule needing to revolve around how that course can be offered with the single teacher with the S with the single section um and that creates scheduling inflexibility that leads to in some situations other courses that are that we are required or do offer with higher enrollment um to be split in to multiple sections artificially just to be able to schedule around that um and that is what we also looked at in the longer term as far as um creating more flexibility as we navigate what will probably be two or three or four years of of challenging budget environments um I think that addressed your question but have all the details I just have a brief just a really brief follow up that's okay good um Joe could you you said that you weren't involved directly in the decision that was made may could you tell us who was involved and and uh and and provide some indication of a of a record of conversations that took place I believe the folks involved were the superintendent the principal um the guidance office looking at looking at schedules and and looking at impact um and then and then that gradually worked its way out to department heads and and other people who would be involved in the the the implications of such a decision thank you arsa okay um hi everyone I wasn't at the school committee meeting last week so I didn't hear all the discussion on this topic but I have read all the emails that have come in um and I appreciate everyone's point of view I just wanted to share my position which is that I'm I'm very torn between um my finance committee hat and the fiscal responsibility that we obviously have to have um and the desire that you know we could have all the money that we want for everything all the time um with unlimited budget um but I do think that after giving this a lot of thought my position is that I I like Steve's um position of funding this committing to fund this for the year and the incoming students and taking a more holistic look at you know what we should or should not Fund in the future I hate to think of just cutting it um I don't want to say hastily because I'm sure that wasn't the case but the way it seems to to folks um and so i' I'd like to agree with funding it for this year committing to funding for the children that are in the classes and take another look next year at what we should do in the long term so thank you Ursula um Carrie yeah I just want to add another couple of fun facts about um our changing population and who is actually teaching Latin um at this point about 26% of school districts in Massachusetts offer Latin um of the top 50 school districts ranked by places like us news 80% of those schools offer Latin um Latin is um we've heard from lots of folks and I also appreciate all of the um positive feedback and support for the study of Latin on the classics but the demographics in our districts uh in our districts uh sorry the demographics in our district um they're changing and the demand for Spanish is not just about not wanting to take Latin it's about wanting to have a spoken World Language um and so I don't expect our the demand for Spanish will go down and the way we're going to have to accommodate that is to either hire another Spanish teacher which we cannot afford to do or to repurpose a teacher who is teaching half the number of students as most other teachers in the school it's just an unfortunate fact of what we are facing so I am not going to support another year of the program and it is not because I don't value the study of Latin and I hope that people don't think that um it is it is uh strictly practical financial and uh you know realistic I think um position on my part about where we are now and where we're moving um as a district so um I do have another meeting that I'm supposed to get to so I may not actually record my vote um unless we take it soon yes but I just wanted to thank you kri and and I do Echo that and I think there are other people that need to leave soon too I would like to point out again that we last year had 300 Spanish students and 58 Latin students and I can't help but Wonder at what detriment this would do to the um proportion of our the proportion of our spage students I want Latin for for the students who are here for sure this is a very very difficult position we're in I don't I don't like it I wish we weren't here um but I do like that fiscal responsibility is just it's it's knocking so loudly at my door and Christina it was 350 Spanish students not 300 350 with three teachers yeah yeah yeah um so I think about the teachers too and and and and the impact on them Joe well one thing that I caution you with the motion that's on the floor is that you would be placing Latin into a position that no other subject is in in terms of being protected for many years and if you're faced with a couple hundred, in budget deficit um to somehow have taken Latin off of the discussion table that should be happening at the school council level I I don't I don't understand how that decision would be responsible but that's that's the one no find it very irresponsible actually so even if you support a year the person who made the motion I I think it's the only can I I think it's the only responsible thing we can do because this was sprung on the communities without giving them adequate time to respond and discuss and debate so if I was a parent of a seventh grader I would be very hesitant of signing them up for Latin after what happened this year without some firm commitment that they will be able to proceed that's why I think it's the responsible thing right now to do it this way um I know people have to leave I would like to call to question and I'll just say one last Quick comment what do we do about people who are native Spanish because what do they do for their language to be a one language school is dangerous I don't know if Latin should be that second language this is a conversation we need to have this is the only thing we can do right now to keep the Latin program viable and give us that time to figure out what we need to do and we need to buy time right now and we fortunately have the money for the purchase so I will call to question okay we have a motion by Steve that's been seconded by Ursula well now we have to vote on this call calling the question that requires a vote it requires a second and a vote to end the discussion I just don't want to have the vote taken after people have to leave the meeting for other for other uh commitments okay then withdraw your call the question and we can move to a vote sure okay I withdraw then okay we have a motion by Steve seconded by Ursula all in favor um alphabetically by last name conry no Constantine I Elfen B ey green regrettably nay Malloy I Miller I okay that motion passes for in favor to against uh would someone like to make a motion to adjourn I'll make the motion to make it easy for the before you do that for everybody a quick administrative note so the team at Mount Greylock is prepared du guidance counselors are going to get back in um they are going to reach out to families and and let them know um of the school committee decision and um go through a process of rescheduling um for uh for all students um that should be happening pretty quickly here so that we can try to try to get all the rest of the the ducks in a row for this coming school year so all of that will be happening here as quickly as we can thanks Joe okay Steve made a motion to adjourn do I have a second second all in favor conry I on c i al and B ey green ey Malloy ey Miller I thank you it is 537 and we are adjourned thanks thank you take care