##VIDEO ID:VcPEFMpgq7U## great good evening and welcome to the special meeting of the Boston school committee I'm chairperson Jerry Robinson will'll begin with the Pledge of Allegiance I'll ask my colleagues to please unmute and join me I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all because this is a remote meeting I will ask Miss parix to please call the role Miss Prix you're muted sorry I'm having problems with my computer Dr alkins presid Mr card Hernandez present Miss Lima Barbosa present Miss palanco Garcia Mr Tran present Mr O'Neal present and Miss Robinson present we have a quum thank you Miss prex tonight's session is being shared live on Zoom it will be rebroadcast on Boston City TV and posted on the school committee's web page and on YouTube tonight's meeting documents are posted on the committee's web page bostonpublicschools.org school committee under the July 19th meeting link the meeting documents have been translated into all of the major BPS languages any translations that are not ready prior to the start of the meeting will be posted as soon as they are finalized the committee is pleased to offer live simultaneous interpretation virtually in Spanish Haitian Creole c cap Verdian Cantonese Mandarin Vietnamese and American Sign Language the zoom interpretation feature has been activated Zoom participants should click the globe icon at the bottom of your screen to select your language preference I'd like to remind everyone to speak at a slower Pace to assist our interpreters we'll move right into our report superintendent school year 2023 24 Summit of evaluation we will have an hour of public comment after the presentation and discussion Dr alins Who with Vice chair O'Neal has helped to lead this process is joining us tonight from the airport while he awaits to board a flight so that is why we have shifted our um agenda timing Dr alins is leading oure presentation tonight the superintendent has completed her self- evaluation which has been distributed to the committee for review each Committee Member has finalized their individual evaluations providing their insights and assessments of the superintendent performance Dr alkins and vice chair O'Neal have Consolidated our feedback into a comprehensive semtive evaluation which will be presented this evening we will vote on the superintendent's evalu ation at our next meeting on August 28th I will now turn it over to the superintendent for remarks followed by Dr alkins Who will present the summit of evaluation after their presentations I will open it up for comments on the superintendency evaluation from other members superintendent uh great thank you chair Robinson um certainly I'm I'm grateful for this opportunity to reflect on the past two years and to speak with you the committee and the public about my work as superintendent and the strides we are making as a district first I I want to thank you chair Robinson Vice chair O'Neal and all members of the school committee for your continued support and direction as I begin year three of my superintendency I want to thank you for your questions and your collaboration all of you bring certainly a different experience set and lens to the work and your expertise and advocacy help me better serve the city's students and families every day I wake up feeling positive and excited about the work ahead and proud of what we've accomplished together so far I'm grateful that each of you on this committee has confidence in my leadership and I'm excited to continue pushing this crucial work forward in partnership with each of you as you requested I focused myself AOW on the feedback shared in last years's evaluation together with my team I did my best to align that feedback with the goals of this committee our district priorities and the standards for the superintendent evaluation set forth by desie students uh sorry superintendents especially leaders of large complex districts like Boston do not do this work in isolation or alone one of my top priorities has and will continue to be building a diverse talented and committed leadership team and staff who believe in the mission of the BPS and who are fully capable and willing to put their passion and talents forward in the service of our children and families as part of my self-evaluation I provided you with many different examples and data points to show that while we are not where we want and need to be we are moving in the right direction I have continuously said that progress must be our measure of success it's important to me that as members of the committee you deeply understand the incredible work that our leadership team and staff are bringing districtwide to BPS in mer many areas such as academics operations Equity family and Community advancement I appreciate the time that we've spent together in these meetings learning about the work and with the time I've spent with you in our schools seeing the work in action I've also said a number of times that while we as a district must work with urgency we must also ensure that our work creates a solid foundation to build upon Band-Aid Solutions work for a period of time but are also the reason that we're in such a need of better systems and structures in BPS serving BPS in the community I love every day and I live in is an honor and privilege I'm humbled by the incredible talent and passion that I'm surrounded by In This district and the level of commitment that the school-based and central office staff bring to this work each and every day we know we still have much work to do to fully address the historical disparities and student outcomes and the institutional racism that led to them for our black and brown students our specialist education students and our multilingual learner students with and without disabilities that's why we're focused on implementing the inclusive education and the long-term facilities plan with urgency but not at the expense of quality and input from our stakeholders we need to get this incredibly important work right and it has to last well beyond my Administration and your service on the school committee and we must we must send every decision around what's best for our students and we must ensure that Equity is embedded throughout our work change will not happen overnight here it needs to happen each and every day in the way that we approach our systems and structures our practices and policies and how we serve our students staff and families I want to take a few minutes to just walk through some of the key highlights from the work that we've accomplished throughout the year I want to start with a work we've done to ensure we are taking an equitable lens to all of our work we crafted our vision for racial Equity this year that is responsive to where the district is now learning from systems and practices in the past to thoughtfully assess what has and hasn't worked we are intentionally recommitting to this incredibly important work moving forward to embed Equity within our operation through tangible practices like continuous learning and training for our staff we have listened to our Central and school-based teams who have provided feedback that helped shape internal structures for self-accountability and we're committed to continued Improvement in this space including creating an internal Equity Council that will convene staff members with expertise in our core Equity initiatives in order to really break down the persistent silence and act as an internal advisory body for our work as we plan for next year I'm also really excited to work with the oag office and the ogag task force to update the 2016 oag policy and implementation plan we've learned a lot over these last several years and a refresh of the policy will help refine our work it'll help us better monitor implementation and ensure that we're working across our systems we're also eager to respond to the growing needs of our community with the newly formed office of civil rights building on the foundation laid by the office of equity we will expand our efforts to help us Foster a healthy and responsive District free of bias and establish greater coherence in safeguarding the rights of our students with disabilities and multilingual Learners to do this work well we are investing in professional development across the organization we're revamping the racial equity and Leadership training for staff to include training on microaggressions and increase support with the racial Equity planning tool which I want to be clear we remain fully fully committed and want to sharpen and we are working to strategically aligned key offices to drive Collective impact we've worked with the office of opport Unity gaps to to help them shift their work to the teaching and learning division the OG office will be situated for systemic impact as part of our core strategy to improve learning for our students there's already substantial collaboration between the two offices so we're very excited to bring the teams directly together to work this will allow a more cohesive integration into our work like Equitable literacy as well as the regional model through quality school plans building on the work of ogag and the office of teaching and learning I'm going to just share a few of the exciting work pieces around academics and instructional leadership we've continued our focus on Equitable literacy and the implementation of highquality instructional materials with 62% of sorry 82% of classrooms observed you utilizing grade level content in school year 2324 and this is in comparison to just 56% in 2223 this past year was a planning year for the implementation of inclusive education all schools convened inclusive planning teams focused on planning for specific grade levels and Educators participated in additional 8 hours of PD focused on building foundational knowledge relative to inclusive at as we begin SF the school year 2425 inclusive practices are being implemented in in grades k0 K2 7th and n9th and school IPS are beginning planning for additional grades to implement in school year 2526 the Council of great City Schools recommended a phased approach over four years including a planning Year we will learn a lot from what we take this first year alone and will continue to make adjustments as we learn and we grow upon reflection of the inclusion planning team process we are implementing some changes as a result of the feedback that we received from different stakeholders for example we'll be focused on progress monitoring this first year of implementation for both students with disabilities and our multilingual Learners I'm also proud that we are increasing the number of community Hub schools from 14 to 20 this year we know that our schools do so much more for our students Beyond just academics and we know that our students can't learn if they don't have a community that supports them and resources that help them and their families The Hub model has proven to be successful and we're working together with the btu and Community Partners to make sure our students have what they need we're also focused on continued work around student re-engagement through many Avenues including the win the day pilot in Region 8 the data there is encouraging showing that this kind of re-engagement work like produces results and allows us to really stay focused and keep students in the classrooms chronic absenteeism rates continue to decrease with larger decreases for our transformation schools compared to our non- transformation schools and that's exceptionally important ensuring our students come to school is critical but we must also ensure that they have a sense of belonging and see options for their future this is one of the reasons that we're continuing to grow our Early College and Career Pathways programs which have recently added or will be adding 10 new programs across nine schools for this upcoming school year this is just some of the good work that the academics team is doing doing to bring strong instruction equally across all of our schools so that we can deliver the high quality academic experience all of our students deserve and help them achieve their dreams for their future I'm going to talk just for a few minutes about management and operations next my team is rooted in learning and getting better it's a big part of the work that we're doing with operations by putting systems in place so that we can track and measure our success this data is critical to helping us understand better what is not and is working and where we must prioritize resources we also know that a strong professional culture within BPS is Paramount to accomplishing the kind of complex work they were undertaking and Equity must be at its core we improved our hiring and retention practices at the district level particularly around stabilizing our principal core and increasing the retention and recruitment of staff so that as Leaders we share our students experiences races ethnicities and languages and just a couple of months ago we launched the Dr Carol Johnson leadership Fellowship to ensure that we're providing an opportunity for people within the district to grow into effective leaders we have an incredible cohort of 15 leaders working to ready themselves to take the next step in their career here at PPS we've also made significant strides across our District Operations in transportation compared to the 2223 school year our ontime performance reported to Desi for 2324 increased by 2.4 percentage points in the AM and 4.5 percentage points in the afternoon we also began the 2324 school year with nearly 200 more bus monitors than the year prior and we achieved full Staffing of bus drivers and bus monitors during the 2324 school year robust new hiring and training pipelines including the new City Academy training facility announced last Friday will help us maintain full Staffing as we look to the future we continue to meet regularly with our transportation advisory Council to identify and collaborate on additional areas for continued trans exportation improvements for students families and schools I was with mayor woo on Friday this past Friday showcasing our new yellow bus technology called Zoom which shares realtime bus information and updates with parents through the zoom application app and will provide us with important data on Transportation performance and student ridership this will help us improve our daily bus operations even more and that's just scratching the surface on the improvements this technology brings for families our drivers and our schools I also want to share that we are now entering this coming year because of the systems that we've built around training and hiring where we're actually above a 100% hiring for bus drivers and bus monitors for the upcoming school year not something that we could ever say a few years ago the transportation department is just a great example of our commitment to in continuous Improvement just a few years ago you know when we think back we were in such a different place they've made consistent progress year after year and continue to implement new tools Technologies and systems to improve the services we provide and we're making strides with our facilities as well you've heard me say again and again that everything we do must be focused on ensuring that our students have Equitable access to the highquality student experience which is why we're steadfast on implementing the long-term facilities plan with urgency but also with care and thoughtfulness for our impacted staff students families I know some were expecting more school closures merges and reconfigurations this year but at the end of the day we had to put our students at the center of the work we must ensure that that students are moved to a high quality seat if they are impacted by a closure or merger as I shared earlier we're focusing on delivering strong instruction and providing more opportunities across all schools so when we do close or we do merge families understand what high quality options they have for their students and this is why we're excited to have 11 major capital projects underway more than the last 40 years combined with those projects combined with new tools like the facilities condition assessment and the school design study I'm confident that we're laying the foundation so that this work is sustainable in the long run with how students experience their education it has to be our priority I'm also proud of our thoughtful approach to budgeting and when with Esser coming to to an end we took a forward look approach which put us in a strong position over a 2-year period as a district to maintain funding for student focused programming services and staff both for this year and Beyond in our 24 budget more than a year before the end of Esser we invested $15 million to ensure that schools were able to transition their highest priority items onto the general fund in our fy2 budget we continued this work by identifying over $10 million in central office budget reductions to fund additional high priority Esser initiatives because of this approach we did not see the large layoffs that many other large urban districts did see this year it's also crucial for our families in our communities to play an active role across all of this work and I'd like to just share a couple of pieces around our family and Community engagement and advancement work I want to be visible and accessible to our families and to our communities which is why we developed the community engagement tour where I had the incredible opportunity to hear directly from dozens of different communities and leaders we learned a lot from these conversations and we're really focusing on developing and communicating more clear processes for Community engagement across the district I can say with confidence that my team and I are listening and we have pivoted on certain things because of community input and feedback which help shape some of those decisions and we know that we as a district have to own difficult decisions and clearly communicate those decisions timely with our families and communities one exciting project that our Communications team is actively working on is building out a cohesive District website this is an incredibly big task that the team is undertaken and they're designing it with families in mind you can think of the new BPS website as a central Hub of information that will make accessing information a whole lot easier for our families and communities as things stand now we plan to launch that new website later this fall we also ensure that accessibility and language accessibility are built into our everyday operation we're serving families through our BPS helpline in ensuring that our information and materials are translated into all BPS languages we also have purchased two-way translation devices that will be distributed across the district to every school so that families can immediately communicate live to any staff in the building in any language they speak last week I had the opportunity to kick off our August Leadership Institute Ali this is really a tradition I remember it all the way back to 1996 when we began it um but this is really where we bring together all of our school leaders and Senior staff to really connect reconnect refocus and plan for the year ahead I shared with them my excitement for this year because I believe that this year we will begin to see the impact of our foundational work we're seeing the needle moving in the right direction in so many different areas data points in addition to all the work mentioned above we've moved out of the state's bottom 10 percentile no small task and it's really due to our team's consistent work every day of the year the past two years have been technical focused building those systems structures foundations it's focused on what we must do this year we start moving on the Adaptive work and that really focuses on how we will do it some of the questions that I shared at AI for our leaders to think about I will say here how will we review our practices as schools and networks to bring our work to the next level how will we observe our classrooms and shift our structures and practices to serve students in the least restrictive environment how will we truly Center the identities and assets of our students to cultivate a sense of belonging for all of our students how will we expand students and support students academic language development how will we plan highquality professional development for our staff so that they too can raise the bar in every classroom in every school in every day as we prepare for this year this is the work ahead serving the students and families of Boston is my greatest honor our kids are depending on us and I take that responsibility very seriously as does my team I'm confident that all of this Foundation Building has set us up to accelerate our work this year and Beyond and I'm looking forward to doing this work with all of you both our short and long-term work and continuing to develop new strategic school committee goals for BPS this fall all of this is in service of our City's greatest asset which is our students so thank you again for the feedback for your involvement and commitment and I look forward to working with you this year and to hearing the feedback on my evaluation great thank you superintendent I'll now turn it over to Dr alins thank you um everyone and thank you for the um the the synopsis um superintendent um I think the the theme that we walk away with as a school committee is twofold um one of confidence and one of criticality um our role um as a committee is to provide that feedback to see where uh areas um can be improved and while we do that um I think I want to know and I think I speak for all of our school committee members where we say that we do have confidence um in your ability to lead this District um we do speak um we believe that you are turning this uh this District in the in the right direction um and that we want to do what we can to support additionally um our reflection in the in the evaluation is also representative of all the great work that um the school-based teams are doing and the central team is doing um and we want to be there to see where we can improve processes do better um and and really getting at the level of of the most of the most detail that we can so that we understand really what the issues are um that we need to address uh moving forward so I think before I get into just the summit of evaluation I think uh this is a an opportunity to say thank you to all the teams that have been working diligently under your watch um um and really have been working alongside you um and with our students to to make strides um and we agree change is not going to happen overnight um and I will say that as with any evaluation process you see the wide range of how each of us looks at the work looks at the evaluation process and I think that came out in um in in in our in our Summit of evaluation um so um before I share slides uh for this presentation um Michael do you want to um or vice chair O'Neal I'm sorry like do you want to add any introductory comments no Dr alins I think you captured it perfectly thank you all right let me share my slide can everyone hear me now okay Co um so as a school committee we have a series of responsibilities um most critically uh defining the Mission Vision and goals of uh the Boston Public School District establishing and monitoring the annual operating budget hiring and managing the evaluating the superintendent our reason for this presentation today and setting and reviewing District policies and practices to support student achievement and so the evaluation really took place over a series of of months um and and so it really involves a set of agreed upon goals um so every fall we as a school committee um with the superintendent undergo a retreat where we're able to discuss those goals we are able to discuss the alignment with those goals do those goals need to change and um thinking about what are the best ways that we should be measuring or looking for those outputs that reflect those goals or progress towards those goals um additionally um the evaluation is preceded by a self- evaluation that is constructed by the superintendent that gives us some insight um into what have been the accomplishments for the year but also directions where uh the superintendent believes that the district should be going moving forward and then after that each School Committee Member is tasked with writing their own individual member evaluations these evaluations are made public um so folks will have an opportunity to read them um and and address them uh directly um and then of course the summit of evaluation is a consolidating process by which we take um pieces from each um evaluation to really find overall themes that emerge um across everyone's uh evaluation and then following that following this presentation we will be voting on the summit of evaluation and performance rate at our next meeting and so including the timeline here just showing you um how this sort of played out over over the series of months uh we received a superintendent self- evaluation in July and between mid to early August we collected individual evaluations from school committee members and then we spent some time constructing that Summit of evaluation where we were pulling out Salient themes and then um we will be voting next week for the summit of evaluation and performance rating so one of the things that helps us provide a a better uh an insightful evaluation is understanding the Desi standards and also there's a Boston Public School rubric that allows us to give a little bit more Nuance in how our evaluation plays excuse me how our evaluation plays out um but the Des standards for superintendent evaluation exists across four standards you heard that just a few minutes ago um in how our superintendent broke down um the progress in these different domains the first being instructional leadership the second being management and operations the third being family and Community engagement and four professional culture so here um what we are showing you is a table that sort of helped us as school committee members um provide feedback in a constructive way so what we're looking at is the Desi rubric versus the BPS rubric so in the top um Row in Gold you can see that desie is um broken down in terms of uh performance ratings of exemplary proficient minimally effective and INE effective um but this requires a little bit more Nuance in how we're looking at evaluating progress and so what you see below that is the BPS rubric broken down in terms of performance uh the first category um is highly effective which would be given a score of five the second category would be effective or developing uh which receives a score of four or three respectively note that the effective or developing rating falls under the Desi rubric of proficient so either an effective or develop in um rating would still classify under proficient uh third uh needs Improvement which receives a score of a two and then bps's rubric for unsatisfactory receives a score of a one and so we took each of these domains and rated uh the performance um based upon the the superintenden evaluation and our individual conversations and our own um conversations with folks um in BPS to help gather the feedback that we felt was necessary to make um informed evaluations so as we look at the first standard inst instructional leadership um you sort of heard a a great summary from the the superintendent uh so one of the things that I will um speak a little bit on our each of the feedback themes um and thinking about where we thought there were areas of of strength and where there are there are areas of growth um to look forward to um so just looking at Equitable literacy um multiple school committee members um um noted that uh superintendent um Skipper has shown urgency around um increasing access to high quality instructional materials um and increasing the um the tools with which we are making classroom obst obervations um we were all pleased to see that we do have a a rating of 90% of schools adopting hqm or high quality instructional materials with that goal of reaching 100% by next year um acknowledging that we know this is a multi-year effort um uh and we do know that there can be some immediate um positive outcomes for our students but I think we're all um in agreement and and aware that the the outcome data for this is probably a three to fiveyear process at least to see um change um further um the district um as we note um these these strides we still noted as a committee that uh we need to have clearer plans for ensuring that multilingual Learners receive quality native language instruction um as uh plans are developed and Implement implementation occurs we still need to grow grow in our communication around this we need to think about how materials build understanding and how they continue to be accessible um we are excited about the progress uh in Staffing to support this work um but there is still much to do um to ensure that our students are truly receiving access to native language instruction regarding inclusive education um the district has definitely um increased um strid taken strides and critical steps to make this a reality for all our students um but we all acknowledged that there was much room for improvement a number of us particularly uh noted the inclusion planning team process as being um as lacking Clarity um particularly for for schools around their expectations which led to a bit of confusion and left teams feeling discouraged um in the sense that schools did not always receive what they felt they needed to implement inclusion properly um some feel that uh we potentially missed an opportunity to really deeply learn and Implement what schools were telling us directly um and so I know uh this is a process that we will take into the future and definitely learn from and um particularly around being clearer in the in the process um some other bright spot that um the superintendent mentioned um um particularly the the lowest 10% of districts showing a positive movement um when we talk about our transformation schools um there is positive momentum in our uh secondary schools in regards to the Early College and Career Pathways um we've seen um exciting growth like in our community Hub schools so we will uh have a total of 20 schools uh increasing by six um in the next year um and so those are some some of the the bright spots of things that we're looking forward to um for schools to come online sort of adding to that idea of increasing quality seats for the district um and then um just looking forward um much of the work and this is always the tough part as a as an evaluator to really think about long-term results and how we're really measuring these things um it means that we have to be creative around the accountability metrics that may not show the effects of our efforts in the short term but really thinking about how there there were we're showcasing it for the long term um um this includes considering how we think about measures of accountability and and means of support um and particular early um just calling out um alternative education programs um when we think about that um so overall in in this um domain the committee rated the uh superintendent um as uh as effective by Desy standards or like which is proficient and the score is there as you can see an average score of about 4.0 out of five and here what you're are looking at is just the distribution of our responses um showing uh two school committee members um voted the uh the superintendent as highly effective in this domain three as effective and two as developing as we move to the management and operations um domain um that promotes the learning and growth of all students and the success of La staff by ensuring a safe efficient and effective learning environment using resources to implement and Implement appropriate curriculum Staffing and scheduling a few feedback themes emerged um the committee was pleased to see the transport that transportation is continuing its progress from last year um um the the increase in ontime performance um by about 2.4 percentage points um the hiring um and paid training bus drivers and monitors um implementation of new technologies to increase efficiency across the board um the school committee was pleased to see that work um uh with regard to food nutrition or food and like food um and nutrition um the growth in in-house um cooked meals was certainly encouraging um the diversity of special meals that are now available to students um giving them a a much more balanced diet to choose from um this is still also an area of continued growth um this is about increasing access um and thinking particularly when we think about our breakfast uh delivery and options um for those uh with hiring and retention we Inc we continue to increase the diversity um of our Workforce particularly around race and ethnicity of our Educators um and staff and staff members um we still must continue to be intentional about this um particularly with regard to increasing multilingual uh Educators and leaders um while our Focus um has been on Recruitment and the development um we have seen positive strides we need to think about retention practices and how we are monitoring the um the the culture that keeps our uh our multilingual Educators and our newer Educators and our leaders of color uh in the district and everyone in the district um also the committee noted um that um particularly in regard to the office of human capital to be mindful of the perception of how uh ohc is handling employee relations during challenging um needs um and that needs to be more fully considered um it's already encour in that I believe the superintendent has been in contact with the Council of great City Schools to begin addressing this um so we are we are proud to see some of that uh that um those commitments are already starting to come into fruition regarding the budget um uh the the school committee last year asked for more clarity around the budget and seeing down to the line item what we were allocating and the district um did a better job this year in providing us with a with those spreadsheets so that we could have a much more uh detailed look like in that that said we still need to be more Forward Thinking and um and thinking about our approach to to budgeting with more clarity um Clarity around long-term goals the sustainability the clear alignment to the district priorities um and and thinking about like truly how is the budget accessible um like for folks to be able to pinpoint what programs are we investing in um where are where are funds being funneled and how these decisions are being made um this is also tied to um our facilities work um we the superintendent noted that more than 11 capital projects are underway more than the last 40 years combined um that said um we do not have a a clear systems level facilities plan which would really give us um a sense of the goals and where what the direction and what the the district where the district is headed with regard to our budget so all these things do in fact uh tie together um but the the committee did note that the superintendent did have um very thoughtful analysis around school closures and mergers noting that you do need those quality seats to move students to if you are thinking about closing and or merging schools um we need to continue how we're doing these things uh we do need to think about how we expand our definitions how we're looking at resources in a more creative way that really ensure that students um have the buildings that truly do support a quality education um so overall u in this category the uh superintendent was rated um as effective or proficient um with an average score of 3.71 and as you can see the distribution a little bit more even across the board uh with um uh two school committee members noting a highly effective rating an effective rating and a developing rating and one indicating a needs Improvement um area or rating as we move into to the third domain of family and Community engagement um several themes um certainly emerge um here um but family and Community engagement surrounds really the learning and growth of all students and the success of all staff through effective Partnerships with families Community organizations and our value holders that uh support the mission of the school and District um so here it was very clear um through the superintendent's listening tour um that the superintendent and her leadership team made a conscientious effort to be visible and accessible to the community um this was a very thoughtful approach to really hear the the the range of of of feedback positive and critical um and so the willingness to listen um to that feedback and in some cases Incorporated directly um like on the Fly um the for example the feedback that the superintendent received in the implementation for the inclus of the inclusion plan for English Learners and the facilities planning uh this specifically in this decision uh also um specifically in the decision to slow the pace of closures this year um and to increase access to those high quality seats for students who are affected by those closures um so all of these um or those those examples really I think showcased the that that visibility and and that Unity there um and so um where we think about opportunities here for um for for growth um we think about how how multiple times we heard from families and from the school committee directly about thinking about um more clarity or deeper Clarity um in in what community engagement is um thinking about what the a specific role is and how Equity needs to be centered in our in our in in the ways that we engage with our community what does it mean um what constitutes equity and Trust what constitutes an effective use of the racial Equity planning tool how are we sharing that with folks with every decision that we make um and so um we had a we had a number of of examples this year that showcased that we need to do better um and so the superintendent heard that loud and clear um from us um and so um summarizing this domain the the composite rating um was developing or proficient with an average score of 3.43 out of five and as you can see the distribution um more um folks um um four committee members felt the rating was effective two felt developing one felt needs Improvement and just as a note um I think it was no surprise uh particularly to Vice chair O'Neal and me that this uh like and and I that this was perhaps the toughest um domain um particularly because um understanding what does it mean to be Equitable and what does it mean to uh particularly rate authentic Community engagement um can be very challenging out of the other domains um in comparison and so um what we did both note um and I'm sure committee members would probably agree with this um that when you see strides in those other domains I think we're going to see strides in the family and Community engagement piece um that doesn't mean that we don't need to focus like on how we are doing this more effectively because we absolutely do um but um this was not a surprise um that this domain was perhaps the toughest of the of the four and then last uh professional culture which is the degree to which the superintendent is promoting success for all students by nurturing and sustaining a school culture of reflective practice high expectations and continuous learning for staff and so multiple uh committee members noted the support for the regional model that the superintendent has put in place um which is a a a great system levels approach that we feel can yield greater insight into the school process and how decisions are made and helping streamline communication um this will also increase um school cross functional leadership uh increase decision- making uh improve decision making I'm sorry um improve the implementation of high quality instructional materials improve Communications to staff and families around um occurrences um but it is critical um that all regions um Reach This higher level um and that um the Liaisons that we have from from Bowling departments to the to the regional Network um and that we empowering those folks to to be engaged the th those Liaisons um what we have seen um in this past year are some instances of when this is not done properly schools suffer um because information is not getting to schools the way that they need to families are not getting access to the things that they need to in appropriate timing um and that just creates chaos um for for our students and for our families um as we move to leadership development um one thing that we noted particularly about um even before the superintendent was hired was the need for the district to have stability um and uh super the superintendent was noted by committee members to uh to stabilize her core leadership team and her school leader unit um the leadership pipeline opportunities exist at all levels of the organization from Paras to multilingual teachers to school and central office leaders um which really shows an investment to our employees um and in dedication um to BPS um and uh and um to professional development opportunities that we are looking to Foster to improve uh Career Development and advancement as we note um also um when we look at the perception and accountability of the of the district um we noted uh this was a a measure from last year uh as well um uh numerous school committee members um did highlight um the decline in accountability that school leaders uh perceive from the district um from an already low number while it could be potentially rooted in um the issue about the liaison empowerment and engagement as I mentioned earlier it still does highlight a critical matter we need our school leaders and our schools to be um to believe in what the district is doing and if there are measurements that are telling us otherwise then we need to get to the bottom of that and we need to really um see what's reflecting that um Decline and perception of accountability there um uh we've heard um some school committee members mention the sort of customer service model of really thinking about um thinking of our families as the customers of our district and and and in all in central must uh All In central office must consistently realize that our individual schools are our families focus and we must work together um to allow our our schools to succeed really um thus there was really strong support um but really a critical eye that this measure needs to continue to be monitored um and really thinking about how we are U improving like accountability at the district level um and then finally um we discussed some of our new Partnerships uh school committee members noted uh the importance of developing and maintaining uh developing new Partnerships uh maintaining current Partnerships uh particularly with nonprofits cultural business higher education philanthropic and Community organizations um it is encouraged to see the ones that we have now um under uh super the superintendent's leadership um we have seen um a couple like we have seen a couple um just in this past year um and so this has not gone unnoticed um and we we we hope that um that the importance of developing these Partnerships eventually translates over into how we're addressing um the opportunity and achievement gaps and I know the superintendent um earlier had mentioned the Partnerships and um looking forward to working with the this office in this upcoming year um so in this domain the overall composite rating was uh effective or proficient with an average score of 3.86 out of five and as we look at the distribution um we can see that two members rated the superintendent's performance as highly effective two rated the um performance as effective and three rated the uh superintend performance as developing and so as we look at the overall rating um the overall rating for the superintendent um averages out to be a 3.75 out of five um which is a score of effective or rating of effective or proficient and another um way of showing you the the rubric distribution um across um all of the um domains but just showing um everyone um with both the Desi uh uh Rubik's present and also the BPS rubric present and if we look at the overall distribution across each domain this is just the Consolidated um figure showing the responses from each of the previous uh slides um and then showing the average rating um across each domain um and so um overall um just to summarize there were um several areas of of strength um again noting the Equitable literacy um strides um also the development of the regional um Network model um the expansion of uh Community Hub schools early like College and Career Pathways our multi-tiered systems of support um to to Really um ground students or surround students with the supports that they need um to be successful and to show up um the positive momentum um noted across the different domains delivering on time and efficient Transportation um improvements in communication and Technology um leadership and devel development pipeline opportunities through our recruitment particularly of those U multilingual um leaders and Educators um improved uh Recruitment and hiring practices our capital projects um and our and the superintendent Community engagement tour um so just summarizing some of those areas of strength and some areas uh for continued growth um uh continuing to refine the implement of Equitable and authentic community and family engagement practices um this really requires some deep and thoughtful work around what does it mean to have a shared understanding of what engagement is um and then what's where each process that we in include the community on that there is clear understanding and knowledge of what the community's role is um in in in decision making and in the process um here um the committee is dedicated to supporting this effort um through through whatever means we we have two uh to continue and strengthen the implementation practices of the district's core priorities um using examples like the long-term facilities plan and inclusive education which need to be uh clearer and have more um detail um for not just us as school committee members but but also for the the school communities and the families that it affects mostly um and it's and also the expansion of districtwide high quality seats third um we need to continue to recruit high quality staff representative that that represent our our student and Community diversity we need to continue to hone our programs and practices that result in increased high quality staff retention development and satisfaction and we need to just as a note we need to think about how we're monitoring that and continuing to monitor that and fourth we need to continue to refine and clarify the budget and our budget process meaning that we need to have a clearer alignment of resources to District priorities and goals Clarity throughout the process communication that that build a shared understanding among bps's various audiences and really points to what the the direction is and um and shows that we are clearly moving in that in that direction and so just to summarize again um the actual uh steps and timelines so following this presentation um we will be voting on the summit of evaluation and performance rating on August 28th and that concludes our presentation um but I do want to uh give time for my fellow committee members to weigh in and um and provide their feedback yes thank you so much for your leadership on all of this um Dr alkins and I'm glad that your plain times have allowed you to remain with us during this thank you so now open it up to um members chair may I just make a before other members start making comments may I just make a closing comment about the work that Dr alkins did on this uh that we did together yes okay thanks so thank you um I just want to point out and I thank Dr alkins for his leadership on this this has been a lot of work over the past several weeks um I just want to highlight a couple of points he made one is you know the areas of continued growth are very important because in fact our conversation last August about the superintendent's evaluation of that time led to the goals and therefore the measures and the metrics that all the committee members looked at for this year as we talked about in our um Retreat last October and then therefore we would anticipate the area to areas for continued growth that Dr Alin just laid out now would be the beginning of the conversations at are coming retreat in October for the goals for the coming year so um that's certainly an important conversation um second I want to Echo what Dr Elin said uh that he and I both noted you know the family and Community engagement is is quite frankly one of the hardest areas right because it's about our families building trust with the district and you know we both noted that improvements in uh instructional leadership and professional culture and management and operations should lead to increased trust uh by our families because let's face it they're smart they have the fingers on the pulse of what's going on in the district and when they see improvements they know it and realize it and so um you know it needs it needs work to continue to improve but it's also the one that is most dependent upon the others improving and um I'll just I'll just stop at that I thank Dr alkin overall for his comments I think it perfectly reflected the summit of evaluation and I do obviously know cheer the superintendent self valuation all seven members individual evaluation and the summit of evaluation of all public documents and will'll be posted on our website for uh for folks to see as well as you know the attachments that the superintendent that shows the the goals the accountability and the metrics that were used great thank you right now open it up to members comments Dr alins uh yes one one thing I didn't mention earlier was that the way in which we sort of constructed the evaluation was that we needed to we wanted to take quotes or points from each member's evaluation to make sure that we had at least representative points from each um member um and so you know what we're and so what's reflected in the summative is either at least like two committee members making the same or a similar comment um across the theme which is sort of like a baseline for how um information was there um so I wanted to add that note um and then just you know my own U my own reflection on the process is that um we learned so much about being we need as a as a committee um you know we're we're we're going to continue to be critical uh we're going to continue to ask for the things that we we we feel that the district needs and I think it's it's interesting because I I was in a privileged position on this process to be able to see how everyone was thinking about um the their evaluation process um it's hard to think about um evaluation of a of an individual but also being an outcomes Driven body um and um being realistic about where we are currently as a district and then where do we think that we're going but then also acknowledging that being critical does not mean that there isn't confidence um there um and so I encourage my my fellow School committee members to continue to be to continue to be critical to continue to be reflective like of of the process um because that's how we're all we're we're all in commitment to bettering the the the quality of of student outcomes and student livelihoods so I encourage my fellow school committee members to do that in the best way that they know possible thank you other comments Miss Lima Barosa thank you chair uh thank you Dr oans and vice shair O'Neal uh for taking the lead on this uh to me it was an interesting process this is my first uh time having the opportunity to provide uh feedback to superintendent Skipper I think what I've been trying to be consistent uh since I've been appointed is really calling the district into the conversation on improving the community engagement I think that's been the one thing that I try to always bring up in every conversation that we've had uh so I have to agree with Dr ains that was definely probably the hardest uh to go back uh reflect on not only the moments that maybe we missed the opportunity but the moments that were acknowledge that we miss opportunities we shift the way on how we're engaging with families I think we still have a lot lot work to do especially when we think about our uh immigrant families folks that English is not their first language our newcomers um you know those are that that was one area that I was not struggling but I really wanted to make sure that I was being intentional especially on thinking on how myself as a Committee Member can also contribute to make uh information a lot more accessible uh but also be clear what a community engagement is are we asking for feedback are we just informing uh and how do we make sure we're doing that in an equitable way uh but overall uh superintendent I just you know I've always uh admire your leadership on bringing your you know your team in and making sure that they're also sitting with us talking to us not only in the chamber uh but making sure that they are being accessible and uh not only to the committee but how do we can make sure that they're accessible as well to the to the community I think about even for parents I know it's good that you know often especially with the tour y we're going onto you know the school campuses uh I wonder how we can sort of figure it out uh I know you have the family engagement now4 does a really good job overall but how other areas can also make their themselves a little bit visible I've always was a fan of the uh mayor's office Coffee hours so I don't know if that's something that maybe BPS can think about doing it maybe in the summer maybe during you know I know during break is hard because our team also needs needs a rest but that is one thing that I wanted to bring up that I didn't have an opportunity to do I think we talk a lot about our students and our staff but how our our parents and Care caregivers also have a better understanding of the overall leadership at the district is something that I think we should we should think through and maybe collaborate on how we could do that um a lot of work to do I think the green New Deal was definitely something that um we were all expecting more but your transparency on why you had to make the hard decision of sort of Shifting what you all were ready to bring uh for us to discuss and vote uh but I do W to call out not call out but highlight that it can often bring anxiety to community me communities and families when we're discussing something that is important is going to impact them and their in their in their families um just thinking about that when we do have to make those hard decisions right on how we're going to communicate that in a way that they see it's coming from a place of care and it's coming from a place of we're holding ourselves accountable we want to be urgent we don't want to do a bandage approach but a lot of these things that we often see our Advocates and community members come to testify to us as conversations as they've been they've been having right they've been having these conversations so they definitely want to see urgency but I I I urge that we are being careful with the urgency in itself so it's not just us um clicking you know checking a box but making decisions that in two three years we're not taking it back right so just wanted to share some of the highlights of what are some things that I thought about while I was going through uh providing the evaluation it is also not only a reflection of your leadership but the work that the district is doing I commend y all uh it's a really hard hard hard job that y'all have uh so like always I'm here to provide support but also be transparent on you know what I do think and hopefully I can bring Solutions and not just highlight things that we need to work on but thank you superintendent again thank you Dr oxen's Vice uh Vice chair O'Neal for their leadership on on this process thank you right thank you um Mr cardette Hernandez uh thank you both for your work on this process and um I appreciated your sentiments Dr alins the sort of calling in that the feedback is is part of the work and I often say this as someone who is newer to Boston there's like a sort of um a a Boston niceness that I think is really is serves folks well sometimes but we've seen the historical outcomes here I think that sort of gentle approach to feedback has not been good for kids and so I appreciate a body that can do that and relationship we have with you superintendent where you can hear where the concerns are um and the best ways we we think we can address them a few things come to mind for me I think there is some work as a body that I think is sort of interesting that we should be thinking about just around our own norming on these ratings we are so far away from each other um in many places on how we're experiencing and seeing the work and that may be where we end up but I think we would be um negligent if we didn't try to tune in to understand why more um and so I don't know if as a former principal if I had a group of of assistant principles who were rating one teacher so differently in the same domain it would be time to tune in and understand sort of what the domain means what the goal that we're looking at and how do we measure results so I think there's something there for us I was not thrilled as everyone I have shared with how the retreat went previously but maybe we can think about that retreat in a different way so it is much more focused on these sorts of stuff and things and nuts and bolts um and then maybe there's a sort of second Retreat that we revisit mid year so that that norming is part of continuous work because the way this rolls out right is we get the superintendent's feedback we rate independently you guys take it and this is the first conversation we have and so there really then is never again another opportunity to Norm on on sort of how we are understanding what each of these ratings means so Food For Thought uh for the chair and the vice chair specifically uh I think just a few other things just while my brain's on it um I I think two things and that's just one thing that I I want to lovingly disagree with which is that we have multiple years to wait to see growth and I don't think that that was what was I don't think it was the intention of what how it came off was not what you meant Dr alkins because I understand what you mean like the actions will take time um but I just want to like name on a value level like we don't have multiple years we have 27% of fourth graders reading proficiently and so it to me it is more than just high quality instructional materials and professional development taking shape there's like policies and practices that have allowed for kids to move forward um that we also have to be addressing so I just want to like make space for the urgency to move results faster and I've talked about that in my uh feedback around transformation schools and around literacy specifically because I think that literacy is the hook for the future work um and so I just want to like make space for that and not with no accusation of that's what you meant just sort of like name putting it out there and naming it um and I just want to Echo the sentiments around inclusive education I think we got a lot of feedback that the proc wasn't clear um that folks didn't really get what they thought they were getting or what they needed and that maybe unfortunately it felt like a little bit of smoke in mirrors and so as we go into the next process and we had raised concerns on this body of like if you don't tell people what they can expect like what's on the menu they're going to try to order things that are off menu that we're not going to be able to cook and so I think we have to start um in this next process being really clear on like what are the options what is the funding mechanisms that folks can use what are the types of classrooms we can build I think there was a lot of Confusion And I think for some of our it is unfortunate that we put Educators in a situation to do planning for some of our most vulnerable kids and then they felt like the district wasn't able to meet them there so I'm just sort of like holding space for that as we move into to next year I will raise the same red flag that I continue to raise which is my concern around the budget and the f Cliff our Clarity around it but also where we're going I worry we are going to find ourselves in a situation that we have seen other districts like us like San Francisco in um where we have continued to overspend and not reduce the size of the system um and have to make dramatic decisions in a moment of urgency instead of the opportunity that we have to be really thoughtful about how we're thinking about the budget and the implications knowing that like that requires us to do hard things on both sides um and I think think two two last thoughts uh one on the family and Community engagement I agree those other things will probably get better as the other sort of areas get better family and Community engagement will improve um but there is still a core of what we hear which is that people don't feel like they know what's going on and that even we talk about it here which is like you know we our feathers get ruffled and we're like people don't know the great things that are happening in the system well we're our messenger and so like that is an us problem not a them problem and so like yes as things these other domains improve that those other you can imagine engagement Community engage family and Community engagement could improve as a measure but like if we are still not great at communicating our own successes as well as areas of concern people are still going to be disengaged and I think that happens and I shared this feedback like we have like a language problem not just like the way that we translate for languages outside of English but like just the jargon that we use here comfortably use and just like sort of apologize for using it and then proceed um as well as what I was so happy you referenced today superintendent but a tech problem um we have a really sort of uh an archaic user experience and user interface on multiple platforms that we ask people to engage with and so if like those don't become easeful the engagement with the system will continue to feel disruptive and folks will feel like they're uh straddling hurdles to understand what's happening so I think both things are true here but I just want to hold space for that and I'm H I'm excited to learn more about the website update and then all the other ways that we'll continue to think about technology as a way to sort of buffer the any confusion and then the last thing I think because I think it's more about us than about the superintendent which is we had school leaders uh 28% say that they felt like the district was held accountable for school performance performance and in many ways I thought that was like actually that was for the superintendent but it was like a moment where we are in parallel process with the superintendent that was also a measure for us that around our ability to hold the district accountable that is what people believe our role is um and I think it goes back to the first point uh around our own norming around like what is success and what is um and what is acceptable and what is the type of feedback that we think is a appropriate to give to push and drive results all of those in service of kids so um just I'm sort of holding that and uh as I'm closing out tonight but thank you again Dr alkins and vice chair O'Neal on the work um it is a hard task to do in the middle of the summer so thank you guys for for holding it down thank you before I move on just want to check in Mr Tron do you have any comments you'd like to make uh not at this moment thank you all right well again I just want to say thank you to Dr sorry Mr O'Neil sorry madam chair sorry I was speaking before as you know helping Dr with this Summit if I just wanted to make a a a couple of um personal comments about how I approach it and you know this is the beauty of having a committee right seven people seven different backgrounds seven different sets of experiences and seven different viewpoints and then you know we put it together and see that on some things we have some consensus and some things we push in different viewpoints and and that's the beauty of working together as a committee so I actually enjoyed reading the other members evaluations right in my own I did just want to note when I wrote my own you know I have done several of these evaluations as a number of the members have and and I found myself thinking where would I expect a superintendent to be at the end of two years with the challenges and the opportunities that we have and I kind of use that as the prism of how I rated superintendent Skipper um we did have you know discussions I know members asked questions about well are we evaluating the district or we evaluating the superintendent or by evaluating the superintendent are we evalu in effect evaluating the superintendent evaluating the district you know I I share a lot of the concerns that fellow members raised about you know we want tangible results we want academic Improvement we want you know more inclusive Ed done right we want more multilingual opportunities we want Clarity on the budget we want more information about facilities planning and I think Dr Alin did a nice job of making sure that those concerns were raised I I personally in my evaluation Tred to balance where were the actions that the superintendent were taking going to lead to those improvements um and so it's that's the beauty again of being a a committee of seven right and we all have different viewpoints and um I was pleased superintendent I'm pleased myself with the the progress I believe that you have made I was also struck and I have and you know I called it out in my individual evaluation I've said publicly you know this year I visited a number of schools with you and to see your interactions with the school leaders and with the teachers and the Paris and you know all who work in our schools um I am very supportive of where you are in your growth as our superintendent obviously your background your experience as a teacher and a school leader and the head of high schools and the experience you gained in being a student superintendent elsewhere have come to beer for our district I and cognizant of and I know we all are we referenced this a number of times the challenges our district face and the and the incredible sense of urgency we all have on improving the education opportunity our children only have you know hopefully one chance at first grade one chance at second grade one chance at third grade and we can't wait and say well five years from now it'll be better but we also know that steps need to be taken and I just want to applaud the steps that I feel you've taken in your first two years and your willingness to listen to the feedback that we give you of we also like Improvement on this we need to get better on that and um that you accept it in the in the intent that we give it which is you know you assume good intent right we're we're trying to help the district get better and and um I just want to speak and said I appreciate that and look forward to seeing the tangible result result s next year and the year after from the actions that you have taken in your first two years in the world thank you thank you well again I just want to say thank you to both you Dr alins and Mr oil for leading Us in the process and importantly thank you to the superintendent Skipper and the team for their incredible amount of work that you've accomplished this past year um superintendent I want to thank you for the way you engage in the evaluation process it's never easy um to put your heart and soul in work out there and to have people um give feedback but your commitment to continuous growth and Improvement and service both of your team and of our students in their families is evident particularly in the data you elevated the Reflections you shared and your openness to discourse not everybody is going to put out there that there's only 28% of their school leaders who who are in agreement here and I mean that that was a big wakeup call for all of us um and will remain so but um thank you for your open UPS to to putting that out there particularly um last week you know I intended the August Leadership Institute and um sitting among the many experienced and new leaders across our schools and in in central office I was filled with hope um I've been to a number of these um as things have shifted and changed through the um District over the last several years but there was a sense of hope hope because of the leaders you know both I had a chance to interact with and both because of the direction of this coming school year that was shared um the work of Dr Chen Dr Ina Dr devar's departments centering on supporting our schools I mean that was clear in everybody's message centering on our schools and all in service of our students I mean we've always said that but you could feel that and see it in a different way uh there is an intentional and strategic alignment you know across each department to meet our District's priorities um and this is a test to your leadership and your team um as a district we're continuing to make steady progress on so many issues that have been stunting our district for decades and as a full team school committee and superintendent we acknowledge we are not where we want to be by a long shot we are aware of the problems but we're also willing to tackle them at the root and unwaveringly focused on improving for the students and families we serve um we are moving in the right direction and superintendent you continue to build and develop the teams of your the talents of your teams to take us there um you know I heard you loud and clear Mr cardet Hernandez about Boston nice and about the work and the way we think about the way we do our work you know as a committee we have work to do you know we will have a very different and a very focused um you know Retreat this fall that we all need to be with and one of the things that we haven't done also is we evaluate the superintendent we need to do a self- evaluation of ourselves and our Effectiveness as well so that it's got to be both ways so um you know and for me similar to Mr um O'Neal um this fall I will have served on this committee for 10 years you know and during that in that reflection I have served under three interim superintendents three superintendents and three Mayors and in that time we as a district have been through many ups and downs um shifting leadership makes it difficult to make any kind of sustained impactful progress so when I think of this decade where our district has been I'm I'm quite pleased finally with the direction in which we are headed I felt like we've been through the churn years um change is difficult but quite necessary if Boston students are to have the rigorous and rewarding programs and school facilities to support the learning we have long sought superintendent you've got us on the right track um but it's not your work alone as we've said many times tonight we're going to get where we want to be it is our Collective responsibility um and together we must all commit to continued accountability focused urgency and SU sustainability um we are in Partners we are all Partners in this work um and on this board we have a responsibility to better our school system and productively push for continuous Improvement and so in the fall when we have our Retreat to reshape our committee's goals in service of student achievement and outcomes and establishing clear means of accountability so we will share dates in additional details in a few future meeting about this but again thank you all once again to everyone involved in this process for your hard work and for your hard commitment and for your efforts are truly valued and I see Dr alkins you got your hand raised uh yeah it just made me think about um just could we include then in the process for leading up to the retreat I I'm trying to remember how we did it last year but I think to to member CET Hernandez's uh uh point we need to have some at least individual goal setting of like what we hope to get out of the meeting of the retreat and I don't know that done that as I don't know that we've done that as a committee to to actually come into the meeting and each of us has like a set of this is what we hope to get out of it um and then we can sort of we we can I mean we can talk offline about this but we can do a pre-retreat a planning meeting a collective planning meeting to plan the retreat because I think that's what I think I'm hearing you say a a an opportunity for a collective conversation as we move forward to what we want our direction to be so um um a meeting about the meeting yes we can work on that but that means it will be a very busy midt and October for folks so we will be needing to get several dates um over successive weeks online because otherwise as we know our year will be off and running and we'll be trying to get a meeting date so if there I think one thing that could be helpful if you know that there are clear dates that you will be away proactively please send these to Lena so that we can figure out quick what we might have in common so we can put a couple of dates on the books yeah and and I don't and I don't mean to like you know jam up everybody's schedule I think I just meant even if it's something simple as asynchronously hey every every Committee Member lists three or four things that you want to accomplish at this meeting because it gives us better sense of what everyone is coming into the meeting with and what they're hoping to get out of it I don't think it needs to be another meeting um but I think it would be good to have like at least a list of priorities so that we can make sure that we are at least in part addressing that and in in in alignment with our goals that's all I'm saying all right all right we we will work on that and have Lena get something out to you all within the next two weeks right if we have no further discussion um I'd like to turn this over and to Lena for um Miss PEX for a public comment thank you for some reason I can't start my camera thank you chair the public comment period is an opportunity for parents caregivers student and other concerned parties to make brief presentations to the school committee on pertinent School issues questions on specific School matters are not answered at this time but I referred to the superintendent for later response questions on specific policy matters are not answered at this time but may be the subject of later discussion by the committee we have seven speakers this evening each person will have three minutes to speak and I will remind you when you have 30 seconds remaining if your remarks are longer than three minutes please email your comments for distribution to the committee the time that an interpreter uses for English interpretation will not be deducted from a speaker allowed time speakers may not reassign their time to others please direct your comments to the chair and refrain from addressing individual school committee members or District staff please note the comments of any public speaker do not represent the Boston Public Schools or the Boston school committee please take your name affiliation and what neighborhood you are from before you begin make sure you're signed into Zoom with the same name you use to sign up for public comment and be prepared to unmute yourself and turn on your camera when it's your turn to testify raise your virtual hand when I call you name we will begin with Dedra Manning Mike hman John mud and edit Bazil Dedra Manning oh I'm in San Francisco not sure how that happened uh my name is deod Manning I'm a Dorchester resident and um mother of two um School AG children I wanted to start by saying that it's human nature to judge by appearances or perhaps by where somebody lives I'd like you to know that I believe that BPS administrators look at me and they see privilege um they don't know that I grew up in a family that received fuel assistance they don't know that as a teenager I stood in a line to get surplus food also known as The Big Blocks of fake cheese that I had to sometimes get up really early to go to my high school to take a shower because the water had been shut off for non-payment that when I went to college the tuition actually costs more than what my mother makes while I do believe that there are pockets of Excellence throughout BPS I feel like superintendent Skipper and the senior leadership team haven't made changes to the exclusionary exam school admissions policy or found a permanent leader for the Henderson school both of these situations have caused my family an incredible amount of stress if you were to look at my younger daughter's scores this year after she started at the Murphy the end of September and what they were at the Henderson a school that was and still is in chaos you would see stratospheric growth and her testing and that's the difference that comes from being in a school that's stable versus one that BPS leadership seems to have just let languish or just abandon if you're talking about wanting families to stay engaged and be committed you need to have a team that addresses crises and fixes them it's super frustrating to feel like there are Band-Aids to sort of quote superintendent Skipper saying earlier today I'd love for the superintendent the office of data and accountability and the school committee members to look at my daughter's test schores as a result of the failure of BPS to provide for a stable environment at the Henderson I sent my daughter to a charter school where she was cheated out of these so-called bonus points they took steps to depress my daughter's GPA there's a clear double standard where they use a special conver version process for BPS fifth graders who received standards based grades and my daughter wasn't allowed to use it as a result I can't have any confidence that two years from now I won't be entering another very stressful period where my daughter is excluded so earlier this month I pulled her from the Murphy School and I'm sending to her charter school where they have an excellent path to an excellent high school because I can't be left out of this process again policies and responses to crises should be encouraging families to stay and that's not what's happening here it's thank you Miss Manning thank you very much next speaker is Mike hman whose children I children children whose schools are schools evaluating the work of the superintendent is an important annual task for the school committee at our last meeting I had asked the school committee whether it had plans to invite the public to participate in this essential activity later in the meeting Miss Barbosa followed up and asked whether there were plans to do this senior School Committee Member Mr o'o gave a very long response but totally and deliberately feel to answer her excellent question the answer Miss basbosa is that the school committee has no intentions to encourage the community to become involved you wouldn't dare because you would fear that the public would interfere with the fairy tale story that you want to tell the public while you would dare to ask the public to participate in evaluating the superintendent beaser decided to involve the public and conducted its own survey these are our children in our schools and our voices matter I have read a draft of the report and is very critical of the superintendent question did mayor woo interfere in any way with your evaluation of the superintendent I will send you my entire testimony I will run out of time therefore I need to say my final comment before I run out of time we need an elected school committee and a new superintendent you have aggressively increased racism and inequities a few examples from the very beginning of your misleadership you fired black and brown central office workers and replace them with those loyal to you Dr Charles granson the chief Equity officer wrote you a letter expressing concerns about the mistreatment of black and brown central office workers you fired him when Dr cilus was our CEO and under the leadership of Dr granson Community Equity round table discussions were held on a regular basis to discuss how different parts of the system would benefit with an equity analysis these meetings were excellent under your misleadership C died you will fail to use the racial Equity tool to evaluate the effects of your proposed policies without prior Community involvement without using the racial Equity to you and the mayor aggressively attempted to move the O'Brien from the heart of the African-American Community to White West Roxbury 30 seconds two the spread of a toxic culture which began at the very beginning of your regime and recently described in great detail by the release of Silent speaks 100 plus voices be beyond the trauma the authors of this report believe that the major reason for the retaliation and harm done to these School leaders is because they had dear to speak out in opposition to your policies this report car thank you very much Mr hman thank you thank you next speaker is mad my name is John mud I'm a resident of Cambridge and a longtime advocate the for the Boston Public Schools I'm sorry to say I really can't hide my deep disappointment in what I've seen of the evaluation process so far uh I wrote you a very detailed memo but my overall concern is I don't get a sense that you are recognizing the full dimensions of how profoundly We are failing too many students in Boston today I don't get a sense of urgency in saying that we must change our approaches and that we don't have three to five years to wait uh to see how what I would say many questionable strategies will play out I think that you got the school committee needs to figure out how it reorganizes itself so it can focus in some deep Dives as the jar has it into specific strategies and you need to decide how much you want to exercise critical leadership versus being apologists I sent you a memo which uh gives some very specific and wide range of examples you say that you are focused on student outcomes well how much is that true uh from my perspective I look at issues ises like the achievement gaps what has happened with those achievement gaps and how is this being Incorporated in the evaluation on teacher diversity there's some words but what are the successes and how much are we really making any progress and recognizing the need for Teacher diversity by language on Equity you know no you are not implementing I have never I've read 20 30 40 racial equity planning tools and they are never have have they followed The Specific Instructions about laying out the logic of how gaps will be enclosed and this is involves Equitable literacy I don't see yet the equity in Equitable literacy do you what's the data where are the student outcomes on inclusion there are huge issues about special education implement there are even more issues about even the approach on English Learners uh on community engagement many of us have said for years you need to take plans when they are in draft stages to the community to get their advice the system says we will only involve the community in implementation not planning that is a failure change it please thank you Mr thank you Mr next speaker is e pil thank you mayor Woo's education equity agenda States quote our system should be led by anti-racist policies that undermine structural inequities rather than perpetuate them end of quote how has BPS done in racial Equity BPS planed to tear tear down McKinley South and Academy and take the land to build a new quinsey upper the public protested and quinsey upper got another site in 2021 construction began quinsey upp's 93 million cuttingedge six-story facility with rooftop classrooms on an acre of land will open this fall what did McKinley schools get more cameras on top of metal detectors random searches physical restraints and seclusions in dilapidated buildings that are run like holding cells with no librar science labs cafeterias or gyms mayor Wu's educational Equity agenda calls for Equitable investment in schools and students with mental and behavioral health issues so why has McKinley's rebuild been suspended the mayor called for valuing quote all Educators creating safe inclusive anti-racist schools end of quote but black Educators have been mistreated systematically pushed out and racial Equity initiatives black Educators fought for since these segregation have all been disbanded where's the urgency when the Community raised complaints the chair scolded the community stating to the superintendent quote I've got your back end of quote I agree chair you need to do a self-evaluation today the superintendent said she is rebuilding racial Equity you don't get credit for dismantling racial equity and claim to rebuild it in the moment of your evaluation the superintendent received a high rating for schools simply for possessing high quality instructional materials really this is tantomile to scrape in the bottom of the academic pudding cup especially when 80% of fourth graders cannot read proficiently shockingly this school committee today rated the superintendent overall proficient which feels like a race to the bottom your evaluation is a betrayal to Excellence black lives and BPS have been devalued dismissed and disrespect seconds but as the chair stated quote superintendent I've got your back and of quot shame on you thank you very much next group of speakers are Ruby Rees taoa Craig and sulea sto Ruby Rees um evening my name is Ruby Rees and I'm the executive director of the Boston education Justice Alliance and Dorchester resident in June 2024 the Bea Community organized a people's evaluation of the superintendent Mary Skipper because superintendent Skipper evaluation is based on the opinions of the school committee and the mayor parents students and educator ERS or those most directly impacted by her leadership are completely left out of the process the beijia people's survey is based on the department of Elementary and secondary education superintendent evaluation questions we ran this survey throughout the summer and hope to begin this process annually to incorporate authentic Community engagement practices some of the results of the Bia people's evaluation include the following in the area of community engagement to the question how well does a superintendent involve students families Educators and community members from diverse backgrounds to make sure their voices are understood and included in decision-making processes 68% of survey respondents answered not at all or poorly one of the comments was the superintendent makes a show of family community engagement with surveys and zoom meetings but makes her decisions with no regard for that input in the question of how effectively does a superintendent hold School leaders accountable to ensure they are improving their schools 56% of the survey responded said not effectively at all one comment shared was after 10 years in Boston I have had six principles just two have had positive leadership approach in my opinion and one of them left the district the remaining four are still principles and other BPS schools I think there is very much a culture of passing principles onto other schools instead of letting them go in terms of data informed decision-making and the use of the Equity planning tool 43% had not heard of the tool and 56% had received no training and not seeing the tool used at all in terms of addressing family concerns 50% of respondents answered that the two superintendent was not effective at all for Staffing support 69% said the schools were not being staffed to meet the needs of all students in terms of school safety health and supportive environments the following respondents felt the Su superintendent was effective or very effective 16% in terms of safety 10% in creating healthy environments and only 15% in providing emotional supports overall superintendent Skipper received a cumulative average of 32 out of 100 according to the BPS grading policy a student must score at least 80% in summative tasks superintendent Skipper did not demonstrate competency Beyond numbers the comment the comments left by respondents were most disturbing we deserve so much better thank you Miss Rees um the next speaker AA Craig is not in the meeting so we will go witha sto good evening my name is sua soo South and Resident BPS graduate BPS parent and a member of beia I'm here to continue to share the results of the people superintendent evaluation which reveals serious and widespread concerns about the superintendent Skippers leadership the community has made its voice clear 68% of respondents feel that the superintendent Skipper does not at all or only poorly involves diverse voices in decision making one parent shared when families have requested meetings with District officials above the regional superintendent that have been dismissed out of hand refer to District staff who do not respond to phone calls or emails and who will not schedule meetings this reflects a deep disconnect between leadership and the community at serves communication is another significant issue with around 89% of respondents stating that the superintendent has failed to ensure transparency And Timely communication communication an educator expressed this frustration stating Miss Skipper wants the compliance of the community she wants to manage the dissemination of information so that the community will have a favorable view of her in the system she manufactures good news and attempts to censor and punish criticism family concerns are also being ignored around 91.5% of respondents reported that the superintendent does not at all or poorly supports Equitable Solutions when handling issues such as special education services or complaints about the school administration as one parent noted superintendent Skipper ignores and fails to address parent and Family's concerns hiding behind a curtain of Lies the treatment of our families feels like relegating them to second class citizenship additionally staff retention and development have been neglected an educator remarked I have worked for other districts that encourage all employees to work towards the next level in their career BPS is lacking in Pathways that encourage career advancement this failure to promote diversity and inclusion within the workforce has left many feeling unsupported and marginalized based on this evening overwhelming feedback the community gives superintendent Skipper an overall rate of f or ineffective for her performance this leads us to a critical point the evaluation process itself must be improved currently the superintendent's evaluation is conducted with limited input from the community this process needs to be more transparent and inclusive the voices of students families and Educators and community members should be Central to the evaluation this means incorporating broader feedback ensuring diverse perspectives are heard and making the process more accessible to those most impacted by the superintendent's decisions it's time for change not just in leadership but in how we hold that leadership accountable including yourselves we urge the school committee to reform the evaluation process to reflect the real Community led by someone committ for every student success thank you um sh that concludes our public comment all right thank you Miss parvex and again thank you to those of you who spoke this evening and shared your perspectives your testimony is very important to us um is there any new M new business hearing none that concludes our business for this evening the next hybrid school committee meeting will take place in person on August 28th at 6 pm at the Bolding building there's nothing further I'll now entertain a motion to adjourn the meeting is there a motion so moved thank you is there a second second Miss prex will you please call the [Music] role you're muted can you hear me yeah you're you're echoing but yeah sorry I with my let's [Music] see Dr alkins Mr C Hernandez yes Miss Lima Barbosa yes Miss pan Garcia Mr Tran yes Mr O'Neil yes Miss robt son yes thank you thank you all and see you next week good night thank you