from the consent agenda since the docket was published so we won't have uh the minutes from June 6th or either of the um Driscoll contract amendments we do have the three Pierce contract amendments uh does anybody have questions on those um yes we need a second as well thank you Suzanne Suzanne second any questions on the Pierce contract amendments if not you can move to a vote Carolyn yes Sarah yes Suzanne yes Ellen yes Val move on to Steve Obin and Mariah yes and Val are you there okay and the chair votes yes very good that brings us to um a happy event we can welcome our incoming student representative Kieran baa you have a very tough act to follow in Laura cevis so um what I know about you before having met you is that you are a Star tennis player um that you've been on the student council and the legislature at BHS uh that you write for the Cyprus and have been a Whipple writing fellow um and a little bit about the process by which you were selected so um each of the roughly 10 candidates submitted a written statement and then gave a speech in front of the student council which then selected you so we're very glad to have you here uh and yeah would you like like to introduce yourself um yeah so um my name is Kieran baa I'm a junior um basically a senior um just one more day of junior year um uh like you mentioned um I've been on the Brooklyn high school student council and legislature for three years um I've written for the Cyprus and um I do play for both the squash and the tennis teams at my high school um I'm truly honored to be here um um this is so incredibly exciting for me personally um and it's certainly a privilege that I don't take lightly and a responsibility I don't take lightly um and you know I want to um just if Laura is watching I just want to say thank you um because Laura is um I've known her for three years and um she's a a true friend of mine and um I think she really has been such a wonderful student rep and student Advocate um for everybody at Brooklyn High School for the past three years um and so it will be a tough act to follow um but I'm very very excited to be here and I'm um very honored to be um with you all today well welcome yeah great to have you here and uh we understand that you have a biology final tomorrow so we not be offended if you don't stay to the end of this meeting yeah I just wanted to ask with all the things you're doing how do you have enough time to do everything um well I think that you know this year especially junior year um all night ERS have become a little bit of a staple um you know you could say For Better or For Worse U most likely for worse but um you know I think that really have had to use all 24 hours in the day sometimes um so all right welcome um this brings us to our superintendent report Dr gillery good evening everyone so it's great to be here with you this evening we're going to take a different uh angle to our superintendent's report tonight given that it is our final uh meeting of the year so what we're going to do is uh offer closing remarks or summations for the year and do that pictorially so and what you may see on the screen will not necessarily be what I'm actually uh saying to you but um let's hope that it all plays out well together uh oh and that didn't happen did I stop sh no it's still there give me just a second because I just did something think I paused my screen somehow okay so as We Gather for our final regular school committee meeting the 2324 school year I am filled with pride and gratitude it has been a remarkable year of achievements Collective efforts and tremendous growth all of which have contributed to making this school year a tremendous success it would be impossible to enumerate all of our successes as well as opportunities to strengthen our system but as I share these remarks tonight we'll also share a few images that will be captured that will be reflective of the year firstly I want to extend a Texas siiz thank you to all of our extraordinary faculty and staff your commitment to Excellence in education and a belief in our children your passion for teaching and your Relentless Relentless pursuit of creating an enriching and supporting environment for all of our students have been nothing short of awesome you have navigated the challenges of this year with Grace courage and resilience ensuring that all of our students receive the highest quality education regardless of the circumstances thank you for your innovation in the classroom your adaptability in the face of change and challenge as well as your Relentless efforts to inspire and nurture our students I have enjoyed seeing your creativity in lesson planning your dedication to fostering critical thinking and your ability to make learning and engaging and dynamic experience have not gone unnoticed I am profoundly grateful for your unwavering commitment from our bus drivers who safely transport our students each day to our custodians who maintain a clean environment to our nurses who keep the campuses healthy to our food services team that provides nutritious meals to our students to our counselors counselors student services support staff to our administrative staff and our school and District administrators and all of our amazing employees who ensure the smooth operation of our schools each of you plays a vital vital role in our success your hard work often behind the scenes is is fundamental to creating an environment where students can Thrive thank you for your steadfast dedication and for always going above and beyond to our parents Guardians caregivers your partnership and support are also invaluable you entrust us with your most precious gifts your children and we do not take that responsibility lightly your involvement in your children's education whether through volunteering attending school events supporting homework or projects at home greatly enhances their learning experience thank you for being our collaborators in this educational journey and for fostering a strong Community around our schools thank you to our community contributors volunteers town partners and school committee for your unwavering support of our students and schools we appreciate your continuous investment in ensuring that our schools are the very best and now to our incredible students you are the reason we are here the reason we strive to do our best each and every day your curiosity enthusiasm and determination are the driving force behind our efforts you have faced a year of challenges and changes with remarkable resilience and adaptability whether you excelled in academics shown your athletic abilities on the sports field dazzled us with your artistic talents or displayed leadership in your school Community each of you has contributed to the vibrant fabric of our school district we are immensely proud of your achievements and look forward to all you will accomplish in the future as we reflect on this past year we also look forward with hopeful and optimistic eyes to the upcoming year we have built a stronger Foundation this year and our plans for the future are ambitious and exciting we will continue to invest in professional development for our teachers ensuring they have the tools and resources they need to inspire and educate our students we will enhance our curriculum with Innovative and inspirational teaching methods and continue updating our facilities to prepare our students for the challenges and opportunities of the 21st century our focus on student well-being will remain a top priority we will strengthen our support systems ensuring that each and every student feels safe supported and value our initiatives to promote mental health inclusivity and positive School culture will continue to grow fostering an envir enironment where every student can flourish we are committed to expanding opportunities for our students to explore their interest and develop their talents by continuing to refine our rich and robust curricula as well as Arts education to Athletics and extracurricular activities we aim to provide a well-rounded education that nurtures the whole child yes there is more work to do but we wholeheartedly believe in the potential of each and every student and and are dedicated to helping them discover their passions in the spirit of continuous Improvement we will continue to seek your feedback and involvement as we enhance our system we are PSB strong and your insights perspectives and perspectives are vital to Our Success together we will navigate the challenges and celebrate the triumphs that lie ahead in closing I want to express my deepest gratitude to each of you for your contri butions to this exceptional year it is through our Collective effort our shared commitment and our unwavering dedication to our students that we have achieved so much congratulations again to the class of 2024 you have made it the rest of us are still in the system and will be following in your tracks thank you for your trust to our parents community at large thank you for your trust your support and your partnership our summer officially begins June 18th at 12 noon um have a wonderful safe time and I look forward to seeing you in the fall Ready to embark on another year of learning growth and success and with that that concludes superintendent's remarks for this evening right thanks thanks very much Dr Gill Helen that was wonderful I mean that really sort of captured the whole year and I'm wondering when you put this out uh wherever we put it out you put out the superintend yeah the Weekly News can it be with your voice voice over doing that I you're raising the bar Howen well I'm not a tech person but I have a feeling there's a way of doing that so that when you click on it you can hear it no I'm sure we can get that it's a challenge yeah it's a challenge we can get that done get one of our kids to do it they'll figure out out right are there any other SCH committee members who'd like to comment or ask anything all right seeing no one uh we can move on to public comment we have four people signed up for public comment today um the first who uh said she would be in person but I don't think I see her in the room is shenn and DOA pon oh oh okay we moved things along um all right well let's let's proceed and if um and if she joins later we can uh we can always um slot her in uh so next up we have AA Sanchez floor is yours for three minutes it up can you guys hear me clearly or should I speak up a little more thank you I was gonna say I'm like waiting for the Mark um good evening my name is AA Sanchez um I was um raised in Brookline went to Brookline High and I went to ever Devotion School I have a little sister we share an age difference of 14 years um she's currently attending BHS she's a sophomore I did reach out to some of the uh committee members thank you for those who replied um I appreciate it um I am speaking on behalf of her but not just her because I realize that there's a concern amongst um the students of color in particular and probably not just only the students of color but also people with disabilities or any other thing that may make them different um Brook line high now or Brook line now um is not the brook line that I remember it to be seems like there's a lot more bullying that's happening and um as I've recently learned because I've attended two of her meetings with my mother and her Dean the systems that are in place right now are not working um it was welcoming to come in and hear um superintendent lonus say that mental health and the safety of the students is priority um and the safety is definitely one of the St student civil rights um which kind of isn't working right now it's not being protected um and so um just hoping that there can be conversation hope to meet with some of you in person on um what we can do because the systems right now kind of give a little bit more leniency to the students who are maybe need more support need more support from parents more support at home um obviously a lot of it starts from home um a lot of students from color um get passed on generational trauma and um more support from the town resources I think um mental health therapists um education fun education making things fun like how they used to be back when I was I'm not sure how it is now but um I'm definitely proud to say that I I was raised in Brookline because we are so inclusive we are diverse and a very Progressive town in my opinion um so I hope looking I hope and also these children are our future so once we get old they will be taking over and that's very important that we kind of get ahead and set these students up for Success so thank you for your time thank you very much Miss Sanchez next up we have Laura Baines Walsh hello my name is Dr Laura Bain Walsh I'm a town meeting member from Precinct 16 a teacher although not in Brooklyn and a proud parent of a current Sixth and fourth grader at the baker school I am also deeply invested in our educational system and the welfare of our students and I would like to welcome and congratulate our three new school committee meeting our school committee members you guys all ran wonderful campaign focusing on investing in our teachers and in our classrooms I'm here because I have questions about next year and specifically how they impact the seventh grade at Baker the class of 2030 I understand that for the second year in the row the class of 2030 at Baker will be packed into three sections and deprived of a Content teacher this year they did not have an Ela teacher and yet again next year it looks like we are going to be down in three sections with only three content Specialists and missing a core teacher I like I said am a history teacher I'm an and I have taught middle school and I can tell you that I am a really good history teacher and I would be adequate at best as an Ela teacher teaching history which is my specialty is not the same as teaching math science or Ela if we are going to set up our students with a foundation to succeed that means investing in content Specialists and not depriving the same students again and again of having content Specialists they need to do this they need those teachers I voted for a budget override because we were promised that by raising our own taxes we would address the budget shortfalls and ensure adequate Staffing to meet the needs of our students the seventh grade at Baker next year is projected to be 66 students and that is before 250 Apartments come online this summer at Hancock Village however at Lawrence where there's a projection of 68 seventh graders they are going to be in four sections this is a lack of parity and equity and it is highly problematic this is setting up the class of 2030 at Baker to be in a position where one day they will not be adequately prepared for high school despite the best efforts of their teachers this is an addition to the fact that the current 8th grade class at Baker also lacked an Ela teacher we have been having so many conversations about the need to unlevel the ninth grade English uh class because students are not fully prepared for honors level or even high school work would not the best solution to this dilemma be to ensure that every Middle School teacher is taught by by a qualified Ela teacher in closing I would like to know are there any other schools in Brooklyn where middle schoolers are being taught core subjects by non-content Specialists and why is Baker seventh grade being forced into three sections when similar size grades in other schools are not thank you thank you Miss Beans Walsh next up we have Julie Jetty thank you and good evening uh my name is Julie Jetty and like uh Dr Baines Walsh I am the proud mother of a rising seventh grader Baker unlike her I am not a doctor but uh I'll do my best so anyway um and I'm here to basically voice the same concerns when I found out that this year um the seventh grade class or the sixth grade class was going to be sort of rotationally taught Ela so that it would be taught by three different teachers um you know I kind of assumed that was some sort of Bridge to um you know a different situation where maybe a core teacher couldn't be hired in time or what have you um so I was really surprised to learn today that this uh sort of system is going to continue into the seventh grade this time in social studies um so you know now I'm and knowing that this was the way Ela was taught in the eth grade I'm also wondering what's going to happen to this class in the seventh grade uh or in the eth grade is there going to be another class that's kind of rotationally taught uh not by uh core subject teachers um so I you know I went and looked at the enrollment projections for next year uh that were put out on May 23rd and it looked to me like this was the only seventh grade in town that had more than 60 kids with only three sections um so I'm assuming that this sort of arrangement isn't happening elsewhere but uh like Laura I would I would like to know that and there's been a lot of conversations for years about the Middle School experience in Brookline so I'm I'm wondering if that is the new Middle School experience and we're just early at Baker or if you know if that's going to continue and uh you know also I would add and I know this is sort of not something um that the district likes to talk about there are 250 Apartments opening at Hancock Village this summer and so it just seems like a really nonsensical time to me um to be down a teacher to start a year uh you know when the class is just bound to get bigger it certainly isn't going to get smaller so thank you for your time and good evening right thank you very much much Miss Jetty um has our other speaker um shann and DOA appeared okay um so so we do need to move on now to presentations and discuss the first one my hand is up oh hi Maria go ahead okay thank you um lonus could you clarify something for me because the budget this year included a second Ela teacher for the middle school at Baker so it was a new addition there was one before and it included two is there something that has changed that that Middle School Ela position is no longer included and how does that how does those one how does going from one to two I thought that was meant to address the issue that is being raised tonight yeah I don't think that was the case jod do you have any more details on that one I know we did add um as you're saying a unit to Baker uh for that but I um yeah it's what it's labeled in the budget Middle School Ela teacher Mariah I believe what we are trying to hire for right now is um a 0. five Ela teacher and a 0. five history teacher um a 05 social studies teacher so we're looking for somebody with the humanities license okay that's not what was in the budget Sarah seeing that we started down this road um do you mind answering the question that the um the two of our our um commentators public comment um asked us because we have had other Middle School teachers teach out of their subject area so is anybody prepared to answer that tonight I believe the the the um highly qualified portion allows uh teachers to teach one out of their certification area so it's my understanding and again we're we're talking with Mr Ola the principal over there about uh those needs so we'll continue to check in on this as well but you can teach one out of your certification area and just to confirm and we have done that in the past yes Caroline thanks and I'll pick up where Sarah just went saying since we've now gone down down this road and I'm trying to sort of get my head around the the question and the circumstances so Dr Giller you're saying that it it exists that there is a fact that teachers can teach outside of their specialty but is that the practice that is in place at every other k through eight or does every other sixth through eth grade have 12 teachers I'd have to look at their budget documents for that but I know that we've had teachers teaching out of their certification area uh before so that's not a new um a radical shift as such um and even I as a high school principal I have done that many times in the past as well okay that's not um it my children went to the baker school they had an Ela teacher a social studies teacher a science teacher and a math teacher and I guess I was also hoping maybe someone could clarify what does rotationally taught mean what was what was rotational teaching at Baker this year well I think probably the the level of detail we're getting in would be best um responded to by the principal and the school team as such um so we can get into that um as well but typically um jod do you have any insight on that um because my interpretation of rotational teaching and what it is could be different as such um but I do know that what um I think the sixth graders this year was it Ela I think it was Ela where you had the Three core teachers science math and social studies in each one of them uh taught a section of um Ela I think is what the case was that's exactly what the case was you're correct sorry we have a parent shaking her head now I'm I'm sorry but I I'm sorry to cut this off but if we are going to change our practice uh during public comment to have it become a back and forth um between school committee and speakers that's something we should take up I think at our Workshop as part of school committee governance okay I'll ask Jody then if she could clarify I I was told that um I'm sorry um I think we need to move on right now from public comment and if this is going to be a discussion it should be docketed separately okay I would like for it to be docketed then well we can discuss that for meetings yes all right so this brings us to presentations and discussions of current issues uh we start with um the district literacy plan with the deputy superintendent Fortuna and senior director Herman I'm really excited to be here this evening with this plan for you um we've been as you know literacy has been a focus of ours for this year and we are going to talk a little bit about the timeline for our plan adoption um we have Kristen Gray with us who is our interm direct um coordinator of English language arts for K to8 and Kristen and Michelle are going to be doing the majority of the talking so you don't have to to hear my voice and we'll take questions at the end of the presentation okay good evening um I know that Christen and I are really excited to be here because we spent the last year in our review process and now like we're jumping into the work which is the exciting part I think for us and for teachers and students so tonight we're going to talk about our Ela curriculum selection and implementation process and um we have an agenda just so that it is super clear that we're making connections to uh the curriculum itself which are the standards set by the state and the curriculum materials that will support students in learning to read and applying their reading so um basically we are going to highlight the alignment to the Strategic plan and the K12 literacy review because we want to make sure that it's really clear that this is not something added or something additional but that it's actually from the research we've done within in the district and the plan we've set that they're very much aligned we are also going to look at the focus of tier one instruction and we'll talk more about what that means but that the focus of this work right now is for tier one we're also going to review the draft model of literacy of what we think literacy should look like and we're not going to go too much into detail on that tonight but I want to make sure that that you see that and then outline the steps for aligning materials for getting those materials that we've been talking about that align to both our district vision and the um address what we learned in the review and also meet the model so um I'm going to move on I want I brought up your mission and vision that you um voted very recently and it's a reminder of um all students and so I did underline all students and because normally when we're talking about all students it's with a lens of students whose needs were not meeting who have challenges but our definition is really about students who have needs on about any kind of need so if they need to be challenged or if they are challenged by content that we are providing instruction that supports um all students and that's our definition of all um and so wanted to make sure that you knew that we were looking at that as we move along the other thing that really stood out to us is this idea around joy and learning and how important that is especially with reading because as we look at reading right now reading is becoming the knowledge um the way that students gain knowledge and we are going to be looking at a knowledge based reading program so that we're thinking and Kristen's going to talk more about what that is but we want to make sure that we're building all students background knowledge in addition um we want students to to be happy and we want them to feel accomplished and we want them to enjoy what they're doing because when students are enjoying what they're doing teachers are also enjoying what they're doing so I think it's really important for us to make sure that that is a key piece and that came out in the way we look at curriculum materials as well and then finally thinking about the Excellence in teaching we have excellent teachers we one of the things that stood out for me here is the idea of the professional community and right now because of our different practices it's hard to build the professional Community when people are coming from different experiences and this is going to be a way to make that professional Community super strong and hopefully be more supportive of teachers teaching and teachers so I'm going to move into this idea about the alignment to the Strategic plan and the literacy review um this is kind of a a document that we've been using in the backside uh jod Creed it was great and to kind of look at like what are we doing and how are we making sure that we're meeting the objectives of the Strategic plan and what we started with was the Strategic District strategic objectives and they're at the top where that's pointed and one of the things we noticed was they talked about achievement for all students by implementing and regularly assessing content and using high quality materials well that's exactly the recommendation that came out of the literacy review and the literacy review really provided us with the steps to get there and so that work was already set up for us by having that review done and having you vote in our new strategic plan so we're going to focus in on two of the major literacy recommendations that came out of the Strategic plan that I that are really important around instruction and lead to this work that we're doing around materials adoption the first is one of the Strategic the the literacy review gave us feedback in multiple areas and we talked about that I think the last time we were here where we talked about the idea that it was around leadership tiered instruction professional de development assessment and um Family engagement and what we noticed here in the tiered instruction is there are two areas that are highlighting this continued need to identify materials that support students and teachers and this first one is to continue to develop our mtss model and make that super clear so what you'll notice are there are some notations next to the pyramid that was drawn so our goal right now is to ensure that our classroom instruction is meeting this says 80 I would say 80 to 85% of the needs of students and so that means that the strategies which need to be research based and the um the content materials those need to be in the classroom available for all students to be at grade level standards but have to meet the needs of 80 to 85% of students it also does mean that intervention still takes place in the classroom and I like to call the that type of intervention more at bats because some students take longer to develop their understanding of content than others however they're still looking at grade level content they're still being presented with the same strategy they just need additional time to practice try it again when we move to tier two that's when the support becomes something different for students and that is might be a small group that could be a place where students get more challenge um Etc that should never exceed 15% of a student body and then we go up to the final top which is more specialized in in reading that might be more specialized instruction something that is not done in the classroom something that um is provides instruction to students through a different type of modality what I want to be really clear on is that top tier does not mean that a student needs an i students can receive their special ed services in any of those tiers and it really depends on the particular particular um uh things identified in the IEP so the reason we bring this up is we need to Define our tier our tier one our tier two our tier three instruction so that we are buying materials that align with that so this is something that we need to keep uh in Focus all the time so when I look at this I think of this our curriculum is the standards that fall in these tiers and the materials support the development and support what happens during that tier one tier two and tier three instruction today we're focusing mostly on that tier one the next piece is this idea of an instructional model because to deliver that tier one instruction you need to know the how and so we are yes I just just a clarification question these literacy review recommendations are they coming out of the the needs assessment or are they coming out of the road map or is this another the needs assessment drove the road map so we what we did with the needs assessment is we narrowed things to create the road map because the needs assessment gave us way too many recommendations no I know the these specific recommendations that we're looking at right now where where are they coming from they're both in the needs assessment and the road map they're the exact language that we pulled out of the needs assessment okay thanks Michelle yep so the next piece was is part of that part of developing that mtss is to develop that model of instruction and what it should look like so we've been playing with the draft we showed a I think subcomittee saw it several weeks ago we are in the midst of sharing it around the district we will continue to do that for feedback work with our principles um do some independent work with them to have them sit and tell us you know how does this look in your building and it hits two things on the left side in that long Colum it talks about what we value as an instructional um model what do we expect from students and when we look at that other piece it talks about the steps that we use to get there and so as we're looking at curriculum materials they also have to align to this if we if we say this is what's important to us about instruction and we look at curriculum materials that don't align to it then we're going to have a mismatch so we want to make sure that that all of this aligns so again we started with the Strategic plan and our goal there we are developing our mtss we are moving through what that would look like and then um shortly we're I'm G to pass it to Kristen who's going to talk about the how do you need that bigger I'll I'll share the document I yeah nope I know it was I tried um so I will make it bigger I will send you a bigger copy but what you'll see to orient you to it is that it's talks and the other thing I think that's really important that's in there is it has reading it has writing it has habits of Learners so what what makes the student so like when I when I think about it like reading writing speaking skills those are all part of what we're talking about but we also want the habits of learning which include that joy and curiosity and we we want to make sure that that's held on to so I will send that to you and you'll have a better a better um understanding the next thing so that those of those two recommendations the next recommendation and and this is where Kristen's going to talk through more of the details but we're going to facilitate a comprehensive core program review process that engages all staff in the process utilizing a review tool that creates a common lens for for reviewers so one of the things we've been looking at through here is where do we get that common lens from what are those values that are super important important to us and what we want to make sure we have as part of it and then also to look at making sure that we understand what high quality materials are so I want to make sure that that's super clear um defining yeah sorry so all stuff means all EA Ela stuff no we've includ we no we invite special Educators we invite staff that do e I've had um several School psychologists reach out to me and say I want to be part of this so any we are open to any feedback um we've had social studies people and Christen will talk more to that involved already and science so anybody like I think of all of us as reading teachers right now as I learn more and more about the reading process I think every educator has has a piece of teaching reading that's part of their role so I want to make sure that that is is not lost here so thank you for the question so we want to make sure we get we do this review but we end up with really high quality instructional materials so I want to make sure everybody sort of has that lens for the high quality instructional materials so that when um when Kristen shows you our process that it's really clear how we got there we want to make sure that there's a coherent sequence of lessons that are aligned to grade level standards so that means as you look at a standard a standard tells you what a student should be able to know and do and the skills we need lessons that build that for a student so we want to make sure that those lessons start with where a student is at and build to where they are um I don't like to word proficient but they are proficient in the STA in the standard they need to be research-based strategies so there is a whole bundle of research and you know I've heard us talking things about science of reading there's a whole bundle of research that really does highlight uh strategies that get it all students and that that are inclusive all of all students the content needs to be engaging we need to have that Joy there and then it also needs to be relevant to our student population it can't be I always have this classic example and like I'm embarrassed to share in public but I will as a teacher because it's my aha moment has been recent um I my first teaching job was in rural Pennsylvania and my students were 60% uh Mexican migrant students that worked on mushrooms their families worked on the mushroom farms and we did a really great unit on the Japanese internment literature from the Japanese internment it was completely meaningless for them and so they learned this great part of history but it wasn't the right content to engage that group of students in so when we think about our student population we have to sure that we are representing their stories and then I think the other piece here is the research and again you probably cannot see this but the research about high quality materials so when we have high quality materials students tend to get a almost a half a year of better instruction in terms of more learning and that's a pretty big um percentage and then the other piece is that we talk about giving quality scaffolds to students we also have to provide teachers with quality scaffolds so that they are not having to make up everything on their own and do their own research and so if we provide those scaffolds for teachers even people who are brand new prove to have better brand new teachers prove to have better outcomes because they have that material and so the research around having these high quality materials is is just as important as what a high quality the the content that we want to put into it so I am G to pass this on to Kristen because she's GNA talk about the importance of the strategy that we are using to get to the identification of those high quality hi everybody and I don't know if anybody I'm I'm coming from home so I guess I can see everybody now with like in the group but if anybody's on if you feel comfortable putting your um video on that's great because I love seeing people even though I'm not there I have no kids home tonight so it's all good hi Stephen um so I'm gonna talk a little bit about um you know I'll start off with the highlights from desie and um some of our work that we've done so far we we are partnering with them and I've been connecting with a lot of my counterparts um in different districts through across the state um so we're using resource is from Implement um ma process and there's three phases in this process there's learn and prepare investigate and select launch and Implement and monitor so our current status is we're really in the learn and prepare phase which sets the stage for successful um selection and implementation and in school year 2425 um we will focus on investigate and select for the first half of the year and move towards the launch phase for the second half of the year so really like this year we've really been trying to build connections with desie um through individualized meetings with the content Specialists particular with literacy um who direct the curate process and direct the grants division um last week Dr Fortuna shared that PSB was applying for the Massachusetts tiered literacy Academy and um we are excited to announce that we were accepted into the academy um I also um attending like an informational session about evaluating and selecting hqm Network and um we also are looking forward for another potential Grant um it's pending funding from the governor's literacy launch initiative but that additional Grant would provide us um more funding for professional development and implementation um for our um newly adopted curriculum so I'm trying to work it as much as possible to get that because I think that'll be really helpful for us okay you can go to the next slide could I just ask you to say what HQ is oh yeah it's high quality instructional materials thank you I'm going to use that so Michelle talked a little bit in the last thing I'm going to use that because it's a mouthful but I also might mess up the letters too so but I'm GNA do my best to keep on track but yeah that's what that means thank you for asking too because I can't again it's really helpful huge great news about the academy yeah yeah it's great great and I also like if that um Grant comes out for like um implementation and additional funding for implementation I think that would be perfect too um okay so I'm going to move on to um the mass literacy and the four instructional shifts and the mass literacy guide highlights early literacy practices which are based in evidence um from a large body of resource and the this resource outlines four main shifts seen here that um from outdated practices to evidence-based practices in early literacy so shift one is provide explicit systematic instruction and foundational skills to every child shift two is to build comprehension by engaging all students in discussion of complex knowledge Rich Text sets uh shift three is use small group reading time to Target foundational skills or develop comprehension using complex text and chaor is provide time on all components of the core literacy block every day to develop all aspects of literacy and so I just wanted to define a couple things um from these shifts and what they mean so a complex text has three dimensions quantitative qualitative and reader and task considerations the quantitative um Parts factors includes things such as word length frequency and sentence length the qualitative factors incl include things such as text structure language Clarity and conventions and levels of meeting and the reader and task includes factors such as reader background motivation knowledge of the topic as well as the tasks and um purpose and complexity but overall complex text offers opportunities to develop academic language and acquire knowledge about the world and the other thing one of our members has a question if you don't mind sure than thanks um who is this sorry can you just tell me your name Yep this is Carolyn Thal hi Carolyn how are you so can you just um what when you're saying early literacy is that K through like pretend I'm not a literacy specialist kindergarten through third grade okay perfect thank you yep any other question all right so I'm going to talk a little bit about um the core literacy block so what that that has three main components foundational skills engaging with complex text writing and then of course we always have oral language which is the foundation of all literacy learning and it's embedded throughout the three components okay know you can move on to the next slide okay so um I included this visual one because uh I really think it's great how it has both the simple view of reading and Scarborough's reading rope together and how you can kind of see how the two areas um so if you see the language comprehension um in the simple view of reading Scarborough's reading rope includes you know background knowledge vocabulary language structures verbal reasoning and literacy knowledge and the word recognition um includes phonological awareness decoding and site recognition so these two areas really work together language comprehension and word recognition to um build the necess the skills necessary to read and comprehend so over the past couple of years we focused a lot on word recognition we're using a systematic explicit approach um with fundations and integrity which focuses on um the phonological awareness and decoding and sight recognition um along with purchasing a lot of decodables um to support and reinforce those skills that they're learning um and we want to make sure that we're also providing evidence-based instruction for language comprehension looking deeper into the hqm and selecting an updated curriculum will allow us to focus both on language comprehension and word recognition and the knowledge building curriculum will allow us to have consistency across the district for our topics of study at a deeper level and the use of complex text you can sh you can switch it thank you okay so I'm going to go over over what our goals were for this year this school year um and you'll see that these are um uh written in the past tense commun but um I'm going to talk with what we've done so far so um in our school year we're going to um 23 24 we wanted to begin the um Ela selection process and our goal was to develop an instructional vision and establish District priorities to guide our work that is in progress still and some of us um we but we did use some of the district priorities to establish PSP's criteria when looking at Ela curriculum literacy team meter me sorry literacy team members will explore the hqm curriculum that meets expectations on curate and Ed reports and narrow them down to three options so we met as a team with um that included literacy team members and also special Educators the el director science and social studies curriculum coordinators were also invited to be a part of the process and I'm going to speak more about that a little bit later okay so communicate and we're also going to communicate frequently to inform PSB Educators and other stakeholders of the KDA Ela curriculum selection and implementation plan and here I've created a slide deck for um K to8 staff to share updates about the selection and implementation Pro process and we developed a Q&A document where folks can continually ask ask questions about the process so that everybody can look at it it's like a shared experience and we want this to be as collaborative as possible go ahead okay so um desie identifies materials that have been reviewed by Ed reports um as partially or fully aligned to College and Career ready standards and these materials are then reviewed through the curate process you can go to the next slide thank you so um curate stands for um curricular rate curriculum ratings by teachers and these reports are used to identify which evidence-based H um hqm we should be looking at in the panels of a teachers evaluate and rate the evidence-based curriculum materials on the rubric so the rubric is divided into two domains for grades and it goes K through 12 there's actually a separate one but um for 12 but they have all these um consistently across both rubrics there's a standards alignment criteria and that looks at text quality and organization um foundational skills in kindergarten through grade five only and classroom task and instruction and then that also looks at classroom application which is um looks at accessibility for students usability for teachers and impact on learning okay So based on Ed reports and curate we developed some criteria for the ELA curriculum based on our district priorities and so it kind of um morphed into a two-pager thing but we also um put it onto a Google form so folks could put in their input so the criteria is that we looked at mainly was the organization of the materials and so like the materials used by the Educators um are they userfriendly are they clear are they well organized easy to navigate Etc and the same thing for students are they user friendly um are there materials available to differentiate for students who may be working below or above grade level and just the overall um organization of the curriculum materials we also wanted to look at academic features a little bit um so we wanted to think about how much time is needed in order to incorporate all the components of the program we also wanted to look at what text they were using we wanted to make sure that students were engaging with um a wide variety of texts that were grade level appropriate and that they included representation and valued various cultures identities and perspectives and we also wanted the text to make sure that the modules is which like what they call units um adequately adequately build background knowledge in science and social studies we also um wanted to look at writing so we wanted to think about how many days a week students are writing how long the writing books excuse me how long the writing blocks are and that if the students were given a choice of the writing topics or if they were predetermined and that if the materials excl included explicit instruction in narrative informational and persuasive writing we also um looked at foundational skills and word study so we wanted to make sure um to see if the materials included explicit systematic instruction and pheic awareness and phonics and we also wanted to see if the materials included LED cohesive vocabulary and grammar instruction um another piece that we looked at was um professional development how long does it take to get trained in one module the entire Pro program and um if they provide a train the trainer option to offer ongoing support and the other thing the last two things that we um were important to us is like looking at assessment and did the materials include informal and formal assessments that help teachers measure learning and just instruction and interventions on top of the universal screeners that we have going in um K through three and then next year four to six and then the last part was just like overall areas of strength and weaknesses and then any surrounding districts of who's using the curriculum because one of the things that we want to do is um visit schools that are using these curriculum so that we can see what they're like in in action can I ask a question about this of course okay so just so I understand the process you're choosing a subset of three that have gone through curate and then this is the secondary validation that PSB is running those three programs through yes okay and these questions well no a small team so I'm gonna I'm gonna you're getting ahead I oh sorry sorry okay that's why I didn't know I guess okay you're totally fine you're thinking ahead so I'm going to talk about what our next process was so this was just kind of like what we looked at um as a like used for our literacy team um and we will use like a form of this I to um our team in the fall so I'll I'll return back to this but I wanted to give you good like we kind of like um curate and Ed reports they are very extensive and people read through those reports but then we also wanted to focus in like some tease out some things Mariah if I can all seven you're going to see that in a minute all I think it was seven programs that we looked at had high ratings from Ed reports and cure rate and then what we did is we used this rubric to narrow it down to the three because these were things that were important to our district thank you we also question Sor go ahead oh no that's okay we'll also use some form of this again with because this was just a small sampling of like literacy teams and like coordinators um but we want to bring it out to all of our stakeholders too to see if we need to make any adjustments in the fall um I have a quick question sure this is Carolyn th again and forgive me because I'm new to the committee so I'm playing a little bit of catch up I know there's been a lot of conversation about this before so so where we are here and the three systems that you are bringing to the community now to be considered that went through this um that's for K through a okay and so when you're talking about curriculum materials like I'm here we're talking about books basically is that books that would be like maybe is it when you're saying curriculum materials like for the super early Learners is that something that comes with the system but then when you're talking about sixth seventh and eighth graders and we're talking about curriculum materials are we talking about book selections short story like Kristen can I take a shot at this thanks yeah I'm yeah go ahead yeah so when we defined high quality instructional materials before when when we showed you that slide we are providing any material so that we provide the lessons structured lessons and not I'm not talking about structured lessons like a basil but at least direction for a teacher to develop lessons that are standards aligned and it also includes the material to teach those lessons so for any any tax sets any charts any of that material so like um if we do a phological awareness any pieces any cards any things that students need so we're talking about we are talking about materials and so um that does that help okay she good I think Carolyn I just excuse me for Suzanne um I think you're asking what books they would read is that what you're asking no asking whether that is somewhat prescribed under this thinking so I'm not asking for like a list of books but if you go on to the materials they will tell you the list of books so they will have lessons around a list of books generally I I don't know each of them but I know a couple of them do that and there's also choice and there's choice we are not I Kristen will talk more to this but it is not prescribed that at this time all third graders are going to read X Y and Z okay thank you that does more answer my question whether that was sort of a shift away from but it sounds like it's not a shift in terms like right now there's zillions of books in classrooms and that would still be the case at the I think it would be more narrow but I don't think it's not it's it's not the Pres prescriptive basil or the prescriptive reading that we all that I grew up with where we all sat in the classroom and did the same thing all the time and I think Kristen can talk more to that um okay I think one of the things that I did hear the group talk about is we understand our community and our teachers and where where they've come from in terms of autonomy and supporting that keeping that as part of our lens is important all right Kristen I'm sending it back to you okay okay so um exploring the ELA curriculum options so we looked at the following programs based on the reviews from curate and Ed reports we looked at arcore elel education fish tank Ela into reading and into literature my view and my perspectives wit and wisdom wonders and study sync and so why when you see like and um the into reading my view and wonders was K through five and then the into literature um was the six to8 so um the team team unanimously chose the following three options to move forward which actually kind of felt I guess I would say I'm going rogue here but I felt like it was great because um I felt like we were aligned in some way of like which would be the best fit for Brooklyn um potential best fit for Brookline so those are arore El education and fish tank um so we've updated um the K to8 colleagues on the ELA curriculum selection and implementation plan slide deck and we included links to overviews reports sample lessons and videos about each curriculum option so that folks can look through begin to look through them okay so um next year is a huge year um with the um selection and implementation process in the beginning so um through September and November uh we want to actively involve and collaborate with stakeholders through the K to5 Ela curriculum team and the 6 to8 Ela team meetings to review the three curriculum options and I'll just talk a little we wanted to separate that out because when we looked at it as a literacy team we looked for the K to8 and um we really needed to tease out the six to8 so that it got its own attention just as much as the K to five because often the presentations would um talk a little bit about the six to8 um but is hard to put it all in um one presentation so there will be a series of after school meetings about the curriculum options and we want to engage as many Educators and stakeholders as possible we'll engage each school by creating opportunities to view the three Ela curriculum options um we'll visit schools with some print materials and leverage additional opportunities within the school day and then we'll present OTL with the recommendations based on the feedback from the K to5 Ela curriculum team and the 68 Ela team and then we'll present the identified Ela curriculum to you all okay so from November to June we're going to begin the implementation process we're going to recruit and identify the K to2 Educators to launch the program in each K to8 school and we'll provide ongoing PD to K to2 Educators and literacy specialist to support the implementation of the new Ela curriculum um beginning in January 2025 meaning like that we would have some professional development um in November December and that we could um start using some of the materials in January and then um the we'll identify an implementation process for the 6 to8 Ela team we have Team um Team meetings department meetings once once a month so we have them already embedded within our um monthly schedule meeting as a team so we're going to focus on that um for the second half of the Year okay so the um goals for school year 2526 is we're going to um continue the implementation process all K2 classroom teachers will Implement and engage an ongoing PD to support the new Ela curriculum adoption we'll recruit and identify Educators in grades 3 to 5 to launch the program in each K to8 school and will'll provide ongoing PD to Educators in grade 3 to five and literacy Specialists to support the implementation of the new Ela curriculum and so overall all our goal in school year 2627 is that all K to8 classroom teachers will be teaching the adopted Ela curriculum and continue to have ongoing professional development questions uh Sarah I have to say that your rubric really checked off all the boxes it was unbelievable as we were going through and you know because you can't say everything as we were going through the presentation I was like and when were we going to talk about this and we're going to talk about that and then we got to the rubric and it um it includes modules adequately building background knowledge in science and social studies and materials that are aligned and you know so I just I was I'm just so happy that the conversation is at this high of level thank you and Suzanne then Mariah then Helen yeah I just could you go over the timeline for the six to eight I'm a little confused on that yeah y I could see where you're getting confused because I not that I'm not confused but I just um but I do know that it's not set in stone right now because um we really have um an opportunity where we consistently meet with all um six to eight ELA teachers across the district at least once a month so um we really want to work as a team to one at the beginning of the year have our department meetings looking at our options and talking through them as a team including other stakeholders but we already have that built in and then for the second half of the year um like when we make a decision of thinking about the best way with them to implement it I I would have to update you on that because I really want to talk to them as a team of like what they think the best thing is um the the sooner like honestly if we have funding I would I think they would be up for doing it sooner quite frankly do you know I really want to work us on you know really build our team and utilize our team meetings um to work on it collaboratively overall Suzanne um we're about a year ahead of where we thought we would be to implement six through eight so that's what um Kristen and the team are going to be working towards and when we just a quick one if I could when you do the uh beginning or like uh next year from November to June are those early adopters are they going to be uh volunteers or is it the entire grade uh throughout the whole district is going to be there I'm just nope it's going to be volunteers yeah we're going to ask folks to um you know who would be interested in um launching it early adopters and then with the idea we want PE folks in each K to8 school because we want them to be a leader um and also um we have an incredible group of Educators and they're excitement and um positivity um will spread throughout the school so we're really um looking forward I'm really looking forward to working with folks um for the second half I mean for the whole year but for the second half to really get in there with the kids thank you Mariah then Helen then Stephen thank you um I have two questions the first one is that the presentation tonight focused on K through 8 and I was wondering if the literacy plan that accompanies this at the Strategic level is prek through 12 or what is the what is the overarching grade range of the entire literacy plan so the literacy review was K through 12 however the high school um teachers have been or the people on the literacy team have included the high school and they were part of building this and if you remember the idea was to build a one-year program and then to continue to build on and I don't think we have the capacity to do that whole K to 12 all at once and so um John and and tal nardy who are on that team and Kristen and I have been talking about what are the things we can do to um pull the thread up through but we are certainly not in a place to be able to keep to do that this year so that planning stage continues the the idea of from Hill was only to develop a one-year plan a one-year plan for what I'm not following I'm sorry for addressing the literac so we can't address everything that came in the literacy report right all at once so Hill helped us with the help of of K through2 teachers and um stakeholders as a team we met multiple times and we reduced that number to um what we could do in the first year and the first year was to FOC on focus on early literacy it does not mean we have finished with the high school it's just that the literacy reviews road map for this year will be to focus on K2 but the multi-year plan is a prek through 12 literacy structure okay yes okay thank you and then my second question is that the rubric talked about um introducing culturally responsive texts if the curriculum itself did not provide those and I was curious about whether these curricula already include science and social studies texts that are aligned to our curriculum or if they would also need to be supplemented to be aligned with our curriculum like including a scient text is great but if it doesn't match what we're actually learning then so it won't match our science curriculum or our social studies curriculum one to one what we're attempting to do for our students which will help level the playing field is build their background knowledge or schema with the knowledge building criteria with things that are of high interest so for example we wouldn't teach planetary science in second grade however we may Adopt A literacy program where students are reading about the planets and that way there when when they hit the that point in their science curriculum they will have background knowledge and they will have schema for um being able to better understand the work that's happening this is it's based on research um there's a great research study it's called the baseball study where students that had background knowledge on baseball far it's an old study far outperformed students that had no background knowledge on baseball so on a test of their reading comprehension even among students that were highly rated readers so what we're trying to do is level the playing field by building background knowledge and building schema perhaps before students get to that point in the science or social studies curriculum thanks and so so that's great too in that it's sort of like orthogonal opportunities to learn but then like so do they do they not have is there not an opportunity for intersectionality between science and Ela and and social studies and Ela on the actual curriculum topic I can talk about that a little bit just if you want um because Mariah both um the science and social studies coordinators were um present when we and listened to all of the presentations for the seven and they also um unanimously thought that the three that we put forward would um have um would be a good good for for PSB and also have some capability to have some alignment with science and social studies units it's again it's not perfectly aligned none of them are but out of these three these are the ones that had more um opportunities for alignment with science and social studies okay yeah and we're GNA continue sorry one sorry we are going to continue our work with the science and social studies Department I've never been a part of like um choosing curriculum but um with them on our team and I think it's an we're starting it from the beginning um in being collaborative instead of choosing something and then finding ways like we're starting early in the process like where they're starting with us from ground zero and um it's a you know our collaboration is really important because I do know that teachers do want some overlap between um the science and and that's I guess my question is are we going to be intentional about providing additional literacy resources that match the science and social studies curriculum for kids who do want to extend further into that topic and have that opportunity yep so that can I answer this please Kristen can I answer this sorry many of the um programs that we're looking at have a wide variety of text sets so there will be an opportunity to extend that learning for students sorry it's hard not all being in the same room Helen now to you um first of all thank you for this report and for all the hard work you guys have been doing along with the rest of the the staff the teachers and all that um I'm just trying to get my head around a couple things one how will this be different than what we're doing today and then I'll ask you a second question I'll take that one too um I think it was Michelle said that we're going to be narrowing what we're doing today we're going to go from having the gazillion books in a classroom where a third grader in Caroline's room could be having a very different experience than a third grader in Sarah's room and try to create a third grade Brookline experience for students that will be one thing that's different we'll have a core set of texts that we do want everybody reading um it will also be grounded in outcomes um and evidence-based reading which currently we're not doing um exclusively we're going to move more towards that type of teaching and embody the scientific research on reading and how students develop their reading skills okay thank you that that's helpful um and so I'm trying to put myself I'm not a teacher but put myself into a second or first grade teacher's shoes and I have my lesson plans probably for the year because I've done it for five years or 10 years and now in November I'm going to change that for the rest of the year is that what you're I think like the reason that we talked about the tier one instruction first and the what makes a good reader and what we want our reading instruction to look like is we're not jumping to professional learning right in a new program we're Beginning by massaging like the the audience to look at like what does current literacy instruction look like from a research based perspective so that by time we get to the shift in materials it's not a new thing to teachers they will have looked at it and I believe from the people that have been working on the the district literacy team and people who have been reaching out that we have teachers who are already doing this research and already considering it and already trying it out in practice so the hope is to have them fully prepared and feel comfortable and then maintain the support it's it's not going to be perfect no no I'm I'm just trying it's actually the reason we're not starting September Helen is because we want to give teachers a Runway where they can learn and plan and so that the expectation isn't oh I'm starting my my class right I'm I'm welcoming these kindergarteners into my room and I'm enacting this new huge curriculum so it's part of the reason why we're delaying that so we can do the professional development we can do the roll out and we can give teachers the runway that they'll need to do this effectively yeah what what worries me is maybe it's the other side that we need the whole year to do that so that they can start the following year but you'll see I mean you can always change I'm gonna share an article with you later about that exact question okay steephen thank you very much uh thank you and thank you Jody and Michelle and Kristen for this presentation it's exciting to be so close to finally choosing a a instructional shift and implementing it thanks for that presentation too it was really was really clear um a couple of small questions and then just a broader question so first I think Michelle you referred to a literacy team I wasn't familiar with that team what is it that's the team that I spoke about and I think you were also at the CPAC conversation the team that that reviewed the results uh the district litery leadership I think I may have called it llt they're the group The District leader literacy leadership team which was made up of I see that's team teachers that's the team that's selecting the the curriculum now no so that's the team that the previous part of the member yeah they oh go ahead Michelle go ahead no that's the team that made the plan and when Kristen opens up the the the opportunity for other people to join the next level team that group is certainly has that opportunity okay so they were working on the road map to uh with the hill to implement the recommendations okay thank you um okay and another small question you you mentioned that we were taking a fresh look at um at phonics Infinity MC awareness when we were looking at the curriculum replacement does that mean we're taking a look at whether we're going to keep Wilson and heg as well or are we continuing to keep those materials moving forward regardless of what we choose can I take this or is that on the table I take this one or goad okay because some of them some of the three choices um some of them have um foundational skills block um two out of the three do um but we also want to evaluate the quality of it um I'm not sure we have to delve deeper into those aspects of them to see if we want to switch to be completely honest I don't know if that um that I don't know if they'll be the right fit or if it's worth switching over so it's we we're open to both do you know so we're just we have to dive deep that makes sense um one more uh smallish well maybe not so small question is I I think I missed your rationale about why we're um starting with a pilot rather than starting with a full scale K2 next year can you can you say that again me or whoever it was who said in the first yeah so I think um I don't know if jod if you want to jump in too but the my thinking or what you know why we want to start kind of slow to go fast um and we really want to build um buyin um from our teachers and um from being in this District since 2005 um and knowing the culture of our district um I think it's advantageous for us to um have bring folks on um that are interested in implementing it in the middle of the year and then going full force the the following year I don't know if Jody if you want to add more but I I really we just want this to be a successful implementation and um my fear is that if we just do that in the middle of the year halfhazard ly with everybody k to um it won't be as successful if we do it at a slower Pace okay and I'm deferring to Michelle and Kristen's institutional knowledge on that um so that is the reason why we're doing it okay I'm not asking again if I could just throw something it's pretty common practice at least it's been my experience with curriculum work that you go with early adopters first those are the people who are eager and want to try it and then they become our uh early adopter leaders and so other uh teachers then can go to them because they've already had some experience before the others so it's that's pretty common practice at least in my experience and we're not planning on limiting the number of teachers we'd like to have one in each building but say an entire second grade team wants to do it together then that's completely fine it's not we're not limiting the scope we just want those early adopters okay excited so that thank you for that and thanks Suzanne so that links to my bigger question which is about professional development so I was I wasn't totally clear on the professional development strategy and also how it links with the academy funded professional development that we likely to get through the grant so especially now that it's going to be pilot in a year one full scale up in year two and then SC and then pilot scale up in the other in the in the other phases um how what's the what is the PD strategy mixing in both sources of PD both from the grants and from the provider and how does that what is the strategy a and then B how does that affect the budget picture because my understanding was that the budget strategy was premised on having the full PD strategy a with a full scale up in year one and B having entirely from the provider can so I guess that's partly a question for for you Kristen and partly a question for you Jody I'll start Kristen if that's okay so with the state um multitiered support Academy our hope is not our hope our what's going to happen is they will give us technical assistance on those four shifts on foundational skills really get into um the the reading rope and the two models of instruction that Kristen was talking about and then that'll be combined with the provider PD so we'll actually be hitting PD from two angles um one on teaching reading in general that's program agnostic and one that is program specific um and during as I said last week one of the things that we'll be doing with the academy is building up our coaching skills to coach in this new way which will be really exciting for us as well so do you see that as Ela teacher facing liter literacy specialist facing or a new literacy coach role facing or all three all three actually Stephen okay it'll be a comprehensive team and Stephen to expand on that a little bit um um the terms of the PD it a lot of it varies like with from the provider it depends on which program that we choose too of like how they um some of them are more flexible than others with how they um their PD structure so once we choose that you know what program we're going to go with we'll have more of a detailed um PD plan and that on that side but we aren't able to predict that because we just don't know yet which program okay and so I suppose that uncertainty means that budget part of my question is hard to answer to okay you can ask it I know just like how does it impact how we're budgeting the PD side because Jody when you presented it last time it was you were rolling the curriculum purchase plus the PD into one package that you were budgeting um and now that it's PD for a pilot plus it's plus the scale up the next year but it's also mitigated by state Grant um uh uh curriculum agnostic PD how does that impact the whole budget picture for what we're going to be transitioning to or is it is that too many variables to to work through there there you gave me a lot of variables there Stephen right um I it depends on the program right one of these three programs was the program that we used to price this out so in that case the budget will be right on um uh to even though it'll just be a pilot because we'll purchase because we know it's not really a pilot it's more of an early adopter we're going to select the program that we're going to use we're not going to Pilot all three programs we're going to select the program that we use and have early adopters so it's a little bit different than a traditional pilot um and because we have the budget money and we don't know how many people we are going have that are going to be an early adopter having that budget funding there will continue to be important okay thanks so much everyone could I ask a question about assessments so um do these curricula include like assessments and Diagnostics that would eventually supersede what we do now U to identify students who are going to need extra support or different support I know at least one does um the our core reading does um Chris how about the other two yeah they all have some aspect of assessment um but and we need to delve deeper into like tease out what they all exactly look like but they will not um take um we will always have the universal screener if that's what you're speaking about and we need diagnostic um assessments as well yeah because I'm asking because as a new teacher I'm starting to appreciate what a Time sync it is when you have to do diagnostics that aren't really embedded in the curriculum so if it's possible to get away from that yes yes might be nice I I feel you and I know a lot of teachers do yeah all right um oh Helen you have a question just a quick one just following up on what you're saying so I know that we've been talking a lot about you know trying to identify children with reading issues and um making sure that they're dealt with early on and don't get to high school and still have the same problems so all of three of these curriculum well first of all the identification happens with the testing that we're doing the identification of the potential of a reading problem right but once there is the potential I get that once there is the potential I assume we go further to make sure and inform parents that you know we're concerned you know may not be a concern but yep and and the state law requires us to at at a certain threshold to be reaching out to parents and caregivers immediately so um we we should be doing that as good practice nothing should ever be a surprise okay no that's that's really important I'm glad to hear that suan yeah so could you so we've been talking a lot about tier one and the new program whichever what curriculum it might be but could you talk a little bit about tier two and tier three and how that is connected to a new curriculum or is it not connected I could you just kind of weave that for me a little bit Yeah I'd be happy to try so we're focusing a lot on tier one because again that's where 80 to 85% of our students should be so that should be our biggest lever for us and we believe that once we have a strong tier one program that both um accounts for students that may be struggling and those students that may be Advanced then um we can start looking at what tier 2 looks like and then the tier three interventions would be far more individualized based on the learning profiles of our students but the so but we'll continue doing doing what we're doing with tier 2 and tier three yes we feel like those are fairly successful interventions and it's the tier one we concentrated on with these curriculums although I take it that these curriculums probably also have some work around either advancing students who need more advanced work and helping students who need more support is that that was one of the things we looked for okay thank you and Suzanne it's also looking at some of the structure of what's happening in tier 2 and tier three and how that's applied so that um right now we rely heavily on a u you know I just Ed the nebulous example a heavy Reliance on pullout model and then what might be the opportunities to engage that tier two support within the classroom structure as well so it's not just the material aspect of it but it's also the structural piece as well so there's work that's happening in that area too all right thank you very much Kristen and Michelle and Jody Andy I have my hand up again sorry I'm sorry I was looking for hands and did not see yours um go ahead Mariah sorry I just have one um side question um which is is the is the mclass screener like do you notify parents of end ofe data or only middle of year that letter should have gone out today no okay it's going out tomorrow I was gonna say so if we didn't get it okay it's going out tomorrow yeah it's going out tomorrow okay and does it follow the same it had there were some things we had talked about last time so I'm presuming it's the same kind of letter as it was last time okay thanks the things that you suggested last time we have put in so that you the suggestion gave it curriculum subcommittee were added to the letter thanks all right I'd like to thank our presenters for the very clear uh presentation of um process and timeline I appreciated that um all right before we move to our next agenda item one of our speakers who had signed up for public comment and wasn't able to be here before is now here so miss sheno Aon you have the floor for three minutes thank you so much sorry The Bu Bridge rotary is just like an insane variable you never know will it take 12 minutes well it take 45 so I apologize for being a little late um so Shannon do pound I on first name Basics with most most of you at this point um but I'm a Spanish teacher at Ronco for now um and I'm here for I mean I wrote a thing I'm not going to entirely read it um World Language still doesn't have what it needs in terms of FTE for next year um we've been here many many times uh we had a lengthy presentation that some people Dr gillary saw and some others um we've shared with many of you about the reasons why we need um a certain amount of Staffing and eliminating the K5 program obviously you know changes the overall to total number but it doesn't eliminate the problems that we've been advocating about for Middle School uh one of the main issues that we've been having is that Middle School World language teachers often are loaded up with extra sections which uh a adds to their workload and may make doing all these things I'm hearing about like literacy that's language like that's what we do all the things that I heard presented about oh you have to develop phonic awareness and you have to develop develop schema and you have to build all these things and connect to the population we have we're doing all of that and it takes time and we don't always have a a canned curriculum that will meet our needs so we end up doing a lot of work and that takes time and thought um and we'd like to be treated similar to our colleagues in other Middle School content areas so that we have the time to do that um and also to attend things like special ed consults which I know I think Suzanne you mentioned at the sub curriculum committee meeting um that you know you hoped more special ed students would be included in World Language um and and we hope that too you know that is something we want but I think that also means that we need our world language teachers to be present in the consults where they can learn about the needs that their students have and get updates on them so that the teacher is supported to support that student to succeed and we're not just throwing a kid in a class with a teacher who hasn't had those updates about what's going on this week or you know things change and you do need to be up to date on those things um and we want to make sure that all of our world language teachers are included equal to their other uh colleagues seventh and eighth grade World Language meet every single day uh sixth grade is still three times a week which is a lot of student facing time um so it's very important that these World language teachers be included in that and in order to achieve that I've mapped it out two ways we need to get to a minimum of 15.1 FTE um and then a cushier way of 15.9 why is there that range 15.1 is the sort of more efficient model of if in a spreadsheet it works uh but we know that schools uh making schedules it's often very complex and sometimes what works in your spreadsheet doesn't actually work when you actually put all the pieces together they're they don't run at maximum efficiency I think we all know that so having that little bit of wiggle room or Landing in that range is going to allow principles the flexibility they need to schedule with what works for their buildings um and just to close I'm going to give a final plea uh for a few seconds for our poor one Chinese teacher shashu who is an amazing teacher and next year will be tasked with 26 unique lessons that she will plan I'm sorry I'm going to finish this uh I apologize uh every single week uh with just one prep a day so for four she that lives her less than 10 minutes to plan each of her lessons just think about that it's about eight or nine minutes and that doesn't factor in that one of the days at least she will actually have to use some of her prep time to travel between two schools because she's teaching three grade levels of continuing Chinese and three grade levels of beginning Chinese and for next year those are different tracks because our Rising middle schoolers and current middle schoolers have had the K5 program in the future they will eventually come together and be on the same track but not next year right now fifth graders have had Chinese so they're going on to a different level um and it honestly I would say it's inhumane to expect her to do that level of work you need to at a bare minimum add a part-time Chinese teacher to our team um I know budgets are tight I know that you have to pull the money from somewhere you we cannot suffer another year of this we just cannot and I'm saying this I don't know that I'll be returning to Brookline because I know that I feel that my work isn't valued here so this is my plea for my team that I leave behind please please please do anything you possibly can to find the FTE that we need thank you thank you very much Miss pound that concludes public comment for tonight and next up we have Dr gillery for an update on the fiscal year 2024 budget so there hasn't been much shift in the budget since we presented the update last week but what the um Administration and finance team are working on is getting the budget submitted to the com controller's office that's due tomorrow to actually get the budget over to our town partners so folks are working hard uh on that area that's um the all the update that I have right now Mariah was there anything else um out of Finance I think we covered that in the last meeting though I think we did I think we did and and on Friday after after school committee took its vote last FR uh last Thursday um a vote did we vote I feel like we did but my brain is so foggy right now but any uh just we got the update of the reduction that had been we did have some vote I'm sorry I can't remember oh it was Shifting the the vote to the circuit breaker right so I updated um uh Partners on the town side of um the latest numbers and we've gotten some update on the process um by which we will if we need to request a reserve fund transfer the process by which that would happen um but it's more or less as we understood it before and I won't I won't go through the details here sorry am I just have a quick question for you what's the the time frame that is there a time limit on when we need to request the transfer by um okay so so Finance is going to meet on the 26th and if there is still a deficit at that point we would um uh vote to um ask staff to submit the reserve fund transfer um I I'll go through the details since you're asking so the um the select board typically would review uh the reserve fund transfer before it goes to advisory just to ask questions and be up to date um however they don't have any meetings they're their their meetings are before we would meet on the 26th and the meeting at which advisory um would take this up is on July 9th um and so essentially we would submit on the 26th and then it would get um considered by advisory on the 9th so I don't know if there is a hard deadline but these are the dates that everyone knows about and is planning towards sorry Mariah were you saying that we would not be going to the select board before AC just because the select board won't be meeting correct ah yeah and and from what I can tell it's an optional step not a mandatory step since it's just advisory who considers it and so it would be going directly then Mariah from Finance to AC so by bypassing full school committee because we don't have ating sched however it would be one of those it would be one of those times that certainly I would be looking for strong attendance from nons subcommittee Members got it thanks yes Helen do you know what time that meeting's at the 26th is at 5 and the 9th I presume is at 7 because advisory typically meets at 7 okay thank you all right if there are no more questions let me look I see none so I think that concludes our update on the fiscal year 2024 budget we now go to Suzanne for an overview and discussion of one of our core responsibilities the superintendent evaluation thank you Andy um if you would take out uh if you're here the evaluation report so you can look at it we follow along um are you going to put that up on the screen sure so while she's doing that just to let you know kind of the time frame I expect that we will discuss this uh in workshop on August 8th is that correct Andy and uh Dr gillery will get us uh his evidence report and uh some things we need on this evaluation by mid July Dr Giller i' rather try to stick to the end of the month but knowing that we don't have to go you don't need it until August okay or you won't be meeting until August my goal would be to get it to you by by the end of June okay great y okay great okay here we are so um again just reminder if you're new to the committee uh you are are not required to uh fill this out it's up to you certainly you can look at it and think about uh What uh you might be interested in thinking about for the coming year so on that first page it's really a summary if the of and the first page and the second page is are summar so we're going to go back to those pages in just a minute so you can just flip to page three now we got a little confused last year so Dr under um student learning goal and description Dr gillery will put down which of his goals will be uh the focus for that for the learning goal he'll do that for the professional practice goal he'll do that for district Improvement goal one and District Improvement goal two so he will take his goals that he has had for this year that we looked at uh several times this year and he will plug those into which one of those uh categories and that will be under the description and then if you look at that next that smaller column it says Focus indicators if you look down at the bottom of page three you will see the indicators for each of the standards and he will let us know which indicators we are to look at for those standards for each goal probably totally lost already so let's look there's going to be a student learning goal he will have that description it's one of his goals that he has and he is going to tell us which indicators we are to uh look at for that goal probably under uh instructional leadership I would guess but it could be including things like commitment to high standards or it could be managing conflict but here's the deal deal he picks out two go indicators and those are the only ones that we actually rate him on so if you go to page four we'll show you an example this is his uh performance rating for instructional leadership he is only got you can see there's a b c d e and f he is only going to pick two of those indicators he will let us know which ones and those are the two that we uh grade him on or rate him on so you're going to look at what it says you're going to look at his evidence that he's providing us you're going to uh Market either unsatisfactory needs Improvement proficient or exemplary and then you can make comments in the comment section usually I just take evidence straight from his report that he gives us his narrative and that's what I plug in there Suzanne can I ask a question sure so just for just for the ex example here lonus chooses one a and one b um and so those are the ones that we have to score and those would be the ones that would determine an overall rating but can we is there any problem with us also scoring other things and commenting um more broadly yes there is a problem with that because he is telling us what indicators we are to look at and he's giving us evidence for those indicators now what you could do is you could say maybe down in the narrative not grading or rating those but you could say you know I'm interested in looking at assessment maybe for next year and maybe make a comment about that but that would not be in his ratings but it's but even like if there are sort of positive things like again he wants us to do onea and 1B but there's something great I want to call out on 1 C I can't say anything about this other great thing that I'm seeing I can only limit I have to limit it to the two you can put some comments down and you could say and I also would like to say he did a great job with evaluation or student learning and put some evidence there but that's not what we'll be voting on as we rate uh him on this evaluation no I understood the scoring was limited to those but I was just wondering about the comments and if we could sort of put more in okay you could put comments in yes yeah thank you okay okay uh and so then after you've done all of those four er standards this page four five six how we go seven then you're going to take that information and you're going to put it on your first two pages so you're going to see we have the goals and he's told us on page three what the goals are under description and you're going to give him a uh rating for that for each of the goals well not each of the goals the goals that are in the in those that those three areas and then you're going to go down to step two and you see standards 1 2 3 and four and you're going to give him an overall rating for each of those standards should be based on your indicators I mean if you had um exceeded on your two indicators uh and then you put down that for that standard you're giving him a needs Improvement that would be inconsistent okay and then you go to page two and you give him an overall summiter of Performance Based on steps one and step two ratings and you give them an overall unset needs Improvement for efficient or exemplary and you can add any comments you want and then you send all of this to Andy and Andy's going to pull it together and we usually discuss we will discuss at the workshop on August 8th if you don't panic it's it's not really as hard as it looks um so Betsy you will probably send out this form with Linus's information so really it's you really just have to concentrate on page 3 through 7 and there's just two indicators for each standard so it's really des's intention that a school committee can only evaluate a superintendent on goals and evidence supplied by the superintendent themselves because we agreed to those right so you can put you can put comments but the evaluation is based on what we have agreed where his goals and when did we agree I'm sure we did but I just don't remember when I think they were at the beginning of the year it was like October November I remember things being presented I don't remember them being agreed to right well okay he presented them if we didn't think they were good that was our time to say something I mean those those are his goals that's what he's working from this year when do we when do we agree on the focus indicators I I also don't either the presentation of the goal much less our agreeing to any specific indicators well it's so it says right on the form superintendent should identify I don't recall us agreeing to any of these indicators or a presentation of those indicators yeah we haven't done the indicators yet because uh Dr gillery has not uh selected those yet right so what does it mean to say that we're going to agree on the indicators so we're agreeing on the indicators in the future or we've already agreed to them we evaluated him on the indicators that he's going to give us for this year and if we want to kind of change that a little bit which it sounds like some people might we might want to have a say about the indicators in the fall when we agree to the goals Carolyn I'm mainly taking a backseat on this thank you Andy um because I will not be doing this um but I was looking at last year's just out of curiosity because it was mentioned previously and I happen to have open on my desktop a presentation it's been open for a while so I don't remember where I found it but it does say superintendent midyear goals update it's dated 3724 so I don't if that helps Orient you thank you at all thank you yeah we did mid year I'm not sure March was M that was a presentation of progress to date and that wasn't a presentation of anything about goals because because I remember a question they asked at that time relating to how does that relate to the goal specifically I'm I can't read it from here what it just says what read the if you would Carolyn I'm sorry sure it says superintendent midyear goals update it's dated 3724 and it's a slide deck yeah we've definitely had them presented to us both early in the year and the midy year I don't maybe Stephen wasn't there that day however I never understood that there was any sort of approval that we by seeing the presentation that we were essentially um agreeing with them I understood that they were Linus's goals that he had set for himself so I'm not saying anyone did anything like that there's I just think that maybe next year when we go through the goal setting if there is an expectation that by hearing the presentation we are explicitly agreeing to them then maybe we need to have a step there where we actually agree to them yeah I think I think we can set it up differently next year so that uh we maybe take a more active role in the goal setting um we now know that that has to occur in the fall are there any other questions on this form yes Stephen for the last two years we've talked about setting up the process differently so that the school committee would have a greater say and its ability to evaluate the superintendent I say this with no intention of poorly uh evaluating our superintendent but we are not succeeding at changing our process it doesn't seem to me that we have had any ability to change our process so that we have actually been able to evaluate the superintendent according to what the school committee thinks is successful I don't think the way we're setting it up right now will allow us to do so either and I think we should be able to do so so Stephen uh what would you propose doing I'm not sure anything can be done now about the process that we're about to undertake right and finish I think we should at least be able to negotiate what indicators we're evaluating the superintendent Tom I was at the previous presentation it wasn't a presentation of the goals it was a presentation of progress made to date in a number of areas none of them referred to goals specifically much less goals that we approved and I asked specifically about that at that time apology for my frustration but this has been something that I've been asking about well we are doing what desie requires of us to do and I think if you wish to talk about a different process uh that does still evaluate this I mean that does still look at this evaluation form because this is what we are required to uh turn into Andy it's a public document and then we put one together for the superintendent uh we could talk about that at the workshop and how we might want to do it next year remember we have our own goals uh which I'm not sure I guess maybe at the workshop we should look at those from last year because uh I'm not sure we did a great job on some of them but it's time to revisit those and again come up with new goals for us and then I think perhaps we want to talk about how do we help support Dr Giller with his goals they are his goals they they are not our goals they are his goals and but we want to support him and this is this document is in keeping with the way that we evaluate Educators and so it's it's like a it's a familiar process and I have to say that by streamlining it to not look at every aspect but to look at the aspects where the evidence is there makes it that much more um interesting and in depth instead of looking at all different indicators so if you get if you get stuck on this just let me know and I'll try to walk you through as Sarah says some of us have been are very familiar with this no I continue to be familiar with it I'm objecting to the process as it's set up right now I hear you I don't I don't think that we're I think we're setting it up poorly right now and I'm thinking that we should change it yeah I do think that when we have our overall discussion of pretty much everybody's goals over the summer uh we this year can be much more intentional about making sure that our evaluation process and so it's simply too late and that we have I I I do think it's too late to change it for for what we're doing right now it would not be fair part of our challenge last year was that we all that that the form itself got in the way of the process and so now we're fixing the form issues and and that is letting us be a little bit more deliberate in the issues you're raising Stephen um and I do think it's an opportunity for us to all be the same page a bit more so I look forward to our conversations where we refine the the process now that we've gotten the forms peculiarities um dealt with yes thank you Suzanne for the very clear explanation this is pretty much news to me actually yeah all right I don't see any other hands up oh and now I do Helen so you know who you have to thank for this the Bill lupini and Rebecca Stone were the ones who worked on this when this was done at desie yeah I think Bill had Bill and Rebecca headed up the committee unless they've changed it which I don't think it has been from my recollection oh there is oh so okay maybe we'll see the new one Stephen and you'll be happier all right so this brings us to our one proposed school committee action of the night aside from the consent agenda so I'd like to turn it over to Mariah um to introduce the topic of uh non-aligned hourly rates and stiens and U make a motion so that we can have that on the floor for a discussion thanks Andy so at the finance committee meeting that was um held on May 16th we had reviewed the um proposed non- align rates for um um the upcoming year and um we received the document with relatively quick turnaround and so we didn't have necessarily all the time that we would have liked to to explore it and um but we understood that there was time pressure to um to to vote the um the rates so that the summer programs could occur in particular um so that the offer letters for those um activities could go out um and subsequently there's been um one particular area that's been flagged as being um discrepant from both within itself and um and discrepant across programs Betsy do you mind pulling up the um the file and so I'll just keep talking while that comes up and so the um extended school year um and Faith dtz came to us um last week can provided public comment on this um extended school year is the program the summer program that's been flagged and within extended school year there's four categories of staff that are um that are that participate in extended school year and three of the four categories um are are offered per DM their per DM rates and one of the four categories is not um there we go it's the and so um The Proposal is for this first category which you can see under the extended school year so the PSB special ed special education teachers and Specialists um which were when we voted it in May um were just listed as 56 an $56 an hour um is to change them to per DM and I let me clarify and say that the pair of professionals are paid um at their current hourly rate so it's per DM for um for the teachers and then um the par rate currently but it's everyone's essentially current rate and um the $56 an hour for the special education teachers and Specialists was not the current rate um is not their is the only one which is not their current rate um does PRM mean that you take your annual salary and and prate it per day right that is what it means yes okay um and so so um Helen has another question go ahead Helen it's not a per DM that's a summer rate it is not a per DM that's a summer rate this this past year they were all they were all paid per DM is my understanding and then this year it was reverted for one category um so the proposal is to um revert it back to um parody across the categories of PSB employees participating um so that special education teachers that you see in that top category are treated the same as the special education teachers who are in the specialized programs that are in the last category and is Tre are treated the same as the nurses that are in the second category there um so that's one of the two modifications and then the second one is um there have been some um questions raised about um of um coordinator stiens across the summer programs and so I um I reached out to Deputy superintendent leis o Connell and asked about that and she um recommended an increase from the current $7,500 um that is is was in the prior version We budgeted to um $8,800 for each esy coordinator um and as we said in our time that we looked at this because many of us looked at sort of broader questions of what was um we just didn't quite understand why some categories would were getting X pay scale and others were getting y y pay scale and and the ANF office has already committed to looking at this more broadly um for next year to make sure that we are having Equity across programs and so this would be a um the change for this upcoming summer would be 8,000 800 with again the broader intent to look at Equity across programming for the following year um so other than that you can see those are the primary changes um there was just a little bit of like word cleanup like spelling out extended school year um removing the word nursing there I think I um moved where there's only one category there it says paid from revolving I just moved it up to the top so it's minor little cleanups of the document but the the motion that I'm going to make is to um accept the revised document um that you see in front of you again in the primary changes are per DM for the special education teachers and increasing the esy coordinator stipended from 7500 to 8800 that is there a second to Mar I second it I have a oh sorry y go ahead discuss do we discuss after the motion we can discuss now been made and seconded yet sorry sorry sorry um thank you Mariah and I know you've been working on this um I guess I still want to understand a little better where I'm looking at BHS Summer School director 12,500 Star Academy um 18,000 for a director and I'm guessing that the esy coordinator the word is coordinator but I'm guessing that's somewhat like a director the difference is so huge that it makes me really uncomfortable and I I took Faith's concerns to heart um I don't want to sort of um point to one particular Community member who isn't staff but obviously faith is a really involved person um so I appreciate that this has gone from 7500 to 8,800 but it's so shockingly different from the Star Academy that I just would like to understand how it is that how how was $118,000 for the director of Star Academy approved or proposed what's sort of the history here and while I really appreciate the work it makes me really uncomfortable to see the differences in these numbers you can make an amendment to the motion to increase it if you would like to Helen sort of to follow up on what you're saying I think we need to understand what the role is of all of these people I'm assuming when you have three coordinators there's less work than if you have one director um I'm not sure I don't know that for a fact I think it you know I'm not Helen can I make one comment about that yeah sure I think you're absolutely right and I think that as I've been talking about this with people this week There's multiple dimensions of the the role these roles that we're talking about so just to give a little bit more color to that how many we is the program how many staff and students is each person overseeing is it a director role that has um assistant directors or other sort of supportive staff or are they working by themselves so I think there's a lot more um there's many other variables that like we really a I don't think a school committee is at all well equipped to um parse and certainly not parse on the Fly and I don't think um that OTL and OSS are ready to give us all of the rationale for why one should be um X versus y the 8,800 is on parody with the dis the project Discovery director who there is one of although they have an assistant director so there is that parody there I uh Caroline or Helen do you want to continue this no I just want to ask for next year to have a better understanding so that we know why there are differences and and if there needs to be adjustments to do them and I guess I do have I believe that is an ongoing effort in in to get it that was already the plan before this came up yes that's wonderful um and do we have the money to pay it so the other information and I think Lisa's online but I'll try and summarize Lisa um which is essentially um we were over budget last year this is all funded out of a federal um Federal no State it's funded out of a grant I'm sorry I can't remember where the grant comes from but essentially we were over budget last year and from what I understand from Lisa um we will um probably do a little bit like we will be a little bit less over budget than we were last year even with this change last year we were funding our staff at PDM we actually had more Staff last year than we do this year we're adding on some non non-salary programming um uh but there is essentially it will hopefully be it won't be worse than last year and it might be a little better is that an accurate summation Lisa she's nodding So Okay C it okay and and just to add that the the co the the the obviously the bulk of the cost here that we're talking about is the per DM for the staff the um esy coordinator change is a much smaller magnitude of impact so we're spending money we don't have we're spending money that is not in the Grant I would differentiate between those two things and where will the difference come from that I do not have the answer to I don't know where it came from last year except the operating budget is that correct cus and Lisa well we're we're going for a budget transfer this year remember I do I saw Lisa raise her hand I'm sorry in my last conversation with Dr gians um the majority of our extended school year programming is written out of the idea Grant and then an additional 50,000 is in our operating budget um but we are last year for FY 23 we had um 159 esy staff and as Mariah pointed out um for FY 24 we're at 135 uh staff so um it is less staff and we were funding at the perdum rate last year um so I you know I'm not the finance manager and I would defer to my ANF colleagues but um you know we'll be looking at that closely next week but I think it will uh it will come out because of the reduction and staff numbers it goes without saying but we did have a chance during Finance to ask about the process for setting these rates and then of course Mariah has done a lot more since then but um we we were able to ask those questions sort of I mean I think that the the reality is that we did we did have some of these questions but they weren't necessarily answered because they're questions that require a lot more time from everyone to really be able to come up with a good answer but absolutely we had flagged the need for this deeper conversation and this is just one area where we've decided we or we we may decide that we're not willing to wait a year for these particular changes suan yes I had two uh points kind of still following the conversation with h Helen and Carolyn is it possible that all our teachers would pay the should be paid the same rate I mean we've got 47 and we've got $56 per hour per DM should they not all be paid the same if they give it an hour teaching I I don't well or beyond that should they all I mean there's lots of questions here right should they all be paid on per DMS what makes what is the decision about 47 why 47 versus 56 to me there's lots of questions here yeah um when was the last time the the hourly rates were raised what's you know we don't have the history of the hourly rates either and um I don't think that they've changed in some time but I could be wrong on that I'm pretty sure though that in the document we had from 2019 they were the same rates I'm pretty sure again I I'm not 100% sure so there's lots of questions and and again we all already voted this document because of the conversation we had again we talked about this at Finance on May 16th and on May 17th full school committee voted this document with the same conversation of understanding that there are um many questions about this but this was the first time that the document sort of wrote down everything in one place and this was the building the foundation from which we will have better information and better context for the rates going forward and then the reason we're going back to the esy is because every single category and esy is per DM except for this one Cate or period per DM or hourly except for this one category could I just ask Lisa could you just talk for a minute about the esy coordinators you have three of them is that the same as directors or is that more like assistant director or is that more like team leader I'm just wondering why that's at 8,800 versus 12,000 or 18,000 well thank you for the question Suzanne uh again I'm not a a historian and the discrepant rates um definitely require um our targeted attention I think Dr Fortuna and I um look forward to sort of grappling with the differences we know our esy coordinators are working all six weeks full time um they're managing the IEP team meeting process the service delivery to prevent substantial regression scheduling facilities issues Transportation um their role is is significant if I were to think about it uh as an assistant director role that would be closest I think okay thank you all right is there any further discussion yes there is Carolyn sorry um where while we're talking about where the money's going to come from I did notice an apologies for I'm still catching up and you all can at some point like say Carolyn you can't say I'm catching up anymore but may maybe give me till like August um I do notice assist in the Star Academy there are two tbds um so in terms of where's the money coming from and and these questions can you can anyone speak to that at all Jody are there currently or were there in the past fre years um assistant directors or team leaders for Star Academy or has the director been doing that themselves and is that possibly why part of that is TBD I don't know if Jody's still there I'm talk I'm asking oh there you are okay I'm here um I don't know if in the past there has been um only because I only have one summer under my belt um I do know that I'm in agreement with Caroline that that salary is not correct and we've been working this year it's actually reduced from what it was last year last year it was more than that um so we're working and Lisa and I will grapple with how to best um align our our program director um salaries and sorry just to be clear I didn't say it's not correct I just said it's really different from the others it maybe it should be double or triple and my question really is I guess is there an intention to hire an assistant director or team leader where we have tbds there is for an assistant director so that'll be additional cost yes all right Val thanks so it seems to me that the higher rates and numbers are in the grant funded categories and I guess my question I don't know if it's for you Jody is do do we write those rates into the grant do we report on them are we I guess what comes first the chicken or the egg in terms of the rate and the grant because it does seem to me that the general fund rates are the ones that are substantially lower than those that are Grant fund it save the change in esy this year the grant comes first then the salary for at least for the grant funded ones that OTL is responsible for so like Star Academy is that's funded through the Meco Grant or what which Grant is that it's funded through the Meco Grant yes all right any further questions or comments before we go to a vote on Mariah's motion I see none so Carolyn um so can you repeat the motion Mariah do you want to restate your motion sure the motion is to accept the document that um has been presented tonight yes Sarah yes Suzanne abstain Helen yes Mariah yes Stephen yes Val yes and I vote Yes as well all right so we've now taken our one action of the night uh and we move on to subcommittee and liaison reports um Helen Capital Improvements okay um so a couple things uh building commission met last night and um discussed both the Pierce project the Driscoll project uh which we'll give you some updates on B and I but the high school just so people are aware um there's um oh a little while ago they found some leakage in the basement and the old old part of the school built in 1930 that hadn't been touched really but there had been some um they're not sure why everything happened why there's leakage but in Old buildings that happens anyway they're they're looking at solutions for it and that will be worked on not this summer but the following summer it's not urgent um it's something that can wait till next summer and they're doing the plans now for that uh it will the monies will come out of the high school project um I think you know it's a basically an engineering um project that they're doing to shore up and make sure that the leaking stops um peer School uh we had the peer School building committee uh just before this meeting uh Andy thank you for getting there in time though I didn't ask you for your vote and I'm sorry about that thank you yeah I was driving on the highway I figured i' probably better not disturb you at that point um things are moving along very nicely actually um the 60% documents are going to be submitted once the school building committee votes it next week uh to the msba we have um estimates both from the contractor and the our um The Architects estimator that have been reconciled and come in at a 100,000 a little more than 100,000 I can't remember the exact amount underneath uh budget for the project so we're pleased with that we're hoping that it may come in even more once we do go out to bid but that uh first they'll be 90% um estimates and Reconciliation and then it would go out to bid uh they're estimating it'll go out to bid in sometime uh late fall uh early winter um the article 97 is moving along also there was a meeting a meeting a um tabling event at the peer school um um end of the year picnic which had many of the residents in the area plus the school at that event there were probably about 600 people there um and the table people were coming up to it and asking questions getting information Etc um that's part of the article 97 process along with the two other meetings that were posted and people could come to and ask questions um trying to think what else of import they will start putting up fencing and stuff as of July I think 8th 5th or eth no not the fifth 8th the following week um and secure the building so that people can't get into it and cause any kind of damage not that the building's going to stay but you don't want people in there uh in the meantime um there will be a newsletter that goes out to anybody who wants it but especially to the neighbors uh in the area notifying them a week ahead of time or two weeks ahead of time of what's planned uh the understanding is that the um in order to take down the bridge uh over School Street School Street will need to be closed their thoughts are to do it during the summer when the traffic is less and do it on the Saturday um that's still in process but that's that's the Hope um what did I leave out anything um go ahead let me just continue on article 97 I did have a chance to speak with um representative Vito who said it is moving along it's come out of committee and there were like three processes that happened and there's another five or six that still need to happen but he seemed to be optimistic that this is going to happen by July 31st Andy what did I I forget I don't think you forgot anything as far as I know oh okay um Val is there something you would like to say about Driscoll sure um so Driscoll is moving along full seem ahead uh geothermal continues to be drilled and with students departing the building on Tuesday um they'll be uh working really at 110% on completing the geothermal and beginning work on the field um and the Landscaping so uh knockwood uh the commissioning of geothermal should be done in early September um discussions now are on uh solar for the building uh moving forward and um transitioning over to uh geothermal as a primary after the wells are commissioned and Helen do you have any update from building commission that yeah um so the um gilbane was saying that September 19th was their substantial completion date correct um and that um they had all the wells drilled already but four I think still needed yeah four and um that that was about it there's still contingency money and we didn't have any change orders I don't think this time from Driscoll there is a question about putting in humps on westborne Terrace that apparently has come up traffic calming traffic calming on the Westborn side there's a difference between a bump and a hump the high school has humps uh there are some places in town where there are bumps that you just hit the bottom of your car on that's the difference uh so they're wider um softer and um but they were talking about three which seems a little bit excessive on such a small Street my opinion but I don't live on that street so I don't know I I think there's concern about uh the field access and how many folks are going to be accessing from that side and and student safety it it came up really uh through the community and uh with more activity happening on that side it had been really quiet Westborn had been a really quiet side of of Driscoll for 100 plus years and um it's it's really activated now and so there's some concern uh among families about traffic calming on that side I think it has to go to the transportation board is my understanding even yes and it's not clear that it should be a project cost as opposed to a DPW cost so right there more to come on that one Speaking of traffic control I don't remember Helen whether you ever updated this committee about um the select board's reversal of the T board's decision about very much the C cut and the garage I didn't because I didn't it should have last time um so the transportation there was a neighborhood group who appealed to the select board about the decision of the transportation board to the Transportation board had originally I did do it because I was showing the streets I did talk about it last time okay that's why I remember because I was about to I couldn't remember what you'd said at which meeting thank you but but I think the the question is still ongoing and it may be something at some point that we want to weigh in on because it just it doesn't seem to make sense to me yeah I mean today we heard quite a bit from our principal at Pierce about the D posed to students by forcing every single car to go through the Washington Street entrance in and out at the same time as all of our students are trying to get to pierce by the same route yeah yeah it's it's not you know for the functioning of the school in the town um and the functioning of Washington Street because what it does is it puts all the traffic onto Washington Street as opposed to dividing it up presently there are four ENT entrances to the garage four entrance two entrances and two exits and this would limit it to one entrance and exit in the same place going so there's a there's a Washington Street entrance and exit now uh no what happens is you come in through Washington Street you go out underneath Pier school and sometimes they open both sides so you can go out both ways but in the morning it's all in that way out the other way and the school has one entrance and exit and this really limits it in many ways and you know there there are a number of issues in terms of why this is not a great idea it's you can't go in the school Street entrance to the garage now I mean I've never parked to which garage the peer school no that's the way they go in oh okay that there's a circle and one goes to one side the Town garage to the other side the school and that entrance won't exist with the new building and so everything will be forced to go through that little entrance by the library between between the library and Town Hall but currently all the cars go in School Street no there's also Washington for the school or F Town well or either one just all the cars no there's two now yeah thank you so there's one entrance to the school and one entrance to the town garage they're separate this would put them together got it there are many thank you and and the thing that uh we the schools only asked for the curb cut to be able to have the garage have a second egress and entrance um the Transportation board were the ones who decided to eliminate a left turn lane that I think sparked most of the issues for the residents because then they were concerned if you can't make left onto cyp uh School Street traffic would go up towards Auburn Street uh further up and make that left so that's just to give everybody the the background so you know if somebody comes and talks to you about it what the issues are the um Architects are looking at it um it's costing us $63,000 to redesign that area because of the elimination of the um the sidewalk gets smaller that's the other piece in terms of safety Jamie was talking about that the sidewalk in front of the um AO the multi-purpose room and the gym gets is what it is presently which is a very narrow sidewalk for such a big school so all right Suzanne curriculum oh and wait one other thing uh June 20th at 4 o'clock we have a a capital subcommittee meeting where we will be discussing summer work and other items okay curriculum met on May 21st uh some of the items that they're working on in OTL uh they were having a final meeting with the hill on their literacy review uh they're ready for summer school uh they're looking they we talked a little bit about curriculum and and of course the recommendations and it would then culminate in the literacy plan that we saw tonight um and they're talking about screeners for Literacy for grades four to six and possibly uh screeners and diagnostics for math those are just kind of big generic topics we spent some time on the grade nine English class um this year they have five sections next year of the um homogeneous classes or heterogeneous classes I want to say uh sorry and next year they have 10 sections already signed up so the students are signing up for this class um and they're going to continue to see how that goes they'll probably come back and talk to us maybe in January uh to see how that's going um um and then we talked a little bit about World Language there's a task force and 6 to 12 um there's an action plan they're having a review with there's 11 recommendations uh we haven't really gone through all of it yet are talking about professional development for World Language assessments schedules uh particularly uh 6 through 8 uh and talk about the Seal of biliteracy that we've talked about maybe offering and how we could get there um their priorities in Ro language is to think about thematic units um next year the next nine years they want to develop four backwards designed units for each grade level it's taking them a long time they're taking it slowly I'm sure they'll get it right can you repeat that last thing again Suzanne backward design sorry thank you yeah so yeah they went thematic units uh for they want to design over the next nine years they want to develop four backward going backwards like what do we want at the end and then you go forward to see how you're going to teach it how you design it for each gra grade level and they're going to do two units per year it's going to take them a while I'm not sure why it's going to take so long but maybe once they get one or two under their belt they'll move a little faster I don't know um excuse me and they talked about PD for World Language scheduling again we talked about having uh World language teachers possibly having common planning time time uh looking at their duties and their workload I think we heard that tonight from our public comment um and also role of world language teachers their importance looking to see could grade six go to five times a week viewed more as a specialist and a or more of a core language um and then doing some differentiation again keeping in mind that some of our students come in already bilingual but they went to improve that and uh knowing that students will be at different levels as as they come up through the grades uh so that was our conversation on the 21st um we are not having uh a meeting in uh June no so thank you for everyone who's on the committee this year it was a good year they've done a whole lot of work in OTL that's for sure Helen so I'm wondering if there was and maybe you'd said it and I didn't hear it any discussion about any data that we could get about the um unleveled classes both the social studies and the did you say something and I just it just went by me no we didn't talk about specific but we did talk about that there would be some need for um you know take looking at data looking at how many go into honors class the next year uh who's signing up for the classes uh how the teachers are feeling about how the students are feeling about how the parents are feeling about so there's there'll be some data collection um as they come back to us okay and they felt like they got because that was one of their questions they right right well we had we had Stephen with us and Sarah some others um and so you guys gave them a little bit Yeah they I think they're going to come back to us some more okay thank you all right Sarah any updates on De we're going to look for a date for this summer to sort of do an overview and a look forward and then start setting the topics for the next year great um Finance Mariah so um I think we've already previewed the finance committee's um activities through end of the month and then what will be going on um possibly in early July the other thing I'll just mention is that um I believe Betsy will be reaching out to the subcommittee members to look at scheduling I think two meetings in July and one in August so that fingers crossed we can finally get through the redo of the finance policy that's the big plan for the summer and that's my update thank you uh Val government relations no new update since last week uh hopefully we have an update in mid July on the final budget Suzanne negotiations we met this week with the beu to talk about beep um we're getting closer but we're not there yet we hope to meet again next week it's been confirmed we're meeting on Thursday of next week all right thank you uh Stephen policy we met um this week last week recently this week this week thanks with um masc field director for Brookline uh Jim Hardy who came and gave us treat it was like a workshop and he he um he helped set our expectations about what a policy subcommittee could and should be doing and what are some good practices in Massachusetts policy sub activity um one major takeaway I think for all of us was that uh policy subcommittees ought to be turning over their entire policy manual with more frequency than we have um he suggested doing it every two two to three years so it's a goal for this policy subcommittee to start the process of going through the entire policy handbook one section at a time um um and making some slow and steady progress um another thing we learned is that maybe maybe only some of us learned it maybe the rest of you know this is that the masc does a review for legal compliance of um District policies for a fee it has a bunch of feed services but that was when I thought the the full committee might be interested in learning about for $3,500 uh for the first year a $950 per year thereafter they will continue to review District policies for uh requ for compliance with state law and statute and other requirements um and there are some just in a cursory review he found some of our policies that were out of compliance um what else are some highlights that's it it was devoted to that Workshop we asked a lot of questions another I think another point for me was that he stressed for us that the school committee should be reviewing uh policy handbooks per School uh that's a practice that I think we are not practicing so I think we should um and if in a in the next meeting I'd like to per conversation with you Dr gillery talk about how to engage better with the school leaders especially surfacing what issues they see as pressing and how the subc commmittee could best respond to them but also respond to them on what process would be best for them in uh reviewing school-based policies so anything else from the those who were there on what they thought was an important point to bring out at that meeting has her hand Mariah well before we go to let's just any other points from the meeting that people want to raise I thought that it might be worth repeating when you asked um about how sometimes things end up in policy because um they're generated from the community and we weren't sort of sure if that's the best way to decide that that we need a new policy at that time did you feel like you got a an understanding after asking that question um so what Sarah's referring to is I was asking questions about agenda setting and um I I was interested in I I I had said that I felt that the in the past the policy subcommittee was very responsive to community pressure for better and for worse and I was looking to to strike more of a balance between um policies driven by Community advocacy but also policies that were responsive to a school based needs and I was looking for good practices on how to set policy agenda other than turning through the entire policy handbook which it looks like that will take up a lot of time on the policy subcommittee um and I think the answer was just to Simply um work with the administration to engage the school based leaders if you can finally get the finance section updated that will be wonderful that's yeah I I think if we I agree with youy 1982 that was the last time a lot of it was done so I don't think us there are some that are older there are some that are old from the 70s too so Mariah had her hand up and then Helen unless you were responding directly to Stephen Helen I was responding directly okay well why don't you go ahead so one of the things I took away was less is more you know in terms of policy that we really need to sort of think through you know is this something that is really critical that we need in order to run the schools or whatever I mean that was one of the things I took away two things one um is Stephen maybe we could um and I'll follow up with you separately the um the policy on life or I can't get it right now what the policy is called but the draft policy that's life of the school outside of the school day if there's some opportunities to talk with masc about polic like first off compliance with the law and also policies that may Exist Elsewhere because they have such a great overview of what that looks like and then the second thing is that one thing that I don't know if this is a policy thing but maybe it could be is um the actual medium by which our policies are shared and the town is just switching over its bylaws to can't remember the name of the of the platform but it's one that's specifically designed for policy and bylaws and so we might want to and I don't think it's very expensive and it might be an opportunity for us to um have policies that are more accessible and manageable for um BR up yeah that was actually explicitly Docket in the meeting as policy accessibility and I wanted to raise the topic of um good practices and electronic dissemination of policy documents so knowing that the town has is moving to a new system was really good to know the zoning bylaw has already been transferred and the town bylaw I believe I heard it town meeting will be transferred like complete in August so I believe Ben cman is overlooking or overseeing the town bylaws so he might be a great resource for you to thank you it would be great to connect offline on that topic because I asked Dr Giller if if a PSP resource could be put towards it over the next couple of years but also we tried to figure out what what the price of Contracting or masc would be to do it through them but definitely a goal that I've got for the policy subcommittee over the next year is to figure out how to make our policy simply more accessible that's the know has done an amazing job with what what we've got so far but taking it to the the next level so that um Beyond scan PDF so that it's all electronically searchable and browsable and very user friendly and I think that this new software actually allows you to like some way that people understand layer revisions of overtime so that you can see what's been changed and when um in a very I don't know how it works I haven't seen it I've just heard great things about it so great for to get the details that's great all right addition just and I am looking to schedule one summer meeting of the policy subcommittee with the administration's availability and Helena saw your hand up yes um so I forgot one piece on my because you rushed me there I rushed me um the um there was a visit to the Baldwin School by the preservation commission to look at what has been done and what we're planning on doing they were supposed to get back to the um Building Commissioner within a day or two with their recommendations um and we are hopeful that they did that because we need to move staff in by the end of July so that was that happened this week I can't remember which day now um that's it all right Monday it was Monday thank you I am aware that I have not yet made uh the updated liaison assignments since the committee turned over I I'll be doing that soon and we'll be checking in with everyone before finalizing just one more subcommittee Le one more subcommittee update um the uh the sustainability and climate uh task force met in person for the first and probably only time last week no this week last weekend for a for a 4-Hour Workshop in which each of the subgroups uh shared out and workshopped their recommendations that they'll present to the full committee whenever we're able to dock at it in the fall and um each group has done an awful lot of work um meeting with stakeholders of every kind to determine what um actionable and viable recommendations might be considered by the school committee so just I'm really excited for these for these teams they've really put a lot of work into it Stephen what will be the sort of work product of all this it'll be uh presentations to I what I'd like to propose are Workshop presentations to specific subcommittees to uh work through some of the recommendations a little bit further and then one full presentation to the full committee during which uh specific recommendations will be made for the school committee's consideration for adoption that they might be policy considerations Financial considerations or other considerations but um they will be made with an eye to their um to their to how reasonable the actions will be with the understanding that there are very severe constraints on our budget are you also looking at a written report the written report no the report will be the PowerPoint just the PowerPoint okay yeah there are there's and and how sort of several years on from that of I think what's left is is a written report that you know people still go back to and so if you want to really memorialize it that might be the way okay good feedback Thanks Candy especially for things something that you know things might might not be implementable right away but people want to keep coming back and thinking about when times change like the BAC recommendations I think it's really valuable to have a written report and not just a PowerPoint thanks um any other Le on reports and updates all right any new business Carolyn um thanks so first of all like what typically falls under new business I've only heard one new business which was I think um Jesse just like talked about something last week so like yeah it wasn't something that it wasn't something that never happened much before before now a great question uh maybe Betsy knows more about this than I do my understanding is simply that it's um something that somebody wants to bring up but hasn't really been docketed and we don't have like a full fleshed out discussion of it at the time but it's a way of raising the topic okay perfect Betsy is there more to be said about it okay I mean I think the way Jesse used it last time was was quite appropriate right okay then I do have something that would be I'll follow that go ahead yeah I would love to um talk about Community engagement kind of generally I feel like in the past like preco there were sometimes like School visits q&as we did q&as during covid which were tough but you know you guys did them they were on Zoom um so yeah as a longtime parent and a Community member and now a school Committee Member and and having just campaign so I talked to tons of people um I think there's a desire for that and I think there's a a need for that some kind of system um and I'd be willing to I don't know like propose something or maybe we can talk about it in the summer workshop yeah this is something that I think is talked about every summer at the workshop and we always write down sort of a set of things that we want to do that year and most of them don't actually happen I want I want to dispute Andy I want to dispute that characterization which is we've okay some of them don't actually happen well we talk about aspirational things and some of them we do and some of them we don't we don't say we're doing all these things but I do think that there's room for doing more things and yes I believe it's on the summer workshop I think we made a lot of progress in communicating out but we've made less progress in actually getting in the schools and having real dialogue with people I would say we did go to schools this year but again this is a topic that's coming up yeah summer workshop yeah why don't we talk about it summer workshop yeah do is there an agenda for the workshop that is not yet um we're kind of assembling things that will be part of it yeah it's it's it's pretty much the same topics most years um can I just add um that I would love for people to take a look through the the revised Communications and engagement Norms that I I drafted in May um as just as a starting point before the workshop um because it I I tried to take what what Mariah and I had drafted and Nancy had drafted I don't know however long ago that was and tried to update it um because I think it at least reflects where we were last when we tried to think it through it it's linked on the email response calendar and I think you and I were or I I it's on my to-dos to actually look at it because not everyone can provide you feedback outside of the um except for Val and Mariah you can't write on it without violating o Open meeting law so just Val and Mariah can comment on it directly but if the rest of you can um mull it and one of the things that has to happen soon is to decide who's going to be on this communication subgroup that we maintain it's not an official subcommittee but it's Andy I didn't realize you hadn't sent out Liaisons I thought you'd sent out Liaisons at the same time you sent out committees no I wish I had but I did not no I did the subcommittees right away because that urgent and then the Liaisons I haven't done yet so I'll be doing that soon and checking in with everybody yeah um all right any other new business seeing none we can move to our proposed executive session so I mov to meet an executive session pursuant to Mass General laws chapter 30A section 21A for the following purposes purpose three to discuss strategy with respect to collective bargaining with the beu unit a and Par professional unit if an open meeting may have a detrimental effect on the bargaining and litigating position of the public body and the chair so declares and purpose two to discuss strategy with respect to negotiations with non-union Personnel do I have a second second I heard Carolyn first um all right Carolyn yes Sarah yes Suzanne yes Helen yes stevenh yes Mariah yes Val yes and I vote Yes as well so we will not be returning to open session thank you and good night recording stopped