##VIDEO ID:AKvyS-RMIKE## for the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge aliance to the flag un United States of America and to the repic for it stands one nation under God indivisible with liy and justice for all thank you uh this meeting is being live streamed by CHC Tel media and posted a CPS website for interested community members to access and watch inperson public participation will be taking place tonight in accordance with the Chums school committee public participation policy anyone speaking tonight during the public input portion of this meeting has notified the superintendent's office of the desire to speak and been provided with these guidelines upon request written comments received no later than 12:00 p.m. on the day of this meeting will also be read and made part of the record of of the meeting during the second public input session so welcome to this meeting of the CHC school committee uh first order bus to approve our minutes from our meeting on August 20th I make a motion that we approve the minutes of the regular school committee meeting of August 20th 2024 second second anybody have any rections for the minutes okay all those in favor of approval I any extensions one abstention um is she's joining us remotely tonight okay so she's going to take the minutes and have them for our next meeting but she's just not physically with us Perfect all right uh I guess student rep's next meeting they're going to join us on the 17th so they'll be here the next meeting great all right so uh good news we have any good news to share well I'm not going to take Dr Lang Thunder but I'm just letting you know that we had a great opening to the school year so we are excited to see everybody back in the buildings and the buildings are humming and you know it's good to see people and kids and all sorts of fun things happening okay anybody else have any good news Jing right along in school some people work at home so I see it's good news for you work from all right um I don't see anybody for public comment so I guess we can move on to new business sure thank you and welcome everyone tonight um first is just kind of a verbal uh little report we do each start of the school year just letting you know um how things went and as I had emailed previously we really had a very um good opening for the uh for the school year it's hard to believe we're already in week three um of school so we're we're back in session it was great seeing the kids um come that first week right before uh Labor Day our teachers came back that m day and had a full day of kind of professional development and getting uh the rooms prepped for the arrival of the kids on Tuesday our kids came back Tuesday Wednesday Thursday we took the long Labor Day weekend so last week we kind of gradual uh gradually got into a 4- day week and then now we're back into full five-day week schooling so that has really worked well for us as um as we do with any given year obviously there are little logistical issues that we work through when it comes to um you know either busing or Transportation or assignments within buildings but it's it's really working out um honestly fairly uh fairly well and smoothly it's been a very good uh opening um one of the other thing that's been a little surprising is usually at the start of the school year um we got a number of parents that come to still continue to enroll in uh in school but it's as Jane was reporting it's been very quiet we had a rush before the start of the school year there were a steady group of uh families coming to register their um students but now that the school year has begun on that front it's actually been um quiet and uh which is obviously helpful for us management wise to be able to get the kids right into school and get them into home rooms and get U them getting their relationships with kids going um overall our transportation has been going fairly well in the district um first couple of days we actually started out with full buses and then uh we ended up a couple of days having um less drivers so having to double up some runs which you know unfortunately we're used to having to do uh based on driver availability but um um folks in town seem to be getting acclimated to the bus stops to the times the first couple of days you know it's long if you're out on North Road and you forgot it was school you know those buses are stoping every it seems like few feet to to pick up kids but it's actually every few streets to pick up kids and um the town has adjusted so uh so that has gone very well um Staffing wise overall uh we're very fortunate that we're able to um kind of lock in over the last week and a half our last couple of vacancies that we had open in the district um one of the positions I know I reported last time that was still open was the psychologist position at Center and um we actually had the three psychologists to fill this year which is very tough in any given year even to have to fill one is tough but we were originally able to hire um two great new psychologists to the district and we were able to actually hire a third um just the week school was starting so obviously they had to do a little bit of transition with the district um but they're going to be coming on board I believe next um next week Joanna next week okay Joanna's ging me the look so they're coming on board very soon uh but the uh but that position is filled and then um again teaching and professional staff in the district we're full at this point we have obviously a few folks that are on long-term leaves for uh for different reasons but we have long-term Subs in those roles we still have a handful of support staff that we're hiring um at all the different buildings our par professional par educator staff um often It's Not Unusual oftentimes at this point in the year sometimes those individuals are looking for full-time teaching positions and they may get something um at the end of the school year so it's not unusual for that to happen um but on a positive note we are seeing applicants to our positions it just takes a little bit of time to on board to do the fingerprints have been running a little bit slow these days cories have been okay um but all in all I actually feel uhu feel pretty positive about uh the level of of Staffing in the district um families have been excellent at the schools again the first couple of days when the kids have been coming and uh you get to see them particularly the elementary kids are really cute when they're coming to school to get started middle and high school has gone um well as well so all in all very good opening of school I know at our last school committee meeting we kind of made the rounds afterward to take a look at some of the capital projects that were uh coming to a close and I'm still making very good progress on uh on those I know one that was a kind of a concern for all of us was the um kitchen at the high school and uh that is still kind of coming to a close we had our weekly construction meeting uh today um the equipment has all arrived over the course of the last week and a half it's all being installed final inspections are underway um at today's meeting they reported out to us that it looks like at the end of next week um that uh kitchen will be at substantial completion all the permitting will be signed off on it they'll be turning it over to us for training on the new equipment and whatnot so we're about another week away from fully opening up that kitchen at the high school but it looks markedly different even in the two weeks since we saw it um with all the equipment and and whatnot in the kitchen so um the Food Service staff uh just a special thanks to them have been running all around the district to make things work um for these couple of weeks because we haven't been obviously cook at the kitchen so they've been doing some prep and cooking at Harrington and bringing food over um we have grills that they've been cooking on you know outside the school I got to witness that on Friday and the kids have been very Cooperative in the school as well I think they understand this is a temporary um thing that we're working through but uh the group has been able to maintain um you know overall very good options for the uh for the kids um no one is going hungry and within another week or so we should be able to have full access to that kitchen and I think the kids are really excited about that so um no all in all very good um opening of um school year or one other project we looked at was at the back the tennis courts and the basketball area um tennis courts are done fencing is up the paving went down for the back portion which is going to be the basketball and pickle ball at this point uh the top coat is going to go on probably within another week or so and then you'll start to see the painting so that'll all transpire between now and mid- October so that project would be coming to a close as well I know there's been a lot of activity back there lately if you went to maybe the football game on Friday you saw a lot of construction vehicles because they were getting ready to do um all the paving and that got done um yesterday actually at the school so again a lot going on but very happy with how the opening of um of school went and very much appreciate um you know our staff and uh the community support as we get uh get things rolling into week three so happy to answer any questions you may have and uh obviously follow up um curious the status at McCarthy the front entry way the front entry way or the different traffic pattern no the vesle thing the vesle oh the vesle that is also um wrapping up so two things actually of McCarthy note um the school decided to um change and kind of on a trial basis the traffic pattern for pickup and drop off in the school so this year buses are all going in the front and the parent pickup has been in the back I didn't know if that's what you were asking about but we now a couple of weeks into that and um we've actually seen very good Improvement on um the transition time out of the building to get the kids on the buses and ready to roll over to Parker um the first day obviously the kids are new and they're getting to meet their friends or whatnot it um you know we get out at 2:30 we try to have those buses roll at 2:40 because Parker is dismissing at 2:40 we want to get the buses over there it took us almost 20 minutes to get the buses out so we were running about 10 minutes late before they even went to Parker um it was down to 11 minutes today so the buses rolled to 241 so you know after a couple weeks at time those things work themselves out um we're going to obviously keep monitoring that um Jeff the principal is um hearing from parents about whether they like don't like and we'll see um how we're going to keep working that through at McCarthy right towards the opening of school the cement way uh right in the front of the building was completed that was key because we couldn't replace the front storefront doors until we actually had the access done so we were able to get that done before the staff and students returned um the storefront those new doors um were originally slated to come in around the middle of September um so we're just waiting on an installation date for that that'll probably have to be after hours and over a weekend um so I'm anticipating between now and probably Columbus Day is when we'll have the sore front replaced um the security area on the left um the last thing that has to be installed there is the um the fire uh alarm system the smoke detectors and things like that and then get the final building sign offs and that is all scheduled to be done next week as well so I'm thinking really within the next week or two um that should be finalized and then uh we'll be transitioning to um us utilizing that as an access point during the day as as opposed to the regular doors but the regular old system uh the way it was working is operational right now until we can shift into that um and I'll certainly report when that's done um but everything again I think we're just waiting for the smokes to go in and then get the final sign offs so by the end of this week is that extra door extra area will be complete and then that can be used already I would to be safe I would probably say by the end of next week because they have next week is the week that they're installing they have to have a fire smoke system that goes in and it all has to be wired to the alarm system but it gets you can use that before the rest of the doors oh yes we're going to use that entryway before the regular doors go in but we're still probably a week or two away from that because then the building inspector does have to do the final inspections okay but as soon as that is functional we'll start to utilize that the old doors are still working fine in the front now it's just the new ones coming in are going to be a double set of doors so it's going to be four doors instead of three and it's going to be a little bit more symmetrical that's why we had to have the cement ramp be flush over the whole area as opposed to just being a little piece of it but um that again is just going to be a coordination issue because now the kids are in the building it's loud when you actually have to go cut out the old um um entryway as well as the floor is Tazo so it's stone that goes up to it you do have to make some cuts at the stone as well so it's going to be very difficult to do during the school day so that's going to be like an after school might start it on a Friday and actually have the cruise work Saturday Sunday to have the bulk of that done over weekend um but that can maybe happen in isolation from the secure entry so as soon as the secure entry is ready to go we'll start to use it good and I'll let you know that's good yeah and are all the like the visitor identification systems in place and the other buildings I know we're going to yes so those are actually out in all the other buildings at this point so two big things on the security front those are out um we're now kind of just working through all the protocols with all the schools because this is new to them the high school had had it previously but k a didn't um so this is their first time kind of getting up to speed on that um the radio system is uh fully in place we have a new radio system that's in place in the schools those have been tested they're doing the final um adjustments that they need to so that has been um a big step um the security vesu and the secure entry was obviously a third big component um I did speak with um the Davis Group who had done the security audit for us and asked um to kind of get on their agenda for mid to late October I'd like to have them come back in and actually just look at the work that we completed to number one take a look at a next phase but I think we're also at the point where I'd like to get kind of third party eyes on our drills and things like that as we get into the school year so they're going to get me some dates to come back out and engage on that particular project um but we'll be able to show them that you know three big recommendations that they had were actually completed over the course of the summer and I want to see them all in action um so that's why we're looking for after Columbus Day weekend for for them to start doing that work I I think security is on the mind of a lot of people because of recent happenings um the technology that was used in that school M uh is something I've been getting a couple of folks asking me about and whether you know there was ever any thought of looking at I don't know if that's something that that group can uh look at and maybe we figure out if it's available what the cost is and all of that where they can immediately call police oh they have like a you have that your school no we don't I know what you're talking about though yeah they were different um what I would say is this like we obviously have used the um security Consulting Group to help us overall um because things are going to change from time to time there's always new products that come along yeah that's why I do actually go to some of the different conferences to stay up on like what is the new stuff that's happening um but if we were able to implement uh a new system we typically would vet it through the security group to just see how it would actually work in our schools with our staff um that may be one system that was successful in that particular application there could be a different system that's more successful for our application but we do rely heavily on um the Consultants to recommend those type of things but we're always looking you know we're always um you know we did upgrades to our um security camera system there are different things that that system is doing now that it didn't previously um there's different ways of us communicating with within buildings within central office within the police department during emergencies and whatnot we can overly talk about them in public um that's why we have some of these discussions in executive session but um you know we definitely can have a follow-up session with the security group um you know after we get a little bit deeper into the school year but please know that I do look for those things and I do follow up to see like what is kind of the latest and greatest and how it would potentially factor into our operation the other thing I thought that came out of it that was so important was the internal communication when somebody calls in and says you know be alerted to something so I'm glad to hear that you know you're going to have the group look at the protocols and so on because that's really important right and art rooms all done all the just punch list at this point okay so yes U they're all um completed I know there was like a doorway that still needed to some paint on it um the there was one sink that hadn't been installed the first time we had to order an additional sink so the last sink came in it was installed earlier this week so they really just punch list at this point uh minor little you know touch-up type stuff so that looks very good what I will do we don't have to do another tour of it I will do like some pictures and I'll incorporate them into a slideshow that you know we can obviously use and then even say like for town meeting if someone ever asks like what we're doing with our improvements we'll have pictures that we can show folks of the the improvements okay and just to clarify the um ID system you said that's where they show the ID and it prints out the badge correct and does every school has that now correct great yeah the k8s have never used it before so this is a new application for them so we're just rolling it out now so the staff do need to be trained and get up to speed on and kind of how to do it and how to react and whatnot but the new system will scan it scans your ID it runs against a database to make sure that someone you know shouldn't uh be able to access the school and then um obviously if all goes well it prints them a visitor badge um that they then wear when they're in the building right like the high schools had like the high schools it's a very similar system and then if something were wrong it gives the system an alert so that the administration would know at that time yeah they mentioned that chips PTO last night did they have it and yeah it's just starting to get rolled out K8 we just haven't had it at that level before but again that was another recommendation from the security group so that's why we're implementing that's great yeah and again what I'd love to do is just get all the schools on the same page as far as even like the greetings that they use when people are coming in what that screening protocol is you know if something does get flagged who's responding um so that's what we're working through right now but it should be uh it's a nice enhancement that we haven't had previously last question I was just like scheduling at middle school going well I know we kind of changed tweaked things a little bit that's going all right yeah there's been um I wouldn't say huge tweaks there's been little tweaks at both schools as far as some of the teaming Concepts have gone um yes I mean there's always little issues that have to get worked out at the beginning of the school year I know um uh Parker I haven't heard too too much from I know McCarthy was still working through some of the um the different like options the kids had for electives and some of the special education scheduling um you still need some tweaking because you have certain kids that might have um like the schedule is conducive to someone who requires Services two days a week because um everything is now working like two-day pairs but we do still have some services that require three days a week so it's just those have to be kind of hand scheduled but uh at this point in time all in all Yes um you know people are scheduled some of the complaints that I heard um well not a lot but some of them were like students didn't get electives that they requested they got different electives a lot of that just relates to the um different blocks when the classes are being run and when the kids are going to the electives that not all of them are operating at that time because you could be different staff teaching them um so I do know that you know both schools are going to continue to look at their um you know the schedules how they actually do that try to figure out there are ways for improvement but um overall they're in a pretty good place at this point any other questions about schooling it's good we don't have a lot of questions things no was honestly it was a good um good open of school great that she was knocking I know I know superstitious the other thing we have been able to do just as we switched to number two now that things are kind of getting a little more settled um I know over the course of the last couple months committee members have asked for different updates on different things in the district um Sue in particular had asked on like some PD offerings that we offer in the district so we've been able to start to kind of frontload some of the reports and um on the Google form that you all have access to I went back as far is I think the April meeting to kind of take notes to make sure I had all the different requests you had on there but uh the one we were able to knock off tonight was uh just a little bit of overview Linda is going to provide on some of our professional development opportunities for staff and over the next couple of weeks too we'll have additional reports that have been requested but this was the first one we were able to uh to accomplish so I will turn it over to Linda okay so yes um I like that I say this is a brief overview even though it's 20 five or 26 slides but you know more like 23 by the time we get through the first one and the last one so um yes and this is actually timely because next week is our first professional half day so please be looking at the school calendars if you're watching right now to be sure that um you know that there's a half day next Wednesday and you look at the times for the schools so I wanted to start off just kind of like rooting us in our philosophy of professional development so we really do believe in having like a variety of options for PD there's not like just a one-size fits-all there's certain things that we have to do but then you know how else can teachers access PD based on on their years of experience and needs at the same time so really it's all things that promote changes and instructional practices and are good for students and children in our schools so um this is just um you know I well I was already gave you the purpose I guess but um part of the um pieces for professional development there's requirements that we have to do all school districts have to provide professional development for their teachers right we're a PD provider so it's required but beyond the requirements is really just making sure that our teachers have like the highest quality professional development to move them forward and also to keep their certifications in order um it's a it helps us with decision-making models how what is important what aligns with our strategic plan and why we're actually doing it this is just a snapshot so this is this years professional development it has all of the dates in there and then we divide them up between building and content so that we can build out like if we have speakers coming in if there's something a building is working on for an initiative if there's something the whole district is working on for an initiative so this at least gives all the teachers an idea of okay these are the actual professional development days they we put these in all of their drives so that they know what days and how they're planning and then if they're going to be reporting to their departments or if they're going to be working with their principles there's two pieces in here for both Elementary and now Middle School that two of the professional days actually are for the conferences so we do lose the Elementary Middle School teachers for a little bit of time after the November 5th full day but then we bring them back into the fold for professional development starting in January so conferences are still happening and those are the two dates of the conferences for the teachers yes quick question uh Blended learning here is that the content that they're learning about or is that the method they are engaging with um it's it's it's a little bit of bow right so um typically we just put like that that's going to be a you know a Content day but Blended learning is just some of the things that they wanted to focus on for that January PD but they're not accessing it in a blended way like it's not like at home High they're just learning no no no they're actually physically in the building what's the focus of next week's so next week um It's a combination so the schools are working on some of those roles of the par the new I AP and then um we have like a new program it's called near pod so it's a way for teachers to actually access additional lessons if they need to um you know focus in on something specific or they need to retach so the technology department is going to help them understand the new near pod system to access what's it called near Pod near pod yeah and it's it's actually pretty good if you needed a quick lesson on something you can pull it up like we have our teacher toolkit for our math and um ELA teachers but this is for every content area so everybody could pull up an additional lesson if they wanted to teach it or Focus in on this product it's actually it's really good like I I actually used it last year when I was teaching Spanish um and you you can find any Topic in there and it's super fast it has the power points that you can walk through and then tweak if you'd like to tweak them so they're going to be doing a little bit of a combination of the um that technology piece and then also the work that we're doing around the roles of pars and the new IEP and this is is just a snapshot of the grid that we use so there's one for every single professional development day and the reason we have it broken down by all of the different um content areas is that anybody that we call them loow incident teachers um so there's just not a lot of them there's been times and I'm sure you know some of us sitting at this table can um attest to it where you've sat in professional development that has really nothing to do with what you actually do so we want to make sure that when we're developing those days that everybody's accounted for and they know what is going to be happening because it may be a building day where everybody's doing the same thing but then it may not so we want to make sure that all of our content teachers have an idea of what is happening what the focus is going to be where they're going and who's responsible for it so that we don't leave uh you know a set of nurses learning about math because it's really not going to help those nurses at that time and we do it for every single day so um one of the things we do and I'll be talking about course reimbursement as well is and we've been offering this for several years is we have an articulation agreement with pitchburg State University and we try to offer a graduate level class in chelsford that is very low cost I gave you an example of this year's um um graduate level class and it's the one on Project based learning I gave you two work um sheets so what's great about this is that it's our staff teaching our teachers so the staff has to go through a process with fitzburg state to become basically an adjunct faculty member member and they are allowed to then teach the course within our district our teachers can take it they can take it for pdps only which would be 67.5 pdps or they can pay $295 to receive three graduate credits it's a deal of the century so and we'll take any of our staff members that want to learn about it and what's great about this new one which is Project based learning so it doesn't matter what your content area is once they get the um teachers that have signed up for the course they will be able to then um basically differentiate the course depending on the content area of the teachers so that's this is a really great one we like the ones that you know get a broad spectrum it's not just focused on like say history teachers or because we did one on Civics and that was really just focused on the history teachers this one is any teacher in the district and what the teachers do is we have a um a course Builder within Aspen which is our student management system and you'll see the directions on there the teachers go on they have a PD plan within Aspen they log on sign up for the course then we know who's in the actual courses and we house it for their pdps and then they if they want the fitzburg credit they sign up with fitzburg pay the 295 and when they finish the course and receive their they receive a grade on a transcript they'll have their three um graduate level credit classes which is you know a because typically a UMass class is about ,7 $1,800 it's $295 for three credits so we like doing these we like to offer one at least once a year if not twice one of the big pushes we did um was when we had our one to1 initiative and we did a lot more for everybody but then Co hit and everybody really learned about technology that year so um we were able to then shift onto another one the different um courses that you see up there just things that we've offered in the past four years just to give you an idea of what we've been doing and then I bolded the Project based learning because that's the one that's actually people signing up for as we speak and then moving on so new to chumford um so our relationship with um UMass L which is a great relationship for many different reasons they are offering a graduate certificate program in diversity equity and inclusion and um uh Dr Lang I don't know if you know how many teachers have signed up I know we can have up to 15 I don't know if we have all 15 in that that group uh we have a u the first cohort is um 11 so we have 11 teachers who participating in this um can I give a little bit of back you can give I was going to go through the overview but no so um this actually kind of came as just an option for our teachers um who wanted to take like a Step Beyond some of the ideas work that we had done you know how the the committee did and the building level and we had some teachers that obviously wanted to continue to to talk about practice so UMass L um has partnered with us on different um uh programs and they offered to work with us to create a specific four um course graduate certificate that uh the students will get um what's unique about this is we kept it to be a cohort of just Chumps for teachers so it was only open to Chumps for teachers we negotiated A reduced rate on the um the tuition for the uh for the our teachers who wanted to do this and the district obviously is contributing each of the teachers um pays $500 for participation in the course which as Linda mentioned you know a course is close to $1,800 UMass LW so it's a reduced rate it's offered by one of the UMass LW professors on site here in chel so we're actually operating at McCarthy because we had a number of students from m not a student a number of staff from McCarthy and it was just an easy Central Point for the others to come to but our first cohort is 11 so um they actually decided to Tak a course last spring I forget which one they took but they took one of the courses and then they were actually set to begin next week so when they' done this they're obviously getting a certificate from um ums those courses would count toward for the degree if they wanted to and it also counts for credit for us towards advancement on the salary scale so um and this was again just a a more kind of extensive offering for those folks in the district who wanted to take some of the Dei training a step further so um you know if this works out well and we get continue to get good interest you know we potentially could do additional cohorts of different certificates with UMass but this is one where um we launched just last spring and what's nice is they'll be completed by Fall 2025 so corre you know it will be over and they have the four classes that they take the three that up front of the ones that everyone will take and then they get to choose from one elective course that those three that are underneath there starting with methods of teaching students with moderate disabilities so that's amazing and we Yeah we actually get to decide the fourth course so what we wanted to do is the first three are locked in because that's part of their approved program but then we're going to have the um teachers actually have some input into which they'd like the fourth to be because they have to take it as a cohort but there's like a menu that we can select from so we're going to work with the teachers to figure out which they may like to do but I'm EXC about this for good things back to you all right back to me so um ongoing to for professional development is always workshops and training so when you have a new curriculum adoption you always have a focus on that and really um beyond the original group of teachers that have had training we also focus in on like our new teachers that have have just joined us so for example um I actually just got received the list today and we're signing um some of the teachers up that are new to the district on the foundations training because you don't want to put a program in or do any of like the platforms that we have and then it just kind of runs its course and it's like we kind of do that anytime a new teacher comes in we train the new teachers because they it's it's kind of hard for the mentor to do it all alone so um if we have a ccum adoption we continue with that type of workshop and training our online platforms we do a continuous piece with that so if we have a large group of teachers that come in that are new to our district we'll do a um training again on I ready and we can do it like the advanced piece of it or the brand new for the new teachers and then any type of required workshops that are necessary like we have the new IEP so we've been spending sending the special ed teachers to training for that with one of our vendors to in order to get all the information they need to do their job so workshops and training ongoing and it's at different levels based on if it's a larger group or if it's just we're focusing on on on your teachers and then we always have the option this is a great op option for anyone that really wants to go a little bit deeper into um a topic that they need they're interested in they want to apply towards their learning which is a book study group so we take proposals for book study groups I have a form that they go through and they propose what they're going to do what they're going to read how they're going to break it down and then how they're going to apply it to their current practices and like what their product would be and once they go through that process and if there's any costs associated with it usually it's can you pay for the books which of course they'll pay for the books so anyone can put this proposal in it could be a teacher could be an administrator could be a group of teachers and then they can learn what they would like to learn as a group just exactly what it is it's a book study group that they go through and they usually do it for about maybe five we typically try to stay like between five and eight weeks because you don't want to like lose momentum and you also want to be able to apply towards it and then how many pdps would be associated with the time to to read to do the you know um the book time together and then to create what they're going to do for their product and apply to their classroom and then they can have pdps for that so that's always a that's always a good one because the teachers really like to do that work because it's they get to choose right it's something that they want to do it's not just put on them and then one of the um we've been doing this for a while too so part of your recertification in Massachusetts requires you to you have to bundle your pdps together in groups of 10 so it doesn't have to be the 10 of the same um Workshop or training but you have to have 10 on the same to 10 to 15 on the same topic and one of the requirements that's big is that you have to have at least 15 pdps bundled together for SE which is the sheltered English immersion piece and for special education so we always try to put together these online asynchronous five-week sessions and people have discussion boards and they can do it if it's 2 o'clock in the mornings what time they want to do it that's great if they want to do it later at night earlier in the afternoon and do we give them a certain amount of time to complete it and we put we have like either an administrator or a teacher in charge of them and that's the other example that you'll see that's the sped module that I gave you um where they are monitoring it working with the discussion boards asking questions it's like running PD but virtually and asynchronously so people can both learn something new and also meet the requirements for their certification so we've bundled it together for them and these are some of our current um sessions that are running for this fall and and again we'll probably repeat these because some of them are new for the spring because some teachers it's good for them to take it in the fall but they may not have time in the fall they rather take it in the spring so we give them the option and again they sign up through our Aspen system and then the facilitator of that PDP module we'll contact them and run the PD for them for the 5we session and issue them the PD and that's always been a good one because people get I think nervous around this recertification piece they like how am I going to get these because the seven days that we have for PD is not going to meet your certification requirements you have to do something above and beyond for your certification within the fiveyear cycle that you have for recertification how many people take advantage of this a lot like sometimes sometimes you getting the emails like I know that you filled it up but can you take one more and of course we're like sure we'll take one more so we try to cap it at like 20 25 we've had times where it's 30 people but where it's asynchronous I mean nobody's ever going to say no or if it's too unwieldy we're like we'll open up another session because they're five weeks long and you know it's not going to hurt we just need to designate the time and we don't want to open up another session and it's only like one or two people because then you have no one to have a discussion with but yourself so about how many courses do you have available for doing well right now for running okay yeah yep oh these four oh the four that's right there I see it now yes four of them are running so those are the current sessions that went out and I gave you just an example of one of them um it's the second flyer that I gave you so that's just an example of the description and what they so they all all the teachers received all the flyers I just didn't print out every flyer for you so I saw the one about the Universal Design SEI it says it doesn't provide the Desi um endorsement how did teacher how do new teachers get that desie sheltered English immersion so a lot of them have already come to us with it so any new teachers as of 2016 it's part of every um education training program teach training so after that big push and you were part of the big push we all were where I think I ran 95 sessions of SEI through the state through their um platform so once we got the bulk of the people certified all new teachers are typically coming in with that endorsement they have to it's part of their education program the only people that have to end up taking it is say somebody took some time off child rearing did something different they come back in they have one year to go and take the course and get that that se pitchburg or something like that yep and that SEI endorsement is on is is a oneand done once you have it it sticks with you you don't have to recertify but every fiveyear cycle if you have a professional license you have to do at least 15 pdps in SEI to keep you know current where this where is this one that you handed out to us correct so we right we never want anyone that may have you know came back into the education field to think oh I'm just going to take this at the beginning there was still people that were still outstanding with it but we don't want them to feel as though they've been sent down the wrong path of of information so we always let them know this does not count towards that it counts towards your recertification but I would have to say I don't I don't even know anyone that doesn't have the SEI endorsement that's working in the district you have it even even Dr Lang has it we all have it we we all took for it was great any other question Mar question oh I'm sorry did you have a question it says faculty created so it means a faculty member creates this yes so the one that you're looking at right now it's um we broke it up into the different content areas to add a little twist to it so it was just a generic one but that's actually all the department coordinators so I'll put stuff out faculty can create these courses or administrators do that I will say that the department coordinators do a lot more of them because that's part of their job um so it's faculty creative meeting they create the course the sessions that you do so they you we use our Google Classroom we set up the course and it's like modules so the teachers click on the first module and then there's it's like taking any online class what you would do what you're supposed to read how you're supposed to respond any type of Reflections so it's it's based on what they decided they should read it could be an article it could be part of a book that we buy that they're doing different chapters in so that's what I mean by faculty created it's somebody inhouse that's created it we didn't purchase it we don't have somebody from the outside coming in and teaching it it's our people's the people that offer get paid s for for so I give them a stien to create the first set of it and then I give them a smaller stien to like monitor it when it's going and then any additional sessions that they monitor they get that smaller stien and that all comes from the professional development it all comes through yes I I pay them through my title to a grant okay and so and then we keep these modules they're ours they're always ours right so like for the special education one um a teacher who no longer works for us she had created the first one but like we had the module as a base so that when somebody else took it over they could go in and you know add to it tweak tweak it change it all together but we own these they sit in our school district um Google classrooms so if it was to be used again and by a different faculty member the they might simply be monitoring the feedback part and the discussion because the course itself is already going to is done it's done good that's nice yeah and we can change we'll build up a library of offerings this way exactly nice you always want somebody though to monitor it because you can't just say go on and do this by yourself because right you know what are you getting from that there has to be some type of interaction and and a point person to ask questions to yeah good you have it as a face but you might tweak it oh yeah we change it like if we want to add a different reading to it but the the the initial stien that's paid is to build the main course if you want to switch out an article you're not going to suddenly get a whole new like brand new stien for that how do people come to do they just come to you and say okay I want to create a module no um I put it out to everybody and then whoever is interested in doing we put it part as our as part of our PD survey too like are you interested in participating on the PD committee are you interested in creating a module and it has to be a topic that you know is going to reach out to a lot of people it can't be just like three of my friends really want to study this that that's something they should do in a book group right that would be a different way to do PD and that's a little less I think people get a little nervous because they think they're like teaching but I'm like no it's asynchronous it's you're just monitoring um the discussion boards clarifying if somebody has questions um if somebody's not logging on you know hi what's going on are you okay you a little check-in but um no we and I put it out there and then I wait to see what I get for a response some of these ones that you're seeing right now like the elll one and then the um SEI one the udl one that we have and the special aded those are like because of certification so we tend to lean on some of our people that know a little bit more about certification but if somebody had like a larger topic that they wanted to do they're welcome to do it and then I send out I just literally just sent it out was it yes yesterday I think the email where all here are all the courses this is how you do it I also give them the PD calendar and then I have a document on like what is PDS like what's pdps how do you get recertified what are your requirements so that they only have to go to one place to find out when is PD what do I need for PD right like what do I need for pdps and how do I sign up for a course and then um between Kathy Mercier and myself like we get we feel I think I've only fielded like maybe five questions um from teachers like somebody like I can't log on my PD plan's not up so we just managed the internal piece of like okay let me go into your account let me fix this I get a lot of people that say I can't access the course it's because they're on their personal Google so I'm like oh you got to go on the school district Google like little things like that so there's a little bit of uptick in the first few days and then people settle in and they find so the Fitchburg class starts in a week and a half the the modules we don't start until October so they have a little bit of time to sign up and decide teachers are good they'll always email and ask questions and then we always um send teachers so another way to receive PD in the district is conferences so if it's a specialized course especially AP training those are the first people we send out sometimes we send them in the summer for the week long class if that's their preference or they're new to AP or we do the you know the one day or two day Ones based on what the different um cont content area is and they usually that's something that people want for like to enrich their content or their pedagogy sometimes we send people to PD if we feel like they need some support you know maybe it's classroom management something in particular that they should learn for their job we're always sending people out to conferences so I have a conference line the schools have a conference line and we work together to decide who should be going to what and you know we try to get as much you know obviously cost as a as a piece there but we do our have toos and then we also do our like what we think people would like and of interest because again you have some you have veteran teachers teachers that are new people that are in the middle everybody needs something very different when they go through this and then we have in our contract course reimbursement so this is for teachers if they go through an accredited institution so this is like your UMass lels or some of the online schools and that's when they apply for course reimbursement and they receive um up to 75% of their course to be reimbursed back to them if they are approved we have a tiered system um back in the day when I used to work here it was like going to a rock concert and you lined up out the door here and it was first come for a serve like elbowing each other to like I'm getting up there people literally people were camped out so now it's a tiered system um of you know people who haven't had a chance to have a course yet if you're going for your certification if this is for your like you know getting your master's degree so we tear it so that it's not just first come first serve of the same people over and over again I think Susan and I have lived through a couple of these um so it's always good time but um we have it as a tiered system so that everybody gets an opportunity to take a class because we spread the money out and we take the money and spread it out by fall spring summer One Summer two so that all the money isn't just used up in the fall and you don't get an opportunity to take a class so it based on that if you go into the contract we have a the system that we break it down and then we just work it through that way with the teachers and typically people get their courses I think the only people that don't is if they put in for two of them and we have just a lot more people that have never had a chance to take a course they might only get one of them reimbursed so always good and then you know and Maria I think you were with us with Dr Brown um but we bring in some you know pretty high-profile speakers through our grants um we were very lucky even with the Esser um when two three all of our Sr grants to help us bring in some of these larger speakers so that people could get a chance to see some of like the more um people that are on the circuit doing some of the work based on our strategic plan and then typically what comes from these speakers is um book groups so if there's a speaker that really resonated with the group you'll start seeing people asking hey can we now you know do a book group and dive a little bit further into that person's work which yes they put in a proposal so these have always been been really you know a good hit we usually do it for the opening day but now we've been switching more to like the November day because on opening day teachers have really kind of I think enjoyed since covid we we brought them back once I think that that's a stressful day you're trying to get your room ready lots of things that come in your way so we haven't been bringing the speakers in for the opening day but trying to push it to the long full day so these are past speakers past speakers yep yeah that Dr burn was amazing yep so they've all been very good they're usually you get somebody that's just like really like the the person that's out there on the circuit and they're talking about what we're talking about in our schools it should be aligned to everything we do and then um the department coordinators will get together by you know levels and by their content area to create like in the summertime sometimes teachers are like is there anything going on so this isn't PD that we're actually running we just know of like free decent PD opportunities out there and they'll put together they'll curate a list in that link when you go if you go online it will I because I'm pretty sure I opened it up to everyone um because I've shared this with my colleagues in the area PD sessions that if somebody wants to learn about PD and receive the a certificate from an outside vendor that's offering free PD we always get information from different vendors we put that together for any teachers in the summer time that are looking to just get additional pdps on their off time and the summer just works for them so they at least have an option we have a good amount of people like I we put out a little um like a s'more flyer and I probably get and I know most people are looking to see what's out there but I mean we get a good like 300 hits on the flyer so I know people at least looking because it's an outside PDP provider they get the certificate from them so we don't put it in our system because we can only put in our system what we offer but I know that like some teachers like oh that was really good and they'll tell their friends and just gives them another opportunity and another way to be able to receive pdps so summer PD opportuni is always available and then the department of Elementary and secondary education does put out certain PD at at times um one of the biggest ones that they're putting out now is for um elll but they've offered all of the different content areas you go to the center of instructional support and it's online 20 PDP opportunities and that is another option for the teachers to actually you know receive p online some of them are in person they'll put out their list every summer too what they're offering but I know they big push especially um for elll students they also offer the course where if you want to get the elll certification and you want to go through the mtel process um they'll they put together courses to help people pass the mtel in elll so that they can receive that certification because we do know that there's a shortage of L teachers in the in the state of Massachusetts so that is another resource for the teachers that we put out for them and then um this is new too and I don't know if Dr Lang wants to jump in as well but we have an opportunity to partner with um MIT on artificial intelligence and education and they're looking for districts and chumford is one of them to put six to eight C CPS Representatives we're actually looking at the list of people Dr Lang put out a list uh a request for who would be interested and he received a lot of requests and we have to narrow it down to 6 people to be on this committee to go to MIT and learn a little bit more about AI explore it and what I thought was great too for the committee is that if they do come up with some guidance around policy for AI That's I mean it's going to be here we're going to be addressing it we have to figure out what's going on so this is exciting news to be part of the commit learning about it and they'll re see professional development points for this as well so it's I mean a lot of people very passionate about this and I think they're excited but what what a great opportunity and I'm we're excited about it wonderful bill will be their leader Bill silver will be their leader it would be great um and then I just wanted to talk about some more embedded PD in the district which is our mentoring program right so mentors math Specialists new this year and then our technology integration specialist so this is that PD that actually happens during the workday so if you are a mentor and a mentee relationship you are are receiving professional development points and professional development because these people work hand inand it's all about the relationship I know we talked about you know just touchbased on it a little bit last week um and we'll talk to Mary Beth McAllister about she's the mentor coordinator coming in you can speak to her directly and she can give you some more details but this is I mean they're trained mentors they're there to help teachers whether it's you know through the conversational process showing them how to do it coaching them modeling lot of different ways happen but they always see professional development and that's more embedded happening right there right then with students in the classroom so that our mentoring program is very good for that and then new this year we have our math integration Specialists right so their goal is to not only look at program implementation but to help teachers come up with Solutions with the work that they're doing in their classrooms look at the consistency that's happening with teachers working with grade level teams individual teachers schools looking at the data to help them make those decisions in class again happening right there and then and then offering additional PD in certain topics so we had actually spoke about this a little bit like trying to do some like entry level like what would be good because this is new for teachers so we were talking about like the reveal program and the there's some routines that happen at the beginning of the lesson right so what are those routines should we do some more professional development on those routines to make sure those routines are solidified rather than the teachers trying to figure out what the routine should look like and interpreting it themselves and not really knowing what should be done they're going to work with the teachers entry level to be like okay let's just start with routines how do we start off a lesson with the new program because that's that's going to go a long way so we're super excited they're excited they've been surveying the teachers to ask them their input find out what they know what they've worked with before and so far the feedback has been good from the in at least from the math inter ation specialist um Katherine Richard our new math coordinator has meets with them weekly and regularly to talk to them about like changes and the principles as well to be like okay how are we scheduling them so it's it's been a good start so far it's only been we're on the ninth day of school they housed in the building so they so yes so two one of them is going to Bome and Harrington and the other one is going to Center in SRO okay so they have spaces in both places so they will you know work out the schedules that way so and they're brand new so have they gotten like really heavy duty training in reveal math y so we didm they really know it yep and then then need some more but we started off with them this Summer we so they got that going in that they're very familiar with it ex right in so not only just math teaching but the actual program itself so we started that with them this Summer good and then um our Lifeline out there is our technology integration Specialists um they they like do a lot for us on so on on such quick notice but they actually do the coaching in class about know so they teach classes but they also go into the classrooms to help teachers with technology now I know everybody's like oh well Co everybody knows everything about technology well there's a lot about technology that none of us know right like we don't even know yet Dr L what Dr Lang does a great job with technology he does a great job now so they'll come up with different topics variety of topics when they they they're going around the classrooms they see like okay people are really struggling with this they'll put together a session and people can sign up for those sessions it's you if staff have specific um things that they want to work on they'll go and help them out um they'll do training videos for us if something's new they'll put together the video whether it's you know them talking through a process like this is how you get to something but those are there and then they're there for all the online Platforms in our Google Suite so they are the lifeline there's not many of them but get around and they do a lot it's amazing what they can do so we're always thankful for the ti in this district and then I didn't want to forget about we had some previous initiatives prior to covid and you'll see because one of them actually says 2019 on it um but these are things that we are going to come back to and like reinstate because they were you know good PD initiatives at the time um the first one is kind of near and dear to my heart because we're I'm part of one of the group that put this together so this is our Northeast educational Network um we call it npen and this was the meramac Valley area assistant superintendent getting together and really looking at what we like to call loow incident teachers which means we just don't have a lot of them so for example you have 55 Math teachers but then only 15 World language teachers we wanted to make sure they got really robust PD so what we did is we combined all of our teachers together and similar to the um and I'm going to talk a little bit about the multi-part series too similar to um self-generated PD people put in proposals with us so if you a World Language teacher you could put in a proposal you were going to run that PD and we would know how many of those sessions we'd need for all the area World language teachers and what we did is we made sites for all of these um different content areas so Chumps was a site we used chelsford High School I always had special education I had PE and I had um um f and Performing Arts so all the special education teachers from these 20 20 to 30 districts would come to Chum chumford High School while some of the other groups would have the L teachers so like tux fa high was another site so say like all the L teachers would go to that building as well as the Early Childhood teachers and any of the PD that was being run for those teachers they would go there and it was like a it's a production I'll tell you and teachers received the typ and we all you so so what you did as a district is you paid $1,400 this was back in 2019 before Co came in $1,400 and that allowed you to be an npen member and to send as many of your loow incident teachers to these PD sessions that's how we paid the stiens to the teachers creating the sessions for those days and any like ancillary things that got print out our lanyards we had it all and um it ended up working out so if you see up there we had about 2100 Educators that we ended up giving PD to my cost of the 1400 so I paid my 1,400 of all the teachers I sent was $9 a teacher for PD for that day it's a bargain that we can't we can't you know give up so once we all get back together because we've been talking about this we have a a job alike group everybody's been asking us when's npen coming back when's npen coming back so once we put it back together we will run our npen group so it's a great way to do that a lot of people have asked can we do it with like our Ela Math Science and there's just so many teachers so I'll get to that in a second what we do with those teachers but it's just we' need bigger sites so like Chum's a big site tux B's a big site we would also um use Bill rup Bill Rah high was a good site but if you're a small district and you just don't have a lot of room we really can't send people there plus we don't want to send teachers too far out if they live here they don't want to be driving an hour away to another District so we're trying to just stay with these these content areas that at times don't get the PD that we feel like they need and then one of the other things we put together was Ed camp this the best way to explain this is manage chaos um so it is there's no preset professional development the teachers come there's different ways to do it the way we did it was with the teachers would come all the ideas would be generated we did it digitally so if somebody's like I really want to learn more about AI people be like me too so we put up like okay I I'll facilitate it you're don't really facilitating it you're not teaching about AI you're just the person that's the point person so Linda hirs AI I'm so interested in this Maria goes I love AI too I want to learn about that she would start signing up for that and then say John wanted to learn about um you know diving deeper to you know math facts how do we teach kids to memorize their math facts he puts up his and people like I want to learn about that too so it's really educator driven PD and we would assign them a room it all takes about 15 minutes to do it's weird you wouldn't think it would get done and everybody gets to go to that room they they Branch off and they go and they have it's almost like a PLC like a um a group learning community talk more share ideas and they get to walk away with it and then they would do another session and another session like I said it's managed chaos but it works um you don't want to do it too many times because it can get a little repetitive but we'd like to bring back our Ed Camp piece which is always fun like I said a lot of work but a lot of fun a lot of great conversations come from it and nobody's an expert nobody has to feel like they have to know everything about it they can learn different things and then um we had done a multiart series and this was for all Educators um and this is a similar to the end pen piece where people put in we had proposals we had a Review Committee and we ran it was conference style so you would sign up so we knew who was teaching what they got a stip in through the grant to put together the the course right what they were going to do for that day and then they would all the teachers could sign up for those different PD options and go to them so we've done that as well so we'd like to bring back the multi-part series The only hard part about some of these things is um you need the people to do it people need to be able to say yes I'd like I'm I'm very confident know how to do this I would be happy to teach this to my peers I'd want to do it it's always getting the people the other stuff works out the time to review the um the proposals we used to have a a a committee of people that you didn't have to be if it was a math proposal you don't have to be a math teacher sometimes the fine and Performing Arts teacher would be like I have questions about this and you know you just have a different set of eyes on it but it works out great and you know people get to make a little bit of money show their expertise people get to have choice I think it's really when it comes down to it it's all about choice for professional development because everybody's at a different place and that is the overview of the Chums for public schools professional development managed chaos of the district anybody have any other questions pretty exensive it's a lot of work a lot a lot and it happens so like there's a lot of people that do it so you know they're they're great everybody's really good about it and we just want people to get what they need I love these this Google Classroom idea in addition to the things you do on the early release days it's nice to have another thing that's just right in house right easy for people to sign up and do right um I I think yeah like early release days are a little bit more structured because there's only so many of them and you know we have to get things done but people are just at different spots and they want and this is great for people who are not looking toward getting another degree they just need to know they need their points yep um I think this is wonderful that you're doing these yeah they like it it's it's again it's not a a class where like you're getting a letter grade it's you go in you learn no different than if we were sitting here doing professional development you take from it what you need yeah I I really love that those are offered right well thank you for a very thorough report thank you I I'm still I still think you have to talk to me I think I'm the next person too next agenda item right yeah we get two in a row no but that was again I I very nice overview I appreciate putting that together um next upep also was Linda when we're were taking a look at our um rates for non-affiliated staff the interventionists and the tutors uh we' like to just propose an adjustment so I'll turn that over so um through the title one Grant and also in our operating budget if you had a chance to read the memo we do um we do employ interventionists and tutors to be working with the with the students based on the needs of the schools obviously if they're Title One school or if they're not a title one school they would have tutors and they are um it's basically data driven based on of these kids who would need a little extra support in mathematics there's clear like entrance and exits into intervention and tutoring you don't to intervention and tutoring and you stay there forever we you know there is a you know there is a way to exit out you want to just really fill in that tier one gap for students if they're not getting a concept and um but over the past I would have to say at least six years um our rate has always been $30 an hour so I did a survey of the area um marac Valley area schools with the assistant superintendent to understand what their rates were because we really weren't getting as many people as we wanted to apply for the jobs I mean it's been good we're able to fill a lot of it but I was trying to figure out what was going on like are we not competitive enough so I wanted to get their rates to make sure that we were competitive with the area districts in order to make sure that we're also paying people properly and also to get the people and retain the people so after doing that review you see my little chart there um I noticed that you know we're $30 there's few districts that are doing that but we're not really as competitive as we could be so after talking to Kelly Rogers and our central office team I was proposing that we would move that rate to $35 an hour for our interventionists and tutors in order to be competitive in the rate and also to retain the people that yearly come back to us and maybe to capture a few more other people that would like to come to the cheler public schools so my request is to move our current rate for the interventionists and tutors from $30 to $35 an hour we're currently um interviewing for them now and they we haven't gone through a pay period with them so we could make the adjustment we did post it as $30 an hour because that's what we were pay actually paying but we would like to increase it at this point so we're asking for these are just grant funded positions right it's not coming out of the general Bud some are some are not so we have the tutoring lines in our operating budget but the majority of the ones the title one schools are all coming from the title one Grant okay and do we have any idea what sort of increases I mean what what would this cost the district you know to well I mean uh for the title on Grant we're actually receiving more title on money this year so it's not going to impact the Grant in any way on the local budget side we have the line item for the tutors and honestly it's gone um largely unused because we've been having a hard enough time just filling the interventionists on the grant um so yes I mean in the end we would have to either just adjust the number of tutors we we can hire but we haven't even been able to hire a full batch yet um or just take a look at that for budgeting purposes you know basically each week the individual if it went from 30 to um 30 to 35 and it was 18 hours a week it'd be about $90 well it's not not about it'd be $90 a week as an increase um I do think the 35 is a good first step to just again um thank and kind of reward our current employees for sticking with us but maybe allow us to attract some additional employees um again it would not have a big impact on the Grant and on the local uh funding the money is there anyway and we would just assess it um through throughout the budget process next year how that helped us hiring wise and it may need a supplemental you know increase in the future and we could look at that through through the regular budget process but um I do think it's a good first step so if I'm understanding correctly it won't necessarily eat up the budget faster because there's unspent techn I mean technically could if we were fully staffed but we've never been able to be fully staffed in this so you're not going to feel an impact personwise or individual wise right we're not going to have less people it's not like can we the year will end sooner for tutoring because we can't yeah okay these are not full-time positions no 18 yeah they're 18 about 18 hours a week under benefit benefit corre y um I don't have a problem with this but just a question in terms of the pool of people that we get is it usually that we're looking for retired teachers or what do is there like a particular pool it's both so sometimes we have retired teachers we have people that may not want to step fully back into the classroom right they might still be raising kids at home you know they want to be able to just walk in do the job walk out um so we have a variety of people and a lot of believe it or not a lot of them we have for interventions we end up hiring them as teachers right so if they're ready to come back into the classroom it's like almost like a feeder system too of like classroom teachers so we have from retirees to people that a lot of them actually hold their certification they just may not want to go back into the actual classroom full time and have the dut the minimum requirements a bachelor's degree bachelor's degree right but we you'd be surprised I think a good majority of them are actually certified teachers so maybe that's why the pool is a bit less because certified teachers are more necessary uh and you know we don't require the certification we do all the training but the bachelor's degree is the minimum requirement right no that that's fine just thinking if there's any way that we can also add other attractions that are not just the monetary because you know the difference between if people are just looking for money they're all going to go to Drake it right there 4264 I don't know where that came from but there it is and like 3389 what on Earth I know what do I mean can you then you have to drive to Drake it like and that's the thing like no offense but CHS are just easier to get to I'm sure there are reasons people wouldn't want to work at L either probably right but just think yeah I'm just commenting on the drive to drink it because a like about mil away we came from there just remember this I know I do okay so I did I know so um qu what I'm thinking is let's say that we had a retired teacher I I've heard some some things about you know if you're trying to come in and you want to substitute or whatever you might have extensive trainings but you had all these trainings already because you just retired all kinds of things like this just making sure that we've made it um attractive for people to want to go through the process of coming in remaining here and so on because if I don't really need the income which is a possibility and I just want to keep myself busy uh I might look for the easiest way to get in there so just just thinking it through and making sure we looked at our entire process and that you know we made it as attractive as possible not just on this point there are people who fall in this category who maybe and a retired teacher is perfect for something like this right they use the kids they have the license they know the content hopefully and they haven't been removed for too long that it's an easy transition back um some may not want to actually commit to working the 18 hours a week because that's you know actually physically coming in three or four days a week they may just want to be a day-to-day uh substitute because they want to kind of pick and choose if they want to just come in for a day or even if it's a school or a teacher or a subject that they're comfortable with so we do get some because we pay a little bit more for a retired teacher in the sub rate we may have some people who just want to enjoy that you know that they can be more selective in when they come in this might work again for some people who just are ready to do more than day-to-day teaching and they want to get their foot in one door they want to see if they want to get back into teaching permanently and this is like a great way to get in um would we have multiple options for people to really be able to kind of re-engage in the work and then as Linder indicated we really do um this is a pool for potentially when we have an opening um if you've been the school and you're successful and you're licensed it is kind of like a foot in the door to uh to consideration for a permanent position so there's just multiple options and it's kind of a different pathway almost for adults to figure out like what's the best way into the into the workforce I'm curious though if there were are there options for folks who say could commit to 9 hours but not 18 per week people who need truly part time I'm just thinking because um there could be folks who have um if somebody isn't looking for a full-time job there may be some folks out there who are looking for you know a a smaller number of hours per week and I'm wondering if we've considered splitting them into two roles sometimes or anything like that the the hard we we haven't we've thought about it but we haven't done it it's hard with the scheduling right because you it's they may not be able to service kids if and and also keeping the consistency so scheduling and consistency with the kids has always been like let's just get our group here for the 18 hours and we've been able to do that right um and we'd like to keep it with that consistency because sometimes the schedules don't work if somebody's like I can only work on Tuesdays well we already have enough people that are working the full 18 hours we don't need additional people on Tuesdays only right so that's sure I just was thinking of like better than not hiring someone if you're saying all these positions are unfilled I wanted to just ask if there were any ways to fill some of them rather school schules and for the principls to schedule the is nothing prohibiting us from doing that so I guess like that is an option to consider if if people come up with something like that we just haven't done that to dat no one no one has asked either too so that's been helpful so no one has asked but I know I've talked among my fellow chumped retired teachers and that's often come up that people don't want to put in quite that many hours but might be interested in it if there were fewer hours um Poss POS so it might be something to look at I understand that you've got to make it consistent that whatever people are doing it has to be consistent week by week but perhaps there's a way to work that out I definitely think we need to increase the amount of money though because I know if you're doing it privately maybe you wouldn't be able to get as many hours but people charge a lot more than this for private tutoring so I think for people are thinking what do I want to do do I want to just take a few kids after school or do I want to get something that's more of a consistent job I think we have to offer that little bit more money because they know they can make a lot more privately and I think that is the competitive pool you know you're competing for those people who can do this in a private way and also people who you would expand the pool I think a bit if the hours were more flexible but that's you know just thinking give and take of that yeah thinking of possibilities and I understand about the consistency it's nice it is well if I mean I think if if the group's supportive of this I think the wage is certainly the thing to First do and then see what we get um applicant wise see how this actually may influence the applicant pool and then you know take it from there any other questions on this right I'll take a motion okay I will make a motion that we increase the pay rate for interventionist tutors from uh $30 an hour to $35 an hour I second okay any further questions we'll have to do a roll call vote so Diana I Susan I John I Maria I I okay you thank you very much and we'll report back at a future meeting about how the uh the Staffing is going um thank you for that uh fourth item on the agenda this evening is just your first look at at the uh masc resolutions for the fall membership meeting which is going to be in uh November that's at the Joint conference um so you're not in um expected to act on anything tonight but um we were able to get the list of um resolutions there were 10 resolutions this year that they're going to be considering um and they're attached so at your leisure you can kind of read through them and get a feel for them and then likely at one of the October meetings um we'll put this back on the agenda as we've done in the past okay and we'll just go resolution by resolution on the Comm will vote to either support or or not support so that um we have to have a delegate be um recognized for the conference as well so that your delegate at the conference will then um vote on your behalf um so that's how we kind of figure out which way the group is voting um so we'll do that at one of the likely one of the meetings in October and I think the the the voting on resolution is Friday so it would have to be somebody staying Friday thank you for sending the's not I think though I think what Diana think I think I saw that it Friday I was kind of lousy was it Thursday last year it might have been it was it definitely been earli it was before Friday it was um Wednesday last year wnes it was early yeah it was early before I got sick so I was able to do it yeah yeah so it was it was early you got sick at that oh yeah yeah remember that I forgot that I was like yeah I'm like what are you doing yeah so as far as if you just read through them some of them I you I have my personal opinion on some of them but you know read to them get make your own personal opinions on it I the other thing that's in there that I they have never had a NE are expiring resolutions so ones that haven't been voted in in the past I don't know what they want us to do with those if they're looking for people to re you know re-engage with them if so that might be something to look at too um as you're reading through that and just you know some of them we've seen before um if there's one that you know in particular you're like oh I really wish we had done something with that we could always always reauthorize it as a committee and propose it you know during a convention say okay we want to bring this back up for a vote you know if it's something but there's probably like 10 or 15 of those as well so um yeah so maybe that maybe some one of our October meetings we'll we'll go through these and uh we'll vote y or nay and then whoever's the delegate will uh and if most of have done po but basically you go in and they just go through all the resolutions and do a Voice vote of what what people think and the key thing that you have to know how to say is move the vote so if you go up after a bunch of people talk about something for a long time and you say I move the vote everybody cheers for you makes CH to meeting look like a you know like a Sprint I mean it's it's they go slow really interesting yeah I I've think about town meeting but people that don't get to speak out in front of big groups all the time like us I well I personally never attended that because I know the Committee Member goes to do that I'm just more Curious does the individual school committee who recommended the resolution do they speak they do speak yeah oh really yeah whoever put the proposal in they will say why they put the proposal forward and then they'll fail questions from other people people stand up at the M ultimately somebody will put a you know a new riter on the motion or we want to change the motion or change it's it's it's an event it's so all right well we'll confirm when it's going to be and Diana thank you for sending around that agenda because I hadn't uh seen that until you did today so that was helpful um and we'll put this on like I said for one of the octobus sounds good to record our vote so that's what I have for this evening all right anybody have any lays and reports at this point yeah okay good um I went to South Row PTO meeting last night and um a couple things to share um first of all they are really excited about the new Radio Systems um the administrators at least were commenting about how much better it works than what they've had in years past and how it's one of those kind of invisible to most people things that has made a big difference this year so that's great um overall I was hearing reports of a relatively strong start there was very healthy attendance from parents at this meeting um more than I've seen typically so that was really encouraging um the two there was generally an overview of things coming up this year but the two big soon to come events are the um School Community focused ice cream social on the 24th that's specifically for the South Rog Community um but open to all is the pumpkin Fair on October 19th at 11:00 a.m. and um that's really popular across the community you don't have to go to South Road be part of the pumpkin Fair um and uh other than that yeah not not a lot of new stuff to say just hearing um great excitement about some of the improvements that happened in the school over the summer um sharing that they're still getting up to speed with a new kind of visitor management system and that um the uh the PTO is in a very healthy Place both financially and in terms of Engagement so that's really encouraging great anybody else tomorrow tomorrow I I um attended the chips PTO meeting yesterday and attendance was good I think it was twice as many people were at last night's PTO meeting typically were coming to meetings that I was attending last year so I was really glad for them to see and they got some new parents um volunteering to do some things parents who weren't on their board so uh thanks to all the parents who are stepping up to do that I know they have their open house night coming I don't remember the exact date but it's in November and one of the things they're doing is a basket raffle again which apparently is extremely successful there they make a lot of money they said with the basket raffel so if if you're a chips parent um be on the lookout to hear about how you can contribute toward those baskets because it's really a big fundraiser for the school I had talked about um the safety um vestibule that's coming at McCarthy and then their their director I think she's called talked about the new ID system and the parents who were attending were just really glad to hear about um how seriously the chord schools are taking the safety issues and you know we talked about how it's said that we need to but we're very they're all very glad that the chumford schools are taking action to make sure that entry into the schools is safer so parents were glad to hear that part on my other lay is on Roll right now is um as I talked about last meeting um on the town's strategic plan steering committee and Dr Lang did include in his newsletter um the QR code and the website people could go on to complete complete the survey everyone in town is invited to please complete that survey it's going to be really helpful in helping the town look 5 years out and I'll make good plans and there is on September 18th a free ice cream Community kickoff night at the chelsford Elks at 5:30 p.m. where we're going to um be partnering with Nim Cog and the open space people um just have people to able to have discussions about what they want to see for the town of chelsford um going forward so kids are at welcome at that if you um would like to come to that meeting and you don't have anyone to watch your kids you can bring your kids because we're going to have snacks and crafts for the kids um to be doing while the parents are talking so that's September 18th and then tomorrow night I have Harrington PTO yes that a pick up tomorrow I am tomorrow good all right anything else on leaz on great all right any uh new items people would like to um I know we're still working our way through the kitchen um Capital project but uh just want to keep it on the radar about the food the the Halal food versus you know non-halal food being available okay just keeping it on the agenda some it's on there all right I'm telling I'm going to keep asking every week anything else yeah I um this is sort of came up at the PTO meeting last night um but I've been hearing from some parents and I wanted to just raise uh the fact that there are a lot of very concerned parents especially after some of the tragic events last week um in terms of safety and it's not necessarily just focused on external people coming into buildings a lot of what um the concerns that I was hearing were around um whether students in our school communities feel socially safe to report dangerous behaviors in their peers and a couple of parents were asking if I could bring up that they would love to see some sort of anonymous Reporting System made available to students where they could report a wide variety of concerning or unsafe behaviors in their peers um I express you know that may be something that would you know be Consulting with school resource officers or you know be through the the police um or in partnership with the police um but I think there was just generally a feeling that parents would love to know um that their kids who often said I wouldn't feel safe telling an adult about something that I overheard in the bathroom because I'd be worried for Retribution from my peers they'd love to feel like there was an anonymous reporting option was this like a a global discussion of among the parents or just like a like a side a few parents um were all talking about it they were parents who have older children um so I was at the South Row PTO it was less about South Row but I think they were speaking specifically of the middle and high schools okay but this wasn't a discussion among the whole group this was just a a couple parents I would say it it began with one person but then several people chimed in with yes and my child said this and I really want that so it was several parents advocating I explained that I I wasn't clear on whether that would even fall under the the school department versus the police department um but given that there are obviously existing Partnerships between the the police department and the school department I thought I would at least bring up that there were some concerns and and Curiosities I would say as much as anything else like does something like this exist do other districts do things like this and is this something we could consider what was the um did the administration weigh in it all about like things that they do at the at the school levels they did not okay I think because the concerns were mostly talking about secondary and we were at an elementary school PTO meeting it was oh it was a lot of parents more raising concerns about um middle and high schoolers who might be experiencing Mental Health crisis or displaying concerning behaviors okay all right thanks for the feedback anybody else I know Dr Lane mentioned in his email but uh we're going to try to have the M group come in and help us with our goals soon yeah I believe it's next Tuesday next Tuesday yes at least test if not other members of the team um yeah we've just been going through different iterations of the goals trying to like look at like the realistic benchmarks and whatnot so that we can have the Strategic plan goals for the El out and then um have some draft for school committee superintendent calls um so just depending on when I get those we'll send them to you obviously ahead of time for you to kind of read through and think about and then at least next Tuesday have the initial conversation with her and figure out where to go from there okay right so something to think about for for next week Y and the only other thing I forward you a copy um from um Tom manager Cohen they're doing that um what do they call it annual committee orientation and they gave you an agenda what the night would look like so if anybody's interested that I think it's uh the 24th would be uh for that meeting so just just something consider all right uh we have no other public comment that I know of I don't see any emails so I will take a motion to adjourn I make a motion that we adjourn second all right all in favor I I right thank you very much thank you thank you