##VIDEO ID:X4hSGMQjfOQ## okay good evening and welcome this is the September 11th uh 2024 meeting of the school committee is medal school committee call the meeting to order 502 the meeting is being both audio and video recording recorded this evening um and I would ask that folks please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God um and this being the 23rd anniversary of uh the tragedies of September 11th if we could just have a moment of silence for uh those that we lost and uh those that put their lives on the line um to save others thank you okay uh if we could do a roll call please Samantha secretary Pamela Blair assistant superintendent for business Sarah trulo Gordon Smith superintendent of schools Gregory Thompson Anella R William stur senior Amy denta Heather Brown director of curriculum Emanuel Garcia representative and as our viewing audience uh has noticed we have two new folks at the table today uh we welcome William as our newest member of the school committee appointed last evening um by a joint meeting of the school committee in the Town Council so welcome and thank you for jumping right in and being here the next day after being appointed so looking forward to working with you and then Manny uh thank you for joining as our new student rep and uh look forward to your input and uh whatever you can contribute to to being here so thank you for being here tonight okay I have some minutes for approval I would look for the August 19th executive please approve the August 19th 2024 executive session meeting minutes motion made by Sarah second by Antella any of the discussion hearing on all favor say I I I those opposed nay and abstentions William gain abstain for that yes yes yes so 41 uh and then the regular session Mee to approve the august 19 2024 session meeting minutes by Sarah second by any discussion all favor say I I and extensions one abstention 41 okay thank you Samantha for the minutes we have uh committee and SubCom communication Sarah would you like to start I have nothing at this time anilla nothing right now yeah William would you like to toss in any any information I have nothing right now welcome Amy I do I do need to share that the elaf um the run is coming up I Spartan sprint Spartan sorry Spartan sprint It's Beginning this year at the um Depot thank you yep so much the depot um and more information and registration can be found on El lef.org always a fun of always are you running of course I'm not oh over this thought you might reconsider now are you ready man do you have anything tonight to add tonight okay that's great uh one other thing I just wanted to mention was my fabulous book club that we just finished up um walkable City uh it's doing with the town Deputy town man manager yes and about eight citizens from Isam meow we read this book and had four or five meetings today we walked Isam Meadow and look for opportunities for zoning uh and increased housing and uh we'll see what happen so pretty cool was super fun how do you get into this book sidewalks you got to know people no we're doing another one I'll let you know but anyway it's very cool and I was very appreciative to be part of that stay tuned for more more information about that okay we're moving on uh opportunity for visitors to address the committee seeing none tonight we'll keep on trucking we have the approval of an eighth grade waiver for field hockey so um in your packets you have a memo from Mr McGee athletic director unfortunately he could not be here tonight so he has given me um the information and um it's a a waiver for eighth grade uh field hockey players uh that has been supported by both Mr Paige principal of the high school and uh Mr Pearson principal of the Middle School um and basically as you can see in the bullet points that uh our eighth graders just similar to other waivers in the past if we sign up eighth graders they would only play at the JV level they're not going to display any Varsity players um and what this would allow us to do um in the middle of August um or August 22nd so towards the a little bit later in August when M migi wrote this we were anticipating 22 field hockey players um we actually have 23 so we're excited about that however uh to field the JV team we feel we need more um and so right now we're just running a varsity team so we don't have a JV schedule we would like to put a JB schedule in place if we can attract enough eth graders um Mr g m excuse me Mr McGee feels that we may get seven or eight uh eighth graders who might be interested in doing this and then they would um help us field A Team all right I just ask one question I remember this occurred I'm not sure if it was baseball or something and the question was about the students who were in eth grade that were going to be participating on the J team usually were also involved it might have been softball Sarah with their how does that impact those individuals so they would have to participate in um the high school event Andor practice first if they're going to be a member of the team however if there is not a scheduled High School event practice or competition they could play team so as long as the uh the Mia rules are such that as long as it does not interfere with a scheduled High School event then they are allowed to play for other teams and that doesn't impact will that impact the current like the eth grade town team or wck um it can yeah because they may lose these players uh if there is a game that's scheduled and then there's a high school JB game that they would have to play the high school game to stay on the team to the eighth grad still need to pay the sport fee they do yes right how much is it this year it is uh it's been $149 for the last 20 20 years oh really yeah yeah never increased it dro the Commonwealth it's a pretty good deal no any districts have a much higher athletic fee shortest hurtle to participation that's the key uh any other questions on this I would entertain a motion to approve to make a motion to approve the 8th grade MIAA waiver for field hockey motion made by an second second by Sarah any other discussion hearing none all in favor say I iose nay one abstaining and one exstension okay 401 okay you know thank you very much okay moving along we have assistant superintendent for business reports we have an update on elps bus transportation and new app or families 2425 School very exciting so I wanted to let you all know that uh we currently have 1328 Riders this year last year ended with 1371 Riders um so that's very good we have 14 regular Ed buses and uh I'm very excited to say that the late bus started this past Monday at birchland Park in the high school so I think that's uh received very nicely um you know well attended um so lpvec had a new software system and we a little glitch so unfortunately out of those 1328 Riders about 250 bus letters never went out to tell the parents like what the bus number was and the route and the whole thing so as you can imagine it caused total Havoc for our family so we're very very sorry for that confusion um the good news is um they have identified what went wrong so that it will not happen again um which is very exciting the other exciting thing that happened is because we weren't able to get that information to the parents through the the mailing we were able to upload into power school so all the families were able to see the information in power school so it all ended up working out okay and again we're very apologetic to our families um and we sure hope that this won't happen again um I wanted to uh lastly say that lpvec has launched a new mobile app called my drive K to2 I gave you all in your packets here information that was shared with the families I think this has been received very very well folks can go in and track the bus to see where it is so if their child isn't home and they're getting all anxious they can look it up to see okay all right it's on its way and you know kind of relieve that tension so um we're very very excited about that um the last thing I wanted to say is that uh electric buses are coming they're due to come at the end of October and two or three will be uh designated to elps do have the infrastructure in the busard they're working on it right now yep than so that is very exciting we just thought we should let everybody know what's happening with Transportation any questions on the update for transportation did you take the bus to school yeah I do how's it going doing good yeah coming on time and good answer if it wasn't I would I would honestly want to know so cool okay thank you P Thank you Pam yes moving along we have grants for approval 2025 grants so the next one is in your packet you'll see a list of the 24 25 grants uh they're the typical grants I'll go through them you got the title one which is $279,600 title four $221 19 the special ed Early Childhood Grant $1,760 the special ed idea Grant which stands for individuals with disabilities Education Act $874,900 uh the Meco Grant uh which is $3 44,6 55 the comprehensive school health services Grant from the dph $80,000 so the grant total uh for Grants this year is 1,658 565 all steady related to last year say that again similar to last year all the grant very similar yes so these are the new grants these are not any of the rollovers um which I'll talk about with my first quarter I mean I'm sorry with my fourth quarter with you one was a grant we were worried about but it was not it was not cut as as much it went down 23,000 and I forget the exact number that we were remember we're told that it would be much more than that so we were able to do uh some things behind the scenes and and uh put it like a pair of back under the title one Grant please for this current year yeah any other questions on the [Music] grants if there are no other questions I would entertain a motion to approve the grants I move to approve the grants for the 2024 2025 school year as presented Sarah second second by Anella any other discussion all please say I I I those oppos nay you know it's up to you okay and one OB sension 41 okay great thank you thank you and the fourth quarter report okay so in your packet uh the fourth quarter report I'd like to apologize up at the top it says as of June 30 2023 that's incorrect it should be 2024 my apology on that so uh as I always uh make mention to you uh tach is a spreadsheet that's designed as a financial update for the school department operating budget after the fourth quarter dated June 30th 2024 the report also uh includes grants and revolving accounts if you go over to page five where the numbers are that's the best place to just go right to uh you'll see that the salaries are in the top section of the uh the spreadsheet mped into to items that just makes it easier understand and uh as a reminder 83% of our budget is on the salary side uh which is 28 million 62194 for last year of that we we're returning back to the general fund 26,28 from the salary side the bottom side um the bottom side of the spreadsheet here is 177% of your um but I just lose my track of thought here your expense side of the budget thank you and um that amount was 5,996 517 and we're returning back $ 28,37 on the expense side so the grand total is just returning back $ 54,3 25 to the general fund which is what happens to every Department in the town at the end of the year I want to remind everyone that that is less than a half a percent from our 34 milon that usually run in the red well where are you at here so Athletics can fluctuate because that's that's the salary side so that's your coaches and so I might be somebody that's at a step four and then it changes they're at step one or do you see it's never quite exact okay any other questions on that portion him I I just have never I guess made note of the diff what's the difference between office supplies and educational supplies like how are those two line items different differentiated so office it would be like the the things that we the pens and pencils that we use in the office whereas the educational side it's it's it's um more of whatever the the teachers need to run the classroom some of them may be similar but they're coded different the scenes everything I'm working on my end of year report now this September and everything is driven by location by Doe codes I love my do code so behind the scenes it's a different code and they they want to know might be many of the same things but they want to know using it is office y okay so and again I just want to remind you that every single requisition that comes through for any type of Supply comes to my desk for my approval okay every Thursday I sit with my accounts payable person and approve those wrecks so we really are on top of that and I'm always looking at the doe codes to make sure that we're that we're you know processing things correctly thank you welcome any other questions there and we we used all the permanent building sub money so all the positions weren't filled by way or were they fill well so remember I'm just going to remind you that we had um I think it was four three or four at each building we had originally originally at each building two and three at met Brook okay so it was funded from Esser the other one this this is the operating budget here and um I broke it out so that we could start tracking it better um because there was a lot of questions about that and um for William's sake the permanent building sub what what we did a couple of years ago I guess after coming back from Co coming into okay we designated um one person at each school that came in every single day and they they could qualify for um ra rather than being an on call sub they came in so the the principal would have them to be able to use them because it was so challenging there was yeah a lot of Staff out and it was very challenging as I'm sure you know so now we have one building that comes every day but we moved money from the um daily sub uh line item to this which permanent so again we're we're monitoring things to see how this goes so we'll see what happens in F525 any other questions if we can flip over to the next page uh and again I'm just going to remind everybody that this was at the end of the last fiscal year so that's as of June 30th um this is where our grants ended we have our federal grants uh at the and and our state grants and then the uh private Grant we have just a small amount rolling over from that so the rollover amount is $4,660.00 which is happening as we're speaking so we'll have an update for you hopefully at the next school meeting so this money that's left over is for the no you've already encumbered it I well I I during the summer and I'm still in the process right now of finalizing that because it does all have to be encumbered by uh September 30th so you partially encumbered and an's question 30th so I didn't know uh who was going to do the installation at that time so that happened after the June 30th date and now we'll Wipe Out the 345 yeah we're use I was like we're using this right absolutely it's be used and then esser's gone yes gone so and we should do some big press for that though once that playscape is done get the reminder out there yeah let the community know it's there so they can use it yep absolutely awesome great that Esser money was so nice it was I mean 2.2 million doll you know and we used it wisely so I know so again that's the the rollover that will go into fy2 and uh be fully expended there okay down the bottom are your revolving accounts um so you know these are a little different than grants we they roll over from year to year so you're gonna and again I'm going to apologize if you look at the headers there it says fy22 that should be 23 FY 23 that should be 24 I'm very sorry um obviously I copied the template from the fourth quarter of last year and then updated all my the numbers are correct so you can feel confident with that so the athletic revolving account you can see we um you know the carry forward then the revenue last ran in the red say that again that ran in the red this year that's what I was talking about yes that's that's the one that is yes um because typically we like to see that roll over 25 30,000 what I can say is that um at year end we were able to help Athletics um which we try to do every year anyways um to kind of help with um the expenses because we know what's going to happen Transportation has been crazy and the other item that's um for this upcoming year that we're in now is is um Kevin McGee needing to find sites to use since we don't have the high school so it gets it's going to be a little challenging but those are conversations we'll have next month we're going to use that account to pay rental fees usually it's to take them in this account right this you're saying we're going to use that account to pay other places to use their places the athletic budget yeah so are we GNA have to through that account with additional funding we may we may at different points we haven't yet though in our projected budget but we don't have specifics from Kevin yet just starting to we have specifics uh for some of the spring Sports which we did uh discuss through the building committee um so we do know those numbers what um we don't have specifics on or as we continue to go forward and we lose say this practice field um what say next fall will look like uh the athletic stadium is the next line there uh there was no revenue and um we expended uh 5,150 there so you got 4,000 rolling into that have been a reimbursement to the D DPW the 5,000 um or may may we have bought something something for it yes it's a supply and I can look it up if you want worries you uh the school rental accounts um you know you can see we uh and and there's many accounts in in here each school has a rental account um you know Revenue goes in there from the cap program Willie Ross the rec department agreement which covers uh the custodial you know uh fees the custodial um costs for them to use it and receipts are in rentals so you're right on the money right yeah exactly so you know that collectively with all the accounts is rolling over $192,600 uh the next line there is your student mobile Technology Insurance um account which again has been um it it's been a good partnership I I think parents are happy with it um the first couple of years it was really topheavy because we had we had a lot of Revenue coming in right but the machines were still new but now you're going to see if you look here that just you know 19,000 came in and Revenue but we put out 46,000 for new Machine replacement yeah we should get a number on that and we should talk about that within our Capital discussion because normally we would rely on Capital to make that and that's a substantial investment yeah it's broken machines to be fixed it's not all brand new it's not all brand no it's not do a lot of screen rep okay um and so right now as students come back from the um summer break they're doing a ton of repairs on screen replacement keyboard replacement and that type of thing um as over the summer if that's the case though that 46,000 can't be sustainable if been only taking in 10 or 19 remember that's just as of June so then now it's a new school year so you've got new Revenue that you're GNA see in the first quarter thank you so we'll talk further about that and just as a reminder I think this was my third quarter um you had asked some questions about like what what we were purchasing Etc and at that time uh Ryan had said that there was 30 Chromebooks and it's mostly screens Chargers and keyboards they bought 30 new ones I believe so yeah that sounds right with the for so it's not like it's a lot of I think there's a lot of um broken things that was it birin Park I think is their heavy vir also they all have cases far I but but you're right it's the first year moving yeah and switching class and transitioning over an entire campus as opposed to across the hall so makes sense it does uh the next line is the uh the staff teacher parah mobile technology repairs and you're going to see that's just kind of evens itself out the unit a actually funds this so as this uh becomes depleted they give us a check um and we monitor that uh together lots of communication um the school gift accounts each school has um a gift account as as well as the district and this line also includ includes Elie grants which is El gift uh which is wonderful I'm just going to remind you this and you don't see it here um that'll be in the first quarter again I think it was like $54,000 $4,388 was um gifted to the to the schools um by Elie which is really wonderful did that jump a year you did it in so it must have we must have gotten Revenue they kind of changed the way they did it I think before June and after July exactly so yes that's exactly what happened Greg so you get a double next year potentially depending on how they do it yeah uh depending on how they do possible that that could happen um so then once once uh Gordon gets the list of the um approved submissions you know that that they're going to fund I set up an individual account for each one at each school because remember Desi wants to know where where the money's going and which school how much and what's it being used for so I use my set it up with doe codes and um and then send out an email so right now they're in the process um of ordering the items that for this next year so just uh your benefit William um East Long Meadow the e leaf stands for East Long Meadow educational endowment fund and so it's a group that's been um in existence I think for over 20 years and um they do an incredible job of fundraising and um basically managing a fund and then they ask for minig Grants from teachers um or Paras or administrators uh anyone can put in for a minig grant and then they um they usually the board and Amy sits as a representative um for the school committee on their board uh they designate a certain amount based on the fundraising that they've been doing that year um but I think their fund has gone now over and I think this was in the last year or so over a million dollars so it's now generating um much more interest than uh they had been used to and so it's been really great uh to see because they've been able to increase the amount of grant money they're willing to give back to the schools yeah it's pretty neat thank you for explaining that sure uh well that was the gift to account the next line is the um it says tuition revolving it's preschool tuition um is really what's funding that right now um we brought in the revenue is $75,000 I believe I was anticipating like $100,000 yeah that can change for a few reasons students might start out where they're supposed to pay that they yeah and then then it's you know discovered that perhaps they really need an IEP and need Services now they qualify as free so you know those things happen I I do know Renee um preschool um Renee the principal over at um Meadowbrook I was talking to recently and I wouldn't be surprised if she comes back to this committee and perhaps wants to look at how um it's the programs being run again remember we made Chang and it was kind of a work in progress and we always want to re-evaluate and make sure we made the right decisions right so I'm just giving you a heads up that I foresee that that might happen um the next few months uh when she gets you know School up and going and things are going smoothly um so that amount rolling over 62,000 don't am I on the wrong line I I am the tuition 9,11 I just want to remind you that we do fund some uh positions from that I believe it's preschool teacher7 preschool coordinator portion of that salary 2.4 peras uh and a.3 teacher that's the 50 that all fits in the 50 well remember I'm going to have Revenue coming in um this year but that's expensive side though right the things you just listed that all fits in that 50 well be oh I I see what you're saying I'm gonna have to double check that correct that because we added stuff for this fy2 stuff not been encumbered yet well isn't everything cover this is fourth quarter this is last year right wasn't the preschool coordinator paid from Esther last year yes so things were paid other so now we're utilizing this and I had a plan I probably have a here during the budget um discussions we did outline how we were gonna are we going to use it transition from tooling account and I believe we also knew that after this year it was going to be starting to be depleted so we were going to have to talk about that for the FY 26 budget because it wasn't going to be able to sustain itself over time yes well the expenses must be more than the 50 typically in an annual basis more out of that because we we're taking in 75 I know it's all changed I know it's all changed recently with s has and just because we're bringing right in 75 in revenue and only putting out 50 our goal is to keep that going so that when things happen like the year when all of a sudden in the month of when was it Gordon like two weeks before school we had like 20 new kindergarteners that came and they they never registered and we had to like open I don't know if you remember that year like when things happen or with special ed and the kindergarten revolving account yeah so yeah just okay uh the next line circuit breaker so this is special education circuit breaker uh reimbursements that come back from the state uh to help us with our um tremendous amount of um specialed expenditures um what you will see is that the revenue there which is 1.2 million ion really is supposed to be 1.7 million the the fourth quarter 430,000 992 didn't get posted until July 11th it came in in the next fiscal year so that's why you're not seeing it here when I run reports does that does that mean the current balance is5 no it can't be because that's more than our annual what's the current balance then so it rolled over to the falling quarter so it didn't matter correct it should have been here yeah and then different decisions would have had to that been more than in one year of circuit breaker isn't that against the rules to roll that but I but we didn't receive it so what happened is the prior years probably so we yeah that work to our Advance yes yes it does so th those are the kind of things where it gets really tricky at year end Greg that I'm always looking at because you're gonna have to spend more out of compensate for that yeah and the expenses are up there yeah we'll have reason we had extraordinary relief um at the end of the year so there was a significant amount of money that came in at the end of the year you had extraordinary relief coming in I think late May early June and then we had the final quarter of circuit breaker coming in in July right there extraordinary Lea count to the amount you can roll over no that actually has to be expended in the year that's given but we did ask for an extension on that and spending it yeah so we're spending it this year an extraordinary relief yeah we had asked I think it's paying for the co- teing okay I'm sorry I'm not remembering that put in for mention um so that we could spend it in the next fiscal year okay I'll check on that um you concerned about that though Pam in terms of next year um we use more circuit breaker than we took this year you're saying we used more than we took in but we're also going to get we're projecting 1 63 million coming in this year okay so we won't use it all then correct okay we're hoping not to well we have we so you have to spend what what you roll over right so we can legally uh roll over one full Year's worth of circuit breaker um if we can and most districts William try to do that try to roll over as much as we can um because there many things that are out of our control and you know a student could just move in and it it these add up very quickly out of District tuitions um transport special ed Transportation um behind the scenes so I just wanted to make sure you knew what I was talking about um the next line is the transportation revolving account um I just want to remind you that when you see that Revenue there of $142,000 the a lot of that is from uh June payments that are made for this fiscal year if that makes sense folks are we request people to do it before school gets out and then we need them to register so we can do the all this wonderful routing behind the scenes over the summer and get everybody those bus passes the revenue Still Still Still expected then yes not all in y that's correct so that rolls over 136,000 and I always um use a good $100,000 towards uh the Transportation uh cost that's where that fun goes um the next one is school lunch um you will see that's a healthy budget there um healthy available budget $814,000 over the summer Lori did do a walk-in freezer project at uh metal Brook I believe that was close to $100,000 it might be maybe 80 90,000 it's a decent amount of money she's also I don't I don't think this has been completed yet but it's in process Maple Shade a steam table um which is about $35,000 these are they you know the the ticket items are are pretty expensive and so she's always on top of it and as a reminder you know part of her um audit with the state because you do get federal and state reimbursements to fund um school lunch is that they're always inquiring about projects and where her budget is and and you know what what's in line so she's reporting to them as well um the other thing I do want to talk to her about and um we talked about how uh typically you need to have at least I think it's like two months worth of operating in there and I was using the figure of like 220,000 I think that that operating expense is actually higher so I'm just kind of going to go over that with her because supplies everything right I've been using that number for a number of years and it's probably not accurate I'm thinking it's probably closer to I don't know 280 you know and and and to use two months so when you see this large balance it is a large balance but she does need to have um you know a good 5 to 600,000 in to cover and and that's a rule behind the scenes um with the state also so I just wanted to make mention of that to you uh the last account is the school choice um we have a rollover balance in there of 789,6 182 uh we worked on some projects over the summer that was funding the Summer Academy um every school had a a summer program which I think those totaled I was just looking at that today I believe that was I think I budgeted I was projecting $108,000 collectively from what I got from the principles and Heather um and I think it came in about 94,000 that's just for the regular Ed summer program special ed summer program is a separate entity and has its own budget code in our operating budget um so that was really great um and some of those projects uh that are still ongoing that the principales brought forward that the school committee approved um I will say over the summer the um what was it called the PA intercom system which was a safety issue over at uh Mountain View school that was completed and everyone's very happy um because it again it was a a safety issue because when obvious when she's you know talking to the school not everybody was hearing that so uh they're very excited I think that project was about $22,000 that hasn't been incumbered yet no that that's done but it's after after the June 30th date so it's not it's not here uh but we'll talk about that again in the first quarter so does anyone have any other questions about any you know how far down school choice is going to go once it's all everything settled I think there still be a very healthy balance in there as as we talked about wanting to do so that we could continue to do these one projects that are so desperately needed across the district as well as the summer program which I believe is a great success um so we'll see that on the first quarter of the DAT balance okay great thank you questions on the quarter report no more questions take a motion to accept the quarterly report please move to accept the fiscal year 2024 fourth quarter report as presented made by Sarah second by Amy any other discussion all in favor say I I nay motion carries 5 to zero thank you okay we have old business discuss 6.1 discussion revisions of policy recommendations from the elps diversity and Equity steering committee okay uh you remember at our last meeting we had looked at um the policies coming um that had been recommended um some revision or an brand new policy in section a uh so I'm bringing back um some of the ones that uh we needed to add more revisions to um in the motion last time we did have a few policies that were accepted um one of those however was not acab sexual harassment and sexual misconduct so I just wanted to bring that back and that could have been due to the fact that we um concentrated a large portion of our discussion on um AC ac- which are the procedures um but I do not remember but I wanted to bring back to all of you if there are any questions the new portion of sexual harassment um and sexual misconduct is the sexual misconduct section policy so that is starts on page two and is in red just want to make sure there were no revisions there I didn't have any notes on revision okay so that's AC a correct and we can you know take a motion after we the procedures if you want to do it all on one M that would be our yeah we approve that no no this had um questions and and uh took it back to um not only to look at the language that where there was confusion we wanted to make sure that we were reflecting actual practice um because these actual procedures have been around for a long time and we had not scrutinized them in a while and so we did things it back to the leadership team after the discussion that took place on August 19th so move to procedures um questions on that on acab yeah on our you were talking about y yeah okay so the areas that we were looking to revise um and we had quite a bit of discussion on was actually on the page see Roman numeral n and Roman numeral 10 and instruction of um so discussing this with all of you and then bringing it back to the leadership team uh during one of our leadership team meetings we revised that to reflect what is actually happening in our schools um with regard to this policy and how we're going about communicating this policy so um yeah we revised um the top part a little bit upon adoption of the East Lang Public Schools policy prohibiting sexual harassment students will receive age appropriate information and instruction which will include the following and there there had been bullets there uh the bullets though had not been revised in quite a few years so one uh the first bullet point actually was not even included in the last procedures and yet it is in our code of which gets distributed on the first day of school every year so that should be included in there that there's a definition of sexual harassment and a summary of the policy reporting procedures and possible consequences annually provided in the elps code of conduct and student handbook that was a bullet that we needed to change so now next year will that code of conduct include this new policy correct yeah what what we'll do with all the policies as um we finish off we just have one more section that the diversity and equity on steering committee had looked at um what I'd like to do is similar to last year where we had revised the few policies after um the progress monitoring it used to be a Desi audit but it's called progress monitoring now um once you've approved everything I'd like to message out to the entire District um excuse me the entire uh School Community the LPS community and include the policies and where they've been revised and then we can also put them up on our web page but um makes it easier for them to find them but then also it's a great reminder as you said M Julio to put into the code of conduct can we do it digitally yes we can so we'll make that happen the unfortunate thing is we have to have printed copy in accordance with the law um for a students day one yep so so we will certainly announce all of that um then bullet two uh at the secondary level both at the middle school and at the high school level they do still have uh class assemblies within the first few days of school so for instance um senior class probably at a class assembly and they address a number of things would that be right Manny of school first day of school yes Manny excited about that probably none of the students were excited about um and so they do go over not only certain procedures but they highlight certain sections of the code of conduct um now we would become much more specific as part of that highlighting that they speak to sexual harassment then they also pick it up um both at the middle and and high school level in their health classes so for the first one around the explanation of the policy and its purpose is that something then that we're collecting at the district level to say that we have that it has occurred like I uh we have not collected um at the district level so for instance one of the things that they do is um at the high school level by law they have to in clubs and Athletics present the anti-hazing law and then make sure so the coaches and the school collect that okay and then they keep it on file there that you know so and so Gordon Smith participated in this club um and this law was presented and explained and then we sign off on it that uh yes I did receive a copy of it similar to receiving a copy of the code of conduct that we do collect at the schools I'm just wondering if we should have evidence that it happened sure especially if we're talking you're not talking about a Club where maybe there's 15 students participating or an athletic team where it's 30 if you're talking about an entire class so the it might be it may be easier to um at least collect agendas that it was covered um that's something actually we did at the middle school last year due to an inquiry about what do we cover right um and so we provided for pieces such as the anti-hazing and for this piece around um sexual conduct and sexual harassment do we have a standardized format that we say it should be done uh we have't standardize the presentation no but we can I I think it might prove us like if we have if we're putting forward a policy with recommendations for procedures associated with it that we have a standardized way that we are presenting it so that it's not left a chance okay I don't know that's just can I piggy do you want that as part of the I mean I just putting this leadership team put together at the secondary level we would work with them to say hey here's your approach here's what you should be saying yeah okay I just make a followup comment to that I remember in the Dei steering committee we spoke a lot about making this information you know the handbooks great the the presentations hopefully going to be really um useful but I think that maybe their focus was making sure that this is accessible espe to the students and staff alike especially the students though because they might not always have the resources um or the maturity to know how to access the information that we're presenting so they I remember we spoke a little bit about like is there a way like even a QR code a place where they know they can go to get the information if they feel that they're being that they're being targeted under one of these which is a great a great Point thank you um we could online similar to The Bullying so that everybody and that could be one of the things that we speak to that you know if per chance you lose your code of conduct happens where to go to and there's a QR code that we have in the code of conduct that can take you to not to the sexual harassment policy but to the anti-bias um policy and uh reporting right where to how take them directly to the helping spot to get them the help that they need I'm wondering do we have a strong partnership with the District Attorney's Office through the youth Advisory Board I wonder if there's any kind of standardized they may PowerPoints or um student created more student facing um presentations that they've done they've done wonderful things on driving well impaired and um they had the one of the assist assistant District Attorneys I remember she did a presentation around um use of your social media and and phones and that and that type of of information so maybe that's something and we have representation I think still from isow on the youth Advisory Board we do every year every year being able to maybe lean into that as a way of of ensuring that this is happening in a more standardized fashion and then the third bullet is that one when we talk about instruction being provided in health classes that's in alignment with the state framework like like talking about in health classes yes yes okay just making sure that that actually was in addition that wasn't a big change in ter of the new Frameworks that something we both but just making sure that that's not we're not providing instruction that's not in alignment with what the state has already decided should be no we're in mind with that um and then that that final bullet uh there was a lot of discussion around this both at the school committee level but then also at the um leadership level and most of the discussion in uh say when the counselors are doing second step or they're starting to talk about um say different aspects of the health curriculum it's mostly around um reporting and problem solving with a trusted adult and the leadership team felt pretty strongly that maybe that's where we put our focus and only when needed take that further should that problem solving um they didn't feel incredibly comfortable starting to break down you know sexual harassment and when the the lessons that they're learning at that level um are more around problem solving with a trusted result reference the health standards and there's nothing in there for elementary elementary believe it or not I thought the new framework did have information in there for not it's not specifically sexual harassment not specifically sexual harassment but I do believe talk about incest and it talks about rape and it talks about certain aspects like that which would also lend themselves toally this policy and so they're not saying that they will not take those discussions on they're saying that they would like to do that as needed work first and foremost focusing on how do you problem solve with a trusted adult whatever those problems may be yeah I just wonder about the language as needed like you think about like a youngest of students who aren't maybe necessarily aware of what is appropriate versus what is inappropriate how do they then determine well they also talk about so that's a good question if it's needed it's needed they talk about um personal space and they talk about how everyone has that space around them and for us we talk about respect and understanding being understanding of others that we should not be invading personal space which certainly would get into if someone is touching you um that's invading your personal space did a quick search for some terms no I I can understand very thin more age appropriate I think than necessarily as as need say it again sorry Heather so I did a quick search and the the terms that you were just talking about are in the the middle school but there is under Sexual Health 5.6 so that three to five locate trusted adults including parents and Guardians for whom to get help if boundaries are being violated or if one is being physically emotionally or sexually harassed or assaulted so I that to the point of knowing something's going on wrong to talk to the trusted adult into personal space probably at the fifth grade level you might start entering into those conversations I mean maybe then just saying at the elementary level age appropriate discussions will take place and maybe striking as need I don't know that's just my thought because yep determining the need yeah pretty subjective which it probably shouldn't right in elementary level uh discussions will be age appropriate and we're confident that those discussions are going to happen through the health standards and through second steps I think uh our discussion our continuing discussion with the counselors um because with the health new health standards um they're taking on more of this and so we have to continue to have discussions to make sure that there's an understanding and then there's a comfort level okay there's also I think going to be a lot of theming if if you will where something may lend itself to a PE lesson but they may team um and I'll take it out of the realm of sexual harassment they with the school nurse around proper hygiene and um nutrition and so forth and so that's something that we're talking with um Andy Goyette about with who's our administrative Health Services we're hoping that there's going to be a a large collaboration amongst a number of people throughout the district uh to keep us moving forward with the health standards so are you recommending a change to that bulletin saring I I mean I would at least say take out as needed and then how about elementary level discussions will be age appropriate Elementary level age discussions will take place um what do people think discussions at the elementary level will be age appropriate sure okay okay at the elementary level discussions will be age appropriate is that what you said discussions at the elementary too I I got discussions at the elementary level will be age appropr will be okay perfect that Mr English teach English teacher yeah yeah works I like your is better I just didn't hear it you're just saying that no I'm I do okay so that was good for AC ABR is the that's it right so if uh ultimately the motion is to this as a packet we'll put that all eventually back into the manual um then you have ACB as well ACB yes was uh a new policy that came out of our work with the diversity and Equity hearing committee and we discussed it last time but we um specifically talked about if you leave a few pages in to where it talks about privacy confidentiality and Student Records um in a lot of this uh preface what I'm about to say a lot of this comes almost ver excuse me verbatim from Desi guidance on this um but it is confusing in terms of and this is the Bold at the bottom in that we do know that a child who is 14 years of age or older um or who hasth grade has legal authority to consent to disclose information from their student record they have um authority to do some other things when you talk about AP teams and so forth but students who are under 14 and not yet in the ninth grade you do have to defer all that to the students parent um or guardian and so we had language in there that um maybe was not as clear so we want to clarify it that students under 14 School staff will work with parents and and the student to determine individual plans as needed the next page iisize this is coming directly from desie guidance and I know it was causing confusion um and it and it causes confusion for administrators too because the Desi guidance if you choose to include it then says to the extent the school is not legally required to use a student's legal name and gender on other school records or documents so this means you're not changing the official record you're not lobbying desie um to uh through their scid to make a name change which then would trigger name changes on things like mcast rosters and so forth however the guidance is that if the student um chooses to uh go with a name that's not the chosen name that we do our best to um uphold that a non-official right non-official name and that that is challenging and that is where we would need to uh for children under age of 14 discuss that with parents um but that does often present conflict so that's why I kept that in italics to see what this group wants to do and rather to keep that in there or to um remove it or reward it because it's it's not regulation it's guidance I double check that on the website it um there is regulation on there um and so we do need to and it caused a lot of confusion as we were discussing it um as a leadership team because we're all uh we all tend to be as administrators rule followers because we have to enforce the rules and so we see desie come out with new guidance we're like oh that's what we should be doing and then we start moving forward with it but it does just as everybody pointed out as we um put this recommended policy in front of everyone it becomes confusing because the law is 14 years or older and um this group wanted to make sure that it was clear that we are working as a district with uh families that makes sense we try to partner with families whenever we can I know though that you not only have that confusion but sometimes you do have conflict uh which then administrators are into those discussions uh which can be challenging discussions thatly supportive of keeping the Desi language our guidelines here know it's all this policy and procedure and all of this is it's so critical but I also think that this takes the um a human lens M to it you know we're remembering that these are children families that we're supporting and there's a lot of great area in this so I think this is um I think this is an appropriate way to show our support but also recognize that there's you know we're we're following we we're certainly within the law but we're also saying we're supporting families and this is how we're going above and beyond to make sure we're supporting everybody okay okay so that's ACB so you want me to keep that in there as we just I support that but that I would recommend it um I think when we can follow de's guidance it's helpful because um that's a big role that Dey holds is providing us G um okay so than Alex out and we have to as administrators become increasingly more comfortable with uncomfortable situations working on is that your newest book club that's my newest book I'm writing the stay in the gray we do book clubs yeah okay so we have uh is that it for ACB that is is NOP there's one more uh at the bottom under restrooms you would add I wouldn't necessarily keep the Bold in but that was so that we could find it um we did talk about designating at least one single use bathroom in every building the high school and the middle school already have that um but the elementary schools had not and we did discuss that if you're planning individually with a family and you want to offer the nurses bathroom that's up to the family but you have to have a bathroom that is designated that could be separate from the nurse's office and so they do know that um they would need to make sure that there's a designated bathroom now with that said we did talk about the fact that we're not at the elementary level going to be announcing to our students that uh hey there's now a designated bathroom that is available for all students um that they can then lock that we didn't see that necessarily as appropriate but should a family come seek us out definitely saw that as appropriate I think we would have a lot of takers if they all sub they could loock the back but that'll be open to the staff as well that B it's not wasted I we're Limited in terms of restroom I think we would have to because in at least one of our elementary buildings there is no male designated staff bathroom it uh but for whatever reason there is is a female designated staff bathroom and so that got discussion too okay any other questions on ACB so we would look for um approval of the three we have an amendment on acab SLR and we have uh going to include the Desi guidelines for AC I got a motion to that effect you can take them one at a time or hit them all three at once de's choice go all right approve first acab approve ACD the sexual harassment and sexual misconduct yes okay motion you want to do them all I'm sorry sure oh yep yes great um additionally making a motion to amend um ac- rers that's discussed discussed and final motion to approve the ACB non-discrimination on the basis gender non-binary and gender expansive students including the Dy guidelines including the dusty guidelines perfect motion made uh by Amy seconded by William you get that uh yes thank any other discussion on that hearing onone all in favor please say I I I those oppose nay that carries five to zero okay good work you okay these are um into a first read so these are policies coming out of section g that again our diversity and Equity steering committee worked on last year um and so the first one is gbaa and um this is a new policy what it's capturing here is actually some things that we already have in place but it's now actually putting it into a policy um and what I mean by that is that um we used the top statement East Long menal Public Schools is a district that values lot of postings for the last three years um so when we post a job we've had this statement um on the job posting and then as you continue to go through uh we've talked about um easto public school district is committed to cultivating an environment that's been part of posting and part of our hiring um work that's gone on over the last three years as well when we' put together hiring tools and ways to train committees that uh will be helping with hiring in terms of eliminating to the extent possible um unconscious bias these are some of the things that have come into place within those tools and so this a way to capture all of that in a new policy Mr Smith would you say that the heart of the policy is where it says East Long meta Public Schools take proactive measures too yes questions on gbaa diversity of the workplace okay okay gbac okay now this is um also a new policy and if you remember um I want to say at least five years ago it was definitely free covid um the protected uh groups had been um increased and pregnancy and pregnancy relateded conditions were added to uh many of our policies around um making sure that we were welcoming and supportive and discriminating uh and so we had updated policies at that time with that um that wording this however takes it um even further and makes sure that we're really supporting anyone who um may be dealing with um pregnancy related conditions or um be pregnant and making sure that we're a very supportive community and have these things in place this is and I'm asking this because it's been a while our original policy around disabilities but with the pregnancy and pregnancy related conditions or is this taking the place of accommodating employees with disabilities this is actually a new policy and of itself we still have a policy that is accommodating employees with disabilities it's actually specific to pregnancy and pregnancy related conditions you're talking about the ADA compliance any questions on gbac accommodation accommodating employees with disabilities pregnancy and pregnancy Rel conditions okay so those two we have for are we going to Second that's up to you bring them back just to stay it yeah okay takes it off the leadership team agenda tomorrow oh you want to do that we can do it I don't mind I'm bringing this one you want to do it I don't mind let's just do it take a motion I was just kidding all right no I'm fine though it's really it'll save time Poli it'll save us time next time William typically we do a first reading and a second reading just to have the public opportunity to visit us and give us input but sometimes we wave it so you have some reason to use it everybody going we doing this okay keep going busy tomorrow okay um I make a motion to um accept the recommendations section g is that what I'm doing yes if we could approve the policy okay to Y section g of the policy manual from the elps diversity and Equity steering Comm committee policies gbaa diversity in the workplace and additionally make approve CAC accommodating employees with disabilities pregnancy and pregnancy related conditions okay motion made by Amy second second by Anella any other discussion all favor say I I those oppos nay that carries five to zero okay thank you for those thank you up next we have the approval of a donation from aana Salon and Spa of met Brook Elementary elementary autism program you have the information on this one you want me to just take it over uh Renee had reached out principal Loi uh back in the spring a was doing uh wanted to do a um like a fundraiser and they wanted to at first it was to donate uh to gift funds for the school but then they kind of um more thought about how they wanted to go about this and so they asked for a list of items that the Autistic Program over there would be interested so they they purchased these items already and have donated them to the school so they're sitting on Rene's stage until school committee officially approves this gift because as you know everything is always very transparent and um so for $1,471 39 worth of items which was we're very thankful to Oxana uh salon for the very generous donation and Miss Lo was hoping school committee would just approve that gift I move to accept the donation from aana Salon and Spa to metav Brook Elementary autism programs for $1,471 39 motion made by Anella second by Sarah any discussion I would simply say it's always advantageous for local businesses with our school so that's thank you to O on and SP all in favor say I I I those oppos nay that motion carries 5 to zero Rene no thank you use Stu U the final item on our agenda is director of students Support Services position we're going to table that until our next uh meeting and we'll have an update hopefully by then okay okay if there is no further Ado uh Jamie thank you tonight our new director of elcat nice job J congratulations uh Manny thank you for being here tonight and we look forward to seeing you at Future meetings and with that I would entertain a motion toour Mo motion made by Sarah second second by Antella any other discussion all in favor please say I I those oppose nay motion carries 5 Z thank you we are adjourned