##VIDEO ID:lsfc9AnbIw0## e e those who are watching at home and those here in the audience this meeting is being recorded I would invite those here in the audience to please rise for the pledge of alance I pledge aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republ for it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for [Music] all right so typically we do start with uh public comment I do not see anybody here uh in the public to make a public comment uh but we could move into recognitions if there are any recognitions that anybody has to make for this week okay um then do we want to move into the superintendence report sure I just need for Mike to get me on that screen ah beautiful thank you magic okay uh so this is the superintendent report for September 26 2024 um tonight I have just three topics a very brief discussion on where we are with all enrollment um the announcement that uh the high school has been named a national Banner school and then I do have the hopkington public schools mcast rankings that were released on Tuesday I don't want anyone to get confused and think that this is the same thing as the in-depth report that Mr labrad will do uh when he kind of dissects and analyzes all the data that comes to us so in terms of enrollment I show you this all of the time uh if you take our current enrollment and you add all of these up we're at 4141 adding in the 96 students who are in the integrated preschool we are currently at 4,237 students which means we are about 53 students well we are exactly 53 students away from uh the projected enrollment of 4290 that we anticipate reaching by June of 2025 uh the high school is a national Banner school I will read to you what the email said and then I will actually ask Mr Bishop to talk about it because it's really fortuitous that he's here tonight uh congratulations to Hopkinton high school for once again receiving National Banner recognition from Special Olympics North America your school has been selected from a national certifying body for achieving national standards of excellence in the areas of inclusion advocacy and respect the athletes Partners students coaches volunteers teachers staff and administration at Hopkinson High School have all played key roles in creating a social climate where everyone feels included and respected for who they are so I know you're doing a special night yeah so it's certainly a a great honor um it's it's actually our fourth year in a row that we've received this honor which is pretty neat uh we're one of one of 19 schools in the state and one of 202 in the nation that has earned this which is pretty awesome uh I want to thank our our coaches our athletes um our volunteers the teachers everybody associated with the program um I know Chris I saw you at the the home opener of the UniFi it was great to see you there uh they had another game today on the road in deam I actually got a a text message from the dam principal and said you your team is bigger than a football team there was like 70 kids that showed up it's awesome so it's just such a a wonderful program uh so we're going to honor uh the group at at a banner ceremony on uh October 15th uh it's going to be during our spirit week uh so we're going to publicize that and going to raise the banner have a few people say a few words it's a 5:00 game it's usually right after school but we wanted to have kind of more of a night game for our athletes they're excited about that uh and against it's against our rival Ashlin which is pretty neat so we encourage you all to come and uh be part of that ceremony but yeah it's to see the areas in which we're being honored inclusion advocacy and respect I mean that's what we talk about all the time at the high school so it's really nice to receive that honor and shout out to everybody that's involved thank you yeah U so just are mcast rankings across Massachusetts and just so you are clear how these r are being done this is the percentage of students who have either met or exceeded expectations in both Ela and math um across grades three four five 6 7even eight and 10 so grade three rankings uh we were sixth in the state and there were seven schools um in the that top six ranking because for example sometimes at like number three there could be a tie um and in math the third grade came in seventh and there were eight schools at the top in grade four Ela we were fourth in Massachusetts with five schools at the top and in math those fourth graders were sixth in Massachusetts with eight schools at the top grade five has an awful lot to celebrate they were third in ela of the top three schools and they were first in mathematics which is really nice to see they do so much work there with math instruction that um you can see that it's paying dividends in grade six our Ela students were sixth with seven schools at the top and in math they were second with two schools at the top also something to be very pleased with uh Ela in grade seven they were ninth with 21 schools at the top and in math they were fourth with five schools at the top grade 8 Ela they were eighth with 16 schools at the top and in math they were second with three School schools at the top and then finally grade 10 English language arts they were third with three at the top and in math they were fourth with eight at the top so I am feeling really good about those rankings um there's an awful lot to celebrate there and really these scores come to us because our kids work so hard and our teachers work so hard so thank you to them and that is all I have for you any questions do we want to um Jump Ahead just to the school Improvement plan for the high school is that sure if you like since you're already up here yeah that'd be great if you don't mind yeah we'll Jump Right In awesome um well thank you so much for for having me and and for rescheduling I know I had a conflict two weeks ago um so uh I'm excited to come here tonight to talk about our Focus areas and how they relate to our school Improvement plan at the high school uh it's certainly a team effort uh a lot of folks are part of developing the school Improvement plan I'm sure you've heard from my colleagues when they came two weeks ago uh we have a school council that's a big part of creating the school Improvement plan it's a group of 25 parents students teachers and administration and we meet five times throughout the course of the year and talk about areas we want to focus on uh we also have the department heads that are part of the discussion or smls we call them at the high school uh the other two assistant principles Mr pville and Miss Ty are part of the conversation and of course central office so certainly a lot of folks as well as students getting feedback from them as you can see from some of the mcast results that Dr K I just show we doing well in a lot of areas at the high school very proud of the work that we're doing uh but we had a conversation this summer and again at the first day of the school year about not being complacent and always trying to push forward and get better at what we do uh and so there's always still areas that we can look at the data and say we're doing wonderful but there's areas we can still can look at and try to find areas in which we can improve upon there certainly some spots where we've identified in the school Improvement plan that we're excited about working on uh we have two kind of large goals with multiple action steps underneath them uh so I'll start with the first one uh which uh we're calling kind of meeting every student's needs in the classroom uh that's kind of the idea of the goal our theory of action for this goal is if that we continue to examine our data sources to update and revise our curriculum assessments and instructional practices then our students will have the opportunity to experience success reach the desired levels of Mastery and feel greater sense of belonging uh so our first kind of action to meet that needs of every student goal um is the work that we've been doing with black Print uh I'm sure you're familiar with that we had an equity audit come in last May to the high school with the company called black Print uh they met with students staff parents Administration uh gathered a lot of feedback uh and so we're excited about getting those formal results we haven't actually got our hands on kind of the results yet uh we're looking forward to doing that hopefully shortly uh and part of our kind of success criteria on this goal is once we get that information planning the proper PD to be able to kind of implement to positively impact our student experience uh and also surveying the students at uh and staff at the end of the year that they have a better understanding of the report and how it fits into what we're trying to do at the high school so certainly more to come uh with that action step uh our second action step underneath this goal uh revolves around our continued focus on looking at data and analyzing uh student assessment data from a variety of different sources um in this case we're kind of specifically looking at our AP exam our mcast scores as well as our star work uh and so some of the areas in which we're going to measure if we're meeting this goal um you kind of just saw up there some of our scores we're hoping that in the 2025 mcast all three of our subjects Ela math and science uh we'll have 90% of our students receiving a score of meeting or exceeding and no students failing the exam that's a lofty goal but we're talking about meeting every student's needs and I think we can do it we talked to staff about it um this past year we had 92% of ela students meeting or exceeding no students failed math we had 88 no students failed which is just amazing and science we went from 83 to 888 in terms of meeting or exceeding uh and so we're really going in the right direction obviously every year it's a new group of students right uh but we have great teams at that level working together looking at the curriculum so um it's a goal that we're shooting for which we're excited about uh in regards to the AP exams we want all of our still we have uh quite a few students take the AP exam we had 624 take it last year which is about 50% of our population um and so we want all of our students across the 26 different subjects in which they're taking the AP exam to score a three or higher which is kind of passing uh which we were pretty close we had 94% of students this past year so I think we're we're close we can get there so we want to push forward see if we can get to that higher number um and we also want all of our exam averages to be above the national and state average uh so that's something we really focus on 96% of our exams this past year were above the state and National so we're really close again not trying to nitpick but not trying to be complacent and trying to continue to kind of push forward to get to those higher numbers so talk to our AP teachers talk to our mcast staff um obviously they're they're they're like 100% that's a lot but they they're they're up for the challenge they're excited about it I think we're looking forward to kind of our work in that area and the same goes with our star data uh not necessarily as publicized as the AP uh results in mcast but certainly as valuable uh certainly in our math and our Ela departments uh we give star uh testing multiple times throughout the course of the year and it's really for us and our data team to kind of look at what remediations uh what placements will be appr for students uh what additional supports they might need in the classroom uh and so we've had our first installment already happen in math and Ela we're looking forward to the next few to kind of take a look at the results where they're going how they're looking and then plan those appropriate uh interventions for students so that's kind of under the action steps of looking at student assessment data in the third part of this first goal is more geared I guess towards the staff than it is to the students but I do think if we do this at a high level it'll have a big impact on our students uh and that's uh our goal around peer observation so we're really encouraging our staff to get into each other's classrooms we think that's really important especially outside of the discipline in which you teach uh it was a goal of ours uh a few years prior to covid and it was really meant to kind of be a cultural Builder and kind of get some practices from their colleagues and maybe maybe you have a student in your class that you're trying to connect with and you want to see them in another class to see how they're doing and how you can kind of reach that student in different ways and so we got a lot of positive feedback from that and we've had some turnovers since Co so I think it's time to kind of go back to that goal uh so we're meeting with every staff member Mr pville Miss Tyson and I right now talking about their goals for the upcoming year and unless they have a set professional practice goal we're really encouraging them to get into each other's classroom so we have a number of Staff members already excited about that collaboration building that trust the respect that we keep talking about at at the high school uh and so we'll survey the staff at the end of the year the ones that pick this as a goal to see if they're feeling like they've built better relationship with colleagues outside of the department what they took away from those classes and how they incorporated into their curriculum so that's a goal we're really excited about so along those lines our second kind of goal uh I would say the theme is around building a community of respect and and collaboration uh our theory of action is that if we continue to examine data sources to amplify student voice and choice as well as self- advocacy skills then students will employ more agency in the learning build better relationships demonstrate a healthier level of school life balance which is so important for us at the high school and continue to contribute to their community in a positive way um so our first kind of action step to reach that goal we talked a little bit about student assessment data we also have a lot of student climate data which I also feel is as important if not almost more important in some ways uh and we get that from our school climate surveys from our the HSA the holistic student assessment that every student takes the Metro West adolescent Health survey that we do every two years as well as our Pathways after graduation survey which I'll talk about in a moment I think um you all know we focus onal and the mental health of our students very much at the high school so we we've seen some really good survey results in these categories uh I opened up the staff uh meeting this year and the first day of school highlighting some of these the data that we got when it came to the climate survey just to see to show the staff like the things that we're doing are working and going in the right direction but again if you dig a little bit deeper there are areas that we still want to focus on and so the measurable criteria suring this action is uh within the Metro West adolescent Health survey which we do every two years so we took in November of 2023 we won't take it again until November of 2025 so we have some time to make some gains there hopefully um areas in which the numbers were a little higher than we'd like to see was around um our female population actually reporting that they are feeling very stressed over the last 30 days overall our numbers were lower than the years past at 20% but 31% of females reported that so we want to get that number down a little bit so I've already worked with our Wellness Department talked about what can we do within our curriculum uh and so those are things we're going going to be focusing on as well as our female population reporting that they have depressive symptoms over the past 12 months that number is at 20% overall it was lower when you consider the the the mail results and compared to other communities in the in the area but still it's higher than I would like to see it so we want to really work on that um another area is that climate survey that we send out to students twice a year we send it middle of the year and end of the year uh questions about how we're doing as an Administration uh what can we improve upon uh one question we ask is do you feel safe at school do you feel emotionally safe at school and one is do you have an adult in addition to your counselor that you feel knows you well and that has your best interest in mind uh and 85% of students last year said that was the case both times and so that's great I would like to see it a little bit higher um we're in the business of building relationships with kids and getting to know them and helping them along the process so um we all talked about trying to move that a little bit higher to the 100% number if possible again that's lofty but it's something we really want to focus on uh so that's another area in which we will assess to see how we're doing we have the third part of this goal is around the pathways after graduation survey so uh you may be aware of this but we have partnered with a researcher to survey our graduates the class of 2023 and the class of 2024 about their experience at school or whatever it is that they're doing work military uh and we had a pretty good number of students respond to that survey in the class of 2023 so we have some good data um all types of topics from academics were you prepared social life um mental health are you receiving the the the supports that you need at colle I could share the survey with you a lot of questions on it uh but one area that I was particularly interested in was you know how prepared are you compared to your peers when it comes to um you know being at at that next level mostly college and 92% of our students said they were prepared or very prepared which is good but again you know we're in that 90 range we can Pat ourselves on the back that's great but we still want to kind of push to make sure that we're preparing it even more so than their peers in other areas so that's an area that we're going to hopefully see increase as well um we've also I think I came talking about handbook changes is at the beginning of the year we've added some different things to try to um uh have positive impacts on the learning environment for students and staff we've added Vape detectors in our bathrooms um and I can tell you that they work and uh we have a uh cell phone policy that we're really uh committed to uh that students will put the phone in the the phone holder during the class and we've received quite a bit of positive feedback on both of those from students uh and parents as well and staff so we're hoping that that continues but we do want to survey the kids at the end of the year to see how much it has had an impact on their experience I have a principal's cabinet meeting tomorrow with 20 11th and 12th graders and that's going to be the first question I'm going to ask how is that going from your end and what are you hearing and what can we approve upon so uh I'm interested to see if if that's going to that's going to come up uh in a positive way which I hope it will and the last aspect of this goal is around the HSA data I know you've heard about that before we administer that twice a year it's a holistic student assessment um we have the date set for the fall it's going to be on the 24th of October uh and so we'll get that we get those results back usually it goes straight to the cing Department who then will work with students that might need additional support based on the results that we get uh and then the last part of this second goal is around creating more opportunities for career exploration for post-secondary options maybe students that might not be going off to a two or four year college we have 94% of our students generally go off to two or four year uh colleges but on that survey that we sent out to students that 5% felt like we they weren't that prepared to apply for a job or to go through that process of find a job and so we really want to kind of do a better job I just came here from our senior parent night we had almost a pack house in the auditorium which is great uh and I was watching Miss King who is our new director of counseling talking about the application process but also talking about other options for students uh and kind of defining that what is success in your family doesn't always have to be the Harvard the Y it's a lot of different things out there for students and so we're going to put a lot of effort into that through the myap um which is the U my career and academic plan that the that the dec has put out uh I put a committee together working on that helping students find different Pathways for them so we're hoping that at the end of the year I can come back and tell you that students feel a little bit better about other post-secondary options that might not be a two or four year college uh and we also have and I'll wrap it up here I know I've talked a while here I'm sorry um we also have a senior Capstone uh which some of you may be aware of at the end of senior year many students take part in uh from the Monday after April vacation through graduation in a month-long kind of work study uh they go out and they find a passion and they come back and report on it for a month worth of work um I would say it's gone postco up to about 80% of the senior class is doing a senior project uh we have it in the Athletics Center it's almost like a college feir people from the community can walk around students can walk around ask questions it's really a wonderful program um we're hoping that it's with the junior class right now that every student partakes in that and gets an opportunity to kind of close down school when it comes to April vacation and really dig into something they're passionate about uh and so that's going to be something we're going to do a lot of work this year to hopefully be able to have that be the case for the current Juniors at the end of their senior year so that's more of like a two-year goal so a lot of stuff in there um sorry to throw so much data at you but um you know it's exciting stuff we're doing really well in a lot of areas but certainly some stuff that we can continue to improve upon and I'm happy to answer any questions that you have about the the Improvement plan thank you yeah what is a climate survey yeah so uh a climate survey is a survey that we've created um actually with help from some of our our psychology teachers and a person who actually um kind of reviews surveys and is part of creating them so we've sent some questions to them and they've given us some feedback over the years uh and it's for us to get a sense of how things are going uh get a dipstick of are things going well they're not going well are you feeling I know I mentioned are you feeling physically and emotionally um you know uh safe at school but there's all types of questions we'll ask about you know the new school rules um do you feel like you have a voice in decision- making at the high school um oh boy uh it's probably like 20 to 25 questions Google doc we send it out on a flex block we ask kids not mandatory but take it if you want to we get a lot of kids that respond and then there's also boxes where they can kind of type in responses which is helpful for us and we usually take that information and try to set a goal around it so the kids just don't think it's like oh they're not listening to us we want them to feel heard uh and so we try to cover a lot of different topics but some of it will be related just to this Improvement plan to say you want us to improve so yeah it was created internally used twice a year middle of the year end of the year gotcha and you so you said 30% of the high school girls feel uh they said that they felt um very stressed in the last 30 days yep do we have comparative data from prior years or other high schools I'm a lot of yeah absolutely yeah so we have the Metro West adolescent Health survey goes back all the way to the early 2000s so every two years we have that data so that number is lower than years past the 30% is lower yeah but still higher yeah so overall if you look at the number they break it down by School versus other schools around the Metro West area which is interesting to see but then it breaks down grade gender yeah um and so you can really dig into the data on the surface when we looked at our numbers it was really good but then when you start to look at the breakdown of like where's the stress coming from is it Juniors usually right sometimes freshman it depends on the question that they're asking um they talk about bullying they ask questions about bullying they ask questions about physical activity it's an interesting survey uh and so I always enjoy getting that feedback back and trying to look at areas we can improve upon uh and so that's going to be another topic I'm going to bring up tomorrow principal's cabinet about like what do we think this is how can we address it you know um we do things like Flex block and homework free weekends or try to address that but there's got to be more that we can do right got it okay great thanks is that something you um discussed with your faculty too like like what is yeah come causing that because it's a very specific group does it pan out to be a specific like age grade level yeah so that particular question around being very stressed yeah um I can pull it actually I might have it the results here on my computer I think if I remember correctly it was uh the numbers was highest even the 30% was average across the four grades I want to say it was a spike Junior and Senior year yeah and I think that's probably academic pressure academic pressure uh the post-secondary I mean that is depending on the time it was given exactly rightly that's November when applications are being sent in or decisions are coming back so there's definitely you can dig into like when we sent this and why that might be the case totally um but still areas in which that that's I I'd like to see that lower and like to support um the students if they're feeling that way how can we help them kind of deal with those that stress High School's come a long way since I was in high school no one would have cared what I thought or any of the kids I went to high school it's is it wonderful how better we are yeah no it's really interesting when you talk about the wellness staff because I'm um from the Stone Age was that the um what we call the health teachers back in the day I guess it would be the PE and health teachers yes yeah okay y yeah we call them well teachers they do a little bit of both they do classroom uh they do fitness center they do athletic center activities um and a lot of our conversations around some of these topics happen freshman sophore year when they come into the high school but kids do take a wellness class all four years okay yeah it's important I really appreciate the focus on other options for postsecondary I think that's you know we've seen how valuable it is and how important it is and how many people are feeling that they have to go to college and that's just not the case yeah I really appreciate that we're giving that support to kids yeah it's important so one question I had about you talked about your surveying the students who whether they feel prepared or very prepared are you able to correlate that to what schools they are chosen what majors they are chosen like yeah kids are going into high math programs are not feeling it yeah that's a good question I um so the work is being done through a researcher that we're uh collaborating with so I think we can they can get that information for us if we ask for it yeah yeah I think that would be really interesting yeah I agree and we're hoping to do this current so the group that's one year out right now that just is either in their fall semester college or just beginning work or military we're hoping to survey they get them in May to see the difference between this year and last year and then we're also considering Maybe following the class of 2023 all four years you know and some of the things we're interested in is like the transfer rate you know they going someplace else why is that the case is it social reasons is it fit is it academics like those things just so we can help prepare families and and students to make the the best decisions when when they graduate when your teachers do are um going out to do um observations and other do they have some kind of instrument they use yeah so we don't really want it to be evaluative so yeah so we don't want there to be like I'm going to go in take notes and feedback it's just more about um kind of seeing other strategy maybe you do a really good do now to start the class that I even thought about to get the kids up and moving and get them active and I can take that back into my class or maybe you know Susan's been a real pain in my class um I heard they like your class I'd love to go see kind of how you're interacting with them maybe there's a technique you're using that I'm not so um those are the types of things very and it's usually like you can pick if teachers come to me and say I'm looking for someone that different differentiates really well then I have a list of people in my head I'm like that person does it really well you're free that period why don't we why don't you have you go see that person okay that's yeah so there's a little bit of like a like a structure but not too formal right uh and only people are comfortable with it uh but it's one of those things when people start to hear about it I do hope with like oh I want that I want to go see that and it also gives our veteran teachers who are tremendous who are at the middle or end of their career it allows some younger folks to go in and take a look at some of the good things that they're doing you know and and kind of remind them that you know when in a profession you're going to get all these bonuses the the better you do and the data you get but like you can take that next generation of teachers and kind of take them under your wing which I think is super important one thing and I've heard you say it other years when you've come at this point that I I really appreciate is that you're not just comfortable sitting back and appreciating where we are and and what we've accomplished but in trying to find more trying to figure out the different little corners of pockets of places where we could be better um even in things that 100% seems like a really high goal for anything but that you're looking at pushing forward that way and reaching all of the students and looking at things like alternative paths I I appreciate that and I know that it it serves our students very well thank you important we're good we do uh we need a motion though is that oh yes I move to approve the high school Improvement plans for 2024 and 2025 second motion by Jamie second by Susan all those in favor I I it's unanimous thank you thank you very great job awesome thank you thank you have a nice evening going to circle back to the school committee chair report uh just to say that school committee War at payroll warrant s255 and s256 have been approved Warren 25-16 s 25-0 17s 25- z18s 25-01 9s 25-20 s 25-21 s 25-22 s and 25-23 s I have all been approved uh warrants have been included in the folder are there liaison reports I missed my first uh youth commission meeting because it coincided with third grade curriculum night but I look forward to the next one esbc we had a meeting uh Monday Tuesday Tuesday uh Tuesday uh things are going good um under budget um 10% under budget yeah I'm sorry what percent 10% 10% under 10% 1% yeah 1% sry okay I was like close but still 1% back to high school okay yeah um so it's everything's good there that's great yeah okay all right um then that we going to move down oh should we talk about no I guess I just went that there was CPAC event last week whatever um meet the uh administrators for special education there was about 15 20 families would you say superintendent yeah oh excellent um there it was good um of all and a lot of time for the families to talk to their school's administrator personally um get personal advice get um really create a connection with them outside of the IEP meeting which is really great experience that's great was there any sense uh if they were families that are newer coming into connecting with CPAC yes there were I think there were some newer families um although you know there were families also on the upper ends that have been around for a while but new to you know new to a new school middle school high school or there was a family that's getting ready for college you know what is that going to look like transition and those connections between I I think are important between families that are newer to the entire CPAC but also to the we Hade some preschool students and family well not students family okay all right good thank you all right um the Hopkins lower Middle School Chris are you there Chris can you hear can you hear us there he is he is there he is I am um I've been watching you on YouTube because the feed's not coming through so I'm going to pause that and hopefully you guys can hear me yes we can hear you we can hear you okay yeah I have the audio um so I'm here tonight to talk about insurance I know you're all thrilled um we're at the point where um the new addition is about to begin sprouting out of the ground with the foundation and at this point um um typically We Begin the Builder Risk insurance policy Builder risk is a specialized insurance policy that is specifically for buildings under construction buildings under construction have unique risks and the way that um the way that insurance generally works and construction Finance generally works is once you pay the requisition the town owns the products that are on site and that they have paid for and so you want to ensure those against potential loss this becomes a little more complicated when you're dealing with an existing building addition because you also have the potential for the in construction building to affect the existing building and it's also further Complicated by the fact that the existing building is occupied throughout construction so working with miia the towns insure um since February we've been working to uh get a quote for a policy to take over um or to take the building off their regular um schedule of insurance and Ure the building specifically with the Builder's Risk insurance they initially went through their preferred vendor and a secondary market and both declined to take up the policy for the risks that I mentioned such as you know the there's a wood frame structure it's an occupied building as well as an addition and renovation ultimately they ended up with the proposal that's before you tonight which came from Atlantic specialty insurance company um it is uh proposal for and of course that's the one number I did not write down in front of me um $245,600 $297,000 $761 and um we've compared this to what we had budgeted for the amount which was 170,000 we have seen across all of our projects a dramatic increase in the cost of Builders risk over time and as a result we did see this premium come in higher than we forecast but the project continues to have ample contingency in order to cover it the original design phase had $ 95,7 38 of owner's contingency remaining and so with this um transfer of $75,600 to the Builder Risk insurance category we would still have 20,000 of that original um owner contingency remaining in the budget and we still have uh 250,000 from construction um authorization owner's contingency now that contingency from our conversation when I was last with you is completely separate from the construction contingency that's used for change orders as well as separate from the cm's contingency that's part of the authorization that you voted on when I was last with you so we still have 2.9 Million for construction contingency and the budget remains in a healthy place even with the authorization of this um insurance policy tonight if you have any question I'm happy to entertain them um and with that I'll turn it over to you for any questions you might have great helpful um so mi is the current insur for the middle it's the um insurance broker that the town uses it's they hold all of the town's insurance policies and so when we began this process we were asked to work with them to obtain the policy got and they because the during the construction the renovation the addition they the um coverage the school has is paused and that's why we need this supplemental insurance so what what happens is it's typically carried by the town the the existing building yeah um when you're doing construction you go out for this Builder's risk so it comes off the town existing building and shifts on to this policy okay and so the town policy gets paused so to is that I don't know if that's okay so the and I assume that pausing um triggers that coverage and what the town pays there's some type of refund or rebate or if that policy's on pause for I assume the length of the construction that's correct do we the town do we get that money that that would be on the town side so so basically the cost for that insurance does shift to the project and would come off of the Town operating budget that's correct all right so we're not paying twice we're not paying twice got it okay thanks any other questions if that's the case um we seek a motion and the amount I know is $245,600 there's a a blank in there motion to approve Builder Risk insurance policy for the Hopkins school and related Construction in the amount of $245,600 all right so that brings us down into item C which is the intent to travel okay thank you uh so I am looking for your approval for the uh music department specifically Mr hay and Mr Brody to take students across grade levels all 9 to 12 on an overnight outof State field trip uh they will be going from Saturday February 1st to Sunday February 2nd and you can see that uh the purpose of the trip is really to learn more about musical theater and to to um experience a live performance um with the New York philarmonic so a really nice trip for for those kids great great any questions on that I'm just curious do the students have an option to not have four kids in a room so I don't know the tri triple say trip quad yeah and then I'm just curious I know when I played hockey we're four in a room we didn't have a choice or an option I was just curious do they they might have a choice if there's a group of three that all want to kind of room together yeah I get that but yeah okay I'm just curious I I think in past overnight overnight trips that have happened in the past I know we haven't done as many of the like because the eighth grade trip doesn't run anymore but they have not had that option for like the eighth grade trip in the past and unless they just happen to look out yeah yeah just curious but looks like a great trip I've seen two of those shows Aladdin and Back to the Future those were those were great so sounds like a good trip yeah is there anybody that would like to make a motion on that I move to approve the travels to New York City for high school music motion Jamie second by Chris all those in favor I and it's unanimous uh thank you for bringing that forward and that brings us into the FY 26 Capital plan there it is okay so this is the capital plan um for fiscal year 26 what we do uh typically is we show the next 5 years years of the capital plan we do put together a capital plan for 10 years and we do submit that to the town um for our presentation we just kind of keep it condensed but what the school committee is looking at for tonight really is fiscal year 26 and what those requests are for 26 so when you go down the list here you can see um the capital replacements for these years goes from 2 .5 million to 3.1 to 2.2 1.1 825,000 and 3.8 the strategy with these Replacements is obviously to spread them out over fiscal years and when we have a large project such as in 2031 which are the roof replacements for um the high school we try not to put any other uh projects in that same year just to make it more palatable for the community so looking at FY 26 we're looking at HVAC districtwide at 735,000 storefront entry doors for 200,000 a sewer pump cover for 60,000 technology for 100,000 and under enrollment growth the Adaptive playground for 1.5 million looking at the HVAC districtwide this represents units in both the middle school and the high school as well as a feasibility study for a sustainable replacement plan in the high school as a reminder the high school has 14 units and the middle school has eight units with the replacement cost above the $25,000 threshold these units are all we use an life expectancy of 30 years therefore the replacement is spread out out over several years the storefront the entry doors these are the this is a replacement for the entry doors for the middle school this is on the water tower um side of the building and these are two sets of double doors that have heavy use not only is it for school use but Community use for the gyms uh town meeting all of those uh uses come through these entry doors uh so the frames are corroded and there's large gaps between the doors um so this is kind of a um way of working around the building and getting at some of these uh storefront issues the sewer access cover this is in the driveway um behind the high school and the bus lot uh access and you can see the damage that has happened over time uh the sewer pump is down in a chamber below those doors so these uh doors need to be replaced technology for 100,000 uh this is looking at updating the existing existing firewall appliances and they are located at the high school uh the systems need a larger capacity to help manage heavier Network traffic and to help with the expansion of the new charleswood school and the Hopkins Edition current firewalls have 10 gbyte links and will be moving to 25 gbyte links in the new system in addition we'll be expanding the core switch capacity at the high school to addition to accommodate additional growth as well as updates to the AV capacity at the high school auditorium and Press Box the Adaptive playground has a placeholder of 1.5 million as a reminder town meeting in May of 24 approved the use of CPC money for the design uh study and Engineering for the Adaptive playground an Adaptive playground committee was formed to guide the direction of the process hire a designer and seek Community input working with the Design Group beta the committee chose the location of the marathon school after a process that began with 198 Town owned Parcels the survey was sent to community to seek input on the design and elements for the playground and beta is taking all the input from the committee and the survey to develop designs for the playground and this project will again be submitted to the CPC for potential funding and that Grant is due to the CPC October 10th to give you an idea of the schedule that we worked through for the uh adaptive playground so in July is when the designer was hired so that we had a project kickoff meeting with the designer beta in August uh the committee met to look at all of those uh sites and put together some type of criteria and finally make that site selection so here we are in September um the committee has um looked at different landscape analysis and early thoughts of the site that was selected which is the marathon School in October we'll be uh receiving Design Concepts based on the information and in November hopefully we'll be looking at some construction documents so again looking at the site that has been selected this is an aerial view of the marathon school you can see the Box around the area that has been chosen for the Adaptive playground so the question is what is adaptive or inclusive playground it is um and these are put together by Beta our designer so we are looking at something that is accessible to all designed for children of all abilities to play together a universal design features ramps accessible paths ground level play areas sensory Rich offers varied sensory experiences like textures sound and movement encourages social play promotes interaction and cooperation among all children safe and supportive provides secure barrier-free enrollment environments sorry with quiet spaces for retreat so some of the uh thoughts around what could be done with that are area that we're looking at at the marathon school so you can see one of the circles as a potential location for the playground um kind of enhancing around the asphalt area that already exists and over here where it says incorporate diverse swings this is the existing playground that is there for Marathon now and we're also looking at an area that is close to the building as potentially a quiet space and more seating areas um for for the playground for students another area is just the flip side of that lawn um with the same idea and the last thought is creating somewhat of a playground that surrounds um both sides of the grass in the middle and just as a reminder the the GL grass area is used for um PE classes and um you know regular school classes in addition to recess uh so this is another thought that would put the playground on both ends with the inclusion of a sensory path that could connect all different areas of that back area so some of the play elements that the committee uh looked at in their last uh meeting and were were able to vote on it again to give feedback to um beta in terms of which elements uh to include not include and this is where we'll start to see some designs um as they take this information back uh so some of the things are different elements a basket swing an Adaptive swing or a highback swing a wide slide a Roller Slide or an inclusive Loop slide an in inclusive climbing nit inclusive spinner or a spinning Bowl social play elements that we looked at were a playhouse a wooden playhouse a group play space or a stage then different uh playboards if you will tic-tac-toe some kind of sensory games Cooperative puzzles and educational panels inclusive Play Elements a color sensory path a texture sensory path or a nature texture sensory path inclusive seesaw inclusive spinner chair inclusive Carousel and just a quiet space and some more play elements that we looked at a nature sensory table explor exploration log a wood climbing area butterfly garden Boulder climbing area bird habitat nature education panel nature shade area and an archaeological exploration area so that just gives you an idea of all the many many elements that we will be considering at our next meeting that bet will be pulling together um for possible inclusion into the playground and by our meeting mean are the school committee or the Adaptive playground meeting the Adaptive playground meeting questions on are they also thinking about incorporating um shade over some of those things because like that is a very sunny area so shade is uh one of the elements that was brought out many many times in the community survey and also by the Adaptive playground great committee so yes one of the interesting um pieces a shade element is unbelievably expensive um because guess that yeah you wouldn't guess it but what happens is it basically becomes a wind sail so the footings and the grounding that you need for the install become very substantial as opposed to just putting in a swing set um so those are elements that we have to kind of balance with bud as well right I know there's so many kids who are so sensitive to Bright and heat oh agre agreed in terms of and I I appreciate all that I know goes into getting to this point with the capital plan the Adaptive playground in looking at um much work obviously has been done and brought us to this point has any work been done with the CPC to communicate with them ahead of time or is that just not do they not want to talk until the grant until it's submitted well for the grant specifically that like I don't even have that application there is a member um that is a CPC representative that is part of the Adaptive playground committee I have also sent uh Communications just updates um to the chair of the CPC so they knew where we were at this point especially when it came to the selection of the location because that was something that the committee did a lot of work on to choose where the playground would be located that's great other any other questions on that okay um any questions on any of the capital plan no I thought it was great that in your report that you noted the HVAC and the entry do really focusing on the high school middle school because we have other building projects going on in a brand new Marathon school so we're not already replacing those I think it's important for the public to understand that and appreciate the the way that the HVAC and the other Replacements are done on the cycle so that's it's not getting as much as it feels like it a lot when you look at anything like that m if we were doing the entire thing it would be obviously significantly more so I appreciate how thoughtful your approach is year over year and the CPC money for the Adaptive playground that's that wouldn't be coming out of the school but like we're anticipating that that's being covered by CPC that's why it says CPC well I I note that it is CPC because I will apply for the grant um we just don't know we don't know that it would be accepted by the CPC so there's there's always that right question mark so we will submit the capital plan as it is hoping that we will be funded for the playground that way if we do get funded by CPC would you push the Loop Road up a year or just hold on to the5 and so the Loop Road we're still hoping that um potentially or anything else I just didn't know do you just no we no we would keep it as it is okay yeah yeah we're trying to stay very light unless it's something that is you know absolutely needed like like roofs yeah I know the CPC has a time where you can come and talk about projects if your representative on the committee would like one of us to also join them um to help Express the need for this I'd be willing to help thank you and I think that typically we do have some school committee representation there it has not um it has it's been a challenge this thus far it has been passed over two years previously this year coming with a concrete plan I think put this in a different place it was what they seem to be looking for last year it's possible I'm assuming because I've seen it with other projects that they would fund a portion of it but not the whole thing and then it would be dependent on making sure we can get Town funding for the rest but right yeah so it will be a challenge we don't we won't have exactly the design by the time I need to apply for the grant so the next uh adaptive playground um meeting is about two weeks after the grant is due so there'll be a timing where hopefully by the time CPC has their hearing right I'll have something more definitive in hand and they haven't given dates on hearings yet have they no as I said I I don't even have the application at this time I just know the date that it's due all right well that's good for now y thank you thank you all right that moves us then into school committee goals um so just for a little bit of a historical perspective we've only actually done school committee goals for a couple of years it was something we started uh we did it the in the summer her the first year we had as a committee worked with a consultant from uh he's from Tony Ben from Mass or is he still I know he works as a consultant but he's he's a member of mas yeah um but does a lot of work with other districts so you know one of the things in looking at goals is it has to be things that we can do ourselves that don't add to it's something that the school committee under our perview we can do so in terms of can you pull up the District Improvement piece cuz I think that's okay so I can just quickly run through that go through quick okay surely uh so when we did the district Improvement plan we have sort of three big buckets to fill one is to plan for enrollment growth another is to make sure that we are meeting every student's need I know you saw that tonight when Mr Bishop was here we really do adhere to the all means all all really can mean all all means all every student every day we've altered that M uh Mantra just a little bit each year but inevitably we really believe that we need to make sure that every student is reaching their fullest potential in the Hopkinson public schools and then the third is building a community of respect and collaboration we have a rationale for each one of those and so the rationale for enrollment growth says that with predictions of reaching over 5,000 students by the 2030 2031 school year the hopkington public schools continue to focus on growing our physical plants and extracurricular spaces bringing new and renovated schools online in the next few years responsibly our construction projects are fed are focused on accommodating future growth as well as ensuring the environmental health of the community accordingly the schools must use budgeted resources wisely to provide the highest quality Innovative education for all students flexing programs to ensure equity and access of student profiles demand fortunately beyond our campuses lies a community of invested stakeholders u under meeting every student's needs the rational is that the Hopkinton Public Schools see each child as an individual learner and human being it's imperative to note that hopkinton's student profiles are diversifying resulting in broader student needs academically we Center first on learning foundational skills within a community gradually introducing more diverse Pathways as students mature near graduation we pledge an investment students social emotional behavioral and physical wellness and we commit to Growing programs that help all students access challenging curricula with the hope to graduate well balanced young adults who take risks think independently believe in themselves and persevere and then the last under building a community of respect and collaboration while it might be easy to focus on academic successes alone the Hopkinson Public Schools believe in helping children develop a capacity for kindness respect compassion and service to to others we believe in Collaborative Learning and fostering the growth of relational competencies students must understand how others live and build relationships across race class gender and learning abilities to create caring learning communities every member of our community is expected to model these behaviors we engage in this work believing that the ends are best met when we also have strong relationships between families in schools and so those are the things that our administrative team has sort of refined each year um and then can you pull up and I can go to the school committee goals this was also in the packet so but I wanted just to pull it up for sake of discussion so these are the goals that we did last year um we can change them we can adapt adapt them or you know change them in any way change to different goals the the one tenant is it should be an alignment that we're moving in the same direction as the the district Improvement plan but um how did it go from last year so you know the the smart goal piece of it was the I think was were the details where we did a midyear check-in it felt like we were definitely in the right um on the right track it felt like we there's work still to be done um on some of the things the looking the budget piece obviously is something that we face every year I think this year's budget is probably going to be at least a little bit more challenging than last year's budget um so that's you know the one thing that we didn't do at the regular Pace that we had talked about doing was office hours that was something that um the year before we had worked on we did more office hours we did a listening series which was largely by Zoom uh where we did a series of seven or eight where people came in for we targeted different groups groups different weeks and everybody was welcome but we'd pick a topic um one week it might have been like special education and trying to listen and hear from stakeholders what they thought in that what they're what they were hoping to see from us I think that would be really good to have list absolutely I'm very interested in that yeah you know I think um the timing is always the the hard thing it it's I think in an Ideal World we'd all be able to be there for as many as possible thewe time that we found when we did do them regularly was a Sunday evening because I tends I think people tend to be out more on other evenings but I don't know what people's schedules are like we don't have to set the dates if we want to do a listening series um right now obviously uh but we could put that in as we want to do that and we can work out the details of It kind of at a off off further down online you see did you did them uh during Co did you do any that were live they they were live um on Zoom Oh you mean in person so we the listening series was always done on Zoom okay we did office hours that we did in person the office hours we didn't do as a group of five we did it intentionally as like groups of two so that it would be like two people would go we'd went to the farmers market a couple of times we did um like at the spoon or something like that where we would have two people and then invite people to come in and just come over and talk and share their ideas ask questions about us and then report back to the whole group for that piece that sounds good too yeah and and those were not set times and dates the idea was we're trying to catch people where their schedules were so that while Sunday might have at the time been good for the committee there were some people that a daytime was better or some people that like we did one year we did right before the concert you know when the in the high in the middle school when some of the school concerts were coming in parents could come over we found that that was less um productive in terms of getting a lot of feedback but it was high visibility and it gave people the opportunity to see faces and to kind of try to figure out where to connect with us so that's the something like that you might have include like a slip of paper that they could write down something that we would be able to address because they don't have the time but or even a QR code to a Google form for them to submit something yeah if they didn't feel like writing an email did both of those sound great I think that's um helpful I find a lot of people who don't have the the time to devote to watching all the meetings or all the various committees in town um don't necessarily understand how everything works and so there's a misconception about what our role is and what what we can actually do and what's the appropriate venue to approach when there's a question about something at the schools and so finding ways to get that information out seems really valuable um was there connecting with other school committees in the region so that is something that we have done we did less of last year than we did the year before we actually used to have a group and it was like again because we couldn't have without posting it with the committees it would be like two people would go and we did it with there were a bunch of different districts we did it with um a lot of our ones we compare ourselves to we we did with Ashlin Westboro we did also like Lexington uh Welsley Weston invited them and just sort of would it and during when we were going through Co we found that a lot of people were facing some of the same challenges that we were figuring out how to reopen figuring out you know navigating all the masking things stuff like that so that has been really helpful um I think as people have moved away from covid not just our school committee but some of the other school committees there are different fewer shared challenges that people are looking at it tends to be more some some are obviously more Universal but it's not the driving thing during covid with so many um so many I was talking to a colleague this week too on the school committee in Belmont and just she's like oh what's going on with you obviously both facing budget situation under tight budget y that's the thing I was thinking about little camaraderie about that yeah yeah and you know there was for I I got to know a couple the chair of the Holliston school committee for example who's no longer on that but it used to reach out and I'd reach out to her I'd people that were reaching out to me from Holden and other places that it was good to be able to bounce things off of and ask you know we I see you have such and such policy in you know we're we're looking to Institute that policy how did that work for you so we could do it as a formalize to try to set up a group or we could do it as trying to just set up um resources between like identifying Who members of different School committees are and try to build relationships like that that's I'm open to either I think it sounds B is there a Communications plan that we should is that somewhere that I haven't found yet so that was something that we discussed uh part a piece of that was a we didn't come up with a a big plan so much as we had a discussion about it and a piece of that was talking about um how social Med people were using social media um people who had social media Pages specifically to the school committee people that were talking on like hopkington dad's group The some of the moms type group stuff like that um as a and wanting things to go out through more official channels but not wanting to say members can't engage on social media with people that way that was the I don't know if you remember finer details but we didn't pass a big I actually need you repeat what you just said cuz it got lost okay so I will apologize yep so our the conversation that we had last year we had we talked about the use of social media specifically um and the we discussed people who had their own pages that were discussing on their Pages because there were a couple of us that had school committee specific Pages uh and then people who were commenting on group social media pages we talked a little bit about the dangers of violating open meeting law and trying to be careful and aware of that but the committee at the time did not feel like they we wanted to make a directive to say you can or can't do this and let left it up to individuals to figure out how to do other school committees engage on social media yes it seems to me such a treacherous place that could be a topic of discussion if we put together right do what they do to have a discussion with other school committees other school committees about if they've had any plans about that or that any limits or run into things yeah yeah sure there's that issues can back down sorry yeah I just want to make sure that I'm not missing anything and kind of so this piece um the yes so we did talk with some of our new legislators that was specific to James Arena D Roa who was new um he's been very supportive in general of Hopkinton I think in terms of reaching out proactively he's been at a lot of events he was at our town meeting one night but I think um it's always good to have those relationships because in the past uh it has been some of the legislators who have helped us to get in line for msba funding things like that yeah he reached out to congratulate me about joining the committee and said he'd love to chat at some time yeah and also see how we can increase State funding that's coming towards happy I love that already super helpful so in terms of this piece because I think pieces of this we've discussed the office hours as well as the listening tours um as well as connections with other school committees in the region um the other piece that we tried to do we weren't monitoring it but was trying to make sure that we as a school committee got out to other events in the community just to talk with people I don't know that we need to I don't know I don't want to police that or anything I think people it sounds like everybody's doing their own thing in the in the school committee in the school Community as a whole I think we should make a conservative effort to go into these bot tournaments absolutely together yeah oh yeah oh yes yes y I actually think there might be something more powerful about going as a group it's if we're not conducting business right it's not a a problem to show up at a Bachi tournament or something we're not allowed to stand next to each other stand can't talk about things that are going to come before no Talking Shop we talk about bot yes talk about which I know very little about all I know is it is an Italian sport it involves balls you are there other things under here um do you pieces that people would like to take out because you don't think they're necessary you don't like or whatever and pieces or pieces that you would like to keep in and or add do we think that we need to have develop a Communications plan there if the conversation occurred previously and it would sort of yeah it sounds like but I do try to be smart about how you do this like Don't Step at anything uh I do like the idea of of making that a topic of conversation with other school committees but I right and so like and a connecting with other school committees like how do they manage things like that but since we're it doesn't sound like developing a plan happened and then we don't have new legislators we don't so maintain maintain orish yeah like we have a senator and a representative but we could cross off the new they're not get rid of new yeah yeah yeah I'm not established right now we're like mer I'm good with main or nurture nurture is is a little more positive would we also want to include in there like staff because sometimes staff is the way to communicate absolutely so especially if you need things so I think that's and their representatives right yeah yes and their staff particularly I think with senator spoka who is representing a larger area sometimes the relationship with the staff is the way to get to yeah mhm I mean it seems like there isn't anything to to me it doesn't look like there's anything that should be removed necessarily unless I mean esbc 2 is still called that um unless we wanted to say charleswood there I don't know that's still the committee's name and we have both do we want to note both projects oh with the addition I it I think that's good to discuss both I also think the high level campus planning was a process that we were going through actively at that actively at that time I mean it's important to always be support have awareness of I don't know of that project I mean I guess awareness and support of it I what if that were to say support districtwide planning and addressing enrollment and programming that makes sense I like that I think one and two continue to be super important M anything else that people think in terms of responsible stewardship of our assets would be a good all right scroll up to yes to one this one we did not do as good a job at it and we did discuss the fact that we weren't doing as good a job at it discussing the events at the beginning of the school committee meetings it was more kind of conversations that were happening hey this is invitations that come out things that we could go to so would that be something to consider adding in our agenda even in like wrapped into leison reports that even just ween then upcoming or things that we have gone to because again people yeah you know then we have that record M was really good at that um just to give Georgette one more thing to do is it possible that um we could get some kind of teaser of here the events for the week you know kinds of things that might be good for us to go to because there are things that I would like to go to but I'm not aware of them like jazz concerts and things like that maybe I could get that into a single slide in the superintendent report each time and I think that there is a districtwide calendar I know there a districtwide calendar because we talked about it the other day but I feel like the building principles now think that it feels unwieldy because if there are many things so many athletic contests sometimes you have to read through 10 athletic contests before you get to that jazz concert on a given day yeah or week quite long it is very long isn't it it's so un that would be a great thing I made D does that help yeah so just follow the colors there are colors the colors what color do I need foric is one color it doesn't tell me what the different colors are though that's too bad find a music event and see what yeah arts and crafts that's you can go into the calendar and customize your calendar and you can unselect if you go into school calendar you can unselect Athletics as a for instance oh there's the legend okay I'm going to come see you and you'll show me how to do it all right so are there we want to bring the calendars forward here yeah are there other pieces under the smart goals and is this feels like a bigger thing Than A diversity equity and inclusion I'm not sure that's the right um category for it right are we really I are we really trying to meet different Dei yeah that's what I'm seeing well cultural events perhaps cultural events may not be happening at in the on the school calendar too right um I think when you talked we have a unified bot team right yeah so that would be a really good thing that would fit very well under that um yeah there are some really big events that are nice if you go to and I think that the kids feel supported when people come to them so for example science fair y when our kids are doing science fair the day that the judges are there you know people from school committee or faculty and staff can go through and the kids are so articulate about their their projects or things like the pops event or you know bot those are some of the I think more interesting and maybe I think more diverse ones because each kid kind of finds their little niche in you know what motivates them in terms of clubs activities robotics robots I went I grew up with Doug Scott who's the robotics oh my God he's amazing teacher coach yeah um so a couple years ago I just he told me about it and just went over oh yeah and saw it but I assume that would be another one that would kind of fall into that category yeah yeah yeah anything people want to add or change do people want to sit on this for a week or do people want to vote this I'm to adopt it as goals looks good to me okay would you like to make a motion um make a motion to accept the what are we calling it amend school committee established goals that perfect Mo by Chris second by Kyla all those in favor I I all right that brings us then uh into the items by consensus okay a superintendent I recommend the school committee approve the items by consensus as outlined in your agenda so moved motion by Susan second second by Jamie all those in favor I I and then is there somebody that would like to make a motion to adjourn oh can I compliment georgette's minutes oh absolutely she's doing a really great job I really appreciate the effort I think it's really nice and I'd like to make a motion to a Jour fabulous motion second by Chris all those in favor I I it is we're adjourned at 8:21 our next meeting date is uh the October 1st joint meeting with the school select board and I know there is a remote option for those who are not able to get in because the select board always has that I know you had I did not yeah I'm supposed to be out of town yep but there will be and I can Bo it to you all great uh and then we have October 10th is our next regular meeting here so all right thank you all for tuning in and have a good night and October 3 we're done