##VIDEO ID:wG9tjrghPfU## for e e good evening the school committee business session of January 13 2025 will now come to order this meeting is being recorded and will be made available for viewing on the methan public schools website secretary would you please call the role member dolio present member Donovan present member Kean present member Maxwell present member shilia present member wette here mayor Bard here all are present we need a motion in a second to accept the agenda for January 13 2025 as presented so move second motion from Member shabila second from Member daglio any discussion there's no discussion we'll vote all those in favor say I I any opposed the eyes have it and our agenda has been accepted uh superintendent I'll invite you at this point to introduce our student for tonight's flag salute yes thank you um i' like like to call up seana toolan up to the podium as with uh miss goette the lower school associate principal from the Tenny Mr Hill the supervising principal is also here to support our flag salute today good evening everyone my name is Amanda go at Landis and I'm the lower school associate principal at the Tenny and I'm here with siia tonight um she's a fourth grade student in Mrs power's class who's also joining us tonight at the Tenny Sianna lives with her mother Landy and her father nesle and her brothers Joshua and Hakeem and her aunt and her three cousins and her cat Felix and her mom is here with us tonight too s reported she loves to spend time with her family one of her favorite things to do with her family is to go out to eat s revealed IHOP is her favorite restaurant because of their yummy burgers and pancakes with whipped cream she also enjoyed enjoys going to church with her mom her most special family memory is a road trip to Pennsylvania which included visiting a water park Si's favorite subject in school is science it's her favorite subject because she is learning lots of new things and it is fun she says her favorite lesson was the paper bag science experiment where she had to use her senses to describe an object hidden in the bag sna also likes to read some of her favorites are the Juni B Jones series and Kate D Camilo books especially because of wixie her favorite special is PE she reports that she loves PE because she gets to run around and exercise she says the best activity in PE is the game messy backyard she likes this activity because it is competitive and a Cooperative game next year she's looking forward to being in fifth grade and using the upper school big gym s's teacher Mrs power States s is a true Tenny rock star in class she is a attentive and always ready to learn she is helpful to her classmates and is a responsible member of our community SI actively participates in class and enjoys working in a group with a partner or by herself sna wants to do well and tries hard and will even do extra practice at home to learn new skills a perfect example of the conscientious person Sana is is when she was chosen to recite the Pledge of Allegiance for the school committee she carried around a copy of the Pledge and practice it every chance she got sna always has a smile on her face and we at the Tenny are so lucky to have her as a Tenny Rockstar student when s is not in school she is very active and has quite a few Hobbies she likes to draw anime she likes to read she takes swimming lessons at Goldfish Swim School she participates in gymnastics at interstate gymnastics and she's most proud of mastering a back handspring she also takes tap ballet and jazz dance lessons and Jazz Jaz dance is her favorite because it requires attitude when Sana grows up she reports she sees herself becoming both a gymnast and a dentist s stated the Tenny is a special place because people are kind and respectful her favorite memory is being nominated and recognized as a Tenny star in first and second grade her second favorite memory was the third grade field trip to Davis Farmland she says that one of her favorite things at the Tenny is earning gold slips for demonstrating perseverance and responsibility for learning for the show what you know gold slip Raffles saana we all agree you make the Tenny a special place because you're one of the kindest and most respectful students in the building who demonstrates Tenny Rock's Behavior each and every day thank you please stand for the Pledge yes I pledge allegiance to the flag flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all long to the front right say cheese congrats thank you thank you okay very nicely done thank you at this point we're going to open the organizational part of tonight's meeting uh I'll begin by accepting any nominations for the position of Vice chairperson do we have any nominations member donova um yes I'd like to nominate member Keegan please so we have uh member Keegan nominated is there a second I will second uh member Keegan do you accept the nomination yes okay do we have any other nominations for vice chair there's no other nominations we will proceed to a roll call vote on member Keegan member dolio yes member Donovan yes member Keegan yes member Maxwell yes member shabia yes member Willette yes mayor Bard yes congratulations Madam Vice chair at this point we need nominations for Secretary of the committee Mr chairman I'll nominate member shabila second so we have member shabila nominated member shabila do you accept sure any other nominations for secretary there are no other nominations I will close nominations and we will proceed to a roll call vote member daglio yes member Donovan yes member Keegan yes member Maxwell yes member shilia yes member wette yes mayor borgard yes unanimous congratulations we need a motion to appoint superintendent Brandy Quang as secretary to the committee just as a note this is a formality since I automatically serve as the chair so we need a motion in the second so moved second motion from Member shabila second from the vice chair discussion there's no discussion we will take a roll call vote member daglio yes member Donovan yes member Keegan yes member Maxwell yes member shabila yes member wette yes mayor borgard yes unanimous at this point I will close the organizational part of the meeting and we will move on to uh participation by others tonight superintendent I'll invite you to introduce our sore award student thank you I would like to call up U Moren Melanson she's our CTE our um Career Technical education Lead Teacher and Ella Benson tonight hi everyone my name is Mari malanson I'm the CTE Lead Teacher at the high school um we're here tonight to give Ella Benson our sore award so the career uh Vocational Technical education department is delighted to honor Ella Benson as this year's recipient of the CTE award this distinguished recognition celebrates students who demonstrate outstanding qualities and and Ella you truly embody everything that this award represents your time at methan high school has been marked by dedication growth and achievement and we are very proud of your sorry we are very proud to celebrate your many successes today Ella exemplifies what it means to be hardworking motivated and passionate student her impressive academic performance combined with her active participation in extracurricular programs highlights her commitment to personal and professional development having completed both marketing one and marketing too Ella is currently thriving in the externship program as part of her externship she has gained hands-on experience at Alice and Taylor photography company where she has been praised for her creativity professionalism and drive her ability to um to take initiative and constantly produce high quality work has made her a standout cont contributor to the team Beyond her externship Ella has shown exceptional leadership as the vice president of deca her competitive success speaks volume about her skills and determination last year she placed seventh at the district competition and advanced to the state competition this year she earned third place in the district competition um with her Innovative mtic cleans commercial business plan and will compete at the Massachusetts Deca State Career Development conference in Boston this February Ella's passion for marketing and business strategy shines through all of her Endeavors her Mentor Mr Rado says that quote Ella is one one of those students that you wish you had 25 of she takes every task to the next level and doesn't shy away from a challenge she is very passionate about business and according to Mr agato Ella approaches each challenge with enthusiasm focus and creativity always striving to exceed expectations her genuine genuine love for marketing and business has positioned her as an outstanding role model for her peers outside of the classroom Ella enjoys exploring creative projects strengthening her communication skills and building connections within the marketing field her vibrant personality paired with her exceptional work ethic sets her apart as a future leader in the industry as Ella looks towards her future she plans to continue her studies in communication and marketing given her Talent drive and determination there is no doubt she will continue to achieve great things and make a lasting impact Ella on behalf of the methan high school and the CTE Department it's an absolute privilege to present you with the CTE SAR award your leadership dedication and passion for business make you an extraordinary student congratulations and we look forward to seeing all that you accomplish as you continue to soar good evening thank you I would like to thank all of my teachers from the marsh and the methan high school including my deck adviser Mr rato and Miss Thompson as long as well as all of you here at the school committee for the profound support that you guys give the th in as a whole and all of the academic privileges that you guys have given me thank you e at this point superintendent we'll have the introduction of uh the CTE students being recognized yes I'm going to turn this right back over to Moren malanson uh and there's a memo in your packet that sort of outlines I think our discussion tonight and who we're recognizing um so hopefully this will will help this evening uh thank you guys so our CT CTE department has had a lot of competitions that have come up we have a few students are here tonight to talk about specifically some competitions in the um computer pathway as well as the marketing pathway so I'm going to start off with yasim breida from the computer uh pathway good evening everyone my name is yine and I'm a junior at mythen High School School I've been involved in the computer science department since I was a freshman I began by taking the computer science Essentials course and last year in my sophomore year I took the computer science principles course and this year I'm enrolled in the AP Computer Science a course so throughout my high school experience I've been involved in this department and if I'm being completely honest we have progressed in ways that I can't even tell you about but that I'd rather show you through the achievements that we've had so one of a pretty popular achievement that has been talked about kind of recently was last year we a team of two other students and I we um we placed first in the computer science um category at the applied learning student showcase and so I'd like to talk a little bit more with you guys about that so the applied learning student showcase is kind of what it sounds like it celebrates students across Massachusetts and their work in applied learning so if you're not familiar with applied learning it's a research-backed concept that kind of encourages students to do Hands-On work in order to solve actual problems so to provide you know good solutions to real world problems and so at the applied learning student showcase students from all different departments are um kind of showcasing their solutions to all different types of problems so problems in computer science biomedical engineering medical research all different areas the area that we were focused on were computer was computer science and so students in all different computer science courses have different problems that they're supposed to solve and different categories that their projects follow so for us last year we had to use Python to solve some type of real world problem because in the Project Lead the Way computer science principles course python is taught and if you're not familiar with Project Lead the Way it's kind of just like the curriculum that our school follows to teach computer science so last year what um I and a team of two other students Thomas Lee who was a senior and Luke fch who was also a senior um we worked on a project called um fory detecting recyclable items and so basically what we did was we used computer vision um which is kind of like a computer's ability to see essentially um we used a pre-trained library pre-trained computer vision library and modified that so that it could detect recyclable items um to a certain degree of certainty and what we did as part of our project was we modified that pre-trained Library so that it would be able to sue our needs and so we were able to have it only say that it could detect this item as a recyclable item if it met that threshold of a degree of certainty so if it was for example 60% or higher then it would tell us that um it was certain that that's a recyclable item so items like spoons bowls things like that and we brought a bunch of different ones over to the Showcase to kind of demonstrate our um our invention's ability and so at the Showcase we presented it and ultimately we won the outstanding computer science projects award which is the top award in the computer science area at the competition um we were very excited for a lot of reasons one because during the actual event itself we were able to get so much positive feedback from industry professionals um professionals from Liberty Mutual base systems pic code so real world companies that have software Engineers or are software engineering focused companies and being able to receive that positive feedback and ultimately winning the award kind of showed us just how much we've learned as students in the school you know like sometimes it's hard to feel obviously like software engineering is a real field and sometimes if you're in school it's kind of hard to feel like am I doing anything but this we have learned so much and we were able to demonstrate that by having these industry professionals tell us that this is something you know worthy of winning an award so that was one reason another reason was part of our award is that we were able to visit the Liberty Mutual headquarters in Boston and take a tour and a job shadow at at the headquarters and so we shadowed software Engineers products managers um a bunch of different positions in the area of computer science and that was a great experience for us to not only apply what we've learned but to kind of just get a taste of what our future could be like if we were to continue in computer science so that was a great experience um not only that but just about a month ago I believe um the student solve challenge um St three students from Mrs nar's class were able to win that competition and I participated in that competition as well and what that was It was kind of similar to the applied learning student showcase except this was a virtual event and so real world companies gave us real world problems to solve and so they were looking for the most inexpensive kind of feas I solutions that they could use to solve these real world problems so students and groups from different schools were assigned to different companies and our school was assigned to Verizon and so we were asked to solve these customer service related problems and kind of help customers understand what they need to do to seek help from Verizon or to get certain products and so we were asked to like kind of figure out a way to do that in a way that would be as feasible as possible and the students that won from our school created um a video that would kind of explain to customers what Verizon offers so they were able to come to a solution that was not only inexpensive but would work for the customers and would work for Verizon and so they won an award and they were also offered a trip to the Verizon Innovation Center I believe it was so as you can tell you know the computer science department we're not only learning how to code but we're learning the skills that it takes to become involved in the real world and to not only become involved but to succeed we're winning these Awards and and we're succeeding which we're so proud of especially considering all the progress we've made you know this was within the span of one year and so it's crazy to see how much we've grown and the year isn't even close to over so it's amazing and like doing this don't only shows that we know how to code and that we know how to be Engineers but that we know how to be team members that we know how to respect each other's opinions we know how to listen to each other we know how to present our ideas and all of these are such important skills that I in three years in the computer science department known that I have gained and so we're looking forward to participating in so many more events we have the lock heed Martin code Quest competition coming up and looking forward to hopefully winning something else um it's it's amazing and every day I learn something new and something that I can apply to a new real world situation so I'm very grateful for all that the computer science has department has done for me so thank you so much for your time good evening uh thank you guys for me I'm Josh Rado I'm a teacher here in the CT Department um here to talk about our business program and uh more specifically Deca uh I teach marketing accounting and externship here but I've also um run the club Deca for the last two years um it's a co-curricular organization of high school business students uh with over 200,000 members in all 50 states uh including Canada Mexico and Germany uh Deca is one of the largest High School academic clubs in the world and deca helps students develop skills for successful careers build self-esteem provides leadership opportunities and stresses Community involvement in service students engage in learning about the for forces that Propel our Market driven system and the DECA program is allows these students um and gives them the opportunity to uh apply their classroom knowledge and realistic competitive scenarios while gaining valuable leadership training um here at methan High School uh last year we had 30 members in the club and we saw 236 per growth this year we're at 200 MERS um right now and it's it's crazy to think about in in one year where we're at but um next year we're losing a a good amount of seniors but we're probably going to grow to 250 300 next year so just showing you guys um how awesome this club is uh we recently just competed in the district conference in Danvers at the Double Tree Hotel uh our Central Catholic Andover North Andover and we qualified 60 members for the state conference uh February 27 to March 1st uh in the seport Boston so we go for three days two nights it's it's an amazing conference CFOs CEOs marketing managers presidents of banks um all take work off to come and judge uh these students and see where their business knowledge is at so um my main goal is here is teaching students um what they're going to see postgrad uh in the business world and then this program just connects perfectly with um aligning that for them so um we've only had one uh or two students ever Place uh for the National Conference in Orlando Florida but this year I think um it it might be our year so I have four students here um amazing kids they they um really love this program so I'm going to invite them up to talk more about Deca thank you good evening my name is DOB and I'm Desmond Sadia first firstly we would love to thank the school committee for their time and also our DEC advisers Mr Rado and Mrs Thompson for doing such an amazing job running one of the greatest clubs this school has to offer we both have had very different experiences with Deca but its impact on us has been profound nonetheless this is my first year in the program and I haven't really taken any business courses at the school either so I began the year with no real idea of what I would be taking part in LED only to join by the by the numerous stories of pure relation told by my friends however the lessons I learned during my short time with the club are so instrumental that they will help me long after high school being what most in the club would consider a season deck of Veteran I already had the firsthand experience of the lessons previously mentioned and these played a vital role in shaping the student I became for my upper classman years and soon my post-secondary education these lessons along with the honor of being named president of this amazing Club have given me the skills necessary and being a leader in my community and further sharing the deck of magic with all my peers uh despite our differences with the program we have found three main takeaways from participating in the organization being professionalism teamwork and real world opportunity for students with aspirations to pursue a higher higher education or with entrepreneurial dreams this club has served as an incredible resource for learning about professionalism and using this new found knowledge for their own passions for me Deca has provided me with the skills are necessary to carry myself in a professional manner to help me succeed in connecting with others in any environment whether it is social in the classroom or in the workplace I attribute many of my achievements to Deca for example becoming the youngest intern at PTC at just 17 years old and helping me network with my fellow colleagues that provided me the opportunity to already have a guaranteed internship placement my junior year of college these skills rooted in professionalism that I have learned through Deca are vital to any student in finding themselves opportunities for networking and succeed in in the real world Deca provides countless opportunities for students looking to collaborate with others in order to find success many of the category students are able to take part in require them to work with their peers and build connections I truly love this aspect of the club as being in a team roleplay has allowed me to develop my skills with interpersonal communication while learning how to determine the best course of action a real business scenario with my partner who essentially becomes a CO cooworker together we were able to uh win first place at Deca districts and are looking to uh compete further at Deca States however this teamwork is extends beyond the actual competition as there's a distinct and passionate culture of unity within the program the awards night we had after districts was one of the coolest events I've experienced in high school everyone truly wanted their peers to succeed and the celebrations were exhibitions of unrelenting Joy personally how Deca has impacted my life the most is with the real opportunities given to students when I entered my junior year of of high school I hadn't had a clue of what I truly wanted to study After High School or even any passion to pursue anything as I have not had any indication of what I could find the most success in it was a confusing time and for many students also in the same era of their life they struggle with the same thoughts when I joined Deca and experienced for myself the many intricate paths and Niche opportunities available in the business world I fell in love with it and I got the guidance needed to have a grasp on a path I could pursue After High School this was the case for me and for many others this may also be the case for them Deca is a real world real world opportunity for students who may also need guidance in the future endeavors additionally for students not looking to pursue a degree in business or Finance decen can still be a great resource I'm looking to pursue biomedical engineering so you may not think that the experience I get from the program will help me with my career but it certainly can be applied if I was looking to start a business in my selected field or wanted to sell a product that I created then the education I'm receiving as a result of the club will be a great asset despite all this talk about the future right now we are really focused on doing well at the state competition in Boston and hopefully qualifying for the national comp comption in Orlando we have high hopes for the continuation of this deck of magic and hopefully many others in the classes Beyond ours will experience it as well thank you again for having us tonight good evening I'm Ella Benson Matthew and High's 2024 2025 vice president of and I'm Gracie Neil first year a DEA member only being part of this prestigious club for a short time I have understood how much it has impacted my life both academically and personally I have joined a community of support and empowerment that no other club could have given me and has taught me so much more on what it means to be a part of this business world as I intend to pursue this career in the near future with Deca I have been able to pave a path for myself as a leader and as an powered woman knowing I will be pursuing a degree in either mass communications or marketing next year I've taken part in Deca projects the last two years that I have feel have enhanced my knowledge in those sectors of the of business to help me succeed more in the future I hope to continue my journey as a Deca member collegiately at whichever School i cho I choose to attend in the coming months where I can challenge myself and build top skills to use in any job setting that I Inspire to follow from deciding between when deciding between a paper a role play to competing at a conference DEA puts our minds at work and brings out the best in our creativity critical thinking public speaking and professionalism we are pushed by our advisors and peers to think outside the box with our papers challenge ourselves with our knowledge try something new present ourselves as a whole other person that we would in school and make our speaking more eloquent while we have been challenged and pushed academically in Deca we are also well known for being engaged enging and having a huge loving Community with close to 200 members this school year the leadership team strives to build a family through fun fundraisers such as the 3v3 basketball tournaments and glow-in-the-dark golf where we have connected with state representatives participating in yearly community service to help better our surroundings and supporting community and Creative Group activities that better de develop connections with our peers it is this community that we have created and built together that makes my Deca experience memorable and makes me excited and proud to be part of the thrill and opportunities that Deca provides as we begin our journey to states that will be at the end of February and beginning of March I'm looking forward to the experiences that will be provided from Massachusetts Deca such as workshops focus on finance public speaking writing a better paper building a resume Etc we will also Embark in Deca after dark activities where we were able to connect with new peers and some of the best schools in the state it is the most outpouring resources that Deca and our advisers Mr orado and Mrs Thompson have provided us with the support from the school committee and the community surrounding Us in hopes to send students to Nationals in the late spring the DECA experience is like no other it honors our individual work creates memories builds our resumés and anchors ourselves to work hard now and forever what's up that's what I'm trying to decide I don't think there is there is not we want to wish them all the best in a few weeks sorry about that there was one more section so I just want to make sure the students were all finished uh it's a phenomenal uh Club as you can see we wanted to Showcase their work uh and and I think one of the things that has been the most striking for Dr golovsky and I is the growth of this club uh and talking about sending 60 60 students to our state competition uh has never happened in my time here in methan so we're really excited for that excited for these kids and certainly the advisor supporting them so thank you for their time and thank you uh students for for sharing tonight as well I'm a big fan of the DECA program thank you for a great presentation Y at this point we'll move on to updates from the student representative I'll be presenting today on behalf of the student TRS from student council as well first off um the MHS School play our town performed from Thursday December 12th to December 14th the stage door 22 put on four amazing shows of our town by thoron Wilder um and they did a beautiful rendition of the American classic um the basketball Christmas tournament played by the methan varsity basketball they played three games beating Newberry Port and North Andover and moving on to the champion ship game against Andover where they faced a tough loss poetry out loud um the class competitions were held from January 2nd to 13th the class comp competitions are held on the date determined by their teachers um the top scorer was Advanced from each block and the semifinal competition is from January 14th and 15th um and they will be competing for the top finishers which will compete on January 21st for the MHS final competition and each participant recites two poems the band concert um performed the night of December 19th in the MHS Auditorium the JZ the jazz band performed before the concert band the jazz band performed a couple of improvised solos and one soloist in the concert band a Crispy Cream fundraiser was also held for the band's Disney trip funding director Eric poster and Brian Mogel also starred started what they hope to be an annual tradition of welcoming back alumni of the band to help close out the show this year almost 60 alumni many of whom had to blow their dust off their instruments dating back to 1992 joined the students for a beautiful rendition of slay ride the MHS jrtc program once again placed third in the CMP which stands for the Civil Marksmanship Program competition overall out of 10 high schools participating in this event highlights uh from the J team includes shilia Davis who won the Marksmanship badge and Emma Demers who won the expert badge which is the highest badge a jrtc Cadet can earn that's all thank you thank you for the update at this point we need a motion in a second to approve the Cooper Town methan High School baseball trip in April 2025 so moved second motion from Member shabila second from Member daglio discussion coach okay um so the Koopas toown trip is going to be on April 25th is very very similar to the exact same trip we did last year uh it is being going to be paid for by the Mia family uh Foundation uh so the cost is nothing for for the for the school system So the plan is to leave on Friday April 25th around 10: a.m. take a bus out to coopertown enjoy the um the history of the baseball and everything that that does at coopertown and the Hall of Fame and then they play on Saturday at 10:00 a.m. so they play tuxbury high so it's that that's what happens they bring another team out you got to kind of travel with at a team that agrees to do that and so it be tuxbury this year and they play a game that's officially an MIA game and they play seven Innings but then they end up playing a couple Innings after after that uh so I think they totally played nine innings so that everybody can get a chance to play a double day field and get the experience and different things like that and then they take a bus home directly from double day field so they'll be staying over in Cooper toown on Friday night the the um the whole itinerary was right here and that will be the itenerary for the most part are there any questions any questions from the committee Vice chair um I fully support the trip but I just have a couple of technical questions I guess um do we fund front the money and then get reimbursed or does um the the people who are paying for it fund it first uh the milia family will fund it first and if there's if there's any sort of um at all gets taken by care of the Mia family that's a short answer okay and my second question is is this considered a donation and does the school committee need to accept it I don't I don't know that answer sorry you're looking at me I question is it very good question um I they did it last year as well I'd have to look to see uh if we I don't think we called it a donation they sponsored it but if the school committee wants to approve the donation and the trip tonight to cover both I would think that that would be okay ultimately the agenda but yeah great question the agenda ultimately refers to the trip overall so I think we would be covered from an open meeting standpoint if we wanted to have that be the intent perhaps yeah yeah yeah great I think that's what we sorry your still as the floor you all that I'm I'm finished thank you member I was I was going to say I think that's what covered us it was part of the memo last year we just approved it all together I think that's how we did it last year so we were but if we did it wrong last year we should fix it it's a good question if it's actually considered a donation if they're sponsoring the trip so that I don't know but again if we want to vote it as it is a donation so we cover it uh and not have to come back to the committee that makes the most sense to me if it makes the most sense to the chair any other questions I'm fine with Simply Having the committee take a yes vote and we'll have that take care of great any other questions if not all those in favor say I I opposed the eyes have it have fun in Cooperstown thank you thank you very much thank you Mr we're moving on now to public participation uh we have uh five individuals who've signed up and then we'll open it up to the full uh room if anyone else wants to uh come forward we'll begin with Ben Thompson good evening mayor Bor members of methan school committee and the City of methan residents in methan my name is Ben Thompson I have worked at the Marsh Grammar School as a program assistant in the pathways program since 2022 working at Middle School words of autism throughout my workday support students as they get on off their buses assist them in their classroom and and com them specials and support them at lunch and recess Burger assens are the backbone of special education and ask any if you ask any special education teacher they couldn't do our job us well my job is very challenging it has become been very rewarding one of my favorite experiences in my life it has allowed me to grow as an educator alongside my students although I'm not originally from a I've come to be I feel like I've been embraced by the city and I've come going to love it however I am very concerned about the high stuff turnover du to low wages compares to other communities is the lowest paying District in the merac valley on average teachers earn significantly less here than they would in comparable districts including Gateway cities currently program make just 20 to $25,000 a year which is a poverty wage on um as a result the school year rest started a record 62 Untold positions of program assistance as program assistant are leaving to for similar positions in other cities this is my fourth year working inan and every year I worked at the different teacher every program have worked has left as well except for one who went to a different program this has left me as the most experienced me program assistant in my classroom there are students are noticing and they're asking why so many teachers and and staff are leaving but the the giving them a true straight answer is difficult but the truth is simple but does not offer competitive pay the district's current contract proposers for teachers and programs to little will do little to address this crisis for teachers the current proposed 12% increase over four years with additional B both um salary increases for veteran teachers will contined within w low the pay scales of neighboring communities and risk creating division between younger and Veteran teachers as for program assistance the current propos that only increase the top step to $34,000 a year this is still a poverty range and far below the city's median income in $ 49,679 is near or above $40,000 making it clear why methun struggles to attract and retain staff it is critical to remember that teachers working conditions are students learning conditions High staff turnover leads to frustration decreased morale dis and disruptions in student learning building relationships with students takes time and this is and this is gets harder and harder as Turner persists to ensure my public schools can attract and retain talented Educators the fent school communties negotiate with the teachers a fair contract that offers competitive and Living Way liable wages for all members our students deserve the Civility and Excellence of having dedicated and experienced staff our time is now thank you thank you next we have Kate kodagi apologies if I mispronounced your last name I think you did all right thank you good evening School commit me school committee members my name is Kate capad dagle and I've had the privilege of being an educator here in Methuen for 15 years however tonight sorry okay however tonight I stand before you not just as a teacher but as a frustrated resident and a disheartened and angry mother before I begin I do want to thank you for your efforts this past month in cleaning our buildings and aggressively tackling these unsanitary issues I want to thank all of our amazing custodians who with their little Manpower they have work tires tirelessly to clean our buildings I want to make it very clear that in no way do I blame them or hold them accountable for these preventable unsanitary conditions they do their best every day and I don't expect them to be scrubbing mold or cleaning dead mice out of air vents I want to take a moment to address the conscious choices and decisions made by you the school committee as well as our mayor and city council that have led us to this place as you are all well aware our school system has made national news not just for not just for accomplishments or accolades but for the deplorable conditions that you have allowed our children to be educated in the situation that you find yourselves in today is not a result of unforeseen circumstances it is the outcome of long-standing neglect by our city leaders you included I know you are all looking for accountability and I hold each and every one of you accountable I want to hear excuses about you not knowing or putting the blame on custodians teachers and administrators we are not your scapegoat you are the school committee the governing body of our school district this is happening under your leadership and oversight problems with mice mold and air quality have been a concern for many years problems which may have been which many have been vocal about this is no secret as the school committee all of you have to have been aware of these issues but only now have they become a priority if you claim to be unaware then that brings up an entirely different concern about your duty and obligation to your constituents and calls into question your transparency and dedication to the extent of how bad you understood it to be remains to be determined you have admitted to be finding out about these issues in September but it was four months after the fact after it was all over the evening news that it became top priority why was this not a priority in September why has this not been any kind of priority for the many years it has been going on it is heartbreaking and absolutely infuriating to feel that the only time you open your ears and your eyes is when fox25 news is on your doorstep is that what it takes to be heard is that what it takes for our schools and our children to be a priority as a teacher these issues go much deeper than wearing red and fighting for a fair contract you have teachers leaving in droves no par professionals and now infestations the biggest and most important question is what what are you going to do about it this is not a legislative legislative issue this is not a brandy issue this is not a custodian or teacher issue this is an issue of neglect and putting our schools on the back burner if this were not from page of the news would it continue to just be business as usual as you should be aware methu is doing the bare minimum required by the state to fund and support our schools for this I also hold the city council responsible for the years of neglecting our schools in this way and for allowing our children and the importance of their education to be on the back burner schools are critical to the well-being and success of our future generations and when local government does not prioritize education it can create long-term consequences we are experiencing these consequences consequences from years of cutting Corners cutting budgets and cutting staff years of minimal funding with scraps left over after other departments are taken care of I often see social media posts from members of both committees sharing their good de deeds and proud accomplishments however none of that matters if your schools have no teachers no Paras and students are learning and nice and mold infested buildings this is shameful so my most my most important question is what are you going to do what are you going to do to ensure our schools and our children will be properly cared for what are you going to do to prevent the loss of great teachers and ensure the safety and health of our students and staff going forward I understand understand that there will be a school audit which I welcome but whatever comes of it I hope you take it seriously and you are ready to fulfill your obligations as we put the as well as put the pressure on our city council and mayor for them to fulfill theirs as someone who has dedicated years to educating the children of this community and being a resident and mother I can no longer Stand By and Watch This Injustice continue I Look to You For answers and a plan going forward I'm asking for your commitment to ensure transparent communication and support our children deserve better they deserve schools that are safe clean and conducive to learning I urge you to take responsibility for the conditions that you have been allowed to fester and I look forward to your commitment to prioritize our children and make real lasting change thank you for your time thank you next we have Sarah Cordo is this on okay good evening methan Public Schools board members my name is Sarah Cordo not only am I a resident of methan but I am also a multilingual learner teacher in methan public schools My Two children attend Marsh Grammar School and my stepson graduated from athuan high school in 2021 I started teaching in 2012 in Lawrence Public Schools it was in Lawrence that I fell in love with teaching practiced a teacher stare and it was solidified that children come to school for so much more than lessons on math and reading in 2015 my husband and I moved from Lawrence to Methuen we were confident in our move knowing we would be living in a district that would provide a learning environment in which our children would not only learn and grow but Thrive we were excited to see what the ranger nation was all about it was in that same year that I made the difficult decision to leave Lawrence a district that gave so much to my life professionally and personally for Methuen I was committed to being part of the educator community that I felt so confident about putting my own children through and what better way to do that than to teach at a methan public school I began teaching at CGS in 2015 but after 2 years at CGS I found myself being called back to teach in Lawrence in 2017 I returned to my Lawrence students and I stayed as a Lawrence Public Schools employee until 2022 when an opening became available in 2022 for a multilingual learner teacher at the Marsh Grammar School it felt like fate you see we had moved from the East side to the west side and into the marsh District just the year before in 2021 the idea of working in the same building that my own children would spend most of their days in for 9 years was extremely appealing to me throughout my teaching career and most recently at the marsh I have gotten to know Educators who truly do the most for their students Educators who attend evening and weekend games or performances Educators who buy gifts for students who would otherwise go without Educators who know exactly which family member is sick and regularly ask their student for updates as Educators who make home visits to show students and families that they care Educators who maintain contact with students who have long left their classroom walls Educators who make phone calls well after their contracted hours just to make sure a student is okay Educators who learn phrases in unfamiliar languages just to see a student smile these Educators know the minutia that is foundational to their students worlds this is exactly what makes the ranger Nation so great my morning mornings afternoons weekends and vacations have been and continue to be filled with names like Mrs Bruder Mrs Dei Mrs power Mrs Cormier Miss Gangi Mrs Lavin Mrs Windsor Mrs Kelly Mrs kelasa Mr Pendleton Mrs Slayton Mrs SMY Mrs gagman Miss Cashman Mrs Jeffrey Mrs poo Mrs Connelly Mrs Finch Mrs Williams Mrs goven and Miss Lori just to name a few these names don't work in 8 to3 these names infiltrate our car our home and our family dinners these names are often the words that fill in the blanks to the request of mommy take a picture and send it to miss or Mommy can you tell Mister about or I learned that from Mrs duh luckily for me these names also have faces these names belong to teachers who have made a significant impact on my children's lives I work alongside these names these Educators they are my colleagues I urge the board members to remember these names as you hear your own versions of these names while discussing our contract negotiations remember them at your own dinner table in your own car at your next family gathering our methu and public school teachers deserve the best the time is now no more business as usual thank you thank you cara BL and Sue just come along Su Paris is joining me if that's okay our co-president of our Union with us thank you tonight also we want to just extend that there has been some cooperative and collaborative conversations going on between the union and the school committee about a number of issues so we're very excited about the collaboration piece but we're working to swiftly get the contract done and fund the schools as we need fed the high needs population dictates a lot of this budget as well as we are the largest city Department in the City by over 500 the Staffing in the way is viewed of budget especially with the budgets coming up cannot be viewed as we need to cut or we're going to be fiscally responsible like a business we're not a business we're a school that Services 7,000 children and a lot of the population has high needs and difficult demographics that other systems do not have you cannot solely look at a budget based on numbers of students or just of Staff or just because the city we are the biggest we need to be funded based upon what the needs are and how do we retain and keep our staff a program assistant should not be on Mass health because they cannot afford the City's health insurance a teacher should not be working three jobs and still trying to correct papers at midnight because they are not being funded we are the lowest paid in the marac valley and our contracts deserve to be funded not based on what what you think is fiscally responsible but the city narrative needs to change we've had very productive conversations we are hoping that the Swift action that you were taking for the schools will translate into our contract negotiation and we appreciate your time thank you Nicole Pereira hi everyone um I'm Nicole Pereira I'm a mom of three boys attending the Marsh Grammar School and the current president of the methu and CAC um I just wanted to thank the mayor and superintendent for inviting the state to conduct a visual walkthrough of the Marsh Grammar School in addition to conducting indoor air quality testing I encourage staff and parents to read this report it can be found on the me.gov website um the report highlights several areas of concern that I do feel like need to be addressed in order to ensure safe and healthy learning environment for our students and staff um some of these key issues I identified included um deactivated ventilation systems several of the supply and exhaust components of our mechanical ventilation systems were found to either be uh deactivated or non-functional so I I think it would just be um great for us to know whether those were determined to be deactivated or non-functional um of course the Aging infrastructure many building components particularly in the 1969 section have surpassed their service life in our need of replacement this includes unit ventilators that are essential to maintaining fresh air circulation in classrooms as well as Windows potential for mold growth areas of visible water damage and mold growth were noted and I would like to see a clear plan to address the mold that was discovered and then just overall general maintenance issues accumulations of dust and debris and Vents and carpeting that is beyond its service life can contribute to poor air quality until permanent carpets can be removed it's essential to vacuum regularly with a vacuum cleaner featuring a HEPA filter I'm just curious if we have a vacuum that has a HEPA filter on it awesome I love that great um are we using them on the vacuums regularly awesome um and then for areas that experience heavy foot traffic or are heavily soiled the state recommends cleaning them annually or semiannually and I know that I had presented that already before just having a protocol for the rugs that are in the classroom that are used daily that obviously have spills um you know accidents and all that those I would just like to see a plan to have those maintenanced even just yearly um giving these fining findings I would like to ask the school committee what the plans are in place to address these concerns specifically how does the district intend to implement the recommendations provided in the report I know that some things obviously take time and substantial money um but nonetheless they still do need to have a plan and I think families are just truly interested in understanding not just the current actions being taken but also how we can ensure that we are sustaining the improvements moving forward um so I just think that like if we could have a clear plan for people to access on the me.gov website on the meth Public Schools website that highlight you know during this break this is happening at this school um and you know going over the plans for the capital Improvement and how what that looks like I know that all of that information can be found somewhere on the internet but I think having it in a central place like that um site that the mayor set up is great I think for people the most people being able to access information efficiently um and then lastly i' just like to say in terms of the methu CPAC um we would like to take on a more active role um as outlined in the desie pack guidelines and Advising our school committee on education and safety of students with disabilities um we'd like that by meeting regularly with school officials we can collaboratively contribute to the Planning Development and evaluation of special education programs fostering a supportive environment for all Learners I'm not sure how that looks um with all of you and and what you guys Envision that looking like but I just wanted to throw that out into to all of your ears um that that is something that we're looking to to do essentially is pushing in um we're doing that with our PTO and working as Liaisons with our PTO and so that this is just another Avenue where we would like to be able to push in and advise um our first cek meeting again um is going to be on January 23rd at 6 o'clock pm. at the n's Library this is open to all parents of children on an IEP or 504 plan being serviced their methu public schools and all interested parties including teachers school committee members school officials as well as any interested community members if you guys have any questions at all please reach out to Methuen CPAC gmail.com thank you so much thank you is there anyone in the audience who didn't sign up who would like to speak if not then I'll close public participation if you can't make the meeting in person for public participation you can send an email to Martha m i ois s at mean. k12.us before 3M on the day of school committee meeting uh at this point know there might be some folks who want to leave the room like to entertain perhaps a motion to recess for 5 minutes so moved second motion from Member shilia second from the vice chair all those in favor say I I opposed the ice havit will recess briefly for 5 minutes e the time is 7:07 p.m. we're returning from a f minute recess I'll ask the secretary to call the rooll Upon Our return from the uh recess me daglio me Donovan member Keegan here member Maxwell here member shilia here member will let y May haveon here all right at this point we need a motion in a second to approve the minutes of the December 9 2024 meeting so moved second motion for member shilia second from the vice chair discussion there's no discussion we'll vote all those in favor say I I opposed the eyes have it we need a motion in the second to approve the minutes from the facilities building subcommittee from December 18th 2024 so moved second motion from Member shilia second from the vice chair any discussion all those in favor say I I opposed the eyes have it moving on now to staff reports uh first we have updates from the uh superintendent and assistant superintendent this point we need um I'm sorry do we have any updates that's next on the agenda yes have updates um for you tonight we have um Dr kbski I'm going to turn it over to her there should be two memos in your packet one regarding the CTE program advisory committees that we actually need your approval for which she'll go over and then she also has a school library updates which was a EST per member uh will let but also we're halfway through the year so we want to tell you where we are with our library uh Revival that's good I like that one yeah okay thank you um so the first the CTE program advisory committees this is a a requirement of chapter 74 programs that there's a committee to advise um us as educator s um and also interact with students and to help make sure that we're heading in the right direction and actually preparing students for the skills they'll need upon entering the workforce so it helps us stay current it's also a really nice way for kids to interact um with community members um to see themselves in the roles of the future so I'll call uh Miss Moren malanson up one more time a busy night for her as she facilitates the packs um in case you happen to have any questions um another requirement of the pack is that you as a body approve um the people that serve on the the program advisory councils so they've had a meeting already um everyone listed has um expressed interest in serving um and the next step is that there'll be a person from each of these separate program committees who will volunteer to serve on the general pack um and that they'll need to schedule a meeting with you the school committee um for uh a more information sharing uh Q&A type of session um so miss malanson did I miss anything just to explain a little bit about what it is we invite members from our business industry Partners we also invite um members from higher education we have parents and students who All Join This committee and the purpose really as stated is to look over the curriculum see what we do see see what the current trends are in the job market see what skills um people that are entering the market and entering higher education maybe need to develop a little more um we we work that back into our curriculum so the people that are on this list here have all as you said volunteered to come on they've given us lots of feedback in our first meeting um we had a lot of feedback based on programs that we could use in our disciplines that would increase our skills um we also looked at um those power skills that need to be worked on specifically um interpersonal skills emotional intelligence teamwork collaboration um and they also provide a lot of opportunity for our students to do competitions to find externship opportunities to find job opportunities um and then speaking engagements where members of the community members from higher education come and speak to our students um about the career path that they're involved in so I'm happy to answer any questions that you have about what the packs are um what we do so any questions any questions from the committee um and just one more note we do have a radio and TV broadcasting pack that is not a current chapter 74 approved program but we are in the application process for it to become one um so we're ahead of the game in that area M Willette it was excellent presentation so um I just wanted to add that beyond the scope of of people receiving passing grades for the AP courses I know there's a movement a foot to be able to secure credit from colleges while you're in still in high school is that something that we have a Synergy with this program to gain credits at community colleges and public schools uh going forward or currently do we have that mechanism Beyond obviously the scope of AP credit for for kids um if that's something you wanted to Enlighten us as a committee I would appreciate the feedback just to learn more perfect timing um so we've been in discussion with Northern essics and also middle sex about articulation agreements um where they match our curriculum against theirs and say that they're reciprocal and that um students would have a pathway that we could advertise as already having earned credits at at a un University or college Beyond um some are very clearly outlined within the state guidelines for instance the early childhood education and some other programs such as radio and TV broadcasting we know aligns really nicely with what middle sex offers mostly because the department chair is on our pack and pointed that out um so that would be another networking opportunity um so they'll just need to be um some documenting of that that agreement but yes that and we're using that um to help advertise the opportunity to students particularly even incoming um middle school students who plan to attend the high school as an opportunity for them to get involved in CTE because I see it like twofold it it keeps us honest in terms of our standards because if we're aligned with community colleges and public schools and also because of the framework we have right now of tuition free opportunities at the community colleges and the public schools I think it's a strong Synergy um Beyond just liberal odds and again I think business marketing bio technology early childhood I think a lot of that's the future um and I I appreciate that and just moving in that direction if we have further updates down the line or uh invitations or even have outside people come and speak to us I would love to have that vantage point of like either the community colleges or the experts from outside fields and just explain how it benefits them because right now there's a huge outcry um for skills um in certain fields and I think this is a perfect alignment thank you any other questions or comments from the committee if not that'll do it thank you excuse me Maya we just need just a sec that was just the update yep we do need a vote for a motion in a second so this is regarding the approval of the advisory committees for the CT program okay so we need second motion from Member Willette second from Member shabila discussion no dolio I'm sorry remember dolio you second it yes yeah I S any discussion not will vote all those in favor say I I opposed the eyes have it at this point we'll move on to the update regarding the school libraries okay thank you so as you'll see in in your packet there's a memo that outlines um the many steps of the project and I hope to inform you as to where we are now um so at this point in every grammar school um we've gone through the design process of what we hope the library to eventually look out look like in terms of layout in every space we heard loud and clear from the principles um and also from our vantage point that it was important to preserve open space um such as in this Media Center um areas to collaborate for students to hold meetings professional development opportunities while also maximizing storage um for books so we purchased and installed um wall shelving which is uh the one-sided shelving there's some two-faced or double-sided shelving um that's freestanding in in every school as well and the bulk of the work was the weeding process and we um collaborated with fallet they flew out a librarian um they thought they could do it with three um and some staffers they provided uh we had some awesome volunteers some parent volunteers some community volunteers who also joined to help in the effort um and upon working through our our library ctions that hadn't been touched in many many years um they became fallet being they became overwhelmed and flew out another librarian and more staffers so um it it took a lot to get through that collection um into to to get the collection to a place where we feel like it's it's updated it's relevant um there's texts that are meaningful for kids every school uh received more than 2,000 new um books that are all fallet perab bound so with that binding it's guaranteed for life so if it were to become damaged um we just let fall it know and they send us a new one um and uh we're able to inventory the entire collection so we see where our holes are where we need to build in the future um and so that puts us about above 11,000 um books at each school the high school currently just um because we're in the space and you get a visual um is about 14 ,000 so now um that fallet has come and gone and it was it was really a whirlwind of weeding um I wanted to be sure that what we weeded should have been weeded um so we had another team that was consistent that went from school to school to get their hands on every single book again um to make sure that it was an appropriate weed and that we weren't moving too quickly um and for the most part we found that we were we were right on the money the first time around although we were able to save um some additional books um and I would like to um give a mention to Vanessa Guthrie who's the media center specialist at the high school um she's really been helping with the process so where we are now is that with the weeded books um once they've been double checked all staff will be offered the opportunity to grab from the piles if they wish um to add to their classroom collections we'll also offer offer the opportunity to students and Families um and for the books that aren't um selected or chosen we'll be able to donate those um and we need to identify um the furniture and the type that needs to be purchased um what we can afford uh Miss Guthrie from the high school is helping us with decor and signage and displays um and we also purchased um the materials necessary for self checkout stations at each school um so the student will be able to um um type in their ID number or the teacher will be able to help them and then they just scan their book and they're on their way um without a specialist in each school we think that might be the most feasible way to get through the year with the assistance of some volunteers to help us reshel and um keep the The Collection organized um and also to make it visually appealing with more displays so that's where we're we're looking um to go now there's been a lot of work that's gone into it so thank you to everyone who's been involved and we know kids are eager to get their hands on some books and we're eager to have them do so as well um there's also a few pictures in there um just so you can see the scope of the job and uh the personalization that went through the review of every single text do you have any questions comments from the committee I'll defer to them for vice chair um it's probably a silly question but um in the elementary schools are the books off the floor so that the mice can't get to them the the shelving is raised um much like it is here so there's they're not there's nothing that's that's flat on the floor you might see when you travel around schools we did leave some shelves at the very top top um open and that's purposeful for display of books um but we're maximizing the space we're trying to fill what we have in terms of shelving member Donovan um Dr kovsky can you fill us in a little on where these volunteers may be coming from because obviously it's going to be key jobs to maintain the libraries make them look good and accessible so can you give us a idea yes um yeah I'm concerned with um getting uh volunteers with regularity to make sure that we have h a schedule of when students check out books and return them who's putting them back in the right spot and what not um we had um asked the city for some senior volunteers if you remember that program um that was advertised before um and so I think we were um waiting to see if anyone had selected Ed us because they can select their site um and also um I don't know that that would take us throughout the year but it would be helpful um so that's that's one plan we have another is the principals putting their newsletters um that we were looking for volunteers and I know several have had some parents who have reached out with days or hours they'd be willing to give um and then we're also looking at um the National Junior Honor Society we've talked about um maybe by weekly those students could cycle through um and help recatalog organize the books um Miss Guthrie's also been really kind and offering to make videos and training videos uh for the new volunteers that come on to catch everybody up um because we expect there'll be a lot of hands thank you member Willet thank you Mr chairman and I really appreciate the report and without highlighting the spefic specific school I had concerns um but I think we're moving in the in the right direction now what is the timetable an estimate of the step six of the completion date are we looking at the remainder of the school year um are we pretty close to that step six we're close so two schools have been um fully double checked in the weeding which would um put us toward um the end of step five the third school is almost finished and then we'll start at that last school um next week so I'd say in Fe by February we should be having kids check out books the furniture um may be happening concurrently as we establish where that money is coming from for the furniture and how much we need um that's a real variation between schools um for instance a CGS although I think it's the original furniture from the media center it's pretty solid and and it's there are tables and there's other spots where we need to purchase more um so we'll have to figure that part out but we'll be able to have students check out books certainly February so in terms of our Equity mission statement we don't have really any laggers we're pretty much uniformity amongst the schools okay yes we prioritize that okay and then also so uh I don't know if you emphasized it I apologize if you you did already but people have to realize at home that this is a a project that was 15 years and waiting to accomplish we have not done this in 15 years of weeding through the books purchasing new books um assessing our libraries uh encouraging volunteers so it becomes like a Herculean task now in terms of uh the ne Library I know we mentioned during prior meetings their involvement I don't know if you want to go into a little bit of detail on that their involvement of recommendations review coming on site because we do a municipal chargeback I believe still and in partnership with the nans library um as far as I know is that something that you know we we don't do the municipal chargeback anymore okay with the nans library we don't do that anymore okay good okay so okay all right so in terms of um what you will need for furniture within the libraries I believe that's something that is an immediacy to that uh but also cataloging what will need to be removed and I read in the methan Life in terms of the donation from the first church that was great for the the students and I don't know if we're doing any Outreach to maybe local businesses and nonprofits and churches in terms of matching up students with books or sending out a letter um I know there's different uh businesses that do a lot of charity work and I'm sure churches and nonprofits would also be part of that mission if we just do an introductory letter um but I think we're moving in the right direction um and I appreciate that and then if we're not doing the municipal charge with the nans anymore I think that's kind of a good thing and that we're putting the money into our libraries and I know working with the mayor as the education mayor I know there'll be certain items that he'll have to approach to councel um in terms of replacement of furniture and shelving um so I think again overall we're moving in that right direction and I appreciate the report thank you thank you memb shilia um over the break I was at the Marshall and in the media center there are the boxes of what I'm assuming are the weeds I know that you said that your timeline is to have kids checking out in February what do you think the timeline is for kind of your donation collection passing out getting all the extra weeds out of the building the the March is actually they're at 75% um completion of the double check of the weeds so they started they got to the marsh um toward the end of last week so that that's almost done and then we can open um for teachers to come and take um and then we'll go through with the family in in the student offerings uh the group that we've used before um they pick up books um it's a Boston based group and um they're they give about maybe a week they need a week lead time um to come with their truck and to take away um at the very last step so I'm not worried about that there were there were a lot of boxes at the marsh which is why I want to be sure we double checked pretty big pile right yeah so thank you any other questions from the committee if not we'll move on to uh the Student Services report um good evening I'd just like to highlight and congratulate tab for his selection as student representative on the safe and supportive schools commission um so just wanted an opportunity to highlight that tonight um and then open it up if there's any other questions about the memo tonight member wette thank you um in terms of the nonresident approved the stay for the current year is that in relation to graduation correct okay and um how is the new uh system in terms of the new form and reviewing the real estate transactions and more involvement with the police of doing checks how is that how is that going does that seem to be Improvement so the form has definitely been very helpful um in getting information to us um the enrollment Specialists have done a great job checking um any resource that we have available to us and um collaborating with any agency while we go through residency investigations we're now gearing up for um our grade level checks so in the coming months you'll be getting updates we're going to be doing two schools at a time okay and we've had um it was there were five person um since it was 15 before now it's 20 so far so there was only five from the previous month that we were still processing okay y all right and then um this might be a a question for the the mayor in terms of the um the shelter has the has the governor uh visited with her team of inspectors to the shelter yet no okay so no visit to to the shelter that we have major concerns with and we've had no additional funding to help us with that shelter to the school system not yet uh but I have had City inspectors visiting uh but not from the state at this point uh but I will point out that in conversations with the Healy Administration uh they are winding down use of hotels in the Commonwealth as uh shelters altogether and at this point I think I indicated uh perhaps back in November December my advocacy for the days in in that hotel's use as a shelter to be uh winded down in the initial phases of their plan simply because we were one of the first to be opened and uh that at this point is what I am pushing for in terms of advoc at the state level yeah because I think it's an Abomination over there the reports I'm receiving and also in terms of we're talking about uh fairness across communities uh and again we will educate the children that is my priority in terms of fairness we are being uh victimized as a community and we have deficit spending with the illegal alien situation and so I know you're on top of it Mr mayor I know you reflected it to the governor in conversations but I I just don't think as a gateway community that we should be hosting that many families and not receiving any assistance and it's an Abomination at that place uh the reports I'm receiving uh but other than that I appreciate the report to the committee thank you member shilia looking at the three bullets under grants first um I guess my ask would be I mean these are all well written but they're very much written in your Corporate email type manner where there there's there's nothing in here for specifics it's it feels to me when I read these like I'm at work and there's just a lot of buzzwords and I I mean I get it that's kind of the world we live in but also I think people want to actually understand what's going on like for example in that first bullet me reading that the first thought that came to my mind was what you were trying to say is we'd be renewing cartwheel and I mean that's that's well and good and all it's just I feel like I had to like dig to figure out what that actually meant so I guess my ask going forward is if we could just be more specific with what we're saying instead of the uh I don't know how the corporate language de bureaucratic language stuff um go going past that in the third bullet the other two tell us how much the grants were the third bullet doesn't so in my mind I automatically go to those are million dollar grants which I I know they aren't but but it just it it stands out as a a missing bullet point um in the school health services section it says that the part-time director of Health Services was removed and you added the two stipended nursing roles I'm going to assume that these weren't a onetoone switch would that be an accurate assumption yep so so uh we were struggling because the part-time position that we thought was going to help us get through this year uh was from a staff member who's not currently here in Methuen and so only available uh after hours right so so that person was doing our uh paperwork with the state our state reporting and communicating with our nurses or families as needed but after hours for non-urgent situations that's sort of how we set it up uh it was brought to our attention uh from the group uh that Miss boak and I met with the the nurses group that that was just it was a struggle they needed something more tangible during the day uh to help them work through situations within and among themselves and also with families and so we came to a mutual agreement with the Union that we would uh sort of cease that director position take those funds and the union did agree to split two stip in positions for current nurses in our Union so those those positions right now uh and divided in a way that they can do their full-time jobs as nurses right we really I thought I think we did a good job working closely with the nurses Union to really figure out what they need to get us through this year um um but with with real Clarity that it's very hard to function without a director with that being said do we now have two full-time present accounted for in the building nurses in each building I know so close we are so close how close is so close where we at we are working we are finalizing the final position in one of the buildings awesome so these positions that are stiped it they are they're they're doing that that backend work that was being done by that part end person yeah part part-time and and the work that Miss boac was taking over so uh that in combination with the director of special education leaving uh we had to spend some time really figuring out time and tasks and that's what we did with the nursing position with special education uh and that vary uh that's the other piece that she uh supervises so so again we just we put all the pieces in place that we feel were the priorities and worked with the unions and uh we do have two staff members who applied for both of these so each of them com you know we comp compartmentalizing the tasks uh there's still working with Gina but we've taken those the day-to-day subbing the you know off of off of Miss bac's plate and now they have a leader who if there's a problem with a parent if there's problem with meds if they're having trouble getting doctor's notifications uh they have someone right here right now that they can pick up the phone and dial and call so uh awesome we put that in place Upon Our return uh in January and uh we we hope uh to have some success with that to to get us through the rest of the year awesome two questions on the mckin vento I was brought to my attention the other day by member Keegan that we let's call it ride share with special ed busing yeah do we do the same thing here to try to mitigate the cost of the of the the busing like say for example y yes we do yes yes wherever we can we split the cost or we put kids from different districts on the bus and share the cost okay that's an I was hoping we weren't we could save more but you know um and then into the residency so I'm I'm coming into 2025 with a perspective across the board of I want things to mean something when we do them and The Residency chart is nice and I understand the need despite the contention that may be around it but it it doesn't tell me what the impact is on the district so of these 20 kids that have withdrawn from the district how many of them were counted in last year's October numbers that we received State funding for how now if we then remove that kid from the district and we're being paid for them do we now have to send that money no we don't never because I've for the 20 kids that we've gotten out I've probably quadrupled that in the amount of kids I've received in since October 1st and have not gotten money for okay that's how the state works we don't pay money back and forth so if kids have withdrawn after October 4th I mean October 1st they've withdrawn kids who are enrolling now I mean we get a report every Monday morning on the kids that are enrolling it doesn't stop right so so we've gotten far more kids enrolling than we have withdrawn so and the state just assumes next October 1st the kids that are here and stay get picked up on that October 1st enrollment that's it's never worked any other way since I've been in this business um so which is why there's some I will say uh I know that some people have asked the sort of why are we allowing non-resident to stay when there's a graduation situation 8th grade 12th grade uh the school committee in the past has given me that the the money as long as it's in Massachusetts right it's about the kid at this point not not about uh we don't provide transportation or anything like that because we can't uh but if we're talking about a senior that wants to graduate with their peers uh I'm just not in the position that I would say uh no um so that has been allowed yeah so that's the only time when we would have somebody who's not living in methan if they have asked or they're living in a close enough town that they want to finish their year with their peers make sense to us financially not to my thought process when reviewing this was I have this chart every two weeks and I'm not sure what to do with it yeah I it was basically asked for us to provide you for sheer information of how many how many at the time if there's a if there's something more that you want that's at the will of the committee to let us know what you what what other information will help us with some outcome you know not maybe I get it because information just to have information uh but how helpful is it I yeah I guess that can be an ongoing conversation I would I would like it to be worth the effort of putting it together and right now I don't necessarily feel that it is understood so and if we deem it not worth the effort then why are we doing it maybe I'm alone in that but that's all I've got thank you student representative um going back to the the money towards the cartwheel and the um there's a section at the bottom that says it will also help fund the MHP sa I was wondering if there was a an amount that was allocating towards that group or is it still being decided well ask Mr Crocker more details we got it we have member Maxwell and then member daglio um so I mean I was just wondering what the used to Advance Counseling staff use was evidence-based Mental Health Services I guess that's cartwell I didn't realize I made assumptions yeah so I guess I would be interested in knowing what that is what what is the evidence-based Mental Health Services and and then the CP s coaches in the second bullet are those going to be at each school what like what is that so we we currently um are looking for about a dozen uh coaches at this point throughout the district and uh there will be coaches assigned to each school so we will it might not be an even spread of numbers of coaches in each school but um we're looking at having at least one or two coaches in each school at this point yes what exactly will they be doing so there so we've done all this for the course of three years to have a trainer of trainers program so that they have gone through I want to say three are we at level three so three levels of training to then become Trainers for teachers professional development that is the way that the collaborative problem solving implementation plan goes it is it's a large especially in a large District like ours it's hard for the professional group to come and do small group implementation and training so they uh have recommended since the onset of us working with them that we go through a a pretty strict training process to train the trainers so we have our own trainers that can then work with grade levels different schools and we have enough people to deploy for smaller groups on those professional days we already have those that staff or are you hiring more like are teachers staff yeah these are current staff members who have been interested and trained all along the way gotcha and a variety of types of Staff members as well so we have some guidance we have some teachers we have some administrators it's a variety of uh uh staff that have gone through the process to this level okay and and what about the um top one is that cartwheel is that what we're talking about the top bullet yeah I'll have to get yeah we're going to get some more information from you that was the one that member shilia mentioned we'll get some detail for you a little more breakdown member jaago yeah um just to follow what with m shilly is a um statement about the residency the reason why we put it together um was because at the time especially when I first got on and when Mr wette I remember wette back in his day residency is to a big issue with residents through through through the whole city they want to know whether it's tax pay is going so we set that block up so when people do tend to want to look at our agenda they saw what we were doing actively moving with showing residency so I I still think it still does some use because we know that we're actively moving forward in continuously doing our checks where when we when I got on it was kind of in this limbo type thing where we didn't have the Staffing or we did have Staffing but we didn't know where the paperwork was going or it it was kind of why we formed that subcommittee we were fixing what the residency area was doing and providing that information so then we knew if it was working that thing that that's why and it was a simple boxes like four or five boxes as you see but I that's why I wanted to form maybe the subcommittee for a small portion to see what we could do to advance that too so maybe in the future that could be the subcommittee idea of moving forward how to advance it any other questions from the committee Vice chair um so going off of something that member wette said um if they were to close the days in all of those students are methan public school students and if they get moved to another Community is it going to increase our transportation costs to bust these students from another Community to methan yes potentially potentially that's what I thought and they're not necessarily so one clarification all the students at the days in are not necessarily attending methan public school so I just want to mention that um but yes there is a potential that if they are moved which some have already been moved from days in um there is is potential cost if they remain with us here in methan okay and they would they would have the right to remain in methan as long as they continue to be homeless correct that's correct so it doesn't matter if they move to let's say New Bedford we would still have to bust them um the rule of thumb is if the distance is in excess of an hour okay then it's not in the best interest of the child to be transported um and so those are conversations that we have um and there are times that parents or Guardians will say we would like the student to remain in methan and then we have to appeal that decision okay but it is a cost to us if they leave methan now a greater cost than what it is right now okay I just wanted to make that currently we currently have students who right we're doing both we have students who are enrolled with us and we have students that Miss boak's office is already working on they live at days in but are bused too so we we own uh that part of that Transportation cost I just wanted to be clear to the committee that just because the days in closes the cost doesn't cost doesn't go away and it in fact could be increased not decreased I just want to be cognizant of time it's almost day o' CL we can have I'll be very brief brief statement very brief if you look at a few years ago the cost of the the homelessness program right has been absolutely dwarfed by the illegal alien coming into this state we've wasted $2 billion in counting and going into the next fiscal year the current fiscal year where we have $400 million deficit okay and then next fiscal year we're talking about our budget collectively definitely is an impact so we can have a breakdown of the numbers of the homeless versus the illegal population that came into the state a couple of years ago and we can have that breakdown I have no problem with that but we had $2 billion dollar wasted on illegal aliens coming into the state the governor is waking up to that problem we have a $4 million excuse me $400 million deficit currently that's going to have to be shorted up before the next fiscal year and I know for a fact the next fiscal year is going to impact us school budget so we can talk about numbers and I will definitely do that going into the next uh fiscal cycle thank you member Donovan ju just for clarification Miss boac um under your year to dat Transportation expenses special education uh this parentheses plus 60,000 $67,000 um from when is that an increase from last month from last month and okay so what so that year-to date Transportation expense so the total is from July 1st forward but the 67,000 is from last month now that is all dependent on when we've received invoices it's not a $67,000 increase from last month it's just when we've paid the invoices okay I appreciate that clarification that's homeless it's oh okay okay thank you for that we'll move on now in the agenda to the uh Director of Human Resources report any questions from the committee it's only one page lot of red on that page I know but I'm just saying any questions from the committee regarding the facilities report I had a question for the um the staff yeah yep I'm sorry the districtwide psychologist is listed at the marsh um would that just be is that like their home base yeah it's simply because that's where it needs to live in the budget somewhere when we do districtwide and we usually find an Office in a building for districtwide staff that's the only purpose for that okay yeah facilities members should beia so do you want me to explain what's here and start that conversation or um right in no Dive Right In we're good all right so Dive Right In let's do it I mean first off I think the efforts that have been taken over the last three or so weeks are are fantastic I was in the Timothy while those that team was in there cleaning it was amazing it's an unfortunate reality that it can't be done every day watching them clean the vents at the marsh was also let's call it enlightening um and talking to the folks folks that were spraying at the Tenny everyone I talked to said that they were coming into these buildings expecting them to be War zones direct quote from the gentleman I spoke to at the Tenny and they were all surpris pleasantly surprised at what they were coming into because it wasn't as bad as what they were anticipating now things have a way of becoming worse as soon as they hit the public ear but is it great no is it as bad as these folks thought it was going to be coming in no that being said thinking about our standard facilities report um I I took the same approach I took what the the last report I it I'm looking at it I'm going okay this is great you changed light bulbs they updated the ATX system over here the one that we presented in December right our standard report y I understand and my thought was that's that's great and this report is lovely but again what do we do with it this just shows that people are out there doing their job and that's that's great I had a conversation with Bruce on Friday um trying to figure out how we operationalize that report so it becomes a useful piece of information and I mean it's it's with his support that I say I I think a better use of a a facilities discussion would be a monthly report of the ongoing issues something tied to for example our Capital Improvement plan which I know gets submitted to the city that I think is something that we all as a committee can review especially where budget time is is looming right around the corner for not only us but for our delegation and everyone else we can see that and say okay this is what we're looking at how do we plan for this and that also helps with the presentation of the capital Improvement plan to the city I don't know what our Capital Improvement plan looks like I've never seen it so what it was in your budget book no oh no I mean it is it not like a bigger thing um I would expect it's not a much bigger thing than what you saw it's it's the projects I mean we present it with the city in a spreadsheet format so there's cost and time and a more Project based planning that's and that's what I would expect to see the narrative is exactly what we put in that spreadsheet right so I I I know the page in the budget book yeah but what I would expect to see is more detail as to what what the plan is and like what the goal is and what we're asking for the funding for I guess is a better way to phrase it instead of saying I don't know what it is um and and talking to Bruce he also recommended maybe submitting the P1 tickets which I think is more actionable for us and more enlightening than looking at a list of things that they did and I mean I would welcome feedback because I I'm just I'm trying to find a way to make this report useful instead of just an exercise and information gathering remember Willette I think I think what we we're moving in the right direction and I understand exactly what you're saying we really have to disclose in a truthful and accountable fashion what is going on with that school system so the format that we have currently in this report I think tells us what we've completed what's in progress and what has not been completed so in follow-up meetings when we had the ticket system things that should be probably encapsulated by the individual principles right should be reported to us and the format could be this of these are the classrooms that had significant issues and we went through these classrooms and we completed and were're in compliance with the inspector's report now we've had like literally years if not Decades of things that we put by the wayside in order to focus on our main budget of personnel and funding positions and I want to make sure that as a school committee as a community we're taking advantage of opportunities out there that other communities are taking advantage of for instance with the accelerated repair program and I talked to you about that with the school building authority right there's an opportunity to look at with our boilers and maybe some the roof repair or Windows putting in a package right and having us receive funding from the state and it could be like in havil was 76% funding from the state and the remaining amount was 24% and because we have more money in our cash reserves that lowers our interest rates and it's more affordable for us to take on that type of uh program with the accelerated repair of our schools because that's a new feature of the school building authority but in havil it was from the beginning of the application process which would need to be approved by the school committee and by the city council that there on the same page okay there's an application process it's going to be starting soon we're we're in the middle of it right now okay yep so that's but that for havil it took a course of three years from start to finish they they came in the last two weeks that's where Bruce has been and walking they've gone to every school uh coming in to do the assessment piece uh actually we just got the ebil um Mr golin and Mr Stella have a few more pieces to give to the state as far as equipment and details but that will that will allow the state to tell us what we would qualify for because we have to qualify for things before we can actually put in our letter of interest in Mars so we are we are well into that process and you're right it's not going to happen tomorrow uh putting in the letter of interest starting in March I think this Pro program opens March 6th if I remember correctly uh that we could even put the letter of interest in depending on what the state says we are qualified for yes um you know it's it's not again it's not going to be all of it and it's not going to happen now it's going to take some time if we do qualify it's going to have to be sort of put out and planned when those bigger projects of Windows and roofs and doors and things like that for the accelerated repair part not the building construction yes now I know in conversations with the chairman he is dedicated to emergency cleaning from outside uh resources into our school we did the the timy I think there's a commitment to do the Tenny and I know with the mash we did the the ventilation right and another thing I'm interested in is establishing some type of protocol that we know in a certain timeline we're looking through our ventilation systems we're upgrading our energy resources and I know we have the department of uh energy resources that we apply on a a regular basis for funding and maybe that's another element of checking within our schools of the Department of energy resources so I think us reporting is very important because if we didn't disclose it I think someone would complain that we're not disclosing I think that the mayor's website is absolutely 100% important to the process I think the health and and safety task force and inviting I think a teacher to that process is absolutely necessary okay and we will work through these issues and we'll have emergency funding there will have to be some type of capital bond in terms of replacing furniture and cabinets and doing masonry work and tiles and then also too inviting The Vocational students and approaching Home Depot and Lowe's and maybe get supplies and doing a partnership with the vocational kids and building the cabinets and building new bookcases I want us to take advantage of every opportunity of funding and I know the mayor is committed to doing a package before the city council but again some of it's going to be emergency some of it's going to involve the state I know the the federal green program I think that's already elapsed we did some of the stimulus funding I understand that um and the Again The Accelerated repair program that's a different component we are working together as a school committee and I'm I'm dedicated to that process and we'll have full disclosure of it and I understand members shilia again I have no problem of modifying the report but I think a report is absolutely necessary because back in 2023 and 2022 we had a total of one report when I got back to the school committee we have had nine reports and tell me that that is that full disclosure hasn't helped with the process and it's not a Panacea I'm not saying that but we will work continue to work as a team and again and if this is the template then that's something I'm willing to look at but we have to have some type of information Beyond again our mandate is not day-to-day operations but we've been doing it we've been visiting the schools we've been in contact with the mayor we've been in contact with Personnel on a daily basis recriminations that's going to be another time I'm interested in Solutions and that's what I've been doing since last January to this point is the Fulfillment of constituent services and finding the truth and having accountability and full disclosure and having any outside State inspectors coming in and your inspection team and working with that personnel and identifying issues and following up and that's going to be an ongoing process so there's no illusion on that and it's not a Panacea but we're working in that direction thank you I'm not advocating to scrap a report I'm advocating to make the report actionable I'm advocating for the report to be something that is clear concise of what needs to happen and how we can Aid in doing that also I would argue that reading those reports over the last 12 meetings where we've had them has not Advanced the problem or Advanced a solution to the problem it has just put information out there for information purposes but that that's just my perspective we'll keep we'll keep moving uh member Maxwell and the member daglio and then we'll Circle back around I just have a couple questions on the reports so a lot of the in progress says that materials needed or ordered when when will the materials needed be here for any of the projects really so it depends on uh that's my first question yeah no it depends on what it is I I typed this myself uh and all cabinets and so cabinets and uh I put that on the cover letter so some of the cabinets those those you know that I uh our team focused on cleanliness and the disinfecting pieces of the work first the stuff that is in progress typically means we need kind of all hands on deck ripping down cabinets and rebuilding them is not going to be an easy or quick task uh so we have that uh dedicated in some spaces during the vacations um but I think there needs to be a l and I I believe I said it and if I didn't I thought it and I should have typed it but but the the cabinets or rebuilding rotted wood things like that that aren't uh necessarily uh a direct priority cleanliness health issue right now I need a long-term plan for that because it it that again we can't just we can't just knock down a shelf here a shelf here uh and again with a few maintenance folks I have I'm really trying to focus them on some of these other more pressing issues but we do have some plans at the marsh we have some specific places just because they've been uh thoroughly outlined uh where we had the rotted wood and some uh water damage that we will have those removed replaced probably not but removed for sure right so these are also part of it it's a removal a replace what am I going to replace it with uh those of you who I think all of you have been in our classrooms all of the W wood shelving cabinets is I'm pretty sure original from all the buildings so if it's at the CGS it's 30 years old if it's at the ten Tenny or timy and Marsh it depends if it's the old side of the building new side how old it is so there's just there's a lot there that uh we need to uh think a little bit more about how we're going to tackle that those are bigger projects so but some of these things door sweeps things like that some of those have already been ordered it's a matter of The Ordering of um in installation um so I didn't go into that level of detail I was trying to get this ready for tonight's meeting to make sure there was an absolute current progress report and this is up to date as of last Wednesday when when I had to get the school committee packet ready so even today that this is living and working uh principes and Senior custodians are still updating this as we speak right so um you know to to member will let's point at some point this is going to expire right we're going to we're going to meet all of this and move on what does the moving on look like and I think that's uh the conversation I think we're all on the same page of what does that moving on look like how do we make sure that we have a long-term plan for this and that it's sustainable and that there are systems in place that don't get missed and that's what uh I you know I don't have that for you tonight that's going to take some time because we have been uh this has been Fast and Furious trying to get this stuff remediated right now right but but those conversations I would say this past week have started to happen of what is that long term we've got vacations we've got summer uh but those go quickly as well uh if we do you know that's all impactful on everything else we do right if if the carp get replaced in the schools nothing else is going to happen in those buildings this summer that's just that's just the way it's going to go because we have to do the abatement and the removal so so how well I IED I wanted to comment on a couple other things too so but anyway the the longterm is what we're really we are focused on some of the long term this shows you that we were focused immediately on the cleanliness aspects and immediate health concerns some of those other projects are need to happen but they weren't necessarily the immediate health concerns that we had with the staff that we had so there are a few immediate emergency things that um well a couple things say complete that aren't complete but um like the boys locker room there's no hot water in there there's small black spots on ceiling in the fourth grade boys restroom is that just going to be like painted over it says complete where where are you looking what school that one's the marsh and then at the bottom 216 room is empty has not been used since roof leak um it was a window leak not a roof leak but it says it was complete not sure why it's complete when it shows signs of a black substance I mean was the air quality reports done in there also in the what um also in the Tenny there's a bunch of water sailing damage that has complete next to it which is concerning did we inspect why there's water damage in the ceilings the boys's locker room has Rusty lockers uh like there's a lot of things that are marked complete but they're not complete and that's concerning anything that was marked complete was the cleanliness part so if there was if there was tiles that need just the cleanliness part not the black mold not the we're not testing every room that is in these reports as saying black we're not testing every I mean we just we physically can't test those rooms and even in the Health Report even the ones that are identified as possible mold we're not testing those rooms right so um I think well we had the department you're referring to the marsh no I ref I'm referring to the Tenny there's a couple there's a couple in progress that says water damage and then they also say black questionable spots possibly mold question mark and it says complete yeah so I think you referring to room 107 for instance there this one's 140 this one's the difference member Maxwell is that complete means that it was it was complete well it is complete in the sense that uh everybody that we have talked to including the City Health Department and the State Health Department because I walked around with that gentleman as well the entire day he was here at the marsh um was very clear that anything that would appear to be mold we need to clean right and make sure there's no water source to actually do it so when clean it doesn't necessarily get rid of the problem and painting over it surely doesn't get rid of the problem that's a concern right so any anywhere that we had so if you look at the marsh report for example is the best this is the best thing and a couple of you were with me so just chime in but um that they there at the marsh it was about cleaning it and that there was no uh water um I I don't know what that tool was but but there was no it was a moisture meter moisture meter um that there was no uh moisture right it was dry so it basically is there's no water that's continuously coming into this space at some point there was water so clean it and and that was really what his the state guy uh the state inspector was really clear on you need to remove it and clean it now if we have a situation where we have a cons we have we have definitely identified some places where we have consistent leaks that we need to repair those are being looked at a little differently right I need to repair uh uh we have a sprinkler in one of the spaces that needed repairing before I could replace the tiles on the ceiling right so we are doing those things so complete means if it needed to be cleaned it was absolutely cleaned things replaced removed painted whatever it needed it was done okay yeah I mean I just I just assumed complete me that the entire problem was going to be dealt with and resolved I don't know I mean when it says mold and mildew on the outside of En counters showing water signs of damage and then it says complete without an air quality test being done that you know that's Troublesome I can I can understand the concerns of the teachers that are in in those rooms I I just yeah it's I think that this list is just I don't know it's kind of deceiving it's not really it's not really in progress It's just whatever whatever the cleaning is is complete but the stuff behind the cleaning that actually needs to be done to get rid of the problem isn't complete that's not necessarily true okay and I'll also just mention that um and I'll I have a some things I want to say and as the chair I'll speak last but just to clarify we did have the Department of Public Health come in and do air quality testing Etc at the marsh for instance and that report it's available online at lethu in.gov school safety I put that up there today was that every room that was noted in this report that we went to every classroom okay um but anyway that that report has more information that's online regarding specifics about what they found but also their recommendations going forward and just for the sake of transparency I not to use that buzzword but um a lot of these things are there it's not like deep cleaning a lot of these things are going to take us some time and I think that that's why it's important for our task force to continue to ensure that we are adhering to I agree I I don't want you to think I meant like I expect this to be overnight I just don't want it to look like things are complete when you know people are in the buildings and see like this isn't actually complete this isn't fair to report that it's complete you know what I mean I and I just for transparency I want to be transparent that it's in progress but it's not complete and it may take some time but it's in progress understood am zag thank you U Mr Mr chair so um I've been on school committee for five years now and this report just I just wish it we we knew sooner in the sense of I was never told of these problems we were always told every building has mice um I work in a school and I never seen mice in two years but all of a sudden I've seen three in the last two days which is jinxed um and I've said that um but I was always at these meetings and when questions were asked it was always considered a minor thing or the mayor would say not this mayor but the formal mayor would say we we are dealing with the same issue at Town Hall and when you're 29 years old you you just trust what you're being told which is one thing people would tell you don't ever do that um I think one of the things is is yes it's great that we're moving forward but we also need to know why we got here why that it went by the wayside for so long um teachers that I've talked to have been telling telling me these issues that been talked to to their their administrators was talking to private parties and nothing was done uh I spent my days on Thursday and Friday at the marsh in the timy and I talk to people um some of the teachers are in the back over there I appreciate you guys for having me um and that was their major concerns their major concerns is that their voices are never heard and when they and they are worried about being fired or B being written up and that's why they don't talk anymore they just become comfortable with the environment that yeah you see a mouse run across your classroom it's no big deal it's it's a normal thing and to me that is shouldn't be the normaly and it's great that we're doing that now that but how do we get here that's one thing nobody's talking about and one of the things I do want the school committee needs to be involved in we need to be involved more we need our facilities committee subcommittee should overlook the capital Improvement plan we should be involved to see making sure that things are being done that's great that we're thinking about doing the report in a different way with the concerns that members sh ear brought up the vocational effort I think that is absolutely necessary um I just learned the other day we used to to have like a co-op um that kids that weren't going to college were offered jobs here why don't we offer that again um and that's we should be we should be actively looking at these Channel and people will say well that's a good idea but no don't knock it until you try right now another very big con um thing that we suggest because everybody's throwing suggestions out there is is that the Vocational School absolutely cuz I've talked to our sta uh custodian staff they're about to lose the m u maintenance guy um a Craftsman because of retirement and we don't have anybody in the back burner to train so that's going to be costly in the future because we'll be subbing out work to have work done in the schools and we'll be paying more than we're paying our guys that we're working in so we need to think of that plan and I think by having members in meetings and looking at these issues it also brings morale up because I I did the two days I spent at the Schools teacher says thank you for coming in thank you for listening thank you for hearing us when we asked you guys to come in like it's it's time for that it's we can't just be a body that says well we can't be in day-to-day operations the building itself I I I I don't know that perview to me that's not that's not interrupting day-to-day operations I think we we we need to because this list that's years of neglect I'm sorry to me that's years of neglect and moving forward to do that we need to change things so that's just all I want to say I don't need people to tell me I'm wrong or tell me how they feel about how what I feel the member that's been on it for five years I'm taking accountable that I should have known that's all I should have known I should have know more and yeah thank you I'll briefly add just a few points um to share an update uh I think with the committee but also with the public in general about some of the things that we've done I know that uh this has been publicized but just to kind of clarify things here Al together uh so uh just before Christmas uh we had that Department of Public Health visit to the marsh and uh right away as a result of that there were recommendations about ensuring that we clean for instance the exhaust vents at the marsh Etc and so uh we brought in a company called a complete cleaning company out of uh the North Shore and uh they conducted a deep clean of the timiny school and they assisted us with the cleaning of the vents as recommended by dph at the marsh and uh utilizing chapter 278 um and also given the fact that we're still awaiting a certification from the state of our free cash we're expecting that sometime in the coming week utilizing uh the extraordinary maintenance line item for now until that's certified uh but going forward um we have a plan now uh especially with pest end uh you might notice outside of the building here at the high school but also at the other school buildings we have had them install outdoor rodent control systems uh at all four grammar schools plus the high school with the objective of trying to do a weekend to deal with the problem Outdoors before they enter the building I'm referring to the road issue but also over the break pest end uh came into all four grammar schools as well as the high school to uh conduct in essence uh cleaning of rodent droppings uh that they identified but also uh taking care of disinfecting and sanitizing the buildings to address potential pathogens as well and going forward uh I think it's uh key for us to continue this process of uh assisting our custodial staff bringing them up to speed at all the schools with the deep cleaning service so this is something that I want to look at for the February break as well as the April break and uh namely focusing on I think the Tenny and the marsh next just in terms of that priority list uh that we got from the city inspection reports and the other thing too is um we we need to prioritize over the next couple of months I know during the summer break uh the super tenant referenced we need to address the issue of replacing the carpets uh it's a major issue and I think that we need to prioritize it once and for all just so we can get that done um I also want to use this opportunity uh to address um some concerns that I've heard related to The Narrative uh from the city as it relates to these broader issues uh and I I can't speak for other members of this committee I can't speak speak for members of the city council but I can speak for myself uh during a recent city council meeting I made a statement regarding teachers use of various types of food preparation appliances uh during that meeting and really my my heart there was to draw attention shine light on the need for a team approach to addressing a lot of these issues however in hindsight it's easy to see how my words could be perceived as a blanket statement that effectively blames teachers for these facility issues that we're seeing that was not my intent and I apologize to our City's teachers uh for making uh such a blanket statement along those lines and I pledge to do better going forward and utilize a more positive tone that aims to unite our city rather than divide us any further uh so I just wanted to share sh that briefly with our teachers um do we have any other questions concerns from the committee uh Vice chair and the member will up um one of the issues that I've been hearing from the custodians when we went to especially in the timy is that the school is always being used and that one of our janitors is being pulled for those extracurricular activities and that means we don't have the full staff to be cleaning the Timon um and I I just have to wonder how we can share the use of the schools so that the timiny isn't always the one being used um and perhaps cut down on the number of um events that are going on at the Tim and you know figure out like what can go there and what can go say at the CGS which is the underused school and really spread that around so that we can actually clean the timony right because we never get a chance to just clean the timony because it's always being used so um I I'd like to come up with a plan that we are not renting out the timony all the time and that we put a limit on the number of rentals we have at the timy so that we can actually address these problems just yeah I I um just to comment on that you know it is uh by far of the five schools it is the most used school gym auditor small gym big gym Auditorium uh for a variety of reasons right the high school is certainly used but used in a very compartmentalized space and mostly used by high school programs right not a lot of uh on the weekends uh basketball but not a lot of community programs are coming in during the week because our kids are using it um the hardest part about what you just said uh is that each school has its uh limitations as far as what it can provide and the best example I can give you is that some of our schools uh you can't have let's say volleyball teams or a game in there because they are not uh the right size and don't have the holes for volleyball that so they can never use that guess what school does the timy right so there's there's there's just challenges because the timy kind of has everything everybody needs and it has the parking spaces it has the auditorium right next to it the gym is right there I mean the world does use the timy uh but it is causing some consternation with uh the Staffing is you know we're it's a it is a huge building um and our also our high school team right now use the timony because they can walk there we can't expect our freshman girls to drive to practice or games so they're held at the timy so while the Tenny is the next most used School uh it it it still doesn't compared to how many events are happening at the Tim at a given time because of the space and what the space provides so it is a huge Challenge and uh another huge challenge in this community is the fact that as large as we are we only have five schools to give right so many other we have the same number of school gyms that North Andover does and we're twice the size so it's just there's a lot of different things that go into that and trust me we are going to be thinking about that Mr Goin and I have already been talking about the rental just the constant the pace of the rentals because it's not only kid use we have Police Department uses it it for basketball I mean we have Community team you know Community it's a community building right um so we're just trying to figure out the balance of having it be they Community buildings you can't we can't close them um but how do we balance that to just be like where's the pause button certain times a year that we need to just pause and clear things out and just say like it can't be used right now because we need to inspect you know make it better um so we're working through all of that I do appreciate uh that because that that's a big stress on the building right now now too is uh not being fully staffed or having enough staff on a day-to-day cuz people are out sick take vacation like everything else we're dealing with um to have a staff member pulled to come to the gym to set something up or to clean something or to do something because a group is in there is certainly challenging and I appreciate the acknowledgement of that and I mean we I don't have a solution right now but we we're going to work through that and see what we can come up with yep it's an important topic we can Circle back for second round member Willet thank you Mr chairman again like I said this is very healthy um and another idea that I tossed out last year was that um the sale of uh Surplus schools we should have some type of mechanism that that money will go back into our schools to help with deficiencies within our schools and I know that's an ongoing conversation I know it was with the prior mayor May and with the current mayor is that we should be looking at every opportunity for for funding um to help with our schools and I know again I represent One Voice one vote so these are just ideas I'm tossing out there another thing is that we should have um maybe some additional custodians but that's a a budget consideration definely and also a hybrid approach going for forward of having a combination of custodians that areand as best we can under the budget that's going to be presented to us from the state and the governor and the deep cleaning outside sources it has to be a hybrid approach on a permanent basis of cleaning our ventilations uh and also um doing a deep clean and again the thing that was brought to my attention and member Maxwell you raised very good points we were at the school I'm not going to emphasize which school it was I have no illusion that those issues have not um that those issues have been resolved those are ongoing issues um with the school that we we visited I'm not going to highlight the school but um we need that if a hi trffic schools should involve a combination of custodians the properly demand and if it involves at times overtime if there's call outs or people on sick leave right in addition to the deep cleaning and again I don't want to blame somebody but if we have a facilities rental fees and if we have it up to $127,000 what exactly are those fees being used for it's the same thing with the the packing fees and that is like $62,000 I I want that by the end of the year $10,000 on both accounts you have a little bit of a cushion but let's start using those rental fees into the schools themselves um so that's being proactive working with the mayor working with the the committee and again member shilia you and I we're at log ahe heads at times and we have our debates but your H is in the right place we'll have our disagreements I have no illusion that this is going to be an ongoing process in a simple piece of paper isn't going to solve it it's something that's been years and like member daglio said we could have recriminations I could talk about prior School committees it doesn't solve the situation we got to have Solutions and a combination of state and local funding emergency funding and again I know the mayor said he's the education mayor and I'm going to hold him to that and he's been in regular communication with me every single time I've sent him an email a text a message he's been very responsive he's been conducive to our ideas we did a hotline and it's confidential so please uh the community use it like we had the residency enforcement we had a hotline that people could uh in confidence disclose issues and we will follow up I will take things in confidence and again I share the same thing I'm not interested in a conflict and a drama I'm interested in resolutions and that's always been my mentality so I share the same thing it was never interpreted of attack I will never scapegoat the Frontline workers you never hear the custodians or the teachers or the staff I will never uh scapegoat them so if I make a mistake and sometimes in my language I will personally apologize for that as well thank you thank you member Donovan well I'd like to bring it all home and say how much I do appreciate the partnership uh with the city school side uh I think it's been pretty unprecedented in my many years in this District to see the two forms of the two most important people in our community working together as a team and it means a great deal to me as a taxpayer as a former parent and as a repr representative our our parents and you know it it was a Terri it's a tough situation but I think we are looking through now the front the windshield not the rear view mirror and it's a much wider view of things we have a lot of work to be done but I have some great confidence in the partnership that I've seen being created thank you thank you m sh one more point Sorry remember done no real quick I just I almost told almost um the the facilities in the facility subcommittee I wanted to clarify was formed with the intent and purpose to be the group that is dealing with the disposition of the two maybe three buildings TBD um so I don't think that that subcommittee has scope over this um also on the marsh and I didn't catch this the first time until a few minutes ago sitting here looking at it again room 216 it says the room is empty and not been used since the leak that room is not empty I know we were in it the day we were it's a resource roomle to I typed exactly what was on that form even if it wasn't I think it may have been empty when they were there maybe it's a resource room and they kids go in I didn't want to be accused of typing anything different than was on the report I know just so I know that it's not empty but that's what the report said and we know what the problem is is in that room right yeah we don't have empty space any right and you're right I think it was empty when they were there NE not necessarily not been used since so yes thank you you're welcome well next on it's it's an important topic so we can we can engage that's so to to counter back to members shilia yes the facility is is in that but you could always expand a subcommittee's objectives that's just that's just one also instead of looking at what we could do to reduce rental fees and all that in in rental usage let's just add more staff like the next budget we passed the budget as I recall I voted last year's budget no because of what it was and again if I don't see custodians added uh to this one and we cut it I'm going to vote no again because that is one of the major things we need to do is that we pass the budget and I know it's all about a number getting down to a number but we could pass the budget that Dr Kang passes and let the city council vote on it and if they vote no then we'll deal with it but we shouldn't give up things right now when we need to fund our schools that's just I'm hearing all these different ways of again like that parent said cut Corners then actually solving the solution and I get it remember willot said the state the state funding the yeah that that I know I know member but again to set that to the council and put that and I'm not trying to cause a riff between the two but let them make that decision they want to vote no let them vote no if not I'm going to vote no on the same budget cuz I if it's shorter than the number that that will get us up to par then as a member of the school committee that represents the schools I'm going to vote no so there's there's that I just want to finish up with that take it home but ready to work so we had on the agenda also uh Board of Health progress monitoring we covered that I think pretty yes extensively covered both of pest covered extensively so agree I just want to say thank you to pest end it was is no fee for three months on that state-ofthe-art system that they provideed for our our community and also along the lines of pest end uh they started work on Christmas Eve y they had teams in the schools on Christmas Eve which is great and a methan based business and outstanding reputation so I just want to say that for the record no cost to us what they would were doing for us thank you for the new system for the rest of it a little bit of a cost yeah right um so at this point uh we'll move on to the out of school suspensions and other disciplinary actions report any questions from the committee one com members uh same comment as before if I just want to be able to acknowledge that this is information for information purposes or if there is something that would be helpful from the body to to do something with this otherwise it's and if it's information for information purposes that's cool if we can acknowledge that but if we can action it somehow to assist you the folks in the building in any way it makes the report meaningful and that's kind of what I want to stare to if you guys haven't caught on to where I'm going this year I mean the the report is solely this has never been in we've never had a report like this um I may have actually requested this at one point I think you might have so and I acknowledge that and I I think oh yeah I think remember Keegan maybe asked it and then it just has kind of grown into information to see if some of the things we're doing is working um so this is born out of the will of of you all and you know what what I can see from it I would say the last page is the most important the policy uh piece of it to see if our policy is working working and it continues to work I mean it really does um you know I think after the the vacation we heard uh Dr golovsky and I have been in some schools and classrooms since we've come back and uh I think some of our students need friendly reminders right so the the principals and the teachers have been doing the friendly reminders about the cell phone policy and the remove the headphones so I think that's been happening over the past week but they're kids and that's typically what we would do anyway after any kind of break but that one to me has been the most helpful just pulling it every month and we have a way to do that um to see if what we're putting in place has worked um the other information this is information we live and know every day so it's really up you know I don't see the suspension numbers uh being actionable necessarily uh but I do want to also say that um I have asked the principles to uh I want a report to be able to share with you all the impact that the um risk coordinator and the crisis intervention staff that we kept in the budget uh the impact that that has had that is a conversation member Donovan and I have had and I have uh asked the principles to think about that and what they want to report out because uh their conversations at our level have been incredibly positive and if I gave you this report the suspension report right now compared to last year you would see a decrease and I'm not saying that it's 100% correlated but there is definitely a correlation there on what we're seeing with overall behaviors and some of the things that we've put in place to support uh the um change in Behavior right our goal is to change Behavior so before it gets to suspensions or repeat suspensions uh we have staff in buildings working really hard with students so uh they're excited to report out they're you know coming up with some of the data that they've been looking at themselves I think that's important for us to have it's important for me to have um when we're presenting the budget as well as why we want to keep positions and so uh I do think that's important you can't see that here but I can easily share with you that this report exactly a year ago uh is is different and less this year than it was last year and I just jinxed everybody knock on wood because we're halfway through the year um you know so that's helpful for us but as long as it's helpful I'm happy otherwise we could change it again yeah it's this was your the will of the committee so uh information that you don't want we're happy to remove it it's reports that are automatic for us and infite campus so we can add them back in uh it just it's really the will of the committee at this point member Maxwell um just a quick question on the cell phone policy violations are these all happening during school or or are you counting after school incidents as well these are all I believe I will check I'm looking at Dr glovsky because she works with Mr C as well but uh I believe these are all incidences that have happened during classroom time uh in violation of the policy so none after school my concern is with the school dances and everything I know that that was a part of the policy and some schools are allowed to use them during school dances and some aren't so I'd have to double check and if you give me that opportunity I will definitely double check and report that back out um to see if if any of those were happening at other school events as defined yep thank you yeah I definitely other questions comments from the committee if not we will move on to Old business and other Penning matters we have the Whistleblower policy this would be uh the second and uh final read for this to adopt it we need a motion in a second to approve so moved second motion from Members Shia second from the vice chair discussion Amo I just have um just a general statement as I went to the two schools the other day and talked to staff the one of the things they are worried about is again that okay this this policy is in place but is this really going to protect me so I I don't I'm I'm in full support of it it's great and the thing about it is we need to educate our staff members of how this will protect them that's I just feel like they just when even when they read it they don't believe it so they're like great so I don't know how we can do that I don't I'm just saying with behind this I think we need to do an education thing with our staff to make sure they know the protections they have any other comments or questions from the committee so I do this goes to Mug's earlier Point um people don't feel empowered to speak up for a slew of reasons and now now this whistleblower policy was born out of a phone call that I received that seemed actionable and I feel like this provided that particular person which I assume is additional people just an added layer of comfort but this is this is a redundant policy not only do they have the union not only do they have uh State ethics they have the uh ig's office there are several other organizations that would protect them from retaliation that being said I fully acknowledge that this workplace is no different than any other workplace and just because your boss is not retaliating against you doeses not mean you're getting the brunt end of the stick and it's not a unique thing to meuman it's not special in education it happens in every company all over the place if you say something that someone doesn't like that's that's just facts um that being said I I want to believe that the added layer of information shared here the fact that although not involved in the actual operation and management that you do have the the the school committee chair mayor the the vice chair and you know whoever else the superintendent May deem appropriate adds that level of visibility where folks are going to be more conscious of the decisions they make and again the this will all if if if this truly is a problem should come out in any uh culture and operations audit that we do and from there on we can make appropriate recommendations and adjustments and mitigate further thank you member Willette just very briefly I've always as my 14 years of service I've always uh allowed the constituents to forward things to me in confidence and I maintain confidentiality is this secure all no but it's a policy that could help somebody and like my request was to make sure people had access to the information about the state ethics Commission in the Attorney General's office if they wanted to go outside uh that process um but I think it's a very helpful to the process and like I said if someone feels that they need to confident eventually approach an elected official I've always had that approach you know just like a reporter you just you maintained the confidentiality you work through the issue and get it resolved and that's always been my Approach so thank you any other questions comments I'll just say before we vote just personally I've never met a whistleblower protection policy that I haven't liked so happy to vote in support of this all those in favor say I I opposed the eyes have it we'll now move on to the public participation policy again this is second read we need a motion to approve move second motion from Member shilia second from Member daglio discussion yes member shilia uh I guess question going through this I mean I the changes are fine if if it makes residents happy to have their address not spoken at the podium minor things make people happy let's give them a win um however going through this I don't think in my tenure in the city in watching school committee meetings we've ever stopped someone from speaking at the podium correct whether they be whether they be from methan or from Tallahassee where we're we're letting them talk so the way this policy reads is they have to be a member of the community because it is it is Citizens so I mean I guess my my my my change here would be to change all the term to strike in the second paragraph citizens of methan and just replace it with public participant and then all the citizens throughout change to public participant because you may be speaking so don't a reason to be speaking well that's in the policy you have to have a reason it has to be topical it has to be part of something our purview our scope but you may be from I don't know havil and have a piece of business with the methan public schools but according to this policy you need to be a citizen of this city or from yeah I read that's what I do like like I it's it's it's minute I don't think it would ever change anything materially for us it doesn't stop anything but going through this over the weekend it jumped out at me that you have to be a citizen or you're not welcome at the podium and given the conversation that happened last week at the council meeting and all the discussion about how courts have upheld the fact that freedom of speech at the podium and all those good things it just it seemed like a a simple change to make this more appropriate so I guess that would be the friendly amendment can you state the can you just State for the record the specific the wording uh to strike from the second paragraph citizens of methun and replace with the public participant and to remove the word citizens throughout and replace with public participant so moved right sec so okay so we have a motion in a second to amend the uh legislation and make those tweaks any discussion regarding the proposed amendment if not we'll vote all those in favor say I I opposed are you voting no so we'll record member Maxwell as no vote um any other proposed amendments if not we need a motion to approve as amended so moved second motion from Member shilia second from the vice chair further discussion if not we'll vote on the legislation as amended all those in favor say I I I opposed we have no vote from uh member Maxwell aside from that we have all others recorded as yes votes we'll move on now to uh new business we need a motion in a second to approve the methan high school competency determination so mov second motion from member shabil second from is from the vice chair discussion member Maxwell I just have a concern that there's no real um competency test to I mean I know it was voted that mcast needs to go away but now Massachusetts is only one of four states that don't have a test that doesn't have a test to test out their seniors and I know that the competency determination relies on the students scoring you know and it said that um grade 10 English or an equivalent course Algebra 1 I mean as long as that passing grade is based on all work being turned in and completed and it being right and scoring at least 61% or higher per average throughout the year then you know that would make sense but I just I have a hard time with this because there's no there's no standard there's nothing to we're just going to graduate kids to graduate kids at this point so I think um if it would be helpful um Dr golovsky can just go through some of the most important pieces of this and the task that is in front of all of you this evening uh what we need to be able to move forward just so you so so the public can also because you're right member maxw well there's some interesting pieces to this that we are now faced with and that and that we may not all agree with but it is now uh part of legislation right and so uh we do have to adere to certain things so we'd like to be able to share that tonight and then I believe on the last slide has what we need you to motion to approve tonight so that we can continue to move forward uh in this process of making sure that we have what we need for our graduating class this year and our previous class students who are coming to us at this point uh oh yeah yeah I don't know if you want to vote to move past 9:00 because it's 5 of n yeah we'll have to we have to motion to extend second okay the motion is from Members Billy to extend past 9 o'cl the second is from Member daglio all those in favor I I opposed I have it we'll move on pass n and return to the presentation is on that all right so uh I thought we would start by um making the distinction between graduation requirement and competency determination um so just to start with an overview and this was pulled right from the the program of studies so the current graduation requirements from auuan high school students need to complete full four years and they need to um complete the credit requirement ir ments and meet the standards for competency determination so none of that is changing what is changing is what we are considering to be the competency determination so the credit requirements will remain the same the full four years in high school Remains the Same it's just the discussion tonight is what we're considering to be the competency determination so just an overview of what the credit requirements are um and you'll see here it's by subject uh number of credits um and we do align with mass core which I'll talk about in the next slide um but students need to take and pass four full years of English math three years of a lab science three years of history and Social Science World Language they need two uh ful year courses in the same language there's needs to be one full Year's worth of Fine Arts two full years worth of physical education two credits health and then elective credits so we align with mass core um and we did so purposefully um we Revisited this a few years ago to make sure that we were aligned and added in um the Fine Arts requirement um and this is the state recommended program of study which um in theory makes students prepared for the workforce um and prepares them for um higher education and this uh these would be the courses that uh uh College University and the Massachusetts system would expect to see on an applicant's transcript so we want to make sure that students were prepared for whatever Next Step they would take and we feel really good about that now um um because with the compet competency determination change um moving away from mcast we feel strong strongly that our required courses are um are good to lean on to earn a diploma and you'll see here um the Boston clobe did an article in October and talked about um the report from voices of economic equity that found that only half of all Massachusetts schools have graduation requirements that either meet or exceed Mass core standards so others are close um but we are in that half that do have the mass core alignment okay so again to be clear we're talking about that third Criterion which is the competency determination so since 2003 the competency determination had been based on the qualifying scores earned on the mcast tests and students still need to earn a CD to graduate the issue is the CD has changed and it's up to districts to determine what that is so desie um was clear in communicating that they don't have um a suggestion at this point or a standardized um recommendation they say in the future they will um but they do um recommend that the course work not necessarily courses but course work in the areas that were previously tested by mcast tests um be used as evidence that the student is able and ready um to graduate so it is a little complicated because our Mass Core Credit requirements um overlap with what the courses would be to prove the competency determination um if we went by by the courses here but where it helps us is when we have students um enrolling from other districts or schools or when we have students matriculate to the high school it puts that set of eyes on the transcript to make sure that all students do get to that step of geometry and have the opportunity to demonstrate Proficiency in Algebra 1 so um desie does recommend that first steps um we think about the graduating class so the class of 2025 what does that mean for them in just a few short months so students who had previously earned a competency determination on the mcast tests for the current seniors they're cleared um the CD would count for them and that's through um the retest in 2024 students in the graduating test graduating class of 2025 who have yet to earn a CD so those that hadn't met the qualifying score on the mcast exam we proposing here um and the bullets Below in red that they demonstrate their Proficiency in those areas through the passing score in grade 10 English Algebra 1 and geometry and a passing grade in biology chemistry or physics or the equivalent courses um and so as you can imag imagine all districts across the state are in the same position um and I've spoken with a number of people in my role in other districts we've been on several lift serves um there's a bunch of shared Google folders out there of people posting um what their best ideas are for competency determination and I haven't seen anything other than this um this is predominantly what I'd say 95% of the districts are moving toward for this year um with the with a few differences here and there this is predominantly where the majority seem to be going okay so um how does this impact students from previous years because that that brings about a change in an opportunity so students who hadn't had the opportunity or hadn't earned a diploma in previous years um it's our responsibility to offer that so previously if students hadn't passed the mcap and therefore hadn't earned a diploma they could reach out to us we would reach out to them and offer the opportunity to retest so they'd be able to come in and have the opportunity to earn their CD that way and potentially earn a diploma after their their class had exited meu in high school so the same needs to be true here um so students still need to be afforded the opportunity um to earn their CD from previous classes so so without the mcast being in play um we propose a request uh that the students could request a transcript review so we would review their transcripts to see if there is demonstration of passing cours workk in those designated areas so a student found who have passed those listed courses or their equivalents would therefore earn a diploma and that diploma would make them a graduate of the class of 2025 not of the year they exited methan high school so that brings about a bunch of questions um so desie recommends and on this table here you'll see that right now we focus on the short term so the students immediately in front of us in the graduating class those students who are reaching out I know Miss Tetro at the high school has said there have been students reaching out from previous years already um and there's a list here of what desie had supplied to us as what they see as as their responsibility or vision and also that of of the board um so immediately we're thinking about what's happening in June with our seniors and the students from previous years who have reached out and then we need to think about also going forward what that means for students in um grades currently 9 10 and 11 incoming students um but whatever decision that we make going forward we need to get the word out um and communicate to families and in multiple languages about where we plan to go so as as recommended by desie that we um seek board approval we're looking to school committee um to give us that approval to use the transcript review in those designated subjects as the competency determination for students in the class of 2025 um and the transcript reviews for students um from previous years will be performed by counseling staff and school administrators um and upon your approval we will get that information out to students and families and posted on the website for those seeking a transcript review from previous years um they'd be able to file that via Google form or calling the counseling office to get the ball rolling there so with all these changes um again we're really proud and and pleased that we have mass core in place because there are many districts who are moving fast and furious to figure out how to strengthen their credit requirements for graduation and we have that part down um and the work we see on our end is is reviewing the transcripts making students are placed in the appropriate courses and the work we're already doing and um making sure sure that our grading practices are are Equitable and solid um also lends to this effort we'll start Miss Tatro is here tonight as well the our counseling department chair if there are questions we'll start with uh member Donovan then we'll have member jaago member shilia m Donovan just a few quick questions and one observation so this year every student has had will have had the opportunity to qualify at least because I know there's the retakes thrown in to qualify for the atam scholarships is that accurate thank you thank you for pointing that out so the retests are still being offered even though they cannot be used from this point forward as part of the competency determination for students who have transferred in after potentially that grade 10 year and want to qualify or attempt to qualify for the Abigail Adams are the C scholarships and also um the Seal of biliteracy oh yeah it'll also be an important determinant for that moving forward okay because we do have a number of students who qualify for the Adam scholarships which help okay yes and in subsequent years as well so we're still expected to have the same participation rates um and the the um results will still count as they do for our accountability data even though there's no um impact on students for graduation outside of their qualification for seala by literacy or those scholarships and just so I understand you we are now expected to go back from the beginning of mcass to provide the opportunity to receive a diploma so that's like how many years ago No Child Left Behind when that the Inception of that wow so we're talking 2003 the graduates of 2003 to uh 2024 that's so there are several there are several graduates early on that a lot of appeals were able to be filed um and then the state changed the requirement for the appeals they also added in BIO will they added in the science technology so that too is going to be a little challenging I was thinking about it there are some that didn't have that as a requirement but you know the diploma they'll get is a 2025 diploma and St is now a requirement when it wasn't for them in 2003 I think through 2011 or 12 and and this strikes me to be an incredible amount of work for the guidance staff it's going to be great I I can't imagine just going through the records but okay this is what we must do um and I I don't know would you have Miss tatra off the top of your head how many people could qualify looking back who who didn't pass that would be like fun data but too much work to do okay can you give me an example of the what an equivalent course would look like you referenced that in your presentation like what would be an equivalent course for the math passing Algebra 1 and geometry well we have some students that take Algebra 1 in different forms so it might be um that they sat for the course Algebra 1 um and it didn't go the way they had hoped and they need another take of it and so it might be a recovery course okay or it might be um we use Edgenuity as our online coursework some students take that course so it's not necessarily titled Algebra 1 but it is the equivalent um same thing with alphar after school program um and then in some ways we have courses broken down by semester at the high school um and so there might be um in in some Pathways for students that they've taken a part A or a Part B which together shows us the C coursework for algebra one okay great and I do I do Kudos I have talked to many people who are where we are and so many school districts did not use masse and it is a tremendous struggle right now so I'm glad we're there and um Good Luck to our guidance Department I'm I'm hoping like everyone takes advantage of it I hope we can get the word out the word is definitely out I apologize so quick question if we vote no on it what happens if you vote okay oh good question so if you vote no then we have to come there has to be a comp determination that the local board sets so we have to come to you with something because there has to be that's part of the legislation there has to be local high school graduation requirements plus a competency determination that now is not mcast the state defined that for us we never had to think about it so and okay so if we vote no then this plan goes away and a new plan will have to be develop okay second of all but I never want I wonder this question all of a a d right determines a passing gray right it that right is that set by the state law no it's local oh so what one thing I I would because a 60 61 61 okay they put it up to two points determines that some what 60 right is it 60 60 flat so one point from feeling determines that this person is capable of being in the workforce course where in English so if someone gets an English 10 with a 60 barely can read according to this document he is capable or she could capable be in the workforce where we could set a standard which I've always said this that it should be moved up to a c to determine a passing grade instead of a d because at least that fluctuation of a 60 to a 59 because one point less he would be a fail like he failed or she failed and that we always used to say that in high school like why is 60 that just one point determines a person is eligible for graduation or failed a subject so that's one thing I would say is on a local level we should be increasing our standard in grade level saying a c is a passing grade instead of a d as a passing grade if that's set I know a lot of people are like wait wait Ryan but too bad that's like I I known kids that passed that shouldn't have passed but because they got a d and a subject they passed in and they're not doing so good these days so if we have the right to change that I would say to move that grade up to a c if we have that right technically we could put that as a standard of a graduation requirement right that they have to get a c in theory you could I I would say this that the competency determination for instance let's just talk about English is for grade 10 English so that competency determination is over at grade 10 they still have to pass a junior year English and a senior year English so there's still two more years of full English that they would have to pass and demonstrate Proficiency in the coursework there um ALS Alo with the mcast when students reach that threshold of score which I think I would equate to what you're saying is is a 60 we would we would consider that a passing score with the plan where we would track them for their remaining two years to make sure that they're slated for the appropriate courses and they're fairing well so it's it's similar in that idea whereas if they have a passing score in grade 10 we're still watching students in 11 and 12 to make sure they're persisting and have appropriate interventions to do well so response to that so what happens if that student in his junior senior year continues to get D's across the board does he still graduate well that that's what it would be now with the graduation requirements so we do have some students who um have ended up in that situation um very rarely is it D across the board usually there's there's evidence there and that's what the statute says cours workk it doesn't necessarily say full year they're performing to their ability but within the year's time there's cour work that would tip the average to the 60 that would indicate their Proficiency in that area so it's course work and so we're confident that our courses are covering the standards at that for instance grade 10 English level and they've demonstrated proficiency I would also may I make a comment is there's there's a sense of urgency that that we need right now and then there's a time to think about this and plan for the next classes and I think this is where we are when I say sense of urgency uh probably miss Tatro uh more so than Dr golovsky and I have just taken a nose dive into this to fully understand uh what we are up against and so the reason we're here today and the reason uh all of our colleagues are in the same position and trying to figure out what they're going to put in front of their school committee because we have a graduating class in five months that we have to make some decisions about so I would urge the committee to this this isn't the last time we're going to have this conversation and I think we need far more more time than the few weeks we've given with not a lot of concrete guidance from desie which is surprising all of us I mean we we spent uh a whole half a day on Friday with our colleagues talking about this because they're not giving us the hey this is what you guys should do or think about these seven questions and you know fill in the blank I mean we're not getting any of that right now uh so they're taking their time so so for me I think we just we need a sense of urgency to make sure our class of 2025 we have a plan we're going to do what the majority of the districts are doing and what has been the guidance that we've been given is the course work it's competency you have your high school graduation local requirements that's not going to change and then allow us the couple of months coming now we're going to have to present something more concrete for next year's class so so I'm just saying that as a little bit of a plea but also think about this is Phase One this is truly phase one this decision came in November desie is not giving us concrete they're still planning and trying to give guidance we make a decision they come out with different guidance now we're upending different things uh so we're looking for some action tonight so that we can have guidance department and everybody move forward with the the folks who are reaching out from previous years and also alert our class of 2025 now what they need to do and then I'm guessing if not this spring early in the fall we're going to be coming back to you and saying we think this might be a better plan desie might give us more information they keep promising that that they'll have some more concrete sort of facts and and ways to organize it so I I don't want to seem like I am dismissing because we have had all of these conversations member do Zago M Maxwell like we're like why can't we just use the test can't use tests uh we have to figure this out and we have staff that need to actually start doing this like yesterday um so I would just put that out there as a step this is a process you know steps that we're going to have to take sort of the right now the what happens in the next five to six months and then after that I just I wanted to point out that no in 27 years here there's a lot of kids that I've seen that and I'm really passionate about our kids so forgive me there's a lot of kids I've seen that did not pass that test and for whatever reason I couldn't get them an appeal right with the state because we're allowed to do that and they are incredible community members as we speak they're actively engaged here in other places in methu and and they're successful regardless of having their high school diploma the ability to have them fill out a request form and immediately because I know those kids say yep I want you to get your diploma because you're deserving is something that I think we should be looking at and the flip side of that coin is there are also some kids that really just test well but they don't do the day-to-day things so do we have some kids in however many we years we've had the Copic in the atams that have actually received been on the receiving end of the John and Abigail Adams scholarship whose GPA was probably below a 2.0 and they weren't eligible for a four-year school we have high school is different for every single kid that walks through this door just because because you aren't successful as a freshman or sophomore doesn't mean you can't turn your life around as a Junior and senior and for some of those kids that I couldn't do the waiver for that was their reason their attendance freshman and sophomore year was terrible and I couldn't file an appeal because it wasn't allowed nine absences was the state standard nine in a year there are so many things and people that could be positively impacted and I know we need to think moving forward what we're going to do this is not a cart BL blanch everybody gets a diploma I'm actually very comfortable telling you that's not accurate because with the standards we set we are having kids transfer in here as Juniors and seniors that do not meet that requirement not because of us we are working here right now knowing the standards we're working right now with kids to try to get them to where they should be I'm asking you to really consider this knowing that we're right away impacting I have kids waiting they're probably watching with their parents who actually were accepted to college and because they couldn't get the CD status in the last couple of years those colleges deferred their acceptances and I'm talking about some four-year schools because didn't pass mcast and I couldn't do an appeal because they didn't qualify but here they had A's B's C's and they got in colleges wouldn't take them because they didn't have the high school diploma we have an opportunity to impact people from 2003 to 2024 we have an immediate opportunity to impact our current kids in 2025 and then we have the opportunity if you want to review new standards which definitely we've had that conversation I'm going be honest we have that opportunity moving forward to do that so am I literally standing in front of you going yes I'm asking you to vote for this I am because I love our kids and love what I do so let's keep moving uh with uh member Maxwell so I guess my concern is I mean can is there a way to issue um a comp competency exam in in maybe not mcast but a different type of exam because I mean I know that methan right now we're working on grading and we're working on Equitable grading and we're going through that whole process but we're not there yet um and for you to say that they're showing profic Proficiency in those things it actually says that they need to be showing Mastery of these skills and competency and knowledge contained at the State academic standards they're not the people that are requesting their you know their CD is they didn't pass the state standards so they're not competent and knowledgeable in those State academic standards so I I don't know I just I have a hard time going forward with something that you you're not you're not at state standard you're not you're not showing that you're able to produce what you need to produce in order to graduate high school is there there a new way is there an exam that we can no so there's no other exam other than mcast that would equate to the state standard that we're talking about I mean we could pick a national test it's not going to be what Massachusetts state standards are and what our course courses and curriculum standards are required to be and it would be somewhat random I haven't heard any school picking an ass equity and assessment is really a Hot Topic to so a lot of the many reasons people weren't fans of the mcast was because of that um because there's a lot of skills such as um for instance language skills right in and we're talking about English 10 it's only testing written language not spoken language there's a lot of um pieces to it what types of questions are being asked is everyone familiar with that content or do you need background knowledge that some kids have and some don't is that equal is it equitable is it fair um so to in order for us to first of all create a test that would be reliable and valid and an actual measure of what the standards are that that's what the state took so many years to develop and even still there were some pretty solid arguments that it didn't do that well um I just worry I just I you know being in like the lower schools and the upper schools and you know you're really required to turn in your work it's not necessarily about the quality of your work that you're turning in and I I that's concerning because if we start doing that at the high school level then yeah no mayia so first first to member doag was pointed about adjusting the grading I mean if that's a conversation we want to have I support the conversation but that being said I was an atrocious student in high school the worst I know that comes to a shock but I was too I barely graduated by the skin of my teeth passing mcast and graduating but then managed to do okay in life so I don't think adjusting the grading is a a valid use of our time but willing to have the conversation um that being said how does the throughout the whole campaign to get rid of mcast the the the narrative on the commercials was always teach the test stop teaching to the test how does that change our curriculum or does it so test or no test our our teaching Remains the Same correct because our so the curriculum standards in Massachusetts is what drove the mcast um that's what drives our curriculum so we are required to teach to the curriculum that has been implemented in Massachusetts it was a pretty good slogan yeah no it's not going to change uh our curriculum or our cour workor okay am I did I say that definitively enough okay yeah it's not going to change anything that we're doing with our courses and then looking at this slide here with the graduation requirements the the three items I understand number one that's four years for your commitment do your time you you check the box the complete methan High School's credit requirements in the meet the standard for competency determination that seems like the same thing twice and I was hoping you could clarify that for me because I I I want I want to vote Yes I want to support it I feel like also we we don't really have a choice but I want to understand it so I can feel good about my vote okay Miss Tatro is really wanting to answer this one so I think the hard part with that is that we might have some students transfer in um and they transfer in their senior year and if our competency determination is algebra 1 and geometry and they transfer in and they're only at Algebra 1 then unless we double them up in math so they'll end up graduating with five credits of math if they are successful then that's where you might see someone be here for four years but not meet that competency they might have the credit requirements but they don't meet the competency so we've actually also had some kids that have been above 2 for credits by the time they're end of their senior year but they are missing a math credit because they failed their senior year so actually they're they actually met the 24 credits but they didn't meet the standards within the 24 and that kid may have passed previously passed mcast so they and we have some kids right now that have come in they've passed mcast and they're not you know some of those kids might not be contct did that make sense it does and it brings flashbacks to having to register for classes so and I it it all clicks now um and then I had one other question about mcast scores but you guys have already answered that so I'm good thank you Vice chair so of course special ed kids are near and dear to my heart because I have multiple of them um and especially looking at the coursework I'm concerned learned that English 10 there are some classes that are called English 10 that aren't actually at the state standard for 10th grader so for instance this the course that my son is taking he is taking English 10 he's getting an A in it but the reality is is that he's reading at a fourth grade level and he is writing at about a first grade level and based on this looking at a transcript it would appear that he would pass that and the reality is is that he has not gotten the education that he needs to meet the state standards for 10th grade and so for kids like my son we need to do something different than just looking at a transcript because the specialed kids need to actually get an education and actually meet those standards right and if they're not meeting those standards then it's going to affect me but they shouldn't be getting a diploma and in the long run that diploma is going to hurt a kid like me my kid because that diploma is actually going to prevent him from qualifying for DDS and so I think it's very important that when we say we're looking at grade 10 English it's grade 10 English that actually meets the state standards of grade 10 versus grade 10 English because we're just naming the class grade 10 English because my son is a 10th grader and he's taking English right and so I want to be very cognizant of those kids that actually aren't meeting the state standards and I they shouldn't be getting a diploma and just because my son has an A in grade 10 English he shouldn't be getting a diploma and so I want to make sure that the special ed kids are are being looked at and we need to make sure that our specialed curriculum especially in the sub separates is actually getting them to State Standards by the time they graduate um and so I just want to be very cognizant of that and I understand the need to do this now but thinking further we really need to be cognizant of the kids who aren't actually meeting State Standards even though they're taking a class that appears to be grade 10 English yeah and I think that's part of uh what we've started to have conversations about is the opportunity for uh especially some of our special education programming and our English learner programming is there you know I think there's a misconception when this uh this vote passed that now all kids are just going to get diplomas and that's not true uh because there are kids that are not going to meet the local graduation requirements or the competency determination are both right so uh there are some again opportunities that we're looking forward this is what I'm saying like in the coming time right and working with our colleagues sort of up against the same things is how do we look at um a situation where you know we we're really like grade 10 was it uh in the compensate determination part how do we look at a four-year math curriculum instead that might cover in a very different way than we're thinking about it right now and again that's what I'm saying to you all is that like we just haven't even had the time to comprehend all of this and desie is still trying to give us some guidance and working through their own things to give us different ideas but we see those two areas as areas for opportunity uh for our own program development and curriculum development because we we just haven't had that opportunity because we've been so FOC focused on making sure kids are coming in from a new country they're freshman year we got to get them an mcast prep for bio mcast prep like we got to get them the opportunity to have a diploma and then by their their senior year make sure that they have all these courses in place right it doesn't always happen and it's still not going to always happen but what opportunities can we afford that makes sense that meet that and we are going to be uh I think I do think desie was purposeful when they said course work and not cours says partly for what you're saying is that it is not just about the course title uh it has to be about the course work and that may happen over three years or two years or semester uh in different titles so I think that's allows us that now but the further conversation about programming in the coming months right but my concern is is that what you want us to pass tonight says grade 10 English or equivalent right and so my son has grade 10 English and I would be very upset that he would graduate with a fourth grade reading level and you would give him a diploma saying that he has met the state standards because that diploma actually diminishes right my other kids diploma right and it's no longer the same so I just want to be cognizant that we're actually meeting State Standards not just getting a passing grade into grade 10 English member K can I just add to that a little bit so with students with special education we also have the team process that we have to go through to look at those very things as well because we talk about anticipated date of graduation so the individual team for each student has to look at all of those pieces as a whole too with the parent or Guardian so that we are making those cognizant decisions and not just basing it off of a course title right I'm just saying that what you're putting in front of us tonight is just the course title right and we're we're agreeing to just a course title and I'm just saying that there is a course at the high school that is called that that actually doesn't meet the state standards for grade 10 and we can have kids getting fantastic grades in those in that class and they really haven't met the state standard but I believe right I believe that wouldn't be an equivalent and that would be part of the transcript review by the guidance Department because they would know that that course is not an equivalent to the grade 10 English that we're identifying just a point of clarification I thought there was a waiver process too for the special ed uh students and previously with mcast we had a portfolio approach to a lot of the special ed graduating now I understand what you're saying in terms of the people not going to school and work making sure they can graduate and I understand that but you're thrown out the baby with the bath water we had the best standards of the country in the world right and we tossed it away now I think we're adhering to the referendum language corre and the regulations are like way behind us so that's what we need to do whether we agree with it or disagree with it and I totally sympathize with you we might be on different positions but we need to do it for these kids right now because we have to adhere to the language that was passed by the voters and the regulations will catch up to us and the legislature might catch up to us is that accurate 100% okay that's all I want to say thank you it is I think again having been here 27 years I think we're ahead of the curve in our mindset and our thinking and we're very much in tune with exactly what you were talking about Lori and that's a conversation that we were already having in the counseling department we're already having you know the counselors are saying students in this program versus this program um it is happening and I think it's important for you to know that and we're with mass core standards we are with masse and that's all I need to know at this stage what else can we do thank you member Donovan just quickly a student to fail a class because of attendance how many days of class you miss they don't fail because of attendance yeah they actually a student doesn't fail a class because of attendance okay a student can actually get an A in a class but receive a CDF which is a credit denial that's what I me failure thank you okay so a student can get yeah the report card could actually say CDF Dasa so they earn the a but they get the credit denied because of absences okay and they can recover that the next quarter okay by not hitting the threshold of absences they can recover the first quarter credit back and how many absences would five result in a credit I don't know it's it's in the it's in I can look it up it's in the and I'm sorry that right now I can't off the top of my head I wasn't it's five it's five a semester it used to be more a term ter a term it used to be more it was lowered okay so okay thank you all right all right at this point I think uh we've had sufficient discussion so we'll move on to a vote uh let's take a roll call member Zago no member Donovan yes member Keegan yes member Maxwell no member shabila yes member wette yes mayor borgard yes two three four yes to no all right so that'll come back on the next agenda I believe for a second read or is that adopted this is ad okay uh so we'll move on uh at this point we have on the agenda member Doo's uh legislation that would require in essence the state to conduct annual Health inspections it's not on here for a vote simply because it's not actionable we can't force the state to do something but nevertheless member doog if you want to take a minute to discuss this that's fine yeah so um just doing homework and going through what's has happened in the city um one of the things I I think the school committee should know is what's going on in the buildings especially when inspection reports are given I know their public record but however uh discussions one of the biggest things that that talked to teachers and staff was that it seemed like we were ignoring the inspections um which was never the case because we didn't know what previous inspections were taking place and unless we went and asked for it um it would it would fall like it was never given to us so one of the things I wanted to bring up was that we get a copy um especially the superintendent also gets a copy um in of all inspections moving forward when it regards to the schools because we should be entitled to know what these inspections are coming out so if we were to bring it here we can have discussions about it and moving forward action plans that should take place that's why I wanted to bring it up more I did my homework you can't force the state as much as I wish you could but um but you can't but we could work it on a local level so that's why I was up for a discussion and see what we can do to possibly bring it to a policy thank you member Donovan I just want to point out that we are at 940 and there's a school committee policy that mandates that you got credit if we get to 10 o' you you you call me me member Don my first event started this morning at 7:30 so um I apologize member she gets everything so um it is 9:40 and there is a school committee policy uh that requires us to in essence punt on any agenda items we don't get to before 10 o'clock so I just want to be cognizant of time we have some time sensitive things so if it's right with you we'll keep moving okay so now we are on to finance and operations uh the expenditure report do we have any questions relative to the expenditure report if not we're going to keep moving the revolving funds report questions comments from the committee I will note we did get the um deposit from the state for circuit breaker 2.3 that's that's shown in here want to make you aware of that I also want to make you aware somebody had asked about um the um the revolving account for our facilities uh we do actually pay a full custodian out of that account um it's not showing in there because the he hasn't actually got paid for the full year yet but there is we do use that to offset any overtime due to rentals um fix anything the auditoriums or gyms that need fixing as well as it covers one full-time custodian at bran Street just want to make be aware of that remember Willet again I want want to get those accounts both the the packing fees and that that down you utilize those accounts uh we've had conversations again I know you guys have been inundated with with issues and I know I had a request that's going to be at a future meeting about what was ex expended by the food service and that's list I'm I'm going to be looking for and I know the pestan with the invoices I know that's that's something you're going to provide to me uh this week but again I I see accounts of $62,000 and $127,000 and we're scrambling to do stuff or make purchases and we talk about traffic and we're not utilizing those accounts for the you know and that's the concern I have not to be criticizing anyone individually but I want to see movement in the next few months on that that's it thank you other questions comments member Max well um just a quick question on the the general budget the um the supplies being 7 152,000 is that supplies for all of the schools just because I see a lot of teachers saying that they're not accessing supplies and getting supplies and I know we've had this conversation a bajillion times so I just want to make sure that like that money is in fact for that reason correct that's for all supplies that's custodial supp supplies building supplies supplies any Supply okay yeah and if they need if there's a need for school supplies you need to contact their administrator and they they should be able to get what they need any other questions or comments if not we'll move on to the grants report M shilia uh there are some grants on here I mean I see the 2012 Tenny memorial fund I assume that's revolving um the mark PTO playground I mean it's got 677 bucks in it is a dairy one that hasn't been used 21st century continuation that hasn't been used I mean and then there's a lot of the 2024 grants that I assume we have to probably managerially close at some point because they're renewing because they appear to be Federal at least that's how they're labeled the um the title grants that were 2024 we extended so to use the remaining money this year too so we try to push back our purchases and save save some money that way some of the remaining funds I think we talked about before um might have to do with mtrs or retirement payoffs um there's a couple on here that are in the process of closing out um but the there are some 24 grants we're still able to use yeah not not to channel member Willette in any sense but if we can move some of them along that have been lingering that I hope so thank you other questions or comments member Maxwell uh just a quick question the Civics teaching and learning I is that um coming is that why because I know it says fiscal year 25 is that in the work is that um that's that's a new one yep so we awarded that for this year so that was a grant for professional development um for civics education and also pays for our participation and generation citizen which is a program that all the eighth graders do um for their Civics project okay um and then what about the 2f promoting safe and healthy learning environments what's that two F has to do with the youth youth participatory action research Grant so we're using that at all upper schools and the high school so we're starting clubs um where there'll be two advisors per school and 12 to 14 students um and we've partnered with up for learning so they're our Consulting partner um who will take care of of the Retreats that are in District the goal of the um youth participatory action research is for students and adults to work on an even playing field um to address a problem they see that needs fixing but the whole idea is to elevate student voice thank you other questions or comments if not we'll move on to Student Activity reports Vice chair um on a the class of 2024 and most of them um are still in the grammar schools and that money needs to be moved to the high school um because it's it's in the wrong place basically and it belongs to the Freshman Class um and as well as the timiny has their grades misnumbered so they have grade eight as the class of 2024 um and so their the account name is incorrect and it's every single grade level it's completely misnumbered that's all got it I wrote it yes I wrote it up all right that's been noted all right let's keep moving Food Services report no questions or comments contract approval we have none at this point we're on to notifications of appointments and other Personnel matters we need a motion in a second to approve one new preschool teacher and three preschool program assistants motion from Member shabila second from Member daglio discussion one question we're out of space now huh uh no this is the last room for this year just for this year because remember we have two kindergarten going to cor correct okay we still have a few rooms left in the rooms that we would have for pres school okay but kind of amazing the will be do you want me to say it out loud this would make the 18th preschool classroom cool 18 so six years ago it was nine we didn't need a building it's fine it's 18 right now and yeah I I yes I'm all done talking yeah so Mo do we have any other questions or comments if not we'll take a vote all those in favor say I I opposed the eyes have it other business from the Committee Member shilia have an update regarding the transportation subcommittee Transportation subcommittee was supposed to meet today um we're going to have to bump that update to the next meeting because the posting didn't get up in time all right uh next uh regarding the audit I had a meeting today uh with representatives from uh previously Markham now ciz with the cafo and our purchasing director uh to walk them through some concerns that we had regarding some proposed amendments to the contract we got most of those questions answered and we're awaiting um finished product to be submitted after vetting from ca's legal team and my anticipation is that I will be able to have that on the council agenda in time for the 21st as I have been uh aiming for uh so at this point unless there are any last minute issues that need to be dealt with which I don't foresee I anticipate being able to submit that to the council for approval uh at the next meeting just to point out as I referenced earlier we're still waiting on certification of free cash from the state uh so the funding mechanism for the audit uh will be free cash and so there is a uh another item on the agenda to implement uh transfer free cash upon certification to pay for this uh so um you know we expect that also in the next week so I'm hopeful for the 21st that we'll make some progress with the audit any other business for for yes Vice chair when do we expect that the audit will be completed and we'll have a report we're giving them up to six months okay so we would expect them to start say February March upon contract approval okay so we're not we're not expecting anything until next school year is that correct not necessarily well if it's going to be wrapping up by by June no later than June U you know we'd be looking at information in time for summer if they have yeah it's it's not something that we're not going to have I'm sorry I I misunderstood what you were asking at this point you know we would be looking at next school year we'll have the report something we will have and we will not have it this spring at all for sure unless by some unforeseen circumstance they wrap up their work early I don't Envision that I okay you know we want them to you know take the time they need and do a comprehensive thorough report absolutely no I just I just want the expectation that we're not getting it this school year it's going to be next school year yeah this isn't beginning school year but couple weeks certainly okay thank you uh any other business from the committee if not at this point I'll entertain a motion to adjourn our business session of January 13 2025 so move second motion from Member daglio second from Member shilia all those in favor I opposed the I have at the time is 9:52 p.m. and we are adjourned good night Mur