##VIDEO ID:D9ZKu8agpks## order it looks like we have a quorum at um 6:31 p.m. and if you would all mute and join me in the Pledge of Allegiance you can rise I pledge allegiance to the 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 all right everybody so um first item on the agenda tonight is Citizens comments and I do not have any that have been registered with the committee so we're going to move on from that item um as you guys can see we have a consent agenda that's pretty full so um before we take a motion on the consent agenda is everybody okay going ahead with it as is or is there anything that anybody wants to pull out of the consent agenda and look at individually hold on oh hi Scott go right ahead no I'm trying to find my notes on that Hey Joe can I just ask a clarifying question really quick I'm assuming Joe is here I'm I'm here yeah go ahead hi Joe um Joe if we keep things in the consent agenda and people don't want to necessarily vote against it they just want to ask a question about an individual item in the consent agenda we can do that during discussion after the motion correct yes what if after that discussion somebody wants to pull something out of the consent agenda at that time is there a method for that yes um any member of the committee can move to object to a particular item being in the consent agenda the objection does not have to go to a vote you are compelled Under The Rules of Order to essentially if any member uh objects to uh move the consent agenda item back onto the regular agenda awesome Joe this is why you get paid the big bucks we're so grateful that you're here so everybody um so I don't need to pull the items out of the agenda but I do have some questions about the grants yeah so it seems like we can proceed with um if Amy Cohen has a motion for the consent agenda that will allow us to open up discussion so Amy do you want to give us the motion yes I am struggling a little bit because I'm on a different computer so give me a moment here um I just had them up and they disappeared but I will move to um I will move the consent agenda of September 25th 2024 as provided in the meeting materials I'll second that thank you uh so there is some discussion I can tell so we'll go with Scott first because he brought up that he has a couple of items that he'd like to question so go ahead Scott thank you Madame chairman um so specifically I have questions about the cshs Grant and the Essa Grant um starting with the cshs grant um so it looks like that's a 10-year grant that renewed each year for $75,000 if I'm understanding it correctly um does the grant amount and please confirm that first of all um second of all um does the amount of the grant go up each year because if not is the school committee going to need to find additional money each year to pay higher salaries for the people that are hired under that Grant so Kirk I'll send that to you or perhaps to Ross uh thank you I will uh yeah referred to the team on that and let's go first to Mr moar y absolutely um so in my understanding Mr pal this grant has not doesn't mean it won't in the future increased uh so your point is valid um I would have to do the charting out of the math on your question with regards to the salary um but we obviously you know if we got to a year year in the future where this would potentially take operational money we would have that discussion at that point so in looking at the grant our best bet is to just decrease our materials and supplies off that come out of this versus um continuing at that level and then having to look to the operating budget for the salary portion of it um but your point is a good one and one to watch over time for sure so Scott did that satisfy everything you wanted to know about that Grant yes okay and then you had a secondary question well is Sharon's question about that Grant or something else it's about that Grant Sharon so Sharon why don't you Scott's deferring to you go ahead thank you Scott um so I was just looking for a little bit more information about that Grant um what is the district nurse resource nurse position is that a new position or is it a continuing position I can answer that question yeah this is a position that we that hit was Grant funded um I believe during the time of co uh with nurse leader uh Gil Becky when she was here and so we've continued to main that maintain that program through the grant funding this point6 nurse is a float nurse throughout the district so we'll perform the duties of a school nurse if we need them in a school we'll help with uh hearing and vision screenings uh and but also uh this particular uh position helps with u specific plans for people that have very detailed medical plans that have to be uh handled out so uh she's she supports all around the district but primarily works on specific nursing cases that help Sharon yes and answer my question thank you okay back over to Scott thank you um so with respect to the Essa Grant um it looks like all the additional staff are being allocated to Lancaster um is there a specific reason for that because I have to believe that you know Bolton and Stow would also have some need for those resources and um how long does this grant last and similarly like what happens when it ends to the people that we hire under it so Mr pal the Essa Grant is otherwise known as Title One and so the title one program has specific rules and it's located in Lancaster for reason I will turn this over uh to our assistant superintendent Miss friend to describe that Grant Miss friend sure the the title one um allocation is identified to support Lancaster and it's based on uh lowincome percentages um that um make our two schools in Lancaster eligible for title one so that's why the the grant is associated with Lancaster specifically we did receive an increase a sub this is this is an entitlement Grant versus a competitive Grant so one um that as the name would would would would State we are entitled to um all four elements of the essay Grant are entitlement grants versus a competitive Grant like we presented to the committee before say The Innovation Pathways Grant which is a competitive Grant one that we apply for and write a narrative to or high quality instructional materials grants which are competitive grants so this one the um is a Federal grant um and is provided to us we do need to write narratives and state the reasons why and how we're going to use that funding but it is provided to us based on metrics so for title one it's based on socioeconomic uh lowi income percentages did that answer the question it answered the question about why it's going to Lancaster but I did have additional questions with respect to like the durability of that Grant sure so I don't know if U Mr mcaren if you want to speak to the salary portion I can certainly help with that with the additional Staffing if I can interrupt for a second oh certainly Mr pal can you um just Define what you mean by durability right so does does that does that Grant renew every year or is it is it a multi-year grant and to the extent that it doesn't if we if the federal government cut it off at some point would we adjust our programs accordingly so this is a federal entitlement Grant and if any program if say Federal funding were cut off uh our program would be eliminated and we would have to pick up the funds locally if that ever happened okay thank you are there any other questions about the consent agen agenda or anything in it and not see any Golden Hands all right everybody so we are about to take the vote on the consent agenda for September 25th I'll go to Sharon first yes I vote Yes Amy vessels yes Amy Cohen yes Scott yes uh Lindsay yes Jackie yes Joe yeah shondor yes and I think I got everyone it jumped on me did I get everyone all right guys uh so thank you our experiment with the consent agenda um feels like a success so great job guys uh let's go to the school committee chairperson update um the only thing that I wanted to alert the committee on and Bolton reps you can correct me if I'm off here we have a vote happening at the select board meeting is it tomorrow night guys it is y so Amy and Amy are going to appear at the select board to according to our regional agreement uh vote for the third Bolton representative who will be filling Jesse Davis's vacancy so we have I think three interested candidates who have submitted letters of intent oh two interested candidates who have submitted letters of intent if you're interested in understanding more about that you can watch the select board meeting tomorrow night uh hope to have that person sworn in and attending our next school committee meeting I will also say that uh Stow at this moment in time still has a vacancy and if any interested uh resident would like to um inquire about that they can reach out to the uh town hall and speak with our town administrator's office or they can email me all right so uh next item here is our favorite part always our student represent V ative report and I do see Ava with it looks like a uniform on and um probably multitasking uh so Ava uh please uh we'd like to welcome you and it looks like we have a new face as well that you're probably going to introduce as well so go for it do we have her okay well Ryan is up first so hello Ryan hi Ryan will you introduce yourself to all of us because you are new go for it y I'm Ryan Metro I'm from stow and um I'm excited to be here so everybody can do like a virtual wave hi welcome bud we're excited to have you here thank you go for it all right so this we this uh Year's homecoming dance is coming up on October 26 that'll be from 6:30 to 9 UM until then during lunch we're going to have a different group of people um selling tickets it's during lunch which um so we have like a whole schedule set up for that and each block will be taken care of um we had an activity Fair last week where different clubs um sat in the courtyard during lunch and they kind of advertised and show and put on display what they're all about and um that was a big success uh I know I did and saw others signing up for new clubs and I thought that was neat um we had our first nooba news of the year going out and they're incorporating a new segment called the campus update and they're going to kind of track the construction process and any other the news about the new school and then AA is going to talk a little bit about the sports so our fall sports teams are doing really well as we head into the second half of the regular season and we're still waiting for the power rankings to come out to see where our teams fall in the state the football team had a huge win 17 to 14 on Friday Night by kicking a field goal with under two minutes in the game and our fan section has been really great it's been really positive supportive and there's been a lot more spirit so that's all we have Madam CH I can make a comment here yeah please do and if if Ryan and Avid can share this with the students uh we received an email this week from the parent of the visiting team and this parent wanted to express how amazing she thought our student fan base was how polite they were how respectful and boisterous they were regarding the game and really thought our student body was an example student body so I I share that with you all uh to say that somebody outside of our community recognized that about our student body when they came to see the game last week so kudos to you and all your classmates cool that's really awesome yeah do you think like letting the showa or something like that just to like kind of congratulate uh the school more University would be like better good idea yeah I think that's great Ryan that's great the second thing Ryan for you and able to know is that I believe it's in in two weeks I have a a planning session coming up with Dr Boon uh regarding uh The Advisory Group we're gonna uh start this year and so we're going to look to the two of you to help us in um you know uh seeking out folks that are going to be on that advisory team so so be looking out for that Dr Boon and I will be planning that two weeks and we'll be reaching out to you afterwards awesome thank you thank you good I wonder if any member of the committee has any questions or comments like to add all right I'm not seeing any so Avan Ryan uh thanks so much for being here as always we appreciate it on a couple of weeks we'll get to see you in person uh but welcome Ryan and Ava thanks again for uh helping him get on board thank you yeah of course have a great night everyone bye bye guys all right everybody so we're gonna move on now to the superintendent report I'll turn it over to Kirk thank you madam chair I appreciate that um have several updates for you tonight uh we are reaching that time where we've settled in at the start of the year so I want to give you a hiring update of where we are currently very excited to report we started the school year with 100% of unit Aid positions filled a couple of them at the very last moment so we work together with superintendents uh in in the other school systems to transition those people but now they are in their officially in their seats and uh we're rolling and as the committee knows we've struggled particularly in the area of hiring some special education teachers uh in the past but uh we're we're fully staffed and rolling along uh we still have a few open IA positions that our principles are hiring for and that's currently happening now uh we also have hired some are looking to finish to round out the lunchroom monitors uh what I want to share with the committee that is a great benefit here is as we look at our finances through Food Services these are positions that are supported through the Food Services um budget and they are able to uh supervise and monitor the lunchroom practices the way that is impacting learning in the classroom is it's freeing up teachers and instructional assistance so that they can be servicing students as opposed to doing Duty coverages in the cafeteria so this is a great investment and it's also supported through the Food Service budget so it does not impact the operational budget um we are adding a kitchen manager to hail as part of the redesign of Our Food Services Program um and our substitute pool is growing with applicants um and they've shared that the accelerator rate that this committee passed last year is an enticing incentive to them I was uh speaking today with Miss Hanigan and she is uh ordering some some signs that you're going to see posted on 117 on school properties uh advertising and looking for more more substitutes to come into our district um I bring those up because uh we've had those discussions uh the past couple of years in our meetings um and connected to that and I'll pause after this part um is uh some net neutral sapping adjustments we made uh this summer uh part of it was uh due to well a good deal of is due to how we are linning our schedules together and found some efficiencies so at Florence Sawyer School the health position decreased to 10th but we needed to increase the art to 10th um Center School there are no changes uh at hail Middle School uh we needed our our health teacher um and art teacher both uh moved on to positions districts and so we hired them at the rates uh at the percentages we need them in this master design that was a net uh Savings of a 1.0 as we needed a06 health teacher in halil and a point4 art to execute the the uh our our educational plan at Mary rollinson uh the net is a is a zero net however I use this as a reminder of the committee we added a position back into the budget before we had the budget hearing specifically for Luther Burbank because we were Wonder excuse me specifically about Mary rolinson uh because of the mystery of kindergarten numbers but also we saw our fourth and fifth grade numbers were hovering close to that threshold well indeed they're they're right on that threshold and have crossed over it and so we are actually hiring with that 1.0 FTE a fourth and fifth grade academic support teacher that will support both grades in the the core subject matter areas and um so this is not an additional position it was activating the position that we were holding in ab bance and it will slide into uh be a fourth grade position in the FY 26 budget as part of our Baseline staff uh there were no changes at Luther Burbank uh at noober Regional High School we did increase Spanish by uh 02 as we saw uh students come in and they're they elect that elected to take Spanish uh we were able to do that uh through some Library IIA Staffing and then in special education we increased uh the psychologist U uh Staffing at the high school by 02 so rather than three days a week we have now four days a week of a school psychologist at uh our high school and the last uh special education piece is looking uh doing A needs assessment around the District of where our staffing needs to go we elected to combine the 0.5 special education Staffing at Luther Bank Burbank with the 0. five Staffing uh at Center into a 1.0 position specifically at the center school um and so I'm GNA pause there on the update uh with Staffing uh and see if there's any questions from the committee on just those two elements any questions anybody right that was perhaps very clear no questions Kirk go ahead very good very good uh we will remind you of these when we get to the budget Workshop as well uh as we are going to be hearing from our principals tonight regarding their requests for the Washington DC experience and we know that we got aligned on the Washington DC experience last year uh so that was good and our next um uh area to tackle was Nature's Classroom and we have uh worked collectively as as a leadership team and have decided that fifth grade is going to be the place where we focus our Nature's Classroom experience in Thea origional School District we see that as if you will sort of a landmark time for our fifth graders that would be rising in the middle school and many ways the DC trip is the uh seminal moment for the eighth graders as they rise up to the high school um and so uh right now uh for this particular school year we will continue as planned knowing that beginning in the fall of 25 we will all be aligned aiming for our first combined trip to be in the fall of 2025 and uh we are currently looking for um high quality educational experiences that can take um you know the approximate 200 students that would be going uh so we'll be shopping for that and we'll be coming back to the committee later in this year for approval of that trip uh once our team is able to to make those decis decisions um and I will pause there one more time before I turn it over for a special recognition any questions about Nature's Classroom I think Amy Cohen perhaps yeah thank you I'm still having difficulty navigating my two screens here um so I think that sounds like a great um plan that you put in place for this Nature's Classroom to be to take all three schools and have them doing them at the same time and fifth grade seems like a great time to do it too but what just occurred to me is that um what happens to the kids who are in sixth grade this year well we have to make some decisions and make that uh we don't have a a trip plan for the current sixth graders this year um and that is specific to I believe um um the students at the Florence Sawyer school if I'm correct and so um Mr Bat has there been any conversations about that at Florence Sawyer we we haven't had those conversations yet superintendent Downing no so what we know right now miss Cohen is that we have uh established this but we'll take that conversation back to the team uh certainly because we don't want our students to miss out on that great opportunity yeah thank you um I happen to be the parent of a sixth grader who might just fall into this category of missing this as a result of of course you are I will say that the point of the alignment is um so that we're all experiencing that um the the opportunity to go to Outdoor Classroom uh but but in the past couple of years we've had to bring them on site it because it just wasn't viable uh to travel away all right thank you uh let's go over I think Jackie might have been next no oh Sharon oh okay oh Sharon sorry Sharon go ahead I'm just curious um if you can tell me a little bit more about it sounds like you're looking for a single location where all the groups would go together and so you're looking for a Nature's Classroom campus that can accommodate all of those kids at the same time or is it not is it something different than the classroom that we've that we've done before yeah Miss Pac there there are many places that do this and so as we've talked about it and talked about building that kadada 12 noova identity we would like to be align there it may very well be the location that that the Lancaster students currently go to but it may not it it the priority for us is to get a highly enriching educational experience and if we can do that together as a system that's our priority as we've explained about the Washington DC trip in the past there's so many complexities involved with that regarding the size of groups that it makes it very difficult which is why we don't um do that for our schools with Washington DC uh but because it's closer to us the proximity the familiarity we have with those programs we're hoping we can find that all right uh over Jackie I I think you did a really excellent job superintendent answering kind of like what my I guess my concern is knowing that we've had a long-standing tradition of going away um so I hope that the district is able to really identify a place where kids are still able to go and experience a new exciting and very dirty and smelly Dr rard thank you for that and as we were discussing this as a team we did discuss the option of bringing it in and our leaders felt it was uh such a valuable experience for the kids to have the time away that that is our priority uh all our principles are unanimous in that uh over to Lindsay yes it's just a clarifying question um can someone give me an example of for example what Lancaster is doing or currently planning just so I can do some additional research on kind of what Nature's Classroom is and what that entails uh and do we have Mr Blanchard with us at the moment okay so I'm gonna turn over to Mr Bates because Mr Bates is very familiar with that sure so the Nature's Classroom experience and I should say that very recently Nature's Classroom has been rebranded as Outdoor Classroom uh there are multiple sites around the New England region the only site that is still considered Nature's Classroom is is in Charlton and it's it's much too small to accommodate yeah uh really even in one of our uh larger fifth grades much less uh all three the goal as as we continue to build our nishoba identity prek through 12 is is as superintendent Downing said to bring all of the fifth graders together in the the final year of their Elementary experience um if if if we can and there are um a limited there are a lot of sites but a limited number of sites that would be able to handle um uh all three uh fifth grade uh School schools fifth grades at once um but um uh Mr Blanchard and miss savc and I are um talking with them and and trying to work that out currently Lancaster uh goes to um a site in Maine uh sha OA is here I think um I'm I'm not sure where the location is it's about an hour and a half away and I think that that's been the site that they've gone to for quite some time interesting okay great yeah thank you for the background that's very helpful you're welcome oh go ahead Sharon the the Nature's Classroom site that rolinson has gone to is in um uh Orchard Park Maine it's yes about a mile from Old Orchard Beach yeah thank you and just for a little bit of context too I want to say how much I appreciate you all bringing some parody here across the three towns because the kids of Stow I don't think have ever done this and um you know Bravo to the leaders and Stow especially for stepping up and taking that on because it's a really big uh undertaking and I really appreciate that so uh even though my kids are sixth grade and above and will'll never experience it I'm really happy that of the younger kids will Madam chair um just for clarity that that the experience for the sto kids have been the in school experience they haven't had the overnight experience and so that's where we had a lot of discussion around the value of the overnight experience yeah Amy another question yeah I just wanted to clarify for um other school committee members who may not be aware that this tradition of Florence Sawyer has happened at seventh grade sounds like I didn't realize it was happening at different grades at the other schools and so that's why I was asking about the sixth graders at Florence St now because I think that this is an experience that they um as they're rising up especially through k38 school they really look forward to this being a seventh grade Milestone and so I just hope that um if this plan goes forward that there is some thought given to what will replace that for the current sixth graders because to them it'll feel like they're missing something but to everybody else it's GNA feel like they're gaining something so thank you Miss Coen yep yeah all right everybody so let's move on to the next item in uh the superintendent report and that's updates on strategic work yeah and I'm actually gonna bring Mr braids to the Forefront again to um celebrate uh one of our outstanding Educators miss the toi so Mr Bates thank you superintendent Downing I um ladies and gentlemen could not be more proud as a principal to announce to you that our e8th grade social studies teacher thuli has been named the 2024 2025 middle level social studies teacher of the year by the National Council for social studies this is an award that is uh indeed a testament to um Mrs Tully's long commitment to um to social studies to education to our school district and to an interactive and Innovative approach to learning about Civics and history and social studies um she will be recognized in uh at the ncss annual conference which happens to be in Boston this year in uh in late November congratulations there very much thank you what an amazing honor and we are so proud this is a huge accomplishment so congratulations would you like to say anything to the committee or to the communities um just thank you for all your support and uh a shout out to Laura Padington um who put a bug in my ear so I just say thanks to everybody everybody's been wonderful thank you so much thank you thank you for being here thanks for all that you do for our kids appreciate it wonderful all right so Kirk you can just keep it keep it rolling yeah we'll move into our updates on strategic work and I'll first give it to um finance and operations director Ross mcaren thank you superintendent John thanks to the committee uh I have a brief item today but it's an important item so we've begun our work on the FY 26 budget and our first step is to determine and publish the timeline for the budget season ahead uh you'll see the FY 26 budget time line for your review and the meeting materials this was already presented for review and feedback at the September budget and warrant subcommittee meeting uh the timeline includes the key benchmarks in prep preparing the proposed budget for the January 15th budget workshop and the subsequent review and approval process that culminates at the Town meetings in the spring uh We've added a short message uh at the top of the timeline to direct the public to the finance and operations center which you've all seen um and certainly to the budget process video so the intent there is to continue to bring the clarity and information forward about the full scope of our budget process so that these types of documents don't live in silos and that there could be greater context across the budget process when the public is viewing them thank you Mr mcaren and for our last piece I'll bring forward assistant superintendent friend to talk about the new pilot schedule at Nashoba Regional High School thank you superintendent Downing we are excited to share that our high school will be be piloting a new schedule beginning on October 7th the piloting of a new schedule reflect our continued work to support and strengthen the student learning experience as you are aware we have implemented a line schedules K to8 uh the work at the high school level reflects the next phase of this work it's big work in a culmination of year-long efforts on the part of Dr Boon and the high school scheduling working group and team last year the group met weekly during which time they explored scheduling options and sought faculty and student feedback about what was working and what was not working or could be improved the result was a schedule for piloting this year and a goal of full implementation next year the proposed new schedule is a 7day schedule that drops one period each day allowing for longer periods and uh time for deeper learning less trans transitions for students and staff and a new flex block period two days during the week the flex block period would serve two purposes it would create space in the schedule for Teacher collaboration and professional learning communities already underway in grades K through 8 and provide time for students to ask for and receive targeted support from teachers as part of our buildout of mtss at the high school level after the pilot Dr Bon will be surveying staff and students to get their feedback on this new schedule to inform next steps towards implementation thank you Miss friend and Madam chair that concludes uh our report this evening excellent uh are there any questions about those last couple of items um forgive me if I miss this how long will the pilot um what's the duration how long will it go three week weeks okay all right well we uh are excited to see how that goes great job with all that experimenting and all the teamwork between the admin team and the teacher teams staff teams all right guys we're moving on uh new business uh without objection I would like to move uh the letter B to the top here and actually take on our Washington DC trip requests so that some of our special guests um can have their business taken care of first seeing no objection let's go ahead with that and Kirk maybe you can queue it up before I take a motion you bet I would like to introduce Mr Bates Mr Grady and Mr oay as our Middle School principls uh this is the annual request to uh approve travel to Washington DC for eighth graders we're bringing this request to you tonight with a motion to vote tonight uh because we have a financial hold that we can take advantage of if we commit by September 30th and so that's why we need your approval to do that tonight um but this is our annual trip that we aligned with all of our eighth graders you might have heard me mention earlier uh that our our three uh schools do this a little bit differently and part of that is uh because uh of how we have traditionally experienced the DC trip in the past but it also is very difficult to find a vendor that will work with us 200 students large on this particular trip so we do uh go school by school with that uh so without further Ado I would just like to turn it over to our principls and who's taking the lead on this one tonight gentlemen superintendent Downing I think it's Mr O'Shea's turn Okay so Mr OA we'll turn it over to you um yeah it was great to hear that conversation about Nature's Classroom I've been involved with that for you know 15 16 years and seeing the growth students make when they travel is tremendous and um and so the opportunity to travel out of state to Washington DC and something that is deeply connected to the eighth grade curriculum um is a phenomenal opportunity for our our our students and um this has been running for quite a while um at at Luther Burbank and and took a pause during the pandemic and then it's wonderful to have it back and uh the last few trips have just been successful and um as I tell parents every year when the kids come back they they and the parents just um have tremendous um you know feedback on how beneficial it is and um even you know uh just as importantly how we get feedback from doents and people in the museums about how wonderful the kids of nishoba are so it gives um you know the opportunity to represent uh our schools and our communities outside of Lancaster so um you know each of our our um proposals are have before you for approval tonight and then uh I would like to also bring Mr Bates forward because Mr Bates there's something unique about Florence Sor school that's going on and uh can you because there's two requests in here for Florence Sawyer school so can you bring some light to that correct thank you superintendent Downing uh what what we are seeking at Florence Sawyer school is your approval and consideration to Pilot a trip in the fall of 2025 of our current seventh graders would be eighth graders so in effect we would be planning for two trips uh concurrently the the spring trip for our current eighth graders and uh we'd like to Pilot a fall trip for our current seventh graders who will be e graders in the fall um we've we've had some conversations about uh the possibilities that this type of trip at this time of the year might offer and and we'd like to explore that um to say nothing of of the opportunity to be there at a different season and um and um the potential availability of not as many schools being there at the same time um but most importantly to sort of set the stage for the work that our students do in the eth grade around Civics and and understanding government and and the role that they play in it and the role that government plays for us thank you Mr Bates and then finally Mr Grady if we can turn our attention to Stow um can you please review for the committee we know there's a bit of a difference in terms of the ask for our families for Washington DC can you bring some light into the role uh of the the style of trip that the the students at Hy do relative to Mr cini's expertise in the leadership that that um he provides there C certainly um thank you so uh it's a very similar trip that uh to the other schools with the exception of um Mr KY serves as our trip coordinator being that um you know Mr keany for several years uh after his um I believe undergraduate worked for company called closeup and closeup still to this day runs tours of Washington uh the Washington DC for student groups across the country um so really what Kevin does is Works directly with the with the uh the the bus company um the the different museums and locations that we're visiting to coordinate our arrival um and and a lot of what the students are seeing and that entails also like making in the- moment decisions to you know foro a certain mon monument at that time to go someplace else because there might be um uh you know a road a road closure or um you know some similar event um so it's it's a diff a little bit of a different role in um um there's also some particular preferences for what what hotels we that we stay at um it's been a little bit more restrictive in recent years because of the things that principal Bates talked about with there being so many student groups at that time of year um so there are some minor differences in how the how the um the trips are run but generally speaking what the experience is and what they see are are are similar across the three towns so as a result um Mr Grady with Mr cavini leading essentially is our lead tour guide uh for our students in Stow uh we don't pay for those Services through the service because Mr Kini is able to do that and so uh with that Madam chair um I'll turn it to you all right everyone so are there any um questions maybe I'll take some questions before we take a motion go ahead Scott so you addressed most of my um concerns or questions regarding the trip the one thing you did that I that I noticed that was a little bit concerning to me was looks like one of the trips was scheduled for Memorial Day week the last week in May and I know that it looks like one of the objectives of the trips is to like see Congress and just like to point out that that week Congress is likely not to be in session in previous years they're not in session the week of Memorial Day so you know just want to point out that you they might not be there if that's one of the weeks of the trips noted it seems thank you Mr pal um Amy Cohen uh thank you so I think the can't the um idea of doing a fall trip and booking it this far in advance seems like it's um allows families more time to plan for the expense um of the trip and maybe help us lock in lower rates in addition to all the educational benefits is is that have you found that that is true or yeah I I don't terms of the cost of the trip per student I guess I I think the cost will be similar to the spring um that far out at you know I'm I'm not it's about the same cost and I'm not sure sorry I'm not sure there's much of a savings okay will it require families to commit to this trip of a year in advance or will that timeline remain the same in terms of putting deposits down and that kind of thing Miss K we're asking for approval tonight just so we can begin those planning processes in Earnest uh and give us an opportunity to find a ventor so this is simply to get the ball rolling on the planning cycle for that trip so we're at the very Genesis stage gotcha okay I'm putting the cart before the horse um but I think it sounds like a great idea thank you for being proactive about it any other questions and so Amy I'm gonna come back to you and ask you for a motion okay hang on for a second um let's take it uh and it looks like Kirk wants two separate motions so the first motion yeah is just for the current school year yeah for tracking purposes I thought it'd be better to do a motion on this year's trip together in a bundle and then we will isolate the Florence Sawyer trip for the fall of 25 okay I moved to approve the Florence Sawyer hail and Luther Burbank Middle School Washington D trips DC trips for the 2024 2025 school year I'll second that is there any further discussion seeing none we'll take the role Joe yes Lindsay yes Amy Cohen yes Sharon yes Jackie yes Shan door yes Amy V yes Scott yes and myself yes that motion passes and Amy will take the second motion okay I move to approve the Florence Sawyer Washington DC trip for fall 2025 I'll also second that one any discussion on that I will just quickly say that um my the high school that I work in is going in the fall this year and I've already told Kirk that so maybe he you could even check in with the principal to see how or the superintendent to see how that that went but they are hoping for a good experience also great all right thank for that yeah let's take the vote any vessels yes myself yes Scott yes Sharon yes uh Jackie yes shondor yes Amy Cohen yes Joe yes Lindsay yes all right motion passes thank you to our middle or our Middle School principls who are here Joel I know you're more than a middle school principal but uh our Middle School principls thanks guys for joining us and for um always being out ahead of the horse thank you so much for your support thank you Mr Bates Mr OA Mr Grady for coming tonight thank all right guys moving on um I would just like to say that there's an item in new business called super superintendent goals recommendations Kirk I think that was an oversight on my part because this presentation is going this presentation was in the planning calendar for tonight yeah but we're gonna have Kirk present his goals at the next meeting yeah that's correct yep so that's totally fine Personnel met with Kirk um on Monday night and we hammered all of that out and so it would have been just too quick of a turnaround for Kirk to build the presentation for tonight um after we uh identified all of the indicators that he is going to be focusing on based upon what the committee decided at the workshop so at the next meeting and I've already moved it on the planning calendar at the next meeting Kirk is going to do a presentation on what his goal structure will look like and at the meeting after that we will vote to approve his goals remembering that it is now a two-year cycle so we do have a little bit more wiggle room on that timeline all right so that takes care of that agenda item let's go to what we've all been waiting for and that is the school committee goals presentation and uh what we have here is a spreadsheet in the meeting materials that tries to get the school committee to formulate smarty goals that are um that hold us accountable for uh moving the Strategic plan forward in our own right and so if you guys could or maybe Alita you should can I share my screen Alita all right so I'm going to share my screen which as you guys know makes you almost invisible to me so Amy you have a question already I um I just wanted to point out that it looks like the goal for the communication subcommittee was deleted so I'm going to while we're talking I'm going to be typing in there and trying to recreate what was in there before right on thank you for that somehow disappeared oh I'm sorry that's okay um you know you can go into the version history and maybe find it that way or if you can just recreate it quickly that's fine too and Madam um Miss masteron will'll make sure that once that update's there that we update the meeting materials because we should always make sure that what is presented publicly is in the record as well yeah and Alita did you did you post you posted the Google doc to the materials so Kirk it'll update automatically all right so I'm am trying to share hang on guys I'm rustier than I should be okay so what we'll um do is we're going to present the goals tonight I'm going to ask um the chair people of each subcommittee to announce themselves this is the big reveal and then please share with the committee the goal that your subcommittee has come up with for the school committee and then we will open it up to questions after each subcommittee chair is done explaining so I hope that's clear enough for you guys uh we're going to start with budget and warrant so this is Scott Powell and I was elected the chair of the budget and warrants subcommittee um we discussed a couple of goals um only one of which actually aligned with the Strategic goals and it's effectively what the same goal we went worked with last year so apologies to my fellow committee members if I only included one of the two things we discussed on here and it's maybe slightly different from what we discussed in the subcommittee but again effectively the goal we we talked about was um um aing the the district the 26 District budget and the activities um associated with that all right great any questions on budget and warrant and I cannot see your golden hands so please feel free to just jump in hearing none we're going to move on to policy is that you Amy she's trying to unmute she's very focused yeah sorry there you go um yes so I'm the chair um this year um and our goal is uh I'll be working with sha dor and Jackie and Lindsay and our goal is to um it's pretty much the same as last year uh to review and revise the policies making sure that they're up to dat um and um make sure that they're representative and align with our goals around diversity equity and inclusion all right any questions on the policy goal do you want me just to change the date oh yeah sorry y oh yeah yeah do you have editing privileges Jackie I think you do graus any other questions um backing up just for a quick moment I have a question actually oh go for it Amy sorry my video is um yeah I'm just wondering um if and maybe this will actually answer itself as we go further down um how policy works with dear J um whether that's well funny enough our dear J liaison is also excited to be on policy this year so Jackie you want to speak to that yes um so dear J is working with all of the school committee not any one specific sub committee so when we get to the goals for the ask for dear J from us there's specific goals that you would want included that certainly is a conversation that we could have okay thank you any other questions or comments about policy all right and also backing up really quick Scott you are the chair of budget and warrant can you recall who the secretary is who is it drum roll is it shondor it's shondor okay good nice so Alita I'm going to do that for each one of these subcommittees to so that you can add that I think I didn't know the secretaries on all of them on the on the word document that you're going to post to the web that is the explanation of who's on what committee and in the charge of each committee so we're going to actually talk about that at the end uh policy we have Amy vessels as the chair and who's your secretary uh Jackie excellent thank you Jackie Lindsay yes oh good I wasn't sure if you could see my hand um I apologize I just have one question so previously policy had Jackie shandor am and Jesse on it I have absolutely no problem joining it but I was just curious if maybe there placement for Jesse should be joining instead of me that is my error only because I'm on I'm on Personnel in CPAC but again I will gladly join I just didn't want to step on somebody else's toes no no no let me fix that that is 100% my error it should say this okay and vacancy perfect thank you yes so whoever is chosen at the select board tomorrow night in Bolton they will be joining policy great thanks Lindsay all right guys let's move on to communication it looks like Amy was able to recreate that so thanks for that Amy go ahead because Amy are you the chair I am um yeah I was elected chair and Sharon is the secretary um we met and came up with three goals the communication subcommittee is kind of been reimagined this year because last year the work was mostly focused on the school committee manual and there's just a few things left to tidy up with the school committee manual so that did end up as one of our goals um but the other two are kind of a new redefined Focus for the communication subcommittee the first one has to do with the superintendent's professional practice goal of forming the student advisory Council so our goal would be to facilitate consistent communication with that Council in accordance with policy jib um and I actually have that policy I had it hyperlink before but it it is hyperlink over under um key action steps if anybody is curious about where that lives it is it is hyperlink there um the second goal is that we will explore opportunities for improving access to meeting materials and archived information um from school committee meetings and we have some pretty specific action steps listed over in column F about how we plan to go about that any anything else I need to say questions yeah so this is probably the mo the newest or like most unique goal any questions on this one or comments Madam chair may I make a comment yes please uh the advisor group that Dr Boon and I are forming uh is around um uh supporting and understanding students directly to the operational aspects of what's happening in the school system therefore I'm a little bit cautious about connecting it to a communication subcommittee and specifically the school committee I understand the policy uh language in there and we certainly can achieve that objective but tying the two together um I don't think would be a prudent uh way to achieve those objectives because I want to make sure that we're keeping that Advisory Group uh to the superintendent principal in a pristin and what may be necessary confidential space yeah so we had some conversation about this at the workshop and and I don't think we ever came to a complete conclusion over which student body will satisfy this requirement of JB so in the past we have um collaborated with the stuco the student council yes and that's where the student council representatives are elected from and that is uh what's specifically cited in that in the the in the mgl around student selection of their classmates so that's the body that makes more sense uh connected to the school yeah so just pulling up the policy just so just to make sure that everybody is completely clear over what we're talking about here um this so-called student advisory committee uh you know that the nishoba high school calls at the student council Hudson High School call the community council like it can be different at every school but there is a requirement in Master General law that the school committee has um a kind of consistent well it says here that students will be welcomed into the committee but that also the committee will then go out to the school it says once every other month to meet with the student advisory committee whatever that is in your particular school it's says that it has to be at least five students elected by the high school body and so in the past just to make it easier we met with you know whoever was available from the stucco and so Kirk is this something that you know I mean we can change the language and the goal here yeah we can certainly work that out and when I sit down with Dr Boon the week after next to do that planning we'll incorporate that uh into it and then I'll update Miss Coen yeah so like this is kind of um Up For Debate still it's not going to be that one Council that you had that is serving a very specific operational purpose but yes you will tell us which student body you want yes communication kind of interface with yeah the student council does serve as that student advisory committee to the school committee with the elected representatives being the two high school students that you saw tonight um so it's a matter of coordinating what uh some communication moments can be uh with that body so uh I'll work with with both Dr Bon and our advisor this year on that work excent awesome I think that that might have just been a little misunderstanding about what what we were tasked to do um you know as a subcommittee and so we will definitely work with the superintendent to you know fine-tune that within what you know what his his plan was yeah that's quite right quite right thank you Miss Cohen and I think Amy too that when I think of this just trying to give you guys a little bit of feedback I think that because this has not been a practice you guys like your goal is ultimately to craft a practice right to find out how to make jib operational and so your goal is not only to do the communication but to set up the construct through which this communication can happen in a sustainable way I think that's what we were we were getting at is that okay we're just trying to figure out how we interact with whatever committee this policy is referring to because that structure doesn't we weren't sure that that structure already existed I know we have student Liaisons to the school committee and I guess um I'm wasn't sure that those two things were the same so would you mind would anybody object if um if I put that the committee will construct and facilitate or we kind of in the action steps we talk about creating a structure um it's so I think it's in there it's just not captured in the this is partly because I had to retype things like I I had put more thought into the wording of this um but it got deleted so um does that make sense so just I just added the committee will create a structure to facilitate consistent communication with the student council likely in accordance with policy GI I'm okay with that guys any other questions yeah any other questions about oh I'm sorry Amy go ahead oh I was just going to check him with um I'm curious to hear what others think especially others on the communication subcommittee don't want to speak for them anyone looks like they're okay all right everybody moving on to Personnel uh Sharon so that is me um I will chair the personel committee this year and Lindsay is secretary um our goal again is very similar to um um previous year's goal it focuses again on uh the student or the superintendent rather evaluation process and with the with the goal being that at the end of two years now we'll have a full particip participation from the committee in um the evaluation process all right any questions on no that looks good any other questions all right and then over to Dear J and you guys might notice that dear J has written more like a goal for dear J and less like a goal for the school committee um correct me if I'm wrong Jackie which is totally fine by me but um I just want to point that out that that makes this one a little bit different and um if the committee wants to keep it that way that's again totally fine by me uh or if you would rather it be revised to be more of a goal for us I'm I'm fine either way so Jackie I'm going to let you describe the work that you guys have done because it looks like a lot of work here that's pretty awesome and then we can open it up for discussion so the way that I was thinking about it was what are the things that we talked about in the workshop and then what are the what's the spirit of the goals that dear J had supported um in the school committee last year so that was specifically around providing feedback um for the equity audit and then also supporting us in developing a deib statement that the school committee could uh adhere to so these goals look a little bit different because the ask is these are the things that we are looking for and I I'm happy to revise this however we would like um what I what I am trying to replicate is more consistency um in how dear J is sharing feedback with us and we're asking for and then having specific dates and deliverables around things that we're really looking for um so there's some specific things that we are hoping based on the conversations that we had last year at the workshop this summer and then in some early um discussions this year so they have not met as a group that's happening on October 1st and really that's the hope is that if we decide that these are the the deliverables or the activities that we want them to focus on then at that onboarding and first meeting that they'll they'll review these and basically determine whether or not it this can be met so for me the the key takeaways are providing additional feedback and maybe some more space around uh hearing what they had to say um in response to the equity audit as being something early on they also have a really phenomenal guiding document that uh has been cultivated over the course of many years and so part of what we're asking them to do is look at how that guiding document currently exists and then realign it with current policy so that we're making sure that we're identifying um potential candidates for The Advisory board at specific timeline um and that there are other Key activities for them to be able to do um for me the big one is finalizing a decision-making tool that all subcommittees can utilize and then hopefully pilot that um starting in December or January so that we can give active feedback about how is that working for us is this a tool that's sustainable for the school district and the school committee thanks so much for that Jackie um does anybody have a question or a comment anything you would like altered Jackie I wonder if you could add a sentence at the beginning that basically just like forces it into the school committees realm where you would say something like the school committee commits itself to um utilizing this advisory as stated do you know what I mean can you say that first word the school committee is commits itself I think I said um you know what I mean just so that when we're listing our goals we're basically saying our goal is to properly utilize this advisor filled with really awesome people doing great work and the utilization will be as listed yep all right I got to think about and yeah and you can you can do it in whatever way you want I just want to kind of pivot it toward us because these as listed these are their goals which we that was our task to identif to give them a charge and now we want to make sure that we are committing ourself to that charge as well yes so I think that where I would want to re like state that at the beginning of this school but then also in terms of the ask to the school committee is that if we're asking them to give us specific tools that we are then open to utilizing them and that that is a goal for the school committee correct yes is everybody okay with that everybody's looking good about that okay Amy question I can see you thinking are you unmuted trying she's trying okay there we go so frustrating on the phone um I my I guess my only comment is this this seems um very ambitious well um yeah there are parts of this that it that have been worked on for many years and I think specifically the decision-making tool that there has been a tremendous amount of work poured into that and I think it's just coming to a place where we're saying okay let's try this and it may not be the best tool and we're trying it to see how it feels and to make a commitment to utiliz in it on a regular basis in real time and that's listed like as the um I see it now okay all right all right guys um so I am noticing that that oh excuse me so obviously negotiations is um not applicable at this moment in time I'm seeing Sharon's hand let me back up go ahead Sharon I can wait I didn't see that there was um two more lines on your chart okay um so negotiations is not um necessary at this point in time if it does become necessary we'll take that on but there's going to be no state of goal uh audit advisory though Scott what's going on here the copy last year's goal it made a lot of sense excellent and let's see awesome any questions about the audit advisory all right guys um so it looks like there are no other questions or comments uh give it some thought oh Sharon I just um I had one other goal that I had been thinking about we talked about it a little bit at um Personnel the other night uh and it it was kind of um it's hard to know where to classify or where where to put it um which which group it might belong to and so I just wanted to throw it out there for um for thought and maybe it's not something for this time maybe it's something to think about for the future um or maybe it is something that we want to think about this time um but the the goal that I'm thinking about is to address the question about um committing ourselves to operating in a way that is consistent with what we expect from our school leaders our teachers our staff our students as it relates to Equitable practice to um emotional intelligence which is commonly referred to as social emotional learning um communication among ourselves with the administration and with the community and um fostering a Shar nooba culture um and I guess what I'm thinking about is we have a team that works very well together and what can we is there a way that we can [Music] um share our strengths and use our strengths to commit or or create a way for or help me out Leah um well I think what you were saying at Personnel the other night is you like what we have going on right now you don't want it to go away if members leave so like is there a way that we could kind of codify our operational behavior and root it in the equity audits recommendations that which we are asking our staff to exemplify how could we fleece our own behaviors protocols practices with these same kinds of expectations and let me let me add in there I think I misspoke the other night when I said spoke about it not going away as much as I was thinking about how can we use what we've learned as the committee now about how to work really effectively together to pass on at um to this committee as it reinvents itself on a regular basis um that these are some things that we've learned a way that work along the way that work really well um it's kind of like institutional knowledge um that work really well and maybe that will be helpful in the future and maybe they'll find some other things to add or change or update as personalities change and as we move forward um so just something to throw out there I guess right so let me um see what Amy thinks go ahead Amy thank you sorry I'm gonna stop sharing my screen but go ahead yeah I I like the idea of an um almost like an over stretching goal for the school committee um I think that's what Sharon's getting at but I also think that what she's referring to we try to capture in our protocols that we develop and so maybe all we need to say is that we you know one of our goals is to conduct business and in in um accordance with the protocols we have all like we have pledged to um what you were saying Sharon and Leo was much much more eloquent than what I'm trying to say but the point of it was that we have protocols in place that kind of we've already agreed to operate by but they're not really captured in any of this yeah and I think what Sharon and I were and Lindsay was at personel with us as well what the three of us were kind of bantering about I mean Lindsay is obviously new so we were trying to like bring her up to speed about the history of this committee Etc and I think what we said was maybe what the protocols need is a preface that almost provides like some sort of historical context and um because there is no introductory paragraph really of any substance and so maybe Personnel because we have this two-year cycle for the superintendent now like Personnel is feeling like we don't have anything to do you guys could maybe task personnel with looking at the protocols to perhaps build some sort of preface that will get at what Sharon is looking to do provide future School committees with a little bit more institutional knowledge so that none of that gets lost uh so let me go to Kirk I should have lowered my hand Miss Cohen stole my thunder ah darn you um but I think that's exact what we're talking about here is the sectors of the committee and your subcommittee goals to those sectors so what Miss Pac is talking about is overarching definitely belongs in the protocols as that's the Norms of Engagement for this group and so that makes good sense so guys I don't know that we want we need to make it an official goal but can I get a thumbs up if you guys are all okay with expanding the charge of the Personnel subcommittee to explore this idea a little bit I see one thumbs up couple thumbs up everybody okay with that Joe you all right with it Shand are you okay with it he's like sure have at it um all right guys so can I ask clarifying question sure so you would explore the idea of developing language for an overarching goal that would tie into the Protools because I no we would explore the um possibility of putting a preface in front of the protocols and you guys don't have to vote for it okay but then I don't think you're necessarily getting to the Crux of what Sharon was talking about which is well Sharon doesn't necessarily need it to be a goal per se and it's not like every single thing we do needs to be um codified as a goal but I think she wants to start toying with this idea and Sharon correct me if I'm wrong of like how to find a home for this idea she has Sharon does it feel okay for you that's fine for me yeah um I I guess what I'm thinking about is we've had some challenges in the past as a district and we've figured out how to move in a positive way so that we're in we're in a much different place now this this district has taken off in the last few years what I what I'd like to do or what I'm thinking about is what can we how can we use what we've learned from facing the challenges that we've had and how can we pass that learning along to this committee as it reinvents itself as it goes on so that if a similar challenge were to come up in the future or when another challenge comes up in the future there's something to rely on or you know it's not like Reinventing how how do we deal with this it's oh we faced we've had something like this before um this is some tools some strategies this is what we know whatever um and so you've got a springboard maybe to start from I don't know if that's making sense I know I can be a little bit like kind of up in I think that it could land in a bunch of committees places but because it's kind of sharing brainchild Personnel was willing to just put it on our next agenda and talk about it and then we might decide like you know this is something that belongs here or there um and we can retask it later but is everybody just okay with us moving it to Personnel the first Personnel agenda it's feel I feel like I had all the thumbs uh Jackie final comment you're good where' Jackie go I'm good oh you're good okay sorry you jumped thank you sorry okay thanks all right my friends so we will vote on this spreadsheet the next next time we're together it seems like the ones that are up there are going to be the formal goals for the year um that's that so moving on the agenda uh the next topic is finance and operations but the only thing um Ross had to share was the grant information I'm pretty sure and that was all on the consent agenda and we have no unfinished business because we're that good I wonder if there are any subcommittee or advisory reports beyond the goal stuff that anybody would like to share seeing none uh thank you everybody for that items on the next agenda you guys can check out the planning calendar but is if there I'm actually let me share my screen really quick I'm less Rusty right now so you guys can see that this is what's going on for the October 9th agenda I think I have it all right any questions or comments just yell it out because I can't see you guys do we need the budget timeline at the next meeting it was shared with us at this meeting Kirk no we don't and I was going to say also where you see the equity audit strategic plan superintendent goals that's all going to be wrapped together and we'll flush that out in our planning session Madam chair very good so I can delete this yeah Kirk please yes thank you all right we moved it up any other questions or comments yeah Amy yeah I was just wondering if during the school choice update we could um also if the update could include how many spots were filled um from this year and what the process of applying for school choice looks like for students that's already done perfect thank you great anything else guys all right so if there is no more uh business from the committee I am going to move to adjourn do I have a second second second all right Scott good job let's take the role Amy vessels yes myself yes Scott yes Jackie yes Sharon yes Joe yes Amy Cohen yes Lindsay yes it was not a record breaker guys but it was pretty darn good hey you you missed me but I'm a yes oh shanor you have to stay you have to stay sorry I'm going Shand D votes yes I'm sure he does thank you everybody