##VIDEO ID:mxEmhNXgixA## e e e e I'm going to call us to order at 7:02 we're going to do a roll call call to order uh Sean needed to be home this evening so let's start with Chuck here Carla here Ain here Sarah here Sean here Tom here and we are called to order at 702 so a quick walk through of the agenda um we will start with public comment um we don't have anybody here but maybe somebody will join in the meantime well then um we have no focus on Excellence for this evening um but we will hopefully for the next meeting on the 10th um we'll then drive through our consent agenda and any reports we have uh at which point once we conclude those we'll meet some of the student advisory committee members at least one of them will be with us and hopefully a few others might be joining us remotely we'll see uh we know there's a few Sports conflicts as well but we'll see what we can do um and then we'll drive into the uh Financial update including the Special Reserve uh special education Reserve fund uh and there will be including some budget transfers in there um which we didn't officially notice so we might have to come back to that um review and approved Director of Finance search process timeline um update on the metco program director search process and math pathway update on summer progress and that will conclude our uh meeting appropriately okay so we do have now a member of the public here um and we'll start with any public comment have a public there you go Jeffrey question uh in light of the Massachusetts ballot question on mcast as a graduation requirement I was just curious how it affects our local public school system do we have over the past you know five years or something how many students have not been granted a diploma because they did not pass the mcast and is there any um statistics or any information to share regarding there was some claim that uh was it sorry the students who did not get a diploma only because they did not pass the mcast and then there were some claims that people who had trouble with the mcast then decided hey I give up and didn't you know work to their classes that would have and therefore you know were denied a diploma for two reasons I just do you have any information to share on on that we don't technically have to address public comment but Dr meski do you want to address any of that or can you address any of that sort of soort of way actually one one Committee Member and I were actually had an email exchange on this too where we were able to share some of the information that you were asking for uh we do think it's like a very small number of students who may have been impacted and maybe some of that information may be identifiable so I can follow up uh maybe just afterwards which just some more like generalities around the question generalities are over a five year or 10 year span or something 10 year span and I may be able to speak maybe include a couple of other local communities and things like that I just you know it's a again probably a small number of students who' have been impacted in that way I just want to be really careful with that too if that's okay okay thank you but I can we can follow up um on that as well I'll shoot an email right now okay can I ask a followup question you may yep okay um would it impact though the students for whom we've submitted portfolios like do you think that that practice would potentially change yeah for it's my my understanding is that that's still going to again I don't know that the intricacies of the uh of of the ballot question nor am I necessarily prepared to speak about tonight but my understanding from sort of my initial conversations with uh my own understand is that that would not impact sort of what we have for the alt as well okay thanks so okay so let's move on with the agenda and we'll start with the consent agenda do we have a motion motion to approve the consent agenda and a second first we have a second second second by Carla okay so any discussion Cara um if if I could just ask um the field trip approval form it looks like it may the have potentially have some of the wrong names on it um it um Robin Koda and Jennifer Gray are listed on there are they the coordinators or they the people who went last year yeah so Jen gray is coordinating the uh the Parker trip okay so it's not the actual um two chaperons that um she's the friend I don't know who the if Jen and Robin are the two chrons I'm not sure but I know Jen's recording the chat so I I guess that's my thing the two chaperons listed are two other French teachers actually one spot it's says French teacher and another spot it says science teacher um and Robin and Jen gray are listed and my guess is that they were the teachers last year okay so if somebody can just after this we approve it look at this um field trip approval form I don't know if we use this form for any other thing that needs the correct people on it um the price seemed a little off to me um and it the number of teachers attending says three on this form but it looked like there was only two to me so if somebody could just take a look at it because I know at one point they list um medical needs of students so you want to make sure that this form is right okay so there were a couple of other questions I know from another Committee Member on just there was like in and for the the Parker case there were two you know kind of two quotes that were included there wondering which company we were using even though we are uh so I think there were some questions confusion we can tighten that up and you know kind of have it in the next packet I do know they thought you know approval was timely given that they want to get things going but we can so if we want to wait on the vote we can or if he want us to submit a kind of updated one and email the committee we can do that too I I'm I'm fine with voting on it like I said my concern is if this form is used for other things you want to have the right contact people on it yeah and and and write you know medical information if an old form was used you want the most Comm medical information for coverent students Carla can you refer to which section you're pointing at it is um on page 41 of the packet yeah and it's um field trip approval form yeah there's two field trip approval forms which what I'm asking par one's for coolage one's for Parker this one is for Parker and at the top it says Robin and Jen is the cordinators yes and then where are you seeing the chaperon names so um number of teachers attending AG three yeah um and then H2 has the medical Stu L it's written handwritten see on the left allergy yeah but at the bot I mean where I was going is you know B down at the bottom after the premature documentation is a a section or a page that they specifically included that says Robin is confirmed um it's on page for some reason I don't have page numbers on my PDF for some reason I'm not sure um Robin is confirmed but possible additional chaperon are Mel daring Christina celo Judy bullar Jess dhy Kim Moro and Chris agerian um so just it sounds like they're not 100% convinced not 100% knowing yet but I also think it's two to three depends on how many students sign up so right and there's there's another spot where at list the parer keep you know potential additional shapon as well okay um and I just noticed because I I noticed that they were talking about um two of the teachers um and Jerry coin is listed by um the travel agent as a science teacher but then on the forms Jerry's listed as a French teacher so it just kind of caught my attention and I always look at see who sha on and and making sure that they're RPS yeah um employees Jerry science that's I don't know where it says okay yeah science at coolage yeah and it says um okay on a disclosure form it says that he's a French teacher on that page so that's an error then Jerry is not a French teacher if somebody can just take up look yeah I mean there's a few other things that need to be cleaned up as it goes through as we officially go through it right um the fundraising proposal still list pample moose which unfortunately we no longer have pample moose there's other things that just need to be cleaned up I think this is just trying to make sure we get this early on the docket so it gets provisionally approved and they can start the process but we might need to have the final approval come through later on once everything is cleaned up and ready to go okay perfect they also this is they as they would probably recognize to this is last minute kind of put in before or just to get it in for approval um and I think that that's why it's in the revised packet too so what we'll do is if there's approval tonight we'll make sure to send out a you know kind of cleaned up revised version on some of those questions and concerns you have too thank you okay just curious why would they use two different tour companies when they're going at the same time we were just talking about that oh I'm sorry that's okay no no not not publicly I was I was the other member that asked questions uh that was one of the questions I asked as well you want to take it you want me to take it you can all right so I'll open up my text to make sure I have their words here too so um couple things so um one there was a uh without going into too much detail on why maybe they didn't like one company uh one school feel like there was a um didn't reach out to one of the other companies because they had used them uh a couple of years ago then they feel like they went radio silent so it was a struggle to work with them so left them without much company uh confidence in that company that was another company that someone else had explored um and they um coolage also Parker also really liked the tour guide who used to be with acis who's now with Landmark so that made them gave them confidence to sort of move forward with that company um so they've used both companies before and um but I think it comes down to their comfort level each ultimately what I see in both cases it comes down to the Comfort with the tour guide this prur was chosen by coolage because of the tour guide as well okay right so comes down to the Comfort from the teacher with the tour guide um and there are price differences so that was one thing else we should just align between the two right um I would hate to start to hear from the community hey it costs $200 more to go for Parker than it cost to go for coolage so you know we should make sure that that's aligned even if the contracts come in slightly different that we figure out how to financially align them Pro properly yeah and I mean again kind of drilling down that far like Parker using Landmark as Tom saying because they're more comfortable with that tour guide but the concern from coolage was they had felt like Landmark at once after the shift from acis hadn't been as responsive as they had have hoped so they where do you land on that you want Parker to be comfortable with their tour guide and you want to be supportive if coolage feels like they were not you know the company wasn't as responsive as they felt they should have been too so and we want to give school's autonomy to be able to do what they feel meets their school committee's needs okay I don't know how to reconcile the the price difference if there's a slight difference either we should look at the activities funds or something like that as a way to reconcile it there plenty of activities funds in those two schools that they stand right now and if we need to use that I think that's a reasonable reason to use that fund okay you talk to the companies why don't you go back first and negotiate with them and say yeah sounds like we're going to get to the point where provisional approval but we might want to have some District level tightening up of of the process there yeah um I have another question or Point um the scholarship uh you know the letter that came out for that uh it sounds like it was being previously managed by a staff member do we have the original intent documentation with that scholarship um it has come up in other scholarships that we need that we need the exact language so we should follow up and get the exact language of the original intent if we're going to accept that which I think we should accept we need to know the original tent specifically okay great yep there is so we can find that okay okay any further discussion all right all in favor actually roll call first of all uh Chuck yes uh Carla yes Aaron yes Sarah yes Sean yes Tom yes and it passes um 6 to zero so we'll move on now to reports and Dr milesy will start with you just to uh report tonight just want to make the community aware that uh mcast results will be shared publicly across the state tomorrow night uh tomorrow morning at 10:00 a.m. uh families and uh community members can find them on the uh school and different District profiles part of the uh part of the Desi website uh we will present uh more in-depth analysis of the data on the 10 10 school committee meeting we just want to make the committee aware that that will be released might start to hear some uh communication about that over the next couple weeks two just we were notified late last week that we have uh 10 National Merit Scholars nine National Merit commended students won National Merit semi-finalist uh families will be notified this week and then we expect to uh recognize them during the 1010 school committee meeting on our focus of EX on exol too but uh excited to share that there'll be again nine National Merit commended One National Merit semi-finalist in the community nice okay U moving uh down the list we'll start virtually with Sean any updates from you sir yeah just a couple of updates from the finance committee um finance committee held its First Financial Forum last week um this one's really just intended to be kind of a review of where we are sort from a Current financial position perspective um I won't there's a lot of great information if you watch the meeting or review the packet the one thing i' just call out uh to maintain the same level of growth in the operating budget year-over-year um would require about just north of $6 million in free cash which is not inconsistent with the total use of free cash over the last couple of years um but the free cash position also is fairly is relatively stagnated so the projected fy4 numbers same same as the fy22 number give or take a couple $1,000 um so as a percentage of our operating budget free cash is you know is declining uh um you know with uses in the $6 million range so the fincom will be taking that up in the October 9th meeting uh believe the plan to do the um kind of the recommended you know recommended use of free cach uh for for Budget planning purposes um the only other thing I'll share I think I maybe heard Dr Forum in the audience there if I was not mistaken he is yes Dr cor was was uh identified or selected I guess I suppose um as their representative representative to our director Finance scen um which I know we're going to talk about more this evening but that was the other the other piece that was specifically relevant for the schools thanks Sean all right Chuck uh so the naming uh committee we had our first meeting a couple weeks ago just kind of an organizational meeting and and we are meeting again uh next Wednesday Wednesday night with the two groups uh to have them give a similar presentation that we got here at the school committee and then uh at that point we'll have a followup meeting if there's any uh any Community it's like an open open meeting or uh public for type meeting if anyone has has any other comments on it and then we'll be ready to come back to the school committee with a with a recommendation shortly thereafter so we're we're moving along okay so your your meeting next week is at the public forum or the one after that it'll be the one after that okay because you have to post for it and all that kind of fun stuff so next the next week meeting we'll have the viaro group and the Hardy group come in and say peace and and U we'll go from there great okay the charter meeting is tonight so I'm obviously not there so Recreation hasn't met in a while so that's that's coming up again so that's all I have okay thanks Carla thanks Tom um so for kilum we've had um two meetings with the msba we had one on September 11th um um that we and I think I may have mention this one I'm not even sure the weeks all kind of go together um we did the a presentation by designers Tom and I um participated in it as well um and it was for the facilities assessment subcommittee where they really want to see that there's alignment between what our um educational goals are and what our design looks like so um it that was a great meeting they they were really pleased um we had another meeting with the msda on September 18th it was a preferred schematic call about the preferred schematic design and um we are on target for a October 10th msba board meeting where they would take us into um schematic design so and um we have to wait for the vote but there's nothing that has there's no red flags raised that we would have any issues we've answered all of the questions that they've given us um the designer and the opam have been really responsive our next um ksbc meeting will be on September 30th um we'll be nailing down our HVAC systems within the next two months which is huge um and we have two Community meetings coming up October 23rd is um a site and Community use meeting so we'll talk about about how the community will be able to use the school and we'll talk about the site and then November 4th is going to be on traffic and queuing everybody's really concerned about how the cars are going to queue on on um on site and things like that um and then we were asked by at the financial Forum on their October 30th meeting to give an update on killum so we'll give an update on killum then on the first piece about the msba facil assessment subcommittee meeting just want to thank LBA I thought in that presentation they were did a great job organizing and facilitating our presentation uh I mean Carl did a great job LBA carried kind of the majority of the presentation I thought uh it was really encouraging how I thought how well they did so excuse thank you to that and that'll be in our packet people want to see it so it'll be in our packet for our next meeting it'll be up our website too okay awesome Aaron um so CPAC I was able to attend a wonderful webinar with Lynn Lions last week um she spoke about managing anxiety and depression in children um she's she's really awesome very powerful and also very um direct um unfortunately that meant I missed the pair meeting but um can't always be everywhere at once uh the next CPAC event is a meet and greet with the team chairs on Wednesday from 9:00 to 10:30 and because we're not meeting again for a few weeks I'm going to plug uh movie that they're going to be showing uh the right to read there will also be a panel after the movie um this is open for the whole Community um that will be Tuesday November 15th at 6:00 p.m. in the Performing Arts Center um that's going to be a really great event so um they are looking for people to try to register in advance though if you can so keep an eye out for that flyer it'll probably be in all the sto School newsletters and and widely shared but um keep an eye out for that and pair uh the next event coming up is the Autumn Moon Festival at the library which they are co-sponsoring that is September 28th from 12: to 3:30 p.m. great thank you did you give the date yes October 15 is the right to read 6 p.m. I'll just we'll be putting on our Facebook page as an event as well and marketing it we are joint sponsors with the friends of reading Meco and CPAC as well um so you'll see a lot of advertisement for it coming out soon Sarah just one quick update on the Coalition um September is National alcohol and drug addiction recovery month so you might have noticed on the common there was a recovery walk story walk set up which is a visual kind of storyboard with messages from people living in recovery that was set up um and just want to flag ahead on October 30th there will be a community theater presentation at Parker called I I'll never do that which is being performed by actors with lived experience of substance abuse and tells the story of a family struggling to cope so that will be free open to all you'll see it in the school newsletters and and other places um and we are meeting on Wednesday this week okay great um Sean took my finance committee update Aaron took my right to to read update um so that'll be fun and uh that'll we'll move on from there so let's uh start with the student advisory committee and Dr M ches do you want to start with the introductions sure so uh excited to have Jason here with us too but uh a little bit of context says the community knows over the last couple years we've tried to move closer and closer to compliance with mgl which requires us to not only have a student advisory committee but have five board members who uh who were able to meet regularly I think is a four times a year at least supposed to be yeah with the um with the school committee I think that's exciting to be able to give our students a direct voice to the school committee uh we have a pretty large group now that are able to come together and they're having elections We Believe next week to elect the five board members uh Sachi and tamama are the two returners so that kind of fills two of the spots uh and then we'll have three more board spots to fill on the board and we'll see sort of next week but uh I don't know if Jason came tonight want to share a little bit of maybe what's happening at the high school too and then hopefully during the year once we have those five board members officially elected we can introduce them all as well yeah so uh we've been starting out very strong this year a lot of new improvements over the summer um the PTO funded some new tables on Main Street which have been a huge issue for the past few years we've been using old art classroom tables um on Main Street for students to eat lunch and gather in the morning um and so now we have I believe six new long tables with charging stations which have been a huge hit for lunches and also in the mornings um the PTO also funded a speaker for a motivational speaker at the freshman orientation this year um and we also have some new ceiling fans in the third and fourth floor classrooms which were super helpful for the first two weeks of school with hot temperatures um we also have a bunch of important dates coming up this Wednesday There's a a field trip for Innovation career pathway students doing the manufacturing and Engineering pathway excuse me so we have 50 students attending this I believe it's to a local University but I forget exactly where um we also have the internship fairs for seniors this week during lunch and that's just to get a head start on all the internship programs that begin in the spring for second semester and specifically the fourth quarter we do have the Freshman parent night coming up on October 1st for freshman parents to meet the school counselors and get more information about how students are supported and how the um advisers are helping different students we have a bunch of different adjustment counselors that are new this year and also the um guidance counselors also October 5th are the SATs here at rmhs and there's already over 200 students signed up to test which is one of the biggest groups that we've had in a while um and then coming up also that week on October 8th during Flex is the activities fair for all students which has through the past I believe three years since it started it's become one of the biggest events for clubs and extracurriculars to find new students um it's probably one of the most attended events of the Year all students go down to the gym and usually walk around see all the different clubs represented I want to say we have at least 60 clubs that um have signed up to present there and that's a great way for especially freshmen who haven't seen many clubs or had an experience to um join different extracurricular activities they've have always been able to find a bunch of new ways to get involved which is definitely one of the best ways to meet new people and have a successful High School career we also have the PSATs October 23rd which all 10th and 11th grade students are invited to take this year um Following last year where it was the first time it was during the school day it will be the same thing this year so the morning is dedicated to the PSATs for 10th and 11th grade students with a late start for freshmen and seniors um which also allows more students to take the PSATs without having to deal with weekend conflicts and different timings um issues and then also that week a super busy week in October the 29th is the National Honor Society induction for the class of 20125 um and those are most of the big dates coming up in the next month but there's a few big announcements that we recently heard about like the Thanksgiving football game this year being held at Fenway Park um with against stonum and so that's going to be a huge event for this year um tickets are already available online and that's the Tuesday before Thanksgiving um at Fenway Park and then this week we also have the Swiss exchange students visiting um they were in school last Wednesday and Thursday I believe and got to see different classes and then also went on a field trip to Boston at the end of last week um and the students will be going to Switzerland I believe in April uh and then also a new program this year that was um figured out was the rmhs students are all able to get S cards for the MBTA at Half Price allowing students to um explore Boston and other different areas at a cheaper affir uh they're free to get and they're available in the High School main office or Athletics office right now um just as a quick update we had we spoke about in our first student advisory committee meeting last week um about some goals that we want to achieve this year we based it off of last year's achievements which were mostly degendering some bathrooms in the drama suite and the main office adding water filling stations to the um Fieldhouse with I believe two more on the way soon from leftover budget from last year and then we talked about how we want to address um keeping the infrastructure clean and safe definitely a big problem has been bathrooms with the last two years um last year I believe we put in 40 work orders to fix different appliances in the bathrooms lots of things breaking and being U torn off the walls so that was a big Focus for this year and then also just making the school more accessible and adding some more um investments in different ways to add like water filling stations and better um ventilation in the Fieldhouse I believe was something we spoke about um just to make students more comfortable in school especially with extreme heat or cold in the winters right thank you Jason job any questions for Jason thank you for your leadership on this and I'd also like to thank uh Tom too I think if you talked to a lot this a couple years ago if you talked to a lot of local communities I think kind of the process of having a student representative on the school committee is high school principal finds someone in the community I mean the school in the high school community and ask them to come serve I think that you had dug up the mgl language which not only requires the five member board but also amongst them to elect a chair who then the chair serves as the uh as a non- voting member of the school committee too so I think that uh I just feel you know I'm encouraged that we're moving closer and closer when I say closer we didn't have our elections in the spring which I know would bring us into probably full compliance with mgl but seeing some of the impact that this group has had over the last year and to continue to have that line of communication between the students and school committee I think is really exciting so thank you to you and to your peers for your leadership and also thank you to the committee for making this possible and opening up these doors of communication great Jason you didn't really tell us much about yourself some of us know you a little bit but give us a little bit of your background as well my name is Jason Walsh I am a junior this year and I'm mostly involved in the Arts um I've been my role in the student advisory committee I've really been advocating for changes in the arts department um we have a new uh arts department head this year so that's something I worked closely with the principal and other um advisers in the arts department with to be on that selection committee to find our new arts department head um I'm also super involved in the sciences and different extracurriculars um I'm leading the a world of difference group this year which is returning with a new advisor um and then I'm a member of the drama club the select choir uh all the different subgroups of the choirs the choir secretary um a bunch of different involvements with and then cooking club which is coming back um after a few year hiatus and yeah just a bunch of different extracurriculars awesome great thank you all right and with that said um just so you know protocol wise you're welcome to stay or leave after the student announcement it's up to you sometimes we find that students are doing so much that they need to come and then go but you are in this role you also as Dr mileski mentioned a non- voting member of the school committee so your input is valuable throughout the whole process if you're willing to stay so but don't feel any pressure like you have to say okay all right so with that said um let's move on to the end of year Financial update and special education Reserve fund update and I will mention uh we will not vote tonight because we did not notice to vote um so we'll we'll notice to vote at our next meeting and I'll mention when that might be um at the next agenda item so uh Dr Miles you want to start with this and we'll jump in yep great so uh I think everything you find on page about 70 uh 70 of your packet I just one thing I'd like to flag in the special ed Reserve fund as you'll see s of in the last paragraph of the narrative uh that we still uh as this right the FY 24 end of year report is not yet completed uh so that's still in the process so when that's updated we'll have sort of a more updated table at that point as well too so we'll probably probably the 10 hopefully the 1010 meeting but if not the meeting right thereafter too other than that I don't have any other commentary any questions from the committee I'll just raise a couple of the quick points that I noted earlier um I'm not looking for answers just points of of observation um the extended day revolving account went down rather significantly in one year I would have expected to be maybe half that decrease um so I just want to make sure with all the increases in salary and whatnot we put in last year and other contracts and whatnot that we are maintaining that susten uh sustainably so I'd love to see the forecast that Chris has for that and you know as Kate and um are able to work with her with Chris on that to make sure we're we're good to go for the whole year I don't want to have what we had a couple years 3 four years ago when we had to make adjustments in January if we can avoid that so um that's one and then the other one was um we do have a little bit more in the revolving fund for the kindergarten as well so we can you know that can help us as we go forward for the next few years so we'll just have to look at adjusting the forecast appropriately to account for that so it's good that we were able to keep those at the levels and then even augment it slightly as a result too so okay I I mean I'll even just add one other thing one revolving account we're really interested in this year too is also the food service line too knowing with the uh with the bre with you know Universal breakfast now we've been seeing higher than anticipated uh participation which is really exciting uh also knowing that we've also had to add Staffing so I feel like right now we feel like we're in a a really good place in that account but something that we're going to see I think is going to be a little bit different than maybe has been over the last couple years yep yeah that one grew by almost 400,000 last year right so that's a pretty large CH chunk of change there um so yeah it' be as we as we build out that the forecast of these different revolving funds it'll be good to see how things are going to go and if we have any specific plans on school choice I think we talked a little bit about that during budget cycle but we know there's going to be even more going into that fund this year so as we think about it let's plan appropriately okay anything else all right that naturally transitions over to the Director of Finance search process so Dr miches you want to start with that great um first would like to thank uh Dr Derk pin for year plus of service in the ready Public Schools who has moved on to be the assistant superintendent of Finance uh in the L Public Schools um so in the packet you will find uh more information around the uh draft uh search process pending approval I'd just like to make a couple of points as you look through that one uh we recognize that this is not an ideal timeline for I mean um timeline to be hiring a Director of Finance and operations therefore we have also talked to you know are mindful of potentially shifting to an interim in the process if needed we've talked to the posting Clos Friday we've talked to candidates who are coming in for an interview that there's a possibility that we do shift to an interim to allow us to give you know some more flexibility to post in a more favorable timeline uh sometime uh later in the you know winter early spring so that's a possibility in the search that I want to raise the committee the second piece in that too is I I mentioned the word internal interim here in the in the packet I would like to say that our assistant business manager Kate finegan is awesome uh she was the business manager in stonum uh the town and school side is extremely qualified to be able to do the job uh we also think at this point it's Kate's pretty open about it that it's not something that she wants to step into right now just at this point in her career with just you know her own family and personal commitments would step into the role if that was something that we had needed and we have all the confidence in the world in her uh and at the same time you know we would like to have someone by her side as a teammate too um which I think would be the best sort of support for her and for our office as well so while we have a good option to fall back on uh we also want to be responsive to sort of her needs as well in the situation so we will uh start interviews this week I see Dr corm in the audience who will be a part of the uh the committee I will loop back to the committee if we feel like we're in a position where we want to move the process forward whether that be with a uh you know a nomination or recommendation to hire at that point we'd obviously have to pull the committee together for a vote and approval so just's more on that to come over the week so uh again appreciate the committee's understanding that we're on a tight timeline here under appreciate the understanding and flexibility of us you know potentially having an interim option and we're excited to explore some candidates and see who we can bring in to join our team go CH so if if you do decide to go go beyond instead of interim to potentially hire somebody will the committee have an opportunity to meet that yeah great question um how we're seeing it now is if we are to move into a a full-time someone who we think is a candidate for the full-time position we would move forward in the process have likely having interviews with the school committee and whether that's you know a public interview like we've done in the past whether we have a couple of you know rep you know small members of the team meet with them on a smaller group we will figure that out but I I wouldn't feel comfortable hiring someone for the full-time position if we did not have uh you know school committee members have the chance to interview and meet them uh if it's for an interim position I feel like we'd probably want to be able to move a little bit quicker and to be honest I I think at this point that's likely the direction that we're leaning um so in that case we probably have a little less involvement uh from the school committee in terms of interview and direct meet and greet so on that front as well um couple of notes Here is one when we started this a couple weeks ago we wanted to see who might have availability and I reached out to Sean to ask if he'd be willing to be the the school committee member on the committee and he said yes so officially I'm acknowledging that Shawn is the school committee member um and the interview process for the time being um and he so I want to thank him for that and willingness to step up because some of these meetings are in the middle of the day and we all have different challenges in the middle of the day as well so that's one thing second is um what I alluded to before is if this process moves forward say this week or even early next week we might have an interim meeting between on this and our next meeting just for this purpose um just to make the official appointment so that we can have the vote and appoint as you as you all know from the committee perspective this is one of the positions that we as school committees actually do vote on and do approve as hired hired positions so we'll find a suitable time probably to have a hopefully what becomes a 5 minutes minute meeting but um maybe it'll be in the morning maybe it'll be quickly in the evening we'll have to find a time that works for everybody to do that so we can move that forward if that happens I will probably layer on the transfers that we just postponed as well into that same meeting so it'll be 6 minutes instead of 5 minutes um but just want to put that out there so everybody's aware of that as well okay so could be Friday could be Monday could be sometime next week depending on how quickly the process moves this week okay any other feedback on the search process that anybody wants to give Sean thanks again for stepping into to fill it for us Bud all right so moving on then let's move on to the um the Meto director position update Dr mileski on this one too great so you'll see some more information in your packet as well got see there more information your packet to um as a community at at this point would know uh Mr Curtis Martin will be transitioning to be an operations leader in the Boston public schools which we think comes with a significant increase in both salary and scope of responsibilities uh and his new role in Boston Public he'll be overseeing a portfolio of 12 schools in Boston Public uh as a Lea on between the central office and school on anything relating to operations so including discipline uh HR and budget and finance so excited for him and uh disappointed for us as well I just want to take a couple of minutes and and and speak about Curtis's impact on our district where he's been here three plus years as you know when Curtis had started uh I had received a lot of feedback from met Coq and from a lot of our families around the improvements that were necessary in our community to be as strong of a program that our students deserve um I continue to really appreciate the work that Mr you know Mr Martin did during his time one one of the most obvious was uh you know expanding our enrollment from in the 50s uh up towards close to 110 with the support of the school committee desie and met Coq also now building out what used to be sort of a oneperson staff model for the entire District to now uh is a eight person model uh and some of the roles that I think have been really creative and Innovative to meet both the needs of you know red you know Boston resident students but also reading resident students with a particular focus on social emotional and counseling needs um also his continued focus on opening doors of access you know adding adding late buses uh uh opening students eyes to opportunities postsecondary with HBCU you know opportunities for and Boston families to come together I think he's done a really amazing job of building out a vision of what our community can be and what a good metor program can be and helping us to start to move in that direction too uh plenty of work to be done to continue to build out our program but I think he's left a really important Legacy in our community that I have a ton of appreciation and respect for for him uh as a leader so huge thank you to to Curtis as well um we spent a lot of time uh I mean Curtis has hinted to me he was looking to eventually to take this step in his career so we've talked you know many times over what model would make most sense for us I think the good news for us is we feel that we have a really good pool of talent in District to be able to fill these roles we have a lot of Staff members in our metac roles who I think have the skill and the interest in eventually becoming um taking on an expanded leadership role so we were looking for this you know when Curtis left to be able to have an internal staff member to be able to build that pipeline of talent the challenge was if we shifted someone from a met coac role into the full-time director role we'd be pulling someone out from a direct role impacting students dayto day and we know the difficulty of finding someone to be able to fill a counseling role particular leader of color which you know is really important in these roles as well it did not want to have a uh a significant impact on students when the year had just started therefore in collaboration with Curtis and with our uh Meco team we decided to uh name two of our mechos sacks as co- interim directors for the year uh Cindy Marte who has been our longest tenured Elementary uh uh meos saac she's our Birch meoac will be taking on the lead at the elementary level Jericho Santiago who is the meoac at the middle school level will be the secondary um uh interim Meco director and they'll work together to assume all responsibilities at the district level a lot of Curtis's work and the district level is heavy in the summer around like recruitment of students enrollment of students uh we've been meeting as a team to map out how that you know those responsibilities will shift on those two leaders now as they carry additional responsibilities but we are excited both both Cindy and Jerica think they'll do an amazing job in the role and we look forward to supporting them to continue to move our program forward uh come springtime we will then look at a search for our full-time met codirector and think about what model makes most sense to us now that we're have a model to try this year and we've had more of a traditional model so we'll come back together in the spring and see uh this was announced to community uh to Boston resident families early last week Mr Martin and I held a family uh Zoom to meet with any families with questions concerns or feedback and then this information was shared out with staff and with families and various newsletters uh last week as well just want to make sure the committee and the community heard that update and happy to answer any questions Chuck so I guess theoretically the the the heavy lift the summer work will be done by what is probably going to be a new a new person at that point in time so yeah we're not really putting a lot that part on on the interim people's jobs correct yes so we know that October 1st is the big day for our enrollment numbers so sort of once October 1st passes at that point we don't receive any you know additional funding for students to come in at that point so I feel like a lot of times and Curtis has spoke about after October 1st you know enrollment really slows down what does pick up though starting to you know you know February March April is the recruitment process as you know now there's a new enrollment process for Meco families can rank their districts of like their choice which wasn't used didn't used to be an option so there's even more of an you know importance of getting out in front of families so there is going to be that push for Jerica and Cindy and our team to be and may to be out in the community and trying to drum up interest for reading which is a again one of the communties a little further away from the city I think that will be a challenge but in terms of the actual enrollment process and the interview process those are things that are G are going to be May June July when we should have someone in place at that point too and in full transparency you know we are interested in what how this model works I mean Curtis I him sometimes that he has done a great job building up you know building leaders across all of our schools that some of their scope of responsibilities that he used to carries the director are now living in the school level so we'll see sort of down the line is the is the traditional model of having one metco director what's best for us in a model where we also have eight leaders or is it better for us to do something more creative more outside the box I don't know but it gives us a year this year to assess that thank you anybody else I mean I think you hit on the key things I I was concerned about the recruiting both from a student perspective but also a staff perspective right to make sure that we can continue to recruit maintain train uh leaders of color as well that Curtis has been huge in that part of the process too so I'm looking forward to Cindy and Jericho continuing that process in the meantime um and figuring out how how we best manage that on a go forward basis too okay anything else else for maybe else all right I think we're done with that topic and we'll move on to the math Pathways update uh Dr Hardy I gave you sharing permissions if you would like to share or I can do it from here um I am happy to share have it all queued up just in case okay go for it let me just put it into all right how does that looks good it's uh it's a little bit forwarding your slid set there you go there we are y all right well hi everyone so I wasn't going to put together a slide show for you tonight um because I know I'm was just giving a quick update but when I started digging in there was so much good um happening that I thought even though I'm going to go through some of this quickly I would just memorialize some of it in this presentation for you to review after and we'll make sure that this gets thrown into the package too all right so we're going to just talk about a few different areas that occurred over the summer and the first one jumping right in is summer geometry as you know we ran a um a new summer geometry course this summer and just to remind you the purpose of this initiative was giving our high school students another way to accelerate their high school math pathway this is technically always been on our math pathway that students could access a summer geometry class but previously um at least in my years in Reading we hadn't offered one so this was like a really concrete way um and that's something also that's the district sponsored and was great to students um so it's intended for our Rising 10th graders but we also have Rising ninth graders this year who it um there's just some details here for folks that are interested in learning a little bit more about it but basically it was a 4-we class 15 students participated um all of them um are now enrolled in algebra one Algebra 2 which to me is like success that is what we were looking for we also have a plan in place to continue to work with and support those students this year um again since it's our first time through we're not sure what supports they'll need um but we just have um carved out the time so that we can be proactive in that regard um we got some really nice feedback from the students and families that participated um they gave a lot of positive feedback about the way the course is set up the the workload and such um they really appreciated um our teacher um and the like energy she brought to it and sort of how she made the three hours go by quickly um we actually had students we we were we were sort of debating how much homework assignments and like uh takeaway work students would be able to handle after being in 3 hours of math a day um and the good news is I think the students we had this summer they were so motivated and um such amazingly dedicated students they actually said they could have handled even more homework so um you don't hear that often from students and so that's one of the adjustments we'll look for next year um and then just continue to be creative with the three-hour class that is a long time in the summer for students to be there but overall we feel like this was a really great um first run through for this course and look forward to continuing to offer this as a really viable opportunity for our students to accelerate in the MTH Sarah you mind really quick I like the anecdote you Shar with me a little while ago about the grade n student the uh entering grade nine students who were in you mind us speaking a little bit about how they engage and participated because I think that's a thing that's of interest is that something we can scale up in the future too yeah we had um as you know we had two Rising ninth graders who um really just like everything about their experience in ELD one in eighth grade supported that they could handle the rigor of this acceleration and they just arrived this summer um the teacher reported that they um would finish any independent work quickly and then she would find them off in the corner just you know continuing to work through different theorems and um they just loved being there and you know picked up any Challenge and ran with it so we're really excited uh to have this opportunity also as as you heard me talk you know every time I talk about math Pathways it really is about customizing to the needs of our students and we know we have lots of different types of math Learners in our district and we just want to ensure that we have opportunities um for every type of learner and so this is an exciting um way to challenge that those two students thank you so uh middle school math you know is a spot obviously where we always look to our math Pathways because it's the first opportunity where students might accelerate um and or just making sure that the math our middle school students the math instruction our middle school students are receiving is really high quality so that they are ready for high school math and Beyond um and so just to um share out the numbers because I know this is something that often folks are curious about just um sharing our enrollment this year in seventh 8th grade math a reminder these are students who in sixth grade um took a series of Assessments and um were offered the opportunity to go into seventh eth grade math so we're excited to um you know continue with this acceleration point we think for some of our students it really works well and um they really Thrive um on this trajectory another new thing um for Middle School this year that we um look forward to um refining next summer and continuing with as we offered some summer work modules we think this is a really great way to help all students so it isn't just about students accelerating um but it is about that preventing some of that summer regression if we can um and hopefully getting kids excited about math so these were a series of modules that students could complete over the course of a number of weeks in the summer we had one of our Middle School teachers um who was monitoring and going on reviewing work and if students had questions responding to them um so I will let you know at the end of the summer we had a handful of students who were Rising eighth graders who um did take the assessment to see if they would move into Algebra 1 um for each of those students the Middle School principls reviewed the results talked with the families um and just based on how students scored on that assessment and then based on the conversations with families we just had a very small number of students um who sort of went ahead into algebra one even though they hadn't been in Stu at theth grade now Sarah to make one more point on that too like I I just want to make sure the commun is aware that with all the additional summer work and summer modules offered we didn't expect or hope or necessarily want this to mean that it was going to have more kids sort of like move up in the level right or skip a level we thought it would open the door for maybe a couple of kids who need a little bit of an extra push but we're also mindful of we did not want to put kids and push kids who weren't quite ready and again over the summer independent modules we're aware that there's only so far that can move the needle so I just think that because we only had a we're saying here is to make it not identifiable a very small number of kids make that jump that for us does not mean that the modules are were not a success for us I just want to make that clear too because we don't want to push kids up unless we feel like they are truly prepared for that next level of course yeah thanks for clarifying that I think that's an important thing um to to understand about the process um we are going to be gathering uh feedback has gone out I believe so we're just so waiting for it to come back and we think that we have lots of room for improvement we had some really bad Tech glitches with Google classroom and one of the platforms we were using um we've got some really great feedback from students um as they came back into school this September that we um will be able to so I think that these modules will become like a really strong thing we can offer families and students um especially who um kids who really love math can I interject before you move on um so just is there a reason or are we considering um a similar in-person type session like we've did with the geometry where we would do four four weeks of class if somebody wants to try to move forward actually instructed and and handheld like we did with geometry for 7 to8 I know we're not trying to push necessarily but there's a difference between pushing and then not I'll say fully supporting that move um for lack of better way to say it so is there a logic that we applied there is it just a staffing issue is it a you know a philosophical issue yeah I guess I'd like to think about that a little too but I guess off the cuff I would say that um I feel like the process we have in the when we select students for 7 eight is really strong and I think there's usually just a couple of students who really we see that burst of growth over their seventh grade year um and I think if we continue to refine the modules we can do an even better job of prepping them um I don't know that this would be like a whole class full of students who would be ready to take that jump but it's definitely something we can EXP FL um I guess one of the reasons I'm thinking that is when we did sit down and review a few students who were interested in taking that placement test to see um we did look back at what they had scored in sixth grade and sort of like you know like what was our placement decision right we obviously want to go back and see like this is a student that's now interested in moving on did you know how did we fall on that placement decision and we felt like what we were seeing at the end of the summer still really lined up with what we had been seeing the year before um except except in the very few cases where we um you know really talk to the families about what this would look like to miss that class and and to press on um so I I think you rais a you know a great question we're always looking to expand and come up with new ideas to support students um but as of yet that hasn't really felt like a strong need Tom I think s I'm going to build on that to a little bit of the idea that what makes them different is geometry none of the kids have taken geometry and it's a it's a set of St standards that we have to meet over the course of the entirety of the course which all students are coming in from the sort of the same position having to master certain standards when we're talking about seven that you know kids who have not made that jump to be you know kind of move up at sort of the next level of at the middle school level you have kids who have gaps in different across different standards from you know all different areas of you know math from the years before it's not just a new set of Standards so I think at that point you're talking about a lot of students who may have gaps in certain areas or may need support you know Remediation in C certain areas but that's not going to be consistent across all the kids too so it have to be even more of like an individualized you know sort of classroom could you do that absolutely but I think it's a probably a harder thing to build than probably being able to build a a standalone geometry class wouldn't it be the grade8 math that's incorporated into the 78 math so if I back up if you get the kids who didn't make the cut to be able to to move who took grade seven math took grade seven math the reason why they didn't make the cut would be different for different kids oh right some may struggle with number sets some may struggle with basic algebraic reasoning some students May struggle with fluency of basic facts some students there's there's different things that students May struggle with where you're going to Geometry you're building a course and everyone's taking the course it has to matter certain standards so I think I think it's a different game I okay wait to figure out how to play the game yeah I'm not saying I I think I like the idea I do I just don't think it's a as simple as yeah it's probably not as simple as as your points are 100% valid I think the question is how do we use I how do we use other things to to find F tune it a little bit or you know how do we support during the school year to fill those gaps and then the summer becomes literally like eron's question the grade8 math content right so such that we have confidence we' closed Gap a b and c and now really is grade that we're having to fill um so just as we continue to improve and none of this is negative in any way shape or form there's a huge amount of positive in this in this overall step I just it's just all right is there another step is there another step right as we can continue to keep improving yeah I even thinking like I opened up an I ready report too and it's broken down by the domains you'll see as you know geometry measurement data algebra and algebraic thinking number number operations and I have kids here who are on the cusp who all are wildly different profiles so again yeah there's a way to do that Technologies are could be a great tool to support us here it's just as I appreciate the push we you know I I don't think we've pushed as far because of that reason but it's something we could could and should explore yeah if we if we start thinking about it now for next summer we should start thinking about what gaps we've got to close and how we customize Gap closing throughout the year with the m additional Mass supports we put in place throughout the year and then maybe another reassessment towards the middle to end of the year and see what's the next Gap we got to close and are we ready to just start with e8th grade math over the summer or something else like that but it takes strategy and it takes time and focus right so all of which we have but we haven't we have a little bit of because we're focused in a lot of different places so I'm fully aware of that and the last thing I'll add on to is I guess I underestimated too how many kids would have genuine interest over the summer of like really digging in on math and Sarah went through all the feedback that Janelle was giving to students and I think was blow Away by like students engagement over the summer but also then therefore the amount of feedback that Janelle was giving students over the summer it showed us as a lot of kids were like eager for this which I think shame on us maybe or me for thinking that there wasn't that many as many kids as there was who are eager for more in the summer so um we'll look into it we'll loop back appreciate the push okay can I ask a few questions oh sorry are you still going Sarah we can go I haven't I haven't seen I haven't seen your you still have more to do I can wait till the end okay no I can wait till the end I'm making a note of my question so okay so the slide up there right now is just a little bit of data on how students did access the modules and um you know how many students completed them um so just there in case you're curious um I was really happy to see that you know 93 sth graders joined the Google classroom and then 59 Rising e joined the the Google Classroom that right there to me was like a step to say hey I'm interested in this so um it was really great to see that participation all right uh two more quick areas sorry so we piloted a really interesting program we were able to receive a grant from Meco Inc that allowed us to run some summer MTH um tutoring essentially for some of our Boston resident students um the goal of this was to provide um that opportunity for our Boston resident students to improve their achievement and possibly set them up for a later acceleration along the math pathway we also really wanted to be able to customize it to their individual needs um so I won't go through this is a lot of details here if you're interested um looking at it but essentially we provide the service we provided the service to six students it was a mix of inperson um and asynchronous this work and we we learned a lot from the process there were some things that worked well and there were some things that didn't work well for our students um but now we know and we have like a really nice template for something moving forward um and hopefully we'd be able to continue to pursue some grant funding because we think that this type of opportunity is really important um we know in particular that our Boston resident students often don't meet with the same levels of success in math as their peers and services in area that is is certainly a priority for us one other program that we were running this summer um we did provide some some tutoring for Title One students um and this initiative we we undertook because we know that the students that are identified in our two Title One schools um for needing support in math um are kids that would benefit from um tutoring to prevent regression um as you remember our two Title One schools are kilum Elementary and Parker middle school and in each of those schools they rank order students to identify students that will be eligible for services that are provided by those Title One funds um this summer we did offer to all of our students um who were just finishing grades 4 through 8 um access to tutoring at magnesium and reading um PID for by Title One funds we had three students from kilum and four from Parker who participated um so we look forward to being able to take a peek at um I ready results if they come in this fall to see if those Services um you know added or I guess supported the students in and um not regressing over the summer obviously this we're proud of the work we accomplished this summer but looking forward to continuing to improve um that Pathways for all of our students once again um the math lab will be up and running at rmhs we are still working with the high school um to perhaps find a different location um space unfortunately is at a premium right now so we are still in the library which was not our first uh pick but we are implementing um a new sort of sign out procedure to gather some new data from students so that we can learn about what brings students into the math lab and how we might attract other students as well um I wanted to mention too that both of our middle schools have been looking at uh some of their blocks of time throughout the day and are starting to talk about and explore how we're running math intervention and enrichment at the middle school level this is very new work so I don't have details for you yet but I wanted to pop it on there because I do think it's an important piece of what I was talking about earlier the fact that those Middle School years are so key to developing students foundational math understanding um the other um piece that I wanted to mention is that some of this exciting work has led to the fact that we are going to have students who are accelerated Beyond even our Pathways um so that's one of the things that we are um starting to plan for we already had conversations with our new math department head um to say this is the timeline we're working in let's start to think about what the options might be um so more to come on that I don't have any like more details right now but I just wanted to let you know that's something that is on our radar and that we're already working on um and then the other thing all of these programs that I talked with you about tonight are also things that we will be tracking students that participated and as best we can trying to determine you know what their what the impact might have been um through the various assessment results that we have happy to take any questions you might have awesome um so this is all really exciting and I will reiterate that um I'm so impressed by how much was accomplished in a short amount of time when you think that this time last year we the committee had not even started yet or had barely started so um thank you for everything that has been done um to start with the summer geometry class um can you remind me Sarah was that leveled like like was it College Prep honors yeah the course was designed um to mirror the honors GE geometry course okay so those students got credit for honors yes um I'm not sure how it shows up on the transcript that's something I know that we talked about but I don't want to speak off the top of my head can I can I get back to you on that yeah yeah I'm more wondering can they go into honors algebra 2o because that has huge implications for what comes the following year yes so yes so I believe all of the students did go into honors elra 2 okay thanks um and how how you know in talking with the teacher did you get a sense of like how much bigger the class how much she thinks she could accommodate if we had more interest next summer I didn't ask that directly but it's a really great question um I do I do know like we had multiple students mentioned that the class size felt really good to them and that they were able to get individual attention so I do think we would um you know just keep that in mind that um keeping it to a slightly smaller size than a typical math class what does really allow students to get that intense instruction absolutely yeah I'm just curious if we end up having more interest now that it's happened and it was so successful um I also just just want to be cognizant that we continue to offer it to Rising ninth graders so just um okay and then regarding um the Middle School summer modules forgive me if you said this but did any of the 38 who Rising seventh graders um switch what they were going to take this year like did any of them who were planning on taking seven math switch to 78 math no no um I don't think like right now there isn't really a mechanism to do that um I don't think that taking the modules at this point given especially because we've worked really hard in the last two years actually to build in a much bigger break base if you will for students at the end of sixth grade and you know our Middle School principles this year more than ever were reaching out to families to say Hey you know your child didn't quite need the cut off that we usually look at but here's we want to let you know the option if this is something you really want so I I feel like in the spring we do a pretty good job of selecting those students and the students that are on the cusp when we have those conversations with families we find you know it's it's kind of 5050 some parents are like great let's let's go for the challenge and others say you know what that just doesn't doesn't sound like something my students going to really be interested in so um I will say we weren't approached by any families asking us to reconsider that um but if we were of course we would you know meet with that family and and ask you know take their their requests seriously right right okay I was just curious um my next question is regarding that so so our numbers of groans um for 78 math um participation um which is fabulous but um but I actually asked Dr mileski last week um it's still like one two class class is for the grade like one per team um so at what point are we saying like this class has gotten too large cuz some of the number I think there's one of 28 um so I I kind of wondered if maybe there would be an extra class this year or something but our our conversations happening like as we expand that do we have the ability to have a a second to 78 math within the same team um yeah instead of letting the class get so big cuz it is it is a really rigorous class you know you're getting essentially two years of curriculum one class so so to make that class even bigger is is not ideal for those students yeah I mean in my conversations with the Middle School principls um you know they that came up like if we have more students what will happen and my my comment to them has always been we're not putting a cut off on the number of students so we if we reach the point where you feel like within your schedule because the principles do their own scheduling for classes but if they reach a point where they feel like it's not tenable with the structure they have that would be something we would support them in um to this point they hadn't come to us with that concern um but we have reiterated that that will not you know that will not be an obstacle to students moving into that class okay great check get some other questions in while that's going while they're ask question you mind going back to that table that you have that just outlines the enrollments that just that maybe of Interest I just want to make a point on that too so you'll see that this year's numbers is 95 students who are in 78 math and if you add that up for the years before last year is 75 the year before 83 the year before 67 and the year before 74 and there's a lot of people who are worried and I think like we had the math Pathways meeting that if you push kids too early to be in 78 math and they're not ready they're we're then going to see an impact when having kids in you know Algebra 2 who aren't quite ready I remember several High School teachers feel like in the past kids who've been pushed into those math too early come and they're underprepared so I I just I think there's we're trying to open doors for kids by you know in a lot of different ways but we are also mindful of the drawback of not just allow opening up to to any student who were setting them up than we seeing in Algebra 2 them really you know floundering too so I just want to be mindful that you know it's not a goal for us to necessarily just keep increasing these numbers because we know there's also you know a lot of people on the other side who say a stronger foundation in algebra is a better move than pushing a kid too early so so you might have a few more but let's give Chuck a chance and we can come back and Carl I thought I saw that your hand was up too so we'll start with chucking and just a thank you Sarah uh just a question on the uh looking ahead uh I think we had a fair amount of discussion at our meeting last spring about the math lab and the concerns about having it here and I came out of that as looking at that as a loow hanging fruit something we could take care of and get them a spot and now I'm seeing here tonight we don't have a spot for that that's concerning to me cuz I felt like that was something a lot of people wanted us to take care of so it's a thing that everyone wants the challenge is we thought it was a lower hanging fruit that maybe was of the extended day is in the space that we know that that was the former math lab there's not an easy spot for extended day to move that meets their needs as well that wouldn't impact someone else as well so we just haven't been able to identify easily yet something that works for everyone again I I think there's people in the high school math department who believe that there's you know sort of other ways around that but we are still looking at space and trying to figure that out but but am I am I correct you're correct something I came out of that meeting hearing loud and clear yeah yeah another reason for killing to be built what's that another reason for kill another reason for kill yeah yeah yeah it's a good point that yeah we did we spent many hours this summer working on spaces and movement um the other thing too though I think to Tom's point we we did um we did get some feedback from some of the Math teachers though they felt like um there were things they could do internally as well to encourage students to use the math lab even if it's in the library um there's some you know some Renewed Energy in the department this year with the new department heads so we will keep an eye on that as they mentioned we have a new monitoring system um that we will take an take a look at you know what students are reporting after they use the math lab and hopefully be able to use that while we continue to look for other possible spaces great thank you Carla thank you Sarah um so my question was around accelerated math in um you know like Junior and Senior year and and I I guess in my head I said oh dual enrollment is a perfect Avenue for that is is that a pike dream on my end or is that something that not at all okay not at all there's you know there's a variety of options we're looking at um whether it's you know courses that are taught internally um or if we work partner with a a university um those are all things that that are potentials and part of it too as we're starting out since it will just be a couple of students we'll really be able to C ciz that experience to what those students are looking for um and not creating just like a oniz fits-all solution right because I know in the past that you know parents would get together you know a group of five parents would get together and then come to the school and you know ask for a class and then they would get a teacher to just teach those small group of students but to me the um dual enrollment seems like a a perfect solution for it we agree that's the clubhouse favorite I would think is an option right now but we're exploring all Sarah Shar thank you okay you a few more questions there you I just have just one more of a comment I know you said you were going to um gather feedback from the students who participated in the summer modules for Middle School um I'm just particularly interested in that you know we had 40 eighth grade Rising eighth graders who did one module but then only four who completed it so what happened there and I'm sure there's some that just decided I don't want to spend my summer doing math work and and that might be all of them but um but I'm just curious if there was you know if it had been structured differently might might we have captured more you know I don't know same same with 73 to 38 um and I guess for them there's a little less um incentive cuz they are really just doing summer math work it's not it's not to change their course outcome so that makes even more sense to me but but for the rising eighth graders who maybe originally thought you know I know often times as kids who were bored in seventh grade and did very well and they think you know they want something more for 8th grade so I'm I'll be curious to see the feedback on that that's all I I agree I'm looking forward to seeing that feedback Sarah can you move forward to the um the Meco Bridge slide um so this this result said unfortunately it concerns me I just uh I'm wondering if we're if we received any feedback from the parents or and or the students involved was the location not right was the structure not right I know it says consider having students for a full week um do we need more than a week you know as it is right now it almost looks Fair unfair almost looks like we didn't do enough or didn't do what we what or they we didn't have enough Buy in I'm not sure what the right way to put it is it just it looks Troublesome so do you have any immediate feedback from this process and what what thoughts of areas for improvement that we can have besides just the Lessons Learned can I just ask one question before you do what what looks Troublesome well a couple a couple things that jump out to me is you know we only arranged 3 2hour sessions in June and two 2 and 1 half hour sessions in August if you compare that to and we only had six students participate out of 13 right um if we compare that to some of the stuff that we have available that we made available in in here in Reading we had 15 students here for 4 weeks at 3 hours a day for geometry it's different right geometry is different than what we're trying to achieve with this program and I understand that but and the population is bigger that could engage in that 15 students so there's a percentage issue there that that comes at a play but you know what prevented us from doing 2 weeks of 3 hours a day or or 4 weeks of 3 hours a day with this population as well in a place that they could reach was it Transportation was it support was it our budget but you know you know just to me I'm looking at it without you know without full facts but just the facts on the page it it seems a little inequitable in terms of what we were trying to do here um but maybe I'm off base so I just wanted to put that out there and see if I'm if I'm missing something which is entirely possible um or if we the way we structure the program was a little bit too flexible or or what well we were restricted by the um the amount of the grant the other piece too was it um it was sort of a late spring planning process one of the pieces of feedback um that we received uh so Randy Merl who is um someone that we've worked with who's a Harvard intern was the one who ran the program for us and in debriefing with him one of the the really strong pieces of feedback he gave us it was clear to him that some of the students really wanted to be there and they were motivated and others you know expressed that they were sort of being told by their parents they had to go and so they were there but there was very little you know they just they weren't as invested so um if we planned earlier and we had the opportunity like we had we had offered to 13 students but only six were able to actually meet the dates um because they already had you know other things planned so if we if we planned earlier we would have perhaps been a to do a better selection process having par having students there um who perhaps were you know motivated to be there I think the other piece too is that um we didn't see good success in this program with zoom and to be honest with our summer module for the middle school students we offered a weekly Zoom session and we only had one student ever come on so that to us as adults probably seemed like a great way to test space and to keep kids on track but from the student point of view they probably like this doesn't work for me um our students that participated in this program did have good participation in the asynchronous assignments and those were customized to their needs um they were we used an online platform for those um so we did see that students participated in certain ways um you know I think as with anything when you try something for the first time you're not quite sure how many days um are is going to be the best fit and so kind of coming out of it with the recommendation from the consultant that ran this for us that you know having the students there for a full week is one we certainly will consider um and you know obviously it's dependent upon funding as well I think now I just I'm looking at the carryover we have on the Meco Grant as well I think there's while we have the 15,000 that was specific to this program and I know we have other Meco challenges we need to continue to advocate for from a financing perspective but I think there's a way for us to figure out the funding side of it y uh in some way shape or form I would I would argue just as challenging as the funding is the the model like what's the model to close gaps I think what makes this one different than the summer geometry again goes back to like this is intended to be individualized Gap closing for kids this is not a Ramsay comes and teaches a onee class that's a geometry class CL or Ramsey come and teaches a one we the purpose of this was design some as individualized based on kids ey ready data or other assessment data where their gaps were meet with them sort of the summer to provide direct instru instruction and then design modules that could be done asynchronously that align to what that child needs so I don't think it's a fair sort of conclusion to make to necessarily think that it missed the mark yet if we don't see how these kids did if we see there six kids who went from you know you know low needs Improvement to all of a sudden you know May proficient I would say that's a huge success for these kids this model was something that closed those gaps for those kids was it enough of you know was it six kids for 15,000 add enough of bang for your buck I don't know we could debate that but I'm really interested to see how these six kids did as something that was really targeted to their needs now what I think we've talked about the math coaches we love to have a model in the future where more kids get this type of individualized support based on their own gaps their own needs could we scale this in a way that's more cost effective could we scale in a way that's you know I I think it' be easier to build in Reading than it would be in Boston but I think the intent of this was different than necessarily the summer geometry class too um I think this is more like what we would try to do with the class of what you were saying before with some of those seventh graders you know who may want a little bit more to be able to take that next step so I think we should you know look closely at the data and and sort of see how the students did um but definitely some other unique barriers that we're working with given sort of the Boston you know uh you know location as well can I just add one thought I think maybe also zooming out a little bit to a higher level to look at how are we how are we think about summer services to expand opportunity and close gaps and how are we doing that across different for different populations so that we have consistency in our approach so if what is the goal of esy for students with on iups who get Summer Services is it for to prevent regression or to close gaps how do we how do we make sure we're you know moving kids forward in math otherwise not just looking at it population by population looking at it more holistically too from in terms of our approach it's a great Point yeah that applies title one too we said Title One is only for avoiding for avoid so avoiding regression they said so the title one is just to avoid regression as opposed to closing gaps while this is for closing gaps the other math one for middle school is for closing gaps theoretically so we just need to be you know consistent why are we not closing gaps for Title One students why are we not closing gaps for special education students we let's to Sarah's Point let's make sure we're looking at it as completely as we can and I'll add to my previous Point sometimes it's not just summer like we've already we've done some stuff during the school year we need to continue to figure out how to refine that too as we work our way through um but so much work has gone into this and you know I'll Express the appreciation as well I don't mean to rain on the parade at the end right I just want to I want to make sure we're again continuing to strive to get better so yeah absolutely and to your point this this slide doesn't tell the whole story yet we don't have the return information on the investment yet we just have the investment and without the full return information yet and if we don't see movement from these stud it's not a good return on investment obviously these six kids right you hope that with the amount of money we poured into this with the individualized attention you'd see some movement okay Sarah thank you thank you Sarah thank you huge progress thank you all right I think that was the last agenda item and somebody's bet at 7:30 was on off slightly um but here we go my comment to myself any further motions motion to adjourn a second motioned by Aaron seconded by Carla uh roll call we'll start with Shan yes Chuck yes Carla yes Aaron yes Sarah yes Tom yes and we're adjourned at 8:29 e