School Committee: September 6, 2022

Transcript captured from YouTube auto-captioning. No speaker labels; proper names and dollar figures occasionally misheard. Click any timecode to jump to that moment in the source video.

0:29 all right sorry for the delay everyone um we’re just having a little trouble with the live stream so just getting last little detail ironed out on that and uh open the meeting and just let me know when you’re ready

1:25 foreign

1:54 uh first up is commendations

2:00 anybody have any commendations this week okay um then we will move um Yasin is actually a huge shout out to me yesterday and he’s going to join us next week uh since two weeks in a row and she’s gonna have quite enough stuff to report on so he will be with us next week tonight and that moves us to public comment so if anybody wants to make public comment please use the raise hand function and I will call on you um just remember to state your name and address for the record and um the length of it will be three minutes should we ask that you keep your comments to three minutes

2:46 all right so Josh Barron go ahead thank you Josh uh Josh Barron 17 Vassar Road um I want to first of all thank you Sarah and Dr Bucky for your committed leadership during this difficult time Dr bakkie I can’t imagine the more challenging start to occur as a superintendent and I’m deeply grateful for your continued efforts to do the right thing for our children and Community I recently heard some troubling comments suggesting that the children of a member of the school committee were receiving special accommodations for covet related reasons including the use of Scare School space and personnel as well as influencing the location of a school-related performance now I don’t know enough to know whether these comments reflect reality or

3:32 unsubstantiated but I do know something about good governance both from being a business school teacher on the topic and in leading governance workshops with the major city school board so I have three related questions uh first of all what process is in place to approve any accommodations given to Children of school committee members to ensure those accommodations are equally available to all students the second is what process is in place to allow any teachers or School leaders to raise questions or concerns they would have about requested accommodations without fear of potential retaliation and third what action will be taken to investigate this situation in light of the potential impact on the reputation of the school and District if there’s no validity to these comments then it would be valuable to have that shared with the community to avoid any

4:20 further speculation the Integrity of our district depends on our confidence that there is no abuse of power by any member of our school committee thank you for your time thank you Josh those questions um we pull the comment it’s not a back and forth um and so but we would be happy to email you with responses uh Jess benedetto

4:55 hi good evening uh Jessica benedetto uh eight Bradley Road um this is based on an email that I uh sent to the school committee members uh Michelle Cresta and Dr Bucky after the meeting two weeks ago I’d like to thank you for the informative update on the paid to ride busing program at the last meeting I’d like to start off by saying that this year’s pilot program on the bus has been a complete game changer for our family as my son has had a positive experience riding the bus thank you from the bottom of my heart I’d like to point out some details about what was said at the last night uh meeting in the bus update and lastly proposed a compromise to the current bus system that would

5:41 utilize the driver and bus to maximal efficiency Michelle when you point out that the bus program was quote unquote full and had a wait list of 30 people this does not fully describe the utilization of each bus broken down by run number one Humphrey Street to Marblehead neck and run number three old town and transfer station area I’m sure that run number one and two are full but actually run number three has about 10 to 15 kids each morning you actually utilize the bus I know this because my son uses it regularly and I’ve seen the bus and talked to him specifically in the afternoon the bus run combines two and three together due to the driver’s shortage so this quote-unquote full bus will not be full next year if we have a

6:29 dedicated bus for just afternoon run number three if run number three is going to Old Town and then the transfer station area has its own run there is room to add additional Riders to this route from morning and afternoon this area of town does not have as many kids as the Humphrey Street neighborhoods however a bus through this area is mandated because we are more than two miles from Brown School additionally run number three currently Services Village and brown literally passes by Veterans School both in the morning and afternoon run Veterans School is specifically along its route could we pilot just adding 7th and 8th graders to run number three to the pay to ride program I believe we could do this without changing any of the start times which was your reasoning

7:15 verbalized in the last meeting as to why we don’t offer busing to anyone in grades 7 through 12. the stop at veterans could utilize the front access of the school avoiding the Vine Street Loop in the back there is room for a bus to pull over there easily to drop off and pick up students I would like to propose to the school committee uh adding veteran students to the pay to ride program for the next school year for run number three only contingent on space available and a dedicated bus and driver for run number three could this be proposed for a vote by the school committee as a pilot project with the contingency of it being reevaluated after one year could we consider even offering space on a bus for a morning run only or afternoon run only as many other

8:04 districts offer these options to families this would augment the program’s funding by adding stipends paid by those families and lastly I applaud your work on the budget and your diligence and persistence in asking our community to fund our schools through an override if we propose to offer services that will benefit more students in the community and thus decrease traffic it’s more likely that tax paying parents and community members will be willing to vote in support of an override thank you thank you Jeff so I don’t know where this goes but can we just get at some point and update the bus audit and we’ve got a response to that yeah

8:55 uh Catherine Martin uh Catherine Martin 29 westshire Drive I was actually just on this call to listen tonight but I am so appalled that a member of the public would bring up a member of your committee’s children that you didn’t speak up and ask them to stop I’m disgusted by that your children are all off limits everybody’s children are off limits and somebody in positions of leadership should have stopped that comment we all have personal situations some of our kids have IEPs some of them have fought 401c whatever they are whatever the acronyms are that was disgusting disgraceful and it should never been allowed to continue thank you Catherine thank you

9:40 all right I don’t see any other hands raised that will lead us on to John your superintendent’s report and first up we have Gina Hart um and Gina if you would like to come up and and use the table we welcome you she’s an in person with us tonight and she’s going to be talking about the youth risk behavior survey as well as an additional survey that I think you’ve created that kind of captured all students um who did not take the other one welcome hello hi Gina hi Sarah if I may um can I ask for um the courtesy of a brief recess um for for three or four minutes please I’m terribly sorry Gina I just um

10:28 I think in light of what we just heard I I would just say ask for that courtesy um do you just need to step out of the meeting for a few minutes no I I would like to still be part of this I think what Gina has to say is extremely meaningful and I’d like to be part of that but in light of my disabled child just being announced in a public meeting I would just like a couple minutes to I would just like I I make a motion for a five minute recess okay okay um second for discussion just for clarification I didn’t hear anybody’s names mentioned but um motion seconded and I’m in favor yeah yeah I agree I don’t I did not take that that’s your name but

11:14 as anything but a concern over Converse Behavior but um all right David Harris yes Sarah gold yes Megan Taylor yes Emily Baron yes Sarah Fox yes thank you we will uh re-adjourn at 7 19.

12:02 foreign

14:38 questions

15:32 foreign uh

16:00 okay um it is 7 19 and I will call us back to order uh Gina go ahead you’re out thank you okay oh it was on mute or can you hear me okay yes it is okay hi everyone thanks so much for having me I’m Gina Hart I’m a political social worker and I work in the high school and I’m here tonight to talk about the youth risk behavior survey which is a survey that Massachusetts runs a youth risk behavior survey and it collects data around risk behaviors mostly centered around substance use of mental health and so we have not collected data since 2007 and so for the past few years I’ve been really talking about it and pushing for it in our wonderful Central

16:47 Administration um has has supported it this year which is great and so when we are doing any sort of mental health or substance use programming it’s really just important that we know where our students in our community is at and so when we’re choosing programming we really need that to be data informed so that we can choose the best programming and so in the past we’ve done a lot of really great events and programming in the school for parents in the community but we were kind of shooting in the dark in the past and and we really thought it was really important to collect some data to see what are those doing it so that’s what we did and how we ran This was um you can do the first slide

17:36 thank you okay so as I said the state runs you the risk behavior survey we had 100 of our students take that surveys and that data goes into the state analysis what we chose to do was then run the Marblehead uterus Behavior survey at the same time so that we could create a survey that was specific to Marblehead so what I did was I matched a lot of the exact questions from the state survey so that we could compare because it’s really important to be able to compare and then we were able to ask some of our own questions which I think was great and so 587 students were surveyed our school is 9 35 so it’s a good representation all four grades ages 14 to 18. it was done by Anonymous Google form there was a parent and student opt-out option it was done October 27th during her

18:23 advisory magic law um all questions had 550 responses or more and something just important to note you’re going to see that as I go through the analysis um I compared it to State data which I said is really important unfortunately the the newest State data is from 2019 they’re about to release the 2021 data sometime in the spring but we don’t have it yet and so that’s just something to note that the pandemic has happened since then and so when we’re looking at the comparison data something to know also something that people ask about the universe Behavior survey or any survey taken in a school about things such as risk behaviors are students honest and I think what we can see as we look at how it compares the state data is that it is pretty comparable for a lot of it which is great there’s always going to be

19:08 students that no matter how how Anonymous it is and how clear we make that to students that may not want to share that information with the school and I think we have to take that into consideration but our hope is that um that students are honest you’re going to hear me talk about risk and protective factors which are things that make our students in our community more vulnerable to or protected against substance use and misbehavior so that’s something that you’re going to look at that we’re going to look at in the basic analysis so gender identity 45 male 51 female 2 percent non-binary race and ethnicity 86 White 3 black 5 Hispanic or Latino three percent Asian four percent other in other category people self-identified Pacific Islander

19:55 European hours of sleep per night a pretty basic protective Factor the more sleep we’re getting in the developmental stage the more we’re able to function so eight hours or more is the recommended only 14.5 percent of our students are getting that much sleep a big chunk almost 80 are getting five to seven and six percent are getting four hours or less so obviously we would love to see our students get a little bit more soon regular physical activity we know that this is something recommended for our health and our mental health 71.7 of our students are getting regular physical activity that is defined as engaging in vigorous physical activity three plus times per week this is obviously a protective factor and interestingly enough it actually that data matches about how many of our students are are engaged in our Sports programs about 70 percent

20:44 positive connections with peers this is a protective Factor luckily 97 of our of our students endorse that they have positive connections so these are some of the questions that were specific to Marblehead if you don’t see any state comparison data these are something that you just asked our students so we want to think about with social emotional learning it’s really important that our students have connections with teachers strong teacher student relationships are associated with both short and long-term improvements on practically every measure schools care about higher student academic engagement attendance grades fewer disruptive behaviors and suspensions and lower school dropout rates so if we feel like our students have positive connections with our teachers that’s going to help and so we ask students do you feel like there’s a staff member at the school who has really made an effort to get to know you 64.7 said yes

21:32 so that’s great we would love to see that that number increase we wanted to check in on our students mental health during the past 12 months how often have you been struggling with your mental health enough to affect your daily functioning this includes doing anxious or worried feeling increasingly tense or agitated difficulty sleeping Etc 20.9 said never 19.5 said often 41.7 said sometimes spend 17.8 percent said always this is obviously something we really want to pay attention to a lot of our students are indicating that they’re struggling on a daily basis thank you during the past 12 months if you were struggling would you feel comfortable speaking to any of the following people 63 is apparent 62 said peer 17 said

22:18 School staff 33 said Doctor a therapist 34 said sibling your family member 24 said extended family member and 14 said no I think we would love to see students wanting to talk to our school staff increase and the fact that 14 percent said that they wouldn’t tell anyone is definitely concerning um we’re wanting to check in on if our students have experienced bullying we know that this is a risk factor students that experience bullying are more likely to experience anxiety and depression so have you ever experienced bullying at school at home by friends or online 23.8 said yes so you know that’s a significant number that we want to keep in mind have you ever felt discriminated against targeted or unsafe in school based on any of the following categories so 185

23:07 students responded that they had felt this way of that 185 16.2 percent said race 10.3 said culture 19.5 said physical emotional or learning disability 11.4 percent of gender identity the highest endorsed category was 24.9 or sexual orientation 11.4 percent of religion 7.6 said financial situation 35 said other and the other category was height weight political views thank you so now we’re going to get into some of the substance use questions we included a few questions around adults either behaviors or attitudes because these are going to affect what’s going on with our students this is a risk

23:53 factor potentially currently or previously have any adults that you live with use substances in front of you in a way that made you concerned only eight percent said yes which is which is good so now we’re going to look at some of the specific substances we’ve looked at age of first use the reason we want to look at age at first use the chances of developing an addiction are nearly seven times higher proteins to begin using before the age of 15 than for those who delay uses of the age of 21 or older so any any amount of time we can delay first use is important 96 of adults with substance use disorders began used before the age of 20. so when we asked about age of first use for alcohol 41 of our students have said that they’ve ever drank alcohol 38.9 said that that happens 16 or younger and so we’re looking at an early use issue alcohol use in the past 30 days anything

24:42 in the past 30 days is going to give us a better picture of what’s going on currently um 26.3 said that they had used up consumed alcohol in the past 30 days age of first use electronic nicotine Vape products so only 19.2 percent of students said that they had used an electronic nicotine bait product so the Statewide RBS doesn’t differentiate between marijuana and nicotine vaping I really wanted to do that because they’re two completely different substances um 19.2 percent seems low and I when I looked at that I reached out to the Statewide RBS I said why does it seem so low because I think people feel like more than that are are vaping um and so actually what we found um before I go on to the next site I’ll

25:27 just say that of that 19.2 percent 18 said that they started 16 or younger so again we’re looking at early use for that and that’s the next line so when I reached out to find out if our day if I said something seems wrong here but when I reached out what what I found was this is the most updated data we have in this yellow category from the this is National Data from 2021 and what they explained was um significant decreases in use across many substances including those most commonly used in adolescence um Vapes nicotine the 2021 decrease in vaping for both marijuana and tobacco problems sharp increases in use between 2017 and 2019 and then they leveled off in 2020. the pandemic really saw first use decline because so

26:14 much of first use is socially driven sometimes it happens in schools it happens when students are or adolescents are together during that chunk of time when they they weren’t in school consistently they weren’t together consistently it did delay first use and so even though substance use in general for adults would stop during the pandemic first use was what we’re seeing from the data was delayed and so that’s a great thing I think hopefully we’re going to take the uterus Behavior survey every fall I I would imagine that when we take it again we’re going to see a pretty sharp increase in this and so but I was happy to see that I think that shows that our students were hopefully honest and that data is is comparable to State data and it’s accurate age of first use marijuana THC this does not include CBD or hemp products

27:00 um 23 indicated marijuana use of that 21.4 since 16 are younger marijuana use in the past are 30 days 13.7 percent okay so social norms theory states that our behavior is influenced by misperceptions of how our peers they can act so if we think our peers are are doing something we’re going to be more likely to engage in that so we really wanted to see do our students think how much do our students think that their peers are using alcohol and marijuana so what percentage of your peers do you think are drinking alcohol or using marijuana on a regular basis the highest category was 25 26 to 50 if you think back to the last few slides I showed you

27:47 each of those was less than 30 so our students have a misconception of how many of their peers are using which is something that’s really important for us to know foreign

28:02 marijuana parental attitude substance use are important um and so 87 said that that their parents would be upset or give them a consequence which I think is a protective fact other data um so there’s a lot of questions on this for the purpose of time we just kind of put together what we thought was important low percentages of other addictive substances we asked about lifetime use seven percent cigarettes point five percent non-prescription opiates like Paramount or fentanyl 1.1 percent benzodiazepines Xanax admin Klonopin Etc one percent cocaine one percent other stimulant use Adderall MDMA or Molly methamphetamine some other significant data eight percent tried nicotine Vape products at 13 to 14 years old which was

28:49 in our Middle School ages we’ve been very young and I just thought it was really interesting of the other um addictive substances 3.7 hallucinogen use acid PCP or mushrooms that was one of the higher ones so I just thought that that was important to go so what do we do with this information so this is just a basic analysis of the data we talked about having an early use issue and so we want to look at evidence-based programming at the lower level schools prevention is its own science people that are working on treatment and Recovery that’s one thing but prevention is really is really different so it often has less to do with the dangers of substance use there’s there’s research and evidence out there that shows that basic education and awareness campaigns about the dangers of drug and alcohol are not

29:35 effective in Behavior change so we want to focus in the younger ages about more addressing the protective and risk factors social norms so programming at the middle and high school level targeted sharing the real data around use one of the things that we’ve been missing over the last few years that I would love to to see is some sort of student-led or involved initiatives around substance use prevention we talked about our students Mental Health social emotional learning and mental health support programming at all levels that supports the needs of our students in these areas to enhance protective interests and reduce risk factors I think our district does a great job with this so we just need to keep doing that and then using the yrbs as an annual tool it’s the only way to assess where our community stands and analyze Trends over time

30:20 it’s a way to see if the implemented programming is effective and so we’ve done a lot over the last five years parent education nights student assemblies Health curriculum um we have some tier two interventions that have been great and like I said at the beginning we really just kind of picked what we thought was helpful and and those things we think were helpful but when the pandemic happened we kind of took a breathing year to say let’s collect some data let’s really start to kind of come up with a consistent plan that we can Implement each year that we have we have some tier two interventions we have some tier one interventions we had some parent education nights that we do a few things a year that that people cannot really access resources and do some awareness but that’s evidence-based and it fits the needs of our district

31:05 so so that’s the takeaway in the recommendation hope that this was interesting and helpful and thank you so much for letting me share thank you Gina

31:22 right um this was really interesting and I’ve been looking forward to this survey for a while um of course and uh you know I’m wondering but not all of them to the committee as well but I can’t help myself not just to jump in and ask um with your takeaways um you know it occurs to me that there’s a lot of research about um the amount of traumatic incidents that kids experience and as we grow through the lifespan that lead to um substance use of of any kind and and substance use disorders so I Wonder has there been any conversation at this point I’m clearly you’re aware of that not surprised um and is there any conversation about like at the very low level sort of that type and given everything we know about pandemic and

32:11 and some of the traumas with Big T and Little T that all of us you know most importantly our students have experienced about sort of targeting um targeting that piece so that we’re hopefully not setting kids up as they move through to to Really increase numbers yeah and and so what I can say because I I’m not in the lower levels list I definitely said that it’s been discussed and I think I think what’s already happening is and how it relates to this is we’re talking about like adverse childhood experiences um That Couldn’t lead to potential risk behaviors the risk and protective factors a lot of the protective factors that we can build up to help our students you know be aware and have the skills to avoid some of these risk behaviors I think it’s really embedded

32:56 in a lot of that the social emotional learning work that’s being done I think what we’re missing is that connection piece we’re doing this because SEL is great but also because it can prevent so many risk behaviors on the road I think I think what we’ve been missing and what we’re hopefully going to do in the next few years is is district-wide we’re focusing a ton on the high school which is important because that’s what we’re seeing a lot of the behaviors but we really do need to kind of get down at the lower levels because prevention is going to look so different I think we’re talking about it but I do think the piece that’s missing is kind of the implementation and the thread that goes through the whole district and so hopefully those are things that we can work on as we go great okay thanks um anybody else no I think you know just going through this for the first time the early news data is the concerned piece right and so

33:45 I think that’s your point right so like if we know early use is an issue what are we doing to set our kids up so that we’re actually addressing that so that that’s what stopped out um but I appreciate the data and the information and it’s a useful place for us to start take a quick question just on the data points I know what is a good percentage because I know it’s never going to be zero of kids doing stuff and so 20 was like that average of the substances what’s a better number like what are we trying to get to I think that’s a great question and I think that’s why we look at the saved data to see where where are the other communities in our state are at but just because we might be at the same

34:32 level of State data doesn’t mean that that’s good or bad right but I but I actually think that’s a really good question I think we definitely want to be somewhere like a quarter like 25 or less I think would be what we want to shoot for um because I think it’s important too we have to normalize some of this teenagers are going to engage in some of this it doesn’t always mean that they’re going to become addicted or have negative consequences from it and I think balancing like the harm reduction ideas around making sure that if they are going to use it they do that appropriately and and that doesn’t lead to addictive behaviors so I think we do have to accept like you said it’s never going to be zero but um I think we definitely want to hope that it’s less than a quarter of our population that are using regularly ever have tried I think is experimenting um not necessarily going to lead to an addiction because that’s when we’re in

35:20 the danger though right but I I don’t have a specific answer I think that’s a really great professional answer as we continue to look at the data though Sarah um yes Gina can you let us know what next steps would be this this is a great first step collecting the data but what are next steps yeah I think that’s a great question and so I think I think we’ve collected the data I think the next step is to collect the data again I think so we have a more accurate representation of what’s going on now that hopefully the pandemic has evened out um and I think we need to we need to talk at each school about excuse me what our goals are I think I’m actually meeting with my principal on Monday to talk about what we’re doing next year really in the high school our goal is to do

36:07 um curriculum-based lessons which the health classes are already doing I actually go in and do a substance use lesson myself um we want to have one parent education night a year we want to have one student awareness assembly a year and then we want some tier two interventions so I think what you’re asking for I think is more specifics I think we really need to take the time to look at evidence-based programming that fits the needs of what we just talked about and so I think we’re looking at a few events a year with some ongoing tier two interventions that we can provide for students that either are already at risk or struggling with substance use and so I think when we decide exactly what we’re doing we’ll definitely share those dates out and um you know we can we can share that with the school committee as soon as we have it but I think we need to be looking at some specific several events a year with some ongoing support and resources I

36:57 think as well available for parents but I think to your point earlier and this is probably more directed to John it’s like this is not specific to the high school so if my district perspective I am interested to see like what that plan is and how that all lines up together yeah I think Gina made a great point when she said that we have to look how this I like how you sort of thread how it starts through the whole District starting from like the very beginning and can I just ask when you say tier two supports what does that mean in substance yeah so like a tier one into it would be something in our in our health classes where all the students are in a health class get that’s what or like for example I can even talk a little bit this might answer Sarah’s

37:44 question a little bit about some of the things we’ve done in the past we’ve done the improbable players which is an evidence-based program where um it’s a theater production where they come and they talk about how substance use affects the family and we did that for our sophomores and juniors a few years so that would be a tier one intervention because the whole brain gets it tier two would be something like a substance use group for students who had uh disciplinary issues it needs to build around it okay come and excuse me I can come and get um like some psychoedter counselor so tier two being a little bit more specific

38:31 um so I recently heard someone saying I can’t remember if a stand at the Sac or where it was at but sort of the interesting piece that if this was if this was done right now the sort of the Wonder around um the back to the beginning of the presentation about having adult meaningful a meaningful adult interactions and support and and kind of a relationship that they were looking for that was like 60 some percent um that wondering particularly given the pandemic and how disrupted it’s really you know not only just the freshmen but you know basically every other grade that was wondering sort of now that we’ve had a worn normal year if that would be higher at this point in the year um and it so it was an interesting wonder that that made a lot of sense um and and you know probable um and a good thing I think the timing

39:20 of the year that we asked that question too is important it was at the beginning of the year yeah

39:29 um

39:40 we really appreciate this and I know I’m fascinated you know next year to have you back and and learn especially with vaping piece that was fascinating to me and I you know I’m sure you’ve seen it just as much of sort of like pre-pandemic it was kind of all encompassing and then it just paused and now it’s funny because I’ve started over the past like month or two to hear more about it again um and that that it’s you know kind of turns way back up to being to being a problem um so it’ll be interesting to see what that data is next fall yes and we will take the survey again every year right absolutely yes great um today opportunity at the middle school level we haven’t yet but yet

40:25 thank you very much all right John I will pass it over to you for your business updates sure uh just a couple updates the um stipend committee uh continues to meet I think we have come to a final place for club and activity and team leader stipends so that is set um we continue to meet on uh perhaps the bigger part of our stipends which are uh athletic coaching stipends and so there are several proposals on the table uh currently looking at the number of categories that we have and then how many steps are within each category and so uh a couple proposals have come in Michelle has been betting them and

41:13 costing them out and so I am very hopeful that we will have this uh resolved by the end of the year so that it’s going to go into effect for next year deal the other update that I had oh was there any questions just can you remind me who’s working on that with you and Michelle sure it’s uh Dan Bauer Matt Fox Michelle and I it’s Andrew scolia at uh High School um Greg siglarski the athletic director Sally chevry and Jonathan hello all right will we see any summary data absolutely yeah I’m just curious how that all

42:04 and then the Brown School principal search had its final round of interviews today we had um a search committee meeting on Tuesday we did the final interviews today and I am hopeful that we will have an announcement for the Brown School principal at school committee next week questions on that that’s it any questions and when would we anticipated that position would start July July 1.

42:42 it has been a very comprehensive process yes there are more levels uh there have been more levels in this search process uh than uh prior searches and I think some really nice pieces have emerged that we’ll want to consider for future searches as well all right Michelle that moves us into the finance and organizational support section and you are up with a monthly financial report yes thank you so the financial report um that was distributed earlier this week as as of March 31st at this point in the year we were 61 of the way through our expense budget or our whole operating budget um just 25 million 668 000 in expenditures

43:29 so we do have a couple areas that we continue to monitor as as we have all along during this year so we’re currently projecting a deficit in the out of District tuition um which we knew about but right now the current figure we’re looking at is 552 000. um this is due to additional out of District placements to meet means of our students and also a reduction in the tuition in Revenue we’ve had some students that started with us who have actually withdrawn from the program so those were unanticipated even two months ago um but not to worry these uh shortfalls will be able to be funded through um savings that we’ve realized through unfilled positions it’s not positions that we don’t need um certainly if we had these positions filled it would be less of a demand on

44:17 our staff so I don’t want to say we have surplus funds because certainly we do not but um due to just the difficulty in filling these positions this year we have come up with a large Surplus in our um salary budget piece so that is going to cover all of our deficits for this coming year um the second area we’re looking at is out of District transportation Transportation costs these costs are split between our special education idea Grant and the operating budget with most of the expenses Falling Towards the grant this will be covered by some discretionary funds within that Grant and the additional will be covered by the operating budget um it was due to those unfilled positions again

45:04 next is our substitute account um so far we have spent 178 000 of that account or 78 of the budget line we actually received about a hundred thousand dollars in covert reimbursement sick time from the state which we applied to this account because we had credited employees with their sick time back that we’re eligible for it and if we didn’t have this hundred thousand dollars one-time offset we would be running into deficit at this point so because of that funding we are in okay shape I think we will be close to um written even in this account by the end of the year and lastly our custodian overtime account is now in deficit as we

45:50 anticipated or as I anticipated um currently we’ve spent just over seventy five thousand dollars which is our budget amount we will be able to cover this deficit with the um Surplus from the unfilled positions or um just vacant positions within the custodial lines we have had two bus drivers vacant all year long we have had a number of custodians on extended leaves this year so it gives us some some savings and but it’s also causing us both into overtime on recurring regular basis um lastly I’m also attaching an Esser status report of the three Esser grants that we have we have the sr1213 grants total spent

46:35 all those three grants is 681 000 we have encumbered 89 000 and we have about 480 000 left that has not been spent um the first of these grants is actually expiring this September but we pretty much have have spent all of it with the exception of a couple thousand um sr2 is right behind it I think we’ve spent all of it but about forty thousand so we’re really into the sr3 funds at this point um which do not expire until 2024 so um certainly we want to use them in the best needs possible to impact our students but we’re we’re in no hurry to spend them right now is there any questions Sarah

47:20 um yes Michelle do you have a sense there’s a lot of items where we’re running in a very very deep deficit um but luckily or look unluckily depending on which way you look at it we’re able to make that up because we are so understaffed right now because we’re just there’s a staffing shortage out there we’re just we we are trying to hire these people we just are unable to um do you now or could you present us a number maybe next week of if we were fully staffed what the actual deficit would be because I think that number is really good for people to understand you know as we move forward through the budget process because I think when people hear there’s a surplus it’s really hard to understand that it’s not a true Surplus it’s it’s

48:08 that we’re running understaffed because we can’t hire staff right absolutely um honestly that figure would be approximately six to seven hundred thousand dollars we would have those fed tuitions um that we’re we’re using the the unfilled position funds for and a good portion of the the transportation piece so probably that would be about roughly seven hundred thousand dollars which is a significant amount of money and we all know the only place you find seven hundred thousand dollars mid-year is salaries so we’re fortunate and that’s and it just highlights you know the budget situation we are in and why moving forward it is so important um that we stabilize though that that

48:55 volatility um do has there been any additional out of District placements Beyond because I know it’s that is a constant moving Target um and we do a lot of work to project that but again you know it being what it is it’s hard is there have there been any additional that would rise above the what is it 84 or 886 that we plan for next year um we’re looking at that number right now so we are we’re taking that into consideration um and looking at that and we are looking at um possibly hopefully preserving some of our carryover circuit breaker funds from last year if at all possible to push in some of that um for next year and I used to mentioned that we are not anticipating having to dip into the special education Reserve

49:45 fund this year as we had initially thought we might have to but we will not have to do that thank you Michelle for giving a very thorough report I hear that we’re not going to have to dip into the uh those are 99 sure you’ll not have to okay right and I think there are a few things here that are one time the the covid has ended the Massachusetts benefit I believe what expired April 1st or in that yeah right about right about that time my place of work as well so so that benefit there won’t right well hopefully if we don’t have a pandemic you know we’ll be good to go with that um but I think it’s interesting too because um I can wait but since we’re talking about Finance so article 27 was the transfer funds to the special education

50:34 stabilization account it’s been in place for three years now and so the VidCon voted to uh have a recommendation of town meeting because at the time when we were before fincom Michelle wanted to be able to do this more complete dive and as more weeks went by obviously we knew closer and closer and where we are and so I learned something and that we understand uh we found through Steve my understanding always was that if the money would be was swept back into free cash every year but we learned that this is a true stabilization account so the money stays stays in that account had we needed to spend some of it say fifty thousand dollars

51:21 we would have gone back to ask the finance committee to fund it fund another fifty thousand dollars so it would get back to the 250 I believe correct so that’s my understanding yeah so that’s that’s good news because we don’t need to go back we don’t need to make any motions at town meeting and ask right and based on the updates I let the town know that last week I wanted to finish this projection that we should be awesome that we’re hearing that we’re hearing tonight so that’s that is really good do not have to because I think as fincom said there with all appropriated budgets and funding there was about a million dollars of unappropriated funds from leftover free cash and that was just you know a level of Safety and Security for

52:08 what might and could happen throughout any given year they didn’t really want to go below that number so that’s good news absolutely yourself all right uh we’ve had schedules um so I will ask for emotions improve the identified schedule for bill so Bill’s totaling 554 906.94

52:38 any questions on any of those all right uh roll call Sarah Fox yes thank you David Harris yes Sarah gold yes Megan Taylor Emily Barron yes all right thank you all right okay um that brings us to our school committee discussion items um I am going to ask that it’s okay with everybody

53:11 okay article 33 discussion up to the top of this um we do have a member of the reckon Park uh commission with us and so just to be cognizant of your time and we thank you that you’re here uh that we’ll move it up to the top and and talk about that right now is that okay with everybody excellent great um so as I think all of us know do you want to join us why not yes Linda rice Collins join the latest technology um so this has been an ongoing piece with bike more um it was somewhere around a year ago that we go to this committee to enter into an mou with like more um about the property at Green and Beacon that we have that’s um you know kind of being unused land

54:01 and whitemore wanted to put in a white park there and as after we go to the mou they came back and had trouble with the liability insurance piece to it so they’ve been working behind the scenes um it I’m not really sure where the disconnect is I think we’re getting towards having a solution here but the liability piece kept kind of popping up so at the warrant hearing this was discussed with this article 33 that it wasn’t just as simple as kind of where they had it in their original language that it actually according to the town and Town Council made sense for the school committee to turn over the beacon and Green Street property to reckon Park and that then Bracken Park would work with bikemore to attempt to come up with

54:52 an mou that’s suitable for you and your board and an organization and invite more and then putting it kind of more with the town the liability aspect starts to I think come easier to to iron out is what I’ve where my head is at with that correct me if I’m wrong Linda um I’ve had also some sidebar conversations and I I think the key word is if we have it as a recreation and because we have a recreation park Department it makes sense to move the property over to us we haven’t had any discussion formal discussion with the bike more group so that has to happen so the language that I was given by John again is it’s recommended but that

55:41 doesn’t mean it’s a done deal we have to as you said we have to go through the process of the mou and ironing out everything along the way making sure we have that liability insurance yeah and that’s exactly how I understood it and I was on a couple of email exchanges with Derek today and John mcginn and that was exactly sort of the concern that was stated and and that you know as we all know we can’t make sure that any of our boards are going to do one thing or the other before the board actually meets and votes to do one thing or the other so um so yeah so I’ll open this up for some discussion if we want to move forward there’s kind of two motions that I’m prepared to put forward one would be that we would have to turn just pull it up that we would have to transfer the

56:31 ownership of the parcel of land at Beacon and grain over to the town of Marblehead and then that we would also motion to support article 33 at town meeting um so those are kind of the two talking points tonight as as we’ve talked before um I think even just last meeting I think it was the facilities subcommittee had recommended that we that we turn this parcel of land back over to the town regardless we’ve had this piece out there with the mou on on our land use and sort of wanting it to be more coordinated effort um so that was and then when we at that point it didn’t appear to be that we could turn it over at this town meeting um so this you know all of this work has kind of happened since that meeting um

57:17 to to provide an opportunity that that we can take so I will be quiet um sure I’m trying to answer them so I feel like we’ve been talking about this bike more project for a long time and I’m fully supportive of like more project and getting that land to be used for that purpose so I just want to be clear about that I’m so confused about where it started to not work out because my understanding we had like more in here was that they were going to use it we had mou all lined up set up for you know reviewed by Council and approved

58:03 that the town would support the liability piece of it so I guess I’m just not clear why it doesn’t work for the town to support the liabilities for the schools for park and rec but that’s the piece I’m kind of not understanding right now so and Linda correct me if I’m wrong this was talked about a bit at the warrant hearing that that if we hold that piece of property it’s it’s designated as for school use and so this would not be for use of the schools if we kept the property under the schools if we turn it over to the town with and give it to park and rec because that’s their designation and then technically if it’s going to be a recreational park that then the town would be able to figure out that liability insurance piece that that was a snag

59:00 the key was the word recreation and as you said you are more educational and we’re the recreational part and because um they’ve gone through several rounds of this insurance so it has to come it has to have the word recreation within it when Lisa Mead was investigating it if that’s making any sense yeah that makes sense so then in terms of the process can you walk us through that again exactly follow that so so I believe that they that kind of like they have it ironed out town meeting and article wise so that this the the email that was in the Dropbox and the the

59:50 wording that is down at the bottom of that email is what’s going to town meeting and is what’s been okay to be put at town meeting by at least Mead and I believe Gary spies um so but it would require us to make this official vote to turn it over to the town tonight and that would recommend turn it over to the town and then also kind of put our support behind this article and and supporting reckon Park to come to an agreement in an mou hopefully with so there’s a warm article that so that we can be that the town can use to take it from the town to parking lot so I think this whole this article does

1:00:39 all of that article 33 artists

1:00:45 Sarah yes Sarah um if I may so we went through a little bit when we were building the school about transferring property the possibility of between us and park and rec when we were looking at moving pieces of evolith and butterworn and what those mechanisms were and we’ve added that pretty thoroughly um at that point it was okay for us to to transfer directly from the schools directly to park and rec so why can we not do that now it worked then why can’t we do it now okay okay uh so Michelle I’m looking to Michelle because she and I were I I’d asked her for um language for the motion uh I think that we can get that most property is just general Town property I

1:01:36 mean so I find actually it’s very unusual that this particular parcel that doesn’t have any school uses under the school department um and it’s actually back it goes back to the 60s I believe um so I I thought if we just transfer it to the town the town can determine their their ownership but then they would need to in order to because for some reason because well because in Marblehead we always do things slightly different um we have things under our Parcels strictly under the Karen custody the schools the Karen custody of Park and Rec the Karen custody of the cemetery commission so on and so forth the Karen custody is the fire department that’s how we that’s how uh we do our Parcels um and so because I know at other Town warrants you know there was a plot of

1:02:22 land that went from I believe the the cemetery commission to the fire department or vice versa so it would be it would be my preference that we transfer this directly to the care and custody of Park and Rec reation yeah

1:02:43 I think that’s yeah

1:02:50 all right any other questions concerns clarifications can I just let you know I can’t get myself I cannot help myself with this I’m sorry I’m gonna be the broken record I would really love to see us take the mou that we have with the town and really look at a strategic plan for how we want to handle all properties that is false under the school overall I really like to see us make that happen because this is now I think at least the second and third time this year where we’re having these conversations and we’ve just kind of looked at it strategically and had a plan for how we want to use this I just think we can all be in a better place so and I completely agree I think the holdout is we’ve identified our

1:03:38 people the board of selectment has not identified their people for the side the side of the mou so we’re kind of in a holding pattern until the town decides who Emily and I are supposed to work with um we’ve contacted them I just they haven’t they haven’t voted it they haven’t it’s not been on their agenda I will reach out again um but they until we can identify the people that are representing their side of the mou we can’t I mean I guess we could meet with their whole board we could ask to get on their agenda as a whole board rather than doing it via the mou but if we don’t know who the reps are we can’t really move forward just my plug which is a general comment like we’ve just we’ve been talking about this for a long time so let’s just see if we can get that done yep yep I I

1:04:25 understand where you’re coming from and I don’t disagree and you know at Sarah’s point is well taken and um yeah I think you know I I also I’m fully in support of this and I think you know but we sort of keep sort of having these one-off pieces of land and that’s the the idea of that we would have a coordinated plan um and and one just kind of point of information on that Sarah and Emily when you guys obviously had recommended at the last meeting that we turned this property back over did you have at your second meeting a fuller conversation around all the properties or was it really more this one kind of because there’s all this stuff with the article that’s been that’s been simmering for a bit

1:05:11 we we talked about every property mostly in a list of identifying what each property is because some of them for instance labeled Smith Street it’s not it’s not obvious it’s actually part of our campus the high school so as we went through line item by line item every one of these quote-unquote you know unidentified Parcels if you will were actually a portion of our campuses because our campuses are segmented like um David if you recall um the original Bell school was actually six or seven different Parcels um and we merged it as one so it’s just another quirky Marblehead thing um so other than Beacon Street everything has a a building on it that is a school a present oh interesting okay

1:06:00 what about Green Street this is the beacon in green yeah we already gave that up that we transferred that to Water and Light right yes last year that’s and I guess I’m calling that um I thought that was Green Street

1:06:24 let me let me hold the Shelf language back up a little bit so can I get a motion to change parcel of land known as Beacon Street with parcel ID 169200 shown on the Assessor’s map as map one five nine lot 20 to the care and custody of the recreation and park Department

1:06:51 all right I think we’ve talked that one to Ducks uh Sarah Fox yeah David Harris yes Sarah gold yes Megan Taylor yes and Emily Baron yes all right great that passes five to zero and then I hope this works out for breakfast and then can I get a motion to support article 33 of the annual town meeting

1:07:21 Sarah second all right uh Sarah Fox yes David Harris yes cerebral yes Megan Taylor yes Emily Baron yes all right that passes 5-0 Linda thank you very much for joining us this evening we appreciate it um just so that you know that was going to be a Nature’s class they were going to use it as a Nature’s Classroom for the schools in that in that area thank you for that little bit of History can we um at town meeting when article 33 comes up as our representative can you um just coordinate with them and let them I’m sure they’re probably watching but I I think it will help when they’re going for their their warrant article if they say they have the unanimous support

1:08:09 of the school committee I think it’s always really nice and you know to have that yeah no absolutely and um Pat and I were playing phone tag yesterday and so I can absolutely connect with her and let her know that we’ll be prepared to do that all right so we’ll go back up to speaking of town meeting to the top of that um list and so I just I wanted to since we have this meeting right before town meeting I wanted to just kind of officially have a conversation around things that people want to see in the presentation that that is done for article 46 um I know Emily you’ve been doing some work with John on on that on creating that presentation and so I just want to

1:08:56 make sure that you know the entire committee and and what they had concerns about is represented there and then um just to sort of delineate who’s going to who’s going to represent that article um so I’ll I’ll put out just first sort of the representation that I think should happen is um Dr Bucky and and David um sort of taking the lead on that and and presenting that um so I’ll put that out there and then just kind of yield the floor to discussion around important pieces of of our budget of our past budget that we would like to see represented in the slides I will also put out that um John spoke with John mcgannon the other day and was recommended particularly fingers crossed that we get town meeting in in

1:09:45 one night that we really stick to kind of three to five slides um and a pretty quick a pretty quick presentation um so with all that in mind questions comments um I support David and Dr bunky doing the presentation I think that’s a good recommendation um and I’ve passed my feedback to John in terms of what I want to see so it’s aware of that uh if I could um so before we get started with 46 I just also so article 11 the understanding was that um since it is sponsored by the board of Select mode uh that John mcginn will be speaking to that article so as we know Emily and Sarah that the roof for the high school

1:10:34 is included in that the roof for the uh wing of the vet school is included in that article um the HVAC units and the technology peace is included um for the smart for the smart screens that being said um if somebody asks a question you know we should be prepared uh you know I think John can answer but let’s you know I was talking to Steve earlier and I said let’s say someone just stands up and says can you tell me like what kind of smart screens these are and how big are they and just a basic like here’s here’s the information that we can

1:11:23 pop up on the screen um when it comes to the roof uh whether or not we want to take that report I don’t think we need to put it on an m a shared drive but we need to maybe we make it available to the person who holds the computer town meeting you know so that maybe we just have a couple pictures of the roof that’s in that report those color pictures that were in that report and and then you know I mean on article 11 we can decide uh you know who who wants to answer the question if somebody asked a question about the roof yes yes so you’re completely right I did I did I’m connected with Jackie buff Becker on that okay sort of what their plan was she said basically exactly what you have said is that John mcginn is fully

1:12:12 prepared to talk about everything but if someone asks a question that goes into into our different asks who is who should John know to reach out to at that point um to answer those questions so um that’s the question that I’m not totally sure of if it’s if it kind of continues to be dated or if it’s someone from the administration um I can see it going either way I’m yeah I’m perfectly happy to answer any questions on on number 11. I’m pretty well versed in in talking about the facilities items and and plan I’m also happy if someone else wants to do it but I kind of have it all embedded up there so I I can do that yeah sounds good that’s good and then deep in

1:13:03 preparation for that Sarah you have the two um how left field did it into like I call it worst case scenario if there was no support from the msba in case someone says also we have to ask as we know for the full amount of the funding so the article carries that worst case scenario number of the 5.6 so I guess if somebody says are we have we looked for reimbursement yep because you need those support documents we can make sure you have those but there was that scenario too potentially that we could get some that must be reimbursement but in all cases you have to ask for the follow-out first yeah and then as far as um the question about those those pictures um I think it’s probably really easy for

1:13:49 Michelle to just get those to Stephen because she has all that the original files for that um from the auditor um and since they’re you know located in the same physical space I think that would be that would work right Michelle yeah okay you’ll do a little overview of what what the like a one-page PDF of what the screens are so that maybe we can throw that up that we have to and just talking about this can I go to 46 yeah who gets the slide deck Becky current is responsible for getting that to her so I’ll give you the final draft yep so also I think it’s important you know

1:14:42 as it was you know when we did this in 19 for all of us to be prepared you know depending on how the night goes to also speak to why we support this um I think that 19 that was really super powerful having a lot of our committee members speak to why we support this and um you know because the public wants to know and needs to know that you know we’re behind this and why we’re behind this to kind of help them get behind it if you will that’s a good point Sarah and maybe you know somewhere in either the the spoken presentation or on a slide that it can that we can mention that this was a five to zero um budget vote um so we’re all fully in unanimous

1:15:30 support of this um foreign

1:15:41 right and I think once again to the to the extent that people I think town meeting you know over the years goes in a couple of different ways people generally can just get up and they’re making us they’re making a statement so it doesn’t necessarily require a response by anyone after the presentation has been made uh you know it’s not required to jump up so unless maybe there was a sure we’ll all be there Michelle will be if someone had a number specific question you know we can figure out and at that point um you know given odd if you need to get up and just answer a specific question you know somebody drills in on a on a question yeah and I think that’s the great part about just being a positively reframe how this process has been so

1:16:30 lengthy is that we all have a really good working knowledge on this budget and the budget asks and what have gone to it and how it puts you throughout the past few months um the piece that I had wanted to kind of note and again I don’t know whether it just goes into the spoken piece but I actually think this might be a little highlight that the pieces around the um the benefits that we’ve added in that that are not going to the school department that are going to the town as well as um you know sort of highlighting that facilities aspect um of that we’ve sort of are memorializing that within our budget so that that we can take care of our properties that was a big piece because

1:17:16 the facilities meetings is better you know concerned historically so now yeah

1:17:30 and so we are posted for six years for seven o’clock yes for a town meeting starts so as as I think this fits into this art like this part of our agenda um I think one of the things that you know I’m just trying to think you know what has really been successful in the past and also what are people looking for I think it would be really helpful for us now to kind of say you know obviously we help we hope we get through Monday night and pending approval Monday night we will be hosting XYZ you know three or so whatever the amount of forums are that that are to answer questions concerns comments and just you know help to to get the

1:18:17 information out there um so I think that if we could do that as a group now that that that would um be very helpful in the process just saying just committing to we will be doing these these forums in in doing that yeah no that sounds good um and so you’re talking about forms similar to what happened with the building where sort of yeah facts were laid out again and questions to be answered and yeah like not not necessarily a debate Forum because no no no just could you explain what line this line item does can you explain what that you know just really answering a lot of those questions I think I think that that was really really helpful when we did those I think you know

1:19:05 they were looking back they were in the High School auditorium there they were well attended they were well received because you know some people really just needed more information I know we have the budget hearing but until it kind of goes through tempting and gets on the ballot some people just don’t know that they have questions and want to come and I think it’s really good for us to be able to say Monday night we will be holding these sure yeah that makes a lot of sense um so if I’m hearing you correctly you want us to pick a few dates to kind of be able to put out or or we don’t have to necessarily iron out dates tonight we need to let the minutia just say we are committing to doing at least two or at least three public forums where the school committee and administration will be presenting and

1:19:50 answering questions okay with you if we say two to three just yeah yeah that’s I think that’s really going to be helpful okay yeah absolutely and we can work those dates out later with school schedules and administration okay

1:20:14 right um and I’ll just take a moment because I I wanna so there’s been a couple of times that people have reached out to me just sort of with some concerns over some things that you know just things are going back and forth in the community and questions about some facts that I think are not quite correct um so I’ll put these out there and then anyone can correct me if I’m wrong so there will be if if if we are unsuccessful with either article 46 or then the general vote at the at the ballots um on June 21st if we’re unsuccessful we will not have to cut any staff we will not have to cut programs that that there’s no um like any kind of math

1:21:03 curriculum piece isn’t being impacted with that um and give us one more thing that I don’t know if any of that’s true there’s parts of this new of this additional override that were that our principals came to us and said they needed to expand on the math curriculum the homework components that they asked for at k-6 those are embedded in this or at least as it was presented Michelle correct me if I’m wrong as it was presented by the principals in December when they presented why they needed some there was extra programs they needed and things like that additional educational programs and things I’m not aware that they’re connected to the math curriculum necessarily the the

1:21:51 new program we put in this year there might be some enhancements to certainly well yeah so that they could do the homework component I thought that’s how it was described by Mandy and Sean and Brian was they were enhancements so that we would be able to use because the current program I don’t believe has a homework component that we that these were enhancements and add-ons I didn’t remember that at all so that’s why I sort of bring it up because again it’s been something that was brought to me um yeah and then as far as the staff goes some of these I mean I know there’s one thought that we would and this is a bigger School Community conversation I think that we would just not add any of the items that are in the override but some of those items are actually very necessary items they’re things like

1:22:37 security updates so we would have to then go within that body and prioritize are any of those immediate needs right now and if they are we’ll have to make adjustments to allow for those immediate needs we have never talked about cutting staff yeah I’m not saying we did but there’s one big pot of money never been a conversation and like as of right now our staff are fully funded through the budget that was passed at VidCon every every position is fully funded so this override has no impact on our staffing levels and it the only impact it has is adding staff and services is some items in this override we currently have staff for instance long-term Subs

1:23:26 we currently have hired them we currently staff them right now if this override is not fulfilled we will no longer be able to staff those is that correct Michelle I think all of the current long-term Subs because we’re actually having some difficulty retaining them we’ll be able to be funded we will not be able to put two positions at every school I’m suggesting we put one position at each school so most likely existing staff will continue okay so everything in the new override we just there will there’s nothing that we would anything in this override there’s nothing that we would operationally have to have next year we could get rid of all of it correct and the very few things that we do need we can probably get with some savings

1:24:15 due to a retirement or two we’re just starting to hear of possible a very small handful of retirements which is going to be a small amount of savings some of these things I thought were necessary for next year that was my understanding we needed them for next year yeah so well Sarah I think I think I’m I’m sort of missing so so we’re asking for an override that will um help support and provide exemplary education that’s that’s been the theme right and that’s what that’s what’s been put forward and then we have our tracking budget priorities that are recurring and one time it’s about two million and one million and those are

1:25:06 those are all uh you know take the tuition for kindergarten that’s you know that that’s there so if it doesn’t pass people will still pay their kindergarten for tuition oh no definitely those some of those I definitely I just I truly believe favorite vitamin items in there that were an absolute need for next year so I didn’t so I I needed I think we need to be very careful with our words because all of these things are needs for our district but and and this is the and this is one of the big reasons why you know the question of like why can’t we just wait until next year well next year not only have we not funded these needs but there’s going to be the additional needs it we can just look at the

1:25:54 facility maintenance means in and of it themselves that if we don’t take care of the ones this year those will be there next year as well as the ones that we are slated to take care of next year and then you know there’s there’s other pieces that within one time costs or even recurring costs that are going to continue to fund other pieces within our larger strategic plan such planning for success so these are all needs but I have never been under the impression that if we do not get this that we would be that we would be kind of back to the drawing board and sort of seeing who you know seeing which part of the budget we’re going to rob from to to to

1:26:39 support this other stuff um that that obviously yes these are needs that’s why we’re going they’ve been needs for quite some time but they’ve been needs for quite some time so yes how long can we put Kick the Can down the road we’re saying we’re done kicking the hand down the road right now but if the voters say no you know okay here’s where we’re at and I think that was the piece for me at the warrant or another warrant here at the Vincom budget hearing that having that special education and transportation tuition put into our operating budget that took that heat off of if if if that had to be put into this override as well we would be in huge trouble if we did not pass this because it absolutely would need to write that those are known costs that

1:27:29 have to be supported and they are Now supported so all of these all of these other needs will continue to be needs until we support them and at some point you know they may become something that has to take priority you know we can’t we can’t never fund a roof um we can’t you know we can’t never get new social studies textbooks but this year things will move forward and again you can see them next year with additional asks thank you for that because in reading some of those yes some of those kindergarten tuition things like that it’s a need that we want filled now if we had to kick the key and we could um some of those I thought were a can we literally could not kick any further we just could not we hit a wall and it had to be right now that was my

1:28:17 understanding on some of the safety things but I I guess that’s to the decision of all right certainly there are things we want to do sooner than later but there’s nothing we absolutely have to it’s not an end-all deal can I just make a comment though so just to not confuse people it’s not that we can really not have these things we have to remember that if we didn’t do them now they’re going to be more expensive next year and what we have is going to continue to fail yep um so we have to remember that for town meeting that it’s not like it’s okay if this doesn’t pass because it’s not okay so that’s the biggest priority and message we need to send right now yeah but we could survive yes but survival is not we don’t

1:29:04 want to just be surviving yeah we’ve done that for far too long yeah so we just I just want to make that clear yeah thank you yeah that’s well played

1:29:15 all right okay okay that’s great so we’re good I think selling orders yes um all right that will move us on to um I wanted to lay out it’s everybody’s favorite time of year the superintendent evaluation discussion um so I wanted to lay out the process obviously we’re kind of coming down we can sort of see the end of the year and so we need to be on this so um I need a calendar to look at um what I am proposing and have discussed briefly with John is that so our next our meeting next week um because we’re we’re on and off week because of April vacation so we’ll have a meeting next week on the 5th that is the meeting that we’re going to be at Medco headquarters

1:30:03 so that meeting although Marblehead people are absolutely welcome to join us down in Boston that meeting will will also be on Zoom um we thank Stephen ahead of time that he’s going to make that trip with us with all the technology and everything um so so you know I don’t want to kick off the superintendent evaluation at that meeting so I think at the not on the meeting at the night on the 19th John is going to present his self-evaluation and so that was sort of officially kick this off um and then I will have them do by the second of June and then at our meeting on the 16th we will look at the the collaboration results and vote it

1:30:52 um ideally okay so John’s self about is on the 195 19. yep we when do we need to get we would get them to the person and so I I would I’m going to recommend that we have Emily um put them together

1:31:18 if you want to um and I know last year it worked really well with Lisa um to kind of help combine and do it but particularly a lot of that um the formatting formatting was a nightmare I remember um so when we need to get questions so but in a second so the back juice second okay yeah so that’s two weeks there and then two weeks for them to be blanking on the word like tabulated and combined Consolidated yep um and put into the one formal evaluation and then presented at the meeting on 6 16. um now as a piece of this I had asked at the last meeting that we talk about

1:32:06 doing a staff survey one of the target items was leadership and I think it’s really hard to um I evaluate that without a staff survey and and um a 360 survey if you would um so I would propose that you know we we developed that survey and then ask you know Steven quiet Tech maybe just to send it out because he has you know the access to the Aspen and the tech and all that that he send it out to the proper parties and when it comes back forward it to all of us so I know John has a little bit of information on that because he’s done it after Sarah asked at the last meeting he followed up with mea um and asked other

1:32:52 districts as well I will just put out there right from the get-go uh like survey writing and we’ve seen our survey things go south in a hot minute um I would be highly uncomfortable crafting a survey it’s it’s not in any of our wheel houses yeah that’s what I was going to say like I’m not it’s not even oppose or favor the idea it’s more just that I don’t think we have the time to put a effective or appropriate survey in place develop it review it and get it in place um in time I think this is something that you know we’d need to think about get some outside assistance with and make sure that we’re very clear to John

1:33:38 on what we’re going to be evaluating and how we’re going to use that data so I think honestly to throw it in at this point is a little bit too late for it to be both thoughtful fair and effective John um I did I when Sarah brought it up I put it out to the superintendent’s list um 79 districts responded 77 do not do a 360 survey for a variety of different reasons some of them exactly what you’re talking about survey writing is tricky um I did talk to mea they were because I think Sarah had mentioned that uh facilitating it through mea they were not amenable to doing a survey um so that’s the data I have I’m happy to do a

1:34:27 survey with direct reports as we did last year and to include that in my evaluation yeah I guess I would I would assume that anything you gave us last year would give us this year again yes um

1:34:48 does that timeline work

1:34:57 yeah I mean I’m happy to work with someone say I know Emily’s doing this I’m happy to work with Emily oh you know so that we can present I guess I’ll make a motion that Emily and I work to develop a survey that um we the the school committee can review prior to the next meeting um and and then we would have Stephen quiet Tech send it out so I made that motion so I think you’re treading on on Dangerous Grounds there we don’t have we don’t I mean that would be a Regis overstep of us to to go over MEA and and send out a a survey to the teachers I mean you know our our direct contact is Dr Bucky

1:35:46 um he’s he’s the administrator that that that we manage and then he’s the administrator that we’ve hired to manage all the other staff um so I would be really uncomfortable with that

1:36:03 yeah I would agree I’m not I’m not in favor of any survey this year if it’s something that the committee wants to take up maybe at our summer agree and have some further in-depth discussions at this hour and stage of time I think one I just don’t think there’s time one I think there are a lot of questions that you that you point out and how that would be facilitated and if we even wanted to facilitate it and so maybe if it does become a summer Retreat issue or an item like that for the discussion for future evaluations Sarah that would be my recommendation possibly reaching out to Dorothy to see if there are any committees that do this um

1:37:00 so I just want to make sure I clarify for the minutes there was no second on the motion correct correct all right so we’ll just say that that make sure that Lisa reflects in the minutes the motion was made what the motion was and that there was no second yeah um all right we’ve done article 33 so then we are talking about the metco parent representative process so Emily you had a couple of policies that um were dropped in this the Dropbox folder um so I’m going to just kind of turn it over to you and you can kind of Kick this conversation off um yeah so I contacted the Bedford

1:37:46 um I was gonna say PTO because I wrote PTO school committee chair um and she sent me the policy that they just created and implemented um to have a echo representative on their school committee a non-voting member so I think we can follow their policy I mean we don’t have to vote it obviously we’ll bring it to our policy subcommittee and then work out the um the actual ideas and language and then send it out to the appropriate people but we did want to get it started um to have the person selected and we were thinking maybe at our next meeting uh because it will be at Petco headquarters so what they State here is

1:38:35 that the person or the candidate is nominated by the superintendent or metco director and the mecco PCO chair or president come together and figure out a good candidate for this position and then brings it to us and we can discuss and vote the person on uh so I thought that was a good way to go about it if anyone has different thoughts that’s great too but um the policy does kind of go over what their role is they’re basically a member does everything that we do but just doesn’t vote okay um or comments um I just needed so much I’m not sure

1:39:22 um I would really like to get this in front of mecco you are going to be there yeah next week I would like to have them review this um and get their thoughts on a timeline yes so I met with Julia Ferreira today who is our um interim co-director she’s taken over that role and I discussed this with her and she thought there will be definitely parents who are interested and she knows that I was going to talk to John to get them contacting um to get contact with them so I’ll send this to her send it off and she’ll kind of facilitate that because she has been in contact with parents is that what you need to like get them to see it yeah I mean I I guess I thought this would be one of our topics when we are meeting with them okay next week oh so go over the policy yeah to be

1:40:08 like okay guys you know this is something we’d really like to do this is an example policy we’d love your feedback on it but here’s the process we’re thinking about it again you’d love your feedback um you know in terms of timeline what works for you all getting your meeting schedule so I don’t know you know how often they meet either um so I think I definitely am on board with all this stuff I think it’s all great I think one of the things you know just the final piece but I think this is really a great um kind of Base to start with and just get their feedback on it sounds good can you what was the Lincoln schools policy that’s in our folder as well I looked up the two because Bedford said uh Lincoln’s policy has been

1:40:54 they’ve enjoyed us for a while and Bedford took their or used Lincoln as you know a resource for their policy so it’s just where this has all come from LinkedIn was the first bedroom right because it’s adapted there okay so this is this is sort of a metal bedford’s like goes on for like a page and a half and right Lincoln’s is a paragraph yeah yeah sometimes happens with policies okay yeah that’s not it’s not the most uncommon thing to see where some we’ve got one in our in our policy manual that is like seven or eight pages and most of the other districts that we compare to usually is it’s like yeah okay and so you know we we worked with legal on that to make sure that that we’re that we’re that we’ve dealt with that correctly um but yeah so they’re

1:41:42 representative of of the needs of the district okay so so the the next steps obvious you know so we’re bringing this forward thank you Emily for the work you’ve done to give it and then it would be that uh the policy committee starts to work on what what the proposal would look like or we would vote to support a policy and then put that to the committee to bring a policy back yeah so yeah I think so yeah so we got some feedback from our trip to metco next week if I’m wrong and then you and I which works better because I don’t know if you can see the policy in between today and next Thursday um so that you and I can meet as policy and and you know figure out what it would look

1:42:31 like for a Marblehead um a Marblehead policy okay that makes more sense like having them help us prove it yeah and then in conjunction with that they can be figuring out okay I guess that was a jumping gun because I you’re so excited let’s get it done okay I think this is all great and I’m really glad that we’re doing this oh God can we just talk through yeah what we’re doing on Thursday with them that schedule does that cannot fall under this topic um completely business okay thank you anything Sarah you did you have anything um no as long as I can zoom in the same you said Steven’s coming with you so

1:43:20 that everything I’ll will be cohesive as far as be the same as it is tonight and Stephen We Trust

1:43:32 um all right so any subcommittee or liaison updates good yo you go first so like I said I met with Julia today to get an update on how to make the Met program is going so she’s taken it never and each school has a coordinator um like underneath her so really focusing on the children and they pick three things that they’re working on in its communication with parents and students um figuring out the budget and working on enrollment for next year so it’s just and it’s all coming along she says it’s been going really well the students are doing well the parents seem to be happy and things are running smoothly so that’s just good to know

1:44:19 um it’s been kind of put some ups and downs in the program but I think right now everything’s very smoothly and the big update is at the cultural Fest May 20th Friday at the high school also everyone put that in the piss and I guess this year is like off the charts oh wow this last year it was really that’s what I said yeah but I think this year it’s like even great I have to say I know you I know you guys all know that on some euros is like my favorite event but this this Rivals it yeah cultural cultural Fest is always a good time yep okay real quick I don’t know if you know this or maybe Johnny can follow up but what is enrollment that you like for our Boston students next year uh I talked to Julie through the chair go ahead talk to Julie

1:45:06 about that today awesome thank you all right awesome another quick um question the mecco I think it was three meetings ago I think um we had talked about I think Emily had brought it up and asked kind of what we’re doing to look into the fact that we’ve unfortunately had five different mecco directors in four years and I I think that you know our Boston students and our Metro students are are a very important part of our district and we owe it you know to them to kind of dig in and find out if there’s some what what is leading to that and is there something that we as a group can do to kind of make it a better

1:45:54 um experience so it’s so that we don’t have such turnover John I know you’ve been working with um Millie at mecco on the kind of that that search and um and really what needs to go into the MacBook program um I know I had a kind of random conversation with Monique and relayed you know some of the highlights from that to you um per thought and I know you talk it’s a little bit of regularity um so I think Millie is going to talk about that at the meeting next week as well okay we can talk about it all at the meeting it might be good for parents to tell us yeah exactly what’s going on absolutely

1:46:39 in that perspective will be really and I think for us to hear yeah yeah absolutely yeah and if there’s any you know just within the planning again if there’s a parent that wants to be recognized to speak or anything that they you know that that is absolutely fine the David’s turn I guess so if that’s the next topic um share screen first I guess is that one up yep so just wanted to share three or four photos from uh work that’s off the punch list that was done over April vacation so many of you are familiar with this this is the this is the property line with Tower school and in

1:47:25 exchange for them giving us egress through their property and making some improvements that were needed along that rock wall we agreed to uh put up this nice fence even got a variance from the town I believe it’s going to be eight feet and then go down to six feet so that’s well underway and it might even be I think that’s almost done I was in a meeting the other day yeah that is that fence new yeah it’s beautiful I mean I was there I this was this was Monday so yeah the work progressed fast they put those polls in they needed to um you know the concrete needed to cure and everything but yeah so I haven’t seen the finished product then yeah that’s really nice yeah or at least from the vantage point that I had out of towers Windows yeah up in the top of this area that we’re looking at at the front of the screen I think so so

1:48:11 that looks great and that was weather dependent and Tower I think I know Tower is very happy according to Brian Johnson and Brian Dakin and the new people have seen it and saw the first panel and we’re really excited to see that yeah part of the school or is that the house yeah yeah and down below is the other second home that they own right below it the director facilities director facilities house okay I want to work for Tower someday okay and then uh the next next photo so next photo this has been you know a big part of of the Brown School it has been the Outdoor Classroom and I mean Sarah take it away I mean you you know what these two things are um something we’ve

1:48:59 been trying to achieve and here they are so actually David I’ll have to get you a new photo because as of today some of the classes already were out I know my son’s kindergarten class was already out doing a garden lesson um planting there’s some already there’s some plants in some of those beds um this is the shed we we had moved to the original one and and this is just putting back you know what we had there but you know when we started at the very beginning of this and we had the envisioning sessions and they went out and they talked to a huge cross-section of the community um and they came back you know after with you know parent teacher administrator all this input and they came back and they kind of did one of

1:49:46 those I forget the name of it but you know when you do a survey and the word that comes up the most is the biggest biggest word in the center um and they asked what’s important when you build a new facility the biggest word by far was outdoor Garden Outdoor Classroom that program that Gene scona and Kenny Martin built at the Bell school for the Bell organic garden was just when we closed down was that a hundred percent um use and these this makes us whole again this is exciting our students and our teachers are super super excited about it um it’s not just kids you know playing in the dirt it’s real curriculum real science um curriculum that’s going on out there in those beds and it’s really exciting to come pick up and see you know each

1:50:34 day what they’ve done that’s new so it was awesome to see that those went in over the break great work so we got that in one one last picture is yes the so the fencing so there was there was a chain link chain link fence and you know the project paid for designed approved you know this call it imitation ornamental fence um has certain safety features related to it too it’s it’s harder to climb than a chain link fence where kids can get their toes in it and things like that so um this was uh there was a small section so that’s probably finished I haven’t been there this was Monday is that done Sarah I haven’t seen but I think it is yep no it looks great and I will say

1:51:20 every day you saw some kid um not that I knew one of them but climbing up that fence every single day and no they can’t climb this it’s great they’re kind of just in there safely and good to go and it looks nice they did they did a nice job yeah it does look really and that same fence goes along the retaining wall along the back roadway as well so it looks just a nice little Finishing Touch and I thought I’d give people a little snapshot of that and last but not least we received information from Left Field that the project has reached 95 reimbursement from the msba at approximately 13 million two hundred and twenty five thousand dollars thank you msba thank you left field and all the project team for the work that was done and so what happens now is since we’re done effectively the final invoices are

1:52:10 coming in we had some invoices at the OAC meeting on Wednesday those would come in and then the audit will be done by the msba so they hold back five percent it’s usual and customary then they audit our books and when the books are audited they’ll release the last five percent of the reimbursement which will get us close to 14 million fantastic so that’s my update all right action I’m sticking with it anybody else

1:52:41 being well at the business so we’d like to talk about next week’s meeting I would like to talk about next week’s meeting just kind of what the plan is um we can start there that would be great all right well our plan is still coming together a little bit uh because we’ve been out of the office all week so um and I was supposed to talk to John today in my little sideways so um we’re either going to take the metco bus in with the students after school or we it depending upon room in that and then we also have the option of because we have to get home and that’s kind of the trickier piece so um there’s also a van that we could drive down there someone could drive down there and then we could all drive back I think David is planning to meet

1:53:27 us there because he is at work um but I could take three people back right so if we were able to ride the bus um so there’s still some moving Parts on that that are being worked out um but yeah we’ll we’ll go down you know after school and and then John take it from there and say can I know there’s a portion where we’re gonna dine with the medical families Millie is excited tour the committee through the facility and show off um some of the work that they do uh at Medco Inc and then an opportunity for us to have dinner with some of our Boston families and then our regularly scheduled school would be meeting at seven o’clock that will be you know again people can come in person uh if they would like and

1:54:16 because um in working with Lisa and Sasha down at metco Inc we made sure to get a room that has capacity and then I think it even has the ability to um like stream into a different room in that co-building so if there was any kind of overflow piece that was needed um and like you said Steven’s gonna join us and help us make sure that our zoom and live streaming is is tight um so it should hopefully you know just a different space and but to anybody zooming in look you know kind of be the same situation did you see what time bus we’re taking there so it would be I believe the first after school bus so it would be kind of like basically at dismissal depending

1:55:02 upon 30. 215 3 o’clock three o’clock yeah so yeah okay yeah I’m just trying to plan I will I will out iron as much of that as possible out with John tomorrow so that we have all of that um I would love to ride the bus I think it sounds like fun and a chance for us to get to know some of our Boston students okay all right yeah so I’ll connect with you because I think that’s a little piece of the bus too is that um we coordinate with Swampscott on the bus I believe and so sort of what the capacity of is at versus how many people are coming with us um but I didn’t you know you’ve been wanting to drive a bus so the big silver van

1:55:52 passenger van around Boston yeah I mean at your own risk but um so just thinking about you know we talked about reviewing the role with um Metro parents and talking about the um that co-director position in my mind those will be really effective as you know like informal conversations working with I don’t know what you’d call it so is that like is the dinner the place for those conversations can happen or does it or will it be part of our official meeting I just want them to feel free to speak openly right in a job you can step in at any point in my head just sort of as we

1:56:39 process this tonight I would say that we’d be maybe both that there’s some time during the dinner and the and the conversational aspect that we could really get some solid feedback but then also to kind of have that business like presentation to it and coordination of it at the meeting um to kind of officially roll it out or you know I’ll discuss as a group yeah yeah are you guys post posting the dinner as well as a meeting because otherwise it can only be a social event you can’t talk about anything that’s cool related like school like like at exactly

1:57:24 what you guys just were talking like you can’t have that conversation about you know forming a role and that’s a policy that’s like forming a policy you can post the dinner you can you can very easily post that as part of the meeting right now we can just post it post it it wouldn’t be so right macaroni and cheese or something right no no but you can post it like if you look at other towns like when they do their full day in District or whatever they post they post Those portions as part of you know the public posting okay

1:58:07 yeah and that’s not that’s not the other the other option is you know I know we don’t interact with public comment but that’s always the discretion of the chair I mean during the pro the the main meeting Sarah could open that for discussion with mecco parents there’s there’s nothing in the law precluding that it’s to the discretion in the chair so if we wanted to be able to incorporate and kind of not I mean my concern is we don’t want to have our Boston New Mexico families feel like this is your time to speak and then it’s separate from if we brought it into the meeting then we really we’re having a discussion as a Marblehead Public Schools community and we’re showing that you know we all I don’t know that I’m articulating it correctly but I think like you’re getting the I think my ideas coming

1:58:54 across that if if Sarah is able to you know through the chair make it an open you know Forum piece with those Matco families that we could actually enter in that dialogue hear their ideas but our our members uh that live in of the Marvel schools that aren’t you know living in Boston can hear that and be part of that conversation too which I think is a nice first step in not making it a Boston student’s Marblehead students piece it’s we can have a community discussion I think would be nice agenda yeah yeah but it’s sort of it I mean it and I think I think you know I think I I am taking Sarah’s point I just think you

1:59:41 know sort of we have to be careful because our policies are there for a reason and you know that’s that is why we’ve got public comment as comment um and we’re it isn’t a forum that we’re hosting next week it’s it’s a meeting that we’re holding in Boston um yeah but you could have a portion of it be a forum is what I’m saying you could have a Roman numeral if you will be the The mecco Forum so it’s not the whole meeting but we we’re push we’re taking 20 minutes of it I mean you can do that now I can reach out to Dorothy on that and kind of pick her brain a little bit for her best practice around that and how it would look in just a gender setting and all that good stuff I just think it would be a really good way to to make that step as being a

2:00:32 community instead of a segmented community well taken um any other divisions today okay um I don’t think I mean one of these correspondence that needed to be highlighted was the article 33 email so that’s been talked about so um I don’t I didn’t know if this would be new business or correspondence so I’m kind of straddling the line um Gene’s going ahead reached out to me and asked me to realize she was hoping to be here tonight she had a class that overlapped um and asked to be on a future agenda she was really excited to highlight the work she did this year talk about you know what she presented to the students the feedback I guess there were some surveys the feedback she got and some of

2:01:18 the student impact that she she got I think is a nice way to highlight some of the um social emotional work we are doing in the community so I just wanted to relay that I like I said I didn’t know if it went under new business or correspondence or where it went yeah sure I’ve got that noted I will put it Lisa and I keep a running list of um you know future agenda items and where we can put them in so that we’re managing the agendas effectively so I will add that this evening and we’ll get in contact with Gene for her schedule as well um and also Sarah I I think that maybe um I don’t know that the proper place would have been an accommodation but at some point I think in our meeting we should

2:02:05 um recognize the loss our community suffered this week um through a Glover school teacher I don’t know if you want to speak to that or I’m I’m happy to but I think that you know it it was a loss felt by many people past and present staff and students and community members um in I just think we should recognize that absolutely um and you know you’re you’re absolutely right Sarah and um the superintendent and myself and Emily have the um opportunity to attend the funeral and it was really lovely I didn’t I didn’t know Brooke Gano um as a teacher but it was really touching to hear people talk about her and to hear her eulogize um and then just kind of speaking with teachers afterwards um you know she she was she’s you know

2:02:54 again I didn’t know her but she seemed to be a really special person um and a tremendous loss to this district for sure foreign

2:03:08 all right um on that note I will adjourn us at 906 pm thank you everyone