School Committee: June 6, 2024

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.

0:12 coming so I will call um Frank will you continue to thank you I will call us to order at

0:26 accommodations I I have one I went to the Glover School Field Day and thanks to M Eric Fargo our the teacher and I don’t maybe 20 or 30 parents have volunteer to staff it it is an incredible experience they get a chance of do one those you know the kids get out there and just run around the whole time everything from the parachute G to the water balloons we name that they and it’s great and it’s really something that’s been a tradition of GL school for a long time so thank you Mr par anybody else for commentation I would just say we attended graduation Friday night which was great Dr Guinness did a wonderfully inspiring speech um and it was just great to see all the students beautiful night and I just want

1:13 to congratulate The Faculty students for a great event greaton um yes I wanted to add on to that um cat you and your fellow graduates are the most polite class that I think I I have given diploma every single solitary student J said Thank you and in a very robust way it was really exciting and it was so wonderful to be there and to be part of it congratulations to you all um all righty that brings us to public comment so I know we have some people if um you want to come up Diane had asked um just take your name and address for the

2:01 record hi I’m Diane G from4 Merson street I’m also a first grade teacher at Glover school and I understand that next year the first grade is being the first grade classrooms are going from 4 to 3 in September and um which means that the class sizes are going to be between 20 and 22 um I just wanted to make the committee aware that every year the first grade gets new students in at the first grade level um some come from Marblehead children center some from Deo school and others um move in uh last year throughout the year we had 10 new students um throughout the year we started off with seven new students and then three more moved in so um I’m just

2:47 here to ask that if we do get an influx of student new students at first grade that you staff the first grade appropriately for the numbers thank you thank you there’s anybody online if you want to raise your hand um you can go to the online as well don’t see any hands online is there anybody else just see your

3:23 names um good evening my name is re stalberg I live on Fieldbrook Road and I’m the parent of a rising sophomore and two sixth graders uh Vanessa quick paor Road I’m the parent of a fourth and sixth gr we would like to take a few minutes to give a giant thank you and offer a commodation to sixth grade Village School teacher Jonathan hel two weeks ago 164 students pack those suitcases sleeping bags fishing pools hawaian shirts and the aborted buses down for born down for four days and three nights sixth grade students spent their days together sharing meals learning about the cave Cod Canal how to dissect a sharp and geocaching students were shuffled with new faces in every class as they learned how to build a rocket and they cheered for Mr Murphy as he crossed the tyes swing Adventure

4:09 course they ate at dinner tables with friends they maybe didn’t know very well or hadn’t seen since the sports fields in second grade each night at bow has different themes Marblehead Head night low different themes Marblehead night low night and last but not least the big color War they line bassed and karaoke Sweet Caroline and the Frozen Anthem let it go every day was a new adventure and a new mix of pears by the third night the energy was at an all-time high in anticipation for science Idol each class put forward performers who wrote a science related song and performed for their entire grade the judge is assembled with Mrs Murphy for One Last Time Kevin merrian and Jeff mome rhymed their verdicts and Mr bulby looked AER while his fifth grade students excitedly

4:54 particip excitedly participating via live stream back home the emotional close of an epic week came with an allg grade along to the journey hit Don’t Stop Believing back at Village an incredible group of sixth graders had their own epic adventure closer to home with activities like Fenway Park tour studying saltwater ecosystems at Cranes Beach and most importantly they created enduring boms and friendship we are here tonight to say to Mr heler and his and his exceptional team we are incredibly grateful for you we know that countless hours of coordination and work goes into making magic happen for our children every year the core memories and life liong friendships that you work tireless tirelessly to make sure happen each year are so appreciated generations of marble headers have experienced this right of

5:40 passage mothers and fathers armed with their own borale memories were able to share the excitement with their children when the big yellow buses rolled back into Village and welcome home hugs were given after long hot showers were had and excited chatter over dinner died down these incredible lucky kids settled into their very own beds and as they fell asleep we hope the refrain from Journey at Eed in their minds reminding them to hold on to that feeling thank you Mr heler for being the steward of this Priceless right of P passage for the students of marble p and we thank you on behalf of not only the sixth grade parents but the community for your Jed to keeping this tradition alive thank you

6:25 thanks any other couple comments hard act to follow that brings us to who will be joining us for one more meeting after this our student represent that’s kind of a Bast from the past that was six years ago for that was very fun I

6:45 went the second half of May was filled with various celebratory events such as the culture Feast senior prom and graduation students attended the culture Feast on May 24th to celebrate cultures from around the world including a potluck style dinner and performances from our very own high schools the underclassman awards ceremony took place last night in the field and students were handed Awards ranging from Wellness to college book honors AP class meetings have started this year for Rising sophomores through seniors which will highlight the course and any expectations for the summer and school year mcast has wrapped up for the year with the Freshman finishing their biology testing yet meanwhile students are preparing for final exam starting next week the tests run for an hour and a half per block with extra help portions in between classes

7:31 while the senior project showcase has already happened there are still some final performances to be seen tomorrow at 5:30 p.m. there will be a strings Cho and piano chamber performance at the Hooper Mansion completely created and conducted by seniors also on Saturday at 7M the student Le show Tuesday afternoon dead will be presented in the High School auditorium which is an ironic spin-off the famous Saturday Night Live the senior prom on June 29th was success at the House of Blues in Boston over 250 attendees the DJ caded music towards the students who were more than happy to break it down on the Dance Floor plus there was a Ben in Jerry’s ice cream dessert bar the seniors have officially been released from their High School careers as they walked across the stage last Friday the weather was sunny and

8:17 cool and the field was filled with family and friends from all over the community the Bandon Orchestra played the traditional Pomp and Circumstance during entrance as well as Marblehead forever as the new graduates left the field the choir sang a tear jerking slipping through my fingers by as well eighth grade stepup day was today and the entire class of rising freshmen toured around the high school sports teams and clubs presented to the middle schoolers at the end of the day to welcome new faces I do want to note too that um cat qualified in Ran I thought did a very good job in was it the necs finals the NEC Champion um championship for track it was I was very exciting watching you

9:02 run um and congratulations so thank

9:09 you that brings us to our district updates with Dr Teresa M great thank you I have a special guest to introduce in just a moment but before I do I just wanted to take a a simple moment to say a heartfelt um thank you before I introduce this this candidate to a great colleague who spent two decades here as a guidance counselor as an assistant principal extraordinaire and as a principal um who will be leaving Marblehead physically but not spiritually and Head physically but not spiritually and leaves behind such a legacy so before I introduce this gentleman who’s wonderful I just want to say um Mandy you’re the best and you have left such a great legacy here and I’m talking about Mandy Murphy the principal at Village School

9:54 um so we’ll have more to say on that later but before I introduce someone I since you’re looking at me I just want to make sure I put that out there first um so welcome I am delighted um to introduce you all to uh Mr Scott Williams who happens to be a candidate that we want to appoint um to the Village School and we want you to appoint to the Village School for the 24 25 school year he comes to us from situ Public Schools where he presently is a principal um at the Cushing Elementary School uh many successful years in school leadership and also experienced teaching fourth fifth and sixth grade um which is terrific um but beyond those years of um teaching and leading um his greatest strength um that was told to us

10:39 is this ability to embrace collaborative and distributive leadership and uh leveraging the very um seasoned staff at Village School that we are delighted to have and he also holds many um Advanced degrees certificate of school management and Leadership from Harvard two masters um and master in elementary Edge and a master in Communications and a bachelor from University of Maine Orno um and um we have the strongest endorsement of Mr Scott Brown and Scott would you mind Williams would you mind coming up to the table there welcome thank you very much for that warm welcome and and introduction I hope I can live up to that um I just want to thank you all it’s an honor and a

11:26 pleasure to be here tonight um I I know this is a very busy time for all of us I also want to thank the village community everyone has been welcoming and receptive thank you to Teresa thank you to Julia um I’ve met with the staff our stakeholders the leadership team it’s truly been a a wonderful experience for me I’m excited for this opportunity and I I welcome this and I embrace this um I am from Maine and the impetus for this change is I wish to get back to the NorthShore I led the Newbury port in ipswitch about 20 years ago and I moved to the city and then I moved to the Southshore and so I’m very very keenly interested in getting North again uh Marblehead strikes me as a very strong Community lifelong learning embracing

12:14 communication embracing collaboration embracing education so um the pillars and your strengths I I hope and believe would be a nice alignment to my philosophical belief in helping our children to be their best so um thank you thank you um I’ll open up anybody in the committee has any questions I don’t have any questions I just want to say thank you and welcome it’s the team starting July 1 so we’re really looking forward to it I think you are making good decision to come up to the NorthShore Northshore Southshore um thank going on um but no welcome and and thank you thank anybody else um well I will say that it was a

13:00 very robust process um I had the honor of sitting on the committee that got interview you twice um was lots of great feedback um I think everyone’s really excited to be at the point we’re at right now um and so I will ask for a motion to approve Mr Scott Williams or to appoint Mr Scott Williams as the Village School principal so J ched by Al Williams um we’re going to do a roll call vote Alison Taylor sorry I had to un myselfself uh in favor in favor um Frank can you try us up a little bit

13:47 here um I okay yes subject to in faor um Brian OD in favor Jen shner in favor Sarah Fox in favor motion carries five to zero and welcome

13:59 welcome I will just give you the head up you and Al they get some emails from each other um I think Matt can can say he sometimes gets mine not often but it happens because we share last name too um so welcome and we look forward to getting to work with thank you very much I greatly appreciate this opportunity thank Youk thank you thanks for com tonight my only other update around no you’re good uh around hiring is that um The Glover School principal search continues and they had some interviews on Tuesday and as um information becomes available I will share it with the committee okay um next we have the school Improvement

14:42 plans all right so I’m gonna start before um we bring up principal CLX um each year uh our School principles uh lead a team of Educators and their school advisory council members through a process the creation of a school Improvement plan that’s specific to their school and reflective of the district goals through that which are outl through our marble Hood Public Schools district Improvement plan or plan for Success uh tonight we have principal Fox and principal Carlson who are going to outline the goals and objectives for their school sta that their school staff will work on um in the uh coming year we are presenting it after reviewing it as a leadership team presenting it to our sub committee this evening um for your review as well so the school Improvement plan will highlight the areas of Need for

15:27 improvement including academics attendance school culture technology facilities diversity Equity inclusion and it may also include strategic object objectives and action plans that will overcome uh to overcome challenges and ensure the school students faculty are meeting both district and Statewide expectations so I’m proud to present um our two uh amazing secondary principles Dr Carlson and Mr Fox for their presentations for the

16:04 so Vex has four goals this year um we’ll jump right off there all four are connected um to last year’s goals uh considering I think some of the turnover in the central office and new changes that it’s sort of smart to make those connections of what we’re doing this year into next year I always like to think in multiple years when we talk about plans instead of just one year so our first goal um is part of the teaching and learning strand you’ll notice um this is going to be continuing with our vertical alignment goal our vertical alignment meetings with um with Village and the high school uh we were successful this year in having those meetings uh there was some great sharing and aligning of curriculum English math soci science especially with with um with Village in particular uh there are some new

16:50 standards we’re dealing with English teachers got a good introduction to uh the new the new literature program at the elementary school after it already been put in place for a while um they were really successful meetings and I think rich and we want to continue those those uh conversations the next goal is also under the teaching and learning strand um this is continuing some of the work we Cate we worked on this year which is uh it’s the next one right uh continuing the work which we started this year which is creating a social emotional learning curriculum for our students um and also creating a calendar of activities to increase student engagement um really I’m going to say a word that I’m going to also you’ll also hear from the in the

17:35 fourth goal uh which is belonging we want students to feel like they belong to our school and our school Community um that’s why we’re we’re approaching it this way one through social emotional learning using theme that are developed from best research and practices such as CLE um and finding activities and things that students can relate to um and it and grow with but also finding those nice fun engagement activities that um that that also get them involved in the school competitions uh events activities uh tournaments things like that that really make them feel part of the of the community and so this is the first step that we’re taking um and we’re excited to sort of see this the sort of flesh out through our advisory

18:20 program the third goal uh that we’re going to be working on um was actually sort of piloted a little bit this year uh we are going to be working through teaching and learning and professional culture um if you remember couple of years ago and our for those you that were here our school Improvement plan uh spoke about tier one um instruction teachers leading teachers to tier one uh model workshops we ran 12 workshops um throughout the course of the year they were very successful we follow that up this this year um by encouraging teachers to do peer observations and digest those other tier one practices that they seen other in others other teaching um other teachers and in their classrooms and then incorporating those in the new practices with in the

19:06 classroom we had we had almost 10 teachers do this and they conducted over 30 peer observations just this year Alone um I got to read the reflections and what they pulled away in their and their summatives and their their evidence at the end of the year um and it was a really rich process so we as a faculty created now a care observation tool moving into next year so that way the reflection will be now consistent so that when it comes to going to P observation and now have a tool that will look the same for everybody we’re really going to encourage all the teachers to make us their professional goal next year yeah those pure observations did they sort of fall along the trend that you would have done you were doing the observation where they sort of ask me I’m sorry ask me one more question what was that

19:54 question here if they were they follow my observation no no did their pure observation results are similar to ones you would have done no because you know we’re coming in I’m coming in looking you know for different things they’re coming our Focus has been solely on tier one instructional practices for the for our peer observations so they’re coming in in a way of creating access for all of our students in our classrooms and it might not be this big giant new shiny Cadillac that comes into the classroom but it might be that Cadillac that they’ve had now gets polished and shine a little bit more because of what they saw in the classroom so it’s these really these tier one instructional practices as a evaluator I come in looking as you know for a lot more than

20:40 just the tier one instructional practices so it’s it is a different process and it’s a it’s it’s been a fun process I think for a lot of them to experiment with this year and then the final goal um falls under the diversity Equity inclusion strand um and again here’s that where I’ll drop that word belonging again uh as a as as a faculty and staff we gave a survey a couple years ago and what we’d like to do is sort of refine that and come back and give that belonging survey to our students again uh there’s been numerous studies that show that student belonging students feelings of belonging lead to Greater success it’s as simple as that and it doesn’t just lead to Greater success in a non quantitative version it leads to Greater academic success period so we want to make sure

21:25 our students feel like they belong to our school and this also dub tails in with some of the PD work that the administrative team has done under the leadership with central office throughout this year we’ve worked on our belonging under the de Str so those are our question um so it says here um the updated survey will be given to students to evaluate our efforts to create belonging through the curriculum determining any additional School needs so does that mean sort of looking at academic curriculum and seeing where belonging or is it specific Dei curriculum back mic curriculum for me curriculum encompasses everything so you go back to our first goal and we we’re talking our second goal talking about curriculum things like that so curriculum is just the bread of what we

22:11 teach we don’t have a standalone Dei curriculum we have an English curriculum that wants to expose students to writers and authors of all different experiences and backgrounds we have a math program that wants to make sure students see themselves in those problems that they’re working on to and not just students that don’t look like them so we have Dei threaded throughout brought our entire we don’t that’s all done at the sort of administration level or no it’s done at the truly honestly done at the teachers level I mean we for example um our English teachers going into this year really revamp their their um classroom libraries and so their classroom libraries really have a focus on uh windows and mirrors that’s a concept that I’m sure you’ve heard

22:56 before of making sure students are exposed to something that’s not like them but at the same time also exposing them to to educ to to literature that that does reflect them and we want to make sure they do have that experience so it that starts at the teacher level you know of really sort of getting the roof on the ground and making sure that happens some of it falls into an administrative level or a collaborative process when we’re looking at new curricula you know we want that curricula if it’s in a box of sorts like a math textbook or a new something that comes in a box we want to make sure that does reflect all of our students I just wanted again so that that we have consistency so that there aren’t different experiences students depending on the

23:42 class that right no in fact that’s I’ll be honest that’s a strength of our school when you go from social St teacher to social teacher in seventh grade or e8th grade or science to science you’re going to see the same lessons the same assignments the same exams you know Al be it if we’re teaching the same subject I have different personality than than Dr Carl but we’re still teaching the same Concepts we’re our students are being held to the same assessments and they even in some grades they’ve been experimenting with cross rating where they will bring in to their data chats you know Julia’s test they’ll both grate it and then they’ll talk about the why if they have any differences that alignment has happening K12 I know mat speak I’m just talking about that is Prim focus of and one other thing to add to that

24:30 acronym that no Dei people Define it differently and part of the discussion that Julia is leading um principles and teacher groups is you know diversity Equity inclusion and belonging should be a B on that and the belonging is the umbrella that shows every child their reflection mirror in their in all of that so I think it’s important to put the be on there um you know as you go for it it’s not a program it’s not it’s how do kids belong oh this is the examples you gave to WR thank you open up to other committee members who have questions Alison um I I have a couple um so what one of the questions or comments is as you work through your I think was

25:18 your third goal um on on developing that social emotional curriculum um just to work when you get to that point work through the superintendent and through uh Julia to get that on our agenda we have a policy that new curriculums just get come through the school committee and get approved when there are new curriculum so just as long as that that follows that will be good and then um I I think I brought this up at one other point this year a few years back before um Co hit you were working on an awesome concept I believe with tnie and one other staff member for student L conferences and at the time you know I got to hear about it as the school committee rep on your sa and it’s sounded really well thought out really

26:04 exciting and um then Co hit and really messed that up do you foree that being something that you might be working on moving forward it’s not off the table but we haven’t set that up yet um you know you you mentioned two teachers right there off Tope that had an interest in experience in the past but we’ve also had a lot of work in the last couple years that they’ve been in in charge of yeah um so it does take an investment this isn’t uh student Le confid is quite an investment across the board if anybody’s everever involved in it it’s not just it it can just be a portfolio project but it’s really not just a portfolio project so um it’s a big thing so it’s not on our goal quite yet uh but uh we we might come

26:49 back to it okay that’s great to hear because when you first said it in that meeting I was like student like what but then when it was really explained all the thought and all the work that went into it and students really get to own their work and and get more invested in and it does dovetail a little bit in some of the things that we’re doing so like the seeds of planted for it in the future um those data chats that we’re doing through I ready where students own and set some goals for their education and things like that I mean there are some threads and that’s why that you know we started looking ahead and saying where can we wrap these threads into a whole process but it it is a commitment it’s a commitment by Community too because it involves parents coming into school uh during a work day uh to be successful and we you know when we’ve done in the past you know we really

27:35 shoot for 100% because you don’t want to be that you know that sort of left out of that process so it’s a it’s a commitment that would be like I said like piloted probably and then a roll out if eff um and then just when you talk about the I ready goal um which is an awesome thing you guys are doing again I’ve gotten to see that but I’m not sure some of the other members can you just tell really quick you know short what how that happens because it’s not something you know I had seen prior to this and it really is exciting so you know after students take the I ready exam they um we share with the family a family report uh the family report for the first one just gives you sort of a starting point for the year um and how you’re doing towards a goal then in the mid report you get to see how you’re you’re moving towards the goals that

28:21 were set based upon that Baseline and then the third one for the seventh grade the eighth grade we held off on a third M we’re not doing a third ey ready because the eighth grade us for mcast now um and we’re testing but the seventh grade we’ll have a third eye ready which will talk about sort of the Capstone goals that they made and then at each of those steps those first two steps students reflect with their parents and make an academic goal what they want to do some of the things they can do to improve as they move forward um and then they they can chat with their parents at the end of the year they’ll be getting their sco reports next year yeah and there’s and because the kids are setting the goal for themselves and if parents are really doing this the kids you know have accountability to themselves and pride in their work and Direction and I

29:08 I think it’s been great yeah it’s Julia and Angie Graziano and other other staff at our school are the ones that really sort of came up with this process and it’s really work well okay um and then the next one and this is something I’ll say throughout all the school Improvement plans when um this goes back to one we used to call site base there used to be a facilties school for everybody um and those were not things that would be embedded in the capital cost or Capital articles that we hear like the big things like GRS it smaller things like an example would be I remember Donna zasi had one she she desperately wanted um a new rug in her library and so that was an element on there so as we move through this next year if we can put that piece in there possibly at the faciliity schs it’s

29:54 helpful um I think to guide some of that summer work that happens in facilities and to give count ability um to us here as a district to help you guys get that done like funding wise or whatever else those elements thanks for bringing that up we’ve we started that discussion as a leadership team we look forward to also bringing in our director of facilities as well that conversation and um perfect thank you very

30:24 much Dr Carlson for her marble Hood High School school plan so we as well have four um four goals uh three of the four are building on what we started this year uh the one outlier that we didn’t have on for last year is um to prepare for the new the neas collaborative um visit which will be happening um either in the spring or the fall of 2025 um they haven’t sent me the date check for that so we need to spend next year preparing for that visit and we have a lot of work to do get ready for that um for those that don’t know sorry yes so n ask is um our accreditation through um the New England

31:11 Association of schools and colleges and every 10 years we go through this accreditation process um so we have to create a committee of teachers um with um a couple Point teachers that will start compiling evidence to present to them um they need to do a self-study where they look at you know what we’re doing really well where we want to go with things um one of the new things since the last visit is the vision of the graduate which they will be looking for at our school and so it will be looking for competencies that we expect students to have when they leave us um ideally this would be you know a full

31:59 kada pre to 12 of eventually we’ve been talking about that um but we do need to get ready and sort of speak to that for the high school because the committee will be looking for this information we did start um about two years ago talking about this with faculty and we had a um a PLC group that started looking at it um and they wrapped up theyve um looked at the competencies that they want to Target um and they figured out how we would report out on those next year so we need to roll this up next year so there’ll be Comics that comment codes that will report this out on the um report cards four times a year um and they need to identify the assessments that that will go into that as well so there’s a there’s a lot of work we have

32:45 to do on this I’ve spoken with Julia about professional development time which we will um use towards working on this this goal so um so that’s why that’s in there because this is a pretty pretty big deal for us at the high school um the next goal um is work a um a continuation of one that we started um with the um Middle School this year so we’re it’s it’s in the teaching and Marine strand as well it’s to um use um time to facilitate some vertical alignment that we started this year which has gone great and the teachers really enjoyed it moving together and made some Headway there’s more work to be done on that as well so we’re going to continue with that this year

33:34 um and the third goal is under professional culture um so this is um providing professional learning opportunities to support educator development and best practices we did some of this this year we brought in um some training on the smart panels that were all installed in all the classrooms uh we brought in training on the smart path system that we use we had teachers that went out to some conferences and came back and presented to their colleagues and we want to expand this next year uh I will be putting a survey out to the staff to see what they’re looking for that they feel that they need and I have heard from talking to Seth this year AI is going to be something that we will be targeting next year to do um some professional development around in our

34:22 meetings um because that is we to stay and not going anywhere and changing rapidly and from where we started in September to right now now um it actually has the capability for kids to take a picture of a multiple choice quiz put it on chat GPT and it was that the ANS is within 30 seconds so we have a lot of work to do to to teach the kids and and ourselves about this and how rapidly it’s changing and how we’re how we’re going to teach the kids to use it as a tool so um so that is going to be a focus among other things that the teachers will be looking for as well in that um I do have a a group of Educators that has started meeting this year around Ai and gathering this information they’re

35:07 going to also continue hopefully um do some work over this summer and then we may do some educator workshops that are uh led by our Educators in the fall um the fourth goal is um around diversity Equity inclusion it is something again that we had this year we are um going to continue with this and expand it a little bit so uh we have had a deit that has been meeting for a couple of years um that will continue and they are creating some model classrooms they haven’t done as much work on this as they want to so they need some time to continue with this as well so this would be where staff can go in and observe their colleagues to see what’s going well in those classrooms and maybe they can incorporate some of those things into their own

35:53 their own their own classrooms um also um any of you saw the there was just an article in the newspaper about our we had our social studies a worksheet curriculum that we changed um so for those that aren’t aware of it earlier this year a student found a historical era in one of our worksheets and he was a ninth grader he was I was at a um Lapin Foundation online conference and and I hear oh we’re gonna have a presentation from a Marblehead head student presentation from a Marblehead student and I’m saying oh boy what’s this going to be and so he talked about his experience that he found his historical era wrote something to his teacher was called in by the U department head had a

36:39 great conversation and it’s changed so I think we need to look at what we’re handing out to the kids and sort of put this Dei um lens on everything just to make sure that our things that we’re putting out there are accurate it was a 10-year old worksheet so um yeah so just continuing with that to do some more work around around the EI in the classroom that’s about it questions question Alison I’m just with our audit that’s coming through how do we how does that get incorporated into

37:25 this like if we’re voting on these but we have M I think she means the accreditation is that what you mean do you mean the accreditation or do the yeah the the accreditation and the desie audit that I just am curious as to how we manage both of those at the same time so improvements I think I want to speak for you but what I saw in the jie report was the expectation that we um remedies would be reflected did say that and yeah no I’ll start I don’t think everybody’s seen me

38:11 on it yet it just came in in the suite yep no I know that’s why I’m I I’m not suggesting that these School imp I don’t agree with these School improvements by any means I’m just saying there will be additional ones and I’m I just want to understand what the process is once that gets complet completely reviewed and and obviously Incorporated and also how that works from the perspective of having a a new team coming in the deadlines with that you know it just it’s a complex web and I understand that um I just I just want to make sure that I understand sure um Sarah had already asked us to bring the information to the June 20th meeting um just to give a little bit of an

38:58 overview so that’s what we plan and the interim director of student services Patricia Bell um will be here she actually called desie today because you guys had that question which was a very good one um and they were like no it doesn’t have to be in your school improv plans right now because you just got it you have to give us what you’re planning next year and it’s mostly at the district level of changes we have to put across K to 3K to 12 in terms of IEP process that sort of stuff so it’s more of a district level that has to be executed of course in the schools but we got to figure it out this level so by July 1st in terms of you ask the timeline we have to come up with our plan of um addressing the points that they made in that document what’s the

39:43 beauty of that document and the timing for Marblehead is we have a new assistant superintendent of student services Lisa Lisa mariao and she will have this as sort of a road map of must do however we’re already working on it with desie on L the IEP process so it’s good it’s all you know this is a normal thing that desie does this um every um Cycles um uh for English learners for special ed for monitoring federal grants and every District we get back okay here’s what we didn’t do well here’s what we did well here’s what we need Improvement here’s a new law and you know so it feels alarming when you first look at it because you’re like this this a report card it doesn’t feel so good but give you very concrete what you

40:30 um next year I’m sure with the new superintendent and the whole team um how they’ll they’ll address those I seen a lot of faces here it feels a little bit like inside baseball right now I’m sure so um as many people know um early February um desie came through and did our the three-year audit on certain elements of our special education program um each year at the three-year Mark they do different elements um and they’re supposed to get us back the feedback within 60 days we received it in the last week um and so In fairness to everybody at the table here I think the turnaround just we haven’t gotten to that point because I’m see just like wait what’s going on um and there were

41:17 several areas where we need Improvement and um things need to be addressed they gave us some timelines for response um of July 1 which was a standard I think timeline of July 1 if you had gotten this document in the 60 days you were supposed to which we would have had it months ago because we received it now um getting it so late from desie my understanding correct me if I’m wrong is we will have the appropriate amount of time to make our response to come up with our plans well I read I mean did about 20 days 20 days response so I think it’s 20 days no matter when you get it so the 20 days just happens fall first

42:02 yeah I talked to julan reprentative from Bessie who I actually work she came out for her site visit um and discussed you know the timelines and all of that we she’s she’s okay with where we have right now we have meeting set up she’s meeting with Patricia Bell she’s meeo they’re working on that and feels that confident that we are going to continue to you know make the progress that we need with these new meetings that we’ve set up and we’ll have more report on yeah right and just so I mean the things that come from desie do come through the district right and it’s our expectation that we will fulfill that um so I don’t want anyone think we’re holding anything from our school no no and I didn’t mean to apply that there’s just some looks of we I didn’t mean to miss something did I you and you toit nobody missed anything

42:49 like my question was to the bigger table not Michelle and Matt sorry guys it was about what you were saying but my question was really to the bigger table I just want to make sure that the new Administration I’m I’m is is also going to have a hand in that you know since that’s that’s important I I would love for both to have a hand in it to be fair preserving it on a platter so I think a really great thing is um this gives us a list of our areas of growth and where we need to pay attention and aligned with that is we’ll see later in the agenda we’ll be approving the we’ll be voting on whether to approve the contract for the full special education audit and these two things working hand inand really will guide us um in the direction we need to

43:37 go so I think that’s really good um so um I know anybody else have a question um so the portrait of a graduate I think also once it’s developed will be really helpful especially once we get ultimately to the K through 12 level of alignment in guiding us through our strategic plan um because want to align where we’re going with where we want want to be step so I think that that’s a great step in so thank you um I will ask for a motion to approve the Marblehead veterans Middle School and the Marblehead High School school Improvement

44:25 second CH Shatner discussion all right I will open for roll call vote Alison Taylor um in favor Al Williams in favor Brian Nota Jen chaper Sarah Fox in favor motion carries five to zero um that brings us to our next item U thank you very much um and to our district and school support sta classification plan yeah thank you and we have uh Mary ju here with us our interim Director of Finance operations who did um wonderful work on uh organizing a system that’s um more

45:11 Equitable more clear um and um offers a good structure for to move forward with our new assistant superintendent so I let you take it Mary thank you um and I do again apologize that uh offered up some Visions all the way up to the last minute here but I do all always believe that when you get input from staff um that is worthy of consideration with you and so the changes that we made were because between the time we first shared this week with you at the May 16th meeting um and now we had shared it with the district school support staff who were impacted by the plan offer up any question there were certainly questions uh and we made one kind of I would say more significant change which is when we

45:58 when job descriptions were presented to us that have been presented to others we realized that the uh Clerk and secretary uh groupings actually made more sense to be aligned into one grouping Asos of secretaries and admin assistants so we need clerk secretary and then admin assistance so just sh that so way that uh impacts the staff is that all of the um school-based staff um are either titled secretary will work and there only Administrative Assistant positions are positions that to

46:37 director the other requested change that we’ve made came late in the game and was a result of the reclassification of um our director student services to an assistant superintendent Ser of student services typically at the assistant superintendent or superintendent level support staff positions are titled executive has higher level confidentiality maner so we are asking that rather than having an administrative assistant to Student Services we havea assistant to student services and just to reiterate that under this proposal every employee is held harmless if you know if there’s benefits that the current would be receiving that are greater than what’s

47:22 in this they would be grandfathered to receive what they’re receiving everybody receives at least the budget is 2% in as well so we really focus on impact here make sure that everybody was held on this and did better terms of compensation there are essentially two motions one is to approve the classification plan uh and the other is to approve a set of job descriptions that we have created and aligned the positions in plan not have job we open up to the committee for questions

48:04 if if I look at um pull it up here the spread sheeet that was provided yes with the salaries um I just want to make sure I understand it so if we look at you know to the to the right you know you have a 25 you know full-time employee a rate and then I believe with it’s proposed cost which is just math right it’s if it’s a full-time person um you know 280 hours times that rate but if I look at you know the what there’s one in yellow the number one and so it’s a fulltime for 25 the rates $25.10 an hour I don’t that math doesn’t come up to 40 it should be well over

48:51 $50,000 let see $4,997 in the proposed cost uh that position is a school year position so it’s not okay so it’s just the 10 month okay so that would explain the difference in some of the math okay yeah and the highlights are just to show because you see such a large percentage increase it’s because the FTE also increased it double okay uh just this is a small item but uh under the tuition reimbursement paragraph it it says specifically that the course has to be related to the current job I’m just wondering is that a bit narrow because say you have a clerk that wants to be an accounts payable position and so he or she may want to take a business class that really doesn’t

49:38 affect what may not add to the current job but would make them much more viable for another job can we make the wording so that in that particular case that we might allow something like that absolutely I it’s a very it’s an excellent point and as we were interviewing today folks for the accounts payable position we were having the conversation about how we look for people who we can see want to be promoted over time and support that growth so absolutely take out the current

50:12 subject yeah and I think that wording is in there maybe just take out yeah because this this is something we’ve talked about um how as a district we need to kind of work on succession planning so that we can celebrate and grow the talent that’s within abut um so that I think that would that would feed into that yes um anybody else before I um what one thing I have is in this first group here weekly pay rate for 52 week employees um I just want to clarify we’ll be moving every we should be moving everybody in this to a Buy weekly to accommodate the request that is made as we transferred to munist and new payroll system yes that there we should

50:57 phase out yes okay I just wanted to make sure that you didn’t need us to to change the and that to be aligned uh for nonaligned nonunion employees we can Implement that change sufficient notice and then I know that there’s conversations happen okay yeah I just want to make sure that we’re in line with getting as much out of the transition from nness and the payr system as as we can and actually the town would love to do that sooner

51:27 later all right that’s wonderful um so I will ask first for a motion to move to adop the district and school support classific oh one last thing I just want to clarify I’ve gone over this with you but I think it’s important that everybody hears it um everybody will will remain whole yes we we’re not um no one no one will be taking a cut and the other piece is um when we talk about for instance there’s a different structuring here for our administrative assist that service serves the school committee than what we’re current utilizing it doesn’t mean we have to stop corre as of today it gives us an option um so it’s not a mandated that’s um so intended to cover any potential

52:13 position that we currently have or it might have perfect um so I’ll ask for a motion to adopt the district and school’s uh support classification plan Marblehead Schools

52:28 administration so administration so Willam seconded Brian up for discussion for a roll call vote Alison Taylor in favor Williams in favor ran Oda in favor J in favor Sarah Fox in favor motion carries five to zero I will ask for a motion to approve the four proposed job descriptions referenced above and attached is proposed by the Marblehead Public Schools administration

53:01 by J sner seconded ran Oda discussion yeah I just have a a question um so some of them have degrees referred um and I’m just not sure it was consistent as I think I would suggest you know for example there’s a $26 to $32 per hour where the bachelor’s degree referred then there’s a higher paying position with no degree specified so I think there’s a little bit of inconsistency there and then I’m wondering whether we need to even specify degree at all um I I think there’s more of a movement when we’re recruiting Personnel today you we want to hire someone with the necessary skills and experience whether that’s a degree or whether it’s experience doing the job

53:46 the job the job elsewhere um so I’m just curious if we could just make you know make that a little tighter and that or at least aligned across those positions it’s an excellent point um yeah we can absolutely make that

54:03 change there change there so make okay thank you all right so roll call vote Alison Taylor in favor Williams in favor ran Oda in favor Jen chaer Sarah Fox in favor motion carries 5 to zero thank you so that brings me to um the schedule bills enclosed in everyone’s packet um and I will ask for a motion to approve the enclosed schedule bills total of 2,53 88799 88799 so

54:48 brianner brianner discussion roll call vote Allison Taylor in favor El Williams in favor Brian in favor chaper in favor Sarah Fox in favor motion carries 5 to zero next will be the minutes um so that as well and I will ask

55:25 um I grabbed Teresa’s packet because mine did not okay so um I’ll ask for a motion to approve the minutes from Thursday March

55:42 7 will 7 will seconded by Brian order um

55:51 discussion all um roll call vote Alison Taylor fa Al Williams in favor Brian uh Jen CH in favor Sarah Fox in favor motion carries 5 to zero um that brings us to the school committee communication and discussion items our interim superintendent came on Monday and enjoyed a very comprehensive day in District uh throughout the date dad he met with multiple groups he saw all of our schools he met the town administrat or Town officials um administrators principals staff parents um got to

56:36 intera some students as he went through different schools and community members inion um we received some fback forms which everybody has gotten a chance to look at and you know I’ve I’ve um I’m looking forward to hearing what everyone has to say so I will open it up to the committee Elison you want to lead us off I sure I had um a great discussion and uh I I think he would be a great ad I don’t you know there’s not one question in in my mind about it I I loved his approach I loved his

57:21 demeanor I loved his mannerisms um I really felt he had taken the time to actually watch some of our meetings and understand details of things that were Happening Here in Marblehead um and I personally I just feel that that kind of sets sets him apart from so many other candidates that we’ we’ve seen in general and I think that’s such a wonderful trait I feel that it shows that he truly cares um I think between everything you all shared from your site visit I I know we didn’t get to hear from Al he he wasn’t at our last meeting but Brian shared some of their their discussion and you know I I absolutely think he would be a wonderful

58:08 app yeah I um I wasn’t I didn’t participate when he was here in marad but I did go to swans um and so talk with him um also talked to a school Committee Member I talked to a with Brian talked to a principal and uh you know based on yeah the the interaction with him and what I heard from the others that he’s worked with both above and below his position um you know I feel very strongly as as Allison does I do think he he’d be a very good person for the for the

58:45 job yes is how was saying that we we did ask a lot of the hard questions one of the questions I did ask was it’s a two-hour commute work every day how you going to do that as an interal he said well that’s a good question question you didn’t you didn’t really have an answer to that but you know four hours of commute a day is a lot and so I think that’s going to something has to address but you know I asked them a hard question about why I leave all of a sudden because you Chang in the chairs in the school committee and there was a misquote one of the things in the paper it wasn’t just the latest school commit it was a series of every election new people were brought on board so it wasn’t like one year it got bad reviews it was a series of them and just kept after s 19 years was

59:33 it yeah 18 or 19 years and always having good relationships with the school committee always able to F with the budget get the numers he needed for the budget the relations with the Union everything was going really well but suddenly have people picking them apart every meeting was going through he just said I don’t need this so um I feel very comfortable for him to come here people we talked to had a really high opinion of him and the principal liked him a lot and he had been in 19 years that’s for sure and so he had a lot of good things to say J yeah I’m not gonna I’ll be back on everyone I um a very strong supporter of Mr Robo um to come in as superintendent here in Marblehead having done the visit and both down swy and then here in

1:00:19 Marblehead getting the um the surveys back the surveys or evaluation forms from um administrators faculty staff and parents and community members um kind of had a good Mi it wasn’t a lot of of evaluations but we had good next and all were very positive one thing I’d like to throw out to the committee to consider is um I feel strongly I would like to go forward I make a motion uh to ENT negotiations with um John robu for superintendent of schools but my question is you know for what period of time um one of the things I want to have us maybe think about is um you know we talk about a one-year intern um position obviously um that

1:01:05 being said you know we’ll be right back in the fall talking about um the next superintendent search or what what that may consist of what we may want to look look at so I just wonder whether it’s um something the committee would think about one idea I had is need we talk about twoe um for um for a one year and that we will you know sort of intervene sometime in midall or late ball what we want consider or an extension or something versus being right back you know where we are half that I think he’s a very strong candidate and I don’t you know I don’t

1:01:51 know that we’re ready to jump permanent necessarily at this point but I think want I get we obviously talking about it right uh the chair will um that’s something I thought we talked about that when we were talking about opening up the search potentially being twoe but I’d have to go back to my notes I don’t think we settled upon on it have c yeah I mean yeah I think it also depends on the candidate right you know that whether we wanted whether we would want to have considered that I think it’s important to note I would I would I mean I think two years as an interim would also allow him to have or you know

1:02:37 Implement a plan um have potentially some bigger impacts um as well so I could support that I think the other thing too that we would want we you know we should talk about amongst ourselves and certainly the Republicans at any point during the contract we also can go into negotiations to making a permanent contract to extend it we have doesn’t we can you know still look to to John to be our permanent during that time and or at least to approach negotiations with him during that time as well it just gives you know us time to not have jump right back and fix it come with the house and I think I’d support two years

1:03:23 also well I think his work heths demonstrates is not a jumper 19 years on same district it’s a long time so you know we’re looking for stability certainly demonstrates that 10 s um I do just want to point out to everybody that it was advertised um and really presented at least to him um as a one year so I want to make sure this is something that he also is interested in because um we want to make sure that he that is what he was looking for it’s you know and um yeah certainly if that’s what we advertise we have to be willing to to follow through on that if that is his will um that said um that

1:04:09 during the contract negotiations I can absolutely um relay to him that we would like to start at the point of a two-year and um and he is not open to that that’s yeah oh

1:04:27 sure um all right so then I will ask for a motion to appoint Mr John rido um for as Superintendent of Schools starting or interm superintendent of schools in the Marblehead head public school schools in the Marblehead public school system commencing July 1 pending successful contract negotiations for attempting a negotia for yes that will be the attempt and if not then

1:05:06 second Taylor no that’s fine sorry discussion I think we’ve had our discussion um so I’ll ask for a roll call vote Alison Taylor in favor fa Al Williams in favor ran in favor CH in favor Sarah Fox in favor and that motion carries 5 to zero very exciting um and actually when we have our our five minute recess um between now and executive session I’m going to take the opportunity to call tonight okay great that little bit of a break anyway so that’s very exciting um thanks everybody yeah no this apprciate it this is you know the one of the final pieces um that brings us next to our memorandum of understanding with the recreation and

1:05:51 parks department um this is something we did last year as well it has served us well um Jamie from Reen Park had reached out a month or so ago and just asked to REM meet on that and touch base um they had um presented I think like one slight tweet uh which they worked with Mary to make sure it works for us um and so it would be the re Mary’s recommendation and to adopt this I yeah I certainly support that okay um does anybody have any questions I just want to thank Dr M for their hard work that they do and um this is great that we have it you know

1:06:36 kind of put knows what everyone’s doing um there’s a

1:06:42 lots lots iate yes I just had one question as it’s written I believe it has an effective date of April 15th which is in the past so I don’t know if that’s do we need to change that to be from whatever sign going forward yeah

1:07:02 cross cross yes the date we met I think yes I think um so yes we can do that um must be July 1 basically yes so we will we will absolutely do that back dating um no they brought this on to our meeting that day no it makes sense at the time we just make that edit before we sign it this yes yes um thanks for catching so I’ll ask for a motion to approve theou between the Marblehead head public schools and the Marblehead public schools and the recreation and parks department as presented with the edit of the effective so moved by Al Williams seconded by Brian Oda up for

1:07:47 discussion roll call vote Alison Taylor in favor Al Williams in favor ban in favor Jen shner in favor Sarah Fox in favor MO um motion carries 5 to zero next will be a memorandum of understanding with S6 Tech if um you want to mcin have oh I have your packet okay I’m gonna give it

1:08:18 back although I think I’ve actually destroyed larer order goes at this point

1:08:34 um yes um yes so yes um uh I’m just going to read the part of it that’s um particular to this on April 2nd um NPS issued a request for oh no I thought we were on the we are we’re it’s not this oh SAR so this is a yearly item that we do as well just to be clear I shared all of my documents with Sarah she after trying for half an hour to get my packet to print tonight we gave up so we work with Essex Tech and every year there’s an annual um vote like you all do to say we it’s a great thing for

1:09:21 our students and I know Michelle back there a little bit is there anything you want to add on to the Essex Tech goodness of that for our students before we vote our

1:09:47 vote and the areas there CTE areas so um construction craft labor Early Education and Care Health assisting and sustainable horiculture um and this is the you knowa describes our our agreement with them continued agreement with ess6 North Shore agricultureal Technical School um see there’s anything else in here

1:10:14 that uh for the school year um per student cost for our district is 7500 um or the chapter 74 per pup differential rate whichever one is higher that okay and I think that’s about it it’s just the annual sorry yeah that’s what Michelle was mentioning is the after dark program is that what you’re referring

1:10:42 to yes I think just I have some questions on it so I think that I was confused I’ve never seen this before I’ve never thought it before I’ve never heard of it that being said this is not the regular we have students that are students that go to to the T go to the V right this is a different program that our students it’s I think it’s a smaller cohort we started it last year the year before we had our first graduating um students last year from the program it’s a two-year program so students enter in their junior year they come to Marblehead high school in the morning then head high school in the morning then they hop on a bus about 11: go over to Essex Tech work um on their curriculum over there in the afternoon and then come back after school here so they

1:11:28 fulfill our graduation requirements and they also will earn um a certificate or you know the health assisting they get their CNA after the first year and then they’ll go out and be placed in um at location in nursing home or hospital to to work that so now it also said that we’re not going forward next year so we are not going close with new students so these students are going to be seniors that are finishing out because it’s a two-year program and that was a recommendation that was a budgetary recommendation because of the cost of the program this year was about the same cost of the high school teacher model for high school um we also only had four

1:12:13 students that were looking into it for joint year so which we didn’t know at the time but um the enroll there wasn’t the interest for this class maybe there will beward so it could be year yeah

1:12:32 so I will ask for a motion to approve the memorandum of understanding for the SF Tech program as included in our by Jen chaper second by Al Williams questions or discussion uh roll call vote Alison Taylor in favor Al Williams in favor R Nota in favor Jen chap favor Sarah Fox in favor motion carries five to zero some more graduates from that next year um next is the special education program review contract this is something that we’ve been talking about um I know Alison I believe Allison you work to help review some of these packets um so

1:13:20 I will I will ask um Mary answer any questions anybody has about this um and Alison if you want to just speak to the review proc process if you got anything else to add thank

1:13:35 you um you have a memo in your packet I know we talked a little bit about this with the superintendent talked about this um at the last meeting but we have uh since that time conducted negotiations with uh the winning proposer you have the details here we did received five proposals all outstanding as you mentioned um the evaluation team did include Alison Taylor as well as um Patty Bell our interm director and one of our team chairs actually and so academic discoveries which is Massachusetts base consultive company was the highest rank firm we entered into completed reference checks negotiations their initial proposal was a little bit higher um but we came to

1:14:21 not to exceed price of $58,000 and recommendations that fing still have available ands immediately so support I know this is an important project for this community so Alon do you have anything to add to that no I just want to I mean I think I just want to thank you because the process um was was really smooth um we met and uh Mary created some lovely spreadsheets for us to use so that we could all you know in the Comfort um of our own time because there were very thick packets um I you know some of them were 200 pages long um they included references and I just want to thank

1:15:08 everybody that did respond to the RFP all of the companies because um we really appreciate the effort that went into those responses there were referrals in there there were um resumés in there there was everything you could possibly think of about the organization not just you know a quick paragraph or explanation um so it was really helpful to be able to review those in the comfort of our own our own time when we could fit it in in our day because of course everybody on the committee you know has full-time jobs families other things that they need to attend to so I really appreciated that format um and then we did meet to discuss and rank how we felt um there was a points system that was very very helpful also um I definitely think it’s something that we should consider that format I think it’s something we should consider you know

1:15:53 using in the future for additional um when we have additional art P that go out I just want to commend you for that and and thank you for bringing that to us because it was it was just very helpful made the process easy and very clear um I also want to thank everybody that was on the committee with us um I think everybody was incredibly respectful of other people’s views um by and large we all had you know a lot of the same thoughts which was nice also because it gives a little bit more confidence into the company that that we did um end up selecting and um but I but everybody was open to and interested in everybody else’s Viewpoint because we are all looking at at these types of things from different lenses and I thought that was just a wonderful attribute of it was a fantastic process and um thank you for letting me be a

1:16:39 part of it and thanks for all the work that you put in I know I know it was a lot for for you and

1:16:47 Patricia I’m I’m very supportive of the review I’m just curious how the you know the desie Office of Public School monitoring there their review and recommendations how much overlap will will they address this will the the new academic review look at the same thing or will they look at entirely different areas I’m just curious if there’s overlap or not uh if there is an overlap it’s that the Desi report would address a subset of what this larger program review will it’ll be far more comprehensive when desie does these um site these reviews which are cyclical they focus on three indicators out of many many indicators that they use uh and this will this will not just focus on Desi indicators they will look at

1:17:34 demographic data andc performance data IEPs review files process procedures it’s intended to be part thank you so I’ll ask for a motion to support the award of a contract for special education program review services to academic discoveries

1:18:00 second oh Alison trying to guess where the

1:18:07 sounds uh roll call Alison Taylor in favor Williams in favor Ryan Oda in Jen shaffner favor Sarah Fox in favor motion carries 5 to zero good to go with that um the next it we have is for the OPM to be awarded to left field um to manage those roof replacement project of the high school um I’m going to hand this to Mary and then I’ll I’m going to give a little bit of that left with uh Julia just whispered in my ear that I’d be busy so I’m glad that that’s that’s consensus have but all all for good so it’s been good busy um I know that this is also has been um you know a project of interest for all of you and that is commencing the start of the high

1:18:54 school Ro replacement project I know that when I first was here probably in April and told you that it was highly unlikely to happen this summer it was disappointing um I do feel however that actually the timeline that we’re on is outstanding this is exactly where you want to be now the OPM with the OPM in place they’ll work to procure the services of a engineer designer to designer Ro project they and the designer will work together to prare the services of the construction contractor all that should be in place so that they can start work even perhaps before the end of the school year to ensure that the work is all completed over the summer and ready to go so I think this is good timing um the price well it seems high at

1:19:40 $420,000 in general um the rule of thumb is that the OPM cost will be about 10% of what the total construction cost is this is going to be a $4 million project 5.2 is what was appropriated from you know Capital funding uh and so it’s not surprising this is a this is not to exceed price if they don’t expend certain hours on certain things if they go to the part-time Clerk of the works because it’s a summer project instead of fulltime might saves some money but this is an not Seas um I don’t have procedures per se established about what comes to the school committee but I just felt like typically anything over $250,000 is what we bring to it so I thought was important at this level of

1:20:26 investment to have I’m opening up for questions I guess the only question i’ have is does is there townside approval because I don’t know how this works it’s not our bond issue right no you are the owner um it really comes down to who the owner is you are the owner of the school so you are Services yes you Department of the town but um I had a question on the last paragraph on the the total value contract exceeds 250 um I I read it the other way that our threshold was we could only approve

1:21:13 up to 250 um so maybe just saying that you know the the threshold that we typically address items would be 250 and yes um yes and is that an actual policy it is not I couldn’t find one in terms of the contract so I have this on my successor Michaels um to do this but in general as I have done this work in the past usually it can be set a value of 250 above it’s also tied to some of statutes another question maybe should we just take that out I have I think it’s a good idea for us to establish a policy around that yeah I don’t I don’t know that I put in the memo would rise to the information information to let you know

1:21:59 that’s why this is coming before you for a vote where you might not typically been asked to vote for contct but I still I would just take that out if we take that sentence out does it change anything what I’m a little bit worried about it’s implying a policy that there is a threshold when there isn’t yeah now should there be a threshold is a good question which I think you were trying to imply here but I think we should take that up as a different discussion still move ahead with this absolutely just say that um you know well you to just this I don’t to read this memo because all this is memo right in terms of this particular paragraph so it doesn’t bind us in any way to that we’ve created a

1:22:44 threshold because all right this informational me to you and it isn’t policy until it’s in a policy really it’s the motion that be careful and we can bring the take that up in the Poli anybody join the um so I had the pleasure of um serving on the ble or the Brown School building committee for many years and left field was our open for that and I will say um we came in ahead of schedule and under budget by a significant amount and having been involved in that very very granular level for several years I would attribute the majority of that um

1:23:32 success to Le they managed this project very well um they were exceptionally organized um when they promised a deliverable it happened if it didn’t why you when it was coming they were in their capacity as an ERS project manager very very good um we were a large committee we’re a committee we started as a committee of 27 um I think we add Ended as a committee of 21 that’s that’s a large group of people to work with and they did it very well um if anything when we decide when we go through this process um because as we all know you know Marblehead can be unique to work with especially through the permitting

1:24:17 process and all of that and in leftfield often talked about a little bit of a learning curve even they had um through that if we can facilitate um there were different there was probably about five different people from leftfield that worked throughout the project with us if someone familiar um David sandon was the lead at the beginning he does very large scale projects this would be below his threshold I believe but um there were there were some other individuals um if we can just get someone that has been familiar with working Todd coordinating things um working with the town working with various departments I think it would be helpful in the process but not obviously and Mandy um so I’m I’m happy to see them on board I’m confident this will help us again deliver when we’re

1:25:03 supposed to for what we’re supposed to um which is always so I will ask for a motion to support the award uh for the contract for oders project manager services to left field of Boston Mass for the amount of 4 the amount not to exceed

1:25:25 420,000 so move by Jen chatner seconded Brian Oda um discussion roll call vote um Alison Taylor in favor Al Williams in favor Brian Oda in favor Jen chatner Sarah Fox in favor motion carries 5 to zero that brings us to communication survey presentation um does Frank have this to put up or I have it on my screen just g i I have it on my screen also and I have the the tables to show um from the raw data like the pivot tables okay as well so do did I give you what you need tech wise to share think you should be able to U let me see fingers

1:26:31 screen here we go right Brian do you want to walk through this let me make sure that it’s big enough for everybody to see um is that font big enough for everybody to see presentation mode please I’m trying no one’s doing anything on purpose guys Lord love a duck isn’t it down at the bottom here right here here we go it covers both of my monitors so I I can’t see anything so you’re just gonna have to tell me Brian when to pop forward okay you’re gonna have to move the slides I can’t do it on my side yep I know that’s what I said tell me when

1:27:17 you want me to pop forward it’s like so we had 568 responses in tables for a couple question question yep we’ll do that after we can do that after yes I was very impressed we got that many and very candid and open comments some part and other ones were very positive and strong so I think it was a good mix I think and uh to make our transparency obvious I’m wanted to make sure we’ve covered everything so 231 responses were on are there any other suggestions the school committee increase Communications so in order to really understand the responses every response that we saw and looked at

1:28:04 could not easily be assigned the bucket because one comma may have four different topics in it others would have one so we did the best we could if the multi um responses look like um a theme was there then that’s what we used does that make sense okay so we gred into these major categories Communications transparency Dr Bucky Mr Oda mea budget miscellaneous didn’t any specific category the numerous responses contain multiple topics of grouping became very difficult and Allison will test of that when we discuss this absolutely

1:28:53 yeah I I think I went too far there we go sorry I’m pressing the button too fast yes you’ll find the communication and transparency are very close in definition when you startop looking at the comments on it and anyone who wants this data it is available while so under improved communication one of the biggest things that they came up with is active listening and less talking they want answers to questions honest communication build better relationships with the news media school committee meeting minutes have to produced quickly and published and our goal would be to do it by the next school committee meeting public comments must be responded to at a school committee meeting don’t

1:29:38 hide behind executive sessions lawyers or M advice publish and measure goals objectives meet with teachers and understand where they are and cleaning up the school committee website because there are some errors on it and we really need to update more use Cly is this oh these are the you take the 200 some try to make categories from yeah and just to um elaborate just a a little bit on what Brian said about the data the raw data being made available it is um 1,700 plus pages long and it just needs to be redacted from the perspective it was Anonymous so there’s nothing from that perspective but there

1:30:24 are some comments that may have an indication or provide specific detail um we certainly wouldn’t want um anybody to able to identify who the person was so that has to be gone through um by our public ref records officer uh before it can be shared sorry B go

1:30:51 ahead so improve transparency there was a lot of comments made about transparity sometimes that was just a single word and sometimes it was a whole bunch of language behind it but there was no clear definition that I can understand for transparency and you’ll see in the back page we put together there’s a little Miriam Webster definition of transparency so that we can try to come up with the stand just of what that means and there was also a lot of opinions that there was um not a lack of honesty answer questions St hiding behind closed doors and stop blaming the others for holic environment making public comments and not responding publish something to counter the anti-school

1:31:38 committee sentiment focus on educational matters rational for previous decision should be made clear updates on school committee goals and progress and one thing we did agree to that we didn’t do Gos in this year because we didn’t have our Retreat the school committee Retreat which I think based on all of the turbulence and Chaos beginning at the end of the school year it was not possible for us to get together over the summer we have to make a definite effort to do it this year so that when we head start the new school year the school committee will have its goals and its objectives and Ms that we have to report on a monthly basis um and you’ll see that there also in any of these conversations a lot of

1:32:25 the data people school is already published they just don’t know where to find it so you’ll find on the fact page that I sent out for everyone to look at I put in a section where the budget is the budget book that people want to see 220 plus pages is online so anybody who wants to read the whole budget book get their hands on there was a suggestion that why don’t we just putp it up for every parent District that would be a pal paper and I almost guarantee you there won’t be that many parents that will want to read 220 pages of our budget so uh they also wanted to see some sort of a definition of terminology that we use in the budget like what revolving funds are free cash all of those terms we

1:33:11 throw around here frequently in the discussion people don’t really understand so we should have a primer that we would have at the beginning of every budget

1:33:25 cycle um should we do you I think um some of the stuff is on um additional slides should we push

1:33:34 forward the the information you’re sharing I think it’s on some other slides do we want to show those

1:33:42 to I can’t hear you he said yes okay I couldn’t hear him sorry one of the most common things that popped up a lot and I think goes down to the matter of transparency is what happened with Dr Bucky multiple a multitude of comments were directed about Dr Bucky indicated the public believes they were misled about his resignation here are the facts that the SE school committee can discuss Dr Bucky resigned and was not fired that’s very important distinction Dr Bucky required a non-disparagement clause in his resignation agreement this prevents disclosure of why he resigned designed by the school committe more

1:34:29 information is to be given Dr M must publicly remove the non-disparagement clause and then we would be free respond to all these questions I think it’s also in the minutes that um of our public meeting as well as our executive session minutes that have already been published and voted on um that we as a school committee did not want to have any type of NDA

1:34:57 my name popped up a couple times um because people also thought that this was the transparency lack lack of honesty there were comments believed that I lied about to the electorate about my massachusett commission against discrimination complaint with Dr Bucky this is one of his underlying belief that the school committee is not transparent and therefore is not honest so here’s the chronology of events and I wanted to publish this once and for all because I’ve stated this many times in the past I filed an MC complaint against Dr Bucky it is not a lawsuit before contemplating running for the office I contacted Massachusetts ethics commission and asked for their advice the ethics commission told me that I do not disclose the Mad complaint

1:35:42 before the election because it is personal and confidential matter if I lost the election then potential damage may have occurred to Dr Bucky before the election results mcrat also agreed that it was compal want the next page please also before the mcad complaint results I mean that’s important to note too so the ethics commission and M um did make it very clear that if I won the election I must immediately file a Massachusetts 23 B3 um before upon being swor into office with the town clerk this form was filed as required it disclos what the conflict interest might be what areas would

1:36:27 affect Dr Bucky and how to avoid any potential conflict on the conflict of interest form I stated that I would not participate or have any discussions with other school committee members on matters of Dr Bucky’s employment performance reviews and salary the school committee minutes will show that I recuse myself from all discussions both in public and executive session concerning Dr Bucky’s Employments performance reviews or Sal next the ma also was a very large one and it was very simply they want us to open the negotiation of the CL elected bargain agreements to be public they felt that putting negotiation in public would improve

1:37:13 would improve would improve transparency this belief is what will give observers an understanding of the budget TR walls meet Union requirements question next Y and I want to make sure no one has any questions we haven’t stopped does anyone at the table have any questions we’ve done a lot

1:37:40 already concerns around the budget how the budget is created negotiated finalized requirements includeed fully funding the schools which is not defined as to what this included request to develop a primer on budget development and all the terms you in budget process for example free cash and involving accounts and the budget books and other planning documents that people are looking for and said were not available are on the Marblehead head School District’s are on the Marblehead School District’s web page and see the fact from more next the The F just so people are aware the FAQ is something that we are going to develop and have on the website um that will provide easy answers to some of the top questions and the top concerns that we got in the Sur

1:38:29 and the school committee performance performance fell into two categories everyone wants the school committee to resign and a lot of people like the school committee the way it is and surprisingly the responses were actually pretty easy although some of the comments may be buried in those thick commentaries but when I count them up was pretty much same number yes and no next suggest the goals that we we need to discuss the school committee didn’t have its Retreat we have to definitely have a retreat this year actually if I can interrupt you right there we did have if you go back to the um scheduled meetings um we did have the first part of our Retreat and that was when we had masc and mass come and present to us because

1:39:15 usually the retreat’s broken up into some education pieces and then some planning pieces so we had the first step which were was our education pieces where they came and presented to us and then you know events occurred and kind of took over the next steps which would have been the second meeting um but we did have a retreat where we did the education yes part that’s missing is the goal yes I think the planning piece is is key from the comments anyways of what people want to see I think it’s key Al together so on the coming agenda we definitely need have scheduled and plan of Summer Retreat on our next SCH comme

1:40:02 agenda again we have to publish goals a measurable outcome and timeline and have at least a quarterly review of where we are against our owns next I think that I like that point I think earlier in this meeting Bri or maybe beginning of this we talked about a monthly update that might be just a pop my and that might be um a little agressive yeah yeah I don’t monthly I don’t I wouldn’t agree with schedu for that time

1:40:36 period so once again I’m really thankful and Alice and I are very thankful for all the people responded and I said it we had plenty of handed and honest opinions and we took those into account and are planning to address them while our future

1:40:54 Mees as I said much of the documentation that people looking for are on the Marblehead web page as public schools web page although I think we have some yeah I think that there is are some ways we can probably improve that um you know to be fair to make it as easy as possible for people to find things so they don’t have to click a link and a link another question I have um I guess the whole Comm so when I think back two we had two forums that we surveyed one was the sort of open conversations with the school committee and the other was legal Women Voters we have Jen I have some data that will show after Brian um I have some pivot tables that will’ll show with I

1:41:40 think where you’re going with that um about attendance and such yes as far as IL legal Women Voters go I didn’t analyze their responses because I had taken that on the survey at the request of the League of Women voter so I was planning on just just taking them out s to so you were you were just reviewing the conversation with the school committee was oh no so there was a specific question the League of Women Voters had asked Brian um I don’t I don’t think we should include questions for anyone else in our survey next time I don’t um I think that was probably a mistake but the League of Women Voters had specifically asked for a question to be included in our survey if people thought there was anything different that the League of Women Voters specifically should do we did not

1:42:28 include the responses to that question that was a completely separate question from the do from the free text do you have any additional suggestions for the school committee regarding um communication so there were two separate um questions with two separate answer columns we did not analyze these 53 responses that were provided in that column we’re just going to hand those over to the legue of Women Voters does that make sense thank you yes so that’s might be so Alison you want to do your slides yeah I I just do you want to talk about the next steps oh covered those mostly As we spoke I think it’s a good summary but I think you hit on all those areas yes

1:43:15 perfect um I need to stop sharing and then share my other form um just moving my files so that I can have them on the right

1:43:30 screen hopefully this font is big enough for everybody to

1:43:38 see is there a question I can’t hear you guys like at all so I’m not feel like I’m seeing talking and not hearing anything so if I’m not answering it’s not on purpose um so obviously the raw data just came in you know in this form format um some of the interesting statistics that we found so the raw data doesn’t have um any data captured but it does show the date and the time um it was interesting that I think about 58% of the responses came in between 6:00 am and 12 uh noon on the day it went live we did have about 25 or so responses that came in um prior to it

1:44:24 being live because I think the link went out in a couple different formats um and we did include those still though just so everybody knows in case you one of those 25 uh this is the question you know part of this survey was in hopes that people attended our communication forums and if folks remember we had the conversation with the committee which was more of an ad hoc you know in the- moment conversations people could come or be on Zoom with their questions um that was significantly longer from a forum perspective than the League of Women Voters there was no predetermining of questions and we actually had were able to have conversations with individuals um and it unfortunately there were a lot of people that didn’t didn’t attend that one I think that that

1:45:09 one got by and large a lot um better feedback from folks on whether or not they they like that one people like the back and forth um still a large response I don’t remember the exact count but we had a lot of people there 2011 responses is still pretty high for a survey um it is yes that’s almost everybody that responded I mean people could have watched it you know we um we wanted to make sure we included people that perhaps watched it on um YouTube after okay okay someone could have watched it yeah um from a comments perspective from people that completed the free text comments um it was you know about half

1:45:56 and half on whether or not they attended um the conversation with the

1:46:03 committee um so on the count of whether or not people watch Qui second well yeah sorry go ahead I’m sorry I can’t see you so I can’t oh yeah just go back I was doing you know I love numbers um yes ma’am I just so bear with me for one second so so only 47% of the people who gave comments that we did actually watched or attended it correct so 53% of the people who gave comments and rated how we did didn’t watch it attend correct well also there’s opportunity to give feed right there were some like

1:46:50 sort of just verage you know yeah correct I I do think the goal though is that people would have attended our first two I don’t want to say attempts and I don’t want them I shouldn’t even say first two because I think we share a lot um there’s certainly room for improvement but I think the Hope was that people would have attended one of these two items we kind of talked about it is you know attend one or both of these and then provide a

1:47:21 comment thank you for you’ll um the same here Sarah um for the um League of Women Voters people who attended the League of Women Voters only 82 out of the 232 comets had attended the League of Women Voters that’s only 35% yes but the question is do you have suggestions

1:47:47 for continue to increase information communication which is what we were trying to do in those forums um I I could I could definitely see it both ways yeah no I’m glad people took the survey very good yeah um it’s a little bit of a mind-blowing number of people that took a survey we’ve never really had yeah um particularly to have you know 60% of it done in the first six hours of the the 10 days that it was open um it does seem like I’m not certainly no expert at all but everything I’ve heard about surveys is that you know it’s usually a pretty it’s not this kind of a response although I guess we don’t know how many people watched it yeah we don’t have any

1:48:32 way to know that um maybe next time we can um separate out the questions to did you attend or did you watch that would be um a good delineator um this is did you watch the League of Women Voters Forum that we had now for those um just folks to remember the League of Women Voters Forum was a little bit different we had a lovely moderator from the League of Women Voters she was fantastic she kind of kept us on task kept us on time um it was predetermined questions by the league there was no involvement um with us we didn’t know the questions in advance um they were agreed upon and kind of I think a lot of people sent in questions one of the things I will say one of the comments that I saw a couple of times was that someone’s question

1:49:19 wasn’t asked uh in the League of Women Voters Forum um unfortunately the school committee doesn’t have any purview over that because the questions were sent to the and determined by the League of Women Voters I think they really did a great job of trying to my assumption I should say is that they did a great job of trying to um combin questions like-minded questions questions that were trying to get to the same theme um and I think you know she did a great job of really kind of covering all of the bases in it um but we did have slightly less uh attendance there the next um I can try and make this a little bit smaller so it all fits what you’ll see here uh we asked folks to kind of rank or tell us if they would

1:50:06 like a frequently asked questions page if they would like more League of Women Voters if they would like more like a coffee chat with the school committee if they would like um a monthly newsletter or if they would like more conversations with the school committee oh you can’t see that last one hold on is that font too small no it’s fine I think you’re looking at it a big screen right so you’re good I’m on the little screen so um you know what what you’ll see here by and large as people are really interested in a lot of different things I think the frequently asked questions of course stands out as getting the most votes which is fantastic uh interesting that that 170 number on somewhat interested I think a lot of people just kind of did that across the board one thing that Brian and I discussed at our subcommittee

1:50:51 meeting is the coffee chat with a school committee member you know there certainly are people that are interested in that and I think all of us invite people to give us a call and have you know have a chat at any point in time some of us have given our cell phone personal cell phone numbers out multiple times on these public meetings I it’s just a slight concern if there was to be one school Committee Member and multiple people that wanted to have the coffee chat which is fantastic um there would be kind of limitations potentially on what they could talk about um and we we just wouldn’t want anyone to feel uncomfortable as a result of that so that’s something I think we just want to talk a little bit more through um before we we think about implementing

1:51:37 that these numbers when you look it seems like there’s continuity people were either not interested in anything they were very like these numbers are they’re varying by wild 53 for not interested for all of them um I think it looks like to me if people clicking a box they clicked it across the board could be it could be but you know we all we can do is is hope we ask for the information and um you know hope that people are putting their best their best effort so that we can we can provide that back to them um conversations with the school committee definitely was up there as well I think that by and large from the comments was the best that was the most attended by far and it was the

1:52:23 most commented as uh having you know being very interested in that and I think it’s because people crave that back and forth um from some of the comments they they want us to respond whenever possible um I think doing more of that is really important that doesn’t mean they’re necessarily going to like the answer and I think we have to distinguish between I don’t like your answer and you’re not telling me the truth or you’re not being transparent because those are two distinctly different things I’ve certainly been on the other side of it and I understand how frustrating that can be as well um but it it still Rings true and I think that FAQ will really help um some of the things that are in there it we definitely need to fine-tune it and I think um perhaps at our Retreat kind of

1:53:10 go through it and and put some thought into what else we want in there I would encourage everybody to look at the draft um determine what else we want in there and um I think getting that up and getting that communicated out and and making sure that we continue to add to it as we go through things um and as as situations occur so that folks have a One-Stop shop to get that answer and then finally um this was whether or not people would be interested um in hearing this no these numbers came out exactly the same so I need um to look up whether they want the monthly newsletter or the coffee chat um I need to look these up but again this kind of goes through you know to someone just going through and and running down

1:53:58 the Yes No Maybe box um but that’s how that’s how the data crumbled for those two um these were separate questions from the rest so I think um this was the biggest teller I really liked for for me personally that there were so many people that were interested in having more interaction with us or hearing more from us um I thought that was a good sign understanding there’s certainly from the comments um you can see where uh folks clearly lie on one side uh or the other of you know thinking we’re doing a great job or an okay job even um thinking there were some minor improvements or thinking there were some major improvements there’s still a large

1:54:45 percentage um if you know three fifths of the folks still want to have more information come from us um I think if we start providing that that’s you know how we start to turn the ship a little bit and I just want to thank everybody that did respond both the positives and the negatives nobody’s perfect everybody has room for improvement and we appreciate folks taking time out of their already busy days to to fill this out and to put particularly you know if you put time and effort into the comments um we’re very grateful for that we have those available to us or comments the comments are yeah they’re being uh because the pages because there’s so many pages we do have to make sure I think I had mentioned that um before that we I just want we just want

1:55:30 to make sure that there’s nobody there’s no information in any of them that is potentially indicative of who the individual was who the responded because it was really important that the survey be anonymous thank you thank you both for your work on this this just one piece I sent everyone the rough draft with facts yes just so that when we get together for the next school commit any modifications or anything you want to put on the facts or any new facts we haven’t included okay so want to bring those send those back we’ll do that I think it’s probably something we we that really would require a working session I I think to ensure

1:56:15 that Retreat yeah absolutely that’s what I to to highlight so we can we can yeah that’s yep that’s what I would say thank you very very much um any questions any questions all right I could go through like the data all day long because I’m such a nerd but um so if there’s any other questions on on that I have about 436 pivot

1:56:43 tables I know I admitted it I’m a nerd you had me at pivot table yeah right I know oh there so great so that brings us to subcommittee and Le on update um I as we getting to the point in here we are I don’t know that we’ve had meetings I know you were talking about get a policy subcommittee

1:57:06 meeting one thing that did come up just um around that is a comment from last um week and I I think there’s a letter to the editor about it also uh in regards to the different policies that we have or I guess not school districtwide policy we have on um screening committees how how they operate who’s included um so that might be something that we want to consider as well there are different you know different policies at different schools or different levels of positions um and maybe having one there aren’t policies at those levels but there are processes that have been followed continuously and you know just having a

1:57:52 discussion around potentially developing a policy to streamline it or um or at least identifying what those processes are and including those processes in an FAQ as well because I know we always get tons of questions around those processes whenever whenever we’re hiring someone and obviously we’ve had a lot of different um hires and different schools and locations so we want to make sure we if we have that at least have that identified if we don’t have an overarching policy

1:58:29 um M um if you could if I could be um allowed to offer just an opinion and recommendation my understanding that there’s a facilities sub committee um I wished you my you here that I have been able to convene work with you to convene that committee um I heard this a discussion about having a facilities goal on the school plan um and I just want to offer my perspective as a assistant superintendent of finance and operations and also as a superintendent um I really feel strongly that the facility goals for any of our schools should be the responsibility of person sitting in my seat and the directly facilities and so I would

1:59:15 encourage the facility subcommittee to ask my successor and the facilities director to put forth a facilities in plan we have but I think that is the vehicle to me by which you um put forth your your facilities goals I don’t I wouldn’t as a superintendent have held a principal accountable for the facility I would hold them accountable for having a collaborative relationship with facilities and be able to make sure they know that the carpet and the library need to be replaced but really the prim mover for that is our facil director with support superintendent so maybe that’s some consideration and I think as we move forward this is a theme we’ve talked about continually um when we worked on that uh strategic the facility

2:00:02 strategic plan which is um really really comprehensive and we had an audit come in um and give us a lot of that the issue is um for a district with the number of pieces of real estate we have we knew this going in one of the subject matter Experts of a member of our committee Jeff St George um who does this professionally for for some um he’s a facilities manager on a on a larger scale um and said you know even before we start this his year mark was two to three million per year to keep facilities where they need to be for the number we have and we all will take back a little bit but then we when now we had this comprehensive review done and that’s exactly what they came out with as well and they year marked the

2:00:48 positions so we really have to work on how we figure out how to keep up to dat not defer maintenance but at the same time work within the reality of what our fiscal reality town is um so we have some more us yeah and I think the master plan is great I’ve been involved in those and the goals that I’m talking about include such goals as making sure that on an annual basis there is a comprehensive Capital plan that is completed and submitted and even if you can’t fund it each year that it is done and it’s comprehensive and that’s where the the information from principle gets incorporated into that plan but even the way the budget is developed the way we monitor our ventilation systems to ensure we have a healthy environment there are a lot of differents that I

2:01:36 help that I think think about the cont you’re gonna talk with the yes I think he feels the same we’re closely with Mike thank you thanks yes um that’s wonderful so that brings us to new business school committee announcements in your class we’re good um for I don’t think we’ve had any new correspondence um that I can think of in the last few weeks and then that brings us to um motion and vote to meet an executive session pursuant to mass I’m going to request a motion to vote to meet an executive session pursuant to M General Law chapter 38 section 21A for to discuss strategy respect to in preparation for collective bargaining

2:02:21 with Marblehead education asso Association per substitutes professional team because open discussion May a detrimental effect the bar with not to return to session moved by Jen shner seconded by Brian Oda roll call vote Alison Taylor in favor Al Williams in favor Brian Oda in favor Jen CH in favor Sarah Fox in favor motion carries five to zero for second um so that I will call us into um I’m actually we’re gonna go to recess for five minutes you want me to log out and log back in Sarah so you C so

2:03:07 everybody can be ask I’m gonna close the zoom and I’m it so at 904 thanks