School Committee: August 14, 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.

0:02 going in want me to get the sign is she see Callum yeah sure so we’re going to have 15 minutes of public comment I’m going to call the meeting to order at 9:17 uh it is being live streamed we do have folks here in the audience that want to make public comment as well and then we’re going to shift our whole presentation 15 minutes we do have presentations planned um we hopefully will’ll get through as many people as possible so um Renee if how many minutes I can speak yes three minutes each yeah yes we do not have a

0:48 laptop at home and Jen hear she do you here do you want me to bring mine over are you

0:57 okay well I just she can’t see yours right Jen can you hear her can you just speak and see if Jen can hear you online yes I can Jen can you hear her um is she

1:16 speaking is she speaking yep I’ll bring mine over and you can okay perfect yep and then unmute and I will mute mine

1:48 okay thank you good morning I’m Renee Ramirez keeni uh to Beverly AV I came this morning in hopes of learning more about what the Imp implementation of the draft flag policy would mean one question I have is when you state the school committee claims sole responsibility to determine whether flags are appropriate does this mean that you are the ultimate final arbitrator deciders uh of what’s appropriate or do you mean so as in the only source of input as to what’s appropriate in other words are you intending to give students and staff of voice as to how they choose to create

2:33 and express their sense of community will the policy be so restrictive that it takes away a valuable learning opportunity for students to have a dialogue with classmates their teachers and administrators to think critically about banners that should go up and when and why will this policy prohibit a black lives matter and pride flag if the community staff and students want one I was a clinical social worker for 40 years including starting the social work department in the low Public Schools children and adolescen have taught me what it feels like to be included or left out to feel different in a very homogeneous group to not sometimes be able to trust if they have

3:20 allies in the administration I know for them any symbol of acceptance any sense of Welcome can matter when you’re trying to determine whether flags and banners reflect the Mission Vision and values of the school district I know you agree that it’s the mission of our school department to Foster an environment of belonging and acceptance because it’s on the school website I hope you agree that it’s part of our vision that we aspire to prepare our students for the extremely diverse world that they will live work and compete in as for values there are flags in addition to our proud American state and Marblehead Head flags flags that can and Marblehead flags flags that can

4:05 also signal and emphasize values those which strengthen our common purpose as a school and the community we aspire to be one last uh Point uh we urge students to have confidence in their voices to speak up you know respect respectfully and uh use the process which many students did last fall and winter so I’m not clear why the decision was made to drop this in the middle of Summer uh but I urge you uh to schedule your next meeting in the evening in September after the school year is settled in and to listen with Open Hearts and Minds before you vote on this thank

5:00 you good morning my name is Cameron wolson I’m at 16 Road um I’m the proud mother of two young children James and Grace who will soon be attending Marblehead Public Schools my wife and I recently made the difficult decision to leave our home our family and our friends in South Carolina to move to Marblehead the town where I proudly grew up we did this because we wanted to raise our children in a town that shares our values values of inclusivity kindness and civic responsibility a place where the school district lists School culture among its core values and Promises to quote create an environment of respect and appreciation for individual and cultural differences and instill a passion for responsible social action we knew that moving here would mean that our children would grow up in

5:47 a place where they could be themselves without fear where their family would be respected and valued and where they would learn to stand up for what is right but today I sit before you deeply concerned about the proposed flag policy this policy directly contradicts the very Mission and values that Drew us to Marblehead in the first place how can we teach our children to appreciate differences to respect others and to take responsible social action if we erase the symbols that represent these ideals as a mother I want my children to grow up in a school where they feel seen supported and empowered to be who they are I want my children to learn in an environment that doesn’t shy away from difficult conversations but rather Embraces them as opportunities for growth and understanding this is about

6:33 more than just Flags it’s about the kind of community we want to build here in Marblehead a community where every child regardless of their background or identity knows that they belong I urge you to consider the impact that this policy will have on families like mine and on the values that we all hold dear please let’s not silence the symbols that represent the very diversity and inclusivity that make Marblehead a place we can all be proud of thank you

7:18 [Music] [Music] yes um I’m Nina Johnson and I live at T spray app um Marin Potter seven Emer La okay as students of marble High School who walk these halls and see these Flags every day we have come to voice our opposition to this flag censorship policy you told us five months ago during the student listening sessions that you wanted to include student voices in this process but by speeding up this process and trying to pass this policy before school starts you are actively trying to avoid student input you’re trying to make this quick and easy but this is not a quick and easy topic because these flags mean so much to students at our school who would like the opportunity to share our voices on this issue during the listening sessions we discussed compromise on a part of the policy that allowed students to petition

8:04 to add a flag for 30 days we believe that this duration was too short and were promis more listening sessions to discuss this aspect of the policy further however these sessions were never granted and instead of adding more time you instead remov that entire section fully removing the opportunity for students to have a voice in the policy Flags such as the black lives matter pride and juneth flags that currently hang in our school represent an active support system for students who may feel unseen and underrepresented the removal of these flags by your policy would send a message that our school no longer chooses to support or value these students we urge the school committee and our community to actually care about the students when considering a flag policy and to care and to wait until school starts to finalize the policy in order to include students in the process thank [Music]

8:57 you yeah you got it yeah no problem was wor it wouldn’t even fit on the um so my name is Jordan caress wheelright I Live at7 Lafayette Street and I’m the parent of a Glover school school student while I’m here as a parent I also work at glbtq legal Advocates and Defenders or glad as some of you may know glad attorneys brought marriage equality to Massachusetts in 2004 and later won the case that legalized same-sex marriage for the rest of the country in 2015 at the Supreme Court glad has recently won several cases challenging discrimination and censorship in schools including in Massachusetts I am not an attorney but I have shared the proposed flag policy with three senior attorneys who are

9:43 constitutional law experts at glad they all cautioned that while the school committee does have the right to control which flags fly on a flag pole the proposed policy extends far beyond that they called attention to the phrase banners and similar symbolic displays noting that it is vague and open to Broad interpret that could lead to enforcement that infringes on the constitutional rights of teachers and students for example a child could be banned from wearing a pride flag pin on their backpack or a teacher could be banned from hanging a black history month’s display in a space designated for visual learning AIDS in their classroom in both scenarios Marblehead Public Schools could be sued for a violation of First Amendment rights I would also like to speak to the school climate this policy would create

10:29 for students since student feedback was sought out and then ultimately not incorporated into this policy if imposed as written students will feel that their opinions and deeply held beliefs as you just heard are not valued by the school committee this will inevitably lead to a school climate where students feel unsupported by school leadership this is important because significant advances in educational research show that a positive inclusive School climate increases learning for all students to quote a glad brief on this subject Studies have consistently found at positive inclusive School climates in which Stu schools appreciate students for who they are and acknowledge different students backgrounds including racial cultural immigration

11:16 status-based and lgbtq Status leads to Greater student engagement in school and better academic outcomes positive School climate and its practices and approaches play a powerful role in success for all students and I will email each study and referenced in that quotation to the school committee uh following this meeting I urge you to adjust and clarify this policy incorporating feedback from students teachers and administrators before rushing to approve it prior to the start of the school year thank you [Music]

12:08 done a wonderful job at that we appreciate

12:20 you uh thank you to the committee for the opportunity to be heard um here is a parent a homeowner a taxpayer um and an educator myself uh to speak against this flag censorship policy which I view is entirely unneeded and unnecessary and as Jordan points out likely to lead to costly litigation that our community can uh cannot afford and that the taxpayers of our community don’t want um it’s a policy they don’t want and the expense of litigating over it is an expense that they don’t want and I I certainly as taxpayer feel very strongly about that um so I agree with everything that’s been said by the prior speakers I’m grateful to the student leaders in particular for being here and raising their voices I agree with them that this process needs to incorporate student input uh and should not happen over the summer I understand there’s been some discussion around that there need to be

13:07 discussions before consideration when students are back I’m particularly concerned about our Meco students who are an important part of our school community and who aren’t here in the summertime so I think we need to give them voice uh as a former student leader myself representing students on the University of Massachusetts Board of Trustees in my senior year um I think it’s important that students have that voice but I want to focus my comments on unintended consequences I mentioned I’m an educator I teach at the college level um so I run a classroom and when I look at the policy I see consequences on the quality of teaching and learning in our schools that I think may be unintended but would be very real I give you examples this is the Earth Day flag are we to have a policy in Marblehead that says that this cannot be displayed in the school building on Earth Day the

13:54 current policy would do that this as you know as the Olympic flag are we to have a policy that would ban the applying of the Olympic flag during the Olympic Games as an opportunity to teach our students about the importance of the Olympic movement this of course you’ll recognize is the juneth flag a national holiday approved by Congress signed into law by the president are we to have a policy that says that we cannot fly a flag that rep that represents the end of slavery in this country in our Public Schools unintended consequences so I strongly opposed this policy I don’t think we need one at all uh I would encourage the committee to Simply remove this from the committee’s agenda there are bigger things to worry about including the negotiation of the new teacher contract which I think are far more important business for the

14:42 committee to deal with um and to what to the extent that any policy is being considered let’s do it in the light of day when students have an opportunity to be part of the discussion thank you very much

15:06 Mary mccarriston Pine Cliff Drive you know where I stand anyways all of you do so what I’m going to do is I’m going to read you a poem that my child in the third grade wrote open your eyes open your ears what do you see what do you hear I see War I hear crying open your ears open your eyes what do you hear what do you see I hear Angry Words I see Prejudice open your eyes open your ears what do you see what do you hear I see bullying I hear my heartbreak open your ears open your eyes what do you hear what do you see I hear birds chirping I see hope in the world open your eyes open your ears what do you see what do you hear I hopefully

15:52 see freedom I hear marching I open my ears I open my eyes I open my heart I open my mind I work hard to see here in fi that we are all the same because we are all different it’s not too hard to find we need to be inclusive thank

16:32 you hello name k k I live on 19 pck Road um thank you for letting me speak today I’m generally not one to speak up you’ve never seen me at a school committee meeting before but I’m here today because I’m very sad um the the flag censorship policy in question won’t impact my high school senior in one way or another as she isn’t part of either of the communities in question but I’m still heartbroken by the cruelty behind this effort these Banners are not hurting teachers or students they are merely there to help some students feel a bit of acceptance so I guess it does impact my child because if this policy is enacted she and her classmates will be taught that it’s okay to bully those with the least amount of power I’ve also come to understand that the effort to ban them has nothing to do

17:18 with Marblehead it has been coming from outside groups determined to stir up chaos in our schools where it did not exist school boards are supposed to be nonpartisan but politicizing School committees is a widely acknowledged strategy of a particular National Party platform I canite dozens of reports and high gred news organizations outlining this approach or you can Google it yourself in fact I was alarmed to see the agendas of some extreme Facebook groups to which um a school Committee Member May belong most posts are too abhorent to read aloud in public but there’s a great deal of celebration on the page when our last superintendent was the superintendent was fired at Great expense to our town more chaos so it seems inevitable that these topics

18:04 discussed on this Facebook group such as changing the curriculum Banning books will be subject our will be subjected to these efforts going forward divisive issues that have nothing to do with what our students or teachers need to

18:21 thrive we’ve been working over time um to ban these peaceful symbols in the school but do you know what our students really need by September 3rd quality teaching teachers who are happy to be in their classrooms because they are valued supported and properly con compensated by this District instead some rooms will be empty why isn’t this our first priority I’m afraid I may know why people in town are starting to see that our Public Schools may have uh an an agenda to suppress inclusion and acceptance and if they cannot they want to create non-stop Discord and until the schools ultimately fail I just wanted you to know that some people here are starting to see what’s happening I hope

19:07 that more people understand the big picture will be able to focus on creating a harmonious District instead of using your authority to focus on cruelty like doctors Educators should focus first and foremost to do no harm look at each other now make a decision is it a school committee or a cruelty committee thank you um hello my name is Sonia soberg Potter I live at seven Emerald AB um I have three students I’m in the Marblehead

19:52 system a senior an eighth grader and a fourth grader this summer my Rising eighth grader was assigned a book for civics class and in that book it’s telling young people that their voice matters that they do know some things um I believe that nobody knows what it’s like to grow up in this current culture than the young people themselves and so a flag policy that doesn’t um prioritize their voices and their say is irresponsible and harmful thank you

20:31 Chris paru 212 West Shore Drive I couldn’t find the policy behind the readings themselves but I would assume that the whole purpose of the readings is to make the public aware of what the proposed policy looks like give them a chance to digest it and to also then give them a chance to comment on it it doesn’t make sense to me then that you appear to be simply pushing through this policy without giving actual stakeholders an opportunity to add their input related to the policy more importantly I referenced the first point in the school committee operating procedures that states that you place the interests of all students above all others I have not been privy to the private meetings that have taken place between the committee administrators and students but from public rhetoric and

21:17 actual uh evidence it appears that this is not what is taking place in regards to this policy I also then refer to point 13 in the school committee operating procedures that your actions should quote be consistent with the core values of the district and be consistent with our vision of a high class organization I respectfully submit that the current draft policy and approach to finalizing this policy is in direct conflict with the procedures just referenced on the surface at least it appears that you’re pushing through a close-minded inflexible restrictive policy that does not represent the well-being of all students nor does it conform with the core values of the majority of District members finally I also quote uh from the

22:04 Marblehead school committee policy kcb Community involvement in decision-making it reads the school committee endorses the concept that Community participation in the Affairs of the schools is essential if the school system in the community are to maintain Mutual confidence and respect and work together to improve the quality of education for students it is therefore intended to exert every effort effort to identify the desires of the community and to be responsive through its actions to those desires all citizens will be encouraged to express ideas concerns Andor questions about the schools to the school administration to any appointed advisory bodies and to the committee I believe that the current

22:50 process is being carried out in direct conflict with the policies and procedures already in place to govern your actions I therefore once again request that you slow the process town to accommodate and take into consideration the input of all community members not just those that can make it here or on Zoom at nine o’clock on a Wednesday morning in the summer to take into consideration the fact that we have the ability to actually have the ability to contribute their thoughts views and opinions on a policy that can have detrimental effects on some of our students thank you and I just want to end by saying I think it’s extremely disrespectful to hold this meeting at this time under this manner and the only reason that I understand that we had Zoom because the chair couldn’t make the meeting not to try and incorporate other

23:37 people who couldn’t make it there’s 14 people on the zoom there’s maybe 15 people here and a town of 20,000 people I’d like to see the metrics that you have collected that shows that this flag policy is consistent with the core values of our district thank you

24:12 wson Allison what are we doing for time hang one second my name is Beth wolson I live at 16 Road hang I can only Echo what my wife Cameron said I grew up in South Carolina and left my family friends job and a lifetime of memories behind to move to Marblehead to foster a sense of community inclusive ity and respect for my children something that I didn’t have and that I can personally speak to the detrimental effects of I was a police officer for 13 years and I can assure you that I have seen the worst of what cruelty and lack of inclusivity can do to people particularly our young people I don’t need to be explicit but I do need to say that our children need support and a nurturing environment to be their best selves the proposed policy is in direct opposition to the celebration of diversity and positivity that I came

24:57 here for in the sense that so many marble headers Pride themselves on in addition to that giving children the space and freedom to cultivate important and open conversations is an integral part of Education as a point that I feel needs to be made I find it discouraging that the first two meetings on this topic were not open to public comment and occurred during the summer in direct conflict with the committee’s policies and practices I don’t need to belabor the point so as each and every person before me I implore you to rethink this policy please let the voices of our community be heard thank you

25:41 thank you very much um couple points of clarification um it is a policy it’s it’s not Banning anything the reason that we’re doing this not because we decided one day that we wanted to have this policy we’ve never had a flag policy and that has been fine and it could have continued to be fine except that Administration asked us and by law when Administration asks what a policy is we do have to develop one um I was not involved in the listening session previously I was not um the vice chair then I would like to have another listening session for sure um if it’s the will of the committee of course um I will also say that this is not the final reading and I I think there may be some

26:27 miscommunication about that I’m not sure where that stems from but do apologize um this is the discussion of the one of the drafts that we came up with so the policy sub committee which are all open to the public and all have public comment is where we discuss that and then we bring that policy to the full committee because while the policy subcommittee does create the policy it does have to be discussed um and vetted and approved by the full committee before it can actually become a policy here and we have to read through that and have those disc discussions um three times in order to do that so hopefully that um helps give you a little bit more information or clear up some of the other misinformation that was out there on that um and we appreciate all of your

27:14 time and effort and coming here to yes I ask a question

27:22 sure I’d be very curious to hear what our new superintendent feels about this and particular how it was dealt with fire district I know knowledge of what other districts do in regard to this you point out while the requested come from a prior Administration that Administration Place y yeah Jen is Raising her hand I I because she’s not here I’m cheering the meeting so she probably doesn’t like that I took your question because that’s not normally how these go I just I want to make sure that the public hears directly from us not from a Facebook group or from an an article with potentially misleading information on you what um what is happening here and why but I’ll let Jen speak because not let her speak she can speak at any point

28:09 in time can you hear me I think yeah can you hear me sorry about that Allison can you hear me yes great yeah I just want to say thanks appreciate everyone’s um understanding on this I’m sick which is why I’m not able to be there today and nobody wants what I have so um I I appre appreciate your understanding um I just was I just had a question Alison on how um how from a timing perspective um uh we’re just shifting our um schedule a little bit um but also that this is on the agenda for later for discussion my intention for today’s purpose and and Els and you as a subcommittee member can agree or not but my intention today was to just bring this to the um not to consider this a reading but to bring it

28:55 to the school committee and just uh get the school committee members um feeling on this that we are as a subcommittee going in the right direction with this and it would also be an opportunity for this superintendent to uh um at you know at that time in the schedule today share his thoughts on that as well so this is an iterative process um the process I know um a few folks make comments about um it taking place in the summer um and the work of the school committee does go on in the summer um I know that might be frustrating for some folks but we do get stuff done in the summer and you know our sort of hamstrung if we don’t move forward um but this will clearly have additional readings as we get into the school year so there will be opportunity for people to continue to

29:41 express their thoughts on this and I thank everyone for for their comments today

30:18 I’m not hearing anything Allison I don’t know if other people on Zoom can

30:26 hear just so we can can I I’d like to make a motion that we take items out of order and have the full discussion now on the flag policy instead of doing part of it now part of it later it seems like the people here would like to hear the discussion if we may it just feels like we’re doing part of the discussion and then we’re going to pause and then hear from the rest of us if John’s gonna speak and you and Jen have spoken Alicia can you I haven’t spoken on my thoughts on it I just I was just wanted to make sure I cleared up Miss communication really agree we should extend no I just want to make sure Alicia are you okay with shifting time frames okay we have we have raise point of course we have a very limited amount of time to cover a lot of work which is what this is really

31:12 supposed to be a workshop for the school committee to establish our goals and our directors for next year the more time we take away from this the less time we have to get to the work of what the school committee is expecting to have done by the end of the year so I’m asking that we table this discussion till our next open meeting in September and and uh bring it up there give it the time it needs because we’ve already we’re already quarter of 10 and we haven’t gotten to any of our topics yet so we really need to think about extending this any longer I recommend we wait till our first open meeting is September and then make it a dedicated meaning if that’s what we need to do to get this out and done so I raise that motion so I think Sarah had a motion first I’ll second

31:58 I’ll second Sarah’s motion so discussion discuss what I feel I agree with Brian too I think that Jen or can Jen hear um something Jen I’m unmuted Jen go ahead I was just gonna say I agree with Brian I think that um we have an awful lot of work to do today we had an opportunity to hear from folks um but I think that we are not going to be giving this the amount of time that it deserves um to try to jam it in today because I think um and I think that you and I need to also you know do a little bit more preparation for a bigger meeting but that aside I mean we we can definitely do it we had our discussion earlier this month on it um but I do think that we would be cutting it short a bit if we try to do it and do it

32:46 today yeah I think we need sorry additional time um more than a half hour um in order to to fully vet this I would like John to just provide his his quick thought thought but we do have a motion on the table I know um so do you want to vote or do you want still up for discussion the point my understanding was that the subcommittee had come up with a new version of its own which was different than what the full committee had last discussed and that you were bringing this to us so you could hear feedback from the rest of the committee on what direction to go so my thing is do you want that feed if this discussion item is is to give you feedback on on what this proposal

33:32 policy changes because this one is fairly different than the last one that came before the full committee so that was what my understanding and what I think I just heard someone say the agenda item was for was to you for you and Jen as a subcommittee and I know we’re doing subcommittee reworks so I don’t know that it will stay the same but if it does for the the policy sub committee to get direction from the full committee if you’re if we our will is that you go forward with it or if we we do not or we amend so I I just don’t know how you continue your work without our feedback we I don’t think anybody intended to continue oh okay I’m not sure why that would even be a thought in someone said so um the the thought would

34:17 never be to continue anything without this feedback but there is a motion on the table and so we want to vote on whether Sarah just to be clear whether you take things out of order and do the flag policy now alici has said that we are only her only Retreat today so she can wait we appreciate that very much um so we can take roll call right Al Williams in

34:42 favor Brian Oda not in favor Sarah Fox in favor Jen can Jen hear us um I am not in okay um so I am going to say not in favor uh because I would not because I don’t want to have the discussion because I would like to have a meeting dedicated to this and I think if we limit this to just a half an hour then it’s not going to be enough clearly this is a very vocal group here and it’s not going to be enough time so I do think that we should have a separate meeting it can be at night so more people I had to take the day off today as well to do this um so I certainly understand that um so that we

35:28 can have that discussion and full um full time I would like John if you’re okay to respond I think I think it’s important to respond um and just be my response and take it as you may and then obviously fall will take place what it needs to I think um so I just want to say that when this when this policy was brought up to my attention we had some brief discussions about it um I didn’t have a whole lot of the historical information being very new to the district um and my initial response to the policy was probably makes sense to have something that we’ can follow so that there’s you know things in place um but what I will say is in the last few weeks that have transpired in further reflection and really um born out of some of the conversations I’ve had with our administrative team about making

36:15 sure that um we’re giving students voice and that being likely one of our shared administrative goals this year I think upon further reflection I would agree with the committee that tabling this discussion to either have it a larger more inclusive input from the community makes sense Andor um potentially moving forward giving uh with no policy and having the lowest control go back to administrators um that that would be the will of the committee but that’s my initial thoughts um it’s different than what I initially had the discussion with uh Jen about um and again I will I will own my uh my my shortsightedness in having the conversation um because I think it’s important uh for folks to know that you know as an educator as an administ Ator

37:01 um my sole focus is making sure students are heard and students are um a part of their uh learning community so that’s where I stand at this point I want to thank everybody that came to speak um and particularly the ones that um certainly had heartfelt um experiences and we want to hear you and we want to make sure that we move forward with that um discussion and so we will make sure to publicize besze that so that everybody is aware of when it happens where it happens the time it happens um and having Zoom available as well because I have a young child at home I understand it’s not always possible for folks to come here and speak in person though we do appreciate you taking the time to do that thank you very much you’re more than welcome to

37:52 stay we do and we let the two news we let the weekly news and um the current know as well um and we can make sure to extra emphasize this and and make sure that it’s in Facebook groups it’s generally on like alt Marblehead Head generally on like alt Marblehead everything Marblehead um and anything Marblehead those three someone generally posts there as well but we can make sure to increase um that awareness understandably share yeah um I always find it the the town website’s a little bit clunky to to get to the calendar what I found through the years is if I just put in the Google search bar Marblehead Mass town meeting calendar it comes right up to the top and it’s the monthly C month by month you can go back years and years and or you know as far

38:41 as things are bucked and that always will show you what’s been posted the minute it’s not actually by law an officially posted meeting till it shows up on that website so um the requirement is 48 Hours a lot of committees um even ours will do it earlier than that but the legal requirement is 48 hours but if you just um Mark that on your computer it’s I don’t know I’m the only Dy person that does it but I love I check almost every couple days to see what meetings if there’s a select board meeting or this and I go to a lot of them but it’s a good thing to know what’s going on because there’s a lot of great information on there come on subcommittees are posted there as well as an

39:28 FY it is on our website but that’s not the legal post the town website is the is the one to use that’s that’s the official one so I always tell people that’s where that’s the

39:41 real thank you everybody you’re more than welcome to stay um Alicia thank you so much for waiting thank you for your patience we greatly greatly appreciate it

40:15 man oh my God you know the best part of this is I see bullying do you see it because so do I thank you very

40:54 did do you mind if I watch it off my screen because I can actually read it better here yep I have

41:10 you it you it happens take a muffin a bagel of my presentation things there’s Bagel you think I would know better by now I able to start my own thank you absolutely system and thank you very much I appreciate that a

41:44 RO is there anything else you guys no I think we’re good I I didn’t find a laptop up all of our other laptops in the classrooms are locked

41:58 down okay down okay yeah Frank L comes in with a whole cart full of stuff I know I don’t think he was thinking it was a zoom yeah it wasn’t originally that yeah she has Co

42:18 so get off so comedy of errors it’s fine it’s really not the end of the world and don’t give it another thought the frustrating part is you know they tell us to not bully and then

42:33 they we appreciate you a muffin just muffin Bagel fruits all you had was a yogurt come

42:46 on on [Music] y do oh yours isn’t I can’t I have my wrong glasses on no that’s not an apple the uh Google I can I’m happy to do it if you need oh yeah we’re about to start no I I think that was I used to have one of those it was like a little thing that plugged into the power adapter and then it had five different

43:17 options I know if you need to transfer to me that’s okay too what if I hate that you’re having to do this okay hey Alon yes sir is it

44:02 okay so we’ll go ahead and get started and um I hope everyone can hear me because we do have a remote participant um we’re going to start with introductions my name is Alicia malan I work for the masd the Massachusetts Association of school committees uh we are a member organization that does training and support policy work searches things like that for school committee members in the state of Massachusetts one of the great things about working for masc is that everyone on staff either currently is or has been a school Committee Member so we have all sat or currently sit where you’re sitting I’m just now starting my third year on the nelch school committee prior to that I was on my town school committee for five years in Westward so um what I’d like to start with is just to go around the room brief introduction

44:48 your name and how long you’ve been on the committee or what role you play in The District so can we start over

44:59 here Fant fantastic know been Ono okay myd year fantastic this my sixth year okay and you guys John Rob the interim superintendent been here for six weeks okay I’m Julia fist super of teaching and learning second fantastic so we have a little bit of a spread but sometimes I do these presentations and someone’s like I’ve been on the committee for 14 years and I’m like do you want to come and oh sorry Jen I’m sorry that’s okay um Jen Schaffner I’m chair of the school committee this is my fifth year on the committee okay um fantastic sorry about that so we’re gonna start with a basic overview of roles and responsibilities and then

45:45 we’re going to take a break for a quick second and do an exercise where we talk about some things that your District currently does that you feel are working not working and maybe you want to start doing and then we’ll get into some um I should actually go to that we will cover your role as a Committee Member on let me just adjust my screen really quick um your role as a Committee Member your responsibilities as Municipal legislature then we’ll talk about goal setting and monitoring superintendent goals and evaluation and then implementing best practices when we talk about operating protocols agendas strategic planning and Communications so first up understanding and respect for roles there are two wings of the um

46:30 governance and management sides of the house so when we’re talking about the school committee school committee is governance you are the means you’re the mission and vision you have you govern through goals policy and budget I like to use the analogy of I want you to think about your students needing pencils so the school committee is the what the why and the how much you know that your students need to learn how to write you know it’s important because they need to be um compe itive they need to keep Pace with their peers and then you allocate will’ll say $100 in the budget keep that analogy in mind you are the bridge between the community and the superintendent and you authorize by vote and then you Monitor and on the other side of the house we

47:15 have the superintendent and their Administration they are management day-to-day boots on the ground lights on students in classrooms so they are methods strategies action plans regulation and procedures back to the pencil analogy you have told them our students need to write and this is why it’s important and here’s your $100 the superintendent takes that $100 and says all right room five needs 50 pencils and this is where we’re going to buy them from room six needs 100 pencils halfway through the year the superintendent figures out you know what I really think we need to change the pencil colors in room five to green and room six actually needs pens so you have told them what it was important and why and you’ve given them the the money and then they take that and they implement

48:03 it in the classrooms they are the how the who the when and the where they are the bridge between the staff and the committee and they recommend and Implement now I really want to on this slide I feel like I should do like a seesaw back and forth the administration recommends the school committee authorizes the administration implements and then you monitor so it really it isn’t just a column it’s a back and forth It’s a a Cooperative relationship and when you develop that relationship in effective ways you can hopefully have trust and respect in the Comm from the community you want to build trust and respect between yourselves and with the community so when we talk about our

48:48 roles as individual community members versus uh as individuals and as community members as an individual member you have no more Authority than anyone else on the committee you are one vote in the body and the body decides it is your responsibility to ask critical questions to come to meetings ready to go to understand at least at a baseline the materials you’ve been provided and then to participate in the discussion so that you can have so by the time you’re done at the end of the discussion you have effective policies effective budgets things like that you also have to as school committee members support the final decision the analogy I like to use here is nobody loves budget season nobody looks at

49:33 their budget and goes we have funded everything we possibly can everyone would love a couple million more but at the end of the day when the budget is voted on it is the district’s budget and it is the responsibility of the committee to support that budget in every way they can um and then you need to be dedicated to the work on the behalf of the students this is one of those places where when you think about who elected you your true constituency doesn’t even get to vote for you because your true constituency is the students you here you are here representing the town and the voters but the students are who you are working for now on the other side is the committee the committee can only exercise power through officially posted meetings and actions taken at

50:19 official at properly posted meetings you govern through policy you create the policy that the regulations then flow down from and this is kind of a trick question because when we ask people where policy is policy is not just in your handbook in your uh policy menu policy is everywhere your biggest policy document is your budget because your budget should reflect your policy goals uh you are also the stewards of the financial um of the finances the finances of the district so you are you are expected to not only help with the budget development but you need to then support the budget going forward and monitor and make sure things things are being done the way they should be done you engage the community and you sustain the superintendent and school committee

51:06 relationship and we say this we’ve lost count of how many times we say this during charting the course you are the employer of record on collective bargaining agreements in the district so any questions there by the way if you have any questions showout them out we’re not going to be formal let me know um and if I’m speaking too fast which I have a tendency to do tell me to slow down so School committees are the municipal Municipal legislature for the district much like a select board you have responsibilities as a municipal legislature you determine operating protocols for yourselves you establish the rules of the district which for you guys’ policy um you hire the chief executive the superintendent the budget originates and is

51:52 set good budget best practices the budget will originate with the administration and then come to you and you set it um you approve expenditures you have other special duties as set by state law and you are a public figure legally and publicly your meetings and actions are in public with a few exceptions those would be things like uh your executive sessions those are not are not necessarily public though their minutes would be made public down the road after the issue was adjudicated fully and reviewed by your legal council and then you maintain the balance of power between the executive and the municipality that’s the that’s the school committee superintendent relationship so your other Duties are

52:38 including but not limited to you Ser serve your constituents not just the voters but your students um you have limited additional hiring responsibilities when we do charting the course we talk about how the superintendent has one boss the committee the committee has one employee the superintendent however you also have advis and consent on the special education director the school business official the legal counsel and the school nurse now the advise and consent is not that you’re running all the interviews it’s that when the candidate for the position final candidate for the position is presented to you you’ll review it and you cannot unduly withhold your consent from a qualified

53:24 candidate so uh you review School Improvement plans and then again we’re going to say it you are the employer of record on all collective bargaining and it is your responsibility to retain a legal council so including but not limited to also includes your approval of handbooks your approval of fees all grants gifts and donations strategic plans overnight and out of state field trips the calendar uh new and substantially different job descriptions so if you had a an assistant superintendent in charge of pencils and the new assistant assistant superintendent is going to be in charge of pens that’s not substantially different but if the assistant

54:11 superintendent in charge of pencils is suddenly going to become the transportation director you would need to reprove that so and this is not an exhaustive list so now is the time when we’re gonna we’re going to get up stretch a little bit and do the oh go ahead so strategic plans for us in the past have been a sticky wi it we currently do not have a strategic plan um I shouldn’t say that we have a facility strategic plan that’s the only strategic plan that we have had my six years here we developed it three years ago and it’s very comprehensive um a districtwide strategic plan we have not had in six years it had run out the previous administration ran something called

54:56 planning for success and they d did a strategic plan a strategic just I want edification here once and for all a plan for Success particularly when it’s not brought forward to the point where it has budget drivers attached to it timelines attached to it metrics in which to measure success by is not a strategic plan is owned and voted on solely by the school committee so strategic plans originate with the administration but we vote you do vote on it eventually but it does ad it does it sorry it does originate with the administration uh we are going to talk about strategic plans a little bit later but yes a strategic plan or a district Improvement plan they’re called different things in different places they do originate with the administration um they take into account

55:42 stakeholder feedback and then they are voted on by the school committee okay so yes that would be a different thing and we will talk about okay best practices in developing strategic plans okay Alicia yes what is our role and responsibility towards select which is the town Municipal for issues so it is part of your job as school committee members to work with your town with your with the various subcommittees and Boards within your town very often you’ll see liaison being sent back and forth not necessarily like a a subcommittee representative but more someone who would attend a meeting if it has something that is and representatives for so I would say a lot of the best practices

56:29 in districts are that there are uh board leadership meetings or chair meetings where they will have the town manager the chair of the select board the superintendent the chair of the school committee um probably the finance committee they would bring in um people from the town side who work in their budget department and they would meet regularly to talk about what was going on especially as you start to approach budget season and you want to talk about what the town um what the Town forecast for Budget season looks like and start those conversations so you are um you are a partner with the other boards in your town but you are the governing municipality for the school district you have the final say about

57:15 decisions in the school district if I’m guessing what you’re getting at we have had at times not not um certainly not the current SEL board CH but we have had times in the past where we’ve been called the junior board as we serve under the select board we are and we’ve had it clarified through our Council we great if you can clarify it to though we are an independ duly elected independent board we do not there is no triangulation where they are up here and we are below them no you are your own you are the governing body for the municipality of the district um Alicia quick question um I think it actually on the P side but we also do approve new curriculum that might under budget but generally we’ve

58:00 we do I believe we do that when it you know if there’s a new curriculum that’s being brought into the district it will come before the school committee for approval I was waiting for the feedback um yes you would in the budget in the process of budget or in the process of approving um say the course of study at the high school you do have some input on the curriculum new curriculums Etc but most of the curriculum approval is out of your hands anyway because the the Department of Education and desie send down the curriculum Frameworks to the district the district then needs to interpret the curriculum Frameworks so you’re not necessarily approving the curriculum but you may be approving the materials or the pathway to accessing the curriculum that the Department of Education has said you need to

58:51 follow okay so our exercise we’re going to do really quickly is we’re going to think about what’s how you conduct business in the district right now think about how you put agendas together think about how your meetings are scheduled how you communicate um and I want you to think of like a like a traffic signal things we should definitely cons continue doing these things are working for us think about things that are absolutely not working for you we need to stop those and in the middle we have the yellow light these things may be beneficial to us we want to keep looking into them so let’s just take like five or 10 minutes and I have a bunch of Post-it notes here grab some Post-it notes put your answers up on the sheets on the wall and then

59:37 that will help us as we start talking about best practices to hone in on what is most necessary for you all to work on are we incorporating ideas for superintendent goals in this or no sure yeah yep um how should we work this should Jen do you

1:00:03 [Music] [Music] want that’s all right I’ll just go by whatever you guys do Jen can you hear me yep yeah okay um Jen would you want to let me know what you would like to write down on your red yellow and green poits and I can post them for you or do you want to let Alicia know I’ll just go by what you guys do I’m it’ll um it’ll be okay I’m if there’s something missing I’ll add it in okay talk about it I want to make sure you have the opportunity I just can’t see it that’s

1:09:40 right getting some feedback there so I’m gonna

1:09:46 let hey Jen there seems to be some feedback sometimes so if I miss that you want to speak if you just raise your Hano help me so that I can unmute the um the speakers here I’m sorry about that no problem thank you is that Julia

1:10:00 okay sorry I’ll yeah I’ll raise my hand thank

1:10:21 you for anybody we might want to just tell the people online we’re just

1:10:33 yes discussion um it’s it’s been broken for those online we’re just taking a quick bathroom

1:10:52 [Music] [Music] break I’ll weren

1:11:24 orig no I don’t think you I didn’t want you to think I do get like why they might not see it they might not in

1:11:50 there you could tell you live in a place with a budget crunch when every time you’re handed Something In Color you’re like oo yes well or expensive paper know this is I know the paper’s like this is not I don’t order you clearly did

1:12:17 yeah I don’t do okay so don’t look at them yet just hang on to them for when we get to those

1:12:26 sections so sections so am I unmuted yep I’m unmuted okay so on your yes things that are working well in the district we have we have school committee members who are dedicated to improving and responding to public um to to the public we have the school committee supports the administrator Administration teachers and students that you have your recordings of the meetings on the website A diversity of thought in committee members um we have greatly improved respecting others opinions and live streaming so it sounds like you’re doing well at least with access that’s what those things tell me things you feel

1:13:12 consider how Tech happen today yeah well you and I me we had a hurdle but we’re still are we allowed to inject here yeah okay yeah we’re still like when I think of the trajectory while I’ve been here for six years like even three years ago we weren’t we weren’t um recording our meetings we weren’t live streaming them and it was the technology was available we just weren’t necessarily doing it with with everything we were doing it for many meetings but not and purposely not doing it for subcommittees and that was a big change when the committee really changed is all of our subcommittees now were as long as it’s every once in while you have a techit and they’re recorded they’re up there so we get people work during the day we

1:13:57 don’t expect to to take off days when we have a meeting but we make it accessible because our work does sometimes happen during the day so I do think that this committee has made some great strides on making things available to the public to see later on also I work full-time I don’t no one else Works fulltime on the committee right now but we have had other committee members that work fulltime so it’s it’s important to remember that too when we do something during the day it’s not always easy for all of us whether you have a bunch of kids or whether you absolutely it’s a balancing job and a it is it’s a balancing act 100% so things that are not working um I’m seeing goals timelines goal

1:14:44 tracking protocols communication sticking to agendas having clear agendas staying on timelines so that tells me that you’re you’re functioning which is exactly what we’re talking about today that tells me that that’s where we need to be you need measurable goals you need strategic a strategic plan we need to talk about school committee goals and superintendent goals and how they work together and getting you some operating protocols that will keep you on track we’ll also talk about agendas which are a really good way to keep your meeting on track best practices go ahead we have operating protocols we’re on our website they’re essentially at the Mas ones I don’t think there’s different yeah yeah um so and then maybe so these are the things that we need to work

1:15:29 on uh we need to communicate more proactively Community input Community input relationships with the Press open to changes updating policies and better addressing unused buildings and supporting that position with data so again I’m hearing goals and operating protocols and things like that so we’ll keep those in mind while we start working while we start going through um oh hello sometimes it doesn’t did you fall asleep on me try that again again um on one second there we go all right so where do we start we know we need to

1:16:17 improve where do we start this is a a very abbreviated version of a self- evaluation we can actually send you we have a lengthy self- evaluation through Survey Monkey that we can send out to you where it has um operate uh governance operating um professional development questions so that everyone on the committee can give feedback um we can rank it there’s room for comments so we can send that to you your superintendence evaluation so I know this is a little bit different because you have a brand new superintendent so you wouldn’t necessarily be looking at last year’s evaluation but the evaluation process uh strategic slash sure around the self evaluation yep so that tool can be used outside of an open

1:17:05 meeting you can no so you can use the tool you can gather the feedback on Survey Monkey and then you would talk about it in your open meeting yes you would not be looking at each other’s responses we would get the responses aggregate them and send them back to you uh so a district Improvement plan we already have identified that you review your mission vision and core values and your portrait of a graduate does this District have a portrait of a graduate we it’s been something that’s been talked about um a lot in my time here at least um that exact phrase we’ve talked about what we want bumpy couple yes yes triaging critical absolutely but now you’re at an

1:17:51 inflection point where you can start putting those things together absolutely so what do you do with all that data so you’ve looked at your strategic plan or lack thereof or an old one you’re looking at go ahead yeah I I just wanted to that point Sarah’s absolutely right we have just kind of been having to be more I don’t want to say reactive putting out fires and that of thing but I I think that’s also something that we should recognize as a group we did and through um because yes it certainly wasn’t easy so I just very hard I’m just absolutely I just

1:18:50 um there we go okay

1:19:00 any of us some of us more than others every time I

1:19:18 okay they’ll still be able to hear us on just because you have your zoom on I’m just I’m in here well you’ll be able to hear us yeah [Music] you okay um so can I just ask a quick question for um Alicia

1:19:42 hello hello okay I am yes oh there you are Jen hi ahead can I just ask a quick question sure if you go back to the that the previous slide this where do we start review all that is that something or it’s actually also a question for the committee is this something that we would do in a regular business meeting or would we do this review in sort of a separate Retreat Workshop style meeting where we would maybe do this allinone meeting so you could do it either way whichever works for the committee um what I had said in the room was we have an online self-evaluation tool where we would send it out to you all we would aggregate the feedback and then deliver it back to you so it does have to be done in a meeting because you’re discussing things that could potentially if it’s anything having to do with something that you may or may not vote

1:20:28 on you should be discussing it in an open meeting so if you’re talking about feedback on a self- evaluation that would dictate operating protocols goals decisions that would come down the line you would definitely do it in an actual open meeting that was posted whether or not it was in a workshop or a full committee meeting regularly scheduled that’s up to you yeah I just think I I just question so I think personally I think we should do it that’s I’m just one person I’m sure we’ll talk about this but I do think that having the results from the Survey Monkey um and and a discussion of these other four items in and of itself could be its own meeting because I feel like if we were to put these into say regular business meetings and we were doing like one per meeting it could take us a couple of months to get through this and I I just

1:21:15 feel like we could have a time slip away um thought for the committee as your field director if you have anything that is governance related that you want masc to come out and do workshops or meetings with you that’s part of your membership we will come out and we’ll talk about self- evaluations we’ll help you with operating protocol development specifically we can do all of that related to governance how long would you say the actual Survey Monkey self- evaluation tool takes depends on how long your comments are if you have a lot of comments you could probably do it in like 10 minutes maybe 20 20 so what I wonder is should we set up a workshop which you know we Ty Ally if we were to do a full day Retreat this would be you

1:22:00 know a chunk of it that we would do this we we’re we’re doing this and we you know while we have our muffins or whatever can be doing our individual self- evaluations the Survey Monkey turns that around right away we don’t need someone to aggate it so we’re doing it and then getting the results you know at at the end of the 20 minutes look at the results and and really work through all of this at once before we get Kickstart our year because I think it’s really important and time gets away from us we open the schools we’re we’re doing a lot of things it’s not that any of us intend to kick this down the road but when you have to do a budget and you have to do handbook and those things need to happen right away so that you can open the door and get things this stuff is what tends to get kicked down

1:22:46 the road yep so I’m wondering as a committee I would like to see us pick a a full day even if it’s like a Saturday and and to really doing this soon because I kind of thought that’s what we were doing here today with that no no that wasn’t realistic Sarah not in an hour and a half okay so um so here’s what I would say let’s get through the best practices and talk about that and then figure out what exactly it is you would want to do in a workshop okay because if you want to focus on one thing or the other we can we can definitely schedule more um AB school committee goals are yes so um we have what do you do with

1:23:34 all that information you meet as a as a committee with your superintendent to talk about the superintendent evalu the superintendent goals and evaluation we have a rubric that you can use um you would vote to adopt your own goals just like you would vote to adopt the superintendent goals to approve the superintendent goals you would vote to set operating protocols and to create a year-long agenda so this is what our self- evaluation looks like just so that you can see what the tool looks like on Survey Monkey um and then let’s start talking about goal setting so why do we set goals anyone who’s ever gone grocery shopping knows why you sets because if you walk in thinking I need meels for the week and you don’t have a list you walk back out with the chocolate chip

1:24:20 muffins your kids ask for and you forget the milk and all that so goals keep your committee on track they align the committee with the superintendent um we can talk about goal alignment momentarily they align the committee and the superintendent with the district and they let your stakeholders know that the district is functional if your District can point to we have set this goal we have checked in on this goal we are monitoring this goal we are reporting on how we have completed this goal that tells your stakeholders that your district is functioning and if you don’t do it someone or something else will and I don’t necessarily mean someone coming in and directing your agenda somewhere else the day-to-day functioning of a district you

1:25:07 need to deal with Transportation issues you need to deal with um Food Service issues all of a sudden covid happened and everyone needed to turn to that life will happen so if you set goals you can at least try and keep yourself running on the same track together so when we talk about oh that shifted I love when there’s like editing things that happen and you’re like why did that happen um we talk about goals we like to talk about smart goals smart goals are specific and strategic we’re not going with a fi smile and file we want all of our students to be happy what does that mean we want them to be measurable and we can talk about the ways you measure goals going forward you want them to be action oriented don’t just say you have a goal talk about the

1:25:54 steps that you’re going to take to achieve the goal they need to be rigorous realistic and results focused and they need to be timed and tracked how are you going to monitor this we’re not just setting a goal with a wide open ending we need to know when we know the goal has been achieved so how do you measure make sure it’s measurable when we’re talking about uh the example I like to use for this one is student mental health and well-being how do you measure that you just walk around and ask students how they’re doing there’s quantitative data so that would be things like in the around the subject of student mental health and well-being your behavior risk assessments your referrals out of District reports from the guidance office and then there’s the qualitative

1:26:42 data which is not necessarily numbers on spreadsheets it’s how things are actually being do the students report that they can get to their guidance counselor do the students report that they feel like they have an adult that they can speak to so you have numbers and you have actual impacts you also want to make sure that there are actions and processes and results and benchmarks there need to be benchmarks you can’t just talk about it in September and then go back in June and say did any of that work so this is an example of two school committee goals that are very effective um I’ve also given you in the pack in

1:27:29 the handouts that I just gave you I gave you a copy of Chelmsford school committee goals for last year they are very welldeveloped they have what they want to do they have their action items it is a wellth thought out process it is a wellth thought out set of goals so that can be a place where you start talking about your goals so when we’re talking about school committee goals not superintendent goals let’s remember that school committee goals are not a way to give the superintendent more work they’re your your job you say that again school committee I will put it on a t-shirt school committee goals are yours they’re not a way to give the superintendent more work they’re

1:28:14 actually if Done Right a way to make the relationship with the superintendent more effective and therefore less work less work for everyone so when we’re looking at the things that you feel like you do well and the feel the things you feel like like you need to do more work on clearly you your goals should be start with getting goals um publishing the goals uh the Strategic plan timeline so it sounds like for this year to me what your goal should probably be are you develop goals around your operating protocols your governance getting your meetings on track um things like the year-long agenda and those can be your goals for the year creating a process to develop goals is a goal so any questions

1:29:03 on school committee goals go ahead so along the lines of our goals shouldn’t create more more work you know we have talked about a strategic plan and where that is the Strategic plan is something the school committee votes if we make having a a true strategic plan a goal that is creating a lot of extra work for the administration but it also something in my mind the school committee owes the district as we do this budget Drive yes it definitely creates work so it’s but a strategic or a district Improvement plan is something the district should have so it is something that they’re already working on so your goal is not necessarily tell the district to have a strategic Improvement plan your goal is support the district in the development of a strategic Improvement plan and when we

1:29:49 talk about those steps um that’s later on in the presentation it starts with the administration and then you support it so your goal is not create the Strategic Improvement plan your goal is support the administration and the development of but that goal would be one in my mind that would be aligned with a possible superintendent goal ours is this and yours is develop in for appr yes school committee goals and superintendent goals should align and I would recommend that you review yours on the same schedule that you review the superintendent’s goals set them in the fall you have the formative assess halfway through the year the check-in are things working and the summit of assessment at the end of the year your goals you should evaluate them on the same cycle so it’s similar to like so as

1:30:35 a superintendent I would work with ad other administrators to develop that goals if we have a shared goal y then the shared goal would be kind of same overarching thing but how I um encapsulate that goal how I implement it with look different than how absolutely be similar so if the I be developing maning

1:31:02 admin the same of yep absolutely hold on one second we have Jen and then we’ll go back to you go ahead Jen oh just a quick question so first to Sarah’s point I you know I see like what I take away is that a strategic goal or strategic plan is the responsibility of the superintendent so it wouldn’t be its own school committee goal um but how many goals are reasonable do is it you know for school committees is it four is it 10 is it like what does chumford have and maybe that’s not realistic for us but you know chelsford is many years down the road on developing school committee goals I would say for you guys three to four to start with great three to four goals have them around not necessarily developing the Strategic plan but supporting it Etc but I would say three to four goals is a good place to

1:31:48 start go ahead I was just going to push back a little bit I don’t I don’t see supporting a school Improvement plan as a smart go what what does that mean so you would participate that’s great so the budget is the biggest the budet we have but still I would just say that that probably needs to be refined a little bit yes to be much more measurable than just we meet with oh yeah absolutely there should be action items and when a schools committee supports a district Improvement plan or a strategic plan you’re doing things like participating in stakeholder meetings you’re receiving stakeholder Fe feedback you’re communicating feedback to the administration you are um participating in the discussions at the meetings

1:32:34 you’re making sure that the superintendent has a strategic plan development process as one of their goals and then you’re evaluating the superintendent so yes you would I’m saying strategic plan but there are many steps that you can put underneath that that actually are your purview that would not then cross over into the administration the number one I see as our purview it and this is a piece that’s been lacking in the plan for success is the budget driver and timeline so as we look at long-term budget V envisioning and planning we can say okay on our strategic plan we’re going to be implementing the the Educators have said we should be implementing this curriculum this year which is this budget driver that’s a one-time cost but when we look ahead there’s another one-time cost budget

1:33:21 driver in their strategic plan here and we have to make sure and work with them that because this is something this fell on the school committee of why it wasn’t happening the last time the plan for successes we all just applauded ourselves and said we have a plan for success but there wasn’t a majority saying this plan for Success has no long-term Vision in immeasurable goals as far as funding and implementation so then when we went out for funding to the community the number one thing we heard at the polls was why would we give you so XYZ dollars you have no strategic plan of how you’re going to use this year one year two year three so I do see a strategic plan as the number one thing that have kept us from giving funding

1:34:07 which is our job yeah but it’s not our plan Sarah right that that’s what I’m hearing that it’s theel it’s our plan to make sure that the plan brought to us has the data we need in it to properly Fund in plan funding right so we approved the Strategic plan and that would be part of our approval process yep and we fond the strateg yep okay so yes go

1:34:43 ahead okay um yeah Jen I I just wanted to add for Al so my first year on the committee um one of the things that I I ran on or one of my frustrations for running was the fact that the plan had no by this date we will do this it was all everything will be done by June of 2026 and that is not going to be successful for anyone I don’t care who’s on a committee who’s in the administration that that just doesn’t work and as someone who does you know implementation and customer success of the job knowing that we need that to Sarah’s point is something that I’m really looking forward to having because then subsequently getting the funding and having things that you can point to that you have done with the funding or you

1:35:31 know succeeded on with the funding is is critical for and then that also helps the public gain more confidence in what you’re doing yeah and I think it helps answer the questions that we got a lot of what’s an ideal budget look like and we could say

1:35:53 well I lost your audio guys Allison I lost the audio

1:36:31 job is to make their educational Vision possible through funding and through policy that’s our job Jen your hands up did you want to say something else before we move

1:36:46 on oh am I muted go ahead sorry I lost audio there I don’t know what happened so but it’s back now okay all right so next up let’s talk very quickly about superintendent goals and evaluation so superintendent evaluation overview uh the superintendent evaluation process is modeled after the educator evaluation process in Massachusetts in 2011 they aligned it so that it’s literally the same process for all Educators um the three key components ah there we go um there is a five-step cycle this is where everyone’s eyes start to get really wide and panicky

1:37:32 there’s a five stepy cycle there’s a twostep two-part tool and a multi-part rating system Don’t Panic so the five-step cycle start with self assessment figuring out with the committee and the superintendent the superintendent usually originates the goals you bring them to the committee either you bring them to the full committee or you can actually establish a sub comme to work on superintendent goals hold that do because we’ll get back there later they the starts with self assessment which then feeds into goal setting and plan development then there’s the implementation the midcycle review so um when you are a superintendent for three years or less you have to be on a one-year cycle beyond that you can move to a two-year

1:38:18 cycle and then the final evaluation which would be at the end of the year oh I didn’t turn off the there we go so the model process the evaluation tool itself on the one hand you’re going to have the superintendent goals we hope that they are smart goals we hope that they have key actions and benchmarks goal areas for superintendent they must have one from each of these categories they must have a professional practice they must have a student learning they must have a district Improvement you can have more than those three and some of them will cross over but you must have one from each of those categories those goals are developed are proposed by the superintendent developed and approved with the committee and then

1:39:05 put into action by the superintendent yes so the desie r is a nightmare yes um it really is it is it is clunky it is not effective it is a terrible rubric my understanding at least and I I may have this wrong was if you have a a superintendent who’s part of the new super production program and is in those first years you’re kind of stuck with that rubric which is where we were we’re not in that Bo anymore can we do we have to still use the D rubric I thought there’s a loophole and we can come up with our own rubric that’s effective I would say this year stick with the Desy rubric yep beyond that I

1:39:51 would want to uh go back and talk to the field directors the executive director what you could do beyond that but this year I would stick with the desie rubric okay yes the reason being it’s it’s your first year as the interim superintendent so being your first year you want to make sure that you’re consistent in your practices with previous years you’re also doing are you doing an entry plan or you just you’re you’re the interim so you’re not doing an entry plan yeah okay so I would stick with the desie rubric because it’s consistent practices it’s what most of the rest of the state does it already aligns so I would stick with that I think it’s just I think to Sarah’s point it’s um it’s a nightmare on the school committee side because I I’ve had this I

1:40:37 was years here so every single year it’s like trying to get everyone to do the do the evaluation in proper order yeah because it’s not it’s not set up the way user friendly then once you go through it it’s you you’re miss things it doesn’t align and they C in my opinion it caus issu so I was actually excited to hear we’re going to do in the tech version the tech everything about it is just yeah it’s very cumbersome it’s cumbersome especially if you want to make it very accessible to the public to see our R rubrics and to share information which is crazy that Des didn’t do so so it’s a recommendation it’s not a requirement I would need to go and check on that whether or not the actual rubric

1:41:22 is a requirement or a recommendation we can have yep and I would say we can we’re going to talk more about how the evaluation process works and there are ways that you can I have never been a fan of the rubric itself because it is very hard to work with and if you accidentally send the PDF to everyone and don’t tell them to download it suddenly you have people editing things at the same time and yes but there are ways to help clear up that process so let me check on that but in the meantime let’s keep talking about standards and indicators so part one was the superintendent goals that the superintendent they originate with superintendent and you approve them part two is the standards and the indicators there are four standards that you have to evaluate the superintendent on now

1:42:07 this is not a goal from the superintendent these are the four standards instructional leadership management and operations family and Community engagement professional culture under those four standards there are 23 indicators total please for the love of cupcakes do not choose all 23 indicators like two maybe three and you want to make sure when you’re looking at the standards and the indicators that they are not completely contrary to the superintendent goals they don’t have to match up exactly because these are the standards and indicators you are choosing but you want to make sure that they’re um harmonious so I’m sorry did

1:42:54 you say two or three IND per per standard so don’t use all 23 so I think this is why a lot of school committees have subcommittees to do this that way they can pick the two or three and circulate a general meeting and that comes the one yep I think I think that makes a lot of sense previewing a a slide coming up so when you talk about the multi- rating system you have the summi of performance rating so your for is your midyear check-in how are things going um sometimes you have to realign or even change a goal completely if you if the superintendent had a goal that said we’re going to do XYZ and we’re going to use we’re going

1:43:40 to apply for this grant to do it they don’t get the grant we need to adjust that goal the formative assessment in the middle of the year is a check-in it’s a dialogue you want to make sure you’re checking in on your progress the summit of assessment is that giant form so so you’re evaluating the goals of the superintendent exceeded met significant progress some progress did not meet you’re then evaluating the standards exemplary proficient needs Improvement needs Improvement can also be in progress by the way needs Improvement shouldn’t be you know something to bludgeon the superintendent with if it’s an impr progress goal most goals take multiple years and then unsatisfactory now the theory that darthy presser had shared many years ago

1:44:26 was there’s five over here and four over here there’s a really good chance they did that so you couldn’t just add them together and divide and figure out you get a B they want you to evaluate on the two things separately they want the goals evaluated and then the standards evaluated can I ask a question on that absolutely so when the committee goes through and they say there’s three exceeded meets whatever and then

1:44:53 there’s whatever there’s whatever um does it get reported like that or there’s been a tendency to sometimes like average and to me it makes sense to like call it what it is three members thought it was exemplary two members thought it was whatever not three and two makes it you right we’re not averaging them okay where your composite which is the report that gets generated at the end should reflect the voices of all members but it’s not a direct quote again my again my previous both ways and I just send

1:45:41 everybody the um Dy evaluation 44 page thing yep and we have a 36 page guide we can send you to I found that Jen go ahead I just had a quick question Sarah correct me if I’m wrong because I was in the cheap seats before but I think there was this process of sort of averaging in the past um with the previous superintendent they don’t they um it’s been done both ways it’s not an average because that way if it’s an average say you have five members you seven members so do look too much like us you have seven members six are giving someone exemplary and then there’s one member who is just furious to be furious they could give zeros to bring the average down but that’s not reflective

1:46:28 of overall feeli but how was it my question was wasn’t it done that way in the past I just I’m trying to that we had one or two outliners there was a year that it was a pretty like a two three split and then that’s not outliers that was so it wasn’t that it was an average it was that it’s reflective that there is no super majority here so I a yep I would say whether or not you’ve done it that way in the past you should not be averaging so the composite itself should reflect as the superintendent said that these are what was said and then the comments underneath would reflect the comments and how the composit gets developed is we’ll get there in a second it’s up to the

1:47:14 committee but having a subcommittee do it is actually really effective so the first year that that I was here I had to create the composite I was secretary my first year and that’s we we did we technically I think if you watch the video you’ll see we said probably did use the word average to be transparent not in a negative way just didn’t use the word composit um we we did look at them and say if three said exemplary and two said what would that come out to you but then there was discussion around it and we decided as a group and there’s only five of us so I I was I’m okay with being the group doing it we decided the comments that would go kind of discussed it in I would say that process I would show as a success oh

1:48:01 yeah um absolutely being part of that process and having done it another way where one person took everyone’s comments and decided the value of what went in there and not everybody’s voice was in there we did this as a workshop was which is funky like it felt like it was a lot but it was very productive lot and it was respectful and we were all happy with the outcome yeah like we made sure everyone’s voices if if some people felt something went really well and some people felt it didn’t we made sure it was reflective of all voices I thought it was a very collaborative successful proess so when you get to the end there will be an overall summative rating and this is another place where you have exemplary proficient needs Improvement

1:48:47 or unsatisfactory and then you would have a comment field and again the composite should reflect all of the members voices when you get to the full I don’t know why I kept the animations on this I need to stop doing that when you get to the full committee whether or not you’ve had one person do the composite or subcommittee or the full committee when the full committee votes what you’re voting on is this composite reflects all of our opinions that we put into the superintendent’s evaluation I have one I just want to clarify just so you know when I said I did I just took the notes as the secretary we were in all with all five of us Gathering that composite together and the way you explained it makes makes sense to to a degree and you were able you’re able to explain why did that way andine I Just sh had

1:49:40 experiences experiences doesn’t yeah I would strongly suggest I just I just I would like thats and yep so I have one question yeah why do you call it I I think for me anyways as a manager in real life first and any way shape or form seeing a needs Improvement versus and in progress sends a very different message it does and it can be very understandably difficult for me it is I’m only speaking for me but I have to imagine other people feel the same way when your options are needs Improvement exemplary I I just yeah you can absolutely you can say in progress

1:50:28 especially when you’re just starting out with this superintendent in your District needs Improvement 100% okay you absolutely can use that sorry in progress progress Y in progress no that that’s fine it’s you know um and I think the other thing on this to remember and I know you you’ve mentioned couple times is having measurable goals oh yes just saying that so and so did an exemplary job and you may feel that and maybe they did but when it comes to an evaluation there need to be specific line items yes in my opinion to back that up yeah was something that we struggled with in the past too a word about exemplary do you guys use um oh what’s it called it’s a the report

1:51:13 card that doesn’t have letters on it shoot stand thank you do you guys use standard based report cards are fours supposed to be rare we did away with four okay Exemplar should be rare Exemplar are this superintendent absolutely 100% knocked it out of the park right yes so they shouldn’t be across the board so if someone is just saying exemplary exemplary they’re not they are not Faithfully executing the evaluation system right it’s like

1:51:48 having hard could just be like oh he’s really cool guy he’s a great guy you know that’s help because to be brutally honest I would rather but I would rather know where my of growth and development are sugar and ideally and that’s the relationship yeah yeah ideally you’re having those relationships and those discussions throughout you don’t get your review and you’re like holy cow you know I do so when the superintendent goals get set there’s a couple ways you can do that you can do a subcommittee you can have a subcommittee meet with the superintendent to start drafting the goals um and the rubric that I will show you in a moment uh the school committee has final approval over the goals but

1:52:34 they do start with the superintendent and again we’re not adjusting things to be unreasonable you can’t set a goal for the superintendent that says every kid gets a pony they need to be reasonable goals also that would be a mess um you want to identify all standards and indicators from the rubric and all standards must be evaluated if you want and I would say probably not this year do not wait the standards this year but you can wait the standards if there are standards that are more important to your District identified by a strategic plan you can do that and then you discuss ahead of time you agree ahead of time on what the evidence will be to demonstrate the proficiency or progress so the superintendent’s goal say it’s a professional development goal it doesn’t

1:53:20 just say I will work with the teachers to improve the new to align them with new math curriculum what does that mean that means we’re going to have this professional development day we’re going to set up this mentoring program we’re going to do these check-ins these are the benchmarks I’m looking for and the superintendent reports those back to you so this is our worksheet our rubric that we send to our members that outlines the process you can um I sent this to you all digitally and I can actually send you just this as well um it has not only the steps but it also has dates to keep everyone on track and it allows time at the end for the compilation which is uh when you’re

1:54:05 making the composite for questions you get the composite you feel like it does not reflect your voice it gives you time to have input on that so this is a super helpful worksheet that we send out to our members to start the superintendent evaluation process so then the superintendent implements the plan and everything goes great the formative assessment like we said this is the midyear check-in this is a conversation about how things are going and if you have set school committee goals have a conversation about your goals at the same time so that everyone is rowing in the same direction when you get to the summit of evaluation at the end um that is where committee members each complete individual

1:54:53 evaluations the superint will provide you with a self assessment and the evidence and then you have the form you’re going to use to complete it so we I will do more research on the form and the rubric and I will get back to you on that but those are the things that happen composite evaluation is then prepared usually by the chair or the secretary or the designate or a subcommittee but you’ve decided in September how that’s going to happen in June so there’s no surprises in June and then it is discussed and voted on by the full committee at a public public meeting the composite superintendant are one of the one rare jobs where you have your performance review in public so we want to agree I know right we want to agree ahead of time on all of

1:55:39 the steps what the steps are what the indicators what the the standards are we want to agree on what the evidence will be because at the end of the day the review should be no surprises but you should be reviewing how you actually how the superintendent actually did on achieving the goals go ahead go back to the formative is that done in the public meeting yep and it’s just a checkin it’s a discussion item you don’t have to go nope you do not have to do the rubric halfway through please don’t do the rubric halfway through so this is the big terrifying form and you can see that the superintendent goals are on one side and the standards and indicators are on the other um you’re not choosing all of them but that’s just that’s in there so you guys can see what it looks like most of

1:56:24 you have experience with it and we can definitely support you with that going forward as well so when we are talking about required items versus optional this is what happens when I copy slides over there we go um things that are required smart goals in District Improvement student learning and professional practice ratings on all four standards and the overall summi of rating the things that are optional you don’t need to use all the indicators please don’t use all the indicators you can wait them the timing of the evaluation cycle is up to you most districts start in the fall finish

1:57:11 in June but when you’re talking about um expanding it to a two-year cycle when you’re talking about aligning it with the other things going on in your District the timing of the cycle is up to you how the evaluation is used is up to you um it does need to be reported to desie because you need to do it every year uh sorry you need to report it to desie when you do it but how it’s used is up to you use it definitely to set the superintendent’s goals for the next year because that’s that cycle of self-evaluation some districts use it to set contract um items some districts use it for compensation Etc you don’t necessarily have to do that if you’re just reviewing to keep going on goals that’s great and then your process for completing it for compiling the composite that is up to you as well

1:57:59 so timing of the cycle you want to see what makes the most sense for your District you want to think about when your data is available you want to think about your local elections when do you guys do it is that spring for you they Tuesday okay and then are your members seated immediately yes okay so you want to think about when you’re doing that we get a lot of questions about people coming off the committee people coming on the committee the the way I have recommended to committees to do this is you want to think about it less like the people and more like the seat the person currently sitting in the seat can submit their evaluation they’ve been along for the ride all this time that evaluation goes into the composite they leave the seat the new person comes in they vote on the composite at the end they’re part

1:58:44 of the discussion they have not completed that evaluation because they haven’t been along for the ride but they can see what has been submitted by the previous members and then they vote on the compos it yes so I’ve always wondered this as far as for multiple factors you know obviously we use some of the reporting that comes out of um mcast that’s a goal like you know increasing learning or whatever it it is a an indicator in some places um that gets released fully publicly like November yeah I know some districts do a December to December I know if you’re in that first three years you have to do one every one year can’t be more than two years have you seen a district

1:59:30 because in my thinking is we are not going to have this set you know today this week even and so then we’re really looking at 10 months nine months we start the evaluation sometime March or April six months can you really evaluate someone on six months or do we want to look at making it a longer cycle through um maybe that we do an evaluation next December so that we can really see how our superintendent did with a full school year what did those scores show that come out in November what did a full budget cycle know and then that changes our cycle so that we’re always on December and one of the the pluses to this in my mind is we’ve always budgeted I don’t know if

2:00:16 anybody’s noticed in the budget book for the superintendent line item at what they’re making that current year so then do an evaluation after the budget’s been set and we’ve typically given movement in their raise or in their their earning dependent on that that evaluation and all of a sudden we’re on you know day one July one opening with the superintendent earning higher than what we budgeted because we budgeted for in January of 24 we plug in his 23 24 earnings and then all of a sudden July 1 of 24 keep making a different rate so it’s the Minimus in a in a $48 million

2:01:02 budget but is it best PR or should we be budgeting and having a line and that’s reflective of so I just didn’t know if this year timing wise it makes more sense to give a little bit longer get us ourselves on that cycle so that we’re evaluating because when when we evaluate in the spring right now we don’t have any measurable data to show that academic growth from that year because it were’re always in a re so eight months but I would say one Desy says you have to do it every year so you can’t push it off they say every year for a new superintendent or every two year up to an every twoe right um but I would also

2:01:49 say you maybe the superintendent goals are not student achievement maybe the superintendent goals are like an entry plan where the superintendent goals are I am going to do these things that will create my best professional practice and they’re not necessarily about measuring mcast scores the very first year I think what what I what I heard s saying is is if we’re starting the process now and the goal say just say the go don’t get approve by a school to say like October right October June year right yeah how can you be successful seven so yeah so I this is again previous this has happened in my previous life so we went like

2:02:34 October to October mean I ran my goals October October and then you evaluated me in November yeah you can do that as long as it’s every year uh sorry Jen is has her hand raised I want to make sure Jen um yeah you can I just I have a question and a comment so do you want to finish your thought Alicia or do you um no go ahead go ahead Okay so so um so first I’m going to make my comment to Sarah’s point I do Sarah I to I agree with you that it’s it has it has felt somewhat truncated so one option at least is what you’re describing in terms of how we set the goals the other and I and I have had this very brief conversation with John that we’re kind of in a unique situation and and when you talked about a two-year evaluation that earlier this morning it’s been kind of sticking with me um because it does it does seem like a you know a 2-year or

2:03:21 even an 18-month evaluation does give you time to go through that we have John right now it’s a two-year interim contract I I do think you know that in the spring it would be and again I’ve talked to John about this it would be logical for us to be probably having a conversation about where we’re going with this as an interim you know extending the contract making it permanent you know starting to have those conversations so that’s sort of hanging out there too um for this year um and so anyway so I’m throwing that out to the committee this idea of a subcommittee is definitely to be percolating in my mind that might make sense for us this year um and the only question I had earlier you you had said about the vote right so what you described um was in terms of the seats

2:04:06 right so you go through this process you have the summit of evaluation and it’s the person it’s the seat not the person so so if you have a new person in a seat that’s going to come in did not do the evaluation but going to vote on it you know under what circumstances would you vote against an evaluation I guess or an assessment I mean I guess if the process is working properly you might be in a minority in your assessment but is that why you would vote no like how when would you vote no I it just seems so if you really felt like all right let’s back up yes twoyear cycle so what we’re talk what you’re talking about is if you want to choose the two-year cycle which we said the timing of the cycle is up to you and you have previously been a superintendent so the timing of one year versus two is up to you so what you would do is don’t think

2:04:52 of the formative assessment is like December think of the Forma of assessment as the end of this school year and the summit of assessment at the end of next year so yes that conversation mid cycle if you’re going to choose the two-year that would be at the end of this school year so that’s the formative conversation in the middle you’re not necessarily measuring things um if you as a member feel like the composite 100% does not reflect your your voice you could vote against the assessment you could vote against the composite hopefully you’ve gotten to the point in that conversation in the development of the composite that it does reflect everyone you could also in the meeting say I am I don’t feel like this reflects

2:05:37 my voice I would like to send it back to the subcommittee you could do that and then bring it back again for a second vote so voting against it it’s it’s kind of rare that someone would vote against it unless they really felt like it did not even after multiple you know swings at the piñata they didn’t feel like it actually reflected their voice they could vote against it you can also as a new member even though you’ve been part of the discussion at the end if you were brand new you could say I’m gonna abstain right you can just abstain so does that answer your question okay fantastic can you set it so that I would be of the mindset where I’m so my term ends in June let’s say I

2:06:23 don’t run again or let’s say I’m not in the seat in come June date it [Music] is how to

2:06:43 that anyways um so say that right um I I would want to be the one voting on it can the timing of the cycle be adjusted for that you can yeah you can I have been a member though sitting in the audience watching them talk about the composit that I contributed to and I wasn’t voting on it because I had already left my seat so you can definitely again the timing of the cycle is entirely up to you so you could time it so that you voted on the summative and then left your seat and the new people came in sure yeah timing is entirely up to you the past right that’s what I was thinking like we I and I understand understand not having a full year to achieve a goal when we are crafting the goals for this year and for

2:07:31 the full two-year term can we craft them or my suggestion would be to craft them and evaluate on them under the GU of you’ve only have nine months 10 months whatever the DAT so if you do say end the cycle end of the ccle when you our goal so potentially that middle set middle but that understand doing really well so I mean that’s also yeah and I want to be clear I think that it’s certainly possible to get Exemplar in certain areas on noted because I know

2:08:13 I and I I want to tell you like I’ll I’ll do whatever whatever cycle you guys works for you I’m fine with I just I’m just making suggest another I’m open too right but another option be like you know so it’s a year so we’re doing an annual we have to do an annual cycle July start July one so you do have that you have to do the cycle the timing of the cycle and the length because you’ve previously been a superintendent are up to you you can do a one year but you’ve been a superintendent before so you don’t have to do a one year you can do a two

2:08:53 year no no you’re part of the new superintendent induction program which is a threeyear program yep yep so resources for you all online this is our web page for superintendent uh evaluations this is our web page and then this is the desie resources we have let me go back for a second on our member resources when we do learning lunches those videos always go up on our website um and there are some videos from my predecessor I replace the Irreplaceable Dorothy presser um there are learning lunch videos there that Dorothy did about the superintendent evaluation process and she taught me everything I know about superintendent evaluations so I would recommend those as well and then desie has their implementation guidance their rubrics

2:09:38 and they have a five-part video series but I’m going to be honest their five-part video series is more about explaining how we got here than actually doing the the review itself so um I know you guys are short on time I know we want to talk about operating protocols and strategic plans so so operating protocols and agendas and then there’s strategic plans at the end so operating protocols very quick because I know you said you have them it just sounds like you haven’t reviewed them in a while so it’s time to review them operating Protocols are set of ground rules mutually created mutually agreed upon they are preconditions so that you are productive uh so that you are a productive committee they are a document also that you can use for your self evaluation

2:10:25 when you do that formative assessment in the middle of your cycle I always say year but when you do that formative assessment in the middle of your cycle that’s when you can look back at your goals and your operating protocols operating Protocols are not a way to stifle desent the way to suppress Free Speech a way for the majority to control the minority controlling information and they are not a way to circumvent the open meeting law so operating protocols operating protocol are generally rules for the school committee this is how we’ll communicate this is how our agendas get posted this is the standard of conduct we hold ourselves to they should include a statement of purpose and objectives your conduct of business the scope of your responsibilities um you’ll see in the

2:11:11 examples I gave you guys a packet of some examples of operating protocols from a couple districts they talk about the areas that they are responsible for and how they will conduct business around those um and then staying on track how we keep each other on track when you talk about your operating protocols if you’re talking about communication Pathways in your operating protocols some things to consider what it looks like when the public wants to communicate to you um you can you don’t have to you can designate the chair as the spokesperson informationally only for the school committee so if you’re hearing from a whole bunch of people and they’re emailing everyone and you don’t want to necessarily send out a million

2:11:58 emails that all say thank you and this is the meeting and date when we’re going to discuss this we welcome your comment then if you’re responding individually about something if you’re responding to a constituent that’s fine but you don’t necessarily want to send out that informational email a gajillion times you can designate the the committee chair as the person who says here’s where you can find that information here’s where our meeting is we welcome your feedback important note if you do that the chair is the spokesperson for the committee superintendent is the spokesperson for the district sometimes they work together but the committee does not speak for the superintendent and the chair never Speaks For The Individual members you’re only sending out informational updates um other things to consider in your operating protocols

2:12:45 around communication if you’re using social media what that looks like District versus non-district does the district have social media we want to be very careful as school committee members about how we use social media and we also have a guide we can send to you as well because social media has the possibility of creating discussions outside of your meetings and you don’t want to do that all of your discussions all of your decisions should be made at the table with the committee in a duly posted meeting um and then you in your uh operating protocols around Communications your board member role in public um one of the biggest things and this doesn’t you know when they say to you policy budget hiring an evaluation

2:13:32 of the superintendent they never say the communication part one of the biggest jobs you will undertake as a school Committee Member is knowing who to send someone to when they ask you a question because you can’t answer something about Transportation but you should know where to send them you can answer something about someone’s homework um that they’ve been assigned in the class room but you should know where to send them so understanding as a committee who in the administration you should be directing the person to is a huge part of your role um once you decide that you’re going to do operating protocols we have some next steps announce that you’ve adopted protocols following best practices make a big deal out of it it tells the community this is how we

2:14:17 conduct our business and this is how we’re going to communicate with you um post the protocols on your school committee website have them available at your meetings vote on them um jump ahead for a minute this is an example from my previous District the first year we had operating protocols we had darthy presser come out and do them for us these operating Protocols are signed by every member and the superintendent everyone signed them because everyone understands the rules of the road made a big deal about adopting them in meeting posting them online so the operating protocols can then be checkin several times a year we doing what we’re say what we say we’re going to do um and then reminding each

2:15:04 other when things get off track this I tried to contact you for this agenda posting our operating protocols say this oh no there was a failure in communication let’s regroup and realign and again this is after me but yes so any questions on operating protocols yeah so someone ask ask me you know goes to my school email yep hey you guys are really messing up around this particular policy I wish you to do this I guess how do we want I know what I can’t say that right but how do we want to are our operating protocols detailed enough that I should just forward that to the chair and have in this case her respond to that and I

2:15:50 don’t do anything else or do I respond back to the person saying Hey listen how we communicate this is how we typically communicate these things uh you know whether you attend a meeting or whether you look at our meeting minutes and that’s it and how would we prefer us to respond to questions like that so operating protocols should definitely outline the way the community receives information from the school committee as a whole you can always answer the person directly even if the chair is also going to answer that if you feel like you need to answer them and say okay that thank you for sharing that concern with me um I see in our policy it says XYZ I know we’re having a discussion on this date about

2:16:37 an a policy that we’re going to that may supersede it or adjusting the policy here’s that information I’m also going to CC my chair so that they know that this is a concern or you can CC the superintendent be very careful about reply all never reply all the chair can send out informational housekeeping emails to all of you that say hey we move the meeting to 7:30 instead of 7 because the hockey team needs the space before we get there informational only and never reply all but you can send your chair an email that says I received this concern from the public I’m sharing it with you so you have this information and then when

2:17:23 we’re talking about the chair and superintendent relationship the chair keeps the superintendent aware of things that are going on the superintendent the chair would say I just found out that this thing is going on I wanted to let you know the superintendent then takes it upon themselves to take it to the appropriate staff member I think in most cases our public sends it to the whole committee also yep and there are some committees that have a an email address that is school committee we that yep and then the chair could be the person fantastic because we don’t want any surprises we want everyone to have the same information so that we can all make the best decisions possible and like just for you know best practice although it’s not a protocol I think

2:18:09 it’s just a human decency best practice you know if I’m at I don’t know the the youth soccer banquet with you know 300 parents and I’m hearing the Scuttle around the room of this wildfire topic I’ve always made a policy of afterwards calling the superintendent saying I’m just giving you the heads up yeah there’s a lot of chatter around XYZ because it’s never good for someone to be blindsighted with yes in their email the next day with 400 emails because a group send out a mass email to them like so if if there’s something really bubbling up out there I try to always or if I if I’m if I’m somewhere and I say and I hear blah this is happening at this school

2:18:54 and we’re all going to email this principal I’ll call the superintendent say you know I’ve heard this you you do you want me to also do you want to let the super principal know do you want me to let them know for what I you tell the superintendent leave it in there nope leave it in their hands is you the superintendent should be communicating those things to their staff because the school committee only has one employee yeah and the superintendent should be communicating to his staff but 100% you can’t solve a problem if you don’t know the problem exists so sharing information is always the best way to go yeah y so J do you ever a preference if someone does directly email me that I reply to them in CCU or would you prefer me to send it to you and you reply to the person maybe CC me doesn’t matter to

2:19:41 me I’m just curious if you have a particular presence uh I think that it’s totally up to you I think I think if you want to reply to them what I used to do when I was vice chair not chair is I would often reply to not everything but a lot of items that I received and I would reply and say you will be hearing officially from the school from the chair but I wanted to reply and you know thank you and whatever some you know what my personal um response was so it was clear I’m not responding for the committee the chair will do that but acknowledging that you sent this and whatever my you know sort of personal so I would say if you’re if you want to you know because I think the more more connection we have to the public is the be is better um but I I

2:20:27 think at least unless there’s a problem with copying me it just helps the chair to know who you know who has been communicated to because it’s informational there is not a problem with copying the chair I wouldn’t copy never copy the entire committee do not create chain deliberation copying your chair is a housekeeping thing it’s hey I want you to know this thing is happening and this is what my response was so for open meeting L stuff like last year Jen and I were on finance together if when we had when this whole committee got an email about the budget Jen would reply to them with her her response which you know had some things that could be considered an opinion and she would be very careful to not include me even though I’m the chair on that because then it’s the two members of the

2:21:13 subcommittee and it’s deliberation her opinions are in there so just be mindful if you’re responding to someone with your thoughts or anything that could be considered an opinion be mindful of who you’re C seeing on there because it does create an open meeting violation so if in doubt yeah don’t put someone on it because we get slapped with a lot of reference requests and open those so here’s the thing at MC we want to make sure that you do not create accidental quorums in any places so you would also never CC your chair and then send it out to each individual Community member you just created also I think to Sarah’s point if you’re on a subcommittee get two of us quum so that would be why never create an accidental Quorum for the full committee or the

2:22:01 subcommittee excellent so I know we are running late but and you have other on today um but a quick word about agendas so agenda best practices establish a consistent process how agendas get set be clear about the timelines and requests for post in clearly you have to do it the 48 business days according to oml but it some districts do it further out some districts have a process where in week a the superintendent and the chair and maybe the vice chair and the assistant superintendent they’re meeting to talk about the agenda the agenda gets posted a week before the documents get uploaded to whatever document manager you’re

2:22:47 using be clear about the timelines be clear about the consistency create a in an informative and unified agenda template for all subcommittees your committee meetings your subcommittee meetings the agendas and minutes should all be the same form they’re not all going to say the same thing but they should be the same format your agenda must have the name of the committee or subcommittee date and starting time the location and whether or not there is remote access we still have remote access to meetings until at least March 31st of 2025 there are Rumblings that it may become more permanent than that but at the very least until March 20 31st 2025 we still have remote meeting access um and then on your agenda you have to have a list

2:23:33 of topics that the chair will reasonably anticipate being discussed and they must be specific should be an itemized list the public should be able to look at your agenda and know what action steps you’re taking that night and what things are discussion or just informational um if the committee will be entering into executive session the reason for executive session with as much detail as you can so it’s not just we’re going to talk about collective bargaining it’s we are entering into executive session for the purpose of collective bargain with units A and C and then you should always say and the committee will not return to public session or the committee will return to public session those things must be included in the motion to go to Executive session optional items a

2:24:19 consent agenda do you guys use a consent agenda consent agendas um time estimates today you can estimate the time it doesn’t always work that way but time estimates reasonable relationship to goals I’m going to show you an example in just a second for that and then subcommittee reports what are the the subcommittees are tasked with doing the background work and research for the committee they should be reporting out to the committee and additionally the superintendent and chair should discuss the guidelines for staff and student presentations that are informative not necessarily something you’re going to be voting on you don’t want your kindergarten teachers waiting until 9:30 at night to do a half an hour hour presentation they need to go home they need to work the next day being respectful of student and staff time placement on the agenda some districts

2:25:06 do two meetings a month where one is all informational and one is all votes up to you how you do that but agree ahead of time so that we respect student and staff time um consent agenda Basics you guys already are doing a consent agenda so we understand the process things go in it they can always always be pulled out they should only be housekeeping items warrants minutes things like that this is I’m going to brag on my committee for a minute and they were doing this before I got there so I take zero credit for this this is an agenda for the noova tech school committee one of the best things nishoba does as a school committee is see where that arrow is that’s the superintendent’s goal that relates to the thing we’re voting on when we have an item on our agenda that directly relates to a

2:25:53 superintendent goal or to say something that’s happening in the Strategic plan it indicates on the agenda what that goal what the goal it relates to is you do school committee goals too and then you know you’re monitoring the goals as the year goes on you don’t have to stop and say let’s monitor the goals you’ve been doing it and at the end of the year you can look back at your agendas and they’re there the evidence there so huge brag on them they were doing this way before I got there I love that yearlong agendas so are you guys doing a year-long agenda yet I don’t think you are so here’s the thing they’ve been done for every year but in the Dropbox I think we have promised with people not being able to

2:26:39 accurately access the Dropbox which is another thing but we’ve had a standard year toe long before I came here something I know for six years predating me that’s going back 12 years um things that happen every year like you can look at it and tell school choice will be on this you know handbooks are done before the beginning of the year you know budget season starts yep I don’t know it’s in every year three at least it has whenever you’re reupdated in the Dropbox we seem to have a lot of tech issues with accessing various things in the Dropbox but it exists and it’s also um it always was posted on the wall in the um administrative assistance obice we use it with plan agendas so here’s the

2:27:26 thing you know that one of your um places for improvement is access to information and communication so putting that as a school committee goal so that everyone can access those things in the appropriate places is public so sit down do it myself I don’t care we it needs to be easily accessible we do have and I know about sent an email requesting that we have um conversation about that as well just about our issues accessing Drive yeah I think some of I think that’s more of an internal texting that we talk about but um it it certainly lends itself to the same type of conversation yeah

2:28:12 absolutely so I have one question on this so one of them I see has um public comment not at the very beginning I’m just looking at these examples yep some so and some have it hesitate to say this to the end because I answer this question wrong all the time people were like is public comment mandatory technically no but your job is to hear from the public so you should be having public comment absolutely there are districts that have it at the beginning there are districts that have it at the end um we are going to our learning lunch in September we have um Liz Valerio to find it oh it’s not on the website yet we just we just confirmed Liz Valerio um Liz Valerio from one of the schools she oh she’s fantastic she’s doing our learning lunch in February uh

2:28:58 February September September let’s not go that fast about public comment because there have been you know the recent decisions about what you can and can’t do um we I would recommend a public comment statement that says this is how public comment is going to go it’s going to be 20 minutes everyone gets three minutes you can’t share your time we ask you to keep it to things that are under our purview you don’t need to hear about recycling in Marblehead like recycling pickup that’s not something you can do anything about so please don’t bring that to us you can also say things like um we ask that that the members of the public remember that um students and staff are entitled to privacy under Massachusetts General law because you would not discuss openly a

2:29:43 student’s information at public comment you can’t tell someone not to violate their own students privacy but you can’t they should not be getting up And discussing other students in a way that is identifiable they shouldn’t be discussing staff staff discussions only rise to the school committee when it rises to you as a grievance that has moved all the way through the process staff concerns should be going to the administration and employees have protections under that so you can remind people of those things but again you would want to talk to your legal counsel about exactly where the line is because it feels like it’s fluctuated you can do public comment at the beginning you can do public comment at the end I know of at least one committee that does it at the beginning and the end I would also caution and I think you did a fairly good job of this today public comment is

2:30:29 not a discussion U I’m going to have t-shirts made school committee meetings are business meetings of the school committee in public not public meetings of the school committee hearings are a different story not having a back and forth in public comment is actually best practices around open meeting law because if you start discussing something in public comment that is not on your agenda you have not noticed the public that it is going to be discussed so public comment is a chance for you to hear from the public and occasionally answer back with thank you for your input we are discussing this on September 15th we encourage you to come back and join us for that meeting yeah and I just is an FYI I’m well aware of that normally I try my hardest not to I just there was clearly a lot of

2:31:17 misinformation out there around you know this sort of topic for us there’s that seems to be a recurring theme um and I just yes wasn’t trying to purposely violate that I think everyone you didn’t you didn’t sometimes don’t and you want to hear from the public and let’s be honest they’re not coming to talk to you if they’re not passionate about something this is education they’re talking about their kids there is nothing more important in this I think I I like what you noted about having you know what public what public comment should and should not contain privacy being respectful all of that I think it might be nice for us to have some sort of one pager that we have you know we have sign up sheets when we

2:32:03 ask the for folks to sign in maybe we have that and decide it we have our yep I’m making a note so my chair at NCH again this sort of started predating me but um my chair Charly Ellis will read our public comment statement right at the beginning of public comment public comment will be 20 minutes long etc etc um please when you come up state your name Etc so let me I’m writing down things that I need to send you guys in the fall one thing when we knew there would be some topics I’ve been struck at the time by legal to read the policy at the beginning of public comment and to adhere if it’s three minutes and a Max of 15 adherer shut it down at 15 the problem is when you have a 100 people in

2:32:49 a room and there’s a lot of people to speak very understandably so there’s see there then is a will of the committee to say we want to extend it because which I understand you want to give people but then then you’re setting the practice of diverting from your written policies and that gets sticky so I would say that’s a really good place for that communication we talked about I’m hearing things bubbling I think that this is going to be a bigger issue than just public comment can we send out a statement that says we are hearing from the public that this is important to you all we are going to set up a hearing on this date please join us then because no you don’t want to take away from the ability of the public to talk to you but again school committee meetings or business meetings of the school

2:33:34 committee in public the lights need to stay on people need to get paid you need to be compliant with um sepa and furpa and you need to hire the people you need to hire you need to approve the contract so your business needs to get done if you see something Brewing that will be a larger public conversation schedule a hearing for it yeah there’s always the temptation to expand public comment but again you’re correct you don’t want to set the Pres precedent of the entire meeting being public Comon and none of the business getting done because you have business you are legally obligated to uh conclud yes but and listen again we’re talking about our kids there’s nothing more important you joke that you know I

2:34:20 pitch my husband been off a bridge to save my kids he knows this by the way everyone laughs and I’m like he knows this I’ve said this to him we’re talking about our kids people are very passionate but there are times when you need to put the business of the committee into a meeting and then hear from the public at another meeting where they can fully Express themselves where discussions can be had and that can be a hearing but you can still conduct the business of the meeting um and and during that time because we were very cognizant of the new case that came through because that really threw a wrench and a lot um and what I was directed by actually two different councils because we switched Council

2:35:08 last year at Stride and was short of the threat of violence you you can remind people about deorum and people listen you can shut down nothing yep absolutely nothing so if they talk about student personnel if they talk about teachers personally you can remind that this is not polite essentially but there is nothing you can shut thing yeah I like the idea of having a hearing if that’s what you called it I’m not yes it would be yeah it would be a hearing um and you would still have to post it by via EML Emil and whether whether it’s on this particular topic or other ones that do come up um because I think sometimes it’s a question people of we even when

2:35:55 it’s a dissenting argument we want to hear from everybody and we want to give them their time and we don’t I I should stop saying I do not ever want it to seem like we are not interested in hearing from the public don’t want to continue to hear from public don’t appreciate their passion yep and their thoughts and ones that do research of course particularly when they come to us in a very collected income manner um and I and respectful manner I should say and I I don’t ever want to disu that and so I really like that idea y so the thing I will also say about that is as committee members masc H is accessible to you and we can train you and we can tell you

2:36:42 what your role is we don’t have the access to the public to say listen this is what school committees really can and can’t do so as much as there is a learning curve for you as committee members as to what you can do the general public doesn’t really understand that and communicating through through operating protocols Etc public comment statements what you can and can’t do as committee members won’t solve all the problems but it does at least help and I always we always say I am not a lawyer um Glenn cud likes to joke that like we we’re not lawyers but we watch what did he say um night court and law and I’m like Glenn I don’t watch Night Court I listen to podcasts on my drives between districts thank you we are not lawyers if you ever we are policy people we are

2:37:29 Finance people if you ever have a question ask your legal councel when you ask your legal councel and they give you an answer and you act on that it doesn’t prevent problems but you have consulted legal counsel and that does give you a little bit more protection your legal counsel for your school district knows more about education law than any of us ever would if you ever have a question ask your legal counsel that’s what they’re there for then you got to follow what they say yes you do actually do what they say if you don’t follow it then you’re in demn ifications yes so I have a section in here on strategic planning and then I have some just uh comment guidelines that are from our guidelines for MC

2:38:16 members I know you have other things that you want to that you have to move on to today the comment guidelines are pretty straightforward um sorry the comment the communication guidelines are pretty straightforward and they are the masc communication guidelines for members strategic plan we’ve talked about that a lot so I think what I’m going to do is I’m going to stop for a second and say is there anything you guys have additional questions on and then let’s talk about what your next steps are going to be so let’s start with additional questions anyone have any additional questions there’s some trainings I’d like to see you come in do throughout the year but we can work through our chair to kind of organize those 100% so I technically I’m your field director you would more often than not get me but

2:39:03 we do sometimes cover Jim Hardy retired yesterday yeah um his replacement is not going to be full-time until I think February but Tracy Liz and I and Glenn are covering what needs to be covered sometimes if it’s something specific to finance we might Loop Tracy in and have her in like she does a lot of our Chapter 70 presentations but I would be your field director but you can get almost any field director you can get Glenn and we are more than happy to come out and talk about anything and everything having to do with governance we can even have a workshop just on what your Walkin a walk- on song would be what I will say to to some of the newer members too is um through our membership any of us can call um Alicia if you want to share your your contact information I know that through my six years here Liz

2:39:56 was Dorothy was absolutely invaluable whenever in doubt I would pick up the phone and call her with a question she would often give guidance on you know it’s and how to go with something where to find information it was just a wonderful wonderful resource to call and use and that’s not just um for specific members of the committee anybody can and it’s resource we pay one flat fee for and get unlimited so I would use it heav yeah the only thing we ever charge extra for is when we do the full policy manual review which is literally section A through Section K did that about six years ago or superintendent search which you’re not going to do anytime soon you’re good so yes and again one of the great things about calling an ASC is

2:40:42 almost everyone in the office either currently everyone currently is or has been a school Committee Member so even if I’m not in during the day and you ask a question someone will be able to either answer you or direct you somewhere else so I would say so go sorry goad I’m just looking for that com yes and that is my contact information um if you call the office you generally get like everyone if you call the number at the bottom you get me so but again if I don’t know the answer we field directors are a hive mind we try and share as much information as possible so I would say your next steps are you’re going to want to figure out how you’re going to set the superintendent goals are you going

2:41:29 to do it in a subcommittee are you going to do it the full committee agree on what the goals are and what the process will be you’re going to talk about school committee goals and we can I can come out and work with you on any of these if you have a subcommittee thing um occasionally I end up at subcommittees to talk about policies too outside of the policy manual process um you’re going to work on committee goals and you’re going to look at your operating protocols and update them now your committee goals can be we’re going to look at our operating protocols and update them don’t give yourselves more work but it sounds like what you’re looking for is a streamlining and you know tuning up of the efficiency of your Communications your goals your strategic plans all of that so that sounds to me

2:42:14 like that’s where you’re supposed to you’re you’re headed next if you want assistance with that you can totally help just let me know and you’re going to share that link or I guess we talked about maybe waiting to share the link so we can decide what our format is and if we’ll do it as a workshop that would everyone okay yes so when you guys figure out how you want to do that just let me know okay um and then I’m going to send you some public comment statements I sent via email all the things I handed you today I G I sent those via email already um if there’s anything else you want to see um we have social media comment guidelines most of our stuff’s on our web page you can just go and download it um but if there’s anything else you’re specifically looking for just let me know and I will send these to you I will

2:43:00 put these into a document and send them to you thank you absolutely thank you Alicia thanks um everyone just so you know this is in our Dropbox or the in the Google Drive for today so the presentation is um I know you know I took notes on our next steps particularly around the self- evaluation and the Survey Monkey so I’ll follow up with Alicia um because I do think it would I thought this was extremely valuable and I’d love to have the help as we go through this as a committee that’s only my personal opinion and obviously I think we’ll deliberate on that today and in the future so thank you we’ll be back to you on the next stabs

2:43:38 here yeah so um make a motion to take things out of order we’re running an hour I think on time I just want to be mindful jul

2:43:59 have Alison I see that we have we have the working lunch with um Jen King and we have the sub subcommittee leers on assignments we could up to the committee we could go right into Jen I assume she’s there that’s what I was gonna make sorry I kind of spok it

2:44:26 sorry Jen um that is what I because we’re I don’t think you can hear me um we’re since we’re about an hour behind schedule and Jen is here and I want to be respectful of her time as well as everybody else’s uh if we could just make a motion to change the order of the agenda um okay ionna take a vote I’m assuming there’s no discussion on that all right um Al Williams in favor Brian Oda in favor Sarah Fox Jen Schaffner in favor I think I saw the words in favor come out of your mouth but I didn’t in favor in favor fa thumbs up I think your volume oh no one’s yeah no since so

2:45:12 sorry yes in favor can you hear me no one was on sorry it’s me yes I am no good at Tech either so add that to my list um okay so we um so that motion is approved 5- Z we will shift um if we can just take a five minute um mother nature and grab lunch if so desired Jen that means you too of course is that okay and we’ll start in five minutes all right thank you so much really appreciate it Alicia thank you for absolutely everything yeah

2:45:48 fastic information so when you think of the

2:53:55 all all right is Jen there too G to make sure I don’t oop do we lose Jen chefer I mean I don’t see her’s never under her name she’s under Ms oh she is okay uh Jen if you can hear me we’re gonna start now we have our next presenter uh Jen King is going to review open meeting law with us thank you very much Jen and for your patience let me just share my screen um and I just want to confirm I know there

2:54:41 was a a hard stop time is it still 12:45 or do we have any um wiggle room with that I think we could go to one is that okay I know Julia and John have I I have a meeting at 1:30 um but Julie and John I think have 1:30 or two o’clock meetings as well are you okay

2:55:09 with’s um and a lot of what I had um also it seems like um Alicia already covered so I’ll try to just sort of quickly go through those and get to what we’re discussing for for the meet of today um so it’s very nice to meet you all in person my name is Jen king um with Valerio dominello and Hillman which is one of the the firms um that your committee utilizes just to confirm we are here just for educational training purposes only um not discussing any legal advice I’m happy to discuss that sort of another time if necessary it in line with committee policies and procedures um and the topics that chair shaftner asked that I speak with you all about today starting off with open meeting law but again being mindful that you just had some discussions on that um just a refresher on conflict of interest and then Communications which again it

2:55:55 seems like masc covered really well for you so I’ll try to sort of quickly go through that um so starting off with open meeting law and although I do have time reserved at the end for questions if at any point as we’re going through this any questions thoughts concerns just feel free to stop um been happy to sort of go through those so sort of to start so you’re all on the school committee which is a public body in the state of Massachusetts so you do fall under the realm of the open meeting law and that basically defines how those public bodies need to to operate and when you think about what is actually a meeting of the school committee it is any time that there is going to be a deliberation by a public body in its Quorum with respect to any matter within the school committee’s jurisdiction so I

2:56:41 think that um Alicia gave a good example a few minutes ago when you know there’s a discussion about recycling in town um that typically isn’t going to be something within the school committee jurisdiction unless it affects us somehow so thinking about it sort of in in that lens um deliberations can be oral and written this includes email it does include texting and it also includes social media when we are commenting on Facebook Instagram things of that nature again anything within our our school committee’s jurisdiction so if you have a personal Facebook account you put out a picture of you know some accomplishment your child made um you know my son made Eagle Scout you’re free to say you know that’s that’s great that wouldn’t be considered within the public body’s jurisdiction to be some type of deliberation so you should be good with

2:57:26 that piece and remembering when we’re talking about a a quorum that doesn’t just apply to the school committee as a whole that also applies to our subcommittees so typically we’re going to see subcommittees are you know three three people so if we have two of those members um discussing something um within that subcommittee’s jurisdiction so if you end up creating a um a subcommittee for intended evaluation and they are discussing that outside of the subcommittee that can be considered a a deliberation um another piece is just a one-way communication to a full um public body and the rest of the committee can be considered a deliberation so um and again I think Alicia just sort of discussed that the

2:58:11 importance of not replying all so let’s say that the chair disseminates the agenda you review you see something on there um that you may not sort of agree it should be put on the agenda you put out a reply all message um basically putting out your thoughts and opinion we shouldn’t discuss this you get into the merits of it that would be considered a a deliberation that is a open meeting law violation um within the Attorney General’s jurisdiction on this already apologize in connection to this can you on um serial Communications that’s whats most you’re getting right into the next slide so that is perfect because to your point that is what becomes really popular so serial Communications sort of more colloquially

2:58:57 we call it the game of playing telephone that the kids do you said this then this then that person um so it starts off it’s a communication of fewer than a Corum so one or two people that may not start off as a deliberation but then it goes from person to person and that does qualify as an unlawful deliberation if you’re going to pursue a communication that way it’s basically put together does this all constitute a deliberation all these different for lack of a better term but serial Communications again this can be emailed this can be text message in person um so if one person texts you know the chair texts something to the vice chair uh Vice chair then texts the secretary who then texts another member and we know all that or this is email and it is within um the

2:59:43 public body’s jurisdiction it is something that you know should be discussed at a a meeting um is not subject to an executive purpose that is considered a Serial communication that the AG’s office is going to look at um we also can’t ciron vent by way of Serial communication so just sort of keep that in mind that is not a way to avoid a deliberation um and again just to emphasize that this can be any form of communication to take place um and it can be you know in in person um that you know I’m speaking as the chair I’m speaking with the vice chair then they go speak to the secretary again it is like playing the game of of telephone and that is something we want to avoid we want to make sure we’re discussing matters within the school

3:00:28 committee’s jurisdiction in properly hosted and occurring meetings there are some exclusions from the term deliberation this is the General Distribution of the meeting agenda again you know try not to reply all to to that piece scheduling or procedural information um before trying to schedule an executive session um agre some of that nature purpose one um scheduling is excluded from a deliberation or if you’re Distributing documents that are going to be discussed at the meeting um does that typically get included with like as a packet with the agenda perfect excuse me yeah Distributing the meeting agenda school before the school committee meeting that’s not considered a violation open no that’s an exclusion

3:01:15 so I could comment if you get the agenda the week before the meeting this something on there I I’m concerned will take more time than there aot would I make comment to that or is that so if you’re replying all to that then that’s still consider that would be considered a one-way deliberation if you’re sharing your opinion on that topic um so it might be best to maybe um if you have a concern you can either share because the chair is the one that um schedules the agenda or at the beginning of the actual meeting or sharing of the meeting um you know do we want take things out of order or something of that nature so I just want to make sure I understand this correctly I don’t want to Viola it right when I saw the agenda for this meeting saw the

3:02:01 flag oh my God that’s gonna suck up our entire time but but I didn’t know I could send saying take that off the agenda the public sees that’s a mistake we’re here for a retreat you know that kind of policy discussion rules so what would that have been that dat I mean if that had happened you and the chair are otherwise on a subcommittee um that let’s say the flag policy is anything that falls into that that could be considered a deliberation I think the sort of the biggest thing is we we say to put our trust in the chairs to um you know properly put on what topics need to be discussed in time frames and knowing that during meetings we we can extend times we can change we can move things out of order with the agenda fairly

3:02:47 easily I think we saw that earlier today um so the biggest thing is putting that trust in the chair who um you know it is their duty to to create the agenda that it is properly discussed um and sort of you need to look at what subcommittees you are on with the chair um and being sure that if you are going to have any conversation with the the chair about that scheduling piece um again never a reply all situation um but again the biggest thing is really having that trust in the the chair um about the agenda piece but if you’re going to have sort of concern or conversation um it needs to be sort of just one way with the the chair um and I don’t know um because you’ve been the chair before Sarah like if you had any sort of

3:03:34 practices what for that one thing one I always try to think of was if right away when you said the statement you said myve right if it’s a concern if it’s your thought if it’s your feeling it’s your opinion that’s deliberation if your responses agenda item for misspelled that’s a fact it’s not an opinion it’s not deliberation if it’s reflective of something that would be something particular possibly to you that someone else could disagree no one could disagree school was SP incorrectly that’s not a that’s if it’s a fact it’s fair name to talk about if it’s something that someone else could say I

3:04:22 see it a different way that is your opinion and that’s deliberation and that happens at the table in front of every because quite often these agendas topics are taken up between the chair and a vice share at least that was always my everything I did I brought Jen on when I when and so if you were to say to J I really think this should go and then J

3:04:53 we’re now in serial communication so it is I get the reasoning behind the open meeting a lot so everybody knows what’s going on but it does In fairness it makes it really hard to just get an agenda posted just to get worked on because you would think you’re not trying to deliberate there’s no Mal inent there whatsoever you’re trying to make us have a functional meeting TimeWise but it very easily if someone wanted become something that’s problem no Mal intent whatever but intent doesn’t always matter it’s a pretty strict liability yeah and I think also M I don’t think anybody’s expecting Perfection well some people might be but no one here is expecting Perfection out of anyone so if

3:05:39 you did happen to one time respond you haven’t but if you did um you know I just am trying to leave a little room there for not expecting everybody I me it’s just real open meeting the remedy is that in a public meeting you would say I sent this email you make the email available for the public all to see those are the remedies but like for instance today what happened was I when I saw the when I I saw on the agenda that we had couple comment we clearly knew a lot of people here for certain topic and then it was further down I made a motion to out of Weber I was not party that’s how this

3:06:28 works that was the process in which you would do it when the opened you could say XYZ open me right that’s why we’re here and I think just one quick thing on the fact and opinion piece uh there are times where even a deliberation about a fact could still be a deliberation just because we do live in a society where we’re you know people do dispute facts you know is this fact or not um so just be but just be mindful of of that as well um sort of as we we go through there are some other exceptions to when something is or isn’t a deliberation um if and again the first element is that there is no deliberation so we are not all sitting together we are not having serial Communications if we are conducting an on-site inspection let’s

3:07:15 say a new school building um if it is a public private Gathering um some type of training conference program social event or we attending um another public bodies meeting select board town meeting something of that nature right yeah so this is all triggered by the first element that we are not otherwise deliberating um so that just being really careful about that piece as well so for instance the the training program piece um so we’re here because we want to be able to learn more about the open meeting law but also discuss that piece um so technically this is a public meeting um if you wanted to all go to a a local social event let’s say a quorum of you um and you’re not otherwise discussing matters within the school committee’s interest

3:08:02 you’re going to an arch galery opening nothing is discussed about the school committee or anything within its jurisdiction that is not going to be considered a a meeting so it really comes down to the the deliberation piece I think a lot of it too I think we get hyper sensitive I think we are hyper sensitive to it because there are some people that think maybe there is Mal inent behind things um and it just causes us to have more hyp sensitivity about it is for me even when we like for instance we had violation that ultimately went through the appeal process it was found to not be an open meeting violation we did anything wrong to begin with ultimately through the process it showed we didn’t do anything wrong yeah the

3:08:49 process work but the process costs a lot of money and time we’ve e lots of attorney fees to fight that the Secretary State put a lot of man power to to that our internal people put a lot of man power so although just because we’re doing it right doesn’t mean that we don’t want to be hyper Vigilant because it when you have really active Community it can cost a lot of misuse of resources and we’ve seen that even when it comes out with we didn’t do anything wrong it doesn’t change the Public’s mind on it always one and out post like we’ve had subcommittee meetings budget meetings that we

3:09:35 knew I always used to say l year if there’s a subcommittee meeting extra member is g to tune into just because they want to be informed it’s a Hot Topic I’m sorry talking let me know I’ll post as a full committee meeting we’re committee at five so one of you go then we’re covered it’s posted as the budget sub committee and a full school committee you’re covered and if you don’t show and there’s only two you know the other meeting to order it’s okay when out post and we’re cover there was lots of budget meetings we posted so that all members of our committee always felt they could be involved if they wanted to and we wouldn’t be violated

3:10:22 y that all make sense assume that would be absolutely well my

3:10:30 opinion and also stop me if there’s anything that um that oish will like absolutely covered um in terms of posting agendas did she go through that it seemed like she she covered that in in some sense uh but make sure it’s posted at least 48 hours prior to the meeting that includes excludes Saturday Sunday legal holidays unless there is an emergency treat emergency very narrowly um just sort of keep be mindful of that it really needs to be something sudden unexpected related to uh to our jur U our jurisdiction we still need to post as reasonably as possible make sure the agenda is conspicuous it’s legible we’re not posting it in some font that no one can read or it’s not too small um also

3:11:16 if we post on our social media page up the agenda and a zoom link that if you’re just doing that that does not satisfy the posting requirement we need to make sure that we’re posting with the Town Clerk and then also best practice you know post on our own school committee website we want to be as transparent and as accessible to the community as possible um and obviously we’re posting topics that we the chair reasonably anticipates um discussing and we need to do it with sufficient specific specificity and I know masc touched on that but again like if we’re going in and having a a grievance hearing what is the bargaining unit or same thing with negotiations um purpose one there are certain ways that we need to post um and we’ll discuss sort of those main executive session purposes

3:12:02 but we need to enable the public to have some sense of what you know we’re we’re looking at and keep it to that

3:12:15 end our to cler very specifically has a specific format and you can’t just put like there’s a secretary of state requirements even if you meet those has to be on a specific very specific form in a specific version they’ve updated the version so like if the Dateline isn’t where the has to be so when and doubt is a great resource if you’re not using the most updated version that they like can’t be posted in a specific time frame too they have additional time frame restrictions additional like hour 45 minutes [Music]

3:13:26 yeah think about it coming from the perspective of a citizen if they’re looking at the agenda are they going to understand what it looks at and obviously to that point acronyms I know there was also some discussion about public comment and it looks like your committee last updated policy in May 2023 there’s obviously been some more case law um since that time but for the time being your policy provides the period does not exceed 15 minutes speakers need to sign in they are encouraged but not required to present their remarks in a respectful manner they are provided up to three minutes to present their material um in

3:14:12 the chair can permit extensions in extenuating circumstances and again I know that masc touched on best practice I with all of this we limit topics to to sort of our Authority um we reserve the right to terminate speech but again it needs to be that really high threshold where we’re looking at like true threats real types of harm things of that nature and um written comments can be presented to the chair before or after the meeting um but again I don’t want to restate what what’s already gone into um if we’re going into executive session just procedures make sure we always start in session first then we make a motion to go into an executive session for one of the purposes we need to do a roll call vote on that motion the chair is going to then announce that the committee is

3:14:59 meeting an executive session the purpose of that session and whether or not the committee is going to reconvene in Open Session following so that way if people are interested in um any further business they know you know this is it for the the day or not um and just make sure that those statements get recorded in our Open Session minutes um there are 10 purposes for executive session there are four that we typically see school committees are um are using for um most of that time purpose one is to discuss reputation character physical condition or mental health rather than professional competence so excluding evaluations of an individual or to discuss potential discipline or dismissal um that person has the right

3:15:44 to attend that hearing they need to be notified 48 hours in advance and they can ALS request that the meeting be made in Open Session if they so choose something we’ve had to implement in this one know the 48 hours in advance is not the same as the clerk’s 48 hours in advance so the clerk closes at 4:30 our meeting starts at session starting at we have we have had to do it not it’s never advisable it’s never the goal but we’ve had to split that difference and it’s like a 658 but we made the 48 in writing so that to clarify that 48 is not by the

3:16:30 clerk’s CL it’s a true 48 Hours um and this is another one when we’re considering the the posting that um you know the the name usually um can be put out there um so that is something and again just when we talk about the exception of rather than professional competence so this is not a purpose to deliberate about an evaluation that should be happening in Open Session um additionally you’re also going to have your strategy sessions for um Union personnel and non-union Personnel under executive session purpose two um you can discuss strategy with respect to collective bargaining or or litigation if you were to open it up and that would create a detrimental effect on the the bargaining or litigating position again that’s another typical purpose when you’re in negotiations or facing some

3:17:17 type of litigation and then lastly is purpose seven to comply with some type of statutory requirement so that would typically be to um to review and approve executive session minutes on a periodic basis um when we’re talking about executive session deliberations and actions these are confidential uh unless and until the point the school committee has voted to release those minutes um and full and any documents with that piece it is a separate violation of the state ethics law because as members of a public body everybody falls into that to disclose or use confidential information that we obtain in executive session before the school committee properly approves it for release and that disclosure can be verbal it can be email

3:18:06 text to again think of that as um think there that one is really important all um we have had situations where had members of the committee leave an executive session write a letter to the editor as an individual with their opinions on ACs of the executive session and that is a clear violation of not only open meeting law but St so you want to be very cautious that when you leave you’re sharing your opinions on what happened you’re disclosing and to that end also just being mindful of you know our our home lives and you know where we close things have had situations where um members of

3:18:52 public body um share things with a a spouse and a child that goes to that school overheard the conversation that child came to school the next day and shared out some very confidential information so just um kind of be mindful um again another reason but also to comply with that confidentiality requirement as well um some sort of recommendations because um if you’re there Tex emailing during um a meeting it could appear that you’re having some type of private deliberation um with other members and Forum of the committee so to the extent possible understanding you know life happens we have um you know Partners we have children we have pets like things go on but if we are

3:19:39 able to avoid any type of texting or emailing and we can be sort of very present during those um those meetings that is advisable and sort of to Sarah’s point it helps sort of negate any accusation that um you know we’re not engaging in any improper Liberation but understand again sometimes you know life happens people need to get a hold of us um but again we absolutely advise not communicating with anyone else in the committee other than speaking with them in that meeting during the meeting um and we sort of touched on the the reply all piece um so again just not doing any type of reply all um I think we’ve sort of covered that piece um just again really really important something else is make sure to use your your District school committee email address

3:20:24 for all school committee matters and then separate that from personal matters personal accounts if you have children uh you know within the the school system obviously we’re going to to not use our school committee email address for that we want to keep that to to our personal piece um and also just be mindful to if you’re signing up for like list serves or anything else using your your District email account because everything is a public record so if we have to have it do a search um and you’re getting some list serve every day that can certainly add into things so just be be mindful what um you sign up with your District email account for um again cannot emphasize enough do not reply all do not communicate among a

3:21:09 quum electronically via email just same thing don’t do that during meetings no emailing or texting especially with others during um in your um in the committee and then serial Communications as well not playing the game of telephone and I told this person this and then they passed it along um just key takeaways for that piece um it is possible for individuals to request permission to make video or audio recordings during an open session meeting but they do need to notify the the chair um and so that way they can make sure that reasonable requirements for that recording is in place if that is happening the chair has to inform attendees recordings being made this can include you know Zoom TV anything of that nature

3:21:57 um right yes and so that’s an important U piece and we get that question a lot because you think of the um the Massachusetts laws concerning audio recordings it to an extent it compies it’s the person saying I’m putting you on notice that I’m going to record so then the chair is basically following through with that to let everyone know hey this is being recorded and it’s the onus on those people who may not want to be recorded to step away from that position um social media we touched on a little bit and just to reiterate um Communications about school related matters school committee related matters on social media can still be subject to the open meeting law um the A’s office has held that posts and comments with one another can be deliberations so just be really careful um to the extent you

3:22:42 have each other on social media accounts and the interactions that you’re having on there um so additionally those could be potential um Communications that are subject to the public records law um know that that applies to email text social media um so just be mindful of that if you are discussing a school committee related matter um there was a case um that came out of it was Boston about a year or two ago and the court indeed held there that text messages between that school committee about school committee matters are public records so just be mindful of of that piece um and again just for for minutes um I think that um masc sort of covered that piece but just make sure that sort

3:23:28 of the basic pieces are there date time location who’s present who is absent who is participating remotely we need some type of summary of discussion on each and every topic it doesn’t need to be a full on you know transcript of everything that was said but enough to put somebody who wasn’t there on notice of what the discussion was that was had any decisions being made actions taken include that within there and then we also need to list any documents used and referred to at the meeting um and we need to retain a copy in case there requests for minutes or public minutes is there any time requirement when you have to publish the minutes um so great question and that actually gets us right into our next slide you guys are great you know exactly where we’re going um so

3:24:14 for Open Session minutes and we sort of go by um requests um and it’s different than the public records law so just want to be clear on that piece if you get a request for Open Session minutes that let’s say you get one after today for this session’s minutes um you do have to make those available within 10 calendar days either in draft or approved form um and that is for Open Session um so typically we we say to try to do it for the next meeting so that way we maintain an accurate record and that way there is a request that comes in we’re able to appropriately respond to that Brian’s Point there’s no requirement at all to have them proactively

3:25:02 available want to do to Bear there’s no requirement have them posted on your website or somewhere someone asks have to produce them we not Reed to any yeah so just best practice and again anticipating if you were to get request and that way it keeps the public informed of what we’re discussing um we want to sort of if we are putting those out there um we just say you know try to do it in a timely

3:25:42 manner got a executive session is a little bit different so in in that case if there’s a request for executive session minutes first we need to look at the status of those minutes um if they’ve been voted by the committee to be released um we can provide them to the requestor within 10 calendar days they can be redacted consistent because at that point it’s a public record if we’ve not voted to release the minutes um we basically say at this time we’ve not voted to release the the minutes the matter is still on going um and if they have not yet voted that the school committee has to review it at its next regularly scheduled meeting or within 30 days whichever comes

3:26:25 first so in the interest of time I might just kind of

3:26:32 quickly do these exercises but I’ll just do one instead of all of them so assume we have an open session meeting and the school committee members are texting each other about how they plan to vote on an upcoming agenda item um and then one of the members text the president of a local parent group who’s attending the meeting asking how the group wants Empire to vote um just sort of at the outset do we think this is the unlawful deliberation yes yes second one is not actually a problem it’s an ethical issue because you were elected to vote right not for special interest group yeah um and this is another example and this we did sort of in line with the EG’s uh

3:27:18 sort of decisions on social medias but that a member of a school committee posting on social media page talking about topics within the school committee’s jurisdiction invites individuals to weigh in and respond has comments open um recently po posted about redistricting plan two other school committee members gave thumbs up thumbs down and one other person commented that is a deliberation you have that Forum of people that are engaging with something within the um School Comm would it be okay if they just posted the agenda I just want to clarify on that you can post the agenda pieces yeah absolutely yeah um and then just a quick refresher on conflict of of interest um we’ve touched a little bit on this but it

3:28:03 governs anyone who is a school Committee Member as well as other public officials it ensures that our Private Financial interests in our relationships um do not otherwise conflict with our responsibilities um so first you know we need to make sure that we’re not getting any type of unwarranted privilege and that we’re not using any public resources for personal or political reasons so making sure that we are not using District resources like copier secretarial services paper postage if we’re having a um another election uh you know to be on school committee um and also making sure that we don’t use our position to try to get unwarranted privileges for ourselves or for um others like our children within the the school district um so we are not going

3:28:50 to go into our child’s um you know classroom we’re not going to have the parent teacher conference and say you know I’m on the school committee um if you know you make my child pass this class I can make sure that um you know you get tenure for next year type of thing we’re not using our position for to gain anything for ourselves or anyone that we care about um self-dealing is another important piece um so making sure that we don’t take any type of official action if it’s going to affect your financial interest or the financial interest of your business partner a prospective employer or Association um or any organization where you serve as an officer director truste or employee or any of your immediate family

3:29:36 members um and that is pretty broadly defined when we say immediate family member so it’s not just our own spouse children parents and siblings it is also those of our spouse so it gets you know branched out quite a bit there um so when we’re asked to vote let’s say on a bid or something and let’s say our brother owns a construction company they’re putting in the bid um that is potentially self-dealing um and that is going to create a a conflict excuse me what about if it’s R voting on kindergarten tuition and you have a family member who’s entering Kinder is that selfing or that sure so there’s disclosures to be filed there’s actually a specific form that the state ethics commission maintains so they

3:30:22 recommend that whenever there is potentially a decision that impacts your your child that you Bill out and submit that form um and then just generally um letting everyone know in advance like I still have you know children in the school system they are here um but they do have those forms available um and that way you’re able to submit those um ahead of a vote um so for instance if you’re voting um sort of to that that piece if that impacts you um if it is something related to special education funding and let’s say your child’s in an outof District placement um that is something you’re going to want to file that disclosure as well um and we can follow up with

3:31:15 year voted on the user Fe and they said because that Ed so it wasf that one wasn’t an issue but at the same time if um we had various members throughout the years seing here and there from AED bills like if your grandchild had a specific evaluation that we brought in an outside evaluator from that’s like a oneoff it would be on schedule bills for instance when I KN was going to Happ as a superintendent know like keep your eye open this may be coming through know and then I just to tell the public why you’re you just obain that single schedule um but you know’s been great this Brian’s called like four or five times this year in doubt call they give you an

3:32:19 I abstain they see her they’re hi Sarah um I abstained when we were voting on the new football field because my son plays football um he’s younger so he’s not playing High School football um but it still could potentially affect him and so I I didn’t fill out a disclosure to be honest I’m not trying out myself as long as you follow their their advice and honestly when you call them that carries more weight down the line when you’re following their direct advice because as long as you follow their guidance that you can say I I have this that’s usable in any future thing yeah I have a whole slide on it and I abstained so I you know an immediate family extends to grandchildren so it’s interesting when

3:33:06 they go by their definition it doesn’t but just because there are other overarching um components of the state ethics law that basically forbid you from engaging in any sort of interaction or activity that can give the appearance of impropriety we would probably still say um you know do the disclosure but also still call State ethics again it’s um free and basically their advice is going to to hold water later on if there is any type of allegation

3:33:39 so um so just trying to I think we have a few minutes left um just know that as members of the school committee were prohibited from hiring promoting supervising or other wi participating in the employment um of any person in our immediate family or our spouse’s immediate family um for an army there so we are not going to call the athletic director and say you know my child just came back from college please hire them as the assistant coach or like you are going to hire them as the assistant coach that is the exact type of violation that um these laws were enacted to basically protect against um finances and gifts are really important as well so as school committee members we are prohibited from requesting or accepting um or giving anything um in exchange for agreeing to perform an

3:34:25 official or not official act so the example we just had um asking a member of another local parent group how they want us to vote on something um let’s say they said hey we will give you you know this amount of money to vote this way that is obviously a massive ethics violation um same thing for um requesting or receiving um something of substantial value $50 or more to influence your performance and duties as a school Committee Member this has some exclusions so anything less than $50 be mindful of anything in the aggregate because it is not just single gifts but in the aggregate if it comes out to $50 or more ceremonial gifts if masc um or somebody wants to give a gift um for

3:35:12 your years of service on the school committee um you know that is something that’s excluded and then gives her family or friendship um so let’s say um your best friends with the person who was running one of the elementary school ptos they can buy you a birthday present like don’t worry about things like that we have some people that get very stressed out about that um I don’t think we have to worry about that period and just like we can’t emphasize enough the confidentiality piece is um you as school committee members um in attending executive sessions and other matters you’re pry to confidential non-public information this includes executive session minutes and what’s discussed there um collective bargaining strategy um if any Personnel medical information is sent to you proposals and bid documents during the

3:35:59 bidding process and going quickly to personnel and medical um just as school committee members you’re going you do and are going to receive Communications from parents Guardians members in the community and they may not always know when they reach out to you that um what they’re sending is a public record so sometimes we’ve had that they’re disclosing some really highly confidential information that is personel to them we want to be very sensitive to that um and sort of where we go with the the chain of following that um so if somebody is disclosing that just we we am of that summer and issue being then we had a lot of sure and that stuff was given out and they had some really personel people

3:36:46 were pouring your heart out C personal experiences of children or themselves and public records

3:36:58 request there’s if you’re us there’s no there should be no understanding that right and so that’s sort of what we run into is that like it’s usually the first time that somebody is reaching out because you may have in your um in your signature line that like anything you sent to this address is considered a public record and we also recommend and many districts do have on their website when they have like the public records request form or on the school committee page that like any Communications to our members are considered public records like as much notice as you can give the public um because otherwise until you give them that response with you know likely that signature line they may not know or appreciate that um so that is sort of the exception that we’re we’re just running into that is like this is

3:37:45 confidential it’s like it’s not yeah and obviously if there’s a you know request you know responding in in line with the the public records on what privacy piece allows but just even if you do get that um you know just sort of using best practice with what is you know allowed to be to be shared um you know with the world and this is something that we’re going to schedule an ex redex something like that because it was given to us maybe not in the proper form does that mean that we can then give it to somebody else don’t get we have no choice and the records officer which I have a question for you about that um who designates that that’s typically a function of the superintendent okay so

3:38:31 the public record officer there is public records Officers Training KN our district as it

3:38:43 exists the hope is that you know but or they’re even properly reporting because I can share my personal experience there my response to particular questions was not shared I never said that I deleted texts um literally was never anywhere in my email my public record email response yet somehow it was in the record as if I had said I deleted text messages and it was in the public in the newspapers and everywhere and that never happened so but I I didn’t know that it had gone out inly public reference fine so unfortunate I guess I was just worried about like if someone gives us information that probably should shared it was right but I would

3:39:29 hope that I know it’s hard you think that because now we’ve been asked for we could not violate fura right and so we would take action to not violate fura so okay I just want to be clear about what it came to

3:40:00 one some of what happens well since I’ve been here

3:40:17 we upload those we sendal legal what’s need to be redacted so that’s practice it was our make sure it still is we

3:40:36 toal toal before estimated cost they cut a check then they start theut understand that and that’s that question I said we been doing that I yes but consistent and then there was one recently that it should money we did but happen again but but

3:41:29 understand cost us $7,000 in leg we have had that in the last year the check comes to the town Mar the check goes to the general and the bill to that school resour and you’re not you’re not $7,000 for that public record’s rules around what you charge

3:41:50 may have been for people about the legal last year it cost us more in legal to meet the public rec request than it

3:42:34 any way shape or form because

3:42:41 information if someone sends a committee an email and it has in there shouldn’t be in there and someone it’s not in

3:42:59 that yeah I mean every record is Case by case I think the point we sort of want to get across to you as Community member committee members is like if you get something that shares like a very recent um or or you know some type of experience or medical information then we’ll get through the communication lines but it might be better suited to make sure that and it sounds like you Jon are on the school committee at Marblehead Head schools but if someone Marblehead schools but if someone reaches out to you individually and it’s like this sort of terrible incident just happened with my child um you know that is something we just sort of need to to be mindful of that like as people we don’t want to go out in the community and and

3:43:44 dis correct right yeah um no but I would not to get off the topic if you if you were to get email

3:43:56 or it’s hard that third party thing is hard but right um so just sort of to to wrap up and I do want to get to that communication piece just knowing we we actually we just talked about an actual conflict versus an appearance of conflict actual when we know um that ourselves or one of our immediate family members um has some involvement with a a business or our employment involved we need to file a disclosure with the town clerk it is not with the the school is with the town clerk um and that basically you are not able to participate in that matter uh for which the conflict exists so you can recuse yourself until those deliberations are done if there’s more of an appearance of conflict so like the example you just gave related to a grandchild even though that doesn’t fall into immediate family member we still filed that disclosure

3:44:43 again file with the town clerk um and typically the town clerk would then give the go ahead to participate um you may run into a situation with um what we call the rule necessity which is when you want to deliberate and vote on a matter um but certain individuals are disqualified because of conflicts and it’s something you really need to to vote on the rule of necessity does permit participation by disqualified members um but this is a absolute Last Resort um we would say don’t do it unless you have advice of council or state ethics commission um calling either or both um it does not apply if somebody’s simply unavailable um just you know is not there to to vote and it

3:45:31 cannot be used to to break a tii vote so hopefully not a situation that um you know the committee ever has to be in but that is a mechanism if you’re truly need to vote on something time sensitive it can’t be Ted to another meeting uh that does exist but again we recommend Last Resort and don’t do it unless you’ve been advised to do it um as we’ talked about getting the guidance before going ahead and doing something State ethics commission they’re very responsive they always have an attorney of the day um so they have a staff attorney they’ll call you back if they’re not right there um they’re they’re fantastic they’re very responsive um so please reach out to them before going ahead with some type of action um and I won’t go through the exercises but just quickly to wrap up

3:46:16 best practices and Communications um Communications by the committee um outside of our meetings just remember that our position on things is determined by a vote at a properly posted meeting the spokesperson is going to communicate our official positions in line with committee District policies um and other school committee members should note that they are um not going to speak on behalf of the committee and should be referring requests so if you do get that message and I know that Alicia talked about it you can say not speaking on behalf of the committee U but the chair will will follow up with you on this matter um administrators making sure that we communicate policies directives if we’re changing a policy making sure that um our Central Administration is aware of

3:47:02 that um other sort of necessary directives to the superintendent and and business manager and we talked about getting those Communications from parents Guardians and students as well if it’s something that is at the the school administration level making sure that um that the superintendent in central office is aware of that because they may be better suited um to handle that that matter like if it’s a bullant complaint things of that nature there are mechanisms in place at the school and District level to promptly address that um superintendent can also give direction to business manager special education director and other administrators do take that direction from the superintendent um Communications with legal counsel um so follow our district committee policies procedures um I don’t know if you have

3:47:47 something in place at this time if everything goes through the chair Vice chair or um if anyone can reach out in any time it’s different in every Community um is there an understanding of what that looks like right now always generally gone okay in the like question don’t believe telephone

3:48:21 and some with the the person record of that time is who deals with as you guys know um who deals with the evidentiary information one thing the superintendent and business manager

3:48:55 are the school committee will do okay that go

3:49:46 right um so just a few more things to to wrap up just remember that legal council represents the the committee as a a whole um so not able to offer sort of individual unrelated advice type of thing and it sounds like you have a policy in place to do things through the chair whoever is of record same thing with community members again following our district policies and procedures um if we’re speaking on behalf of the committee it can only be sharing something out that basically is only action we took it a properly hosted meeting and voted on um if it’s something that really needs to be referred to the school level Administration we’re going to send it back to or send it to the superintendent um again you know things that are School related matters um you know allegations

3:50:32 of bullying grades issues of that so we want to make sure that that went up the proper chain at the school and District level before we address that matter uh and then basically just inform those individuals that um we have that sort of for lack of a better term but like chain of command that you know we start at the building level and then we work our way up and eventually it can can come to us um and again just the reminder about that uh confidential information District employees really important um make sure not to negotiate directly with any individuals represented by a union they are uh their employment is through the terms and conditions of their collective bargaining agreement direct dealing is a violation of state law so we cannot be speaking with or offering them anything directly about their

3:51:18 particular employment we also want to be really careful not to take any actions or engage in any speech that is going to chill an employee in a bargaining unit or make them feel chilled or retaliated against um again another violation of of state law um and then just making sure you know if we do get a communication from a district employee does it appear that that sort of chain of communication has been followed is this something where we need to go back to building level superintendent things of that nature uh and that’s it so I apologize I think we’re about 10 minutes over um but well done thank you very much thank you for understanding the shifting

3:52:06 problem Jen can you hear yep y yeah yep is it okay I didn’t have it up um I know we were so this is where where I’m going to probably show ignorance um we were supposed to do subcommittee and liaison assignments I can’t stay for really much longer so I don’t know that we can do that today um I know that we need to do it I know that it’s important um I’m not sure what everybody else’s ability to stay is if I’m well I think the only one that can’t that’s fine so let me just make a quick comment I think I I got a ton information today oh I’m sorry I thought it was yes Jen

3:52:51 sorry so I got a lot of information to think about today one of which is the idea of having maybe a superintendent goal or goal subcommittee so it probably is um a topic for a bit of a longer conversation um so maybe we could we don’t have to do this now I I can do this over an email um do we want to try to maybe put one another meeting together um in the next week or two um and we can cover um the school committee calendar for the year which is also on this agenda we can um do the subcommittee and liaison assignments and also talk about some planning for if we want to do a a self- evaluation um of the school committee have M Alicia and masc help us with that um and I think

3:53:36 that’s what I think the flag policy Maybe Will We Will table Yeah separate for when school starts so maybe it makes sense to think about ending now and that we try to put this on for something in the next week or two that you can with on the um bargaining subcommittee just because as we continue to go through that I I think it’s important that I’m not anticipating it’s been the recommendation a strong recommendation of council that there not be a switch Midstream and bargaining but I think if we can just reaffirm that one and move on thank you well I Sarah I mean I think we that ought to be part of the overall because I think it fits in into the whole thing and I agree that you know the council is not recommending a change but you know we’re going forward we have a

3:54:23 number of um probably bargaining sessions coming up so I’m not sure that can’t get tabled to the next week or two okay uh Jen just quickly back to the positions you know you mentioned the superintendent goals perhaps being an another subcommittee um were we going to give consideration maybe to just maybe having a communication subcommittee or or that being continued would that be part of it because I know that’s not officially listed at one of our subcommittees okay I think so yeah I think all of that’s up up you know up for discussion on it was off it was on I don’t actually know where we ended on that but that was one I think this would all be part of our discussion yeah I just mention so that’s as Jen as you’re kind of thinking about it and maybe sending something out that could be part of it I think the

3:55:09 superintendent subcommittee should also include the evaluation process in the superintendent right I I yeah I would yeah it’s just not as cold as the whole thing I agree that we should postpone all of these discussions if we can get a another meeting in the next week or two Jen Jen can you hear me yes I can just put in the back of mind I’ll try to remember to shoot you an email too we have to um I tentatively hired a nurse we need to put that if we’re going to have that meeting agenda like put her on there and then um there’s two donations that we received I want to make sure that we accept those donations um so we can just put it in the back of your head too is the nurse

3:55:55 um do she do you need to get that is that sort of immediate Is she starting soon or I told her we would schedule a meeting um you know when we could um you know another week’s not I don’t think it’s going to be okay break or anything she she’s she’s agreed to come on board I did tell her she had to go before the chch committee whether it’s by a Zoomer in person just to get your blessings so okay do

3:56:24 that should uh should I make a motion to postpone those two agenda items is that I don’t okay just um all right I just didn’t want to do it yeah I don’t think we yeah I’m not sure we NE we’re all in agreement I don’t think we NE need to vote listen I told you to give me some Grace no no problem you doing an amazing job awesome job this is a big meaning for the first I know great you’re rocking it to address these items when do we go back to the regularly scheduled two Thursday meetings so that that was yeah that was going to be one of our agenda items today is going over that calendar right um and so we we’d want to have that next meeting before that so it would be the 5th of September would be because it’s the 1 and the thir Thursdays start

3:57:10 September the 5th starts the tentative next Cal I only I need to schedule my ad the meetings just predicated on when you guys doing I know we said t the first the third so I’ll go that and if you change anything I’ll yeah you have a policy that it’s the first and the third unless vacation weeks you know and that’s kind of or holidays um Russia Shana I believe falls on the first Thursday I have I don’t think I got this in the drop box so I was going to share my screen but um we had a couple of couple of um issues February vacation would normally Falls on when our meeting would be juneth falls on when our meeting would be and I think it is no the Russia sh does not there’s not an issue there um so we’re just going to need that’s why

3:57:57 we need to dis discuss our meeting dates as a October 3rd is Russia Shana that’s the first Thursday in October oh I’m sorry oh I missed how did I miss that no Russia I’m showing starts oh you’re right yeah you’re right it is I starts the second so that’s why I missed it on third all right so October 3D is also going to be a discrepancy so we need to yeah we need to have to I just I just have a work meeting I’m not trying to be a jerk I’m sorry um so we need to have another meeting for the calendar for liais on subcommittee uh we want to have a separate I think we want to maybe potentially discuss having a hearing for the draft policy so it can be more of a conversation um to ensure the community feels heard and I appreciate everybody’s

3:58:44 time folks that stuck with us through through the 4 hours online you are rock stars also I think there are a few of you there still um will thank you for sticking it out and thank you to our two presenters yes Alicia and Jen who just were very worked with us from a timing perspective and very patient um and and agile in the process and we appreciate that as well um we do have new business does anybody have new business I think or it’s not supposed tox thing but we can do that next week it’s not supposed to that okay I heard you say that earlier um if if there’s nothing else I will the dropox the Dropbox yeah we can I think the um the the Dropbox concern because I do

3:59:29 have it’s not a Dropbox it’s Google Drive that we use it is um and the concern is we need to just have the links sent out each time and I think Lisa’s been really great um about sending out those links Google Drive can be we use that in my my work life as well and Google Drive can be very finicky if you are trying to search for something yep um and so we can’t we can’t fix that that’s a Google Drive thing um but having Lisa send the links directly to everything into each folder each time she sends us out and um for those online that don’t know Lisa uh sends out our packet with what’s information is going to be discussed in the agenda and all of the attached materials Etc to us and when she sends out those links like you exactly what

4:00:15 you requested yeah I mean it’s got all the stuff in it you can’t find anything easily it’s got to be we know the school committee meetings are going to be every first and third Thursday those get put in chronological order special meetings get put off to the side they are in chronological on my screen so you might want to sit down with with Lisa you just might have a different order I know i’ I’ve talked to Tech they can’t figure out what this yeah because mine do come up mine does not I always have to just go back to previous emails and the link to be honest it’s hard for me to search and find a lot of that is just predicated on Google unfortunately but um okay so thank you again everyone first successful Retreat for this committee and I will adjourn us at 117