[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: The meeting of the Medford School Committee will come to order. The secretary will call the roll. Sorry. Yes.
[Unidentified]: Member Kreatz. Present. Member Mustone here. Member Gero. Here. Member O'Stone. Here. Member Van der Kloot. Present.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: present, six present, one absent, all please rise and salute our flag. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Approval of the minutes of February 12, 2018. There's a motion on the floor to approve the minutes. Is there a second? Seconded by Ms. Van der Kloot. All those in favor? Aye. All those opposed? Motion passes. Approval of bills. Transfer of funds. Motion to approve. Motion to approve by Mr. Benedetto. Is there a second? By Mr. Ruggiero. Roll call vote, please.
[SPEAKER_08]: Member Di Benedetto. Yes. Member Prince.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Yes. Six in the affirmative, one absent. Motion passes. Please mark Ms. Kreatz in attendance. Approval of payrolls. Mr. Benedetto.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: Just for knowledge and clarification and backup, I am going to request I'm actually making a motion to receive an Excel spreadsheet with backup info and totals for each weekly and biweekly employee with their salaries. I would like it on an Excel spreadsheet in alphabetical order.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: So you'd like it emailed to me?
[Erin DiBenedetto]: I would like it emailed to me within two days. And I would also like to add that I would like it presented at every meeting that payrolls are asked to be approved. moving forward.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: The next payrolls that are prepared would be Wednesday, Thursday, Christine, when do you hit the send button? Wednesday or? Okay. So it could be available for probably by Friday.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: Oh, they could send me last week's and then send next week's Friday. So I'm requesting that for tomorrow, an Excel spreadsheet with them listed alphabetically for the current school budget for the second half of the year and for it to be moved on to come with backup instead of just approving payrolls like we do, having them back up like we do with the bills. I'd like that as well on whenever we meet. So I need one of my members to second that.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: So it would be for the prior weeks? What are you looking for? Yes. Approved payroll that's been submitted.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: Right. Ms.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Van der Kloot.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: Before we rush to approve that, I just, I have some questions for my colleague. Um, first of all, and I, uh, Christine, um, I'm not.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Ms. Patterson, could you please step forward? Thank you.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: Is that something you can easily get to us, or is this going to cause a great deal more work?
[Kirsteen Patterson]: Well, this is going to be very cumbersome. The biweekly payroll is approximately a phone book worth of backup material. So this will take a lot more time to prepare and have available, as there is a lot of detail that goes into a payroll processing.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: So I'll amend my motion to have the electronic version for now in an Excel file. And then you can present the backup at the next meeting. So that gives you plenty of time. So as of tomorrow, you can just send me the Excel spreadsheet with the names alphabetically with the current payroll. who's, what their salary is, all of that. So I have the backup because I'm approving stuff every week within not one of us sees it just like with the bills. Kathy goes and miss secretary.
[Kathy Kreatz]: Oh, miss Kreatz. I'm confused because I signed the bills every week and I see every single invoice and I not pay payroll.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: I'm asking for payroll months, people's payroll. I want to see that not bills.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: Mayor Burke. But we know what we have a yearly budget. And in that yearly budget, we're given the yearly pay rate. I mean, it sounds as if my colleague is looking for something specific. And if she's looking for something specific, then perhaps it would be wiser to zone down into it too.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: There's a motion on the floor. I need one of my members to second the motion. And I request a roll call vote at this point.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Is there a second on the floor to request, in Excel fashion, the payroll after it is submitted, so be emailed, correct?
[Erin DiBenedetto]: Great. And to be presented at meetings.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: It could be voluminous. And that's really an administrative task, not a school committee task. There's a second on the floor. Mr. Russo.
[Paul Ruseau]: So is this a, are we required to provide this in a format on the on the website.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Not right now.
[Paul Ruseau]: But if it's approved, we would have to make this public. And am I correct that printed this is, in fact, going to be another REMA paper per person per meeting?
[Kirsteen Patterson]: At the very least.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: That's why I'm just asking for the Excel spreadsheet to be sent to us of employees' payroll, not asking for paper copies, for the current budget, And I would like it in alphabetical form. It's one spreadsheet. Any payroll department should be able to present it. Payroll information is public information. I just want to have the data before we vote on it every week. And I want to be transparent throughout the community as well. I think it's important for us to have the data because we just vote on it and we don't ever check it. And I think it needs to be looked at. So that's why I'm requesting I just have a question.
[Kathy Kreatz]: Correct. So, I wanted to ask Christine a question. So, Christine, I work at the Massachusetts Retirement System, and I know that the deduction reports get transmitted monthly. Correct. So, what happens is, each month, and I don't work on every public school, by the way, because it would be a conflict, but I know I work with other districts, and they report to us monthly. So, for example, February is due in on March 10th. Okay, so what happens is the district has until March 10th to give us their electronic file. And when they import that file, the file can be exported to Excel and sorted alphabetically. But that's the month after the payroll's due. And that would be like the soonest, and that would be the most, the easiest way to do it because in myTRS you can generate that report really quickly and just cut out the social security numbers and that could be emailed to somebody, which wouldn't take time. It's already built into the payroll software from ITRS, the reporting software, but it wouldn't be something that could be done biweekly. I know what's involved because I work with multiple school districts. That's what I do all day. Mr. Ruggiero?
[Michael Ruggiero]: Yeah, I just have a couple questions. So first, I'd like to offer a friendly amendment. Do we need to have this information presented physically? Is it OK that we just have this information presented as an Excel file or comma delineated database? Is that OK? Because that's a lot of paper. Yeah. So you want the physical? I want it in an Excel spreadsheet every time people want anything at all to be sensualized. Yeah, yeah, but I mean, I'm just a friendly man. I think that the paper version just that's a lot of I mean you're looking at A lot of entries.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Mr. Giroux has the floor right now.
[Michael Ruggiero]: So I would like to offer a friendly amendment if it's accepted that we have this information presented physically and if one of the members needs it to be printed out, then they can request it. But for me, I would prefer to have this digitally. If I'm going to search it or scan it, I would need it digitally anyway.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: Ms. Vanden Heuvel. I guess I have a concern because I haven't seen this. And I don't feel like there's, we've been doing it this way for many, many, many, many years. Perhaps it's a good thing. But I believe that I want to understand what exactly we would see. I wouldn't want anybody's confidential information now coming to us. So I'm very concerned. So I'm going to table this until our next school committee meeting.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: There's a motion on the floor to table, which takes priority. Is there a second on the motion?
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: Second.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: All those in favor of tabling the paper? Aye. All those in favor? Aye. All those opposed? Roll call. The chair is in doubt. Roll call vote on tabling the paper. OK. Mrs. DiBenedetto.
[kF4MfjuZkZ8_SPEAKER_04]: No. Mrs. Fenton. Yes. Mrs. Stone. No. Mr. Durden. No. Mr. Russo. Yes. Mrs. Kennedy. Yes. Mr. Bamford.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Yes. In a vote of three in the affirmative, four in the negative, I'm sorry, four in the affirmative, three in the negative, the motion is tabled. Report of secretary.
[Kathy Kreatz]: Oh, yes, I have. with the committee regarding the expenditure report. When you see the vendor name, WB Mason, the line item description only references telephones. However, the function code represents other expense. A review of all account structures and descriptors will take place over the summer with the finance director and city auditor to update as needed. Going forward, this won't be an issue for WB Mason when you see telephones, which you might see it Right now on the report on page five of nine, you'll see telephones going forward. It will show up as telephone other expenditures, but this is just one of the items that is, you know, um, one of the fixes that they're going to be doing with the descriptor updates over the summer. Um, and currently the auditor and the finance director actually corrected that one. Um, so I just wanted to point that out. And, um, during the month of February I signed batches for invoices related to heating, electricity, pupil transportation, educational supplies, piano tuning and repairs. That was something that caught my eye, Paulette and Paul, because we were at the concert and we kind of heard that the tune, the piano needed a tune up, so I wanted to mention that. I saw the invoice and I signed it. So, yep, and many more, many, many more, so just wanted to share that. Okay, thank you.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Is there a motion on the floor to accept the report and place it on file? So moved by Ms. Van der Kloot. Is there a second? Second. By Ms. Mustone. All those in favor? Aye. All those opposed? Motion passes. Community participation. Ms. Melanie McLaughlin, CPAC presentation.
[Melanie McLaughlin]: Hello, thank you, Melanie McLaughlin, Austin Street in Medford, and co-chair Tanya Sullivan for Medford CPAC. Thanks for hearing us out tonight. First, we wanted to just sort of share what the Medford CPAC directive is, so folks who are watching tonight know. The CPAC's purpose is to fill the directive stated in Chapter 71B. of the Massachusetts General Laws, which requires school districts to establish a Parent Advisory Council and assign both an advisory and participatory function to the PAC. In meeting this requirement, the mission of the Medford Special Education Parent Advisory Council is to advise the district on matters that pertain to the education and safety of students with disabilities by seeking input from the special education parent members, meet regularly with school officials, participate in the planning, development, and evaluation of the school district's special education programs, participate in planning workshops and activities as prioritized by the CPAC board. So that's our directive. We want to first start tonight with saying thank you for all of the responses from committee members this past week. who emailed us or called us, and any responses to questions that we had. We also noticed that you're honoring or thanking Mr. Petrales tonight for the camp. And personally, my daughter attended the camp last week, and it was really great. He did a great job, so we're happy. To see that that's happening and that it's inclusive as well We met with the Disability Council this week as well to discuss some concerns and also The Recreation Department representative was there and he talked quite a bit about inclusivity in the Recreation Department as well So we're very happy about that want to say thank you about that too. We wanted to share that last week that Tanya and I worked on an advisory report and PowerPoint available on our Facebook page and also shared with the school committee members and the mayor having to do with safety protocols in schools, CPAC advisory and CPAC PowerPoint. We also shared that with the Department of Education, elementary and secondary education, our Joint Committee on Education at the state level and our representatives and senators. And we spoke with DESE last week. We're happy to report that next week during the Special Education Advisory Council to the commissioner. We will be working on drafting a letter for recommendations for all schools on safety protocols in our schools, particularly to our population. which we're very pleased with. And we also met with our representative this week and are going to be exploring additional issues around that. So we wanted folks to know. We have an upcoming meeting a week from this Wednesday, so March 14th, 7 and 9 p.m. on emergency preparedness in schools. And we want to make sure that folks know that this is for everyone in the district. It's an inclusive event. It is not specific to any incident. It is instead about emergency preparedness in our schools. We were able to secure so far a DESI emergency preparedness expert, Ann Gilligan, who's going to come and speak with us as part of a panel, the Medford Police Department, Medford Fire Department, and a first responder who deals specifically with ALEC training, which is regarding autism and law enforcement training. And that first responder has also been doing trainings for mental health and first aid. So for folks who have mental health needs and first aid concerns, so they'll be a part of the panel. We're respectfully requesting that the school has someone on the panel as well, and hopefully maybe someone from the Disability Council or someone from the city on the panel as well, just to create a positive conversation around some of these needs in our district and across the state. Also wanted to let folks know that we have elections coming up in May, and in June we typically do our end of the year PowerPoint presentation, where we present to the school committee. And also, we give out awards for folks in the community who have demonstrated inclusivity and equity. So we're looking forward to that. We have two concerns that we wanted to represent to the school committee. One is that we requested a subcommittee last year as part of our presentation, our end of year PowerPoint presentation. And it was advised that we join a subcommittee that already existed, a curriculum subcommittee. Unfortunately, that subcommittee, as far as we know, did not meet, or at least we weren't invited to part of a meeting for a subcommittee. We respectfully request, once again, that we have a subcommittee regarding special education and high-need students. So our high-need students population, for those who are unsure, are students who are receiving special education supports and services, students who are economically disadvantaged, and our English learner students. And as you can imagine, there's intersectionality with all of those. We'd love a subcommittee regarding that. And then it has been brought to our attention over the past, I don't know, probably a year or more, that there's been some concerns of disciplinary action at the McGlynn Preschool level in terms of inclusivity and activity at the McGlynn Preschool. We want to ensure that the McGlynn Preschool staff has the appropriate supports in place to be able to attend to students of all needs. They receive an inclusive preschool learning environment grant. which requires a minimum of three and not more than five students with disabilities in the classroom. And some students, we're getting reports of some students spending an extensive amount of time at the principal's office in terms of behavior and discipline. And we wanted to bring that to folks' attention, because that's a concern. We want to make sure that the McGlynn Preschool has what they need to be inclusive, especially in light of the fact that they're receiving a state grant for inclusivity. And that's it. Thank you.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: All righty. Thank you very much, Ms. McLaughlin. She has requested that a paper be sent to the Curriculum Subcommittee, which Ms. DiBenedetto is chairing this year. Yes.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: Ms. Vanderkle. So first, I know that you guys did a lot of work over the past weekends, and I appreciate that. I am a little concerned, whatever, school committee last week also voted that we wanted to set up a parent advisory committee on security. So I want to make sure that we're working, that your group is working in tandem with that. I don't think we've yet appointed anybody, but I just want to make sure. I mean, if We did have any idea who was going to be on that. It would sure make sense for them to attend next Wednesday. Melanie, I do need, as the former curriculum, I do want to point out that you and I had talked many times. And it was really tough to schedule a meeting. And we have emails where back and forth. So I think that we should go ahead now and send it to the curriculum committee again, which now Erin is the head of it. And maybe we'll have better luck this year. But I just need to say in You and I talked many times, and I could show you those e-mails, too. Okay?
[Melanie McLaughlin]: Thank you. I don't think we need to see the e-mails, but I do appreciate your response, and it's just that it's been almost a year, so we're very concerned. We requested it last January.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Thank you very much. On the motion that this paper be sent to subcommittee, I'll... Mr. Benedetto.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: Thank you. First of all, I don't think that this should be joined to another committee. I'm happy to work on this, but I think that this issue, and I'm not sure we could have already voted on that, and I'm not remembering at this moment.
[Melanie McLaughlin]: Well, we had respectfully requested that it be a separate committee, but we were told that there was so many committees that we had to go under another committee, and that was part of our concern is that we actually do feel that it should be a distinct committee.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: So I'd like to make a motion for this to be a separate committee because curriculum is already a big K through 12 curriculum is a very vast subject area and so is this. And I don't want either to get overwhelmed by the other or maybe that's not correct word, but you know, it's been a long week. Um, so I just want to make sure both areas get the attention that they deserve. And, um, Parts of what you're asking for does relate to curriculum, but not all of it.
[Melanie McLaughlin]: Correct.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: So I'm not sure that that's appropriate. So I'd like to make a motion at this point to add a special committee for this. And we have a new committee, a new school committee, since January. So I think these members have a right to weigh in on what their opinion is on this. I'll second it.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: Any other questions? I actually concur because I saw the difficulty in trying to do it as a curriculum. The reason why we didn't just remind people was because there's six of us and we each have one subcommittee and then I think in the past it was, well, everybody wanted to be on that subcommittee. We've now already had differentiated with a subcommittee for selection committee, so I actually think that doing a separate committee makes a lot of sense.
[Michael Ruggiero]: I just wanted to present that motion before. Mary member.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Are there any members that would like to serve on this? Mr. Russo. Oh, goodness. Okay. That's the problem. Now let's pull out the people that are on the search committee. Okay.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: That takes care of you too.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: One, two, three. Okay. Aaron. No.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: Oh yeah. I'm sorry.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: All right, we will pick three and let you know.
[Melanie McLaughlin]: Thank you very much.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Thank you very much. On the motion this be sent to the subcommittee on special education. All those in favor? Aye. All those opposed? Motion passes. Miss Kreatz, would you like to make a motion to suspend the rules so that we could have an individual come forward that you recommended for? Yes. Yes.
[Kathy Kreatz]: I'd like to suspend the rules to have Anthony get the first paper on the new business.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Yes. Oh, OK. Sure. There's a motion on the floor for suspension of the rules. Is there a second? Second. Motion to include. All those in favor? Aye. All those opposed? Suspension is granted. New business, be it resolved that the Medford School Committee express its sincere gratitude to elementary teacher Anthony Petrellis on his handling of the children at the February vacation camp last week. Mr. Petralos, could you come forward, please? Ms. Kreatz, would you like to speak on his behalf? Yes.
[SPEAKER_08]: Welcome. Thank you.
[Kathy Kreatz]: Hello, Anthony. Hi. Thank you for coming this evening. I sent a special message to Mayor Park because I received a message from a parent who was very gracious for everything that you did last week. And I'll just read the email that I got. Good evening, Mrs. Kreatz. I wanted to send you something positive from all this mess that's since been unfolding. As you know, the high school was the home of February Camp and also was swept yesterday as it was filled with the campers. I would really like to give a huge shout out to Anthony Petrellis. My son is working as a Councilor this week with Anthony. He's a 10th grader at the high school. Anthony was informed shortly before the sweep was happening and he quickly got a plan together and met with Councilors to have a game plan. They kept these kids extra busy and occupied them in multiple activities during the process. Her son, not going to mention names, said most of the kids had no idea what was going on because of the plan Anthony came up with. He said the few that did know were minimally scared or nervous. Just wanted Anthony to get some credit for what could have been a huge disaster. I feel because explaining to younger children what the difference between precautions is and when they see dogs and multiple cops, in cop cars, well, you get what I'm saying. So Anthony, I just want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for doing such a great job at the camp with all the kids and keeping everything under control. And I know my son has worked with you over the summer. And you're just an incredible Councilor. And the way that you handle kids is incredible. And it's a very difficult job. And you do it extremely well. And I want to thank you very, very much.
[ACxsV5H4ehA_SPEAKER_12]: Thank you I'd you know, it wasn't just me too. I mean it it goes back to you know, my boss Bobby and Rachel Lee, you know athletic directors this athletic director of all of us kind of coming together and you know I just want to recognize to my counsels and Pat Hurley Hannah O'Brien Nick Carlino Bobby Norton Adriana Boboza Mariah Munez and Delaney Tivenin They all were awesome. You know, I We came up with a plan, but they're the one who really kind of executed it. So I want to give them most of the credit there. It's all of us. So thank you. I appreciate that very much. And yeah, I'm glad that everyone was safe and everything was OK. So thank you.
[Kathy Kreatz]: And thank you, everybody else who helped out. We really appreciate it. Thank you very much.
[ACxsV5H4ehA_SPEAKER_12]: Thank you so much.
[Kathy Kreatz]: Thank you.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: On the motion that this item be received and placed on file.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: Mr. Benedetto. I'm sorry. Thank you. Um, I just wanted to say thank you to Anthony and all, all the people in the schools recently keeping our children safe and moving forward. Um, I also would like to know like more about the camp. So that way other people in the community know about it, how many kids attended, how's it advertised, what the cost is. I'd like to see the breakdown of the financials of these camps, so that way maybe we could offer more. So I'm going to ask for a motion to see the financials on these extracurricular programs that we run, so that way we can look at our budget and make more opportunities. So there's a motion on the floor as well.
[ACxsV5H4ehA_SPEAKER_12]: OK. Um, yeah, sure. We can get a copy of that. I'm not really the person in charge of that.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: No, that wouldn't be.
[ACxsV5H4ehA_SPEAKER_12]: Um, but you know, it's advertised through the schools. So basically, you know, a flyer will go out. I think we put it out right after the new year to all the schools and every class and every kid receives them. So I'm able to get somebody from every school to kind of hand them out, put them in the teacher's mailboxes. And most of their registration forms are handed in prior to camp. Anybody who comes the day of the sign-up, we basically take the information down, put it on a spreadsheet so we have contact information, name, address, and so on. And usually, Monday is kind of the beginning of it. You never know what you're going to get or how many walk-ins come in. But we always put a few extra bodies on to kind of anticipate that.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: How many students did you have participate?
[ACxsV5H4ehA_SPEAKER_12]: So we had 55 who preregistered, I believe. And I want to say we probably had about another 10 or 15. I could be wrong. I mean, it's somewhere around there. But I know we were close to 70, about 70, somewhere around there, yeah.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: That's great. Is this your first February?
[ACxsV5H4ehA_SPEAKER_12]: No, we've been doing this for about 10 years, I would say. Yeah, I mean, when it first started off, we were maybe lucky to crack double digits. So it's kind of grown a lot over the years. I think the summer camp has a lot to play with that as well.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: I also think that parents working, it's a great thing that we can offer, and that's why I wanted the financers to make sure that we're giving it to as many students as we can, especially if they feel like they can't afford it. But if we know what the financials of the program are, we can do some. help, financial help to families that we might think would benefit from coming. Do you know what the cost is for the camp?
[ACxsV5H4ehA_SPEAKER_12]: So for vacation camps, there are typically $125 for the week. That's amazing. That includes breakfast. During the summer, it's a little bit more. It's $145 a week, but that includes breakfast every day and also includes pizza on Fridays. And it includes, you know, some sort of indoor, something that comes to us on site during the week as well, usually like a Wednesday or a Thursday.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: Mayor Burke, if I could continue. Thank you. I think the programs are so beneficial to our families and our community, and I appreciate you running these year after year. Do parents sign up through community schools, or is it handled differently? And that might be not a question for you. It might be a question to either deputy superintendent or for Kirsten, our financial person, of how we handle this. Because I want to make sure we give this opportunity to as many students in the community or families in the community that we can, even if we have to subsidize in some way.
[ACxsV5H4ehA_SPEAKER_12]: Yeah, usually it's, I know it's ran through community schools and it's posted on the Medford website. So it's usually one of the links, one of the first links on there when we put it out. And as I said, for the same for vacation and summer, when we get the information together, we send it out to all the schools immediately. You know, and usually the beginning of the summer, it's a little bit slower. I think, you know, families kind of go away. And then after that 4th of July is typically when it really starts to pick up.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: So to you Mayor Burke, would this be moving under the recreation person or would it stay under community schools? Yeah, I'm just curious as to how these things are going to work.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: We'll work collaboratively over programming because we don't want to take away from Anthony and the community schools program. We're trying to augment programming, so certainly this will stay intact.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: So I'd like to make a motion to review these programs and see how, you know, make sure they're in the black and if they are, how we can help benefit families. This program, as well as any like programs similar to this, I don't know exactly the whole list of them, but I want to make sure we open up opportunities to more families. So there's a motion on the floor to have all of these, maybe the whole account for community schools. I know that's coming before us at the end of the month, But if they could break down these type of things within it, so we can really give like, you know, a school social worker in adjustment Councilors might know families that could benefit from this. And if we know we have the staff already in place. that we can work with them and get them in there if we're already paying staff.
[ACxsV5H4ehA_SPEAKER_12]: We do try to assist different schools. We do get in touch with the principals and see if there's families that are in need and what we can do to try to help out and so on. So yeah, there's definitely a process as far as that goes.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: Yeah, I mean anything to help anybody else is obviously beneficial to so I'm asking for the the review of the I think it's 362 account the community schools account to be presented to the school committee so we could see these types of Programming that we're offering Mr.. Russo Thank you.
[Paul Ruseau]: Is there any capacity issues, or I? Mean you you don't turning any you know turning anybody away.
[ACxsV5H4ehA_SPEAKER_12]: No. I mean, we used to be at the Columbus School, and I think our program got so big that we had to move to a bigger site. So I mean, that's the positive behind that. But as far as capacity, no, we've never shut it off to any person saying, oh, we're at capacity, or we're at limit for anything. We just try to hire more people if that was the case, to kind of have a better student, person, and teacher ratio, Councilor ratio. Thank you. Yeah.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: Ms. Vandekloot. Anthony, thanks for your good work last week. We really appreciate it. We didn't expect anything less from you, though. Thank you. Thank you so much. In terms of the vacation week camps, are we doing another one in April?
[ACxsV5H4ehA_SPEAKER_12]: I'm not too sure. I do like to take a week off because I do work the entire summer, too. So I'm not too sure to answer that question right now. I'll know shortly whether I'll do it or not. Last year was the first April vacation I didn't do in 10 years, just because I wanted to enjoy my time off a little bit.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: I certainly understand that, but it may be that we should look at to see if there's someone else who could do it, since it does fulfill a need in our community at this point. And I was curious, during the winter February vacation, did the students use the pool?
[ACxsV5H4ehA_SPEAKER_12]: No, typically during the vacation camps we don't use the pool. We never really have. During the summer we use it full time, but some it's so cold outside sometimes. I mean we were lucky this February break we had a couple 60 degree days, but typically we're out in the snow sledding down the hills in February, so it was a little different this February with warm weather.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: Okay, thanks very much. Yeah, of course.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Thank you. There's a motion on the floor to request the finances for the summer February camp program. There's a motion. Is there a second? Mr. Russo, question.
[Paul Ruseau]: These are finances that are just part of the school system, right?
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Yes.
[Paul Ruseau]: Anthony's not going to be- It's a program. Okay, thank you.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Christine can whip it out pretty quickly.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: It actually goes through community schools. If it could be presented with the community schools budget that's coming before us, I think by the end of this month, is what my team are asking. I'd be happy with that in a breakdown of the different programs in that fashion.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: On the motion as seconded by Mr. Russo. All those in favor? Aye. All those opposed? Motion passes. Thank you, Anthony. Is there a motion to revert to the regular order of business by Ms. Kreatz, seconded by Mr. Ruggiero? Report on elementary response to intervention. Good evening.
[Beverly Nelson]: Burke, members of the school committee. Diane Caldwell, our assistant superintendent, has prepared a report to update the committee on the implementation of RTI. This is a very important initiative. A lot of progress has been done. A lot of work has been done by Diane and the teachers. And again, Diane, if you want to share the progress to date and plans moving forward.
[Diane Caldwell]: Ms.
[Beverly Nelson]: Caldwell. Thank you.
[Diane Caldwell]: Good evening, everyone. So as you know, we've been working hard implementing RTI in grade one. We have different scenarios for response to intervention at the various schools. Some schools are doing it full force, all in, everyone in grade one is doing it, and some title one teachers are doing it, and in other buildings, it's just the literacy teachers as well as the grade one teachers. We actually are piloting an assessment tool called Renaissance Star Literacy, but our teachers are also using the DRA, Fountas-Pinell, Words Their Way, and of course, teacher recommendation to see what students might need some extra help. We have provided professional development in Renaissance. We did that in October with our grade one teachers and literacy specialists at the high school. We met for about three to five hours. because we want to take a look closely at this to see if this meets our needs. In addition, we have provided professional development in response to intervention through Teachers 21. That was done in November. We had hoped to do some more professional development in March, but as you know, we had to change our March Professional Development Day. One of the wonderful things that we did was had our principals go to Burlington Public Schools, and they met with Susan Stone in Burlington, who is the RTI coordinator. And she walked our principals and assistant principals through what RTI really looks like in their buildings. So they've been doing this for about 10 years, and it takes a lot of time to really become knowledgeable about the best way to implement it in your district. Our Title I and literacy staff have been assisting our first grade teachers in RTI. I have shown you and given to you a clear vision, identified a screening tool, and it was STAR Literacy to get started. We are progress monitoring our students, so every six to eight weeks we're looking at our children to see what progress is being made. And we are providing intensive tiers or change in different strategies with our kids. However, we're only in the beginning stages, so we're still continuing to look at this. Last week, Dr. Chiesa, myself, the principals, and our grade one staff met to discuss how things are going after a month or so in their rooms. They're finding Renaissance a difficult tool to utilize, so we have to look more closely at that. There's a recommendation, perhaps, to use assessment tools that they're familiar with, such as DRA or Fountas-Pinell, in addition to Words Stay Away for next year. We have to look closely at scheduling because that is an issue, especially if we want to have sustainability with RTI. If you have specialists push in with each grade level, it may not be sustainable to go one, two, three, four, and five. We're also looking at specific models. So we'll take a look at what the Brooks and the Columbus are doing and how it differentiates from what the McGlynn and the Roberts are doing. We're going to look at specific topics. So for instance, if we're continuing with literacy, which is our plan, do we focus on subjects like phonemic awareness and fluency and comprehension, as opposed to opening up to a variety of different literacy components? And we're also looking at what grade levels we may be able to move forward with for next year. Currently, we're just, you know, with grade one. I'd like to move it into grade two and see how that works, and maybe do full force with grades one and two. Dr. Nicole Chiesa, principals, grade one staff, and I did meet to debrief about RTI working. We have another meeting planned in April, and hopefully we'll get more information and update you as we move along. I'd love to answer any questions if you have some.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: Mr. Benedetto. Thank you. So Diane, when I read your report, a few things stood out to me. The first one is that because the professional development day has been changed, is there another plan to help these teachers make sure they have the training that they need?
[Diane Caldwell]: So I have reached out to Teachers 21. I've spoken to Maureen Huddleston. We are looking into it. Time is really short for us, and we can provide after school, but I don't have any specific mandated time to do this for this year. But I have reached out to Teachers 21, yes.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: And hopefully they can have a PowerPoint or something that teachers will want to look at, so that way they can implement some of that.
[Diane Caldwell]: They could, or we could work an afternoon. So if teachers want to stay maybe a couple of afternoons from like 3 to 5, we could see if we could work that out with them.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: OK. I just would hate for this not because you've worked very hard on it, and they have too. The teachers have done a great job. Right. The next thing that really stood out to me out of your report was Burlington is fortunate enough to be able to hire several RTI tutors for each building. Having those tutors assures fidelity to interventions, providing more intensive support and core instruction in E-Line and PD around intervention training. That's true. I think that's key. I don't know if you feel like a curriculum meeting towards budget time, we might sit down and talk about this situation. Or you can just make recommendations.
[Diane Caldwell]: If we want it to work and we want it to be sustainable, we may have to entertain the idea of having additional tutors. Now in Burlington, they're very lucky to get retired people to come back. So that saves their district money. So we could look into maybe bringing back some retired people. to work as tutors. But, yeah, the more you can push in and take small groups of children and work with them, the better we would be.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: All right. So I just want to make sure we're ready for budget time and that, you know, your recommendations. I know that this was the year that you were going to see how it was working and make recommendations because I know some of us were pushing for our TI teachers for this year, and we said we were piloting this and see how the data brought us. Do you have an idea of which way you're going to be heading? Because budgets are starting to be presented tonight. I just want to make sure that we have a clear vision for next year. And I'm going to look at you as the expert, seeing what's happened so far.
[Diane Caldwell]: Well, I'm going to ask for the moon and then see what I get from that. I think that we owe it to our teachers and staff to give them the additional support that they need. So if I could ask for some additional RTI help in the schools. I would do that, yes.
[Unidentified]: Okay.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: Thank you. It's just good to know so that way we're all thinking and preparing for that. Sure. Coming forward. Thank you for your report. Thank you.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Mr. Russo, you're all set. Mr. Ruggiero.
[Michael Ruggiero]: Yeah, a couple of questions. So when you say several RTI tutors, how many are we talking about per building? Like three or two?
[Diane Caldwell]: Well, so if we just start with grades one and two for next year, if we had one full-time tutor that we might be able to split between the two grade levels for each building, that would be helpful. Okay.
[Michael Ruggiero]: And, um, so I have a, this is on page two of the report and you say Renaissance is a difficult tool to utilize. Do you have sense of what the participation rate is among teachers? Are teachers using part of it now because it's too difficult? They're having trouble using it all? I'm just, what do you mean when you say Renaissance is a difficult tool to use?
[Diane Caldwell]: It's difficult for the teachers to navigate through Renaissance when they go online. The children have headphones on as they listen and they do the assessments. We can't hear what's going on. So if something's not working in the headphones, we don't even know that.
[Unidentified]: Oh, I see what you mean.
[Diane Caldwell]: And the children are filling in blanks. We've had maybe three professional development sessions, online sessions with Renaissance, and honestly, they haven't been as helpful as I hoped that they would be.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: All set?
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: Yeah, thank you.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Ms. Van der Kloot.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: Diane, I have a relationship with one of the Burlington elementary teachers, and that's what really sparked my interest, our long conversations about this. And I do know that she said that The tutors were extremely helpful. But I also, and I'll check back with her, but I wondered whether, is this something you could, could you train any volunteers? Or is it too extensive?
[Diane Caldwell]: I think you might be able to train volunteers to do that. Currently at the McGlynn Elementary School, we have one of our grade, first grade teachers is utilizing Mystic Valley Elder Services in that capacity. So yes, I think you could probably train people to do it. They're using teachers, retired teachers, so we'd have to think about making sure that the kiddos are getting the best.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: Right, of course. Of course. Thank you.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Very good. I'm sorry, Ms. Mustone.
[Mea Quinn Mustone]: Thank you, Diane. One of the concerns was staffing. And this is more just, I think, what Erin was saying for us to get a head start on budgeting. For the four schools, could you just, if you can offhand, say how many kindergarten classes they have, how many Title I teachers they have, and how many literacy support teachers each school has?
[Diane Caldwell]: So off the top of my head, each of the schools has four kindergarten teachers. You said kindergarten, correct? At the Roberts, they have two Title I teachers and a literacy specialist.
[Mea Quinn Mustone]: One literacy?
[Diane Caldwell]: One literacy specialist. At the McGlynn, they have 2.6 Title I teachers and a literacy specialist. At the Columbus, they have 3.0 Title I teachers and a .5 literacy specialist. The Brooks does not qualify for Title I, and they have 3.0 literacy specialists.
[Mea Quinn Mustone]: So that almost makes up the difference? Yes. Okay. And then with the other options, so the plan is not to pick renaissance this year, but to try the Fountas, Pinnell, are the words their way next year to pilot?
[Diane Caldwell]: So I'm leaning towards either Fountas, Pinnell, or DRA 2s. Our younger elementary grades use DRA 2 and words their way, so they're already familiar with that. But I would need monies to train our new staff, and I would need materials. Not for every single teacher, because a lot of teachers already have their DRAs.
[Mea Quinn Mustone]: Okay, and then the comments, were they from a survey that all the grade one teachers took? I don't know where the comments came from.
[Diane Caldwell]: Well, the comments came from my meeting when I met with the teachers last Thursday afternoon.
[Mea Quinn Mustone]: And all the grade one teachers were part of the meeting? Every single one of them, yes. Oh, that's great.
[Diane Caldwell]: And the literacy specialists were there, and the principals were all there, along with Dr. Chiesa.
[Mea Quinn Mustone]: So we don't have to move yet on Renaissance, because from the comments, it doesn't seem like it's supported by many teachers.
[Diane Caldwell]: So we bought into Renaissance until August this year, because the grant went from August to August. So they're still using it, because the teachers said they still want to keep up with it. And I'll still continue with the professional development. But after, you know, a short amount of time, I can, I can get a feeling from the teachers and we need to make sure it meets their needs.
[Mea Quinn Mustone]: Okay, great. All right. Thank you. You're welcome.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Very good. Is there a motion to receive this report? Place it on file by Mr. Ruggiero, seconded by Mr. Russo. All those in favor? All those opposed? Motion passes. Recommendation for approval of overnight field trip by McGlynn middle school, grade seven. Ms. Nelson.
[Beverly Nelson]: The students in grade seven have for many years participated in this environmental camp, which is located in Rhode Island. We're asking for the committee's approval for the trip. We realized that we should have perhaps done it earlier, but with the field trip policy changing and the edits and so on, again, we're asking for your permission based on the fact that the trip did get signatures back in January. I know that Mr. Cieri is here, director of science, who could speak to the benefits of the trip, and I believe Ms. Bellini, who helps to organize it, is with them tonight. So if you'd like to, again, talk about the trip, I believe all medical clearances have been vetted and that you're ready to go if we get approval.
[SPEAKER_08]: Good evening.
[Rocco Cieri]: Good evening, Madam Mayor and school committee members. I'm excited to be able to provide you with a recommendation to approve this overnight field trip. It's a one night trip to Rhode Island, University of Rhode Island, an environmental trip. Ms. Bellini has worked pretty hard putting it together, trying to get all of the sort of back end of the trip prepared with her colleagues in the seventh grade. And all of the information that you have in front of you has been put together by her. And we're here just to answer any questions if you have them.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Mr. Benedetto.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: Thank you. I added up all the money and it's $225 for this trip per student. Is that the right amount?
[Angela Bellini]: No. So because we're going in March, it's a discounted rate. So it's actually $160 per student. OK. So it's $160 per student.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: And is there any reduced rate for children on free or reduced lunch, or how do you do that? How do you know if a family's just struggling to be able to send their child?
[Angela Bellini]: So we have some funding that was given to us by Ms. Liu from fundraising back in November, I believe, with the 5K race that she did. So we have some funds available to us, but that's kind of our limited supply of funding to assist with students that need that extra help.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: And how would people know that was available to them?
[Angela Bellini]: I spoke with all the students individually and mentioned that at the meeting. And so I told them that if any of them need any financial assistance to please come see myself or Ms. Haas. And we've been dealing with the students individually.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Thank you. Motion to approve. There's a motion on the floor for approval. Did you want to speak on this?
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: Could you please tell me how many students are signed up to go?
[Angela Bellini]: Right now we have 72 students, and I think that's the final number. So I gave them 90 as the basis off of what we had as an attendance last year. I think last year we had 88 kids going, but this year we have 72. OK.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: Thank you. I think it's great.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Is there a second? Second. OK. Roll call vote, please.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: Yes.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Yes, seven in the affirmative, zero in the negative. Motion passes. Have fun. Thank you. Thank you. Also, could someone make a motion for suspension? We have another field trip for the Medford Vocational Technical High School. There's a motion for suspension on the floor, seconded by Ms. Vanden Heuvel. All those in favor? All those opposed? Addendum. This was added to our agenda. This request was received after the meeting was posted. However, it was within the 48 hours of the field trip for the Medford Vocational Technical High School. to attend the DACA state competition.
[3N-X2ResFqI_SPEAKER_02]: So good evening.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Good evening.
[3N-X2ResFqI_SPEAKER_02]: A couple of weeks ago when we were here and the kids got their certificates, we were just going to go in Friday for the competition and then Saturday morning for the awards banquet. Since that time, They decided to cost share and fundraise with the funds that Mr. Fallon was able to secure for the registration. So we have five vocational kids that are going to stay overnight with myself Thursday and Friday. And the three high schoolers are going to come in Friday just for the day and maybe come back on their own for the awards banquet. So I just did a quick spreadsheet for you that basically everything is covered so there's no request for funding. And I also included in there is the liability and the consent forms. Because those forms are not only signed by the students, but also their parents. And it outlines very clearly level one and level two infractions and what happens. And I know securities are concerned on everybody's parts these days. So there's 2,900 advisors and students who are going to occupy 90% of the Marriott rooms. DECA has their own security force that works in conjunction with the Marriott and the Boston Police Department. And even they're starting to tighten up things. So the bags will be checked internally by us before we leave Thursday. And then they go into a secure area before we move to the rooms. And the Boston Police Department's going to sweep it with dogs.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: Mr. Benedetto, thank you for bringing the children to this, and good luck. I hope they will bring back a lot of awards. And thank you for making sure that the security measures are implemented and followed. Have a fun time, and a motion to approve.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Motion on the floor for approval. Seconded by Mr. Ruggiero. Roll call vote, please. Mrs. Benedetto. Yes. Yes, 7 in the affirmative, 0 in the negative. Motion passes. Good luck. Oh, Sebastian, Mr. Tringali.
[Sebastian Tringali]: Yeah, I was just wondering if there's anything the high school community can do, like fundraising, or if it's already more or less the dust is settled.
[3N-X2ResFqI_SPEAKER_02]: Hopefully, we're going to ask for some support if we make it to Atlanta. All right.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Right now, we're all set.
[3N-X2ResFqI_SPEAKER_02]: Thank you, though.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Good luck. Let us know.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: Thank you. Thank you. While we are under suspension, I wanted to talk about our subcommittee meeting, Mr. Ruggiero. So typically, we send things to subcommittee meetings, but Mr. Ruggiero has proposed that we have a subcommittee meeting on community outreach this Friday. And perhaps I could just ask you to talk about it. I just want to make sure that the rest of the committee knows. I had asked that there be a preliminary meeting. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem like timing is. And Mr. Ruggiero, I just want to mention that it needs to be posted. And that means you need to contact the superintendent's office to have that happen.
[Michael Ruggiero]: Yeah. Um, so we, we, as the three members of the community relations subcommittee, we all worked out when would be the best time to me. It's going to be on March 9th from 1230 to one 30. Um, we cleared the date with the senior center. So that's where we'll be. And it'll also just give opportunity for seniors. that sometimes aren't able to come to our meetings or just have an opportunity to speak. All the issues were forwarded to the superintendent and to the mayors. I think maybe just due to the timing of things and what's been going on lately, I think maybe it's been lost in the shuffle. But I'm going to make sure everything is going to be posted properly. It's also been posted in the senior newspaper that they have.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: I just want to make sure we officially post it towards our regulations.
[Michael Ruggiero]: I'm following up with the deputy superintendents to make sure everything is posted properly.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: Could you announce what the agenda is for the meeting?
[Michael Ruggiero]: Sure. So I'm going to be posting the agenda online. So basically, we're only going to have an hour. Unfortunately, that's all the time they could give us. But the primary issue of the day is going to be discussing how we can reach out to our senior community to improve whether it's through tutoring or maybe through RTI, whatever sort of implementation that we're able to have for the senior community to help out with our education system. And basically just to hear from what we can do. All this will be posted officially though.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Okay. And one of the members will keep the minutes because you're doing it off-site and you need two for a quorum. Ms. Mustone is unable to attend.
[Michael Ruggiero]: Yeah, unfortunately.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: Okay I'm certainly hoping to be there planning to be there, but you know sometimes I would do work in an environment which can be tricky Thank you for the information
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Motion to revert to the regular order of business by Ms. Kreatz, seconded by Ms. Stone. All those in favor? All those opposed? Motion passes. Recommendation to approve incident report policy.
[Beverly Nelson]: At our meeting on February 27th, the proposed new incident report policy was reviewed by the school committee. Mr. Rousseau recommended an additional edit. It was a sentence to be added to the draft policy. And that sentence reads, this policy will be integrated into all annual reviews, contracts for rentals of our facilities, and school handbooks. So the sentence has been added to the draft. And again, the recommendation is up to the committee.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: This is a motion for approval by Ms. Mostone, seconded by Ms. Van der Kloot. Roll call vote, please. Policy. Ms. DiBenedetto.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: Thank you. Could we please read the motion? The incident report policy. So just so the community knows moving forward. I know it's a long policy, but I think that the people in our community are watching. They would benefit from hearing the policy.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: It is the report. I read it at our meeting last week, but I will read it again. Thank you. Policy definitions. Discovery. Finding any object or observing any situation that applies to the safety and security of the school and or school district which would negatively impact the well-being of students, faculty and staff. Notification. Verbal and or written communication to the appropriate authority including but not limited to the police department. Disposition, reporting of actions taken and conclusions reached that describe and explain the nature of the threat and or behavior identified, as well as any recommendations that emerge from the investigation. The policy is any individual who discovers an item, including but not limited to weapons, ammunition, explosives, drugs, any contraband items, shall notify the Medford Police Department immediately and inform the principal. If the principal cannot be reached, the individual who discovers the item should notify the superintendent of schools. This process will be in effect on a 24 hours a day, seven day a week basis. As soon as possible, the principal shall prepare a written report surrounding the incident and submit to the superintendent of schools. The school administration will promptly notify parents of situations that may affect the well-being of students, faculty, and staff. These notifications will be done consistent with applicable law, regulations, and policies of the Medford schools. Additionally, principals are required to immediately notify the office of the superintendent of schools about other incidents, including, but not limited to, accidents, fires, and suspension expulsion of students. Written reports concerning the incidents must be submitted to the superintendent no later than the next day following the incident. The principal or his or her designee must also notify the mayor and members of the school committee as soon as possible. Upon disposition of the investigation, the superintendent, in conjunction with the police department, will provide an appropriate written report to the mayor, school committee, and principal. This report shall include the facts surrounding the situation, conclusions reached, as well as any recommendations to be considered. This policy will be integrated into all annual reviews, contracts for rentals of our facilities, and school handbooks. There's a motion on the floor for approval as seconded. Ms. Kreatz, is there a question?
[Kathy Kreatz]: Oh, I just wanted to, um, to give a big thank you to, um, everybody who sent us the reports last week. We were getting them and I got a lot of positive feedback from the community, um, regarding the robocalls and the information that was sent out. And it was, it was very quickly and, um, it was very, you know, very useful and very informative. I just wanted to say thank you before we did the roll call.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: Ms. Van der Kloot. I just want to make sure, though, that we received one report which had the name of a student. And I just want to make sure that it's deducted, because we should not have that information. Also, we do have a protocol for, what's it called, Paul? I can't remember. A protocol when a student says something or is of concern a safety care, and I think that we should remind everybody that that is in existence and in place. If, in fact, a student makes some kind of threat, but the safety care protocol is followed, then while the school committee can be informed, I just, I received one robo-call from a principal, and I wondered how, if nothing was, if there was no reason to be concerned after professionals had assessed the child, and it was an elementary school child, and kids will be kids and say things, that I didn't want to, I think there's a balance between what some would call transparency, and my concern would be heightened I'm just wondering where the line is so it's not too much and it's not inappropriate. And that we're protecting our students appropriately. So I think it's a balance that we need to achieve. I think we probably need a little practice with it. But I do think that we put in place a couple of years ago the safety protocol for assessing situations. And I think that we need to make sure that we're sticking to that. And if nothing is determined, and it was by Elliot, then I don't think that there's a reason to alert every parent that a third grader said something. Because sometimes third graders say something. I mean, they're kids. They're kids. And we have to recognize that, too. In our concern about safety, we also need to be concerned about safety and worried about or realizing the impact on the fact that these are children.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: As always, Ms. Van, very thoughtful comments. And actually today we had a meeting. Ms. Nelson was present. Dr. Perrella, as well as our middle school principals, Mr. DeLever and assistant principal, Ms. Liu, was present. And we discussed that exact item, because it seems that people are getting information that really isn't necessary. The overhearing of a child saying something, and it being investigated, and it turns out to be simple just talk between two youngsters. Certainly, a call out to the community isn't necessary. School committee will continue to be informed of things that go on, but it certainly, there has to be some decision making that happens. I think Ms. Nelson, were you going to?
[Beverly Nelson]: I was just going to say we share that same concern and we are currently, as Mayor Burke said, we met this morning. We're working out situations that really the robocall is needed. In other situations, like the ones that you've identified where it's probably something that is not something we want to do. And again, we want to protect the identity of children and we want to make sure that our schools are safe, but the robocalls can be overused. So we're working at a happy balance, hopefully we'll have it resolved soon.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Thank you. So there's a threat assessment matrix that has been incorporated into prior incidents. What we're going to add on is another column that talks about notification. So once they get through the boxes and they reach this set, yes, we need to inform the public and the teachers and the whole school system.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: And will you be bringing that to us at our next meeting? Hopefully. We can get it done by then. That would be great.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Thank you. There's a roll call vote on the floor for this policy of incident report policy. Yes, seven in the affirmative, zero in the negative. The motion passes. Report on Medford High School graduation and dropout rates.
[Beverly Nelson]: So the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education just released their report on graduation and dropout rates of all high schools in the Commonwealth. And Dr. Perrella is here to share the good news about Medford, because we do have good news. Thank you, Dr. Perrella.
[John Perella]: Good evening, colleagues. I'm very pleased to be presenting this report of significant increases in our graduation rate and improvement in our dropout rate. Before I do so, I'd like to provide some context. About two years ago, we noticed a slight dip, 0.8% in our graduation rate. And after doing some data analysis, we realized it was very likely due to a variety of factors, but primarily the fourth year of math requirement that we had just approved the year before that. So what we did in the interim is we spent a lot of time looking at the data, looking at how we could improve these two significant indicators, and what we did was we identified that we could do some targeted individual intervention. This was in conjunction with the guidance department and with central office, who provided additionary tools, such as online credit recovery capacity, and I'm very happy to report that our Our graduation rate from 2006 to 2016 was 84.7%. In 2016 it was 83.9%. With the interventions that were put in place, we were able to improve that to 90.3%. And that includes positive impacts on all the following subgroups as well. Students with disabilities rose 8.8%. Low income, 6.9%. Students with high needs rose 8.5%. Our African American black population raised 13.9%. Asian, 11.6%. Hispanic Latino 1.3% and our white population at 2.9% increase. This also coincided with a significant drop in our dropout rate from a three year average of 3.6% to 2.7%. So we're very excited about these positive changes and we do anticipate them to continue as we move forward. I'd be happy to answer any questions regarding this.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Very nice. Mr. Benedetto.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: Thank you. Thank you for the report. It's great. Great to see these increases. And as Mr. Belson would have always said, just because we might have a 90% doesn't mean that we're not still committed to the children that haven't passed in four years. Sometimes children take longer than four years to complete this work. And I remember him saying that many times when we get this report. So I don't want anybody in the community to think that we just let kids go if they don't graduate. We keep working with them. until we can't anymore, you know? Thank you. It's really good news.
[John Perella]: And if you notice that the 95% is the four year adjusted rate. So that is students that we're able to work with over the summer who didn't graduate in June, but we were still able to get them to graduate by October 1st. And I'd like to add one other thing. This data looks great, but I would really love to share the experience of working with parents and families and being able to say, yes, your daughter or son will graduate in June. They can go through the ceremony. It's a very exciting, opportunity for me to work with families like that and to see the faces of the students and the families when they can participate is really much more impressive than this data.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: So it's 95% adjusted four-year rate?
[John Perella]: Yes.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: So that's just carrying you through the summer, or does it go beyond the summer?
[John Perella]: That's carrying us through the summer.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Right, yes.
[John Perella]: So what we do, some students are unable to meet that graduation requirement by graduation, but we still work with them over the summer. And we can get that to 95%, like it shows, by the October 1st deadline.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Wonderful. Great job. Thank you.
[John Perella]: Thank you.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Are there any other questions for Dr. Perrella? Motion to receive this paper? So motion. Mr. Ruggiero, seconded by Mr. Benedetto. All those in favor? Aye. All those opposed? Motion passes. Pre-budget report finance. Mr. Signi.
[Beverly Nelson]: I'd like to just preface by saying that, especially for the new members, that every year we begin the budget process with these pre-budget reports. The department directors come before you over the next little bit, the next series of meetings. We have them scheduled. So by budget time, you can see what some of the priorities are for the departments, so you can make your priorities as you go into funding things as the budget rolls out. Again, Mr. Zigney's done a great job his first full year as Fine Arts Director, and he's here to present what's been going on briefly, and also some of his needs moving forward.
[Tony Szykniej]: very good. Thank you. Thank you. Good evening.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: Mr. Benedetto before Mr. Zigney starts, can I, can I make a motion to receive our 17 18 budget in some kind of online format so that way when people are presenting to us, we can review it easily and make notes so that way binder. Well, I have the binder, and to see this with all the papers coming in, if it was electronically on a spreadsheet that we could see his department and what his budget was and what he's asking for, because throughout these meetings, it's weeks and weeks of these, you lose a paper and you're in trouble. So I'm requesting, I'm making a motion that I'm trying to get us more online and less paper and less binders, and so we can really look at the data at any time. So I'm making a request for this year's budget, the 17-18, or the second half of it, be presented to us in electronic format, so as we're getting these new papers. It's online. Is it broken down in each? By department. Not even by department, by subcategories in each department, so that way, like if Mr. Zigny asked for paper, which I know he's not, that paper line is there? Okay. All right. So I'll look at that. Um, well there's a motion on the floor to have it sent to us as committee members.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: It's PDF downloadable, correct?
[Erin DiBenedetto]: It's a PDF download.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: PDF downloadable.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: Okay. Can we look forward and make steps to make sure that the current, the next year's budget is in some type of electronic full, um, so that the committee can receive it and look at it as an active document throughout the school year for next year. I'm making a proposal. I just think that this is so hard to keep track of all these papers in each department as they come forward, and we can make notes next to them as they're presenting. It would be really helpful.
[Beverly Nelson]: I just have one question, because if we have last year's budget, it will not reflect the needs moving forward. Would it make more sense to send electronically the one-page summary that goes back to this year and then moves forward to this year? Because, again, you won't have in the report of last year's budget what the request is for this year. So we could send one page electronically for all the departments when they prepare them, and then you'd have last year and this year's side-by-side.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: And you could keep it in a file on your computer. That would work.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: I'll bring this up when we talk about at our next meeting. It's just something to think about moving forward. I really want more electronic documentation and less books in front of us and ways to make, you know, bring us forward so that way we can keep track of things as they're presented throughout the school year. You know, budget updates as well. So we have it all in one area. It's just so much easier than trying to go back to meetings and stuff.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Is it dinging? Something's dinging. Can you hear it?
[Erin DiBenedetto]: My mother-in-law is in the hospital, so I'm sorry. Oh, that's what I'm hearing. Yeah, I have to keep my phone on today. I don't know where it's coming from. My mother-in-law is very ill, so I'm getting updates on her. I've been there all weekend. Sorry for the inconvenience. Mr. Ruggiero.
[Michael Ruggiero]: I think that it would be very useful for us as a committee to actually have something that's machine readable as well. Just having a PDF is not as useful as having something that is where the data can actually be read. And I also think it'd be great for us to have an easy way to visualize the budget, whether it's a pie chart people can click on. I'm happy to do a lot of the visualization work. I just need the data. That's machine readable, because I'm not going to data entry it all step by step.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Thank you. We can certainly download it to a data CSV file.
[Michael Ruggiero]: Yeah, then I can. We can do a lot of great stuff with that.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Ms. Kreatz.
[Kathy Kreatz]: Yes, I have a question. I mean, I know a lot of people are talking about going electronic and I think it's fantastic. Is there going to be a plan for the school committee members to get like tablets or iPads, you know, I mean, I have my phone, but you know, um, so that we have it to view electronically.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: We did talk about that. I believe we moved it into your committee to discuss a means for us to go paper free and that's being thought about.
[Kathy Kreatz]: So in the interim, until we have those devices, are the people who don't have the laptops going to get their paper copy?
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Yes. The paper copy is here.
[Kathy Kreatz]: Right.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: So we're getting the paper copy that she's requested, and then the big document is online as well for last year.
[Michael Ruggiero]: I also started off with a school committee Facebook page for my firm. We can all talk about how we want to address that as well. But if you ever want me to send you their digital copies, that's why I'm letting you know. But I don't, once again, it's not machine readable. So if the PDFs could actually have the text on there, that would be my way.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Mr. Zigny. Hi. Welcome. He's patient. Welcome. Sorry for digressing.
[Tony Szykniej]: Not a problem. Are we ready? Quick overview of department, what we do. At the elementary level for music, K-5 all students get a weekly general music class. And also we have the after school troublemakers chorus. I got to hear them giving a rousing rendition of Don't Stop Believing as I left the school today. Ms. Turner meets with them on Monday afternoons at the high school. A string program starts in 4th grade and a band program starts in 5th. So kids who might play violin in 4th grade as they move on, they can either continue in 5th grade or a lot of them like to switch to band. But that's what's happening at the elementary level. The middle school, both middle schools have general music as well as band and orchestra twice a week. And the McGlynn Middle School has chorus. And at the high school, we've been able to expand our offerings over the last couple of years, which is great. In addition to band, orchestra, and chorus, there's percussion and guitar, music appreciation, music technology, and musical theater. And this year, the percussion and guitar is going to be able to be offered to freshmen coming in. We made a lot of adjustments and looked at the scheduling and made a lot of, I think, improvements. move things around so there'll be more opportunity for the 8th graders coming in as 9th graders to take more music classes as well as art classes. They'll also be able to take either comprehensive art or art appreciation so all of those will be open to freshmen. For the art classes at the elementary and the middle school they all have weekly art classes K-8 And at the high school, there's ceramics, sculpture, drawing, AP drawing, AP 2D design, comprehensive art, and art appreciation and practice. So we have a lot of different offerings in the department. This past year, a lot of budget money in the music side of it. Went for performance sheet music, instrument repair and replacement, piano tuning, classroom instruments. And actually, most importantly, curriculum materials. And on the art side, expenditures including ceramics and sculpture equipment, maintenance, paint, drawing, construction paper, various adhesives, markers, clay, pencils, accessories. There are really a lot of consumable supplies on the art side, where a lot of our budget went. For accomplishments, each year we do at least 14 major concerts at night and that doesn't count all of the performances the kids do during the school day. I think we give more concerts than any other which one has to do with the size of our theater but two I think it's good.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: And outside events. And outside events that you come to.
[Tony Szykniej]: Absolutely, absolutely. And a lot of other communities might do just one big one in the winter, one big one in the spring, and it lasts three hours. And each group only plays a couple of pieces. And I think this way, the kids get a lot more out of it. And it's actually to the credit of the teachers, not only who teach these specific ensembles, but who also come just to help out so that we can present all of these concerts. The Medford High School Band won nine trophies at six competitions. They hosted its fifth annual NESBA championship finals, placing third. They performed at the city inauguration. We had one member accepted the MMEA Northeast District Senior Festival. And the band will be going to Florida, the Magic Kingdom, right before April vacation. to play in Orlando and they'll play at Disney World as well as demonstrate for a group called Give the Kids a World which is part of the Make a Wish Foundation. So they'll be doing a lot of community service type things there as well. The Medford High School Orchestra, we had 3 members accepted to the MMEA Northeast District Festival. and two members were selected to the All-State Orchestra this past Saturday. I had the privilege of watching Justin Tseng and Arden Ingersoll perform on the stage at Symphony Hall with the Massachusetts All-State Orchestra and actually it was a performance worthy of Symphony Hall. They did a fantastic job. And I'd like to actually publicly thank Justin Tseng's mom, Jane, because she took Thursday off from work, Friday off from work, because we needed to send the chaperone. And she was our representative and was there all day Thursday, Thursday night, all day Friday, Friday night, and most of the Saturday being our representative and watching out for the kids. And it was a huge help to me and the department, and we really appreciated that. So it was a really great, great experience for all of the kids. And in a couple of weeks, Mrs. Chang is taking her middle school string ensemble on March 25th. They'll be competing at the King Phillip Regional High School in Rentham for their annual Micah Festival. And hopefully she's brought home many medals over the years and hopefully we'll be getting one more. On the art side of it, among the many things the art teachers do, there's all kinds of displays not only in the schools but around the city. Medford Children's Art Showcase, Arts Council Exhibits, West Medford Open Studio Displays. Just recently, three Medford High School students were recognized by the Scholastic Arts Awards. And I think in an upcoming meeting, I'll be submitting those names so that we can can recognize those students. A docent training partnership with the Museum of Fine Arts and they had a joint field trip along with the history department to the Museum of Fine Arts. So the art department was very active also. As lead teacher I was involved in a lot of things. This was the first year I was really involved with the budget and over the course of the year I think I got a handle on things and figured out a few ways to do things a bit differently. So as far as the requests, just some minor increases is what I'm asking for. Pretty much level funding is great. A little bit more money for piano tuning. We have, across the city, we have 15 pianos that we actually use either for concerts or We have a lot more, but it's 15 are in use. And some authorities say you should tune them twice a year. Everybody agrees they should be tuned once every year. We haven't had enough to do that, so we kind of triaged them a little bit. But a little bit more money for that would be helpful. And the band has grown in numbers, as well as equipment and in activity. And we're looking just for an increase in the, um, bus transportation for the band. They do a ton of fundraising as it is. Um, if they could do a little less fundraising, a little bit more playing, that would be a great thing. So if we can increase their, their bus budget a bit, that would be, that would be helpful.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Great. Thank you. Mr. Signey, Mr. Russo, you.
[Paul Ruseau]: I'm sorry. Thank you very much for this. Um, I see you're not asking for more money for art supplies. And I'm just wondering, my experience at the elementary level was that the art teachers seemed to be out of supplies before Christmas every year.
[Tony Szykniej]: Yes. That's not going to happen. It isn't happening. What I did do is, again, the art side of it was a little bit more alien to me. But after going through it, one of the things I realized was there are certain things that they all need and they all order separately. So they all need drawing paper, they all need Elmer's glue, they all need glue sticks. Rather than having seven or eight separate orders, I've combined them all and just ordered them all together, which means we can buy more for less, basically, because we're getting the bulk, which is leaving us more money for them to get some other things. Great. And after, again, getting through the year and seeing what we have left and what I was able to buy, I'm actually in the process of getting actually more for them for the rest of this year and next year, too. Excellent. Thank you. I do understand that's been in the past. felt like Santa Claus when I said, hey, I just bought these. Oh, this is great. So I think we're OK there. Great. Thank you so much.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Thank you. Mr. Ruggiero?
[Michael Ruggiero]: Two questions. So the first, I noticed the increase in van bus transportation. So right now, you're making up the $5,000 as fundraising. Is that where that money is coming from right now?
[Tony Szykniej]: A lot more than that, yeah. Bus prices have gone up, the band has gone bigger, so they need additional buses, which isn't necessarily commensurate with that many more kids, but you need a certain number of kids per bus. So, yeah, they need more buses. They do a lot of fundraising, as it is. So, yeah, even with that amount of money, there's still going to be fundraising for more buses. But that's going to help a bit.
[Michael Ruggiero]: Yeah, and my second question involves the instructional supplies. Has your department reached out to like Blick and Michael's Arts and Crafts to see if we could get a grant from them to get some art supplies?
[Tony Szykniej]: That's something, you know, we do ask for price quotes, which usually gives us a much better deal over list prices. But grant is a good idea, and that's something that I'll get a handle on, hopefully, in the future.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: Thank you. Mr. Benedetto. Thank you. Through you, could we please send a letter to Mrs. Zang? Is that her name?
[Tony Szykniej]: Yes.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: Thanking her for her commitment to the Method High School, or for her students and her time. Justin's mom? Justin's mom. Justin's mom. So I would like a letter sent from the school committee showing our appreciation for her chaperoning our students and taking that time from work. And my second item was to thank Mr. Zigny for coming first. and putting up with my questions before you got to present. Out of the way.
[Tony Szykniej]: I thought if I went first, there'd be more money, but I guess it doesn't work that way.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: It might. Who knows? Rookie mistake.
[Tony Szykniej]: I don't know.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: It doesn't hurt to try. But thank you, Mr. Zigny, for coming forward. And congratulations on presenting your first budget and almost completing your first year. You've got a ways to go. And I make a motion to approve this.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Motion to accept this report.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: I accept the report.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Ms. Van der Kloot. Ms. Mia.
[Mea Quinn Mustone]: Thank you for the report. And I just, you do a ton. And I just wanted to give a shout out to Mr. Connor, the Roberts School teacher, music teacher, who now already stays after school Tuesday for our hand chime choir for fourth and fifth graders. He stays after school on Thursday for fourth and fifth graders for trombone for an hour. And then he stays and lets sixth, seventh, and eighth graders come back and teaches them for an hour. And then now on Friday, he's keeping kids after for a little recorder ensemble to be in one of the music concerts in the spring. So he is one of the most humble, hardworking music teachers I've ever met.
[Tony Szykniej]: And in addition to that, we've had a really good year of professional development. And Mr. Conner and Ms. Turner have presented professional development workshops for the music teachers. Also, the art teachers, Peter Gallagher and Suzanne Fee on the art side, have presented art professional development, which has been well received and very useful, and just another thing that Mr. Connor has done for us. Thank you.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Just a funny little story. I was at the Roberts before school, and there were a couple of kids that were out in the schoolyard playing their recorders, walking around, and it's like, and everybody's fooling them. It was really adorable. So he's doing a fabulous job.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: Yes, I just wanted to add my voice to thanking all of your teachers. I, you know, attend as many concerts as I possibly can. I know Mrs. Kreatz and I and some other members were at the winter concerts and, you know, you listen to the orchestra concert. It is the thing that makes me, I think, so proud. when I can talk to other people and say, yes, all of our kids get to, you know, try out stringed instruments. And then they can do something in fifth grade. And people really are amazed. I mean, I tell them how many people we have in our orchestra. And then the band concert, the winter band concert, it was just blow your socks off. just so I wish everybody had been able to make it. So I really appreciate all the hard work of your teachers and yourself. Thank you very much. Thank you.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Very good. Thank you. There's a motion on the floor to place this report on file as seconded by Mr. Russo. All those in pro all those in approval, all those opposed. Motion passes. Thank you. Recommendation to approve the school calendar for 2018-19 school year. Ms. Nelson.
[Beverly Nelson]: You have attached the draft of the school calendar for next year. We'd like to get it out this time of year so people can start to plan for vacations and again for other events coming up.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Do you want to just highlight some of the dates, Beverly? Right.
[Beverly Nelson]: I think, um, Ms. Vandekloot, did you have... Ms.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: Vandekloot? Yeah. I had a question because I understand that, um, the, um, that there's going to be an election or preliminary election and is it the first day of school?
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: No, I believe... It's the Tuesday after Labor Day.
[Beverly Nelson]: Right. Again, the professional development days, I just noticed on this, we do have to adjust those. That can be, again, an adjustment there because I believe the election dates were the September 4th, and then the other one was in November. So again, I noticed that March is on there for the second one. Traditionally, we have one in the fall and one in the spring, but if it needs, if we need the schools for the elections, we can make that adjustment before we get this out.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: So we would have school on September 4th? or school would be in session?
[Beverly Nelson]: Well, right now, I think we have to have a discussion as to whether or not we feel we can have the election and have school in session, which we've done. It depends on how you structure the professional development, again, and the kids being in session. So we've done it before, but we'll need a conversation. I'm not sure how many people would be, again, using the data vote.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: Well, I'm just a little concerned about it. The students grade 1 to 12 go back the 28th, 29th, 30th, then they're off Friday, they're off Monday, and then Tuesday would be the election day. I mean, clearly when we think about concerns about security. So I just, I think we need to think this through and look at that particular date. I don't know if any other members have thought about this yet. I don't want to leave them out of school for, it seems difficult to leave them out of school for another day. So, but I was a little concerned.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Traditionally, we've canceled school except, I believe, the last primary, the numbers were expected to be so very low that we did hold a session. We had school in session. This is a state election. I'm sorry. This is a state election. And the numbers are expected to be very low. Higher than what we expected.
[Beverly Nelson]: I think it's very tricky because professional development days, having them all at the start of the year, then you don't have any time to do anything else the rest of the year is problematic. Perhaps in the new contract we'll get additional days, but right now we're living with what we have. And we can make that adjustment on this draft if we feel it's necessary, change the March 11th to the September 4th. But remember one thing, we do not, the dates the school start and that first week is determined not by administration, but by the contract. All right? The teachers in the last contract opted to go back to school before Labor Day. And so again, they start on Monday when the teachers come in prior to Labor Day. The teachers themselves wanted Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday to be full days for students. They did not want a PD day when they first came back. They wanted Friday off before Labor Day to have the long weekend, and of course, Labor Day. So when we get calls saying, you start school before Labor Day, how can you do that? We are bound by the contract. And that's why we have this schedule the week before Labor Day. So again, the day after Labor Day being the election, we'll have to make a decision on that.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: Mr. Benedetto. Thank you. Um, through you too, uh, Ms. Nelson is, I know the teachers are up for contract renewal and I'm wondering if we could possibly talk to them about working that Friday in exchange for the Tuesday. So that way that safe or even a half a day of those that day, rather than the children not be present for such a long period and still ensure their safety on the date of the preliminary election. That's something we can look at. Be moving forward, yes. And that's for August, right?
[Beverly Nelson]: This year, so.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: It's the Friday of the long weekend.
[Beverly Nelson]: So the calendar, again, we have had it reviewed by administrators. We've sent it out. Everyone seems to think there are no conflicts, except perhaps for the professional development day, and that would give us, with seven snow days, a closing of June 24th. So again, we still have a relatively early closing in June if we don't use a substantial number of snow days. So again, you can just, again, inform us what you'd like us to do with the professional development days, if you'd like to schedule it in on the 4th, or we can leave it as is, We have moved professional development days around. We've done it just this past month. So it can be done with proper notification to parents and to teachers and so on. So whatever you want me to do, we can adjust. But I'd like to get it out because people are looking for it. And other communities have it on their website. So.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: We have had school before. And if we have school, people who come in to vote at the schools are segregated from completely? Correct. Correct.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: If I recall, the issue that caused schools to close was an accident outside of school in a town that's next door to us. And that caused a lot of concern throughout all the school systems that use schools for voting locations. Mr. Russo.
[Paul Ruseau]: So I'm sorry, I'm just very familiar with the Columbus's layout. And I'm just really trying to, so we have had people voting in that cafeteria when there were 400 kids eating there.
[Diane Caldwell]: If I could address that. So at the Columbus schools, we sometimes use the two classrooms that are on that first floor and not use the cafeteria. We've done it that way before. And so people can actually come in the other door. Okay.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: Yeah. It's not just one. Um, when do kindergarteners go back to school? Uh, beginning September 5th. Um, beginning September 5th. And the day that we're talking about is September 4th. correct. Have we set the voting machines up in the kindergartners, kindergartens at all at the Brooks? At the Brooks. Yeah, because I mean, if you can think of, is there a way just to isolate? I'm just looking at a way to isolate.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: It's a much higher voting poll location. Just is. It's fact. Why don't we give it some more thought and at least the first day is set in stone in any event.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: I think the rest of the calendar, I think that the only question that we have a concern about is September 4th and how to deal with that. I guess for you it impacts the other day, though. Can we hold it?
[Beverly Nelson]: Whatever you want to do, OK? Again, if you want to delay and take a look at it, we want to talk more about the election, having the 4th off rather than the March date. We can do that, or we can perhaps just put the calendar out and say that the PD day is to be determined. Put one as November, the November day, the second to be determined. We could do that in lieu of doing nothing. Okay? Okay, so I'm going to take out March 11th right now. I'm gonna keep in the November day, and then the second PD day will be to be determined. And with that change, then we have approval to get it out.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Mr. Benedetto.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: Beverly, could you provide us the last day of school for this school year? I saw some people asking that and I just want to put that out to the community. I know we could possibly have more snow days, hopefully not this week. Very soon. do that. Some of our teachers are doing snow dances as we speak.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: I'm sure everyone is.
[Beverly Nelson]: I believe it's relatively early as we look at the calendar. Diane, do you recall on the 18th, perhaps 19th? It seems pretty early. But we will get that date again. This week's snow is predicted. So we don't know how that's going to go.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: Right. And maybe even on the website or on the blog, an updated calendar be presented because I know some people are already planning. some of vacations. I think I saw it out there on Facebook or some social media thing.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Still within the snow days. So we have the date that's online. What date is it, Michael?
[Michael Ruggiero]: It's going to be Thursday, the 8th. It doesn't look like we're going to get snow according to the forecast.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: No, the last day of school for this year. June. The 18th.
[Beverly Nelson]: Isn't it?
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Who can get it the quickest?
[Beverly Nelson]: We never get out, so we don't know.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: But right now, we're within the days. So the end date is, it could only be a little earlier, but it probably won't be. Two, I believe. I don't know. I think it's two. Two, only two? Two. There were cold days, no snow days. Right. Yeah.
[Beverly Nelson]: They were January, right? Yeah.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Okay, there's a motion on the floor to accept the calendar for the 18-19 school year subject to the Professional Development Day being withdrawn from March and to be determined at a later date. There's a motion on the floor by Ms. Stone, seconded by Ms. Kretsch. Roll call vote, please.
[kF4MfjuZkZ8_SPEAKER_04]: Yes.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Yes, seven in the affirmative, zero in the negative. Motion passes. Recommendation to approve grant from Exxon Mobil to the Brooks School. I'm sorry, Ms. Kreatz? Is it on the agenda? Open meeting law requires something to be on the agenda that we can't deliberate outside of open meeting law. We can certainly listen, but we can't deliberate.
[Kathy Kreatz]: I'm fine with that.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Can we, is there anyone here from the Brooks school for this grant? Diane. This is the last main item then. Recommendation to approve the grant.
[Diane Caldwell]: It's two $500 checks, one from Alliance and one from McSheffrey Service Station. Alliance wanted the Brooks School to spend the money on math and science materials. Of course, we'd have to speak to Mr. Cieri and Ms. Joy about the different materials. And McSheffrey's just wanted to match the grant.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Oh, that's nice. Thank you, Sir. Motion for approval by Miss Mustone, seconded by Miss Van der Kloot. Roll call vote, please.
[kF4MfjuZkZ8_SPEAKER_04]: Yes, 7 in the affirmative, 0 in the negative. The grant is accepted.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: There's a motion to revert to community participation. Just for those in the audience, open meeting law requires that any types of items be on a calendar so that those that are interested in coming to a meeting know what we're going to talk about. The items should be clear enough that people can figure out what is going to be the topic. So at this point in time, Ms. Kreatz has asked that we entertain some people from the public that would like to speak on a topic. We will not be deliberating, but we certainly will listen for They're required.
[SPEAKER_02]: Hi, thank you for hearing us out of order. And we're going to be speaking on a topic that I think some of you all are already familiar with. Heather Rumenap had asked us to come and speak on behalf of some parents who were concerned about adding some administrators to support to both middle schools. So my name's Michelle McGonigal. I have a daughter who's in the 12th grade and went to the Andrews when Mr. DeLava was quite new. And I have Becca Chanahan, who's a seventh grader there now. I'm also speaking as a longtime social worker who provides clinical as well as programmatic consultation to schools in Boston. And also, I work for Wodeco Children's Services, which also provided support to the Medford schools. So I'm speaking. on behalf of a group of parents who would like to offer some opinions and suggestions, we understand you can't deliberate around this, in regards to offering support to both middle schools. I just have known Paul DeLeva through the years and respect and appreciate his leadership and his skill and his capacity. I also respect his desire to help where needed and when needed and putting it all in. I also know that we have a habit of putting more on our administrators who are so competent. And I would wish that, I want to sort of address three things. As we try to figure out how we can support the McGlynn in this time of transition and change, I think it makes sense that the leadership at the Andrews remain consistent and stronger, and that to take some of Mr. DeLeva's time and to have it go daily over to the McGlynn, as well as offering support around MCAS, seems to sort of be a misuse of administrative leadership when I think we need more, not less, in both schools. And I'm wondering if we can perhaps think of some alternatives. If we have two administrators at the Andrews and two, I think, vice principals are at the McGlynn right now, could we add a third administrator, either from central office or either from the, one of the suggestions was, I think, Ian Charles, who's the ninth grade headmaster, who knows the McGlynn. Could he be fulfilling some interim administrative facilities there? To add more, sort of just splitting the difference between the two schools. I think those are my main concerns and some of the suggestions from the other parents. Because I think the basic sort of understanding is to increase the help and the need as we want to make sure there's safety and stability moving forward to the end of the year. And it's a short-term problem to solve. I also think that if you add another administrator from outside, you also have more voices and more perspective on what might be needed moving forward into next year. So those were my three suggestions.
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you. Hi, I'm Maria Daniels. I have two sons at the Andrews Middle School. here speaking both to back Michelle up, and she's an expert in this, so I don't know if that came across, but she spends every day in schools dealing with a lot of issues and really knows what she's talking about. I think from my perspective and the perspective of other parents that I've spoken with, we really feel it's a mistake to weaken one school, just try to fix a problem elsewhere. And Mr. DeLeva is highly competent. He's called upon by a lot of people to help outside of his duties already, and I admire that, and I respect that. I really think that no matter the leader's capabilities, removing the leader or distributing his time this way is weakening the school. If it were like a few weeks in June, if we were at June 1st and talking about this, I might feel a little differently, but the truth is we have a significant amount of the school year left, about two-fifths of the school year. So we're just here to express that. Thank you for listening and for your time. Thank you.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Mr. D'Oliva.
[Paul D'Alleva]: You have to excuse me. I'm a little under the weather. So I'll just do this kind of thing, virtual. Someone told me virtual handshake. Just so I can respond, I want to, first of all, I'm very humbled and flattered. So thank you very much for the confidence that the community has in me. I appreciate the, the sentiments and everything like that. But as I've said before, and I think if you've known me through my career, I've always said, I will go where Medford needs me. If Medford needs me somewhere, I will be there. And I think that's sort of my mantra, and I've always said it, whether I was a student teacher, or a teacher, or a coach, or however my career has moved up. And at this point in time, I know Medford needs me in a certain way. The one thing I do want to reiterate is that McGlynn is going to be doing MCAS online, the whole school. And I have that skill set to help guide that school in that direction because, as the superintendent has said before, if one school fails, we all fail. And that's something I don't want to see happen here in Medford. But I do want to also state I appreciate that everybody's looking out for me in so many ways. But I can do it. I can do it. But I respect my families. My families are, you know, this is why I do what I do. It's not just being with the kids. I love being with the kids every single day. It's meeting wonderful families, getting different perspectives. moving everything forward in a direction where we're working as a whole. So I just wanted to state that as well, that I am very humbled. I'm very humbled that people are here speaking on my behalf. But I just wanted to let those points be known that I'd really like my focus to be on the MCAS for both schools because, again, if one school fails, then we all fail. So thank you.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Thank you, Mr. DeLeva. No deliberations.
[SPEAKER_00]: May I just add to that or just respond to that? I'm not here really to look out for Mr. DeLeva. I'm here to look out for my children, my two sons that are there at the Andrews School every day. And I feel like if you remove an administrator, you're making that school more vulnerable, period.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: They would just send in an email through the superintendent's office, and just like Melanie's item got on for CPAC, we put an item right on that says what you're going to be talking about. It's that simple.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: Miss Van der Kloot. Technically, it's supposed to come in by Wednesday, by noon, although I know that there is a certain amount of leeway that's usually granted. But just people need to be aware that our packets are received on Friday, so that it, you know, they can't come in at Friday at 5 and expect it to go out to us in a timely manner.
[Michael Ruggiero]: Thank you for the clarification.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Perhaps there could be a form developed that's on the website that someone can just fill in and hit send and give the deadlines and whatnot. If we could move negotiations and legal matters to the end of the calendar on the motion, Mr. Ruggiero, seconded by Ms. Kreatz. Yes. All those in favor? Aye. All those opposed? New business, school committee resolution. Be it resolved that the Medford School Committee express its sincere condolences to the family of Irene Anestis. Mrs. Anestis was the former secretary for the School Buildings and Grounds Department. Be it resolved that the Medford School Committee express its sincere condolences to the family of Tilly Fodey. Mrs. Fodey was a long-time Medford resident and Medford High School secretary. And be it resolved that the Medford School Committee express its sincere condolences to the family of Joe Small. Mr. Small was a retired Medford firefighter and father of Robert Small, former teacher at the vocational school. If we could all rise for a moment of silence. Thank you. Also under new business, Be it resolved that the Medford School Committee review its current policies and practices on school rentals and take actions as deemed necessary to enhance the safety and security of our schools. As we realize, I think this is something that's going to need a broader conversation, perhaps in a subcommittee, to determine how we want to move forward. Over the past two weekends, we have canceled, for the most part, events at our outlying schools, not the high school, but our McGlynn, Andrews, and Brooks school for rentals that have been occurring in the interest of safety. And also, we have been putting so many resources into the high school that There was just no way we could cover all four. So we need to make decisions on whether or not we want to reopen these schools, if we want to add on a detail rate to the form, so that anyone that would like to rent the The facilities, there is a cost above and beyond the rental fee that covers coverage, whether it be a detail or security presence. So we need to figure out those things that we can move forward with our rental program or cease rentals altogether. So that certainly is a call that the school committee needs to make and assumption that can, from a security standpoint, it could be discussed in executive session as well if we wanted to discuss security measures.
[Paul Ruseau]: I'd like to make a motion, if in fact it's allowed, to close the superintendent search survey this Friday. We've never discussed an actual end date, but of course the search committee will struggle to analyze the data if we actually don't turn it off.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: So I don't know if that's... So applications, the deadline was February 28th, so applications are closed from anyone wishing to apply. Questions have been developed and tomorrow night are actually going to be finalized by the search committee, so certainly the survey should be cut off. Okay. If you could just make a note that... I know, we were talking about this and we shifted gears. We need to give guidance to community schools on the rental situation. So, Ms. Van der Kloot.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: Yes, Mayor Burke. I'm a little bit troubled just how, um, when we just had people before us, we wanted to be clear that we couldn't deliberate on that.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: This was actually on the agenda. It just didn't reprint it. No, no.
[Paulette Van der Kloot]: But I just wanted to add a sentence. I think that I would have added earlier if I had realized that we're going to walk away at that point. But, um, I just, it just the fact that we have it deliberated on it doesn't mean that we didn't hear the parents and their concerns. And that's an important distinction to make. Certainly we've been C receiving emails. I think that we're, um, that we're, I'm sure that every school committee member, if I can dare to speak for the body, is concerned about this issue and waiting to, we can't make a decision here or whatever, but I think that there's, that I would like to say that I heard them and have heard from parents. And if there is a better solution or whatnot, I'm sure that's something that we might take up at a different point. OK?
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Thank you, Ms. Vandermeer. Mr. Rousseau. I'm sorry.
[Michael Ruggiero]: I'm certainly, I think this is important that we do this. I would just like to have a report that we can have. So I'd like to know how much money we generate from these rentals, how large the groups are. I think that I would like to suggest that we have a committee of the whole meeting with just this particular issue is discussed. We have all the paperwork before us. We can have the research. But for me, I need to know what are the groups that are currently renting, how much income we receive from these groups, and the size of every one of these groups, whether it's the Impact Church, how many members they usually receive on what days.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: I would say one case, it's a soccer program at the Brooks School. It's a basketball program at the Andrews School. It's a church group at the McGlynn School. Mr. Maloney, is that about the size of the outside rentals at the non-high school locations?
[Michael Ruggiero]: There's a senior group at the pool, right?
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: We're not talking about the high school facility. Not high school, I see, I see, okay.
[Robert Maloney]: Good evening, Bobby Maloney, Sheridan Ave. Metfit. Columbus School, we have a night volleyball league on Wednesdays. The McGlynn School, we have Impact Church on Sundays. The McGlynn School is done for youth basketball as of tonight. The Roberts has one more night of basketball, which is tonight.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Roberts?
[Robert Maloney]: Roberts School.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Roberts, not Andrews. Roberts does have some. Yep. Andrews?
[Robert Maloney]: Andrews Middle School has one more practice basketball Thursday night. And then you got the high school, which is going 24-7. So the big thing, I need some guidance on Impact Church. I mean, they've been a fantastic renter for the last two and a half years. They're good in the community. They're good with the McGlynn Middle School and Elementary School. They need some guidance whether they need to find a new home. They've been going week to week and been very patient, so.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: And they're willing to pay police details.
[Robert Maloney]: They're willing to put on a police detail.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Multiple. Yep.
[Robert Maloney]: So my recommendation would be to have them come back with a police detail or multiple details and be happy to sit down with the committee and the committee of the whole and you guys can give us some policy changes or some guidance on what you want to do with the outside schools.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Mr. Benedetto. Thank you.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: Um, Bob, you might not know this, but, um, do you know how much we in revenue we get from the impact church or any of these programs?
[Robert Maloney]: I believe it's, uh, the impact church is about 800 and I can get you the definite answer.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: And when I look on their, um, social media sites, they're not just in the auditorium, they're throughout the building. At least that's pitches they have posted.
[Robert Maloney]: They use the gym twice a year for annual events for the kids. Generally they're in the cafeteria and they're also in the theater. They should not be anywhere else in the building. Sometimes they go for long weekends or vacations, they store some stuff in the music room that's right next to the theater. But other than that, they shouldn't be anywhere.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: There's a motion to send paper, but Mr. Maloney needs guidance for this upcoming weekend because I pretty much, we've been arbitrarily, not arbitrarily, we've been deciding that until we have a handle on the outside schools that we won't have outside vendors that are coming in. Ms. Mustone.
[Mea Quinn Mustone]: I just want to say that the pastor's wife has four small children, three of them are at the Roberts, and they do a ton of Mayor Burke. Mr. Benedetto. Thank you. I second the motion of Mr. Ruggiero.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: only because we don't have any answers, we don't know where or how things have happened recently, I would just hate for anything further to happen within our community without thought and care. I'd rather err on the side of being too safe right at this point than opening it up again, especially without time to really consider it and see how we can move forward safely and what rules and regulations we need to put forth. Um, so I second the motion on the floor.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Well, the motion is just, I'm sure they're lovely paper to committee of the whole, which is one motion. The other item that we're talking about is the issue for this weekend because we can't just cut off one renter. Uh, they have a right. We can't just, we open it up to whoever has rented. We can't just stop one renter from coming forward.
[Michael Ruggiero]: So we have to be fair and equitable about that. Least detail until this issue is resolved.
[Robert Maloney]: They're willing to put two details on. I'll take some guidance. I know if you want them in front of the building, if you want them in the building, and I know some people are going to say, are we going to sweep the buildings? They've been fantastic for here for two and a half years. Yeah. I mean, they're willing to put two details on until the subcommittee meets and they'll take further guidance from the committee and the superintendent's office.
[Michael Ruggiero]: Mayor Burke, I mean, I definitely have sympathy with the church and this is partly their home as well. Um, so I, if that is acceptable to church, that's definitely acceptable to me until we can talk about this issue in more detail. So I'd like to add in addition to my motion to make sure that we have police details until the committee of the whole can meet for this weekend to make sure they're responsible for at least two details.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Mayor Burke. Mr. Panadetto.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: Um, so, Can we shut down these external schools to outside groups and not MedFed, like youth registered groups that are provided? I feel more comfortable with youth basketball than I do with the outside faction.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: There's a US Supreme Court case on allowing rentals to churches.
[Robert Maloney]: We do have a request for two weeks for the McGlynn school Bangladesh event they've been there on eight or nine occasions in the last three years They're looking to use the cat the auditorium from 3 to 11 On a Saturday coming up. So I'm gonna need some guidance. You either tell me to shut down or not so I
[Erin DiBenedetto]: With the amendment added, I would withdraw my second. I'm going to err on the side of safety at this point and say nobody until our committee can meet and make sure that we're safe.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: There's a motion to send this paper to committee of the whole and also require that a police detail be present for these groups. Until further notice. Mayor Burke. Seconded by Mr. Russo. Roll call vote. Mrs. DeBenedetta.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: No.
[kF4MfjuZkZ8_SPEAKER_04]: Mrs. Rex. Yes. Mrs. Stone. Yes. Mr. Ritchiero. Yes. Mr. Russo. Yes. Mrs. Vanden Heuvel. Yes. The affirmative.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Yes. Six in the affirmative, one in the negative. Motion passes. This paper will go to committee of the whole and we will schedule one as soon as we humanly can. Oh, definitely. Yes, definitely.
[Robert Maloney]: Just for the everybody's, uh, we have a five K road race at the high school this weekend, the run into the leprechauns. There'll be two police details and a fight detail up there because we're expecting a decent crowd on Sunday up there. Okay.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Mr. Benedetto.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: Um, Could we request that one of the detail to make sure that the group stays within the gym and outside facility and not?
[Robert Maloney]: We have two details because there's only two entrances, one into the gym and one from the outside. So there'll be a cop at each door.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: OK. And they can use it. I'm sure they're going to need to use the restrooms and stuff like that in that area, right? By the gym. By the gym. So that area will be closed off. And people will come in and out one door.
[Robert Maloney]: They're going to come in.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: I think there's going to be a lot of people. I just want clarification on that.
[Unidentified]: Thank you, Mr. Maloney.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: I know they raise a lot of money for a good cause as well. I just want to make sure our buildings are safe and secure.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Mr. Russo, are you blinking? Are you all set? Mr. Russo.
[Paul Ruseau]: Do we have an estimate of what it costs to sweep each building each time we do it?
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Well, it would be more of an overtime issue. It's NMLAC, so our police department works in combination with other police communities that we're a member of. And they all come in, and they bring their various dogs and whatnot. So we incur overtime if it's above and beyond our office's time. But we don't pay for the other communities. So it depends on what time, when you're doing it, and who's on staff that day. Mayor Burke. Mr. Benedetto.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: Thank you. Going back to an issue that, um, my committee member brought up about closing the questionnaire. The survey. Yeah. The survey. I'm sorry. It's, it's time. I just had a few questions about that and about what feedback you've gotten in any updates and how that's being used to, um, prepare questions for the superintendent's interview. I know you did a lot of work on it, so I wanted to give it the justice and a moment to bring forward what you've learned.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Yeah, highlight the survey, because you had some decent results.
[Paul Ruseau]: It's pretty good for a community. The multiple choice questions, those are easy to give answers to.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: I know, you're just not coming across loud, but you are on. We'll close it.
[Paul Ruseau]: Bring it closer. So for the multiple choice questions, these are kind of easy to get answers to. I will say the multiple choice questions, sort of as predicted by Glenn and Richard and Nancy, were really much less interesting than we thought we could imagine. I think the hard part about this survey is that, Generally speaking, the public doesn't know what a superintendent does because the superintendent does so many things. And so, you know, there's a pie chart with like a gazillion little slices and almost no slice that's particularly big. So, I mean, I don't have the, to close it, I'm not gonna sit down and spend days analyzing the data, because I'd have to do it all over again. But what I will say is that in the open,
[Erin DiBenedetto]: Do you want to use mine? Oh, there we go.
[Paul Ruseau]: Anyways, it's the open-ended questions. What would you ask a new superintendent? What do you think is great about Medford's public schools? Those are the questions that, well, first of all, are going to require a small army of people to analyze, because people were not brief. So 458 people so far have responded, and each person seems to have prepared a small novel. So we'll be reading through those, which I have not done yet, and pulling out themes that come up. And then once I have had the time to do that, then I will certainly present those results.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Very good. Thank you. Okay. We're down to our last item, negotiations and legal matters. And this is the discussion of upcoming employee negotiation strategies, discussion of security strategies and discussion of employee complaint under mass general law chapter 38 section 21 a one. Is there a motion to go into executive session by Mr. Ruggiero seconded by Mr. Russo roll call vote. Ms. Kreatz.
[Erin DiBenedetto]: Yes.
[Stephanie Muccini Burke]: Yes, seven in the affirmative, zero in the negative. Motion passes. We will now enter executive session and we will convene. We'll come out of executive session to complete the meeting. We will not reconvene in this room.
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