AI-generated transcript of Rules, Policy & Equity Subcommittee Meeting

[Ruseau]: So it's May 5th, I'm calling to order the rules policy and equity subcommittee meeting that is scheduled for tonight from four to 6 p.m. Pursuant to Governor Baker's March 12th, 2020 order suspending certain provisions of the open meeting law, and the governor's March 15th, 2020 order imposing strict limitations on the number of people that may gather in one place. This meeting of the Medford School Committee will be conducted via remote participation to the greatest extent possible. Specific information and the general guidelines for remote participation by members of the public and or parties with a right and or requirement to attend this meeting can be found on the city of Medford website. For this meeting, members of the public who wish to listen or watch the meeting may do so by accessing the meeting link contained herein. in person attendance of members of the public will be permitted, but every effort will be made to ensure that the public can adequately access the proceedings in real time via technological means. In the event that we are unable to do so, despite best efforts, we will post on the City of Medford or Medford Community Media website an audio or video recording, transcript or other comprehensive record of proceedings as soon as possible after the meeting. The meeting can be viewed on Medford Community Media Comcast channel 22 and Verizon Channel 43 at four o'clock. Since the meeting will be held remotely, participants can log or call in by using the following link or call in number. The Zoom link, oops, which I just clicked, hopefully doesn't take me to another, one sec, it's trying to take me to another meeting. The Zoom link is https://mps02155-org or you can call in at 301-715-8592 and the meeting ID is 969-500-81661. Questions or comments can be submitted during the meeting by emailing me at PRUSEAU at medford.k12.ma.us. Those submitting must include the following information, your first and last name, your Medford street address, your question or comment. We'll take roll right now. Member Graham.

[Evangelista]: Here.

[Ruseau]: Member Ruseau present. Member McLaughlin will be joining us shortly. She had a partial conflict. to present the quorum. So the agenda for tonight, we have three items listed. We have policy BEDH, which is the public participation policy. And we're going to be reviewing a possible update for that. We also have policy BEDB, the agenda creation and format for regular meetings of the school committee, which will be also an update. And then we have the sexual harassment procedures, which are new. So I'm gonna start with the public participation policy and I'm gonna just share my screen.

[Unidentified]: One sec.

[Ruseau]: Alrighty. Let me just rearrange things on my screen so I can see everything. Okay, so I'm gonna just read my introduction that I wrote for myself to read to you all, but since it's on screen. The current policy is quite brief and does not include much detail that is necessary for concise understanding of our expectations as a committee. this major update to this policy should provide clarity to the public and to ourselves about what we mean by the phrases public comment and community participation, as well as lays out some expectations to ensure we can perform the work we are charged with in a welcoming and efficient manner. I expect there to be a discussion on the addition of full Medford Street address where you reside, to which I will remind folks that owning a rental home here or having a friend or relative in Medford does not grant you a voice before the committee If we fail to limit participation to residents, we open ourselves up to participation by anyone across the entire nation, which will become a real challenge when we deliberate on controversial matters and diminish the voice of the residents of Medford by drowning them out. So I'm going to just first bring up our current policy, which is remarkably brief. So if it was long, I wouldn't take this approach. The current policy says that any citizen in the audience may be given permission to speak once at school committee meetings regarding any item on the agenda for up to three minutes on any one item. Community participation portion of the agenda be established, which will give any citizen the privilege of placing any item for the school committee or be heard on any item. Any item to be presented must be submitted in writing to the superintendent of schools by the Wednesday noon prior to the scheduled meeting. with a maximum of five minutes allowed for any one presentation. So I've done a little bit of legwork to prepare for this meeting. So this is the language that I am proposing. I did look at other school committees policies on this. I didn't just start writing. And this particular section here is actually called out in several other communities. the new policies. In fact, it's actually written right on the agendas of some of them. Um, although I don't ask me which ones, um And this is this is, uh So this would be the new policy starting. Right here. Apologies for not including Start. And this just calls out the often confusion about, well, what are the requirements around, you know, do people truly just have the freedom to come and talk about whatever they want? And this is just language right out of the law that I thought was particularly important that really says, you know, if the chair, no person shall address a meeting of the public body without permission of the chair. And then it just goes on, I won't quote the whole part of the law, but essentially if somebody, wants to disturb the meeting and prevent the committee from doing our work, that they can be removed. I can't imagine that this has happened in ages, but I do recall seeing that on medfordtv.org a couple of times prior to being in office. So that's just a reference to there, and there's a link to the full law. And then this is where there's really new stuff. public comments on agenda items. So I've broken the new policy out to really make it, to beef up the language. Any resident in the audience may be given permission to speak once on any item on the agenda for up to three minutes. The speaker is expected to keep their comments to the item on the agenda. The speaker will speak to the full committee through the chair and will not address individual members or administrators. The speaker must begin their comments by providing their full name and full Medford Street address where they reside. Residents may also submit their comments in writing to the superintendent prior to the meeting, and then there's the email address. Written comments must be kept to a length that allows for them to be read into the record in less than three minutes, or the comments will be summarized by the secretary of the school committee. That's the person who typically reads in comments during the meeting. A welcoming community is, this is a new couple of sentences based on feedback I know I've heard many times in the last three and a half years on the school committee. So this language may not survive to the full committee, but I drafted this in hopes that it will at least survive at a subcommittee. A welcoming community is both a value to the school committee, a value of the school committee and an aspirational goal. To move us towards this goal, we ask that the duration of your residency in Medford not be provided as all residents have the same rights and responsibilities regardless of the duration of their residency in our city. And then there's just the, if you're writing or providing a comment, name and number of the item on the agenda, your first and last name, your Medford street address and your question or comment. Before I go on to community participation, are there any comments or questions about what I've presented so far? Mr. Cushing.

[Cushing]: So just a suggestion to add the superintendent at Medford email address. as that would make it easier for people to, if they find this policy, that would make it easier for people to report out to the superintendent. And then that doesn't change with names or anything like that. The other, Or the other point I had is up above where it says may authorize a constable or other officer, just given the fact that zoom might very well be here to stay. Um, would it be, would it be worth the chair may authorize and this is from the law.

[Ruseau]: So like, okay.

[Cushing]: Yeah.

[Ruseau]: I realize this doesn't work for Zoom.

[Cushing]: And I'm only thinking like, you know, if you think about it, who is a constable or officer, even when we're in the chambers? Yeah, I have no idea.

[Ruseau]: Yeah, no, I certainly understand that that's a really excellent point that this does not address the fact that somebody may have to be put into the waiting room or I don't even know what the language would look like. And then somebody clearly would have to investigate legally, like what does any of that mean? Like even just muting somebody, I think is something that is not yet decided. And, but.

[Cushing]: The only other suggestion that I would have is you have the option for a person to go up to five minutes. My only suggestion would be to just given some of the public comment that we've had to go from three to two with the option to extend as the board sees fit on various things. I'm just thinking about the sometimes the number of people. And I think recently, we did set it at two minutes, and it seemed to be functional. But that's yeah, question.

[Ruseau]: I think that's an interesting suggestion. And I certainly what isn't in the this new policy here, assuming we adopt it, is something that I do see in many other communities. And that is public comment has a time limit. It's 20 minutes, it's 30 minutes, whatever. And if there's 500 people that show up, it's 30 minutes. And when you hit the 30 minutes, everybody else can submit it in writing or whatever. And I'm a little surprised that other communities don't explode over that. Like if you take the effort to show up and to prepare comments, and then you're number 48 on the list, And they also require you to sign up ahead of time, like before the meeting begins, you must provide your details, what item you're gonna talk about, and then it happens. But it ends when it ends based on the time, which is partially how they're able to, many communities are able to have much shorter meetings. But I just feel like that, I personally like to keep three minutes, and maybe that's because I'm not, I talked too much. Member Graham, do you have thoughts on that?

[Graham]: I don't have a problem with three minutes necessarily. I actually think many people who participate don't speak for three minutes. I think we need to uphold our rules and have some clear procedures on how to do that. Because the places where our public comment has gone on for many, many, many hours is not because any one person at one time spoke for more than three minutes. It's that the same person spoke many, many times for three minutes and that there were a lot of people who wanted to speak. given that, like, I don't have a strong opinion about two versus three. I like, I think there are times where the difference is important and giving somebody three minutes to, like, give us their sort of fully baked thought is a good idea. Especially if it's something that is evolving as they're listening to the conversation that's unfolding, right? So it's not like you're necessarily limiting people who came prepared to talk about something. So I don't have a problem with up to three minutes. I would hesitate to put in place the time limit, because I feel like that's too far gone. But I feel really strongly that we need to uphold our rules that we have set. So when we moved to a two minute comment, that was actually done without the committee's approval. And I wanna make sure that whatever rules we set, they are adhered to, and that there's just a clear process for that.

[Ruseau]: Thank you. Dr. Edward-Vinson?

[Edouard-Vincent]: I actually was in agreement with Dr. Cushing's comment about the two minutes or if we're going to say up to three minutes that we respect that it's up to three minutes. where I think, you know, with emails and allowing the opportunity for the public comment, I think that that is important, community participation, but I too feel that there needs to be clear rules that everyone understands and that they are actually followed. The other piece that I had a question or a comment about was the addition of people not stating the duration of residency in order to be a welcoming community. So I wanted to know, would this verbiage be read prior So this would be read at every meeting, this particular paragraph that's being added onto the official agenda so that everyone would know that's the goal that we're moving towards. So I just was trying to get a little greater clarity on.

[Ruseau]: So the next item on our agenda is the agenda format. And I'll give you a sneak peek, but yes, much of this language does end up on the actual agenda. But we'll get to that exact thing after we get through this one. Because I agree that it should be part of the agenda and actually read out loud, but.

[Edouard-Vincent]: So I guess my wondering was if, for example, you were to have someone, we're promoting, we're encouraging public participation and community comments, if someone, not realizing that the policy changed were to state that, then what would happen during that meeting, I guess, is what I'm trying to understand.

[Ruseau]: I mean, I don't think anything would happen. I mean, I think I did include it on the agenda statement. We'll get to that one later. But I think just repeating it at the meeting you know, if people are going to, some people may feel that they're going to say it now, especially because there's a change in policy. But, you know, that'll be up to the chair, frankly, to, to say something or, or not. Yeah. But I mean, I wouldn't imagine if somebody decides they will, they're going to say it because it's also remember, it is sort of automatic, I think for a lot of people. I don't that people say this usually out of any kind of like any attempt to make it an unwelcoming environment. I think it's just like, you know, I was born and raised in Medford and like when you're speaking at a public meeting and it's you're speaking both to the to us and to frankly the public that's watching. It's sort of like it just rolls off the tongue. So I don't imagine it's anything that like causes any consequence of any sort. But I just think it's important to state it clearly that we as a committee, that your duration of residency in no way affects the value of your opinion on what you have to say, and that that's our statement, even if individuals may feel differently about that.

[Edouard-Vincent]: So I guess I almost feel like it sounds like we're creating norms and I don't know if we should call them, call it out as norms so that if we're saying, you know, we want it to be a welcoming community that, you know, earlier you mentioned that they will address the entire school committee and not individual members through the chair. So should we also have a statement in there about, You know, we understand. It's like we agree to disagree, but in respectful language and respectful tones. And so I just, that's what I was thinking, like, are we really creating like norms that would be said, and if so, I think we should probably add an additional statement about you know, ensuring that we want to use appropriate language and, you know, even if we're presenting divergent views, we do it in a respectful manner.

[Ruseau]: Yeah, I think I completely agree. One of the challenges is that the language that the chair will be reading, you know, after, especially after having just said the governor's statement, you know, we don't want the chair to have to read for 15 straight minutes. And I think that some, most of this stuff, you know, the speaker will speak to the full committee through the chair. Like that's not our opinions. That's Robert Bowles. It's literally in our city charter. It's not optional. And so, you know, pulling that out and saying that it's just sort of highlight what I see are things that, we don't always adhere to as norms, even as members, frankly. And the question of what do we pull out and put up in the policy, this is the policy, this isn't the agenda though. What do we pull up and add into the policy and what do we not, even though it's all really there behind the scenes automatically is important. So, because of this being the actual policy, it can be as long as we want. You know, there's no reason to be brief here. The current policy is surprisingly brief in my opinion. So, you know, if there's thoughts on an additional sentence about being welcoming, I mean, what I would suggest is, you know, we can certainly amend this, well, we can amend it tonight if we have that sentence, but we don't want them to go all night you could also, you know, think on it and send any one of us, you know, suggested change, and I can offer an amendment in the actual meeting when we hopefully adopt this, rather than putting us on the spot to wordsmith it and come up with a new additional statement. If that sounds okay.

[Edouard-Vincent]: Okay, yes, thank you.

[Ruseau]: Member Graham, yes.

[Graham]: I didn't have any significant questions or changes to this policy revision in general, but I do think it would be wise for us to explicitly call out that there will be a timekeeper that is managing public participation, whether it be three minutes or five minutes, and that speakers will get a 15-second warning when they're approaching their time limit. And I do think, you know, obviously that has some implications about how the meetings are run and who does that. And that would need to be a role for somebody. But I do think When Lisa has played that timekeeper role for us a couple of times, and I thought it's been very effective. And I would like to see us adhere to that as standard practice versus only sometimes. So I would like to see us be much more consistent about that timekeeping process so that people know what to expect when they come to a meeting and everyone is clear upfront that there will be that timekeeper. And this is how they'll signal that we're out of time.

[Ruseau]: Right. Yeah. And when I've been to the state house for subcommittee meetings or whatever they call them there, there's a screen, the timekeeping is going on. It doesn't matter if it's not contentious or contentious. It's just always there. to be expected and it will, you know, flash and then it will be, it doesn't care who you are. And that's sort of, you know, that's the core of Robert's rules is that there's fairness and that the idea of being preferential is impossible if you follow the rules. So I certainly like that, I guess, you know, I just worry about operationally and, And I mean, superintendent, do you have thoughts on that? I mean, cause it feels to me like it's a role in addition to. taking notes, minutes.

[Edouard-Vincent]: So we could, to allow for flexibility, I agree, you know, Lisa Evangelista, she did a very good job maintaining time for us. And so we could say that, you know, there will be a designated timekeeper, you know, to you know, to monitor or to support public participation. And if we were saying up to three minutes, I actually would love for, at the one minute marker, for the person to be told one minute and then 15 seconds. But just while, that doesn't have to be spelled out, but just so they can keep track of their message. Yes, a designated timekeeper will be provided by the superintendent's office. Yes, I think that that's perfect.

[Ruseau]: All right, great. Is there any other comments on this before we go out of the community participation section? All right, so community participation. So the purpose of community participation, regular meetings of the school committee will include a community participation agenda item. give any resident the opportunity to place a presentation before the school committee. A resident may only present once at any meeting. These presentations are an opportunity for the public to make a presentation to the committee, but are not opportunities for dialogue with the committee. If one or more members of the committee wishes to have a conversation about the topic presented, the member may request that the item be added to a subsequent regular meeting. I'm going to stop there because this particular paragraph I think, well, first of all, I believe this is not typically how our community participation presentations are understood by most members. And certainly they're not understood by the public. I mean, it is so common for somebody to come to a community participation and ask a question. And certainly the superintendent is more than legally and under open meeting law can answer the question or say that she'll have somebody get back to them or whatever. But the person coming to speak does not have the opportunity to circumvent open meeting law. So if they bring up something within our authority, which is their only option, like if it's not within our authority, it shouldn't be here at all. if it is within our authority, then it is not on the agenda for other members of the public who might be interested in dialoguing on a particular topic. So it's important to understand that. And we see this in meetings where people ask a question and there's like really significant concern about the fact that we aren't responding. And it can be about a topic for which, of course, we all have opinions and we all really want to respond. So I think it's really important to spell it out that this is not an opportunity to essentially circumvent open meeting law and have us start making motions and deliberating on topics. There's other reasons for which I think it's also just a bad idea. I mean, to take a presentation and assume that the superintendent may disagree with some of the information presented, for instance. It's not fair to her and the administration, and it's not fair to the members who may wanna go off and read and do some actual background work on the presentation that was given. So I think it's really critical to point this out so that, Everybody's on the same page about why we all just sit like deer in their headlights when these situations come up. Because, I mean, I've seen some pretty nasty comments, like, I can't believe nobody had anything to say on something as important as that. And the answer is, because we are not supposed to have something to say. Any other comments on those two paragraphs under purpose?

[Graham]: I don't have any changes or issues with what's been outlined.

[Ruseau]: Thank you. So then I also looking at the current policy, which essentially says, you know, the public can submit something to school, the superintendent for a presentation. It says nothing about, you know, I mean, if you submitted a presentation to talk about, about, you know, the speed of cars on 93. That seems slightly out of the authority of the school committee. And this doesn't say anything about, you know, what if the superintendent is just like, that's not appropriate. So, you know, I took that first issue of like, okay, it's, you know, the things that are presented should be things within our authority. And then, well, what if there's a disagreement on that? So that's where I sort of went a little deep on the submitting a presentation. Lisa, did you want to speak before I keep going?

[Evangelista]: Hi, can you hear me?

[Ruseau]: Yes.

[Evangelista]: Yep. No, I just, you know, everything you're saying is appropriate, Paul. I'm not saying it's not. I was just saying that I don't know if the general public knows that. And so, you know, these changes have to be made, but I'm wondering are we, are you planning to do this so we passed it say Monday night, would it go into effect for the next meeting? Or are you gonna, you know, get a press release out and tell, you know, so people can learn about how to approach an elected body the proper way. I just, You know, I just, I don't know. Maybe this would take place in your first meeting in August or something like the new rules or something. I don't know. I'm just throwing it out there because I think that generally people aren't gonna literally know. I mean, unless the mayor would show explain it the first night in detail, you know, I don't know. I don't know.

[Ruseau]: I'm just- That's really, sorry. That's incredibly important. And that's on the second I'd edge. on our agenda tonight is the agenda actual format. So I think that will be addressed when we get to the agenda format. And if not, please raise your hand and say you don't think that covers it. Certainly the public knowing this, you know, writing a policy that gets stuck up on our policy service that nobody knows about, that's not really, that's not a good idea. So I laid out a process for submitting a presentation, which the current policy just says that it has to be sent to the superintendent before the Wednesday before noon. It says almost everything is the same. It says it cannot exceed five minutes in duration. This adds that it must be a topic within the authority of the school committee, which I think is really implied in the old policy, but I thought, why not just say it? The submission timeframe is the same, Wednesday before noon. It has to include, we didn't say that this stuff is included, but I mean, if you sent us a presentation to the superintendent and didn't tell her who you were or anything, that would be kind of strange. So here it just lays out the details. And then what happens there is the superintendent makes a determination on whether the topic is within the authority of the school committee, which is not new. always just done that. And then in the event that the superintendent says this is not within the authority of the school committee, the person has the, what I added here is an entire appeal process. The person would write back and say, I disagree, or I'd like to appeal this. And it would actually show up on the agenda. I guess I should read all of this, I'm sorry. determination made the appeal by submitting and writing to the superintendent and request for an appeal. The appeal will be placed on the next scheduled regular meeting of the school committee under the community participation agenda item as appeals of authority determination with the full name, full Medford street address and a very brief description of the denied presentation topic. The superintendent will then, so when we get down to community participation on the agenda, this appeals and the superintendent and the presenter will have two minutes to address the committee on why the item is or is not within the authority of the school committee. So, you know, hypothetically, somebody wants to do a presentation on the performance of a teacher. I mean, that is not within our authority. The superintendent would reject that. The person would have two minutes to explain why they believe that is within their authority. not the actual performance, not the presentation itself. And then the committee will not discuss the performance of the teacher, but we'll simply discuss whether something is within their authority or not. And then the vice chair or some other member make a motion to sustain the determination of the superintendent. And if we sustain that, then the presentation will not be coming to us. If it, is if we disagree with the superintendent, that actually this is within our authority, then at the following meeting, it will appear on the agenda, obviously under the objection of the superintendent. This of course does not give us the authority to, for instance, you know, violate employment law. I mean, like we're still bound by law, but I think there are plenty of situations for which there's lots of confusion about who's authority, what is our authority? And I know I frequently have to look it up, like, well, do we really have authority here? And I think, you know, things like curriculum, we don't have authority to decide on the curriculum. We have authority to decide whether to buy it. So, I mean, there's like, there's some gray area. So I envisioned this being about the gray area and it gives the members of the public who, you know, took the effort to create a presentation for us. The superintendent is saying, no, you can't. I think the public needs to have an opportunity to explain or to perhaps have us override the superintendent. Dr. Edward-Vinson.

[Edouard-Vincent]: So with this particular portion, I actually feel like I The possible example that you gave personnel is never discussed on the floor. So I almost feel like if something were to be denied, that I should use the district counsel, legal counsel, to be able to say if it's something that is clearly not permitted that I don't even feel like the person should be presenting that at a school committee meeting because legally it's not permitted. So even if I deliver the message we don't discuss personnel on the floor like that is that does not happen. That if they didn't believe what I said that I would have legal counsel and school committee could be CC'd on the legal counsel response to what was said. But as you said, if it was someone wanting to present about curriculum and present a different program that I might not have liked, but still to be able to present it, that's something that I see as permissible.

[Ruseau]: Okay, so how about a step after a determination? So let's say the person sends you an appeal, like the superintendent will seek advice from the- District council. District council. Once I spell it right, that's the right one, right? It's too many councils. About whether to proceed with the following appeals process. Should the council determine that The presentation did not proceed. The, I don't wanna say petitioner, I don't know what we call a person, the presenter will be informed. How's that sound? So I think that's really, I think that's good, because I do worry about, I did worry greatly in my example, like if they can come in and even have the microphone and talk about personnel, they could easily go off the rails a bit, and then we get in trouble, real trouble. So I do like this out for our council to simply say, no, this cannot proceed, and that's the end of story. Member Graham, do you think that sounds okay?

[Graham]: I do, I think that makes a lot of sense and provides assurances that we don't end up wading into unallowed territory on the floor.

[Ruseau]: Thank you. Actually, I'm gonna put the superintendent may seek, you know, if it's a curriculum issue and you're like, Howard, you know, he's already said many times, yeah, you know, if he throws his hands up and says, it's the gray area, then you may, you know, may not wanna ask him, but for things that you're just like, whoa, we cannot have this, Are there any other comments on the language of that? Did I finish reading it all? I'm sorry. Oh, I do have this thing in here about, okay, in the event that there is no majority due to an absence, abstention or vacancy within the committee, the determination will be deemed rejected and the presentation will be placed at the next meeting agenda. So this is, if it's a split vote for any reason, then the public presenter will be given the benefit of the doubt. It does also include that no member may vote present. This is in my opinion, and the members can disagree, but this is a matter for which you can't just be like, I don't wanna get involved. Like you're on the school committee, you signed up for the job, make a vote one way or the other. And it says that we may only vote abstain if there has been a conflict of interest that we have presented and has been determined to be valid.

[Graham]: Dr. Cushing, can you make Melanie a co-host so she can unmute? Okay, good.

[Ruseau]: And welcome, Member McLaughlin, hi. And did you have a question? Were you raising your hand because you couldn't unmute?

[McLaughlin]: I was, yeah, raising my hand because I couldn't unmute. But I also wanted to apologize for being late. And I had the chance to read through this. And I think those changes make sense as well. So thank you.

[Ruseau]: So can I make a motion to approve? You can, although I see Mr. Cushing has his hand up. I figured we should listen to him.

[Cushing]: So just a quick question, and I don't know if it's elsewhere. I've heard other members say that in chambers, signs are not allowed and things of that nature. And on Zoom, it's slightly more problematic because anyone can change their background to literally anything at any time. And I don't know if that's covered here or somewhere else, but that seems to be public participation. And, you know, I'm like, I'm just there are moments when I'm extraordinarily You know, our hashtag Zoom bombs is a thing. And it's a, as someone who helps manage the meetings on the back end, it is something that I'm continuously looking for. And I'm not saying it needs to be a policy, but I just figured that this might be where it needs to be.

[Ruseau]: Yes. Thank you, Dr. Kashigi. Actually, that, that, so there was a second sort of like level on this policy that I have refrained from, because I feel like this is a huge movement from our current policy of just a few sentences. And I felt a bit like, do we go all the way or do we go a lot of the way and then revisit this? And then, because one of the things that I've also heard is, when people come to speak in the chambers, there's, you can't have your screen, you know, the equivalent of not turning your video on doesn't exist. And I know that I personally like wish that anybody speaking had to put their camera on. I mean, but I think there are some issues with that that concern me that are just beyond the amount of time and scope to getting something done. So, and I know that, I believe Zoom allows you, for instance, to configure it so that nobody can have a background image. Because I joined plenty of meetings where my photo doesn't ever show up at all. And I'm always surprised. I'm like, where am I? Because most meetings, the photo is there. So that's configurable. And I don't know that we have to put that in policy. I think that a member could simply motion at a meeting and say, going forward, you know, Dr. Cushing, could you configure our meetings that don't allow people to have anything but a black screen or there's their video? Like it is right this moment, I don't know if people have actually chosen this or if it was just a configuration that happened to be in place. It is distracting, but at the same time, you know, when we go into the chambers, you know, I'm thinking of when the Red for Ed, when all the teachers were there with their red shirts on, And like the red shirts were speech. They were, you know, we didn't have name and address and we didn't have who they were. They could have all been from another community, frankly, but there was speech and we allowed it. So, you know, thinking about that and how is that terribly different than somebody who changes their background to, you know, to Medford Pride or something else. I don't feel like I have the bandwidth to philosophically work through that. And I prefer to err on the side of speech should be protected. We are the government. So, you know, freedom of speech is actually about us and what we do around it versus what the public generally thinks freedom of speech is. So I prefer to go slow. I'm sure there are other communities that have gone much more, gone hard on this stuff. And I'm expecting that they will go through the lawsuits and go find out what the real answer is. I don't know, other people wanna speak on this? If not, that's okay too.

[Graham]: So, yeah, I just, I guess what I'm thinking about is that the vast majority of people who come to speak at a meeting, whether it's in person or even on zoom, like the majority of people are behaving in a manner that allows constructive dialogue. And there are some that don't, but at the same time, I feel like we can't get into the business of saying there can't be more than five people in chambers with a red shirt on. And so to police There can't be more than five people with a red background. Like I just feel like it's such sticky territory that I would rather maybe keep the faith in our residents because I think they deserve it, that this on the whole can go well. And I think if it becomes a recurring issue, we may need to revisit it, but I'd rather not be preemptive about this particular issue.

[Ruseau]: Yeah, I agree. I also think this piece from the law, which is very clear, the chair has, frankly, an enormous amount of authority around ejecting people if the person's being disruptive and they've been warned. The chair, I read this as the chair could eject somebody from a Zoom meeting just as, I mean, if they can call the police and have them removed from a public meeting, that is consequential. consequentially the same as clicking the remove from the meeting. So I think in my opinion where we have enough so far, I certainly want to acknowledge though that Dr. Cushing who does our meetings from a technology perspective has to keep a remarkably high level of vigilance and stress hormones flowing to make sure that we are not zoom bombed with some truly, you know, I mean, it's not, every meeting, thankfully, but he doesn't know when it's going to come. That's the thing. So you got to kind of like be ready at all, every moment. And I do want to acknowledge that, but I don't, I don't think we're, it doesn't sound like we're ready to move towards anything more restrictive. Any other comments?

[Evangelista]: I had a comment.

[McLaughlin]: Yeah, sure. I'm sorry, I didn't see, did you guys discuss the aspect of the full address consideration that we talked about?

[Ruseau]: Oh, good, thank you. Well, we did talk about it and I did talk to, I sent an email to the, so you had communicated with me about the, what about somebody who is the victim of internet partner violence, I believe is the current language. And I emailed the, MASC, our Schools Committee Association, to ask folks what they have done about it, how have they put that into policy explicitly. And what I did get back was apparently there's a Massachusetts law that allows for, I don't know if it's a fake name, it's certainly a fake address, but I think also a fake name. for the purposes of allowing this kind of thing. To me, that seems like an awful lot of work to expect to somebody who just wants to comment on a bus schedule or something. Like if they've never needed to do that, it seems like a huge lift. And that is still an ongoing conversation in the responses I'm getting. So I think we can amend that. or even have a separate policy that sort of covers all policies around this situation once we have some more clarity there.

[McLaughlin]: And I guess, thank you, Member Ruseau, and I guess I would also just like to think about, as I'm thinking about that, just to sort of think about language around presentation, you know, when we talk about how people need to reach out or if they want to do presentation or what have you that, you know, the policy just includes something that, you know, if accommodations are required to let us know, right? So basically if I'm imagining somebody who, you know, maybe doesn't communicate with words and uses a, you know, maybe has cerebral palsy, is not communicating with words, needs a device to be able to articulate, or not needs a device, but needs a system technologically to be able to communicate with their device, right? Like any sort of accommodation like that for public presentation, I think we should just be thinking about, align like that in all of our policy, right? Like if there are combinations of, yeah.

[Ruseau]: Yeah, that's, sorry, let me interrupt. Yeah, I think along the same lines, we may wanna have a separate policy to, because then we can, if you have a separate policy that affects all policy, you can tweak and change and update, especially as the law changes and not have to run around and find all the instances where it is. And I certainly, We'll take a note on that, because I think that's a, you know, I have not looked through our policy manual to see if such a thing already exists. We should get moving along. Is there a motion to approve this for the full committee?

[Graham]: Motion to approve. Second.

[Ruseau]: Thank you. Member Graham.

[Graham]: Yes.

[Ruseau]: Member McLaughlin. Yes. Member, so yes, three in the affirmative. This will be sent up to the school committee at our May 10th meeting for approval. And now we're gonna move on to the second part. So this one is, our current policy BEDB is for our, it's incredibly brief. I'll show it to you real quick. And BEDB-E is the policy that includes the specific of our agenda. I'll start with the- Point of information. Yes.

[McLaughlin]: So can you tell us what BEDB stands for? Maybe we could spell it out the first time so folks know what that actually is.

[Ruseau]: It doesn't stand for anything. It's a numbering system.

[McLaughlin]: Oh, it's an alphabetical in order numbering system. I see.

[Ruseau]: Yeah, I mean, the B I believe stands for, let's see, board governance. But then under that- Yeah, I see what it is. Yeah. Okay. I tried to figure it out myself, but I, and so many policies could belong in multiple places.

[McLaughlin]: So I wonder why they don't, why don't we use numbers then instead, because it just begs that with all the acronyms that exist in education, this sort of opens the question for me, like, well, what does that acronym mean? And if it means nothing, like, why are we not using numbers? And maybe it's just because that's the way it was done before.

[Ruseau]: Yeah. I mean, You know, if you went to another school committee and looked up BEDG minutes would be what you would find there. So we subscribe to the service from MASC. Yeah. And, you know, this dash E for instance, most people don't have it. So I think that once you start adding things in a finer granularity, they just start adding letters. So our current meeting agenda policy, which I am recommending we actually I don't even know the language to retire. That's the real language, lists the order of business. And I believe this is in fact what we have done. We have had many conversations about the problems with this. So I'm just showing this to you before we go to my suggestions. And then there's also this other one here called agenda format. I won't read it. but it is just the arrangement of the agenda, who will do it. And nothing in here is being changed in my suggested policy. So let me come back up here. So I had initially been working towards very, very slow evolution of our agenda, but I feel like we keep coming into things where it's like, it's time to stop being quite so evolutionary and to just take a big bite here. So this is a policy that when implemented by Susie, frankly, will create the agenda. So as a result, it is not a typical policy. At the bottom here, there's this document format information. It says that things are italicized, indicates that they should be filled in when building the agenda. Content that is in quotes must be read by the chair and information in the brackets is purely instructional and does not get included in the actual agenda. So there's some policy before there's some actual formatting. Superintendent conferring with the chair of the school committee will rearrange the order of the items on meeting agendas as provided in this policy. The committee will be judicious in their use of rearranging the agenda at a meeting as this can lead to open meeting about complaints when an item was indicated to be later in the agenda, but it's suddenly taken up early, resulting in a limitation of the public to participate in our open meetings. We saw this in city council where something was early in the meeting, it was tabled and then like, At midnight, it was taken from the table and nobody was paying any attention anymore. And I don't think there was anything malicious going on there, but the public was not happy. And if we put something as the 12th thing on our agenda and you're making dinner or whatever else you're doing, and then suddenly it's the first thing on the agenda and you come to the meeting an hour in and we're on number five and you're there for number 10, but number 10 never comes because it was taken early. We need to be far more judicious with our use of that and just rearrange the agenda before we actually send it out to the public. That's what we're gonna do. That's my logic behind that language. Oh, and I literally said those exactly those same words right here. Superintendent in consultation with the chair will rearrange the agenda prior to the posting of the meeting to accommodate presentations to the committee as may happen from time to time, but these may not include community participation presentations. So frequently, if we have somebody coming to present on some product we've purchased or curriculum, we've asked somebody to come from Harvard or something to come and speak about some project, making them spend all night waiting to do their presentation is just ridiculous and not professional. Rearranging the agenda to move those people up ahead of time to the early part of the agenda is totally normal and allowed, but community presentation should be in the format. It should be in line. It shouldn't be that community participation just is wherever. Any school committee member, staff member, or resident may suggest items of business. The inclusion of such items, however, will be to the discretion of the chair of the committee. A staff member who wishes to have a topic scheduled on the agenda should submit the request to the superintendent. That's current language. I mean, I may have moved or changed the words slightly, but the agenda together with supporting materials will be distributed to the school committee members at least three days prior to the meeting to an adequate time to prepare for the meeting. Materials that are already earlier than the three days prior to the meeting should be distributed to the school committee members when these materials are substantial in length. I'm just thinking if we're gonna get a 500 page document about a Harvard study, Friday evening isn't gonna be enough time for me to read it for Monday. So that's not a, it happens frankly a couple of times a year and we need time to actually read the stuff. Agendas will be posted in the compliance of the meeting law and be available to the press. So here's the bulk of this. The format of the agenda will be, Some of the stuff I've taken from city council that I have found very, very just nice. And what number of meeting of regular meeting of the Metric School Committee are we in? The first, the 12th, whatever. Obviously the very first time Susie does this, she'll have to go and look and count, but then from then forward, she'll know, cause she'll just look at the last one. The month of the date and the time, the meeting location, And here I have specified a few options. So part of this new format is to compensate for our current situation of being on Zoom and to also compensate for when we get off of Zoom or we're also on Zoom so that we don't have to redo this all over. So meeting location would be remote by Zoom only or in-person at the and then Alden Chambers and by Zoom or in-person at the superintendents conference room only, whatever is the right language, but then this is all part of the policy. So any active provisions of emergency orders. So this is that giant blob. When it's active, it'll be here. And when it goes away, it'll be gone. And then should there be another reason for emergency orders, they would just be inserted. We don't have to change the policy. Finally, we get to the actual agenda. Roll call of attendance of members and the student representative. Salute the flag. And then next is community participation, which has been moved way up. And looking at lots of other communities, this is pretty normal. They put community participation way up. And I think that that's, I think that's just respectful. Yes, ma'am.

[McLaughlin]: Thank you. I'm wondering about, and maybe this comes under the suspend the order, but I'm wondering about when we know that there's a lot of people to speak on a particular topic. Do we want to wait until sometimes there's a, you know, there's a, the superintendent is discussing the topic and then people want to respond to this discussion of the topic. So I'm just thinking about times in the past where I've been in meetings and I'm sure you guys have been there as well. I know you have member Rousseau where the room's been packed to speak about a particular topic. And so I wonder if in that instance, it makes sense because there's a ton of people talking about that topic. And then we just sort of go on to the normal procedural stuff as opposed to having this community conversation.

[Ruseau]: Well, and that is so this is just the presentations that we just discussed. This is not you have something to say about an item on the agenda. So it based on my experience in the last year and a half, I 80% of the time there is no public, there is no community, there's nobody doing a presentation. We just have one on dyslexia. Did we have that? I'm sorry, I forget. So this is just those, this is not the public comment.

[McLaughlin]: So maybe we could articulate that so that we are the presentation specifically not public comment yet. So we're gonna need to include this community.

[Ruseau]: I'll just read this. I'll just read this out loud because it answers some of the questions that the superintendent and Lisa had earlier, I think prior to your joining. So this is a sort of a summary slash rewording of much of the policy we just worked on, trying to make it so that the chair does not have to read for half an hour. Regular meetings of the school committee include this community participation agenda item to give any resident the opportunity to place a presentation before the school committee. A resident may only present once at any meeting. These presentations are an opportunity for the public to make a presentation to the, probably should find another word for that, but to the committee, but are not opportunities to dialogue with the committee. If one or more members of the committee wishes to have a conversation about the topic presented, the member may, A member may request that the item be added to a subsequent regular meeting. The details for submitting a presentation can be found within the policy BDH public comment and community participation. So this part here, Lisa had asked about earlier, This is really a substantial clarification. It's not actually a change, but for most people it will look like a change. And so this will be part, so this stuff in quotes would be read by the mayor every single meeting, sort of like a refresher. Yes, member McLaughlin.

[McLaughlin]: Yeah, I guess this is, and I can understand sort of the questions around this. So I'm thinking about in the past, before I was on the school committee, you know, when we would come on multiple occasions, either presenting as part of the special ed parent advisory council or concerns from the, you know, annual report or concerns from the special ed parent advisory council about things that, you know, we were hoping would be discussed or communicated. So this is a huge, and it had- This is not those though. Huh?

[Ruseau]: This is not those. This is not the normal business, you know, CPAC presentations or the PTO presentations. This is not those things.

[McLaughlin]: I see. This is strictly non-organization, individual participation presentations. Is that what you're saying? Or it could be a community group, I guess, right?

[Ruseau]: Right. I mean, the example from the last year that is most salient is Ms. Ronay presents on dyslexia. or I frankly am running short of other presentations, but this is anybody in the community, they want to do a presentation to us about something within our authority. And it's not the things on our schedule. We have that schedule. I believe the CPAC presentation is in there. And honestly, I do expect this to be usually empty as it frequently is now. But I think having this here and explicit may make members of the public feel that they want to do one. I don't think that's bad. If every week we have 15 presentations, we're going to have to revisit this, but that's always been the policy, so it's not like it's new.

[McLaughlin]: Yeah, and I think just making it if I may and I think also just making it really clear. If that's the case if somebody is coming before us to present and I know that this will be read at every meeting but also just either the chair through the chair I would assume, making it very clear that we appreciate the presentation and we want to let you know that, you know, we appreciate And, you know, it can be put on an agenda for discussion in the next meeting. But we're, you know, based on our policy, we can't discuss it at this meeting. So that I just think it's going to be awkward if somebody comes before us with a presentation, and then we're like, okay, thank you. And nobody responds, right. So I think we need to make it really clear that it needs to be because we need to allow members of the community to understand and give us a time to review the presentation so that we can respond? Is that why this is here?

[Ruseau]: Well, I think you turned just after we finished that conversation. So I'm sorry. So I'm sorry. No, that's okay. That's okay. You've got to have you got to ask your questions here. So no, so this is about, you know, the presentation. And I don't mean any recent presentation. We're not fact checking presentations. We're not fact checking the law that might be referenced. We're not This is, I sit down at PowerPoint and I write what I wanna write. I do it on Wednesday and I send it to the superintendent. Whether or not it's accurate, whether the superintendent may want to do some work to respond, whether we may wanna go and do our own research as members and investigate, well, is that what I heard? Is that really what I, is that true? And all of that takes, time and energy and planning that is completely, it would be short circuited if members of the public could just simply come in and decide our agenda, which is really what would be happening here. So, you know, we also are not supposed to be deliberating on this. So this by its nature has to be stuff within our authority. So if this is within our authority and the presentation is within our authority, if we start talking about it and make emotions and like that's deliberation and it's not on the agenda as our business. And so, I know this is your first term and I don't mean that in any way other than simply a statement, but in Zoom it's very different, but in the actual Alden Chambers, we would have a presentation come to us and we would all sit there like deer in the headlights and not say anything. And if the presenter was asking a question for which we all wanted to answer, we would not answer. And it was super awkward, so awkward. And I think this language can make it clear that this is why. And it isn't that we don't care. And one of us is probably gonna reach out to you about, you know, maybe getting this on the agenda. So, and I see this same problem happen at City Council and not problem, but I see this same scenario roll out City Council and at other meetings and other communities. So.

[Evangelista]: Thank you, that's interesting. Thank you.

[Ruseau]: You're welcome. Anybody else wanna talk on the community participation statement look okay? I do realize now that, oh, actually, let's move on to the report of the superintendent. So, oh, that's just the report of the superintendent. This stuff under here is not related to that. So being that this is the policy, it looks wonky. When it gets actually created, an agenda gets created, it won't look so weird. So the superintendent's report would come next after community participation. I think that sometimes is a little later. It is later. And frankly, I've certainly heard the feedback that that's the best part of the meeting. It's often the best part of the meeting for me. So moving it way up, I think is really important. And then the next part. So this is, again, so pursuant to policy BEDH, the public comment and community participation. Any resident in the audience may be given permission to speak once on any item of the agenda for up to three minutes. Okay, we've just read this whole thing. I'm not gonna read it all again to you. And there's that a welcoming community is both a value of the school committee and an aspirational goal about our rights and responsibilities regardless of the duration in our city. And then when writing provide all of those details. So that just gets read. That's not a, at that moment, people can start raising their hands to talk because that's not actually an item on the agenda. But prior to this, there's nothing on the agenda for the community to raise their hands and talk about. The roll call, the presentation by another member of the community, the superintendent's update, that's not the time when we have community people raising their hands to ask questions. After that though, is what we do. So we, the superintendent would, sorry, the chair would read that language, and then we would go straight into stuff that is often earlier. We have the report of subcommittees, and if there are none, I'll say none. Dr. Edward-Vincent?

[Edouard-Vincent]: Member Ruseau, could you change that to report of committees? Because this also includes special meetings, committee of the wholes. And so the language on the, even though subcommittees are also clearly delineated there, I just wanted it to, if you could make that tweak. Yes, thank you.

[Ruseau]: Thank you. And then next, so continued business. Yeah, sorry.

[Graham]: Before you continue, I think in a prior meeting, we talked about the committee of the wholes and the special meetings being part of the consent agenda, superintendent. Um because they because they are attended by the entire group we're really just approving minutes where the report of committees the because they are subcommittees they are not attended by everybody and the the the chair typically provides an update and then the minutes are voted on so I think this was I think the original intent was just simply that this was the subcommittees because there would be like an actual report out and then approving the minutes versus like the committee of the holes are just going to be part of the consent agenda, which is a little bit further down where we are just like in one fell swoop, approving all of that stuff without discussion, because it's just a matter of approving minutes.

[Ruseau]: Thank you. I remember Graham. I forgot all about that, even though I wrote this. That's correct. So yes. So continued business, this is formerly known as old business. I can go to another school committee conference and they yell at us for using the words old business. It's apparently very much not an acceptable way to describe things. So this would be items that were tabled from a previous meeting. We sometimes struggle with this, but we table something to the next meeting and then we sort of forget. the most recent example is the face mask policy. We tabled it to the meeting, the very next meeting, and this is not a criticism, by the way, of anybody here. Frankly, I didn't even realize it until it was too late. But this is continued business, anything we've tabled. And then I realized that I think we have a lot to learn from the city council. this is not the end game here as far as I'm concerned. We don't have a numbering system for motions and all that other stuff that the city council has that I think is excellent. Stuff doesn't just kind of get lost. And when I look at why it doesn't get lost, it's because it has a number. We can have a number and we can have a what happened to it. But we don't go there in this particular agenda update to this policy yet. anything that has been tabled will show up on this list. It must be disposed of by an up or down vote to approve or deny it, or the member who submitted it, one of the members who submitted it can withdraw the item so that it just drops off the agenda going forward. This is something I imagine where we have a motion, it gets tabled, and then come the next meeting, it's actually resolved and not even needed anymore. The member can just motion to withdraw it. And the entire item will be on the agenda. So as it was when it was under new business, this is actually necessary to comply with meeting law versus just having a placeholder that doesn't tell anybody anything. And I've indicated that it would say tabled on and then the date so we can all you know, maybe once a year go through our table stuff and say, all right, I don't want that anymore and get the agenda down from 40 pages down to three again. Any questions on continued business? Okay. New business is new business. It's practically the only thing on here I didn't think needed to change other than where in the agenda it is. And then the consent agenda, which we have previously approved in the full school committee. This just simply moves it in the actual agenda and I've added language. So I, you know, I'm trying to make this policy both descriptive and instructive and prescriptive so that, you know, the chair will know how do you do this the first time the chair sees this. And, you know, the chair will ask, is there a motion to approve the consent agenda? That's the words. That won't be on the agenda. That's not gonna be printed on the agenda, but that will be in the policy. So the actual agenda would show, consent agenda, and then on the next line would be like, number one, approval of minutes for a date, approval of payrolls, approval of bills. And then the chair will ask this. Somebody hopefully will motion to approve the consent agenda. There'll be a second. we do the vote and then everything on there is just approved. And then if there's something in there that a member wants to talk about, we have a consent agenda. I sometimes have an edit to the minutes of a particular meeting. I do not offer my edit. I say, I would like a division to take item number four out. So then the rest of it is approved. And then item number four is called specifically, and then I could make my change to the minutes. Dr. Edward Benson, did you have a question?

[Edouard-Vincent]: Yes, I just was going to ask, based on the feedback that member Graham shared, if you could put within that consent agenda, committee of the wholes and special meetings, because it's only three of you who are here right now. And because this is a significant shift from what we've done before. And so that anything where all seven of you are present. So then they understand that that's where the distinction is between consent agenda and the previous section about reporting out on subcommittee activity. Thank you. Member McLaughlin.

[McLaughlin]: Thank you. So that's an interesting distinction. So does that mean that if we're in the consent agenda and we don't ask for a division of the subcommittee meetings, we're not sharing with the community what occurred at the subcommittee meetings as we have in the past? I mean, I know that we are on paper, but we're not actually explaining it.

[Ruseau]: No, that's number five up here, the report of subcommittee.

[McLaughlin]: So what do you mean by special meetings?

[Ruseau]: Sorry. Sorry. Yeah, so the, if a special meeting is just, if a meeting is called, we had a special meeting just before we closed the schools for the pandemic. Well, it's not a committee of the whole, it's not a regular meeting, it's a special meeting. I mean, I think there's been two in my three and a half years and they're never for good reasons, so. It's a special meeting, we're not happy. So let's see, the next is item number nine, reports requested. And this will take a little time to get us to really be in compliance with this policy because a lot of the information that is listed here, I don't know that we necessarily had our fingertips. So I don't, you know, the first time this new policy is used to draft an agenda, it may not end up perfect That's fine, we'll get there. So this would be a list of the reports that are outstanding that we have approved. So the chair will ask, are there any updates on outstanding reports? The superintendent may provide an update on any item. Members may ask for an update to their particular report. Like I've been waiting for this report since June last year, is it coming or not? You know, we also can, by the way, send an email. We don't have to make everything public. Everything doesn't have to happen in public as individuals. We can ask the superintendent these questions about whether something's forthcoming. We may request that it be rescinded. So we got approval for a report and it turns out, oh, well, that's actually a report that the DESE website has. You know, none of us knew it. we found out later we wanna ask for it to be removed or it's just not important. There might be reports on the first day of school during the pandemic. I'm gonna bet that if we have some, it might be okay to rescind those. And there's just details on how to do that. Only members have asked for the report may rescind them unless the requester is no longer on the committee. So if a former member has requested a report, it should still be here. We voted as a committee, it is the committee's request. But if that member is no longer here, the members may, any member may ask for it to be rescinded, it would have to be voted of course. And then the reports would list the following information, the date the report was approved by the committee, the name of the report, the members that requested the report and the date the report is or was expected. And our whole report policy, which we approved in 2019, does require a name, for instance, of a report. That's why it should be there. Any questions on that? And then this is new. I see it on agendas and I absolutely adore it more than I can tell you. The next meeting's listing. This should be a list in, you know, I understand this is not always gonna be complete, especially when there's those big three week gaps between meetings. It'll be all of our meetings between now and the next regular meeting, inclusive of the next regular meeting. So not the whole year, but subcommittees, committee halls, special meetings, hearings, and the next regular meeting, the date, the time, and the meeting location. And if the Zoom information is available, and that would be handy too. Member Graham.

[Graham]: I was gonna make a suggestion that the next meetings part become an appendix so that there's no obligation for the chair to be reading off like the list, but instead it's just available as part of the agenda. So I think the condolences could be read, the meeting could be adjourned. they don't, this list doesn't need to be read out loud, but just simply the fact that it's there, I think is important. So I just, you know, when we get to the end of the meeting, whatever time that may be, like reading this list is not gonna be meaningful for anybody as so much as having it on the agenda would be.

[Ruseau]: Thank you. I actually, I definitely did not envision that this would get read at all. And although sometimes the chair might want to say the next regular meeting is, but so I've changed the actual text from next meetings to next meetings and then for informational or informational information only just informational. And then I added to the instructions that the chair would know that this is not read. Cause I agree. Is there other things on here that should not be read? No. Oh, reports requested. Oh, no. She simply will ask, are there any updates? Does that satisfy that number, Graham? Yeah, that's fine. And then I added condolences as an actual thing. It's literally on every single meeting, unfortunately, and we don't have it officially part of our agenda. policy. So I so I know it's a lot to digest. And I think I sort of look, look at this is we try and then whatever doesn't work, we come back and fix it. But I hope that looks good.

[Edouard-Vincent]: I was going to suggest that you reverse the numbers for condolences where condolences used to be under the new classified under new business. So if we're having condolences that it be Roman numeral 10 and 11, I actually like having it listed as an appendix, but if it needs to be numbered, then leave that as, 11 because we also list all of the upcoming meetings on our weekly communications for one week at a time. So the parents and community have access to it on a weekly basis as well, upcoming meetings.

[Ruseau]: I think that's smart. And it also sort of reinforces that number 11 doesn't actually get read. I will actually, I just realized that I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. That adjournment. It's literally on agendas. Um. We should have that there.

[McLaughlin]: Um Motion to approve.

[Graham]: Okay.

[Ruseau]: Member Graham.

[Graham]: Yes.

[Ruseau]: Member McLaughlin. Yes. So yes, three and affirmative. And then we have. The last item on our agenda. Thank you, I have the right one up. Dr. Cushing, is this the right one? Great.

[Cushing]: Let me just double check. If you scroll down. Down or up, whatever that is. I changed the reporter to say Director of Pupil Services.

[Unidentified]: Where?

[Graham]: The second to last page. under record-keeping requirements.

[Ruseau]: Thank you. Here it is. Right there. So what is it you changed? I'm sorry.

[Cushing]: So where it says the contact information for the district Title IX coordinator is as follows. It should read Director of Pupil Services.

[Ruseau]: OK. So we are, by the way, just for some context, this is a policy we approved. And I'm actually not supposed to be editing my, let me create a copy.

[Graham]: So the only change to this policy is the Title IX coordinator, correct?

[Cushing]: So let me just turn on my camera. Rude, not to have my camera on, I apologize. When we were reviewing with council, this was recommended to be implemented wholesale, just to make sure that our policies are complete in this area. And so another edit that I made, I apologize it didn't save, is when we're looking at Medford High School. And then you'll notice that there's a, and I know what happened in the conversion from Microsoft Word to Google Docs, sometimes doesn't exactly play nice. So the Medford High School, and then you could just put MVTHS on that. And then.

[Ruseau]: Conversion. There's some conversion stuff going on here. Yup. The Medford High School assistant. Assistant principal.

[McLaughlin]: M-A-T-H-S, Paul.

[Ruseau]: Oh, thank you. Assistant principal.

[Cushing]: and middle school? So the question, so at each level, there should be one, it appears based on the way the policy was written by MASC. So I did not add in every school's assistant principal. But, you know, I could see, you know, there should be one person that these are reported to. So an assistant principal at Medford High School, Medford Votational, an assistant principal at one of the two middle schools, and an assistant principal at one of the four elementary schools. Now, we just need to make sure that in the student handbooks, that those are very clearly articulated, because that might be a person that you're not necessarily familiar with.

[Ruseau]: So we want to have one individual for each level. Correct. And I guess, you know, operationally, if I'm going through this as somebody who wants to file a complaint or something, you know, there's four assistant principals at the high school, there's two in the middle school, there's four in the elementary schools. So how do we write that to make it clear? Remember McLaughlin? Sorry.

[McLaughlin]: We also need to include Curtis Tufts.

[Cushing]: And I would, to member McLaughlin's point, I would simply add another slash and put CTHS.

[Unidentified]: And, you know, the other thing you could put is just Medford High Schools. But I think it works this way.

[Ruseau]: So, but back to my question about, Where's Chandler Street? Right, sorry. I'm not a member of that?

[Cushing]: Right, so.

[Ruseau]: Okay, sorry. We have some updates.

[Cushing]: That's the other, I mean, you can delete that, and then the phone number might be beneficial to put the central office phone number, where then it can then be sent out. from there. I think what we have here is a nexus of policy and then the procedure that will follow it. And so the procedure will be clearly articulated in the handbooks as to who needs to be specifically contacted. Say like, you know, if you have an issue with sexual harassment, you need to reach out to boom, this elementary assistant principal who has received either specialized investigatory training or something along those lines where, you know, that it can be properly investigated.

[Ruseau]: Okay, so would you, do we want actual names here or?

[Cushing]: I don't think in the, so, and, you know, I don't think in the policy you would have specific names. I think here you could have the district contact information, and then you could simply say like, these will be articulated in the individual school handbooks as to this, because this policy will be essentially cut and pasted into all of our school handbooks once we adopt it, right? And so then that will be an edit that each principal or each level will have to say, you know, Peter Cushing is the assistant principal at Medford High School who will respond to sexual harassment, complaints of sexual harassment.

[Ruseau]: So do we want to specify the actual address and phone number or just... I would say the director of people services, you can put 49 Winthrop Street.

[Unidentified]: And then...

[Ruseau]: Yes, let's go first.

[Cushing]: Okay. And I think anybody happen to know the telephone number offhand for the Director of Pupil Services offices, the main number.

[Unidentified]: I just don't have my phone booked right in front of me.

[Ruseau]: I think unless, sorry. Lisa, was that you? Go ahead, Lisa.

[Evangelista]: Director of Pupil Services, Joan 393-2383.

[Ruseau]: and we have to pick. Thank you. I mean, I don't, I don't, you know, what we approve here has to go to the whole school committee to become actual policy. So I know I, as a subcommittee chair, certainly feel comfortable approving this with the assumption that these pieces of information will be filled in prior to arriving at our meeting. And I, Do the other members have any qualms with that? No, okay. Were there other changes?

[Cushing]: No, no, we basically took the boiler plate that was provided for us and made those few minor tweaks.

[McLaughlin]: Can you go back to the top, Member Ruseau, sorry? Sure. So was this formally, just if I may, was this formally referred to in any other language, i.e. bullying policy or anything like that?

[Ruseau]: I don't know if the bullying prevention and intervention plan references this. I have to admit, I would I don't know where I have this in digital format, so I'm searching for it. It doesn't look quite from a format perspective to be related. And actually, let me look to the last page for the legal references, because if there are different legal references, then that would sort of answer the question.

[McLaughlin]: Yeah, I'm wondering how they differentiate it. And maybe again, it's a Howard question, I don't know, but I'm curious.

[Ruseau]: So this one is a reference to National Law 71, Section 370. Totally different sections of the law. So, you know. rational to think that there's a relationship and there maybe could be integrated or overlap.

[McLaughlin]: There's definitely intersectionality. So I guess sorry. Yeah. No, that's good.

[Ruseau]: But yeah.

[McLaughlin]: I wonder if we should include some language to that effect, just that there may be overlap and intersectionality between this policy and blah, blah policy, and both should be referenced or something to that effect, because I think one might assume that this supersedes another, which was what I was wondering when I was looking at it, because obviously I'm not an attorney. So, yeah.

[Ruseau]: So, Dr. Cushing, could you just, I think I talked to you about this, about how this change is related to the prior federal administration's view of Title IX that was a bit unwelcome to public schools, and that there's an expectation that we will be redoing all of this yet again once the new administration has had a chance to get to this issue, is that correct?

[Cushing]: Yes. And I mean, it was actually reported on about six to eight weeks ago that the current administration was looking into the changes. The changes are much more favorable for the alleged aggressor rather than the target. In respect to member McLaughlin's concerns about the bullying policy, there is a, There is a natural intersection under Massachusetts law where it references bullying, but the only mechanism in the law to address bullying is through criminal harassment. So that's the natural intersection. So there's no, if I'm remembering correctly, there's no consequence unless you go through the criminal harassment piece, which is, you know, that three times and then whatever comes with criminal harassment. Now, they're school-based, obviously, but that's school-based under Massachusetts General Law, Chapter 7, Chapter 37, section O, which specifies bullying and all those types of things. So if you want to put a reference down there, I mean, whereas I will say once again, though, where we subscribe to this policy service by MASC, the MASC attorneys vet these and link them fairly well. But there is probably a natural intersection there because of how the law works in relation to bullying.

[Ruseau]: Sorry, I just, so we also are going to be, we approved an update to the bullying prevention and intervention plan just because we had to get one through quickly. But I believe it's on my board here of, things to actually go with a fine-tooth comb and go through this whole bullying prevention and intervention plan. And I feel like that that is probably easier to work this stuff into the bullying, because this is a plan with actual steps and what to do and when to do it. And in my mind, frankly, it's a much better policy. and this thing that we have perceived, which is just a reflection of Title IX. I don't know if anybody has thoughts on that. Because this came before this update for the sexual harassment, for this policy we're looking at today. And given that this policy we're looking at today is going to be before us again by the end of the summer, maybe. hopefully will look significantly different. I don't know, I just think maybe we can put our focus on the one, the thing that we know isn't gonna be changing every 15 minutes, the bullying prevention and prevention plan.

[Cushing]: That's the, I would say that's the only thing that I hope is that we are not going to be yo-yoed, for lack of a better term, with varying administrations and changing Title IX because, I mean, our staff has already gone through significant retraining on this. And there's, I think it was August 15th last year was when the regulations changed. And so there's actually, you need to know both because if something happened before August 15th, you need to follow those regulations. If something happened after August 15th, you need to follow these regulations. So it's definitely something that I know many school leaders are hoping gets resolved in a more permanent manner.

[Ruseau]: Well, it's a good thing you had nothing else going on last summer that might've kept you busy. My goodness. So, I mean, Member McArthur, do you have any specifics about the current language that you would like us to change?

[McLaughlin]: I guess I would want, what I'm suggesting is one line somewhere that talks about the intersectionality of policies, you know, regarding harassment and bullying and, you know, should be referenced. or the individual policy should be referenced around intersectionality for bullying and harassment, something along those lines, just a one line so that people don't. So I'm imagining, say, for example, you're a parent or a caregiver and you've had the unfortunate situation where your student has experienced something along these lines, and you come into or are looking at the policy online to figure out under which category, you know, your situation falls. And again, even around training for staff, you know, are they differentiated? If so, how, you know, in you know, where is the intersectionality? And I don't know the answer to that, but it seems to me that there are some. So, you know, it's just a similar situation. It's just interesting because it's a similar situation when you're thinking about, you know, special education complaints. I mean, there's a special education complaint system for procedural guidelines for IEPs. And then, you know, there's intersectionality with civil rights, right? So you have one office that handles one thing and another office that handles another thing, but there's certainly intersectionality across the two. So I just, you know, in the interest of being informed, I want to make sure that the community understands that, and the staff, frankly, understands that there's intersectionality, but I'm not exactly sure what that sentence should be. And it sounds like you're saying it, you know, may fit in the bullying better than it fits here because of the federal administration's guidance. So I'm okay with that. I just want to be on the record that, you know, we need to do that in one or the other.

[Ruseau]: Thank you. Member Graham.

[Graham]: Perhaps at the end of the policy, we can just add a line that says related policies and put a link in there to our bullying policy. And I think that covers us.

[Ruseau]: Yes, we actually sometimes have a related policies in the policy information section. This was copied from MASC, so it didn't come in. I just have to find, I'm just going to actually call it the bullying

[McLaughlin]: And I would also just offer potentially procedural guidelines for special education as well as an intersectional policy, but related policies.

[Ruseau]: What's that called? Sorry.

[McLaughlin]: I'd have to look at the actual document, but it's procedural guidelines for special education We get them in every mailing of everything we get from the school. I'll ask Joan exactly what the name is, but.

[Ruseau]: Okay, I'll put down that you'll get me the exact words. Okay. Um, so, um, let me hold this so I don't forget that and send that off to the policy service. Um, and what was the other one I want to bold so that we don't send that off?

[McLaughlin]: I found it member Ruseau. Oh, you did? Okay. It's, um, parents, sorry. Um, parents notice of procedural safeguards.

[Ruseau]: Excellent. Um. All right.

[Evangelista]: Um. Motion to approve.

[McLaughlin]: Second.

[Ruseau]: Thank you, everybody. Um member Graham.

[McLaughlin]: Yes.

[Ruseau]: Remember my coffin? Yes. There is no yesterday in the affirmative. This If we don't have answers to these folded items, do the members mind if this actually gets held back one meeting?

[Graham]: That's fine.

[Ruseau]: Great, thank you. So if you can't get that done before Monday, you can have the next couple of weeks after that too. Because you have to pick the person, I think, right?

[Cushing]: We actually already have them identified. So we can put that in and have it ready to go for Monday. Excellent. I don't want to necessarily delay.

[Ruseau]: Sure. That's fine. Great. Great. So are there any other questions or comments? Thank you all. I appreciate that we were all willing to go an extra hour tonight. I just didn't think any of these things could really wait. So is there a motion to adjourn?

[McLaughlin]: Motion to adjourn. Second.

[Ruseau]: Thank you. Member Graham?

[McLaughlin]: Yes.

[Ruseau]: Member McLaughlin?

[McLaughlin]: Yes.

[Ruseau]: Member Rossell, yes. Three in the affirmative. Thank you. Have a good night. Thank you, Dr. Edwards and Dr. Cushing.

Ruseau total time: 71.66 minutes total words: 10261	Graham total time: 7.03 minutes total words: 976	Edouard-Vincent total time: 7.1 minutes total words: 878	McLaughlin total time: 7.76 minutes total words: 1402