[Jenny Graham]: Looks like we're good. Well.
[Will Pipicelli]: We are good to go.
[Jenny Graham]: Hey, I'll go ahead and read the meeting notice so we can get rolling here. Please be advised that on Wednesday, January 28th, 2026 at 6 p.m. there will be a communications subcommittee meeting held through remote participation via Zoom. This meeting is being recorded. The meeting can be viewed live on Medford Public Schools' YouTube channel, through Medford Community Media on your local cable channel, which is Comcast 9, 8, or 22, and Verizon 43, 45, or 47. Since the meeting will be held remotely, participants can call or log in by using the following Zoom link. The Zoom meeting ID is 959-883-9222. 261-6016. You can also send questions or comments during the meeting by emailing jennygram at medford.k12.ma.us. Those submitting must include the following information, your name and address, your Medford Street address, and your question or comment. I will start by calling the roll. Jenny Graham here. Nicole Morell? Here. Will Pippaselli?
[Will Pipicelli]: Here.
[Jenny Graham]: Maria Dorsey.
[Will Pipicelli]: Here.
[Jenny Graham]: And Marissa Desmond. I don't see Marissa on. OK, so we have three present, one absent in terms of voting members. So we have a quorum. And then welcome Emma, who is from the city of Medford's communications team. Thank you for joining us. I know it's like a busy night in Medford. But we think you picked the best meeting to come to. I agree. Thanks for having me. And then the other folks on the call, I think, for those of you who may not have met some of the other folks in the call, Jen Carlson, Matt Galeno, Linda Laporto and Adele Sands are all from left field. They're our owners project manager. Hi, everyone. And then Matt Rice and Helen Fantini are from SMMA. They're from our team of architects. So. Welcome everybody, so our agenda tonight is a couple of things. 1 is to talk about. both upcoming scheduled meetings and to think about who our key audiences are in Medford and how we reach them. So I think Emma, you'll be like really, really helpful in that conversation. So I did put together with Linda's help, a starting point just to get us like going in the right direction in terms of like thinking about all the various audiences and what they might want to know. And I think, you know, we may or may not have identified all of the audiences or we may want to spike them out as we, as we move along. So since it is a fairly small group, I think we can not worry so much about hand raising and those kinds of things. But just go ahead and like, get this document in shape. So let me share my screen. Can you all see that?
[Unidentified]: Yep.
[Jenny Graham]: OK, great. OK, so the first thing that I did with Linda's help is just try to outline some of our different audiences and the kinds of things that they might want or expect from the SBC as we go forward. So I'll start with the row across the top just to give you an orientation of what's here. And then we can maybe move through the different audiences without, we don't have to repeat everything all along the way. And then I think once we maybe go through all of them, we can talk about what's missing. And specifically in places where we have some placeholders or some question marks or nothing at all, we can talk about how to fill those in. So, like, if you go across the top of this grid, we have our stakeholder group. So, for example, the school committee. And then what we tried to do was, like, group them into, like, some categories of what their primary concerns might be. So, not everybody cares about the same things. And lots of people, like, sort of end up in many of these buckets. So, we tried to be—I tried to focus on, like, the primary things. And then the communication objectives, really sort of like in a big broad sense, you know, keeping the school committee informed on the status of the project and the ed plan, obtaining the required votes on the ed plan, for example. And then the preferred channels for the school committee is pretty easy. We have meetings. I provide a monthly update. We hold special sessions. It's all very, like, streamlined and regulated. So everything that happens with the school committee happens via a formal meeting. So they're easy to articulate in this way. And then just some frequency and notes that I try to plug in, mostly so that if there are people who are joining us or watching, they have some sense of what is happening already, because there is actually a lot happening. So if I go down this list, Hold on one second. Where did that go? I think I lost something here. Here we go. Just found a weird little loop in my document here. Um, so. Okay, so the 1st, 2 categories are school committee city council. I think 1 of the things that. You know, there will be times where the city council will have to meet that to take formal votes, but that will come much later in the process. So, I think for now, and for the feasibility study, just primarily what I'm hoping this document can can carry us. through um there's not an active like set of requirements for the council to weigh in but we obviously want to keep them included and involved so um we did talk about we did have some members of the council join us on monday night when we reviewed the ed plan and the status of the project so that was great and then as we kind of look forward um You know, a couple of the things that I was thinking about is, like, do we do some sort of quarterly update for them, which I can certainly talk to the council about. And then the other things that I thought might be helpful is like, a CC to them on updates that go out to parents of students so that they know what they're. Constituents are getting, which might require some expansion superintendent of your Friday email list so that they have access to that same information. Um. And then invitations to the meetings, um, particularly and I would, I think for those, like, particularly the ones that are, like, important meetings where we're going to do some extra outreach. So. That's sort of how this whole thing is. And then we have our legislators on the bottom of this page. So, again, like, their needs in terms of the things that we're wanting to keep them. Apprised of they often tune into council meetings, so just including them in invitations to meetings that are already happening was sort of where I was thinking about. Our state delegation, and then we will have an invitation to them in March to come meet our team so that our delegation has some dedicated time to ask their questions, et cetera. and then just ad hoc updates as we go.
[Unidentified]: Excuse me, Jenny.
[Maria D'Orsi]: Excuse me. I have a question.
[Unidentified]: Yeah.
[Maria D'Orsi]: It's Maria. Hi. Um, are is there any requirement? MSBA seems to have requirements for everything. Is there some requirement on their side? Um, as far as communication with school committee? Well, not school committee. Obviously, that's not the group. Um, but with the city council with legislators, do they have some important in this?
[Jenny Graham]: Not here, so no, formally, no. The MSB does not have its own requirements. They tend to, and Matt and Linda, keep me honest here, they tend to rely on local communities to follow their own ordinances about how building committees and projects are done. And to my knowledge, like Medford does not have any sort of structure that is outside of our SBC. And, um, like, in other communities, they have, like, standing building committees that are involved in projects like this, or they have, like, town meeting and there's all kind of any number of ordinances that some other communities follow in terms of these kinds of things. Like. I, in my research, I've not found anything that requires us to do anything here in Medford, although I consider the council partners in this work. And so making sure they're informed and they know what's going on, I think is important, but not required.
[Linda Liporto]: Just to add to that too, Jenny, one of the very few requirements that MSBA somewhat not very clearly states is that they require us to have a certain number of community forum meetings during the first process of the PDP and PSR. I think, Letfield, correct me if I'm wrong, I believe they require us to have three public meetings of some sort in the first stage.
[Matt Gulino]: Yeah, yeah, it's three. Yeah, it's only three and we'll end up doing more than that. You know for this we typically do. But yeah, it's usually three formal like community forums that are required. I will add that, that the only approval that we really need from city council is the approval on the debt exclusion. So they'll have to approve whatever the total project cost ends up being at the end of schematic design before it goes out to vote. In Medford, the council will have to approve that debt exclusion, whatever it ends up being. But from a scope and what's going in the building standpoint, unless it's specific to Medford, which as Jenny said, that doesn't seem to be the case. There's not really a requirement through the MSBA for city council to approve the project aside from the debt exclusion.
[Jenny Graham]: Um, this, the next grouping, um, are another, like, group of our, I'll say our, like, our heavy hitters in terms of people with high interest in the project. Um, 1 is our butters. So we have, I think, just for those of you who may or may not know this already. Um. We have, like, identified sort of the range for our butters. So we have a, like, a. Fenced off area on a map of who the abutters are. And they're actually, all things considered, aren't that many abutters to this project because we're largely surrounded by fells. But we have actively been working with abutters because there's been so much site work happening. And as the site work got started, we hand-delivered letters to all of our Abbotter homes and made contact with the folks at the temple so that they knew what was happening from a site work perspective. And they also got an invitation to join our Abbotters email list so that we had a quick way to reach them. The uptake on the, like, Butter's email list is not huge just yet, and I expect that it will continue to grow as the project progresses. We are also sort of in the end stages of putting together a postcard for the abutters, so they get like another kind of communication from us. And that postcard will tell them, will invite them to two specific meetings we have on the calendar, particularly for abutters, where they can come in, they can like look at whatever, wherever we are in the project, provide input, get their specific questions answered as being abutters. So that's sort of the strategy for our butters is like knowing that they don't all have school age children and they're not all plugged in and that it's like a relatively small number like a postcard felt like the right way to like Be less labor intensive than hand delivery of messages, but another way to reach people and invite them to be part of the process. And then we'll hold some specific meetings for them so that they can come in and chat with us. And then the next 2 groups are, I think. They're similar in lots of ways, although maybe a bit different. And we probably need to do a better job on the teachers. But we have our teachers, obviously, big stakeholders in all of this, and our parents of current, our families of current students. So the interest there is sort of everything from site work to project options to cost, all the things. The things that we have been largely doing so far are making sure that things are going out in the superintendent's weekly update and posting information to social media with graphics and visuals and notices of upcoming meetings, things like that. And then I think the other thing worth mentioning with teachers is that we have held Sort of in tandem with our community forums, like teacher based community forums. Which I will add and we have another 1 coming up in March, which will actually occur on the professional day. So we're hoping that we'll have great turnout at that 1.
[Will Pipicelli]: Um, can I also just add to that? Um, just also do with all like the space programming meetings that they were that teachers were a part of a lot of the envisioning work that has been made it over November building tours. Um, so we've definitely been thankful to have their voice at the table in multiple instances so far and more more to come.
[Jenny Graham]: Thanks, Will. I was like, this one is just incomplete, but I'm moving on for now. Somebody will correct me. So I think, you know, one question that I have about, like, these two groups in particular is, is there something, is there anything we're missing, like, in terms of how we want to be thinking about reaching these two stakeholder groups? It's like Maria is trying to come up for me. I'm going to give her a second. Maria, are you trying to come off mute? There you are. You're on mute again, Maria.
[Maria D'Orsi]: Sorry, I'm on a Chromebook rather than my Mac, and I'm having a little difficulty. I'm not quite sure. Could you reframe your question about teachers and parents?
[Jenny Graham]: Sure. So I think there's a couple of questions. One is, have we have we correctly identified the things that they care about? And I think in these cases, like we've identified that these two groups care about all the things right in varying capacities. And I think the other question is, if we, if we sort of think about these being the primary ways we're going to reach them, whether it's like the superintendent's weekly update and social media posts, um, Are there things we're missing in terms of making sure that we are reaching these folks in a proactive way when we need to reach them?
[SPEAKER_09]: Jenny, it's Nicole and I apologize if you mentioned this, I'm operating on like two brain cells with a head cold. But the Gotta Know Medford, I mean, maybe it's not all of the time, but them being one of our few news sources in the city, that's not social media, that's not direct email that could be useful.
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah, I think that's actually a great call out. I'm gonna give them their own row. And I was supposed to meet with one of the editors there today. And we had to reschedule, so I'm going to just put them on as a placeholder right now. But yeah, I think that's a great call out. So if we scroll down, I think the other things that are, oh. Can you hear me, Jenny? Yes.
[Suzanne Galusi]: Okay. Really quickly, if it's okay, just based on street data feedback and then some of the preliminary feedback, which included parents and teachers in the survey about the strategic plan, there was a question in there around what is the mode of communication people most want to see when we're communicating important pieces and like the top three were the superintendent's newsletter or newsletters in general, school visits and listening sessions, and advisory councils.
[Jenny Graham]: Let's see. So I think from a school visits perspective for teachers, the community forums I think are like meeting that need. And for parents, was that feedback coming from parents as well? Yes. Interesting. So I guess the question, maybe a question for the group is like, how do we, Is that simply a matter of bringing the project to various school buildings? Because this project obviously actually is not going to really benefit the students that are there now, but instead be much more intriguing to folks that may not really interact with the high school very much at all right now, because their kids are much younger. So do you have any thoughts about how we might add that?
[Suzanne Galusi]: I think that's an option. I think inviting people then up to the high school for a community meeting or a listening session or a community space like the Metro Public Library, which might be central, or like the McGlynn, which is definitely central to the city, but maybe using one of those opportunities. I just think that And I can like disaggregate that so that I can see clearly what educators said versus what caregivers said. But if you just look at the top two responses, it's people want things in print, but they also want that personal touch and that human connection in a meeting where they could probably, you know, follow up and ask questions and gain better clarity.
[Adele Sands]: I do think in a number of our projects, school tours have been very effective with community members, people who don't come to school regularly, don't know why it's necessary, why this project is important, and sometimes having students doing the tours, explaining why it's so why it's difficult to do what they need to do, why it's difficult to get educated in this building. We've found, particularly with people who don't think it's necessary, suddenly they get a tour and they think, oh my goodness, how are kids functioning in this space? How are teachers functioning in this space? And it does have a different impact, but a good impact for people to go home and really think about it.
[Jenny Graham]: Adele, do you normally see the most success with those during the feasibility study phase, or is that a little bit further along, or both? Both. Both. OK. Great.
[Adele Sands]: Both. I think it's important. And it really depends on the community. But in one school, very distinctly, We were just beginning our presentations with the architects and there was such a negative from some folks. Once we took them through they were like, Oh, I didn't, I had no idea. Yeah. And I do know that with my own project. I was getting a lot of pushback from some towns and their financial folks. And then I took them through classrooms where there was no heat source. And suddenly they were our biggest champions because kids were having classes with their coats on.
[Jenny Graham]: We can take that away and find a place in the schedule to add that. I think that's a great idea. And lots of people have asked for that.
[Linda Liporto]: I agree. Also, just to stay on the parents' side, something else that we've done successfully on other projects as well is going to the schools of the future students whenever there's events. Obviously, I think we need a little bit more information or move a little bit further into the project, but something that's been nice is for us to sort of be present with some presentation materials, whether it's a table at when there's parent-teacher conferences or some events at the other schools, so that the parents are already there, and then we're there to offer answers and just updates when they're already going to the school, and it just kind of keeps it on that educational level. So that's definitely something that we can start doing. Maybe we need a little bit more information about the project, I think, before we can make that really successful. But it's a nice way when parents are already there to have to arrange for childcare and get out of their homes and get to another location to find out more information.
[Jenny Graham]: Is that most useful when we talk about a narrowed set of options that we're considering? So right now, I think most of you know, there's a lot of permutations, but there's 29 rough, high-level options. And by the end of April, that will narrow to three to five. That's our plan. And so are those meetings best held Like, when we have 29 options and we have 3 to 5 options, where is the right level of information to think about the calendar in that way, Linda?
[Linda Liporto]: I think it really depends on what kind of information or amount of information and feedback we want back from the parents, right? If we're looking for feedback on what they think options should be, then maybe it's earlier on, but although I think it's just completely overwhelming with the number of options right now, but- I am hearing that, that it was overwhelming how many options there were. Yeah, yeah. So I think it would probably be better served when we're really, really close to sort of narrowing down at least the educational piece of the project so that it's easier for the parents to sort of associate with that. Right now, it's just too much for them to really, unless they're really keyed into the process, it's hard for them to understand. I think from just passing by somebody in a hallway or standing at a meeting. So I think we need to get a little bit further into the project before we start doing that.
[Kimberly Talbot]: Yeah, if I can just add, I think the hardcore press is really when we start schematic, and that timing will be with fall open houses. And that is a great opportunity to start to build knowledge of the project, or especially those parents of younger students, get them excited about it. Sure.
[Jenny Graham]: I am thinking that, like, once we have narrowed to, like, that 3 to 5 range, Helen, to, like, that will be a good time to seek input, right? Like, in terms of, like, helping the SBC think about, like, narrowing that down. So I think we can maybe look at the calendar, maybe a takeaway for Will and Dr. Glucy is to look at the spring calendar and work with the principals to identify the things that are happening in that sort of sweet spot of end of April and May, where planning to have some presence at things that are already happening would make sense.
[Will Pipicelli]: Yeah, I mean, we definitely know that May is a really a full court sprint to get to the end of the year in terms of end of year events. So I was just thinking, as we were talking, like, if we ask principals to identify three end of year events, and we can kind of coordinate, you know, what would be best for our purposes, that seems pretty easy and flexible for everybody.
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah, and Emma, I think this is a great question for you from the city's perspective, and we're moving quickly into residents without current students. I think a lot about them because many people are residents with very young children or hypothetical children just yet, right? And they will benefit greatly from this project. But it is also really hard to find those folks and engage with them because they often aren't yet like woven into like and settled on like how they're going to participate. or not in our community, right? So they come to us with like their own lives that don't anchor them to Medford necessarily, right, in all cases. So I was curious, as we're talking about this, if you had any suggestions in terms of like, how do we reach the folks that don't have children in school? Like the people with kids in school, we have like a really, I think we have really clear pathways for them. I am worried about everybody else.
[SPEAKER_08]: Yeah, definitely. And I think it is going to be super important to educate those people on why they should even care about this project, which there are definitely reasons. I would say on the city side, we're always willing to share stuff on the city social media. The mayor has newsletters that go out to 4,000-ish people around the city. Our robocall system is also super robust that goes out to We have almost 50,000 contacts in that, so that's a great way to reach a ton of people across the city.
[Jenny Graham]: Something else we've done for... How many people get the Mayor's newsletter?
[SPEAKER_08]: About 4,000 I think right now, maybe a little less, but around there. Something else we've done for bigger projects like zoning or... maybe waste collection, stuff like that, is sending out bill inserts within people's water bills and tax bills and stuff like that. So that goes through the assessor's office, I'm pretty sure. And we can do a half page or full page just with general information. You could put upcoming meetings, stuff like that on there.
[Jenny Graham]: And Emma, do you have a sense of, The timing of the walks, we get a water bill every 3 months. Is that right? I think so.
[SPEAKER_08]: That sounds right to me.
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah. And so I think I just paid my water bill actually in January. So the next 1 would be.
[SPEAKER_08]: Maybe March or April.
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah. Do you have a sense of, like, if we wanted to put a full page insert in a water bill, like, when would we have to have it to. Whomever in order for that to be possible.
[SPEAKER_08]: I can reach out to Judy, who's the treasure collector for better information on that, but I would say maybe. I think she usually wants things maybe three weeks before the bills are sent out, because they have to be approved, obviously, and then go to print, and then go through the whole mailing process. But I can reach out to her. And the Mayors Newsletter goes out how often? That's monthly, the first week of every month.
[Jenny Graham]: OK. Would it make sense for us to? like provide you like a monthly update for the mayor's newsletter so that in a standing way, we just know that we have to give you some sort of update to let people know what's happening.
[SPEAKER_08]: Yeah, that would be great.
[Jenny Graham]: What's the timeline for that?
[SPEAKER_08]: Just like the last week of the month, if you could do that. That would be great. And we can leave like a standing section for school updates.
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah. And then the robocall platform, can you tell us a little bit about how that's used?
[SPEAKER_08]: Yeah, so we use it for- I guess I would say. Yeah. So we use it in two main ways. I would say one way is for urgent updates. That would be snow emergencies. We'll do construction notices to abutters, stuff like that. like if roadways are being repaved, things like that that are kind of time sensitive and maybe to more specific neighborhoods sometimes. And then the other way is the mayor does about every other week kind of like events and general important reminder updates to the entire community. But yeah, we can target by location. So that might also be a good way to reach abutters, because we can target the calls and emails and texts by specific addresses.
[Jenny Graham]: Oh, great. We should definitely do that, because we talked about that when there was real urgency to get to the abutters. And we had some high school volunteers make the rounds, which was fun. if they appreciated the volunteer hours. But there's like two feet of snow now, so it's a little bit harder to do right now. Yeah. OK. We can definitely do that. And then there was something else that you said that I was interested in. I'm trying to remember what it was. I don't know. Are there, oh, I know what it was. Are there events in the spring that you think we should be really thinking about? And you don't have to answer that right now, but if there is the list of city events that we should be planning for, we'd love to put them on our calendar if you could get that to us at some point in time.
[SPEAKER_08]: Yeah, definitely. I can think about that a little bit further. I know there's obviously a ton of Pride events coming later May, but mostly in June. I think we do Arab American Heritage Month events in April. So yeah, there's a bunch. So I can list a bunch of those.
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah, I think if you can maybe give us a list of the things where you think it might make sense for us to have a table and provide people some updates or information, et cetera, that would be great. Yep, definitely. The other question I had about the water bill, I think one of the things that I have heard like consternation about is that the water bill reaches the homeowner and like half of our city are renters. So how do we reach renters?
[SPEAKER_08]: that is a harder question that we're always kind of going back and forth about. I think the best way would probably just be a mailer to their address because that's not going to, you know, whatever owner address that's going to the people that live there that like get the mail from the bail box, you know? So I think that's the best way along with like digital communications too.
[Jenny Graham]: And, um, does the city do those kinds of, like, all address mailers?
[SPEAKER_08]: We have done them. I know, like, the PDS office does them probably most often. They're just kind of expensive, so we try not to do them. Or, you know, we're kind of cosperative from doing them too often.
[Jenny Graham]: Well, that was going to be my next question was, what does that cost? Because it is a lot of houses. Yeah.
[SPEAKER_08]: Yeah, PDS would probably have the most updated information on that.
[Jenny Graham]: Is that something you think you could check with PDS about and just give us some understanding of what the costs might be that they have seen before? Yep.
[s093VSbtp08_SPEAKER_01]: This is Jen Carlson. Sorry, my camera is kind of funky today. I was just going to say another thing that we've seen used in the past, even just, you know, mailing, not mailing, nailing up flyers with QR codes that say, are you interested in learning more about this project? Like put them on telephone poles or especially where there's, you know, denser residential that you are trying to, get people's attention. So something kind of flashy that's just kind of nailed up where people walk to kind of get passers-by.
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah, and I think the other thing that I'm thinking about that has been suggested to me is like, do we create a. A mailing list of people interested in updates on this project that. Perhaps get, like. Similar info to what is going to go out and like a superintendent's update. So, like, if we're going to send an update to this to the school community, is there a listing? Is there another mailing list of people who are interested in this? And obviously, we could push that out easily on social media and we'll get a few hundred people signing up. But if we perhaps, if we took the approach, if we were going to do some kind of a mailer. if we did some kind of a postcard or something like that, that gave them a QR code of like, here's the project website, here's how you learn more, here's how you sign up to get project updates to your email box. I don't know if you've tried that before, Emma, or if you've had any success with some sort of loop like that. We had mixed success so far with the Butters, I also think, like, it's very early in the project for the abutters to, like, be super-duper plugged in unless they are, you know, plugged in because they have children or, you know, kids who work in the school or, like, those kinds of things, you know.
[SPEAKER_08]: Yeah, I like that idea. I've worked with Office of Prevention and Outreach. We've done surveys for the new senior center website that we were trying to revamp. And so we sent out postcards with a QR code to the website and to a survey. And we got a pretty good amount of responses from that, I would say. So I think people are pretty responsive to that.
[Will Pipicelli]: And once we have all those emails, we can build the lists in final site relatively easily. And so right now, our system is broken down by school and role. So parents at the McGlynn or students at the Brooks, for example. If we just make a list of MSBA info seekers, I guess, and we can just send MSBA specific or just general project updates to them as opposed to. any school-based updates that may not be as relevant to them.
[Linda Liporto]: I think they then also put a sign up here, so to speak, on the project website with a button where you can just click on to enter your email address to be on the mailing list. I think once you get them there, the easy part is gathering their email address. The hard part is getting them. It's like a bad circle, right? Yeah. I need to get them the QR code to go and sign up for the mailer.
[Jenny Graham]: The other group that I'm going to break out here is community members who require translation services. Um, and we've been doing a lot of work, um, with the folks at city hall with Catherine, um, to provide like in person translation to some of our meetings and then zoom translation services. So I will call them out just so that they are front of mind as we're talking about all of the audiences that we're interested in reaching. Um, so I will add them to the list. Um, And then we have a couple of, like, specialty groups, so, like, our 1st responders, police department, et cetera. I'm making a broad assumption that email is the easiest way to get to them, but I think we just might want to ask them that question. And some of our upcoming meetings, because the things they're going to need to know are a little bit. Different than the broader community. Our boards and commissions, there's any number of boards and commissions. Will and I have a list of how to reach the folks on our boards and commissions. And we have been talking about putting out an email that introduces where we are in the process and asks them to provide us some feedback about the kinds of things that they want to know about so that we can tailor how we are communicating with our boards and commissions and we're getting to the right people at the right time. So that is upcoming. We have the Council on Aging here as like a separate group because I know that this project will be of great interest to our senior citizens, many of whom love our vocational programs and the services they're able to take part in there. And then also, obviously, when it comes time to talking about a high school and the reasons to say yes to a high school, to Adele's earlier point, Um, it's sort of like a less direct line for for the folks at, um, at that the council and aging might have access to. So. Um, I think we have to think about the right way to reach those folks beyond what we've already talked about. And I don't know if you have any secrets, um, in terms of, like, reaching that population that we should be adding to the list.
[SPEAKER_08]: Yeah, I mean, I know off the bat that Pam Kelly runs a really great newsletter for seniors that's also monthly. And that gets mailed out and like hand delivered to a bunch of places across the city and like a bunch of addresses. So that's a really good option. I would also say for the senior center, they do a lot of like in person events there. So maybe during one of their like lunches or something like that, people could just go with a table and just kind of talk to people face to face. I think seniors would probably really appreciate that.
[Adele Sands]: I concur, Emma, absolutely. I think bringing the culinary arts, bringing cookies from culinary arts or treats and having people go to them during an event, I think that's a very good opportunity.
[Linda Liporto]: Right on target, I have two districts that preferred meatloaf lunch hour specifically to come and talk.
[Jenny Graham]: I know the mayor is a regular there, and she likes to call bingo, but we can't let the kids gamble. But other than that, I'm sure we can find something else. I can reach out to Pam. and find out if she has any other suggestions about, you know, how to make, like, more consistent contact with those folks. And again, like, invite them to be part of the mail list so that we start, like, amassing a list of, like, the people who are interested in knowing more about the project. And then we had MHS alumni on here, and I think that's a great idea. I don't have a good sense of like how to reach the MHS alumni, or if we have a way to do that.
[Suzanne Galusi]: I don't know if there's necessarily like a complete network, but I can work on that one. I would probably start with athletics, as well as our like guidance department. There are stakeholders that we're missing. Did I miss a specific separate block for students?
[Jenny Graham]: You did not. And I'm going to add them right now.
[Matt Rice]: I assume that includes both high school students and potentially middle school and or elementary. And we might want to break it out there. Sometimes elementary is like, it's great to do those events and we have done them in the past, but as well, like the, the, the, the benefit that's going to come from that may not be as directly tangible as talking with middle school students, potentially.
[Adele Sands]: Do you have like eighth grade tours, Suzanne, or, or. Yeah, seventh and eighth grade tours. That would be a great. Yes, it was seventh grade. Yes, we can embed that. That's a perfect time to. OK.
[Will Pipicelli]: Yeah, we can have something set up for curriculum night that happens in the spring.
[Adele Sands]: Perfect, yes. OK.
[Jenny Graham]: They just narrow the list of things that they're interested in. I'm going to go out on a limb and say our students are less interested in project cost. How glorious for them. Yes.
[Adele Sands]: The only group, the only stakeholders that don't care about that.
[Will Pipicelli]: I would, I don't know if it's worth adding to that list, like how it would affect like their learning, because I was talking to a student who was filming the Mistletoe Concert last week and I was telling him about the project and he was asking like, oh, so like, does that mean like we're going to have to go to pods? And I was like, we don't know that. It's a little too early to tell. But that was one of the first things that he asked me about. So I would imagine that's on the top of mind for many of his peers.
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah, so I think, you know, one question I have is like, what is the best way for us to be reaching students right now?
[Suzanne Galusi]: I think, I'd actually like to talk to the principals about that, because I do think it's going to vary from level to level. But I think there's multiple ways. I think there's clearly with school Councilors, there's with building leaders, and then I think there's also with clubs and activities. I'm meeting actually with all principals on Friday, and I can start to bring this up. Yeah, that would be great.
[Adele Sands]: And there are different ways that we can participate in that also. I mean, if there are ways that you would like our group to engage with students, young students, and talk about the building, you know, the process, the building, we can change it up depending on the grade level as well.
[Jenny Graham]: Adele, do you have suggestions on how you've done that before beyond like a table at like a curriculum night kind of thing? Absolutely.
[Adele Sands]: I mean, actually, I can reach out because we have done at different schools, different levels, gone into classrooms and had kids build things. But I can certainly reach out. We have a couple of people on staff who've kind of made it a semi-career to go into elementary schools to do this, so I certainly can. They've written it out, so I can gather that. And as, you know, depending on the older grades, it's more interesting when we get more in the design like when we're really designing the older kids can participate that a lot yeah but with the little ones do the elementary schools still do that exercise where they create like a
[Jenny Graham]: Medford. Create Medford or I forget what it was like the future of Medford. Yes, kindergarten. And is there like maybe an opportunity to like have them create a high school instead of Medford?
[Suzanne Galusi]: I mean, is it a possibility? Yes. Do they have necessarily as kindergartners a frame of reference for what that might be?
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah, that was what I was wondering about, too.
[Suzanne Galusi]: Yeah. I mean, a lot of times when you see what they want Medford to be, it's like a giant amusement park. Disney. It's always a zip line.
[Adele Sands]: They're animals. There's lots of slides. There's a giraffe in the court.
[Jenny Graham]: Yes. Yep. I think that could actually be really fun. I can't imagine what they would come up with for a high school.
[Suzanne Galusi]: I'll add it to the principal conversation.
[Jenny Graham]: Okay. Is there anybody else like audience-wise that we're missing that you all can think about? Oh, Maria?
[Maria D'Orsi]: Yeah. It's actually not an audience question, but we really haven't talked about the community media or, you know, the TV where people can view maybe interviews, meet the architect, meet the designer, Um, I don't know how well used or how well, um, if people are taking advantage of our community stations, but I, I know when Suzanne's dad was the chairperson of the, of the building, the future, I watched that weekly show that he had that he was showing progress and. talking to people that were involved. And it wasn't question and answer, it was just, you know, information that they wanted to get out. And I found it very interesting. So I think maybe that's something we could think about too. And when Will and I had talked with the teachers in the TV area at the Vogue, he very much wants to get involved and have the students involved.
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah, I think that would be great. And we actually have a little mini project Matt and I are working on in the next week or so. So we'll start airing some fun content around some of the space considerations that we're talking about now.
[Suzanne Galusi]: And I don't know if it's for this meeting, a separate meeting, this list, a different list, but what about community partners, places of business, Tufts.
[Jenny Graham]: We can add them. Oh, sorry.
[Matt Rice]: Sometimes we go to the Chamber of Commerce meetings. I was just going to say that. Yeah.
[Jenny Graham]: And Suzanne, as you're thinking that, we would want to reach them separately somehow, or that they have a different level of interest, or what are you thinking about?
[Suzanne Galusi]: I would say yes, and. I think in my mind, there's a lot of businesses that have legacy holds here in Medford, or community partnerships that do a lot to support. Um, the schools, a lot of the programs associated with the schools. And I think it would, some of the outreach might look different, but I think there's a lot of community partnerships and businesses that would be, would be helpful to lend a hand.
[Adele Sands]: Yeah. I agree. The other thing is, Chad has to have two advisory meetings a year with all of his programs. And that's a great place to get to them to do a presentation. I don't know how he does it. Sometimes it's one time it's just a working event and the other is more of a eating event, but to do a presentation for the whole, through all of the advisories together and then send them off to their groups to talk about specifics is also a way to get your, your local businesses, the people who co-op your students have them involved. Yeah.
[Jenny Graham]: Is that like a schematic design activity or is it more of a like right now activity or both?
[Adele Sands]: I always think that involving the advisories because from the very beginning, it doesn't have to be specific later on. next year's advisory. I mean, there's a fall and there's a spring. One can just be, we're here, this is what we're doing, this is where we are presentation with questions just to keep them invested and involved and feel like they're volunteering to be on this advisory to say your input matters to us. But then later it becomes more, Are we missing something? Have we not thought about something with your program? Have we, because these are the people in industry and say, have we not considered something that you think is coming down the pike in your program?
[Jenny Graham]: And Suzanne, did you have other thoughts about reaching community partners?
[Suzanne Galusi]: I mean, I can still continue to think about that, but I, my first inkling was what Matt said about starting with the board of commerce. But I think there are a lot of groups that also sponsor or assist some of our school based groups between clubs, activities, athletics, that I think we could maybe also generate a list
[Will Pipicelli]: Even if it's just also to like establishing a relationship and hanging like a flyer, like learn more about the Medford High School project, like just expanding awareness about it as well.
[Jenny Graham]: Is there anyone else that we're missing? Okay, so I've been keeping notes of some of the to do's and the details that I'll weave into all of this as we talk. The next table, give me just one second, I'm gonna drop it all onto one page. This next table is our planned community meetings coming up. And sort of the, I'll say the goals of each meeting in terms of what we're trying to accomplish to give people a better feel for what the pathway is, and I think the question that I had, and I'll go through the list, is are there other things we should be doing to reach the stakeholders beyond what we've already talked about that would be unique or different Um, as it relates to, like, getting the word out about, like, particular meetings, or are there things that should happen before certain meetings? Are there, like, places where we should be adding things in? So, I'm just, I'll run through the list from top to bottom, and we'll, like, do it in chunks. So, February's busy. So, on the 2nd, we have a school committee meeting. That's where we're expecting the school committee to approve the educational plan so that it can be submitted later in the month. On the 11th, we'll have a building committee meeting. We'll be reviewing our space planning findings of all the surveying work and the work that Helen and Matt's team has been doing so far. And we will see a review of the cost of the 29 initial alternatives. On the 23rd, we will have a meeting that we will, where we will approve the PDP submission that's due later that week to be submitted to MSBA. And on the 25th, we'll have a meeting, it's very targeted around whether or not we pursue a construction manager at risk model. And there's a presentation that we have to hear about what those options are versus design bid build. An application that has to go in and then ultimately a selection committee to pick up to select the that and that all that work would happen in the spring as well. And that brings us to, like, community for number 2, I didn't have the date handy, but I think it's like, the 1st, week of March. So, the idea of that community form is to say. Here is this sort of bigger point of view of all the options that are on the table, that are still on the table, and the rough costs associated with each of those to solicit some more input there. And then at the end of March, the building committee will meet. And what we'll be doing there is sort of taking all the input that we have so far and saying, what is our decision matrix, essentially? So what are the criteria that are important to us? What is the weighting? And then how are we going to have a thoughtful approach that moves from 29 to 3 to 5? So that's all happening in February and March. Any questions about any of those things or anything that you think is. Not that we should be thinking about adding in that timeline, given what we have to do in meetings.
[Will Pipicelli]: I know the, uh, the March 3rd PD day for staff can definitely add it to this list.
[Jenny Graham]: Is it the 5th for the community forum?
[Will Pipicelli]: A fifth for the forum and then a third for staff.
[Suzanne Galusi]: I think we got a time for that too. Just we have a lot of key people on this meeting. Did that already go out?
[Will Pipicelli]: I don't think so yet, but OK.
[Jenny Graham]: Okay, so then. At the end of April is where we'll be narrowing from 29 or 25 or however many we have that we submit at the end of February to 3 to 5 using that decision matrix. So I do think. Something there should be some sort of input. Um, session before that meeting on the 27th, or some sort of, like, I think there'll be high community interest in. Like, the narrowing of the options, so I'm curious for this group. If you have thoughts about the kinds of things we should be thinking about adding to the calendar. In this space where we're going to go from, like, 29 to 5, say, to 5. Would that be, like, the right time to be doing an open house? That could also double as, like, here are all of the options on big pieces of paper, so you can take a look at them.
[Will Pipicelli]: Yeah, I mean, the week before that is April break. I believe.
[Unidentified]: Yeah.
[Will Pipicelli]: So the, the March, the March community form is essentially like, this is the, this is the latest updates. These are some of the designs.
[Jenny Graham]: March 23rd.
[Will Pipicelli]: Yeah. And then. So what's, what would we then need between collecting that input and then late April when we narrow it down?
[Jenny Graham]: I think it's just another touch. That's a big narrowing of options. So just giving people another opportunity and maybe bundling it on a day where there can be some building tours would make sense.
[Suzanne Galusi]: So does that mean you want it during either the April break or a Saturday?
[Jenny Graham]: I definitely don't want it during April break. Because I don't think there will be enough people around to do it, but maybe, like, early April, like, I think we could certainly do that in early April. Just looking at the calendar and we could do it on a Saturday. That'd be fine. So, we can find a date for it. Yeah, like, add another date, but I think does everyone on the call think that's like a good idea or is that a horrible idea?
[Adele Sands]: Oh, that's a good idea.
[Jenny Graham]: OK, perfect. Oh, go ahead, Adele.
[Adele Sands]: No, I was going to say, I mean, if you could get some kids, I mean, either Honor Society kids who need some time or any programs that really are underwhelming right now, we could have kids. Kids are very compelling on these tours. They will tell you the straight story. They will definitely tell you the straight story.
[Jenny Graham]: Okay, then May 4th, we have a. A school committee meeting where we have a plan status update on May 20th. We'll like. again have a school building committee meeting and we'll have like a this is where we'll have a refined cost estimate of the three to five options that we selected in April. We have a meeting on the 27th just for like additional discussion about those three to five options wherever we're at whatever the like back and forth is. And then the decision of which singular option will go forward is slated to be made on the June at the June 10th meeting. So I think the other question I have is in the like In the May-June timeframe, are there other things, like, we'll plan to do some community-based events in that timeframe, it sounds like. So we'll add those to the calendar for sure. But are there other, like, bigger events that we should be thinking about doing in that timeframe?
[Suzanne Galusi]: Is this where you want to be weaving in some of those community events? Because I think Will and I can work on that with principals as well as May is typically arts month. So I think there'll also be a lot of performances, art shows. Yeah. Got it.
[Jenny Graham]: They get the whole chart. They get a whole row. So I do think that if that's our May strategy, I think that makes sense. And if we have done the community meeting legwork, like the bigger community meeting legwork in the lead up, we can be focused in May then on getting out to all of these events and not trying to do both of those things at the same time. Does that make sense to everybody?
[Suzanne Galusi]: Yes.
[Jenny Graham]: OK. What else are we missing?
[Suzanne Galusi]: That seems like a question for the experts who have gone through this several times. Or Emma and Will.
[Adele Sands]: This looks very comprehensive. It really does. And as we go through this, we also may see things, see opportunities, or people may bring opportunities to us. You may hear somebody say, oh, can you come too? Yes, we will.
[Jenny Graham]: Yeah.
[Adele Sands]: Okay.
[Linda Liporto]: And as you start going through the process too, you might get a better feel for who feels like they're getting good information and who, they might give you ideas of, oh, this group is not somebody that we had thought about, but now we have two people that have said, oh, hey, I'm with this, and we didn't know about this or such a thing. So I think once you have the starting plan of reaching out, people will also give you opinions on where it's missing or where it could be useful. I think the key is just to make sure that we don't give out too much information too early and that it's concise and it's the same consistent message to everyone, right? So that nobody ever feels left out or too clued in, if you will.
[Matt Rice]: Does it make sense to have any additional touch points for Butters? Um, on this list, um, later in the process, I know we talked early on about it, but, um, like a special meeting, um, primarily for butter is obviously public. Anyone can attend, but really to let them vocalize their concerns in a more direct way to the project team.
[Jenny Graham]: We have two meetings on the calendar, one in March and one in.
[Kimberly Talbot]: I think it's May. Yeah.
[Kimberly Talbot]: We have two.
[Matt Gulino]: Yeah. March and April right now.
[Kimberly Talbot]: Okay. Yeah.
[Jenny Graham]: And I think, you know, one of the things that's like challenging about this is like, to the extent that you have like a lot of offshoot meetings, you are, you are then like having a lot of conversations that everyone doesn't have the benefit of hearing. Right. And that becomes, I think that becomes could become challenging for the building committee to keep track of, because they're not going to be able to be at all these meetings and things are going to be, like, changing or suggested based on something they didn't hear. Right. And so I think 1 of the things that we've been trying to do, at least so far. is like funnel people to the places where those big conversations are happening, which is the building committee meeting. And we did have a number of people come out and I think the feedback about the, the Mentimeter like way to interact with the presentation has been pretty positive. So I think, um, you know, for those like bigger input sessions, um, it is helpful to, for those to stay like focused, but I think there'll be like, you know, lots of good, if we can come up with like a presentation that we take out to all of these different places and a way that we collect input. So just so that it can be shared back with everybody, I think that will be key. Okay. Is there anything that we didn't talk about that we're missing? And is there a vote to allow me to update this per our discussion and submit it to the larger building committee for input? So moved is Nicole. Thanks, Nicole. So a motion by Nicole. Is there a second Maria? Thank you.
[Unidentified]: Maria, was that a second?
[Maria D'Orsi]: Yes, it is. Sorry.
[Jenny Graham]: That's okay. Okay, I'll call the roll. So, Jenny Graham, yes. Nicole Morell?
[SPEAKER_09]: Yes.
[Jenny Graham]: And Maria Dorsey? Yes. And Marissa Desmond is absent. So, three in the affirmative, one absent. That motion is approved. Is there a motion to adjourn?
[Maria D'Orsi]: Motion to adjourn.
[Jenny Graham]: Motion by Maria, second by Nicole. Roll call, Jenny Graham, yes. Nicole Rell? Yes. Maria Dorsey? Yes. And Marissa Desmond is absent. So three in the affirmative, one absent. The meeting is adjourned. Thank you, everyone.
[Adele Sands]: Thank you.
[Jenny Graham]: You have a good night.
[Suzanne Galusi]: Good night.
[Jenny Graham]: Good night, everyone. Thank you very much, everyone.
[Will Pipicelli]: Jenny, what's the language on the motion, the first one, the communications plan?
[Jenny Graham]: to update the plan based on our conversation and submit it to the building committee for input. All right. I guess I'll stop sharing. Perfect.
[SPEAKER_09]: Have a good night.
[Jenny Graham]: We're a few minutes early.
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