09.28.2026 MSC Regular Meeting (In Person)

AI-generated transcript — the recording is the record.

Agenda

[Breanna Lungo-Koehn]: Good evening. Good evening, everybody. We have the seventh regular meeting of the Medford School Committee tonight. We'll just make sure we're recording. Thank you so much. The 17th regular meeting of the Medford School Committee will come to order. Tonight is Monday, September 28th, 2026. Our regular meeting's at 6 p.m. and be advised that it's held here in the Alden Memorial Chambers, Medford City Hall, and via remote participation. And the meeting is being recorded. Meeting can be viewed live in the Medford Public Schools YouTube channel through Medford Community Media on your local cable channels, Comcast 9, 8, or 22. and Verizon Channel 43, 45, or 47. Participants can log or call in by using the following Zoom link and the meeting ID is 918-0256-6887. Member Ruseau, if you could please call the roll.

[Paul Ruseau]: Member Graham. Member Mastroboni. Here. Member Olapade. Absent. He's online. Can he unmute himself yet?

[Jenny Graham]: Present.

[Paul Ruseau]: Thank you. Thank you. Member Parks. Yes. Member Reinfeld. Present. Member Ruseau, present. Mayor Lungo-Koehn.

[Breanna Lungo-Koehn]: Present. Seven. Present. Zero. Absent. I know we have our student reps here. A new student rep. I'm sorry, I don't know your name. Leo, thanks for being here. What's your name? Lillian, thank you for being here. Welcome. If we all may rise, please to salute the flag.

[SPEAKER_06]: I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

[Breanna Lungo-Koehn]: We have our consent agenda, approval of bills and payroll, approval of budget transfers, journal entry number 21162, 653,933.55, approval of donations, First Baptist Church, $500 donation for Medford High School Best Buddies Chapter. and from the First Baptist Church $250 donation to the Medford Middle School Best Buddy Chapter. We also have approval of meeting minutes from our regular meeting on September 14th, 2026. Is there a motion on the floor? Or is there any questions? Maybe we could, if through the chair, if there's no questions on the floor, if we could just explain the $653,000 transfer. Thank you.

[Noel Velez]: Hello everyone today. What you have in front of you regarding the first budget transfer request for school committee was as doing the end of year reporting, I wanted to kind of lay out a few more things with our summer school spending. So I created two new accounts. which I feel give us a better overall understanding of how much we're actually spending in our extended school year, both in teachers and parasalary. So instead of keeping them lumped in one account, which we've been doing the previous year, I would say 10 to 15 budget cycles. I created two new accounts for next year. You'll get a better understanding overall of the layout of that, which also will help us better in the year reporting, separating para spending and summer school spending with teachers. With the leftover of that balance, I just moved it into undistributed salaries, which I'm hoping to use those fundings to approve all the new salaries for assistant superintendents, principals that were done after the budget. And I also created a security overtime account to separate them from the maintenance, just again, better for budgeting purposes and the year reporting, giving better, more accurate numbers.

[Breanna Lungo-Koehn]: Thank you very much. I appreciate the breakdown. And we also obviously have that in our packet. Is there a motion to approve the consent agenda? By Member Reinfeld, seconded by? Second. Thank you, Member Graham. Roll call, please.

[Paul Ruseau]: Member Graham? Member Mascobone? Yes. Member Olapade?

[SPEAKER_11]: Yes.

[Paul Ruseau]: Member Parks? Yes. Member Reinfeld? Member Ruseau, yes. Mayor Lungo-Koehn.

[Breanna Lungo-Koehn]: Yes. Seven in the affirmative, zero in the negative. Consent agenda is approved. We do not have any reports of subcommittees. We do have three reports from our superintendent. First up is the Mustang Moment, Dr. Galussi.

[Suzanne Galusi]: Can I just double? Just point of clarification. Can I just confirm that that vote was for all of the consent agenda? Okay. Thank you. So here we are. I'm so grateful to be able to introduce our Mustang moment for this meeting. In a few moments, we're going to have Director Fee and some very talented high school students come up and talk about a new installation of a mural that happened over the summer. And if you haven't had it, you'll see a little sneak peek here in their presentation. But I really would say it's just so inspiring to see it in person. So if you happen to be at the high school, please make sure you take a walk down the hallway by the library and make sure that you can kind of like take it all in in that space. It's just beautiful, beautiful work. So without further ado, I'm going to call up Director Fee and her crew of talented artists to update us about the mural installation. Yeah, come on up. Wait till it turns red. Wait till it turns red.

[Katherine Buckingham]: Oh, okay. Good evening, everybody. I'm Suzanne Fee, Director of Fine and Performing Arts. Last summer was the second summer that we were able to do a mural through funding through the CCSR, so students were able to participate for free. This year's mural is very Medford focused and tied really closely to our core values at the school. There are five participants here tonight. There are two other students who also participated but couldn't make it. Those are Douglas Casey and Aya Najjar. But I'm going to let the students tell you about our process and our inspiration and give you a whole picture of the mural. And we do hope you'll come see it.

[SPEAKER_11]: Good evening, everyone. Thank you for giving us the opportunity to share our mural project with you. Our mural is called Our Core, and it represents both who we are as students at Medford High School and what makes our community special. The goal of the mural was to show our pride in our school and our city, while the highlighted The core values that we try to live by at MHS, those values are respect, responsibility, and empathy and kindness.

[SPEAKER_10]: We wanted the mural to be something that people could look at and immediately recognize parts of our school and our community. But we also wanted the symbols to have deeper meanings. So instead of just putting random pictures on the wall, we researched different symbols from different cultures. and thought about how they connected to our values. The mural was also inspired by the work of artist and activist Shepard Fairey, especially his bold graphic style and use of symbols and strong visual imagery. The mural isn't just about making the hallway look better. It's really about telling the story of who we are. And before we could start painting, there was quite a bit of planning that had to happen.

[SPEAKER_12]: Before we even started painting, there was a lot of work that happened behind the scenes. Mrs. Fee and Mrs. Belanger first looked for the right location for the mural and figured out exactly where the panels would go. Our buildings and grounds team then prepared the brick and hung the panels for us. After that, Mrs. Fee and Mrs. Belanger primed the panels so that we would have a good surface to work on, and so the mural would hopefully last for a long time. That came the fun part, figuring out what we actually wanted the mural to look like. We started by sketching ideas, researching symbols, and thinking about ways to represent our school and our core values. We also worked with a specific color scheme. We sketched and planned the colors first, and then the teachers went out and actually picked out the paint colors that we would use. Once we had everyone's ideas, we used digital design tools to combine our sketches into one overall design. Then we projected that design onto the panels and traced it so that we could start painting. It sounds pretty straightforward when we say it like that, but there was definitely a lot of adjusting, changing, and repainting along the way. And once we finally had the design on the panels, we could actually start painting.

[SPEAKER_09]: Painting the mural took a lot of patience. We'd have to paint, step back, look at it, paint again. Something that looks good in a sketch doesn't necessarily look good on the actual mural. But development like this is key to the artistic process. The mural was not an idea, it was a project, and it came out very well. No space was wasted. For instance, on panel one, the image is dominated by two symbols. In the back, we have entering Medford, which is an obvious and direct connection to our community spirit. In the front, we have a handshake, an ancient symbol of respect with a deeper meaning. If you're shaking somebody's hand, that means you don't have a weapon in that hand, despite being within striking distance. The rest of the symbols we picked had a similarly deep meaning.

[8vfGP8SYT18_SPEAKER_13]: On slides two and three, one of the biggest symbols that we included in the mural is the Mustang because it represents our school mascot. It also is a symbol of partnership and mutual respect in a lot of Native American cultures. We also included an Ohene-Odwa symbol, which is an African symbol connected to respect and responsibility and the idea of valuing good leadership. We added turkey feathers because turkeys are common in Medford, and so it connects to like our environment in Medford. And on panel three, we have a ladder to represent ambition, but also diligence and responsibility. There's a hand building the ladder, which represents our commitment to helping members of our community reach their goals. There's also a poppy, which can represent peace and remembrance. And depending on the color, poppies can also symbolize compassion, the pursuit of goals that might seem impossible. So when you look at these panels together, you can see that we're trying to connect our school values to larger ideas like leadership, helping others, setting goals, and taking responsibility. And the final panels continue that idea, especially through symbols of kindness, compassion, and personal growth.

[SPEAKER_10]: On panel four, there's a dove, a universal symbol of peace and kindness. There's also an endless knot, which is a dharmic symbol representing the connection between wisdom and compassion. We included handwriting from the poem, Over the River and Through the Woods, written by Medford's own Lydia Marie Child. That was important to us because it connects the mural not just to Medford today, but also to the history of our community. Then, on panel five, we have a butterfly. Butterflies represent kindness, transformation, and overcoming hardship. We connected that idea to MHS because we want students to have the opportunity to grow and become their best selves, regardless of the circumstances. Then there's a hand, which can represent diligence and responsibility. This hand is a representation of the Virata Mudra, a Buddhist symbol associated with compassion and charity. And finally, there's 02155, which is our Medford zip code, along with a lotus, which in Buddhism can represent deep empathy. So when you put all five panels together, the mural becomes more than just a collection of images. It's a combination of our school, our city, our history, different cultures, and the values we want to see in our community.

[SPEAKER_11]: We hope that when people walk past the mural, they don't just see something colorful on the wall. We hope they stop for a second and think about what the symbols mean and maybe even recognize something that connects to them personally. The mural is located outside the library in the main hallway. So it's a place where students and staff will be able to see it every day.

[SPEAKER_12]: We want to recognize everyone who helped make this project possible. Thank you to the CCSR and the Cummings Foundation for their generous support.

[SPEAKER_09]: We also thank Ms. Belanger and Ms. Fee for directing the project and giving us all guidance. They also went and did a bunch of extra painting after we left.

[8vfGP8SYT18_SPEAKER_13]: We also want to thank the Medford Public Schools buildings and grounds team for preparing the space and helping with the installation.

[Katherine Buckingham]: Most importantly, we want to thank the student artists and designers who put so much time and effort into creating this mural. It gave us a chance to make something that will stay at MHS and become part of our school community, and we put it on panel specifically so that we will be able to transport it to a new school someday, hopefully. So thank you for listening, and we hope you stop by the hallway outside the library to see At Our Core in person.

[Suzanne Galusi]: Could you please, I did notice when the students came up, they didn't introduce themselves. I know it's on the slide, but could you just? Sure.

[Katherine Buckingham]: This is Lillian Schofield, who's a freshman. Jack Master Mateo, who is a sophomore. Bronwyn Summerock, who's a junior. Thomas Ronnie, who's also a junior, and Tristan Ingano, who is also a junior. And Douglas Casey is in ninth grade, who is not here. And Aya Najjar is a 10th grader, I believe. Thomas, you're a senior. I'm sorry. Thomas is the leader. He's a senior graduating this year. Bronwyn, you're a senior too. I'm so sorry. I guess I had my summer brain on. She just wants you to stay one more year. So that's our crew. And part of you will be here forever because of the mural. So we're excited about that. So we can take questions if you'd like.

[Breanna Lungo-Koehn]: Yes, wonderful. Member Reinfeld.

[Erika Reinfeld]: So this is stunning. I walked past it at curriculum night, and the people I was with, we were just taken aback. It looks even better than the photos. So congratulations. Well done. Excellent. And my question is, I love the deeper meaning. That is what art does. It brings more meaning to things. Is that information available on a QR code or a label or something? How can people learn more about the mural?

[Katherine Buckingham]: I'm glad you asked. There's a small frame to the right of the mural with each symbol and a little write-up about basically what we've explained here tonight.

[Erika Reinfeld]: Great. I'm glad people will have that access if they happen to have not been watching our meeting.

[Katherine Buckingham]: We felt that it was really important to personal interpretation, but we wanted to get that information out as well.

[Breanna Lungo-Koehn]: Yeah.

[Erika Reinfeld]: Thank you so much.

[Breanna Lungo-Koehn]: Wonderful. I think it's beautiful. I can't wait to see it in person myself. So thank you so much for presenting tonight and for creating such wonderful art at the high school.

[Katherine Buckingham]: Mayor, take a selfie in front of it when you get there, OK? I will.

[Breanna Lungo-Koehn]: I just did the last mural. I love art murals. OK. You got me. All right. Superintendent, do you want a picture? OK. If you don't mind coming in front of the reel, and we'll grab a picture. Great job. Next up, we have the State Accountability and Academic Testing Results 2026 Part 1. I'm going to turn it over to Dr. Kim Talbot, our Assistant Superintendent of Academics and Instruction.

[Suzanne Galusi]: What a nice way to start this report for Dr. Talbot, just that brilliance of the mural and the deeper meaning that our students put into the work just got right to my heart and soul with that presentation. Dr. Talbot has been putting in such tremendous work working with our instructional leaders across the district and this report is going to highlight some of the work that she's been doing and how it relates to accountability, our accountability scores with the Department of Education.

[yGcuIBQZTjc_SPEAKER_00]: Great, thanks, Dr. Galusi. So it was intentional from the curriculum department to break the marathon three-hour state accountability and academic testing presentation down into smaller manageable parts. Just to give each part its due diligence. So we're going to call this part one. And the focus is about accountability and some of the testing results. Part two, Ms. McNiff will come and present at a future meeting about the access results for our English learners. And then in part three, Drs. Khan, Chiesa, and Mr. Cieri will come and present the traditional MCAS outcomes. So welcome to part one. It is my hope today, because I have a little bit now of extra time and hopefully bandwidth from everybody, that this is broken down into three parts. The first is framing the role of state accountability and why it still matters. The second is to present Medford accountability data from last year, big picture. And the third is to peel back the layers a little bit to give you a peek inside how educators use accountability data to ask more questions and do some action planning and have a cycle of improvement. And we decided to move this presentation up a little bit because these were exactly the questions that you were asking Dr. Galussi at the last meeting when she presented her district-wide goals. Sound good? Great, so accountability and why it still matters. So accountability matters, you know this slide, this is our instructional vision slide. It matters because it's connected to a data informed approach. Yep, because it's connected to a data informed approach and high quality instruction. But also, I want to be clear that the accountability report is not just about numbers, it also really speaks to belonging, because it gives us lots of indicators that tell us how our kids are kind of feeling about school. So it's important for all of these reasons. I'm going to share a slide that you've seen before. This is what research says young people need to thrive. socially and economically. So in this wheel you can see that the students are at the very, very center and they are supported and surrounded by belonging. This is a theme that you heard all throughout last year.

[Unidentified]: Whoops.

[yGcuIBQZTjc_SPEAKER_00]: This is a theme that you heard all throughout last year, and it's really important to us. It really is the center of our work. But the state accountability is also a lot about an academic foundation. It is so important in the work of schools to support all of these factors so that our students can thrive in the future. And an academic foundation is, well, the foundation. And it really matters. especially to the students who need it the most. This graph I shared with you last February. And in this graph, if we read it from the bottom to the top, what we can see here is the high school students from middle and upper income families, their likelihood of earning a living wage by the time they are 30, 63%. But now I'll invite you to jump all the way up to the top where our high school students whose families are experiencing poverty have a much lower likelihood of earning a living wage by the time they're 30, 31%. But the joyful news for me and the reason that I'm in this work and so excited to be here is in that second row where you can see the power, the mitigating power of education to combat poverty and provide students almost as much of a likelihood of earning a living wage by the time they're 30 as if they were born to a middle or upper class family. This is the promise of education, and this is why accountability matters so much to us here. In fact, in Medford last year, from the Open Architects source, we had almost a third of our students reporting from families who experience poverty. So it really matters for our kids. These students are not in specialized programming. They're not necessarily EL students or students on an IEP, students on a 504. They are every student. They could be every student, and they are all of our responsibility. And so the state checks. The state checks to make sure that students are having a strong academic foundation by checking in on their English. Progress toward learning English is a goal in all of the grade levels. That's the access test. And they check on grade level standards for ELA, and math, and science, and civics is new to the party, but not unimportant, in a variety of grade levels. And it really matters. It matters so much that academic achievement is actually three of the five big indicators in the state accountability system. You can see that achievement in ELA, math, and science takes up a big chunk, as well as the growth for ELA and math. Also, progress when making English proficiency. Now, I should say, as a caveat here, it's not just about how well students do. The state works really hard to set targets for us. And they set targets on grade levels, and they set targets throughout our entire demographic population. And those targets are smart targets. We're able to reach them in a timely fashion. But they are also rigorous, and they are designed to close gaps. And so the state tells us how we're doing on meeting their target and closing those gaps. But it's not just about academic achievement. There are other factors that the state reports on in their accountability system, because we know it's more than just academics. Some of those criteria are nestled right into high school completion, things like a four-year graduation cohort, extended engagement for kiddos who takes five years to graduate, and then the annual dropout rate. And then there are additional factors, including chronic absenteeism, which is a K to 12, all schools, chronic absenteeism. And it's the percentage of 11th and 12th graders who complete advanced academic coursework. Even though this indicator shows up at the high school numbers, this is also a K to 12 indicator for schools and districts. So the accountability matters because these numbers show, they provide actionable items to families and caregivers about how their child's school is doing in terms of closing gaps. It gives us good information, too, about where to look next. Stay tuned for part three of this presentation. And it also helps the state determine where and how to direct the limited resources they have. And so that is the state's accountability system and why it still matters. I'm going to pause after each section for questions. I think that's easier than holding on to lots of info in your head. Any questions? Nope, you can keep going, thank you. Thanks, Mayor. Okay, so how did we do last year? Well, let's take a little look. So on this slide, I'm gonna walk through what you see here. This table has three pieces of information for each of our schools that have a population that's large enough to report out on and the district as a whole. I'll walk you through what the district as a whole looks like first so that I can orient you to what this graph is. The first is where the state determines we've made progress toward our goals. In the case of the district, we've made substantial progress toward the targets that the state set, and they are rigorous targets across all demographics. We could have met the targets, we could have exceeded, but we also could have declined and not met them, and all of those things are reported out. Here, we've made substantial progress toward our target. The line right underneath that talks about the state's assessment as to whether or not we require any intervention. Here you can see for the district, we don't require any assistance or intervention. And then finally, the percentages to the right are our accountability percentiles. So these are a normed percentile about how Medford has done with respect to other communities that are like us. You can see that in 2026, as a district, we rose to the 50th percentile. And the little arrow pointing upward says that was a gain from the previous year. This chart sees all three years. That's what you're looking at. So there's lots of good news here. In fact, you can see the strong outcome in raising for accountability ratings in seven of our eight schools. And one school stayed the same. That's pretty great news, lots of substantial and moderate progress toward targets. But even better than that, two of our schools increased their normed percentile by more than 10 percentage points. That is a lot of people working together for students toward a single goal. That is absolutely something to celebrate. But wait, there's more. Three of our schools are at a post-pandemic high in terms of their accountability percentage rating. This is incredible work that cannot be done by one principal, or one teacher, or one grade level, or one central office member. This is work that represents a consistent, coherent, strategic plan of buildings working together for student outcomes. So I'm going to pause for questions and celebrations.

[Breanna Lungo-Koehn]: Member Ruseau.

[Paul Ruseau]: This is amazing. Thank you. I really appreciate the presentation format and that we don't have to eat dinner before we come because it's so long. And I also like the the I mean these 11 or 11% increases in those two schools is, I mean, that's incredible, incredible. So thank you to you, the administration, and of course to the teachers and the building staff and everybody, because as you pointed out, this is definitely a team effort. Thank you.

[yGcuIBQZTjc_SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I appreciate that. And this is how it feels when you walk through buildings, too. Like, it feels like this. Like, people feel empowered and powerful and academically ready to go. Great, thank you.

[Breanna Lungo-Koehn]: Oh, sorry.

[Erika Reinfeld]: Member Reintel. So I'm looking at this. I'm just wondering what can we read into, if anything, about the variation across schools within the district?

[yGcuIBQZTjc_SPEAKER_00]: I know, such a great question. So it depends on so many things. So the state accountability data holds three or four years worth of information together. And it sets targets, but it only sets targets annually. So the target is set for you in December. Once you have your student outcomes in June, the targets get reset. And so the variability comes as a factor of all of those things. All the things that make work consistent or outcomes consistent for kids. If we don't have that consistency, you can sometimes see.

[Erika Reinfeld]: Like our two middle schools, their numbers are different. I think the trends are similar. And the elementary schools are different. So I'm just kind of wondering what to make of that.

[yGcuIBQZTjc_SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, those are really great questions. So this is super high-level data, and then each school looks at its own data and charts their own path forward. So schools have different configurations of teachers. I don't know, it's hard to say.

[Erika Reinfeld]: So am I right in thinking we're better off looking at the trajectory of an individual school over time rather than multiple schools in a single year?

[yGcuIBQZTjc_SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I don't think it's helpful to compare across schools in a single year in a district. It feels like that's not how the district is set up.

[Erika Reinfeld]: That's what's being measured here is the progress within.

[yGcuIBQZTjc_SPEAKER_00]: And the celebration of the progress of the height of accountability data in a post-pandemic landscape.

[Suzanne Galusi]: And Dr. Lucy. And the only thing I would add to that is just All the arrows are green. And so we're always going to have work to do. That is clear. That is evident. But I think the piece that Dr. Talbot and I and Kim Clinton, the whole senior team, as well as school leaders and administrators and teachers, we're really working on the consistency and the coherence. and the priorities of why we're here, which is the students. And I think this data really speaks to all of us rowing in the same direction.

[yGcuIBQZTjc_SPEAKER_00]: Okay, so now I wanted to tell you a chapter in the story of Medford about data-informed actions from the 25-26 school year. So I'm gonna ask Just for a little indulgence, we're gonna go in the way back machine so that I can tell you a complete chapter of beginning, discovery, actions, interim measures, and then I wanna give you an end to the chapter. So please join me one year ago today in September, and let's pretend that that's where we are. So, I'm looking at the accountability data, all of the criteria, and I need to decide what criteria am I gonna focus on? There's so much here. And so for my position as the assistant superintendent, it makes sense for me to focus on the number of students who are completing advanced coursework as juniors and seniors in Medford High School. This matters because this is a K to 12 indicator. Even though for students in K to 10, it's a lagging indicator, It'll take 11 years for anything we do in kindergarten to show up in this data. But it is very real for students in 11th and 12th grade. And every member of our school district can see themselves in this data. So this is what we're going to focus on. I want to remind you as we look at this data of the power of education to change outcomes for students, especially with respect to economics and the ability to earn, the likelihood of earning a living wage by the time you're 30. So this is deep in my heart, and so as I walk you through my action steps, the subgroup that I'm going to focus most on is the low-income students. So, how do I get to figure out what's happening? This is the accountability data that I just showed you. In 24-25, remember we're in the Wayback Machine. So the 24-25 accountability percentile for Medford High School was 32. We had moderate progress toward our goals. We didn't need any intervention or assistance. And that doesn't give me any action to follow on. There's nothing I can do with this data. So I'm going to dig a little deeper. On the state website, you can click in. And now I can find out how we did, how many points we earned on the targets that the state set for us. So what I've highlighted in red right there is the number of students who completed advanced coursework. And we got zero points for that. Sad, but not actionable. There's nothing I can do with that data. I don't know what our target was. I don't know what our points were. I don't know really where we were the year before. But I do know what to do next, and so I can dig a little bit deeper. This is all publicly available information on the state website. So I can dig a little deeper, and now I can find out what our targets were. Now I can see where the state said we should be in all of our subgroups and overall for the 24, 25 accountability data. And I can see the Medford outcome there. We declined in lots of the targets, and we exceeded in one of them, and we improved, but below the target in another. So you can see how the state sort of rated us in the targets that they set. Helpful. Autopsy, but still helpful. So luckily, the state provides us with a tool as a district. So not available online, but I'm happy to share it with you because it tells the story of this chapter. And so I could dig a little deeper and actually find out what the state set for us for targets for the 25-26 school year. Now I have something to work for. If you can see, I'll just narrate the slide for you, the all students. Slide. In 24-25, 42.3% of students in grades 11 and 12 completed academic coursework. And the state says, you can do better. Your target for next year is to have 45.7% of students complete academic coursework, advanced academic coursework. Great. But we know we're paying special attention as a subgroup to low-income students. And you can see that our outcomes for 24-25 were 25.5%. And the state set a target for 31.7%. And I want to say something really important right here that you're probably already thinking, which is the target for low income students is much greater than the target for all students. The state does not believe that a rising tide lifts all boats and we should end there. The state believes in closing gaps for kids. And so for some of these subgroups, you will see that the target is aggressive. Make sense? All right. So now I feel like I have what I need to make a plan, or at least a start. So my goal and action plan for the 25-26 school year, remember, we're in the Wayback Machine, my goal and action plan was to do what the state says. I want to increase the number. of 11th and 12th graders completing advanced coursework to 45.7% for all kids. And I want to close the gap with low income students to 14%. Make sense? So this is how educators approach what to do with state accountability data and MCAS data. So that's my goal. And there's a couple of things, super high action steps that I'm going to do. like verifies the reporting system and build a data system and focus on grade level standards. And because these are lagging, I chose a lagging indicator. I'm going to pick a couple of interim measures that I can do to keep track of my goal along the way, year after year, age group after age group, even before they show up in this accountability data. Make sense? All right. Are you on board if I walk you through my action steps? Yes, Member Graham.

[8vfGP8SYT18_SPEAKER_13]: Can I just ask a quick question?

[Jenny Graham]: When you say completion of advanced coursework, do you mean finish the class in an AP class? Do you mean finish the class or do you mean pass the AP exam?

[yGcuIBQZTjc_SPEAKER_00]: Finish the class.

[Jenny Graham]: OK, got it. Thank you.

[Breanna Lungo-Koehn]: Member Ruseau?

[Paul Ruseau]: So I'm trying to figure out how to ask this question the right way. Obviously I'm very much happy with us focusing on our low income students. But I also am curious about how like the number of students in a category goes into deciding where to focus. Because I feel like that's also why our students with disabilities, which are a smaller percentage in general, tend to always, I mean, their numbers looked not good. And so, like, I do want to focus on a larger group of students. Because while we can all pretend that every single student we're gonna focus on, you can't have a goal for the year that you will make sure that every single student of 40 something, 100 students is going to reach their goals. That's why you picked one, which is good. But I'm just trying to think, how do you think about the number of students in a category when doing this kind of work?

[yGcuIBQZTjc_SPEAKER_00]: Such a great question. And I'm really fortunate in Medford to have a team of people to help me think through it, like Assistant Superintendent Clinton is sitting right here, and Ms. McNiff, who directs the EL work. So there's lots of minds working together on this. I chose low income to illustrate for this group here, because low income students are in every classroom. And EL students, or students with disabilities, may not be. So I wanted to pick and lead with a subgroup that I know I can look every single person in the face and say, these are your students too. Are you with me to take a walk through how the action steps turned out? Yeah, okay. So the first action step is to verify the accuracy of what we're actually reporting to the state. Seems like that would be an easy thing. However, I can assure you that if Ms. Drain and Mr. Fallon were in this space, you could read by their expression that this really took a full year to figure out. I don't know why it's so complicated, but it really is super complicated. Stuff like, how are AP classes coded? And which of the thousand school brain fields should that information belong in so that the state can look to read it? And what actually is the criteria for Chapter 74 programs to be considered advanced? And how do we report advanced coursework for Chapter 74 programs? These are just a few of the high-level questions that we had to grapple with with this action step. So I don't want to oversimplify, but for the purposes of this presentation, we had to ask lots of questions. And for every question you ask, five more emerge, like a hydra. So in action two, we talked about this a lot at this committee, to build and revise a data system to monitor enrollment and advanced coursework and gateway classes like honors classes and general CTE enrollment. Again, easier said than done. This is a screenshot of some work in progress. You can see how some dashboards aren't quite done or weren't quite done yet and how it evolves along the way. Working with responsive partners like Open Architects, we get to say, yeah, you built it the way I asked you for it, but that's actually not really what I want. I really want this other thing. And then they'll do that. And I'm grateful. And then the third action step, I say this all the time, is a focus on grade level standards for all students, what's actually happening in the classroom. We know that our students love our teachers, and our teachers love our students, and our students do what teachers ask them to do, and we reflect the national data that says we're not asking them to do grade level tasks enough. So I remember sharing that with you in February. And so here are some examples. of how we elevate grade level tasks for all students. We have a lot of amazing partners. There's three on this list here. There's the Barr Foundation, which funded our GLEAM framework. And Principal Cabral has done and continues to do a great job reflecting this back to teachers. TNTP is our partner, assigned to us by the state, and we're super grateful for that. They've aligned their tool, the GLEAM tool, to focus on grade-level tasks and standards. And we're in classrooms reflecting that data back to teachers. And our longtime partners, Hull for Literacy, are doing the same things for us, did the same things for us in 25, 26, with building walkthroughs in literacy, focusing on grade-level standards. And so I just wanted to give you a quick snapshot about how this aggregate data is reflected back to teachers in a way that's really affirming. big graphs, lots of context. You're trying new stuff, we really appreciate it. Here's where we can grow. And so toward the end of last year, we were ready to do, and again, those are really high level, lots of people involved, lots of work. But here we are at the interim measures, it's time to check. And so we wanted to check to see the number of students in AP and honors courses from the 24-25 school year to the 25-26 school year. Now there's a couple of ways that you can look at this data. The first is you can check a grade level across the years, 11th grade, 11th grade, 11th grade, 11th grade. like this blue hour shows. And here you can see that there's a higher percentage of students in 11th grade who are in, taking AP or honors classes in 25, 26 than there were the previous year. That's great news. Sometimes, and this is like a systematic approach. So if I'm directing grade 11 curriculum, I want to make sure it looks like this for all students year after year. But another approach to take is a more human-centered one, which is a cohort model, like the red arrow. You start with ninth graders, and in ninth grade and 24, 25, 40, boy, is that number small. Yep, that percent of students were in honors or AP classes. And then that group, as sophomores, picks up some speed. We get a couple more kids in honors and AP classes. So two ways to look at the data. Both seem like they're trending in a good direction. And then the final interim measure, which I know I shared with you in our February presentation, is the percent of students who have an A or a B in grades 6 through 10 in MCAS-tested subjects. in comparison to the percent of students who earn meet or exceeds on the MCATs in those subjects. In 24-25, the gap was 33%. 25-26, that rising tide lifted all those boats, and we have more students scoring an A or a B, and we have more kids in meets and exceeds, but the gap persists. There's still a 33% gap in outcomes there. I know, right? So you ready for the end?

[Breanna Lungo-Koehn]: This is very interesting.

[yGcuIBQZTjc_SPEAKER_00]: All right, well, here we are at the end. So I wanted to tell you a chapter story that had a beginning and then came around to the end. And so this is the actual accountability data that was presented to us from the state. As a reminder, what's in blue here was the target that we had. The state said you should get 47.2% of all kiddos to complete advanced coursework in grade 11 and 12. And you should get 32.9% of your low income to do the same. And the great news is highlighted here in green. I know. You wanted to get to the end. I get you, Mayor. So not only did we increase all of those targets, but we also closed the gap. Not lots, but enough to be excited and to remind ourselves how powerful it is, how powerful it is to be an educator and to make differences for kids so that they can achieve their full economic and social potential. Okay, pausing for questions and celebrations. I have one more slide after this though, but pausing for questions and celebrations, or just keep going? We're going to finish it. And so the end of the first chapter is a little Scheherazade-ish in that it says, well, now that we know what we're doing, what are we going to keep doing? So I can't tell you what the 2027 targets are. They come out in December. But I can tell you it's going to be about, well, you'll recognize this from Dr. Galussi's goal. It's going to be about raising the level of the percentage of 11th and 12th graders who complete academic coursework and closing the gap. generally speaking. But what I want you to notice and to remember about the educators who lead in this district is how much more precise now the action steps are. So now in this year, I'm not like figuring out if we're reporting the right stuff. But now I'm going to leverage open architects through a coherent system and consistent data meetings so that we can monitor desegregated enrollment data in advanced coursework. And we're going to leverage the assessment portfolio. We had a conversation about this in the last meeting. We're going to leverage the assessment portfolio not to be passive, great job taking the test, but like, OK, let's go. Let's recruit you for AP classes. Let's get in there with our interim assessments and interrupt learning that's not complete in our elementary grades. And let's examine what's happening in our CTE classes for co-op, which, by the way, is what the state says is advanced coursework. for CTE classes, as Mr. Fallon and I presented last week. Let's examine what the barriers are for students actually completing co-ops, and let's see what we can do to reduce those. We're gonna continue to focus on grade level standards and task and instruction for all students, but that's an understatement. We're really leaning heavy into that this year. Lots of systems and structures there. And the interim measures seem to work pretty well, so we're gonna keep on with next year's data. And that is how educational leaders use accountability data to understand what's happening in the district and to make a plan to move it forward.

[Breanna Lungo-Koehn]: Thank you very much for the presentation and the good news at the end. I'm going to turn it over to Member Ruseau.

[Paul Ruseau]: Thank you. Excellent presentation. The brevity, of course, is appreciated. Just from those who haven't watched previous meetings, it is three hours or more. I've spent my whole time on school committee being down with the standardized test. You might have given me the only moment where I'm questioning my view of that. I'm not instantly giving that up, but I want to say that I appreciate the way you told the story. I think the reason that I'm having a moment about my opinions of standardized tests is that you made it make sense for what it could do instead of just being this dump of bar charts and all the different stuff that I haven't paid any attention to since I did statistics in college. You told a story that made sense, and you didn't try to tell all the stories. That's the other thing. We could have gone through all of the 10 or 11 categories of students, but we You know, there's only so much you can consume at once. So I want to thank you for making this presentation something I actually enjoyed. Thank you. And for all the amazing work going on in the district because I realize the presentation is not the point of it. It's the students. So thank you. Thank you.

[Breanna Lungo-Koehn]: Thank you. Member Graham.

[Jenny Graham]: Thank you. I just wanted to say. Thank you to the team who took the time to unfold weather. our systems were right, whether our data was right. I think too often, everyone just runs forward assuming that those things are true. And often, they're just not. And so being able to say, yes, we agree with this data, yes, we know that it's accurate, is hugely important when we start talking about why something is gonna change from one year to the next. So I really, really appreciate That you stepped all the way back to the beginning because it's so tempting to just start running forward rather than saying like what is the beginning of this story? And like, are we all on the same page on page one, right? Like, so I think that's super important. So I'm so appreciative that you did that. I also feel like there is a coherence to the work that you're doing that is becoming more and more and more clear, like as we hear from the district about what's going on. And it's such, It's like such a welcome change of pace after seven years to hear that like here are the actions we're taking and this is what the result was. Like I think we've been begging for that kind of commentary about like OK this is all a bunch of data. What do we do about it and then how do we know if it worked. And I think you heard some of those questions about the superintendent's goals. But that's what I'm always interested in. It's like I'm OK if we're making making plans and setting targets. And if we fall short of the targets, that just means we have to like revisit whether our plans were the right ones or not and go forward. But in the past, we have only made plans that are like impossible to measure. So it's really hard. And everyone, except that we know everyone is working hard, right? So it's like, are we working hard? Are we working smart? Are we doing them both at the same time is always sort of important. And I really appreciate like the push towards helping students see what is possible for them, because I think there are students in our system who get lost in a shuffle all the time. So the active push that we are giving to students to recruit and to say, you can do this, we see that you can do it, I think that is hugely important. And it's the kind of thing that sort of shifts the narrative about what the district does and doesn't do. in the community, and I think that's hugely important. Like we heard from, we had a meeting with some of the mayor's neighborhood ambassadors, and there was a woman on the committee, and she basically was like, I think Medford Public Schools kind of stinks. Like that's basically what she said. And she doesn't have kids in the schools, but it was clear that like her source, like her, Her feeling about that maybe is historical, which lots of things change over decades. But also that when you look at a list of students of schools and how they are performing, there's obviously so much more underneath that. But I actually am going to find her email and send her the list, the ranking of high schools in the state, because we jumped 20 points as a high school in one year. that means we're doing something right. And we did our best to tell her that in the meeting, but like that's the proof, right? Like the proof is that we are on the move and we're on the move in a good direction. The last thing I will say is the other thing I'm interested in when it comes particularly to AP coursework is I'm interested in understanding who who is not sitting for the test because I have heard about students who are taking four and five and six AP classes and they are never sitting for a test because they cannot afford the fees. And I believe that we have programs in place for that. But if you're if you're a student and you don't know that that's true you are passing by literal savings. If you want to go on to college like if you are passing that AP exam that is credit in college that you may like desperately that could be the difference between going in as a freshman and a sophomore. And that is that is real money. Right. And so yes there are places you can go to school for free. I just think opening up that line of like that there may be being some gaps there in terms of How rigorous is our team in making sure that students who want to sit for the test are proactively just like we are recruiting for the class. Like we are proactively recruiting people into those tests too because there may be a better story here than even we know if we could bring those kids to the test and get to a place where they are earning college credit right here for free instead of having to pay whatever thousands of dollars a college credit costs these days. So I think there's like one more step for me that's not about accountability, but it's again about access. So I never want to hear that someone is doing all of the work and then not able to reap the benefit of that hard work in a way that would be particularly meaningful for them in the future. I'll follow up with you because I have a couple of specific thoughts about that. But I just wanted to flag that because like AP like to me AP is this like there's an additional like like leveler in AP classes in terms of opportunity that I want to make sure we're also harnessing even though it's not going to show up here. So thank you for all of this.

[Erika Reinfeld]: Thank you very much. Member Reinfeld. Thank you for the presentation and the work. It's really incredible to see this target not just met, but exceeded. That's so exciting. Where would you recommend people go to see some of the other stories that weren't in here, right? Like, I'm now excited to see, oh, how are we doing on these other targets? And I know In order, as a district, we have to prioritize and say this is the one we're focusing on this year and we can't focus on everything because then nothing gets the attention it needs. But where can we see what else is happening?

[yGcuIBQZTjc_SPEAKER_00]: So the action steps around the, around the accountability from our team, is that what you're asking? Yeah. So I am hopeful that the strategic plan is going to harness a lot of these so that we can build an interim measure system and structure where we can regularly report back how we're doing on our strategic plan. Will it be all of the stories? I don't think so, but I think it'll be some of the other ones that are really important. You'll hear from the academic... Well, you'll hear the EL's experience story in two weeks from Ms. McNiff, but likely across the measure of meeting progress toward English language acquisition. Great.

[Erika Reinfeld]: Yeah, I'm gonna have a lot of questions for the department heads and for Ms.

[yGcuIBQZTjc_SPEAKER_00]: McNiff. Well, that's great. And if you can send those in advance, then they can tailor a presentation that will meet your needs. They will either present action steps that are coming up for this year or, like me, a retrospective. Yeah.

[Erika Reinfeld]: And then I would just say the other piece of this is making the choice to focus on advanced coursework or the other targets that we've identified as the goals. looking to see how progress looks in those areas versus the things we didn't focus on is also a correlative function of saying when we spend the time focusing on this, here's what we accomplish. And we're not seeing that in other areas where we're not specifically drilling down. Hopefully we are seeing some progress because we're working hard across all academics. But I think that's a really important thing to say when we've picked these goals. We can see if the goals we've chosen We can see evidence that the focus leads to progress.

[yGcuIBQZTjc_SPEAKER_00]: I love that statement, because it reminds me that I didn't quite answer, or I didn't quite make the full case for why I picked the indicator that I did. And this goes back to Mr. Rousseau's statement, too. To pick an MCAS outcome as the focus is a really, really narrow focus that leaves lots of content teachers out of the picture. And it's hard to get excited about MCAS data. I'm not going to lie. It's really hard if you look at it in and of itself. And so I had wanted to put MCAS data in its place, which is a check. for us on grade level standard acquisition so kids are ready to be in the advanced coursework. So my hope, Ms. Feinfeld, by picking that indicator, was that it was one that scooped up lots of the academic pieces. Yeah, at the end. Thank you.

[Breanna Lungo-Koehn]: I appreciate that. Great. Thank you very much for the presentation and the hard work. We'll move on to number three, a natural gas powered equipment replacement. Mr. Kenneth Lord, Chief Operations Officer, welcome.

[Kenneth Lord]: Thank you, Mayor. As I've submitted a memo requesting permission to replace three pieces of equipment or three sets of equipment at one of the high school, one of the Roberts, one of the McGlynn with like gas, natural gas powered equipment. The first is a high school kitchen stove. One of the double convection ovens failed recently and needs to be replaced. And we don't have the electrical service to support electrical kitchen equipment in that site. The Roberts hot water tank is the second item we replaced one on an emergency basis during last school year and the second tank needs to be replaced proactively when we had the A feasibility study report from RFS engineering, they recommended staying with natural gas. It wasn't economically feasible to move to electrified hot water tanks. And we also have to do some hot water tank replacement to McGlynn in a similar reason, suggesting that we stick with natural gas for those. Resolution in 2024 banning the purchase of natural gas equipment by the school committees. That's why I'm here before you to request approval of those.

[Paul Ruseau]: Yes Thank you, mr. Lord member Rousseau Thank you, I I knew the kitchen one was coming and obviously that the only question I have about the kitchen one is that I is sort of a, you know, this is not a piece of equipment to last for four years, I assume, right? So what happens to equipment like that when we bulldoze the high school? Is there a secondary market for that stuff?

[Kenneth Lord]: We'd probably use it, we could use it as a replacement for another building. It's a similar stove that could be purchased for any of the buildings. It's a double convection oven. So we could probably move it to another school. It would definitely, I mean, in the phasing of the high school, we're gonna have a temporary kitchen set up someplace when they redo the kitchen and that'll help me move to that location anyway, so yeah.

[Paul Ruseau]: Okay. So I'm fine with the high school one because we can't put an electric one in if we wanted. Could you talk a little more about the other two, though? When we said it was economically not, it was, it's cheaper to stay with gas.

[Kenneth Lord]: Significantly.

[Paul Ruseau]: What does that mean?

[Kenneth Lord]: So when they studied the options at the Roberts, because we're doing, we have the Accelerator Repair Program, they studied electrification of all the HVAC equipment, as well as the existing hot water systems. They found that the hot water tanks electrified of that size are exorbitantly expensive and the life cycle cost analysis just didn't support replacing them with electrified. So they recommended that we stay with the gas systems that we have in those. We did a similar study before I was here when the Brooks hot water tank system failed. We did a complete study of that, trying to find a way to do an electrified hot water tank at that school. And it was, again, just not feasible on a cost basis to try to replace that. You can do it. It's just exorbitantly expensive.

[Paul Ruseau]: And when we say exorbitantly, like double?

[Kenneth Lord]: Hundreds of thousands of dollars for the electrified, where I could place a hot water tank for about $25,000. So it's many, many times over.

[Paul Ruseau]: Motion to approve.

[Breanna Lungo-Koehn]: Motion to approve by Member Ruseau, seconded by Member Graham. Roll call, please. I know, and then it was on and off. Do you have a question?

[Jessica Parks]: Can I amend that and say motion to approve as long as the kitchen stove does go somewhere and be used if we are approving it as gas? Can we put that caveat in there?

[Kenneth Lord]: I couldn't hear.

[Breanna Lungo-Koehn]: Motion to approve as amended that the stove will go somewhere else. Okay, is that amendment okay with member Rousseau and member Graham? Yes. Okay, motion for approval as amended. Roll call, please.

[Paul Ruseau]: Who was seconded? I'm sorry. Me and Jen.

[Breanna Lungo-Koehn]: Jen, member Graham.

[Paul Ruseau]: Member Graham. Member Mastropone. Yes. Member Olapade.

[Noel Velez]: Yes.

[Paul Ruseau]: Member Parks. Yes. Member Reinfeld. Yes. Member Ruseau, yes. Mayor Lungo-Koehn.

[Breanna Lungo-Koehn]: Yes. Seven in the affirmative, zero in the negative. Motion passes. Thank you, Mr. Lord. I believe our student advisory council would like their presentation tabled until next week. Can there be a motion on the floor for that? By member Graham, seconded by member Reinfeld. Roll call, please.

[Paul Ruseau]: Member Graham? Yes. Member Mastraboni? Yes. Member Olapade?

[Noel Velez]: Yes.

[Paul Ruseau]: Member Parks? Yes. Member Reinfeld? Yes. Member Rossell? Yes.

[Breanna Lungo-Koehn]: Yes, seven in the affirmative, zero in the negative, paper passes. And it's tabled, it'll be on for next meeting. We do not have any presentations of the public, nor continued business, new business, or reports requested. I'm gonna go to number 10, condolences. The members of the Medford School Committee express their sincerest condolences to the family of Ralph E. Giddings, Jr., father of James Giddings, kindergarten teacher at the Roberts Elementary School. The members of the Medford School Committee expressed their sincerest and deepest condolences to the family of Caroline Luciano Labbadini. Caroline lived and raised her family in Medford and was employed in the cafeteria at Medford High School. Also, the members of the Medford School Committee express their deepest condolences to the family of John Bud Bissell, Sr., father of John Bissell, Jr., district-wide maintenance supervisor, and father-in-law to former Medford Public Schools grant manager Michelle Bissell. If we all may rise, please, for a moment of silence. Thank you. Our next regular meeting will be here in the Alden Memorial Chambers, Medford City Hall, as well as Zoom, and that will actually be next Monday, October 5th, 2026 at 6 p.m. Is there a motion to adjourn by Member Reinfeld? Seconded by? Second. Member Graham, roll call, please.

[Paul Ruseau]: Member Graham? Yes. Member Mastroboni? Yes. Member Olapade?

[Kenneth Lord]: Yes.

[Paul Ruseau]: Member Parks? Yes. Member Reinfeld? Yes. Member Ruseau? Yes. Mayor Lungo-Koehn?

[Breanna Lungo-Koehn]: Yes. Seven in the affirmative, zero in the negative.