 hesitate to reach out and happy to come back and share with the committee. Thank you. Thank you. Take care. So committee, we are pivoting now and welcome Representative Brady. We are moving into S16, creation of a task force on school exclusionary discipline reform and going from there. And I think you're joined by Ms. Parker. And I thought that Mr. Demeray was coming in, but perhaps not. He may be on his way. They were just wrapping up in house at a couple of things. Got you. Would you like to kick us off or would you prefer to wait for him? I'm all, I'm new to all of this. So I'm happy to give it a shot and correct me or direct me in the right direction at any point. I will not be offended. And I have my wonderful mentor in the room here. So Representative Townsend will certainly help steer me in the right direction. Very good. I understand you want just a very high level overview of the bill and it has just a tiny amount of money in it. Yes, yes. I did notice that it had a tiny as tiny as under $10,000. So I'm not holding the exact amount. I think it's like 6850, but I might be wrong. Yep, yep. So, so this bill came to us from- Please introduce yourself first. Okay. Morning. I am Representative Brady from the house education committee and I will be reporting this bill on the floor next week. Very good. This bill came to us from the Senate and work that had been done in previous sessions as well to try to make some improvements to our disciplinary processes and schools. There's sort of three big things that stand out as the reasons for this bill. One, there's a lot of research to show that exclusionary discipline. And when we say that we mean suspensions and expulsions tend to be highly inequitable in terms of what students are put under exclusionary discipline most often. It has exclusionary discipline has a lot of short-term and long ranging impacts on students and families that can be quite negative. And perhaps most importantly, it's not educational. It doesn't actually change behavior or teach students something different. So in looking at the bill, section one is the findings. Section two is the meat of the bill which is to create a task force in order to do two things essentially. The task force will need to come up with recommendations to end suspensions and expulsions for all but the most serious student behaviors. So part of their work will be defining what are the most serious student behaviors. It's not to say that there aren't sometimes when exclusion is necessary and we know that. And also to do quite a bit of work around better data collection information gathering from what's happening in schools and sharing of best practices across schools because there is some really great work happening in some pockets of Vermont. We're pretty proud of the task force membership. It's a diverse membership with a lot of expertise in the field on it. And we took a lot of testimony that is then tied to the appropriation which is per diems for the task force. Section three is the appropriation, the piece that's in your purview. And section four directs the secretary of education to essentially help the task force with data and making available what's already there. So the task force does not recreate work that has already been done. Section five deals with the reports that will come back to the House and the Senate. Section six is recommending that suspensions and expulsions end completely for students under the age of eight. And section seven gets into trying to better understand cases of truancy. There's some inconsistency across the state of how often truancy is referred to state's attorneys. And section eight is your effective date. So the appropriation is simply for per diems for the members of the task force who would qualify for it. Several of them it would be part of their regular job so they would not. But for those who would, Brianna has a fiscal note for us that I believe is posted on your page today. Yes, and before I go to Ms. Parker I just wanna say that was outstanding. Thank you. Well, that was the short version of my floor report. That's okay. That's okay. You kind of give you a little bit of practice but that was just outstanding. That was exactly what we needed. So thank you. Ms. Parker. Thank you. That might well be the shortest fiscal note I've ever read, but I'll let you kind of just tell us in one whole sentence. But you know what, that's. Thank you very much, Brianna Parker from the Joint Fiscal Office for the Record. And we're really just looking at per DM compensation for this task force. There are nine members that are eligible under statute for this reimbursement and our kind of standard is $126 per DM. And so the committee will meet no more than six times. So that factors out to about $6,800. And the appropriation is $6,750 in the bill. So that does seem appropriate. And that is coming from the general fund for FY22. And that will go through the agency of education. Thank you. And we have a couple of questions and I'm sorry, I didn't see which went first. So I will defer to Madam Chair first. Thank you. And Rep Brady, I just want to add that was an excellent report. Thank you for being clear, concise and to the point. We really appreciate it. I am curious if you all had a conversation and I know this isn't in your typical purview but this bill is requesting that we pay for this work with out of the general fund. Did you have a conversation about using the Ed fund to support this work? I do not recall us having that conversation. I would be surprised. I mean, and truly that is in our purview but this is going to be kind of a question that I'm going to be asking. Why one fund rather than another fund? That's not your problem. I'm now off into the committee. In just FYI committee, this whole need was of a large source of discussion with the Joint Justice Oversight Committee during the past couple of years. There was a considerable amount of work and concern around what is going on with particular communities and the kind of disproportionate burden or focus on them for expulsion and loss of school services. I personally was delighted to see this coming forward. It's clearly an area of need and so I appreciate the House Ed committee working on it. So thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair. So one of the, just a quick comment and obviously this is not every school district is the same but having been on my school board for 13 years we saw one suspension and no expulsions. And so you just, and that was for the Rutland City School District. So you have to, because we had a very robust in school mechanism that could help a student that was just having issues that day. But that's just one, there's sort of a whole bunch out there. So there appears to be a pretty big difference across the state in terms of even school by school within a district of how things are handled. And there's also a lot of very short-term a student can be sent home halfway through the day and that may not be counted as exclusionary discipline. So there, but expulsions are, we have in the last couple of years under 11 expulsions statewide. So it is really more a matter of suspensions. Yeah. Sure, it still hurts. Representative Helm. Thank you. Mr. Vice Chair, I guess, thank you. Just quickly. So why you mentioned on suspensions wanting to, it sounded to me like all but eliminate them, everything, but the worst, whatever those might be for. Now, I realized the times have changed, but when I was in school, you didn't want to get in a suspension. If the threat was getting close, most of the kids would smarten up because they had to go home and break the news to dad and mom, which was not fun. Is that changing today? And if that's changing, maybe we've got another problem. That's a big, difficult question. A part of me, I come to this also as a high school teacher. So I have a lot of experience in the field with this. Generally research does not show that exclusionary discipline helps change behavior. So whether it's the fear of it or actually having it happen, it doesn't tend to lead to a different outcome or change in student behavior. It's removing the student from the situation where they most need probably support and may need to actually deal with that sort of stressor in the moment instead of be removed from it. It's hard for me to speculate, I think on, you know, like the, whether the possibility of suspension impact student behaviors, but certainly my experience in the classroom would be, would be no that often we're talking about students who are very dysregulated, students who face a lot of challenges, students who often are low income students. So there's a lot of compounding factors often in the students who are hit hardest by it. And again, so much testimony we got was really compelling that it just doesn't, it doesn't change behavior and it often puts those students in a worse position. They may be out of school where they have no food, where they have no services, where they have no support. Their education is further interrupted. And I certainly saw that in my classroom that the kids where it was, whether it was two days in school or 10 days out of school, it was always a sinking feeling of, this is the last kid I need to not be in class. He's going to get, he or she is going to get further behind and we're going to struggle to make that up. I don't know if that really answers your question, but. Well, yeah, and I'll be done with this statement. But, you know, so you just answered my question and that they are non, at home, non-managed kids very much. And so just send them home, they come back and then you've got the problem back. If you keep them in school, you've got the problem all the time. So I don't see a win either way really, but that's all right. You know, I'm not against the bill or anything. Go ahead and take a shot at it, but I think that's all it's going to be. Thank you. There are a lot of members of the task force who are doing really good work about what preventative things we can do in schools, like to help students learn moderating behaviors, to help students face stressors. So, you know, I think what we were most excited about as a committee is not the things, the suspension and expulsion stuff, but the way this could amplify some work around trauma-informed practices, restorative practices. There's something called PBIS that if you have kids in elementary schools, you're familiar with where it's sort of trying to really train kids and reinforcing constantly positive behaviors. And there's a lot of success around that, that that's probably where more investment in that is going to help us than sending certain kids home. Thank you, Representative Brady. I think another portion of, not to testify on your bill, but another portion of this look is that these disciplines tend to fall disproportionately on different types of kids, kids that you're seeing as being different. And that is troubling and that we need to understand what's going on. So this is a way of also bringing resources to not financial resources, but the helping schools begin to learn about how they should be handling these approaches. I assume that that will be one of the outcomes of the task force. Represent, I'm not sure who was first. So we'll go with Rep Harrison. Yeah, thank you, Madam Chair. I just wanted to follow up on your question about where the money comes from. And the scheme of things, obviously this is relatively minor request, but if it's an education related expense, I guess, unless we've done otherwise in the past, I think it should be an educated fund related expense as well, and in either case, it won't have a big, but if someone can, whether it's joint fiscal or whether a ledge council can give us some insight as to these types of studies. I know the last one we did, I think was ESSER funds or something. So that was different, but that does probably not available in this case. There is generally a great deal of reluctance to allocate these sort of costs to the Ed fund. And I think this is an interesting area of discussion. Mr. Demeray, you came on, are there practices or principles that you're aware of in terms of our decision-making process for determining which fund should support these costs? So I'm not sure what principles, but there are processes I have seen in my time here, which has been five years, which is the per DM and reimbursement for task forces or secondaries if they're, and if they're education related, always come from their own funds as far as I've seen. Yeah, that is my experience. And I am challenging the status quo. I'm not asking the committee to think about this differently, but I'm asking us to think differently for this particular bill. I mean, we can have a conversation about that, but I am questioning the status quo and I'll get in trouble for this, but I think this is a conversation we need to have about how we allocate monies to different funds. So thank you, Mr. Demeray. Rep, can you then go ahead? Yeah, just as a follow-up, again, this is not, I'm not looking to upset the apple cart either in terms of what we've typically done, but it's easy for, it seems and I didn't count them, but it seems like we have more task force and committees coming up than we've had in a while. And it's easy for policy committees to just push it onto the general fund rather than the fund that they are in fact responsible for. So again, I'm not at all suggesting that this is not a worthwhile endeavor and it's not a lot of money, but as a matter of policy, it seems like if we were going to have a transportation study, the transportation fund should pay for that study. And this is an education fund, hopefully to improve our educational outcomes. So, I think it's a legitimate question that you raise. And so what if it changes the status quo? Maybe that's what should be done. Thank you. Thank you. Representative Shai? Yes, thank you. And I agree Madam Chair that this is a subject of a longer conversation, but I think it's a conversation we need to have about where the funding comes from. So I'll look forward to that happening whenever we're able to do so. But just secondly, I just wanna say that I think this is a great bill. I'm really glad we're finally doing this. And I think it's been said by Rev Brady, the kids who are getting disciplined are often the ones that need more support than ever before, not less. So kicking them out doesn't solve a problem. And in fact, if we don't work to solve it at the student level, they're gonna have problems throughout the rest of their lives that they're gonna be much more expensive than what we're talking about in school. So I see this as a win all the way around. And I'm really excited that it's finally coming to the floor and to our committee. So thank you. Thank you. Representative Fagan, you're muted, Peter. Yes, I was. I'm just gonna pile on a little bit here and I will let Ditto what Representative Shai just said. And what I'm gonna pile on about is that if you look at the ED fund, as I understand it, it is educational processes that are for all the schools in the state, the public schools in the state, not for the administrative piece that the agency of education provides. So we cannot tap the ED fund for that. This study is for the non-administrative, but it is for the educational processes of all public schools statewide. So while, yeah, we probably shouldn't change it on this bill, I think this is definitely a conversation that must be had in the future. So thanks. Thank you. So Fagan, did you go back and look, is there a statute that describes the, I should know this, I feel like. Is there a statute that describes the use of the ED fund? There must be, of course. I know there is and it's, I didn't go back and look, this is based upon something else that a few years ago, I or someone attempted to do, and I did some research on it and realized, no, we would have to not withstand the statutory use of the ED fund to be able to do whatever it was we were gonna do. So we didn't. Okay, interesting. So you know, let us have a little seminar on the ED fund. We'll organize that. So we'll have a conversation about who we should hear from. But in the meantime, let us come back to this bill and see if there are any more questions for rep rating Mr. Demeray or Ms. Parker. Representative Schye. Yes, would this be an appropriate moment? Let's make a motion. Yes, except I am curious if we are done with the conversation about the funds source. Are we content with as it is now? Or do you wanna think about that a wee bit more? Rep Harrison. Yeah, I just think we ought to know what the law says. If we're handcuffed by the law and we should pass it out with the general fund, but if we're not, I mean, if the law needs to be changed we can have that discussion later and not hold up this bill. But if the law doesn't need to be changed and I think it's a legitimate question that's why the bill goes to appropriations. Yeah, I think maybe we're gonna get some guidance here. Ms. Parker. Yes, thank you. I've been in communication with Mark who has much more experience. So he has informed this discussion that there is an allowable uses section and statute under title 16, BSA 4025B. And so if you wanted to change that appropriation source to the education fund you would have to change the law to be an allowable use for this particular appropriation. There's Mark, I'm so glad he's here to help this conversation. Thank you and go ahead. If I could jump in, you also, you might wanna do it in session law and talk to the drafters. So rather than changing the green books, the statute for something that's this small and this temporary. This has precisely answered the question of no, we should not touch it here. We're more interested I think in the general conversation of why isn't it an allowable use which is now clearly a much larger conversation since there, I am assuming is no gray area having not read that portion of the statute is it in fact, is this use not an allowable use? And it's better than me, but I think that the way the statute reads it enumerates the allowable uses. So it doesn't disallow uses and tells you what you can spend on the fund. Ah, okay. Just to point out that there's a very dangerous clause there that says if you spend money outside these permitted uses, the whole education funding system goes poof. So it's quite dramatic actually how this section works with law. Having said that though, you can not withstand this to appropriate money from the education fund. So you can either go in and amend the statute to create a new use or you can not withstand it in session law. So you could do, you could do, you could change it now if you want for this point of ruin purpose by not standing that provision. Yeah, thank you. Thank you. I appreciate the clarity. Yeah, Representative Townsend. Thank you, Madam Chair. I would advocate that we the committee have a conversation about what we think might be an appropriate use of the ed fund in our own time in a different timeframe, not in regards to this particular bill only or as a trigger for making a change potentially in use of the ed fund. Point one, point two, I think if indeed following such discussion, we wanted to pursue a change in potential use of the ed fund that it should be done in a way that allows for consistency across the board, not sort of, I mean, we're almost at the end of this session. And I honestly can't remember if we've had other ed related bills that had some sort of committee established earlier in the session. I'm just looking at the whole matter of consistency of application. I think that's it for the moment. Thank you. Thank you. I think that is excellent advice. I am assuming with what we just learned from Mr. DeMaris as well as Mr. Perl and Ms. Parker that we're not interested in making a one time exception in this area. I am not. Rep Giacoboni? I am, but I won't. If there were ever a case, if how we best manage for one of a better word, student behavior, if that's not germane to education as opposed to the administration of education, I don't know what is. So I was all prepared in Gung Ho to do a notwithstanding the amount is de minimis. That's not the issue. But to send a message that it's time to do this. However, my good friend, Representative Townsend who always makes so much sense has persuaded me. Gosh darn it. So I'll just sit back. Thank you. Thank you. Representative Helm? Yes, very briefly. I've made a set and a whole bunch of words that I'm not going to repeat, but I'm with Maita. Thank you. Yeah. Okay. So perhaps Rep Shy, you would like to offer. May I make a motion that we accept or approve or whatever the correct verb is S16 as passed by the committee, House Committee on Education. Is there a second? Second. Thank you. Representative Townsend, whenever you are ready, please go ahead and call the roll. Thank you, Madam Chair. I am ready and the motion before us is to approve S16 as recommended by House Education. Representative Fagan? Yes. Representative Feltas? Yes. Representative Harrison? Yes. Representative Helm? Yes. Representative Jessa? Yes. Representative Shy? Yes. Representative Squirrel? Yes. Representative Tolino? Yes. Representative Townsend? Yes. Representative Yacoboni? Yes. And representative Hooper. Yes. And there we have 11, 00 and the reporter will be Robin representative shy. Thank you. So, Brett Brady, thank you very much for joining us. I hope we didn't worry you with our little antics over the use of the different funds. I know that we worried other people in that conversation. But, you know, this is this is what happens upstairs. Yeah, so thank you for joining us also. Thank you, Mr. Demeray, Ms Parker and Mr. Perl. So, committee March. Yeah, yeah, we'll see you around. Our next agenda item is at 11. So do you want to take a break until 11 and then we've got what is it as s 115 before us then but before we go, Robin. Thank you, Madam Chair. This is another education bill and we have. I know that some of the folks that are here from Fudge Council and JFO or probably swamped unless they're going to something else for this next half hour but maybe we take a shorter break and then come back and see them. See it earlier. I don't know if that's more helpful for them or whether that matters with the problem is the reporter of the bill. Oh yes, that's true. So, everybody else. Yeah, yeah, I wish we could be more efficient but I'm not sure we can be. Okay. Okay, so Teresa why don't you take us off live until 11.