 Good evening everybody my name is Paul Schluckman. I am the vice chair of the Arlington School Committee. Dr. Allison Ampe is with us tonight remotely So I will be chairing the meeting This is the meeting of February 29th. Happy leap day We are operating remote. We're operating with remote. We have A hybrid setup tonight because Dr. Allison Ampe is on hybrid Just a reminder to everyone that under these rules we have to do all roll call votes And I will ask the people who are on remote right now to respond Dr. Allison Ampe. Can you hear us? Yes, I can. Okay, and Jenna Medeiros is our AEA representative. Can you hear us? Okay, so we're in good shape Reminder to anybody who is interacting with us through the wonders of zoom that If your mics are on or your cameras are on we can see or hear what's up. So Please be aware First order of business will be a moment of silence Unfortunately, we have learned of the tragic death of our former town clerk Corinne Rainville who is somebody we've all interacted with who is a constant professional a Wonderful friend for us all and for me personally we shared a birthday And so I always made it a point to wander by town hall on that date Just to celebrate with her It's a tremendous loss and so moment of silence for Corinne, please Thank you and now for Public comment we have nobody in the room and nobody is signed up for public comment So we'll move on to the Arlington high student representatives. I have one on the list Amy Chirallu and You'd want somebody else with you, right? Would you want to pull down the microphone and introduce yourself, please? Hi, I'm Asra I'm the vice president for the class of 27. Congratulations. Welcome. Do you Have a report of what's happening in our beloved high school? Yes, I don't know if anyone had the pleasure of going to the all-town concert last night But everyone from grades elementary school up to high school did fantastic The opening of our new school cafe was on Tuesday I mean you guys want to cross over a little concrete ramp and check it out I would very much recommend it the dumplings are fantastic and not the last Last but not least I'd recommend checking out the H.S. Zoo Most recently yesterday we got an axolotl There's tarantulas and cockroaches and goldfish and anything anything you'd really want to see so I would recommend going to the fourth and fifth floors of the steam wing to go Checks out some animals, but no petting not that kind of zoo. I don't think you want to pet the cockroaches. Do you? Okay, anything else I Want to shout out gymnastics for having a record-breaking season and breaking their own record and points not once but twice in this year Excellent wonderful. Thank you Next up will be field trip approval. Dr. Janger or Mr. Barossa. Mr. Barossa Good evening everyone. Can you hear me? Okay? Yes, we can great. Thank you so much for for having me Check in with you. I appreciate your patience and in the time you're you're allotting me So we have officially been formally invited back to visit our sister city Nagokukyo, Japan As some if not all of you know I First was involved in the trip in 2010 and I spent two years as you know one of the exchange teachers in Nagokukyo so I Miss Sonoi Toyama and everyone in Nagokukyo is just very very important to me as I know, you know, we all have Different just really lovely relationships that we've all developed through the sister city exchange program As you know, it's the 40th anniversary of the sister city relationship and the 20th anniversary of the first time We successfully completed a student exchange So we understand that it is late in the game, but but we just heard back I think on February 13th or 14th from any travel agent that we reached out to with an actual Price point and itinerary We have only gauged interest so far Because we're obviously waiting for the trip to be approved But we are requesting the opportunity to go back. Miss Toyama has formally invited us back For a 10-day stay in July So we have the information that we can answer questions. I don't want to belabor the point I'm happy to keep talking, but I know you have plenty of other very important things So I'm happy to answer questions. You might have Or continue talking about the trip if that's the easiest thing for you So delightful time of the year to be there for the for the wonderful July weather in Nagokukyo It's about 6,000 degrees with 500% humidity. Yeah, that's the basically what it is. It's like Alabama in August Any questions or comments from the committee? You're none, do I see a motion? So moved motion by mr. Thielman seconded by Liz There are too many Liz's in this room Say that by miss Xton All in favor roll call dr. Allison ampy Yes, miss Giddelson. Yes, mr. Cardin. Yes, mr. Thielman Yes, miss Xton And I vote in the affirmative I can't see you over there miss Morgan We need a curve and and I vote in the affirmative that's a seven-nothing vote Congratulations is Dr. Janker going with you. He is scheduled. So I'm currently not planning on traveling myself only because I'm working out a little blood clot situation And flying that long is not advised. I'm hoping to Return next year, but I'm gonna be setting everything up language and culture classes And he's very excited and mr. Yama is incredibly excited to have an administrator Visit. Oh, yeah, he will be treated like a VIP. Thank you very much. Absolutely. Thank you very much. We really appreciate it Next up is the literacy screening update with dr. Ford Walker Thank you. Good evening, everyone. I am here to present a brief update on the literacy screener process for the district As of july 1st 2023 massachusetts regulation States that all schools require are required to screen all k-3 students for early literacy skills I've shared the regulation here Just for your reference But basically the summary is that school districts shall assess each student's reading ability and progress at least two times per year If screening determines that a student is significantly below benchmark for age typical development In specific literacy skills the school Shall determine which actions within the general education program Should be taken in order to meet the student's needs And this may include differentiating instruction or providing a supplementary evidence-based reading instruction program And ongoing monitoring of progress And also within 30 school days of screening results are if the results are significantly below the relevant benchmark Then each school is responsible for Sharing that information with parents and guardians And also have a follow-up conversation with the parent and guardian The early universal Screening assessment tool that we use here in a ps is the dynamic indicators of basic early literacy skills Or what is known as dibbles? Dibbles are measures used to determine how students are performing on specific skills Skills that are measured include phonemic awareness Afonics fluency vocabulary and comprehension The tests are indicators of the student's overall reading status and are not intended to be an in depth analysis or a comprehensive measure of reading An administration of the dibbles assessments typically takes about one to three minutes per assessment for tests This year our testing window For our first through third graders was september january and the third window scheduled for june for our kindergarten students The window was november and then also in late may or early june of this year And all students in grades one through three are given the test three times per year as well as two times per year in kindergarten And just to share a little bit about the process that we use here in a ps typically after a test is completed There's a home connect report A home connect report that's generated for all students And the home connect report shares student scores and provides information about whether or not A student is on track for reading success And students that are in need of academic support are identified as a result of this process And students who are not in need of support also have areas identified areas of support we call them At the beginning of this academic year Only students that were identified as performing well below the benchmark received a home connect report And that was sent via us mail After the second administration this winter students who were identified as performing In that category of well below as well as students who were performing in the below Category received a home connect report And at some schools all students received a home connect report no matter what their performance was After the third administration in the summer of this year all students within all seven elementary schools are Going to receive a home connect report And follow-up discussions with families with students in the well below category Usually begin at curriculum night And they continue through the parent teacher conference process that each school engages in And there's a communication that is ongoing between teachers and students based on student progress and based on growth And often members of the school team will reach out to families to continue the conversation As well as to continue the planning that may be needed for a particular student This is an example of a home connect report, which is pretty detailed in terms of student performance And based on the data typically from this assessment and student performance Schools use that to determine which actions within the general education setting are needed to meet a student's needs This may include differentiating instruction or supplementing reading instruction And student progress is monitored by school teams and teachers who review that student information and work together to Response to that information teacher teams discuss progress and opportunities for small group instruction in response to the data as needed Also in response to the student data teachers utilize the student support model that exists in schools In order to further the conversation with special educators and additional interventionists At the table as well and student benchmark data are documented within the aps amplify dashboard that exists and available to all teachers And progress monitoring of that data is collected and shared with teacher teams within schools All students in k-3 are screened using the dibbles and students that are found to be performing below the benchmark of dibbles May take additional assessments Are screeners to determine specific areas of need? There are generally four other screeners that are used in addition to dibbles for students that may fall in that particular category And also a student that is found to be in supplementary reading instruction Need they participate in one of these eight programs that is offered And offered by a reading interventionist A Goal of the teaching and learning department is to have all Home connect reports available available to all families via an online portal Beginning next school year and this will provide our families with easier access So this information as well as remove some of the barriers that exist as it relates to us mail or snail mail And we've encountered a number of challenges to Actually identifying a portal that exists But we are Pretty encouraged by some of the conversations that we've been having specifically with amplifying We think that we will be able to reach this particular goal by fall of next year Some of the next steps also include Making sure that we're identifying All of the processes that the district is currently using in a clearer manner for families and making sure that The processes that are used are consistent across all of our elementary schools And finally, we're looking at how we can ensure that these reports are providing meaningful information and accurate information for families as well I received a number of inquiries from families and different community community members that have shared feedback around what's working and what's not working well And we're using that information to make sure that we are creating processes across the system That are coherent that are clear and that are normed across schools So this concludes my report Thank you. Any questions or comments from the committee? Ms. Ekston Thank you. Dr. Ford Walker for your presentation And I some of my questions were answered, but I do want to just sort of reiterate some of the comments that I Had made I I appreciate the presentation and a lot of Uh-oh my mic. No Okay Is in response to the to the legislation and sort of this is the expectation from the state for schools But I think and and you did respond to this in the presentation tonight But I I think it's really important for all families to receive this information In a timely in a timely manner I think One is just fair if we're assessing children, we should be telling their families What what the results are but I also think that the composite score doesn't always give the full picture and Families need to have an opportunity to to see that and getting it when the progress reports come out You know three months after the assessment is You know, there's a lot of time lost or maybe a lot of work has been done with that student But but families don't have that that picture So that was one of the things I wanted to mention My other question is About the decision to administer the screener to kindergarteners twice a year And specifically why in november and and june and the the Are you using the beginning of the year? Benchmarks in november are using the middle of the year benchmarks in november just thinking about what that That looks like for kindergarteners and how those How the results are going to present themselves Thank you. Thank you for your question and thank you for your your feedback that you provided me So in terms of your question about the kindergartners historically November has been identified as the time to collect that data based on some of the beginning of the year structures and systems that teachers and educators are Attempting to introduce our kindergartners too. And so there's been I think a really strong belief that students need that first couple of months to get used to just being in school and understanding what school is and understanding What systems and structures are and so from my understanding historically November has been the marker that educators have found or kindergarten educators have found as the Ideal time to introduce these assessments to students as part of the work that i'm currently undergoing I'm looking at the time frame that is being used to collect this data Because I think that we can make some shifts in order to collect that data a little sooner Great. Now I look forward to hearing how that You're what you find and and the outcomes and what you decide to do moving forward and then final comment I would just like to suggest that That the communication around what is the dibbles and what is it screening and what the results are telling families Perhaps come from you or the ELA department I just It seems like principles were writing them and so different principles clearly Had sort of different priorities or different things that they wanted to highlight and so Different families across town are getting a slightly different message about what What it's screening for and what's going to happen next. Thank you very much. Absolutely. Thank you miss goodlson um I was this is Sort of repeating what miss exton just said, but I was wondering if in the future there could be More um, I don't know if a family forum or some sort of opportunity Where rather than getting the information for the first time as you are receiving your scores And maybe those scores feel alarming or maybe they don't um sort of setting up expectations for parents um families and I I'm very glad we are working and getting it online because I don't think I'd actually mentioned this To dr. Homer before but mine got lost in the mail So I one of the people for whom the u.s. Mail system was an ineffective way of getting my children's dibble scores So fortunately, I got them from the school and I knew to ask for them But if I had not known that I just would never have had them Um, but thank you. That's uh, that's all. Thank you Mr. Curden Thank you. Um, thanks for the presentation and for adding in some of my Additional information that I had requested Um, still a couple of things the the letters that go out when Somebody scores Well below do we is that something that you've written? What what does that look like? Yes, uh, so there are letters that do you go out to students that are well below And those letters are sent out by by every school automatically And those aren't adjusted. They're kind of the the same letter But what happens is when those meetings happen with the families of the students who are scoring in that particular category The follow-up conversation is more specific to their need Right or can we can we can we see that letter you only linked to the initial Absolutely screener. Yes, absolutely Great, um And then at those so so who participates in those meetings So it's the teacher that's participating and then if there's any other staff member that's part of that particular child's Plan in order to be successful in school meaning a special educator or MLL instructor they can also Participate as well, but generally it's the teacher and the parent or guardian So there's not necessarily the reading interventionist present That's someone also in case if a student is receiving tier two or tier three for example Instruction, yes, they would be participating as well Okay Now the state guidelines say that if somebody scores in the fifth percentile They should automatically get tier three. Is that something we're doing? Um, I do not know if that is actually the case. I will look into that to make sure that's happening Um, yeah, it's not in the regulation. That's just in there. They're sort of suggested guidance I think that's it for now. I mean the state the state does have What I thought were very well written notices the the four different notices I don't know if we utilize those or not. I think our initial notice Is pretty vague. It doesn't really say much about what's but you know, what what the assessment is going to do what the process is The state version is actually more robust. So I would suggest we go back and think about Making that notice a little bit more robust All right. Thank you. Thank you Anyone else I have one more question then Didn't want to take up too much time. So in the in the sample score that you you have um in the presentation If if um This student on this on the decoding subtest was in the yellow range if if And this is getting pretty granular. I know you're not involved in the day-to-day um operation of this but um If we had a student who who fell in the red zone under decoding But what what otherwise was not in the well below Would that trigger anything other than the teacher, you know, make adjusting their own practices? Ideally it would just trigger that and the teacher would be equipped to respond To what the specific need is um in terms of a student Let's say receiving tier two instruction. That's what the total composite score would would tell us if that's what's needed But ideally the sub score here is not Use in isolation to make that determination. Okay. Thank you They do then after the administration At that grade level we have grade level team meetings at our data meetings And so though that grade level team sits down with their literacy Coach and reading specialist to look at all those scores. So they are looking at those subtests and even if your composite score was not You know in the red, you know, but there were some subtests They are using that actually those subtests allow us to target the instruction the composite Gives us an overall score, but it's the subtest that actually targets the intervention So they use that to then make their intervention groups whether like, um, dr. Ford Walker said You might be getting a second dose in your classroom of foundations You might be seeing a reading specialist is pulling that but the grade level teams look at that data through our data meetings Great. Thank you And let me just ask one technical question Assuming that the double scores are coming as a PDF. Do we have the capacity to Put that into power school so that parents can access it that way ups So power school was the initial Portal that we looked into because it's I think the most easily accessible and often accessible But that is not an option. So now we are left with looking at our other portal, which is amplify. Okay. Okay. Thank you Oh, dr. Allison and dr. Allison amp. He's got her hand up. Yes dr. Allison amp. Thank you um You just asked one of my questions. Um, I'm confused why I'm wondering why we can't use power school But um Because I'm worried we're already Asking people to use it for other things and I'm worried if we're sending them somewhere else that this is getting really messy I mean, I think elementary student elementary parents already have problems just Connecting with the schools online with power school at least that's been my impression in the past So that's one question. Um, but the second one is just For the students who are scoring well below. I understand we're rolling out online Uh communication, but are we still going to mail out their reports? Um next year And I understand what miss goodlison said that the mail is not perfect either, but I'm Worried that we don't want them to fall through the cracks So I'll start with your second question. Um, our primary form is going to be online access Of course, there are going to be scenarios in cases where that will not work for um A set of people in our in our schools. And so what schools will do is Have the names and have the families identified for who that does not work for and they'll either have emailed If that works or then if that doesn't work, then also receive a physical mailing through the us mail But our goal is to try to have the electronic version available and in easily accessible That brings me to your first question. I completely understand and realize that Um adding on another form of communication through a different portal may complicate things for folks Which is why we initially Start it with power school. Um, and it's a simple what I think is a simple problem and many others on the team think which is essentially, um student ID numbers need to be listed And power school doesn't have the platform available in a way where those We're number one where the id is listed on the report and that where their software can pull that and put it into their particular platform And so there have been requests from a number of districts around the country for this to actually take place because everyone is um engaging in these conversations at in various districts. And so the need is You know, it's quite a large one. And so power school themselves understands that and they're Working on a fix in the meantime because we have no idea around the timeline for that In the meantime, we need to pursue other options. And so the other option right now is looking at amplify Which is a portal that families do have access to we would have to of course Look at the impact of using an amplify and look at what that, you know What complications that might add such as password retrieval and all of the technical things Um, which are things that we're considering But right now I think the the priorities to make sure that we can provide better access so that Reports aren't getting lost in the mail or aren't received by families Okay, thank you very much. Thank you Looking around any more questions or comments? Hearing that we'll move on to the next item on the agenda, which will be the superintendent's proposed budget superintendent homing. All right folks, so I am pleased to be here to present the FY 25 proposed budget. I'm joined by Jose Ferrius who is our assistant director of finance We I just want to sort of explain kind of why we're here when we're here Taking a look at the FY 25 proposed budget. Mr. Mason Had a little one not too long ago and went on a parental leave And has since also informed us that he will be joining Chelsea the city of Chelsea as the deputy town manager or city manager before too long and so Mr. Ferris and I along with Leanne Wilson ski who's a consultant who's helping us out and is on the zoom have been working diligently on the FY 25 budget With a little bit of help from mr. Mason, which has delayed us a little bit three weeks and getting this proposed budget to you So I want to thank you first of all for your patience as we worked on this We've had a lot of meetings with budget subcommittee and are pleased to bring you our plan for FY 25 So with that said, I'll get into it Our budget priorities for FY 25 are as follows The first priority obviously was to make sure that we funded the override competitive compensation commitments that we Talked to voters about at length as we headed into the fall voting season We were really excited about that override being passed and are dedicated to making sure that we set aside funds And resources to meet the commitments of that Of that override we wanted to make sure we ensure we left aside adequate funds for what will be A 40 projected increase in electricity supply rates This is happening all over the country all over the the commonwealth And is having a pretty significant impact on the FY 25 budget We're adjusting elementary staffing levels because we have decreasing enrollments But we want to make sure that we sustain existing service levels and even add resources in particular areas that will benefit our focal groups We're maintaining our staffing to support needs and special education And expanding our and what we know are expanding secondary enrollments We've also made some prior investments and secondary enrollments that I will try to highlight And we're of course continuing our implementation of the five-year strategic plan And making sure that we're maintaining our focus on focal groups, which I'll talk about in just a moment I want to start by highlighting our 10-year district enrollment trends So what you see here is a graph that should be relatively familiar to those of you on the committee And to folks who have seen some of our presentations to the town The blue line is our actual enrollment from FY 18 until now and then you see also a projection up to FY 28 The other lines are different projections that we've received from Different organizations as well as an internal projection That's the gray line and that's the line we primarily use to project sections because it's the one that has proven the most consistent What you'll see is that we are trending along that gray line But we're slightly below where we had projected our enrollments for this fiscal year fiscal 24 The purple lines are two projections that we got from decision insight a couple of years ago And the orange line was a projection that we got prior to the pandemic from mckibben So you can see the dip in enrollment and then you can see the trend moving upwards and also starting to level out Which is where we're at now I want to speak a little bit about our focal group populations If you recall there are five focal groups identified in the strategic plan And i'm going to talk about kind of what's happening with the populations of those focal groups in our linkedin public schools Because I think it's important for thinking about how we're allocating resources So one of the focal groups is students who identify as bipoc Particularly students who identify as black or african-american and students who identify as hispanic or multiracial So are we have stable populations of students who are identifying as black or african-american or asian right now in the system? But we have a steadily increasing population of students who are identifying as hispanic or multirace non-hispanic over the past five years So our population for that focal group is going up We also have steadily increasing populations of english learners and students for whom english is not their first language and families A steadily increasing population of students with IEPs Students from income insecure households or low-income households and students who identify as non-binary. That's that lower green line I just want to note that it's not surprising that this line is going up And we don't feel that it's representative necessarily of all the students who might be identifying as non-binary because this is really new data It's very recent that we're even capturing it as you can see because it was not even represented in 2019 at all And that's because it wasn't collected And what I want to highlight in highlighting the focal groups is that a number of these focal groups Also are captured in high needs populations And I think what's perhaps most telling is this trend Which is that a ps has a steadily increasing population of students whose needs are requiring additional material resources additional support additional staffing Those resources absolutely are required in order for us to meet our five-year strategic plan goals And so this line shows a ps students who are identified as high needs, which is an aggregate Calculation is one you see a lot in the school improvement plans Because we sometimes have smaller populations of some of the other focal groups But this will capture more of our students because it puts some of these focal needs together And that population has been very steadily increasing since 2019 in Arlington So I will get into the nuts and bolts of some of our numbers for f y 25 because everything I just shared is driving some of our calculations This is a Projection of revenue by funding sources from f y 21 through the upcoming year What you'll notice here is that um chapter 70 funds and town contributions continue to increase the covid 19 grants have expired in f y 25. So are no longer a source of revenue And there's a gap that is a little bit growing between what chapter 70 contributes and what town contributes However, that gap decreased this year because our chapter 70 allocation was significantly lower than anticipated This is f y 25 funding sources across all of our funds again You'll notice that the covid 19 revenues are no longer represented there Circuit breaker is contributing 2.1 percent to revenue special revenue to 1.9. That's our revolving count Grants 3.2 percent in our town appropriation is larger than it has been in previous years at 90 almost 93 percent This table represents our f y 25. It should say at the top. Sorry about that proposed budget expenses by category What you will notice is that there is a change overall In various categories here a change in 11 percent increase for special education a change of 7 173 999 across all accounts And I just want to note that there is a new category here of contingencies And that is a net of funding to be used to support competitive compensation And our budget additions and efficiencies that we haven't yet identified in position control because there are positions that are being Potentially eliminated, but we don't quite know yet because of the time of year which positions exactly those will be Also the 400 000 budget contingencies for f y 24 if you recall are funds that will be allocated by the town As part of some of the conversations we were having with long-range planning To support competitive compensation, but have not yet been allocated towards salaries These are our anticipated funding sources and how they break out across the long-range plan for this fiscal year And I want to talk about the proposed budget changes across the f y 25 budget So we'll start with contractual obligations and salary adjustments Overall the aps will spend three million eight hundred thousand fifty three 151 more Dollars on our contractual obligations and as a result of salary adjustments in f y 25 Then we did an f y 24 We're setting aside a significant allocation for collective for the purposes of collective bargaining with unit a About 1.7 million or 1,699,000 the there is a Line here that represents the unit d f y 25 increase that I want to explain a little bit It's 344,457 and what this represents is the increases in salaries for unit d employees Compared against the original contractual agreement But correcting for the four hundred thousand allocation that will happen in f y 24 because that goes into the base so the overall Difference between what we would have paid in f y 25 For unit d for the increase to unit d under the original agreement And what we will pay is actually 744,457, but if you correct that for the 400,000 that's going into the base Budget then you arrive at the 344,000 investment because it's offset by that 400,000 So if you put 1.7 million together with 344,000 you arrive at about 2 million Which was the commitment that we made in the override to contributing to salary adjustments and competitive compensation for our educators in unit a and unit d So that's what those two lines unit d is. Oh, sorry unit d is our paraprofessionals and unit a is our teachers There is a 436,000 allocation to support utility increases as I mentioned because our supply rates are going up About a 2 adjustment up in departmental budgets and then Some efficiencies and additions that I will talk about in just a moment I want to take a few minutes to talk about our sr 3 Assessment and what we're going to choose to adopt and what we will be Sort of moonlighting and saying we're not going to necessarily keep this in the f y 25 budget We're gonna we're gonna sunset that and not bring it in so Maintained from sr 3 our diversity equity and inclusion specialist is in addition that we had in our sr Dollars and is part of our covet 19 grants and we'll maintain that in the system Our director of research data and accountability was in addition this year that we will also be keeping We have an Arlington high school that should say assistant director of school counseling And a communication specialist at the district level at the at the fte rate of 0.6 So the reason we're keeping some of these things Is to make sure that we're increasing our administrative support at Arlington high school There are an an increasing number of students at Arlington high school And when we thought about the fact that there would be required administrative additional support dedicated to that school We wanted to focus on making sure that that was supporting student mental health And the counseling services that we provide to our students We are trying to increase our capacity to maintain functional data systems as you've seen in several presentations this year We'd also like to make sure that in future years data our research data and accountability department is providing reports directly to teachers Helping us make sure that we get reports out to families So that team has really been instrumental in helping us think about what the connections could be To families and getting those reports out such as our dibbles scores Um, and we want to maintain that work and we want to increase support for professional learning And our consistency of communications to families and staff when it comes to communications with families And so that's why we're maintaining those from sr3 We're also eliminating a few positions from what we had used those s or three dollars for this year So we'll be eliminating the director of leadership development onboarding who you had Heard from previously not because we don't think that that work is exceptionally important But because we knew that the whole point of that role was to build some systems to build some plans to leave us Some recommendations that we would then embed in the capacity of the existing system We've done some work looking at liaison structures for families and we had piloted a family liaison at Gibbs this year We are wanting to reassess that liaison model work directly with the welcome center and think about ways that we can do that Both efficiently and in ways that increase the capacity of our educators to work with families and we're not sure that The system is going to be able to sustain full-time liaisons at every school So we want to take a look at that model and think about what? alternatives we could we couldn't consider and then for communication specialist We had put point we had put a full time but it's shared between two staff members And so we're going to eliminate point four of that support from the s or three grant and not pull that over into the general fund So I want to name a few commitments that we had made previously That are maintained in this budget because I think it's easy not to see some of those We've been because we had additional revenues because we had other funds available in previous years We've been preemptively planning for what we knew would be increasing secondary enrollments So there are some commitments that were made in previous budget years using a combination of funds that were keeping in this budget And that I want to name specifically as things were sustaining because they come at a resource cost and have an impact on those Contractual obligations that we have so we added 6.2 positions in the fy 24 budget to our linkedin high school Those were teachers pair professionals a theater manager other positions that were linked to the opening of the new high school wings We added almost four 3.9 positions at oms and gives in the fy 24 budget including an expansion of the team chair role And various teacher positions. We've added lc at oms in 22 and 23 We did half of the lc in fy 22 the other half in fy 23 And that was to support what we knew we're going to be growing enrollments over the next couple of years We also expanded some specialist staff at oms last year knowing that those sections would be getting bigger over the next year or two We've added staff and sections at Gibbs in fy 23 because we had one of the bigger class sizes going to Gibbs in fy 23 And we've maintained that staffing level so that will support another increase in the student Population at Gibbs next school year in fy 25 Our monotony paraprofessional shifted to the ssp pay rate in fy 24 And that will be maintained in the new unit d agreement and is another investment that we've made in our unit d paraprofessionals And in this budget in fy 25 we're maintaining elementary class sizes at under 25 students per section So while there are reductions at the elementary level due to enrollments We're making sure we sustain Both the service rate So we're not eliminating any special education positions, for example, or any ml positions multilingual learner positions Only the class section levels which actually comes at a service increase If you think about the fact that there are fewer students that our special educators and other service providers will be providing for four So all of those commitments are sustained in fy 25 So here are some of the efficiencies that we're considering What you'll see here is a total of five classroom teachers It's actually a total of six sections from fy 24 to fy 25 that are being reduced It's six because we we added a kindergarten section in fy 24 after the budget that we're now not including in fy 25 So that's why that sixth section is not included on this list As well as the paraprofessional that comes along with that section It's just sort of net neutral because it wasn't in fy 24 to begin with and this is a budget to budget comparison We're eliminating about 1.0 in pe specialists due to the number of sections And the number of specialists that we need in order to provide the number of special sections of pe that we provide for students on a weekly basis We are reducing one curriculum specialist at the district level We currently have three of those an instructional coach at the district level that is tied to mathematics And that's at the middle school level And a library paraprofessional role in at about the level of point two that we had had to support some of the special The specialist coverage at the elementary level The library paraprofessionals would occasionally teach classes with a reduction in sections may not need to teach as many Of those special classes. So that's a total budget efficiency level of 8.2 f te's or 567 thousand dollars And here are our additions I want to name something explicitly about these additions in that these additions while they are additions from fy 24 to fy 25 A number of them won't necessarily be felt in so far as they're already here So most of these additions have come after the budget. These are positions that already exist within the system And we're like I said sustaining them. So first is a classroom This is the only one that that is not true for a new classroom teacher and specialized support paraprofessional at monotomy preschool Because monotomy is adding a classroom because they are now in their new space I knew this was a major priority for a number of Committee members and we want to make sure that monotomy can take in as many students as possible because of the importance of That early education for our students We are adding we are keeping the following positions We added an inclusion specialist after the fy 24 budget at Thompson and we're maintaining that We will have some larger class sizes still at Thompson because of the limitations of space though I am working on buffer zone Strategy that will help us swing. Hopefully some students out of that zone so that we can reduce some of the enrollments there We had added a bcba Full time at stratton and we're actually backfilling that at the district level And so that's an addition of 1.0. So that stratton with the slc Program that is there can have the full time support of a board certified behavior analyst We are also adding three Specialized support paraprofessionals. We actually already have at stratton to support the slc there We've added various one-to-one teaching assistants for students as needed as further IEPs over the course of the year in special education Specialized support paraprofessional at arlington high school to support one of the programs A tutor at arlington high school that runs the learning center And is available to students for tier two support on any homework that they might need And is there actually also running some student level tutoring Where students can help their peers with their homework, which is a great addition to the arlington high school Codray of services that they're providing We've added two custodians at arlington high school since the opening of the New wing we haven't been able to fill those positions yet, but we're hopeful that we'll be able to before too long That's 2.0 The 3.6 positions from the sr3 allocation that I already mentioned and an administrative assistant for the district welcome center because we moved Over here we need to make sure that people can access the building can get in And that role is also serving the Welcome center as an administrative assistant and the department of equity belonging inclusion and justice um In in an administrative capacity, so that's total budget additions of 19.2 or 1,147,748 dollars in 99 cents I do want to name a few future additions if funds allow for it when we are at the conclusion of collective bargaining And as we continue to work on Funds for fy 24 should funds become available or should we have savings from vacancies? Which is a possibility a reality something that we've had over the past several years Then there are a few things we could consider funding If there are resources available one is Additional clerical support for special education department This was a request that came through and something that I think would greatly benefit that department and making sure that we're meeting Timelines and getting all the paperwork that comes along with those requirements completed Potentially special education liaisons or service providers We had a number of requests for that as well in our requests for this year Elementary librarians was a major priority that we would consider funding if funds would allow for it Um custodial support across the district has been a challenge So we might take a look at that as well Social workers were requested in a number of sites across the system And reading additional reading intervention support was also requested So should we have the funds available? We will come back to some of those requests that were top of mind for many of you and for us And see what we can put into the fy 25 budget at the conclusion Of our planning and finalization of that budget We have a few remaining steps left as you all know Where we have a school committee meeting for a public hearing in a couple of weeks one week after that a tentative date to approve The proposed budget A finance committee we will be visiting on march 25th and town meeting opens in april happy to take any questions Any questions from the members of the committee miss giddison I was this is my first budget season. So um looking going through the all of the Line items and cost centers was a challenge And i'm wondering you spoke to this a little bit if it's possible for us me and the people at home Is if there is a way to get a breakdown of where and how we spend our special education budget There's a lot of interest right now in You know different services that people need And I think it would be helpful to understand how you know, are the you know reading specialists versus evaluations versus Legal fees I know this might not be able to be answered tonight But I do think having that kind of information Would be really helpful for me and for other members of the public. Yeah Um, I can't answer with specificity right now But I can say that the very the vast majority of our funding for special education goes towards positions in that department As you can see in most of our investments for f y 25 are on positions in that department And there is about a 2.5 million dollar increase in special education funds for f y 25 The how that all breaks out I'd have to work with the zelmer and and the finance department to sort of get a little bit more fine detail for you on Okay, and I also just wanted to reiterate my the idea of if money becomes available The priority to be placed on adding the elementary school librarians The other comments or questions from the committee Mr. Thielman, I just want some clarification for on the s for the high school regarding the building So there's two custodians. There's the manager of the Of the theater Not so those are the three kind of So there were some other additions in f y 24 that like somebody to manage the cafe and to work directly with the students on Getting the cafe up and running which it sounds like it is which is fantastic And the also the there's a copy center upstairs So there was a f te associated with that. It was an ssp f te in f y 24 And there's So there's the theater manager, which we added in f y 24 The biggest concern that has come from the opening of the second wing has been around custodial support, right? And so that's that's what we're prioritizing Should funds become available? All right, thank you Well, but there's two custodians that we haven't filled yet, correct They were posted in f y 24 added in f y 24 after the 24 budget, but they haven't been filled yet Right, but those are but those jeff. Those are part of the f y 25 budget for sure. Yes. Yeah I I get that. Yeah. Okay. Sorry, but you would be adding more than that. Should funding become available? That's on the list. I would say probably below a couple of the other things we've talked about One of the challenges that we have with custodians at the high school in particular Is that when there is an absence at another school of another custodian? We will often pull from the high school because they have the most custodians But what that means with the building this big is that on a day like that, which is almost every day Um, you have some absence somewhere then your short staffed at the high school So that's additional too at the high school will make a big difference. Okay. Thank you Mr. Cardin, I just wanted to point out there is a schedule in the budget on special education and interventions Yes, one of the many schedules. Yeah, no, and I'm sort of working my way through it, but Translate to that to what is happening in reality. Yeah, okay If there are specific questions about that miss giddelson and you want to reach out to myself and miss elmer We can sort it out for you Seeing no further comments Dr. Allison ampie. Oh dr. Allison ampie. I was looking for a little hand icon. Okay Sorry Okay, so First I know when we were Talking through how we're going to do this budget. We had discussed potentially having a budget subcommittee meeting next week Which has not yet been scheduled and I just want to reiterate my hope that we would do that and we invite any Or okay, I'm not chair of that committee. So I can't actually say that but I expect the chair would invite anyone Uh, any of the other school committee members who have questions or comments about the budget to come um and then second I just wanted uh Dr. Homan, I appreciate all the hard work that you and mr. Ferris and and uh all the other people have put into this um looking through the budget we've used the same um Messaging for the first parts and it continues to have things which I personally feel are errors and I guess in addition to my little hand I'm stomping my little foot and um I am going to share with you what I think those are and perhaps some suggestions for different wording it it's things Let me sorry. I'm on the wrong page. I'm away at this. I'm away at this start um it's things for example concerning chapter 70 and the way The information is written in the budget book. It suggests that the town Basically is a pass through for chapter 70 and as we all know we're as members of the long-range planning committee and Actually all school committee members now because we've been working on the override. No, that's not how it works here All the money comes into a big pot. It gets stirred up together and then the town dumps out money You know, yes, it's an interesting and important Um amount to be keeping track of how much chapter 70 we're getting but it's not you know, it could go to zero and the town would still be um, hopefully Fulfilling their obligation to us and I'm just there there's things like that in the messaging at the start and I just like to get some of those cleaned up or at least Have that discussion and if I get over real ruled I get over ruled But it just it concerns me that it's giving the wrong impression to Our families and then when we have to do things like override sets starts getting They start from a position of confusion, which isn't helpful. So that's all for right now. Thank you Any other comments questions? With that we move forward to superintendents update Okay, one second Hold on Technical difficulties. Okay. All right So our a number of our ahs students went to kebek over the february break and they wanted to say a special Thank you to school committee for approving that trip. That's a picture of them Um enjoying the very very cold weather. I heard it was freezing Uh, but they had a grand chime and sent a lot of pictures back with them And we're really excited about this inaugural opportunity to visit kebek I have a few updates on administrative searches. We are currently in the process of um Identify well, we have actually identified finalists and we're planning on announcing those as soon as we can hopefully monday And then we'll be running some finalist rounds through next week And probably into the following week and then identifying the principal for the hardy school very soon and announcing that as well We have some upcoming searches one for k12 math director If you recall our former math director moved into the data and accountability roles We have an interim in place right now. We also have an interim met co director in place right now So we'll be doing a search for that permanent position And right now as noted, we are currently looking for and are posted for an interim cfo And or we will be running a search for assistant superintendent of finance and operations in The absence of mr. Mason who will miss very much I have a small kindergarten registration update with more data on this to come very soon As of yesterday we have 152 kindergartners approved 148 kindergarteners pending and 300 total in the queue to be registered for next school year As indicated in the kindergarten letter They the sort of deadline to apply for first consideration around buffer zones was up until the 28th And so i'll be sending buffer zone assignments Super soon as soon as we have all of these Applications sort of organized in a way that I can assign buffer zones prioritizing some swoop away from east arlington in buffer zone assignments and Then we'll get that back out to families so that they can make decisions about things like after school care So we try to coordinate the after school care with kindergarten registration launch So that's kindergarten registration update. I do want to note that your enrollments Don't reflect actual numbers yet for kindergarten, but i'm hoping that the next time I send enrollment data That'll reflect the actuals for kindergarten. So right now you're still working with a projection In the enrollment data that I sent along I have a quick athletics update for the winter season the wrestling team when there's six consecutive middle sex league division championship and MIA division one metro central sectional championship the boys hockey team when the middle sex league championship Highest ranked public school in the division one state tournament very exciting girls hockey qualified for the state tournament Boys basketball won the middle sex league championship in second straight year Nordic ski competed in their first ever state championship meet girls track finished third at the middle sex league meet both boys and girls track How a lot of students can meet at sectionals and state as well boys swimming finished second at the middle sex league meet Gymnastics finished sixth at the middle sex league meet and qualified for sectionals for the first time in over 10 years As they already got and shouted out. Yay And the alpine ski team had another successful season with three students qualifying for the state meet As and there were a lot of other successes in the in the season as well But these are just a few of the highlights from the winter season and I also provided your enrollments. I'm happy to take any questions any questions during I'm ready to go to the policies for second read We are pulling off of the list b e d h and j l c d which were referred to council And we're holding k d c Because we need to Assure that we have the technical capacity to do that so If there are any requests to pull anything off the list Beyond those three. I'll entertain any questions about that Hearing none then I would go and present ask for a motion to adopt the remaining policies on second read Can you say the third one that you were pulling? We're pulling k d c Okay, sorry K d c which sort of requires a little pop up. We don't have the technical capacity to do that right now Any comments or questions hearing none? I'll look just the ones you're calling and yeah, we are we are removed We are pulling b e d h and j l c d Which were referred to council. Okay. Yes, and k d c which for reasons of the Technology other than all all the rest are ready to go Should the committee choose to adopt them and when you say council, it's a town council. Yeah I will approve all the remaining motions. Okay motion by mr. Thielman second by miss giddelson Any other comment and it's roll call Dr. Allison epi. Yes Yes Miss giddelson Yes, mr. Cardin. Yes, mr. Morgan. Yes, mr. Thielman. Yes, miss exton. Yes, and I voted in the affirmative. That's a seven nothing vote Uh 750 There's a consent agenda all items listed with an asterisk are considered to be routine and will be enacted by one motion There'll be no separate discussion of these items unless a member of the committee so requests In which event the item will be considered in this normal sequence warrant two four two nine on the amount of five hundred forty seven thousand Three hundred seventy seven dollars and seventy seven cents dated February 21st in our only in school committee draft regular meeting minutes February 9th 2024 Motion to approve so moved moved by miss exton second by Second mr. Thielman roll call vote dr. Allison ampere Yes Uh miss giddelson. Yes, mr. Cardin. Yes, miss Morgan. Yes, mr. Thielman. Yes, miss exton. Yes, and I vote on the affirmative That's a seven nothing vote Subcommittee and liaison reports and announcements budget mr. Cardin Uh, we've met a couple times to talk about progress on the budget book We will try to schedule a meeting next week to uh receive any feedback on The draft budget book ahead of the hearing um We do have a meeting scheduled On the 12th like of the day before the hearing which is not going to be very helpful. So out of the 13th um So we'll try to get one scheduled for next week. Um And that's it Thank you. Miss uh exton community relations. Thank you. Um, there was a school committee chat hosted on tuesday, february 27th Um That was well attended. There are notes from the chat. Thank you miss morgan for taking those are in novice Um, the next school committee chat is on saturday april 6th at 11 a.m. Which I also believe is election day Um, and that will just be school committee members I think there was some confusion from some members of the community about the school committee chats and who would be there Um, and the subcommittee had decided to try having administration attend as well to provide some More instant and direct feedback and answer some questions um But we also had feedback from committee members that having Chats that just have school committee members would also be helpful. So the next one Um on saturday april 6th will just have school committee members Uh, and I think that's all there is to report. Okay. Thank you facilities. Mr. Thielman No report policies and procedures. Mr. Schlickman. No report Our all into the high school building committee. Mr. Thielman Where we meet next uh tuesday. Oh wonderful Leah's on the uh, cia some committee will be meeting. Ah cia. Well, you know You hide over there in the corner Please make it about me. Um Curriculum instruction assessment and accountability. Ms. Morgan. Yes, we are meeting on uh, monday The 18th at two o'clock. Okay Your meetings are always wonderful So I've been told Leah's on reports and he Leah's on reports any announcements Uh, then we are proceeding to future agenda items any future agenda items Hearing none executive session We will be Looking to enter executive section to conduct Strategy sessions in preparation preparation for negotiations With union and or non-union personnel or contract negotiations with union and or non-union In which if held in an open meeting may have a detrimental effect To conduct strategy with respect to collective bargaining and litigation in which if held in an open Meeting may have a detrimental effect collective bargaining may also be Conducted with a ea unit a negotiations And to discuss the deployment of security personnel and or devices or strategies with respect to their too Do I have a motion to go into executive session? So moved by mr. Thielman second second by miss exton Roll call vote dr. Allison ampe Yes Uh, miss giddelson. Yes Mr. Cardin. Yes, there's morgan. Yes, mr. Thielman. Yes, miss exton. Yes, and I voted on the affirmative that is a seven Nothing vote. We are entering executive session and we will not return to a public session thereafter. Thank you