 Andrew last meeting, do you want to do the honors and open? You got it. You're the chair, my friend. I'll see you for a minute. All right. One minute on the clock. All right, so we will we will begin this meeting of the Montpelier Roxbury Public School Board at 634pm. I don't have an agenda in front of me just yet so give me a second here. Yeah. Public comment. Read I'm happy to read that. Yeah, if you want to go ahead. And maybe in the meantime, we want to do public comment that are on start by raising their hands so that we could get. Yeah, great call. Yeah, I see. I was going to say, I wonder if we can get a sense of how many public because we have a lot of people on the call and if we have a bunch, I think we should, because we have a time limit on our presenter from the Vermont equity coalition. So I, if you have a bunch of people on public comment, we might just have to do like 30 seconds or a minute. So, quick instructions on how to raise hands. Yeah, please. So if you're on zoom and you're interested in speaking, the best way to let us know is to go, if you click down at the bottom to the participant list, it will open up a participant list off to the right. Once the participant list is open, you should be able to scroll and find your name usually it's at the top, and then click on reactions. Right at the bottom and raise hand. And I see raise hands I see like Joel Lincoln and Lisa and out and I see Ethan. It actually looks like you could just click on reactions at the bottom there's a toolbar at the bottom, click on reactions. You might need to click on more there's a whole bunch of different reactions like clapping hands and a coffee cup and all of that and then you have to click on the raise hand button. Sorry, Ethan, we, we, we saw your hand. We'll get to you. All right, should we just go. So are we going to start with Joe. Joe, do you want to read first and then comments that were just sent to us at the board by Jolinda Burton to the MRPS school board I would appreciate if you would include the following in tonight's public comments. I apologize I cannot be there in person. My thoughts are regarding yesterday's letter from Superintendent Libby bone steel to district families regarding the change of in school mask mandate announced yesterday. And to the governor's press conference yesterday which included data and context from Health Commissioner Levine and Education Secretary French. I understood this shift in recommendation to be a result of weighing the science and medical data balancing the overall public health costs and benefit and to be a determination that the costs of wearing masks all day in school is no longer justified by the medical and epidemiological perspective. In her letter yesterday Libby shared this change and mandate not with that data and context but with opinion that while it will now be a personal decision, wearing masks in school is still the right thing to do. Libby equated students continuing to wear a mask with caring for each other after parentheses after the Vermont Health Department sanctioned removing masks in school period. I found that at minimum confusing and at most potentially divisive among students and staff. What about caring for those with anxiety around wearing masks or who can barely be understood through a mask. This district has navigated the pandemic incredibly well I think most would agree, and it's been by following the state's medical and scientific data and advice. The letter diverges from that without giving database reasoning. The letter references quote positive cases still occurring in our community and quote as a reason to continue wearing masks. So what will the MRPS administration choose as a low enough bar to remove masks and our health professionals consulted on that. This MRPS students and families two years into this is not good students many too young to grasp or living through have been told to stay away from each other stay silent while eating, only play with certain groups stay in line rather than run around outside and cover their noses and mouths, but still managed to be discernible by each other parentheses not to mention trying to understand what all the masked adults are saying and parentheses. The mitigation tool and the transmission of COVID but now our state administration recommends that to balance our mental and physical health of our students. It's time to drop masks in school time for kids to fully see and hear each other again. I'm not an educator but I know a little about transitions and I humbly suggest that the schools plan to transition students from wearing masks all day to not wearing them at all. Wait, sorry, to not wearing them all day. We're removing masks outside and incorporating eating lunch in the cafeteria. For those that would like them add in class mask breaks when students have plenty of space and so on. Make it an opportunity for students to practice empathy and inclusion with their classmates. We can follow the guidance and be gentle with our children at the same time. Students and much of the community have been working really hard to get to a point where it is safe to do this. It's a great moment and opportunity to share the joy and hard won fruits of our labor with them and with each other. I appreciate your time and the opportunity to be heard sincerely Jill and the Burton parent of second grader and kindergarten. Thanks Jill. And just since we have a number of public comments in case it's your first time attending a board meeting I just want to qualify that the board receives input during public comments but unless it's public session set up for an exchange. The board doesn't typically go back and forth so that we can move through our agenda in a timely fashion, just so everyone is aware. Please feel free to reach out to us again outside of the board meeting. If you'd like to have a conversation. Anyone else want to add anything. Yeah, a couple things I think given the fact that we have time limits for people on the agenda. Please keep your minutes your comments to one minute or less less would be better. If you repeat something someone has said you can endorse it without resaying it. And I don't mean to limit public comment at all but if this drags out for too long or we're going to lose time for people who prepare presentations for the board. So thank you. All right, let's start with Joel. I also applaud the move away from mandated and asking him on failure public schools will never live in a world without managed risk, but we still climb trees, take your kids hiking and tick ridden woods swimming muddy lakes, we still ski and sled and snowboard. Life is too rich to hide from it you know that makes us a tiny bit safer, my three children including two with special needs that are specifically impacted by having their faces covered, and the faces of others hidden deserve every opportunity for generations before the privilege to smile and be seen, and we deserve district leadership that does not frame us as uncaring bills. That's all. Thanks. Thanks Joel, thanks for the brevity. Lincoln and Liza. Hi, thanks. I want to cheer for this decision and also shared Jolinda's concerns about the framing. I have a letter saying that an action that shows we care maybe to continue to wear a mask. And I, I really think it's from that letter, I, if I were a teacher in our school district, I would not feel comfortable unmasking for my class and I think it's important that we also show that a sign of caring is unmasking so your students can hear you better and so that your friends who are English language learners can see your lips or your friends who are hard of hearing and that care could mean smiling to appear. I only know two high school youth in this district at Montpelier High School who have been suicidal this year one has attempted suicide and I know a seventh grader in another school district. So literally unmasking and smiling could save a life of your peer and so I really hope that the leadership of our school district can reframe what it means to care in many diverse ways. My teacher for the past 20 years, my smile has always been my most important tool, establishing community reassuring after a mistake adding humor reduces anxiety and promotes moods. I know a lot about the timing of this there has been an uptick in cases after every single vacation. So I want to caution us that an uptick in cases is not to be blamed on the unmasking, and that we need to prepare for that and hold strong, because cases are going down. I think it's great the antigen test that will go out so hopefully people use those, and we'll just not come to the school. I also want to point out in the press conference yesterday, Secretary French, specifically referred to some local mitigations that have been in practice that should not have been in practice and these are masking kids outdoors. I want to advance the guidance of the Vermont Department of Ed from this fall, and having kids not speak during classes, the elementary school kids have been watching movies every day in their classroom so that they're not talking and Secretary French said, absolutely kids need to talk during lunch, and they need to be able to see each other's faces at recess so I just hope we can reflect on that as a community Montpelier rallies around going above and beyond the recommendations and I think that actually, we need to be aware that this can cause more damage than good. I would just add a couple of points to what speakers have said before. What hasn't been mentioned is a concern that I have that we are explicitly at this point, linking, taking masks off to vaccination status so I see that our school district is not going to be inviting the youngest kids the pre K kids to be unmasking. And I think that that's that sounds like it's based on them not being available to get vaccines and that school districts that haven't reached the 80% mark or also being discriminated against to not have their kids have a choice that that and Roxbury included in that in our school district that that feels wrongly coercive to me as a parent in our community that everybody has the opportunity and has heard the arguments for this mitigation. If people are deciding not to do it then they shouldn't be penalized for that and all the data about our pre K kids are clear from my perspective from what I've read that the risks to their development far outweigh the very small risks that they have from COVID and and having bad illness or ramifications from COVID so I encourage us to reconsider as a school district those two milestones. That's all. All right, Alex brush. Hi, I'm a 10th grader MHS I wasn't planning on speaking I just, I have the letter yesterday caught me off guard. I live with my grandparents, and who's who are immunocompromised as well as my high risk stepfather, and I directly oppose this even though I know it's a state decision not directly based on you guys. And I just want to make sure y'all are like putting all the precautions to make sure COVID doesn't spread, which I never really will with the lift of mandatory maskings and want to make sure y'all just know that this is going to directly harm the student body of not only our high school but all the schools in the district. Thanks Alex. I'm not even park. Yes, thank you. I would just like to endorse the speakers ahead of me who have applauded the lifting of the school mask mandate. I'd also like to thank our superintendent for her email yesterday. I know there's been some friction around the framing but I still think that she has taken a courageous position and it's a position that appears to be in line with the governor and the Health Commissioner and the Secretary of Education. So, I'm all in favor of lifting this mandate. I'm the father of a third grader at us. Thank you. Thank you even. All right, I think that's all the public comments and lesson missing one. I don't think I am. You could offer to people didn't get to figure out how to raise their hand you could just unmute and say that you have public mind. If anybody else has an additional comment, please unmute yourself and let us know. Seeing none. All right, we're going to move forward with the consent agenda. They already spoke. I moved the consent agenda with the addition of the third resignation letter and the appointment of Christina Kimball to business manager. All those in favor. Hi. Can you post. So did you want to discuss the two items. No, we just had to add them verbally. Sorry. Yeah, I was like, yeah, I just when you said that I like, usually you remove them. Nope. My brain was going on autopilot. Yeah, I did the same. And in fact, I just realized I had the plumber. All right, so board discussion student representation on the board. Yeah, so just for context for those who are listening. This board has almost always had a student representative or two. As part of the board. And that sort of fell off the radar during COVID and we are reviving that practice of having student representatives on the board. So we're going to move on to students in high school and I think also middle school. Is that right, Libby? Again, to from middle school. I'm sorry. Did we end up extending the offer to middle school students or no. If you didn't do it, we didn't do it. Okay, I remember having an email. It's okay. But I remember having an email change with you where I asked if you want to meet a reach out to the principal if you would prefer to reach out to the principal on that. And all of the middle school students that reached out, they had heard about the opportunity, but they didn't end up applying. So we did extend it to the high school students and Matt McLean helped us sort of spread the word. If any high school student was interested in serving on the board that they could apply. They had about a month to do so and many of them or all of them are here tonight to address the board and then we'll discuss. We're going to be appointing two student representatives to the board. And I believe the, the idea being that they would serve through the end of the school year. Is that correct, Jim? Yes. Yeah. So we'll be doing that during executive session and then when we come back from executive session will announce the two appointments. And if people are not present, if the applicants are not present when we announce I will just be sending out an email to all applicants letting you know who was appointed. So I think we can go ahead and allow the students who came to address the board about their interest in serving in this capacity. And how about we just go in the order that they're listed on the agenda? So, Merrick, you're listed first. So yeah, if you could come to the table just so that you're at that microphone, that'd be great. Hey, members of the Montpelier-Roxbury Public Schools Board. Good evening. My name is Merrick Moden and I'm a junior at Montpelier High School. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak with you all and to present the reasons why I should be your next student representative. Now, what would I bring to the school board? Well, first, I'm an active and contributing member in various groups, including Montpelier High School's Gender and Sexuality Alliance, Racial Justice Alliance, and Student Council to groups in our community such as Montpelier's Complete Streets Commission, as well as the recently formed MRPS Vision Committee, among others. I will be able to draw from all these places when bringing my voice and input to every meeting. I cannot understate the importance of this. Having a wide range of views that I and thus the board can take into consideration when discussing significant issues is extremely valuable. Additionally, I would be a valuable representative because I provide an LGBTQ plus perspective myself. Second, the very reason I stand before you all today is because I am passionate about change and helping our community improve and thrive. I care deeply about my peers' voices and the school community, and I want to do everything I can to ensure that everyone across the district is adequately heard and represented. As a measure of this, if appointed, I can commit right now to working with the other student representative to organize regular meetings across the district where we can gauge what our fellow peers want to focus on and bring to the school board. Third, I'm a strong listener, planner, and hard worker. The various commitments that I have and dedication that I have to those highlights these traits and also show that I am prepared for the extra work that being a student representative will require. Now I want to thank you all for your time, consideration, and enthusiasm in this process, and I sincerely hope that you select me as your next representative. Thank you and have a good evening. Thank you so much. Okay, the next person is Meg. Hi, I'm Meg Bosun. I'm a 10th grader here at the high school. I used to hear her pronouns. I'm a part of many sports and clubs here at the high school, including the student council and also earth group. I do sports season, all three seasons that we offer them and have a widespread like experience with different communities at the school. I think it's a really awesome opportunity that we have student voice that could be on this board now and know there was a little gap, and I think it's really great that we're bringing it back in making decisions as part of this board. Thank you. Is Caleb Caleb are you on zoom. I can't see all the participants. So if you are. If you are present. If you could unmute yourself. And they could be joined from somebody else's computer right. And Caleb wasn't able to join us, but if Caleb if you are there and you want to speak later we can move you to the bottom of the line. Um, me. Hello, my name is Mae Byrne. I'm a current junior at Monterey High School. I would be a good member on your board because I am a hardworking student who is part of many sports and clubs at our school. It's hard work. I know that people need to be represented, especially in this unprecedented time of COVID. Our students need to know their voices are being heard that they are safe, and that we're going to do everything in our power to like make their experience at the school better. Thank you. Thank you. No, well, it looks like you are joined via zoom would you like to address the board. You could unmute and speak. Um, I'm no well west bomb, and I would like to join the, like to give my perspective to the school board because I've had a lot of different educational experiences in the past and I I'm also very passionate about being able to improve our community in any ways possible. Thank you for offering this opportunity to people to school. Thank you so much. Okay, um, Zachary, I see that you're you've joined would you like to address the board. Yeah. Hi folks, my name is Zach Kenningson. I'm a junior Monterey High School. And I want to thank you for taking the time to consider my peers and I student representatives on the school board. The inclusion of students voices is vital to any equitable and functioning school system and I'm incredibly grateful that our district is offering this opportunity in the first place. My interest in this position stems from the main principle of including students voices. I previously served on the school resource officer oversight committee with a few of my peers. My experience only led me to wonder what more could be done for the school district community as a whole. One of the tasks we did for that work with survey stakeholder groups, parents, students, faculty and community members. For all the students on the survey who answered about how uncomfortable and just how unsafe they felt at school. How can we stand to support them. Students and teachers are the ones living the reality of being in the building every day and especially in a time like COVID it is essential to hear from the affected populations. Another part of my interest is directly connected to the work I do with outright Vermont as a youth organizer. I actually participated in facilitating a space of LGBTQ plus community members in regards to Essar funding. And the reason for my participation in that facilitation. So it's told when I arrived at the meeting was because no one on the current school board identified as LGBTQ plus as an LGBTQ plus person in this district hearing that only further motivated me to apply. How can a board support the needs of an entire group of people whose voices are often under representative. If no one there shares the lived experience, especially in regards to supporting trans youth. The fact that there were even was an opportunity for students and community members to come share about their needs in regards to the Essar funding shows that the board is aware that input is needed. And I've encouraged the board to continue the inclusion of different perspectives and voices. Student input and advocacy should be easily accessible and including students on the board who represent underserved communities is the first step to making everyone feel safe and supported in and out of the school building. Thank you for your time and consideration and I hope you all have a good night. Thank you so much Zach. Yeah, I know that after we received all of the letters of interest. I got a lot of emails from my fellow board members just expressing profuse thanks for all of you who have applied. It's a really great candidate pool and we're just so thrilled and excited that you all applied so thank you so much. We're going to move to the other part of our agenda with the waiting study. Did you want to. We don't want to do any questions or anything like that. No we don't I mean I want to reiterate the thanks. Yeah. The interest was overwhelming I've been on the board for what's going on six or seven years now and we've never had this many people. Step up and I know it's a little high just before that you know the interest level is through the roof this year and I really appreciate everyone stepping up and want to do this is a really important thing. And since it's just thank you and it's amazing to see this function interested in the board so really appreciate it. So yeah we have one more agenda item and then we will move into executive session, and then we'd likely be back here around eight. Well depending on how it goes. Yeah, I know it's seven now. It's going to be a long night for you all so I might maybe tune it on zoom. It's up to you. Everyone, you know on zoom or in person you're welcome to stay or go. I will definitely be emailing after the meeting, the decision that was made and also you're able to access either the zoom feed or the live YouTube either way. So, but I just don't want you to feel like you're beholden to stay either on zoom or in person. We'll communicate with everyone. Yes, immediately after the meeting I'll send an email. Yeah, I'll tell you right now that we wish you could give you all. Yes. Definitely. Hi, good evening. My name is Mark Schauber I'm the executive director for the coalition for months in an equity. I'm here tonight with Alex and worry. And I'm going to turn it over to them to do a brief presentation for you. I was wondering whether I could share my screen I've got a few slides for you all. I think so. Yes, yes you can. Great. You should be able to mark let me know if you can't. Okay, thanks, Libby. Can you see my screen. Yes, thank you. Excellent. And this this presentation is also available. It's available at mrps.CVTSC.org. It's a PDF that that you can download. And with that, I will turn it over to them, Rory and Alex. Good evening, Rory Tivo, I'm the cabinet school board chair and I'm one of the directors for the coalition for Vermont student equity. Here we'll go to the next slide. Just start off with a brief overview of who we are a little bit of the history of why this is a hot topic today. And then where we're heading in this that current legislative session. So, the Vermont coalition for student equity was formed last year in response to forward movement on legislative action on the 2019 people waiting factors report. And in a broad sense, this is the first hard look at Vermont's education finance system or the most comprehensive look at our system since the time of Brigham and act 60 back in the late 90s. So the coalition exists today, really to advocate for ensuring that Vermont's general education fund and other funds are equitably distributed to districts that need them in a way that fits. That really Vermont values and is consistent with the empirical data collected in that waiting factors report. The coalition is comprised of school board members, superintendents, business managers, legislators and a few other members of the general public. If you go to the next slide. There's a significant amount of geographic reach member districts are spread throughout 11 counties representing 80 different towns and cities and about 19,000 of Vermont's current student population. What I like to remark on is this that if you look at the map, it's where geographically distributed throughout the state. And a lot of the districts that are participating on face, if you take them at face value wouldn't necessarily have a lot in common. And I think that highlights the reality that while the post Brigham and act 60 structure worked well for a long time the time has come to take a hard look at it. That's particularly true. My home district of Cabot and district like Peachham are about as different as you can get in terms of population size both being very rural communities versus member communities such as when you ski or Burlington, for example, which are really the heart of our metropolitan part of Vermont up in Chippin County. So with that said, there's a broad range of stakeholders who are interested throughout the state. And that's why I'm here as mentioned before, over 25 years ago the Brigham decision required that Vermont students have substantially equal educational opportunities and that meant breaking down the barriers of property rich towns versus property poor towns and the struggle that came with that. Of course, integral to this as you are no strangers to as school board members. So we did live and die when it comes to tax rate and other factors by a number of equalized peoples that we have. It's foundational to the system that we divide our education spending by that number. However, just got you know, stratifying students by by number based on whether in high school middle school elementary school or pre K doesn't necessarily address or speak to particular demographic needs or the needs of those communities. This is particularly cute as Alex will talk about when we start considering things like English language learners in our community and the impacts of poverty. So in the last two, three years there's been a substantial move to really studying this issue and understanding how we should best wait pupils or purposes of looking at tax rate and tax and capacity in these communities. Next slide please. So final thoughts before I turn this over to Alex to take over the presentation. The dates are important for a number of reasons. And when we look, I think that when making the pitch to another school board as a school member. There's another option out there called cost equity that would effectively be for the district like how we look at it as small school grant and steroids this uncertain number each year coming from the agency of education based upon some similar factors but different in the less granting sending grant money or in effect subsidizing districts. We believe in the coalition that weights are better, mainly because it's predictable. It shifts with demographics. And I think, you know, Vermont is poised for some significant demographic changes in the near future, especially as we consider at a systems and policy level the addition of refugee families to our communities or those from out of state, the addition of different demographics and particularly more English language learners in our system are particularly acute. And we think that staying with the weight system is more predictable and easier to manage at the district level. So with that I'll turn this over to Alex who's going to have some more comments and talk about some more of what the coalition is doing and where we stand today. Hi, my name is Alex yen and I'm also a member of the coalition for Vermont student equity but I'm also on the school board when new ski. And there's often like many like changes when you're thinking about like why weights versus grants and weights to me and just as a simplified form is just the notion that it costs certain weights allows to better adjust to see the accounts for students because we know that educationally that it costs more to educate certain students or it costs, and I hate to use the word costs really about investment. We need certain investments to help educate certain students to reach a equal level of outcomes and that's how we see a play out in when new ski in the sense that we know that it does have additional costs for the students that we serve not because necessarily just also in the classroom but because of things like how do we translate our materials for our English language learners parents because we find it invaluable for our students to also have their families be involved in these things that are characteristics of things that sometimes when you're in the majority crowd that you take for granted and you don't know. And one of the reasons why we prefer weights over grants is that grants sometimes come from legislation and they make mandates on how you have to spend the money to a certain way and then you have to document it in every format. And it takes away the local control whereas weights it's about giving us the general fund and allowing the superintendent in the school board of flexibility to actually use the money for the student for the programs that we believe that are important. As you all well know that we're moving to a universal design learning type of format to to make it really more inclusive and having that integration of our students. English language learners with our other students enriches the educational experience of all students. And I think that is just way too difficult when we think about grants and as I mentioned in many ways when I've been testifying is that like. It's hard to hold legislators in a different county accountable for the brands that they're going to give us. Whereas I want to be accountable being a school board member in my school district and showing that we're educating students and as a school board member. I'm constantly also looking out for the outcomes of our students in terms of what are their meeting and there are some outcomes when when I sit in on our jampos and Winooski which are our demonstration of unproficiency education in our school that I've been impressed. And I know that that's why I believe in the faith of our local school board and why I think weights are the way to go as opposed to grants. So where are we today in many ways and when you look at it like the Senate finance draft to the bill deciding between they're trying to decide between cost equity and weights which is cost equity is like reverse funding grants and stuff. Senate education is deciding between EL as a grant versus EL as a weight and using potentially a hybrid approach. House ways and means are working on the education finance restructuring likely to receive a bill from the Senate. And the house education hasn't even started on the people waiting by waiting to discuss as a possible at 173 so there's still so much work but we all have agreed around the legislation all this is that the current system is not working and we need to make changes. And we're hoping that will buy a school district like you joining us will help us move further and actually creating a more equitable education funding system. Next slide mark. So this is how the kind of impact that would have on the different models and simulations, and we can get more into details. There's the link here for you to look at what it means in terms of your taxing capacity and remember taxing capacity does not mean necessarily your tax rate it's just giving you the option the flexibility on how how you will, how much money you can actually use and then convince your residents to actually vote and support the educational needs of your students and stuff. So that works in different levels. I think I got a minute like sometimes this gets get way into the weeds and I'm sure Mark or Rory or I would be happy to speak more in detail off offline or even more to go through the mathematical equations that you need to go and understanding our taxing system. And finally I just want to before we leave and really open it up for questions from the board. The next slide just basically says if you're thinking about joining us. There's no membership dues but because we, we are all volunteers I got a minute like we all have our day jobs and top of the school board but then. So we have actually helped get external help with the lobbyists and so donations are strongly incurred this is our really only source of revenue to help pay for our lobbyists to make sure that they keep us informed on what's going on on a day to day basis of what's going on. The AOEs general council has said donations to a 510C4 such as CVSTSER and acceptable use of state educational fund just to give you a hint. Just last week our school board and Winooski actually authorized a $2,000 on contribution to this because we know how important it is for this for us to work on it and I'll just leave. If you're wanting to make sure you contact Mark but I just need this one final note like when we started on this journey of a bunch of school board came together. I actually set out came out strong and told the group like the only reason I'm doing this is because I see that this is an opportunity to actually like unite the rural and the in the urban school districts in Vermont because education and equity is important for all. And isn't I'm not doing this just for Winooski I'm really doing this because I believe that this will help benefit all children in Vermont, and I think that is the ultimate goal of this coalition. So I think at this moment I'd love to open it up for questions for people that to ask between Rory and I and Mark. Thank you so much. Presentation has been that good. Well, I just want to thank you. I've been part of the list of so I've been kind of listening in for the past year but haven't been able to put things in my brain to get here. So, I guess in terms of your actual coalition, you have individual school boards, and you have individual school board and the school boards as a whole that vote in for your coalition with that with that right. So, our membership is made up of of school district boards and supervisor union boards, who are represented by individual school board members. And we also have like Rory talked about some superintendents and business managers that that are active with the organization and help steer our policy decisions. Yeah, and so I, I'm wondering if some school board members are not represented their whole school board because there's no consensus just trying to figure it out. Yeah, yeah, any school board members welcome to join and be a part of the coalition, even if their board has chosen not to, not to join. Absolutely. So what do you think it's the priority right now, in terms of pushing for the, I'm, we've been thinking and talking a lot about the ELL piece of it. And I just wondering what you think that's going. One of the priorities for that is like it, you know, do the recommendations of researchers of Rutgers and UVM have said and really push weights, but also waits for ELL students because it makes no sense to exclude them from the counting system. It seems even discriminatory in my opinion. But Senate finance, I'm sorry, Senate education will probably be voting on a recommendation later this week to Senate finance to go with the weights for ELL. It's something that the coalition has been pushing very hard on. And we do believe that that's the direction that they're going to take at this point. And of course what happens when the bill gets over to the house, assuming it gets to the Senate is a whole nother story. There'll be a lot of a lot of work to be done over there. Hi, thank you so much for coming tonight and giving such a great presentation. I also I had a question around the hybrid, the potential for a hybrid option being proposed, and where your coalition stands stands on that and what that would look like like what, what would exactly the hybrid be between waiting and grants. So, the proposal that's being made in Senate education regards to ELL is the position that we've actually been advocating for, which is to implement the ELL wait as recommended by the UVM and record study. And then for districts that have low incidence ELL a number of ELL students to provide a small grant on top of that so to they can ensure to that they have the necessary resources to build up their program as needed. The recommendation that we believe is going to be coming out of Senate education is for a grant somewhere in the range of $25,000 to $50,000 on top of the weights. And we absolutely that is by far we believe the best situation possible at this point. Okay, thank you. Yes, I mean so the coming up and this is complex and I have not built nearly as deeply into it as I would like to. I really like the idea of the weights and the flexibility it gives districts that has a lot of appeal. Just a question what sort of safeguards can or will be built into ensure that the money is actually distributed to the students that really need it. I think if you give districts too much flexibility with the money. Is there a temptation that they might, you know, not increase spending but just let property taxes go down and and not, you know, and that money not might not trickle to where it's needed which is the students. You know, rural district that's persistently under the old system bumping up against the excess spending threshold. If that's not necessarily a marker of inefficiency it's a function that we have a lot of students with additional needs and our discretionary spending is typically totally wiped out by urgent, you know, facilities needs that come up year to year, or alternatively. There's significantly above average number of students who receive special services so for us, we need the breathing room to have spending capacity for just the regular operations, you know, for example, we had to close a playground because we can't find $60,000 fair on the budget to replace it. And that's the type of choices that are happening in a lot of the smaller rural districts, even right here in Washington County. And, you know, so I think that there may be an anomalous district here and there that will want to realize some tax savings but I think that for many districts like we have it, we need a little bit more to be on a level playing field. And, again, I don't think the work of a we or the state is going to stop in terms of trying to ensure efficiency that our, you know, student to faculty ratios are in accord with where the state wants us to be. But that's somewhat separate from this, just baseline of how we can equitably access state education funds. I'm also just gonna admit like in watching how we progress throughout this whole thing and I've watched parents and integers and superintendents come out constantly protests I actually haven't heard any of them really say like hey, you know, we want to do this because we don't believe in our community and we want to hold the tax capacity low. Because I think in the long run, and I was amazed by how many students actually want to be on your community that they're going to hold you accountable to to make sure that you're spending the budget like like like and the same thing in Winooski we're going to have our students are going to be telling us like hey like what are you doing there on the school board like there's a lot of checks and balances by keeping it in the local control arena. And if your school board and anything and this is something that we work closely with the, when we went made a pitch to build our new school and Winooski. You know, I think all of us often believe that the school district is the heart of our community. If you don't take care of your heart, you're not going to have a long community in the long term and I think. But giving us the tax and capacity to actually spend wisely, judicially and making wise investments in our children will pay off for not only our school districts and our students and students but also our community because they will want to come back and stay in the community for the long I think we've found by I know my experiences. I have not spoken to a single board member who has any desire to reduce taxes with the additional taxing capacity. These underweight districts have been hungry for the resources for up to a quarter century at this point, and are going to take advantage of every dollar that they can possibly get their hands on. So I'd also say that I'm a state board of that is is opening up EQS standards, the EQS rules, and we are advocating for stronger EQS rules. So that would be how school boards and districts are held accountable. Excellent that's super super helpful. See Libby has her hands up. I'm just curious, Mark if we can go back you just you said a couple comments ago. When you're talking about where the process is in the legislature about you weren't sure what the house was going to do about it I was wondering if you could like, say more about that. I'm very curious about what your thoughts are from the legislative process. So, how's it like I said house education or worry said, or Alex, somebody said house education hasn't started taking this up yet. So it's really hard to know where, where their heads are at houseways and means has been looking at education funding. Since the beginning of the session. And there are a number of members of that that committee that are advocating for the cost equity, the grants model. Our hope is that they will take a bill that is sent from the Senate that advocates for the weights and make it better, not worse by changing it to the grant program that they've the task force had recommended alongside the weights. That's helpful. I'm on, I'm in the via Vermont superintendent trustees group as a trustee for Washington County and there are five or six of us that testified to Senate finance a couple weeks ago and, and to, to a person in the trustees group as well as the people who testified are all in favor of the equity, equity version of the bill so we hope that that that's why I was curious as if we need to do more advocating for that we certainly will because the trustees are behind the equity, the equity idea, or the waiting idea I'm sorry the waiting idea. If you go to the house. I do testimony will will be invaluable. There is no question that that having the number of superintendents lined up and to a T all green, made a difference in the eyes of the Senate finance. I think it totally did so yeah. So thank you for doing that. Yes, thank you. I have a question. Thank you all for for coming tonight and I appreciate I appreciate this issue that you've been working on. It's, it's an important one to our state. In terms of the cost equity model and I realized your, I'm asking you to explain something that you're kind of opposing, but just just for this board who is really just waiting into this issue. To explain what the proponents of the cost equity model are championing championing like why, what are the advantages of that model, alleged advantages of that model that a number of legislators are are interested in the poor. It's simplicity. We all know how complicated our education funding system is we're all board members and have to deal with making, you know, putting budgets together annually. A fully grant run model would be a lot easier we that would do away with the concept of equalized pupils. And would go a use of a long term 18 ADM instead. So it'd be closer to the actual number of students in our schools. So there's simplicity. And a number of legislators believe that it is actually more equitable. It's a really hard time understanding it because the concept of cost equity is they take an average of the spending throughout the state, and that's the amount that is provided to every school district for every child, every student of that type of who's that type of learner. And in essence, in the presentation, one of the slides we didn't go over towards the end there's a picture of a bell curve. And in essence, what the cost equity model does is you'd have a handful of districts that are right and center that are getting exactly what they need. And then the remainder of the districts are split in half, half of them are going to be getting more than they need and half are going to be getting less than they need. So I suppose if I completely understood why they are advocating for the cost equity, I might feel differently but they've yet to explain it in a way that makes any sense to me. And I understand the math behind it. But, and I'd be happy to go over that in detail with with any of you. But it just from an equity perspective it does not work. Be more, you know, direct I think that politics plays into it where there are, you know, some members from communities that feel that the any change is going to be detrimental to taxpayers in their district, which is, you know, respectful to the advocate of a half of them, of course, but I think that comes with also the notion that districts that have been historically underweighted by the current education system are not going to invest and instead are going to just realize the tax savings, which I think is detached from the reality in the ground and a lot of the districts that have, have need and need greater or more equitable access to funds. So in some ways, I've joked in our meetings and said it's a very paternalistic, you know, system of trying to mandate that that's going to be done. I think our business managers or superintendents would love the idea of then having to, you know, account for how this is spent. And I think it would add complexity to, you know, it may simplify the formula but I think it would add an immense amount of complexity to the day to day operations of a supervisory union or particularly school district. Thanks for that. And so the board's aware there was a comparison chart that came out. I think it was last week by Brad James with the AOE that went to ways and means in Vermont peel you're looking at weights versus cost equity when modeling that against our FY 20 spending would be looking at like a 10 and a half percent increase in taxes with the waiting versus like 15.1% in terms of cost equity to get at what Rory was just talking about. With the waiting. It's about 10 and a half percent and with the cost equity it's 15% more. Yes. Okay. Just in terms of a local taxpayer impact right. Yes, Montpelier rock higher impact on the tax rate with the with the cost equity, also known as grants. Yes. Okay, but then there's they also had a and I can send this to everybody there was also. They also model the ELL grant, plus the weights and I'm not certain. I don't think the original weight had a weight for ELL. So, okay. And that's in the middle it's like 12% for for taxpayers of Montpelier rocks. Um, if you'd like I could pull up the slide that has all the information from Montpelier that that you're speaking of. Sure. Thank you. Thank you. While he's doing that I have a question for us which is, are we deciding something tonight, or are we just taking the information in. What's our exactly. I mean, I think we can talk about that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I would be interested in passing a resolution to join the coalition that that seems like, well, can I ask a clarifying question on the coalition? Is there a way to endorse what you are. Joining the coalition. I'm just curious. I'm not like, I'm just trying to know what our options are, or is it like joined this coalition because we are advocating for for this certain model in the legislature. I'd say the latter. You know, for us to be able to give the number of students and number of districts that that have joined is is impactful to legislators. On this slide, it's showing the tax rates, which are are used kind of as a proxy or taxing capacity just because it's easier for people to understand. And all the way on the left hand side is your tax rate from FY 20. And that may be slightly off from what you saw in your tax bills only because that does not include any act 46 incentives, or any excess spending penalty amounts. Then in column a, you have the weights that were recommended by the task force, along with ELL as a categorical grant. column B are the weights with ELL as a weight. So the entire package of weights. Then columns C is your cost equity with using ELL weight number to come up with a dollar figure. So it's still a grant. And then column D is kind of it's from the original report to the original model that was recommended. The task force made some policy changes that that changed the weights. But you can see what it would what you would have been if they were to implement the weights from the report. And then the last column is the your ELL grant number, should it be a grant in column A and C. It's approximately $24,000 per ELL student and for you, it's you know $1.2 million, which is substantial. Are you saying that bottom left number is what bottom right bottom thank you bottom right number is what Montpelier would receive if it was ELL grant. So yeah, that bottom row or all the numbers for your district. Most of them based on the Brad James most recent documents. So if they were to go with the weights with ELL is a grant or with cost equity, the, the cost equity payment or the grant payment that you would receive for ELL is that 1.2 million. Okay, thank you for explaining all of that it's very very helpful that you walked us through that the hybrid model that you're that you're most in favor of is not represented here in these columns correct. Um, no, come up with that number. Right so that would be, it would be column B. Plus, if you had fewer than 25 ELL students, you'd receive an additional 25 to $50,000 as a grant. Oh, sorry, go ahead. I was going to say the way the $24,000 per ELL student was figured was based on the weights was based on the 2.49 weight. So it's while the math doesn't work out exactly. It's relatively fair to say that you're going to. The amount that would be received in taxing capacity by districts is going to be in that neighborhood of 24 $25,000 per ELL student with the weights. It just won't be in a, in a single check that you receive from from the state. And what's the number on the bottom row just so clear is that tax rate tax rate. How the tax rate would different as the 1.512 2020 now and those numbers what they would be under the various proposals. Correct. And it's all based on FY 20 numbers. Yeah, the task force chose to use FY 20 because that was complete set of numbers and it was prior to the pandemic so didn't didn't have all the federal funds involved. So I have one more question as well. So it looks like it's about a one and a half cent increase on the tax rate. Roughly is what we're looking at if we, if we, yeah, if we support if we support the coalition if we join the coalition that's sort of what the model that we're looking at. Grant our business manager had said at our last meeting. I think it was our last meeting that that there's a possibility or maybe it was Libby that said there's a possibility of sort of much larger than one and a half. So it's about 16 cents. Oh, 16 cents. All right, it's like a 10% increase. I hate to give you the bad news. Okay, I'm not reading the numbers right. So anyway, they said that they would maybe roll that out over the course of several years or a few years as like, it would be like a slow introduction of this new rate, rather than all at once. How would that work. They haven't worked out the details yet, but they will be rolling the transition period will be somewhere between three to five years. Just to give you some reference to that act 60 was rolled in in three years and act 46 was rolled in in five years, but it will be a rolling period. I think that both districts that are receiving additional taxing capacity and are losing some taxing capacity, have the time to make the changes necessary in order to utilize the taxing capacity that they have available. There may be some additional funds that are available to help districts that will be losing taxing capacity, but none of that has been kind of feathered out yet. There are federal funds. There's a surplus in the education fund, but I wouldn't count on that. I'm just letting you know that it is a possibility but I absolutely would not count on that happening. And I just want to clarify folks and we're talking about losing tax capacity we've seen that even in the past year in a city like Burlington where tax rates went up considerably. They had a really important bond vote that did not get that did not pass. As a result of those increased rates so you know, there are, that's just an example of the type of issue. Just to add to that, Andrew, I'm sorry to jump in but it doesn't matter if they if the legislature choose equity or category or sorry, why are you saying that to change the weights or categorical grants because either way, we're going to have increased tax burden. It just doesn't matter for Montpelier Roxbury right equitable weights are a thing that the statewide soups in any way support quite a bit as the we go for here, going forward. And most districts benefit from these proposals period right it's like, I think it's like two thirds of districts. And what I say by benefit I'm talking about from a tax capacity perspective I want to be clear for everybody. I'm not talking about I'm talking about it make for two thirds of districts, it will make it more affordable for their taxpayers to fund education, and for a third of districts, they will, they will take on that additional tax book, right. We're talking about a closed loop system. Montpelier is one of them that would see the tax increase. Mark, do you right now, and I don't know the answer to this I haven't looked closely but I have followed your general work and I do appreciate it. Are there any other districts similar to Montpelier in terms of the tax capacity situation that have joined your organization because I do understand. I do think it would be pretty simple. So, Washington Central is another district that was overweight. They were overweight in the original in the original report. They're a little bit closer to even with the modified weight. And the same with with Peachham which obviously is not similar to to you all but but but they did join knowing that they were overweight. While my own district, which is River Valley's school district down Southern Vermont, while the district itself would policy a slight increase in taxing capacity, my own town, which is over would actually see a tax increase. And so there are, we do have districts that and towns that have joined because they believe it's the right thing. So, I hope that answers your question. Other questions. Hi. So, my question. I guess my question is so this is maybe going a couple steps back to the study and the findings of the study that's more effortably educator students across the state that we needed to bump up the weights that those were 20 years out of date. And I'm curious as we look at what those bump ups are. You know, how significant are they, you know, and I know this is the work of PhDs and things but do we feel like the bump ups are adequate and I'm curious from your perspective, Libby, do you see like an immediate use for those funds if we're talking about bump ups in the categories of the LL students are experiencing poverty. And if you all might actually just clarify where we're seeing the increases in in the weights and then Libby I just be interested to hear from you if you have any like immediate sense of how we might dedicate those funds. And I'm just saying that we know that it's actually it's it's getting to the students in the programs that that really needed. We won't have a through through ever happens one of these two things is going to happen and we won't have any additional tax capacity to play with. And that's, I don't know how to answer your question because there isn't an answer to we won't, we will have to figure out how to maintain the capacity we have with a higher tax burden. Yeah, so we're like we have to raise taxes to keep the same level of services. Okay, okay. That's helpful to understand. Yeah, but that's the reason like that. Yeah, which are they though Andrew it may not be as high as what because you're using 2020 guidelines right or 2020 taxes and pupil counts and all that kind of stuff and we've had a significant increase in our population of English language learners because of the the families from Afghanistan who moved into the district so it's not exactly that it's a model right so. But either either way we will be thinking about as a board and administrative team. How do we understand our new tax burden with the capacity of need we have it will be just be having that conversation. Luckily, it will also most likely be combined with a new CLA with appraisals coming in. And then a follow up question to that is, and I don't know if you've run the numbers but for tons like mobility or when we raise the taxes I think we're trying to get a board to generally raise the taxes. With the exception of there's, you know, as we raise taxes popular is already a tough place for people of lower income to live. And does kind of the current property tax relief and income sensitivity adjust for it so I mean I have a bit of a fear that this might make towns that are already somewhat non economically diverse, more exclusive because there's a higher burden to housing and to the current system, if you earn between a household or it's between 47,000 and 30,000. They will that those households would see the same increase as those who pay purely on property tax so it's lesser than those who pay solely based on their property value but the increase. So if they were paying $4,000 instead of $8,000, they would see a $400 interest. So that's going to happen with either scenario. Yes, yes, or any of them. Okay, so I getting back to what are we doing to with all of this information tonight. I'm also fully on board with joining the coalition. I mean our superintendent is already advocating for the same position that they are advocating for it will, it will strengthen the foundation to have a town that is in that one third for whom the tax rate will change in the, you know, negative or however we want to say that increase tax burden. And while they have it sounds like they have momentum now. They may run into some challenges once it gets into the house and having the weight of a district like Montpelier as part of the coalition I think would really benefit the their efforts, and it feels like, honestly, not only are their efforts the most equitable to handle distributing education funds throughout the state, but it's also like not that what they are advocating for is not that much different that not not any, not. While Montpelier and Roxbury as a district may stand to have a higher tax burden as a result of all of the efforts that are happening. What this coalition is advocating for is actually not any more detrimental to us it feels like a no brainer to me for us to support this coalition. Right. I just have a question about where I'm hearing I say we're talking about two choices but I heard three choices. So when we talk about weights, are we talking about weights with the grant, meaning the hybrid model. Are we talking about weights without the branch. And is there any way of knowing how many districts have less than 25 ELL students, because that kind of matters for those places, and doesn't change my support for this but I'm just curious how many districts have less than, is there a way to know that is it something that's estimated. Is it data that's public. Is it not legal to make it public. The end sizes 11. So anybody above 11 would have to report it out or would be okay to report it out. The other thing I would say is, is typically in Mark please come around because you probably know way more than I do about this but typically if there's a low population of English language learners there are other weights that would also help that district typically, maybe in more world places. So that that is often the case. It's not definitely not all these case. And I can give you the numbers are public as living mentioned if you give me a minute I can pull up, I can pull up some numbers for you. I just don't have them right in front of me. I mean, so when we talk about weights we're talking about weights with the grant we're talking about the hybrid model, or talking about, yeah we're talking about all of the weights. And then on top of it for ELL, you'd have the, the small grant for low end for the smaller communities for people with a small number because you can't have a successful program without. So far, you need a full time teacher. I anticipate there'll be more districts that that have an increasing number of students as you know Afghans move in and, and, and other communities like that. Yeah, we also have outside of the refugee population, we do have a lot of farm workers and leaving some of the rural areas to have a lot of families so it's not this is not just our refugee community is also supporting our migrant farm workers and their children. So I, I would love to join the coalition for many reasons one because these is moving our equity work forward with other school districts for the state. These are like minded boards that you know have equity at the forefront, it just diversifies the resources and amount of people who have different voices that bring different voices to these conversations, all united in one front so I think, I think it's for me at least a great. I would love to join. Other questions and then we can maybe move to discussion about action. Well, thanks everyone the presentation was super super helpful and really appreciate the perspective and the questions is really important work you're doing and appreciate all the, all the I know for mostly this is volunteer time we put it to really appreciate all the, all the effort and engagement that you've done. And again, thank you so much for coming tonight. Thank you for for inviting us. We really appreciate the invitation and for you considering joining. It would be a pleasure to have us members and while I hope you do join, even if you don't any of you are more than welcome to join and attend our meetings and participate. Can I ask one question on the decision point before us this evening. What is the role of the, what what is the role of each of the districts like what is the opportunity for input, like, you know, what I'm saying mark like so we join on. Obviously, that there is like the symbolism there, but you know what is what is the commitment to we have individuals who regularly attend the meetings to do, are we involved in strategy. So, what is, what is the involvement, what does that look like as much or as little as you'd like. I'm quite honestly. I would hope that at least one of your members would attend we have, we do meet every Thursday for about an hour. And from 5 to 6pm. More than one of you are more than welcome to attend you're all welcome to attend. We don't have any, any kind of formal process. We get together and we discuss, we, we get updates from the lobbyist, and we discuss any decision points, and we make a decision as a, as a group. But we really have all. It's pretty amazing. The coalition is made up of districts from kind of every walk of life in Vermont. It's a unique group, especially as far as education goes in this state to have so many people agreeing on, you know, something that is so important and so important to the state. I've been really grateful for this coalition because as a school district that has a very high ELL, when the task force first recommended the weights without ELL, a lot of the school districts could have left and said like no, we're happy with what the task recommendations and actually all them came out strong said that is ridiculous that they would think about like leaving out the ELL students as a weight. And, and I think that's what makes this coalition really special is that like our goal is equity for all students. And I think that's why the coalition is coalition for Vermont student equity. Thanks Alex. Thank you. And if we do join just let you know Mark. Yeah, look to it. You know, I'm happy to hang around I know Alex needs to go and worry has a family to help me to go to but I'm happy to hang around if you'd like further to answer any questions. But yeah, you just let us know. My emails is on the presentation. Yeah, it's really pretty simple process. I also have one other question on the table here which is, you know, tonight, do we also make a donation. You know so there could be a motion to have the resolution to join the coalition with the donation, or just or separately to join and we could discuss the donation at a later point. I don't know I have those the sample resolutions in front of me so I can read one if people are feeling one way or the other about that. Can you send it here? Yeah. Joe had her hand up. I was just wondering if we were taking action or since this was discussion only if we weren't going to join the coalition. We can definitely take action. Action. Thanks. So. Yeah, so I said put a motion on the table we can put it on the table and then discuss it. I'm moved to join the coalition for Vermont student equity. I second. Discussion. I want to just so my general thought on this and I feel like I should kind of step back because it's my last meeting but I think there's a lot of merit to this proposal and I think there's a lot of value that could be added for both this board and and that there really is no other I mean for for this organization there really is no other district that's in a situation like ours. And so I understand, you know this idea that something's going to move along but my understanding is that there are a lot of other districts in our seat from a tax perspective that are trying to be a part of this process. So I think that is, you know, that's, I think that's a really big deal and I think it's a big deal for this organization and it's all movement and it is a movement that I personally support at a statewide level. My only concern about this board right now is I feel like this board, and I might be off base here but I feel like this board could use to better understand the situation a little bit better but if people feel like they have the understanding that you can forward. I'm not going to get people's way on that. I do think it's, it's going, I think how this is implemented could be a really big deal for this community though. I don't know if, if we do have a 10 to 15% increase in tax rates it will cut it. And I just think it's important. Yeah, and to go back to Mia's point it's and what Libby said is either option that the state moves, I mean there's momentum behind this, that changing the waiting. And so either way either direction that the state decides to go is going to be a pretty similar increase on our taxpayers. And in fact, and maybe I was moving decimal points around earlier so it sounded to me like it was going to be actually less of an increase if we go with the coalition's recommendations. So I'm not sure why our community wouldn't be supportive of that. And I think like what Amanda said is sort of leading with our values around equity is what's driving my interest in, in joining the coalition. I'm kind of interested to hear from other people. Yeah. I think I'm 85% there and I didn't move to the board. I mean my only hesitation is one hesitation you have. I don't, I feel we, I feel that Martin everyone you've done great work. I feel you come in with a perspective and it would be great to hear from a neutral perspective just to have someone who does not have a stake to give a comparison because it's very complex, and I don't fully understand it. It makes sense. And I trust your new word, but yeah, usually when I'm making a decision like this, I like to hear multiple perspectives and certainly perspective would count as, as not part of a group that already has a stake position. That's my own hesitation, but my, my instinct is that it would probably confirm what the first slide. I could just say one thing. I don't know that you'd find a neutral person to see. Yeah, I can honor you but I'm thinking even something like, you know, a legislator who's been deep into it, who might be able to at least kind of tell us about the place that they're here at. Well, both the co-chairs of the other task force would, I'm not going to speak for them, but it wouldn't surprise me if they'd be willing to come in and speak to you. Another recommendation I can make Senator Purchlick was part of the task force and sits on the Senate Education Committee, and as our presenting Washington County, he came and spoke about this to the Cabot School Board in December. Yeah, I, Andy, if I. Yeah, he spoke to us along with the rest of, most of the rest of our representation a few meetings ago, not specifically on this issue is more of a broad conversation. Well, I would also say that there's a lot of you too. We're in legislative session where this topic has come out. So all the voices are there. We want to just take the time to streamline the one meeting school board meeting on it. Can you say that again? I'm sorry. Like, all the voices have come to the Senate Education Committee. So if we want to just do a list of all the people that spoke there so you can get a sense of what the conversations is there. But a more, it's a little bit work versus like one more voice here. I agree that there's going to be a neutral person that's going to that we're going to find that's what we're trying to find. I think I was, I was very similar to Jim that I'm, I'm pretty compelled and also hesitant to sort of jump on the bandwagon when it's really exciting in the moment. But as someone who spends a lot of time in those committees and has watched education legislation over the years I'm I know I say this a lot that if you're not at the table you're on the menu. So I like the idea of being part of an informed coalition that shares our understanding and our approach, and that would inform us as a board and obviously has eyes and ears. And I think also what was really compelling for me is to hear that I'm pretty sure the school boards association is also trying to steer the legislature back to the original proposal to hear that the superintendents are largely behind in that way. I think it's it's pretty glaring that that there's pretty large scale alarm about where this could go. And to your point Emma about if the if the if Vermont pillar is, is going to feel the impacts of this one way or the other I'd like us to be part of a group like I said that's an informed, and that that sort of helps the state as a whole, and may in fact selfishly also help our district more than some other so I'm, I'm, I'm in support of joining the coalition tonight. There is also a time factor here to where, and Mark mentioned this before, it's going to be coming out of Senate finance soon. And I, I, I don't know this but I speculate the reason why it's in the Senate is because it's more regional rather than a house. There's going to be a lot of skirmishes. Because it's at that, that more micro level, which is where these impacts are, are felt more acutely. So, there is that factor to this. Which is that sooner. Yeah, I'm more beneficial. I think I'm pretty much there I just, I just want to put out there that someone asked me if I really done my homework and fully understood this decision I'd have to say, I don't know if I would have liked. Can we push a decision to the next board line board meeting out, let's give it a, you know, a timeline that I mean I'm hearing that we also there's, there's an urgency. In terms of moving from Senate to house is two weeks. I'm worried that with the vacation and we did discuss it at the last meeting Andrew brought up the same concern and I invited Andrew to try to find somebody to come to speak at this meeting. I'm worried and you know, provided a lot of resources for people to educate themselves between the last board meeting and this board meeting. I'm worried that that won't happen again and that people will feel pretty similar at the next board meeting that they do at this board meeting. So I'm concerned about pushing it ahead with also the vacation and the timeliness that Andrew talked about a movement in the legislature. So they take the week between the week of town meeting off from lawmaking and then usually the week after that week after that is what's called crossover where it has to have gone to the other side. I'm very concerned about the slide that showed where the four different major money and education committees are such different places. Yeah. So I'm a little worried that in two weeks a lot is going to happen. I hate to put that pressure with this. It's from my perspective it's, it's, it's very symbolic there's no other there's no other district that's in our position that's doing this coalition. And we also don't have to have a unanimous vote on this right. It just has to be majority. Yeah, so I would go, I would go yes. I mean, but if people aren't comfortable you could abstain and or not. I would just add that it's a coalition which means that we can get input in these changes we can be part of the conversation and so that it is not we're not voting. Hey, yes, Mark we everything that you're going to do, we will be part of the conversation, and, and sure and that the conversation flows so I think that I mean I just don't. I will. Yes. Should we move to a vote. Yeah. All the member. Any opposed. Great. So you can put it down. Thank you, Mark. Thank you, Murray. And thank you very much. I would like to talk about potentially making a donation at the next 40. Thank you, Mark. And I'm on a thank you for suggesting this. It was just like two weeks ago on Roxbury that you really push us to hear from these folks. So thank you for making that happen. Yeah, absolutely. Thank you for joining. We do have a, an email list where we send out kind of updates as well as a weekly update from the, from our lobbyist, which welcome all of you to join any of you. Kind of force anything anybody, but we absolutely would, would appreciate your participation in meetings. It would be a big help and thank you. I think it will make a definitely make a different to make the statement is, as you mentioned. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. So I think we're ready to go into executive session. This is not for negotiations. For personnel and personnel evaluation. So moved. Second. Oh, the favor. Thanks again. Is that room locked. One room 126 is locked before, but we can find a classroom. Two representative spots. Excited to have two of you be joining us. I do want to say that we discussed, you know, the momentum involved with people having interests right now in serving in this capacity and that we can harness. That momentum and potentially, you know, build some systems, maybe a subcommittee where the two student representatives could sort of lead a process by which all the students who were interested to serve as the two appointed positions could still have a voice and be involved. So I will reach out to Matt McLean on that and we'll sort of brainstorm together with the two student representatives about how best to do that, but we definitely want people to stay involved. The other point that was brought up in executive session is that no senior. No senior is applied, which is actually great for us, because that leaves this possible possibility of any of you applying again to be a student representative in the fall. So please keep that in mind. I'm going to make a motion that we appoint Merrick Modoon and Zach Pennington as the two student representatives to the Montpelier Roxbury School Board. Second. Any discussion? Yeah, in terms of the timeline, because we just talked about in the fall, doing this again. What is the timeline of this appointment? We discussed it during the other during regular session, which was that this appointment would be through the school year. So these two appointments run through the school year and then we'll have another process to appoint two more for the next school year. And I'm not sure at that time if we want to potentially do it as a semester long appointments or if we want to do. The past event is a full year. Yeah. Which I think is. And so the first meeting is two board members. And the second meeting is two board members would be the day after 10 meeting. Yep. Our second. March 2nd, Wednesday, March 2nd, and it will be here at the Montpelier High School library. Great. Thank you again to everyone. I really appreciate all of your, do we need to have a vote? Yeah. Any more discussion? All those that ever. Hi. Any opposed? Yes. Thank you so much. And now I need a vote to go back into executive session. Yeah, thank you. We look forward to having you at the next meeting and definitely let's keep brainstorming ways to keep everybody involved. So we're just, you know, really excited to have all of your voices. Yeah, absolutely. And I want to encourage, you know, everyone who who submitted and didn't get chosen to, you know, stay involved and I think we'll work with with Americans act to figure out ways to do that. And, you know, as, as Emma noted, you know, we will be doing this. Most of you will have one if not two or three more times to serve and hopefully we can get, get all of you on the board before graduates. Yeah. Great. Thanks. Good night. Thank you. I move we go back into executive section for the purpose of discussing personnel evaluation. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. All right, now. Now we. Now. Yes.