 So the Montpelier-Roxbury School Board actually was called to order at 5.30, went to executive session. So we are in order now. First, thanks everyone for showing up. I know that we have two important topics tonight, the after-school programming and the budget. I just want to run through the agenda quickly so people are clear on how we're doing this procedurally. We're going to have a public comment immediately, but it's a public comment on anything other than the after-school programming and the budget. So if you want to speak on those, there's going to be opportunity for comment later. We're going to first have a presentation from some alumni, and then Libby is going to give a presentation on the after-school programming, then Alex Robb is going to make some brief comments. Then we're going to have a half-hour for public comment on the after-school programming. If people could queue up, I'm just going to do a rough guess from the queue and try to give everyone an amount of time, hopefully no less than a minute. If we have more than 30 people, I'll extend the comment. We'll write down questions during the comment, and then after that Libby will answer the questions, then we'll have a board discussion, and then we will have the budget presentation, which will be given by Grant, and then we'll have another period for public comment on the budget. So if your comment deals with either the after-school programming or the budget, please use that time to make the comment, not the current public comment time. So first order right now, we have public comment not related to the budget or after-school. So if anybody has public comment on other issues, please step up to the microphone. Great, thank you. First order of business is the consent agenda. Do I have a motion to approve the consent agenda? Don't move. I'll second. Second. All those in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Great. Consent agenda, and then next is the alumni panel, and thank you everyone for coming today. We don't have our usual table, so I don't know how you want to do it if you want to go up to the microphone. You can come sit next to Becky if you'd prefer to sit down and present. However you want to do it. And Jim, what's the question before us? What's the question before us? They're just going to come and speak a bit on their experience, as along with how popular public schools prepare them, what they're doing now, yeah, oh, sorry. So if you could just please come up and introduce yourself, and yeah, thanks again for coming. That's not going to make your voice louder, it's connected to the camera back there. Got it. Feel free to speak. Feel free to sit down too. My name is Jackson Marko, I'm a first year student at the University of Southern California and a graduate of the 2018 Monterey High School Class of 2018. So I graduated just last summer, and wait a minute, hold on, I was in the back and I understood just how possible it is to hear back there, so you can stand like this maybe, then maybe your voice will be in the shot. Oh, yeah, okay. It's not a PA system. Oh, okay. Cool. Yeah, just face the front. Just face the front. Here you go. So I graduated in the class of 2018 of Monterey High School. Yeah, I think we can hear the better. Good. You don't have a fan. Okay. Time's good. Yeah, like I said, I'm a first year student at USC. California. I'm studying aerospace engineering. And so what would you like me to sort of elaborate on? We just have to hear about how your experience at Monterey, well, not Monterey Rocksburg Public School, but for you, Monterey Public School, how it prepared you? Or didn't. Or didn't, yeah. Things that you found helpful, things that you feel maybe you didn't, experiences you didn't get that you would have appreciated getting. How do you feel you compared to kind of now peers across the country who went through different high schools? Yeah, I think it prepared me really well. I've obviously met a lot of my peers at USC and talked to them in various ways about how their high school experiences were. And I think you, I think Monterey High School and Monterey Public Schools prepared me really well in a lot of different ways, especially in the sort of personalized attention that I got. And I think part of it was by design. And part of it may have had to do with the fact that it's just a really small public school. I don't know what percentile it is, but I haven't met anybody yet at USC who went to a public school as small as MHS, which certainly benefited in some ways. Other ways I think it was really a well-designed education that gave care to individual students. And from my point of view, teachers and I think administrators put in a lot of effort to make it so. Anything specific in terms of? That's great. Thank you. Thank you. Sorry, I'm just going to keep doing this. And next? Noelle, you didn't have to use the microphone or people at home might be at home. Yeah, and I think it's just to, if you want to. Okay. I'm Noelle, I'm William's, and I'm also a first-year student at UBM, at your school. And I think Monterey prepared me more in my CBL learning. I did CBLs every high school, like, year of my high school career. And people at my school now, they're like, what's a CBL? And I was like, oh, like, I, it's a community learning, based learning program that I was a part of. And they were saying how well beyond, like, experience-wise, we looked for my, because I wanted to be a pediatrician, and I got to shut my own pediatrician. And they, like, didn't have to experience at their schools. So I think CBL really was one aspect that helped me prepare for college. Great. Thank you. My name is Zach Ruff. I'm a sophomore at Kansas State College. I'm going into elementary education with a secondary in history and a minor in Holocaust and genocide studies. I think MHS prepared me, and also kind of, not didn't prepare me, but I think responsibility-wise, I didn't take it into my own actions to become a responsible young adult. I slacked off a lot in high school, didn't go to lie about it. I think the resources, I think the resources were absolutely there, and I started to realize that the older I got, you know, junior-senior year, I also did some CBL learning, like Noelle said. I think that helped me a lot, because that really showed me my love for children and teaching, and wanting to teach elementary school when I'm older. And yeah, I think, like, everything here can prepare you well, as long as you take your own responsibility. Hi, my name is Jacob B. Ho Brown. I'm a second-year student at Cornell University majoring in Information Science. I graduated MHS in the class of 2017. And I think that Montpellier did a pretty good job of preparing me for school or for college. I've really, since being in college, I've really come to appreciate the small classroom setting environment that MHS has. I know now I have lectures with 600 people in them, and being able to sit down in a classroom with 20 other students here at MHS was a really valuable experience. Also, just echoing some things from before having resources here and people that are willing to pay attention to you, especially like in the guidance office helping you figure out which classes to take and the college apps and things like that. And overall, for a smaller public school, I think MHS did a good job of preparing me for college. I know a lot of my classmates now came from larger schools, like specialized schools and private schools. And since I'm in like a STEM major, I'm a little biased here. But I think that MHS, I know they have a lot of like science, some science and technology courses. One of my favorites was AP Computer Science. And I think that's something that I know when I was a student here there wasn't a lot of interest in. And I think that's something that could be familiar more. But overall, I think MHS did a good job. I'll try to speak up so you can hear in the back. My name is Maggie. I'm a third year student this year at Stanford University. I graduated in the class of 2016. And I really just can't speak highly enough with my experience here at Montpelier High School. I think the most important thing that I would emphasize about my experience would also be the CBL Community-Based Learning Program with Matt McLean. I'm not sure where he's seated here in the back. I had the opportunity throughout high school to have this really unique experience where I would take classes in the morning. And then in the afternoons, I would go out and intern with, I did an internship with Cabot Creamery and Ben & Jerry's in their corporate offices. It was just this extremely valuable non-traditional high school experience that I think really ended up being what was able to tip the scales for me in college admissions to sort of speak to having both the traditional classroom experience with these whole wealth of other experiences outside of that. And even now as I'm applying to jobs that I'm hoping to be out of college, most of the experience on my resume is still the jobs that I had in high school, which is really a pretty amazing thing. And the other thing that I would definitely speak to is just the small school experience. I'm now also at a large university where most people have hundreds or thousands of people in their classes. And I think I really, really to the small town, just compassionate environment I think that you find here. And I really emphasize that too on college applications. It's really a unique experience, I think, to be able to grow up in such a small place where everyone's really cared about. So I can't thank you all enough. And especially, again, this community-based learning program is incredible. I'm Willa Horchnoff. I'm a sophomore at McAllister College in the Twin Cities. And I was also in the class of 2016 at MHS. And I completely agree with everything that's been said so far, especially in regards to the CVL program. I think that creating your own community-based learning plan requires a lot of motivation and self-initiative, which isn't really acquired in many other high school classes, specifically. And I'm now a current political science major, Spanish minor, and human rights minor. And I gained a lot of really applicable skills in high school that now translate directly into those majors. I did an internship with a human rights organization called WITNESS that has an office nearby in Montpelier and that directly translates into my minor. I was able to spend a semester off school traveling. And I'm not sure if you still have a SOAR flexible learning pathway program here, but that was around when I was in school. So I was able to take a semester off and get credit for that, which was hugely important. It relates to my Spanish minor. And then I was also able to work for Bernie's 2016 presidential campaign as a senior high school. And that also directly translates into my political science major. So again, none of my current classmates in McAllister really were able to have this level of real world experience as a high school student. So I'm really grateful for that opportunity. Thank you. Any questions from the board? Great. Well, thank you all. It was great to hear about your experiences. And thanks for taking time after a break to come in. And good luck going back to school. Thank you. Yeah. There you go. So thank you all for coming tonight. I'm going to do a presentation on after school. Before I start though, I do want to extend my sincerest apology for messing up on process. I did that. I messed up on some communication. I messed up on timing. I'm still new at the superintendency thing, so I apologize to the board members here. I also apologize to the parents and I have apologized to the people who work at Community Connections already, but I extended apology again. I messed up. And I'm going to learn from this experience and I'm going to do better next time. So I wanted to say that first, prior to this whole presentation around after school. And then also say, sorry, if there's one thing that we're going to hit upon tonight is this theme of spending this first six months, my tenure of superintendency in the leadership team. We're really looking at what are our systems and structures that are currently in place and how do those systems and structures relate to the board's vision for what the students are here at Montpelier High School. I've spent a lot of time doing that with my leadership team. After school is one component of that, but you're going to hear multiple components through our budget presentation later on today. And there is this theme of how do we create systems and structures to get to this vision. So Jim, if you, that's part of there. This is the vision just in case people haven't seen it. It's on all our letterhead. The board has adopted this as our students are caring, creative, and equitable communities that empower children to build on their talents and passions to grow and to engage citizens and lifelong learners. So our goal with the budget and with after school is a piece of this is to build systems and structures to reach that. So with that we can go into the data. Andrew, can you, is there a light switch that you can hit just to make it easier to see? Maybe a pooch. Yeah, that's better. So, I want to start with what we're valuing as a leadership team for after school in particular. What we really want value is providing childcare for students after school that is affordable for families. That can provide enriching and engagement opportunities that get kids moving in particular. When I say moving I'm talking exercise kind of getting away from the screen, getting going, moving those bodies and using their brain in a different way than they have all through the six hours that we have them at school and that is accessible to those who need it. We want to provide equitable opportunities for all of our students in terms of after school programming. And we also really want to target and grow this extended day opportunity for our adolescents. So when I'm thinking about our students in the 10 to 15-year-old age range there is so much research is quite clear and there's no debate about the research about what matters for kids and adolescents with their brain growing and changing and we know all of that research. We know that kids at that age need caring adults that they connect with so that they have somebody to talk to about the choices they're making and some of the choices they're not making. That we know that kids who are outside and exercising have better for kids and it's better for brain developments. We know that kids who have connection to something and or someone tend to make better choices in that age range. So we really want to think about and target that adolescent. We value that research. We value that belief. We completely believe in it as well. And so we want to provide opportunities in that age range I'm calling them the adolescents to get kids outdoors and exercising. We want to continue building equal relationships with positive adults. We want to continue to build their confidence and life skills just with these wonderful young adults we're talking about today to make them stronger people. And we want to create positive connections between groups and people in the community. I recognize we have that for this age group for some of our adolescents. So when we think about moving forward we want to think about how do we grow that. So as I did my kind of what I'm calling my road show of my tenure here at superintendency I'm looking for themes that stand out. And concerning after school there are several themes the major theme was that there's a lack of after school options here in Montpelier that our current after school programming has considerable weight lists. That the library is absolutely swamped with children every day particularly in this adolescent range for age group that we have considerable liability concerns as I was talking to the superintendent in Washington Central that I'll get to later that we have considerable liability concerns with our current programming for both school districts. And then parents are also saying these services aren't equitable. If I can't get in my paperwork at the right time because I don't know about it I don't get in. My kids weight listed and I'm not sure what to do. We also know that's from kind of the parental side that we have a theme of increasing enrollment. That's something we can say that across Vermont. In 2021 our models are projecting to have approximately 100 more students. So when I think about that in terms of after school our needs are not going away. They're going to increase over the next few years. Just in society in general there's an increase in safety concerns. We all know we're sitting in this room that the world that we grew up in is not necessarily the one that our kids are growing up in. There's an increased in the very safe community to live in. We're not immune to some risks that are happening right now. We have increases across the board in single working parent families and two parent working families. It's very hard to survive in this economy without two working parents. So we have an increase in that which also requires an increase in the need for childcare. We have capacity building needs across our district and we have a need that we've heard from various people doing all the things we need to do. So when we're thinking about our after school childcare options that UES in particular just some data that we're looking at we currently have 432 students enrolled at Union Elementary School that is this current school year. Our current after school capacity is approximately 70 students. That's only 16% of students that can access the after school opportunity not the students that would access anything good that's it that's the limit that we have 16% of our students that provides a serious equity issue equity issue. Our enrollment projections at UES our models are showing that that increase is going to happen by five kids and then it's going to stay stable for the next few years after that so that need for after school care is not going to go away. We are going to continue as we have a need for what happens to our kid after 3 o'clock at Union Elementary has a very short window it creates challenges for new families in particular to our school district who do not know what that window is and also the working families who don't have the availability to stop what they're doing in order to fill out a registration form and get it in on time and this is a really real need I have a call from a parent this beginning of the school year that says I didn't know I'm new to your school district I didn't know the window or I didn't get my paper working on time I filled it out the way I was supposed to I got it in when I got it in and I was told that there's no way that my kid will get after school care what am I supposed to do I didn't have an answer for and that same conversation was repeated often with Ryan Harrity our new principal at Union Elementary as well with several families because it's first they're going to get into the after school care everybody else will have to figure it out so in the beginning of the year we have large weightlifts I know some of the board members have asked what are those weightlifts that weightlifts is hard to say because when parents get on it and then they have to figure something else out for their kids and take their kids off of it so it's kind of hard to give an exact number as to what at main street middle school our total current enrollment right now is 365 students we have 95 fifth graders so 95 10 and 11 year olds that's an age that when I was talking to Alex Robb on Monday said some fifth graders can handle that alone time some cannot and we need to figure out what to do particularly with the fifth and sixth grade population our current after school capacity at main street middle school is 25 new kids each day that's 25 kids per day that are often repeats from days before and so that services 7% of our students that's like the entire main street that's not just the fifth graders but 7% of our students have access to that after school opportunity 93% of our students do not enrollment projection increases at the middle school see the numbers right there this is only going to decrease our opportunities to 6% of our students across the next three years and in addition we've heard multiple parents really frustrated with the registration process and we want to increase equal access to that registration process if you're in the know and know when the pamphlet comes out and can get it back to community connections really quickly and have the ability that's when you're talking about 93% of our students that's a lot of people who are on the not side we also looked at financial considerations currently Montpelier Roxbury budgets $36,250 to go to after school in fiscal year 20 in our budget we have $37,338 this is paid directly to Washington central supervisory union community connections is not a we cut a check to Washington central supervisory union for that amount of money that amount of money is put into one pot of money at Washington central so in addition to our three schools five schools at Washington central pay into the same pot that is worked through for after school care this provides some budgeting challenges and financial challenges for Washington central certainly it's a liability issues and money main street budgets $2,610 for additional homework help that's tied to after school for next school year UES budgeted $2,268 in additional funding because they wanted to increase the opportunity for club type activities like stem opportunities and kindness and friendship club that the current after school provider couldn't provide for them so they budgeted additional funding for that in addition to funding that money is paid to Washington central as well so in total for next year it's $47,216 paid to after school with four parent contributions so taxpayers are paying for child care to another school district this creates this idea that community connections is owned by Washington central that it's actually just Washington central supervisor issues for school systems not just ours but theirs as well Washington central currently provides all human resources support so the employees for community connections are actually Washington central supervisor union employees that they do their payroll they do human resources they do all the accounts panel the insurance has a start up to it because that's where the considerable liability comes into play Washington central uses national life as their insurance agent whereas the two insurance agencies have not talked to each other or formalized who is responsible for what and thank heavens in the past 15 or so years that this partnership has gone on there's been no big big crises however if there were we don't know who would pay for it or who would have the financial responsibility or anything else around that because there's no formalized process with this both Bill Kimball the superintendent at Washington central brought it to my attention the most Washington central also provides legal support they do all the processing for payments and all the transportation that's available for after school is done through Washington central supervisor union so speaking of transferring students the Washington central the vans that have been used for after school purposes are the property of Washington central they're releasing those this year they said we're giving up that lease in February that was planned on before I got here that I was told right when I got here in July that that was happening because I called Washington central to say hey could we use those vans because we want to run a lake bus for a Roxbury and we were told absolutely not that is a liability issue you may not use those vans for that so because of that we got two new vans so we now own two new vans and I'm doing that because we are going to lose those vans that were provided to us by Washington central so those vans in Montpey and Roxbury will be used for community based learning they provide the Roxbury lake bus and they also can be used for extended day enrichment opportunities however when we got those vans Grant and some other people in the leadership team started looking at what are the laws and rules around transporting students and this law came up and tells it pretty simply so according to Vermont law you can only transport more than five students in any kind of van it doesn't matter if you have the capacity to to drive 25 kids in the van you can only do more than five you display a school bus sign with red flashing lights and have a driver with a type 2 license which is essentially a school bus discovery license we have nobody on staff nor is Washington central and we can only transport five students at a time excluding the driver if the school driver is a school employee or volunteer who has a criminal background check complying with this law further limits the opportunities that we have going on right now and so we need to think about how are we doing this how are we building our capacity in this way so that we can increase opportunity so here is our plan our plan is to bring a childcare provider a UES that has the ability to increase our capacity for childcare without any monetary support from the school district we need to offer scholarships and a rolling scale to support families financially we do that by in lieu of rent for using our building the provider would give scholarships and develop a rolling scale in lieu of that rent money that we charge people for using our building this program would need to be at three stars then you can take childcare subsidies further and the support for families in need we need to have a provider that can increase our offerings so more students at UES and MSMS can access we need to build potential programs so we're thinking about how do we provide full day pre-school in the future that is a further driver for getting young families to come live in Montpelier and Roxbury currently they're tied to central Vermont under a grant under the 21st century grant for after-school care that will be eliminated in the coming years and we're going to need to figure out how to provide after-school support in that school as well community connections was clear that they could not do that for us we also need to provide a fair registration process so that all families have the chance to participate should they need to the second piece of this is to get the money and the budget and funding for as an extended day enrichment opportunity this is where I was not clear my communication to parents and I truly apologize for this because it caused a lot of consternation that didn't necessarily need to happen there was never a plan to eliminate the programming that's happening at Main Street or the high school that's why I have ideas on the table right now as I talk to Alex and Drew in order to do this and I'm really excited to collaborate with them further as they're excited to collaborate with us one opportunity would be that they form a true nonprofit that's not tied to a separate school district and Alex is in the process of seeing how to do that right now and then collaborating with the school district of how we grow that program we have the money in our budget to do that we've saved the money in our budget to do that so we're going to do that we're going to figure out a way to do that and we have two legitimate ways to do it right now and I'm sure as we continue to think about it and put more heads on that we'll continue to think about how we can do it faster next year I can probably say that programming will look so the idea of middle school in particular is that there would be a child care child care provider for parents who need the everyday the everyday support and there would also be an enriching extended day opportunity for students the idea to grow the extended day opportunity but yes keep the child care idea too that currently is unavailable to parents that's a big one and we want to continue to eliminate liability concerns for the district so that was our plan learned for it we're thinking about future needs our growing enrollment means we're going to need more support for new families we need to continue that growth we don't want to see our model prove to be wrong we want to see our model prove to be right wrong in the other direction where more families are coming in because we can support them in the way program for our adolescents is one way to do that so we want to see how we can grow that opportunity like I said earlier Roxbury Village School will be in need of after-school services in the next three years or so and we need to figure that out we need to decrease liability concerns across the district in a few other ways not just in after-school but after-school certainly in one area we want to potentially offer full-day pre-school to further track younger families full so full-day pre-school a lot of the after-school is that pre-school would still be a half-day and then we would add on after-school for pre-school so it becomes a full-day option for families we have some logistical challenges with that that's not going to happen in the next year or even two years but that's something on our plate to consider as we consider how do we grow these programs we want to increase the opportunities for more adolescents to build that confidence to be out in nature to be having quality relationships for caring adults to increase that opportunity we have some plans in place right now to do so so we just need to go with a change now in order to get that happening later that's the pre-meditation for after-school Thanks, Louie I believe Alex wanted to take a few few minutes before we open up for public comment Thanks, Alex I just will I found out this afternoon that I'd be given a chance to speak I really appreciate it I've run community conditions now for four and a half years I work for seven school wards most of them in Washington Central and I've never been given the opportunity to present to the board in my four and a half years now that I've been running can people hear me I'm sorry in the four and a half years I've been running CC I've seen a lot of changes there's only one principle left still from when I started four and a half years ago when I was a Pam in Main Street Middle School so I think one of the things that's happened to CC over the years is this organization that came up kind of grassroots it was formed by four groups Washington Central Montpillar Public Schools Montpillar Alive and Washington Central Friends of Education which is a booster group for the U32 community and it was formed because of a need and an opportunity and the need was to work to help the kids in Montpillar and the surrounding towns give them access to after school programming and the opportunity was the start of this grant program called the 21 C Grants and really what started CC was a group of community members that came together and applied and were awarded this grant and since then CC's gone in all kinds of crazy ways over 14 years we really adapted we have lost some partners and the money and the assets that kind of consolidated in Washington Central Supervisor Union as Libby pointed out but there's still this organization that has been created over 15 years that's got 60 people in it that we have the people that have come to work from us and who have stayed because they're really good at their jobs and they really want to do this job and this all the things that we do sixth grade play Drew is right now he's at Bolton with 60 kids after school they're all going to be showing up here in like an hour or two I told them there's really good snacks so we're all but we do we do there's so many things the outing club Maggie was in our outing club and Willow and Emma was in our outing club and we've done trips together here at the high school there's it just goes on and on and on we run the mainstream middle school across team we did it across country ski team we started a mountain bike team last year we have done the golf team this year when students have an office up here and students are always coming into my room with the craziest ideas and I feel my rule as someone operating kind of outside the budgetary process to be like hey I have $200 for you if you want to start a school newspaper which is what we did last year with Jackson who is also here presenting just a little bit of go so I look at the presentation and I agree with almost everything living sex in the presentation I have a few I don't think that our wait lists are ridiculous but again it varies throughout the year one of the things that's happened at Union is that other providers have gone away so River Rock used to have an after school program and it's gone Carl and Conan used to run an after school program it's gone so as our capacity about three years ago was 50 kids a day and two years ago we increased it to 69 kids a day because one of these after school programs went out of business it's really hard to run after school programs over a long period of time and that's what we've done at Union and we've addressed some of the issues that came up I agree about the registration issues we've made a change in leadership at Union as a result of all that and I have a new Heather who's running the Union now she is completely dedicated to those who will not be an issue next year so I do feel that we could meet all of these things but not in our current structure I agree that it's awkward the Washington Central Supervisory Union running after school programs in Montpil I brainstorm with people over the years here and there and we've never really committed to a solution but we care enough about serving this community and serving these schools that we're willing to look and do what it takes to hopefully be in place to be one of the providers that are considered for our very next year it will not be the CC that exists now the Washington Central Supervisor Union CC but it could be some other entity involving the same people and the same values and I just want to add one more thing and that's about the power of the partnership you know we are here in Montpilier all the buses from Washington Central go through this community every day on the way up to U32 or East Montpilier Berlin Dodie Romney and Calis we run our camps we combine both communities we have 25 kids from one town we have 25 kids from Montpilier and 25 kids from Washington Central they come together and it makes our camps vital and vibrant and sustainable we ran the middle school play this year students from nine towns who auditioned for the play we have my own son is a seventh grader at U32 he the work that Drew and Dave did with him in the mountain biking camp in the mountain biking team has been one of his favorite things that he's done ever he's completely into it he has met a bunch of friends in Montpilier through that work and they still ride bikes together so here in Montpilier you have bus loads of U32 kids that are getting off the bus every day if you go into the traffic circle the late bus from U32 lets off and I would guess they probably have the kids at the library actually don't go to school here so one of the things about CC is that providing care to the kids in the towns around Montpilier we're actually helping the situation in Montpilier and so it's the relationships among the kids the partnership in providing care across the community and just trying to address those needs at the library I'm going to talk just quickly a little bit about the middle school program with Drew so our program at the middle school our budget was cut from 120,000 to 30,000 36,000 dollars the same year that the fifth grade was moved over from Union to Middle School so that changed that school completely and it changed the after school programming needs completely we had numerous discussions about increasing programming there but our program is very intentional Drew's been doing this for 15 years he's not interested in running a cafeteria like this full of 60 students with a proctor sitting in the corner because the only relationships that you're going to develop with kids are fat ones and so he has small programs he has small numbers limited somewhat by the transportation issues but he wants to build relationships with kids he wants to work with them one on one he wants small groups doing fun things getting out of the school going into the community going and doing permaculture mountain biking backcountry skiing Bolton all those things and he is limited in numbers and because these employees do need to get paid the money is a limiting factor for what we can do every day there here at Mont Blere High School we basically in the younger years at Union we say oh this is what you're going to do after school at Middle School we say hey what do you kind of might want to do after school and the high school here is what do you want us to do for us so I go up at club day I offer to incubate clubs any student with an idea I can come over to my office we have a grant program we run the outing club and anime club Dave does a whole fitness club and there's going to be a completely new fitness facility here at the high school that's coming down the road next year or the year after which is really exciting we have high school kids that go to Bolton we did the solar spectrum newspaper last year basically we incubate activities where students show up in October and there's no money for them any budgets but we have a little money for them we help them find an advisor and we've done this for student after student after student and I work here right at the high school and getting to know all these kids as they come up through the programs through CC through the schools and they finally show up here and we all to take them all canoeing in gym class they're freshman year we get to know all of them and it's really amazing just to see these kids that were here and to know that they came up through everything so I guess what I'm saying is we just would like a chance I feel that there's this thing three connections that's been created I don't see the sense in tearing it all down and starting over I think that we can adapt and change and address the concerns and grow and do a better job in the future and continue to serve the vision and the people that are up there so that's what I thought so thank you both Libby and Alex I think we all acknowledge that the original communication and timing of this was not what we wanted I do really want to thank both Libby and Alex for spending a lot of time over the holidays thinking about this and talking and kind of reflecting our paths forward and I really like what I heard from both of you so we're going to do public comment now again I'm just going to give a minute to people we just be cognizant that we do have another presentation after this so try to be concise we have another presentation and we have I think zero coffee pots in the room so be concise if you can but I don't want anyone to not feel like they didn't have an opportunity to say whatever they need to say or ask a question I'll be worldwide questions down and take some time to answer those and then we'll have some more discussion on the topic so if you just want to queue up in front of the mic and I'll keep a rough count on time and hopefully not have to exercise the gang authority please introduce yourself by name first my name is Ginny Burley and I'm the mother of community connections when we got the big federal grant in 2001 speak to the crowd because I think it's easier for them remember you're on camera we might want to try and see should I be on the digital? 180 I think is thank you is this better? great so in 2001 we got a federal 21st century community center learning grant it was for $1.25 million a year and that's what it took to start after school programs in 10 communities that had never had one before Berlin did have Kidwatch and that was it for the entire area so we worked really hard we got the grant in June and by September or October we had programs running in every single school in the district it was a massive undertaking and it happened with this partnership between Washington Central and Montpelier I was also on the U32 school board I've been through four should we join, should we get married conversations over the years so this did and it's actually been written up by UVM professors as a positive partnership and it's been around since 2001 so I'm really committed to this partnership I'm really committed to seeing these things work but as Alex said funding is what it comes down to because there's either community funding school funding and we're no longer eligible for 21st century funding because of the sizes and because of the lack of poverty in most of our schools you have to have 50% free and reduced lunch to qualify and we only have that in Berlin and Doty so what does it come down to if you can't get funding from grants and all the federal grants are going on, believe me they were still around that's how we have all the mountain bikes and the canoes and all that stuff but they're not there anymore the federal government is decimated safe and drug free schools is gone so there's the community funding the schools have cut back U32 gave us $70,000 a year at one point that's gone they don't even have a program anymore so it comes down to parents we got licensed early on so that we could access childcare subsidies we do that, we give scholarships we give all sorts of things to make it possible for parents but it's still not cheap we need other funding sources if it's going to be cheap or free it could be schools it could be, I'm not sure what it could be but I'd really be happy to work with Alex and help him try to figure out how to do that because I'd hate to see this go away it is my baby I'm committed to it and it's been great for these communities remember in 2001 when we started there was nothing parents had nowhere to go there were a few private day care providers and when we started people had to hold their slot with their day care provider and pay them but come to us because they couldn't afford to lose their slot so compared to where we were then we're in a great place now but again it's another crisis but it's about money and it's about equity and it's about access thank you I have cold selfies as loud as I can my name is Lisa Burns I'm a parent of now a middle schooler and a high schooler my kids have been through community connections from elementary through high school and have enjoyed and prospered at every single event that they partook in they did not have any instance where they were unable to attend and I think in many instances Drew especially will go out of his way to max out his buss at capacity so my one question that I would like to ask is there appears to be problems with availability of slots and what not but this was I think something that could be addressed in a slightly more scientific way by merely having a survey which we parents could fill out because I think that some of those 365 children at the middle school and some of the 300 or 400 whatever at the union are not interested in the program as if all of those children are being denied their opportunity I think gives very false figures and I do think that community connections its strongest point is that its local I was totally unimpressed with the website of that one thing and I would just think that maybe the school board would consider asking the parents who have children in the school in a scientific way as opposed to just taking ancillary data of parents call and complain thank you I gave Ginny some more time given her special relationship with CC but please try to stick to the minute because I don't want to brush the people around sure yeah my name is Casey D'Sharnas and my son Dax is into his program at middle school and I love going to pick up Dax after school and seeing Drew Dax loves Drew so that's just a plug but really I wanted to come up and just ask the question as to it didn't seem like there was a plan like community connections was approached and a plan laid out and problems addressed with them so I just was hoping to kind of see the reason why the school board didn't kind of go up and address community connections and see if they could meet the need or a plan could be made to meet the need and just wondering why that didn't happen hello I'm Kate Holly I have two sons that have taken advantage of community connections through elementary middle school and the high school these are professionals who have worked with their children for years and built very strong relationships my older son learned how to play lacrosse with Drew in middle school now his favorite sport on the varsity level not to mention several overnight outdoor experiences teaching outdoor survival skills leadership and responsibility in high school he has hiked Mt. Washington with Dave through MHS Wild and I would just like everyone to please understand that CC is more than just an after school provider it's unique and it really makes this community special and for that I thank you all Christine Zacchi I want to use my time to share some thoughts that parents shared on the petition that we circulated the last time I checked the petition a couple hours ago over 350 parents had signed it in support of CC and took time to make comments on there that I wanted to share one comment from a mother says that she led a CC program a summer camp and saw firsthand how important access is to the sort of quality experience for kids especially those from low income families in the foster care system living with grandparents or having parents who work full time and have long commutes and CC is creating access and quality opportunities for those sorts of kids another person Ashley commented on the petition saying she grew up in this community she lives here now she may have children soon she wants CC programs in the future for her future children we need to have these sort of affordable programs to encourage people as you said to live in Montpelier and have children here a grandparent wrote in saying my grandchildren attend Montpelier schools as a taxpayer and as parents and grandparents they should have been consulted a single parent wrote in Samantha who said community connections on their sliding scale was invaluable and she depends on them greatly a teacher wrote in saying community connections provides us with tons of support that's not even in their sphere community building that CC provides especially connecting students with teachers in a recreational atmosphere is invaluable and finally the common theme that we saw over and over again that the relationships as this woman Elaine said the relationships that my children formed with their peers and with staff have lasted and are what the community is based on and those human relationships I think are why we're all here finally I just want to close with some context the $36,000 that's budgeted for community connections is 0.0015% of the proposed $24 million FY20 budget I understand the fiscal restraints I also think that we need to have some context when we talk about these numbers I really love CC like I've been doing it since like fourth grade like Drew he's amazing I'm on the ski team this year I did downhill skiing with him last year it's all really wonderful I love CC Hi my name is John Turner I've lived in town for about 40 years two of my kids went all the way through the Mount Pilly school system and now I have two grandchildren going through the school system using the after-school program my big concern I think is around the cost right now I think they're paying around $19 there is a school district Waterville has an after-school program charging parents $3 a day I would just ask the board to be a little bit more creative in thinking about what we're paying for and who's doing it I would encourage the board to think outside the box a little long-term there are a lot of people who look like me in town who could be coordinated into supporting some programs there are older school kids that could be involved in supporting an after-school program and I know I knew at one time Mount Pilly had the second per capita group of lawyers in the country other than Washington DC and my daughter is a lawyer and she's a great person and I love lawyers but lawyers worry about liability issues and they tend not to want to think outside the box and I think we need to if we're thinking about taking our kids taking care of our kids after school I go to Franklin I go to MSMS I'm in fifth grade and I've been doing CC ever since I was in kindergarten and I've loved it that whenever I was feeling down Didale would always come to me and hug me and help me feel better Peter Wach I have two students in the middle school I think Libby we just want to convey to you that we understand your decision-making process that you went through this was really helpful today but you have a community of people who want to help you solve the problems you've identified and we hope that you engage us in that in the future we are pretty easy to work with this is not a hostile environment this is a group that wants to work better together the other piece is I wouldn't be afraid of the shared services model that actually works and has worked and the fact that we get for $36,000 where you said that sort of level of service in terms of doing all of the HR and payroll and all those things for the entire community all five schools and whatever is fantastic like that is not something we should be afraid of yeah we should figure out the liability piece that scares me to death but we should keep working on that if it's actually working First I just want to say it's so amazing to see all these people in one room on an issue that affects the future of our schools I mean that is really heartening to me to live in a community like this that is this engaged I know that this parent community can't be involved in every decision about how the schools work and how the district operates but I think that you can tell from the amount of energy and concern in this room that people here feel like this is a decision that has major magnitude for our community it has magnitude because it employs a lot of people who live amongst us and we care about that it has magnitude because there are people who have built these programs over years and there's a lot of institutional knowledge about how to deliver good programs to this community that we will lose with a quick transition to another provider and lastly clearly as everybody is saying it really affects the quality type and cost of the services that are available for after care what I want to urge is that we slow down a little bit that we design a process that is structured to allow for parental involvement and not at every turn in minute detail but that there are thoughtful strategic places along the decision making pathway where people can understand what's being looked at understand not only the gaps which I feel like we heard really compelling information tonight about gaps and challenges and problems what I didn't hear about is what will be lost in a transition away from community connections and what are the options that allow us to address the gaps and do so in a way that preserves what's really special and unique about the programming and the people who deliver it here in our community so I support the let's get on it kind of spirit of what's evolved here and a recognition that we have some problems and we have to address them I would really urge us to do that in a way that leaves everybody feeling good about the decision understanding it and really taking a thoughtful look at what the options are and there may be a lot of creative options that haven't been visited yet I would urge us not to commit immediately to another organization before we have really considered what those options are and people have had a chance to weigh in on what they feel is most important thank you my name is Cassie Wilner I am the parent of a five-year-old here in Montpelier I also work for an organization called Vermont after school and we are a non-profit dedicated to increasing access and quality of out-of-school time programs across Vermont something that we're really interested in in Vermont after school is increasing youth voice and I just loved Alex sharing the stories about how you incorporate youth voice into your programming and I hope that that is also part of this process is having youth provide input of any age elementary school included so that their voices are heard and what they want in need during out-of-school time hours I think that's really important the last thing I want to add is that we're using a new phrase at Vermont after school called third space for learning so we are looking at kids as being at home and then they're in school and then what they do outside of those two places is called the third space and includes libraries and it includes after school programs, summer programs summer camps, rec programs karate club, gymnastics, etc and really looking at this as a broad range and saying what can we do for our kids in our community to make sure that everybody can access these opportunities in the third space of any age because we want our youth of all ages to thrive thanks Hi, my name is Gary Holloway I have two kids in the schools my son Farris is at the middle school my son Winter is at the elementary school and first of all I just want to say thanks for offering an opportunity for for all of us to be able to have this public comment I know sometimes public meetings you can get squashed down to a really short amount of time so to provide this amount of time for us to talk about this is terrific so thanks for doing that and also for the parents who organized a lot of our thoughts that we threw out to the wind over the holidays into a petition was appreciated everything that everyone said or most of the things that folks said I agree with and in support of I have a few other things I'd like to mention one is just the public process it's so important to have a public process around something that's so important to our families and to our kids so thanks for being willing to walk down that road of having a public process and I don't know what that looks like if it means there's going to be a committee that forms all of the work that you know 2016 a few folks in the room here participate in the committee about after school so perhaps they can continue that work and build off of that I agree with Alex you know don't blow it up let's work with what we have because there's been a lot of work put into it over 15 years I think affordability and access for all is perhaps one of the most important to be able to send your kid to golf for 50 bucks or 40 bucks for six weeks or to bolt and skiing you know for kids that might not otherwise have access I think is really important so I would just hope that whatever plan is in place that you're considering the affordability and access for all I'm not sure how you'd do that without increasing a $36,000 commitment that's not a lot so I would hopefully look for ways that you can increase that and there'll be you saying that you really want to get beyond the 7-9% served and try to reach all I think that's an important goal and kudos to Alex and Drew and the rest of CC staff for getting chopped from $100,000 or whatever that number was you said $36,000 and still maintaining the program increasing it in certain cases and then finally I just want to say two things just Drew's amazing with the kids and I think the relationships that the staff have is something that's hard to measure with dollar amounts when you're evaluating cost and then I told a friend of mine I mentioned something around specifically around the elementary school and the programming mayor that I wasn't even aware of that community connections offers low income families in the hilltop community in Berlin 10 hours a week pre-K plus the rest of school after school programming that's subsidized so that's something that would be lost if you did away with community connections all together so I appreciate the hybrid model and considering both so thanks for your time I'm Nate Anderson I have a daughter who's at CC she loves it just three things I wanted to say number one this all kind of came on suddenly right before the break where the board is on this decision making process I would like to think that decisions have not been made in contracts have not been signed so that would be great to learn about there's all of this talk about 16% of students who have access to care no mention has been made so far about those families who would lose all access to care with the pricing models that are up on part two's website nor was there any mention of any way that our situation would not just be what's reported on their website so my wife would have to stop going back to school if part two was our after-school care option and finally there was a point made about local taxes being paid to support after-school care in other school districts I would much rather pay for that than pay for the salary for people working in chicken and chicken county great people though I'm sure they are thank you my name is Jason Woodard I have two daughters who came through the elementary school and are in middle school now and as a middle school teacher at a school that lost its after-school program and is really never been able to get it back I definitely appreciate the situation you said it up there earlier this is all about relationships teaching comes down to that bottom line and I know the current staff those relationships are there Heather took care of my oldest when she was this big and that same daughter now is up on the mountain with Drew who is like a where's wall though because everywhere I go with my students rich building competition or youth environmental summit he's there so my hope is whatever decision is made that that is really factored into it and really establishing those relationships beyond just the slotted and allotted hours because it is about helping kids feel trusted, safe and respected a huge piece of it the question I do have for the board is there any plan to engage the students in terms of what they're interested in and what they would like to see in their needs because another thing we know in teaching is without student buy-in the best lay plans are doomed to failure so just sort of wondering is their voice going to be taken into account thank you My name is Sarah Truckel I have a 10 year old who is a 5th grader at Main Street Middle School and I have an 18 month old who is currently at LoveWorks Daycare I had a great experience with UES my son loves DiDell runs a door every day at the farmers market and gives her a big hug Drew was great for field days but that program is not meeting my family's needs I haven't been able to get consistent coverage at Main Street Middle School I've had programs that were canceled that weren't able to get back that I found out last minute 1.30 in the afternoon, there's no coverage today the programs are amazing the people are the best people I've ever met I would never trust anybody more than these people with my children but it's not meeting my family's needs and I really read the petition and I really support everything everyone said but I think it's really important that we also as a community recognize that having full time preschool is going to be important to younger families we're looking at buying a new house right now it's something we're considering as we're house hunting because honey I'm spending $17,000 a year for daycare between my two children and that's not a joke, $17,000 so I just think it's important that as a community we think about the younger families who are spending this money in preschool who are spending this money in infant care and who are moving into Main Street Middle School with a fifth grader who the experiential programings are great but really do need from three to five they know their children are safe and some of the concerns that I also think are important is I don't know how many of you have kids who spend time at the library after school but I do and my son has told me that there have been drugs at the library that the police have shown up and I think that's important that we recognize that we need to have that capacity I know it might be unpopular but that's important I also am willing to say that I think the sliding fee is great $5 a day though for golf like I as a parent would be willing to spend a little bit more money both taxpayer money and in coverage if that meant that my child was safe after school and I had the reliable coverage there's a lot of options with scholarships but I can think that I'm not the only parent who's willing to spend a little bit more if it means I've got the reliability so I just wanted to kind of boost those concerns but also express great love for my CC people because you guys were phenomenal Heather in particular I have a pre-k a second grader and a ninth grader and when we moved here in 2015 I had a sixth grader and he's now at molten snowboarding with Drew right now so I just want to say that I really appreciate CC it meant a lot the hard transition to middle school to have a strong male role model that Drew is to encourage my son and I just wanted to express that appreciation and hope that CC will continue my name is Lisa and I have two boys one in union and one in middle school both are involved in the CC programs and I can't say enough for what these instructors have done for both my boys whether I'm talking about Anne at our elementary school or whether it's Drew at the middle school my oldest was really struggling and Drew really helped to bring them around and taught them to ride a bike none of us could do that it's been an incredible program and certainly I listened to these now college students talk about their high school experience and what they really valued were these community experiences these small groups do we need more capacity yes but not if what we're doing is going back into everybody in a cafeteria doing crafts my little guy would probably be thrilled with the crafts and try and teach them my middle schooler would refuse to go and what the real value for us at that middle school is that he's choosing activities he wants to participate in and getting to know other kids who also love those so thank you really appreciate it thank you for letting us express my name is Lauren Hurl I've got a seven year old in second grade who's been in CC since kindergarten and I've got a four year old who next year hopefully can get a slot at CC and appreciate the opportunity and having this process and echo the comments of how we're running a good process moving forward and appreciate the challenges and hope that as other people have said that we're all in the mode of how do we solve these challenges that are very real and how can we be creative and build on the strengths of what we have one thing that just hasn't been said I just wanted to add was it kind of gave me red flags when I saw that the provider that was in the link is a for profit corporation to me it's like why are you working with children like if your motivation is the bottom line and profit motive as opposed to what's best for our kids and working with our children in the best possible way so I just wanted to throw that up that's ahead and hard at tonight but I just found that strange and concerning that's okay good evening my name is Larry Corsai I'm actually a transplant to Vermont I retired from the army in 2014 and moved my family here I was one of the folks that showed up on this slide that I had no clue that there was such a backlog to be able to get childcare so I'm all about capacity building but we all as a community know that we want to have a small classroom environment because that's what we have at the high school that's what we have at the middle school and that's what we have at the elementary school and I'm wondering what community partners are you involving so we can continue to do that who are the people that play the flute who are the people that play the violin who are the people that do these type of things as our community who wants to help you and who are these community partners that are now helping CC because everyone here wants to keep CC and loves everybody that we work with there because I have three students they've gone from elementary school middle school to high school they've gone from playing magic to skiing to lacrosse you name it we've been in it small classrooms community partners and we want to keep CC I don't know how to do it but hack you can call me up on the phone anytime I'll give you my phone number we're willing to volunteer and help out and I think there's a lot of us that I will to do the exact same thing quite of order we're a little over half an hour I know I see Tim just before yeah go for it and then does anybody else want to just go I don't want to go so two more and anyone else okay three more okay perfect yeah the last time I was here was for teacher child ratios in schools and now I'm back again so our community is growing we're attracting young families as well as families that want to stay here since 2005 I've always had problems with getting child care I know that I went to Heather was my kids baby teacher with Steve and stuff but currently right now community connections I can't get my kids into their after-school program there's just not enough slots and child care is really important currently right now sometimes at their on their dad's time they go to the library and I don't feel it's safe for them so for the community we need to have a after-school program I've always had great luck with CC I hope we can keep it in some capacity but we have to have a solution for our children and I do want to continue to attract families here to Montpelier and we probably have to talk about the teacher kid ratio too again hopefully so thank you I'm Tim Duggan I have two children in Montpelier once a second grader has been in CC since Kindergarten loves it and I have a daughter who will be in Kindergarten next year hopefully will join him in CC as well just wanted to express my support my family support for CC for everything everyone's done to care for our children and also just sort of express the same question I've heard before but a question about where we are in the process I think we've heard a lot of people who want to be in solutions mode it sounds like CC has a lot to offer in terms of solutions and one thing that we hadn't heard tonight that I'm curious to hear about is how the problems that were articulated are solved by any other providers such as part 2 or any other provider that might come in I think we all agree that there are challenges we're facing but I think the different providers can provide solutions and we really haven't heard about them yet so I hope we have a chance to listen learn and weigh in before decisions are made I'm Ronnie Lynn Shrouds I have three kids in middle school and one to be an elementary soon I also ran the Girl Scout troop and I was unable to continue because of all the outcries of the kids wanting to come into the troop and lack of help from the volunteers my question is why part 2 why did you choose part 2 as the provider they don't give much information and there's a lack of transparency there with them and are you going to give other providers an opportunity to step up to come into our community or in our community to want to step in and use that I haven't been able to use community connections because of the huge wait list but I've been lucky enough to be home with my children so I haven't had to use that so if we can build upon community connection instead of bringing in that other provider I think would be better than bringing in new people maybe add something to community connection it sounds like it's more an elementary than the middle school but if we can find someone to add to them instead of bring in what I want to see with them we're going to discuss process and this presence is actually not a requirement but we are just going to Jill do you want to talk really quick hi I'm Jill Ramick I have a daughter who has gone through union and is now at the middle school and I think as Peter pointed out there's a lot of us here who sort of want to help you guys figure out a bigger picture solution because what the common theme is there's this not going away anytime soon window of time where our kids need and want activity and extra care activities so if there's some way that some of us could help have the rec department conversations and the after school program and the sporting there's different pieces that our kids all sort of participate in in that window of time so it's more than just this one narrow piece so Libby I love what you said when you said we want to talk about how to grow and expand it because we absolutely need to reach those families that need it and I'm definitely guilty of being the Drew we got to get it like turning it right around because Drew's amazing my first thought when I heard about this was the school should just hire Drew and just have him create this magical Montpelier after school community because we're all here and the demand is here so that's a good problem to have so yeah if there are any things that we parents can help talk about to bring the rec department into this or the athletics division into this to talk that through okay thanks so as you put it no there's not a requirement to need an RFP I think what the board has to deliver and decide and I think what you're hearing from both Alex and Libby and I think the seven of the crown well first of all I want to say I think there's a lot of commonality in terms of goals and visions and what we want I've heard that from everyone who presented the need to expand opportunities quality opportunities the type of opportunities that represent our community values I think what the board is going to deliberate on is what what does give guidance on what that process is looking forward so we can put something in place for next year that builds on all the great assets we have I'm actually unclear what the board's role is well we're going to talk about that okay because I I feel like we're in a position here we're having a board meeting about this but we don't actually the board has not had a roll-up at this point so we want to figure out I would like to have a conversation about the definition of the administration versus the board's role on this we're not going to have to write the second benefit before we take any action let's deal with any of the questions that Libby feels she's going to knock off and some of the questions were directed to the board and some of the questions were directed to the board we're going to have to answer okay so I wrote down some of the questions I've heard and I'm trying to lump them together as much as I possibly can because I'm connected some quick ones that I can answer there have been no contracts signed whatsoever so naming part two as the next provider was part of the mistakes I made so there are no contracts signed with them and if the board so wishes to have an RFP process and put out these are what the school district needs who can come help us with our needs if the board so wants us to do that so as far as part two that for me at this moment has been sidelined because my suspect my suspicion would be that the board is going to ask me to do that and we'll go ahead and do that and in addition to that process knowing this board the way I do I imagine they will be asking for some parent volunteers to be a part of that advisory role to play a role part in that advisory role so that kind of works out a few different parts of these questions in terms of parent involvement as well as part two in particular and process let's see here I think I appreciate Jason you saying and a few others how do we engage students as a middle school teacher so you know the importance of that particularly for this age group I would imagine that any provider we go with to provide the child care option piece of a plan going forward would absolutely be asking the students particularly at that age level I'd expect that to happen and sure it happens and I know that the extended day opportunity which I'm separating those two pieces out between the routine daily three to five as Sarah was talking about child care option and the extended day option which is what I'd like to think of as the outdoor enrichments and the things that are currently being provided those also would engage students as to what do you want to do during that time with some control around that it's active we're out moving, we're outside, we're doing things so yes absolutely that we know the importance of that and that would be an absolute expectation in terms of options that goes back to what I imagine the board is going to ask me to do in my mean age with CC before or this fall with Alex in particular we talked about capacity issues I did not push him hard on capacity issues and Alex and I have talked about that and I recognize that yeah I probably should have pushed you a little harder on that piece we had a long conversation about that on Monday in particular and I could have done that better I could have done that piece better so that he knew where we were in this process in a different way so Alex and I did talk about that and I apologize for that to him so I could have done that better in that process it's one of the few places that I'm learning in this decision making piece so we did talk about capacity a bit at the times we talked I don't want to speak for Alex in any way shape or form but he's a very busy man running an after school for eight different school buildings and it was that we don't really have capacity to increase at that point in time and Alex I don't want to put up words in your mouth so if I all mean speak up if you think I am so that was pretty clear to me and capacity again is one piece of this issue liability is another piece and so when thinking about could we divorce from Washington Central that's central right now to community connections as it is it's a central piece to it so going forward I think that whatever the entity is that CC becomes that's a major piece right Alex? it's a major piece I would just say things are complicated and Washington Central as well right this is just us it's not just here that's complicated to that yeah so it's bigger piece than capacity that Alex and I are now currently trying to work through and figure out I'd also like to just reiterate that we had a great conversation on Monday we're really excited about what we can do together going forward and I think both of us have a common value in what we want to do for kids it's just how do we move forward getting it to happen Alex do you want to say anything more about that piece I don't want to put words in your mouth just your future I think we have to say that yeah so the question is how do we accomplish them be a part of that or not what makes me see for the community most of them that can be so I'm going to put some parameters around the board discussion so we can do it productively and somewhat efficiently because we still have this is very important I think we need it's a discussion on the board role I'm going to give my kind of thoughts on the board role I think the board has a strong consulting role on this I think we should give guidance as to how we want the process to play out I think this is ultimately a super intended decision with consultation from the board I want to keep it that way but I think we should set some parameters for how we want the process to look I think we should recommend encourage a RFP process that I think has two main components one I think is Libby and Alex continuing to work together to figure out how to work for some structural issues and whether the pieces need to be brought in to you know fulfill the things that have been laid out and to carry toward the values we want and I think there should be an advisory committee to discuss parents board members students and some staff members to work with Libby and putting together a recommendation for her decision that she would come to the board and get our ultimate guidance on so that's those are my thoughts and now I'm opening up Michelle so one thing that I heard a little bit from the parents is a perception that part of our capacity problem is that we're underfunding our after school can you talk to us about how after school works at other districts yeah for districts who do not receive I almost want to lose the person who works Vermont after school they might be not a person to answer more than I do so please speak up but it's my understanding that school districts that have 21c grant funding money have higher poverty rate and generally the school district supports the after school so they get federal funding to pay for their after school program and in addition there's typically a position with that school districts who are in that position have an after school coordinator whose job it is to run the after school programming the district that I'm coming from has an after school coordinator also funded by the federal grant yeah in part but school districts pay towards that as well I don't know of many other school districts and correct me on this one if you know more than I do who put money towards after school programming if it's not right if it's not better under the 21c but do you know more I can do some research on it and it it gets a little complicated because of different sizes and poverty rates some of them are non-profit the greater Burlington YMCA is a large after school and summer program provider throughout greater Burlington and Washington County actually but it would involve a little bit of research but it's something that we can do from our organization happy to help we probably have a better way of getting it than I do quicker is that like programs which is like each things like that would our community be eligible for the Beach program our community is not eligible for federal funding via the 21c running certain grants or 21c that is a threshold of 40% probably for you to reduce the plunge rate or higher what's there is what's there is so Libby yes are there districts are the districts since they don't get funding that do have after school programs then it's paid for by the parent so the amount in pay yes so I guess I want to get back to this issue of defining roles because I think that a consultative role is a very squishy thing and I'm concerned for instance in the needs of the district laid out there are some things missing that I think reflect the values that I think should be in any RFP for instance I believe community connections plays a livable wage would that be in the RFP for instance the retention of existing staff at all levels I saw what I think and this is the first time I see you explain it are we actually talking about defunding community connections further I saw 30 some thousand that would be in there and then it comes out of grant or out of scholarships from the provider there was something in there about scholarships from the provider yeah so one way that school districts reduce costs from alternative providers is that in lieu of rent right because essentially a business is using our buildings and we would charge them rent so lieu of rent they either give scholarships for students who need or they create a sliding scale based on how much they would typically pay to the criminal so that's separate we haven't touched the money budgeted for after-school programming in our budget you don't see it as a separate line item because it's part of under the new chart of accounts it's in the co-curricular okay I think maybe that's what I was seeing is a shift there was definitely something on a slide sorry I'm missing it now about that moving I kept that money so that we could keep the mainstream middle school programming what about elementary for completely self-funded yes okay alright and then there's a so I'll stop I just wanted to make sure I think my concern is in RFP can effectively limit applicants proposals by how high that we set the bar or by what we expect of folks and I wonder if the board has a role in establishing the RFP or whether you know it just I'm here sitting here in a public meeting and I have nothing to do with this process and I want to figure out what my role is is really what it is so I'd like that very clearly to find a consultive means something but it doesn't mean a lot and ultimately if the board objects do we do we have a say or do we wait till your evaluation in a year and then you know say thank you for making that decision on behalf of the district I just don't understand that role and I'm sure that's a conversation you would make you would have a collaborative conversation about that before you might establish that but I know that out of the blocks it would you are assuming that this is just something you could just do and I just want to be careful about not making missteps around authority going forward and not making assumptions probably incorrectly if there was a committee form to work on this and there were a board member or two on that committee but it would be their responsibility to keep the board abreast of how it's going and express the board's concern to that committee that would be my understanding too I mean the question is do you want I also think we need a question on timing because we have to get certain things in place at certain times to have this work I had that question is there time for an RFP and a committee and an RFP and a committee I think there is but I think it's it's going to be quick and the people who are going to commit to it are going to have to commit to it and expect to have some probably 10 weeks so why did you choose to do it now why not at the beginning of the school year I didn't know I was coming in as a new administrator we all know this is a big problem but your years past yeah so just point of order we're not taking questions from the crowd I mean I think the answer on timing is there are a lot of things moving and I think probably the process got ahead of you so we're hoping to have what you're hoping for it sounds like Libby is at the beginning of next school year to have in place both the middle school and high school programs that exist now somehow with the funding that we have for them already and an additional reliable daily child care option through fifth grade at least it would be at the middle school but essentially to expand the existing program at UES so it serves more kids and to add a similar program at the middle school to ensure that we have coverage for parents who want it yes that's your goal that you hope to have in place by next fall yes can I get Alice's thoughts on time I'm going to say that any licensed provider that you're going to come through has to go through the licensing process so they would do that over the software we can't just train we can't transfer our license even if we were to form a new entity we would have to start over in the first day so you can start to have the department specialized care and we actually have a provisional agreement in there right now talking about that later you're hard and fast for the provider which is a process funded children child development division it takes about two months and also finding because you need a program director with certain qualified agents in place in the beginning of that licensing process I would say that would be your major type frame the strength of the provider would be the process of licensing so would it be possible in the next month to decide what the priorities are for this provider and be able to put out an RFP and then have it a quick turnaround and meanwhile your continuing conversation with Alice has one of those people but that doesn't mean that we would choose somebody else but then we've done the process you know what I'm saying, is that possible I mean it sounds like we actually kind of are in agreement about what we want and need now we have to figure out how to get it so if that's an agreement it's not something we're going to argue about seems like we can write up that list fairly quickly put out an RFP continue to talk about it because you'll apply the RFP and then in a month if we knew in a month and what I have an RFP is that time table doable it's hard to re-assign because I don't know what the new structure would look like for some city I can I can assume that you can get some of your guidance for the RFP through the licensing application itself I mean there's a long flow application that you have developed for licensing so there's certain requirements around lake lead paint, things like that but obviously they would have to be licensed as a restart provider there's no reason not to do it I think that what you would do at Union would be pretty similar no matter who was coming in to do it and you provide your main street most of the little trick here has never been licensed you may run into some issues with space there but I don't know that I think Union is a much more there's a lot of programs that I get to say what you're talking about at Main Street is more I think we know the stuff that you would make to a media art committee we're the only program that might get all state there's nobody else that wants a program like what we run at Main Street most of the school that's not funded by federal state but I'd be happy to help out so does the board have to take an action tonight or do we just have to in a more general way endorse the process that you've laid out which is a process that involves a community agreement and the superintendents ongoing work and our process is there an action for the board? I don't think we should at least get verbal agreement it sounds like there's a question as to whether the board wants to charge a committee or not I have a larger question actually so we're talking about an RFP as though it's an isolation but to me this seems like a bit of a systemic issue this process could have occurred on any number of issues that were important to our community and so I wonder if and it's not a decision for tonight but I do wonder if we need to consider a more system-wide approach where we encourage a more competitive and more community involved process when we approach these issues because this isn't the only time that we're going to have an issue like this you could re-engage it through your policy right and there is a policy that you could look at that's called budget execution so it is in policy if you want to adjust it you can adjust it through policy but I think that's my concern too is that the policies aren't clear about this or perhaps they limit us and so I just I'm not advocating that we don't participate I'm advocating that we're very clear what our role is short of having a clear policy on this I think it's always obviously our role is a little squishy I mean there are I think from the structural standpoint this is clearly an administrative decision but at the end there's spaces where obviously this touches the community hugely and the community wants a voice and our role as a board to help with that so the reason we're having this meeting the reason that people reach out to us so I think I can live with little squishiness in role it seems like the timing is urgent the timing is urgent yes there's clearly a need to make sure we have something in place next year that needs of access and equity for kids that's not something that can be delayed a year so the discussion that about roles and the next time this happens is a bigger discussion that will take more time that we don't really have time for in order to get this process no and to be honest with you I think it's going to be a hard thing to nail down where it ends up and this isn't an unusual issue this issue where there's a major service being provided to our kids through a very old store we don't do a lot of that the district will usually provide services directly so it's a little bit Swedish and nice and thanks good Laura talk unique great I would just say I like what you're the lead now but I think we should the other piece that community members mentioned is this issue of regionality or a regional approach to a problem beginning historically and I'm wondering what we're effectively advocating for here is that we stop regional collaboration perhaps that's the fact that there's no choice that the region has fallen apart over a period of time both initially from a funding fail or funding into funding but also just from the fact that no one seems to Washington Central anyway doesn't seem to be engaged in this process and I don't know if Washington Central is engaging it but it is and so I wonder whether this issue of robust, stable programs is important enough that we need to have some volunteer numbers to make that work or whether that's not important to continue this program on any kind of a cost effective way and if it is then shouldn't we be requiring this to be a regional version but if the number is because it's being regional where they are we wouldn't have this problem now is that the reason I'm just wondering whether have we given up on the idea of working as Central Vermont and we're now just working as in Roxbury that's a big historic political movement change from where this community was so maybe the question is what's more important do we have regional combination or have all of the people that need and want actors to repair well I don't think absolutely not I mean there could be a point where the city has the counterpoint to regional collaboration with the district having more control with its own options definitely and it's been a problem in terms and we've rushed into a new district with another district so we now have a region of our district which will be further away from Washington Central well Washington Central is working on a lot of stuff and they're working on things so where are we at so I think on RFP Alex and Libby are already talking and I think really thinking hard about next steps I think the question is do we want some sort of advisory committee I would say yes but I would also like whoever's on that the expectations that would be that's what they're doing for the next month and it's not going to be overlapped at least for the next few weeks probably spending some time with both Alex and we'll be really learning what the the options are and coming back we'll make sure we have an options place that can serve our kids well and build on the good stuff we have and point to some stability and growth and growth of our values and this is a very important aspect I think the school district that's where I'm at do we need a is this something we need a formal board committee charge for I think if we're forming a committee we should probably charge a committee so I would move that we charge an advisory committee create an advisory committee charged to work with the superintendent on actual programming second do we need to set the composition yes we need to I suggest composition duration charge so we need a certain number of school board members two board members two students two staff two board members two students two staff slides staff slides staff how about one teacher you're talking about staff of the Montpellier Roxbury school system and to serve until the end of the until the end of the process to serve report back what's the product they're reporting back to us or are they moving on without any further board consultation I would I don't know the board can always amend the charge if you need a formal board and if there are expectations the board members will report back the board members can report back if we need something more we can direct them can we get a second we can get back a second all those in favor any opposed great thank you can we get your members email me if you're interested should we just try to submit your board members now I'm happy to do it I'm happy to defer oh I would do I'm sorry we're just sharing okay yeah and it's Jim Murphy at MPSBT.org but I would please do it do it quickly I would love to I think given the speed with which we're going to have to work that we're going to need to keep the numbers a little bit smaller just to be able to get it off the ground and meeting we can also invite elementary students to come to a meeting without necessarily having you know the trickiest thing about a committee that's going to be often assumed is to get everybody in the room so that'll be hard to have yeah and we can definitely do outreach okay great so please do email me I'll send out some social media to soliciting yeah it's going to be time intensive I think it'll be rewarding and it'll be a good process and it's obviously important to the district so it's got some time over the next month or are willing to make time I first want to thank everyone for coming out for caring about this issue because it's very important so thank you I also want to thank Libby and the entire administrative team for the work that's gone into thinking about this issue and for making sure that we're meeting the needs of all the kids in the district so thank you I want to second that because Brigitte took this on herself a couple years ago in making sure this became a priority for the district and at that time the administration did not adopt it as a priority and now it is and so that's a really important step for our district is that this is elevated to be one of our highest priorities it was falling on I honestly believe it's falling on deaf ears before and the board wasn't able to move it forward the way it wanted to so having you Libby and your team make this a priority is a huge thing for our district so thank you yeah now I want to echo all of that thanks everyone for coming Grant is up next for the Sicillating Budget Presentation I appreciate all the conversation that has occurred and some of that might need to continue and if you could continue that in the hallway if it's not related to the budget that would be awesome for those of you who are sticking around for the budget presentation I appreciate your time and your patience obviously I'm going to try to get through this very quickly because we're already beyond the scheduled time for the board meeting so this is I think the third time we've gone through the presentation with the board and my clicker doesn't work could you do the so just to go over what we're going to talk about we're going to go over some district confirmations and context some things that have changed enrollment and staffing we'll look at the budget both general fund and capital fund we'll talk about tax rates which as the slide says are not final yet because there's still some missing pieces and we'll look at a little bit of an outlook going into some future years so for the overview district overview so just in case anybody doesn't know we have Roxbury Village School it's pre K to 4 grade 4 and right now it has 44 students enrolled Union is pre K to 4 has board of 32 students enrolled Main Street is obviously grades 5 through 8 has 365 students enrolled and currently Roxbury Village students attend Main Street as well Montclair High School is grades 9 through 12 and it's only has 302 students enrolled and for personnel we have 240 employees 225 of them are full time equivalency and 142 teachers when we get them all in this room it is packed solid we try to do that at least once a month and that school that was on the bottom left is Roxbury if you haven't seen it it's very cute so for some context if this was my years of that we were asked to put together a slide to basically explain the education funding system which that's impossible but what we did do is we found this YouTube video which I encourage you to look at it kind of reminds me of the old school house rocks except it's not as musical it's like a cartoon that goes through the whole process of the Vermont education funding formula it's very good it's about 11 minutes long and that's the link I've watched it now five times and I still probably don't understand it all but I'm closer just some quick things where the money comes from so the education fund is a separate fund and the money that goes into that part of it comes from the state's general fund that gets transferred part is sales and use tax part is the lottery proceeds about 41% of it is non-residential taxes so businesses and rentals that kind of thing the rest about a quarter of it is property taxes which is kind of surprisingly low that only a quarter of the education fund comes from property taxes of those the only one that the budget really directly impacts is property taxes and then once you start looking at property taxes a lot of the most critical factors that come into that calculation we don't really have a whole lot of control over like common level of appraisal which is based on property values and to give you some context a 1% change in the CLA increases or decreases the tax rate by almost two cents we don't have any say in the statewide dollar yield that every school district is compared to and a hundred dollar change in that dollar yield which you'll see later impacts the tax rate by over a penny and a half equalized pupil count we can say we kind of have something to do with that because I think we provide services that make people want to move into this community but you don't have total control over equalized pupils and if you have an increase of 10 students or a decrease of 10 students it impacts your tax rate by 1.4 cents the thing that's interesting is that we could add $100,000 to the budget and it's only going to change the tax rate by less than a cent so you can see there's a lot of things that we don't have control over whenever you see the tax rates and we'll actually show that calculation in a little bit so statewide I mentioned the statewide dollar yield it depends on the health of the education fund and it also depends on what the spending is looking like so we're fortunate this year that the education fund doesn't have a hole that has to be filled we're also fairly fortunate that ed spending as a state is projected to go up 3.24% which isn't huge ours is a little bit more than that but then again as Libby mentioned we're one of the few places that has increasing enrollment fortunately the dollar yield is expected to increase in FY20 is decreased local spending it's divided by that number to come up with a tax rate on the flip side unfortunately the CLA is dropping in our communities it's kind of a good news and bad news, good news is your properties are worth more money the bad news is the tax rate goes up as a result of that statewide property values are supposed to increase about 2.5% in Montpelier they're up about 2.64% and in Roxbury they're up about 5.9% part of that is because Roxbury recently reappraised and I'm not sure what's driving the rest of it I mean it could be that there's they have an excellent school system now well they had an excellent school before but this CLA, that last bullet if I used last year's CLA this year the tax rate in Roxbury goes down almost 10 cents so just because of the CLA drop of 5.86 it swings at 9.7 cents another kind of statewide factor that's not directly related to the formula is health insurance so statewide health insurance premiums are up almost 12% and health premium costs are over 2 million dollars so it's a big piece the good news is there's something called a CLA back where the state realized we went to hide deductible plans and that was going to cost less money so they did us all favor and took money from us so they didn't give us all the revenue they were supposed to because they knew that we were going to save some money we don't have that CLA back in FY20 they took money away from us in the 18 they took money away in 1965,000 we're not going to do that anymore it's in statute so we don't have to worry about that the other good thing is we have health reimbursement accounts for our staff and we're going to assume that people aren't going to use all of that money so that helps fill some of that void too so some of our context as I said earlier one of the pieces that leadership has been doing this school year is really evaluating where we are in structures and systems and which of those are really solid and which of those do we need to grow and build our capacity so you're not going to see many frills in this budget simply because we're still in that in that evaluation mode we've noticed some major ideas that stuck out to us and you do see those represented in this budget but it's really how do we take stock of where we are and build systems and structures and build our capacity in the future some more systems perspective so this current fiscal year was big we had a merger that we were working at we had several projects that were started and finished and some not finished and we had a significant turnover in administration myself taking on the new role as well as Ryan Haridy at UES taking on the new Principalship role two administrators in one year is a pretty big first school system as small as ours I'm sorry oh we also thank you you're right sorry I was thinking Brian that was the most important obviously so we have I hope that Andrew's getting out of here so we have some capacity building that we've noticed we need to do we want to establish structures so that in the future we can develop things in a way that works and is not just laying things on teachers and our staff but is doing things in a very progressive way that works for us and we want to ensure equitable services for all students that is most definitely a theme from the board as well as from our district leadership with the merger we were asked just to speak to this briefly with this merger there were definitely some bumps in the road that we couldn't have imagined prior without actually going through the merger process we weathered those pretty well and the transition has gone pretty well from my perspective I have nothing to compare it to however I think that it's gone well our tax incentive because of that merger goes from 8 cents to 6 cents in fiscal year 20 which of course is actually a 2% increase for us so the amazing financial planning from this past year helps us speak to that later in what he was thinking about in terms of factors we have an increased enrollment and we have minimal staffing increases for this fiscal year despite the increased enrollment this year is the first year of paying back the bond principle for the playground work and the work that is about to start here at the high school in particular we had one time fiscal year 19 projects that's what's helping even from the 2% increase tax rate because fiscal year 19 the team before me planned on one time project costs that are now eliminated from our budget that was pretty smart fiscal planning financial planning on the team's part that I can't take credit for and we also are having going forward reduced tuition costs so students who are grandfathered into school choice from the Roxford Montpelier merger that number is getting smaller each year so we have reduced tuition costs there which factors into the overall budget in terms of things that we've noticed that we'd like to hit upon in this budget there is a theme in the community around adding busing for main street middle school students so you'll see that represented in the budget in terms of capacity building this budget hits on the idea of an immersion, a study for programs to move forward not actually putting programs in place but a study to provide us with the baseline capacity to move forward with that idea we have a need for social emotional learning coordinator that really helps us build capacity in the future with our kids who are the most challenging kids in terms of school and what they bring with them to school so that position is meant to increase capacity in the future years of our programming and systems of how we support kids with really challenging needs and of course equity which is something that we've talked about a lot tonight we also see some additional support for our food services providers in this budget increasing management positions at UES and Main Street in order to provide one more equitable wage for those but also to increase capacity to build better food programs for our kids so that's represented in this budget in regards to the bond the UES playground work has begun most of the heavy I'm looking at Andrew so I don't say anything wrong most of the heavy lifting or the rough work is completed there's still a bit more and if you're a UES parent you saw today in Ryan's swoop scoop that the contractor has been able to work longer in January than they expected they didn't expect necessarily to do that because of the warmer temperatures is that correct Andrew and it's scheduled to be completed by the beginning of school next fall so they will eventually take a break the construction crews because of weather and then come back when the weather allows them to the UES vestibule is nearly complete so it will be done late February early March so it's moving forward and other projects that we are going out to bid in mid January for that we've had lots of conversations right before break around was particularly the Montpelier High School Auditorium and Fitness Wing and making sure those plans are the way that we want them and the UES elevator and bathrooms which were part of the bond work will go out shortly mid January still Andrew and then other projects to bid in January Jan Andrew just said in the same package for costs so we can try to keep costs down as much as possible as we have mainstream middle school bathrooms that are getting renovated those will be unisex bathrooms over by the gym area and the remaining high school replacement the roof over the auditorium that was not done this past summer that is being bid in January okay as far as unknowns that are still out there we don't have an equalized pupil count from the agency of education they're having some challenges trying to pull data we do have an estimate that we're using and my hope is that it's maybe on the conservative side I think we're close the dollar yield and non-residential tax rate are as good as they're going to get but they aren't official because they have to be set by law career center six semester average that's for tech tuition we don't have that yet and that will impact revenues and expenses but not in a significant way at all changes and what I mean by changes is these are changes that occurred since the last time we met in December 19 so we got final CLA numbers we were off by 0.33% in Montpelier so we were guessing pretty close from Montpelier but we were off by a pretty significant amount in Roxbury so we plugged in these new CLA factors and you'll see how that gets factored into the tax rate calculations later you're going to hear everybody talk about it a lot equalized pupils it's the biggest unknown that I have right now we did change it since the last time we met I bumped it up to be level with FY19 we had been using a number that was a little lower I think that we're safe saying it's going to at least stay level my hope is that it will go up we have more kids but unfortunately that's not the only thing that's factored into equalized pupils it's a two-year average it's weighted for English language learners poverty factors there's a lot that goes into it so you're never really sure how that's going to come out on the expense side we had a real minor change based on some do's that we got a new estimate on the revenue side we increased tuition because we were just assuming that the kids that were here are going to come back but chances are we're going to at least pick up one more kid so we did decide not to be ultra conservative and soon we're going to get at least one new kid balance forward is really using fund balance as a revenue source which you can do in a budget I had been using it as a revenue source we decided to take it out so it's showing that we decreased fund balance by 87,500 as a revenue source if we put it in it helps this year's tax rate but whenever we take it out next year it would create a bigger hole to fill and we're already having to deal with that two cent tax rate that's going to be bumped up next year so for now we've taken it out if need be we can put it back in later so this chart is just a quick preview that compares FY18 through FY20 the total budget is up about 2.7% much less than last year non tax revenues is actually less so that kind of hurts a little bit but not really because the main reason why it's down is because we get special ed revenues based on our expenses our expenses happen to be lower in special ed which means our revenues are probably going to be lower as well education spending is about a 4% increase which is less of an increase than last year equalized pupils as I said is hopefully a conservative number and then ed spending per pupil is really dependent on what that pupil count is but for right now we're showing a 4% increase from last year where almost $2,000 below the excess spending penalty threshold so we're still in good shape there we did institute a capital plan last year or actually FY19 at $250,000 we're proposing to have a capital plan of $260,000 for FY20 and it'll be a separate article and a separate one so now we'll look real briefly at enrollment and staffing you'll notice on this chart or you may not notice but K through 4 does not include Roxbury College school if we put them those kids in here it would really skew our class size analysis because there's so few kids there so K4 does not include Roxbury 6 through 12 does include Roxbury students as they transition into Main Street and Montpellier High School kindergarten is circled because you'll see starting in FY21 the numbers look kind of low that's based on birth data from four years ago so you know I'm hoping those numbers are actually going to be higher but that's it is what it is even with those kindergarten numbers potentially lower than they really are our K through 12 numbers that are circled you see we're going up to 1136 next year which is 64 new kids and up to 1212 in FY23 so if you look at that period of time you're talking about an increase of about 140 kids now some of those kids are Roxbury kids that are transitioning in maybe 50 of those so you're still looking at at least 100 new kids into the community the seniors drop considerably is that because those kids are doing early college or tech center or something it could be that the model shows it going trending like that because it the models based on historical so we would probably I mean I guess I would probably want to talk to Mike McCrath to find out you know if there's a reason that he can think of it's not a dramatic change in a lot of years I mean like 69 to 65 60 to 58 but it does drop somewhat my daughter's about 76 to 62 14 kids from last year to this year I don't know I think they're just at early college or early college or maybe some dual enrollment maybe they're not in school for the majority of the day so they're not counted as a student so we can talk to Mike about that so even with projected enrollment increases we don't appear to need to add classroom teachers until FY22 this chart if you see cells in yellow up above that means we're within one student of the max class size if it's red that means we're over class size so you can see in FY22 we would need to add a classroom teacher in 7-8 which would solve the problem in FY23 as well and then in FY23 we'd probably need to add at least some portion of a teacher at the high school that may not be a 1.0 it could be that we need another 0.6 in science or something like that depending on how the class sizes look the lower chart is average class sizes so not every class size is exactly this some classes are going to be higher and some classes like AP classes at the higher school might be lower so for the maximum class size we'd be determining that I know that there was a policy that was in place and it was a summary in each of the schools at the time and so was that re-zoned for the movement of the 5th grade too like how was that done the class sizes so K through 3 the class sizes are 15 to 20 I believe so 20 would be the maximum 17 is the optimal that's a policy that was adopted by the board for Montpelier schools not Roxbury 4 through 12 is 18 to 25 with an optimum number of 22 students remember that all new policies came to effect this year because of the new district so any of the policies that you might remember from good old days when we were talking about class sizes but the policies are online so you can get to them so there's new zoning and new numbers okay so when the classes reach over those 22 then it would be considered needed so for K through 3 if the average class size hits 20 we would want to bring on another teacher I'm more interested in like 5, 6 5, 6 is 18 18 to 25 18 to 25 is the range so if we hit 25 we want to add a teacher and we are real close the interesting thing there is because we're not a school of 10,000 kids if you switch from if you add a teacher you're going to go from from being right at the edge of maximum class size to being like below the window because one more teacher has a dramatic change but if we go over the maximum class size we'd bring on another classroom teacher so I just want to reiterate the class sizes and how important it is and the experiences that the children that are having lower optimal class sizes come back to our school systems and say that is the one thing they remember the most I know my grad guys are in that bubble and I see the other challenges and one class one teacher like I know it seems like a huge deal but on the effect of that one teacher it could be greater than the cost just to acknowledge we're going through quite a bit we're slacking off the chair but we do have a a late night window for discussion so the rest of the story this is Roxbury K-4 so it just shows you the other one didn't include Roxbury K-4 this is a snapshot there's no fancy math here there's no big model it's just if there's eight first graders this year we assume there's going to be eight second graders next year and the class sizes are obviously different for Roxbury Village School so on the staffing side there's not a lot on this chart we're proposing two increases one decrease and a shift from grant funding to local funding so we are recommending a human resources coordinator I think you'd be hard-pressed to find an organization that has over 200 employees and 24 million dollars that doesn't have an HR coordinator in fact you'd be hard-pressed to find one that doesn't have an HR department so the size of the organization alone is an argument there liability concerns are something that are worrying me things like the Affordable Care Act Labor Standards, Family Medical Leave Act health changes all the time so there's a lot of things that could go wrong and could go dramatically wrong the bottom line here is the chart says we just want to make sure that we're taking care of the employees so they can focus on their job and focus on the kids the custodial decrease of a .5 that's not cutting a .5 we have a .5 that we didn't fill and we think we can survive without it so there's no sense in funding it at UES there's an interventionist coach position we're not, we don't want to cut it we think it's a very much needed position the problem is UES won't qualify for title funds next year so we're shifting it from being funded by federal funds to being funded locally so it's not an increase in the expense budget but we're not able to use revenues to cover it so it kind of increases education spending the social emotional learning coordinator position would allow us to institute a model to integrate kids back into the classroom and hopefully avoid costly outside placements the focus would be teaching social and self self-regulation skills so this is kind of an exciting thing to see if we can build some capacity here as well really briefly on the shift from title funds we could mind just briefly explaining that to folks who aren't familiar with how to qualify for that what that even means so with title funding with title one funding it's based on poverty rates and when you're in a district with multiple schools of the same level which we now are, we weren't previously we now are it involves targeting and ranking based on poverty levels so where union falls in terms of free and reduced lunch numbers now a newly merged district does not qualify them for title one funds this year we grandfathered them in because sometimes that change can be unexpected and the defense know that so they allow you one year of grandfathering that's what's happening is now but because they're grandfathered this year that's like our one get out of jail free card next year there's not a possibility for grandfathering we know they're not going to be offered title one funding what level do you mean the same grade span yes thank you Tina the same grade span and so some of these budgetary pressures like the ship from the title funds the federal grant funding we were talking about with after school funding that in some ways is representative of our socioeconomic status as a community and therefore not getting federal assistance other communities might so I just think it's important alright so we're going to dig into expenses real quick this slide just shows the number that we're tracking to the twenty four million eighty thousand this is just a pie chart showing kind of the percentage of money that goes into each of the buckets I think most of these are pretty much self-explanatory but you know if you look at general ed special education career center tuition and maybe a piece of speech you're looking about sixty percent of the budget is going toward direct instruction some of the areas like buildings and grounds just so you know the capital plan that two hundred sixty is part of that safety includes our school resource officer bus aids and crossing guards the principal and special services would be your principal's budgets of each school and the special administration administration office here and fund transfer we'll talk about that a little bit later we did touch on it a little bit when we did the fund transfers purely the money that we have to transfer to food service as an enterprise to help it break even because it doesn't so moving on this is just a quick visual that shows increases and decreases I'm not going to spend any time on here because the next slide goes into the details and career center tuition is highlighted because we don't have a six semester average which goes into that calculation I think I should point out some of the things general education is going down which is refreshing a lot of that is because of the grandparent in Draxbury tuition there's less kids because it's one less year of kids being grandparented or preschool tuition is going down as well special aid is only up one point six four it actually would be a bit of a decrease but next year there's a statewide account and we have to re-bucket some things we used to show some costs for triple E which is essential early education we used to show it in general aid it's really a special education requirement so if it wasn't for that $170,000 shift in between buckets special education would actually be one that too let's see co-curriculars and athletics that's where we do have money for after school and items that are being cut I'm sorry in the comments or those things that are being added those are both general education is decreasing and it's because there's a decrease in grandparented Draxbury tuition I'm sorry co-curricular and athletics those are things that we added so in co-curricular and athletics you'd see an increase in this line because we added some advisors for equity alliance, racial justice the conversation but you're going to see that it looks like there's a cut the reason why that is because of this statewide chart of accounts we had bussing costs in co-curricular and athletics you can't put it there it has to be under transportation which is down below so we actually increased the budget but some of the costs shifted down student support is where we put the money for the social emotional learning coordinator staff support is where you see the money for the world language immersion study principal's office isn't really increasing that much and it's a little bit of a misnomer because you can have one person that comes in that shifts us from a single person coverage to a family coverage for health and that's a swing of like 20 some odd thousand dollars so when you have one or two of those situations it can really make it look percentage wise like it's a big increase business services is a significant increase there because that's where we plugged in the HR coordinator that we're looking for buildings and grounds is a significant decrease because as Libby said last year we knew we had an 8 cent tax incentive we knew it was going to drop to 6 so we put a significant amount of project funds in FY19 knowing that we were going to cut those back out in 20 a big influx of one-time project money to keep Andrew busy this year which he is keeping busy we did cut that back significantly in FY20 we didn't cut it all the way back to where we were but we did cut it back significantly and we hopefully will be able to make another reduction next year to help out with that 2 cent tax incentive change would another way of saying that be that we took the tax incentive from the merger and invested in facilities some of it yes a good chunk of it and it wasn't wasting money we're pretty smart as a group to say how can we use a significant amount of money in the right way and not just toss it away we don't want to just spend money to spend money so we took care of some of that deferred maintenance that we were looking at so we did some good things with that money and this year we're going to do some more good things but not quite as much as we did this year didn't we also pay for the tuition for students in other schools out of that money I mean we paid it out of something part of the budget well the budget was a big budget last year there were a lot of pluses and a lot of negatives but we did have to pay for four years worth of grandparents of tuition we're only going to have to pay for three transportation looks like a huge increase a big piece of that is busing from main street middle school but we also had to move field trips from general education athletic trips from co-curriculars and athletics so all those went down into transportation the increase that we plugged in is 120,000 for main street but realize that we do get transportation it's two years delayed but in two years we would get about $48,000 of that 120,000 so it's really like a long-term net cost of about $72,000 debt services Libby mentioned there's a big increase because this is the first year we had to pay principal on that $4.9 million bond from here on out it should be level or decrease in slightly fund transfer isn't a huge number but percentage-wise it looks huge and that's because we're adding money in trying to bump up food service salaries to make livable wages there and also as Libby mentioned there are some people that are on the cusp of getting health insurance and we really should go ahead and give them that extra hour and give them their health insurance so next we'll look at revenues boy it's hard to go through this fast but I'm going to try and spending really just balances revenues so that's all that is tech on behalf when we have a six semester average we'll figure that out but it should be close the small schools grant is really tied to Roxbury and we only get it because of Roxbury because we merged voluntarily we'll continue to get it and at that level there are several special education revenues that we get from the state the intensive is a significant decrease from FY19 because our expenses are lower and it's based on 56% of your expenses there the block grant is formula driven and it relates to the cost of staff so you do see that go up usually which it did extraordinary is going down because that is only if you have students who their cost exceeds $50,000 this year or $60,000 next year so when you have a high cost student once they hit that threshold you get 90% reimbursement instead of just 56% we're seeing a decrease in that line because we anticipate less students in that situation and also they raise the threshold to $60,000 so it takes more to get to that threshold state play students the revenue for that is a lot lower and the reason why is just we anticipate less state play students next year I'll skip down a few lines here transportation aid a little bit of an increase that's the one that will go up significantly if we do busing this year in two years if you skip down to IDA B and then those CFP lines those are federal funds so IDA B is special education funds that are federally sourced CFP is Consolidated Federal Program that's Title 1 Title 2A funding that we were just talking about a little earlier you'll see that we broke out Title 1 and Title 2A separately now and you'll see that in total it's a little less money that we're counting on because funding typically is thought to be drying up rentals, miscellaneous and interest those are local sources local revenue sources and they're just kind of associated with what we're seeing in prior years as actuals balance forward is where we plug in balance if we were going to use fund balance as a revenue source and triple E is not much there's actually two lines left EPSDT and one that says IEP those are both Medicaid so federal Medicaid funding the IDA B CFP and Medicaid all the revenue you see here is exactly how much we plan to spend so if we're going to spend $365,000 in CFP money we're showing $365,000 in revenue here so those don't really cost the community anything because it's an expense and the revenue taking it back out Capital Plan this is probably about 1% of the budget which is reasonable we intend to show it as a separate article and establish it as a separate fund this year that way the money can roll over from year to year for those years down the road where we might have to save money over a couple of years in order to do a project for audience that means a separate vote it's a separate article so you'll see it in the warning as a separate article that will be voted on correct the $260,000 though has already been factored into the tax rate calculation that you're going to see later you don't have to worry about what is it going to be if we pass this $260,000 it's already assumed by me that you're going to pass that in there you're going to notice that Roxbury's not on this list not because we forgot about them their building is in very good shape which we knew going into this merger the roof is good, the heat plant is good so there's not anything in the foreseeable future that we would put on this Capital Plan for Roxbury that doesn't mean we're not spending money we spent a decent amount of money on the kitchen this year we're going to spend a decent amount of money on the general fund for some bathroom renovation work and town hall work for those of you who aren't familiar the town hall is part of the school it's like the auditorium, cafeteria town hall it's the cappagymatorium town hall you will see that Main Street Middle School is on here a lot and that's because the bond took care of a lot of things at Union and at the high school there wasn't anything in the bond for Main Street the 260 that you see in FY20 is what we showed that we were going to do in FY20 last year so it's still there that's what we're going to do and Libby spoke about that a little bit earlier as far as when the bids are going to be going out the future year requirements don't get too excited about FY21 and out we've got time to look at that Andy Andrew's been here for what six months now, seven months so we're going to dig further into this but at least Andrew and the facilities folks have got a good picture of what some of the big requirements are out there and they're tracking them they might shift them around a little bit the cost might change a little bit but at least we have a plan that we can react to and adjust so now what you all have been waiting for the tax rates I wish I could say they're final they kind of are if you live in Roxbury but not for Montpelio this chart shows all the math behind it, you'll see the mathematical equations on the far left Equalized Pupils I've mentioned it several times is the big unknown if that number goes up by seven kids the tax rate in Montpelio drops by a penny so hopefully the Equalized Pupil count is low so we can set up and have better news going forward I said that Roxbury residents their tax rate is pretty much final and that is because and I'll stand up to show you this down here this adjusted residential rate really at some point is going to be one number for both Montpelio and Roxbury but by statute as long as we're getting this incentive Roxbury's rate can only drop by five percent so this times 95 percent is a dollar six five four it can't go any lower than that by statute so no matter I could cut a million dollars out of this budget that number can't change I could add a million dollars and it probably isn't going to be enough to make it go up any higher so Roxbury that's your Equalized Residential Rate this is the common level of appraisal that means Roxbury's tax rate is a dollar seven so it's about one point two cents higher than this current year that's less than a percentage that you can see it's five percent lower as far as what we could do with it but this is killing us this five percent drop in CLA can't do anything about that that's why this ends up being an increase instead of a decrease on the Montpelio side this number will change as other numbers change if this goes up by seven kids this number goes down by a penny so this number will still change the CLA is a known number now so that doesn't change but hopefully this number comes in higher which will drop that number in this number and we'll see as time goes by the Montpelio rate is an increase of six point four cents right now that's four percent that hopefully it'll be less CLA is obviously the big driver you can't really see it on this slide but if CLA was level as mentioned before Roxbury's rate would be nine point seven cents lower Montpelio's would be four point eight cents lower of that the six point four if you know so the tax rate impacts that last slide said four point eight is that by four the new CLA what is the CLA rate by four point eight cents the CLA because the CLA is ninety seven instead of a hundred eighty nine instead of ninety two that if I change this number to ninety two point three one the Montpelio tax rate would drop by four point eight cents so four point eight of the six point four is just because I had to change the CLA oh CLA driving four point eight cents the next slide I guess we shouldn't get too excited about from Montpelio because things are still changing but if you look at what the tax rate impacts if you look at how the tax rate impacts you based on your property value so if you have two hundred thousand dollars worth of property your tax rate would go up by one hundred twenty eight dollars as of right now Roxbury's tax rate is pretty much just on the CLA you can see their impact if they have a two hundred thousand dollar property their tax rate would go up twenty four dollars the last note is very important though this assumes that you're paying purely based on property and we know statewide about two-thirds of the people get income sensitivity adjustment so this is like the worst case scenario that you pay purely based on property value which most people don't and also assumes are equalized people but count doesn't get any better which hopefully it will but that's where we stand right now this chart shares the non-residential tax rates it's a statewide base rate divided by the common level of appraisal for the community so as the note says our budget has nothing to do with non-residential tax rates but we show it to you so let me mention it before when we built this year's budget we were thinking about FY20 now that we're building FY20's budget we're thinking about FY21, 22, 23 because we don't want crazy tax rate swings we want to make tax rates pretty sustainable so we know that the merger incentive is going to drop two cents every year to make up for that we would have to cut the budget by about 250 to 275,000 so that's in the back of our head how are we going to reduce costs or increase revenues or do something to help moderate that we know enrollment and staffing are both going to increase but if they both increase then spending for pupil shouldn't be impacted so that's pretty much level we know some expenditures are going to decrease which will help with that incentive issue one less grandparented group of kids every year means less tuition we know that we can probably cut back some more on facility projects to get back to the level that we were in FY18 we know transportation aid is going to increase so more revenues coming up in the future years and we know we don't have to deal with a $250,000 increase in bond expenses that we dealt with this year so bond expenditures are actually going to drop just a little bit but not much but they're not going to increase so those are some things that we know are coming in the future that we'll keep in mind the budget summary I don't really need to say too much about this there's still that big one unknown for Montpelier which is equalized pupils I mentioned what the increases are in the total budget the education spending as far as residential tax rates are concerned the increase for Montpelier still to be determined Roxbury is increasing a small amount but that's because of the CLA drop we're on the last slide okay so I started out with questions but I do want to jump real quick to changes first these are on here in case anybody has questions or anybody wants to make changes but the one change I want to point out that hasn't been talked about I took another snapshot of employees and their healthcare coverage and this time it was bad news we had people that were going up this time we have people that are going down we have some people that are going from two person to going on to their spouse so two person is zero and we have a couple of folks that are going from family coverage down to parent child coverage so just to let you know without you making me make any changes the next time I come back expenses are probably going to be about $48,000 lower in the healthcare area to get too excited about it $48,000 is about 3 tenths of a cent but that's one thing that I will be changing voluntarily and I'll turn it back over to you Jim to manage questions and talk about any other changes great so we have scheduled public comments so folks want to ask questions make comments 30 minutes 30 minutes right so that's what you said 30 minutes not 30 minutes for you look at the line 30 minutes my name is Nathan Souter I have two kids in the schools my wife teaches here thank you all for your service school board members I'm sure it's 9.30 for you just like it is for me the administrative staff who are here Andrew Grant and Libby who I know have been what I've heard and I can only imagine have been working extremely hard for the last six months and Grant before that so you may not hear that enough but thank you Libby just want to appreciate your humility earlier this evening which I think is important for the character trait that we all hope for in ourselves and then what is that I have no idea what that means and I think I love budgeting in organizations because I see it as an expression of our values and so my internal narrative is different from Grant's maybe or when he says I don't know what we've all been waiting for which is tax rates and I'm like no god damn it the moment I've been waiting for is how are we making our students better and how are we making this community better and I love that this board is organized around or the district is organized around the ends one of the outcomes and so this budget is about what's important to us is the pouring of interest when it came to community connections which is phenomenal I don't know how many other districts would see this kind of turnout for anything and then we just got to see these I'm not hearing any more of these graduates who are succeeding in their lives in tremendous ways of these great institutions having done community based learning and so then the downbeat for me hits and I wonder what's the front row of the graduates who are not at Stanford and where are they and the fourth graders who are in my son's class right now who was at 10 so nine years from now they will be in their first year of college will they be in their first year of who knows the work you do today the work you guys do is you put together this budget and put together your staff has I think a tremendous impact on this community and I see humans, adults in our world who struggle everyday who need tremendous amounts of support and I ask myself what can I be doing and I also ask what can we be doing collectively because that's Christmas future right we can see that what are we doing right now to sort of prevent that those states and so I want to you know I ask to Libby and to the team is how are we meeting the academic needs is one more social emotional learning person at the elementary school of almost 500 kids is that what we need is that anywhere near what we need I'm glad that we didn't just cut the person who's no longer eligible for federal title one funds right okay that's a moment of courage is it enough and I would say it's probably not enough I mean just looking at my daughter's classes and my son's classes and when we do the math on in the fifth grade if we have four teachers equaling 20 almost 25 almost 26 kids per class well if you do the math on that number and you add one more teacher you're still at 20 or 19 or something like that and it's actually not below the bottom of your window and that might equate to excellence as opposed to squeaky pass right um what is happening I watch what's happening in my son's class and how his class and his learning and the learning of his peers is impacted by students around him who need tremendous amounts of social emotional or academic and if we're if we're not and I've seen that in a number of different classes not just that class um so I'm mindful that we're not if we're if we're doing more not just helping the students with great need the students with greatest need theoretically are on IEP center getting more support but again if you're not in that super super low trunch what what support are you getting and if if we are being champions for those kids as a district if we are a district of privilege which is as evidence by the lack of funding that we're getting we no longer qualify for this stuff okay so we've got a lot of dough right we we are you know like where are the people who play flute and how can they help Alex make cc or whatever it becomes even better okay if that's our community like let's let's instead of the money went away we can't serve that those kids anymore no let's step up and serve those kids let's be courageous are not equal as people because they know it's not the same but our enrollment last year this year jumped 65 students according to the numbers in this display right and we're projecting equalized pupils flat for the purpose of this budget and we're saying oh it's only growing up 2% last year went up 8% last year went up 8% and our tax rate had almost no impact because we're gaining kids right like now is the time to be aggressive now is the time to like invest in the capacity to serve those high need kids to serve all of our community and I want to see you do that and I frankly am not you know I hear like well we're still getting our feet on the ground we're figuring out our systems I hear that argument academically I don't hear I don't feel it emotionally I feel like you know show me the action show me the movement like okay we're going to make a livable wage for our food service workers and we're going to stop trimming their hours by an you know an hour a week so they don't get health care good where's that behavior across the board so I just want to challenge the board and challenge the administration to think aggressively about how to make these kids lives amazing are they thriving are we excellent our folks who are behind grade level advancing to grade level our folks who are at grade level advancing you know accelerating beyond that I think that's what this community has the capacity to be doesn't matter whether you are a child of non-college background or if you're a child of two parents with advanced degrees everybody should be accelerating because we should have that capacity I'd like to see us show it that's it oh that's not it that's not it so great I know that you're making a committee to steer the administration as far as how to deal with community connections and I appreciate that that process has sort of slowed down and shifted a little bit my questions are is there I hear some of the urgency for why to jettison CC and try something else for next year I'm also hearing that that sounds pretty complicated and I wonder if the district might take a little bit deeper breath and say hey maybe we keep this little Frankenstein that doesn't work perfectly but works pretty well in some ways and maybe we add something to it that in you know the idea of becoming a hybrid and then moving to the new thing because transition as you guys will experience this year can be challenging and and I think that the RFP I share I think Steve's concern and perhaps others which is at the end of the day this is an administrative decision I think the administration heard about as clearly as they can hear about what the community expects and I didn't hear you actually resolve like direct the administration to do an RFP process so I'm hoping that that committee has the power to look at the options and say to do ministry of team well maybe we don't have to do that process but we can do something well that's it thanks for what you guys so I wanted to come and express my support for busing because I worked hard on that and I know you guys did too and I'm really excited to see it in the budget so thank you for listening to us I echo Suzanne's concern especially with the fifth grade class at mainstream middle school which has a very large class size a lot of social and emotional needs and one of the things I wondered about which is probably not feasible for this year but is the ability to have teachers flex their grades as they as it looks like over the next five years you're going to have a lot of class sizes where some are a lot smaller and others are bigger so is there an ability for a fourth grade teacher to become a first grade teacher or a first grade teacher to become a fifth grade teacher when that capacity arises and I know as a state employee at testifying in that capacity that would be a union issue so something to explore going forward because I know I think that would address some parental concerns that we have had especially with that particular class with maybe allowing some flexibility within the administration don't know if you've explored that one of the things I was wondering about from a budget perspective is around the main street middle school which often feels like a jail when you walk in there and I don't say that nicely but it really does it's not a very pleasant in terms of facilities or in terms of just overall feeling facility facilities yes no the staff that was not like just you walk in its concrete walls small windows just seems like a jails I'm wondering if there's a district plan for long-term capacity I'm looking at that building it isn't built into any of the plans but it should be Jim's praises right now hey look union is an older school but it's pretty I mean I've come here and I go this is gorgeous I go to mainstream middle school and I say what's wrong with our community it's a school that we threw the fifth grade into it I just I just wonder I as a taxpayer would be willing to spend some money to do that or endorse a bond or whatever you need but it would be nice as a community for us to start thinking about that long-term the other thing I wondered is around a staffing assessment and if you've done that having a consultancy firm come in talk more about that so a lot of times consultancy firms can come in and do long-term staffing assessments looking at organizations needs across the board thinking over the next five years what really makes sense from a standpoint you thought the fact that you don't have an HR coordinator astounded me for 200 employees that would be something they would highlight also looking at areas of redundancy or areas for efficiency but also looking at your future needs so we've heard a lot around teachers associate social support those are things that the district needs there's some great consultancy firms out there that do that there's also just the ability to do it on a local level so I just wondered you know are you making the decisions based solely on the class size ratios or are you also thinking and just the teachers needs or are you guys thinking of let's look at the system as a whole what do we want to achieve in five years what do we want our school to look like in five years and then how can we use vacancies or you know the changes in the administration that naturally happen to be able to build into that long-term plan more just an idea just just that that's all I have but I really did want to just stay to say thank you for including busing in the budget because it will make a huge difference to me my family I was here for your participation and staying she participated in some discussions with Libyan others too it's important there are lots of things turning the back of my head about you know it's just one of those unfortunate things you know walk into a school and to have that as the environment and I'm not saying it can be fixed overnight my 18-month-old is in school as a fifth grader or maybe to be a little bit of a different environment I have to say I taught in that school for ten years and it's been improved since then there you go but you know is that school really going to meet our community needs in 25 years and it takes 10 years to go to school right one thing some of us have been talking about is the sort of a larger community discussion and to build a consensus around what to do with our middle school there are these things that come up that are predicaments and we don't necessarily can't just proceed sometimes we can't proceed so we don't have a consensus and with the Washington Central going kind of being faced with the challenges of now kind of forced simplification kind of our approach or our conversation with them has to go unfold in terms of that kind of regional collaboration the building has always been a piece of that larger conversation about the use of buildings throughout Central Vermont and so at some point we need to have a community conversation to create a consensus around what we want to do and we just haven't done anything yet I would be happy to participate in that outside of the legislative it sounds like you already are anything else any board questions is the board happy with the budget is the board happy with the budget is this the way you would direct the administration to do anything different not yet I mean so far from the data that we've been able to see just the open question of the equalized duty that's just hanging out there Jim I think I just need one of the big things on the bill right now the question about whether we put whether we feel like this raise is on the edge and therefore we want to be putting some one time funds into that or not and it seems that that's something at this point being resistant to do because we know we're just kicking the can down the road for the next problem but that is one of the few things we could do in this budget we haven't said you know take busing out or any of those things yet but those kind of hard conversations at some point yeah I just wanted to respond Nathan some of the things you've talked about in terms of you and I have and we've talked about it have incredibly similar goals for Montpelier Roxbury schools in terms of I want to knock this place out of the park right I want to be the best in Vermont and have data to prove it to data to back it up I'm right there with you on that just so the community knows those first six months really in painstakingly with staff as I'm sure Morgan has come home and told you to having conversations of what do we believe for all kids around that's culture so we've been working on our culture and when I say this whole room is packed with teachers we do it once a month it's packed with teachers rather uncomfortably at times and we've truly been working on the idea of do we all believe that children will learn at high levels because of what we do with them every day and there's some debate about that amongst our staff and I'm not saying that as a knock on our staff that's just where we are right now so people might cross out the word will and say can which is a different connotation they can if they choose to right so if they come to school ready if they come to school with parents having read through them if they come to school with a certain socio-economic status or language then they sure they can learn so we're really having hard conversations right now about that piece I agree with you we do not have the staffing that we need in order to truly support all the learning and socio-emotional needs for our kids we absolutely it's glaringly obvious to me as an educator and as an administrator however I didn't ask to put that piece in the budget this year because the system also isn't in place to support we would be adding people to a broken system and so we really need to think I think we need to think about how do we first get our culture online that yeah we can do this we have the collective efficacy to do this we can we will we don't know necessarily how to do that but we're willing to put ourselves out there to do it and once we're there or we have the vast majority there then we can really think about let's ensure that the systems and structures that we have in place are truly working together let's ensure our professional learning communities are looking at the right stuff let's ensure that we have a common curriculum that's vertically aligned K-12 across all our buildings that we're truly knowing exactly what learning targets we're hitting let's ensure that we have all those pieces in place those are the kind of pieces that we're going to be working on this year and next year that don't cost money so we're thinking about how do we use our resources really well and once we have those things in place then we can start talking about let's look at our staffing this isn't addressing class size it's more of additional staffing in terms of interventionist in terms of instructional coaches we're one of the only districts in the state I think who doesn't have an instructional coach for our teachers so how are we looking at those pieces welcome to Montpellier Roxbury teacher new teacher this is what we believe in how we teach as everybody have a common definition of what that means and right now if I ask five different teachers I get five different answers so it's we're working on a lot of things about our narratives and around our systems and around our structures and yes I agree with you we're going to get there I promise we're going to get there we just have to we can't add people to a broken system and can I say that you've heard me say before just throwing money at it doesn't make it better and so I applaud Libby on trying to figure out how it is exactly we need to get better and then we can say this is what we need to spend to get there so thank you for that with respect I don't agree that these things must come be completely resolved before the next step is to and I also think that you just said oh those things aren't about money they're about time when I look at Morgan and her peers and their time spend and their mental presence and recently being asked to participate in I think it was math curriculum development you know half day of profession whatever and capacity may not always be money but if your your choice is to create subplans for a class where you're concerned about it about the management of that class and then learning progress on any given day in order to give yourself to this other multiple goal of professional learning professional learning communities that's about capacity whereas if things are well supported and under control in your classroom or in your grade level you may actually have the capacity to participate in that in this process and if if not every faculty member not every teacher is at the shared values position or shared belief system position shared skills system in terms of multi-tier etc how are we as a district providing them the capacity and support be that time be that professional level whatever that is to gain those skills and accelerate and make those changes perhaps sometimes with the system sometimes willingly but just you know we're in that capacity I'm not suggesting we put money on it Tina I'm suggesting we invest in good people as a new administrator I can imagine it would be tremendously valuable to you to be able to hire people in your own vision you're the one having a conversation as they come in as a teacher in the Rocksbury here's what I think there's a level of autocracy here the ability for you to bring people in in that role is extremely valuable and to convey that down the chain of command and to take participation up the chain of command so I encourage your investment I would reject this current budget and if I were the board I would say you just said out loud you do not have enough you don't have enough interventions of instructional coaches we're going to have 20 more equalized people than we have projected here that's three times seven you said seven was paid that's right we're going to have 20 more equalized people then that's my guess I can't even calculate that right now I'm just betting I'm watching what I'd be surprised if it's that but it's it's a crystal ball I'm asserting I think that we're being consistently being conserved in the way that we project our budgets in the last two years have been surprised as heck it's been different even between when it gets warned and put on a ballot to when it actually the ballot number last year the real tax impact because the number was old not your fault the legislature and the law changed and they changed the dollar yield right let's be aggressive let's be the community that has awesome schools let's do the best we can even though it's an imperfect system we're going to fix it while it's flying in the air that is what it is and I just want you to be more aggressive about it with respect does the district do strategic planning we are engaging that makes sense so at the end of the strategic planning will you publish like your and that would lead to the ask I'm guessing at that point yeah it determines the newest term from the agency of education it's improving planning using like lean or that type of method it changes yearly what they ask us to do when do you guys expect to have the strategic plan public we've been in the process relatively since we started we'll target it more this spring in February and March with leadership teams in each building and have the goal is to have the overall district vision and goal and then where each school comes into that where is each school so that we differentiate by school and thinking about what they really need to target and need so for instance if our goal is to create an effective multi-tiered system of support as a district which I have a good hunch because I'm a superintendent it will be then that one piece has several factors to it whereas Roxbury might need to work on something that the high school might necessarily not but the high school needs to work on something that so where do they see themselves right now we're building a common understanding of what that means administrative level so we're working on that piece right now and that will come out in the spring we have to have that in full place for our federal funding anyway which we can't get unless we have it in place that's great and it presumably is a multi-year strategic yes the dates January 2nd has a question mark because the budget calendar I gave you initially at the beginning of this was scheduled for January 9th meeting it's not a regularly scheduled meeting and I have a question mark there because I'm not sure you want to do it one of the reasons why is because I'm not sure I'm going to have an equalized pupil number by then so I'm not sure how much I'm going to be able to what new information I'm going to be able to give you it does put a little pressure though because January 16th when we go through this again and hopefully have the answers you'll probably need to approve we'll have to look at the calendar and the timelines for warnings but it may be that the 16th is the day that you'll have to approve the budget and approve the articles so we may have to do some real time stuff that night and I can have my budget file so that we can decide like as Steve mentioned at the last minute we see we're at you know 6.1 cents and we really want to get under 6 cents how much would we have to add we can figure that out so my gut feeling was that maybe we wouldn't do the January 9th since I don't think we'll have any more information but we will do the 16th and we'll try to be able to do everything we have to that night to be able to come to a resolution can you just say you think that you'll have to equalize per pupil numbers or equalize pupil numbers rather not per pupil by the 16th I hope so I've already gotten a rough draft and the rough draft was 30 kids less than what I just showed you on that slide which scares the dude but they are missing some key information they're missing a year's worth of ELL data that we're trying to sort through with them and so that swing right now it could be dramatic and right now we're on the low side but I do think that once the data gets in there depending on the statewide equalizing factor which is 94.27365 new 2 or something like that I don't know what they'd equalizing factor is going to be either but I would hope certainly that by January 16th we will get something from the AOE that they call frozen I would hope by then as well as six semester average but that's that's really not a big deal at all it's really that one yes to kind of my question the board yeah given the time frame as third presentation we've had you know my sense is that there's pretty high level of support with the board I think everyone shares Nathan's concern and vision but I also think yeah we've listened hard to Libby that her goal is to have capacity to deal with the equity issues but you know right now she's doing system evaluation she's looking at things and adding adding without knowing where to add to right now is not where we're at but I'd love to give a sense if people one if my read is right I think that would determine whether or not we want to something January 9 because we need to approve the 16th we're not going to have we're not going to be able to and if you've got the equalized people spending number you could generate the updates and send it out to the board before the 16th so we can look at it and that would be good there's nothing new by the night I don't know why we need to meet do we think that we might be interested I agree with not meeting on the 9th but do we think we might want to do if we thought we might make some changes on the 16th and we want to try and have another meeting and succession I don't know that would make sense a couple of days later early the following week do we have to do any Wednesday kind of thing I don't know or just have a look following it that way or a week later I don't know if it's going to be this so the 16th we think would be the absolute last day we'll have to look at what the 30 to 40 day window is I haven't done the math to figure it out yet but it's getting close on the 16th to March 5th or 5th is the 5th is town meetings 4th is information rooms 3 to 40 days from the 5th and that's the window is it has to go to the printer is it going to go in the city yes it'll be in the city in Montpeliers and Roxbury's articles so we'll have to figure out when their dates are typically we have to get it to them before the city council meeting that's the week after our meeting okay yeah so January 24th the window to post budget warning is January 24th to February 23rd so January 23rd is the following so I mean I just yeah we've seen this presentation three times it's a good presentation yeah we yeah it's just as excited everybody I know you have to like hold yourself back and go to this quick left I'm going to take the camera notice the solidifications yeah thank you it sounds like actually that we couldn't wrap it up we could and I don't see any fragility issues in the court needed me earlier because they're obviously there I mean I think ultimately maybe we don't need to have a conversation but is there a threshold at which we're concerned about that's kind of a I guess we can kind of a thing we don't want to get in there too much but that will be the driving I think every single star aligns yeah I mean if there's something scary about this I mean I this honestly is about is kind of I think it's I think it's steady I think it's building out a foundation I think there is some good building pieces in there honest initiatives yeah but yeah if we had a bad surprise with equalized pupils and it shot the tax rate to five percent I think at five percent think about it four percent yeah which yeah we'll cause consternation I think we have to be mindful of that but I also yeah this is not yeah this is this is a transition stabilizing budget where we're in new districts new administration that's looking at things yeah it's that four percent is not representing a really impressive expenditure unfortunately I feel like Libby is the first one to acknowledge this we don't really have the best of data right now to make the type of informed decisions that we want to make to better staff our districts yeah so we're not decisions that we want to make we just get our teacher data in uniform across all the rest schools yeah the reasons for it being the way it is make a lot of sense but I think if this was the budget where we were going for some major growth and major spending based on that analysis and we got a scary tax rate or an iffy tax rate then we had some discussions about how we're spending but yeah I mean we're kind of the point where if we start cutting to get to like a three or two percent it's got to be it's going to be a bare bone yeah at least I don't even if four percent I'm like I'm like what am I really getting at four percent increase like I'm not getting anything good you know really it's kind of like you know what I mean like I'm just saying from like hand grenades like coming in and looking at I'm like and I'm going to say it again but like give me some teachers give me something that touches the students you know what I mean I don't need another parking lot I need like a teacher I need someone like like what do I see in this budget like I don't see anything like of from like our community values truly being met and still increasing four percent I just want more teachers like I've been saying this for quite a long time and I think it has a huge impact and I don't think the cost is a lot like what would a teacher be like seventy five thousand not like including benefits I like the statistics to say where that teacher goes so I know you put where you put that no I think just in general like there's this bubble that comes through I'm watching this bubble come through and they have been ignored since I started complaining about this how many years ago so I mean my thought is I mean we put the teacher there like because it's still growing and people are still coming to our town like we have growth teachers not going to be utilized yeah I think we've gotten a lot the last couple years that we've been able to increase the budget fairly substantially and add some stuff with cloud hitting attacks really decreases the last couple years I think some of the numbers that have been working against the state aren't working for us to play they were previously which is why you're seeing four percent I think we've I think we have a really good opportunity right now with a new administration that is really I think taking a good systematic and structural look at how we're spending our money to make sure we're getting the most out of what we're spending where we need to build and keep spending and where maybe we're overspending we need to do some shifting around so I think that's what we're getting and I think that's exciting and then we are getting some exciting things we've been talking about four language for years and this is the first budget I've ever seen with a meaningful step that could lead to four languages at the elementary school I think that's big and we've been talking about things like busing which I think is a big equity and safety issue also for years and this budget is adding that so there are some key pieces that I've been hearing from the community that are being addressed here facility wise too we're really kind of falling them down and the capital plan is putting some structure in place to keep up with maintenance we did the BOD last year I think we started seeing some of the projects come to fruition so I think we're at a good place at a good building place I wish we could do it with a slightly better tax situation but I think we've got a good story to tell Is there a concern from voters that they're going to shoot down the budget? I guess I just to me as a mom, as a resident and as someone who approves of school budget and who has family who lives in Montpelier who also approves it I just wonder if that concern is realistic especially when it's and maybe I'm naive but we're talking about somewhere between you know 120 and $200 right for the average home in Montpelier per year they did vote no four years ago and I think it goes up the closer it gets to 5% I didn't know I mean I just to me the city budget also the city budget is on balance at the same time and the school budget has increased people look at it as a whole it's something you cannot do yeah and also I mean we have a very smart community it does have an aging community our our student enrollment is increasing but if you look at what student enrollment was in the early 90s when the town was relatively the same population we have a much older community yeah and more community members who are theoretically supportive of school but are as involved in schools when they start to see certain numbers yeah or getting to the point where they're you know they're retiring they're on fixed incomes you know they start to get certain numbers we do get to a point where we certainly can't take classes for granted we're in the oldest state in the country we have one of the oldest cities our population has actually been decline since 1960 by like 16% we just have a nice bump in the graphic who has kids so we've been able to enjoy a bump in kids but to actually have the growth that you were talking about Suzanne and this is something outside of our scope we really need more housing I was about to say we have aging communities and the only reason why we're getting more people here is because my neighbors are passing away and it's sad I wanted to bring chicken soup 75% of the houses on my street turned over and there are millennials with kids and it's true so that's good and there's also do you think that the $10,000 incentive to bring people to work remotely and move into the states could affect us at all hopefully moved mom pillar what is that quick we're pointing to the committee do we want the board to that or do we want the power that's my thought yeah I would say I would say would be or be okay okay okay okay okay okay okay