 Hey good evening and welcome to the pandemic version of Mount Piliers Civic Forum. Pandemic being of course we have a town meeting on Tuesday, March 2nd of which most of you will vote by absentee mail and we hope that you will vote but at the same time we hope that you'll watch these shows because they're good shows and they present to you the things you need to vote intelligently. We've got a number of really good candidates school board and city council we've got one person running for the parks commission for a five-year term and we have Ann Watson presenting the view of Mount Piliers from the mayor's seat the projects that are ongoing the projects that are going to be kind of slowed down the projects that probably won't happen for a long time and we have Jim Murphy the school board president tonight who is going to present the school board budget. Jim thank you for coming. Thank you for having me Richard. This is not our first time yes. No it is not our first time it's always good to be here. School budget you've held all kinds of hearings on it you've got budget documents that you would not believe sitting on your website. It's kind of like the film Rashomon people are looking at the same event and seeing it differently notice that illusion for those of you who've seen that film. The district's budget how is it evolving still? I think the budget itself is has been I think pretty stable since you know we started formulating it's a it's a responsible hold the line budget it meets the needs of our students it doesn't have any major initiatives in it this is not the year for it I think we're what's evolving is everything around it obviously. It is the state is their figure their contribution solid yet? Right now the you know my understanding is the information we've gotten the latest information we've gotten out of out of the house is that the the state contribution the state yield is going to be significantly higher than we originally anticipated which is good news for Montpelier taxpayers it means that the the anticipated tax impact of what's a very sober budget is going to be much less than we originally thought. Yeah we really came in to this year knowing the overall financial situation with COVID with the fact that the state numbers were going to be uncertain at best. You know fortunately we had a I think we had we have a fantastic business manager who's you know been planning for tough times and for a district that could weather tough times so we came in with kind of that mentality that we wanted to hold the line we wanted to make sure that that we didn't have to have cuts that would you know impair ability to to give a excellent education to the kids and that we'd you know kind of survive until we we pulled out of the other side of this pandemic so that was the tone we started in September and it carried through. Now to contrast that with the city budget Bill was making cuts in that city budget during the last year yeah he was downward adjusting as the year went on did the schools have to do that? We really didn't I mean it's it's it's a the budget is overall a 2.8 percent increase in spending which actually you know kind of tracks inflation and is smaller than the budgets of the last few years and the actual education spending is about 2.1 percent which is which is the money that comes from the city in the state some of that spending comes from federal grants so overall it was not cuts but but increases that were just basically in line with with what we had to do to keep up. Now regardless of whether there were students let's go back in the spring when we had to close the schools time the schools still had to be heated yep the staff stayed on if I'm correct yes so the costs were fixed costs regardless of whether the students were in the schools are not in the schools yes so there's no money saved because students were at home doing home instruction. No there's there there were no money saved in fact one of the things that the board with leadership from Libby set early on was Libby being Libby the superintendent Libby Bonesdale being that we we wanted to especially with the district employees make sure that that they stayed whole through this process you know a lot of the district employees such as teachers still had jobs to do some did not though some of the staff without the buildings being open did did not have jobs to do but we wanted to make sure that they were not not left out so we you know we maintained you know those salaries through the closure. Now the board is a supervisory board over your superintendent and her staff over over the superintendent directly we only directly supervise the superintendent we don't we don't directly supervise staff below that. So you set the goals and objectives and metric standards that the district will be judged by Libby Bonesdale and her staff and her staff in the schools as well administer to the goals that you guys have set hoping to meet the metrics that you guys have established. Yeah not a good overview of how it works. Yeah I mean we kind of broadly set policies based on you know educational goals and community values and you know and and those those policy and goals are kind of directional and aspirational and then Libby deals with the day-to-day operation of the school and the you know the managerial decisions within those those policy parameters. Were you able as a board to judge the success you know as you define it of spring of what was what it was like when we first went virtual have you been able to tell whether that was what you would consider to be successful it was an experiment on the fly but. I think you know it's it's it's a hard thing to judge and like quite honestly the I think the mentality in just in spring was to get through it as as best as possible I mean there was there are so many so many both adjustments that needed to be made and you know like families were were dealing with you know having to you know supervise their kids online you know the teachers had a huge adjustment I think we did and parents were online for their work and parents were online for their work I mean it was just huge adjustments across the board I think we did about as well as we could have I I'm not sure that in fact I'm quite sure that kids did not get the same educational experience that they would have gotten if we didn't have to do that but I think we got through it I think we got through it in a way that kept most kids up to pace and then you know what the focus on was from you know the end of last school year to the beginning of this school year and the the administrators of the school led by Livy Bonesdale but also all the principals the you know the curriculum director you know the the special ed director etc worked tirelessly over the summer I mean they were working you know six seven days a week you know 12 plus hours a day for a good portion of the summer to put in place a system that allowed for a return a largely in-person return this year and I think this year has been quite a success now other districts approached it differently yes can you take us inside the board's thinking because this budget presupposes everybody's going to be back in school yes so take us inside the board's thinking on the school districts that chose a couple of days a week you'll be in school a couple of days a week you'll be at home and then the thinking about if you're going to be at home and you don't like it you can't go into school you can't easily go back in the school lane or vice versa for that matter what was the thinking that went into that and when was that decided when was that discussion happening I mean those discussions happened all through summer I mean Libby did a great job of showing us the showing us the the data and the information she was working with in terms of you know what our spacing looked like what the directions were from the governor and for a while there they're like you know I think the governor has done a very good job of putting Vermont in a position where we have a lot more in-person schooling than a lot of other states but for a while there was not clear direction and oftentimes changing direction during the summer so you know so the administration was constantly constantly dealing with that I think our attitude towards the administration it was we're going to support you we we value in-person learning it's it's a it's a it's a big goal we think it's best for our kids best for our families obviously it needs to be safe we need to protect both our employees and our students and our students families from the spread of COVID but you know that's a goal and you know finding out how to do that was something that the administration largely did and we were updated on and you know the updates we got through the summer you know plans changed and there was a lot of problem solving but what came into place was I think one of the best plans in the state well I'm going to put you on the spot right now you just give me ballpark how many parents opted or how many families or students whichever way you want to look at it opted to stay at home and and not do in-person learning it was around 20% and you know it was it was important and and I know there was some inflexibility there and I really like honestly when that option came out I didn't know how that was going to turn out I kind of felt I felt there was a possibility that that it could be one of those things where once a few families did it and you know it might create concern and it could be a snowball I think 20% turned out to be a pretty good number in terms of of getting most of our our students back in school and then also giving an option for families that didn't feel safe doing that the reason that it had to be rigid was because there were some major personnel and spacing plans that depended on knowing how many people were going to be in school because you know we're doing the pods those pods are really pods so pods are basically you know the way that we've been able to return in school is keeping tight groups together that that have very little interaction between them so so that way if there is any sort of outbreak it's easily contained and it also means having two adults to each pod so each so the pods are basically and this is kind of the the the model at the elementary school the middle school it's a class with two adults in it with with a teacher and someone to help the teacher and also someone who can be but there's a subclass within that class that are together a pod is like if it's a 25 person oh no it's a it's a it's a classroom so each each fifth grade you know there's what four or five fifth fifth grade classes each one is a pod oh so pod is a euphemism for a class it's basically a euphemism for a class but they stay together all the time they eat lunch together so so the things that happen in normal school you know maybe like you know they go to band together like you know band mixes fifth graders sixth graders seventh graders eighth graders uh you know they go eat lunch together in a common cafeteria all of that activity has basically gone away or maybe they you know so so that classroom a pod is basically a classroom that classroom stays together and another difference is it has two adults as opposed to to one adult um and and the two adult model is if if you know one goes out if yeah if one goes out you don't have to bring in a sub who's not from that pod so it's it's basically if I could walk you back to one incident and how pods affected it the hockey outbreak yes at could you explain that what that is or was I suppose and and how pods affect we're affecting that well that occurred outside of the district um you know that was there was someone who brought it back from New Hampshire yeah and it was it was a club event um where where I think that you know where the efficacy of that was shown with our school was there was um someone carried that into a classroom um and there were a couple people who were infected in that classroom uh we were able to you know shut that pod down and then we took precautionary measure and and closed that school for uh a week um and that contained the outbreak that was was the end of the outbreak and I think we had another case in in another pod where we were just able to have that pod go remotely um and and not close the school I could be wrong on that but that's how I remember it um and again that was contained so by having those pod structures you you're able to contract trace you're able to know uh with a fair degree of certainty who an infected person may have come in contact with and you're able to kind of contain that and not have it spread throughout the school did we learn anything from this experience that you think will be carried into the fall well we have the pod concept even without covid or two teachers or is there anything that's coming out of this the specials over the computer um I think there's going to be lessons learned uh I'd love to hear from the educators about things that have worked and things that that have have not worked um I mean I think some of the lessons learned have been you know technology is a is a can be a huge piece of education but uh I think the value of in-person learning is has has been emphasized I think that um and I think we're seeing this right now in in some districts and states that haven't really gone back to in-person learning um kids want to be together in a classroom and I think that's where they do best um you know can we find some ways to integrate technology um or integrate you know different teaching styles and have we learned those lessons I think there probably will be some lessons learned but I'm gonna let the educators kind of ruminate on that did we learn anything about our physical facilities and their inact and adequacies I I think actually our physical facilities have have been able to house this pretty well uh we have uh you know two schools that are in-person five days a week uh that's not true in all districts and some of that's which two schools are those uh actually we have four three schools uh Roxbury Union and and Main Street Middle School um and the Montpelier High School is um in-person four days a week and and uh you know Renee DeVore the principal there came up with I think a pretty brilliant strategy to to allow that to happen how did what did she do so she went to um because the the pod structure is hard at a high school because you know because unlike fifth grade it's you're not in a fifth grade and you don't you know sit in fifth grade all all day uh you know students take various courses and you know those classes naturally mix so you know in in normal high school you've got you know the the student has you know four or five classes throughout the day all those classes look different in terms of the composition they've got you know five different teachers and five classes with five different compositions in it so so how to minimize the mixing is she kind of went to a model of I think middle variants of other colleges use this where you do intensive quarter courses so each student is taking two two classes per quarter intensively so instead of you know eight classes over the course of the year all mixed together they're doing two two two and two each quarter intensively so that way they're only in two groups for a three month period and they move to sounds like the college model of changing from quarters to semesters yeah exactly so so let's just look at the district itself you've got Montpelier high school now has 382 students ironically the same as main street middle school yes they caught up 399 in union yep and 32 in the Roxbury village school now taking the Roxbury village school putting it aside what's the peak capacity any of those schools reached what you would consider the new peak capacity obviously 399 students for those of you who went to Montpelier to union elementary school for those of you who went to union elementary school there were far more than 399 students but the school was configured differently then where are we in terms of reaching our maximum at main street middle and union because obviously the high school has a greater maximum of 380 some odd students you know my understanding is you know we're not at capacity yet main streets pretty crowded it's you know we're at the point where it's it's it's going to be if a lot more people went to main street it would be difficult to find find space for them you know and I think I think union has space but is it's it's not too roomy there either I'm going to hit this out of order but it just came to mind do we anticipate losing any of that 20% to homeschooling uh is that written into the assumptions of the district's model uh no I don't think we've written any assumptions about losing students to homeschooling it's a possibility um I and it may happen I'm not sure what's going to happen in in substantial numbers uh we have 147 teachers of which 143 are full-time equivalency and I'm not even going to get into the difference it's half-time part-time it's what makes the glue work in this high school yep uh how does that compare with the past I think it's similar to the past I'd have to look at the numbers but um I think it's relatively on par to historic we have an experience teaching crew in this district do we anticipate getting a number of retirements soon yeah we get retirements yeah I've been on the board for a while now um you know we've gotten some very fine teachers who who have retired uh I think the good news is we've attracted we have a lot of young talent too uh or newer talent and um I think as I think you know we've got a strong district with strong leadership uh and a supportive community uh and you know we're able to attract good talent to teaching positions um you know as as teachers retire our administrative levels are those holding constant are we picking up dropping off in terms of percent that's administrative um staff you know what there's a state guideline that for that we fall well within it yeah no our administrative staff has pre stayed pretty constant um you know the expansion was had was a few years ago we added a a vice principal at union which was needed given the size of that school um I don't anticipate any increases or decreases at the administrative level and and we've got uh we've got a very solid administrative team now I'm going to warn the viewer now is the time we're going into weeds yes so this this is going to get technical here health rates are increasing by 9.8 percent yes they're not increasing that to that level in the in the city what is causing that level and is that normal for you guys is that a high year um can you control it in any way I have you know I have never fully understood now health numbers work um they it always seems to accelerate it at paces well beyond the the increase in other expenses um 9.8 percent is a concerning number it's a big number it it's not out of line with other numbers we've contended with unfortunately it health costs are expensive and they increase at um large and chunky rates okay now we're going further into the weeds talking about the merger incentive yes it went down from four cents to two cents yep which starts with a definition of what is the merger incentive what did it start at to get down to four cents so it started at eight cents um and what is the merger incentive so under act 46 was which was the act under which Montpelier and Roxbury emerged um maybe what three years ago now uh the state gave districts that merged uh an incentive which is basically a tax reduction uh that would phase out over time uh and and I think the idea was that one it would entice districts to merge and then also I think there was an idea that that cost of merger would be um somewhat absorbed by by that that tax incentive um our merger had an eight cents tax incentive I don't remember if that was particular to our district or just what all districts got uh it's dropped to two cents each year over time so uh the the the de facto result of that is it's been a two cent increase each year um we got a a nice dip and now it's stepping up by two cents each year and next year it'll be gone um what does that mean in practical terms uh it means that two cents on every hundred dollars you get a discount and that discount so that's coming back goes away uh each year so each year we have to pay two cents more than we otherwise would have um and you know Grant has done a good job of who is Grant? Grant Geiser is the business manager has you know this this was an anticipated you know we knew this was coming so um the the budget planning since the merger has has planned for ways to ensure that this does not um we don't feel this yeah now we're going to go even deeper yes when we have to discuss why there's a 3.1 percent increase in Montpelier and Roxbury is seeing an eight and a half percent decrease uh there's a a few reasons one was the way the merger was was structured um Roxbury had a very expensive uh a very expensive structure before the merger occurred structure in one sense in terms of um there there all their students were tuition so um their their savings from the merger was enormous and that savings continues to be realized over time so so that's one thing whereas with Montpelier the effect was was pretty negligible um we had a little bit of a savings um but but our our trajectory is is relatively what it would have been without the merger a little a little bit of a savings but but not a ton now that's whoishening meant the kids who were getting out of the village school were able to go to other school districts and that would be paid for out of this now that that practice ended didn't it that practice ended yeah but but the Roxbury you know when when Roxbury merged they were in an unsustainable financial situation with how much the tuition system was costing them um so again their savings was is has been you know quite substantial because they were in a upward spiraling situation but that should be as that ended the Roxbury savings should be going down down the Roxbury savings is going down eventually it will level out but it hasn't yet yes the other piece so that's that's a merger piece the other piece that plays into is is what's called the common level of appraisal which is the statewide tax equalized tax rate yes for education exactly now what is that i know what it is but possibly they don't so it's it's basically an equity measure that disincentivizes wealthier communities that have higher property values from undervaluing their property because you know you're obviously you're you're taxed on the value of your property uh right now mob piliar is assessed property value is substantially less than houses are selling for so the common level of appraisal is a mechanism in our educational tax system that accounts for that depressed assessment and so pet so communities like mob piliar that right now have assessment rates well below what the actual market value is effectively get penalized whereas communities like Roxbury that are actually seeing houses sell at or sometimes below their assessed rate don't get penalized so that the the idea behind the penalty is that it makes up for that depressed assessment so that way you know towns like stowe and mob piliar can't undervalue their their property and pay less while other communities pay more and aside on that and the budget showed with bill and an yes bill spends a lot of time speaking of the coming appraisal that will be in our community in about two years yeah half of its cost is budgeted in the city budget this year and then half of it will be in the following year but there will be a reappraisal that will be coming that will take us to the 100 percent level yeah and i believe that bill said it was nine years ago that we did our appraisal in town yeah uh but if you want more information that that's a real good source and that's bill and and budget city budget program that that's broadcasting right now on orca's youtube channel as well as on the cable yeah and the effect the effect on tax rates will um the practical effect will be zero the um but you'll pay for but nobody lives in the practical world some of us will see it go down relatively speaking some of us will see it go up well what's what's going to happen is instead of of having this tax increase occur each year as a result of the common level of appraisal you're going to have a one-time bump in the value of your house in the assessment value and then your property tax is going to go up to meet that new value but the pool doesn't grow all no it's the same pool it's the same pool so that relatively speaking if jim's house goes up a certain level mine might remain constant yes so that it doesn't hit everyone equally you can't look at this and go oh my god the world's falling apart in two years although the world might be falling apart for you in two years jim it's a 2.8 percent total budget increase yes was that the number that you said initially or did you come to it you know we uh we a few years ago stopped setting a what we thought was kind of an arbitrary you know don't go over this percent because we felt you're then you're making a budget around a random number rather than what is needed to achieve the goals of the district which is to give a an excellent education to our kids so our approach has been to the administration build the budget that meets the educational goals that need to be met and we'll look at it and if it's too high and something that you know we can't afford we'll figure out ways to to phase things out to make cuts but let's not build the budget around a random number you have a two percent increase in in educational spending which is less and a 1.5 percent in per pupil spending yes those are all very responsible numbers in terms of per pupil spending how do we rate against the larger districts you can rate it against every district in the state but there's so many small districts that really don't have an economy of scale how do we rate against those districts with a thousand or more students are we in pretty much in the middle of those my understanding is that we are pretty much in the middle of those that that we are very on par i know that we're very much in the middle of of washington county i haven't seen i haven't seen the specific numbers on a thousand or more but my my belief is that we're we're a pretty reasonable liar yeah we're not i know we're not an outlier whether in the the you know exact middle of those thousand or you know a little on one side i'm not sure but we're definitely in in the median zone when you major adjustments in the budget were there any cuts that that the board made that that were painful uh you know we really managed to avoid i think i think any any painful cuts there were some positions that that have been phased out but there were programmatically planned phase outs any new equipment major equipment that was delayed because you're putting in a a tight budget uh there were some small things there was a a gazebo project that roxbury wanted that we decided not to do because it it didn't make sense we certainly haven't done you know all all of all of the the facility investments that we've looked at uh were our needed upgrades well you've got a list like the city does in their capital budget every year you you know and that's safe costs over time i mean what what we had we a few years ago we passed a major bond to do some uh you know serious and needed upgrades on our buildings and uh we had a discussion about the fact that that our buildings have a lot of deferred maintenance and we haven't we didn't have a plan in place for dealing with that deferred maintenance and as a result what what the what we're doing is we were allowing the buildings to fall apart and then passing bonds to to fix expensive problems and it made a lot more sense to put in a relatively modest yearly capital budget and and keep up with our buildings so that way we we don't acquire those more expensive costs over time now we've got over a thousand students in our district we picked up 13 students this year so it's better to pick up 13 and to pick up zero or to lose but we're essentially at a stable level at this point part of your budget process and if you by the way there's a budget meeting when a public budget meeting on this march first how can people access that meeting should be on the district's website um you know one of the one of the uh i guess benefits of our pandemic is everything is online now so you don't have to physically go there it will be on zoom so all you have to do is click a button uh on your laptop in in your living room and you can attend and on orca and on orca yes orca youtube as well as orca uh but but zoo gives you you know is the ability to speak in yeah you can speak in and participate um were there more students anticipated in the um do you do a multi-year projection yes and you've been on the board long enough yeah how long since 2016 so five years so you've been five years you've seen the projections are the projections fairly close to reality is the rejections are fairly close to reality um you know the way that the way that students are calculated for tax purposes uh is you know Vermont's tax education payment system is is very Byzantine so uh we don't count heads uh do we have equivalencies we have equivalencies you know so for instance um you know preschool students do not count as a full student um students that have English as a second language count for something like 1.2 or 1.3 students the idea is to weight those students based on resource requirements um i i don't believe i i actually don't have to answer the budget that will be presented the buzz presentation which is online right now for the march first meeting projects the high school in about five years at about 460 students now 382 why the jump uh we've got a large bubble moving through i'm one of the few districts that are are growing in in population um so we are going to need more resources of the high school um going forward because we have substantially more kids so that will help our AP program i think it's going to help all our programs i think it's i think it's a good advanced placement yeah um yeah i think it'll be a good good to have uh you know more kids in the school but we're going to have to you know prepare for it so we'll we'll be a new england regional powerhouse frisbee both boys and girls perhaps perhaps hope that's hope um union is going to lose students that's that's the projection right now the some of the early kindergarten classes the projection is is it's not troubling but it's a lower number of students than we've seen in the past the the growth at the lower grade levels um appears to be falling off the level if union is losing students what does that say about the long-term viability of roxbury village school with 32 students if union is losing students i don't know if those two issues are um are connected i mean i think we do have to yeah if we have as we have you know bubbles move through various schools i think we have to ask questions about um you know where are we shifting different than just shuffling and adding a teacher to the middle school because that bubble is moving up or adding to the high school we're talking about an actual facility yes um you know what was the original deal with that was struck between the two districts dealing with roxbury village school well the original deal was that roxbury village school would basically stay intact for four years so four years has already happened it's happening we've got i think a year left a year or two left what are those are those discussions starting yeah we're starting to have those discussions this needs to be a focus of the board for the next i mean it's not suddenly going to close no and we don't we don't want to do that we that's a few things one um you know this district has a commitment to both our communities to both roxbury and montpelier to ensure that we give kids an excellent education and um you know roxbury village school is a very has been a very important piece of educating roxbury kids if i'm correct roxbury village school is newer than montpelier high school is it a newer building yes i believe it is it's a very nice building and we've got a very nice facility there um so we've got a facility in roxbury that that is excellent and is underutilized and frankly has some assets that we don't have in our three buildings in this school it's got incredible access to the outdoors it's got a lot of space it's got you know big grounds on it there's a lot of creative things we can do with that building and i think i think the long-term viability of that building uh requires um some creative thinking and i think some joint community problem solving about how we keep it as a place where we can educate roxbury students and maybe create some sort of attractive education model that we can you're talking about a magnet school that that is definitely an idea that's on the table so this calls for yet another task force it might be another task force um that's that's how we seem to do things but uh it it certainly needs to be a community discussion i think with with both communities about how to ensure that school is um utilized to its fullest potential to the benefit of both communities one of the higher profile task forces in recent years was the one that came up with this recommendation to eliminate the school resource officer yes could you explain the process how that started and how it ended with a recommendation to get rid of the school resource officer well it started with uh some concerned community members uh coming to the board um and expressing concern over having an armed police presence uh in in our schools that particularly for uh for students of color for students with disabilities for lgbtq community um that that that presence was was troubling to to many members of those community and to other members did you think to go to brian pete our place chief and say could she leave her body armor off and her and her weapon outside we did um and for reasons that i think are explainable and and you know uh chief beat if he ever comes on can explain this to you uh you know they were unwilling to you know have an unarmed police officer and i can see why i mean there are you know there are you know police officers uh you know they they put their their bodies on the line and um you know there are situations where they're in where not having a weapon uh could be fatal for them so so we see the reasoning there um but we were looking at it from our perspective and having that armed presence uh was feel intimidating was intimidating and and threatening and created an unwelcoming environment for many of our students and that is is not what we want um what was the function that the sr the school resource officer was doing uh you're doing a variety of things i mean uh you know they were working closely with some of our social workers and and counselors uh you know to to help with with some some tricky legal situations with some liaisons you know for activities that had to occur outside outside the school grounds um you know they were kind of coordination and between the district and and the the police department uh when police services were needed is that a euphemism for a possible school shooter uh i mean they definitely helped with with safety although it was i think most of the functions that they were they had um were were more related to offenses yeah to to offenses and i think to you know also situations where you know for you know a kid had to interact with with a truancy officer for example they were the liaison on on those instances so so where there was kind of school and court system or uh you know judicial system interaction uh the sro was was liaison in many of those instances on the city side that position becomes the 16th member of our police force yes on your side what are you planning to do with funds that went to half of that position well we we did cut that funding in half uh most of it is to give support for those functions that that they were doing we we you know the district still needs help with with some of those instances but we can do it in a way that doesn't have an armed police officer at school and doesn't make students feel uncomfortable so that that's where um liby boat steal and and chief brine peat landed and and they they did a good job of working out an alternative way to make sure that um that kids were getting services they need and the district was getting the services they need uh without having that armed presence that was was uh that task force is continuing and ongoing what are they doing now what are they looking at beyond that they're just looking at they're looking at at at how we look at safety in general and um i think focusing a lot on uh ensuring that work that the school is doing what it can to create a safe environment and and more i think broadly defined safe environment to me not just physical safety but uh emotional safety behavioral safety and thinking broadly about how the school can interact with the police department but also use its own resources to uh ensure that that students feel safe on all levels are there any other task forces initiatives that are moving forward community type initiatives or is that principally all folded into there that's the main one right now that we have i mean we were looking at uh at the middle school and how best to use that building it's it's an older building um with covid that that work has largely been put aside and we're going to give thought to you know how or if we start up that work again um is language immersion in the same boat uh language immersion was looked at the conclusion of the committee was that um for a variety of reasons it's not not practical um uh space being one of them we don't we don't have the best configuration for it uh so that yeah we did a one-time study on that and the conclusion was was that's not the best fit for a district at this time um low-income students yes and the district it's 18 percent on subsidized lunches yep it's kind of a surrogate measure of low income 28 percent in roxbury i'm sorry 25 percent in roxbury i can't imagine that covid helped that gap between low-income students and the rest in terms of achievement no and we don't have numbers on that but i think the uh at least you don't have numbers i'm aware of um yeah but i think the you know the anecdotal information plus the information we're getting from you know other districts from nationally indicates that that a lot of the students have uh have suffered the most i mean they've they've fallen behind um further behind further behind yes the board was puzzled and let me stop today for all the years i've been doing this the board has been puzzling about that achievement gap yes they were puzzling about it before you were on the board they've been puzzling about it every year yep is there a task force or anything studying new approaches that might be taken we do not have a task force right now on that um it's it is and has been a major priority i think you know we've we've definitely increased um a lot of our investments prior to this budget have have been with the achievement gap in mind uh increasing support increasing literacy support increasing math support um you know getting those students you know that learning support and then plus also increasing uh emotional behavioral support to to make sure that they've got you know if they're um you know if they're if they're dealing with with difficult emotional issues it's hard for them to focus on learning so a lot of a lot of investment has been made there um and and i think there's been some gains but we have a long way to go i mean that's that's a that's a big battle um um we don't have a task force but it's it's certainly a high priority for the board and the administration i mean for years we've been fighting being a gated community when we talk about housing costs and reappraisal it's really tough to buy a house it's really tough to rent in montpellier yep and i mean this plays into what happens to the 18 percent that are struggling just to stay in our town economically i imagine um so the board has turned a liby for direction i knew they did last year before the COVID pandemic and this is a priority that next year's board will yeah it's it's absolutely a priority i mean this is this is a problem that um we are always going to have to work on it we are always going to have to try to figure out how we can do better uh to support support our students and it's i mean it's quite frankly a broader societal problem i think you know a lot to ask of our school districts and um you know i think to to truly achieve progress here the school districts have to do all they can but we need we need state support we need federal support um we need we need to give a lot of these families you know better child care better health care um better after school care better after school care etc and make that make that affordable and accessible um is that written into this budget after school care for next year yeah we're going to continue with the after school care program that we have what about transportation are we going to continue um taking kids to the middle school and along with their elementary school yep brothers and sisters no absolutely i think that was a good step um and that's you know another step of equity is is making sure that you know more kids particularly younger kids like the fifth graders to sixth graders have that access to to transportation and families aren't burdened with that now we have the uber-like um shuttle buses that used to be the circulator uh any possibility the kids will be riding that to Montpelier high school i certainly hope so um i uh you know with covid and other things going on the at least i certainly have not been able to engage in much as much as i'd like to in terms of of how we can link up but there's been a lot of talk and there's a lot of desire so i i really look forward to you know finding ways as as that system gets going to get as much student ridership as we can are the avenues still open to discussion of synergies that can be gained from partnering with washington central visa v u 32 in montpelier high school uh there are not any active discussions but the door has not been closed i don't think the door has ever been closed uh you know they have gone through um are they still one are they one district there are one district i mean they've they've gone through a tough merger i i think they're you know adjusting to that and and probably not in any mood to to do anything major soon you know and and i think at some level the fact of the matter is we have two pretty i mean if you look geographically you know the donut whole thing kind of so can you explain that so basically the the washington central unified union district um which i think is i think i got all those words right uh circles montpelier completely it's it's middle sex uh waster callas east montpelier and berlin which if you look on a map creates you know a donut around montpelier which is the donut hole uh so you look at a map you say that that makes no sense but the reality is you've got for for mott two actually relatively larger districts functioning pretty well so uh there are there are some reasons to merge but there's also some reasons to say these are are two districts that are pretty good size and and doing pretty well if you were an advocate of that you would say that you have one heck of a good set of sports teams with that many kids on the other side you'd have excellent arts and performing arts programs if you were on the outer side of that you would say boy we have access to advanced placement programs that we never had before there are complementary things that each district has that the other lacks there are some complementary things that each district has the other lacks i i think i think it's a it's a tougher question than than people think i mean sometimes when we also have two we also have two districts that are producing a lot of good opportunities for kids that is true as is as is as is right uh you know and some of yeah and i think i have to have some some questions you know some of those kids who are able to play sports at montpelier high school would they be able to play and who are able to play sports and really grow and benefit and get a good friend group and and have participation you know would they make the team right on a thing and and would they then end up maybe like doing something less productive with their time uh you know would they would they be able to make the play in a bigger high school i think these are questions questions that we have have to ask and then you know what does it look like i mean right now one of the nice things about montpelier is is you've got you know you've got a cohort that stays together it's one of the i think the few in the states from you know elementary school to middle school to high school uh you mean you go to the prom with someone you were in first or second grade with yeah what what happens if we merge do we have two elementary do we turn main street into uh another elementary school and have a district where it's you know half of montpelier goes to one half of the other goes to another with some kids from east montpelier and middle sex and then do we end up you know closing dodie down because it's it's small uh maybe closing callus down uh well we end up with at the eighth cent merger incentive again yeah uh it's it's one of those things that you know i can see a lot of reasons for it making sense but um i think it's i think it's a more complicated proposition than just merging and i think there are some downsides another another downside kids in montpelier can walk to high school you send them out to you 32 uh and and that's not the case anymore and then kids in montpelier could walk to high school why do they have a full parking lot every day i got one more question yes what's it like as a parent going through this um you went through an entire spring with your children at home learning online but what's it like for you and your wife uh you know um i think i think everyone is is struggling at some level and adjusting i think everyone really uh miss you know miss is getting together and miss is having you know there's there's there haven't been any any school events that you go to all all the regular things are gone i think i think there's a lot of grief and a lot of missing of that and certainly uh both my life and my wife's life have gotten a lot busier paradoxically even though we're not you know i'm not you know my job entails traveling i'm not doing any of that but it's just been very busy managing kids it's been amazing to see the community come together and see the schools come together i think the importance of of school has has been illustrated it's it's interesting my kids used to complain a lot about school but going through a few months of homeschool they're amazingly those complaints have stopped this year uh and um um you know the spring was a struggle and and having having in person school even though it's been in person school with um with the restrictions we've had um the the effort put in by teachers and administrators to make it happen has been astounding and it's certainly for me personally um you know seeing my kids my kids have had a fantastic year this year school wise um and i know that the the efforts to make that possible has been above and beyond the fantastic efforts that usually come in and i'm just deeply appreciative on that note that positive nurse uh thank you for watching this show i hope that you'll watch every one of these shows because they're all good uh the one with an Watson as mayor explaining the city was a really good show i referenced the one with annan bill that was a good show on the city budget all the candidates are excellent uh again they're on the cable channel they're also on the youtube channel most importantly get out make sure you get out and vote and get out and vote means possibly postmarking your um your absentee ballot and sending it that way or actually getting out there and voting on town meeting day but these are the days when it is important for democratic purposes to really have your voice heard and again civic engagement is what keeps our town a vibrant town and thank you very much for watching