 Good evening, everyone. Welcome to the regular meeting of the school committee going to school committee on Thursday, November 14th, 2019. Welcome, Mary and Nolan are a wrap and Bill Hainer is not feeling well and won't be here tonight. And I assume Mr. Thielman is on route. We're going to open the meeting with new artwork. We have artwork from the Audison middle school tonight. Each of the three Audison display boards are a mixture of artwork made by the seventh and eighth grade artists. The displays include photographs of the three-dimensional work that the Audison art students are working on this year as well as mixed media prints made by the seventh and eighth grade artists. So everything is sort of mixed around. I'm not going to point to individual boards. The eighth grade students were introduced to the idea that using their art as a way to relay a message to an audience. Students looked at the work of contemporary artists to see the variety of ways that artists show their personal voice through art. Students were challenged to come up with their own message, something that says that they are passionate about and create a piece of art that conveys that message. Eighth graders were also challenged to be subtle with their designs as a way to bring the viewer in and make them wonder and think about their piece. For their choice projects, the eighth graders were asked to design a project entirely on their own. The goal was for students to choose a project or idea that appealed to them personally and incorporated materials that they would be excited to work with. Students either made a project from a list of project ideas inspired by heroes or they made a project entirely of their own design. They were asked to choose a subject based on something that related to them or someone that they look up to as a hero. Students were allowed to choose their materials and whether the project would be two dimensional or three dimensional. This term, seventh grade students looked at many different contemporary artists to find inspiration for their master inspired sculptures. Students were asked to find a painting by a master artist that they connected to in some way and respond to it in the form of sculpture. Students could choose to replicate the composition or some piece of the original art. They could incorporate any element of the original artwork, the colors, the shape, the subject, whoever they wanted to reflect the original painting. The sculptures are made with cardboard, newspaper, paper mache, found in recycled materials and paint. Seventh graders also experimented with printmaking and mixed media techniques this term. We looked at the work of master printmakers and contemporary artists to see the endless possibilities of the medium. Students were asked to paint to plan their own print which is inspired by an event in the past or present that has impacted their life either personally or globally. They could also plan a print that is inspired by a topic that they are passionate about. Students experimented with many different printmaking techniques including mono printing and block printing. They also experimented with other various mediums to create different layers in their prints. We challenged students to be subtle in their use of imagery and asked them to show their ideas to the audience abstractly or symbolically rather than spelling them out with more obvious narrative representation. Congratulations to all of our Audison middle school artists. Do we have any public participation? Nope. All right. So our first item is presentation of the sixth grade contest of vaping calendar winners by Carleen Newell. Carleen. We're thrilled to be here tonight to be able to bring the calendars to you. This is probably our seventh year of doing this and each year the children do a fabulous job. This year we were at the Gibbs for the not the Gibbs for the first year sixth grade and now these children are in seventh grade. I'd like to present September with Sophie. Sophie Dolly and May. No, the cover was Izzy. Reese Hansen Izzy. Great job on the cover. And Amethyst Stensik did May. Some of the children couldn't be with us tonight because they have other classes that are obligations. But we just want to make sure that you each get one and think about it because we know that we're going to get somewhere with this vaping sooner or later. Thank you. Thank you so much. This is a wonderful tradition. I also want to recognize Carleen Newell, who was also recognized this year at the AYCC Gala. As for all of her many decades of work helping our children in this district live healthier lives. She's also an AYCC board member and we have such a strong partnership with them. But I want to acknowledge all the work you've done, Carleen, in our district. And this is a good example of the way you bring our students together to do these projects, but more importantly, what they learn about it. And it's, it's, you've just been a real gift to our district. And we really appreciate it. Thank you. And thank you to the students. This is terrific. Really appreciate it. Yes, thank you to all the students and to Carleen for all your work. All right, our next item is Sarah Bird and the Leslie Institute for Trauma Sensitivity course graduates. Sorry, we're running a little ahead of time. Which means I would like to share a short video with you as an introduction to our time. I was actually hoping we would be running ahead. I'm going to let the video speak as introduction and then we'll follow up shortly. Done. For seven out of 10 of the leading causes of death in the United States. In high doses, it affects brain development, the immune system, hormonal systems, and even the way our DNA is read and transcribed. Folks who are exposed in very high doses have tripled the lifetime risk of heart disease and lung cancer, and a 20 year difference in life expectancy. And yet doctors today are not trained in routine screening or treatment. Now the exposure I'm talking about is not a pesticide or packaging chemical. It's childhood trauma. Okay, what kind of trauma am I talking about here? I'm not talking about failing a test or losing a basketball game. I am talking about threats that are so severe or pervasive that they literally get under our skin and change our physiology. Things like abuse or neglect or growing up with a parent who struggles with mental illness or substance dependence. Now for a long time, I do these things in the way I was trained to be them, either as a social problem, refer to social services, or as a mental health problem, refer to mental health services. And then something happened to make me rethink my entire approach. When I finished my residency, I wanted to go someplace where I felt really needed, someplace where I could make a difference. So I came to work for California Pacific Medical Center, one of the best private hospitals in Northern California. And together, we opened a clinic in Bayview Hunters Point, one of the poorest, most underserved neighborhoods in San Francisco. Now prior to that point, there had been only one pediatrician in all of Bayview to serve more than 10,000 children. So we hung a shingle and we were able to provide top quality care regardless of ability to pay. It was so cool. We targeted the typical health disparities, access to care, immunization rates, asthma hospitalization rates, and we hit all of our numbers. We felt very proud of ourselves. I started noticing a disturbing trend. A lot of kids would be referred to me for ADHD or attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. But when I actually did a thorough history and physical, what I found was that for most of my patients, I couldn't make a diagnosis of ADHD. Most of the kids I was seeing had experienced such severe trauma that it felt like something else was going on. Somehow, I was missing something important. Now, before I did my residency, I did a master's degree in public health. And one of the things that they teach you in public health school is that if you're a doctor and you see 100 kids that all drink from the same well and 98 of them develop diarrhea, you can go ahead and write that prescription for dose after dose of antibiotic. You can walk over and say, what the hell is in this well? So I began reading everything that I could get my hands on about how exposure to adversity affects the developing brains and bodies of children. And then one day, my colleague walked into my office and he said, Dr. Burke, have you seen this? In his hand was a copy of a research study called the Adverse Childhood Experiences Study. That day changed my clinical practice and ultimately my career. The Adverse Childhood Experiences Study is something that everybody needs to know about. It was done by Dr. Vince Feliti at Kaiser and Dr. Bob Anna at the CDC and together they asked 17 and a half thousand adults about their history of exposure to what they called Adverse Childhood Experiences or ACEs. Those include physical, emotional or sexual abuse, physical or emotional neglect, parental mental illness, substance dependence, incarceration, parental separation or divorce or domestic violence. For every yes, you would get a point on your ACE score. And then what they did was they correlated these ACE scores against health outcomes. What they found was striking. Two things. Number one, ACEs are incredibly common. Seven percent of the population had at least one ACE and 12.6 percent, one in eight, had four or more ACEs. The second thing that they found was that there was a dose response relationship between ACEs and health outcomes. The higher your ACE score, the worse your health outcomes. For a person with an ACE score of four or more, their relative risk of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease was two and a half times that of someone with an ACE score of zero. For hepatitis, it was also two and a half times. For depression, it was four and a half times. For suicidality, it was 12 times. A person with an ACE score of seven or more had triple the lifetime risk of lung cancer and three and a half times the risk of ischemic heart disease, the number one killer in the United States of America. This makes sense. You know, some people looked at this data and they said, come on. You know, you have a rough childhood, you're more likely to drink and smoke and do all these things that are going to ruin your health. This isn't science, this is just bad behavior. It turns out this is exactly where the science comes in. We now understand, better than we ever have before, how exposure to early adversity affects the developing brains and bodies of children. It affects areas like the nucleus accumbens, the pleasure and reward center of the brain that is implicated in substance dependence. It inhibits the prefrontal cortex, which is necessary for impulse control and executive function, a critical area for learning. And on MRI scans, we see measurable differences in the amygdala, the brain sphere response center. So there are real neurologic reasons why folks exposed to high doses of adversity are more likely to engage in high-risk behavior, and that's important to know. But it turns out that even if you don't engage in any high-risk behavior, you're still more likely to develop heart disease or cancer. The reason for this has to do with the hypothalamic pituitary adrenal axis, the brains and body stress response system that governs our fight or fight response. How does it work? Well imagine you're walking in the forest and you see a bear. Immediately, your hypothalamus sends a signal to your pituitary, sends a signal to your adrenal gland that says, release stress hormones, adrenaline, cortisol. And so your heart starts to pound, your pupils dilate, your airways open up, and you are ready to either fight that bear or run from the bear. And that is wonderful if you're in a forest and there's a bear. But the problem is what happens when the bear comes home every night. And this system is activated over and over and over again. And it goes from being adaptive or life-saving to maladaptive or health-damaging. Children are especially sensitive to this repeated stress activation because their brains and bodies are just developing. High doses of adversity not only affect brain structure and function, they affect the developing immune system, developing hormonal systems, and even the way our DNA is read and transcribed. So for me, this information threw my old training out the window because when we understand the mechanism of a disease, when we know not only which pathways are disrupted, but how, then as doctors, it is our job to use this science for prevention and treatment. That's what we do. So in San Francisco, we created the Center for Youth Wellness to prevent, screen, and heal the impacts of ACEs and toxic stress. We started simply with routine screening of every one of our kids at their regular physical because I know that if my patient has an ACE score of four, she's two and a half times as likely to develop hepatitis or COPD. She's four and a half times as likely to become depressed, and she's 12 times as likely to attempt to take her own life as my patient with zero ACEs. I know that when she's in my exam room. For our patients who do screen positive, we have a multidisciplinary treatment team that works to reduce the dose of adversity and treat symptoms using best practices, including home visits, care coordination, mental health care, nutrition, holistic interventions, and yes, medication when necessary. But we also educate parents about the impact of ACEs and toxic stress the same way you would for covering electrical outlets or lead poisoning, and we tailor the care of our asthmatics and our diabetics in a way that recognizes that they may need more aggressive treatment given the changes to their hormonal and immune systems. So the other thing that happens when you understand this science is that you want to shout it from the rooftops because this isn't just an issue for kids to be here. I figured the minute that everybody else heard about this, it would be routine screening, your multidisciplinary treatment teams, and it would be a race to the most effective clinical treatment protocols. Yeah, that did not happen. And that was a huge learning for me. What I had thought of as simply best clinical practice, I now understand to be a movement. In the words of Dr. Robert Block, the former president of the American Academy of Pediatrics, adverse childhood experiences are the single greatest unaddressed public health threat facing our nation today. And for a lot of people, that's a terrifying prospect. The scope and scale of the problem seems so large that it feels overwhelming to think about how we might approach it. But for me, that's actually where the hope lies. Because when we have the right framework, when we recognize this to be a public health crisis, then we can begin to use the right toolkit to come up with solutions. From tobacco to lead poisoning to HIV AIDS, the United States actually has quite a strong track record with addressing public health problems. But replicating those successes with ACEs and toxic stress is going to take determination and commitment. And when I look at what our nation's response has been so far, I wonder, even this more seriously, you know, at first, I thought that we marginalized the issue because it doesn't apply to us, right? That's an issue for those kids in those neighborhoods, which is weird because the data doesn't bear that out. The original ACE study was done in a population that was 70% Caucasian, 70% college educated. But then, the more I talk to folks, I'm beginning to think that maybe I had it completely backwards. If I were to ask how many people in this room grew up with a family member who suffered from mental illness, I bet a few hands would go up. And then, if I were to ask how many folks had a parent who maybe drank too much, or who really believed that if you spared the rod, you spoiled the child, I bet a few more hands would go up. Even in this room, this is an issue that touches many of us. And I'm beginning to believe that we marginalized the issue because it does apply to us. Maybe it's easier to see in other zip codes because we don't want to look at it. We'd rather be sick. Fortunately, scientific advances and frankly, economic realities makes that option less viable every day. The science is clear. Early adversity dramatically affects health across the lifetime. Today, we are beginning to understand how to interrupt the progression from early adversity to disease and early death. And 30 years from now, the child who has a high ACE score and whose behavioral symptoms go unrecognized, whose asthma management is not connected, and who goes on to develop high blood pressure and early heart disease or cancer, will be just as anomalous as a six-month mortality from HIV-AIDS. People will look at that situation and say, what the heck happened there? This is treatable. This is beatable. The single most important thing that we need today is the courage to look this problem in the face and say this is real and this is all of us. I believe that we are the movement. Thank you. I believe Dr. Burke Harris says it beautifully and helps to explain what we mean when we're talking about trauma, that we're talking about more than 67 percent of our own population in a mostly Caucasian Arlington, just like the original ACEs data came from. And although a lot of folks may have come to the course thinking this is going to help me with one or two students, what they actually walk away realizing is that it's more of an ecology and it's a whole environmental approach. We can't afford to have individual student plans for 67 percent of our kids in every classroom and simultaneously a lot of our kids won't identify as having an adverse childhood experience or maybe they haven't had one yet. And so how do we create spaces that almost inoculate and support and protect not only our students but also our staff who we know the data also bears out. 67 percent roughly of our staff have most likely and our families have encouraged some kind of adverse childhood experience. So I share that to bring it home and I would love to introduce the associate dean at Lesley University, Patricia Crane de la Crest. Did I say this right? Oh I probably got to say that. That's okay Sarah. Hi thank you so much for having us here today. I want to thank Sarah Bird for arranging this and and the committee here for inviting us. So my name is Patricia Crane de La Crest. You were close. And we are in a movement and we have a group of educators here today. One more. We have a group of educators here today that have have done exactly what Dr. Harris Burke was was calling us to respond to. So this group of educators tonight will receive from Lesley University, Lesley's Institute for Trauma Sensitivity the Certificate in Trauma and Learning. Which means that they have worked really really hard, have achieved 12 graduate credits from Lesley University and done amazing work in their schools and in all of the Arlington Public Schools. They're transformative educators and we're so proud of them and the outcomes that they have already begun to see will our hope is will continue to spread and that it will benefit all the children in Arlington Public Schools. So we are really really excited tonight to award the certificates and and present it in front of all of you. And I know we have some principles here. So the hope is that these five and the 20 more that that weren't able to make it tonight continue this movement throughout the Arlington Public Schools. Are you ready? Just one other piece. It took these folks behind us how many four years? Four years to complete this program. This was not something that they just did one year. They took four years. They waited patiently for instructors to be available for cohort sizes to grow and I want to acknowledge Alice and Elmer as bringing the program to the district many years ago. So now that there's over what 75 staff who've taken at least the first course. So although we have 24 who've graduated from the four part program over 75 of our staff have taken at least three credits in the first course. We have a cohort that's summing up. I would say we currently have what 23 people who are taking the first course right now. So we're almost at 100. And it's really beautiful. So I wanted to acknowledge that and thank Allison for bringing it here and additionally to recognize that this cohort of folks who have graduated are one of the first five cohorts not in Massachusetts not in the US in the entire country who have completed this level of trauma and learning training. No joke they bring this across the where we're talking about Australia and you're going to Cleveland. There's about a lot of places and I don't think we give ourselves enough credit for being the first in the nation and in the world to do this. So please know that these are trauma experts and help us to recognize. And I just want to add that some of the coursework was supported through the AEF. So we've had a unique model which is different than many of the other districts that participate in this model. They often offer the coursework outside of the school day on weekends and in evenings. And because we prioritized it and we said this was valuable we made it available to staff during the day and they still had to pay out of pocket to get the graduate credits but AEF also sponsored a number of the courses so that it was not as much of a burden on the out of pocket. Thank you. We have a couple more members here to acknowledge and thank them for their contributions to support our educators so that they could be able to participate in it. We're going to recognize the folks who are in the room and then be sure that we share the names of those who aren't with us as well. I want to recognize Danielle Eggelson. She even came back even though she's not with us anymore but she spent the past few years learning this. So thank you Danielle. Deborah Bermudis. I have an order here. Hannah Borden, thank you. Christina Chevalier, Tanya Phillips and not present with us in the room we have Jeffrey Babin, Heidi Bankman, Amy Bell, Jennifer Brineisen, Marion Condon, Jill Conner, bless you, Allison Cox, Liz Verola, Danielle Hurl, Leah Hugh but I think that's her maiden name. Kelly Hughes, Lori Key, Danielle Ladd, Noel Oliveira, Nancy Siegel, Lauren Stute and Natalie Tussoni. I just wanted to add one more thing that I think in my previous district where we worked you know this was largely populated by special educators but what's been really great here in Arlington is that we have had educators across the both general ed and special educators as well as across the age the grade levels so it's been really great to see the work go across the district. And I did it if the committee would be okay with that I just wanted to open the mic for our graduates to be able to share any thoughts with you. I'm putting them on the spot last minute but if there's anything that you wanted to share with the crew now is your moment. Thank you. It actually is really well timed. We had today, I'm Hannah Borden, I'm at the Pierce School and today we had a meeting on a student who we thought a lot about during this course. I thought a lot about and has been here for about three years and when he came to us he was really having a hard time struggling and had a trauma history and we we did a lot of work to really cater the classroom to him and really use a lot that we were learning at the school and when we had the meeting today a lot of the adults including teachers and parents were in tears just at how much progress he had made because we gave him that time to really just settle in and feel safe before we really pushed the academics so I'll just start to share that. Just one thought. So the story Hannah told was about a student who they knew had a trauma history but a lot of what we learned in these courses is that there are so many people we don't know and the beauty of this work is that as we try to create trauma sensitive school environments for kids we're able to really sort of reach kids that we might not know they have a trauma history we might not know where their struggle is coming from but if we make safe spaces for all of them then we're sort of preemptively you know addressing that so I just wanted to point that out. Great thank you. So I have gone back to school to become a social worker which is why I'm not here presently but a lot of what we learned in this 12 credit course is being taught in my current field and I don't think that some of this stuff was taught you know for some of the social workers who are more experienced so I think it's great that you know we're able to bring this in and this is cutting edge in the graduate level social work right now so thank you. Thank you. In questions from the committee. All right congratulations everybody thank you all. All right well that was exciting all right so next on the agenda is the evaluation of the superintendent so evaluating the superintendent is one of the core responsibilities of the school committee and it's actually required by state law and regulation. We always have some difficulty with the process I think we've gotten a little bit better at it as a committee because we're better at setting goals and listing the evidence that we want to see for goal achievement and moving in that direction with smart goals and things that are measurable makes the whole process a little bit easier we also get reports during the year on different activities that are driving towards the district goals so it's not like we wait till the end of the year and see all all of the evidence although we do get a lot of evidence to review at the end. This form that we use is I'm not sure that's required by the state but it's suggested by the state they just came out with a new version of it still very similar it's not the the greatest form but it it's what they provided and it's what we've been using and we've we've managed to make it work except for a bunch of clerical errors this year. Why are you looking at me? There are four of you there are four of you that had clerical errors so don't worry about it. Thank you for catching them. There were a lot last year too. Okay all right so it's a regular thing. All right so I am going to review that I each member completed a evaluation report a summative evaluation report and I completed a composite of those evaluation reports. I will go over sort of the highlights of that and then individual members can choose to read any comments there's a section for summary comments and there's a section for comments on each of the standards so the overall I'm going to start at the end the overall composite some summative performance rating for further superintendent is proficient. There were five members that noted that rated her as proficient and two as exemplary. Going back to the individual goals Dr. Bodie had a professional practice goal. The professional practice goal this year was in order to effectively supervise and support principals as well as high expectations for teaching and learning and consistency and common focus on instruction. I will visit each school a minimum of three times between September 2018 and June 2019 which will include a meeting with the principal and classroom visits. The committee was a little bit divided on that one. There were two that rated some progress two significant progress two met and one exceeded. Her second goal is a student learning goal. The student learning goal for last year I should just clarify that that all of this is related to the 2018 2019 school year. We waited to do the the evaluation to the fall so that we received the MCAS results which are reflected in the last goal which is a district improvement goal. So for her student learning learning goal for 2018 2019 Dr. Bodie's goal was ensure the development and implementation of our preschool to 12 approach to social and emotional learning with an emphasis on culturally responsive teaching and on that goal all seven members said that Dr. Bodie met that goal and then finally the district improvement goal that's about resources infrastructure and the education environment. There was not one specific goal selected for that this year but there were a large variety of district goals that we had adopted previously and we saw evidence on whether those were met and on that goal five members said she met the goal and one said she exceeded. The second part of this evaluation was to assess performance on standards. There are four standards. The first is instructional leadership. There was one rating of needs improvement five proficient and one exemplary. The second standard is management and operations. There were six rated as proficient and one exemplary. The third standard is family and community engagement. There were two needs improvement three proficient and two exemplary and a standard for professional culture. There were five proficient and two exemplary. And so once again the overall rating was five proficient and two exemplary. So that completes the review of the composite summative evaluation report. There is more detail and comments. This report will be filed with our meeting materials tomorrow and this is the time for individual members who wish to read all or some of their comments. Start with Dr. Allison Ampe. I don't need to. Okay. Mrs. Yeah, I'll read it. Thank you. All right. Dr. Brody continues to be an attentive competent administrator of the Allington Public Schools. She excels at creating a professional culture that fosters a shared commitment to high standards of teaching and learning. The superintendent's servant leadership style works well at APS given our many devoted and visionary employees, many of whom have been hired under her tenure. I commend the administration for rolling out a thoughtful onboarding and mentoring process for new teachers as reflected in the new Tature Handbook. While this was a multi-year initiative, it's great to see it all coming together. I commend Dr. Brody for prioritizing frequent contact with staff and administrators as reflected in the log of site visits and individual meetings. A lot can be learned from being in the room and talking face to face with those on the ground. Such outreach gives Dr. Brody a good understanding of the issues and concerns of our district. I commend the superintendent for continuing to focus attention on the social and emotional needs of our students. This is a really hard problem, but it is a critical one. Students with social and emotional stressors are not in position to fully learn and grow. I'm excited that we have a safe and supportive school teams at each school to identify issues, solutions. Thank you, AF. And that we continue to roll out responsive classroom training. I remain worried that having so many different SEL, social and emotional learning approaches in the district, responsive classroom, open circle, et cetera, makes it difficult to have a shared language around these issues. I also wonder whether schools that claim to be implementing multiple approaches are really implementing each approach fully. As a final note, the district would benefit by being clear about the language we are using and the distinctions between, for example, cultural competency, social and emotional learning, and mental health first aid. I commend the administration for beginning the process of analyzing and mitigating cultural deficits in the district by looking closely at curriculum materials and practices. I'm especially excited by the work that is happening in the history curriculum. The administration, oops, ah, sorry. The administration should continue to work out a sustainable model for integrating the school-based digs, diverse inclusion groups, into these efforts in a way that feels both positive and productive for all around. This year's community outreach engagement centered around most exclusively in the high school, which is unfortunate because there's a lot of great things going on in the district. The newsletter is effective at showcasing exemplary accomplishments and individual initiatives, but is less effective at communicating larger or multi-year initiatives. Ideally, the district goals would offer this vision. Unfortunately, many of the district goals reflected things that we need to do, for example, according to state standards, rather than things that we want to do, for example, ensure that all third graders are reading at our exceeding grade level. We need to continue to work through a start with a five-year financial plan to look closely at where we want to end up in the next three to five years and how we want to get there, and I'm going to stop there. Thank you. Mr. Thielman, I can read an excerpt, right? Yeah, I didn't read all mine. Okay, good. And if I don't, if I say something that's not on there, I get in trouble. Just stick to the school. So I haven't worked closely with Dr. Bodie on many issues during a long and successful 10 years as a superintendent. I witnessed her work ethic, broad and deep expertise in teaching and learning, and her deep commitment to the district. In the past three years, we have served together as chair and vice chair of the HHS building committee, and I have continued to see her attention to detail, her ability to descend into the particulars of a complex project, and her commitment to ensuring we build the best school possible for our town. She has played a role in every aspect of the high school project, including costs and design decisions, communication strategy, construction manager selection, and much more. Kathy has attended every public meeting regarding this project. I met with nearly every committee in time to explain our work in progress interface with the MSBA and actively lobbying to ensure that the committee is listening to the public. For Tyler's tireless efforts on the HHS project alone, she deserves an exemplary rating. I'm particularly grateful that she has agreed to remain as our superintendent until June of 2021, when phase one of the project should be wandered away. In addition to the high school building project, which gained the support of 76% of the voters in the spring 2019 referendum, Dr. Bodie spent 2018-19 overseeing the completion of the Hardy edition in cafeteria overseeing the first year of the new Gibbs sixth grade school, developing both an FY19 budget and five-year multi-year budget, hiring and mentoring a new chief financial officer, negotiating the district's first contract with paraprofessionals, and mentoring the Addison Middle School and Hardy School principals during their first year in APS. Both hires, along with the new CFO, are very strong in our testament to Dr. Bodie's ability to attract talent to public schools. I'll stop there. Thank you. Mr. Schuchman. Thank you. Once again, I'm pleased to commend Dr. Kathleen Bodie, a very successful veteran superintendent. The children of Arlington are fortunate to have our leading their schools, as we've made two key gains over the past year. The success we had over the past year, with a successful debt exclusion for the high school, and a successful operating override, is a testimony to the hard work and partnership with the school committee. Community confidence in our leadership is high, as we presented a credible plan, solid support documentation, and a convincing argument for gaining community support for our schools. In my opinion, the most consequential work of the superintendent at this time is planning for the new high school. This is an immense task, and I continue to encourage the superintendent to focus on a project that will define education in Arlington for several decades. Thank you. Ms. Morgan. Pass. All right. Mr. Haynor said that he did not need his red, and I am also going to pass. So reviewing the materials from the state, just looking at them today, we are supposed to adopt the composite summative evaluation report. So can I get a motion to do that, please? So moved. Second. Any discussion? All those in favor? Yes. Aye. Any opposed or abstentions? It's unanimous. Great. Congratulations. Thank you for your very positive comments. I appreciate it. And I look forward to our continued work together. And the high school is certainly a lot of work. But it's going to be a great high school. In fact, I have some of the pictures I want to show tonight. Good. Cool. Nice. All right. Moving right along. Mr. Mason, the end of year financial report. Good evening. So tonight, in front of you, you have the end of year report, which reports on expenditures and school year 2018-2019. So fiscal year is from July 1st, 2018 to June 30th, 2019. This report will include all expenditures from all funding sources for education expenditures for the town of Arlington. So this would include the town appropriation, which is driven by the state and local aid. Additional expenditures from city, I mean town services that are provided on behalf of the school department, which is reflected under column two under city town appropriations. Column three will reflect all federal grants on this report. State grants is followed by that circuit breaker, which is a reimbursement for special education expenses that occur in the prior year, but we can apply it in current year expenses. The column six would include private grants and gifts. Column seven includes tuition. Related expenses from other revolving funds and athletic funds is in column eight. The school lunch fund is reflected in column nine and other local receipts or revenues that we would receive that will reflect to the expenses, to those revenues would be reflected in column 10. So overall total spent for education was $103,158,433, which is approximately, approximately an increase of $6.7 million, $6.8 million, which is around 7% increase from over prior year of fiscal 2018. If we were to go into each of the individual categories, the town appropriation was total spent was $66,575, which was an increase of about $5 million from the prior year. This does not include any transfer that was made at the end of the year to the special education reserve fund. So if we did additional expenditures, they would be reflected in there for that. Other things to note is the grant spending was $2.2 million, which was a decrease in spending of $390,000, which is, we can only spend as what we're awarded. And the revolving funds was reported spending of $8.8 million, which is an increase of a half a million dollars. And this would include, once again, monotony preschool, community education, school lunch, fund, and other things that were not approved by the school committee's budget. All the report included is a three-year look at total spending on accounts. So there are some lines that are duplicated, and this is based on slight changes in how they're titled each year to year. But they're functional categories of the DESI codes. And so if you look, there's a four-digit DESI function code next to them. So some of them aren't on duplicate lines. So if you would tie to them, you could actually tie if you need to across all three years. There are some cost function codes that are added this year that will not reflect prior year expenses. But to note that the 2019 column we should tie to the main report. And then tonight I provided you just a chart that's not included in this report that was given prior, which summarized some of these categories into sections. So the functional codes, for example, anything in the 1,000 series is part of administration costs. Instruction related are usually in the 2,000 series, but they're broken up between instruction, instructional materials, and technology. 3,000 series is usually other services and pupil services. And the 4,000 series is tied to operations and maintenance. And so forth. So if you wanted to tie the numbers from the different reports, you would be able to look at it graphically and how it's been changed over the last three years. If there are any questions and tie them to these reports? Yes. Yes, Mr. Schupin? Yeah, okay. Is this the end of the year report that we submitted to the state? Is this the source? Correct. Okay, I'm really very appreciative of having that and having the categories the way it's charged because this gives us a really good understanding, not only of what's under our jurisdiction, but the other expenses that are aligned to schools. Unfortunately, I feel like a politician here asking the questions that I'm coming up with, but there's considerable debate out there on Medicare for All and there's considerable medical expenses within this budget. So if we can get down to, in total instruction, to medical health services, 3,200. I just want to tease out some of the health stuff. The medical health services for 983. Is that our school nurses and just the routine stuff that we'd have no matter what? Medical health services can include, that's a good question. Let me actually pull up exactly what that would include, but medical health services can include the nurses. It includes also some services that are occupational therapy, physical therapy, or speech therapist. But let me file a file to find the exact details so I can get back to you. Okay, yeah, I don't mind getting back. What I'm trying to figure out is how much of this is routine. We have a school nurse because we have kids in the building and they get sick versus how much are we providing in terms of medical services that are really medical service, that are the kind of things that are subject to a Medicaid reimbursement. Okay, that's question number one. Then getting down to insurance for active and retired employees. This is all townside. 6.5 million for the active and 2.6 million for the retirees. Is this our contribution and the employee contribution is separate from this? So can you repeat what line? Oh, I'm sorry, line 5252.50. Okay, 5252.50. So insurance for active employees, this is what the town incurs for expense. So if there's a premium that's paid by someone for the individual outside of that, is not reflected in this report. And so our standard word is 7,525? I don't know that exact percentage. We are at 7,525 for any employee who was hired since December of 2011. There are some employees who were hired before that and depending on the plan they have may pay either 15 or 20%. But the standard is 7,525. Okay, because I've looked at the Arlington course on the GIC package and the ones that were advertising on GIC are the 7,525s. So I can go back home and play with the numbers and get a baseline figure of what the employees are tossing in the pot. Okay, any other health numbers that would be the sort of thing that impacts us through there? I don't think so. So also on the side of if you're looking at what's not reflected in this report is the, so this is the expenditure side. So this doesn't reflect revenues. So the town does receive revenues on claims that are filed for health services that are provided. So we can look at that and provide any information that you would need in regards to that. But that's also reported, but this is just strictly only on expenditures. So we're looking at maybe a tenth of what we're spending as a district out of that 103 is really health care costs related. Maybe 9%, yeah. Yeah. Okay, okay, okay. I appreciate knowing that because this is this is raging debate in the nation right now. And I want to have knowledge of how this is impacting us as an employer and as a district providing services for our kids. Absolutely. Thanks. Can I get the, also if I could, if this is an Excel spreadsheet, if you can send that along too, I'd like to play. All right. Paul really wants to know if Medicare for All would solve our problems. Okay, I get it. Yeah. Did you want to comment? I don't want to put our administrators in a position to take a political position, but I just wanted to, you know, obviously tease out some of that so that when these discussions happen, I have good data that seems to be verified through our numbers. Yes, Mrs. Seuss. So actually, I have a question about medical stuff too. So what I remember is that the town gets about 100,000, and I think it's a little more in, from Medicaid reimbursements. But we do the expenditures, but they get the money back, right? Is that, I mean, we have a very good relationship with the town. And I know that there's all sorts of cost sharing, but is that right? So if our costs were to go up dramatically, it would be on our dime? Yeah. So with the amendment of 2009, eligible to be claimed for services and expanded to beyond students receiving special education services, but in doing so, they also expanded the responsibilities of the districts in documentation, record keeping, authorization. So we're in a process where we're exploring what that means, because it's literally an insurance billing company. So we're a school, and we're not used to insurance billing, as far as international medical codes, things like that. And so a number of districts across the Commonwealth are looking into what that new responsibility will be. It was intended to allow districts to claim more, but I don't think they've calculated for the additional accountability. Expansibility to do so. The town considers it in their formula for what they give back to us is my understanding. But yes, we do the service, we do the claiming, we do the administration of it, and the money goes to the town. Right. But if our costs were to double, we don't get any extra money. I said, yeah, right, because it's going to the town. So yeah. So I just want, yeah. Through the formula. Right. So I mean, and the number has been fairly low since, but we just sort of want to keep an eye on that because of our costs go up dramatically, and or, you know, we're potentially getting more reimbursement. Yes. And then I just have a couple of questions which I should know the answer, but I don't. The regional school assessment, is that Minuteman? Is what is that? Is that something else? Yeah, regional school assessment would be Minuteman or another program that a student in the town would like to take. So got it. North, North, that's a agricultural school. This would be one of them. Okay. So, so it's interesting. So some of this budget is student services, but the town doesn't think of this as APS type of money spent. Is Minuteman usually considered a town? Yeah. Okay. The other question which just sort of jumps at me is this graph. The other teaching services, the big sort of high numbers in 2017 that dropped. What is that refer? Other teaching. The graph on the graph. No, no, no, I'm aware of it. I just to know the exact to help you give you that answer. So sorry they didn't have that answer for you already. No problem. I know we're supposed to give it to you beforehand. No, we just got the graph. Yeah, the graph is there, that's true. That's fair enough that you're asking these questions. So that reflects other teaching services would reflect items such as the medical therapeutic services, substitute teachers, non-clerical paraprofessional instructional assistants, librarians and media center, directors. So the cause of that in 2017, if we were to look at that data. So it's killing me. It is tied to it seems as though it was reported. You had a hot was we reported back then it was a teacher specialist was considered under this category. Okay, so it's a categorization. And it was a shift in change of how they're reporting it. So, okay, there you go. Okay, great. Let's get a couple of questions first. Thank you for doing the multi-year comparison. That's really helpful to see trends. I realize that there's these weird things where categories change. We've had three different CFOs over this period plus substitutes. So it's not an exact science as to what costs go into which categories that affects the analysis. But it is helpful to- That's why I try to provide this- See some trends over time. Yeah. So the one thing I just wanted to ask about was the out of district stuff. So tuition and non-public schools as I think we've heard before went down considerably almost 10%. Last year, right. The collaborative number just seems a little off in 2018. Did it really jump from 1.4 to 2 million and then back to 1.5? Or do we- So we also had a reduction. I would have to look at the actual enrollment and what was decreased. But I believe this is tied to the reduction and still enrollment that we're having students being sent out of district and providing those services in district. So but I can get back to you the exact- Okay. I just saw that it would be relatively 1.4 to 2 to 1.5. But yeah, thank you very much for both the chart and the three year comparison that we haven't seen before. So very helpful. All right. Anything else? Great. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Superintendent's report. Thank you. Just to begin with the high school. So it's been a very intense last couple of weeks as we're working literally going through many reviews, both interior, exterior, athletics, sustainability issues. As we go through this process, it's required by the Massachusetts School Building Authority, which is looking at all of your costs and seeing if there's any efficiencies or prioritizations that you can make. It's important to note to the public that we have a budget which was voted by the approved by the community back in June and that budget we will stay within. There is a process that we go through. We get some cost numbers back when we do schematic designs, which is a time in the process where you have very, not a lot of detail around the design of the building. But as you move through into the design development phase, you get much more detail. And therefore, it's much more specific when you go out for a cost analysis as to what the project is going to cost. We're in that process now. We're going to be getting the results fairly soon. And then the committee over the next few weeks is going to look at the cost comparisons and take a look at this work we've been doing that's been required that we do and have to make some adjustments. But usually there are about cost efficiencies that you look at in this process. And we can tell you, still when I tell you much more as we actually go through these next couple of weeks, the building committee meets next Tuesday to begin the process. And we actually have, we've gone through a very thoughtful process by how we're going to eventually get to a vote that will have to be submitted to the MSBA on December 10th. So the first meeting then we, during from after the meeting on Tuesday when the results of the design development costs come in and we look at it vis-a-vis all the work we've been doing on these subcommittees. Then we will continue with subcommittees to do another level of prioritization over the next, you know, less than a week. So there will be a lot of committee meetings then and then more discussion. It's just a more discussion until we finally get to the point where we reach some consensus on all of these things. So that's the process we're engaged in and the committee knows that to expect a pretty intense next month as we go through this. But one of the things that we've received as a building committee, which I think would be great to share with you, we might need. Right, yeah. Now these are just sketches. There's still more work to be done as our architect says, we really are still in design for another 10 months. Construction drawings will begin at some point later in the spring. But they are, this is the foyer of the new high school as you come in and there already been some feedback on this. And there's some things that still haven't been developed. For example, we don't see it maybe as well but there is the auditorium door. Right now it's very plain, it's sort of nondescript and that will be worked on as well. And there's some comments about the columns but some of those support columns. So we're just as a committee starting to get some idea. Is this exactly what it's going to look like? No, it's not. And by the way, this is not until phase two of the project. This was the first time we got some idea of what the auditorium was going to look like. And I think generally speaking, the committee was really pleased with this. Unlike our current auditorium in order to have 900 seats, which we currently have, this room will require a balcony. So the auditorium can be entered into on two different floors. And as you can see along the sides, the seats go along there as well. So again, this is an initial sketch of this. There's still much more that will be developed over the next year. This will be phase one. So the construction on this is going to start well actually next fall. We begin all of the pre-construction work that has to happen beginning to end of February. So we're going to be doing the digging the geo wells, laying new lines outside, which we went through the last time with some of the phasing. So there will be starting to see fences out in the front. We really won't, we'll take up some of the circular drive. We'll have to be just taken out in the early spring. But we'll go through with you more of the phasing probably as we get into January. Okay, so going along here, this is again a picture going down the, as you come in the front door, the Mass Ave door. Actually we're calling it, I think not the front and back, we're calling it Mass Ave and field side. But it's hard for us to all remember to say it that way. So this is the Mass Ave side coming in. And on the left would be the entrance to the black box theater. And then the right is one of the things we're putting in is the culinary program. And this will be used by both the special department, the culinary department, family and consumer science department. But this is an opportunity for students to get live cafe experience. As you continue down that hall, you're going to come to the stairs that will lead down to the cafeteria area, which butts the field side of the building. And these are called the forum stairs. And in fact, when I've gone into a couple of schools recently, this seems to be quite common in many, many schools. The Minuteman, for example, has forum stairs. And here's another view of them. So you have regular staircase, but in the middle, you get these seats, stairs that are much wider where students can sit. Yeah, so another interesting feature in the school are what we call these light wells. And these are going to be, they're going to go through the entire floors, will go in the stem building, as well as the humanities building. And what that will allow is bringing natural light into the hallways. They will be, it also positively affects our ratios we have to have for gross and net. So there's another positive on this, because otherwise you would have corridors that would be very narrow if you wanted to put the square footage into the classroom. So this really had it made it open up. And you'll get a lot of natural light. And some of them, is this the one? Yeah, they'll have like perhaps a ring of a table or chairs. So you can, it's a place where you can sit. This is the first look at what the gym is going to be like. And as you know, this is going to be 4,000 square feet more than the red gym now. And when the bleachers are pushed back, there will be a walking track around the gym, so that there can be, you can run on it, but you just can't, it's called a walking track for the reason you can't use it for competition. And this will give you an idea of what the media center could look like. The learning commons, and in some of the diagrams you could see, but there's going to be some like a folding glass wall out to a corridor so you can have a little bit more quiet space in there. And also this will have an area where you can again have a partition so you can create another area where you can have a class in there. So that's where we are at the moment. It gives you an idea of where we're moving forward. So there's still a lot of decisions we made, a lot of design, you know, when probably we get into the next 10 months, there'll still be some substantial design issues, some just tinkering around the edges, and then of course we'll have to get into the furniture and color selections and all that kind of stuff. Lighting fixtures, you know, all these things. So anyway, it's moving along quite well, and we'll just give you up to date. It probably won't be at the first December meeting, but the second one we can give you a report on where we are. Okay. Dr. Alsonampi? I was just going to point out in the form stairs that one feature that Dr. Buddy didn't mention is we're concerned about accessibility, and so it'll have an area at the top that is wheelchair accessible, then there's a lift actually that gets students to the middle and then an area at the bottom. So we're working on trying to have it as accessible as possible. That's fine. Thanks for adding that. This is? So I asked this question last time, and I can't remember the answer. So when is the date that we'll have a sense of the money, the financials coming back to know if we have to make some dramatic cuts? That's what I was talking about. That's happening. This is the December date. No, we're going to get the numbers probably tomorrow. I see. So we should know tomorrow. Okay. We'll know tomorrow, and then we'll be talking about that at the Tuesday meeting, the 19th. Okay. But you're just kind of, yeah, I mean just throughout the entire process until we're at 100% construction design, which is in November or the fall of 2020, we're charged by contract to align project costs, what the voters approved with the project. So it's a constant process of making judgments based on new information all the time. Right, but potentially the big shock if they're showing B1 is to know. Is that? Well, yeah, I mean, so we're going to have, we're at 60% design. No, not, what are we at? We'll be close to 90%. Well, we're not, oh, in terms of design? Yeah, I forgot. 60. About close to 60. Yes, it's about 60%. We'll have a, so this process is the 60% check-in point. Got it. Okay. And then we do a 90% then 100%, and then that's it. It's done. Okay. Right, but actually through the whole process, there's going to be throughout, from now on, you're always going to be looking at efficiencies because one of the things we're seeing, not we're seeing yet, but other districts are seeing, is that given all the construction that's going on, costs keep growing up in terms of subcontractors. Now, one of the things that will happen is that we were, they're going to bid the whole package out once we get all the construction drained. So we will be locking in some of those costs, but things are going to change. I mean, you can have materials costs change. Again, they'll try to buy all the steel at one time, sort of take advantage of possible savings. But I remember when we went through the Thompson Project, we were even making decisions in the last few months. Well, maybe we need to do this instead of that, and that happens. As a process, we list alternates too, and so that's a vote of the committee. It's a majority vote of the committee to decide what an alternate is. And just to clarify, I wasn't there for the whole meeting, but there hasn't been any discussion of cutting out a gym, or cutting out an auditorium, or a black box, nothing like that. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Nothing big like that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's about some material costs. Okay, just a couple, just a couple of other items. One, these are more just announcements. The Arlington High School Drama Department is going to present the three Musketeers this weekend. It's going to be on Friday at 7.30, and then Saturday at 2 p.m., and then again that evening at 7.30. So welcome everybody to come. It probably will be terrific. Then the other thing is this is going to be an high school jazz festival concert, which is going to be Sunday, November 24th, from 7 to 9, and this will be an old hall. The other thing is the athletic director, John Bowler, gave me some updates today that the girl's soccer will advance to the North Finals. So they've done quite well, and I believe it's going to be the Division II North Finals versus Winchester on Sunday, November 17th at 5.30. But this is not going to be in either town. It's going to be in Lynn. And then the winner is moving on to the state championship the next week. So Boy Soccer, which was in the playoffs, unfortunately did lose in overtime in the first round. Girls hockey also lost in the first round, but they made it to playoffs and congratulations to all of them. And so this coming weekend, we have members of the cross-country and swim team competing in the Massachusetts State Meet. And cheerleading competed last week, and the football team won their last two games and will play Malden Catholic this Friday at 6 p.m. at Arlington High School. And the football team has been in a regrouping this year, and so congratulations to them. Great. Thank you. All right. Next item to put on here, a discuss need for November 21st meeting. We had under a policy which we'll discuss later. We had scheduled 20 meetings, including a second November meeting next week. The administration does not have much to anything really to discuss. We have the goals which we can discuss or we can wait till this December meeting. Do people want to have a meeting next week or what's the sense of the committee? No. All right. We will cancel the meeting next week. No, you have to move this. Sorry. So I move the cancellation, not a post-movement. I move the cancellation of the school committee meeting on Thursday, November 21st, 2019. I can't. Thank you. All those in favor? All right. Any opposed? Sentions? Unanimous. Cancelled. All right. Consent agenda. All items listed below are considered to be routine and will be enacted by one motion. There will be no separate discussion of these items unless the member of the committee so requests. In which event the item will be considered in its normal sequence. Approval of warrant. Warrant number 2002 dated 102919. Total amount 374420.49. Approval of minutes. Regular school committee minutes 1024, 2019. And no trips. Can you pull the minutes? Sure. The minutes are pulled. So just the approval of the warrant. So moved. All those in favor? Any opposed? Extensions? Unanimous. Was there a discussion on the minutes? I just wanted to abstain. Oh, okay. Sure, Mrs. I think I'm not listed here. It's being present. Thanks. I remember you being there because you had a lot to say. All right. Do you want to vote minutes as corrected? I move the minutes as corrected. Second. Is there a second? Second. All right. All those in favor? Yes. Abstention. One abstention. And the rest were yes. The minutes are approved. All right. Policy BEA. Regular school committee meetings. First reading. Mr. Schipman. The policies and procedures is recommending embedding policy BEA to change the number of meetings that we are required to schedule from 2020 to 2019. All right. Is there any discussion? I support that. It's a first reading. First reading. We will wait till next time to approve. All right. Great. Subcommittee and liaison reports and announcements. Budget. Dr. Allison Ampe. But it's going to figure out what's going on in the next week and report it our next meeting. Good. Policy and procedures. Mr. Schipman. Okay. I included in the novice the draft minutes for both for the policies and procedures meeting. So folks know what we were up to because we're going to go back and look at a couple of things. The subcommittee asked me to make some proposed revisions of certain policies after our discussion. So just to go through this quickly, that includes BEDB agenda format preparation to dissemination. BEDH public comment at school committee meetings. BEDH-E guidelines for public comment. We brought forth BEA as a first read tonight. BE school committee meetings with recommended changes. FAB athletic field facilities improvement needs. We're going to vote on recommending to delete this at the next subcommittee meeting as the athletic facilities are generally under the jurisdiction of the parks department. And that happens in our capital planning process. KFE fee structure for rental of school building space. And those are the policies that we'll be reviewing and tweaking and putting forward for a first read after a vote from the next subcommittee meeting. The next policies and procedure subcommittee meeting will be Monday, November 25th at 5.15. Hopefully it'll be a short meeting as we'll just hit these and a recommendation coming back from Dr. Seuss' subcommittee. And that's our report. All right. Great. Thank you. Next curriculum instruction assessment and accountability. Ms. Morgan. Nothing right now. All right. Community relations. Yes. On November 6th, we had a really productive meeting with many of the afterschool programs are housed in our schools. We sort of clarified what we were looking for from them in terms of policies and schedules that will be on their website and they'll be in common. They all agreed to get things updated fully by Thanksgiving, which is fabulous. I'll present the minutes soon. And we talked about surface place policy in which I'm going to draft a version of to be sent over to the policy committee so in clarifying what kind of financial information we want from them as a school committee, what makes sense and what doesn't make sense. And we, I asked them a question which I've got really interesting responses, which is this fantasy question. If you could have anything you wanted, what would you, to expand your program, what would it be? And some of the programs said, nothing you can give me. Make it so that more people aren't employed and will work for me, right? But that's not something we can give them, right? But there was a few that had some really productive suggestions. So again, I'm going to write up these minutes and send them over. And I just thought it was a really productive, valuable meeting. Yeah. Yes, sure. Right across the street. There was a daycare center that's opening. Right across the street. On the corner. There's two of them actually. Okay. Kitty corner to us. So I wonder how that's going to impact. So we just spoke to the afterschool programs that are lodged in our schools. There have been some discussions with the afterschool programs that are not in our schools in terms of many of them, but not all have agreed to sort of follow our calendar. So that after the in-district programs give their responses, then they give their responses to parents. So we've had productive conversations with them, but we consider ourselves sort of, we don't control them as much, right? They're not in our schools. They're not, you know, paid by ourselves. They're just in Arlington, right? So I assume, is that a similar program? It's a private program? Yeah. I think it's a private program. Yeah, they're nursery. They're nursery schools. They won't be helpful. Oh, they're a nursery school. Oh, then we definitely aren't talking to them. So we are, but we are talking productively to the afterschool programs that are private, that are not in our schools, to have a conversation, to see if there's anything. Yeah. So, but those are all sort of, yeah, can you go on that type of thing? Yeah. Great. Thank you. Facilities bill is not here. I did not get a report. There's nothing for legal services. We already talked about the building committee. Calendar committee. Yes, we met today. And a lot of discussion about how to solicit information from teachers, which is not something, something that the teachers in the room had a lot more to say about than I did. But, but then there needs to be a part, we didn't have as much discussion about the parallel process with the community, but we are looking to bring in a facilitator who can do that work a lot better than any one of us. Tentative date for the community forum is December 11th. And I would like to bring to the school committee information about what we've gathered so far by December 19th with a caveat that there may be some schools who haven't had time to get sufficient information from their staff by that date. Many of them will have, and so we will have a lot more information than we have now. We talked about gathering a lot of qualitative information, which is rather than just doing another survey and saying 70% feel this and 30% feel this, gathering a lot of information about really what are people's concerns, what are people's hopes, you know, what are people, what do you want, you know, that kind of thing, and sort of that's the kind of information that we'll send to the committee. Okay, just a question. So there was a question on Facebook recently and other people have asked. About 20 minutes a week. About, and basically we're behind schedule on this calendar issue, right? So the question is about start of school, Labor Day is late next year. People are trying to make plans and I think we need, we should be deciding soon if we're going to start school before Labor Day. Right, so the calendar committee completely has decided to punt on the Labor Day issue. Because of the schedule for contract negotiations with teachers. And it's just not going to happen in time for that. So what we're considering now are only the question of religious holidays. Okay, so what I think we need from the administration is a recommendation for the first day of school. And that's something that we can approve without approving the rest of the calendar. That has to be negotiated. So we're entering into a new contract cycle next year. No, no, but the first day of school for 2020, for September 2020, what is the first day of school going to be? September. It's, I have to look at the actual date but it's going to be the Tuesday after Labor Day. So you need a proposal to vote on that. Oh, I'll give that to you. I'll give that to you. We usually do that in January but do you want to do that before that? Right, but we do that, well, that's too late because people, we've been talking about changing it. So there's this uncertainty. Oh, we can do it the next meeting if you want. Great. The issue is that Labor Day is Monday, September 7th. Correct. And that's, you have to kind of... I don't have it with me but I think that the 185th day that year is June 29th. That's right, I did it the other day. I liked action. It's June 29th. So that means that there's only one extra day that potentially could be used for snow or something else. And the next, the year after that is June 28th with 185th and we are required to have 185th on the calendar. So it's going to be a late year. The problem we face with snow which is, fortunately we haven't had, we've had been able to keep it quiet at a minimum but we did, it was three years ago, have a whole lot of them. It was just like one storm after another on a Monday, it seemed like. But at any rate, we'll have to just wait and see what happens with that. I mean, we have to have 180 days, period. So the rest of the calendar... We're not going to solve it. Yeah, the rest of the calendar is still up in the air but the starting date, the rest of the calendar is still up in the air until this committee does its thing. Correct. But the starting date we should be able to set. Dr. Ellison Ampe. I'm just looking at our calendar and so we just got rid of the 1121 meeting which means we won't meet again until December 12th. Do we need, I mean, should we put back the 1121 meeting if people need this date like now? It's a lot of weeks in between. No, I mean, I think we're pretty clear that the start of school is going to be September 8th and we just need the formal vote. Mr. Shulman. I was just wondering if there's been any informal conversation with the AEA about the fact that the start is very late this year and if they'd be willing to impact bargain that one item? We have had informal discussions about that. So you're recommending the September 8th start based on... Oh, we are right now, yes. I mean, if you have one more conversation with them and they seem open to it, that's one thing. If not, bring forth the September 8th date and I guess we have to live with it. It's a year of negotiations. We begin negotiations probably maybe even in the spring as we look at some areas where we might need more time to talk and think about things. But we will be in negotiations. You know, we're actually meeting tomorrow. We have every other... Every few weeks we have meetings with AEA leadership. We can certainly talk about this. We've talked about it a couple of times, but we can certainly talk about it tomorrow again. I mean, there's no reason why we can't move that outside the cycle if they are agreeable to it. It is an agreement outside the contract for adoption next year. But if they're not willing to go in that direction, there's no point pushing it. I'll bring it up tomorrow. Okay. But just for clarity, we're not talking about... We're not talking about next year being next September start. We're talking about... No, no, we're talking about next year so that if they said, oh my god, it's a very late start and day 185 is June 29th, we might want to go and do that. This would be the last opportunity to have that discussion with them. But if they are willing to enter into negotiations very quickly to set an earlier date that we can have back here for the consideration of committee in December, that would not be a bad... That would be the only way we'd be able to do it. Yeah. But I thought... Thank you, Morgan. You're welcome. So, but everything we had heard clearly, explicitly around this table for a long time coming from the calendar committee that has been charged with dealing with this calendar has been we are not going to change to a pre-Labor Day start for the fall of 2020. Yeah, I think people can kind of... We are not going to do that. So, I guess I'm uncomfortable that there's now this back and forth about talking about a... I'm not a contractee person, so I don't use all that lingo, but that makes me really uncomfortable that we are... That that's a possibility and that we're not going to come back here until December or whatever. And I just feel really uncomfortable leaving the community hanging about whether or not we're going to do something as significant as coming back before Labor Day. So, but... I think it might be a challenge to get something that significant ratified by the full membership by that time. And so that's why I think we were putting it into the regular negotiation schedule. I'm just concerned about the two-paragraph advocate blurb about this meeting and then it goes out and then parents are like, wait, are they going to really go before... Like, because that's the only piece that they read, so really want the grown-ups here to be really clear about what the intent is. Because, yeah, I just worry about the headlines. The question was whether we have to have these discussions and the answer is yes, we have. And the other part of the answer is that we'll be in a contract year, so it would be... Even if you have an MOA, that would probably have to be something of this nature be ratified, go through a whole process. So at the moment, my understanding and I think that our collective understanding is that we're going to have a regular start to the school year next year and everybody understands that it means that it's a late June. Yeah, yeah, that's right. Okay, I withdraw... Well, you can't withdraw, but I think that... You can't sort of unmake a motion you didn't make, but please reflect that as a question and not in any kind of interest in pushing the committee to do something it doesn't want to do, because clearly it doesn't want to go there. So forget I said it. All right, Mrs. Seuss. Moving on to the election modernization committee, anything to report? No, I haven't had a meeting since we left. Okay, great. Superintendent search process, Mr. Schuchman. We're going to meet on the 4th of December. I put the draft minutes in NOVA so you can see basically what we talked about. We're looking at a timeline to get a consultant on board by the end of March, so that we can do all the community outreach in April, May, June, and be able to hit the ground running by advertising the position and soliciting candidates at the beginning of September, which would seem to be the most advantageous time to be out in the marketplace, be one of the first out with a really good proposal. This is a good committee. This is a district that's been well led over the past few years. We're in great shape. We should be able to track magnificent candidates that are worthy of the task of replacing Dr. Bowdy. Great. Thank you. So we have not done anything on AA negotiations. Are there any liaison reports or announcements? Mrs. So I forgot to mention last time that we had this meeting on the 17th with the Rainbow Coalition, and it was a very productive meeting and some members of the coalition, actually a bunch of members from the community talking about LGBTQIA plus issues, and lots and lots of positive reports about the district, about parents who are in that community, walking into classrooms, feeling welcome, seeing signs, triangles, really welcoming signs. A few discussions of a teacher here and there who maybe just didn't understand something, but generally it was a very positive discussion, and what they want to come back to us with, to the superintendent with, is some suggested resources of things we can put in our libraries, things that we can make available to schools, and so they're going to work on that and hopefully come back to us. So back to the superintendent. So that was just a great meeting. Second thing, and this is something that's big, I attended the wellness meeting and on the 31st of October, very interesting, lots and lots of stuff that was being reported. Big discussion about what's happening at the Great Body Shop, which is now being shifted over to being taught by nurses, because of the new schedule. It also means that it's being taught more than it used to be, because it often got pushed to the side as other needs of the teachers, educational instructional needs, would sort of credit it out. So there's a real place for it, so it's an interesting change in the district. But the thing they wanted me to bring to the committee is a very casual discussion right now about whether we should offer condoms in high school. Casually, you want to have that right now? Casually, it was, there's no specific plan. Apparently it was mentioned 20 years ago, and one school community member said, over my dead body, and sort of dropped. But so there's just sort of the nascent discussion about whether that might make sense for our district and how that would look, and what kind of big instructional thing you'd put with it, saying, by the way, here's the healthy things you should be doing. But anyway, so just wanted to throw this out, and I can go back to them if there's any beginning thoughts right now. Is it a policy vote? Is it a policy vote we take? Or how does it work? Can I? Sure. So, you know, just at the last school committee, I mean, we had the youth health report. Mm-hmm, yep, right. And then one of the problems was that- So I think that we have some data points there that you can use as a foundation for your discussions. I just want to make sure we- Yeah, that was right. That was one thing. There was an increase in number of students who were having unprotected sex. And so there was a concern about that. And in general, they're finding in Massachusetts, there's an increase in sexual transmitted diseases across Massachusetts right now. So there's just a concern about it. So we have some data from the- Straight from the students that we can use. Right. And I just want to make sure that we always go back to that source. I'm all for it personally, but do we take a vote on the- Yeah, so I mean, I'll have to look at the- I don't think that- We're not taking a vote. Is it an applicable policy? It's not a policy. Yeah, it's just that- So I don't- But I don't think it's a school committee issue. So if there's no policy that forbids it or requires it, then the question is, do we need a policy that requires it, or do we just let the administration decide what to do? I told them I'd come back with any strong feelings, either way, from the committee. So I was just- All in favor. Dr. Ellis-Hampy? I feel like this should- Okay, first, I'm personally- I think it's a good idea, but I feel like it should be referred to the administrators of the schools. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We shouldn't be- Well, because there's been- Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. So they weren't coming- I mean, it's nascent, and there's no proposal out there, but they weren't going to bring to you. Okay. I think like anything else, like many other questions and requests we get, the first step is the administration. The administration believes that it's something that should become just for the school committee, then they can bring it to us. Great. Okay. Or if the administration doesn't give the answer they're looking for, then they can come to us to- Or if it's a budget issue. Yeah, or if it's a budget issue. All right, great. Any other announcements? Mr. Shugman? At the MASC delegate assembly, our resolution was approved. It was subject to a significant debate in some of the more conservative districts that we shouldn't lower our standards in any way, and what would you use to replace it? But a majority of the delegates looked upon this for what it was as removing a barrier to recruiting folks from out of state and recruiting qualified candidates. So life is good there. One of the things is, as they were talking, I went to the superintendent evaluation session and yeah, the forum is being revised and there'll be more stuff coming out. One of the things that they were talking about which won't apply to us going forward immediately, but if you have a veteran superintendent who's been with the district three or more years, you can go to a two-year evaluation cycle which in many ways makes a lot of sense. Other than that, it was a great conference. Thank you for going. Well, hopefully I'll have some friends to come with me next year. I have a conspiracy to try to make that happen, but we'll work on that later. But yeah, it was well received. Great, great. Can I have an announcement? I forgot, the AEF annual fundraiser. Yeah, I'm going to do that actually. I'll do that. Yes, I have a written announcement. So on November 25th, the Arlington Education Foundation will host its annual showcase and fall fundraiser, a celebration of the transformative teaching and learning in the Arlington Public Schools. The festive evening will highlight how AEF helps to innovate, educate, and empower teachers and students join the AEF board from 6 to 8 p.m. at Trist for an evening of guest speakers, grant project demonstrations, food and cash bar. This year's guest speakers will be Matt Coleman, Director of Mathematics, Terry Dash, the OMS Computer Science teacher, and Sam Hoyo, the Director of Science. Any other? What's the day begin? The 25th Monday. I'm not sure this is coming Monday. Did you say where it was? Trist. Okay. Yes. Any other announcements? Did you guys all get the notice from Ted Paluso? No? Okay. Yes. Okay. Yes. That we were ranked 346th of top STEM schools. So this is a STEM thing. So I thought that was helpful. In the nation. In the nation. Of about 5,000. Right. Yeah. Top 7% of the country. That's great. And there's 33 in that group. It sounds like, I don't know, it wasn't quite that many. But there were 33 districts in the state. In the state. In the state of Massachusetts. But we did well, relatively speaking. All right. Anything else? All right. So now we have the executive session to conduct strategy sessions in preparation of negotiations with union and or non-union personnel, or contract negotiations with union and or non-union personnel. Which if held in an open meeting may have a detrimental effect to conduct strategy with respect to collective bargaining or litigation. In which held if an open meeting may have a detrimental effect, collective bargaining may also be conducted. In this case, it's to discuss the school traffic supervisors current agreement. Can I get a motion for executive session? So. And yes. No, no, we will adjourn it. I mean from executive session. Yes. Exit only to adjourn. Sorry. Okay. Motion. So moved. Second. Second. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. All right.