 Hello, welcome to Town Meeting Television. This is ongoing coverage in advance of Town Meeting Day, which is March 7th, 2023. Tonight we have here the candidates for the two-year seat in Winooski for the Winooski School Board and the unopposed three-year candidate for the Winooski School Board. Town Meeting is gonna host forums with all candidates and we're gonna cover all the ballot and budget items that you'll see on your ballot coming up this March. If you have, if you would like to call and ask questions, you can call us at 802-862-3966. And you are either watching this on Comcast, channel 1087, on Burlington Telecom channel 17 and 217, or you're watching this live on our YouTube channel, which is youtube.com, backslash, Town Meeting TV. Welcome folks tonight, thanks for joining us. I think we'll start, Allison, with you with an opening statement and just tell us again the seat that you're running for and how, why you're running and what folks can expect if you get elected. Sure, so I'm Allison Berlach. I've been a resident of Winooski for about six years. I am running for the three-year seat and I am currently the chair of the school board. So I'm looking to continue that high level of service to the community of Winooski and involvement in Winooski. And I'm looking to continue the board on a, and the school district on a path of becoming data driven and really using data to make decisions. That's my passion. Great, and how long have you been on school board? I've been on a school board since July of 2021. So a little more than a year and a half. And then we'll move on to you, Robert, and you're running for the contested seat. So you and Jordan are running, I guess, up in opposition to one another. Give us an introduction. Who are you? Why are you running? And what's gonna be different for Winooski if you're elected? Sure, well, we're actually, the only ones with a contested race in Winooski. That's right. I'll be honest, I actually wasn't really intending to run from the get-go, but I was seeing not a lot going on on the ballot and finally decided to jump in. Tried to encourage a few other people to run, but it's harder than ever to get people to get involved, they're concerned by the national tone a lot of the time. But thankfully we don't have a lot of that in Winooski. But when I saw Alex wasn't running, I felt like we really needed a good candidate to replace him. He's been there for six years and brought a lot to that discussion. And I'm somebody, I've lived in Winooski almost 15 years now and I've served in, actually a bizarre number of different roles. I previously was on the school board way back in 2010 when I was just a little person. Of course, only my 20s then. But at any rate, I've served in a lot of roles, I've got a lot of municipal experiences of various kinds that I think could help me in this role. Great, thanks so much. And yeah, this is the seat that Alexander Yin held and is stepping down from. And so Jordan, Matt, why are you running and what's gonna be different for Winooski if you're elected? Sure, so I'm a lifelong Winooski resident. I work in the city, so I spend a lot of time in Winooski. My main reasons for running are, we're gonna see a new wave of funding, how the school weight, the student weighting is gonna be changing to benefit Winooski school district. So this is kind of the time to help us to that end in a sustainable way. And Thaleson's point is to make those decisions based off of data. And so if we can see where the focus needs to be beforehand, we'll know what we need to do with initiatives, with students to make us fulfill the end statement that Winooski has put forth. And so that's really why I'm running. Great, thanks so much. Thank you all, and a reminder if you're watching at home, you can call us at 802-862-3966 with your questions for these candidates. So the Winooski school budget is gonna be 25.4 million, that's a proposal. It's up 20% from last year at an estimated tax increase of 9.66. Can you explain your understanding of the budget and the impact on school, on the school and voters? And so Robert, we're gonna start with you on that. Sure, so it's a big increase, but a big chunk of that comes from the first debt payments for the capital project, which is a big project over the last few years, just getting to the point of wrapping up to expand the overall footprint of the building. Unlike a lot of, I think any other district in Vermont, we're just one building for pre-K through 12, about 800 students. So that's a big part of the increase. There's also some funds for dealing with plowing, which the city's traditionally done for the school, but the city's at this point because of staffing issues is actually not able to do all its own plowing at this point, so that's something that we saw in there. But anyway, there's also a couple of instructional assistance and just general increases that we're all seeing. But one of the great things I think the board did is they really worked to decrease, even with a large increase in the overall budget, they were able to decrease the impact on taxpayers by using some of the fund balance that they had accrued over the years. Pretty significant chunk of that, which I'm sure Allison could better explain than I could, but. And you'll be supporting it? I do support it, it is a larger budget, and we've passed some larger budgets in the last few years, but the tradition before that for a long time was pretty moderate steer budgets for a lot of years. So in a lot of ways, the more recent years has been kind of correcting that. When I was on the school board way back in 2010, we were down near the bottom of per pupil spending, even though we have a very complex student body with a lot of different needs. So, sort of correcting that was unnecessary. Great, thanks so much. Jordan, we're gonna move on to you on this question. Do you support this year's school budget? And can you explain your understanding of the budget and the impact on school, on school and voters? I do support the budget. I know board and everybody worked hard as they do every year to mitigate the tax impact, and this year they spent some money on the general fund to kind of dumb that down so that the tax impact wasn't as significant as it could have been. On top of the capital improvements that gave us a bigger building, that factors into the budget. Now you have to maintain cool, heat, clean that much bigger area. Rob is out of the plowing, that's another expense. So I think they did a good job in doing it, and we should see, when the weighting comes through per pupil, we should see, it scaled back a little bit, so I don't think it was too absurd of a budget. Thanks so much, and you will be supporting it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I'll be supporting it. Great. Allison, you helped work on this budget. You can tell us a little bit about it. Yeah, so the 20% increase is about 4.16 million, which is really driven by the debt service payments we will start making, which I think both of the guys here mentioned, doubling the building size, which means additional facilities staff and utilities, et cetera, and then also increases in basic salaries and benefits due to inflation, which we've seen all around. At the same time, our Equalized Pupils dropped a little bit, I think about 1%, which kind of counterbalances, and then we did apply 1.4 million in fund balance to the spending so that it wouldn't have as great of an impact on taxpayers. Can you just explain, I mean, Equalized Pupil, when most people are home going, what does that mean? So Equalized Pupil is a way to adjust the number of students in the school for the intensity of resources they need in order to educate them. That's... And so, Winooski has about, how many students? About 800, around 800? Yeah, and the Equalized Pupil brings you up to like 900? Yeah, okay. Yeah, so that indicates that we have some students with characteristics that mean they're more resource, they need more resources in order to be educated at a certain level. Great, all right, thanks for explaining that. We're gonna move on to the question of language access. Winooski is a community with a diverse number of languages spoken. What important initiatives are underway and what more needs to be done to meet the needs of students and families who are proficient in languages other than English? And we're gonna start with you, Jordan, could be what, if you have any experience with this also, I would love to hear about that. Sure, so there's a lot of initiatives, of course, with the school system being as diverse as it is. The school was able to use ESSER funding to bring in more cultural liaisons, to work with personalized work with students, which benefits obviously them and their families. They're critical in basically supporting those folks. I believe there is discussion about updating the curriculum to be more culturally inclusive. They also worked with a consultant to figure out how to diversify staff. The Heart of Winooski is a program that is working to help diversify the workforce to better reflect the student body. I know there's the anti-racism steering committee as some committees under them that are also working to diversify the workforce. There's also reading math literacy resources on the WSD site, Richmond Mentors for New Americans. So there's, I mean, there's a lengthy list of things that are happening, and I think they just need to be either expanded or leaned on a little more than year over year. Great, can you just clarify what is ESSER funding? It's like it's school emergency resources, I think. So it's like ARPA, so it's like the American Rescue Plan for businesses during COVID. Great, thanks so much. Allison, the question on language access, what important initiatives are underway and what more needs to be done to meet the needs of students and families who are proficient in languages other than English? So Jordan mentioned a lot of them. I guess my comment would be that we have an amazing group of the cultural liaisons who do an amazing amount of work for those families that they serve. They don't just work school hours, they work nearly around the clock for these families and students, and we really need to support the work that that group does and bolster it where we can. In addition, I would like to see resources available or accessible in other languages. So I'm thinking particularly about, like with the public health emergency with COVID, the need to translate documents. I'm thinking particularly about how we can bring in resources from the state, from other places around to kind of give those liaisons some rest, and get some help from other organizations translating and providing information to, yeah. Robert. Your take on this question. Yeah, well I think they covered a lot of what's currently active. One other thing that had occurred to me is the city and the school have started working together more, trying to share resources like the cultural liaisons, recognizing that there's much more to people's lives once they're outside of the school building and to better meet folks where they are and have them be more actively engaged in the general community. I don't know if I have anything else to add on that. I mean, to you, one of the things that this doesn't talk about is the richness that a community like Winooski has when you have a multitude of languages spoken. And I wonder if you wanna just talk a little bit about that. Yeah, Winooski is unlike just about anywhere else in Northern New England, we have 11 languages spoken and a variety of different cultures. That's why the term cultural liaison I really like as opposed to just simply like translator or something like that because they really help the communication go both ways in more than just language-wise. It can be complicated at times but it makes for a much better community overall. Great, thanks. Capital improvements and bonding. Everyone's straight from the head into the body. Capital improvements, what role does school infrastructure play in a healthy community and what is next for the city of Winooski in school expenditures and improvements? We all saw the high school. Well, it's not just the high school, it's the whole school. So what's next, Winooski? Allison. So I think that what's next for Winooski is the city is going to develop into a place that even more people want to live and work in because the school is going to be the center of that vibrant community. This, the building was so thoughtfully designed. I was so impressed when I went on a tour. The architect was talking about, this window is placed here because the sun comes in this side of the building from these hours, which illuminates this room, which is used at this time, it was all very thoughtful. And so I think that we have an amazing building that's going to be able to be used by the community now and enjoyed by the community. And so what's next is really maintaining that building so that the investment that the community has made can persist for many years. That's what I see as next, is really maintaining the building well. Little improvements and bonding. So what role does school infrastructure play in a healthy community and what is next for the city of Winooski and school expenditures and improvements? And I don't think you mentioned it, but one of the things that I thought was interesting is that the school has a health center in it, right? So Robert, to you. Sure, I would agree with what Allison started to say, but the next steps are really going to be about maintaining what has been built. And there's money in this year's budget sort of anticipating the increased operating costs, but it's really gonna be a learning curve in the coming years of, do we need more staff? Do we need janitorial staff? Do we need furniture, supplies, all those things to really make sure that the entire space is being well utilized and properly maintained. And longer term, making sure that we maintain a healthy fund balance so when the inevitable happens and future fixes are needed, we can better handle that. And just generally making sure that it's, well, I said well maintained already, but well maintained because it was old, but it's also, some of it was deferred maintenance. I can go back to my time on the board we were talking about some things and we dealt with some issues, but you only have so much money available and particularly in recent decades, I guess at this point, the state hasn't really had a freeze on infrastructure improvements for school districts, so it just falls on the local districts. That's why you're seeing some large bonds for Burlington, South Burlington, other places that's entirely on the local district when they need to maintain these things. And so you don't wanna let this beautiful, it is a beautiful new building, I mean compared to where it was. Though it can be a little drying to walk in and you expect a library and now it's a hallway, but it's a huge improvement. Great, thanks. And is there pre-K at this school? Yes. There is a pre-K offer, great. Jordan to you, what role does school infrastructure play in healthy community and what's next? So like you said, it obviously needed a rebuild, a freshen up and I think that's needed for students to have a welcome healthy place. They have mentioned the dental, the healthcare center, the kind of takes their minds off of maybe those pressures at home that they may not be getting and so I think it's much better for them and for the community. I mean, the new performing arts center is obviously gonna be used by students a lot, but there's also a budget presentation, March 6th for the community in there so people will get to kind of see it up close and personal. I believe there's more space for pre-K, I'm not sure, to expand that, to take the pressures of finding childcare for families off family shoulders. Other than that, I'm not sure, the school's rebuild, I don't think it needs really any more physical rebuild other than preventative maintenance and just kind of keeping up with it. Great, thanks. Teacher wellbeing and retention. So we have a beautiful school, do we have the staff and do we have good morale for our Winooski teachers who are gonna be in that building? What is Winooski doing to retain good teaching and support staff? I'm gonna start with Robert. Sure, I think, like a lot of folks teachers have had a really rough time in the past few years that really have been on the front lines of the pandemic and it's been hugely stressful. I can certainly speak to my own mothers and IA in Richmond and instructional assistants, sorry. And instructional assistants have just fled. If they can retire, they're retiring and it's left her where she is and Richmond just handling an absurd amount of extra work and there's some of that happening certainly in Winooski and throughout the state and the country. So a lot of it is just making sure teachers have the resources, whether that's also, it's the support of other teachers or assistants, things of that nature. And that can be really difficult for Winooski. We've kind of historically been, haven't been able to maintain the same sort of salary. Salary levels is a lot of places around here. So finding other ways to ensure support for teachers so they don't burn out and leave or seek other opportunities is always an ongoing and complicated and difficult thing. We're moving on to Allison on this. Teacher well-being and retention. What do you understand as the current level of morale among Winooski teachers and are we doing enough to retain good teaching and support staff? Sure. So I know that teachers are struggling with the after effects of the public health emergency COVID and then potentially related or related mental health concerns among both students, children and adults. So I know that every person that works in that building is tired. Plus we did a capital project at the same time. So every person in that building is tired and digging deep to keep going. And I need to recognize that and thank them for that. Are we doing enough to retain good teaching and support staff? I don't think that that's something we can say, okay, we've reached a point, we can stop. So I think we need to continually look for ways to retain good teaching and support staff. So I don't think. And what are some of the things that happen in your mind that the board does or that happens in the community around that? So I think the board works to balance the needs of the staff and the faculty in terms of salaries and benefits with what's possible given the tax base in Winooski, right? What's affordable for the town of Winooski and also recognizing the hard work that they do. So I think there's a very delicate balance to be found there. But that's not the only thing that can be done. And I can't speak specifically to other initiatives that are happening, but I can imagine that the administration is working to be creative with staffing and with breaks during the day and just alleviating pressures where they can. Great, thanks. Jordan, this question to you about teacher wellbeing and retention. So I don't have any personal knowledge of the teacher's morale at Winooski. I would hope that after the capital project is through, the pressures are off from that, COVID is winding down. Getting close back to normal with a new building, as Alison was saying, the lighting and how they designed it and like a very clean space. They're getting more space, opening bigger classrooms instead of having to work in a corner in a closet because I've heard those horror stories. I would hope that would boost staff and teacher morale. Obviously nationwide and in Vermont, teachers are underpaid. So I would imagine that's an ongoing thing for the board to look at. And there's a new superintendent coming on. So it's an opportunity for the teachers to build a new relationship with a new superintendent because at the end of the day, that's kind of who deals with faculty and the board is kind of the overarching policy makers. Great, thanks so much. I mean, I imagine the board must hear from teachers periodically too on issues. Periodically. Correct, yeah. Maybe just, what are some of the things that you hear from teachers when they come? What is the board heard? In the last year, I don't know that we've heard a ton or that I've heard a ton directly. Yeah, okay. Yeah. All right, great, thanks so much. Yeah, go ahead. Sorry, I had sort of a tangential thing that occurred to me in talking about this was some of the creativity around the need for bus and busing, not that kind of busing. And how the school worked with some folks in the community to get their CDL and sometimes that even involved interpreting so that they could actually get that and that filled a gap. And one thing that occurred to me in thinking about this question was a lot of it is just taking some of that pressure off, making sure teachers have all the support. So looking at IA is looking at how do we get people in the community who can come in and get certified for that kind of work just like we did with the buss driving situation. Yeah, Winozgino has a bus system and I think there was some news about training new folks. Yeah, cause like a lot of things there's their licenses. A shortage of bus drivers across the state, so. Great, thanks everybody. Racial justice. So Jordan, we're gonna start with you on this question. What is your current understanding of the work around this issue in our schools and how would you support leadership efforts and initiatives to meet the challenges of creating an equitable and thriving environment for all students? So I do believe, you know, Lewinowski School District's on a good path. I had mentioned the Heart of Lewinowski Foundation earlier in the anti-racism steering committee, those both working on diversifying the workforce. The steering committee is overseas, basically eight or nine student demands that have started to come to fruition in the form of truth and reconciliation committees, anti-racism committees, strategy and action plan for hiring teachers of color. I mean, and they have quite a few initiatives already in the works. One of the most important things I think we can do is focus on results for students to kind of see what's working, what's working for them. We know that there's test scores for Lewinowski, there's racial disparities. And also that the administration and curriculum director are working on improving learning and closing the gaps in those test scores. The board should be focused on ensuring we're tracking metrics and raising scores and closing those gaps so that we're helping those folks out. But of course, I would support any new initiative if that was brought to the school board and kind of investigate that and see if that's something of value that would add to what's already happening. Thanks so much, Allison. What's your experience been with this issue and what do you think needs to be supported? So my experience is that there's a lot of people in the community doing a lot of good work on these initiatives. And the board so far has been involved in funding that work but it has been outside of the normal budget. So it's not sustainable, so to speak. It's not baked into the budget. So my intention is to support the administration to make this work part of their regular work. So not something above and beyond the normal activities of the school day or of the school year, but to be baked into that so that it's a normal thing that happens all the time. And then do that from a budgetary perspective as well so that it's sustainable for the future. So we can keep doing work on equity and justice and keep making progress. Thanks. Robert. Just back up what Allison said about bringing it into the regular budget, into the regular day to day and taking off, you know, a lot of this work started with students who really had to push themselves hard to come and tell the parents, the adults that they were being harmed and they wanted help and it's still sort of on their backs. So the more we can take it off of them and maintain the work, the better. We haven't talked about it yet at all today, but we had an equity audit, a combined equity audit of the school and the city which had a number of recommendations which could also come into play in coming years for the school and the city and again an opportunity for the two entities to work together since one of the things that came out of the equity audit was from some polling work and talking to people, people don't really see the huge distinction between the two entities that, you know, those of us who get on boards and things, think about them as so separate, but the general populists don't necessarily see that they're separate and they want them to work together. And what don't they see as separate? The school and the city. Okay. As much as those of us in government think about them as very separate. There are certain requirements that have to keep separate, but as far as people are concerned, it's government. So the more we can work together, the better. That's all that I wanted to add. Great. Is the school, as far as you all know, involved in the language access plan that the city is going to be adopting? Is that something that's come before the board or something that you all have? I am not familiar off the top of my head. We just had the Winner's City Council forum before this. It was brought up during that and maybe something that's happening just on that level or not to put everybody on the spot to change the subject. I think the intention is to get there. Move this. There's often a tendency to start separate. So Allison, we're going to start with you on this question, schools and school funding. What is your take on efforts in mob tillier to address school funding? Yeah. And again, back to this complicated issue, if you make this much and if your house is this much and if you, you know, how we pay for school is complicated. Yes. So my understanding of what's been done in mob tillier recently, like in the last year, is changing how equalized pupils are calculated. And so UVM and some consultants did a big study called the Pupil Waiting Study, which made a recommendation for how the legislature should move forward with a funding model, specifically for those equalized pupils calculations. And so I am very pleased that it looks like the legislature move forward with something that mirrors what the study recommended. So I think that that's a step in the right direction for Winooski and it is going to, as long as it remains unchanged in this session of the legislature, it will bring benefit to Winooski and the school district in terms of additional resources. So I'm pleased overall. Great, thanks. Can you just tell me a little bit, why should we support people waiting? So I mean, it gets back to the idea of adjusting the number of students we have by the intensity of the resources they need, right? So if we have a number of students who need additional resources to be educated to a, let's just call it to 100%, like it's a video game, right? Then we need additional resources to get them there. We should be able to get those additional resources, right? So from my perspective, it's kind of, it's science and math, you know, like the math of how this, of how the people waiting study worked out, yeah. Science and math and heart, right? So great, thanks so much. Who's next on this? Robert, schools and school funding, what's happening in Montpelier? Yeah, so the waiting really can't be emphasized enough, particularly for Winooski. If you look at the, even this year, if it had gone in, the new weights have gone in into effect this year, are the weighted numbers we were talking about before from 800 to 900 would instead be almost 1200, or over 1200, which would have meant even with this 20% increase, a slight decrease in taxes for most folks in the tax rate. It's always a little complicated with education funding because it's a mix, up to 90,000 gross income is by your income, and then in between 90,000 and 134,000 is a mix of your property value and your income, and of course there's a lot of other things at play. But even setting that aside, it will make a huge difference for Winooski. Another thing that's been talked about in Montpelier for a long time, off and on, is moving completely away from a property, property tax based system to an income based system, which is something that I would support, which would be a much more progressive approach to that. But yeah, I think that's great. Thanks so much. And Jordan, your thoughts on what's happening in Montpelier or what might happen in Montpelier to address school funding? I mean, it's a big win for Winooski. Like everybody else has said, the waiting for them is gonna change in our favor to help us be more sustainable. We do have a small tax base. It's not a very, not an industry in Winooski, so you're relying on a lot of resident taxes to pay for it. And so it puts us on a sustainable path to kind of continue to invest in the school, to invest in future generations. And hopefully it does, you know, it's already gone through, but hopefully it comes through this year to us. You know, Robert brought up the income tax instead of property, which I would support too. You see folks, older folks that are on fixed incomes, while their property rises, doesn't necessarily mean that they can afford taxes to go up because they're, you know, getting their social security check, getting retirement funds. And so I think it's a fairer way to tax and raise funds for schools and cities and those types of needs. And does anybody have an answer about why? And I think it's x60 doesn't address that because there's an income weighting in terms of your property tax minus, you know, like your income. But why isn't that enough to meet the needs? Why move to an income-based system? A fully income-based system? I think it'd just be the more equitable and less complicated. Right now we have just a ridiculously complicated system. I mean, you're the math person, so it might make a lot more sense to you. But I remember when I was on the school board just trying to, just spending long amounts of time to try to explain how, you know, the common level of appraisal shifts it around, what, you know, your property, all these different things. And so part of it would be just the more we can streamline the more direct system. Now we're looking at housing assessments coming up to the city here at some point, so what the impact on that, you know. When was the last housing assessment in Wynoski? 2007. Yeah, 2015 years ago. So, I know my home is well under the, like the median assessment value, so I don't know what that'll mean for me, but it's been a while since it's been done. So that could be one of the challenges. There's two last questions here, and I'm gonna combine them into one for the sake of time. We have, you know, what educational reforms are important to you and also what do you see are the biggest challenges facing the school? So maybe you can kind of think about those reforms and challenges that are coming up, and we are gonna start with Robert on this question. Great. You know, I never liked the word challenges. Probably the next big opportunity is hiring the new superintendent. I think Sean has done some great work over the last nine years, and nine years is actually a long time for the superintendent. I think he's the third longest serving in Vermont as of right now, in one place continues. And I think he'll be missed a lot, but it's also, you know, we've got a new building and a lot is happening, so having new leadership is an opportunity in a lot of ways. Obviously, some of the anti-racism and equity work we were talking about before, both challenge and opportunity. You know, for me personally also is coming into this, I feel like I'm coming in less with specific issues in mind with specific things I'm trying to run on and more with just a desire to listen and communicate and, you know, use that to decide where we are and where we're going. Great, thanks so much. Jordan, educations on what reforms are important to you or what do you see as challenges or as Robert puts it, opportunities in the next five to 10 years? What's your vision? Yeah, so there's a lot of evidence that we can do better teaching, reading, not just in Winooski, but statewide. The school district made a good investment in hiring a curriculum director that'll help our students, you know, understand, you know, what they're learning and really hopefully that brings up, you know, their scores, see where they're at, you know, and the biggest issue for me is the funding goes through and that gets implemented first. I think it will, I don't think there's a big risk of that changing. The superintendent search, of course, to, it's an opportunity, like Robert said, for people to make new relationships, you kind of start fresh. Sean did a great job over those years and now we're on to a new superintendent. Hopefully it's a pretty tight window to get somebody in. I don't. Yeah, what is the toss the window? What's the superintendent trying to hire before the new, like May or something? So they will start July 1st, the new contract. I believe the, we're aiming to select a new person by May 1st. Wow. It's a pretty tight window. Yeah. I didn't mean to cut you off. No, that's okay, it's a good question. And so I think the other biggest thing is that the end statement that Winooski has that the students will graduate college and career ready, the support from the community. And there was a way to measure students' progress and stuff before the pandemic and that kind of fell off. So it'd be good to get back to that system or system like it so you can get feedback from what's working, what's not, make data-driven decisions that'll benefit everybody. And I think that's one of the challenges. Great. Back to the data-driven and Allison will end with you on this question about educational initiatives and challenges, opportunities you see for Winooski. So I'm really excited also about the curriculum director and the opportunities to improve math and literacy curriculum and instruction and assessment and how that can relate to characterizing the success of Winooski's students and back to what Jordan said about getting back to measuring the end statement. So it kind of ties together like one of my, one of an initiative that's important to me is the math and literacy curriculum, instruction and assessment and how that, then that ties back to a challenge we have which is telling the story of how we're meeting or not meeting the end statement, but yeah. And what do you feel excited about digging into? I'm a statistician, so I'm really excited about digging into the data, looking at what does the data show us from a numbers perspective and how can we translate that into students? What does that tell us about students? So, for example, I could tell you that it's a 50% increase, but what does that mean in terms of students? That means five more students are graduating every year with this particular characteristic, so humanizing it. Great, awesome. Thanks so much. Thank you all for joining us and I hope you have fun out there campaigning. I'm assuming knocking on doors or talking to people. Thank you all for joining us tonight for ongoing coverage of Town Meeting Day. Here at Town Meeting Television, so thoughtful. Don't forget to vote on or before March 7th when you will not be mailing ballots. So if you want to vote before March 7th, you've got to go to the City Clerk or call and request an absentee ballot, although it may be a little late for that at this point. Thank you for watching and we'll be bringing you a result show on March 7th starting at 7 p.m. Good, thank you and good night.