 Welcome to Montpelier Civic Forum and we're on the road to Town Meeting Day 2020. We've got a whole series of shows. This year we have a really rare occurrence. We have two open seats in District 3, one of which is the one-year seat filling Ashley Hill's remaining term and one is the two-year seat replacing Glenn Hutchinson. We also have incumbents running in District 1 and 2 being Connor Casey and Donna Bate and we have the school where all of the candidates will end up on the school board. And we also have Libby coming in to talk about the school budget and we have Bill Fraser coming in to talk about the city budgets. All the shows are well worthwhile. Tonight is a really good one. We have Jim Murphy who's the school board president. And how long has Jim Murphy been the school board president? Since October of 2018. That's a long time. You're heading towards John Holler territory. Maybe. What's school board president do? The school board chair just basically facilitates the board meetings. Meet with the superintendent weekly to set the agenda to convey concerns about the school board to discuss items to make sure that the school board is thinking about the things it needs to think about as communicating well with the superintendent and that we've got a good agenda. We're talking about the matters that the community wants us to talk about and that the school needs us to talk about. How do you ascertain what the community wants you to talk about? We listen. All the board members I think have a role as community facilitators, as voices for their constituents. So my board members will tell me that they've been hearing certain things in the community. They want certain things discussed. Not all things make it. Some things are more appropriate than others. Some things are, oftentimes, people try to go to the school board directly when calling up a principal or the superintendent could resolve the issue. So first of all, we figure out is this really a board matter? And if it's not, we try to handle it. As own budget. Yeah, exactly. And then some matters are right for the board. So that's how we do it. We largely do community feedback. You not only are a member of the community, but you're a parent. I'm a parent, yes. Which school or schools? UES and Main Street Middle School. So you've got both of them covered soon to be the High School and Main Street Middle School? Yeah, next year will be two at Main Street Middle School. And then the year after that, I'll shift to the Main Street or Montpelier High School and MSMS. Your older one, was your child always in the Montpelier School District, or did they move in from another one? No, my kids have both started in kindergarten. They both did there. They both were Turtle Island and Children's House. So they've been in the Montpelier education system, private and public with their own kindergarten. So being that this is Montpelier, likely their prom date is sitting in their class somewhere? Probably yes, yes. If you could discuss our enrollment. You see the enrollment projections. How long have you been on the board now? Four years. So you've seen four years' worth of projections. How close have we come to those projections? The longer term ones. Pretty good. I mean, we've projected an upward trend, and it's been a steady upward trend for the years I've been on the board, which is unique for Vermont. Most Vermont towns are going in the opposite direction with a few exceptions, thus being one of them, which I think is a real testament to our schools. I think people are moving to this community because we do have strong schools, and it's also a great place to live. We have a strong community in general. But yeah, those have allowed us to invest in our schools, I think in ways that other communities have not been allowed to invest in their schools, because we have advantageous tax consequences because we are a growing town. And we picked up Roxbury in a consolidation. How long ago? It was official that we're in our second year of the actual merger in terms of students being at both. Now how many students are coming in roughly annually from Roxbury? Yeah, the total RBS school is a little under 40, so you're getting on average about five to seven kids per grade. So it's really small in a sense. It's relatively small, but it makes a difference. I don't have the exact figures out the top of my head, but five to seven students has a significant impact in tax rates, actually. So the more students you add to the mix, the more you're able to do without burdening the taxpayers. Now there was a tax break that the state implemented in that act in order to get districts to step forward and consolidate. Yes, and it's a stepped tax rate. It was eight cents, six cents, four cents. I think we're in the last year of that. We have a fantastic budget manager in Grant Geisler who's done a really good job of forecasting it ahead and making sure that as those tax breaks go down, there's cushion in the budget to absorb that, so it doesn't become... So it doesn't become a very large lump sum? Yeah, so it doesn't feel like a tax hit. Now, Libby's going to discuss this, but I just want to walk you really briefly through health care and its impact on the budget. Yeah, my understanding, and I do not pretend to have a full command of all the details, but my general understanding is that unlike some other districts in the state that are going to be pretty severely impacted by the results of the statewide health care for teachers, we are in pretty good shape. It will either not really knock us off course or it might even play out slightly in our advantage. So we're in a pretty good spot in terms of health care, and I think that's because of the system we have and also I think we've got good budgetary management in the district. In terms of management, this is something that forever... I mean, I've been in this district, I've been in this town forever, and there's always a question of the relationship between the board and the administration and the superintendent and her administration. How do you understand that evolving in terms of responsibility, in terms of authority and accountability? You know, I've actually tried to focus on that a lot. I see the board's role is... it's pretty high level. I think she kind of backed away from formal policy governance, which I think everyone... What is formal policy governance? Policy governance is the idea that basically you just set policies and then manage the CEO to see if they're reasonably following them. The policies are very high level. For instance, in true policy governance, something like the budget is a consent agenda item. You can't really oversee it. And we felt that just given the fact that the policy governance model is really made for like a nonprofit board. We're really not a nonprofit board. We're kind of a hybrid between a board and an elected entity. And we do have constituents, and constituents have questions about the budget and they want us to know about the budget. And they also, you know, there's some agenda items that the community wants brought up and brought to a board level that might not be appropriate in a true policy governance system. So we kind of backed away from that and acknowledged the reality that we have a level of detail and involvement in things like the budget and in things like the after-school program that happened last year that just really doesn't fit under policy governance. So we still try to stay at a high level but realize that there are levels of involvement that the board has. But are you working on metrics in terms of acceptable scores, like in our proficiency-based graduation? We are certainly looking at those in terms of the performance of the whole district. And, you know, one of the things that we've been working on is really asking Libby, and she's done a fantastic job of it, to start putting some data together on our scores and how we're measuring up. And really the last couple of years has been the first time we've had good data about what our scores look like. Now are you talking about aggregate scores or are you talking about subpopulations? We're talking about both. We're talking about really getting the type of scores to get the overall picture of how our schools are doing vis-a-vis other schools but then also being able to delve into equity. Is everyone in our schools, being able to access the level of education they need? Are, you know, subgroups doing well across the board? And, you know, as you know, you know, Bob Piller does well overall, but unfortunately we have students who are falling behind and we've had trouble closing that gap. In terms of, now again, this makes me feel like your dad, but when my son, who's in graduate school now, was at Union as a small child, we were still doing portfolio assessments. We hadn't had the kneecap yet. We hadn't gone into our proficiency style graduation. We were years away from proficiency graduation, which I'll ask you what it is. Do we still do portfolio assessment? Is there a softer side of assessment that parents are aware of besides the parent-teachers conference? I'm not aware of portfolio assessments being done, so... Okay, so they weren't... Again, what it was was it was parents meeting and being able to see the child's work and the child helped assess their progress. Well, I mean, there's definitely the... at least in the... I don't know how it's out of the high school, but at the middle school level, the elementary school level, there are parent-teacher meetings that are student-led where the students come in and they do something similar where they show their work and talk about it and, you know, talk about those meetings. So it's still... We still haven't left the softer assessment of success. Yeah, we still haven't. And that gives the student, I think, an idea to engage their parent and talk about what they're doing and build confidence in that way. Well, that was the purpose behind portfolio. What is proficiency-based graduation? So proficiency... It's a new law. It is new law. It's a legal requirement for the... the familiar ABCD grading that probably you grew up with and I grew up with. It's really moving towards the idea that you're trying to teach kids skills and proficiencies that they can then bring with them throughout life. And it's more of a focus on giving students the opportunity, one, to actually reach proficiency, not just give them, you know, go through a class, they take a test if they get a nef. Okay, they get a nef, it goes on the record. You know, they flunk and you don't go back and say, okay, let's get it right. And also the idea that skills kind of transcends a lot of subjects. So when you're in science, you're also, you know, you're writing. You're presenting orally. So those are skills that you're building and skills that as part of your science class you should be looked to be developing. So it's the idea of really focusing on skills and building skills through a variety of ways and giving kids kind of the chance to keep coming up to proficiency. And what grades does proficiency testing start? The grading has started I think through all levels. And the idea is that by the end of the year you want all your students at least proficient in the skills that they need to move on to the next grade. If a child is proficient in all of those skills at the beginning of the year, are we advancing children upgrades? I think we are certainly trying to challenge children that need to be challenged. What about children who don't need to be challenged but need the challenge? I'm saying this in the most inarticulate manner possible but a fourth grader who comes in meeting all of those proficiencies and still needs a challenge are they taking the proficiency training that they've already know? Probably in certain circumstances if a student really is at a grade level then you're probably talking about the possibility of moving them up a grade if that's what's best for their educational needs and there's considering social and other needs. I think that teachers are trying for students who need more challenge to make sure they get them and then of course once you get to kind of the later middle school level and high school level there is more room for kids to grow and advance at different rates and at high school and other options the opportunities for advancement and challenge are really much broader than they were Well Matt McClain's been doing community based learning for a long while. And that's a hugely growing program and as we put more resources into that that's one of the most popular programs at the high school. What kind of resources are we throwing into Matt's program? He just has he actually just did a presentation on it but he has three or four people working in fact he's gone from kind of doing it solo to now being director of a program that has three or four staff people who are making sure that there's rigor in the programs that are doing outreach of the community that are making sure that kids can get where they need to get so those are relatively new things and as a result it's both expanded the program and also added a level of kind of rigor and consistency even though people have different placements throughout the community they're getting a consistent level of supervision and structure to their programs. Speaking of getting kids where they need to go how's the school busing of middle school kids doing? The school busing middle school kids has been I think well appreciated throughout the community I've heard a lot particularly from middle school parents who live somewhat more on the outskirts who work, who have busy schedules they're feeling that they know their kid can get to school safely in the morning without them taking them which some of them don't have time and I think also after school now they know that their kids can go home How is that program doing? We replaced what community connections with another after school all things I've heard have been positive it's increased capacity we've kept Drew Norton on as an after school coordinator so he's been able to expand his work and I think really kind of focus on the things that he likes to do so thus far the hiccups have been few and self-sustaining it's staying within its budget It is staying within its budget I wanted to get to an issue that we discussed last time that we discussed this and we'll discuss next time that we discuss it because it's a real issue in terms of parents and the community at large school safety and I know that that weighs on the board tremendously as it weighs on the entire community it's in the background how are we doing in terms of school safety? I think we're doing a fantastic job in terms of school safety Libby has really concentrated on some programs to make sure that teachers are trained for an event we've got we've got a relationship with the police department where we've got a member of the police department who's basically responsible for coordinating with the schools We've had that for a while but it was in terms of drugs and things like that Is it now in terms of school safety? Yes I think we've put measures in place to ensure that our teachers are trained and know what to do Libby just recently went to a training on school safety and the thinking on that has evolved quite a bit as unfortunately we've had experiences across the country to learn from So it's definitely a big concern Well, you get a buzzer to get into school now Yeah, exactly But it's even more than that It's how how teachers are being trained to react in an active situation An active situation being an active shooter situation? Exactly Or some other active threat What about parents coming in? Those are gun-free zones Yes Teachers with guns? We do not want teachers with guns Why not? For a variety of reasons One, teachers are educators They're not cops The presence of a gun can lead to accidents Teachers just aren't trained and it's unrealistic if they get the training to react in a situation like that There are much better ways to keep kids safe And the things that teachers are being trained in For instance And this is kind of morbid to think about But the previous training was around things like just duck and cover And what they found is that actually kids should be evacuated and moved out Because when people just sit and cover it can take a while for cops to get there and quell the situation And you oftentimes have sitting duck Is evacuation training for kids traumatic? We do Fire training on a routine basis Yeah, they're not doing that level of training with kids And there's a real conscious decision that that is too traumatic for them Basically, what studies have shown is kids will follow the directions of the teachers and if the teachers know what to do if there's a situation where action has to be taken the kids will follow the teachers and we do not need to put kids through drills like that because it is traumatic and it makes them thinking about things that they don't need to think about Staying in the school on social issues Religious freedom in the schools Has the board addressed that at all? Yeah, we had a policy I think both our community values and our view of the school is the school should be a place where all people feel included and equal And bringing religion into the schools in ways that makes people not feel included is something that we're not supportive of at least I'm not supportive of and I don't think the board as a whole is The administration has taken steps to make sure that around holiday times that we don't promote certain religion So student allowed to wear clothing that expresses their religion? I think a student absolutely is the school itself is not going to promote symbols But individual students can still wear a cross? Oh absolutely An individual student can come in and that's within their free speech rights? Yeah, absolutely In terms of free speech what about the political rights of students? Are students allowed to wear political buttons? Are they allowed? Where would run afoul expressing a political opinion in our school district? Yeah, I think basically if it caused some sort of safety issue it was intended to intimidate a certain set of students or a student and I don't know the legal standard exactly I'm trying to paraphrase as close as I can to something that was intended to incite violence Or obscenity? Maybe I'm not sure exactly Is a student newspaper an MHS? Is that edited by teachers? I don't think so But I'm not sure But I don't think it is Drugs at the school, how do you think we're doing? For years there's been a wink-wink situation in terms of we know it's there Yeah, we know it's there My understanding is that we definitely have use of substances that ideally we would not have I have not gotten the impression that it is a severe problem although of course you have younger children but I hear enough Obviously you don't want kids doing things that are unhealthy or unsafe Or illegal But I think compared to some of the problems that some other schools are having we are not in the type of scenario where I would say I don't know if I were you Has decriminalization had any impact whatsoever on marijuana use? I don't know Because that's a reality up here and the fear was that decriminalization would bleed into a younger clientele Yeah, I mean I don't know Is that discussed at all by the border? It hasn't really been discussed No, I think we Is that brought to you by the community at all? Is it a concern? Not Not much That's Montpelier But I also I think one of the best ways to get to get students involved in things other than drugs is to give them alternatives for healthy engagement and I think one of the reasons we probably have drug use that's not as problematic as other communities is we have a supportive community where kids can do a lot of ultimate Frisbee teams Yeah, exactly, well that's what they're doing They're playing ultimate Frisbee and Yeah, it's awkward This is one where people who aren't on the inside of this conversation sit and say Huh? Transgender and nonconforming students It's a major initiative within the school district, yes? Yes, it is certainly important Can you explain that to people who know nothing about that initiative when it started what it involves and what the objective and goal is So when did it start? I think it's been an evolving conversation over several years as the district has come to the realization that we do have gender nonconforming students and they face some really huge challenges we don't have a society that's necessarily accepting of them or that's welcoming of them A society or a community? I would say both I think the society as a whole is not accepting and I think we're trying to wrestle as a community with being a place where we are accepting Now is that community a broader community beyond the schools that you're talking about? Or are you specifically talking about the school community? Because there are, it's a bend diagram Yeah, I mean the board is obviously related for the school community but you know there's synergy between the school community and the broader community and I think if the school can be an example of a place that is welcoming of gender nonconforming students and transgender students in the ways that we design bathrooms in the ways that we accept them in the ways that we give them support a gender change then hopefully we can be a lesson for the community and and get people asking the question what does this mean and why should I care? In terms of process I imagine it came from parents and then went to the board I think a lot of it came from students too I think students that you know, transgender students and students that were you know, facing big life decisions and having to change genders in a school environment were saying we need support for this this is a big deal and this is something that we need acceptance of but not just acceptance but support So it went to the board what did the board do at that point they have a concern in front of students who feel that they're not accepted fully accepted as they feel they should you probably have parents saying that my child is not and other children that we know under similar circumstance are not feeling welcomed in this school which I think is the core of the school's mission is that every child feel welcomed and strong and healthy so what did the board do at that point we put in place policies that explicitly state that this is a value and a priority of the board in the district and that instructs the administration to take measures to ensure that we have policies and support and resources in place to make sure that are transgender students. Now when did this come to the, was Libyan at this point or is this before Libyan, Brian and Ricka I think some of it definitely was during Brian's reign and then you know part of the Black Lives Matter flag we put an equity policy in place and worked with students on that and worked with Libby on that and then as part of putting new policies in place for the new merged district that also became very important that we did you get any parental resistance on this I mean it is not everyone's not in agreement on this being a priority you know they're certainly worse than parents who weighed in with questions about that you know you know uncomfortable that there were bathrooms that you know multiple genders could use were there hearings on that did the school board hear parents or was it a thing where it was handled by Libyan or staff did it make it to the board? Oh no we definitely are the board level I mean we heard from students we heard from some community members it's been an evolving discussion there's been several board meetings for it's been on the agenda to some extent what at this point remains to be implemented I think this is because this is one of those issues like racism that I don't think just goes away in fact I know it doesn't go away we're going to have to keep checking in and making sure that we're truly being welcoming and it's something that I think we're going to constantly be on top of you know the fact of the matter is I think we've taken a lot of positive step but I think there are still transgender students you know LGBTQ LGBTQ yes thank you students who are not feeling welcome in schools and who are you know again you've got your ear to the ground on this for those of us who don't watch your meetings or don't have parents talking or don't even have kids in the school as we don't what are we hearing from those parents that that's left why if we're addressing the issue what is the lingering left you know on this well I think a lot of their students are still facing I mean I could see it in the broader society but again I come back to our son in graduate school this was an issue that was kind of worked out in a lot of way it wasn't transgender in those days but gay students weren't stigmatized in the least you know ten to twelve years ago well I mean I think there's definitely been advancements but I think you know both students and parents of LGBTQ students and transgender students are finding that you know there are subtle ways that they're not being accepted and you know just because so the comparison to racism in a sense is apt exactly just because you put a it's a small minority group within a predominantly white school yeah exactly I mean a lot of it is implicit and you know also just because you put policies in place doesn't mean that you change culture doesn't mean that small little statements that that aren't so small because they well they're personal or they carry away I mean you've got again a predominantly white heterosexual relatively educated culture and there's a lot of privilege there and I think getting a lot of folks to realize their privilege and how their actions impact you know minority segments within our population that's takes ongoing work. See now we live fairly close to Union Elementary and walking back home one evening we saw an extremely well attended meeting on this topic are those regular meetings that are being held at the schools? They're, that was a series actually put on by Mara who's the new new member through outright Vermont that was I think a series of a few meetings they're semi-regular but they're not a regular thing and yes we would like more of them and again that constant education from I think a variety of angles is extremely important. Again this dates me as almost like your dad do they still have a gay straight alliance at the high school? Yes. Again that's been going on for a long while. Yeah. It's been renamed. As it probably should be. As it should have been a long time ago. So basically this is an issue that you feel that people feel good about that change. Oh absolutely I mean I think we it's it reflects the board's values, it reflects my values it reflects the community's values I mean to the extent that I don't feel good about it it's to the extent that I feel we've got a lot of work to do. I feel this is even though we're well ahead of many other communities I think we still have a lot of blind spots and we still have a lot of work to do it's going to take quite a long time. Are there other social issues social awareness issues that the board is dealing with? I still think that a lot of our students of color do not feel that they have the type of welcoming environment that they really need to succeed and that's everything from not feeling fully included socially having comments directed against them that clearly have racist intent or racist implications behind them it's fully integrating a curriculum that that includes the history of African-American ancestors we still have a history that's largely male dominated that leaves a lot of the female story out as well certainly the LGBTQ community is not well included in a lot of our curriculum I mean I think we're doing a better job but you know we're still it's still George Washington and the cherry tree to some extent. Do the kids in Roxbury feel fully welcome? They've got the long bus ride and then they leave is there a problem there? Yeah my understanding is that you know the integration has been a little uneven I think some students have felt very welcome for some students there's been a little more of a challenge integrating. Is there something that the board can do you know to change the human heart? I think again I think it's you know it's education it's giving those students. It's also only been two years. Yeah it's only been two years I think time will help with some of it and you know giving all the students the support they have you know socially and emotionally to you know to integrate as well you know but I think it's been by and large good but not perfect.