 Let's get started. Welcome everybody. It is January 11 and 618. We're going to get this virtual meeting started. Thank you for being here. I appreciate that we have so far 92 people in this meeting and we appreciate the engagement with your schools and more people keep coming in, but we're going to get started because we have limited time. So I want to start by welcoming you to our budget forum. We had an extra meeting to intentionally engage with our communities and continue to collaborate meaningfully with the leadership team and the community in developing the budget. So as we listen to the presentation tonight I'll go through the agenda in a minute but as we listen to the presentation tonight I would like us to keep in mind our three guiding principles, and that is academic achievement, safe and healthy schools and humanity and justice. Through this budget process we have the budget, both the leadership team and the school board are really purposely making sure that all our schools will maintain strong programming and also remain in alignment with our equity, our Vermont education quality standards. As we move into the public comments I would like you to keep in mind or just to remind us to keep a growth mindset just like we tell our kids. We are using an equity lens and equity implies call to action. I remember that we're looking for progress together. That's why we are here together. We have so much as a district to be grateful for just look at all the community here today, our leadership team, our staff at our schools, our building grounds crew, especially Chris O'Brien and so many more expand most of their holiday, keeping our buildings for getting pipes frozen so we have so much to be thankful for so keep that in mind too. So moving together into this brave space. I'm going to remind you of a couple of things please be kind in your comments. Everybody's working really hard in behalf of all our kids and our community. We are all in this together. Let's be curious and model it. I'm going to read a quick sentence. I took the class with Shelly. I had known about this before, but I just wanted you to read at, not the entire point but I was going to read she introduced me to this woman who is incredible. So I'm hoping that we can hold the space for all of you. I'm going to ask the board members if there's any adjustments to the agenda, but after the presentation we're going to let the public have their comments, we're going to strictly we're going to have a timer and have one and a half minutes per person just so that everybody has equitable time to keep their input and then the board is going to move into discussion and action and operations after listening, both the presentation and what the public has to say. Are there any questions about that? If not, I'm going to pass it on to Megan so that we can get started. Thank you. Thank you, Floor. Thank you, everyone. It's nice to see you. And let me just get the presentation up. Okay. So I would just start by echoing the thanks that Floor shared for everyone here and for everyone in the system and for our board and administrators who are also working really hard as part of this process. And in a process that's as thoughtful as it can possibly be. So I'm going to get started so that we can spend most of our time on the dialogue and conversation. Just a quick reminder, we always want to ground ourselves in where we are and where we've been. So this is where we are in the process. As Floor said, this is an additional meeting that we added knowing that the input that's been had and making sure we wanted to give the board time to be able to react to what they've asked us to show them and have adequate input for that. So they have all the information that they need prior to their conversation. So that's where we are today. Next week will be the opportunity for the board to adopt the final budget and the warning that will go to the voters. And then we have our annual meeting and voting day in March. So for tonight, this presentation, you know, we hope to give you a little bit of a budget recap, not not trying to recreate three previous presentations but give you enough to be able to draw the connection between each of the conversations we've had, especially for those of you that aren't at every single meeting. Then we will share two drafts based on what the board asked us to do in December. We're calling them 3A and 3B. One of them is what the budget would look like at a 9.7% increase and one at what it would look like with a 7% increase. These overviews will also give tax implications for each one of those versions. And that's based on the most recent tax information from the state. And then the board will have an opportunity to discuss. As a reminder, this is a list of the original board parameters from back in November. I've highlighted two revisions to what the board has asked for one, as I said, is bringing in two versions of the budget. And the second is the board has asked around the creativity piece they've asked for some more specifics around proposals for what combined services could look like. As a recap, there are additional and much more information actually narratively in the packet. So I won't try to recreate that but just to kind of draw the through line. In November, the first step of the process was to bring the board a presentation of a level service budget. A level service budget is what it would cost to provide exactly what we're doing this year next year with no program changes. The outcome of that conversation was the original set of board parameters, one of which was to bring a proposal for 6%. In December, the leadership team brought a budget to the board draft to that budget got as far down as 7.59% increased. And that is as far as the leadership team felt they could take the budget without making structural changes. As part of that conversation, the administration was asked to come back today with 9.7 and 7 and the board is understanding that that 7% would include some combined service options. And the other piece in the spirit of recap because these things are part of why we're having the conversation the way we are is just what our realities are as a system. We know that our enrollment decline over time and continued from here forward. Folks who've been, you know, listening to the news will know that this is not unique to Washington Central it's something that all of Vermont and in fact out of New England is dealing with. We know we have to address the sunset of our ARP ESSER funding that's one time funding next year is the last year. We have inflation and economic realities, the tax implications of what we put into place and you'll see that as part of today's presentation. And there's still a lot of things unknown in Vermont one of them is the continuation of universal school meals. How the state chooses to use the surplus in the Education Fund, these are things that we don't know of yet, and those are still part of our reality. Again, showing you this you've seen this before these are the decision making lenses that we have been using as we have these conversations. We look at how we compare to education quality. We look at how we distribute our resources and we look at student need so that we can address those three pillars that floor talked about. I just wanted to make sure folks know that the leadership team also took into into consideration the conversations that have been had the two biggest themes from our December conversation is making sure we have the time that we need to consider structural adjustments. So we're giving the board some additional information about what that could look like. So we have the universal and shared belief of the of the administrative team that we want to preserve quality programming for our students. So with that, I'm going to start with what we're calling three a. This is the version of the budget that was designed to come in at 9.7% net increase and you'll see what it actually shakes out to be as 9.62. It's not really possible to hit exactly a mark like that, or at least it's pretty rare. So again, just where that 9.7% came from that came from the fact that the level service budget originally came in at a 9.7% increase by the time draft to came along that increase had gone up based on some assumptions that have changed over time. That's pretty normal part of the process. So we chose 9.7 just to give the board a sense of what would it take to get back to where we were with that level funded budget. So that's where the 9.7 came from. And in order to do that, we focused again on staying within education quality recommendations, creating consistency of staffing across the district. So that's the equitable distribution of resources that priority of quality education and the things that allow us to move forward the board priorities. And this version of the budget minimizes program changes in anticipation of strategic planning. So we know that we're going to engage in a process that brings a lot of community voice into helping us decide what we want for our students. And that's where we need to achieve that. And that's a long term process. So this budget, this version is meant to show the board, what would look like without those programmatic changes. So in this draft, this 9.62%. These are the reductions that would be that would be recommended in this model. So I have notes in here, I'm going to overview it. This is also in the budget memo. So there would be a reduction of library media in callous, and that would be to bring staffing into alignment with the rest of our schools. So compared to ourselves and also remain in alignment with education quality standards. So the reduction at Dodie would continue to be a reduction of a paraprofessional position. And that is because there is a decreased student need this is the position that would come out of the budget, because the student is no longer requiring services. That leaves support staff in a system, one of the things that came up in December was folks wanted to see what's left, not just what was reduced so that's what that column is. The proposal would reduce 1.86 actually of a position for food service in Romney, and that again brings staffing into alignment with other schools. So that is what would put them on par with the other elementary schools in the building. And the other thing is there are vacant positions in this area in the district so there would be a job available for people impacted. So the reduction would be in support staff, there would be a change in one administrative support position, but the remaining positions are currently unfilled. That's part of our staffing challenge, but the the three additional support staff positions could be managed, because they are currently being managed without them, and it would still leave 14 instructional para positions. Susan for some details about the numbers associated with this version of the budget. Hi. On page 14 in the board packet there's a comparative budget budget summary that provides a breakdown of the changes in the budget by category. Expenditures here are the amount the district plans to spend revenues or the money the district anticipates receiving to offset those expenditures. And the net education spending is the amount that needs to be raised by property taxes. The tax rate is then calculated based upon the local education spending per equalized people. And here we have a 7.4% increase in expenditures offset by a 1.31% decrease in revenues for a net difference of 9.62% increase in local education spending. Next slide please. Equalized pupils have decreased 46.75 from 1,423.57 last year to 1,376.82 this year. This is likely to be the last change that we see coming from the AOE this year. So I feel confident that this is the final equalized pupil for our calculations. A 9.2 change in equalized pupils equates to approximately 1 cent on the tax rate, which means the tax rate has increased $5 or 5.08 cents just based on the change in the equalized pupils. The local education spending per equalized pupil equates to $22,946 for draft 3A. Comparing this amount to the $15,479 property yield gives us an equalized tax rate of 1.4824. The property yield is set annually by the legislature and may change depending on the amount of unreserved or unallocated funds from FY23 that are applied towards lowering the FY24 property tax rate. $15,479 assumes that nearly all of the $64 million in that fund is used. $15,479 is an increase over last year's property yield of $13,314 by 2165. This was based around a forecasted year-over-year growth in education spending of 8.52 per cent estimated statewide in November. A $104 change in the property yield would change the tax rate by a penny. The common level of appraisal for each town is then applied to equalized homestead tax rate to get the individual tax rates for each town. A CLA drop of 0.673% is about 1 cent on the tax rate. The CLA's for all five towns decreased significantly. The changes range between a drop of 8.95% in Berlin to 5.19% in Worcester. The next slide. This table applies the individual town tax rates to a house valued at $100,000, $200,000 and $300,000 to give you a picture of what it might mean to an individual household. Recognizing this is a lot of information. I just, I want to pause here to give you a minute to review the table and I'll turn it over to Megan. Thank you, Suzanne. We do realize that's a lot of information as Suzanne said, hoping to give it to you in several different ways so that you can see the impact. And this, this one is probably the most applicable for folks. So all of those numbers are and those increases in taxes are associated with the 9.6% budget, which is draft 3A. So now I'm going to talk about draft 3B. So this is the version that aim was to get at seven. So this is about a 6.95% budget. And to do that, we've again continue to focus on remaining within ed quality standard recommendations. This version identifies areas for combined services that could reasonably be implemented next year. Combined services is a change to the system and requires work to study. So the elements here to bring down to seven are the ones that could be implemented next year. And then continues to provide quality education and allow us to move forward the board priorities. And just to say a little bit more about reasonable, reasonably implemented. We know the board is entering a strategic planning process. The purpose of that process is to talk about what we want for our kids and what we believe we should be able to deliver to them. And the structure is then what we talk about later so that we can say what, how should we be structured in order to achieve that, but the strategic planning is to talk about with deep community engagement, what do we want for our students. Those are not quick conversations, they're long term. So this budget is meant to show you the pieces of combined services that could be done next year, while all that long term planning goes along. So the, I'm going to give a quick summary and then I'm going to run through there's three slides here only because in order to give the level of detail that folks wanted in December, it doesn't fit on one slide. But the reductions in this 6.95% budget are the same as what was proposed in draft to with the addition of reductions that would come from combined services. And I'm going to run through them because there's some information in here that was requested at the last meeting. But just so folks know these are not new. So, again, in callous we're looking at reductions in library media and school counseling. This is again, bringing staffing levels into alignment with other schools and specific to school counseling. You know, in small schools in Vermont, there are teaching principal models principal teacher models and this is a form of that because of the particular skill set that we have in the principal in callous. So that is those are the callous reductions. In Dodie, we've already talked about the support staff reduction. We would maintain the reduction in instructional coaching. That is a grant that is currently a grant funded position that grant would sunset and we would not replace it. And then there would be some reductions estimated to be about two thirds of a teaching position. Around combined services, I'm going to talk about what that would be in a few slides, but that is where that reduction is in Dodie. In remedy, we've already talked about the food service reduction, and this would retain the world language reduction. The language at the elementary school would then become part of a bigger future planning conversation about what do we want for all of our students in elementary school. That would be a future conversation though this budget would have that position reduced and music again is an enrollment related decrease there is FTE remaining that was a question that came up in the last budget. It's a reduction of that FTE. In the year 1932, we talked already in the other version about the support staff ESP reductions. And this would be, it would maintain the reduction of classroom teachers identified in the first in the draft to budget. Across the district, what there would be is a reduction of 0.9 school nursing. This again remains keeps us in alignment with Vermont at quality standards. This is a position that's currently funded with Essar funding. So this money sunsets in a year anyway, and we will need to have this conversation in a year. This would move up the development of a model to understand how to serve our elementary schools for funding that goes away next year. So again, in a second I'm going to turn it back to Suzanne, she will talk about the numbers but just to kind of recap, these are the reductions presented last month. Yes, last month with the addition of some combined services reductions that I will also talk about in a second. Draft 3B is a 5.19% increase in expenses combined with a 1.69% decrease in revenues for a 6.95% increase in the local education spending. You'll notice that the revenues in draft 3B are lower than 3A. This is because the announced tuition is based upon the budget. So it will change depending upon which budget the board decides to warn. Next slide please. This table exhibits the tax rates calculated across the district for 3B. The tax rates still increase in each town, but the increases range from 6.8 cents in Berlin to 0.2 cents in Worcester. The local education spending per equalized pupil equates to $22,388 for draft 3B. Comparing this amount to the $15,479 property yield gives us an equalized tax rate of 1.4463. If the state excess spending threshold were still in effect, it would be $22,204. After reductions for debt, capital spending, and special education, extraordinary cost expenditures, both draft 3A and 3B would be under the excess spending threshold. And the next slide is projection on $100,000, $200,000 and $300,000 house value using draft 3B to project the increases. You can see that the increases on $100,000 house range from $68.16 in Berlin to $2.21 cents in Worcester. And we'll pause again for a minute to allow you to consider the table and I'll turn it back over to Megan. Thank you, Suzanne. So again, two different versions of the budget and the tax implications of them. So the last piece of information we wanted to give the board as requested is a little bit more information about options to combine programming that could be implemented next year. These are conceptual models. There would be more detail put to exactly what this looked like. So the budget that you saw, the 7%, the 6.9% for 5%, assumes some reductions based on what's here and the detailed design of these would come after. The first one I will highlight as a concept is combining pre-K programs between Middlesex and Worcester. Those are two, particularly in one school, very small pre-K programs. So merging them together brings the class size into something that's instructionally a little bit more beneficial, more robust class sizes. It would likely be hosted in Romney. So the implementation would be provided for students and it would serve current and incoming pre-K students and there would be a reduction in pre-K teacher as that was built. Another conceptual option of combined programming because of very small class sizes currently would be a combined sixth grade program between again Middlesex and Worcester. This concept would move current fifth graders at Doty to Romney for their sixth grade year. The class sizes would be more in alignment with education quality and Washington Central. Again, transportation would be provided and there would be FTE reduction. So, again, these are conceptual ideas of things that could be pulled off in a year if the board decided that the 7% margin is a place that we need to be in terms of a budget our community can afford. And the detailed planning would come later. And all of this is happening regardless of where the budget lands in the context of a strategic planning process, as I said. So that is the end of what we wanted to share with the board. I'm going to stop sharing now so that our faces come back to the screen. And I'll turn it back over to Floor. Thank you, Megan and Suzanne for that clear presentation. We're going to move into public comments. I know there's a lot of people I'm going to ask you to raise your hand we'll have public comments. If we have too many hands up right now we'll have public comments now and at the end of the meeting we're going to try to do the bulk of the public comments right now because we really want to use that for our deliberation. Okay, so please raise your hand we're going to order we're going to have a little timer, like it said before, and it just mutes automatically so I apologize for that. Already, but we're going to try to get everybody in order. Mark, are you ready with that. Yes. Okay, right up. Right up. Okay, so I'm going to start to see the order here. You tell me when you're ready Mark and we'll get started. Sorry, I just switched computers. No, no. No need to apologize. And then the other thing that we want to tell everybody, we have 129 people online and this is trying to keep track of everybody that is online so we're going to try to do our best we can and hopefully not miss any, anybody but I also think we could use the opportunity to if you wanted to just send. Well, maybe double check on that I was thinking sending an email but let me double check on that year was that mark. I don't want to lose time. Okay, honey, you can get started welcome. Thank you. My name is honey bean Barrett and I am currently the fifth and sixth grade teacher at Doty. The Doty staff would like to thank mckaylin garrity Leclerc for coming to our staff meeting today. We had a wonderfully robust conversation and staff were able to share their questions and concerns about the budget process and the cuts to Doty and budget draft free. I appreciate mckaylin bringing our questions to the whole board and we look forward to your response to all board members members of the leadership team and the WCUSD staff. Doty is a magical place where students are thriving due to the care of the entire Doty staff from our full time five star pre K program to our monthly spirit days to our cross classroom collaborations to our student leadership program which is embedded into the WCUSD community. Doty is a magical place for students to learn what community means. We invite you to come and visit and be part of our community and part of our magic. Thank you. Thank you, honey. Okay, Christina Polar. Welcome. Hello, just give me one second to mark. We said there we go. Go ahead Christina. Welcome. Hi, I'm the current preschool teacher at Doty. The proposal to combine at Doty and Romney pre K programs next year comes with great heartache. Worcester is a town rich in community from our robust food shelf to the spectacular fourth of July celebration each year. Community begins at the elementary school level. Previously our preschool program was a small 10 hour per week program, it then grew through community connections to offer family care for three full days a week. We have grown to serve Worcester and middle sex preschool students with five full days a week of care at a cost lower than private preschool programs. At a time when child care is hard to find and there's such emphasis being placed on early childhood education, losing the Doty preschool program would be irresponsible. This move would leave parents struggling to find care for their children and would leave Worcester children without access to preschool programming giving them a disadvantage when entering kindergarten. Our program is a is a five star full time preschool program with consistent staffing and programming. Mindy Audet and myself run both the preschool and community connections program allowing for the same high level of education and care all day every day. No other school in the district provides this level of programming to quote the movie field of dreams. If you build it, they will come. We have built a fantastic community driven educational and family friendly preschool program at Doty and the response has been overwhelmingly positive and meaningful. I encourage board members and members of the leadership team to visit Doty pre K to see just how magical our classes. I'm confident that a few short minutes would convince you as to the importance of this program. I have no doubt the preschool program at Doty will continue to grow and thrive over the next several years and I asked the board to consider voting in a way that would allow that to happen. Thank you. Thank you. Welcome. You're still muted. There you are. Arlen Berkeley I am the library media specialist in technology integrationist at East Montpelier elementary school. I'd like to thank the board and the administrative team for their hard work. My hope is to use my comments to convey a deeper understanding of the work of a modern school librarian. Everyone in this meeting has an idea of what a librarian is, but many of those understandings are based on long ago experiences. We do provide those essential services that many of us remember reading to students sharing book recommendations and running the circulation desk. But we do so much more as part of my role as a librarian at East Montpelier. I work to maintain a robust and diverse collection of books. This requires research and meetings with colleagues to determine important titles to support the needs of all students. A high quality library collection is one critical piece of the humanity and justice coalition work of our district. As a librarian, I teach students how to use a library and support them in seeking books that match their interest and in sparking interest in other subjects. Beyond those traditional library roles, modern librarians teach students how to use a variety of technology tools to express their ideas such as video and media digital presentation apps. We work to support the development of our students as critical consumers and creators of online media. We help them to think critically about online sources of media. We teach students these skills to support them in being a digitally literate citizens who vet sources of information understand bias and are able to engage in respectful debates online skills that are absolutely. Mark. Looks like we still had seven seconds or did I miss something. My apologies. Different view on different screens. Oh, okay. Sorry, please go ahead. I'll unmute you. Okay, Arlen. Sorry. You still have seven seconds. I'm getting there. Arlen I can allow you to unmute but I can't unmute you. But you should be able to know my apologies. Okay. I'll just close to say our library and technology. Our programs provide many of the traditional services that many of us associate with libraries. Those services are essential and to be done well or time consuming. In the 21st century, we also provide direct instruction and additional learning opportunities for the children in our community to help them have the skills they will need to participate in our democracy and thrive in a global society long after they leave our schools. Thank you. Thank you Arlen. Jill. Can you hear me okay. Yeah, we can hear you. Hold on one second. Mark, could we reset the timer. I know this is a little clunky, but it was. Jill, a bear librarian at U 32 former librarian of callous. Thanks for allowing me to speak today. Yeah, hold on one minute mark unless my screen is showing something different. I don't know why I'm working on it. When I go while he's working. Yeah, go. It plays an integral role in educating children for the future is where students learn to find analyze evaluate interpret communicate information and ideas skills they need as adults to live and work in an information based society. The impact your librarians have on your school community is larger than what you'd see on the surface. Hence my visual of the iceberg metaphor. Research shows that where library media programs are better staffed and funded academic achievement tends to be higher. Research shows a direct link between higher reading scores and collaboration between librarians and teachers. This month in school library journal and article features a pediatrician who recommends books to her patients. She says she uses books to make kids laugh to help kids process hard times until it kids know they're not alone. My patients have told me that certain titles allowed them to feel that they are valid, worthy. What will they do without access. What happens if I tell a patient a book will help them, but when they go to their school library, it's not there. I have a lot of concerns about the cuts in the library program. Each year these positions are tipped away at creating a further divide and the skills our students have when arriving at you 32. If we continue on this path, students will miss out on important instruction. Your librarian is the only person in the building hired to curate a collection that's inclusive and helps build empathy. The library is a place where students are welcome with open arms, where they are met and encouraged to challenge themselves beyond their potential. Your libraries are more than just places where books are kept. They're vital places in your community. During the pandemic, our schools delivered food and books to our students. We understood that those vital needs to feed our bodies and our minds are the most important resources we can. Thank you, Jill. I'm just going to do it manually. We have a timer going on. I apologize, Jill, but I think we totally understand what you're saying. We have a lot of hands up to apologize and thank you. Please submit it on writing to us. I see that you have a document, so make sure that you send it to Megan and myself, and we'll share it with the board. Okay, let me. Stacy. You ready? Yes. Good evening. My name is Stacy Rupp, and I have been the library media specialist and technology integrationist at Calis since 2018. Prior to this, I was a fifth and sixth grade classroom teacher at Calis for five years and before that para educator at CES for many years. The story of my teaching career is very much a story of the opportunity that rural schools can provide for new educators. I have been with Calis through nearly 15 years of learning, change, growth, tragedy and triumph, and I am not a resident of Calis nor indeed of any of its neighboring towns. What kept me returning here was the school's steadfast dedication to high quality teaching to engaging student and staff curiosity and identity, and to the community support for a vibrant program beyond the three hours of old. A major part of this vibrant program is its library, which serves as a hub of engagement that is far more than a book repository or a location for students to visit once a week for 30 minutes. As my library colleagues can attest a robust education requires a dedicated library professional to help guide student learning, both within and outside the library walls. Information and the acquisition thereof are not static and cannot be taught well just once a week in isolation. Collaboration is the cornerstone of good teaching and reducing this school's program by even half leave zero time for Calis librarians to push in take small groups or consult with teachers. By reducing this position you will lose the spark that keeps highly qualified and dedicated professionals returning to this school, growing in their practice and integrating into the community. Our students are bombarded by initiatives that reduce them to mere data point. Thank you, Stacy, I know that it feels harsh, but I'm so sorry. You're welcome. Thanks for being here. Hi, thank you. My name is Avery and I'm a junior from Calis and my library experience is ongoing and I know the incredible positive effects of a full time librarian. Throughout my elementary experience, I had the amazing Jill Aver is my librarian and she still is thankfully, and some of my best elementary school memories took place in the library. She's been a place for me to go and talk about what I saw to be the best thing in the whole world books. They are what kids can use to see into entirely new perspectives as well as learn more about themselves books help kids learn empathy and kindness towards others, and librarians are an integral part of getting books to kids. When I'm in high school, I find a library to be the safest place to me in the school and as a student, I expect our school to have full time librarians everywhere because they are truly invaluable resource and because students need them to have the greatest success. Thank you. Thank you, Avery. Steve, welcome and go ahead. Steve, my wife Catherine and I moved to Worcester recently with our newborn and our two and a half year olds in large part because of the great public schools and we're particularly concerned about the proposed closure of the Doty pre K program. And a couple of questions on that front. One is where the predicted cost savings are expected to occur precisely. If it's cut to a full time teacher, then we're wondering what is going to happen if your predictions about class size are incorrect. And whether there will be enough room if there are more than the expected number of Worcester pre K students and also what what other cost savings are predicted from this and how those were calculated, as well as how the predictions about the class size were reached, what data was used, and, and how that came to me. Thank you, Steve. We took note of all the questions. Ali. Ali. Do you want to go ahead? I have you as Ali in the, I'm going to ask you to unmute and see if that helps. I think your cameras frozen Ali. I'm gonna. I'm going to jump to Lauren. Well, I communicate with Ali. Okay, go ahead, Lauren. Hi, can you hear me? Yes. Hi, my name is Lauren Chabeau and I'm a Worcester resident and parent. I find the proposal which would require Doty students to attend pre K and sixth grade at Romney to create a huge inequity for Worcester students and families. Pre K and sixth grade are pivotal transition periods and schooling, mandating a small subset of the student body to endure an additional transition and in the case of six graders only one year before the transition to you 32. At a time of dramatic cognitive and social emotional development is unfair for Doty students. No other students in the district will have this type of disruption in their education. Additionally, according to the 2021 22 annual report 44% of Doty students qualified for free and reduced lunch the greatest percentage of any of the elementary schools in the district. Therefore, this inequity is being applied to the population that is already facing challenges. Restructuring has been proposed without any input from the community which it will impact and the impact is huge. The relationships my children are forming at Doty are irreplaceable and not transferable from one building to another. The sense of safety, respect and belonging developed at Doty directly impacts my children's academic achievements. The foundation of these relationships is built solidly in the Doty pre K program. My child will be ready to learn on day one of kindergarten because of this. And for what I've seen the sixth graders at Doty are kind confident students and leaders of their community. They deserve to remain a part of the community they built for the entirety of their elementary education. This may look easy on paper but the impact is frankly unconscionable for students and I will not support a budget. Thank you Lauren. I'm here. Yeah, can you hear me. Yeah, I can hear you Ali. Okay. I'm sorry I lost connection for a second there. My name is Ali Mani and I'm the librarian at Romney and Doty, and I thank you for giving me this opportunity to talk about the potential impacts of library cuts and other cuts in our district. Producing a librarian position impacts a library program. A well resourced school librarian program offers students more than just an opportunity to check out books. We offer maker spaces where students learn to create and engineer things. We teach coding and robotics information literacy technology and digital citizenship skills. We can give you data like how many thousands of books are checked out each year, or how we manage resources that are worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, but it's harder to quantify however is the confidence in a fifth grade boy, who has always hated reading and finally finds a book about basketball worth his time, or the young girl who reads a story about being black in a rural community, or the gratitude of a parent whose child is finally hooked on reading, or the relief of a classroom teacher when we find an audio book or an accessible tech tool for their student. Producing and removing positions leads to staff turnover, poor morale, unfilled positions, and very part-time staff which puts enormous stress on our schools. It is harder to build and sustain a community. We know that trusting relationships take time to develop and are the cornerstone of good education. Cuts to student-facing positions impacts our historically marginalized students and small communities the most. Some of our students in schools have. Thank you, Ali. We're going to move into Lauren Frank. I'm meant for you to go before and I'm sorry I didn't use the last name. I apologize for that, but welcome, and this is your time. Go ahead. Hi, I'm Jesse, my wife Lauren. We're here with concerns with almost all the cuts that are going on at school, at all of the schools in our community. A school is a lifeblood of the community. Our children are our future, and I would rather see the school grow and so we can enrich our children's lives more. To use an example in history, we're pulling out of the Great Depression. We do things like the Federal Arts Act to enact arts to pull ourselves up and out of a dark time. So if we destroy our programs, we have nothing to attract people to our towns. This region of Vermont is one of the best kept secrets because of our education, because of the community that we have built here. Seeing these cuts to me, frankly, is kind of unacceptable to food, library, service, foreign language. These are all skills that our children are going to need in the future. So I would rather see a budget that is based on growth of services to enrich our children's lives and enrich the lives of all the people who know and love our children, the people who are working at the school. There's where my concerns lie, not small percentages on on paper. Thank you. Thank you. Jessica. I do want some clarification around what a sustainable school health model would look like to the administrative and leadership teams. But at the meeting on 1221 I spoke about historically underserved students. These students are often in need of more support and are often seated in the nurses office more frequently. Additionally, the students in our most rural schools can have less access to health care. This year 30% of Dodie students did not see their parent primary care provider in the last year. This is up from 16% in the previous school year. These disparities will continue to become apparent as the fallout from the pandemic continues. In most rural schools are set to lose Essar funded school nursing positions. Dodie and Romney nurses are both currently partially funded by Essar at Dodie we are 20 to 30 minutes from a hospital. In my tenure there we have had to call the ambulance for a student, it took about a half hour for the ambulance to arrive. And if the student had needed to be transported it would have taken another half hour. One hour from the emergent situation. If there had been no nurse, I'm afraid to think of what might have happened. School nurses play a critical role in managing the physical emotional mental and social needs of students while conducting health screenings, facilitating compliance with health mandates, and reducing burdens on educators and staff. All while supporting a positive and healthy school climate, leaving our schools with less than full time nursing coverage is irresponsible. Jessica. Becca. Hi everyone my name is Becca Mandel I'm a parent of two kids at Romney one in kindergarten and one in second grade who's here, they're both here actually. I just, I want to echo a lot of what has been said here and I think with the 3b budget that proposes the restructuring, which is actually pretty significant restructuring at Dodie and Romney. I actually think that those changes really need to happen as part of a much larger community process they are really, really drastic and severe, and I think do not belong in a quick on budget process like we're having right now. And they, one of the things that. Sorry, there's a lot I want to say in my minutes are ticking down. So I just you know we want to keep our schools vibrant because that's what attracts folks here and I'm really struck by our declining enrollment numbers seem to be predominantly in towns where there isn't broadband yet there's not high speed internet. We saw a lot of COVID refugees we're going to see a lot more climate refugees coming to our communities. Our district is so desirable we're near Montpelier we're near recreation we're near so many great things, cutting the programming at our schools cutting our schools is really, I think short-sighted plan right now as we're going to see more and more people moving in as we get broadband finally so that people can move in and live in our communities so I think we should not fund such a but not the lower level budget and make these changes after a long community process. Thank you. Thank you Becca. Dina. So, my name is Deanna Murray, I am the preschool teacher at Romney School. It is stated on page four of this meetings packet that all of these reductions will allow our schools to maintain robust programming for our students. My concern is how are we maintaining this robust programming with significant cuts across our district, specifically speaking about the reduction of library programs, completely cutting Spanish at Romney and not having kids at their local schools. And that last piece is in regards of moving Dodie preschool and Dodie sixth grade to Romney next year. I'm a teacher at Romney. I feel the need to express the importance of having preschool age children in their local school in order to start building a sense of community in the town where they reside. Dodie preschool, it must be noted is an absolutely high quality program and should be kept exactly where it is. And it's also important to note that the people that will be affected by these cuts are people that are part of our community, and that care deeply about the schools and and the communities where we live. Thank you. Thank you and I apologize. This pronounced your name. Mark Brown. I can't see you but I see your hand is up. Hi Mark welcome. Just turn my video on to go. Go ahead. Yeah. Thank you to the board for doing this additional meeting. Thank you to Megan for all the work to create two new budgets. My name is Mark Brown. I'm a teacher at you 32 a callous resident. My wife is a paraprofessional a callous elementary and I have two sons a callous elementary and I'm lucky enough to be Avery Cochran's TA at you 32. In other words, this district's welfare and my family's welfare are inextricably linked. I always all students at callous in all the students in our district need librarians five days a week, librarians help build a love of reading. They help our kids to explore world they serve as a valuable refuge for many of our kids who need a quiet and calm and peaceful place at school. I heard you say that this cut at callous would make it equal to other schools in the district. I believe some of our elementary schools do have full time librarians. So I wonder if bringing calls in line is related to per pupil librarians. But anyway, at the last meeting, some board members supported the idea of using the fund balance to help lessen the tax impact of preserving our programs. I didn't hear that idea tonight. I would sincerely encourage the board to consider doing that for next year and lead a district wide discussion of structural changes so we can talk less about what we're taking away from our kids and how we strengthen these beautiful programs we already have. Thank you. Thank you, Mark. Brittany Paolo. Hi. Yeah, can you hear me. Yes, go ahead. Okay. My name is Brittany Powell. I'm a parent parent of a Doty pre case student. It's true the program at Doty is magical. My son began attending Doty after facing several really difficult transitions and other programs where we were commuting upwards of 45 minutes each way to drop him off for childcare when both my husband and I work from home. So as a two parent full time working household, our family chose to send our son to Doty because it because it was the only full time available program in the area. We're really sad and frustrated at the proposed change in programming in a time when there is increased dialogue and pressure for action to address the crisis and access to affordable early education programming in Vermont. The setting and combining programs seems incredibly short sighted, asking with their parents to choose between busing young students under five or driving them to neighboring schools doesn't provide an equitable way to access education for our youngest students, or does it signal an investment in their potential and the needs of working parents, asking current Doty families to transition their kids to new programs and situations is a huge disruption to both education and the health of working families. Thank you. Thank you. Jasper. Hi, can you hear me. Yes, perfect. Yes, we can hear you in a little bit louder would be great. Hi, hi, my name is Jasper in the current senior you 32 I use their them pronouns. In third grade I transferred to Calis elementary school from water school and due to the nature of other schools I entered completely and utterly unable to read. The Calis library was integral to my journey as a student and I was able to catch up solely due to the library. During that journey, it often often became a refuge and a safe haven for me like it does for many neurodiverse queer other marginalized students. In third grade I entered it unable to read by the end of six, I had left house being able to read at a college level I had read basically every book in the fantasy section and I had helped JLA bear categorize it. The librarians, not just the physical space are incredibly integral to the growth of students, and they provide a lot of support safety and security to students and to cut that opportunity and help in half is just completely uncautional to me. And that's all I have. Thank you. Thank you Jasper. We appreciate it. Next. Davis. I'm not sure of s a Davis. I'm not I can't see a face so I don't know who it is. Oh there. Yeah, I'm here. I can't say it's a little dark so if you don't mind introducing yourself and get started you have one minute and 30 seconds. Yeah, so my name is Sarah Davis I'm a Worcester resident and I have a two year old is with me that I was planning to send a dirty next year and in fact one of the reasons that I moved to Worcester was because of Dodie and the ability to start our daughter there and have her move all the way through pre K and elementary school at the same place. So I'm going to be part of a community that is our own community and to have her have continuity and security as she moves through that. And so sorry as you can see I'm actually really disturbed by the combined services model between Dodie and Romney because early childhood care is at a complete crisis level in this area, especially in the moral communities and those are the ones that are being affected the most by these proposals and forcing parents to send their three and four year olds to a non local school, and for six graders to have to spend this like random year at a different school and just isn't a workable proposal I think and I understand that the board is trying to come up with creative solutions to a very challenging budget client, but climate but I think cutting programming to our youngest kids right at these really sensitive points in their education just doesn't seem like the right approach to that. Again early childhood care is just at a complete crisis level here there are literally no other options for people with young children, weightless at private programs are literally and the hundreds if you can even get on it all and so I just think it's incredibly important to maintain these programs for for communities here especially the smaller ones. Thank you. Thank you. I just realized that I was going by the pictures and I still have some people on the side so I'm going to ask Caitlin. My finger cracked. My finger cracked. Hey so to buy your own muted. Okay, I found this on the web for Byron. You ready for me. Yes. Hi, my name is Caitlin Hawonsky and I am a list of residents. I moved to Worcester to raise my children in a loving community where they are known and valued as individuals. Both my husband and I had education experiences where we were just an anonymous number broadly shuffled around based on budget or administration needs. I'm horrified to think that the same thing to be preparing for my children, a pre K student last year and one who's upcoming in the 24 25 school year as such effects are long lasting. My schooling was also at so called robust levels and the levels at Dodie are far superior. Practically speaking, I will either have to put a three year old on the bus for how long, or put my then six year old on the bus for well over an hour, either of these benefit my children or my family. I'm also relying on the Dodie pre K program is the only full time pre K program in the district. It's only because of this I've been able to return to my career and without it I do not know what I will do. I very much want to encourage the board to maintain the current level of staffing for a school nurse illness and need do not follow a schedule when students or staff are in a building there is a need my son utilize the school nurses today. And I'm so glad that nurses just was there for him. Further I would like to add, what are we as a society if we are not willing to spend our money on quality education for our youngest people. Thank you. Thank you. Meg. Meg, can you hear me. Yeah, we can hear you now. Go ahead. Great. Hi, everyone. My name is my Allison. Thank you for your time. I'm a teacher librarian at you 32 as well as the current past president of the Revont School Library Association. I dedicate not only for retaining the current level of service at the Calis school library, but to propose full time librarians at all of our schools. Our national library standard state the school libraries must facilitate opportunities to experience diverse ideas by promoting the use of high quality and high interest literature in formats that reflect the diverse developmental cultural social and linguistic needs of all our students. The updated educational quality standards ensures that all students will have access to print multimedia and alternate technology formats that represent the diversity of students personal experiences. Our school libraries are places that are uniquely designed to support the work and vision of the act one working group. The goals of the eq us updates are ambitious. They aim to ensure that equity is at the center of everything we do in schools. They aim to create safe and inclusive spaces for all students. As a school district committed to equity, justice and inclusion as articulated through our humanity and justice coalition. I ask that our school board provide full time library services at all our schools. Ultimately, I believe that the libraries of the wcu usd provide a strong foundation for our students as we co create equitable anti racist culturally responsive and a discriminatory inclusive places for all. Thank you, Meg. I believe that land is and I apologize if I mispronounce your name. Please introduce yourself or is that you, Kyle. I can't see a visual. Hi, I'm Mela. I'm an operator at you 32. The library is my favorite place in the school and the librarians are some of my favorite people. The library and librarians support and benefit everyone including the faculty, whether it's helping you find a book providing you with resources to learn about something or teaching media and technology skills. The library's foster learning and creativity and librarians are necessary for this to happen. The school board should not cut the library budget or the working hours for librarians in our district because our school community would be less creative, less fun and with a lot less learning and creative thinking without them. I would also like to add that cutting the other budgets such as music in Spanish also should not happen because those were some of my favorite parts of school as a student. My name is Talitha. I'm going to chime in. Thank you for this additional meeting. Thank you very much for communicating about these meetings. I appreciate the communication. I would like to see level service next year and I would like to let you let the communities vote and decide on these tax increases. I just decided that we'd pay a little more to see our schools remain level service complete. No changes. I've also heard the phrase alignment with other schools quite a bit. I'd like to see the strategy and philosophy used to raise people up, not as a race to the bottom. Thank you very much for listening tonight. Thank you. Amy. Amy young. Hi, my name is Amy young, and I'm the librarian and tech integration specialist at Berlin elementary school. Thank you for giving us time to speak. I'm going off script because a lot of things I would want to say have already been said, I would like to echo the idea of raising our libraries up rather than bringing them down. My good friend Ali struggle to maintain two libraries and a two day and a three day level, and she's just drowning in it. And to give you a little history I've been there 16 years before me there was a full time librarian, straight librarian with an assistant that was cut. As a librarian, it's been my job has changed. I've been stuff has been added. I've been made into being a librarian and tech integrationists. So I wouldn't lose my job. They just pile more and more on. And I don't want to see that keep happening to the other libraries. I depend on a volunteer that comes at least three, sometimes five days a week from one o'clock to 330 to keep me above water to keep me from drowning and all of the work. And I am able to offer makerspace and book lunch groups because of that volunteer help. But if we keep cutting away, all of the good stuff that we can offer is just going to be gone to the wayside so I want to build a stop rather than tear us down. Thank you. Thank you Amy Danielle. Welcome. Hi. I don't know if you can see me but I'm here with my beautiful daughter Sophia who's in grade five at East Montpelier elementary school. And on Friday she brought home this book I don't know if you can see it but the cover of the book has a beautiful black girl on it. I know this is because of her librarian who has made this available to her she came home she talked for about a half hour, but how excited she was about this book. And I am grateful for Arlen and for all of the library services. And in terms of the humanity and justice role. It's right here it's right here in my hand and I really want to say that the library services are crucial. Thank you so much for your time. Is Sarah. Can you hear me sir. Yep, you hear me okay. Hi there. My name's Sarah. I am a parent of two children at Dodie. We moved here a couple years ago and the pre K program specifically was a godsend to our family and was a huge reason why this specific town worked for our family. I can't even imagine not having that program. It is like incredible. What can see and Mindy have built in just a couple of short years is nothing short of amazing. It would be devastating to our community to not have that program. I feel fortunate that I don't need to have that for the full time but I know so many of my friends need to have that full time access to childcare. So many of my friends who are transplants to this community as well who are coming into this district with young ones and are also needing that kind of full time care. Something specifically that came to mind was that. So we have two kids so like if we had come into this district my three year old at the time would have in this situation gone to Romney while my seven year old went to Dodie like their siblings are going to get split up because of this and with so many new people coming into the district. It just breaks my heart and quickly as far as school nurse goes I have lots of thoughts but I believe that is irresponsible and does not reflect the guidelines of a safe and healthy school. My family is my son has Tourette's I can't continue but. Thank you Sarah. Shani welcome. Thank you so much. I just I want to, I'm Chani Waterhouse I live in Worcester. I'm a parent and resident and I want to just start with expressing my deep gratitude for the board I'm a former board member. The finance team the leadership team the faculty and the staff I know how hard the work is that you're doing and how heavy it weighs on your hearts. I know we're all here because of how much we love kids and want the best for them. So the what's weighing heaviest on my heart is how structural changes that are already happening that I'm already seeing in the SU, as well as those being proposed may impact community connectedness for kids. There is a lot of data confirming that community connectedness is a protective factor for children and youth and supports better outcomes across a wide range of life experiences. Worcester is a town with relatively high numbers of families impacted by socioeconomic hardship. It's also a town with, I think, relatively community connectedness. Kids need to feel held by a loving multi generational community. Let's not rush into structural changes without time to understand big impacts especially for the kids who are already having the hardest time and consider how we could be investing in differential engagement support and community connectedness. Thank you so much. Thank you, Kenny. Amy Rose. My name is Amy Rose and I'm a middle sex resident and a parent of children at Romney and you 32. I want to start by thanking you for hosting this forum. I'm deeply concerned that none of the budget options presented include budget recommendations that do not include cuts and consolidations with the current rate of inflation, we should expect school budgets to increase. I'm willing to accept the tax burden and to think creatively to ensure that our school community remains whole. These cuts are not simply positions but humans. The humans who fill these roles are members within our community, and they are valued. Collectively, these individuals and their roles support our children every day. They fill in when others are out sick. They expand our children's minds and offer countless opportunities for all our kiddos, creating a space where our children are offered an opportunity to practice the love of learning, build deep curiosity and experienced human connection to our school. Reducing staff impacts morale, and at least scars. My seventh grader was shocked by the consolidation recommendations. Please get more input before making shifts during these critical moments in the development of our children. And disheartened that the term equity is being used in an effort to reduce opportunities. I've always celebrated equity as a means to expand opportunities for those most marginalized rather than take away resources from all. I've always voted in favor of school budgets and I'm proud of that. However, I'm not confident that we can vote for a budget that causes harm. Our children are. Thank you, Amy Melinda. Hello, can you hear me okay. Yes, welcome. Hello, thank you. My name is Melinda desk. I work in the Doty pre K program with Chrissy Pollard. And I just want to start off by saying I echo everything that Chrissy said. All of my children have attended Doty pre K and to think that other families in the Doty community wouldn't be given the same chance to experience the love, passion and quality care that Chrissy and myself provide for everyone in the community. It just is saddening that that is even on the table. My second part before I don't want to run out of time would be that my daughter happens to be one of the fifth graders that is moving that they're thinking about moving. I just want to say that as a parent I think that moving my fifth grader to remedy during the last year of elementary school is a mistake, and that she's already has anxiety and fears while you've been up to you 32 in the next coming years so to repair at a Doty year earlier than to attend a new school where she has no supports relationships would be physically and mentally tolling, especially when so many of them have looked forward to being sixth graders at Doty and sharing the same Doty traditions that their siblings experienced. As an educator I asked in question, if the physical mental and educational well being of the fifth graders have been taken into account since they've endured so much in the past few years to make them think that they are going to I'm going to run out of time, but I just feel passionate about that and I think that we shouldn't be moving them. Thank you Melinda. Lisa, and then I have Michael and Kathy, and then we'll move into the board deliberations. So go ahead Lisa. Thank you, my name is Lisa Hannah I'm a Worcester resident and former fifth and sixth grade teacher at Doty, I have two kids at Doty currently. And for one I would just like to thank everyone who's spoken so far, and echo everything that everyone has said about the district as a whole and about Doty. I just have one clarifying question without repeating a lot of feeling strong feelings and emotions that everyone has said but one clarifying question I would have that I haven't seen yet the answer to is with the proposed restructuring of Doty at the fifth grade level. What does that look like for the rest of Doty, having a five six classroom with small class sizes, does that also impact the rest of the structure of Doty, what would the fifth graders do. I would just be curious what the board is thinking about that or what the administrative team is thinking about that. Thank you. Thank you Lisa. Michael, can you hear me Michael. Yeah, I can hear you I can't see you but I can hear you welcome Michael. Okay. Not sure if I can do the video, but anyway, so a couple of quick things one is as a taxpayer and homeowner in middle sex. I would really not favor this budget probably voted down because my property values will go down. That's better off paying a little more in taxes every year to support strong schools than to see people leave town to the other school districts. So that's an economic impact. The other is in your creative pursuit. What about redrawing the shed, the draw lines for these schools. In other words, you're talking about middle sex Worcester cows. There are schools in those towns. But maybe it makes more sense to think about who lives near those schools draw five mile circle 10 mile circle. And I think you need some time to consider that. So I also echo this being way too radical change for doing on on the fly like this. There's a lot of, I think unintended consequences that people have raised. So I really urge you not to pursue such a big change in this method. Thank you, Michael. Kate, I see you now. Sorry, say a cat. See it, but I see you now, go ahead, Kate. Thank you for I don't have anything rehearsed. I've got body here. Michael, I think everything you just said I don't know you but that just rang so true to me. I feel like more communication and conversation about all of these cuts. And what we need, especially with consolidation it from the last board meeting to this one it just breaks my heart I grew up in a small pillar and moved to middle sex specifically for the quality of the primary teachers and specifically the Spanish program. And I also do the school nurse subbing for Romney and Dodie and you 32. And all of these cuts really I'm just I would so much rather have a larger conversation about the budget and potentially increasing that rather than potentially sacrificing all of these incredible programs which is why we chose to live here so there's a lot more that I'd like to say about the nursing piece because I've had the privy of being able to do the nurse subbing at three of the different schools for almost six years now and I have a lot of insight about that but I just I think the more conversation we can have about that would be really beneficial. Thank you. Okay, with the with that we're going to conclude the public comment part of the meeting. Mark, do you mind taking out that. Taking out the timer, I see that a couple of hands. Okay, that's your hand Kate that's coming up. Kathleen. I don't want to be rude and with anybody but yes. I can see you. Yeah. Okay, this is going to be the last comment to get everybody that is in there and then we'll get started. So if you would give me a minute I'm just going to start the manual timer okay go ahead. Sorry, it's really dark in my car. I just want to offer something that hasn't been said tonight. I'm actually a Worcester resident my name is Kathleen Bookchin. And I've actually already left your district this year. I've put my kid in private school, because I wasn't fulfilled enough with what is currently happening at the Worcester, and the Washington Central Supervisor Union So, to think that we are actually considering further cutting is emotionally upsetting obviously from what you've heard tonight and I just wanted to offer that too. I think that you're cutting library you're cutting Spanish, you're cutting music. You're cutting some of the food. Staffing I just. Again, I echo what to let the set as far as let's increase our education in our communities let's not cut it and I think if you gave the taxpayers and ability to make a choice. I too would like to shut this down and raise our communities up not further cut them. Thank you. Thank you. Nothing. Okay. And now that we have I'm just going to stop this right there. I don't want the timer to go on. So before an album around this by the board but so we're going to move into our third part of the night. We are nine minutes past our ending time so I'm assuming board members that we're going to be here for a little while. So we're going to move into the board operations and the discussion of the of the budget, the documents that we received before we get started. I was wondering if we could address some of the key questions that that were raised, or do you rather have a individual board member that I was, I was hoping, this is my thinking, I was hoping that we could talk a little bit just a couple of snippets on preschool there. There's some misconceptions that I want to clear a little bit about library and a little bit about a, what does it look for Doty community with the numbers on the sixth grader. Is that fair for the staff and the leadership team. Megan I'm looking at you and please say no, if this doesn't make any sense at all but I think it will help while the community is still here to know sure that's no problem floor. I'll respond to the questions that I think we can respond to right now. There's one that I don't know if we can, but I will put it into the room and ask. And then, then I think we can move on, because I not everything I, we would be able to respond to so the first thing I would say is more of a common and a reminder. The concept of a pre K combined services program. First of all, the goal is actually to create a more robust program that can be done when there is scale so there were a couple of comments about full day and half day. Those are conversations that could come out of the planning of what the program would look like together. It is not an elimination of a program the goal would be to serve all students and potentially serve more students than it currently serve so that's more of a clarification. There was a question about what would happen if enrollment projections are not accurate. What would happen then so I would say two things one I would remind the board that our enrollment decline has sustained over time. So the predictions several years ago have held those predictions come from kind of demographic analysis and those things. That is an internal analysis we also have an external firm that does most of the work around New England to kind of compare our numbers to. And so they come from, we do not have evidence to suggest that we would have huge enrollment gains. That said, any board, any community if there were a spike in enrollment that caused class sizes to be high, the board would have to come together and address that. But I do want to be clear that our enrollment projections have held very well over the past number of years. And by that I mean they have declined and the predicted decline has been met, and if anything exceeded. So there was that piece. There was a question around what would the sustainable school health model be. And the answer to that question is we need to design it. And we have to do anyway we have to do that because the additional FTE put in with Essar funds, the funding for that goes away so they're already in a year would need to be a conversation about designing that. So administration doesn't have the immediate answer there would be a process that includes engagement with our nurses and our faculty and staff around designing that. And the question floor that I don't know that I can answer off the top of my head is what would the classes look like in Doty if grade six were to move I would start by saying and then Gillian it you can either tell me that you can answer it or not. And because of the kids moving up, there would, there would be class sizes that made sense with what is left because the group that would be moving if that model were to be put in place is very small. Gillian do you have a sense of what this class sizes would look like or would we need some more time to be able to describe that. We need more time to describe and to talk through because at this point it is a, it's a concept and something to put on the table as a consideration and it's not a thought through model. Thanks Gillian so floor that's the list of things that I feel like we could respond to off the top happy to respond to board questions during their conversations but the question that I had written here I think there was a perception that we were losing library or having less money for books or, you know, so could I don't have cat or you can talk to that there were a lot of cats residents I just want to make sure that we can. The board has that information not necessarily responding to public comment that this moment because we will respond to public comment but just getting some information so that it informs our discussion. So first of all there is no reduction in this budget to supply lines library budgets, how they function in terms of what books are allowed and not allowed. It really is a reduction that brings the staffing into alignment with the proportions and other systems. Cat, I can't see you on my screen so I can't see your face and whether or not. If you had would have anything to add to that. The only thing that I would add is, um, I, this is my eighth year, working on the budgeting process and I have been looking at the declining enrollment for callus for quite some time, and the predict the projections from eight years ago about where we would be on this day are pretty spot on. And it does hurt my heart a little bit to see things change so I just want to be honest about that I'm a callus taxpayer I grew up and went to callus and you 32. I am invested in this community, and I don't want to see things change, and I want to show my care for kids by doing what's best for them and what a student centered and that is programming that is student centered and fiscally responsible for our payers. Many years ago, we realized with this decline enrollment we needed to make a change in the number of fte's in our classroom. Teachers, and over the last few years we have begun to make commensurate cuts in fte across our allied arts, so that the that so that students are getting everything that they need, and a way that does not have to adjust every time there's an ebb and flow. We have not yet done that with library calluses down to 92 students today, and the projections for next year are lower. I don't think that we need a full time librarian and can still offer. Do I have the exact answer about exactly what we need to right size. I don't have any speculation and library and tech and all of those wonderful elements that all of the people spoke about today. I don't have that right now. I just know we don't need a full time. Thank you, Kat. Thank you, Megan. So with that, we're going to move into discussion, and this will be a conversation with you guys is still the finance committee met yesterday, and we have not a motion recommendation just to get the conversation frame today, the recommendation of the finance committee and finance committee members could raise their hands was just not just me was that we that we should start a conversation with 3B, and their commendation of the finance committee was to recommend 3B to the finance committee. I can go down the list of why but I want to keep it open minded for each board member to be able to reflect in and not as your opinion about what we were thinking. So, so with that I wanted to open it for for discussion is that okay with the finance committee is that true to what we agreed on. Okay, so I what I'm going to do is really call in each of you just because I want to make sure that everybody has a turn. So if you want to raise your hand or if you're okay with me just calling on you either way it's okay with me but I think it's important for all of us to get a reflection on that. If that's okay. Volunteers to get started. Diane. Oh, sorry, Michael, you're first looking at the pictures and go ahead. So are we sorry for are we giving our reaction or asking questions or both. So both but a reaction to 3B will be will be great and asking the questions within that to start, and then we can move the idea is that then we can move and say well maybe this is not where we need to be we can go back to let's say version two of the budget but that 3B fell by the finance committee responsible, and that there were certain amount of over to I'm starting to speak for the finance committee, I just want you guys to give your input. So 3B is the one with the combined services. Yes. Yes. Okay. Um, so I read this last night and then proceeded to have nightmares about this process. And as a person who went to Doty and as a Western resident and a Doty mom. The concept of Doty students transitioning from Romney to Doty to Romney to you 32 feels disruptive. And it also feels like a temporary fix because, you know, numbers wise what works for this year's fifth grade probably isn't going to work for the following years, you know, 26th grade. So I'm not sure this is a sustainable model. I also worry that this is a larger conversation to have and it's an important conversation to have with all the communities in terms of restructuring, but it's a lot to do in what feels like a rushed manner. As someone pointed out, Doty is at least in some measures are most vulnerable community. And so it feels unfair in that sense. And lastly, I guess getting to the question component I would be curious to hear from Gillian her thoughts on it as principle at Doty. And there was one more thing I was going to say but what was it. Now I don't remember. So I guess, in terms of the combined services. I have a lot of concerns on this draft. Thank you, Megan. Oh, I know what I was going to say. Okay. Doty pre K is amazing. I'm going to second what everyone else said. So the idea, I know Megan, you said it's not like closing a program, but it feels like it's taking this amazing five star full time pre K. And putting it somewhere else, not to say it wouldn't be amazing at Romney but like, if Doty is thriving, if we're going to move people just move more people to Doty. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks. Thanks for the presentation. But again, we have a very strong outpouring from our community. More from Wooster, this time than middle sex last time. So we had a also a strong outpouring from middle sex. And, you know, one of the threads I take from the outpouring is the cuts that are being proposed are for direct service positions that have a significant impact on opening opportunities for students like librarians, the coaching. And then see the Spanish program at Romney. That is a program cut. There's no other way to say what is being proposed for Spanish at Romney is anything other than a program cut. I don't see any other programmatic cuts that are being proposed. But that is a program type it's not a staffing type because it's, you know, specific to the Spanish program. But what I think we have to do pretty strongly and I supported is that we should endorse a level funded a level service budget. And then our communities vote on whether to support that type of budget or not. If the community, it's another method of community voice by having a vote, and if the community votes it down, then we come back and we have backup plans, or this backup timelines for what we want to do. The other thing that I see here is that we're targeting the cuts to direct services for students, and we talk about wanting to provide the best we can for our students and I understand that there are financial constraints. But if we're talking about reductions, the place that shouldn't happen to me is direct service to students, because that's where it matters most me. I don't see administrative cuts. And if we're having reductions in students at local elementary schools, we've seen that there would be a corresponding reduction in administrative need at those schools. And so combining maybe principal ships amongst the elementary schools and maintaining direct student services would be a way to go. I didn't hear anything about coming athletics. I mean direct services to students to me, and we're making choices these cuts represent choices by what we're deciding to include in potential cuts and what we have not even talked about. So, you know, we're making those value choices, even though that we haven't discussed them. So I would support level service budget, and if our communities reject it, then they reject it and we come back to the front door. Thank you. Thank you Chris Dan. Yeah, you know basically, I, I, I want to be clear too that I don't mean any disrespect to the leadership team and to the creative thinking that they've been doing. I just, I worry that as some people noted, it's a little bit quick. We really didn't have much turnaround time around this. I think there's some ideas that have been percolating. And so this is us trying to work through that. Historically, I know there was, you know, I was the preschool teacher at Berlin for many years and I know that at one point, there was a combined preschool between Dodie and Romney. I think for a variety of reasons that it didn't work. And so I think we also identified that it used to be within Jen's job that she really organized and kept things up to date and we as a board voted to put a person into that position and I think we need to look at that similar to what McKaylin saying is there a way of encouraging and gathering people to go to choose these quality programs. I, I think we need more time to really clearly identify. And so I support a level funding. And I want to be clear that I'm not saying that when we have the hard conversations, and we need to start those hard conversations that it wouldn't necessarily that we wouldn't get to a point. But right now I'm concerned that there hasn't been the opportunity to fully understand and fully flesh it out for the community, so that one understands. I also really appreciate the point that preschool and sixth grade are critical transition times. And we already know that there are transitions that will occur. And so to then compound that doesn't seem to be a good idea to me. So I guess, you know, I think there are ways of raising up our standards and our, our programming. And we just, I feel we need some more time and a wider conversation I trust our leadership team and I appreciate cat, your statement about those numbers. I just think though that it's, it is dramatic changes, and we need a bigger conversation. Thank you, Dan, Carrie. Hi everybody. I want to thank everyone who is here tonight and everyone who spoke a lot of great points. Also want to thank the leadership team I thought that was an excellent presentation, both in the content and the clarity of the analysis that's really as clear as I mean, a few points that are on my mind. One thing I want to acknowledge right off the bat is these numbers are not as bad as I feared they might be so I think that's just something I want to say. I also think that it was mentioned earlier but I think one of the most important points in this process to me is in the memo on page four of our packet there's a very clear statement from leadership team that they're judging that these assumptions that were the ones that were included in version two are appropriate educate educationally in their professional judgment that carries a lot of weight with me. The point, good to point out that the tax rate projection that's built into these into the assumptions of this budget is based on the commissioners letter and that includes its own assumption of a full use of the state fund commissioners and I think we should keep in mind that that that will be a political process we don't know how it's going to turn out, and I'm inclined to be more conservative as a result in budgeting than we might usually be. I'll point out, you know, it's probably clear to everybody but in all of these scenarios where we're talking about increases for our taxpayers across across the board in all of our towns, to some extent and this year. Everyone is paying more for other expenses in their lives, a lot more in the case of energy and food and housing and other expenses so and also that some people in our town their incomes will grow commensurate with inflation, but many will not. And so I think that's important to keep in mind. I have a lot of empathy for the comments that remain tonight. I think we all want what's best for our students in our district, we would be in such a different situation if our communities were growing but that's not the situation we're in. And I just, I need to state that over the long term. This year and over the long term we need to match our spending and our staffing levels to the enrollment and we're this year we're looking at a 2 and a half percent decline in enrollment. It seems to responsible to me to be reducing our staffing in, you know, consistent with that. And likely, we're going to be facing similar decisions next year and the year after that and not reducing where it's appropriate to do. So this year is really delaying and potentially even dealing with even more budget pressure next year. And last thing I want to say is that the trends dictate, I think that combined services are coming for us and we're going to be looking at those kinds of changes in the near future. One example, I don't think that I think that we will be considering is having all sixth graders go to you 32. I just, I think that's not an unreasonable thing to think about. I think what, you know, if we can think of this as an opportunity in some sense, we should view next year as an opportunity to try some combined programs on a limited basis, and see what we can learn from them and so that's why I'm, I'm favoring 3B. Thank you. Thank you, Carrie. Natasha. Good evening. First of all, I just want to thank everyone for coming out tonight. It's great to see so many people participating, especially from the town of Worcester. I was very excited to see so much participation. And I'm just looking down on my notes to make sure I cover everything I want to say. So, I want to start out by saying that the only year that my son attended at Doty was sixth grade. And that was a huge year for him to be able to transition from another school system into our school system and established friendships, moving into you 32. I would honestly say that his sixth grade year at Doty is probably the best elementary experience he had in the three different schools that he has been in between Baltimore, Northfield, and Washington Central. So, I would, I would hate to see other sixth graders not be able to have that same sort of experience that he had, and that came from the teacher he had and came from the group of students that he was with and it came from the leadership and the compassion and love that Gillian showed to him as a new student So, I would, I would hate to see sixth grade move out out of Worcester. I also just want to echo some of the thoughts that I think that we do have to be responsible and think about some creative solutions to this. But I think it does need to be a bigger conversation, and I appreciate the community members who said that they, they would like to have more opportunity to participate in this conversation, and not just in a couple meetings, leading up to the vote. So, I understand we're going to have to make tough decisions, whether it's this year or next year or the year after. But I think that if we're going to be talking about restructuring how our schools look that needs to be a bigger conversation and a conversation that our community members can be a part of, and pushing that further out, I think is going to enable us to have more of that kind of participation from the community. Thank you. Hey, Joshua. Everyone, I just want to say thanks for everyone who showed up the leadership team. I just want to say right off the bat that I do support option 3b. I think that to go ahead with level funding is just as some others have pointed out, it doesn't seem very responsible given the decline in, given the decline in enrollment. I support combined services. I did not know that Dodie had such a reputable BK program. And one of my questions that I think was raised by a fellow board member is why, why combine, why go to Romney, and why not students from middle sex go to Dodie. That's one question. I'm not saying they should do that just a question that comes to mind and the, the combining or having six graders from Dodie go to one go for one year to Romney seems a bit clunky to me but overall, like I do, I do support 3b even if that is still part of it. I just, I wonder if that needs to be part of it. That's my only, it's been a comment on that. Anyway, thank you everybody. Thank you so much, Joshua. I think if Daniel if you would allow me, Megan, I'm wondering if, if you could speak a little bit of the preschool program I at least I haven't urged say like my kids went to preschool in East Montpelier and it was a great program actually my kids moved out of the school and I didn't want that to happen and I, you know, I had to learn about that so could we just explain a little bit do we have a good preschool program in every school. Yeah, thanks for, I think, you know one of the advantages to being a system that collaborates across the system is that we do have very high quality pre K programs in all of our schools and we would rely on that quality and expertise to design a system to serve two communities and that's really what it is which is a different thing than just closing one and putting kids in another one. It is very much designing what is needed for those two communities. Yes, it would be at one site instead of two and there's changes associated with that and we're not naive to those at all. Our programs are very high quality, led very well by a team of people and so that is what that would look like is really a design of a program to serve two communities, building on the successes that we already have. Thank you, Daniel. Oh, I'm sorry, I did not mean to infer that that's a wrong program. No, no, I get it just but we, we had some. If it's five days already that's amazing that's one of the reasons why I don't send my child to Romney is because it's not it doesn't support working parents already so that's all I did not mean to. It was not because of you I just wanted to clarify that we have good programs in elementary school. Yeah, yeah, okay. Yeah, and the hope is that it will help working parents like you. Okay, Daniel. Thanks. I just want to do acknowledge all, all of what everyone said I was also want to acknowledge a lot of written comments that we've received by email as a board from people who maybe couldn't make it here. Also the questions from Dodie that McKaylin shared. We've, we've all had a chance to, well, we've received them I had a chance to look at them while I was listening to some people speak earlier. I acknowledge the fact that there's a lot of people out there who also don't oppose funding our schools adequately but also who are very afraid of the rising costs in their own household budgets. I'm leaning towards supporting a level service budget or whatever is closest to that offered. I'm interested in knowing what the process would be. If voters choose to vote that down. What the costs are of that, both the financial costs of the district in having to pull together alternative and conventional time of year, and also the political and social costs of the community which I acknowledge people maybe can't quantify as easily. I really appreciated a lot of what Carrie pointed out where we're in sort of a bleak period, funding wise and budget wise and socio economically and demographically here. The increase in property taxes is big. We're facing a significant increase in property taxes under the best case scenario here. And I agree with Kari and I think it's worth repeating what Kari said that the 63 million offered are currently in the Education Fund as a surplus is almost certainly not all going to be available to us. So, those projected tax rates are going to be higher than than what we're listed. So we should go in with our eyes open. I also not to be snarky or snide appreciate the attendancy I hope everyone else was here and even more show up for conversations about restructuring. So I'm not going to oppose. I mean, I am going to oppose restructuring sort of in this quick. What feels to me like a quick way this year, but restructuring of some kind has to happen it doesn't necessarily have to be negative thing. I think there's a lot of opportunity, like what Megan was saying, I acknowledge the opportunity that the consolidation of the pre K might offer that I want to see possibly, you know, across the entire district, five days a week, full day pre K as a possibility in restructuring yes it might require some consolidation but imagine that imagine. A lot of other opportunities world language exposure for all elementary elementary schools. Maybe some amazing things to come out of restructuring but we all have to bring sort of our full hearts to that so I hope we all do. Thank you Daniel. I'm going to try to pull two questions and maybe Megan can help us answer that that would inform the board members. So, so first question man would be, what would it mean if the budget that voted down what does it really mean for the people doing the work. And then the second one that I think we didn't do enough today, maybe, and we haven't done it in a little while is could you talk a little bit about the sunsetting of the answer once to try to combine those two, if you're okay with that. That would be great. Thanks. I'll start with a budget voting down. There's a couple of really immediate things that happen. And the first one is. It is really difficult after the typical budget season to turn around with an effective timeline, because new budget would then have to be warned with the right amount of time forward and so it. I mean, we think this process felt rushed it would be much more rushed. Now, it is true we've already talked a lot about reductions and so if the board we're just going to then take those reductions. And it's never quite that simple so it's an incredibly compressed timeline. The other thing though that that's a reality that that is real but perhaps we could adjust to it the second piece is much different and more difficult and that is because in the timeframe that we would need as a system to notify potential teachers of potential reductions. If we don't know what those reductions are, because we aren't sure if the budget will pass, and there's a risk of cutting positions after the, we would notify people of a potential reduction in force early and we would potentially be notifying more people, because we would have to cast a wider net, because otherwise, we would find ourselves in a position where we haven't met those notifications and then we're unable to make the cuts regardless of the budget situation. There's a couple of impacts. One, it has a psychological and emotional impact it already does it already has, even in these hypothetical conceptual conversations. But the second piece is it also causes teachers to look around and in Vermont right now, there are jobs available because there aren't enough. We know that we experienced that so we risk losing quality people. Budgets go down school districts figure that out but I think from a strategy standpoint, wait and see is really risky. And then the SRP sorry floor I forgot you had two questions. We talk about SR money a lot. It is a significant amount of money paying for a significant number of FTE in this current budget, and it goes away next year, one fell swoop. That means that we start next year's budget right out of the gate regardless of tax rate or anything like that in the whole, so to speak, we know that we've known it ever. We've known it since we put those positions in place. But that's another reality that we will have to face that I sometimes wonder if we really understand what that means it's like our budget will automatically our level service budget next year will automatically go up by a large number and that won't even count factoring teacher increases and all and all the other things that caused our first budget to go up. So a lot that's when we say thing like that's just delaying the inevitable. That's kind of what we mean that that is a significant cliff that we will have to adjust to and and that includes if we are having conversations about keeping those positions. Those positions either are gone or we find another funding source for them but again that's, that's that piece. So, I know that's been said before, but I think sometimes we lose sight of the magnitude of that. Suzanne, I hate putting my team on the spot. Do you have off the top of your head number for what that will be. I can get it for you. Give me just a minute. This is what I mean, but I don't really do that. But we're not talking about $50,000 or $100,000 we're talking about multiple hundreds. Right now, our best or is supporting $575,000. Thank you very much. Thank you, Suzanne. Eric, and then Maggie. Thank you. I want to thank the administration for the presentation at the beginning and all the information that you gave and I also want to thank the community for all the input that you've given tonight. It definitely made me stop and think a little more about my position on the budget and what all is going on and and you know what is important to folks, and I am leaning more towards the level funded budget. So I know there are parts of the other budgets that, you know, may not be as bad to cut if there are positions that are currently not filled or not needed. That could be cut out without any impact, but I really do see from both my own perspective and the communities, the importance of some of these other programs and positions being cut. And I really want to thank everybody for their, their well thought out comments tonight. In regards to that. So, um, so overall I was looking at 3B but I am more seriously leaning towards a level funded budget at this point. Thank you. Thank you, Eric, Maggie. I'm just reiterating what everyone else has said thanks to the administration for the two budget models and making the information accessible and palatable for those of us who don't live in the financial world in particular. And also for all the time that's been provided to answer questions as we've gone along tonight I think has been helpful to hear directly from administration rather than waiting until the end. Thank you, floor for facilitating that and for all the responses from Megan and Suzanne in particular. The first thing I wanted to comment on is the enrollment projection accuracy as a community member as a parent of children who attended callous elementary school one since pre K. Children who went through you 32 one still there. And my alarm when I was presented by that information disbelief over a decade ago by a prior superintendent. I didn't want to believe it. And here we are experiencing it now. And I want to reiterate my query from a prior recent meeting how can we prioritize engaging with the planning commissions and development review boards in our communities to support development. There is no housing for sale. They we can have all the high speed internet we want. There's no work for people to live and the affordability factor is real. So that to me, we need to be looking not just at the school but the larger community and how we can facilitate people moving here. I agree this is a great place to live equally attractive to the educational opportunities for my kids to grow up and having come from Massachusetts schools which are considered to be some of the best in the country. And this is something that my kids to have community and this is something that we do afford with our small schools. So strong proponent for small schools here, but I agree that we need to do some major planning that's far beyond schools themselves. With regards to the budget, the community members that came out today collectively expressed a desire for level service budget and some recommended an increase to enhance educate educational opportunities for you today. Now work as an educator in a neighboring school district, I spent eight years as a home health care provider home visiting and households across the county. And I want to acknowledge that there are other community voices that we're not hearing from who are struggling to afford property taxes experience transportation challenges experience food insecurity and challenges affording health care, like basic medications. Valids by mail offer everyone an opportunity to make their voices heard on the coming budget, but I just want to acknowledge we are not hearing from the entire community here we're hearing from the folks who are most immediately affected. And those other voices are valid and need to be brought to the table. I do support three a with the commitment to the visioning process. I have concerns about morale in what is an exceptional school district and experiencing school board resistance to supporting administrations budgeting goals in my own school district. I've seen firsthand had affects my coworkers and that insecurity. In the same way that Megan is saying, not knowing what the future holds, if the budget was voted down creates insecurity but we know our communities I think if you look back at the history of budget approval. We are overwhelmingly communities that prioritize education. So, I, my hunch is that we have some security in that right now. But when we talk about future years with the loss of the ESSER funding. And perhaps for some of the families that are participating today, that is the, the budgetary climate in which they have been raising their children in our school district, so they don't know what it was like before. I also want to say that I 110% believe in the importance of having school nurses in all the schools as a former school district employee I have seen the impact, not having full time nursing in a school when there were students who really needed access to that full time. And I'm also the child of a librarian so I understand that that's equally important so for all those reasons I'm sticking with 3a and trusting the community to make that determination collectively and much larger numbers than what we're seeing tonight. Thank you Maggie, Lindy. I moved and then I couldn't find my mute button. I've listened to a lot of this and I returned to the population numbers and student numbers. I've done it for years from before I was on the bigger board and at the school board, because sometimes as we get smaller. Well, not sometimes always the per student cost goes up, because it's very hard. If we still need to have a first grade, a second grade, a third grade, whatever, but we don't have as many kids and so that is my big concern and I had, I want to keep reiterating how small our schools are getting how they are so small. When I was working at East Montpelier the pre K was moved to the four corner school. It had been in the building but our numbers were almost 300 kids and that tells you how much our numbers have changed in 20 years. More than 20 years. So they moved the pre K to the four corner school which people weren't very thrilled with but it turned out to be a pretty nice place for the students but they weren't in the bigger school with all the kids. I, I think the idea of that sixth grade was, I just don't even, I don't get that one, but moving all sixth graders to a building somewhere in the future. When we have a plan, I understand, but I don't understand when I worked in the district and I was in all the schools, the Dodie banners with the eight kids that were the sixth grade class. They have them all over their gym. They had their names they had their year. Those kids had gone through and then they get into the big you 32 and just, I'm sure like my own children. They become friends with the person who lives the farthest in the district like my child. It was Riverton I think was his friend and it was so far to drive but they. It's such a great transition from the small school into the you 32 school. So we have great schools. I've been in all of them. I've worked in all of them. They all have their own taste. But voting a budget down. I've been in a district where the budget was voted down a few times. And as a staff member, it's very disheartening. You don't feel the community believes in you. You don't feel the board believes in you. You don't feel anybody does. And the timeframe on the administration to get all those budgets reworked and then a full town clerk having to run. It's, it's, it's not fun. So that scares me as well. I would like to say I appreciate some of the creative creativity, one of which was the principal teacher model that cat talked about. And that was something that Vermont was kind of known for in our small schools, a principal who taught reading or a principal who was also well Stephen this year, a math teacher. Those looking outside the box of I'm this person and that's all I can do. I might be able to see ways to keep some of these positions that are being cut back. Used in a different way as our population goes down, because what I was assured of in our last time was these were not going to affect programming as far as if music was cut by point something. But I'll still be getting their music lessons and their, but there were fewer students and fewer sessions needed. So that was important to me. I'm really having trouble with what I believe because I think we don't have the number of students, and we don't. I'm worried about the amount of money. So I'm, I'm having a little trouble saying whether I'm for the level or for the be. I am not for some of the changes in where kids go to school because I don't think we've spent the time that we need for any kind of reorganization that should start this spring. Have all kinds of input and have a lot of different options and table moving around for community where we can write on paper or do whatever and talk about. So that part I'm, I'm not in favor of. I guess I'm, I just think we have to keep in mind our population and that we don't have as many kids in the schools. And how can we be creative to meet the needs of the students, because we do have some great schools. Thank you, Linda Ursula. So, Linda just talked about our decreasing number of students and the fact that our schools are small and they're going to be getting smaller. And we as a board it's our job to be fiscally responsible to our whole community. And we've had a large outpouring tonight but it is not everybody it's not representative of everybody. I've already said it at the beginning but I'm going to repeat it. Inflation has gone up and people are paying more for food, medicine doctors visit everything across the board. And now taxes are going to go up, even with our cuts. And I would be concerned that we are going to increase our budget increase our taxes to a point where people are going to be turned away from our towns. And it's not possible to consider coming to our community, because they can't afford to. And so that does not bring families into our communities. And so it returns me to that fiscally responsible portion and it's why I support 3B, and I support those structural changes knowing that they are going to be hard for the communities we heard from everybody talking with so much and excitement and love for their local pre-K and their sixth grade and the traditions that they have. And I'm here to say that we didn't hear from everybody but every one of our towns has those like amazing traditions and amazing pre-K programs. And I think that we will create something new. But, you know, Flora said at the beginning about looking at it with a growth mindset. And it's hard to change, but let's see what we can do with it. And it can be a pilot program to look at how we can make structural changes for the future that our district is going to need to succeed. Thank you Ursula. Jonas. There's very, very little that I could say that that everybody else hasn't said. I support 3A or something like it. It's. We need to make sure that we understand that's a close to a level service budget, not a level funding budget, level funding budget would be much, much less money. I don't think it's fair to Worcester and to Dodie to put these changes in as a bunch of people have said without a lot of consultation. This is, and it's also, you know, it feels like a band-aid, right? There are, we need to address the structural issues. We need to address the enrollment issues, but that needs to be part of a very, very intentional process. I don't think it's fair to have to do that, you know, in the context of, you know, a budget year where we're under the gun. What else can I say? I think that we should be approaching, you know, in, we should be approaching this with, you know, without a scarcity mindset, you know, I think we should have an abundance mindset. I also think it's really important to distinguish between the cuts in FTEs that are an inevitable result of declining enrollment and cuts in FTEs that we that are purely intended for budgetary reasons. I think, you know, certainly support the first where necessary, not the second right now. I agree with what Chris said. We should put it to vote, you know, put it to the voters. I think that that's how, you know, we, that's how we hear the voices of most of the community. You know, let's put it to a vote. I also echo what I think Daniel said about hoping to hear this level of input from the community when we do go through that process. Right, because we can't do this without the community. I think we're seeing, you know, why tonight. Yeah. I think that's that's all I have to say, because so much has been said already. Yeah, thank you everybody I have. Oh, Joshua, do you want my last comment. I want to come into go ahead, go ahead. But I just, I just really quickly want to like just reiterate and point out what Megan said, if we think this process is rushed now, what happened, like, when it gets voted down that's even worse. I don't think we're going to run setting up SR funds next year. I mean, that's going to be that's going to seem so so so drastic. And that's going to feel like we're under the gun. I don't think we're ever going to probably get to a place where we feel like, oh, like we're not under the gun we can feel comfortable making the hard decisions that need to be made for the, for the education that we all deserve. That's all. Thank you, Joshua. So I have some of my own comments, taking off my chair for for for a minute, just if you guys would allow me, I think that, you know, I think that we've been at this for for a long time as community is we have had strong schools in our community for a really long, long time, not just this three years. We had had, if I'm going to pull this out this efficiency study from 2014 2015 that, you know, the executive committee pulled together a Michael Dewey's who was to help us interview and put together for us that outlined a lot of opportunities that we that we had together. And what I want to say is that I think, yes, the sixth grade and the and the pre K my field, my field rush, but but I think we have the best people to rush that with we have the best team to work to what is best for our students and make those a pilot program, you know, that is a way to see, Oh, it might work or it might not work while we are having the strategic planning a conversations with our community which we're about to engage of what what we value as a community we hear a lot about Spanish we hear a lot about art, and that would allow us to prioritize that as a district together. I feel, I feel strongly that we will delay the pain, the cliff will just be wider and and and and just taller next year right. I know it's hard. I hear the community I've been in this position many times, and you know it breaks my heart there's so many things that I would like to keep to but but if I really think about what is best for kids if I go back to that sentence that I tried to say it at the beginning to that we're going to preserve strong programs for our kids. We are not giving less to our kids we're doing what is best with the resources that we have is my understanding from the information that I'm getting. So, so we're not. It's not that we're taking out a Peter to give to Paul there because that's not why we do that the leadership team and our entire district works together to collaborate to, to give to each other to learn from each other. So, as a board sometimes we, we do have to take risks we do have to lead that's part of why people elect us to, and I want to reiterate that not everybody, you know, as a BIPOC person. And I know we have another member in our board, not and our diversity in the Washington Central area is is more in economics is not really. We don't have a real big diversity and we have they are not at the table with us today. Right. We don't have everybody at the table and three different people have said it, and we all, especially us at this table, including the community members have the responsibility to put that hat on tonight, when we're keeping comments, and I know that all of the board members care, all of the board members understand that and one what is best for kids so that was my last attempt to try to beg for 3B. But I have heard from board members and I wrote two of you didn't say one way or another, but from what I've heard, I am thinking that maybe what we want to do is go back to budget draft to what was presented at the last time as a middle point. Right. As a way to maybe we don't take the pre K and the six changes, but we take all of the other changes and Megan I wonder if we might have that slide that we could bring it up I see two board members have a question but if you would allow me to just refresh everybody's memory on what that is. Is that okay. Okay. I will put it up right now for. Thank you. How are you doing. I've been sitting for a while and I have forgotten to give everybody a break to but after this will get a little break and then come back and deliberate. And I know it's getting late. Okay, thank you, and I'll put my torture hat again and behave myself here. Thank you, and I will just acknowledge that this is now not formatted the same way as what you just saw. The last it's last month slide just moved over. And, and actually I could show it to you on the other slide that does have the explanation but these are the reductions that were proposed before and I would also remind the board that this draft to included the add of health education, that was not represented in the 7% budget recommendation so there is an ad here in order to be able to deliver that service so these are the original cuts. Forgive that the explanation are on the other slide. The other thing that we can show up because I saw Suzanne looking at it I can show you the tax implications of draft to, if that is also helpful. Let me do that. Sorry for the switching. Will this include the CLA changes, because when we had draft to we didn't know the CLA changes. That's what I am showing you. And I see Suzanne on it Suzanne if I share slide 25 is that if you share slide 25 that is draft 3B less the preschool and sixth grade conversion so it's not necessarily draft to. It's our 3B with without doing the pre K and sixth grade moves. Great. And it's with updated CLA is perfect. Thank you for that. So this, it says 3B but this, this is the 3B recommendation which is the reductions except for the two restructuring and this is the tax rate implications. Thank you Megan, it's Suzanne do you by any chance it have the per hundred K. Yeah, it's $71 for Berlin. 64 for callous 44 for East Montpelier, 68 for middle sex and six for Worcester on 100,000. I didn't do it all the way out. No, that's okay. Yeah, thank you. Is that helpful for board members. Did you get that you need to repeat it or you got it. Okay, so the possibility of doing a split screen of the two slides so that we can see it visually. The 3B versus with zoom, come on, we can do this. It's more that I don't have them on a document together. Let me think about split screen a zoom. I'm a questioning that. So I'm not saying I know how to but I'm assuming as a way to show two different screens at the same time. But let's, let's work some logistics. Well, let's have a five minute break and maybe work out some logistics then we'll come back and have Diane Maggie and then you ask questions and then we'll do some less deliberation is that okay. Just a five minute break so everybody can have T. Okay, it will be back 2040 845. Welcome. It's so nice to see the students with us. Can I ask you a question. Sorry, which I know you want to see the 3B without sorry you can't see me. So you didn't see my thinking face. I know you want to see the 3B without the restructuring. What's the other slide do you want to see the, the level, the new the 9.7 or the seven, what's the other slide you want to see. I was thinking the seven, unless the border feels differently that night the okay the level service I'm here I'm seeing some faces so the level services and the, and the 3B without pre K and without the sixth grade. Okay, keep talking. Yeah, while you while you do that and Steven I was just saying, I hear you made it to the area center thank you for going and such else I couldn't make it. Thank you for going. It was good thanks for supporting us you had some representation there from the other board. Anything you have to share while we wait about that meeting, you can share with everybody. So, to the other board members in the community. There is a listening session going on right now in the state about CTE education and governance and how we fund it and all of that and so there is a consultant group that is listening in on these conversations where they're asking questions about how we can improve what are some of the roadblocks. And so I went over to the community forum today for that group and there were several people there that spoke about first the positive nature of career and technical education it's so important to our state and to our community. And then just some of the roadblocks that exist, you know funding is always tricky for CTE schedules are tricky for it. What, what length of day, the programs run because they're both half day and full day and full day can mean a lot of different things depending on where you are. It's a very good conversation. I think that they gathered quite a bit of information and they said that they're still continuing to gather more. And I think the thing to remember is that the state is going to be making some decisions about our CTE system in the state. In the coming months about how they want to organize and governed long term and and funded as well, which will play back into some of our conversations that we're having today as well. Thank you so much to you and that was great. Did I buy you enough time Megan. Almost not quite. Okay, I'm going to let Diane and Maggie, Maggie sorry, my Kailin, and I keep changing her name. Okay, and then Chris, I haven't forgotten you go Diane, and we still have another part of the packet right so that everybody remembers. Um, you know, so I just I felt compelled to just respond that you're to me the biggest disservice that we would do to all of this work that has happened is if we don't have the conversations beyond this point of what we look like as a district that, you know, we often have had these hard conversations right at budget time budget we resolve it and then we don't pick it up again. And so to me that's where the huge disservice is that if we don't start these hard conversations right away and begin it and I know we're doing a lot of strategic planning, but we need to remember all of these things that we've been bringing up and all of the voices that we know are missing. I mean, I'm a Berlin rep here I'm the one, I am one of a community that's going to be greatly impacted by this. And I get it I worked with these families I know and I respect that, but I also am very concerned that we're shutting down a lot. Without having greater input into it so I just I felt compelled to say that I just hope we don't drop this ball regardless of where we go with this budget vote that we do not drop the ball because we do have to have these hard conversations. So we need to have them with opportunities in a wider range. Thank you, Dan. McKaylin. Thank you. Yes, everything Diane just said also I had, I had asked a question that didn't get answered so I was hoping to ask it again. And, and before I do. In future conversations like this it would be super helpful and maybe this exists somewhere and if so, or you can email me but to know what programs exist in which schools. Because I think there's some misconception maybe about what's available in each of the schools. Okay, but my question is in light of the restructuring restructuring question. I could hear if we could hear from Gillian as to her thoughts as principal at Dodie about the possibility suggested tonight. Yes, thank you. So, what has happened in the budget process is we're looking at the reality of declining school, declining student enrollment across the district. And the board asked for some creative solutions. And so there was a lot of brainstorming done and ideas that were thrown out. And these were two of them. The idea is that we've really fully fleshed out exactly what it would look like and I appreciate the board's comments because what I would want to be clear about is that consider them well thought out enough to be a pilot program or something that could be replicated particularly for example with the sixth grade option that wouldn't work in the following school year because the fifth grade, the current fourth grades at Dodie and Romney would be too large to allow that to happen. And so this has been a real struggle because any of you guys who have read my annual reports or my, my digests know that I have a real love affair with Dodie and Wolster. You know, and that heart is right out there on my sleeve. And yet I also look at the numbers. And in the spirit of frankness, I agree with Floor in that the cliff is only getting taller. And I agree that not all voices are present at the table right now. And that, that it would be a making the shifts, the proposed shifts this year would be a bandaid. You know, just to spin a little bit wouldn't it be wonderful if we could instead of just looking at what we're doing with pre K and two of our schools. If we looked in pre K across the entire district. Kim Bolduc and I spent a summer sweating about whether or not the Dodie five day combination of pre K and community connections would work and it and it did work. And so we have a model that we know we can do and how do we look really thoughtfully and planfully about how do we make it work across the district rather than with just five schools so that we can have, have maximal access to a limited resource which is childcare for three and four year olds in this state. And I just want to be really upfront that the shifting the sixth grade option. That's not a sit combining Romney and Dodie fifth and sixth graders might work this year but it wouldn't necessarily work down the road. And I support the board ideas of getting more voices around the table. And so that's really sort of the thinking about it and, and the proposals are really about absent strategic planning. This is what we could do. And the word was used clunky and it is clunky absent strategic planning. I hope that answered it because I got a little rambly because it is kind of late. Thank you Gillian and I just wanted to remind, especially community members that haven't been to all of our board meetings that we put our request for proposal out. We're about to engage in a consultant to help us with community engagement as we, that is one of the four goals right to get better a community engagement and tie that process to strategic planning to help us exactly. To do our year round budgeting. So I just wanted to tie that that in there, Megan I'm going to give it back to you just to I see your hand Chris but I want to do what we asked Megan to do so that I can take the share and I can we can see everybody. Go ahead. Well, I think that I have the two things up that you that you want to look at on the left hand side is the slide from earlier tonight around the. It's not really level service right because that's level service doesn't exist in the same way but this is the 9.7 this is the higher of the two that you've seen. And this on the right is the sorry, Floyd you asked for the other one didn't you. I'll flip it in a second but the one on the right is your draft to without the restructuring the draft 3B without their destruction right restructuring right that's what's on the right on the right okay. So this is actually the difference between the highest and the middle ground that you're just representing. Is that helpful for board members can you see it. Let's hold that it's up for a minute or if you guys need to take a screenshot and then let's just a take the, the share for a minute of my it's just really hard to see everybody a Chris, and then I'll speak to the comparison, go ahead Chris. I just had an informational question and the answer funds that's been talked about quite a bit tonight, and the positions that are related to it. I think my, my understanding of these impression was that those funds will be used to hire for staff members due to the increased need based on the pandemic, and that they were never intended to be permanent positions. Is that accurate or not accurate. Well, I'm going to answer that for your time. Right, but conceptually yes that is what our funds were they were the third phase of funding designed to help schools respond long term to the pandemic. So they were designed to be used to infuse systems with what they need according to their plan and all of that. They were always intended to be one time funds. In terms of the genesis of how we are using them I may Jen I don't know if you would add anything to that for that half of the question. Yeah, I think I could just add that all of that are moving forward plan or recovery plan had come from the comprehensive needs assessment that we had engaged in when those funds were first available and have continued to build on those around social emotional learning and health for our students academic recovery engagement with that was less of an issue for us because of the ways that we operated our schools we didn't have a lot of truancy issues like other school systems, but all of that those systems had come from the needs assessment that we had done initially. And that's exactly exactly what Megan said is conceptually they are designed to help us go through the pandemic and then recover in the areas that our school system needs to recover in. So has the use of the funds. been transformed from that goal and that that goal to a different goal. Well, I would, I would answer it this way, they are used right now to pay for staff or that at least the 575. Yeah, yeah, they that's used to pay for staffing and yes, that staffing is there, carrying out the plan that Washington Central developed the challenge with it was the intention for those positions to go away. The money goes away. So the district. The answer is yes, but many districts once you have positions people begin to like those positions and rely on those positions and so it is not as easy as it sounds to say. But that is one answer to the cliff Chris is that the money goes away the positions go away. Okay, so I would be assuming that the need has diminished as the pandemic has faded. That's not accurate, you should hear that. But my needs as much that would be good to know too. I would say that. Well, it related to answering that question what I would say is we, we continue to serve a very needy population. Most school districts who have added positions in the areas of counseling and nursing which is what we did among other things is that the that the schools would then lean into a design of what we do need moving forward. And if we did need some of those positions to remain, we would have a thoughtful plan with which to do that. And then that thoughtful plan would have to include how to pay for it once the money goes away. So, that is the work that most schools have to engage in. There's a different way of answering the question of neediness it's more about what do we need, how do we need to be structured to be able to be ready when that money goes away. Okay, thank you. I can't resist saying as the family physician that the needs have not gone away that the pandemic, I think was a lot more traumatic than, you know, initially thought and has these ripple effects that hopefully won't last forever but with this cohort of students still exist. So I think that needs to go into, you know, hopefully our larger discussion down the line as to how to support these really critical services for our, you know, the well-being of our students. I think we might have lost her to her internet has been unstable it Maggie and, and then I want to bring us back because Maggie go ahead. I'm probably going to be a little broad brush here to and just add that, you know, it's not just us that's being affected in the educational sector this is happening in the entire economy. There are still housing needs, people are no longer getting housing assistance that was being provided. People were getting a few assistance that are no longer getting fuel assistance so that there are so many different sectors and different aspects of basic needs that are being affected by these funds being so much of ending. And, you know, it, the whole point during COVID was for us to be having a larger conversation about what is our vision and that's something that's come up a lot tonight is what, you know, what is our optimal educational environment how do we, you know, serve the needs of our kids and how do we prioritize education, and how much money are we willing to to put towards that. I don't quite understand what's happening she just disappeared to and might disappear. I know what's going on, Kari. Bring us back. Oh Maggie there you are you were done Maggie I see you. Finish I think Maggie. So, I just want to talk about our process, a little bit because it's late and there's so much more to talk about but floor what do you what is your goal for tonight what do you want from the board. So I would like to get some clarity for our leadership team and I also would like to encourage us to give an inclination one way or another I know we have told the community that we would approve a budget on the 18th. The next item is to approve denounce tuition so we got to do that too so we have to know more or less what their range would be in order to approve the tuition you guys read the memo on time. So, with that, I'll go ahead. Here's a suggestion. What if we ask that everybody think over the next week about three a and what we might call three C the new one that we saw tonight that is the version of 3B without the restructuring that those be on our minds over the next week. So we have questions that come up maybe we can create a shared document, and I hate to burden Megan and the team anymore but maybe we can get those answered by, you know, a date certain before the meeting, and then everybody come on Wednesday next week, and we'll go around and we'll say what they're what they're leaning towards and and one or two or three reasons why so we each get to hear from each other, and then we vote, because the questions, the discussion could go on throughout next week's meeting as well and we'll have other business. And, and one more point floor to you you're looking for an inclination. Yeah, I wanted to do it. We can, we may want to just be conservative and choose the more conservative figure tonight if we have to make a decision. I'd rather make a conservative decision about that and stay open minded about what happens next week if we can, if that makes sense. Thank you. So with that, Jonas, I see your hand up I was gonna before we turn so we'll transition into talking about tuition after Jonas's question. If I still feel that we haven't done clarity. Oh, Megan go first and then I'll get to Josh to Josh to Jonas sorry everybody. Go ahead. Yeah, I don't mean to speak over Jonas, I just want to make sure that I at the end before you go to the next agenda item can just make sure I understand and then I do want to put some due dates around when we would need to get the questions in order to be able to answer you. That's all. So Jonas, you go first but just. I remembered one thing that I wanted to say earlier, and that is that even 3a does not exceed the excess spending threshold. Right, we are, we're not I don't think that 3a I don't think a level service budget is is irresponsible. And there are, you know, there are, there are, you know, Vermont has systems for the mitigation, you know, for tax mitigation, you know, and income sensitivity, you know, there are there are mechanisms there. I understand that, you know, tax rates have a ripple effect across the economy, particularly on renters. Right. I don't, you know, that's that's that's not lost. But I can't see myself supporting a budget that cut services. I can see myself supporting a budget that cuts money, but I can't see myself supporting a budget that cut services. Thank you Jonas. I think we need to give a little bit more clarity to to Megan so carry within within the questions that we answer because we won't have a lot of time between now and next Wednesday. So we got a document with questions from my Kailin that I think that that would be helpful that was coming from from from her today that we all received if we give a deadline for those questions to be by the end of tomorrow. I don't want the board members and board members to be here because always it wouldn't be fair. I don't want the staff to feel like they have to spend our weekend answering and answering questions. I don't know that we were going to be able, as we heard about it. I think our equation now is not to go into the pilot programs the pre K and so I don't want them to do extra work for for that either if that's not what the board is inclined to do. So we're saying I just want clarity, we're saying 3B without the restructuring the questions will be around that and level services. Can we do Friday at noon. Just because tomorrow at the end of the day seems a little rough. I can Chris because it wouldn't be fair at noon on Friday the board that our staff will have to answer those questions through the weekend. They won't be able to use their Friday to to finalize stuff and then be able to present to us by next week so I think is we have heard a lot from. So if the board has questions deeper questions that they need to answer informed by what the community has said. I think by the end of today, by the end of tomorrow would be fair so they don't have to spend all weekend doing this that would be it's, it's a lot of work for for the staff. So are we going to get a copy of the 3B minus the combination. Yes, we will try and we will get that before I meet so just to think about it for everybody to put a perspective also if we have a meeting next, which we have a meeting with more action items next weekend. So it needs to go out Friday by by noon so that we, everybody's able to look at the information by. So I'm not trying to be difficult is just the reality of what we need for being fair to our already overburden administrators and stuff. So, so by the end of tomorrow I and I understand we also have business tomorrow the board has meeting tomorrow too so not for this. So we, if we can get it by the end of tomorrow that'll be great. And we're just looking at 3B without the restructuring and level services agreement just thumbs up from board members so that the staff knows what they're doing Eric thumbs. Yeah, there. Okay, I see everybody now so that sort of clear as much but a little clearer. I think so not no that is clear that I don't know what you mean by I see everybody now to me. I guess that is clear and helpful and I, and I think that is deliverable so that you all have it in the packet to read in advance with the caveat that not knowing what the list of questions is if there is a question that can't be answered by Friday afternoon it won't go in the packet, and we'll do the best we can for the following day. It feels like it's doable with that caveat. If I could I wasn't I didn't have any expectation that the answers would be in the packet. I thought, you know, by Tuesday next week was was what I had in mind. Thank you for that Kari, I did not. I was nothing I was assuming people would want to read in advance. Well my understanding of what Kari was suggesting and I don't know if this is feasible is that it would be like a Google Doc. So it'd be a shared doc that we would see kind of live, but I don't know how legal that is and I don't know, you know, I don't want to be putting words in your mouth either. It would be against the open meeting law, we would be having a discussion before having the discussion at the board meeting that's have Google Docs work. They're not legal we can ask our council for advice, but we can't do that so my intent was to have as many questions ready. And then if there's more questions obviously the, the leadership team can answer but I can imagine anything more clear that the memo that you have in your packet so I think concise memo of what 3b would be without the restructuring will be helpful to taking in consideration what we have heard from community members and board members. Can I just ask real quick. Yes. If the answers aren't going to be in the packet, like Kari said and like you're just going to be able to bring them to Wednesday's meeting. Could we get them in print at least at Wednesday's meeting. Some of us maybe need both print and audible information. I think we need a person on Wednesday so that is easy to deliver. Yes. And if they're so that they could be available for community members to, because I think that would be helpful community members are showing up. Thank you. Just so we can post it somewhere on the website. Okay. Okay, with with with that. Can we move into the tuition conversation. Yeah, okay. So in page 30. And Megan, I'm going to need a little help from both of you because we wouldn't. I think what we're going to do is lean to the more conservative, but I would love the number for 3b without the restructuring. I know that to send you were working miracles there. Well, I was trying to. Can you give us that number. Yes, can I find the unmute button. That's the real question. That would bring. Elementary to 22911. And it would leave secondary at 21, 413. Sorry, Susan. I was multitasking getting somebody in 22911. Mm hmm. Yeah. And the secondary would remain the same because the change would only be in the elementary. Okay. And just clarification. So then the. The 3, 3a would be the 23, 4, 4, 3. Correct. Yep. Thank you very much. Yeah. And for secondary 3a is 22, 0, 0, 6. Great. Thank you. And, and like Kari said, I would prefer that the board went more conservative. So went with the lower tuition amount because even if you keep the higher budget. We can always go back and, and build those schools later. It's, it's a full like year after the. After the year has occurred that we could build them as long as it's within the statutory percentage overage. So I'd rather you, you went under than over myself. Can you give us those numbers? What would you, just because we have already, I recommended for action. So the board moved to announce that for the year 2324, it says 2223, but it should be 2324, right? Oh, yep. Yep. Sorry. I didn't change that. Yeah. For elementary. Can you just say it out loud? Sorry, it would be the 22, 808. And that's 21, 4, 1, 3. Okay. All right. Is somebody prepared to make that motion? I can. Okay, Daniel. Yeah, I moved the board. I moved to announce the fiscal year 2023, 2024 district tuition rates as 22,000, 808. For elementary tuition and 21,000, 4, 1, 3 for secondary tuition. A second by Chris, I heard. Yep. Any more discussion or questions? Yeah. Suzanne, what is the like percentage we can go over that you can like charge over? I'm so sorry, Ursula. I don't have that in front of me. I didn't mean to throw it. No, I should have. I should have thought to bring that one with me. I don't recall what it is. And I'd hate to throw out a percent and not be right. That's okay. Thank you. Any other questions? Okay. All those in favor, please signify by saying, I, yes. Hi. Any. Any abstain the motion carries unanimously. Okay. Thank you. All right. I thought, I thought someone said they opposed. No. Yeah. I think it was a late I. Oh, sorry. Okay. Thanks. It was the weird Alexa voice that's been haunting us all night. I know that my computer here is trying to a Siri and I don't get along. They never understands me. I actually always have a different. They just doesn't understand me. It's been trying to introduce herself. Okay. Okay. Now let's move. I'm like so fried. I'm sorry. A poor future agenda items. I think that if you would allow me the steering committee had a pretty robust meeting the last time about the agenda. And we looked at, and I hate to get away from process, but it is 918. And I think if we could adjourn, it would be helpful for some of our administrators and people driving home today too. I move to adjourn. I second. I will note that we do have another public comment section noted here. So if there are members of the public who want to raise their hands, I think we owe it to them. Yeah, I tried to get everybody in before but if there is, thank you, Jonas. I totally miss that if there's any other member of the public that would like to speak I see Sarah raise her hand. Go ahead Sarah. Hi there I'll be really brief. I feel like something that did not get discussed very much I know we really focused on again I'm from Worcester talking you know what my kids go to Dodie. I feel like the pre K program and the sixth grade, you know program that really got a lot of attention tonight. And I feel like the, the 90 second, you know, limit was was really difficult to work within I totally understand why it existed. But I do feel like the nursing cutting school nurses is really really concerning to me and I know that I'm not the only person who feels this way. Especially being such a remote tiny little school. It is really. I can't even picture a situation you know like having a medical emergency and not having a trained professional like onsite like we're half an hour from the closest hospital. And just from a parent's perspective, my son has Tourette's we found that out, you know, a year and a half ago like right before we moved here. Yes, at Dodie has been one of the amazing supports for our son. Her office is a very safe place that he can just go if he's having like a lot of anxiety and a lot of like a hard time in school. And I feel like as a, as it's such a small school anyways and there's a lot of like combined spaces in Dodie there are not very many areas even physically in that school that would create something like that and, you know, the care and support that Jess specifically has offered to not just my son but many students there, apart from just being a trained medical professional like is like should not go unnoticed. And that that is when I found out that that was something that was even being considered cut. I was shocked because I didn't think that was a thing you could cut that feels like a mission critical kind of position and I just wanted to put that out there and I intended to take that down as well in an email to you all. But thank you. I won't keep any longer. Yeah, guys. Yeah. Kathleen, you're next but I'm going to let Sonya go before and then Patrick, just because you had an opportunity to speak before. So if you would allow me, I'll go to Sonya first then I believe that's you Patrick and I pad nine. We'll go back to you Kathleen and I'm going to trying to be fair. So I'm going to stay with the time limit. I just forgot a bit of timer. Okay. Okay, well, I think you guys got a lot of our information of first off I'm Sonya Rhodes. I'm at Dodie. I've been there since 1997 was hired when we had a bubble. And if I the numbers stayed up I continue to be there. So thank you guys for re looking at making Dodie. Not part of this pilot program, and that we really look at and remember and I appreciate those buys. Those of you who think of our students and truly who they are, because I would have hated to try this pilot program. And as Gillian said, not really well vetted out on the backs of our students. I believe in Dodie love Dodie. I know as a negotiator and against you guys for a lot of times, I'm negotiating for the union. It's a tough job. And I also want to say that I and other people will go and support you in creative thinking, because I think we all want to keep that vibrancy throughout the district. And we not only will go and, you know, stand up to support, but we want to help be part of the C around process and get our voices heard in some creative things that actually work for all our students. Thank you. Thank you Sonya. Patrick. Hi, thank you. I know it's late and everybody wants to go home so I'll be very quick. Thank you all for all of your hard work here. Thank you for doing this process community asked for it you responded. Thank you to Megan and the administrative team for providing a budget narrative is so helpful. Quick things to ask before the next meeting are one, please upload magazine's presentations to the board websites. So they can be there with the packet because they are really helpful for the community to see. In addition, I think the most salient metric with all these numbers for people in the community to see is with each budget side by side comparisons of the cost for $100,000 and home value. I don't see that in the packet, it might have been shown tonight I had to put our kids to sleep. But if you can, I strongly encourage including that so everybody in the community and all of the board members can see that because that really brings it home. Is it $20 a year per family to cut these programs is it 60 people can evaluate when they see prices for $100,000. Thank you. Thank you, Patrick, Kathleen. Yes, thank you very much I just wanted to add something based on everything I've heard after hearing the board talk. And that is, again, I understand the inflation we're up against I understand the declining enrollment we're up against. And I understand everything that the committee is up against. I want to reiterate the whole flip flopping of, of a Worcester student that would be going to Romney for pre K, if five years down the line this comes true. And that then they would be coming back to Doty and then they would be going back to Romney for sixth grade, unless, as Kari said by then sixth grade would be at you 32. But if we're talking about equity, I just wanted to propose that maybe we split the difference and have for example, pre K at Romney and sixth grade at Doty, or sixth grade at Doty and pre K at Romney. So, not one school is doing the flip flopping, and the flip flopping would be shared that that's just one suggestion that I had. I obviously don't really remember this hour what my second point was I know it was in regards to the nurses. But again I just sort of want to echo what has been said that I that I do think those are, it's a critical position with all the social emotional wellness that's going on and oh I do remember my point. That's scary statistic that Jessica, the nurse at Doty gave out that a lot of the underprivileged students that Thank you, Kathleen. Sorry. I'm just trying to be respectful to everybody is there another person that would like to speak. Otherwise, okay. We had a motion on the table to adjourn. Thank you to all the community members that came today. Thank you to all. We appreciate your input. Thank you for being here. It's a long meeting and doing this is is hard but I'm glad that we're able to have this honest conversations together and everybody's able to speak their mind and here we are all working together. Students, do you guys have anything to share you are why we're here and just seeing your smiley faces makes us all happy. So thank you for sharing your smiles. So with that, let's adjourn the meeting everybody's really tired. Have a good night everybody will see you next Wednesday. Please email your questions. Goodbye. Can we can we take I years and days for adjourning, since the motion was on the table. Yes, yes. Sorry. Bye.