 This is the House Education Committee and the Vermont House of Representatives and today we are going to be just having a committee discussion on some of the work that is before us. I want to give you a couple of updates as well. First is the lead bill. As you remember, Emily Simmons thought that she had another potential delay coming forward. She sorted that out. We do not need statutory language. So the only delay that we have at this point has to do with the lead bill. I have asked Michael O'Grady to just put a couple of findings into the bill. That was a request that came from leadership to make it a little bit more understandable why we're taking a bill and just crossing out four numbers, putting in four numbers. Okay, so that is that. And there's no appropriation. So I was going to bring that back on Friday to present that and do a possible vote. Are people okay with that? Are you comfortable with that? Or just a little discussion if you have a problem with that. Everybody seems okay. Okay, so we'll take that up and move that through. Act 173 delay is that that's act 66. No, excuse me. Lead bill is act 66. Act 173 delay. Representative Coopley went up to appropriations and maybe you could fill us in a little bit on that, Larry, and on that how it went and what the vote was. Unmute. Got me. Yeah, it was, it was a little contentious in some ways. A couple of representatives were curious about extending the time for the advisory committee and the costs involved in that and a little difficulty, a little torture and explaining the finances to them over over the period of last year versus. The 12 meetings going out to 2023. And I have to, I certainly will commend Jim for helping out there. It was great to have them available. But it did come out a committee that did come out of appropriations with the 10 01 vote. So we're, I think we're okay with that. It goes on the floor tomorrow. Yeah. So I believe. Okay, so it went on the notice calendar today. So, yes. So you should be anticipating that that will be pulled off notice and you'll be ready to go. I'll be ready to go. Yeah. Should be okay. Chip is going to report for appropriations. Okay. That's good. Excellent. We had a request from from an advocate to have someone from Sharon Academy come in and talk to us about their experience with proficiency based learning and remote learning they had a little update on that and I thought that could be of interest to us so I've accepted that to have them come in and talk to us about what proficiency based learning and remote learning how that how that works together. Next week we have the New England Board of Higher Education coming in the term coming in, which you know what I mean. Talking with us about trends in higher education in New England and the rest of the country so that'll be a very interesting conversation for us I don't yet know what our committee role will be, but I think that we do need to be, I do we do need to be in the conversation and having a better sense of higher education changes. Probably a good use of our time. As far as the 19 districts go. I'm looking to bring folks back on Friday, at which point we will, we'll have a discussion to see we had a conversation with Secretary of State, as well as the League of Cities and Towns as well as I think JFO was there as well. I think we just need to have a conversation I've asked the school board's association I said, please do a survey, we need a survey we need data from your members. Where are you with what's going on, you know, what do you need, what's the problem, should we what what what do you want us to do. I think we got a letter from. I think we all got a letter from the armwood. Yeah, there. And they are saying that they would be comfortable with the FY 2020 budget. I think there's also a little bit of lack of clarity that she thought that maybe they wouldn't have to vote and they would they would be able to not deal with voting at all. And I think that that was something appealing. At the same time, there are about three of those districts that would probably be fine with the FY 20 hardwood is one, I think Slate Valley is one and there's another one that I think would actually be okay. We know that the rest of them I think Dylan your district wouldn't do too badly. You'd be struggling a little bit but could probably figure it out. But there are other districts that really do really are that would be devastating if they're stuck with that. So, we're going to bring them back in and say please I only want to hear from you from you districts that are affected. What do you want. And what don't you want. Okay. Yeah, Madam chair. Those budgets with hardwood were they. They're okay with their FY 20 budget, but does that also include the 4% and later. No, would they be okay. They only had like a 1.3% increase on the Ed fund. I think that Slate Valley was relatively shy of 3% increase. Yeah, well so. And yeah so they're not sure about the I'm not sure about the rest of them. I'm not sure about those other budgets. I'm just asking them to what we've got that we've got the nice list that Brad and Chloe gave us that we can certainly pull up I maybe maybe Avery you could take a look and see if you could find it just so that we have a ability to look at those. I think we will have an opportunity to set finally sort of decide what, what does the committee think I don't know if I can do anything. I don't know if just waiting, doing nothing and just seeing if we see who makes it through and we pick it up in August I don't know. It'll be part of our committee conversation. What we want to do. I'm just going to comment. Um, could you just clarify what the process is I'm, I'm just a little confused I understand I guess the bill is in the Senate. And so what happens now do we does anything we do can we have any impact until we take possession of that bill. I'm just a little confused about what the process is. The agreement between the. I was actually part of that agreement with them. The pro tem the speaker and the two chairs of education to agree that we would look at two bills that were coven related in terms of that you could justify as being coven related. One was the act 173 delay and the other was dealing with the 19 districts. We agreed that it would start in the Senate and it would do that because they were further along than we were they had already they already had remote voting we didn't, but we also agreed that we would have agreement between the two committees. Before anything moved. We didn't see that we were going to be in position for, you know, committee of conference that the complexity of it we're looking for something that we could we could all agree on. And as you know, we were able to do that with that one 73 they came up with some ideas we came up some with some ideas they melded into one bill. And that that was how we had anticipated this process working as well. So at the moment. Yes, I think that Caleb was wondering, do we have an opinion on the FY 20 budgets, or do we just want to wait and see what happens with the feedback that we get on Friday. So, just to clarify, so are we having a discussion so we can bring something into the discussion with the Senate so we can reach a compromise and then present one bill is that kind of what the rationale is. Yes, the rationale would be to see if we could get something that I could I could take to take to the other body to see if they would be more comfortable with that. We'll reach a compromise right. Yeah, that we'd have agreement before a bill after committee, let the committee. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah, so I keep I respect that process and I think that the idea of trying to do a conference committee, when we're not in the capital would be very challenging. You know, I would still sort of return us back to the testimony we heard a couple of Fridays ago which I thought was pretty potent. I'm glad we're getting some more clarity as to exactly the status of everybody's budget, because there were a few that were still hadn't necessarily been warned we weren't sure, but also about what their plans are for voting. In various conversations I've had outside the committee, a lot of these districts are pretty committed to holding a vote of some kind before June 30. And it maybe it might be interesting to see how, you know, if we don't get an agreement in this part of our session. It may not be the end of the world. And I would just remind everybody that if nothing ever happens, we still have the fallback of current law which allows districts to borrow up to 87% while they continue to vote until they have a budget. So anyway, and they don't just grow 87%. Yeah, right. They borrow as they need it. Yeah, and we're even, you know, I think there's even legislation being looked at to use COVID money to cover any interest payments. And that from that borrowing. So anyway, you know, the idea of waiting till August knowing that we will more likely have a session in August is worth contemplating but I look forward to learning more on Friday from these districts. There is a bill. I think it's up in appropriations I think it might have been voted out that's actually going to give municipalities. They have to borrow to pay their education property tax, so that the, the municipalities collect the education property taxes, and they give some directly to their school districts and the rest goes to the to the state for the Ed fund. And there's some question if they are unable to collect those taxes, because people are struggling pay their taxes that they would. There's the possibility of using coven money to pay the interest. So I think it's looking more at interest on money that the municipality borrowed in order to pay the education property tax. They need the money so have to collect it schools are going to need the money. And they felt that that could be probably covered related expense. Peter you still have your hand up is that new or is that. So Rita, you unmute you. Is anybody hearing any conversation of the possibility of the state, borrowing the money for school districts and not asking the municipalities to borrow the money is you hearing any conversations anywhere about that. So conversations that we just had in ways and means, where they were looking at setting the yield. One of the questions that that that time was to say, do we set the yield, recognizing that we still have 166 million that we haven't covered, knowing that we're going to have to address that. We're not on the back of property taxpayers but we're, it would be a whole that we would need to fix and maybe we could fix that in August, I don't know that looking at it. That's on the table. It could involve borrowing on. It could be sure that there could be borrowing involved to pay for education. That's conversation with the treasure as well. The general fund I think is down 14% to we're down, we're down 166 is what the expectations. Anybody else. So, okay. Caleb. Thanks. I guess I just want to mention I have some concerns about asking the VBS a or their members to do any kind of survey, or any additional work. I don't have reasons to believe that that, you know, work product will contribute to a viable process with the Senate. I just don't see this committee coming up with a bill that's going to win over our colleagues in the Senate based on simply watching their comments on YouTube fairly closely over the last month and going back over that, unless there's an indication that that's really different. I kind of feel some of the testimony we already had was unfortunate because we couldn't be more responsive to it. Due to the Senate's kind of entrenched position and so I would just hesitate to make another ask without feeling like that's got a place to land. Larry, did you have something. Dylan. Yeah, I mean I, I appreciate where Caleb's coming from on that. But for me, the piece of information that I really want is the lay of the land with regard to how districts are moving forward with votes, because I think that the timing will really provide us with some clues as to when we will fully and probably in June, how much pressure is going to build for a solution if in fact we do not act on a bill prior to the end of the fiscal year. So in other words, I'm trying to understand the timeline when we will get feedback from the field on if votes are approved or not. So my local district it's really June 2 or thereabouts is my time when I'll know how, how much pressure will be facing here locally based upon the outcome of the vote. And I expect there will be a string of other votes along the way as well. And to me those pieces of evidence are just really important. And I'd like to understand now as much as I can what the timeline is going to be so that we can understand well, maybe we do need to act more immediately but I do sympathize Caleb with that that you know we don't want to put more on the plagues of these districts. If we don't think we're going to reach agreement but I still think we're in the phase of figuring out if we can. And the pressure that builds in the field will probably inform us. So you need, you need those back in two weeks right. I'm sorry the results. In order to be to have them had a June correct. I think is really important to me, and then whatever comes in after I do think it will inform the decisions right up to the end of the fiscal year for as long as this body is meeting. I asked them to get that to us for Friday. I asked if it was possible to get that by Friday. And they indicated that they could. Yeah, I was just going to say that both the superintendents and the school boards are in frequent constant contact with these 19 districts so getting the information we need really isn't wasn't a big ask. Yeah, so where are you in the process. Do you have a meeting. Do you have a budget. And do they plan to go ahead with a vote. Do they plan to go ahead with the vote exactly. And it may be that we're going to have a bunch of districts that are budgets are going to pass. You know, and we only have a few districts that we're dealing with Serena. Just this is a little off topic, but it's again, I don't know if we could combine two things with one, but I do we have any data on districts that don't have access to broadband. I didn't know if that could be a question that could be asked as well if they're asking questions if we're compiling. I believe the secretaries gathering that information. I can check back on that I believe gathering that when I asked when I asked the superintendents in the early stages. It was a very stressful question that I asked. So I believe that I believe the secretaries is gathering that information. Kayla. Yeah, just to clarify, so I didn't realize we'd already asked for this survey. So, what are we hoping. To confuse are we trying to take what we learned this Friday and incorporated into either our draft 6.1 or 7.1, or are we looking to learn something that will bring us closer to the Senate like, what's the goal like what is the policy goal of whatever we're going to hear from this survey you requested. What are the effects that are lay of the land from actually what's happening what are the effects if we do one two or three what's the effect on you. Is is I think and so that's in the survey we laid out one two and three. I am in my conversation with them we talked about those issues I've not seen the survey. Peter you are involved in that conversation. You know what we're really. Yeah, for me. A lot of it is if if we find out that of these 1917 have got a worn budget they plan to go ahead with a vote they've got a vote schedule they've got the logistics in place. And it's all going to happen before June 30. To me that that might be might make me say, okay, you know something let's just not do anything until we get see what the results of all of that is. And therefore in August we may have three districts that are really struggling that we have to that we have to deal with. Or we might find out that these folks have no vote schedule because they're scared of holding votes, in which case we might need to move quicker than that. And I think that you know the information I think I'm looking for is those definite plans budgets in place. You know I don't necessarily. I think we have a good idea of what the impact of not having a budget or the Senate's proposal. But I'm sure also in the impact of doing nothing for the time being. Go ahead, Caleb. I believe my hands down. I just want to make sure that you get your questions. I have to call you back. So, yeah, and it's really just to see what what's the next best step for us. Is it for me to go to the Senate and say listen I think we've come up with another solution. Are you in, would you consider this. Do we say golly gee it sure looks like the Senate ideas a great idea let's just go ahead and pass it. Although there are some fixes that need to happen as well because there's a couple of things that are missing and related to voting. Are do we just wait. And I'm hoping that this conversation will help inform our decision. Now there are questions that that folks would would want to have from the school districts. I'm just, I'm concerned with, you know, with putting these, these budgets out. I'm not sure what the flavor is right now with with with voters. I'm not so sure that a lot of these, these budgets are going to pass. Just, I guess just wait and see what happens. But as far as the you know as far as going to the Senate cake. I think we know pretty much where we stand with the Senate, in terms of coming up with solutions. Senator Baruch, I think it's been very clear that it's his bill and that's the way it is. I don't know how anyone else feels about that, but that's the message I have. Well, these are those are all in the area of kind of conjecture. It's not, it's not at this point. I think it's a matter of public record at this point. So that's just kind of where where we're looking at this moment in time. It's possible that possible we do nothing, and we wait. It's possible that we come up with another solution. It's possible when we demonstrate that this is really hurtful to this number of districts that they might want to consider another route. It's possible that they won't. I guess what I'm just trying to do is say what is the thing that we can do. Is there something we can do that is going to deal with the challenges in voting addressing the equity concerns that we have going forward. And in addition to the very complex financial issues that we're facing with the Education Fund be able to keep those things in mind and move forward thoughtfully. Kathleen. You've asked the VSBA to get back to us this week and we're scheduled to talk about this at two o'clock on Friday. Friday, yes. On the agenda. That's good for me. You could. Peter no, Serita. Would it be helpful to know without a 4% inflator, what the impact would be on their programming? Would that be helpful? I'm not, you know, I don't know if that's a helpful piece of information for us. Avery, did you find that document from Brad James? I can send it to you. I don't know what I think is, is the right one and you can let me know if it's the correct document. I think it says April 24 on the top of it. It might have been in ways of being done. No, I think it was. Yes, that's the one I'm looking for April 23. There we go. So, if you look at the budgets of the failed districts, you can see where they were. And then you can go over and see what their revised budgets look like. So we have, you know, on one, one level, we have down here, Harwood, that would be facing with their revised budget at a 1.4% increase. So they were thinking we could probably live with live with with that and would rather have that than to do the borrowing or vote or whatever. If you look up at Albert, that doesn't work quite as well. But if you look down at those that have not yet voted, could you scroll up a little bit? And you can also figure in, you can also look at these numbers and see where it would be in terms of if it were only 4% how far off. So that that gives you an indication there so we have wind of northeast that probably would be just fine. Rivendell not so good. Okay, probably if we're looking just at proposed and spending. So for some of them, if it were level funded, could probably make it work. 4% was one that was also recommended it. For me, it sort of didn't make sense because we had such a range. Why would we want to give Harwood 4% when they only need 1.4. So that's I, I, I see these as strange bedfellows and that they all come with very, very different needs with a quite a range of challenges. So we're doing a flat 4% and it what's funny is actually the, the, the average for the other 77 budgets I believe was actually 4.7 so 4% is came from that only they lowered a little bit. Well, well, no increase in time going to be okay for some force going to be okay for others and for others is just not. So, again, I think I tried to explain to some of these, these people that I've spoken with is go for a vote. I think some are waiting for us and encouraging them to say no, you need to vote, you need to go for a vote. And I hope that that is coming through. Kate, if I may read if you're interested in programmatic impacts I'd refer you back to the testimony, which we have a fair amount of written testimony from Friday the 24th of April, which really spelled out a lot of the impacts and some of these districts. I know I know it's concerning to me, you know, on some of the districts the impact that it will be if they have to just go back to the 87%. So anything else. I just want to clarify something. They spoke about the impact if they have to go to 2020 spending, not to funding at 87%. And a lot of districts borrow right now anyway, not now a lot of districts are using the using the borrowing power to get through, you know, the first part until they get their first, first payment. So I think they get pay is it September 1 or second is that you school members. You know that that Ed fund is distributed to you, money's distributed. September 10. Thank you, Jim. So, so there are districts that are going to borrow anyway, because they're not going to have their money until September. So, so that's what it's there for anything else. Caleb, I want to make sure that I'm hearing you in this process. Yeah, I feel heard. You know I don't feel agreed with but I don't expect to. It would help if Caleb would bring his daughter into the picture on his lap during these conversations. Well, she agrees with me. So, so part of let me just see if go ahead Casey, what I'm just going to say give that time and she won't agree with him. Yeah, that's, that's, that's a certainty Casey in a world of few certainties that is one. So part of your concern is just the futility of working on this. Is that correct. It's an optics thing I'm embarrassed about the testimony we took, given what had happened on YouTube in the Senate just the day before it was discordant it was poorly integrated between our chambers and it's, it's critically and it's sending a confused message and if, if the place we're going to end up is the status quo or the Senate's version, then I would prefer to stop taking testimony on things other than that. Because I think it sends a signal that something may happen which I logically do not see a path to happening. But that's my concern. I don't feel the pain. So I see this as our last, our last ditch effort to see basically to see. Would we be better off waiting. Would we be better off going with the Senate view Senate version, or is it worth trying to pursue a different option. Okay, if I may, I guess I should just admit that also philosophically, I have a very hard time with the default budget concept. And if we have any bill with default budgets, I would love our decision to be unanimous. And I think that's the only work well that they virtue of the Senate's bill is that it has a default budget, and it was a bipartisan decision. I think we're going to put up a different version against theirs I hope we can say the same. My quote of the month is from Neil deGrasse Tyson, which is, you know enough to know you're right, but you don't know enough to know you're wrong. And I think we've done a pretty solid job of speaking with the people affected by this. And that wasn't to you not knowing enough. Not personally to you, but we sometimes move forward with incomplete information. Okay, anything else. That's really all we were doing today. So we'll do, we'll do, I'm hoping we'll do lead on Friday. If Avery if you could reach out to Michael Grady and see if he'd be available on Friday to finish up lead. And with that also. I just wanted to send a note to and pew as well. That we're going to be taking that up. So that they know it's really just as you remember to deal with testing and schools that are closed. Larry, did you have a question. Yeah, I think for if we're pretty much complete with the meeting I just would like to ask Dylan. If he can respond to maybe some of the meetings that are going on with the stakeholders. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Sure. So we, we have had a lot of meetings over the last couple of weeks and had one most recently yesterday. So we've had a series of events that you've probably read a bit about. The first was of course the chancellor proposed the reconfiguration of the system. What followed was within a fairly short amount of time. Public opinion boiled over on that and we got a lot of instruction from both our statewide leaders, legislative leaders and others that urged us to preserve rural access points where those campuses currently reside. And so the board of trustees went through some deliberations. Ultimately that led to the chancellor's resignation. And so we have been going through a period of flux. We appointed an interim chancellor who was the general counsel Sophie Zedotny. Got to make sure I get my pronunciations correct here. Sophie is really an excellent member of the team who is a longstanding member of the chancellor's office staff. And she's been very strong so far at keeping us looked in on what's going on as a board. So I've been appreciative of that. We've had several other things happen in the Rutland area in particular at Castleton University. The president of the university submitted her resignation after some press reports you've probably read about that. You know we as a board regretfully accepted her resignation. We have appointed a interim president who I saw it sounds like representative Toof knows him quite well he's a well liked. I think he's in the humanities department a history professor with a lot of expertise. I want to make sure I get the name right here the pronunciation I think it's John Spiro do I have that right or is it Spyro I want to make sure I don't screw up any names here. He's come forward as well with a great spirit of partnership. And and I really you know being at someone who really likes history as you know I'm very glad to work with him but also he clearly has a love of the institution. He's been there for quite a while and I've actually heard from a lot of past students and members of the campus community who regard him very highly. So I'm very encouraged by them. The actual steps that we've taken since that time have been discussed in a public setting so I'll share some of them. We've held a variety of meetings with members of the campus community. Notably I had an opportunity on the board which is a 15 member board we have a student trustee who's been wonderful and she has coordinated different types of community conversations with students and otherwise. I had the chance last week to sit in on a meeting with the interim chancellor and the student community. A big part of this is going to be communicating after some of this fallout has occurred and making clear that it is an open process going forward so everyone who's been participating has been trying to gear our activities in that direction. Now the most substantive thing that happened. We recently was at yesterday's meeting. We had a board meeting yesterday afternoon where we received updates from each of our campuses. So we heard updates from Castleton University. We heard updates from Vermont Technical College. We heard updates from NVU and we heard updates from the Community College of Vermont. I encourage generally with some of the positive signals we're getting around where we stand in the budgeting process around budget adjustment. I know our CFO and others have worked to provide very rapidly information to the General Assembly about the budget, about our needs from the COVID-19 emergency for consideration both in the budget adjustment context but future decisions as well. It was announced last week by the speaker you heard probably in our all member caucus at the Joint Fiscal Office has retained a person with expertise in higher education. A person who was the chancellor of the main system most recently who is doing a complete analysis of just where we stand, which I think is a situational analysis for legislative leaders is they make decisions about how to provide bridge funding and what that process looks like. In the final at the campuses. This is the core piece from yesterday. There are a lot of initiatives going on so for instance, Northern Vermont University has convened stakeholders and a group that is looking at some goals that they've set forth for how to move that system forward and what they need to There's some great information there and I'd be happy to send it to Avery if you're interested, but they're calling that the NVU strong initiative. Vermont tech under the leadership of President molten has convened process as well with local community stakeholders, and they're working through different groups in areas such as agriculture and a variety of others. Business and other categories to try to figure out what they're going to do moving forward as well. The Community College of Vermont only stands ready to provide support and castle and university which has experienced a lot of shake up recently. I think that they're also working through this process and there's just a slightly different dynamic there because of some of the immediate changes that occurred, but I do want to let this group know I mean I'm very encouraged. It's amazing what the campus communities can do when turned loose and that I have a lot of confidence and respect in all of our presidents and all of our leaders and the entire faculty. The campus community as it relates to sports staff and others the students, they're all pulling in the same direction. So first we do know not to opine on what's going on at the University of Vermont but we do know that this is not a something that's just happening at our state colleges system. It's happening at other post secondary institutions, the University of Vermont, and many private institutions. What I'm also encouraged by and this is good for this group to know is that we've heard that the Association of Independent Colleges here in Vermont, the University of Vermont, and the Vermont State Colleges System are meeting are discussing options to move forward and there are individual initiatives with the campuses in the Vermont State Colleges interacting with the privates in the region and others. So I think that the whole landscape, they're trying to work together. Now where this all leads we don't know yet, but I expect we'll be learning more. Our goal in the Vermont State Colleges System at this point is we've instructed our executive committee which is a subgroup within the board leadership to work on a timeline to process for pulling in a longer term interim chancellor. Well, we have an interim chancellor. I would describe it as on an emergency basis for this quick transition. And so you go to someone within the organization with expertise who can make decisions as we work through, but we need to get someone in there, probably over the span of a year or so, and we discuss this on our board meeting yesterday, who has expertise and perhaps, you know, in understanding of the complexities of organizational change, because I think that there is a realization both from the signals we've received from state leaders, but also internally that we're going to need to make some structural changes to sort our way through this. And as you might imagine as we discuss these things and move into a process of selecting an interim a longer term interim chancellor. There's probably going to be a lot of anxiety out there. So if you hear it in your communities, Larry, if you're hearing it in the Rufflin region, Jay, if you're hearing it down in your neck of the woods, Lynn, if you're hearing it up in the kingdom, please let me know because that feedback loop is really helpful. And I recognize there's a lot of Bruce feeling so do know that I'm just trying to do my part to listen and to receive information and be a conduit to this body. So I hope that helps. It's sort of the most that I know at this point, but there's a lot going on out there. Thank you, Dylan. You're doing a great job. Keep up the good work. Kate you're Kate you're you're. I'm sorry I'm eating myself. Kathleen. Yeah. Thanks Dylan I just wanted to make sure I understood sort of the lay of the land so sounded like there was a task force or a committee at each of the campuses. And then an independent consultant who'd been hired I was reading about him and digger this morning a consultant from Maine, who was going to take a really hard look sort of at the finances and the structure and deliver a report by the end of June, it sounded like. The search for a chancellor or a long term chancellor is ongoing. So there's, it doesn't sound yet like there's a statewide. It sounds like the pieces are coming together for there to maybe be a statewide task force or the pieces, the pieces will be put into place for some sort of long term visioning plan. Once all of these components are assembled. The, the memos that have come out from the pro tem and speaker part of it that they've described is once they assess the overall condition. As the system begins its own processes. It appears based off of the way I've read it that they also want a broader look at it so I've heard some say oh it'll be a blue ribbon commission on higher education. Of course we've had a lot of suggestions I don't feel like I'm speaking out of turn to say, I'm getting feedback all the time of, is it time to look at the Vermont State colleges and UVM, and perhaps a different governance structure where they are connected somehow or one system. I don't think I'm not sure what the outcome will be because there have been previous discussions about unifying the system and there have been blue ribbon commissions in the last decade or so, and they have not recommended that. However, given the changing landscape that may be part of it but yeah you're absolutely right you have the big facts down. Okay, I just wanted to make sure because it seems like the only. It seems like the solution needs to be a very big picture long term thing and everything I heard you describing individually didn't seem like that. It seemed like the ingredients for that. So, alright, thanks. Yeah, and I just want to say as well I was so excited to see the nevy discussion schedule for next week, because we obviously we have a lot to learn from what's going on in a region. And I know that people on this committee are plugged into that process very closely it's just, it appears to me that the one of the things that we need to do a really good job up here setting the table, that this is not a Vermont specific problem, I mean we can, we can discuss and debate the funding level that the that we have provided post secondary education in the state relative to what we used to provide. It's a very important debate, but there's also things conspiring against post secondary education more broadly, and I want to make sure that everyone has an understanding of them because I think that'll best inform our decisions, particularly when it comes time to make decisions about how we prioritize funding and so forth. Casey. I just wanted to thank Dylan for the update. I really appreciate it. This is the state colleges is something people in my area. Take advantage of we have UVM that's a half an hour south of us but a lot of kids still. A lot of students will utilize Northern Vermont. I'm a, I went to Castleton I had a bunch of friends went to cast them so this is really important for our area too so I really appreciate the update. Thanks. Thank you for getting your questions ready for neppy for next week. This will be a real opportunity to get a little bit higher level view. What's happening with post secondary education, particularly since we've been so much has been remote as of late. And I think with that. I'll see you Friday. I think that would be just those two items. And on Wednesday we should see our vice chair do a spectacular job on 173. And Kathleen, if we do lead, you were, you were on the committee that reported that bill would you be prepared to report that if we, if we get to that point of voting it out. I'm not sure tomorrow. I can do it tomorrow. I'm just no, no, no. We haven't voted it out yet. I didn't think so but I had no recollection of voting it out but you know, I thought we were talking about tomorrow so I had a little panic but yeah, yeah, I'm sure I'm happy to report lead whenever that's ready. Okay. Excellent. So with that. We are. Okay, thanks.