10.21.2024 Fall River School Committee

order the Monday October 21 uh meeting of the regular school committee Deb would you please call the role Mr a Mr Bailey Mr Das here Mr Cory here miss lvy here miss Pereira she here no mayor hugan no go ahead mayor oh yeah salute to the flag please I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of Amer and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for

all pursuant to the open meeting law any person may make an audio or video recording of this public meeting or may transmit the meeting through any medium attendees are therefore advised that such recording or Transmissions are being made whether perceived or unperceived by those present and are deemed acknowledged and permissible uh we have a number of people signed up for Citizens input

tonight um we are going to try to limit everyone to three minutes we'll follow the guidance of the gentleman in the first seat that says respect and that will be good if it goes both ways it helps everybody again we have a number of people so we're just trying to be fair and first up we're going to need a motion to wave the rules Westport resident so move question are they educator in full

River yeah elth Davis is Educator okay I need a second though second all in favor I I opposed unanimous Liz madus three minutes please we have to startop stop meeting like this uh tonight I want to address some of the statements that were made in a special alternative Ed subcommittee meeting that I feel are very telling to the culture of the district at this time on October 9th one Committee Member shared that after

months of back and forth team chairs need to move on and just accept that Although our working conditions have changed and our workload increased all while still in the process of negotiations team chair should just accept this and move on the committee members stated people need to stop sharing concerns about workload being un um unsustainable during public meetings and that doing so is unacceptable public

input during public meetings holds purpose and should be valued it is important to make one committee it is important to make the committee aware of feedback from the school Community I would hope that as members elected to represent the city and this District not all committee members feel the same way as those comments I would hope that you are willing to hear from the community and think and reflect about what has

been shared with you however by remaining silent both in subcommittee meeting or when people reach out specifically to you through email like myself your silence comes off as complicit on top of that it feels disingenuous that then on October 15th during a meeting of the whole committee members stated their quote all years and that if there's a problem the committee needs to be made aware you've been made

aware many times of the team chair issue but we have yet to speak with any of you we're not fooled by the smoke and mirrors and I hope the public isn't either to publicly dismiss team chairs concerns and to simplify our job to two meetings a day not only undermines the hard work and dedication we have to this community our students but also shows a lack of understanding of everything our

job entails is truly it is if you truly believe that our job only includes two meetings I urge you to have a conversation with us about what it entails and I assure you my job is so much more likewise it's not about how much can be fit in a day but rather working together to design and Implement working conditions that are sustainable to complete during contractual hours while adhering to the special ed

compliance laws and regulations that guide the work we do to publicly state that you don't want anyone to share public input about their concerns ekko's lack of value for not only team chairs but to the whole staff of the district and for not one leader from the district to chime in about the dedication of their staff speaks volumes I understand that the team chair workload is just one

item for negotiations but in this case you've implemented changes without an agreement the sentiment that things need to be accepted without feedback is dangerous the culture of do as you're told and don't speak up not only lacks value for professional collaboration but has led us to this very Point 38 days without a collective bargaining agreement I truly believe the number of

FEA F Rea members that have been filling this room speaks to our feeling as a whole we are not to going to just accept things we will at least be heard and we want to be valued and appreciated the team chairs may only be a small fraction of the F but our message is those of all members it's time for the district to do better thank

you um um second speakers from East Providence uh motion I have a motion I have a second all in favor I unanimous uh three minutes please Ashley bisc City View East Province R uh good evening School member school committee members and my fellow Educators I'm here today to speak about the vital role of Special Education team chairs in our schools and the profound impact we have on the

success of students with disabilities as Special Education team chairs we are the four front of supporting most some of the most vulnerable students in our district we serve as advocates to in problem solvings for both students and teachers our responsibilities include coordinating running IEP meetings ensuring compliance with legal mandates and leading critical meetings that shape

the educational experiences of students with special needs this week alone I will spend approximately 21 hours in meetings supporting students collaborating with administrators and assisting teachers and families those are just the meetings I have in my calendar in addition countless hours are dedicated to answering teacher question questions providing guidance on implementing IEPs reaching out and

working with families and addressing urgent situations that arise throughout the school day compliance is a credible aspect of our role we must navigate a complex web of federal and state regulations to ensure that our schools are meeting the legal requirements for special education services this not only safeguards the rights of our students but also protects our district from potential legal ramifications our work

on maintaining compliance involves continuous training careful documentation and regular communication with families teachers and administrators to sure that all students receive the support they are entitled to the need of our special education students are vast and varied and many of them are unable to speak for for themselves it is our responsibility as chairs to be their voices advocating

fiercely for their rights and ensuring they receive the resources and tailored support essential for their success these students depend on us to make sure their unique challenges do not become barriers to their education however the overwhelming demands of large case loads can impact the quality of work we provide when team chairs are inundated with too many students to serve effectively we risk burnout stress and a

sense of being overwhelmed this emotional toll significantly affects our ability to support both students and teachers effectively supporting teachers is a critical aspect of our role Educators look to us for guidance as they navigate the complexities of special education from creating inclusive learning environments to ensuring they have the strategies tools and accommodations necessary to meet the

diverse nudes of their students our support empowers teachers to better serve their students with disabilities unfortunately many of our students have not had a certified teach in multiple years due to ongoing staff shortages further compounding the challenges that we Face our special education system is already under resource and under staff with trained professionals without manageable case loads Services may be

delayed and crucial interventions may be missed to truly address these challenges we must prioritize recruiting and retaining trained Professionals in special education when teachers feel supported they stay when teachers stay are students benefit team chairs play a vital role in this chain of support in conclusion in ing of in manageable case loads for Special Education team chairs is crucial not

only for the well-being of our Educators but also for the success of our students we continue to raise these concerns to ensure that team chairs can perform the jobs that they are passionate about while upholding the needs of our most vulnerable students we would never turn a teacher away in need in ignoring these challenges it an effect silencing the needs of the students we serve we are

able to properly support our teachers they in turn can provide the individualized attention and care that the every student with disability reserves ensuring the the education opportuni to thrive and succeed so let us be the district that suce puts students success first thank

you next up Kristen Rell nor Norwood Street forer three minutes please Kristen I'm reading this letter on behalf of another F member dear members of the school committee and Meer Coogan I am writing to express my concern regarding the ongoing contract negotiations specifically regarding special education and teacher pay disparities the outcome of these negotiations directly impact not only

the working conditions of our Educators and staff but also the quality of Education our students receive I understand that negotiations can be complex and timec consuming but I urge the committee to prioritize transparency regarding the pay for our teachers which is significantly lower than that of neighboring school districts this disparity not only affects the morale of our dedicated professionals but also

hampers our ability to attract and retain high quality Educators we risk losing additional talented individuals to districts that offer more Equitable compensation competitive salaries are essential not just for retention but also for fostering an environment where Educators can Thrive and focus on delivering the best education possible as you are aware special education teachers play a crucial role in

supporting our students with diverse needs many special education teachers are ma managing large case loads which not only impacts their ability to provide individualized attention to each student but also contributes to burnout and job dis dissatisfaction moreover the complexity of their roles often extends Beyond classroom instruction they are required to engage in extensive paperwork attend

numerous meetings and collaborate with various professionals all of which can be incredibly timec consuming this still does not take into account the vast amount of behavior management and specially designed individual instruction for each and every child on our case loads special education staff pour their hearts into their students just as all teachers in Fall River do but when it comes time to compensation

this is again an area that is not comparable to other districts within a short radius we deserve Fair compensation as a young adult looking to purchase a home on a teacher salary it has become abundantly clear that all a teacher salary in Fall River at this time is not enough to run a household on a single income with Rising housing costs and everyday living expenses it has become increasingly difficult for

educators to make ends meet this financial strain not only affects their well-being but also impacts their ability to focus on teaching and supporting their students effectively many talented Educators may be forced to seek additional work or leave the city all together further exasperating the Staffing challenges in our schools it is crucial that the committee addresses the compensation of teachers during these

negotiations more seriously by advocating for competitive salaries we can create a more supportive environment for our Educators ultimately benefiting benefiting our students and the community as a whole thank you for your time Courtney Santos thank

you next up Jessica McDonald 4801 North Main Street good evening school committee members over the past few months I've enjoyed hearing the stories of my colleagues especially of those who have grown up in Fall River and stayed here to teach I wanted to share with you my story which is a little little different I grew up just outside of Albany New York and I attended Marram College where I graduated from in

2017 in the spring of that year I went to a career fair in Boston in which a large number of districts in Massachusetts were accepting resumés from prospective teachers I'd never even heard of Fall River but the table was open so I marched right up and I handed in my resume the very next day I received a call from Sylvia's principal wanting to interview me for a fifth grade position when I shared my

excitement about this interview and Fall River with friends I was met with remarks that were less than positive um despite that I drove an hour and a half here for my interview I accepted the position a few weeks later and I was quickly welcomed into the Sylvia Community all this to say I chose Fall River not only that I chose to move here by myself leaving behind family and friends in New York and I've lived here

for the past seven years I invite those very same friends who made remarks about the city to visit and I show them the wonderful things going on here and I share with them my successes as a teacher here I chose Fall River Because deep in my soul I believe all students deserve Equitable access to excellent teachers and education but when our Educator's pay is inequitable our students education becomes inequitable

as well the student Opportunity Act was designed to level the playing field between funding and higher income and lower income districts as we've heard many times in this very room we are not even on a Level Playing Field with other low-income districts I have dedicated my career so far to the children of this city and I've been proud to say I chose Fall River however it's getting harder

and harder to continue to defend that choice in a school district when I'm barely making enough to get by as a professional with a master's degree the amount of my colleagues who have shared this exact sentiment is unacceptable even with the stress I carry about payments and rent because of the beliefs I hold I choose to stay I just want to be given a salary that reflects my value as I know all of us do

and though I do choose to stay to quote one of my colleagues and mentors any other District would be rolling out the red carpet to have a Fall River teacher she is right and it's already happening you have a responsibility to stop it thank you for your time thank

you uh I need a motion to wave the rules as the next speak is from Bristol rhod Island so moved second I have a motion a second all in favor I opposed unanimous uh three minutes please Jamie good evening members of oh I'm sorry Jamie Wilson Spruce Street Bristol I'm sorry Scott Avenue Bristol got you wrong Jame go ahead good evening members of the Fall River school committee thank you for allowing me to

speak here today my name is Jamie wil and I have had the privilege as working of working as a special education inclusion teacher at Frank Sylvia Elementary School for the past 6 years I am here because I love my students and my colleagues and I want to advocate for a fair contract that ensures we can continue providing the best possible education for this community over the years I have seen my case load increase

the needs of my students in front of me grow more complex yet every year my co-teachers and I step up we collaborate with my team to schedule dozens of meetings every year to ensure that my students have IEPs to match their needs my colleagues and I take our own time to support brand new Educators who arrive each year to fill our vacancies we are committed to our students success and we

work tirelessly to create inclusive and effective learning environments we choose to do this because we believe in the potential of the children in this District I have however I have also watched talented passionate Educators leave Fall River for nearby districts that offer higher pay and more support this is disheartening as I know these students deserve the best teachers Educators who are fairly compensated for

their dedication and expertise the constant turnover and loss of experienced teachers disrupts the continuity and quality of our education that we are providing I understand that many May perceive teachers as simply complaining when we speak up for this Fair compensation but the truth is we are fighting to continue working in the district that we love we are fighting to remain in the classrooms and school

communities we have invested in I respectfully would invite each of you to come and visit our schools come to see for yourselves the love and passion that the Educators in Fall River pour into their classrooms every day we are here because we care deeply about our students and we want to build a future where every child receives education from teachers who are fairly compensated it is critical that we address the

disparity in pay and provide the appropriate salary Corrections that the f is advocating for we are paying significantly less than surrounding districts this discrepancy is affecting experienced teachers especially where the pay Gap becomes more pronounced over time these are the Educators with years of knowledge and those who have built relationships within our schools and Community by not addressing this pay

disparity we risk losing these invaluable teachers which would be a loss our students and this District cannot afford Fair compensation is not just about salary it's about respecting the commitment and professionalism of the educ Educators who choose to be here I urge you to stand with us the Educators who have dedicated themselves to this community let's ensure that we can retain and attract the best talent

for our students who deserve nothing less thank you for your

time I'll need a motion to wave the rules as the next speaker from Somerset so move second I have a motion to Second all in favor I opposed unanimous Carlos nevs 24 Spruce Street Somerset three minutes please Carlos thank you members

God did you understand what I just said okay this is the reality we face in our classrooms teachers who are dedicated and go above and beyond teachers who are dedicated and go above and beyond their abilities to accommodate the needs of our students especially those students that yet cannot speak English and are eager to learn and have the opportunities like many of you and your assessors had in

the past this is what I said in Portuguese good evening members of the committee of f River I would like to begin by expressing my deep gratitude to all of the teachers in F River who work tirelessly to support our students and especially to the teachers who learn their communication skills and in other languages to educate our students who do not yet speak English or who are in the process of

learning this Educators play an essential role not only in the academic success of our students but also in building a more inclusive and support supportive Community the relevance of these teachers cannot be of stated they not only provide academic instructions but also Bridge cultural and linguistic gaps fostering an inclusive environment where always students can drive in a district like

ours as diverse as it is the ability to speak more than one language is a rare and invaluable skill by paying us our fair share you will be helping retain dedicated Educators and multilingual Educators like myself who bring a unique set of skills to our schools you will also attract more multilingual Multicultural Educators we are uniquely equipped to meet the needs of our elll students and our contribution is

invaluable furthermore you must recognize the importance of maintaining our veteran teachers their experience and dedication are the Bedrock of our rer educational system this season the teachers and Educators bring a wealth of knowledge and disability to our schools mentoring new teachers and ensuring continuity to our education programs Additionally you should value those who are returning to our district like

myself by acknowledging appreciating our contribution by reinstating our professional status you can attract the former former teachers back to our district their familiarity with our district and their proven commitment to our students make them an asset that we cannot afford to lose it is crucial to pay our teachers or your teachers a decent salary because we go above and beyond to teach every day for

many of our students we are their nurturers psychologists mentors and often parents many of our students are desperate for more just than just an education there the students come to our school because here they find the structure care love and dedicated adults in many cases they can relate to us because of our cultural background thank you thank you very much callus can I just conclude

myself that we have way well we're trying to show respect in conclusion investing our teachers to a fair salary it's not just about compensation it's about Valu the critical role we play in shaping the future of this community by paying us a fair share you are ensuring that we are continue to provide the high level of education and support to our students who needs and deserve show that

you care by recognizing our hard work commitment and unique skills dedicated to your District show us that you care by accepting our proposal thank you thank you thank you no they made a motion the W already you hear them and I don't hey uh we are trying to be fair to everybody in the auditorium tonight we want everyone to have a chance but we we're trying to hold people to the same

standards as this gentleman in the first row respect please so can we hold it to three minutes respectfully next up I need a motion to wave the rules from New Bedford motion so made second do I have a second yeah second I have a motion to Second all in favor I opposed unanimous let's try this again Jenna Vieira Sterling Street New Bedford three minutes please Jenna sure thank you good

evening I'm sure by now the committee is familiar with me but my name is Jenna Vieira and I'm both a team chair and the special education representative on the F bargaining team I would like to briefly address the state of the negotiations between the team chairs and the district regarding team chair workload due to discussion during this month's special and alternative education subcommittee meeting it is

regrettable that the district is committed to misrepresenting the nature of our negotiations that have been conducted over the past 18 months to reduce the job of a team chair to just holding two meetings a day is a drastic depreciation of what our job entails I believe we are actually in agreement that it is time to wrap up these proposals so my message is this if the district would like to move on from the

issue of Team chair workload then resolve it the F remains committed to negotiating a sound agreement on this and all other issues in a manner that demonstrates greater respect than what has been shown here thank you thank you all right uh a little bit of housekeeping I just have to announce joining us virtually is Shelley Pereira she actually joined a speaker ago but I forgot to say it so she's with us

virtually next speaker I'll need a motion to wave the rules is from Somerset so move second have a motion a second uh Lauren Shay Rodney Avenue

Somerset three minutes please law hi I'm reading this on behalf of the team chair at dery high school she wasn't able to be here tonight dear members of the school committee I'm writing this letter to bring to your attention a matter of great importance concerning the increase in workload for the team chairs and its in its eventual impact on the district's compliance with special education

regulations as a team chair I'm responsible for maintaining compliance at the building level and ensuring the district resources are allocated to support our needest students last year in January I returned from attorney leave as one of our team chairs at dery and RPA from January to June my case load was approximately 145 students and I scheduled and ran 73 meetings this year my case LW has jumped to

approximately 185 students and in the first two months alone I've scheduled 76 meetings I would like to be clear in my opinion that I agree that it's in the district's best best interest for the team chairs to run annual meetings in the spring of 2023 I shared with my supervisor that with a this was a manageable case load I believe team chairs should run annuals however those are not our current working conditions

at this time I cannot follow the SOP that the district has developed and approved regarding scheduling facilitating and documenting the newly added annual reviews with the increased workload of running annual reviews I no longer have the time to review the drafts of IEPs prior to meetings or review finalized drafts within the state's 14 calendar day time online this increase in workload will have negative

impacts on the district's compliance rates and could cause an influx of PRS compaints appeals with the BSA in possible litigation a greater concern is the loss of trust our special education families will have when we are not able to uphold the standards of special education regulations our team chairs serve as liaison between the district and the families are at need students my

favorite part favorite part of being a team chair has become getting to know our special education students and their families The increased workload limits the time that goes into fostering those relationships professionally speaking being a team chair was my dream job however running an average of 12 meetings a week and not having time to complete paperwork or view IEPs has made

me feel completely ineffective as a team chair I can no longer do this job with the same Fidelity and thoroughness I did when I first started the mental load created with the increased workload has made me feel like I'm suffering from dementia this is not sustainable and my mental health will always win over any job even that means moving back to the classroom or working in a different

District thank you Erica for that evaluation team chair at dery High School

I'll need a motion to wave the rules as the next speaker is from Somerset so move second have a motion in second um Kelly gabardi Riverside Avenue Somerset three minutes please Kell thank you thank you I'm reading a letter in behalf of Hannah Boon from Henry Lord community school but first our little Frontier we haven't felt respected so are you starting right yes you can stop we just haven't felt

respected so I figured he should stand just that you don't respect us and your respect for us is dead but okay dear Fall River school committee I hope that this letter finds you well I'm writing to express my strong support for advocating higher salaries for teachers in our district I recently moved to Providence Rhode Island from Denver Colorado with my partner to move closer to my extended family I was nervous

about our CrossCountry move but but I felt relieved to know that I had landed a position in a school with a supportive team of Administrators and diverse group of passionate Educators moving from Colorado to the east coast was a significant decision for me one driven by the passion for teaching and the promise of a higher salary that's sad but that was communicated to me during the hiring

process I believed that by joining this community I would not be not only be contributing to the education of our students but also receiving a fair compensation for my work as a recent transplant I was eager to start my eth year of teaching in Far Riva Public Schools I have heard such wonderful things about the students and families more specifically more specifically What attracted me to the Henry Lord Community

School was the amount of teachers who had worked for at the school for multiple years coming from a School in Colorado with similar demographics as to Henry Lord Community School I was eager to DP right back into the ethnically rich and supportive Community before I started this school year I was told that I could expect an increase in salary after NE negotiations were made this was

in May and now we're in the beginning of November it's disheartening especially since I got married this year and was generally hoping for a 5 to 8% increase and actually told that this isue would have been negotiated by now we have we we have remarkable team of dedicated teachers who pour their hearts and souls into their work the hours are long and it often feels like gratitude we receive isn't significant

to sustain our momentum teaching is not just a job for me it is a commitment to our students and their families I want to give my all without the burn it of financial stress I urge the union to PRI the school committee to prioritize this issue in negotiations with with Union help I I changed that sincerely Hannah Boon second grade teacher Henry Lord community school thank you thank

you I'll need a motion to wave the rules on the next speaker from wck Rhode Island still move second I have a motion to Second all in favor I I opposed unanimous Helen shmaker I can barely read your writing I think it's 39 margerie Lane 29 29 sorry uh Warwick three minutes please good evening once again my name is Helen Schoonmaker and I teach 8th grade foundational at cus Middle School I want

to preface this by addressing Dr Curley Mr agar and although not up on stage Dr b as well I worked with all of you at Henry Lord where you were either my principal or vice principal as such I know you each know how difficult it is for me to speak up how much anxiety it causes me and how much I detest being the center of attention I hope that my

being up here for third time despite the terror I feel at public speaking speaks of how important this is the last time I was up here I described my financial situation to you showing how little I have to my name despite being year 11 I was wrong last time not 10 with a master's and a teacher leader stipend I want to again describe to you my finances in the last few weeks since the

last meeting I pinched pennies a lot on purpose just to see how much I could save by not spending money on anything I didn't have to unless it was for survival obligation or love for my friends and family over the last month despite pinching pennies I spent $25 on gas for my car $64 on coffee but only on the days I ran out of coffee at home or forgot to make my own and I need the

coffee in order to work the long hours that defines the teaching career $3,200 on my house including internet otherwise how else would I complete lesson planning the October mortgage repairs my pets gas electricity utilities 250 in co-pays for appointments with my therapist psychiatrist dermatologist and my medications two 116 on good materials for my classroom 260 on food primarily

for days I forgot my lunch at home but also to be able to make a nice dinner for my mother on her birthday 193 on other miscellaneous purchases including a birthday gift for my mom and tickets and parking for Block Island to attend a friend stepfather's memorial service as of today I have $544 in checking and 981 in savings if my next paycheck is the same I'll have 2,125 more in my checking

and I will be able to pay my November member mortgage and have some money stored away oh wait no that car that my dad spent $2,400 on in repairs in the end it couldn't be fixed so it was a loss my parents gave me their car and bought another for their use so now they owe money they also helped pay for a new pump in my basement and have asked that

I do pay them back for that now that they are again in debt themselves they are less able to help me even though they want to and I owe them almost 3,000 due to the car and the pump suddenly the little bit of money I was able to save up over the last month is gone our salaries are not sustainable if you think they are please tell me where else

can I pinch pennies should I not have gotten my mother a birthday present should I have told my friend I couldn't make it to her stepdad's memorial service should I skip lunch on the days I forget my lunch at home I haven't even bought myself new shoes for work even though there's a literal hole at the bottom even though one of my middle schoolers who we all know can be

brutally honest has asked me why I wear such old shoes are you poor M I do not teach in Fall River for the money I try to explain that to them if I was teaching for the money Fall River would be the last place I look yet here I am 11 years in because I love this city and these students and want to stay I'm not telling any of telling you any

of this for your pity I don't need it I don't want it I need your understanding and you to take action thank

you I need a motion to wave the rules as the next speaker from Riverside Rhode Island so move second I have a motion a second all in favor I I opposed unanimous Chelsea Burnham Garden Drive Riverside Rhode Island three minutes please Chelsea good evening school committee members and fellow Educators my name is Chelsea Burnham and I am a music teacher at cus middle school and the kd8 music teacher

leader I have worked at both cus and Morton and have seen some absolutely amazing top tier Educators leave both buildings in droves this is my six year infall River and I have not once worked in a full year in a fully staffed school being the person I am I wanted to figure out why and how to change that I joined the joint labor committee for social emotional learning because I wanted to

understand and help teachers who might be struggling with their social emotional well-being take care of themselves and get to the root of why people leave in doing so I put my name and my face into a video where District Personnel stated and I quote our committee has decided to focus its efforts on our single most important investment you I believe in this work and I'm proud of the work we did last year but you can

understand my embarrassment when I presented this video to my colleagues and my friends days after our initial Financial proposal was met met with 2% 2% 2% when we talk about the social emotional needs of our students we talk about how many of them come to school to be fed and loved how basic needs have to be met before real learning can happen teachers are expected to fill these gaps that may not be met at

home I have watched teacher after teacher come up here and speak about how they are on food stamps to keep their kids fed or living with their parents to keep a roof over their heads safe warm and fed are basic human needs we make sure our students have that it's time for you to make sure our teachers are able to have that in their homes no teacher working full-time should have to rely on family or

government assistance to get by we should not have to leave school to get to our second or third jobs and we should not have to rely on stipended positions to make sure we can make our bills we can't keep teachers we can't fill vacancies I was a part of the interviewing process for new music teachers this summer and we offered to multiple amazing people who backed out within days for districts with higher

pay our contract is public the first thing people do when they're looking at a new school or interviewing is look at the contract these meetings are public and they can see that we're struggling we are never going to fill these positions or keep highly qualified veteran teachers if this continues you want to see math scores go up how can that happen when a math classroom doesn't have a consistent teacher

throughout the whole year it's time to prove to the F rea the statement that was made in that jlmc video that the entire District watched in their faculty meetings in may teachers and staff are your single most important investment thank

you the next speaker is Robert Gorman Kisa Drive Robert is Kisa driving for I need a motion to wait the rules so moveed second all in favor I opposed unanimous three minutes please Robert sure thanks sorry for the confusion I'm reading this for a member who couldn't be there today dear members of the school committee I'm writing to you today with a profound sense of urgency emphasizing the critical importance of

teaching retention and its profound impact on Student Success within our school district as we starty to provide the highest quality education for our students it is imperative that we recognize and address the alarming factors that are contributing to the high turnover of our dedicated and talented Educators firstly let me be clear teacher retention is directly LED linked to student achievement research

consistently shows that students perform significantly better academically when taught by experienced teachers who are familiar with the school's curriculum and culture these teachers have had the time to develop and refine their their instructional strategies build stronger relationships with their students and create a stable and supportive learning environment this continuity is absolutely essential for fostering

academic growth and emotional well-being in our students yet the school committee continues to ignore the urgent need to retain these invaluable Educators on the flip side High teacher turnover rates can have devastating effects on the entire School Community when teachers leave it severely disrupts the learning process and lead to a St catastrophic loss of valuable instructional knowledge

new teachers no matter how qualified require an extensive period of time to acclimate to the school's environment and establish a rapport with their students this transitional period invariably results in a sharp decline in student performance engagement it's as if the school committee is content to let our schools descend into chaos moreover retaining our teachers is not only crucial for our students success

but it's also a cost- effective investment for for the district the financial resources required to constantly recruit higher and train new teachers are staggering by prioritizing the retention of our current teachers through competitive salaries robust professional development opportunities and a truly supportive work environment we can redirect these resources towards enhancing educational programs and

resources for our students yet the school committee seems more interested in lining their own Pockets than investing in the future of our children I must emphasize that increasing teacher salaries is a critical component of this investment competitive compensation not only acknowledges the hard work and dedication of our Educators but it also makes our district more attractive to highly qualified professionals when

teachers feel genuinely valued and fair fairly compensated they are far more likely to remain committed to our schools fostering a stable and thriving educational environment however the school committee's unwillingness to prioritize Fair compensation for our teachers is a slap in the face to the very people who shape the minds of our Future Leaders it's worth noting that one of our own school committee members

is a principal and a neighboring District this should be seen as a clear conflict of interest and frankly they should know better their unique perspective should make it abundantly clear just how vital it is to retain quality Educators and ensure they are fairly compensated as they are the backbone of any successful school system yet the school committee seems content to ignore this glaring issue

prioritizing their own interests over the needs of our students and teachers in conclusion the time to act the time for Action is now I urge the school committee to consider the long-term benefits of teacher attention and to take immediate action proactive measures to address this critical issue our students Futures depend on it if school committee continues to neglect the needs

of our teachers we can expect to see our schools crumble and our students to suffer the consequences together we can create a supportive and enriching learning environment that empowers both our teachers and students to reach their full potential however this will require the school committee to put aside their personal agendas and prioritize the well-being of our educational Community

I am confident that with your true leadership and unwavering commitment we can overcome this Challenge and secure a brighter future for our entire School District sincerely parissa Bailey thank

you next up John Andre Prospect Street Fall River when I was a kid my mom introduced me to her world famous alfredo pasta she let me take St right from the pot and it was s lamon I'll tell you that uh she gave me the option to make whatever adjustments I wanted to it and I not truly appreciating what I had in front of me immediately grabbed all of the

spices I could I was trying to make it better while also making it mine but long story short I ruined it beyond recognition my mother and I remade it but I learned a few lessons that day one just because I was in empowered to make decisions in the moment didn't mean that a big decision needed to be made and two no no no no no this is 3 minutes and I'm

going to go over two um I'd for sure have done a better job if I just leisurely managed something that was already working instead of you even if it was like less work for me um so surprised obviously this is a metaphor um I I'm I'm sure you didn't see that coming right uh it's regarding the decision to make team chairs run annual review meetings this kind of change feels like very rushed especially since

we're also uh changing our IEP format for the third year in a row and asking staff to catch up and like we don't have the number of etcs to take on all this new work um and I understand running review meetings is typically done by team chairs in some other districts but like you know what else is done in other districts paying a competitive wage um no no no no um even before now team

chairs were always the busiest people in our department uh my team chair averaged 165 meetings the last 2 years just about the highest in the district and this year with these changes they'll hit 100 meetings before November ends the fact that any of the these chairs have decided to not abandon that post and step into the classroom or elsewhere is a testament to the kind of pay increase

that they deserve if not for the workload alone then for their grit they're paid about the same as any classroom teacher which we can obviously agree is not that much um plus like a very small stipend afterwards and there was already a position that was like very hard to fill so why why are we playing with fire here um school committee Kevin uh I Sor it's always back to you um he said Team chairs need

to do the work the right way and we don't need to keep hearing it at every meeting that the numbers are unsustainable we can't have every single meeting someone get up to the podium and tell us that they can't do two meetings a day it's unacceptable well first of all sorry to disappoint um your comments make it sound like you don't know that most meetings require at minimum an hour

of work to prep beforehand and then an hour minimum afterwards so those two meetings add an upwards of six extra hours of work a day um do you feel like you could do any job the right way with six extra hours of work added to your day um and and like sorry but you'd really rather fight this fight than help us get on the same pay scale as New Bedford or Taunton it's decisions like

these that grease the hinges of the revolving door in this District they demonstrate a lack of empathy and respect for people who share the same goals as you um and your indifference to their workload is like kind of embarrassing and and pretty irresponsible after endorsing this kind of ludicrous change and after your ongoing opposition to a fair contract all year do not believe for a moment any

of you that this District's future successes are in any way because of you they are in spite of

you next up next up next up Amber suer Woodman Street River three three three minutes please Amber thank you my name is Amber Souza and I am an algebra and teacher at dery high school as well as a dery alumni and lifelong Fall River resident I am speaking to you today regarding an issue that is increasingly become more pressing as a school year has marched on which is the absence of a special

education teacher in two of my algebra 1 inclusion classes it has been 30 school days since there has been a special education teacher in these two classes of mine you might not be aware of this since my former co- teacher's name is still listed on Aspen desie might not be aware of this either with no end in sight this situation is not only severely impacting my mental health it is also significantly impeding on the

learning opportunities of my amazing special education students inclusion classrooms are designed to provide Equitable access to the curriculum to all students regardless of needs without there being a dedicated special education teacher in these classes the responsibility of not only teaching the curriculum but also making sure I am meeting the many diverse needs of my students has all

fallen on me writing IEP goals and Gathering data relating to student progress on my own all while trying to differentiate a math curriculum that at times does not feel practical to teach to any of my students has created unbearable levels of Stress and Anxiety for me each day I step into room 2308 this isn't my first rodeo at this either I have lost four special education teachers during my 2 years and two

months of teaching Algebra 1 inclusion at dery trying to balance everything without adequate support has caused levels of burnout I have never faced before and it's only October the stress has impacted my ability to effectively teach all my students and it has made me question my own abilities as an educator it breaks my heart to see my students every single day work hard to do the

best they can but still struggle because they are not getting the appropriate supp support they need I am one person trying to do the job of two and being told that I am a strong educator and that if there's anyone that can make it work it's you Amber is not changing the simple fact that this district is doing a disservice to these students there is a 50% deficit of teachers in these two

classes of mine and US teachers know that that is a failing grade I constantly hear that Algebra 1 is one of the single most important classes a student will take in high school so I ask this is it fair to these students to miss out on the Equitable highquality math education they are entitled to is it fair that my students are asking if their accommodations will be met during high stakes testing is it

fair to me me that I feel like I need to put on a brave face and pretend like I'm okay even though I have no idea when I will finally have a special education teacher in my classes is it fair to undermine the principle of inclusion for these students is it fair to your special Educators that you do not support them enough so they wish to remain teaching in Far River let me tell

you it is not and my students know this too as the voice of my students impacted by this problem I ask that all do not forget about the special education students as well as your special education teachers I ask that you all # show UPF frsc and come to an agreement on a fair contract that makes special education teachers want to teach in Fall River so your students can receive the high quality education that this

District prided itself on thank you thank you next up Josh laer Deval Street Fall River three minutes please Josh thank you uh thanks and my name is actually pronounced lower uh it's easy to remember if you just think about our salary um so uh my name is Josh leder and I've spoken to this committee before about the urgent need for this District to make significant pay adjustment in

addition to a cost of living adjustment to make our salaries competitive with nearby districts I don't teach economics so I won't go too deep into the principle of supply and demand but I think uh you all on this stage are educated enough to know this uh when there's low Supply and a high demand for a good or a service the price of that service becomes more expensive this committee has dragged out negotiations

for giving its seizures of competitive salary uh supply and demand weighed heavily in our mind when we made our first proposal for a 12% increase each year over 3 years that number would have actually made us competitive against similar districts in the job market instead of being perpetually underst staffed as we have been since I started working here six years ago in the time

since our financial position has changed but the economics of reality have not as we've been negotiating other districts that were not as far behind as Fall River in terms of teacher pay have given three-year increases close to and around the same level as your most recent offer which was made before the school year started the Gap is widening between us and other districts and even if you were

to take our current proposal now we'll still have have this pay adjustment conversation again in 3 years because we're going to still be in the same position behind everywhere else overall this district has a major Staffing issue and it's three-fold there's a lack of teachers who are willing to accept positions in this District in the first place there's the fact that we're already always

hiring teachers that are new to the district and as we all know uh just because they accept the position doesn't mean they're going to necessarily stay long and lastly there's the morale problem that exists in many buildings as many teachers are struggling with their mental health and are burnt out uh before October is even done dery isn't even the biggest culit of this but look at the schools with the most staff

absences the schools with the most resignations in tonight's agenda the schools that need to rely on staffing agencies to fill teaching positions these are all signs of something deeply broken in our system and this is the only opportunity you'll have for three years to put us on the right track financially to solve these problems while this process drags out our members continue to feel undervalued by District

leadership your lawyer has indicated that paying teachers a competitive salary isn't sustainable well working in a district that pays so poorly isn't sustainable for us paying teachers less than the market rate isn't sustainable vacancies and special ed and MLL aren't sustainable the impact this is having on our students isn't sustainable we fought four years to get over a 50% increase in

state funding how are we even still having this conversation about sustainability at this point please consider this as you go into executive session tonight thank you thank you uh next up I need a motion to wave the rules as the speakers from Swansea so move second I have a motion a second all in favor I I opposed unanimous um Rachel Martin Oak Street Swansea uh three minutes please ra hello I'm

reading this on behalf of another F member who couldn't be here tonight dear Fall River school committee my name is Caleb Schaefer and this is my 11th year as a teacher and my third year in Fall River Public Schools I've spent my entire career in underserved communities and districts including Houston Texas new Newark New Jersey and Providence Rhode Island I left each past District

heartbroken when the pay didn't match the demands there comes a time when you have to do what makes sense for you and your family no matter how much you fall fallen in love with the community I have fallen in love with the four Rover Community I think of my students before I fall asleep and as soon as my eyes open I am working on my dyslexia certification through URI so I can

better support the academic gaps my students have from having overworked stretched th brand new teachers in previous grades I am a teacher leader because I want to create a supportive culture in my grade and help roll out effective practices especially since we have three brand new teachers on our grade level team this year after school my fiance lead The Dungeons and Dragons seal club with my previous students I

come to basketball games and regularly give up my free time to host lunch bunches for past and current students I love my co-workers and admin and all the support we give and take from each other I am fully in meshed in this community and I feel grounded every day in my why but I also spend all of my summer working and during the school year I work a second job almost every weekend

and evening do you know how embarrassing it is to be a dog walker when you are a professional in your mid-30s I love this community but having worked at several different schools in the past I know there are communities everywhere I will fall in love with and who need me just as much who will pay me an appropriate amount of money for the work I'm putting in I'd love to stop walking other

people's dogs but the rain the main reason I care so much is because our district isn't retaining teachers when we don't retain teachers the kids suffer our students will never reach Mastery with brand new teachers Staffing every grade level it took me three years of teaching before I became even close to effective there is just so much to learn we can't keep losing teachers and

replacing them with new ones even great new ones our kids deserve better and if you don't agree then you need to get into the schools and talk to them see their potential see how they're suffering from high teacher turnover and then see if you're okay with underpaying and overworking the keys to their future thank you for

listening uh next up I'll need a motion to wave the rules is this speakers from East Providence so move second I have a motion second all in favor I opposed unanimous Keith michon um Trion timeon Tron Avenue East Providence

good evening Keith michan incredibly proud to be the president of the Far Over Educators Association I I want to be clear that we represent uh the teachers the nurses and therapy assistant some other unit members also but I also want to bring attention to our unit B members the therapy assistants LPNs and our Sams and Unit C and also share that we stand in solidarity with our Paris and clerical

staff and as well as the uh other uh members and other units that don't have contracts right now um a lot of those members are not only not getting by because of the Master's level low Master's level rate that our educators are paid but they're paid in a poverty wage an incredibly low wage and not a living wage that needs to be addressed uh so I want to bring attention to that

and the other thing I want to do tonight is share petition that's been signed by over 800 of our members and this petition has been shared with the mayor and and the city council and tonight we're going to share it with the school committee and I want to sh read it as it's written I join my fellow members of the fallover Educators Association in calling on you to settle a fair contract

without delay we have been bargaining since January 2024 and seek your immediate action in settling all outstanding issues the city has a chance to invest in its future and transform its schools with tens of millions of dollars in new state aid an annual Surplus by for River Public Schools amounting to $5 million in the each of the past two fiscal years Fall River has never been better positioned to meet the

Urgent needs of our schools and has never oh and invest in the future of our students the time is now for you to do your part in supporting an agreement that includes fair and competitive compensation which will enable for River to retain and recruit quality Educators a modern parental leave policy that is inclusive of all families and which will allow Educators to care for our children

in the same way we care for our students language that respects the expert Judgment of forer public school Educators there is no time to waste for for's elected leaders to properly invest in our school system and in turn in our students futures thank you thank

you you guys gave me those day you oh okay thank you next up C Kristen Anderson Roberson Street Fall River three minutes please Deb good evening members of the school committee I stand before you today not only as a future educator but as a concerned member of our community the frea represents approximately 850 dedicated teaching faculty and educational specialists in our district these

individuals are not just Educators they are our community's backbone Tire ly shaping our children's future yet they have been working for 36 days without a contract 36 days without Fair compensation for their invaluable work how much longer can we allow this to continue these Educators deserve wages that reflect the demands of their profession especially as they dedicate their time and energy to their students

it is unacceptable that they continue to provide high quality education while receiving last year's wages which were well below market value for a teacher in this area to begin with when you add in inflation rates over the last two years it's a wonder how any of them stay are staying afloat we must ask ourselves how long can you tell them you're trying your best how long can we negotiate

while they while we feel while they feel disrespected and humiliated I have shared my aspirations to teach in Fall River Public Schools because of the incredible Educators who have been who have influenced my life however I now I now find myself questioning that dream what will I receive in return for my commitment to the city will it be disrespect and wages that Force Educators to rely on working multiple

jobs or to live on government assistance to make ends meet will I be there in three years speaking for my own contract talking about the same is issues such as pay and health and safety within schools while you say you're trying your best is that the same easy answer you'll give Educators in this community years from now the same copout easy answer this situation is urgent the lack

of contract is affecting not just the teachers but the students who rely on them teachers have spent years building their careers and many are trying to establish roots in this community they stay for their students the ones who rely on them academically and emotionally if this delay continues it won't just affect their lives it will impact the learning environment for our students it's no secret every District

in the surrounding area has a better pay how are you going to keep our teachers here delaying this process will only exagerate the challenges we Face I've been I've seen how quickly the frea can organize what if they strike are you prepared for them to strike what then if the teacher stri strike our students will be without guidance routines routines will be disrupted and the quality of Education will suffer not to

mentioned schools will have to close their doors thank you uh and finally I need a motion away the rules for ouille Mass so moved second I have a motion second all in favor I opposed uh chenice Madden pin L ouille dear superintendent and school committee my name is Janice and I am a fourth grade teacher at Henry Lord I'd like to share with you some information about our students my classroom and

myself so that you have a better understanding of why I am asking for your support I have always enjoyed working in urban situations and when the two positions opened in coaching and teaching care I sought the opportunity to come to this district and I took the risk when I say took the risk I left a place that I have been that I had been teaching for 3 years and most likely

would still be there but was drawn here when I came here I fell in love with my students and my athletes and the people I work with it continues to be that way but there are some things that are getting in the way of making me want to stay up to this point things have been as expected the challenges from the students were moderate but the support from my Administration was great and the

additional professional work was manageable this this year however things have been different from the start I am now encountering challenges that I did not plan on dealing with a sixth year teacher this year my class of 28 students is stacked with a variety of needs from emotional IEP needs and English language Learners to behavioral needs it is astonishing that two teachers myself and Miss Cano are

expected to figure out how to meet their needs with the Limited time we are already given because of required PLT and CPT requirements from the get-go my focus has been to split time my emotional state has a as a human being has been strained I want to be able to give my best as my best as not only a wife but as a coach as a teacher and as a emotional support emotional support for my

students The Limited resource ources are um already provided along with the limited pay as made this year much more challenging than it should be I want to be able to provide my students with the best opportunities especially with the limited experiences they have already this is difficult to do because we are asked to do more than time allows and pay allows as teachers we are asked to

educate support console love care and mediate and take in Stranges All In one day especially in Far River I want to do that but with more less in planning the less the less pay and breaks it is impossible to meet the needs of these students I want to do all that you ask so why are you asking me to sacrifice more than I than I have and can offer I

cannot be a teacher I want to be let alone the teacher or coach the kids need with your expectations please support the students by supporting us thank you item number three chairman Mr Agia just want to respond to a few of the comments that people made relative to me spe specifically uh we have an issue going on with Team chairs now I grant you that we've dealt with this issue of

Team chairs one of the speakers even said it for me that it it's been 18 months since we've been actually working on having team chairs serve both regular meetings as well as annual meetings 18 months this school committee has unanimously voted on a number of occasions to tell the administration that we need to implement the job description that says that the the team chairs will run annual meetings as well

as the regular meetings Mrs obenchain has spent countless hours going over numbers and data asking for information from the team chairs so that this school committee could try to get a real number relative to how much how many meetings they had and what their duties are what we've come out with and why I said I think two meetings per year is definitely doable is there's 180 days in

a school year you multiply that by two that's 360 meetings in addition to that there's a job description that has a whole bunch of Duties some that they should have been doing and some not Mrs Oben chain worked with the superintendent the prior superintendent and the current superintendent to make that more manageable to streamline for the importance of the teacher uh the team chair to run both annuals and

regular meetings for this the team chairs are receiving a $6,000 stien which I think is fair to get them extra money because obviously there's time that they might need to do some things after hours in order to meet the needs of that job I in no way I'm disrespecting the team chairs but I am asking you that you work with the administration work with Mrs obenchain who I have 100% confidence in and her

leadership team to make sure that we're running this District properly no one's going to be asked to do things that they can't do and that and she's always there as well as superintendent Curley to try to help with these issues but no one can come up and say over and over that we need to lower the case numbers when we've already voted unanimously multiple times to say we want to implement this

over 18 months ago and it's just now starting to get implemented the start of the school year it just that's why I said what I said I stand by it and I stand by what Mrs oen said okay I also was was called out to talk about whether we're going to have increases or not and I want to make it very clear this school committee at least this member of this

school committee can only vote to give money that is available for the teachers and for the staff for raises I and personally and other members of this committee are very dedicated to the teachers in this District we have offered over five million dollar in benefits and teacher raises to each and every one of this uh bargaining unit over the next three years that's 5 million per year with that being said

we're still $9 million off between your what you're asking and what we're giving somebody came up earlier and said they needed a raise well we offered 8% raise that's $6500 to that teacher that would have been getting paid that that they don't get it so we're still $9 million off I don't know what people have been promised by the union or by anyone else but this committee can only give you what we have

and right now we're doing the best we can which is over $5 million a year I just need to get the facts out there the fact of the matter is is this Committee in my opinion respects teachers we're given Millions and millions and millions of dollars to make the teachers in this District get the money that they deserve we do not have 12 12 and 12 I don't care what anybody says the gentleman can come

up and bring a box over there with with petitions on it we all know it all of us know it but I know it's not in that box is $9 million and we're not going to have $9 million to meet the need so we we're already offering you over 5 million try to consider meeting us somewhere so we can get you a fair contract with that I yield that's fine that's fine okay okay okay oh

this is no I know that's what I mean okay okay they want to call me out I have a chance to say I said what I said all right you have your piece all right and if they don't want to calm down you can send them out Corum to Corum to let's just be respectful um item number three recognition Awards there are none tonight sorry we have two subcommittee reports uh the first one is special ed

alternative Ed and early childhood subcommittee Kevin agie our chair you have a report just a Qui report so most of the items that were on the special ed subcommittee agenda actually got referred to the full committee so I don't want to go in and Bel the point we did ask for some follow-up questions from the administration so I would just like to reiterate that when subcommittees asked for that we need to

get that information it's not do ready today please get it to us as soon as possible thank you thank you Mr agar policy sub commit we can hear shell please can you see what we can hear sh shelle you're there correct whoops yes I'm here okay thanks um next up is the policy subcommittee Tom Cory yeah so we cleaned up uh some language and some of the policy that was

existing and uh and brought it up to Snuff and uh the meeting went very well thank you okay thank you thanks uh subcommittee uh reports are completed superintendent's report um superintendent Curley enrollment update please um in terms of enrollment um I wanted to give an update um that shares some comparison data from October 1st of 2023 to October 1st of 2024 the 2024 numbers haven't been

certified by the state but these are the numbers that we have reported to them from last year to this year we've experienced the following increases in enrollment prek through 12 enrollment has increased by 437 students districtwide since last year for a total of 11,093 students in our seats our foundation enrollment has increased by 544 students since last year at this time for a total of

11,270 this number includes all of the students for whom we're financially responsible including our outof district placements English learner enrollment has increased by 57 students for a total of 2,923 students this year um and a last highlight from the data is that we've experienced a more than 50% actually 60% increase in the number of students new to the US um since last year so this

year we have 653 new to us students enrolled as compared to 411 last year um the next update I wanted to offer um is with respect to Yonder and the no cell phone policy that was implemented in grades 6 through 12 um starting last week so following the roll out at Morton on Tuesday we kicked off Yonder systemwide uh on Wednesday of last week overall the implementation of the new policy has been been received

really well across all of the participating schools and um I've said this on numerous occasions I'll take an opportunity to say it again I really believe that the positive response and the smooth kick off it's in no small um part due to the fact that there were hours I mean months of planning actually um in really clear communication from Dr Bron hard's team so I'll thank you and Victoria for that

um as well as school-based teams led by principes andal staff and during crunch time the technology team led by Mr Cal and just wanted to be able to acknowledge some of the folks on that team who you know at crunch time in the final hours went above and beyond um and and took on responsibilities that wouldn't normally been wouldn't have normally been theirs so I just wanted to acknowledge some folks um Darren McAn

Joey pachico Christy conell Lisa ferado Keegan Murphy Emanuel monus Debbie Sardina Kim Costello Chu Tang Billy Gonzalez Melanie Smith and Emma tovaris um these are folks who might um not usually have been um on the front lines of this kind of work but they they really came in um big for us um at the 11th hour so just wanted to say um thank you for that um the last piece of my

update is a hiring update since um our last meeting we've had 67 new hires including 17 teacher teachers and 18 paraprofessionals and 16 um cafeteria workers seven security officers and a whole host of other positions we've also had 18 resignations and five retirements right now we have 139 open positions in our schools including 71 teachers four administrators 52 power professionals

and 14 other positions so that is my update Mr D Mr Das yes just a quick question on Yonder um have you um superintendent received any complaints um since it's um beginning from any parents um either no response when they called the office or um maybe students weren't allowed to use their use the office phones have you received any I haven't received any um any kinds of um complaints like that personally um from

adults we do have a our student delegates here tonight from dery high school um and RPA and I know that the um dery High School delegate is going to talk a little bit about um Yonder and what the student experience has been like and is going to potentially touch upon some of the things um that you've mentioned I you thank you chair U Mr ago can I just ask again um I think it's on

the end of the agenda I've asked this for multiple meetings already that when the public gets edification of appointments we should get any other appointments that are made by the superintendent so if you're in one position and you get another position trans I don't know why that doesn't get listed here but okay just truth in and being transparent is if someone gets a promotion I think we should see the same

okay so I'm not sure why that's still not here but I'd once again ask that it come on and I'd also like to ask that I do think that the teacher uh the tech department that folks that you indicated uh did a nice job of getting us ready uh stepping out of what they normally would do to do that so I would uh request that you just put a letter in their files

just so that it's acknowledging their hard work thank you thank you AR yeld thank you um I'm going to turn it over to U Vice chairman laravie uh to do the um student comment and introduce our new student delegates hi uh so tonight uh we have Brooke Asia handbrook from dery uh she's going to be uh presenting on uh some of the things that are happening at dery uh for the first time tonight we have NAA

and Wilson from RPA uh they are both on right right they uh NAA and Wilson are both on student government and uh Brooke is the class president at dery so Brooke you want to go first student body student body president sorry the mic Brooke okay yeah thanks so I just wanted to talk tonight mostly about the Yonder pouches um I wanted to talk about what I've seen as well as what I've been told

by other students students and I wanted to start off with the positives because there are quite a few negatives just things that I feel like were overlooked when these were rolled out but there's also a lot of positives I've heard a lot of positive feedback from students and teachers just on the fact that there's been more social socialization with other kids and obviously we were raised

in a world where cell phones were our normal so it's a very hard adjustment for most of us but even I've noticed like more talk talking like people are not looking down at their phones in the hallways like everyone is just more like open to that communication and a lot more people are getting schoolwork done that I know personally so I think I think that's really good but there are quite a few

negatives that not only I've experienced but I know a lot of other students have experienced so I wanted to start off with the fact that locking our phones away it creates um so for college classes and other like classes that we take we have to have passwords and have them saved and be able to log into these accounts and a lot of students have their password saved in like their Notes app or have

other like personal information that they may need for college application saved and I know like it doesn't seem that important but when you're trying to log in to your common app account or try to get your college applications done sometimes at school it's the only place where students have the ability to ask for help with that CU sometimes they're the only PE they may be the only people

in their families who are going to college or who have applied to college so it just creates a very difficult process for them and then specifically for schoolwork as well I'm in AP classes I've always taken higher level classes I'm in college classes it makes it really hard to go on to zoom meetings as well because we're not allowed to have our airpods or earbuds at all like I

know personally like when I had our Zoom meeting I got my airpods taken away from me when I wasn't using them they were just sitting on the table and I just think that locking away the earbuds and apple watches I feel like I think the phones are necessary to be locked away but I just feel like and from what I've heard the earbuds aren't necessarily causing any issues so I don't understand

why they're locked away when we can still have other headphones it just creates a very difficult learning environment specifically because I know a lot of kids who do have to go on Zoom meetings who don't have access to any other headphones that are allowed and then also there's um some of the websites that students may need to use Ed for um for their classes are blocked on school computers which makes

it really difficult like personally again like I've experienced this where I've had to before phones were locked up I've had to use my phone to look at a source that for a paper I was writing that I need to do in class um and then it also creates an issue with communication so I have heard complaints about the office not taking calls when a parent was calling for um for a student to ask where a student's

medication should be dropped off they called I believe three times and every single time it went to voicemail so if we are locking away phones I feel like there needs to be better communication especially with issues like that and then it also creates an issue with sports dismissals because during it makes it very hard with the lack of communication because you don't you don't know if your

sports dismissal was moved or where to go and the sports dismissals take a you have a short amount of time from when you are able to leave class and when you have to be on the bus and changed and ready to go obviously to the sport and with the Yonder pouches I didn't personally experience this but I was told that they had to wait in a single file line they all had

to be there they all had to wait and then they all had to one by one go in and unlock their PCH and then continue on to the locker room which was all happened outside of the gym so it was still like they still had to go into the locker room after waiting and getting their phones unlocked and then going to change and it just slows down the whole process and then

um oh okay this is the final thing I actually have to say is that it also creates more issues when you decide not to bring your phone in obviously the whole point of this was to keep kids off their phones in school but to to make it more convenient for kids I've I've seen it and I've also heard it that when kids choose to leave their phones in their

car or when they choose to leave them at home they have to go through another whole longer process to go they have to go to the main office they have to sign something saying that they're not going to take their phone out they definitely don't have it like they're agre to like get in trouble if they get caught with their phone sorry acknowledging the fact that they do not have it on them thank

you and it just creates a whole it just creates a whole new process in the mornings because I know kids are going to be late to class because they all get stuck in that line wherea they're either sent back to their car to get their phone or are told they have to go and sign a paper saying they don't have it it just slows everything down and slows everyone else

down that's it thank you let's let the other students comment speak thank you Brooke um RPA who who's speaking first NAA okay come on Wilson all my name is Wilson Oh closer Bud all right my name is Wilson the only thing I want to mention about nrpa is that for the past speak a little bit longer all right my talk to the microphone so we can hear you all right so last month that we did

in our pa uh we we did some few fun activities such as welcome um RPA breakfast offer in the morning and then we went we helped out the church gave out high jeans bags for the youths and then after that we went we had different meetings talking about different topics in school what needs to be changed or not and besides from that we were mention about Let's see we we have

done September F September 5th we did the home welcome breakfast September 3rd we did the hygiene bag and then for the open house and then October 2nd we had open house and then October 6th we had the the Hispanic lunch which every student came in came in as one communicated and enjoyed each other's time that's what we did thank you Wilson NAA do you have anything I just want I just wanted to talk about what we

have going on during the month of October we've had another open house we've had an Hispanic heritage lunch for the students that's where the teachers have brought in Hispanic food for the students to enjoy during our lunch period it was it was a very like thoughtful thing that went on we do a lot of things like that RPA where the students feel like they get more like attention towards them when little

things like that are provided for them we also had a breakfast for the students in the staff for the gold medal Bakery which it was optional students didn't have to go but a lot of students did go and it was very enjoyable also um we also have coming up a volunteering at the church the Congregational Church to make lasagna for the students that don't have food to bring home or students that

just would like to bring food home for their family members um and we also have a movie night going on at RPA for students to spend time a little more time after school since we don't have any after school programs at RPA what's the date on the the date on that is November 14th wait no no sorry November October 23rd sorry guys October 23rd is the movie night and then um for

November we also currently only have planned to paint night for students to come in and paint also because a lot of students don't really like to be home and we're just going to drink lemonade with each other and enjoy each other's company and for November 14th is the student council's first field trip thank you much Mr D yeah um I I just want to make um I want to make a motion that we refer the

Yonder policy to policy subcommittee just to address some of the concerns that were raised I'll make that in a form of a motion I'll second that is this just discussion yeah if I can continue just um just to give the um superintendent just a opportunity just to take a second look at it and maybe make just a couple tweaks see if we can help address some of the concerns that were raised not

looking to end the policy or anything like that but I think it's just worth having a discussion a second review um y i i y Mr larvey yeah um my opinion is uh we're still at the beginning uh of the Yonder pouches and uh I I think we need to give our staff some time our administrators some time if uh we still hear things there are still some concerns maybe uh in a month

uh I say then we can revisit but let's I say give this a little time and let Dr B and her her staff and and Dr curlyy figure out some things I know for a fact Dr Curley is already she we've already had a conversation with um Brooke about this and Dr Dr uh Curley uh is on it so um let's give them some time my opinion Mr chairman I yield U Mr Corey then Mr

Bailey yes I uh I I agree with the vice chairman I I think that um the building principls and uh Dr B and her people ought to just have some more time to vet the thing you know get some more complaints get some more positives uh I know that I'm hearing from some teachers throughout the system that it was very good things have been working very very well uh with the no cell phone policy I

know that for years we've been kind of hoping uh to try to limit cell phone use inside schools and I think this is a huge step forward and so it's it's going to be some wrinkles give us a little time to work out the wrinkles and I'm confident that our superintendent and our staff Dr B and our principls will be able to do so so let's give it a little

bit more time thank you I yield I I do want to comment oh uh next was Mr Bailey I'm sorry um I I do agree about giving it some more time but when listening to some of their concerns uh my only concern is some of the negative things then obviously yes give everyone more time um but when we're talking about Zoom meetings and we're talking about students um having an ability to connect

with certain colleges and finish applications um I think this is something we really need to create a solution for um to make sure that the students are also getting with their need can I um that's my only concern um I agree with uh Mr Corey there there's a bunch of positives that come with this but I think we also have to look at the negatives and make sure we're providing the students what they need um because

if they're up their voice and their opinions I think we should take that into account as well um because we don't want to limit them um when it comes to college applications and things of that nature so Mr that's all I Mr Mr Cory I just want to follow up with a comment thank you m Mr Bailey I agree with that entire assessment and I also want to praise Brooke for bringing out

you know her comments about y because it gives us a realistic View and and they're the ones that are feeling it the most so we can we can feel it through the students testimony you know to try to which way are we moving with this so thank you Brooke for the uh for the comments and let's continue to you know to vet the process I yield I believe I'm going to let Dr

curly go then Mr Agia go ahead oh then n okay yeah I just wanted to address some of the things I did have an opportunity um to speak to Brooke on Friday and um did hear some of the concerns also got an email from her today with you know with talking points so that's why um Mr Das I said I hadn't gotten any complaints but I knew that Brooke was going to address that communication

piece and the potential of you know phone calls not being received at the school things like that but in terms of this going back to policy subcommittee the one thing I would want to point out is that the policy itself doesn't really speak to any of the issues that are coming up um as presented by the student delegate it's really about implementation at the school level and we're working through those

implementation pieces so I think that so the policy itself doesn't speak to what's going to happen um when a student says they don't have a phone and now they have to go sign something I know that's something um about which I've spoken to Dr Jay um and Dr bronhard just in terms of you know how could we do this differently and they are already tweaking some of those pieces um I can

see where kind of the you mentioned athletic dismissals and maybe there was only one magnet available and no so now that people know that we can provision better at um you know at the Fieldhouse for that kind of dismissal early you know it as long as people are sharing schedules and people can expect it so I think these are just the typical kinds of things that would come up that we

will make adjustments to but it doesn't NE necessitate revisiting the policy per se it's really about taking a look at the implementation plan and making adjustments there as necessary okay well um Mr AG I told you next NAA NAA please so RPA being a school that doesn't have phones we just wanted to tell say that we do relate to the no phone policy and for students that aren't used to the fact that they

don't have phones um will soon get used to it and it's not something that they need during school considering that we do in RPA at least have staff that help us with most of the things that we need like our college applications and stuff and um there's not a lot of students that need help there with that stuff unfortunately but um having no phones like gives us a better communication with our teachers and a

better communication with other students also in RPA and it's a it's a really big distraction considering it's a school full of kids that need more attention on them and um for dismissal time on the under pouches I was just thinking that maybe it should be put out there that you guys have teachers unlock them during sixth period when it's time to leave to make the dis time a little more

faster thank thank you n good point uh Mr AGA so just uh I think that this is a uh there's been more positives than negatives in my mind from what I've heard uh I do think we need to give some more time to the administration to work on the day-to-day operations school committee policy is one thing but we are more doing the policy superintendent and her team is doing the implementation on

a daily basis so it does bother me when a student rep can say that a college application wasn't allowed to be done during the school day that begs more questions that need an answer separate from this meeting sure because uh quite frankly we have um plenty of counselors and we have programs in place to do that so if we have to buy regular headphones things like that that I'm sure that that

would be implemented but I don't think you or Dr b or any Dr J or anybody's going to say we don't want kids doing college applications dur in the school day but it is concerning that they felt that that was what happened so there might be some miscommunication on what that is and what it's not somewhere in the policy the people that sat down said there's a reason why earbuds are going

to be put in the pouch somewhere along the way and I don't think that we should just go backwards on that right now because you guys said for a reason and we need to stick with it and we need to support you and the team what I would ask is that at the next full school committee you just do a presentation on how it's been over the last at that

point it would have been 3540 days I think that's a more a beneficial opportunity for us to hear from you you all and if at that point there's recommended changes I want to hear those recommended changes by from you Dr Curley not from the other side so I'm not going to be supporting this but I do think we need to get a full report at the next meeting yeah I I I thank you

find myself agreeing with Mr agar I was in dery today for about an hour and uh it was very positive I actually saw kids walking in the hall talking to each other and of course I was a vice principal there when we had the Advent of the phones and it went sideways really quick was sold to us as something to help with math classes and it turned into much much more than that um I was

very pleased what I saw today with that being said they had a couple of people that did have their phones out that they had to take off them and the parents were being called and notified about the consequences going forward and I do think that Brooke uh highlighted some of the fixes that we can fix going forward I mean they all have Chromebooks they can load their in uh information into a

Chromebook and have that available for college uh essay or college uh applications and I think we can work on this with that being said I have a motion in a second um I want to um I'd like to vote on that right now but it seems like um Mr Mr Das Mr Das um yeah I still take a vote on it because I still think there's some things we can look at

but um I just want to make a couple of requests um actually um got the idea from Mr agar um if we can get like um maybe we can put out some sort of survey um maybe within the next um two months um just getting some feedback on the policy um and I'd like to request that we do look into the office situation because I think that's very important for this policy to be able to somewhat

work we need to have commun have the the ability for students to be able to go into the office and communicate their concerns to their parents that have some sort of communication um it's going to be very important so so we can really take a big look into that that would be um swell so the motion is to refer back to the policy committee I'm sorry Mr Ag and see

your hand Mr Agia so just on what Mr D said I think one of the things that I think should happen is so the person told us that a family member of some family some person called in office three times to try to get somebody and they got voicemails what I would do is ask that person to go back to that other person find out what their name is and

try to get to the facts of what happened what office was it that's how you solve problems as you get to the real number not somebody that's saying oh this might have happened that might have happened get right to the point if there's an office that took three calls didn't get anywhere hadn't check their voicemails and this person didn't get their medication as indicated we got a bigger

problem but I think targeting it to when somebody says there's an issue we have 2 200 students at the high school or more so if one or two had an issue relative to this we want to address it but we don't want to all of a sudden I'll say we're going to need to change the policy so I just think going right to the point and say if you if you want to say what

it was I called the office at X time and nobody answered Dr Curley can then say why is nobody answering the phone are thank you that's fine all right so let's vote on this um the motion is to refer it back to the policy uh subcommittee um Deb call the rooll Mr agya no Mr Bailey no Mr Das yes Mr Cory no Miss lari no Miss Perera no Mary Coogan no next item on the

agenda we have 12 sets of minutes we'd like to get approved uh motion to approve them all second I have a motion of second Mr Das uh Mr Mayor is it you're not don't you usually ask for holds on minutes oh yeah if you have one you want to hold that we will definitely take it separately Mr Das tell me which one it is please thank you um all the superintendent search committee U

meetings um the rest i v i support approval so to make it clear 7-1 to 7-5 71 to 75 is on hold to approve the rest 76 to 72 I have a motion and a second uh any discussion Deb call the rooll on 7 I'm sorry 76 to 712 Mr a second second um who seconded it second Mr D second second 76 to 712 Mr Agia so on I think on 710 I'm not

sure if it was this meeting or last but the technology subcommittee has had executive session in the past and I'd like to ask publicly when we approve those minutes were the minutes reacted and that's a yes or no question are you asking me I'm asking anyone that has the answer so in the past we had a technology subcommittee meeting we had a technology subcommittee executive session correct I'm asking a

question were those minutes redacted yes or no I don't know they're given to once I do them I give them to I send them to attorney Assad he reviews them if he feels anything needs to be redacted he then redacts it and then sends it to me so mrad with those redacted the subcommittee executive session minutes for technology I don't recall U reviewing subcommittee uh meeting I re I review uh

the uh regular and special meetings if I had uh the technology subcommittee meeting and if it came to my attention uh I would have looked at it obviously but I don't recall it uh also just so that everybody is aware we don't redact uh on minutes for the for regular meetings or special meetings or or anything that I have I do not redact uh if it was grammatically um incorrect I

might change that uh but other than that uh we don't change what the tenor or what the the purpose of the the meeting was or what was said at the meeting just don't do that I I I Mr a I just don't see the executive search committee I don't see anything from executive SE technology in here I understand go ahead I'm just referring to the line item that's 7.10 related to technology I'm

trying to get a flavor for what is the when a technology committee gets voted what does it look like and I think from what attorney Assad said is that all school committee subcommittee meetings whether regular or executive do not get redacted I think that's what I deser yeah I didn't I don't redact them now if you're referring to the search committee that's a little different that's different than the regular special

meeting or even a regular subcommittee meeting of the uh of the school department because the with respect to the uh the uh search committee there are privacy issues that have to be uh dealt with and addressed and that's the reason why there would be some redactions in that but as a general rule we do not redact is I guess oh that's correct thank you okay so let's vote on 76 to 712 do

we have a motion I have a motion second we have a motion in a second Deb call the pleas chairman one more question Oh Mr AGA relative to the open meeting Lord is there any special requirements for us or can we do these in a bunch is this legal to is it legal to do these all in a bunch can we do them in a bunch yes thank you

yes Mr Bailey yes Mr Das yes Mr Cory yes Miss larv yes Miss Pereira yes mayor cin yes now on 71 Mr Das yes um few issues here so my concerns are so and actually this a piggy back on Mr agar's previous question um through the chair to attorney to as side um when we approve executive session minute subcommittee or otherwise is it usually done in executive session that's correct um so today we have um minutes

that have both um public session and executive session but we're approving both in open session today why is that the reason for that is uh with respect to the search committee uh these are the minutes of the search committee itself which has dissolved after they perform their their services so as a result uh the parent of the subcommittee which is the F committee would vote on the the

minutes itself the parent being the school committee members except for I believe one school Committee Member were not part of that meeting so they would not be able to say yes or no that the uh that the minutes are correct or incorrect or something should be added or something should be deleted so it would make no difference if it was in executive session or an open session uh with respect to the uh the uh uh search

minutes those that were redacted were redacted for privacy Med for privacy reasons and has been adopted by the not only the Attorney General but also the courts in uh several decisions uh that allow for the fact that individuals who are not finalists their information is private and will remain private um odd in finitum um just just a quick follow up on that so um so the school committee is in um

allowed to see these executive session minutes in executive session with everything you just mentioned you could sh an executive session also sure okay um so the school committee so why are we approve so why didn't we get a copy of the executive session minutes wouldn't we usually receive a copy my understanding is you did receive it um Deborah yes all members all all members did receive um copies of the search

committee unredacted no no no they're going to be redacted uh they uh the uh the parent which is the full school committee receives redacted minutes they do not receive unredacted minutes the only individuals that had the unredacted or would have reviewed the unredacted or who were part of the unredacted would be the search committee itself and that's something that u u uh is pretty firm um

and I understand what you're saying in terms of transparency but the transparency also has to be uh uh looked at in terms of the privacy of individuals the reason for this law and the reason why it is like this is because you would not you uh history has shown that you would not have as many candidates applying for these jobs especially uh when they have positions at other institutions uh if in fact they

were not finalists even in the finalist they have to sign off that it is okay to use their name otherwise they would not be be finalist for the school committee to to uh make a decision on so it's something that uh the courts have ruled on there something that the attorney general has ruled on uh it's something that U is it makes the process work uh without that you would have very few

people or not as many people from other districts who have jobs uh with those communities uh and would would take a chance of of not having a position and not being a finalist and not want their names mentioned so um this law and if the committee could be provided a copy of the law that that would be um Stellar um is that so that was supersede the requirements of the open meeting law no

the open meeting law this is allowed by the Attorney General as part of the open meeting law it's one of the exceptions in terms of once you could have an initial uh uh uh screening of candidates which is which is subject to uh what I had just mentioned after the initial SC screening of candidates then it's all open session that's why they reviewed there's a uh individuals that are

brought before the committee and when the committee has them everything is an open session as we had in the last session last situation with respect to the superintendent search okay our next question is um so I I've noticed that there were some preliminary votes that were taken that don't list um who voted for who is that also allowed under the open meeting law with respect to finalist see so they can take a secret

ballot vote no it's not secret the names are are redacted right but in the minutes um the point of this you can't even miss Colin you weren't there right I'm we're voting to approve minutes you got to you can't vote you have to obstain on all these issues you're bringing up you didn't get on until June this doesn't apply to you we're approving minutes from these meetings you weren't here

May if I if I could help uh the committee has the m has the minutes they've uh they could have re reviewed the minutes obviously in the package that was sent to them I'm sure everybody did uh the they have a right to vote yes no or abstain uh but it's not a situation where they can uh at least in my opinion can question whether they're right or wrong because they just weren't

there right none none of us were there except for one member I believe and that's my point I just think we should get on with either voting yes or no on the minutes there's the sets 1 71 to 75 if someone wants to vote no vote no but I believe I Y for now I see my colleague to my to my left I'm sorry go had to stand up I'll I'll say who speak next I'll tell

next Mr so I think my colleague raises some quite valid points just want to state that for the record so part of the problem that I have with how this has gone was right from the GetGo and I think that we are entitled to get this information and if we need to get an outsider person to look at it the way that the search was conducted was wrong in my opinion not looking to do

revisionist history and go back to changing votes or anything like that but let's talk about the facts as they are the mayor created a search committee on own this this excuse me if I may the agenda about a minute it's not on the agenda it's the minutes in the minutes where it starts to talk about why are they in a meeting the Ser first meeting of the superintendent search committee

if I want to go over I can go over everyone stated how the process worked which is in the minutes so how we got there to the first meeting is very important one of the things that is an issue was how this committee got formed the mayor created a committee on his own with no input from this school committee whatsoever the mayor also suggested the reason why he could do this and we have a letter

from our attorney that states so was because the charter indicates that a the mayor can appoint subcommittees of the school committee and he can appoint the members I've asked for over six months now for five months for someone here to show me a vote of this committee that we voted to create a subcommittee of the committee and not one person on this stage the attorney the mayor or anybody

else can produce it so how this got created right off the bat was a problem okay going forward as you look at what is in the minutes there is redactions in some of the stuff because of trying to keep people's names uh protected because they Wen in it but there's also things in here where it indicates what people said or voted on when you look at a subcommittee on technology executive

session you're going to see several things you're going to see if there was a motion made it's going to say Mr Agia voted yes Mr Cory voted no Whatever It Is Right Down the Line in these minutes we don't see any of that so we don't see to Mr das's point we don't see who voted for anything because it's all just summarized now if this is truly a subcommittee of the school committee

even though it was never formed as such the rule should stay the same whether it's the search committee or an executive session of a regular subcommittee these rules are being changed and we're going to just dictate it based on what's here but this is a public document now people can see exactly what anyone said that was at the subcommittee so it's right here for anybody to look at all I'm saying is

they're incomplete and they don't have all the information that we should have as a requirement when we go through this this meeting here for instance is on May 2nd and this has been over for since July 1 so now it's October 21st and we're still waiting I don't know how many months you have to do this but I would say that this is an issue I'm going to be voting no on all of these

and I do think that we should get somebody else to look into that how the position was created we can't go back in history but if we don't fix what was wrong originally we're going to do the same thing over and over Mr okay with respect to the the charter the charter is clear in terms of the mayor assigning who is going to be on a subcommittee uh I believe Mr AG your question is is the

fact that the subcommittee was created was never created that's my question okay it was created okay I was given uh minutes uh back in March 18th 2024 uh and a vote that was taken by the committee and just to to summarize just a portion of it uh there was a statement here from mards asked if there would be a screening committee or would masc bring forward certain candidates that

the committee would interview the mayor then stated that there would be a screening committee made up of one to two members of the school committee and other members of the district and Community they would then bring the finalist to the full committee for an interview there was a motion made by Miss larvey and Mr Cory seconded by him to retain the services of the Massachusetts Association of school

committees to assist the school committee in its search for a new superintendent of schools which which uh is the uh the approval uh of the subcommittee go Mr chairman uh M Mr D I'll go right back to you go ahead Mr D thank you um so um one more question um turn side I know you mentioned that um the committee dissolved um when did when is the date the search committee

dissolved was it um done by a vote of the search committee or was it just I don't know uh that I don't know all I know is that when we received the the minutes I Look to have them approved uh and was advised that the committee had already been uh dissolved at that time at that point in time I contacted the Attorney General's office they mentioned that the parent which is the school

committee could approve it and that the the minute should be brought before the school committee and if I can through the chair to the chair of this um subcommittee did the subcommittee ever take a vote to dissolve don't believe so we dissolved at the conclusion of the five May 13th meeting after all the interviews and at the closing of executive session so there was a vote to dissolve

the committee they don't need one we don't need one we closed the meeting we didn't have another meeting scheduled and the four applicants uh went in front of the school committee and um attorney Assad um when was this committee formed I don't know uh I'm sure there's a record of somewh I know Colin Please Mr Agia just uh just listening to what attorney Assad said and reading those minutes I believe that

I didn't hear for one second that we voted to create a search committee what I said what I heard was that we were going to bring in masc so at the time in those same minutes the mayor promised to do a whole bunch of things that didn't happen nowhere did we vote to create the search committee that's my only point we have to correct this so that in the

future we do it the right way I yield okay can we vote on these minutes 71 to 75 can I get a motion in a second please so moved second um Deb please call the roll Mr no Mr Bailey no Mr Das no hold on does he vote he wasn't on the committee that during the Mee minutes it's okay I would think that it's okay okay Mr Cory yes Miss lar

yes Miss Pereira yes mayor Coogan yes motion passes motion passes next item up on the agenda is a request for travel we have a number of travel requests again I'll put a hold on anyone that someone has an issue with if not motion to approve second I have a motion to approve all discussion de call the RO on travel please I believe Mr AA had a question second it if nobody did okay Mr AA yes

Mr Bailey yes Mr Das yes Mr Cory yes Miss lvy yes M Perera yes mayor Coogan yes Mr chairman Mr AGA may we just uh ask that the um star presentation related to the um Services of the van get moved up so that the person can go before we continue the agenda sure it's item I can't what is what where is that located Mr it's going to be under the uh

Community Partners I think 12 12 uh 12 it's item what uh Deb it's 12.2 12.2 and then can I follow it's about the mobile Health van yes motion to move up section 12.12 second Kati here too huh someone here from Katie Brown as well I believe okay well we'll do them next if we okay so let's do uh Mr aga's 12 point what's 12.12 12.2 12.12 we'll do the the van now uh I

have a motion a second uh Deb call the roll and Tak it out of order please Mr agel yes Mr Bailey yes Mr di yes Mr Cory yes Miss lari yes Miss Pera W May Coogan yes motion to approve motion to approve the van I have a motion and a second on the van any discussion Deb call the roll Mr Agia yes Mr Bailey yes Mr Das yes Mr Cory y m lovy yes Mr

Perera yes mayor kouan yes M hold on just briefly I'm sorry just briefly on that one issue oh go ahead I just want to say the subcommittee they presented a good plan Dr B presented we're not looking for any answers or questions I just want that the public to know this is a work in progress they've been working on this hard Community Partners with stock and this is something that's really good for the district and I

didn't want it to go without saying but in effort of time I don't need any answers questions answered but I want to commend Dr B and the stop folks for support on this thank you thank you Mr item next just a very quick comment in regard to the mobile Health van very excited that it's going to be added to our plethora of services here for our staff and students and in our schools

it's a real big step forward and I want to commend uh Dr B and and our Community Partners for acquiescing into that rule thank you II this really Qui we do this what do you want do probably the Katie Brown can I just make one comment about just real quick for the Public's edification um because we didn't really have much of a chance at the subcommittee knowing it was coming here

for the full committee um but prior to my arrival in this role I know there was some conversation around bringing forth a Health Services Center at dery high school that was never part of the original plan of the new building there are some legalities when you open a health center that there need to be students in buildings and there and there needs to be other legalities around this configuring the space that

was going to be quite a lofty bill for us last November you know without the support of uh Senator Mike Rodrick we cannot go without giving him all of the credit um he really stood firm on wanting to see a health center here at dery High School school to help support all of the health needs uh for our students and staff as noted and so with his perseverance to stay to stay true to

that and to keep the line item in the budget over the last couple of years star has been able to come forward um to support us in this partnership the the partnership with star is a little bit different than that of Health First which is currently at Diamond it should be noted that diamond has a Health Center and as they build their new facility they will retrofit the facility to be encompassing of a Health Center

and Health First is the provider in that Health Center but here at in Fall River with not excuse me here at dery not having the physical space to be able to make this work star has been able to come to the table as the owners of the mobile Health van so if anybody is familiar with the present layout at dery our nurse's office is right in the front with the very easily accessible as well as

um not just accessible excuse me handicap accessible as well so that all families will be able to access and not have to go through the building but also to be able to access a wealth of and and repertoire of services across the health Spectrum so I'd like to give Sherry just a couple of minutes to speak to that partnership because I really do see this as being another Cutting Edge step in

the right direction of overcoming um some of the barriers to really just do what it takes to put these services for our kids and families here at dery high school specifically sure I'll just take a couple minutes of your time I know it's been a long night for all of you and you have more to do after this so this mobile health unit is a retrofitted 16t box truck that's actually created

and sustained to be a full van for full access to exams it has solar power it has its own wi-fi system it is a really interesting vehicle it's a brand new vehicle it actually was just put on the road and it was really custom done for both dery and to serve the city of Fall River for any of you have seen the old van that is not what we are using we are

using a brand new medical unit that was retrofitted for this and customized we're really excited about it we've hired a new um nurse practitioner who's excited to get going we also have hired a new clinician who can do some of the work for kids if anything comes up during sessions who is a master's level clinician who's skilled with adolescence in addition we have an RN that will be

on the van with the doctor so we tried out the other day the parking space it'll be parked right in front of dery right with easy access into the nurse's office and then we will have sustained Services back at Star and we are only down the street from you so in the sustained Services we will have somebody who will coordinate all of the appointments with the staff from the high school and there'll be nurse to-

nurse communication on every level the first year is is sponsored and paid for by the line item that was given to us through the advocacy of the senator and then after that we will find a way to make this third party billable go after Foundation funding and make it sustainable so our goal is to keep this going for kids in dery and to make sure that we can do everything from school

physicals to vaccinations to make sure that we can move kids through the system questions yes um Mr Cory yes I I I want to congratulate you and uh not only is it a big step forward to have a a Health fan as a health center uh to service the kids in a triage situation and then follow up in sustained care you know at your at your facility at Star but the long-term partnership that star has also

had with our our Fall River Public Schools I'm really appreciating the partnership part of it very very much and um when I was here working uh 20 years ago we worked really hard to try to get a health center going we faced some opposition due to funding so for Senator Rodricks to step up and recognize that funding like this would be so valuable and now that it's going to actually take shape in this mobile

van I just want to say thank you very much for all your hard work and the coordination of the hard work it's a big step forward for our kids here at school thank you a no thank you and and just to make it really clear the senator was really clear that this funding was for dery he felt that dery had this need that wasn't felt and so he has been the biggest supporter of getting this into

dery he wouldn't settle on any other place it had to be dery so I'm really excited that we could do this with the van thumbs up thank you thank you NE next Mr no it's not a question but I think this is a no-brainer relative to what we have and I understand uh from members of the community that I know uh there's something in the process to for us to get another van for the parent

Center something along those lines I highly encourage you to bring that forward at the next meeting because that's also something that's a no-brainer and we have two we're going to have I think two Vans or two mobile units awesome just bring it forward next month thank you thank youer okay item nine donations we have three tonight um motion to accept do we vote on that or that's

doesn't she give us vote so huh I think we vote on accepting the donations yes we did vote we did vote on that already 12.2 yes no no 12 donations no Mr AG was asking if can I get a motion to accept the three donation move second second de call the rooll and then miss curle explain them us I think just what I was just mentioning relative to the other issue

uh I believe that we have an opportunity to get something donated so I think it would show up here uh in it but what I would ask is that that gets a presentation some you know what I'm saying like at the next meeting so we don't have to bog it down in sub just bring It Forward obviously we're going to take it but uh we should see what's happening yeah

absolutely Mr yeah yes Mr Bailey yes Mr Das yes Mr Corey yes Miss laring yes Miss Pereira yes M Coogan yes M Dr Curley on behalf of the Doran Community School in Sylvia Elementary School principles Mr Souza and Mr lens accept um a donation of books from AF Massachusetts and the Fall River Federation of par professionals the donation will be used for Fall River students to read love and

keep on behalf of Green Elementary School principal Dr Liz Dunn accepts a donation of homework bags including school supplies um a donation from the UN um Union United Methodist Church the donation will be used for school supplies for all students and on behalf of theal Department I accept uh a donation of 22 backpacks this is a donation from ships Cove operations Pathways the donation

will be used for students at Green and fonsica schools um next item up number 10 approval of Grants we have a number of them there does anybody want to put a hold on any of those grants motion to approve first one you want to hold the first one Mr vagar any others I motion approve the others I have a motion for Mr D I have a second Deb call the rooll on every Grant but the first

one Mr AGA yes Mr Bailey yes Mr Das yes Mr Cory yes m larv m larv yes yes Miss Perera yes mayor Coogan yes on Mr agar Grant number one my only question is probably a a request I guess so I ask this every year that we get we have a grant that comes out this is $8 million so it's sort of complicated and um I always ask this question in the future

that if we can I'm going to vote for this of course just that we if we could get a summary of what's the impact of this on the budget things that have come and go like how does that interact with the budget that's my only question what positions are necessarily going to be Title One positions moving forward that weren't in the past things like that if we could get that one page after the

fact I I will support it you got it thank you okay approve motion to approve by second uh Deb call the rooll on all the grants please the last Grant I'm should I should say the first one Mr a yes Mr Bailey yes Mr di yes Mr Cory yes M lar 30 yes Miss yes Mayan yes uh just make an announcement before we uh lose the audience completely Thursday night here at dery

speaking of Health and Wellness it made me think of it we're going to have Chris heron doing a uh Speech part of the money we've gotten to the schools with the opioid funds uh we're going to kick off a curriculum but we're also going to have a community event which everybody's invited to it's free we'd love to have you come down here on Thursday the do open at 5:30 and here u a dery graduate

Chris Heron that has made a tremendous impact in the fight against wellness and the fight for wellness and Against Addiction so thank you very much and I hope we see you all here Thursday item number 11 tonight is the approval of contracts um new ones are at the top we've been taking them in sections so let's do the new ones first does anybody have a hold on those four contracts Mr D just the new ones just

the new ones at the top those four um the first two the um Sentry Paving and service Mass to Southshore okay um Colin Das col so the first two we have a hold on how about the other two equity and the seal motion to approve the other second I have a motion is second on the other two uh DB would you please call the role on the last two Newton's equity

and seal Foundation Mr drag yeah yes Mr Bailey yes Mr Das yes Mr Cory yep M larv yes M Carrera yes m c yes Mr Das the first one enty Paving construction yes um I'm actually really happy um to see the playground going in I drive by it's on my street so I drive by it every day it looks amazing um I have gotten a couple of concerns from parents um going

forward I know the new playground the small ones um I don't think you're going to be able the answer Mr Pico um this the the fencing the small ones um is there but um are we going to continue allowing um students to play Within the the front yard um with that fencing I've gotten some concerns about the um Integrity of the fencing and they just don't think it's enough and they're

worried that you know their son or daughter is going to run into the road is that part of the contract that's not the contract though is that part of all right if I I'll ask you uh to keep it to the question um does the contract um also pertain to the fencing in the front yard so the contract pertains only to the playground itself the the front of the the building

is never used for just play area it never was what it was used for was fette classes so there was an instructor out there with a small group of students who were in a fette class but it was never a play area the play area is always been reserved into the back of the building in the courtyard area um this playground would not fit in the courtyard area and

it would take up most of the area which was the reason why we moved it to the front of the building but it is fenced in completely in Secure um but that other area is strictly for supervised uh fed classes it's in the front of the building right I I I'm not going to be asks right now but um thank you I appreciate that I'll make a motion to

approve the first one yes okay I got a motion on I have a motion second Mr agar I couldn't find it in here but is this for old work or new work because there was already work being done there is that in-house work and now this is has this already been done is the timing I guess the work is finished yes and the work of finished quicker we we we have four playgrounds that are

being constructed and the order has always been um tough to predict because of the availability of the of the playground equipment so it came in kind of backwards um fonso was was last westall was second 2501 was first so the be because the order got confused or didn't come in quite on time that's why this is here now and not prior to the others yeah I mean I support it the only thing I would say is

we should get them beforehand so if we know what it's going to cost for all four throw them all four at once so that we're not approving something after the fact that's and I don't know if it's in there that explains that so if it did I apologize but um it's not a big deal with this one but when we're approving things that have already happened it becomes a little odd thank you sir I

understand I have a motion in a second on Century Deb would you call the role Please Mr a yes Mr Bailey yes Mr Dian yes Mr Cory yep M lar yes M Carrera yes may Coogan yes uh Mr di on service master Southshore thank you so are we doing this work um basically as a direct response to the report from environmental health we're doing this work as a direct response to the work

that needed to be done not one particular report triggered this work okay um I guess the issue um so this was done um before the um report we got from um the former teacher from room 008 done this work was done this is the last work that was done in that classroom so this is after two two reports or three reports I I don't know exactly how many but this

work was the work that was needed to be done um after those reports came out but it was a combination of all of the items that triggered the work that's done here and do you think that work contributed um positively to um lerno like you think it helped with a lot of the issues the work needed to be done so I I'm what what needed to be done was what was directed to service master to be

finished so this work was a process of the reports that were written okay um motion to motion to approve second I motion to approve in a second Mr ago if I could just get uh or we could all get a summary of the total cost as we've been going I've asked for that before um just same same question sure this isn't the only expense there's plenty yeah there's plenty of expenses got

it are you are you okay can I get I have a motion a second on service m huh yes on Deb would you please call the role Mr agam yes Mr Bailey yes Mr Das yes Mr Cory y Miss lar yes Miss Pereira yes mayor Coogan yes uh the continuation grants are below we have 1 two 3 four five six seven seven8 nine any holds on the continuation Grant Mr agar

train oh the first one yep okay any others yeah I I was going to um put train but that was done um research for better teaching research for better teaching and DocuSign and DocuSign okay Miss larvey Green City Growers Green City Growers all right so excluding those green City Growers DocuSign research for better teaching and training can I get a motion to accept moved second I have a motion to second on the others

Deb would you please call the rooll Mr AGA yes Mr Bailey yes Mr Das yes Mr Cory yes M lar yes M perara yes may cougan yes train Mr agar the first one so I think this is probably already in because the timing was already up uh and it's a continuation so I'm assuming that we just have no choice in this um until equipment until the equipment is no longer there we have no choice so my

only question or request is to the superintendent which is a a follow-up request so in the summer we toured uh green school and I had mentioned that the HVAC system wasn't working properly it hasn't been for I think the last eight years since we couldn't get information on something at that time I asked you for all of the backup relative to train for any requests that you know when things aren't working when did we

know who knew what was fixed and the like so I would just reiterate that request this contract is is something that has to stay as Mr Pico said but I think we need to do a deeper dive into what the issues have been over the past so that's all I ask thank you are y anything further on train Mr Das yes um so I I don't think I'm going to support

this um and the reason why I'm not um so this company has been doing um de ventilation remediation the HVAC system since um Green School was built correct the reason why this company why this contract exists is because it's their equipment it's proprietary so we cannot have another company do this work so there is certain work that only train can do it's their property their proprietary rights to the controls that

we can't not have them do so that's what this contract's all about there is there is a small portion of the work on the green school that they do it's the equipment side of it but it is a small portion there's other work that goes on at Green that is not part of their contract that's covered under their contract it's strictly an equipment contract yes they they don't do the services um they do some Services yes

they do they do okay so the reason why I have a concern um superintendent provided in their um one of their one of their updates um was about the dph visit and um I have it quoted here that there early indications that ear that air quality issues at both sites are related to ventilation issues that are part of designed and or construction flaw since the buildings were were built I just

can't with all the issues that are happening at Green I just can't support so yeah if I could just not to interrupt but ventilation is not necessarily just the system ventilation is is um air movement in the building it could it be outside air coming into the building by a natural cause s vents ridge vents things like that so in that conversation I spent five hours one day with with a

gentleman from uh dph and part of when he's saying ventilation it's not strictly equipment just for edification nothing more than that I I can't say which which is which okay because we're not there yet what we're saying is it could be one or the other or both so there's a possibil without without there's a possibility okay then I I want to make a motion that we refer to facility and

operations um the dph report and figure out um what's who's responsible for um the ventilation issues within that school second I have a motion a second to refer this to facilities and operations um Mr Mr uh Pico has this work already been done which work this a contract contct the it's a yearlong contract and the contract started when the contract started in July 1 July 1 it renews each

year so we're already well into this uh the issue is that if the system goes down I can only have them work on it okay so I need the contract in place as long as we have the equipment there Mr Mr Mayor just to clarify I wasn't making a motion to refer the contract I was making a motion to refer the dph report oh I'm sorry I just want to be

clear that we don't have a report yeah we don't have a report we don't have it yet yet yeah so there's no report to so this is the motion is on train Mr agar um as to hold um we have a motion do we have a motion a second on this yet there is a motion and a second on Mr das's um but that was the DP report correct it's no

report I withdraw the motion he withdraw the motion go back to Mr agar so I think what Mr dce is asking is a valid question the uh document that we have I just found it says they adjusted the contract start date to September 1st 2024 so we are currently it's October 21st so we're already six weeks out into this so why I asked the first question was this is this contract's in existence

it's a recurring thing so it's not going to affect anything if we either referred this or anything because there's still this contract's in force now so what we're voting on is an after Thea uh approval but I don't think Mr das's Point um of asking for a larger discussion about dph what is trains involvement what's this I don't think that's a bad thing to bring to facility subcommittee I don't either um so

separate from this vote I think mam superintendent or whoever should schedule a facility subcommittee meeting as soon as possible once you get the report or whatever I think we should have a meeting and all of these issues should be discussed train en uh dph all that stuff should be talked about I don't think there's a problem but with this particular one my only question Mr Pico is what do they actually do in here

so I see all the stuff like pumps air cooling condensing units whatever what are they doing are they um doing preventative maintenance on do they oil Motors they do preventive maintenance right they come into the system they yes what would happen if they went up and they needed to fix something they do they do repairs it's not only just PM they do do some repairs there are some things that covered there

some things that are not over the years they have done some repairs yes yep so that's sort of the nature of my question to Madam superent was just about what do they do what don't they do yes and what I've been trying to focus on is how did we do this over the years so that's all it is is trying to figure it out what they do they change more than filters is the bottom

line yes they do a lot more than filters yes thank you I yield all right so I have a motion to second on the train contract I don't have a motion oh you don't have ation motion to approve I have a mtion I have a motion to second second on train um T please call the Mr AA yes Mr Bailey yes Mr Das no Mr Cory yes M lari yes Miss

Carrera yes mayor cougan yes next is research for better teaching Mr Das yeah so a few questions so I see in on the agenda it's budgeted for um $44,000 um when we go into the contract itself um the total believe it's just 40 40,000 um I just wondering what the discrepancy was I have a few other questions but that was just one uh the difference is the 4,000 for travel for the person that comes

down right which I I have a concern with but um before I get to that so I'm going through the course fee and the materials fee and that that's 35,000 the materials 5,000 is the projected building schedule below basically like the like the the payment schedule for that 40,000 above they it's it's I I think that we we pay based on whenever the classes happen that's how that's how we pay and so each invoice

will typically have the cost of that class along with whatever the travel cost is so that's typically how the invoices come in um next question so um this company is based out of act active massachus it I I believe so but the um the individual comes from out of state um what state I think from Vermont and or I believe Vermont Vermont Vermont so and how many times does he come um how many

times does he come per year um I believe it's a total of seven sessions and then um they actually do additional school-based visits um I'm not sure if that's counted in the seven or if there are additional days beyond that and this this is what this individual has done for how many years I know it's a continuation well since I've been here it's been the same presenter but the company itself has um many people who

deliver this just happens to be the person who's worked in follow for a number of years my qu yeah yeah just my question is um is it $4,000 to travel from Vermont seven times throughout the year where do that 4,000 come from um I don't know exactly I believe it's hotel and mileage they stay they drive in and they stay over to do a full day course Mr chairman I'll you for Mr AAR

just a point of clarification in the contract it reads Fall River Public Schools agrees to reimburse RBT for Patricia weel's travel expenses not to exceed 4,000 so my reading of that is she's going to travel she puts in a travel request if it only comes out to 3,000 they don't get the 4,000 it makes it look on the front like it's a 4,000 but it's up to and they're gonna have to

Pro provide backup to Mr raposo Mr ala and that's how they get all right thank thank you for that um last last question is um can do we have copies of their um like mileage and um hotel costs like receipts I can yeah we can request that certainly I know that they attempt to coordinate because they do this training in other districts um when we schedule dates they'll often even try to

coordinate when they'll be you know traveling towards this area anyway uh to try to just save on costs if if they're going to be around okay but you don't have U but you don't have you don't have that like readily available I don't have it ready available in front of me now um is there any way we can um approve the contract with the um because depending on what the the

costs are I like to save on we shouldn't be paying for it's not to I think the language is not to exceed the 4,000 so up to right I guess the point I'm trying to make I like to see like I want to make sure are not stay like the richz Carlton or you know somewhere else like I like to be able to know like where they're staying and what we're reimbursing them for maybe the school

like how we approve any travel expense for any um employee within the district should be should be the same um I don't know that's something we can put in the contract or make a suggestion go Mr that Mr reposo has to approve the $4,000 expenses so up to the $4,000 so if they present a a thing to us to say that they stand at the risk Colton Dr KY and Mr

Roso say no that's what I think is should happen you know realistically and they these people know that we're looking to save money we're not looking to have you be absorbing it so I think it should go on Mr reposo and Dr krly to say and I trust their opinion St at a ridiculous Hotel it won't happen again right all right got it I'll make a motion to approve I just like to request

that um the committee be C provided any copy of any travel expenses when they arrive have a motion on the 44,000 for research for better teach second second I have a second discussion none Deb call the rooll Please Mr yes yes Mr Das yes Mr Cory y Miss larvi yes M Perera yes mayor K yes now we have also have a hold on the next page Green City Growers Miss larvey yeah just a question well a

couple questions is this a farmtable program and is it being used in the culinary program so it's being used in environmental science the product is being used in culinary it is and in the yes so that was one of my questions in in the report here it says uh 235 visits yeah that's wrong that's they okay it's not it's i y yeah it's um motion to approve that's my that's my mistake all

right thank you I have a motion to approve second have a second Deb call the r please oh I'm sorry I'm sorry Mr a yes Green City Growers I just read this as it says they have been working side by side with dery's environmental science program to bring gardening and farming to our students for the last two years that's what I read here and that's accurate yes so this isn't had nothing

to do with the uh any gardening on site that's that's not what this is this is student driven student related so it's student it's the greenhouse and the exterior farming area that's right around the greenhous they're not coming in and going to do work that we already have people to do it's nothing to do with no it's strictly educational thank you are I have a I have a motion from Mr

a second M lar call the rooll please on Green City Growers Mr a yes Mr Bailey yes Mr di yes Mr Cory yes Miss larv yes Miss Perera yes mayor C yes finally the last one we have a hold on Mr Das docus sign thank you so this is the um the contract that covers um the bills that we sign it covers that and it covers the special Leed uh contact with the parents and the

fors that get signed and everything else um have we looked at any other platforms I know we it was um some discussion on this a few months ago um have we looked at any other is there any other platforms besides docy signed for electronic signatures that are more user friendly uh I'll be honest with you I'm not familiar with any other but I can do some more research okay um the only issue I have

with docy sign is is um and actually I I think to your point that we discussed earlier that um you can't sign certain um parts of batches over others so say if I have a question on something on a batch I agree with every I'm going to sign off on everything else I want to sign off on everything else and wait for the questions to be answered on a certain batch we're not able to and we

have to sign every single batch not any I don't know if there's something in the system that we can um change or we're we're stuck like that I don't know how to fix that only because it would require the only way it would work is if we would submit the bills to you you take a look at it and you whatever one you question we put it off to the side and that's the only way

that it would work so okay um I you thank you chairman Mr ago the I see this one says October 1 started it's October 21st so I assuming we're we we've been working with the company to get to get to get the quote to get get all the information as to what the costing would be and and originally when we did uh the when we had it last year it originally

started because we've had it in place for several years now the finance department has sped sped put it in place last year and so when we worked with docy sign we wanted to get one full inclusive cost uh which we recently got all the information yeah because it it's all in one via the special ed the majority of it's in special ed yes I think I'm going to vote to approve this

but I want it to be put on the next um agenda for the subcommittee so we can can dive a little deeper into what it is and some of the questions that Mr D has and others might have it'll give us a time to Hash those out in a subcommittee so I'm going to vote Yes on it now but I do want to bring that up before second motion to approve I have a motion for Mr

Das to approve I I have a second special okay I have a motion for Mr Dian to approve I have a second second second I have a motion to Second Deb call the rooll on docy sign please Mr AA yes Mr Bailey yes Mr Das yes Mr Cory y Miss lar yes Miss Pereira yes mayor K yes 12 Committee of the whole 121 is discussion and vote to approve the selection and appointment of

Shannon Mado motion to approve second second I have a motion and second on approving Shannon M Shadows and LPN any discussion Deb call the rooll Mr AGA yes Mr Bailey yes Mr di yes Mr Cory yes M lar yes M Pereira yes may C yes 122 is a discussion and vote to approve the ktie brown educational program contract so moved as approved by the special ed alternative Edge and early Ed uh subcommittees presented by Dr Amy

bronhard I have a motion to approve I have a motion and a second any discussion on ktie Brown Mr just just wanted to once again mention that what was mentioned at the subcommittee so we had several uh Community Partners come before us they get a variety of different amounts of money and I had asked at that time and I understand that there's a lot of things that have been

going on but I do think we need to do a deep dive into each of the organizations that we provide uh funds to why does some get some other there's like a $80,000 difference or $60,000 difference in some so I'd like to reiterate that in the upcoming future if we can get some kind of report I'd appreciate it thank you so I have a motion a second on 122

Katie Brown uh Deb call the RO Please Mr chairman oh Mr AGA I believe I heard the uh Miss perea sor but I'm not sure m per you have a question thank you no I was just going to comment on on what um member a said I just think that possibly it's a funding difference between programs so some programs perhaps you know get funding from other sources whereas don't get as much funding um you

know I know he knows that this is a worthwhile program and we're going to approve it I'm guessing that's why but certainly he'll he'll get that information when he takes the B five that's all okay thank you Kevin thank you Miss Pera I think she was reiterating her point was what Mr agar said can I get a vote on 122 Deb Please Mr agan yes Mr Bailey yes Mr Das yes Mr

Cory yes M lvy yes Miss Perera yes M hugan yes 123 is a discussion and vote to approve the child advocacy sener as referred by the specialed approve second I have a motion in a second on 12 three any discussion Deb please call the role Mr AG yes Mr Bailey yes Mr Das yes Mr Cory yes Miss larav yes Miss Perera yes mayor kouan yes motion to table 12.4 till next meeting

second we have a motion to table 124 I have a motion to second on tabling 124 you want to do that okay uh Deb call the RO Please Mr yes Mr Bailey yes Mr Das yes Mr Cory yes M larv yes M Perera yes mayor KGAN yes 125 is a discussion and vote to approve a reading specialist job description is presented by Brian reposer assistant superintendent Chief academic officer can we hear from him Mr reposer

please good evening um so the reading specialist is a position um talat as you know has been the recipient of an intensive assistance grant um through the Department of Education uh part of what um uh talbet has outlined in that Grant is the uh creation of a multi-tier system of support to produ uh to provide targeted interventions to students um and one of the um areas of focus um and

requests in that Grant would be to add a reading specialist um as we were looking at adding this position at talit um and I did a little bit of research I I realized that we do not have um a job description that is specifically a reading specialist and so um we're coming forward tonight uh to present that to you for review um Mr AGA so I wholeheartedly agree you know with it um I think it is

not only for Talbert uh quite honestly I think we need reading specialists at the younger grades because that's what where the need is and we have a issue with achievement and all that stuff I'm not telling you something you don't know but speaking for myself I think this should all it says all grad so I think it's incumbent you know encompasses it all but we need to create these type of

positions at the younger grades in every school or everyone that needs it and I think all of our schools need it going forward so I I wholeheartedly support it and commend you for bringing this forward and I ask you and Dr curlyy and the team to look at if we have this need in other District lower grades Now's the Time thank you are Mr Cory yeah uh Brian I just want you to reiterate what the uh

the parameters of this ground I just couldn't hear you very well sure so this position um what we're proposing is a reading specialist the reason it's specifically at talit is we have an intensive assistance grant there uh that we've been awarded and so part of the focus at talit is to create um basically an intervention system to support students who are struggling um across different content areas but really

specifically targeting reading and so in order to do that work well um it's important for us to have someone who has uh real expertise in that area and that's why we came forward with this request we did not have a job description um to my knowledge you know in Fall River for a reading specialist and so we're here this evening to bring that forward so if I could reiterate my colleague's comments I agree um as you

explore the possibilities to to even deepen this into the future are you looking at the earlier grades yes I think we have um you know we certainly have many of our teachers um do have some specialized training you know in different types of interventions um but I think it you know would be important for us to look at to have you know a resident expert um in buildings we know that you know in the younger

grades that's a crucial time for students uh who are learning how to read so for kid at talit um they already have a schedule that they have to follow but are are we targeting like the e the L students students in that population so to speak so we actually screen the entire building at at all the middle schools um and so as a result of the universal screening we give sort of one

layer of screening from that we determine who needs a little bit of further assessment depending on how students do on that reading screening and then we'll continue to collect data usually we have um you know two or three pieces of data that tell us that a child really needs a certain type of intervention um and then what we're doing is at the middle middle schools um there is a targeted um strategies block

which is an intervention block built into student schedules and So based on what students need in that moment they may be scheduled for uh this this intervention class um and this particular individual would not only be um working with students providing that direct support um but also supporting staff with understanding that data um and other staff who might be providing support to students to be to support

them as well um administering any interventions thank you for that clarification I yield all right Deb do I have a motion and a second on 125 approve and the motion to approve second I have motion a second I call the role Please Mr yes Mr Bailey yes Mr Das yes Mr Cory yes M lar yes M perara yes mayor kouan yes 126 is a discussion and vote to approve the revised District handbook is presented

by by Dr Tracy Curley superintendent of schools point of clarification sure is this a first read if if that's what's required I'm just asking because of like uh typically if something this large like we would have a first read and then a second read okay so if there's a first read I have a chance to ask my questions offline if it's now going to get approved then I'm going to ask the

questions now and it's already late I trying to get claric it doesn't say it on the agenda first read which it should say sometimes but just as a clarification if you say it's the first read I'll hold my questions okay it's so do do we have to make a motion to so we got to make a motion to to change that or uh I don't do we have to

am um amend the agenda or just call it first read on the vote make a motion to approve the first read first read just okay I have a motion to approve the first read have a second discussion on the first read Deb call the rooll Mr TR again yes this will yes Mr Das yes Mr Bailey I'm sorry Mr Cory yes M larv yes Mr Pera yes mayor kouan yes 127 discussion

and vote to approve Credit Recovery at Dury high school as referred by the special ed alternative Ed motion approved second second I have a motion on 127 and a second any discussion Deb call the role Please Mr AG yes Mr Bailey yes Mr Das yes Mr Cory yes M lar yes M Pereira yes Mar hugan yes 128 have 128 is a motion to approve evolved competency report card I have a

motion to approve in a second any discussion on 128 the Evolve competency report card hearing none de call the role Please Mr AGA yes Mr Bailey yes Mr Das yes Mr Cory yes Mr larvi yes M Perera yes mayor Coogan yes as 129 is as Mr Agia pointed out this is the first read of the updated policies as referred by the policy subcommittee and presented by Brian ly human resource director Mr

chair Mr Das um did you want ones that we were going to question deeply on did you want to take the others out of order um it is a first read um I'd actually like to make a motion because um I was at the subcommittee meeting that we um approve through all readings the wellness policy second so it's the four policies below no the the four that are highlighted in the agenda it's just no

but he pointed out the wellness policy yes I I um three yes I because um the P individual who presented the um wellness policy requested to the subcommittee that we pass it through all readings so I just wanted to honor the pull that out and do all readings on wless policy yes okay so I have a a motion by Mr Das to take the wellness policy and pass it through all readings

tonight um can I get a u there is a motion in a second there is a motion to Second de call the roll hold on she's ringing I'm sorry the thing I just wanted to make sure cuz I was going to say it but Colin was ahead of me just to be clear he's he's making a motion that the wellness this is going to be the final read we're voting on it

it's not a first read yes correct correct okay cool thank you have call the RO Please Mr chairman U Mr so sometimes you know it makes sense to to go backwards and say well we want to do a first three to get more info in this case we're doing the opposite agenda actually reads first read it does read first so if I'm looking at this I say oh first read I got a chance to ask

my questions hear a presentation and then go from there now on the spot we're being told no now we want to just wave all readings to do what well he's pulling out the wellness policy my my point is on the wellness polic right so what is it that's so urgent that we have to go through all readings on this can somebody please articulate it from the administration I Mr Mayor I'd ask the um

individual or Mr ret LA to come down and give an explanation as to why I wasn't sure why I know the request Miss Picard Podium Please Mr chairman yeah Mr M yeah Mr L is the human resource director right Mr L person I would assume that is working for us that's going to recommend this policy no it's it was a request made at the subcommittee the policy subcommittee meeting by um Miss bard um she asked if

we would be able to wave first read and get it approved that's what Mr I understand I if you just take my but if you just take what I'm saying I understand what you're saying read the agenda it says the first read updated policy as referred by the policy subcommittee presented by Brian ly human resource director I'm not making that up nowhere in there does it say there's a

request for ADF to be a different one so if that happened at the subcommittee which didn't happen today why is it on the agenda with all of the other stuff lumped there's nothing against either one of you people this is what is not okay when we do these agendas we screw them all up and then we get here and then we look like we don't know what we're doing I want to be really clear

that it wasn't a screw up it was the we said that we were going to bring it forth as a first read that we would do with all policies and at that time the request was made that someone on the committee um make a motion in the way that Mr Das did there wasn't we did not mess up this agenda where is it in the documents that were given to us that

indicates this what you just said where is it in this document that says we are going to do this as a final Reading Please tell me we it is not our proposal that was something that was requested I'm not requesting it I I didn't request it a member of the committee asked the rest of the committee to wave the first read that was a request made by a Committee Member if I could provide could we give

Mr D has a chance go ahead if I can provide some clarity I know Miss peard um asked um we we approved the um wellness policy to come before the um full committee Miss parar just asked um if we could just wave all readings um when it arrived I didn't think that was um I I didn't know that was just the normal procedure if there was something we wanted to just to get through I I

don't think this is necessary to go through multiple readings I didn't have any concerns or issues with the policy yeah I I yield okay I I think what happened is it was listed with a bunch of other policies and they're all identified as Mr agio said his first reading pulling one out why don't we pull them all out it's it's a first read of a policy that came from the uh policy

subcommittee I would just do them all as the first read and then we go from there like uh we've done on the other things unless there's something yeah if there's some timely thing that we're doing this for is there a reason that something jumping I'm going to let Shelly talk and then um nice and Loud Miss perea please sorry um so at the policy subcommittee we had read through the

wellness policy um Mr Corey uh Mr Das and myself had no um you know yet any questions we had were answered we felt good about the policy we referred it to the committee um we were then approaching and yes I guess there are times constraints I think that should be address addressed um probably by is card in the room I'm not not sure um but they were time constraint in getting this

policy and she approached us and said I realize that it is the policy of the school committee there's always a first reading and then a second but if you don't see you know if you don't think anybody sees any need for changes is there any way we can expedite that in order to provide services quicker and me and Mr Das both stated that we would bring that to the committee's attention

which really I didn't think would be very controversial but um we're just I that was what was asked of us we thought if nobody had complaints of the policy and there were no questions and no changes need to be made why do we have to bring it back a second time let's approve it so we can get Services um you know too quicker um and it's to me it's

a simple vote if you don't want to do that you can vote no I don't know okay Miss lar and then Mr ego just can't I can't hear I really M Pera you have a lousy connection I'm having real trouble hearing you myself U Miss larv y so before I call on you uh Miss Picard um after reading it what was what was sent to us what I get out of it and we

just added a lot of social emotional uh stuff to the wellness policy is that accurate please comment I yield for now but please comment is that accurate that right that's correct as as um um Miss Herrera said there's nothing cont controversial the uh the wellness policy up to now was pretty much focused on nutritional wellness and physical wellness and we felt the need to add social emotional

Wellness uh we had submitted the revisions to the W the wellness policy last June in hopes that this would all be approved prior to the start of the new year because we feel that there are a lot of teachers brand new teachers and and other staff who are not even familiar with the fact that the wellness policy exists so we were hoping to get it going as close to the beginning of

the school year as possible and that's why having been to school committee meetings for bazillion years now there has been those occasions where a a um policy or or a document is uh the first we read is waved it's just that one read as Mr Das had said uh to get it passed again nothing controversial the only other change that we made actually is uh several of the Articles says that

schools will do this and schools will do that and we determined that schools are inanimate objects and can't really do anything so now it says School staff will do this but those are the only changes made again the significant one is social emotional Wellness which was added to several of the policies but again I desire is to get this disseminated to staff as soon as possible that's why we were hoping when

we submitted it last June that it would be approved prior to September so now we're hoping that it doesn't go until November right so I'm unyielding no go ahead so my my question for you Mr uh Fitz is that is there anything in this policy that we need to streamline and vote on tonight is there a reason why we we should Rush this yeah well like Miss pakad said there hadn't been a subcommittee meeting

since June we want to get this out so that that the school staff has backing on it let me re what so the verbiage in there is there anything preventing is are you worried about anything if we do wait are you worried about anything and that's in the old policy if we don't approve this tonight well in terms of any of any policy that go out to school staff uh

obviously ideally it is uh um it it had it been there for September uh then it would have been better for all of the new staff and existing staff too that needs that need to be refreshed but it's pretty much a okay and from now on we're going to do this the the base the most of the the policy that already exists the majority of the policy that already exists um still exists it's just again

that that social emotional Wellness is is added but the fact that that has been added or our our intent is to have it added now if we can get it out to all teachers with a new and improved kind of wellness policy it's going to bring attention to all the staff that this actually exists and there are there are policies within the the full document that really need to be adhered to uh and

that's the other thing that we want to be sure that we get the information out with the rationale for why everything is there as it is as it is worded so we're just anxious to get it out because it's already you know we're two months into the school year so the only that concerns me is if if if we're not going to discuss it you know if we're just going to vote on it without having

discussions and St and if it's not a first read like we we're not vetting it we just got it I just read mine last night you know what I mean so I I'm sure others have um I don't the the subcommittee got a I sent them a cheat list a cheat sheet of these are the only changes that are going to be made and in the policy subcommittee they really vetted it they

asked lots of questions and all but again the majority of the policy is still as it was prior to our having made those resion revisions I I yielded I it just we're anxious to get it out so that people know that it exist I know the importance I'm just making sure we're going to get this right that's all Mr Cory and Mr D and Mr agar um Mr chairman at the at the policy subcommittee when

uh when uh Miss bicard presented this policy we were very enthusiastic about it because it was very logical minor changes made to the policy and it's a great policy and I say let's get it passed so they can Institute it this year with the new language it's just a great policy it's very supportive it really is sorry I I I I my only question is procedure Bruce how do we do this uh I'm kind of

you know I have to agree with Mr agar it's listed at first read and then we're going to pull one of the four listed policies From Below out how do we do that well we just uh on the other end we went from uh all to a first read right uh so that it would was require a vote of of the committee uh to do that at the contracts to pull wellness policy out of

the out of the first read that's correct so that's what we would do I'll give it to Mr agar then Mr Das as I said Mr Das first and then me go ahead Mr Das yeah Mr Mayor I only made the motion to be able to support Miss Bard and as she said just get this up and running um to get get it out to the entire staff I didn't see anything that

was majorly controversial I'm not opposed to waving first reads just to you know to get something just to support the staff especially if um I didn't know if any other members had any like pertinent questions um if that's the case and if there needs to be more reads then I wouldn't support um waving all reads but if it was just something that wasn't controversial I didn't see the issue of U making a motion but if

other members have questions or they believe it should be um beted more and I respect that and I'll you from Mr agar Mr agar so consistency is the key and it's hard sometimes so at the subcommittee they probably took a vote to said we want to vote to refer this to the full committee correct I'm I'm guessing what they didn't do was say we want to take this and make a recommendation to go to the full

committee waving all readings so that it would go on the agenda as a second read I'm guessing because it didn't show up here as such that's what I think is probably happening so I'm not looking I don't know what's in here I'm still trying to figure out something's highlighted in yellow a whole section cha I don't know where that language came from what it looks like to me is that it takes some of the authority of

the school committee to have to vote for policies away from the school committee just my first look at it my first read of it but you brought up that this has been going on since June now that's a bigger issue for me of how does someone like Mr L who is the person who's on here as it this is under him yourself as a director of Health and Wellness how does it get that someone's

trying to get a policy change before September we're told in a public meeting you came here in June and it never got done somebody please explain to me how this happens because this is the problem now we're faced with something 6 weeks into the school year did that not happen can I just weigh in for a second this didn't come in June I think that was a misunderstanding the PO the committee

came to an end in June there has not been a policy subcomittee meeting up until this point this was the first policy subcommittee meeting that we had an opportunity to bring it forth in front of and that was why the request was made to wave the first read because there wasn't a policy subcommittee meeting between July and now I guess that's my question yeah so for the superintendent someone is has a

subcommittee they must have had a wellness committee something to get all of these brains together to figure out what's the policy I'm guessing it ended in July in in June that's what I'm hearing so if they have a thing the director works with Miss Bard and whoever else to come up with a new recommended policy in June it shouldn't wait for whatever the date of this meeting was in October so what Happ happen in

the intervening time did anyone ask to say we have a need for a policy subcommittee before the start of the year in order to get this passed let me just add that the the wellness advisory Council has been in existence for 10 or 12 years now uh it was something that was mandated when school lunches were uh were not being universally uh provided so it was a it was a mandate that every

school district have a school advis a wellness advisory Council so we've had one for 10 or 12 years now and I've always co-chaired that committee with the head of the the nursing department I would also add too that 80 85 90% of this policy has already been approved by the school committee it it it has been so this isn't all new this this wellness policy has been approved by the school

committee several years ago every so often we look at it for revisions which is what which which is what this ongoing committee has been doing on a yearly basis that we look at it to see if it had needed any revisions and this year we decided that the social emotional Wellness reference needed to be added to a number of the Articles the rest of the policy is not brand new the rest of the

policy has existed for several years now again having been approved by the school just those minor additions you're not going to get an argument from me on the need for social emotional learning to be in here and with all du respect my comments aren't made for you you don't work for the school department full-time as a director and that's not a criticism what that is is that we need to hold our

directors and superintendent accountable to when we have need for something we do it we wouldn't be sitting here right now if that was the case if this was done in the way that we suggested as a first read so if we want to just do this we're going to create problems going forward of being consistent and that's why I urge people to just say nothing in here is going to be Earth shattering over the

next 30 days to have it come before us anybody has a chance to ask their questions they ask them maybe we want some tweaks to this to make it even a more robust policy that's what the purpose of a first read is if you said came to us and said we have something in here that's going to be really important that we have to get on the I'm not hearing that all I'm hearing is that

because we waited so long since June to have the meeting now we want to rush it through all I'm saying is I don't hear anything and the superintendent is there anything in here that's that pressing that if this continues to next month is the end of the world no no no all right a motion to table motion to what table table well it's automatically going to go back next month but it'll still be first

read at that time when it gets brought up you can do whatever you got to do okay I'm just trying to get it or vote no all I'm saying is we're going on and on here yeah but if we do the first read then they then then we have the month to amend any of those making a motion and call us a first read that's what it says in the

agenda 129 it says first read we have on the table we have on the table a motion to to wave is what I'm saying if we want to just withdraw the motion and move on that's fine well that's what I I I'm going to ask Mr Das if he's going to withdraw his motion um Miss Bard if it does go through the third readings um no you don't see an issue with that is nothing

pressing as um as we pointed out it's just going to hold up the dissemination of getting the information out because we really don't want to make everybody aware that by the way there is a wellness policy in existence and then a month later say by the way we have one but there are changes in it because the question would be if I were a staff person well why aren't they sending it

to me or making me aware of it with with the change is already there it just seems strange to present something and then a month later saying oh but there's been some changes that's our rationale okay so the agenda list first read the updated policies uh do I have a motion to uh go as the agenda is listed Mr Mr magia said so moved I have a second Mr Mr Das with Drew his motion am I

right oh let's take a vote on it take a vote we'll take a vote on do you do you withdraw or do you want to vote again I would ask is any member of the commit have any questions looking at this policy no right now we haven't read it like no the policy has been in existence for years I'm voting for it if that makes any sense you want to go go

ahead take a vote on it take a vote I have a motion on Mr Das to pull out the wellness policy and treat it a second reading to approve all readings yep Mr AGA no Mr Bailey yes Mr Das yes Mr Cory yes Miss larvey yes Miss Pereira yes mayor Coogan yes um okay so the wellness policy pulled out now on 129 itself Mr chairman yes agot I have Mr L come to the podium Mr L

please yeah the agenda reads uh as referred by you sir I'm sorry the agenda reads as presented by you sir so can you talk about the wellness policy the wellness policy yeah I didn't have anything to do with the wellness policy well I'm going to the bathroom any uh I have to I'm just reading from here I'm not trying to be factious I think that is all I'm saying is that I'm has been a um

I'll go to it has always been the practice that policies are presented by the human resource director and so just like it is really always been the practice and you know since I've worked at central office that the human resource director was the person who would outside of um policies like a bullying policy a grading policy and things like that um would always be the person who would bring to us recommended

changes um take the lead on getting all of those things um you know policies amended for presentation to the school committee this particular policy the wellness policy is something that you know it didn't come out of the Human Resources office as something that was presented to us um you know as a central office team for a potential change it is something that came out of the wellness

committee to us and it is bundled here with other policies so I you know it it just wasn't Something That Grew From Within particularly our central office team we had central office um representation on that Wellness committee and then it was brought to us so I know you had an earlier question Mr agar about why if this was ready in June why it didn't go to subcommittee it was really the only policy that was ready in

June so with the transition of um the former human resource director in the spring that's usually the time where we would start looking at potential um policy changes and amendments and we work on that through the spring spring and into the summer and then in the past we've come to um policy subcommittee in August that was not the case there was no working on policies in the spring um

we didn't start looking at them until Mr L was here in the district and kind of was getting experience um and then he started looking at the policies and bringing them to our central office team so that really was the delay in getting the policy subcommittee scheduled um we had a lot of policy subcommittee meetings to start the year other other subcommittees and this one just got

pushed out as we worked on other things and we readied other policies so anyway that's why the wellness policy waited so when I asked Mr LA to come up I have nothing to do with this agenda I have nothing to do with the agenda several other people do chairman the vice chair yourself T Assad everybody that's by policy is supposed to deal with the agenda so Mr L is listed that it's going

to be presented by him when he just said he has nothing to do with the policy to me that's a communication issue of internally how does this happen and the reason why the human resource director always was part of it I would assume was because some of the things that are in the policies are reflected in what staff is going to do or not do Mr Picard just indicated that we're going to send

something to all staff related to this policy which he's the guy who knows whether that's good bad right wrong or indifferent there's a reason why Mr L and I understand he was new and all that stuff doesn't mean we don't act because the person's been out or the prior person didn't get what they needed to get done before they left and left this guy a mess that's not what the issue is

here and I'm not trying to be critical of him but it says on this agenda he's the one presenting so then what I've got here is nothing we've got nothing here other than in the folder here there's a one page that says policy change cha with some yellow marks on it some blue marks and lines then there's something that's a draft of something else with some yellow marks on it nothing in here says anything

about the need to this to be quick or anything so now that we're going to be here I have questions on what is actually changing so I I would say that In fairness to Mr L our expectation was that this was going to be a first read and generally it's just that would be a presentation of the policies um to be Revisited at a later date and that's I'm that's what he was expecting today so

are you recommended to not talk about it today as superintendent because it sounds to me that you weren't ready to have your people we can talk about the wellness policy so we can go through I I can see where maybe there would be some confusion about what the highlights represent in this policy when it was presented to the um the subcommittee it came in two forms there was you know

there was the old and the new and there were highlights to show um where where where some um additions were made so I think that what's highlighted on page three in terms of the school meal program highlights the fact that um we don't have an issue at this point with eligible children receiving free reduced price meals because all of our students do um all of our students do receive uh

free lunch on page four there was I'll be honest with you I don't see the um page three if you if you're looking on page three School meals has no highlight in my opinion okay so I'm looking at the one music lessons is the only thing highlighted on the physical activity so that's right so the one that says draft is the new and the old policy is also in the binder and so what's highlighted in

the old policy were language changes um language that needed to be amended so school lunches instrument lessons um in the new policy is amended to reflect that it is for not just instrument lessons but for any music lessons um and then there's language on page five that was also amended um in relation to how the um how the policy is addressed each year on page two if you have the new policy in front of you you

can see that many of the highlights do reflect the addition of language around social and emotional Wellness in addition to the physical and nutritional Wellness you see that reflected on page two in number four and in number six there are links there that were added um in part b nutrition standards for food items music lessons on page three is what um replaced instrument lessons and

so it really if you go through it it was a cross reference between the old and the new documents um and what's highlighted school lunch so in the old policy page three school lunch says highlighted in yellow says and ensure actually can I just say I I called Mr L up obviously sir you're not part of the discussion I appreciate your honesty I have no questions for Mr L on page three it says and ensure all

eligible children receive free of reduced price meals and then in the front one it says the school meals is totally blank it's totally no yellow marks so so can you please explain or somebody please expl so that language um and ensure that all eligible children receive free or reduced price meals okay me it it that was just deleted and and the and the language that's there just reads District

administrator shall maintain a coordinated and comprehensive Outreach and promotion plan to ensure maximum participation in the school meal program and so that's the replacement language because we are not you know the action these days is not to ensure I guess the intent of the that language in the original policy was to ensure that all eligible children receive free or reduced price meals is it codified in

the law that forever the state's going to fund School free meals point of um point of information I think we should invite U Miss Bard back down that I think that would be the person who can answer the questions my question was to the superintendent and it says all free Adu meals well we can amend it next year Mr AAR if they change again but this year it's all free why would we take it out

is my question I think it's just updated language to reflect what is actually happening in our schools if it was worth being in there in the original policy why would we not take it out it's still being in there it still says ensure that they're getting it so right now everyone gets it we took it out so now we take it out to put it back in if the state says they're not going to fund it

anymore if it really is worth putting in there in the original policy why are we taking it out because the the replacement words that say ensure maximum participation in the school meal program still addresses that it's broad enough language that if we if we did revert back to a situation where students parents were filling out applications for free and reduced price meals the language that says ensure

maximum participation in the school meal program for breakfast and lunch would still cover that situation I disagree but okay I'll be happy to hear from the folks that exactly because right now there's no such thing as a reduced lunch so the language wouldn't make sense which is why we we chose to delete that and as as Dr Curley said should it change as far as funding is concerned

then we would revise again yep but we wanted it to be current yeah so the language reads and ensure that all eligible children receive free or reduced price meals I don't see anything in there that says anything about a program or policy well there what I see is it says free or reduced meals I'm sorry there are no such thing is there's no such thing as a reduce lunch now because it's it's universally free

correct when the legislation no longer funds it I I'm sorry when the legislature potentially no longer funds the program how are we going to ensure that all eligible children receive free or reduced price meals and we put that wording back in the policy weion we're just going to come back take it out to put it back is my point well again there's no such thing as a reduced lunch so it's inaccurate

should we keep that language in now and you reduce and they're taking out all free lunch so I'm not going to get back and forth with it with you quite honestly we pay people as directors and superintendents to figure this stuff out ahead of time so if somebody would like to present what are the changes so we can move on that's fine but this isn't your issue Madam uh I'm not trying to be

mad with you this is an issue for directors and superintendents not for you somebody please tell us what were the changes so we can try to vote on it because we don't have a good summary of what it is we already approved this Mr agar we voted already no we voted to make the amendment to go for the yeah I think we got to vote so keep trying to play with the games of logistics the

bottom line is the bottom line we we're doing something that we shouldn't have done we would have been over this already I wanted to go on to the next agenda item please tell us in the summary what has changed okay for the introductory paragraph sh we can't hear you when you're speaking trying my Des everybody at home C can you hear me now yeah okay just point of information I

want to make sure Mr Agia has the one pager that we received at the subcommittee I don't know if he got that in his packet but it outlines the changes I just want to make sure he has that was the that'll answer some of his questions Poss it's the last the draft thank you that was all thank you without I yield is that what you have the last

page of the draft I have no idea what we have because I'm reading it and it's so damn confusing I can't figure out what is actually being recommended could we deliver you the one pager on the revisions that we made I have something that's mocked in yellow it says page two the last page page of the one that's marked draft you just passed it it's right there please explain he has it please explain what

the changes yes Mr Fitz can you please explain thing for the first change or the first revision we made is in the introductory paragraph we added social and emotional Wellness to physical and nutritional Wellness us um the second change we made was the list of the overall District go goals um added to provide and support an environment that supports social and emotional Wellness also added to educate staff

students and family adults regarding the wellness policy including the rationale for its various components the third revision um to the Nutritional standards for food items section added a link to the John C stalker Institute food and nutrition alist website fourth revision um to the school meal program section eliminated the reference to free and reduced meals currently all uh meals are universally

free now to the physical activity section we change instrument lessons to music lessons to cover both instrumental and vocal music in the section enumerating the various cases for which recess cannot be withheld from students the six revision to the school based activity section added individual school-based Wellness teams and staff carrying out District wellness policy initiatives

shall employ communication methods be it print or electronic best suited to reach members of their own School Community seventh a question on that on number six yes can you explain what that means and why like I just don't understand what that we just not communicating well as a as a school system yeah so in this we talked about when um for example it could be a parent bringing in celebratory food at the

front desk uh instead of our secretaries in our front office workers getting bombarded we talked about having a q R code to keep current with the times where parents could scan it and it would be translated into the native language um of that parent or Guardian um that way um you know they best could understand exactly what policy or uh what policy or um message that we're trying to convey and that language

equals what you just said about translating stuff into the person's language language I I'm just having a hard time understanding it's the law that me reads if we're going to give anything to any child you have to give it in their native language that's the law I think I don't see what you just explained and number six how one leaps to the other I just I'm maybe it's me and I'm missing

something ra rather than mandate to every principal how he or she gets disseminates information to their staff relative to the wellness policy we thought we would put in that language so that each uh principal could determine on their own the best way to get that information out whether it's print whether it's emails uh whether it's notices in the office so again the uh clerks who are are Staffing those front

desks aren't taking any heat from parents saying well I'm bringing in all these cupcakes from home for a party uh which they can't do because of uh because of all of the allergies now that uh that exist and that's a big concern for the nursing department so it just puts the onus on the uh the um principles so we actually determine how they get information out to their staff is she saying that we allow people to

bring cupcakes and everything in to the schools no that's part of the wellness policy no I think that what she's saying is we're trying to in in our communication to families around why that is not allowed we want to make sure that we are communicating with people in kind of the preferred method of the school print electronic in their native language and then number six can anybody tell me where the word

native in their native language is because what I'm hearing him say is one thing what I'm seeing in writing is totally the opposite well employee communication methods best suited to reach members of their school community and you think that that leaps to in your native language I think it covers a lot of things including that and I think that our schools know outside of this policy what the expectations are for

communications with families we know which families uh prefer communication that's not in English we have our parent Square that's set up so that parents can translate messages into um their first language so I I I think I think it's broad enough that it covers all of the things that we would expect in schol I think it's just a la but go ahead move on Mr chairman Mr Mr uh Cory yeah I'm

not going to I'm not going to you know ask any questions here but I do want to provide a comment and um the discourse we're having over this issue seems to um um really call into question what the wellness policy is but I'll tell you the wellness policy has been active for many years it's a great policy and the only way policies get better is when they're Revisited and revised and I know that

the work of Miss peard and her committee has has been nothing but Stellar for the longest period of time and uh that the intentions of any kind of revisions in the policy are are toward becoming more holistic within the policy and not less so and that I think we're protecting our students uh within our public schools to the utmost with safety and concern and consideration so that that's for the public

certification this wellness policy is quite extensive and they've been working on it for many many years I my full trust and compassion for that committee I yield Mr chairman number seven number seven to the wellness and staff section added social and emotional to positive nutritional physical and environments shall be promoted added social and emotional health to staff um shall

support the physical and fitness of all students um number eight to the policy compliance review section added as well as with new staff throughout the year as part of their onboarding to ensure awareness and compliance with school staff and school Community to each principal shall review the wellness policy with their staff at the beginning of the the school year deleted the superintendent or design in

collaboration with school-based Administration shall complete an annual report on wellness policy compliance by June each year to be shared with the wellness advisory Council for review and assessment nine in addition all references to school or districts carrying out any action or change to school staff or for district administrators in as much as schools in the districts are inanimate objects and

cannot actually undergo any action only people can the page in the front cha the one with the yellow is that new that's a different poliy could you repeat that the one that looks like thisum that that was that was a different policy that was in the um that was in the bundle that's not part of the wellness polic it's not part of the wellness policy so why is it here I'm Miss I'm

missing where it's it's right in the front of the wellness policy in this so it's it's a different it's a different policy it's the cha CHC development and dissemination of procedures it was one of the other four they're all in the same section so this is the first read the first yeah that's the first reading I think it's just um unfortunately you had to wait till when you came in June it should have been

done already before the start of the Year I'll maintain that we didn't have to go through this entire thing I appreciate what you're asking nothing in here is an emergency in my opinion I think it the language around what that piece of what the schools are required to do is an issue that should be addressed I believe parent Square actually translates the stuff that get sent home so I think we're covered as

far as giving people in their native languages that information uh nothing in here was that big of it should have been done in July or August and gotten done for the start of the year so for that I apologize that you had to wait this long thank you are y that whole that whole piece on the native language that was when we talked with our nurses a lot of the sometimes in the especially in the

elementary schools parents might show up with something celebratory for their child where they may not be aware of it we just didn't want the secretary or the front office staff to you know bear the blunt the brunt of the complaint from my parent Guardian that might be upset as to why they couldn't have cupcake for a kid's birthday or a piece of cake or whatever it may be I guess as an aside

do we all do is there in the wellness policy that we have for the district is there anything to say you can't bring brownies cupcakes and candy or whatever into the schools in the wellness policy yes not this one all food has to go through witson so and that's consistently uh across all schools followed correct thank you Mr Cory so Mr chairman point of clarification can we move this uh

forward can we uh uh even though it's listed as first read can we go ahead we already Mr uh das's uh motion pulled it out of uh first read we've done first read now we're voting to approve if we get a motion a second Mr Das has to talk go ahead Mr D thank you just uh two very quick points the the Mr agar's Point um one in the future Mr agar has a point

with um the the presenter I believe the person who presented it to us in subcommittee should be the person who presented it to us in the full committee and or the p h the person who is listed on the agenda should be prepared I'm not faulting the the HR Director but um should be the person prepared to speak on it I think that would solve a lot of issues secondly as was unfamiliar with

the with the verbiage and the need to wave um all readings I didn't know if it had to be an emergency or not I learn for next time I yield all right so now we're down to um do can I get a motion to approve the wellness policy so moved second I have a motion a second Deb can you call the role on pulling out the Mr chair 129 Mr Agia I believe you want to

make somebody wants to make the motion to approve it waving all rules and whatever the language is I thought we did that the first time we pulled it out now every time you make a motion you got to say what it is but I thought we pulled it out without waving all rules Mr on Mr D I'm just saying when you make the motion to be clear I think that's what you want to

do so it's so once it's done all right make a motion make no no no make a motion to wave all rules and uh vote to approve the wellness policy as it presented yes okay have a motion a second yes okay Mr Bailey yes Mr Das yes Mr Cory yes Mr larv yes Miss Pereira yes mayor kouan yes also 12 9 there is no vote it's a first read of the other policies um let's go to

1210 thank you so much I did have um some comments on BD on one of the policies yeah but we're not we're going they're coming back to us for final leave can still ask questions huh we can still ask questions oh go ahead go ahead thank you Mar thank you and and I'm um yes thank you um so just um a few comments and again um I just was suggested I I do appreciate the

dialogue we had within the subcommittee in reference to this policy there um B DH the public comment policy um we had some good dialogues um the subcommittee to I I wanted to go even further with this policy and I'm prepared to entertain debate and discussion on it um subcommittee suggested that some of these I should introduced within the full committee so here we are today um I do have a few um questions comments

concerns first of all in in BH there's a section that says public comment is not a discussion debate or dialogue between individuals and the school committee it is an individual's opportunity to express an opinion on issues within the school community's Authority I disagree with the language we have many individuals that come before us and there's many times that I want to get a

clarifying question like I just want to understand like get a bit better read on what they're saying but because of this section we've been stopped um so I think we need this school committee should be able to get a clarifying um be able to ask clarifying questions of individuals who come up before us to speak to get a better idea of one what they're saying and two so we can be able to solve any

issue that they might having or or whatnot so i' like to make a motion that we strike the section I just read second uh I I would not be in favor of changing uh public input we had 19 people come in front of us tonight I did not see any issues I believe everybody had the ability to express their opinions um I think going forward we should try to keep it at that kind of a

number I mean it's obviously uh we have a number that's higher than most of our meetings usually we have one or two and I think people have the opportunity to come in and say what they want to say I think it's their time um if we need followup I have no problem with doing that after but at public input at a meeting I respect the people and give them their opportunity to

speak I don't think it's a debate right I I think you just agreed you just said that if we had followup you're you're okay so you'd be okay with the chair as as chair if we ask followup questions if I follow up later after the meeting yeah yeah speak reach out to them and see what their concerns are like you do that many times right now Mr Das so I mean you're not opposed to it I

see your emails and that I think that's the proper my my opinion again that's only me I think we have a very efficient public input procedure I think we showed that tonight I think we showed it the last few meetings everybody gets the opportunity we wave the rules for mostly everybody and uh we go from there um did you have something else you want to talk Mr Das go ahead yeah um

well we have a motion I still want second okay do I have a second yeah Mr Agia seconded it Mr Agia yeah so I think the comment here is just I think it looks like it's uh limiting the role of the school committee as an elected official we come up we can listen to the citizen input time and if we as an elected official have something to say we can say it back that's my position

and I'll maintain that position okay I Y that's fine Mr uh Das would you are we are we talking about the whole thing are we just talking about that he's talking about what he's talking about is his his response public yeah this is um well the I have on the motion um I have no more comments on the specific motion I I I have followup conversation I don't know

if you want to take a vote first motion yeah what's the motion the motion was to um destroy yeah amend the policy by striking public common is not a discussion debate or dialogue between individuals and the school committee it is an individual's opportunity to express an opinion on issues within the school committee's Authority I my motion is to strike that okay I have a motion and second on

striking that language from public comment Deb call the rooll Please Mr agan yes Mr Bailey yes Mr Das yes Mr Cory

Mr Cory yeah I'm I'm uh somebody comes up and says something we shouldn't have a chance to say something back vote it's what it's up put down you either want to be able to say something back or not yeah simple as that yes okay Mr M larv no Miss Pereira I don't think it's as simple as that so I'm going to go with no we'll discuss it further yeah mayor C I'm going to go with

no motion passes motion passes anything else Mr Das go ahead uh yes um I'll try and make it all in one motion for um the sake of time um so under section three um topics of discussion should be limited to those items within the school committee scope of authority um to through you to attorney aside um would it be um legal if we change school committee to fall over Public Schools so

it's just within any issue within the fall over Public Schools not necessarily the narrow scope of the school committee the one of the uh uh the rules that uh is being followed especially with respect to Citizen input it's it's a it's a wide birth however the matter has to be uh a subject matter uh within the jurisdiction of the school committee it has to be by law yeah um okay two more um two more

sections um I have um disagreement with um one and actually just got this idea because we had an individual that came down and spoke in a bilingual language um I'd like to make a motion that speakers have an additional 45 seconds for bilingual translation if they want to translate um language um from English to another language I make that in form of a motion have was second on that

second question did she say second yeah yes I don't know okay I said second okay I I couldn't understand you Michelle I have a motion to second question Mr agar when does the clock start it because I'm looking at what I think is what's recommended here yeah is that it goes from 3 minutes to 5 minutes so we're increasing it by 2 minutes and then now we're going to increase it by

45 seconds on top for we yeah so it would be five so we amended it within subcommittee to be from 3 minutes to 5 minutes if an individual wants to transy from another language allow them another additional 45 seconds I think that's fair and Equitable can i m lar hold onar I'm a little confused can can we get back to this motion or just withdraw it right now and discuss the the 15 to3

and the 3 to five before discussing the the other that that was amended I'm sorry you you I I just think it makes sense we're going to talk about adding 45 seconds but in number two we're talking about adding two minutes so maybe we should discuss one and two before discussing this new motion on the FL more that's all my opinion I yield um oh yes fine um if if I can um

we can fine that that's fine with me but if I can address a separate issue first and then we can come back to the minutes your with fine I withdraw my motion um I'd like to also make a motion that we add language stating that individuals can speak on any topic related to the school committee at a normal and special meeting I make that in the form of motion that I think that's law too the

the uh that is that's a concern because on a special meeting uh the rules are that the only matter that can be discussed would be what is on the agenda for the special meeting that's the reason why on the citizen input it's it's restricted and relegated to that um so on that if that's something that you want to address uh I'm going to have to take a second look at it also the the U

uh City Charter also weighs in on a little bit uh so that would be it if it's if it's the city Charter the the uh uh legal Authority on the city Charter in determinations is the Corporation Council um okay so attorney side you'd be willing to take a second look at it we we did get a an opinion from the um City attor from the city Side I don't

know if that cover I don't know if that answered really answered the question I'd like to get a second legal opinion on the matter but um the uh with respect to the uh the city chart the city chart is is specific that the citizen input is is restricted to what is on the agenda and that flows from the the definition of a special meeting special meeting has certain subject matters uh that are

addressed and and the reason for that is is that people have a right to know what is on the agenda in case they wanted to speak on it or to be here or to weigh in uh members of the public and that's the reason why the special is different and there different rules and regulations than the a general meeting okay I'll withdraw my motion for now and I'll make a second motion that we um seek outside

legal counsel to look into whether section 9-18 of City Charter is constitutional I have second okay okay second I have a question we have a motion a second on seeking out outside legal council I don't know where that money's coming but hold on hold on go ahead Miss larvey okay so this these are first reads why are we making motions why can't we take this home read it and come back the second read and and ask

these question why are we making motions to to get rid of stuff strike stuff this is first read that's what is that not normal is that not no I think we do it on a second read when it comes back in front of all I yield I yield I I yeld for now I think so okay Mr Agia did that you I can't see you here yeah the the true reason why you have a first

read is so that committee members can do their due diligence and in a public meeting ask the questions that Mr Das is asking his questions are not out of excuse me Mr chairman I know hold on not asking for any comments so Mr Das is doing excuse me am I hearing something yes I said yes sir okay yes sir if we're going to talk about respect let's both way Mr chairman yeah okay Mr

chairman Mr has the floor just do your job as chairman and if the vice chair is being inappropri my J let her know thank you for telling me my job yep so Mr Das was asking requisite questions on a first read that's the point of the first read is to ask questions so that we can try to get a policy changed or any kind of amendments to it before it comes back

in the second read the first read is not meant for just let it go through and nobody ask any questions so he's doing his due diligence whether you agree with it or don't agree with it the issue that I have is on the document that we have is a few items in red that are taken out and I think that's something that we should talk about the first part says the public comment section shall not

exceed and it says 15 in red blacked out with 30 minutes what is the current policy a c there's a cap of 15 minutes on public input but we don't follow it obviously as demonstrated tonight right so we're not following school committee policy on this issue for the whole time so cor to me that's a problem in that why are we not following what the policy says now I personally would disagree

with that policy but we have a policy for a reason so if the policy all along has been to keep public comment segment shall not exceed 15 minutes that's a problem and then now it's looked at I guess the subcommittee might have went to go to 30 minutes I think it needs to be addressed that if we're going to listen to the people like we did today respectfully and people want to come up

and talk to us for an hour I don't know how we limit it if you want to divide it up and say the beginning of the meeting will be 30 minutes and the rest will have to wait till the end of something this doesn't address that whole issue of the timing and listening to people when they come so one of the suggestions I'd make to the makers of this policy is to

come back to us with some sort of feeling on what that is why are we not following it if that's what it is um the second time is about the 3 minutes to 5 minutes I think we've been respectful trying to ask people to be at 3 minutes what's the rationale for changing it to 5 minutes don't need to have those questions answered now but as the first read part of the duties are to ask those

questions and I'd like the superintendent or her designate to come back to us with a recommendation thank you are you yeah um um hold on so miss lar so I wasn't uh actually asking Mr uh dis not to ask questions I was asking why we were making motions and making decisions without really having a first read and bringing it back to to the full committee I would like to not make any

motions on this have the first read have discussion ask your questions and then sit on it like a first read is supposed to be so let the questions flow I just don't want to make any motions tonight on a first read Mr chairman Mr hold on Mr Das thank you um and I I I I to an extent agree with with my colleague Miss ly the only thing I will say the motion to um

SE outside legal counsil to get an answer to that I believe that's entirely appropriate to do so we can get an answer for the second read and not have to delay this any further so I still stand by that motion well I got a question do you meet outside legal counsel you don't mean the corporation council's office not the farer Public Schools not the city of far river outside someone independent that can

just give us is a straight answer somebody we have to pay for you're not you're not aing I'm not giving a straight answer are you not you attorney is no you did not give us an opinion on the matter we did receive an opinion from the city's legal council which I do question yes okay all right um Bobby I mean I was just going to say uh looking at the duration um whether there 15 to 30

minutes and 3 to 5 I think we've done a good job um waving the rules um since since I've been here I think we done a pretty good job waving the rules at least um speaking for myself I think every time someone's up there we give them respected time um so and I know this special cases but I mean even tonight um the amount of time we took um listening to people

speak so I just want to add that when we're looking at some of these things um I don't ever remember limiting anyone um that's that's all I have to say Thank you so Mr chairman I agree I I think that uh under extenuating circumstances such as the teachers displaying you know their right to US during negotiations we've waved the rules very fairly and we haven't limited anybody but we need to

keep to Quorum and we need to keep the Parliamentary process moving forward so um also my second comment is we took a vote on the last vote we took I was I was still not clear on the vote that I even took I was sort of like confused can so being that these are all first reads uh you can amend it next time it comes we can amend that vote next time I

just wanted to make sure with that thanks I Yi okay Mr D yes the only point I would make um and for this to Mr agar's point of the um thre minute the five minute ration now um and superintendent please correct me if I'm wrong at any point however superintendent didn't really want to weigh in on this policy just because this is something primarily under the jurisdiction of the school committee and

so superintendent left it to the school committee to debate it amongst ourselves and not give much of an opinion was that am I wrong in saying that I yeah I don't I don't really think that that was I don't know that that's accurate um but I I mean I do I mean I do have an opinion it is it is a policy that impacts your you know your work this is a school committee meeting and I

I do have an opinion I don't mind expressing it I mean I for me I think the three minute timer is a good one I think the 15 or 30 minutes is probably arbitrary and I think we could benefit from asking people to be succinct in their um in what they have to say in terms of comment and then not worry so much about how many people get up but have individual

people you know keep to their three minute timer I mean I think I think that that could be beneficial thank I I'm in support I'm still in support of the five minutes just because um we've seen just throughout this process we've seen so many individuals come before us and they're just getting to the end of their statement and then we hear the gab we hear the um the sir alarm go off and I

have no issue here in extra two minutes of individuals coming up to express their concerns if it's an an extra two minutes for everyone that's fine with me I support it I don't see any issue with it if individuals want to come before us and speak honestly my personal opinion I know it would never pass I support even higher than 5 minutes but I know I could never get the votes for

that however 5 minutes especially seeing individuals come before us and and the amount of time they speak um 5 minutes I think would be um appropriate we wouldn't have to worry about bang in the gavel we would have to worry about the SII alarm going off and just having like this negative energy within the room we can just have the individuals come up 5 minutes is more than enough and now and

we can maintain the Quorum and we're banging the gavel and you know the alarm and everything that's I'm not saying just a lack of the Quorum like from any of you I understand but that it's just not it Just creates a bad um environment and we should be fostering a better envir hold on M lar then Mr Cory so decorum of of meetings is is our number one concern right so we have to

There are rules in place for a reason right we didn't create these rules they've been in rules they've been in place for years so my opinion is everybody that spoke tonight got to say what they wanted to say everybody was very respectful about the three minutes it is up to us to uh basically let that be known ask for some respect we offer respect the same thing I think Mr Corey

said we're not cutting anybody off if they're saying okay we're going to finish we're going to finish but we have if we go five minutes on a night like something tonight um it would have been two and a half hours we have the we have a whole other two and a half hours ahead of us that's just something that I I would never be for I would never vote for I

think three minutes is more than enough to to to get out what you need to say what you need to say you can do it in three minutes and um I I don't ever want to cut people off or but when you have 20 people in front of us with some important stuff to say they know they have to say it in 3 minutes and they were very respectful tonight I I don't

see any need to change to five minutes so okay Mr Cory so Mr Das I respect where your heart is coming from on this issue but in regard to the three-minute parameter it's upheld at the city Council level as well it's also a policy rule that when people approach a citizen's input they know that there's a thre minute parameter so it's up to the person during normal citizen input hours

to design their comments to fit within that three minute parameter and they get their question off their chest and it's addressed to the city government in no way are we limiting people's freedom I think the three 3 minutes is totally adequate in order to have a parliamentary process move forward I yield okay Mr Mr Mr Ag and Mr Das so two things one is I don't believe that anyone can show a vote of this

committee waving the rules to go beyond 15 minutes let's just call it like we see it that's a fact so if that's the policy at 15 minutes we need to say we make a motion to wave the rules to extend it or we change the wording somehow to address that but going from 15 to 30 isn't going to correct that issue we need to do a better job of what

does the policy look like so that it says we'll listen for the f I think the city council does this at certain time after some somebody else signs up you do your business and then at the end they'll continue it what we've had is hours of the same people coming up over the same issue saying the same exact thing and yes we're respectful and we listen but but it's the same issue every

single meeting that's that's coming up so I'm in favor of going back to the 3 minutes keep it at 3 minutes be respectful and call it a day so I make a motion to keep it as three all right well wait a minute wait a minute I think that's going to come up Mr AA would you be in favor of enforcing the 15 minutes and after that move people to the end of

the meeting like you suggested I think we got to come up with a a number like a time so you say if it goes to 30 minutes and we don't address the what happens after 30 what it is is we're going to say if you don't happen to be here for the the first 30 minutes we don't want to hear from you and I don't think that's what anybody is saying okay so

what I'm suggesting is we come up with a number that's reasonable once we say we'll do that for if it's 3 minutes each that's 10 people that can speak right so the first 10 people get to speak after that you're going to have to wait till the end of the meeting okay or whatever else I just think we need to address it um I and I don't want to stay at five

minutes I think three minutes is enough him then Mr D the the only concerns I I have with that um if we move individuals to the end of the meeting it says in our City's Charter that um citizens input must be um made um at the um convenience of the public um so I don't know if that would no many of the boards in the city are at the end of the meeting now I I've

questioned them but well they are what's convenience that's fair and and to the comment of um a few things to the comment of the city council city council should be also raised to five minutes so I'll be more than happy to give that argument argument to them stick to the school um so in in terms of of um theorum being the first priority theorum is very important very important in the meeting

um first priority when it comes to Citizens input should be hearing from hearing from residents um and again I've seen throughout this entire time individuals have come down and they get shut down after 3 minutes when they just have a few more sentences I don't think we would lose the Quorum or waste that much more time if we raise 3 minutes to 5 minutes I wouldn't be in support of of

um lowering it back to 3 minutes um um I support the five minutes and then get it out of the way um I do support what Mr Yar said about following the policy um the only thing I would say if we wave the rules we should just get rid of the 30 minute timer all together and just allow it to be unlimited and I the reason why is if we at some meetings decide to wave the

rules and at other meetings we decide not to I think we' put ourselves in legal Jeopardy I think that's something else we should look at as well but um I do know I still have my motion on the floor that we get um outside the city legal council all right let's vote on that one and then we'll go to Mr agar's motion Mr Das has a motion to go to outside Council to look at the um

requirements that special meetings stay on the topics on the agenda am I correct there correct okay section 918 right section 918 correct so I have a um I have do I have a motion a second yep we do call the rooll Mr AGA yes Mr Bailey no Mr Das yes Mr Cory no Miss larv no Miss Pereira no mayor Coogan no now we have Mr agar's motion to keep citizens input at three

minutes do we have a second on that second I have a motion to second on Mr agar's Amendment Deb call the rooll please on stay at three Mr AGA yes Mr biley yes Mr Das no Mr Cory yes M larav yes M Pereira yes mayor kouan yes anything further Mr Das yes um uh two more things so if we're going to keep it at 3 minutes um I like to make a

motion that we just get rid of the 30 minute timer just have it unlimited that's basically what it is already no no no so um Mr das's motion is to eliminate time constraints on citizens input do I have a second last call for a second un removing time constraints hearing none go to your next one Mr Das um I just would like to um since the motion failed I just like to request that attorney

Assad look into to the 9-18 issue I don't know if you need would need a motion attorney Assad or no I we can we can do that yeah which uh which is 918 the public the the section of section 918 of the city Charter seeing if it's constitutional that prohibits some special meetings what else you got M oh Mr Bailey um I think even if we're not moving that 15 to 30 we should have a

duration that we agree on and talk about I'm not against the 30 Mr Bailey you want to make a motion no no no I'm saying I think we should at least have a time and if we're discussing moving people to the end of the meeting we should well it's first read we can come up with something ler I'm I'm with you on that I am go ahead I just do do have

a question um so this entire time we've been making um U motions to weigh the rules for a residency residency requirement I just don't I might be missing it but I don't see that in the policy um if anyone can show me where that is I just feel like we've been making uh motions that were just not necessary this entire time okay that's you know you want to make a motion on

that what do you want to make the oh no I I keep keep it as is I just want to make G to find it okay chairman Mr a I um want to make a motion that we chair uh charge the chair and the vice chair coming back to us with language relative to the 30 minute time limit for review at the next meeting second I have a motion a second on a 30

minute time limit discussion um call yeah basically for you guys to do the work we can't do it as a whole it's open meeting I I like what you suggested about going to the end of the meeting but I think having the chair and the vice chair talk about it you can legally do that we can't as a as a body so go ahead um Deb Mr yes Mr uh Bailey yes Mr

Das yes Mr Cory yes M lar yes Miss Pereira yes Mary cougan yes anything further all right so we got through that first read 1210 motion approve I'm sorry 12 no I'm sorry 1210 approve what you say there's no there's no vote on it it's just the first read of the new policies referred by the policy subcommittee I think we have to vote on this no move on move on 1211 discuss

discussion and vote to approve a job description as referred by the spread alternative Ed committee second I have a motion to second on that any discussion Deb call the rooll Mr AG yes Mr Bailey yes Mr Das Mr Das yes yes Mr Cory yes Miss larv yes Miss Perera yes mayor Coogan yes 1212 we did earlier 1213 is a discuss second I have a motion uh on 1213 Mr Bailey seconded it Mr Agia made

the motion 1213 to approve the discussion and vote to approve the pass program that call the role please description and job description and job description drag yeah yes Mr Bailey yes Mr Das yes Mr Cory yes M ly yep M Pereira yes mayor cougan yep 1214 is discussion and vote to approve the first quarter revolving fund report as presented by Kevin almea Chief Financial Officer so in front of you you

have the uh quarterly report for September uh it's the 13 revolving funds they all have positive balance is uh with this report um you'd be approving a first quarter transfer into the use of schools account of $3,945 for the outside overtime associated with use of schools with that I'm requesting your approval anybody have any questions for Mr almea C question I'm sorry Mr AGA uh

the cbtv maybe um the revolving account um I think there's a vacancy in that department right now okay and is the money coming out of this account and is that position being filled you say that a little loud I couldn't hear you sorry I'm asking about cvte and I thought some of the salary for the new position that a vacant position is being paid out of this so I'm asking one if that's the

case and two is when is the position going to be filled uh if you don't mind me asking which position are you referring to I believe there's a second position in the um construction craft labor now that's out of the budget that's out of the operating budget and is that position being filled Madam superintendent that position is um we are still in the hiring process so it's going to be filled just not yet it will

be filled yes thank you I yield anything further for Mr almeer can I get a motion in a second on that move second Deb call the rooll Please Mr actually I had one question oh I'm sorry go ahead Mr sorry the um last line on the tuition Stone tuition I'd like that to be an agenda item at the next subcommittee meeting as well just to put it on on your radar sure thank you okay

and yes on the yes yes and if you don't mind me asking what should I have ready or what do you want me to have ready for that just be prepared to talk with Miss obenchain superintendent about okay what's in the account and how much we're sure using what's the plan going forward okay thanks no problem Mr Bailey yes Mr Das yes Mr Cory yes Miss lar yes Miss Pera yes Mary Coogan yes 12:15 is

discussion and vote to approve the quarterly budget report update as presented by Kevin almea Chief finance officer so this is the uh first first quarter report um for the year um everything at this point is subject to negotiations so I've projected as best as uh possibly can as of now and what I know as of right now um you know at this point you know we um we're in you know we're in pretty

good shape um I've provided all the documents that we typically provide um as of 9:30 the eser funds have been fully spent so uh that just point to point that out and make that note uh I've provided the updated administrative support for each building as we typically do uh and I've also provided you with the insurance projection uh as to where we ended as of June 30th because as of the last report we hadn't

fully uh provided what was spent at that time but um just to point out that it is about a couple hundred, which so the original projection was pretty close to uh what was originally budgeted for last year so with that I'm looking for your vote for the quarterly report so moved do do I have a motion to approve yes Cory do I have a second second I have a motion second question Mr AGA uh

the difference of uh whatever that is 300,000 I'd like to make a motion that we send a letter to the mayor asking that that money be sent to the school department as soon as possible second hell we have a motion in second to $300,000 Deb call the RO please the rules right I'm I'm only trying to get ahead of it that's all well I I actually thought we were better than most years

this year we did I think it's very good most and I'm trying to ensure that you're at 100% And that's yep that's why we're doing it just I don't want to get the 300,000 June 1st and have to spend it in 30 days relax we give you the money we're very we're very the sooner you give it the better we can be with service and the children all right the

motion is to uh get the $300,000 over from the city as quick as we can uh Deb you want to call the roll please Mr yes Mr Bailey yes Mr Das yes Mr Cory yep M ly yes M perrera yes mayor cgan yes one more question go ahead so Mr Al me you right here um it's I can read it's not a controversial thing but the Esser funds uh cares act funding or whatever is all

of the S one two 3 four whatever it was I'm reading here that it says he provided with an update how much each granch is and when it was spent please note that we are fully spent with all of our cares Sr funds as of 9:30 so that was like the law and that was the rule so yes just for the edification of the public we are not sitting on millions of

dollars in SF funds 1 2 3 4 or whatever correct all that money is spent and it was spent within the confines of the law as well as bringing in positions that fell within the S of plans that we submitted correct yes correct so we don't have $9 million in that account waiting no we have no money in that account it's spent thank you I all right I take a vote no we don't we

already voted did we vote on the quarterly no no oh go ahead I'm sorry Mr Dr yeah yes Mr Bailey yes Mr gas yes Mr Cory yes M lar yesera yes mayor c y we have a number of items for your information um retirements resignations appointments uh regretfully again some death notices those are for your information only uh next item any new business to come before the committee I need um a motion

we a motion motion to accept motion to accept and place on file okay Deb call the quick question Mr Mayor okay Mr di thank you just a quick question um M I think Mr agar made the point before um if we can just get some clarification like I I don't know if it's just like so like some of these resignations are really they're resigning their position and going into a new one just but but

for transparency maybe we could do this agenda a little bit for that uh the transfers to be listed on there also right and there's one more thing as well um I asked it in an email if the committee could start being provided in weekly reports um the exit interviews and to see um that's personel that's personel that's personel you can't do that can't see it not within the jurisdiction of the committee y okay you

um we have a request for executive session item number Mr chairman can I just ask on another on the new business oh go ahead so uh one of the things that I'm sorry I don't mean to I just finish taking of course oh I'm sorry would I stop you that's to me yes Mr yes Mr Das yes Mr Cory yes M ly yes M Perera yes mayor Coogan

yes uh Mr Mr Agia so one of the requests that I have is relative to um superintendent weekly updates so if I could ask that we get a new one um a new email each time so what's happening is when we hit uh the reply all it's very difficult on our end to actually see what was the current one and it there they were all lumped together so I

wanted to print one of them today and it printed 21 pages so if we can just each week please get one that's like superintendent's update on Friday of next Friday that'll start any back and forth for that and then go to the next one because now every time I try to print one it's 21 Pages it piggy backs it piggy backs on one or the other I always think it so I'll tell you why I

do it the way I do it it's so that I always just reply all to my previous one that way if you were there and you wanted to do a search you'd kind of be searching in one document that would cover all but I understand and I can and and it's all a matter of just how to find something so if for instance you send an answer to a question on a certain issue it's looked

with in 21 Pages it's very difficult fine so right okay just a point of asking for support thank you all right um Bruce do we have a request for executive session yes we would need you want to read the reason for this and we'll vote after sure Master Law chapter 38 section 21 A7 to review and approve executive session minutes for September 9th 2024 regular school committee meeting M General Law

chapter 3A section 21A 7 to review and approve executive session minutes for September 30 2024 special meeting of the school committee master of Law chapter 38 section 21 A7 to review and approve executive session minutes for October 15 2024 special meeting of the school committee Master law 38 section 2183 to discuss strategy with the Str to collect the bargaining including hearing

grievances relative to All Professional teaching employees of the forward School System including coaches Title One teachers nurses occupational physical therapists and specialists in the teaching profession represented by the for educators Association as the chairs determined that no possession may have a detrimental impact on the Bing position of the committee mtion Law chapter 38

section 2183 to discuss strategy with respect Collective Bing relative to all administrators and employees repr presented by the former administrators Association as the chair is the T that open session may have a detrimental impact on the Bing position of the committee M Law chapter 38 section 218 read to discuss strategy with the respect to collect the bargaining relative to all cafeteria employees of

the forward school system represented by the American Federation of state county and Municipal Employees Council 93 local 1118 as a chair is determined possession may have a detrimental impact on the Bing position of the committee M Law chapter 30A section 21 A3 to discuss strategy with the respect Bing to all maintenance employ uh employees of the forest SCH system represented by the

American Federation of State County Municipal Employees local Council 933 local 1118 as the chair has determined an open session may have a detrimental impact on AB Bing position of the committee M laws chapter 3A section 2183 to discuss strategy with respect to collector Bing Rel to all custodial employees of the forward school system represented by the American Federation of State County Municipal Employees

Council 93 local 1118 as the chair is deter the Open Session may have a detrimental impact on the B the position of the committee masteral Law chapter 38 section 21 A3 discuss strategy with respect collective bargaining relative to all Safety and Security employees of the former school system represented by the American Federation of state county and Municipal Employees Council 93 Local

18 is the chair deter Open Session may have a detrimental impact on Bing position of the committee M general laws chapter 38 section 21 A3 to discuss strategy respect colle the B relative to all civil clerical employees of the forward school system represented by the forward Department of Civil service clerical employees Association as the chair has determined that open session may have a detrimental impact on the

Bing procision of the committee Mass general laws chapter 38 section 2183 discuss strategy of the respect to collect the bargaining rela to relative to all par professional employees of for school system represented by the for Riv Federation of pray professionals that chairs determined that the uh an open session may have a detrimental impact on a bing position of the committee M law

CH 3A section 2182 to conduct strategy session preparation for negotiations with non-un personel specifically superintendent TR Dr Tracy Curley and to conduct contract negotiation with non-union Personnel specifically superintendent Dr Tracy Curley we will reconvene the may may up your statements at that time can I get a motion in a second to so mve second I have a motion second

that call the role Please Mr aan yes Mr Bailey yes Mr di Mr Cory you can't down he can't vote from down there no to sit here or no this is ridiculous V go Ahad go next ly yes Miss Pereira yes mayor Coogan yes executive session here Mr Cory here miss larv here miss perea Mr Mayor Coogan here anything further to come before the committee motion of J oh I to do the minutes the minutes the

minutes yes mayor I'd like to get a motion to approve the executive session minutes for September 9th 2024 regular school commit so moved second I have a motion to Second any discussion Deb call the rooll Please Mr AGA yes Mr Bailey yes Mr Das yes Mr Cory yeah Miss larv yes Miss Pereira mayor Coogan yes can I get a yep can I get a motion to approve the executive session minutes for September 30th

2024 special meeting of the school committee I have a motion and a second on those minutes uh any discussion Deb call the rooll Please Mr AA yes Mr Bailey yes Mr D yes Mr Cory yes M lar and finally can I get a motion to approve the sorry Pera Mayan yes anything else yes can I get a motion to approve the executive session minutes for October 15th so moved 2024 special

meeting in a second any discussion de please call the rooll Mr AGA yes Mr Bailey yes Mr Das yes Mr Cory yes M larv yes Pereira mayy Coogan yes anything further motion to adjourn second new business motion to Jour that please call the role Mr a yes Mr Bailey yes Mr Das yes Mr Cory hoay larv yes Pereira mayor kouan yes ajour