7.31.2024 Fall River School Committee - Special Ed, Alternative Ed, & Early Childhood Subcommittee

yeah ready yeah all right I'm going to call to order the special education alternative education Early Childhood subcommittee meeting Wednesday July 31st 2024 can you please call the RO Mr Ria here Mr Cory here M Pera here can we please rise to with the flag pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivis with liy and justice for

all person 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 T these are therefore advised that such recordings or Transmissions are being made whether perceived or unperceived by those present and not deemed acknowledged and permissible the uh meeting just want to uh welcome our new assistant superintendent Brian Roso to

his first meeting so welcome Brian thank you very much everybody in the room knows him but for the edification of the public this is his first meeting and the pressure is on I guess the um we do have two people signed up for citizen input time and the first is Nelson Vasquez of 210 Sunset Hill and Miss cabal will read the good afternoon members of the special education subcommittee I am ready to

address the proposed contract involving School Committee Member Mimi larav who is set to lead a program at one of our schools under People Incorporated while I hold great respect for our school committee members I am deeply concerned about the potential conflict of interest this contract represents first and foremost it is essential to verify whether the exemption granted by the city council remains valid with with

this new agreement and has not lasts adhering strictly to the conflict of interest disclosure requirements is non-negotiable and we must ensure full compliance with the law approving a contract that might be illegal could have serious repercussions furthermore I have been informed that the actual contract was not included on board docs for review by the members this lack of transparency is

troubling why was the contract withheld complete documentation is critical for informed decision-making and maintaining trust we also need to consider the broader implications of allowing committee memb members to hold contracts with the school department this practice sets a concerning precedent if we approve this contract we are opening the door for every Committee Member to have side agreements with the school

department this situation could undermine the Integrity of our governance given these concerns I urge a thorough investigation to ensure no policies or laws have been violated we must maintain the highest standards of our school committee and cannot in good conscience approve a contract involved in one of our own members without comprehensive review thank you for your attention in this critical

issue thank you next up colum Das 560 Race Street B of contract thank you and I have no wish standing either um good afternoon members of the committee sub Committee just speaking right now particularly as a private citizen um so I make that clear and um welcome welcome board Mr Roso as mentioned um here today to address as the last person and citizens input mentioned um the contract of one of our own members that is

currently under consideration today while I have um utmost respect for all the school committee members involved and I have no issue with the actual contract itself or the program that's involved I think it's important to note that was mentioned that the private salary of one of our own members as a part is being paid in this contract there are several questions that I believe need need to be solved in

subcommittee before it goes before the entire school committee that's why I'm here firstly we must verify whether the exemption granted by the city council is still valid because there is a new agreement that is being discussed here today we got to make sure there is no um conflict of interest there's no um it's not expire or if it the time runs out I I think we need to reach out to

attorney Assad or get a second opinion on the matter additionally I think it's imperative that we ensure full compliance with the conflict of interest disclosure laws our policies and the current disclosure that was passed by the city council to make sure it is being filed appropriately approving potentially an illegal contract is just not an option we must set a clear preson today whether we're going to allow our

own members to engage in side agreements with the school department I believe approving this contract could set a dangerous precedent in the future I believe the city council was wrong in approving the disclosure last March of last year and we must consider the implications of allowing school committee members to hold side contracts with the school department we need to thoroughly investigate this matter to

ensure we're not violing any policies or laws believe it's crucial that we uphold to the highest standards for the school committee and we cannot under any circumstances approve a contract involving our own members thank you thank you can we respond to the citizens input always yeah I think you always can I hear words for the public to understand uh it would be very difficult for me as a school Committee Member to

serve on this committee and this board if I thought that there were any conflicts of interest present and that would Hinder any of the work involved in this board moving our school department forward especially as it applies to Mimi lvy who is not only the chairman Vice chairwoman of our school school committee but also the reputation that she's developed over a long period of time which is an upstanding and an

outstanding uh development with children and teenagers in our community year after year after year after year after year it goes back 30 years we're talking about 30 years of reputation on the line here um and when I hear words like Integrity or trust issue or implications that really worries me that there's a little bit of a digging effort you know to try to look at this as the city council exonerated this position

last year they made it clear that it would be okay for Miss laravie to serve on the school board as she holds her position with People Incorporated which by the way is a contracted agency with the school department however the work that they do is child centered and there is no one better when it comes to child cented work than Mimi Lar this should not be an issue at this

time and I wonder why it's being raised at this time in the critical nature and the critical work of our school board while there's so much going on new developments new new leadership teams in our school department and the such uh it just brings to mind why is this coming up at this time and so with that I I lend my full advocacy and support to Vice chair women Mimi larav and I hope

that this is not an issue moving forward and I hope that her work her valuable work involving teenagers and youth in our community is allowed to move forward I yield thank you so the um I do have some questions on that but it'll come up under the people link uh some of the questions to raise I think are deserving of a a response of some type and then when that comes time

so I don't I'll wait for my prise you can say something else no no I'd rather for the sake of time I don't like to repeat myself I'll wait till we get sure once we get there I'm sure we'll have questions about what it's contract and all those details so uh the first item on the agenda is the discussion and vote to refer an early release for the stone school I believe we had uh one pager

that um you know we're in the process of having um you know some department heads and um we have the support of directors and so the early release once per month will allow us to uh just support teachers with the academic needs so really for some planning um so that they can make sure that their lessons are targeted to meet the needs of the students that are in front of them every

day um and so by doing the early release I can make sure that um our directors are also available to support teachers uh we we're proposing probably just a one one time a month for two hours um in looking at the uh instructional hours um you know we would still be um above the required hours quite a bit so I know principal Shaw actually um did that um math out and I connected with her on

that as well uh before we open up the questions can you just send that to the committee that analysis Mr C yeah I'm fully in support of this with a question um first of all I I honor the work that uh principal Shaw has done at this school for a number of for a lengthy period of time thank you for all the hard work and focus that you bring to this unique population of

ours um I just qu what's going to happen on the early release days with with the students are they going to be safely let out of the school is going are there going to be any safety issues uh as they leave the school earlier are they going to be picked up by bus or what's going on with that yeah so typically when we've done this at other schools um everything would be the same in terms of

if the students receed Transportation there they would receive Transportation back um so really you know their day would just be amended for that one time per month teachers would remain uh the rest of the time so I don't foresee um you know any major change to what the end of the day routine is other than students are just being released a little bit early thank you um would it be the same I because I

can think of one is a single month 2 hours even if it's 2 hours a month that may change my routine so what do we I think it's a great idea I'm for it but do we have anything in place that is going to be structured so parents know it's the first Monday or the last Friday so they can put their their you know their team in place yeah absolutely I would connect with principal Shaw

actually I know that she was also um surveying just her staff for some input um around this to make sure that there's some shared ownership you know from and voice from teachers um and so I think at this stage it was really to bring this idea to this group and then we would certainly have it would make sense to say it's going to be you know the last day it would have to be a consistent

schedule shared with parents ahead of time so that they know this is the expected day so that when we refer and you come to the full committee you're gonna have those answers yes yeah okay thank you that was all so the um one of my questions is just around the transportation and making sure that that works for non-typical half days or however that works and you can probably have flexibility to tweak it a little

bit but we don't want to approve something that they obviously don't have busing to yep to do um and I believe does RPA still do this currently from what I understand RPA has when Wednesdays um as an early release but I believe that's a weekly um different than the it's a weekly we start talking about if it turned out to be a Wednesday could we share some benefits of PD and

whatnot so it really is a benefit from our staff uh in particular for any kind of PD but we had a a young man killed last year we went into try to reform practices for our whole team uh all our kids it was beneficial so it really does work for us thank Mr you obviously need the minimum number hours the same question I would just be curious to make sure that is happening

in general um not so much of the timing I just have a question on the department heads is this new totally new uh the people only for the first year like is this new in the budget or is this what's the history of department heads at RPA you sharing it with RPA yes so was this new to the district this current budget or is it my understanding is that you had a depart department

heads so we decided to um we have Coach we had coaches we feel that we need more support for academics so we're going to share the department head between the two of us we've already worked out a partial schedule and all of that so we thought we could pair up together put our staff together for some of the professional development especially because Kyle and I are in the same boat

where we might have one middle school math teacher who has nobody to talk to about what's going on in their class so this gives them a peer a colleague to meet with so um it's not a new position it's just kind of a re it's we've just changed the way that it works so it's between the two of us so this what we have in the one page says this during this current school year the upcoming

school year stone school will have a department chair in both stem and Humanities that is shared with another School in the district does that mean RPA that's the other school one for stem and one for humanities yes one Ela one math one Ela one math and one math two separate positions I see I just had Ela uh and we hired our department head into a vice pcor role and we just weren't

able to fill it for the remainder of the year so that's my one position that's split5 and5 now so not additional money or additional position for RBA two people two people so there new person Bo yes two so last year would have been that what Mr was talking about and his person elevated so now that left one but we added a position this year so the math department had was a new position had too I'm sorry

no position did you lose a coach we did move a coach in order to make it work but I I still thought the you had to no department heads okay I'm just trying to figure out like so we basically have English and usually it's English and social studies science and math like gu if you only had two people yes is that basically the same model yes and you're going to have to two people so my

only question is on the unique needs and it says it right here they have unique needs at these schools to say what is the requirements of that particular person needs to have skills with those unique needs that I think it's logical so looking at just job descriptions how we fill the spots and whether we is it the same is it a gen generic job description and then we just kind of

like ask somebody if they have those skills or we actually have to think about maybe having a new job description that says this type of job at this unique School uh so that's my only concern is not about the two hours but but making sure that we're either getting the right person and I'm sure you're going to make sure that they're yeah doing that work but you don't want to advertise a Job saying I'm just a

department head in a traditional Middle School yeah so I think through the process that's a great question I think through the process where the questions that we're asking we're really transparent about the particular needs of the building right and so and that both principles were actually involved have been involved in interview process every step of the way um and so I think

it's just important for us to note that you know and be clear with people around what the grade range grade range is it's not unlike um for instance in a school where there might be foundational English Learners right so a department head in that particular building has to have a skill set around that area to support the needs of those students or a school that's I think a dor in Henry

Lord where you're K to 8 or pre to 8 that's a big spread right so while the job is still the same in terms of the general description that it's an academic support position their role is really to support teachers to meet the needs of those students what we've done on the teaching and learning side um in working with directors and of course I'm just kind of getting my feet wet um but

I've met with directors in we have um modified pacing um modified scope and sequence in some cases for in for instance at RPA know specifically for ELA that at the high school level they have like a homegrown curriculum with some novels that they've selected um I know that um right now with Carnegie uh for math um middle and high school we're actually working them and we're asking

them for some modified pacing um in a different scope and sequence because we recognize that you know we may not we're not going to necessarily move at the same exact Pace but we still need to make sure that we're um really working toward a deep understanding of the standards right so the I think given the early release and given that um these two positions they can dig in with teachers around like those specific

needs for their students and that's really what department has to do across acoss no I I think that's well said in the past we've been told we're using the same exact curriculum as the high school and I've always had a problem with that because we have that you put a unique set of academic needs and so we we can't be just doing the same thing and I think it's thisen to think that we are so I'm

glad you're saying that how it's modified you want to get that's the goal but you can't tell me that a student in these schools that have these unique needs can do everything that they're doing at the same pace and so I do appreciate that um one thing I would ask is if you could just send us uh the whole committee when it comes up uh to the job description of what a department

head does just so that we can um take a look at it and um I know your rationale would be that the schools have a number of students so therefore they should get a department head you know like that's valid to say what they did my question is about other areas of the two those two schools uh like for instance in technology like so every school has a integration technology care whatever the

technical term is what what is the status of those schools relative to a person and you might not know that answer but or maybe they do what is the status of you your schools having an integration technology person available to you like the other schools for equity do you guys have any like I had U for the second half Marcus hman come in but it was really a part time I was sharing with the high school

so you come in once or twice a week U for half a day and I just actually reached out to someone today to see if he was coming back half a day yeah and how about we do not you have nobody we have somebody who comes over and supports our teachers with technology if that's what you're talking about but for students not and at the middle school level level um currently like I'll speak

you know from talit um we initially when we were in the with the Verizon like that vills partnership we had someone where that was really the role um but what's happened is we built capacity you know over the last few years and so our department heads or instructional coaches are just also doing that work because it's part of right it's directly related to the teaching um I'll certainly look to see what I know that

the district you know there are positions I can look at how those are allocated um and I think naturally if we have a you Department chairs coming on part of that work also will be like how can teachers leverage technology in a classroom to do some individualized learning for kids or some small group learning for kids right we and we can't in my opinion have somebody half couple days a week half time like that to me

doesn't work when we're just looking at equity and what you need so if you can look at it and see we've had I'm also the chair of Technology where we tried to do a charts and look at that and for some reason the or chop doesn't have the technology director integration person with the people under them even though we've asked it over and over that that's the case so they're like scattered

around so for us to try to figure out who's doing what where when in what schools is very difficult so somehow we can either clarify and make sure that they get a person at a consistent basis at these schools because they are just as worthy of you know between the two you probably have 300 kids right they abouts you know I mean so that's a basically a sizable school that somebody

else might have somebody every day and he's saying he's got somebody half time a couple days week so you can look at it appreciate it can I make up one more questione Mr chairman can I ask a question that's somewhat related I just it's about those two uh of course two schools it's not necessarily related to absolutely so I was just curious um marelen how's the work going on there

and in at the new facility it's going how does it look to you it's are you excited I'm very excited it looks like honestly it looks like what our kids deserve it's a bigger school there's an auditorium um there's a cafeteria there's things that we don't have the kids are very excited the parents are so the kids are excited oh very excited we've been taking pictures showing them

the pictures and I go over once or twice a week just to kind of see what's going on and it they're getting there they're making progress I'm a little sad that we're moving away from our paa because that partnership is so helpful but we're going to make it work we'll make it work but I think that the school is perfect for our kids and Kyle I want to ask you

about the work that's going on at OPA in the big room in the front and in the kitchen and stuff is there any updates how's that going along yeah our front room was basically waiting for a ceiling to be put in but it really is new floors the rooms are done bathrooms are done uh the colonary department is new walls new ceilings new floor and there's a teacher there's a teacher allocated that

position now to right a teacher of Power yeah that that I just for the Public's edification that kitchen is in the same room that the late Stephanie Baker used to teach home economics and and so there's a real Karma feeling to that room and so I I can't help but think that it's going to be very successful for your students at that school thanks for those updates I'm just excited a lot

of moving Parts going on and please come and visit us I certainly will I look forward to it thanks I yield the uh the old school year were at the you know where uh the West Hall oh at West Hall at West Hall when that was uh fixed you know they uh they rid it did they repaint the whole place they did and was it in good shape when you left it's in

good shape but we've been there for five years so there's wear and tear you know they are doing painting now because you know some of the walls needed people hang things up and they leave spots on the wall stuff so they're they're painting the areas that need to be painted now but um I would say that we left it in decent shape considering our clientele um you know and it's not that

you were neglected when you were there as far as the oh not at all no absolutely and now they're fixing it because they have to do different build uh buildups and all that stuff so absolutely absolutely I'm looking forward to seeing uh the other place as well so you have any questions no can we get a motion to approve and V make the motion second all in favor I oppos so VK thank

you very much I'm glad to hear the schools working out though that's fantastic I knew it would I'm excited next on the item is 302 vot to refer coaching for change contract and I'll turn it over to Dr B thank you um so this is a continuation contract first to note uh we have come to the end of a three-year contract with coaching for change um that the school committee had approved as we've looked at the

different sites that we have expanded to over the course of the last 3 years we also have worked with coaching for change to identify a tiered funding model recognizing that not every school serves the same number of students therefore um it doesn't require the same funding um totals so we really worked to be very intentional working with principles one thing that you know we do really appreciate throughout this

program is that it is just another opportunity for after school connections with kids very often middle school students um you know it's got to be super cool for middle school students to want to stick around um not all of our middle schools um are afforded 21st century Grant programs and so we really rely on our robust Middle School athletic program but as everybody knows Athletics are not for everybody and the

benefits that we have continued to experience with coaching for change as it relates to both mentoring Project based learning creating safe spaces for kids after schools and really um providing kids with models who are much more connected to their range than we are these days um so it just helps our kids connect with college students um being able to share the college experience while simultaneously taking

part in a pro you know a semester IED project-based activity that always culminates in a family gathering at the end where we celebrate student work and bring the families in to put our students in the spotlight positively um so with that I will turn it over to Maris um to speak about the contract and our looks to continue the program here in fall thank you just so you know we do have

the PowerPoint all the members have that so if you want to refer to it feel free but you can go as how definitely thank you guys for having me today uh I really appreciate this the space time and uh I know you guys have a lot of busy things on the agenda so I really appreciate it and I'm joined here by my colleague Ally she will be able to answer any really

really specific uh questions uh as as we dive in um into the presentation my goal for today is to recap the last three years um then talk about the shifts and learnings that have happened uh and then what the next steps and what the future could look like um and so when we started this out it was right on the the the back end of coming out of the pandemic um and we really focused in on

being able to place after school programs um in the schools uh with the idea of placing college students that was what the contract was based on and so we were able we were looking at put placing about 198 college students um across uh the middle schools um and over the last three years we were able to place 207 and so coming out of the pandemic we weren't really sure what to expect um

but we knew that there was going to be some support and the idea coming into this was this was just going to be after school but when understanding the needs the challenges we learned that we could place college students in summer and after school and then we also tested out an in school model which allowed us to do a lot of learning there and so that's how our 207 college students were able

to work with um I'm using round numbers 2400 um fall Riv public school students um and it was something that a lot of learning um and being able to stay consistent um and and and being a presence in the school and being becoming embedded within the school culture um and knowing that each school has its own challenges its own initiatives and how do we customize and tailor the approach to to

each school's needs and one of the things that we learned over when looking at data was our impact on attendance which was a huge initiative of the district and how could we be a part of that um and so that's what we really looked at uh both attendance and also um um chronic absenteeism and so being able to understand what does each what do we need to do to to to add value for each

school because each school is very different right so I I'll use talit as an example um in year one and two of the partnership they had 21st century but in year three they did not so we were able to support the after School programming there whereas Henry Lord they have kitchens and um I forget what's the place across the street uh the old folks home right so we were able to deliver

Valentine Valentine's Day cards and really do a cool uh programming there be based on the resources just illustrating that every school is different um and has different needs and so we we do our best to customize it to what to what the school has as an infrastructure um um so what we started learning was really how do we systematize the process knowing that each School needs a little bit of

different so one is how do we customize and tailor our approach to schools two is how do we Implement these interventions in partnership with the school because what we learned was if we came into the school with our agenda it may be in conflict with what the school is trying to accomplish and do and while the intentions are good we want to make sure that there's a through line and we're we're aligned and so using

teachers um counselors uh Educators to help us build that connectivity was really powerful especially as we built after school programs that we infused academic support with um and then two ongoing support and continuous feedback right so we know that our Educators in the building they have a lot on their plate and so how does our team support the teachers in just implementing it right so like it may be something as

simple as we schedule gym time but someone else is in the gym and instead of that falling on to the teacher trying to scramble to figure that out our team is able to do that um so we worked in partnership with um with the coaches or with the with the Educators to understand what we needed and we were able to build out feedback loops through that process um part of what we learned

a little bit more is we started fine-tuning the work we're doing through the c4c implementation model I'll pass the mic to Ally um to kind of talk more about this and some of the shifts we've made based on a lot of the learnings that that have occurred yeah so I think this is really about like how do we get our mentoring intervention to have the most impact at the school level and so

what we found and plan to continue to do is make sure that in in every school that our programming is in there's a consistent point of contact so that's that educator counselor teacher whoever it might be who our College mentors report to and really work alongside um that they have a consistent connection point so that they meet to debrief talk about the plan for the day and how it went every time our mentors

are there um that our mentors have a really consistent schedule that's aligned with the school goals so if the school really wants to focus on attendance let's say our mentors are are scheduled in such a way that they can have those one-on-one check-in meetings with students to make sure that you know they're talking about their attendance progress and setting goals with them and that that works within the school day

schedule um having a really consistent case load of students so as you know like in a in any kind of mentoring program it's really important that they're developing deep connections and so if we're trying to connect with 400 students at once it's not going to have the same Deep Impact as if you have a targeted case load um and then fifth is is just that number so it's it's a consistent meeting time and it's under

20 students that our mentors are really focusing in on supporting and so in in this model it's really about thinking about how we can use our College mentors as additional support right we're not coming in with our own curriculum it's we're working working side by side with a teacher and I'm going to be cautious here because I don't know the union implications but we're not actually

right but it's the the the idea of them being an aid or support of some sort um based on the needs of that after school program classroom intervention um so just being able to support and add that add add value there um especially as we think about it from a small group perspective a one-on-one perspective um and just understanding School Dynamics um because we understand that based on

the research and data every when when students have caring adults in the building they perform and feel more connected and they do um better um so and I think that part of what we're also learning right now is when we when we're going into schools not being vague being very act making everything very actionable and tangible right so our College mentors are focusing on shifting specific

behaviors that the school has flagged as being something that creates them at risk and so being able to allow our College mentors to focus in on that one or two specific aspects it makes it very tangible and real and allows our College mentors and students to have an action plan every single week to see how they're making progress um and so uh the c4c process on the last is we are moving forward in the future

because we're really want to make sure that this is data driven right understanding how are we impacting the data so that it's not just we it's a feel-good program we can name it from from a data perspective we're going to recruit um we're going to Target we're going to have a targeted recruitment strategy um um and we're specifically going to look at students that are chronically absent and so when we say

that we're not talking from the standpoint of kids that are missing 30 days of school we're looking for the students that may need five or six additional days and being more targeted with that population so that we can help the district improve that right so knowing that the bonds that our College mentors creates with the students they're now in asire to go to school the days that they're going to go ah I don't

want to go I'm sick right now they're like I'm today I'm going to see my college mentor and they're going to show up uh the second part is we're going to have a comprehensive review we're going to be looking at student data in partnership with the schools uh based on student surveys Based on school-based data and then the data we're pulling ourselves uh through through our program

and then also specialized training for our college students um really making sure they understand what their needs are what the students needs are um so they begin improving and then also piloting a blended model where our College mentors are both supporting in school and after school interventions to see how does that work is there a way of building a carryover from after school

or sorry in school to after school and what does that look like and mean um and I think that the the the part that I didn't put in here that I'm also excited about is we unintentionally um get a lot of college mentors that just want to give back and they want to explore what it means to be an educator and so a by product of the experiences is they become interested in education

and so I'm going to say I've been we've been talking about this from a Visionary standpoint but we haven't been intentional through action um but over the last three years about seven college students have gotten jobs within the district um and so now it's a matter of figuring out how do we make it more intentional and for me and Ally and the code for change team what we learned was

principles own the hiring portion right it doesn't go through HR so how do we support principles in making the connections with college students more intentionally and that's part of the work we're trying to build out here through this process so it's not a it we're our goals to make this a byproduct of what we're trying to accomplish but also making sure that young people are getting the supports uh

that they need within um with within schools to help them succeed and stay connected um so thank you yeah questions Mr C so thank you so much I mean our public school students here in forer could use all the scaffolding possible and so that's what your program speaks to extra added supports how would you say your program has grown since its Inception yeah so I would say that it's

grown from a not only a model but from a training's pers perspective too uh we came in just purely as an after school program hoping to to to to help with extended time and learning but what we've learned is that by training our College mentors becoming more targeted um some some of our our training is really based around mentoring um deescalation um providing academic supports through Project based learning

and so understanding what that connection looks like and means um and then also I think think understanding that each School needs its own approach um has really helped us as as as we grown over the last three years so with the Project based learning going on are there any ties to the curriculum that that a teacher May approve you know their work with curriculum definitely do you want to speak to the yeah you all

might be able to speak better to the like School specifics but I know that like the person leading the charge on uh like the school staff memb is the person who's leading the charge on what the projects are and so that our mentors are helping with like as if it we're social studies teacher or something like that right so there's kind of a natural way of doing that in the sense that it's a

school staff member already who knows the school culture curriculum and needs and is saying like we're going to take on this project together um and then our mentors are able to step in and help with the planning and execution of that so my biggest question with with your program is how are the college mentor are do they show up consistently are there any absente absenteeism issues

with the mentors themselves do they keep signing up do they work hard to develop a connection because connection is the key word here connection with the kids that's the whole thing how consistent is that so so I would say we have about an 85% attendance rate for our College Mentor showing up and part of what our focus is is making sure our college students are developing Workforce skills also right so making

sure they're if they're not going to show up they communicate with the teacher um we don't ask them to communicate with the kids for risk management that's fine that's um and then so our our College mentors also what we've seen is Shifting this from being a volunteer position to seeing it as a job has really shifted the mind set of college students because our college students get paid for the time that they

spend um and then on top of that um our uh college students typically stti with us for about a year and a half which is three semesters so the way that we when we partner with principles we talk about it is if you need someone for a specific time slot right like your bell schedule you need them here Monday Wednesday when block that's it that's hard but if you're flexible with time then

that gives us that opportunity to keep College studs longer from semester to semester CU College let me refer to your after school program so now you have a host of mentors working with these kids after school they're the same mentors that show up week upon week upon week so the kid is looking forward to working with that mentor and developing a sense of spirit in in behind their work that's

what I'm concerned about you know because there's a lot of change over in the support industry whether you talk about local agencies or schools or what have you there's so much Personnel turnover that it gets in the way of the connection element with the CH School child themselves yeah you know yeah I think the the way we we think about it and we approach it is we look at it a

13we basis right so every 13 weeks it's an open it's a beginning middle and end um but our goal is to keep that college student in that school for the entire year um and so being a and we're starting to think about this too um and we're we're not ready to implement but we're asking the questions of like how do we ensure we could build deeper connections by texting kids um parents right to say hey

I'm so and so's College mentor and now they're texting once a week with a positive update of something that their child has done right so that there's so let me ask Dr B this if if they if if they had would are there any Union issues if they tied into the parent portal on emails this is the first I'm hearing about this piece so I would have to dig in on that particular piece but I

think it's important that we go back to the Grassroots of how coaching for change started because I was at the Inception of that right it is a tiered model of professional development and support when we think about the the adults that we are identifying in our building who are who we are asking as building leaders to be the adults in the building we are strategic in our recruitment we are bringing our teacher

leaders in we are asking our high functioning teachers that really build climates and cultures in their in their classroom that we want to model for college students so that when they come into the program they're not just excited to work with our kids ideally they're also excited to work with the adults that we've identified within the program because when everybody has somebody they can look up to we all grow

and develop right in addition to what we realized in the early days of the program Makita got to give her a shout out right um she started with us as a college mentor and then quickly wanted to learn what it took to be an educator very often the public looks at education and they identify the role of a teacher but as we all know there are many job titles within the world of Education

that someone could partake in and so opening up the doors to college mentors to recognize the Myriad of job opportunities and titles and roles and responsibilities that exist if you don't want to be the teacher has been really really impactful for us in addition to that recognizing that the recreational experience after school is very different than the structured expectations of classro and and what it

takes to be part of the daytime schedule and so as we've learned and kind of Blended the after school model and open up the door to the in school model as a district we've really been able to benefit of exposing College mentors to the opportunities of being an urban educator across a myriad of job titles and opportunities um so we will continue to do that work by identifying the right

staff at every level because as a result of that everybody shows up the college mentors show up because they adore the adults that they're working with they don't want to let the adults down as much as they don't want to let our kids down right but they're also getting professionally developed by the adult that now is going to give us an opportunity in Fall River to really open up the HR our pipeline right um we

started last year with Mr Coogan we're excited to bring it back with Brian laally as the HR Director um how do we create a red carpet experience for our College mentors because recognizing yes the principal hires but once the principal sends the hire button now it's up to HR to really you know carry people through the hiring process that sometimes can be challenging right to get through all of the processes and

procedures that we need to happen so as much as it's just the principles we also need to make sure that the the door of HR that we are opening up the door with wide arms so that we can really Usher folks in to create that opportunity to hopefully um develop lifelong employees here in Fall River um who want to give back and be part of this community so there's an incubation so so to speak to

uh Personnel in in in staff for the public schools it's providing that uh and and they now now they're being paid I'm not even I don't care about the rate uh it used to be volunteer before are they getting college credits for their work some are so some participate as part of their internship program so they get actual credits through their college or university yeah um some don't and

some do and all of this looks really really good on their resumés as they're moving forward right so they're very uh eager to add coaching for change as part of their resume when they're looking for work sure social particularly in the social service field in the social Serv because it's a directly aligned opportunity and particularly speaking with you know a few different skill

development opportunities that they can speak to so I I've heard about coaching for change since my first term on the school board but Co got in the way and we're losing sight of all so this is the most indepth conversation that I've had with you and and and just being able to understand it from the inside you know in in in affecting the two schools that our assistant superintendents worked at

that's that's good enough for me so thank you very much yeah come see us like yeah come see us this year like we'll be in schools in the fall I'll try very hard thank you yeah question no I have no questions great program I'm glad to see it's working well I'm glad you brought off a point which I I think of immediately when I think of this it's not just about making sure our students

get what they need which obviously is our main intent but the fact that it's bringing people maybe into education which I know you Educators need uh as well as also into Fall River maybe somebody striking in love with our schools and saying I want to work Kid Forever well I think it is important to know they have a choice right um there you know we are not the only District

that even in this area um coaching for change is up and down 24 um you know in Rhode Island and so folks that are signing up for coaching for change they have choices of school districts that they could potentially be a part of um and I've had the opportunity to sit on a couple of panels you know kind of doing the welcoming piece to all the college mentors and it's exciting when we know

that people are choosing Fall River because when they're choosing Fall River we can do something with that energy and momentum um to really get serious about Recruitment and creating that red carpet experience um one question I had on the contract is it says that you were saying that it's the end of a three-year agreement and now this is a one-year agreement is there like what's the

rationale for that so the majority of our contracts that I typically am overseeing are one-year contracts I think one of the best parts that we've been able to do is get back to the table every year to take a look at how is the program meeting meting our needs um we've talked about expanding the program to elementary schools and looking at the ways we can extend um the in school

model so a yearly contract for us just gives us opportunity to reflect on what's working if we want to make additions and then we come back to the committee for additional funding and support should that be the request um right now based on all the other competing priorities we're looking to stay where we are at um and taking on some next steps looking we were discussing RPA that is a school that

we're looking to bring this in for moving forward just didn't feel that this year was the right year to make that request to ask that question I forgot to yep um but an annual contract gives us the opportunity for that level of review the only thing I would say is I think I was part of the um rationale for the three years this is a very complex program where it's not like a

it's wide ranging there's salar because it's more complicated than some of the other programs where we might want to do a one year to see how it's going and we've made the investment in my mind over five years however long we've been yeah been doing this um my personal recommendation is that we add this as a three-year contract with anything additional like if you wanted to expand

which I would encourage because I think it's a great program we just add it as an extra but I think when you look at the organization and the depth of what's going on I think we need to give them a threeyear just because it's a commitment and at that point it's us making a commitment as well saying what our priorities are so if this is a priority for us I say we give it as a three-year

now we know it's a three-year commitment both for you as well as us so when we're coming in and say well don't do all this work and get everything going and then sorry we're going to cut you next year like I think we need to look at it this one here as a I looked at it I'm sorry but that's one of the things that I go ahead you can comment I look at it sort

of like a contract renewal I don't think it's I didn't take it as a matter I kind of I noticed that I thought it was smart and the only reason I think that is because think she's just trying to bring everybody back to the table and readjust what the needs are because they can change so frequently it's like taking a contract I don't know I'm I can't think of an example I apologize but if the

needs change that the contract may need to be modified or whatever and in which whatever way so I think she's saying because of the structure of this because we're looking they're looking at expansion they're looking at changing they already know that next year this contract isn't going to work because she wants to see RPA involved and what have you so because of that I think she's

saying right now I just want a one-year contract next year maybe maybe she'll come to us and say a three because she's going to already have it in RPA and here and there and it's going to be expanded but I mean I I I I'm sorry go ahead no no go ahead I just so so I agree with her Russ go ahead so the only thing that I would say from a mindset standpoint

right is because things move so frequently within schools principles often ask the question is this going to be here and when that is there we're able to have conversations because there's a level of confidence there so I just lay that out there as part of it because that is a question we get once it's time to start building things up for the upcoming school year like are you guys for next

right what's the plan for next year are you going to be here is he going to get cut so agreeing with the one year but there is a mindset piece for a principal because they have so many other things going on as it relates I would say um so you think it you think it should be 3s I'm saying that in your opinion you can I I would say that we would

want it's not a guaranteed right like it's a exactly what Amy said we come back to the table to figure it out but for a mindset there's this level of confidence within the principles that that's there right but we can re-evaluate every year with nothing being guaranteed as a threeyear what I would say is that it to me it needs to be a threeyear but the rational for that

was because it was threee so I would go back to the table look at what it was so if it was a three-year agreement it probably had language in there that said we will review it annually or something along those lines would be what I and if you're running an organization trying to raise money and do all these things knowing that we have a three-year commitment is much greater than having a

one so personally I would say we should forward it forward but do some due diligence between now and then maybe copies of the old one let's see what it was and I think that's going to help the full committee to be able to but I mean a contract's a contract so whatever says in the contract we have to do for three years so what if she decides there some I don't know my rationale was simply

that right that we've just had a three-year contract I think it's all about having confidence with our principles and ongoing communication there are number of these contracts that I would expect our committee to support annually yeah you know Youth Court is certainly another one as we're looking at all of our alternatives to suspension specifically um I think about the CAC as another organization without them where

would we be with supporting our students who are most at risk um and so I think it's about the communication with principles just ensuring you know what are those programs and projects that are non-negotiable for us um and keeping an open line of communication so what would the what would the um negative be if we were to do with threeyear contract would you see any negative I think the only

part would just be to come back annually to review make sure meeting the needs that's in that is that in the contract yes we've met we've met more than it I partn like collaboration regard and I think it's probably in the I don't have it in front of me but the other agreement probably said something like that so I'm only trying to say I think we should look at if we have

programs that are this intensive and we're going to do it long term let's give a three-year window with some outs if if your program started to tank and you had 40% of the kids showing up and the principal are saying it's a mess we need to be able to pull the well how do we have out if we signed a three a contract that's kind of my it's within the contract the cont is it in the

contract now yes it is yeah so like if after year one if if the district wanted to pull out we could pull out after year one okay that's what I'm saying I think out for that and I don't see it but for the full committee we can get a copy uh to see it my only other question was the adults the teachers staff that are working at are they paid out of your

funds or are they paid out of District funds so like a person at Henry Lord like Dr B was talking about funds so those people are paid for by district school district as a after school correct to Grants or to whatever and um what I would just ask for the when we go to the full committee if we can get a report on that for the rest of the so

then we can just kind of say okay this is what we're getting for the he's get listed here all the numbers but there's also another component of it that says we're spending x amount of dollars on our people and then now the whole program cost us just just for review so can you get a motion to you are we amend you want to amend it or you just oh we

don't need to we're just going to I would say refer it and Dr B will take our advice and then come back motion to refer motion second all in favor I post so voted thank you very much you're more than welcome to uh leave you don't have to stay for this uh the rest meting it's nice and cool here though next is the discussion of vter Youth core contract

Dr yes so this is um a second of uh contract that we have been in partnership with the Youth Court Organization for a number of years um Youth Court serves as one of our alternative to suspension programs to really help our students um and I will kick it over to Terry who will take the lead in kind of running through where we've been as a district in our partnership

um thank you very much um as I I have been around for 20 going on 23 years in Youth Court since we started um in new for 23 years ago and it's my honor over the last um six to eight months to come back and um put down some roots in Fall River you've had some great directors here in the last 15 years um jotty has moved on jotty Romero has moved on and

of course Nina is now a practic attorney here in Fall River um so I am trying to fill their shoes here in Fall River while still maintaining New Bedford but we are in our 15th year here in Fall River um in those 15 years we've heard over a thousand cases and have kept a thousand kids from a criminal record um so we are at still at a 91% compliance

rate so we only lose about 10% of the kids who come through the system each year um to non-compliance me meaning they either picked up an additional crime they've gotten involved with the police or the courts or their infractions have um granted that the case needs to move forward to a different direction that what we're doing was not a fit or not a good fit for them and their family um we also look at recidivism

rates that's a huge number that we always get asked about in the 15 years here in Fall River 14% of the kids have have ended up in the court system after 1 year and 28% have ended up with the police or court record after 3 years completion of Youth Court which is still a pretty good number from our perspective um then and we look at when we look at recidivism we're not just

looking at they've actually been charged and convicted it means that their name was either a suspect or anything involved with the police or courts so we look at it as a as a bigger um Peace than just the the conviction and um Court involvement in that from that regards um 65% of the cases are coming for habitual School offenders and assault and battery cases those are typically the two the main two cases that we're

getting that are coming to Youth Court Prior to CR and prior to court involvement for those assault and batteries those are the highest num number of cases that we we see annually we saw a rise in substance abuse over the last couple of years we implemented implemented a vape program a pilot Vape program this year this past year we're still working out the Kinks and looking at what all that means and and how we

can be an effective partner in regards to that there are challenges on every level one of them has been every it seems like every school in every District does things differently and does different steps in regards to to vaping and there's different levels of vaping there's nicotine vaping there's there's marijuana vaping and you know so how do we look at that and how do we make the same kind of um referral and

process for everybody so we have done a TR tried to start a really good job of doing some Fe back from the districts from the principles from the staff that are utilizing the program and working with the kids on a day-to-day level and asking for their feedback of what we can do to be a better partner um but also looking at ourselves and what we know we do well and what we know we don't do

well we are we are not a great fit for skipping classes and treny um your court has never excelled at those cases so you know what are some of the things that we do well and how do we how do we step it up and and be more inclusive of more students that might need our services and our case management team so when it once a youth court kid comes once we get

the referral the case goes in front of a peer Run Court the attorneys are high school students the jury is made up of middle and high school students they get their sanctions and our team needs you back up and just say that again what you're saying that was just I'm sorry it's a peer-run court so it's peer-run diversion court so all of our attorneys in our courtroom are high school age

trained students the jury is made up of middle school and high school age students they are the ones who put forth the sanctions on the young people coming forward so there is also a level of um confidentiality no one from the same school hears a case from the same school so if a talbet student comes in no one from the talbet school can sit on on that case either in a jury or as a as an

attorney that way there's nothing coming back into the school of that case that came forward um they are assigned a case manager from our team the case manager is typically assigned T case managers are typically assigned per school so there is one case manager for each school they're given a school they have a case load at that school they go in once sometimes twice a week depending on

the number of students they have in that school they meet with them for however long is needed sometimes it's the break that an adjustment counselor um can use to have our staff kind of calm the situation down um and get them back to class they also our case managers are meeting with the families once a week or conversating with the families once a week and they're seeing those kids at

least two or three times a week whether it be a Duty Community Service an after school program um or just a check-in over the phone video conference call that kind of thing um they have four months to complete the program if they've completed the program then they are considered to be Youth Court completion and it goes nowhere on their record if they do not complete the program then it's defaulted and then

gets moved forward and that's the 10% we lose each year once that default happens it's incumbent upon the referring agent to have an alternative of what's the next step for that young person so most of the time it is a uh a moving forward to juvenile a traditional Juvenile Court referral for a CRA or a habitual School offender charge um sometimes it is an assault and battery charge hanging over

them that then gets moved forward to the magistrate and or um I think I mean I those are typically the two Alternatives if they don't complete um we did have some discussions this year there were we we had a few probably about 27 20 27 to 29 declines um that was a parent choice of refusing to participate or not following through when the schools made the decision as Youth Court being a choice

um unfortunately we're not traditional court and I can't subpoena anybody say you got to do this um it is a voluntary it is a voluntary um program but we do our best to work with the schools and and have those conversations with the families and are always open to say this is what you know this is what we are offering this is what happens if you don't um and try our best to work as as

as partners to to make sure that families follow through we are we are not the be end all we are not the only solution for for families and and things like that we know that but we try our best to make sure that we're a good fit for 90% of the referrals that are coming to us Dr can you get us a copies of what happened to those cases not the names of you know just the

whoever refused like what was the ramification of that yep um one of the we have um did I did I send you the list I don't know if I sent you I'll send you the list um they uh um a lot of it is just you see it all the time it's par parents wanting to take an easier route I mean Youth Court is a little bit more work than going down in front of the judge

sometimes and I know I get it and I didn't want to start to get you off track but we have see what you presented and you know I think you did it well do you have any other questions I do I just just got a couple of questions um I'm a former judment counselor and and be truthfully truthfully being honest with you I never ever interacted with anybody from the Youth Court

program while I was still working I'm going back 10 years okay so I there's probably been some growth over that amount of time we have had we're a nonprofit organization and a small organization we have a lot of transition yeah there's a lot of transition uh are you guys receiving Shannon funding um minimal yes yes um so you say that it's it's a 4mon completion program and then the the records would

be erased the criminal record on the kid would be erased coming to us they don't they don't have a record they can't have a they can't have a criminal record to come to us in the first place all right so it would be it would not go on their record at all because it's a diversion from a charge so it's basically kids who were habitual School offenders that you're seeing typically we see a lot of

I mean of the of the Thousand kids I would say probably 500 close to 500 of the cases have been habitual SCH offender charges oh so I haven't seen any data at all on this program so if there's any way yeah I know I still don't really quite understand it I'm trying to understand it a little bit more uh if it had more visibility uh what I'm really truly concerned about is leniency versus

consequences that's really where where I'm asking right now I I think if you if you want my opinion yeah I think we give more consequences than Juvenile Court gives that's and M magistrate happy and the magistrate would probably agree with me good that's the kind of stuff I need to they get communities every student who comes through Youth Court in their sanction hearing they get no less than

six sessions of community service they get no less than one session of jury duty to come back and sit on somebody else's case they have research projects in essays and apology letters they end their youth court hearing every every single youth court hearing ends with a apology and a hug to their family member who brought them there y um and they have to do it in front of the courtroom

and in front of the jury and in front of the judge um they are sanctioned to after school programs or prevention programs and you know they have four months to complete that if there are other infractions that take place during that four months like they get into to another fight or they bring a vape to school um in the course of that four month period those sanctions can be extended those sanctions can also be

increased yeah I mean I was really just going to um you know as a as a building principle um this is something we utilize quite a bit um and it's been incredibly successful and just to Echo that point um we really there's an ownership um so part of the piece around to sort of flip that having the parents on board is that there an ownership um and responsibility there with the parent

and the student because we all have to be on board that this is the right approach and so I feel like from the beginning by Design although there's this element where there may be a small percentage of folks that decline that for the large percentage who don't you now have some common ground with that parent and because really they're going on this journey with the child right so um you know we've seen a lot of um

progress with students because of the fact that they there's some reflection on their behavior either through an apology through a research project there is required community service um so all those components are really um powerful for kids reformative yes and so and we know again as a as a principle you know this is sort of my preferred of course there are certain offenses where I don't

have the option to do this because it's more serious right and I'm going to proceed differently but for really most low lower level offenses or habitual sort of situations um this is something we utilize you know really frequently SE all I need to hear is that that that like as building principles you guys utilized this and there were positive effects coming out of this and that the kids truly took ownership of their

offenses and Tred to refor reform their ways they can't not take ownership in order to come to youth cour if a kid if a kid says I didn't do it it wasn't me or I I don't know who I don't know what you're talking about pull the Shaggy fense um they're they're not they're not eligible for Youth Court we we they have to they have to take ownership and and

say it was me I I own this Behavior or they can't come because it's a no contest court it's not a court of guilt or innocence they can come in and they can say I did this because I got into the fight because he's been bullying me for 10 you know 10 months but they can't come in and say I didn't hit him so they have to they have to own their behavior

in order to even go through the process thank you very much is it still one you got one shot that's it like can't come they can only come to Youth Court one time I think that's important to all yes we will at times um to your earlier point we found success in um revisiting the conversation with a family so as a principle it might be that the first time this was proposed maybe it wasn't

received in that moment but I can have an honest dialogue with that par and say okay let's have a conversation about this but here are sort of my EXP you just basically get diverted one shot shots get to 10 fight I I will I will there's there's there is a caveat um if they're coming because of the juvenile law reform that changed a lot of things for elementary school students

we did put in a brighter Futures program which for third to fifth graders there is an educational um group kind of component prior to Diversion that kids can that elementary schools can send them to for some of those habit School behaviors and things like that it does not stop them from coming to Youth Court when they've reached Beyond 12 in those third to fifth graders is that

there one shot with the court or does it not count towards the no it does not it is one shot it's one shot in brighter Futures and one shot in youth I don't want to go into detail about that law because I don't think it's really U good what you say but at the end of the day it what Mr Cory asked was a valid question to say what is it that you're

doing is there a penalty how sad is it that we have to sit here in a public meeting and say that a youth court volunteer program gives more consequences than an actual cour that's a different story for the administrators that are getting paid to do this work to meet with them because that's a sad commentary um in my opinion but the only question I had was I don't see the

budget like is there a um is it just staying the same like we had the other ones yes yes yes yes can you actually how much is it that we the contract from the last year was it was 108 108 and that's so your recommending is just the same can I get a motion motion second we'll add that for the final piece I I missed if that wasn't yet because I was more focused on the

itself uh motion made in second that all in favor I post so voted so thank you very much thank you um next up 3.04 discussion about people in corporate Dr thank you come

so for the sake of some of the commentary that was already shared I would appreciate if we could kind of take this from two separate angles um one as it relates maybe that can be secondary as it relates to Mimi lar um the committee us here as District leaders were under the um assumption that the exemption by city council was still in a place of being validated in the live exemption so that being said

I'd like to focus initially on the path ways at RPA as we have just most recently adopted a program of study um back in May that very much included Workforce Development and opportunities for career exploration um to really have somebody boots on the ground that can help personalize the career exploration piece as well as the Workforce Development over the last couple of years but more

specifically this last year and my stepping into the role what we realized is creating single programs at RPA was very much a challenge because of the wide ranging number of needs and really not such an enrollment at RPA like dery high school that has 2,000 students when we offer Pathways for kids to get involved in and we struggled to put students into particular Pathways because they were

not enough students truly interested in that one or two Pathways so as we got to looking at what worked and what didn't work what we did realize is that our students at RPA specifically need employability skills and once we can support them with employability skills we really really need to look at the successes the the energy the the career interest as well as the barriers that

come with finding employment across the city um and so really personalizing the employability piece for our kids and really working with each individual student to ensure that their needs are met and that we can overcome those barriers to support them to not just gain employment but gain meaningful employment within the community um has been really really important to our development of this model as well as in

our Middle School to be bringing in guest speakers and really thinking about how we can bring in community members to really be part of the teaching and learning for our middle school students as well um so with that I will turn it over to the team so that they can talk us through um our plans sure um thanks for uh hearing our proposal um I want to talk a little bit about what

Dr introductions oh I'm sorry introduction you guys I'm sorry I'm uh uh Dr Kelly hartney and I'm the um vice president of children's services at People Incorporated I'm Emily Martins I work for RPA the CC and I run the Workforce Development and Meg president CEO of people Incorporated thank you thank you so last year was really a year of kind of um figuring out our model right so a lot of transitions um Mr

Kylie uh did a really uh extraordinary job of kind of taking on a very challenging kind of uh climate and environment at RPA Dr B was very helpful we met throughout the year um and talked about sort of how best can we support the unique needs of students in that um in that program um we did a lot of work in terms of tutoring um mcast completion

is a big area of uh Focus um so we did a lot of tutoring uh for Math and Science and Ela students came down to the community engagement Center we did a lot of relationship building we made it a safe and inviting space um and we started with uh career placement we had a original program called Urban Youth connection which was training and supporting students into careers in human services but our career interest

surveys showed that they were um not interested in career not interested in human services they were interested in much broader range of um much more uh exciting uh careers and maybe more lucrative too um there was a very very positive response to the speaker series uh there were six speaker series events um and students came during their lunch period um and um em you want to talk

lunch and we had every Wednesday we had a different speaker come into the CC and meet with them it range from um Plumbing to a barber um we had some R RPA alumni come back and kind of see where they're at and it went really well um the kids really enjoyed those speaker series and we were very intentional uh the alumni event was a very big event because these are people who look like them who are

doing jobs that um are um careers um and so that was really important the career day was also uh a great a great day it was great we worked with um guidance on with that as well as mass hire and brought a lot of different community members in to um to Showcase um some Workforce Development and like what it takes to get there and the kids traveled from room to room and really really

enjoyed that as well so we do believe that um that what the students need are foundational skills and based on the restructuring that's been done for our paa we've uh been working with Drew and Dr B and Mr Kylie I'm sorry Riley sorry Riley did I call you the wrong name say Kylie it's all right Kylie Riley I saw you smiling I was like he's used to it um so some of the obstacles

we experienced the kitchen we intended that we were going to do a culinary program the kitchen wasn't available um the attendance was a challenge because there was inconsistency and attendance so it was hard to get students to follow through um collaboration and coordination with the RPA team needed improvements so we learned about uh how to put systems in place so that teachers

knew how and when students were going to be coming to the CC for tutoring um we had better connections I think with guidance and uh I think there's been uh a lot of development in terms of the leadership uh team at RPA over the past year and that's been really helpful uh data collection systems um we're collecting data but the data is not as integrated as it could be or should be

um in terms of the the information we're getting from RPA um and what we really found was the biggest barrier is uh students expressed an interest in working and had significant barriers to employability um sometimes that um included from the basic foundational skills you know like interview skills um just having a conversation with somebody like we really struggled there so I feel

like implementing those foundational skills and having our kids walk out of there with like a portfolio a lot of work experience and a job is something that could you know be great for them and there were a lot of disruptive behaviors that led to sort of expulsions and lack of continuity in um kind of the supports that we providing for the students so um our goals for um fy2 is instead of having extracurricular

supports that we're going to work on a model of co-curricular supports where we're actually uh partnering with guidance um and we're partnering uh at the higher grades with English uh faculty so that our um job coaches and uh Workforce Development folks are kind of pushing into classes so for seventh and eth grade we're going to utilize the leadership leadership view framework uh we're going to engage with navian for

career exploration we're really going to start to sort of lay the groundwork um so we're going to uh support um a period per day for five days a week uh six to seven students per quarter and we'll be working on the um curriculum um could you explain navian just briefly navian sure I can I can explain it um um it's a platform it's a digital platform where students uh have access 247 they

can take interest inventories they can look at careers and find more about the careers and stay get to high school something that might might help them to click into something correct and and staff also has access to n so they can see the student favor uh a career in Mechanics for example they can see that and that can open up doors as well when they get closer to graduation it's where

they are applying for college and scholarships and things like that so it's a pretty vers versatile tool we can also build resumes through the Naviance platform it's also it's also important to know that Naviance is a program that the district has sponsored up at the high school um so for us another piece of our work is really opening the doors for this back and forth two ways um once

kids come to RPA once we remediate their needs and support the development of the tools that they need if their choic is to go back to dery we want to make sure those doors are open for kids and any work that they've done at RPA as it relates to their career pathway development we want to make sure has a through line back to the high school as well as if students are at the high

school and get referred um to RPA we don't want to be starting from scratch with kids when they come back so the Nance platform will be utilized in both locations so that no matter where kids are residing um The Faculty that are working with them have access to the same information any guidance counselor guidance counselors high school middle school guidance counselors at the other school so correct y some of my same

thing we had talk about the high school like but for these other programs and grants the guidance councilors will be working on some of these programs with that I just think it's important to keep saying that because we it makes it sometimes look like as if the only reason why we're going to be using this is because of this and that's not NE they're just helping to facilitate it

but it's not but for people in but for whatever that place is at the high school these kids will still be utilizing this program in our district they would have access to this program in the district the level of utilization potentially might look different and so our our intentions are to really personalize the experience for kids that we know in a class of 25 is going to be very challenging for kids to really dig

in and do that personalized work right um so yes it is available and it is there we just want to be certain that it is a real personalized approach um for kids to access the material ask another question it says six to seven students per quarter one period per day what is what happens the other periods oh do you want to talk about about how it's structured yeah and

Kyle you can jump in too so for the middle school we discussed um uh this being one of the elective choices uh that the middle school students would get like art PE and they would cycle through them so there'd be a group of students you know going I guess my question is who's running it uh the school counselor and in collaboration with people link so so the guidance counselor would be facilita people link

would be in the running this like proba me yeah and you're there full-time um 30s 30 hours so you're in the building and that's like your period of an hour in the morning is this particular thing yeah I'll be going into the classroom wherever these kids are and then the rest of the day you're doing something else list thank you well I also the mentors um are going to be doing not

only um academic support but they're going to be doing some Workforce Readiness um skills as well so it could be Emily but it could be the mentors as well tutors tutors yeah yeah sorry yeah um other questions on this one or no so you can keep going we can just jump in if you have okay so for n9th and 10th grade when we get to um High School we're really focusing on individualized

Workforce skills uh doing the skills inventory and really kind of coming up um as Dr B said an individualized plan because the level of complexity in some of these kids' lives is really extraordinary and so you have we found um kind of a generalized plan you really need to kind of meet the kids where they are um and you need to build that sense of trust and they need to know that um

you're not just sort of giving them generic information that doesn't apply to them you got to really build that um build that relationship and connection um we're going to we're going to do me mcast coaching by referral so we have a referral process where um students who are having difficulty with uh passing mcast get referred to the C for um um targeted coaching we'll also be using

some leadership VI um curriculum in this um we'll co- facilitate a semester long Workforce Development seminar with um RPA guidance so again one period a day five days a week um we anticipate that there will be nine to 10 students per semester we'll still do the speaker series with six events um and a career day event so that's for um the and 10 graders for the um students who are

getting ready to graduate and launch and who become um more um age eligible for internship placements and um gainful employment we'll be doing individualized Workforce Wess skills so everybody will have a a plan um we'll do some career planning with Community Partners so we'll work with U Mass hires or jobs and other um Community Partners um on some res May writing interview skills some

professionalism which is a challenge even for college students um uh and uh Vision boarding on a post-secondary plan so not everybody is going into uh a trade or going into a job or going to college or going to Job Corp or into the military or um so really kind of getting them to think about the broad range of options and to really set a chart a course for them um for their postsecondary life um and

financial literacy we don't think this gets um addressed enough um and we think this is a really critical skill that um students need um and then we'll do school to Career work experience with Community Partners that those are some of the placements that we've done that have been very successful um they'll be able to do their job shadowing or paid internships for limited duration but

they required a lot of handholding lot of yeah just to get through like basic HR or anything like that again holding a lot of one-onone um because it can be hard to get a job you know it can hard to get a job when you're 16 you're going through um you know you're not necessarily you don't have that high touch experience in many um organizations you submit your resume online you may or may not get a

response you don't really have that you know and somebody's not going to walk you through yeah just that followup is hard for them too you know and the support at home sometimes isn't there for them so if we can help with that so we're going to be doing um two uh two different uh uh fall semester uh for seniors that's on the postsecondary exploration Capstone and uh spring for juniors so I think the postsecondary uh

exploration Capstone is for seniors right is that is that true and then theice learning it's going to be built into the English curriculum so it's going to be kind of like co- facilitated um for example in the uh in the Jun in the spring of the junior year there's going to be a career research project um and so people incorporate would kind of cycle in to support that work and again this targeted mcast

coaching uh by referral I think um you had some experience with um students who were maybe a little reluctant to engage with the coaching but then came back to tell you right absolutely they're excited and um so that feels great yeah when they when they were passing their mcast you know they would come back and let us know and it was a good moment for them and it was a win for sure CU some

had such a Negative mindset about I can't do it I test I'm not going to do it it's never going to happen for me so to really see that accomplish that is a big win yeah um so again speaker series and career day event um our big um our big um our big parts of what we bring in um before we move on to the next one I just had a question for Mr R as the

principal so as I'm reading through this and it's like one period this that I point to like where does the school think like so what he's in charge of this building in the schedule so I'm trying to just figure out what is happening with the schedule um and how that goes if could just either way in or interesting enough we meeting on schedule tomorrow to kind of wrap that

up and we were waiting for some of these pieces I think one of the biggest pieces you heard this year that you probably didn't hear last year was that it's a much more of a pushin model and so the kids are getting the services not have to go find them uh so when we set up in a classroom and need tutoring a teacher would send you down there you'd get

there most of the time um maybe You' be going there for a snack this is going to be in the classroom supporting the work being done with a certified teacher and do guidance counselor so I think that's a big piece for this year the pushing piece but yes for the schedule if that's your yeah so like I'm looking just says uh so one period per day five times a

week for six or seven kids so that would tell me those six or seven kids are not in their class at that time they're going to whatever this is so how does that oper so we're we're putting it almost as an elective so we got three other electives to unified arts and and something else that we shuffle through kids for a quarter and then they kind of rotate new set of kids would go through

and then it rotate again so they'd be rotating through four quarters but if it the numbers are just so low so 24 kids in seventh and eighth grade and we're probably about at 30 on paper right now because we're going to be putting it per quarter so every kid can get a piece of it that make sense M so if you have more kids you're just going to add more I'm just trying to figure it so

that you see then the other one is 9 to 10 and the other it says 9th and 10th grade so is that the same you have less doesn't your enement go up it does but we kind of U Dr D myself whoever would listen to send the message like we want the kids up front this year we want to make sure that if this kid is being transferred at all possible we know

there's going to be exceptions but at all possible to do it early on before the school year starts and then a natural cycle would be when first quarter would end to bring more kids in if necessary um so once we set this and we set the schedule I think we'll be in good shape yeah just Pro for thought anybody have any questions thank you Mr okay so first of all I'm very

appreciative of the uh scaffolding going on with your agency and health my school um very very happy to see Mr Riley principal Riley uh really driving this forward too because uh I spent five years at at the it was before it was called RPA it was dery's alter Al ative High School I spent 5 years as counselor working at the alternative level and it was never really vetted properly right

from the get go and so now it's it's like the whole program of that school has been like in a deep hole and right now we're looking at ways of digging out of that hole and so now there all all this targeted response to helping this school dig out of its hole is very welcoming news to me and I'm appreciative of the work you're bringing there could you tell me a little bit

more about Mass hire I don't know anything about that agency but I am very very interested in trying uh to get the the local community Business Leaders on board with our school district to help to try to hire these kids for part-time work does mass hire help with that process it's especially in the summer they have a huge summer program all over the city um but they do facilitate um job Readiness

financial literacy through their agency um they do youth Connection in the summer um we filled out tons of applications during the end of the school year to try to get them into jobs this summer so when kids are in the jobs Emily are they showing up are is there y if it I feel like if there's a paycheck they show up and they're getting that Workforce Development under their belt

and they're getting some money in their pocket and they're developing experience absolutely and so I'm I'm hoping that in some way that drives their School attendance rate to become you know to be better yeah absolutely that's one of our goals that' be great the other question I have is mcast related and I know I'm sitting in front of uh um Mr opposal right now who's an mcast expert but he

knows that I'm I'm the devil when it comes to mcast first of all I always found mcast to be an inequitable situation to our school kids especially in Fall River because we have a demographic here that has never really expired and we have a population here that doesn't really achieve High academic U you know attainment that being said we have a ballot initiative this coming November in Massachusetts that

may if passed take away the graduation requirement of mcass and that would be like so good for a guy like me because trying to stay focused on the people in contract no I am I am uh and as far as as as far as that ballot initiative is concerned and if it passes it's going to take away the graduation requirement in some way would that affect any of the change with your

mcast level work with the kids I think we would pivot to supporting credit recovery work right um and other areas of academic support students are still going to need to complete you know the required number of credits yeah um and a lot of them struggle with that and a lot of them need really you know um oneon-one uh support for that's good no we want to promote their literacy more

and more and more absolutely work with them I'm hoping what it does is it takes some pressure off of that kid you know and and if it takes some pressure off that in itself could be an improvement for that School child to be able to work math to be able to work Ela in that in that sort of thing that's what I'm hoping for with this result so I'm really hoping that that ballot

initiative does pass because it's been a thorn in in whole Rivers side ever since it's been instituted our numbers have been really struggling with that um the financial literacy piece is that budgeting is that teaching a kid how to do budgets or live within you know all that kind of stuff like what living within their means you know putting start bank account yeah all that kind of stuff yes yeah that's are they

developing any type of like ideas for themselves based on that kind of yeah I think that's our goal so if they can be financially stable within you know start getting their bank account a lot of our kids are 18 and don't have a bank account so just getting that one step in there and how to have a budget how to you know put some money away get groceries for your house pay for your

insurance pay for your car you know just pushing that so they develop in a certain sense of what that's all about right that's great worth for sure the last question I have maybe uh principal Ry is is the referral process to RPA from the high school okay that's that's another area that never really was properly vetted early on so I'm hoping that there are improvements in that process and are kids still able to leave

RPA and go back to the high school absolutely and and how's that process done is that done with the guidance is that done with you is that done with P um going back to the high school or the first going back to the high school going back to the high school so this criteria that we've set up um Dr P teams worked really hard on making sure that we have criteria both ways uh both

coming to us yeah uh and it's not we were in a decision making uh plan today with the high school principal myself and Dr B really talking about you know let's get person all out and think about criterias and we judge every kid the same way no matter what we how old they are what we think of them what they've done we got to judge criteria the same way so I think we've done a real good

job of sticking by that and continue to improve it so what's driving my question on that Dr B is the availability of maybe chapter 74 looking down the road because they're talking about getting these kids financially literate and into the job stream and and trying to develop a sense for life after school so that they mature properly and I know that if if we have kids at that facility on Rock

Street then it's preventing them from being part of any of the workshops that are at the high school like The Culinary shop or or the Cosmetology shop or the construction shop or or the health assisting shop stuff like that that that's what's driving this question and I wonder if those shops may be available to an RPA kid at any point so we've already engaged in conversation around

taking advantage of the after do program that does exist up at dery um as of last year again I've only been in this role for one year and last year was my first experience um I think it's about identifying the right pathway for kids you would be interested to know that you know some of the Juniors and seniors don't necessarily want to go back to the high school um that is really a piece of

it too we're making programs available they develop a sense of camaraderie where they're at you know I think it's really about us creating and using what we're referring to as the Readiness rubric you know what does it mean to be ready to go back and forth between the high school and RPA and how do we support our kids in seventh eth and Ninth Grade to get back to dery to get a

full experience in those cbte programs because as you know there is selection criteria we have weight lists for kids even up at the high school around some of those programs just speaking of um so it's really important for us as school leaders to make sure that if students and families want their children to be at dery to experience those things then we need to all be on the same path

around what are we doing to support your kids in getting back to that place so they can have an authentic experience if they don't make it in time in essence I think that's where some of these alternative opportunities through the after do program we can create halfday schedules for kids um and be flexible between the two sites we're not as elaborate yet in that way um but I do Envision that that is where we're going

at this point and I understand where we're at now is that something that could help out with at decided RPA I think all of it is a conversation and the more that kids understand the adults are fighting for whatever it is and advocating I should say for whatever it is that they want to do um I think that's where we're going to get really the best outcomes because when kids know

that you're in their Corner um they will leap on whether it's RPA whether it's our current guidance counselors whether it's you know Vice principles that facilitate those conversations I I truly you know it's the community that helps create opportunity for our kids um and whether that's a courier is the person that picks the kids up to transport them because transportation is the barrier at the middle of the day or

whether we're helping connect kids with the bus to take it up to dery um so I think it's really just about removing barriers for every child um no matter what their intentions are whether it's dery getting a job um Andor taking on community service and philanthropic work across the city thank you I would add to that too like we've sent kids this year um we've had one student come back to us

it was totally his choice just wasn't too big for him he was well behaved good attendance and decided I really need to go back to RPA so it's been successful now that we set those criteria and and put together the rubric that we keep enhancing I think but um we're not getting the kid back in two weeks because they've you know made a mistake that's going to cost them a long time

now so I think it's it's going positive this thank you we also clarified at the last meeting I think the regular meeting that as assist assistant superintendent you're the final site that people aren't just being in the past it's been that's been diverted and it's like oh the person comes from outside they're automatically sent there and I'm like who the heck authorize that so we had a

policy that the assistant superintendent was going to be that person wasn't necessarily followed but we clarified a month ago or two months ago when somebody moves or doesn't move it's on your plate yeah it's directly connected between uh Mr Woodward and myself who takes um responsibility for all of the intakes that come in at the high school level and partnership at dery and then we collaborate on any decisions of

students that are going to RPA I certainly appreciate the extra supports you guys are providing for the kids thank you very much I I don't have any questions per se um but again I also appreciate the support um especially the students at RPA need it they're often Left Behind um not that it's intentional but that seems to be the way the world works and I think we all know why it's sting to say

that on TV um and those are the students in my opinion that need does the most they're the students who often times have parents who are struggling parenting therefore Str you know how's a parent who's struggling going to have time to get their 15-year-old job right a bank account what you know what have you um so there are students that are in the most need of services that we quite

frankly wouldn't be able to do without you right so that's the bottom line here in my opinion whatever um was to be said before after the bottom line to me this is a no-brainer contract because it's for the children it directly affects our Scholars it affects their outcome quite frankly when we're talking about RPA students and I'm not being factious when I say this you're saving lives if you

can get a kid employed a kid thinking positively about themselves because their life has been so challenging you know it's hard for adults to wrap their head around bad life things never mind a child who's growing in their brain is is growing through all of this um up until a couple years ago that's all I did was work with at risk youth I was a nurse and and a and a teacher too at

alternative schools and site facilities and the bottom line is you're what what you're literally doing literally is Saving Lives because there are students that if you didn't there's a student out there that if you didn't contact him or her you didn't get them involved you didn't get them to pass the mcast or whatever accomplishment that made them realize hey I can do the next thing the

next thing you very well could have prevented that student from doing something illegal doing drugs and end up on the streets or dead because we've seen that happen to our students so thank you so much for the work you do um wasn't that supposed to be the only question I kind of had wasn't it supposed to be a culinary thing are we still working on a kitchen or is that through us not through that's through US

now but it is okay got you it was originally I just refreshing my memory originally was going to be through them we took it back okay got you and that's still happen I heard you saying that everything for for real principal Riley yeah I'm not banging nails down right all right I told everything's going to be right on time so we had walk through a week and a half ago we had walk week

and a half ago so we are on top of it awesome all right so yeah with that I Y thank you um can I ask uh what other districts does People Incorporated do this work with for strictly for strictly yes the um question I had was on the budget so so uh last year was 151 and then I see the I can kind of see the breakdown and I want to say when I asked

at the public meeting about the calling everything whether it was hired not hired we had not paid or we paid like can you just clarify whether um we paid people link however they did not pay out so if Meg if you want to speak to it but absolutely so the original contract was for the 151 151,000 that included culinary year ago when we were in here uh so then obviously there was no

culinary so there's you'll see on the bottom in Gray uh that's the the unspent uh funds from this past year The Culinary is a big chunk of it we because of that we decreased some of our supervision or Emily uh Emily's time and then we had a couple of our one our Ela teacher went and became an employee of the the school department uh so there was a gap in the tutors along the way so

you'll see at the bottom there's the unspent funds of about $40,000 from the past year and where does that live like that so that money was that money was was was we we received the entire 151,000 we have it on our end in a deferred account that you'll see on the fiscal 25 side of things we we would be looking to defer that into this next year so this current year that we are in

the original fully um the full budget would have been for about 139 140,000 we decreased it because of the unspent funds so last year we paid 150,000 this more of a question for the school department folks but so we paid $150,000 for X Services we didn't get those Services based on whatever MH why did that money not come back to the school department so that now that closes out this year

and then when we get the new budget to say it's 100,000 it's really not 100,000 it's really 140,000 is what I'm seeing so if I'm comparing last year to this year we had last year 151 with a culinary program that was going to be run by people link for 151,000 this year we're going to spend 140,000 because it's the 39 and the 100 and we're going to absorb whatever the what's the salary of the person that's

going to be the teacher in the E uh teacher will be midrange 60 0 high 20s it's also a full-time teacher position at RPA where it was not a full-time teacher position in that position last what we were intending it to be it was going to be 5 days a week a few hours a day whereas now this person at RPA is built into the schedule how much was in your budget last year for for The

Culinary culinary teacher uh it was to to dror B's point it was very minimal that the person themselves was a consultant and it was about 16 probably that we year yeah that's what I'm just reading here Bas funds not expended was 16,000 based on the culinary position from last year because it was going to be a shortened experience it wasn't going to be a full-time teacher providing access I think across the we

had just a couple hours a week it was for a certain semester so it was very limited compared to what's going to happen so in the budget for 2024 where it said subcontract 151 then it was 39,000 program management Personnel then 35,000 Direct Care staff and sub total was 74,000 you're saying that the 16,000 for the kitchen whatever person was within that not one of those numbers like what's the

so that was the actual payroll what you're looking at in the in the top white section not shaded that was the actual only I only got a white paper it wasn't shaded his wasn't okay so no ours was sh this if you look I'm sorry on the on the funds not expended I'm not talking about that part up top that is the payroll actually incurred during the year so there's nothing culinary related

this is actual expenses incurred during fiscal year 24 so so we spent 100 we spent $111,000 so I guess you have a budget document that I'm trying to figure out where was the what was the budget last year and what was you're showing us the actuals was there a budget a line item budget when we approved it last year yes that's what I was I think I'm trying to figure out what was what was in the

budget for it because when we were told we were going to have a culinary program P you know nowhere I can tell you I didn't think we were going to spend a couple hours a week spent 16 Grand cuz then it was a big Hull because supposedly somebody was hired and wasn't hir and it became a big issue people were all wondering who could hide or whatever now we're talking about like

and I'm thinking it was a real full-time position if everybody was that worked up over it right now I find out it was a couple hours a week in the consulant and that's just different information so if my if I'm looking like confused that's why um but when we go to the current which is more of a school issue we we're still recommending 140,000 for the for the budget for the upcoming year it's the way

um 139,000 yeah if you want to take the 39 from last year going into this year right but I'm trying to see looking at this how does it match up to 139,000 I guess that's where I'm trying to be because you're looking at this is what is given to us so we got to break it down right so if it was only 60 if taking 16,000 off you add the 16 that

brings it up to just about the budget of 150 so we're looking to offer the same level of services but we're going to increase the culinary program because we're looking to extend it to a full-time culinary program but that's not on this budget correct so that's my point what do it's different from last year to this year so we had 40,000 of unspent funds for a variety of reasons last year so

this year what are we going to do when we don't potentially spend those funds I think we need to now that it's a fresh year have a mechanism in place that we don't just give the 140,000 ahead of time maybe it's in years past we've been voiced monthly I mean we've been doing this with with the city for a decade now back 10 plus years ago we invoice monthly I mean that's what whatever

following Mr Al meter I know I was questioning back in the middle of the year I didn't realize that it was one invoice that got paid because when the culinary was was not happening I had asked about how did this get paid out I was not responsible for that piece but I can certainly follow up with Mr Al to make sure that it's more of a quarterly invoice as opposed to an initial payout

up front just to make sure that we're not in this situation at the end I think I think what happened is we had we had paid it when we had onetime funds correct a mechanism of that all I'm suggesting is that just being a transparent would be if we don't spend it we shouldn't have it like carried over it should just say no it goes back to us or something and then we if we cut

the car lary I'm trying to wrap my head around what are we getting instead for that 10 grand difference 20 grand difference so I I think it's solid what you're suggesting I think the folks there I think Mr Riley would say it's a benefit to the district so and I and I think it's also important to note that the extension of the services that are projected within this budget far supersede the programming efforts that

we were projecting for last year we took the best of what happened this past year amidst some stuff that did not go as planned but we took the best of what occurred and really strategically built out a middle school in early High School in a late High School programmatic approach and that will require additional funding that will require additional sources of of supports so in order for us to achieve everything that

we just spoke of in this package um that was why we landed where we landed this year for a budget because we will be much more um extensive in our offerings across all grade levels not just the high school and not just looking at mcast tutoring as an outcome how many weeks does the tutor work it's 40 weeks in the school year the whole school year right so we've had G obviously there

were gaps hiring gaps but absolutely the whole year are we missing some part of this budget that is a grant or something that people in gets from another place that is supplementing because it's not listed here so and that's not in play for this year that contract did not renew into this year from the Department of Developmental services that was the urban youth collaborative that Urban

Youth collaborative piece which is um which was separate from was never part of that talk about last me right correct so if I'm looking at 30 4,000 for 22 is 20 do they not get paid the contractual teacher rate like what do they get paid for 20 bucks an hour so they don't get a teacher rate should be through them yeah different through us so rate that just seems 34,000 for two2 just seems low you

know but I don't see the breakout of the budget mostly um that's one question that I would have as we get to the full committee it would be more of a breakout of what happens with the the titles here project program management like I see several people here today but who's paid what and how is it coming out of this account uh that being said the two people that spoke

earlier about the conflicts I think is a legitimate concern and it's a concern that I have as well and I've had that concern for a long time since the program started when we had the CC the community engagement Center where we had a position at the school fulltime person was working person left to get a job in the school Department that position was replaced in my opinion based on everything I saw on the website on

everywhere else with a director of something of this type of program so when you see that particular piece that position was replaced by one of members of our school committee Miss ly it's not telling us it's a fact I'm not speaking that's just a fact so the position was at the school that position got eliminated the person left got replaced by Miss lar who happen to to be a member

of the school committee so we also now have seen through the city council by Miss L's own doing sent the thing to try to get a disclosure to say that I have an exclusion to be able to participate whatever that is it just is a to me it's a very messy situation when we have a member of the school committee and the public people that spoke today and other people are the same concern because you

just have it has to be a separation and it can't be part of both so when you look at the disclosures and says you know it said we could do it and you can still serve my impression is that and I guess the district feels differently because Dr B just indicated at the beginning that said the uh District's role was that the exemption allows her participation I think that's that the is that the

message I know superintendent curle is not here today she'll be back the end of the week she's currently looking into that to have conversations with uh school committee women laraby but based on us bringing this forth um I think it is separate pieces and whatever decisions and however that needs to function from an Ethics perspective um Miss Miss larvey needs to figure that out and certainly the superintendent

will weigh in on that piece of it I don't want to speak now because I was under the impression that we were moving forward with the same level of authorization that we had last year to move on this yeah and I think the issue is and it's and I'm not being critical the fact of the matter is it is what it is we're all in the committee we have to

you know be transparent and say what it is we have a disclosure that was given as a public document to the city council City Council voted on it what I personally think is it's still an ethical issue because at that point you can still serve in a position but you can't actively participate in any function at all relative to this contract and we all know if we're being honest that Miss lar has participated

both at the school as well as in these contracts and the question I just asked about how many other districts we work on if your title is this about this Workforce stuff in schools and trying to build this up and the only place that this agency works on is in Fall River it becomes a little bit of a a problem because you can't say well I'm doing this job in

hton and I'm not part of the Fall River piece so there's valid concerns that were raised here there's valid concerns that I have and I've always had them relative to this and I think that we have to we have to do a deep dive excuse me I'm I said up when you're done okay yeah so I just think that we need to get our ducks in a row and have a solid look

at it so that we can go forward say whether this program can exist with the current structure Mr Cory okay so um and speaking to that point Mr chairman I understand your concerns and maybe in some in some other areas it could be legitimate but as I spoke before Miss larvi has developed a reputation for her work as a superior child advocate over the past 30 or so years at the boys and

girls club and now that she's working with People Incorporated um the city council knew that fullon well when they took the vote and they saw fit to move Miss lv's position uh to a point where she could still serve on the school board ethically as well as be a director of the programming for People Incorporated at RPA and in my many visits this past year to RPA and I

was there quite a lot um I got to tell you that the programming that they just presented I could see it coming alive and I could see an environment in that school that has never been there before that environment just has never been that cohesive or that driven before it's taken a long time for our our school district to really properly support RPA and I can't help but think that the work

uh of people Incorporated is driving that and I can't also help but think that Miss lv's expertise working with students and teenagers especially um is helping to drive that even further um and given that the city council exonerated her last year uh I would find it hard for myself to serve on this school board if I thought there were ethical violations going on but based on what I've seen the example of the work

going on there and the city council's ruling I have no problem with it I think by your own admission Mr Cory you you indicated that Miss ly is part of the process of of the success of the People Incorporated program at the school including working with Dr B well she works on that campus correct yeah and I think that is part of the issue so the issue isn't whether these people are

doing good work whether that that's not the issue and we have to take personalities aside and say what is the ethic piece of it now the city council did not f an Ethics disclosure that said Miss lovi can stay on the school committee and actively participate in the program and advocate for the program at the school at the administration or anything that's two different things and

all I'm asking them to do is to look at that because I think that's where the problem lies that's what I'm suggesting and you admitted in your own commentary in defense of Miss ly and the situation you're indicating for the public to hear that yes Miss larvey is participating in this program with the admin ministration with people link and with Mr Riley at the school that's what you're saying and

I think that's the Crux of the issue Mr Pera so I go for you have to leave please run long no problem understand no problem to me the to me more of the Crut of the issue is do we determine what Mimi gets paid no do I pay her salary do I determine if she gets a raise and do I evaluate her at her job uh everything is no um no everything

is okay great that's to me is the crutch I'm not sure what my colleagues are trying to insinuate because maybe you guys aren't doing it intentionally but it's certainly coming across like you're trying to insinuate that my colleague is doing something unethical and given her role and the fact that we have nothing to do with what she gets paid or evaluating or her keeping her job there meaning by us

meaning the school district I mean we've also had other former colleagues who also have had jobs that have taken into schools have taken him into IEP meetings have taken them into things I don't think anybody had a problem with that because it was for the benefit of the students and that's what Mr Cory is saying it's the benefit of the student what my colleague did was what she did

was ethical she went and reported what was going on she asked for the legal opinion from the attorney that we pay well no offense I'm going to take his opinion before either of you gentlemen I'm talking about attorney Assad wait in on an opinion with Mimi and it also went to the school uh the city council if their attorney looked at it I have no idea but the point is she

went the right approach she got approval and she's been doing her job so my question is why is and she's doing her job I'm assuming well the program's going well it's betting it fitting our kids so what every year when we renew this contract we're going to come and throw a colleague under the bus because that's what we're doing here today publicly whether you believe it or not that's what we're doing here today cuz

we all have a seat at the table we all have the time to talk and the opportunity to talk and you know what I don't like which is maybe different than all my other colleagues I'm not sure but I don't like to know what people think until I'm sitting at the table until it's ready for me to vote otherwise it feels very insincere so quite frankly I didn't get a phone call from Mimi today knowing her

opinion I didn't get one from Bobby knowing her his opinion thank God they didn't show up cuz we'd be in violation right no oh please this is a complete I don't care you can talk you both can talk however you want it is very apparent you want to take personality out let's take personal out because this feels very personal we're here to pass a contract you have an issue with Mimi doing it

take it through the correct channels it's not us and with that I yield I'm ready to vote if not I need to use the restom and come back thank you very much so you don't have to think me I'm going to use the restro from though I apologize if I have to okay we'll take a two-minute recess thank you to order set so relative to that issue so being uh

trying to be consistent I think we just have an issue that we need to address here on the school committee we've had situations where we actually appoint people to positions and we actually have to vote on those appointments and it's brought up that somebody has a conflict such as when the superintendent was before us that a certain member had a complaint saying somebody had a conflict

and that was an issue why they had to choose one person evaluation and pay yeah so they had a they had a conflict with that one so I think we need to excuse me I have the floor I know so we need to address the issue has nothing to do with People Incorporated I don't want you to think any offense to that whatsoever I just want to make sure that

as we're going forward we're all on the same page so that we can do it I think it's very clear to everybody that including from yourselves and correct me if I'm wrong that miss larv is an active participant based on in some way shape or form with the programming and follow R between the admin you guys in here so I just don't want it to be hidden that say I'm not trying to say oh I think

it's not inuendo the fact is is that she's a participant so the question for you all is de facto superintendence that I have to talk to Dr cly is to say let's get an answer on what this is so that when we do this we don't have to go through this every year if it says you can you can participate then you know that's totally fine but I think the

charge is for you guys to come and try to get some clarity on the issue awesome a motion to refer motion made to refer refer to who comme okay second second all in favor all right those so voted next up we have new business so we had some issues with um special education that we deferred um one of the things though that is I think a time uh constraint for me was the um I

think it was in January February sometime earlier in the year we talked about communication boards for the uh playground I yes can you give us an update on like where they are what they are like are they in and are they going to be like what's the status so they have been uh they were ordered and received in the late winter um so I talk to Mr Pico and he was putting it on the

to-do list for his team um I followed up with him consistently and again it is still on his to-do list I have not crossed paths with him this week but I don't know if anyone I have not seen any I I thought I saw one so not even one so Henry Lord already had one if you saw no it wasn't that one okay so again last when I asked Mr Pico

probably a week ago or a week and a half ago it none of them had been up right but since then I have not been able to just we haven't crossed paths to be able to ask him um where we are but it's on uh Dr Curly's radar as well um because it's really important to me especially in the summer time that these get up and families are using them so I know it's

on the to-do list Mr AAR but as far as I know so if we could ask folks to get an answer Friday Emil what I'd like to get is when were they delivered and when are they going to be put up with a drop de date that they have to be soon because they would deliver in the winter yeah late winter L win late February maybe they can say when they are because the

reason why I ask is common sense right so here's an important piece for children with disabilities that are going to help them and when I hear the director assistant superintendent say something was delivered in January let's say and it's now August could he put him up in Jan I'm sorry could he put them up in January I don't know how they put up the reason why I'm saying that is

because these are the things that drive me you know it bothers me when we had something delivered and it's not that it has to be up in a week but when we have eight months to put something up they just no excuse so you get the idea of the um it needs to be on the top of his to-do list whatever it is I just think it it needs

it needs to be done so anybody else have any other new business motion to I'll make a motion motion to adjourn you want second second all in favor I voted thank you so much