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HomeMy WebLinkAboutSchool Comm. 12/15/2020approved 01-26-21 Mansfield School Committee Meeting Minutes for Tuesday, December 15, 2020 Virtual Meeting using GoToWebinar An Open Meeting of the Mansfield School Committee was held virtually on Tuesday, December 15, 2020. The open meeting session was called to order by Chair Kiera O'Neil at 6:06 p.m. Members Present: Administration Present: Kiera O'Neil Teresa Murphy, Superintendent of Schools Lynn Cavicchi Michael Connolly, Assistant Superintendent (Teaching/Learning) Lauren Scher Edward Donoghue, Assistant Superintendent (Finance/Operations) Jenn Walsh Linda Fernando Members Absent: None ***All votes taken by roll call vote *** Roll Call: Kiera O'Neil aye Lynn Cavicchi aye ,c Jenn Walsh aye .71 -r, Linda Fernando aye r.� Lauren Scher aye Public Speak: Public Speak is open for 15 minutes for anyone who has registered via GoToWebinar. Robert Burnett, 349 Central Street. Very upset that schools are not open full time. Our policies are not supported by fact or science. The facts show minimal to no school transmission. The current model is a significant burden on families, especially single parents and low income families. There is no roadmap for a return to school. It is time to get the kids back in school. Communications: None Administrative Reports: Superintendent Teresa Murphy discussed our Time on Learning. In November, DESE did a survey of all districts on live instruction and synchronous learning. Last week, DESE announced a minimum of 35 hours of this instruction over a two week period for hybrid students and 40 hours for fully remote students. Unfortunately, Mansfield did not pass the audit. Approximately 1/3 of districts failed. We must assure that all students have daily check -ins with teachers; add 33 minutes per day over 10 days. We are working with principals to see where we can add this time. We are also reaching out to other districts to see what schedules they are using to exceed this time limit. Teresa does not disagree with the need for more hours. However, our original plan met the state requirement so it is frustrating to hear in mid December that we need to restructure our schedule with a January 19th deadline. Chair Keira O'Neil noted that it is a difficult ask since quantity does not always equal quality. We need to not only meet the time requirement but make sure it is effective use Page 1 of 7 approved 01-26-21 Mansfield School Committee Meeting Minutes for Tuesday, December 15, 2020 Virtual Meeting using GoToWebinar of time. Vice Chair Lynn Cavicchi noted also that livestream is not always effective. She is curious as to what DESE is looking for and how they define "increased engagement." Teresa announced several students who were awarded recognition in the College Board National Recognition Program for Rural or small town areas. These students scored in the top 2.5%. Nikhil Lankipalle, AShley McNamara, Vishnu Vardhan Kchittibhooma, Jessica Zenak. Lulu Cavicchi, Stefan Steyn. Finally, Teresa provided an overview of all the charitable activity happening in our schools. High School Student Representative Report Senior Ethan Bruce provided an update of happenings at MHS. Students are adjusting well to the hybrid model. Winter sport practices have started. The Drama Club performed their first ever podcast performance which went really well. The Best Buddies group held a virtual movie night. The National Honor Society held a weekend toy drive for Toys 4 Tots which collected 332 toys. Seniors are starting to receive their acceptance letters. Regarding COVID safety, he felt that students were starting to pull together doing a better job of keeping outside gatherings small and wearing masks with their peers. Approval of Warrant: Goods & Services Salary & Wages Goods & Services Salary & Wages 21011S 2021-10 21012S 2021-11 11.10-2020 11-13-2020 11-24-2020 11-25-2020 General Fund 228,065.53 1,506,021.22 547,701.02 1,536,807.54 CARES 52,439.71 4,000.85 - Medicare - 2,323.69 - 2,323.69 Capital 58,746.91 - - - Revolving 9,530.47 74,406.12 2,642.44 76,033.64 Food Service 50,498.11 28,316.41 22,229.13 24,345.31 Gifts - - 1,130.72 - Student Activity - - - - Grants 41,364.48 93,708.39 72,079.25 96,822.30 Prior Year 88,826.69 - - - 529,471.90 1,704,775.83 649,783.41 1,736,332.48 Motion to approve Warrant memo dated 12-08-20 by Linda Fernando / Jenn Walsh Roll Call Vote: Lynn Cavicchi aye Jenn Walsh aye Kiera O'Neil aye Page 2 of 7 Mansfield School Committee Meeting Minutes for Tuesday, December 15, 2020 Virtual Meeting using GoToWebinar Linda Fernando aye Lauren Scher aye Motion Passes: 5-0 approved 01-26-21 Approval of Minutes: Motion to approve Open Meeting Minutes dated 12-08-20 by Linda Fernando / Jenn Walsh Roll Call Vote: Lauren Scher aye Linda Fernando aye Kiera O'Neil aye Jenn Walsh aye Lynn Cavicchi aye Motion Passes: 5 - 0 Motion to approve Executive Session Meeting Minutes dated 12-08-20 by Linda Fernando / Jenn Walsh Roll Call Vote: Lynn Cavicchi aye Jenn Walsh aye Kiera O'Neil aye Linda Fernando aye Lauren Scher aye Motion Passes: 5-0 Old Business: Committee Updates: Audit: No update CIP: No update Budget: Jenn, Lynn, Teresa and Ed met as part of the town Budget Subcommittee with FinCom and the Select Board. Discussed dates for the spring along with a high level overview of the challenges that we face. Facilities: Met last week and discussed our PPE supplies which are sufficient. The system for work orders is up and running. Also discussed return to school plans, cleaning and custodial needs in relation to the proposed 1/2 day model at Robinson. A few polices were reviewed and will be ready for January. Policy: A few policies are ready for tonight and are working toward more for January. Returning and Learning: No update New Business: FY21 Quarter 1 Financial Update: Assistant Superintendent Ed Donoghue provided an update of our financials. There are a few areas running in the negative: Facilities for PPE expenses where we anticipate reimbursement from the CARES act soon. Special Education where we have not yet applied circuit breaker reimbursements. Salaries which has not been offset by the CARES act. Other than those areas we seem to be running well within our budgets. Page 3 of 7 approved 01-26-21 Mansfield School Committee Meeting Minutes for Tuesday, December 15, 2020 Virtual Meeting using GoToWebinar Questions/Answers: Have we received any updates regarding expected chapter 70 and circuit breaker amounts? Any cuts expected with these reimbursements? We do not anticipate any cuts. CARES Act funding ends January 1. Do we have any concerns? There are salaries being paid through this act. We are keeping track of these and are in communication with the town. We anticipate they may be able to release some funds for us. Can the committee get a copy of the COVID expenditures? Ed will review and provide. Consideration of FY22 Budget and Bottom Line Number; Assistant Superintendent Ed Donoghue presented the proposed FY22 budget. The proposed level services budget of $55,794,658 represents a 5.93% increase over the FY21 budget. Due to COVID, there was a loss of revolving revenue (especially CHAMPS which is down 80% due to limited services and interest.) The general fund must absorb $980,541 in order to maintain level staffing. Special Education budget is up 5.58% due to outplacement costs and a reduction in circuit breaker funds. Technology costs increased dramatically due to our 1:1 rollout of chromebooks, hardware and software costs associated with remote learning, and ongoing xfinity costs to improve security after our dDOS attack. The budget does NOT include $1,612,902 in requests for post COVID staff, services and supplies. These are needed to help remediate the loss in services for our students during late 19-20 and 20-21. Questions / Answers Lauren Scher asked if we knew for sure that we need those COVID expenses. We definitely have the need. Increased staffing will be needed for social/emotional support, catching up on evaluations, phonics training, math interventionists, and other district wide services. Vice Chair Cavicchi asked whether we should include the COVID expenses in our budget as we know that this is required. It was noted that this money was separated per a request by the town. However, it does reflect our total need. It was agreed to include this number so the new budget request is: $57,407,560 which is a 9% increase over last year's budget. Chair O'Neil noted that this is the largest percentage increase that she has ever approved. However, she 100% supports this increase as it is so critical to support our students. Motion to approve the FY22 Budget number of $57,407,560 by Linda Fernando / Jenn Walsh Roll Call Vote: Lynn Cavicchi aye Jenn Walsh aye Kiera O'Neil aye Linda Fernando aye Lauren Scher aye Motion Passes: 5-0 Consideration of Robinson School half day Feasibility Study: This information was presented by Assistant Superintendent Michael Connolly, Principal Kerri Sankey, Kindergarten Teacher/MEA rep Scott Cohen and Occupational Therapist Paula Boylan with comments by Superintendent Teresa Murphy and Assistant Superintendent Ed Donoghue. Page 4 of 7 approved 01-26-21 Mansfield School Committee Meeting Minutes for Tuesday, December 15, 2020 Virtual Meeting using GoToWebinar The history of the study was reviewed by Michael Connolly. Right before we were to begin hybrid learning, petitions were received from a group of parents and a large number of Robinson staff. We needed to focus on the return of students so in November, a team was created to review the possiblities. Several participants contributed to this effort including administration and teachers. Areas of focus were: scheduling, academics, start and end times, mid day dismissal and arrival considerations, cleaning, space, transportation and food services. In addition surveys were sent to families and staff. Approximately half of the staff and 60% of the parents surveyed were interested in this change. However, specifics of the day had not yet been worked out and provided prior to the survey. Scott Cohen emphasized the importance of repetitive teaching and having our students in the building daily. Paula Boylan emphasized the importance of specials and one to one student support. Both agreed that the staff were collegial in working toward our options with the students best interests in mind. In addition to the details on the presentation, Ed Donoghue provided the following: 24 buses would be needed mid -day for an added cost of $1000 per day. The 45 minutes between sessions provided enough time for the 3 custodial staff to clean all rooms and bathrooms. Food Services provided an interesting challenge. The A cohort students would attend every morning. They would get a breakfast break and be provided a take home lunch daily. The afternoon students (B cohort) would be provided a take home breakfast and lunch daily for them to eat on the following day. Michael Connolly noted that in addition to the study, we are now faced with the DESE minimum hour requirement. We do not know how we would scrape in more hours in this model. This puts us in a tough position for moving ahead. Superintendent Teresa Murphy provided a summary. In her opinion there is no compelling evidence of gains for our students and families. We understand that hybrid is a huge impact on our families. We want nothing more than getting our students back in the building. We do see difficulty for some families if they had to switch mid year. In fact, some families noted they would switch to a fully virtual remote if we made this change. We don't feel that we can support additional families in these remote models. We are also uncomfortable that the morning program and the afternoon program are not necessarily equitable. Teresa's recommendation is to maintain the hybrid model that we are using. Questions/Answers: Kiera O'Neil thanked the administration and teaching staff for their willingness to take on this study recognizing the amount of time necessary to cover all aspects of the proposal. She agrees with Teresa stating our goals should be to improve our hybrid model and work toward getting our students back full time. Lynn Cavicchi thanked everyone for their work. She would rather see us improving our hybrid model. The proposed change could be a major disruption to families who are just starting to get accustomed to the hybrid learning. jenn Walsh thanked the staff for their efforts. Page 5 of 7 approved 01-26-21 Mansfield School Committee Meeting Minutes for Tuesday, December 15, 2020 Virtual Meeting using GoToWebinar Linda Fernando thanked everyone for the comprehensive study. Initially she was all for this change but now that she has seen the detail she realizes this is not the magic solution. Let's focus on Time on Learning. Lauren Scher agrees this is not the solution she was hoping to see. She questioned the survey, indicating it may show an over -estimate on who favors the change since only 50% of families responded and the details of the new model were not available. She reminded us that polling is a place in time and that ideas and preferences are evolving constantly. She asked if kindergarten is part of the DESE time on learning requirement. Per Teresa, the DESE mandate is for grades 1 - 12 only but we do feel it is important to maximize kindergarten exposure as well. As no change will occur, Chair O'Neil announced that no vote is required. Consideration of Policy. Teresa Murphy reviewed the modifications to the policy. Title Action Motion Motion Disc Vote Order Code 1 2 Y N Non Discrimination Revise LF JW Y 5-0 LynnC. Jenn W. AC Kiera O. Linda F. Lateen S. Non Discrimination Revise AC-R /Anti -Harassment (not sex based Non Discrimination Revise ACA on the Basis of Sex Non Discrimination Revise ACE on the Basis of Disability Bullying Prevention Revise LF JW N 5-0 Lauren S. and Intervention Linda F. Policy Kiera O. JICFB Jean W. Lynn C. Bullying Prevention Revise JICFB-R and Intervention Plan Bullying Reporting Review JICFB Form Teen Dating Revise Y Postponed until Jan JICFC Violence Teen Dating Revise JICVC-R Violence Protocols for Res onding Discussions: Page 6 of 7 approved 01-26-21 Mansfield School Committee Meeting Minutes for Tuesday, December 15, 2020 Virtual Meeting using GoToWebinar ACE: Add the title Director of Technology to the contact page. Non discrimination policies: Lynn noted that approving these met a school committee goal. Lauren asked what happens next; how do we keep momentum going? It was proposed to keep the committee informed on the number of complaints and annual training. Teen Dating: Why are the words sexual violence and stalking removed? Are we at risk of not protecting our students and staff? We believe these were removed because of the new Title IX and Sexual Harassment policies. Policies postponed until a definitive answer. Please change the words girlfriend/boyfriend to dating partner. New School Committee Business: None Other- Items not anticipated by the Chair 48 hours prior to this meeting_ None Documents Referenced: FY21 Financial update FY22 Budget proposal Robinson School half day feasibility study Motion to adjourn: At 9:09 p.m., Motion to adjourn the open meeting by Linda Fernando / Jenn Walsh Roll Call vote: Lynn Cavicchi aye Jenn Walsh aye Kiera O'Neil aye Linda Fernando aye Lauren Scher aye Motion Carries 5 - 0 Respectfully Submitted, Diane Nugent, Secretary to the Superintendent & School Committee Page 7 of 7