===PAGE 1=== 1025 Massachusetts Avenue, Lunenburg, Massachusetts 01462 978 582-4100 ~ fax 978 582-4103 MEETING MINUTES SCHOOL COMMITTEE MEETING Wednesday, May 22, 2024 LMHS Collaborative Room #D132 6:30 - Hybrid School Committee Superintendent Carol Archambault, Chair -Present Dr. Kate Burnham Brian Lehtinen, Vice Chair - Present Business Manager/ HR Director Anthony Sculimbrene, Secretary - Present Peter Beardmore, Member - Absent Laura Brzozoski, Member - Present Recording Secretary Courtney Fuller Guests: Eric Hevy – Director of Grounds, Julianna Hanscom – Director of Special Services, Bill Bernard – DPW director, Meredith Weiss – ELL Coordinator, Michael Smith - Teacher In accordance with the requirements of the Open Meeting Law, please be advised that this meeting is being recorded and broadcast live over the Lunenburg Public Access channel, on Facebook Live on the Public Access Facebook page. (http://www.facebook.com/Lunenburg-Public-Access-Cable-157427270975305/) and will be uploaded to the Lunenburg Access YouTube after the meeting. The agenda lists all the topics which may be discussed at the meeting and those reasonably anticip ated by the Chair. Votes may be taken as a result of these discussions. Not all items listed may in fact be discussed and other items not listed may be brought up for discussion to the extent permitted by Open Meeting Law 1. Call to Order by Carol Archambault at 6:31 2. Pledge of Allegiance 3. Public Comment Sybil Kaufman, 27 Oak Ave Thank you to everyone and Kate for putting all the extra work. I hope you ask what we need not what we think we can get. I just wanted to do a bit of a debrief, I am sure everyone here including me, we can breathe a big sigh of relief in a lot of ways, and could also compose an extensive list of what this body collectively and we as individuals might do differently if we could jump back in time. Someone who ha s herself put in some overtime getting to know the details of public school and town government operations in Lunenburg, MA. I would like to go back at least a decade so I could get a PhD in Education admin, something I did consider at one point in my lif e, as that would have been very helpful. I am left with a few takeaways that I hope prove useful to you as a governing body, moving forward I hope ask for what we need. Political strategy is about nuance and communication but comes after a fair assessm ent of what our children need to stay safe, healthy, happy, and engaged in a competitive curriculum that prepares them to thrive in adulthood . Ask for what we need and demand it if you have to. Look beyond what is to what should be; does this meeting str ucture serve your population optimally, can committee members work out their policy positions ahead of a public meeting; is there a way to summarize and communicate the policy discussions and decisions that take place here, can you provide child care and hold a meeting a weekend once per quarter. I am willing to help, not just throw out ideas and not be involved. Can you help us set up a rotating refreshment donation, can you be creative, innovative, or simply copy another town who has a higher community engagement rate with their school committee to achieve better turn out at meetings and more participating in surveys and votes, can bylaws be revised to allow for community discussion rather than the structure of being welcome to attend but not actually interact with you beyond these sometimes insufferable speeches with the caveat that I know these are volunteer positions, the lowest hanging fruit for improvement seems to be a concerted effort between us all to improve the Lunenburg Public Schools Dr. Kate Burnham, Superintendent of Schools ===PAGE 2=== 1025 Massachusetts Avenue, Lunenburg, Massachusetts 01462 978 582-4100 ~ fax 978 582-4103 productivity of and community engagement at these meetings. We could do our homework beforehand, research, read surveys, synthesize and come prepared with position statements and questions. We can try our best to avoid talking at each other and instead talk with each other and truly if nothing else, please from here on out, let’s not ask for what we think we can get, lets as for what our children need. Mr. Sculimbrene Thank you, I want to thank Sybil Kauffman, Mandy Gilman, TJ Laughlin, Shoshana Mulè, Kara Harunkiewitz, Noah Lind, Tatum Furman, Kaylin St. George, Joseph James, Brandon Harris, Cecilia Stanek, Sophia Mulè, Owen Foyle and my son. I was very proud when he made a comment at town meeting in support of the override. I think that the fact the override passed means that this is a community that valued education, it values our students, it values our teachers, and it values the role a school plays in the community. I think that the passage of the override and the efforts by the parents and the students to organize in support of the override is really a message to the school committee that we need to work just as hard as everybody else and we need to have innovative ideas that make what we do more accessible to people. I think that one thing that has happened especially since the open meeting law has passed is that meetings in public have become cumbersome and my comment is in line with what Sybil said, and we did not collaborate in preparation, I think Peter and Carols presentation at town meeting was an example of how you hit all the notes in less than 10 minutes, so I think you know if the override can pass we have a lot of work to do and I want to make sure that we d o that work correctly. Lastly, I just wanted to say to Dr. Burnham, you can thank your team, but at the end of the day we would not have been able to ask if you had not had a vision for what a curriculum change could do in terms of test scores, and we wou ld not have the support, if the schools were not running the way they are, and we would not have the buy in from parents if they didn’t see meaningful improvements and assessments and test scores across the board. Ms. Brzozoski I wanted to start tonight off also by saying thank you, thank you to every single person in this town who voted yes or no, 1,411 people participated in the democratic process. Thank you to every person who participated, thank you to every citizen who paid attention, who asked tough and insightful questions and who cared enough to get involved. Thank you to the Lunenburg SOS group who advocated so fiercely for the students and got out the vote so successfully. Thank you to the students who made their voices heard. Thank you to the teachers and staff who have had to bear through this process and the uncertainty. Thank you to the superintendent and team and Annika and Juliana who put in incredible amount of work and hours and their knowledge into these budgets. I really do want the public to understand how hard Dr Burnham and her team worked, there were times that a budget document would be uploaded to our drive at midnight and that a 6 a.m. when I would open it, Dr. Burnham was already working on it again. Thank you again to Dr. Burnham for her patience and her diligence and for not flinching when I sent her an email with 90 questions about the individual line items in the budget, and she answered every single one with a lot of detail. Thank you to the other elected and appointed officials in town for working with us during such an unprecedented budget season. Thank you to our town manager Heather Lemieux who worked hard to fill in then budget gaps and work through a difficult scenario, the finance committee put in an incredible amount of work and some of its members were strong advocates for the schools, thank you to the select board for working with us during this season and some of their members advocacy of the school system and for their votes of sup port for the schools. I do want to make it clear while this is a victory, this does not mean we are swimming in money, we purposefully kept the override to a modest achievable amount, the exact amount was to level fund the schools from the previous year m inus the ESSER funding. We had always known that funding was ending. I personally did not feel it appropriate to transfer the burden of that money from the federal government grants on to the backs of Lunenburg taxpayers. So there will be some positions cut this year, those positions have been planned for strategically long term. It does not mean we have money to expand programs or staff, or that we have a sudden influx of more money, it means exactly what we have been saying….level service funding, the exact amount of money needed to do the same thing this year, that we did last year. Lunenburg is still at the far low end of the spectrum for per student spending in the state, one modest override victory does not make up for years of low school funding as we have been very transparent during this process every dollar of the override budget has been allocated and budgeted. I am asking the board going forward if we can be very cognizant of the budgetary constraints and work within the resources allocated, and if we can maintain this careful budgeting going forward. Every budget decision is made with student success in mind and what is best for the students. I am so happy and so proud of my town that on Saturday, enough Lunenburg voters asked themselves that exact same question and made that question their priority. Mr. Lehtinen I would like to congratulate the PTO on a great cruise night tonight, I was there earlier it is a great crowd and a great event. I also want to thank all the Lunenburg voters who came out and voted. Thank everyone for their support throughout the process, the school committee members, the superintendent, and her admin team, and also the staff, and all the parents and students who really got involved in the process to make it happen. We couldn’t do it without a great community effort. ===PAGE 3=== 1025 Massachusetts Avenue, Lunenburg, Massachusetts 01462 978 582-4100 ~ fax 978 582-4103 4. Chair’s Report Thank you to everyone who helped get the override passed, whether you were part of SOS Lunenburg or fincom or whether you went to town meeting and or voted on Saturday. We are grat eful to you every little bit of anything was helpful, the stories that I heard from neighbors saying their college age students came home to make sure the override passed and also the amount of high school students that are 18 and were able to vote and did so, it is a great lesson in civics and also a wonderful statement by the community. We do have an attorney double -checking to make sure there was nothing else we have to do, but we think we are all set. Legislators are working in their conference committees to finalize this year’s budget and there is a bill that would be of great help to us. The bill is sponsored by MASC, MACC, and the two major teachers unions. Thank you to Senator Cronin, he is on top of this inflation adjustment to chapter 70, we are told my MASC, this bill will bring around $500,000 to Lunenburg as we are not a hold harmless community. Also a bill for 100% reimbursement for special education transportation and circuit breaker that you can also reach out to Senator Cronin about to gain more support. 5. Review & Approve Minutes a. Regular Session None 6. Review & Approve Warrants & Line Item Transfers a. Warrant Total 4/30/24-5/15/24 $226,250.36 Ms. Archambault has signed, no questions. 7. Superintendent’s Report We need 34 transportation forms at the high school, and 28 at the middle school, Turkey Hill and the Primary School are 100% compliant. Early Learning Center registration opened on Monday. There was a conversation about what student activity fees are used for, so I am working with Mr. Santry to prepare an informational slide deck that will be shared at a June meeting. My gratitude to all people that worked so hard, paid attention, and participated, I am proud of our students, and also thank you to the committee, it required an awful lot from you, you were all very strong vocal advocates for what our school district needs for funding. I think that is a very powerful message. Upcoming Dates May 27 Schools and offices closed for Memorial Day June 1 High School Graduation June 5 School Committee Meeting 6:30 Town Hall June 12 Special School Committee Meeting 6:30 LMHS June 12 Last day of school for students ½ day June 26 School Committee Meeting 6:30 LMHS 8. Student Representative Report - none 9. Old Business Action a. Rainwater Retention Project Mr. Bernard reports he has received many questions via email, and has responded and sent answers back. This is an educational project and should be located at the Middle High School. Mr. Sculimbrene asks if it still include poisonous plants Mr. Bernard replies, we can change out the plants Ms. Brzozoski asks if we outsourced this, he replies yes we did and it was around $5-10,000. Did you ask any on in the school before spending that money, reply no. Is your design mobile, reply no. Mr. Santry (Principal of LMHS) sent a response to this project and was read aloud by Dr. Burnham Ms. Brzozoski makes a motion to not support the rainwater retention program, Mr. Sculimbrene seconds the motion all agree. b. School Choice At the previous meeting Dr. Burnham brought forward a list of potential school choice spots open from 1st through 8th grade, generally we do not open school choice until 9th grade, but wanted to make sure we explored every option available to bring money into the district. Through conversations all members of the school committee agree class sizes are growing and we still desire to keep class size as much as possible. Mr. Sculimbrene makes a motion to not increase any school choice spots for 1 st thru 8th grade, Mr. Lehtinen seconds the motion, roll call vote approved by Mr. Lehtinen, Mr. Sculimbrene, Ms. Archambault and abstained by Ms. Brzozoski Discussion c. Family – School Partnership Compact Meredith Weiss, our ELL coordinator and also Mr. Smith a teacher at Turkey Hill are part of the district Family School Partnership Initiative team. Last year when we were doing work facilitated by the Department of Ed, they did such outstanding work as a part of that committee t hat I asked them if ===PAGE 4=== 1025 Massachusetts Avenue, Lunenburg, Massachusetts 01462 978 582-4100 ~ fax 978 582-4103 they could lead and be co-facilitators of the Culture and Climate Council.. Ms. Weiss reports their hopeful intentions are to align the three stakeholders, our families, our students and our school staff in ways t hat we can best support students and their expectations in classrooms this document can be used as a springboard for many conversations about expectations and how to uphold the responsibilities of an LPS community member. The committee discusses the documents, mostly that it is a great document, but also maybe a shorter version that is more understandable to general public and also an option of potential QR code to be added, so feedback can be given. d. Facilities Update Mr. Hevy gives an update on current projects happening within the district and also goes through each building and lists all projects that are going to be necessary in the future e. Topics of Delegation Ms. Archambault shares that originally we wanted to meet with the delegates. I have spoken to them and was told it would be helpful if we gave them topics that we would be asking them. If each committee member could come up with topics and send them to me prior to the next meeting. Some topics discussed, bus bidding process, state funding as Chapter 70 minimum, we are not receiving enough state funding, millionai res tax, the regional transportation has a lot of work being done for it, but that does not help us at all, 10. New Business Action a. Donation $24.90 from Box tops will be deposited into gift account at Primary School and $21.00 from Box tops will be deposited into gift account at Turkey Hill. Mr. Lehtinen makes a motion to accept the donation, Ms. Brzozoski seconds the motion, all approve Discussion b. New IEP Form The team shares a PowerPoint slide deck explaining the new IEP form and the differences that we will be seeing and implementing. Meetings will be longer, much more detail and also includes students feedback c. 2024-2025 SC Meeting Calendar The school committee calendar is presented for the 24/25 school year, mostly the same 1st and 3rd Wednesdays of the month, with adjustments for holidays and school vacations. If you have any questions or concerns please email questions to Dr. Burnham 11. Public Comment Dr. Burnham shares this afternoon she was invited the Primary School. The entire first grade became aware there are students that rely on our food pantry, and some do not get birthday celebrations. They put together 90 celebration boxes that are ready for graduations or birthdays. The parents donated all the items, and will be donated to the food pantry tomorrow. Also one more aside, I updated the superintendent evaluation folder, it includes a timeline and a “how to” but if you need any help you can certainly reach out, that is set for the June 12th meeting, so I need the completed evaluations by June5th 12. Reports Ms. Brzozoski reports the PACSAL met and talked about the new IEP form and bylaws at Turkey Hill. Turkey Hill Advisory met on 5/5 we talked about the Family School compact, which will be presented at the May 22 nd school committee meeting. Bussing for field trips are very expensive, which made field trips trickier to plan this year. The 5 th grade is going to a Woo Sox game, 4th grade is having 2 in-house experiences, animal adventures (which was entirely free and funded by the PTO) and earth dome, 3rd grade will have animal adventures (which was entirely free and funded by the PTO) June 5 th is field day with a rain date of the 6th. The 12th will be the last day and a half day. There was an optional survey sent out requesting any classroom placements, you cannot request a specific teacher, but the teachers can use this information for placement in classrooms. Teacher appreciation was 2 weeks ago and we appreciate our teachers very much. Mr. Sculimbrene reported that the PTO met regarding the event that is currently out front, the cruise night, in collaboration with the Lions Club, the food pantry and the Boys and Girls Club. Ms. Archambault reports the Master Planning has the next public meeting on May 30 th at 6 at Smokestack Roasters again, I will send out the flyer, they will be open for their menu for you to enjoy. What they are trying to do is the launch of the next survey, they are trying to take what they already have and really break it down. May 30 th is also our Senior Awards Night, so I will not be able to attend the Master Planning meeting as I need to be at Senior Awards. ===PAGE 5=== 1025 Massachusetts Avenue, Lunenburg, Massachusetts 01462 978 582-4100 ~ fax 978 582-4103 13. Topics for Future Discussion Delegation List AARPA Funds 14. Executive Session –to discuss strategy with respect to collective bargaining or litigation if an open meeting may have a detrimental effect on the bargaining or litigating position of the public body and the chair so declares 15. Adjournment Mr Lehtinen makes a motion to enter executive session and adjourn immediately following at 8:48 pm, Ms. Brzozoski seconds the motion all approve Respectfully Submitted Courtney Fuller