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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2025-03-07-ESTABROOK-min Minutes of the Site Council's 3rd meeting of 2024-25 academic year (March 7th, 2025) Attendees: Gerardo Martinez, Maris Joniec, Karyn Zhao, Carolyn Mabardy, Joe Sullivan and Ethan Wells Agenda: • Introductions • Public speak • Updates Public speak: Mr. Wells asked where to find the Site Council minutes online . Dr. Martinez found a link where the town posts all town public minutes. Mr. Wells noted that, if the point of posting the minutes is transparency, the town can help make them more easily accessible. Perhaps a link to the minutes could be added to the school's website? Dr. Martinez said he would follow up with the appropriate party to see if possible. Officer Sullivan noted that many preparations were underway for Lex250. Ms. Zhao updated the council about the Me and My VIP party. Updates: Data team meeting: three times a year, there are data meetings to look at literacy and math assessments, and to discuss students who might need social/emotional support. These meetings compare numerical assessments with teacher observation. On the basis of this dual assessment, support services will be recommended for specific students. The middle of the year assessment was recently completed, and saw lots of growth. For those students showing less growth, literacy and math specialists support efforts were made to remediate and close the learning gap. Ms. Mabardy noted how useful these assessments are for keeping track of these kids and making sure they get what they need. Mr. Joniec concurred. Conferences: Reading assessment data has been sent to parents in advance of the forthcoming parent-teacher conferences to facilitate conversations. These conferences will coincide with 12:30 dismissals. Mr. Wells noted that conferences have been quite helpful, even if he is able to frequently interact with his son's teacher thanks to his son's IEP. The other parent member, Ms. Zhao, concurred that the conferences were quite beneficial. Dr. Martinez noted how the release of grades and assessments is timed to make the conferences as useful as possible. Ms. Mabardy and Mr. Joniec noted the importance of the conversations with parents, with Mr. Joniec emphasizing how he tries to speak with parents in as accessible a way as possible, avoiding lingo that would risk excluding those unfamiliar with it. Mr. Joniec and Dr. Martinez noted that 5th grade conversations were somewhat different from those for the other grades, as they had to address the 5th graders' upcoming transition to middle school. Kindergarten registration: Portal is open, and parents have been invited to register- but registration is going quite slow. A recently updated letter to incoming K families included information about the kindergarten screening and sign up. Enrollment creates some stress due to an overall dip in the number of students in the elementary level and its implications for Estabrook. Estabrook's kindergarten enrollment for the current academic year is at 75% capacity, with 25% availability. In grade 4, by contrast, Estabrook has 100 students - 4 more than its technical capacity. At stake in these enrollment numbers is how many sections will be necessary for each grade level. In the past, Estabrook has had 4 K sections pretty regularly. This is an important conversation for parents as tax payers: Some parents want to keep class sizes low, especially for younger grades because younger kids have more needs. Other parents want to get the most bang for their buck by having Estabrook operating at maximum efficiency, which here means: maximizing class sizes to minimize costs. Mr. Wells asked about the implications of lower enrollment on teacher retention. Dr. Martinez explained that lower numbers will reduce the number of teachers; which teachers stay or go is a function of numerous factors. Demographic changes present constant challenges to accurately projecting student enrollment across multiple classes. Ms. Zhao: are teachers cross-trained across all grades? Not exactly. Dr. Martinez noted that teacher licenses covered multiple grades, which means that every teacher is qualified to teach more than one grade. That said, to be qualified and to be experienced are two different things, and a first grade teacher who is qualified to teach 5th grade would nonetheless probably not apply for a 5th grade opening. Mr. Wells: will current and upcoming federal cuts affect Estabrook funding? Dr. Martinez: Estabrook is not a title 1 school, so Estabrook does not get significant direct federal funding. That said, every town is taking a closer look at their budgets and making tough decisions faced with the prospect of cuts in general. The town has also put a soft freeze on spending. Student support updates: This update is related to the students potentially coming to us from the Armory on Bedford Street. Estabrook is coordinating with the Fiske school to make sure all the supports are in place as needed. Efforts were also made to ensure the privacy of the families who are coming and to avoid stigmatizing incoming students. To avoid splitting up families, the decision was made that all kids from the Armory will go to one school even if numerically speaking Estabrook might be more able to accommodate the lower grade kids and Fiske the upper grades. At our next meeting, Dr. Martinez will present updates on the school improvement plan. Ms. Zhao asked whether Estabrook had anything planned for Lex250. Dr. Martinez indicated that nothing, other than district celebrations, is currently in the works. Meeting adjourned at 3:10.