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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2016-09-20-SC-min1 LSC Meeting 9/20/16 LEXINGTON SCHOOL COMMITTEE Tuesday, September 20, 2016 Town Hall, Selectmen’s Meeting Room 1625 Massachusetts Avenue, Lexington, MA Present: Chair, William Hurley; Vice Chair, Alessandro Alessandrini; Judy Crocker; Eileen Jay; Jessie Steigerwald; Superintendent, Dr.Czajkowski; Student Representative, Matt Campos The minutes were taken by Sara Calvino, Executive Assistant to the School Committee and Administrative Assistant to the Superintendent The meeting convened at 7pm Call to Order and Welcome: Chair, Bill Hurley called the meeting to order, and introduced committee members. Public Comments: Jenny Richlin, 36 Sherburne Road- Thanked school committee members for all the hard work that has gone into buffer zones. She feels as though the communications around buffer zones, around the policy and the discussions have been lacking. The pieces that are important to the process of buffer zones are not being communicated to the public; most of the community doesn’t even know what buffer zones mean and how it will affect them. Superintendent’s Announcement: • Dr. Czajkowski updated the Committee on a meeting she had with Maureen Kavanaugh, Sandy Trach and 2 consultants from AppGEO regarding their work together this year. They will all meet again on October 4th to review parent feedback from the two public forums on buffer zone policy language. Dr. Czajkowski reviewed the 2016 – 17 Expanding Capacity, Central Registration and Student Assignment Project Timelines handout. • Dr. Czajkowski is working with Carl Valente, Pat Goddard and Sandy Trach to identify a location to implement central registration in January 2017. Her hope is to bring an update and recommendations to the School Committee at the November 1st Meeting. • Dr. Czajkowski spoke about the Middle School Back to School Night on October 6th and the concerns about parking with the major construction that is currently well underway at both schools. One option would be to have a virtual back to school night where teachers would prepare a video that would be posted for parents to log on and watch as if they were attending back to school night. The second option would be to split up the night into two nights with sixth grade one night and seventh and eighth grade another night. Dr. Czajkowski opened the discussion to the committee to make a decision. o School Committee members support either of these options but would prefer the sixth grade to have a parent’s night and a virtual night for grades seventh and eighth. Ms. Steigerwald recommended getting feedback from the PTA leaders and site council parents as well. o Dr. Czajkowski will meet with the Principals at both middle schools along with Andrew Baker and will report back to the School Committee by email. School Committee Member Announcements: 2 LSC Meeting 9/20/16 A. Alessandrini: Mr. Alessandrini was able to see the movie Beyond Measure as a freshman parent and believes it is worth watching to see how the solutions in the movie could apply here or not. This past Monday was the first task force meeting regarding dyslexia to discuss goals. J. Crocker: The community should have received their Cary Lecture series in the mail. Ms. Crocker attended the Dyslexia parent group meeting that focused on social and emotional barriers and a lot of wonderful resources in terms of reading were presented. The Policy Subcommittee had the pleasure of working with Maureen Kavanaugh, Sandy Trach and Ian Dailey with preparing a draft buffer zone policy. The Buffer Zone Forums that will be on September 24th at Bowman and on September 28th at Hastings will really be about the “what and why” policy is and what we have formulated for the buffer zones. W. Hurley: At the Special Town Meeting tomorrow night, if asked Mr. Hurley will address Article 2. Mr. Alessandrini will speak to Article 3 and Mr. Hurley is scheduled to speak to Article 4. E. Jay: Thanked all the voters who came out to vote for Minuteman today. J. Steigerwald: The Community Coalition event is next week for the book, Beyond Measure. Some of the topics for that night will be on “What is your vision on what homework should look like for various students” and “What should an ideal day look like for an Elementary, Middle School and High School student”. Book discussion is on Tuesday, September 27th at 7pm at the Lexington High School Library; you don’t need to have read the book to attend. Screenings of the film will be on October 18th at Cary Hall. Ms. Steigerwald and Ms. Crocker attended the discussion on the opiate epidemic and the message was clear that anyone struggling with addiction, there are a lot of great resources in the town. Ms. Steigerwald will ask Dr. Czajkowski to put up a link on the LPS website regarding resources for addiction. M. Campos: Mr. Campos attended the school site council meeting for Lexington High School regarding I- block and new emergency procedure briefings. Consent Agenda: 1. Vote to Approve and Not Release Executive Session Minutes of April 26, 2016 2. Vote to Approve and Not Release Executive Session Minutes of June 16, 2016 3. Vote to Approve and Not Release Executive Session Minutes of June 21, 2016 4. Vote to Approve School Committee Minutes of September 6, 2016 5. Vote to Approve School Committee Minutes of September 7, 2016 Motion to approve consent agenda items 1-5 as amended. (Steigerwald / Alessandrini) The Motion was approved (5-0). Agenda: 1. – Agenda Item: Summer Curriculum Work and Professional Learning Assistant Superintendent for Curriculum, Kelly Chase and Ms. Caitlin Ahern, Coordinator of Professional Learning and Special Projects provided an update on summer curriculum work and professional learning. All School Committee members have been invited to this year’s Lexington Learns Together on Tuesday, November 8th at Lexington High School. All members are looking forward to Lexington Learns Together; it was fantastic last year and they are positive it will be again this year. Mr. Campos is very satisfied with the depth of information that is being provided about Lexington Learns Together. What stood out most to Mr. Campos in the article written by Del Nero and Olivier-Mason was 3 LSC Meeting 9/20/16 “Lexington Learns Together is fun-- and that’s OK”. He finds this to be absolutely essential for teachers to translate into the classrooms. 2. – Agenda Item: Draft Superintendent Goals 2016 – 2017 Dr. Czajkowski will continue to work collaboratively with the School Committee while building relationships as well. This is not listed as one of Dr. Czajkowski’s goals but rather an expectation she has for herself. Dr. Czajkowski reviewed her proposed goals for 2016 – 2017 with the School Committee. She went into detail on each goal and how she is beginning to achieve each one of them. Dr. Czajkowski is open to any recommendations from the School Committee. Ideally, she would like her goals to be finalized for the October 4th meeting for the School Committee’s vote of approval. 3. – Agenda Item: Transportation Update Ian Dailey, Assistant Superintendent for Finance and Operations gave an update on Transportation. He discussed a few issues they are currently addressing with a wait list of 43 students for the after school bus and the timely issues of buses running late. Ms. Steigerwald recommended that the bus fee be reviewed during budget time to see if that fee needs to be raised to accommodate more buses and to break even. Dr. Czajkowski also agreed with Ms. Steigerwald that the fee does need to be reviewed during budget time, as Ian mentioned the district is in a downward trend for breaking even with this program. 4. – Agenda Item: Update on Training for School Safety Sandra Trach, Special Assistant to the Superintendent updated the School Committee on the Annual Chiefs Meeting, REMS, ICT and ALICE Trainings. School Preparation and Evacuation Drills have been complete thus far. The Schools are in process of finalizing a formal evacuation site agreement with off- site locations. The Department of Public Facilities safety training to provide ICT, REMS, and ALICE training is projected to take place in December 2016. Members appreciated the safety update and are excited to hear more about the offsite locations for evacuation. Ms. Crocker reminded everyone that bus evacuations are held twice a year as well. Pat Goddard, Director of Facilities will be working with Sandy Trach this year to study how the High School can be made more secure as it is an open campus and will be reporting back to the School Committee on their findings. 5. – Agenda Item: Policy Update The Policy Subcommittee presented a brief update on the buffer zone policy process. Last Thursday, the Policy Subcommittee met with Dr. Czajkowski, Maureen Kavanaugh, Sandy Trach and Ian Dailey. Now that a draft buffer zone policy has been created, the working group along with Dr. Czajkowski will create a draft FAQ document as well as evaluate current related policies to ensure that all policies work smoothly together. . Dr. Czajkowski will then share the draft FAQ document with the Student Assignment Committee. Due to the School Committee’s Boston meeting on November 15, the Policy Subcommittee asks that the School Committee place the first reading of the draft policy on the October 18th agenda. This meeting may need to occur prior to the film premier of Beyond Measure also on October 18th The Second Buffer 4 LSC Meeting 9/20/16 Zone reading will be scheduled for November 1st and the third reading on November 29th. However, if more public zone forums are needed based on input from the first set, these reading dates will be reevaluated. Members made clear that the draft buffer zone policy creates a foundation to build flexibility into the attendance areas map and is a tool that can be used to meet the urgency of our growing enrollment. Motion to adjourn. The Motion was approved 5-0. The meeting was adjourned at 8:42 (Alessandrini / Steigerwald) Meeting Materials: Agenda; A.1- Agenda Item Summary, Lexington Learns Together: Rewriting the PD script, Lexington Learns Together should be a model for PD, HO-Update on Summer Workshops and Professional Learning A.2- HO- Superintendent’s Performance Goals 2016 -2017; A.3- Agenda Item Summary; A.4- HO- Update on Training for School Safety A.5 – Agenda Item Summary, Draft Buffer Zone Policy; Superintendent Update HO- 2016-17 Expanding Capacity, Central Registration and Student Assignment Project Timelines, Middle School Back to School Night