School Committee - Regular Meeting

Sorry.

Call to order the meeting of the Salem School Committee taking place on June 22nd, 2026 at 7 p.m. This meeting is taking place in person at 29 Highland Avenue, room 227 in Salem. This meeting is taking place in person. Members of the public can also watch the meeting by following along on Zoom on the link posted in the meeting agenda. We do have one member of the committee participating remotely, so all votes will be by roll call vote. Our first order of business is approval of the agenda.

So moved.

Motion made by member Miranda second by member Hoffman roll call vote. Member Miranda.

Yes.

Member Scott. Yes. Member bias.

Yes.

Member Cornell. Yes. Member Hoffman.

Yes.

Remember Manning on and myself. Yes. Another emotion take out of order.

So moved to take out of order to is it for the students.

I will yeah with the students first so we can take out of order items want to under the superintendent's report which is a recognition of our unified track and field state champions in recognition of our retirees.

So moved. Second.

Motion made by Member Miranda. Seconded by Member Stott. Roll call vote. Member Stott.

Yes.

Member Bias.

Yes.

Member Cornell. Yes. Member Hoffman. Yes. Member Miranda. Yes. And myself. Yes. Superintendent.

Well, welcome, everybody. We have a packed house here tonight, lots of special people from our school community to recognize. And we're going to start by celebrating four outstanding athletes from our Salem High School Unified Sports team. Unified Sports is about so much more than the final score on a scoreboard. It is a program that breaks down barriers by joining athletes with and without disabilities on the same team. And it proves that sports have a unique power to unite us and to foster deep relationships and to ensure that every single student in our district has a place where they belong and a team where they can shine. And so we have four student athletes tonight here with us that we are recognizing, not just because they've excelled in competition, but because they've led by example. They have shown us what true sportsmanship and dedication and inclusion look like in action. And it's a real honor to welcome them and their family members here tonight to celebrate their hard work and publicly thank them for making the entire district proud. And there are many members of the Salem high school community here, staff and Principal Burns and I see Myra Caldera here and others in to honor these students as well and of course Coach Giancolo. Where's Coach? There she is in the back there. So Coach, would you come on up and help us recognize these students? So we're going to recognize each student. Marisa Bell-Diaz is a state champion. Come on up, Marisa. She scored first place in the Division I shot put and 12th place in Division I 100-meter race.

Wait with Coach G for everybody else too.

Yeah, that's awesome. Next we'd like to call up Niall McManus, who's also a state champion. He scored first place in the long jump and first place in the 100 meter race. Great job. Next is Mara Laskowski. Mara is also a state champion. And she placed first place in the javelin and ninth place in the 100 meter. And next is Eric Shihage. He was also a state champion, first place in the javelin and 12th place in the 100 meter. Awesome. Also, I just wanted to, of course, thank Angie Giancola because behind every great team there's a great leader who sets the tone, she builds the culture, and she believes in the potential of every player. And unified sports is really a special program and she is a coach who has created a culture of empathy belonging and community we're incredibly grateful and fortunate to have you as a coach and would like to thank you for your dedication the hard work that you put in the leadership and the environment that you create for students so that they can feel proud both on and off of the field and we in Salem Each week in our family newsletter, if you see that, someone in the community recommends or nominates a member of the staff to receive a magical moment award. And Angie was nominated a few weeks ago, and I haven't had a chance to come to the school and give you your little award, which is a duck with a... Little witch hat. And your certificate. But I knew you were coming here, so I wanted to wait to thank you publicly for all that you've done to support our students. And students, if you didn't have a cupcake, we want you to take one for the road and enjoy that. So thank you so much, family members, for being here and helping us celebrate your children and their accomplishments tonight together.

Great.

Yeah. Thank you. Thank you. Congratulations. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Congratulations. Congratulations. Congratulations.

But wait, there's more recognitions to come.

So we also have some of our retirees here tonight. Tonight is, today was our last full day of school. Tomorrow, actually last day for Carleton, if you teach at Carleton. Tomorrow's our last day for every other school except New Liberty, so I guess not every other school. New Liberty goes until Wednesday. But we wanted to take a moment at this meeting to honor this special group of individuals. We have a number of retirees tonight. Not everyone was able to be with us, but I would like to say their names, where they served, and the number of years that they dedicated to the children of the Salem Public Schools. So I'll start with June Kershaw, who is an adjustment counselor at Salem High School. She retires after 16 years of service. Susan McLaughlin is a grade two teacher. She is retiring after 33 years of service. Allison Traxler is a literacy coach. She is also retiring from Bates after 16 years of service. Donna Cohen is a para from Salem High School, eight years of service. Janice D. Lorenzo, a para from Witchcraft, 24 years of service. Patricia Cullen, a grade three teacher from Horace Mann Elementary School, lab school, 30 years of service. Beth Kwapis is a member of our food service department at Witchcraft, and she is retiring after 23 years of service. Torin Maylou was a foreman. He was our district HVAC foreman, and he is retiring after 26 years of service. Robert Kaliri, a custodian from Salem High School, 22 years of service. Rose Caballo is in our AFSCME and 17 years of service. And then we have six members who, six staff members who did make it here tonight. The mayor has city seals to share with you. What?

Yes?

Yeah, I didn't say all the six that are here yet. Oh, I'm sorry. That's okay. That's okay, Ann. And we have an apple fitting to give to you as a paperweight, and it's a small... remembrance of the incredible dedication and service that you have provided and the lives that you've touched over these years. We calculated, and it's 317 years of service that our retirees have given to the Salem Public Schools. So I would like to call up first, let's call Lisa Linehan. Lisa is a fourth grade teacher and she is retiring from witchcraft after 12 years of service. Six years in the fourth grade and six in second grade, right Lisa? Yeah. Yeah, great. Thank you.

Yeah.

Great. All right. Jen Garpy. Jen Garpy, yay. Jen Garropy works in our IT department. She is the student information system manager. She keeps all the data flowing and keeps us compliant with the Department of Ed. And she is retiring after six years of service with us here at Salem Public Schools. Next, how about Maureen Pasek-Torville? There you go. And Maureen, Maureen leads our Parent Child Plus program, which is a home visiting program for children 18 months to four years. And we work with the families on literacy and math activities. And so thank you so much, Maureen. Next is Kathy Fazio. And Kathy has given 20 years of service to the Salem Public Schools as a bus monitor. And that is amazing service, right? Right? Thank you so much, Kathy, for that. Okay, Louise Fredrickson, right here in the front row. Louise is a paraprofessional at Salem High School and is retiring after 18 years of service. Okay. Last but not least, Donna Callahan. Donna Callahan is a paraprofessional. She's been at many schools, last serving at Carleton, and she has 38 years as a paraprofessional.

Thank you. Yeah, Donna. Yes.

So thank you so much for giving of your time and really the work that you have done over the years really has changed lives. And we're gonna miss your wisdom, your smiling faces and your expertise in our buildings. But I think that you have more than earned the next chapter in your lives. And so on behalf of the school district, the school committee and all of us at the community at large, we thank you for your service. We wish you nothing but the best, health and happiness, and well-deserved relaxation.

We'll take a brief recess, so you don't have to stay for the whole meeting. But thank you, everyone. Congratulations, retirees.

Thank you.

Our next item on the agenda is public comment. The Salem School Committee would like to hear from the public on issues that affect the district and are within the scope of the committee's responsibilities. Spanish interpretation is available for anyone who needs it. The members of the school committee would like to remind the public that Salem Public School students regularly attend school committee meetings. We encourage all meeting participants to model respectful and productive public discourse for our young learners. Is there any public comment in the chambers? Is there any public comment on Zoom? Please use the raise hand function if you have comment. Our next item is approval of the consent agenda. These are the minutes of the regular school committee meeting of June 8th. Approval of the field trip for the JROTC leadership camp to Buzzards Bay, June 29th to July 2nd, and approval of the warrants of June 4th and June 11th.

So moved. Second.

motion made by member Cornell second by member Hoffman under discussion seeing none a roll call vote member Cornell yes member Hoffman yes member Miranda yes member Scott yes member bias yes and myself yes the matter carries student representatives report none okay superintendent's report

Great. So I just want to acknowledge that we are, I think this is our final meeting of the regular school year. So I just wanted to take a moment to thank all of our educators, our administrators, and our support staff. Our district only moves forward because of your tireless work and dedication. You are the heart and soul and what keeps things going over the course of the year. From our classrooms to the front offices, from cafeterias to the buses and our facilities team that keeps everything running. The Salem Public Schools teachers and staff have created a safe and nurturing environment inspiring environment for our students throughout this school year and you truly are the backbone to the district and we are so grateful for your commitment and dedication and just really wishing everyone even though we have a half a day school tomorrow and New Liberty has a day on Wednesday wishing everyone a restful a peaceful, joyful summer break and hope that people have time, plan to really just relax and get ready for the school year in August. I know, Ann. But really, just really grateful for all the work that everyone has done. And to our students, I also am wishing you also a restful and rejuvenating and safe summer as well, because you earned it as well. So that's... What I wanted to say and now I will move on to the technology update said OK so we do have a presentation tonight although before we do that I did want to acknowledge also I did send a parent square earlier today with news in the realm of Salem athletics. announcing the resignation of athletic director Riley Christie, who announced today that he is taking the athletic director role in Malton Catholic. And Riley has really been a tremendous asset to the Salem Public Schools, to our athletic program, and most importantly, to our student athletes. During Riley's tenure, the Salem athletic programs grew. They became more inclusive under his leadership, and certainly the championship titles were flowing during his time here. So Riley will be definitely remembered for his energy, his fierce commitment to the student athletes and the coaches, and we wish him nothing but the best. and just to let the public and community know that we'll be working in partnership with Principal Burns as he plans on next steps in a process to fill this important position. So with that, I will move on to the technology presentation. I'm excited to introduce this as our final presentation of the school year, and I think everyone knows Mark LeBlanc, who is our executive director of IT. And he plans to cover a lot of ground that directly impacts our classrooms and families in terms of technology. He's going to talk about our infrastructure as it relates to student devices in particular. I'm going to give us some updates on how we're starting to respond to the rapidly developing terrain of AI in education, both for students and staff. And then we'll finish up with some information about how we're proactively gearing up for tackling a challenge that I think a lot of districts are starting to really examine closely, and that is screen time, especially at the early grades. So I'll turn it over to you, Mark, at this time.

Great, thank you. I'll share my own slides. And there we go. Good evening, everybody. Yep, so my name is Mark LeBlanc. I'm the Executive Director of Instructional Technology at Salem Public Schools. Just have some updates on what we kind of did this year and then what we're looking forward to over the summer and then for 26-27. I know we have some new members of the committee that I don't believe I've presented to before, so I just wanted to kind of uh show what our organizational chart looks like so so you can kind of understand like what exists in the realm of instructional technology so we have kind of three arms that exist in that department one of which is technical support those are the people that are really in schools every day supporting students at the student help desks and staff in the elementary schools in the high school middle school all over the district on things like chromebook repairs things not connecting to projectors, really you name it, they pretty much help out with that. We also have a data team. You saw Jen Garropy, who's retiring this year, so she's our data and applications manager. We also have a couple other people on the data team, and they really help with things like doing state reporting to the state before end of year. They handle our application systems like ParentSquare and Aspen and our single sign-on. So a lot of different data elements. And we are bringing on at the end of the year, at the end of the month, a director of data analysis. So that role will replace Jen Garropy's role and that will be somebody that is going to start being a little more proactive with data reporting to schools. and district leaders. Right now I'm pretty much doing that, and I just am at my capacity limit to do that work, so we're hoping we can get another person in here. Well, we've hired them. We're gonna have them in at the end of July to start doing some of that work. We also have our digital learning area, and that consists of people like our coordinator of digital learning, Kristen Condon, who works with educators. teaches them how to do things that they don't know how to do, as well as she's been doing a lot of the work on AI, and she's starting some work on screen time as well, some research, which we'll get to later. And then we have our library staff, which is in around a blue box because they're school-based staff, but I assist them with teaching our students library and digital skills classes. We're actually coming to the end of our three-year technology plan. We're going to be integrating our technology plan into our new three-year strategic plan and 10-year innovation plan because it shouldn't really be a standalone thing. It should be part of the business that we're doing just like every other department. Just a couple things that we've done over the last three years. We did establish a library in digital skills classes. As of next year, we'll have them in all K-8 schools, so students get that special as part of their regular rotation every week. We have updated our student technology and our internet to be up-to-date and robust. In the educator space, we've spent time teaching educators about AI. We built an intranet with over 100 articles, different guides that educators can look to that will teach them how to do everything from how do I put in an absence on the absence system to how do I look at my students' data in STAR after the STAR assessment window closes. And we also have a training request category in our ticket system, which allows educators to sign up and have a trainer come right out to them desk side so that they can learn to do what it is that they need to do. For family, we ran the Tech Goes Home program twice, which was a program that our bilingual staff in our tech department taught adults in the community how to do some basic technology skills that allowed them to take a Chromebook home with them for free after the training. as well as some parent guides, family guides that we've created. In the data world, we launched an interactive data dashboard. We've created a data handbook that explains to school staff and different educators how to do things like, how do I take attendance? How do I manage student data in our Aspen system? So all different kinds of things like that. And we'll bring in a director of data analysis. So that was three years. There's more stuff, but that's the highlights from the last three years. Last year was really AI. I had AI coming out my ears. I mean, it was AI all the time between vendors and trainings and groups and all different things. In Salem, what I did first was we started a technology advisory committee, which was made up of a variety of educators and community partners and central office staff and assistant principal to really focus on AI and to kind of guide the work this year. From that, we created an AI vision statement, an AI intranet page that contains all different resources on AI for educators, and guidance documents that we provided to educators and students, and AI suggested usage by grade band, like what kind of AI is appropriate for what grade level. if at all. We also determined our approved tools. So there's a lot of AI tools out there. There's a lot of vendors that are trying to kind of sell to educators, sell to me. So we really narrowed down the scope of what tools we're going to be using. in Salem. We did monthly training sessions virtually after school for educators on a variety of AI topics. We had 10 sessions this year. We had more than 250 educators join those sessions to learn about topics from how to do a prompt to how to differentiate using AI and so on and so forth. We also had an AI corner every other week in the teaching and learning newsletter, which kind of give like a tip or trick that they could be using with AI in their practice. Library digital skills, as I said, we have, it's a special that next year will be in every school pre-K to eight. So students will go to the library. They have an opportunity to check out books every week from a licensed librarian that can help them with their selection, as well as learning age appropriate digital skills that they can then take back to their core classes and a big focus on digital citizenship and digital safety in all grade levels where age appropriate. Technical support, we had a great year. We closed 4,810 tickets this year. And our average response time was 3.4 hours, as in like that's when we get to start the ticket or put a comment in the ticket letting somebody know that we're on the way. And resolving tickets an average of 6.9 hours. So it's well below the 24 hours that I set for my team as a goal. So we had a really great year. Data and applications, we're very busy modernizing our systems. We added new platforms for professional development tracking, for evaluation, for a new grade book, which I'm sure you all know, Jump Rope, as well as really digging deeper into data analysis. They've been very busy this year. And with Jen's retirement, we're going to kind of reorganize some things to change up some workflows so we can bring on that director of data analysis. Summer projects, we're always very busy during the summer. We'll have new Chromebooks for rising sixth and ninth graders, new Chromebooks for kindergarten and first grade classrooms, which they haven't been replaced since, I think it was like 2020, like right during the pandemic. So those are very, very out of date at this point, or they're the oldest ones in the system. We'll have new interactive displays for Sarah Parker Ramond and Bentley Innovation School. Those are two of the only spaces that don't have interactive screens yet. They're still operating off of older projection technology. The city's moving to Zoom phones for the citywide, and the schools are part of that, so we'll be assisting with the rollout of the new phone system. We have a new staff attendance and timesheet platform as we continue to modernize our systems to things that are more user-friendly and easier to get data from. Aspen has finally come up with a mobile-friendly site, so we'll be launching that for families over the summer, as well as some curriculum work for library and digital skills, and edits to some academic systems, helping out academics with changing standards in Jump Rope and some common assessment changes. So now we get the screen time, which is AI was definitely the story of 2526 and across Massachusetts and really across the nation. Screen time and access to technology in schools is like the hot issue right now. All over. I just put this little timeline together to kind of explain like where we were, where we are and where we may be going. In 2011, Burlington Public Schools launched one of the nation's first one-to-one programs with iPads. I actually toured that building when I was working in Peabody as we got hosted there to learn about how they did it. It's a long time ago now. In 2014, Google came out with Google Classroom, Google Apps, and then all of a sudden, like, getting an iPad for every kid was very expensive for a school. Getting a Chromebook and free tools from Google became very affordable, and that was something that seemed possible for a lot of districts. And then, obviously, COVID pandemic and ESSER funding allowed districts to rapidly grow. Like, we could really, like, use that money to get to a one-to-one space, and we needed it for remote learning. In 2026, the estimate is about 85 to 90% of school districts in Massachusetts are 1 to 1. So there's a device for every kid. And then earlier this year, I think it was in April, Cambridge School Committee proposed a ban on technology in grades pre-K to 2. So you can see the pendulum has started one place, and now we're... swinging another place cambridge did go back on that they decided to think more about it because i think that teachers taking technology away from kids they'd have to really rethink the way they do school because they're relying on technology a lot of ways um so it would be very like for things like assessments i think you know you have students that need to take mcas since third grade so exposing them to online testing for the first time in third grade is could be problematic there's a variety of reasons that they're looking at it some more We've already started our own research in Salem. And here are some things that we're thinking about for 26, 27. As I said, we are replacing the kindergarten and first grade classroom Chromebooks. So I did propose to schools that perhaps we go down to more of a shared cart model instead of having a cart for every classroom. But the principals pushed back on that and said they would be concerned that teachers would really feel the burden of that because now they'd have to figure out who gets the cart when, when they need to do certain things, and it would really be a burden for the teachers and the educators and the schools themselves. We are gonna talk more about that, but that was a conversation we did have. We are gonna get a new tool as part of our single sign-on platform, which will allow us to analyze screen time. Right now, we don't really have a great way to do that, but with this new tool, we're gonna be able to I'm going to be able to look at that and say, how often are they really using them? We just don't know the scope of the problem, or if it is a problem. Anecdotally, I'm in classrooms a lot, and I don't see prolonged uses of screens. ST Math is probably the place where it's used the most, and that's only in some schools. So we want to really make sure that we're trying to solve a problem that exists and what the scope of the problem really is before we start swinging that pendulum. One thing we really want to do is create some guidance. We've already started drafting some of this around the difference between active versus passive screen time, because that is really important. Screen time is not all created equally. I think everyone here would agree that like the Simpsons and Sesame Street are not the same screen time, just like watching a YouTube video up on a classroom for 20 minutes is not the same screen time as working on a research project with a partner and creating a slide deck that they can then present to the class. So those aren't the same screen times. And we want to start doing some walkthroughs with schools to really take a look and see where we're seeing good uses of screen time and where we're not seeing not so good uses of screen time, as well as creating some look fors for principals so that when they go through and do their observations, they know what to look for, what they should be looking for as a good thing and not so good thing. We have started doing some research, but the reality is there's just not a lot out there. There's a lot of research around screen time usage. There is not a lot of research, if any research, on educational screen time usage limits in schools. I think there will be research done on this because this is becoming a really hot-button issue, but the research just really isn't there yet. In fact, I pulled out one thing just a couple months ago from the American Academy of Pediatrics. The question was, are there screen time guidelines for schools? And the short answer is no. They recommend focusing on active versus passive use of technology. But more to come on that. That will definitely be the focus of 26, 27 for my team. And that's all I have for you tonight. Time to take questions.

Thank you, Mark. Questions from the committee? Member Miranda.

Do you happen to know in terms of pre K like I come up I'm a little bit familiar with kindergarten how much time is spent on the Chromebooks there but in terms of pre K is it used at all.

Every pre-K classroom, both the Salem Public Schools and our partner programs have a set of four iPads for each classroom. And mostly it is used for a math program called, I believe it's called Math Shelf. And that is really, that's really the only use that it gets. And it's a couple, it's a little bit each week. It's a very low usage.

Okay, thank you. And thank you so much for this presentation. Yeah, no problem.

member corner can you elaborate a little bit on on student assessments that require technology

Sure, so obviously MCAS is the big one that starts in grade three where students have to take, it's only online now with some very small options for paper based but mostly it's online from grades three until ten. We also have our star assessment which we take, that is taken Math has taken grades one, starts in first grade, and our ELL reading is starting in kindergarten. They do an early literacy assessment, and then they do a full-star reading, usually around second grade, depending on what their level of proficiency is on the early literacy. Those are done four times a year, but we are going down to three times a year. I think there's like a little bit of over assessment perhaps that we're trying to dial back on and get kids off of assessments as often. So those are the big ones. We do have our district common assessments as well, which are done. They're done four to five times a year depending on the content area. But a lot of those are done especially in the early grades on paper. And the teacher then takes it and puts it into the system so the kids don't actually go on. So Star is the big one that kids are using early on. And then in third grade, that's when it really ramps up to MCAS. There is an early, no, there's a pre-K assessment, but that's another, they don't take that. That's an oral assessment where the teacher is putting it in. So they don't interact with that platform. Sonya's not here, but I think I did pretty good.

Yes, you did.

For questions. On the timeline, can you just help me chart? When did Salem start its one-to-one program?

Salem had a one-to-one middle school and high school prior to me arriving. It had just kind of been built out that way, though, probably in like 2019. The one-to-one really started during the pandemic when we needed to make sure every student had a device. So I would say by 2021, we were fully one-to-one.

I have a question. Do you have a policy around the use of AI outside of the classroom, like central office or employees who might have access to student-sensitive data?

Yes, we do. We call them educator guidelines because we're all educators in Salem, but that applies to both central office and teachers. In those guidelines, it talks about making sure that personally identifiable information are not put into classrooms. AI platforms, even ones that we subscribe to because data breaches can happen. So we want to make sure we're anonymizing student data whenever possible, as well as like paying attention to bias because AI is inherently biased and we need to make sure we have like a human in the loop anytime we use AI. And that's all laid out in the guidelines.

Any further questions from the committee? Member bias, do you have any questions?

No, thank you. I'm sorry I just have a couple more. Have we done as a district any surveys on computer and laptop access in our students homes

We have not. That is something that we want to do, though. There is a there's a digital equity task force that the city is running right now that we are a part of. And that I think is part of that process. But one thing that now we've kind of moved our welcome center into more of a place where families can get more resource, less transactional, more of the ability to get those types of resources. I want to partner with Laura to see if we can get some got. some systems where like you know if you need internet like here are some free internet options that you can get or very cheap internet options and here are some here's options for computers i would also love to be able to um think about right now our chromebooks kind of get outdated and they're no longer useful for us but they have some usable life left in them so i'd love to get to a place where we can perhaps offer those out to the community we just have to set up that system but that's that's something that we're looking at in the future

Yeah, I'd be really interested in seeing that information. You know, I think digital equity should be at the forefront of how we're having these conversations, particularly given the community that we serve here and not all of our families are coming in. to digital learning or technological access or even technological savvy from the same place. So I think we can assume all of our families have phones. But when our students walk in the door, you might have this group of parents who's incredibly concerned about screen time and this group of parents who's who is really hoping for that digital, that technological engagement that maybe they don't have access to at home. So being able to really understand what our community's concerns are when they're not here, I think, should help to inform the way that we, if not the way that we use technology, the way that we communicate it to parents. There was another question that, oh, I was looking back at the expiring tech plan that you have because I remember I was thinking I was like I know I have seen this somewhere and I think like at its core I think of folks were really looked at the I think there are four different kind of priorities that you all had come up with they're really good priorities and I wonder If now going forward there we may we might think about it differentiate by age. So we have these four priorities that we're sort of talking about as a full district. But, you know, like in Cambridge, they're thinking like, OK, you don't necessarily want to just throw the baby out with bathwater, but. But having different priorities for different age groups and philosophies that we can articulate to parents might be like the next step in the process.

That's a great suggestion. Thank you.

I just wanted to mention that Representative Cruz helped to broker a partnership between the Latinos for Education and the Rennie Center that Salem Public Schools is participating in. It gets to your question around digital access. We're partnering with the Rennie Center, and they're going to help conduct a digital access gap analysis in Salem, review the findings, and then deliver some training with some tools to drive equity and tech-forward solutions in our community. So we're just getting started with that. Mark is going to go to Utah. The Latinos for Education is sponsoring that to a national conference around AI and technology. So I think he'll bring back some really good information around that. I do want to say that Rennie wanted to implement a survey to students and staff, but last week. And I just felt like that just, I didn't think our educators would receive that well. And so I said, you know, I had to say no. But did offer that we could do some focus groups in our summer programs with kids and so forth. So we'll want to figure out, you know, how to get them the information that they need to help us out. do some analysis and understand the landscape and the context a little bit better to help inform I think your work Mark with your team and for us as a district as a whole

Member Miranda.

This might be a question for Kate but in terms of the IEP process how much of that is done electronically versus paper.

The IEPs are all stored electronically and all the work is done electronically. Am I right on that? Yeah, Jenna's here and Monique. So we have a system. We're shifting systems now from eSped to... Bullypad. What is it? Lilypad. Lilypad, thank you. To a new system that is more user-friendly, I think both for families and students, but like all the notifications, a lot of that used to be paper, a lot of it's electronic now, but we do, we use an electronic system to do all the IEP paperwork.

Okay, awesome. I too, as other people have noted, have heard from parents and some concern around the amount of time on electronics, and I understand that that data will be collected over time. And so I don't mean to ask this question to say, like, give them more time, but also wondering if the district has looked into or if they would be interested in looking into some type of universal screening to kind of something electronic that we could facilitate for kids and kind of figure out where learning differences are and things like that.

So you're suggesting like we do use, we have universal screeners that we use in literacy so our star and other tools are part of our required state required literacy screeners so we are currently you know you leveraging online tools to do that for us in literacy in particular so that we can get good information bring parents into into the conversation if we have concerns if kids are behind and to do required intervention and monitoring of students who may be behind benchmarks. So we do have, I think, a really good system in place that our academics team has developed in partnership with special education and our student support team and Mark's team. So I think that that

i think your advice is good and we have um we do have a system like that in place amazing at some point um at another time i'd love to learn more about what exactly that screening children for and yeah thank you

I just had one question.

Only because you brought up the old Chromebook. What do we do currently with the old Chromebooks that we don't use? Because it feels like a lot of waste. And that's not on us. That's on our population as humans not building things to last or grow. But I love the idea of if there are families in need, is that something that would be possible? Or is that something that school community needs to do?

Yeah. So we have, um, so first what we usually, we try to get whatever we can out of the Chromebook. So oftentimes that might mean like pulling parts out of one Chromebook to fix another one. We do, I mean, middle school or slow or hard on the Chromebook. So, We spend a lot of time. But then once we get to a point, and really what drives it is MCAS. There's a point at which the state says you can no longer use this device for MCAS. And at that point, that's why K and 1 is kind of further behind because we don't have that requirement. And they will last longer. But once they can't be used for testing, it makes it really hard. So the ones that are... just damaged we we have a recycling it's the same recycling company that's used in salem during like the e-waste days that will come and they they remove all the data from the drives and recycle the chromebooks but if they're working what we usually what we've done in the past is bring a list of devices that we want to declare a surplus to the committee and have you all vote on it and when you do I usually put out we put out like an all call to the city and say like anybody that wants you know you can come have this device like we're not you sign you sign it away to you I'm not we can't support it any longer or guarantee that it's how well it works but you can have it we have had a couple people come and pick up some devices and then it goes to the recycling or we get used for parts

One more question. Do we teach kids how to treat these Chromebooks? I mean, I understand accidents happen, but I do understand teenagers had a few. But I just want to make sure that we are like, I think it's really important for the schools to reinforce that these are expensive tools that we use, and it is a privilege that we have these.

Yes, it's definitely, it's part of the library and digital skills curriculum in every grade level. We review Care of My Tools. I think the kindergarten, one of the first lessons is like how to carry the Chromebook with a gentle hug so that we're not swinging it around while we're walking with it. Every sixth grader, when we do that rising sixth grader Chromebook day, they all come in and I speak to them personally and explain, like, here's the deal. Like, this is your Chromebook. You're going to have this thing for three years. The better you take care of it, the better that you're going to it's going to work for you. So, you know, it's it's. It's challenging, but I think we have, since we've moved from carts, because we had carts in every Chromebook cart, and it was shared carts in the school up until this year, we saw a lot of damage there. And I think it was just kids, they had no personal responsibility over the device. It wasn't theirs. It was just a classroom device. Since this year, we moved back to kids. Each kid gets their own device that they walk around with during the day and then put. We've seen a lot less damage. And I think a lot of that is like this is it's yours. You put your stickers on it. You make it yours, like personalize it. But it is yours. And if you treat it poorly by eighth grade, it's not going to be as in good shape as it could be. We'll get it working. But I mean, it's if it's in rough shape like that's it's kind of on you. So hopefully we're building some of that like responsibility at the middle school level.

thank you yeah remember cornell um i just have another question about how we communicate to families the kind of i know we don't have the how often yet because we're going to collect that data but the the why and the how so for example i think I've heard you know parents have asked some questions and I wasn't quite sure where to send them about like here's the why you have somebody in second grade using a Chromebook and so you know not everybody's aware of the fact that you're taking MCAS on a Chromebook right so I'm just curious about where that stuff lives so that when community members have questions for us about like, well, why is my fourth grader using technology and, you know, how are they using technology? Is it in a group? You know, this, oh, I forgot my microphone, sorry. This came up because there was a conversation on Reddit where parents were asking, and people were trying to answer the questions about what they believed their kids were doing in class as effectively as they could, but they weren't quite sure. So where do we How well are we doing it? Can we do it better? And is there somewhere we can point people?

We're probably not doing it as well as we could be. I think that I read that Reddit thread. I frequented that thread during that conversation. And I think that I always say that the I in instructional is purposeful in my title because we are an instructional organization. And I do feel like my role straddles both operations and academics. So I am the right person, but it is a collaboration with myself and the academics team here. So I think that it's a well-taken point. I think that we can do some messaging over the summer and maybe in the fall to really talk about what technology is used for and why. And then when we have some of that data, we can also provide like here's... Because I do think like... I don't know that parents know. They're not in class. As far as they know, they could be sitting on a Chromebook all day long or not. I have a middle schooler. She didn't tell me a lot. So I think it's a well-taken point. I will effort that for sure.

I would concur with that. I think it's a good point, and we certainly could leverage the family newsletter, I think, better, as well as potentially the handbooks. There could be a section in there about what to expect with technology, what some of the acceptable usage expectations are, and then nothing in greater detail, but something that points to what they will be using technology for, and then we could leverage the newsletter for messaging throughout the year that serves as a reminder around key parts.

I else I'm looking at my technology that I thought it was going to be a last meeting the thank you.

Thanks Mark right next under superintendents for finance and operations. And

This evening I have just a few updates on our summer projects because as we close out the year, we are turning towards our summer work and getting our schools and play spaces ready for fall. So as I was thinking about how to share this with you, it seemed easier for you if I just shared a couple of slides. These slides were shared, mostly they were shared with the city council as part of our budget presentation on June 10th. So this first slide is just a reminder of the capital projects that we prioritized this year. The city did appropriate over $3.5 million to support our capital work this year, including funds for replacing the Bates roof. So we are in the accelerated repair phase. program and will be replacing the base roof and we anticipate that work happening next summer. So summer calendar year 27. We invested in ADA repairs primarily this year that was repairing the horseman sidewalk and ramp to make the entrance to the school more accessible. We, just to continue the technology theme, we did replace eighth grade and ninth grade Chromebooks as well as classroom displays. We purchased special ed devices and Chromebooks for Salem Prep and New Liberty. So that was part of our replacement cycle. Also, I think one of the most fun, well, there were some plenty of fun projects now that I look at that list. One is the new gym floor at the high school, which we were assured was a floor upon which the students were undefeated. And so may that continue. That floor, as you'll remember, is a portable floor so that when we build the new high school, we can pick up the pieces and move it to a different school. So that was purchased with intentionality and anticipation of using that for many years to come. We also continue to replace our playgrounds. So in 2022, we did an audit of all of the school district's playgrounds, and this year we replaced the Bates Early Childhood Playground, and that is a small picture of it on the screen. If you haven't had a chance to visit it, I urge you to do so. Next slide, please. So looking ahead, we have another busy summer planned. We are hosting summer school in the following locations, Collins, Horseman, Witchcraft, and Salem High School, limited programs at Salem High School. Most of the Salem High students will be here at Collins. And that is for climate control, that they will be here. We have better air conditioning. We are moving schools, as you know, this week, New Liberty and Salem Prep, all of their things will move to Carlton. The technology is scheduled to be moved on the 24th, and everything else is scheduled to be moved on the 25th and the 26th. So our crews will be in there this weekend, cleaning up, making sure we're ready to vacate the space, and we're anticipating doing a walkthrough with our landlord, either on Monday or Tuesday. We are planning to move, we are moving all of the New Liberty and Prep furniture and belongings into the gym at the Carlton building as a staging area because their move happens first. So we expect the move from Carlton to the new Sarah Parker Raymond school to happen the first week of August. In the meantime, July will be spent getting the current Saltonstall building transformed into the future Sarah Parker Raymond. At the Saltonstall building and all the other schools, there are some internal moves, classrooms that are changing, and things that will keep our custodial staff quite busy. We are hiring professional movers for the New Liberty and Prep move, as well as the Carlton to Sarah Parker Raymond move. So our custodians will be doing the rest. And as always, we're planning a deep clean of every building. We will scrub and wax every surface. Witchcraft will get its parking lot lines repainted. And then we will work our way through the open work orders throughout the district. So anything that's going in related to light bulbs, HVAC, et cetera, will be repaired or replaced this summer. So that's on our general fund. Could you go to the next slide, please? So, this is a picture of our FY27 capital budget from the city. The amount is a little more than $3 million. The bar highlighted in yellow are funds that we are requesting from the state for replacing the witchcraft boilers. So, if we are able to secure funding for that through state or federal sources, then that will be another million-dollar project on top of that. So what will we do with those funds? Next slide, please. We are planning to replace the Horace Mann Early Childhood Playground. This was the next playground on our list, and that is this summer's project. We are investing in security and life safety, so new fire panels for Bates and Horace Mann and new PA systems at the Bentley Building and at Witchcraft Heights. We are under mechanical, electrical, and plumbing, which if you ever wondered what MEP stands for, that's what it stands for. And HVAC, we are planning to replace the lights, all the lights at Bentley, converting them to LEDs, and make HVAC repairs district-wide, including in this building. We are also planning to replace the air conditioning at Bentley. Bentley is the only building without central air conditioning, and so we did budget to replace the window units. We're currently working with the city to determine if that's the most effective and economical way to ensure there is air conditioning. The long-term plan is probably to apply to the MSBA accelerator repair. program, but that would be a year or two down the road. So in the meantime, we need to make sure, since we're staying in the building and we're doubling our commitment to it, that there is our conditioning. And then we are planning outstanding ADA work repairs, so requests that have come in over the years. Those will happen and will be funded through our capital project, including curb cuts. We do plan to repave at Bentley. We'll invest in new signage for the Sarah Parker Raymond School. And these investments from the capital budget will complement those on our operating budget. For technology, Mark mentioned we'll be replacing the K1 Chromebooks since they are older than the children in those grades. We'll replace the 9th grade Chromebooks, some staff Chromebooks, as well as touch Chromebooks for STEP and TIDE special education programs and the touch view screens. And then there's one last slide. Oh, great. Last slide. The rest of the capital projects, we will paint the Sarah Parker Raymond and Bentley building. You'll recall in the budget process, we talked about prioritizing these two buildings this summer. I mentioned the backlog repairs and playground accessibility. We'll repave at Bentley the new signage, as I mentioned. We also received funds for a new rack body vehicle for buildings and grounds. So the current rack body is the big truck that we use for landscaping, snow removal, for moving furniture and equipment. It is more than 15 years old and we rely on it. So we are planning to replace it this summer. And then we've got other interior upgrades. planned, including a vestibule for visitors as they arrive at Bentley, new restroom partitions at Witchcraft, a glass divider at Horace Mann, and then investments in the Salton Stall, soon to be Sarah Parker Raymond building, including the auditorium. So we did receive an earmark from the fair share amendment, and this investment in the auditorium was identified by the school community as a priority, so it's part of our investment in the new Sarah Parker Raymond School. And that short list is what we plan to do this summer. We invite you to tour with us as the projects are underway or come and see the finished products in August.

Any questions from committee members on...

presentation member Hoffman I just have a question when we were talking about the air conditioning event me is are we gonna look into those heat pumps with that I don't know if that would be more

Not this year. We, as a part of the city, we share the city's goals of becoming greener and reducing our carbon footprint. We anticipate any sort of greening or major overhaul of the HVAC system, such as it is, would be what we would apply to the MSBA's accelerator repair program. Program for so we're looking at the best ways to reduce our carbon footprint while keeping a building cool now While looking ahead to the a longer-term Investment in that building and then Any other questions Thank you very much

That's it for your report. All right. Subcommittee reports. Any of the subcommittees have reports to share? I'm a superintendent search update so we had left on this agenda from the previous meeting a discussion of the interview questions for the upcoming interviews in it in the event that members wanted to change or discuss the questions that we had previously discussed in light of the community forums and I guess I will open up if there's any interest in revisiting the 8 questions that we had previously discussed. And we're stuck.

Thank you. I have no suggestions for changes to the questions. Listening to the forum, I want to thank the public for submitting their questions. I thought it was a good collection of questions. There were some good follow-up questions. There was an outstanding question that we had on the questions at the last meeting regarding follow-ups. So we can ask follow-up questions. Can we ask follow-up questions on other members' questions? I don't know if we were able to get an answer on that yet, but that was really my only question.

Are you asking that like from a legal standpoint? Are you allowed to ask?

I did, but I haven't heard back from counsel yet. I mean, we have a week, so hopefully she'll get back to me before then.

All right. Move over, Miranda.

I had a question about that as well. I did a little bit of digging, couldn't find anything that specified legal restrictions on that, and so just would like to state that I'm fine with keeping my questions as they are here, but I would like to reserve the right to ask a follow-up question while also acknowledging that we can't have this go on forever. But to be able to ask questions that come up in the moment is important to me, and to be able to potentially ask a brief follow-up question is important. Thank you. Great.

Yeah, it's a fair point. I think with eight questions, if every one of us has a follow-up question to each eight questions, be a very long evening. We'll try to get an answer from the legal counsel. Yeah. Member Parnell.

So I would just ask everybody, like assuming the answer is yes, which I think it is, that you can ask a follow-up question that relates to the question you're asking. If the answer comes back from Council that like if member Hoffman asked a question and then you have a follow-up question to that do we want to set some ground rules for ourselves so that we're not going bananas like restrict that to 2 or like one additional person. I don't know how people want to handle handle that because we're not going to be able to have this conversation before we have those interviews.

I'll open it up to the membership. My feeling is that since we have eight questions, having no more than two follow-up questions with the first right to ask a follow-up question being with the person that asked the question, they felt like they didn't get as much information as they wanted. But if they don't use that follow-up question, then other members, up to two members, could ask a follow-up question. Does that?

I'm not sure. I don't know what that means. I'm sorry. Can you repeat that?

So you ask a question of one of the candidates, and if it's allowable under the law, right, you're entitled to ask a follow-up question if you want to clarify or explore something further. And then one other member could also ask a follow-up question. If you choose not to ask your follow-up question, two other members could ask a follow-up question. So there could be up to two follow-up questions with the member that asked the question initially getting the first opportunity.

Okay.

I understand the intent and the desire to want to put guardrails like that on that. I just don't think it's needed. I think if we have follow-up questions that we want to ask and they're not answered and somebody asks it in a different way, I think that that's acceptable and we should just make sure we have an open time for the evening. I think we all are respectful of each other's times, and hopefully we won't have five-hour meetings, but I think it's important to ask our questions that need to be asked, like how are we going to decide who gets that one follow-up question if all four of us want one, or six, seven, however many there are.

Don't say six, seven.

Stop that. I've told you before. That's just my opinion.

So are you suggesting that We just leave it open or, oh, you are, okay. All right.

Okay. member miranda i agree with that um and also i think it's it's would be appropriate for us to just kind of you know remind another person um if they're taking up a lot of space but then separate from that question of being able to ask follow-up questions um what if something comes up in the moment that hasn't not been brought up Will we be able to ask a question that's maybe not related to somebody's question?

I believe that we have to ask the same questions of all the finalists. So we wouldn't be able to create a new question spontaneously for somebody that wasn't asked of the other candidates.

Is that, like, best practice or, like, a legal requirement? Because I'm just wondering, like, the three candidates, there may be specific things. Like, I'll speak for myself. Like, there's specific things that I would want to learn more about from each candidate based on, like, their work experience. And so wondering, like, where's the space for that kind of dialogue if it's so scripted?

I think this is what why the question came up about how how we do this and so Colby and her associate both sort of sent the law which is why we have to have this meeting in general because we have to agree that these are the questions that are going to be as I think the yes you have to answer you have to ask the same questions of every candidate that's the legal piece of it and then when I had a sort of offhand conversation with Colby before I asked him a little bit more formally, it was, yes, follow up questions are in bounds to those questions. But like, I do think we need more clarity around because to your point, like I have the same thing I would like to know in certain circumstances, like how they achieved X or whatever. So hopefully I'll just poker a little bit more and then I can have counsel respond to everybody so everybody is clear.

Member Hoffman?

So if we ask the first follow-up question with the first candidate, does the same follow-up question have to be in the net? It's just only the first question.

I think it would be helpful to get from legal counsel a very specific guideline for us to have before the interviews.

One more thing I'm also wondering like it might be good for us to kind of see how somebody would respond to a question that they don't know is coming and if they're paying attention and you know they'll see this list but Just from our perspective, it might be helpful to be able to ask something that they're not kind of preparing for.

I could see the value in that. I think we also have to be mindful if the law says we have to do something a certain way, that it's a problem, it's a flaw with the law. But if we're allowed to do that, then I think that's totally fair. Member Stott?

I think that was one of the great aspects of the public forums, to have the public be able to get up and ask their questions that, you know, were not prescripted. Is there any, there's no public comment portion of this, okay.

So as far as the upcoming interviews, for the public's awareness, we have Thomas Welch on July 6th, Jorge Allen on July 7th, and Andrew Bott on July 9th. All of the interviews will take place at 6 p.m. here in the school committee chambers, and they will be streamed on SCTV and via Zoom. the The feedback form so hopefully people will have the opportunity to see the community forums They are recorded and they're available at Salem k12 org search the feedback form is on that same website and it closes on Next Friday, June 26, to allow time for the team to pull together the feedback and provide it to the school committee. Folks who are interested in providing feedback are asked to complete the form once for each finalist that you wish to provide feedback on. And the form is available in English, Spanish, Portuguese, and Haitian Creole. I think that concludes the superintendent search update.

This is anything else members members stopped to have a date for the final meeting.

So we are holding July 15th Wednesday July 15th at 07.00PM for special school committee meeting to deliberate and potentially vote on this election. OUR NEXT ITEM IS ITEM NUMBER NINE, MOTIONS AND RESOLUTIONS, RATIFICATION OF THE EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF SPECIAL EDUCATIONS CONTRACT.

I DON'T HAVE ANYTHING TO SAY OTHER THAN THIS IS A CONTRACT THAT THE SCHOOL COMMITTEE IS UNDER YOUR PURVIEW TO APPROVE. I THINK JEN DOUCETTE LEE HAS DONE AN OUTSTANDING JOB SERVING IN THIS ROLE. She's been very forward thinking. I think she's further developed our programs here in the district. She's forged really strong cross collaboration with our academics and student support teams that I think really, you know, pay off. well for our educators and our students, and has done some significant work around engaging families in ways that we haven't seen in recent years. So I strongly recommend and advocate for the approval of this three-year contract for her.

Is there a motion?

A motion to approve the three-year contract for Jen Doucet-Lee. I'll second.

Motion made by Member Cornell, seconded by Member Miranda. Under discussion? Member Miranda.

I do just have a quick question. What has changed between this contract and the last one, if anything at all? And I'm particularly looking at the salary here and just want to know if there's been any changes to that.

Yes. So, that's a good question. Yes, the salary has been adjusted, you know, to recognize her work. We also did comps with other communities in this local area. We brought her vacation days comparable with all the other executive directors and school principals, and we converted the one thousand dollars that was in there for a professional membership to be to for tuition reimbursement so those were the three adjustments awesome thank you so much any further discussion seeing none roll call vote on the motion

Member Hoffman. Yes. Member Miranda. Yes. Member Stott. Yes. Member Byas. Yes. Member Cornell.

Yes.

And myself, yes. The motion carries. Newsletter items.

Okay, so in the updates section I have update on candidate visits and the technology update because that's something important to our community. For upcoming, I'm going to list the superintendent candidate visits. important votes are new liberty and carlton innovation plans and for upcoming calendar items i'm going to include the summer capital projects the interview schedule and the potential deliberation and vote on july 15th is there anything else that i'm missing remember miranda

Did we, and I'm sorry if you sent this already, but in terms of the schedule for the year, do we have that down somewhere?

We do not have that written publicly, no, which is not helpful. So maybe I can, you and I can.

work on that getting it published the calendars like of regular meetings in the schools are the school committee count the time it's committed. The topics are just the meeting that topics. Oh yeah, but we just had those scoped out through the end of this year right so we'll have to work on that okay.

I don't love an announcement. It's an announcement over Hoffman.

I would just like to remind everyone Pride is Saturday and the Salem Public Schools are marching in the parade. The lineup is 11.30 at Shetland Park. Rick Burton is the teacher, they use they, them pronouns, that will be lining everyone up and be the point person, I should say, there. And I hope everyone has a happy Pride.

Announcements I'll also share the Salem summer eats kickoff is going to be Monday the 29th at Palmer Cove Park from 4 to 6 hopefully folks and come on down for that and be sure to check the district website for more information about the summer eats locations and schedule for free meals. Is another motion.

Motion to adjourn second.

Motion made by member Miranda. Second by member Hoffman. Under discussion? Seeing none, member Miranda?

Yes.

Member Stott?

Yes.

Member Bias? Yes. Member Cornell? Yeah. Member Hoffman? Yes. Myself? Yes. We are adjourned. Thank you, everybody.