Note: These proposed minutes should be considered preliminary until they are approved by the
board at a future meeting.
WINDHAM SOUTHEAST SCHOOL DISTRICT (WSESD) BOARD
TUESDAY, OCTOBER 24, 2023
REGULAR BOARD MEETING – 6PM
HYBRID MEETING: DUMMERSTON SCHOOL AND REMOTELY VIA ZOOM
DRAFT MINUTES
Summary:
● A student representative on the board shared about an unmet need for students to make social connections during class.
● The administration presented about the budgeting process and timeline, including the need to make adjustments now that ESSER funding has been discontinued.
● There was a discussion about whether the district should continue administering student climate surveys twice a year in order to improve school climate. Ultimately the board voted to follow the administration’s recommendation to conduct the survey only once a year.
● The board voted to re-adopt three updated policies: E10 – School Crisis Prevention & Response, E15 – Security Cameras and F9 – Student Substance Abuse Prevention. The board presented three more updated policies for a first reading: C9 – Notice of Non-Discrimination, D11 – Public Complaints about Personnel, and F2 – Bus Discipline.
● The board approved $458,735.95 of carry over funds for EES from last year’s budget. These funds were unused due to not being able to find a contractor for planned kitchen renovations at the Birge Street facility and having to close some classrooms due to lack of staff. The funds will be used to complete the renovations under a scaled down plan using internal staff and for retention and wellness bonuses for employees.
● The board discussed adding the SEPAC to meetings they promote on the WSESD facebook page. They will seek input from the Special Education administrator and consider further at a future meeting.
WSESD Board Members Present: Chair Kelly Young (KY), Anne Beekman (AB), Jayden Gonzalez (JG) Non-Voting Student Representative, Alora Lawyer (AL) Non-Voting Student Representative, Tim Maciel (TM), Ruby McAdoo (RMC), Robin Morgan (RMO), Shaun Murphy (SM), Eva Nolan (EN), Kimberly Price (KP), Matt Schibley (MS), Deborah Stanford (DS)
WSESD Board Members Absent: none
WSESU/SD Staff and Administrators Present: Mark Speno, Frank Rucker, Paul Smith, Nancy Wiese, Deborah Gass, Brin Tucker, Keith Lyman, Julianne Eagan, Mary Kaufman, John Gagnon, Kate Margaitis, Jon Sessions, Kelly Dias, Deb Schiller, Flo Levin.
Media Present: BCTV, Chris Mays (Brattleboro Reformer)
Others Present: Liz Adams of Putney, Mindy Haskins Rogers BUHS alumna, Sherri Keefe, Attorney Pietro Lynn.
Please note: attendance may be incomplete.
I. CALL TO ORDER
KY called the meeting to order at 6pm.
KY read the hybrid meeting statement.
● Review of Agenda
There were no amendments or adjustments made to the agenda at this time.
II. STUDENT MATTERS
AL spoke to the importance of students’ need to socialize as a part of school. She noted it’s generally discouraged during class and she often doesn’t even know her classmates’ names. TM added that the SRO Report from 2022 supported AL’s statement: one of the findings was that there were many students who did not know their classmates’ names after spending a whole semester in class with them.
KY noted that Superintendent Speno was taking notes on this matter.
III. ADMINISTRATIVE REPORT
Superintendent Mark Speno gave his report.
● New Hires/Resignations
Mr. Speno announced two new hires:
● Cindy Henry, First Grade teacher at Green Street School
● Eduardo José Juan Melendez Rodriguez, Co-op Coordinator at WRCC
MOTION BY AB TO APPROVE THE NEW HIRES.
A discussion ensued on whether the packets with information on new hires were sent to all Board members; some Board members had not received them. Mr. Speno shared printed copies of the packets with Board members.
RMO asked for clarification on the WRCC Co-Op Coordinator position. AB responded: This person helps students moving into careers or training coordinate this to fit in with their career center education.
VOTE ON THE AB MOTION: MOTION CARRIED UNANIMOUSLY.
Mr. Speno announced the BUHS Leadership Council has proposed Stephanie Bonin as its chair. She has been part of this Leadership Council for a few years.
MOTION BY DS TO APPROVE STEPHANIE BONIN AS THE BUHS LEADERSHIP
COUNCIL CHAIR. MOTION CARRIED UNANIMOUSLY.
Mr. Speno announced parent conferences are coming up, and students’ Vermont Comprehensive Assessment Program (VTCAP) results will be available at those meetings. VTCAP is a new statewide summative assessment that was first conducted last spring. The district has created a video to support parents in interpreting the results.
Mr. Speno announced the second edition of the SU Connection will be out early next week.
● The budgetary process, how the Budget is built to meet the goals and established timeframes leading up to 03/2024
Mr. Speno said the budget-development process is exciting because it is when we can highlight our values and goals, and what we need to achieve this.
WSESU Business Administrator Frank Rucker reviewed the budget-development process and timeline.
Highlights included:
● The sharing of documents: “School District Budget Development Preliminary Timeline FY2025,” and “FY25 Budget Planning Overview Memo.”
● An explanation of the budget development memo, which is an internal document used to review budget planning completed by school principals. This document is developed with a focus on how to replicate and enhance successes and how to staff schools in a way that will support goals identified in the Continuous Improvement Plan (CIP), such as a 10% increase in literacy proficiency and student kindness.
● A review of the budget timeline and its components.
◦ Statute dictates the meeting and warning dates, so the timeline is developed by working backwards from our annual meeting date of March 19, 2024. In order to publish the annual review in time for consideration at that meeting, the Board will need to approve a final version of the budget at their last meeting in January, 2024. The official public budget hearing is on February 28, 2024.
◦ To determine the budget goal amounts, we will need data from the Agency of Education (AOE) which is supposed to arrive in December.
◦ In November the Finance committee will begin meeting weekly to develop Elementary and Secondary budgets, with the input of the Independent Budget Review Committee who attend each meeting.
◦ Because ESSER funds are no longer being distributed, we will not be able to continue our spending at this level without putting taxpayers in a difficult situation. Budget development includes assessing the effectiveness of things that were added to address school needs during the COVID emergency and how to address existing needs going forward.
◦ Mr. Speno described the budgeting timeline as an approach to get to the endgame, which is a vote by the public. He emphasized the need to speak with all stakeholders, including parents, Parent-Teacher organizations, Leadership Councils, and relationships with community partners, and evaluate what’s working and what’s not.
MS asked about school or district conversations with mental health organizations and Success Beyond Six. Success Beyond Six is an arrangement between the AOE and Department of Mental Health that was established in 1993. It allows schools to contract with the Department of Mental Health for school social workers, clinicians, and behavioral interventionists. The local designated agency is HCRS. Mr. Rucker replied that during the pandemic, many mental health services community partners were overwhelmed and that’s where the district chose to make investments – nurses, school social workers, etc.
RMC spoke to the very positive effect of having social workers available at every school. If any reduction in this is presented, she asked to see a report or presentation to explain the justification for that.
EN asked about addressing the disparities reflected in student data between students of different levels of economic privilege. Mr. Speno assured the board that this is taken into consideration very profoundly in data meetings. Mr. Rucker added that the statewide Picus Study conducted in 2016 actually held two WSESD schools up as an example of how to close the opportunity gap between low and average socio-economic status students in a fiscally sustainable way – Academy and Oak Grove.
Mr. Speno said that systems development is at the top of the list that the administrative team is working on. There have been some great stories shared at school data meetings where teams have made some decisions that drastically improved outcomes. Julianne Eagan shared that current Dummerston School fourth graders are a great example. Their kindergarten and first grade years were highly disrupted by COVID. They came into second grade very impacted by that – out of 19 students, only one was proficient in literacy. By the end of third grade the class was more than 70% proficient in literacy. The VTCAP data from last spring showed them as 74% proficient. This success was due to decisions by the second and third grade teams to completely rework their tier one instruction.
IV. CONSENT AGENDA
● Clerk’s Report – Approval of Minutes – October 10, 2023
MOTION BY KP TO APPROVE THE MINUTES OF OCTOBER 10, 2023. MOTION
CARRIED UNANIMOUSLY.
Due to technical difficulties with the zoom feed, KY altered the order of the agenda to push Public Comment and Sexual Abuse Investigation Update to later in the meeting in order to provide greater access for people to comment during those parts of the meeting.
VI. UNFINISHED BUSINESS
B. Follow-up on CIP & timing of future Panorama climate surveys
TM provided some history on the Panorama school climate surveys, presented a motion, and spoke in favor of the motion. The full text of his statement is as follows:
“Let me begin with very brief background information for our newer members. For the past two years, the District has conducted Panorama Student Climate Surveys – as well as Panorama Family surveys and a Panorama Teacher Perception of Students survey – in the fall and spring. These are highly research-based surveys conducted in all 50 states and in over a thousand schools. The Panorama Student Climate Survey asks students questions about their social and emotional learning, school climate and student learning. It is given to students in Grades 3 – 12. It is done online, takes about 30 minutes to complete and is completely confidential. The District needs the results of the survey to understand student SEL needs and to plan support and training for these needs. The board needs the results of the survey to continue to provide oversight and support of district and school goals.
Questions in the Student Climate survey are in three categories:
1. School climate. Perceptions of the overall social and learning climate of the school.
2. Sense of Belonging. How much students feel they are valued members of the school community.
3. Custom questions designed by the District, e.g. “I am respected by the adults in my school.”
This school board has shown a strong interest in these surveys. At our July 25th regular board meeting, the importance of conducting school climate surveys was discussed. At that time, I believe it was understood that they would be done in the fall and spring. At the August 22nd Board meeting, the board passed a motion unanimously to release the full results of both the fall 2022 and spring 2023 surveys. Later, at the September 26th meeting, the administration presented the Continuous Improvement Plan. One of the District goals for the year was to increase the positive response to a single item on the Panorama survey, “Students at my school are kind to one another.” More specifically, the goal was to show an increase in favorable responses by 10% by June of this year, a goal that has also been adopted by many of our schools.
However, just recently at the last board meeting when I asked when the survey would be done, we were told it was scheduled for February and later it was confirmed that it would be done just once a year. This change has not been included in any of the reports to the board nor is it reflected in the SD Admin calendar, which still has a Panorama Climate Survey presentation scheduled for May. The board, like the administration, makes data driven decisions all the time but maybe we just haven’t expressed our need for Panorama Student Climate survey results twice a year in order to continue to track data over time. My hope is that revisions to our Continuous Improvement Plan Policy (G-8) will clarify when and how the board receives data on student climate and academic learning. However, at this time, I would like to make the following motion:”
MOTION BY TM THAT THE PANORAMA STUDENT CLIMATE SURVEY CONTINUE TO BE ADMINISTERED TWICE A YEAR, IN THE FALL AND SPRING.
“My main argument against doing it just once a year in February is that the results of a survey done in the middle of winter just cannot be reliably compared to results we’ve seen in fall and spring. It’s kind of like comparing apples to snowballs. And so we would have to wait until February 2025 to track progress. Also, if there is benefit to students in conducting climate surveys, as we’ve heard, then there is more benefit in doing them twice a year. The argument about survey burnout just doesn’t stand up to a 30-minute survey done online at a time convenient for the student over a two-week period. This just doesn’t seem like a burden. Also how can schools measure progress on their stated goals in June if the survey is done only in February? How can the board, at the end of the academic year, determine if the interventions, the additional resources, including social workers, the refinement of policies, the effort to engage students and families, the focus on PBIS and restorative practices – how can we know these are making a difference if we survey only in February? And so, I am very much in favor of the motion.”
A discussion ensued. The board invited feedback from administrators.
Mr. Speno said that the district has been collecting student data for 15 years. Student voice is a top priority. It is important to hear from them and to take those data points seriously and make decisions to change the trajectory of trends in that data. The Board hired Dr. Chris Overtree as a consultant to evaluate school climate. His recommendation was to shift back to only conducting surveys once a year in the spring, because the administration already has an immense amount of student data and because many students are still getting adjusted to new school sites in the fall. Panorama is not the only way to assess how our systems are working. There will be multiple opportunities in the board meeting planning calendar that will highlight how we are doing in all of our schools to support our students. Our goal is to improve. Mr. Speno did not recall a decision by the board to continue conducting the Panorama surveys twice a year.
Paul Smith added that Mr. Overtree said in his presentation to the board that we should think about student climate data in longer term thinking rather than chasing results from fall to spring.
KY asked whether having information about school climate twice a year would offer more opportunity for making improvement. Mr Speno replied that this is already addressed in our CIP. Goals were developed in reflection of the data from last spring. There are three data meetings throughout the year and administrators take time to set goals for cohorts and individual students.
Nancy Wiese compared students in the fall to people starting a new job and still in the honeymoon phase of their relationship with their workplace. She said that an assessment in February provides a more accurate view of how students are feeling at school.
Brin Tucker elaborated on different types of assessment data. Panorama is a summative assessment like the VTCAP for academic data – it provides data on the general outcome. It’s not obvious what the benefit would be to conducting that more frequently. The data meetings provide opportunity for another type of assessment – formative assessment of what is happening in the moment. At every data meeting, there is a portion of the meeting devoted to social-emotional learning (SEL). Data teams also look at things like behavioral referrals and time spent in and out of the classroom. These conversations also include kindergarten and first grade students who aren’t able to participate in Panorama surveys. Building in opportunities for all of those layers of assessment is a top goal of every teacher that she works with.
DS asked what is the starting point to compare formative assessments to when we’re looking for progress? Is it the prior year’s spring summative report?
Julianne Eagan said that one of her takeaways from working with Dr. Overtree in terms of the climate data was that even if a school is doing great work and making great improvements, you will not see the needle on school climate move that drastically over the course of a year. It’s different than academic data where schools are doing student progress monitoring every six weeks and expecting to see visible growth. She also emphasized the importance of not conflating SEL skills with climate data.
KP advocated for taking the recommendation of the consultant hired by the board to only do climate surveys once a year.
EN expressed concerns about the number of students completing climate surveys and said that an advantage of doing surveys twice a year would be to capture more students in the responses. She also emphasized the importance of teacher surveys and talked about how adding open-ended questions could give us a lot more information about what students are experiencing.
RMO acknowledged the value of open-ended questions noting that there are a lot of ways schools can assess student climate beyond the Panorama survey. She asked the administration to clarify why the district began conducting fall climate surveys so the board can better understand the choice to discontinue that practice. Mr. Speno replied that it was to help the district understand where school climate was at after the disruption of COVID.
MS asked whether there is a financial difference between doing one survey and two? Paul Smith replied the difference is minimal, just a small amount of time for students and teachers. Keith Lyman added that schools are trying to build systems to analyze and break down that data with their leadership teams. He cited a presentation by Steve Ventura where Mr. Ventura urged them not to collect data just for the sake of collecting data. There are certain key areas that are really important and those points aren’t changing significantly from fall to spring.
RMC recalled hearing a presentation by the administration that stated we were going from two survey as a year to one. She acknowledged the frustration present in this conversation, noting that administrators seemed to be feeling of a lack of trust from the board, while board members seemed to feel a lack of detail being shared. She urged everyone to remember that we are all trying to do the same thing and improve things for our students. She suggested the board consider the language in the CIP policy that recommends a committee composed of various types of stakeholders involved at every level of the process, noting that that hasn’t manifested in a way that the board is happy with. She also questioned whether the board was happy with Dr. Overtree’s work. She suggested assembling an ad hoc group that can have some conversations and come back with some understanding and alignment.
TM added that in the Washington DC school district, every school does Panorama surveys twice a year. They are a model of how to use Panorama very well.
VOTE ON THE PANORAMA MOTION:
ROLL CALL VOTE:
SM NAY
RMO NAY
MS NAY
TM YEA
DS YEA
AB NAY
KP NAY
EN YEA
RMC NAY
MOTION FAILED 6-3.
KY called for a break at 7:42pm.
KY called the meeting back into order at 7:48pm.
V. PUBLIC COMMENT ON NON-AGENDA ITEMS
Liz Adams of Putney lamented this meeting’s technical challenges with the zoom feed cutting out multiple times. She noted that this happened last time the Board met at the Dummerston School in 2020. She asked if there was a way to learn ahead of time if the Zoom connection would work at different school sites where meetings are to be held.
KY responded: she asked the administration to look into this.
VI. UNFINISHED BUSINESS
A. Sexual Abuse Investigation
KY reported she has received no further information from the attorneys.
Mindy Haskins Rogers of Northampton, Massachusetts asked if KY knows when a report will arrive. KY responded: she has made requests for a report through the Board’s attorney. She assured the public that she remembers the request to indicate differently on the agenda so that people understand when there is something substantial to share.
C. Policy & Amendment presents the following to be re-adopted:
● E10 – School Crisis Prevention & Response
● E15 – Security Cameras
● F9 – Student Substance Abuse Prevention
MOTION BY DS: THE POLICY AND AMENDMENT COMMITTEE PRESENTS THE FOLLOWING FOR RE-ADOPTION: E10 — SCHOOL CRISIS PREVENTION & RESPONSE. MOTION CARRIED UNANIMOUSLY.
MOTION BY DS: THE POLICY AND AMENDMENT COMMITTEE PRESENTS THE FOLLOWING FOR RE-ADOPTION: E15 — SECURITY CAMERAS. MOTION CARRIED UNANIMOUSLY.
MOTION BY DS: THE POLICY AND AMENDMENT COMMITTEE PRESENTS THE FOLLOWING FOR RE-ADOPTION: F9 — STUDENT SUBSTANCE ABUSE PREVENTION. MOTION CARRIED UNANIMOUSLY.
VIII. NEW BUSINESS
A. Policy & Amendment presents the following for 1st Reading:
● C9 – Notice of Non-Discrimination
● D11 – Public Complaints about Personnel
● F2 – Bus Discipline
DS announced these policies are now in their 10-day reading period. She encouraged everyone to read them and send comments to her, AB, EN, or TM.
RMO asked about bus discipline, specifically when bus company staff’s interaction with students does not align with District policies. A discussion ensued. RMO will send more details about her question in an email.
B. EES Request for approval of Carryover Funds from 22-23 fiscal year
EES Director Deborah Gass requested permission to carry over $458,735.95 from the Head Start/Early Head Start fiscal year that ended on June 30 to the present fiscal year that began on July 1. She reported the reasons for the carry-over:
● Some of these funds were carried over from FY22 to make repairs to the Birge Street facility’s kitchen. Because it has been difficult to find a contractor, the project was not begun. They have revised the plan and downsized the scale of the project. As a result, they will be able to use their own facilities team to do some of the work, outsourcing the electrical and plumbing work, with
a reduced final cost.
● The rest of the carryover funds are from vacant staff positions for classrooms they weren’t able to open because they were not able to find staff. They will use these to pay staff retention and wellness bonuses until a change of scope is approved and then this funding allocation will be converted to permanent staff salary increases.
MOTION BY AB TO APPROVE THE CARRY-OVER OF $458,735.95 FROM THE 2022/2023 FISCAL YEAR TO THE 2023/2024 FISCAL YEAR.
RMC asked for clarification on whether EES is under the administration of the WSESU Board or the WSESD Board. Ms. Gass responded that the Head Start/Early Head Start grant is administered through the WSESD.
VOTE ON THE EES CARRYOVER FUNDS MOTION: MOTION CARRIED UNANIMOUSLY.
VIII. BOARD MATTERS / TRAINING
A. Leadership Council Updates
BUHS
TM reported that this Leadership Council recently met. BUHS is resuming its student travel abroad program. He asked if there could be a discussion on how to help students participate who cannot afford the program’s costs.
RMC asked Mr. Speno about appointments of leadership council members and orientations. Mr. Speno responded that he had hoped to offer a list of LC members for appointment at this meeting, but some LCs have had trouble identifying a chair and recruiting members, so he is delaying that until a subsequent meeting.
B. Board Sub-Committees
◦ Communications Council
RMC noted that there was a request on the WSESD facebook page for the page to promote Special Education Parent Advisory Committee (SEPAC) meetings. She asked the board whether they would like to have the Communications Council post SEPAC agendas and minutes, or any other district committees that exist but aren’t a body of the school board, such as the WSESU Diversity and Equity Committee (DEC). She asked about board representation on these committees. She also asked whether the website could be adjusted to make it easier for people to find information on these meetings.
RMO noted that she had conferred with the WSESU DEC, who said they did not need help promoting.their meetings as they have their own social media presence and the meetings are predominantly a work meeting for DEC teachers. She shared that she had attended the most recent WSESU meeting and requested a board presence on the SEPAC and AB had volunteered to attend their meetings.
Paul Smith said that as the website is being maintained by the district, people can send him suggestions for adjustments to make it more user-friendly.
MOTION BY RMO THAT WE SHARE THE SEPAC AGENDAS AND MINUTES ON THE WSESD BOARD FACEBOOK PAGE.
RMA noted that for the Communications Council to be able to share their agendas to the WSESD Board facebook page, they need to be posted on the WSESU website.
Paul Smith recommended consulting with Special Education Director Tate Erickson.
RMO WITHDREW THE MOTION.
She volunteered to check in with Mr. Erickson and report back at the next board meeting.
C. BOARD TRAINING RESOURCES
KY thanked TM for sharing resources. She encouraged other Board members to do the same.
IX. EXECUTIVE SESSION
MOTION BY DS TO FIND THAT PREMATURE PUBLIC KNOWLEDGE WOULD
CLEARLY PLACE THE PUBLIC BODY OR PERSON INVOLVED IN SUBSTANTIAL
DISADVANTAGE UNDER 1 V.S.A. §313(1)(D) GRIEVANCES OTHER THAN TAX
GRIEVANCES, PROVIDED THAT THE PUBLIC BODY SHALL MAKE A FINAL
DECISION IN OPEN MEETING. MOTION CARRIED UNANIMOUSLY.
MOTION BY KP TO ENTER EXECUTIVE SESSION UNDER 1 V.S.A. §313(1)(D)
GRIEVANCES OTHER THAN TAX GRIEVANCES, PROVIDED THAT THE PUBLIC BODY
SHALL MAKE A FINAL DECISION IN OPEN MEETING. INVITING IN MARK SPENO,
PIETRO LYNN, AND FRANK RUCKER. MOTION CARRIED UNANIMOUSLY.
The Board entered into Executive Session at 8:20pm.
KY announced the Board would take no action.
The Board rose from Executive session at 9:09.
MOTION BY AB TO ADJOURN. MOTION CARRIED UNANIMOUSLY.
The meeting was adjourned at 9:12.
Documents presented:
● New hires information packet
● School District Budget Development Preliminary Timeline FY2025
● FY25 Budget Planning Overview Memo
Submitted by WSESD Board Clerk Robin Morgan from minutes taken by Wendy M. Levy
This represents my understanding of the above dated meeting. If you have any changes, please submit
them at the next board meeting.
