Budget FY23: Board of Ed

 Hills: meeting before the November meeting
DESE budget and DESE priorities
understand the priorities the Commissioner has laid out

just missed the beginning of what Bill Bell said..will come back to this

Commissioner's goals for coming year

They're here
Riley says they fall under "recover" and "reimagine"
Morton asks about change in assessment
Riley needs to be more engaging, more collaborative, more reflective of outside of school
more coming
Moriarty "delighted" to see early literacy as one of the priorities

Hills: will you avail yourself of midyear assessments to see progress rather than just MCAS?
so does Hills just want to run districts directly? Does he know how poorly equipped the Department is to do that?
Hills: next mix of key objectives here, do you have the staffing you need?
Riley: believe in constant improvement

I'm noticing that there is literally no mention of the trauma of the past year, no mention of mental health supports, no mention of any of the "non-learning" parts of school

Stewart: don't want to let up on vocational admission issue
"to say that we're going to wait and see doesn't sit right with me"
Peyser just went piece by piece and dismissed concerns
Moriarty shouldn't comment without their being there (hm, they don't seem to apply that to Boston)
Hills effectively saying they should stay at their level 

October Board of Ed: opening remarks

 The Board of Ed meets today at 9; the agenda is here. The livestreaming of the meeting (assuming all goes well) will be here. 

updating as we go

Public comment: with a new note that interruptions will not be tolerated: one warning, and then they'll be asked to leave if there is a second disruption

comment on respecting "equity by respecting the unique needs of each child"
"flowery talk and... pilots while disruption reigns across the land"
30 years of disrespect for advanced children
personalized competency 

BPS student: receivership isn't the answer
MCAS shouldn't be the test of competency
disruption of different plans put into place
"real and sustainable changes"
PD, sufficient supplies, manageable workload, more support for students
"give us the resources, not receivership"

Boston Education Justice Alliance: here to address the ongoing bullying of the Boston Public Schools around receivership
"systemic disarray" of state receivership across the state
all came under between 2011-14: DESE has had time to provide support and improvements
Lawrence lacking supports for students in coming back
"this is the state's record of receivership and it is chronically underperforming"
know that this is coming when parents are pushing for an elected school committee
track record of takeover across the country in response to Black leadership
"receivership is a form of institutional racism"
"your record of leadership helps no one"

BPS parent: in Boston, communities of colors lost the right to elect their school committee just when those communities when they were gaining power
no coincidence that just at the same time, there is talk of state receivership
it is evident what happens when voices are left out of decision making
Lawrence makes it clear what happens when those voices are left out
"receivership is obviously not the answer"
DESE is not providing support that is needed
uplift community voices, cultivate trust, and close achievement gaps
all mitigation can be undone by the time they're eating together unmasked
need further guidance for when students are exposed and waiting for test results

organizer with BTU reading a statement from someone else about Lawrence:
Writing to call into question the efficacy of receivership
most often, "as I learned at Harvard," receiverships don't do what they've set out to do
"gathered in collective rage" in response to increase in student violence
just last night, DESE's presence was requested and it is unacceptable that no one could be bothered to go to Lawrence
"what exactly is DESE accomplishing with this experiment?"
varied magnitudes of violence; compounded trauma from last year
has gone unaddressed 
systemic failures and injustices
"receivership since 2011 has failed to respond to students social and emotional needs"
"racist and classist receivership law" rests power in hands of Commissioner Riley
Striping us of the ability to address needs of students and community 

Lou Finfer, vocational 
emergency admission policy from Monty Tech's new policy
continue to rank students through four sectors
"look, after you passed this new policy, they're passing it again"
DESE can intervene when there is non compliance: "isn't this non-compliance?"
doesn't align with the spirit of the regulation passed
request no ranking unless required for participation
intervene now if there is this ranking
ask Board to spend time in November on implementation
"something must be done rather than wait and see in a year"
"aren't they flaunting this when they pass it" again after two years?

Chair Craven: members to the budget committee: Hills, Moriarty, Stewart, Carris Livingston
Ed diversity: Fernández, Lombos, Rouhanifard, Stewart

Peyser: it's STEM week
theme is "see yourself in STEM"

Riley: Regina Robinson now joining department; per earlier note, "Special Services, Strategic Transformation, Problem Resolution, Curriculum and Instruction, Educator Effectiveness"
New org is over here

Moriarty for some reason is now talking about school ventilation, even though we aren't on that part of the agenda?
very often facilities don't know what to do with the new equipment

Mass Teacher of the Year: Marta García 
"this accent which is my super power...behind the accent is the story over overcoming struggle"
"a sign of another part of our identity"
students who have taught me more than I can say
like the student who brought her new kitten to school because she didn't have the words in English to tell us about it

We love to teach our kids to be independent. See what a kindergartner might pack in their backpack 🎒 when they want to bring a comfort of home with them 🤣 pic.twitter.com/5Ot2z7DV4A

— Salem Public Schools (@SalemSchoolsk12) February 24, 2021

and the student who talked about it being dark and cold in the desert and spoke of the border patrol
culturally responsive practices and assessments

Commissioner: shorage
brought in National Guard "to solve that problem" of bus driver shortage
that didn't solve the problem
now doing so with testing
mask removal is a local decision when hitting metric; districts may consider other things
Nine schools have asked so far
"by early next week, the decision will be made whether or not to continue masks" at state level
MEMA supplies for schools 

visited Lawrence last week and this: "continue to support administration as they enact a plan to strengthen the school and give students what they need"

Hills: on testing, is National Guard going to clear out a backlog, or are we constantly going to need help from National Guard
Riley: anticipate will be similar to buses: as companies train drivers, will be able to wean off 

Carris Livingston asks about masks with clear shields being provided

Rouhanifard: breaks spirit of law in new regs
Riley in process in reviewing this particular case and others
Craven "but it's fair to say the Department was aware of this before this morning"
Riley: "we had heard about it"

Lombos: asks about receivership process
Riley: multistep process he said more than that and offered to share more

Pieces to read and reflect on

 ...should you have Monday off.

This ProPublica investigation into the juvenile justice system in Rutherford County, Tennessee is the sort of piece that wins prizes, and, one hopes, major reform.

The New Yorker rarely notes anything about school board meetings, so it is telling when it does. I also thought this piece from ProPublica, which also comes from a school board perspective, was useful. 

You may have heard of Dr. James Whitfield, the Black principal in a majority white school district who has been put on leave; here is how some of his students have responded.

Very relatedly, read this piece about the experience this year of Maryland superintendent Dr. Andrea Kane.

SNL on school board public comment

 When you've hit a Saturday Night Live skit: 

<

A real 'great divide'

 It's odd to me that a newspaper that has an education section termed "the Great Divide" would write about the Republican governor being led by particular groups of parents on his decisions around masking in schools without addressing who those parents are. 

In a Boston Globe public records request found the following exchange:

“There has been considerable pushback from parents groups that feel that masks interfere with social interactions and speech and language development,” wrote Dr. Larry Madoff, medical director for the state health department’s Bureau of Infectious Disease and Laboratory Sciences, in a July 30 e-mail to Dr. Regina LaRocque, his former student at Brigham and Women’s Hospital.

For any of us who watch Board of Ed meetings, though, it has been clear who that "considerable pushback" is coming from. Note this from Forbes early last month: 

 The poll, conducted August 16-25 among 10,168 parents, found the biggest predictor of school mask mandate opposition was a parent’s political party, with 56% of Republican parents opposed to school mask mandates versus 24% of Independents and 4% of Democrats.

White parents are also far more likely to oppose school mask mandates, with 42% opposed versus 6% of Black parents, 15% of Hispanics and 25% of those of other races.

Parents’ opposition to mask mandates increases as their income goes up: only 19% of parents earning less than $50,000 per year oppose the mask requirements, versus 36% of those earning between $50,000 and $99,999 and 40% of those making more than $100,000 annually.

There is, very clearly, throughout the pandemic, a "great divide" in how we handle education. This has continued around masking mandates. Having a Republican governor from suburban Boston, whose record on racial equity is...not much hasn't helped.

Note further that, while the Globe elides this, the Commissioner of Elementary and Secondary Education is not directly answerable to the Governor. As I have noted in the past, Commissioner Riley works for the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education. The Board deliberately is constructed such that the Governor cannot control their decision making: only the Secretary and the Chair serve at his pleasure. Other members have terms that, again, deliberately are not co-terminus with his.

It thus matters that the Board, again has been noted before, is made up of members from: 

Brookline
Boston
Belmont
Newton
Boston (again)
Holyoke (Moriarty)
Milton
Brookline (again)
Lexington
Newton (again)

The overrepresentation of white suburban wealthy metro-Boston should shock us. It is also where much of the masking push back is based, at least from what can be derived from public testimony. 

Looking for a "great divide"? It's staring us in the face if we're willing to see it. 

Yes, there are Worcester School Committee election forums!

 If you think of it as "if it's Wednesday, it's a forum," you'll have this schedule down!

• Wednesday, October 6, 6 pm--Centro forum--11 Sycamore Street, Worcester
  
  
• Wednesday, October 13, 7 pm--Worcester Regional Research Bureau forum--Mechanics Hall, Main Street, Worcester
  
  
• Wednesday, October 20, 6 pm--YWCA forum--Salem Street, Worcester

In most cases, there are multiple other sponsors involved, but that's the highlights! Hope you'll join us!