Worcester School Committee first business meeting of 2020

The agenda is here.
I'll update as I am able


There's a number of petitions coming in from Mr. Davis, which are here. Important note: public petitions are referred to subcommittee without comment from the committee (they aren't posted items, so committee deliberation would be a violation of the Open Meeting Law). This doesn't mean you're being ignored! Petitioners are informed of when the subcommittee meeting is on their items, at which deliberation actually takes place.
In this case, the petition includes a number of proposed topics for policies, and the items are being referred to Governance (chaired by Mrs. Clancey, Mr. Monfredo and I are the other two members).
Speakers speak to the school to prison pipeline, the need for anti-bias training, and greater consideration for the ways in which students, particularly those of color are treated
Petty speaks that wellness counselors is something important to be considered under the funding of the Student Opportunity Act.
Items gb 0-32 and 33 are taken out of order, as Teamsters are here to speak to them.
Mr. Foley notes that the School Committee has little idea of how the buses are actually doing at this time; the items are designed to give that information to the School Committee.
The Teamster business manager doesn't believe that the schools should be running buses, that he'd like to see "both sides" held accountable.
Ms. Biancheria objects to the comparison with Framingham, noting its relative difference in size, comments that she doesn't want to micromanage, that a bus being 15 minutes late on a single day happens due to traffic or construction sometimes.
I spoke, adding a motion, which passed, requesting a simple reporting form on the transportation page for parents and students to report buses which are late, asking that we receive that report weekly until MyStop is up and running (we're on the third contract requiring GPS reporting), and urging administrators to report late buses. I also said a lot about parent and student experience of buses. 
Administration says that MyStop should be up and running in the coming weeks; integration with Durham is what is lacking, it appears.
And the morning article on that is here


Report of the Superintendent is an update on the building of the new South High (the backup is here, but it's just photos; the report includes a video, which the Mayor asks be put up on the website). The Mayor notes that it is projected to open at about the same time as the baseball stadium.

Presentation on vaping: you can find resources here
The Mayor's question is requesting clarification of the amount of nicotine: a Juul pod is the same amount as a pack of cigarettes.

The Commissioner shared with the urban superintendents a presentation which Superintendent Binienda presents: Governor Baker's budget is released on January 22, the Commissioner will present at the superintendents' gathering the next day (Thursday).
Plans must be voted by the school committee prior to submission on April 1; the plan then is for the Worcester School Committee to have it at their last March meeting
focus on how funding will be used to reduce gaps
"commit to doing a few things well" built on district improvements
The state is attempting to require curriculum to be on CURATE in order to be approved
required that parents, community stakeholders, the special education and English learner PAC
collaboration with the community groups
"right now we've been told that no district should be talking about any type of number on this"
"they're also in the process of writing an amendment process" which I assume is due to the fact that budgets essentially are never based on the Governor's budget
targets will be calculated using 2020 as a baseline, but many of them don't exist
the thinking at this time is that there will be metrics but no targets
thus target setting would not be required in the initial plan submitted in April.

Mayor: this is probably the most important issue we'll be doing over the
three Mondays in February excluding vacation week, first week in March in four different quadrants
have we're going to operate those meetings
then come up with a report on how those meetings will be run
Foley: also doing something online to solicit feedback
critical importance of adding our parent advisory councils involved
use site councils
Monfredo: one of the groups we need to reach out to is our educators
teachers have a vested stake in our schools
Binienda: just sent out allocation dates to principals for their meetings
I'll update this with more info as we have it. Also note that the next meeting on Feb. 6 will be on budget

report on the question of consolidation of facilities city and school sides
I had some questions on this, which I'll post on.

report on Columbus Park school, which notes that the HVAC systems (outside the boiler)
Foley: we're at 80% of the deferred maintenance in our buildings (of all buildings in the city, WPS has 65%)
"we have a financial problem in investing in our schools"
remember, we closed eight schools: "our elementary schools are bursting at the seams"

We're going to have to come back to the argument over grants...I'll make a separate post...

On Miss McCullough's request for a report the last 7-10 years on the number of students in the WPS who have mastered a particular trade and succeeded in securing a position in it, we apparently only check this one year out because it is hard to find the graduated students longer.

The Mayor's item to send the rules to subcommittee (Governance) raised concerns from Biancheria and Monfredo that, in essence, we might spend less time on recognitions.

After a back and forth in which Mr. Monfredo initially made a motion to hold and then withdrew it, the Mayor's item on sex ed goes to subcommittee. This made me realize that the state is behind where it said it would be on the new standards; they should have been out for public comment by now.