Mass School Building Authority August meeting

I popped across the street this morning for the Mass School Building Authority meeting; there's some interesting projects on the agenda:

Those accelerated repair projects at the top are sizable: Norfolk Aggie has multiple buildings, and, for those in Worcester wondering, Challenge and Reach is the Harlow Street building, half of which would be covered by the state: $6M project, $3.1M funded by the state. 

Both approved

Coming in for Preferred Schematic Design is Leicester, which is a PreK-8 building on the site of the current Leicester Middle. It's a $69.5M project for construction, total cost of $86.9M.

approved

Preferred Schematic Design: Nauset Regional for addition/renovation in Preferred Schematic Design; total estimated cost of $140M

approved

invitation to Project Scope and Budget:

Amesbury: Amesbury Elementary for a new building at $60.5M: approved

Braintree: South Middle for a new building at $86.5M, which notes their East project will open next week: approved

Bridgewater-Raynham Regional: Mitchell Elementary PreK-2 for a new building for $80M

"thanks for all the support since our roof collapse": approved

Gardner: Waterford Street Elementary for a new building for $89.5M

will replace two elementary schools on a site on Pearl Street (so will they change the name?): approved

Holyoke: Chestnut Street Middle and Peck Middle both new, $62.4M and $70.4M respectively: 

nice mock-ups on these; Holyoke of course doesn't have a lot of space, and they're making some thoughtful use of space; the mayor notes that two projects at the same time is unusual 

approved

Millbury: Shaw Elementary for a  new building of $60.9M: approved (after comment sent in by Senator Mike Moore that his children both went there)

West Springfield: Coburn Elementary for a new building for $69M: approved

Dennis-Yarmouth's project once again on hold due to another lawsuit; will cost the towns "as costs are just going up"

Waltham was hoping to be on this agenda, but still facing eminent domain challenges; are in fact before the court right now

There's some interesting charts presented here about projected changes in project costs over time that are going up on the website. 

Worcester building changes

The backup is here.
Foley recuses himself as he's a board member of the Y
UPDATE: Scott O'Connell covers this here. 

Worcester School Committee meets Thursday, March 3

You can find the agenda here.
Bill Coleman wants to talk about substitute teachers' compensation.
There is no report of the superintendent.
F&O will be reporting out from their Monday meeting.
There is a report back on textbooks (timely, as the district is also buying $700,000 worth of new ones!).
There is a report back on the projected cost of a gymnastics team (which doesn't look as though it has changed much since I asked in 2013).
There's a request to authorize adminstration to have a five year contract for environmental management services (the authorization is for the length).
There are several donations being received.
And Miss Biancheria would like reports on Read Across America Day, the assignment of full-time teachers for long-term absence, and the Recovery High School.
The School Committee is also receiving the proposed relocation plan which was covered in yesterday's T&G. The district has been renting space for Chandler Elementary for a number of years, so the school has been split between its building on Chandler Street and a building at the YMCA on Main. The school is continuing to grow, and managing the single school in two spaces is...less than ideal. Plus, of course, the rental costs money...and not just any money: rentals don't count towards Net School Spending. Add to that the complications of a single administrator covering the grade 9 and 10 program at Fanning as well as at the Creamer Center up on Granite Street, and you start to see why some of these moves make a lot of sense. And, frankly, anything that gets the Parent Information Center someplace that makes some sense to parents (like the central administration building) is progress.
I hope to make this one: 7 pm, City Hall. 

Chapter 74 and Perkins funded courses

Novick asks about the discontinuation of the agriculture program a few years ago due to lack of interest; with YouthGROW, NOFA conference, community gardens, much farming happening within Worcester right now. Any inquiries for an ag program?
Brenner: not as yet, but sees the need. Willing to explore with community. Would need to look for appropriate placement

Worcester School Committee meets Thursday

The Worcester School Committee will have a pre-February vacation meeting this Thursday at 7pm at Worcester Tech. You can find the agenda here.
Big report coming in this week: we will be getting the stakeholders' recommendations for Burncoat Prep this week. More on that to follow!
(Side note: this is the report the stakeholders came up with and presented to the superintendent as she/the administration put together the Level 4 plan for the school. Thus the School Committee is really getting this report as a courtesy at this point; we aren't voting on anything yet. I just has to check that myself.)
Two subcommittees met and are reporting back (TLSS and F&O...in both cases, notes are posted on here. Agenda backup to come.)
We're getting a report back on how the revamped Challenge and Reach Academies at Fanning are working.
A number of items going out to administration, as well.

On the heat

or lack thereof. The Worcester School Committee received the following from Mr. Allen this afternoon:
It is clear that the recent cold weather has had an adverse impact on some of our heating plants and we are taking the necessary steps to address these issues as soon as possible so as to minimize any impact on instructional time. 

We have received the most communication regarding Doherty High School.  The immediate response that we will be taking is an earlier starting time for the heating system during the colder weather.  This should mitigate much of the overall building problems that has been experienced at the school.  However, the school does experience significant heat loss; first when the rush of students enter during the morning (with doors being opened for extended times) and during the day due to the condition of the school’s overall building envelope.  This also contributes to the variances in temperature within rooms and is not a new issue.  This is the condition resulting from of the non-insulated, single paned windows that surround the entire building envelope.  This is one of the reasons that we have identified Doherty High School as a project for major renovation under MSBA.  We will continue to work with our HVAC and building custodial staff to address daily, localized issues at the school.  We believe that turning the heat on earlier and some other steps will mitigate the problems at this school.

We have also experienced problems at other schools this week, including WTHS, McGrath, PIC, Quinsigamond, and Fanning.  These were primarily related to building controls and remote communications issues and have been resolved.  We’ve also had problems at North High and those issues appear to have been resolved through the construction contractor.  The building needed adjustments to the building controls based on the commissioning process of the school while in full operation. 

Jim Bedard is meeting with the HVAC lead tradesman each morning to review the status of all buildings and deploys necessary resources to address any issues.

TLSS subcommittee meeting:alternative education

...starting a bit late and short Miss Biancheria.

They are talking first about reorganizing the alternative programing, as Dr. Gribouski is here (this is Annex B of gb #8-174, which is the school reorganization plan). She's talking about reworking the alternative programs, of which currently in Worcester there is the Creamer Center (about 250 11 & 12 graders, largely; plus 65 at night), Juvenile Resource Center (25 students), Fanning (60 seats for 8, 9, 10), and the 9th grade recovery (40 students).

Reworking to have a principal who is doing oversight for all students. Change to 7-9 grade students (80 or more) who are overage and undercredited at Fanning, 10 and 11th at Creamer Center (250 kids) focusing on MCAS, Ed Resource Center for kids who have passed the MCAS and have most credit requirements done (100 students). Partnering with the Simon Foundation (that'd be the mall) with some work in the mall but some around it, with focused internships.

Then by 2011-12, it would be gr. 7 and 8 at Fanning, 9 and 10 at Creamer, 11 and 12 at Ed Resource Center, as well as returnees (kids coming back who had dropped out). Assistant Principal at the larger sites, a Lead Teacher at the smaller sites.

Bringing the kids back into the district would save us money. Might potentially reallocate teachers. There is funding associated with the Simon Foundation, as well (1/3,from them, 1/3 from us,1/3 from other foundations and volunteers, she says). Need a School Committee letter of intent in order for this to move forward.

Here's the information about how this works.

Monfredo went to the meeting with the Simon Foundation. Cost savings: asks for a breakdown on savings. Additional narrative in writing, as well.

O'Connell: major change for next year is that the night program goes into large prgram, Fanning comes under direct WPS oversight, and one administrator over all of the programs.

Mulqueen says not so much adding on as reconfiguring.

Cheryl Delsignore asks if the alternative evening program would be gone? No, it will be in the mall, but will continue. Possible flex time working schedule? Staff at Fanning don't work for WPS right now.

O'Connell asks for timing. Letter ASAP. Mulqueen says before the end of March for this to work for next fall.

Delsignore asks how long this lasts: three to five initially, but they have a long term support mechanism in place.

Biancheria wants to know if this is going to go out to the community before there being any vote of the School Committee. This will be part of the meetings held at each quadrant.